How Microsoft can keep Win XP alive – and WHY: A real-world example What if Microsoft announced it's not ending support for Windows XP next Tuesday after all, and instead will offer perpetual updates (for a small fee, of course). Something inside me, somewhere between my sense of humor and soul-crushing cynicism, drove me to turn that dream into an April Fool for this year. But all cruel …
I had trouble finding the actual thread. I see, so it's also custom hardware. At this stage, it's only "good enough" until it's "not good enough anymore". It isn't broke now, but it will break eventually, at which point one's lost the paddle needed to stay out of Crap Creek. A similar thing happens when a piece of hardware goes to EOL because a key component is no longer manufactured. It happens in every industry sooner or later. About the only thing that can probably be done is to start putting aside for some sort of migration plan while there is still revenue being generated.
>it's only "good enough" until it's "not good enough anymore"
Yes. Name one thing that's not true of. The Pyramids at Giza have been "good enough" for their function (serving as mausoleum and memorial to the grandeur of the kings who commissioned them) for some several thousand years. Eventually, they will fall and be "not good enough anymore." That looks to be quite some time from now, and the lifespan is being extended through maintenance.
I have hammers that are decades old, a clock-radio as old as me, and my neighbor drives a car twice as old as me. All of which are "good enough" until such a point in the unknown future as they become "not good enough anymore."
I fail to comprehend the special wisdom of this statement.
> It isn't broke now, but it will break eventually
Which is pretty much reiterating the above statement. Yes. All things break. What you don't seem to be getting is that:
A) there are enough spare computer parts to keep the computer portion of the exercise in these lathes going for the next decade, at least. Realistically, I've got enough gear on the shelf to get 30 years out of those buggers.
B) The mechanical portion of the unit will make it deceased after the last computer component has burned itself out.
C) The software is the only bit in which there is an artificially planned obsolescence, and (wonder of wonders) the people owning the $7M machine are disinclined to honour the software vendor's desire to introduce artificial scarcity.
So yeah, it's "good enough until it's not good enough anymore." That day is quite some time in the future. Long enough to earn a profit from the unit and either eventually replace it. More likely, the owners will simply retire before the thing gives up the ghost entirely. They mortgage everything they have to buy the unit, they run it (and several others) for a few decades, they pay off the units, make a reasonable profit, retire and die.
It is good enough until it's not. And that's perfectly okay by everyone.
Except Microsoft.
Totally agree, as I have two CNC machines in our shop, both running on XP machines and no route for upgrades - even basic elements in relation to direct access to serial and parallel ports cause issues with modern hardware.
Maybe he should strap the willing dev to the front of the machine for testing - if the drive is screwed, then so is the dev - literally!!!
"Windows 7 brought bloat, eye candy, and features barely anyone used such as bit locker"
It's pretty clear you don't know and never bother to understand changes Vista, 7 and 8 brought under the hood - especially to support new security features and take advantage of the latest hardware.
There is far more than you think - I would suggest you to read Windows Internals (http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963901.aspx).
XP is now outdated code, and unless you really need to run if for reasons like those explained in this article, it's just lpainly stupid to run it on a multicore CPU, many GBs of RAM, SSD disks, a powerful PCie GPU/NIC, plus USB 3.0 and other new technologies unsupported by XP.
But I guess many like XP just because it's easier to run an illegal copy...
It's pretty clear you don't know and never bother to understand changes Vista, 7 and 8 brought under the hood - especially to support new security features and take advantage of the latest hardware.
That's the point. People still have computers that are still (physically) working, from 10 years ago. Why should they replace working equipment? Who cares if the newer OSes support newer hardware, with 4 cores and 2gb graphics memory? They just want an OS that supports their current hardware - that is working very well, and does not need replacing!
You're not getting it, are you?
But I guess many like XP just because it's easier to run an illegal copy...
You should know; you've said it enough times...
But the cost of the OS is insignificant to the required hardware upgrades.
So why they replace their working mobes with the latest "cooler" version? I too have old PC still working, I've a 2005 one that has just been reinstalled with FreeNAS to be used as such. It was running 7 until a few months ago, when I got a new one.
XP will not stop working, it will keep on working, but of course the risk of being compromised will be higher and higher. You have to perform a risk assessment and assess how would cost you to be compromised over upgrading your OS and maybe your hardware - or switch to a different OS.
Is really new hardware so expensive? Many PCs today cost less than a "cool" mobe.
It's like when you have an old car still perfectly working, but finding spare parts becomes increasingly difficult, and maintenance expenses higher and not every shop may still accept it for maintenance - you may decide buying a new car is better, even if expensive. Sure, you can't crack someone else car easily...
It looks a lot of people are after the latest mobe for status reasons, even if they have no real technical need for an upgrade. While upgrading an outdated operating system, because it doesn't make you cooler (but it does make you more vulnerable) is not interesting. Nobody is crying if Apple no longer updates the older iPhones - why? Because almost everybody switched to a "cooler" model.
When I buy a computer, I know I will have to replace it - or its OS - when the obsolescence cycle is completed. As when you buy a car you know it won't last forever, or a washing machine, a heating system, or an alarm system. You know when they are old enough maintenance costs and the risk of a sudden break could cost you more than "upgrading" them. Sure, there are those who blindly spend money in everuthing else, and when they found themselves in a cold winter with a broken heating system too old to be easily repaired, discover how silly they were....
That is fine for you.... its a PC. not an industrial computer. Its easy for YOU to upgrade or change out your computer. You are young, things are more open to you. In my youth, I upgraded to every new OS, even beta. Re-building your OS/boot/settings were a part of life - to make every Mhz count, because back then, our computer speed was typically single or double digit Mhz. NOT GHz. My first 5 computer speeds: 1Mhz, 2Mhz (C=128), 7Mhz (Amiga 1000), 14Mhz (A1000 CPU upgrade), 25Mhz (Amiga 3000). Then 100Mhz i486 as I entered the PC market.
As we get OLDER and need to spend more time WORKING rather than tinkering, having a reliable computer was most important. My last Win98se system lasted about 2-3years from its fresh install. My XPs lasted 1~3 years. My current PC is a 2yr old Win7 install that should last me another 3~5 years. I rarely push my quad-core 3.xGhz intel to its limits (I forgot its clock speed).
So for many companies, as long as it keeps things working, fine. Also, *YOU* are not the one who is spending money to pay to upgrade 12, 1200, 12,000 whatever PCs and making sure they work with the rest of the network or equipment... or training the minions to use it. At one of my small biz. clients, they have a $6000 plotter from HP who don't provide a working driver for Windows 7. Are you offering to BUY us a new plotter? Its BS that HP can't get a 10yr old plotter to work!! Again, this isn't the same as my $100 multi-function at home that tends to be replaced every 3~4 years.
Its good to have forward thinking... but this isn't the 80s anymore. And you are correct in some ways... One of the things that HURT & killed the Amiga was that it was a locked-in design. Games made in 1991 were coded to run on 1986 Amigas.... ie: What works fine on the cheapest 7Mhz Amiga would have problems with my $2500 25Mhz, also the games wanted OS1.3 but would fail with OS 2.x or 3.x. Because the company was stupid to setup DevKits to state "STOP HITTING THE HARDWaRE" so hard. So they were kind of like consoles... So yeah, in 1992 the company was building and selling NEW Amiga PCs with OS 1.3, 2.2 and 3.0 - God what a mess.
MS can cheaply afford to support XP Security updates... that is all they need to do. Yes, it would be GREAT if those companies can buy newer hardware with Win7 on them... but they cannot.
Upvoted because I went down the Commodore route (C64->A500->A500+) before stumbling into the PC Market with a Win95 Dell P60 with 16MB of RAM, which I immediately upgraded to Win98SE 96MB RAM and a P90 (the most that particular Dell would allow me to upgrade).
(I still have two working C64s and A500s although that Dell is long gone...)
When I worked for the MOD we had an incredibly expensive data capture machine with an Internal SCSI HD. To get to the data you had to hook it up to a Win98SE machine with a certain Adaptec family of SCSI cards and refresh the SCSI bus, which, after a few seconds pause, the Win98SE machine found the internal HD of the Data Capture Unit and we could read the data.
This function only ever worked in Win98SE! When we upgraded our labs PCs to NT4 and some others to XP, we discovered that this option never worked under these OSes. The manufacturer of the Data Capture Device tried very hard to come up with a solution but failed. So we kept a stock of Win98SE machines, Adaptec cards and SCSI drives because we couldn't afford to replace £100,000 worth of Data Capture Device with the £250,000 latest version of it.
This loss/change of functionality wasn't done maliciously by either the Device's manufacturer nor probably MS - it was probably never even conceived as 'an issue' until it became an issue...
A quick look in the cupboard reveals my HP 800CT (Win95B), My IBM Thinkpad 300 (Dual boot Win98SE/Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon), Generic naughties Acer P4 laptop (XP SP3) - they all still "work" - but I accept that my HP and IBM basically don't work on the modern 'net any more (and so I don't connect them) and that, actually, the Acer, if I keep it on XP will be the most vulnerable on the 'net (and I've tried a few liveCDs of various Linux distros and none of them seem to work fully on it), so I will probably just stick to my little Asus netbook (Win7 Starter of course) that I'm writing this on and increasingly my Tesco Hudl using a Bluetooth keyboard.
I will miss XP, we had some great times together!
(My daughter's laptop is Win8.1 running Classic Shell - it's sufficiently XP like now for me to resist the urge to throw it down the stairs)
We have a Pentium 4 at home, the children use it, it works, it is on XP and has been since built.
Why would I want to spend my money on a new PC when I could spend on something I actually want?
We also have a few XP machines still at work to run the software which newer than XP refuses to run.
Vista was the start of the rot, the first time features were removed rather than added. This is another reason why XP will not die. It runs more software than any other MS OS before or since.
But I guess many like XP just because it's easier to run an illegal copy...
My-my, you really do have a chip on your shoulder, don't you? Do you work for or have shares in MS? Seems like it.
...And to answer your question about this same matter in a later post of yours, yes, the XPs are fully licensed, moreover, as with many organizations, we've more licences than copies of Windows in use.
@LDS
No, it's a legitimate copy but I just don't fucking NEED most of the stuff you mentioned. So fuck off you patronising bastard!!
Don't let your prejudices get in the way of an actual debate!
Actual cash is supposedly outdated now (by some) but it still hangs around as it it still has it's uses.
You and MS may consider it outdated code, but if it does all that one needs, then it's not actually outdated - is it!!
" Windows 7 brought bloat, eye candy, and features barely anyone used such as bit locker, but it wasn't all that much better than XP"
Bzzzzzt: Wrong! XP started the bloat & eye candy with the Tellytubbies hill and many transition effects, Vista took it to stupid extremes. Win7 development included the WinMin process which reversed a hell of a lot of bloat. 7 introduced little new candy and it can all be easily switched off. Put 7 in classic mode with visual effects set for best performance and it is perfectly acceptable.
Win 7 even introduced useful tweeks such as when you press F2 to change a file name the extension isn't selected. The 7/2008R2 combo is superb for GPO admin too. Ok so that exhausts my list of known improvements but at least there are improvements with 7 unlike Vista, 8 or any office after 2003.
useful tweeks such as when you press F2 to change a file name the extension isn't selected
I actually find that feature mildly annoying.
It's an extension of the "hide extensions for known file types" philosophy, and the infuriating way everything's now a "Library" instead of an actual disk directory. Acceptable on a consumer PC, perhaps, but why propagate this nannying to servers? Why, when I'm logged in as a server admin and I start Explorer, do I see a load of crap about Games and Music Libraries?
> Bzzzzzt: Wrong! XP started the bloat & eye candy with the Tellytubbies hill and
> many transition effects, Vista took it to stupid extremes
I'd agree on that. I resisetd even moving to WinXP because of that. Had to bit the bullet eventually when Win2000 went out of support. At least I eventually found how to de-crappify XP (and eventually Win7) and make it look/behave more like Win2K (such as outright *disabling* the themes service). Unfortunately there's *NO* way to disable Win8's pastel-coloured toy interface, even after disabling the themes service.
Way back in the Win3.x days you could outright *replace* the system shell (remember Norton Desktop for Windows?). I've looked at some of the current shells (LiteStep, SharpEnviro, etc) and none seemed to work anywhere as smoothly or integrated as NDW. For all the effort I'd have to put into them, I might as well stick with Linux. Of course, would *love* to see Mate or Cinnamon ported to Windows (including enough of a runtime that their various apps could be ported in too).
@ pirithous
Indeed! When I started reading your post I was about to tell you (rudely) what I thought of your initial sentence. Fortunately, however, I read it all before ranting! LOL.
So have an upvote!
I have been in IT since the early 60s from mainframe through to pcs.
I have now retired.
Why in hell would I want anything more than XP and Office 2000 at home. It does me nicely for what I want to do and I have no intention of paying MS for product(s) I don't want or need.
I have just bought a new Win7 laptop as I thought my XP one had died, (it hadn't, it was just the screen which is now replaced) so now I am stuck with it.
I grant you that Win7 is probably/possibly a more secure OS and it might even be a lot better, but I hate the UI (and I don't use the term 'hate' lightly) as I can't find anything I want as in their wisdom MS designers have renamed functions, or placed them in places where it was not before.
Fortunately I discovered that I could get an XP type view of the Control Panel, but even with that, I still find there are things I can't find. If you are using it every day for work, that may not be a problem but for just doing emails and the odd letter at home, a likttle bit of photo tweaking and some music, and not a great deal more than that I just don't need it
Not to mention that I have some old programs running under XP which again does what I want them to, so I have no intention of upgrading (at a cost) to newer version which will run (possibly no better either) on WIn 7 or whatever.
I realise that I could use Libre Office or similar, and whilst I have loaded it, there is some functionality in Word and Excel which doesn't exist in Libre Office.
If MS offered ongoing support at a modest fee per year as outlined in the article, I would certainly consider that.
In short I just plain can't be bothered learning new UIs when I don't need 'em to do what I do.
I am investigating the possibility of going to a version of Linux, but I will certainly not be upgrading to more MS stuff. Sadly a lot of my programs don't have a Linux version. On the other hand I believe that one can run XP under Linux in a virtual box, so that may be the way to go.
I am still trying to get Virtual XP to work properly under Win 7. Mostly OK, but it won't see either my network or printer at the moment. The whole exercise is just bloody frustrating, and a huge time waster - especially as I am pretty computer literate.
Whatever happened to the idea of 'it just works'! Maybe I'm dreaming and it never was like that, but I do believe that was the dream we were sold
Have a beer. I am, as I need to cool off now.
It seems that many people including decision makers at Microsoft simply do not understand that in industrial situations it is common for capital goods to have an expected life exceeding 20 years. That includes ( or should include) any software packages necessary as in Mr Pott's example.
If it works initially then why should it not continue to work and there is probably little scope for justifying an operating system change on the grounds of looking pretty or doing things unnecessary for the application. It is simply not good enough to say that the software if going to effectively go away at some arbitrary date. It is not just machine shops, ATMs are not all that easy to up grade for technical and legal reasons and there are plenty of others in similar positions.
If MS wants to be in that market ( they undoubtedly were willing to sell into it) then it needs to understand the nature of the market and deal with the real needs. As Trevor points out the cost of ongoing support is not unreasonable but abandoning customers is.
Or maybe the market needs to adjust. Equipment lasting 20 years might have been fine last century, but as technology progresses, so does the rate at which we churn out new/better tech. 10 years is plenty of time today, and in the next 50 years or so, you're going to need to upgrade every year. If, today, your choices are "run an insecure operating system" or "go out of business", then you seriously messed up running your business, or shouldn't have had one in the first place because you weren't ready - and you deserve to go out of business.
"Equipment lasting 20 years might have been fine last century, but as technology progresses, so does the rate at which we churn out new/better tech. 10 years is plenty of time today..."
You can't just generalise 10 years as an adequate lifetime for a capital expense. That's ridiculous. It is all tied in with margins & volumes and opex.
In addition change for what often amounts to little or no improvement is inefficient.
"and in the next 50 years or so, you're going to need to upgrade every year."
Well I hope you're earning very big money from your business degree, because in your world view life is going to get a lot more expensive in the future
The PC needs to adjust. Mature technology always moves at glacial speeds, simply because it works good enough and money is better spend on different things.
Essentially, the PC is mature, and XP is its OS. Its fine for what it needs to do: show some reasonable UI to control other mature stuff that won't be replaced for ages either. People wanting fancy need to buy something else.
Equipment lasting 20 years might have been fine last century, but as technology progresses, so does the rate at which we churn out new/better tech. 10 years is plenty of time today
If you think train fares are outrageous today, try applying a 10-year life to equipment used on the railway. Signalling systems for starters, or the trains themselves. I think a doubling of fares overnight would hardly come close to covering the additional costs.
"it is common for capital goods to have an expected life [far exceeding typical PC/server lifetimes]."
Indeed it is, which is why Windows XP Embedded was around, and will be supported (complete with patches) for a few more years.
Strange that it's not mentioned afaict in the article or comments.
Not that I'm recommending it, other options may well be more appropriate in some cases - but it did and does exist. MS were already committed to continuing to support it, even before MS decided that a sufficiently large cheque book would also provide continued support for generic (non-embedded) XP.
"If it works initially then why should it not continue to work"
Quite, and I confidently expect isolated systems running XP to carry on working until the hardware fails. I've heard no credible claims that XP is going to stop working next week.
It's obviously different if you want to use your lathe to surf for porn on the internet. If that's what floats your boat, I suggest you get a new lathe with Windows 8 on it. (It'll serve you right.)
Irrelevant here. All our XPs are still on sp3.
Can't you people including Microsoft actually get the idea why there are so many XPs still in service?
We XP users just want to be left alone. We don't care about viruses, we don't care about patches/updates. We are NOT interested in Microsoft flogging us new crap, NOR new services, we are NOT interested in upgrades! Get it??
XP sp3 is working just fine as it is, it has been for years -- in most cases raw out of the box as sp3, it will continue that way in many of our applications for years to come.
We have NO intention of changing anything.
Now, just piss off!
Nothing, and that's exactly what we are doing.
Perhaps some explanation is necessary. That abovementioned comment was written after many posts by me where I was careful to explain the rationale behind such decisions.
Let me be precise about this:
1. Microsoft, in its newer offerings (Vista, W7 and W8 etc.), has only provided customers with a range of products that are functionally different to XP, thus there's no newer equivalent products to XP now available, and (b) Microsoft has now finally withdrawn all support for XP.
2. Not only were Microsoft's newer products both functionally significantly different to XP but also Microsoft provided no built-in fallback options to provide the equivalent of XP; thus their deployment was difficult and expensive (and little incentive to use them).
3. Operationally, the new products were so functionally different to the previous line W95/98/W2K & XP that in ergonomic terms it was the equivalent of say General Motors or Ford offering their new vehicles with the position of the brake and clutch interchanged. By providing no fall-back position to earlier versions, Microsoft was just experimenting on its users, we were its guinea pigs, W8 being the quintessential example.
4. In fact, Microsoft actually withdrew all useful/effective support from XP ages ago when it failed to provide updated drivers etc. for new mobo chipsets and other hardware. By failing to do so Microsoft used coercive business practices to 'force' users to newer versions. However, many resisted this coercion.
5. Whilst most techies and readers of El Reg welcome upgrades and new technology (believe it or not that also includes me), Microsoft's changes were unacceptable for both many normal and commercial/industrial users.
6. What we are now witnessing is a pretty open and brazen campaign by Microsoft to make these reticent and recalcitrant miscreants feel guilty, in that somehow by not upgrading they are going to be the downfall of computing (by hinting that their unpatched machines will be the downfall of everyone).
7. To my knowledge, there is no other company in history that has suggested that by continuing to use its previous product, the world would come to and end. In marketing terms, this has to be a first.
8. Now, who caused this 'catastrophe' in the first place? If there is to be a 'downfall' then I'd suggest with respect that Microsoft's business and marketing practices will ultimately be to blame.
Good points. I think the folks who came up with that detestable ribbon should be tied up with it and made to watch Teletubbies all day....
I think, though, that the real motivation for getting folks off of XP is that it's the last Microsoft operating system without the so-called secure media path, one of the many "features" brought to us in Vista.
Little by little by little Big Brother is being build into our PCs and other boxes, all of which "phone home" every so often, and have various timers, counters, controls, etc. to be sure that we do what "they" want. I don't think it's so much copy protection as content control, i.e. WE control what you see (aka the Outer Limits TV show...).
Any content deemed unacceptable to the licensing/what-have-you hardware will either be reproduced using low-fidelity playback options, or not at all. We don't have the military-industrial complex here, we have the Microsoft-Hollywood complex....just as bad...I like Windows, but Vista/Win8 are just trash. Win7 is barely acceptable, but an option provided needed features of XP are there.
Have a look at built-in drop-dead-dates on printers, and their associated evil spawn chips on ink cartridges.
Planned obsolescence and the like. There are many of us who are NOT cheap, but don't want to change a running system, nor do we want to buy new hardware every time some software vendor fancies adding some unnecessary eye-candy to their GUI (ending up with what I term a GUI mess...like the ribbon).
With regard to these fans of ever-shorter product lifecycles, some people want something new, whether or not it's better; I want something better, whether or not it's new.
</rant>
"I guess you all are still using 2001 mobes. After all they still work and can make calls and send/receive SMS"
Were talking about desktop computers here, that have already matured since the 90s and are now being artificially end-of-lifed.
Not a technology that has only just emerged this decade.
If you can't add anything constructive to the discussion, then shut up.
Matured? I see a lot of new technolgies entering now desktop PCs. Multicore CPUs, GPUs for high-speed parallel processing, SSD disks, 10Gb and higher networks, IPv6, and so on. Sure, you don't need them to update your FB page, you can do it with your expensive mobe which you of course need to update every six months to feel "cool", because it adds "exciting new technologies" like a fingerprint reader, or some more screen size, right?
It's you that understand nothing about IT, it's something more than what you do in your bedroom, so please, shut up, coward.
Matured? I see a lot of new technolgies entering now desktop PCs. Multicore CPUs, GPUs for high-speed parallel processing, SSD disks, 10Gb and higher networks, IPv6, and so on.
I've used computers before 16 colours, and well before the mouse. Honestly, desktop computers haven't really changed in the past decade, for what consumers use them for. Don't believe the marketing.
You can still use your old Compaq presario for emailing, writing letters, and whatever else 90% of desktop users do. Try it, if you don't believe me.
Sure, you don't need them to update your FB page
Exactly.
you can do it with your expensive mobe which you of course need to update every six months to feel "cool", because it adds "exciting new technologies"
I don't own a mobile phone. And to be cool, I've stopped wearing socks when I wear sandals (apparently it's not cool to wear it like that).
It's you that understand nothing about IT, it's something more than what you do in your bedroom, so please, shut up, coward.
While on the topic of maturity...
Trying to aggressively put an anonymous person down like that, without even adding anything constructive, just because they do not share your opinion does demonstrate your inability to even pretend to be a mature adult.
"Honestly, desktop computers haven't really changed in the past decade"
Are you sure? Just open one of ten years ago, and a new one. It's easy to spot the differences. And there are even more you can't see. You see them if you actually code for them.
There's a lot you can do with an actual desktop you couldn't do ten years ago. Sure, an old PC still works. And XP still works. Keep on using it, nobody forbids it. Just you can't ask Microsoft to mantain it when it's no longer a viable business.
"I don't own a mobile phone. And to be cool, I've stopped wearing socks when I wear sandals (apparently it's not cool to wear it like that)."
Ahh, you're Stallman!
"Trying to aggressively put "
I was not the first one to be aggessive - and I was fully constructive - I explained what there's new in actual PCs older operating system can't support, but it looks people like you understand only new widgets as "improvemetns", and that's say a lot about what you know about IT.
Your post was totally irrrelevant and not constructive at all - frankly I do not care if you have a mobe or not, or if you wear socks or not. But I guess you're wearing the same socks for the last thirteen years and never thought to "upgrade" them...
There's a lot you can do with an actual desktop you couldn't do ten years ago. Sure, an old PC still works. And XP still works. Keep on using it, nobody forbids it.
Personally, I use the latest and greatest hardware my company can acquire. My job requires me to, and I love experimenting and learning about new things. Its what keeps me going. I'm a software engineer working on consumer products which has to work on devices before the likes of you get their hands on it. I'm all for the whole world upgrading every month - that's more customers!
However, even though me and my company have thrown £1000's at Microsoft, I am (by far) not their typical customer.
Get your head out of the IT industry and look at the real world. Along the lines of this article (did you read it?), you don't need SSD, touch-screen, or translucent window borders to operate a lathe, check patients in, print labels, book a holiday, write a CV, email/chat with relatives abroad, or watch farting dog videos. People have been doing that very well for over a decade... how are they struggling by not having the latest and greatest that the IT industry will produce next year?
And while you're at it, lay off the forums, meet real people.
Just you can't ask Microsoft to mantain it when it's no longer a viable business.
The article (please, read it) shows that it is, even at the worst pessimistic scenario.
This post has been deleted by its author
However, even though me and my company have thrown £1000's at Microsoft, I am (by far) not their typical customer.
Precisely correct, and for that very reason Microsoft has failed.
For a given version number, every version of Windows, Home, Professional, Enterprise etc., is essentially identical--just appropriately nobbled to suit marketing requirements.
Most noticeably, there is NO technical version of Windows--a version not meant for general consumption but rather for developmental technical/scientific and or industrial use. A version in which 'Administrator' was actually an administrator with super-user status etc., or where I could select whatever specific GUI I wanted, or where I could bolt on another file system which doesn't belong to MS.
For example, one of my pet peeves, is not being able to hierarchically control or set file-locking. If I'm stupid or careless enough to accidentally unlock and delete the wrong file--a critical system file for instance and BSOD the machine then so be it. Past usual default warnings, I should be able to what I want with techie-specific O/S.
If proper techie versions of Windows were offered then many of the criticisms leveled at Microsoft would disappear.
Microsoft has added a lot of functionality, with the emphasis on fun rather than function (eye candy, etc.).
They've taken a single-user OS and basically kludged it into a multi-user and/or multiprocessor OS, rather than building a true server OS from the ground up (looks like marketing won that battle, eh...).
When the only choices out there are MS (with its MULTICS-derivative file system) and any of the *X's (with their MULTICS-derivative file systems), we're pretty much sunk until someone has the guts to come out with something completely new (and I'd hoped that WinFS would have been that....).
Maybe not all of the "big iron" bells and whistles for home users, but a more-secure, well thought-out file system and security scheme would have been nice. On the server side of things, it should have been designed with the datacenter in mind rather than just a clone and go....
They've taken a single-user OS and basically kludged it into a multi-user and/or multiprocessor OS, rather than building a true server OS from the ground up (looks like marketing won that battle, eh...).
Dead on, methinks.
Despite my love of Linux, the Win32/64 API is all pervasive so we have to live with it or somehow manage it. The real tragedy in all this is that there is no true competition for MS. As I've said elsewhere, it would be wonderful if say ReactOS were to offer an alternative clone of Windows but that project really hasn't gotten off the ground, so it's back to MS.
Where there's a monopoly and a captive market, one can't expect innovation to flourish, unfortunately.
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