Windows Blue build 9364 leaked to the internet

I agree with many of the reviewers sentiments – predictions about the demise of the 'desktop' being mostly sensational. (bound to get people's attention!)

Microsoft's strategy with Windows 8 may well have been a logical corporate decision to try and muscle in on the 'portable' touch device market, but I'm sure they didn't see the poor uptake of Windows 8 coming! Despite this, Microsoft appears to be ploughing on with their strategy in blatant disregard for their traditional base – or are they?

Windows 7 is being supported until 2020 – most corporate users are still using XP or are\will be, migrating to Window 7.
I doubt Microsoft expected corporate users to jump onto the Windows 8 bandwagon in the short term anyway – they might have anticipated that it would actually accelerate corporate migration to Windows 7. With regard to home users – many are still using XP and may well decide to migrate to Windows 7 in view of what awaits with Windows 8\Blue.
I don't think Microsoft is exactly buckling at the knees due to the poor sales of Windows 8.
Microsoft have probably now decided that they have little to lose by continuing on with their 'portable' device touch strategy (aka Windows Blue) and if things don't quite work out - they only need make concessions (whether it be in Windows 9, or 10) to appease (corporate\home) desktop users.

IMO there is far too much invested in the traditional desktop arena (software development\market wise) for Microsoft to simply ignore this area. That would be corporate stupidity!

 

Indeed...

 

I still can't understand why MS is doing this to us . . .

 

It's been spelled out several times in the thread. Dollars and desperation. I look at it this way, they didn't create Windows 8 to replace Windows 7. Nor did they create it because they "saw the future of technology". They created it because they saw their future in the rapidly rising mobile sector. It looked sad and pathetic. Trouble is, they're so late to the party that their future is still looking dreary.

Can they become a major player this late? Sure, even the unluckiest of souls have a good day now and again. But I don't see them being anything other than an "also-ran" for a long time.

I see a typical MS/Ballmer continuation coming. Keep pushing something unpopular until customers are fighting back. Office just went through it, and touch-obsessed MS will do it with Windows. Either 9 or 10 will bring some compromise, that I'll agree with. My money however is not until 10 and only if the mobile world sends them back from whence they came like I feel it will.

 

Perhaps we should separate "mobile" from "app/store/cloud" (ASC) centric computing. I'm sure Microsoft wants to gain more market share in the mobile space. However, it also wants to drive Windows users into ASC. Question is, could Microsoft have pulled off a full-frontal assault on the traditional computing model if the mobile space hadn't already fallen to ASC?

 

"Microsoft is going to be on an annual release cycle, and enterprises will have to figure out how to get used to it," said Frank Gillett of Forrester Research.

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Windows Blue includes Start screen sync and IE11 desktop swipe

 

Yes, exactly I couldn't agree more. I was thinking something along these lines, you just said it more eloquently.

 

Subscription based OS is what Windows Blue is. So the enterprise world is going to have to 'figure it out and get used to it' ...

China, which is a 'enterprise' has already figured it out. They are going Linux. India to follow as they are not so good at paying for stuff, if they can get it for free. The US has no appetite for being forced into doing anything they do not want to do. Europe will look to impose a huge fine on MS to punish them (they have a way of figuring it out, even if it is totally ridiculous). The home user will have to determine if a slew of annual subscriptions is worth it or not. If you have a lot of devices then that will be a lot of annual carry charges to consider.

 

i've already done the math. lol
it's not worth more than 10-15$ per year.
especially considering that the Win 8 upgrade was 40$ and it will be about 3 years until Win 9...

that's what i give per year to my favorite Linux distros, about 10-15$.
and i don't have to.

i've given a lot more to Microsoft over the years starting with Win 95.

 

I don't even want to think about how many thousand dollars I have given them over the years. I won't go subscription though. If they move everything to that model then Linux it is.

 

If it plays out like I think it will, you're going to have a "Firefox situation" in the corporate world. People are still getting mad when a new FF rolls around. Imagine the build up of seething fury and caffeine-filled rollout sessions of IT departments dealing with a yearly Windows. Oh, right, you don't have to imagine that because corporations won't deal with it. No, seriously, the corporate world will collectively moon MS if this goes through the way it looks. Corporations would have to get some sort of exemption if these are full blown Windows releases annually.

 

Same here, I have bought everything from compilers to Office to the OS's since back in the 80's and supported them all this time. But no more. I have already moved on to linux now, and I don't think I'll return unless they make a radical about face and return to sanity, something I'm almost sure they won't do for quite a long time... It's truly crazy.

 

It will be really tough for the corporate world. There are many many custom applications written and modified to fit corporate needs that are Windows-based for one thing. That's got to be a huge market for MS also. I don't know what's going on there or what will happen, but it's beyond belief that MS would risk that business too.

 

If that´s the case i believe that most of the corporate world will stay with Windows XP or 7...

 

Not indefinitely.

No corporation risk staying with EOL software.

People here talking about a faster release cycle being problematic to businesses still have a mentality of past.

In the current model which points to subscriptions, everything indicates that updates/upgrades are going to be faster, more significant, much more transparent and cause even less rare issues.

They can as well get integrated in the Patch Tuesdays seamlessly.

Technical aspects of latest implementations also contribute to this.

 

Corporate and business IT departments, generally speaking, don't like change much, because it usually creates problems and issues and can also break things, which is much harder to deal with in an environment like that. So I don't see corporate users embracing any of this stuff coming from MS, starting with Win 8, and moving forward.

 

The corporations that really "don't like changes" are those using XP and IE 6/7/8 (which still aren't EOL software, btw). For them, a radical departure will happen.

Corporations already using latest MS software have no "ifs" installing all the updates that Microsoft release on Tuesdays.

What is going to happen in the short future, IMO, is that these patches will include, more often, new functionality ready to be released and even what could be considered "new" Windows releases.

 

I don't know about the rest of your post, but this (above) isn't true at all. Corporate IT departments running ANYTHING don't like changes, period. It's easy to understand why, when changes have to be deployed across hundreds and even thousands of machines, with potential for issues and problems each time there is a change, no matter how small.

 

Exactly, because in the past, the huge changes required thousands of tests, clean installs, etc.

The mix of improved this + improved this can fix that.

 

What does this mean exactly? I mean, if you want to pointlessly argue for the sake of it, fossil fuels won't be used indefinitely. I definitely think that companies may switch to other operating systems the way Mickeysoft are going. The Chinese seem to be going all Ubuntu. I really don't know why you just can't see that companies don't want to spend money unnecessarily. I know that you could argue that we aren't in a world recession again, ad nauseam as usual, but you really are flogging a dead horse here. I mean the horse really is so dead it waved goodbye to being deceased in the rear view mirror so long ago it is now on its way to becoming fossilised. The real mystery is why you just aren't getting this.

 

I don't see what any of that has to do with what we're talking about.... the situation remains unchanged.

 

What the heck are you talking about?

Big companies are switching to subscriptions - http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/software-assurance/enterprise.aspx

"Once viewed as simply upgrades, Software Assurance has evolved..."

Because you refuse to see the implications of the recent improvements.

Not sure you can understand that without more vision.

 

The irony here is that I could well ask you the same thing.

Oh, a link that proves unequivocally that you're right & I'm wrong. Oh hold on, no it doesn't.

"A horse is a horse, of course, of course ... "

 

Well dave, Microsoft Software Assurance is a huge success.. Go research that.

 

Well WH, what does that prove? What, no link? LOL