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The End of Windows

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51–60 of 617 posts

Re: The End of Windows

#51
post #6

I'll be interested to see how this bifurcation of the Windows team plays out. Windows 10 has been a mixed bag - some nice new features but also a lot of half baked buggy stuff. The evergreen nature of Windows 10 feels like the right move, but I'm worried they're going to let the OS stagnate. There's already a lot of low hanging fruit they could clean up with an update, but haven't. I'm not a huge fan of using my tabl…

Linux on desktop is pretty amazing. Haven't looked back in 3 years.

Outside of Dev work unfortunately Linux is not that much fun. If you need to do accounting, graphics or other work there are options on Linux but they are usually way behind what Mac or Windows are offering.

Re: The End of Windows

#52

So are mom and pop businesses using Chromebooks and Ipads to do their accounting now? Last I checked Windows was still pretty dominant in both Enterprise and midsize businesses, though I could see a food truck being run from a phone (theoretically).

I own a small business and I run my accounting with FreshBooks, which I can easily use via my phone, iPad, or MacBook. I haven't used windows for 18 years. I'm probably an outlier, but it can be done.

Re: The End of Windows

#53
post #6

I'll be interested to see how this bifurcation of the Windows team plays out. Windows 10 has been a mixed bag - some nice new features but also a lot of half baked buggy stuff. The evergreen nature of Windows 10 feels like the right move, but I'm worried they're going to let the OS stagnate. There's already a lot of low hanging fruit they could clean up with an update, but haven't. I'm not a huge fan of using my tabl…

Linux on desktop is pretty amazing. Haven't looked back in 3 years.

I should wade back in and try again. I attempt to use a Linux distro as my daily driver every couple of years or so. I can usually get pretty close, but inevitably I end up going back to Windows and MacOS.

There's small UI affordances I miss, there's no MS Office (which is becoming less of a problem for sure), Spotify is iffy, etc etc. So many small things that add up.

Finally - Windows Susbsytem for Linux, or whatever it's called, has really made CLI work on Windows painless. With oh my zsh and CMDer I can do just about everything I can on my Ubuntu machines. Even though Windows 10 or MacOS aren't perfect, the pain isn't quite great enough for me to seriously make a change.

Re: The End of Windows

#54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux on desktop is pretty amazing. Haven't looked back in 3 years.

If I still have to open the terminal and edit text files in /etc for essential things like sound, WiFi, accelerated graphics, and so on then it hasn't really evolved in the right ways. Linux on the desktop has always been a niche experience for a niche audience. ChromeOS and Android (both based on Linux) are mainstream desktop experiences, as are MacOS, iOS, and Windows.

If you still have to, except you don't have to.

Re: The End of Windows

#55
post #15
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see iPads everywhere at smaller restaurants. Especially in food courts. I've even seen a few Android tablets (including at one upscale food hall in Plano, TX). Not just restaurants, too; independent stores are picking up tablets at a huge rate. If a store has opened in the last three years or so, they're probably using a tablet as a cash register. Tablets are rapidly taking over the market for cash registers.

Many of those tablets are actually running W10.

I'm pretty sure all the iPads I see are not. In all honesty, I can't recall the last time I saw a Windows laptop in the wild.

Re: The End of Windows

#56
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux on desktop is pretty amazing. Haven't looked back in 3 years.

Is there a laptop you would recommend?

I've used Linux on the desktop and laptop since about 2000, always with thinkpads.

Back in the late 90s there were genuine hurdles to do with Linux desktops, my 1999 desktop didn't work in X with redhat 5.2 because of the graphics card.

Today's when most productivity programs are web based, and so much more is cross platform, its far easier to run Linux than windows.

Re: The End of Windows

#57
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

General Purpose Computing using PC's is a thing because of Microsoft (and IBM). Without those two there would have never been a PC in the first place. The forces against general purpose computing are to be found on 1 infinite loop and 1600 Amphitheatre parkway.

I rode a PC wave that nearly completely bypassed IBM/Microsoft: 1. The "home" computer boom: ZX Spectrums, Acorn, Commodore, Atari with maybe an Apple II or a CPM machines for more serious use. 2. The Atari ST or Amiga wave. WIMP and productivity software as well as gaming and content creation 3. At this point I did switch to Windows but I could just have easily switched to Mac. Apple didn't cease to be a force at an…

I've had computers since the KIM-1 and the TRS-80 were around so I'm well aware of the world of personal computing before the PC.

That also makes me well aware of how much a fully decked out computer cost before IBM released a hardware spec that allowed companies to compete and the vast economies of scale this involved brought prices down to where mere mortals like myself could afford very powerful machines. Unlike the various 8 bit offerings of the time, which were relatively expensive for the computing power and storage options they provided.

Even though the initial PCs were expensive and anemic and did not even have the same capacities as many other machines aimed at the home market of the time it had staying power because of IBM's formidable manufacturing and marketing capabilities and Microsoft made it useful enough that non-technical users would dare to make the jump. Tandy/Radio Shack tried - and to some extent succeeded - to do this too with their TRS-80 models. Competition by the clone builders then did the rest.

So I'm sure there would have been a 'computing scene' without Microsoft and IBM, and it likely would have been an interesting one. But the machine under my desk would likely not have existed in that world, other than maybe as manufactured by DEC, Apollo, SGI or some other player of those days and it would have been marketed as a scientific workstation and cost North of $10K instead of 10% of that.

General purpose computing for the masses rode in on the back of economies of scale that IBM and Microsoft enabled.

(And trust me on this: I'm not exactly a Microsoft fan but that bit they did actually made the world a better place.)

Re: The End of Windows

#58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Linux on desktop is pretty amazing. Haven't looked back in 3 years.

Funny - I use a linux desktop in a VM only when I absolutely have to. Because I can't get much done without a struggle. But to each his own!

Opposite. I use Linux in VM because I can't be bothered to do everything in Windows (when I have to be on Windows).

Re: The End of Windows

#59
post #6

I'll be interested to see how this bifurcation of the Windows team plays out. Windows 10 has been a mixed bag - some nice new features but also a lot of half baked buggy stuff. The evergreen nature of Windows 10 feels like the right move, but I'm worried they're going to let the OS stagnate. There's already a lot of low hanging fruit they could clean up with an update, but haven't. I'm not a huge fan of using my tabl…

> also a lot of half baked buggy stuff

This morning I noticed I have a 3D Objects folder pinned to the This PC item that I can't remove. I also have Mixed Reality Portal and Mixed Reality Viewer that I can't remove.

Why on earth are those apps part of the default install? Worse though - why doesn't Microsoft make it easy to uninstall them? I don't want their crappy news, weather, contacts, maps, music, and other default apps. They should make the apps so good users want them, not force install them and make them uninstallable.

Re: The End of Windows

#60
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a long time developer on the Microsoft stack (approaching 20 years now?), it seems to me like this makes Microsoft and it's services less relevant and more easily replaceable in the long run. It's clear Azure and the related services are very lucrative, but I feel this is because of the prevalent use of Windows, not in spite of it.

well, as a long time developer in financial enterprise space (18 years) I think MS made a lot of right moves already since Nadela took over. betting all your eggs on Windows dominance proved to be a faulty (and dangerous) strategy especially since a lot of enterprise started using Linux / open source. For example I know a very major hedge fund that went from Windows everywhere to using every open source database they…

Microsoft could kill Linux's foothold in the server + SMB space right now just by simplifying licensing.

Get rid of CAL's. Charge a fixed price for a certain # of simultaneously running Windows instances, no matter how you run it. Even charging an ongoing subscription for this would be acceptable. Simplify the licensing situation for SMBs wanting to run an on-premise redundant systems, without needing diagrams to explain the difference between running, standby, CAL's, virtualization, etc.

If you're developing software for a platform, trying to figure out how to optimally license that platform should be the least of your concerns, so you can focus on your product.

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