Windows Phone Free-Fall May Force Microsoft To Push Harder On Windows 10 (pcworld.com) 250
tripleevenfall quotes a report from PCWorld: Microsoft sold a minuscule 2.3 million Lumia phones last quarter, down from 8.6 million a year ago. Phone revenue declines will only "steepen" during the current quarter, chief financial officer Amy Hood warned during a conference call. That's dragged down Microsoft's results as a company, too. As the company's mobile device strategy continues to disintegrate, Microsoft may feel compelled to push harder on Windows 10 adoption and paid services to prove it can survive without a viable smartphone. CEO Satya Nadella's strategy is simple enough: grow Microsoft's revenues by convincing customers to adopt its paid subscription services.
Time for the Paid Shills to Earn Their Keep! (Score:4, Insightful)
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I do .NET development and really there isn't one.
You can develop .NET on Android too now. Windows phone is simple a bust.
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By the way, I've been porting a fairly complex app to Xamarin for the past 3 months, and it's a wonderful environment compared to Objective-C
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Best Microsoft hardware since the Zune!
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Unfortunately there isn't. Windows phone is on its deathbed. I agree that if it had more apps it would be a serious contender .
Re: Time for the Paid Shills to Earn Their Keep! (Score:2)
Out of curiosity, what functionality is missing due to lack of 3rd party programs (oops, I mean "apps"?) I have GPS (both HERE and Waze), Pandora, FM radio (which oddly is unavailable on Apple without buying extra hardware....), email, browsing, and banking programs. Skype works well and there are enough games to help pass the time. Specific games are missing, yes, but it's anyone really buying a $600 define to primarily play a specific $5 game?
Re: Time for the Paid Shills to Earn Their Keep! (Score:4, Funny)
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Perhaps your bank supports a Windows Phone app, but many banks don't. App developers have been pulling apps from Windows phone, so the situation for WP users is actually getting worse. Finally, it's quite well known that many WP apps don't work as well as their Android/iPhone equivalents.
The problem is similar to that of a Linux desktop: for any given buyer, it only takes one missing must-have app (or feature) to make the whole platform unattractive.
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Windows on phones were never really taking off because it was so lobotomized. It was a hell trying to make apps for it since the documentation stated that there were function calls that could be used but there was nothing behind the call. "the light is on but nobody home"-effect.
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I have a Windows phone and I haven't really found the apps lacking. But that may depend on my limited uses for a phone. It makes calls, sends text messages, manages my calendar, lets me read and reply to email, lets me browse the web, browse reddit with one of the best redder clients out there (Readit), lets me check the weather, connect to Facebook, twitter and other major social networks, record my bike rides, look up maps and get directions and download maps for offline use, listen to music, watch videos
Re:Time for the Paid Shills to Earn Their Keep! (Score:4, Insightful)
I feel like there's too much stuff in your list! The only stuff missing is e.g. the local bus company's app, that of the bank. Even government/welfare apps etc. Trading broker's app. Grocery delivery. All that stuff is made for the duopoly. Although there's no big reason why a mobile site with a shortcut on the home screen wouldn't do the job for most of these, hence why I'm pissed at the death of Firefox OS. Native apps (including Java/C# here) were vitally needed when they needed to support a single core and 256MB RAM and also the javascript engines were more crappy back then.
Perhaps with Web Assembly that will make the news again. Although yes maybe web apps are technically despicable but well I'm typing on the Slashdot "web app" right now.
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My phone does all those other things you mentioned as well. The local bus company doesn't even have an app, they just have a web site. They actually opened up the API so other people could provide a better experience and have real time bus locations without the bus company needing to pay for expensive development fees. My bank app works on my phone, although I hardly use it because I don't really see much need for banking on my phone.
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Actually Windows Phone is pretty good, it's just that the software development isn't there which makes them less useful than an Android phone. Try one the next time you see one in a store with a display - it might surprise you.
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I don't believe you. While I did not own a Windows Phone, I knew others that did and they did not suffer this problem.
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Re:Time for the Paid Shills to Earn Their Keep! (Score:5, Informative)
When Windows Phone was newer, Microsoft paid everyone to write apps for it. As such, people were giving it tons of half-hearted lipservice calling it the "legitimate 3rd platform" to the exclusion of anything else (that didn't have as big of a bank account behind it).
Now that they've stopped the payouts, and still keep changing the APIs, support is dropping and a lot of that lipservice is starting to fade away.
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You know, I came here to say that I actually like the Windows phone. But it's true I don't own one - I had to use one when abroad for a month last year. But by the time I was done I thought it was actually a more-well-thought-out UI than my iPhone. I didn't scrap my iPhone though. Friends of mine that have tried them have said the same thing. But none of them have switched either. So what you're saying is true, even without paid shills: there are more people that "like" Windows phone than use it. I guess th
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I guess I'm the opposite then. I actually owned a Windows Phone. It was the large screen (for the time) HTC. I don't even remember the model name. I only gave it a chance because of the heaping praise all the tech blogs and commenters were giving it. I absolutely hated it The browser sucked, the apps sucked, the swoopy animations sucked. I eventually traded it for some craptastic Galaxy S based phone that while it sucked too, was a helluva lot better than what I had.
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I prefer Android for several reasons but I am sad to see the Windows phone fiasco. I really wanted it to succeed... for other people.
The biggest reason is that it didn't try to be a clone of iOS and Android. I especially liked the tile-based interface. I don't know how it does in practice but at least, they tried something that is not a iOS clone. They also introduced the "flat" design which everyone copied, for the better or for the worse. It seemed like it was rather well designed internally too.
It was fa
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I owned one. A dirt cheap Nokia 820. I bought my elderly mom a Nokia 640 for Christmas. :-)
I LOVED the OS. For a cheap phone with 1 gig of ram it was very quick. Never froze. Had the best UI. Outlook worked well. The tiles were big and animated to keep me up to date until, I switched to Kitkat a few years later, etc. The big tiles and ease of use is why I bought one for my Mother. BIg easy things to read and it was cheap and ran well on low end hardware.
I own an Android now because I dropped it and saw the
Harder? (Score:3)
Seriously... Harder?
I know no one ever RTFA... (Score:2)
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(ok, it's in the header. expected to see it in the summary)
Why do they need "a viable smartphone"? (Score:2)
Microsoft may feel compelled to push harder on Windows 10 adoption and paid services to prove it can survive without a viable smartphone.
Which makes me wonder: why did MS think it needs a viable smartphone (smartphone OS?) just to survive, and why do other people think this as well forcing MS to prove the opposite?
Maybe they should have a good look at OS-X, Mint and Ubuntu, get some good ideas on how to design a proper modern OS (ssh out of the box would be awesome, both command prompt and a way to easily connect to sftp servers which only Windows fails at nowadays), and make Windows desirable again. They for sure have the money and manpower
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It doesn't, which is why I think this article is useless PCworld crap trying to gain clicks through sensationalism. Nadella has already stated that they're probably going to axe the mobile division.
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Apple had one so via cargo cult mentality MS had to have one to get success as well. The irony is they did it by getting hold of an already viable phone company and then removing everything that made it viable - destructive idiots.
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at least Ubuntu has a stable fan base. Haven't seen anything like it for Windows in many many years.
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Largely because PCs come with Windows pre-installed. Using it on this laptop as well. Works good enough for what I do with it most of the time (surfing, reading mail), but it still sucks - first time in a very long time that I had a driver issue was on this Windows system! Pretty hard to trouble shoot and fix as it was the WiFi driver knocking me completely off-line... It just doesn't suck bad enough to reinstall.
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Admittedly I have a small sample size but my one and only driver issue over the past decade has been with Windows 10.
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fan base != installed base
Windows becomes SaaS? (Score:5, Insightful)
...CEO Satya Nadella's strategy is simple enough: grow Microsoft's revenues by convincing customers to adopt its paid subscription services....
Microsoft has already stated that they intend to make Windows 10 a service.
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Now Microsoft is saying that they want to move away from the "buy once" revenue model.
So how long before there is a monthly fee to use Windows?
Perhaps the enormous data harvesting is only the first of many egregious aspects of Windows 10.
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Never. This is not only old news, it's been covered in depth that the operating system will not become something you have to pay each year for....
All Microsoft has stated was that there are no current plans to make Windows a pay-for SaaS.
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Those plans can change tomorrow, and their prior statements would still have been correct.
btw, Microsoft also stated that Windows 7 would be supported through 2020, but that has changed now, hasn't it?
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Get out from under your rock and read the news once in a while.
Perhaps you should take your own advice. :)
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Obviously we're talking about home licensing. It's like you're intentionally being dense.
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" Get out from under your rock and read the news once in a while."
Try using your brain and logic, and realize Microsoft has QUITE OFTEN said one thing AND DONE THE EXACT OPPOSITE.
Those who fail to learn from history are condemned to get bit in the ass again by it.
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You must not work for any corporation then. Microsoft licensing the OS (and other software) on a yearly, renewing basis has been around for over a decade. They do want this for the consumer as well and have so far done it with Office and e-mail. They want to go on a subscription basis, only then they'd lose either to piracy or Linux.
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You must not work for any corporation then. Microsoft licensing the OS (and other software) on a yearly, renewing basis has been around for over a decade. They do want this for the consumer as well and have so far done it with Office and e-mail. They want to go on a subscription basis, only then they'd lose either to piracy or Linux.
No they won't! You are kidding me? The last thing MS wants it another XP which is what 7 is right now. A fragmented user base is a nightmare for support and developers alike. Apple and Google have free upgrades for a good reason. What MS wants is to offer services from WIndows. Hey want a 1 TB of Onedrive storage? Go subscribe to 365 etc.
Also not to sound like a shill but I do use office 365 as I get 5 free versions of Office professional and get free bonuses like extra charts and BI in Excel and extra dark
Don't want it for "free", some may pay monthly? (Score:4, Interesting)
In Microsoft's heyday, people would anxiously await the opportunity to pay $120 to upgrade to the new version. New bells, whistles, and blue screens.
Now many people are trying hard to avoid Microsoft's "upgrade" to Windows 10. More and more people go through the trouble of removing the Windows install that came with their computer, to replace it with a less troublesome OS. They want to get rid of Windows.
Microsoft's last-ditch solution is to try to get their few remaining hostages and fanboys to not only pay for MS software, but to keep paying again and again every month. I feel for anyone who's either stuck in a position where they have to keep paying every month for software most people don't even want for free, or who simply doesn't know any better, they're probably still paying $25/month for AOL too.
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Microsoft's last-ditch solution is to try to get their few remaining hostages and fanboys to not only pay for MS software, but to keep paying again and again every month.
I don't like Windows, but who are these few remaining hostages and fanboys you speak of? Would they be the The >90% of users on Windows machines? [wikipedia.org]
You misspelled Android (Score:2)
The vast majority of CPUs sold in the last three years run Android. Did you make that post from an antique Windows desktop?
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It's called pushing on a string (Score:2)
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Considering they have 200 million installations and growing it's been very successful.
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...it's been very successful....
How much revenue have all those copies contributed to Microsoft's earnings?
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I wasn't aware that Firefox contained its own drivers for talking directly to the network hardware without going through any code from the OS.
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How Microsoft can win the users! (Score:3)
1.) radically change window 10
a.) make cloud/spy "features" optional and opt-in
b.) make the XP & 7 GUI availible (the GUI is not the fucking OS)
2.) offer WinXP & Vista Keys an Upgrade
3.) don't force users by circumventing the window update blocklist by changing the "update date" on the installer.
The children will come!
Re:How Microsoft can win the users! (Score:4, Interesting)
Should I be Happy?: I Can't Upgrade Win 7 (Score:2)
Ugly Phones (Score:2)
Since they took over for Nokia, their phones [microsoft.com] have just gotten uglier, too. I really liked the look of the 532, wish they'd bring that back.
Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)
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Re:How the hell can MS push Win10 HARDER? (Score:5, Interesting)
Free download for Vista and XP users.
So far they've only targeted Win 7 and 8 machines.
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I'm still waiting for that to happen. I'm not going to pay CAD$149.00 [microsoftstore.com] for the OS of a gaming PC.
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Well the simple path would be to make it totally free for all users like Apple does.
And then stop making it worse every version (which Apple also sadly does).
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Well now that Windows is getting bash instead of powershell, it's definitely taking some lessons from Linux. I'd like to see this trend continue.
A lot of things Microsoft does, they do better than everyone else. Their file explorer GUI is absolutely incredible, for instance. If I'm forced to use OS X I just browses directories through bash since that's so much less painless.
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It's not bash 'instead of powershell', it's bash and enough stuff to optionally let a windows person develop for a linux VM on azure without needing to run linux locally.
Powershell remains what they really want people to use for Windows stuff, and bash is only really intended to facilitate supporting VMs on Azure.
Re: I'd consider paying for Microsoft Linux. (Score:2)
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I wouldn't say that it's better than anyone else, they have a good marketing but I wouldn't call the logic in their OS user-friendly, it's easy to get lost in group policy rules and other headaches.
Re:I'd consider paying for Microsoft Linux. (Score:5, Insightful)
Indeed.
Sometimes I just cannot believe it's decided to let me wait while it renders a huge number of thumbnail images instead of letting me actually do stuff. Context switches just browsing into another directory are also difficult to believe are a good idea. Incredible indeed. They managed to make it far worse than the earlier version.
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I have been involved in administrating both *NIX and Windows boxes but powershell isn't really something that provides any added value for me.
Re: I'd consider paying for Microsoft Linux. (Score:4, Insightful)
If your current strategy works, great. But as someone who has also been involved in administering Linux and Windows boxes, Powershell is a great tool with a multitude of very useful features. As much as I love Bash, I would be very happy if Powershell got ported to Linux.
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I have been involved in administrating both *NIX and Windows boxes but powershell isn't really something that provides any added value for me.
???
uh ok. I assume you have not touched Exchange or SQL server then or had to do offline domain joins on server farms or frankly do anything in droves. Powershell desired state configuration is ahead of bash and provides templates.
You can't manage thousands of servers with a mouse. You need Powershell or some expensive 3rd party tool to automate.
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"Allow a move operation to be undone with visual feedback "
What, seeing the file disappear from one folder and reappear in another not enough visual feedback for you?
"When making a selection, show some useful information about the selection, such as how many items are selected and how large the selection is. This used to be shown in the status strip in XP, but was removed in Vista/Win7."
No, it was not. Hover over your selection, the information window pops up. Oh, look, length, file size, type, resolution i
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... but I think my point stands, the Windows File Explorer is just the simplest bare-bones GUI for manipulating files.
Did you have a 'golden' file manager in mind for comparison's sake when you said that Microsoft's is "simple and bare-bones"? I have no experience with Windows file management beyond XP, and none at all with Mac file management. But I do have lots of experience with lots of file managers under Linux. In my opinion, only one of them comes close to Windows Explorer for features and ease of use; that would be Dolphin, and unfortunately it has almost all of KDE as a dependency. Thunar has Bulk File Rename, whic
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Holy shit. You REALLY think microsoft wouldn't put TONS of stupid shit in it over the years?
Like create their own 'branded' GUI, and their own 'easy to use' network manager, and their own 'updated' init system?
You really think they'd dig into the future of strong linux systems?
Really?
It's time to wake up: Microsoft has changed! (Score:3, Funny)
Well, I'm not obsessed with the 1990s-era hatred for Microsoft like some people here are. I also realize that the Microsoft today consists of many people who weren't there in the 1990s, and many of the people who were around in the 1990s no longer are. The name may be the same, but the people who make up the organization are markedly different. After all, the 1990s were around 20 years ago now! If there's one thing I've learned in my many years, it's that things change over time.
I look at Microsoft's action
Re: It's time to wake up: Microsoft has changed! (Score:2)
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In some sense it would be a return to their Xenix days.
Oh, ok, your post was joking.
In case people take it seriously, MS if anything would be a fan of pulseaudio, network manager, and systemd (also dbus, dconf), those are more similar to the Windows way of doing things. If anything it would be even messier, as MS' versions of those technologies can be even more convoluted, except maybe their software audio device abstraction is more robust than pulseaudio (though it can still get weird).
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They'd just fuck it up like they've done everything else, New Linux: Now with In App Ads, Get it Today, Use and Enjoy!!
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You think that Microsoft, the creators of the abomination that is the Registry and that use things very much like systemd (although even worse) in their own OS would be able to do a decent Linux distro even if they tried hard? Talk about blind faith that a known bad actor would do good here.
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what do you think "Microsoft Linux" would give you that cygwin on Windows wouldn't?
Re:How about MS Android? (Score:2)
MS bought Cynagyn and has some tools in development to make android apps that do not use Google's proprietary AOSP store API.
No middle aged neckbeards Xenix is not the answer.
Rather, who is the market today and tomorrow? There are more millenials who LOVE their apps and portable devices as much as baby boomers and guess which one is entering the workforce and which one is leaving in droves? MS is in trouble and it's premier brand Windows has an identity crises. People do not care about WM's that mimick 20 y
Re: I'd consider paying for Microsoft Linux. (Score:2, Insightful)
Larger community, more drivers for common hardware. Why would anyone use BSD?
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Windows Phone is suffering somewhat from the Osborne Effect. There have been rumours of a "surface phone" which may or may not materialise.
In the meantime, they only have flagships in Lumia 950/XL that support *fully* Windows Phone 10 and few are buying because they're as costly as an iPhone and no one wants to pay that.
If they do have a long term strategy they ought to be releasing low/medium models that run Continuum and bundled with a free Display Dock.
Re:What? (Score:4, Interesting)
MS takes 30% of sales on their Windows store. MS wants everyone purchasing from their store so they get a 30% cut of every other company's programming work.
How I interpret MS's a long term goal - it's likely that they want to at some point force you go through the "Windows Store" to buy programs, just like Apple does on their "App Store". Hey,if you can't ignore the forced update that makes this change, then too bad for you. Here's how I see it as a general outline:
1. Develop New Windows OS that Data Mines (read new MS agreements @ https://edri.org/microsofts-ne... [edri.org] ), "cloud services", and more importantly includes the windows store and forced OS updates to add/remove features as they see fit. - Check
2. Offer "Free" windows upgrades - Check
3. Gain Installs / market penetration for new windows OS - In Progress
4. Sell / Use mined data for marketing purposes - Check (See above)
5. Leverage "cloud" services as a vendor lock in - Future
6. Sell more "windows services" - Future
7. Use forced Os updates to lock windows program installation down to their store just like Apple does on iOS - More Distant Future
8. Utilize a 90%+ PC device install base to profit massively off the "windows store" ( http://www.windowscentral.com/... [windowscentral.com] ) - More Distant Future
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Re:What? (Score:4, Informative)
> it's likely that they want to at some point force you
> go through the "Windows Store" to buy programs,
> just like Apple does on their "App Store"
Score: -1, Factually Incorrect. Apple does NOT "force" you to buy apps in their store. They encourage you to use the store, sure, and they'll pop up a warning the first time you try to run an app from somewhere else, but it's literally one click in System Preferences to say "run software from anywhere."
http://cdn.osxdaily.com/wp-con... [osxdaily.com]
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it is a little more than just wanting a piece of the store apps. It is a lot more that the aging baby boomers who buy pcs are retiring and are old enough to hate change and never upgrade until it no longer works. The new entrants into the workforce are millennials who LOVE their apps, portable devices, mixing work and play, and want flat UI's and battery saving features so they can take their life with work and play on the go with apps that do everything.
Where does this leave Windows? Where does this leave
Re: One might almost say: (Score:2)
So I assume there's a happy ending where Nadella is badly burned and THEN falls to his death, right?
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How can we dance when our earth is turning
How do we sleep while our beds are burning
How can we dance when our earth is turning
How do we sleep while our beds are burning
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Re:Fixed that for you (Score:5, Insightful)
"Apple's core customer base is interested in fashion accessories and status symbols". Not really, I work in science and we're filthy with Macs and iPhone and iPads, this is not status conscious community. They use the devices because they need to get work done. I recall one fellow finally making the switch from Winders to Mac, his comment to me was, "I feel like I own my computer again". I'm not entirely sure what MS is doing to their clientele, but that sentiment seems rife among scientists.
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Amen! I work as an University teacher in Telecommunications Engineering (mostly computer networks) AND as a trainer (Cloud Computing) for one Chinese telecoms manufacturer, and my main machine is a MacBook air Early 2015.
Why?
* I need all the power of Unix under the hood without fighting with my drivers.
* I want a nice slick GUI on top of that to help my workflow.
* I NEED full Office compatibility without whining at all (pun intended).
Note: While I use LibreOffie for work
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There is a big area of the industry no one is paying attention to: the enterprise. It was determined long ago that the consumer was the new fr
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Apple and even Google are replacing enterprise applications very quickly. In higher education almost nobody buys new Windows machines, the current ratio is something like 80/20. The 'new' enterprises (startups) are all running OS X and Linux. The old enterprises are still running some Windows for Exchange and legacy apps but anything new (since cloud and embedded is all the rage) is also running mainly Linux and thus slowly Microsoft is getting replaced and becoming another IBM.
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Business favors highly scalable, automated, stable, secure, low overhead, long support cycles, etc
So Linux then?
Windows has had it's course. It's a decent operating system for a single system where the operator/administrator doesn't know too much about computers. You could even run a directory service entirely through the GUI. However, it's not very scalable (look at Exchange and SQL Server), it is very difficult to automate (until very recently there was no SSH-like common terminal), it has a reputation of
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So Linux then?
A great choice. What Linux has lacked in the past is certainly automation and, as you pointed out, ease of administration. Microsoft spent a lot of money and time making their products highly powerful and automated with minimal training required for administration. As you also noted, Linux is a much stronger, more stable and scalable platform. So what Linux lacks, seems to be Microsoft's strengths and vice versa. A company like the Microsoft of the 90s, with a primary focus on the enterprise, and the fores
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and free. Jump! Jump! Jump!
The sudden stop subscription is a real bugger...
Re:But free falling is fun (Score:5, Interesting)
Strange, I have one sitting right in front of me, and it seems to still be alive. A few hours ago, I was sitting next to my son at dinner, and he was showing me his Android. I used to have an Android, but I much prefer the Windows OS. He said, "But you can't get App A on Windows!" I opened up the Windows phone store, and downloaded App A. "Oh, but you can't get App B!" I went back to the Windows store, got App B.
Obviously there are far more apps for Android than there are for Windows. Some would say I was just lucky. I'd say I don't need the junky apps that mostly fill the Android store. In all the years I had an Android phone, I never found as good a weather app as the one that came built into my Windows phone. I prefer the navigation apps I have on Windows to the ones I had on my Android phone (although I hear that app maker has jumped ship). It's much easier to set the alarm on my Windows phone (the Android phone was always over-shooting). And in general I find my Windows phone easier to use.
I am _not_ an Ms shill, and I never moved from Win7 to Win8 on my desktop (nor have I found any compelling reason yet to move to Win10). And for programming, Linux is far superior. But Android is, IMNSHO, a piece of junk.
I realize that barring some miracle, the Windows phone will probably be dead some day. But it isn't yet.
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Probably a general association by high levels of evil.