Happy 2nd birthday, Windows 8 and Surface: Anatomy of a disaster This weekend marks two years since Windows 8 and Surface were launched at a press event at Pier 57 on the Hudson River in New York. The invitation for the Windows 8 launch in October 2012 “It is today that with great pride we unveil this new generation of Windows. Starting at 4.01am worldwide, the next era of Windows …
Uhh, don't forget VP Belfiore, he's might have done more damage than Sinofsky. From the outside he's the classic archetype of the all-too-common unmitigated Ballmerian managerial disaster, that still just keeps rising and rising - no matter how big of a clusterfuck he produced Joe just keeps getting promoted: IE4, Windows eHome, Windows Media Center, Zune and the current ongoing royal fuckup called Windows Phone, with its missing features, continuously non-upgradable iterations year after year... aye and he's the reigning "UI design king", don't forget whenyou think about your current UX. =)
I call foul on Microsoft's touting Windows 8 being the most successful release. What bullshit. The only reason it's done as well as it did is because OEM's were not allowed to ship windows 7. If I had a captive market like that, I certainly wouldn't be proud of the way it was received. I'm glad Sinofsky resigned and hopefully Apple hires him as he will be forever known as one of the key figures in the decline of Microsoft. (along with Balmer and a cast of other idiots)
The point about not being able to buy Windows 7 is key, I think, MS had retailers clear the shelves of Win 7 machines within 3 months. People did not know you could buy win 7 on some web sites and so they didn't buy anything.
I think the other major factor is that older people and most people, for that matter, don't like change and win 8 had way too many. I advised my clients to stay away!!! and they did.
>The point about not being able to buy Windows 7 is key
Windows 7 end of retail life is definitely an interesting factor.
As of 30, October 2013 MS stopped selling retail versions of Windows 7. Since then you've only been able to purchase Windows 7 pre-installed on a system. However, it does seem that MS (back in December 2013) have broken their own convention (defined in 2010) by retracting the 30, October 2014 cut-off date for OEM's. Currently MS have committed to giving a one year notice on when it will set a new cut-off date, so currently OEM's can install Windows 7 until at least October 2015.
However, I note the major OEMs seem to only supply Win8.n in their "home" ranges, for Win7 you have to visit the 'business' pages and select a "Win7 pre-installed through Win8 downgrade rights" system.
>>a fat toolbar called a ribbon, or the “Fluent user interface.
Didn't realize W8 and the ribbon came from the same guy.
I've totally avoided W8. None of the companies I work with have shown any interest in allowing W8 in.
100% Win7 or XP(still)
Forced to work with whatever version of Office available at a site...I did adjust to the ribbon but... I still HATE it.
Maybe W10 will win me over?
I have wanted to buy new PCs for a couple years now but... couldn't accept what was offered by MS.
I bought a used Gaming PC a few months ago, came without any OS. Went looking for Windows 7 Professional FPP (full retail), didn't want OEM as the PC is an unknown quantity. The bastards don't sell it. One can buy OEM version, but FPP does not exist.
Found someone offering genuine New sealed Old Stock. Counterfeit of course, blocked volume license key. Paypal thankfully forced a refund. You can see that Microsoft has a role in this.
Gaming PC ended up with Linux. Steam can be streamed over LAN, so that works for the kidiots.
Sinofsky and/or anyone else involved in these decisions is a stubborn arse. Ass hats.
Found someone offering genuine New sealed Old Stock. Counterfeit of course, blocked volume license key.
There's an interesting trick around MS not selling Win7 licenses, and you were already halfway there. Install Win7, get the "Windows product not original" message. You will be sent to a site offering to buy a legal license for your OS ... and yes, they will sell you Win7 Pro or Win7 Ultimate, whatever you did install on your PC. I was able to get XP this way long after MS did the same thing with Vista, and I'm pretty sure that Win7 licenses are probably still available through this channel. WGA is probably more concerned with legalizing pirated Windows versions than trying to push the unloved Win8; at this point, users will rather deal with pirated Win7 than get reamed with Win8. MS is better off getting revenue from Win7 rather than no income from pirated Win7.
When I was installing the latest 10 Preview build, watching the continual colour change as those nice people retrieve your apps for you, I was reminded of using the batch I used to have for cycling through the foreground/background combinations courtesy of Ansi in DOS. I thought 'are they showing off how far they've come?' You know, it was like an epiphany. Here I am as ever in Windows 7. I've got Mint 17 (and have tried all the main distros at one time or another) and a couple of examples of recent OS X - and Windows XP, 8, 8.1, and 10, and I think Windows 7 Aero is easily the prettiest, yet not only did Microsoft throw that away with 8 - and go back to something aesthetically nearer 3.11 than Windows 7 - but apparently, going on the Tech Previews, they don't plan to reverse that.
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"BTW, Windows 2000 may have been the best OS MS ever made. If only it had a firewall it would have been a great consumer OS."
I liked Win2k as well. I used a desktop with it on at work for a couple of years. Absolutely no drama, just cranking the work out (Celeron, 256Mb ram, large crt monitor).
So upvote for that
Windows 3.1 dud
Windows 95 dud
Those were very succesful Operating Systems (or GUI if you prefer).
Your list also omits Win98SE (not a dud).
Windows 2000 may have been the best OS MS ever made. If only it had a firewall...
...If it also had Cleartype, MUCH faster boot times, remote desktop, shadow copies (system restore), , Wi-Fi management, and it was called say, Windows XP, it would have been even better! :-)
Anyone who hates Vista has to hate 7 ... because it is the same shit - the only thing they fixed between the two is a humongous memory allocation bug that affected Vista.
Windows 7 is dog slow, compared to my Linux box on outdated hardware, or Windows 2k for that matter. Boot time of 2k is long, I grant you that ... but not nearly as long as it takes Windows 7 to "prepare a file copy". I do not know about you, but I happen to copy files more often than reboot ...
I agree with you on w2k, XP probably had USB2 and "wifi manager", however, the windows firewall is crap. Note, also, that it was introduced in SP2 ... XP needed twice as much RAM as Windows 2000, at launch, all that for a FisherPrice ui. There was only one year between the release of the two.
One of the most requested features by the W10 test community is Aero. I myself have requested it. I am going to install the latest update and request Aero again. I have also requested a customizable start menu so that users have a choice between WinXP style, W2000 style, or WinVista/7 style.
One of the most requested features by the W10 test community is Aero.
Given how MS reportedly handled user requests for the ability to choose to have a start menu in the Win 8 previews, I'd suggest a slightly different tactic - demand that they don't ever consider putting Aero back in.
All M$ had to do was the option to change between metro and a start button and it would have been a great release. Let that be a lesson to all of us in software. Give people what they want, not what you want to give them.
One pig headed manoeuvre and bam - epic fail.
> Give people what they want, not what you want to give them.
However ... “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses” as Henry Ford said.
What I find more interesting here is how Ballmer, Sinofsky and Nadella are all so, erm, follicly challenged. Is there a Conspiracy of the Bald in charge of Microsoft? Or was Ballmer such a leader that all his minions chose to shave and polish their heads in emulation? Or is it just chance that the last three middle-aged white males at the top of MS have been slap-heads?
"What people want is obviously not the same as what they say they want."
You'll find that most people want what they're used to, with the new, and a chance to chose between the familiar parts or the new parts that may work better.
Win 8 provided neither familiarity or choice. That's why it failed.
"However ... “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses” as Henry Ford said."
Bah. Henry Ford was not bold enough, or not Modern enough, to push out the product with bright-coloured square wheels. Had he done it, history would have been very much different.
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> However ... “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses” as Henry Ford said.
Except this isn't some primitive physical item that is still inferior to what it's trying to replace.
This is software. It doesn't wear out and it's easy to change. Enabling your "Model-T" doesn't require shooting everybody's horse.
“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses” There is no evidence that Ford ever said that, it appears to have come from some focus group idiot.
Ford didn't invent cars, he just made them cheap enough for more people to buy.
And therein the problem: the UI is too deeply embedded in the OS. There isn't the equivalent of the Linux trick of 'don't like Unity? Try Cinnamon. Or KDE. Or...'
With an OS separated from the UI, or even delivered with a choice of UI, or just come with the W7 UI, it would probably have flown - at the very least it would not have crashed and burnt the way it has. But MS seem to believe that the punters won't believe it's new unless it looks different - and so everything has to look different and work differently and a lifetime's learned reactions go out of the window... I mean, 'windows S' for search, when everybody and his granny have been using ctrl-f for find since the year dot?
@ Neil Barnes "and so everything has to look different and work differently and a lifetime's learned reactions go out of the window"
And yet you're preaching a UNIX-like separation of OS and GUI? It hasn't worked to push Linux into the mainstream, why would it work here?
Bit of a straw man argument there, Neil? The fact that Linux isn't as mainstream as Windows has a lot more to do with the fact that the average punter buys a computer and it comes with Windows on it, unless he goes into an Apple store.
I'm just proposing a mechanism that could have been used to offer W8 without the apparently largely reviled UI; the fact that the UI and the OS are so deeply intertwined makes it difficult to run a different UI.
The fact that Linux isn't as mainstream as Windows has a lot more to do with the fact that the average punter buys a computer and it comes with Windows on it...
No, the reason it isn't as mainstream is that it's a darn sight harder to use.
Last time I tried Linux and attempted to install Firefox I first had to find an installer for the distribution I was using. Then I had to decide from a swathe of nonsensical file types, gar, tar, bar har-de-har-har (with no explanation of what they meant or do). Finally I had to go through the rigmorole of 'unpacking' them, and typing a load of cryptic command to try try to complete the install.
I know this will be downvoted by those too blind to see that if Linux is to succeed in making it to the desktop of Joe Average, it will have to get a lot friendlier. We are used to double clicking a file to install it, so don't make us jump through hoops. EXPLAIN things, don't keep it a closed shop for those who laugh through their noses.
I would drop Windows at the drop of a hat if Linux was more accessible to the uninitiated.
That does sound hard. Of course the last time I tried to install Firefox on a Linux machine (Gentoo) about 5 years ago, I opened the program manager, selected browsers and clicked Firefox at which point it duly informed me that it would also install a few prerequisites for me and please enter your password here to complete the install.
I don't do desktop Linux but how recent is your experience?
Most distros come with a pretty nifty package manager a la apt/yum. On the command line it will be something like apt-get firefox. And... drum roll... a desktop distro is bound to have a gui front end for it.
I think you are right to bash the old style installers you are talking about, but they're mostly gone now. Try again?
Having said that the constant flux in Linux GUIs is what drove me off. KDE 3 was good enough.
Choice is _not_ a panacea, for core, needs-to-be-used components, especially wrt to newbies.
For example, Python suffered greatly from an overabundance of GUI toolkits. Newcomers had no obvious, elegant and mature default GUI toolkit to work with and were told to evaluate the choices themselves. Just where you want to be as you finally jump into a brand new technology.
This cycle started up again with web servers, until Django got general acceptance and became the default to use. Not to take away any credit from good alternatives, like Flask, but a good-enough default also forces the wannabe challengers to up their game in terms of power, useability and stability. I've had the displeasure of working with several crappy, buggy, immature Python web servers and GUI toolkits which should never have been widely recommended as choices and it does a great job in undermining your confidence in the system as whole.
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