MS Upgrades To Be Smaller And More Frequent

duplicantk8 writes "Following the numerous delays to the Vista launch, MS is planning to have more frequent and smaller incremental upgrades, according to the Financial Times." From the article: "Those delays are set to end late next year with the simultaneous launch of new versions of Windows and the Office suite of PC applications in the company's most significant new product cycle since Windows 95. The new versions of the company's key PC software are likely to rekindle higher growth after a period that saw its growth rate slip below 10 per cent for the first time last year, according to Wall Street analysts. Mr Ballmer's comments are the most public sign yet of the dent to Microsoft's confidence in its core development process that resulted from the Vista delays."

Comments

Reboots

[Average_Joe_Sixpack]

Wonder if they have finally figured out a way to update the OS without performing a reboot.

Windows update....

[Misanthrope]

For some reason windows update will be replaced by the commands.
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade

Beleaguered

[sg3000]

Remember the 1997 buzzword "beleaguered"?

Does anyone else remember in the mid 1990s when Apple announced the same thing? It was around 1996, and Apple was finding it impossible to get its next generation Copland/Mac OS 8 operating system out the door. I think it was then-CEO Gil Amelio who announced after several years of delays that Apple wasn't going to do monolithic releases any longer. They would do little ones to be more manageable. Eventually, they came out with Mac OS 7.6, Mac OS 8 (what many considered to be 7.7), and Mac OS 9. That's also when they started shopping around, looking at Be and NeXT.

As Apple discovered--and now, I guess Microsoft is discovering the same thing-- it's really hard to keep backwards compatibility, drive new features, and do it within a reasonable budget when you have a big installed base. Apple's installed base was never more than a small fraction of Microsoft's, but Microsoft's resources were also proportionately more extensive.

Microsoft is having as many (or more) delays with Longhorn/Vista as Apple had with Copland/Mac OS 8. In the mean time, Apple bit the bullet with NeXT/Mac OS X back in 1997, and now they're seeing some pretty good returns on their investment. Releases have been fairly rapid, and they've introduced lots of innovative features.

So as far as coming up with their next OS, Microsoft, you can use the word now. Apple doesn't need it any more.

Re:Beleaguered

[sg3000]

I can't find the original article, so here's the only reference I could find:

During his keynote speech at MACWORLD Expo Boston ... Dr. Amelio announced a fundamental shift in the way that Apple delivers new operating-system functionality.

Dr. Amelio stated in his keynote speech that Apple is changing its strategy to deliver new functionality through incremental releases rather than large monolithic releases. Moving forward, Apple intends to follow the industry model of shipping software releases in incremental segments. ... The motivation for this change is that Apple believes that its current model of monolithic system-software releases isn't working, and that it doesn't allow Apple to get software advancements out to customers and developers soon enough.

I found a similar statement in a Boston Globe article from August 8, 1996:

As far as Apple's new operating system, known as Copland, Amelio wouldn't give a release date, saying instead the company would begin selling components of the new operating system as they become available. Such piecemeal advances in the operating system are part of a broader shift by Apple away from big, monolithic upgrades. "Copland is going to appear, but it's going to appear over a series of releases," said Amelio.

Who would have thought that about a decade later, it would seem like Microsoft was having the same problems:

Microsoft has overhauled its core software development practices to avoid any repetition of the delays that have bedevilled the next planned version of Windows, according to Steve Ballmer, the company's chief executive.

The changes, along with plans to release more frequent, less ambitious versions of the widely used software, mark a significant shift in Microsoft's approach following one of the most troubled new product cycles in its 30-year history.

"We attempted something that was beyond the planning and conceptualisation of the system," Mr Ballmer said of Windows Vista, the much-delayed version of the software that is now planned for late next year.

"The product cycle has been longer than it should have been," he told the FT.

Of course, what fixed Apple was not doing incremental releases. They had to do a step-function switch to Mac OS X.

Re:It won't help

[theantipop]

It has yet to hurt Apple. I don't see the difference between the proposed schedule and what OSX has doing for years.

MS becomes agile?..switches to XP for development?

[FerretFrottage]

Wouldn't you love the be the developer who gets Ballmer or Gates as your pair programmer.

[developer]:You forgot to comment that code

[Ballmer]: (pickup chair and tosses it smashing his triple head display of Dell 2405 monitors) The code comment's itself!!!

[developer]: What about best practices? I'm suppose to be learning from you.

[Ballmer]: Well then start by getting off you ass and picking up that chair. Now with both hands on the arm rests.....NO NO NO...use you're back to lift, not your legs.