On one hand, allowing Win XP apps to run on Intel Macs will ease the transition of more people to Macs.
I suspect we'll be seeing the Mac equivalent of CoLinux (http://www.colinux.org/)very shortly. Cooperative operating systems will allow developers to address the best aspects of both systems - UI from the Mac, drivers from Win/Vista, for example.
Eventually the two commercial oprating systems will merge and become one. The merged system will be co-developed as a joint venture by Apple and Microsoft, who will trade under the name of Cyberdyne Systems.
Steve Jobs made the decision to move to a robust, open framework, using the a MACH kernel.
Apple could make that change because the majority of their customers use a narrower range of applications than Windows users. There are thousands of businesses out there running custom or niche applications on Windows with only a few equivalents on Macs.
The problem for Microsoft is that the depth of the legacy software they support is how they lock their customers in. If the business is already committed to use Windows for , then they may as well use it for their office work as well. If Windows loses compatibility with some of the thousands of specialised apps out there, those customers will have no incentive to stay with MS.
I'm surprised Ballmer hasn't been accused of a 'hate crime' yet
From TFA: "if there's a bug in Linux, IBM is not the responsible party to fix that. It's whoever in the community. And you know, let's say that person has a death in the family..."
I don't think Microsoft can salvage this. they've locked themselves into selling a monolith in an environment when a modular, easily and frequently updatable system is needed.
I'd love to see the major corps get behind a push to reimplement the Windows APIs (IE, Wine or similar) so all OSs could run Win32 executables. Then the big MS lockin would be over and we users could have some choices.
OSS is good, I know, but Christ, is the open-source self-fellating around here ever getting old.
This isn't about Open Source. It's purely about choice and competition. If APIs were open, any commercial company could reimpliment any parts of the OS. If formats were open, software users could switch to better products when they became available, or choose an app that suits THEM instead of one that suits Conglomocorp (TM). If communication protocols are open, you can transparently run hetrogenous networks and use the right computer and OS for the task, instead of adapting the task to MS Generica.
OSS is a symptom of the problem, not the (whole) answer to it. If any normal CEO was told; "Here's a business for you to run. Your biggest competitor is a bunch of hobbyists mucking around with a 40 year junker they got for free.", they'd be rubbing their hands together and thanking their lucky stars. Instead, Microsoft is running scared and fighting dirty. That tells you how little faith they have in their ability to compete.
The reason so many of us gravitate to FOSS is because we're in a trap which has been set by ruthless monopolists and complicit governments. FOSS is the only path we can see out of the trap, but what we really want is choice. Lots of it.
No, you weren't. If you'd bought an operating system, you'd be able to keep it and put it into other computers. You'd be able to customise it to work the way you want to. You'd be able to update the bits that don't work the way you want, when you want. You'd be able look under the hood and learn how it works. It would be YOURS to do with as you saw fit.
What you have is an instance, a snapshot of somebody else's development cycle. It's locked to the hardware, so it'll die when the electronics does, and you'll have to pay for it all over again. They'll grudgingly fix the most dangerous flaws when THEY feel like it, not when you're being hurt by them. It's not your operating system, it's theirs. And don't you ever forget it.
The entire computer industry has been stifled for years. We need competition, and we need it badly.
So where is computing's future going to come from? All these years we've been giving MS monopoly rent for OS software in the belief that we were paying for an exciting future, and now the company that's been taking our money is going to give us another "ticking time-bomb of unstable code".
After five years and more than a hundred billion dollars revenue from computer users, Microsoft will revamp Vista at the 11th hour to turn it into a little more than a skin on XP, which was little more than a skin on 2K.
Almost all recent innovations in computing have come from organisations with orders of magnitude less revenue than MS. We are simply not getting value for money. This monopoly must be broken so competition and progress can resume. Formats, APIs, and communication protocols MUST be documented and opened to allow competitors a level playing field.
Anything else will just perpetuate the current stagnant, inbred computing environment.
Not until there is reported improvement in load times.
Interesting astroturf attempt you have going there. Open Office Write 2.0 starts in about 3 seconds on my P/M 1.4Ghz laptop. MS Word is possibly a half a second faster.
Opening a 1.6MB.doc file in Word took about 2 seconds, while OOo took about 7 seconds to import the same file. Once the file had been converted to Open Document, load times were indistinguishable.
We're not, but the Qinetiq engine being tested tomorrow (supposed to be today, but delayed due to bad weather) is British.
The HyShot program is an international effort coordinated by several Australian universities, but particularly the University of Queensland, with testing performed at Woomera rocket range in South Australia. In another four days, the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (Jaxa) engine will be tested and in June, our own Australian Defence Science and Technology Organisation (DSTO) version will be fired up. That one's expected to go past Mach 10.
Computers have already gone through several booms of massive technology increase, and are now very stable creations.
No, they're stagnant creations, and that's because there's a monopoly player acting as a sea-anchor to innovation. Wait until there's real competition in the software market and you'll see what computers can really do.
Probably this one. Not exactly a law, but definitely god's will.
"And it came to pass, that at midnight the LORD smote all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh that sat on his throne unto the firstborn of the captive that was in the dungeon; and all the firstborn of cattle. And Pharaoh rose up in the night, he, and all his servants, and all the Egyptians; and there was a great cry in Egypt; for there was not a house where there was not one dead."
You'd be pissed of wouldn't you. It didn't matter how much goodness, love, charity or faith you'd demonstrated, if you were first out of that particular womb, you were cactus, even if you were a cow...
"We can basically choose between two parties: One is evil, and the other is incompetent".
No they're both evil and incompetent. The only real difference is that the Libs put the interests of big business ahead of their own. With Labour, it's the other way around.
I mean, the wear swimsuits when they take showers.
Yes, that's true. We do that so we won't become inflamed with lust when we catch sight of our own genitals. Obviously a sensible precaution, just as our habit of covering the legs of our tables helps avoid licencious thoughts about other legs.
does do a pretty good job of uninstalling Malware.
No, sorry, it doesn't. It may have when it was first introduced, but any spyware/viruses released in the past five years insert themselves into the _Restore folder and reinfect from there.
Worst of all, any legitimate program which tries to clean the _Restore folder (ie, an anti-virus tool) will be blocked by the OS from modifying the folder contents.
The OS does provide some security protection the restore files and system restores program files, but I'm sure some hacker out has or could create something to attack this feature.
If you look at history, after WWII there were American soldiers being killed by insurgents in both Germany and Japan for about seven years.
No, that was just more spin from Condi Rice.
According to America's Role in Nation-Building: From Germany to Iraq, a new study by former Ambassador James Dobbins, who had a lead role in the Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia, and Kosovo reconstruction efforts, and a team of RAND Corporation researchers, the total number of post-conflict American combat casualties in Germany--and Japan, Haiti, and the two Balkan cases--was zero. Slate
What they are hoping for is people like you, aka morons,
And one "moron" like reporter (666905) raising interesting questions is worth a thousand anonymous cowards regurgitating the government party line.
Slashdot Mirror
I suspect we'll be seeing the Mac equivalent of CoLinux (http://www.colinux.org/)very shortly. Cooperative operating systems will allow developers to address the best aspects of both systems - UI from the Mac, drivers from Win/Vista, for example.
Eventually the two commercial oprating systems will merge and become one. The merged system will be co-developed as a joint venture by Apple and Microsoft, who will trade under the name of Cyberdyne Systems.
Imagine it? I can already remember it...
Apple could make that change because the majority of their customers use a narrower range of applications than Windows users. There are thousands of businesses out there running custom or niche applications on Windows with only a few equivalents on Macs.
The problem for Microsoft is that the depth of the legacy software they support is how they lock their customers in. If the business is already committed to use Windows for , then they may as well use it for their office work as well. If Windows loses compatibility with some of the thousands of specialised apps out there, those customers will have no incentive to stay with MS.
I'd love to see the major corps get behind a push to reimplement the Windows APIs (IE, Wine or similar) so all OSs could run Win32 executables. Then the big MS lockin would be over and we users could have some choices.
This isn't about Open Source. It's purely about choice and competition. If APIs were open, any commercial company could reimpliment any parts of the OS. If formats were open, software users could switch to better products when they became available, or choose an app that suits THEM instead of one that suits Conglomocorp (TM). If communication protocols are open, you can transparently run hetrogenous networks and use the right computer and OS for the task, instead of adapting the task to MS Generica.
OSS is a symptom of the problem, not the (whole) answer to it. If any normal CEO was told; "Here's a business for you to run. Your biggest competitor is a bunch of hobbyists mucking around with a 40 year junker they got for free.", they'd be rubbing their hands together and thanking their lucky stars. Instead, Microsoft is running scared and fighting dirty. That tells you how little faith they have in their ability to compete.
The reason so many of us gravitate to FOSS is because we're in a trap which has been set by ruthless monopolists and complicit governments. FOSS is the only path we can see out of the trap, but what we really want is choice. Lots of it.
O Rly?
No, you weren't. If you'd bought an operating system, you'd be able to keep it and put it into other computers. You'd be able to customise it to work the way you want to. You'd be able to update the bits that don't work the way you want, when you want. You'd be able look under the hood and learn how it works. It would be YOURS to do with as you saw fit.
What you have is an instance, a snapshot of somebody else's development cycle. It's locked to the hardware, so it'll die when the electronics does, and you'll have to pay for it all over again. They'll grudgingly fix the most dangerous flaws when THEY feel like it, not when you're being hurt by them. It's not your operating system, it's theirs. And don't you ever forget it.
The entire computer industry has been stifled for years. We need competition, and we need it badly.
After five years and more than a hundred billion dollars revenue from computer users, Microsoft will revamp Vista at the 11th hour to turn it into a little more than a skin on XP, which was little more than a skin on 2K.
Almost all recent innovations in computing have come from organisations with orders of magnitude less revenue than MS. We are simply not getting value for money. This monopoly must be broken so competition and progress can resume. Formats, APIs, and communication protocols MUST be documented and opened to allow competitors a level playing field.
Anything else will just perpetuate the current stagnant, inbred computing environment.
This is a good place to start. http://techbuilder.org/recipes/163101045
Have you watched any Hollywood movies lately?
http://www.bsd.org/?
Interesting astroturf attempt you have going there. Open Office Write 2.0 starts in about 3 seconds on my P/M 1.4Ghz laptop. MS Word is possibly a half a second faster.
Opening a 1.6MB .doc file in Word took about 2 seconds, while OOo took about 7 seconds to import the same file. Once the file had been converted to Open Document, load times were indistinguishable.
Now. http://www.fsf.org/
We're not, but the Qinetiq engine being tested tomorrow (supposed to be today, but delayed due to bad weather) is British.
The HyShot program is an international effort coordinated by several Australian universities, but particularly the University of Queensland, with testing performed at Woomera rocket range in South Australia. In another four days, the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (Jaxa) engine will be tested and in June, our own Australian Defence Science and Technology Organisation (DSTO) version will be fired up. That one's expected to go past Mach 10.
No, they're stagnant creations, and that's because there's a monopoly player acting as a sea-anchor to innovation. Wait until there's real competition in the software market and you'll see what computers can really do.
Is that why France is a Catholic country?
Probably this one. Not exactly a law, but definitely god's will.
You'd be pissed of wouldn't you. It didn't matter how much goodness, love, charity or faith you'd demonstrated, if you were first out of that particular womb, you were cactus, even if you were a cow...Mate, it's all yours. Enjoy...
No they're both evil and incompetent. The only real difference is that the Libs put the interests of big business ahead of their own. With Labour, it's the other way around.
Yes, that's true. We do that so we won't become inflamed with lust when we catch sight of our own genitals. Obviously a sensible precaution, just as our habit of covering the legs of our tables helps avoid licencious thoughts about other legs.
You know it makes sense.
You mean it belongs alittle in both.
If you want to cut birthrates, it's not the men who are going to have to swallow.
No, sorry, it doesn't. It may have when it was first introduced, but any spyware/viruses released in the past five years insert themselves into the _Restore folder and reinfect from there.
Worst of all, any legitimate program which tries to clean the _Restore folder (ie, an anti-virus tool) will be blocked by the OS from modifying the folder contents.
The OS does provide some security protection the restore files and system restores program files, but I'm sure some hacker out has or could create something to attack this feature.
Yes, most of them have done just that.
No, that was just more spin from Condi Rice.
What they are hoping for is people like you, aka morons,And one "moron" like reporter (666905) raising interesting questions is worth a thousand anonymous cowards regurgitating the government party line.