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Regarding #1, eventually I expect Microsoft to release their own Linux distribution and keep Windows as a GUI. I would not be surprised if their failed project

Regarding #1, eventually I expect Microsoft to release their own Linux distribution and keep Windows as a GUI. I would not be surprised if their failed project Astoria was reused to run android apps on that.

evv 8y ago
It would be make me so happy to see WINE supported as the first-class way of running Windows software.
- cptskippy 8y ago
  I would be surprised if that was the approach Microsoft took, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a supported way of running Windows Apps emerge. This could be used as a way to maintain backward compatibility in Windows as it evolves in the future.
- devereaux 8y ago
  I would fully expect them to buy Codeweavers should they do that. Win32 binaries running on Wine is one of the best option for desktop software. It's funny how it is like the polar opposite of UWP, but it just work and I guess that matters more than technical beauty.
- acct1771 8y ago
  Valve (Steam) are doing this.
VRay 8y ago
Speaking as an OS engineer who's worked on both kernels a lot, Windows is way better under the hood for low-latency, responsive end user stuff than linux Then again, WinMo 7 was way faster and more responsive than Android at the time, and look how that turned out..
- zozbot123 8y ago
  The PREEMPT_RT patchset (sometimes confusingly referred to as RT-Linux) is slated to improve the kernel quite a bit wrt. "low-latency" and "responsive" workloads.
- kokey 8y ago
  I'm not sure why this is such a problem in Linux, where latency is really not such a big problem in Darwin/MacOS/iOS.
  - dralley 8y ago
    Architected for throughput instead of latency.
- mixmastamyk 8y ago
  One costs a lot to maintain, another doesn't.
- grumpydba 8y ago
  > Speaking as an OS engineer who's worked on both kernels a lot, Windows is way better under the hood for low-latency, responsive end user stuff than linux Still it's probably a lot cheaper to fix some latency issues on linux that to maintain your whole kernel. The main issue with linux is the GPL for drivers, a long with kernel API instability.
  - zozbot123 8y ago
    > The main issue with linux is the GPL for drivers That's the main benefit with Linux. OEM drivers on MS Windows are a shit show, even on Windows 10.
- aries1980 8y ago
  I don't believe you: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCHED_DEADLINE https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCHED_DEADLINE
nailer 8y ago
Windows is a pretty good kernel, GNU/Windows (aka WSL) effectively feels like Linux, with some drawbacks mainly NTFS being very slow (which Microsoft are aware of and working on - see https://github.com/Microsoft/WSL/issues/873#issuecomment-425272829 https://github.com/Microsoft/WSL/issues/873#issuecomment-425...).
- eknkc 8y ago
  Yeah I remember reading this particular comment when it was new. It mostly feels like “ok guys this is the best we get out of this” to me though. If they do not go with a different approach, the filesystem will always be an issue with WSL. I planned ditching my mac in favor of WSL. Due to MBP hardware issues and the fact that a git status would take 10x time drove me away. I wish it was good enough though.
  - blinkingled 8y ago
    git status maybe 10x slower on WSL than native Linux - I wonder how much slower it is than macOS - in my brief use macOS filesystem never felt anywhere near Linux fast to me.
    - eknkc 8y ago
      Never been bothered by it in practice but good question. The newish filesystem (apfs) feels faster in daily use so your experience might be outdated by now.
  - avtar 8y ago
    I keep a Debian VM around with Samba exporting my ~/src directory to the Windows host. That way it’s possible to avoid file system issues while still being able to use editors and other tools (Adobe CC apps in my case).
  - nailer 8y ago
    Anyone tried ext3 or 4 on Windows?
saosebastiao 8y ago
Why would it need to be Linux? I love linux, but mostly because it works well and is open source. I'd love for a big tech company to put their weight behind SEL4. That would go a long way for Microsoft: formally proven security, tiny footprint, good performance, etc. It's something that has massive potential for super computers all the way down to IOT. It just needs a proper ecosystem behind it. Or maybe buy QNX off of Blackberry and make it open source again. That would also be nice.
- Kye 8y ago
  Microsoft already has a lot invested in Linux support. They're not going to switch to something with a fraction of the community and ecosystem even if it has a lot of good qualities.
- kokey 8y ago
  I think as long as Microsoft holds onto Windows tightly the better bet in the future will always be a Linux or UNIX-like OS. Like many other things, the thing that works more like evolutionary systems tend to prevail. Linux might be the dominant race of the UNIX ancestry tree at the moment, but it may not retain that dominance and the thing that will overtake it will probably come from the same UNIX evolutionary roots, e.g. the BSD side where FreeBSD, Darwin, MacOS and iOS came from or the other Linux side branches like Android and Chrome, or somewhere less unexpected. The only way Windows tree OSes will prevail over this is if they allow more branches to evolve, even open source parts of it. User interfaces tend to do better if owned by an organisation with a concentrated purpose and commercial vision, but the stuff under the bonnet seems to do a lot better from being more open and evolutionary.
  - 20190129 8y ago
    Perhaps Google Fuchsia[0]? I hope not. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Fuchsia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Fuchsia
  - pjmlp 8y ago
    Looking at the embedded market OSes, everyone is pretty keen in moving away from Linux into RTOS, mbed, NuttX, Tizen IoT, RIOT, eventually Fuchsia, .... Who knows which ones will survive, however they all have two things in common, they aren't GPL based and just enough POSIX to keep C and C++ happy. Additionally some of them do have stable ABI for drivers. Linux's long term victory might be constrained to the server room, and even there it is debatable, given the increase in managed runtimes for micro-services, which could even be running bare metal for what I care.
pjmlp 8y ago
They already have their Linux distribution, it just doesn't run on the desktop. https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/azure-sphere/ https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/azure-sphere/ However on what concerns the desktop, I am betting more on GNU/Windows.
20190129 8y ago
I just hope one day they add regular expressions to Excel.
int_19h 8y ago
WSL came out of Project Astoria.
ksec 8y ago
At the rate things are going, may be Microsoft will even open up their Windows kernel, leaving many of the Windows user land and UI proprietary.

evv 8y ago

It would be make me so happy to see WINE supported as the first-class way of running Windows software.

cptskippy 8y ago
I would be surprised if that was the approach Microsoft took, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a supported way of running Windows Apps emerge. This could be used as a way to maintain backward compatibility in Windows as it evolves in the future.
devereaux 8y ago
I would fully expect them to buy Codeweavers should they do that. Win32 binaries running on Wine is one of the best option for desktop software. It's funny how it is like the polar opposite of UWP, but it just work and I guess that matters more than technical beauty.
acct1771 8y ago
Valve (Steam) are doing this.

VRay 8y ago

Speaking as an OS engineer who's worked on both kernels a lot, Windows is way better under the hood for low-latency, responsive end user stuff than linux Then again, WinMo 7 was way faster and more responsive than Android at the time, and look how that turned out..

zozbot123 8y ago
The PREEMPT_RT patchset (sometimes confusingly referred to as RT-Linux) is slated to improve the kernel quite a bit wrt. "low-latency" and "responsive" workloads.
kokey 8y ago
I'm not sure why this is such a problem in Linux, where latency is really not such a big problem in Darwin/MacOS/iOS.
- dralley 8y ago
  Architected for throughput instead of latency.
mixmastamyk 8y ago
One costs a lot to maintain, another doesn't.
grumpydba 8y ago
> Speaking as an OS engineer who's worked on both kernels a lot, Windows is way better under the hood for low-latency, responsive end user stuff than linux Still it's probably a lot cheaper to fix some latency issues on linux that to maintain your whole kernel. The main issue with linux is the GPL for drivers, a long with kernel API instability.
- zozbot123 8y ago
  > The main issue with linux is the GPL for drivers That's the main benefit with Linux. OEM drivers on MS Windows are a shit show, even on Windows 10.
aries1980 8y ago
I don't believe you: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCHED_DEADLINE https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCHED_DEADLINE

nailer 8y ago

Windows is a pretty good kernel, GNU/Windows (aka WSL) effectively feels like Linux, with some drawbacks mainly NTFS being very slow (which Microsoft are aware of and working on - see https://github.com/Microsoft/WSL/issues/873#issuecomment-425272829 https://github.com/Microsoft/WSL/issues/873#issuecomment-425...).

eknkc 8y ago
Yeah I remember reading this particular comment when it was new. It mostly feels like “ok guys this is the best we get out of this” to me though. If they do not go with a different approach, the filesystem will always be an issue with WSL. I planned ditching my mac in favor of WSL. Due to MBP hardware issues and the fact that a git status would take 10x time drove me away. I wish it was good enough though.
- blinkingled 8y ago
  git status maybe 10x slower on WSL than native Linux - I wonder how much slower it is than macOS - in my brief use macOS filesystem never felt anywhere near Linux fast to me.
  - eknkc 8y ago
    Never been bothered by it in practice but good question. The newish filesystem (apfs) feels faster in daily use so your experience might be outdated by now.
- avtar 8y ago
  I keep a Debian VM around with Samba exporting my ~/src directory to the Windows host. That way it’s possible to avoid file system issues while still being able to use editors and other tools (Adobe CC apps in my case).
- nailer 8y ago
  Anyone tried ext3 or 4 on Windows?

saosebastiao 8y ago

Why would it need to be Linux? I love linux, but mostly because it works well and is open source. I'd love for a big tech company to put their weight behind SEL4. That would go a long way for Microsoft: formally proven security, tiny footprint, good performance, etc. It's something that has massive potential for super computers all the way down to IOT. It just needs a proper ecosystem behind it. Or maybe buy QNX off of Blackberry and make it open source again. That would also be nice.

Kye 8y ago
Microsoft already has a lot invested in Linux support. They're not going to switch to something with a fraction of the community and ecosystem even if it has a lot of good qualities.
kokey 8y ago
I think as long as Microsoft holds onto Windows tightly the better bet in the future will always be a Linux or UNIX-like OS. Like many other things, the thing that works more like evolutionary systems tend to prevail. Linux might be the dominant race of the UNIX ancestry tree at the moment, but it may not retain that dominance and the thing that will overtake it will probably come from the same UNIX evolutionary roots, e.g. the BSD side where FreeBSD, Darwin, MacOS and iOS came from or the other Linux side branches like Android and Chrome, or somewhere less unexpected. The only way Windows tree OSes will prevail over this is if they allow more branches to evolve, even open source parts of it. User interfaces tend to do better if owned by an organisation with a concentrated purpose and commercial vision, but the stuff under the bonnet seems to do a lot better from being more open and evolutionary.
- 20190129 8y ago
  Perhaps Google Fuchsia[0]? I hope not. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Fuchsia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Fuchsia
- pjmlp 8y ago
  Looking at the embedded market OSes, everyone is pretty keen in moving away from Linux into RTOS, mbed, NuttX, Tizen IoT, RIOT, eventually Fuchsia, .... Who knows which ones will survive, however they all have two things in common, they aren't GPL based and just enough POSIX to keep C and C++ happy. Additionally some of them do have stable ABI for drivers. Linux's long term victory might be constrained to the server room, and even there it is debatable, given the increase in managed runtimes for micro-services, which could even be running bare metal for what I care.

pjmlp 8y ago

They already have their Linux distribution, it just doesn't run on the desktop. https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/azure-sphere/ https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/azure-sphere/ However on what concerns the desktop, I am betting more on GNU/Windows.

20190129 8y ago

I just hope one day they add regular expressions to Excel.

int_19h 8y ago

WSL came out of Project Astoria.

ksec 8y ago

At the rate things are going, may be Microsoft will even open up their Windows kernel, leaving many of the Windows user land and UI proprietary.