A year later, Vista SP1 or XP SP3

[CoffeeFiend]

[*]Give it time, I'm guessing this will happen. Although keeping them updated as Russinovich updates them might be a problem, it is still a good goal.

I'd still be VERY happy with that. Even if it's not installed by default (perhaps make it an optional component, added in "programs and features"), and they could deliver updated builds via Windows Update for those who have it installed.

[*]*cough*antitrust*cough*. Microsoft has to be VERY careful what they do, and do not, include. If they step on ANY public vendor products (like Roxio, Nero, et al) they tread on very thin ice.

Yes, you're totally right on this one! It's amazing no one's sued them for including notepad or calc.exe yet... I hope I'm not giving anyone ideas here!

[*]Indeed, although killing FTP over SFTP/SCP would be great...

For sure, but unfortunately not all servers support it. The way I see it, FTP is kind of a lowest common denominator (kind of like FAT32), which everything can use (web browsers, any ftp client, CLI tools, download managers, etc)

[*]Win7 currently has a much nicer RSS app, so you might get your wish here.

Good news! I'm looking forward to that.

[*]I think this falls under the Expression products umbrella, so doubt it makes it into the OS anytime soon.

I was thinking the closest product would have been the digital imaging suite, but it wouldn't have to be anything fancy like that even. Anything more than paint would be nice...

[*]One man's garbage is another man's just fine app, so to speak (actually, MCE - but it runs on top of WMP, so...).

I think we've been there already: DRM in recordings, support for the broadcast flag (broadcasters get to chose if they allow you to record something), no support for CableCARD if you build your own MCE box -- nevermind CableCARD is only used in a small fraction of 1 country, which is no help for most people, and besides it tends not to work so great as I've read in some places. And CableCARD is being replaced by SDV in a lot of those places too (seemingly most CableCo's are moving to that) for which MCE has no support, MCE has no support for DVB-* devices (much less for CI modules and such for them), no client/server model (forget about having your noisy multi-terabyte server with all the capture cards away, and a quiet front end in several places), very poor menu design/layout, very bad support for x264-in-mkv files (i.e. all of my HD stuff, I encode in that very popular & good format), the resource usage isn't exactly low, etc. But sure, some people might like it anyways. Some people even like WinME & IE, and that's saying a LOT...

[*]I find the Vista defrag just fine for the majority of users, including myself.

It's improved a lot for sure, I just meant that as in, there's still place for improvement, if they add a few more features, no one would want/need to buy a separate defragmenter anymore (but then again, antitrust issues perhaps)

[*]Gotta wait for powershell to become more mature, I'm expecting these to come as powershell gets older.

And it's certainly getting there quick. One can write/install cmdlets to do most tasks like this, but it would just be nice to have them built-in. But yep, Rome wasn't built in a day. I guess powershell has other things to take care of first (like releasing v2 final, fixing their ngen problems, etc)

[*]With the amount of languages supported, this is currently not financially or code-wise feasible.

Well, even if you'd only support it in your "traditional" 6 or so languages, it would be a start. Code-wise? Looking at projects like aspell, I don't really see why. Financially? I'm sure MS can afford buying a few basic word dictionaries from companies specialized in this (or reuse those from MS Office, even if only using a subset of them?) Oh well.

[*]Live Mesh, it's coming. It's a live product, but it (shock) actually *works*.

That seemed to be more along the lines of sync'ing your desktop with your phone and mp3 player and such. At least that's what I remember about checking it out a while ago. But if it's more than that, sure

[*]This might happen in time, but not soon. All kinds of legal issues.

Understandable. I guess Linux has it easy when it comes to that. They're only distributing updates of open source stuff, so no legal problems there.

[*]Again, one man's trash... IE8 B2 is fantastic, at least as good as FF3 (personally I find it better, but I'm slightly biased - however, being a web dev, it really is at least as good as FF3).

I haven't tried B2, but B1 is a GREAT deal behind FF3 in every aspect IMO. In this particular case, I think it's bias indeed. Especially if you're doing web dev -- there's nothing for IE quite like Firebug, the web developer toolbar and all that (no, Fiddler and such aren't equivalents). If there's one group for which FF truly shines above other browsers, it's web devs.

[*]Hard to say if this will happen, but probably not. Adobe's got this locked up, and it'll be hard to compete and not see the inside of a courtroom.

Adobe discontinued ATM a while back. The only real option I see nowadays is extensis suitcase, at $100. It would still be nice to have something basic in Windows itself, I've only been waiting for that since 3.1 was out But I still totally understand your point.

[cluberti]

[*]Again, one man's trash... IE8 B2 is fantastic, at least as good as FF3 (personally I find it better, but I'm slightly biased - however, being a web dev, it really is at least as good as FF3).

I haven't tried B2, but B1 is a GREAT deal behind FF3 in every aspect IMO. In this particular case, I think it's bias indeed. Especially if you're doing web dev -- there's nothing for IE quite like Firebug, the web developer toolbar and all that (no, Fiddler and such aren't equivalents). If there's one group for which FF truly shines above other browsers, it's web devs.

Beta1 was for web devs, and had very few features that will (are) in B2 and will make the release (hopefully in November). You can't judge IE8 B1 against Firefox, as that was a rendering engine update only, really. Take a look at B2 when it releases.

[Mr Snrub]

I've seen code that is pretty big that takes into account the register pairing and chache predictions execute quicker than small chunks of code. Smaller code is not always better.

I would agree only with "less lines of machine code in a given execution path (i.e. disregarding exception handling code) would run faster than a larger number of lines in the same path" and "more lines of (source or machine) code increases the risk of introducing bugs".

However, the (security, stability, extra feature) benefits of the changes/extensions to code (IMO) outweigh the potential performance hit and risk of bugs (as the internal, alpha and beta testing phases before the release candidates will identify and nail the vast majority of the bugs anyway).

Here's an example. If I have misunderstood you then I apologize.

I was quoting you to agree with your statement ("QFT") - the paragraph you pasted above was actually a reference to the suggestions from others along the lines: "while (1) {smaller = better};".

(Sorry, I should have rearranged the paragraphs or spaced better in my response.)

[GrofLuigi]

[*]I'm pretty sure the Windows desktop is gonna stay one per user, just because of the userbase. The kinds of users who would use/understand this and not get confused is pretty small.

It saddens me to hear this. It's so nice having different "desktops" for different purposes when you're a heavy multitasker... Office apps on one, video encoding apps on another, programming tools on the 3rd, web browser and winamp and such on the next, etc. All your open apps separated by purpose. I'd pay good money for that feature alone, but there isn't a product out there for windows that works (virtuawin and such apps are buggy as hell/not worth using unfortunately)

Did you know your wish has just come true few days ago?

GL

[jcarle]

Did you know your wish has just come true few days ago?

That just made my year. I love that guy.

[CoffeeFiend]

Did you know your wish has just come true few days ago?

Cool new util, I've always been a big fan of everything sysinternals.

While it's certainly nicer than virtuawin, it has its share of issues and shortcomings

• when I alt-tab on a new desktop, the cursor vanishes (not only hidden, it's missing altogether, like, it won't make the auto-hidden taskbar show no matter how much you go down)
  
• it opens up the language bar at the top of my screen for some strange reason (i got that thing closed)
  
• heap exhaustion problems on some boxes seemingly
  
• no way to transfer apps between desktops as they're not virtual (it creates a new "real" desktop + instance of explorer.exe to go along with each desktop) -- many apps don't want to be open twice, and you can't exactly open a new Firefox window and drag it there either (forcing you to have all your browser windows on the same desktop)
  
• desktops can't be closed/destroyed, and as a consequence of that, you can't really close the app itself (otherwise the desktops just stay open with no way to use them, forcing you to reboot to "fix" it)
  

http://www.codeplex.com/vdm *might* be better. I'll try that one too. I'll have to wait to try it though (don't wanna load it at the same time as sysinternal's, so I have to reboot, and I can't reboot for a while as I'm encoding a hig def movie in x264)

[jcarle]

http://www.codeplex.com/vdm *might* be better. I'll try that one too. I'll have to wait to try it though (don't wanna load it at the same time as sysinternal's, so I have to reboot, and I can't reboot for a while as I'm encoding a hig def movie in x264)

I tried that one, it brought my machine to a crawl. :S

[Fredledingue]

AFAIK modular Windows has been discussed in depth at Microsoft (from a few conversations I've had there). And, again AFAIK, it's just not feasible to turn Windows into this without a lot of work.

Windows is sort of a one-size-fits-all OS. It tries to do everything for everyone. They also use versioning (Home Basic, Home Premium, etc) to pitch optimized packages at different types of users. But this is a marketing thing, not an OS essential thing.

So, for most people, it does what's needed. Those of us who are more technically oriented (who, by the way, are in the minority of Windows users) are just trying to get a one-size-fits-all OS to meet our needs. Unfortunately, the compromises that are necessary to fit the OS to all users will inevitably leave some of us feeling unsatisfied with what's there. If we get fed up enough, we move elsewhere.

In the end, the consumer pays for it (and not just the average user - but the big businesses also). If they don't pay for it, then Microsoft will have to go out of business. We vote with our wallets.

Ok, I'm rectifying the shot about "Modular Windows":

The installation disc can include everything M$ sees fit for an OS, but they should let users customize their installation.

Then, when windows is installed, offer an EASY way to add/remove component _and_ Customize/configurate every setting that it's possible to configurate.

[hatem20]

Vista of course

[S.SubZero]

I'm curious about the average specs of the group in the "sticking to XP" category. I can see keeping XP on an older machine; I just re-did my roommate's laptop which is an old (my old) Inspiron 9100, P4 2.8Ghz, 1GB RAM, 60GB hard drive. The hard drive is kinda small for Vista, the other specs are very borderline. That's an XP machine really.

The choice would be more clear if it was "Do you run XP because you want to, or because you have to?"

[MrCobra]

The choice would be more clear if it was "Do you run XP because you want to, or because you have to?"

I use XP64 because I want to. I really tried to like Vista. I really tried to like Vista SP1. But there are still lots of problems with that OS. XP may be 7 years old, but it's stable and fast. Vista to me is just too "meh". Even with Vista SP1 it can still takes ages to copy files. I'm still not too keen on the out of memory while copying files bug that's still lurking around. It seems that they moved stuff around just for the sake of moving it.

I don't like:

• The constant thrashing of the HD.
  All the graphical glitches in the theme.
  Losing performance in 3D apps because of Aero.
  The blatant bugs that are classes as 'won't be fixed' that shouldn't have been there at RTM, let alone SP1.
  

Nothing in that OS is consistent.

My H/W is way more than capable of running Vista, but it does feel too sluggish (to me). I was not impressed with the OS and there was no WOW factor for me.

[MrCobra]

Ok, I'm rectifying the shot about "Modular Windows":

The installation disc can include everything M$ sees fit for an OS, but they should let users customize their installation.

Then, when windows is installed, offer an EASY way to add/remove component _and_ Customize/configurate every setting that it's possible to configurate.

I think if they can provide the abaility to add/remove features from the Server OS then there should be those same capabilities in the consumer editions as well.

[CoffeeFiend]

Vista to me is just too "meh". Even with Vista SP1 it can still takes ages to copy files. I'm still not too keen on the out of memory while copying files bug that's still lurking around.

I've posted some screenshots of my file copy speeds before. They're no worse than XP's (some stuff is actually much faster). Out of memory bug? Never had that problem. Sounds like early RTM problems.

The constant thrashing of the HD.

I never experienced that

All the graphical glitches in the theme.

Such as? I don't even know what you're talking about here.

Losing performance in 3D apps because of Aero.

3D performance being lower was due to bad drivers mainly, and that's been fixed.

The blatant bugs that are classes as 'won't be fixed' that shouldn't have been there at RTM, let alone SP1.

There aren't that many serious bugs, the only annoying one I can really think of, is the explorer status bar.

I think if they can provide the abaility to add/remove features from the Server OS then there should be those same capabilities in the consumer editions as well.

The same functionality is already there. Go to Control Panel > Programs and Features > "Turn Windows features on or off".

[jcarle]

Even with Vista SP1 it can still takes ages to copy files. I'm still not too keen on the out of memory while copying files bug that's still lurking around.

You should read this article on SP1's copy engine improvements : http://blogs.technet.com/markrussinovich/a...04/2826167.aspx

The constant thrashing of the HD.

Perhaps you don't have enough memory or you have applications running in the background that are trashing the disks?

All the graphical glitches in the theme.

I haven't seen any yet.

Losing performance in 3D apps because of Aero.

Well considering that Aero is not actively drawing while you're in a 3D application, I don't see the problem. And if you're in a windowed 3D application and your video card can't draw a bit of transparency while rending it's 3D content then you seriously need to consider a video card upgrade or turning off Aero.

The blatant bugs that are classes as 'won't be fixed' that shouldn't have been there at RTM, let alone SP1.

Such as? I haven't actually even encountered anything yet in the OS that would be even classified as a bug.

[MrCobra]

But Windows is expensive to produce (man hours == $), so who pays for it? I have heard quite a few here say Windows is too expensive already - so who pays for the optimization?

/totally a devil's advocate post/

I'm sure a lot of people would be willing to pay for a faster cleaned up Windows. I would.

I have heard quite a few here say Windows is too expensive already - so who pays for the optimization?

That's what it really comes down to. Yes, everything could be hand-optimized asm. But the development costs would spike incredibly.

Nowadays, all developers are dead-set against premature optimization (profile, then optimize the parts that actually need it).

I never said everything and what I provided was only an example. There are key parts in the kernel and the driver systems that are not optimal. Try disassembling them and have a look. In other parts of the OS the "optimizing" compiler didn't do a very good job optimizing. Sloppy code = slow code. There are ways to trick a C/C++ compiler in to creating a more efficient compiled version of a routine.

The second version operates quicker. I also have an SSE2 example that's even faster than the 2nd.

The second version is also a lot more complex than not only the first, but MUCH more than the C or C++ version. You'd need to hire a LOT of asm gurus to optimize everything like that too, and that doesn't come for free (like cluberti said). Plus, higher LoC count usually means more bugs, hence higher maintenance costs and all that. And there is far more to it than just that! You'd have your i386-hand optimized version, then your other code paths for different processor capabilities (e.g. your SSE2 version of that) plus processor feature detection and such all over the place, so now you're maintaining like 6 different code paths, which are each 50x longer than the original (so like 300x more code), which took a LOT longer to write, likely contains more bugs, and takes more time to maintain, etc. The project very quickly becomes a even bigger monster, which makes it that much more difficult to manage.

By using an exception handler to detect if SSE2 support is there takes 7 lines of code in C++. There really only needs to be 2 functions for those routines that could benefit from the optimizations, one for a normal routine and one for the optimized routine. The way around one doesn't have to interfere with the other. The OS could detect is SSE2 is present and if so arrange some internal tables (as it does already) to point to the optimized versions. And just like now with Windows, when you call a routine from your program, it calls to a pointer that holds the location of the routine you're calling. No difference with optimized routines either. The Intel C++ compiler does exactly that when it calls routines within its library.

I would argue that if MSFT were to clean up some of the "optimizations" that the compiler produces, foregoing any further optimizing, it would reduce the size of routines and allow for a small increase in execution speeds.

Mind you, I'm all for optimizing stuff that actually needs it/benefits from it, up to a reasonable point (things like video codecs, and those already are).

Ok, so your codecs are highly optimized and the drivers that Nvidia/ATI have are as well, but the part of the OS that allows it all to work together is full of unoptimal code (have a look) that causes register stalls, branching problems and cache misses which effectively causes the CPU to take longer to get the job done, then those highly optimized codecs aren't doing the job as fast and as efficiently as possible.

I think if they can provide the abaility to add/remove features from the Server OS then there should be those same capabilities in the consumer editions as well.

The same functionality is already there. Go to Control Panel > Programs and Features > "Turn Windows features on or off".

So, in Vista I can totally & completely remove Aero, Windows Mail, Media player, Indexing and Search, and others just like in server 2008? Not a chance. In server I can choose to install the desktop experience pack and if I don't like it I can remove it. There's absolutely no trace of it left. Same with the indexing and search. The whole point in choosing what to install is so that those things that aren't wanted/need never get installed in the 1st place.