VISTA

Well said!

I remember when the critics were telling us to hate XP and that it would break all our applications. (Even though there is virtually nothing that runs under 2000 and won't run under XP.) Before that, I remember when they were telling us to hate Windows 95 because it would break all our DOS applications. To hate VM/CMS because it would break our OS/360 applications. And so on.

To a certain mindset, computers were perfect 5 years ago and we don't need no steenkin' progress!

One thing nobody has said enough about is that the embedded systems industry is burdened by development tools that *insist* on not following best practices that have been standard since the 1980s, such as distinguishing user from system file space, not making arbitrary assumptions about disk drive letters, etc.

See for example:

:-) Only really use it for fun (like 35mm film cameras now we have a digital SLR)

Thanks for the commercial :-)

I would have to agree there for some areas. The Linux market seems to be maturing.

There are still some areas where UNIX is king (but they are niche)

Then Linux could be an option for Office use except that very soon Open Office will be using a non-standard XML format...... ECMA fast track though ISO. Many are more than a little annoyed about that and it will cause a lot of heat. It remains to be seen if it causes more than just a lot of noise

Not sure about that but not enough to argue :-)

:-))) I know what you mean Prepare for a near Israeli amount of propaganda and FUD from both the pro and the anti's

Too late at night.

Yes... that was it. That little fiasco

And on going. (Not to mention C#, CLI, CLI/C++ etc )

Yes... An interesting anomaly .

Trust MS to create a standard and then not adhere to it :-) You couldn't make this up could you really.

So why go to all the trouble of creating the standard in the first place? Seems strange. What convoluted reason can you think of for MS spending a lot of time and effort in forcing the ECMA standard through and not adhering to it?

In message , MC writes

Is it a smaller foot print than Vista? Might it run on an XP class PC?

Opps, I meant XP upgraded to Vista.

ce

I don't know what you mean by "displaced". I still don't expect very many people to go out and buy Windows 7 (this time I mean Windows 7) to replace Vista. I just have *never* seen anyone unhappy enough to actually go through the effort of installing a new OS rather than just waiting until they replace the machine.

A lot of this is the difference between the typical geek that inhabits this venue and the average user, personal or professional. There are a lot more lawyers, secretaries, bankers and clerks using Windows than geeks. For the most part, they use a computer in the same way they use a card. They turn it on, do what they need to do and turn it off without thinking about it.

There

I was very happy with 2000. But now that I have seen Vista, I am happier with that user interface... with one exception I won't go into here.

Rick

I was going to stop responding because this is getting monotonous. But this is silly. If everyone cuts expenses, doesn't that mean they will either be laying off people or reducing the purchase of goods from other companies? Even if they do as much as possible to be more efficient, when they don't sell as much, they don't buy as much. That's just common sense.

The cascading effect is why it is so hard to turn a failing economy around. If a car company is hiring engineers, it is because they are being forward looking. But I hope that you can see the difference between hiring a few engineers and laying off hundreds or thousands of factory workers. Which car companies are not cutting production?

Your view of the economy is very limited as you demonstrated above, seeing the engineering hiring and not the production layoffs. Perhaps the companies you do business with are not yet laying off. But surely their sales are off and a car company can't keep producing cars when they aren't selling. Their parking lots can only hold so much.

Yes, for the short term. You are talking about now. I am saying that as this continues, you will see an impact. If you aren't prepared for it and you are one of the laid off workers, you can be like so many who are losing their homes and so much of their lives.

Which countries don't rely on credit for capitalizing production? All major world economies work the same way other than communistic societies. Even those are moving more toward economic capitalism. In any country where companies internally fund all capital projects, they make themselves targets for buyouts. I can assure you that there are no semiconductor companies that build their own fabs with their own money. Auto makers are the same way. It is just too expensive to invest all your own capital and limit your growth.

Please let me know who they are. I would like to invest.

How did you prepare? If your sales are not down, why would you need to prepare?

Rick

How much would the MS operating systems be simplified is they were single-user rather than multi-user? I've always found that having multiple users on an XP system is more trouble than it is worth. I think that the days where a PC had to support more than one user are past in most offices and businesses. Most home users could probably get by with a single-user OS also. About all you would have to add is some password- protected folders.

Mark Borgerson

lt

I would guess that production increases are common among electric car producers.

I also think that the car companies shot themselves in the foot when they started producing and advertising cars that are=20 good for 100,000 miles or 10 years of normal usage. Gone are the days when you needed a new car every 5 years to keep the reliability satisfactory.

ve

How about Brunei and the other major oil producers? I thought most of them got paid for letting an outside company capitalize their production.

It would seem now that limiting growth a decade ago might have been a smart move. Privately-owned companies can do that. Public corporations are held hostage to the earnings and share appreciation requirements of Wall Street.

Perhaps their sales are not down because they DID prepare-- by=20 developing new markets and products.

Mark Borgerson

... snip ...

I think the point is that the present recession has forced MS to expose their foul organization, overstaffing, etc. Can you possibly imagine needing 94000 people to support their present product line? The only reason is the many ugly inhibitions against usage built into the software.

...

ince

Buying new hardware with OEM installs is cheaper these days (even if you=20 have no proper disks to fix problems or similar problems).

Also how often do these pwople change their copier, desk, washing=20 machine? After many years, once they can wirte their letters, send a few emails, browse a few web pages they keep installing software until it=20 crawls and needs fixing or replacing.

Typicial replacement times are 3 to 5 years (some longer).

=A0There

or

But you skipped XP, others may well skip Vista for the same reason.

Often home users and corporates will skip one or two versions of Windows as what they got 'works'.

Microsoft has problems with revenues due to market saturation and most of the unwashed who don't buy things because it is new in the same manner as they do cars, washing machines.

Saying these things from experience of supporting customers from home=20 users, through small one man bands to installations of approx 300=20 systems.

In UK most of the education market where large system deployments are=20 done in a mamnaged way are still on XP.

Many students/schoolchildren find Vista a pain. Many home users I see find Vista a pain (unprompted).

--=20 Paul Carpenter | snipped-for-privacy@pcserviceselectronics.co.uk PC Services Timing Diagram Font GNU H8 - compiler & Renesas H8/H8S/H8 Tiny For those web sites you hate

Um, no, you haven't got that *entirely* correct...

One of the most powerful aspects of open source software is that you cannot make a change like the one you are suggesting - if Sun (they are the main commercial backers of OpenOffice, and owners of most of its copyrights) tried to change to a new closed format, the project would be quickly forked and backing companies, developers, and users would switch to the fork.

I believe that what you are referring to is that Open Office 3.0 now supports importing MS's OOXML format, which is the non-standard format used by MS Office 2007. A slightly incompatible version of this format was fast-tracked by ECMA through ISO. Although Open Office now supports importing these files (and may later support exporting), the standard format for Open Office is still the single *real* standard format, namely Open Document Format.

There is a lot of debate in open source circles about whether including this import support is a "good thing". Some people feel that simply because it is an MS format, it should be avoided - anything MS touches is corrupt, and that corruption spreads (there is good historical foundation for this somewhat paranoid viewpoint). In particular, the so-called "standard" documentation for OOXML is very unclear about patents, copyrights, and other licenses - should people worry that using Open Office will leave them open to patent lawsuits? MS certainly

Other people are concerned about the source of this import support - there is a substantial group of open source developers who try to avoid anything to do with Novell since its deals with MS. This is partly because they view Novell as a traitor, and partly because they worry about code coming from MS through Novell which may then be open to lawsuits or other legal issues.

Then there are those who dislike anything that makes it easier to interact between the MS world and the free world, because they believe it makes it easier for MS world users to benefit from free and open software without making a full switch, and that without such interaction, more people would fully switch to FOSS. This is, IMHO, rubbish - but they are entitled to their opinions.

MS has spent an enormous amount of time, money and effort trying to confuse everyone on this issue - it looks like they succeeded with you!

Think of the situation before MS started this OOXML nonsense. There was already a perfectly good standard format for office documents - the ODF. Sure, it had its faults and missing features - these things evolve over time. The format had several implementations - Open Office, Google Docs, KOffice, amongst others, and has been in use for a long time (it was developed from the original formats for Star Office, the ancestor of OpenOffice). Once the Open Document Format became more than just the default format for Star Office / OpenOffice, it was transferred to OASIS which maintains, develops and documents the format. OASIS is an independent standards group with a solid reputation, thus keeping ODF separate from any one implementation and ensuring it can be freely used by anyone (user or developer). Its future and features can also be influenced by anyone in OASIS, ensuring that the ODF will evolve as needed by the industry. OASIS guided the format through the ISO standardisation process, following the standard paths - a process that took years, but was smooth because ODF build on existing standards and was well documented. It's worth noting that MS is a member of OASIS.

At this point, the ODF is the only real ISO-certified office document format. There are good free office suites that work with it, and it is a popular format for the growing on-line application market. Governments, US states, and other bodies around the world are looking at it as a choice for documents - in particular, it is much better for archiving because it does not need specific versions of specific commercial software to work with it. MS knows that controlling people's data is vital if you want them to be forced to use your software.

MS has three choices - they can produce something better than the ODF (impossible, because they don't have the time, and they couldn't do better anyway), they could support the ODF format in MS Office and compete fairly on features and price/performance, or they could cheat.

Thus MS started a campaign to cause maximal confusion with a total disregard for the standards system and the destruction they would cause. They started by calling their new format "Office Open XML" - hardly a name designed to keep things clear. They immediately claimed it to be "open", since it was called "open", and since it used XML and XML is "open" and a "standard". OOXML is "open" in the same way a binary file is "open" if you convert it to "open standard" Intel Hex format. This gave them a wedge to delay any government or institutions decisions about formats - it would be totally unfair of anyone to decide on ODF when there are now two "open" standards! (They used various lawsuits to force such delays in the USA.) Then they pushed the format through ISO

- the bribery, corruption, and destruction of standardisation bodies along the way is well documented elsewhere.

The fact that the OOXML format accepted by ISO and the formats used by MS Office are different has no impact on MS - ISO standardisation was merely a tool, not an end in itself. The result is that people are thoroughly confused as to what is a standard and what is not, or even the extent to which it matters - thus fewer bodies will decide to standardise on ODF format, and will stick to whatever they are used to (i.e., whatever MS tells them). As a plan B, to ensure that even when ODF is mandated, MS Office is still a possible choice. You can be sure that MS will make it clear that ODF is an "inferior" format, of course. Supporting ODF also helps MS claim to be a nice guy that believes in standards, interoperability, free competition and consumer choice - very useful for its various lawsuits in the EU.

When I bought my Dell AMD system two years ago, it came with XP. But I was given the option to "upgrade" to Vista. After hearing some of the horror stories, I elected to pass on Vista.

When we bought my wife's Dell one year ago, we had no option: it was Vista, take it or leave it.

Today, Dell is again giving buyers a choice: Vista or XP.

That should tell you something.

Jack

Yep, that propaganda still works.

Yes, when you start at the bottom with no sales, the only way you can go is up. But you are helping to make my point. The only companies that can be expected to grow are ones that have virtually no sales because they are new.

You must be an ex-Detroit employee. Those days were gone 20 years ago. That was the attitude of the US automakers for many, many years, that to boost sales you needed to make sure the old car wore out quickly. But then Toyota is now the largest auto maker in the world by building quality vehicles. And they have never had to offer a

Isn't it a bit silly to think that a longer warranty will make a car last longer???

No one will capitalize your production unless you pay them adequately for it. If they are doing this, then they are using the credit of the outside company and are paying both for the credit and for the company's overhead.

I can see why you are in software. Why would limiting growth be good? Growth is not a problem. The problem today has to do with the disruption of credit markets by allowing them to operate without proper oversight. At least that is the problem in this country. Why is Brittan's economy crapping out now?

You seem unsure. I'm asking what actions they took. Do you not know? Isn't developing new markets and products what everyone does in

Rick

I beg to differ. I think that many companies can be expected to grow or remain stable over the next year. Among them are companies=20 producing and distributing basic foods and groceries and companies=20 producing medical and health-care products.

For example, Pfizer's stock price today is about where it was last July.

Nope. Never worked east of the Mississippi except in the Navy.

My point exactly. =20

It actually might if the longer warranty period motivates the consumer to keep up with the scheduled maintenance.

However, don't mix up cause and effect. Cars that last longer make=20 longer warranties economically feasible.

I think the companies are paying the resource holders, not the other way around! ;-) However, you may argue that the net profits of Brunei are reduced by the cost of the capital for the oil company.

Actually, software and hardware both. Software is less capital intensive, though. Other than a few expensive compiler licenses, not much capital is required. The PC board do require some parts and equipment---but not more than I can purchase with retained earnings.

It is if your market shifts to the point where you cannot sustain the worker and infrastructure levels you've acquired. Did the big three automakers think they could increase sales and production forever? At some point you saturate the market for your product and revenue can only be sustained by increasing prices or cutting costs. Wall Street is OK with that, but Main Street is not.

I agree with that. Tighter controls on credit might also have restrained the corporate impulse to grow without limits.

Perhaps one of our British readers can answer that.

Since we're not talking about my company, I do not know.

Nope. I don't develop new markets and products for my company unless an older market or product declines. But then I'm not a corporation and can limit my growth based on personal, not market, considerations. But I have a few advantages that the big corporations do not: I can develop a new product in weeks or months, not years. I also have no long-term business debt.

I'm not alone in this outlook. About half the US GDP comes from small, non-corporate businesses. Those that have maintained some limits on growth and capital debt are probably those best equippped to handle the current economy.

Mark Borgerson

... snip ...

All this is a good indication of why they needed 94000 employees.

Ok, right there is the problem. I don't _WANT_ a multi-user OS. I'm it. Me, myself, and I. No other users. Just me. Only me.

Actually, Vista is more tolerant of this than a properly

Yep. Another multi-user system, based on a 40-year-old design. Like Joerg, I didn't like that aspect in Unix, either, and for the same reason. It's just me out here.

I understand the notion that the user shouldn't be constantly logged in as root or administrator, lest he should himself in the foot and break something. But the notion that an installed app is not allowed to use the directory its own installer created, is to me bizarre. How did _THAT_ become accepted as a rule of nature?

But, again, I _AM_ the single, all-powerful user. I want to keep it that way, too. I'm a firm believer in the Pournelle doctrine: At least one CPU per user. I ain't sharin' with nobody, no how. No way.

Jack

Not anymore. Consider minix3.

Jack

Now come on there, I have always thought that only one CPU per user is being a bit mean. When the CPU is busy accessing something on the hard drive for me I would like to think I could still do stuff on the screen. Thankfully we are beginning to see the emergence of mesh processor chips which have many processor cores woven together into a mesh that will enable a user to be in charge of as many processors as he would wish.

That is what DMA controllers are for.