On the surface, perhaps. But as far as I know, Microsoft 8.1 is the only operating system with a standard 3D Printer API defined.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/apps/dn26313...

Microsoft may not have any innovation in the end-product (its not like any of us expect MS Paint to be "innovative"), but the OS-perspective, they are years ahead of both Mac and Linux. Of course, a de-facto 3d Printing API may eventually be developed for *nix systems, but Microsoft's standardization upon a 3d Printing API puts them far ahead of the curve on this one.

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For other tidbits of OS Innovation, Transactional Filesystems (yeah, its deprecated, but word on the street is that next-generation ReFS is going to support it), User-mode Schedulers, WebSocket supported in the BSD Socket layer, and more.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/bb96... http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/dd62... http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/hh43...

Microsoft's main product is the Windows OS, and they seem to continue to innovate in this sector. Adding 3D Printing support to the OS is only a good thing!