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Comment by listenallyall | Hacker News Reader

Omg that really is crazy and disturbing that a small development shop would hitch their wagon to the most popular desktop OS in the history of the world.

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Desktop OSes are for browsing the internet and editing documents... complex, rapidly evolving, not very reliable or sensitive to reliability. It's terrifying enough to involve a Mac in a stage performance.

Does the popularity make their jobs easier?

Is that a serious question? Is selling Windows software that a user can install in 5 minutes easier than selling Linux software which likely requires a municipality to buy all new computers (and all the local government budgeting that involves), teach all its employees a new OS, standardize on things like distros and window managers, and then maybe be able to run it? Yes, it's much easier.

Where it's sketchy to find Windows is inside the chassis of some piece of specialized equipment with its own control panel. You may not even realize that what you're working with is a full-screen Win32 app until you get a bluescreen or taskbar popop or something. Then you learn that in addition to the domain-specific software/hardware and what you're trying to use it for, you've got a whole Windows desktop worth of reliability risk in there.

If it's just a touchscreen or hardware buttons, you may need a key to open a panel where the keyboard/mouse are, or to bring your own keyboard/mouse, in order to navigate the Windows part of the interface to fix the problem.

Obviously if it's intended to be networked to existing desktops for control over a LAN, the client software will be Windows, but even then you hope the server isn't.

Everybody knows Windows a bit. Even my retired mom who isn't a native english speaker could click few times on Next button, which might be enough to deploy controlling software with default settings. Good luck with Unix.

Outside our tech bubble working on Unix is still perceived as hollywood-style hacking of the bank and folks really have no clue, unless its done in GUI just like... you guessed it, Windows. Folks wouldn't even touch it.

OMG did they really pick an OS that's so known for its unreliability that it coined "the blue screen of death" and that people now expect it to update without their consent?!?!

Windows is an awful choice for any system that must be reliable. I know, because the industrial control system at my workplace used to be windows, and cost us mega bucks every year in down time. Now it's Linux, and we haven't had ANY downtime in over two years.

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