Comment by x0054 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by x0054 | Hacker News Reader

Windows 8 suffers from the problem of not knowing what it wants to be. I like the Apple approach of having a hard division between OSX and iOS, because touch interface is inherently different from one that’s keyboard and mouse driven.

Someone once described Windows 8 as a large estate house, with many rooms and corridors. For the most part, all the rooms look great. You have the west wing (old windows) and the east wing addition (the new metro UI side). But as you wonder around the building, you on occasion stumble into a room that has no paint, the walls are ripped up, and there is an under construction sign.

Now that I think about it, maybe Windows 9 has a chance after all though. Think about it:

  Windows 3.0 - bad - quite terrible
  Windows 3.1 - good - worked ok
  Windows 95 - bad
  Windows 97 - good
  Windows Me - terrible
  Windows XP - very good
  Windows Vista - bad, basically Win 7 Alpha
  Windows 7 - good, stable and get’s out of your way
  Windows 8 - bad, has no idea who it’s target market is
  Windows 9 - ????

Above is just my opinions, of course, but notice the pattern. Maybe there is a hope for Windows 9 yet.

Rewriting history aren't we?

First, Windows 2000 is missing (as discussed in other comments), which was stellar and widely used in corporations. Second, Windows 95 was very popular and received very positive reviews at the time. It wasn't an ME or Vista. Windows 95 basically turned Microsoft's DOS monopoly into Microsoft's Windows monopoly (effectively killing OS/2 et al.).

Windows NT 3.5 and 4.0 are also missing.

Windows 8.1 is Windows 9.

I was at Microsoft over the summer but this is public knowledge. I got a Windows Blue t-shirt a day before the announcement. Even the existence of the "start" button was a last minute thing. Windows 8.1 is no service pack. It was developed by the entire Windows division. Service Packs are only developed by the Sustained Engineering sub-division.

I've mentioned this to friends but they were not convinced. After all Windows 8.1 adds so little. You must keep in mind that Microsoft was, and may still be, trying to move Windows to a yearly release cycle. This is why Windows 8's upgrade was so cheap. They've caught on that time based release schedules work, and work well. Ubuntu made it popular in open source and things from your kernel to your browser are on it.

Remember the person responsible for getting Windows 7 out the door? Steven Sinofsky. He got fired. In his place was promoted Julie Larson-Green, the women responsible for Windows 8's new interface. She is still in charge.

Windows 8 knows what it is about: managing your computer as Microsoft sees fit. Windows 8.1 may have given back the start button but in exchange you are now forced to create and use a Microsoft account.

Those who continue to use proprietary software should be prepared for the future. If you want to keep control of your computer you must make an effort because your overlord is not going to do so for you.

Sorry, I suspect my Internship just made me more of a open source zealot.

> Windows 8 knows what it is about: managing your computer as Microsoft sees fit. Windows 8.1 may have given back the start button but in exchange you are now forced to create and use a Microsoft account.

For the time being you can still opt out and choose a local account. One just needs to select to create a new account, followed by clicking on the bottom text for having a local account instead.

But I do agree it is not easy to find.

I was under the impression that the first service pack was usually made by the main engineering team, and subsequent SPs were done by sustained engineering.

Why would you insist that "8.1 is 9", after admitting 8.1 isn't much of an upgrade?

Windows 8.1. "start button" thing isn't "giving back the start button". No one was asking for that, they were asking for the start menu, instead of the annoying new full-screen launcher.

You skipped Windows 2000. Windows 2000 was NT5, XP is NT5.1… same as how Vista is NT6, and '7' NT6.1.

8 and 8.1 are only considered 6.2 and 6.3...

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms72...

Windows 2000 and NT were "server" systems which sometimes were used on workstations.

Windows 2000 was certainly not only a server system. Windows 2000 was very popular outside the consumer segment. Like Windows XP organisations used it well beyond the intended lifetime. E.g. see this article from 2005:

"Just as Microsoft prepares to end mainstream support for Windows 2000 next week, a report surfaces from AssetMetrix, an asset management software provider, that indicates Windows 2000 is still installed on nearly half of corporate desktops."

Source: http://www.itjungle.com/two/two062205-story01.html

In other words, four years after the introduction of Windows XP, half of the corporate desktops was still using Windows 2000. The success of 2000 was only eclipsed by that of Windows XP.

Windows 2000 was a good stable system, but it was hard to find it on laptops, and it was targeted to the corporate world, not consumers. You could not go out to a store an buy a Windows 2000 desktop or a laptop. You had to order a business workstation or install it your self. I am not arguing that NT and 2000 should be dismissed, I was simply talking about consumer grade OS MS has been putting out.

> You could not go out to a store an buy a Windows 2000 desktop or a laptop.

On my home country you could.

Windows 2000 was the true next step for Microsoft after 98, not Me, as they prepared to jettison the DOS line entirely. Me was simply an extension of 98 with a lot of improvements backported from 2000. While it may not have been marketed as such, 2000 was as suitable as any Windows for consumer purposes. It turned into XP after relatively minor cosmetic and usability improvements.

No, it wasn't. 2000 was the successor to NT in the business line the same way that Me was to 98 in the consumer line. And, while it was more usable for consumer purposes than NT, because it was a different code base and not marketed as a consumer OS and much consumer software was written to quirks of the 95/98 line, it wasn't as consumer usable as XP was (which IIRC had more backwards compatibility features, but more importantly was the target against which new consumer software was written and tested once it was released.

To me the important thing to note is that the DOS line died with Me about a year later, and 2000 turned into XP which people are still using as a mainstream OS.

Anyway, my original point was that it should be on his list of Windows versions. I don't mean to throw a wrinkle in his narrative, but 2000 was the predecessor of XP and it was neither wonderful nor terrible.

Windows NT was a business (as opposed to consumer) OS, and included both Server and Workstation versions. 2000 was the direct successor to NT and filled the same role.

It was a special time in Windows history, though, since it marks when the server and consumer OS started using the same kernel. That's why I think 2000 belongs on the list but not NT4 or Server 2003.

The way Windows alternates between good/bad has always been a running joke among my friends and I, and we always assumed Win 8 would be crap, and Win 9 would be good. Most my friends didn't even upgrade to 8, being so sure that this is going to be the case, and are waiting to see 9 instead.

There was no Windows 97.

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