Microsoft Said to Speed Windows Upgrades to Once a Year

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-11-29/microsoft-said-to-speed-windows-upgrades-to-once-a-year

by JumpCrisscross • 14 years ago

6 16 14 years ago

businessweek.com

nextstep• 14 years ago

Wow. Are they just going to attempt to mimic Apple in every aspect of their business? It's not a bad idea.

mc32• 14 years ago

I'm not sure Apple are their guide; I htink it's more that they react more slowly to market forces.

It's like someone in a swift boat and someone in a row boat, they tale the same course, but the row boat seems to be imitating the swift boat while in actuality both are reacting to the river's course -one more swiftly.

btgeekboy• 14 years ago

If they're gonna go the Apple route, go the whole way: don't make me ask for permission to install software I've licensed on my computer (via software activation). Charge a reasonable amount ($20? 30?) and charge that same amount to SMB customers. Don't make massive UI/UX changes in each release.

goggles99• 14 years ago

Not mimicking Apple, but all software and OS's today. How many major software companies come out with a new version of their product every 3-4 years???

lini• 14 years ago

I really hope that this will be a consumer thing only. Enterprise IT will not like having to upgrade & test all their systems each year.

robmcm2• 14 years ago

I really hope it's an enterprise thing. Enterprise need to get better at upgrading and testing systems, otherwise as developers we are stuck accommodating the lowest common denominator. cough IE6 cough

michaelhoffman• 14 years ago

Why do enterprise customers need to change their ways? Developers provide a service to them, not the other way around. Although if you don't want to support customers using old software, you don't have to. Maybe someone else will.

gbeeson2• 14 years ago

Indeed. XP and IE6 are tired in the enterprise but, they are paid for, they work and apparently, we fear change. Those are the big three that I hear on a weekly basis from management. At this point, if Windows 8 was super enterprise friendly and completely free, we still wouldn't budge I am sure.

lloeki• 14 years ago

If they pull this properly I suppose either each release will be supported for the usual five years, or some releases will be picked as LTS. Either way, if support is long enough nobody forces anyone to upgrade on each release (it's not like enterprises upgrade on each release anyway).

brusch2• 14 years ago

That's exactly what I didn't like. Maybe I had the worst possible time to "experiment" with OS X (it was the moment they changed from their power mac CPUs to the Intel CPUs) and it sucked. Three years later no new software ran on the Mac. I would have to update to OS X 10.5 or 10.6 and the performance sucked.

This made me really prefer the Microsoft way of doing business. But this seems to change now.

I really wished they didn't try to copy the bad parts of Apple too. My only hope is that they try to cater a little bit more to business customers who prefer stability.

Hopefully they bounce back from the way their headed with Windows 8, where it looks like they completely forgot their business customers.

dagw• 14 years ago

Windows 8 looks like they completely forgot their business customers

It's probably more a case of ignoring them for this release cycle rather than forgetting them. I suspect businesses will be back in full focus next update.

brusch2• 14 years ago

Yes I hope so.

gbeeson2• 14 years ago

That is where my thoughts are as well - business customers make a large mind share that I cannot imagine that they would ignore. I am hoping that Windows 8 as it is right now is the foundation for a more enterprise friendly set up. Please notice 'hoping' - I am equally prepared to not be surprised if this is it so to speak. Can't imagine that but hey, stranger things have happened.

Microsoft Said to Speed Windows Upgrades to Once a Year

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