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Why is Microsoft Patching XP?
akkarin noted a story about a new Service patch for XP. Dubbed SP2c, the new service patch contains no bug fixes or features. Instead, this exciting patch exists only to add new valid active product registration keys. Oops.
Well, back to rejecting software patent applications.
a large portion of the world uses XP and it is likely a lot of people on Slashdot have to administrate it.
Why would it not be on the frontpage?
Slashdot needs Geekcode | Can anyone recommend any good SCIFI? My tastes: Foundation, Startide Rising, CITY, Ringworld,
It's front page material because it allows us to have fun bashing Microsoft. ;-)
This is Slashdot, after all.
http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
init 11 - for when you need that edge.
Why would you need to guess about something which is already publicly known and their obvious policy?
XP will eventually become unsupported, they won't have any new patches for it, and they'll expect everyone to upgrade to Vista. Oddly enough, Windows 3.x, 95, 98, and ME have all gone through this.
Believe it or not, every software company does the exact same thing. Just than when Microsoft does it, it's on a massive scale, and it gets rammed down the throats of everyone no matter what they think.
Longterm this will be seen as a major mistake made by them, in my opinion....
Long term, none of our opinions seem to alter what Microsoft does. It just happens.
Cheers
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
The reason for it is easy:
If they sent it out as a normal update, people could choose to ignore it. As a servicepack they can set it as a requirement for future security updates. This is just what they did with SP1 & 2, only this time without any added features for the user.
Also: they really have to sell Vista...
A computer is a tool, but I am not. I use Linux
XP is fine now (when they're not breaking it remotely), Vista was delayed and Vista sucks. If Vista didn't suck then I wouldn't still be reading horror stories about DRM, HD-crippling, driver issues, kernel vulnerabilities etc. etc. etc. long after it has been released. Barely a week goes by without a handful of things like this or this cropping up.
Are all of these kinds of stories just trolls with spin skills worthy of Karl Rove? If the answer is no then Vista sucks. If the answer is yes then there are lot of people angry at MS - probably, at least in part, because Vista sucks so very much: http://slashdot.org/search.pl?query=vista
I've been part of several discussions trying to ascertain what advantages Vista actually offers to outweigh the drawbacks and it ain't pretty. The bottom line for us, and I daresay hundreds of thousands of other organisations, is that XP works, is mostly stable and is well supported. Vista can't compete with that - and they're calling it an upgrade?
So if you need Microsoft - and unfortunately we still need to develop with DirectX - then XP will do fine. Vista has to bring something really worthwhile to make us want to go through the hassle of the upgrade and to put up with all the unwanted baggage that Redmond seems to think we all need.
And of course if you don't need Microsoft then you're already laughing. Whatever OS you're using will be just as secure as Vista (if not more so), fully extensible, support all sorts of open formats and not try to wrestle with you for control of your own computer.
I really am glad that Vista's working out for you but unfortunately for most of us the "nifty new features and new look" just aren't enough to justify a broad OS upgrade - certainly for anything other than a home or hobby rig. And my home'n'hobby rigs all run XP or Linux and serve me just fine. =D
Why do you think the ribbon is horrible? Sure it takes some getting used to, but I've found the interface much more intuitive. Try telling your grandmother how to print in Landscape all the way up to Office XP... It required at least 3 levels of menu-digging and a half-dozen clicks. Now, it's 2 clicks and she's on her way to printing out cheap-ass birthday cards!
I had a problem moving from using only a keyboard in Windows 3.1 to using a mouse in Windows 95, I thought it was too "clunky" and "bubbly" (pre-XP.) In the 10+ years since those 4 months of annoyance, nothing has really changed!
I'm dealing with a reasonably large staff which has grown incredibly accustomed to, over the course of a decade, the Office 97/2003-style interface. Whatever the "intuitiveness" of the ribbon, the fact remains that it would be a rather large effort on their part (and mine) to move in that direction. Even I, a guy who has been using computers in one form or another since the early 1980s, and considers myself fairly adaptable to new interfaces, found the ribbon and the general displacement of all the important functions I use in Office to be very hard to overcome.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Methinks theres a pattern here:
Win95 - compelling reason to upgrade
Win98 - pass
Win2000 - compelling upgrade
WinME - hahahaha
WinXp - compelling upgrade
WinVista - Jury's still out, but probably pass
98se was such an improvement over 95, even over 95osr2, that it was definitely a "compelling upgrade". XP was not "compelling" for me until SP1.
Vista:XPSP2::ME:98SE