Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Ditch Linux For Windows 10 On Your Raspberry Pi With Microsoft's IoT Kit

Posted by samzenpus on from the get-started dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Partnering with Adafruit, Microsoft has announced the Windows IoT Core Starter Kit. The $75 kit comes comes with an SD card preloaded with Windows 10 IoT. According to the Raspberry Pi blog: "The pack is available with a Pi 2 for people who are are new to Raspberry Pi or who'd like a dedicated device for their projects, or without one for those who'll be using a Pi they already own. The box contains an SD card with Windows 10 Core and a case, power supply, wifi module and Ethernet cable for your Pi; a breadboard, jumper wires and components including LEDs, potentiometers and switches; and sensors for light, colour, temperature and pressure. There's everything you need to start building."

160 of 308 comments (clear)

  1. Uh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    As if.

    1. Re:Uh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      It's perfect. Now my Pi can have Telemetry!
      DirectX ought to come in handy, too.

    2. Re:Uh? by sumdumass · · Score: 1

      Are you going to put in your drones so they phone home right before crashing into a Microsoft campus building?

    3. Re:Uh? by I'm+New+Around+Here · · Score: 1, Funny

      Well, if it doesn't come with a pencil box that looks like a small briefcase, I'm not buying this kit.

      --
      If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
    4. Re:Uh? by Eythian · · Score: 5, Funny

      It doesn't come with a GUI, so if you want a working display, you need Linux.

      I don't think anyone has ever said those words before.

    5. Re:Uh? by gl4ss · · Score: 1

      I doubt they managed to cram in telemetry in there, it's so half assed.

      It's "Windows 10 core".. basically.. it's about as windows 10 as windows phone 8 is windows 8 - heck, even less. I wonder when they get tired of their fake one platform shit. you can't just name everything the same and then claim its all unified. a fucking dos based nokia communicator from late '90s is more unified with windows 98 than current shit.

      --
      world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
    6. Re:Uh? by Darinbob · · Score: 1

      So it's Windows 10 without any windows. Do we just call it "10 IoT"?

    7. Re:Uh? by arglebargle_xiv · · Score: 2

      It's perfect. Now my Pi can have Telemetry! DirectX ought to come in handy, too.

      Just as we don't have Pi's telling us to go out and find some dodgy hookers, maybe pick up some syphilis, share a few needles and get hepatitis, so we shouldn't be telling Pi's to infect themselves with Win10.

    8. Re:Uh? by TuringTest · · Score: 1

      More like "Plain Wall 10 IoT"

      --
      Singularity: a belief in the "God" idea with the "demiurge" relation inverted.
    9. Re:Uh? by godefroi · · Score: 1

      It comes with a GUI, it doesn't come with the Windows shell.

      --
      Karma: Poor (Mostly affected by lame karma-joke sigs)
    10. Re:Uh? by Groo+Wanderer · · Score: 1

      I think we just call it X. :)

    11. Re:Uh? by unixisc · · Score: 1

      In other words, it's just PowerShell, or DOS?

    12. Re:Uh? by MoarSauce123 · · Score: 1

      Exactly! All you get is a shell command line. Might as well stick with Linux then because the shell there is way better. The only benefit I can see is that you can use the free VisualStudio dev tools to code....on a Windows PC.

  2. pft... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    why the hell would I want to do that?

    1. Re:pft... by edxwelch · · Score: 5, Funny

      masochism?

    2. Re:pft... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      some people will do anything to avoid systemd.
      of course, systemd isn't on the linux version of the pi either.
      But why take a chance?

    3. Re:pft... by Sandisfan · · Score: 1

      masochism?

      HAhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha oh my sides are hurting who thinks up this stuff...... I mean I'm not just laughing at you're comment but the whole Idea... OH here it comes again Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha oh i can't get my breath hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha Oh my sides are hurt please stop hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

    4. Re:pft... by arglebargle_xiv · · Score: 1

      some people will do anything to avoid systemd.

      So now you get svchost.exe instead, the model on which systemd was based.

    5. Re:pft... by jones_supa · · Score: 1

      So now you get svchost.exe instead, the model on which systemd was based.

      More specifically, it's called Service Control Manager. svchost.exe is just a container process for a group of services. Type "tasklist /svc" in PowerShell to see what I mean.

      In all fairness though, I think systemd pulls more from Mac's launchd.

    6. Re:pft... by fisted · · Score: 1

      I'm not just laughing at you're comment

      Your not?

      --
      CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
    7. Re: pft... by fisted · · Score: 1

      whoosh...

      --
      CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
    8. Re:pft... by Wdomburg · · Score: 1

      Actually, the direct inspirations were launchd and SMF.

    9. Re:pft... by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      Breathless and flushed, she said, "I need to be punished."

      He said, "I understand. Hand me your Raspberry Pi."

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
  3. Avoid the Microsoft tax! by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Build your own Raspberry Pi kit. It will be cheaper.

    1. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      This is Microsoft selling something, how does the "M$ tax" nonsense have relevance? When you go to the grocery store, do you whine about the Kellogs tax on your Corn Flakes? Don't want to run Win10 on your Raspberry Pi? Fine, you don't have to. But spare us the anti Microsoft BS, in this case they have built something pretty cool.

    2. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      I did a while ago. But you still need win 10 as a development station for Windows 10 IoT Core. kinda lame.

      http://ms-iot.github.io/content/en-US/win10/SetupPCRPI.htm
      "
      To setup your Windows 10 IoT Core development PC, you first need to install the following:

      Make sure you are running the public release of Windows 10 (version 10240) or better. You can upgrade from here. If you are already running Windows 10, you can find your current build number by clicking the start button and typing “winver” and hitting enter.

      Install Visual Studio 2015
      We recommend Community Edition.
      If you already have or choose to install Visual Studio Professional 2015 or Visual Studio Enterprise 2015 (available here), make sure to do a Custom install and select the checkbox Universal Windows App Development Tools -> Tools and Windows SDK.
      Install Windows IoT Core Project Templates from here. Alternatively, the templates can be found by searching for Windows IoT Core Project Templates in the Visual Studio Gallery or directly from Visual Studio in the Extension and Updates dialog (Tools > Extensions and Updates > Online).

      Make sure you’ve enabled developer mode by following these instructions."

    3. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      It also isn't much different from the price of other kits already on Amazon.

    4. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 4, Informative

      Microsoft's contribution to this kit is Windows 10 Lite OS installed on the memory card. Jameco sells a similar kit for $60. If you're willing to scrounge around for individual parts, you might put together a identical kit that cost less.

      http://www.jameco.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10001_10001_2156164_-1

    5. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by war4peace · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If you're willing to code a lot, you can build your own OS.

      --
      ...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
    6. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 2

      I'll add that to my to-do list as soon as I get finished writing a chess engine in Python.

    7. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by khellendros1984 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      No one who is a serious Pi user today will bother giving this a look.

      Most of the people asking about Windows 10 in the Pi group I take part in are just interested in running "Windows 10" on a cheap computer, and they generally lose interest when they learn that it doesn't even provide a GUI. Developers actually talking about writing software for it have been few and far between.

      --
      It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
    8. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Easy. The tax "cost" has been shifted from cash to telemetry. You're still paying, just not directly from your wallet.

      Only a complete moron would buy this kit.

    9. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by CanadianMacFan · · Score: 1

      It's the setting up the servers and functionality for the OS to send all my personal data to that is the time consuming part.

    10. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by gweihir · · Score: 1

      So this is really just about forcing more people to move to Win10. Figures.

      --
      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    11. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by gweihir · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If you take into account the added effort of protecting you privacy and having it break on patches you cannot refuse, I would say the Win10 downgrade is excessively expensive.

      --
      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    12. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      But they dont matter in a practical sense in the real world..

      Yes they do. Just because the uninitiated masses don't recognize the infringement of their computational soveirgnty doesn't mean it "doesn't matter." This is the same reductionist philosophy which has given us such great lines such as "privacy is dead" and "nothing to hide". This does matter in a practical sense, because the more positive re-inforcement we give the powerful to abuse us, the more they will abuse us. Privacy didn't "die" overnight, there was no mandate from god. It was corporate (and government) greed which "killed" privacy and everyone who has ever uttered the phrase "privacy is dead" has been an unwitting enabler of the widespread abuses we see today. Let me guess, to you the widespread compromise of your privacy is doesn't "matter in a practical sense in the real world", how did that come to be?

      The "real world" to you is the one where we all ignore the blatant wrong doing of the powerful just because that is easier and everyone else is doing it? I don't think so. The "real world" is the one where you recognize the extent to which the general population is being duped. And you can be part of the problem if you want, but don't tell others your fantasy is the "real world". The problems with Windows 10 and the iphone are well documented. If these things are not problems for you, then congratulations, but therefore your talk about my "education" is unfounded.

      And I would hardly call lack of knowledge of non-standard ways to develop apps for the iphone a "lack of education". I haven't researched how to develop an iphone app in close to seven years. Why? Because when I first researched it back then I realized that the iphone was a bullshit platform not worth my time. Education on the topic complete, bullshit is as bullshit does. Sorry if that is not compatible with your view of the real world.

    13. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by tapspace · · Score: 1

      Pst, I think it was a joke!

    14. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by storkus · · Score: 2

      When you go to the grocery store, do you whine about the Kellogs tax on your Corn Flakes?

      No, because I have the option of buying some other brand like Post or Malt-o-Meal, or the house brand. Micro$oft is doing everything it can to make sure you don't get a choice and have to pay them even if you use someone else's software.

      Want Android? Pay M$.
      Want Apple? You're probably paying M$.
      Want a PC? Unless you build it yourself, you're paying M$. Even if you don't, they're still controlling the hardware specs.

      This is extortion and monopolization at its finest.

      Meanwhile, my blood ran cold when I read this knowing that LadyAda sold out. I guess she needed the money. So much for Adafruit.

    15. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by Darinbob · · Score: 1

      in this case they have built something pretty cool.

      I missed seeing that part in the article.

    16. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by Darinbob · · Score: 1

      Which is way more fun than using someone else's.

    17. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by tibit · · Score: 1

      I think that this is bullshit. VS 2015 works fine on Windows 7, and I don't see what's so special about building for the arm targets that would require Windows 10. I build for ARM using VS 2105 on Win 7 already, I just haven't deployed the stuff on RPi yet... shouldn't be hard, but I really don't see what's the outrage here. People, let's try it before you spew nonsense, mmkay?

      --
      A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
    18. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by tibit · · Score: 2

      I can't develop an iphone app without enduring a multi gigabyte download/install of "XCode"?? are you for real?

      LOL. When you install any development platform, do you think that the compilers, libraries and "documentation" just materializes itself from thin air? You had to download all of that stuff anyway.

      --
      A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
    19. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by Ulric · · Score: 1

      Yep, I did the same. When I realized that after jumping through this nasty bunch of hoops, I still did not have anything remotely as competent as Linux on the Pi, I put Raspbian back on the SD card.

    20. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      Did you mean to link to a clear plastic bucket?

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    21. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by Dog-Cow · · Score: 1

      That's no surprise. I bet there are no pictures. When you learn to read, you might want to catch up. You seem to be missing a decade or two.

    22. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      *sigh* Corrected link.

      http://www.jameco.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product_10001_10001_2224243_-1

    23. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by balbus000 · · Score: 1

      I don't know, I got mine for free at OSCON ;)

      Of course I'm running a Raspbian image instead of theirs, but the hardware is nice.

    24. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by balbus000 · · Score: 1

      I can confirm that VS 2015 running on Windows 7 works fine, even though they don't advertise it.

    25. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by Shirley+Marquez · · Score: 1

      The IoT version of Windows 10 is free as in beer, though not as in speech. Adafruit isn't paying anything to Microsoft for the OS, so there is no Microsoft tax. There is some cross-promotion going on with Microsoft; Microsoft recently sent a mass email to Insiders touting it, and Adafruit was featuring it on the front page of their web site. (It is no longer there, probably because the kit is currently sold out; I expect to see it pushed again once they build more.) But I don't think any money is flowing from Adafruit to Redmond; if anything the cash is likely to be going the other way.

      Adafruit is rarely the low cost provider of tech toys and this kit is no exception; you could save a little bit of money by buying your own Pi, downloading the software and flashing a Micro SD card, and gathering the rest of the parts from cheap offshore sources. (Not that much money really; there is quite a bit of stuff in the box.) But Adafruit provides a lot of support for makers by using their resources to write drivers and tutorials, thus adding value to the things they sell, and the kit has the convenience of one stop shopping.

      Their position on Windows IoT is "this is a cool new tech thing that some people might be interested in, let's offer it", just as they do with everything else; they don't take sides in tech battles. Over in the Arduino world, they are a manufacturing partner with arduino.cc (building the Gemma, and the Uno for the US market), but they also sell products from arduino.org (M0 Pro, Leonardo) and their own Arduino-compatible board (Metro 328).

    26. Re: Avoid the Microsoft tax! by unixisc · · Score: 1

      He's talking about Windows 7. There are very good reasons to upgrade from Windows 8, which is what I did. But for Windows 7, other than support ending in 2020, there's not a compelling reason to go to 10.

    27. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by beastofburdon · · Score: 1

      Or it could be that you are delusional. Microsoft collecting telemetry on your pi project is not something cool.

    28. Re:Avoid the Microsoft tax! by RockDoctor · · Score: 1

      So this is really just about forcing more people to move to Win10. Figures.

      What are the figures? Single digit still?

      I stopped buying Windows with Vista (and that was kind-of forced on me by circumstance), and when the wife got a Win8 computer, I simply couldn't figure how to do administrative tasks on it, so [SHRUG] it just sits there and falls over from time to time. I just don't touch it more than I have to. I guess it'll die one of these days and take everything with it.

      I still haven't seen a Windows 10 installation out in the real world. Everyone is still on either XP or Win7 for work.

      --
      Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
  4. You really make it hard by Opportunist · · Score: 5, Funny

    Dumping a system that works and does what I want for a system that spies on me and will change at the whim of its maker with but a "swallow bitch" if I complain.

    Decisions, decisions...

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    1. Re:You really make it hard by PhrostyMcByte · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Dumping a system that works and does what I want for a system that spies on me and will change at the whim of its maker with but a "swallow bitch" if I complain.

      You jest, but Windows is far and above king of backward compatibility as far as APIs are concerned.

      One does wonder how efficient it is compared to Linux, though.

    2. Re:You really make it hard by nyet · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You jest, but Windows is far and above king of backward compatibility as far as APIs are concerned.

      Right. Like the amazing job they did with winsock?

    3. Re:You really make it hard by Gr8Apes · · Score: 3, Insightful

      You jest, but Windows is far and above king of backward compatibility as far as APIs are concerned.

      We can start with Office95 breaking backwards compatibility with all previous versions of Office, and the attempt to do the same with Office 2010. Then you can go look up how .NET's incompatibilities between versions cause havoc. Don't forget to look up Win32 System API calls, especially in the security area. Finally, finish off with retraining everyone on every release of a MS product because the GUI has randomly been redesigned, and I use "designed" as a concept loosely here, other than maybe to cause maximize confusion in users as a primary goal.

      Backwards compatibility? Only enough so they can use it as a marketing bullet by saying you don't "have" to upgrade your other latest MS software....

      --
      The cesspool just got a check and balance.
    4. Re:You really make it hard by PhrostyMcByte · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I just had to post something against the classic /. hivemind. What do I do to myself. You see, I mentioned APIs specifically, because I was talking about their APIs. Not Office. Not their latest shiny UI throw up. Their APIs. I'm a dev, I've been using their APIs extensively for close to two decades, and that's the perspective I wanted to give. I wasn't commenting on the quality of Linux vs Windows IOT, or the benefits (or lack thereof) of backward compatibility.

      you can go look up how .NET's incompatibilities between versions cause havoc. Don't forget to look up Win32 System API calls, especially in the security area.

      Yes, you can.

      Newer .NET versions tend to, in the vast majority of cases, be backwards compatible with apps compiled for older versions. They have broken this in some very niche cases, but only where strongly justified. Their wont for backward compatibility is so great, they will leave in bugs and even keep the internal structure of objects the same to ensure any apps relying on that continue to work. I've submitted my share of bugs that ended up in the "won't fix" pile due to this.

      Their Win32 API is probably the single largest working example of "backward compatible" you'll find in an API. The thing is for better or worse riddled with deprecated functionality, "Ex" functions to replace it, and structs which need to know their own size. Run an old Win32 app from the Windows 95 days and there's a really good chance it'll still work today. There are very few cases where they've made something specifically not work, and that has sometimes been because people have been using it wrong to the detriment of the user (i.e. retrieving the Windows version).

      Their driver side tends to fluctuate a bit more as they make performance or safety enhancements by replacing the various APIs, but there's really no way around that.

    5. Re:You really make it hard by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      You jest, but Windows is far and above king of backward compatibility as far as APIs are concerned.

      Right. Like the amazing job they did with winsock?

      Or the fact that I still have to write workaround code for the brain dead behavior of various COM objects, nearly 20 years after better techniques / approaches are available.

    6. Re:You really make it hard by shaitand · · Score: 1

      The king of breaking hardware compatibility, instability, and malware affliction you mean. Also the king of bitrot prone design and reboot requirements. None of this is good for an embedded OS.

    7. Re:You really make it hard by msobkow · · Score: 2

      I suggest you look into the history of POSIX before making this claim. POSIX goes back way before Linux was even a gleam in Linus' eye, and Linux is still compatible with it.

      --
      I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
    8. Re:You really make it hard by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      And this is were you show yourself up as a total n00b. What you are ultimately discussing when you try to drag in that kind of APIs, isn't Linux. It's GTK or Qt or whatever. These are userland APIs and does not have one iota to do with Linux.

      Linux is brilliantly backward compatible externally. what tends to change are internal APIs. However, mucking around with these usually means you are writing some kind of driver, which should be a part of the kernel in the first place. They are not something someone trying to write an application should ever touch.

    9. Re:You really make it hard by tibit · · Score: 1

      Frankly said, I'd use Windows on RPi simply to have access to decent documentation. Linux is a very loosely tied bunch of stuff, there's no overarching design and no single source of documentation - heck there is really no documentation for a lot of things, apart from the code itself. As much as I enjoy reading code, sometimes I'd rather read English and be sure that the API won't magically change overnight...

      --
      A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
    10. Re:You really make it hard by tibit · · Score: 1

      Windows 95 would not run _any_ Windows 2 programs.

      Not that it's very important, but are you sure about it? It did have support for 16 bit winapi applications... I did run plenty of Windows 3.x code on Windows 95...

      --
      A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
    11. Re:You really make it hard by Gr8Apes · · Score: 1

      Wow we have to go 2 decades back to find an example.

      No, it was an example to show how far back their intentional breakage of backwards compatibility runs. IOW, you can't state that oh, it was only since 2xxx. It actually goes back further, to DOS days as well, as in almost to the inception of the company.

      Then you can go look up how .NET's incompatibilities between versions cause havoc.

      Nope, very rarely has there been any breakage of backwards compatibility except in areas that were required for critical fixes.

      Then I suppose this page is pure fiction?

      Seriously if you struggle using Windows 10 coming from Windows 7 just because they changed the start menu then computers aren't for you. I am curious as to what exactly you are having so much difficulty with though.

      It's not the start menu, or lack thereof, it is the randomization of the location of configuration applications and options, which have changed with each major windows release, including the menu organization itself. Such as how to forcibly configure wireless networking to connect to a non broadcasting SSID on a specific channel in a congested wireless environment, or to test that the connectivity is good. Those things used to be simple and intuitive, now they are hidden behind layers of irrelevant crap IMNSHO. As for Win10, I won't run that pile of spy-ware on any network connected computer, ever. (If you're slow, that means it's been relegated to unusable status as far as I'm concerned.)

      --
      The cesspool just got a check and balance.
    12. Re:You really make it hard by djm · · Score: 1

      The Linux part postdates POSIX, but not the GNU part. Remember who came up with the name POSIX? Richard Stallman.
      Several of us who worked for the Free Software Foundation in the late 80s/early 90s contributed changes to the POSIX drafts while we were working on implementing them in the existing GNU libc and shell and utilities.

    13. Re:You really make it hard by Blaskowicz · · Score: 1

      I'm sure some programs will have trouble but you underrate the backwards compatibility, you can run Windows 1 programs in Windows 7 32bit - and even then it's worth trying on 32bit Windows 8.1 and 10.

      The one program not very forward looking I know of is Myst, as the installer dumps Quicktime 2 shit in c:\windows\sytem. Still okay with Window 95 if I remember correctly, certainly not with XP.

    14. Re:You really make it hard by Opportunist · · Score: 1

      Ok, then "trade a system that might have flaws for a system that is known to spy on you".

      Better?

      And, for the record, my "inflated sense of ability to secure a computer system" is paying my bills, btw. Apparently my boss and my customers agree that I can actually do it.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    15. Re:You really make it hard by iggymanz · · Score: 1

      oh boy my old legacy x86 code will run on the pi arm7 because of the "backwards compatibilty"? wow, that's miraculous!

    16. Re:You really make it hard by iggymanz · · Score: 1

      Well.... a lot of the handy network and IPC stuff I use appeared in the early 80s.

      You can run mainframe programs from the late 60s on a current System Z though. And the Burroughs then Unisys MCP operating system is even older (1961) yet still current!

    17. Re:You really make it hard by Art+Challenor · · Score: 1

      they will leave in bugs [...] to ensure any apps relying on that continue to work. I've submitted my share of bugs that ended up in the "won't fix" pile due to this.

      This is often not good for any API. What tends to happen is the another function with the bug fix is created and then you end up with groups of functions (A,B,C,D and W,X,Y,Z) that have apparently the same functionality, but if you mix calls between the two groups you end up with the most obscure and difficult to find bugs. I suspect that this, and the half a dozen different string pools account in large measure for the legendary instability of Win32 API applications.

  5. Security by mhkohne · · Score: 4, Informative

    As if IoT wasn't insecure enough already - let's put the BIGGEST consumer malware target into everything!

    Anyone else think this is bad idea?

    --
    A thousand pounds of wood moving at 300 feet per minute. Don't get in the way.
    1. Re:Security by LVSlushdat · · Score: 1, Insightful

      With all of the lemmings flocking towards the cliff in their haste to get their computer sending all they do to BigBrother err.. Microsoft, I suspect those who still suck on the MS tit AND like to mess with IoT stuff will love this.. Those of us who no longer have any use for MS products, will not...

      --
      THANK YOU, Edward Snowden!! Americans owe you a debt of gratitude (whether they know it or not..)
    2. Re:Security by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Except that this is Windows running on ARM with severely limited functionality. You should probably go look at what Windows on a Pi actually is, hint there is no desktop. The attack surface is very small as there are almost no running services by default and you don't even have options to run most of the typical insecure windows services that you're complaining about.

      It pains me that your post is modded informative as it is clearly ignorant.

      If you're going to bash it, bash it based on reliability instead of security which is as yet unknown since it is a completely different code base which is completely incompatible with x86 software written for Windows that you know and clearly love.

      Of course reliability improved dramatically between the test releases and the full release. BSODs were quit common on start in the earlier releases.

      Basically it's just a pi that can run powershell with a pretty slick web management interface.

    3. Re:Security by westlake · · Score: 1

      As if IoT wasn't insecure enough already - let's put the BIGGEST consumer malware target into everything!

      You could make a damn good case that malware is a far bigger problem for Android than Win 10 in any of its many incarnations.

    4. Re:Security by Osgeld · · Score: 1

      yes security is at the core of thinking when 12 year old "hackdaddy88" rolls his own distro, which happens constantly on PI, look at the game centric distros already there, dump you to root with the press of a single button, its like fort knox

    5. Re:Security by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      > Linux and Mac users are very very small minorities,

      Android is Linux, users outnumber Windows.

    6. Re:Security by shaitand · · Score: 1

      Linux and mac users are definitely not a small minority in the embedded space. Ever heard of Android? Or the raspberry pi, arduino, roku, chromeos, probably at least a dozen less well known gadgets in your home right now. I'd venture the most die hard windows fan has half a dozen linux bits running in their home.

      And more and more the computing isn't even happening on your system, it's happening on web based systems which are almost universally running linux as their back end.

      Linux is without question the most dominant platform on Earth even if it isn't the most visible to end users. The only threat to Linux is that it's only good up to about 100k concurrent connections. Scaling to 1M+ doesn't actually require dropping linux though, it just requires an app design that moves threading logic away from OS threads and into the userspace.

  6. The Year on Linux on the desktop by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    is the year that Windows will replace Linux on the IoT.

    1. Re:The Year on Linux on the desktop by unixisc · · Score: 1

      Why don't they at least focus on Windows 10 Mobile - the successor to Windows Phone 8.1? At least there they'll have a surer chance of success

  7. The question is 'why' by Junta · · Score: 5, Informative

    'why' for developers and 'why' for microsoft as well.

    For developers, MS is so mismatched to the sensibilities of the embedded space, business and technology wise. Picking up the ball and going home from one linux to another or even to something like a BSD is easy enough if you have to. If you commit to MS ecosystem, there's no where to go if things pan out poorly (e.g, Windows mobile, windows ce, windows phone (at least 7 was a dead end), Windows RT). MS has a terrible track record in this space, even when their wheelhouse of desktop application ecosystem has some relevance, where the Pi has pretty much no relevance (it may have video out, but there are better choices for even ARM based graphical systems than Pi). MS ecosystem is in general so *alien* compared to the rest of the industry, you *really* have to believe in it to commit. It's silly to bet your project on MS's technology and ongoing commitment to the platform in this market.

    For MS, what do they hope to get out of this? They are coming into this from behind, against a competitor that gives away for free and where the entire ecosystem is tilted against them. They are going in to explore with no royalties, and no path to profit, or even revenue. Incidentally this has some resemblance to when they tried to break into 'supercomputing' nearly a decade ago, only to give up and let the resources mostly scatter to the winds when they figured out that there was no money to be made in the market, despite the prestige.

    --
    XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
    1. Re:The question is 'why' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The "change" in Linux is mostly invisible, and backwards compatible. For one thing, the POSIX API is there and remains unchanged, and is identical across all Linux variants, not to mention all the BSDs variants. POSIX is the #1 reason to stick with Linux or an open source variant. All this systemd non-sense? As an embedded and appliance developer, I couldn't care less. Systemd, BSD RC, it doesn't make any difference to me because I don't make any assumptions one way or another--you have to _actively_ work to become dependent on something like systemd. If daemonizing or logging is a chore, you're doing it wrong; and you can never go wrong by supporting a mode where you don't fork and simply print logs to stderr, which makes you compatible with every service framework ever invented.

      The APIs for the desktop and GUI crowd are more volatile, but the beautiful thing about open source is that 1) nobody can ever force to move away from a framework and 2) it's much easier to move to a newer framework because you have access to the code, allowing you to hack together intermediate solutions until you're upgraded.

      Windows offers none of those things.

      Of course, lots of developers on Linux rely too much on non-standard GNU extensions, niche Linux kernel APIs, and make a host of other bad decisions which will come back to haunt them in the future. Indeed, many of those developers come from the Windows world where using and abusing hidden APIs is something of right of passage. But that was their decision to make. The rest of us who take a long (decades long) view know how to steer clear of dangerous dependencies, or how to isolate dependencies on such APIs so they don't poison the entire codebase.

    2. Re:The question is 'why' by fisted · · Score: 2, Insightful

      This would be a better argument if not for the plethora of distributions and the constancy of change on the Linux [actually: GNU] side of things.

      FTFY. Your argument might be true for the unix clone(s), but the real unices (and that doesn't mean "Trademark UNIX" but "source code ancestry") do not welcome change just for sake of changing something. Quite the opposite.

      --
      CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
    3. Re:The question is 'why' by AmiMoJo · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Windows as an embedded platform is really attractive to companies. They can reuse a lot of their existing software with minimal changes, and reuse their existing developers. Real embedded and Linux experts are much less common and much more expensive than .NET monkeys. If you do have problems, MS has support (even if it sucks).

      It's the same reason that, despite being absolutely awful, WinCE is widely used. The same reason that ATMs run Windows XP.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    4. Re:The question is 'why' by Kartu · · Score: 1

      Well. For a hobby project (controller for Gaggia Classic coffee machine) I am actually quite tempted, as I am familiar with coding for windows and not at all for Linux world.

    5. Re:The question is 'why' by Dracos · · Score: 1

      There is no "why" other than padding sales numbers and not losing ground to Linux in embedded deployments.

      Win10 IoT is aimed at embedded systems vendors, not hobbyists or makers. It is specifically intended to replace all the old XP/CE deployments that still exist. They're tossing it out to end users (people who might buy a kit like this if it didn't involve Windows) as a bone. The OS itself is just a glorified bootloader for a Universal App: no shell (unless PowerShell counts), no desktop, and even some of the GPIOs are inaccessible. Plus, you need another full Win10 machine to load anything on it. Maintain vendor lock-in? Check.

      MS wants to get to a BILLION Win10 devices, and IoT is a stunt to get there faster: that many forced upgrades and Surface/WinPhone slaes will never happen, but the embedded vendors will happily push them along so they can sell new ATMs and POS systems at outrageous markups.

    6. Re:The question is 'why' by kirkb · · Score: 3, Insightful

      As a developer with >20 years of embedded experience, nothing makes me sadder than seeing desktop developers (like your .Net monkeys) programming in an embedded environment. They don't understand multi-threading. They don't understand being efficient with CPU cycles and with memory. They struggle if luxuriously rich API's and libraries are not available.

      Whenever I see a kiosk or a bank ATM with a BSOD or windows error dialog on the screen, I know that the wrong kinds of developers worked on that project.

      --
      Slashdot: come for the pedantry, stay for the condescension.
    7. Re:The question is 'why' by Junta · · Score: 1

      If I write something while running Ubuntu, getting it to run in RHEL is no big deal. Changing to SuSE is no big deal. Changing to FreeBSD is *probably* not a big deal (as a developer). The distribution variability is more an issue for operators/administrators/users than anything on the developer side. Yes, if you develop against bleeding edge and then try to run it under an 'enterprise' lifecycle environment, the vintage of some of the offerings may frustrate, but that's life on any platform if you play in the deep end to start with. Just like with Windows, you do well to target established technologies rather than chase the latest and greatest, but it's still pretty workable either way. By the way, I have code that I wrote 15 years ago that still works on modern embedded platform. On the desktop, MS has handily shown that capability, but in embedded space, they have not had such a stellar track record for backwards compatibility.

      I don't mean to say Pi is bad because it is an ARM platform, I'm saying better ARM platforms exist for the sorts of things Windows is equipped to deal with. Windows doesn't give full GPIO access to the thing anyway, and that's really the part of the Pi platform that distinguishes it from a horde of media stick type platforms with more powerful MediaTek SoCs.

      --
      XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
    8. Re:The question is 'why' by Junta · · Score: 1

      Yeah, I think that goal may be misguided. For the same reason they probably live in terror of the reality that tons of XP/CE based platforms are alive in the world, they should be very afraid that Windows 10 IoT 'success' would look the same way: long defunct software responsible for critically important things that could give them a black eye at any moment. The upside? A relative pittance in licensing compared to their standard business model.

      The things that are still XP/CE will forever be XP/CE. Windows 10 won't change that reality, just another generation of equipment that MS ends up hoping goes out of service ASAP if it does take off....

      Embedded can be a very thankless market for software vendors. Anonymous software under the covers hidden well behind the brand of the hardware brand on the case just fits the market better for the most part.

      --
      XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
    9. Re:The question is 'why' by Junta · · Score: 1

      Yeah, from a hobby project it probably doesn't make much of a difference, but for commercial scenarios, I just don't see a good upside for either developers or MS.

      Perhaps it's a sore spot because of a recent scenario where someone wrote a crappy .Net app and I'm having to do a different implementation because they weren't thinking about licensing and the licensing for Windows is damned near impossible for the scenario at hand. Also their code was crap, so it's not entirely terrible that their shortsightedness forced the issue.

      --
      XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
    10. Re:The question is 'why' by geoskd · · Score: 2

      It's the same reason that, despite being absolutely awful, WinCE is widely used. The same reason that ATMs run Windows XP.

      Wince isn't widely used. There are a few large customers who (for reasons passing baffling) stay with microsoft. Most everyone else in the embedded space uses linux, or spins their own OS. There are 15 Billion embedded devices connected to the internet, and approximately 10x that many standalone embedded single board computers. Of those, less than 80 Million run Wince, with that number steadily dwindling. That's less than 1/2 of 1%. Microsoft makes relatively little money on embedded systems (to get companies to use their products at all, the per unit cost has to be ridiculously low). It's part of the reason that Microsoft largely ignored the embedded devices markets (including MP3 players among others) until after other companies exploded the markets, and suddenly microsoft realised they had missed the boat and jumped in the water to try and swim after.

      At the end of the day, microsoft has nothing to offer the embedded market that others aren't already better at, cheaper at, and less likely to pull the rug out from under their legs.

      --
      I wish I had a good sig, but all the good ones are copyrighted
    11. Re:The question is 'why' by PPH · · Score: 2

      .NET monkeys

      I think companies have caught on to the true cost of this approach. NET monkeys are cheap for a reason. And we can't wait for that one in an infinite crowd to luck out and crank out a Shakespeare.

      --
      Have gnu, will travel.
    12. Re:The question is 'why' by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

      You can run NetBSD on the Raspberry Pi, you know. There's no reason to screw around.

    13. Re:The question is 'why' by unixisc · · Score: 1

      'why' for developers and 'why' for microsoft as well.

      For developers, MS is so mismatched to the sensibilities of the embedded space, business and technology wise. Picking up the ball and going home from one linux to another or even to something like a BSD is easy enough if you have to. If you commit to MS ecosystem, there's no where to go if things pan out poorly (e.g, Windows mobile, windows ce, windows phone (at least 7 was a dead end), Windows RT). MS has a terrible track record in this space, even when their wheelhouse of desktop application ecosystem has some relevance, where the Pi has pretty much no relevance (it may have video out, but there are better choices for even ARM based graphical systems than Pi). MS ecosystem is in general so *alien* compared to the rest of the industry, you *really* have to believe in it to commit. It's silly to bet your project on MS's technology and ongoing commitment to the platform in this market.

      For MS, what do they hope to get out of this? They are coming into this from behind, against a competitor that gives away for free and where the entire ecosystem is tilted against them. They are going in to explore with no royalties, and no path to profit, or even revenue. Incidentally this has some resemblance to when they tried to break into 'supercomputing' nearly a decade ago, only to give up and let the resources mostly scatter to the winds when they figured out that there was no money to be made in the market, despite the prestige.

      Perfect question!!! Forget developers - just look at it from Microsoft's POV. The last time Microsoft tried something cross platform was Windows NT and Windows CE. Windows NT on every RISC platform that it lived on was aborted, b'cos Microsoft never bothered trying to make those platforms successful. It could have had a start had they put most major Microsoft applications on those platforms, and then other major ISVs would have followed suit. And on those platforms, the competition was really weak - at least on the Alpha. While the MIPS may have had Irix, Risc/OS, Ultrix and other Unix derivatives running on it, the PowerPC workstations had only AIX, and the Alphastations had OpenVMS and OSF/1. NT never took off on any of them.

      In this case now, Raspberry Pi already has Linux, which for this platform has everything it needs. Windows IoT won't be any different from Windows RT: it still won't run off the shelf Wintel software. Plus the resource requirements for Windows 10 are huge, even if they don't include a lot of the backward compatible Wintel baggage for Windows 7. Whereas all Linux software would be ready for Raspberry Pi (as well as Beagle Bone, Arduino and other such kits), only a selected few from Microsoft would be there. What's the point? I could understand if Microsoft took a subset of Windows 8 - sans the desktop and other Windows 7 backward compatible stuff - and made it into something small that could go into an embedded Atom based kit. But not ARM or any other CPU platform

      For the ARM based platforms out there, like Raspberry Pi, Arduino, Beagle Bone and so on, if one wants alternatives to Linux, one should look at developing platforms based on NetBSD or Minix. There's something that could be useful for people who don't want to use Debian on Raspberry Pi due to systemd or whatever other reason they have in mind.

    14. Re:The question is 'why' by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      .NET guys understand threading well. They love threads, everything happens in threads. All the popular UI models are thread based, e.g. WPF.

      What they don't understand is being efficient, as you say. The default solution in .NET is to allocate more memory. If you want to manipulate a string you create a new copy of it at every stage, rather than operating on a single copy.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    15. Re:The question is 'why' by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      WinCE is very popular in the embedded space, especially with people who made test equipment and industrial equipment. You probably don't see most of it because it is specialist - oscilloscopes, digital multimeters, data loggers for industry, industrial tablets etc. I make that stuff for a living, WinCE is used by almost everyone and Linux has almost no penetration.

      Linux is king for networking devices, media players and the like. But for a large amount of industrial and scientific equipment it's almost 100% WinCE.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    16. Re:The question is 'why' by tibit · · Score: 1

      As someone who sometimes has to use the POSIX "API", let me tell you this: it's a piece of a fucking joke. As much as it pains me to say it, the functionality provided by the core winapi, even with its idiosyncracies, is way ahead of anything POSIX lets you do. Sure, you do want to use a decent C++ wrapper around either winapi or POSIX, but still: POISX doesn't do the very basics of what you need to develop actually useful applications: you need to provide lots of your own, or library, code to get where you want to be, foundation-wise. People hail POSIX as something wonderful, but all I see is a bunch of very much anti-UNIX philosophy codified for no good reason. Even Linux APIs are much nicer than POSIX - the modern "everything is a file descriptor" is much closer to what Windows provides with its universal object handle metaphor. All the while POSIX has special approaches to everything: when you wait on one thing, you can't wait on another thing, everything needs special treatment - it's disgusting, frankly said.

      POSIX api was designed by people who never seemed to realize what the needs of modern, responsive application and server design are.

      --
      A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
    17. Re:The question is 'why' by Junta · · Score: 1

      the modern "everything is a file descriptor" is much closer to what Windows provides with its universal object handle metaphor.

      I think this depends on your perspective.....

      For my perspective it was 'everything is a file', meaning that some effort is expended to provide some sort of discoverable entry points into function. It's a matter of how it gets mapped to a namespace. This is an area where windows falls short as it does not do as much to model it's environment in an easily discoverable namespace. Of course things like 'ifconfig' and such violate the principle by needing to do magical invisible things for enumerating network devices for no particularly good reason.

      Of course I hear you on the limitations of what happens in code once you have open references to 'things', and having to do some interesting unnatural things when the thing in question isn't modeled by a file handle and you want to deal with it or deal with it amongst a bunch of things that are modeled by a file handle.

      --
      XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
    18. Re:The question is 'why' by fisted · · Score: 1

      Yep, and it works well.

      BTW, Jun has updated the image now that 7.0 is de-facto released (announcement still missing)

      --
      CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
  8. All your (P)r(I)vacy belongs (2) U.S. ? by burni2 · · Score: 2

    And you will get a free update offer for Windows11!
    And once it's not free anymore we will force it onto you!

    Sensorinformation Privacy "Sharing" E.U.L.A.
    You hereby transfering all your sensory data from the PI to the microsoft cloud.

    1. Re:All your (P)r(I)vacy belongs (2) U.S. ? by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      Huh? Windows 10 was forced on me, and it's still free. (There's this piece of malware that downloaded a large file and keeps popping up some stupid window telling me to "upgrade" to Windows 10.)

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
  9. Why would I run windows on the Rpi 2? by serviscope_minor · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Why would I run windows on it? One of the main advantages of Windows is all the programs compiled for it, but those are all compiled for x86 windows, not Windows 10 on Arm. Apparently it won't even run office.

    --
    SJW n. One who posts facts.
    1. Re:Why would I run windows on the Rpi 2? by KGIII · · Score: 1

      So does that mean Windows is like Pokemon?

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
    2. Re:Why would I run windows on the Rpi 2? by Keruo · · Score: 1

      The point is pushing .Net universal application concept to wider range of developers.
      It's kinda like Java was supposed to be, write once, run anywhere.

      --
      There are no atheists when recovering from tape backup.
    3. Re:Why would I run windows on the Rpi 2? by Lumpy · · Score: 1

      And sadly it has all the same problems as Java.

      --
      Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
    4. Re:Why would I run windows on the Rpi 2? by Dracos · · Score: 1

      It only runs Universal Apps. Win10 IoT is a glorified bootloader.

    5. Re:Why would I run windows on the Rpi 2? by maccodemonkey · · Score: 1

      Why would I run windows on it? One of the main advantages of Windows is all the programs compiled for it, but those are all compiled for x86 windows, not Windows 10 on Arm. Apparently it won't even run office.

      Note: I'm not trying to side with Microsoft here, as the name hints I'm an Apple guy, but I can see what direction Microsoft is trying to go in...

      Microsoft is betting the future on the new "Universal" APIs that have .Net byte code, and run on Windows, Windows Phone, Windows Core, and Xbox. The course Microsoft is charting for themselves is architecture independent. As you've pointed out, they aren't there yet, but that's where they hope to go. Will they make it there? Will everyone transition to the new Universal APIs? I don't know, again, I'm an Apple guy, But at least where they think they are going, Windows 10 on a Raspberry Pi is not totally crazy. And I'm sure Office will make it to the Universal APIs too. Cheap $70 boxes that run Office might not even be a bad idea.

    6. Re:Why would I run windows on the Rpi 2? by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

      When they write a port for my old iPod Touches I will be elated. It would be nice to have a port for my SE/30, too, but I'm not that hopeful.

    7. Re:Why would I run windows on the Rpi 2? by unixisc · · Score: 1

      Why would I run windows on it? One of the main advantages of Windows is all the programs compiled for it, but those are all compiled for x86 windows, not Windows 10 on Arm. Apparently it won't even run office.

      It'll be the part 2 sequel of Windows RT

  10. No by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    http://hackaday.com/2015/08/13/raspberry-pi-and-windows-10-iot-core-a-huge-letdown/

  11. Media Center by chrisautrey · · Score: 1

    Great! Now I can hook my Windows Media Center PC right up to my TV and . . . Oh, wait. Never mind.

  12. Troll Level - 10 Infinities! by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 1

    A major goal in life is to REMOVE windows from my life, not to put it in more places. If it weren't for games, I could eliminate the contagion completely.

    Ain't no chance in hell I'm putting windows on Things(tm) in my house that might do something important, like climate control. Every russian and chinese hacker in the world will be having thermostat wars in my house, and I've already got a Wife(1.0) for that particular feature.

  13. Re:I guess that's pretty cool. by sumdumass · · Score: 2

    I dunno. It might be nice having a ms honey pot that you can make appear like any number of different devices. If you log it effectively, you might just find exploits that cross over to other windows versions.

  14. Dear Microsoft by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Hi, thank you so much for the offer but I'm afraid I'll have to decline. It was really nice of you to offer, and believe me I feel terrible about this, but I'm not going to be able switch from Linux to Windows 10 on my rasbpi. Hope this doesn't hurt your feelings in any way and I apologize profusely for not being able to use your fine product.

    As an aside, I also hope this won't affect your intentions with the data you've been collecting from my Windows 10 desktop machine. I still think your company is awesome and please don't consider this as an affront and thereby sell or distribute the personal information you've attained. Pretty please.

    Thanks for all of the high-quality software you've shared with us over the years. Hope your day is a happy and productive one.
    - Steve

  15. The big question is by TheRealMindChild · · Score: 2

    Will it be able to playback netflix?

    --

    "When life gives you lemons, don't make lemonade. Make life take the lemons back!" -- Cave Johnson
  16. FUCK No by zlives · · Score: 4, Funny

    just trying to make sure all iterations of "no" are covered.

  17. How much would you pay? by OrangeTide · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How much would you pay to have a software development platform that is more difficult to use? $25? $50? no, for only $74.99 you too can run a limited subset of Windows kernel on Raspberry Pi! (plus $0.01 handling)

    This is sort of like the opposite philosophy of Ardunio, instead of a simple IDE where people can get things done you can have a hairy ball of software and expensive tools where few people (if any) get to making their projects go.

    Linux on the target plus eclipse/emacs/vi/whatever on the host is all you really need to make a RPi go. There are cross compile suites for Windows and Mac, and they tend to integrate with most IDEs (maybe not so well with Visual Studio, but if you really want that option I guess Window IoT is made just for you)

    --
    “Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
    1. Re:How much would you pay? by G00F · · Score: 1

      Well it depends, I have a Raspberry Pi 2 that I bought for the purpose of replacing the 10 year old computer I had attached. Only thing is, it couldn't replace it.

      No Hulu, No NetFlix, and no Web/HTML/Flash video's. Which is ~2/3's of the media watching now days. Kind of sucks having a bit of "new" hardware that can't do what it was bought for. If this windows 10 can do those things it might have something.

      --
      The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive
    2. Re:How much would you pay? by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      The Raspberry Pi was meant to be an affordable, educational computer for children. Not a $35 replacement for a $300 media box. Windows 10 isn't going to change that.

    3. Re:How much would you pay? by j2.718ff · · Score: 2

      The Raspberry Pi was meant to be an affordable, educational computer for children. Not a $35 replacement for a $300 media box.

      Funny, that's exactly what I'm using my pi for. It does a great job running Kodi. The old PC it replaced would sometimes drop frames at 1080p, but not my pi2. (I can't speak to the streaming options like Netflix, as all my media is local.)

    4. Re:How much would you pay? by luther349 · · Score: 1

      openelec does everything you mentioned.

    5. Re:How much would you pay? by OrangeTide · · Score: 1

      I bought a RPi2 to replace an old computer too. But then I realized that $35 is probably not a reasonable amount for something to replace an old Celeron M. a $150 Atom system did the job better, even if it was bigger and used more power. Then I tried to used the RPi2 as a little web browser, but it's pretty slow at loading a new page. Scrolls around the page OK after it's crunched on it for a while, so it's not totally unusable but not really worth my time.

      Now I run a small MUD on it for my friends. It's very much up to that task, and runs way better on this little dedicated system than MUDs did on a shell account with very limited quotas (5 processes max on that old account, made it tough to do much).

      There are some places now that do RPi hosting, maybe you can just use it as a fairly cheap way to host a small website or have a place to experiment?

      --
      “Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
    6. Re:How much would you pay? by OrangeTide · · Score: 1

      No. All you need is a Raspberry Pi (preferably a 2) with Linux (plus monitor or TV and keyboard, mouse) and that is _all_ you need. The Pi is perfectly adequate as a development machine. It can even run Arduino development.

      Very good point. This is how I have mine old RPi1 set up. I even have my toy OpenGL ES 2.0 apps building on it and running on the console without X. When I am running X I tend to prefer older window managers like WindowMaker, the old ones seem to play nicer with poorly accelerated X servers.

      $35 computer + $30 64GB SD + $150 22" LCD + $95 mechanical keyboard + $30 mouse ... I never claimed my setup made sense or was cost effective, but it does work.

      --
      “Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
  18. How much $ is MS making off all this snooping OS? by denis-The-menace · · Score: 2

    MS seems to be bending over backwards to has this OS installed everywhere for FREE.

    No Corp does anything for free.

    e.g. Lenovo is probably getting getting paid by the Chinese Gov. for its info.

    Has anyone "Followed the money" ?

    --
    Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
  19. Technical stuff. Read if you want real info. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    There were a ton of misconceptions and two tons of lies/crap (can't tell which) going on over at the Ars Technica comments thread about this earlier today.

    1) Windows 10 IoT is free. There is no paid-for version of WinIoT. (And you thought "WinCE" was a bad nickname...)
    2) WinIoT is NOT based on the main WinNT kernel. It's based on good-old Windows Embedded Handheld, not Windows Embedded Compact. WinEC is based on WinXP, and is thus part of mainline NT, but WinEH is based on WinCE.
    3) It uses .Net Micro Framework (NetMF), which is a stripped-down version of the standard .Net Framework (NetFX). It shares virtually nothing in common with the old .Net Compact Framework (NetCF), and is, in fact, less stripped-down than that.
    4) If you like Linux, then use it. The reason to use WinIoT is if you already have a ton of experience working with .Net and the rest of Windows. Nobody (reasonable) gets belligerent and calls you an asshole because you use Linux, so have the same consideration for those that work with, or even *gasp* like, WinIoT.
    5) WinIoT doesn't spy. It's too stripped-down to do most of that telemetry crap, and people (even "true believers") would piss/bitch/moan/threaten-mob-action if they were to waste precious processor cycles on an embedded platform for that crap anyway.
    6) WinIoT doesn't auto-update. Again, people would be pissed off if their "things" suddenly stopped working because an update broke compatibility. Not gonna happen. (Also, it's WinCE, so it never had an update cycle to begin with.)

    Now that that's all out of the way, there can be a civil discussion (read: no discussion, because this is the internet, and everyone hates everyone else).

    1. Re:Technical stuff. Read if you want real info. by ArylAkamov · · Score: 1

      Neat, it does appear to be free:

      https://ms-iot.github.io/conte...

      I might actually have a use for this. Some good people reverse engineered my car's ECU and developed a free software suite for live monitoring, logging and tuning. Problem being is that it uses .net framework and nobody has successfully gotten it to run on linux.

      With this it looks like I could easily add a small touch screen to my center console and have it permanently installed in the car instead of hooking up a laptop every time I want to make a change to the .bin or log data in real time, and I could get rid of my head unit. No chance in hell I would give it an internet connection though.

    2. Re:Technical stuff. Read if you want real info. by ras · · Score: 1

      WinIoT is ... based on WinCE.

      WinCE?

      *shudder*

      Even Microsoft has dropped that basket case, when they moved WinPhone from CE to NT.

      Why anybody would use it when Microsoft is making Windows 10 available for free on the Pi 2 is beyond me.

    3. Re:Technical stuff. Read if you want real info. by Palinchron · · Score: 2

      6) WinIoT doesn't auto-update. Again, people would be pissed off if their "things" suddenly stopped working because an update broke compatibility. Not gonna happen.

      The exact same consideration applies on desktop windows, and microsoft doesn't give a crap about such complaints in that area. Why would they feel differently for WinIoT?

      --
      The lesson here is that a sufficiently large corporation is indistinguishable from government. --ultranova
    4. Re:Technical stuff. Read if you want real info. by Rufty · · Score: 1

      5) WinIoT doesn't spy.

      Yet.

      --
      Red to red, black to black. Switch it on, but stand well back.
  20. Welcome to the party, pal! by niks42 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I remember when Microsoft used to try to compete against us with Windows NT replacing OS/2 (OS/2!!!) on ATM machines. It took them a very, very long time.

    I remember when Microsoft used to try to compete against IBM embedded PC/DOS on handhelds. It took them a very, very long time.

    Now I shudder at the thought that they might just impact on IoT. They've started late, and it may take them a very, very long time but they are a relentless, well-funded and Government approved software company. This is a genuine threat, people and you shouldn't just laugh it off.

    1. Re:Welcome to the party, pal! by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

      I worked at a Medical Device company where they were in the process of digging out from implementing an important interface device on Embedded OS/2. Believe me, they wished they had used Embedded NT.

  21. No thanks. by dsmatthews9379 · · Score: 1

    I prefer to know what's in my pie.

  22. Windows IoT Core is meant for embedded systems by dalosla · · Score: 1
    I gather from the Hackaday review of Windows IoT Core on the RPi that is is very much for embedded systems. To quote from the review

    This is not a device for makers, this is a device for point of sale terminals and ATMs. Windows XP – the operating system that is still deployed on a frighting number of ATMs – is going away soon, and this is Microsoft’s attempt to save their share of that market.

  23. Ditch Linux for Windows? by fleabay · · Score: 1

    You're going the wrong way!!!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_akwHYMdbsM

    --
    PlanetVulkan.com
  24. Crock. by sillivalley · · Score: 4, Insightful

    To start with, I have to dedicate a PC to Windows 10 in order to do Windows development for my Pi 2?

    Or, I can continue to run Raspbian (Debian) on the Pi and host development on the Pi, or do cross-development on other Linux hosts or my Mac.

    I know the overhead/footprint Raspbian imposes, and I know how to carve out the bits I don't need.

    How do I do that with Windows 10?

    Easy! Stick to Raspbian!

    Oh, I realize I won't have access to the latest development tools like Visual Studio, .NET APIs, viruses, trojans, and whatnot infesting on the Windows 10 ecosystem.
    Thanks, I'll stick with Raspbian on the Pi, and not having to support a separate Windows 10 box as well.

  25. Yeah, that'll work by scdeimos · · Score: 1

    REF: What's in the box?

    Windows 10 on an 8GB SD card ... will it even have enough space for the first run of Windows Update?

  26. Ya by tom229 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Because Windows on ARM has been nothing but a giant success so far.

    --
    If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
  27. Re:Windows 10 has APPS! by 0123456 · · Score: 1

    I long for the day when I can download a fart app to my thermostat through the IoT.

  28. $75 is not a half /bad/ price... by rnturn · · Score: 1

    ... for the extras they include: the pots, proto board, case, etc. (Roughly what I recall paying for something like this from Amazon.)

    One could always buy one of these kits and do the normal thing: "dd" a copy of a RPi-compatiible Linux distribution onto that SD card.

    --
    CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
    1. Re:$75 is not a half /bad/ price... by PPH · · Score: 2

      You're kidding, right?

      The Rasperry Pi isn't included in that kit. Pricing that stuff out, Microsoft is getting something like $50 for the Windows 10 image on the SD card.,

      --
      Have gnu, will travel.
  29. Sold out by iONiUM · · Score: 2

    From the comments it's clear that people think this is a terrible idea, and on a somewhat pro-Linux site that's to be expected. But it should be noted that this kit was way more popular than Adafruit though and they sold out rather quickly with people still asking for it.

    It may just be that some people like coding against Windows and are more comfortable with it than Linux.

    1. Re:Sold out by zlives · · Score: 1

      nah its just MS buying the kits to inflate their sales numbers again

    2. Re:Sold out by PPH · · Score: 1

      "they sold out rather quickly with people still asking for it."

      --
      Have gnu, will travel.
  30. Re:I guess that's pretty cool. by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 4, Funny

    It might be nice having a ms honey pot ...

    With the impending IoT, I suspect that eventually, actual jars of honey will have IP addresses ... allowing one to make the metaphor a reality.

    --
    It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
  31. Ooh this sounds fun! by WillAffleckUW · · Score: 1

    MSFT Win10 uninstall is now 45 pct complete ...

    --
    -- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
  32. I like my Pi GMO free by BigCigar · · Score: 1

    Ugh, I cannot imagine a reason to do this at all.

  33. Why the hell... by God+of+Lemmings · · Score: 1

    would anyone even think of doing that... wait... are you high? can I have some?

    --
    Non sequitur: Your facts are uncoordinated.
  34. Penetration by JBMcB · · Score: 1

    To be fair, windows seems to have pretty good penetration into the embedded market already. Heck, I see random boxes with screens frozen on the windows desktop all the time.

    My favorite experience is waiting at airport security a couple of years ago - there were screens denoting which lanes were open and which were closed. Apparently each screen was an individual windows box, and every single one would randomly crash and reboot every minute or two. Made for a nice light show while waiting mindlessly in line.

    --
    My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
  35. Developers, Developers, Developers by Technician · · Score: 1

    Unfortunately Windows 10 will be constrained by the limited memory and speed on the Pi.

    So to quote someone about Developers, Developers, Developers, All the apps are already built for Raspberian that can't currently run on Windows on the Pi.

    I bought a couple of the SBC to run Falcon Pi Player and run a small version of Asterisk for my SIP home office phone system. I don't know how either could possibly run under the overhead of Windows 10.

    This is only two examples of the many wonderful things being done on the Pi without Windows.

    Want to see what a Pi can do without Windows 10? https://www.youtube.com/watch?... One of the greatest animated light displays last year had the sequence and music played on a Pi. Great timing, no glitches, no crashes. Why mess it up trying to run this under Windows.

    --
    The truth shall set you free!
  36. A different kind of beast by aNonnyMouseCowered · · Score: 1

    "They can reuse a lot of their existing software with minimal changes, and reuse their existing developers. Real embedded and Linux experts are much less common and much more expensive than .NET monkeys."

    WinPi comes with a stripped down version of Windows that doesn't even run a desktop. Most of the software written for desktop Windows is gui-fied by default.

    Any software that runs without the need for a GUI tends to be common development languages and environments that also runs on Linux as well, so any advantage is negated. This is besides the fact that Windows software development tends to be business-oriented which is not a market the Raspberry Pi is known to serve well.

    So, no, you can't just stick in a .NET monkey into your Raspberry Pi Project.

  37. Boot times by msobkow · · Score: 1

    On a Lenove Z580 Core i7 laptop, Windows 10 was taking over three times as long just to reach the login prompt as it takes me to boot, log in, and have my Ubuntu 15.04 installation ready to use.

    Why in the world would I want to use that crapfest on underpowered hardware?

    --
    I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
  38. Use Windows 10 if you are stupid only. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=7958349&cid=50460317

    http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=7988275&cid=50494871

    Just came across this one after reading all current comments on this article.
    https://senk9.wordpress.com/checklists/windows-10-privacy-checklist/

    Basically Microsoft said fuck the world. Global backstab. There is absolutely no good reason to use Windows 10 on a Raspberry Pi. Ever. Do you notice how Microsoft's global spyware situation hasn't been in dinosaur media much? The only place I saw it was on Fox... "you can install an app to stop it from spying..."

    http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2015/08/05/stop-windows-10-spying-dead-in-its-tracks-with-one-free-app/

    So it's a lie. How could you install an app that prevents new spyware installs and modifications in updates that you can't block?

    http://q13fox.com/2015/08/17/is-windows-10-really-a-privacy-nightmare/

    Didn't bother reading the q13fox article.. but skimmed to the end. "Windows 10 is not nearly as bad as what you’ve read." --Fox news says.

    OK. I wouldn't expect anything more honest from MSNBC since it literally stands for http://www.abbreviations.com/term/374902
    Microsoft National Broadcasting Company
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MSNBC

    There are shills all over every high traffic site including this one and especially this one. Everybody should be leaving Windows in droves. Linux is way better anyway. Now queue the shills wanting to argue with me... an argument that they have not nor can win because I've used all OS's for decades.

    This one stood out as shiny shill in the current comments on this thread so far, but there are others.
    http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=8084215&cid=50616457

    Malware "on Windows" is moot when the whole Windows OS itself is malware.
    https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/malware-microsoft.html

    What we need are game companies to turn down the payola and compile all of their games for Linux too. They do it for PS4 which is a forked BSD kernel. Everything will surely run better on Linux. We also need OEM PC's to think principle > money too and ship pre-built PC's with Linux at least dual boot... if not choose-your-OS. Shipping PC's pre-compromised by Windows 10 should not be looked at passively.

    I guess the primary reason people don't grasp how actually fucked up Microsoft is... is because they were too busy with their lives to pay attention. They just want to trust their computer. Microsoft has gone full betrayal. I type fast, sorry for the long book here. Need links? Ask before this thread gets archived. Also queue the shills and tin-foil accusations. This isn't my first rodeo.

    If anything they should be up front AND PAY YOU to give you this much access to your PC and life. This wouldn't be accepted of course, so they disingenuously advertise it as "Free" when it is not free in any sense of the word. You can not just say hey send me a disc, or just go to a site and download it. You have to have paid for a different version previously whether bundled or retail box. Not free. Spyware on your system? The whole system is spyware? That's not free either.

  39. ATMs by unixisc · · Score: 1

    For ATMs, Windows 8 - just the Metro part - would have been ideal. Even Windows RT. That would make it cheaper (due to the ARM CPUs being so commoditized) while the interface of big icons on the home screen is just perfect for an ATM interface, no matter how bad it was on a desktop. It's a pity Microsoft didn't recognize that opportunity and pursue it, as opposed to coming up w/ the one size fits all Windows 10 platform

    1. Re:ATMs by fisted · · Score: 2

      For ATMs, Windows 8 - just the Metro part - would have been ideal.

      I don't think "ideal" means what you think it means...

      --
      CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
  40. Re:Windows 10 has APPS! by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

    Sorry, there probably won't ever be a version of iOS for the Raspberry Pi.

  41. Uh? #2 by Reprint001 · · Score: 2

    I need an expensive Windows 10 PC to even start developing with Win IoT??? From Microsoft's Get Started guide - http://ms-iot.github.io/conten... "Make sure you are running the public release of Windows 10 (version 10240) or better. You can upgrade from here. If you are already running Windows 10, you can find your current build number by clicking the start button and typing “winver” and hitting enter." With a Raspbian/Linux based Pi kit I can be coding within minutes on the Pi itself I don't need an additional PC! This is just a way to shove desktop Windows 10 down people's throats! Again, as if!!

  42. ADVERTORIAL by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Seems microsoft has again taken to slashdot to place their disguised advertisements. Someone has to pay to keep this site up I guess?

  43. We can throw hardware at the problem now by Goonie · · Score: 1
    ATMs and kiosks don't strike me as "embedded systems" any more.

    Well, they are "embedded systems" in that they are computers embedded in a mechanical system, but:

    • They don't have hard real-time requirements.
    • They aren't power limited.
    • Equipping them with an overabundance of CPU, memory, and secondary storage is a very minor factor in the cost of the system.

    As such, throwing hardware at the problem to make the programming easier seems like an entirely rational approach.

    --

    Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
    --Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
  44. One thing comes to mind - Ready, Set by ebvwfbw · · Score: 1

    Garbage!

  45. /. please! by sad_ · · Score: 1

    The headline of this post is an insult for what this site once was.

    --
    On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
    1. Re:/. please! by iggymanz · · Score: 1

      nonsense, it is nice sarcastic title that would have appeared 15+ years ago. And it is tech news and also indicator of strategic direction of Microsoft.

      In short, better than 9 out of 10 slashdot articles