Gates Explains Longhorn Delay, Diet 619
An anonymous reader writes "Microsoft has set late 2006 as the deadline for shipping Longhorn, but to make that date, it had to delay the full implementation of WinFS, an ambitious file system geared at letting users search through all of their files at once. In this interview with Bill Gates, he provides a summary of why Microsoft decided to drop WinFS, saying: "WinFS, I'd be the first to say, is very ambitious. Nobody has ever brought together the world of documents, media and structured information in giving you one simple set of verbs that lets you richly find, move around and replicate those things." Meanwhile, MS Watch has published Longhorn head-honcho Jim Allchin's memo on why some Longhorn features had to be axed."
Free Ads / Free Betas (Score:5, Insightful)
We will not cut corners on product excellence. Our powerful vision is intact; our shipment plan changes will let customers get access to parts of the vision faster.
Why don't they just admit that the market is forcing them to release parts of Longhorn (like Monad) [tech-recipes.com] earilier than expected! Leaks of betas and press releases like these are easy ways to keep the Microsoft buzz elevated.
If they didn't release a product until 2008, the market (mostly linux) would have time to catch-up.
What about Meta-tags? (Score:5, Insightful)
Wasn't this the whole idea behind meta-tags for files? I thought thats why we had such tags in windows media too?
Or is this the same tags that winFS will use to search with?
Re:Free Ads / Free Betas (Score:5, Insightful)
You mean like.... (Score:1, Insightful)
Date-driven releases (Score:5, Insightful)
Previously Microsoft were skirting around the 2006-7 point without being clear about when Longhorn would ship; it looked like they were going to try to finish features X and Y before release. So now they've moved on to a date-driven release, we can pretty much guarantee 2006 for Longhorn (client edition) and they're going to drop anything they have to, to make that date.
Bill said that the OEMs are okay with the delay, so why the pressure? Looks like Linux is hurrying Microsoft up!
So, still NTFS??? (Score:4, Insightful)
Just as they're making some progress with mounting NTFS filesystems under linux, MS changes the FS. Something which surely would cause problems in Linux.
Looks liks we'll be able to keep dual boots with Longhorn after all.
Re:Avalon's gone too (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Via babelfish (Score:4, Insightful)
Well it's sure as hell not going to be an increase in stability or performance. From the interview:
What is really causing sort of the rewrite on Longhorn?
There's no rewrite going on here.
Things I can think of: the tacky sidebar, the 'My Games' et al. menus which will only work with a handful of Microsoft games, and the new GUI look and feel which is probably tied to Avalon. So nothing worth upgrading for, then ;)
No-one ever did it eh? Ever hear of IFS? (Score:5, Insightful)
Someone please call Oracle and tell Larry that Bill says that IFS (The Oracle Internet File System) [internetweek.com] doesn't exist.
What is iFS?
iFS can manage all content -- which is scattered across PC desktops, document management systems, and websites -- in a single repository, he said. It supports the storage and management of more than 150 different file types, including documents created using XML.
BeOS? (Score:5, Insightful)
Didn't BeOS have something similar?
Also, won't OSX actually have something like this even before Longhorn ships (without WinFS).
Aren't there a lot of pretty advanced projects to do the same for Linux, for example beagle for gnome and the new kde search feature planned for the next release? (Granted, these won't be implemented at the fs level, but who cares as long as they work)
Isn't reiserfs4 actually providing some of this functionality (and much more) and has allready been released?
Doesn't MS have about 60 billion Dollars in the bank and still can't get its act together?
Didn't MS talk about something similar already years ago and wanted to ship it with what is now known as Win2000?
Re:catch-up? (Score:2, Insightful)
I hope not because then I'd have to start worrying about whether my device will be compatible with my computer.
Re:catch-up? (Score:5, Insightful)
However, Monad is obviously a way that Microsoft is trying to catch-up with the powerful scripting ability of *nix shells.
Of couse, some linux installs with have sidebars and other copies of new longhorn features. Longhorn will likely gain some new linux-like features between now and then as well... It's just the features race.
In competitive software markets one product will always try to match the bells and whistles of similiar products. For example, IE gained pop-up blocking.
Talent borrows, genius steals.
AC
Faster, better searching? (Score:2, Insightful)
Let's hope for an actual improvement this time around.
Ummm ... AppleTalk? (Score:2, Insightful)
They understood all too well that the classic MacOS ... was not designed with networking and multitasking in mind.
We had our Mac Plus systems networked, along with a LaserWriter, in 1988 via AppleTalk.
SteveM
Re:Is there a word... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, actually. That you have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. Come on, do you really believe that the windows development team would give that much weight and media time to a system that implemented find / -name $string -print?! And even then, that they couldn't hammer it out in a day? Please.
What they are looking to do is to integrate the filesystem into a database system, where files are organized not by directory, but by use/type/relationship. Even I have a hard time wrapping my head around what this will look like once it's carried out. What will it gain us in user experience? My gut says 'a lot' given the sheer amount of development time these people have put into the project.
I certainly feel anger, fury and loathing when simpletons critique what they don't understand.
Re:Free Ads / Free Betas (Score:3, Insightful)
Do you really think the content of the interview will be exclusively available on zdnet and /.? There are a few more sites on the net (who will link to the article (though I don't doubt that most of them are run on Linux machines))
Remember: Every news is good news.
Re:Is there a word... (Score:3, Insightful)
You should have read the fine print.. (Score:5, Insightful)
He said "the market", you're talking of "the product". Those two are unfortunately nowhere as closely related as one might wish...
Kjella
Correction of the press release (Score:5, Insightful)
The slow painful death of Microsoft (Score:4, Insightful)
Unix-like systems are going to win out in the end. That is why Mac's OS X looks like a smarter move every day.
Microsoft has so much cash and so much clout that it will take a long time to die, but it is doomed to do so unless at some point it ditches backwards compatibility and the current codebase and does something new.
WinFS bad? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Does it matter!? (Score:5, Insightful)
I really don't see what difference it makes as long as longhorn is released in the next 4yrs. No matter how many computer-savvy people decide not to use it, it will still be THE os.
It matters because the market is now aware of Linux, which it never previously was. It has major corporations backing and investing in it (IBM, Novell, HP Compaq, Sun) and it has not only mostly caught up with the "features" of Windows but has surpassed them and approaching the kind of features slated for Longhorn.
Just look at the 6.8 release of the X.org X11 server. With the composite extension and cairo you'll be able to do pretty much anything offered by the Longhorn GDI. Of course, it needs to mature, to be further tested, to be further accelerated, and to have enough applications developed for it to become useful... but I think between now and mid-to-late 2006 is more than enough time for that to happen. Add to that the network transparency of X and all of a sudden Microsoft will be playing catch-up in that respect.
Also, look at Storage and the various other FOSS projects working towards that goal. It looks like WinFS may even be late in that regard to, again playing catch up.
Put all this together with the market momentum Linux is gaining (don't be surprised if it hits double figures in terms of market share by 2006) and Microsoft's position as the dominant OS player will be under massive threat.
Also, they can't afford to fuck up again on this one. The world is getting very impatient with the whole security mess. It's simply costing businesses too much to keep on top of it. FOSS operating systems have a far better security record making them even more attractive.
I could go on and on, but Microsoft is betting their monopoly future on Longhorn. And the free desktop could literally beat it to the punch.
you mean like 'spotlight'? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Does it matter!? (Score:5, Insightful)
You will take your hundreds (maybe thousands) of current files and insert meta-data into each and every one so they fit the new "paradigm"? I won't, and my guess is that a whole butt-load of soccer moms won't either.
I personally don't understand the need for the concept. I do my development, writing, gaming, and keep my photography on one computer. I find the current file-system completely satisfactory and sufficient for the job.
The way I work in the physical world is the way I work on my system. I keep everything in organized stacks, in specific locations. "Emails to Bob" are kept, for instance, in MyName/Emails/Bob. Not hard at all.
I see all this meta-tagging as making everyone into data entry clerks, and, personally, I don't need that.
I would entertain someone coming up with really functional reasoning explaining the need for all this.
Re:You should have read the fine print.. (Score:2, Insightful)
New innovations these days happen more rapidly in the Linux world than at Redmond - hence my post.
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Re:Is there a word... (Score:2, Insightful)
Plueeze, ok, Microsoft employs some of the brightest minds in the world, but something here is totally wrong. Or maybe marketing departament simply is incapable to explain required functionality to programmers
Re:Microsoft's Copland? (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously, have you heard of Windows NT? It definitely has it's problems, architectural and otherwise but to say it was designed as a single user system with no networking is just false.
Re:The slow painful death of Microsoft (Score:5, Insightful)
And you want them to ditch compatability?
That's the way you get users to.. use.. your product!
If I can't run my copy of *work program from 1998* (read: game) on the latest version of windows, I'd end up not using the latest windows, costing microsoft another sale. They had already sold me the current version of windows that I run. Their next job is to sell me the new version. And the features that 99.999% of the customers NEED is the backwards compatibility.
Re:No-one ever did it eh? Ever hear of IFS? (Score:3, Insightful)
If you can't find the pictures from your cousin's wedding by searching for "wedding pictures," it's not the same thing as WinFS.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
I have this book over here... (Score:5, Insightful)
- unrealistic expectations
- wishful thinking
- placing politics over substance
- overly optimistic schedules
- inadequate design
- feature creep
Maybe this company should take some time to read their own publications.
Re:Free Ads / Free Betas (Score:5, Insightful)
Frankly I have grown disappointed with the level of reporting on software from Slashdot. A main reason for me to prefer open source software over commercial software was that what you got to read about it came from real developers and real users of real, readily available software. Since it focused on open source software, Slashdot's reporting used to reflect this, announcing release reports from actual developers on actual releases of software that people actually used.
Today many of the "news" items on software releases that feature on Slashdot are no longer on actual releases, but announcements on future releases, delays on future releases, plans on future releases, etcetera. The announcers are not developers but CEOs, marketeers, magazine columnists, tcetera. Consequently the "news" items themselves and the ensuing discussions are shrouded in marketese and speculation, and generally demonstrate a very superficial, PC-ish outlook on software, treating applications or even whole OSes like participants in a sports competition. "Will Microsoft's (KDE's, Mandrake's, Enlightenment's, ...) New Team Top The League Again In 2005?" Having to wade through this hogwash is what turned me off commercial software; now that sites like Slashdot and their users give free software the same treatment, both the sites and the software itself lose a major competitive advantage. Slashdot is a major culprit.
Interestingly enough, Microsoft has made a very successful move in the opposite direction by letting its developers blog on their daily work, which provides us users/programmers with the kind of communication channel that sites like Slashdot used to provide for open source software.
It would help if Slashdot introduced a system to separate advertisements, in whatever form, from real reports on real product releases.
Re:Tiger's Spotlight, anyone? (Score:4, Insightful)
I love consistency in the tech industry. It gives me warm fuzzies.
Re:catch-up? (Score:3, Insightful)
it's hardly a new innovation(expect they of course make it too big so that people notice it..)
Re:Free Ads / Free Betas (Score:5, Insightful)
There are plenty of sysadmins reading slashdot, and probably quite a number of them maintain Windows networks, or are caught up in between. The idea is to make them think "Oh, if the next version of Windows is out in 2 years, it's not really worth attempting to convert to Linux." It doesn't actually matter whether Longhorn is released in 2006 or not, as long as it's "real soon now".
~phil
Re:What about Meta-tags? (Score:4, Insightful)
File metadata should be in filesystem side.
First benefit: (semi-)standard interface. Want to parse MP3 tags? Write code for it. Want to parse Vorbis tags? Write code for it. Want to parse WMA? More code, man, more code! If it all were in the file system side, you could edit and find it easily.
Second benefit, especially for l33t m00zik d00dz in P2P networks: Editing file metadata would not touch file contents and thus not the file checksum. You could manipulate the tags to your heart's content and the MD5 for that file would stay the same. These days, there are only hacks that specifically open the file, parse the actual data content, and get checksum for that. Very wasteful. Very non-generic.
Third benefit: Extensibility. Ease of searching. Blah blah. Read the marketing material.
Humm, would be cool to use vorbis-like tags in POSIX extended file attributes, but the software as of yet doesn't even think of supporting them... =(
WTF have they been doing? (Score:5, Insightful)
Now Longhorn isn't going to be shipped until late 2006. Let's give them the benefit of the doubt and say they'll hit that date (just in time for Xmas!). OK, so that means that they will have been working on this thing for a MINIMUM of 5 years. If there was any release overlap, and I am sure there would have to be, it is probably more like 6 years. WTF have they been doing in Redmond!? You can't tell me that everyone there has been working on XP service packs.
Now I am not discounting the complexity of software and what it takes to release something of this magnitude. But we are talking about the largest and richest software company on the planet! Surely if anyone could do this, it would be..... Hmm. Perhaps what seems to be an advantage is actually a disadvantage in this case. If you look at their OS timeline (I used this one [computerhope.com]), it seems that it was usually around 3 years between major instances of their OS lines. Now, that has doubled for some reason? Maybe they had to start over from scratch and are putting some security into this one. (the good kind, not the DRM kind)
I guess we'll just have to wait and see. It's good for me that they are delaying, at least they won't be changing the "corporate standard" again where I work. I really don't care for XP and wish I had 2000 back...
Re:Does it matter!? (Score:2, Insightful)
Current modern filesystems allow names long enough to be able to sufficiently describe the contents of a file, people are just too lazy to give files decent names or to organise files in to directories/folders. And if people can't be bothered to give files decent names, what makes anybody think they will enter useful meta-data???
GIGO anybody???
Even if the the meta-data is available in files, I've seen enough examples of 'soccer moms' who have trouble finding things on the internet (via google etc) so how are they going to do any better when searching for files on their machine. I am not blaming the soccer moms here, just pointing out that putting a natural language search expression in to a search engine doesn't always give you what you want.
Re:Date-driven releases (Score:5, Insightful)
Two words: Software Assurance.
Right now, the managers that took that bait are looking silly so they would like to show something for the expense. Unfortunately, Microsoft is still a few years away from making a difference for this group, and in the meantime there's quite a bit of room for them to look foolish.
Spice for the pot.
Re:You mean like.... (Score:1, Insightful)
I'm not sure if MS can pull this off, though. But if they do before anyone else, I'll have to applaud them even though I don't generally like MS "innovations" much. While filename/directory structure is a nice way to separate one file from another, the constant growth of information people keep on their harddrives is creating a huge demand for a semantic browser. Even though I make an effort to keep my files organised, I'm having a hard time browsing through all the images/documents/songs etc. I have.
Re:Is there a word... (Score:5, Insightful)
Practical example: I have a couple of VCDs. My daughter wanted to watch one, on the PC (as my gf was watching TV). It didn't auto-play, and no application was associated with VCDs, so I had to try to work out how to play it. In the end, I realised that the ~700MB
I can't associate all
Re:Is there a word... (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't be ridiculous. Windows (since 2000 at least) has had an equivalent to Linux's (s)locate tool. Clearly that's not what this is about, as it already exists!
I can't think of a word to describe this feeling of anger, fury and loathing combined.
Why are you so angry? Are you losing money (or anything at all!) because of the delay? Seriously, if Longwait being delayed and scaled back in scope makes you that angry, you need to sort your priorities out.
Re:Ummm ... AppleTalk? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:What about Meta-tags? (Score:5, Insightful)
You are, of course, assuming that what he's talking about is actually what they're planning on doing.
MS has a long-standing tradition of talking about things that don't really happen (Win95 is a 32-bit OS, anyone?)
As they say, fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me.
Personally, I'll believe it when I see it.
Re:No-one ever did it eh? Ever hear of IFS? (Score:3, Insightful)
iFS can manage all content -- which is scattered across PC desktops, document management systems, and websites -- in a single repository, he said. It supports the storage and management of more than 150 different file types, including documents created using XML.
Gee, whaddayaknow... that doesn't say SFA about being able to search for content using meta-tags, etc.... all it does is act as a network drive in a SAMBA environment.
you need a clue (Score:5, Insightful)
"implement the things that FOSS world can't do" eh? Then you go and talk about filesystems and vector graphics, both of which, at present time, FOSS absolutely trumps MS at. Linux has ext2/3, ReiserFS, Reiser4(which was just released, and has the potential to do everything WinFS will do), Storage(another datastore similar to WinFS). KDE and GNOME are both moving to SVG, and are moving along quite nicely. The X.org X server is implementing loads of new graphics features, and since forking from XFree, they're actually getting done. Also, most of E17's base libraries are mostly done, and implement a lot of features MS is in the process of "inventing."
Same Story, Different Year (Score:2, Insightful)
That's probably why their release schedule always gets pushed out by a few years. The interns are only available in the summer. Anyway, those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it, that might be worth pointing out to any purchasing managers you might know. I'm sure the first release of Longhorn will be as half-assed and unstable as Windows 95 will and it'll take a couple years worth of patches to make it work correctly. You could start a migration to Linux now and by the time Longhorn rolls around the X.org guys will probably have the entire GUI running on OpenGL.
Re:Problem with meta-tags (Score:3, Insightful)
Which will never happen, because the system cannot look at a jpeg and and say "Oh, that's Jim+Masai Warrior+Africa+Summer Vacation+Draped Clothing+Acacia Tree+Always reminds me of that cute little girl I never actually got to take a picture of+Masai Mara+sunset+. . . "
KFG
Actually, I think you misunderstood... (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not so much that FOSS can't implement these ideas. It's that they can't, or at least won't, do so in a way that's pervasive for the whole OS. FOSS can, for example, design a new filesystem or display model, but it can't make all of the apps written for Linux support those things. It especially can't make the apps support it in a consistent and comprehensible way.
Microsoft is capable of saying: This is the way we are going to do things now, and if you are going to make software to run on our OS, that's the way it's going to be. If the Office suite, for example, deals with the new filesystem in a certain way, that becomes the Right Way. Instant industry standard. Any software vendor who deviates from that method is going to be looked at as doing it the wrong way.
FOSS can't compell that kind of compliance. Developers are free to support or not support the work of other developers depending on how much time they want to put in or if they think it's a good idea. If there's a difference in vision, a fork can occur.
Don't get me wrong; I'm not saying the FOSS way of doing things is bad, and I don't think the grandparent poster was either. It's just different. It absolutely has its strengths, but it also has its weaknesses too. Microsoft is, perhaps wisely, choosing to try to push the strengths their model has.
what about managed code base? (Score:3, Insightful)
Now that would be somewhat innovative because such a system would be protected against buffer overflows and would provide nice, all-managed
however, MS has not detailed how much of upcoming castrated Longhorn will be in managed code.Any thoughts?
would be cool if Ximian can pull all-managed desktop (based on Mono) before MS did.
What is this, stealth blogging? (Score:5, Insightful)
I really wonder if there is not some stealth blogging going on...
Now to address your issues...
1) I read MSDN blogs and it is essentially the same material posted by ten different people. It is quite amazing how "monolithic" independent blogs can be. Scoblizer seems to be the only "oddball"
2) Slashdot has always been about both gossip and tech news.
3) More people use Open Source, hence more news will be about CEO's who give press releases about Open Source.
Re:catch-up? (Score:2, Insightful)
What I want to know is why posts that criticise commercial software are classed as Interesting or Insightful and those that criticise open-source software are classed as Flamebait.
I mean I really do wonder why the statement "Does that mean that MS are now copying Linux...?" is not considered flamebait. Where in the moderation rules does it say that criticising commercial software is to be encouraged but criticising open-source software is to be stamped out?
I do wonder what's wrong with the parent though. I mean it really is a right royal pain in the ass whenever you try to connect a device to Linux machine. Will it work or won't it work? Can I get the drivers? Or has Linux improved in this regard?
Please explain it to me (Score:2, Insightful)
What is so great about Longhorn?
Seriously.
The only thing useful about it is WinFS, which sounds nice but even that is just a nice-to-have feature most people can and will do without.
"Avalon" is a buzzword just like Apple's "graphics-engine" (whoa, it's an engine, whoa!) with no real use. (At least no Apple user could explain the real-world advantages to me so far, also the Winlots failed to explain what *exactly* makes Avalon so great)
Actually, I think the sooner MS releases Longhorn the better it is for Linux. The incompatibilities, the headaches, the problems that come with each Windows-release (sometimes even with a servicepack) will push Linux. When support contracts run out and Microsoft stops supporting older versions of Windows, that will push Linux. When Microsoft stops to support MS-Office for older versions of Windows that will push OpenOffice.
So please Microsoft, ship it quick.
Re:Free Ads / Free Betas (Score:2, Insightful)
The main problem that microsoft faces is compatibility. They have to try to make most of the programs from previous versions of Windows work with the latest versions of software.
Linux has some of these issues, but not as many limitations. Linux binaries often require miniumum versions of libraries so that it can use the latest features and if an old program doesn't work it can often be recompilied so that it will work with the different libraries.
Re:catch-up? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Microsoft's Copland? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:catch-up? (Score:2, Insightful)
One reason I use linux is because I don't HAVE to have these features. If Linux gains some "features" like sidebars and whatnot, I can choose to not install them, or find an implementation that I like. Most likely with Windows, they will be ON by default and the means by which to turn them off will be buries so far in some sort of crayon bright eye-candied "configuration" that I would never, ever find it.
Re:Actually, I think you misunderstood... (Score:3, Insightful)
In FOSS, these things can't be implemented in a way that is pervasive ??!!! Do you even know what an FS is, what a display server is, what a DE is in FOSS ?
Apps can be made to support every innovation, as long as it is FOSS ! Where your logic is flawed, is that the only apps that cannot do that are closed apps, like most apps are on Windows.
FOSS is different.
For example, Mozilla innovated, the only apps that could not follow fast enough where closed plugins.
The X server, for example, is implementing those things announced in LongHorn right NOW ! And the DEs (Gnome, KDE) already have dev versions (of GTK+ and Kdelibs) trying to take advantage of these improvements. Yes, that is RIGHT NOW (the thing you say would take a decade). And once it is done in the framework, it works automagically in all the apps based on these DEs (like font handling or antialiasing for example).
FOSS has already i18n and l10n completely integrated, and it did not take a decade. Actually, the Linux desktop environnement are pretty young (less than 6 years), and already have imposed many framework, and changed directions several times too.
There is an authority since a long time in FOSS desktop world : freedesktop.org.
And it is doing a nice job thank you.
Well, we will see if you are right
A big concern (Score:3, Insightful)
What constitutes a decent browser? One that has built-in vector graphics rendering would be nice (no plug-in). One that has complete and really good CSS1 support. One that does not render really broken pages would be nice, too. One that is not easy to 0wn. One that has good popup controls. Tabbed browsing would be good, too.
Like I didn't see this coming! (Score:5, Insightful)
2. Apple hires the BeFS developers and within a year integrates the BeFS metatag system into HFS+. It's extremely fast and it works great. Apple calls it Spotlight and it's available to developers right now in Beta form within the Tiger OS 10.4 beta release. Tiger's been updated a few times already. Expect in first or second quarter of 2005 for gold release. The system works across all file types and can handle indexing the contents of files. There is an API for more advanced metatag insertion and application specific search features and interface. I've seen this system in action and it is truly remarkable. Less then a second to retrieve all sorts of data. Email, AddressBook, keyword search in documents, URL's, Bookmarks, etc., etc., etc. It's so good, why even bother organizing one's data anymore?
- Microsoft forgot a primary engineering philosophy. "Keep It Simple Stupid" - KISS! They simply failed in their initial design of WinFS with MS-SQL Server. They need to scrap it and start over. The primary problems being it's too big and bloated and the potential for bugs is enormous. It's too difficult to build queries. They started with the work done on Office 2003 instead of being more innovative and starting over with a better design.
When XP changed it's search abilities I had endless calls from developers who could no longer search the contents of source code files or SQL files like they could with NT's Find command. Apparently, one had to write a plugin to the MS Search engine to add support for various file types. There were work arounds but they required re-indexing all of the files and it took hours and hours to finally start working. Also it was unpredictable in the way it began a re-index. A new file was not immediately available via search. If Longhorn really does not ship with WinFS then it is deeply disappointing. Well back to giving my developers a grep GUI...
The Apple Spotlight system instantly and on the fly indexes the metadata. It does so very quickly. The results are instantly available. You can save the query and add it to your sidebar so it's available from the main file manager (Finder). Click the smart folder (saved query) and it's always up-to-date with the latest data results. The Smart Folders idea was from iTunes, it's a way to represent a query.
Here's to looking forward to OS X Tiger and future Linux systems using similar metatags! And watching Microsoft fumble the ball and have a thirty yard penalty! Gee, by 2010 MS may actually have a viable search system. Perhaps Google will beat them to it by releasing a Windows file search feature. The Google toolbar and SearchBar are awesome all Google needs to do is add filesytem metatag layer and do the same thing as Apple Spotlight. Heck, I would pay for that solution!
Re:Tiger Anyone (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Gates: Lying or willfully obtuse? (Score:1, Insightful)
Micrsoft has announced WinFS and provided alpha code to developers. Apple has announced Spotlight and provided code to developers. Somehow Microsoft's product is vaporware and Apple's is not?
Difference? Bueller? Bueller?
We need WinFS now... (Score:5, Insightful)
I admit to thinking this was kind of a cool idea...a big information store instead of a bazillion files. The actual implementation, I would think, wouldn't actually be that hard...again, you're not dealing with files per se, but with data.
The *nightmare* is probably in how you're supposed to interact with it. When your whole world is made up of the file/folder/cabinet metaphor, trying to define what an "information store" is, and how a user is going to interact with it in some seamless fashion, must be mind boggling complex because the only way it will work is if you have the relationships correctly set up. Photography cataloging programs do it by giving the user dozens of fields for him or her to fill in, and only on those fields that there is data is it useful to search on.
Back to Linux...I think that implementing this, presumably using a Reiser4 plugin + some RDMS, and then have the correct way to interact with it, would show Microsoft up to no end. "Information at your fingertips" is more likely to get the attention of a PHB than "10,000 node cluster" and anything to show how the Linux community delivered when MS couldn't, is obviously a Good Thing.
Re:Correction of the press release (Score:3, Insightful)
Shedloads of smart people usually can't do anything, because they work by consensus. The only way for anything to work is from Insightful leadership, and defined goals. These are the things that almost never result from a consensus.
Re:Please explain it to me (Score:3, Insightful)
Core Image and Core Video will allow the GPU to do much of the same for filters. They'll be produced by the GPU instead of the CPU and they'll happen in real-time instead of me having to wait for the CPU to render them.
So, while Windows and Linux users' GPUs are usually idle unless they're playing a game, Mac users' GPUs are providing a faster, richer [apple.com] experience.
Re:Tiger Anyone (Score:3, Insightful)
From what was briefly described all of the features of Searchlight would be there and it will be implemented in a similar manner.
WinFS goes further in its storage model, and this is where I'm not so clear. From what I've gathered it's akin to a fully featured SQL database system layered on top of the underlying filing system. Apple don't have that right now, although the storage model they had for the Newton was an OODBMS, not a filing system. It is possible (although I think it unlikely) that Apple could come up with their own "Future Storage" system based on the old Newton model before Microsoft finishes WinFS.
Given the lack of plans for server support for WinFS for Longhorn it seems very sensible to drop this right now and wait for it to mature. Networked environments are, after all, pretty important.
Hmmm, 2 specific examples vs no examples. (Score:2, Insightful)
Maybe, maybe not. But you have not provided any support that it is NOT accurate.
Yet there you have posted TWO references where it WAS accurate.
So far, the weight of evidence is against Microsoft.
"The latter incompatibility was somewhat justified in the fact that Windows needed to tweak the internals of DOS, but the way Windows reported it was extremely deceptive."
Then why was it encrypted and hidden?
"They go to great lengths to keep badly-written applications running."
So you claim, yet there are lots of examples that disprove your claim.
"I know that MS has made deliberate decisions in the past to make the OS incompatible with software that competed with another MS product, but that's unusual."
So, Microsoft has been guilty of this, yet without any evidence to support it, I'm supposed to believe that Microsoft has changed?
Does your dictionary have a definition for "Gullible"?
Re:WTF have they been doing? (Score:3, Insightful)
With all those irons in the fire I'm not surprised that there is slowed development. Perhaps they are just covering all their bases in case FOSS really does end up killing their cash cow.
Comparing Longhorn to OS 360? (Score:4, Insightful)
Bill seems to be forgetting that OS/360 was one of the first attempts at anything like a modern OS and whole books have been written about the mistakes that were made in its development. Fred Brooks "the Mythical Man-Month" is largely a result of the lessons learned in its development. What's he saying here? Is he implying Microsoft hasn't learned anything about developing complex software since 1960? As cynical as I sometimes am about the company, I don't believe that... they have put together systems successfully that are far more complex than OS/360.
Remember, OS/360 had to run on hardware that was less powerful than anything any Microsoft operating system all the way back to MS-DOS 1.0 has had to deal with. Features like being able to run a variable number of jobs were restricted to the top-of-the-line models, and most early installations ran it purely in a static batch mode with a fixed number of concurrent jobs.
This is a great soundbite, but it doesn't begin to address the question. The best answer to a question like "Has software just gotten more complicated to write?" is "Yes." I don't know if Microsoft accepts this or not, I have no idea, but if Bill Gates answers a question like that with a red herring like "We're doing better than IBM did on OS/360" I fear they're still in denial. So perhaps the best answer to the next part, "What, if anything, does Microsoft need to do as a company to reflect that reality?", is "therapy".
Gorilla Marketing at its Finest (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:What about Meta-tags? (Score:5, Insightful)
Grandma: What do you mean type?
Grandson: With the keyboard. Just type in your query.
Grandma: Why can't I use a mouse?
Grandson: Because queries are easier. Now just type "taxes 2004 lastmod yesterday"
Grandma: Why can't I just click for it? I know I put it in the "taxes" folder.
Grandson: No, no, no! Using folders is too difficult. Just type in what I said using the keyboard.
Grandma: Okay. Oh wait... There's that nasty error message again. It says it can't find it. Oh this is so difficult!
Grandson: No it's not, just type it in again, all you did was mistype "204" instead of "2004".
Grandma: Aaargh!!!
Re:WTF have they been doing? (Score:3, Insightful)
Granted, it's not as much a jump as their previous releases in terms of how it is perceived by users, but they had to do something. It's been 3 years since any release at all, and I suspect their shareholders wwere getting a bit pissed. Plus, this way it looks like they're covering their ass over the worms/virus issue.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Please explain it to me (Score:3, Insightful)
It's about freeing up CPU cycles for other tasks.