Slashdot Mirror
Windows 7 Won't Have Compact "MinWin" Kernel
An anonymous reader points us to an interview Microsoft's Windows 7 development chief, Steven Sinofsky, did with CNet. He reveals that Windows 7 will be a further evolution of Vista, and will lose the rumored MinWin kernel. "We're very clear that drivers and software that work on Windows Vista are going to work really well on Windows 7; in fact, they'll work the same. We're going to not introduce additional compatibilities, particularly in the driver model. Windows Vista was about improving those things. We are going to build on the success and the strength of the Windows Server 2008 kernel, and that has all of this work that you've been talking about. The key there is that the kernel in Windows Server 08 is an evolution of the kernel in Windows Vista, and then Windows 7 will be a further evolution of that kernel as well."
oooooh that was quick.. /marks that one off the list/
shall we have a pool as to what will be next?
(and yes I know powershell was released as an addon)
The current fortune cookie ("User hostile.") at the end of the page is somehow very fitting...
Why would we believe these guys in Redmond again? They have sold us vaporware for decades. They promised the cool new file system in Vista and it was scrapped early in. They are going in the right direction--abandoning the hamstring of backwards compatibility--but who has any faith in Microsoft's ability to execute? I think I know the reason too. Microsoft has always selected the highest rated developers. Well, ratings may judge raw intelligence but not creativity. And it is the latter thing that is in short supply. Microsoft just does not attract creative rule benders. Instead, it attracts go alongs--people who followed the rules and did the right thing all along--which leaves them with high scores on standardized tests but bereft of any creative initiative. This has been my experience, at least.
"..and will lose the rumored MinWin kernel." So in other words, the only thing really going for Windows 7 has been dropped. I feel that many businesses were holding out for Windows 7 to fix all the problems that Vista introduced.. it looks likely that this is not the case. If this shift is confirmed, then I really suspect that a lot of Microsoft houses will begin to dump the platform altogether.
Never email donotemail@WeAreSpammers.com
Great, an article telling us what Windows 7 isn't. While they're at it, somebody should write a story about how it doesn't use the Linux or MacOS kernels either. From the start Microsoft has been telling us that MinWin is an experimental, non-production kernel and that it wouldn't be in Windows 7. Now CNet reports it and its like new news all over again. Yawn.
We saw this only too well with Vista. /. readers) are experiencing.
...'
Now the same with Windows 7. The more and more I hear about it the less I'm inclined to beleive that this new OS release will fix the problems that have been all too evident with Vista ( slow file copy, nagware etc etc etc) that the majority (non
Everything seems to being rushed out. I wonder how many cases of Duct tape are being deivered to Microsoft this month.
Remember the slogan 'The WOW starts
All I here is "WOW is it that bad"
Will it become worse that Vista? That is the $64 Zillion question.
In related news, the US Military is going to build off the success of the Iraw war, the travel industry is going to build off the success of the Titanic and David Letterman is going to build off the funny of this comment.
We're very clear that drivers and software that work on Windows Vista are going to work really well on Windows 7
What, all five of them?
I wrote my first program at the age of six, and I still can't work out how this website works.
Disappointing that the first exciting thing coming out of MS OS in a long time is now not even to be a part of Vista part 2. MinWin had me thinking that MS was starting to change back into the company of its golden era (i.e. late 80s - 90s) when it released operating systems with new features that made one excited to buy the latest and greatest OS.
Oh well, maybe this will enable the year(s) of the Linux on the desktop (smile)?
...now, what exactly?
Not only could the average user not find an advantage in Vista over XP (remember, users rarely care what's under the hood, they just want to use the system), now even geeks won't see a difference between the old and the new system?
Ok, let's be constructive. We heard now what will not be different between Vista and "Windows 7". So what will? Because, well, if it's the same... I'm no marketing guru, but I guess even the marketing guys in Redmond might have a hard time selling the same product again.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Let's see now... MS develops great new technology, but only so far as so that it can be seen what potential it has. MS hypes (to a greater or lesser extent) this new technology. MS explains that actually this new technology won't be used in the next version of MS Windows.
What was that really good filesystem we were going to see in Windows XP, sorry I mean Vista?
Oh right, this time it is because of backwards compatibility, rather then any other reason. But still, people keep saying it, why doesn't MS just dump the crud, go with a great new secure system (MinWin sounded like a good start), and use emulation to support all the old software?
With drivers (the specific reason given here), they could easily have a backwards compatible layer implemented above the microkernal for drivers that needed it.
Meh.
I wank in the shower.
Is there anything actually wrong with the NT6.1 Kernel?
I mean, Vista has it's problems, granted, but can any informed person here state what's so bad about the Kernel itself, since that's what's causing all the fuss??
+1 IDisagreeSoHeMustBeATrollOrAnAstroturferOrAShill
Isn't this slow and steady 'removal of promised features' what got us Vista in the first place?
If firefighters fight fire, and crimefighters fight crime, what do freedom fighters fight? - George Carlin
"drivers and software that work on Windows Vista are going to work really well on Windows 7; in fact, they'll work the same"
Bzzt! Logical inconsistency detected! Abort/retry/fail?
apterous.org
Augh. The entire concept of MinWin has been lost to time. It's NOT a custom kernel. It's NOT a kernel rewrite. It is, and always was, the literal minimal version of Windows. MinWin was never a shipping feature that any customer would care about - in fact in the first iteration it was intended as the first, required, component of Windows embedded - the fully componentized version of Windows.
If my Vista Ultimate is less than a year old, do I get a free upgrade? I have a VERY bad feeling about this.
Goddamned kids! Get off my lawn!
"We're very clear that drivers and software that work on Windows Vista are going to work really well on Windows 7"
Windows 7 will be incompatible with just about every third party application. Any compatibility with other Microsoft will be purely incidental.
"We are going to build on the success and the strength of the Windows Server 2008 kernel"
We're making it an even larger resource hog. Idling, Windows 7 will likely occupy 2 or more cores, and 4GB of ram.
"The key there is that the kernel in Windows Server 08 is an evolution of the kernel in Windows Vista, and then Windows 7 will be a further evolution of that kernel as well."
We're going to try our best to make Windows 7 so convoluted that no one can possibly discover the vast security holes.
Hope this is a bit easier to read.
Heck, as long as they fix the many problems with Vista and make it the product Vista should have been, it will probably sell quite well. In fact, they've practically created a new OS market with all that nice new hardware going out the door with Vista pre-installed: the "Vista replacement market". Currently that huge market need is being satisfied by Windows XP (a sale is a sale), Linux, and (if people get fed up enough and switch hardware) Mac OS X.
Who would have thought Microsoft could have figured out a way to sell *two* Windows licenses per machine (one for Vista, and one XP license when people downgrade)? It's brilliant! Well, as long as too many people don't switch to other alternatives, but en masse migration is a long way off. Still, it would be nice if Microsoft offered a more modern "Vista replacement OS" once Windows XP is completely phased out. Windows 7 could fit that bill.
Well, unless it is so bad people will want to downgrade to Vista. That's a scary thought.
M$ is hoping for a "WinWin" kernel.
Invenio via vel creo
"We have no idea if drivers and software that work on Windows Vista are going to work at all on Windows 7; in fact, they didn't work on Vista either. We're going to introduce additional incompatibilities, particularly in the driver model. Windows Vista was about perverting those things. We are going to build on the relatively lack of bad publicity of the Windows Server 2008 kernel, and that has all of this work that you've been complaining about. The key there is that the kernel in Windows Server 08 is an incompatible fork of the kernel in Windows Vista, and then Windows 7 will be a further incompatibly forked up fork of that kernel as well."
(I'm sorry)
In my home business, I'm down to ONE program that runs only on Windows (ebay Blackthorne). ONE. (Wine doesn't cut it).
Otherwise, I could be running on OS X for 1 laptop and the PCs would be switched over to Ubuntu or something similiar, maybe RedHat.
Years ago, the internet was hamstringed by many windows only incompatibilities. Firefox evened the playing field there. Most programs were windows only (Quickbooks and Tax Programs can run on Mac now).
Windows grasp in my business is tenuous indeed. Granted, mine is a small business - but aren't many in America?
Plus in Linux, it's simple not to include a webbrowser. You can do the same in Windows, IIRC, (actually just turn it off), but there always seems to be a workaround on firing it up again. Those are one of the biggest productivity killers - my employees should be surfing at home.
It's not that I care about licensing fees, but my operation is too small to hire someone technical who knows how to do everything the right way and I find the Windows boxes need the most babysitting. Time killer = Money Wasted.
Even worse, he then said "We're going to not introduce additional compatibilities", so there's a chance that they're planning to introduce a few incompatibilities.
which is totally what she said
"...and then Windows 7 will be a further evolution of that kernel as well."
Could you guys just go back and evolve Windows 2000 instead?
The Microsoft OS development model:
1. Promise the next version will be a geek's wet dream
2. Over the course of the several years of development, slowly step away from each and every major feature
3. Release the new version which is, at best, a minor upgrade from the previous version.
4. Profit!
We are currently at step 2.
The last thing anyone needs is for Microsoft to be even less open than it already is.
Well, I guess not totally unbelievable. Slashdot readers are capable of complaining about both Vista's biggest non-imaginary problem (hardware compatibility) and in the same post, complaining about the solution (building on the existing core rather than rewriting again, thereby making new driver development much simpler).
I am really happy about this.
as a linux user, (i befriended the penguin after one day of vista) watching MS drop the ball a second time is good news.
i can feel it.....
2010 will be the year of linux on the desktop.
(at least for some people it will be, just like how 2007 was the year of linux on MY desktop)
-I only code in BASIC.-
If you read the entire piece, that is what he said in answer ANOTHER question, but when asked directly- What was this idea then that got talked about in terms of a kind of minimum kernel? Sinofsky: Well, why don't we stick at a higher level today, because I think that I don't want to really dive into the implementation details today. It's still out there.
/LabMonkey09
Windows 7 = Vista 1.1
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
Am I the only one who's leaving system administration over Vista?
It's being rammed down our throats right now and it's just way too awful. It's actually the reason I'm quitting my sysadmin job and am going back to college for a non-computer related degree this fall.
If Microsoft were to break backwards compatibility, it would first and foremost mean that all current windows users would evaluate the opposition. And to beat the competition Microsoft would have to offer better quality at a better price. From scratch, from day one. Yeah right.
This is the exact reason why Microsoft keeps extending its flawed product while pretending to fix it.
Stop the brainwash
Nonsense, .NET is quite possibly Microsofts one winning strategy in the programming language world.
.NET, I don't see it going away any time soon.
.NET compatible version of Python. That's bordering on seriously cool.
I'm guessing you haven't used it, since you mention hearing it's dying, but not your own experience with it. You should give it a go, it's actually rather nice in its c# form.
Given that it is compatible with both Linux and Mac versions of
While your at it, try IronPython, the
A learning experience is one of those things that say, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.' - D. Adams
If it's just a small evolution of the existing kernel, shouldn't it be Windows 6.2 instead of Windows 7?
On the other hand Microsoft has never been logical with version numbers, Word 2 -> 5 -> 97 -> XP -> 2007. Exponential growth seems to be what they're aiming for.
Erik Dalén
Of course the drivers and software that run on vista are going to run on Windows 7. Clearly, all they're going to do is rebrand Vista, change some eye candy, and pray it sells thistime around!
They'd be doing it now, but they need to wait long enough that people will believe they've done some actual work on it.
Don't let THEM immanentize the Eschaton!
Why, can't find jobs as a Unix, web server or even plain networks administrator?
Computers != Microsoft.
SAN FRANCISCO, Redmond, Friday (UnGadget) - With Vista(tm) just out the door, Microsoft is drawing up plans to deliver its followup, codenamed Windows 7, by the end of 2009^W2010. That would be a much faster turn-around than Vista, which shipped more than five years after Windows XP.
... Except Vista, of course. That's pretty good. But Windows 7 is just so amazing. Wow(tm)! It's the most fantastic thing ever. Incredible. Mac OS 10.4 can't possibly hold a candle to it."
Vista's uptake has been stupendous, with copies flying off the shelves and midnight queues on release day turning into major street riots, police deploying water cannons and rubber bullets, to rival the release scenes for the PlayStation 3 and the Zune. It is expected to give a significant boost to the computer hardware industry, per the Mended Windows Theory of economics. But Windows 7 aims even higher.
"We have a radical vision for Windows 7," says Steve Sinofsky, corporate vice-marketer for development. "It's definitely the one to wait for. You should avoid buying any other operating system or even looking at them until you see Windows 7
So what will be the coolest new feature in Windows 7? According to Sinofsky, that's still being worked out. "We're going to look at a fundamental piece of enabling technology. Maybe it's hypervisors, or a new user interface paradigm for consumers, or rotating cubes like in Ubuntu, or WinFS, which is definitely due to ship with Windows NT 4 in 1994. Or whatever Apple puts in Mac OS 10.6, really. Hell, I dunno. What's really shiny?"
The much-derided Digital Rights Management system in Vista will be worked over. "We'll be including user-downloadable 'tilt bits,' which you can configure to your own liking. It'll require every user to supply a blood sample for DNA analysis, but of course that's only if you want to play *premium* content."
Independent bloggers Wiki Jelliffe, Patrick Durusau and Alex Brown were incontinent in their praise. "I am so excited about $NEXT_VERSION of Windows. It will surely go beyond just solving all of the problems with $CURRENT_VERSION, it will be an entirely new paradigm. Forget about security problems, that will be all fixed with $NEXT_VERSION. And they?ll finally be ridding themselves of $ANCIENT_LEGACY_STUFF. Also there will be $DATABASE_FILESYSTEM. It?ll be awesome! I wonder how $NEXT_VERSION will compare to $NEXT_NEXT_VERSION."
"It's too early for me to talk about it," added Sinofsky. "But over the next few months I think you're going to start hearing more and more."
http://rocknerd.co.uk
Can someone point out where in the article it actually says that MinWin will not be included?
Yah. Windows Vista has been a bit of a learning experience for them. What they discovered is that the popular press, overflowing with security concerns, was not entirely representative of their customer base. Their customer base does want security, but they by no means want their security ahead of compatibility... or even convenience, for that matter.
Vista's mistakes are understandable from a certain point of view.
Really, they should take a major hint from apple. Go ahead and make major transitions, but use virtualization to bridge the gap. Under no circumstances break compatibility.
C//
By it either by using compatibility layers like Wine (which reaching a 1.0 milestone) or using virtual machines like VirtualBox, VMWare, Xen, etc... (I saw the "seamless integration" mode of VMWare on a MacOS X and its really nice). And these virtual machines are only running out-of-the-box plain Windows on out-of-the-box plain hosts. Imagine what Microsoft could achieve, given that they control the software and can re-design the "free Windows XP / Vista virtual OS" to take special advantage of the system and integrate even better.
I think the main reason they're not doing it is exactly that :
they maintain their market monopoly by leveraging the lock-in people are experiencing because of thousand of legacy Windows applications that they depend on.
If Microsoft go the "Virtual OS" route, they'll suddenly bring to the general population's attention that their software runs perfectly inside virtual machines. The users would suddenly realise they might NOT be forced to pay once again a Microsoft upgrade tax. They could use a well integrated virtual machine on which ever OS they chose and simply keep their old Windows version for which they've already bought a license anyway to run their legacy applications inside a virtual machine.
Suddenly Microsoft would be at risk of seeing masses of users switching to VMWare fusion running on Macs or the then descendants of EEE PCs (which, I suspect, by then could have enough horse power for a virtual machine. Although maybe not a Vista one)
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Dude, where do you work that is "forcing it down your throat"? I've seen no business Vista use (granted I'm not exactly in the business of surveying other businesses about their OS choices). My impression is that Vista is nearly non-existent in the corp arena. Perhaps you could get a job....anywhere else, and thus not have to worry about dealing with Vista as a sysadmin. I'm also puzzled how being a sysadmin has anything to do with Vista. Normally sysadmin implies server mgt. and the like. I would think of dealing with Vista as desktop support or something. Anyway, not important, just curious. In the end, "leaving system administration" over Vista is idiotic. If you like sysadmin and you're good at it, get another job administering systems you enjoy (Linux, Unix, Windows Server, etc.). I didn't see many sysadmins leaving in droves over Windows ME.
We're rolling it out, even though none of the IT staff (just the manager) wants to. We just see it as being a hassle -- retraining the staff as well as ourselves -- with no real benefit, as all the software anyone needs to use works fine on XP.
Not to mention that we'll now be running an OS which contains code specifically designed to prevent the computer from working. We've already had one system fail to activate using our key management server, and we've only rolled out half a dozen. In a perverse way, I'm actually looking forward to when every desktop is running Vista and then decides it's not activated and nobody can do any work while we try to fix a problem caused by code that shouldn't be there in the first place. A high profile screwup like that could be the death knell for shitty license activation schemes.
Sorry to burst your bubble, but if every machine in your organization suddenly decides its not authorized and refuses to boot, it won't help you at all. The IT staff will be blamed even if they recommended against it. We did the same thing with regards to MS Exchange at a place I worked at a few years ago. The company hired a new VP for Tech, and he was a seagull manager (fly in, shit all over everything and then fly out again) who had no idea what was what. He insisted we move to MS Exchange and easily sold it to the top execs because of the stupid scheduling feature. We spent probably 250k or more in upgrades and licensing. We replaced one reliable Linux box with 2 Top end servers, a DB server, 3 expensive tape back up units and a loadbalancing setup, and it was no more reliable than the linux box, but boy could you schedule a meeting easily :(
When it went down, we had the boss of the company standing in the center of the IT space screaming out that it was costing the company $10k a minute when the email was down (he worked it out apparently). The VP then left the company a month after we were done implementing things.
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
It first came in with IE4's "Desktop Update" for Windows 95, which gave Win95 a sort-of halfway to Win98 look. Win98 was the first MS OS to integrate file browser and web browser without additional software.
I remember installing the IE4 desktop update on my 486/66 with 8Mb RAM, running original Win95a, and it made a BIG impact on performance - suddenly folder windows took 10 seconds to open instead of being nearly instant.
Interestingly, MS appeared to quietly drop it in later IE versions. If IE5 or 5.5 are installed on a clean Win95a, the "desktop update" is not offered as an installation option.
Driver compatibility will come with time as people like Nvidia get their act together.
Streamlining Vista can already be done though, it doesn't have to take a lot of resources unless you want all the eye candy and the resources. I think you still have a valid point, with all the work that went into it you would think it would work faster. Personally I don't notice any lag, but I'm running on new hardware.
It remains to be seen what Windows 7 will offer that will redeem it. The vast majority of people see no reason to go to Vista and as a home user I understand their feelings. As a sysadmin though I understand why Vista is the way it is and how it's desirable for a corporate environment.
It's the same basic issue that developed when the 9x line died and everything moved to NT. We can all agree that the NT model is far superior to the old real-mode model. The problem is that you have a business optimized OS being pushed on home users, in an attempt to make the home users happier you screw the business users and you end up with Vista where no one is happy.
Of course if the whole thing was more modular then it would be less of an issue. Then Microsoft would be doing what the Unix world has been doing for 40 years and what Apple caught on to a few years ago.
Big companies take a long time to adapt though, look how long it took IBM to recover from a failing business model, almost 10 years. I think Windows 7 will be Microsoft's wake-up call if Vista isn't already. Execs have a habit of being hard-headed about stupid things though so I wouldn't be surprised if that was holding things up.
Hey guys - I'm a program manager on the Windows Server team, and having been a long-time lurker on slashdot, wanted to point to the most cogent public explanation of what MinWin is.
Eric Traut's speech at UIUC got a lot of attention but has been largely misinterpreted. The interview at http://edge.technet.com/Media/567/ explains the relationship between Server Core and MinWin, and if you're interested in the subject matter, is worth watching (at the very least, for the inadvertent use of night vision by the cameraman).
Brendan
- Well, that's a great question.
- There are a number of elements of the question...
- In a way that's a different question.
- What I think I want to say is what I just said...
- I didn't actually say that.
I know that I've just pulled some quotes out of context and sometimes that makes things look worse than they are, but does anyone else see my problems? Do you have a hard time even reading the answers? Very disappointing but, again not unexpected of Microsoft.KangarooBox - We make IT simple!
It was never a filesystem.
It was always a metadata layer built on top of NTFS.
I'm not going to do the research on this to provide links, but I'm 99.9% sure of this.
The bennies were an ubiquitous API and unified approach to this stuff, that any 3rd party software could use, and even end users directly could manipulate it.
The problem is it may not be relevant anymore. With horsepower and disk space so high nowadays compared to then, the simple brute force of the currently used desktop search systembs by MS and google work well and dont require a revolutionary product.
Nope, you're not the only one. I'm switching from sysadmin to go do multimedia school next year (but in management, not production.)
Vista is so complex that normal users and even sysadmins are suffering. While I'm that navigating through the labyrinth that is Vista's various control panels and settings gets easier with time, it mainly shows an almost total lack of communication between the various development teams at Microsoft.
I also imagine that Microsoft's lack of direction is making them panic. Kicking out various managers, like Allchin, but keeping king size buffoons like Ballmer only make the situation worse. Not knowing how they can improve on the disaster that is Vista, they variously try to copy:
a) Google,
b)Apple,
and when the going gets really rough, even
c) Linux.
The touch screen thingamabob they demoed today must have Apple employees laughing so hard they must be crying. If you think that Vista has enormous hardware requirements, and it really does, can you imagine what that touch screen thingy will require, which is in reality, just Microsoft trying to do a vapourware job on Apple.
The problem is that the media have grown up (partly at least). No one is going to fall for MS vapourware until Microsoft produces concrete implementations on commodity hardware. Apple's iPhone can do all that on an embedded CPU...
Champaign is the city in Illinois. Champagne (DOC) is the French sparkling beverage.
you had me at #!