“So far, Windows Vista is an interesting OS. It does quite a lot of things much better than the previous versions but then it also requires way too many resources in order to work appropriately. There are also some slight glitches, but those are probably due to its beta status and nothing more. Besides, this is probably the most successful and productive Beta that ever came out of Microsoft.”
I hope this time they don’t introduce old bugs with new patches.With XP SP2 they introduced the old LAND-attack from ’97.
If it has a registry it will suck.
> If it has a registry it will suck.
You don’t seem to know the reason why Microsoft Windows is the most successful desktop operating system on earth.
– Almost every feature has an API that is accessible to external developers.
– APIs don’t change. If an API is introduced, it remains stable for years.
– It is manageable. Administrators don’t need to write shell scripts and perl scripts to manage thousands of computers and their /etc clutter in a network. REGEDIT.EXE does it for you!
As you can see, the Windows registry is one of several reasons for Microsoft’s incredible success.
> If M$ was smart, they would use XML for store
> configurations. It is plain text and it is easy
> to access from programs.
1. It’s not “M$”, it’s “MS” or “Microsoft”. Writing “M$” instead of “MS” is a sure sign of trollery.
2. Microsoft is the most successful desktop operating system vendor on earth and not you. Please don’t talk as if you were an expert.
3. Configuration doesn’t need to be “plain text” or “human readable”. It needs to be manageable and automatable. That’s what REGEDIT.EXE is for.
XML is slower than binary storage. Try to guess why Oracle databases are not built in form of hundeds of “plain text” or “human readable” XML files. XML is good for interoperability across platforms, but the native configuration storage of an operating system does not need to be interoperable across platforms.
Furthermore, XML is not easier to access from external applications than the Windows registry. Guess why GNOME applications must never, ever write to GNOME’s gconf registry XML files directly: Because they would trash the files and ruin the system sooner or later.
Therefore they must write all the things they want to write through gconfd, and that’s the point: Windows has the same thing, but for more than 10 years and with an API that never changed and will never change. Please try to actually understand things before complaining.
You don’t seem to know the reason why Microsoft Windows is the most successful desktop operating system on earth.
Because of the huge success of ibm pc’s and windows 95, and later Microsoft’s monopolistic position?
– It is manageable. Administrators don’t need to write shell scripts and perl scripts to manage thousands of computers and their /etc clutter in a network. REGEDIT.EXE does it for you!
What?
As you can see, the Windows registry is one of several reasons for Microsoft’s incredible success.
Umm… No?
1. It’s not “M$”, it’s “MS” or “Microsoft”. Writing “M$” instead of “MS” is a sure sign of trollery.
Agreed.
2. Microsoft is the most successful desktop operating system vendor on earth and not you. Please don’t talk as if you were an expert.
Despite this fact, they still manage to pump out inelegant, crufty designs over and over again…
3. Configuration doesn’t need to be “plain text” or “human readable”. It needs to be manageable and automatable. That’s what REGEDIT.EXE is for.
Having them in plain text is good because it means you’re not constrained to any specific editor. This doesn’t mean there can’t be a custom one, but having a choice is always a good thing.
XML is slower than binary storage. Try to guess why Oracle databases are not built in form of hundeds of “plain text” or “human readable” XML files. XML is good for interoperability across platforms, but the native configuration storage of an operating system does not need to be interoperable across platforms.
You’re talking about databases, not configuration files, which rarely get larger than a few kilobytes. The performance aspect rarely comes into play, and using that as your reason to prefer binary configuration files is ignorant to say the least. Plus, I don’t recommend using XML for configuration files; its verbosity doesn’t lend itself well to that type of work.
Furthermore, XML is not easier to access from external applications than the Windows registry. Guess why GNOME applications must never, ever write to GNOME’s gconf registry XML files directly: Because they would trash the files and ruin the system sooner or later.
There’s another reason against using centralized registry-like systems.
– It is manageable. Administrators don’t need to write shell scripts and perl scripts to manage thousands of computers and their /etc clutter in a network. REGEDIT.EXE does it for you!
I’ll take simple, well documented text files and shell scripts over the Lovecraftian horror that is the registry any day.
You don’t seem to know the reason why Microsoft Windows is the most successful desktop operating system on earth.
Willingness to bribe, steal, and lie to take down competitors they can’t beat otherwise? A huge legup by IBM that let them get their tenth rate software entrenched in the hardware installed base? A truly great marketing division, completely untouched by any sense of ethics?
– Almost every feature has an API that is accessible to external developers.
Are there any modern OS’s that can’t make this claim? Apple and Linux both do the job better. (Apple’s documentation is admittedly so much worse than MS that it’s hard to tell.)
If I had a dime for every hour I’ve wasted figuring out why some wretchedly documented Windows API didn’t work as advertised so I could hack around it….
– APIs don’t change. If an API is introduced, it remains stable for years.
See above. If an API has a major bug in it, we can only hope it stays stable, and doesn’t wreck our hack around.
– It is manageable. Administrators don’t need to write shell scripts and perl scripts to manage thousands of computers and their /etc clutter in a network. REGEDIT.EXE does it for you!
It does the job very, very badly compared to the worst of the *nix scripts and config files. And if you make a mistake w/ the registry, (REGEDIT has no Apply, Cancel, or Undo, guys, only full backups) you may get to reinstall the entire OS, not revert a config file and try again.
As you can see, the Windows registry is one of several reasons for Microsoft’s incredible success.
It’s more a symptom of their success. Someone in marketing came up with the idea (more likely just the name) back before Win95; the competent engineers (I would hope) screamed in protest but got overruled; and MS bound itself to (IMHO) the single worst design idea in software history (narrowly beating COM, which isn’t quite as pervasively destructive.)
If it doesn’t it will suck
Funny other operating systems works just fine with binary ini-files.
which OS uses binary INI files? Gnome and KDE aren’t operating systems, so they are out…
The only ones that I know of that are mainstream are the Microsoft operating systems.
“which OS uses binary INI files? Gnome and KDE aren’t operating systems, so they are out… ”
Well, if it’s used in KDE: Suse Linux Pro.
If it’s used in Gnome: RedHat Enterprise Linux.
Do you feel better now?
Psst: I got a secret to tell…
Vista will require a dual core chip to run, prepare to upgrade.
But remember Apple is going to release Mac OS X “Leopard” about the same time, which might run just about all Windows and Linux programs (minus those who depend on Direct X) at just about the same speed as a generic PC box.
2006 is going to be very interesting year.
“Vista will require a dual core chip to run, prepare to upgrade.”
Are you smoking crack??!! It will not. I guess it will require 100GB are RAM too right?
he is not smoking crack.
microsofts recommendations say it does require a dual core chip, 1gb ram and a 3d card with 256mb ram
so shut the fuck up dickhead
Registry sucks. If M$ was smart, they would use XML for store configurations. It is plain text and it is easy to access from programs.
Good article.
Nice to see virtual folders that don’t require a “ln -s”, easy to click search and organize.
By the time Vista comes out terabyte drives will be > $200 so you can basically save everything (unless you are a hopeless leech).
Dual core 64 bit processors will also be commonplace on higher end systems, as well as at least a gigabyte of ram on standard $399 computers.
The PC industry is going to get exciting 2 years from now. I see hardcore competition driving the industry to new levels. There’s no doubt Vista will be impressive.
The PC world has not been exciting in about 7 or 8 years, and won’t be until we get something beyond X86 and what we currently consider desktop OSes.
Besides the fact that you would need a dual core machine to run Vista at a speed that is not too painful they better resolve the registry issues. If Vista still had an “old style” registry that would make it even worse and guarantee to turn off even more potential users.
Turn off what kind of potential users? The ones that already use Linux because they hate Microsoft no matter what they do?
No one beyond geeks gives a crap, or even knows about, the registry.
I don’t know what you are smoking, but I generally found Vista to run more smoothly than XP. But you kinda have to actually load some drivers for it (like the ‘supplemental’ drivers that came with it).
I guess your windows doesn’t have a spellchecker?
> I guess your windows doesn’t have a spellchecker?
1. Complaining about other people’s spelling is a sure sign that the one who complains doesn’t want to contribute to the topic of a discussion.
2. No, my Windows has no spellchecker because my Windows does not exist. Can you imagine that there are people who don’t like registry bashing although they are not using Windows themselves, or is this too difficult for you?
I tried it on a spare machine here;
sempron 2200
2gb ddr ram
nvidia 5500 256mb
120gb western digital hard drive
it borked on the install as it could not recognise the 2gb ram
I tried with only 1gb ram and it installed
it was slow
I then tried to install the other 1gb
crashed again
btw – vista includes a blue-screen for such instances !
back to 1gb and tried a load of my old games.. mohaa did not run after it install
fs98 died at install
enemy territory worked… but framerate was really slow
sorry, but the machine was reformmated and mandriva put back on it… where it runs perfectly well
I can’t believe you are honestly going to pass judegment on a beta operating system because you couldn’t get a couple games to run on it. You are the exact reason why betas are not made publically available.
I can’t believe you are honestly going to pass judegment on a beta operating system because you couldn’t get a couple games to run on it.
Then they’d better work hard before it’s released. The backwards compatible stuff should work, and work well, like it’s done in all previous versions of Windows and people should be testing the new features. If that doesn’t happen then it’s not a beta.
You can’t be serious…It’s a “Beta”. Repeat after me: “It’s a Beta.”
Vista is still a year away from launch and I don’t see how you can make a judgement on a product that’s not going to be announced any time soon. I agree with the other poster; this is EXACTLY the reason why Betas are not made public because people like you don’t understand the reasoning behind them.
I hate this fanboyism mentality…open up your mind and maybe you’ll learn something from another platform.
you two guys are muppets
I had to PAY microsoft money to test their beta software
they said it should run
it is BETA, not ALPHA
there is a difference
Vista is at an Alpha stage, because it is not feature complete. Microsoft using the word Beta is misleading, at best.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Development_stage#Beta
It still looks pretty inelegant to me. Virtual folders are a nice addition, but it’s unlikely they’ll drop their horrible UI.
If it doesn’t it will suck
Funny other operating systems works just fine with binary ini-files.
Are you kidding me? A centralized registry is probably the worst ideas known to man, not to mention a binary one. It’s one of my pet peeves of gnome.
Personally, I think storing the config file and configuration program in an application bundle with the program is the best bet, along with a smart folder that collects the configuration program from each app installed, which allows for centralized modification. Not only that, but, if the config file is stored as text, you can still use a normal text editor for manual configuration if you want.
-bytecoder
Physically it is indeed “centralized.” Logically speaking (from an application’s standpoint) it is not…each application has it’s own reg keys, and they might as well be “local” to the app.
What you mention in your second paragraph will lead to huge bloat, not to mention inconsisten API’s for setting the config settings. Plain text leads to horrible performance, plus what do text editors offer over regedit? You still have to understand the format of either (the text file or the reg key). Neither solution wins in this case.
“You don’t seem to know the reason why Microsoft Windows is the most successful desktop operating system on earth. ”
It has nothing to do with quality but everything with monopoly practices from both M$ and big outsource companies, plus ignorance from around 95% of Windows users, people are not looking for the best but what is most common used, thinking they will be okay if they just follow the other sheep.
Have you ever scrolled through the registry and seen all the hexadecimal trash in there?
If you have seen the souplesse of a module based OS like OSX, you never want to go back to the spaghetti of windows with it’s (very, very poorly implemented) registry.
> It has nothing to do with quality but everything with
> monopoly practices from both M$ and big outsource
> companies, plus ignorance from around 95% of Windows
> users, people are not looking for the best but what is
> most common used, thinking they will be okay if they
> just follow the other sheep.
Sorry, No! It can’t be that easy! What you say is correct, but it can’t be the definite and only reason. If Windows were nothing more than pure trash, then people would suffer from it and sooner or later look for an alternative. It is true that Microsoft used and still uses unfair practices, but this doesn’t mean that non-Microsoft technology is implicitly better than Microsoft technology.
Furthermore, it’s quite arrogant to call Windows users “ignorant”. This might be the case for home users who buy a computer with a bundled operating system and then use it without even looking at alternatives, but it cannot be the case for corporate or governmental users. Just the fact that you have your opinion, which is absolutely OK, doesn’t mean that other people are “ignorant”.
Microsoft criticism is very welcome, but a certain sort of criticism (like “Winblowz crashes four times a day”, “the registry suckz ass because I cannot edit it in vi”, “IE sends personal data to Micro$oft”) gets boring over the time.
As far as it concerns the registry: Try to set the default home page for all female users in a network to http://www.test1.net and for all male users in a network to http://www.test2.net. Do the very same thing first for IE and then for Firefox. Maybe this will show you what the registry enables you to do. No custom perl scripts, just one mouse click. This is easy administration.
And finally, please count the number of registry databases on a typical Linux desktop system:
/etc as a whole is one
/etc/gconf is one for GNOME
/etc/X11, the Xresources database
/usr/share/omf, the first part of the scrollkeeper registry
/var/lib/scrollkeeper, the second part of the scrollkeeper registry
/var/lib/rpm, the software registry
Continue it if you wish. As you can see, Linux systems don’t have one registry, but at least half a dozen of them and still people are saying that a registry is bad. Every UNIX config file has its own format, it must be a nightmare to create parsers for all of them. And the consequence is that there are none and that users are forced to edit them by hand.
There are very few exceptions like SuSE’s YaST, but YaST is bloated, and its bloat is understandable because every single config file needs its own parser because it has its own format. What do people do on UNIX if they experiment with settings? Make a backup copy and test. Then make another backup copy and do the next test.
And so on, until there are dozens of backup copies with .bak and .bak2 and .beforetest3 and .aftertest4 extensions. Who wants to merge them all after the tests are done? On Windows it’s sufficient to click on an exported .REG file, thanks to the registry.
…still people are saying that a registry is bad.
I can’t speak for everyone, but I’m not saying the concept is bad in and of itself. I’m only saying that Microsoft’s implementation of it sucks.
Sorry, No! It can’t be that easy! What you say is correct, but it can’t be the definite and only reason. If Windows were nothing more than pure trash, then people would suffer from it and sooner or later look for an alternative. It is true that Microsoft used and still uses unfair practices, but this doesn’t mean that non-Microsoft technology is implicitly better than Microsoft technology.
You’re kidding, right? Most people think Microsoft = PC and PC = Microsoft; it’s kind of hard to look for an alternative if you don’t have a doubt in your mind that there are none (Apple’s aren’t considered “real” computers, for some god-awful reason). Anyway, it doesn’t particularly bother me–if they want to get screwed over with crappy software, that’s there problem, not mine.
As far as it concerns the registry: Try to set the default home page for all female users in a network to http://www.test1.net and for all male users in a network to http://www.test2.net. Do the very same thing first for IE and then for Firefox. Maybe this will show you what the registry enables you to do. No custom perl scripts, just one mouse click. This is easy administration.
Create two users: ‘male’ and ‘female.’ Configure firefox the way you want for each user, and copy the ‘.mozilla’ directory into the new home directories. I don’t see how having a registry makes this any easier.
And finally, please count the number of registry databases on a typical Linux desktop system:
/etc as a whole is one
/etc/gconf is one for GNOME
/etc/X11, the Xresources database
/usr/share/omf, the first part of the scrollkeeper registry
/var/lib/scrollkeeper, the second part of the scrollkeeper registry
/var/lib/rpm, the software registry
Half of those aren’t even registries, they’re databases. Even still, who said GNU/linux is perfect?
And so on, until there are dozens of backup copies with .bak and .bak2 and .beforetest3 and .aftertest4 extensions. Who wants to merge them all after the tests are done? On Windows it’s sufficient to click on an exported .REG file, thanks to the registry.
It’s also easy to completely tank your entire registry and have to reinstall windows. Not only that, but have you seen how bloated a registry gets if it’s not properly cleaned up after uninstalling an application?
-bytecoder
As far as it concerns the registry: Try to set the default home page for all female users in a network to http://www.test1.net and for all male users in a network to http://www.test2.net. Do the very same thing first for IE and then for Firefox. Maybe this will show you what the registry enables you to do. No custom perl scripts, just one mouse click. This is easy administration.
Nonsense, this is easy because it was provided as is. The fact that it does not work in Firefox just shows that this thing is a hack, and surely not a standard. Now, easy administration means using standards, not hacks.
And finally, please count the number of registry databases on a typical Linux desktop system:
Unfortunately, none of these are registries, but just directories with configuration file. A configuration file is not a registry. You’re confused between central configuration tools and specific configuration files, it’s pathetic !
/etc, /etc/gconf, … are actually standard places to put some specific configuration files, which is a GOOD thing.
And then, you try to twist this good thing into a BAD thing, with wrong logic of course.
The only thing you listed that is a database is the RPM database.
Continue it if you wish. As you can see, Linux systems don’t have one registry, but at least half a dozen of them and still people are saying that a registry is bad. Every UNIX config file has its own format, it must be a nightmare to create parsers for all of them. And the consequence is that there are none and that users are forced to edit them by hand.
Like I said you are confused, Linux systems don’t have registries like you say. Some specific apps perhaps, but Linux systems sure have no such thing. The fact that you think creating parsers for these configuration files (so they are not registries finally ?) is a nightmare shows that you have no knowledge of the power of the command line or the free dev tools. But most importantly, there is no need for parsers for all the files in /etc for example. Worse, you are entirely wrong for the other config files, as gconf has well defined (even DTDs) config files, scrollkeeper too, RPM too, … with frontend to access them without having to edit anything by hand.
There are very few exceptions like SuSE’s YaST, but YaST is bloated, and its bloat is understandable because every single config file needs its own parser because it has its own format.
Stop saying nonsense, Yast does a lot more than the Windows registry !!
What do people do on UNIX if they experiment with settings? Make a backup copy and test. Then make another backup copy and do the next test.
Exactly, except for the other copy. You never need more than one copy of the original, that is, *when* you need a copy. Most of the time you do not need any copy. I don’t understand your nonsense about having to have more than one copy. With most complex config files (Apache, Samba) you NEVER need more than one copy !!
And so on, until there are dozens of backup copies with .bak and .bak2 and .beforetest3 and .aftertest4 extensions. Who wants to merge them all after the tests are done? On Windows it’s sufficient to click on an exported .REG file, thanks to the registry.
Nonsense again. Talk about comparing apples and oranges !!
But I understand the origin of your confusion : you think about everything in Windows term. You see, in a config file (on Linux at least), once you have changed a setting, you can do a thing that will look AMAZING to you : you can comment out the old setting, put your new one, and add a comment about your new or old setting, *in the config file*. That is the very reason why I actually never need more than one backup copy of my original config file !!!
Obviously, you can NEVER do that with your click on your .reg file, and so, you could never imagine there could exist somewhere a config file more powerful. Because while I can do that in my config file, I still can create a small shell script which, when clicked upon, will modify the config file just as you’ve done with your .reg file (I basically use patch or sed with other things like zenity or KDE equivalent to do that).
Ya know, If linux is so great, there whould’nt be
this constant need to come out with new versions
of mandrake or accme linux every week to try to
get it right!!!
Hehe. You’re funny. Have fun with the rest of your pathetic, ignorant life.
-bytecoder
NO… NOW bow down before your computer, “linux”… now thats
pathetic and ignorant.
I don’t bow down to anything. Linux just happens to suit my needs the best at this point in time. Now, what is ignorant and pathetic is bashing something that you clearly have no knowledge of.
-bytecoder
Okay we can keep this up all day, I do use linux on
occsaion (knoppix) but at this point not much oh and i read distrowatch, and 300 distros and new versions of whatever linux is constant.
Okay we can keep this up all day, I do use linux on occsaion (knoppix) but at this point not much oh and i read distrowatch, and 300 distros and new versions of whatever linux is constant.
Having 300 distros is a GOOD thing. Is there one soda? Is there one brand of toilet paper? Is there only one type of computer? So why should there be only ONE distro? This is the single biggest failure of both Windows and MacOS – lack of choice.
I tried maybe two dozen different distros before settling on one that suited me. If not for choice, I’d have been stuck with something that worked, but didn’t suit me as well as something else. Keep the distros coming! Give everyone something THEY can be comfortable with instead of telling them this is your only choice.
It’s a big advantage — choice. But it’s also a huge disadvantage — standards, compatibility, consistency.
Apparently many people here are clueless as to the reality of what a beta tends to have as attributes:
1. It isn’t ready for release because it (depending on the definition of beta you use) may not have all the features the final version will have, but you can be reasonably sure they aren’t 100% working in the way the *final release* will run, because not all the kinks have been worked out yet. A beta release is a *test* version!
2. In many cases, a beta release is sort of like a trial balloon for external testers asking them, “Do you like this? We think we’ve got what people want, and we’ve got an implementation, tell us what you think!” since there are some things that can’t really be evaluated in real life merely by describing them or using mockups that aren’t functional.
3. Beta releases are frequently built with compiler settings for debug mode, and optimizations for size and/or speed turned *off* resulting in something that’s usually much slower than a final release, even if you don’t have the system managing all the extra debug symbols in memory while running. This will, of course, result in CPU caches being thrashed more, as the code will likely be much larger, and not optimized by the compiler for instruction scheduling for the CPU. This allows someone (a beta tester) to have a problem easier to report and reproduce, as it is pure hell to step through very optimized code in a debugger, as many things are often completely optimized out of the resulting code, meaning you can’t even place a breakpoint on certain things, such as when variables are used purely within a register, or small snippets of inlined code are used.
People judging the final speed and resource needs of a system based on a beta when all those things (and I probably forgot to mention some) are not taken into account are living in delusion. I’m betting that an OSS DE (Gnome, KDE, etc.) when in debug versions are absolutely horrible, too, for performance, as well as debug builds of the kernels under them. I’d suggest you nitwits that are comparing optimized release builds of systems with betas that are debug versions and drawing conclusions from that (unless the debug builds manage to give a better performance result than an “optimized” release build of something: a great algorithm for the task may run much faster even in debug build compared to a poor algorithm built for a release build) are being incredibly unfair and just plain stupid. All this testing and “reviewing” of beta versions so far from final release is all a bunch of hot air by idiots that are too bored with not having other things to tear new posterior portals in. All the stupid comments by people that don’t take into account what *beta* releases really are, simply come from those that are smoking crack.
“Furthermore, it’s quite arrogant to call Windows users “ignorant”. This might be the case for home users who buy a computer with a bundled operating system and then use it without even looking at alternatives, but it cannot be the case for corporate or governmental users. Just the fact that you have your opinion, which is absolutely OK, doesn’t mean that other people are “ignorant”.”
Well I do work in the IT business, and to my regret I meet far too many people who are ignorant, also I believe many IT managers choose to be iignorant since it will save many IT jobs. The ‘We like none IT folk too be dependent on us.’ attitude. The amount of maintanance windows needs as a platform is reason enough for IT managers to keep promoting Windows.
To be honest about myself, since I am an OSX user, I am talking from that perspective, but I don’t see any reason why Linux/KDE/Gnome couldn’t be as easy as OSX.
“So far, Windows Vista is an interesting OS”
Yawn.
MS’s only chance to sell a gazillion copies would be to make all new games playable in Vista only, and not on XP.
Instead of “successful and productive” “buggy and slow” would be more appropriate terms to describe Vista at its current stage. If development continues at this pace it wouldn’t be ready for the desktop within the next 5 years.
et tu Brutus?
why are you modding down beta testers who are reporting their honest finding ?
can you not face the fact that your beloved windows vista is not gonna be all that microsoft make it out to be ?
It’s not a review…they call it a “first impression”, and it is totally useless. The whole article is GUI centric with a brief sidetrip into virtual folders. This beta does not represent what Vista will look like when shipped.
I agree with the above posters who stated that you can discount anyone who writes MS as M$, most of these people have an ax to grind and they won’t let facts get in their way.
Keey crying, you little baby.
Maybe you didn’t read the whole thing: “These are our first impressions on the Beta release of the upcoming Windows OS. As we get more familiar with the interface, we will take this series forward with more information on what Windows has done well and what it has failed miserably at. Stay tuned…”
Anything wrong with “First Impression”?
People like you are nothing but trolls with no real intention of contributing something useful to the discussion. (Yes, I am off topic as well but I do hate bastards like you.)
excellent, your erudite argumentation has definately won me over.
were “buy Apple stocks”.
Seriously, I was stumped by the confusing interface in Vista. The theme and colors were confusing, making it hard to single out the items you need and what you could do to it.
Their virtual folders and searching interface were a mess
beyond what I could believe.
To make it a short story, after playing with Vista for about one day, “Microsoft made a huge mess, this isn’t going to help my daily work”.
Look back through Microsoft’s history. Did they ever had the final user interface in their first beta? Ever? Take Whistler for example – when was Luna introduced? Beta 1?
I’ve seen many mentions of “the Windows registry sucks”…but can anyone please inform me as to why they think this is true?
I’ve always been one to say I hate the registry. Not for the same reasons as these people though.
The reason I hate it is because applications always leave stuff laying around in it, and it’s not easy to clean up. That has always bothered me to no end.
I personally think the registry is fine, but that most apps should use local files for most settings. But I think apps like IE and most of the included Window apps are exceptions, because of the sheer flexibility involved with them in group policies through registry.
The reason I hate it is because applications always leave stuff laying around in it, and it’s not easy to clean up. That has always bothered me to no end.
This is not the fault of the registry but that of developers not using standard installers. You can avoid alot of this by always using add/remove programs in the control panel.
Oh I know it’s the developers faults. I do use the add/remove programs dialog myself, but as you said, non-standard installers tend to leave stuff still. Though I don’t think it’s as bad as it used to be, as a lot of people are either using MSI now (very good installer) or Nullsoft’s installer (good as well).
Virtual Folders seem like a good idea, i just hope they are transperent to software accessing the file system, I remember back early windows 95 when most software didn’t know how to understand the .lnk files that were shortcuts.
The article states they are xml files, which seem like a good format if it has to be a file, but I would have thought they would have integrated it directly into NTFS.
Someone before mentioned symbolic links (ln -s) in regards to this, I am pretty sure this is closer to Tiger’s Smart Folders (in fact sounds rather similer). Will be interested to see how well it works without WinFS, as spotlight + Smart Folders on the mac really gives some interesting functionality
An example would be having a smart folder with all photos that were taken with a certain exposure, with a certain camera, without a flash.
Can we stop the windows bashing please.
WE might have differences but it’s been hard for some in
the Linux crowd to admit that since Win2k that MS’s offerings have gradually improved, and they can only improve. Windows does have its problems, but those problems result more from their management style than their lack of expertise. They have different priorities.We keep on complaining about this and that on Windows etc etc We can’t be THAT naive to think that MS is totally clueless about desktop computing. Apple hasnt necessarily got it all right either.
I think that we in the Open Source community have to realise that the Operating System horizon is changing. With the advent of dual core systems,fast GPU based video cards and large amounts of ram on dekstop systems the way operating systems are being programmed is changing.
At this turning point in the industry nobody is necessarily right, nobody REALLY REALLY knows the right thing to do. I agree 2006 is going to be a very interesting year
…Vista seems like putting lipstick on a pig.
Vista feature exposes beta machines
My first impression,well they haven’t learned a thing.
http://news.com.com/Vista+feature+exposes+beta+machines/2100-1002_3…
If Windows were nothing more than pure trash, then people would suffer from it and sooner or later look for an alternative.
I think 140.000 viruses qualifies as suffering.
There’s going to be good stuff in Vista [you should hope so], but the intelligent folder thing… OS X has a similar feature [of course, I don’t know how Vista implements it, they may have found a way to make it truly shine].
I have little faith in the fact that the footprint will be dramatically reduced once the gold master is built. Windows systems in my experience are enjoying ever grander and grander delusions of grandeur.
The registry… Look at what Microsoft says when you have to work in there: back it up! back it up! for God’s sake back it up!
I rather work in .ini files.
1) people will be adversely declined to buy a new computer if they had not been planning to anyway. To buy a new computer just to run the system…
2) the public will want to take a good, hard look at what’s actually in Vista and whether it justifies making the switch. Industry is NOT going to adopt a new system in its first year, with the slew of new problems that are inevitable to emerge.
Vista is going to be a hard sell for Microsoft. They will have to have a very compelling message to sell this puppy.
And the whole superduper graphics thing… with the graphic stuff -for the Patience like stuff- Are you serious? Vista, the latest, greatest advancement in the progress through the ages of Mankind, giving special care to the vital applications like Patience…
512 Megs of RAM as the bare minimum to run the system. Add another gig and a half to have it run chipper AND some other apps to boot.
Anyone who thinks the next few years are going to be ‘interesting and exciting’ should also realise that in these next few years oil is going to cost $100 USD a barrel due to the Chinese all [all 1.something billion of them] wanting a car and the nice sandbox tic tac toe game the US is playing in Iraq, and it will make a lot of stuff much, Much, MUCH more expensive.
Sorry to rain on your parade.
The Vista that is going to become evident when Microsoft opens the Windows [if you’re going to use barfologuous puns, go ALL THE WAY, my friend] is a desolate, scarred landscape with a lot more urgent problems than whether you can have smart folders that sing a lullaby for you.
Let agree on something Mac, Win and Linux fanboys (I’m a Mac fanboy btw)
MS has the office locked up, buisnesses are not going to change.
They want cheap PC’s that are functional, a common GUI and a OS that they can marry to a frigging office crockpot if they need to.
So the buisness space is owned by MS, they have Office which everybody has been using for years, fine. Buisnesses have written many lines of code for Win, fine.
Apple on the other hand is a consumer computer, it’s flashy, appealing, safe, reliable and easy to use. Apple pushes iLife, which is a suite of superior “consumer” programs. Apple also makes great educational computers, science computers due to Unix, artists computers and places where a large IT force isn’t needed. That’s Apple’s gig, fine.
Linux is a geeks OS, it survives in areas where one doesn’t want to pay M *cough* $ licensing fees because interoperability with MS isn’t needed or wanted.
So just like there are sports cars, trucks, SUV’s each serves it’s particular function.
I see Apple as increasing it’s consumer and science market, staying out of the buisness area as show by many marketing videos I have seen.
A area I see Apple trying to get better in is in 3D games, as it’s a consumer market. MS of course tightened up and made Direct X king and hobbled Open GL.
Linux needs to get just one desktop GUI version and content creators to jump on it. Like OpenOffice and the like. Package the whole deal on a easy self installing cd/download and get it into PC’s.
The sooner joe average can simply burn a combined install cd and burn it in Windows and self install Linux, the better. Heck even I ( a mac user) would be interested in taking a old PC and slapping Linux on it if it was easy to do.
But it’s not from what I hear, you have to constantly seek out parts to make it work.
If there is a download that I can burn to a cd on my Mac and self install Linux (using a GUI) and a bunch of (GUI) apps please let me know.
Mind you it has to be easy, I’m no geek and don’t like having to learn all sorts of command line terminology. IMO that’s a waste of time.
thanks
I do not want to sound cheeky,
but you are a fucking retard
Mac has no chance of running up to date 3d games because the hardware is not up to the task
The Apple software is all a pile of shit. And there is only one button on the mouse
The only people who use Macs are poseurs who think it is a trendy computer, or dimwits who think it actually is a computer !
linux is shit, period
but until you realise these points, then shut the fuck up dim boy
I see Apple as increasing it’s consumer and science market, staying out of the buisness area as show by many marketing videos I have seen.
So you think science can’t be business?
A area I see Apple trying to get better in is in 3D games, as it’s a consumer market. MS of course tightened up and made Direct X king and hobbled Open GL.
I don’t agree,i see the consoles gain and PC’s regardless of the OS loose terrain.Not that hard to predict when you compare the performance,console prizes and gaming titles avaible.
Mind you it has to be easy, I’m no geek and don’t like having to learn all sorts of command line terminology. IMO that’s a waste of time.
It’s very easy all you have to do is orientate a little and choose a modern Linux distro.You wouldn’t have to use the command line interface if you don’t want to.Everything can be steered by “click and go”
I switched from windows 2000 to Linux and it took me a couple of hours finding my way.A lot of friends have at least finished college and some of them still use windows.Last weekend a biology student asked me to give him some advise and help him a few steps ahead.It took him less than a day to use gentoo on his windows niveau.
In order to quickly and easily learn (Linux) you don’t have to be a geek or technology freak.All that is handy is common sence and a good set of brains.But even if you don’t learn that quickly Linux can defenitely become your favorite OS if you have at least a little bit stamina and willingness.
Linux needs to get just one desktop GUI version and content creators to jump on it. Like OpenOffice and the like. Package the whole deal on a easy self installing cd/download and get it into PC’s.
Why don’t you use a live-CD instead?
I’m personnally delighted by the wealth of potential desktop GUI’s and themes to choose from.Just like in every day life,let’s face it some people can’t handle to much options.
Trying to deflate the Linux balloon this can be a good thing. Does Linux live up to the Hype?
http://windows.czweb.org/“>windows