6 ms·

Microsoft had all the cards to win the device war. But they forgot what made them win the PC war. They tried to emulate apple while forgetting that people that

Microsoft had all the cards to win the device war. But they forgot what made them win the PC war. They tried to emulate apple while forgetting that people that bought into apple ideology already had apple. If the W8 arm was unlocked it would have been a big winner. WP7 just needed fast moving instead of stagnation and they almost got everything right with the original xbox and X360 in the beginning. But I am moving away from microsoft right now even as a desktop. Arch with KDE is almost as good. There is surprising gaming support and the only real show stopper is the terrible fonts in JetBrains products.

archivator 13y ago
Slightly offtopic but can you point me to a description of said font issues? My Android Studio (IDEA) fonts seem fine (on latest Kubuntu and Fedora w/ KDE).
- SamColes 13y ago
  IDEA-57233 Editor font antialising/appearance problems on Linux http://youtrack.jetbrains.com/issue/IDEA-57233 http://youtrack.jetbrains.com/issue/IDEA-57233
  - stoolpigeon 13y ago
    I had huge issues with swing fonts. Bad enough that I bought a couple jetbrains products that I wasn't using at all. Then when the Android Studio came out I installed it just to look at it and noticed it looked good. I fired up my other swing stuff and saw noticeable improvement. This is on Fedora 18 (64 bit if it matters, KDE is my desktop) with the Oracle JVM. I don't know what changed - if it was something in Fedora, Java or what - but I'm pretty happy with how things look now, whereas before I couldn't stand it. I tried all the java switches and what not to no avail - but now it just works. All that said, KDevelop has made such great strides I can see it becoming my primary environment for all my development.
  - timrichard 13y ago
    Hi, have you tried the AAHack plugin? It made a difference for me when running IDEA on Arch/Gnome.
jemeshsu 13y ago
> They tried to emulate apple while forgetting that people that bought into apple ideology already had apple. Agreed. Their enterprise offering is strong. And one day they will realize it is IBM that is their destiny, and drop out of consumer market.
- arethuza 13y ago
  "IBM that is their destiny" Which means becoming a company built around professional services which will mean a lot of unhappy Microsoft partners.
  - Shorel 13y ago
    I have always thought that being a Microsoft partner is already a corporate suicide note. They are ruthless when trying to earn more money from existing business lines. Here we were customers of some company who sold Exchange hosting, now we login into outlook.com. And all this without having into account the discontinued products because of internal politics. Think XNA Game Studio.
    - serge2k 13y ago
      Their setup works well with companies that are willing and able to pay tons for a setup that works well top to bottom. Last job used MS for everything, but they got a setup which worked well and anyone they hired could use. Plus it's well supported (although they were stuck on XP still, that's going to be lots of money).
- astrodust 13y ago
  Microsoft has no hope of becoming an IBM. IBM manufactures lots of hardware, produces new technology it licenses, and has an enormous software consulting division. Microsoft does none of these things. If anything, Microsoft will become like Computer Associates (CA Technologies), a company that milks products enterprise is hooked on and can't quit, squeezing money out of these things for decades to come.
  - 13y ago
_pmf_ 13y ago
The reasons why Microsoft fail seem so petty. They are technologically probably the most advanced company, but ruin it by dubious politics.
- rbanffy 13y ago
  > They are technologically probably the most advanced company I disagree. Their technology is mostly OK, and, surely, they seem managed by idiots, but I wouldn't dare to call them "the most advanced company" when compared to even most software companies.
- riskable 13y ago
  > They are technologically probably the most advanced company What?!? How could you possibly believe that when you know they're all using Windows in Redmond. It has absolutely zero technical superiority over everything else out right now (e.g. Linux, Mac OS X, iOS, etc). I don't want to say which company is the most technically superior right now but I'd probably start my investigation at Google because of things like Google Glass, Google Now, self-driving cars, Maps & Street View, and a search engine that still bests everything else out there by huge margins.
  - nivla 13y ago
    >It has absolutely zero technical superiority over everything else out right now. Not necessarily in the enterprise market. Based off my experience, their enterprise softwares are vastly superior other alternatives. May I also mention the advancements of Kinect? The ability to scan and display with a great deal of accuracy: your body skeleton, your heart rate, muscle maps, etc is pretty awesome. I find whatever comes out of Microsoft Research to be very exciting. However the truth is most are killed even before they make it to the market (remember Microsoft Courier?), thanks to their internal politics.
    - riskable 13y ago
      Yeah, so vastly superior that they can't even convince their enterprise customers to adopt their latest platforms (phones, tabets) and operating system (Windows 8). Also, do you realize that the Kinect technology was developed outside of Microsoft? It was invented by an Israeli company: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PrimeSense http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PrimeSense Microsoft just licensed their technology for use in the Kinect. So if you consider licensing someone else's inventions as, "the most technologically advanced" then yeah; Kinect is pretty good as far as game-playing technology goes.
sentenza 13y ago
From my experience, Arch with KDE and XP/Win7 are extremely similar with regards to user experience quality, so that I myself wouldn't be willing to call one or the other better. At this point, a person more used to Windows might get annoyed by having to edit config files on Arch/KDE every so often, and a person more into Linux might be frustrated that in Windows, some things can't be easily fixed. But these are more differences in preference than in quality.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- kryten 13y ago
  Quality really hits you when you have to set up postfix, dovecot-lda, dovecot imap, ldap auth and an NFS share to store mail on. I'd genuinely rather use exchange and active directory!
laumars 13y ago
Arch's fonts can be prettified a lot with Ubuntu patches from AUR: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Font_Configuration#Ubuntu https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Font_Configuration#Ubun... (I'm another Arch + KDE user - both at home and at work)
- venomsnake 13y ago
  I used infiniality and the result is beautiful. From what I was able to deduce it was a mix of phpstorm bolding everything way too much, JDK refusing to use rendering and some dpi issues (a letter in storm is almost twice smaller than in kwrite) But my experiences with arch are very positive so far.
astrodust 13y ago
What made them win the PC war was what landed them in federal court. By controlling the Windows ecosystem they could "disrupt" any competitors trying to produce applications, pushing Office while alternatives struggled, and they could use Office to push Windows. Charging OEMs a flat "per-CPU" fee for licensing meant that Microsoft was getting paid regardless of the OS being shipped on the system. They eventually had to stop doing this, but came up with other ways of achieving the same effect. There's no Office for game consoles. No matter how popular your title is, another platform will have an exclusive of their own that's just as compelling. They can't strong-arm OEMs because they are the one making and selling the hardware. Linux has all the technology needed to overcome Windows, lacking only fit and finish.
- sauravc 13y ago
  What landed them in Federal Court was bundling a browser (the most advanced at the time) with their OS for free. Over a decade later, we all know that a consumer OS that ships without a browser is an incomplete product (as BillG testified in the case). What Apple is doing now with dictatorial actions in its app stores is just as, if not more, overreaching IMHO. Does that make it OK? No. But keep in mind why people were actually interested in what MS had to offer back then. Just as we still buy Apple products despite their anti-competitive behavior, people bought MSFT products in the largely because the product addressed their needs better than others and the price was right.
  - erikpukinskis 13y ago
    They did more than bundle a browser, they gave OEMs financial incentives NOT to bundle Netscape. The reason why Apple's dictatorial actions don't bother me is they're only a small part of the market. If I want to develop a mobile web browser, I can still use Android and have a market. With Windows, Microsoft WAS the market.
    - venomsnake 13y ago
      With the tablets there was a time (roughly a year) when Apple was the market.
podperson 13y ago
Microsoft had all the cards back in 2008, maybe. The missteps started with Vista and Zune, and continued with Windows Phone 7, and were magnified with Windows 8, Windows 8 RT, and now XBox One. There's also the big non-step of trying to starve the iPad by not porting Office to it -- which has made it glaringly obvious how little we need Office to get stuff done. I'd say Microsoft's problem now is pretty intractable. I think it's quite possible there will be no victor in XBox One vs. PS4 just as there was no victor in Bluray vs. HD-DVD (Bluray just lost more slowly).
- o1iver 13y ago
  Why did Bluray loose? I love Bluray. And I buy them too...
  - dasil003 13y ago
    He means disc growth is stagnant with all future growth apparently going to streaming.
  - mercurialohearn 13y ago
    i think he's referring to the fact that disc-based delivery of content is quickly becoming obsolete.

archivator 13y ago

Slightly offtopic but can you point me to a description of said font issues? My Android Studio (IDEA) fonts seem fine (on latest Kubuntu and Fedora w/ KDE).

SamColes 13y ago
IDEA-57233 Editor font antialising/appearance problems on Linux http://youtrack.jetbrains.com/issue/IDEA-57233 http://youtrack.jetbrains.com/issue/IDEA-57233
- stoolpigeon 13y ago
  I had huge issues with swing fonts. Bad enough that I bought a couple jetbrains products that I wasn't using at all. Then when the Android Studio came out I installed it just to look at it and noticed it looked good. I fired up my other swing stuff and saw noticeable improvement. This is on Fedora 18 (64 bit if it matters, KDE is my desktop) with the Oracle JVM. I don't know what changed - if it was something in Fedora, Java or what - but I'm pretty happy with how things look now, whereas before I couldn't stand it. I tried all the java switches and what not to no avail - but now it just works. All that said, KDevelop has made such great strides I can see it becoming my primary environment for all my development.
- timrichard 13y ago
  Hi, have you tried the AAHack plugin? It made a difference for me when running IDEA on Arch/Gnome.

jemeshsu 13y ago

> They tried to emulate apple while forgetting that people that bought into apple ideology already had apple. Agreed. Their enterprise offering is strong. And one day they will realize it is IBM that is their destiny, and drop out of consumer market.

arethuza 13y ago
"IBM that is their destiny" Which means becoming a company built around professional services which will mean a lot of unhappy Microsoft partners.
- Shorel 13y ago
  I have always thought that being a Microsoft partner is already a corporate suicide note. They are ruthless when trying to earn more money from existing business lines. Here we were customers of some company who sold Exchange hosting, now we login into outlook.com. And all this without having into account the discontinued products because of internal politics. Think XNA Game Studio.
  - serge2k 13y ago
    Their setup works well with companies that are willing and able to pay tons for a setup that works well top to bottom. Last job used MS for everything, but they got a setup which worked well and anyone they hired could use. Plus it's well supported (although they were stuck on XP still, that's going to be lots of money).
astrodust 13y ago
Microsoft has no hope of becoming an IBM. IBM manufactures lots of hardware, produces new technology it licenses, and has an enormous software consulting division. Microsoft does none of these things. If anything, Microsoft will become like Computer Associates (CA Technologies), a company that milks products enterprise is hooked on and can't quit, squeezing money out of these things for decades to come.
- 13y ago

_pmf_ 13y ago

The reasons why Microsoft fail seem so petty. They are technologically probably the most advanced company, but ruin it by dubious politics.

rbanffy 13y ago
> They are technologically probably the most advanced company I disagree. Their technology is mostly OK, and, surely, they seem managed by idiots, but I wouldn't dare to call them "the most advanced company" when compared to even most software companies.
riskable 13y ago
> They are technologically probably the most advanced company What?!? How could you possibly believe that when you know they're all using Windows in Redmond. It has absolutely zero technical superiority over everything else out right now (e.g. Linux, Mac OS X, iOS, etc). I don't want to say which company is the most technically superior right now but I'd probably start my investigation at Google because of things like Google Glass, Google Now, self-driving cars, Maps & Street View, and a search engine that still bests everything else out there by huge margins.
- nivla 13y ago
  >It has absolutely zero technical superiority over everything else out right now. Not necessarily in the enterprise market. Based off my experience, their enterprise softwares are vastly superior other alternatives. May I also mention the advancements of Kinect? The ability to scan and display with a great deal of accuracy: your body skeleton, your heart rate, muscle maps, etc is pretty awesome. I find whatever comes out of Microsoft Research to be very exciting. However the truth is most are killed even before they make it to the market (remember Microsoft Courier?), thanks to their internal politics.
  - riskable 13y ago
    Yeah, so vastly superior that they can't even convince their enterprise customers to adopt their latest platforms (phones, tabets) and operating system (Windows 8). Also, do you realize that the Kinect technology was developed outside of Microsoft? It was invented by an Israeli company: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PrimeSense http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PrimeSense Microsoft just licensed their technology for use in the Kinect. So if you consider licensing someone else's inventions as, "the most technologically advanced" then yeah; Kinect is pretty good as far as game-playing technology goes.

sentenza 13y ago

From my experience, Arch with KDE and XP/Win7 are extremely similar with regards to user experience quality, so that I myself wouldn't be willing to call one or the other better. At this point, a person more used to Windows might get annoyed by having to edit config files on Arch/KDE every so often, and a person more into Linux might be frustrated that in Windows, some things can't be easily fixed. But these are more differences in preference than in quality.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
kryten 13y ago
Quality really hits you when you have to set up postfix, dovecot-lda, dovecot imap, ldap auth and an NFS share to store mail on. I'd genuinely rather use exchange and active directory!

laumars 13y ago

Arch's fonts can be prettified a lot with Ubuntu patches from AUR: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Font_Configuration#Ubuntu https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Font_Configuration#Ubun... (I'm another Arch + KDE user - both at home and at work)

venomsnake 13y ago
I used infiniality and the result is beautiful. From what I was able to deduce it was a mix of phpstorm bolding everything way too much, JDK refusing to use rendering and some dpi issues (a letter in storm is almost twice smaller than in kwrite) But my experiences with arch are very positive so far.

astrodust 13y ago

What made them win the PC war was what landed them in federal court. By controlling the Windows ecosystem they could "disrupt" any competitors trying to produce applications, pushing Office while alternatives struggled, and they could use Office to push Windows. Charging OEMs a flat "per-CPU" fee for licensing meant that Microsoft was getting paid regardless of the OS being shipped on the system. They eventually had to stop doing this, but came up with other ways of achieving the same effect. There's no Office for game consoles. No matter how popular your title is, another platform will have an exclusive of their own that's just as compelling. They can't strong-arm OEMs because they are the one making and selling the hardware. Linux has all the technology needed to overcome Windows, lacking only fit and finish.

sauravc 13y ago
What landed them in Federal Court was bundling a browser (the most advanced at the time) with their OS for free. Over a decade later, we all know that a consumer OS that ships without a browser is an incomplete product (as BillG testified in the case). What Apple is doing now with dictatorial actions in its app stores is just as, if not more, overreaching IMHO. Does that make it OK? No. But keep in mind why people were actually interested in what MS had to offer back then. Just as we still buy Apple products despite their anti-competitive behavior, people bought MSFT products in the largely because the product addressed their needs better than others and the price was right.
- erikpukinskis 13y ago
  They did more than bundle a browser, they gave OEMs financial incentives NOT to bundle Netscape. The reason why Apple's dictatorial actions don't bother me is they're only a small part of the market. If I want to develop a mobile web browser, I can still use Android and have a market. With Windows, Microsoft WAS the market.
  - venomsnake 13y ago
    With the tablets there was a time (roughly a year) when Apple was the market.

podperson 13y ago

Microsoft had all the cards back in 2008, maybe. The missteps started with Vista and Zune, and continued with Windows Phone 7, and were magnified with Windows 8, Windows 8 RT, and now XBox One. There's also the big non-step of trying to starve the iPad by not porting Office to it -- which has made it glaringly obvious how little we need Office to get stuff done. I'd say Microsoft's problem now is pretty intractable. I think it's quite possible there will be no victor in XBox One vs. PS4 just as there was no victor in Bluray vs. HD-DVD (Bluray just lost more slowly).

o1iver 13y ago
Why did Bluray loose? I love Bluray. And I buy them too...
- dasil003 13y ago
  He means disc growth is stagnant with all future growth apparently going to streaming.
- mercurialohearn 13y ago
  i think he's referring to the fact that disc-based delivery of content is quickly becoming obsolete.