Microsoft popularity is at an all time low. Only 6% of businesses have bothered to make the switch over to Vista. Microsoft recently announced that it would continue to support XP Home until the end of 2010 now, and also recently announced it has pushed the next version of windows up to the end of 09. Is Vista this decades Millenium?

Heres an interesting article:

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&taxonomyName=development&articleId=9076698&taxonomyId=11&intsrc=kc_top

I don't even think I'm going to get Vista, although I already have it on my Laptop, and quite truthfully I have'nt had a problem with it. But why spend 400 dollars now and then again next year? I think I'll wait for windows 7 and see how it fares.

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Quote from Nietzsche....God is dead
Quote from God....Nietzsche is dead

Nobody needs Vista. So they are trying to force people into it, lowering sympathy for Microsoft even more...

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Why snark works.

This is what happens when big businesses get greedy. They did the same with the Xbox 360. They knew about its problems but decided to rush it ahead anyway in order to release it before the Play Station 3. Because of that decision, Microsoft hasn't made any profit from the Xbox 360 even though it has sold more than the Play Station 3.

I mean with vista, how greedy releasing so many different versions. Just look at this.

I mean with this windows 7, I don't want a fancy UI and this user friendly business, I want a practical operating system that runs efficiently.

Now where is fatstrings to talk about all the "benefits" of vista? :razz:

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Aaron's Stuff

I heard about this awhile ago. Don't expect it to be something like "oh we're sorry about Vista, here, take this" ... As far as I've seen, the big difference in new OS is that is can run virtual machines of older versions of Windows and it's got like some better core functionalities ... otherwise, it's most likely still using the main parts of the Vista kernel.

So, then when it comes out and people like it more they can exclaim how much better vista is compared to vista ... only it wont be called vista.

Aaron ... you know there is an operating system like that ...

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Crono said:
Aaron ... you know there is an operating system like that ...

And what operating system would that be? :razz:

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Aaron's Stuff

I'm taking a stab in the dark at Linux here... or hell, even Mac OS X

Ubuntu?

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Aaron's Stuff

Go read about Linux :smile: Ubuntu is a distribution based upon the Linux kernel... unless Crono wants to explain, run it by Wikipedia or something. It's useful to have a basic understanding of how it works/what it is, especially if you want a career in I.T.

The new Mac OSX is pretty impressive. It runs both 32 and 64 bit programs, comes in only one version, is safe, stable and better thought-through than anything Microsoft has ever produced. Except for gaming there aren't many programs you'd miss, compatibility-wise, on Mac OSX. Photoshop is perfectly optimized for it, for example.

God I hope that more major developers start looking beyond their own nose and make their software available outside Windows now.

I'm not an Apple fanboy (my iPod died today), Mac OSX is just good. And if you make a program available for OSX, Linux isn't far off. It could be a "gateway drug".

I think that gaming is a big topic here. It's the only thing I need Windows for, actually. If Apple would start to realize the potential market is huge, they could become a true competition for MS.

True competition on the mainstream OS market, just imagine!

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Why snark works.

err... why would aarondakiller want a career in IT?

God I hope that more major developers start looking beyond their own nose and make their software available outside Windows now.

I agree. I, personally, think it makes projects far more difficult to use DirectX, it also causes a dependency. If these guys were a little smarter about their projects there'd be no issue and games would be absolutely platform independent.

Maybe they get paid a lot of money to develop on DX ... or maybe (more likely) their project managers are douchebags who don't know the difference between Windows and Linux and think "Windows" is the "proper" "enterprise" software for development .. or some other stupid stature thing like that.

Although, I will say this: most Linux users refuse to pay for things. :\

Yes, I was talking about using Linux, since that's basically what you described Aaron. If you were to choose a distribution, I would suggest Ubuntu as it's ridiculously easy to use while still retaining all the "power" you would want from that OS.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

i don't know much about mac operating systems, but i saw the changes their new "os" brought, leapord or whatever and just wanted to shoot someone, their new operating system was just a sp for the old one, it allowed you to do some stupid s**t like put a background on your video chat and had time machine, which as i understand is just a ghost program that should have been sold as a separate program anyway

sorry if i have no respect for the fact that mac puts prices on service packs

i'm not going to repeat myself regarding vista, I will say however, that judging the time frame it took for them to get the os known and put a deadline on it so soon, i'd say it has more of a chance of being millennium than vista

millennium was created in very similar circumstances in regards to 2000 and it was the biggest piece of s**t software i've ever encountered

"Service pack" is a word invented by Microsoft to release embarrassing bug-fixes and security patches at a more attractive name.

Leopard isn't a bug fix. It has the most thought-through interface of any OS out there. It has all the technological advantages Vista should have over XP. And that has nothing to do with toys like video-chat or time-machine. Really, I wish it was more popular.

The thing about Linux distributions is that their interfaces just plain suck. Sorry. Even Ubuntu. You feel like using a programmer's toolbox, not something that was hand-tailored for the average computer user. That's what comes with the non-commercial nature of Linux. A deniable issue for someone who likes the OS, but a huge disadvantage for popularity.

Firefox somehow overcome this and created an interface that is properly designed form the core up to not only be "easy" but also to be "comfortable" and thinking ahead, always showing first the things you actually need. Carefully crafted to not confuse newbies.

I do not doubt that there will be a Linux distribution one day that truly changes things. But until then I think Apple has a better chance of pushing Microsoft from its throne than Linux.

I'm always mentioning the interface because I'm seeing this very much from the design point of view. Not "decorative design" but true usability/comfort from the newcomer's point of view. Programmers tell me about their favourite Linux distributions and how easy they are to use and I tell them, well, that they are not. And then they defend it and I just think right here, right in this arguments lie the reasons why Linux doesn't prevail outside its group of opens-source sympathist core-users.

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Why snark works.

Back in college I changed my degree away from computer science because I would prefer to dig my eyes out with a spoon than use linux. Trying to wrangle with that piece o' s**t regularly doubled the time of assignments. I love fighting the interface instead of programming. Thanks for nothing you dumb nerds! shakes fist

Heh, well if you don't like it, then maybe you should have changed operating systems.

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Aaron's Stuff

The gnome window manager's interface is, in general, lovely and very clean.

It takes two commands in the command line to create a file and compile it under Unix or Linux ... in Windows, you have to use an IDE, which demands you make project files, add the libraries being used, then add linker commands in the properties of the project, then figure out the layout of the IDE so you can properly compile and run the program.

Give me a break.

The only thing I can think of is you were told to use Vi or Vim ... when you should have been using Pico or something like that until you had time to learn the other text editors (which is all those are).

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Actually now that I think about it it was probably unix, all I remember is we had to use Sun Workstations. The point is:

I can attest to the frustration potential of Linux. In many ways though it IS more user friendly, it's just different from what everyone knows. There is a fairly steep learning curve at first, but it levels off pretty quickly. It will take some time though, you can't learn to use Windows or Mac to their fullest overnight either.

To me Vista is just Windows ME version 2.

The average non-gamer PC user who doesn't want to switch to an 'alternative OS', considering how demanding things like web, email, word and excel art, is probably best off with Windows 2000 SP4 on a PC designed for low power consumption (which as a result is quiet or SILENT). If only Win2k were still supported.

Right now I'm running Windows 2003 Server as my desktop OS, mostly for the novelty of it and because I got a free, legal copy (for college students)(google dreamspark). It seems a little more responsive than XP, much less crap is running by default, I have more control over using my compy as a LAN file server and intranet web server. I had to switch my IM program and FTP client, and Quake 4 is harshly borked (unplayable, haven't fiddled with it much to get it working) but other than that it works great.

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o

Well, I've always actually preferred Windows as my OS of choice -- partly because I grew up with it (Windows 3.1/DOS anyone?) and am comfortable using it.

Fact of the matter is, I really don't care which operating system has the fanciest gizmos or prettiest graphics built right into it -- I've found Windows to be functional, and it does what I tell it to do. I like my Windows XP computer, and quite frankly, I don't want anything else. Don't get me wrong -- I'm not advocating Microsoft as some kind of glorious figure -- I've got my own fair share of gripes with them as well (removal of DOS for one, and trying to jam Vista down peoples' throats rests somewhere near the top of my s**t-list.)

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Breaking the laws of mapping since 2003 and doing a damn fine job at it

Actually now that I think about it it was probably unix, all I remember is we had to use Sun Workstations. The point is:

Oh, I see.

I'm sorry. If you used a Sun machine it was probably running Solaris, which is pretty widely used in academics ...

Its interface is THE worst interface of any window manager I've ever used. It's absolutely horrible. I can see why you were frustrated.

It would have been simpler if you just used the command line instead of logging into the window manager. :sad:

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

We all bitch about the newest version of windows. I personally put off every new version until I essentially had no choice in the matter. I ran DOS 6.2 till almost the release of win98... Actually I did run DOS until 98 but only because I bought a Compaq with it installed.

My first PC had DOS 6 and Win 3.1 and DOS was sooo much better. Win 95 came out while I had it and.. It was so nasty. I installed it over 3.1 and shortly afterward formatted it back to the original config.

Win ME was nasty as well and I only used it for a very short time. I did however like Win2000 and I stuck with it long into the WinXP days.

I finally swapped over to WinXP full time with my last two PC's. It seemed stable enough after all those ungodly patches and truth be told, no games supported Win98 anylonger anyway so it was no longer a consideration.

Games sometimes borked out on Win2000 so that too was incentive to switch to XP.

Now we have Vista. I have yet to hear something good said for it. It seems to be a RAM hog and sadly needs about a gig to function. Sadly too, most PC's barely have a gig so the first order of business is to buy more ram.

I do not look forward to dealing with another windows.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Some people do like vista and it will eventually be accepted. Vista is a big ram hog, and it would help to have a faster processor if your going to upgrade to Vista, and then you need to think about running games....

But I mean, its a new operating system, it should be instantly accepted and should function better then the previous one, but instead it is quite the opposite and many folks would argue that it dosen't operate better than Windows XP. Microsoft really need to understand this and listen to people.

Microsoft are really rushing things and its making them a bad company.

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Aaron's Stuff

I remember not so long ago the massive amount of crying about winXP. I doubt seriously that there will ever be a widely accepted opsys.

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The best things in life, aren't things.