One Windows? How does that work... and WTF is a Universal App? “Whether it’s building a game, or a line of business application, there’ll be one way to write a universal application that targets the entire product family,” said Microsoft Executive VP Terry Myerson, announcing Windows 10 yesterday. One Windows: Windows 10 will be delivered on multiple device types One Windows: Windows 10 …
"I would be interested to know why you consider Windows as being 'entirely modular in design' and 'Linux' (as opposed to a given Linux distro) not."
Linux is based on a legacy monolithic kernel design - everything bolted together at compilation time. Windows is based on a more advanced hybrid microkernel model - meaning that kernel and other modules (not just drivers) can be loaded and unloaded dynamically.
Linux is based on a legacy monolithic kernel design - everything bolted together at compilation time. Windows is based on a more advanced hybrid microkernel model - meaning that kernel and other modules (not just drivers) can be loaded and unloaded dynamically.
That sounds like something from a salesperson, than from an engineer, by glossing over facts, using throw-away words, generating conclusions to favour your owner. "oh gosh, Linux is monolithic.. we'd better not use it" sigh.
Linux is, in fact, a modular monolithic kernel. You can load and unload modules on the fly. You can even compile those modules so they're part of the kernel.
I'm a Windows user, and even I know that.
Linux is based on a legacy monolithic kernel design - everything bolted together at compilation time. Windows is based on a more advanced hybrid microkernel model - meaning that kernel and other modules (not just drivers) can be loaded and unloaded dynamically.
Ooooh, lots of fun words to play with. Quite a lot of NLP hiding in there, so let me unpick this.
"a LEGACY monolithic kernel" - BS. If you want legacy, see how long EDLIN.EXE was carried in Windows. Secondly, I started using Linux when it still came on 14 floppies as Slackware and yes, in those days you have to compile a bespoke kernel. However, it's actually a very long time ago I compiled my last because it's all about runtime insertion of modules now. It appears your knowledge of Linux is, umm, a tiny bit out of date.
"Windows is based on a more advanced hybrid microkernel model" - "more advanced" is clear BS. The day MS leads the IT field in anything but the novelty of its security leaks I'll have a party. MS never leads, it always follows and copies. It has to, because every time it *cough* "innovates" *cough* it does so in ways that are simply disastrous, and in ways that prevent rollback. I'm also not so convinced about all this "dynamic" stuff you talk about, no doubt a word the marketing department insisted you put in there. Windows is still the OS that gave us the reboot to fix it all, and frankly, I don't think you've caught all the memory leaks yet or you wouldn't need Patch Tuesday.
Last but not least "hybrid"? Trying to surf along on the eco wave? Hybrid of what? All I can think of is incompetence and greed, but I don't think you meant that.
Again a nice bit of word play - all talk and no substance. We're getting a lot of that lately, which is a compliment for The Register IMHO as it appears people have been specifically tasked to talk up MS here. I really feel sorry for you. Well, a few seconds that is.
"The day MS leads the IT field in anything but the novelty of its security leaks I'll have a party. "
Like it's SSL stack and Shell for instance? Oh, wait...
MS never leads, it always follows and copies."
Actually Linux has copied far more features from Windows than Windows ever has from Linux. For instance - Per processor cache lists, Granular ACLs (NFS 4.1), Application Control (SEL), etc, etc.
Windows is based on a more advanced hybrid microkernel model - meaning that kernel and other modules (not just drivers) can be loaded and unloaded dynamically.
That would be "hybrid microkernel" as in "not a real micro-kernel at all"?
I remember going to a presentation about this back in the mid-90's. The presentation was by DEC - as at that time Windows NT was going to run on multiple CPU architectures and DEC were keen to be involved. That turned out to be a useful and relevant as the "micro-kernel".
The only really useful thing from that day was a cotton bag they handed out, which is still doing sturdy service to handle my Waitrose shopping. Now that is good re-use of "soft"-ware.
Being able to load/unload drivers don't make a microkernel. Having drivers run in userspace is (one of several) minimum requirement for a microkernel. Neither do that, both run drivers in kernel mode. Microsoft doesn't even make the display driver loadable, they gave up on that back in the early NT days because it hurt performance, and paid for it with years of BSODs until the display drivers got more stable.
Calling Windows a "hybrid kernel" is laughable, there is no such thing. That's like saying "she's partially pregnant". You either have a microkernel or a monolithic kernel, there is no in-between except for Microsoft apologists who don't want to admit that the original NT concept of a microkernel was never realized because they couldn't make it perform well.
If Windows has a hybrid kernel then OS X's / iOS's XNU a microkernel by comparison. At least it uses a few more microkernel features like message passing instead of shared address spaces. But it doesn't qualify as a microkernel either.
The only true microkernel in mass market PCs / mobile devices I'm aware of is the L4 microkernel running on the security co-processor in the iPhone 5S / 6. That's only because for security purposes you want the privileged portion to be as tiny as possible, and L4 is certainly tiny, and the performance penalty of a microkernel isn't a concern for this use case.
"Calling Windows a "hybrid kernel" is laughable, there is no such thing"
Clearly you have absolutely no knowledge of the subject.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_kernel
The best known example of a hybrid kernel is the Microsoft NT kernel that powers all operating systems in the Windows NT family, up to and including Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012, and powers Windows Phone 8. NT-based Windows is classified as a hybrid kernel (or a macrokernel) rather than a monolithic kernel because the emulation subsystems run in user-mode server processes, rather than in kernel mode as on a monolithic kernel, and further because of the large number of design goals which resemble design goals of Mach (in particular the separation of OS personalities from a general kernel design). Conversely, the reason NT is not a microkernel system is because most of the system components run in the same address space as the kernel, as would be the case with a monolithic design (in a traditional monolithic design, there would not be a microkernel per se, but the kernel would implement broadly similar functionality to NT's microkernel and kernel-mode subsystems).
You either have a microkernel or a monolithic kernel
Rubbish. Modular kernels with dynamic loading are by no stretch of the imagination microkernels, but there's a wide range of kernel architectures between micro and monolithic. Modular kernels are a tremendous step forward from monolithic kernels like SVR3 and BSD 4. Less useful, but still not monolithic, are the older partitioned kernels with driver and services layers, like AIX 1 and 2 for the PC RT and the original HAL-based Windows NT. And then there are other variations, like the "library OS" design that builds a custom special-purpose kernel on the fly when a VM spins up.
There are microkernels and things that are not microkernels, but to label the latter category "monolithic" robs that term of all meaning.
> would be interested to know why you consider Windows as being 'entirely modular in design' and 'Linux' (as opposed to a given Linux distro) not.
Especially since windows needs a reboot to update it's web browser application, never mind the kernel.
I've also noticed updating Word on a Mac requires you to shut down firefox, chrome and safari. Now that's "special."
"Presumably much like Linux everywhere works"
Indeed it does!
"except Windows has the slight advantage of being entirely modular in design from the ground up versus the more monolithic approach of Linux."
This is an irrelevant (and debatable; see above) detail regarding the kernel itself. If it were significant then I'd be seeing Windows on things like my ADSL router instead Linux.
What is significant is that most popular operating systems built around the Linux kernel are entirely modular and built from the ground up using packages (e.g. RPM, Debian). This provides a level of modularity that Windows could only ever dream of and it makes software installation and patching a breeze.
NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Complain NOW before they try taking it away.
Apparently already forgotten how willing MS are to remove features then drag their feet waiting for users to give up complaining... it's like Win8 never happened. Still annoyed that XP SP2 reduced access to all the RAM on a 4Gb+ system.
I am using Windows 10 right now. And despite there being an option to disable this stuff during setup, it is both re-enabled and greyed out in windows proper. Half the privacy controls are missing and I am seeing quite a lot of traffic streaming to Microsoft-held servers that I explicitly didn't authorize.
So fuck your simplistic world view, fanboy. I'll stop complaining when they act with honour.
" I am using Windows 10 right now."
Well at least its got to be better than trying to use Linux on the desktop.
"And despite there being an option to disable this stuff during setup, it is both re-enabled and greyed out in windows proper. "
So what - it's Alpha code - they probably need to test that it works. Or it might be a bug. Come back crying if it's like that in production. Which we all know it won't be as Microsoft never enable stuff like this by default in final release software and always ask you first. If you want to complain about spyware by design and by default you need to look at a Google product...
"Microsoft never enable stuff like this by default in final release software "
Bullshit. Install Windows 8 and just skip the customization at install. It's all on and streaming your life to them, 24/7. Despite your love of that company, they are emphatically not honourable. They just put hundreds of millions of dollars into deflecting the discussion about privacy - and the selfsame data collection techniques and tactics used by Microsoft - onto their competition.
“Mind Control: To control mental output you have to control mental input. Take control of the channels by which developers receive information, then they can only think about the things you tell them. Thus, you control mindshare!” From one of Microsoft's own documents: http://techrights.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/comes-3096.pdf
Sorry, but I believe what my packet sniffer says, not marketing. And I'm seeing rather more traffic out of my 8.1 VM than I authorized too. And I just did a default install. Hmm. Even after defanging the thing as extensively as I know how, I've obviously missed something, because it's calling the mothership from time to time.
But it's all good, hmm? Because it's Microsoft?
Sorry, but no beans. On the whole, I mostly like Windows 10. (Despite the now 48 feedback items I've logged about various bugs and nit picks about the UI.) Or, at least, I only hate it about as much as I hate Windows 7, once all the customization is done.
But the privacy thing...that's a no go. There's a lot more going on here than in Windows 7, and there are no obvious ways to kill it.
Google, for all their sins, give you one single location to see everything they collect on you and to delete it, opt out or quit the service. It's time Microsoft did this. And at the end of the day, I don't care whether or not you agree. My privacy isn't for sale, and it certainly won't be a coin paid in the name of your brand tribalism.
"Install Windows 8 and just skip the customization at install. It's all on and streaming your life to them, 24/7."
I assume you mean the Express Settings option - that displays a warning in large text in the middle of the screen that tells you very clearly and specifically that if you continue it will "help improve Microsoft software, services and location services by sending us info" if you continue - so it's not on unless you agree to it. It's not exactly buried in an EULA, etc.
"Google, for all their sins, give you one single location to see everything they collect on you and to delete it, opt out or quit the service. It's time Microsoft did this"
There are only two locations - Under Settings Privacy > General and Search and apps > Search if you don't want your searches sent to Bing. Not exactly challenging to disable if you mislaid your tin foil hat.
It doesn't matter if they "display a warning" or not. Your claim was that they didn't enable it by default. They do, and you're full of shit.
As for your "disable in two places" tripe, it's funny how even if you disable that stuff - when the OS lets you disable it, that is - the damned thing still calls home. There are more knobs than just those, because Microsoft reports more than just your searches. (Not that disabling those seems to stop it from communicating when you search, but I digress.)
No tinfoil hat is required. Microsoft flat out doesn't give a rat's ass about privacy. And they won't, either, unless we make them.
"From one of Microsoft's own documents: http://techrights.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/comes-3096.pdf"
Thank you for that. It confirms what we already know, and have experienced on this very forum.
It does? It was published in September 2000. Every molecule in your body has been replaced since then and I think it's fair to say (given products on different platforms and the ongoing open-sourcing of many of their developer tools and other stuff) that Microsoft are a very different company in 2014.
But no worries.
Hey Trev, while you're here, maybe you could complain about MS beginning to bundle IE in the OS? That only happened in 1995, it's practically the same vintage as your document.
"I think it's fair to say (given products on different platforms and the ongoing open-sourcing of many of their developer tools and other stuff) that Microsoft are a very different company in 2014"
I don't think it's fair to say that at all. Their corporate culture really hasn't changed much at all since then, with the exception of a minor focus on security...but they all just got fired. Now security is the responsibility of the same people under pressure to deliver to deadline. Which is going backwards into the 90s, thanks.
Nadella's good people, and I honestly believe he's trying to change things for the better, but he just doesn't have the cloud. He's fighting vicious piranhas in the board room and his own executives - none of which are his lieutenants, you'll remember - who are all devoted to protect their empires at all costs.
Microsoft is still very much Ballmer's baby, with Bill's hands deep in the pie, as it was throughout Ballmer's reign. It will be years yet - if it's even possible - before that changes. And Windows 8.2 (now 10) is not something that bears Nadella's personal mark.
Ad for the bundling of IE, I never had a problem with including it in the OS. I did have a problem with building other OS components such that they depended on it. (Windows Update, etc.) It's still a problem. In fact, I have 9 separate bug reports in on Windows 10 right now about elements of the OS that seem to call IE, despite my desire to banish the thing from my sight, and it not being the default browser.
For example: that integrated search shit I can't turn off? Why is it calling IE, when Firefox is my default browser? More to the point, why is it calling Metro IE? There's something broken there.
Funny, isn't it, how those problems from so long ago are still problems. Especially is Microsoft were the "good guy" company you and others so often make them out to be.
They are the product of their history. Good and bad. And change in that company is very, very slow.
"Ad for the bundling of IE, I never had a problem with including it in the OS. I did have a problem with building other OS components such that they depended on it. (Windows Update, etc.) It's still a problem. In fact, I have 9 separate bug reports in on Windows 10 right now about elements of the OS that seem to call IE, despite my desire to banish the thing from my sight, and it not being the default browser."
No change from Windows7 then ...
open-sourcing of many of their developer tools and other stuff
Most if it isn't really OSS, it's a "look, but don't touch" un-compilable reference.
They had to do something in order to remain vaguely relevant to developers (plus anything in .NET is decompilable anyway). I do appreciate the very little they've done, however. I won't begrudge them credit for it, the few decent MS devs must have lobbied hard for that. (Although it's funny how you get the MS-only nerds whining how shite OSS is, when at the same time MS are convincing them they're now an OSS company)
Their "real" products, however, are still as closed tight as a nun's crunt. VS? Office? NTFS? IE? No chance!
Anonymous Bullard:
"Their "real" products, however, are still as closed tight as a nun's crunt. VS? Office? NTFS? IE? No chance!"
This is very true, and I am not fooled by it.
I am, however, continuously surprised at the amount of tech people (not meaning you, sir/madam, as I don't know your stance) who seem to give Google a free pass on this self-same issue. The Chocolate Factory are cool guys who do OSS - apart from anything that matters like the Search/Ad stuff that provides over 90% of their revenue and for which they don't even reveal the exact algorithms let alone the code.
Again, this is not to excuse MS but rather to use the opening to remind readers about the real nature of Google too.
The Chocolate Factory are cool guys who do OSS - apart from anything that matters like the Search/Ad stuff that provides over 90% of their revenue and for which they don't even reveal the exact algorithms let alone the code.
Well, since you mention it, I do prefer that Google aren't afraid of releasing the source of their developer tools, and aren't afraid of using external and existing OSS tools too. I'm not interested in their code for their "services", because my code doesn't depend on it (I don't call it, or have the need to debug it). Likewise, I don't need to see Bing's code.
Google, for all their sins, give you one single location to see everything they collect on you and to delete it, opt out or quit the service.
Nope. From their Terms of Service, topic "Your contents in our Services":
Some of our Services allow you to upload, submit, store, send or receive content. You retain ownership of any intellectual property rights that you hold in that content. In short, what belongs to you stays yours.
So far so good - I'm going to skip a few bits to get to the fun part which contradicts those wonderful words:
When you upload, submit, store, send or receive content to or through our Services, you give Google (and those we work with) a worldwide license to use, host, store, reproduce, modify, create derivative works (such as those resulting from translations, adaptations or other changes we make so that your content works better with our Services), communicate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute such content. The rights you grant in this license are for the limited purpose of operating, promoting, and improving our Services, and to develop new ones. This license continues even if you stop using our Services (for example, for a business listing you have added to Google Maps).
Not so good - they just rephrased the word "perpetuity" because people started to pick up on it, and their description of "limited" is rather all encompassing IMHO.
Some Services may offer you ways to access and remove content that has been provided to that Service. Also, in some of our Services, there are terms or settings that narrow the scope of our use of the content submitted in those Services.
You try and find a service with a more limited data grab. Good luck finding it.
Google is IMHO evil - it just talks nice. It learned that trick from Microsoft, but in my opinion even Microsoft never dared venture where Google walks in with hobnailed boots. Beware.
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"If you find desktop Linux difficult "
It's still much more of a pain than current Windows versions. Sure most of the installation and driver issues that used to plague Linux have gone away. But want to do anything advanced? - you end up have to use primitive text editing tools editing multiple obscure complex configuration files - or have to actually build and compile the software you need from typed commands! Linux is still way way behind Windows in terms of usability for average Joe Public
Well, in a way it's nice to see that Microsoft has added multiple desktops (workspaces) to windows. Pretty late to that party - it was by no means a new idea when Linux arrived on the scene.
As for using Linux desktop, the Linux UI is superior to the Windows UI in most regards (the exception being raw performance achieved at the expense of seriously compromising the system's security).
So you must mean the apps. Well, they are Microsoft Proprietary. If you think they are good enough to lock yourself in to the Microsoft walled garden, that's your choice. I'd just comment that if you have a corporate Windows license, and if you don't need the ultimate raw graphics performance, I'd say the best place for Windows is running in a VM, displaying in a Linux window in a workspace on a Linux desktop.
If nothing else, you get snapshots this way. Next time installing something borks Windows (or it gets a nasty dose of malware, or it auto-borks) just revert the VM to the most recent good snapshot. What about your recent user data, you ask? Well, if you have any sense it's on a Linux host filesystem presented to the VM as a network share. And (separately) snapshotted.
I wonder when Windows will get something as useful and reliable as btrfs? 2030? (And yes, I am quite aware that btrfs is not fully mature yet, and there are more reliable similar filesystems out there, such as ZFS. Talking of which, ZOL is also coming along nicely).
"So you must mean the apps. Well, they are Microsoft Proprietary"
Not sure what 'apps' you mean - but MS Office for instance is currently by far the best platform on the market that fully supports ODF.
"As for using Linux desktop, the Linux UI is superior to the Windows UI in most regards"
It really isn't - Windows has far more advanced touch and gesture capabilities for instance.
"(the exception being raw performance achieved at the expense of seriously compromising the system's security)."
You mean using BASH presumably.
" and if you don't need the ultimate raw graphics performance, I'd say the best place for Windows is running in a VM, displaying in a Linux window in a workspace on a Linux desktop."
Linux is one of the least efficient, least secure, and least popular Hypervisors (KVM has a less than 1% market share). The more obvious choice for VDI (as is reflected in market share) would be to use Hyper-V Server which is totally free (including patches and support - unlike say KVM on Redhat) is much more efficient, is more scalable and has a much smaller attack surface than having to run an entire Linux install as per KVM. Or I would consider vSphere if money is no object.
"If nothing else, you get snapshots this way"
You already have that built into Windows. No need to add a hypervisor for that functionality.
If the general release of the software still has these restrictions when it is released, I will help you up onto that high horse you're on, but right now, it seems like you're complaining that the software is communicating with its publisher when that's exactly what they told you it was going to do.
When you participate in anybody's "early access" programme you are a beta tester. Beta testers get early access to software in exchange for providing test and usage information to its developers. If you don't like that arrangement, then stop beta-testing the software, and wait for a review copy.
To be fair they should have disabled the option at installation if they didn't have it working in the beta (although if it's a bug then that's fair enough). It's one thing collecting data in the beta, but if you give customer/tester the option to opt out of that collection then you really should be going along with that
@SolidSquid it's odd. Because it's like half the controls are missing from PC Settings that I'd expect to be there, and those that are there are greyed out. Sort of what I'd expect if some sort of group policy were applied, but I can't find anything in the registry that would administratively disable it.
What's more, there seems to an awful lot of traffic going to MS. Enough that if I was on 4G I'd be actually angry. And there doesn't seem to be a control at all do disable unified search. Hit search in the start menu and it takes you to bing, despite my explicitly disabling that during install.
Bugs I'll accept...but these aren't new features. Windows 10 isn't a new operating system. There's nothing here but a cosmetic layer over 8.1, and a mostly unfinished one at that. There's no reason for this stuff to be broken if it was present and working in 8.1. It's not like those areas of the UI were reworked. It's all the same stuff there.
It's just bizarre.
From just a basic reading of the Windows Universal Apps description, all UAs report analytics data back to Microsoft which routes to the developer. I expected that, store apps already do it. What was really cringe-worthy was reading the Get A Developers License which carries monitoring into your system. Even should you have a non-internet connected machine (you get issued your license from your domain admin), it seems you still agree to some form of local monitoring as it will revoke your license on the spot, without a connection. Okaaay!
Definitely not letting this beast near my machines. VM, obvious, even though that fails to test the most important aspect here: H/W compatibility.
@Jack of Shadows: You've solved it!
Once I started pulling out all the store apps the constant stream of activity to Microsoft's server ceased. My next quest is to find out which of the store apps were causing this, and what, exactly, they were sending.
Also: why some of them were sending so much data...
@Kristian Walsh: part of testing the software is seeing what data it's collecting on you, how you have the ability to turn that off and how much of what gets turned on when you tweak the various knobs.
I have absolutely no problem with Microsoft collecting info on my beta copy. I signed up, I know how that works. I even logged in with my Microsoft account in order to leave feedback.
But when I go explicitly hunting to turn it all off in a separate, created for the purpose of testing that functionality, VM I should be able to do it. Ensuring privacy controls work is a critical part of ensuring that the operating system is ready for prime time. And, to me, it's far more important than making sure the graphics subsystem works, or that the Start Menu doesn't irritate me too much.
I'm beta testing the product and there are notable bugs in how it handles privacy. I'm willing to bet Microsoft won't address them unless lawsuits are involved. Quite simply because that's what it always seems to take with them to get privacy taken seriously.
So you'll have to excuse me if I make my fuss now, in beta, before the product goes out. That way at least there's a paper trail that says "no, actually, this was raised with you repeatedly."
All part of the process of holding their feet to the fire. (Well, bitching on El Reg's forums is an irrelevant part of that compared to sending formal feedback through the various other channels available, but damn it, it makes me feel better.)
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