OT: More IT treacle please

En el artículo , John Rumm escribió:

So we can make Linux as unreliable and crash-prone* as Windows? Yeah, great idea.

  • Graphics card drivers running in ring 0. Say no more.
Reply to
Mike Tomlinson
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Fortunately I know no one like that.

Reply to
Tim Streater

En el artículo , michael adams escribió:

I gave your request earnest consideration, and concluded that you can feel free to piss off and do it yourself.

I gave your request earnest consideration, and concluded that you can feel free to piss off and do it yourself.

Reply to
Mike Tomlinson

I already did.

Your dispargement of Tim was based on little more the fact that he happens to post using two different News Servers.

And thus uses two different email adresses

The List in full

  1. T i m

  1. T i m snipped-for-privacy@spaced.me.uk

However if you want to include this evidence in your report to UseNet HQ concerning his damnable attempt at subtefuge, which clearly has so upset both Huge and yourself, then please feel free.

michael adams

...

Reply to
michael adams

En el artículo , michael adams escribió:

Actually, it's based on the fact that he's a tedious, prolix, OS- advocating, clueless cockwomble who belongs in my killfile.

HTH. HAND.

Reply to
Mike Tomlinson

Still seeing some potential downsides.

If I understand correctly, the kernel will be Windows, and the device drivers will be for Windows - so very similar to running Linux in a VM.

Driver upside - access to new hardware and Windows only hardware from Linux (but do you get better access than via a VM?).

Driver downside - one of the main reasons (for me) to keep a Linux platform knocking around is that legacy hardware left behind by the manufacturers when Windows goes up a version are usually supported under Linux.

For instance there is generic TWAIN scanner support in Linux, and lots of other old hardware is supported because once the driver is written it seems to work (or at least be ported) to newer versions. Support for hardware seems to erode under Windows. I have been running an XP VM to support an old scanner because the software wasn't there in Windows 7.

Access from VMs to hardware seems to rely on the Windows driver as an intermediary which is not always good.

This doesn't seem to have changed.

One thing that intrigues me - updating software. Is Windows Update also going to do the equivalent of "apt-get update" then "apt-get upgrade" or are you going to have to run two update systems side by side for the Windows and Linux software?

TL;DR - struggling to see any major benefits over having Linux in a VM.

Hybrid systems with some parts Linux and some parts Windows, with easy inter-communication?

No longer a requirement to maintain two versions of useful programs such as Thunderbird and Pan?

Seamless desktop integration?

Cheers

Dave R

Reply to
David

Quite possibly - who knows what MS are going to do...

Although this is a different situation ISTM... Allowing Andoid/IOS apps to run unchanged on WinPhone carried a huge risk of killing the incentive for developers to write native code for windows phones - which were already starting in a very distant third/fourth place (depending on where Blackberry fit into the market). Indeed it seems that the windows phones are now losing what little market share they had built anyway.

The same parallel does not exist in this case - its as if windows is short of developers or applications. And running linux user mode stuff on windows is hardly a mass market appeal activity - I can't see many big name PC application writers deciding its worth taking the risk of re-targeting their apps on linux and abandoning the native windows versions, just because this will let them them sell to linux users[1] as well as their existing client base.

[1] many of whom are notoriously unwilling to actually buy software anyway!
Reply to
John Rumm

No need to worry there would be no linux in it. It would be Ubuntu windows not Ubuntu linux.

Reply to
dennis

*applause*
Reply to
Huge

Good point.

Reply to
Huge

We are not talking about shim code at the driver level. Dealing with drivers at the level of bit bashing and interrupts is a kernal mode function, and we are not even using a linux kernel here, but the normal NT Kernal and HAL. So drivers would be normal windows ones in a normal windows environment.

Its obviously not that simple. Which is why this is quite a significant technical achievement, if they have actually managed to pull it off.

For mass market stuff like printers and scanners etc, yup sure. For more specialist hardware however, its not often going to be worth it.

Agreed, but it does depend on the category of product. If you are selling hardware devices into a specialist market, the customer will tend to buy whatever PC and OS is required to make the hardware work - the choice is of secondary consideration. That tends to mean if you are a linux fan that also wants to run high end audio kit for example, you are often out of luck at the moment.

Reply to
John Rumm

In reality how unreliable and crash prone is that these days?

Indeed - the alternative would be to make them as slow as the linux ones... ;-)

(architecturally, I agree with you - moving the GDI into ring 0 was a lame decision. However I understand the commercial reality that made them do it)

Reply to
John Rumm

En el artículo , John Rumm escribió:

'Follow the money' is usually a reliable guide...

Yes. I predict that M$ will pull out of 'phones within the next 6 months or so. Win10 on 'phones is a total disaster if the reviews are anything to go by.

Seeing as one of the main tenets of Win10 on 'phones is Continuum, doesn't this rather kick the rug out from under the whole Win10 farce anyway?

ITYM "it's not as if"

Wouldn't it be more that Linux users, being accustomed to high quality software for free (free as in beer), would be unwilling to pay for versions of that software to run on Winux*? (As you say in your footnote below). Especially when the vagaries of the underlying OS would likely make it less reliable than running it on Linux in the first place.

  • my name for it

Microsoft seems to be aiming Winux at developers, but as you say, it's hard to see where the benefits are.

My suspicion is that this is all smoke and mirrors for the sake of having a big announcement to make at the current Build conference, along the lines of the iOS and Android app runners, after which it'll be quietly dropped.

Reply to
Mike Tomlinson

En el artículo , John Rumm escribió:

It's not too bad, granted. But what is it going to be like when it's trying to run native Linux apps? All those translation layers to get through. Ugh.

Yes, agreed. But they only did it to appease the gamers who demand performance. Business users and those who don't game couldn't give a stuff.

Maybe the option to offer two drivers should have been offered. One to run in ring 0 for the gamers with the consequent risks, and another to run in userspace for those who like their machines to stay up for more than ten minutes* at a time.

  • a slight exaggeration.
Reply to
Mike Tomlinson

Nothing like running linux in a VM, there would be no linux code in the system as linux is the kernel and only the kernel.

The software running on the linux kernel is open source software that runs on freeBSd, linux and other kernels.

This is true for some hardware, unfortunately lots of hardware never worked under linux and has also been dropped by windows as the driver model changed. I still have an old IBM laptop running windows 95 just to run my kodak film scanner.

Scanner support in linux is poor, even modern ones that have manufacturers software for linux are poor compared to the same hardware under windows.

Reply to
dennis

My thoughts too. They'd have to push the video out the day before to get the ball rolling in time for it to become viral.

:)

Reply to
www.GymRatZ.co.uk

Yup. Its a harder one to call, because we don't really know what the future revenue model for windows "as a service" rather than a product will be.

I can see that they are keen to push existing win 7 and 8 users to 10 though, and developers in particular have been a difficult bunch to prise away from Win 7. For those working in a cross platform environment at the moment, I can see attractions of winux.

They may keep lobbing out the occasional new handset as a face saving exercise... but its difficult to see them doing much of interest in market share from here.

Some of it - but I can't see them dropping the whole platform!

Indeed I did...

Pretty much...

Are there many "paid for" applications out there that only target linux?

I guess if you are a long time windows developer, who is doing ever more cross platform stuff, then it could be an attractive alternative to running linux VMs or having a "foreign" GUI open on your desktop in a windows Xserver. Day to day GUI based interactions remain the same as you were accustomed to, but you also have all the *nix tools available on your main machine able to access and manipulate local files etc.

Reply to
John Rumm

+1.
Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

I do. Two probably

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

Yes. That is absolutely true.

But it seems to slowly be changing

Reply to
The Natural Philosopher

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