“After months of speculation, Microsoft has released XP Service Pack 2 in order to fix problems in its operating system. Amid reports of problems and some successes, I recommend prudent users continue to wait before deploying this service pack. It has security holes and its own set of problems. Meanwhile, the company is pulling features from its next operating system, code-named Longhorn, in an effort to get it on the street by 2006,” Charlie Paschal reports for The State.
The Register has reported, “Two mainstays of Windows Longhorn will be ‘decoupled’ from the 2006 release, with Microsoft dropping the WinFS storage and query system. Originally intended to be a full-blown replacement for the NTFS file system that put a database at the heart of Windows, WinFS will now be available as an add-on no sooner than 2007 for Longhorn, XP and Windows 2003. Or to be more precise – and here is another new piece of jargon for Redmond watchers – WinFS will be released as an ‘out-of-band add-on pack.’ Got that?”
“A cut-down version of Avalon, minus the compositor and the new device driver model will be backported to Windows XP too. Microsoft had already pledged to backport the next generation of middleware APIs, code named Indigo, to XP. All of which has left developers questioning the necessity of a ‘big bang.’ ‘If WinFX (including Avalon and Indigo) are going to be available for WinXP and Win2003.
“WinXP has a DOS emulator, and does not run off of it.”
Windows XP, the colourful clown suit for DOS.
re. “It continues to amaze me that anyone uses a PC running Windows. Absolutely mind-boggling.”
Business perceptions are slow to change … IT departments are loathe to change … Home users stick with what they know …
Apple doesn’t seem to have a clearly defined marketing strategy. It’s a pity they’re not pushing more into all of these areas as they have an amazing opportunity at the moment …
People forget (or never learn) what happens over time with technology and tech companies
High tech soon becomes “common place commodity” stuff. Look at grey box PCs.
Microsoft attempts to please everyone and that means backward compatible, multi-vendor CPUs, etc, etc.
There is a distinct possibility that for the average PC user, that Linux & Mac may achieve critical market size mass before Microsoft ever gets a stable usable LongShot ready for release. And it will be driven by cost and/or features that suit users.
How many major corporations of the last 100 years failed to keep their lead for more than 20-30 years. How many, including IBM, have stumbled.
Microsoft is walking a fine line. The pricing for commodity OS and standard office applications WILL GO DOWN. Microsoft will hurt over this.
With a degree in Computer Science Engineering, 20 years experience in PC networking and support, 20 years of experience in UNIX network and support, and 7 years experience in Macintosh network and support, I feel qualified to make the following comments.
1) MS has NEVER released a decent 1.0 version of ANY product.
2) Longhorn WAS to be a complete rewrite so as to avoid the current problems of a non-network OS being networked.
3) OS X is based on an OS which from the ground up was created for networking.
4) UNIX (OS X’s base) has been under developement since 1969.
5) OS X upgrades are not really OS updates by interface updates (still worth the cost).
6) IBM use to be the 800 lb gorilla but stagnation and “corporate blindness” cut them down to size.
7) MS (and in many ways Intel) appear to be going down the same road as IBM circa 1981.
8) Windows98 is running in more homes then any other MS operating system.
Just some observations…..
It’s been a while since i’ve heard so many people pretending to be clever, saying, “Admit Apple isn’t perfect and MS has done some things that benefit society” blah blah blah…
Mac users DO NOT need to be reminded what XP is like.
I know what it’s like. It sucks. Big time.
Longhorn exceeding Mac OS X is downright side-splitting…
I’ve seen just as much footage as anyone on here, and believe me.. it looks great.. but it’s still MS and they still fill up the OS with clutter.. god I hate that…
And by the time LH comes out, We’ll be on OS 11…
Despite being a die hard mac fan, Im sad that MSFT has to gut the feature set of its next major OS release. I was looking forward to the idea of my colleagues having a more secure and stable OS( even if it wasn’t OSX).
Most people don’t realize just how much money and productivity is lost due to security and stability issues concerning the absolute dominant OS in the marketplace.
Our economy suffers when servers are off line and IT systems are paralyzed due to old spaghetti code and malicious script kiddies.
LongHorn held a lot of promise. Unfortunately, MSFT seems unable to marshall its vast resources, experrtise, and marketing will power to fulfill the promise.
Maybe – after this decade MSFT will finally be able to truly prove why it deserves its 97% market share and 80% profit margin.
SnagglePus, BM, JV and other (blind) PC devotees …
There is much more to operating system history than the crap foisted on us by Microsoft … I have used more operating systems than you guys will ever have decent cold beers. In the mainframe era operating systems were command-line oriented (which is not at all bad and often powerful) and then we started getting GUI based operating systems. MacOS was amongst the best and most consistent (especially compared to Windows 3.1 and even 95 was a true POS!) but I had a preference for AmigaDOS where one had the choice of GUI or command-line. I could see even almost 20 years ago that this is the way to go – AmigaDOS was virtually Unix and running a GUI on top was sheer brilliance.
The MacOS (pre OS X) was not all bad – the focus was on quick user interaction and not running other processes so there was no pre-emptive multitasking … hence the slight performance hit in user interface going from from OS 9.2 to OS X. Some versions of OS 6 – OS 9 (my major experiences) were better than others but they were a darn sight better than the competition. I had to set up a Mathematica lab using MacOS 7.x, Windows 95, Windows NT, SGI IRIX and the Mac based one was the easiest to set up and maintain.
Currently, Mac OS X has few peers. Windows XP may have some minor interface niceties but as an operating system it is a true POS … security or lack of implementing it well being the biggest problem.
Mac OS X can be improved, I don’t much like the Dock (needs to be more coarse grained at the top and hierarchial) but that is the least of the advancements in Mac OS X. The fact that the PC blind can only point to minor problems (if any) with Mac OS X shows they are not real users. Dumping on Unix/Linux/BSD shows a real lack of knowledge I suppose they wouldn’t know a PDP-11 from a DEC-10 or a VAX-11/780 with an FPA either!
Sigh … get a life … or get some knowledge!
“When Longhorn ships, it will be a good OS. “
But you won’t own it – you will HAVE to pay (maybe a monthly) licencing fee and you will log on to get your world and data via broadband via MS servers. Won’t that be fun.
Didn’t see you mention that– nor Microsoft yet- Longhorn means this: “sneak them into the corral first, then lock the gate. Now it’s slaughter time for the mindless steers.”
“It will have thousands upon thousands of applications written for it.”
Which all will be subjected to a big brother search via Redmond servers, valid licencing, etc. – will you trust MS to manage and audit all of your software and data?
“It will have massive developer backing.”
Of course, because MS is selling them the concept of 100% software protection with access to data via those programs under lock and key. Wait and see when people wake up and realize their OS, programs, and files are not their own in any way and they will have to pay and pay and pay, then email or call whenever a program needs to be ported to another machine or reloaded.
“It will be the top-tier OS choice for anyone purchasing a new PC.”
Dual nitro cooled PCs won’t be mainstream for quite a while. Many people still running Windows 98 for web surfing, emailing, and solitaire will not move into the Brave New World. They see themselves having no better a time w XP. “Top-tier” is not necessarily better, but it sure means complicated and in depth- and that’s is what the core is all about: invading every part of your computing world.
Wait and see, your Longhorn demo is just a cartoon version of the real deal:
http://www.aaxnet.com/editor/edit029.html
Microsoft has relabeled its Service Pack 3 boxes and discs as “Longhorn�; therefore, in 2006 MS can simply roll out what was already accomplished as a routine XP upgrade and portray it as Longhorn.
Brilliant move, Bill, selling obsolescence as high tech programming. The masses will be thankful and will never know the difference.
My Test Drive version of Word for Office 2004 crashed, and I’ve been using it for two days. Thank god I still save religiously!
New IT staff? They do support Linux, Solaris, NT, XP, various versions of Unix, and OS X and support some 8k computers, with a couple superconputer farms here and there.
Naahh. the infections are because Windows users are among the most ignorant users of all about security – and 164k viral attack to labs worldwide are just the norm on a monthly base. Research institutions attract much more than your mom&pop; home business or your home LAN.
Didn’t you know that? Oh my poor silly sausage. What happens? Haven’t defragged your silly brain recently?
AND, ‘yikes!!!’, Microsoft has put instructions on how to BLOCK SP2 for sys admins? Wonder why?
If it happens you cannot play for a day your silly IPS game on your toy PC who give a fscking care?
If your silly SP2 makes even a single service from running 100% safe and efficiently someone DOES care.
The adoption of SP2 among networked users is abysmally low. Some can afford service disruption to a certain degree, others not even a �cimal.
Anyway, enough wasting time with you.
SnagglePuss, where is the desk-lamp iMac that you are talking about? I’m looking at the Apple iMac page ( http://www.apple.com/imac ) and I only see a white LCD screen… oh wait it is the new iMac G5!
“New IT staff? They do support Linux, Solaris, NT, XP, various versions of Unix, and OS X and support some 8k computers, with a couple superconputer farms here and there.
“
Impressive! And they cann’t do what many home users have done- apply a free upgrade that you can instal while the OS is running?
I can only imagine how they handle upgrades of OS’s that are more complex than the click n’ drool of Windows update.
“AND, ‘yikes!!!’, Microsoft has put instructions on how to BLOCK SP2 for sys admins? Wonder why?”
Because even sys admins who are clueless are customers, and the customer is always right.
“Naahh. the infections are because Windows users are among the most ignorant users of all about security”
Or it becuase the IT department supposedly defending these machines can not do what the average computer n00b can?
I’ll help em out some. You can go to [url=http://www.microsoft.com]http://www.microsoft.com[/url] and download SP 2 and burn it to CD, test it on one PC, and see how it goes. Then, they can do it on more than 1 PC.
I’m guessing they might need some help burning a CD since they haven’t figured this out yet, so go ahead and post, and someone will help.
“Anyway, enough wasting time with you.”
Yes, yes! Make sure you spend plenty of time complaining on a forum about XP’s SP 2 when you could be busy learning how to deploy it. Heck, if you’ll send me the model # of your CD burner, I’ll explain how to burn a CD so you can begin testing it.
“7) MS (and in many ways Intel) appear to be going down the same road as IBM circa 1981.”
I think MS is going down a new path, although not better. MS’s most pressing problem is how to server the rest of the world.
MS/Apple cann’t charge $100/OS in 3rd world countries which will soon have millions and millions of users. 100 USD can be equivalent to 3 months pay for an average person in some countries.
If MS/Apple releases a special lower priced OS, it will then be asked, if you can sell X/XP for $20 in country x, and still make money, why not the US? Then Apple/MS will have to give up their profit margin and be seriously hurt.
XP Starter Edition for $25 fizzled, we’ll see what Apple does.
Microsoft must be doing something right since PC users far outnumber Mac users (or is MS just a cheap skate option).
MS Office is really a good product and one thing I find hard to comprehend is why is there not a competitive product from Apple? AppleWorks is fine for home users, but it is definately not as functional as Office in the….. well, office!
yikes: maybe you are truly silly. Comparing a single Windows installation with no networking needs to a full campus with Gigabit ethernet connections live with servers worldwide…
LOL, you made my day.
You thing the problem is in burning the CD or download the pach?
ROFLMAO
Oh my gosh: is this guy for real?
And, major labs and customers have MS in-house engineers and THEY have troubles ensuring everything works with not even a nano-second interruption in the services.
LOL, you’re truly an “average computer n00b”.
ROFLMAO N0000000000000000000B
dannyk: quality does not equal quantity.
There were little to no computer viruses till Windows released. Then they skyrocketed because suddenly it was easy to infect a computer.
The majority of people eat fast-food, much more than those at fine restaurant. They by far outnumber customers of the best chef.
When all is said Windows apologists have to come back to the “the majority can’t be wrong” argument which make them look even more silly.
Certain features of Windows XP means that Service Pack 2 doesn’t work well with all software.
At Microsoft’s Web site, the company lists about 40 software programs that may be hampered when Service Pack 2 is installed and 50 that don’t seem to be
compatible at all. These aren’t obscure titles, either — programs that are “known to experience a loss of functionality” include such mainstream products
as Encyclopedia Britannica 2000 Deluxe and America Online’s Toolbar program.
SP2 blocks some crucial networking and remote NFS/AFS server mounting to take place. And to fix that changes in those server configurations or patches are to be expected in order to restore functionality. Result? SP2 blocked by admins till 3rd party products get compliant again.
MS have granted 8 months waiting period before polling again IT professional about making SP2 a mandatory patch.
Haha I hate Windows! Let those lemmings suffer, I’ve just got me a Nokia 6600 and Salling Clicker, this is the shit! iTunes integration is so cool!
“yikes: maybe you are truly silly. Comparing a single Windows installation with no networking needs to a full campus with Gigabit ethernet connections live with servers worldwide…
“
No, I’m trying to explain how to test SP 2 in an isolated environment (test) then deploying it across a (live) network based on those results.
“You thing the problem is in burning the CD or download the pach?”
Well, its either that or a lack of a real test and deployment environment. I’ll assume the better: that burning the CD is the problem.
“Oh my gosh: is this guy for real?”
Oh my gosh: you don’t really work in an IT dept. do you?
In fairness to Microsoft, Apple went through the same exact thing not too long ago with Copland. Ulitmately, Apple had to back off its promised OS and incorporate pieces into OS 8, and then continue adding additional pieces with upgrades.
However, Apple was then smart and realized it had really screwed up and decided it needed to buy a new OS or they were toast.
Seems to me that Microsoft is in a similar spot.
Think about it guys, the PCs that are in use today will not be able to run Longhorn, if you remember right the specs that MS gave for what it will take to run Longhorn were outrageous….
So unless everyone is going to go out and buy a new computer just so they can run a new OS, Longhorn will be a long time in implementation.
Also will all the proprietary software that people had created for their comapnies work on this OS?