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Gates Admits Stripped Down Windows Possible
ChristTrekker writes "The Financial Times reports that Bill Gates admitted a stripped-down Windows is possible after all." This kinda contradicts a lot of other
stuff he's been saying. There's a few bits in the article worth a read.
I wonder if a stripped down version of the Windows OS would yeild better performance with the decreased overhead of the needless features...
:-)
If so, that would be great...you could then get Microsoft's patented "blue screen of death" in half the time!!!
Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy. -- Benjamin Franklin
And why don't perjury charges apply here?
They talked about this on NPR on my way to work this morning. Windows XP Embedded ("used for medical devices," amongst other things) is completely modular and can be customized for specific purposes. Gates admitted that he did not know how this might be adapted to x86 machines.
I think it's clear that XP embedded would not be what "the consumers" want for their desktops; but on the other hand, Microsoft clearly CAN engineer an OS on x86 that is modular and customizable for OEMs, as the sanctions seem to be calling for.
I think the issue is that Microsoft doesn't WANT to expend the time, effort, and MONEY to develop such an OS; not that it isn't possible. They apparently think integration is their only key to stability.
Explain to me, then, all the various Linux distros for desktops that allow you pick and choose? And much of those components are developed by what Microsoft would consider "amateurs?"
SlashSigTheorem: Humorous, Political, Critical, Constructive- If you have a
"What Windows is loses any meaning," claimed Mr Gates. He said the proposals were "fantasies" that gave his business rivals "everything they ever dreamed of".
Sure, Microsoft needs to lose some power here, but I hope they don't swing the pendulum too far the other way. Are we really any better off if Sun or Oracle are given the power to choose the direction of Windows? I hope the decision makers stick to the principle of "What's good for the consumers," and not just "What's bad for Microsoft."
Like woodworking? Build your own picture frames.
I was scanning the article quickly, and read this: bank cash machines. I swear that I saw an 'r' somewhere in that sentence!
Microsoft *can* manufacture a stripped-down version of Windows without all the unnecessary bells and whistles.
This new product is called 'DOS'.
;)
pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate.
Admitting something can be done is redundant. It is technically possible to do almost anything, but that isn't the point. What should and should not be done, or forced upon a company by Tha Man, is the question here. Stripping down Windows may indeed cripple Microsoft and traumatize the computer industry as Microsoft pundits claim. Or it might not. Whichever view is more convincing to a Judge is what matters here, not the almost limitless potential of technology.
perl -e 'print $i=pack(c5, (41*2), sqrt(7056), (unpack(c,H)-2), oct(115), 10)'
These, and other stories, covered in DUH Magazine.
Heh...sorry for the rant. This Microsoft "admission" is something that's so obvious to people in software development. I'm glad someone realized that was a point they could make against Microsoft.
The thing I find most amazing about this whole thing is Microsoft saying "Other companies want to see Microsoft destroyed" and similar things. This is EXACTLY what Microsoft has been doing to countless other companies for YEARS.
Newsforge is running a very good article summarizing some of Gates' testimony with a number of links to further info. The author makes some good points. There's a claim that Windows' code is too complicated to document and it's not at all modular. Any good software developer knows that modular design is important in large projects. Only a monopoly could claim their software is poorly designed without fearing loss of customers.
Developers: We can use your help.
Personally, I think a more modular Windows - where DiectX, IE, Media Player, Et All, would be a Good Thing allaround. It would make it much like OS X - a system where the core API and commands (cut, paste) are controlled in one place, and the apps simply using the OS for basic i/o needs - so it doesn't matter which browser/media player you use - it just talks to the OS for what it needs. The way it Should Be.
But lets not forget MS's past. Suppose they shipped XP Lite (say $30 to the consumer, $15 to OEM's, and other components could be downloded for a price). You put on Mozilla, and set it to be the default app for HTML.
Any bets that MS would simply make their help files - which should be HTML based - so non-HTML standard that Mozilla can't display them correctly? Then they can say on their tech support line "Oh, help files won't display? It's because your computer seller sold you a non-standards compliant browser - buy IE for $5, and next time, only buy a computers from a vendor that isn't trying to rip you off with cheap open source software."
They do the same for media files (excusive contracts with artists, who don't get anything from the RIAA anyway) to make their online music only Windows Media. Or who knows what else - remember the DR DOS issue? They've done t once, and like a fomer priest defrocked priest running a day care, they'll do t again.
The point is MS could make windows modular - and we would still have to watch them like a hawk to keep them from using their old tricks.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
Wait a second, is there a single slashdot reader who wouldn't agree that writing modular software is a good thing? Is there a single person who passed Computer Science 101 who wouldn't agree that modular software, with clearly defined interfaces isn't easier to debug and maintain?
If Microsoft's software is not modular, it is not for technical reasons. Its monolithic nature is not an attempt to "serve the consumer". The monolithic nature of microsoft software has proven extremely costly to consumers. Gates cites "reasonable business behaviour"? Translation: "Screw the consumer. Hook 'em. Gut 'em. Hang 'em up to dry. And tell them to like it."
Let's examine some of Microsoft's design decisions.
MS-DOS, MS-Windows 3.x, orginal Windows 95, did not initiate a fsck, or its DOS equivalent. How come? I am sure slashdot readers who are old enough have had the same experience that I had back then. Naive computer users who ask for our help, because "they have been hit by a virus". What makes them think they have been hit by a virus? Some of their files have become corrupted, or disappeared. Initiate a scandisk, and what did you find? Dozens or hundreds of file fragments, leftover and never repaired from when Windows crashed on them. How much has all this disk corruption cost consumers? My estimate? At least ten billion dollars.
Or consider macro viruses? People used to ask, "can I get a virus through e-mail?" And we used to be able to tell them "no", unless they chose to open an executable attachment. E-mail macro viruses, Word macro viruses, are only possible due to really stupid design decisions on the part of Microsoft. How costly has that been?
That's impossible... the rich never lie.
He was only mistaken 2 years ago...
He was confused with all the technology talk...
He didn't understand the judge's Dialect...
He couldn't hear correctly as he was overly upset hearing about a possible bug in windows...
He couldnt sleep the night before worried that he was overpricing windows and wasn't thinking clearly..
He spend the night before helping homeless children learn linux, so he didnt think clearly...
I can make up tons of other excuses for him...
I am sure that Billy only has our best interests in mind.. he makes his products only for the good of all humanity...
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Not correct. Microsoft has two embedded code bases, Windows XP Embedded and Windows CE. See http://www.microsoft.com/windows/embedded/default. asp for the differences.
As Gates made very clear in his testimony, Windows XP Embedded is based on the Windows XP code, but without an installer for new applications.
You should find the following article from CNN MONEY interesting. It discusses a certain aspect of Microsoft balance sheet.
"No other nonfinancial firm has more liquid money at its disposal, and only a handful of banks do. It's more cash than Ford, ExxonMobil and Wal-Mart have combined, and nearly four times as much as Intel, the tech company with the next largest cash balance.
It is enough to buy the entire airline industry -- twice. Or all the gold in Fort Knox, four times over. It is enough to buy 23 space shuttles or every major professional baseball, basketball, football and hockey team in America. It is an enviable stash. Who wouldn't love to have a bank account like that?"
Some food for thought.
LOL. Funny how a troll like this can get modded up on /.
I'm developing a Windows XP Embedded based project. Windows XP embedded IS Windows XP -- it IS MOST DEFINITELY NOT based on Windows CE. The individual components and dependencies have been worked out allowing you to choose to install or not to install certain components. Windows XP embedded can run any Windows application and device driver designed for Windows XP or 2000. Windows CE.NET is the next version of Windows CE. Windows XP embedded is the next version of Windows NT embedded and is designed to be fully compatible with all XP software and hardware.
And ofcourse desktop windows is modular, it's built up of many DLLs etc (for fuck's sake). Each new windows OS has been built on previous ones with added functionality. It's just a matter of how fair it is to expect Microsoft to remove vital parts of windows (like IE) from THEIR OS. Windows XP is just as modular as Windows CE. You have DLLs, Drivers etc. It's just that CE was designed to allow the OEM to add/remove certain components (just like Windows XPE).
I can't believe slashbots are still arguing about the modularity of Windows. Noone ever said it technically wasn't. Simply that integration means there are too many dependecies to reasonable remove IE from windows without crippling related subsystems (the help system etc). How can you not understand that software is software, you can remove anything you want. It's just a matter of which components will fail because it relies on it. Redhat Linux wouldn't work as usual if you removed the GTK+ components. Gnome would fail to run etc. But this doesn't mean Linux isn't componentised (I would argue that windows is MORE modular than Linux - windows has proper design for objects (COM) and drivers (WDM)).
If you go farther to their Getting Started with Windows XP Embeded page, it adds some more interesting notes, such as Based on the same binary files as Windows XP Professional, Windows XP Embedded enables you to rapidly develop reliable and full-featured connected devices. and You can use standard, off-the-shelf x86 hardware components in your Windows XP Embedded designs. In addition, because Windows XP Embedded supports the Microsoft Win32® application programming interface (API), you can use Win32 applications, drivers, or services in your embedded designs with little or no porting required.
This doesn't sound to me like it is impossible to be able to run other software of XP Embeded. In fact, they specifically claim that you can. It should not be too difficult for them to modify it to automatically check dependencies as needed.
So as long as people are willing to accept whatever their OEM have installed for the lifetime of their machine, this is a perfectly acceptable solution.
However, it does seem that they could develop an installer for XP Embedded--the fact that it currently isn't up to the task is hardly an excuse.
~=Keelor
98Lite.net
98lite.net shows it's not only possible, but helps improve the speed and reliability of windows.
Is perjury still against the law?
Webster: " the voluntary violation of an oath or vow either by swearing to what is untrue or by omission to do what has been promised under oath : false swearing"
And for all you disagreeing posters, read the actual 98lite.net pages first before you post back.
) Human Kind Vs Human Creation
) It'd be interesting to see how many humans would survive to serve us.
Sums it up nicely: ... ... an unfair advantage.)
In the courtroom at the stand
Gates: The proposed restrictions are too severe!
Gates: If they're imposed, I bet we'll have to stop selling Windows altogether!
Judge (banging gavel): Order in the court.
Judge: Everybody put your money away. I don't think Mr. Gates was literally offering that bet.
(Standard Tom Toles Small Print -- Gates: You can't give our competitors our most valuable asset
> Only a monopoly could claim their software is
...oh, I kid...must not troll during hopefully great troll blackout...). But the point is, modularity is something that is great for users once it's completed, but really hinders rapid software deployment. Real-world software engineering is riddled with these comprimises.
> poorly designed without fearing loss of
> customers.
The Linux kernel has made similar comprimises, and Torvalds has admitted as much in debates about monolithic vs. micro kernels. Linux's monolithic design is not as flexible as it could be (when compiled), but the design increases execution speed and ease-of-coding. The HURD was designed to be aggressively modular, with very cool, very fine-grained things you can do with services that would be the exclusive domain of the superuser on other kernels. It was designed this way because the FSF is lead by a visionary, uncomprimising, probably somewhat mad Coder. Linux was designed initially to be a quick fix for GNU (see Torvalds' 1991 post to comp.os.minix announcing Linux -- "just a hobby, won't be big and professional like gnu"). So the Linux kernel design comprimised modularity for expediency. This was a good thing, just as the continuing work on the HURD is a good thing. They have different goals, and will succeed in different ways.
G-tes, although he probably doesn't realize it, is pointing out the same phenomenon in the codebase of his Spawn. The ol' NT codebase wasn't designed to be modular (to the extent it was, it didn't stay that way long). The non-modularity was for expediency (like Linux) and to promote an inescapable software monoculture (ALSO LIKE LINUX!
"Whatever happened to fair use?"
-- Duff-Man
Who are the dealers in the PC world? Dell, Gateway, HP. In each case, MS mandates that they cannnot make such deals with their customers. There was a time when Dell offered Netscape instead of IE. IBM offers Norton Antivirus, not McAffee scan. But if you don't like it, nothing prevents you from doing so. But to replace IE is to reduce the functionality of explorer.exe!
But of course, you could still replace your liver with a bag of CornNuts, thus making it a 1:1 swap. In theory.
interesting.... well, I hope you realize that you'll probably never know what OS the equipment used on you uses, much the same as you don't notice on bank machines (which hardly ever crash, btw)
True enough, but the one time I did have one crash on me (while I was getting it to do the intensive task of checking the balance in my current account) I was faced with the message "Windows NT is Restarting" and could only watch helplessly through the reboot as it kept hold of my card (and my one source of getting money). I've made it a point ever since to avoid ATMs with pretty displays just in case they're running NT. Green screens just feel safer, somehow.
I would be a paid subscriber if Taco and Hemos weren't such cunts
Lots of talk about how 98 is 4 years old, and so on...
Here's the trick. I use 98SE at home for two reasons:
First, I know it inside and out - I can troubleshoot it, I can tweak it, and I know what to expect when it inevitably blows up. I can't say the same for 2000, no matter how vauntedly stable it is. The internal archetecture is just different enough to throw me off, and I don't feel comfortable with it. I'm sticking with the devil I know.
Second, I only use it as a game machine anyway. Most games that I've purchased these days only have manual addenda for running the software on 2000/XP boxen. Plus, most require that you play it as Administrator, which kills the whole reason for preferring a NT-based kernel over 98's anyway. I can't say I'm an industry insider or anything, but it looks like games are still being written with Win98 users in mind. I mean, we don't *all* run out and upgrade each time Microsoft decides it's time for us to do so. There's still a good-sized user base out there, and I think many would agree with me that 98 represents the best balance between functionality and bloat, or between stability (look! it runs!) and compatability (look! it runs what you want it to run!). At least for my purposes it does.
Seeing that Win95 recently fell out of the support chain, I'm sure 98's head is on the chopping block for the next year or two. After that, I may well have to upgrade, at which point it will be time to reassess my priorities...
...or hope that WINE's got support for whatever DirectX version is out by then.
Well, yes. It's quite possible to ship a version of Windows XP without the web browsing component. It's also possible to ship it without the DOS Emulation component, or the Win16 execution environment, or MFC, or any VC++ libraries, or whatnot.
They're called API's, folks. Application Programming Interfaces. Win32 is clunky as hell, but undeniably exposes some damn powerful capabilities. Do we really want a federal mandate that developers must not have dependable access to a better way to code?
For all the talk of the browser, I do note that by '98 there wasn't an operating system on the market that shipped without a web browser, except perhaps VxWorks. Windows 98 was one of the last.
--Dan
P.S. I'm a hardcore Linux user, coder, and administrator, and wouldn't mandate Win32 on anyone. It's in that context that I understand the painfulness of MS's position.
Have you read the Microsoft Financial Pyramid, the MS financial fraud analysis from November 1999 by Bill Parish? There's more on Parish's Research and Press Release Archive. Let me quote few paragraphs:
What do you people think about it?
~shiny
WILL HACK FOR $$$
Of course any version of Windows can be embeded...
You just have to throw the disk at a wall hard enough.
There it is embeded.
Have you read the moderator guidelines? Well, have you, PUNK? (and I want a Karma: Gnarly option)
As for the law, there was once a time when car dealers could only represent one company. A Buick dealer might also sell Chevys and Cadillacs, but could not sell Fords or Volkswagens or else GM would yank out all it's cars. But back in the 60's (IIRC) GM, Ford, and Chrysler together made more than 90% of all cars sold in the USA, and a court decided that was close enough to a monopoly. They ordered that car dealers be allowed to pick and choose the lines they sold from more than one manufacturer, and now we've got dealers that sell Saturn (GM) and Toyota sedans together with Chevy (GM) and Jeep (Chrysler) trucks. Never mind that the "big three" haven't been so dominant ever since 1973.
As for Microsoft, about six years ago they were in the middle of a case about bundling Explorer with the OS. This must have been about when they CHOSE to change the OS design to make it much harder to separate Explorer from Win 98. It's a problem of their own creation, and they did it when they knew that legally they probably shouldn't.
Let's say someone is caught littering, and the judge sentences him to pick up trash. So he shoots off his toe and asks to be let off of the sentence since it's hard to walk. Would you go for that?
Yeah ... The thing is that Windows XP embedded is a fixed codebase on a well-defined hardware platform with no expectation of being added to or installed upon with additional consumer applications written by numerous 3rd party software developers. That's a HUGE difference with how Windows XP Home or Windows XP Professional is used.
Yes, you can choose what kind of cars you want, where to buy cars, what color you want it and low and behold when you get it home it is still a car no matter who built it.
But *I* for one don't want the computer industry regulated like the car industry. I don't want to be 16 to drive, i don't want my computer prices to jump up because the government body assuming responsibility/liability is having to do crash testing.
The computer industry has excelled beyond anyones imagination. With or without microsoft THINGS HAPPEN.
I don't want DellXP, CompaqXP, MSXP, GatewayXP. I don't want a stripped down car either. I don't want to go to the VW dealer and tell them i want a small block ford engine instead of a vw motor. What is the point?
It isn't about stealing a product and emulating it either. Windows *IS* microsoft's product.
It Isn't a matter of "what choice of windows do you want today" but "What choice of operating system do you want today"
Don't let this choice BS get to your head. The government can't dictate our choice just like microsoft can't, so i don't know what the big deal about stripping down windows is. Windows is CHEAP, Affordable and RUNS JUST FINE. I don't know about you but i HATED The days when i had to buy Stacker for 99 bucks, QEMM for 69.00 bucks and DESQview for 199 bucks just to run my Wildcat BBS program that cost 399 bucks. I'm pretty happy that a 199.00 product does all of that and more, and i'm SORRY, but that *IS* innovation.
Just like my 500.00 coffee table that lifts up with ease and turns into a desk. Its just an ordinary coffee table that costs alot to everyone else but me who knows the innovation behind it, and yes, adding fatures, functionality, dependablility and useability IS INNOVATION.
This isn't about Microsoft Owning the roads, they *DO* own them. You can CHOOSE YOUR OWN GODDAMN ROAD THOUGH. If you don't like taking the toll road then take the free country road.
Just remember you do get what you pay for, and you don't get something for nothing.
You're pretty much correct, but the primary difference I see between computers and automobiles that cars are pretty much a stand-alone purchase. The infrastructure (roads, etc.) are already standardized and in place, so you buy your car and you're done.
With computers, we've got the infrastructure standardized (I refer to the Internet and TCP/IP here.), but after you buy your computer - you not only select an operating system, but also all the software that runs on top of it.
I think people often forget that only 10 years ago or so, we had all sorts of operating system choices - but people did nothing but complain about it, and demanded standardization. (That game is really cool on your Commodore 64 computer, but it won't run on my Atari, or on my buddy's TRS-80.) Back then, your computer and your operating system were truly tied together, since the OS was usually in firmware.
When IBM compatibles started gaining popularity (with MS-DOS as the operating system standard), it only really happened after they offered enough compelling software titles to pull everyone else away from their non PC compatible systems.
In other words, the software applications/games/utilities themselves drive people's operating system (and therefore, computer) buying decisions. Since Microsoft lucked into owning the OS (DOS) that ended up rising to the top back then, they've had the head start and the money to hang onto that position ever since.
New companies could write consumer operating systems left and right, but it won't make any difference unless compelling new software is developed that only runs on those new operating systems. Right now, except for Linux people who attempt this largely because they just want to do something to force Microsoft out, there's not much of a business reason to develop code for anything but Microsoft products. (Most game programmers, for example, are tied up developing compelling new titles for dedicated gaming systems like Playstation 2 -- not for some yet unheard-of OS for a new computer.)
"You can't remove IE without crippling Windows!!"
That is complete bullshit and is not comparable to anything Linux/hurd/solaris/... have ever done.
t.