4 ms·

Keeping in mind that I don't know much about Win32 and even less about UWP. It seems people are less worried about Win32 becoming unsupported and more worried a

by BigJono 10y ago

Keeping in mind that I don't know much about Win32 and even less about UWP. It seems people are less worried about Win32 becoming unsupported and more worried about some new technology only being available to UWP apps (maybe something like the next version of DirectX?), which will force everyone to move away from Win32.

ocdtrekkie 10y ago
Microsoft absolutely wants everyone to leave Win32 behind going forward. Because Win32 is old and holds their platform back. UWP apps work on multiple architectures, hardware formats, etc. But since UWP isn't a walled garden, this is okay, it's just... the new way for apps to be built on Windows. And obviously, Microsoft being Microsoft, legacy Win32 support will be around for a ridiculously long time. This is the company that still provides monthly updates for Windows Vista.
- Silhouette 10y ago
  Because Win32 is old and holds their platform back. That's one way of looking at it. Another would be that for most practical purposes, Win32 is their platform. We've heard this mantra from Microsoft many times before, switching out things like database APIs, dev tools, interop protocols, the entire history of .Net, and so on. These things have come and, in many cases, gone, all while Win32 endures in the background supporting the software that makes the real money.
  - ocdtrekkie 10y ago
    And surely, as long as Win32 is still making the real money, it'll still be supported. But UWP, while nascent, is at the very least, far more secure than Win32, which is something any platform should strive to aspire to. In almost any other topic on HN, if we were discussing moving to running things in secure containers, people would agree it makes sense to move that way and that the additional layer of security is worthwhile. But because it's Microsoft doing it, and Microsoft is changing their software from like... the same way they've been doing it for the last twenty years, people are upset about it? I'm confused. When we talk about UWP, it shouldn't be "UWP is inherently evil", we should comment on and criticize issues Microsoft may have with the development of UWP. Initially, UWP was very hard to use outside of the Windows Store, and so it's fair to criticize there. And arguably, they've been working on improving this. They demonstrated Steamworks running on a UWP app at Build this year. We should definitely criticize if Microsoft does something specifically to lock down UWP. But we should not inherently decide UWP is evil because it's new.
    - douche 10y ago
      I won't make any bones about it, Win32 is an awful, outdated API. Something better without having to fight with all the awkward legacy C-isms, WPARAMs, LPARAMs, awful Hungarian notation and "overloaded" functions would be nice. But I've mostly learned to take a wait and see attitude with new silver bullet APIs from Microsoft. Sometimes they take off and really do became the way forward, but far, far too often, after some initial hype, there is a lack of uptake, they wither on the vine, and then are abandoned for the new shiny, leaving behind the developers that did invest in them. Meanwhile, Win32, like the Dude, abides.
    - Silhouette 10y ago
      I don't think we're necessarily disagreeing here. Certainly we agree that there is plenty of room for more secure execution environments than traditional open desktop OSes and the APIs that go with them. That doesn't nullify the concerns that started this whole discussion, though: Microsoft could be pushing people towards UWP for less benevolent reasons, and surely has the technical and commercial capabilities to try to make Sweeney's hypothetical scenario the new reality. Maybe this is just a mistaken perception, but I suspect Microsoft may have burned a lot more bridges with their recent actions than they have realised so far, particularly among enthusiast and "professional geek" communities that have remained generally positive about MS and its products for longer than most. Viewing anything they do with suspicion is a natural consequence of the way they've been treating their customers lately, and I don't see anything they do that has any hint of lock-in getting an easy ride from here on out.
      - ocdtrekkie 10y ago
        I suppose they COULD be, but there's no current reason to believe they are. And Sweeney ran this story previously right before Build, and Microsoft's response was to show Steamworks running in UWP. Microsoft people directly responded to Tim then on Twitter too. And I actually tweeted with Tim Sweeney after the announcement as well, I'm pretty sure he knew what they announced at Build: https://twitter.com/TimSweeneyEpic/status/715240126897590272 https://twitter.com/TimSweeneyEpic/status/715240126897590272 So it's weird this post is becoming a thing now, after he demonstrably knows they're not (currently, at least) trying to do that. Reading the parent post: "The risk here is that, if Microsoft convinces everybody to use UWP, then they phase out Win32 apps. If they can succeed in doing that then it’s a small leap to forcing all apps and games to be distributed through the Windows Store." That's not a small leap, it's a huge leap. And this is an inherently fallacious statement. It's equating a technical one, swapping an insecure app format for a secure app format, with a policy one, blocking third party apps. When, as a closed platform, they could block third party Win32 apps if they wanted to just as similarly. They could make Win32 apps ship through the Windows store, and I believe they discussed it at one point. It's silly that he's particularly equating UWP, a security feature, with a platform lockdown, when the platform lockdown could easily come with or without that security feature. And even if this imaginary reality of Tim's became real, we currently have two viable OSes that Steam works great on that aren't Windows. So Microsoft would have to weigh their perceived gain of a lock-in against the potential loss of the gaming community. Ubuntu wouldn't have a hard time attracting gamers if Steam support was solid, and was kinda broken on Windows.

by BigJono 10y ago

ocdtrekkie 10y ago

Microsoft absolutely wants everyone to leave Win32 behind going forward. Because Win32 is old and holds their platform back. UWP apps work on multiple architectures, hardware formats, etc. But since UWP isn't a walled garden, this is okay, it's just... the new way for apps to be built on Windows. And obviously, Microsoft being Microsoft, legacy Win32 support will be around for a ridiculously long time. This is the company that still provides monthly updates for Windows Vista.

Silhouette 10y ago
Because Win32 is old and holds their platform back. That's one way of looking at it. Another would be that for most practical purposes, Win32 is their platform. We've heard this mantra from Microsoft many times before, switching out things like database APIs, dev tools, interop protocols, the entire history of .Net, and so on. These things have come and, in many cases, gone, all while Win32 endures in the background supporting the software that makes the real money.
- ocdtrekkie 10y ago
  And surely, as long as Win32 is still making the real money, it'll still be supported. But UWP, while nascent, is at the very least, far more secure than Win32, which is something any platform should strive to aspire to. In almost any other topic on HN, if we were discussing moving to running things in secure containers, people would agree it makes sense to move that way and that the additional layer of security is worthwhile. But because it's Microsoft doing it, and Microsoft is changing their software from like... the same way they've been doing it for the last twenty years, people are upset about it? I'm confused. When we talk about UWP, it shouldn't be "UWP is inherently evil", we should comment on and criticize issues Microsoft may have with the development of UWP. Initially, UWP was very hard to use outside of the Windows Store, and so it's fair to criticize there. And arguably, they've been working on improving this. They demonstrated Steamworks running on a UWP app at Build this year. We should definitely criticize if Microsoft does something specifically to lock down UWP. But we should not inherently decide UWP is evil because it's new.
  - douche 10y ago
    I won't make any bones about it, Win32 is an awful, outdated API. Something better without having to fight with all the awkward legacy C-isms, WPARAMs, LPARAMs, awful Hungarian notation and "overloaded" functions would be nice. But I've mostly learned to take a wait and see attitude with new silver bullet APIs from Microsoft. Sometimes they take off and really do became the way forward, but far, far too often, after some initial hype, there is a lack of uptake, they wither on the vine, and then are abandoned for the new shiny, leaving behind the developers that did invest in them. Meanwhile, Win32, like the Dude, abides.
  - Silhouette 10y ago
    I don't think we're necessarily disagreeing here. Certainly we agree that there is plenty of room for more secure execution environments than traditional open desktop OSes and the APIs that go with them. That doesn't nullify the concerns that started this whole discussion, though: Microsoft could be pushing people towards UWP for less benevolent reasons, and surely has the technical and commercial capabilities to try to make Sweeney's hypothetical scenario the new reality. Maybe this is just a mistaken perception, but I suspect Microsoft may have burned a lot more bridges with their recent actions than they have realised so far, particularly among enthusiast and "professional geek" communities that have remained generally positive about MS and its products for longer than most. Viewing anything they do with suspicion is a natural consequence of the way they've been treating their customers lately, and I don't see anything they do that has any hint of lock-in getting an easy ride from here on out.
    - ocdtrekkie 10y ago
      I suppose they COULD be, but there's no current reason to believe they are. And Sweeney ran this story previously right before Build, and Microsoft's response was to show Steamworks running in UWP. Microsoft people directly responded to Tim then on Twitter too. And I actually tweeted with Tim Sweeney after the announcement as well, I'm pretty sure he knew what they announced at Build: https://twitter.com/TimSweeneyEpic/status/715240126897590272 https://twitter.com/TimSweeneyEpic/status/715240126897590272 So it's weird this post is becoming a thing now, after he demonstrably knows they're not (currently, at least) trying to do that. Reading the parent post: "The risk here is that, if Microsoft convinces everybody to use UWP, then they phase out Win32 apps. If they can succeed in doing that then it’s a small leap to forcing all apps and games to be distributed through the Windows Store." That's not a small leap, it's a huge leap. And this is an inherently fallacious statement. It's equating a technical one, swapping an insecure app format for a secure app format, with a policy one, blocking third party apps. When, as a closed platform, they could block third party Win32 apps if they wanted to just as similarly. They could make Win32 apps ship through the Windows store, and I believe they discussed it at one point. It's silly that he's particularly equating UWP, a security feature, with a platform lockdown, when the platform lockdown could easily come with or without that security feature. And even if this imaginary reality of Tim's became real, we currently have two viable OSes that Steam works great on that aren't Windows. So Microsoft would have to weigh their perceived gain of a lock-in against the potential loss of the gaming community. Ubuntu wouldn't have a hard time attracting gamers if Steam support was solid, and was kinda broken on Windows.