Professor Testifies Windows Is Modular, Separable

circlejtp writes: "Princeton University professor Andrew Appel said in written testimony that modular design is an accepted standard in the industry, and Microsoft has already created a version of Windows for interactive television boxes that has removable functions. The full story can be found on the Tacoma Tribune website." At issue is Microsoft's claim that separating Windows' components would cripple the OS.

Comments

Can't Resist

[Tim C]

What do they mean, Windows would be crippled? ;-)

Cheers,

Tim

Sure it's modular...

[Skweetis]

Here is proof.

Re:cripple

[lysurgon]

The only thing it would cripple is their business model. So in a sense they aren't lying.

Exactly! But that's an admission of gult there! Check it: the DOJ has found that their business model is monopolistic and anti-competative. Ergo, any solution that would rectify that situation would by necessity cause them to change the way they do business.

That's why these nine states are holding out, because the current government settlement will not stop microsoft from deploying its monopoly of the desktop in anti-competative ways.

The problem is that with the influence of Sun and AOL/TW, this case is becoming more about giving up market share to existing competitors (cementing the current plutocratic high-tech oligarchy) and not about opening the field to innovation, entrepeneurialism and true competition.

Sadly, it's mega-corp vs mega-corp at this point... feels a bit like the last presidential election: you root for the lesser of two evils.

Re:What about OS X?

[Dark Paladin]

Remove iTunes.

OS X still works.

Remove iPhoto.

OS X still works.

Remove IE.

OS X still works.

It doesn't come back and say "No, you can't use Kodak's software - you must use iPhoto!" You don't have to fear something coming back and making iMovie your default application over Adobe Studio (or whatever it is).

That's the big difference. If you try and remove IE from Windows, Microsoft gets pissed off because that's a big bad no-no, so you have no choice but to have that software whether you want it or not. It was put on to keep their monopoly - not because they thought they had a better browser. (Whether it became a better browser is not for debate here - that happened after Netscape basically was dried up.)

Re:Thats funny

[Edgewize]

I don't know what kind of world you program in, but where I code, componentisation and coupling are not even close to the same thing. For example:

Mozilla encourages use of its components. Anyone can use the rendering engine and distribute it with his own product, saving on development time while still providing a product to the widest possible market.

Internet Explorer promotes coupling. Anyone can use its rendering engine, except that nobody is allowed to distribute its rendering engine except as part of the full Internet Explorer package. This cuts down on development time at the cost of forcing all your users to run Internet Explorer.

See the difference?

Easily defended

[mjh]

Unfortunately (or fortunately, I guess depending on your perspective) this is probably pretty easily defended. The difference between an embeded OS and a consumer computer OS is pretty significant. In the embedded OS, you can take out a bunch of features and not consider the OS to be crippled. Whereas the lack of those features in a general purpose consumer computer would make that OS crippled.

The reason is that in the embedded space, the OS tends to be used for very specific services. Thus removing any services not related to the one being provided does not cripple the OS. But in a general purpose computer, as the name implies, the OS is expected to do a huge variety of things. Hence losing some of those features would cripple a general purpose OS, but not cripple an embedded OS.

An analogy: an automobile that came with no radio, no cup holders, no airconditioning, a net instead of a drivers window, and no doors, would by consumer standards be crippled. However those same things that cripple a consumer car are requirements on a car that's going to race for NASCAR.

So while it's interesting to see that MS *can* modularize their system. It's not a very compelling argument.

(Just a minute, I gotta get on the asbestos suit on... ok flame away.)

The technical issue is NOT about modular design

[Ryu2]

When will you guys understand? Windows has always been modular, in that it separates functions nicely into DLLs which export APIs and can be replaced or removed as needed. It's rather that as a standard part of Windows, many MS and non-MS apps use components from IE to do various things, like render HTML (including many non-"web" apps that use the HTML renderer as a quick way to have a nice UI), or do network stuff like HTTP queries without having to "reinvent the wheel" with each app.

If you remove IE (meaning all the dlls that form it, not just the stub executable which is little more than a front-end to the underlying HTML rendering and networking DLLs), sure the OS will still run and you could definitely still use it as a server, BUT a lot of user-level stuff like the shell and applications, not just IE, would suddenly break. So even if it were removed, you would need to have some sort of other implementation of the functionality that IE provides to other apps via COM.

Re:The technical issue is NOT about modular design

[killthiskid]

However, as such programs as 98Lite show, you take the IE out of windows and still leave the ability to render html, by leaving the html rendering dlls registered and on the machine.

So, not IE, no active desktop, and the ability for apps to still use built in html rendering. Isn't this what we are looking for? Then any program could be the browser, MS would just be providing the guts.

I think that this is what MS is afraid of. They want control of the browser becuase it roughly equels control of the internet (for the average person).

Ever notice what happens when you upgrade IE? The first screen you get when IE is fired back up is a request for the user to change the home page to MSN. This is a big deal in terms of driving traffic to MSN.

This grip on the internet via IE also allows MS to embrace-and-extend... which they could still by controlling the abilities of the html rendering dlls...

You're right about one thing: it is not a technical issue. It's about control.

Re:How does this compair to linux?

[Boulder Geek]

How modular is Linux? How easy is it to pull apart the pieces? (I honestly don't know the answers, so input would be great).

Pretty easy, depending on how you define Linux. The kernel is a monolithic kernel made from many modules. The rest of the system is just a bunch of programs that depend on various shared libraries. In this regard Windows is essentially identical, other than the fact that MSFT refuses to distribute various key components independant of particular applications, even though other applications use those components. This is why MSFT continues to maintain that Windows would be crippled if IE were removed. They are claiming that components such as the html renderer cannot be distributed without IE. This is contradicted by the fact that many applications use that component and no other part of IE.

Honestly, coders strive for modularity on almost every project. Theory says its possible, but anyone that's worked on a large OO project knows that there is always an exception (usually a dozen) to the rule, and "seperating" the modules is a lot more work than you'd think.

MSFT uses COM to export various modules from programs like IE. All of these modules have well-defined interfaces that can be used by other programs. By definition these parts are modular, and have no dependenciels other than (perhaps) on other COM modules. Any spaghetti is hidden behind the COM interface. In the UNIX world we sort of do the same thing, in that code that is meant to be shared is put into shared libraries and usually packaged separately from the main application.