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Windows Is Dead – Long Live Midori?

Posted by timothy on from the what-about-midori-linux? dept.

parvenu74 writes "A story from Infoworld is suggesting that the days of Windows are numbered and that Microsoft is preparing a web-based operating system code-named Midori as a successor. Midori is reported to be an offshoot of Microsoft Research's Singularity OS, an all-managed code microkernel OS which leverages a technology called software isolated processes (SIPs) to overcome the traditional inter-thread communications issues of microkernel OSes."

11 of 695 comments (clear)

  1. Prediction by kalpol · · Score: 5, Interesting

    web-based == subscription model.

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    12:50 - press return.
    1. Re:Prediction by Hatta · · Score: 5, Interesting

      How does one have a web-based operating system anyway? If you're running your OS inside a web browser, what is the web browser running on? Is it just turtles all the way down?

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    2. Re:Prediction by MightyYar · · Score: 5, Interesting

      If the replacement rate for a desktop computer is 3 years, and everyone buys for $250 and Windows for $130 - that's less than $400 over 3 years... or just over $10 monthly.

      If I had a website that offered full MS Office functionality and compatibility for $10/month... wanna bet I'd have some takers? They'd need 366 million customers to equal their current revenue using this model.

      Worldwide, PC sales are supposed to grow to over 250 million/year by 2010, so while their target would be ambitious - it is feasible if they could rope roughly half of new PC buyers into this new model.

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      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    3. Re:Prediction by negRo_slim · · Score: 4, Interesting

      If I had a website that offered full MS Office functionality and compatibility for $10/month...

      I concur, there would be probably be tremendous interest. I just wonder if it being a Microsoft branded product wouldn't be a detriment to it's success as opposed to it being judged purely on the merits of what it offers. But allow me to play the devil's advocate for a moment and suggest for gamers this might not be such a bad thing. (Potentially) Less OS on the hard disk could mean lower resource utilization and I'm sure a few enterprising users would find further ways to enhance performance maybe something a kin to tuning current Window's services so as to prevent unnecessary network access?

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      On the Oregon Cost born and raised, On the beach is where I spent most of my days
    4. Re:Prediction by nizo · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Wanna check your email? That'll be $1. Wanna post to ./?? That'll be $2.

      [after searching Clippy pops up]

      I'm sorry, I was unable to process your credit card number on file. To see all of the search results, please enter a valid credit card number.

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      I Am My Own Worst Enemy
    5. Re:Prediction by Pincus · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The 366 million seems ambitious, but an online model would also curtail some piracy. The equivalent of copying my Windows disk would be to give out my i-Windows login, meaning they would just use my desktop.

      Of course, why not, especially if the cost is high, share it between users? Especially if it will support multiple desktops, won't every household maintain one OS for multiple users?

    6. Re:Prediction by Lord+Apathy · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Well it all depends on how you use it. Back when I was married to The Bitch we had one master computer running linux that we both used. Sharing time on it was a bitch because I used it for work, and she used it for play. To solve this issue I rounded up a old '486, a 20 MB HD, and a 15" display. Piece of crap. I installed a very slimmed down linux, just enough to boot and connect the X server to central host.

      She had her play computer and I had a work computer and everything was fine.

      Actually there is was a interesting turn on that set up. After we separated her and some of her cult buddies broke in to my house and stole that X terminal I made her. I found out through a friend that they did that because they didn't me reading the email she left on "it" or having access to her icq logs. I found it very amusing that she had stole the wrong computer.

      And if you wondering. Yes, I did look through the icq logs and email. I did show them to the judge and use them in court. I found out her nuttiness was more nutty then I ever imagined. I found out she had been abusing my son and what she had planed. So if your going to bitch about her privacy or some such BS, save it.

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      Supporting World Peace Through Nuclear Pacification

  2. Defense against Linux boxes? by Sockatume · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The Eee and its ilk have shown that people are willing to buy Windowsless boxes, which is an affront to Microsoft's business model. You have to wonder if Midori is a "plan B" to allow them to continue to get revenue from Linux users. Alan, Bob and Clarence may well be willing to pay $10 a month for "Windows access" on their Eees if it lets them use Office, and this way Microsoft have a guaranteed revenue stream whatever OS people actually buy with their machine. Especially if it's agressively marketed and bundled.

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    No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
  3. Re:Thin Client? by mlts · · Score: 4, Interesting

    It seems that every ten years, someone re-invents the thin client.

    First it was dumb terminals connected to a mainframe, then to a serial port box so one can connect to a UNIX box.
    Then came XStations which used various (direct, indirect, broadcast) forms of XDMCP to find a host to download microcode and run apps from.
    Then, it was JavaStations where people talked about fast broadband access to stuff on the ISP's server, and not to worry about all their private documents being stored offsite.

    This just seems like more of the same, perhaps an offshoot of cloud computing. It will work for a couple niches here and there, but as a whole, Net based operating systems will fail, as people want to keep their stuff private on their own systems.

    Same disadvantages apply. Security of stored files for example -- I trust my external TrueCrypt encrypted drive that uses both a long passphrase and a set of keyfiles a lot more to securely store my Word documents than I do some random ISP's computer.

  4. Trivia ... by Bob-taro · · Score: 5, Interesting

    "Midori" is Japanese for "green". It is also a common female first name.

    I don't know how either would apply to an OS, unless it has some connection to this.

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    Prov 9:8 Do not rebuke mockers or they will hate you; rebuke the wise and they will love you.
  5. Some confusion about Singularity / Midori by argent · · Score: 4, Interesting

    With the ability today to run an OS, applications -- and even an entire PC desktop of applications -- in a virtual container using a hypervisor, the need to have the OS and applications installed natively on a PC is becoming less and less, said Brian Madden, an independent technology analyst.

    Brian Madden is either talking about something else, or he's confused by references to hypervisors elsewhere. Midori will run under Hypervisors... but as one possible deployment of the OS, not as an essential part of the system. Singularity is more like ".NET" taken to the next level, with the entire OS running without hardware memory protection (let alone hypervisors), so it can run anywhere... even as a module inside another application... without any specific hardware support.