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Windows 7 To Be Released Next Year?
KrispySausage writes "A recently-released roadmap for the next major Window release — Windows 7 — indicates that Microsoft is planning to release the new operating system in the second half of 2009, rather than the anticipated release date of some time in 2010. This quickly-approaching release date would seem to be at least partially verified by news of a milestone build available for review by an anonymous third party." We've previously discussed the upcoming new OS version, as well as its danger to Vista.
itll probably end up being a minor change, Vista SP2 with new name?
they are taking a leadt out off Apples book again, "release often and charge alot for overglorified service packs"
Windows 7 - because Vista sucked
which is totally what she said
*yawn*
Vista isn't getting the sales MS hoped, so perhaps they are planning to sweep it under the rug as soon as possible.
given the delays of Vista I would schedule the next version for tomorrow, and hope to deliver some time in 2010.
1 - Microsoft says they learned from their mistakes, and have been deconstructing Windows to remove bloat, and make the whole thing run faster. Windows Server can even run sans-GUI now, and they're building up from a minimalist stack. This is a really good thing.
2 - There were some neat concepts that were promised with Vista and never delivered, like the file abstraction stack, or WinFS. Now they might have time to do it right.
3 - Vista was a total bomb. There is no denying it at all. So why bother? Admit your mistake and move on quickly. All in all, this sounds like a surprisingly smart move on their part.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
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They will schedule the release in 2009 but it won't be released until 2011. Yeah ... Microsoft ... did I mention that it will be missing key features they "said" would be in there.
Blah Blah Blah ...
Hopefully it will end up being like windows ME -> windows XP, with vista being ME, and the new OS representing XP. Contrary to peoples constant whining, vista is a reasonable enough O/S, the only problem i've seen with it is the resource intensiveness. Rarely do i ever have crash problems. But this will turn into another 300 comment microsoft hate-o-thon just because of story that is an unverified RUMOR about an operating system that nobody responding has even SEEN yet.
ME was out HOW long before the next OS?
and WIN98 SE maybe this is Vista SE...As long as they cut some bloat and give me back admin controls in less than convoluted places, I'm cool.
Ask not what you can do for your country. Ask what your country did to you
So is it official now is vista the next Windows ME? Funny some of the Microsoft fan boys are so in love with it just like they were with ME.
From TFA:
"The system is very responsive, using barely 480MB of memory after boot."
I've obviously been in *nix land for too long, I'm still of the impression that 256 Mb is pretty much all one needs for most tasks. Even EMACS!
Two words:
Yeah. Right.
And same goes for the feature list. I haven't been arsed to check but do they have the new filesystem there once more? Someone has been working on the new Windows filesystem for about 14 years now (since chicago). Must be really rewarding to have it axed time after time.
Perhaps MSW7 would be the equivalent to what win2k was over ME? It might actually be a decent product then (of all them, 2k was a shining star in many ways), but I'd imagine that if this is the case a *lot* of those who bought Vista (or machines with Vista) are going to be royally pissed.
Wow, what a creative name they came up with. Knowing M$, they probably thought the problem with Vista was it's name and not the O/S and this is their solution.
If the screenshots are anything to judge by then Microsoft are changing user interfaces AGAIN ( and as usual it is a partial clone of Apple ). Wonder what will happen when people find that switching to Linux is an easier learning curve than upgrading windows...
The sooner they push the release date, the less time they have to debug it.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
I remember reading an article in 2001 in a computer magazine about the marvellous things that were going to be in Longhorn (now Vista). A wonderful new database-like file system, brilliant UI and other great things. I thought how wonderful this system was going to be compared to WinXP (which had just come out).
Then later I read about how the new file system (WinFS) was based on something called 'Cairo' and about how that too had been scrapped.
At that stage I was using Mandrake Linux (I switched to Ubuntu at the start of 2007), and wanted something better.
Anyway, so this chain of thought ends in, well now I am using Ubuntu, it does keep getting better all the time. I don't use MS Windows really at all now on my computers. Why do I care?
Meh, lets try and get back to where I stared. Can we expect a new file system? Can we expect radical 'new' technologies? Perhaps even voice commands? (Computer: open http colon slash slash slash dot dot org)
I wank in the shower.
This strengthens the impression that Vista is the second iteration of Windows Me which was also replaced by a new OS rater quickly (about a year) after being found to suck donkey balls.
... can be found here.
We Build Beautiful Websites
Microsoft may have blundered, but they're not dumb. I'm pretty sure they wrote Vista in such a way that it's extensible. So people didn't like Vista, so what? Some people have paid for it, enough at least that they've gotten feedback on how to polish it up. Then they release their next OS, and life goes on. One product failure is not enough to kill MS.
"A recently-release roadmap for the next major Window release -- Windows 7 -- indicates that Microsoft is planning to release the new operating system in the second half of 2009, rather than the anticipated release date of some time in 2010."
Given Micro$oft's track record that means if they say it's going to be out in 2009, it's on track for release in late 2010 or 2011. Nice to know that it's on schedule.
This is my opinion. To make sure you don't steal it, it's covered by the DMCA.
Microsoft is not a good example of the standard by which to abide for defining the time it takes to make an OS. They releases OSes at a regular pace, and each os release is done to exploit more the new hardware. It's not a matter of "it took microsoft 20 years so it will take you 5000 years", NO! If you want to make a multitasking, multithreading OS with an interface similar to XP, I would say one year is a reasonable time frame. For vista it's more difficult since there's the 3d cards for them you need to write drivers. YOu also need to write network support for your os to be like microsoft's. But please remember, The microsoft operating system is plagued with politics, negociations, legacy support and all that, and if making an operating system just like what microsoft did is really what you want, Im sure you can do it in less time microsoft did it, if you work on it full time. But about this particular opensource operating system that just want to be exactly like windows, I don't know. Reactos is its name, http://www.reactos.org/en/index.html
Insiders say, it's gonna suck!
If someone only bothered to spend two more minutes investigating...
Windows Seven with a build number of 6.1.6519.1? The Windows Seven that is currently in the kernel-only, text mode, MinWin phase?
This was probably some kind of a Vista SP2 build, something that will be released next year and is in heavy development. That, or the guy was given a modded/themed current version of Vista and was fooled.
If only there were an OS out there where you could just turn on the machine for the first time, and have your browser, office suite and media player installed and ready to go.
and if you need a new program, no endless googleing for a trial version of something that should be included, you just go to Applications > Add/remove programs, search for what you want, and click install.
Once MS makes an OS that can do all that, I might rejoin the dark side.
oh, wait, I already have an OS that does all that...
I have a good feeling about this 'Windows 7' it sounds simple, direct, and straight to the point. lets hope that MS has learned from their mistakes (ME, Vista, or anything they release before SP1) and can give us a lean, secure, and easy to use OS.
Of course, I don't expect to see MS make their deadline. It's more likely that we will see 2008 become the year of linux on the desktop than have MS release something on time
-I only code in BASIC.-
Meh. I didn't need to use Vista in order to try out OS X. I just wanted a laptop that came with a Unix pre-installed, got more than 3 hours of battery life, and didn't cost more than $1,500. The MacBook fit the bill.
I write sci-fi for metalheads
I'm concerned about the return to numerical versioning.
They went from 3.11, to year-based (98), to cheesy acronyms (ME), to acronyms containing the Mighty Letter "X" (XP), to the vaguely multi-cultural (Vista). Now they're going back to whole numbers. All the joy of 3.11, half the perfomance.
They haven't really cribbed Apple's Roman Numeral approach, so let's work with that.
Vista...VII-STA...VII: Something To Avoid.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
That Microsoft cant do what others can?
I just got a copy of OSX 10.5 for my really old and outdated mac. Specifically to get a working copy of dashcode as I write OSX widgets for Crestron control. I was expecting the worst as installing the latest OS on a old PC never is a good thing.
10.5 makes my machine faster. I kind of looked at it skeptically but it actually boots faster and has a more responsive feel, even NeoOffice opens faster as well as Final Cut.
Why is Apple able to deliver an OS that is faster instead of slower? It's got as much eye candy as vista.
Maybe microsoft needs to have all their programmers re-trained?
FYI: Single processor G4 with only 784 meg of ram, and a crappy laptop video card.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I've expected this ploy. They need a new release so they can sunset XP and force people to vista, or to vista renamed.
When you have been out of school long enough, you will start realizing that "next year" frequently means at least two to three years from now. This is especially true with Microsoft. Next quarter means next year sometime.
...Microsoft MUST start its wide beta program within the next few months. That could indicate we may see the first wide beta release out probably around late March to early April of this year.
Does this mean that we can expect Longhorn in less than 2 years?
Guys! Guys! Microsoft is finally releasing Longhorn in less than two years' time!
All this makes sense...
I wouldn't count on it!
Maybe we will get lucky and this will be a finished version of Windows instead of a half ass one. I would much rather wait 4 years for a good operating software than 2 years for a piece of junk wraped in too much fluff.
Everyone need a good geek handy! Where is yours?
I'm really of the mindset that you can take Linux away from me when you pry the Live-CD out of my cold dead fingers, hell I just might have my coffin setup with wi-fi and a sub-notebook so that I can read /. in peace.
Homo homini lupus
With free open source platforms such as Ubuntu/Kubuntu offering increasingly sophisticated 'windows style' desktop environments, more configurability and faster release cycles I can quite see why MS is becoming paranoid over the sucession of bloatware they continue to offer to the home desktop market.
Your average home user is now in a position to purchase even a mid-range PC for £500 which probably offers more document management and multimedia capabilities then they will probably need; typically just browsing, email, IM, media play/record, DTP etc.
Persuading this market of the *additional benefit* of upgrading, firstly to Hasta la Vista and, apparently quite soon, to Windows 7, will be a tought sell.
IMO, unless MS or another software vendor comes up with a so-called "killer applicaton" in the mean time, that will only run on the latest MS OS platform (though I think MS7 will still be 32 bit?) or only on a high spec hardware (forcing said user to upgrade their PC to a new one pre-loaded, of course, with the new MS OS!), then how, exactly, MS intend to market this new OS any better than Vista is beyond me.
FYI, I've been dual booting Vista and Linux K/Ubuntu for a few months now and, aside for some driver issues, the Linux environment has not compromised my core usability in any significant way, though clearly some tweaking - which would generally be beyond the level of (and undesirabe to) the mainstream home market - is still currently required.
But as the open source OS market continues to grow, how does MS intend to combat this threat?
By speeding up their own release cycles, of course, in desperate attempts to quickly copy and match the latest OS functionality and UI gimmicks already freely available on the rival platforms!
"He Who Dares Wins"
http://www.willowglen.ca/Products/Vista/Vista.htm
I'm seeing a Coca Cola parallel here. Everyone was happy with normal Coke. Then Coca Cola released the new-fangled Coke which everyone hated. In desperation, Coca Cola released 'Classic Coke' which was the old stuff which people liked.
Expect to see 'XP Classic' being released before long.
Windows 7 will remind us all of the movie Seven.
We'll have
glutinous Bloatware
Sloth
greedy pricing
DRM lustfully controlling all media.
Proud non-interoperability
and mac -envy
oh and you get the wrath, like in the movie ending where you find can't take back what is in "the box" because you opened the EULA.
Balmer will play the Kevin Spacey role.
personally I had to leave the theater.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Is this release date causing time to somehow accelerate? If not, how could it be any more "quickly-approaching" than any other future date? Time -is- still marching along at the same speed, right?
Don't put advice in your sig.
...actually taken the time to install Windows 1 and then upgrade it all the way to Vista one version at a time? I wonder what kind of relics you'd end up finding in the registry and hard drive.. heh. almost makes me want to do it.
It will really be version 6.66 - use at your own risk.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
...except Microsoft didn't get the chance to pull XP from the market before the outcry started.
Right now, XP is Classic Coke.
Do what Apple did all those years ago: put the whole current OS in a Classic-like environment and do something worthwhile with the rest.
Also, ship all those things that were cut from Vista.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
35s boot time for my 600MHz Pentium M based Eee PC running Debian Linux that is.
Seven deadly sins Seven ways to Win(dows) Seven holy paths to hell And your trip begins
Seven downward slopes Seven bloodied hopes Seven are your burning fires, Seven your desires...
And not to mention the evil portent later on in the song of opening "the seventh seal" of the seventh iteration of your newly shrikwrapped Windows! Just hope they don't release it at 7:07 am on the 7th of July or we'll all be doomed!
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
So Microsoft has basically admitted that Vista is a flop, market wise. So what do they do? Announce a successor Real Soon Now.
They know they can't possibly get anything worth a damn out that quickly.. but that's not the goal here. The goal is to stave anyone figuring they might as well think about switching to Linux or OSX, cuz "Microsoft is going to fix Windows Real Soon Now".
In reality the product will actually be released in the middle of 2010. It may be good, it may be another bomb. How long can Microsoft keep up the "But the next one is going to be just GRRREEAAAT!"? Stay tuned...
AccountKiller
My wife already has "Longhorn" - three times a week!
I'll get my coat...
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Simple Joe and Jane don't buy Windows upgrades - they get whatever comes with their computer.
1) EULA evilness
2) Product activation
3) WG(Dis)A
So I don't do XP.
Problems with Vista
1) EULA evil++
2) Product avtivation
3) WG(Dis)A
4) DRM-gasm
5) "It's your fault" Security system
6) DirectX only
7) DX7 only
8) IE "Fixed" only
Doesn't look like a progression in any form whatsoever, but going back to XP isn't any good either (you were whipped, then arms broken and now you're getting your arms fixed and they'll just go back to whipping you. Great).
if all windows were this airbrushed...
You must be young. The limit is the new fix. It fixed the 8 char filename and 3 char extension..
The truth shall set you free!
Won't it be funny if when Windows 7 comes out next year and PC Vendors are still offering XP as an option? Let's sure as hell hope that MS learned with Vista and hired all new programmers to code Windows 7.
For Google Bot and to get the word out(whether MS is ready or not)
Windows 7 is coming out in 2009.
Windows 7 is coming out in 2009.
If you wanna get rich, you know that payback is a bitch
Final Fantasy was one of my favorite game series, but I'm thinking that Microsoft is trying to make us feel like their operating systems are like MMORPG's. Kind of like FFXI (why do you exist?), Microsoft is taking the same tactic of designing a world filled with problems and inviting developers and hackers to register and join in the never ending, yet ever-so-tedious, quest of fixing (or exploiting) the crises. I hope that Windows 7 will at least let us choose a neat avatar.
The windows roadmap marks an update for Media center for next year the next version "Viennia" isnt dur till 2010, and they expect that to slip.
Surely if MS just made the OS and bought in FireFox/Opera/StarOffice/Lotus Notes/... and made a collection of such applications as they had license for to be installed on the machine. They could call it a "distribution". No monopoly problems there.
Or they could let the OEM install just the OS and allow them to change the applications to suit their/custmer requirements.
But MS will include MS WMP (with the MS propriatory format and DRM). Or MS's Outlook. Or Word. MS Office, etc.
Well, that's a monopoly problem there.
Vista is a danger to itself.
... is the key to all this. Obviously, someone on the Vista team left the keys to the booze cabinet on their desk.
We can only hope this is rectified in the next release...
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Man, Microsoft have been doing this for as long as I can remember. "Yeah, OK, you got us, this version stinks to high heaven, but we'll nail it next time, just you wait and see. Don't go running off to the competition, 'cos you'll only be sorry when you see what we've got in store just round the corner." This time they're starting the rumour mill extra-early, well before any sign of an announcement, presumably because Vista's gone down like a turd in a hot tub.
And then one by one the whiz-bang features they promised at the time of announcing the product disappear, and it turns up late and full of bugs.
Every time.
Sad thing about it is that people still fall for it.
Every time.
Why? How many times do you need to be disappointed by them before you decide that enough's enough? I swear, it's like an abusive marriage. They're the drunken husband in the string vest - they beat you up, then they promise you they love you and they'll change, only for it to happen again. And again. And again. And you, the battered wife, are convinced you're lost without them.
Seriously, folks, pack your bags and get out of there. He's a brute and he'll beat you again. Because you let him.
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Oh yeah, just like Windows 97 which became 98
So Microsoft tried to copy Mac OS X, but it didn't work, so they're going to copy Apple System 7.
Is it me or does everybody else see where this is going????
Software that will only run on vista and not XP that has been shipped with the new machines will not work on Windows 7. This will mean that you will need to purchase all new versions of your new software.
I have heard on the grape vine that the new name for Windows 7 is going to be Everest edition. The reason for this is that it is going to be a mountain of bloatware that it reaches epic proportions.
-1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flamebait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
It's nice to see that Microsoft have learnt their lesson and will be ensuring it's proven ready for release by a rigorous testing regime instead of rushing it out to meet a deadline to cover up for a previously botched product. Oh wait.......
Hmmmmmm..... Deep fried and look like Squirrel.
When you're running as an admin, true, you don't need to type in an admin password; since you're already logged in as an admin, so you must have typed one it at the login prompt in the first place! Again, this is the same as Linux -- you don't need to type in your password when you're logged in as root. The only difference between Vista and Linux in this sense, is that, by default, Vista prompts for user confirmation for admin tasks when you're logged in as admin; obviously not asking for a password since you're logged in as admin, but notifying you that you're performing an administrator task. Note that in this situation -- when you're logged in as root -- Linux would not (by default) prompt at all, and would certainly not request a password.
What's purple and commutes? An Abelian grape.
Most programs require you to install them as admin, true, but that's so they can be installed for all users; and that's the same as with Mac OS and Linux (Synaptic and apt-get both need privilege elevation, to use Ubuntu as an example).
What's purple and commutes? An Abelian grape.
So Vista will be the Windows 3.0 of the post-NT era.
I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.
I've got it running Duke Nukem Forever flawlessly!
Yea like XP has so many bells and whistles that it's a problem?
Step one: Disable Windows firewall, Themes.
Step two: Pretend it says "2000" instead of "XP"
ps. They didn't just "update the documentation" for defrag NTFS on NT4 to Windows 2000. There was no NTFS Defragment tool in NT4. The idea was that NTFS is much less susceptible to fragmentation (it is) that it would not be necessary. Unfortunately, this is untrue in the long-term - even NTFS can't avoid the fact that sometimes there will not be enough continuous blocks free for a file.
Generally speaking, you don't need to run defragmentation tools on servers anyways. It's just not a big enough problem. For a busy file server, perhaps, but back in NT4 land a file server didn't have 1TB of word documents like a medium-large sized company today does.
They added an NTFS defrag to Windows 2000.
ps. There's no built-in defrag tools for Linux ext2/3/etc or MacOS even still. Because, it's just not a huge problem with modern filesystems. But it would be nice to have these tools available for those times when heavy fragmentation has occured.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
What's purple and commutes? An Abelian grape.
There are actually two versions of Mac OS X. The full release, called Mac OS X Server, is $499. Granted, the feature set of plain Mac OS X is already similar to that of Vista Ultimate.
Yes, because sudo is only used rarely every once in a while (when you do some system-wide installation or configuration) whereas UAC opens up in Windows at the slightest event ("You're going to sneeze. Cancel or Allow ?") Presumably you're quoting off the 'Get a Mac' ads and haven't actually used Vista yourself, but just in case you have, could you give an example of Vista producing a UAC prompt when you're *not* doing system-wide installing, configuring, writing to folders you don't have the permissions to write to, etc. -- i.e. in cases where Ubuntu wouldn't prompt you?
What's purple and commutes? An Abelian grape.
I think this is great news, as it means I have no reason to upgrade my WinXP laptop and PC until 2010.
WinVista was such a resource hog, and made our computers go slower, so we specifically reloaded WinXP on the few remaining non-Linux boxen at work, and have been looking at replacement MS Office packages and databases since then.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
(Apologies for dropping the formatting in the first post).
What's purple and commutes? An Abelian grape.
OMG, you mean, a 3 year cycle between Operating system releases is a NEW thing! OMG OMG!!!eleventyone!!! Listen, This pisses me off, This attitude that 3 years between OS releases is too soon, and will cause confusion is retarded. Offence intended. I'm SICK of hearing how "OMG Windows 7 to be released late 2009? thats only what 3 years since Vista? uh, 3.1('92) to 95 ~3 years, 95-98, ~3 years. 98-ME ~3 years, ME-XP ~1 year... (I'm focusing on home marketed OSes right now as Simple Joe and Jane never bought 2000 as it was marketed mainly to business market. XP was the merge OS between home and Business... comparisons to ME are a bit late, if it was like ME, 7 would be out any day now not ~2 years away (second half of 2009 is 1.5 years away, this is MS we're talking about and they'll never release right at the first part of the second half if they make it in the second half it'll be nov-decish which is 2 years away). It wasn't confusing the last few times it's happened, just because we were graced with a long standing XP recently doesn't mean it's always been that way. and it certainly isn't going to be like that everytime. Look at linux releases, geez new versions come out all the time, Mac OS X, comes out 10 times faster than Windows releases. but because it's MS, it's "OMG!!" Come on people this is the computer industry, we're all part of it here. Grow up, and look at the history of our field, and realize that this isn't different than last time. Look at the old adage, "If you don't learn from history you're doomed to repeat it" AND LEARN YOUR HISTORY!!! Back in July 1995, I had just graduated high school, was starting university in the fall, the huge marketing buzz around Windows 95 was in full swing, (START ME UP!) People were arguing about how much slower windows 95 was on a 486 than Windows 3.11, and that to run windows 95, you'd have to purchase a new computer with a Pentium to get the full effect. a few years earlier with 3.1, the buzz about needing a 386 to run it well. Come on people, this is par for the course. NOTHING NEW TO SEE HERE... Study your history, learn from it. if you can't do that, take one lesson from an easier read, the hitchhikers guide to the galaxy, "Don't Panic!"
What's purple and commutes? An Abelian grape.
They could easily push out a renamed version of Vista and call it Windows7.
Msft counting: 1, 2, 3, 4, 95, 98, 2000, 2003, 7
Actually it's much more complicated than that. When you consider that msft has an NT line, and until recently had a DOS line, and a server line.
The dos line of windows goes 1, 2, 3 . . then msft pulls the 'ol switcheroo and the NT line picks up at 3.5. Then at the same time, msft also pulls the 'ol switcheroo on the number of their dos based windows line: 1, 2, 3 . . . 95.
Almost as if msft is trying to trick people into thinking that next upgrade to win 3.1 is win 3.5, when in fact the upgrade is to dos based windows in win 95.
Then msft pulls the same 'ol switcheroo again: 95, 98 . . -switheroo- and msft comes out with win2k. Again the NT line picks up where the dos line leaves off. Strange, isn't it? And again, at the same time, msft changes the number scheme of dos based window's line. Now, instead of years, msft switched to letters, i.e. 95, 98, ME.
I was at a Microsoft/HP sponsored event this monday where Windows 2008 was introduced. Some responses from the attendees when the MS presenter was looking for audience interaction: - "Who is using HP servers" : 50 out of 100 hands - "Who is using MS clusters" : 15 out of 100 hands - "Who is using Terminal Services" : 30 out of 100 hands - "Who is using Citrix" : 20 out of 100 hands and then, when comparing Vista security features with Windows 2008 security features - "Who is using Vista" : *5* out of 100 hands ! That was one very awkward moment for the Microsoft guys in the room. In the audience there was a sense of relief that they weren't the only company that hadn't implemented Vista yet over a year after launch, despite all marketing efforts... And everyone knew those inflated numbers came from OEM installs on new hardware. Maybe MS is cutting their losses and coming to terms with the fact that Vista will never amount to much in the real world. Atypical though...
Windows 7 will be released sometime in 2013-2014. You know, about 6 or 7 years after Vista release.
\
Funny, my friend has a G4 1.5GHz with 2gigs and it is slower than a snail. The experience I seem to have taken from OSX 10.5 is if you have a PPC just don't bother. It does run a little bit better on a G5 (at least the cheese grate).
Mabe the gy iz tesd anlist? ;-)
No Code Required (tm)
Couldn't stand the weather
So Shadow Volume Copy addresses about 1/2 of what Time Machine does, but does it without requiring a separate volume. Perhaps I've misread, but you don't seem to have any idea what Volume Shadow Copy actually is. You're making statements like "[With Time machine] you can retrieve individual photos, address book records, etc., from your backup" as if VSC were some sort of whole-PC backup drive imager. Whilst Vista does have such a backup tool, it's not the same thing at all as VSC.
Basically, Volume Shadow Copy is a filesystem-level file versioning system. As such, it has many uses, including backups (useful for getting around file locks), System Restore, and allowing any file to be retrieved as it existed at the time any of the snapshots was made (which, I believe, Time Machine can also do). Note that, unlike Time Machine, it is not in itself protection against hard disc failure, since the previous versions are an integral part of the file metadata, rather than being a copy of the file stored on a seperate hard drive. Obviously, though, it can be used by backup programs to create external drive backups.
(By the way, from your use of "So VSC addresses about 1/2 of what Time Machine does...", you'd think that VSC had been invented in response to Time Machine, rather than preceeding it by a good five years...)
What's purple and commutes? An Abelian grape.
Most companies don't sell the same thing for the same client over and over again, unless the good gets consumed or roten.
Rethinking email
So Win ME must've been 'AskJeeves' then, (..by aid of following Your calculatively outlayed standards.)
A horse can't be sick, you know, even if he wants to.
I think I understand what has happened. Microsoft took so long developing Vista to replace XP (which wasn't bad as it was based on 2000 Professional) that the 32 bit version of the operating system has become obsolete by virtue of many computers already being sold with 4Gb of RAM, which 32 bit Vista cannot address. Of course this causes a horrible problem for Microsoft, as Windows XP64 had poor support for hardware drivers causing a number of software compatibility issues.
With 64 bit driver support improving, Microsoft could of cause just encourage the sale of 64 bit versions of the operating system. But the problem is that while this may be suitable for the Professional Market, as company IT departments could see bigger benefits going for broke an installing a complete new network (although there is the risk of them installing Linux as well), the consumer market would have problems with the new operating system as much of the games software will stop working and items such as printers, scanners and other related hardware needing to be replaced. Not good.
So I suspect that Microsoft have come up with the solution that they should of thought of before they launched Vista; a 64 Bit only operating system with a 32 bit mode operating through some akin to VMWare possibly based on XP rather than Vista. The big advantage here is that you can disable all the DRM features in the 32bit mode and make the files unplayable as an attempt to keep up the performance when using the older software, while the main operating system will retain all the horrible DRM that users have learnt to hate, but at least users will not suffer in the performance of 32 bit Vista.
So the conclusion is simple, Microsoft got Vista 32 bit horribly wrong. Trying to support computers that were already obsolete at the time of launch by having a "Home Basic", when XP was still perfect for this market was a huge blunder. By insisting that Vista needed a more powerful computer would have improved the user experience and would have increased sales for the consumer market in the long term. Now what you have got is a half baked operating system that does not deliver enough benefits to justify its existence; hence the need for Windows 7!
Will it be based on Ubuntu? Here's alpha release: http://chomikuj.pl/e404/Galeria/Desktop/windows.png
Of all the places, I'd thought /. would be a bit less likely to fall for this. You know, this old scam that they've been running for at least a decade?
There's nothing to see here. MS is throwing some propaganda at the masses so the abysmal failure of vista doesn't cause them to jump ship and to hold them on board for a while longer. They're trying to engineer things so that every company (they care a lot more about companies than home users) that thinks about switching away from MS, say to Apple or Linux, has at least one IT dude there saying "but win 7 is right around the corner, we should wait for that before making such a big decision".
And that's all there is to it.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
What Microsoft _should_ have done was codename this Windows version as "Windows 7-eleven." That way they could have kept a bunch of current Microsoft traditions. They would have a greater version number than their competitors (xbox 360), the number would make absolutely no versioning sense what so ever (xbox 360, windows xp), and they would have some letters in the version for no reason whatsoever (windows xp.)
Once you start despising the jerks, you become one.
Trademark infringement. Just think all the Europeans who could confuse it with the Wii.
> Nah, if they were going to copy Apple, they'd also needlessly break backwards compatibility.
Uh, I'm suffering MS Vista, and there is no lack of needless backward compatibility breakage. Lot's of application doesn't work any more. Lots of network services doesn't work any more. And the UI has changed pointlessly, trying to find the old network settings is a nightmare.
I had very few problems going from NT 4.0 to XP (after switching away from the Fischer-Price look to classic), and I remembered all the flames against XP. So I thought the flames against Vista was similar, and didn't insist on getting XP on my new laptop.
Boy was I wrong.
My advice: Stay with XP until Windows 7, or at least until a couple of services packs for Vista.
I don't think Vista is at all as bad as ME; Vista is actually useable as an OS, whereas ME was not at all. But they are very similar in the circumstances of their failures. ME followed in the footsteps of a very good OS (98SE) as did Vista (XP SP2; notice that both 98 and XP required service packs/replacement editions to be good). Both utterly failed in the marketplace. Both, however, introduced some great features. ME was the first version of Windows to include System Restore, which was then included in XP. But Vista, for me, has a much longer list of good features than ME. Vista will be mostly remembered as a failure, but its few great features will live on in later releases (Aero, I think, will be great if they can trim down some of the system requirements; it's not nearly as bad resources-wise as people say).
I am glad they have as much faith in Vista as the rest of us have.
That's it? that's your complaint? you're not happy with a common used phrase that people say when they have a lot to do in a short period of time?
Yes time is marching at the same speed, and that's a pretty quick speed if you ask me. dork.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Why does Vista STILL require defragging. We hear that Linux doesn't NEED defragging because it smartly places files. Why can't microsoft eliminate this part of the market. If they aren't, just for the sake of cottage defragging companies, then aren't such companies vampires and saws and such?
http://cbbrowne.com/info/defrag.html
http://www.linuxforums.org/forum/linux-newbie/58320-disk-defragmentation.html
This one challenges Novell's reply:
http://www.novell.com/coolsolutions/qna/15032.html
http://geekblog.oneandoneis2.org/index.php/2006/08/17/why_doesn_t_linux_need_defragmenting
(Oh, BTW, just heard now 17:05 local PST, Yahoo! is scheduled to layoff numerous employees, but it's about 19hour old:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/22/technology/22yahoo.html?bl&ex=1201150800&en=0019b93b4bb1c219&ei=5087
http://news.yahoo.com/fc/Business/Downsizing_and_Layoffs/
)
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
On the other hand, compared to the rate at which MS puts out improvements in their product, the date is indeed "quickly-approaching" --the way a "swiftly-flowing" glacier will outrun continental drift.
Hey, Microsoft, the only reason you're still relevant is because of your massive inertia. Enjoy it while you can, before the rest of us make a quick right-turn at the intersection up ahead.
404555974007725459910684486621289147856453481154 in hex is "You sank my Battleship?"
[GPG key in journal]
No one gives a flying fuck about you, so you can stop now.
This isn't really a "new operating system", it's basically Vista Service Pack 2 (or 3) RENAMED to something else. Vista has been such a bomb that they now probably want to get away from the name Vista - call it something else as quickly as possible and say "hey look, a new OS".
Do you really think they can develop new features faster somehow, and fix more bugs over a given period of time just because it's labelled a "new operating system"? It doesn't really work that way - maaybe sometimes if you really are rewriting something from scratch, but that's hardly the case, and there are also extra overheads to a new OS (e.g. relabelling everything plus a new look and feel) that slow it down. So apart from maybe pushing forward the release of a few new features, whether they call it Vista SP3 or "some new OS" is for the most part semantic.
They may also want to close in on Apple's quicker OS release cycle, by releasing newer 'OSes' faster, but just evolving them slower.
It appears that some of the things you mention aren't problems with Vista itself, but rather problems in other things, not necessarily Microsoft's fault, brought to the fore by Vista's new way of doing things.
Your last two points about performance and XP being its biggest competitor are valid, but could equally have applied to XP when it was released.
The stupid thing is that neither business or users really want a new OS every two years. For starers we need to slow down hardware development so as to slow down OS development. I mean really! who wants to buy new hardware every two year and a new operating system. Ridiculous in my opinion. Thank god for Linux.