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Latest Vista Build Making Real Progress
feminazi writes "Computerworld's Scot Finnie has reviewed the newest Vista build and found some significant improvements over Beta 2, which he had previously criticized in pretty strong terms. There's improved performance, greatly reduced installation time, four network control panels and some wizards have all been combined into one nicely organized Network and Sharing Center. Microsoft is also reducing the number of annoying User Access Control (UAC) prompts. There are some minor improvements in the way Media Center handles windows, but it's still buggy."
I wonder how much time is really spent on fixing bugs and improving the system overall, as opposed to putting in various limitations and DRM compliance. Maybe I'm going on a limb out here, but I've lost trust in Windows platform ever since the WGA hit the news. Most likely XP is going to be the last MS-based _personal_ use OS I will ever use (hopefully).
I find it interesting that Bill Gates at a recent symposium told Microsoft affiliates that there is a 20% chance that Vista would slip again. Since I live in Seattle, I have friends who are developers over there who swear it will never make the January deadline.
I love it when they are already talking about the new release slipping when they have already made promises through their teeth for the last 3 years.
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
i personally had high hopes for vista. Back when they were talking about how the entire thing was rewritten from the ground up. How features like IE were removed from the Kernel, and turned into ordinary apps. I was looking forward to the fact that MSFT would finally fore users and developers to deal with multiple users per computer in a proper way. That the mess that was win32 would be tossed completely in favor of ONLY Aero's .NET setup. I was hoping beyond hope that MSFT's purchase of VPC was a sign that they were going to do a VPC version of win32 inside of Vista so that Vista code ould be stab le and yet still maintain backward compatibility(ala wine, or Classic mode for OS X)
Then when in Jan. after the first beta was released and the WMF flaw was found not only in XP but Vista as well, and MSFt's excuse was that they hadn't yet checked that dll I knew MSFt was going down hill. Win32 code is still present and merely thrown on top. no separate layer just direct cross calling. no sand boxing old apps properly just an ugly hack to keep everything working. Then with Beta 2 MSFT has to "fine Tune" UAC means that the system doesn't work right. That security will be to complicated for the average users and weak admins which make up 75% of MSFT's install base. MSFT never learned the KISS principal creates a stronger security layer, and then you add on more complicated layers for fine grained control ala selinux, and the other systems designed for hardening a computer, but aren't needed by say my mother.
UAC can be tightened up well, and MSFT and real admins will do so for Servers and other important machines. But the home user will only get frustrated at it's complexity and find ways to disable it like they have already begun to do in the betas.
While I had High hopes for Vista, the above combined with the outrageous hardware requirements to deliver the same features found in OS X running on literally a 1/3 of the hardware has found my hope for vista gone. i have converted my brother to OS X If I can get my mother then all will be good. My brother could switch to linux if he desired, and my mother isn't a tech person.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
That was my thought exactly. Beta testers revealed that the OS behavior was stupid, and sure enough, Microsoft changed the behavior-- to a different stupid behavior.
Seriously, there's just something a little wrong with the way Microsoft handles the "All users" profile. It's a pretty good idea-- to have a place where if you change the settings, it changes for all users. However, it's more complicated of a situation than Microsoft's handling of it implies.
There are your criticisms, and others besides, of Microsofts methods, but I think their solution should entail at least 3 features:
Creating the administrator interface for this behavior might be a bit complicated, but that's how it should work.