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posted by martyb on Thursday May 11 2017, @12:36PM   Printer-friendly
from the what-security-issue? dept.

Microsoft's only choice to move forward is to throw the Win32 baby out with the bathwater. And that brings us to the introduction of Windows 10 S.

Windows 10 S is just like the Windows 10 you use now, but the main difference is it can only run apps that have been whitelisted to run in the Windows Store. That means, by and large, existing Win32-based stuff cannot run in Windows 10 S for security reasons.

To bridge the app gap, Microsoft is allowing certain kinds of desktop apps to be "packaged" for use in the Windows Store through a tooling process known as Desktop Bridge or Project Centennial.

The good news is that with Project Centennial, many Desktop Win32 apps can be re-purposed and packaged to take advantage of Windows 10's improved security. However, there are apps that will inevitably be left behind because they violate the sandboxing rules that are needed to make the technology work in a secure fashion.

"A casualty of those sandboxing rules is Google's Chrome browser. For security reasons, Microsoft is not permitting desktop browsers to be ported to the Store."


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  • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday May 11 2017, @04:30PM (2 children)

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Thursday May 11 2017, @04:30PM (#508160) Journal

    But, Linux? If all the adjoining gardens are walled, what happens to Linux? Are we going to be walled in too? Will there even be a gate for us to come and go through? Will we be trespassing if we go through the gate?

    Alright, more seriously, I've been bitching for years about Microsoft maintaining that stupid-assed "legacy" crap. Linux does legacy so well, that you can run Linux on machines that Microsoft will puke on. It ain't fast, and it ain't necessarily pretty, but it runs faster than painfully slow, and a simple elegant desktop has it's own beauty.

    But, unlike Windows, Linux doesn't bend over backward to maintain decades old exploits, so that people can run un-maintained applications.

    Face it - if an desktop/laptop app is maintained, it's already upgraded/updated to 64-bit computers, long, long ago. The unmaintained applications have probably been dropped, and if the app had any real use, someone else has written a drop-in replacement. 32 bit applications have never been able to use a 64 bit machine, or a 64 bit OS's security benefits. Every single 32 bit "legacy" application in use today, is a huge security hole.

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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by LoRdTAW on Thursday May 11 2017, @05:33PM

    by LoRdTAW (3755) on Thursday May 11 2017, @05:33PM (#508200) Journal

    Are we going to be walled in too?

    More like walled out from our own hardware.

    Microsoft (and other walled garden conspirators) to the open source world:
    "I don't want to talk to you no more, you empty headed animal food trough wiper. I fart in your general direction. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries."

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 11 2017, @05:43PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 11 2017, @05:43PM (#508207)

    That was my 1st thought as well when I saw "Win32" in the summary.

    These days, if you have an old Windoze-only app to run, your chances of getting it running under a supported version of MICROS~1's OS are lower than just using WINE under Linux.

    Just get (gratis and libre) Zorin OS (an Ubuntu derivative that ships with WINE).
    Zero cost and less bullshit to put up with.
    ...and, as you say, will run on old hardware.

    ...and if you can't find a native Linux app to do your task these days, you must really be an edge case.

    Linux [and] un-maintained applications

    With Open Source, if you keep/get an old version of a distro and build a fat binary of that old app (all the dependencies compiled in), you can keep running it forever.
    Your options with FOSS make MICROS~1's stuff look like the bastard stepchild that it is.

    if the [unmaintained] app had any real use

    There are too many written-once-and-abandoned Windoze-only apps with instances of those still in service (e.g. for machine shop gear where the equipment vendor has folded his tent) to dismiss them so easily.

    -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]