07/12/2006, 2:05pm, EDT
Wednesday, July 12th
Vista may see yet another delay
Vista Delay bodes well for Apple, ill for Microsoft
Microsoft in March announced a delay in the consumer launch of Windows Vista, attributing the setback to undesirable timing with partners. Analysts took the news as positive for Apple, saying that Vista's delay could result in a 5 percent negative impact on December 2006 revenue and earnings estimates for Microsoft while potentially increasing market share for the Cupertino-based company.
Unrest ensues
Frustration mounted following the company's decision to push back Vista's release, causing an uproar within Microsoft's own ranks with employees calling for the removal of upper management, including executive officer Steve Balmer himself.
"We're missing the holiday sales market," wrote one anonymous employee. "Not only did we miss last year's opportunity, we're missing this year's opportunity, too."
Followers voice discontent
A Windows enthusiast and author of more than a dozen books about Microsoft's operating system in April described in great detail where he believed Vista failed.
"Since the euphoria of PDC 2003, Microsoft's handling of Windows Vista has been abysmal," wrote Paul Thurrott. "The entire project was literally restarted from scratch after it became obvious that the initial code base was a teetering, technological house of cards."
Thurrott had spent over 10 years investigating Microsoft and its products, saying that the company is collapsing under its own weight.
Further delays predicted
Gartner Research in early May predicted that Microsoft would yet again delay the release of Windows Vista, pointing to its development cycle, previous release cycles, code complexity, and lofty feature targets.
"Microsoft's track record is clear; it consistently misses target dates for major operating system releases," Gartner told clients.
"Distant second-best"
Computerworld in early June listed "20 things you won't like about Windows Vista," and dubbed Apple's Mac OS X the best operating system on the market. The publication placed Windows Vista as "a distant second-best" to Mac OS X, with Linux and Windows 2000 tying each other "a notch or two" below Vista.
More troubles in Redmond
Microsoft in late June announced the cancellation of the WinFS file system in Windows Vista, one of the most anticipated features to debut in the company's already delayed and widely-criticized operating system. Microsoft had previously planned to ship the WinFS file system shortly after Windows Vista, but later said that WinFS would not ship separately, and that some of the features would be included in a later product.
"This was the major feature of Windows Vista," said analyst Joe Wilcox of Jupiter Research. "It was part of the operating system and it was an opportunity for developers. Spreading it out into other things that might appear someday is not the same thing."
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Paul Thurrott. The master of the cliche.
Oh, as for this: With all the resources MS has, they could have built a new operating system based on Unix or Linux and had a Classic/WINE enviroment to work with it.
Unlikely. The problem is that Windows users demand more and better backward compatibility from their OS upgrades than Apple's suckers...er...users. Mac users were just so grateful to get any type of real OS they just dealt with the incompatibilities and such of classic and their software. If someone's copy of XYZWrite doesn't work with Vista, there's ton's of bitching and moaning...
Oh, and just so you know, while OS X does have classic compatibility, they had the Mac OS running under Unix well before Steve Jobs came back to Apple. The Macintosh Application Environment, or MAE, was around in the mid-90s. It was very much like the original classic (which was more like VPC at the time), everything running in a big window).
So Apple had a headstart on their Classic compatibiltiy. They didn't just 'whip it out' in a couple of days. And even though it was based on an existing, feature-rich OS, it still took apple 5 years to go from Next OS to Rhapsody to OS X. (6 years if you don't count 10.0 or 10.1 as anything but beta copies).
It's sounding like we may have another Copland in the works.
Nah, this is nothing like Copland. according to Wikipedia, Copland was in the works for only two years before they killed it. Vista has been in the works for well longer then that. And they haven't killed it yet. And MS has promised a lot more features and enhancements that they won't be able to deliver then Apple ever did.
So, see, you're comparing Apples to Oranges here.
http://www.igeek.com/articles/History/CoplandAndNeXT.txt
Vista, like Copland, is a failure of management, not engineering. The main difference is M$ hasn't bought another OS yet.
It's going to be 2007 when (if) this comes out. If someone wants to run software from 1995, then they should run Windows 95. Time marches on (for most).
Mac users are waiting for a real OS? Agreed. OS9 sucked compared to Windows 2K. Now it's the Windows users that are waiting for a real OS. Give it a year more and you'll put up with the same crap we did.
"If someone's copy of XYZWrite doesn't work with Vista, there's ton's of bitching and moaning"
So you're saying that Windows users demand more quality in their software than Mac users? What dimension are you living in?
windows users demand more from an OS Not nearly as demanding as Mac OS users. Software developers find it a challenge to meet Mac OS user's expectations. Even publicly admitting that windows users expect much less in terms of compatibility and user interface, etc. Microsoft regularly drops support of an older OS from each new version, whereas Apple was still supporting OS 7 apps through OS 8 series (that represents at least 6 years). OS 9 was the first OS to drop some apps, since that was the cleaned up version that we call classic today. OS X did mark a major departure, but was impossible to support both OSes in one package. By all standards, Classic is very well integrated even if it's a separate OS environment.
Looking forward to Vista, the world's most anticipated obsolete OS to go on sale. Course, you won't hear windows users whinning or complaining, as the media has done a decent job of preparing Vista suckers... er.... users.
So Balmer (Bomber?) says that future windows OSes wont take so long. Assuming that's true, we know that they can't keep pace with Apple, who has delivered 4 major upgrades plus updates to OS X at slightly more than 1 year on average. windows ME was microsoft's attempt at that.... I had friends returning that joke. So once Vista rolls out in 2007 (early? mid? super-late?) it'll be a few more years before another OS rolls out for windows suckers... ah... I meant users. Can't wait to see what new upgrade is coming from Apple before the end of 2006. windows will need a quantum leap to catch up. Or they'll just buy a few more copiers. Hmmm:
Aqua : Aero Translucent windows : translucent windows Spotlight : claimed new search similar to Spotlight Releases new glossy black & white MacBooks : Releases new PC guidelines to makers suggesting obsidian black & ice white PCs Ahuh...