back to article Julie Larson-Green: Yes, MICROSOFT is going to KILL WINDOWS

Microsoft's hardware chief has given the strongest indication yet that Microsoft has too many operating systems. "We have the Windows Phone OS. We have Windows RT and we have full Windows. We're not going to have three," Julie Larson-Green told the audience at a UBS investor event. Larson-Green looks after the "Devices and …

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  1. Nigel Steward

    Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

    Microsoft seem to have totally lost their way.

    Windows 8 is a disaster for those who wish to use keyboards & mice - hopefully MS might see the light, but I doubt it.

    Windows 7 is stable & acceptable, but reverting from 8 to 7 is not straightforward for the man in the street.

    Hopefully vendors will see the light & offer PCs with Windows 7 pre-installed with an option to "upgrade" to Windows 8.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

      "Windows 8 is a disaster for those who wish to use keyboards & mice " I really don't see this, I've been using 8 since not too long after release. The updates with 8.1 are nice, particularly the start button's return. I keep having people tell me that it's a touch OS, but both me and the wife manage to operate it perfectly well without touch. I understand that some people just don't like the menu, but I just don't see that it's not perfectly functional with a mouse and keyboard.

      1. Tyrion

        Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

        >> "Windows 8 is a disaster for those who wish to use keyboards & mice " I really don't see >> this, I've been using 8 since not too long after release. The updates with 8.1 are nice, particularly the start button's return.

        What on earth's the point of a start button if it only takes the user straight back to metrosexual land? People want a START M.E.N.U, not a fricken start button for christs sake. Not that I really care anyway because I rarely have to experience the torture of using the schizophrenic Windows 8 these days (thank the gods).

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

        @Anon 16:10

        Your anecdotal opinion is irrelevant, because all usability experts have declared Windows 8 a disaster in UI design, succinctly summed up by the word 'schizophrenic'.

        Windows 8 isn't even that good for touch either, with lots of 'magic spots' and a lack of contextual cues. If people are touching anything, they would be touching Apple or Android products. Don't take my word for it, look at the market share.

        1. Robert Grant

          Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

          All the commentators also laughed at WP's "flat" look, but now in the (genuinely schizophrenic) iOS7 it's a great thing.

          The final "war with Eastasia" step will be for Apple to successfully sue Microsoft over a patent for it.

      3. Tim Bates

        Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

        >I really don't see this [disaster], I've been using 8 since not too long after release.

        As I've been dealing with 8 since about then too, I feel qualified to say it's not only the least usable version of Windows I've played with in ages, but also the least stable.

        It's also the least sensible when it comes to user data - easy user creatable full system backups are gone (I know the old backup system is there, but most users don't), BSODs now suggest effectively reformatting, and if you dare to boot from anything other than the single install of WIn8 on your single HDD/SSD in the computer, you're likely to end up corrupting the filesystem in some way (that damn hybrid boot thing still scares the bejesus out of me when I'm trying to handle customer data).

    2. Tyrion
      Linux

      Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

      >>Hopefully vendors will see the light & offer PCs with Windows 7 pre-installed with an option to "upgrade" to Windows 8.

      I'd rather see more vendors start offering a range of GNU/Linux PC's than Windoze. There's an abundance of choice out there like Mint, Ubuntu, Arch, Fedora, and Debian. Why are consumers forced to pay the Windoze tax in 2013?

      1. Bod

        Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

        "There's an abundance of choice out there like Mint, Ubuntu, Arch, Fedora, and Debian. "

        The vast majority of consumers would be utterly lost with any of these. More so the instant they are told they have to edit some config file and browse through dosens of linux forums to find out why they can't do something they can do easily with Windows (even Windows 8), or where instructions are written for Ubuntu but they've got any one of the huge number of other distributions. Or they buy some USB gadget but it won't work without recompiling the kernel or ripping drivers from a Windows install, hacking about with this and that, etc (I speak from experience here).

        And god forbid they want to do some Excel work. Open Office is okay, if you want the equivalent of Excel 97 and don't mind it taking several minutes to launch and doesn't quite do what you're used to in Excel and isn't quite compatible with the latest Excel document formats, etc.

        Don't get me wrong, I like linux and use it for what it's good for, as a server. I would not recommend it to my parents however (fairly representitive of the average consumer).

        In fact I'm even recommending Windows Phone over Android as the former would be less confusing and less easy to get into a mess or download something they shouldn't and generate a lot of support calls.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Linux

        Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

        "Why are consumers forced to pay the Windoze tax in 2013?"

        Must agree. I recently bought a Lenovo, and found that the same machine was available in Germany, Austria etc, but bundled with FreeDOS, significantly cheaper than I could buy it in the UK, where the model was only available with WIndows 8. As I installed a Linux distro as soon as it was unboxed, it's reasonable to feel agrieved at this, not only for no choic,e but mainly for the UK being a patsy in this way.

    3. robin thakur 1

      Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

      I use Windows 8 every day, but I don't really see it as any sort of improvement on Windows 7, really. Aspects of it are annoying with a keyboard and mouse. e.g. trying to double lick the top left icon on a maximised screen to close the window and accidentally swapping to another app/desktop (I'm not really sure what it is actually doing) and the transitions to start and fullscreen apps are really jarring. Put it this way. I actively enjoy using OSX, iOS et al. Windows is a necessary evil in my role as a SharePoint developer. Nobody knows what RT is for, not even MS, which explains why *nobody* is buying it. "The only bonus is battery life, other than that it is a pointless version of Windows Phone with no apps you cannot make phone calls from which happens to resemble Windows 8 pro." is what I've been telling everybody I know who also has no clue what RT is for.

      I think the take-up of Windows Lumia phones would be faster if Microsoft seemed to act with more confidence. Given the way they killed off the upgrade path for the previous version of Windows phones, and killed lots of other projects after launch, and how they now seem to want to merge the codebases with RT (what effect will that have on compatibility for existing software/phones?) people are understandably quite nervous, no matter how much marketing spend they throw at it, and this translates to lower sale as people wait and see what happens all the while buying alternative devices.

    4. tommydokc
      Thumb Down

      Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

      windows 8 a disaster for those who wish to use keyboards and mice? really? so you've never actually used it then and are just blathering about like an idiot. tell us in detail how hard it is to use a kb and rodent on win8. i've been doing it for months with absolutely no trouble at all. I can navigate it as easy as any other OS.

      1. Grogan Silver badge

        Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

        I don't have any "trouble" at all with any functional computer operating system. Knowing the concepts is most of it and I can usually figure out what I have to do fairly quickly given a list of commands and their synopses OR... a graphical user environment. They are supposed to be discoverable ("intuitive" though I do hate that particular buzzword) and I must say that Windows 8 is poor in that regard.

        Note that I already know how to mitigate the undesirable aspects of Windows 8, but that isn't the point. I very much dislike working with the Windows 8.x user interface though and THAT is the point. It isn't that people can't, it's a disconnect. A regression.

        Windows with no controls. Deliberate hindrance of multitasking. Direction to spammy tiles and Microsoft's products, services, software store, and their "partners" who pay for the privilege. It's designed for lock in. Everything tries to direct you to using a Microsoft account.

        An email program that doesn't do what most people need, POP3 email. No, instead you're supposed to abandon the old ways that they don't want to support and move to their systems. It's smack dab in the middle of the spammy tiles, one of the first things people see, yet useless to most people that use ISP email accounts. You can also still get that crummy Windows Live Mail client of course which is what most people need because of lock in (data migrated from Outlook Express from XP, into Windows Mail in Vista, into Windows Live Mail on Windows 7 and they just kept on that train). I can't believe I'm actually recommending Microsoft Outlook, as the only decent, functional mail client that I can still get their data into.

        These assholes are already calling most of the programs people use "legacy software" in favour of "TIFKAM" apps, too.

        Regressing to keyboard shortcuts for GUI functionality. There is nothing wrong with HAVING keyboard shortcuts, when you display them along side a menu entry, as a choice for people to use but expecting people to know them to efficiently navigate the GUI without a touchscreen is a serious mistake. I am thankful for ClassicShell, which saved me from having to upgrade my customers' Windows 8 computers to Windows 7 or Linux. Linux is easy to get set up, at least for me. Windows 7 is trickier because you have to track down drivers from the actual component manufacturers rather than being spoon fed by a PC vendor. Also, you have to employ "licensing tools" as Microsoft does not honour downgrade rights for consumer editions of Windows.

        It regresses to command line utilities with ugly syntax for simple things like managing wireless networks, as well.

        You shouldn't bandy the word idiot around like that, because your usage and workflow isn't everyone's. I wish I had a dime for everyone who has told me "It just takes time to learn it". It probably took me all of 10 minutes.

    5. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Which one ? Windows 8 with luck

      "Microsoft seem to have totally lost their way.

      Windows 8 is a disaster for those who wish to use keyboards & mice - hopefully MS might see the light, but I doubt it.

      Windows 7 is stable & acceptable, but reverting from 8 to 7 is not straightforward for the man in the street.

      Hopefully vendors will see the light & offer PCs with Windows 7 pre-installed with an option to "upgrade" to Windows 8."

      As a "techie" I find your comprehensive review disturbing.

      I bet your sitting in front of a mac typing this bile!

      I use windows 8.1 and I find it is great, does everything I want it too and it doesn't look like it's stuck in the last century. Yes it’s different from earlier versions of windows. It’s called progress, like it or not! Everything moves on. Users will get used to the newer way of working and start to understand why it does “things” the way it does it.

      When Apple updates iOS, tech journos proclaim them to be “innovative, forward thinking”. When ANYONE else moves forward, it’s slated and proclaimed to be duff.

      MS does have a problem tho; persuading the people whose minds have been poisoned by your type, into actually trying it for themselves and making an informed choice without being biased before they even start. But if you are going to slate it without even trying it, all of your other opinions are moot.

      I'm not a MS lover, I make informed choices and never listen to the complete and utter bollox which 99% of human beings spout on a daily/hourly basis.

  2. Fihart

    Why Windows is doomed.

    Reading something unrelated, the penny finally dropped.

    The reason Windows is finished is speed. They've stuffed it so full of lazy code and pointless bells and whistles that it takes an age to start compared to phone or a tablet.

    So which do you turn to when you want a quick email or browse -- what most of us (mostly) use computers and other devices for these days ?

    In the past I've bleated about slimming down Windows, but MS will never do that because they are stuck in Detroit mode, bringing out a bigger model each time (and we know how well that ended for Detroit). As for moving it to tablets and phones, well, I think that ship sailed with Apple and Android.

    1. Wardy01

      Re: Why Windows is doomed.

      My windows 7 box boots in about 12 seconds.

      My windows 8 box in about 3 with UEFI or whatever it is called.

      I don't think "boot time" is really going to kill windows.

      That "lazy code" has mostly been ripped out with most developers now writing .Net applications the API's are fairly clean and fast ... the problem is crap application developers refusing to grow up and move with the times ... Micorsoft is now suffering because it finally told people with windows 8 "No more, we've moved on and so should you!".

      Good on em I say ...

      Merging windows phone and RT is the most logical thing Microsoft did in a long time and look at that no mention of Ballmer anywhere ... what a suprise !!!

      1. Fehu
        Trollface

        Re: Why Windows is doomed.

        My windows 7 box boots in about 12 seconds.

        I wonder what your definition of "boots" is?

        So, win 8.1 is faster than win 8. The only time that would matter is if you were running from a bear.

        1. This post has been deleted by its author

          1. Fehu
            Pirate

            Re: Why Windows is doomed.

            Oh, wait, do you have your hard drive encrypted, too? Sure it only takes about 10 to 20 seconds for the pre-Windows environment to ask for credentials, but I'm pretty sure any time you see "pre-Windows environment", it's probably Linux. After I authenticate for that, it's another minute or more before I get the Windows 7 login. And my Win PC is a gaming beast. That's pretty much all Windows is good for. IMHO

          2. Tyrion

            Re: Why Windows is doomed.

            >> From the second I press the power button on the front of the case, to the time I can enter my password is about 14 seconds for my Windows 7 machine

            That's not booted. The desktop isn't even loaded yet, let alone usable. Turn on automatic login, then time it again. All Windows versions are slow including 8 once you discount kernel caching and such nonsense.

            1. jubtastic1

              Re: Why Windows is doomed.

              Years ago MS 'fixed' their slow boot by dumping the user at a non functional desktop while the rest of the services cranked the disk, It's cynical but it works, most users consider their machine to have booted as soon as they see the desktop.

              That's not why windows is doomed though, mobile is why they're doomed and they've only themselves to blame, they were mobile computing not so long ago.

          3. PeteA
            Windows

            Re: Why Windows is doomed.

            That definition of boot is just plain incorrect. That's the time it takes for the machine to be usable from a warm condition [basically reloading a memory image]; the time boot to boot is the time for a complete startup of the operating system. This matters because you're not comparing apples with apples; you can hibernate/suspend most operating systems and get similar times to 8's "boot" aka resume. FWIW, my desktop [not W8, which OS doesn't matter] takes about 1-2 seconds for a resume. It was a great MS marketing trick though.

        2. Roland6 Silver badge

          Re: Why Windows is doomed.

          >My windows 7 box boots in about 12 seconds.

          What you need to regularly boot your Windows box!

          I only really reboot mine (XP, Win 7 & Win 8) when MS Update demands it, rest of the time they either go to sleep or drop into hiberation....

      2. Tyrion

        Re: Why Windows is doomed.

        >> My windows 8 box in about 3 with UEFI or whatever it is called.

        Using a cached kernel. Try dual booting or updating Windows, It'll triple that time easy. I'm running on a i5 3570k @ 4ghz, 8gb dual channel 1600mhz ram, a Vertex 4 SSD, and 10 seconds is average to boot Windows 8, not including post / bios delay. So I call BS on 3 seconds.

        >>I don't think "boot time" is really going to kill windows.

        No but system requirements will. Take a look at the 32gb Surface 2 tablet. Guess how much of that 32gb is used by the OS? Then there's battery life, lack of app ecosystem, and dearth of features and customisation.

        In 10 years or less I reckon the only place you'll see PC still running Windoze will be in the enterprise, and even they'll be phasing them out by then.

        >>That "lazy code" has mostly been ripped out with most developers now writing .Net applications the API's are fairly clean and fast.

        Nobody uses .Net unless they want to be locked down to proprietary Windows platforms. Both in development, and in distribution. That's not to mention the fact that it's dog slow.

        No AAA apps or games use .Net - That's a fact.

        >>Merging windows phone and RT is the most logical thing Microsoft did in a long time

        Yes I agree. Those Fisher Price tiles should be kept on Micro$haft's Phones and Tablets, not on the desktop.

        1. Fatman

          Re: Why Windows is doomed.

          >>That "lazy code" has mostly been ripped out with most developers now writing .Net applications the API's are fairly clean and fast.

          Nobody uses .Net unless they want to be locked down to proprietary Windows platforms are gluttons for punishment. Both in development, and in distribution. That's not to mention the fact that it's dog slow.

          FTFY!

      3. Chavdar Ivanov

        Re: Why Windows is doomed.

        I was going to say something similar; instead, I posted two videos - shutting down my laptop and booting it from cold to usable desktop - http://youtu.be/WCBt-LZLpno and suspend/resume of the same laptop - http://youtu.be/RBoQMUgrrJc . Whatever one says, this is not slow. Videos taken with my Blackberry (9900), held by hand.

      4. Blitterbug
        Facepalm

        .Net applications the API's are fairly clean and fast...

        Not enough facepalms available. You aren't actually a programmer, are you?

    2. dogged

      Re: Why Windows is doomed.

      7 was lighter than Vista, 8 was lighter than 7 and 8.1 is lighter than 8.

      I might take you seriously if you had any idea what you're talking about.

      1. Fihart

        Re: Why Windows is doomed. @Wardy01 & @dogged

        Not everyone is running the great hardware you have and as we know Windows slows down with age unless you maintain it (and few people do).

        Windows XP came on a CD, Win 7 on a DVD. I rest my case.

        1. Darryl

          Re: Why Windows is doomed. @Filhart

          Actually, Win 7 and 8 don't need 'great hardware'. I've installed both on older Core and P4 computers and they're noticeably speedier than they were running XP.

          1. JDX Gold badge

            Re: Why Windows is doomed. @Filhart

            Have you timed how long your phone or tablet takes to do a cold boot? It is by no means instant.

            1. Fihart

              Re: Why Windows is doomed. @JDX

              Of course, you have a point.

              My bloody Blackberry takes 3 minutes from reinserting the battery. But its normal mode is standby which doesn't seem to use much power and starts it instantly.

              You could leave a desktop PC sitting in sleep mode but my experience of exploding PC power supplies forces me to turn off at the wall.

              1. JDX Gold badge

                Re: Why Windows is doomed. @JDX

                "You could leave a desktop PC sitting in sleep mode but my experience of exploding PC power supplies forces me to turn off at the wall."

                Yes, and the reason you need to do a full shutdown rather than hibernate is? Rebooting from hibernate is near-instant in many cases. For me it's a sluggish kind of instant, but then my storage isn't entirely solid state like a phone/tablet.

              2. Tromos

                @Fihart

                Use hibernate instead of sleep, or the hybrid method where you just use sleep and don't worry about turning off at the wall. It will just switch from sleep to hibernate when the battery runs lower than a threshold value. Waking up from hibernate is only a second or two with a conventional disk and virtually indistinguishable from waking from sleep with a solid state one. This way, I reserve reboots for patch Tuesdays as it does take a while. Around a couple of minutes in my case until I get a browser home page up or another application loading - time to password entry is much shorter, but I don't regard that as a useful measure as it is obviously still booting as the password is entered and well beyond.

              3. Champ

                Re: Why Windows is doomed. @JDX

                >You could leave a desktop PC sitting in sleep mode but my experience of exploding

                >PC power supplies forces me to turn off at the wall.

                Really? I've run all my PCs in auto-sleep mode for years. It's a functional requirement for my HTPC, for obvious reasons.

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Why Windows is doomed. @Filhart

            That's interesting as the Corporation I work for has gone from XP to 7, and the thing we noticed most was on the same hardware our computers needed more RAM to perform the same with 7 as when we were on XP.

            Office and IE were upgraded during that process. Nonetheless, Microsoft has full control of the OS and Office software for about ever and if they can't increase code efficiency while adding new options with all the system designers and programmers they pay then Microsoft is doing it wrong.

            1. Bod

              Re: Why Windows is doomed. @Filhart

              "That's interesting as the Corporation I work for has gone from XP to 7, and the thing we noticed most was on the same hardware our computers needed more RAM to perform the same with 7 as when we were on XP"

              Likely because Windows 7 installs will have been 64bit, which naturally uses more RAM. RAM is cheap however and more to the point 64bit Win7 lets you use all that 8GB of RAM whereas 32bit XP will barely let you use 3GB. Suddenly it's free to do far more at the same time and faster also.

              Anyway, all this rubbish about boot times - the major audience for Windows now is corporates. Who aside from touch being ludicrous for a productive environment, generally leave their PCs on overnight or at least sleep / hibernate them. Boot time - non issue.

        2. Greg J Preece

          Re: Why Windows is doomed. @Wardy01 & @dogged

          Windows XP came on a CD, Win 7 on a DVD. I rest my case.

          That's a really shitty case. Windows originally came on floppy disks, Windows XP comes on CD, therefore XP is bloated.

          See? Really stupid reasoning, isn't it?

          1. Fihart

            Re: Why Windows is doomed. @ Greg J Preece

            " Windows originally came on floppy disks, Windows XP comes on CD, therefore XP is bloated."

            Thanks. That's precisely the point I was making.

            1. Greg J Preece

              Re: Why Windows is doomed. @ Greg J Preece

              Thanks. That's precisely the point I was making.

              So only operating systems small enough to not even have 16-bit colour are good enough for you? See, this still seems like a really terrible argument to me, but OK, you stay in the "good old days" and we'll stick to a more....feature rich time. If that's your definition of "bloated", then merely looking acceptable on a modern monitor is apparently grounds for the accusation.

        3. Fatman

          Re: Windows XP came on a CD, Win 7 on a DVD. I rest my case.

          and Windows 8 on a BD.

          Completed that for you!!!

    3. Greg J Preece

      Re: Why Windows is doomed.

      The reason Windows is finished is speed. They've stuffed it so full of lazy code and pointless bells and whistles that it takes an age to start compared to phone or a tablet.

      Have you used Windows recently? It's not my primary operating system, but what you've said here is plain wrong. Of the three systems installed on my Macbook Pro, Windows 8.1 is by far and away the fastest, easily outstripping the OSX that the machine was made for. It boots faster, runs faster, and just feels damn quick all around. Similarly, on my various phones, my Windows Phone is way quicker than the others. Microsoft even made a big deal when WP7 was launched about how blazingly quick it was. I remember being at Mobile World Congress, where they had a challenge set up; if your phone can do anything faster than ours, we'll give you money.

      And you can accuse it of being bloated, but my Windows 8 install was smaller than the previous Windows 7 one, and when I installed 8.1 I somehow gained back 10GB of space. It's still far bigger than my Linux install with everything thrown in, but then OSX isn't exactly tiny!

      Given how diametrically opposed your claims are to my experience, I have to ask if you've actually used Windows on a day to day basis, or whether you're repeating FUD from the safety of another camp?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Why Windows is doomed.

        "And you can accuse it of being bloated, but my Windows 8 install was smaller than the previous Windows 7 one, and when I installed 8.1 I somehow gained back 10GB of space. It's still far bigger than my Linux install with everything thrown in, but then OSX isn't exactly tiny!"

        I just tried to delete everything from a Windows 7 computer to get it ready to sell. It never had that much stuff on it in the first place since I was using it as an HTPC. I went to add/remove programs are removed all the 3rd party stuff. Then I created a new admin account and deleted the old one (deleting the files, too). The end result is that 80 GIGABYTES (?!?!) of the hard drive was still in use after my effort to delete all non-Windows stuff.

        Meanwhile, I'm only using 60GB of space on my Mac's main drive, and that includes 30GB of non-stock software and 15GB of my documents, pictures, etc. If I wanted, I could spend less than 5 minutes to delete all the software and files and end up with a perfectly good, clean-ish install of OS X that takes up less than 15GB, i.e., 20% of my "cleaned" Windows install.

        It seems that even if Windows doesn't start out bloated, that's where it ends up.

        1. noominy.noom

          Re: Why Windows is doomed.

          AC from 19:16 25th November.

          What? You don't know how to delete non-Windows stuff from a disk? My Win 7 machines, with Office and some third party apps are at about 12GB.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Why Windows is doomed.

            "What? You don't know how to delete non-Windows stuff from a disk? My Win 7 machines, with Office and some third party apps are at about 12GB."

            Apparently I don't. Where did I go wrong? I used the "Add/remove programs" tool to remove all my 3rd party software (i.e., I kept all the hotfixes and updates and patches and whatnot, for fear of ruining the system if I uninstalled them). I used the account management control panel to delete my account and all its files (after creating a new one and switching to it, obviously).

            I admit, it's been a long time since I've used Windows as my primary operating system and I'm not the expert I might have once been, but what else could a person with a reasonable level of computer competency be expected to do?

            I have a genuine interest in this since the computer isn't sold yet and I'm somewhat worried that the 80GB of data that's left over on the machine might include some of my personal information.

            1. croc

              Re: Why Windows is doomed.

              Remove the hibernation file and the index... That'll buy you back a LOT of drive. Especially the hiberfile.... It takes as much space as you have installed ram (Duh...)

            2. croc

              Re: Why Windows is doomed.

              Remove the hibernation file. Remove the index file. Remove the System Protection files. Remove the installation files. That's a start...

        2. sam bo

          Re: Why Windows is doomed.

          "The end result is that 80 GIGABYTES (?!?!) of the hard drive was still in use after my effort to delete all non-Windows stuff."

          very poor effort then, if I clean out everything , win7 uses about 20gb.

          you are holding it wrong.

      2. Rattus Rattus

        Re: Why Windows is doomed.

        Yeah, under the hood Windows 8 sounds like a bit of an improvement over Windows 7. Unfortunately they've lumbered it with that shitty, annoying, hard to use fucking interface, which is why I am sticking with 7 regardless of the underlying improvements.

      3. Chavdar Ivanov

        Re: Why Windows is doomed.

        Also I've setup 8.1 deployment machine here - takes me about 5 minutes to do a clean install over the network with a pixie boot. Here you are. My sideload of KitKat 4.4 on a Nexus 7 2013 yesterday took me may be 15 minutes...

      4. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Why Windows is doomed.

        Microsoft even made a big deal when WP7 was launched about how blazingly quick it was. I remember being at Mobile World Congress, where they had a challenge set up; if your phone can do anything faster than ours, we'll give you money.

        Mmmm, let's see…

        - Play YouTube in HD

        - Sideload an app without any enterprise infrastructure

        - Natively access online services without requiring a Microsoft ID

    4. Tyrion

      Re: Why Windows is doomed.

      >> The reason Windows is finished is speed. They've stuffed it so full of lazy code and pointless bells and whistles that it takes an age to start compared to phone or a tablet.

      Case in point, my Arch Linux install boots to XFCE desktop in approximately 4 seconds from grub. Windows 8 takes considerably longer despite turning off half the services, disabling prefetch / indexing, etc. Probably about 10 seconds before the desktop is usable. That's from an SSD of course.

      1. sam bo

        Re: Why Windows is doomed.

        amazing stuff ! saving 6 seconds of your precious time waiting for Windows to load.

        I bet you drink your coffee in record time too. Life in the fast lane .

    5. Lapun Mankimasta

      Re: Why Windows is doomed.

      You should take a read through minimsft sometime: his focus was on slimming down Microsoft itself. He argued that Microsoft was bloated; I guess the software took on the behaviour of its development environment.

      My pet peeve about MS Win7 is the way it'll take time out to scrub through memory and halt everything while it flushes the (unchanged) video buffers ... it treats 2 gig of RAM the way MS WinNT 3 treated 12 MB - insufficient memory for uninterrupted running.

    6. Wibble
      Boffin

      Re: Why Windows is doomed.

      Proof of bloat:

      VM running Windows XP is between 3 and 5GB

      VM running Windows 7 is between 10 and 15GB

      VM running Windows 8 is between 14 and 20GB

      Most of this is due to the laugh-a-minute WinSXS directory.

      Installed Visual Studio 2013 on a new Windows 2012 server install. This is now 55GB - and has never been fully used in anger. Whereas the Windows 2003 server running Visual Studio 2005 for the last five years has only grown to 22GB.

      Conclusion: later versions of Windows are bloated.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Just stop calling everything Windows.

    There's many people who won't buy a Windows phone because they think it means Windows Mobile.

    With a tile based OS with no windows, why would you even bother to describe it as Windows?

    They didn't call the XBox "Windows Games Console".

    1. Wardy01

      The irony being that they are all running on "windows" behind the scenes ... they just don't look like what you consider to be a "windows UI".

      XBox one is basically a windows 8 PC

      1. Electric Panda

        You're right, but the tweaked TIFKAM is actually very nice on the Xbox. It works pretty well and looks good, a definite step up from the sort-of Metro running on the 360.

        Maybe the Xbox One will stick with mostly the same UI for its entire life? The 360 had three separate dashboards.

    2. dogged

      There's about 23 people who think Windows Phone means Windows Mobile (and apparently all of them post here).

    3. Zack Mollusc

      There's many people who won't buy a Windows phone because they think it means it comes from the same pillocks who brought out the various other Windows operating systems which have been annoying them for the last 17 years.

  4. Bootman
    Facepalm

    Julie, you already killed Windows when you saddled it with Metro.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      @Bootman

      I thought the point being made was that she didn't? The person who did has gone to explore other career options.

      Larson-Green actually talks good sense. Just making the point that mobile OSes need to be locked down if you want good battery life is stating something that is obvious to developers, but perhaps not to the general public (including some journalists).

      But then, someone who started out doing business administration and then went into programming might well have more of a clue than usual.

      1. Fatman

        Re: @Bootman

        The person who did has gone to explore other career options been placed on another career trajectory.

        FTFY!!!

      2. Tim Bates

        Re: @Bootman

        >that mobile OSes need to be locked down if you want good battery life

        So when the clever people at XDA-Developers (and others) manage to break the locks and free the OS, you're saying there's absolutely no way they could also create a customised ROM that has better battery life? The OS vendor gets things 100% perfect every time, right? And the OEMs never fill the OS with crapware, right?

        So lets all let companies like MS tell us what's best for us. After all, they're a multi-billion dollar company, so they must know what they're doing.

      3. Bootman

        Re: @Bootman

        http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/11/13/who_is_new_larson_green/

        This very websites describes her as being responsible for Metro (and the ribbon for that matter). Doesn't sound like an innocent pawn in Sinofsky's game. There are videos of her eulogising Metro online if you can be bothered to search them out. So yes I have deep suspicion for someone responsible for two of the most unpopular user interface decisions Microsoft have made.

    2. Richard Jones 1
      Unhappy

      MissPrint?

      Surely the reference to one of the windows version was misprinted, Windows Turnkey? Where did the 'n' come from?

      Windows Turkey, now your talking, well turkey?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: MissPrint?

        Windows Turkey, now your talking, well turkey?

        Windows Turkey, the release that goes Gobble Gobble Gobble into your IT budget, with highly restrictive and confusing licensing terms that not even Microsoft reps fully understand.

  5. bigtimehustler

    Putting the cart before horse? I think Microsoft's strategy is more along the lines of inventing a new type of cart and a new type of horse, completely different to previous horses and carts. Then making them impossible to hitch together, so your left riding bareback on something that resembles a horse but isn't or your sat in a cart, that sort of looks like a cart but has no wheels and doesn't move.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Where do all these feet come from?

    Well I'm going to fire anyway!

    The ONLY thing I want want MS for is to allow me to run software that will ONLY run on desktop Windows OS.

    Take that away and at a stroke you take away my need to be a customer.

    1. Dave 126 Silver badge

      Re: Where do all these feet come from?

      And of that Windows-only software, some lends itself to being run on a remote server and accessed from any OS.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hey everyone throw away your Windows Phone apps and hardware again.

    It's all about the change AGAIN!!!

  8. Mage Silver badge
    Facepalm

    Moronic Idiocy

    They need maybe 5 GUI and 4 OS.

    BUT ONLY DESKTOP should be called "Microsoft Windows". Call the others something else. Height of stupidity has been calling ANY embedded version (We have had Win 3.x, Win NT, Win XP, Win CE embedded versions) "Windows".

    One Windows & One GUI (even only two) is stupidity.

    Maybe one Kernel is possible.

    1. Wardy01

      Re: Moronic Idiocy

      Only 1 product is actually called "Windows" ... the kernel!

      That's like saying "stop calling ubuntu linux" it's not linux its ubuntu ...

      1. Darryl

        Re: Moronic Idiocy

        Actually, the kernels are called NT and CE

        1. El Andy

          Re: Moronic Idiocy

          @Darryl: "Actually, the kernels are called NT and CE"

          Actually the kernel (singular) is called NT. CE is an ex-OS, it's dead, it is pushing up the proverbial daisies.

          As to all this "Microsoft is losing it's way, merging OSs is crazy" talk, those of us old enough to remember the comments when NT first came to light have seen this all before. The haters weren't right then either.

          1. Lapun Mankimasta

            Re: Moronic Idiocy

            And the kernel API has two prefixes - nt and zw. It's the interface APIs where the prefix win is used.

  9. BrownishMonstr

    Name Change?

    Sigh, Windows X RT is confusing the average user with Windows X. So they could call it Windows Phone X, but then saying a tablet runs Windows Phone is weird because it can't call. Unless they call it Windows Mobile, for stuff that are mobile, but then that will confuse people with the older phone OS and again, most will think you can call from it. So maybe Windows Go.

    1. Malagabay
      Happy

      Re: Name Change?

      perhaps just: Windows Gone

      1. Fatman

        Re: Name Change?

        perhaps just: Windows Gone

        or perhaps just: Shattered Windows

        1. Tim Bates

          Re: Name Change?

          >or perhaps just: Shattered Windows

          Most phones I see have a smashed screen these days - so probably not a terribly incorrect name.

        2. Lapun Mankimasta

          Re: Name Change?

          There's always "A Better Door Than A Window" : ABDTAW - alternatively (YM)ABDTAW: "(You Make) A Better Door Than A Window". Or getting even more meta: DBTS, GOOML

    2. Paul 135

      Re: Name Change?

      They should just call it Windows Mobile again. Windows Mobile 9 could be the next version, and it isn't confusing at all with the version number at the end.

  10. Christopher Rogers

    still behind.

    Well, she's saying all the right things, but still hasn't addressed the core problem for MS in the mobile world - they are playing catchup and an 18 month delay to pulling their mobile OSes together is not good enough. Android and IOS will have progressed further in that time and any number of competitors could be in the market by then. MS are essentially saying its going to take them nearly another 2 years to join Apple and Google in their ongoing dual OS strategy, a poor show from a software house majoring on OSes....

    1. Wardy01

      Re: still behind.

      I'd love to know why you think microsoft are so far behind???

      In my opinion, if you strip away all the apps and just look at the OS windows is leagues ahead of its rivals in so many ways ...

      1. The desktop version of their kernel is now running on desktops and their flagship console

      2. The mobile OS "out of the box" integrates and pulls together a single view of all your contact data with no apps needed.

      3. Microsoft software is useful, yeh awesome you have an iPhone or Android device but angry birds is totally pointless.

      Point 2 there is a key one ... people bang on about how Apple's ITunes store has a million apps on it but only about 5 of them are any good and those 5 you absolutely must have to make IOS worth using.

      I think its about time people started to understand what Microsoft are doing there before you bash a very powerful platform.

      The only thing that comes even remotely close is linux ...

      Android on the mobile, various distributions on various devices including desktop.

      If someone out there can pull together and make this stuff all talk "smoothly" then I would be impressed.

      Get a reality check!!

      1. Christopher Rogers
        Facepalm

        Re: still behind.

        I'd love to know why you think microsoft are so far behind??? - because market data.

        Get a reality check!! - really?

        I had written a longer answer, but since you seem to be incoherent, I'll stop here.

        1. hoverboy

          Re: still behind.

          Here's some of that market data you were talking about:

          http://www.wpcentral.com/windows-phone-kantar-9-percent-eu-decline-china

          Sure the sales are still small, but they are growing very quickly.

      2. Richard Plinston

        Re: still behind.

        > windows is leagues ahead of its rivals in so many ways ...

        > 1. The desktop version of their kernel is now running on desktops and their flagship console

        I am not sure why you think that makes Microsoft 'ahead'. Android runs on the Linux kernel, iOS kernel is also based on BSD/Darwin as MacOS is. MS managed to get WP and RT on NT kernel last year, about two years behind.

      3. Bladeforce

        Re: still behind.

        http://blog.zorinaq.com/?e=74

        Take a read, enjoy your moment of gaining knowledge after years of living in deep space. Then sit down and think, I was wrong, NT really is a POS being packaged nicely by salesmen that are only interested in my money

      4. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: still behind.

        Clearly there is at least one person out of touch with reality Wardy

  11. Tim 11

    the crazy thing is

    it's only about 2 years ago they decided to dedicate a vast amount of resources to invent the third platform. I wish I could afford to waste $10Bn (or whatever it cost) doing something utterly stupid and then still get a massive payout when I finally got kicked out of the company

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: the crazy thing is

      Do you not remember all the people saying that MS had to have an ARM offering, absolutely had to, otherwise it was going to fail? That's why they put a load of cash into developing RT, unfortunately it didn't work out for them that well...

      1. Ken Hagan Gold badge

        Re: an ARM offering

        They could have just ported their desktop OS to ARM. (WinCE ran on ARMs, back in he day, so it wasn't even like they'd no experience or tools.) They didn't need to re-invent the GUI.

      2. Richard Plinston

        Re: the crazy thing is

        > Do you not remember all the people saying that MS had to have an ARM offering, absolutely had to, otherwise it was going to fail? That's why they put a load of cash into developing RT, unfortunately it didn't work out for them that well...

        Actually they have had an ARM offering for a long time: CE. This was the MS-DOS/Windows 2/3 of the ARM world. Single tasking with a TSR like background tasking.

        What they needed was a viable ARM offering they could use to threaten their OEMs with 'loyalty' discounts to stop them using other ARM OSes such as Linux/Android or WebOS. More importantly to stop them building ARM based servers until MS could get their ARM server OS finished (which may be another couple of years).

        1. Lapun Mankimasta

          Re: the crazy thing is

          They once had "portability" as one of the MS WinNT goals, and they actually succeeded with it - an MS WinNT 4.0 disc I've got's got several chip architectures on it besides the i80x86 one, including PowerPC and MIPS. But that goal got defenestrated around MS WinNT 2k time, and the result is of course Microsoft's now playing catch-up, and they seem to be too demoralized by the long disaster known as Longhorn/Vista to catch-up in any hurry - Vistabetion _does_ lead to blindness after all.

  12. Julian Taylor

    A more mobile operating system?

    "We do think there's a world where there is a more mobile operating system that doesn't have the risks to battery life, or the risks to security"

    Android perhaps? iOS perhaps?

  13. Rampant Spaniel

    So phone or RT will go or merge. I thought as much, they changed Windows enough to work on tablets with metro, phone is growing up and can cope with large screen phones so tablets are onlya small step away. The big question is can they make RT run phone apps and maybe some more full desktop apps (and phone SOC'S continue to develop fast enough to accommodate that) or will phone mature fast enough to cover phones and low end tablets with new atom chips making full win 8 higher end tablets more competitive.

    Or will they screw it up entirely and scrap RT and phone and embark on an entirely new mobile OS, just because it's the last sensible thing to do, like RT was.

    I still don't understand why they needed RT, couldn't they have just developed phone more? Especially given they could put full Windows on tablets as well. Apple and Google seem to have managed on using their phone OS on tablets, given between them they basically have the entire market between them.

    1. Richard Plinston

      > So phone or RT will go or merge.

      So now those developers that have bothered to do WP or RT apps will be faced with yet another dead-ending just as happened with WP6.x and WP7. Now either WP8 or WRT will be dead-ended, or both will be, to be replaced by yet another incompatible iteration.

      1. Rampant Spaniel

        ssssshhh you're leaking their top secret pooch humping strategy!! Or is this a public bid for the CEO position?

  14. DaLo

    A shining example of how Microsoft got it wrong

    For the perfect example of Microsoft having a screwed up strategy is Server 2012.

    When you get a model right everything you throw at it just seems to fit perfectly - however when you have to make massive compromises and do things that just seem wrong just so you can continue that strategy then you should take a step back.

    Microsoft should concentrate on Consumer v Business. Work PCs - Business, Servers = Business, Company phones = Business. Home PCs, social networking phones, etc = Consumer.

    They don't then need to shoehorn business users into a consumer OS and Windows Server 2012 should never have happened.

    You can, of course, run 2012 core, however it is a bit of a gamble that the utility or app that you need to troubleshoot something runs as a powershell or remote management interface. There is no easy way to add on the GUI afterwards if need be. If, you opt for the safety of the GUI to start with you have the Modern UI ... on a server!

    So every entry to the server remotely involves logging on going to desktop, doing your business and then going back to Modern UI to log out...sorry Sign Out. They've had to add additional commands into the control box of the Remote Desktop just to handle this easily. Having to go to the bottom left and attempting to get the start box to appear and then having to go to the opposite corner to log out is just maddening enough with a mouse when you first start with it.

    Seriously Microsoft, understand your paradigm, don't alienate users and stop chasing the consumer dollar by annoying every business user (the ones who are going to be keeping you afloat in the years to follow).

    1. James 29

      Re: A shining example of how Microsoft got it wrong

      "There is no easy way to add on the GUI afterwards if need be. If, you opt for the safety of the GUI to start with you have the Modern UI ... on a server!"

      Very easy in fact if you bother to read the documentation

      Install-WindowsFeature Server-Gui-Mgmt-Infra, Server-Gui-Shell –Restart

      Just as easily removed as well. Only caveat is you might need the Windows installation files, if you installed core from the go as it saved disk space by not caching them on the system drive.

      1. DaLo

        Re: A shining example of how Microsoft got it wrong

        It's a while since I did it but I'm pretty sure you have to restart the server to do that?

      2. fandom

        Re: A shining example of how Microsoft got it wrong

        James, for a minute I thought I was reading a Linux help forum from a few years ago.

        1. Greg J Preece

          Re: A shining example of how Microsoft got it wrong

          James, for a minute I thought I was reading a Linux help forum from a few years ago.

          Hang on, were you expecting a GUI-based method of installing a GUI that doesn't yet exist on the system? Errrrr....

  15. frank ly

    re. "(the politically acceptable phrase is "turnkey", by the way):"

    The obvious phrase is "turkey".

  16. Shinku

    As an owner of a first gen Windows Phone 7 Series Phone... phone...? it would've been nice if they'd worked this out before they spaffed a bucket of platforms up the wall. Since Microsoft figured out it needed to do something (which was long before WP7, they were running ARM ports of desktop Windows on phone hardware long before it, and there are official pictures to prove it), they've released Windows Phone 7 and Windows Phone 8 (which are incompatible with each other) Windows RT (which is incompatible with the previous two) and Windows 8 (which is compatible with RT but not necessarily welcomed on a desktop).

    That's FOUR different essentially incompatible OSs, several of which look the same but aren't, and several of which share attributes but can't run each others' software. In THREE YEARS.

    Fair enough, Windows 7 doesn't really do tablets very well compared to your Androids and iOSs, and Windows CE and its derivatives (Handheld PC, Windows Mobile, etc) were long in the tooth, but christ, how do you screw up a grand unification strategy THAT badly? I realise it takes time, but they could've at least been less batshit with the ground work. They knew Windows Phone 7 would be rendered incompatible and obsolete before they even started it, for example. The whole strategy seems ill-considered, slow to bear fruit and simply confusing to the people who are important: those who don't know what a kernel is or why this tablet can't run that app. What's worse, Microsoft's stance on telling people what's going on over the last few years seems to have been "go away, we don't know yet, don't tell anybody anything, it might be different tomorrow, panic panic, help!", which is unnerving at best.

    I'm rambling, but Microsoft, you might wanna step up the pace and stop dallying with this half-arsed time-wasting and get your ducks in order.

  17. returnmyjedi

    Get rid of Windows Me.

  18. MacGyver

    Why come you ain't got a tatoo?

    I wonder what they will do when they dumb their own interface down so far that they can't even use it to create their next OS.

    "Cannot find 'driver.inf', inf files are not part of the 'Valid Extensions List' that a user may search for. Would you like to Bing for more help?" -- Windows 13

  19. Guz

    Full circle.

    NT is slowly coming back to it's original design: Processor independent.

    From what I've gathered, Cutler originally wanted NT to be processor independent, meaning only the kernel and some basic low level drivers to compiled for each processor. But everything else above would be compile once, run anywhere. Complete abstraction for programs/applications.

    It was abandoned in the beginning because processors weren't fast enough to make it viable, but now things are different. I'm eagerly looking forward to the new "Windows", is it's going to be rather interesting how it works out.

    1. Shinku

      Re: Full circle.

      It was processor independent for a long time, from NT 3.1 which ran on Alpha and MIPS besides x86, via NT4 which added PowerPC support, right up to Windows 2000 which supported Alpha (at least up until RC1 where it was then abandoned) and reportedly existed for Itanium too. Then XP/Server 2003 supported Itanium, as did Server 2008 (and so by extension it should be possible to run Vista on Itanium too). Windows 7 had ARM builds, albeit only internally available, and now Windows 8 exists on ARM publically.

      So really, when you look at it, Windows has almost never been confined to a single architecture. I don't have the experience necessary to talk about the compatibility of binaries between those platforms, however.

    2. hoverboy

      Re: Full circle.

      Interesting! But presumably that means that userland is entirely interpreted / managed code? Even with really good JIT compiles that means a performance hit? Surely there will always be a need for native-compiled code?

      1. Shinku

        Re: Full circle.

        Most of the nitty gritty involved with this stuff is beyond my knowledge, but take a look at:

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hardware_abstraction#Microsoft_Windows

        Essentially the HAL sits between the hardware and the rest of the OS and the software running on it, and in theory should be capable of translating between Windows' API and whatever the underlying architecture is. I don't know exactly how far this goes however, and I'm guessing you still need to recompile applications (and some of the rest of the OS itself?) using native code because it'll use architecture-specific instructions, much like ARM apps on Linux for example. Having said that, .net may render many of the concerns less important or entirely moot, but I'm not certain on that. Of course, .net didn't exist before the early 2000s, so it would've thought everything would've been native code on all of the NT versions with support for more than 2 architectures.

        The more I think about it, the more I think I really have no idea how this works, but that's a good place to start looking if you're interested.

        1. Lapun Mankimasta

          Re: Full circle.

          If you can read code, you should take a look at ReactOS at reactos.org: it's an attempt to write a clone of Microsoft Windows NT, and contains an example of an MS WinNT Hardware Abstraction Layer.

    3. Roland6 Silver badge

      Re: Full circle.

      >It was abandoned in the beginning because processors weren't fast enough to make it viable

      I seem to remember the reason was that MS didn't have the development maturity to develop and maintain a common source across multiple computer architectures. I suspect that with the fuss around XP and subsequent releases of Windows, MS may now have the controls etc in place to handle this.

  20. Michael Hawkes

    Licensing

    I'd be more impressed if they simplified their licensing schemes. IMHO, if your licensing is so complex that you created "licensing specialist" as a job title and certification, then you're doing something wrong.

    1. Ken Hagan Gold badge

      Re: Licensing --> FTFY

      "If your vendor's licensing is so complex that they created "licensing specialist" as a job title and certification, then you're buying something wrong."

  21. Gray
    Meh

    The cart came first; then came a hunt for a ...

    I chuckled at her comment, "just as the mouse drove the adoption of GUIs..." which is a bit like saying that the invention of the cart required that we go looking for horses. If it were MS running things back then, we'd be using a string of pigs hitched under a pole, pushing the cart from the rear. Two boys with whips would steer it, walking alongside the pigs, with the lookout up front shouting directions.

    Microsoft directions? Yeh, that about describes it.

    1. GrumpyOldBloke

      Re: The cart came first; then came a hunt for a ...

      Ah yes, Microsoft Logistics Edition. I remember it well! The home version only allowed for one pig and a cart that could carry one item but the professional version was more useful. The reason few remember it was probably because per pig licensing costs inhibited adoption amongst smaller players and the cart access licences for cart loaders and carry items became confusing and expensive if not managed properly. Being an open carry cart the security model wasn't too good but there were a lot of third party addons to try and rectify the situation. There was one major problem, once a pig was hitched then corrosion in the fittings made it almost impossible to remove. Rather than fixing this Microsoft touted it as a feature and gave preferential licensing to original equipment manufacturers that shipped carts and pigs as a single product.

      Of course there were open source carts whose design didn't have to be licensed but it was difficult to get SLA's. There were also Apple carts but there were always people attempting to upset them and Apple typically responded with the courts. No, Microsoft had a good operating environment back then. The capacity of the cart was only constrained by what you could pay – businesses were comfortable with that concept.

      Piracy eventually killed the Logistics Edition, pigs were just too damn tasty.

  22. norman

    Just call it broken already

    Windows desktop has been broken beyond belief.

    My system boots Linux, Windows XP, Windows 7, even OS/2 with ease in less than 30 seconds, I tried Windows 8 and 8.1 for a 15 minute boot attempt after a half day installation, would not recommend that installation again.

    Windows 8.1 has done nothing to improve the startup horrors created by 8.0.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Just call it broken already

      In that case there is something wrong with your machine. I've had Win8 on a couple of different devices and VMs, I've never heard anything like this, it boots by far the fastest of any Windows OS in recent times. Indeed there are no credible sources of "my machine takes freaking ages to boot" on the Internet.

      What is it with supposedly highly technical people who decide that something is rubbish before they even use it then fail to have any critical thinking such as: A 15minute boot time, hmm is that likely in this day and age?

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It's the developers, stupid

    Microsoft hasn't had a coherent developer story for the last decade plus. Between Win32, .NET, WinForms, Silverlight, XAML, WinRT, and a bunch of other stupid codenames, acronyms, API sets, and boondoggles, I have no idea where they want me to start if I wanted to make software for Windows.

    This means that people at Microsoft can't possibly be focused on making ONE good API/platform, and it just keeps coming back to bite them. It means developers are going to be reluctant to make software for Microsoft platforms. It means community support of APIs/platforms is fragmented. It means Microsoft's own support of their APIs/platforms is fragmented. It enables asinine business decisions like making Windows 8 LOOK like Windows Phone but it's completely different internally. Ridiculous.

    Step one for recovery is for Microsoft to anoint (or invent) ONE native-accessible API to program all their OSs/devices/etc. for the next 20+ years. Some of the UI libraries will necessarily be different (touch vs. mouse) like they are in OS X, but otherwise everything should all be the same--the entire graphics stack, sound, networking, threading, IO, etc. Basically they should continue their business strategy of copying Apple, but instead of just copying the end results, copy the strategy that allowed them to achieve the results in a coherent way.

    1. Dunhill
      Coat

      and than this:

      Don't forget >>

      Microsoft CAN NOT release a perfect version of windows even when that was/is possible, they are not only a software house but also a marketing industry (and they did a good job with that)

      The shareholders would not allow a perfect windows because it would not make money

      because :

      . not selling new versions

      . not selling updates

      . technicians without work

      . sysadmins without work

      . less/no income from trainings

      . less/no income from roalties on computer sales

      etc etc etc

      just because it just works without problems

      what they want are

      errors, virusses, incompatible hardware, problems and more disasters

      just because that makes money by resolving a PART of the problems, upgrades, new versions, technicians training and working and if possible create some more money making issues.

      somebody at IBM said once a long time ago (in the OS/2 ages) :

      if it works don't fix it

      Microsoft change that into:

      if it need to be fixed we can make (more) money.

      So, if you stay with windows your future is upgrade, renew, fix and pay

      You don't want that than you have to use a (more) stable alternative

  24. N2

    Therefore

    Instead of buying one OS to run applications, each application will come with its own OS?

    I hope Im wrong!

    1. Lapun Mankimasta

      Re: Therefore

      "each application will come with its own OS?"

      There are cut-down VMs out there, that only run applications. Their whole raison d'etre is to prevent vulnerabilities in one app from affecting another.

  25. foo_bar_baz

    The lure of the cloud

    MS figures the desktop is dead and you just need a Hardware Secured ™ Microsoft Approved ™ thin client to access the Microsoft Cloud™.

    1. Scoular

      Re: The lure of the cloud

      NSA has made that look like a very bad idea to most of the world where businesses would prefer that all their data not be made available to any favoured competitors. In addition to the other problems of course.

  26. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Prediction: Windows RT will be killed

    My utmost sympathies to Nokia (Lumia 2520 tablet running Windows RT).

    If Stephen Elop (or Julie Larson-Green) becomes the next Microsoft CEO, there will be no need to kill Windows... because Microsoft will kill itself.

  27. Goat Jam
    Coat

    "While RT is the more sophisticated API, Windows Phone appears to be winning the internal political battle, with stories suggesting it has been freed to scale up to 7-inch and 10-inch tablets."

    Wasn't this sort of inter-departmental dick swinging one of the major factors that led to the demise of Nokia?

    Meego vs S60 vs Some other linux whose name I can't quite recall

    On the bright side however, it looks like Nokias merger with MS won't include too much of a culture shock.

  28. mfritz0

    Switch over to Linux

    When they kill Windows, I'm switching to Linux, would do that sooner but my wife wants Windows we have.

    1. phil dude
      Linux

      Re: Switch over to Linux

      kvm, virtualbox..... you can make it look like windoze with linux under the hood ;-)

      I am VERY impressed with the latest turn of para-virtualisation...

      how else am I going to run the dinosaur Nokia suite to access my dying nokia N8....?

      P.

  29. Chris 103

    if only MS would listen...

    ...to the comments on this thread, then they could produce an OS that people would consider buying...........

  30. tommydokc
    Flame

    win 8 kb

    all of you who cannot manage to use a kb and mouse efficiently on something as simple as windows 8 are really the inept ones among us.

  31. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Some valid comments

    Made to sound like they are coming from the mouth of a 13 year old with anger issues by using such chlidish phrases like "Microshaft" "Micro$oft" "WIndoze". They're not even original and haven't been for over a decade. Time to grow up, perhaps? Stop foaming at the mouth and judging everything outside of your particular ecoshpere as somehow less worthy than you?

    And you have to remember - marketing aside, license tie-ins aside, Linux has been _freely_ available for an awful long time.

    Even my old man, who is not the most techinically adept user is aware of it.

    But he uses whatever version of Windows that was put on his machine at purchase time. He could change it and knows this but _he chooses_ not to because what _he_ has does what _he_ needs it to.

    Most users are not necessarily techinically adept. They use Office at work on Windows. Why would they want to retrain / relearn something from scratch?

    Personally I use varied OS's because each one does something I require. My storage and media server is on Suse because it's on a very low-end Neo based microserver that doesn't even require a GUI; my little SIP based PBX is on CentOS and my antispam server is on a BSD variant I can't bring to mind right now.

    My day-to-day work laptop runs Windows (even though it's a Mac Book) because the tools I require to do my job are not available for other OS's

    I work extensively with Citrix technologies, including XenServer their virtualisation product.

    Perhaps. Just perhaps, there should be an appreciation that one tool won't always or usually be enough. But then that takes the fun out of foaming at the mouth ranting and downvoting for opinions that don't match your own. Hey ho.

  32. Dexter

    My work laptop, which runs Windows XP takes 20 *minutes* from switch on to Outlook being usable..

    Thank god they are killing XP; maybe I'll get anew laptop at last.

    1. Roland6 Silver badge

      Re: My work laptop @Dexter

      Yes Outlook on my Win8 laptop takes forever to load, but I suspect part of the problem is that it first has to establish a VPN connection before connecting to the server and then sync's folders - almost forgot broadband connection is usually 1~2mbps.

      So don't get too hopeful about start up getting quicker, but do keep the pressure on as getting a new laptop always feels good, just hope they put more than 2 GB of memory in the thing...

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Windows dies?

    My vote is Windows 8 should die, and everyone involved in it.

    Not that it affects me. I will retire before I have to use it. I'm just thinking of the children! Will someone please think of the children?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

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