The present Germany includes the former Deutsche Democratic Republic (aka 'East Germany) which was one of the more totalitarian states ever devised by man. The DDR took surveillance of its citizens to extreme levels including listening to and recording all phone calls and other communications but also including the development of a nationwide network of citizens who spied on their neighbors (and each other) and reported to the East German police on every activity. The point here is that many/most German citizens are far more aware of the human cost of government surveillance than Americans and the Germans want no part of it. On the plus side, though, there was not a single instance of an attack by Islamic terrorists in the former East Germany during its painful existence.
...because organization is not the problem. Microsoft has operated under the 'look out for number 1' principle for so long that it permeates their culture. Every employee, manager, executive, and group ruthlessly guards their own self-interests at the expense of everything else...corporate goals, customer needs, company reputation, and so on. The general company principles appear to be a) gouge customers, b) drive competitors out of business, and c) undermine partners. These are the principles that built Microsoft and they probably can never be changed. Operating in this way has smothered innovation to the extent that computers pretty much operate exactly as they did 20 years ago other than being faster and more powerful (thanks to hardware innovation out of Microsoft's purview). If it were not for Steve Jobs and Apple, we would still be using cellphones that made calls and played simple games, we would be listening to music on CDs that had to contact a central server run by Microsoft before they could be played, and laptops would be the size of a countertop pancake griddle and put out about the same amount of heat.
The example of OS/2 provides an example for what the future might be for Windows XP. IBM (and almost all vendors) dropped support for OS/2 in 1996. However, even to this day people are still able to use OS/2 due to support from the open source community and new vendors who provided the support that the old vendors dropped. If there are enough Windows XP users, it is likely that drivers and software support for XP will appear from similar new vendors. Windows XP was the last Windows that Bill Gates was involved in. The story of its demise might be premature.
...and deserved to be successful. It never quite made it though...and it wasn't the Microsoft grassroots attacks that did it in, at least not directly. No, it was IBM and, more specifically, Lou Gerstner (the IBM CEO at the time), who publicly admitted that a few years later right before he retired. People have wondered for years about the WHY of that. Gerstner disdainfully referred to "desktop operating systems" as something that was detracting from IBM's image so perhaps the reason was simple corporate stupidity.
We will see senior officials repeatedly make the claims that 1) Snowden is lying, 2) Snowden is mentally unbalanced, and 3) Snowden has ulterior motives (greed/ideology - take your pick) for what he says. Of course, there is no way we can ever personally corroborate anything that Snowden or the senior officials says so we have to decide who to believe...and Snowden is more creditable. Here's why. First, he contacted the Guardian news organization and provided documentation for what he claims long in advance of publication. Second, there is no dispute that he was employed as a highly-paid intelligence analyst with a high security clearance which means that his background, mental health, and credit were thoroughly investigated by the FBI over a long period of time. Third, Snowden has correctly identified numerous secret activities that no one (other than those close to them) were aware of such as PRISM. Obviously, the government loves these programs because access to such a huge amount of personal information represents enormous power. But...power in the United States rightfully rests in the hands of its citizens. Most of us would prefer to take our chances with the terrorists but would prefer that the government officials stay out of our emails, cell phone conversations, and internet searches unless we are actual suspects in a real investigation with a fixed objective and timetable. The damage that the terrorists do will be far, far less than the damage that an omnipotent 'big brother' style of government monitoring would do. Any elected official that cannot recognize that should be removed from office via the ballot box at the next election.
Snowden publicized Top Secret information on U. S. Government surveillance of all Americans in their use of email, cell phones, and internet searches. The NSA is allegedly performing this surveillance under the auspices of the Bush-era 'Patriot Act' which was enacted as a means to locate and monitor terrorists. Prior to the PA, the government had to go to court and obtain wiretap authorization for specific individuals for a specific purpose and for a limited amount of time. Before the PA, the U.S government certainly could have prevented a lot of domestic criminal and terrorist activity if it had been allowed to continuously monitor all landline communications. That type of monitoring and surveillance was infamous and routine in the former Soviet Union, China, North Korea, East Germany, and many other totalitarian governments but we Americans were sheltered by our constitution. Of course, the first landline networks didn't appear until the dawn of the 20th century. The 19th century had widespread telegraph networks that the government could have routinely monitored which would have certainly prevented criminal and terrorist activity. The point here is that it is not the technology that has changed, nor the constitution, but our willingness within ourselves to accept 24/7 surveillance by our government to make us safer. We are willingly giving up our constitutional right to privacy to be safe. Of course, there has never been an actual vote on this but our public acceptance of the unfortunate fate that will befall the courageous Mr. Snowden is reflective of what the outcome of such a vote might be.
There would have been no Tudor England, House of Windsor, Henry VIII, and the schism from the Holy Roman Catholic Church. That would mean no George III who was King at the time of the American Revolution. Maybe New York would be an English City.
A K-mart store in my area stood empty for 6 years. The parking lot had weeds growing up, there was graffiti on the walls, and nearby small businesses were of the low-revenue, low traffic type with a lot of retail vacancies. This was for a store that was in a relatively affluent area with a lot of traffic going by every day. The problem was that the ownership of the store property was tied up in legal issues and no one could do anything with it. Maybe it was Sears or K-mart pre-bankruptcy or someone else. Anyway, finally, finally, the legal problems got resolved and the store was gutted and redeveloped into an LA Fitness and a Walmart food store. That was two years ago. Now, the whole block is thriving, parking is hard to find, and a nearby corner gas station was torn down to make way for construction of another retail block. The point is that sometimes the reason that the store property is no longer in a 'prime retail location' is because of the property owner. The same thing happens in residential neighborhoods when someone moves in and parks a lot of old cars around the house, lets rusting trash pile up, stops mowing the grass, and does not repaint when the paint is peeling.
This is just as stupid as the other stuff Sears has done (or not done) over the last 20 years to slowly go out of business. Sears and K-mart stores are "retail" land uses and are located on land appropriate for retail. This means that there is a) a sizable nearby population base to draw customers from, b) access via high-volume roadways, c) lots of onsite parking, d) other retail nearby to draw retail customers, etc. None of these are important for a "Data Center" which can be located (and often is) in a rural and/or low-population-density area. Converting high-value retail real estate into 'data center' real estate is the same thing as taking $100 bills and burning them to start the bbq. Monumentally stupid...and typical for Sears.
That goal of "upgrade ancient systems to modern standards" is a fine one but...it costs a lot of money. If the upgrade will save money, increase reliability, improve compatibility, etc. in measurable ways that will increase revenue or reduce costs, then that can be used to justify it. If the benefits are not sufficiently large to justify the costs, the upgrade will not happen. Merely reaching the ever-elusive 'modern standards,' is often not enough to justify it.
No one cares what the testing procedure is as long as everyone does the same test and it's repeatable. The purpose of the test is to provide a method for consumers to compare different models with respect to their fuel economy, not to provide a precise prediction of exactly what the buyer's fuel economy will be. Everyone drives differently. People warm their car up in the driveway, fill it up with heavy weight, carry lots of passengers, do a lot of long-distance driving, tow trailers, drive up and down hills, ride their brakes, accelerate briskly to beat their neighbor, drive at high altitudes, drive in cold weather, or whatever. Even more significantly, the energy content of 'gasoline' varies widely depending on how much ethanol it has (more is less) and what its boiling point range is. Just do the same test and do it in a way that someone else could repeat the test the same way and get the same result. That's all we need rather it's a 50 year old test or not.
Businesses should be working a lot harder to find alternatives that do not rely on Windows. This compatibility issue will not be going away...because Microsoft does not consider compatibility to be all that important. Windows 8 users are likely to feel pain when Windows 10 comes out...and so on. Often, there are proprietary/OSS alternatives that will accomplish the objective at a reduced cost and with a far better chance of future compatibility. This doctor's office is not the first to have this problem and it will not be the last.
'With the proper computer tools, biologists can write their own genetic code — and then turn that code into life...
Err...not exactly, Mr. article author. It takes two things, a) copying of the genetic material, and b) expression of the genetic material. The expression of the genetic material is much more significant than the mere assembling and duplicating of DNA code and is only very roughly understood by biologists. It's analogous to an architect showing up at your door with a set of plans and saying 'there you go...you can turn those plans into your dream home' but there has to be the carpenters, plumbers, electricians, and whatnot that read the plans and build the home. Similarly, the way that genetic material is expressed determines if a hand develops or a flipper. The smallest, simplest forms of life are nevertheless far more complex than the most complex device ever constructed by people. It is a form of institutional hubris to suggest or believe that new life can be created by stitching together some DNA. The best we can manage at the present is to modify some tiny function of an existing life form in a hopefully beneficial direction. Anyone who thinks otherwise can volunteer to deal with the next influenza outbreak.
The Wii just didn't have online play in the same league as xBox 360. The xBox connected the teens together online with xbox live. They could chat and play and shoot...a verbal audio 'facebook' for teen gamers. Wii never had that and a generation was lost to it. The Wii U has the Miiverse setup that is a huge step forward from the Wii and its game-specific 'friend' codes but it's still a ways behind the psychopathic Xbox Live. Nintendo has its principles but they might be its undoing.
Microsoft's goal appears to be to make the new version sufficiently different and incompatible with extant versions, formats, UI, etc., so that users will recognize that it is 'new.' Shouldn't the goal be, though, to have the new version have some major new capability that did not exist in previous versions and gives users a new ability to do something important?
Software (other than games) that can actually benefit from this type of hardware is scarce and expensive. This $1000 card will probably be in the $5 bargain box at the local computer recycle shop before there is any significant software in widespread use that could put it to good use.
Anyone can take something apart. It only counts, though, if they get it back together AND it works again. How can they give that thing a "1" out of "10" if they were not able to make it run again? Wouldn't that be a "zero?" Finally, before anyone can say 'who wants to repair something like this, anyway?' let's just note that it's a $900 dollar device with a 1-year limited warranty. Why wouldn't you want to fix the earphone jack if it gets tweaked and will only play one channel, replace the battery if it dies, or put a new screen in if you drop it and it cracks? Those are all pretty common repairs for devices like this.
Let's see...should we choose: 1) the most widely used handset OS in the world with a huge number of apps and open-source code or 2) a much less popular proprietary system with more limited functionality, a limited number of apps, and proprietary code owned by one of the most overbearing software companies that has ever existed? Decisions...decisions...
That's great that Wozniak can look at competing products and recognize accurately their strengths and weaknesses. That kind of objective evaluation leads to better decisions and great products. Companies that mindlessly insist that their products are the 'best' and punish any who dare to say otherwise have a difficult time putting out high quality products that people want to use. Those are the kind of companies that try to force their products on the marketplace and only have success if there is no choice but to use their products.
The Anthropogenic Global Warming advocates tend to periodically go into a 'panic mode' where they predict that imminent disaster justifies the suspension of a normal process of evaluation and consensus-building in favor of immediate 'action.' Someone needs to undertake a study of these people to find out the frequency and cause of their beliefs in sudden drastic actions to remedy difficult problems. Perhaps they are routinely pulling power plugs in server rooms, manually activating fire sprinklers in commercial establishments, and throwing their bag of golf clubs into fairway ponds. Hopefully, Boeing doesn't have this type of person working on the 787 battery problem or the outcome might be to have every passenger provide a personal battery pack that they plug in to get the plane into the air.
Dell is selling itself to a private consortium consisting of Michael Dell and Microsoft. If you were Lenovo or HP or Asus, wouldn't that make you seriously think of supporting devices running open-source system software such as Linux? Wouldn't you start to consider Windows-based machines a deprecated product line?
...the entire civilized world will hang its head in shame over how long this abomination has been allowed to
No shame. North Korea is propped up by China. Unless and until China changes its mind about supporting North Korea, there is nothing that the 'civilized world' can do that will make the situation any better...except, perhaps...buying less of the 'Made in China' stuff. Moreover, the only thing that China cares about right now is flexing its muscles to take over a couple of small islands that Japan has owned for the last couple of centuries.
Napster - this is the software that kicked off the idea of music file sharing. Okay, the record companies hated this program but this is the first program that I can think of that really CONNECTED people as a group on the internet for exchanging data.
MS GW Basic - this was the basic that shipped with the IBM PC and was pretty much what much of its early software was written in because it was so simple to use and yet could be used to do quite a bit.
Windows 3.0 - This was the first version of Windows that people really used and really brought the GUI desktop with the mouse into the mainstream. Okay, the first Macintosh from Apple did that too and came before Windows 3.0 by a ways but it was not nearly as widely used, especially in the workplace.
Slashdot Mirror
The present Germany includes the former Deutsche Democratic Republic (aka 'East Germany) which was one of the more totalitarian states ever devised by man. The DDR took surveillance of its citizens to extreme levels including listening to and recording all phone calls and other communications but also including the development of a nationwide network of citizens who spied on their neighbors (and each other) and reported to the East German police on every activity. The point here is that many/most German citizens are far more aware of the human cost of government surveillance than Americans and the Germans want no part of it. On the plus side, though, there was not a single instance of an attack by Islamic terrorists in the former East Germany during its painful existence.
Iran hijacked a US drone back in 2011 doing this
...because organization is not the problem. Microsoft has operated under the 'look out for number 1' principle for so long that it permeates their culture. Every employee, manager, executive, and group ruthlessly guards their own self-interests at the expense of everything else...corporate goals, customer needs, company reputation, and so on. The general company principles appear to be a) gouge customers, b) drive competitors out of business, and c) undermine partners. These are the principles that built Microsoft and they probably can never be changed. Operating in this way has smothered innovation to the extent that computers pretty much operate exactly as they did 20 years ago other than being faster and more powerful (thanks to hardware innovation out of Microsoft's purview). If it were not for Steve Jobs and Apple, we would still be using cellphones that made calls and played simple games, we would be listening to music on CDs that had to contact a central server run by Microsoft before they could be played, and laptops would be the size of a countertop pancake griddle and put out about the same amount of heat.
The example of OS/2 provides an example for what the future might be for Windows XP. IBM (and almost all vendors) dropped support for OS/2 in 1996. However, even to this day people are still able to use OS/2 due to support from the open source community and new vendors who provided the support that the old vendors dropped. If there are enough Windows XP users, it is likely that drivers and software support for XP will appear from similar new vendors. Windows XP was the last Windows that Bill Gates was involved in. The story of its demise might be premature.
...and deserved to be successful. It never quite made it though...and it wasn't the Microsoft grassroots attacks that did it in, at least not directly. No, it was IBM and, more specifically, Lou Gerstner (the IBM CEO at the time), who publicly admitted that a few years later right before he retired. People have wondered for years about the WHY of that. Gerstner disdainfully referred to "desktop operating systems" as something that was detracting from IBM's image so perhaps the reason was simple corporate stupidity.
We will see senior officials repeatedly make the claims that 1) Snowden is lying, 2) Snowden is mentally unbalanced, and 3) Snowden has ulterior motives (greed/ideology - take your pick) for what he says. Of course, there is no way we can ever personally corroborate anything that Snowden or the senior officials says so we have to decide who to believe...and Snowden is more creditable. Here's why. First, he contacted the Guardian news organization and provided documentation for what he claims long in advance of publication. Second, there is no dispute that he was employed as a highly-paid intelligence analyst with a high security clearance which means that his background, mental health, and credit were thoroughly investigated by the FBI over a long period of time. Third, Snowden has correctly identified numerous secret activities that no one (other than those close to them) were aware of such as PRISM. Obviously, the government loves these programs because access to such a huge amount of personal information represents enormous power. But...power in the United States rightfully rests in the hands of its citizens. Most of us would prefer to take our chances with the terrorists but would prefer that the government officials stay out of our emails, cell phone conversations, and internet searches unless we are actual suspects in a real investigation with a fixed objective and timetable. The damage that the terrorists do will be far, far less than the damage that an omnipotent 'big brother' style of government monitoring would do. Any elected official that cannot recognize that should be removed from office via the ballot box at the next election.
Snowden publicized Top Secret information on U. S. Government surveillance of all Americans in their use of email, cell phones, and internet searches. The NSA is allegedly performing this surveillance under the auspices of the Bush-era 'Patriot Act' which was enacted as a means to locate and monitor terrorists. Prior to the PA, the government had to go to court and obtain wiretap authorization for specific individuals for a specific purpose and for a limited amount of time. Before the PA, the U.S government certainly could have prevented a lot of domestic criminal and terrorist activity if it had been allowed to continuously monitor all landline communications. That type of monitoring and surveillance was infamous and routine in the former Soviet Union, China, North Korea, East Germany, and many other totalitarian governments but we Americans were sheltered by our constitution. Of course, the first landline networks didn't appear until the dawn of the 20th century. The 19th century had widespread telegraph networks that the government could have routinely monitored which would have certainly prevented criminal and terrorist activity. The point here is that it is not the technology that has changed, nor the constitution, but our willingness within ourselves to accept 24/7 surveillance by our government to make us safer. We are willingly giving up our constitutional right to privacy to be safe. Of course, there has never been an actual vote on this but our public acceptance of the unfortunate fate that will befall the courageous Mr. Snowden is reflective of what the outcome of such a vote might be.
There would have been no Tudor England, House of Windsor, Henry VIII, and the schism from the Holy Roman Catholic Church. That would mean no George III who was King at the time of the American Revolution. Maybe New York would be an English City.
A K-mart store in my area stood empty for 6 years. The parking lot had weeds growing up, there was graffiti on the walls, and nearby small businesses were of the low-revenue, low traffic type with a lot of retail vacancies. This was for a store that was in a relatively affluent area with a lot of traffic going by every day. The problem was that the ownership of the store property was tied up in legal issues and no one could do anything with it. Maybe it was Sears or K-mart pre-bankruptcy or someone else. Anyway, finally, finally, the legal problems got resolved and the store was gutted and redeveloped into an LA Fitness and a Walmart food store. That was two years ago. Now, the whole block is thriving, parking is hard to find, and a nearby corner gas station was torn down to make way for construction of another retail block. The point is that sometimes the reason that the store property is no longer in a 'prime retail location' is because of the property owner. The same thing happens in residential neighborhoods when someone moves in and parks a lot of old cars around the house, lets rusting trash pile up, stops mowing the grass, and does not repaint when the paint is peeling.
This is just as stupid as the other stuff Sears has done (or not done) over the last 20 years to slowly go out of business. Sears and K-mart stores are "retail" land uses and are located on land appropriate for retail. This means that there is a) a sizable nearby population base to draw customers from, b) access via high-volume roadways, c) lots of onsite parking, d) other retail nearby to draw retail customers, etc. None of these are important for a "Data Center" which can be located (and often is) in a rural and/or low-population-density area. Converting high-value retail real estate into 'data center' real estate is the same thing as taking $100 bills and burning them to start the bbq. Monumentally stupid...and typical for Sears.
TFA states: "With Intel supporting this approach, the next generation of hybrid drives appears destined to be software-based."
Intel supported 'Windows only' Itanium processors as well and how did that work out for them?
That goal of "upgrade ancient systems to modern standards" is a fine one but...it costs a lot of money. If the upgrade will save money, increase reliability, improve compatibility, etc. in measurable ways that will increase revenue or reduce costs, then that can be used to justify it. If the benefits are not sufficiently large to justify the costs, the upgrade will not happen. Merely reaching the ever-elusive 'modern standards,' is often not enough to justify it.
No one cares what the testing procedure is as long as everyone does the same test and it's repeatable. The purpose of the test is to provide a method for consumers to compare different models with respect to their fuel economy, not to provide a precise prediction of exactly what the buyer's fuel economy will be. Everyone drives differently. People warm their car up in the driveway, fill it up with heavy weight, carry lots of passengers, do a lot of long-distance driving, tow trailers, drive up and down hills, ride their brakes, accelerate briskly to beat their neighbor, drive at high altitudes, drive in cold weather, or whatever. Even more significantly, the energy content of 'gasoline' varies widely depending on how much ethanol it has (more is less) and what its boiling point range is. Just do the same test and do it in a way that someone else could repeat the test the same way and get the same result. That's all we need rather it's a 50 year old test or not.
Businesses should be working a lot harder to find alternatives that do not rely on Windows. This compatibility issue will not be going away...because Microsoft does not consider compatibility to be all that important. Windows 8 users are likely to feel pain when Windows 10 comes out...and so on. Often, there are proprietary/OSS alternatives that will accomplish the objective at a reduced cost and with a far better chance of future compatibility. This doctor's office is not the first to have this problem and it will not be the last.
'With the proper computer tools, biologists can write their own genetic code — and then turn that code into life...
Err...not exactly, Mr. article author. It takes two things, a) copying of the genetic material, and b) expression of the genetic material. The expression of the genetic material is much more significant than the mere assembling and duplicating of DNA code and is only very roughly understood by biologists. It's analogous to an architect showing up at your door with a set of plans and saying 'there you go...you can turn those plans into your dream home' but there has to be the carpenters, plumbers, electricians, and whatnot that read the plans and build the home. Similarly, the way that genetic material is expressed determines if a hand develops or a flipper. The smallest, simplest forms of life are nevertheless far more complex than the most complex device ever constructed by people. It is a form of institutional hubris to suggest or believe that new life can be created by stitching together some DNA. The best we can manage at the present is to modify some tiny function of an existing life form in a hopefully beneficial direction. Anyone who thinks otherwise can volunteer to deal with the next influenza outbreak.
The Wii just didn't have online play in the same league as xBox 360. The xBox connected the teens together online with xbox live. They could chat and play and shoot...a verbal audio 'facebook' for teen gamers. Wii never had that and a generation was lost to it. The Wii U has the Miiverse setup that is a huge step forward from the Wii and its game-specific 'friend' codes but it's still a ways behind the psychopathic Xbox Live. Nintendo has its principles but they might be its undoing.
Microsoft's goal appears to be to make the new version sufficiently different and incompatible with extant versions, formats, UI, etc., so that users will recognize that it is 'new.' Shouldn't the goal be, though, to have the new version have some major new capability that did not exist in previous versions and gives users a new ability to do something important?
Software (other than games) that can actually benefit from this type of hardware is scarce and expensive. This $1000 card will probably be in the $5 bargain box at the local computer recycle shop before there is any significant software in widespread use that could put it to good use.
Anyone can take something apart. It only counts, though, if they get it back together AND it works again. How can they give that thing a "1" out of "10" if they were not able to make it run again? Wouldn't that be a "zero?" Finally, before anyone can say 'who wants to repair something like this, anyway?' let's just note that it's a $900 dollar device with a 1-year limited warranty. Why wouldn't you want to fix the earphone jack if it gets tweaked and will only play one channel, replace the battery if it dies, or put a new screen in if you drop it and it cracks? Those are all pretty common repairs for devices like this.
Let's see...should we choose: 1) the most widely used handset OS in the world with a huge number of apps and open-source code or 2) a much less popular proprietary system with more limited functionality, a limited number of apps, and proprietary code owned by one of the most overbearing software companies that has ever existed? Decisions...decisions...
That's great that Wozniak can look at competing products and recognize accurately their strengths and weaknesses. That kind of objective evaluation leads to better decisions and great products. Companies that mindlessly insist that their products are the 'best' and punish any who dare to say otherwise have a difficult time putting out high quality products that people want to use. Those are the kind of companies that try to force their products on the marketplace and only have success if there is no choice but to use their products.
The Anthropogenic Global Warming advocates tend to periodically go into a 'panic mode' where they predict that imminent disaster justifies the suspension of a normal process of evaluation and consensus-building in favor of immediate 'action.' Someone needs to undertake a study of these people to find out the frequency and cause of their beliefs in sudden drastic actions to remedy difficult problems. Perhaps they are routinely pulling power plugs in server rooms, manually activating fire sprinklers in commercial establishments, and throwing their bag of golf clubs into fairway ponds. Hopefully, Boeing doesn't have this type of person working on the 787 battery problem or the outcome might be to have every passenger provide a personal battery pack that they plug in to get the plane into the air.
Dell is selling itself to a private consortium consisting of Michael Dell and Microsoft. If you were Lenovo or HP or Asus, wouldn't that make you seriously think of supporting devices running open-source system software such as Linux? Wouldn't you start to consider Windows-based machines a deprecated product line?
...the entire civilized world will hang its head in shame over how long this abomination has been allowed to
No shame. North Korea is propped up by China. Unless and until China changes its mind about supporting North Korea, there is nothing that the 'civilized world' can do that will make the situation any better...except, perhaps...buying less of the 'Made in China' stuff. Moreover, the only thing that China cares about right now is flexing its muscles to take over a couple of small islands that Japan has owned for the last couple of centuries.
Napster - this is the software that kicked off the idea of music file sharing. Okay, the record companies hated this program but this is the first program that I can think of that really CONNECTED people as a group on the internet for exchanging data.
MS GW Basic - this was the basic that shipped with the IBM PC and was pretty much what much of its early software was written in because it was so simple to use and yet could be used to do quite a bit.
Windows 3.0 - This was the first version of Windows that people really used and really brought the GUI desktop with the mouse into the mainstream. Okay, the first Macintosh from Apple did that too and came before Windows 3.0 by a ways but it was not nearly as widely used, especially in the workplace.