Microsoft is due to release Windows Vista in early 2007. Microsoft announced Windows Vista, previously Longhorn, in 2003 at PCD in Los Angeles. The release was touted by Gates to be a new look and feel for Microsoft and assuredly, the nail that would be driven into Apple’s OS X.
I’ve been looking forward to Windows Vista since it was announced back in 2003. I’ve seen the many iterations of the Vista look and feel and am overall impressed with where it ended up.
I recently read an article by Paul Thurrot, famous for his Windows Supersite. Paul has been writing about Microsoft for years and has been closely following Vista and it’s coming release. The latest article from Paul was entitled, Part 5 – Where Vista Fails.
I had seen this article around blog websites such as Slashdot and Digg, however I rarely take them seriously due to the large, Linux/Unix fanboy base. In my eyes, why should I read an article or a post that is laced with 15 year old kids raging on about how “M$ sux0rz” and “M$ is going to die!”?
As I sat down to my desk this morning, DailyTech, another blog feed I visit daily had a post on the same Paul Thurrot article. DailyTech is a quiet place to get geek news. It isn’t updated as much as the other sites, but honestly, I prefer it that way. It tends to keep the fanboys away.
DailyTech’s post on the iterative build of Vista linked to the previous “blunder” article which lead me to Thurrot’s website. There, I finally decided to read the “Where Vista Fails” article…
I entered the article thinking this was just another Thurrot raving post. Either he is going to bitch about the release schedule Microsoft’s been following or it’s going to be something else that doesn’t interest me. However, Thurrot argued a very strong point which has put me in a very difficult position…
Thurrot started the article off with a blow to Microsoft’s management structure. In it, Thurrot describes middle men with power that cannot make simple decisions. As a developer, this is very, very, frustrating! How can a project move forward when your project managers cannot make decisions for themselves? The answer is, it really can’t…
In his next statement, Thurrot jabs at the promises made by Gates that failed to make the Vista release. These features include the long awaited, WinFS, a storage system based off SQL Server which theoretically increased searched capabilities and what not. However, what we get is another “indexed” type feature, which compared to the capabilities of Spotlight in OS X, looks like a turtle against a jet plane.
In another blow to Vista, Thurrot nails “UAP”, User Account Protection. Real quick, this is already a practiced implementation in both *Nix and OS X. In OS X, whenever you update the system or do something potentially dangerous, first your account is checked to see if you can even perform such a task. If you can, then you are prompted for your password. This is fantastic! You cannot screw your system up unless you tell it to.
Thurrot describes UAP from the Microsoft perspective as this…
“Let’s look a typical example. One of the first things I do whenever I install a new Windows version is download and install Mozilla Firefox. If we forget, for a moment, the number of warning dialogs we get during the download and install process (including a brazen security warning from Windows Firewall for which Microsoft should be chastised), let’s just examine one crucial, often overlooked issue. Once Firefox is installed, there are two icons on my Desktop I’d like to remove: The Setup application itself and a shortcut to Firefox. So I select both icons and drag them to the Recycle Bin. Simple, right?
Wrong. Here’s what you have to go through to actually delete those files in Windows Vista. First, you get a File Access Denied dialog (Figure) explaining that you don’t, in fact, have permission to delete a … shortcut?? To an application you just installed??? Seriously?”
That’s terrible!
Thurrot’s article continues on to other realms such as the glass window effect and Windows Media Center. He complains about the active and inactive windows as annoyances as well as Microsoft adding crap to Media Center, making it difficult to use. I agree with him on both points, but they do not get to me as much as the other stuff talked about earlier.
I reacted to this article strongly and also reacted to the upcoming Vista negatively. Honestly, the only reason I keep my PC around is for gaming. If it wasn’t just for that, I would feel way justified in purchasing a Mac, which brings me to the difficult position I previously mentioned…
Intel has been ramping up production on the new Core processors. They are impressive chips to say the least. They run super fast, super cool and with super low power. What more could you ask for? I’m asking Apple to put them inside the new “Mac” desktops, most likely to be dubbed, “Mac Pro”. One day, hopefully this year, they will be.
After reading this article, my consideration to purchasing a Mac has gone up substantially. Even more so with the later release of the “Mac Pro”, I have the ability to expand the components such as video and memory. My close nit friends understand my reluctance to purchase a Mac, however in light of the upcoming OS release by Microsoft, I don’t see the need to keep upgrading a PC to handle any new OS features. I just see the need to future proof it 5-7 years, so it’s still adequate to play upcoming titles from Valve and Crytek (Ubisoft, FarCry). The money that could be spent in those years to keep a good computer around would be better spent on a Mac that would cost a lot up front, but would ensure that it would still be a top notch computer 5 years down the road.
In closing, my reaction to Windows Vista is really just a comparison between the PC running Windows and the Mac running Windows and OS X. My work OS would become OS X, while the Windows install would be strictly gaming. You can’t compare OS X to Windows Vista right now, OS X is still leaps and bounds ahead. I’m not too sure if Vista has the capability to push Apple to make Leopard, the next release of OS X, just that much better… But from how it looks, probably not.
To finally close this, I must say the bottom line of what pushed me to this point. With each release of Windows, not including ME, Microsoft has release a superior product. Many people argue that it was not worth upgrading from Windows 2000 to XP, however the networking capability in XP is more solid which makes a huge difference in gaming on the net. But, to stay on topic, each release has been better than the one before, however Vista seems to have broken that trend. It’s been over half a decade since the last release of Windows and for 5-6 years worth of work, I am not impressed in the slightest.
As Thurrot said in his article, “…The company is literally filled to the brim with some of the brightest, smartest, most insightful, and friendliest people…”, so why is the management of Microsoft holding these people down from making Windows a totally kick ass product [once again]?
I don’t know… All I know is that I work within that type of management model and if I can avoid other companies that follow the same, e.g. Microsoft, I’d like to stay away. I’d be happy moving my work environment to OS X rather than moving to Vista and be slowed down.