100%...
Posted on 07/28/2014 4:25:25 PM PDT by markomalley
Microsoft attempted something different and daring with Windows 8. It introduced a whole new interface and means of interaction with your PC that was identical to a smartphone or tablet. It threw out the “Start” menu and mouse-driven interface people had used for decades in favor of a touch-driven interface with tiles, some of which received active information updates.
And people hated it.
“They tried to get their entire audience to jump from a UI [user interface] they were comfortable with to a brand new one with a serious learning curve,” California-based Creative Strategies tech analyst and president Tim Bajarin said. “Had they done a more transitionary product, especially keeping the Start button, I don’t think the impact and perception would have been as bad.”
By removing the Start button, which had been a Windows fixture since Windows 95, Microsoft wasn’t just introducing a new way of using the operating system — it was trying to force people away from the only one they had known for two decades.
The result was that Windows 8 was slaughtered in the court of public opinion, often compared to the much-maligned Windows Vista released in 2006. It was an incorrect comparison; Vista was a technological hairball, a truly awful piece of software that often failed when people tried to install it on their PCs.
Windows 8 was technically sound. No one complained of crashing, slow performance or old apps not working on it. People noted it was actually a tad faster than Windows 7, they just hated how it looked. The result was slow sales for Windows 8, but Windows 7, the OS it was supposed to replace, kept selling like hotcakes.
“Its distinguishing feature was support for touchscreens but also legacy applications,” Endpoint Technologies President Roger Kay said. Endpoint is a Boston-based market research firm. “It ended up being a Frankenstein. So the good parts, like being a little faster and more reliable and more secure were almost totally invisible to the end user. So you could tell people it was faster and more reliable and they said ‘I don’t know how to use it.’”
Kay said the beating Windows 8 took in the tech press hurt, but users also hated it. Microsoft released a public beta for anyone to download and use on February 29, 2012, and released the product in October, 2012. During that time, in all the public Windows forums, “consumers were gnashing their teeth and stomping their feet about it. It was vilified in public forums,” Kay said.
The old guard who came up with Windows 8 and refused to listen to beta testers are gone and Microsoft has more or less given up trying to rescue its slandered OS. There will be another significant update to Windows 8.1 (called Update 2) later this year. After that, the new management are focusing their efforts on Windows 9.
Windows 9, which Microsoft internally calls “Threshold,” should ship around the second quarter of 2015. It will put the Windows 8 interface on the back burner but not throw it out, since applications written for Windows 8 would be broken. The familiar desktop with the Start button will be back.
Bajarin expects Windows 9 will return all of the familiar elements of Windows 7 and prior operating systems, with the new UI relegated to the back burner while new features are added to bring people forward.
“I don’t think it will be radical at all,” Bajarin said. ”I think they will make it easier to work with user interfaces of the past and provide better transition for those with older operating systems to come into this era.”
That could include tighter cloud services integration. One feature widely rumored but not confirmed by Microsoft is that it will offer seamless, tight cloud integration into the OS. Your OneDrive storage will be as easy to access as the “C: drive,” so all of your documents, personal files, photos, etc. will go right to the cloud without having to think about it.
Apps might also be potentially stored in the cloud as well. Say you log on to another Windows 9 PC using your login and password –not only will your data files be accessible from your cloud storage, but also the apps you use.
Kay expects more cloud-oriented features as well.
“It would be good to move to a cloud-oriented OS to do updates more frequently and keep the OS alive,” Kay said. “That way you would check in to the cloud at login but run locally, so you could work anywhere.”
He also doesn’t expect Windows 9 to be a major departure from the operating systems of old.
“You’d expect them to do more in order to justify all of the effort of creating a new OS other than fixing the old one. There will be a lot of it will be bells and whistles, but a lot of that stuff tends to fall into Who-Cares? territory,” Kay said.
Another rumored addition to Windows 9 is Cortana — the digital voice assistant currently being rolled out to Windows Phone users. Cortana is like the iPhone’s Siri: ask it a question and it fetches the proper contextual answer. Microsoft has made comments in recent weeks about bringing Cortana to Windows PCs, and Windows 9 would be the most logical candidate to get its own answer to J.A.R.V.I.S.
At this point, it’s all speculation, but one thing is for certain: Microsoft needs to get Windows 9 right. Kay noted that Microsoft has had only one good operating system in its last three releases over the last eight years. Windows 7 (2009) was good, while Vista (2006) and Windows 8 (2012) were bad.
“Those are not good odds for software. Maybe for blackjack, but not operating systems. I would love for [Windows 9] to work great and do the right thing, but they are one for three in recent releases. So I’m a bit cynical,” Kay said.
I saw an interview with an Apollo astronaut who was asked what changes he thought were the most amazing since the lunar program. He said something like, I would have imagined colonies on Mars but instead we got facebook.
Are factory parts still available for Fords Model T?
Actually yes, there are still some New old stock available. There are many after market parts around also. Old parts are easily repainted without having to update to the latest version.
So Ford is still making them?
Just admit that you’ve lost.
Windows XP was the most insecure pile of crap ever conceived by a development shop. If you understand operating system kernel mode functionality or have any knowledge of the “under the hood” aspects of Windows in general, you would not be advocating this viewpoint.
EVERYTHING about which people are bitching since Vista is aesthetic or control based. The core operating system behind Windows since Vista has been the most stable revision of a Windows OS since DOS 6.2.
Advocating for the return of XP is sheer folly and a waste of time and breath. If you want to advocate for the GUI, go for it, but Microsoft cannot dumb down the UI because a small subset of the user community cries about it. Windows 7 is/was an amazing OS, and Windows 8 is incredibly stable and blazing fast. My only lament with Microsoft as of last is how much they’re speeding up their time to market for new operating systems. They need to let them bake in.
I agree I have three computers with W8.1, and two older W7 units. I find the W8 to be faster. It took a little getting used to, and it is not as user friendly on a non touch screen computer, but I love the tiles and can always go to desktop when necessary.
No wonder MS is laying off 18,000 employees.
Going to Mars is hard, facebook is easy... plus, there are no chicks to pick up on Mars. If there were some sexy Martian women up there, we’d have already figured out a way to colonize the place.
Archived files of importance are best stored on double or even single-layered Dvd’s, IMHO. Quadruple layered disks will improve storage capability and as long as the drives remain backwards compatible and do not require an internet connection to function, what little I have to leave to posterity will satisfy my needs. I neglected to mention that in my comment. Drives may fail for whatever reason as you know.
My concern is privacy and the constant demand of the new OS’s and their ‘Apps’ requiring an internet connection to function narrows that privacy window. MS Office is now cloud based. The programs are ‘in the cloud’ and the results of their use are stored there. Not good. In fact insofar as privacy is concerned that is double-plus bad.
I might find the need to go retrograde and resort to paper and pencil! Did I mention I have the ability to write in cursive? Knowing that eliminates the ability of many to understand what I have written. If you get my drift.
Yeah, I think you could upgrade the TI-99/4A to 48K of RAM.
Don’t disagree with you but DVDs are limited in space and probably won’t be around too much longer.
When did you buy your truck?
Windows XP was released in 2001, and they supported it until 2014. Computer hardware is generally obsolete in about six-eight years with the current pace of development. So, they supported the product for twice the average lifetime of any hardware that it was sold to operate.
So, does GMC support your truck for twice its average lifetime, free of charge?
eliminates the ability of many to understand what I have written.—
Is that why NSA always uses printed caps; Like ebonics/texting?
Oh man, 48k, what would you even do with ALL that memory?!?
Live by the network ... Die by the network.
Looks like 9 is starting to smell *Big Time* already.
I don't think so.
I was there when the mainframe manufacturers went all out ridiculing the very idea of a "personal computer."
They all reassured us that storing all data on mainframe computers (yesterday's 'cloud') WAS the future.
Well, it didn't work out that way.
The only change now is that everybody can buy the equivalent of mainframes, and they all have the same $$$$$ vision in front of their eyes.
I shudder at the thought of having to tell the IRS that the cloud lost all my records.
Worse yet, to hear from the IRS that THEY lost my records, and I owe them a monthly fine until they find them...
Didn’t hurt OS X either.
100%...
walt: you’re making some generic, tepid, off-brand cola. i’m making classic coke.
declan: what stops me from wasting you, right now, right here, and leaving you in the desert? i still make my stuff. see how that works?
walt: do you really want to live in a world without coca-cola?
in this analogy, declan is microsoft. walt is unix os’s.
logan’s run called and they want their terminal back.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.