"J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote in
:
In message
31, DanS
writes:
"BillW50" wrote in
:
(Note: Any deleted material does not mean I agree with it.
And again, going from 32 bit to 64 bit. CPUs with new
added instruction sets and other advances in hardware
architecture can require changes to take advantages of
it.
OMG! Windows supported 16 bit for almost two decades. Now
the move from 32 to 64 bit, it can't be done anymore?
With the older Microsoft programmers it would happen. But
with the new lazy new programmers, it is not possible.
It wasn't 'lazy programmers', no matter what you say.f
It was a business decision.
It's a bit of a combination of both. It takes a non-zero
amount more effort to make something backwards-compatible
than not to; if the choice is between maintaining backwards
compatibility and adding new features (let alone fixing
bugs), and your programming resources are finite, it can
indeed be a business decision: you hope you will attract
more new users with your new features than lose old users.
You can't support 100% of everything forever.
At some point, you have to decide that instead of
supporting 100% you can only support 99.9999998% of users(,
in relation to this 16-bit issue.)
However, I think supporting older device drivers _as a
whole_ - i. e. the _family_ of them - isn't a 0.0000002% of
users issue. Writing a new OS so that it doesn't _work
with_ older drivers _is_ lazy - not necessarily lazy
programming, lazy business decision, as in "if we drop
support for older drivers, we'll not even have to _think_
about it in future in our board meetings".
Users are crying about Windows 'bloat', and how do you cut
bloat.....by removing things that *virtually noone* uses
anymore.
As opposed to adding things that "virtually no-one" (note
the hyphen) wants?
Why point out a typo, when you actually have ideas to convey?
(A third of time it comes out like that, antoher 1/3 it's
'none' and the other third is 'no one'. It's because I'm *not*
a typer, and my brain works faster than my fingers do,
skipping letters and appearing dyslexic, like the 'antoher'
typo I left above purposely.)
Ideally, software should be a whole lot more modular, so
you only have to buy (or at least install) the bits you
want. But that's not attractive from the business point of
view, as they want to be able to keep selling the whole
suite every time.
Of course. They're in business to sell s/w.
(It's not exclusive to softwa if I buy
a new TV, for example, it is likely to include facilities I
no longer not only probably don't want anyway, but also
already have in the devices I'll be connecting to it.) []
There are only 3 OSs now that are viable for everyday
use.......Windows, Linux and OSX (MAC).
I'd eve say that for the man in the street it's only the
first and third two: for whatever reason, all the main (US)
or high (UK) street stores (in UK, that's PCWorld/Currys,
Comet, Tesco, Sainsbury, John Lewis, Selfridges, even
ToysRUs ...) do _not_ sell Linux-based computers in the
mainstream, though will occasionally sell some _devices_
that are Linux inside (but not mention it, and have no need
to as it's embedded).
Well, my list of wasn't in any particular order.
There are many that tried to get into the game. Although
I see a big turning point and nobody is giving what
people want. So the door is wide open for even a startup
to step in.
I can't see any new OS taking off in the real world: it'd
have to run Windows and/or Mac applications or not enough
people would buy it for it to be anything but a novelty for
geeks.
Like Linux ? (Don't let *them* hear you say that...wait, that
was me that said that. I run Linux too, 1/2 the time.)
As a desktop OS, Linux is comletely useable now, for a
*typical home user*, except that 1) you need to make sure the
hardware will work, and two, 2) you'd need to learn new
troubleshooting and repair techniques, 3) some of your s/w
would need to be replaced, which would require some investment
in time to familiarize yourself with it. *Some* of the most
common home user apps are produced for Linux and Windows,
Firefox and Thunderbird spring to mind immediately. Dropbox,
Skype (although the Linux version really does s*ck), Nero,
OpenOffice/LibreOffice, GIMP, Filezilla, Opera, Pidgin.
My dual boot uses the same user profiles for Thunderbird and
Firefox, so no matter which OS I boot into, I'v got the same
user data in both. I see the same mail, same favorites, etc.
Linux does run some Windows s/w using WINE,
It's not that M$/Apple now even have to apply their
(undoubtably significant) marketing force: they're just
_there_ in such a big way that nothing can shift them.
At least not over a truly significant span of time. Since car
analogies are common.....
....Toyota....1958, the first year Toyota began exporting to
the US. 287 cars. At that time, I believe GM ws the hands-down
winner for auto sales.
....Toyota....2009, Toyota Overtakes GM as Number One in Sales
It took over 50 years, but it was done.
(I know, not a truly valid analogy, since the cars don't need
to interop with other cars, but still.)
OK,
some of the developments via the mobile and tablet markets
are likely to have an effect - but I suspect it's going to
be more that Microsoft and Apple incorporate ideas from
those areas, rather than that those are going to replace
M/A. (There is the _possibility_ that computers as we know
them - desktops and laptops/netbooks - will themselves
become the exception, with most people using very portable
devices, but I don't think so for at least 5 years.)
[]
You can say what you
want, but you can't change the truth. And the only danger
Microsoft has is they lost all of the programmers who has
learned the hard lessons from the past. As the new
programmers don't have a clue.
Well, I'm assuming by 'programmers' you are talking about
the heads of individual programs...the one's that *actually
make the decisions* of what is or isn't included in
whatever. The people that actually do the programming, do
what they are told.....unless you think the 24-year old
first year out of college CS graduate is making the
decisions of what goes or doesn't go into Windows.
No, but the person making the decisions may well be a
2x-year-old fresh out of business school.
And, at MS, specifically, are they ?....
----------------------------------------
"Steven Sinofsky (born 1965[1]) has been the President of the
Windows Division at Microsoft since September 2008,
responsible for the development and marketing of Windows,
Windows Live, and Internet Explorer.".....
......In July 1989, Sinofsky joined Microsoft as a software
design engineer.....
You, and BillW50 can read more he
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Sinofsky
but, he's *certainly* not NEW, and has been on-board MS
through the *entire* PC explosion, 3.1 through Windows7 and
now going into Windows 8.
(Not as the head of Windows the entire time, but as a point to
show that those 'running the show' certainly aren't brand-
spanking new 'lazy programmers'. )
--------------------------------------------
Newly appointed head of 'Server & Tools Business'
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/exec/nadella/
Is this *another* one of BillW50's 'lazy programmers'?
....."Nadella joined Microsoft in 1992."
---------------------------------------------
Seems as though the people that *are* making the decisions
aren't new young "programmers" that don't have a clue.
(Not that that
_necessarily_ means s/he'll make _wrong_ decisions, though
we oldies....
[BillW50, does the 50 signify something?] may
So the reason I'm not a typer, is because I'm not far behind
that. Nowadays, 'Typing' is called 'Keyboarding'. When I was
in school, 'Typing' was for girls. There was uproar among my
class when in 6th grade, the boys were forced to do a 1/2 year
of 'Home Ec.' and the girls to do a 1/2 year of 'Shop'. (That
was, until we boys realized most of the 'Home Ec' course, for
the boys version of it anyway, consisted of making and eating
food.)
I've been programming since my first C64 back in the
80's....had 8-tracks, watched black and white TV at times,
lived through and hated disco, watched with horror with the
rise of the front-wheel drive car as the standard, etc.
tend to think they tend to be _hasty_ decisions.)
They can be. MS has made many bad decisions before, like Bob
and Me, that BillW50 pointed out, but they seem to have
recovered from those, haven't they......
.....many thought that the time for MS to fall was with the
release of Vista....expecting large numbers to bail and seek
refuge in MAC/OSX and Linux.....and it just didn't happen.
....not that it won't, in 20 or 30 *more* years.....