Oh for god sake in this day and age where we have so many viable options for personal computing in both hardware and software there are still people whining about how one company's notification about how their browser is better is so much more "evil" than the banner on their competitors website that says their browser is better. Its like all the effort that has gone into making Linux a viable desktop alternative over the years has been a waste, every time the slightest thing happens in the Windows world the so-called geeks fly off the handle because after all this time they're still using whatever Microsoft's latest Windows is. It's a notification popup, if that is really that bad then use another operating system.
Chromebooks, iPads, Android devices... these are mobile devices and are a completely different market.
Well they're just not, as far as personal computing goes pretty much all personal computing tasks can be done on all those devices. By your definition Google has a monopoly on Chromebooks and therefore should not be allowed to ship their Chrome browser on it, but that would just be silly.
There is a reason many people have a phone, tablet, laptop, and a desktop.
I don't think that's even a fact, I'd say very few people have a phone, tablet, laptop and desktop.
Most people have both a desktop device (laptop/desktop) and a mobile device (tablet/phone).
Again with this "most people", what is it they are doing on their desktop that they can't do on any other device? There are some things certainly but it hardly affects the majority of people.
As for Linux distributions and Macs, certainly, they are viable in many ways but MacOS only has 4.9% of the market and linux 2%.
So they aren't a viable alternative because fewer people use them?
Ultimately yes, it does come down to market share.
No, it doesn't, if you think it does then you don't know what a monopoly is. A monopoly is about "market power" this does not just mean market share and you also have to define the market you are talking about.
The simple reality is that so long as Microsoft has a monopoly, people making a product or service that integrates with a computer or software can target that platform and reach 90+% of the market.
Actually the reality is that despite Microsoft's position even the most desktop-centric software like Photoshop, Maya, AutoCAD, etc are available on the Mac and some industry-leading software, like Logic Pro, is only available on the Mac.
Microsoft does have a monopoly and is actively trying to use it to dupe people into adopting their new products.
Oh come on, there's more to it than just market share and as far as personal computing is concerned these days there are a wealth of different options, Microsoft barely has a majority (in fact I'm not sure they do anymore) in personal computing anymore. There's various Linux distributions and Dell even supplies Ubuntu pre-loaded on their XPS, Inspiron and Precision products, there are Chromebooks, there are Macs, there are iPads, there are Android devices, are these really not viable alternatives for personal computing?
Then why isn't there a physical switch on the device to set it in a mode where the user can edit the list of operating systems that Secure Boot trusts?
You would have to ask the manufacturer, indeed this is certainly something any manufacturer of UEFI hardware could do.
Not really, since they sold hardware locked-down that they've already announced to no longer be supporting soonish. Meaning that they now are also slamming the door on third-party improvements and will, once support stops, leave you with an unfixable security risk.
Which is industry-standard these days. I'm not saying that's a good thing but it's exactly what you get from any iPhone or iPad that is out of support or any bootloader-locked Android device that is out of support or devices like the HP TouchPad or Palm Pre.
The issue with "secure boot" is control, and it has always been.
The manufacturer defines the level of control and in pretty much every instance the user is free to completely turn the feature off if they wish (is there any PC hardware that doesn't have this?). In fact for a time Microsoft even mandated that no PC could declare itself Windows Certified without the ability to turn it off.
It's a devious scheme to appropriate the pc and turn it into a closed platform like a console.
By who? The manufacturers are the ones that dictate whether it can be turned off or not, take Dell for instance - they sell their XPS, Inspiron and Precision lines with Ubuntu as an option for the operating system and these systems can also run Windows, you think Dell want to alienate their customers by restricting them to only running approved operating systems? Those customers would just move to other manufacturers. In fact in the ARM realm we have seen some OEMs move away from locking down bootloaders because that is what their customers want.
The ignorance of your post is just staggering. Microsoft's DRM implementation is not the only one, it is also not the standard one nor is it the only one Netflix supports (which is precisely why Chrome and Firefox can play DRM Netflix content at all). So what exactly is your objection here?
So how can others make use of this copy protection?
They can license it from Microsoft or they can create their own or they can do what Chrome and Firefox do which is to use widevine. Why can protected media path do 1080p and widevine can't? Well that comes down to the efficiency of the implementation, not of the browser but of the DRM implementation.
That's right, they can't because Microsoft is the creator of the 'standard' and controls the keys to the kingdom
What are you talking about? Protected media path isn't a 'standard', it is just one implementation of DRM, there are others too. What do you think Chrome and Firefox currently use?
All the browsers had 1080p support on Netflix years ago. This is a DRM downgrade.
Yes then they required DRM. The supported solution was widevine, however it lacks the performance to do >=1080p so Microsoft came up with protected media path instead, Chrome and Firefox continue to use widevine.
BEcause to play 1080p you need to run the protected media path, which only Edge has the rights to do so.
That's somewhat correct but the reason you need to use protected media path to play content in 1080p is because the solution Chrome and Firefox use is called WideVine - this is a DRM solution that Netflix officially supports and is what is used on Chrome and Firefox -- but it does not offer the performance to be able to >=1080p resolution.
There's nothing about *speed* or *efficiency* stopping them.
Well actually there is, but it's not that Edge is more efficient than Chrome or Firefox, it's that protected media path is more efficient than widevine.
Microsoft did magically disable 1080p in the other browsers, it's right there in the summary.
The other browsers never had 1080p so please feel free to explain how Microsoft could disable something (magically or otherwise) that they never had? What they did was create a DRM solution that was acceptable for the content producers, the other browser makers have failed to do this. If Microsoft didn't create their DRM solution then Edge would max out at 720p content just like the other browsers.
You forgot to mention ads in the metro(sexual) start menu.
What ads? On the right are live tiles, which aren't ads and on the left the only thing close to an add is whatever appears under Suggestions, which you can just turn off. Problem solved.
Fortunately much of Linux userland is under GPL so if Microsoft does make any change to a Linux userland tool, it would have to contribute it.
Well nothing that they distribute in Windows can be GPL anyway.
Instead of working with Microsoft. I think Canonical should be working with Dell, Lenovo, HP etc to get Linux to support more PC hardware
They already are, the Dell Inspiron can be configured with Ubuntu, their XPS 13 edition comes with it installed as do a various number of their Precision workstations listed here. The problem is certainly not availability and compatibility, the problem is that people don't want it.
It depends on what you mean by "Linux". When you say Windows there are only a couple of actual versions that it would be, if you're talking about Linux it's just the kernel and there are many many different customized Linux-based operating systems and different drivers with varing performance under certain circumstances. For example you have SteamOS and Valve partnered with nVidia to include their proprietary drivers and Gameworks technology in Valve's Linux-based operating system, yes it's Linux but that doesn't mean the games that run on SteamOS will run well, or indeed at all, on other Linux-based operating systems.
The little poison pills of "Windows only" hooks, offered through the posix api subsystem.
If you're using Windows-only hooks then your software is Windows-specific by definition, if you want to make it cross platform then you need to use the equivalent functionality on the target platform. If that equivalent functionality doesn't exist on an open platform - like Linux - then you should implement that functionality. The only worry when it comes to a dependence on a particular platform is if that platform vendor offers developers such compelling functionality that not only is not available on other platforms but also has enough value for the developer to eschew platform independence.
If Microsoft can get enough users their way, they can then start the extinguish phase.
Extinguish what? The Ubuntu on Windows thing that they just built?
Might be an interesting way of evading the adverts plastered into the hackjob of the win10 start menu.
If you can't cope with that one line of text in the start menu that you can in fact turn off in control panel (Occasionally show suggestions in start) anyway then I don't think you're up to the task of installing a new window manager.
Some part of me sees this as the "embrace" stage of the dreaded trio though.
If history is anything to go by then that's a good thing, Java is hugely popular and the cornerstone of the most prevalent mobile personal computing OS in the world and HTML web standards have almost completely supplanted the old proprietary plugins. When people here say "embrace, extend, extinguish" it either never happens or it goes the completely opposite way.
People who know their way around Linux make more money than people who know their way around Windows.
But if you want to continue doing data entry instead of real work, go right ahead.
Nobody doing "real work" gives a fuck about the operating system, it exists to run their applications and in the vast majority of commercial cases Linux desktop fails at that. That is why 90%+ of the world's desktop users use Windows, not because it's better, not becuase they "know their way around it" but because it runs the applications they need to do real work.
Problem is, you just locked yourself into Windows PCs.
Or you can just use the free office online with a free outlook account, like google docs. Works just fine for those times you really need to use MS Word.
He has a point though. Apple is not a monopoly in the smartphone space, they don't even have a majority of the marketshare.
You don't have to have majority marketshare, just significant market power and influence. Apple fanboys (NB: not every Apple user is a fanboy) love to crow about how iOS is the only profitable platform in the mobile app space and that Android users never pay but then once they're called out for anti-competitive behavior all of a sudden Apple are a tiny, uninfluencial player with miniscule marketshare.
To be competitive in the mobile app space you have to be on Android and iOS, you know that, if you're suggesting otherwise then you are clearly serving another agenda. I'm an Apple user (but not a fanboy), I have used iPhones exclusively for the past 4 years and have 3 Macs but I'm not going to pretend this is not asshole anti-competitive behavior by Apple.
Your proposed solution sounds good, but my issue with it is that the App Store does not cost Apple $0 to operate.
Of course not, but it's a value-add. You think people would be buying iPhones and giving Apple the massive profit margin they make on them if they didn't have the app store? In addition they do not charge free application developers anything (aside from the registration cost they charge to everybody), they just want to take a cut if you are making money so a more reasonable suggestion for subscription services is this.
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Oh for god sake in this day and age where we have so many viable options for personal computing in both hardware and software there are still people whining about how one company's notification about how their browser is better is so much more "evil" than the banner on their competitors website that says their browser is better. Its like all the effort that has gone into making Linux a viable desktop alternative over the years has been a waste, every time the slightest thing happens in the Windows world the so-called geeks fly off the handle because after all this time they're still using whatever Microsoft's latest Windows is. It's a notification popup, if that is really that bad then use another operating system.
Chromebooks, iPads, Android devices... these are mobile devices and are a completely different market.
Well they're just not, as far as personal computing goes pretty much all personal computing tasks can be done on all those devices. By your definition Google has a monopoly on Chromebooks and therefore should not be allowed to ship their Chrome browser on it, but that would just be silly.
There is a reason many people have a phone, tablet, laptop, and a desktop.
I don't think that's even a fact, I'd say very few people have a phone, tablet, laptop and desktop.
Most people have both a desktop device (laptop/desktop) and a mobile device (tablet/phone).
Again with this "most people", what is it they are doing on their desktop that they can't do on any other device? There are some things certainly but it hardly affects the majority of people.
As for Linux distributions and Macs, certainly, they are viable in many ways but MacOS only has 4.9% of the market and linux 2%.
So they aren't a viable alternative because fewer people use them?
Ultimately yes, it does come down to market share.
No, it doesn't, if you think it does then you don't know what a monopoly is. A monopoly is about "market power" this does not just mean market share and you also have to define the market you are talking about.
The simple reality is that so long as Microsoft has a monopoly, people making a product or service that integrates with a computer or software can target that platform and reach 90+% of the market.
Actually the reality is that despite Microsoft's position even the most desktop-centric software like Photoshop, Maya, AutoCAD, etc are available on the Mac and some industry-leading software, like Logic Pro, is only available on the Mac.
Microsoft does have a monopoly and is actively trying to use it to dupe people into adopting their new products.
Oh come on, there's more to it than just market share and as far as personal computing is concerned these days there are a wealth of different options, Microsoft barely has a majority (in fact I'm not sure they do anymore) in personal computing anymore. There's various Linux distributions and Dell even supplies Ubuntu pre-loaded on their XPS, Inspiron and Precision products, there are Chromebooks, there are Macs, there are iPads, there are Android devices, are these really not viable alternatives for personal computing?
Then why isn't there a physical switch on the device to set it in a mode where the user can edit the list of operating systems that Secure Boot trusts?
You would have to ask the manufacturer, indeed this is certainly something any manufacturer of UEFI hardware could do.
Not really, since they sold hardware locked-down that they've already announced to no longer be supporting soonish. Meaning that they now are also slamming the door on third-party improvements and will, once support stops, leave you with an unfixable security risk.
Which is industry-standard these days. I'm not saying that's a good thing but it's exactly what you get from any iPhone or iPad that is out of support or any bootloader-locked Android device that is out of support or devices like the HP TouchPad or Palm Pre.
The issue with "secure boot" is control, and it has always been.
The manufacturer defines the level of control and in pretty much every instance the user is free to completely turn the feature off if they wish (is there any PC hardware that doesn't have this?). In fact for a time Microsoft even mandated that no PC could declare itself Windows Certified without the ability to turn it off.
It's a devious scheme to appropriate the pc and turn it into a closed platform like a console.
By who? The manufacturers are the ones that dictate whether it can be turned off or not, take Dell for instance - they sell their XPS, Inspiron and Precision lines with Ubuntu as an option for the operating system and these systems can also run Windows, you think Dell want to alienate their customers by restricting them to only running approved operating systems? Those customers would just move to other manufacturers. In fact in the ARM realm we have seen some OEMs move away from locking down bootloaders because that is what their customers want.
IIRC, most current-generation fly-by-wire craft can do so, but I think they all still require a human to taxi them to the runway.
Specifically what is an example of one?
The ignorance of your post is just staggering. Microsoft's DRM implementation is not the only one, it is also not the standard one nor is it the only one Netflix supports (which is precisely why Chrome and Firefox can play DRM Netflix content at all). So what exactly is your objection here?
So how can others make use of this copy protection?
They can license it from Microsoft or they can create their own or they can do what Chrome and Firefox do which is to use widevine. Why can protected media path do 1080p and widevine can't? Well that comes down to the efficiency of the implementation, not of the browser but of the DRM implementation.
That's right, they can't because Microsoft is the creator of the 'standard' and controls the keys to the kingdom
What are you talking about? Protected media path isn't a 'standard', it is just one implementation of DRM, there are others too. What do you think Chrome and Firefox currently use?
All the browsers had 1080p support on Netflix years ago. This is a DRM downgrade.
Yes then they required DRM. The supported solution was widevine, however it lacks the performance to do >=1080p so Microsoft came up with protected media path instead, Chrome and Firefox continue to use widevine.
BEcause to play 1080p you need to run the protected media path, which only Edge has the rights to do so.
That's somewhat correct but the reason you need to use protected media path to play content in 1080p is because the solution Chrome and Firefox use is called WideVine - this is a DRM solution that Netflix officially supports and is what is used on Chrome and Firefox -- but it does not offer the performance to be able to >=1080p resolution.
There's nothing about *speed* or *efficiency* stopping them.
Well actually there is, but it's not that Edge is more efficient than Chrome or Firefox, it's that protected media path is more efficient than widevine.
Microsoft did magically disable 1080p in the other browsers, it's right there in the summary.
The other browsers never had 1080p so please feel free to explain how Microsoft could disable something (magically or otherwise) that they never had? What they did was create a DRM solution that was acceptable for the content producers, the other browser makers have failed to do this. If Microsoft didn't create their DRM solution then Edge would max out at 720p content just like the other browsers.
You forgot to mention ads in the metro(sexual) start menu.
What ads? On the right are live tiles, which aren't ads and on the left the only thing close to an add is whatever appears under Suggestions, which you can just turn off. Problem solved.
But the people who still use Office (often because it's a requirement from school) are stuck with a monthly subscription.
No they aren't. Why would they be stuck with a monthly subscription when you can just buy the standalone perpetual version?
Fortunately much of Linux userland is under GPL so if Microsoft does make any change to a Linux userland tool, it would have to contribute it.
Well nothing that they distribute in Windows can be GPL anyway.
Instead of working with Microsoft. I think Canonical should be working with Dell, Lenovo, HP etc to get Linux to support more PC hardware
They already are, the Dell Inspiron can be configured with Ubuntu, their XPS 13 edition comes with it installed as do a various number of their Precision workstations listed here. The problem is certainly not availability and compatibility, the problem is that people don't want it.
Embrace, Extend, Extinguish...
What are they going to "embrace, extend, extinguish"?
It depends on what you mean by "Linux". When you say Windows there are only a couple of actual versions that it would be, if you're talking about Linux it's just the kernel and there are many many different customized Linux-based operating systems and different drivers with varing performance under certain circumstances. For example you have SteamOS and Valve partnered with nVidia to include their proprietary drivers and Gameworks technology in Valve's Linux-based operating system, yes it's Linux but that doesn't mean the games that run on SteamOS will run well, or indeed at all, on other Linux-based operating systems.
The little poison pills of "Windows only" hooks, offered through the posix api subsystem.
If you're using Windows-only hooks then your software is Windows-specific by definition, if you want to make it cross platform then you need to use the equivalent functionality on the target platform. If that equivalent functionality doesn't exist on an open platform - like Linux - then you should implement that functionality. The only worry when it comes to a dependence on a particular platform is if that platform vendor offers developers such compelling functionality that not only is not available on other platforms but also has enough value for the developer to eschew platform independence.
If Microsoft can get enough users their way, they can then start the extinguish phase.
Extinguish what? The Ubuntu on Windows thing that they just built?
Might be an interesting way of evading the adverts plastered into the hackjob of the win10 start menu.
If you can't cope with that one line of text in the start menu that you can in fact turn off in control panel (Occasionally show suggestions in start) anyway then I don't think you're up to the task of installing a new window manager.
Some part of me sees this as the "embrace" stage of the dreaded trio though.
If history is anything to go by then that's a good thing, Java is hugely popular and the cornerstone of the most prevalent mobile personal computing OS in the world and HTML web standards have almost completely supplanted the old proprietary plugins. When people here say "embrace, extend, extinguish" it either never happens or it goes the completely opposite way.
People who know their way around Linux make more money than people who know their way around Windows.
But if you want to continue doing data entry instead of real work, go right ahead.
Nobody doing "real work" gives a fuck about the operating system, it exists to run their applications and in the vast majority of commercial cases Linux desktop fails at that. That is why 90%+ of the world's desktop users use Windows, not because it's better, not becuase they "know their way around it" but because it runs the applications they need to do real work.
First, no you really can't use the online versions in a professional environment...
Why not?
but if you're building or editing a 143 slide PowerPoint
If you're doing that then you're doing powerpoint wrong to begin with.
Also, this has nothing to do with Windows vs Linux vs OSX, it has to do with MS Office in general.
Actually it does, because Apache is not the only cross platform compatible Office suite and this illustrates that point that you have not locked yourself into Windows PCs. Or perhaps you're not really following this thread?
For many people, that is plenty... for professionals who actually use this stuff all the time, it isn't...
You can use office 365 online, and you can use it on Linux or OSX too.
Problem is, you just locked yourself into Windows PCs.
Or you can just use the free office online with a free outlook account, like google docs. Works just fine for those times you really need to use MS Word.
He has a point though. Apple is not a monopoly in the smartphone space, they don't even have a majority of the marketshare.
You don't have to have majority marketshare, just significant market power and influence. Apple fanboys (NB: not every Apple user is a fanboy) love to crow about how iOS is the only profitable platform in the mobile app space and that Android users never pay but then once they're called out for anti-competitive behavior all of a sudden Apple are a tiny, uninfluencial player with miniscule marketshare.
To be competitive in the mobile app space you have to be on Android and iOS, you know that, if you're suggesting otherwise then you are clearly serving another agenda. I'm an Apple user (but not a fanboy), I have used iPhones exclusively for the past 4 years and have 3 Macs but I'm not going to pretend this is not asshole anti-competitive behavior by Apple.
Your proposed solution sounds good, but my issue with it is that the App Store does not cost Apple $0 to operate.
Of course not, but it's a value-add. You think people would be buying iPhones and giving Apple the massive profit margin they make on them if they didn't have the app store? In addition they do not charge free application developers anything (aside from the registration cost they charge to everybody), they just want to take a cut if you are making money so a more reasonable suggestion for subscription services is this.