Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The End of Windows

stratechery.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

281–290 of 617 posts

Re: The End of Windows

#281

Post by Endy »

bhauer wrote: post #243
cpeterso wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can see a nice graph showing (Firefox) users steadily upgrading from Windows 7 to 10 from Mozilla's Firefox telemetry: https://hardware.metrics.mozilla.com/#goto-os-and-architectu...

That hardware report is surprising to me in many ways. * In 2018, the most popular resolution for users of Firefox is still 1366x768. And only 1920x1080 is making any headway against the dominance of 1366x768. As much as I am surrounded by the culture of multiple 4K+ displays, apparently this is not at all commonplace. 4K doesn't even get listed, presumably lumped into the "Other" category. * In 2018, the most popula…

> * In 2018, the most popular memory amount for users of Firefox is still 4GB, trailed by the also disappointingly small 8GB. In my world, I consider 16GB a bare minimum, but at least with memory I haven't been deluding myself—I know many people economize on memory. Still, I would have thought 8GB was the most common memory size by now.

In 2018, my computer only has 2GB RAM and runs more than fast enough for what I need on a 32-bit processor. I don't understand why some people always want bigger hardware numbers, rather than better software.

> * A surprising number of people still have Flash installed. I do too, I don't see how it's abnormal.

> I can barely conceive of the poor experience of running a modern web browser on 4 GB of memory at 1366x768. Can you imagine the user experience of today's modern over-JavaScripted web pages on such underpowered hardware: not simply slow because of their grotesquely large transmission payload but also because they caused your computer to start swapping memory pages to disk?

I can barely conceive of how narrow-minded and myopic your technological experience must be that you feel only the latest and "greatest" is viable. As someone who browses the Web regularly, I spend a lot of time on places like HN, YouTube, etc. My screen resolution is 1440x900 - one step above the 1366x768. As I said, 2GB RAM, etc. This is why I've argued, constantly, against the nonsense of Chrome and "modern" Firefox. That's why users of old computers are going to Pale Moon if they know about it, or back to Internet Explorer, or just not upgrading to the newest Firefox.

Your technological experience is very much a high-class experience, but you have to understand that there are users all over the world and in all economic positions. All this push toward expecting the best and most modern only works to force out the common person - in America it's the poor person in the ghetto who still is well above the position of people in other, even less prosperous nations. Most people, if they are lucky, have a used People who have the view that everyone should have base access to the latest, greatest, and most wonderful hardware upset me greatly. I have one comment about it that seems constructive. If you think it's so important that they should have this, you should provide it. If you can't give every person who has an old reliable computer (that they can repair) the newest bleeding-edge tech (and give them service when it inevitably breaks), then you need to understand that they have valid concerns too - and help provide better software and help others like you to understand what reality looks like for most of the world.

Re: The End of Windows

#282

Post by saiya-jin »

cptskippy wrote: post #166
asveikau wrote: post #33

I still can't wrap my head around everything that was wrongheaded about Windows 8, and I was working there for most of its dev cycle. One wonders what would have happened if they just sort of let Windows be Windows. I.e. if they had continued iterating on core stuff but left UI and general philosophy resembling Win7's trajectory and not tried to force people into WinRT/UWP/store. Even though Win10 attempted correctiv…

> One wonders what would have happened if they just sort of let Windows be Windows. I.e. if they had continued iterating on core stuff but left UI and general philosophy resembling Win7's trajectory and not tried to force people into WinRT/UWP/store. With Windows 8 they tried to do too much too quickly and not well, however their motivations and intention were spot on in my opinion. Security has always been a pain po…

that's... not what most users want. even as a dev myself, I understand most people want just freedom and no hassle, OS to be there in the background, not creating narrow allowed alley for its own users.

will keep my Win7 for as long as hardware and software keeps running. don-t expect much more from OS honestly

Re: The End of Windows

#283

Post by ynniv »

bluGill wrote: post #237
ynniv wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that getting Office to run on Android and iOS is a bright future, but that doesn't mean you put Windows in the corner with "some other stuff". Maybe there are too many people on it and they've gotten too comfortable? Spin it out into a company with half the staff and let it soak up its own sun.

The problem with Windows is operating systems are a commodity. You shouldn't care about it. You are about opening your documents on your desktop and phone - you don't even care what program opens the documents. Mac OSX, Linux+desktop (any of several), IOS, and Android are all operating systems that can do everything you need of an OS, except MAYBE run windows programs. Which is to say Windows as a separate company pr…

If that were true, Linux on the desktop would have already won and this decision wouldn't be controversial. I think what's preventing this is that making a productive desktop operating system is more difficult than we think.

Re: The End of Windows

#284

Post by makecheck »

asveikau wrote: post #33

I still can't wrap my head around everything that was wrongheaded about Windows 8, and I was working there for most of its dev cycle. One wonders what would have happened if they just sort of let Windows be Windows. I.e. if they had continued iterating on core stuff but left UI and general philosophy resembling Win7's trajectory and not tried to force people into WinRT/UWP/store. Even though Win10 attempted correctiv…

To be fair though, it’s not that a desktop app store couldn’t work, it’s that Apple’s implementation and set of restrictions are infuriating.

Re: The End of Windows

#285

Post by Endy »

saiya-jin wrote: post #282
cptskippy wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One wonders what would have happened if they just sort of let Windows be Windows. I.e. if they had continued iterating on core stuff but left UI and general philosophy resembling Win7's trajectory and not tried to force people into WinRT/UWP/store. With Windows 8 they tried to do too much too quickly and not well, however their motivations and intention were spot on in my opinion. Security has always been a pain po…

that's... not what most users want. even as a dev myself, I understand most people want just freedom and no hassle, OS to be there in the background, not creating narrow allowed alley for its own users. will keep my Win7 for as long as hardware and software keeps running. don-t expect much more from OS honestly

I second this.

Re: The End of Windows

#286

Post by reaperducer »

bhauer wrote: post #243
cpeterso wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can see a nice graph showing (Firefox) users steadily upgrading from Windows 7 to 10 from Mozilla's Firefox telemetry: https://hardware.metrics.mozilla.com/#goto-os-and-architectu...

That hardware report is surprising to me in many ways. * In 2018, the most popular resolution for users of Firefox is still 1366x768. And only 1920x1080 is making any headway against the dominance of 1366x768. As much as I am surrounded by the culture of multiple 4K+ displays, apparently this is not at all commonplace. 4K doesn't even get listed, presumably lumped into the "Other" category. * In 2018, the most popula…

It doesn't surprise me too much.

I develop for an organization that serves people of mid-to-lower economic strata. 10% of our users are still on Windows XP.

We get caught up in the tech sector echo chamber and don't realize that upgrade cycles for millions of people is a lot slower than we are used to.

I think that it's not surprising to see what Firefox is reporting. A lot of people go to Firefox seeking something that runs faster or better than what came with their Windows box years ago. Most of the people we serve on low-end computers are Chrome, not IE/Edge.

Re: The End of Windows

#287

Post by makecheck »

orev wrote: post #212
asveikau wrote: post #33

I still can't wrap my head around everything that was wrongheaded about Windows 8, and I was working there for most of its dev cycle. One wonders what would have happened if they just sort of let Windows be Windows. I.e. if they had continued iterating on core stuff but left UI and general philosophy resembling Win7's trajectory and not tried to force people into WinRT/UWP/store. Even though Win10 attempted correctiv…

I feel like they started gathering metrics and then had no idea how to interpret them, and the result was Windows 8. "The Start menu only gets clicked on a few times per day. That must mean no one uses it, so let's remove it". Are you kidding me? It's like they really have no clue there. Some of these things are just so blindingly obvious you are left with no words...

Yep. If this was a car, they’d have said: “clearly the brake pedal is needed but let’s get rid of the door handle, people only touch that occasionally”.

Re: The End of Windows

#288

Post by bhauer »

dannyw wrote: post #257
bhauer wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That hardware report is surprising to me in many ways. * In 2018, the most popular resolution for users of Firefox is still 1366x768. And only 1920x1080 is making any headway against the dominance of 1366x768. As much as I am surrounded by the culture of multiple 4K+ displays, apparently this is not at all commonplace. 4K doesn't even get listed, presumably lumped into the "Other" category. * In 2018, the most popula…

You seem to assume a large portion of users are software engineers or tech people. You may consider a 16GB ‘bare minimum’, but not everyone needs that - nor can even afford that (or a laptop more than, say, new or used for $750).

> (or a laptop more than, say, new or used for $750).

To me, the hardware report shows technology is quite stagnant on display resolution and memory. 1366x768 is a resolution from 2002 or thereabouts. 4GB was common in desktop computers in 2005. ~15 years have passed and consumers in the $750 price range are still hamstrung with 1366x768 and 4GB of memory? I would expect better from a $750 phone, let alone a computer.

I think we're actually talking about computers that are very old and have never been upgraded or new computers in the $200 to $400 range.

Re: The End of Windows

#290

Post by dralley »

pishpash wrote: post #226
blinkingled wrote: post #156

It isn't really the end of Windows - it's the end of Windows' dominance of Microsoft mindshare. Windows 10 was the giant step in that direction - an always updating, maintenance mode, single OS that MS will need to support. Arguably until Win 7 dies out they won't be entirely there but once they are, maintaining Windows is a much simpler affair than yesteryears. None of this means Windows itself is dying - it only me…

Satya is having enormous financial success in chasing much needed markets, but the jury's still out on ditching MS's strengths in large software development in favor of a no-support permanent beta culture at a moment when the latter is showing its ugly side.

I kind of expect that the "let consumers be the beta testers and fire all our QA" approach is going to majorly bite them in the ass at some point and lose a lot of goodwill.
Post reply on HN