Competition is king: why Nokia and Microsoft are the perfect match
Linked by Thom Holwerda on Mon 9th Apr 2012 14:38 UTC
PDAs, Cellphones, Wireless "Windows Phone is fighting an uphill battle. Microsoft still has work to do in terms of user experience and the big hardware partners like HTC and Samsung are starting to lose interest and putting in only token efforts. But Nokia is keeping the platform in the conversation. We're not willing to consign Windows Phone to the same level of hopelessness as the open-source webOS or the out-to-pasture BB OS precisely because Nokia is too big and too active a partner." Having a big partner is by no means a guarantee. Microsoft is doing whatever it can - both legal and should-not-be-legal - to get people to buy Windows Phone, and it isn't working. A brand only gets you so far - you need a compelling product, too, and as much as I like Windows Phone, it's just not there yet compared to iOS and Android.
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RE[11]: Doomed
by gonzo on Tue 10th Apr 2012 18:53 UTC in reply to "RE[10]: Doomed"
gonzo
Member since:
2005-11-10

Most people go to BestBuy/OfficeMax/Staples/etc and just pick something up. BestBuy does have Macs available, but they tend to steer people to the Windows systems any way.

Now that is simply not the truth. They actually always try to steer you to Mac, because profit margins are higher there.

Again, that's only true where people think they have no choice but to use Windows.

Yeah, people don't know about Linux ;)

And there's less piracy of Windows going on now, then there was 10 years ago - in part, because Microsoft is (ala BSA) trying to crack down on it even in countries like China.

We could debate piracy levels, but my point is still valid: those people can steal Windows or use free Linux. They chose to steal, rather than Linux. 'nough said.
Wrong.

Apple presented just as much of a challenge when on PPC.

Wrong. Apple presented a threat, with what 1% market share?? Haha. Even DOJ said Apple is not competition since it runs on PowerPC and thus concluded MS holds monopoly on desktop PC market.


Their move to Intel had nothing to do with improving their ability to challenge Microsoft's market share.

It had everything to do with that. Otherwise they would not do it.

So more people are moving away from Windows.

People want something different, nothing wrong there. But that is not to say Windows is poor choice. Some people will buy Honda, some will get Toyota.. nothing wrong with either. OK, Toyota had its share of fun recently :-)


MacOS itself hasn't really changed. Just people's perception of the market. This incidentally is also benefiting Linux, but to a smaller degree since many applications available for Windows are also available for Mac.

Yeah right, except that it moved to PC platform :-)

Not so much any more. I never said it's be the "year of the Linux Desktop", just that eventually it'll be a split between 3 players.

Wake me up when that day comes.

However, Desktop OS's are becoming less and less important - and Microsoft will die as Windows Desktop declines since too much of their business is dependent on Windows and MS Office.

Again, wake me up when that day comes.

Not saying that it won't come, but we're still far from there.

Win32 is a piss poor API.

Whatever.

As a result, Windows eventually slows down due to a bloated registry.

;) Registry is not implemented in such a way that seek times increase significantly with size increase. There are different data structures, you know? Sequential access is not how registry works ;)


yes, there is software out there to clean the registry - but they had to go through a lot of research to determine what to remove, etc. Such functionality should have been built-in from day one.


Not needed. See my previous answer.

On top of that, since Vista many parts of Registry are virtualized and stored in each user's profile.


Most users are not aware of the Logical Volume Manager (aka Disk Management) and associated tools.
They are also not aware of NTFS Junctions; and Microsoft does a good job of hiding that functionality.

Many people not aware of many things.

BTW, you're using Windows NT.

What?

But that's the point. If you want to be useful it has to be functional on all versions of the system.

No.

Otherwise people won't use it, and applications won't support it unless they are targeting a minority of users.

Home users won't use it anyway. See, you just said earlier that people are not aware of Disk management and junctions even when they are available.

And no, Unattended installations - which are custom built, btw - are not a solution. Do a Linux install and see how easy it could be to have it in the installer.

Real world says different thing. Unattended installations work well.


That's only a solution for Corporate environments where massive amounts of computers are being built routinely; not for home users.

LOL Again, when it's not there you complain. When it's there, you complain.

What's stopping you from using sysprep. Nothing.

So you are either using SQL Server incorrectly, ignoring a lot of its features, or not doing very intensive database functionality in your application, or need a very big database.


Now you are just saying things that are pure trash.

We use SQL Server incorrectly? How so? We are ignoring those features that we do not need, until we need them. What are you talking about --- not doing intensive db functionality in our apps?

When we do need to work with VERY large databases (those that have copy of live data), then we connect to our QA or pre-prod environments. Our internal policy simply does not allow us to copy those databases locally. Local dev databases are smaller of course, no real live data there, but all the functionality is there.

You simply don't know what you're talking about.


MySQL/Postgres can both do all of that, enable all features, etc. and run on your desktop with a large database without issues.

And SQL Server can not run large databases on desktop workstation? WTF???

Your own ignorance and loyalty to Microsoft betrays you.


Yeah right, SQL Server and Oracle suck, MySQL beats them all. Hahahaha ;) Funny.

Windows is not necessary to do business, live, etc.


Still, you do have Windows under VM. I don't need second OS.

You can lie (to yourself) all you want, but until you remove Windows from your system, all your talk is crap (not trying to insult you).

Edited 2012-04-10 18:55 UTC

Reply Parent Score: 2

RE[12]: Doomed
by gonzo on Tue 10th Apr 2012 19:37 in reply to "RE[11]: Doomed"
gonzo Member since:
2005-11-10

Just to add: I can successfully run both SQL Server and MySQL on my Windows workstation.

Reply Parent Score: 2

RE[12]: Doomed
by TemporalBeing on Wed 11th Apr 2012 13:44 in reply to "RE[11]: Doomed"
TemporalBeing Member since:
2007-08-22

"Windows is not necessary to do business, live, etc.

Still, you do have Windows under VM. I don't need second OS.

You can lie (to yourself) all you want, but until you remove Windows from your system, all your talk is crap (not trying to insult you). "

So you only develop for a single platform - Windows; while I develop for multiple platforms - Windows, Linux, etc.

That's the difference.

Your world is limited to what Microsoft gives you. You're dependent upon them for your work; though you might use Linux at home (but I doubt it from this discussion as you seem to lack familiarity with other platforms).

Until you develop for multiple platforms, yeah - one OS on your system will be enough for you. Once you start developing for multiple platforms you'll need multiple OS's using Virtual Machines.

For me, my main work is done under Linux with only a cursory support for Windows. So, Windows under a VM is sufficient - and it doesn't get run very long or for very much. It's more stable because I'm not installing all kinds of crap on it - it only has what is absolutely necessary - so the Registry is pretty clean, and I don't have a thousand different programs running all the time - just what I need to do the job.

Meanwhile, my Linux Desktop running KDE4 has all the stuff that use to bring Windows to its knees and more - and its still just as performant (or better) than the first day I installed it.

Personally, I'm glad to have left the "burning platform" behind. Microsoft has a limited life span left for various reasons, but namely the market is leaving them behind and Win8 won't do anything to stop that - it might even accelerate it. How long Microsoft (and Windows, and Office) have left is all a matter of escalation curves - right now we're near the bottom of the curve; but the tech is there to start escalating it pretty quickly, it's just a matter of time.

And while Microsoft may have billions of dollars in the bank, in stock, etc - they won't be able to survive the loss of either the Windows platform (even to the point of a 50-50 split with any other platform) or Office - and the market is starting to shape up to make them lose both.

And, btw, this will happen regardless of whether Linux becomes a bigger factor in the desktop market; though more likely than not, it'll be that the market just plain leaves the Desktop behind with a few niche markets being the exception - those markets already have plenty of support from and software for the Apple/MacOS platform to leave Windows as well.

Reply Parent Score: 2