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Microsoft Open Source Windows Linux

What If They Replaced Windows With Microsoft Linux? (techrepublic.com) 239

Following up on speculation from Eric Raymond and ZDNet contributing editor Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, open source advocate Jack Wallen imagines what would happen if Microsoft just switched over altogether from Windows to a Linux distro named "Microsoft Linux": A full-on Linux distribution released by Microsoft would mean less frustration for all involved. Microsoft could shift its development efforts on the Windows 10 desktop to a desktop that would be more stable, dependable, flexible, and proven. Microsoft could select from any number of desktops for its official flavor: GNOME, KDE, Pantheon, Xfce, Mint, Cinnamon... the list goes on and on. Microsoft could use that desktop as is or contribute to it and create something that's more in-line with what its users are accustomed to...

[U]sers would very quickly learn what it's like to work on a desktop computer and not have to deal with the daily frustrations that come with the Windows operating system. Updates are smoother and more trustworthy, it's secure, and the desktop just makes more sense. Microsoft has been doing everything in its power to migrate users from the standard client-based software to cloud and other hosted solutions, and its software cash cow has become web-centric and subscription-based. All of those Linux users could still work with Microsoft 365 and any other Software as a Service (SaaS) solution it has to offer — all from the comfort and security of the Linux operating system...

If Microsoft plays its cards right, the company could re-theme KDE or just about any Linux desktop in such a way that it's not all that different from the Windows 10 interface. Lay this out right, and consumers might not even know the difference — a "Windows 11" would simply be the next evolution of the Microsoft desktop operating system. Speaking of winning, IT pros would spend less time dealing with viruses, malware, and operating system issues and more time on keeping the network (and the servers powering that network) running and secure... Microsoft would be seen as finally shipping an operating system worthy of the consumer; the consumer would have a desktop operating system that didn't deliver as many headaches as it did moments of actual productivity and joy; and the Linux community would finally dominate the desktop.

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What If They Replaced Windows With Microsoft Linux?

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  • Gnome Metro (Score:2, Insightful)

    by KiloByte ( 825081 )

    Yes, they may possibly get it right. But judging from Microsoft's history, they'll rather take Gnome3 and make it even worse.

    Just imagine Gnome3 mixed with Metro :/ The new control panel ("Settings") is already there.

    • EEE (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Excelcia ( 906188 ) <slashdot@excelcia.ca> on Sunday October 11, 2020 @06:56AM (#60594138) Homepage Journal

      If Microsoft came out with Linux, it would not be Linux as we know it. Embrace Extend Extinguish is not dead. Neither is Microsoft's love affair with software as a (paid) service. Neither is Microsoft's need for control. There is zero chance they will move to a platform where they have less ability to enforce compulsory updates. There is just too much deep knowledge of Linux and its subsystems in the wild - if Microsoft came out with a Linux that was in any way recognizable as a distro, it would be 30 minutes before instructions on how to permanently disable mandatory updates was posted. Another 30 and instructions on how to get it working with apt. The next day the necessary changes would be available as a downloadable patch even the dumbest user could run.

      No, the only option they would have would be to use the Linux kernel only. It would be Linux the way Android is Linux, or even less. A custom kernel with huge opaque blobs and nothing really recognizable on top. This holds zero interest for me or, for that matter, the wider nerd community. It would still be Windows and Microsoft would still be the scorpion on the frog's back. Which kernel it has at its deepest layer makes no difference.

      • Re:EEE (Score:4, Interesting)

        by currently_awake ( 1248758 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @08:45AM (#60594336)
        Use standard linux underneath, with a custom Microsoft desktop that looks just like windows and runs Windows programs (full backwards compatibility) and Android programs. Management would run it because it's what they know, and they would mandate everyone else gets it because compatibility and it has that Linux stuff you developers and administrators wanted.
      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by thegarbz ( 1787294 )

        Embrace Extend Extinguish is not dead.

        Don't be daft. EEE is dead for Microsoft for multiple reasons.

        a) The market conditions don't exist or support EEE, nor does it make even the tiniest bit of sense. MS isn't losing money on Linux, they have actively monetized it. Linux is a profit centre for them.
        b) To enact EEE you need to attack something financially and convince the world you're better to adopt your incompatibility. There's no financial incentive involved with many small companies and countless community driven volunteer projects. And as f

    • by Forty Two Tenfold ( 1134125 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @07:58AM (#60594218)
      fckgw-rhqq2-yxrkt-8tg6w-2b7q8
    • by Applehu Akbar ( 2968043 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @08:09AM (#60594240)

      Yes, they may possibly get it right. But judging from Microsoft's history, they'll rather take Gnome3 and make it even worse.

      Just imagine Gnome3 mixed with Metro :/ The new control panel ("Settings") is already there.

      Let's see now...Linux Vista, now with a Registry!

    • It will be rebranded as Xenix NT.
    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Kisai ( 213879 )

      Microsoft will never "switch to Linux" as that would destroy the core value of having Microsoft Windows as the defacto default OS on all desktop PC's.

      Besides, look no further than the Microsoft Nokia phones to see how much of a disaster this would be. Microsoft has fumbled every attempt at a non- x86 Windows OS. The closest they ever had was with Windows Mobile (WindowsCE) before they threw that OS out for what became Windows Phone 7 and just utterly botched it.

      The problem is that Linux has zero value as a

  • by Bad Ad ( 729117 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @05:40AM (#60593986)
    Honestly, do you seriously believe this nonsense? Day to day, people don't "suffer" with the Windows desktop. I can honestly count on 1 hand how many times a year someone has a computer issue that halts work at my company. I can tell you that if you gave "normal" users linux, you would get far more frustration and lost time than what you seem to think Windows causes.

    The people making this comments are "open source advocates", its not a view thats actually shown in day to day jobs, its people who are tied into a mindset. Its like religion than an actual business/technical/reality discussion.

    Mod me down all you like, but honestly, if you think this would work with the vast majority of the population (us technical folk are a minority) - you have not got out enough and met normal people.
    • by Bad Ad ( 729117 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @05:44AM (#60594000)
      I can also tell you, no normal user is getting "joy" from their operating system. Windows or Linux. These type of comments just show how deluded the people saying them are and that they don't represent the people they are claiming to be helping from the evil of Windows.
    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by sg_oneill ( 159032 )

      Yeah this is delusional.

      Yes, Windows on a linux kernel running Win32/64 type apis and a windows desktop in a similar manner to how MacOS works does make some sense. But Gnome or KDE? God no. Aint gonna happen.

      And there are fundamental conceptual differences that make things a lot more complicated. Linux doesnt have concepts of C: / D: type drives. The threading model is fundamentally different, and so on. You can still do it. Wine actually works pretty well these days. But theres hard work involved in gett

      • by jeremyp ( 130771 )

        I'm not entirely sure why everybody seems so obsessed with this idea that Windows with a Linux kernel would be better than it is now. There's no reason to believe the Linux kernel is superior to the Windows kernel.

        • by tepples ( 727027 )

          There's no reason to believe the Linux kernel is superior to the Windows kernel.

          Faster I/O and faster subprocess launching under Linux compared to Windows make at least software build processes run much faster when I'm booted into Linux than when I'm booted into Windows 10.

      • And there are fundamental conceptual differences that make things a lot more complicated. Linux doesnt have concepts of C: / D: type drives.

        That's irrelevant, though. Wine solves that problem completely.

        The threading model is fundamentally different, and so on.

        No, the threading model is fundamentally similar [uic.edu].

      • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        What would the point of Windows on a Linux kernel be? What would it even look like?

        Microsoft won't ditch everything that people have invested vast amounts of time and money in. Apps, certifications, decades of personal experience. Just improving WINE isn't going to cut it, it would have to be heavily integrated so that e.g. Group Policy affects the underlying Linux kernel too.

        Even stuff like the filesystem would be a nightmare. Windows is case insensitive, Linux isn't.

        And by the time they had made it all ki

    • If you think isong Windows isn't suffering, you clearly haven't experienced what level of power, freedom, automation and adaptability is out there. No offense.

      It's like "I can't go back to Playboy now!". After a decade of using *actual* Linux, not colorful clickables that try to imitate Windows and macOS and be a desktop, going back to Windows, or even Ubuntu, is cumbersome and so limiting it feels crippling. Even if you tried to adapt it to you as much as you expect now, and if you tried to automate as muc

      • Apparently you didn't understand Bad Ad's comment. Normal people don't even know they have an operating system ...
      • by jeremyp ( 130771 )

        I expect my OS to keep out of my way so I can run the applications I want. I don't want to spend ages making my OS "fit ike a glove", I've got better things to do with my time.

      • by martynhare ( 7125343 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @09:12AM (#60594422)
        Of all the things listed the one that I agree with the most is bug reporting. I want to submit a bug for things like Windows Firewall policy on 20H2 for "Recommended Troubleshooting Client (HTTP/HTTPS Out)" allowing the Windows Update service to communicate, despite the referenced service being TroubleshootingSvc and not wuauserv. There's no place for me to report it. This problem gets worse when Microsoft decides that some bugs should only be fixed in the next twice-yearly feature update.

        With that said, Linux is not what it used to be back when every kernel was 2.6.x, when GTK2 and Qt3 where in vogue. These days, anything/everything you choose to use now radically changes every 3-5 years to the point where you can't keep your customisations working long-term. This is assuming your software doesn't get discontinued or dumped outright.

        I used to run full time with a minimalist window manager and only the required features compiled in. It was heavenly. My computer would run just the code I needed it to run to do whatever I wanted to accomplish. You're completely right in that sense. It's hard to describe but it's the very opposite of what aaS'y services provide us with today, I really enjoyed the 00s with Linux, it was perfect and the we even had two budding alternatives on the horizon. As a community, we had OpenSolaris on the way as a potential "Linux-killer" (at the time) and FreeBSD was doing extremely well to reach feature parity, while competing on speed with its Linuxulator kernel personality sometimes outperforming the real deal.

        However, the good old days have come to an end. A number of large corporations started shoehorning in the same type of integrated stacks that Windows and macOS relies upon. The dungheap of RPC that Windows relies upon has been replicated in Linux with DBus and alongside increasing reliance upon udev, came bloat. Rather than fixing Xorg to make GUI-driven privileged applications safer to use, the community made PolicyKit and started separating out frontends from backends. Then came PackageKit. Somewhere in-between all this we had PulseAudio, which made my PC at the time unusable for multimedia, as it took audio processing outside of the kernel, resulting in crackling, stuttering and nightmare fuel. Just like how audio got ruined, so did video. Somehow, Linux went from having hardware 2D acceleration, to having none, completely overnight. Now, we wrap everything in a layer of OpenGL to avoid screen tearing and waste tons of RAM in the process.

        As an end-user and system administrator with mediocre (at best) programming skills, I've come to realise that freedom isn't all about source code availability but also well-designed core libraries staying relevant for a long time. Until late 2018, with a couple of simple registry changes, people could still run a 32-bit copy of Windows XP on a single-core CPU with 2GB RAM, receive patches for key security vulnerabilities and continue to browse the Internet and play many video games just fine. Any well-software designed to work on Windows XP (as per Microsoft guidelines) still works fully on Windows 10 64-bit to this day. In that time, Linux distros have outright killed key userspace libraries multiple times over, including audio, graphics, UI widget libraries and HTML renderers. Following Linux best practices and designing software to follow FHS and LSB guidelines yields non-functional binaries when run on distros in 2020.

        Overall, I'm a happy Windows user in 2020, despite knowing way more than I should ever need to about both systems internals.
    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by JonJ ( 907502 )

      Honestly, do you seriously believe this nonsense?

      Anyone who takes the insane ramblings of SJVN or ESR seriously need to check in to the nearest mental institution. Those two are the biggest fucking idiots on the planet. Microsoft is not planning to ditch NT for Linux, not now, not ever. What they are doing is making it easy to do the "Linux stuff" in Windows, you might even say they are embracing Linux, and they're extending Windows to work with a Linux workflow. I wonder what might come next.

    • Old MacOS 9 was a total disaster from a kernel perspective and Apple took Next which was built on BSD and made MacOS/X

      They did a very good job combining the power of Unix with a good UI

      That said, I think all of this is wishful thinking by fanatic Microsoft hating Linux fanboys

    • I don't agree with Wallen, as that "Microsoft Linux" would still have the central problem every other Linux out there has, not being able to run Windows applications. None out of the box, many not even with the help of compatibility addons.

      But you're wrong, too. I know people who are so far from being 'technical folk' that they put up with the existence of a computer at home only because they can't completely avoid one, and I know some who got so mad about what Microsoft tried to feed them after Windows 7 t

    • by c ( 8461 )

      Honestly, do you seriously believe this nonsense?

      No.

      I think for most of the Linux crowd, speculation about anything from self-anointed "open source advocates" goes right into the bit bucket. And if ESR's name is associated with the speculation, we remove a few things from the bit bucket first so we're sure it's not going to accidentally fall out.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • by msk ( 6205 )

      I suffer with Windows every work day.

      Does that suffering lead to a total work stoppage? Rarely.

      Does Windows make doing my job painful? Always.

    • Day to day, people don't "suffer" with the Windows desktop.

      I would extend this statement with a second caveat. Even if people were "suffering" due to Windows, their reason for it is due to specific configuration and design choices of Microsoft's user facing applications and user experience. That experience would be ported to Linux. e.g. A poster above was talking about Windows users suddenly being exposed to apt-update, don't be silly. The windows user will be exposed to the usual "your updates are ready to install, pick a time to reboot" and nothing more.

      But reali

    • About the biggest annoyances I have with windows 10 stem around its ridiculous need to reboot. Its not that it actually NEEDS to reboot, but every time you install anything the stupid system claims it needs to reboot. Also its update process will reboot the thing in the middle of the night, again not usually needed. If its going to reboot itself, the least it can do is try yo reopen every app and browser page. You know its possible, because laptops have been doing a sort of suspend mode for a long time. Th

    • The user experience is what people suffer with on Windows. Every piece of software has its own update tool, every hardware has a system tray app, everything wants to load on startup in the background, there are 6 or 7 different UIs each with their own quirks* and everything is in a constant state of tinkering over at MS. Everyone hates the new Outlook and Skype, Lync was garbage but people are stuck using them because of integration, MS Office, especially Word and Excel are hobbled with anachronisms and qui

  • by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @05:56AM (#60594024)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • The end-point OS is becoming less and less relevant. As soon as MS notices that they can save themselves the hassle of maintaining a system and change it without anybody noticing it will happen. They could've moved to linux 10 years ago, but it wouldn't have looked that good. Now they can, because less and less people give a flying f*ck about the actual kernel running their stuff.

    MS will probably switch to the Linux ecosystem sometime in the foreseeable future. If they're smart that is. And if they play their cards right, they'll take a huge dump into the Apple soup along the way. If MS has the opinion leaders half way on board with the Windows variant of linux, Google and Apple will have some head-scratching going on.

  • Microsoft has more than enough resources to port their own windowmanager to linux if they wanted to make a Windows Linux. And I would probably use it too because it is the only part of windows which really is better than any linux windowsmanager.
    • thats what i think microsoft would do, they would build their own desktop environment instead of adopting gnome or kde
  • Microsoft could do many things to improve, but first they would have to
    a) have even a passing interest in making a better user experience.
    b) have even a passing interest in making a more robust, secure product.
    c) have the technical competence to do either a) or b)
    d) have the competence to notice the existing shortcomings

    You might equally say that a cage full of poo-flinging monkeys could use their brains and dexterity to construct a functional toilet and improve the sanitation.

    • c I agree with, but given the amount of money they spend on a and b clearly those hurdles are already passed.

    • You left out the big one:

      E. Actually lose money due to what they're doing.

      Ever since Nadella took over and trashed the traditional "money for product" business model, their stock has picked itself up off the floor and started growing again. As long as herding people like sheep turns a profit, they'll keep at it. They've modeled themselves less as a proprietary software vendor, and more as a services/adware company... like some sick blend of Apple, FaceBook and Amazon web services. As a long time user of

  • by hackertourist ( 2202674 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @06:04AM (#60594038)

    The article spends only one sentence on the most important part of such a transition: all of the software that would have to be ported or made to work under WINE.
    Microsoft has been pretty good about maintaining backwards compatibility, so there's a massive pile of programs that would have to be accounted for.

    • The article spends only one sentence on the most important part of such a transition: all of the software that would have to be ported or made to work under WINE.
      Microsoft has been pretty good about maintaining backwards compatibility, so there's a massive pile of programs that would have to be accounted for.

      Well that's the problem. The vast majority of software that would have to be ported is not made by Microsoft. Making a Linux/Windows OS would then be an enormous exercise in backwards compatibility.

  • Just look at Steam. Or one of those container types.

    They not only ignore all the Unix ideas, but call them stupid because they haven't got a clue about the reasons it evolved to be that way over decades of experience, and go treat Linux as if it was just a weird Windows.
    Their files an directories are in completely the wrong places, if they log at all, it is not integrated and you can't set the log level, their version numbers mean nothing, they don't integrate into the package manager, you can't set any ins

  • Seriously we all have had at least one application or one piece of hardware that simply would not work in wine. Be it through an obscure piece of hardware or an obscure API call microsoft know the cost / benefit ration in not doing this. For me i have some shimano diagnostic software at work that does not play with wine and at home i never used windows 10 since testing the alpha because it would never to this day work with an expensive 16 channel firewire soundcard. Wintel 32 legacy is windows golden goose
  • by evanism ( 600676 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @06:09AM (#60594050) Journal

    Reading this breathless exhortation reminded me of the crap that spews out of North Korean TV.

    Nobody on Win10 "suffers". Nobody who uses it daily gives a rats ass about all the crap espoused here.

    Have a newbie try and use Linux and they will be ripping out their hair. It is NOT FUN.

    • >"Have a newbie try and use Linux and they will be ripping out their hair. It is NOT FUN."

      Actually, if by "newbie" you mean someone that doesn't understand computers at all, the experience is likely to be about the same under Linux as with MS-Windows. The the exception being of not being able to run commercial software XXX package they might want, and that is not Linux 's "fault."

      And if you mean someone that has had decades experience of using MS-Windows and now uses Linux, the pain is probably no worse

      • by Entrope ( 68843 )

        A significant part of "not being able to run commercial software XXX" is the habit of userspace "platform" libraries to borrow the kernel's approach to kernel code compatibility rather than it's approach to userspace compatibility. They spend a lot of time moving the deck chairs around rather than dealing with the loss of library integrity. In that respect, the lack of commercial software is GNU/Linux's fault.

    • Nobody on Win10 "suffers".

      There are days where yes, I do suffer. Windows 10 repeatedly gets in the way of me trying to do something. Here's something for you. Why is it those annoying flyouts will stay on screen practically forever unless you either wait long enough for them to disappear on their own or have to go out of my way to physically get them to disappear? I don't need a five minute add reminding me about OneDrive.

      Conversely, why is it when my password needs changed, that same flyout lasts all of

      • Here's one. I have found that double-clicking something doesn't always do anything. I have gotten so used to the Windows 10 not recognizing this simple command that I've resorted to clicking the item once then hitting the Enter key.

        I thought I was alone here. This happens frequently... so much so that the Enter key has become another mouse button for me; a quick reach and tap with the thumb is second nature now when opening documents.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      Have a newbie try and use Linux and they will be ripping out their hair. It is NOT FUN.

      That is the biggest bunch of horseshit ever. My 75 year old mother bought a HP laptop at a Black Friday sale. I was running Win10. It ran like shit, to the point it was almost unusable. I persuaded her to let me switch it to Linux. I installed Mint with KDE as the desktop. I didn't hear much more about from her. I wasn't even sure if she still used it. Two years later, she called me because Mint was telling her it needed to upgrade. On my next visit to her place, I did the upgrade. But I first check the sys

    • by xleeko ( 551231 )

      All software is shit. Everyone suffers.

      Three weeks ago, a Win10 machine installed some updates and started running at 10% speed. Nobody could figure out why. Last night, my wife handed me her Ubuntu laptop with a grub prompt and said "It wanted me to install some updates now it won't boot"

      The "average" user is completely at the mercy of both camps, and it always falls to "their friend who knows about computers" to dig them out of whatever hole they are in. In this respect, Chromebooks and phones ha

    • Nobody on Win10 "suffers". Nobody who uses it daily gives a rats ass about all the crap espoused here.

      I bought a laptop which came with Windows 10. It is actually more stable running Mint. Suspend/resume works slightly less well, but everything else works at least as well as it did on Win10. Windows 10 was also a performance nightmare. Sometimes the OS alone was enough to choke the system into worthlessness.

  • If they don't replace it, we're fucked. If they do replace it, we're fucked. We're fucked either which way.

  • What gets me about this is the idea that MS will need to get everyone to redevelop all their apps into Linux.

    All the security vendors, all the management plane, all the bugs that they ironed out...

    Every single third party application will need to be moved... I remember when Apple did it years ago, changed CPUs from 68k to x86 and made everyone redevelop their software to change architecture, it would be an even bigger undertaking for MS to do the same thing.

    Another thing in the technology stack that nobody

    • >"What gets me about this is the idea that MS will need to get everyone to redevelop all their apps into Linux."

      Yep. That is the part that is being glossed over. Or they are just thinking "oh, well, everything will eventually be cloud-based anyway, so it doesn't matter." I don't know about most people, but I don't want my computer to be "cloud based." Privacy and control are some of the reasons I choose to use Linux, both are lost with "cloud" apps.

  • Microsoft could possibly make a clean break with new Linux based OS running on RISC-V but they would lose all their 40 years of legacy combability. Emulation wouldn't be enough for specialist applications. UWP couldn't replace Win32 so a new operating system would fail even more.
    • UWP on Edge OS is the most likely scenario if they're outsourcing (Chromium) OS development to Google. They get a web container, an Android runtime and a WSL equivalent (Crostini).

      Win32 would run optionally in a VM. Don't modern enterprise versions of Windows already include an XP hyper-v container for legacy stuff?

  • by misnohmer ( 1636461 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @06:19AM (#60594074)

    Try assigning file permissions to a process on Linux. Linux kernel simply does not support things such as file permissions per process. There are a number of features which Windows kernel has, which Linux kernel is missing. Maybe Microsoft could implement those features in Linux kernel, but how long would it take to get those accepted, if they are ever accepted? Driving consensus in OSS takes time and patience and is never guaranteed to succeed. Getting Linus to sign off on advanced integrated tracing solutions for example (vs. his favorite printk ) is an uphill battle which has caused Linux forks before. Unless we're talking forking Linux kernel into Microsoft Linux kernel, where Microsoft retains all control, then maybe.

    • Why is this even an important feature?

      • It's obvious why this is important. Take a look at Android sometime. Apps can't do stuff to other apps. Android uses SElinux to do this, which is a core Linux kernel feature, so GP doesn't know what they're talking about. It's an important feature, which Linux has, and in fact has had for years.

      • Ask the apparmor and selinux teams who implement specifically that. The idea is simple, an app is not a user. Linux works around this by making a user for each damn app service. A better option would be to start that as a common user account and restrict app permissions. The user on my system is "root, and garbz" not "root, garbz, nginx, deluged, libvirt-qemu, lxd, uuidd", and shit man I don't even know what half of those accounts are for. I'm a user I don't have a PhD in Linuxing.

    • Try assigning file permissions to a process on Linux. Linux kernel simply does not support things such as file permissions per process.

      You can do that with capabilities-based security on linux, like with AppArmor or SElinux. In fact that's mostly what AppArmor is used for, keeping processes from dicking with files that don't belong to them.

      Got anything else completely false to say in support of Windows?

    • Linux kernel simply does not support things such as file permissions per process.

      Ironically all the problems I've had with Linux in the past couple of years has been exactly the transition to this. Get "unable to access" so check users, check groups, tear out hair, check them again, still nothing, apply chmod 777 to the damn file, NOTHING, WTF, pull out more hair, dig through logs, find that the last update changed a config file for AppArmor that is blocking this one specific damn program from accessing this one specific damn file.

      It's quite funny to see that as soon as a Linux program

  • by Dausha ( 546002 )

    Microsoft will more likely use BSD, like Apple, because of its more business-friendly license terms

  • No, thank you. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by MrKaos ( 858439 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @06:27AM (#60594098) Journal

    The Ui for linux has slowly been degrading functionality since it started apealling to a larger audience. There was a time when I could drag stuff between workspaces at a time when Windows or Mac didn't even know what a workspace was.

    I want the full power of the machine, I don't want the fluff of windows or mac UIs, they feel patronising, like they're trying to steal my attention. I don't want my mindspace polluted with advertising. I like the minimalist, austere functional UI of Gnome2 best. Sure I like desktop candy too and sometimes I set up a mind blowing UI on my desktop but at the end of the day I don't really care and I just want to get on with what I'm doing without the OS getting in my way.

    I hope we never loose that about Linux. I don't care if it's never the year of the linux desktop and no one likes it. All I care about is that *I* like it and it helps me get what I need to do done.

    Whenever Microsoft gets involved, it's all about Microsoft doing its Embrace, Extend, Extinguish thing where there once was a community.

    • The Ui for linux has slowly been degrading functionality since it started apealling to a larger audience. There was a time when I could drag stuff between workspaces at a time when Windows or Mac didn't even know what a workspace was.
      I want the full power of the machine, I don't want the fluff of windows or mac UIs, they feel patronising, like they're trying to steal my attention. I don't want my mindspace polluted with advertising. I like the minimalist, austere functional UI of Gnome2 best.

      I installed MINT with MATE and I can drag stuff between workspaces and still have GNOME 2. What's the problem?

  • Even if they did. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by DarkOx ( 621550 ) on Sunday October 11, 2020 @06:31AM (#60594106) Journal

    Microsoft wants people moving to the cloud because that is continuing revenue even if they STOP innovating entirely.

    When it came to the desktop application space they'd really already hit a wall. Please tell me what anyone in the class of %99 percent of users needs (as opposed to might use very occasionally) a feature not in say Office 2003? Right the only one is compatibility with newer versions, the only reason a larger org has to replace all their 2003 licenses with current versions is they can't get more 2003 licenses for additional employees. The writing was on the wall. Until we have another shift in the hardware we are using the desktop computing experience is about at thee end of its evolution. Tools like tablets and mobile phones are where the push toward paperless is happening now.

    So the future of Microsoft traditional core businesses was going to be in hostage taking, it was play the transparent, change for change make new stuff not work with the old stuff or at least go SAAS and sell people on the idea they are managing all that pesky licensing and support for you.

    That said Windows as an Azure client is interesting fundamentally because of the other legacy software (or software with a windows legacy) most places still depend on and will continue to depend on. Linux dressed up to look like windows will never fit that bill. However Linux with the real and actual win32, full .Net libraries (not core), full suite of legacy COM objects, platform on top where its just kernel and file system layout virtual or otherwise is what all those old apps expect, and its a fully supported first party implementations not WINE, well that I can easily see working out just fine technically.

    The real question then is why? The kernel really isnt the hard part folks. 20 years of asking "Is this the year of Linux on the desktop" should tell you that. Its the upper end of the application stack that matters. If it was not Apple could never have pushed MacOS Classic as far as it did with its deep design weakness into an era of highspeed CPUs with MMUs.

    • When it came to the desktop application space they'd really already hit a wall. Please tell me what anyone in the class of %99 percent of users needs (as opposed to might use very occasionally) a feature not in say Office 2003?

      --64-bit support; multiprocessor support
      --More than 65,000 rows in Excel (yeah, yeah, it should be a database by then...but any finance department with more than three people has at least one spreadsheet that big)
      --Intelligent fill-down an fill-across commands (far more aware of patterns)
      --Search for commands
      --Multiple Exchange accounts in a single Outlook profile; Activesync support
      --Lots of new Powerpoint animations and transitions and transparency support and photo editing tools
      --Lots of new document tem

  • then microsoft's development can focus on apps and the desktop environment, it could work, and i would love to see what steve monkeyboy ballmer had to say about it if it did happen, would he say Windows has cancer???
  • Linux people don't want to work under MS, so MS people should get know linux well, and they are not doing it fine. It's a religion, you can't change that.
    They're still unable to make .net core work correctly under typical linux infrastructure, what does make us think that they can handle the rest correctly?

  • what would happen if Microsoft just switched over altogether from Windows to a Linux distro named "Microsoft Linux":

    The first thing that would happen is that a huge amount of third-party "windows only" hardware would become unusable.

    There is a great deal of hardware that only has windows drivers. Mostly tightly bound to the Windows APIs and the internals of the Windows kernel. I suspect the manufacturers would simply be unable to port that across. As such, the initiative would become Microsoft's "3D TV" - a marketing failure for a product that nobody wanted.

    For those companies that did re-write their drivers, there wou

    • It's what happened with the NT kernel, which was the VMS kernel imported wholesale. It was published in parallel with the older Windows kernel, which were still used for Win95 and Win98.

    • The first thing that would happen is that a huge amount of third-party "windows only" hardware would become unusable.
      [...]
      The who thing would set the desktop PC world back about 10 years.

      The USDoJ already found that Microsoft set computing back a decade by attacking Linux, etc. They've already done that damage.

      Neither Microsoft nor hardware vendors give two shits about compatibility. The vendors see it as an opportunity to sell you new hardware. Nowhere is this exemplified more strongly than in the case of scanners and printers. New drivers for these will deliberately leave out compatibility with older models even though they speak the same protocols because making you buy a new device is p

  • Wow man, that's some heavy drugs you are on. Maybe read this again after you sober up.

  • How would this impact gaming? Doesn't seem like an easy transition for that.
  • Also, there will still be an infinite number of things to complain about, so the slashdot crowd will be happy too.
  • What would I do?
    I'd shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders.

  • Mac OSX - Free BSD based

    Windows based Linux.

    I can just SEE the flame wars!!! BSD vs Linux fights taken to a new level!! The first fanboy World War!

    Although, I would hope Linus and RMS force MS to pay for suicide counseling for die-hard Linux - profuse hatred for MS - fanboys.

  • Replacing Windows with Linux would completely screw over large enterprises whoâ(TM)ve invested years in Windows infrastructure. Enterprises move so slow thereâ(TM)s still a large subset running 2008 R2. You canâ(TM)t even convince some of them to upgrade past Windows 7. And if they are on Windows 10, itâ(TM)s not even the latest build. Donâ(TM)t even get me started on end usersâ(TM) having to give up years of Windows knowledge. The amount of productivity lost would be ridicul
  • I orefer "what if wolverine became lord of the vampires" or "what if the symbiote infected the Punisher" myself.

  • by jabuzz ( 182671 ) on Monday October 12, 2020 @08:48AM (#60598394) Homepage

    What gets me is nobody has spotted the irony of "Windows 11" being based on Linux where it to happen. Now just add an X before Windows...

We're here to give you a computer, not a religion. - attributed to Bob Pariseau, at the introduction of the Amiga

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