I love and use both DOS and GUI. Somethings still can't easily been done under the GUI (which is one of the weak things about the GUI that has been true since day one). OTOH somethings are also easier under the GUI instead of DOS. So I use whichever one is best suited for the task.
I don't hate mice. But I'll use a mouse if my hands aren't doing anything important on the keyboard. OTOH I know most of the keyboard shortcuts when my hands are on the keyboard. So I try to use one or the other for long periods of time.
Trackballs are about the same to me as mice. The rubber tiny joystick thing on the keyboard I can use better than most. Although I only like it if my hands are already on the keyboard. And highlighting with this thing seems to be the hardest to do for me.
I have used touchpads and I think they are just as useful for the most part. Although none of my many computers have this device. I only use it on other people's computers. First time was a real trip. As I was thinking how the heck do you work this thing?
I guess I am a bit lucky, it doesn't matter much by me. Mice, without, or whatever. I still get the work done.
__________________________________________________ Bill (using a Toshiba 2595XDVD under Windows 2000)
If the new guy lacks the vision, he has no choice.
In the case of Microsoft, it would be because the only way to keep things humming along is through continuous exercise of the same vision--and that vision is now gone. Steve Ballmer is a businessman, not a visionary, and he belongs much more to the standard MBA school of management. I understand he reads all the latest "how-to" books on management (literally).
Yes. Customers had source so they could change it if they needed to. It was never going to run on any other platform, anyway, so it didn't matter.
I think it was obvious even then. PCs were clearly a different ball game.
IBM has always thought about everything in the same way. I remember renting a typewriter from them once, and it was just amazing how they did it, with invoices and purchase orders and service contracts and so on. If something went wrong with the typewriter, I had to schedule a visit from a field engineer--I couldn't just bring the broken part in somewhere and get it replaced. The cost of one visit from a field engineer was greater than six months of rental fees.
And has any company ever succeeded at this? Success requires being smart, and no process can produce intelligence where it didn't previously exist.
I think it's both, and the wave has definitely broken on the beach and is now starting to pull back out to sea. Unless they come up with something entirely new (not just another "upgrade" of the OS or Office), the tide has permanently turned. I don't expect them to come up with anything new.
The whole business model of continually forced upgrades isn't going to work forever, either. Eventually consumers will get tired of moving to a new OS every year. Even now, there are untold millions of PCs that are never "upgraded" beyond the OS they had when first installed. Each time Microsoft tries an "upgrade" to maintain revenue, it increases the incoherence of the installed base, which has more and more versions of Windows up and running, from Windows 3.1 to XP.
Yes. I think MS has a comfortable number of years ahead of it, but there will be no major breakthroughs or skyrocketing growth now.
MS is becoming the very company with which it fought when it was little. MS is the new IBM. But the wheel will continue to turn.
The next great idea need not come from another company; in theory it could come from MS just as it has in the past. But the visionary is gone at MS, so it won't come from MS this time.
If a single brilliant CEO could live forever, then companies could be successful forever. But that's impossible, so virtually all companies end up with bad management at some point and dwindle or disappear. There are very rare exceptions, such as GE, which is so diversified that it can scarcely avoid making money no matter who is at the helm. Microsoft has no diversification at all, though, and that's very dangerous. Its attempts at diversification have been largely unsuccessful, too (MSN was a disaster and has only survived through constant infusion of billions to keep it in business).
For long-term, large-scale success, diversification is essential. There are few areas of business that are so constant and guaranteed that you can specialize in them over the long term and still make money.
-- Transpose mxsmanic and gmail to reach me by e-mail.
John... you are such a liar! Linux itself is a personal computer OS which is being used by millions.
John you lie like the devil! Linux is hot on Microsoft's Windows butt and is actually competing against Windows. OS/2 tried. but was managed by IBM and was doomed from mismanagement.
You are still lying your butt off John. There are tons of third party companies making a killing off of Windows applications alone. Ignoring the facts is just making you look foolish. Maybe you should give up.
__________________________________________________ Bill (using a Toshiba 2595XDVD under Windows 2000)
Anybody who wants to know what happened to Netscape Navigator needs to read that document. There are copies of it in various places on the Internet.
That's what I thought. You don't believe what most technically inclined computer users have understood long before our federal courts decided the issue.
Are you a Libertarian?
Microsoft has a stranglehold on personal computer software.
The problem isn't the operating system, unless you want to consider the problem with innovation given no competition. The problem is the operating system maker making applications. It's kind of like being on a farm. Let's say the operating system is your farm machinery, and the applications are your various crops. You wouldn't want the farm machinery favoring one crop or another or you're likely to end up with munched up potatoes.
The likely scenario is this. As Microsoft grows old and lazy, it will continue to suck applications into its maelstrom. Microsoft already owns the biggest money makers. The lazier Microsoft gets, the more applications it will have to add to its collection. First it has been the most lucrative applications and applications that Microsoft and its family might need or enjoy. Second it is applications that make the most money. Eventually, any software that makes money will be dominated by Microsoft. Microsoft also squeezes more and more money out of its already captive users. And eventually they cry to the government for relief.
Or you haven't read the Findings of Fact on Microsoft.
The operating system maker should not be allowed to make applications, whatever you call it. If that were to pose some threat to Microsoft's Windows dominance, I guess that would be competition.
You really need to include more than one level of quoting.
I agree that's partly true. But the separation of the operating system maker from the applications makers makes perfect sense to me.
I guess something was lost in the translation. Again, you really need to include more than one level of quoting.
Just because Microsoft owns Windows, does not mean Microsoft can do anything it wants with Windows, no more than the rightful owner of a baseball bat can aggressively bash in the skull of his enemy.
Again, you really need to quote more than one level.
Having no choice of operating systems is not necessarily bad. Having no choice for office applications and eventually no choice for many other applications is bad.
All your insults don't explain anything about why you don't express an opinion one way or another.
My guess is that you are afraid to admit that you are blind to the facts because you know most of your associates know better.
That is a giant leap from arguing that the district court and the appeals court both got wrong something both unanimously agreed on.
Are you saying that there is no way to tell the difference between an operating system and applications?
I use them both, but not interchangeably.
Do you agree or disagree with the vast majority of technically inclined computer users who know that Microsoft holds monopoly power over the personal computer operating system market?
How about the court deciding something that was self-evident to most of us long ago (many Libertarians excluded).
Linux isn't even a blip on the radar for desktop systems. See
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It's no surprise, given that Linux is technically inferior to Windows and it costs at least as much ... according to the above, $59.95 for Suse, $99.95 for Linspire, and a whopping $348 for Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES v.3.0 Basic Edition (say that all in one breath!)--and that's at Wal-Mart!
With competitors like Linux, Microsoft doesn't have to do anything to kill off the competition--it's already seriously ill on its own.
-- Transpose mxsmanic and gmail to reach me by e-mail.
One also needs to read the detailed history of Netscape. The company doomed itself, with or without any intervention by Microsoft. I still recall some of the absolute garbage they tried to sell; I was amazed that they had the nerve to put their name on the box.
The operating system maker doesn't produce any applications, except Office.
Actually I have. But I've read a lot of other things, too, and I don't consider judges to be experts on business and IT.
Why not?
I don't see any point. Microsoft only sells one application that makes any serious cash, and it doesn't have much competition to begin with.
What would be the equivalent of bashing in skulls with Windows?
Is it? One of the requirements of office applications is interoperability. If everyone uses something different, there is none.
And there aren't any other applications. Microsoft's only significant end-user application is Office.
-- Transpose mxsmanic and gmail to reach me by e-mail.
No what I believe is you trust in liars! And I have make a clear cut case of it.
No! I am nothing! I don't vote at all because I am responsible for my actions. Something that those like you can't claim.
Not so! That is like saying Linux has a stranglehold on the personal computer software. Both are rivals. Something that you will never understand!
Anybody is free to create their own OS and some have. And Linux is the strongest competitor to MS. A fact that you have been ignoring this whole time.
Still ignoring Linux and Open Office like a dumbass. Good show John. Ignorance is your best suite!
From known liars? Good show John... good show!
From a guy who can't even respond from quotes from others at all. Good show John. Drop to the lowest level possible!
Buy a Linux computer then. What is your problem?
Since you can't address facts in front of you face, your requests are meaningless.
You are such a dumbass! I said many times now there are Linux and OpenOffice. You on the other hand want to be a total jerk and ignore the facts! That is okay John, we all now know you are just a dumbass. So you have nothing more to prove.
__________________________________________________ Bill (using a Toshiba 2595XDVD under Windows 2000)
Logically, no, but not having one doesn't preclude the fool hardly from trying anyway ;) That's the reverse of my scenario and back to yours: incompetent new management.
I'm not arguing there's a 'universal' scenario but that it varies, depending on a host of circumstances.
Yes, same point I made below.
You seem 'surprised'. Would you be surprised to hear the 'geeks' read all the latest 'how to' technology books and trade journals?
We agree.
Well, I was developing proprietary microcomputers for specific industry applications, not 'general purpose' computers, so I am not sure how 'obvious' it would have been.
Well, now that is definitely true and gets back to the 'vision' thing. IBM's computer vision went back to the early mainframe days when keeping one running for 8 hours straight was big news and the vision that put them on top was the 200% support paradigm. Remember the 'white shirt, black tie, pocket protector army?
Most do, even if the first thought comes from the internal 'genius'.
You don't 'produce' it, you gather it from many sources rather than expecting one person to be omniscient.
And the process itself comes from 'smarts'.
I don't expect it but I don't discount the possibility either.
I tend to agree, as long as the upgrades are relatively minor 'features' but not terribly different to the primary mission.
It's notable that you didn't include anything prior to 3.1, though, because there was a major functionality shift at that point (I'd cut it off at Win95) so it *is* possible for an 'upgrade' to delineate a major shift, if it's functionally significant enough.
And I'm not so sure we may not be near another one as 32 bit transitions to
64, single core to dual core, and, perhaps, the long touted 3D Desktop.
Well, they're 'big' now but that's about the only similarity to the IBM of old. Completely different visions, primary business, and business models.
I didn't say it *had* to, I was just pointing out that it could and put you out of business without one needing to make 'too many mistakes'.
This is where I disagree and intended the previous example to show. Even the most brilliant buggy whip CEO can't stave off the automobile nor does his brilliance in buggy whips give him one whit of insight into making good cars. He's probably better off as the dreaded 'MBA type' that's transportable to any industry ;)
We may be coming to a divergence here because I don't think it takes 'the genius' for a company to survive. Plain old stupidity, of course, can kill anything but there's a whole world in-between genius and idiot.
Oh, lordy. Now that you've said it they're probably doomed ;)
Yes, I agree. But wasn't MSN a Bill Gates era idea?
I agree. It's just not the kind of thing the 'great idea' originator does because his idea is for the thing he started, not diversification. That generally comes from those 'management types' who don't have a vested geek interest in some pet project.
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