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Looking at Longhorn
ShinyPlasticBag writes "Paul Thurrott has an excellent preview of Longhorn milestone five over at his Supersite for Windows. It looks like this may be Microsoft's equivalent to OS X -- the next version of Windows will have a 3D accelerated desktop and other graphical goodies. In addition to this, it will include a journaling file system, so us mere mortals can enjoy what Linux Geeks have had for years."
git with the program dude.
Only if they go back to cooperative multitasking, drop memory protection, get rid of about 99.99999% of the third party applications on the market, start making their own hardware and nuke all of the big name and beige-box builders, have really expensive peripherals, and charge an arm and a leg for it. Oh...and get a cadre of black turtleneck wearing, angst filled, coffee-house frequenting zealots to crow about it for no other reason than to just crow about it.
I'm similarly opposed to the 'eye-candy for the sake of eye-candy' line that Microsoft seem so fond of. But having a 3d accelerated desktop is far more than that. Even if it _looks_ exactly the same, you should expect a performance boost, since much of the drawing work is now being done in the GPU, rather than your CPU. And if you do happen to like eye candy, you get it basically for free (computationally).
...that there are no drive letters in any of the Explorer screenshots? I'm wondering if this signals an eventual move away from drive letters towards UNC-style paths, or referring to volumes by their labels, in a fashion akin to Mac OS.
You pull the plug on your linux box and corrupt a "slew of data" and someone else is a "retard".
Move out of your glass house before throwing stones.
in our defense, at least our laptops are thinner.
The Microsoft motto: "we're the leaders, wait for us !"
Don't forget to think different.
From the front page of the site:
upcoming Windows operating system technologies. These exciting products include Windows XP Service Pack 1 (SP1),
Anyone else disturbed that this guy conciders SP1 to be an "exciting product"/"Windows operating system technology"?
New parental controls let parents determine when and how kids use the computer.
This is one of the things I truly hate about windows : control, control, control !
They drive it so far that a parent (me) has to control how kids use the computer. That's insane. We have 1 iMac at home for our kids (age 10,7 and 5) and they have to figure outTHEMSELVES when and how to use it. If they have a quastion, they can ask away. If they have a fight, i turn off the machine. It took 3 weeks to find a balance, and now they manage perfectly. No control needed.
Control is like a handbrake on kids efforts to solve conflicts. You'de be amazed how intelligent the remarksof a 5year old can be if he is forced to find his own words. Quite often, he's capable of handling his big sister better than I ever could !
When will I end this grieving ? When will my future begin ?
See, seems to me that the proper solution to this problem would be to remove your root priveleges...
NTFS was a journaling filesystem from the start; even before NT4 came out. It was a journaling filesystem before Reiserfs or EXT3 even had a single line of code written. You can set it up to fully journal the filesystem data as well (it only does metadata by default). It did change with NT 5, but the journaling capabilities still existed in prior versions. More documentation can be found here
The wheel is turning, but the hamster is dead.
Macintosh: I made that stuff back in - ..but I already...
Windows:
Now slow, I say, slow down there just a second, boy, and lemme talk a little sense into ya! (If that boy don't stop talkin' he's gonna sunburn his tongue.)
Macintosh:
Windows: Whoa there boy! (Nice kid, but he's about as thick as a whale omelette.) You can't, I say, you can't just take credit for things that ya didn't do! (This boy's about as sharp as a pound o' wet liver.) You can't just keep crowin' on about how young you feel and how hard you work. You just gotta start bein' the best boy you can be and show those folks you can do it just as good as them!
Now go on, I say, go on boy, an' show 'em what you're made of! Now git!
Macintosh: Ah..yeah. Later.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
The new big feature of the filesystem is not that it's journalling.
They are integrating the filesystem with their SQL engine so that files are easily searchable with the multiple GB hard drives everyone will have by the time 2005 rolls around. The big feature is that it's a database filesystem called WinFS.
I guess the submitters of the article don't even read the articles anymore! Gotta love the quip at the end of the summary--makes him look even more moronic. NTFS has been a journalling file system since its inception. Many years before ext3 reared its ugly head.
"Sufferin' succotash."
"Can someone tell me why I need a 3d accelerated desktop?"
Yes, the graphic load is moved off your CPU to your 3D Card, thus improving GUI responsiveness. If that's not a good enough explanation, then try using a dual machine. You'll be surprised at how much more responsive it becomes.
"Would it be easier for me to navigate my windows if I could move between them as if I played Quake, instead of just clicking on the particular window I wanted?"
Where does it say that the Windows shell will be like that? + 1 Imaginitive, -1 Offtopic.
"Would I get more girls if my mailbox spun in cool 3d, instead of just opening?""Would my productivity improve if it took 5 more seconds to open a window just because it had to be animated, instead of just appearing?"
Would you be more productive if your UI was more responsive while the CPU is busy? (you know, that little thing called multi-tasking?) Meanwhile, animations like that give you more visual elements to 'reflex' off of. I mean, if a light turns red at an intersection, do you start moving because you see the light or because the other cars start moving?
"Would it be easier for me to read text if all windows were transparent?"
You don't understand the value of transparency? I have an 'always on top' app on my screen right now that allows me to rapidly switch between desktop and apps within those desktops. It's all icon based, so I made it transparent. I can read text underneat it *and* see what apps I have running without having problems with clashing. You're right, transparent text on transparent text is bad. Icons and transparent text give your screen an added dimension of real-estate. Instead of assuming the worse, look at it's strengths.
"Is the human mind better trained to cope with windows if they are rotated 45 degrees along some axis?"
Were you able to read the scrolling text in the intro to Star Wars?
"I simply don't get the 3d desktop, but then, I prefer stuff that work, instead of stuff that looks good and doesn't work."
The whole point of it is to offload the graphics processing to the unused 3D Card, and free up CPU stuff for other things. The result is a more responsive UI. To boot, they can add features that some apps will find rather useful, like the task switching app I used (it's called AltDesk btw). The extra graphic goodies are actually quite useful. Imagine running at 1600 by 1200, but resizing a web page window with small text very smoothly. (Current methods create nasty nearest neighbor artifacts.)
You may or may not care about this, but some of us that spend a great deal of time making good use of our UI find it rather exciting. If I can smoothly resize windows no matter what their native resolution is, that's damn cool.
"//H, just realized he has another flamebait post on his record. Damn that karma!"
You made some good points. It's sad, though, that you didn't just ask so you could learn. I mean, if you have to ask so many questions about why somebody's investing a lot of time and resources, then doesn't it strike you that maybe you just don't get it?
For example, I think Bablyon 5 is stupid. I think the fans overrate it. But I don't go on long-winded rants about it because I know they enjoy it in a way that I haven't discovered. See my point? I'd sound like a total dumb-ass to them if I said "I don't see why you guys are so immersed in such a corny show."
Heh I hope I made my point instead of pissing everybody off.
"Derp de derp."
So, when you save a picture, do you have to fill out a questionaire? I can picture it now:
.jpg extention. This must be a picture. If you're not comfortable with extentions, I can hide these for you in the future. Please take a moment to fill out this questionaire in order to save your file.
Clippy: I see that you're trying to save a file. I see that this file has a
1. Is this a photo? yes no
2. Did you take this photo? yes no
3. If you didn't take this photo, do you have the legal right to save this file to your hard-drive? yes no
4. If you didn't take this photo, please type in the Name and Social Security Number of whoever did take this photo. (No information is being sent to Microsoft at this time).:
5. If you're ready to save this, please click Yes. If not, please click No. If you'd like some time to think about it, click Later. If you'd like more information about Microsoft's revolutionary new file system, click Help.
OK. Please stand by as the information about this file is verified with Microsoft (note: you need an internet connection to proceed. Click Set Up My Internet Now to commit to a 12-month subscription to Microsoft Windows (formerly MSN) and to activate access to your hard-drive.). Once we've verified your legal right to save this file to your hard-drive, you'll be given a short (5-7 minute) questionaire to provide further details about this file to make finding it easier the next time you plan to view it with Microsoft Photo Monkey. Thank you for choosing Microsoft!
"Would it kill you to put down the toilet seat?" -- Maya Angelou
Huh? Where did you get this?
As far as I know, Microsoft has NO plans on removing compatibility with older applications. I'm running Windows Server 2003, and I can still run Win16 apps as well as most DOS apps.
The parent is nothing but a troll. Yes, DRM in the OS is not a good thing. No, it will not have the profound impact that you think it will have. No one will stop you from running Linux on your computer.
DRM in the OS means very little. Application developers know that the adoption of a new OS is slow, and they will not do anything that would reduce their userbase.
kdm. Easy to configure, many useful options. You can even configure it to log you in automatically. Switch on your machine, go make coffee, come back, you're logged in and ready to start work, your previous session restored.
kuser can do this for you. Linux distributors often provide their own tools for this, for example SuSE, whose admin tools are handily integrated into the KDE Control Centre.
Play around with kicker, the KDE panel. It does most of the stuff that Longhorn thing does, plus lots more stuff which they haven't done.
I expect Gnome does some or all of these things too; I picked KDE because it's what I know.
Rik