I would say when they need some displays set up, they don't want to buy in any new computers so they just get the old office PC's which aren't in use anymore.
Why Do Companies Still Use Microsoft Windows For Displays?
31–40 of 164 posts
Re: Why Do Companies Still Use Microsoft Windows For Displays?
#32Because .NET makes it very easy for average developers to write GUI programs, and Visual Studio is what they use to write them. In theory, this developer could just use Mono to run his .NET app on Linux. But that requires them to learn how to do that. Personally, I've never found a clear tutorial on how to take a .NET GUI app that you've just written in Visual Studio and get it running on Mono. I haven't looked in se…
".NET makes it very easy for average developers to write GUI programs" - it makes it easy for any kind of developer, that's the defining characteristic of best frameworks.
Re: Why Do Companies Still Use Microsoft Windows For Displays?
#33A lot of these systems are just displaying a web page which makes it very easy to move to Linux. I know a lot of the transport ones are simple static web pages on auto refresh. I built some smarter screens which use AJAX and JavaScript which is less jarring when it updates.
I've changed a set of digital signs from running full screen IE on windows (with very long VGA cables) to chromium on Raspberry Pis. The new system behaves a lot better but there were lots of little things to tweak to get it running well. I wrote a short blog post with all the relevant configuration: https://shutdownscanner.com/Blog/Posts/Raspberry-Pi-Digital-...
A lot of the new TVs are smart and come with a built in android browser so you don't need anything else. We have one of these and run Pis on all the existing dumb TVs.
Re: Why Do Companies Still Use Microsoft Windows For Displays?
#34I've seen presentations being really embarrassing because of windows-updates too.
Re: Why Do Companies Still Use Microsoft Windows For Displays?
#35Because the hardware support is good. Because the licensing costs are pretty small compared to the project costs. Because there is plenty of tech support available. Because Windows flash support is good. Because there are plenty of developers who will customize it for you. Because it is easy to add to the existing networking systems being used. There are plenty of reasons to choose Windows for this kind of thing. why…
I agree. Used both Flash and WPF (XAML) for public-facing screens - both worked fine and I didn't have to use mouse jiggler.
Re: Why Do Companies Still Use Microsoft Windows For Displays?
#36A quick Google search of the phrase "build an animated display" with one of the following strings appended to the end reveals the answer, I should think: "raspberry pi" -- 1,060,000 results "linux" -- 4,890,000 results "os x" -- 6,910,000 results "windows" -- 32,800,000 results
There's an office near work that gives its receptionists Macs; it looks great, but an insane amount of money for the functionality they use I'm sure.
Well maybe they installed good old Win 7 on them? As a customer you just need to see the aluminium and a glowing apple.
Re: Why Do Companies Still Use Microsoft Windows For Displays?
#37Because unfortunately, most of these companies are clueless about technology, and buy from whoever comes to them through the door, pitching them about how awesome it would be to buy some thousand dollar/unit such displays, and have them show info to their customers.
Re: Why Do Companies Still Use Microsoft Windows For Displays?
#38Like anything shitty in tech being used, decisions pulled by non-engineers.
...who are good at estimating business value rather then playing with obscure unsupported tech.
Re: Why Do Companies Still Use Microsoft Windows For Displays?
#39Some ideas: - The cost of a Windows license is tiny compared to the cost of the hardware and software. - The cost of installation and maintenance: How much does it cost to pay someone to attach that screen to the wall and run wires around the building to the room containing the server? - Back in 1995 it probably did make sense to use Windows, since it had wider support for hardware and good developer tools. Now that…
If Microsoft is selling them these "solutions" (not products) directly, then it's likely the hardware costs several times more than if you'd buy it from the store.
Re: Why Do Companies Still Use Microsoft Windows For Displays?
#40Because .NET makes it very easy for average developers to write GUI programs, and Visual Studio is what they use to write them. In theory, this developer could just use Mono to run his .NET app on Linux. But that requires them to learn how to do that. Personally, I've never found a clear tutorial on how to take a .NET GUI app that you've just written in Visual Studio and get it running on Mono. I haven't looked in se…
Not to detract from your points (you make good ones); web is probably not a good medium for such displays. Not always, at least. You'd want them to be reasonably functional without comms. Last I checked (I may be wrong), HTML 5 constrains local storage to 5Mb, which is precious little, if the display uses images/media.
Use local files for that.