There is a company, I don't remember the name right now, that does off a program that will take care of this for people.
But it costs $50. So that's another $50 on top of the upgrade price.
I think MS should just buy them, and include it, but it's not likely.
Look what has to be done.
You have to back up your files, which MS can help with.
You then have to wipe your disk.
Then install the upgrade.
Then restore your files.
Then install your programs from their original install disks, or other original downloads.
Then put in any serial numbers and passwords. Last, hopefully, you need to update any programs that need it, and set your prefs back.
Easy, right?
Its tough to predict what people will do. but so many PC people wait to upgrade the OS by getting new machines when they need them, that I don't know the percentage.
but if there is a lot of pent up frustration over Vista, by those still running XP because of it, then they may just not want to bother with 7.
If I were Apple, I would have some new Ads showing how much work it is upgrading from XP.
On the other hand, It's easier moving from XP to OS X. Apple helps with that more than MS helps.
OMG, you forgot the step where you get a lobotomy!
...wipe your disk, install the upgrade, restore your files, reinstall your original software, reinstall updates, and set your prefs... why is that all necessary?
AIR, the move from OS 9 to OS X, and the move from PPC to Intel wasn't this involved
Of all the software I've purchased the only ones I need to do reinstalls and upgrades are:
1) Windows NT--->Windows XP upgrade (under Parallels)
2) Final Cut Express--->Final Cut studio crossgrade
These are a real PITA, as you must locate the old disks & serial numbers, install an obsolete version, then install the update.
The latest FCS allows you to install the latest version but requires you to enter the crossgrade serial as well as the FCS serial.
*
Is this what IT departments do-- isn't it just busy work?
I don't think the systems are ready for this yet. It can take a couple of decades after ideas like this are really refined enough to be secure and reliable. Everyone's in a big rush to be first so that they can end up with control. You know, internet time.
We also need a much faster speed for our connections.
After all, we're all talking about how fast SSD's are when compared to HDD's in reads, but the internet is several orders of magnitude slower than that.
Can you imaging working on a 300 MB Photoshop file over a normal hi speed connection? If we will need to store the file locally, then why bother using the program over the net?
The whole thing is still in the testing stage, though the companies involved want us to think otherwise. Everyone today is a guinea pig.
It is like getting a heart transplant the first few years after it was developed. Most patients died after a short while. Someone needs to be first, but the smart thing is to wait.
But if we think that Active X is dangerous, well, this looks worse.
OMG, you forgot the step where you get a lobotomy!
...wipe your disk, install the upgrade, restore your files, reinstall your original software, reinstall updates, and set your prefs... why is that all necessary?
AIR, the move from OS 9 to OS X, and the move from PPC to Intel wasn't this involved
Of all the software I've purchased the only ones I need to do reinstalls and upgrades are:
1) Windows NT--->Windows XP upgrade (under Parallels)
2) Final Cut Express--->Final Cut studio crossgrade
These are a real PITA, as you must locate the old disks & serial numbers, install an obsolete version, then install the update.
The latest FCS allows you to install the latest version but requires you to enter the crossgrade serial as well as the FCS serial.
*
Is this what IT departments do-- isn't it just busy work?
*
I'm not the only one who doesn't understand this. One would think that MS would want to make this as painless as possible. Since a program is for sale that does most of the work, where is that $9.5 billion in R&D MS spent this year going?
I'm not the only one who doesn't understand this. One would think that MS would want to make this as painless as possible. Since a program is for sale that does most of the work, where is that $9.5 billion in R&D MS spent this year going?
It's netting a couple billion straight into management's pockets Anyway, when I got a Mac, I wondered how did it manage to simply install applications by dragging and dropping into the applications folder. I always wondered why Windows had to have every program open up an installer when in reality you could've just dragged a program file over to the Program Files folder had Microsoft done it like Apple does. And I bet copying a program file is a lot quicker than running an installer
What's that? The Registry requires programs to modify it in order to work? Oh, that's utter BS. Yes, maybe some complicated programs like Office or Photoshop or antivirus may need to modify the Registry, but nothing else should need to. And another problem... why can't I make an image of a fully functional Windows installation and copy it to another computer to run (this would make it so easy for IT, I wonder if there would be a need for them at all)? It doesn't make sense why WIndows is this difficult to administer if they actually used their 9.5 billion a year. But it really does seem like it's run like an academic organization with a great deal of products, but none of them outstanding, clearly better than anything that ever will be. Of course, that may be asking too much of any company, but clearly in some areas Apple has got it right and Microsoft... well, they're still making you remember some arcane keyboard shortcut to do your job.
I'll tell you this, having been a partner in an electronics engineering company, you can't let the engineers make the product design and interface. If you do, you'll be overwhelmed with switches and knobs.
The same thing is true for software. Programmers are the worst people to take a product to completion. They need a strong hand on the rudder. Someone to say "no!". If that doesn't happen, you get a product like MS's.
Engineers like to add features. one of their favorite phrases is " Why don't we add...".
You have to tell them "NO!". And mean it.
I don't think that there's anyone at MS who can do that.
I totally agree and think that is the biggest problem with software development today.
I don't think MS make terrible products because they hire the worst people in the industry. They make terrible products because they epitomise the industry.
Because software is very techy, many people think that there must be good reasons why products are complex and faulty. If only consumers and managers knew they were right, they could demand better quality software.
Steve Jobs has the right attitude, but he is just one man, with his own blind spots. We need a lot more people in senior management willing to learn enough about technology that they can say: we are not shipping this crap!
EVERY problem a company has, is a failure in management.
the crucial failure of GM and other american auto makers was a failure to innovate and seriously introduce a new generation of products in the last 10 years or so. they took the easy profits of gas guzzling SUV's and kept adding bells and whistles, but never seriously pursued hybrids and other fuel efficient technology. so when the double whammy of high oil prices and a severe recession came, they die.
MS is the same in the consumer market. Windows NT, now Win 7 (but NT 6.1), is bloated 1990's tech with bells and whistles bolted on. and it makes tons of easy profits. but consumer computing is headed in the future direction now of lightweight focused everywhere devices, not full scale desktops, which resource and time-guzzling NT does not fit. and MS' horse in that race, Win CE/Mobile, also based on 1990's tech is a dog, rapidly being pushed into irrelevancy by highly innovative competition (this time, american, not japanese).
Sounds more like wishful thinking on the part of some frightened Apple Fanster -
We'll See Soon Enough...
Well, there is always a slim chance there is an army of Secret Squirls and other rodents on Apple's paylist, freely roaming through MS ventilation ducts and managing to remain anonymous yet well informed.
But I'd lucky-guess MS is throwing some sand in people's eyes... or this is just another purely fictional plot.
Microsoft often has internal turf wars between VPs. It was a mistake to make the acquisition of Danger into the Pink project if this rumor is to be believed.
The simple scenario is that the WinMo VP was guarding his turf from the Pink group. This type of situation has played out many times in the MSN group and other internal groups. It is a cut-throat corporate culture (I've been there). Whole teams have been let go as a result of these turf wars. The team members are either absorbed into other groups, leave on their own after being told to look elsewhere, or are laid-off.
WinMo 7 will win out but the real question is - Is it good enough for anyone to care? With Android, WebOS, and Blackberry OS I don't believe WinMo will gain significant mindshare.
This is why they need to move Ballmer out. Leadership is probably the biggest determinant for the mood & work ethic of a company. What you describe above sounds just like the kind of behavior one would expect from Ballmer.
You see similar effects at Apple. Jobs has always bread an environment of simplicity (you can see it in his dress), & doing the job right or not at all.
It only makes sense that MS is full of inner silos, explains a lot of the difficulty they have in making all parts of their OS keep the same UI look & feel. It's like a schizophrenic operating system.
Well, there is always a slim chance there is an army of Secret Squirls and other rodents on Apple's paylist, freely roaming through MS ventilation ducts and managing to remain anonymous yet well informed.
But I'd lucky-guess MS is throwing some sand in people's eyes... or this is just another purely fictional plot.
Shouldn't the product be Pink 2? Didn't they throw out a version of Windows in development as code name Pink back during the NT days to try & throw off advances of other OSes in the market? It was later revealed to be a completely made up project meant to distract from the advances of their competitors?
Anyone else think the coincidence is weird?
EDIT: Little mix up, Pink was code name for a project lead by Apple & IBM. Microsoft did announce an OS at one time as a ruse to distract from their competition's advances but the code name was not Pink.
Wish I could remember the code name of the OS MS announced that turned out to be fake, dang this memory. It was round the time of Win98 I think. Anyone?
Shouldn't the product be Pink 2? Didn't they throw out a version of Windows in development as code name Pink back during the NT days to try & throw off advances of other OSes in the market? It was later revealed to be a completely made up project meant to distract from the advances of their competitors?
Anyone else think the coincidence is weird?
EDIT: Little mix up, Pink was code name for a project lead by Apple & IBM. Microsoft did announce an OS at one time as a ruse to distract from their competition's advances but the code name was not Pink.
Wish I could remember the code name of the OS MS announced that turned out to be fake, dang this memory. It was round the time of Win98 I think. Anyone?
I highly disagree. Microsoft's problem is not the pursuit of profit.
Actually I beg to differ, Microsoft's purpose these days is to prop up the share price, the X-Box is a loss leader with the sole intent of dominating the gaming market by giving away the hardware, driven by exclusivity on a game, supported by the revenue stream of millions of gamers parting with 5 dollars or 5 pounds sterling a month, whatever the price is, when its multiplied by millions at a true cost of close to zero (running a few servers to provide the interconnects). Then you have a revenue stream that is pure profit, the same logic applies to all of Microsoft's annual licensing contracts, we licence something to you, our customer thats buggy and full of features you don't need and in exchange we'll take x in annual fees and 'maintenance'
Quote:
Originally Posted by tundraboy
Ross Perot tried to get the same thing done at GM when he joined its board back in the 80's. Of course the suits at GM didn't want their perks, pleasures, and powers curtailed so they eventually kicked him off the board. That was the last serious attempt to fix GM. And we all know what happened after that.
I worked at EDS when Ross was still running the company after the GM takeover. Ross spent a lot of energy trying to point out that making rubbish products and delivering poor customer service was a recipe for disaster. Shame, because Ross was right.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Maestro64
Actually he did not get recognize for it since the government in its infinite wisdom did not want anyone to know they had the technology to crack the Enigma code, this was kept top secret for 50 years. ALong with him there was another guy can not remember his name but he was a magician who developed camouflage technology during WWII that was so successful that it was still be used into recent times and is still classified and he was never allow to talk about it or get recognized for what he did. Most people who develop these military technologies can never talk about it and usually cause the life long grief.
I find it difficult to understand how such a huge corporation can be so badly run.
I think that the major difference between MS and Apple is the org.structure.
Apple seem to have a very flat structure which makes it easy for Steve Jobs to look over projects and the different products. Every product gets a very close, and intense scrutiny by the top leaders.
Microsoft on the other hand, seems to be a bureaucratic swamp. Layers upon layers in the org.chart is filled with human resource people, middle managers and people that is not producing either vision or code. The coders and product designers are probably in a minority.
So out of this comes products that the people at the top probably don´t know much about, projects and the progress of them are not updated or understood, and a general feeling of being inside a rat-race.
And the result is a company with still much power, but less and less interesting and inventive.
Comments
That's why I don't trust it yet.
Disgruntled employee? [Not you, the cause!]
There is a company, I don't remember the name right now, that does off a program that will take care of this for people.
But it costs $50. So that's another $50 on top of the upgrade price.
I think MS should just buy them, and include it, but it's not likely.
Look what has to be done.
You have to back up your files, which MS can help with.
You then have to wipe your disk.
Then install the upgrade.
Then restore your files.
Then install your programs from their original install disks, or other original downloads.
Then put in any serial numbers and passwords. Last, hopefully, you need to update any programs that need it, and set your prefs back.
Easy, right?
Its tough to predict what people will do. but so many PC people wait to upgrade the OS by getting new machines when they need them, that I don't know the percentage.
but if there is a lot of pent up frustration over Vista, by those still running XP because of it, then they may just not want to bother with 7.
If I were Apple, I would have some new Ads showing how much work it is upgrading from XP.
On the other hand, It's easier moving from XP to OS X. Apple helps with that more than MS helps.
OMG, you forgot the step where you get a lobotomy!
...wipe your disk, install the upgrade, restore your files, reinstall your original software, reinstall updates, and set your prefs... why is that all necessary?
AIR, the move from OS 9 to OS X, and the move from PPC to Intel wasn't this involved
Of all the software I've purchased the only ones I need to do reinstalls and upgrades are:
1) Windows NT--->Windows XP upgrade (under Parallels)
2) Final Cut Express--->Final Cut studio crossgrade
These are a real PITA, as you must locate the old disks & serial numbers, install an obsolete version, then install the update.
The latest FCS allows you to install the latest version but requires you to enter the crossgrade serial as well as the FCS serial.
*
Is this what IT departments do-- isn't it just busy work?
*
Disgruntled employee? [Not you, the cause!]
I don't think the systems are ready for this yet. It can take a couple of decades after ideas like this are really refined enough to be secure and reliable. Everyone's in a big rush to be first so that they can end up with control. You know, internet time.
We also need a much faster speed for our connections.
After all, we're all talking about how fast SSD's are when compared to HDD's in reads, but the internet is several orders of magnitude slower than that.
Can you imaging working on a 300 MB Photoshop file over a normal hi speed connection? If we will need to store the file locally, then why bother using the program over the net?
The whole thing is still in the testing stage, though the companies involved want us to think otherwise. Everyone today is a guinea pig.
It is like getting a heart transplant the first few years after it was developed. Most patients died after a short while. Someone needs to be first, but the smart thing is to wait.
But if we think that Active X is dangerous, well, this looks worse.
OMG, you forgot the step where you get a lobotomy!
...wipe your disk, install the upgrade, restore your files, reinstall your original software, reinstall updates, and set your prefs... why is that all necessary?
AIR, the move from OS 9 to OS X, and the move from PPC to Intel wasn't this involved
Of all the software I've purchased the only ones I need to do reinstalls and upgrades are:
1) Windows NT--->Windows XP upgrade (under Parallels)
2) Final Cut Express--->Final Cut studio crossgrade
These are a real PITA, as you must locate the old disks & serial numbers, install an obsolete version, then install the update.
The latest FCS allows you to install the latest version but requires you to enter the crossgrade serial as well as the FCS serial.
*
Is this what IT departments do-- isn't it just busy work?
*
I'm not the only one who doesn't understand this. One would think that MS would want to make this as painless as possible. Since a program is for sale that does most of the work, where is that $9.5 billion in R&D MS spent this year going?
I'm not the only one who doesn't understand this. One would think that MS would want to make this as painless as possible. Since a program is for sale that does most of the work, where is that $9.5 billion in R&D MS spent this year going?
It's netting a couple billion straight into management's pockets
What's that? The Registry requires programs to modify it in order to work? Oh, that's utter BS. Yes, maybe some complicated programs like Office or Photoshop or antivirus may need to modify the Registry, but nothing else should need to. And another problem... why can't I make an image of a fully functional Windows installation and copy it to another computer to run (this would make it so easy for IT, I wonder if there would be a need for them at all)? It doesn't make sense why WIndows is this difficult to administer if they actually used their 9.5 billion a year. But it really does seem like it's run like an academic organization with a great deal of products, but none of them outstanding, clearly better than anything that ever will be. Of course, that may be asking too much of any company, but clearly in some areas Apple has got it right and Microsoft... well, they're still making you remember some arcane keyboard shortcut to do your job.
[...]
I'll tell you this, having been a partner in an electronics engineering company, you can't let the engineers make the product design and interface. If you do, you'll be overwhelmed with switches and knobs.
The same thing is true for software. Programmers are the worst people to take a product to completion. They need a strong hand on the rudder. Someone to say "no!". If that doesn't happen, you get a product like MS's.
Engineers like to add features. one of their favorite phrases is " Why don't we add...".
You have to tell them "NO!". And mean it.
I don't think that there's anyone at MS who can do that.
I totally agree and think that is the biggest problem with software development today.
I don't think MS make terrible products because they hire the worst people in the industry. They make terrible products because they epitomise the industry.
Because software is very techy, many people think that there must be good reasons why products are complex and faulty. If only consumers and managers knew they were right, they could demand better quality software.
Steve Jobs has the right attitude, but he is just one man, with his own blind spots. We need a lot more people in senior management willing to learn enough about technology that they can say: we are not shipping this crap!
EVERY problem a company has, is a failure in management.
the crucial failure of GM and other american auto makers was a failure to innovate and seriously introduce a new generation of products in the last 10 years or so. they took the easy profits of gas guzzling SUV's and kept adding bells and whistles, but never seriously pursued hybrids and other fuel efficient technology. so when the double whammy of high oil prices and a severe recession came, they die.
MS is the same in the consumer market. Windows NT, now Win 7 (but NT 6.1), is bloated 1990's tech with bells and whistles bolted on. and it makes tons of easy profits. but consumer computing is headed in the future direction now of lightweight focused everywhere devices, not full scale desktops, which resource and time-guzzling NT does not fit. and MS' horse in that race, Win CE/Mobile, also based on 1990's tech is a dog, rapidly being pushed into irrelevancy by highly innovative competition (this time, american, not japanese).
An "anonymous tipster" you say?
Sounds more like wishful thinking on the part of some frightened Apple Fanster -
We'll See Soon Enough...
Well, there is always a slim chance there is an army of Secret Squirls and other rodents on Apple's paylist, freely roaming through MS ventilation ducts and managing to remain anonymous yet well informed.
But I'd lucky-guess MS is throwing some sand in people's eyes... or this is just another purely fictional plot.
http://gizmodo.com/5366263/the-pink-...you-to-see-yet
Microsoft often has internal turf wars between VPs. It was a mistake to make the acquisition of Danger into the Pink project if this rumor is to be believed.
The simple scenario is that the WinMo VP was guarding his turf from the Pink group. This type of situation has played out many times in the MSN group and other internal groups. It is a cut-throat corporate culture (I've been there). Whole teams have been let go as a result of these turf wars. The team members are either absorbed into other groups, leave on their own after being told to look elsewhere, or are laid-off.
WinMo 7 will win out but the real question is - Is it good enough for anyone to care? With Android, WebOS, and Blackberry OS I don't believe WinMo will gain significant mindshare.
This is why they need to move Ballmer out. Leadership is probably the biggest determinant for the mood & work ethic of a company. What you describe above sounds just like the kind of behavior one would expect from Ballmer.
You see similar effects at Apple. Jobs has always bread an environment of simplicity (you can see it in his dress), & doing the job right or not at all.
It only makes sense that MS is full of inner silos, explains a lot of the difficulty they have in making all parts of their OS keep the same UI look & feel. It's like a schizophrenic operating system.
Well, there is always a slim chance there is an army of Secret Squirls and other rodents on Apple's paylist, freely roaming through MS ventilation ducts and managing to remain anonymous yet well informed.
But I'd lucky-guess MS is throwing some sand in people's eyes... or this is just another purely fictional plot.
http://gizmodo.com/5366263/the-pink-...you-to-see-yet
Shouldn't the product be Pink 2? Didn't they throw out a version of Windows in development as code name Pink back during the NT days to try & throw off advances of other OSes in the market? It was later revealed to be a completely made up project meant to distract from the advances of their competitors?
Anyone else think the coincidence is weird?
EDIT: Little mix up, Pink was code name for a project lead by Apple & IBM. Microsoft did announce an OS at one time as a ruse to distract from their competition's advances but the code name was not Pink.
Great article on Pink here.
http://www.businessweek.com/the_thre...oft_apple.html
Wish I could remember the code name of the OS MS announced that turned out to be fake, dang this memory. It was round the time of Win98 I think. Anyone?
Shouldn't the product be Pink 2? Didn't they throw out a version of Windows in development as code name Pink back during the NT days to try & throw off advances of other OSes in the market? It was later revealed to be a completely made up project meant to distract from the advances of their competitors?
Anyone else think the coincidence is weird?
EDIT: Little mix up, Pink was code name for a project lead by Apple & IBM. Microsoft did announce an OS at one time as a ruse to distract from their competition's advances but the code name was not Pink.
Great article on Pink here.
http://www.businessweek.com/the_thre...oft_apple.html
Wish I could remember the code name of the OS MS announced that turned out to be fake, dang this memory. It was round the time of Win98 I think. Anyone?
Cairo?
*
I highly disagree. Microsoft's problem is not the pursuit of profit.
Actually I beg to differ, Microsoft's purpose these days is to prop up the share price, the X-Box is a loss leader with the sole intent of dominating the gaming market by giving away the hardware, driven by exclusivity on a game, supported by the revenue stream of millions of gamers parting with 5 dollars or 5 pounds sterling a month, whatever the price is, when its multiplied by millions at a true cost of close to zero (running a few servers to provide the interconnects). Then you have a revenue stream that is pure profit, the same logic applies to all of Microsoft's annual licensing contracts, we licence something to you, our customer thats buggy and full of features you don't need and in exchange we'll take x in annual fees and 'maintenance'
Ross Perot tried to get the same thing done at GM when he joined its board back in the 80's. Of course the suits at GM didn't want their perks, pleasures, and powers curtailed so they eventually kicked him off the board. That was the last serious attempt to fix GM. And we all know what happened after that.
I worked at EDS when Ross was still running the company after the GM takeover. Ross spent a lot of energy trying to point out that making rubbish products and delivering poor customer service was a recipe for disaster. Shame, because Ross was right.
Actually he did not get recognize for it since the government in its infinite wisdom did not want anyone to know they had the technology to crack the Enigma code, this was kept top secret for 50 years. ALong with him there was another guy can not remember his name but he was a magician who developed camouflage technology during WWII that was so successful that it was still be used into recent times and is still classified and he was never allow to talk about it or get recognized for what he did. Most people who develop these military technologies can never talk about it and usually cause the life long grief.
I believe the magicians name was Jasper Maskelyne
http://www.channel4.com/history/micr...es/jasper.html
The original article was most illuminating and a very interesting read, some of the comments perhaps less so....
I find it difficult to understand how such a huge corporation can be so badly run.
I think that the major difference between MS and Apple is the org.structure.
Apple seem to have a very flat structure which makes it easy for Steve Jobs to look over projects and the different products. Every product gets a very close, and intense scrutiny by the top leaders.
Microsoft on the other hand, seems to be a bureaucratic swamp. Layers upon layers in the org.chart is filled with human resource people, middle managers and people that is not producing either vision or code. The coders and product designers are probably in a minority.
So out of this comes products that the people at the top probably don´t know much about, projects and the progress of them are not updated or understood, and a general feeling of being inside a rat-race.
And the result is a company with still much power, but less and less interesting and inventive.