Starting today, we will extend availability of our current Windows 8.1, Windows 8.1 Pro and Windows Server 2012 R2 RTM builds to the developer and IT professional communities via MSDN and TechNet subscriptions. The Windows 8.1 RTM Enterprise edition will be available through MSDN and TechNet for businesses later this month.
Developers had been asking for this.
You would have thought that they would have learned their lesson on making dickhead moves after the whole XBox One fiasco earlier this year, but yet again, Microsoft has found itself in an “oh shit” moment.
If MS would start focusing more on NOT screwing the customer/developer, then maybe it wouldn’t have so much egg on its face.
Edited 2013-09-09 23:54 UTC
What are you even talking about? In comparison:
1) Apple was the first company I ever saw which charged its customers for a 802.11n wifi driver. Remember that? And they force developers to go through their App store, where they stop developers from providing any apps which compete against their own. So, Apple isn’t a great company. They have also taken plenty of credit for ideas which were stolen.
2) On the Linux side of things, everyone keeps forking everything, or making new libs, and not enough is done to help ensure backwards/forwards compatibility (on the other hand though, you’d be hard pressed having ethical issues). Also, we can’t pretend like that ideas weren’t borrowed from elsewhere for a lot of things. Also, there are a lot of trolls in the community who refuse to accept change (ie, administration should only be via CLI, go away new users who want gui’s, etc).
All that being said, your comment isn’t relevant to the conversation anyway.. I’m not really a fan of Metro, but at least Windows 8.1 looks as though they are trying to fix it (but, I do agree the limitations implemented for installing metro apps should be removed).
trying fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fail-fail-fa-fa-fa-fa
it’s the word… surfin bird.
His comment, comparing a Microsoft act with a Microsoft act, isn’t relevant, but what have Apple and Linux got to do with it?
Microsoft should have released Windows 8.1 much earlier to developers. This has nothing to do with a WiFi price tag or CLI commands.
Microsoft isn’t making live easy for their Windows developers, but they shouldn’t mind because Apple has an app store? I’m sure those Windows guys will feel all stress and ill feelings relieved now.
Because people like to use a different set of rules when judging Microsoft versus the other corporations.
It seems a number of companies have gotten a different rule set, like Apple and Google.
But never mind that, I always dislike any criticism about <something> being waved off because <something else> is worse, because (for one) it doesn’t change or solve anything.
During the 90’s a lot of Linux criticism was waived off because of Microsoft Windows.
You can always find something that’s worse, meaning you should be happy and contend with everything.
posts a comment full of FUD that has nothing to do with the article, accuses others of posting something that has nothing to do with this article.
Until/unless they get somebody with some actual common sense in the big chair (if it turns out to be Elop sell any MS stock, he is a yes man and hasn’t ever had an original thought) you can give it up!
For those that say “Oh its the users, they are luddites, they refuse to embrace innovation” tell me this…why do you drive your car with a steering wheel? Its obvious that bikes are the wave of the future, they outsell cars by a large margin…are you a luddite? Why are you not embracing innovation?
I’ll tell you why you drive not with handlebars but with a wheel because a UI designed for one job doesn’t automatically work well in others and a touch UI will NEVER, I repeat NEVER beat a keyboard and mouse when it comes to desktops and laptops!
The desk and laptop will NEVER be touch either, anybody believes that is as batty as Balmer and the reason why is simple…pick up your tablet or phone right now, hold it like you are using it, ready? Look down, you are holding it like a book with your arms in front of you in a relaxed position…this is not how you use a laptop or desktop as that is vertical and NOT HORIZONTAL,see why Win 8 is full of fail now?
Sorry about the length but Win 8 drives me up a wall, its like it was designed by hipsters with ZERO knowledge of UI conventions or even of how the product would be used! Its like MSFT designed an OS for polka dot PCs only and on anything else it ran like crap…would you think that was innovative? So why would you think a hamfisted grab at the tablet market by forcing a tablet UI where it doesn’t belong is good? Google doesn’t do this, they have Android for mobile and ChromeOS for desktop, same with Apple and OSX/iOS,because “one UI to rule them all” just sucks. I’ll end with this perfect example of why its a fail,BTW click on his username and he has a video of him actually doing the test he talks about in the video, count how many times he says “I don’t want that” and “stop” because the OS is fighting him..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTYet-qf1jo
Thanks for the youtube movie. Best Windows 8 review, ever.
– Gilboa
Pity most of the things on there are inaccurate or just plain wrong.
Let agree not to agree, shell we?
– Gilboa
No I won’t.
There were many factual errors and things which wasn’t true at all.
Could you name just a few of those many errors?
There were at least 3 or 4 in my quick flick though, or comments the guy made which tbh wasn’t fair.
No I am not going to list them because I am not going to waste my time trying to find those particular bits in the video and time stamp them to support my argument.
No need to find them in the video. Just name the parts you remember. You come of as the one with the agenda here.
Getting hold of an iso is totally fucking wrong and he didn’t even attempt a google.
… sigh.
You can sigh all you want, doesn’t change the fact that you are ignoring facts that don’t support you personal agenda that is made quite obvious by your avatar on this very site.
Subjective criticisms of Windows 8 aside (I think Windows 7 was the better OS BTW). There are factual inaccuracies in that video that are to play to people that easily jump on the bandwagon which btw you demonstrated you willingness immediately.
The irony is that thus far, you’ve yet to point out one “mistake” in said movie and yet, you keep blaming world + dog for having an agenda.
I’d expect more from my 3 y/o.
– Gilboa
I didn’t blame the world and the dog I blamed you. You have a tux logo in your avatar … it is the equivalent of having the Ichthys on the back of your car.
There are many factual errors in there such, the biggest one was getting the media. You can download their upgrade assistant that is linked on the main site and will make a .iso for you on any Windows machine.
I can’t remember the rest tbh because I skipped through a lot because of the whiny over the top yank voice.
Edited 2013-09-13 19:31 UTC
What is wrong? List them please because I have seen EVERY SINGLE THING he listed and more dealing with Win 8!
In fact to give Windows 8 a truly fair and accurate test, thinking like Vista maybe it just needed the early bugs ironed out, when dad ordered a brand new laptop with Win 8 I simply handed it over, no different than if he went himself and bought it from any shop…within an hour he wanted to throw the laptop out of the window because Win 8 was constantly fighting him and doing crap he didn’t want it to do!
Why is there no steering wheel on your bicycle? Why is there no handlebars on your car? Simple, because a UI that works great in one context may be terrible in another and that IS Windows 8 in a nutshell! Ballmer saw Apple pass MSFT as the most valuable company and tried to pull a hamfisted repeat of the “IE VS Netscape” bit by sticking a tablet UI on Windows and then thinking he could FORCE the market to buy windows tablets by “getting them used to metro” by sticking it on other devices…look at the figures, WinMetro is a massive failure, users don’t want it, devs don’t want it, nobody wants it.
let me ask you a question Lucas…if this is such a great idea, why hasn’t Apple done it? Why have they not replaced OSX with iOS? Why has Google reversed course and said that Android wouldn’t be replacing ChromeOS? the answer couldn’t be simpler, a UI designed around small screen touch screens simply does not work well on large vertical non touch screens, yet MSFT refuses to accept that.
Did you watch the video through to the end? How do you respond to the actual experts in UI design saying it was a bad design? I mean you have users avoiding it like STDs, you have experts saying its a bad design, and sales of X86 systems dropped like a stone when win 8 came out…what more proof do you need?
There were quite a few factual things wrong with his review. I didn’t watch all of it, but flicking through there were factual errors … the rest was subjective.
In other words “I can’t name a single thing wrong or provide any of the answers you seek so I’ll just say its wrong” is that it?
Perhaps then you should watch this video of the reviewer taking a bog standard windows 8 laptop OOTB and using it for the first time. Please note how many times he says “stop” “No” and “I don’t want that” because Windows 8 is fighting the user every step of the way! How do you respond to that, that users should have to take classes just to learn how to do basic tasks on the broken design that is Windows 8?
I have put 70 year old ladies on Windows 7, we are talking the first time these folks have EVER touched a PC, know how long it took them to pick up basic tasks? About 20 minutes, that is what happens when you have a product that is intuitive and discoverable. Compare that to Windows 8 when even geeks on this very site had no idea where shutdown was and were having to do everything from log off to hit the power button because even something as basic as shutdown was like playing “Where’s Waldo” with the OS!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLTE_bvlWUE
I never understood the rationale, the core people you want to keep on side would be the developers, so why postpone access to Win8.1!? surely anyone with any sense would make sure the dev’s would get early access if anything so they can test their apps and make sure everything is going to be smooth.
If you want companies to roll out win8.1 then technet is Microsoft’s best bet! (don’t get me started on the absolutely stupid idea of cancelling technet and stopping me and others like me from trying software configs for live installs, absolutely bonkers).
Those three Windows 8 Developers must be really happy!
I’ve heard a lot of screaming about how bad and ugly windows 8 / 2012 server is but honestly it’s really not so bad.
The only really ugly thing is Metro… I understand what MS tried to do with that… They tried to make an uniformed experience over the whole MS ecosystem reaching from phones to server which isn’t such a bad idea but no… Metro on production desktops and on servers is a pain in the a$$. It should at least be possible to “opt out†from boot to Metro without third party tools.
The system itself is more and more optimized. Windows 8 turns like a charm on an 8 year old desktop.
What people mostly oversee are the incredible capacities of the 2012 and 2012R2 servers. I work with 2012 server since it came out and took a closer look on 2012R2 and there is one thing I can tell you… It’s good… Really good. The functions that got the most attention from MS are HYPER-V (Nothing to do with what you find on 2008R2), Storage Spaces and SMB3. With 2012 you could already build a solid virtualization farm but now… With the improvements in Storage Spaces you can also totally forget the hassle about SANs and their dedicated infrastructure. Combine this with SCVMM 2012 and you have a complete end to end cloud solution
It would be stupid to change a working and existing infrastructure. But for those planning to renew their server infrastructure and want to go far beyond “simple†consolidation by virtualization it’s really interesting.
If you’re interested you can look here… It’s a bit long but really well explained
http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/TechEd/NorthAmerica/2013/MDC-B205#f…
And NO… I’m not affiliated to MS
Edit: Corrected some mistakes of my Terrible English
Edited 2013-09-10 09:34 UTC
It doesn’t matter how good Windows 2012 is.
People use computers to be productive, servers are for business users. Productivity is the most important part.
Putting the Windows 8 failed touch UI on a server doesn’t make any sense to anyone:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTYet-qf1jo
You have to be able to use it to be productive.
I do not disagree with you… I also said that:
Metro on production desktops and on servers is a pain in the a$$. It should at least be possible to “opt out†from boot to Metro without third party tools.
You can… But there are 3 major problems before you’re able to:
– You must configure the UI like hell before it’s usable
– You need third party tools to circumvent Metro
– You can’t make these tweeks through GPOs (or only through registry keys)
This is not a problem for servers… You just have to get used to the interface and that’s it (There are even some nice tools in the interface I would really miss now), but for the productive workplace this is a “no go”.
Users are simply not able to make such radical changes… I work with this on a daily basis and it took me literally weeks to get used to it and become really productive (again)
Isn’t that what Windows 8.1 is gonna do ?:
‘It should at least be possible to “opt out†from boot to Metro without third party tools.’
And also add a start-button ?
Haven’t been following the Windows 8.1 news all that well.
The other way to opt out of the UI is Windows Core. 😉
(you might still need an other machine to manage it though which does have that stupid UI, but it allows you to configure it ones)
Edited 2013-09-10 14:43 UTC
Honestly… I don’t know… I havn’t tested Windows 8.1, just 2012 R2.
I’ve heard that too (opt out + Start button).
IF this is true, it could be the missing key for business use. At least for me it’ll be the moment I’ll start to test deployment scenarios.
For servers, yep… Especially with the new centralized management interface. This one is a sexy tool
edit : Typos typos and typos again
Edited 2013-09-10 14:55 UTC
There are far more problems in Windows 8 than just these 2 things. So I don’t see a reason to use Windows 8 for businesses on the PC.
Which is something I do not agree on, but that is very off topic.
Have you guys seen Azure Pack for on premise deployments? Makes managing and provisioning services as easy as they are on Windows Azure (includes the Management Portal and essentially on premise versions of all Azure services)
To me this greatly reduces the need to remote into any deployment.
I think its the future of Windows Server.
Yep. Technically interesting but there are some concerns about it:
– You rely (At least partially) on an externally provided service. This is not a problem for some customers but is one for others…
– This service is provided by one of the biggest US company. This is maybe a good argument in the US but can make some companies in the rest of the world feel a bit uncomfortable (I don’t think I have to tell you why)
– The integration which is actually possible with System Center components (SCCM SCOM Orchestrator and SCVMM mostly) allready gives you the possibility to build really flexible solutions without the need for an Azure integration.
So in short yes… Interesting but for most of the customers I work with not a viable scenario (Much more for political than technical reasons)
I think a lot of the stink raised by media outlets speaking in the name of developers isn’t really on the mark.
The deltas between the WinRT RTM API and the WinRT Preview APIs are extraordinarily small, and I’d venture to guess that hardly any code at all has been broken.
http://pastebin.com/H1nKea54
Check it our for yourselves. Developers weren’t asking for this. Tech blogs looking for an attention grabbing headline were asking for this, and you have the entitled pricks who can’t wait for GA like the rest of the world just because they have an MSDN Subscription (or abuse Technet which is why its being phased out)
Furthermore, Windows 8.1 will ship with a compatibility environment for the 8.1 Preview, just like Windows 8.0 shipped with a compatibility environment for 8.0 Release Preview. Meaning all app code and behavior remains the same from Preview to RTM.
There’s nothing more disgusting than using developers as pawns in attention grabbing propaganda.
You must have a very limited view of the world.
I think we all knew he meant in the current context of discussion.