OSes: The Next Thirty Years

[a456]

My predictions for the next thirty years: OS X will gain further dominance as Windows fades out and its technologies get absorbed into Linux, while PC manufacturers slowly put Ubuntu or similar onto their machines, and the choice becomes largely OS X for rich content and Linux for lower level computing. Eventually, however, Linux will catch up with OS X and become a serious platform for Adobe, Microsoft and even Apple at which point high end PC manufacturers will start customizing the appearance and functionality of Linux so as to distinguish themselves from one another in a way never possible under Windows, hence providing a renaissance for manufacturers such as Sony. At this point Apple will start to get left behind unless they follow suit and become PC manufacturers and software developers for Linux rather than OS X. It will be like Apple's programs for Windows in reverse - not designed to attract users to OS X but to ease the migration of OS X users to Linux. Unfortunately the hatred for OS X users among the Linux community will resist such measures, and Apple will be left flailing around. By this time, Microsoft will be a respected organization again and the OS wars between Windows and OS X a distant memory (similar to Britpop). Apple will spend the next thirty years trying to regain ground programming for Linux and making high end hardware. But in the meantime the OS will be slowly becoming extinct altogether. Programs will eventually run independent of OS.

 

[PowerFullMac]

I agree with that point of view very much, but not so much with some of the end bits.

When more people stop using Micro$oft Offic£ that will help M$ get out of the game, as about 40% of thier profit comes from it

 

[r1ch4rd]

I doubt very much that any of that will happen.

 

[Queso]

Your idea of "hatred for OSX" amongst the Linux community is very off base. There are a hard core minority of Linux users who don't like OSX or Apple, but the majority see it as a nice OS, albeit proprietary. As the Linux userbase goes mainstream I'll be very surprised if the bitter fanboy attitude becomes prevalent.

I also strongly suspect that OSX, Linux and probably the entire *nix community will be blown away by then anyway, probably by something that completely changes the computing paradigm. Think of the jump between command line and GUI to get an idea of the progress I'm thinking of.

Microsoft meanwhile will continue to make Windows, but are more likely to focus it at their business core. There will be desktop versions of Windows aimed at the home user, and there will still be versions of Office, but Microsoft will have to become a more friendly company and stop attempting to pervert open standards or they will find more manufacturers and developers abandoning them completely.

 

[ErikCLDR]

Sounds like Linux would monopolize?

 

[snugharbor]

The OS paradigm as we know it will not exist in 30 years

In 30 years the OS paradigm as we know it will not exist. You will just buy or obtain applications without regard to OS. OS's will be little more than UI like IE versus foxfire. This will be done with middleware similar to VM and other technologies and governance not yet created. The drivers will not just be technology but market forces similar to the ones that forced out HD-DVD and made Blu-ray a winner because end the you may not have a win win but a win not so much lost situation to force the elimination of stove pipes. People in the 2038 will want to select software and only have to worry about if the hardware can handle it not the old out of date 20th century concept of the supremacy of the OS.

Some of you may have remembered in DOS that if you bought a new printer or new wp you had to worry about compatibility. Same thing in 30 years...for the most part the stovepipes will be gone like what has happened on the Internet. We may have something like an Intermachine specs...something like IEEE. You would still be able to innovate bring in new machines (like DVD then blu-ray) or UI's (the 2038 equivalent of the OS) but there would be a layer (a mid-tiered kernel so to speak) that all consumer computers would have. Apple could sell it's machines and UI but software will simply run on all platforms.

Don't like a UI, switch to another...somewhat like Linux Suse, etc.

Yes there is still an OS in a sense but not from the user perspective...there will be UI's. We will have finally have the equivalent of separating the DVD from the player if AV worked liked the computer world.

T

P.S. Of course perhaps in 2038 we will have computers planted in our brains and in that case disregard my post.

 

[LizKat]

<snip snip> P.S. Of course perhaps in 2038 we will have computers planted in our brains and in that case disregard my post.

We already have computers in our brains. We just don't fully understand how they work yet. And if we don't stop planting our kids ifo TV sets from day five of life on earth, we probably never will.

 

[irmongoose]

In thirty years the intarwebs will run in our blood, making the idea of a computing platform itself obsolete. The skies will be scorched, babies will be farmed. Our entire vocabulary will consist of the word "Woh".

Anything I missed?


irmongoose

 

[lord patton]

So what's the intermediate step that will make OSes irrelevant?

 

[a456]

OS's will be little more than UI like IE versus foxfire.

If you mean Internet Explorer and Firefox, then I'm not sure about the comparison. There is a lot more than UI that separates the two. Although in theory the w3 consortium would like standardization in theory, in practice (particularly for those practising web design) this is not a reality. Although the difference is not as large as that between OS X and Windows it is more than a question of buttons being in different places.