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$600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

arstechnica.com

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Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#321

Post by marpstar »

gmueckl wrote: post #301
krn wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Office does a lot of things their own way and without a lot of the cross-compatibility that's a feature of most Microsoft products. That's probably because unlike most Microsoft products, Office is cross-platform and has to support multiple operating systems, including MacOS, iOS, and Android.

Isn't Office for Mac a completely diverged fork from an old Windows version of Office? I remember some blog posts from the understaffed Mac Office team stating that much several years ago. I don't know if they rebased it in the meantime. The posts read as if the big Office team was focused entirely on Windows and everything else was done by understaffed teams struggling to keep up.

Earlier this year they put out a blog post that announced that their cross-platform versions share a common codebase for "core functionality".

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/Office-365-Blog/Share...

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#322

Post by magnawave »

gmueckl wrote: post #301
krn wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Office does a lot of things their own way and without a lot of the cross-compatibility that's a feature of most Microsoft products. That's probably because unlike most Microsoft products, Office is cross-platform and has to support multiple operating systems, including MacOS, iOS, and Android.

Isn't Office for Mac a completely diverged fork from an old Windows version of Office? I remember some blog posts from the understaffed Mac Office team stating that much several years ago. I don't know if they rebased it in the meantime. The posts read as if the big Office team was focused entirely on Windows and everything else was done by understaffed teams struggling to keep up.

Not anymore. From what I’ve been told from an insider, the latest versions are derived from a common code base now, with platform specific bits separate for each platform.

The latest office for Mac looks quite a bit like the windows version now (for once) so it’s not too surprising.

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#323

Post by bubblethink »

candiodari wrote: post #285
ac29 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Will these more upmarket Chromebooks (which have x86 CPUs and acceptable RAM & storage) be OK to run any regular Linux distro? Yes, with the caveat that full BIOS/UEFI support sometimes lags hardware releases by 6-12 months - out of the box most Chromebooks can only boot ChromeOS. Pretty much all the Chromebook firmware work to support 3rd-party OS' is done by one guy, see his page here: https://mrchromebox.tech I…

Additional caveat: chrome DRM will no longer be functional if you do this.

I think the highest level of widevine will not work, which is probably used for 4k and such, but regular widevine that works on linux distros will still work since it doesn't need anything special.

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#324

Post by moetech »

komali2 wrote: post #264
Fnoord wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It depends. For me this is about being future proof. Its more secure than X, but you can compartmentalise as well via VMs (Qubes does this) or Docker (Jessie Frazelle runs everything in Docker). Enlightenment [1] supports Wayland since E20. If you use i3 right now, you can use Sway [2] as drop-in replacement. That's my plan (since I use i3) if I might some time. SailfishOS [3] also already uses Wayland. Tizen apparen…

Ubuntu 18.04 gnome shipped with the option, but if you select there's a 50% of forming a black hole where your machine used to be. I'm joking, but it really is super beta.

Wayland worked really well on Ubuntu 18.04 for the period of time I tried it.

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#325

Post by hoosieree »

mark_l_watson wrote: post #308
skymt wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I suspect one reason for $600 devices, other than Google itself trying to reposition Chromebooks as more upmarket, is because $600 Windows laptops are still are a mess of preloaded bullshit put there by the vendor. Microsoft has tried various ways to fix this but it only tends to protect high-end models. In the current version of Windows 10 there's a feature called "fresh start" that makes it trivial to reset to a…

You can also buy a windows 10 laptop from the microsoft store and not getting any crap ware installed on it.

Every other OS I've used recently (MacOS, Ubuntu, Centos, RHEL, ChromeOS) doesn't require special knowledge or extra work to remove pre-installed spyware/bloatware. They may well have crap installed, but at least they're subtle about it.

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#326

Post by wmeredith »

skymt wrote: post #89
sarcasmic wrote: post #24

Any Chromebook more than $400 right now is just there to absorb even more disposable income from the market, because they ship with nicer finishes and faster processors, but they are anemic on memory and storage, making them subpar for intense multitasking, or getting certain types of work done. The situations in which they excel can be reliably hit by Chromebooks around a $400 price point, and even cheaper Chromeboo…

> I suspect one reason for $600 devices, other than Google itself trying to reposition Chromebooks as more upmarket, is because $600 Windows laptops are still are a mess of preloaded bullshit put there by the vendor. Microsoft has tried various ways to fix this but it only tends to protect high-end models. In the current version of Windows 10 there's a feature called "fresh start" that makes it trivial to reset to a…

The geeks could already get this stuff on their system easily. 10+ years in UX design has taught me that little is more powerful than setting something to “default”.

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#327

Post by dawnerd »

tqkxzugoaupvwqr wrote: post #240
dawnerd wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My surface go has been treating me pretty well despite it’s pretty paltry cpu. My iPad Pro has its place and I don’t really see the surface go as being a tablet replacement more of a supplemental computer for when you don’t want to carry a bigger laptop. Or in my case something to test Windows apps and websites on.

If one day your Surface Go decides to die, you can download Windows VMs[1] from Microsoft and run those on whatever device you use to develop websites and apps. [1] https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-edge/tools/v...

Yeah I've used those for a long while. They're just not the same as having a physical device, ya know?

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#328

Post by gscott »

reaperducer wrote: post #304
danso wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stories about his negative side are likely more common because people feel more free to talk about them, now that Jobs, being dead, can no longer respond or retaliate against people with grievances, such as the daughter he disavowed [0]. I perhaps unfairly read negative connotations in your use of "revisionist", but I see nothing wrong with adding Jobs' uglier side to the historical record. It doesn't change what he…

I think you and I see eye-to-eye on Woz. I feel like there's been another uptick in idol worship when it comes to him in the last few years. As for Jobs, I was thinking more of his technical abilities. The Woz-worshippers putting him on a pedestal seem to feel it simultaneously necessary to denigrate Mr. Jobs' technical side. Jobs knew a hell of a lot about computers. More than I, or anyone I've met, ever will. It's…

There are a lot of videos of Jobs at NeXT computers doing meetings that are fun to watch where you get to see his deaper understanding.

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#329

Post by earenndil »

Fnoord wrote: post #238
michaelmrose wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any practical benefit right now to switching to wayland?

It depends. For me this is about being future proof. Its more secure than X, but you can compartmentalise as well via VMs (Qubes does this) or Docker (Jessie Frazelle runs everything in Docker). Enlightenment [1] supports Wayland since E20. If you use i3 right now, you can use Sway [2] as drop-in replacement. That's my plan (since I use i3) if I might some time. SailfishOS [3] also already uses Wayland. Tizen apparen…

What if my wm does not support wayland?

If it provides more security (I guess applications cannot draw over other applications, nor grab keyboard input unless they're in focus), then how can I have a wm? How can I have a screensaver?

Is there any reason to use it if most of my applications are running in xwayland?

Re: $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft

#330

Post by DennisAleynikov »

debaserab2 wrote: post #221
DennisAleynikov wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess apple is totally okay with being a minority of the market then since they're doubling down on proprietary sensors and apps that only work in their own ecosystem. they can ignore the 85% if they want. The 85% of the market will ignore them back in turn.

They "double-downed" on that decision ten years ago, and now they are the most profitable company in the world. I think it's safe to say whatever bet they made paid off handsomely.

it's paid off handsomely and cut off apples prospects of expanding beyond the 15% market share they currently enjoy. sure owning 15% of the global smartphone market makes them money but androids 85% share ensures googles dominance in the sector unless apple lowers some of its hardware walls and turns them into bridges.

#buildbridgesnotwalls

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