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That's clever trick but I think it is a mistake in the long run. It removes incentives from putting effort into compiling all libraries as native code, instead

That's clever trick but I think it is a mistake in the long run. It removes incentives from putting effort into compiling all libraries as native code, instead effectively fossilizing x86_64 as another weird vestigal part of Windows applications.

Uvix 3y ago
Microsoft tried a hard break before (Windows RT), and developers didn't show up. They need this so people are willing to buy the platform and increase the market enough for developers to start doing bespoke ports.
- pjmlp 3y ago
  The break was too hard, because not only it was a hard break, they kept messing the development experience, to this day now with WinUI 3.0/WinAppSDK, still quite far from Win32/Forms/WPF/MFC. Every reboot of WinRT tooling required a rewrite, and some tooling was left behind.
- wvenable 3y ago
  I don't buy it. The problem with Windows RT is that they made it impossible to run ARM binaries on Windows. If they had just allowed, as an example, Mozilla to make an ARM build of Firefox for Windows they'd have done it. And it would have spread to all the small utilities and eventually to larger apps. Instead Microsoft locked down the entire platform iOS-style and nobody bothered.
  - pjmlp 3y ago
    That was the very first version, afterwards the choice was between plain Windows 10 on ARM, or Windows 10 S(ecure) mode.
muth02446 3y ago
yes, this sounds pretty messy and I am wondering how they deal with the different memory consistencies of the two architectures. IIRC apple CPUs have HW support for the stricter x86 model.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
Nevermark 3y ago
ARM has so much momentum everywhere but Windows that I don't think a soft transition will stall any transition, as ARM-Window demand increases. But it would be nice to have reciprocal ARM emulation on Intel. That would reduce a lot of friction for such a transition. Both forward and backward CPU compatibility.

Uvix 3y ago

Microsoft tried a hard break before (Windows RT), and developers didn't show up. They need this so people are willing to buy the platform and increase the market enough for developers to start doing bespoke ports.

pjmlp 3y ago
The break was too hard, because not only it was a hard break, they kept messing the development experience, to this day now with WinUI 3.0/WinAppSDK, still quite far from Win32/Forms/WPF/MFC. Every reboot of WinRT tooling required a rewrite, and some tooling was left behind.
wvenable 3y ago
I don't buy it. The problem with Windows RT is that they made it impossible to run ARM binaries on Windows. If they had just allowed, as an example, Mozilla to make an ARM build of Firefox for Windows they'd have done it. And it would have spread to all the small utilities and eventually to larger apps. Instead Microsoft locked down the entire platform iOS-style and nobody bothered.
- pjmlp 3y ago
  That was the very first version, afterwards the choice was between plain Windows 10 on ARM, or Windows 10 S(ecure) mode.

muth02446 3y ago

yes, this sounds pretty messy and I am wondering how they deal with the different memory consistencies of the two architectures. IIRC apple CPUs have HW support for the stricter x86 model.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

Nevermark 3y ago

ARM has so much momentum everywhere but Windows that I don't think a soft transition will stall any transition, as ARM-Window demand increases. But it would be nice to have reciprocal ARM emulation on Intel. That would reduce a lot of friction for such a transition. Both forward and backward CPU compatibility.