The Empire In Decline?

An anonymous reader writes "Pundits continue to weigh in on Steve Sinofsky's sudden exit from Microsoft (as executive head of Windows Division, he oversaw the development and release of Windows 7 and 8). SemiAccurate's Charlie Demerjian sees Microsoft headed for a steep decline, with their habit of creating walled gardens deliberately incompatible with competitors' platforms finally catching up to them. Few PC users are upgrading to Windows 8 with its unwanted Touch UI, sales of the Surface tablet are disappointing, and few are buying Windows Phones. On the Sinofsky front, Microsoft watcher Mary Jo Foley is willing to take the Redmond insiders' word that the departure was more about Sinofsky's communication style and deficiencies as a team player than on unfavorable market prospects for Windows 8 and Surface. Meanwhile, anonymous blogger Mini-Microsoft had suspiciously little to say."

Comments

Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

I wouldn't count them out just yet. Ironically, they are just know starting to produce technically good products. If only they would embrace interoperability they would be golden.

Re:Still going

[Penguinisto]

I wouldn't count them out due to one word: Inertia.

Enterprises still use the stuff, and will use it for quite a good amount of time. This gives Microsoft something that few others have: time to correct its screwups.

The debacle of Vista would have killed most other tech companies, but thanks to inertia and near-total monopoly, Microsoft had room to breathe while it fixed its messes. I think the same story will hold true here. This is similar to Intel having a chance to clean up all that NetBurst/RAMBUS bullcrap when the Pentium 4 first came out, as an example.

Now how long and how much breathing room? Hard to say, especially now that the competition has stepped up its game by quite a bit more than they had in 2006, and with mobile consumer devices forming a huge wildcard.

Re:Still going

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Hey!

Microsoft will sell to "Enterprise".

GM will ALWAYS fleet cars.

They just won't make a sedan you'd buy, yourself. Mazda and VW will trounce the value/dollar every day of the week.

Re:Still going

[Burning1]

This isn't really true at all. A GM car is fine in a fleet car - it has a dealer network, a steering wheel, instrumentation, pedals, and a shift lever... Just like every other car.

If Microsoft loses the consumer market, it will lose the corporate market as well. Microsoft owns the corporate desktop market, because users are familiar with it's products. Although it might be cheaper from a licensing and maintenance perspective to put everyone on Ubuntu, the cost of re-training all your employees to use LibreOffice and Unity greatly exceeds the cost of licensing the products.

If however, users become more familiar with another platform, it would start to make much more sense to simply employ that platform in your corporate space. Consider ChromeOS; it's cheap, easy, and readily available. If users become comfortable with that platform, there's absolutely no reason why most of the corporate desktop work couldn't be done on that platform. Microsoft would be in trouble.

Re:Still going

[SomePgmr]

I don't know about everyone else, but the users where I'm at are way more comfortable with using something different than they've ever been. Sales staff push for services like salesforce. All kinds of users gripe that they'd prefer to work on a mac, both on the desktop and with laptops.

The remaining mental lock-in nowadays, where I come from, is really just Exchange+Outlook. Of course you can get Outlook to work with other combinations of services, and you can use different clients with Exchange, but what the users are used to is the utility afforded by using the two together.

Obviously this is just what I see at work... your situations likely differ.

Re:Still going

[snadrus]

As a former admin, I can say I've never heard of such training. For advanced 3d drafting software we sent people away for a week, but for office software people just figured it out. I also sat through the IBM shift to OpenOffice and Firefox, both occurred without training to 100,000+ people.
Nobody is trained to use consumer websites, but they still get considerable use. The web is like touch interfaces: Developers are wary of off-screen features (right-click, long, tap, etc). As these better rules roll out, the next major UI platform is going to be the web (on any architecture), because all people need is their software.

Re:Still going

[man_of_mr_e]

The article is a huge sham, and makes all kinds of claims that it simply can't back up.

For example, the claim that Windows phones aren't selling. They've only been on the market for a couple of days, and 3 phones are on the market, and only one vendor has them. There is absolutely NO way to know whether or not Windows phones are going to be popular or not.

Based on initial reaction, however, and long lines outside ATT stores, it looks like they're off to a good start.

Likewise, the Surface tablets are only available online and in a few dozen stores so far. So there's no possible way to judge how well they will do overall once they're available everywhere. Plus, the more powerful Surface Pro's aren't even on the market yet, and many of the third party devices (like Sony's new models) have yet to ship.

Finally, we can see tell-tale signs of bias in the writing. "Unwanted touch interface"? Really? Who doesn't want a touch interface in a tablet? or Phone? And lots of people seem very keen on having a touch interface in their desktops.

There is an interesting class of internet troll that loves to find any outlet they can to claim that Touch in windows is unwanted, and this seems to be the case here.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

I wouldn't count them out due to one word: Inertia.

Microsoft has a monopoly on two things: Desktop OS and Desktop Productivity. Every other market (Server OS, Database, Consoles, etc) has healthy competition.

Microsoft's problem is that the concept of the "Desktop" is in question. We are still going to use monitors & keyboards for a long time, but we're also going to be using tablets and phones/pdas. We want all of our data and work and entertainment to transfer seamlessly from one device to another. On top of that, we're going to want our session state to transfer, so we can resume things right where we left off. We want total hardware agnosticism.

Accomplishing this will require a UI revolution on the order of what windowing did to the command line, and nobody has invented it yet. The answer may not even come from one of the established players (although MS, Apple, and Google have the biggest head start). Whoever gets it right will win big.

Inertia only helps if your market is stable. Microsoft is, and probably always be, the King of the Desktop, in the same way that IBM was King of the Mainframe. Their problem is that their empire might be built on quicksand.

Re:Still going

[j00r0m4nc3r]

Investors don't care about inertia. They care about growth. Microsoft really has nowhere left to grow, at least nowhere that hasn't already been solidly claimed by another company. Their stock has been flat for 10 years. That's a long fucking time. Who wants to invest in a company without much real visible future growth potential? So the investors will pull out, and MS will coast on "inertia" for a while, but then what? What's their long-term plan for growth? I don't see them competing effectively in any market, at least with Ballmer at the wheel.

Re:Still going

[tuppe666]

The article is a huge sham, and makes all kinds of claims that it simply can't back up. For example, the claim that Windows phones aren't selling.

I'm pretty confident that Windows phones aren't selling. in fact its still being outsold by Symbian and Bada...and RIM. Moving exclusivity to windows Phone destroyed Nokia.

Re:Still going

[gmuslera]

The problem with inertia is of using a familiar product. Once Microsoft forces you to use a different, unfamiliar product, that could even not fit in your way to use your computer, then alternatives start to play in the same field, Native desktop apps don't have the same prevalence than before, and the look and feel will change anyway, why not try something else?

Re:Still going

[JonySuede]

Well here we give in house MS Office training to those who request it, but we are a University and we give that training as a part of the business administration cursus, so that training only cost us the trainee time.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows 7.x phones are not selling. Windows 7.x phone adopters are burned by the fact they are not upgrade able to Windows 8 phones. Windows phones went from a 12% market share to a 2%.

I just don't know, but I think the writing is on the wall on this one.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

I was in a AT&T store Saturday. There was no long line. There was no line at all. There was no one I saw buying a windows phone.

What there was was a display with maybe 15 androids, and 3 ms phones. Curiously no where on this display were the words "Microsoft" or "windows". Nada. It looked like there was a deliberate attempt to confuse the issue.

Re:Still going

[man_of_mr_e]

Why would there be lines several days AFTER the phones went on sale?

Re:Still going

[man_of_mr_e]

You're talking about previous versions of Windows Phone. Windows Phone 8 is a different OS, and the phones are actually decent now (hardware wise, on par with top android phones).

Windows Phone 8 has only been on sale a few days, so there is no possible way you could be confident in that.

Re:Still going

[MightyYar]

Ironically, they are just know starting to produce technically good products.

I'm no Microsoft fan (Windows 8 has my ire up currently), but some versions of Windows have been solid. Windows 98SE was a very nice blend of stability and speed. Windows 2000 was bulletproof. Windows XP was very strong after SP2. Windows 7 is actually a nice upgrade as well.

Office has a more checkered past. It has improved with age, but the ribbon gives it a major ding.

Re:Still going

[hairyfeet]

Its not just inertia, its the fact that other than the "Star Trek rule" stinkers (WinME/Vista/8) most folks? they are quite happy with Windows. And why shouldn't they be? After SP 2 WinXP was good, in fact its still being used over a decade after release because many are happy with it, and Win 7 is a damned good, rock solid OS with several features that make your work easier, breadcrumbs, jumplists, and superfetch just to name a few, so why shouldn't people just stick with what they like? XP is still good until 2014, Win 7 is good until 2020, why try to fix what ain't broke?

But as somebody that sells PCs and has since Win 3.1 I am really getting tired of the pundits and their "Post PC" horseshit, they have NO clue as to what is REALLY happening on the ground and nobody is replacing their PCs for a fricking cellphone!

I'll be happy to tell you what IS happening and what IS reality is...my dad. My dad is the perfect example of what is called a "typical user" today, he surfs, chats, uses FB, burns DVD, runs his Quickbooks, watches videos, he is as typical as you can possible get of an average Windows PC user. So when the price dropped on the Phenom IIs I thought to myself "Well it has been a few years since I built that cheap AM2 Phenom quad for my dad, maybe its time to build him a new system" so I set his PC to log his usage for a couple of weeks, then I came back and looked at the data. What did I find? 45%, that is what I found. Now we are talking a Phenom I with the TLB bug and a max speed of 2.2Ghz and the MOST he stressed that quad is 45% and that turned out to be a hung browser tab.

So the PC and MSFT are NOT going away, but when AMD and Intel hit the thermal wall and decided to switch from the MHz war to the core war the chips they produced, hell even for the low end like the Athlon triples or the first gen Core based Pentiums on the laptops, are just sooooo damned powerful the users just aren't stressing them so they just ain't needing replaced nearly as often.

I predict we have less than 3 years before we see mobile, which TFA thinks is to blame (Protip: Its not) have the same damned thing happen to it that happened to X86. i mean look at what is going on, they've switched to the core wars over MHz wars, and just like with X86 you are seeing a race to the bottom with even the low end starting to sport 1.2Ghz dual cores. i predict this time next year you'll see Android 5 dual core 7 inch tablets for $50, 10 inch quads for around $150, and just like with X86 everybody that wants one will have multiple units and will find there isn't any point in upgrading. The only except will be Apple, but as I've said before what saves Apple from hard times is they are NOT a tech company that makes fashionable devices but a FASHION company that just happens to make tech devices. That is why the only items you see people line up and camp out for are Air Jordans and Apple products, using last year's iPhone is as unhip as wearing last year's Jordans.

So MSFT and Windows won't be going anywhere, they just have to accept that people aren't gonna toss machines every 3 years like they did during the MHz wars. Hell as a gamer i used to have to replace my machine every year and a half like clockwork, now I'm gaming on an AMD Hexacore that was released nearly 3 years ago and see ZERO reason to upgrade more than the GPU. Hell even my low end system for the past five years have been a minimum of a triple core with 4gb of RAM and 500gb HDDs, what is the average user gonna do to slam that chip? Not a damned thing, which is why they'll hang onto it for years, if it ain't broke....

Re:Still going

[man_of_mr_e]

You're right. Windows Phone 7.x phones didn't sell well. We're not talking about Windows Phone 7 phones though.

We're talking about Windows Phone 8 phones, and those are totally different devices.

Absolutely, the 7.x adopters were burned. But then, most phones are typically not that upgradeable anyways. You're lucky these days if you get one minor revision of the OS in Android phones. I've been waiting for Jellybean for months on my Galaxy SIII, and that's top of the line.

If you phone Is more than a year old, it's unlikely to be upgraded, although in many cases you can burn your own roms to them.

Windows phone 7 devices just didn't have enough hardware to run Windows Phone 8.

Re:Still going

[AlphaWolf_HK]

I think the complaint is touch interfaces on the desktop.

Windows 8 overall has some nice changes (I am currently running it myself) however what sucks are the so called "immersive" apps. Basically, any app that comes from the windows store.

When you have a large (in my case, 46") high resolution display, having apps take up the entire screen is downright stupid. Overlapping windows allow you to view multiple different things simultaneously, even if they aren't provided by the same app. This is why windows replaced DOS for the work environment (DOS mainly survived as long as it did due to being more efficient for games at the time)

The idea of throwing out overlapping windows in favor of an "immersive" experience is just...stupid. If this really is the future of windows, then windows has no future in the workplace, and probably no future anywhere else either as a result.

This is coming from somebody who has a traditionally favorable view of windows.

Re:Still going

[westlake]

The debacle of Vista would have killed most other tech companies, but thanks to inertia and near-total monopoly, Microsoft had room to breathe while it fixed its messes.

Vista peaked with a global market share of 20 to 25 percent.

Not half bad considering that most installs can be traced back to the retail purchase of a fairly muscular and expensive 64 bit OEM Home Premium system bundle.

Re:Still going

[redneckmother]

... Although it might be cheaper from a licensing and maintenance perspective to put everyone on Ubuntu, the cost of re-training all your employees to use LibreOffice and Unity greatly exceeds the cost of licensing the products.

It is surprising to me (jaded as I am) that businesses and governments fail to recognize that the conversion effort and retraining needed to shift between the recent (read: last decade or more) "upgrades" of MS products is no different than that required to move to open platforms.

I moved from MS to Linux (and associated open applications) many years ago. I have saved hundreds (nay, thousands) of dollars in license fees by doing so. Open data formats have saved my bacon on more than one occasion. I've been able to rescue and reformat data for my friends and employers with open source applications on many occasions.

Re:Still going

[Burning1]

Cost of training is in lost productivity, not necessarily on actual training courses. I'm an admin with 10 years of experience. My productivity would suffer significantly if you gave me a Mac or asked me to manage an unfamiliar distro. A week of lost productivity would easily cost my company thousands of dollars worth of my time.

Spread that out over a company of hundreds, or thousands and the numbers really add up.

Re:Still going

[man_of_mr_e]

There is a huge misconception on this. I don't know who came up with this "Immersive experience" BS, but I've never heard Microsoft refer to it as that, and it's not the point of it all.

First, understand that Metro apps are designed to run in 3 environments, Desktops, Tablets, and Phones. All current Tablets and Smart Phones have single app per screen interfaces.

The original reason for this was so that app developers did not have to worry about different devices with different resolutions. That ship has long since sailed, but the app format persists.

The biggest reason, however, is that dragging windows around does not work well with touch interfaces. So making them full screen, with "sliding" windows based on gestures and taps is a lot easier to manipulate. This is the primary reason this interface is still the norm for touch devices.

This is also why they have large icons and buttons, because tiny menus just don't work with touch. Microsoft already tried that, several times, and it didn't work. Apple's approach took off wildly, and has been a great success.

So, Metro apps are designed to be used by both Desktops with keyboards and mice, and touch devices (some of which are also desktops).

FYI, Metro allows you to run two apps, using the Metro snap feature.

Remember, this is a 1.0 OS (yes, Metro.. also known as WinRT is an entire new OS running alongside Win32) and as with all 1.0 products, if you waited to release it until you had every feature you wanted, it would never get released.

Expect the next version to significantly improve multi-tasking ability.

Re:Still going

[tuppe666]

You're talking about previous versions of Windows Phone. Windows Phone 8 is a different OS, and the phones are actually decent now (hardware wise, on par with top android phones).

Windows Phone 8 has only been on sale a few days, so there is no possible way you could be confident in that.

2013 will be the year of Windows Phone :)

Re:Still going

[man_of_mr_e]

Maybe not, but it's certainly going to be a lot better for Windows Phone than previous years.

Nobody, not even Microsoft, expects Windows Phones to beat iPhone's popularity, or surpass Android in total units. But, it could put a huge dent in both's market share.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

Excellent point, sir.

Re:Still going

[Raenex]

So the investors will pull out, and MS will coast on "inertia" for a while, but then what?

Then they either succeed or fail, like any other company. They don't need investors with all the revenue they have.

What's their long-term plan for growth?

They are trying to transition into mobile. They still have a chance to convert their desktop users to mobile.

I don't see them competing effectively in any market, at least with Ballmer at the wheel.

I don't know why Ballmer gets all this bashing. Yes, he's a chair-throwing, sweaty gorilla yelling, "Developers, developers, developers!" But it's not like he's run the company into the ground, and Gates didn't have the Steve Jobs magic touch when it came to mobile or other consumer devices, either.

Re:Still going

[tuppe666]

But, it could put a huge dent in both's market share.

I'm intrigued how. Microsoft Phone failed when it had positive reviews; Nokia still had reasonable market share, and a plan to convert existing users from Symbian it didn't work. Samsung and HTC and LG [now android exclusive and profitable again] were manufactures that didn't work. It had an opportunity to convert that tiny market share by growing its own group of fanatics; It threw them under the bus with an OS update. Arguing its an improved OS on improved hardware is not enough, iOS and Android both have improved hardware and OS's, and will not stumble. In all likelihood Microsoft will be less successful, and is less resilient to mistakes..

The bottom line though is right now people desire iOS and Android phones...but aren't interested in Windows Phone whatever the version or hardware. The new strategy looks a lot like the old strategy, with the exception of Windows 8 ecosystem [sic], and the treat to OEM's of first party hardware [whatever you think of that]. I personally cannot think of one single compelling reason why my next phone should be windows, and multiple reasons why not, and your arguments reflect that.

Re:Still going

[guruevi]

Really? I would never hire any admin that can't handle at least a handful of OS'es. If there is a new OS, as an admin, I am supposed to learn about it and get some hands-on experience. It's built-in to my job to learn new things.

Re:Still going

[GigaplexNZ]

Everyone talks about growth as the be all and end all. Microsoft is already pretty big. As long as they remain profitable, they don't really need to grow to stay in business.

Re:Still going

[AlphaWolf_HK]

I know the thought process behind forcing the apps to be full screen, but the problem is that this model simply doesn't work for the desktop. Currently, the main reason for having a desktop as opposed to a mobile device (at least, to ma and pa yehaaw) is that a desktop is where you get real work done, e.g. drafting, creating a powerpoint presentation, etc. Touch devices (even with large screens) don't really work too well for that. The keyboard and mouse will be around for a long time to come for this reason. Likewise, the full screen app model simply will not fly on the desktop, that I am certain of.

A perfect example I can think of, is just now when I was entering in configuration commands into some cisco routers, I had three telnet windows open, an excel window which contained subnet layouts and IP addresses, one visio window which contained a physical network topology, another visio window which contained a logical network topology, and a web browser with a command reference page open.

How on earth would I do such a thing using metro? I'm sure you could, but it would be dreadfully slow and downright frustrating compared to being able to have multiple windows open at once. Imagine having to alt-tab through all of those windows each time I need to refer to something else. It would be a nightmare, whereas with overlapping windows I can simply glance at my references rather than figure out how many times I have to press tab in order to get what I am looking for.

While I'm aware of the ability to run two apps alongside one another (I think they might call that "modern UI snap" now? lol) it is really wanting in the face of having multiple windows open. Telnet and excel both depend heavily upon being able to have page width, and not height, which is what metro snap aims for.

Re:Still going

[eco_oce]

... and MS needed a full screen offering to compete with Apple and its full screen Apps in Lion and Mountain Lion.

The logic must be:
typical user == someone on a laptop or 15 - 21 inch monitor
typical user of the near future == someone on a tablet or 15 - 21 inch monitor
Let's give these people full screen apps.

Power user = someone on a laptop or bigger monitor
We'll give them the desktop as another option.

Re:Still going

[Eponymous Coward]

So, Metro apps are designed to be used by both Desktops with keyboards and mice, and touch devices (some of which are also desktops).

Metro works nicely on handheld touchscreen devices. On the desktop? Meh. I have a couple of 2560x1440 panels. Windows knows that I have a mouse and keyboard and the monitors are not touch screens. It should be smart enough to come up with a better UI for this configuration. It's ridiculous that when I open the weather app, it goes full screen. Does Microsoft really believe four million pixels are needed to tell me if it's going to rain tomorrow?

As a developer, Metro sucks. Windows really are invaluable when programming. I want my IDE open, API docs open, the application running, a console tailing a log, and maybe even a chat window or email client running. I have more than enough pixels and I'm running an operating system called "Windows". Why can't I actually have windows?

Re:Still going

[eco_oce]

A perfect example I can think of, is just now when I was entering in configuration commands into some cisco routers, I had three telnet windows open, an excel window which contained subnet layouts and IP addresses, one visio window which contained a physical network topology, another visio window which contained a logical network topology, and a web browser with a command reference page open.

With the greatest respect ... I don't think you are the kind of user Microsoft thinks of in design.

The typical users in my office do one thing at once in maximized windows. Look at outlook, now facebook, now type in word, now facebook, now type in word, now facebook, now outlook, now facebook .....

Each time they jump from full screen app to full screen app

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

Neither did Steve Jobs at the time... that wouldn't happen for another 7 years.

Markets develop. Microsoft didn't.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

"Unwanted touch interface"? Really? Who doesn't want a touch interface in a tablet? or Phone? And lots of people seem very keen on having a touch interface in their desktops.

Tablet, Phone? Great for touch.

Desktop? Absolutely not. Obviously, no one is going to be stupid enough to be touching their screen all day long, but even with a mouse and keyboard, arms are going to get tired quickly enough. Too many mouse movements/distances required to use efficiently.

Re:Still going

[man_of_mr_e]

Samnsung, HTC, and LG are not exclusive to Android. They all have Windows Phone 8 devices, either announced or already shipping.

Check the specs on these:

http://www.samsung.com/global/ativ/ativ_s.html#features

http://www.gsmarena.com/htc_windows_phone_8x-4975.php

People desire iOS and Android phones because Microsoft has done a shit job of marketing Windows Phones. That is changing.

Re:Still going

[tuppe666]

Sorry you should re-read my post. LG used to make windows phones, and was suffering as a result. Like Nokia is but Nokia were stupid enough to go exclusive. They are now Android exclusive and are now profitable again. I said nothing of the other manufacturers.

As for your new claim that Windows Phone is a failure because of marketing I'm not even going to bother to refute. Again re-read my post. Its not great but covers the main point new windows strategy looks like old windows strategy from a worse starting position.

Re:Still going

[Burning1]

You missed the point dude. It's not about whether or not someone is able to learn a new OS, It's about the cost of doing so. No matter how flexible you are, you are going to be slower work in an environment you're not used to. Lost productivity probably costs a lot more than you think.

Re:Still going

[Raenex]

Neither did Steve Jobs at the time... that wouldn't happen for another 7 years.

iPod, iTunes, MacBooks, and the resurgence of the Mac in general all happened well before the iPhone and iPad.

Re:Still going

[Kyusaku Natsume]

Exactly. Everybody talks now about iPhone and iPad because those two products became a money printing machine for Apple, but the original iMac and the eMac were astounding products at its time. After all, the eMac became a consumer product by popular demand, not because Apple expected it to be sold outside the education market.

Re:Still going

[Tough Love]

This gives Microsoft something that few others have: time to correct its screwups.

You mean, enough time to screw up even worse.

Re:Still going

[AlphaWolf_HK]

In my work environment, everybody uses two or even three monitors because they have so many windows open.

Especially when we're working on UCS systems. You'll want the command center window open, in addition to the KVM for the individual virtual machines, as well as your obligatory excel document containing pinning assignments and other notes.

Re:Still going

[BitZtream]

You are not an admin. You are a regurgitator. I'm not trying to be a dick, I just want you to realize where you actually fit in the food chain.

An admin has no trouble shifting to new environments on the fly. He/she doesn't think twice about doing so, its just part of the job. No OS is so different that it matters, even the jump from UNIX to Windows is trivial if you are qualified to call yourself an admin.

Just because you have root on some boxes doesn't make you an admin.

Yes, there is a cost to the switch, but if that cost is significant for a given 'admin' then it shows that you are unable to quickly adapt to a new environment and find the resources you need to complete the job. Windows admin really isn't THAT different now days, the answer to any problem is almost certainly a Google away in any case you're likely to hit. I can safely say that because someone at your level isn't going to be doing anything that hasn't been done a million times before.

In my career, I've dealt with more than one person like you. Not that there is anything wrong with you, but you think you are more capable than you are in one respect while realizing you aren't in others. My typical treatment towards someone like this is to nudge them towards finding a 'higher paying' job else where and get them out of my umbrella. They'll generally fail, but then they also generally get the point and learn the difference, and their next job works out a whole lot better for them. This may not be 'nice', but being nice typically doesnt' get the point across or you would have realized it already.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

He He, I remember the accounting people coming into my dad's office in 1988 and say 10mb hard drive my god you can't use up that kind of space in a lifetime. What they didn't see coming was change, and change things did. Computers changed vastly in a lifetime, even in the lifetime of their accounting software. Within 5 years you had 10mb of ram not a 10mb hard drive! More things were tied in and more reports were required, the os grabbed up more and more, the input devices wanted more and could do more. What your not seeing is what you don't see coming and that is change. change of input devices and output devices and more. Its coming but you don't know where. These changes will make os's, computers, tablets and phones obsolete in short order. So even though you don't see it coming, its coming and at an ever accelerating rate. Until the input devices are listening to your thoughts and the output devices are connecting to your imagination.

Re:Still going

[BitZtream]

And how many business applications did you also move with you in your conversion?

Just because all you do is dick around and 'admin' your desktop so making the transition was nothing to you doesn't mean everyone else does jack shit on their desktops either.

I could spend $50k in licensing fees on an employee and it wouldn't be jack shit in comparison to all the other costs associated with an employee. If you think licensing costs for Windows and Office are 'huge', you've never ran a business.

Re:Still going

[BitZtream]

Apple was certainly a viable company before the iThings culture, but the iThings culture is most certainly when they got their money printing machine installed.

Re:Still going

[BitZtream]

Based on initial reaction, however, and long lines outside ATT stores, it looks like they're off to a good start.

Please who me one non-windows fan site that states that, and show me one picture of said lines where anyone in the line shows their face rather than looking like a setup photo.

The only lines I've seen are shown standing in an empty parking lot, where they would be ran over if there was actual traffic to the store, not wrapped around the store like would happen if the parking lot were full and had cars moving through it.

You've been trolled.

Re:Still going

[crutchy]

i agree... how much easier would it be to figure out openoffice writer having used word 2003 compared to going from word 2003 to word 2007 (ribbons)

...and now with windows 8 users will have to cope with the metro icon screen and all that hidy screen edge bullshit (how about where they put the hutdown command?) would be the ideal opportunity to migrate to openoffice or libreoffice, which ironically still looks a lot like office 2003.

the microsoft magnets are application software that depends on things like sqlserver, and autodesk is basically a microsoft subsidiary so running autocad, inventor, 3ds, etc under linux or mac will become harder and more impossible

microsoft is getting cocky enough to discontinue sbs soon, which will force small businesses to "upgrade" to windows server (and one of the two top editions if they want exchange).

Re:Still going

[BitZtream]

With the greatest respect ... I don't think you are the kind of user Microsoft thinks of in design.

And this is where Microsoft has failed, completely.

The typical users in my office do one thing at once in maximized windows. Look at outlook, now facebook, now type in word, now facebook, now type in word, now facebook, now outlook, now facebook .....

Are these users doing so on small monitors because no one bothered to get them large monitors they could be more productive on? The only time you see that behavior is on 15" monitors. Give people larger displays and that rapidly goes away.

Re:Still going

[BitZtream]

The problem is ... who uses full screen apps in Lion/Mountain Lion?

So far, those versions suck as they basically just hide the menu bar, which is rather useful to most people.

Re:Still going

[Patch86]

Hardware was never the problem. Nokia hardware has always been very good, and HTC hardware is certainly not bad. The Lumia is a great piece of hardware; it's basically an upgrade to the MeeGo phone of yesteryear.

The problem is the software. Win Phone 7 phones didn't sell because people didn't want a Windows phone. At a glance (as someone who has played with them but not bought them), Win Phone 8 looks extremely similar, superficially, to 7. Why would the higher version number persuade me to change my mind?

Re:Still going

[hairyfeet]

I'm sorry AC but you are wrong and here is why: You have users that are doing tasks suitable for a compact car yet they have a fire burning funny car as far as performance goes!

The simple fact is writing software that can truly take advantage of even just two cores is REALLY hard, and to write software that can truly take advantage of 4 or more cores without having serious issue with stalls is INSANELY hard. But AMD and Intel have kept on adding cores, 4 cores on the Intel and 8 on the AMD. Hell look at the Steam specs page, even though we can have AMD 6 cores for $105 and Intel quads for less than $200 we see the number 1 setup being....dual cores, why? Because most games don't need more because again the software just hasn't kept up.

Will we see somebody come up with a way to use all those cores? Probably, but until we have a fundamental shift in the way software is built you'll have users with funny cars driving to the grocery store. Hell if they switched to quad cores tomorrow that would cover damned near every customer I have had since the Phenom I, that was...what? Five years ago? We just have more power, more RAM, more graphics, and more storage space than we know what to do with now.

Re:Still going

[hairyfish]

If Microsoft loses the consumer market, it will lose the corporate market as well. Microsoft owns the corporate desktop market, because users are familiar with it's products.

That logic might apply for the Desktop OS, but like most MS bashers you seem to have not taken into account the monopoly MS has with AD/DNS/DHCP/GPO/Exchange/SQL/IIS and the corporate back office ecosystem that everyone knows and understands. There simply isn't anything that comes close to this*, and if you're not moving away from that, then you may as well make life easier for yourself and keep an MS desktop too. I don't see MS going anywhere. Worst case is Win8 flops, and MS maintain support for Win7 until they release a replacement, then life carries on. *Feel free to post a suggested replacement. But don't bother with a hodge podge home brew mix of unsupported free apps. Any viable replaceble has to have the same or better features, with the same or better UI, and the same or better support.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

Heh. I used my iPhone gen 1 for nearly ten years, then ditched it for HTC and haven't looked back. In fact, the experience with Macbook Pro, iPhone and iPod taught me valuable lessons that now makes me refrain from buying iMac and iPad. The "convenience" is just not worth the lock-in and sociopathical victim syndrome. Never Apple again, they are worse than Microsoft (if you are who I think you are, I don't have to explain why ;-)

Captcha: odorous

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

We want total hardware agnosticism.

And that is exactly what Microsoft and particularly Apple have never allowed and will never allow. Ever.

Re:Still going

[mumb0.jumb0]

They are embracing interoperability, just not in the way you mean.

Dynamics CRM, AX/NAV/GP, Sharepoint, Office and Outlook, Exchange, SQL Server (including SSAS and SSRS).

At the corporate level, the cost of software is not in the licenses. It's in the customisation to conform to your business processes (and the maintenance of those customisations).

MS have one technology stack that covers 80% of your business out of the box. All the pieces integrate with each other as standard (or at least MS are driving everything in this direction). They are making customisation simpler (read: less coding) with each iteration. And MS are the only technology company doing it.

Who cares if an operating system (or a foray into hardware) happens to be a poor performer?

Re:Still going

[Alioth]

Vista wasn't a failure. From a commercial point of view, it was a roaring success.

Since Microsoft has such complete dominance over the desktop, making money with Windows is about as hard as falling off a log. While desktops might not be the growth market they once were, Microsoft could put out a complete turd and it will still fly off the shelves because of OEM installs. Despite everyone moaning about Windows 8, it'll fly off the shelves. I've seen it all before; everyone moaned about the transition to Windows 95 and training costs, but it was still hugely successful thanks to OEM sales. Even Windows ME was a roaring success, commercially. Everyone moans, but OEMs still install it and MS are guaranteed to turn a big profit off even the worst version of Windows.

Re:Still going

[bfandreas]

Bang on. but what we will be seeing is a convergence of tablet and ultrabook. With a proper docking station solution perhaps even tablet/ultrabook/desktop. And that's why I think that Windows 8(not RT...that's a solution to a problem that has already been solved a quadrillion times) and the touch centric approach is quite clever in the long run.

MS is quite painfully aware that Windows 8 is a non-event in the corporate world. Those have just upgraded to Win7 or are planning to do so in the near future. So they need to peddle Win8 to private users. People will get used to the new stuff when it is bundled with new computers.

In the meantime folks like Asus/Lenovo show the world the real potential of Ultrabook/Tablet hybrids with a touch screen. I guess MS is aware that the introduction of Win8 is a long-term effort. And they know, why they do it. And I think it is less of a gamble than people might think.

Also I don't see the need for more computing power for private users in the near future. So Intel/AMD will propably spend more time to scale down their CPUs to a level where they don't need so much active cooling.


By the time Win8 is fully established we will hopefully also have something similar for Desktop Linux. I have to admit I haven't followed Linux news for a long time but I know not of an effort to use touch screens with multitouch on stock desktop Linux. If somebody would care to enlighten me? I'm flirting with the thought of buying on of those i7 ultrabook/tablet mongrels that will be offered by Asus and Lenovo by the end of next year.

Re:Still going

[YoopDaDum]

So the PC and MSFT are NOT going away, but when AMD and Intel hit the thermal wall and decided to switch from the MHz war to the core war the chips they produced, hell even for the low end like the Athlon triples or the first gen Core based Pentiums on the laptops, are just sooooo damned powerful the users just aren't stressing them so they just ain't needing replaced nearly as often.

I predict we have less than 3 years before we see mobile, which TFA thinks is to blame (Protip: Its not) have the same damned thing happen to it that happened to X86.

Yes, and even less than that I'd bet. The latest ARM implementations, whether Cortex A15 or Krait, are already hitting a thermal wall. When benchmarking the latest Qualcomm quad-core S4 based on Krait on Nexus 4 and the cousin LG phone Anandtech saw some discrepancies in the benchmarks results that they eventually traced to thermal throttling. On one phone they had to run the benchmark is several goes due to software issues, and it had better results than on the phone where the benchmarks all run in one go. The only difference was due to cooling between tests on the first phone. To prove the point and avoid the effect they benchmarked both phones in a zip bag in a freezer :-P

Just as for PC chips we'll still see some incremental improvements with new processes and tweaks, but I expect this mobile next gen to be able to last for a while.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

You are mistaken. Growth investors get most press, so it's not a surprise people think they are the only ones in existence. In reality there are lots and lots of value investors who are happy to own stock as long as it continues to meet their profit expectation. These are people who buy stock to keep it, and only sell if their long term value assessment changes radically.

Microsoft pays regular dividends and the amounts seem to be going up all the time.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

Moving exclusivity to windows Phone destroyed Nokia.

Well, good for Nokia then they didn't.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

The touch claim is a valid point. Nobody is slamming it for use on a tablet or phone. They are slamming it because it's half-assed and shoved onto desktop/workstation systems where it has no business ever appearing.

Re:Still going

[strikethree]

If Microsoft loses the consumer market, it will lose the corporate market as well. Microsoft owns the corporate desktop market, because users are familiar with it's products.

Your analysis is dead wrong. Microsoft owns the corporate market because programmers write business programs that will run only on Microsoft operating systems. If the applications could easily move, Microsoft would immediately fall. They have earned absolutely zero loyalty.

Re:Still going

[chrismcb]

and the look and feel will change anyway, why not try something else?

Because all the old software you still own, still works.
Your new computer works with the old software, and before you know it you've also learned the new UI. Now you have the best of both worlds.

Re:Still going

[modmans2ndcoming]

1080p is not "high res"

Re:Still going

[flirno]

Nah office monitors work like real life desk real estate.

If you don't have the extra space you adjust by flip flopping through windows/piles of papers/folders and basically micromanaging the layout. It has a time and cognitive cost to do all that paging through crap to find what you want.

If you do have the extra space you make use of it more or less unconsciously/automatically. You will notice when it is gone however when you want it or notice you are spending more time fudging around flipping between things when you try to get work done.

If you do have the extra desk space/extra desktop monitors then you are able to spread things out more, support more stacks or smaller stacks and buffer information you want to be visible longer. It cuts down on visual search time and cognitive cost of searching because things are split (think sorting algorithms, same idea in a binary or similar search in that you already have multiple buckets when you start your search cutting down how much initial work you have to do to find something). 2d desktop spread allow you to your mapping memory more naturally.

It is not just pile X on monitor A and pile Y on monitor B but upper right corner of A has pile X but pile Y is in lower right corner of monitor B. All this is made easy because the human brain automates it without you having to think it through. It is leveraging the human brain ability to buffer information spatially.

This will be even greater with 3D desktops whenever that happens. The future for high bandwidth computer use is not even more restrictive 2d layouts (or in the case with metro 2d mapped to 1d -- ugh), but 3d desktops layouts. Currently we just do a 3d mapped/flattened into 2d but I would like to see a full 3d environment some day for desktop/tier 1 object organization.

Re:Still going

[modmans2ndcoming]

a huge percentage of users on classic windows operates in full screen.

Re:Still going

[modmans2ndcoming]

If the world were made of engineers and developers then your work environment would have been the driving force for the OS.

Re:Still going

[modmans2ndcoming]

why are you not just using desktop apps then and using the start screen as an app launcher?

Re:Still going

[flirno]

This applies to kitchens as an analogy. Do you want to prepare a Thanksgiving dinner in a kitchen with a little 3x3 counter in it or do you want a kitchen lined with a lot of counter space? With more space you can actively work on more things faster. Period.

Re:Still going

[invid]

In the real world, most organizations aren't blessed to be completely staffed by godlike cyber-warriors who can context-switch platforms without a financially detectable loss of productivity.

Re:Still going

[PlusFiveTroll]

And I could spend 50k licenses for an employee and it would be insane because they don't make close to that in one year, if not two. Not all businesses are large businesses with huge budgets, in some businesses saving $1000 here or there makes a pretty big difference.

Re:Still going

[chrismcb]

You know what? This is what people don't get... you are right. Metro kind of blows for the desk top. Today companies develop applications for the desktop, or for the browser. They also produce applications for iOS and Android... Guess what? It won't change. Tomorrow companies will develop applications for the desktop or the browser. And they will also produce applications for iOS, Android, and Metro.
But here is the cool thing. Lets suppose I have a metro device (tablet, phone, whatever) that app I bought... ALSO works on my desktop. Yeah, it might not be the best experience, and eventually you might pony up and get the super duper mega desktop version. BUT the metro desktop experience blows the iOS desktop experience completely away... cause it doesn't exist!
By the time Microsoft is fixing the thing things that are wrong with the experience, Apple might be figuring out they need to me doing the same thing, and it will be too late.

Re:Still going

[Karzz1]

While I agree that most desktops are way overpowered you are making an assumption that I don't believe holds true. You are suggesting that since most single programs do not use multiple cores effectively or at all, that all the other cores on a particular machine are sitting idle. Anecdotal evidence suggests many/most users run more than a single program at a time and in that context multi-core machines excel.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

"A Spanish speaker has no trouble shifting to new languages on the fly. He/she doesn't think twice about doing so, its just part of the job. No Romance language is so different that it matters, even the jump from Spanish to Italian is trivial if you are qualified to call yourself a Spanish speaker."

If you spot a problem there, I'd invite you to go back and re-read your post. Now ask yourself, would this Spanish speaker, with no professional exposure to Italian, be able to at least understand Italian (written or spoken)? Yes, they probably would. Is it reasonable to expect them to be up to professional standards within a week, and with no significant downtime?

Similarly, exactly who are these admins and what are they doing?

Re:Still going

[bingoUV]

Ok so you call it a misconception and confirm that it is true, not a misconception at all. And you also confirm that aiming to do well in touch devices has hurt usability in regular devices.

Re:Still going

[Cro Magnon]

Even when I jump from full screen app to full screen app, I do it by clicking the taskbar. AFAICT, the only way to jump to another app in Win 8 is to alt-tab for 15 minutes until you get to the one you want, or go to the Metro screen and find which of the 100 tiles you want.

Re:Still going

[TheNinjaroach]

I don't think there are any good replacements to Active Directory. It's a pretty marvelous and full-featured system. I think Microsoft was dumb for releasing Windows RT without support for it.

Also, speaking as an open source fanboy, I still think SQL Server is one of the best pieces of software ever made. IIS, Exchange and Sharepoint are all junk.

Re:Still going

[Agent0013]

Investors don't care about inertia. They care about growth. Microsoft really has nowhere left to grow, at least nowhere that hasn't already been solidly claimed by another company. Their stock has been flat for 10 years. That's a long fucking time. Who wants to invest in a company without much real visible future growth potential? So the investors will pull out, and MS will coast on "inertia" for a while, but then what? What's their long-term plan for growth? I don't see them competing effectively in any market, at least with Ballmer at the wheel.

What do investors or stock have anything to do with running a company. Do you think that the stock price going up somehow ends up with more money in Microsoft's pocketbook? It is simply gambling on what people think companies will do in the future. The only time a company gets money from stock is at the IPO. Someone can feel free to correct me if I got this wrong, I'm not really a stock expert. I just don't understand why companies care all that much about their stock price, unless they are looking to sell to another company.

Re:Still going

[Penguinisto]

In the real world, most organizations aren't blessed to be completely staffed by godlike cyber-warriors who can context-switch platforms without a financially detectable loss of productivity.

Wait, what? Is that how your IT department works? Seriously?

If your IT department is even halfway competent, you get forewarning that there's going to be a change. More importantly, you get time to anticipate and adapt to it. It isn't like the boss stops by one day, plops a MacBook Pro on your desk and says "you get to work with this now".

If you don't want to take that lead time and put it to good use (even if it's done on your off-time due to a rotten schedule), then yeah... you really shouldn't be an admin.

Re:Still going

[Penguinisto]

The typical users in my office do one thing at once in maximized windows. Look at outlook, now facebook, now type in word, now facebook, now type in word, now facebook, now outlook, now facebook .....

Each time they jump from full screen app to full screen app

Really? Account Payable|Receivable usually has excel, web browser (to various bank accounts), email, and a 10-key calc app open all at once. During tax season, it gets even crazier. HR/payroll is often just as crazy, and don't ask what the engineers do all at the same time.

Here on the sysadmin side, yeah, it's a bit nuts (vSphere, a zillion instances of PuTTY, an RDP app with 10 different sessions on it... and that's just the remote stuff). On the other hand, most other departments also have multiple apps open at once, plus do a lot of cut+paste... and not just facebook and Excel.

Re:Still going

[isorox]

You're talking about previous versions of Windows Phone. Windows Phone 8 is a different OS, and the phones are actually decent now (hardware wise, on par with top android phones).

Windows Phone 8 has only been on sale a few days, so there is no possible way you could be confident in that.

They said the save thing about windows phone 7

http://thenextweb.com/mobile/2010/03/16/7-reasons-windows-7-phone-iphone-killer/
http://www.networkworld.com/news/2011/080811-windows-phone7.html
http://www.itpro.co.uk/627835/head-to-head-iphone-4-vs-windows-phone-7-vs-android
http://www.aido.com/blogs/my-blog--sanjays-blog/lg-windows-phone-7----the-iphone-killer
http://www.techulator.com/resources/4775-Few-Reasons-Why-Windows-Phone-iphone-killer.aspx

Re:Still going

[dw]

Linux/*BSD servers offer some rather flexible alternatives to these:

AD: OpenLDAP + Heimdal
DNS/DHCP: ISC Bind + ISC DHCP (with ddns)
GPO: OpenLDAP, PAM, RADIUS + your preferred hacks
Exchange: A capable IMAP server (i.e. Cyrus or Dovecot) + ICal server (Cyrus plus patches)
SQL/IIS: The usual suspects

It's easy to get into the mindset that a proprietary Ecosystem is hard to replace. If you take away the implied requirement that Microsoft has to exist on the Desktop (but but... it doesn't support Outlook Calendaring), the pieces start to fall into place.

In all cases, the open alternatives offer a more flexible solution, and in most cases, a far more efficient one.

Whatever flexibility you get from a graphical interface (Server Manager) is going to get trumped by a well honed script.

Re:Still going

[superdave80]

Because when the stock price declines to much, the stock holders vote in new people to run the company in hopes that new management will be able to make the company more profitable (and raise the stock price).

Re:Still going

[EvilBudMan]

I see this too AND Exchange+Outlook CAN be broken. So Microsoft better keep trying to come up with some new stuff that people might actually want.

Re:Still going

[EvilBudMan]

Where Microsoft actually has a monopoly is in small businesses at least with their servers. You know small businesses are getting rarer than rocking horse poop.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

"AD/DNS/DHCP/GPO/Exchange/SQL/IIS"

Really ? Okay I will bat you back under your bridge.

DNS/DHCP/IIS all have better replacements in the OSS world. Bind, DHCPD and Apache. Strange how Bind is the DNS standard and Apache is more functional than IIS.

SQL, Oracle would like to have a word. As would MySQL, NoSQL and Postgress. It depends on use case.

Exchange, ahem. It is Exchange and Outlook. Without Outlook, Exchange is just an overblown mail server with some groupware functionality. Google and Apple have product that get along just fine without Exchange.

AD is the interface to as series of underlying services (LDAP and Kerberos, basically) . And yes, MS has a better GUI interface on this one. As I mentioned somewhere else, GUI is not the only way.

GPO. Okay, Puppet is the answer here, but you seem to think that GUI is the way.

Re:Still going

[Burning1]

I disagree with you completely. The more proficient your team is on a specific operating system, the more expensive it's going to be to move to a new one. My focus is on RedHat based distros, since that's what's used in the business world. If you asked me to admin a Debian site, or a Freebsd site, or a Solaris site, I'd be absolutely able to pull it off, but my productivity would suffer for a while.

For example, right now I could build a Cobbler host and Kickstart a hundred machines inside of a day or two. If you asked me to do the same with Jumpstart or FAI, the same simple task would probably take me a week. I could absolutely do it, but as a consultant the real cost to my company for moving from Centos to Debian based on that project alone, would be thousands of dollars.

I did switch from Fedora to Ubuntu on my desktop machines. There was definitely a learning curve, and I'm a little slower with system management tasks. It was justified, since Fedora was fairly broken on the equipment I was using. I'm happy I made the switch.

On the other hand, if I was fairly Junior, the cost of switching OS would be lower. Since I'd have a learning curve ahead of me either way, it wouldn't really matter which way we went.

None of this is a complaint about Debian, or Solaris, or BSD. They are all competent and powerful operating systems. It's just an illustration of the potential issues.

I'm very very surprised by the strong reaction I received to my original post.

Re:Still going

[Burning1]

BTW... You still kind of missed the point. It doesn't matter if there is fore-warning - you are still spending time learning a new OS, that you could be spending on other productive tasks.

Re:Still going

[MysteriousPreacher]

As well as Superdave80's points, stock is a nice perk for management and employees. It's a far better incentive when it's likely to appreciate in value. I wouldn't expect to join MS today and become a millionaire through stock, but I would like to see that options granted (or stock offered through discount schemes) would do more than remain largely flat for years on end.

Re:Still going

[painandgreed]

Enterprises still use the stuff, and will use it for quite a good amount of time. This gives Microsoft something that few others have: time to correct its screwups.

Possibly, but I really don't see them asking enterprise what we want so they can give it to us as far as a desktop PC OS goes. We don't want great changes or neat tricks. If anything we want small slow changes so that users will probably never notice in the enterprise situation and if they do, will figure it out themselves or can be trained easily. We want our programs to work and not to have to upgrade them because of an OS*. The best thing they have done is made it more secure, which when judging that MS great leap forward is in security, you can make of that what you will.

*We don't want to have to upgrade our OS because of programs either, but that is another rant about how enterprise wants stability rather than endless upgrades and updates with new features that all include new bugs. In the end, enterprise wants something that installs and works until there is a ROI reason to upgrade, which in some stable fields, might take decades because they're mature and not going anywhere soon, because constant upgrades are a costly pain.

Re:Still going

[cavebison]

Totally agree. I'm a software developer, not a big gamer, but my 4-year-old HP 8510 dual-core laptop does everything I need it to. Proper mobile CPU, not a PC one. I usually have several apps running at any one time - Photoshop, .NET IDE, Eclipse IDE, both Firefox and Chrome, while SQL Server 2000 and 2008 work away in the background, not to mention various little TSR helper apps. This on XP Pro, not even Win7. Mostly goes on stand-by, reboot oh once or twice a week, never a problem.

And I can also play Skyrim respectably. I keep it clean inside, temp is never above 45C. Upgraded the hard drive, otherwise not so much as a dead pixel. Great little lappy. I'll upgrade when the plastic starts to go brittle. :)

Re:Still going

[cavebison]

The simple fact is writing software that can truly take advantage of even just two cores is REALLY hard

Sure, but aren't those cores handy when you're running several *different* apps at the same time? I assume a demanding app might tax one core, and another demanding app will attach itself to another core, yes? So multiple cores are good for people like developers or designers, who might have several big apps going at once, as well as SQL Server, IIS, etc.

And then you can fire up Skyrim without having to shut everything down. :)

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

You keep thinking home PC market, the home PC as a PC is dead. You just dont' know it yet.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

Does anyone know the extent to which Windows 7 or Windows 8 scale? To how many CPUs? I mean, beyond a certain number of CPUs, certain amount of memory and so on, performance improvements level off - just b'cos you have twice the CPUs doesn't mean that the applications will run twice as fast. Yeah, twice as many applications will run, but how many applications do people run at the same time? At work, it's typically my browser, MS Outlook, MS Office (sometimes Excel, sometimes Word, sometimes PowerPoint), occasionally Adobe, and maybe a few things here or there. I'd say 8 max. So dumping, say 16 or 32 cores at a system just because the cores have become cheaper is not going to do much for the software.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

writing multithreading or multiprocess apps arent that hard, yes it adds complexity, but it not end of the world.
Also, people ususally run more than one app at the time, having a multicore cpu will help with this.

Re:Still going

[lsatenstein]

Hey!

Microsoft will sell to "Enterprise".

GM will ALWAYS fleet cars.

They just won't make a sedan you'd buy, yourself. Mazda and VW will trounce the value/dollar every day of the week.

Enterprises will not be buying W8. They took years to move from XP to W7. They will stay with W7 because the hardware they just installed a year ago has 9 more years of life. And since most software is using browsers as an interface, there will be no need to continue with Windows.
LibreOffice and OpenOffice can both read and write MS Office files. Ergo, time to move forward. MS will have to decide to continue supporting W7, or create a W8 that is fully compatible with W7. As far as I have read, W8 will require every software to be installed on it to be MS certified, or pass through the MS app store. This requirement is intolerable for enterprises.

Re:Still going

[eco_oce]

In my current public sector employer the trend is to move people to smaller and smaller desks, or a hot desking set up. Large monitors and dual monitor setups cost too much in office accommodation. We expect most of our office workers to be on laptops or single 19'' monitors by 2016. Cram em in and have them use one app at a time is the flavor of the day.

Re:Still going

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

I wasn't talkin' Win8

Sharepoint/Exchange/MSSQL/Server*

You know. The crap.

Re:Still going

[hairyfeet]

I would give you a detailed reply, but I'm afraid tepples said everything better than i ever could. All I would add is here at the shop I see pretty much every kind of computer user and what you are describing isn't even 3% of the population, even the gamers I know don't run a bunch of heavy apps while gaming because the HDD quickly becomes the bottleneck. Heck I have a customer making his living designing insanely complex robotics in the latest version of Solidworks...is he on an Ivybridge? or maybe an Octocore Bulldozer? Nope he's running a Phenom I X3 I built him nearly 5 years ago and with the GPU taking the load on model rotation he is VERY happy with his performance.

Hell I often transcode WHILE gaming and even with that kind of load I don't peg out all 6 cores of my Thuban, and I paid a grand total of $110 for this chip a year ago, even a multitasker like me can't keep this chip fed for long, its just got more power than I can come up with tasks for it to do...don't mean i don't brag about having a 6 core though ;-)

Re:Still going

[hairyfeet]

Riiiight, because nobody needs to type, email is a myth, and instead they'll all try to hold a screen with one hand and a BT keyboard with another. sigh,try to go without a PC today, just try. Hell one of the Apple loving pundits tried to go a month with just his iPad and iPhone...he failed and gave up after just 8 days because he said even with a BT keyboard it got to be too big a PITA to do anything.

Phones are good for instant on the spot info, what time does the movie start, how do I get to the place i'm going, tablets are good for media consumption and time wasters, but the SECOND you actually need to get anything done your ass better have a desktop or a laptop, or you are gonna be in a world of hurt.

Re:Still going

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm running an operating system called "Windows". Why can't I actually have windows?

Because Microsoft have decided irony is more important than productivity. In many ways I respect this.

Re:Still going

[hairyfeet]

It just amazes me how many here have already forgotten their history, specifically the Pentium 4. Intel had originally designed that chip to hit 10Ghz, in fact if you search the net you can still find talks and papers from Intel where they state that was the goal from the start, and I know several people that managed to get Pentium 4 late models and Pentium Ds over the 5Ghz mark...so what happened?

HEAT is what happened, it was quickly realized that to get a P4 to 10Ghz it would need its own AC unit just to keep from frying! And in mobile its that much worse because you are squeezing the chips into this thin slice of plastic and glass, which is why we now see companies putting out 4 and 5 core ARM chips, to try to get the performance up without melting the device.

And just like with X86 now that they can't brag about "even faster!" we are starting to see the race to the bottom begin, just last year ANY tablet you got for less than $200 was just garbage, now there are several in the $100 range running 1.2Ghz chips and Android 4 and from what I've been told they are very nice to use. so what we are gonna see is no different than what we saw on X86, when the OEMs couldn't sell more units based on speed they sold on price to keep capacity up and we had a race to the bottom.

That is why I predict this time next year you'll see dual core smartphones and tablets in the $50 range, the quad cores in the $125-$150 range, and since they won't be able to make more than minor tweaks as you pointed out because of the thermal wall people will try them and go "Meh, this feels no different than the one i already have" and they'll just stick with what they have until it breaks.

Again the only one who won't face this, or at least not nearly as badly is Apple, because with Apple its as much about fashion as it is the device. that doesn't mean they are bad devices, just that its as unhip to be using last year's iPhone as it is to wear last year's fashion as far as Apple fans are concerned. But even they may feel some pain, as it seems Cook can't build the buyers into a frenzy like old Steve could, just look at how many "Meh" reviews there were for iPhone 5 and the iPad mini.

Re:Still going

[nobodie]

isn't that the actual job requirement of the old school sysadmin though?

Re:Still going

[hairyfish]

Care to name something better than Exchange? Lotus Notes is an abomination and I don't know anything else that has the same features and integration in this space. We're not talking just email here, but full Corporate Messaging/Calendaring/Contacts with all the third party support, features and integration. I've been around the blocks and even the most zealous Linux freaks I've met admit that Exchange does more for less effort. They'll still say they hate it, but I've never heard anyone name a better product.

Re:Still going

[hairyfish]

The problem with this approach is you're cobbling together a whole bunch of stuff from all over the place which requires special skills/knowledge and a lot of time and effort to make work. Then the more important question is how do you support it? Great if you've got the gun who knows all this stuff and stays on top of all the dependency issues and update hell, but with MS I can get any one of a thousand guys at a moments notice who can come in without any documentation or prior knowledge and immediately understand how the environment is put together. By going the ecosystem path, a license fee is a small price to pay to know that everything works out of the box. I've worked in support organisations and this is the biggest complaint I used to hear for the Linux teams. Home brew solutions which take a month just to figure out how the hell the original admin put it all together. As an example the last admin at the place I'm working now has a 32 page script for managing network drives, printer mappings and some other stuff. I spent about 3 hours trying figure it out and gave up. It was dumped and replaced with a standard group policy setting in AD that did the same thing. The bonus of this approach is when I leave, the next guy will know exactly what is going on.

Re:Still going

[Eponymous Coward]

I was responding to the claim that Metro apps are designed to be used on desktops with mouse & keyboard *and* touch devices by pointing out big problems with Metro on the desktop.

So, this is just the semiaccurate.com one?

[dch24]

After I read the summary and all the links, they could have just put up http://semiaccurate.com/2012/11/14/microsoft-has-failed/ and a period!

Re:So, this is just the semiaccurate.com one?

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Sinofsky is J. Allard's next-of-KIN.

"Walled gardens" are in

[Animats]

with their habit of creating walled gardens deliberately incompatible with competitors' platforms finally catching up to them.

Everybody from Apple to Comcast has a "walled garden" now. Even Canonical has an "app store". The New York times is thriving behind its paywall.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[thetoadwarrior]

Canonical offers an app store which just a package manager prettied up. if you think that's a walled garden then all Linux distros are a walled garden.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[inputdev]

Ok, I'll bite. All app stores are "just a package manager prettied up". If that is what makes something not a walled garden, then they don't exist.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[chowdahhead]

Desktop Linux is a garden without a wall. The easiest and safest way to install a program is the official repo, but i can add third party repos easily, or compile packages for source myself. You see, it's the wall that makes the walled garden a problem.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Luckyo]

What makes something a "walled" garden is the concept of walls. I.e. ability to add software from sources other then app store.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[cupantae]

A walled garden is a system where the user is somehow prevented from using anything outside of the intended system. Let's see now, on Ubuntu (or any other modern Linux distribution) you can:
- Add/remove repositories for the package manager
- Install local packages using only the installation tools
- Unpack archives manually or otherwise manually add software to the system
- Compile your own software

It's not the presence of a package manager that makes something a walled garden; it's the absence of other methods of installing software.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[tftp]

A walled garden is a garden with walls. Ubuntu's app store has no walls - you can install your software from anywhere you want. Same in Android, actually, if you click on one little checkbox in settings.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Ossifer]

When it comes to Microsoft's walled garden, I'd think a better analogy would be a caged junkyard...

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Sloppy]

Canonical's "garden" has no "walls." The use of "technical measures to limit access" (if I may borrow some DMCA-speak) against the user is the main distinguishing features of walled gardens. If you let the user do whatever they want, it doesn't make any sense to call it a walled garden. It's just a garden.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, you can compile tarballs from any repository you want. You can install any compiler or interpreter for any platform you want. You can even run Microsoft and Adobe on Wine if you want. I've run software originating from BSD and Amiga on Ubuntu. And that's not starting on VMWare. What "absence of other methods of installing software" could you possibly have in mind?

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Guy Harris]

Ok, I'll bite. All app stores are "just a package manager prettied up". If that is what makes something not a walled garden, then they don't exist.

What makes an app store not a walled garden is the ability to run apps you got from somewhere other than the app store, so iOS is a walled garden (and I have the impression Windows RT is as well), while OS X, pick-your-Linux-distribution-with-an-app-store, and Windows-for-x86 aren't walled gardens (and I have the impression Android, at least by default, isn't a walled garden as well).

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Anonymous Coward]

Walls work in both directions...a non-open approval process to get into the app store is an important part of what makes a walled garden.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[kenh]

Pretty sure Apple has also embraced the "walled garden"...

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Anonymous Coward]

That... was kind of his point.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[westlake]

Let's see now, on Ubuntu you can:

- Add/remove repositories for the package manager
- Install local packages using only the installation tools
- Unpack archives manually or otherwise manually add software to the system
- Compile your own software

The geek will put up with this nonsense. No one else. Not in this century.

The moment a *NIX based OS reaches out for mass market acceptance the repository becomes an App Store with a user-friendly GUI. The old tools may still be there, but no one but a geek will ever use them.

In touch based mobile, the alternatives you suggest are ludicrous.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Anonymous Coward]

But Windows ONLY selling point was the lack of walled-garden. It was also what drags down the perception of quality, innovation, and ease-of-use, but whatever...they one thing they did really well they are no longer doing. The differentiated themselves from the competition well in this regard.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Luckyo]

No matter how open the approval process is, the garden remains walled so long as that is the only proper way to get your software. To rephrase, it's only a matter of "height" of the walls. It's still going to be a walled garden, even if walls are low.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Nerdfest]

This is what Windows and Apple users put up with for years (and still do in both cases for the most part). Surprisingly, people are actually capable of installing software. What they don't seem to be capable of is determining which software they should install, or the realization that their freedom is being taken from them with iOS and Windows 'Metro'. Sadly, these two things run counter to each other, and I have a bad feeling that freedom is going to lose out.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Anonymous Coward]

Desktop Linux is a garden on a floating island - God help you if you compile from source.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Anonymous Coward]

God help you if typing "make install" is too much for your keyboarding skills.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[BitZtream]

You're confusing 'no walls' with 'walls with a gate'. Android is most certainly walled on anything that matters, the wall just has a gate. Ubuntu for all intents and purposes isn't worth talking about as no one cares enough to run it at this point in time.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Patch86]

The key word in "walled garden" is "walled". The fact that your experience is controlled- that it is difficult for you to install programmes or change settings that the manufacturer doesn't want you to- is what people get upset about. iOS obviously does this very strongly. Android does it too (although "rooting" is easier, it is still implemented to put off casual users from doing so). Win 8 RT and Win Phone both go this route.

Ubuntu doesn't stop you doing anything. It has a pretty software distribution programme (akin to Steam or Impulse), but there's nothing to stop you installing any other package you like, or installing from source. It's designed to look and feel like the iOS experience, without the lockdown. It is, if you like, an attempt to make a garden without the walls.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Patch86]

In the Windows 7, Vista, XP, and Mac OSX world (so, almost all users), the standard method of installing software is still:
1) Go to the website
2) Download the installation file (or get a disk if you're feeling retro)
3) Run the installation programme

This works in Ubuntu too- you go to the website, and download the .deb package. Double click it, run it. You don't have to be a geek to do this; the fact that mobile phones don't let you do this doesn't mean it's been scrubbed from the users' skillset quite yet. And as long as this remains an option, it is fundamentally not a walled garden.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[cbhacking]

By default, both Android and Windows RT are walled (that is, they don't allow "sideloading" where non-app-store apps are installed). In both cases, this default behavior can be changed by the user, easily and officially. Some say it's still a walled garden, others say that the ability to enable sideloading means that it isn't. I don't care much about the terminology; I just want to be able to run my stuff, and in that way both those OSes are fine.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Anonymous Coward]

That's perfectly fine. As long as there aren't any wall around the garden, if the vast majority of users never leave the garden, that's fine with me. I assume the vast majority of android users never sideload a .apk. The important part is that the option is there.

Of course, as the siblings point out, installing software on Ubuntu or another user-friendly distro is easier than installing software on Windows (although with MSIs Windows is pretty much at par for the download installer off the internet and double-click on it install method).

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Anonymous Coward]

In fact, there are plenty of people, myself included, who would have applauded Microsoft if they had adopted a Linux-style software delivery and installation system, that is secure (via signed packages) but open (by way of adding other sources or opting for direct installation).

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Flipao]

You're confusing 'no walls' with 'walls with a gate'. Android is most certainly walled on anything that matters, the wall just has a gate. Ubuntu for all intents and purposes isn't worth talking about as no one cares enough to run it at this point in time.

You're hiding behind semantics, Android users can install apps on their own. Windows Phone and iOS users have to go through the App Store. If the checkbox bothers you there are builds that don't have it, that's the beauty of Open Source. As far as Ubuntu goes, it's a very popular distribution with developers.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Anonymous Coward]

Huh? Are you retarded or just a nincompoop?

1. Why would you compile from source?
2. Compiling most packages from source is easy.
3. Ever tried compiling your windows app from source? Start by buying the compiler, and then good luck to you.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[cupantae]

Well, the overall ease of it wasn't actually my point. The point is that you don't have to circumvent anything. You don't have to do anything that's more complicated than it has to be.

That said, I also don't really accept what you say anyway.
- Adding a repository is VERY easy once you know how to do it, and that lets you install reams of extra software straight from the package manager.
- Installing software from a local .deb file is arguably easier than installing your average Windows program, as you don't have to go through an install wizard - the package manager does everything for you. I haven't used Ubuntu in a while now (I'm on Arch Linux), but I'm pretty sure you just double-click on it, select "install" and then give your password. If that's too difficult, you might as well just go back to paper and pen.
- The other two do take some technical skill, but that doesn't matter. The fact that you can do them doesn't mean you ever have to. You can do both of those in Windows and OS X too, but that obviously doesn't make them harder to use.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Rob Y.]

The problem with non-distro repositories (or downloaded .deb's or .rpm's) is that most packages have dependencies on specific versions of many libraries. Unless you're using the repository for the exact version of your distro that you're running, it's unlikely that other packages will install or work reliably on your system.

Windows and MacOS provide much better backward binary compatibility in their system libraries so that you can build to an old version of the OS and install on anything up to the latest version (though many apps come with updated 'system' libraries just in case). Unfortunately in Linux, that's not usually true. If an app is statically linked to just about everything except maybe the CLIB and X libraries, you can hope for a generic package from a third party site to install (and actually work) on your system. Otherwise, you're better off using your distro's repository - or maybe building from source. It's far from ideal, and that's why there are next to no 3rd party apps. Luckily, there are enough 'first party' apps that most users these days can live happily in their distros' unlocked, but nonetheless practically walled gardens.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[SoftwareArtist]

And in Windows RT the standard (and only) method of installing software is:

1. Go to Microsoft's app store
2. Download the programs you want from the store

That's a walled garden. And it's what you get with their shiny new Surface tablets.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[Anonymous Coward]

I've used Ubuntu and saying there are "other methods of installing software" while true is far from informative. I have never worked so hard to install a piece of software as I did trying to get a few apps onto ubuntu outside of the package manager. I'd say that that WAS a wall, it's just not a wall that is impenetrable (unlike Apples). Windows 8 OTOH is not a walled garden; their RT system is, but Windows 8 pro is business as usually with the addition of a MS certified marketplace. In some ways it is just an extension of their "Optional Upgrades" feature that has been progressing over the last few Windows revs.

As for tablet sales, there is no way I would buy an RT system, but sign me up for the Pro! The only thing that comes close is the Galaxy Note, and that system is where the Windows tablet was 10 years ago as far as software is concerned. Also note: since the Surface Pro is running regular Win 8 I can write software for it using my favorite (non-MS) language and install all my Win 7 software on it. In MS software's case (except for the OS itself) I won't even need to pay for additional licenses because their license agreements cover a laptop as well as a desktop installation.

Re:"Walled gardens" are in

[cupantae]

That's very true. I think it's one of the biggest problems with Linux at the moment. I don't think it could possibly remain a problem if Linux adoption became widespread, because de facto platform standards would inevitably crop up just by being the most popular (e.g. Ubuntu's packages, Steam). Because that is the problem really - lack of agreement. And I'm sure it does make widespread adoption more difficult.

That said, there should be more effort gone into making multiple versions of the same package work. Some packages, like libSDL, tend to allow for multiple versions on the same system (i.e. libSD1.2L, libSDL1.1 are different packages) but the onus is on the developer to make sure that their package works even if somebody breaks backwards compatibility. This is a real problem for games, since they tend to stop updating after a short time. It has to be made clear to them that they need to note the version it was compiled with. Ideally, the game should look for a library filename that indicates the version number, too. But for this to work, the distribution maintainers need to understand the problem and provide multiple versions of some packages. It's ridiculous really that every distribution expects people to compile packages using their libraries. How many times can somebody be expected to compile a package that works and isn't being updated?

Charlie D? Pfft.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, I'd not put too much stock in what Charles has to say, this guy's an experienced yellow journalist of The Inquirer fame. Next pundit, thank you.

It was his people's skills, not products.

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

From what I can find around the web, he was asked to leave due to his way of working with people, not the products he created, which frankly are good. Windows 7 is good. Windows 8 is better (not perfect but better).

Now that may mean he gets the job done but they didnt like his methods, or they didnt like the job he did, and the methods. but whatever. NEXT

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[gbjbaanb]

or, it was something to do with the successes he had.... which reminds me, why did Bob Muglia leave... was it:

a) because he was useless, only taking Server and Tools from a cost to a billion-dollar sales engine?
b) Because of his communication style?
c) because of his inability to plan for the future?
d) because he was a shoe-in as Ballmer's replacement when the shareholders kick him out.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

He was asked to leave due to politics. Metro was the brain-child of the bitch succeeding him. He wanted to ditch it after the feedback came in and the suits told him "No" in no uncertain terms. He tried to spell it out for them what a disaster it would be and was asked to leave because they have already pulled the trigger on the project, and put too many dollars into it.

At a company like M$ once a decision is made to go with something you back it until it's well and truly failed.

I think uptake of windows 8 is going to be so fucking horrid that they're going to issue a patch to remove metro, add the windows store as a regular program, and quietly fire their new Melinda. Unfortuantely for the new bitch her lover(Ballmer presumably) isn't as rich as the last Melindas and could lose nearly everything if he pisses the board off too much.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[neonmonk]

Windows 8 shill is back. Keep preaching about how it really is the cats meow JCF. I'm sure someone who is technically literate will listen to you someday.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[WillAffleckUW]

I like to call it Zune 8.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Algae_94]

You don't have to use or even like Windows 8. Just because someone disagrees with you doesn't make them a shill. I personally have no issues with Win8, it works. If there're technical reasons that make it inferior, I am not aware of them (besides UI design choices)

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows 8 is better than Windows 7 in everything except the UI, lack of Media Center, and secure boot. The file operations have been greatly improved. (I've been waiting for years on linux for someone to come up with a copy/move/delete dialog that queues requests and doesn't pause the entire operation when it has a single name or permission conflict. Nothing still does that right?) I don't plan on using Storage Space, but can see how RAID on a folder-by-folder basis could be useful. I assume there's a lot of under the hood improvements as well.

Windows 8 boots faster and don't you dare say that boot times don't matter (even though you'd be true). Even with linux's higher up-times, many distros (or at least their blogs) have major pissing contests with their boot times and market it as a major feature.

Windows 8 can be run off a USB drive. One of linux's great claims over Windows is gone. I fully expect to see some colleges only buying hardware and requiring students to carry around their own Windows 8 USB sticks and get their own email address. Not having to deal with student accounts will massively reduce a college's IT costs. HR will still need accounts about the students, but the students themselves won't need accounts on college servers.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[neonmonk]

I agree with everything you've said here.

My problem is, what's the foundation of any desktop operating system? The UI.

Windows 8, on a desktop, stinks. Metro is horrible on a desktop. The fullscreen "start menu" is horrible and useless as a standard launcher. Things like the network menu give me hives. The difficulty in getting out of the metro interface? Why can't I turn that shit off? Why is the default music player a metro app? Did no one suggest to them that maybe it'd be a good idea to have "metro mode" instead of kludging the two together? Separate file associations for when I'm in desktop mode & metro mode. Now that would work well.

I know, if you're not using the keyboard to find&launch apps you're an idiot, but my dad doesn't use the keyboard, and likely never will as he's prone to forgetting what the app he wants is called, it's just not relevant to him. I would recommend someone learn the OSX interface than learn the Windows 8 interface (although I wouldn't want to support either).

All the technical brilliance of Windows 8 doesn't matter, I didn't wonder where those features were in Windows 7 and I'm not going out of my way to expose them in Windows 8. It's the UI that matters.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[TheGoodNamesWereGone]

I don't know why this was modded troll. This woman was also responsible for introducing the ribbon in Office, which is nearly universally despised.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

"The difficulty in getting out of the metro interface?"

Are you a troll? Win+D will dump you into the desktop from anywhere in Metro. Use it before you criticize it.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

My copy of Win8 pro has media center. I just needed to enable it.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[PiMuNu]

I used to have an application that would let me use the keyboard to find and launch applications. I had to remember quite long key combinations, which was a pain, but I could do a manual search for them if I needed to. But then windows 3.1 came along and ever since then it never seemed to work quite so well...

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[BitZtream]

Windows 8 is a GUI change to Windows 7, nothing more. That change also happens to suck for everyone not using a tablet or phone ... so most people who are actually going to use Windows 8 in the next few years.

At best, it should have been a free add on for Windows 7. OPTIONAL add on.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[BitZtream]

Too bad you don't have Spotliight ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spotlight_(software)

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

Really you're going to call someone you don't even know a bitch?

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[iznogud]

Really? Sinofsky, famous for his "draw the plan and then stick to it" and his obsession for micromanagement, let some "bitch" to design most prominent part of the new OS, and wanted to switch gears late in the production? Yeah, sounds legit.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

Couldn't you have also called her a "skank" or a "whore", you know, add some variety to the sexist undercurrent of your wide-eyed speculation?

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Evil Pete]

I was very pleasantly surprised to find that I really like Windows 8. A friend even said, unbelievably, that he found Win8 more useful than Linux. Not sure about that part, but it is very beautiful and easy to use. I am using it on my aging desktop. Looks amazing. Of course I miss the free stuff but ah well. So, taking that into account the only reason I would think they got rid of him would be for issues unrelated to the actual product.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

How is Windows 8 better than Windows 7. Please provide a coherent, logical, and truthful argument or evidence to back up your assertion.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

Install Start8, change the file associations away from any Metro apps and you'll never see Metro.

You're left with a OS that's a definite improvement on Windows 7 (boot up speed, file copy, security etc)

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

lanchy ? gnome-do ?

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

From what I can find around the web, he was asked to leave due to his way of working with people, not the products he created, which frankly are good. Windows 7 is good. Windows 8 is better (not perfect but better).

Companies usually make allowances for people who put out good products. Its far more likely a combination of the two. Basically, if MS admits he was kicked because of their products, Microsoft is publicly admitting even they believe their product sucks. As such, for a product already horribly suffering, they absolutely are not going to admit its because of his products.

The reality is, its far, far, far more likely the secondary issue is communication.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[cptBongo]

Because it's misogynist, bigoted drivel. The fact it's currently scoring 5: Interesting from ./'s normally intelligent base is the most depressing thing I've seen all day.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you guys actually used Windows 8? I've had it installed for a couple months now (Spark) and honestly it was not that big of a deal.

The metro UI is just a gigantic start menu and if you really hate it you can use classic shell which is a free download.

After fifteen minutes of fiddling I never really touch the apps, but I might if I had a tablet instead of a desktop. My games run smoother than they did on Win7, though the frame rates are about the same.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[aaron552]

So the new file transfer dialogs and task manager, multi-monitor taskbars, EAP support for WiFi, etc. are available out of the box in Windows 7? Please, tell me how.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

Try actually using the UI. None of this "I pressed buttons in Best Buy" or "I had it on a VM for a few hours" crap, but install it on some partition and use it as your primary OS for a couple weeks. It requires you to re-explore how to use an OS with a mouse and keyboard, but honestly - Windows 7 feels rather antiquated in comparison now. The charms, corners, and start screen work _really_ well with a mouse and keyboard, especially if you know the keyboard shortcuts (which, given how we're on Slashdot, I assume you use quite a bit). Seriously, it's better than 7, but not if you go in refusing to change.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Gr8Apes]

Just because it's couched in words with extreme distaste doesn't mean that anything said is incorrect, even the connotations may be correct. I don't know, I don't know the woman personally, nor even casually enough to know anything about her personality.

Steve Ballmer is a hot-headed bastard asshole who is driving MS into the ground with one bad decision after another. Does the invective on Ballmer (which can be proven by a number of different reported instances including those of chair-throwing) make the statement any less "correct"?

Back to the main topic - This woman's brain turds... err, children were the Ribbon AND Metro? She's still employed? (much less being promoted to CEO?) MS may fail faster than I thought.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Gr8Apes]

A) Windows of any flavor sucks, simply sucks, compared to any of the alternatives. Just because there's enough lipstick on the pig to make it deceptively prettier than the competition does not make it "good" in any sense of the word.

B) OSX with Quicksilver (which, I believe is where the keyboard approach from Windows was stolen as QS predates 2004) is about the best combination of OS / app launchers ever, and QS has far more capabilities than just being a mere launcher. There's not much to learn on the OSX interface, really, and I have yet to meet someone that's embraced OSX that wants to go back to Winblows (yep - gotta throw in that invective - but they could at least have trademarked "Winblows" and probably should have ;)

The only thing Windows had going for it was the large number of apps and decent eco system. As MS's growth rate slowed, they looked for more ways to squeeze additional growth out of their market, and they've been slowly squeezing out a large number of players out of their eco system as they expand their base to include all sorts of additional features. This has maintained their (still too high) stock price, but the cost has been the ready defection of developers to new markets, hence the success of iOS.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

Please show your evidence that Sinofsky wanted to dump Metro and he was fired because "the suits" didn't want to.

I'll wait (and will probably be waiting until the end of time as, of course, you have no evidence).

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

We can't criticize women because they're female? What's next? Being accused of racism for opposing President Obama?

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[UltraZelda64]

Windows 8 can be run off a USB drive. One of linux's great claims over Windows is gone.

Yeah, but you'll need a 32GB USB drive just to get it to work and have enough room for your files once you've installed both Windows and all your programs...

Meanwhile, a typical Linux distribution comes fits nicely in 6-8GB (some take up much less) and come with virtually everything you might need, so relatively few packages need to be installed manually, further cutting on size.

Hell, just look at the news story that hit OSNews and IIRC Slashdot not too long ago, about Windows RT on the Surface taking up almost half of the computer's 32GB total storage capacity. Meanwhile, I sit here from Linux looking at my Windows 8 enterprise evaluation partition which I installed a bunch (but certainly not all) of what would be my typical programs, and I'm looking at about 17GB. Meanwhile, my openSUSE / partition is only taking ~4.9GB... and that's saying something, considering many people (including myself) generally see openSUSE as one of the more bloated distros. Turns out it's mainly bloated in memory use, not disk space.

Re:It was his people's skills, not products.

[Anonymous Coward]

I still use it. It's called Cygwin now...

Shame there still aren't alternatives.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm a bit of a hardware power user. I hang an awful lot of hardware off my computer for a variety of purposes. As soon as there's a Linux distribution which supports my 3 slightly different nVidia video cards driving 6 monitors in a way that lets me merge them all into a single desktop that doesn't involve tearing my hear out with configuration files, I'd happily switch over and figure out the learning curve on everything else on my own.

On Windows, it's as simple as plug the cards in, make sure cables are connected, and open the control panel. I have yet to get multiple monitors working on any variant of Linux going back to 2008.

If anyone has suggestions, tutorials, or something along those lines I'd love to give it a shot - I hear nothing but good things, but my blocking criteria for a migration is "can use all the hardware installed in my computer right now".

Re:Shame there still aren't alternatives.

[Xicor]

valve is starting to push towards linux development... both with hardware and with software... we will see how it works out after the first steam client is released

Re:Shame there still aren't alternatives.

[Xicor]

as far as your comment goes about hardware not working right... i run double monitor on my linux... you really just need to get proper drivers for your gpu. i suggest kmod-nvidia.

Re:Shame there still aren't alternatives.

[Shikaku]

try using Arandr, it does the hard work for multimonitors for you.

Re:Shame there still aren't alternatives.

[tuppe666]

I'm a bit of a hardware power user.

I'm still in awe of anyone calling themselves that. I'm not even surprised for a minute that someone who calls themselves claims with a straight face that they cannot install Linux. Personally I buy hardware to work with the OS not the other way around.

Re:Shame there still aren't alternatives.

[neonmonk]

Thing is, once the drivers are working fine you'll have to deal with the horrible multiple monitor support on most applications with fullscreen support. Remmina being a perfect example of something I've struggled with recently.

It's the little things that you notice when running a linux desktop. Multiple monitor fullscreen support, PPTP vpn client constantly disconnecting (when it doesn't on the OSX client sitting right next to it and the Android phone in the pocket)

Then compound those little difficulties you have with the fact you're going to have to make the decision between a sparse DE (lxde, xfce, the many boxes), a wannabe touch DE (Unity, Gnome-shell) or the cluttered mess that is KDE. I still have love and hope for Cinnamon, and hope with the newer version it will be less buggy.

Linux on the desktop frustrates me. Linux on the laptop infuriates me. As Apple cease to be an option for me on the laptop with the latest reductions in features, and Windows 8 being the most frustrating iteration of Windows I've ever dealt with, I'm starting to wonder what my ideal replacement is going to be? I really don't want to run Mint in a VM on top of Windows, but that just might be what I'm going to have to do.

The state of computers is terrible right now.

Re:Shame there still aren't alternatives.

[Anonymous Coward]

That's shitty, I've been doing multi-monitor Linux with Nvidia since 2004 with no problems (actually, in most cases, less problems than I had with Windows 2000 and XP at the time). Now, truthfully, most of the time I limit myself to 3 monitors (with 2 or 3 cards) but have had more. My current rig has 2 monitors right now because one of my NVidia cards died (I'm just suing the crappy onboard NVidia until I get a chance to buy a replacement).

In all my cases, I just install the NVidia driver on linux, run the NVidia control panel, set it up the way I want it, tell it to save and that's it. There was a time when sometimes a new kernel would screw it up and I'd have to reinstall the driver, but I was using Slackware 9 or 10 back then.

Re:Shame there still aren't alternatives.

[PlusFiveTroll]

Not sure what you've done (or someone's configuration somewhere has done), but the PPTP client on Linux that I'm using stays connected pretty much forever without disconnects. It's highly likely that the client code on your Android phone and Linux box are the same or close to the same.

The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

Apple still does well with walled gardens all over the fucking place. Not that I approve of that, but lets not rip MS apart when the competition is fucking worse.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[thetoadwarrior]

Microsoft was trying to lock in people long before Apple and it's caused more problems for everyone. Hell even MS wants to get people off IE6 as an example.

IOS is Apple's only walled garden and quite frankly, it makes more sense and as a result their app store is a far better experience than the Google store. If you don't like it then jail break it. No one will stop you. But Macs aren't in a walled garden. You're free to do what you want with them including putting another OS on it and, unlike iOS their Mac app store accepts GPL code. It's nothing more than a prettier package manager and if you really think that's a bad thing then what option is there? Even Linux has an "app store".

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[tuppe666]

Apple still does well with walled gardens all over the fucking place.

No Apple is in pretty much the same status quo it was on the Desktop since forever...and its influence in mobile has dropped to under 15%. Android is doing pretty well...Apple not so much.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Anonymous Coward]

And Apple will fall soon. Apple is a one trick pony. It succeeded dispite the walled garden due to there was a genius inside the garden. Now that person is gone, Apple will soon return to its former state circa the 90s.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[neonmonk]

Macs aren't in a walled garden *for now*.

http://www.theverge.com/2012/7/27/3186875/mac-app-store-sandboxing-frustration-mountain-lion

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[cupantae]

Only on slashdot can you get a comment that Apple is not doing well in the mobile market. You are absolutely out of your mind.

Apple sells expensive products. It has become the most valuable company in the world by paying attention to detail and selling at a high price. Now, I don't mean to call you a stupid person, but your comment is extremely stupid. There is absolutely no way that Apple could conduct its business in the way it does and capture a majority of the mobile market. Most people can't afford such luxuries, and it would be a poor idea for Apple to cater to those who can't. They are doing more than well enough, and the fact that several other companies produce lots of handsets using the same operating system is neither here nor there.

Likewise, they make a lot of money from Macs, and the fact that most people use Windows does not spoil this. The goal of a business is to maximise profits, not to maximise market share. The reason we hear about market share as if it were the true goal is that it's always good to have more. That doesn't mean that a company should go head over heels to gain more of it. They might lose a lot of money in the process.

This is coming from someone who has little time for Apple. Please think before you speak.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[tuppe666]

Only on slashdot can you get a comment that Apple is not doing well in the mobile market. You are absolutely out of your mind.

...and yet I can back it up with facts and figures :). Seriously the most "valuable company on earth" just lost a lot of its value recently with its shares dopping 700-->535 thats a lot of the value gone in a couple of months.

As for their goal of "maximise profits, not to maximise market share" is working out badly for them as they are losing market share faster than RIM, and thir Gross profits % are down. These are maturing markets, and Apple is unable to compete against Android, perhaps they need a better goal :)

Lets be honest Apple increasingly less relevant.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[falcon5768]

Except its well know the value loss came from insider manipulation that people are demanded be investigated. http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/11/09/apple-its-mojo-and-doug-kass/

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Anonymous Coward]

So if someone is worse, you can't call out injustice and evil? That makes no sense.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[tuppe666]

http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2012/11/09/apple-its-mojo-and-doug-kass/

LOL that is the funniest think I ever read. Its market share drop is due to Apple performing less well than they expected [Apple were not the only one down, Google to name one were down]. The main reasons were poor sales of the iPhone 5, The iPod market vanishing, and lower gross profit %.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple had a decline in Gross Margin from 40.3% to 40.0%, in the context of a 33% increase in profits compared to the year-ago quarter, is selling more iPhones than it ever has and has $121 Billion in cash reserves: Apple is currently very successful. (Based on its 2012 Q4 earnings release)

If you want to claim that in the future they will decline you can, but to credibly claim any current decline requires more evidence than a tiny variation in gross margin.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Karlt1]

"Less well" by what metric?

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Anonymous Coward]

ISTR that the hyper-attention to market share is one of the symptoms of the over-heated markets of the 1990's when CEO's were overly concerned with short-term gains to make their bonus and if they tanked their company they had gotten a golden parachute clause.

Microsoft did well in the PC market by not trying to run the hardware side of things and concentrating one ruling your experience once you got started.

Apple concentrates on the whole package and, with the occasional misstep, does a good job of it. Even if they make me feel a little baby-sat, but I only own one Apple product, an old 3G.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[tuppe666]

Apple had a decline in Gross Margin from 40.3% to 40.0%, in the context of a 33% increase in profits compared to the year-ago quarter, is selling more iPhones than it ever has and has $121 Billion in cash reserves: Apple is currently very successful. (Based on its 2012 Q4 earnings release)

If you want to claim that in the future they will decline you can, but to credibly claim any current decline requires more evidence than a tiny variation in gross margin.

Apple does not sell Easter eggs or Christmas trees it sells electronics. Apples market share has dropped from 23% to 14.9% [IDC figures others are worse]. I'm not really sure why being cash rich is good. I'm glad that you brought up the Q4 earnings which contained the bombshell that Apple only managed to sell 14million ipads [a drop of 70%] guess we are going to see a further drop in Market share from its current 50.4%. Oh and Gross Margin has dropped from 47% to 40% :) Its expected to drop to 36%

The bottom line is Apple is sacrificing market share for the sake of profits, and that will end badly.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Anonymous Coward]

There is absolutely no way that Apple could conduct its business in the way it does and capture a majority of the mobile market

Apple doesn't even have 30% of the worldwide mobile market., and they've lost a huge portion of their market share to Android because of their micromanaging.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[tuppe666]

"Less well" by what metric?

http://seekingalpha.com/article/1002261-apple-why-the-recent-drop-is-unjustified Its a nice little article that covers why apples shares recently dropped, and unlike me argues for a brighter future so you may consider it balanced, and covers some of the measures of performance of a company like Apple in easy to read language, and some nice graphs.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[RazorSharp]

The link you provide doesn't back up the assertion that Apple will turn OS X into a walled garden. Demanding that apps provided on their app store meet rigid standards that increase security and stability is in no way evidence that OS X will one day have the restrictions that iOS has.

You're trolling, your claim is FUD, and you know it.

I can lay out a counter argument with one word: Economics.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[RazorSharp]

It's all about how you phrase it -- Apple's market share dropped, but the market itself grew. Mostly, it grew by expanding low end products, products that Apple doesn't sell. This analogy is used way too much, but apparently you haven't heard it: Ferrari isn't concerned that Ford sells more cars than them. Ferrari isn't a failure because Ford makes and sells less cars.

Companies that cater to high-brow users don't worry about market share. There are some interesting statistics out there that show that iOS users spend more money on apps than Android users. It requires more low-end customers to make the same amount of money. Both Google and Apple are achieving their goals in the mobile space, I don't see how either could currently be classified as a failure. They're both in enviable positions.

The company that needs to find its niche is Microsoft -- oh yeah, that's what this article's about, I almost forgot after you wrote like a thousand posts in a futile attempt to prove that Apple is doing poorly -- Microsoft is facing a do or die situation in the mobile space right now and the future of the company depends on how they fare. The low-end market that MS has in PCs is Google's in the mobile market. Apple is just Apple. RIM is another company in a shaky position. There's no reason to predict doom and gloom for either Google or Apple as long as it appears that neither Microsoft nor RIM stand much of a chance of supplanting them.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[tuppe666]

Ferrari isn't concerned that Ford sells more cars than them.

Except Apple is terrified, that it is losing relevance, because unlike a Ferrari, its hardware is arguably worse than the competition [Its brand is being damaged]. Unlike Ferrari Apple rely on a ecosystem of App developers/Content Providers that will lose interest in its platform if its market share continues to drop. Unlike Ferrari without a controlling interest in the Phone market. Its 3rd party ecosystem will die [signs of this are everywhere], damaging the brand.

Lets face it Apple is not Ferrari, they are not even ford, they simply commanded the market because they were perceived as first mover in a new market and cashed in on all the early adopter money, where companies can always charge a premium...ask Sony.

Like I said Apples Losing relevance...Microsoft never had any.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Anonymous Coward]

" the bombshell that Apple only managed to sell 14million ipads"

in the last what - three weeks of the quarter?

Really, apple haters are a pathetic lot - let's come back at the end of this quarter and see what tune everyone is singing...

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[tuppe666]

" the bombshell that Apple only managed to sell 14million ipads"

in the last what - three weeks of the quarter?

Really, apple haters are a pathetic lot - let's come back at the end of this quarter and see what tune everyone is singing...

Do not get confused what Apple call their Q4 is Q3. Its for a full quarter. The results are posted here. http://investor.apple.com/ They sold 17Million last quarter. Calling me a hater will not satisfy the shareholders or sell more iPads in that quarter.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Zontar The Mindless]

No longer having sole ownership of a market and not having any relevance in it are two altogether different things.

And just because I mostly detest Apple does not mean it will melt away into nothing anytime soon. Good luck with that.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[thetoadwarrior]

A walled garden would mean you could only get apps from their shop and they restrict who can be in it. That's not the case, their mac app shop is one of many solutions so even if they're strict about what gets in there that doesn't mean much. You have tons of other options for selling an application.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Anonymous Coward]

It has become the most valuable company in the world

Completely irrelevant. Besides this is simply nothing more than the (perceived) value of the stock times how many there are.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Anonymous Coward]

You are forgetting it's not money which rules the world, but ideas. You think I am mistaken, look how Microsoft is struggling with a big pocket of money, but without ideas. Apple is at the top of its game, there is only one way to go further: down. Steve Jobs was the detail obsessive CEO no other tech company has, all others release unfinished products we all complain. Seriously, Microsoft is the future of Apple: arrogance and lack of ideas. Google could save the day, if they only could get hold of truly GUI wizards and designers as Apple has or had, and a clear vision what computers should do for us.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[anerki]

Where you getting your figures?

http://investor.apple.com/results.cfm

2011 - The Company posted quarterly revenue of $28.27 billion and quarterly net profit of $6.62 billion, or $7.05 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $20.34 billion and net quarterly profit of $4.31 billion, or $4.64 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 40.3 percent compared to 36.9 percent in the year-ago quarter.

2012 - The Company posted quarterly revenue of $36.0 billion and quarterly net profit of $8.2 billion, or $8.67 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $28.3 billion and net profit of $6.6 billion, or $7.05 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 40.0 percent compared to 40.3 percent in the year-ago quarter.

Quarterly figures you compare to the same quarter, x years ago. Not Q4 to Q3, but Q4-2012 to Q4-2011. Holiday sales, summer slacking, start of school sales, etc. All those have an impact.

On the iPads, as previously stated. Market share is not important here. You don't aim for max market share, you aim for max profit.

2011 - The Company sold 17.07 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 21 percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 11.12 million iPads during the quarter, a 166 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 4.89 million Macs during the quarter, a 26 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 6.62 million iPods, a 27 percent unit decline from the year-ago quarter.

2012 - The Company sold 26.9 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 58 percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 14.0 million iPads during the quarter, a 26 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 4.9 million Macs during the quarter, a 1 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 5.3 million iPods, a 19 percent unit decline from the year-ago quarter.

The market is bound to grow as a whole, how can it not? iPad sales have gone up 26%, and that was in the quarter just before the release of the new iPad which is bound to have an influence.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple should do a strategic investment in Wine.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Anonymous Coward]

The bottom line is Apple is sacrificing market share for the sake of profits, and that will end badly.

PROTIP: you can't pay shareholders with market share.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[Anonymous Coward]

Those comments could have been cut-and-pasted out of 1990. Apple's brand is its most valuable possession. They have positioned themselves to basically sell (at a premium) any electronics. When the "next thing" hits, they'll have the resources to jump in and do it well. Apple understands the goal is to make money and create value - and their shareholders thank them for that.
As for Microsoft... people have been forecasting their demise for 20 years. It's usually technical people that know far less about the marketplace than they think.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[quacking duck]

I'm glad that you brought up the Q4 earnings which contained the bombshell that Apple only managed to sell 14million ipads [a drop of 70%]

Source for the "drop of 70%" in iPad sales, please. That's a drop from 46.6 million. Apple has never sold 46.6 million iPads in a single quarter. Their 2011 Q4 iPad sales were 11.1 million units.

My source: http://barefigur.es/

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[RocketRabbit]

The only market share figures that matter are the ones from Wikipedia. Many people find IDC to be somewhat non-credible these days.

According to the Wikipedia Apple still commands the majority of mobile phone market share.

It's tough to even know how many Android phones are out there because nobody will even say how many get into the hands of a consumer. Apple is the only mobile phone maker that releases this information. Sure, we know how many Samsung phones were produced in a given period, but we have no idea how many were purchased.

Please don't quote some activation numbers, we have no idea what those mean or how credible they are.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[neonmonk]

Well actually, OSX as of Mountain Lion is essentially as walled off now as Android phones. Gatekeeper, "unknown sources", as per the defaults.

Would you really bet the farm on Apple not going further down that path? If you would, you're dangerously naive.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[aliquis]

Ohnoz!

People forced to move away from IE 6?

The horrors!

MUST - NOT - STOP - USING - IE - 6

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[jon3k]

secure boot and windows marketplace? how is microsoft not worse?

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[RazorSharp]

You are dangerously naive if you actually believe that Apple would cripple one of their flagship products to the point that they would lose well over half their customer base just because they have some desire to be nefarious or controlling or something. ECONOMICS.

Basically, you're saying that someone is dangerously naive if they don't believe that Baskin Robbins may replace chocolate ice cream with shit flavored ice cream. Just because they could make shit flavored ice cream doesn't mean anyone at Baskin Robbins is stupid enough to try and push it on the market.

Re:The biggest walled garden is an Apple orchard.

[RazorSharp]

So you're saying that markets are like Highlander. . . there can be only one. Well, I guess Karl Marx would agree with that. Apple's doing just fine, I don't think they or anyone else expected them to dominate the market in terms of market share. You don't have to be #1 to be successful.

If you dominate market share by means of razor-thin margins then you're in a dangerous situation. A high revenue, low profit situation can easily be turned into a high revenue, negative profit situation. Look at the OEMs that license Windows. Every single one would trade places with Apple if they could.

Apple's on sound financial ground because they don't hire people like yourself who think in terms of market share and relevance. They think in terms of dollars and cents, and that's what they rake in.

Two thoughts: 1. Pies 2. Innovation

[WillAffleckUW]

I have two thoughts on this issue.

The first is:

Pies.

Microsoft has stock in a lot of corporations. Lots of pies they have their fingers in. Don't count them out.

The second is:

Innovation.

That's dead there.

Re:Two thoughts: 1. Pies 2. Innovation

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope, they're seriously in decline now. Trust us this time! Just like how Slashdot's been saying for the past fifteen years, Microsoft is going to be doomed aaaaaaany year now! One of these prophecies HAS to be true eventually, and that'll validate everyone's bitching and moaning!

And then Apple can step in and take over, meaning another generation will fully get the same first-hand experience the last generation got when Microsoft took the Evil Empire crown from IBM! We'll all learn a valuable lesson that we should've been paying attention to last time this happened, namely IT WILL ONLY GET WORSE AND IT IS OUR OWN GODDAMN FAULT FOR BLINDLY SUPPORTING THE NEXT EVIL EMPIRE.

Re:Two thoughts: 1. Pies 2. Innovation

[HideyoshiJP]

I don't think innovation is dead at Microsoft. I simply think they have trouble bringing marketable innovations to market. I personally would love to see everything in Microsoft's R&D department.

Re:Two thoughts: 1. Pies 2. Innovation

[wonkey_monkey]

I have two thoughts on this issue. The first is: Pies.

That's my first thought on any issue.

Re:Two thoughts: 1. Pies 2. Innovation

[geekoid]

No, it's not dead there, you, and many other can't see innovation unless someone says 'look this is innovation, cause I said innovation!"

Re:Two thoughts: 1. Pies 2. Innovation

[JonySuede]

Go read the papers !
Seriously MSFT research publish a lot's of first class CS papers. But sadly theirs most marketable products were Songsmith and F#: a failure and something obscure for alpha geeks.

Re:Two thoughts: 1. Pies 2. Innovation

[ColdWetDog]

And then Apple can step in and take over, meaning another generation will fully get the same first-hand experience the last generation got when Microsoft took the Evil Empire crown from IBM! We'll all learn a valuable lesson that we should've been paying attention to last time this happened, namely IT WILL ONLY GET WORSE AND IT IS OUR OWN GODDAMN FAULT FOR BLINDLY SUPPORTING THE NEXT EVIL EMPIRE.

Calm down there. Just because Slashdot can DDOS somebody's 10 year old hobby server doesn't mean anybody else cares what we think. Your not that special, snowflake.

Re:Two thoughts: 1. Pies 2. Innovation

[RazorSharp]

I don't know what Slashdot you've been reading, but around here the general hope is that desktop Linux will replace Windows, not Apple. Personally, I just see it as inevitable. It's one thing to compete with free when free requires compromises. But every year desktop Linux gets better and there are less features for Microsoft to add to Windows.

I'd bet that in ten years Microsoft will, like IBM, remain in business but change their business model drastically. Apple will still be Apple - they sell expensive hardware. But most low end and business computers will run some variant of Linux or maybe some other FOSS alternative. When free matches the functionality of non-free, free always wins. I wouldn't be surprised to see future versions of Windows be Linux-based, like how OS X is a BSD variant.

Re:Two thoughts: 1. Pies 2. Innovation

[Anonymous Coward]

I love all the examples and facts you provided in that post.~

Citation Needed

[Lord Grey]

... sales of the Surface tablet are disappointing ...

I'm not fan of Microsoft. It's a huge bureaucracy that stifles the innovation of a lot of very bright people who work there. I would not be surprised at all to learn that their late-to-the-party tablet isn't selling well.

However, I've not seen any concrete evidence that Surface tablet sales are "disappointing." There were some vaguely-worded comments by Ballmer in a French magazine or something, and something about a few people returning the table after discovering that they couldn't run their existing apps, but that's about it. From what I've read, Surface seems to be selling. Does anyone have any concrete numbers?

Re:Citation Needed

[Anonymous Coward]

And to pre-empt the next series of arguments, when we do get numbers, can we specify whether or not they're sold or shipped? I think we've had enough units shipped fantasies for a while.

Re:Citation Needed

[dark12222000]

http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20121112PD219.html

Well, that only took a quick google.

Re:Citation Needed

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft's Surface RT tablet may see sales of only 60% of the company's forecast by the end of 2012 and the device is also expected to have difficulty achieving a good performance during the year-end holidays, according to sources from upstream component suppliers.

Alarmist rumor. Move along, nothing to see here.

Re:Citation Needed

[Anonymous Coward]

...Not to mention the Surface Pro hasn't even been released yet and that is the one that most people will want (if they are getting a surface). I will be getting one.

Re:Citation Needed

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

Its completely unfair to judge MS Surface right now because its only available in the RT model, which has NO programs, no use, nothing. The app store is virtually just learning to breathe at this stage.

After windows 8 pro x64 has been available on the surface pro tablets for a good peroid.. then we can start to determine how much of a success it was or wasnt.

No one in their right mind would buy a windows RT product right now. Releasing Windows RT on surface first, was a giant mistake.

Re:Citation Needed

[Lord Grey]

http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20121112PD219.html

Well, that only took a quick google.

Ah, I should have searched the intertubes again before my post. That one is relatively new. Thanks.

Re:Citation Needed

[david.emery]

Here's one: http://blogs.computerworld.com/tablets/21317/microsoft-ceo-ballmer-says-surface-windows-rt-tablet-sales-are-modest-hopes-boost-intel-windows-8-version

The specific quote is "modest", and I agree with the characterization of " 'modest' is to Ballmer as 'poor' is to a neutral observer" (particularly when compared to Apple or Android alternatives.)

Re:Citation Needed

[Anonymous Coward]

'Cause people will be lining up to pay $1500 for a tablet that's about as powerful as a $500 laptop.

Re:Citation Needed

[mov_eax_eax]

well, your link is wrong, Ballmer Never said that SALES were modest, the quote is a " widely distributed mistranslation ".

Re:Citation Needed

[david.emery]

Fair enough! We'll have to wait for actual numbers, then.

Re:Citation Needed

[Anonymous Coward]

However, I've not seen any concrete evidence that Surface tablet sales are "disappointing." There were some vaguely-worded comments by Ballmer in a French magazine or something, and something about a few people returning the table after discovering that they couldn't run their existing apps, but that's about it. From what I've read, Surface seems to be selling. Does anyone have any concrete numbers?

There are no concrete numbers, they're far more dense than that. Drop a concrete block in the water and it won't even come close to sinking as fast as surface does.

Sorry, had to make the obligatory reference.

Re:Citation Needed

[whoever57]

, the quote is a " widely distributed mistranslation ".

Notably missing are the original words. It looks like spin from Microsoft to cover Ballmer's ass.

Re:Citation Needed

[Anonymous Coward]

I have one. It's pretty cool, actually.

Re:Citation Needed

[mov_eax_eax]

well, there is the original source

"We start modestly as space is available on our sites selling online and in some stores in the United States Microsoft. But the reception, including the press, is phenomenal. This product is one of the best PC and one of the best tablets combined in one machine. Soon, we will present in more countries, more stores. It is here that figure will talk sense."
(google translate)

Re:Citation Needed

[eco_oce]

Microsoft are caught here aren't they - they need the Surface to succeed for people to say Windows 8 hasn't flopped but at the same time they probably don't want to take too many sales away from the OEMs and hardware partners.

Re:Citation Needed

[eco_oce]

If the CloverTrail Atom based machines can deliver 10 hour battery life as claimed then Windows RT will be dead. There will be no reason to a cut down version of windows (WinRT) when you can buy a tablet to run windows 8 with full backward compatibility for the same price and performance. A WinRt tablet doesn't seem like a good buy to me - I'll take the bet that they will be in the discount bins in six months time.

Re:Citation Needed

[Kergan]

Meh, it's Digitimes. Never believe anything Digitimes publishes. They pull rumors and facts out of their arse all the time.

Re:Citation Needed

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that is not concrete evidence that sales of the Surface are disappointing. That's a PREDICTION about sales.

Please try again.

Re:Citation Needed

[Anonymous Coward]

Get your stupid facts out of here! This is /., dontchyaknow, and it's time for the daily 2-minute Microsoft hate.

Re:Citation Needed

[david.emery]

Not authoritative, but not good for MSFT: http://www.theverge.com/2012/11/16/3655882/windows-8-pc-sales-reportedly-well-below-microsofts-internal-projections

Re:Citation Needed

[jon3k]

If sales were good, wouldn't Microsoft be shouting it from the mountain tops? Why are they so quiet about sales figures?

Microsoft in Trouble?

[boudie2]

I have to admit to a certain schadenfreude every time a story comes out about Microsoft's latest failure. They have been too big for too long and I look forward to the day when someone won't TELL ME that I have to use the latest version of MS Word to write a resume or anything else. And for all those people who bought a computer with Windows 8 recently ... there's still Ubuntu! Ha, ha.

Re:Microsoft in Trouble?

[Anonymous Coward]

And yet you've never noticed that after all these stories, they're still around.

Huh.

Re:Microsoft in Trouble?

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe the future is mobility. Why doesn't Microsoft own the mobile phone and tablet market? Hell, why don't they even have a decent share of these markets?

If the future is, indeed, mobility, do people with Android/iOS really have to use Microsoft products like Windows? Microsoft Office? Exchange?

I was a strong Windows fanboy back when Microsoft made decent things (in my opinion; mid-90s to mid-2000s). Windows Mobile was/is an absolute horrible experience, and then Vista came out. I had had enough and switched to Mac.

I know that those who make buying decisions (consumers, bosses) don't give a shit that Internet Explorer and Microsoft Outlook suck balls, but EVERYONE cares about their mobile experience.

I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

Disclaimer: I am a nobody. A simple techie. I left Microsft last year because I felt they were in turmoil internally. Managment where I worked was heinous and ineffective.

MS has long seemed like it's playing catch up with the IT world. They don't seem to grok what people want. People WANT to move to the "cloud" -- as amorphous as that term is. When I met with customers I was expected to use Bing to look things up in the MS universe and say that I was "binging" this or that. I was asked to also bring up Office 365 at every opportunity.

What keeps MS alive is the corporate sector. What with Google and Apple eating MS's lunch at every turn in the consumer space, it doesn't matter why Sinofsky left. MS is an also ran in the Internet/device/OS world. They are becoming like RIM... irrelevant. Nobody cares anymore.

People want devices and software that are "now" and hip, that are scalable and easy to use. Win 8 is a point and click nightmare. I "lived" with the RP for a few months and was constantly going back to Linux to get real work done. No thanks, MS. I'm done with you. I've embraced better solutions for me and mine.

Re:I can say this

[dch24]

What Linux distro do you prefer?

Not trying to flame here, just would love another data point.

Re:I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

I am partial to Debian by far.

Re:I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

You say people want hip and turn around and say Linux in the same paragraph. This is the work of a total fanboi.
 
If anything, Apple is eating Linux's lunch and MS is staying the course for what they're known for.
 
I seriously doubt you worked for them either.

Re:I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

People WANT to move to the "cloud"

No they don't! A subset of self-proclaimed "geeks" who spend their time guffawing away on social media, "cloud providers" and Orwellian security services want it.

We've had fuse drivers for a long time, I use the openssh command line tools. We've had rsync for a long time, I use removable drives (before USB it was IDE caddies). We've had network capable versioning for years, my personal stuff was in RCS before I switched to local git repositories.

I don't want "the cloud" and I sure as hell don't want desktop / application level social media integration. Like many computer users, I want a reliable OS that stays the fuck out of my way while I work.

Re:I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

Linux not hip? Are you mad? Linux is the coolest thing out there in the OS world. Everything else, save maybe Open/FreeBSD is boring. Apple is boring. It's a walled garden. Linux offers freedom. BSD offers freedom. Just because everyone else is too stupid to actually USE their computer rather than the computer dictate terms is not my problem. I'm done with anything containing DRM. I dictate my own computing environs or I don't use the product.

I did, indeed, work for MS, but it was only for the year. They are not a glamorous company to work for. They expect too much for what they offer and the culture isn't what I expected it to be. It's too "corporate". I've worked for several other large companies and none of them had the utter "corporate" flavor MS has.

Re:I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

I personally think that Microsoft has a serious problem. I have met dev from MS who was writing software using C# but had no idea how to use Visual Studio... How pathetic is that? I mean this is the best tool for C# with intellisense and refactoring and yet dev is using some crappy text editor...

Re:I can say this

[doti]

s/they/I/, then I a agree 100% with you.

But he said "people", and I know the way I use computers is not the same as the majority of people.
People don't even want to know what a file is, let alone where it is saved. It's just their stuff, and they want to access it regardeless of these complicated details.
People may don't want to "move to the cloud" per se, but the cloud can be a way to archive what they want.

Re:I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

People WANT to move to the "cloud" -- as amorphous as that term is.

Nobody who understands anything does. Those people are the same people who want the retracting cup holders that come with their computers to be beefed up to support more weight.

People want devices and software that are "now" and hip, that are scalable and easy to use.

People are lazy idiots. No multi-purpose machine with any power is going to be easy to use. Imagine if people treated cars the same same way they treat computers. They'd say stupid shit like:

What do you mean I have to watch this 'gas gauge' the whole time I'm driving to make sure it doesn't get to close to empty? Why doesn't it just know when it's low on gas and drive itself to the nearest gas station? Then I'm supposed to keep my eyes scanning the road out in front of the car while it's driving and apply the brakes if it's going to run into something! Seriously? And to top it all off I'm supposed to watch another gauge that tells me how fast the car is moving and constantly adjust the throttle to keep it moving at a certain speed which changes from place to place. This is the most ridiculous contraption ever. The thanks I get for this is that I'm supposed to check the air pressure in all the tires on a regular basis, monitor the mileage and change the oil and pay for maintenance services, and check all the various light bulbs to make sure they're still working. What a piece of junk. It's hardly worth using. I didn't have to do any of this shit with my horse. I just fed it and shoveled shit and that was that.

Re:I can say this

[westyvw]

Thank you. I can talk about the lack of a decent desktop environment in windows, or how linux provides me a choice of tools, among other things. But at the end of the day, the Corporate feel of windows and the apps that run on it, just suck the fun right out. Windows is boring, dull as dirt, and uninteresting. Doing work there never gets exciting, nothing new really happens. Thanks for mentioning it.

Re:I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

It's too "corporate". I've worked for several other large companies and none of them had the utter "corporate" flavor MS has.

You mean, like IBM, one of the most "corporate" flavored companies on the face of the planet?

There have been untold hundreds of hip and glamorous companies which have gone tits up over the years in the computer field. Boring works, and other boring companies like and trust that. There's a reason big, boring corporations don't use Apple computers for business. They simply don't trust anything with a pulse.

MS knows its customer base, and it will survive, and thrive because of it.

Re:I can say this

[TheGoodNamesWereGone]

Disclaimer: People WANT to move to the "cloud"

I suspect you may be right, and it's just damn sad. What you're saying is, in other words, they want everything done for them.

Cloud backup services' ads crack me up. "Unlimited storage for $16.99 a month!" I have 4.5TB of storage on this machine. Uploading that at DSL speeds would take weeks.

Re:I can say this

[swillden]

People may don't want to "move to the cloud" per se, but the cloud can be a way to archive what they want.

People want to have access to their stuff anywhere, anytime, from any device, even one they're only using for a few minutes. Not only do they not want to know what a file is or where it's saved, they don't want to have to "save" it at all. They should just be able to get it when they want it and any changes they make should instantly be available wherever else they want to use it.

This is what the cloud offers, and people really DO want it.

Re:I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

People WANT to move to the "cloud"

ABSOLUTELY NOT. Big corporations wants its customer's data served on a platter, but why should a company give their business away?

Sane customers want cloud-like services locally (plug & play, "it just works", service catalog, etc.)
Technically, it's the same, but businesswise they are WORLDS apart.
Open Source is a plus to any sane business.

Sorry that you had to use Bing, I would've used Google and googling anyways. Bing is just not usable to me.

Totally agree on W8.

Re:I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

Non-IT, non-computer people, aka the vast majority of consumers, want convenience and an easy, pleasant experiences controlling multiple multimedia devices for the purposes of collaboration (work and personal) and entertainment (personal). The apps available on "the cloud" are achieving that. i.e. Webex for presentations, using your laptop/tablet/smartphone as a controller for selecting and streaming whatever you want, wherever you are, be it your project presentation, or entertainment storyboards/videos/radio onto the closest HDTV screen and/or HiFi system. There's no deliberate conspiracy to kill the desktop. Its just that desktops are not as convenient for those types of activities for the average consumer.

Re:I can say this

[knarf]

I don't want "the cloud" and I sure as hell don't want desktop / application level social media integration. Like many computer users, I want a reliable OS that stays the fuck out of my way while I work.

No, I don't want 'the cloud' as imagined by profit-hungry starry-eyed Web 3.141592653 prophets.

I don't want social media. If I want to be social, I'll socialize. If I want to contact someone, I'll contact them. The key word here is 'I' - as in the person who is in control.

But... I do want my software to be as network-transparent as possible. I want to be able to access my data from whatever device I happen to be using, from a PC to a phone to a tablet to whatever. That data happens to reside on my own server, which is parked under my own stairs in my own home (with encrypted backups of important stuff seeded here and there and everywhere) so it does not fit the cloud-moniker as envisioned by those who hope to profit from mining my data - sorry folks. So I just run my own 'cloud' services as I've been doing for about 20 years now. I wonder what name I have to use in 5 years time...

Re:I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

I hope it's not Ubuntu with Unity (ducks)

Re:I can say this

[blahplusplus]

"A subset of self-proclaimed "geeks" who spend their time guffawing away on social media, "cloud providers" and Orwellian security services want it."

MMO's, steam DRM and online only games like diablo 3 (10 million in sales) says there is definitely some sectors that are pushing their customers towards the cloud whether they want it or not and most people are too tech illiterate to care, lets face this fact.

Re:I can say this

[gbjbaanb]

as a client, I use Mint (cinnamon) at the moment. For servers I always put Centos on and run it headless - ie command line only.

Centos is the free clone of RedHat so its very popular in corporates. You might like Fedora for a client if you use it, as that's RedHat's "bleeding edge" distro where they test out the new stuff before its fully stable, when it gets put into the server version, RHEL.

Re:I can say this

[chrismcb]

I don't want "the cloud" and I sure as hell don't want desktop / application level social media integration. Like many computer users, I want a reliable OS that stays the fuck out of my way while I work.

YOU don't want the cloud, but at the same time you want your OS to just work.
Guess what most people want (or don't want)???? They just want their OS to just work... cloud or no cloud.
Even better when they can easily access their personal stuff at work. Without having to do anything more than log in. Or access their music on their phone OR their desktop, at home OR at work. And that is what the cloud gives them. And the masses like it, because they have a reliable OS that just works.

Re:I can say this

[firewrought]

Hmm.... let's see... fuse, rsync, openssh, git, command line tools and the hours/weeks of time needed to learn all of that VERSUS a pretty web interface that is accessible everywhere, has an app for your mobile, and is backed up automatically. Which one is the "self-proclaimed geek" solution and which is the ordinary people solution?

You don't have to like cloud (I certainly don't), but most folks are going to prefer it over roll-your-own-infrastucture.

Re:I can say this

[painandgreed]

Disclaimer: I am a nobody. A simple techie. I left Microsft last year because I felt they were in turmoil internally. Managment where I worked was heinous and ineffective.

This is true. I live in Seattle and have lots of friends that do or have worked for Microsoft. One of the most common ways to break the ice between two MS employees is "How was your last reorg?" They both laugh, talk about the groups they have belonged in, and then move on to more relevant conversation.

They don't seem to grok what people want. People WANT to move to the "cloud" -- as amorphous as that term is.

I'd have to disagree with this. People really don't care about the "cloud", as they just want their stuff to work, and preferably without having to memorize lots of logins and passwords for it to do so. Currently, the ideal way may seem to be the "cloud", but it still makes lots of people unhappy because it still don't work without them having to think about it and connection to the cloud is hardly constant. You could just as easily say that they want all their information to travel with them everywhere on their phone. That also has issues. In the end, whatever gives the most people the most stuff with the least effort will win, and the cloud may be that for a lot of people, but they really don't care about the cloud itself.

Re:I can say this

[colinrichardday]

At 450 kB/sec, it would take 10,000,000 seconds. That's about 115 days. YMMD.

Re:I can say this

[Anonymous Coward]

What kept you from Windows 7? What real work is it that you can't do without Linux?

Re:I can say this

[TheGoodNamesWereGone]

I didn't do the math when I said 'weeks'. Thanks.

Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[NinjaTekNeeks]

Come on now, what kind of crappy article is this. MSFT releases a ton of new stuff and has successful products and products that fail, for example:

Zune
Bing
Surface
Windows Phones
Windows 98, ME, Vista, 8
Tons of Server products that suck

But for each that sucks there are a ton that are great :
Windows 95, NT, XP, 7, Server 2003, 2008, 2012
Exchange Server, SQL Server, Sharepoint, ISA Server
XBox, Xbox 360

It's important to test new business models and related fields they may be able to compete in (search, mobile, etc.) but they won't win them all, they can't, else they will be balls deep in Anti-Trust suits again. Declaring the decline of the "empire" is horse shit.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[MightyMartian]

XBox's success comes from Microsoft plowing billions into it. It's like bragging about your car being worth $50,000 when you've spent $1,000,000 to get it there.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[YodasEvilTwin]

Windows 98 was way better than 95. It wasn't XP but nothing was lost from 95, only improved. Also throw Visual Studio on the "great" side. At least 2005 and 2010.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

Surface hasnt failed, and I dont think it will fail.

The problem is Windows RT. No one wants windows RT because theres no application support. However, I'll gladly take a Surface pro tablet with Windows 8 Pro that can run all of my regular desktop apps.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[Anonymous Coward]

XBox's success comes from Microsoft plowing billions into it.

I still have a hard time seeing a multi-billion dollar loss as a 'success'. If Microsoft had bought Apple shares instead of throwing money at the Xbox, they'd be rolling in money right now instead of struggling to pay back what they spent.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[tftp]

You can't use regular Windows applications without a mouse and a keyboard. OK, Surface has one as a cover. But why not to splurge on a hinge then and buy a laptop for the same, if not lower, price? A laptop is more functional, has more connectors, there are many models to choose from... why the x86 Surface, all of a sudden? It's not a lightweight tablet like a Nexus 7, it's a big and heavy thing, more in the "portable" class than "pocket."

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[Anonymous Coward]

You must be thinking of Xbox360, not Xbox1. Which of course was required for 360 but as a product was a total loss.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows 98 was NOT better than windows 95 osr2. Stability and speed were both lost, and it NEVER got back to an OSR2 level level of quality.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[phantomfive]

they can't, else they will be balls deep in Anti-Trust suits again.

This is no longer likely to be a problem, since Microsoft is now a big donor to both parties.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[Anonymous Coward]

Surface is a stillborn clusterfuck that has no, and will never have any significant market penetration. Ever.
Think about this comment, and look back a year from now.
That's me doing the I told you so dance.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting. In my humble opinion, Microsoft has made only three good products in their long history: Windows 98 SE, Windows 7, and Xbox 360.

And their mice are pretty nice.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[Anonymous Coward]

I think you isolated a pattern, here. Every other release of an MS operating system SUCKS.

95 (great), 98 (sucks), 2000 (great, save driver issues for some people, Me (sucks), XP (great), Vista (sucks), 7 (great), 8 (sucks)

I'm not sure where NT4 fits in. I remember 3.11 for workgroups, but I missed NT4 until 1999 and I skipped that and went to 2k.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't use regular Windows applications without a mouse and a keyboard. OK, Surface has one as a cover. But why not to splurge on a hinge then and buy a laptop for the same, if not lower, price? A laptop is more functional, has more connectors, there are many models to choose from... why the x86 Surface, all of a sudden? It's not a lightweight tablet like a Nexus 7, it's a big and heavy thing, more in the "portable" class than "pocket."

I can use Photoshop on an x86 Surface. With a pen.

Sold.

Anyway, businesses all want iPads because they're small and handy, but they're not powerful enough to do the sorts of work businesses need done. Mister Workguy in the stock room, on the road, on a rooftop can't use an iPad to take inventory, create and send invoices, or align a satellite dish signal. Not in any meaningful way which is broadly accessible with the computer systems at company HQ.

The x86 version of the Surface, however, can and indeed, *will*, do all of these things.

Anybody who doesn't see the value in this isn't thinking clearly.

RT, like Windows CE before it, is a waste of time and has little bearing on anything. Wait a few more months and watch what happens.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[Anubis IV]

By your own reckoning, they haven't released a single successful, marquee product aimed at consumers since Windows 7 three years ago, and before that it was the 360 six years ago. Is it really so hard to believe that people are saying that the end of their empire is nigh? Even the Xbox line only became profitable for them just a short while ago, because the original was a sunk cost to simply enter the market and the 360 suffered billions in costs due to recalls and repairs.

And now they've decided to enter the tablet market in order to secure a place there. That's a smart move, since tablets are by all indications in the beginning stages of displacing much of their bread-and-butter PC market. Yet despite all that is riding on this move, they're not making as big a splash as they expected. Numbers indicate that they're only hitting about 60% of what they were expecting, meaning that they aren't laying the foundation they need to be laying for future success. Nor is their brand new OS looking like it will be the success they were expecting based on its sales so far. The last numbers I saw for Windows 8 were that it had sold 4M copies after three days. That sounds pretty darn impressive until you learn that the last version of OS X, which we all know is a bit player in comparison to the behemoth that is Windows, sold 3M copies in four days, putting it not-so-far behind. And their newer Windows Phone line, which is actually a decent OS, is failing to get any traction at all. They're being marginalized in all of the consumer markets that are exploding right now.

More or less, with the exception of the Xbox, they haven't done anything with their most recent iterations of their key consumer products in the last few years that has put them on solid ground for the future, nor are there indications they will anytime soon (Xbox 720 hopefully excluded). They've almost entirely relegated themselves to the business market at this point, yet Microsoft is no IBM, such that it can cut off its consumer lines and focus exclusively on B2B. I have little faith in their ability to survive that transition and thrive afterwards, but that is the choice they are a few years away from forcing on themselves.

Perhaps if they finally oust Ballmer we can expect better. For now though, the reports of their demise are not so greatly exaggerated.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[tftp]

I already have a similar device - Samsung Q1 Ultra. It is not very useful, except for reading books. I do not expect Surface to be much better. PC software is too detailed, has too many fine controls. It is hard to operate on Q1 even with a stylus. Forget about fingers.

But I'm willing to listen to your advice and wait a few months. Perhaps there is indeed some unsatisfied demand for Surface.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm still going to brag about plowing your mom, even when I put a few bottles of wine into it.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[RazorSharp]

The problem is Windows RT. No one wants windows RT because theres no application support. However, I'll gladly take a Surface pro tablet with Windows 8 Pro that can run all of my regular desktop apps.

I seriously question what the battery life on that thing will be. Especially if you have something like Photoshop running and you're doing all sorts of effects. Or if you're playing a Windows-native computer game. Editing video? Forget it. Not to mention all the things the OS will have running in the background. You might as well use a laptop, especially considering the interface for Windows-native apps isn't well suited for touch.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[ram.loss]

You may be right about innovation. But the FA is not about innovation. Compare MS to IBM, the former 'empire'. It's all about market cap and profits, and in that area MS certainly has been falling behind.

There was a time when technology companies were all about innovation, but we are now seeing the commodization of computing, where it doesn't matter how advanced you are as long as you have the largest market share, which may be gained by innovation but might as well be achieved by fashion sense or plain marketing.

MS lost the internet wave, they lost the mobile wave, they certainly have lost the walled garden wave. The new 'empire' is Apple like it or not, and it's not about innovation now, but profits and market share. Nothing wrong with being the new 'new IBM', but they are no longer at the forefront of technology companies when measured in $$$, they may be behind even Google now.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[MightyMartian]

The division as a whole has yet to pay back its investment. Microsoft has basically bought market share.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[cbhacking]

Windows Mobile was successful back in the day. MS just rested on their laurels for too long and were caught out by Apple and all.

Bing had (last I checked, which was admittedly about a year ago) a steady year-over-year marketshare growth. Google search is good and is what people are used to, so the transition is slow, but Bing was catching up to it.

I'd put Windows 2000 (NT 5) in before "Windows NT" (which, as an OS name, means v3.1-v4), but as a kernel and OS family, NT has definitely done well. So did DOS though, for far longer than it should have.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[cbhacking]

A laptop, even an "ultrabook" or MBA, is almost always thicker than the Surface and weighs more. Only a few come with touchscreens, which are not *needed* for Win8 but are definitely useful... especially in a device which is designed to be usable as a tablet, not just a laptop. Yeah, the battery life and weight will be inferior to an iPad almost without a doubt, but it *can* be used as a tablet in the iPad sense, as well as in the old convertible laptop sense (stylus support, etc), and also works as a laptop.

At most of 11 inches diagonal, it's definitely not pocketable, but it can be carried under an arm or slipped into any backpack (even one that isn't meant to carry a laptop, or alreayd is carrying one) easily. At least, I'd assume so based on the Surface RT; I obviously haven't had a chance to try carrying arounf a Surface Pro.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, that's half the problem. The other half is that surface pro
A) weighs over 900g and is bulky: it's not really nice to use the way other tablets are nowadays and
B) is not really better than a laptop (keyboard is not as good, viewing angle can't be changed)

Looks like an ok laptop replacement that is going to compete with very good laptops. Maybe there's a usage model I don't yet know of (that wouldn't be the first time), but currently I don't see the point.

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[chrismcb]

Apple wouldn't be a company today, if Microsoft hadn't invested in it a dozen years ago...

Re:Innovative companies fail a lot, MSFT included

[geoskd]

Surface hasnt failed, and I dont think it will fail.

The problem is Windows RT. No one wants windows RT because theres no application support. However, I'll gladly take a Surface pro tablet with Windows 8 Pro that can run all of my regular desktop apps.

Yes, surface will fail. MS hasn't a clue. They tried to make tablets before, and failed. Apple succeeded because Apple knows how to make a truly exceptional product. MS only knows how to copy and steal. They have done a remarkable job behind the scenes of cleaning up their own dirty history, and still managing to keep the legacy applications working, but Joe average consumer doesn't care about that, they only care about the interface, and in that respect MS is like the idiot child in the bunch. They keep making stupid changes to the UI, and alienating more of their user base with every revision. I probably shouldn't be feeding you, as you're almost definitely on MS payroll given your posting history. If you're not, then you really need to get a life, and a clue.

-=Geoskd

Is it even worth it to watch them anymore.

[strangeattraction]

Time for professional MS watchers to find another company to watch. I am tired of hearing about their decline. It has already happend and will eventually show in their balance sheet. Until then watchers will still watcher and haters gotta hate:)

Microsoft is an excellent company

[Anonymous Coward]

When you think about the innovation at Microsoft I can't see a decline. Rather Microsoft is drawn into the economic turmoil and will experience slower growth rates. I am a PC! Microsoft should reinvent itself and beat Apple with an open source strategy. That would win the hearts and mind of the ubergeeks.

Re:Microsoft is an excellent company

[david.emery]

When you think about the innovation at Microsoft I can't see a decline. Rather Microsoft is drawn into the economic turmoil and will experience slower growth rates. I am a PC! Microsoft should reinvent itself and beat Apple with an open source strategy. That would win the hearts and mind of the ubergeeks.

On what class of platforms? PCs? I don't think so... That's the big change that's happening; the PC is not dead, but its growth is severely limited.

And it's not "ubergeeks" who buy most machines and make profits for hw/sw vendors, but consumers and corporate CIOs.

Not a team player; or was he a threat

[EmperorOfCanada]

I have read that this guy was fired for leaving the stupidest sounding conference I have ever heard of. Two solid days of watching each others' powerpoints. That is pure MBA masturbation. From the sound of it he basically got up, said, "All you need to know is on my blog" and then left the conference. Then he was labeled abrasive and not a team player. Well it sounds like he didn't follow their petty rules (the guy who successfully runs windows development). I suspect that he also sent some shock waves with other free thinkers saying, "Hey I am wasting my time here too."

By saying that all they needed to know was on his blog it seems he was basically saying, Microsoft join the 21st century and get out of the 19th century.

I have seen teams that would appear to be dysfunctional people yelling and stomping out. But these teams produced wonders. I have seen other teams that were quiet and respectful of each other and were nothing but deadweight. I am willing to bet that there is an inverse ratio to the time showing people powerpoints and the genuine productivity of that team. The worst is when someone puts up a powerpoint and then starts reading it to you. Icing on the powerpoint cake is when you have a central item with other items surrounding it with arrows pointing to the central item. A perfect example would be a powerpoint slide saying "Team Player" in the center with items around it that are things that make a good team player.

So assuming this guy wasn't throwing feces at people I suspect that MBA types who had everything to lose spent the rest of this conference making sure that this guy was gone. My suggestion to him is to sell his MS stock sooner than later.

On a whole other page it could be that Windows 8 is a giant turd and this is one of the first heads to role. Either way I just don't see a bright future for MS. Unless they have a world beater about to come out of their R&D people nothing they have catches my fancy. In every category of product I prefer something else. MySQL to SQL, Linux to MS Server, Bean to Word, MacOSX to Windows, Sublime or XCode to Visual Studio, PHP to ASPX, C++ or Python or java to .net anything, iPhone or Android to MS phones. iPad or a Macbook Air to Surface. Anything to Zune. VLC to MS Media. OpenGL to DirectX. I do like the XBox and my MS Mouse.

If MS simply stopped selling products I would not be greatly inconvenienced. This is a massive sea change from say 1998. If they had vanished in 1998 I would have cried myself to sleep.

Re:Not a team player; or was he a threat

[PickyH3D]

From the second-to-last paragraph, it sounds like they really had a chance to pull you into their ecosystem with Windows 8. I bet you gave a really serious shake too.

Re:Not a team player; or was he a threat

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

I'm liking the giant turd so far.

Re:Not a team player; or was he a threat

[Anonymous Coward]

On a whole other page it could be that Windows 8 is a giant turd

What's with the superfluous "it could be" and "8"?

Re:Not a team player; or was he a threat

[EmperorOfCanada]

I was a MS person up to around 2000 then I switched to Linux, Apache, PHP, and MySQL for server stuff. I kept using .net on the client side. But by .net 2.5 it was serving the needs of MS Office and not my needs; so I switched to Java. Hated java and eventually moved my client side stuff to the browser. Was using eclipse to program and running apache, php, and mysql on my windows desktop to simulate the Linux machine. I realized that I was an inch away from using nothing from MS Then I switched to MacOS X as it better resembled the Linux server without the annoyances of Linux as a desktop (No photoshop etc.) So now I was using absolutely nothing MS without any specific motivation to move away from MS. I was just chasing the best product in every category.

It is a pain in the ass to make the above changes so MS had to really let me down in every category. On the other hand if they started to make the best in various categories they might win me back.

I love the XBox but I am just waiting for the XBox 720 to be ruined by the Office group trying to somehow shoehorn Office onto it.

Re:Not a team player; or was he a threat

[Anonymous Coward]

"C++ or Python or java to .net anything"

You prefer any of these over .NET...Got to be kidding right?

Re:Not a team player; or was he a threat

[Anonymous Coward]

There actually was no .NET 2.5...and what do you mean that it was "serving the needs of MS Office"? It sounds to me that you really have no idea of what MS is offering to developers these days. .NET has come a long way since .NET 2.0 was released in 2005...

It's pretty obvious

[geekoid]

Ballmer needed to blame someone and started throwing him under the bus. Being a smart guy, he left before the bus arrived.

The board should have fired Ballmer and given Steve a huge bonus to return and run the place.

The summary disagrees with itself?

[PickyH3D]

Pundits continue to weigh in on Steve Sinofsky's sudden exit from Microsoft (as executive head of Windows Division, he oversaw the development and release of Windows 7 and 8).

followed by

Few PC users are upgrading to Windows 8 with its unwanted Touch UI, sales of the Surface tablet are disappointing, and few are buying Windows Phones.

If the second statement is to be believed, then why should anyone be worried that the person behind it leaving the company?

Alternatively, if you choose not to believe the second statement (though WP sales being high is certainly hard to claim no matter how you look at it), then the first statement is scary for Microsoft.

I was personally a bit stunned by Steve's sudden departure, but considering that the people that supposedly came up with the most hated pieces of Windows 8 took over for him, I doubt much will change (love it or hate it).

Re:The summary disagrees with itself?

[Billly Gates]

I think Steve was agaisn't METRO the whole time.

THe Windows team was all gung ho on replacing fully working desktop apps with crappy applets designed for phones. Ericka Long the new Windows head was a HUGE fan and was a proponent of the ribbon. The WIndows product manager under her was in promotional videos all smiling and proud of metro saying they are all beautiful and modern it is. Sinsofsky's departure came very very short after the Surface and WIndows 8 which makes me believe the decision to fire him came months ago!

Bill Gates himself approved of letting him go according to Windows Fan Boi site www.neowin.net. If they fired him right before the launch the shareholders would freak out and it would send consumers and OEMs a message that Windows 8 is crap!

So the only logical conclusion is he said NO! We stick with Windows 7 UI and add Metro for tablets or an addon. Gates and Balmer chose the tablet UI in 2010 after the other tablet product failed. So both of them over ruled Sinsofsky and went under him with these people to get Metro everywhere and fire him after the release.

Not Tall poppy syndrome, fall guy

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not tall poppy syndrome I think (google it).

My list of what happened based on nothing but a guess:

1. Surface isn't selling
2. It has a lot of compromises like a trackpad and keyboard and 'Windows' mode
3. It has those because stuff like Office doesn't have a touch interface
4. So Sinofsky has a bunch of limitations imposed on him that make the product suck, and he kicks something out the door.
5. Compromised, but at least a foot in the door.
6. Surface fails to wow the world, and Sinofsky takes an exit for 'not being a good enough smoozer' to get Ballmer to do his job and order the rest of Microsoft to support touch interfaces.
7. Sinofsky gets a big payoff to take the blame.
8. Ballmer pays a big payoff to keep his job by passing his own failure onto the leaving Sinofsky.

I think it's just Ballmer being incompetent. Surface can't work until Microsoft other divisions get competent enough to deliver touch interfaces. You can't get developers while Microsoft can't even focus on a single development platform. Xbox division, and its $40k to certify a patch really put people off writing software for Microsofts walled garden too. Who wants to write for a walled garden like that when in 1 or 2 years time Microsoft can take all your profits in patch fees? Nobody! All of these choices/incompetences made Surface what it is today, a sucky platform.

So Sinofsky is more the fall guy, than the tall poppy they're portraying.

"MSFT is dead!" .... again

[boethius]

This has to be the second or third pundit I've read thus far that has proclaimed Win8, Surface, and WinRT a "complete and utter failure."

Dude - These products quite literally JUST CAME OUT. And yet, somehow, they have so much insight that they can proclaim that within 2-4 weeks of their introduction, MSFT has totally screwed the pooch this time and it is "dying."

Slow down for a second. No one expected MSFT to do Apple-like business on their tablets. Not like they're going to have people camping out overnight for a Surface. No one, including Microsoft.

It may sound like it but I'm not a slavish MS fan boy. They clearly do a LOT of crap, bu they actually are releasing numerous great products and even if they're disappointing in certain respects in the consumer marketplace - and if you can't hit it into the stratosphere like Apple you apparently can no longer compete, which is absurd - they're still quite successful and deeply entrenched in the corporate and government marketplaces. The Windows Phone is actually quite good but they are playing catch-up after years of Android and iPhones and are a distant, distant third. It doesn't mean the products are bad or that MS is "failing" per se - it just means it's going to take years and years for the Win Phone/WinRT/Win8 application ecosystem to catch up. The Windows Phone could go the way of the Zune (which also was actually quite a good product) but I don't see that happening until Microsoft has put years and years of time and effort into it.

It's unsurprising their steady movement to being an OEM has been a difficult and unpleasant one for their long-entrenched Windows OEMs. Given the very, very long relationship they've had the PC OEM hardware world it's not terribly unusual that they would react unfavorably to what Microsoft is doing.

Yes, tablets and smartphones are taking over the world - from a certain perspective - but the fact is that almost all real work gets done on either a Windows- or OSX-based laptop or desktop- STILL. Things are fundamentally shifting away from laptops and desktops for casual browsing, Facebooking, emailing, IMming, etc. etc. happening on mobile or tablet devices now - but, having said that, it's clear they're not just going to disappear overnight and it's clear more powerful PC-type devices aren't going to be disappearing just because some mouthy pundit thinks so.

"Walled garden"

[miltonw]

That phrase you keep using, "walled garden", I don't think it means what you think it means.

Re:"Walled garden"

[Anonymous Coward]

It's inconceivable.

So instead of WIndows, what's the choice?

[billrp]

There's really no alternative to Windows for most desktop and laptop usage, and there are "apps" to hide or disable the silly touch UI in Win so that the reasonable Win 7 UI can be used. Trying to use Linux on a laptop or desktop in a real work environment is a deadend, and Macs are a niche - so what's left?

Re:So instead of WIndows, what's the choice?

[0123456]

Trying to use Linux on a laptop or desktop in a real work environment is a deadend, and Macs are a niche - so what's left?

Weird. I use Linux for real work and I use Linux at home. I only use Windows for games and video editing, since my Linux laptop is much slower than my Windows gaming PC.

And, as the articles pointed out, if you switch to 'cloud' apps then you don't need Windows at all.

Re:So instead of WIndows, what's the choice?

[Absolutely.Geek]

Ubuntu + VirtualBox, 3 years solid.

About 70% of my work still requires WinXP, but every now and then another bit of SW is available for linux. Wine is great for a bunch of stuff also...there are options if you want to contemplate them. Also VM's make upgrading very easy.

Re:So instead of WIndows, what's the choice?

[UnknownSoldier]

> There's really no alternative to Windows for most desktop and laptop usage,

Eh?

You have 2 choices: OSX and/or Linux, pick your poison.

Now depending on your apps you may be stuck in Windows land (such as SolidWorks, etc.), but both OSX and Linux are gaining traction at increasing rate which is fantastic to see.

I've been gaming on PCs for 30 years. I pleases me greatly to see OSX finally getting prioritized. And with nVidia working with Valve to increase driver performance ( http://blogs.valvesoftware.com/linux/faster-zombies/ ), Linux *may* still be a viable option for us game devs to target Linux and make a profit at some point in the future.

What apps & file formats are you stuck with that you can't migrate to another OS ?
 

Re:So instead of WIndows, what's the choice?

[Anonymous Coward]

I use Linux in a work environment everyday (programming). What kind of work do you do?

Re:So instead of WIndows, what's the choice?

[rrohbeck]

I run Linux on the laptop I'm typing this on and I do all my work on Linux, except for Outlook in a Windows VM.

Re:So instead of WIndows, what's the choice?

[MachineShedFred]

Damn, that's odd that my "niche" Mac has been my primary office machine for about a decade now.

Re:So instead of WIndows, what's the choice?

[Anonymous Coward]

Trying to use Linux on a laptop or desktop in a real work environment is a deadend

It is only a dead end (1) if you don't want it to work or* (2) if you're incompetent.

Enough of us get work done on a Linux laptop or desktop.

* That's an inclusive or.

Re:So instead of WIndows, what's the choice?

[Anonymous Coward]

I only use Windows for games and video editing, since my Linux laptop is much slower than my Windows gaming PC.
 
Why don't you just install Linux on your Windows box and do your video editing and gaming with that? Oh, that's right. Because the reason you're using Windows for gaming and video editing is because the software is much better on Windows. Sorry, I forgot.... Ha!

Re:So instead of WIndows, what's the choice?

[tepples]

Let me rephrase it as I understand it: The software for gaming is better on Windows. The software for video editing is better on Windows. The software for everything else grandparent does is better on GNU/Linux.

Re:So instead of WIndows, what's the choice?

[UnknownSoldier]

Uh, write the OS yourself? :-)

Sinofsky's Out?

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Maybe he slept with his biographer.

Re:Sinofsky's Out?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, he slept with his autobiographer.

How is this not an Apple Article.

[tuppe666]

Apple shares are now priced at 535 from 700 just a couple of months ago. Its market share in tablets has dropped to 50.4%, and its smartphones down from 23.1 to 14.9% in a couple of quarters. Its saving grace [as a company, not so good for its consumers] are its massive mark-ups on it products, but even those proving difficult to maintain, as its cost of producing devices has increased, driving its gross profits down. Its now announced that Apple themselves in a new step is letting 3rd Party retailers take a large profit in its "me too" device the ipad mini, in the hope it will gain traction in the saturated with great devices "small tablet" [or as Jobs says "Tweener"] market. Apple did awfully well under Jobs bringing in all the early adopter money, but now these markets are mature, and its arguably behind the opposition [Android] in both hardware and software; Apple are undeniably in decline.

In context of this article Microsoft is a "never was" in mobile, and still has a monopoly in Desktop, the fact that they are taking a safe [and lets be honest profitable] gamble on making Windows 8 a hybrid!? OS that fails in all areas. Following Apple into an established market with the same bullshit and bullying tactics [lol and Office] it always has, using New Apples [Old Apple would have tried to reinvent...or find a new market] playbook, taking everything people don't like about Apple [whatever the fanatics say] and pretend those are the things that made Apple successful, rather that being more Open; Standard orientated...and hell being innovative, and Cheaper...like say Android...Oh!

Re:How is this not an Apple Article.

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple declined from 700 to 535 and its p/e ratio is STILL better than Microsoft's! Microsoft is a turd.

Downscale people buy Android, upscale people buy Apple...so who the fuck is going to buy Windows 8?

Re:How is this not an Apple Article.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Downscale people buy Android, upscale people buy Apple" if that's your view on the current giants i don't like your chance at judging anybody else.

Re:How is this not an Apple Article.

[Anonymous Coward]

I hate to break it to you buddy but Google shares are now priced at 650 down from a peak of 775! Oh fuck, I guess Google is dying!

Re:How is this not an Apple Article.

[Anonymous Coward]

The only only real selling point of Android is easy piracy. Google has basically built it's business on facilitating piracy for the masses. Successful people of means obviously don't have to resort to intellectual property theft to meet their media needs.

Re:How is this not an Apple Article.

[jon3k]

It's market share dropped while it's sales increased. The smartphone market is growing at an amazing pace, so I wouldn't consider that a horrible thing. Here's an analysis from Deidu: http://www.asymco.com/2012/11/05/the-late-smartphone-adopter-paradox/

Re:"MSFT is dead!" .... again

[0123456]

No one expected MSFT to do Apple-like business on their tablets. Not like they're going to have people camping out overnight for a Surface. No one, including Microsoft.

Really? You have a source for that?

Because from the pre-release hype, I would say it was expect to be at least the Second Coming Of Android. I didn't see any articles before the release saying 'look, we've got this new tablet, but it we don't really expect to sell many'.

When even Ballmer is calling sales 'modest', it's clearly a failure. He wouldn't say that if the sales had met expectations.

Don't believe the FUD

[TheKidWho]

/. this is Charlie Demerjian, one of the biggest tech trolls out there. He has a personal vendetta against Nvidia, Microsoft, and Intel. Ignore the troll. They're called SEMIAccurate for a reason.

Re:Don't believe the FUD

[21mhz]

Yeah, let's all read the latest word (or more like 10000) from Tomi Ahonen instead... You must be new here.

Have you tried Windows 8?

[micron]

I see a lot of criticism of Windows 8, but I don't see a lot of folks that have actually tried to use it with a touch screen device.
I have played with the all in ones and touch screen tablets at the Microsoft store. As much as a cringe when a co-worker touches my monitor, I think there is something to this adaption of the tablet interface. I actually like the live data features of the icons, I get information without going into the apps. I get that this is a new take on the old widget concept.

I would not count Microsoft out.

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[tuppe666]

I see a lot of criticism of Windows 8, but I don't see a lot of folks that have actually tried to use it with a touch screen device.

Loads of people have tried it, what are you talking about. People also have installed copies on their machine. Its been released. Reviewers have been given free hardware, and their are displays everywhere. Its Awful.

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[knorthern knight]

> I see a lot of criticism of Windows 8, but I don't see a lot of folks
> that have actually tried to use it with a touch screen device.

If you think students are going to write 10,000-word-essays, or corporate types will do large spreadsheets or reports, or programmers will code 10,000-line-programs with a touchscreen device, you are totally out of it. And no, I'm not going to pay twice as much for a Surface as for a real PC, and then go out and buy a bluetooth keyboard plus mouse.

In the mid-1980's, the MS-DOS PC walked all over VT100 terminals as far as getting serious work done was concerned. That's why it was adopted so fast. Touchscreens are so-so for 140-character tweets, or short Fecesbook updates. They suck for real work in the corporate world. Windows 8 is going nowhere, fast. MS better release a "back to the future" Windows 9, or simply start charging for Windows 7 service packs.

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[TheGoodNamesWereGone]

I loaded up the RTM version in VMware and played with it a few minutes. Oh, I have loaded up GNOME3 and Unity for a few minutes too. Nothing to see here; move along. They're all still regressive and get in the way of the user efficiently doing his work.

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[Guppy]

I see a lot of criticism of Windows 8, but I don't see a lot of folks that have actually tried to use it with a touch screen device.

I have tried it. It is currently installed on my Lenovo x201t, which was one of the reference TabletPCs used during Win8 development.

When operating in purely touch mode, it is definitely an improvement. Tablet mode was very limited in XP and Win7 (and by "limited", I mean "painful"), but fully usable now. That being said, I feel the visual prompts are too hidden (there should at least be a tutorial mode that gives more clues, and then steps aside once you're familiar enough everything); the interface is not intuitive enough to learn by osmosis. And if a tutorial mode exists, my installation gave no clue of it.

On the flip side, when working in Desktop mode (basically anything that requires more than a trivial amount of text input), I keep reaching for features that have been moved or hidden, and I itch to install ClassicShell or some other add-on. I've been refusing the impulse to do so, to see if it's just a matter or breaking old habits. But after having kept at it for a while, it seems that some Touch-optimized elements of Win8 just simply are not friendly for Keyboard/Mouse users.

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[tuppe666]

I loaded up the RTM version in VMware and played with it a few minutes. Oh, I have loaded up GNOME3 and Unity for a few minutes too. Nothing to see here; move along. They're all still regressive and get in the way of the user efficiently doing his work.

I would take "Gnome Shell" and Unity over Windows 8, but unlike Windows 8 these can be swapped out for alternatives "mate" and "Cinnamon" [sometimes called a traditional desktop, or replaced entirely with KDE; XFCE, personally I am running Gnome3 with Cinnamon and loving it. I suspect my next desktop will be E17.

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL are you an M$ propagandist?

1: I've seen tons of videos of people using it. Why are you being obtuse?

2: So it works on a touchscreen device? Why is it marketed to laptops and desktops then?

3: So you played in the M$ store and everything was great? Well, things are not great outside the MS store...

4: What are you talking about cringes and co-workers? Make sense when you write, please.

5. You think there's something? Hahahahha, can you even say what or are you trying to sound smart?

6: Aww, you like the bells and whistles; how cute.

This post was pretty funny.

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[eco_oce]

I have been using Windows 8 every day for the last few months on a Samsung Series 7 Slate. Its great for the single use that I have for the slate - taking notes and looking up reference material.

I have tried Windows 8 on the desktop and gone back to Windows 7 - the start menu just works better for a keyboard and mouse

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[man_of_mr_e]

You DO realize that Surface has keyboard options. Right? Not only is there a keyboard cover (which works surprisingly well), but there's a standard keyboard option as well.

Unlike Apple tablets, Surface has real USB ports, and you can plug any keyboard you want into it. And it has real HDMI, so you can plug it into a real monitor without expensive adapters as well.

You really should learn a little something about it before you criticize it.

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[Anubis IV]

Yes, I've used Windows 8. You're playing the role of apologist if you're suggesting it needs to be used with a touchscreen, however.

Windows 8 is marketed as working natively with a mouse and keyboard, which is how most people I've talked to intend to use it (the idea of a vertically oriented touchscreen, like what you'd see at a kiosk, sounds exhausting to me for daily use, and I already have a tablet, thanks). As such, it's perfectly reasonable for someone to have an expectation that it will work with a mouse and keyboard just as well as it would with a touchscreen, and any criticism leveled against it on the basis that it fails to live up to that standard would be entirely valid. So rather than allow an apologist to sweep criticisms away by suggesting that we're not using it right, I think I'll simply explain how my experience went when I used it in a prescribed manner.

In my time with it (at work, about two weeks back, using the release version available to MSDN subscribers) I was continually disappointed by the "tap here to do X" prompts that made no sense for my given inputs, since it felt unpolished and as if it hadn't been designed for the desktop at all. I was also disappointed by the fact that in the span of simply fooling around with it for 30 minutes I was able to crash it twice, forcing a reboot both times. Plus, there was the fact that between those issues and just general problems navigating around, I was unable to even figure out how to install my team's software, let alone test how it runs on Windows 8, which was my whole purpose in installing Windows 8 in the first place. I went into it as neutrally as I could muster, having assumed that most of the issues I had heard about from friends who had installed the beta would have been addressed by now and that the negative comments I had been hearing online were sensationalism or people with a bias at play. I came out of it convinced that I have never had an OS make a worse first impression on me (to be fair, I didn't mind the installation process).

Thankfully, I'm not being compelled to upgrade at work. And at home, I have no intention of upgrading to Windows 8 either now or anytime in the future. I'll be sticking with what I have.

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[cbhacking]

Out of curiosity, what do you feel that Desktop on win8 is missing, other than a visible Start button? I've found it to work quite well if I keep using it the way I use Win7, except for the power state controls (which I almost never need). The biggest nuisance to me is the division of the Start search result categories, and that's something I learned to deal with very quickly (an extra keystroke or two).

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not just serious work. Any operation benefiting from a context menu seems pretty much impossible on most touch interfaces, due to lacking extra mouse buttons. I admit I have not used Windows 8 yet, but I do have a Nexus 7 tablet for development. Just trying to select a piece of text or an address and copy it to another app like mail or IM or notes keeper is an exercise in futility. I remember Macs used to come with a single button mouse and wonder how they solved that problem.

These issues can likely be fixed somehow but the fact remains that touch is just very limiting and also very inaccurate compared to a mouse, requiring simple interfaces with huge buttons.

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[tepples]

Unlike Apple tablets, Surface has real USB ports, and you can plug any keyboard you want into it.

iPad is compatible with a Bluetooth keyboard as well.

And it has real HDMI, so you can plug it into a real monitor without expensive adapters as well.

So once you've plugged a USB keyboard, USB mouse, and HDMI monitor into a Surface running Windows RT, what makes it better than my 10" laptop that runs a real PC operating system? The kind of work I do for a living can't be done in an operating environment that prohibits sideloading.

Re:Have you tried Windows 8?

[Guppy]

The biggest nuisance to me is the division of the Start search result categories, and that's something I learned to deal with very quickly (an extra keystroke or two).

That's probably my biggest annoyance as well. I also had some trouble getting used to the way the Wireless Network list is organized, and accessing advanced settings for individual wireless networks isn't very intuitive.

Unsucessful in Mobile; Still the same Monopoly

[tuppe666]

Year of Microsoft Mobile 2013

Year of Microsoft Internet 2013

Seriously its not even funny any more; Microsoft continuing failure in these markets. Microsoft is not so much in decline, its the same horrible abusive monopoly it always was. Its just that even with its monopoly its failed to breaking to Electonics [Google, Apple] and the internet [Facebook; Amazon; Google].

Windows 8 is just its next attempt at using its monopoly on the Desktop to break into these markets. [whatever you think of that]

They'll never go away

[MAXOMENOS]

There's too much of a customer base for Windows, SQL Server, and Office.

But I do think there's a good chance they'll be acquired sometime in the next ten years.

Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[eco_oce]

I don't really understand why there is so much hatred of the Windows 8 interface. Why not just continue using Windows 7? Consumers have shown they are willing to learn new ways of doing things from their adoption rate of iPads and Android devices - the learning curve from a Windows PC to an iPad is steep, but made much easier because the usability of the iPad is very strong. There is little reason to think consumers won't also be willing to learn the Windows 8 metro way of doing things if they have a reason to.

Microsoft was forced to innovate by Google and Apple. Google and Apple have been going head to head for years. The competitive pressure has reached a point where both services offer fully integrated service offerings. You can use Google services for your whole digital life - office, media, maps and communications. These services are available on any Google branded device - phones, tablets and PCs. Google makes their money on you as a product for their advertisers. You can use Apple services for your whole digital life - office, media, maps and communications. These services are consumable on any Apple branded device - iPhones, iPads, and Macs. Apple makes their money from the devices you use (not on you as an advertising product).

Up until this you couldn't use Microsoft for your whole digital life. Microsoft's enterprise lock-in practices made it very hard to use office on a phone or a tablet, and Microsoft's media services were limited to the console market. Microsoft milked this for as long as they could and then realized they had to offer a full suite of services or risk loosing everything to Google or Apple. In doing this they also probably realized they were leaving a lot of profit on the table. Now you can also use Microsoft for your whole digital life and consume the services on a Windows 8 phone, tablet or PC. This puts Microsoft back in the game in a big way. They are now back as a realistic competitor to Google and Apple whereas 12 months ago you could have more or less ignored them.

They have also used their late entry to try to leapfrog over the Google and Apple offerings. They've done this in a compelling way and we will know in the next 6 months if they have succeeded. They have huge momentum with the purchase and integration of Skype and the 400 million Windows 8 PCs which will be sold in the next 12 month. Even with this they had no option but to build the Surface because they needed a tablet to compete with Google and Apple. Without a tablet there is no incentive for consumers to switch their digital service stack away from the other big two.

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[tuppe666]

I don't really understand why there is so much hatred of the Windows 8 interface. Why not just continue using Windows 7?

...because its not very good in fact its very bad. They are not emotional about it pretending otherwise is ridiculous. Adopting a old version of the software. Is not a solution, it is delaying the inevitable. Windows 9 if anything will move further down this path.

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[eco_oce]

...because its not very good in fact its very bad. They are not emotional about it pretending otherwise is ridiculous. Adopting a old version of the software. Is not a solution, it is delaying the inevitable. Windows 9 if anything will move further down this path.

But isn't the point that Windows 8 is to force change. Most of the new Windows 8 tablets and PCs come with touch. The interface Windows 8 is built for and seems to work fairly well on (at least as well as Android or iOS). I see no sign that Microsoft ever hoped we will also use Windows 8 on equipment released before October this year.

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[tuppe666]

But isn't the point that Windows 8 is to force change. Most of the new Windows 8 tablets and PCs come with touch. The interface Windows 8 is built for and seems to work fairly well on (at least as well as Android or iOS). I see no sign that Microsoft ever hoped we will also use Windows 8 on equipment released before October this year.

The point of Windows 8 is to force change...I suspect their goal should have been to meet users needs. As for Windows 8 working well. You need to use it. It is trying to be both Wimp/Widgets+Launcher at the same time and ends up a mess; its awful for both Mobile and Desktop users. Comparing it to the mature products of both iOS and Android [or even earlier versions of Windows] is an insult to both.

The sad fact is maybe if they hadn't used Windows 8 to force change you could have ended up with two better products, one for mobile and one for desktop, whether these would have been as good as the alternatives is a different matter, but then its about Microsoft forcing itself into the mobile market, not about quality of product, and it shows.

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[bmo]

>I don't really understand why there is so much hatred of the Windows 8 interface.

Because on anything other than a tablet, it's shit. It's a schizophrenic interface that tries to deprecate the desktop interface in favor of this new touch bullshit.

The thing is though, keyboards and mice are better input devices than touch. Touch is only useful when you have no other way to input, have an enviroment that is hostile to other input devices, or external input devices are inconvenient, even if it's just a stylus.

Microsoft is chasing this mythical beast called the "universal interface" which doesn't friggin' exist. They've been doing this shit since trying to force a desktop metaphor onto tablets and PDAs, eventually finding out that people don't like poking at tiny icons with a stylus which can be lost down a catchbasin. But instead, we have error in the opposite direction - forcing an interface suited to tablets and phones onto the desktop, where it SUCKS.

Also

>new account
>buzzword bingo

Shill.

--
BMO

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[eco_oce]

Also

>new account >buzzword bingo

Shill.

-- BMO

I'm not a shill I just bothered to finally set up an account after years of reading slashdot. My main point was that Microsoft had to create the Windows 8 interface in order to compete with Apple and Google - they needed something that would get them into the tablet space so that people would start using their stack of services. If the Windows tablet looked just like another iOS knock off most people would just say ... meh. With Win 8 they at least have something that people will say ... "oh shiny, maybe I should give this a go". I think this is that same as Amazon needing to skin Android for the Kindle Fire - it creates a necessary point of differentiation.

I couldn't care less if people buy stuff from Microsoft, in fact I have a hard time understanding why they would when they can get the same basic functionality for free from Google

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[0123456]

Why not just continue using Windows 7?

Because Microsoft have just announced that Windows 7 is officially obsolete and the next version of DirectX won't be back-ported?

No-one would care how bad Windows 8 was if Microsoft wasn't trying to force the entire world onto it.

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[bmo]

OK, so I'll take that back, as you're reasonable.

It's been happening a lot lately though (the new-account shill thing).

With regards to your argument that 8 is for tablets. Microsoft *had* to go to a touch interface for tablets . I agree, totally, that touch is needed on tablets, PDAs, music players, and phones. It's even better than vocal control. What Microsoft has done is continue on this path to their mythical "universal interface" that totally ignores the fact that people use different sized devices for different purposes. What they did instead was take the touch interface for tablets and shoehorn it into a desktop operating system. This goes against every study over the past 40+ years showing that people don't like holding their hands in front of them with light pens or their fingers touching a screen. SAGE is dead. Light pens are dead. Touch on the desktop never took off, and that wasn't because of a lack of touch software or touch enabled monitors (NEC had a great one in the mid 80s). Touch winds up doing data collection on factory floors, industrial equipment, and POS terminals, tablets, PDAs, and phones, for the reasons I listed in my previos message.

Anyone who has seriously interacted with Metro on the desktop hates it and it's not like you can avoid Metro. And you can't claim that I don't know what I'm talking about, because I've used it ever since the same day the Developer Preview came out. People have been talking about this for over a year.

Yet Microsoft refuses to listen to the desktop and laptop users, because they have an agenda to push, and they think that pushing touch on desktop and laptops will get people to do everything on tablets. The first sign that they don't give a shit about the desktop and laptop users was when they ripped out, the start menu registry entry and the code tied to it just to make sure.

Touch on a desktop or laptop? Not a chance. I'm not rubbing my greasy fingers all over a 27 inch monitor. I'm not doing CAD on a tablet. No.

The hate for 8 (hey that rhymes) is not unfounded. It's from people who have screwed around with this Frankenstein Monster since 2 Septembers ago. And despite all the naysaying of the Windows shills that "Microsoft's gonna fix that" even past the RTM, the root criticisms of 8 were never addressed. Instead, the reaction was more like the reaction from the Gnome 3 devs - "Fuck you, we know what we're doing."

8 is a failure on the desktop. It is inconvenient to the point of unusable.

--
BMO

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[man_of_mr_e]

Except it has. IE 10 includes a back-port of DX 11.1, with everything but the WDM 1.2 specific features (like stereoscopic rendering).

More rumors that people keep repeating.

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[Anonymous Coward]

Unusable? Are we talking about the same OS where you open the desktop and its virtually identical to 7?

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[Anonymous Coward]

Bravo. Points for apologizing and good post overall!

I may not be objective as I agree with W8 being shit, but it's still shit ;-). I said the same when Vista came out, and still there are people who refuse to admit Vista was a huge failure. So I guess wisdom is not for everyone (or opinions will always differ ;-)

I never will apologize for huge corporations though. I never understood the need to apologize for other's faults. I guess the Stockholm syndrome is on the increase.

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[strikethree]

The thing is though, keyboards and mice are better input devices than touch. Touch is only useful when you have no other way to input, have an enviroment (sic) that is hostile to other input devices, or external input devices are inconvenient, even if it's just a stylus.

I was not going to respond because you can be quite abrasive and turn every discussion into a contest, but I really disagree with your assumption that touch is -always- an inferior input method. I do agree that it is inferior for most things that we do with computers nowadays.

An example of where it is not inferior is when using Google Maps. A mouse with a scroll wheel is pretty close to being as useful but having my fingers moving stuff around is MUCH faster and more accurate... for me.

Re:Change was forced on MS - but they reacted well

[Anonymous Coward]

I totally agree with you.

Metro sucks balls on the desktop, however that doesn't mean that Windows 8 sucks. Windows 8 has a lot of under-the-hood improvements that I really like.

Windows 8 is about 30% faster in bootup than 7 and that means something to me (especially on my laptop).

If you install Start8 or Classic Shell and change the file associations you're left with the old UI, (you will hardly ever see metro) and an OS that's damn snappy.

Microsoft are crazy wrong in disabling the start button and enabling booting to desktop mode.

I assume they will enable this in SP1 if they want people to actually buy Windows 8.

Re:"MSFT is dead!" .... again

[mov_eax_eax]

as i stated before, ballmer never said that sales were modest, he said that surface had a modest distribution, i.e. only launching in a few markets.

Everything is in decline...

[The Grim Reefer]

Eventually anything that gets big/successful will cause speculation that it's in decline.

I've been hearing it about America since I was a kid. IBM was in decline until they reinvented themselves a while back. I think they're supposedly in decline again. I don't remember when Microsoft started it's supposed downfall. Probably around the time of the dot.com bust. Apple was a walking corpse and then came back. I've heard they are in decline from several people in the last couple of years. Everything collapses eventually. I guess it's just human nature to try to be the first to predict the fall of successful endeavors.

Enh....

[roc97007]

> Few PC users are upgrading to Windows 8 with its unwanted Touch UI, sales of the Surface tablet are disappointing, and few are buying Windows Phones.

Enh.... not sure if I believe all that. As much as I'd like to see Microsoft become a much smaller company, I observe that Windows 8 hasn't been out long enough to tell yet what the penetration will be, same for Surface, and Windows Phone... well, he might have a point there. But I'm not sure I buy the "steep decline". I strongly suspect that Microsoft's decline, if it comes to that, will be slow and noisy. And hopefully somewhere along the line the board finally ejects Ballmer and gives Microsoft a chance in hell of producing products that people might want to buy.

Re:Enh....

[tuppe666]

I observe that Windows 8 hasn't been out long enough to tell yet what the penetration will be, same for Surface, and Windows Phone... well, he might have a point there.

I think Nokia ex-shareholders would agree that Microsoft phone still outsold by Symbian and Bada is a failure. Surface sales are described by the the most enthusiastic man on earth as "modest". Windows 8 will be a great success...like Vista was.

Too bad...

[flyerbri]

What he doesnt realize is Microsoft and Google have both worked together to start a revolution.

Then again, he seems to be one of those 'backward thinkers' who might kick himself later, but also start up an awesome company because of his exposure and network!

In any case. it will work out for the best. for both him and his employer.tick. former employer.

I fully expected this post to be about the US

[Anonymous Coward]

In fact I skimmed past it several times before finally reading the first line and realizing they were talking about Microsoft, not the USA. According to the stock prices and the number of machines running some form of Windows I would say they are not in decline. More of a slow, steady growth.

Senior Manager Deficiencies?

[BoRegardless]

If Sinofsky had been around for over 2 decades with 'team player deficiencies', what does that say about Microsoft's management methods.

Re:Senior Manager Deficiencies?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sinofsky was apparently a favorite of Bill Gates', until very recently when Ballmer got Bill to agree that Sinofsky was a problem. In fact, press reports said that Softies pointed out (off the record) the similarities with Scott Forstall's departure from Apple after Tim Cook took over.

Re:"MSFT is dead!" .... again

[Anonymous Coward]

These products quite literally JUST CAME OUT. And yet, somehow, they have so much insight that they can proclaim that within 2-4 weeks of their introduction, MSFT has totally screwed the pooch this time and it is "dying."

They just came out of beta... we've had a year to make value judgements based on our observations.

Proably Not

[assertation]

People have been saying that Microsoft is just on the edge of falling for decades now. If Vista didn't kill it, nothing will. After the complaints over the Metro UI deafen their ears, they will do what a lot of people in the company probably wanted to do in the first place. Ship Windows with an option for choosing Metro or the Classic Windows interface.

Apple benefited from Vista. It convinced more people to give Apple a try. I convinced about 4 people shopping for a computer at the time to stay away from Vista.

Apple will benefit again.

Interestly, Ubuntus is doing the same thing with Unity, which forced to discover how nice the KDE has become.

So in the end, everyone will win and Microsoft will still be here.

Re:Proably Not

[whoever57]

People have been saying that Microsoft is just on the edge of falling for decades now. If Vista didn't kill it, nothing will.

I think that the one thing that will kill it is people using smartphones and tablets for email -- realizing that they don't have to have Outlook. Documents in the cloud are another nail in the coffin because they must now be client neutral (that boat already sailed -- the iPad).

Apple accepts GPL code in iOS app store

[SuperKendall]

There is no problem submitting GPL based apps to the app store.

The only problem you will have is if the original copyright holder complains to Apple because they do not like GPL code being used in the App Store (like VLC or Gnu GO). But that's not on Apple, that's on the copyright holder.

Apple doesn't care if other people can see and use the source for the app you submit to the app store.

Re:Apple accepts GPL code in iOS app store

[Anonymous Coward]

...and if i get the source i can sideload it on my own device pay g 99€

Not completely walled, it is just a toll road

Re:Apple accepts GPL code in iOS app store

[xkpe]

I don't think you could submit GPLv3 since you can't provide a way to install it.

Seriously, no way?

[Anonymous Coward]

My friend, why aren't you considering the limited shelf space a bad sign? A sign that those stores or Microsoft itself doesn't have any real faith in the product?

What about the sales of Windows 7 phones, don't they have any bearing on the sale of Windows 8 phones?

It hasn't been a couple days, it's been a couple weeks. And these lines you speak of at AT&T stores, where are these stores? Did AT&T cancel vacations and hire more people?

Be careful not to confuse an honest review of reality as a trolling. We may live in divisive times, but not everyone disagreeing with you is against you or trying to mess with you.

Re:Seriously, no way?

[man_of_mr_e]

The limited shelf space is due to Microsoft's rollout schedule, not anything related to stores. They've had the Surface for sale exclusively at their Windows Stores. No other brick and mortar store has been allowed to have them.

No, Windows Phone 7 phones have no bearing on Windows Phone 8.

There are a number of reasons for this. First, it's a totally different OS (it's based on the Windows 8 RT OS, not the old CE based OS. RT is the same code base as desktop Windows 8, just recompiled for ARM.)

Second, the previous generation of Windows Phones had largely substandard, low-end hardware that nobody wanted. The exception was the Lumia, but even that was not up to phones like the Galaxy SIII. The new phones are actually using quality hardware, with specs similar to high end android phones. For instance, the Samsung Ativ is essentially identical to the Galaxy SIII.

Third, Apps can now be shared between Phone, Tablet, and Desktop OS's, so you only have to uby it once and can use it in all three. Again, thanks to them sharing the same OS.

Nokia is not dead. Certainly, they took a hit, but they were dying anyways. They knew what was coming down the pike and they knew it would take time for the strategy to evolve.

Windows Phone 8 was announced on October 29th, but the phones didn't actually go on sale until November 2nd, which was 12 days ago. Almost 2 weeks, but not quite.

You seriously consider a review to be "Honest" when it claims that tablet and phone users don't want touch?

Re:Seriously, no way?

[wadeal]

What are you on about saying the Ativ is a Galaxy SIII?

It almost identical to the a Galaxy SII. Dual Core CPU as well (SIII is QUAD CORE), EXACTLY the same case just bigger and silver. Fuck, even the Windows button is the same button as a Galaxy SII with a Windows Icon on it.

http://versusio.com/en/samsung-galaxy-s2-vs-samsung-ativ-s

http://versusio.com/en/samsung-galaxy-s3-vs-samsung-ativ-s

Galaxy SIII SHITS all over Ativ S.

Re:Seriously, no way?

[man_of_mr_e]

I'm not sure where they got those specs, but many of them are wrong.

For example, I have a galaxy SIII 32GB, it has 16GB internal and a 16GB sdcard. The specs claim the galaxy has 32GB internal, which isn't the case, and the Ativ S has the same expandability.

Unlike Android, however, there's none of that dual brained BS with sdcards.

It's true about the dual core vs quad core, but I'd much rather have a faster dual core than a slower quad core.

The Ativ S does have navigation.

It's true the Ativ doesn't have Gorilla Glass. That's because it has Gorilla Glass 2. Sheesh.

It's true, there are differences, and the Galaxy does beat the Ativ in some of them, but the reverse is also true.

What other option is there?

[Anonymous Coward]

We could live in the 90s forever.

Metro

[TheGoodNamesWereGone]

Metro is a piece of shit. It's a tablet interface, and Microsoft is attempting to shove it up the asses of desktop users. Every time I point that out I get modded down as a troll or flamebaiting. Here we go again...

Re:Metro

[bmo]

Some of us know you're right.

It's the Microsoft shills that have invaded over the past couple of years that this "downmodding of MSFT dissenters" has happened.

Also note the vast number of newly minted accounts when an article critical of Windows 8 comes out. You never hear from these again, they are used and abandoned for new accounts created when a new Microsoft article comes out.

Slashdot should rangeban Microsoft.

--
BMO

Re:Metro

[Anonymous Coward]

To be the Satan's advocate, the start screen has a good property: it's not that buggy start menu of the Windows 7, which invents new non-translated menu structures from thin air just when I have customized it like I did with the XP. Honor demanded death to the start menu of Windows 7. I sacrificed Windows 7 start menus to the Devil at the dark night of 29th to commemorate the first witch trial in Paris in 1390, the first ARPANET link of the 1969 and the 1986 opening of the last section of the M25 motorway by Margaret Thatcher.

Re:Metro

[Anonymous Coward]

Dude, we are past the "desktop" era. Grow up.

Re:Metro

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm no MS shill. Not even a MS fan.

I kinda hate Metro from a principle standpoint. I hate that MS is focusing on tablets so much. I hate that 8 has barely any (if any at all) improvements over 7 for desktop use.

But Metro as a UI is really not that bad, even for desktop use. People need to calm the fuck down. Try it for a week or so and you might be surprised at how non-intrusive it is.

When MS starts showing signs that they are in fact abandoning the desktop and making it more difficult to use, I'll start to worry.

Re:Metro

[Anonymous Coward]

But Metro as a UI is really not that bad, even for desktop use.

To clarify, Windows 8 in general is not bad for desktop use. I only ever see/use Metro on the Start screen. I don't use Metro apps, I don't find them useful for non-touchscreens. But that doesn't mean they get in the way for my desktop use. I just don't use them (just like IE or WMP...).

Re:Metro

[Anonymous Coward]

Slashdot should rangeban Microsoft.

And Google whilst they're at it!

Re:Metro

[PlusFiveTroll]

It's not likely the shillfest is coming directly from Microsoft, it's probably contracted out by some other group(s). I noticed it on most the major sites that I read not long before release that the number of blatantly obvious shill posts skyrocketed. It would be interesting if all the sites could get together and build data metrics on the shillyness of each user, there IPs, how long the accounts had been created and so forth to see if it points to a shill group, or how many of the shills are just blind Microsoft believers.

I disagree, who is doing the judging?

[Anonymous Coward]

For a customer with only the need to browse the web and play some media, Windows RT is as good as anything out there. So why not buy?

On the other side, it is absolutely fair - indeed you yourself just judged it when you said no one in their right mind would buy. It's just a matter of who is judging. For a market analyst, it may be somewhat unfair - but who is buying matters to markets. For someone who wants it all, RT just doesn't have it nor will it in the usual lifetime of a tablet.

I will agree with you, RT on surface first was a mistake. At the very least RT and Pro should have been released simultaneously.

so predictable

[laxr5rs]

8 has only been out a month and already prognosticators know the future. BS

Except its not threatened on the Desktop :)

[tuppe666]

People have been saying that Microsoft is just on the edge of falling for decades now.

The difference today is different. Microsoft with its monopolistic position and vast cash reserves, bullying tactics, and the usual things FUD; EEE etc could buy; bride; bully the competition into submission. Microsoft controlled the OS...so it was a Microsoft World.

Microsoft hasn't changed, the world has . Its competitors Apple; Google; Amazon; Facebook are in some cases bigger, and all are more successful in their fields, and have too much money to be bought; bribed or bullied. Its not stopped it trying, its just not really effective. The other side is computing has moved away from the OS its about the Internet whether you call it Web 2.0 or the cloud, and its moving away from the Desktop, and onto phones and tablets; Microsoft has been joke in those areas for a long time.
P

Lost in Translation

[SuperKendall]

Ballmer Never said that SALES were modest, the quote is a " widely distributed mistranslation ".

Perfectly understandable, as the nuances with speaking Chair are very difficult to understand (especially when dodging).

MIcrosoft on /.

[Dr Max]

Really what is the point in reading about Microsoft on slashdot. You only ever get the most negative side of the story and all there accomplishments never make it to the site. How many people know that Microsoft just demonstrated real time voice to voice translation using the original speakers own voice and the translated speech is in the correct order for the new language? (that is news for nerds as far as i'm concerned) But instead we have had six stories about how Microsoft is evil and forcing everyone to use a new version of windows that's completely broken and no one any where will ever be able to use it. Reddit is kicking your ass in journalism /.

Re:MIcrosoft on /.

[Anonymous Coward]

Whats reddit?

Re:MIcrosoft on /.

[Dr Max]

www.reddit.com is just a compilation type linking site for a large number of topics (memes, funny, pics, today i learn, but most importantly technology and science). It's really just a collection of interesting links with a very brief title sentence or two, but due to the auto rankings and the wide selection of submitters (like CmdrTaco) it's a site of pure virtual gold.

Re:MIcrosoft on /.

[Anonymous Coward]

Since when does /. have anything to do with journalism? It is about like-minded individuals discussing topics THEY want to. Go back to reddit.

Re:MIcrosoft on /.

[Anonymous Coward]

He should of known /. has no journalism but he could of been fooled by the site moto "news for nerds".

Re:MIcrosoft on /.

[Anonymous Coward]

That is because Slashdot began as a Microsoft hate site masquerading as a geek site. The original crowd are still mostly here - the rest of us moved on to other aggregators and find Slashdot amusing to visit once in a while.

Re:MIcrosoft on /.

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you actually tried that "voice to voice translation"?

There is some funny YouTube videos in making...

Re:MIcrosoft on /.

[Dr Max]

I didn't know anybody outside of Microsoft had any access to it. It was just a demonstration a week ago http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Nu-nlQqFCKg .

Re:MIcrosoft on /.

[strikethree]

How many people know that Microsoft just demonstrated real time voice to voice translation using the original speakers own voice and the translated speech is in the correct order for the new language? (that is news for nerds as far as i'm concerned)

I did not know and I will likely never know since you did not provide any links. Did you at least submit an article to Slashdot about it? This sounds pretty damned interesting and I would love to read about it even though I am pretty much a Microsoft hater.

Re:MIcrosoft on /.

[Dr Max]

Sure i did. I admit i should of added it to my original comment, but i wasn't expecting this much attention.

I didn't know anybody outside of Microsoft had any access to it. It was just a demonstration a week ago http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Nu-nlQqFCKg .

Re:MIcrosoft on /.

[Dr Max]

I didn't bother submitting it either. I've gone off submitting, because i find it a fair bit of work to put together a story (which gets picked to pieces by the /. crowd) and it's so hit and miss what gets through fire hose (even if it gets a lot of positive votes); I've felt pretty dishearten before waiting for it to never show up on the front page, so i wan't going to put myself through it for a good job MS story (but from the looks of it, it would of gone down fine. Feel free to post it your self).

Apolgies are so predictable

[tuppe666]

8 has only been out a month and already prognosticators
know the future.

BS

One month and its already unloved. The bottom line is the product is not going to change, and the opportunity to make an impact has gone. what is likely to change in future that will massively reverse its fortunes.

Re:Apolgies are so predictable

[Anonymous Coward]

windows 9

Microsoft can "fail"

[asmkm22]

It doesn't matter how horribly Microsoft fails because there are no competitors trying to take over. Microsoft wins by default.

This is why companies like Canonical are making a big mistake by trying to chase after the Apple crowd, when they should be going after the enterprise.

Re:Microsoft can "fail"

[guruevi]

There are plenty of competitors these days.

Apple has a really big influence in schools right now as 90% of our incoming student population in engineering either owns or buys a MacBook of some sorts. All-over the student population, the ratio is roughly 60/40 in favor of AAPL in 2011 a jump from ~40/60 in 2010.

Recently one of the IT Directors made the joke they soon may have to learn managing the Mac platform while practically all management-types at the place already have a portable Mac they prefer to use over their stock Dell's.

Microsoft is coming late to the party with Windows 8 and tries to imitate the iOS feel on big computers which is horrendous.

You can't disable the Metro interface anymore, customizing the system for individual users has become infinitely harder as you can't easily customize the Metro interface at deployment. IF you have the chance to use it, try it, it's an absolute UI mess.

The All Programs button has moved to the absolute bottom right which on a 28" screen is an absolute horrendous travel time - actually getting any icon (I launch and close multiple programs many times in short time) on a 28" screen is a horrible hunt-and-seek, the 'hot corners' get in the way and activate when you're in desktop mode and there is no way to disable them, if you need the hot corner you inadvertently click icons and launch whatever program is in your task bar, if you have more than one screen, trying to get to the right bar (where some random functions are hidden) will inadvertently pop your mouse on the second display so it disappears again.

Besides that just about anything you may use in an enterprise environment has changed location. The place where you put your Start menu items, your startup scripts, where programs have to install stuff - it's all been changed. All automation scripts have to be rewritten.

Windows 8 is what Windows Vista should've been sans the Metro or Aero interface. Ready for portables, ready for the modern age of information security, using the capabilities of modern computers and good enough to keep users working but keep the fucking Lego Duplo interface only on small screens (8" or less).

Re:Microsoft can "fail"

[asmkm22]

It's fine and dandy that users like Apple products, but it's the administrators that determine what gets put in place behind the scenes, and that's where the money is. Apple products are cheap as hell compared to "Enterprise" solutions.

Re:Microsoft can "fail"

[guruevi]

I doubt that. The administrators have little to say. It's the corporate leadership that tells you what you will use and so far decisions in IT have generally been made on golf tournaments with the marketing dudes.

If the populace wants Mac, they'll have Mac (they already have). Enterprise management is not hard on Apple systems, it's all built-in already and there are plenty of 3rd parties that will gladly take money from you to re-implement it's native capabilities.

Re:Microsoft can "fail"

[asmkm22]

Speaking from experience, upper management generally doesn't influence things like that as much as people think. The whole "decisions are made on the golf course" arguments are generally bogus.

They certainly may have the final say in making IT get their own Mac's and whatever working, in violation of IT policy, but that's it.

Re:Microsoft can "fail"

[Anonymous Coward]

Do they end up blowing away the OSX installation and putting Windows on it? Virtually all the programs they would need to use won't work on Apple's toy of an OS.

Win 8 OS / phone

[Anonymous Coward]

Not sure what you whiny /. Bitches are on... My Lumia 920 over iP5 any day. Way better... In every way. Unless you're a grandma that is confused by anything except for 4 rounded buttons that give you access to call, texts, etc.

Done with iPhone... The lumia is hands down a way better phone.

Re:Win 8 OS / phone

[Anonymous Coward]

I just got mine as well and really impressed with the build quality and the polish / completeness of the os.

No

[terjeber]

No

Microsoft can still pull this one off.

[xigxag]

I understand what this was all about. Microsoft's plan was to quickly force the RT environment on people so they would automatically be members of the new ecosystem and feel naturally inclined to buy the phones and tablets, especially once they realized you could do more with RT than with iOS. But as things stand now, every time someone is forced to use the RT interface against their will, they are reminded of how their options have been restricted. No matter how good RT is, if it serves as a reminder of a bad feeling, it will be tainted by that. Instead of bringing people into the fold, RTs involuntary start screen drives people away.

Even so, I think Microsoft can still rescue Windows 8 if it just does a few things.

1) Issue an apology and bring back the start button as an optional item, and allow people to boot directly to the desktop. (Yes I know... just like Start8 / Classic Shell) It seems to me that a huge percentage of gripes have been about those two things, starting long before RTM. Why fight against what your customers want?

2) Buy up a couple of good RT games and release them as free gifts to upgraders. $45 in free software! The OS pays for itself!!

3) Reposition Windows 8 as an improved desktop environment PLUS free games PLUS a Windows Phone 8 compatible OS skin which people can use or not use.

Yes, the restoration of the start button and starting desktop means RT use will grow more slowly, only at the pace that people want to try it out. But in the long run, it will make for a better user experience, one that people will want to return to.

The marketing of Windows 8 has been horribly arrogant. By pissing off geeks, MS has alienated its proselytizers and enthusiasts. By pissing off businesses, it has affected its own bottom line. Every day that this debacle continues is one less opportunity that MS has to set things right.

Demerjian goes deep

[epine]

If I show up on slashdot and finger dump my scorn and derision for ten frantic minutes to clear the pyschological slate to continue wrangling with aramid gloves the glass shards of a fragile technology stack (lets say Meteor on top and OpenCL on the bottom) for another long six hour half-day and in my flurry to vent I end two sentences in the same paragraph with "rapidity" I consider myself to be in bad form.

But I can understand the male psyche permuting the words "frightening rapidity" over and over and over again. Really, I can.

Other words: aspiration, modest, abject failure, carpal tunnel nightmare, scream market acceptance, tighter integration, abandon[ment], gushing, clueless, intransigent, and myopic

Carpal tunnel. That's so true. If you can't perform, your wrists take a beating.

It's as if they treat the desktop as deprecated

[Myria]

It seems to me that Microsoft considers the desktop to be a legacy interface, and that tablet interfaces are the way of the future. It's as if they only support having desktop programs at all just for backward compatibility reasons, and that everything new should use Metro.

What Microsoft's Windows team doesn't understand is that there are many things a desktop interface can do that Metro cannot. For example, have more than two programs on the screen at once.

Some of these restrictions are even done for nothing but Microsoft's benefit, in the name of security. Metro applications cannot use plugins, because all executable code has to be signed by Microsoft at application publishing time. Metro applications cannot do runtime code generation, making it difficult to write a browser that performs well. Metro applications cannot read or write any files except their own or the ones it writes.

There are many things that Windows 8 added that were really awesome even for desktop use, but it's just been polluted with this Metro crap. Let's see... UEFI booting, really fast startup, better security hardening, storage spaces... but you're forced to get the tablet UI on a desktop.

Tabloid

[Anonymous Coward]

Lately slashdot has been turning into a sensationalist tabloid, latching on to every "somebody predicts the demise of X" story, the vast majority of which are unfounded. I realize that people here might not be journalists, but come on... What's next, Twilight coverage?...

Obligatory ass kick

[Anonymous Coward]

Disclaimer: I am a nobody. A simple techie. I left Microsft last year because I felt they were in turmoil internally. Managment where I worked was heinous and ineffective.

That's not a disclaimer. That's a *disclosure*.

Punt.

Huh, mod parent up please

[cbhacking]

I have mod points but have lready posted in this thread, so I can't do it myself. That's a very interesting (and quite short) article, though.

TL;DR version: Distribution is modest (only in a few regions), but device is well received.

You don't have to use or even like Windows 8

[jjohn_h]

>>>
You don't have to use or even like Windows 8.
>>>

You are 10% right, no make that 1%. It is practically impossible to find decent laptops or desktops *without* Windows. And please do not offer any links for Linux pre-installed. I have just gone through 3 dozens of them.

The only way you could be right is: you pay up and erase Windows. Hands up all of you that accept this approach.

ARM v7 CPU on MSFT Surface

[Anonymous Coward]

Surface wins. No need for Intel or AMD anymore. No need to be spied on by Dell anymore. Suck on my ARM v7 CPU, Dell. Dell = Access to your brain

Infinite stream of non-news

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's another non-news article. Take a few facts (someone left MS abruptly, some users don't like Win8) and string together random speculation about people's motives and what went on at events not disclosed to the public. Maybe I'm getting too old, but I'm almost at the point where I don't want to read the "news" any more because it's just an infinite stream of non-news that fills up the news cycle. Out of every 100 articles, I'm lucky if 1 is actual news. It's gotten to where I'm reluctant to look at my RSS feeds any longer, because I know I have to wade through the blogspam, editorials, non-news articles, sensationalist articles, etc to get to the few actual news articles. Anonymous sources are not news. People selling books are not news. Consultants scaring people to get more cybermoney from the government is not news. Random speculation is not news.

The most compelling software of the past decade is the software that automatically generates news articles. Hopefully the semantic web will be added to these articles, so they can be recognized as non-news by next-generation RSS feeds. Can you imagine getting up every morning and having a single RSS feed with only the actual news articles?

SURFACE w/ ARM v7 CPU

[Anonymous Coward]

Images & Streaming Videos of Microsoft Surface Initial Setup:

https://skydrive.live.com/redir?resid=B6B5BF36A417B313!339&authkey=!AMwFhC_fU47FVJM

(You may have to sift through some other stuff)

Enjoy

-AverageWindowsUser

(Images taken w/ Sprint Motorola XOOM Tablet, no Dell computers were used or harmed during this process. Dell = Catholicism + Old Fart Cadillacs)

Really?

[SmallFurryCreature]

In general growth is seen as essential because the world grows. There are more and more computers in the world, if MS keeps selling the same amount of OS installs, they are not stagnant, they are shrinking as measured by market share.

If your customers grow and you do not, you are shrinking.

All they need...

[OldSport]

...is to update Windows 8 so it has a switch in the user settings area: optimize for touch screen input, or optimize for mouse/trackpad input. The former gives you the Metro start screen, and the latter gives you back the Start button. That's all they need to do and the main problem with Windows 8 would basically be eliminated. I think the idea of trying to create a single OS that works on both desktops and tablets is a good one; a couple of relatively minor tweaks and I think Windows 8 could be excellent.

That said, Metro on a tablet is awesome -- I just bought my wife an Asus Vivotab with RT and we were both blown away by how nice it is. I mean, it's the same concept as an iPad (sliding tiles around) but something about the way the tiles are grouped and whatnot makes it easier to use and more customizable IMO. (For mobile, I don't get the hate for Metro. The people who complain about the "learning curve" strike me as idiots -- it took me about an hour of messing around with it to figure out how to navigate everything pretty much perfectly.)

Devil in the details

[Anonymous Coward]

Americans don't do nuance, or realism, for that matter.

Depends on what KIND of multithreading

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey Hairyfeet - 1 small thing to note: I've been writing multithreaded code since 1996 or so, & it's TOUGH in only 1 respect - what they call "fine grained multithreading" vs. "coarse multithreading"... the difference? Simple really, I'll illustrate an example or two ANYONE can understand:

---

1.) Coarse multithreading = doing TWO separate unrelated TO DATA tasks...

E.G..-> Formatting a spreadsheet on 1 thread, Printing another on another thread (NOT TOUCHING SAME DATA)

(THAT IS EASY - keep the 2 threads OFF THE SAME DATA, that way, NO "race conditions" - doing both on separate threads will "get the job done", faster, than doing them inline in a queue one after the other...).

---

2.) Fine Grained Multithreading - THIS IS WHERE IT GETS HARD, because the 2 to X threads TOUCH THE SAME DATA!

Sometimes, it's impossible (& I'll show an impossible below) since you have to "wait out" results of one variable before you can process the entire chain.

E.G.-> a = b - a
                      b = c + a
                      c = result

There, "A" can't do a damned thing, until "B"'s result is calculated... perhaps NOT the "best example", but it's there if you look @ it!

I.E.-> Here? You can't put each calculation for each variable involved on a thread (well, you could, but WHY INTRODUCE THE OVERHEADS?) since they have to "wait out" the results of the ones they depend on beforehand... & yes, it gets even WORSE when threads 'touch the same data' - they can "get in a jam" called a "race condition"

APK

P.S.=> In the end though, as far as this Mr. Sinofsky/Mr. Ballmer thing & Windows 8?

You KNOW I am with you 110% though... why?

Well - first of all, I know you're pretty much HONEST TO A FAULT (lol, sometimes, BRUTALLY), but I also KNOW you see what folks use daily from running a shop... that's FAR MORE ACCURATE than some "rubber stamp" put on a project by a "research team" funded by someone that WANTS TO SEE IT GO THRU FOR MONEY ONLY, rather than being an actual improvement...

Put it THIS way since I've been there/done that:

I've seen it too many times, & hands-on for Fortune 100-500's I've contracted for, once for a HUGE air-conditioning concern (who will remain nameless)!

They wanted ME to "put an OK" on a project to replace UNIX stuff with other *NIX stuff (linux) vs. MS, & in good conscience I wouldn't!

My "partner" did though, even though it wasn't as simple to maintain due to Active Directory MOSTLY I felt... he told me, even though he agreed & this guy knew more than I did too:

"Screw that, take the money"... I told him "no man, you can though - I am gone & I know it since I won't DO this thing, since I feel it's dishonest"

So they kept him for 1 more week than me to write out his "ok" since he "kowtowed" & let me go (no biggie, I don't even put it on my resume since I knew it was a BIG SHAM/deceit)...

Yes - it was just about getting "some experts approval", that was all, so someone could get the "credit" & "cash-in" saying they thought of it etc./et al (that company shut down in my area by the by).

Funniest part was, the CEO of the place was "Pro-MS" as I was, & I wager that had more weight than anything here!

Sort of like how Mr. Ballmer's mistakes do @ MS now & in the past - when you told me HOW MUCH HE'S BLOWN CA$H-WISE, vs. what the ROI is, as well as Forbes calling him the worst CEO & his tenure as "the lost decade @ MSFT"? The stockholders will "blow him out" eventually...

(That is, unless the chairman of the board, Mr. Gates, saves him... & even HE can be 'pushed' by the rest of the board (unless he still keeps controlling interest - however, iirc, if Mr. Gates begins to show mistakes, even HE can get ousted as chairman of the board, iirc, controlling interest or not - but, don't quote ME on that - I am *NO* chairman of the board, CEO, or majority stockholder (perhaps others can "school me" here on this last part!))...

... apk!

Sometimes, it's impossible (

Re:Depends on what KIND of multithreading

[hairyfeet]

I bookmarked this post, just so I can point and say "Look at #2" because until you pointed it out I honestly thought people would know what I was talking about. that is what I get for being in front of the damned machines too long, you assume that when you say "multi-threaded' that they will understand you mean true multithreading, to me coarse might as well just be two programs running on the same machine, if they aren't dealing with the same data...hell like you pointed out pretty much anybody with a copy of VS can bang out a program that does that.

But TRUE multithreading, without stalls and race conditions? that is DAMN hard to do, that is why most of the programs taking advantage of GP-GPU are just slicing up the data like transcoders, try to calculate how long each piece of the data will take AND not end up with a race or stall is damned difficult to pull off.

And as far as Win 8? Like I said when I get people that walk into my shop and I haven't seen in years and haven't said a single word to about win 8 go "Man what is UP with that? I tried out some laptops with Win 8 and its terrible!" you know you got a stinker. Hell I had more people try Vista and like it when I had the beta running in the shop...well until the stupid "Cancel/allow?" dialogs started bugging them, than I ever have with Win 8. In fact I have yet to hear anything but backhanded compliments like "It might be good on a tablet" which of course implies "But it sucks on this desktop".

At the end of the day you can use simple math to show why Win 8 is doomed. The last figures I saw had 300 million computers sold last year, lets say that is the average okay? Since I have been selling X3s or better since 2007 that is 5 years at 300 million computers or 1.2 BILLION computers that have more than enough power to run Win 8, so far so good right? Here is where the math bites Ballmer in the ass. Now even the cheerleaders of Win 8 have said "You really need a touch screen to appreciate Win 8" and I wish I had bookmarked it because one actually wrote "And it even works great on old systems! Here we have this touch screen Athlon laptop from 3 years ago.."LOL, like THAT is what the average PC is! So what IS the average PC as far as touch? Well the last figures I saw were 4% but that included kiosks and POS units, when you removed those you had MAYBE 2%, which if my back of the napkin math is right you are looking at around 24 million out of 1.2 BILLION that have a touchscreen!

Hell go to Best Buy, Staples, any B&M and actually count how many touchscreen desktops and laptops are there for sale VS how many that do NOT have touch, at my local wally world out of 27 units they had on display there was ONE that was touch, an HP iMac clone. desktops? Nope, Laptops? Nu uh.

And it is THIS that kills Win 8 like Raid kills bugs, you have a UI centered around touch yet fewer than 2% of the units in the world, both on sale now and that have been sold to date, actually have touch. And why the hell would the customer WANT touch, who wants fingerprints on their pretty new laptop? greasy smudges on their desktop screen? Tablets are treated like "cell phones that don't make calls" so nobody cares if they get Cheetos stains on their Android but they DO care if that nice new glossy laptop looks like shit!

So at the end of the day the math simply don't work. MSFT thought they could ram a UI down everyone's throats that wasn't designed for what it was running on and even the layman can take one look at win 8 and see the suck. Hell I'm "Mr Bleeding edge" and after a month of running the damned thing I wanted to gouge out my eyes with a spoon, and I KNOW all the keyboard shortcuts! Can you imagine what its like for the user that has spent over a decade learning everything by "clicky clicky" to use Win 8? Well wonder no more because here is video proof and it was THIS that I saw in my shop, only with more frustration and cursing than this sweet little old lady.

The Empire In Decline?

[truck87bp]

Yes, Microsoft is in decline because of history and now the cloud. The internet has given us information about companies for years, good and bad. MS's history track record has shown us a lot of bad things nerds don't like: Requested Backdoors, holes that make it easy to attack with scripts, wonderful DRM, Trusted computing, UEFI BIOS and a LIVE Cloud based OS that pours your every day life, up to the minute on the Start screen right in your face all in bright coloured ugly boxes. The desktop where you used to have your wallpaper that showed you photos that you cherished, like mother that had just passed away or the trip you took to the top of a volcano or scuba diving off the islands or your favourite game background. Your temporary sanity instantly removed at start-up by MS before the long tedious job ahead clicking or rubbing the screen for 8, 10 or 16 hours. Most Slashdot nerds don't like the cloud or finger prints but they use it. They want their own cloud at home and not at Microsoft. Oh, here is the new Windows 8, setup your identity with all of your emails and proceed to the next screen and we will full-fill your every wish on the new Start Desktop. MS got in trouble years ago when they allowed outsiders tell them how to do their business, the Federal and local government, the Movie and Recording Industry and worst of all, the Advertising Industry and not to miss mentioning crapping all over their hardware suppliers. Acer has every right in the world to hold off on the MS monopoly BS and the impact on their products. Hats off to Acer, you found some balls. Too bad the others haven't followed you! These changes above has also effected Linux and Apple machines. MS is doing everything to limit the damage caused by these other two wonderful Operating System's but can't seem to stop them. Linux and Apple phones and tablets have taken over Microsoft’s grip. Android has made Linux number 1 today and most people don't realise android is Linux. Linux is NOW and MS knows it. With PlayOnLinux, you can run .exe files in Ubuntu and it works great. Canonical is going in the right direction and their product is getting very easy to use. Apple too, even with their overpriced hardware. Canonical needs to make a simple easy to set-up Ubuntu Personal Cloud for the Home and stop wasting to much money buying hard drives for their cloud. Ubuntu One is fine but keep at 5 gigs. Home is where the heart is. Intel is feeling the pinch. ARM is the future. AMD is on the rocks and this sucks too. I personally have tried to contact AMD to show the how stack computer chips but no reply. IBM has just developed on-chip liquid cooling and I can show them how to stack them. Contact me. Good Luck MS especially after destroying the desktop. I'm not at all afraid to say, I won't miss you, been a ride for 18 years, I have moved on and not looking back. Maybe after MS is gone we can progress and expand our knowledge and the computer. A special thanks to the free minded people around the world for writing code. You are tied for second place with Scientists only after Doctors and Nurses that devote their lives to saving humanity.

Long press opens context menu

[tepples]

Any operation benefiting from a context menu seems pretty much impossible on most touch interfaces, due to lacking extra mouse buttons.

How so? On both old-school Windows Mobile and Android operating systems, a long press on a control opens a context menu.

I remember Macs used to come with a single button mouse and wonder how they solved that problem.

When context menus were introduced in Mac OS 8, Ctrl+click activated them. I believe some web browsers supported the long press paradigm as well.

Touch screen ergonomics

[tepples]

I don't see a lot of folks that have actually tried to use it with a touch screen device.

A touch screen oriented vertically like that of an ATM or a Redbox kiosk, so that you get gorilla arm? Or a touch screen laid flat on your desk, so that you have to crane your neck down to use it?

Works unavailable other than through piracy

[tepples]

How do "successful people of means" obtain a lawfully made copy of the film Song of the South or the television series Spartakus and the Sun Beneath the Sea?

Cloud gaming (not FF7)

[tepples]

I only use Windows for games and video editing [...] And, as the articles pointed out, if you switch to 'cloud' apps then you don't need Windows at all.

Let me know when 'cloud' games* and 'cloud' video editing become practical.

* To avoid doubt, I'm not referring to any Square Enix product.

NES emulators under Wine

[tepples]

What apps & file formats are you stuck with that you can't migrate to another OS ?

As a hobby, I develop video games compatible with the Nintendo Entertainment System. Nintendulator, a player for .nes files that supports debugging, works only under Windows, and not under Wine. FCEUX works under Wine, but only without sound, and the SDL version (what you get when you sudo apt-get install fceux) has no debugger. Several music editors for classic console synthesizer chips either don't run (TFM Music Maker) or run inconsistently (FamiTracker) under Wine. So I have to choose either sound (FCEUX for SDL) or debugging (FCEUX for Windows) for a particular development session on my Linux laptop or wait to go home and use a desktop PC running Windows.

Long lines for Xbox 360 and Wii

[tepples]

Why would there be lines several days AFTER the phones went on sale?

I seem to remember there being long lines for Xbox 360 and Wii months later, to the point where people were auctioning off just the console's packaging so that other people could pretend that they managed to score one.

If a platform makes it painful to be a developer

[tepples]

In general, if a platform makes it painful to be a developer, then few people will feel like overcoming said pain to develop for that platform, and users will reap the detriment of having fewer applications to choose from. The exception is video game consoles, because console licensees are large companies exploiting a captive market who have shown (by their purchase of a console as opposed to a media PC) that they are willing to ignore indie games.

Snap one app to each half of the screen

[tepples]

All current Tablets and Smart Phones have single app per screen interfaces.

Why does this continue to be the case? My Nexus 7 tablet's screen is roughly the same physical size as two and a half 4.3" Android phones' screens. So why can't I hold a tablet horizontally, split its screen down the middle, and Snap one app to each half of the screen? Windows 1 could do this.

It takes a Mac to learn a Mac

[tepples]

It isn't like the boss stops by one day, plops a MacBook Pro on your desk and says "you get to work with this now".

So if the boss stops by one day to announce a deployment of a fleet of Macs next month, how is one supposed to learn how to administer a Mac and continue working at full efficiency after the deployment other than by buying one for home use?

Replace the apps then the OS

[tepples]

And how many business applications did you also move with you in your conversion?

That can be done in stages. Ideally, the conversion to a free software environment would begin by using free applications on an existing platform, such as replacing Microsoft Office with LibreOffice or IE with Firefox or Chrome on Windows, and then replacing Windows with Xubuntu later.

Quit whining and start Wineing

[tepples]

Microsoft owns the corporate market because programmers write business programs that will run only on Microsoft operating systems. If the applications could easily move, Microsoft would immediately fall.

To make Microsoft fall, continue to improve Wine.

Lining up for game consoles

[tepples]

That is why the only items you see people line up and camp out for are Air Jordans and Apple products

That and video game consoles, because they fear that their current console will no longer be supported by new games, and online play with strangers will no longer be possible. Case in point: As soon as the Xbox 360 and Wii came out, the supply of new Xbox and GameCube games dried up. In addition, PS2 games' online play is routinely switched off (DNAS error -103), as was Xbox Live for original Xbox.

Users interact with one program at a time

[tepples]

Anecdotal evidence suggests many/most users run more than a single program at a time and in that context multi-core machines excel.

Over the time span of one second, a user will interact with one program at a time. Only one program can have the keyboard focus, and only one program can have the mouse over its window. The rest are blocking on user input. So until multithreaded programming becomes easy, I'd like to see a strong justification for more than two cores: one for the application with the frontmost window and one for the antivirus and all other tasks.

Re:Users interact with one program at a time

[hairyfeet]

Thank you, nice to see someone understands. I mean let's take myself as an example, I'm anything BUT typical, I'm a multitasking monster! I'll have a game going WHILE doing a transcode AND having a browser with my email accounts running in the background...yet i STILL can't peg out this 6 core AMD I paid just $110 for over a year ago!

But when you look at a typical user, what are they doing? ONE thing at a time, they are listening to music OR watching a video OR burning a disc, OR surfing, they aren't even pegging out the AMD triple cores I was selling 5 years ago, much less these quad, hexa, and octo monsters that are selling now.

So I still stand by my challenge, those that are saying "poo poo multitask needs more cores poo poo" to show me ANYTHING that your bog standard average user does on a daily basis that would peg out even those bottom of the line Phenom X3s i was selling 5 years ago, much less actually require an Octocore or an Ivy bridge CPU, because working in the shop six days a week i see folks from all walks of life, doctors and lawyers to retirees and kids, business men and housewives...hell I have a customer that is running the latest version of Solidworks on one of those Phenom I X3 units I sold 5 years ago and is HAPPY, very happy, with his performance!

The simple fact is once we switched from MHz to cores the users just couldn't come up with enough useful work to peg out these fire breathing monster chips, like I said they are using a funny car to pick up milk at the store. So even if software were to take a leap, which frankly we have seen ZERO indication of happening, they would still have more than enough power to cover it for several years. Like I said my dad is as close to the perfect example of a bog standard typical user and even with him having a Phenom I with the TLB bug clocked at just 2.2GHz he has yet to get over 45% CPU usage, and from the two week log I ran his average usage was running less than 25% which isn't even making the chip work, that's barely above idling. Hell for most of my customers when they are surfing the chips are in idle almost the entire time!

They just can't come up with the work to slam the chips and as you pointed out you certainly aren't gonna change how the user interacts with the PC, which is typically one program in front and the background tasks on the second core. Everything else is just overkill and bragging rights, even a 6 core owner like me will admit that.

I/O bound

[tepples]

Sure, but aren't those cores handy when you're running several *different* apps at the same time?

Yes, and they're all blocking on user input. Please read my reply to Karzz1.

I assume a demanding app might tax one core, and another demanding app will attach itself to another core, yes?

Assume that the first thread of the frontmost window will attach to the first core. Now if a machine has one user at a time, and this user is interacting with only one application at a time, and each application uses only one thread for anything CPU-bound, a single core will suffice. Even if an application performs a task that requires a progress bar, as long as this task is disk- or network-bound, it won't use a lot of time slices on the CPU. For example, web browsers tend to be network-bound, and compilers in my experience are disk-bound, allowing make -j2 to speed up compiles even on a single-core machine. Only running more than one CPU-bound task in the background really requires a CPU with more than two cores.

several big apps going at once, as well as SQL Server, IIS, etc.

I don't know about Microsoft SQL Server or IIS, but MySQL and Apache+PHP tend to be disk- or network-bound at least as often as they are CPU-bound.

So multiple cores are good for people like developers or designers, who might have several big apps going at once

It is disputed that there are enough "people like developers or designers" to justify making the mass-market machines good enough for "people like developers or designers".

daemons/services, trayicon apps

[Anonymous Coward]

It is easy. CreateThread is very easy to use if you don't touch the same data with the threads. Today's compilers and the Windows API makes it so. You're also apparently overlooking the fact that Operating Systems run background processes as well. Their process scheduling subsystems will efficiently schedule threads (the atomic unit of execution) across as many cores as possible as they begin to saturate cores. Then you can also pile on the user apps which consume even more including blocking ones that still have to run be run anyhow despite your arguments on blocking, as well as ones resident as tray icons or other processes I have running in python. For example, I run a 4 physical core processor that uses hyperthreading to create 8 virtual cores. I have currently 158 threads going across those 8 cores. That's roughly 20 threads per core (actually 40 per real physical core). Try doing that on a single core, or even dual core machine, combining that with the fact memory also gets used, forcing virtual memory usage in the pagefile (yes, all memory is virtual, but I am talking when you exhaust physical ram on the ram chips themselves and paging starts) and see if you don't get slowed down more than you would on a 4 or more core system.

256

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/microsoft/windows-7-to-scale-to-256-processors/1687

APK

P.S.=> A good deal of you guys are overlooking the fact that services operate in the background as well as minimized apps also, adding to your thread count.

So you know - The OS' own kernelmode process scheduling subsystem will *try* to "saturate" any core that isn't though, first... but, when it's nearing that, the OS will start sending out parent OR child threads to other cores as necessary!

For instance, I have almost 180 threads going here, and that's due to programs I wrote that run backgrounded minimized as iconized tray apps, or python minimized to taskbar, as well as those services and usermode stuff I wrote too...

It all really depends on what it is you are doing - even if I am a coder, I am still just a user, just a different kind is all... & if the apps are say, multiuser? It gets worse, since that makes thread counts sail upwards too... as well as memory usage!

...apk

SQLServer creates "in memory devices"

[Anonymous Coward]

To MINIMIZE diskboundness (you get flushes to disk though on writes when devices are marked dirty, but it is a DELAYED WRITE, just like a cache, but the idea is to AVOID DISK of course, which is what those devices, do).

See here -> http://manage-sqlserver.blogspot.com/2012/08/flush-dirty-pages-to-disk-in-sql-server.html

* This has been going on since SQLServer for a LONG TIME, & in its "cousin" Sybase as well (& I'd be surprised to see that other large "industrial strength" DB engines don't actually since it works for performance avoiding diskbound I/O slow).

I was part of a team doing contracted work for a company that is a certified MS partner in a product that was a FINALIST for 2 yrs. in a row @ MS TechEd 2000-2002 that used ramdisk devices to go even a step better with the current DB engine of that day from MS in SQLServer, & this was their HARDEST CATEGORY TO DO WELL IN mind you, "SQLServer Performance Enhancement" (that mirrored back to disk for maintaining proper state of course of data inserted, updated, deleting ("flagged dirty")).

LONG before that is where I got the idea since I had been putting DB data from tinier DB engines like DBase III into memory that way, like temp scratch work tables into memory & boosting their performance on ramdisks for example, for ages before that... it works to avoid diskbound thrash slowdowns.

APK

P.S.=> See here -> http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:p6nJSK4_kv0J:http://euclid.ii.metu.edu.tr/~is503/library/TeachYourself_SQLServer65_21Days/ch20/ch20.htm%2B%22SQLServer%22+and+%22database+device%22+and+%22in+memory%22&hl=en&tbo=d&output=search&sclient=psy-ab&gbv=1&ct=clnk

PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT:

"Memory

SQL Server requires RAM to hold all data, index, and log pages in memory. It also holds compiled queries and stored procedures."

... apk

What's your load average?

[tepples]

CreateThread is very easy to use if you don't touch the same data with the threads.

The whole difficulty of multithreaded programming is the fact that avoiding a situation where you "touch the same data with the threads" is easier said than done in a nontrivial program.

You're also apparently overlooking the fact that Operating Systems run background processes as well.

Do enough of these background processes, tray icons, etc. run at the same time to require multiple cores?

I have currently 158 threads going across those 8 cores.

Big whoop. I have a 1-core 2-thread Atom N450 CPU in my laptop, and I have 177 processes on that (source: ps aux | wc -l returns 178, including the headings). How many of these processes are running and how many are blocked? Xfce Task Manager shows that the vast majority of these processes stay in state S (sleeping/blocked) rather than state R (running) the majority of the time. As I type this, the only processes that go to R are Firefox (because I'm interacting with it) and Task Manager (because it's animating).

What you need to measure is the number of threads that want the CPU. The "processor queue length" or "load" is the number of threads that are running or waiting to run at any given time. Linux makes a metric called "load average" available through the w and top; this is the average processor queue length over the past 60 second, 5 minute, and 15 minute windows. I'm not in front of a Windows box, but Google tells me Windows has a processor queue length monitor as well. Only when the 60-second load average exceeds the number of cores are you bottlenecked. And even then, Linux slightly overestimates load because it includes processes blocked on disk I/O, such as build steps called by the aforementioned make -j2.

Do all your threads run on 1 core? No.

[Anonymous Coward]

Do enough run to load the system or cores completely? Yes. Else why would the kernelmode process scheduling subsystem have to use the other cores for at all?

Think about it. The scheduler will attempt to saturate core 1 (0 in zero based array but you get the point) first or near to it. That's its job. Keep them working.

When it hits that or near it? Other cores get threads loaded.

On your big whoop comment - are all of those threads on 1 core? No. You know it, I know it, and why?

See above.

So do coarse multithreading when possible. That avoids race conditions.

Also, not every problem lends itself to what you're describing either.

Some things can't be put on threads and have them improve performance, and multiple thread design has overheads that on a single core system slows an app down actually.

It's ALL "true multithreading" man... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

"you assume that when you say "multi-threaded' that they will understand you mean true multithreading, to me coarse might as well just be two programs running on the same machine" - by hairyfeet (841228) on Thursday November 15, @10:10PM (#41998459)

In real essence, they are - threads ARE truly VERY TYPICALLY the smallest "atomic unit" of execution - essentially "low weight processes" really!

(Well, there are also 'fibers' which are threads of threads but I don't use any compilers or toolkits for using them myself, but, I do KNOW they are out there - & iirc, they are cooperatively multitasked, not pre-emptively as threads themselves are, & yes, there is a difference (think Win3x cooperative timesliced multitasking on a SINGLE CORE system)).

I saw your comment on Tepples, & ask him 1 question:

Do ALL of his threads run on 1 core?

I will TELL you the answer = No.

Why??

The job of the kernelmode process scheduler is to KEEP CORES NEAR TO SATURATION, but not allow it to happen flooring that core... then, when NEAR saturation, it will schedule threads of execution across other cores available that are NOT saturated.

That IS what it does, and why...

(See - If that was not the case, & his load isn't saturation limit/cpu cycles starved @ some point, then WHY would the OS send threads across other CPU cores?)

APK

P.S.=> He's 'on' about SOME things, 'off' on others (especially THAT point) - another way to do stuff? Use CPU Affinity in code - that is scheduling your OWN THREADS but why? The OS does a really good job, & it's less complex than having to add # of cores present detection, and your OWN scheduling (reinventing a wheel) - not that this is NOT ever done, it is, but it's just a lot more work & guaranteeing you can do a BETTER JOB OF IT, than the OS kernelmode process scheduler? Don't bank on it, no matter who a coder is, OR, his years of ability & experience... apk

No, they are NOT all user input blocked

[Anonymous Coward]

"Yes, and they're all blocking on user input" - by tepples (727027) on Thursday November 15, @04:10PM (#41995771) Homepage

Again - you overlooked:

1.) Backgrounded daemons/services
2.) Trayiconized apps
3.) Taskbar minimized ones
4.) Drivers (I overlooked this myself but am not now)

---

As well as threads of execution from the OS itself & yes, it can spawn more as needed (there are even settings to make it have MORE "helper threads" in Windows):

---

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\Session Manager\Executive]
"AdditionalCriticalWorkerThreads"=dword:00000008
"AdditionalDelayedWorkerThreads"=dword:00000008

---

And apps can SPAWN more threads, SPIKING cpu usage even - this IS "the danger"...

Which is part of the reason WHY your OS process scheduler kernelmode subsystem will execute threads of execution, parent or child threads, across diff. cores.

TO AVOID FLOORING A CPU TOTALLY!

---

LASTLY:

* You asked a question above - what is the process load?

The scheduler will attempt to use a core VERY CLOSE to saturation

REASON:

Iit's JOB is to keep the CPU working, core by core & active, vs. spitting out NOPS!

HOWEVER - To avoid it flooring ANY of them?

It does that very thing in sending threads of execution across diff. CPU's less loaded - keeping "balance" & being safe vs. spikes, or poorly written apps that introduce HUGE cpu usage... via race conditions, or think BAD DB QUERIES!

That is also, its job!

(& why your 180 thread load there you mentioned you have is not running on 1 cpu core only)

From what you said you're running?

Heck - It can probably HANDLE it, but if a "spike" comes along when an app spawns a new thread (and, yes, they can @ any time), or is written in fine grained multithread design (which introduces risks of race conditions)?

You could FLOOR that single core - The scheduler tries to avoid it, and it's RIGHT as rain.

APK

I'm also with hairyfeet on this... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

I love the desktop - even more than laptops (unlike some people, who if you ask me, are foolish in 1 regard): Desktops are very "extendable/upgradeable" - far moreso than laptops & certainly things like smartphones, tablets, netbooks (you-name-it from the 'portable puny' world).

* Those types of computing equipment - who REALLY LOVES THEM? MANUFACTURERS OF THEM since they aren't as upgradeable in the long-term, so they can SELL MORE OF THEM IN THE LONG HAUL by making them only "incrementally faster"...

APK

P.S.=> In business as well, the desktop unit won't ever be replaced by "smartphones", mainly for the reasons hairyfeet stated... TOO small to do the types of work involved (I sure as heck wouldn't want to program on one, for example - TOO small/unwieldly to put out code FAST, typing it out)...

... apk

Two vs. six

[tepples]

Do enough run to load the system or cores completely? Yes.

And how many would that be, on average over the past minute?

are all of those threads on 1 core? No.

I will grant you that threads use more than one core; they use the "one and a half" cores of my laptop's CPU. But you still haven't demonstrated that the difference between two cores and six cores is enough for the average user of a mass-market PC to perceive.

So do coarse multithreading when possible.

I agree with you that coarse multithreading is good for background tasks. But the user is not interacting with background tasks and is less likely to notice variations in their performance.

Some things can't be put on threads and have them improve performance

I agree. My point is that in a mass-market home or office PC, there are enough of those single-threaded "some things" that six cores aren't noticeably better than two.

Sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep.

[tepples]

Backgrounded daemons/services

Which sleep until a request is made of the service.

Trayiconized apps

Which sleep until the user interacts with the notification icon.

Taskbar minimized ones

Which sleep until the user restores them or at least pulls up their Windows 7 jump list.

Drivers (I overlooked this myself but am not now)

Which sleep until an application makes a request to send data through that device or until data arrives in that device's buffer.

As well as threads of execution from the OS itself & yes, it can spawn more as needed (there are even settings to make it have MORE "helper threads" in Windows):

Most of which sleep most of the time.

What you need to measure is the "load" or "processor queue length", the number of processes that want to run (not sleep) at any given moment. UNIX and Linux make it easy to view that with the w and top commands. Under Windows XP, it's Adminstrative Tools > Performance > Add > Performance Object: System > Processor Queue Length. By default, Windows applies 10 points for each process so that the graph shows up better with other that are scaled to a 0-100 range. I see load averages around 20 points (2 processes) on the desktop PC running Windows XP that I use at work. And you can cut down your browser's contribution to that by adding advertisement, tracking, and social recommendation servers to your computer's .../etc/hosts file. So with a load average of 2, there wouldn't be much of a benefit to more than two cores.

From what you said you're running?

What I said is that most of them are sleeping, which means they won't be scheduled on the CPU until they need to handle an interaction with the user or with a device.

Going to quote Sean Connery here

[Anonymous Coward]

From the film "Highlander", 1 letter @ a time as he did: B-A-L-A-N-C-E, balance...

You could run ALL YOU DO on a single core, as I noted from the things you pointed out, but WHY does the kernelmode process scheduler send those threads across cores? See above... it's a 'safety measure' as well as a performance measure.

The scheduler's JOB is to keep stuff running smoothly & to avoid spikes & risk of lockup.

Things that get "pre-empted" is usually due to I/O, the "slow link in the chain" on latencies - things that are diskbound for instance CAN & WILL be preempted over non diskbound ones, for example.

* QUESTION FOR YOU:

Since you claim MOST of your apps are in idle states? Then, why on EARTH do you BOTHER with multiple core cpus then??

You're showing us that you're what I call a "grandma does email only user", which is SORT OF like what hairyfeet's speaking of in fact! Underutilization & overkill...

APK

P.S.=> I'd like to see your answer here... I'll be waiting!

... apk

Small correction of my post

[Anonymous Coward]

"Things that get "pre-empted" is usually due to I/O, the "slow link in the chain" on latencies - things that are diskbound for instance CAN & WILL be preempted over non diskbound ones, for example." -

Sorry, correcting that - reverse that: Diskbound I/O for example, in a process that's doing it (since it IS the slowest link usually), will PREEMPT other processes NOT doing that.

APK

P.S.=> Why? Overall smoothness of performance, and B-A-L-A-N-C-E, "balance" ala Sean Connery (safety too vs. lockup)... apk

We agree on a good 90% & should

[Anonymous Coward]

Quoting Sean Connery as "RAMIREZ" from the film "highlander" again:

From the film "Highlander", 1 letter @ a time as he did: B-A-L-A-N-C-E, balance...

You could run ALL YOU DO on a single core, as I noted from the things you pointed out, but WHY does the kernelmode process scheduler send those threads across cores? See above... it's a 'safety measure' as well as a performance measure.

The scheduler's JOB is to keep stuff running smoothly & to avoid spikes & risk of lockup.

Things that "pre-empt" other processes, an example?

Is usually due to I/O, the "slow link in the chain" on latencies - things that are diskbound for instance CAN & WILL preempt other non diskbound ones, for example.

* QUESTION FOR YOU:

Since you claim MOST of your apps are in idle states? Then, why on EARTH do you BOTHER with multiple core cpus then??

You're showing us that you're what I call a "grandma does email only user", which is SORT OF like what hairyfeet's speaking of in fact! Underutilization & overkill...

You DID overlook what users DON'T INTERACT WITH THOUGH, that was my main point to you, along with HOW SCHEDULING WORKS & there's variations of it too. I like how NT-based OS do it, many levels of prioritization but even THOSE will be preempted if IO bound apps surface (especially new threads & the OS + apps can do it, anytime).

APK

P.S.=> I'd like to see your answer here... I'll be waiting! Oh, on what "floors me" here? Python & Delphi apps I wrote that WAIL on strings... it's expensive, & filebound on loads (init. loads & then TONS of stringwork)...

... apk

Average user == grandma does email only user

[tepples]

Since you claim MOST of your apps are in idle states? Then, why on EARTH do you BOTHER with multiple core cpus then??

Because multicore CPUs have become cheap. A bargain-basement Atom laptop either has a 1 1/2 core hyperthreaded CPU or a true dual-core CPU. In either case, two cores (one for the interactive task, and one for background tasks) should be enough for the mass market until computer science figures out how to make multithreading of a single interactive task easy for programmers.

Oh, on what "floors me" here? Python & Delphi apps I wrote that WAIL on strings... it's expensive, & filebound on loads (init. loads & then TONS of stringwork)...

At work I have big batch processes written in Python that wail on flat-file data feeds with hundreds of thousands of rows. These run on a quad-core server several times a day. But I'd guess the average home or office user, the user targeted by the sort of mass-market products sold in Walmart and Best Buy, is what you call a "grandma does email only user".

Re:Average user == grandma does email only user

[hairyfeet]

Thanks for saying it better than I ever could, i would only add the reason i have a 6 core CPU is...it was $105 with shipping and my youngest was running a Pentium D and thus could benefit from my previous chip that was a Deneb quad.

But you nailed it, I sell triples and quads over duals because it is often less than $15 difference and most folks would rather spend the extra $15 and have the extra power, even if they don't need it. In fact on the AMD side lately its been easier to find and cheaper to get the triples and quads than it is the dual cores anymore.

One app that receives input from the user

[tepples]

Also, people ususally run more than one app at the time, having a multicore cpu will help with this.

Just because an application has a window open doesn't mean it's running. It's probably sleeping more than running. How many apps receive input from a PC's user over the course of one second? And how many apps do a lot of computation when they're not receiving input from the user?

Multicore makes sense... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

Personally, since you & I have similar "use patterns" from what you're stating? It makes sense to GO multicore, & not only from a price-standpoint perspective, but for a productivity one also.

I've always looked @ it this way: Given a job of digging a ditch, would I get it done FASTER, with only 1 arm (core) OR N multiple arms (cores)?

Especially if prices are right??

Hey - You KNOW the answer! You're "living it"... & I didn't mean to call YOU "grandma email user", the way you spoke, I doubted you were, I was just trying to make a point that what you noted COULD be done on single core (it was for decades is why).

APK

P.S.=> What I work on @ home? You may not believe it, but it spans MILLIONS of rows (short ones though, 2 items each) -> http://start64.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5851:apk-hosts-file-engine-64bit-version&catid=26:64bit-security-software&Itemid=74

That's just @ home though, & probably THE MOST 'cpu intensive task' I run here that I do daily, & some of its sources I didn't get to "build in" to that for import & processing either (those are done in PyThon scripts that my nephew actually built the underpinnings for, & I added better filtering + errtrapping to & multithreaded design) for that...

I will, eventually, do away w/ the Python though, now that I KNOW they can be done as either 'screen scrapes' or file imports via that Delphi app.

At work?

Since 1994, it's been rather large databases, mostly over time in either IBM DB/2, Oracle, or SQLServer (into the I DON'T EVEN KNOW HOW MANY TOTAL ROWS size tables in devices)... Thus: Did I appreciate multicore when it started arriving (vs. SMP rigs)? Absolutely... everyone did!

... apk

When you assume you know what you do?

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't mean it doesn't though. That's assuming everyone uses a pc like "you-know-who" (grandma again).

Per my subject-line above though - it can 'backfire', & depends on what the guy does + uses to do it. It always boils down to 1 thing: The "use case scenario", like so much in life does...

APK

P.S.=> Good conversation we had thru this thread, good review for me if anything!

THESE kinds of topics really "get me thinking" & to remember things I've LONG forgotten details of!

Peronally - I think it is 1 of the more difficult topics, right up there with managing the size of pagefiles & what-not OR to use them, or not... many moving parts, many exception scenarios, + more!

...apk

When the price of $0 is right

[tepples]

Given a job of digging a ditch, would I get it done FASTER, with only 1 arm (core) OR N multiple arms (cores)?

A task like yours, which involves merging and sorting big DNS blocking lists, is easy to parallelize. So might a task like mine at work, which involves comparing active listings at several different online storefronts to the current inventory levels using one process per storefront. And so might loading ten different web pages in new tabs if your web browser uses a process per tab like Chrome does. On the other hand, nine women can't make a baby in one month. I guess our argument is just over whether the workload of the mythical "median user" is more like digging a ditch or more like making a baby. The speed of the interface to RAM is also important, especially if your working set doesn't fit entirely in the CPU's cache, and multiple cores share one interface to RAM.

Especially if prices are right??

I agree with you: if the price is right, shop for a multicore CPU sized to match your load average. But hairyfeet has found that for a lot of people, the price of buying a new computer isn't right. If the single, 1 1/2, or dual core machine that someone already owns already handles his workload, why spend more than $0?

You may not believe it, but it spans MILLIONS of rows (short ones though, 2 items each)

I might try your hosts file manager on my quad-core Windows 7 box sometime. Do you have a version for Linux as well?

Sure, try it if you like (no Linux version though)

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry on that note, per my subject-line above...

I'd like to do one though (too bad Borland killed Kylix, but, I've seen FreePascal's front-end called "Lazarus", & it reminds me of Delphi 5, or so (they're all fairly the same here, just more stuff added)) - sorry.

It's probably FAIRLY EASILY PORTABLE (except for diff. in sockets work linux vs. Windows, & of course, diskdrive letters vs. mounted devices too, perhaps threadwork, but mostly I'd wager that's been 'abstracted away', hopefully, between the two compilers enough so it isn't an issue, but, I don't know for sure).

It's an ongoing thing, & has been since 2004 (I think, honestly?

In that timeframe I've put MAYBE 1-2 days work in it, lol, it's not that complex... maybe simplest app I ever put out online in fact).

It has threadwork, but it is almost strictly coarse - I avoid doing fine-grained stuff, takes too much thought, & to be blunt about it, since I have only messed with it a few times in 20 yrs. I steer-clear of it!

To get 'more' out of it, performance-wise, I pulled most every trick I know, ala:

---

1.) Playing with CPU priorities dynamically (first "manual-shift" & later, automatically done for a user) - I built in where I had to 'step-up' or 'step-down' cpu cycles usage that way so the user doesn't have to THINK about it!

2.) I tuned up the code over time here & there, algorithm-wise (this was a bigger boost by far imo). Early on, I was actually working on the GUI control lists, bad move. I later went to actual LISTS in memory. Faster results, & I would guess due to less overheads in messaging.

---

Still - I do have message passing overhead of GUI, vs. that in character mode (since I have a tty-term/character mode/DOS Window version that runs ALMOST 10x faster).

1st - I even bought a new CPU to compensate (Intel Core I7 920 QuadCore @ 2.67ghz stock oem speed, vs. my former AMD Athlon64 X2 4800+, which iirc, ran @ 2.4 ghz? Not even SURE anymore, but it was near that - the AMD ran in 2 hours time in the end, too long...).

Yes, used hardware to "make up for my own inadequacies" (not really, it always "got the job done" but it was a matter of speed). You know how it goes - like playing golf, or chess imo. You are really playing against your own self.

E.G.-> First, on the new Intel, it took 45 minutes or so... wasn't enough, & that's when the above 'optimizations' occurred.

So far - I've got it down to roughly 10 minutes time, over up to nearly 1.86 million records output now with very nearly 2 million input.

99% of that is the string processing involved in the "Convert & Filter" step - it is the "time killer"... but, it is ACCURATE to a fault there, afaik! That's the part that matters most - since the data output in the custom hosts file IS what matters.

I've seen shell scripts for *NIX that can do it though, same basic job - you MAY want to look there, since those types of scripts ARE out there.

---

Anyhow/anyways:

Not an argument here - you are pretty much accurate in what you've said, other than the small diff.'s we already discussed!

---

On what Hairyfeet sees? Hey - I agree with him... why??

You & I, + our "use case"/use pattern???

I don't *think* we're the kind of folks that hairyfeet runs into, but, since he does run into them via his business????

He has one hell of an insight into what the "average-joe"/"common-man" REALLY is "into & doing" out there, nowadays.

FAR MORE THAN I DO, admittedly & I've told him that via email, & probably more than most here (and I'd wager more than "paid industry analysts" even).

APK

P.S.=> You are EXACTLY RIGHT on fitting into the L1 or L2 cachelines, & my datasets typically weigh in @ around 52mb lately on import, normalize, deduplicate, & output (when merged in with my OLD hosts file data too).

Like I said, you pretty much know what you're about, so not an argument... just discussion

Makes sense (dollar$ & cent$)... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

Put that way, it makes a lot of sense to go that direction (like "bulk buying" of items) - you get "more bang for the buck" proportionately.

Anyhow/Anyways:

I took a peek @ tepples' suggestion on using "merge sort" & funniest part is, I "hit on that" LONG ago (something very like it) but haven't "built it in" yet, here -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2019504&cid=35395536

(Where the AC "script kiddie troll" ADMITS that IN MY DOING something very like the merge sort, worked (which does more on pivot work for sorts) by breaking the data up)

It works, but I haven't implemented it in code yet (There, I did it manually as an experiment to see IF it would work!)

It does - it can cut the process time on the sort... however:

The sort ISN'T the true "time killer", the stringwork for removing bloat, is - & I won't avoid or stop doing THAT - no way, it's the data output that's the important part (& I want it accurate, & LEAN AS POSSIBLE, 1st...)

I.E.-> There, I found that by dividing up my entire data intake set, that I was running faster...

I thought it was since I was doing LESS per batch, but it ALSO really MAY BE that I was "fitting inside the L1/L2 cachelines" too which tepples noted (Which is faster memory + 'close' to the CPU cores - which tepples & discussed earlier...).

Funniest part: Since tepples is a *NIX man, or leans toward it seemingly?

I suggested using *NIX scripts to do this type of work to him (since I haven't "ported" this to Linux & I don't have a Linux machine running here anymore).

An AC troll (whom I called "the ac script kiddie troll") tried that while ribbing on my program's earlier builds. He 1st TRIED that here, and failed on several points for data accuracy -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1922942&cid=34687498

(By missing things he needed to do to make the data accurate & also as LEAN as possible.)

Then here again later -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1929880&cid=34728830

Still "missing the mark" for data accuracy (the real important part over speed alone).

BUT I HAD TO WALK HIM THRU ALL THE ERRORS THEY MADE THAT WOULD HAVE MADE THE DATA INACCURATE &/or BLOATED (with comments, duplicates, & more)... see here for detail:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2019504&cid=35365340

I.E.-> In his script, he failed to do a number of things (that cost processing time in stringwork, no avoiding it IF you want to do it right)...

The sort I use now, a variation of the quicksort algorithm, pretty stays steady from a few entries, up into the MILLIONS of them on sortation.

APK

P.S.=> However AGAIN though:

That's NOT where my programs "burns the most time" - where it's doing that, is as I said:

During the string operations (which I do 10 per each line item)... THEY are what "burns time" in it, but they're also (imo @ least, for accuracy, which IS the TRUE "Bottom-Line" here).

Eventually, as I have done since 2004 here & there on this program (maybe, lol, 1-2 days time in work on it in that timeframe)? I will implement that data break up... & perhaps? Even using "merge sort" vs. the "quicksort" I do now...

... apk

Re:If a platform makes it painful to be a develope

[modmans2ndcoming]

it isn't painful though...it is DIFFERENT.

get over it.