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Microsoft is embracing Android as the mobile version of Windows
- p0nce 8y agoHere is some hope they extend it.
- tylerjwilk00 8y agoAnd we know what happens after that. [1] [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguish https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extingu...
- SketchySeaBeast 8y agoExcept in this case it's a 800 lbs gorilla trying to extinguish another 800 lbs gorilla. Where Microsoft had a giant weight advantage on a lot of the other guys, here it'll end up in an awkward prolonged hug.
- dredmorbius 8y agoWhilst gorillas may and do battle one another, they do not do so for the benefit of ants. Even, or especially, if they say otherwise.
- Analemma_ 8y agoThis is not Slashdot circa 2004, posting “OMG, EEE!” is not a substantive reply and for years hasn’t reflected how contemporary Microsoft does business. It’s just a cheap grab for upvotes with no thinking behind it. Please explain how Microsoft is going to EEE Android, which is run by an equally large and influential company and runs on way more devices than Windows does, or consider removing this comment if you can’t.
- aaaaaaaaaab 8y agoAh, the good old “b-but VS code” argument.
- bdcravens 8y agoI think what MS has done with open sourcing .NET is more indicative of the new MS.
- yarrel 8y agoContemporary MS are trying to lock you into their hardware, software, development and deployment platforms. They are doing this while making the tools to do so Open Source. You are not free to control your computing in this ecosystem, but hey that's a small price to pay. And people are eating this up. Precisely because they aren't worried about history. As for how embracing Android fits into this, it's not clear how it doesn't.
- Apocryphon 8y agoTo be fair, aren't Apple, Google, Amazon, etc. all pretty much doing the same thing these days? Everyone wants to own the ecosystem. Everyone is patient enough to integrate with others', but with experiences that are just a little worse than going all-native. MS gets the worst hate because of history, when it was the only juggernaut. But now we have many juggernauts, and they all behave more or less similarly.
- bubblethink 8y agoYou can cut google some slack though. They walk a fine line. You can use AOSP without any google play services. It works great. Sure, they won't make it easy, but something has to pay the bills. So things are in a very fine balance right now wrt AOSP. They also earn a bit of goodwill because, as I discovered recently, you can still use carddav, caldav, and xmpp for accessing google contacts, calendar and hangouts although google has officially deprecated all the open protocols. So they haven't gone full evil just yet.
- tylerjwilk00 8y agoLighten up. Are you all missing the irony? The OP is about MS. The title is about embracing. The parent comment mentioned extending it. I must be old and just couldn't pass up the historical hacker pop culture references. My apologies. Don't sprain your wrists while shaking your pitch forks.
- bni 8y agoIts ironic, since Java and Linux used to be the absolute kryptonite for Microsoft in the 00's
- sureshv 8y agoThe change from Windows server licenses to the cloud (Azure) forced this upon Microsoft.
- techntoke 8y agoAnd a majority of Azure runs on Linux, and the major selling points for Windows now is it runs Linux and works with Kubernetes/Docker. Containers still run poorly compared to Linux though and mounting volumes is mostly broken from anything but PowerShell.
- rbanffy 8y ago> and the major selling points for Windows now is it runs Linux and works with Kubernetes/Docker. The major selling point for Windows is that it comes preinstalled on the Dell/HP/Lenovo computers our muggles buy. For corporations, the ability to manage identities and lock down the machines from a central location is a killer. The main selling point of Windows for web developers is that it can do that and still run Office well. As a developer, I'm unconvinced about the value of that second part though. And not convinced at all about the first one too because Macs are Linux-like enough and Linux machines, well, are Linux machines (even when they come with Windows, installing Debian, Ubuntu or Fedora is a zero-effort thing).
- qwerty456127 8y agoThe major selling point for Windows is MS Office (even the Mac version is not complete), Visual Studio and Windows-only games in Steam. if only GNU/Linux would became an officially supported platform for full and up-to-date versions of MS Office, VisualStutio, Adobe Photoshop/Illustrator and best-selling games then Windows would be forced into a fair competition which would be fairly hard for it to win.
- macbroadcast 8y ago...and Google plans to replace Android with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Fuchsia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Fuchsia OS in the future, does that makes any sense for Micro$oft, whats their plan?
- monocasa 8y agoDoes google actually plan to do replace android with that, or is it a "you've burnt out on what we hired you for, but letting you leave would give our competitors a leg up so do whatever you want" project? It really feels like the latter.
- kevin_thibedeau 8y agoIt's a platform for IoT devices. Whether it ends up in consumer handhelds remains to be seen.
- jasonvorhe 8y agoNo, it's not. It's already booting into a desktop like UI on the Pixelbook and they've even ported parts of Chrome to it. It's more like some universal OS for Google products that'll probably be ready for launch in 2-3 years or so. Sure, IoT may be one of the goals of Fuchsia, but I'm sure it's meant for future phones as a step by step replacement for Android and future Chromebooks, probably starting with Pixel devices or whatever they'll rebrand to next year.
- ethbro 8y agoEveryone knew Android made technical compromises for market share (eg security model). It remains to be seen whether business (legacy Android) or technical (new system arch) will win out at Google.
- Apocryphon 8y agoRegardless if Fuchsia has a future, it's highly unlikely that they'll want to stick with Android for over another decade.
- wvenable 8y agoMicrosoft should re-start the Android emulation project (the project that eventually became the Subsystem for Linux in Win10) and make Windows 10 the ultimate OS that can run anything.
- techntoke 8y agoThey should fix Console or the PowerShell app first to be on par with Linux/Mac terminal applications.
- useful 8y agopowershell is a great wrapper around bash in WSL
- techntoke 8y agoNot if you want mouse support for Vim or descent font support.
- wvenable 8y agoYou mean like this? https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2018/06/27/windows-command-line-the-evolution-of-the-windows-command-line/ https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/commandline/2018/06/27/wind...
- bubblethink 8y agoIf MS ends up launching phones based on AOSP like amazon, it could be interesting. Anything that reduces the near universal dependence on google play services really. My wishful thinking is that if AOSP ends up getting forked by 2-3 major players who become somewhat successful, we'll either get to some open standard for stuff that google play services provide, or webapps will become good enough that we won't need them.
- techntoke 8y agoExcept Amazon's replacement sucks pretty hard. They are consistently multiple versions behind, and you can't even use applications like native YouTube.
- zanny 8y agoOf course you can't use Youtube? Its a Google product. Its built ground up to depend on Play Services. That being said Youtubes mobile site isn't abysmal and I'm not a fan of how the last decade saw the open web replaced by proprietary apps. A lot of sites work fine in a browser on a phone but still push users to use an application to interact with them.
- a3n 8y agocough - LinkedIn - cough
- techntoke 8y agoFireOS on my Kindle Fire is still at Android version 5. Fortunately, I was able to install Google Play Services so that I didn't have to use the Amazon AppStore, however multiple profiles doesn't work well on the Kindle Fire. F-Droid is pretty awesome and the ADB toolset is pretty powerful too. I'd love to find a wrapper that just uses the core Android tools for management.
- int_19h 8y agoGoogle intentionally prevents YouTube from working well everywhere but in their walled garden. I sincerely hope they get slapped hard over this. You're not supposed to be able to abuse a monopoly like that. Your sentiment shows exactly why it's detrimental - because it's a major barrier to competition.
- GeekyBear 8y agoMicrosoft could extend Android with an open sourced replacement for the various Google Play Services. Paying for Microsoft to host a replacement services layer for your app on Azure would be cheaper than paying Google a 30% cut once you got past a certain use threshold. As a bonus you can mitigate Google's decision to walk back Android being open and simultaneously give people who have decided to un-Google their lives an alternative to moving to iOS which would risk them moving to a Mac at the same time.
- nabaraj 8y agoGoogle could simply block services like Gmail and YouTube. Microsoft tried it with Windows Phone.
- xyzzyz 8y agoGoogle cannot block Gmail and YouTube. These are and will be accessible through web browser. What Google can do is not spend engineering time to build a special version of mobile app to support the platform, and block other apps that access them that don't conform to Terms and Conditions. (disclaimer: I work for Google on GCP)
- jhasse 8y agoYouTube without an app is just not the same.
- scarface74 8y agoIt’s better. I deleted the YouTube app from my iPhone and iPad because I would rather use the website and if you click on a YouTube link it will launch the app. The YouTube app doesn’t support background playback without paying for YouTube Red and it doesn’t support picture in picture mode on the iPad - I use a third party app.
- gsnedders 8y ago> Google cannot block Gmail and YouTube. These are and will be accessible through web browser. Well, through web browsers that Google chooses to support, given at least Gmail uses UA whitelisting (and, at various times, various non-Chrome Chromium based browsers have been excluded). If Google chooses not to support any browser that runs on the given system and blocks access to any other browser, then Google absolutely can block access to them.
- ourmandave 8y agoMS already makes billions every year on hundreds of existing Android patents. I hope they can give themselves a price break.
- dcgudeman 8y agoBillions? I a source for that would be nice.
- ourmandave 8y agoThis is from 2014 and says they make about $2B per year. https://www.zdnet.com/article/310-microsoft-patents-used-in-android-licensing-agreements-revealed-by-chinese-gov/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/310-microsoft-patents-used-in-... But later reports suggest they're making a lot less now.
- Tiki 8y agoscrcpy : https://github.com/Genymobile/scrcpy https://github.com/Genymobile/scrcpy This application provides display and control of Android devices connected on USB (or over TCP/IP). It does not require any root access. It works on GNU/Linux, Windows and MacOS. Did Microsoft have a choice? https://www.statista.com/statistics/266136/global-market-share-held-by-smartphone-operating-systems/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/266136/global-market-sha...
- ognarb 8y agoSimilar to the integration of a linux desktop with kde connect.
- epx 8y agoLinux should have embraced Android as its GUI, as well.
- jrs95 8y agoAndroid doesn't really have much similarity to Linux beyond the kernel so this doesn't make much sense. They are 2 quite different userland operating systems.
- make3 8y agoAndroid's GUI is made for touch. We saw with Windows 8 how people love when you put a tablet type GUI to a desktop computer
- jrs95 8y agoMicrosoft doesn't need to be pushing their own Android distribution to be successful here. They're building a very compelling set of software that runs atop Android on any device, and this can be done while complying with Google's requirements for having Play services. I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft's existing relationship with Samsung evolves into something where you can buy a Samsung device through Microsoft that comes preloaded with Microsoft Launcher, SwiftKey, Cortana, Edge, Office, etc while still including Google Play. They could also pursue this with other manufacturers or even with their own devices if they absolutely had to. Microsoft wants to get Android devices integrated with their services, but they don't need to be the app store in order to do that. That strategy is doomed to fail as Amazon already proved with Fire Phone.
- qwerty456127 8y ago> Edge Why would anybody but legacy-encumbered enterprises actually use a web browser by Microsoft nowadays? > but they don't need to be the app store But wouldn't it be good if there were more than one fairly-big and well-advertised app store? In fact the situation when there is just one seems worrying, e.g. Apple is already misusing their monopoly on iOS devices actively.
- Marsymars 8y ago> Why would anybody but legacy-encumbered enterprises actually use a web browser by Microsoft nowadays? I expect people have various reasons. Personally, my installs of FF/Chrome/Vivaldi are locked down in various ways to not accepts cookies/scripts, so I use Edge for sites that break in my other browsers that I don't need to access often enough to bother whitelisting. Same way I use Safari on macOS.
- qwerty456127 8y agoYou don't have to disable cookies, there is Vanilla Cookie Manager to delete cookies set by any but whitelisted sites as you close them. You can also use incognito mode (which starts with no extensions enabled by default) - I use it when I have to view a site that gets broken by my ad-blocking and privacy-enforcing extensions set-up. And there actually are so many Chrome-based sites you can always install one more if the number you already have is not enough and you don't like Chrome's built-in user switching. MS browsers have a long history of being not just outdated from the compatibility point of view but also vulnerable to malware so I personally wouldn't trust them. I would actually love to learn there is a real (using a different engine) alternative browser but I feel skeptic about Microsoft building one.
- godelmachine 8y agoAt a time when Google is going to disown Android.
- droopybuns 8y agoFriday nonsense. I can’t conceive that MS would yet again hitch themselves to a failing os. If you want to make money in mobile, you have to prioritize iOS.
- oblio 8y agoAndroid’s global market share is 80% and climbing. Android phones are moving up in the market, with many luxury models. Few people switch ecosystems after 1 year or so and guess what will happen when the poor Indian or Chinese dude who used to use Android Cheapo will get a decent job that will allow him to buy a $500+ phone? Only a small percentage of those will get iPhones, most will get Samsungs or high end Huaweis.
- kuwze 8y agoFirst of all, Microsoft gets a cut of every Android phone sold[0]. Secondly, does anyone know why Microsoft quit competing when it came to mobile? It seems something so odd that future history books are going to point it out. I mean I really don't get it. Unless if they are planning to ramp up and go whole hog on Continuum and they don't want to worry about supporting older phones, which this lull allows them to do. [0]: https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-is-making-2bn-a-year-on-android-licensing-five-times-more-than-windows-phone/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-is-making-2bn-a-year...
- why_only_15 8y agoThe article doesn't explain why the OEMs give Microsoft a cut- do you know why?
- deergomoo 8y agoFAT32 royalties. I would assume this does not apply to Android phones without an SD slot though.
- int_19h 8y agoNot FAT32, exFAT. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExFAT https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExFAT
- kuwze 8y agoSorry that was a bad example link. I believe most of the cut comes from the fact that Linux 'infringes' on Microsoft patents, so to distribute Linux you have to pay them off. https://www.zdnet.com/article/310-microsoft-patents-used-in-android-licensing-agreements-revealed-by-chinese-gov/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/310-microsoft-patents-used-in-...
- naner 8y agoIt was in the news more several years ago. They shakedown companies using Linux claiming they own various patents covering Linux technology. Microsoft made an example of TomTom who refused a licensing deal and was sued and lost over an obscure FAT filesystem patent.
- paulcarroty 8y agoCool, don't forged about forced updates, telemetry and the "new version of OS - new device principle"; and M$ will repeat their Windows Phone success!
- everyone 8y agoDoes this mean they'll finally stop trying to foist the 'metro' blight onto desktop? I have a feeling they will double down and it will now be an Android blight
- wildrhythms 8y ago'Metro' is the only design concept Microsoft has come up with in the last decade.
- everyone 8y agoY'know Windows 10 has loads of great little improvements say on Windows 2000.. You only really notice them when u try to use an old machine running 2000 or XP or whatever and theyre not there.. Examples.. can cut/copy and paste files mutiples times and it will queue them up.. When copying files it shows progress + graphs the speed. Right click on windows button to get list of loads of common management tools (that b4 u had to dig down to in various weird places) Alt-tab shows little thumbnail of each program running. thumbnails of image files and whatnot in explorer loads of option in the explorer GUI for searching and displaying files powershell drag window to side to have it take up half the screen etc. etc. These are all great useful and non intrusive design ideas. Thats good design. And I reckon they came about from more grassroots action, eg. customer feedback or boots on the ground engineers. 'Design concepts' like Metro are the kind of shit that marketing or upper management come up with as part of some dubious business or marketing scheme, and then are awkwardly and irritatingly foisted upon the engineers and users alike. That kind of BS is utterly regressive.
- wildrhythms 8y agoOh yes, I think Microsoft made incredible strides in the UI/desktop design front from 98 to XP and even on Windows 7 (2009). Windows Phone and Windows 8 introduced Metro to the world, and Microsoft seems to have plateaued there.
- everyone 8y ago