Submitted by “When Windows first shipped, 20 years ago this month, it was considered nothing more than a slow operating environment that had arrived late to the party, well behind the industry leaders, Apple and Xerox PARC. Now, it’s the operating system used on nearly 95 percent of all the desktops and notebooks sold worldwide. Take a look at Window’s past and present, and what lies ahead in the future, including an interview with Mr. Bill Gates himself.”
“… it was considered nothing more than a slow operating environment that had arrived late to the party …”
It still is…ROTF
and they are ALMOST as good as Unix and Unix derived systems.
I’ve been using other large-server platforms for the past 25 years (NOS, VMS, OS1100/OS2200, OS/390, MCP, etc), and UNIX variants have some catching up to do as well, at least in areas like user/process privilege enforcement.
Some of it is the fault of the hardware (in the case of *nix flavors running on x86), but not all of it. The whole idea of an all-or-nothing superuser is a timebomb just waiting to explode.
You should have been moded as “Funny”; but hey, this isn’t /.
You can get a feel for those early versions of Windows by viewing the timeline in screenshots here: http://www.neowin.net/articles.php?action=more&id=53&pagenum=1
Bear in mind that at the time Windows 1 was released, Apple users were looking at this: http://toastytech.com/guis/bigmac1.gif
It took MS quite a while to catch up…
And 10 years later they were still looking at that when Windows 95 was released.
That’s not true. At that time the Mac OS had begun to use colors a bit more than before, and simple pseudo-3D look was beginning to show up.
But yeah, the mac OS was a bit ..hmm.. flat to look at in 1995. But no more than “good” ol’ Win 3.x.
And how many bugs have MS solved in the windows desktop the last 10 years?
Not many.. actually I can’t think of any bugfixes, but I can find a lot of bugs. Especially in regard to fonts.
And of course there is all the basic functionality not yet added – remember my 12 point list?
Way to deflect and troll in one post.
So how long did it take for OS X to get preemptive multitasking? Real memory protection? Yeah, that’s right.
Guess what though, it’s pretty irrelevant. It’s about the here and now, and what’s next, not what’s in the past.
*LOL* .. Were you the one to mod down my post? *LOL*
I didn’t troll. Find one thing which is trolling!
Bugs in the windows desktop:
1) Some textlabels in open/save dialogues follow system settings, and scales accordingly. Other textlabels doesn’t. This is inconsistent and a bug.
2) Some dialogue boxes do not scale, nor are they using the right fonts. However, child dialogues do scale and use the right fonts. More inconsistency. And inconsistency is a bug.
See examples here:
http://www40.brinkster.com/dylansmrjones/windows-desktop-inconsiste…
http://www40.brinkster.com/dylansmrjones/windows-desktop-inconsiste…
The windows to the left do not scale, nor are they using the right fonts. The windows to the right are using the right fonts and they scale perfectly.
Such bugs has been there, since windows 95.
This is the past, this is the now and this is the future.
Your images don’t exist, so I can’t see what you are talking about.
Maybe you should report these bugs to Microsoft. But yeah, bugs do exist. Sometimes there are bugs that people runa cross on an OS that are show-stoppers for them. ANY OS. I have not run across any of these on Windows, so I still use it (one of the reasons).
They don’t exists?
Hmm… I can see them. Probably Brinkster having trouble.
Try this one instead, or ask me for a mail if you really want to see them. I’m ready to do so
http://www40.brinkster.com/dylansmrjones/windowsdesktopbugs.html
Actually, most of those issues are program-related, not SO-related. Most times the difference of textsizes, colors and such are caused by poor component implementation – instead of using system components, some development environments re-implement those features.
But the funny thing is, with Linux/BSD, you don’t even have a global setting to all applications. Try using kde applications inside gnome, and they won’t even look the same
Doh.. you’re wrong.
I was talking about the windows desktop. Not about 3rd party apps for windows.
1) Rightclick on the desktop
2) Choose “properties” –> brings you to “display properties”
3) Choose the “appearance” tab
4) Click on “Effects” button or “Advanced” button. Wiiiih there you go. Inconsistency in the windows desktop.
This is not due to programs. This is due to MS not fixing inconsistency in the windows desktop dialogues.
Another thing is inconsistency in 3rd party applications for Windows. And that’s not the fault of MS as such. It’s extremely easy to create a consistent UI so for 3rd party applications the fault is the developer (read: the company releasing said software).
However, in Gnome we don’t have that problem. All gnome apps scales perfectly and use the right fonts throughout the system. But this is not due to gnome being better as such, it’s just a result of a more strict interface guideline.
It’s true that KDEapps do not look like gnome apps, but this has nothing do with the desktop (and it’s a non-issue which is being solved and almost is solved).
Take a look on the windows desktop. Look at it. See…? There is no systemwide settings (actually there is, but it’s not being used – the same is true for KDE and Gnome – lots of systemwide settings – just not being used by other toolkits).
Java based applications on Windows do not look like Windows applications. QT-based application do not look like GTK-based applications. KDE applications do not look like Gnome applications and Gnome applications do not look like Mac applications and Mac applications do not look like Windows applications. So what’s your point anyway?
Try using brand new Windows applications in windows and older Windows applications in windows, and enable the Visual Styles service (if it is disabled), and see how they don’t look like each other.
When it comes to 3rd party apps all the OS developer can do, is to make it easy to create consistent looking applications, and create some easy-to-reach system settings, and “encourage” developers to use them. Whether or not the developers do this is another matter.
Gnome, KDE, Windows, Mac etc. cannot be held responsible for 3rd party developers not coding properly
That said, I still have to say that all Gnome apps have a consistent look. Not all windows apps have a consistent look. The Gnome desktop is also more consistent than the windows desktop – but it suffers from other issues (Nautilus isn’t exactly stable).
1) Rightclick on the desktop
2) Choose “properties” –> brings you to “display properties”
3) Choose the “appearance” tab
4) Click on “Effects” button or “Advanced” button. Wiiiih there you go. Inconsistency in the windows desktop.
I’m no user of Windows, but I’ve looked at a screenshot of this (and I checked it on a computer with Windows)– how is this inconsistency? As far as I can tell, I’m looking at two *different* window classes. The “Display Properties” is a different kind of window than the “Effects” or “Advanced” window.
I mean, I’m not saying that Windows is more or less consistent, but your argument/example here is just plain nonsense. You (or someone else, I don’t know) have been using this example in various different threads, and it annoys the crap out of me. There is nothing inconsistent about this at all.
You haven’t looked at it then. This link is from MY desktop. To the left we have the mother dialogue and to the right the child dialogue.
To the left: No scaling of fonts.
to the right: Scaling of fonts.
This is inconsistent, and one would expect all dialogues related to the desktop to be consistent. Besides that, the kind of “windows” does not matter in regard to make it scalable. Scalability is a property for any visual object in the windows desktop. Extremely easy to fit in. So how come, the mother dialogue isn’t scaled and the child dialogue is scaled?
In gnome all windows uses the same fonts in the same fontsizes. In windows this is easily achieved, yet Microsoft has not fixed this inconsistency despite the fact that the bug has been around for 10 years.
When the child dialogue scales properly so should the mother dialogue.
It’s the same class btw. (There is only one – changinge type of windows is done through changing the property for said instance of the class.) The scalable-property for the mother dialogue is just plain wrong.
This link is from MY desktop.
Erm, the XP install I tested this on is a stock XP install, with everything set to default. *That* is what you should be looking at, not some modified version of it. I have no font differences whatsoever on that stock XP install.
Anyway, could you provide a link to that screenshot again? I’m a huge conistency freak myself, so I find this an interesting discussion.
The links is:
http://www40.brinkster.com/dylansmrjones/windowsdesktopbugs.html
The screenshots were saved as PNG in Windows Paint, and apparently Paint can’t save them properly. At least Paint Shop Pro and FireFox complains about errors in the PNG-files. The work-around is to open in Gimp and save again. This fixes it.
It’s not a modified version. The DPI-setting is a systemwide setting, and textlabels, windowborders, buttons and all other visual components are supposed to follow it.
There are 3 issues:
1) Using the right font.
2) Using the right fontsize.
3) Using the DPI setting.
My screenshots shows two windows disregarding all no. 1 and 3 (the windows to the left), and two windows following no. 2 and 3 – but not no. 1. (The windows to the right).
When I look at some of my older applications for windows, I have to seriously spank myself. I’m disregarding all three points. Wrong font, wrong fontsize, and no scalability.
But they disregard the 3 points in a very consistent manner. Always the same wrong fonts, fontsizes and not even the slightest hint of scalability. I spent quite a bit of time to secure that there was no scalability. That’s because scalability ruined my pixelbased design. However, using scalability was actually recommended, but most people back then didn’t care.
Consistency back then was a non-issue *oops*.
Well, you’re obviously doing something wrong. I just changed the dpi setting on that XP machine from 96 to 120, and everything is working correctly, all fonts are properly scaled, etc. Here’s a screenshot:
http://img428.imageshack.us/img428/7636/untitled4vh.jpg
And, using Classic:
http://img437.imageshack.us/img437/9956/untitled21bu.jpg
So, what’s up? Did you edit them, or is there really an error somewhere in your installation?
Well, how the hell did you do that.
The only thing I can think off, is the fact that I’m using Win2K3. But it should scale perfectly then.
Could be an error in the installation. I have to investigate this.
Perhaps it’s because I’m using 106DPI instead of 120DPI? I have to test that.
But so far, I’m willing to say that this seems to be an error in my installation. I don’t believe it’s a difference between XP and 2K3.
It’s a bug, it’s a bug
It scales fine with 96 DPI (small fonts) and 120 DPI (large fonts), but with customized DPI settings like 106 DPI, only some dialogues scale. Other dialogues do not.
I wonder why… This is funny
[posted this one in the wrong sub-thread.. doh! slap me slap me]
I wonder if this behaviour is true through the whole range [97;119] ?
There’s a discussion here about troubles with scaling in windows:
http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/2004/07/14/182971.aspx
Just wanna let you know that the page has been updated, because I found a new bug, this time in “whateverfile” -> properties -> summary tab
The window size does not scale, nor do buttons. However, some textlabels and editboxes do scale, which results in clipping of these. The same is true for the placement of some buttons.
http://www40.brinkster.com/dylansmrjones/windowsdesktopbugs.html
@Thom_Holwedra
Well, you’re obviously doing something wrong. I just changed the dpi setting on that XP machine from 96 to 120, and everything is working correctly, all fonts are properly scaled, etc.
Actually not everything is correct. You don’t notice that so clearly while using cleartype fonts, but without smoothing you should see the difference – left window (appearance) uses Arial (or rather MS Sans Serif) font, the right one (effects) uses Tahoma (what is correct).
This of course is “leftovers” from Windows 20 year history:) For many versions of their OS they used MS Sans Serif as default desktop and window font, very big amount of visual elements had this font hardcoded (has someone attempted to change W95 fonts in consistent manner? I remember that this was achievable only by *renaming* some font files…). Apparently XP includes some very old dialogs (like display properties); in normal circumstanses almost noone notices difference.
And using MS Sans Serif can explain bad scalabilty too – it is pixel (fixed) font, not truetype.
But – who cares? So far as product sells, such little inconsistencies do not matter at all. Had they more competition (at least for many years ago), probably their OS/desktop appearance would be much more polished.
Are you sure it’s Arial or MS Sans Serif?
Not that I can tell the difference without further testing. They look very similar especially in small fontsizes (and 8 point non-scaled is very small on a 17″ CRT-monitor running 1600*1200
I just don’t understand why it doesn’t work properly in the range [97;119] DPI when it works with 96 and 120 DPI. It’s not that difficult.
Could it be that the dialogues fall back on MS Sans Serif with DPI settings in the range [97;119] DPI? Because that would explain it, because your right about the MS Sans Serif (which shouldn’t be confused with Microsoft Sans Serif. The latter is a true type font, while the first is an old bitmap font from way back, probably from Windows 3.0).
I definitely care about this. It’s an important issue for me, because I’m using a rather high resolution. 1600*1200 on a 17″ CRT-monitor does require proper scaling
Besides that, it’s a bug which one can fix easily (if one has access to the source, that is), and it’s been around long enough to be fixed several times, except that it hasn’t. It’s actually embarrasing – in my mind.
You cannot see the inconsistency if you’re using fonts at 96 DPI. It only shows when using a different DPI setting.
Your nonsense about windows classes is nonsense.
There is basically one class. And all subclasses are scalable. Scalability is controlled through a boolean type.
When scalability is false in mother dialogue and true in child dialogue then we have inconsistency.
Scalability should of course be true in all places. It’s a bug when it isn’t.
And yet still managed to kick Win95’s arse for stability and ease of use!
Yep, that’s why 95 sold like crazy (not including preinstallations).
LOOOL
sappyvcv… how come you always have these issues with the history, and how come you always have to troll? _I really don’t understand why you just can’t stick to facts and behave yourself.
Win95 took quite a time to sell, and it sold well, not because it was a good system (from a technical point of view it wasn’t good – just another DOS+Windows unstable release).. Nooo it sold welll BECAUSE x86 was the cheaper platform and due to marketing hype. All these broken promises are haunting Microsoft today, as you can read in the interview.
Mac was superior in terms of stability and ease-of-use. They were just f****** expensive (that’s why).
So, you are saying that all these people waiting in huge lines for the Win95 launch was a figment of my immagination?
No. But they weren’t as many as legend wants us to believe.
The salesnumbers quickly fell after the first couple of days, and in 1998 there were still many many DOS+Win3.1x users in Denmark. Windows95 was something you occasionally met, but usually people was running DOS+Win3.1x.
But perhaps this was due to the fact that computers became mainstream in Denmark already in the beginning of the 90’es and not in the middle of the nineties?
I can’t say anything about how it was in USA, but in Denmark the delivery of Windows95 wasn’t all that big. It was a slower process, but very successfull. The real change came in 1998-99. That’s where people really changed from old DOS6.x+Win3.1x to Windows9X (new DOS7.x+Win4.x) or like me, switching to NT4 (good for apps, less good for gaming).
Well, seeing as how Win95 effectively killed OS/2.
I’d say most people I knew had Win95 way back when.
Well, saying it killed OS/2 is not something I would claim as being true. It would be more correct to say that IBM kind of withdrew from the competition. But ofcourse that could be rendered as “Win95 killing OS/2”. And such a rendering could be correct. But it’s speculation rather than fact. And OS/2 wasn’t killed. It still lives
Most people I knew were still running DOS6.x+Windows3.1x in 1996 and 1997.
But this is likely to be different from area to area, I suppose.
When did you start to use Win95? I began in 1998, with a quick switch to Win98 and then quickly further to NT4.
I wonder if this behaviour is true through the whole range [97;119] ?
There’s a discussion here about troubles with scaling in windows:
http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/2004/07/14/182971.aspx
Woops… wrong sub-thread :p *LOOOOl*
I think early ’96. We only had a 386/25 when 95 came out.
Then someone gaves us a K6-133, and so we upgraded.
386/25? … uuuhh
… 2 megs of ram?
I switched in august or september 1998, during upgrading from a 486/33 (from 1992) to a K6-233. But I only installed Win95 because OS/2 wouldn’t install on the new pc
Yeah man, those were the days….
My comp before that was an 8088 “portable” computer that weighed at least a hunfred pounds, had a built in green screen, and was about a foot and a 1.5’x2.5’x8″
No hard drive. 640k of RAM. What a beast. lol
Oh boy
Before my 486 I had (well, my dad had one) a Compaq L20 I think it was called. The labtop with an 8086, 640 Kbyte ram, 20 MByte harddisk and a 1440 Kbyte floppy.. wooow! :p
And ofcourse CGA
And the first pc was a 8086 at 10 mhz, 2 High Density floppydrives (5.25″), and a yellow monochrome monitor… and a 9-pin printer.. but no harddisk. Harddisks were expensive back in ’87 :p
But I’ve never forgotten IBM Text Assistant. I wonder how we survived those days
LOOOOLLOLOL!
What’s with you? Are you 14 or something?
I remember history just fine, and Windows sold quite well. You can make all the claims you want, but that doesn’t change what happened.
Now, try making posts without sounding like some teenager that can’t control himself.
Hmm.. I’m 27, and has followed the PC platform since 1987 when I began using PC (and began coding on the x86 platform).
Before the switch to x86 I’d been coding for the C64 and the Amstrad664, even in assembler
I kept coding for those machines until 1992-93, where I left them (far) behind.
I think I know the history quite well
Then start acting like it.
I am
You are the one giving false information
Please point out what false information I am giving.
I believe in 3 months it sold close to 2 million retail copies (upgrade and full) alone in the United States. I can’t speak for other coutnries, but it sold quite well in the U.S.
2 million? It’s like nothing
I actually thought the number was higher. I’ve heard 6 million in the first week alone in USA. I wonder which numbers are right
2 million on retail sales alone in 1995, before the internet boom, is a lot.
If you won’t admit 2 millions is selling well, then I guess there is no point to arguing this anymore.
I don’t consider it selling fast. It’s an okay number, but it seems to prove my point.
Windows 95 didn’t take off from day 1. It took quite some years before it was the ruling system.
That’s what I can read from these numbers and my own experiences. But ofcourse. The situation could be different in USA.
In Denmark we already had a very broad PC base in 1993, and few of these were updated (probably the reason why Windows didn’t really take off until 1998).
Even many PCs sold in 1997/98 was sold without Windows95 as standard. An OS on top of the PC was another 2 grand (in danish crowns, that is).
But you’re welcome to come with information about the situation in USA at that time. When did USA pass the 50% border for deployed PCs? I really like to know that one
…Windows 95 sold like crazy during the first month or two because it was much better than Windows 3.1, but in all honesty that isn’t saying a whole lot.
A few months later, it was actually OS/2 Warp 4 that was sitting at the top of the retail sales charts, not Windows 95. Most Windows 95 sales after the initial spike were preload sales, so a retail purchase wasn’t needed.
They still haven’t caught up! Tiger is light years ahead of XP or Vista.
Ahead of XP, yes, ahead of Vista? No.
Definately not.
Vista already has all the same user-aware features that OSX has (And goes a little further and some areas), and the underlying technologies are much more advanced/thorough, much more can be done with it from an ISV point of view.
I guess that is called “innovation”. O’wait, Apple did it first. Now, hmmm what is that called???
*cough*
rip off
>>Ahead of XP, yes, ahead of Vista? No.
I’d say Tiger is well ahead of Vista, seeing as how you can actually go ito a store today and buy Tiger. I don’t understand people who compare what Apple is offering today to Microsoft’s vaporware, screenshots and powerpoint slides of a product that won’t ship for a year and say that Microsoft’s product is ahead of Apple. That doesn’t make any sense at all.
And besides, Steve Jobs announced publically that Vista will not be competing with Tiger, it will be competing with Leopard, the next OS X. And unlike Microsoft, Apple doesn’t show off screenshots or talk up the features of an operating system that a year away, unlike what Microsoft has been doing with Longhorn since 2001.
And guess what, Vista will not be the culmination of five years of work. Everything Gates and Ballmer were talking about between 2001-2003 is vaporware. The project was completely restarted in 2004 using the Windows Server 2003 codebase instead of the “brand-new-from-scratch” codebase Gates and Ballmer promised for the previous three years. Here’s a link: http://www.neowin.net/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t377379.html
Educate yourselves.
Don’t you see the huge difference in the way Microsoft sells their products versus the way Apple sells their products? Microsoft sells products that don’t exist yet and may never exist. It has always done so since its very first deal with IBM. Microsoft is always off in “we’ll be doing this four years from now” vaporland while Apple doesn’t introduce a product until it’s ready to ship. I can’t believe the Microsoft tactic still works after all this time, but it does, sadly. Just seeing how many people compare Tiger (a real shipping product) to Vista (vaporware that has been promised since 2001 and won’t ship until December 2006 at the earliest) gives proof that Microsoft’s ways still fool the masses. Sad. Grim. Pathetic.
while Apple doesn’t introduce a product until it’s ready to ship
*cough*Copland?
“Parts of Copland, most notably an early version of the new file system, were demonstrated at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in May 1994. Apple also promised that a beta release of Copland would be ready by the end of the year, for full release in early 1995, and that an even more advanced and ‘fully-modern’ successor code-named Gershwin would follow in 1996. Throughout the year, Apple released a number of mockups to various magazines showing what the new system would look like, and commented continually that the company was fully committed to this project. By the end of the year, however, the developer release was nowhere in sight.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copland
Educate *your*self.
Apple under Steve Jobs is a completely different company than Apple under Amelio or Scully. I would be the first person to tell you that Apple sucked royally during the early to mid ’90s. I’m familiar with Copland, and that did not and would not have occured under Jobs’ reign.
Fact is, since 1997, Apple only announces read-to-ship products, while Microsoft has since the 80s sold vaporware, much of which never actually materializes. Their goal is to keep people from switching to superior offerings that exist today by promising superior technology “next year”.
So it is not fair at all to compare Tiger to Vista, since Tiger is a shipping product and Vista is still about 14 months away at the earliest. It would be more fair to compare Leopard to Vista, but of course we can’t, because Apple wouldn’t talk about the features of an OS that is so far away from completion.
Technically Microsoft caught up with Apple when Windows 95 was released: it was a pre-emptively multi-tasking operating system with memory management and a modern GUI with some worth-while interface innovations like the taskbar and the (arguably mislabelled) Start button. They sailed past when Windows NT 4 was released.
Apple was aware of this, but all the changes of mind during the Copland / Rhapsody years really set them back, and it took an inordinate amount of time for them to get their OS strategy sorted. It’s only really been with the release of Mac OS X Tiger that they’ve passed Windows out again (while visually impressive, early versions of OS X had significant performance issues).
Right now, Vista hasn’t been released, so we’ll see who gets the OS crown in a year’s time. My bet is actually on Apple, they’ve already achieved with Tiger what Microsoft is hoping to achieve with Vista, and they’ve given themselves 18 months to stretch that lead.
Where Apple could fall down in the future is in the absence of a modern platform for application development. Compared to .Net, with it’s conventional syntax, memory management, support for generics and a massive library, Objective-C is looking a bit archaic. Even the Linux crowd are doing well in terms of application development with languages like Python and its various bindings.
Just remembered, one place where Apple is undoubtedly taking the lead is in digital convergence (making TV, Hi-fi and computer all the one). They’ve got the software and system for acquiring and working with digital images, movies and music tracks, and with the new iMac they’ve got a system for working with it from a distance.
The only fly in the ointment is that people put computers on desks, not in sitting rooms. However Apple’s been working on the solution for the last two to three years. The Airtunes box already lets you stream music over a wireless network from your computer to your Hi-fi. It’s got a theoretical maximum bandwidth of 54Mbps; according to Apple you only need 8Mbps to stream HD video content. I imagine in the next year they’ll release an “AirMovies” device that lets you look at your computer’s display on your TV, using a remote (the AirMovies box will probably convert the IR signal to a command on the network) to control what you see.
So you buy your music and favourite TV shows on Apple iTunes, and then get out your remote and listen and watch these things – stored on your Apple PC upstairs – on your TV. When your friends are over, if you’re feeling especially masochistic, you can even get them to sit down with you in front of the TV while you show them your picture collection from your holidays.
It’s all really, really interesting. For the first time in my life, I’m seriously thinking of buying a Mac. Anyway, sorry for the diversion into Apple territory, I’m just still excited from what I saw on Wednesday.
How is MS supposed to compete when everyone cries antitrust with everything they do? It’s not that MS can’t make competing technologies because they are inept, they can’t because they’ll get sued by lazy competitors and meddling governments.
Under the law, life is harder when you’re in a monopoly position, that’s just the way it is. Otherwise it would be prohibitively difficult to unseat a monopoly, which is not in the interest of the consumer.
In any event, people only cry anti-trust when it comes to Microsoft because they think it’ll work, and they think it’ll work because Microsoft (deservedly) has been convicted on several counts of anti-competitive behaviour. This was particularly so with the Netscape deal (it made no fiscal sense to release a web-browser for free at the time – they still haven’t done it with word-processing for example – it was just done to crush a strong competitor).[1]
Intel for example, has held a monopoly for just as long, and hasn’t seen half the problems MS has, despite tricks like frequently changing their pin layout to lock buyers into buying their motherboards. They’ve just been a bit more subtle in their business dealings, and have always released high-to-adequate quality products.
No-one seriously objects to Microsoft bundling basic video and photo-editing tools with the OS. The media player thing was just bad blood with RealMedia (whose CEO is an ex-Microsoft employee). But such is their scale, and, crucially, their history, that they will always be viewed with suspicion.
Realistically though, Microsoft was late with the GUI, late with the adoption of the Internet, late with a managed language platform, late with an emphasis on security in the Internet-age and they’re late with a GPU-powered GUI and an integrated file-indexing solution. They’re a company of incremental improvers, not innovators, though some of those incremental improvements have resulted in products of undeniable quality like MS Office and C# and even IE back in the day (Netscape 4.0 was a horrendously bad browser).
We’ll just have to see if, as in the past, they can deliver products that are “good enough” as Windows heads into adulthood.
[1] While Microsoft escaped punishment on appeal, the conviction was upheld.
“Technically Microsoft caught up with Apple when Windows 95 was released: it was a pre-emptively multi-tasking operating system with memory management (…).”
AFAIK MacOS relied on cooperative multitasking, just like Win3.1.
You can get a feel for those early versions of Windows by viewing the timeline in screenshots here: http://www.neowin.net/articles.php?action=more&id=53&pagenu…
Bear in mind that at the time Windows 1 was released, Apple users were looking at this: http://toastytech.com/guis/bigmac1.gif
And Amiga owners were already using this:
http://oldcomputers.net/amiga1000.html
For desktop usage, there should be no doubt that Windows today (XP) is far superior overall to pre-X Mac OS (Mac OS 9, System 8, System 7, etc.).
Compared to Mac OS X, Windows suffers in some respects, notably Spotlight, but excels in others. ClearType is far superior to anything else out there for on-screen text display, whether on Mac OS or Linux.
Windows XP is not as fast as BeOS / Zeta in booting. But when it comes to disk I/O for regular desktop usage, it handily beats BeOS, Linux, and Mac OS.
Only a few weeks ago, a Linux zealot used a PC running XP to show coworkers a work-related web site. “Whoa” he said, when windows snapped into place, programs load instantly. Later, he asked, “What do you have in that machine? RAID?”
He refused to believe it when it was revealed that the PC was actually a couple of years old, with 1 GHz CPU, 512 MB RAM, and one 160 GB IDE hard drive. It behaves far faster than his beloved Linux workstation with 3 GHz CPU, 1 GB RAM, and SCSI hard drive running KDE.
“Impossible. You must have done something to soup in up.”
“Sure. I’m not running any anti-virus crap to slow it down.”
“You can’t do that with a Windows machine.”
“Sure I can. It’s behind a firewall.”
“Then you don’t know what you’re doing. All the exploits out there…”
“Are useless against this machine since it runs Opera instead of Internet Explorer.”
He didn’t know what he was doing. Still doesn’t. And neither do the majority of the dorks frequenting this web site who are still holding onto Linux superiority delusions.
Linux is great as a server and that’s the truth. It also sucks as a desktop, and that’s no less true. For some of you out there who like to deny reality, this is going to be one tough pill to swallow. Too bad. I feel pity for your ignorance.
They might be “home” truths where you live (asylum), but they aren’t in the world of reality. I maintain several dual boot desktop PCs and on the same piece of hardware a modern linux install is far superior in performance and stability that winblows
That’s great. XP and Server 2003 perform better than any Linux distro I have installed on the same machine (3 different machines actually I’ve tried each on). Does that make your experience any less true? No. does that make the experience of who you replied to any less true? Nope.
If you really think your experiences are the be-all end-all of Windows v. Linux, you are a delusional pathetic troll.
Read this: http://osnews.com/permalink.php?news_id=12242&comment_id=44525
Thank you.
I expect you to have the same experience as me: Win2K3 is quite a bit snappier than XP. At least that’s my experience (using XP in CEU (education) and Win2K3 at home (and LFS)).
But my LFS-system is still faster despite quite a bit of services running. But not by much.
And LFS doesn’t suffer from the poor windows scheduler – but it does suffer from less than optimal unicode support, despite the many utf8-patches. I guess no system is perfect
There are quite a few fast linux distros. Which distros did you try? Linspire, Fedora and Mandriva? :p
Yes, 2k3 is snappier than XP.
As far as linux distros, I’ve tried debian, Ubuntu, FC4 (yuck) and gentoo this year alone. I’ve tried others in the past.
XP (with a few services disabled) and 2k3 (nothing disabled) were faster than any of them on all of my machines (750mhz/384mb to 1.8Ghz/512mb to 1.8Ghz/1gb). You can spout out all you want about the linux scheduler being superior, but frankly, I have not noticed any issues. I always have TONS of apps open on this desktop especially.
VS.net, Opera and Photoshop are almost always open. I burn CDs and DVDs and can still browse the net, code (compiling), use photoshop, or anything else, without any lag.
XP with a few services disabled? Did you do the same for FC4 (very yuck! yuck! yuck! yuck!) ?
FC4 is bloated with services.
Debian isn’t known for being the fastest linux distro around. It’s known for stability.
The same goes for Ubuntu.
Gentoo: Which services were running on the Gentoo system?
Just curious, nothing but curious.
What services did you disable in XP? I always start with the theme engine. I really hate it, really really hate it
Did you do the same for FC4 (very yuck! yuck! yuck! yuck!) ?
I did it for every distro.
Yes, FC4 is bloated and crap.
Gentoo was run with minimal services. I don’t know which offhand, but I had a friend who is a linux guru and runs gentoo help me out with that. It was quite usable, but XP and 2k3 were slightly snappier.
XP, I disable a lot of services. Themes isn’t one of them though, I use OpusOS for it. But I disable probably 10 services or so.
If you use Windowblinds you actually get better performance than just plain Windows stuff because of how it stores GUI info and such.
“I expect you to have the same experience as me: Win2K3 is quite a bit snappier than XP. At least that’s my experience (using XP in CEU (education) and Win2K3 at home (and LFS)). ”
You must be pretty well off, since you are using an expensive server OS at home.
Actually no. I got it for free. It’s a deal between CEU and MS. You know, the MSDN AA (Academy Alliance).
Without that deal, I’d still be running Win2K Pro.
“He didn’t know what he was doing. Still doesn’t. And neither do the majority of the dorks frequenting this web site who are still holding onto Linux superiority delusions.”
Hey sappy,
You have the audacity to call me a delusional pathetic troll when I feel offended by the comment (see above) that I was responding to???
I think you’re a hole with an A in front of it.
Pay attention. I said IF you feel your experiences are the be-all, end-all, then yes you are. I never claimed to know if you do feel that way, and I hope you don’t. I was just trying to put your experiences into perspective.
Then don’t switch to Linux
(yes, that simple)
Gnome, KDE, XFce and Enlightenment are all superior to XP – I haven’t tried Vista so I will not comment.
I can only agree to every point.
However I run Linux ONLY on all my home PC’s for 8 years and have never suffered from viruses or a successful attack.
Considering I’m connected all the time, that’s something only few Win systems can accomodate
I’d have to agree. I’ve been using OS/2 since 1989, and have never had a virus. Even in Win-sessions, Linux-sessions, or any other OS I run in OS/2.
I’ve run windows at home for longer than 8 years and I’ve only had one virus.
Guns don’t kill people; people kill people.
Theres a between understanding the tool and your success with it. This doesn’t suggest that one operating system is really any better than the next.. I consider them all a commodity at this point. Its the applications that count.
– Microsoft Fanboy
I’ve run Windows, OS/2, BeOS, and Linux at home on various machines, and I haven’t had a virus on any of them, so they all must be superior to each other!!! (??)
What can I say to respond to that post???
There is a way to discuss something, and there is a way not to. Throwing in off-topic rantings comparing OSes and your personal experiences, then topping them off by insults and flame-bait is NOT the way to post and be respected.
You may have had some valid points, you you didn’t back them up with facts, references or any relevant background information.
Pity, because that posting style generates negative arguments, not positive discussion.
“Sure I can. It’s behind a firewall.”
Does your firewall protect you from email attachments?
Does your firewall protect you from a virus on a floppy or cd?
“Linux is great as a server and that’s the truth. It also sucks as a desktop, and that’s no less true. For some of you out there who like to deny reality, this is going to be one tough pill to swallow. Too bad. I feel pity for your ignorance.”
Well, the concept of a desktop covers a whole lot of ground; and not all users requirements are the same. And yes, I do feel pity for your ignorance.
“Does your firewall protect you from email attachments?
Does your firewall protect you from a virus on a floppy or cd? ”
Don’t run unknown email attachments. That simple. Just like don’t download random exes off the web and run them. Most email services also do virus detection for you.
Common sense has gotten me by on my windows machine for the past 5 years. I’m on a broadband connection, didn’t run a firewall until SP2, wide open wireless. I just do automatic updates from MSFT and I’m set.
And I haven’t used a floppy since about 98 so that’s a non-issue. The only CDs I use are ones I buy.
Never gotten a virus. Never been hacked.
Of course I don’t have an external IP….
just like 98% of the users out there…
Yeah,
I very much like GNU/Linux, both KDE and GNOME better than Windows for useability etc. But it is certainly true that applications load very very slowly in Linux when compared to XP, in addition to Linux booting pretty slowly.
Booting speed and App laoding speed are the only issues I can find when comparing the latest GNU/Linux distributions (FC4 (Fedora Core 4) etc.) against the admittedly several years old Windows XP.
I would like to see significant improvement in loading speeds.
For everything else, FC4 certainly shines way brighter than Win XP.
and in 6 months, a year, two years…
your windows machine will run like it has had treacle poured inside. the linux box will not even have needed rebooting.
we’ve seen it all before – new installs of win95 win98, 2k all run ok to start with but eventually fall apart.
then its the – ‘get the new version – it’s better this time, honest (you’ll need a new PC by the way)’
and so it seems better – but then falls apart….
when you’ve used macs and unix boxes for *years* – and i mean *years* – it makes you sorry for all the amateurs stuck on the windows treadmill, not getting anything done execpt constantly fiddly with their PC’s.
hope you’re looking forward to vista – if MS was any good you’d still be using windows 2000 and would have spent the last 5 years *working*..
fiddling? who the hell fiddles with an xp setup.. i don’t i use a centrino 1.7 laptop that is almost always in hibernate mode when I leave the office. xp doesn’t need fiddling, and thats with 2 desktops and a laptop. xp/2003/2000 is as stable and fast as the first time you format and install it. i dont know what you do in your xp setup.
Cleartype superior to Mac OS X? You must be kidding!
How nice is that to celebrate.
# Windows XP […] when it comes to disk I/O for
# regular desktop usage, it handily beats BeOS, Linux,
# and Mac OS.
I made opposite experience. 2 Years ago I coded a small IFC-parser in C++. File-reading was done with fread() and fseek().
On W-XP (NTFS) the thing was about 20% slower than on Linux (2.4.x, ext3) on the same labtop (Gericom A2, 800MHz Crusoe, 256 MB Ram).
Ironically, this month also marks the 20th anniversary of the Free Software Foundation (http://www.fsf.org/).
Ironically, that’s not ironic.
I think it is. I don’t see why it’s not ironic
I think it is. I don’t see why it’s not ironic
Ironic is not that a difficult term to understand. I’ll explain it using Alanis Morissette’s “Ironic”. Alanis Morissette’s song “Ironic” lists several situations and presents them as ironic– but they aren’t. She sings:
“It’s like rain on your wedding day.”
Rain on your wedding day isn’t ironic, it just sucks. It *would* be ironic, however, if she lives in the rainforest and planned her marriage during the rain reason, and then left for Hawaii in order to have a sunny wedding, and during the wedding, it rains on Hawaii and not in the rainforest where she lives.
Then it would be ironic.
So, the fact that the FSF is also 20 yrs old this month isn’t ironic. It’s just a coincidence.
I think it would be ironic if our guns didn’t shoot bullets, but instead squirted a healing salve that cured all wounds.
Seems to me you’re confusing paradox and irony.
and it is certainly showing its age
MS finally acknowledges that it got its ideas from Xerox and Apple (they even hired employees who worked there previously). They hinted at how they managed to knife OS2, which they were supposed to help develop.
But Gates must find it really maddening that finally with XP he comes so close of Mac Os 6 (everything is graphical and removal of command line) when Apple turns the tables once again by introducing Os X with command line (Terminal) and verbose booting, Quarts, Aqua and iApps. So they are playing catch up once again. This time it has taken them fewer years (only 6 while it took them 15 years previously). Buts Windows is still buggy and it cannot be fixed-unlike the battle-tested Unix-based Oses. They should put their GUI on top of Linux or just let Mac Os X rule the computing environment- which may happen in 2006 with the release of MacTels- when people can compare both Oses on the same machine.
“They should put their GUI on top of Linux”?!?!?!?
Now, that’s a good idea… Linux lacks the visuals…
Well duh that is why you put the GUI On top of it. Do you know that OS X is just the Quartz Window Manager? of course it also replaces X but that is a side point.
I wouldn’t mind seeing Vista based off of say FreeBSD. At least then we would know the software under the hood was fairly secure. What I find funny is that MSFT is going to install a new command line shell just for remote administration. Just like every *nix out there.
Apple turns the tables once again by introducing Os X with command line (Terminal) and verbose booting, Quarts, Aqua and iApps.
Quarts of what?
“When Windows first shipped, 20 years ago this month, it was considered nothing more than a slow operating environment that had arrived late to the party, well behind the industry leaders.”
Funny, that sounds just like the situation today. 20 years of “progress” and nothing has changed.
“Funny, that sounds just like the situation today. 20 years of “progress” and nothing has changed.”
Bah, rubbish.
I’m not running dos anymore. Gaming no longer requires config.sys voodoo either.
For all that people complain that is bad about Windows, there are good things as well. It’s not perfect, but what is?
Will Microsoft give away free copies of its operating system, like Opera gave away copies of its browser, or DivX for their birthday?
Alright, anyway I can get FreeBSD for free and I’ll have a more secure system, so…
I have always found Windows’s interface fairly functional and in some ways more consistent than any Linux WE/WM I’ve used. It tends to be snappy when it is kept fairly pristine.
As the registry gunks up (or spyware is installed), virus scanners are installed, and so on, it slows down.
I just like the CLI a lot better in Linux and the BSDs, and I also like the fact that in most ways, it’s a free lunch.
Windows obviously has problems but my own opinion is that people are too hard on it. When it works, as a desktop, it tends to work pretty well.
There are specific areas in which Windows needs (dramatic) improvement.
I think Windows a little bit overpriced for those of us who build our own systems and don’t get it preinstalled.
I think that people who buy systems with Windows pre-installed ought to get a full-bore install CD as well rather than those horrid “rescue disks.”
Some better registry de-crufting tools would be much appreciated.
Strong encouragement or design wherein users don’t run typically as Administrator (as most seem to presently) would be another thing I’d like to see.
My own hope is that the next Windows fixes these problems and becomes more secure. Whatever we use individually, we all win when Windows becomes more secure and/or more robust in terms of features, since many of us (like me) are forced to use it in the workplace, and we all have to contend with infected machines on the internet.
It’s fortunate that developers seem to be less interested in sniping at other OSes and more interested in improving their own. It would be nice to see more cooperation and support for a more secure Windows and by extension, a more ecologically robust internet.
This is just software. It’s technology, not some kind of values or belief system. The day my OS becomes some kind of ideology I will seriously need to power down all my systems, leave the house, and walk the earth (a la Jules, a la Kung Fu).
Yes, I’ve done this myself, spouted off generally when I’ve had a Bad Windows Day and come across some article on Windows.
There is little to add to the “Windows sucks” argument, really.
Strong encouragement or design wherein users don’t run typically as Administrator (as most seem to presently) would be another thing I’d like to see.
If “Run as…” worked as well on Windows as it does on *nixes perhaps more would be running as a normal user (in Win2K3 this means power user) instead of running as administrator.
It might be a good idea to give a popup warning the user to cautious, very cautious since the user is running as Administrator.
A bit like the warnings in Gnome when you logon as root (and you don’t logon as root!).
The problem however is, that there are too many limitations on what a a non-privileged user can do on a windows system (compared with linux) and too many 3rd party apps cannot properly handle running as administrator, when the user is non-privileged. It works better on XP and Win2K3 than on 2000pro, but there’s still room for improvement.
And it wouldn’t hurt if Microsoft fixed the many small bugs in the desktop, the small bugs which haven’t been fixed since they showed up a decade ago. Not showstopper bugs – just small annoying bugs which can be worked around.
As far as I gather some will be fixed in Vista, except for the TrueType bug from march 1992.
You know…going beyond all of the stupid flaming and kids who actually FIGHT about a silly operating system, it was fun to look back…thanks for the original post putting up all of those shots.
20 years. Seems like so long ago and it is in the computerworld. Funny how in this day and age, after 20 years, we are still talking about how things “should” be vs. how they are….things that they find “wrong” with this or that. In a perfect world, everything would work exactly they way each of us would like it to. Hasn’t happened yet….and that just means that there is a lot of POSITIVE work to do yet…no matter WHAT OS you are using. Windows needs work, Linux needs work, yeah…even the MAC needs work.
Let’s stop fighting and go to work, huh?
Geez
I hate to tell you, but nothing about the world we live in is perfect, when you add the human element. We will always be saying how things should be, because when we finally achieve those things that we said should be 10 or 20 years ago we have found/thought new things to say how things should be.
It’s never going to change.
I’ve used lots of OS’s in my time, and all I can say is that Windows is getting better, we’re finally off that bad 9x codebase, and the NT core can do pretty much the samething as unix/linux can, It’s got a good kernel, only the stuff on top is what’s hurting it. 2k was good, XP was better, and 2k3 is better then both. If they make vista better then I can’t complain. You could say it’s slow in coming but at least it’s happening.
>”all I can say is that Windows is getting better, we’re finally off that bad 9x codebase,”
That ‘bad’ codebase was capable of running on the desktop with Intel 486 and 16 MB RAM. With GUI, mind you.
May be not as good GUI as Apple had, but good enough for commodity OS.
>”and the NT core can do pretty much the samething as unix/linux can,”
How many years it took mainstream UNIX/Linux to get away from rwxrwxrwx- and to ACLs? How about TCP stack before Linux kernel 2.2? 4-8 processor scalability before 2.4?
Linux kernel 2.6 can do pretty much what NT can.
>It’s got a good kernel, only the stuff on top is what’s hurting it.
That’s true for Linux, too.
Also, it is very easy to copy the leader. If Clippy assistant were a success, friendly Penguins will be popping from all corners of KDE or Gnome, offering assistance.
Yes, Microsoft borrowed a lot from Apple and others, that’s why it sells OS for $45 retail when bought with commodity hardware, instead of more.
Linux goes for $0- that is how much of its own R&D is in it.
Trolling
And all the nonsense is factual wrong… I like those trolls
Prior to Windows 3.11, operating systems didn’t crash all the time. How many years out of the 20 did it take to get a stable OS without blue screens? Oh, wait, that still happens, the system just reboots though. Oh well, maybe with the next roll of the dice (and your money) we’ll begin to see some stability.
Meanwhile, smart folks have been counting the years and celebrating anniversaries of their own: years WITHOUT using microsoft software. Truly, the latter rather than the former is really worth celebrating.
Lots of flames not much facts. I could rant about missing multiple desktops in windblows. I could rant about slow graphics in lunix. I could rant about crappy slow ports in *BSD. I could rant about the price of MacOSX (I didn’t ry it so no other rants come to mind).
I’ll tell you a secret. I use linux. Why? I’m a developer and it’s so much better for ME personaly. I get all the tools I need for free, no register crap for a stupid packer and no fuzz about firewalls etc. Is it perfect? Heck no it’s a bloated frog which is so fat it can’t even jump (startup, X is crap, etc. etc.) but it’s the best for my as a devel. Doing my work in windows(btw using same IDE) is possible, but SO much more PITA.
If I just wanted to play my games and browse my web I’d use windblows, but since I need a bit more devel stuff I use lunix. I don’t particularly like either.
On topic: Well it’s a 20 years from which 10 are dirty marketing effort.
Not a whole lot of evolution at all when you step back and look at it. Still doesn’t even ship with a decent text editor that knows what line number you’re on. All those improvements to paint.exe and that wonderful shell, still rivaling dos 3. Just think if it had kept pace with Moores law…
Windows is horrible software. I recommend Macs or if you cannot afford a Mac (like myself), use linux. Especially if you are one of those people that primarily uses your computer for the internet, instant messaging, file sharing, email, etc. Linux is the way to go. If you have any interest in Linux, a far better operating system than Windows, check out http://www.ubuntulinux.org/ you won’t be disappointed.
If I had any votes left I would mod you down. Why don’t you zealots just crawl back into your basement.
– Ripping off the work of others.
– Blue dead screen and any kind of instabillities that someone can imagine.
– any kind of compatibility problems and issues.
– of viruces, security holes and any cyber security threats that you can imagine. It would be interesting to count all the severe security holes found in windows in 20 years, that would be fun.
So i really dont think that there is any reason to celebrate 20 years of windows, Bill Gates has s ahort memory, he shows his face to celebrate the 20 years of windows and he is even not shame. Someone should remind this points.
it is based on 2k3 sp1 code base, and is fully 64-bit, granted there maybe a lack of drivers, does it make it up for 1- stability 2- boot speed 3- responsiveness 4- application launch speed 5- future proof?
also is vista based on 2k3 or is it newer code?
I still consider windows a slow operating environment with its next version arriving to late for the party.
“When Windows first shipped, 20 years ago this month, it was considered nothing more than a slow operating environment that had arrived late to the party”.
Still, Windows is still a slow operating system (by itself, even slower with an antivirus installed) that has arrived late into real desktop experience (have you ever experinced Mac’s Quartz?)
Still, Windows is still a slow operating system (by itself, even slower with an antivirus installed) that has arrived late into real desktop experience (have you ever experinced Mac’s Quartz?)
Well, this isn’t true for Windows 2003 Server. It’s rather snappy, even with antivirus.
It still suffers from some architectural blunders, but considering the codebase it’s nothing but a miracle
(have you ever experinced Mac’s Quartz?)
I use OSX’ Quartz everyday. When people say that OSX is “exceptionally” faster than Windows or whatever, they a) never use OSX, b) have a G5 machine with a load of RAM, or c) are lying.
Ahead of XP, yes, ahead of Vista? No.
Without any desire to be a smart ass here I -would- like to point out that comparing Vista to Tiger is maybe not the best way to consider the argument.
Tiger is a live, shipping product. We know what’s in Tiger. Vista is in Beta. There may be features in there that won’t make it into the final build. There may be features that will be added later.
It is very well possible that Vista is the superior product. I have no information to confirm or deny the claim. For whatever it is worth, the screenshots that I have seen sofar, and nothing says the interface will look like that in the finished product, do not instill in me an overabundance of confidence in the quality of the final product. But again, I can be spectacularly wrong in my perception.
However, it would be better to consider Vista in the context of Leopard. Both products are being heavily worked on as we type. Neither product has been released. Either one may contain features that prove its vast superiority over the other. And although I’m an unabashed Mac head, I am not so far removed from reality that I’d claim that Leopard WILL be better than Vista whatever reality happens to be. I hope so, time will tell.
What I see in Tiger today gives me confidence in the future of Apple. In that context I don’t forget where Apple is at today. Windows will retain its vast market share for years to come, I will never claim it otherwise.
However, for all its superiority, they -are- taking their own sweet time up in Redmond to release it. Am I to believe that the new code is of such vast and immense complexity that it can only be created by the purest minds in IT today? Or are there other nasties lurking in the undergrowth which stifle the leap ahead that Windows wants to make? I’d love to say that a superior product should be more elegant and easier to build, but that would maybe be too argumentative.
Up to and including Mac OS 9 I had to grugdinly admit that there were just too many problems in the system for it to be truly great, however though I wanted it to be. Now, and I agree that they’ve taken the scenic route as well, with OS X we’re talking about a whole different animal and the claims of superiority of Windows over Mac OS X [for those people who care about things like that] are firmly lodged into the “Well, I’m not really sure about that, you know” camp.
Vista versus Leopard. I can’t wait to see what happens.
… But Dosn’t it just show how advanced the Amiga was when it came out 20 years and a few months/weeks ago?
Whatever happened to Commodore?
They sort of went bankrupt.
However, Commodore actually helped IBM with the OS/2 Desktop for v.2 (and newer).
There’s quite a bit of Amiga in OS/2
Prior to Windows 3.11, operating systems didn’t crash all the time. How many years out of the 20 did it take to get a stable OS without blue screens? Oh, wait, that still happens, the system just reboots though. Oh well, maybe with the next roll of the dice (and your money) we’ll begin to see some stability.
Meanwhile, smart folks have been counting the years and celebrating anniversaries of their own: years WITHOUT using microsoft software. Truly, the latter rather than the former is really worth celebrating.
Windows Vista DOWNLOAD: http://windows.czweb.org/