My company actually has a "browser governance committee" - don't get me started - but they meet every once in a while and go over the different browser options, and meet with internal developers to see what browsers work with our deployed systems. And then they choose to standardize on IE because we have shedloads of crap coded with ActiveX and other things that only work in IE on Windows.
I just released our corporate Windows XP SP3 image, updated with drivers and patches for Ivy Bridge laptops that were released a month ago.
That being said, we're steaming along in our transition to Windows 7, but that won't be complete until after Windows 8 ships.
As far as enterprise customers go, Vista didn't exist, and Windows 7 only exists starting late last year, due to all the infrastructure and application changes necessary before a successful migration can occur.
You realize that reverse engineering a protocol which includes DRM (and thus subject to the DMCA) is wholly different from what we're talking about here, right?
That really wouldn't be much different than BMW's "iPod out" support. On 2011 model year vehicles, you can actually get the iPod app's interface on the iDrive screen, and iPod functionality like the Genius playlist (or whatever it's called).
It would just apply to the whole OS rather than just one app.
Again, point out where in the US Legal Code where it is illegal to do so. I'm sure that Microsoft, Sony, TiVo, and everyone else who makes a set-top device that they want to lock people out of would really appreciate it if you succeed where their scores of lawyers failed.
It's not illegal until you show me the law that makes it illegal.
More on this - you put a shedload of LEDs on something that plays video. Some people that are enjoying a video like to do so in low light, and super-bright blue LEDs ruin this, glaring out of the corner of your eye while you're trying to pay attention to the video.
Everything about this design is trying to detract you from the actual usage of the product. That is what is known as "terrible" design - the design should compliment functionality.
Please point out in the US Legal Code where it is illegal to jailbreak and run custom code on an AppleTV. Don't be offended, but we're not going to wait.
It's not "explicitly illegal" and in fact there's a business that is doing it, and Apple's hoards of lawyers haven't had a peep to say about it.
Either you have no idea what you're talking about, or you're posting FUD. Stop.
What a revolutionary idea. It's almost like a major OS didn't implement this new concept 10+ years ago (Mac OS X).
Whoever wrote this article is an idiot. Yes, I know that it's on a Linux site, but still - the idea that every user cracks open a terminal is ludicrous, even in Linux.
You forgot the part where they spend untold amounts of capital and time on going into a market that they know nothing about, and fail miserably: the PlayBook.
If they would have stuck to what they know (phones) then they might still be relevant. Everyone likes to think that a tablet is just a big phone, without the phone. It's really not.
We're doing a combination, because it was the most cost effective. In our Win7 migration we're currently doing, we're mandating that some hardware is replaced (and the Win7 project is paying for that), and it's up to the division if they replace some models that we recommend they get rid of, but we've built in support for that hardware if they can stand the performance / don't have the budget to replace.
However, since we work with standardized life cycles, they know when those models will be retired, and can budget accordingly in 2013 based on inventory reporting.
Hardware with a Win7 sticker on it gets Win7 with only the cost of labor, and anything with a Vista sticker we buy an upgrade license for.
Being as the company I work for has a merchandising system, which handles $80B in revenue, and hasn't been rewritten in over 15 years, I'm doubtful we're going to get right on that and give it a Windows 8 makeover.
Because people don't have some kind of remote execution point in order to run a script to do exactly that, if they are managing an environment of 100+ machines?
Anyone using the UI for that task, regardless of Windows version, is a complete buffoon. Putting something in a login script would be more advanced than that.
Except it's not, and here's why: standard users require training, and training costs the business money.
If the business doesn't have to spend untold millions on retraining their entire staff to use a different operating system / office suite / email suite / etc., it won't; and the IT guys will find workarounds to make the business happy.
This is part of the vendor lock-in that allows Microsoft to survive, even when they release shitty version after shitty version of software.
I would hope that in 2012 that there aren't large businesses out there running different OS versions based on what shipped with the hardware. Microsoft allows back-levelling in our enterprise agreement to n-2, so we can legally install XP on Win7-stickered PCs (until Win8 comes out, then it's 7 or bust). We have one (1) image that we put on everything via a syslinux pre-boot imaging environment (yes, I'm aware of the evil irony of using linux to deploy WinXP), and inject the hardware-specific drivers for that PC model onto the disk, so that sysprep can install the drivers on first boot.
Using one common image reduces complexity (and support costs) drastically. Moving forward to Win7 (currently in process), we're using the same concept.
Actually, Dell hasn't been playing the game very well lately (incoming anecdote).
Two years ago, we put out "bids" for our desktop and laptop hardware contracts. Dell, HP, and Lenovo participated. Here's the short version of how it came out:
Lenovo came in with slightly higher prices, but quality laptops, and pretty good desktops. Displays were basically the same as everyone else, but priced a bit higher. HP came in with slightly lower prices, but mediocre quality laptops and desktops. Displyas were basically the same as everyone else, but priced a bit lower. Dell came in with the same tired crap we'd already been buying for a year+, and no changes to prices whatsoever.
Result: Lenovo kept the laptop business, took the desktop business from Dell, and HP got the display business from Dell. And we spend about $15M/year on desktop and laptop replacement.
We heard through other sources around town that the shops still using Dell have been meeting a new sales rep.
The big reason why enterprise is moving to Win7: XP end of support is in 2014, and if you want continued patch support, you're paying Microsoft on the order of $1.2M/year.
$1.2M buys a lot of engineering hours to make Win7 work in your environment.
The company I work for has over 80,000 windows-based PC's, spread across 2,100 locations in North America. It's logistically infeasible to swap out the OS and application infrastructure every 2 years just because Microsoft wants us to.
Oh, and there's that whole license cost thing - Microsoft hasn't been able to negotiate an enterprise agreement that makes the numbers actually work for being on annual maintenance, so we don't want to have to buy 80,000 Windows 8 licenses for what appears to be very little benefit, and a whole lot of "bleeding edge" risk.
Thanks, but no thanks - we'll use Windows 8 just like we used XP Tablet Edition - it will be on the devices that require it. Everything else gets Win7.
Are you commenting from some hyper-inflation future? Since when does a $99 AppleTV and a $40 keyboard cost $400+? Even if you are throwing in a 24" monitor in that price (which he likely would have on his desk regardless of using a tablet, using a laptop, or using a desktop) you're still not at $400...
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That's my opinion, but unfortunately I don't get to choose what our vendors coded in years ago.
My company actually has a "browser governance committee" - don't get me started - but they meet every once in a while and go over the different browser options, and meet with internal developers to see what browsers work with our deployed systems. And then they choose to standardize on IE because we have shedloads of crap coded with ActiveX and other things that only work in IE on Windows.
That's your vendor lock-in.
I just released our corporate Windows XP SP3 image, updated with drivers and patches for Ivy Bridge laptops that were released a month ago.
That being said, we're steaming along in our transition to Windows 7, but that won't be complete until after Windows 8 ships.
As far as enterprise customers go, Vista didn't exist, and Windows 7 only exists starting late last year, due to all the infrastructure and application changes necessary before a successful migration can occur.
You realize that reverse engineering a protocol which includes DRM (and thus subject to the DMCA) is wholly different from what we're talking about here, right?
That really wouldn't be much different than BMW's "iPod out" support. On 2011 model year vehicles, you can actually get the iPod app's interface on the iDrive screen, and iPod functionality like the Genius playlist (or whatever it's called).
It would just apply to the whole OS rather than just one app.
The difference, is that when Jobs left this time, he left someone competent in charge. John Sculley was incompetent at running a computer company.
Again, point out where in the US Legal Code where it is illegal to do so. I'm sure that Microsoft, Sony, TiVo, and everyone else who makes a set-top device that they want to lock people out of would really appreciate it if you succeed where their scores of lawyers failed.
It's not illegal until you show me the law that makes it illegal.
Al Gore's Nobel Prize doesn't mean anything because Al Gore's Nobel Prize doesn't mean anything.
Well, that's a permeating syllogism you've come up with...
More on this - you put a shedload of LEDs on something that plays video. Some people that are enjoying a video like to do so in low light, and super-bright blue LEDs ruin this, glaring out of the corner of your eye while you're trying to pay attention to the video.
Everything about this design is trying to detract you from the actual usage of the product. That is what is known as "terrible" design - the design should compliment functionality.
Besides being a readymade video-on-demand front end for my entire collection, stored on my home network?
Q can't do that at 3x the price.
Please point out in the US Legal Code where it is illegal to jailbreak and run custom code on an AppleTV. Don't be offended, but we're not going to wait.
It's not "explicitly illegal" and in fact there's a business that is doing it, and Apple's hoards of lawyers haven't had a peep to say about it.
Either you have no idea what you're talking about, or you're posting FUD. Stop.
What a revolutionary idea. It's almost like a major OS didn't implement this new concept 10+ years ago (Mac OS X).
Whoever wrote this article is an idiot. Yes, I know that it's on a Linux site, but still - the idea that every user cracks open a terminal is ludicrous, even in Linux.
You forgot the part where they spend untold amounts of capital and time on going into a market that they know nothing about, and fail miserably: the PlayBook.
If they would have stuck to what they know (phones) then they might still be relevant. Everyone likes to think that a tablet is just a big phone, without the phone. It's really not.
We're doing a combination, because it was the most cost effective. In our Win7 migration we're currently doing, we're mandating that some hardware is replaced (and the Win7 project is paying for that), and it's up to the division if they replace some models that we recommend they get rid of, but we've built in support for that hardware if they can stand the performance / don't have the budget to replace.
However, since we work with standardized life cycles, they know when those models will be retired, and can budget accordingly in 2013 based on inventory reporting.
Hardware with a Win7 sticker on it gets Win7 with only the cost of labor, and anything with a Vista sticker we buy an upgrade license for.
Being as the company I work for has a merchandising system, which handles $80B in revenue, and hasn't been rewritten in over 15 years, I'm doubtful we're going to get right on that and give it a Windows 8 makeover.
... it's amazing how Microsoft still doesn't really get it. Business doesn't really need Metro. There's entire indistries [sic] that...
sed -e 's/Business/The world/g'
Fixed.
Because people don't have some kind of remote execution point in order to run a script to do exactly that, if they are managing an environment of 100+ machines?
Anyone using the UI for that task, regardless of Windows version, is a complete buffoon. Putting something in a login script would be more advanced than that.
Except it's not, and here's why: standard users require training, and training costs the business money.
If the business doesn't have to spend untold millions on retraining their entire staff to use a different operating system / office suite / email suite / etc., it won't; and the IT guys will find workarounds to make the business happy.
This is part of the vendor lock-in that allows Microsoft to survive, even when they release shitty version after shitty version of software.
I would hope that in 2012 that there aren't large businesses out there running different OS versions based on what shipped with the hardware. Microsoft allows back-levelling in our enterprise agreement to n-2, so we can legally install XP on Win7-stickered PCs (until Win8 comes out, then it's 7 or bust). We have one (1) image that we put on everything via a syslinux pre-boot imaging environment (yes, I'm aware of the evil irony of using linux to deploy WinXP), and inject the hardware-specific drivers for that PC model onto the disk, so that sysprep can install the drivers on first boot.
Using one common image reduces complexity (and support costs) drastically. Moving forward to Win7 (currently in process), we're using the same concept.
Actually, Dell hasn't been playing the game very well lately (incoming anecdote).
Two years ago, we put out "bids" for our desktop and laptop hardware contracts. Dell, HP, and Lenovo participated. Here's the short version of how it came out:
Lenovo came in with slightly higher prices, but quality laptops, and pretty good desktops. Displays were basically the same as everyone else, but priced a bit higher.
HP came in with slightly lower prices, but mediocre quality laptops and desktops. Displyas were basically the same as everyone else, but priced a bit lower.
Dell came in with the same tired crap we'd already been buying for a year+, and no changes to prices whatsoever.
Result: Lenovo kept the laptop business, took the desktop business from Dell, and HP got the display business from Dell. And we spend about $15M/year on desktop and laptop replacement.
We heard through other sources around town that the shops still using Dell have been meeting a new sales rep.
The big reason why enterprise is moving to Win7: XP end of support is in 2014, and if you want continued patch support, you're paying Microsoft on the order of $1.2M/year.
$1.2M buys a lot of engineering hours to make Win7 work in your environment.
The company I work for has over 80,000 windows-based PC's, spread across 2,100 locations in North America. It's logistically infeasible to swap out the OS and application infrastructure every 2 years just because Microsoft wants us to.
Oh, and there's that whole license cost thing - Microsoft hasn't been able to negotiate an enterprise agreement that makes the numbers actually work for being on annual maintenance, so we don't want to have to buy 80,000 Windows 8 licenses for what appears to be very little benefit, and a whole lot of "bleeding edge" risk.
Thanks, but no thanks - we'll use Windows 8 just like we used XP Tablet Edition - it will be on the devices that require it. Everything else gets Win7.
Yes.
Disclaimer: I think that these patents are ridiculous, and would be happy if they went away completely.
However, are you saying that attractive and distinct product design plays no role in a purchasing decision?
Are you commenting from some hyper-inflation future? Since when does a $99 AppleTV and a $40 keyboard cost $400+? Even if you are throwing in a 24" monitor in that price (which he likely would have on his desk regardless of using a tablet, using a laptop, or using a desktop) you're still not at $400...