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Microsoft Unveils Windows 10 S, an Education Edition Limited To Windows Store Apps (venturebeat.com)
On Tuesday, Microsoft announced a new edition of its latest operating system: Windows 10 S. Available on first-party and third-party hardware -- Microsoft will be releasing its own Windows 10 S device and will also let manufacturers sell their own -- Windows 10 S is a streamlined edition of Windows 10 aimed at the education market. From a report: "We really are working hard to deliver the best platform for education, for students of all ages and school districts of all devices," said Joe Belfiore, corporate vice president in Microsoft's operating systems group, about the new Windows 10 S release. The main way that Windows 10 S differs from the other editions is that it can only run apps from the Windows Store. That includes Universal Windows Platform (UWP) apps and Win32 apps that Microsoft has approved into its app store. The goal is to avoid the problems of traditional Win32 apps that often run in the background and push their own updates. Microsoft wants to stop apps from hooking into the boot and sign-in process to handle all their own updates, which in turn slows down startup time. Windows Store can take care of this today, but Windows 10 S makes it the only way to install and update apps. As a result, Microsoft hopes Windows 10 S will be able to offer faster sign-in times and better battery life. This is still a full version of Windows 10. It's just locked down to only work with apps that Microsoft has approved, similar to how Apple and Google lock down iOS and Android to their respective app stores. The operating system follows the company's Intune for Education announcement back in January. Those systems created by third-party hardware partners like Acer, Asus, HP, Dell and Toshiba, start at $189.
I'm sure someone with decision making power will buy this and force implementation on some unfortunate soul.
Why have the opportunity to get applications from multiple sources when you can restrict everyone to only purchasing from Microsoft! Who cares if they have made available the actual programs we would like to use, when there are others with half as much functionality (and the added benefit of Microsoft getting a cut of the sales from) they can force you to use?
Why aren't we dumping large amounts of money into ReactOS and WINE? It seems like it's high time to put together a real alternative to a Windows that can still run a Windows software.
Mark my words, this version of W10 has nothing to do with the education markets. Microsoft is just using them as a lab rat to get people used to the notion of having everything locked down to their app store. Soon enough, Secure Boot will become mandatory, and you'll find yourself having to jailbreak a fucking PC just to make it useful again.
If this gets adopted, expect it to become the norm at some point in the future for all editions. Once software devs adapt their distribution to not lock themselves out of the edu market, it will be very easy to throw the switch and wall off the rest of the OS.
I guess English speakers know what the 'S' stands for :)
They really want to try Windows RT again. Good luck. I get that outside applications using updater services is annoying, but that's nothing but a scapegoat here. It's pretty obvious to everyone that MS eventually wants a cut of every application sold.
As long as you don't buy new. Easily done.
I paid $175 2 years ago for a used HP Elitebook with great specs. Got my wife a used HP Stream 11 for $100 a year ago, which is probably not too different from the specs of one of these Windows S boxes, except that it isn't locked down.
"He's lost in a 'floyd hole"
The goal is to avoid the problems of traditional Win32 apps that often run in the background and push their own updates. Microsoft wants to stop apps from hooking into the boot and sign-in process to handle all their own updates, which in turn slows down startup time.
In defense of Microsoft's decision I think this is a good idea (partially).
As a system's administrator I do what I can to shut-down scheduled jobs and launch on startup from apps that don't need it. I especially try to prevent apps that annoy the user by begging for updates from having their beg service run. Everything Adobe has touched in the past 20+ years, Java, even browsers do this. I use a Kace K1000 system to push updates to users, and I handle updates to those apps. I don't need users calling me for updates within an hour of Adobe releasing a new point revision on Acrobat reader. I'll have it pushed to the users within a couple of days depending on my work load.
That's what I do at work. I'm a Linux user at home. I've been saying for years using the Apt Package manager is easier than maintaining software on Windows. It's also easier than keeping up with software on a Mac. I've got both stand-alone software and software manager software both at work and at home - gamers - tell me Steam isn't 100x's better than the old fashioned keep up with the boxes, the disks and every single patch from a different website as well as the drivers in the days of yore.
I realize Microsoft is evil.
Apple I can chose between the store or manual installs - though it does progressively harass you more about unsigned stuff with each OS release.
Linux - I can use an apt repository like I do for nearly everything, or I can download/install it separately like I do for Calibre and MakeMKV.
For students the lock-down thing may not be a bad idea. For corporations on the full-blown MS bandwagon it may not be a bad idea. That being said I've never worked for any company that didn't have one piece of poorly written software that doesn't comply to normal or modern conventions the whole place nearly runs on. That shitty software is going to have to run on something other than one of these - I see up uptick in Citrix use in the future...
I would jailbreak and replace the OS on this like I do nearly everything else for my own personal use, no surprise there, I haven't used Windows at home since 2000 was now. For handing out to users that don't have the good sense not to download stupid shit and cause problems for me, I could get behind something like this at a corporation.
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