Betting the Company on Windows 8

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For the life of me, I can’t understand why MS didn’t just make Metro a shell that could be launched from the regular Windows desktop instead of doing it the other way round. The shell is not the operating system, it’s only the UI the OS presents and presumably there could be any number of those. The OS is all the services and systems the OS supports.

As it is now, Windows 8 disrupts the traditional mouse and keyboard desktop which will simply lead to no one who needs that upgrading. MS won’t mind because it’ll still sell all those guys Win 7 and Win 8 will go to all the touch desktops/tablets it was never able to support before.

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I think a notable point about your Windows 95 commentary is that they didn’t really innovate most of that. Most of the innovation in Windows 95 was a cheap copy of existing innovation that took place in the far-less-popular OS/2 2.x from IBM.

Microsoft and IBM were partners in the OS/2 project up until a short while before (before the better UI), when they split up and IBM kept going with the concept while MS took the code they had rights to at that point as the basis for the WinNT line. Not just menu systems and launching and all that, but even the concept of desktop shortcuts came from OS/2.

Win95 was revolutionary at the time for the Windows crowd, but don’t think for a second MS thought all that up on their own.

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I’m amazed that someone I believe is a full-time-and-a-half programmer, par excellence, Jeff Atwood, would be so fascinated by Metro, which I, in my head, think of as “Rectanglero.”

Reading the comments, I come away quite confused as to what extent multi-monitors will be able to be used in Win 8, each with its own app(s), or multiple window(s) per app, on both ARM and Intel based computers.

Personally, I never want to touch any screen; and I am hoping that the high-precision gestural control-at-a-distance technology now being developed at Leap Motion http://leapmotion.com/ and, I assume, in behind-high-security labs at the usual suspect’s R&D secret skunkworks will open a new world of gestural control without dirty fingers on screens. Obviously, my bias.

For PC-side programmers with substantial investments in .NET, WinForms, WPF, SilverLight, etc. the upcoming Win/RT is a donnybrook, and I’m surprised Jeff did not go into, in more depth, the implications of this change for programmer employment, and re-training, and re-working/re-compiling of existing apps.

Nor was there any content about to what extent HTML5 + CSS3 + JavaScript (enhanced by jQuery, and jWhatevers) will become a programming model for applications.

Being an ancient one, I have trouble forgetting that most of what we are seeing now as “the latest great thing” was well worked out before 1970 at Xerox Parc (touch, and multi-touch, being the exceptions ? … with the exception that I believe Parc did have light-pens styli working on the Alto or Star … not totally sure on that).

And if there’s any one current “catch-phrase” that does describe the “functional divide” between touch-driven small form-factor devices, and desktops with large monitors, keyboards, mouse or trackpad for precision control: surely it is the, now almost a cliche: “content creation vs. content consumption.”

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Microsoft suffer from the most enviable of all corporate afflictions. Success! In fact so damn successful that they are like the Mendoza family, running ot of places to stash their (ill-gotten?) gains.

Once you reach this point (and few corporations ever do) you are faced with the almost inevitable future that can only be downhill. There is no where further up to go; and that causes some problems with certain kinds of corporate egos and shareholders. Microsoft also have had to deal with 2 other major issues. The style and scope of the projects required to create their new products are incredibly complex ( as much as I hated Vista and am appalled that they could spend so much money ( how much was it by the way?) on a piss-poor product while sitting on a absolute motza of cash, i also know that dropping another billion or so would have had no discernible impact on the project (read the Mythical Man Month).

They have reached the limit of their’s and possibly current human ability to manage projects (the haldron collider seems to have gone well though…). The other issue is speed of change in the technology and market.

So apart from trying to be cool (they are not, can not, never will be … look in the mirror Steve, Bill) and follow the current trends, what can Microsoft do to leverage their tremendous cash reserves, technology base, billions of customers and millions of (underpaid and stressed) analysts, developers and support people? while still making money.

I dont know for sure but getting confused about wether your OS is for business or consumers doesnt look like a good call to me. They keep doing it! They can never separate the requirements and while I understand the advantage of sales volume they just never get it right. The consumer version is always crap and the business version suffers because of it.

Microsoft, through insight, timing and a fair amount of borderline un-ethical corporate behaviour actually ensured that we all use windows for (most) work purposes (up till Saas because a reality). Millions of legacy applications rely on this but the cost to move us into the current century is horrific but the support costs and productivity bottlenecks in that old world are breathtakingly huge.

They got us here. Now can they do something monumental to really shift the way that business works, something that harnesses all that resorvoir of technology, skills and customers or will they fritter it away on trying to be cool?

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I agree with much of the article, I’m actually quite excited about Windows 8.

Like most people I have an iPad which I carry around with me to most places but I’ve found that over time I’ve been using it less and less. In fact, I barely open it at all these days although apps like BBC iPlayer are handy for keeping the kids quiet if there’s a decent web connection.
The novelty has worn off, if I want to do something productive then I still need my laptop while if I need some information or to quickly check my email while on the move then my phone is always more convenient. The iPad is just this redundant piece of kit which doesn’t really serve any pressing need in my life except possibly as a convenient digital book store. That’s quite an expensive book storage device.

What excited me about Windows 8 isn’t so much how it compares to Windows 7 but rather the exciting prospect of a tablet that’s actually worth carrying around.
I can still run iPlayer and the other passive app’s the kids run on the iPad but there’s also a keyboard and serious business apps so I can flip out a real keyboard and do something grownup.
How easy is it to use? Well I ran it on a desktop with touch screen and my 4 year old daughter without direction was able to find a game and start playing it, granted using the touch navigational skills picked up from years of iPad and iPhone time. In Windows 7 I still have to really help out.

So Windows 8 combined with more creative devices could give me something I would actually use.
A tablet that even my 4 year old can use like the iPad combined with a very portable computer I can carry on the plane and start using, something I still find awkward even with a smallish laptop.
On the desktop or laptop I’m not so sure, at the very least I hope it won’t be less productive than Windows 7 but to be honest if I can fire up my business software and use it with a real flip out keyboard then perhaps I won’t need a laptop at all so it becomes a redundant concern. That’s what I hoped for from the iPad but it failed to deliver, hopefully this will be the winner and give me a new device that really does replace the laptop.

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I don’t really get the whole “I’m a desktop user, I don’t wanna deal with Metro”, because… well… don’t do anything with Metro then? The desktop is still there and your interaction with Metro is almost entirely limited to the new Start Screen if you so choose.

And the new Start Screen functions pretty much exactly the same as the old Start Menu. Except that it offers a lot more space. Yes, it’s full screen, but the current menu doesn’t allow you to click anywhere outside of it either, so for all intents and purposes, it’s ‘full screen’ too.

Other than that, your “exposure” to Metro is basically that some Metro apps are the default for certain files, like video, which is easily changed (in fact, Windows notifies you that you have other applications that can open the file).

Microsoft isn’t pretending that the current Metro interface is gonna service all your power-user needs. The desktop environment is still fully supported and improved. But for the average user who browses the web and plays games and watches video, it’s perfectly suitable. Even with mouse and keyboard.

The only real annoyance I’ve run into is that the power button is kind of hidden away and takes too many steps to get to. Would be nice if you could pin it to the Start Screen.

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I was convinced that Windows 8 would be a huge flop, and I still think it has the potential to be. For a non-touch desktop machine, Windows 8 is the Black Plague, but for a tablet it could be a different story. And that’s why the Surface Tablet is a potential game-changer.

The iPad and its ilk are toys. The only thing they have proven is that most people don’t actually NEED a full-blown computer. They want to play games, check the weather, surf the Web and make grocery lists. Tablets and smart phones are perfect for that.

Me, I do need a full-blown computer, and I despise virtual keyboards. The Surface Tablet is exactly what someone like me would want. It’s an actual computer – a powerful computer – with a touch screen AND a physical keyboard, the form factor of a tablet and an operating system actually designed to its strengths (as opposed to Windows tablets that have come before). It’s essentially a foldable laptop with a touch screen. That is something I and other semi-power users might actually be interested in.

If only Metro weren’t so ugly…

Anyway, I don’t think this will be an iPad killer as many people don’t need its power and don’t want its complexity. But for people who actually want to get stuff done, the Surface could be the Mack truck to the iPad Flying Turtle.

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Here’s what I remember from the old 3.1 days.
We had our own DLL loader to keep from getting “Out of memory” errors. It was based on a solution from MSDN magazine, to give you an idea of how common the problem was.
The Microsoft/Sybase database client could become corrupted if other code was doing TCP/IP activity.
File Manager and Program Manager were jokes.
The default MS TCP/IP stack would occasionally stop working. I could never figure out how to reenable it without reinstalling Windows. (I eventually went to another stack, which worked flawlessly.)

Windows 95 had a much smarter loader, so we didn’t need our custom loader anymore. TCP/IP was reliable. And we could go 32 bit, which solved our database client issue.
I don’t see similar technical issues for moving to Windows 8.

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"Lower system requirements and smaller footprint than Windows 7"
The first Windows platform not requiring new (more powerful) hardware to run on. This maybe the decisive success factor.

I thought of waiting until August when the RTM will be released to try it out but now…

Anyway, any opinions on running Win8 on non-touch PCs, notebooks etc? What does it have to offer ?

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Hmmmmmm…

Microsoft is, and should remain Line-of-Business. Metro is consumer, and Windows 8 is becoming a lot less Business than all the Windows that came before. Granted, there are a lot of Road Warriors out in the field with apps that could benefit from a touch interface, but really not enough. Entering a name and address is just not any fun on a touch screen. However, I can envision wanting something for the 6000+ roadies I support. Metro isn’t hacking it. I becomes obvious that NONE of the folks who write articles have any experience with the products they review. Well here goes. I want to write a Metro app to browse a database of customers and launch a questionnaire. The database of “customers” is resident on the device and no Internet access is available. There is a whole infrastructure of applications that provides data to these devices when they have connectivity, but they have to operate without it when necessary. So, try and get to a local database from Metro. That ain’t going to happen and Mickey says that Metro was designed that way to protect apps from one another, you know, sandboxes and all that crap. So now I have to run an IIS on the device and communicate through a service which does all the work. Add to this the fact that I can’t use the flashy controls I am used to and have to reinvent the UI again. It never looks or feels like the .Net business apps we use currently, and the user isn’t happy with the dorky interface. This is just the start of converting Line-of Business to Metro. If MS is trying to pander to the consumer, then be up front about it, and stop trying to combine the two.

I like some of what the author says, but it is blatantly obvious he really lacks experience in the field and with Windows 8 and Metro in particular.

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@Chris Doherty: Where is the option to turn off the Metro interface in Windows 8? I have the CTP and I cannot find this option anywhere…not “Display”, not “Personalization”, not “Settings”…not anywhere.

I want my Start button on TaskBar in Desktop mode. Why would I want to interrupt what I’m doing to go to a separate screen, find the app I want to launch, launch it, then go back to Desktop? That is ridiculous.

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Funny you mention switching to OSX, because after the release of Vista I made that switch. My main/everyday machine now uses OSX 10.6, which I find to be superb, but I never have been able to commit 100% to OSX. I still keep my old PC running Vista exclusively for Visual Studio 2010. I would have kept XP on the machine as I much preferred its lack of clutter to whatever the hell Vista was trying to do, BUT Vista’s considerable increase in WPF performance, something which VS2010 uses quite a bit, eventually won me over. I haven’t felt the need to upgrade to Windows 7 on that machine, and the only thing that has been compelling me to upgrade to Win8 is the speed increase. Now that I’ve read your article I am a little excited about this new OS, I may even build a new PC for it!

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So let’s say somehow Windows 8 succeeds, and the majority of desk workers switch from desktop PCs to tablets. Can anyone talk about what’s it like to use a tablet at a traditional 8-hour desk job? (Please ignore the fact that this Surface tablet can be used like a laptop, which is similar to typing on desktops. Let’s assume a normal touch/tablet usage.)

I always see people holding a tablet, and often hunched over, but that’s while standing.

I ask because I’m wondering if there are any ergonomic studies with this. We’ve come a long way in our understanding of what’s good and bad for a typical typing/desktop job, but these tablets could cause RSI to be replaced by neck or back issues long-term.

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So far, we do not know much. The classical desktop is expected to loose Windows 7 chrome (which I like) and get Metro look. This may be anything from very good to a show stopper.

“What’s good about Windows 8?”: I guess the list should also include reduced lags in the sound subsystem and improved multi monitor support. Build in ability to use multiple Internet connections in parallel has been promised too.

Overall, Metro for a common desktop computer reminds me of pop-up DOS programs like Side Kick. It will be useful.

As for Surface and its price, please do not worry. It is a premium product, OEMs will make lots of cheaper ones.

Finally, that which I post everywhere in hope that Microsoft notices follows. Microsoft, make the stylus pressure sensitive so that Surface can be used for serious drawing.

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The Metro interface only supports 1 monitor. What are you going to do with your other displays?

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No, the last truly revolutionary version of Windows was 5.1, aka Windows XP. That was the version where they finally took the useless Windows 95 / 98 / 98 SE / ME kernel out behind the barn and blew its freaking head off with the howitzer it deserved in 1995!

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IMHO - nowadays it’s almost rather rare to see web developers using anything but Linux / OSx. So many more choices in Linux world - Windows makes u feel handicapped.

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I think Windows 8 will sell well because of the $40 upgrade. If I can dig out an old dead XP box, wipe the dust of the license sticker, dial that code into the Microsoft site and pay $40 and download an ISO of win8, then I’ll certainly be doing that. Even if in my case it’s only for a few games in boot camp on my Retina MacBook Pro.
Yep, Apple gets thousands of dollars from me every year, and Microsoft is going to get $40 from me. People have never liked paying for software. Microsoft is now just waking up to this.

I’m sure enterprise users, for years, will lock solidly on Win7 just as they did with XP. I mean I still know many companies who refuse to upgrade from Win Server 2003 because they took away the included outlook license per cal license and they don’t want to buy 50+ copies of office.

I agree with the article that Windows 95 was exciting.

You know what? Look at those two screen shots above. Compare Windows 7 to Windows 95. Which one is easier to use? They’ve seriously gone backwards in a big way.

Even worse, look at Control Panel in 95 vs Control Panel in Windows 7, in large icon view. WTF?? They dropped the ball.

Suppose Windows XP is bringing up a log in screen, and you want it to auto log in to your user account, because you’re a home user. On a Mac, in System Preferences, Accounts, you click “logos options” and under auto login drop down, choose your account. On Windows XP, you edit the registry. Really.

Want to move a program from your old mac to your new mac? Drag and drop, put it on a USB flash drive, whatever. Want to move a program from your old PC to your new one? Oh I’m sorry, you can’t, original installation media required, because the installer file explodes itself into your registry and and system32 folders and program files and puts DLL’s everywhere, which is great until malware or a legitimate app over writes required files.

Sorry, end rant, but I used to be the biggest Windows fan ever but they’ve dropped the ball, and they deserve what they get. I truly hope though that they can pick up the pieces quick smart because we need the competition. Deffiantely don’t want Apple ruling the world as Microsoft did in the 90’s.

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@Chris Doherty That’s not entirely through. Several settings are only available through the Metro UI (changing profile pictures for one) and become inaccessible when the UI is forced into classic mode using the registry. Others, like changing wifi connected networks, bring up a horrible abomination of a Metro-eqsue look that takes up the entire corner (full vertical length) even on the classical destop.

It’s as if Microsoft was undecided where they wanted to go and just gave up halfway.

You know what Windows 8 really is? Microsoft Bob 2.0.

Microsoft hasn’t been successful in their tablet business because they brought what was essentially a desktop OS on to a tablet system, and now they’re trying to do the reverse, and for what? To kill their desktop business?

After trying both the publicly available Windows 8 beta, the next thing I did was to get a hackintosh up and running, to prepare for the inevitable day where I would have to switch to OS X.

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No offence: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_systems

If I was M$, I couldn’t care less, really :slight_smile: