Posted on 12/02/2013 1:06:09 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Windows 8.1 is now the fifth most popular desktop OS, at least as recorded by Web tracker Net Applications.
For November, Microsoft's latest version of Windows snagged 2.64 percent of all desktop OS traffic recorded by Net Applications. That number was a healthy gain from the 1.72 percent seen in October and the 0.87 percent in September.
The rise also pushed Windows 8.1 just ahead of Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks with a 2.42 percent share and just behind Windows Vista with a 3.57 percent share.
Windows 8.1 popped up in June as a preview edition before officially launching in October. The upgrade is free to Windows 8 users and offers several improvements over its predecessor.
Windows 8 continued to shed its share of traffic in November as more users upgraded to its successor. But combined, Windows 8 and 8.1 took home a 9.3 percent share, easily outscoring Vista but still playing a distant third to Windows 7 with 46.6 percent and Windows XP with 31.2 percent.
XP has gradually lost ground since giving up its dominance to Windows 7 in August 2012. But the 12-year-old XP continues to hang on among users and businesses. Time is running out, though. Microsoft is set to cut off support for XP in early April.
I just got Windows 8.1, had been using Linux for several years.
8.1 reminds me of Linux, though it is completely different.
I’m liking it so far.
As a part time Microsoft contractor, I can tell you there are a lot of good reasons to get off of XP.
First of all, the kernel is based on 15 year-old technology. It is version 5, as in NT 5.0, the planned successor to Windows NT 4.0, released in 1996. The then new kernel 5 was developed in 1998/99, but Bill Gates had the release name changed from Windows NT 5.0 to Windows 2000 in mid/late 1999. The name was changed as a gimmick to lead people to believe Windows 2000 had the Y2K problem fixed. If you type “ver” into a Command Prompt on Windows 2000, it shows as Version 5.0. Ver on Windows XP is Version 5.1, and Ver on Windows Server 2003 shows as Version 5.2.
The kernel was completely redesigned in 2006 as Longhorn, and released as Windows Vista in 2007 and Windows Server 2008 in early 2008. A ver on these machines show the kernel Version of 6000, which is 6 (why the zeros? I think they wanted to emphasis the big changes, but it is kind of ridiculous).
So why is this important? Well, we reached the point, sometime ago actually, where the V5 kernel cannot be patched to remedy sophisticated attacks that have had 15 years of legacy and development. Continuing to use XP makes you VERY vulnerable to these types of attacks, and puts your infrastructure and data at great risk. Why assume the risk?
The V6 kernel has removed the code that allows all kinds of unauthorized take-overs of system processes and services. No doubt as years go on there will be future exploits that may get around these changes but that does not change the high vulnerability of the V5 kernel.
Change is change. The tricks and loops that the V5 kernel had to do in order to run on the limited 1999/2000 era hardware doesn’t have to be done any longer—hardware has turned over several generations since then. The V6 kernel, in my opinion, is getting long in the tooth, and needs a complete redesign into V7, which will come soon. I imagined everyone will hate that, too, LOL!
It’s one thing to assume a risk on your home computing environment because you do not care for the new UI, but quite another to do so in the business world. It would be, in my opinion, close to malpractice for a business IT department to want to continue running a V5 kernel. I know it is a well known practice in the business world to replace desktops every 5-7 years and servers are kept not much longer (although I’ve seen some old boxes survive due to budget cuts). Why would you want to keep 15 year-old software around? There has been so many advances since, both in hardware and software!
Finally, the bottom line is that Microsoft will no longer support or provide updates, security or otherwise, for Windows XP after this coming June. For them, it is not so much as business decision based on new profits but rather on liability. Lawyers of companies that may lose a lot of money from a well-known attack being successful against them, try to blame the vendor of that software for their loss, and Microsoft will not continue to be in that position.
Get out of XP and upgrade to the V6 kernel!
True, I should have just said UNIX...worked with all flavors over the years, and I’ll take any flavor of UNIX except perhaps HPUX over windows any day of the week.
Yes, I should have said UNIX, not Linux. Flavor of Unix matters very little to me, I’ve worked with nearly all of them over the years, and the only one I avoid is HPUX.
As an optional accessory, just like you can buy a keyboard accessory for an iOS device (or any other tablet with either Bluetooth or a USB port, which is pretty much all of them).
HPUX makes my neocortex shudder in fear.
And then there’s Novell. People should have gotten the hint, it has “NO” right in the name...
Well haven’t run into Novell in the wild in nearly 2 decades, but I agree with you on that one.
Ah, explains a lot. Kids bring in fonts from anywhere. . . Custom Fonts built on the framework of commercial fonts that they've not bothered to alter the IDs on, that then over write the legitimate commercial files without changing the metric files, crash. I saw a set at one publishing house running on the old MacOS where fonts sent in by customers with their created ads had so corrupted the house's font collection that suddenly their Times New Roman would place one character every three pages! Why? An amateur fontographer (in his own mind) had misplaced a decimal point! Another was dividing by zero! Idiotic. Crashed any document that had that font included.
What advantage is there in having a "super-res screen" other than bragging rights, since the pixel resolution of the iPad already exceeds the capability of the human eye to resolve the pixels? All that exceeding that limit can accomplish is to require more resources than necessary to display what is required to display the required data at any required speed . . . Resources that could be better utilized for other purposes that bragging rights and marketing to low information buyers who think they are getting something beneficial. The iPad already exceeds the resolution of a 1080P HD TV and has a far higher refresh rate. What can be gained by more??? It makes no sense. The down side is high. Battery drain, wasted resources, heat, higher cost . . . all for momentary marketing gain?
Of course iPad has so many third-party manufacturers making keyboards for the device that Apple doesn't even have to offer one.
Amazing how many competing tablets tout their device with keyboard as a major benefit over the iPad, then fail to mention it's a separate non-trivially-priced purchase for their device, no better than a slew of such available for iPad as well.
Actually, more worried about the teachers. Off to a seminar, back with every bit of dreck someone paid to push off on them and not enough intelligence to use it correctly...
Why would Apple want to converge two incompatible user interfaces? I certainly don't want Gorilla arms. Touch screens on a desk top are a bad idea. Mouse driven on a tablet is a bad idea. The iPad succeeds because it is FINGER Multi-touch driven graphical user interface, the mouse touch pad metaphors for the desktop with graphical interface made the desktop succeed. Apple knows not to fiddle with success.
Given that, Apple is converging what are excellent ideas from both interfaces. Many disagree what exactly those excellent ideas are.
As for your consumption/creation wall, you really don't know what you are talking about. I am several hundred pages each into two novels written entirely on an iPad. Photography, shot edited, compiled, and published, 100% from iPads! easily doable. Presentation, with collaboration with multiple colleagues. Also easy. Vide? HD 1080 P. . . Shot, edited then uploaded to the web. . . The only thing lacking is the ability to burn disc directly from the iPad. Creation and maintenance of spreadsheets? Yup. Doable. The one thing that is currently beyond iPads is development. . . but CONTENT? No problem. Don't believe the propaganda. Other make tablets are just consumption devices, except for Windows quasi-tablets cum laptops cum table top Surface machines that really don't know what they are.
Microsoft is killing itself BECAUSE it is trying to do what you suggested. . . Converge tablet and desktop interfaces. People hate it in both.
Saw that too. I've done consulting for school districts in my day.
With a good firewall and resident AV, plus a little common caution, this is a non-issue.
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