The Relevance of Windows 301
Josh Fink writes "ZDNet has up an article exploring whether of not Windows is still relevant. In the age of 'Web 2.0' both older folks who remember the days before Windows and younger folks who have never known anything else are beginning to see Microsoft's offering as old news. From the article: 'Before closing the books on the Age of Windows, however, let's not get too caught up in the fashion of the moment. The water-cooler crowd may take a dim view of "Win-doze" for all the right reasons. Still, Microsoft's archrivals continue to view it as a product with a potentially make-or-break impact on their businesses. In fact, two of them--Adobe Systems and Symantec--are lobbying European regulators to get tough on Microsoft. The European Union already has an unresolved antitrust dispute with Microsoft, and Adobe and Symantec would be silly not to play that card for all it's worth. So this is what they're doing.'"
Is the Operating System Dead? (Score:5, Interesting)
And, you know what? I must admit that I would take the machine that had the connection to the internet regardless of what current OS it had on it.
So, not only is Windows no longer relevant, but the functionality of the operating system itself may have been trumped by our ability to communicate with other people. This doesn't invalidate operating system arguments but it does cause one to wonder about what is really important when you're getting a machine to work & play on.
Re: (Score:2)
Until then windows - no matter how broken - is here to stay. First mover advantage indeed.
Modle T Ford anyone? (Score:2)
Re:Is the Operating System Dead? (Score:4, Informative)
The days of that happening may be limited. MS has just announced the pricing of Vista in Australia ITWire [itwire.com.au]. Vista Ultimate will cost us AUD$751, while Office 2007's equivalent looks like retailing at about AUD$1,100.
That means a fully-loaded home/office machine could attract a Microsoft tax of close to AUD$2,000.
It's possible to build the hardware component of a midrange machine for AUD$6-700, so the monopoly rent for Win/Office is starting to look pretty scary. Obviously most people will be getting their software OEM, but seeing those sticker prices on the retail packs is going to make your average shopper think twice about what that beige box might cost them without the predatory pricing.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Vista Ultimate is mostly aimed at the kind of people who line up outside the computer store at midnight the day a
Price (Score:2)
This is always the thing that I wonder about. So Windows pricing has been more or less reasonable up to now (in large part because of the pre-installs from every OEM), but what if a new generation of folks were to take over Microsoft, realize that their monopoly position makes it almost impossible for anyone to come out with a viable competitor in any reasonable timeframe and then raise the price by some interesting factor say to something like $500 for every OEM install and $2000 for corporate desktops.
Re:Price (Score:4, Insightful)
Thing is, why would they need to "switch quickly"? With the resource overhead I've seen in the beta version of Vista "hardcore gamers" would have to be retarded to make the switch. It'll only decrease the performance of your games, and all games for the next 3-4 years at least will keep running on XP. Meanwhile it makes no sense for corporate IT departments to switch immediately - any decent admin would wait until at least SP1 before switching. So you've got a good 2-3 year buffer there before anyone would really NEED to switch, which leaves plenty of opportunity for a viable alternative to gain popularity. The only thing MS could do to encourage people to upgrade sooner is stop releasing patches for Windows XP....but that'd set up an excellent opportunity for a class action lawsuit. Therefore, no matter how you look at it, it makes no sense for MS to "raise the price by some interesting factor".
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No. It will make them think they've got a bargain, because the box with comes with very expensive sofware.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Operating system far from dead (Score:4, Insightful)
- gamers, who have specific games which exist on specific platforms
- programmers, who have code, and tools, and toolkits, some of which may be platform specific
- Anyone who has been "around awhile" and has invested dollars in software. For example, software I still use on a regular basis under Windows predates 2000 and I don't see a Linux offering worth giving it up for.
Re:Operating system far from dead (Score:5, Insightful)
I see Windows as an unabashedly 'generic' OS, and hence it doesn't lend the same spark to it that Mac or Linux do. I think people are perhaps taking the WIMP interface for granted, sure, but Windows begs to be fucked-up in ways that the other two don't.
Windows is fine if it came with the PC. Otherwise, I'd probably use Linux or Mac.
Re: (Score:2)
Why? Why should a version of Adobe Pagemaker for Windows work any better or worse than a version for OS X? (I'm making the assumption that such beasts exist for the sake of argument.) Isn't it the applications that make the computer useful, while the OS simply provides an interface between apps and hardware?
Maybe
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
There is always more than one way to do something on a computer. Even Linux has a number of different methods for drawing on the screen. You can use X, bypass it a bit and use OpenGL, use the framebuffer, etc. Each of these methods has benefits and drawbacks.
Just like any other non-trivial system, trade offs are made in the design to accomodate a certain type of user. At its heart, any unix-like operating system is designed for multiple users to share on
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
What makes you think this is simple? That interface between apps and hardware has to be sufficiently documented that programmers can use it, sufficiently well-designed so that it doesn't break in weird ways, sufficiently abstracted so that application developers can safely deal with differences between hardware.
Maybe you're making the argument that it's easier to program certain tasks
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I tried to make Linux (Slackware, then Kubuntu) be my desktop. I love Yakuake, Katapult and K3B. I wish they existed on Windows. But I'm a gamer at heart, and the offering for Linux is sad at best. Even with Wine and Cedega, I couldn't play any g
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
- corporate/enterprise customers.
It'd be fun to go to my boss and say 'look boss, it is web2.0! you just stash all your sensitive data with all these unknown private companies and off you go!'
Re: (Score:2)
It'd be even more fun to to to your boss and say 'look boss, acid_zebra doesn't understand that you'll be able to install these applications on a server inside your enterprise and use them there, so that all your internal clients have access to them but and your data will be stored on the network. He's clearly clueless, you should give me his job.
Re:Is the Operating System Dead? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Is the Operating System Dead? (Score:5, Interesting)
The ulitimate goal of a technology is to get to a stage that it is so good, it is invisible. Then it's irrelevant, in these terms. It still matters, of course, but there is no differentiation.
There are plenty of irrelevant things with huge market shares. The point here is that operating systems have been commoditized, and are no longer important - The analogy you could use is that you don't care which brand of gasoline you use, but you care about your car. Of course, as computers evolve, new technologies become old, and then commotized. I cared about the computer architechture, then they all got to be good enough that I cared about by hardware (video card, ram, etc.) Then I stopped caring as long as everything worked.
I used to care about my OS, then they all became sufficient to get to my web browser and do the other tasks I needed done. Then I cared about my browser, but they all became good enough to use the web apps that I wanted, so I'll mostly stop caring about those as well.
Re:Is the Operating System Dead? (Score:5, Insightful)
And herein lies... I'll take the OS I hate if it means that I can play my video games. And I'm not the only person who thinks that way. Until hardware manufacturers start taking Linux seriously and come up with decent video drivers (the sound and networking drivers for all of my systems work fine), then Linux won't be a player in the games market. Likewise... even if there's decent video drivers for Linux, there's still the problem where game producers don't take either Linux or MacOS seriously. Software like Cedega will probably do wonders for that situation in the long run, but you still have the problem of decent video drivers.
Overcome those hurdles, and Windows will no longer be relevant. Until that time, though, it's very much relevant, and no amount of OSS evangelism is going to fix that.
You are right about one thing, though... the connection to the Internet is a deal-breaker. It's just that every OS is the current generation has the ability to connect to the Internet, and a wide variety of options for software that uses it. Heck... most of us can probably get the Internet on our phone. It may be a deal-breaker, but it's an irrelevant one.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Just today I was happily running my Ubuntu based laptop when I saw a notification icon about "available updates". I clicked on it an proceeded to download the updates. Everything seemed right, excepting that there was one package (something called "image kernel") that failed to download and install; besides of that, everything went smooth (or appeared to be).
Anyway, after restarting the computing the only thing I got was a kernel panic... and I could not even restart in fai
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Linux will always be catching up trying to hack togheter hardware drivers until they agree to play nicely with the hardware providrers.
The problem is that "play nicely with the hardware providers" is a synonym for "never make major improvements to the kernel again because you'll break a 5 year old driver."
Re:Is the Operating System Dead? (Score:5, Insightful)
Guess what - those hardware manufacturers who are releasing binary-only drivers aren't going to suddenly decide to release open-source drivers. They have a lot of intellectual property in there that they either cannot afford to be disclosed to their competitors, or cannot disclose due to licensing requirements from 3rd parties.
If the kernel wasnt such a moving target, it would be easier for hardware vendors to release one set of drivers that will work on a large range of kernel versions. I'd imagine having to maintain multiple releases of the same driver for different point releases of kernel contributes a lot to the perceived apathy of hardware vendors towards linux. Before this gets marked as a troll, think about the number of 'i upgraded my kernel from x.y.z to x.y.z+1 and ABC stopped working' comments that accompany so many kernel release announcements
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
If you manufacture good hardware there isn't a reason in the world that you should be timid about releasing open source drivers. This has baffled me forever. Even
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Your ACPI probably is broken. Many laptop vendors compile their ACPI information using the Microsoft ACPI tools, which are not standards compliant. You do not have an ACPI laptop - you have a MSFT-ACPI laptop. You can try checking the DSDT [sourceforge.net] list to see if someone has provided a "corrected" ACPI. Ubuntu probably has instructions for using this.
Guess you have 1GB or less of RA
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm using XPsp2 on a Compaq nw9440 with 2GB memory and the only time I've had a hibernation problem it was related to my port replicating dock.
Ubuntu is the first linux that hibernates correctly for me, but out of two machines I've tried it on (IBM Thinkpad A21p and Dell Dimension D600) only one of them (the dell) is hibernating correctly. Same exact OS...
Re: (Score:2)
It's all about Photoshop, Sonar and Eve-Online (Score:5, Interesting)
If I can't load Adobe Premiere, or Sonar or Eve-Online in Linux or OSX, it's no good to me. I'd even be happy to switch from Sonar back to Logic Audio Platinum and I can run Premiere on a Mac, but still there's Eve-Online.
If I even have to WORRY about whether I can run my favorite apps, I'm not going to change to a different OS, even if there are lots of reasons for me to do so.
I know from experience that I can work longer, with less fatigue, on a Mac than on Windows or Linux. I prefer the look and feel of OSX. I love the idea of open source operating systems, and I like the way Linux can be made bulletproof without sacrificing all sorts of performance and resources. But still... I can't run my favorite apps.
So who's got to change, me or the manufacturers? Am I supposed to switch to Linux with the hope that if enough of us do so the software manufacturers will start to port their apps over to Linux? I don't have time for that.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
The only thing you really can't do is install software, but once we get away from the need to do that (and we will) we'll be set. the only people that will have home systems are hardcore elite gamers and IT pros (and the etremely paranoid).
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
I realize that high speed Internet access is becoming very common but there is still a large segment of the population that just don't have access
Re: (Score:2)
Work, play - I used to know the difference.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Now say I want to do some programming and the choice is an OS with compiler tools out of the box (Linux, BSD, MacOS X) or not (Windows). I guess I'm going to use one of the former. Maybe the prettiest one, or the one where I can install required libraries easiest. But oh noes, my client wants a Windows application. I could program against Wine I guess
The
Re: (Score:2)
So, not only is Windows no longer relevant, but the functionality of the operating system itself may have been trumped by our ability to communicate with other people. This doesn't invalidate operating system arguments but it does cause one to wonder about what is really important when you're getting a machine to work & play on.
Unfortunately, with the rise of Ajax and inept web programmers / short-sighted companies who only develop for and test on one browser, what's really important is going to be b
Re: (Score:2)
Your favorite OS has no access to the Internet, or... ?
You see, the problem with judging Windows relevancy based on bias
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
It is relevent if you happen to be in any business that crosses Microsofts' radar. Some people might want what OS to use be irrelevant but that is understandable.
"Still, Microsoft's archrivals continue to view it as a product with a potentially make-or-break impact on their businesses."
I wouldn't count Microsoft out yet... (Score:3, Insightful)
of course windows is still relevant (for now) (Score:2, Interesting)
i think the software companies involved in the whining are just trying to save an obsolete business model, kind of like the music companies complaining about itunes selling music too cheap or the movie studios trying to keep anyone from hacking the encryption on their dvds.
as far as the security
The obsolete businesses complain the most. (Score:3, Interesting)
Don't get me wrong - I don't love Microsoft - but I'd hate to see Adobe make pretty-printing proprietary in Linux or Windows - and I'd hate to see Symantec claim that patches are proprietary for Linux or Windows.
Re: (Score:2)
Still, it's not quite as simple as you say, because many people have suggested that it may be necessary to use MULTIPLE spyware/adware removal tools. So if Microsoft is trying to prevent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
PDF is a simulation of printed documents on Screen. The idea is that it will look the same on screen as when it's printed... on any computer that supports the format.
Why would you want to see page breaks that are irrelevant to the content? Because you want to see if those page breaks are going to cause your content to annoy the reader on paper when printed.
Metro on the other hand is going to be another proprietary format that will work on Windows... m
Re: (Score:2)
The anti-virus industry have been living parasitic like off Microsoft for decades. But what's the difference between paying Symantec or Microsoft for Live OneCare.
The headline (Score:2, Informative)
Deja Vu? (Score:4, Insightful)
Antitrust in Europe, what about in the US? (Score:2)
"The European Union already has an unresolved antitrust dispute with Microsoft, and Adobe and Symantec would be silly not to play that card for all it's worth."
When was the US antitrust suit settled?
Last I really knew about it, they managed to get it all tossed out except the monopoly ruling, then
George Bush came to be.... and they got a 'get out of jail, free' card, so to speak.
So, when was this all settled?
According to the Wikipedia article on this... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:2)
Any chance they're waiting for a perhaps more favorable clime for antitrust lawsuits? Not that the upcoming midterm elections will change much in the judiciary in the short run, but there is a presidential election looming.
The make-up of the nation's courts may be significantly different
Words and words. (Score:2, Interesting)
I imagine a world where Windows is banned and replaced with Ubuntu (for the sake of argument). Imagine your family installing and updating software from CLI or giving up your favorite software or games.
Imagine relearning all they know about their desktop in a Linux environment.
Windows also has a lot of software not offered on other platforms, such as Photoshop, Flash (the IDE), Dreamwe
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
funny, I have installed hundreds of apps under ubuntu and never EVER seen the CLI. have you even touched ubuntu?
Second, most people outside games dont have a "favorite" software. they use what does the task and what they are used to.. Microsoft Works is the #1 request from people because that is what comes
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I do a lot of support for *nix, Mac OS X and Windows. Even if the end-user doesn't frequent the CLI often, it does provide a very quick and easy way to support them. With Windows, doing phone support is horribly ineffective. I spend a significant amount of time navigating the user around the interface and the
Re: (Score:2)
There is some truth to that but it's not the whole story. It IS possible to buy processor upgrades for Macs and has been for a very long time. They are as hard/
Re: (Score:2)
Meanwhile, I'm currently replacing all of the 3 year old PCs at work.
Some people just want a box that works out of the box. Apple gives them that.
Having said all that, I can't wait for a decent bios-residen
Learning curve... (Score:2)
Imagine relearning all they know about their desktop in a Linux environment.
Sorry ??? Who makes me re-learn everything for each upgrade ? Windows does ! All tools change their names, there's no consistency in the programs naming scheme, and you're on your own to discover what those pesky radio buttons do in each and every config panel. On the other hand, when you face any linux flavour, you know that at least your CLI works the same, and basic things like an editor and a handful of other utilities will w
Windows isn't superior ... it's just there. (Score:2)
If there was a huge requirement for Linux that was "grandma friendly," Linux distributions that were even easier to use than they are today would be created. Nonwithstanding that I have serious doubts that you've ever used Ubuntu or any of the other current 'easy' distros (where you never need to use the CLI to install software), the approach that they take towards ease-of-use is a reflection of the people who are interested in them: computer enthuasiasts and
Re: (Score:2)
Obviously an upgraded machine wouldn't be as fast as one that really had the faster cpu to start with, slower motherboard and memory etc...
The Amiga was always very good for upgrading, you could upgrade even the oldest/slowest Amigas to use the fastest available processors, amig
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
That's funny, I just select a rectangle, go to Select -> Rounded Rectangle..., choose my radius and click OK, go to Edit -> Stroke Selection, choose my stroke options, and click OK.
Rounded Rectangle is a Script-Fu, it's true, but it came in my standard install and is integrated directly into the UI. Where are you getting this strange copy of Gimp without standard Script-Fu scripts?
The Gimp i
If Adobe was serious (Score:2)
Adobe and Symantec Perfect Examples (Score:5, Insightful)
Adobe and Symantec are perfect examples of why Windows isrelevant. Software companies are not properly supporting other operating systems. Although Adobe still builds graphics apps for the Mac, they support for Linux is, at best, tepid; they rarely even bother supporting Mac on non-graphics applications, such as Audition (formerly Cool Edit Pro, which they acquired years ago). Symantec's support for non-Windows operating sytems is anything but legendary (ex. management console for corporate AV is all Windows).
Lawyers for losers (Score:3, Insightful)
1) People who drag lawyers into a tech contest are already on the losing end. (Like you, SCO.)
2) If many people feel the need to get a whole continent's regulatory arm fired up about X, then yes, X is relevant.
A another key point... (Score:4, Insightful)
Operating system is extremely relevant (Score:2)
The faster our computers get, the more relevant Java might become. Or even Flash (shudder).
McNealy on PRI's Marketplace last night... (Score:3, Interesting)
most people can barely tell the difference (Score:2)
Web Browsers Are Not Good App Runtimes (Score:2)
- Word processing
- Spreadsheets
- Gaming
- Email
- Photo/Video editing
- Pretty much any application that needs a rich UI
While DHTML/AJAX are nice technologies for web applications, there are far too many applications in which I do not what to use a web browser for. I even post to blogs via a smart client, and I wish you could reply to forums to do the same. Sure, I can use a Mac or Linux for these things, but for now at least I
Nobody uses windows anymore... (Score:2)
Why? Heres Why (Score:5, Insightful)
This again? (Score:4, Interesting)
Then the dotcom crash happened and people quit asking the question, as Microsoft was one of the few stable pillars of the IT industry for a year or so.
I predict pretty much the same thing this time around.
Is the macintosh relevant is a better question... (Score:3, Insightful)
Yet with less than 5% share and almost 0% of the corporate market, the
There seems to be a "distortion effect" on
Don't make me laugh.. (Score:2)
I'm not sure what vision you see, but the one i see unfolding in front of me seems rather healthy, visionary and exciting to be a part of.
I see it for linux as well, but lets not fool ourselves into thinking this "Web 2.0" is a new paradigm when we haven't
Didn't this already happen? (Score:2)
The tales of anythings demise are exaggerated (Score:2)
When PC's came along they said mini's were irrelevant.
The irrelevance of UNIX based OSes is repeated often.
M$ claims Linux is an irrelevant fad, and everyone is waiting for M$ to become irrelevant. During the dot-com boom, they said the web would rule, and PC's were irrelevant.
Will Windows become irrelevant? Not likely, although some versions (like Windows 2.x, etc.) may become a foot note in history.
If you have to ask, Windows is the new mainframe (Score:2)
Only relevant for games and work (Score:2)
Symantec doesn't want windows to become irrelevant (Score:3, Insightful)
At the same time Symantec wants all that juicy system internal information that microsoft won't share or charges them out the arse for now.
Of course Windows is still relevant... (Score:3, Insightful)
So long as web servers, web clients, etc. have the dependency of requiring an OS to run on, OSs will remain relevant -- just as the hardware on which the OS runs remains relevant. Like hardware, OSs just aren't "hot" or "trendy" anymore among us software people, that's all...
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
So now that you're out of reasons [microsoft.com], when can we expect that you throw out your Windows boxes, and buy Macs for your family and friends?
Re:Office (Score:4, Funny)
Mac User 1: "Coke sucks! Screw them!"
Mac User 2: "Yeah I only buy iCoke! That will show them!"
Bill Gates: [Grins]
Re: (Score:2)
Do I sense lame excuses coming my way?
Mac Word operates like any other Mac app. If you find it scary, maybe Windows is still more relevant than some think.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
That is the problem, it does not. Or at least it did not about a year and a half ago when I last tried it. It was slow, crashed, used non-standard widgets, had ugly interface and had problems with Czech texts, which was a big show stopper for Czech users. Microsoft Office on OS X is simply not the same as Office on Windows. I like to use Word on Windows, I hated using Word on OS X. You did not answer my question, did You ever use Word on Mac? A good word processor
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I can't find anything particularly wrong with it. In fact, it's nicer to use because at least it's not all gloomy grey like the Windows version. (Interesting to see them finally fixing this in the new Office, but it was a long time coming).
D
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I remember I tried writing huge, complex VbScript stuff in Office for Windows, and it was just horribly crashy, so I don't think problems are restricted to the Mac version unless they have really cleaned things up on the Windows side.
I remember the usual lifecycle of a MS product for me:
1 Hey, this does some cool stuff! Maybe MS isn't so bad!
2 That's the second crash in ten minutes! Why can't they make it reliable?
I'm glad I'm not using any MS p
Abandon all hope (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
A couple of years ago I had to build the rough of a book from various sources ; I won't expand on the hassles I had to overcome, let just say I had to try about any word *.doc filter I could put my hands on just to merge the chapters (each written by an author on his own word version, ranging from Mac classic to Word XP / 2KX...). I ended doing the major part of the work with OpenOffice.org, but that's not the point. In the meantime, I borrowed a Mac and was surprised it could understand a section pagebreak
Gripes about MS Office for Mac (Score:2)
For most things I have to do I can usually map the suggestions in HowTo articles aimed at the Windows version of MS Office more
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Now go buy
Re: (Score:2)
But with the New Web Standards becoming in wide use the needs for Office Application will greatly reduce. Right now we are already seeing some rudementary AJAX based WordProcessors and spreadsheets. It wouldn't take long until they can run at a comfortable speed over the network, and start giving us more of the "Pro" features. The real challange will not be technical but political and f
Re: (Score:2)
Huh? (Score:2)
But, perhaps more importantly, so does NeoOffice [neooffice.org], which is a more than adequate replacement for most users. I have MS Office on my Mac and I still use NeoOffice anyway because it interoperates better with Linux and because I prefer the UI.
And for most people, Pages+Keynote is probably a better choice than either MS Office or NeoOffice anyway: less bloated and easier to learn.
Re: (Score:2)
http://porting.openoffice.org/mac/download/index.
Re: (Score:2)
Typical Slashdot FUD
Re: (Score:2)
Or even worse, comments about it?
*ducks*
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Who writes this shit? Or worse, posts it as news.
No. This isn't shit. This really is different. See, it's Web 2.0, not just plain, old www!
Re: (Score:2)
How can Windows not be relevant? As I sit here on my windows box, remote-desktopping (not VNC, because RD is more efficient for the connection I'm working over) into my windows boxes at the office, writing code that runs on windows, how exactly is windows not relevant?
But let's be more realistic here. Maybe for the office crowd (ignoring myself
Re: (Score:2)
Sounds like something Dvorak would have written. Cooper has lost it IMO.
LoB