Parallels is NOT hypervisor based you n00b. Read up on the Xen project at Sourceforge and Intel's Vanderpool technology. We're not talking VMWare, VirtualPC or Parallels here. Those are weak virtualization models based on concepts that always incur a performance hit. When you know what ring -1 and ring 0 are, then come back and talk to me. Until then, you've made it quite clear you know nothing about virutalization.
...that Apple moved to Intel to take advantage of Intel's new virtualization support in hardware. In nearly every case when using a hypervisor on top of such hardware (where there is a ring -1 for the hypervisor) the performance has beat native performance. Or put another way; using a hypervisor for virtualization provides you with virtualization with NO performance hit at all. If anything you get a performance boost. Apple, typically being quite a few steps ahead of the reast of the industry, is very likely going to use this so that you can run Mac OS X Leopard, Windows Vista, and any Linux distro simultaneously with the full performance of running natively. This is the first time in history when you really CAN get something for nothing!!! Not to mention they will likely make it so that you can set up ways to exchange data in a live fashion between VMs. No more incompatibility between OSes ever again. Leave it to Apple to come up with something like this.
What I'm saying is that the typical Mac user (not the new fangled *nix lbackground Mac user who is a totally different beast) does not use such tools and finds them to be abhorrent.
Sure the Mac has those things but it hasn't historically. So anyone who is aware of that functionality is likely a new convert to the Mac or was a techhead Mac user to begin with. I've known tons of Photoshop/Pagemaker, etc... users who never touched that sort of thing on the old MacOS and when Mac OS X came out were griping about how it was too much like Windows for them. In fact one of them told me, "You can always tell when an OS is poorly thought out. It has a command line application to account for it's failings. With Mac OS 7, that was never an issue. Mac OS X is a failure".
Quite true. There are SO many people working in IT who shouldn't be. But the problem is that if they weren't working in IT they would be working somewhere else their apptitudes don't fit either. So it's a society-wide problem. A lot of these people had the apptitude to work in factories but those jobs are long gone and never coming back. IT still requires more of an engineering mindset if you want things work properly. But Microsoft has pretty handily combatted that line of thinking by claiming that "this stuff is easy". Sure, it's easy just like baking a boxed mix cake is easy, but that doesn't mean you end up with the best cake now does it?
I don't think you've not subscribed to the Slashdot "group think" since there is no such thing to subscribe (or not) to. From the sound of it you are in a niche market (professional graphics work) and probably more technically able than most graphic designers (hence your choice of Windows). But you are apparently not really into technology for what it can do overall. You're only into what it can do for your specific task. Considering that most graphic designers don't know much about networking, scripting or coding, they tend to prefer the Mac. Again, it doesn't sound like you're quite down at that level (not to disparage graphic designers, but the best of the lot rarely have any technical ability at all. They simply have great eyes and know how to use their apps).
For me... it's all about "free" in both senses of the word. I exclusively use Linux at home for everything. There are tons of applications that do everything I need. Since I don't need to go to print with my graphic work, GIMP works fine for me. As does GIMPrint for printing out family photos and the like. When it comes to the professional audio and video work I do, GIMP is leaps and bounds ahead of what the Windows platform provides and way cheaper than most decent Mac solutions. The amount of time spent getting mys systems configured (from source typically as I despise pre-packaged software) is not any greater than the amount of time I spent tweaking my Windows systems when I used that OS in the past. This is because for many of us, we like to get every ounce of performance out of our hardware and no matter what OS or platform we're on, we're going to investigate EVERY option all the way down to the code itself. Linux is not hard and the GUIs are much more polished and feature filled than anything that the Windows platform offers. But yes, you do have to spend some time learning the new approaches. I did and it was worth every second.
It still an argument that's stupid and pointless though. It's not about "Good OS" vs. "Bad OS". It's about a "Good for Me OS" vs. a Bad for Me OS". For me, Windows is too limiting and far too expensive when you factor in how much you have to spend on extra apps to actually make it useful. For you the GUI options on Linux didn't suit you, likely due to the learning curve and possibly due to the time you tried it (Development is moving fast and both GNOME and KDE are far better than the Explorer interface in my opinion). Linux also failed you in that you probably aren't the kind of person who likes to work all the way down to the metal to get the most out of your machine (again, not an insult just a basic fact based on what you posted. I don't know, so I can't say 100% that this is true. You might have the.Net devel suite on your box and have downloaded the Windows source code via P2P to get things tuned right...). These failings don't really make either OS "bad" per se. But there are some simple facts to take into account:
1. I used Windows all the way from DOS/Win3.1 to XP and I only got hit with one exploit through a stupid move (putting my XP laptop directly on a DSL link in an emergency with no firewall at all Pre-SP2). I found that putting my Windows boxes behind a decent firewall (typically linux based) stopped a whole host of problems. Even without EVER using any antivirus software (I simply avoided Internet Explorer and any version of Outlook). 2. Nearly every Linux distro I've used has come with everything I've needed at a basic level and the only extras I ever install are typically because of my interests in the rarer fields of computing. Linux is certainly more complete when compared to Mac or Windows, but that's only if you're willing to put the time into learning it.
So there you have it. I hope you can see the wisdom in this piece and take no offense as none was meant.
And again you're making that assumption that computers are used primarly for business. Anyone who uses a computer for business has missed the point entirely. See my profile and you'll understand why.
You are correct sir. However there is one other way it would happen. A major security disaster that really eats nearly everyone's data on the Windows platform in such a way that it can never be recovered and backups won't work because the fundamental OS itself is completely at the mercy of the cracker(s) who staged the attack. At that point, people won't want to use Windows and would be forced to move. Of course, something like that could never happen now, could it?;)
The demand for the products that the pr0n industry produces far dwarfs the demand for the crap that the (MP|RI)AA -- (Note how cool it is that I used a RegEx and actually used MORE characters instead of less to say the same thing. I am 1337, bow down.) put out. Basically if you've got everyone chomping at the bit for your product and you know they're going to sell hard and fast, then you're not going to be averse to letting a little product slip through your fingers. Especially if youre product is cheap. Unlike Hollywood, the porn industry puts out "first run" movies for about $40 and then progressively drops the price the older the product is. If you're a smart porn conneseur, you can buy movies that are one or two years old for only $10. Let's see Hollywood do THAT. It'll never happen. And you know why? Because the music and movie industries KNOW that their product is total crap in terms of demand. Yeah, some morons want the pap, but they don't want to pay outrageous prices for it. And based on the fact that both the RIAA and the MPAA are looking to outlaw the sale of used product more than twice (meaning you can't sell beyond one person) beyond the original sale, I'd say that there's going to be a whole lotta thievin' goin' on... Have a nice day chumps.
Silence! I command you to sit down and shut the hell up!!! There is NOTHING funnier than flying chairs where Ballmer is related. Well almost nothing. The only thing funnier than that is the notion of custom made sexbots that have the structure of a spider but human limbs and flesh, wearing sexy fishnet hosiery and with the head of Amanda Donohoe on them. Other than that, there's nothing funnier!!! Now stay there and lick your wounds in the light my viscious tongue lashing!
Hey ass. When you don't know what the fuck you're talking about it's customary to precede what you're saying with a, "Please ignore me as I am a fucking mouthbreathing moron". If gcc's output is such an underperfomer then why does every box I've migrated from Windows to Linux (we're talking in the hundreds now) always run faster than it di in Windows? Shut the hell up and go play in traffic or something. Ok? Thanks.
Blame the Dems. They're the ones that want into your bedroom to stop you from having anal sex. Or, who want to make homosexuality a crime punishable by death. Or, who want science taken out of schools in favor of myths and fairy stories. Oh... wait...
I read that headline and pictured kiosks that are used to incinerate DVDs using fire. I figured it was just another brick in the neocon megachurch wall that they are building around sanity in this country. Every time I'm outside I'm reminded of just how dumb most Americans are. Better stay home and spend more time on the computer...;P
(NOTE: The above is humorous. If you don't get it, then you have my sympathies for your loss.)
You again? God you're a bore. Why don't you just ignore me and be over with it if you don't like my comedy stylings? That would be the more "mature" thing to do green wing.
"Government May Help Bells Defend Against Wiretap Suits"
Government = ostensibly the U.S. governement (remember there's a whole world that matters a whole lot more than just the U.S. folks) May Help Bells = The aforementioned U.S. Government might offer some kind of assistance to all Bells (Art Bell? Carrie Bell? Reggie Bell?) in the country. Defend Against = A redneck way of saying "defend themselves against" as applied to the previously mentioned Bells. Wiretap Suits = All the rage in Europe. Suits made out of Wire with Taps that slide over any style of shoe but remain attached to the suit.
So in essence we are saying that the U.S. government may or may not defend all people with the last name Bell from having to wear Wiretap Suits. This is not a good development. Why should all the Bells be prevented from looking foolish when the latest fashion rage takes over the U.S? These are dark days indeed...
Then you need to pull your head out slowly and cleanly and WAKE THE FUCK UP! George W. Bush is a criminal and needs to be impeached. NOW. Real Americans realize this. Idiot Americans don't. The only time an attack by a foreign power was ever carried out on U.S. soil was Pearl Harbour. 9/11 was done by the U.S. government. WAKE UP NOW!
... all the people who have no experience with programming are going to jump into this saying how they would do it much better. "SMTP needs to be rewritten!!", is the rallying cry. I've seen it before when spam first started making an appearance and now we're going to see it with a vengeance. The worst thing is that most users think of e-mail as JUST e-mail. They have no idea that their inboxes are held on a POP3, IMAP or possibly other proprietary server. So when they start crying out about spam they want it taken care of at their inboxes and that's what we're going to hear about here on/. This is quite typical. The truth is that there is NO answer to this problem anymore than there was an answer to telemarketing. Short of getting a private number, you can't keep tlemarketers from calling you without getting into legislation (the Do Not Call list). So you could get an "unlisted" e-mail address concept going so that only your family and friends would mail you... but that STILL wouldn't work. Want to know why? Because e-mail addresses are NOT telephone numbers. When was the last time you wanted to let a bunch of people know about something by phone? You called all of them and told them what you wanted them to hear and THEN you gave them a list of everyone else's phone numbers you were going to call or had already called. Did you ever do that? I'm guessing the answer is no. Well, with e-mail that's what a lot of people do each day when they forward on those jokes, or interesting blog links, or news articles. And all it takes is for one of those people to get their machine infected with something that harvests their address book. Bam! Your private e-mail address is no longer private. Short of running your own e-mail service on your own darknet via VPN that only your relatives and friends have access to, there is NO solution to this problem. Only a set of workarounds that have a fair amount of success. I'm not kidding.
OK, all kidding aside I'm pretty sure Microsoft will stay afloat in the software as a service industry. After all it's only web stuff. While the web is a lot more complex than it was at the dawn of HTML/HTTP, it's also very limited. The most that web apps can achieve are consumer level apps that lots of Joe and Jane Averages use. ie. they aren't targetting REAL users yet. They're only going for the majority of users, so... ho hum. More of the same. Where Google offers a search engine, MS will offer a search engine with tail fins and chrome bumpers that gets less mileage per gallon and only refuels at MS stations (OS/browser lock-in). Hmmm... come to think of it, maybe that's why they're splitting the browser out of the OS now? They plan to make their web services more OS independent and perhaps will port the browser again?
Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah. People like us who want REAL software that does REAL work (coders, media production, graphics, etc...) will never want software as a service in it's present and web limited way. The web needs to vastly change in the areas of bandwidth (at least 100 megabits/s at home as a start) and standard 'in browser' graphical functionality (being able to do realtime graphical rendering in 2D and 3D fo UI elements). Could you imagine some numbnut AJAX developer writing a video editor to work in a browser? Or worse yet as a Java or.Net (or even Mono) app? It would suck. The bottom line is that the web is not ready (and may possibly never be ready) to be a software platform for people like us. But Microsoft doesn't cater to people like us. They cater to Joe and Jane Average. So... in other words "Nothing to see here. Move along".
But the American politicians are and should be taken to task by the citizens. It's quite obvious that the people running the show here in the U.S. don't want uppity and informed citizens. Those sorts of citizens are a lot harder to control than the happy, fat, passive TV and Internet addled variety. So it stands to reason that they want to separate people from the tools for gathering knowledge:
1. Make science the enemy. Whether it's the enemy of being a good God fearing fundamentalist Christian (therefore making science the enemy of God), or a tool for terrorists (therefore making science an enemy of the American people) the general goal is to scare people away from science. Or at the very least discredit science as being a valid tool for knowledge.
2. Make it impossible for the average person to have the tools to get a message out to a large group of people. Although there are some valid business points in trying to break the Internet into a 'have' and 'have nots' style network (AKA opposition to net neutrality) the end result is that it will be a lot harder for someone to blow the lid off of a cover-up online in the future. Expect to see the Internet become more and more like TV and less and less like a large public sign board. They will feed you what they want you to see and hear. You will have few and very weak options to make others see and hear what you want them to.
3. Keep the public misinformed about everything. We see this happening with nearly all news outlets in the U.S. and where science is concerned this is becoming especially true. Fox News is, of course, the major culprit in preventing people from knowing what is really happening in the world. They ignore important stories, or provide complete diversions from reality in reporting if possible. If they can't ignore the reality then they make the occurrences into huge emotional plays to hook viewers in (think Geraldo during the Katrina Crisis in New Orleans) and garner more support for being compassionate and caring. In truth, the real news reported properly is boring stuff and will lose viewer. So misinforming the average American is a cakewalk.
Science is being turned into another religious battle. The wealthy and the powerful WANT and NEED science so that their businesses can continue to put out more new "stuff" to keep the people beneath them entertained and complacent while earning them more and more money and power. So they don't really hate science at all. They just want the people beneath them to be afraid of it or hate it. Very much like the church used to operate regarding books before the printing press. A tool like the printing press is dangerous to maintaining that kind of control over the underlings. Thus science (and one of it's many results: the Internet) is making a lot of different printing presses and needs to be stopped...
Slashdot Mirror
Parallels is NOT hypervisor based you n00b. Read up on the Xen project at Sourceforge and Intel's Vanderpool technology. We're not talking VMWare, VirtualPC or Parallels here. Those are weak virtualization models based on concepts that always incur a performance hit. When you know what ring -1 and ring 0 are, then come back and talk to me. Until then, you've made it quite clear you know nothing about virutalization.
...that Apple moved to Intel to take advantage of Intel's new virtualization support in hardware. In nearly every case when using a hypervisor on top of such hardware (where there is a ring -1 for the hypervisor) the performance has beat native performance. Or put another way; using a hypervisor for virtualization provides you with virtualization with NO performance hit at all. If anything you get a performance boost. Apple, typically being quite a few steps ahead of the reast of the industry, is very likely going to use this so that you can run Mac OS X Leopard, Windows Vista, and any Linux distro simultaneously with the full performance of running natively. This is the first time in history when you really CAN get something for nothing!!! Not to mention they will likely make it so that you can set up ways to exchange data in a live fashion between VMs. No more incompatibility between OSes ever again. Leave it to Apple to come up with something like this.
What I'm saying is that the typical Mac user (not the new fangled *nix lbackground Mac user who is a totally different beast) does not use such tools and finds them to be abhorrent.
...as if the black heart of one of the Empire has just ceased to exist.
Sure the Mac has those things but it hasn't historically. So anyone who is aware of that functionality is likely a new convert to the Mac or was a techhead Mac user to begin with. I've known tons of Photoshop/Pagemaker, etc... users who never touched that sort of thing on the old MacOS and when Mac OS X came out were griping about how it was too much like Windows for them. In fact one of them told me, "You can always tell when an OS is poorly thought out. It has a command line application to account for it's failings. With Mac OS 7, that was never an issue. Mac OS X is a failure".
So are you saying that the people who brought us this technology didn't do something original and creative? I think they'd beg to differ.
For some people $499 is half a month's income. That's a pretty sizable chunk of money to just throw out willy-nilly.
Quite true. There are SO many people working in IT who shouldn't be. But the problem is that if they weren't working in IT they would be working somewhere else their apptitudes don't fit either. So it's a society-wide problem. A lot of these people had the apptitude to work in factories but those jobs are long gone and never coming back. IT still requires more of an engineering mindset if you want things work properly. But Microsoft has pretty handily combatted that line of thinking by claiming that "this stuff is easy". Sure, it's easy just like baking a boxed mix cake is easy, but that doesn't mean you end up with the best cake now does it?
I don't think you've not subscribed to the Slashdot "group think" since there is no such thing to subscribe (or not) to. From the sound of it you are in a niche market (professional graphics work) and probably more technically able than most graphic designers (hence your choice of Windows). But you are apparently not really into technology for what it can do overall. You're only into what it can do for your specific task. Considering that most graphic designers don't know much about networking, scripting or coding, they tend to prefer the Mac. Again, it doesn't sound like you're quite down at that level (not to disparage graphic designers, but the best of the lot rarely have any technical ability at all. They simply have great eyes and know how to use their apps).
.Net devel suite on your box and have downloaded the Windows source code via P2P to get things tuned right...). These failings don't really make either OS "bad" per se. But there are some simple facts to take into account:
For me... it's all about "free" in both senses of the word. I exclusively use Linux at home for everything. There are tons of applications that do everything I need. Since I don't need to go to print with my graphic work, GIMP works fine for me. As does GIMPrint for printing out family photos and the like. When it comes to the professional audio and video work I do, GIMP is leaps and bounds ahead of what the Windows platform provides and way cheaper than most decent Mac solutions. The amount of time spent getting mys systems configured (from source typically as I despise pre-packaged software) is not any greater than the amount of time I spent tweaking my Windows systems when I used that OS in the past. This is because for many of us, we like to get every ounce of performance out of our hardware and no matter what OS or platform we're on, we're going to investigate EVERY option all the way down to the code itself. Linux is not hard and the GUIs are much more polished and feature filled than anything that the Windows platform offers. But yes, you do have to spend some time learning the new approaches. I did and it was worth every second.
It still an argument that's stupid and pointless though. It's not about "Good OS" vs. "Bad OS". It's about a "Good for Me OS" vs. a Bad for Me OS". For me, Windows is too limiting and far too expensive when you factor in how much you have to spend on extra apps to actually make it useful. For you the GUI options on Linux didn't suit you, likely due to the learning curve and possibly due to the time you tried it (Development is moving fast and both GNOME and KDE are far better than the Explorer interface in my opinion). Linux also failed you in that you probably aren't the kind of person who likes to work all the way down to the metal to get the most out of your machine (again, not an insult just a basic fact based on what you posted. I don't know, so I can't say 100% that this is true. You might have the
1. I used Windows all the way from DOS/Win3.1 to XP and I only got hit with one exploit through a stupid move (putting my XP laptop directly on a DSL link in an emergency with no firewall at all Pre-SP2). I found that putting my Windows boxes behind a decent firewall (typically linux based) stopped a whole host of problems. Even without EVER using any antivirus software (I simply avoided Internet Explorer and any version of Outlook).
2. Nearly every Linux distro I've used has come with everything I've needed at a basic level and the only extras I ever install are typically because of my interests in the rarer fields of computing. Linux is certainly more complete when compared to Mac or Windows, but that's only if you're willing to put the time into learning it.
So there you have it. I hope you can see the wisdom in this piece and take no offense as none was meant.
And again you're making that assumption that computers are used primarly for business. Anyone who uses a computer for business has missed the point entirely. See my profile and you'll understand why.
You are correct sir. However there is one other way it would happen. A major security disaster that really eats nearly everyone's data on the Windows platform in such a way that it can never be recovered and backups won't work because the fundamental OS itself is completely at the mercy of the cracker(s) who staged the attack. At that point, people won't want to use Windows and would be forced to move. Of course, something like that could never happen now, could it? ;)
Anyone who is in "the industry" knows this. They just like to say the things people like to hear though...
The demand for the products that the pr0n industry produces far dwarfs the demand for the crap that the (MP|RI)AA -- (Note how cool it is that I used a RegEx and actually used MORE characters instead of less to say the same thing. I am 1337, bow down.) put out. Basically if you've got everyone chomping at the bit for your product and you know they're going to sell hard and fast, then you're not going to be averse to letting a little product slip through your fingers. Especially if youre product is cheap. Unlike Hollywood, the porn industry puts out "first run" movies for about $40 and then progressively drops the price the older the product is. If you're a smart porn conneseur, you can buy movies that are one or two years old for only $10. Let's see Hollywood do THAT. It'll never happen. And you know why? Because the music and movie industries KNOW that their product is total crap in terms of demand. Yeah, some morons want the pap, but they don't want to pay outrageous prices for it. And based on the fact that both the RIAA and the MPAA are looking to outlaw the sale of used product more than twice (meaning you can't sell beyond one person) beyond the original sale, I'd say that there's going to be a whole lotta thievin' goin' on... Have a nice day chumps.
Oh, well in THAT case. ;P TaTa
Silence! I command you to sit down and shut the hell up!!! There is NOTHING funnier than flying chairs where Ballmer is related. Well almost nothing. The only thing funnier than that is the notion of custom made sexbots that have the structure of a spider but human limbs and flesh, wearing sexy fishnet hosiery and with the head of Amanda Donohoe on them. Other than that, there's nothing funnier!!! Now stay there and lick your wounds in the light my viscious tongue lashing!
Hey ass. When you don't know what the fuck you're talking about it's customary to precede what you're saying with a, "Please ignore me as I am a fucking mouthbreathing moron". If gcc's output is such an underperfomer then why does every box I've migrated from Windows to Linux (we're talking in the hundreds now) always run faster than it di in Windows? Shut the hell up and go play in traffic or something. Ok? Thanks.
Blame the Dems. They're the ones that want into your bedroom to stop you from having anal sex. Or, who want to make homosexuality a crime punishable by death. Or, who want science taken out of schools in favor of myths and fairy stories. Oh... wait...
I read that headline and pictured kiosks that are used to incinerate DVDs using fire. I figured it was just another brick in the neocon megachurch wall that they are building around sanity in this country. Every time I'm outside I'm reminded of just how dumb most Americans are. Better stay home and spend more time on the computer... ;P
(NOTE: The above is humorous. If you don't get it, then you have my sympathies for your loss.)
You again? God you're a bore. Why don't you just ignore me and be over with it if you don't like my comedy stylings? That would be the more "mature" thing to do green wing.
You are correct. I should have specified within the last 100 years.
Let's parse that headline correctly:
"Government May Help Bells Defend Against Wiretap Suits"
Government = ostensibly the U.S. governement (remember there's a whole world that matters a whole lot more than just the U.S. folks)
May Help Bells = The aforementioned U.S. Government might offer some kind of assistance to all Bells (Art Bell? Carrie Bell? Reggie Bell?) in the country.
Defend Against = A redneck way of saying "defend themselves against" as applied to the previously mentioned Bells.
Wiretap Suits = All the rage in Europe. Suits made out of Wire with Taps that slide over any style of shoe but remain attached to the suit.
So in essence we are saying that the U.S. government may or may not defend all people with the last name Bell from having to wear Wiretap Suits. This is not a good development. Why should all the Bells be prevented from looking foolish when the latest fashion rage takes over the U.S? These are dark days indeed...
Then you need to pull your head out slowly and cleanly and WAKE THE FUCK UP! George W. Bush is a criminal and needs to be impeached. NOW. Real Americans realize this. Idiot Americans don't. The only time an attack by a foreign power was ever carried out on U.S. soil was Pearl Harbour. 9/11 was done by the U.S. government. WAKE UP NOW!
... all the people who have no experience with programming are going to jump into this saying how they would do it much better. "SMTP needs to be rewritten!!", is the rallying cry. I've seen it before when spam first started making an appearance and now we're going to see it with a vengeance. The worst thing is that most users think of e-mail as JUST e-mail. They have no idea that their inboxes are held on a POP3, IMAP or possibly other proprietary server. So when they start crying out about spam they want it taken care of at their inboxes and that's what we're going to hear about here on /. This is quite typical. The truth is that there is NO answer to this problem anymore than there was an answer to telemarketing. Short of getting a private number, you can't keep tlemarketers from calling you without getting into legislation (the Do Not Call list). So you could get an "unlisted" e-mail address concept going so that only your family and friends would mail you... but that STILL wouldn't work. Want to know why? Because e-mail addresses are NOT telephone numbers. When was the last time you wanted to let a bunch of people know about something by phone? You called all of them and told them what you wanted them to hear and THEN you gave them a list of everyone else's phone numbers you were going to call or had already called. Did you ever do that? I'm guessing the answer is no. Well, with e-mail that's what a lot of people do each day when they forward on those jokes, or interesting blog links, or news articles. And all it takes is for one of those people to get their machine infected with something that harvests their address book. Bam! Your private e-mail address is no longer private. Short of running your own e-mail service on your own darknet via VPN that only your relatives and friends have access to, there is NO solution to this problem. Only a set of workarounds that have a fair amount of success. I'm not kidding.
...is the day they make a vaccuum cleaner. ;P
.Net (or even Mono) app? It would suck. The bottom line is that the web is not ready (and may possibly never be ready) to be a software platform for people like us. But Microsoft doesn't cater to people like us. They cater to Joe and Jane Average. So... in other words "Nothing to see here. Move along".
OK, all kidding aside I'm pretty sure Microsoft will stay afloat in the software as a service industry. After all it's only web stuff. While the web is a lot more complex than it was at the dawn of HTML/HTTP, it's also very limited. The most that web apps can achieve are consumer level apps that lots of Joe and Jane Averages use. ie. they aren't targetting REAL users yet. They're only going for the majority of users, so... ho hum. More of the same. Where Google offers a search engine, MS will offer a search engine with tail fins and chrome bumpers that gets less mileage per gallon and only refuels at MS stations (OS/browser lock-in). Hmmm... come to think of it, maybe that's why they're splitting the browser out of the OS now? They plan to make their web services more OS independent and perhaps will port the browser again?
Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah. People like us who want REAL software that does REAL work (coders, media production, graphics, etc...) will never want software as a service in it's present and web limited way. The web needs to vastly change in the areas of bandwidth (at least 100 megabits/s at home as a start) and standard 'in browser' graphical functionality (being able to do realtime graphical rendering in 2D and 3D fo UI elements). Could you imagine some numbnut AJAX developer writing a video editor to work in a browser? Or worse yet as a Java or
But the American politicians are and should be taken to task by the citizens. It's quite obvious that the people running the show here in the U.S. don't want uppity and informed citizens. Those sorts of citizens are a lot harder to control than the happy, fat, passive TV and Internet addled variety. So it stands to reason that they want to separate people from the tools for gathering knowledge:
1. Make science the enemy. Whether it's the enemy of being a good God fearing fundamentalist Christian (therefore making science the enemy of God), or a tool for terrorists (therefore making science an enemy of the American people) the general goal is to scare people away from science. Or at the very least discredit science as being a valid tool for knowledge.
2. Make it impossible for the average person to have the tools to get a message out to a large group of people. Although there are some valid business points in trying to break the Internet into a 'have' and 'have nots' style network (AKA opposition to net neutrality) the end result is that it will be a lot harder for someone to blow the lid off of a cover-up online in the future. Expect to see the Internet become more and more like TV and less and less like a large public sign board. They will feed you what they want you to see and hear. You will have few and very weak options to make others see and hear what you want them to.
3. Keep the public misinformed about everything. We see this happening with nearly all news outlets in the U.S. and where science is concerned this is becoming especially true. Fox News is, of course, the major culprit in preventing people from knowing what is really happening in the world. They ignore important stories, or provide complete diversions from reality in reporting if possible. If they can't ignore the reality then they make the occurrences into huge emotional plays to hook viewers in (think Geraldo during the Katrina Crisis in New Orleans) and garner more support for being compassionate and caring. In truth, the real news reported properly is boring stuff and will lose viewer. So misinforming the average American is a cakewalk.
Science is being turned into another religious battle. The wealthy and the powerful WANT and NEED science so that their businesses can continue to put out more new "stuff" to keep the people beneath them entertained and complacent while earning them more and more money and power. So they don't really hate science at all. They just want the people beneath them to be afraid of it or hate it. Very much like the church used to operate regarding books before the printing press. A tool like the printing press is dangerous to maintaining that kind of control over the underlings. Thus science (and one of it's many results: the Internet) is making a lot of different printing presses and needs to be stopped...