A look ahead: 2012 is Microsoft's turning point

Hi there
I'm sure an MS OS in a phone / tablet will be streets ahead of android - and will be able to control the installation of apps much better than the literally zillions of junk apps on android.

I detest however the whole idea of an "App store".

I should be able to install software on a Windows phone just like installing software on a workstation from ANY legitimate source. The OS will hopefully have enough safeguards in it to stop a lot of rogue applications from installing just like Windows does now (on the whole).

Cheers
jimbo

There are a few good points made by Jimbo45 in message #70.

whs said:

Jimbo, this is a very realistic analysis of the situation in many industries. But for the mobile market we are not yet at the mature point - I think. Take me, I have no mobile phone and no tablet. But I am waiting for a nice 7" tablet with Windows to come out and I will certainly buy. And look how this shoestring OS called Android sold. They are making billions even with such a junk product. So I am pretty confident that MS will do well in this market. At least they go halfway professionally about developing their products.

That is the truest statement ever....

jimbo45 said:

Hi there
I'm sure an MS OS in a phone / tablet will be streets ahead of android - and will be able to control the installation of apps much better than the literally zillions of junk apps on android.

I detest however the whole idea of an "App store".

I should be able to install software on a Windows phone just like installing software on a workstation from ANY legitimate source. The OS will hopefully have enough safeguards in it to stop a lot of rogue applications from installing just like Windows does now (on the whole).

Cheers
jimbo

I think if the Windows Store in Windows 8 added desktop programs to the mix, it would make software selection more consolidated.

I have to admit, based on my brief play sessions with the Win8 Developer Preview in a virtual machine and what I've seen and read online, I just don't have the same level of disdain toward the whole Metro look and/or philosophy that a lot of other people seem to have. Maybe I'm wrong, and maybe that will change, but as far as I'm concerned it's just a little bit too early to panic.

I think some of the opinions of the Start Screen, (metro design is something else according to Microsoft) are misinformed. They're based of old Youtube videos showing off the first iterations of the Start Screen. They're based off peoples' lack of exploration of something unfamiliar. They're based off old ideas of what a desktop OS should be. They're based of ideas that the start menu doesn't have any present issues of hordes of folders and subfolders. They're based of the notion that multitasking only occurs on a desktop and anything that takes away from it is inferior.

Come on, really? Microsoft put their entire brand of Windows on the line to innovate for these modern times. We're literally using an operating system that is still based of vista. It took a good five, six years before we got any actual change. If Microsoft's Windows division decided to make another OS with a start menu, we'd be testing a tweaked copy of Windows 7. Remember how Windows 7 was once called vista 2.0? That's what happens when a product design stagnates. I mean, some people are calling Windows 8 dumbed down. Consider the fact that those people don't like change or anything radical because they might need to learn how to do something they've done for years differently. I think those people might really be the dumbed down ones. If they need to have an OS act EXACTLY as the previous, what does that say about them?

Windows 8 is literally the grandest change in the Windows brand and even rivals 95 in terms of such. It's a start of something new, the start of the future. It is the turning point of Microsoft as a company. I find it troubling to hear about such ridiculous things about Windows 8 that really have no substance.

My two cents....

Hi there
W8 will be a difficult one -- you've got two different often contradictory working environments.

A Smart Mobile phone needs to run several applications when required, have very fast response times and try and minimize power consumption --actually a horrendous task as the owners of modern smart phones will testify - run several apps continuously and the battery will barely last a day.

A Workstation OS doesn't have the same power constraints and speed of launching apps isn't "mission critical".

In putting together an OS that tries to cover BOTH sets of the spectrum quite decently from what I've seen in the preview MS has done a first rate job.

I have no doubt that this WILL be a wiiner -- I'd ditch ANDROID at a stroke if I could find a decent smart phone with Windows in it (a phone equivalent to the latest SAMSUNG's, HTC's or Iphones. Nokia are IMO in the Dinosaur age of new phones -- they don't even LOOK sexy never mind about actually using them.

Cheers
jimbo

lehnerus2000 said:

Perhaps they should change the names of all of the programs and functions too.
"Control Panel" is so 20th Century.

Maybe they should change:
"Windows Update" to "Your Bodyguard".
"Word" to "Scrivener".

Or PC Settings instead of Control Panel.....