Save Windows XP!
-
The trade magazine InfoWorld has launched a Save Windows XP[^] petition. OEM and shrink-wrapped copies of Windows XP will be withdrawn as of 30 June 2008. I have nothing against Windows Vista. I'm running it at home. But compatibility issues with the tools I use every day as a developer mean that I cannot run Windows Vista at work, and withdrawing the OS that they do work on will break me in future. In the end I imagine I will need to keep a spare machine to maintain projects using these tools, or perhaps a virtual machine (but I'll need to obtain VMware Workstation for USB device virtualization, which Virtual PC doesn't do). What tools? Microsoft's own. eMbedded Visual C++ 3.0 and 4.0, and Visual Studio .NET 2003 (mostly works, but not supported).
DoEvents: Generating unexpected recursion since 1991
Mike Dimmick wrote:
I have nothing against Windows Vista ... But compatibility issues with the tools I use every day
Nothing against it eh? :laugh: "I've nothing against Stalin, he just killed my whole family!"
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
-
Why don't they do something useful and launch a "Fix Vista!" campaign instead of a stupid regressive "Save Windows XP". Vista is a better OS than XP but is marred by its UI and driver/application compatibility issues. Campaign companies selling apps that aren't compatible with Vista to provide a service pack. Campaign hardware manufactures to once and for all start writing decent software to go with their devices. Campaign Microsoft to stop training everyone to click warning dialogs without reading them and provide an innovative solution to security. But throwing out something and going back to "The Good Old Days" is stupid. Encourage the best out of a company but don't make them afraid to innovate.
cheers, Chris Maunder
CodeProject.com : C++ MVP
I think your sentiment is good but the reality is Vista won't be fixed by 30 June 2008 whether we campaign or not. Until Microsoft have fixed Vista and driver makers have caught up it would be good to retain the option of Windows XP. Should I buy a desktop this year I don't want Vista on it and I want to be able to put Windows XP on it. If they yank the CDs then I'll be hunting around for illegal sources. (Microsoft of course can do whatever they bloody well like. I don't think it is an obligation they have and we are all seriously deluded if we think it is. So they can weather the storm and keep pumping a broken Vista in the hope that long-term it pays off or they can extend Windows XP now, sell some more, hurt Vista in the short-term but possibly retain users who are on the verge of switching to another operating system. Users who might choose a fixed Vista were it available.)
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
-
Mike Dimmick wrote:
I have nothing against Windows Vista ... But compatibility issues with the tools I use every day
Nothing against it eh? :laugh: "I've nothing against Stalin, he just killed my whole family!"
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
Careful, you're getting awful close to Godwin's law :)
cheers, Chris Maunder
CodeProject.com : C++ MVP
-
Careful, you're getting awful close to Godwin's law :)
cheers, Chris Maunder
CodeProject.com : C++ MVP
:-O "I've nothing against Mac OS X, all it did was delete a weeks code!"
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
-
At it's core it's forced adaption of Vista, by removing consumer choice when buying a new PC. It's arguable if this is good or bad, right or wrong. Still, I am not looking forward to our users moving to Vista, and I guess I share that with some people in the industry. I have no figures comparing that to the initial woes of XP, and though the topics are similar there seem to be more technical reasons not to adapt. My gut feeling is that Vista will be the ME of the new millenium: one of the things that when mentioned makes everyone giggle, then nervously move on to another topic. And during ME times, there was Windows 2000 as "serious" alternative, and more affordable than 2003 is now.
We are a big screwed up dysfunctional psychotic happy family - some more screwed up, others more happy, but everybody's psychotic joint venture definition of CP
blog: TDD - the Aha! | Linkify!| FoldWithUs! | sighistpeterchen wrote:
At it's core it's forced adaption of Vista, by removing consumer choice when buying a new PC.
No product is on the shelves forever. Get over it. This isn't a money-making scheme more than the very existence of any product is. It's not just Microsoft that's dumping XP; hardware vendors are too[^], and for good reason: XP is old. If this petition succeeds are you going to be complaining 10 years from now that Microsoft's not giving people the choice to buy XP? Where do you draw the line?
peterchen wrote:
I have no figures comparing that to the initial woes of XP, and though the topics are similar there seem to be more technical reasons not to adapt.
There is a lot of bullshit[^] flying around. The press has hardly any clue what it's talking about, and they constantly exaggerate[^] "technical reasons" to avoid Vista like the plague. You have no figures comparing the woes of XP to Vista's. What you do have is extreme peer pressure on behalf of your friends and the rest of the industry to talk shit about Vista. At the same time, I have figures that show the bullshit around XP[^] was probably just as bad as the bullshit around Vista, just not as vocalized simply due to the fact that there was a better distinction between "blogs" and "news" back then. The fundamental retardedness of the information out there is the same.
peterchen wrote:
My gut feeling is that Vista will be the ME of the new millenium: one of the things that when mentioned makes everyone giggle, then nervously move on to another topic.
My gut feeling is that you
-
I gave you a 2 because you forget about all the non-technical people out there who will be affected by a forced adoption of Windows Vista.
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
Said people won't care what OS they're using, so long as it lets them read their email and browse YouTube and Facebook out-of-the-box and runs MS Word and doesn't cost more than $500. Vista does this possibly better but not any worse than XP. I mean, come on, how many people out there do you think there'll be that are going to have thrown out or lost their copy of XP, not know anyone else that has it, all while having the savviness to buy a copy of XP then format their hard drive and install it? It's not as if WGA is no longer activating Windows XP, nor is it as if OEM is being discontinued. So please realize that the IT press just wanted to pretend Microsoft is a child killer so that more people would read their garbage.
-
Said people won't care what OS they're using, so long as it lets them read their email and browse YouTube and Facebook out-of-the-box and runs MS Word and doesn't cost more than $500. Vista does this possibly better but not any worse than XP. I mean, come on, how many people out there do you think there'll be that are going to have thrown out or lost their copy of XP, not know anyone else that has it, all while having the savviness to buy a copy of XP then format their hard drive and install it? It's not as if WGA is no longer activating Windows XP, nor is it as if OEM is being discontinued. So please realize that the IT press just wanted to pretend Microsoft is a child killer so that more people would read their garbage.
reinux wrote:
I mean, come on, how many people out there do you think there'll be that are going to have thrown out or lost their copy of XP, not know anyone else that has it, all while having the savviness to buy a copy of XP then format their hard drive and install it?
Like I said. I don't have a Windows XP CD. Should I buy a desktop this year I would want to put Windows XP on it, not Vista. Without access to a Windows XP CD I will end up downloading from some torrent and installing from there.
reinux wrote:
Vista does this possibly better but not any worse than XP.
We will have to agree to disagree about that. Vista has a lot of UI problems that making using it a pain. Windows XP is stable, the UI works and people already know it. It is hard to miss all the bad Vista press.
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
-
reinux wrote:
I mean, come on, how many people out there do you think there'll be that are going to have thrown out or lost their copy of XP, not know anyone else that has it, all while having the savviness to buy a copy of XP then format their hard drive and install it?
Like I said. I don't have a Windows XP CD. Should I buy a desktop this year I would want to put Windows XP on it, not Vista. Without access to a Windows XP CD I will end up downloading from some torrent and installing from there.
reinux wrote:
Vista does this possibly better but not any worse than XP.
We will have to agree to disagree about that. Vista has a lot of UI problems that making using it a pain. Windows XP is stable, the UI works and people already know it. It is hard to miss all the bad Vista press.
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
Paul Watson wrote:
Without access to a Windows XP CD I will end up downloading from some torrent and installing from there.
Then do that. That's my point. Anyone who would even bother to format their computer and install Windows from CD will have access to XP somehow or another. If you buy a new computer you can still get the OEM version of Windows, which is cheaper, and because now Windows XP is not being supported either, is of the same value as the retail versions. The only perk of having a retail copy of XP used to be that Microsoft offered tech support for it.
Paul Watson wrote:
It is hard to miss all the bad Vista press.
-
Paul Watson wrote:
Without access to a Windows XP CD I will end up downloading from some torrent and installing from there.
Then do that. That's my point. Anyone who would even bother to format their computer and install Windows from CD will have access to XP somehow or another. If you buy a new computer you can still get the OEM version of Windows, which is cheaper, and because now Windows XP is not being supported either, is of the same value as the retail versions. The only perk of having a retail copy of XP used to be that Microsoft offered tech support for it.
Paul Watson wrote:
It is hard to miss all the bad Vista press.
I know plenty of non-technical people who went out and bought Windows 95 on CD and installed it themselves onto their existing computers. I know plenty of non-technical people who did the same thing when Windows XP came out. Now that Vista is out I don't want those people to loose the option of Windows XP.
reinux wrote:
Then do that. That's my point. Anyone who would even bother to format their computer and install Windows from CD will have access to XP somehow or another.
Yes, illegally. A torrent of Windows XP is illegal. I know of no Microsoft approved torrent source for Windows XP. Do you?
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
-
I know plenty of non-technical people who went out and bought Windows 95 on CD and installed it themselves onto their existing computers. I know plenty of non-technical people who did the same thing when Windows XP came out. Now that Vista is out I don't want those people to loose the option of Windows XP.
reinux wrote:
Then do that. That's my point. Anyone who would even bother to format their computer and install Windows from CD will have access to XP somehow or another.
Yes, illegally. A torrent of Windows XP is illegal. I know of no Microsoft approved torrent source for Windows XP. Do you?
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
Now that Vista is out I don't want those people to loose the option of Windows XP.
I just explained why that isn't happening, and now you're just appealing to emotion.
Paul Watson wrote:
Yes, illegally. A torrent of Windows XP is illegal. I know of no Microsoft approved torrent source for Windows XP. Do you?
I know of none that Microsoft has bothered to shut down. It doesn't matter where the hell you get your copy of XP; if you activate it on WGA, it's perfectly legitimate. (And you save $5-$10 if you pirate it.) And again, torrents aren't the only place that you can get XP even after it gets taken off shelves. For god's sake, I've never seen so much fuss over someone discontinuing an old product. All this is is mass hysteria.
-
Time to get over it and move on. Nobody is stopping you from using XP or buying used copies. I still remember people insisting on running MS-DOS 4.2 long after Windows 95 came out.
Anyone who thinks he has a better idea of what's good for people than people do is a swine. - P.J. O'Rourke
Ditto when XP came out[^]. Can you believe people actually believed that ME was more reliable than XP?
-
Mike Dimmick wrote:
What tools? Microsoft's own. eMbedded Visual C++ 3.0 and 4.0
As for these, I'd strongly recommend you to upgrade, perhaps to Visual C++ 8. Both IDEs' compilers are based on VC++6, so we're talking about a 10 year old compiler. Not to mention that they're pre-standard, and new SDKs for the machines (Intermec, Symbol iPaq) for Mobile 5 and Mobile 6 are being distributed for VC++8.
Stupidity is an International Association - Enrique Jardiel Poncela
That does not help when you still have to support customers using Pocket PC 2002 and Windows CE 4.x devices. Visual Studio 2005 cannot target these devices. In addition we're a contract software house. We often wouldn't get the business for application modifications if we had to quote an extra couple of weeks' work to migrate to the newer development tools even if the customer had migrated to or was willing to migrate to a newer device. We use Visual Studio 2005 where necessary - because of course eVC 4.0 cannot target Windows Mobile 5.0 and 6 devices - but a forced upgrade is out of the question.
DoEvents: Generating unexpected recursion since 1991
-
Why don't they do something useful and launch a "Fix Vista!" campaign instead of a stupid regressive "Save Windows XP". Vista is a better OS than XP but is marred by its UI and driver/application compatibility issues. Campaign companies selling apps that aren't compatible with Vista to provide a service pack. Campaign hardware manufactures to once and for all start writing decent software to go with their devices. Campaign Microsoft to stop training everyone to click warning dialogs without reading them and provide an innovative solution to security. But throwing out something and going back to "The Good Old Days" is stupid. Encourage the best out of a company but don't make them afraid to innovate.
cheers, Chris Maunder
CodeProject.com : C++ MVP
As I said, Microsoft are the worst offender for the tools I have to use. Their embedded/mobile team aren't interested in anything over a year old. In addition SQL Server 2000 isn't supported on Vista either. Again, we have to support customers using the older database. I don't think anyone's still using SQL Server 7.0 now but it's only been a year or so.
DoEvents: Generating unexpected recursion since 1991
-
peterchen wrote:
At it's core it's forced adaption of Vista, by removing consumer choice when buying a new PC.
No product is on the shelves forever. Get over it. This isn't a money-making scheme more than the very existence of any product is. It's not just Microsoft that's dumping XP; hardware vendors are too[^], and for good reason: XP is old. If this petition succeeds are you going to be complaining 10 years from now that Microsoft's not giving people the choice to buy XP? Where do you draw the line?
peterchen wrote:
I have no figures comparing that to the initial woes of XP, and though the topics are similar there seem to be more technical reasons not to adapt.
There is a lot of bullshit[^] flying around. The press has hardly any clue what it's talking about, and they constantly exaggerate[^] "technical reasons" to avoid Vista like the plague. You have no figures comparing the woes of XP to Vista's. What you do have is extreme peer pressure on behalf of your friends and the rest of the industry to talk shit about Vista. At the same time, I have figures that show the bullshit around XP[^] was probably just as bad as the bullshit around Vista, just not as vocalized simply due to the fact that there was a better distinction between "blogs" and "news" back then. The fundamental retardedness of the information out there is the same.
peterchen wrote:
My gut feeling is that Vista will be the ME of the new millenium: one of the things that when mentioned makes everyone giggle, then nervously move on to another topic.
My gut feeling is that you
reinux wrote:
Get over it.
"Getting over it" means for me accepting that I have to spend additional development time to migrate and test, update documentation and retrain support. For my customers this either means the inconvenience of digging up an XP system or less features delivered this year. And I have to make this decision for all of them, not individually. I am not so much concerned about Microsoft making money as the cost it means to me. Of course I could say "why bother, it's job security", but I value the product I'm working on more than that. I would accept this as a fact of life if I would see more than marginal consumer value in upgrading to Vista. Just because there is bullshit doesn't mean Vista is good by a negative default. I remember the hesitations for adopting WIndows 98 and XP very well, but unlike Vista they added user value out of the box. Some of the new "features" don't translate into benefits: I don't care about DRM features, Data Redirection makes migration, updating and user management more complicated rather than more simple. I am looking forward to support for future hardware, less reboots, and slick UI. I am looking forward to see Superfetch in day-to-day action. But vista doesn't look finished right now.
reinux wrote:
Because my gut feeling is that my gut feeling is better than yours.
Meh. You smell funny (nose feeling). :sigh:
We are a big screwed up dysfunctional psychotic happy family - some more screwed up, others more happy, but everybody's psychotic joint venture definition of CP
blog: TDD - the Aha! | Linkify!| FoldWithUs! | sighist -
Believe me - if I could get the MS dev tools running under WINE or something like that, I wouldn't be running Windows right now.
"Why don't you tie a kerosene-soaked rag around your ankles so the ants won't climb up and eat your candy ass..." - Dale Earnhardt, 1997
-----
"...the staggering layers of obscenity in your statement make it a work of art on so many levels." - Jason Jystad, 10/26/2001 -
Now that Vista is out I don't want those people to loose the option of Windows XP.
I just explained why that isn't happening, and now you're just appealing to emotion.
Paul Watson wrote:
Yes, illegally. A torrent of Windows XP is illegal. I know of no Microsoft approved torrent source for Windows XP. Do you?
I know of none that Microsoft has bothered to shut down. It doesn't matter where the hell you get your copy of XP; if you activate it on WGA, it's perfectly legitimate. (And you save $5-$10 if you pirate it.) And again, torrents aren't the only place that you can get XP even after it gets taken off shelves. For god's sake, I've never seen so much fuss over someone discontinuing an old product. All this is is mass hysteria.
So you are right that it is the key that is the important bit and not the media. I was wrong about that. However as Mike has pointed out[^] the problem is they will stop issuing new keys. That is a big deal for those of us who don't want to use Vista until it is fixed and works with relevant hardware.
regards, Paul Watson Ireland & South Africa
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
At least he achieved immortality for a few years.
-
Why don't they do something useful and launch a "Fix Vista!" campaign instead of a stupid regressive "Save Windows XP". Vista is a better OS than XP but is marred by its UI and driver/application compatibility issues. Campaign companies selling apps that aren't compatible with Vista to provide a service pack. Campaign hardware manufactures to once and for all start writing decent software to go with their devices. Campaign Microsoft to stop training everyone to click warning dialogs without reading them and provide an innovative solution to security. But throwing out something and going back to "The Good Old Days" is stupid. Encourage the best out of a company but don't make them afraid to innovate.
cheers, Chris Maunder
CodeProject.com : C++ MVP
Chris Maunder wrote:
Campaign hardware manufactures to once and for all start writing decent software to go with their devices.
This is one issue that Microsoft could go a long way in helping hardware manufacturers. The driver development group inside Microsoft has since its inception been a fiefdom all its own. They use their own customized compilers. Documentation is spotty. Examples are incomplete and out of date. Even in the case where they discuss a topic, there is often three ways to do a given thing: the way documented in the DDK, the one provided in the sample, and the way it actually works. It's very difficult to write device software for Windows that is fully compliant, unless of course you pay Microsoft to help you develop it by enduring their driver certification process. The driver group should be forced to meet the same standards as other development groups. Use the same tools (e.g. Visual Studio). Documentation should be at least as comprehensive as the rest of the O/S. Updates to the DDK should include reference implementations for each form of driver, not just incomplete code snippets, and should include a complete installer for each one. Arguably, the driver group should be better than the others, given the potential impact on system stability of a bad driver.
Software Zen:
delete this;
Fold With Us![^] -
The trade magazine InfoWorld has launched a Save Windows XP[^] petition. OEM and shrink-wrapped copies of Windows XP will be withdrawn as of 30 June 2008. I have nothing against Windows Vista. I'm running it at home. But compatibility issues with the tools I use every day as a developer mean that I cannot run Windows Vista at work, and withdrawing the OS that they do work on will break me in future. In the end I imagine I will need to keep a spare machine to maintain projects using these tools, or perhaps a virtual machine (but I'll need to obtain VMware Workstation for USB device virtualization, which Virtual PC doesn't do). What tools? Microsoft's own. eMbedded Visual C++ 3.0 and 4.0, and Visual Studio .NET 2003 (mostly works, but not supported).
DoEvents: Generating unexpected recursion since 1991
Well, there's certainly no chance it will be retained indefinitely as that article requests.
Kevin
-
Why don't they do something useful and launch a "Fix Vista!" campaign instead of a stupid regressive "Save Windows XP". Vista is a better OS than XP but is marred by its UI and driver/application compatibility issues. Campaign companies selling apps that aren't compatible with Vista to provide a service pack. Campaign hardware manufactures to once and for all start writing decent software to go with their devices. Campaign Microsoft to stop training everyone to click warning dialogs without reading them and provide an innovative solution to security. But throwing out something and going back to "The Good Old Days" is stupid. Encourage the best out of a company but don't make them afraid to innovate.
cheers, Chris Maunder
CodeProject.com : C++ MVP
I agree - my fear is that the idea of an OS where my files are secure from other users who log in, and I am not admin all the time but can be when I need to, will be thrown out in the backlash against how badly they have implimented it right now.
Christian Graus - Microsoft MVP - C++ "also I don't think "TranslateOneToTwoBillion OneHundredAndFortySevenMillion FourHundredAndEightyThreeThousand SixHundredAndFortySeven()" is a very good choice for a function name" - SpacixOne ( offering help to someone who really needed it ) ( spaces added for the benefit of people running at < 1280x1024 )
-
Actually no. OpenVMS has longer support. Of course it's expensive as hell, but you get what you pay for.
¡El diablo está en mis pantalones! ¡Mire, mire! Real Mentats use only 100% pure, unfooled around with Sapho Juice(tm)! SELECT * FROM User WHERE Clue > 0 0 rows returned Save an Orange - Use the VCF! VCF Blog
Free to hobbyists though.
Jim Crafton wrote:
you get what you pay for
Lots of people still don't get that. "You don't want to pay too little for that muffler either."
