Microsoft has announced a new version of Windows called Windows 10 S. It only runs apps from the Windows Store, and is positioned between Windows 10 Home and Windows 10 Pro, both of which can run third party applications. Microsoft also announced a new line of Surface laptops running the OS. The laptops have been described as competing with either Google's Chromebooks or Apple's MacBook Air, and aimed at students:
Windows 10 S is Windows 10 with its wings slightly clipped: it can only run apps from the Windows Store, disabling compatibility with the enormous breadth of Windows programs out there, which in the educational context translates to better security, consistent performance, focus for students, and improved battery life. It's cheaper and less versatile than Windows 10 Pro, which is exactly what schools are looking for (and the thing that's had them gravitating toward Google's Chrome OS in recent times).
[...] Immediately upon its introduction, Windows 10 S spans a price range from $189 to $2,199 (for the top Surface Laptop spec). So is this a straightforward and affordable solution for mass educational deployment? Or is it a super streamlined operating system for powering extremely desirable and long-lasting laptops? Yes. Microsoft's answer to both of those things is yes. It's not impossible to achieve both goals with the same software, of course, but it is difficult to position the OS in people's minds.
[...] The Windows on ARM effort is going to be rekindled by the end of this year, and Windows 10 S is the likeliest candidate to be the OS of choice for those new computers, in which case the significance of the S label will once again be complicated. Come the holidays, buying a Windows 10 S PC could mean getting either an Intel or an ARM machine, it could mean cheap and cheerful or it could be a premium portable.
Also at the Washington Post, Engadget, Laptop Mag, and Business Insider.
As well as BGR, Mashable, The Independent, PC World, Tech Radar, ZDNet, Ars Technica, Fossbytes, TechCrunch #1, TechCrunch #2, Venture Beat, and The Street.
What do you think the 'S' stands for?
Previously: Ask Soylent: Ramifications of Removing Windows Store from Enterprise Installs?
Microsoft Adds Store App-Only Restriction as Option in Windows 10
Related Stories
Microsoft has added a setting to Windows 10 that will let users restrict new software installation to only those apps hosted in the Windows Store. The option debuted in the latest version of Windows 10 Insider, the preview program which gives participants an early peek at the next feature upgrade as Microsoft builds it. That version, labeled 15042, was released Friday.
With the setting at its most stringent, Windows 10 will block the installation of Win32 software -- the traditional legacy applications that continue to make up the vast bulk of the Windows ecosystem -- and allow users to install only apps from the Windows Store, Microsoft's marketplace. Other settings allow software installation from any source, or, while allowing that, put a preference on those from the Windows Store.
Unless Microsoft removes them, the options will appear in the next Windows 10 feature upgrade, dubbed "Creators Update," which is to launch in March or April.
-- submitted from IRC
In an enterprise environment where I control the apps that I install for my users, what are the ramifications of removing the Windows store and all of its apps from my Windows 10 setups?
Citrix has launched an application specifically aimed at Windows 10 S, and thus published in the Windows Store, which makes it possible to run Win32 software even if it's not available in the Store.
Source: Softpedia
related stories:
Microsoft Knows Windows is Obsolete. Here's a Sneak Peek at Its Replacement.
New Windows 10 S Only Runs Software From Windows Store
Microsoft Windows is back on ARM:
Just shy of a year after announcing that Windows was once again going to be available on ARM systems, the first two systems were announced today: the Asus NovaGo 2-in-1 laptop, and the HP Envy x2 tablet.
[...] The Asus laptop boasts 22 hours of battery life or 30 days of standby, along with LTE that can run at gigabit speeds. HP's tablet offers a 12.3 inch, 1920×1280 screen, 20 hours battery life or 29 days of standby, and a removable keyboard-cover and stylus. Both systems use the Snapdragon 835 processor and X16 LTE modem, with HP offering up to 8GB RAM and 256GB storage to go with it.
Lenovo is expected to announce a similar system in the coming weeks.
Also at The Verge, Engadget, and TechCrunch.
Previously: Big Changes Planned by Microsoft - Windows 10 on ARM, Laptops to Behave More Like Phones
Windows 10 PCs Running on Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 to Arrive this Year
New Windows 10 S Only Runs Software From Windows Store
Microsoft Knows Windows is Obsolete. Here's a Sneak Peek at Its Replacement.
New App Allows Win32 Software to Run on Windows 10 S
Intel Hints at Patent Fight With Microsoft and Qualcomm Over x86 Emulation
Google published a "Chrome browser" app in the Windows Store on Tuesday, but it simply opened up a Google Chrome download page in the default Windows browser. Most users would then have been able to download and install the Chrome browser, except for the minority of Windows 10 S users who are restricted to downloading Windows Store apps which must use the EdgeHTML rendering engine rather than Blink. Microsoft was not amused at the stunt and removed the "app" from its Store later that day:
Google published a Chrome app in the Windows Store earlier today, which just directed users to a download link to install the browser. Microsoft isn't impressed with Google's obvious snub of the Windows Store, and it's taking action. "We have removed the Google Chrome Installer App from Microsoft Store, as it violates our Microsoft Store policies," says a Microsoft spokesperson in a statement to The Verge.
Citing the need to ensure apps "provide unique and distinct value," Microsoft says "we welcome Google to build a Microsoft Store browser app compliant with our Microsoft Store policies." That's an invitation that Google is unlikely to accept. There are many reasons Google won't likely bring Chrome to the Windows Store, but the primary reason is probably related to Microsoft's Windows 10 S restrictions. Windows Store apps that browse the web must use HTML and JavaScript engines provided by Windows 10, and Google's Chrome browser uses its own Blink rendering engine. Google would have to create a special Chrome app that would adhere to Microsoft's Store policies.
Most Windows 10 machines don't run Windows 10 S, so Google probably won't create a special version just to get its browser listed in the Windows Store. Google can't just package its existing desktop app into a Centennial Windows Store app, either. Microsoft is explicit about any store apps having to use the Edge rendering engine.
Related: Microsoft Adds Store App-Only Restriction as Option in Windows 10
New Windows 10 S Only Runs Software From Windows Store
Microsoft Knows Windows is Obsolete. Here's a Sneak Peek at Its Replacement.
First ARM Snapdragon-Based Windows 10 S Systems Announced
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Wednesday May 03 2017, @06:22PM (18 children)
Snare.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @06:42PM (1 child)
What do you think the 'S' stands for?
I was thinking Sucks.
(Score: 2) by kazzie on Thursday May 04 2017, @02:14PM
Here's the mascot [hrwiki.org]!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bart9h on Wednesday May 03 2017, @06:50PM
Slave
(Score: 4, Funny) by butthurt on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:00PM (9 children)
💩
(Score: 3, Funny) by slinches on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:39PM (7 children)
Soft serve ice cream?
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:42PM (5 children)
I'm pretty sure that's supposed to be the dog shit emoji but its rendering on Firefox 53.0 as a squirrel. I'm curious who's getting the dog shit emoji and who's getting a squirrel. The people with windows 10 S are not getting a dog shit or a squirrel, they're getting a chromebook because it sounds like 10 S is going to suck.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Wednesday May 03 2017, @09:19PM (2 children)
On my Firefox 53.0, it renders correctly.
Maybe you are using a Windows system, and your Windows doesn't want Windows to be associated with shit, and therefore replaces it with a squirrel? :-)
BTW, Squirrel also starts with S ;-)
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday May 03 2017, @09:25PM (1 child)
Maybe I've been awake too long. It looks like a squirrel to me, but maybe it is...
(Score: 3, Funny) by VLM on Wednesday May 03 2017, @09:28PM
Damn you guys, I totally though that was a decapitated "Alvin and the chipmunks" head or maybe squirrel head but I stare at it long enough and you guys are right thats a weird little anthropomorphic poop. Now every time I see Alvin and the chipmunks instead of thinking "annoying kids music" I'm going to remember the time you guys pointed out their heads are anthropomorphic poops. Well, I suppose the world has weathered worst tragedies.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Wednesday May 03 2017, @09:45PM
Renders correctly, albeit tiny, in Vivaldi 1.9.818.44 on Win 7.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @04:17PM
No, dammit, it is a gold dress and not a blue dress!!!
(Score: 2) by rts008 on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:52PM
I don't think Ben and Jerry's have the flavor of soft-serve that 'butthurt' was alluding to. I think that particular flavor is way too organic for even Good Humor trucks. ;-)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 05 2017, @06:22PM
Shaaaaving cream... Be nice and clean,
Shave every day and you'll always look keen...
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Wednesday May 03 2017, @09:27PM
Screw customers ;-)
On a more serious note it probably stands for "Store".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @09:52PM (1 child)
Smegma
(Score: 3, Funny) by Gaaark on Thursday May 04 2017, @01:08AM
Rimmer
Wait... What game are we playing?
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @10:46PM
Disclaimer: I'm one of the project leads on Windows 10 S.
The project name was originally going to be "Windows: Suck It Up Ten Times, Bitches!" but for reasons unknown (since the QA department never seem pick up the phone any more*) it kept getting renamed to WindowsS~1. We did ponder naming the product WindowsS~10 as a compromise but the engineers in the marketing department said that the weird squiggle was completely off-brand, so from there it was an easy step to ditch the squiggle thing and pick Windows S 10, and one of our interns came up with the idea of swapping the 10 and the S around.
* Already got our top men working on why this is happening. Marketing are defragging the project server as we speak and the Consumer Engagementing Paradigm team we have on secondment from the Windows Mobile division have already got a phone call from Microsoft Support guys who say there's a virus on the computer and are helping us clear it out.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by boltronics on Thursday May 04 2017, @03:51AM
Steam-less. :)
It's GNU/Linux dammit!
(Score: 3, Funny) by Snow on Wednesday May 03 2017, @06:27PM (2 children)
Finally, a laptop with all the functionality of WinRT but with a premium price point. The Windows store has all the software I could ever want. Want to relive the glory days of minesweeper? Only $5! Want some Majong? $20!
I also get so confused when using Google. Chrome? Firefox? Opera? What are these things? They are all shit compared to IE/Edge. Finally, I can have someone else decide what I should be running on my computer. Choosing has just become too hard.
This thing is going to be so great, I feel like I should probably wear a helmet when I use it.
(Score: 2) by Zyx Abacab on Wednesday May 03 2017, @06:42PM
should probably wear a helmet
That's what they said to the moron who came up with this.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:29PM
I saw a headline at El Reg the other day noting how MSFT was "competing" with Chromebooks with a $999 box.
Doing a quick Google for
http://www.google.com/search?q=Chromebook+price [google.com]
I see $110.79, $129.00, $149.00, $179.00.
Maybe I'm disremembering, but I thought I had previously seen a Chromebook for $99 .
all the functionality of WinRT
Yeah. Hardware that won't accept a Linux install? Pass.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Wednesday May 03 2017, @06:34PM (2 children)
While I have zero interest in ever using this, I am curious as to how they went about killing compatibility with 99% of Windows software. Is it purely a locked-down variant of Win10? Or did they go through and cut out a bunch of legacy crap that would no longer be needed, and actually save some GB of disk space?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @06:44PM (1 child)
There's probably some special cert or bit of code added via the store.
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:10PM
I think you have it. In my story submission I wrote that it "will only run software from the Windows Store" because I read in the The Verge article:
"Windows 10 S will run any browser in the Windows Store," says Myerson, hinting that if Google is willing to list Chrome in the Store then it will be available on devices that run Windows 10 S.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @06:39PM
slave, obviously.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @06:43PM (13 children)
And they faced legal action [wikipedia.org] over the simple act of including Internet Explorer with Windows, but no other options (though users could download them themselves)?
It's amazing just how much more corrupt our country has become in less than two decades. Stuff like this is bringing me ever more towards the anti-regulatory camp. When rules and regulations simply don't apply or are not enforced (or ineffectively enforced) again regards to mega-scale corporations, they really serve little purpose other than to inhibit competition.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:00PM (9 children)
This isn't the same as their prior case. There's 3 different consumer versions of Windows now: Home, S, and Pro. If you don't like the 'S' version, then you can buy Home or Pro instead. They'll probably even have a way to easily "upgrade" to Pro for $$$. So if you don't like being stuck with Edge and apps from the Windows Store, you're free to use a version of Windows that gives you that ability.
This is really no different than Chromebooks, which are similarly locked-down.
It'll be very interesting to see how far Windows S gets in the marketplace. The main thing that's worrying about it is that they seem to be pushing it in schools, where kids won't have the freedom to opt out, and will be trained to view the walled-garden as normal.
(Score: 3, Informative) by takyon on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:01PM (6 children)
http://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-criticism-why-it-costs-money-to-upgrade-windows-10-s-to-pro-2017-5 [businessinsider.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:07PM
> Is Microsoft giving people a crippled operating system and charging them $49 to fix it?
Yes.
If they don't get their cut via the store, they'll charge you for the privilege.
With the GOP in power, they should have gone right away for an annual $49 ... why bother with a one-time fee?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:13PM (4 children)
Is Microsoft giving people a crippled operating system and charging them $49 to fix it?
Well obviously, yes.
I don't see what the problem is here. If you don't want a crippled OS, don't buy it.
Microsoft has been a bad actor for 40 years now. I really don't understand why people act so surprised and angry about it now. By now, you should expect customer-hostile behavior from MS. Any time you see a news report about MS, just ask yourself, "what would a purely evil and greedy person do here?", and this should be exactly what you're reading about MS's latest shenanigan. If you don't like this, it's very simple: stop buying their stuff. Getting mad about it isn't going to help. They're never going to change, and giving them your money is simply enabling their behavior, which means YOU are really to blame for it. If that means you have to suffer some inconvenience, well that's the price you pay. Either choose convenience and put up with MS's shenanigans and stop complaining about it, or choose freedom from their abuse. There is no middle ground.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @08:04PM (1 child)
This!
I, for one, do not give MS my money. I also don't use their OS, so that makes it trivial to not give them any of my money.
(Score: 1) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Thursday May 04 2017, @05:17AM
I am reasonably sure that if you buy a new computer of smartphone, you pay the Microsoft tax: whether Windows is bundled or not.
Aren't software patents great?
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Wednesday May 03 2017, @08:23PM (1 child)
The problem occurs when your employer demands documents be written in MS Word, your kids get gift cards good only at the $CORPORATE store for Christmas and birthday presents, the local government's online services require IE or Edge to function fully, etc.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Wednesday May 03 2017, @08:39PM
The problem occurs when your employer demands documents be written in MS Word
No problem: just use the computer your employer has provided for you. Most employers prefer you to use their equipment, not your own, and they buy all the licenses. Let them give their money to MS and deal with all the support problems.
Or use LibreOffice; it usually exports .docx just fine as long as you don't do anything overly complicated. Or Google Docs.
your kids get gift cards good only at the $CORPORATE store for Christmas and birthday presents
What are you talking about? Kids don't want PCs running Windows, they want game systems or phones. Get them a Wii or an Android phone or something.
the local government's online services require IE or Edge to function fully, etc.
Citation needed. This used to be a big problem 10+ years ago with IE6. I've never heard of anything requiring Edge to function, except perhaps some crappy internal-only corporate stuff. Edge has a pitiful marketshare considering it's the standard on Win10 and they constantly try to get you to make it the default browser, even resorting to dirty tricks like forcing it to default with an update. Chrome is just too popular for anyone to require Edge.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:43PM
Ultimate Edition [linux.com]
(Gratis and Libre.)
The hardware on which it runs is also more affordable.
MSFT's S must stand for "Suckers".
...or maybe "Stuck on Stupid".
M$: Why shoot yourself in the foot when you can blow your whole leg off?
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @05:32AM
This is far worse than the prior case.
In the prior case you could literally go online and spend a few moments downloading an alternative browser for 100% free. This is a system that, by analog, not only refuses to include alternative browsers (which is what sparked the anti-compete investigation and penalties) but is actually hard coded specifically to exclude anything except Microsoft's own browser. In terms of anticompetitive behavior, this dwarfs their previous unlawful behavior. The only difference of course is that now they have enough politicians in their pocket that they're above the law.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Pino P on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:01PM (2 children)
US v. Microsoft ended with a slap on the proverbial wrist after George W. Bush became President of the United States. His party, the Republican Party (also called the GOP), is perceived as favoring free markets at the expense of fair markets. About 100 days ago, another Republican took office.
Microsoft's antitrust evasion strategy appears to be to wait to introduce anticompetitive configurations until the GOP is in power, and don't try to market anticompetitive configurations in Europe.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:58PM
The consent decree was extended and extended and extended. [googleusercontent.com] (orig) [seattletimes.com]
In the end, it meant nothing; M$ had moved on.
(It's like the security theater in airports, with al Qaeda saying "Been there; done that; finding new targets".)
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 04 2017, @06:02AM
I'm not sure why some people try to make everything partisan. No, Microsoft's first 'warning' for this behavior was in 1994 and they full steam ahead screwing customers in spite of said warning right smack in the middle of Clinton's term.
Just wait til the day you begin to understand that democrat and republican are one and the same, playing good cop - bad cop. You know that thing almost all of the 'mainstream media' refused to talk about, the TPP? That was going to be the biggest corporate handout that would have come at great expense to the US worker and consumer protection (it was going to amp up our already insane copyright/patent/trademark laws exponentially, legally prohibit signatories from providing certain information on food labels, and so much more), undermine our national sovereignty for the sake of opaque 'corporate tribunals' which could overrule democratic law, and more. That was what Obama was trying his hardest to get passed before he left office. Do you know why companies are now paying Obama $400k for a talk, or $200k for a talk from his wife? It's not because they actually think they're worth anywhere near this. It's quid quo pro. The president panders and peddles corporate agenda, gets out and is paid out in absurd speaking fees.
He'll receive hundreds of millions in 'clean' money from these speaking engagements. This is a relatively new phenomena. The first president to start going crazy with profiteering off 'speaking' was Ford. [fortune.com] He was also lambasted for profiting off what is supposed to a public service. Now we don't even think twice at presidents exploiting their presidency for hundreds of millions. Certainly the promise of hundreds of millions of dollars of completely clean money could never corrupt a person though. To find a president not sold out to corporate interests you'd need to go back many decades.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Pino P on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:09PM (7 children)
Microsoft is marketing this to K-12 educators [9to5mac.com]: "Windows 10 S mainly intended to run on Windows 10 education PCs from Microsoft partners like Acer and Dell at sub $200 prices."
Microsoft and its ex-CEO's Gates Foundation also sponsor Code.org [code.org]: "Every student in every school should have the opportunity to learn computer science".
Yet Visual Studio is a traditional desktop app and not available through Windows Store. So how does Microsoft expect students using devices running Windows 10 S to build and test the programs that they're creating for a computer science homework assignment?
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:16PM
They'll probably have a special version of Visual Studio just for the Windows Store, that's only available to educational institutions, and costs a small fortune. They'll convince schools to buy Windows 10S by advertising a "low" price, while neglecting to tell them that adding Visual Studio S will cost another $999 per copy.
(Score: 2) by edIII on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:23PM (1 child)
You were confused. What they meant by "learn computer science" was "training of profitable consumers and mass surveillance grooming". It's like computer science, just minus all of the freedom, choice, transparency, privacy, you get the idea....
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @08:08PM
Actually, what "they" meant by "computer science" was:
Learn how to highlight text in word. Learn how to color a cell in excell. Learn how to create a folder in outlook, etc. I.e., learn just enough to remain dependent upon us, so we can continue to extract revenue from you forever.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:39PM (3 children)
Observing the course list my K12 kids have, "computer science" has been dumbed down into operating MS Word and MS Excel for "business users". Every other class that uses word processing or spreadsheets (english lit, geography, science classes) uses google apps. MS Office has finally been pushed off into the business niche. Also they refuse to call it IT, learning pivot tables and changing graph colors in Excel is "computer science" and don't you forget it.
There is a introduction to programming class that uses LUA in minecraft with opencomputers mod or javascript in the browser or Scratch or try-python. I know that looks like a mess, they change the offerings literally every semester. I think my son is taking minecraft / opencomputers summer school class where they program in Lua, which is a halfway decent OO scripting language, and he's taking the try-python and/or javascript class next year, I guess they haven't nailed down the curriculum entirely. I'm told python is probably going to be the winner. In school historically they did some stuff with scratch which is kind of hard to describe, like kiddie fisher-price labview-reproduced-with-logo or like node-red without the IOT overhead but with more programming. Scratch is hard to explain.
Anyway yeah people "in the world" were using C when I was a teen and I had a, uh, BBS downloaded copy of Borland Turbo C (this was the late 80s pre-linux era) and I was mostly happy other than no one liked the PC memory model of that era and people couldn't decide if they wanted OS drivers, libraries, or directly F with bare IO ports. Somehow my dad got his employer to pay for turbo prolog which was weird and turbo basic which was basically visual basic but the users/programmers weren't as stupid so it never achieved the reputation that VB acquired.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @08:06PM
funny, only a few people downloaded that from my board! They all grew up to be something other than hat kids, from what I can tell..
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Wednesday May 03 2017, @09:32PM (1 child)
Given that they give the name "mathematics" to a course teaching to calculate, it's only fair that "computer science" gets no better treatment.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bob_super on Wednesday May 03 2017, @09:48PM
Did you skip the class about ensembles? Calculating is a part of maths, so it's not incorrect.
Of course, if it ain't math until you touch at least the Moments Problem, then we're having a No True Scotsman issue...
(Score: 2) by DutchUncle on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:19PM (2 children)
Or maybe it stands for School, which is the same problem. "Parents, we're going to have updated computers in the school, and they will all be protected against hackers installing something that your children's virgin eyes shouldn't see." Any company wanting to make educational software gets to pay an additional Micro$oft tax to get "accredited" into the Windows Store. All school projects or musical activities must be done with Microsoft utilities rather than those wild, untrustworthy third-party or (shudder) open-sourcery thingies.
The funnier thing is, I'll bet 80% of office workers could be limited to Micro$oft Office and be happy forever. The IT department will be ecstatic.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:49PM
The funnier thing is, I'll bet 80% of office workers could be limited to Micro$oft Office and be happy forever. The IT department will be ecstatic.
The last desktop applications died at $work some years ago. Everything is MS Office (Excel for corporate standard database, Word as the spreadsheet, powerpoint at the email platform, all that stupidity). Add outlook for calendar and email, and add a browser and nobody run nothing else in years. Tech people have ssh and rdesktop/vnc for exotic appliances.
I remember just 10 years ago there were a couple legacy engineering hardware apps, but thats all virtualized now, rdesktop or vnc into some weird as hell box still running windows 95 that costs $15M to replace so we're running W95 forever. At least all the W3.11 stuff is long dead. I think. Or it lies in wait like Cthulhu. Yeah probably the latter.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @08:47PM
I'll bet 80% of office workers could be limited to Micro$oft Office and be happy forever
You're reminding me of the old days of using MICROS~1 apps.
There's their non-standards-compliant browsers:
Acid2 [google.com]
Acid3 [google.com]
...and every time MICROS~1 adds some whiz-bang cross-app "improvement" to something in order to make things "easier" on users, they manage to open several security holes.
There's nothing to compare to getting your M$ OS pwned because someone sent you a M$Orifice document.
WRT office suites, going back several years, Go-OO was associated with SuSE (which had signed a pact with M$).
That fork of OO.o included support for a pretty useful subset of VBA macros. [google.com]
(The OO.o devs wouldn't fold those into their builds.)
As soon as the LibreOffice fork got going, they got right on to including those and adding more.
As long as folks don't get really bizarre with macros, LibreOffice should do what those office workers need to do.
LibreOffice on Linux shrugs off the M$ security flaws in documents as well.
This far into the 21st Century, I just don't understand folks who insist on using Redmond's stuff.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by acid andy on Wednesday May 03 2017, @08:08PM (1 child)
I bet when Acorn RISC Machines were designing CPUs widely used in Acorn's computers in educational institutions they never thought one day ARM chips would be running a crippled version of Windows natively in those educational institutions instead.
OK, it's a tenuous link to the TFA but it is strange how things turn out sometimes.
Consumerism is poison.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Wednesday May 03 2017, @09:40PM
Let's hope BrickBot loves those Microstuffed ARM computers ;-)
(Score: 4, Funny) by Refugee from beyond on Wednesday May 03 2017, @10:37PM
Schutzstaffel.
Instantly better soylentnews: replace background on article and comment titles with #973131.