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About as successful as Linux I guess, which now powers the vast bulk of all CPU's capable of running it. Having Ubuntu on Desktops, RedHat on some corporate se

About as successful as Linux I guess, which now powers the vast bulk of all CPU's capable of running it. Having Ubuntu on Desktops, RedHat on some corporate servers, Debian on others, Pine in VM's, raspberian on rpi's, openwrt on routers, Android on mobile phones, yada, yada, yada doesn't seem to have done Linux any damage. Quite the reverse. It's almost certainly a major factor in Linux wiping the floor against Windows. Microsoft doesn't have the manpower to turn Windows into something that address all those niche's. While it's true Microsoft have succesfully defended the desktop for now, they have in the mean time lost the war on every other front.

varispeed 6y ago
Are you sure? Last update to Windows Linux subsystem makes you feel like running Linux natively. It's a huge step and it will only improve.
- jnxx 6y ago
  > Last update to Windows Linux subsystem makes you feel like running Linux natively. It's a huge step and it will only improve. As long as the system collects and exfiltrates data without me explicitly allowing this, and does OS updates just before somebody wants to give a presentation, it is not the feel of running Linux. The feeling of running Linux is the user being in control of his/her device and his/her data. A 1990 MS DOS installation is closer to that feeling than any recent Windows.
  - varispeed 6y ago
    Unfortunately that is true. I am not optimistic that it will change, but it is miles better than Apple in this regard. Community should put more pressure on Microsoft to change these anti-patterns.
- the-dude 6y ago
  Like Internet Explorer did?
  - varispeed 6y ago
    If you are good at OS, doesn't mean you have also be good at browsers.
    - jacquesm 6y ago
      Was Microsoft ever good at building operating systems? I know they were good at selling them.
      - colejohnson66 6y ago
        Considering Windows runs on pretty much any x86 configuration, it’s pretty impressive. Some obscure configurations can have problems with Linux due to lack of drivers, but Windows manages. So, one can argue that the quality of Windows is changing, but building an operating system is no easy task. And Microsoft’s commitment to backwards compatibility is quite an achievement.
        neltnerb 6y ago
        I just can't help but point out how much more hardware Linux supports out of the box than Windows... is this actually your real life experience or are you just saying this because it's the common wisdom? Excepting the absolute bleeding edge for hardware the kernel has a ridiculous number of drivers built in. I've far more frequently had to find random graphics or network drivers in order to get Windows to install than Linux. Plus Linux supports all that non-amd64 hardware too? The latest Office doesn't even install on Windows 7, nor 32-bit hardware. I don't mind, really, Windows 7 isn't even supported anymore. But Linux would install without a second thought and run the most updated version of almost everything (excepting things like packages not compiled for arm yet or something). Saying Windows should get lots of credit for backwards compatibility feels a little disingenuous when compared to Linux... which actually still runs on hardware from the 90s.
        non-entity 6y ago
        > The latest Office doesn't even install on Windows 7, nor 32-bit hardware. When people talk about Windows backwards compatibility they're mostly referring to running on apps on a new OS, not new apps running an old OS. I bet you could get very old versions Microsoft Office running on Windows 10. I've run Visual Studio 6.0 on a Win10 machine no problem. And yeah linux nowadays has a lot of drivers included with the kernel (I've bene shocked at some of the supported hardware) but vendor provided drivers of often super outdated. I have a decent chance trusting old driver binaries to run on windows. On Linux you likely have to be a driver developer yourself to just to get some vendor's driver source for an old 2.X kernel to compile, let alone run.
- OJFord 6y ago
  What does WSL have to do with: > Ubuntu on Desktops, RedHat on some corporate servers, Debian on others, Pine in VM's, raspberian on rpi's, openwrt on routers, Android on mobile phones, yada, yada, yada ?
  - pjmlp 6y ago
    Ubuntu is the WSL posterchild that might eventually get acquired by Microsoft. Red Hat is IBM nowadays. Android might just be running on Fuchsia in a near future, and Linux kernel is not exposed to userspace, so it is pretty much irrelevant what Android runs on. BSD, NuttX, RTOS, Azure RTOS, Green Hills, QNX, Zephyr, Harmmony OS, yada, yada, yada
    - ThrowawayR2 6y ago
      Microsoft already had the opportunity to bid for Red Hat and didn't so there's little reason to think they'd be interested in the much, much smaller Canonical. I doubt Shuttleworth would consider selling anyway, least of all to Microsoft.
pjmlp 6y ago
Azure. And I bet Ubuntu will eventually be owned by Microsoft. So basically that leaves IBM and Microsoft calling the shots what Linux is supposed to be. Plus in what matters in embedded space I will give about 10 years for MIT OS like Azure RTOS and Zephyr to wipe the floor of GPL based Linux distributions.
- jacquesm 6y ago
  These are interesting predictions.
- shandor 6y ago
  Thanks for mentioning this. Never heard of Azure RTOS before, but it seems MS went and bought Express Logic. That's quite big. But it doesn't seem to be MIT? https://github.com/azure-rtos/threadx/blob/master/LICENSE.txt https://github.com/azure-rtos/threadx/blob/master/LICENSE.tx...
  - pjmlp 6y ago
    Not sure, my point was that most companies are doing their best to avoid GPL based OSes, going forward.
- GoblinSlayer 6y ago
  Oh, yeah Xenix 2.0, everything old is new again.
monadic2 6y ago
You trivially can't see the damage it's done at all—some measure of success does not imply peak success.

varispeed 6y ago

Are you sure? Last update to Windows Linux subsystem makes you feel like running Linux natively. It's a huge step and it will only improve.

jnxx 6y ago
> Last update to Windows Linux subsystem makes you feel like running Linux natively. It's a huge step and it will only improve. As long as the system collects and exfiltrates data without me explicitly allowing this, and does OS updates just before somebody wants to give a presentation, it is not the feel of running Linux. The feeling of running Linux is the user being in control of his/her device and his/her data. A 1990 MS DOS installation is closer to that feeling than any recent Windows.
- varispeed 6y ago
  Unfortunately that is true. I am not optimistic that it will change, but it is miles better than Apple in this regard. Community should put more pressure on Microsoft to change these anti-patterns.
the-dude 6y ago
Like Internet Explorer did?
- varispeed 6y ago
  If you are good at OS, doesn't mean you have also be good at browsers.
  - jacquesm 6y ago
    Was Microsoft ever good at building operating systems? I know they were good at selling them.
    - colejohnson66 6y ago
      Considering Windows runs on pretty much any x86 configuration, it’s pretty impressive. Some obscure configurations can have problems with Linux due to lack of drivers, but Windows manages. So, one can argue that the quality of Windows is changing, but building an operating system is no easy task. And Microsoft’s commitment to backwards compatibility is quite an achievement.
      - neltnerb 6y ago
        I just can't help but point out how much more hardware Linux supports out of the box than Windows... is this actually your real life experience or are you just saying this because it's the common wisdom? Excepting the absolute bleeding edge for hardware the kernel has a ridiculous number of drivers built in. I've far more frequently had to find random graphics or network drivers in order to get Windows to install than Linux. Plus Linux supports all that non-amd64 hardware too? The latest Office doesn't even install on Windows 7, nor 32-bit hardware. I don't mind, really, Windows 7 isn't even supported anymore. But Linux would install without a second thought and run the most updated version of almost everything (excepting things like packages not compiled for arm yet or something). Saying Windows should get lots of credit for backwards compatibility feels a little disingenuous when compared to Linux... which actually still runs on hardware from the 90s.
        non-entity 6y ago
        > The latest Office doesn't even install on Windows 7, nor 32-bit hardware. When people talk about Windows backwards compatibility they're mostly referring to running on apps on a new OS, not new apps running an old OS. I bet you could get very old versions Microsoft Office running on Windows 10. I've run Visual Studio 6.0 on a Win10 machine no problem. And yeah linux nowadays has a lot of drivers included with the kernel (I've bene shocked at some of the supported hardware) but vendor provided drivers of often super outdated. I have a decent chance trusting old driver binaries to run on windows. On Linux you likely have to be a driver developer yourself to just to get some vendor's driver source for an old 2.X kernel to compile, let alone run.
OJFord 6y ago
What does WSL have to do with: > Ubuntu on Desktops, RedHat on some corporate servers, Debian on others, Pine in VM's, raspberian on rpi's, openwrt on routers, Android on mobile phones, yada, yada, yada ?
- pjmlp 6y ago
  Ubuntu is the WSL posterchild that might eventually get acquired by Microsoft. Red Hat is IBM nowadays. Android might just be running on Fuchsia in a near future, and Linux kernel is not exposed to userspace, so it is pretty much irrelevant what Android runs on. BSD, NuttX, RTOS, Azure RTOS, Green Hills, QNX, Zephyr, Harmmony OS, yada, yada, yada
  - ThrowawayR2 6y ago
    Microsoft already had the opportunity to bid for Red Hat and didn't so there's little reason to think they'd be interested in the much, much smaller Canonical. I doubt Shuttleworth would consider selling anyway, least of all to Microsoft.

pjmlp 6y ago

Azure. And I bet Ubuntu will eventually be owned by Microsoft. So basically that leaves IBM and Microsoft calling the shots what Linux is supposed to be. Plus in what matters in embedded space I will give about 10 years for MIT OS like Azure RTOS and Zephyr to wipe the floor of GPL based Linux distributions.

jacquesm 6y ago
These are interesting predictions.
shandor 6y ago
Thanks for mentioning this. Never heard of Azure RTOS before, but it seems MS went and bought Express Logic. That's quite big. But it doesn't seem to be MIT? https://github.com/azure-rtos/threadx/blob/master/LICENSE.txt https://github.com/azure-rtos/threadx/blob/master/LICENSE.tx...
- pjmlp 6y ago
  Not sure, my point was that most companies are doing their best to avoid GPL based OSes, going forward.
GoblinSlayer 6y ago
Oh, yeah Xenix 2.0, everything old is new again.

monadic2 6y ago

You trivially can't see the damage it's done at all—some measure of success does not imply peak success.