Windows Vista Beta 1 and Tiger

[JFreak]

MS is a system developed by geeks for geeks.

yes, and as a system for geeks it makes normal people feel stupid (which they are not) because thinking geek-like is strange.

on the other hand, you could say that macintosh is a system developed by artists for artists, and normal people are not artists either; however, macintosh doesn't make normal people feel stupid, but rather inspired because they know what they should do by intuition.

i just love macs, period.

Once you go Mac you realize how simple life can be and how much time you can devote to the other things in life; because your not fixing a Windows computer. Had to get that off my chest.

well, yes.. that's a cliche #1, but very true indeed. i stopped giving windows support in 2002 and that has probably been one of the most meaningful decisions ever. for me, that meant having at least 10 hours more free time for myself every month, as before that i was fixing someone's windows at least once a week, which usually took more than two hours total including travelling.

the funny thing is, i have as much or more mac-using friends than i have windows-using friends and so far i have had to give very little mac-support (after taking the 15 minutes time to convince people to get a mac in the first place). they're just using their systems and loving that they can actually use it and not get frustrated trying to fix and upgrade.

for example, media peripherals. my father-in-law just called me and asked what brand printer and camera he should buy. after he took them home and plugged them in, he called again, said they work fine, and gave thanks for recommendation. on another story, one of my friends (who is by the way not the stupidest guy as he studies in university) bought a printer and a scanner for his pc, somehow didn't manage to install proper drivers and probably drank too much coffee as he decided to re-install windows to get his problems minimized. or yet another friend who bought a digital video camera only to notice that the firewire connector in his pc didn't have a connection to the motherboard (which didn't have firewire) and therefore had to buy an additional firewire pci card, which drivers just happened to break something in windows thus requiring a re-install after several blue-screened reboots. compare that to my father who bought a digicam few years ago and was importing footage to imovie soon after plugging the camera into the builtin firewire port in his ibook.

this is the thing, macs really work. there's no need for gazillion different hardware and software, as long as there's those few available that are actually needed. sometimes ten is more than a million. i don't care if pc has million game titles as long as i have my civilization working nicely on my mac, and on the other hand, i couldn't care less if my protools software would also work with windows, as i would never even dream about using such an unreliable operating system as a core for a critical production environment.

oh well, maybe i should end typing now.

 

[Evangelion]

of course. can't beat that. kids will also like to eat too much sugar no matter how much they are told to eat less. sugar is what they want, and if they want to play pc games, of course they will need a pc.

There's nothing bad about playing games on a computer. Of course, if you do too much of it, it is bad. But too much of ANYTHING is bad.

there's a difference between what apps one wants to run and what it is that one actually wants to do with the system. my father once thought that he needs to be able to use wordperfect - later on he realized that what he actually needs is to be able to publish quality documents, which he now does with indesign using his ibook.

True in a sense. But again, you can do those things in Windows as well. Hell, you can do document-publishing in Linux if needed. And you can do it with a Mac. But the user might look at the possible things he could do with the computer. He notices that he couldn't run his favourite apps on the Mac, or he would have to re-purchase them. And that would tilt the odds to Windows's favour.

And to continue on gaming: you can't simply look at what you want to do with the computer, it also matter with what apps you do it. Suppose someone wants to play games. Does that mean that he would be happy with a freeware Pac-Man? I mean, the activity is the same. No. He would propably want to play other games as well. The activity would be the same, but the apps would be different.

kids playing games, that is windows' strength. tells a lot about the system, doesn't it?

Gaming is a multi-billion business. being good at it is not a bad thing. And like it or not, most businesses rely on Windows. So it's obviously suitable for other things as well. Some people make it sound like gaming and other "little things" is the only things Windows is good for. But if you take a glance at businessess, you will notice that companies actually rely on Windows to do their business. Yes, they could use Macs as well. But most of them use Windows.

"kids playing games" is not Windows's only strength. It's dominance on the dekstop overall is it's strenght. Believe me, as a Linux-user I have ran in to that fact several times. If Windows was completely useless, it would not have that dominance. If you think "kids playing games" is the only stronghold of Windows, you are sadly mistaken.

 

[JFreak]

If Windows was completely useless, it would not have that dominance.

i think i never stated that windows is useless. it has its dominance, because it's a cheap way to get a job done. it's not elegant, it's not robust, it's not even powerful. but it's cheap and an easy choice for those who don't want to choose.

there are economy cars, too, and totally not useless. however economy cars kill my ears so i don't want to use them more than i totally have to. same goes to economy operating systems. no, i'm not saying windows is useless. i'm only saying that the world would be so much better place without it.

 

[JFreak]

too much of ANYTHING is bad

yes, and that reminds me... time to go golfing instead of chatting here

 

[polsons]

I have never used 'OSX' so I can't speak from personal experience, but the one thing I'm hearing from 'OSX' users in the pro community is that 10.4 is significantly more difficult to use than 10.3.

Apple has survived not because it has always had the best products as Mac users would claim, but because Steve Jobs is nothing if not cunning. Maybe the 'Redmond start your photocopiers' was intended solely as a joke, but what if -yes I know this reeks of conspiracy theories- 10.4 was deliberately released as a lemon knowing Microsoft would copy it in every infinite detail.

If we humour ourselves for just a moment and believe this to be true, Apple will simply revert to a 10.3 style OS in 10.5 sometime in 2007, but Microsoft will be stuck with it's lemon until 'Blackcomb' sometime in 2012. It called corporate espionage and it happens on a massive scale each and every single day.

I cannot compare 'Vista' to 'OSX', but after having used the 'Vista' beta for a few short hours, it is obvious 'Vista' is a long, long way away from the usability of 'XP'. Of course 'Vista' is still many months away from completion, but I doubt 'Windows' users would accept anything like what's on offer now, as a final product. If they do then both the Linux and Mac communities are going to be reeling in fits of laughter for many years to come. 'Vista - windows for morons'. And before you think this is a joke, go and play with 'Vista' for a couple of hours. You'll be surprised just how arrogant 'Vista' actually is.

But this is the real issue. Microsoft is not trying to entice 'OSX' users to 'Vista'. Microsoft's problems are much closer to home. If 'Vista' cannot pry 'Win 98' from the hands of it's current majority user base, then Microsoft is facing serious financial difficulties over the next few years. 'Vista' doesn't have to be significantly better that 'OSX', 'Vista' has to be significantly better than 'Win 98'. So much so that every 'Win 98' user will desperately want to buy it.

The one fact that seems to be forgotten by Mac users is that Microsoft makes substantial amounts of money from Mac users. Office:mac, VirtualPC, and probably a future propriety version of 'Windows' for Mactel's. So Microsoft is not about to bite the hand that feeds. But from 'Win 98' users, Microsoft makes absolutely nothing and yet has to keep giving them endless free handouts which in the end costs Microsoft substantial amounts of money.

However in the end, the battle for the desktop won't be fought over who has the prettiest UI. It will be fought over something as mundane as a document format. And most probably a document format called 'Metro'. Apple needs Microsoft just as much as Microsoft needs Apple. But the Adobe/Macromedia alliance needs neither. And for both Bill and Steve, that is a very unnerving senario. 'AdobeOS' - when can I and millions of other 'Photoshop' users like me, buy it?

 

[Truffy]

Those poor Windows users, how will they ever get used to these changes... like:
Familiar...?

Easy to be complacent, but it was only with Panther that Apple heralded ALT-tabbing, which has been present in Windows since at least version 3.

OTOH, when Apple did it, they did it so much better!

 

[dsharits]

I have never used 'OSX' so I can't speak from personal experience, but the one thing I'm hearing from 'OSX' users in the pro community is that 10.4 is significantly more difficult to use than 10.3.

Apple has survived not because it has always had the best products as Mac users would claim, but because Steve Jobs is nothing if not cunning. Maybe the 'Redmond start your photocopiers' was intended solely as a joke, but what if -yes I know this reeks of conspiracy theories- 10.4 was deliberately released as a lemon knowing Microsoft would copy it in every infinite detail.

Riiiiight.......

Whoever told you that it was harder to use than 10.3 is full of it. Stop listening to heresay and get on a Mac yourself. Microsoft can't possibly copy the "lemon" as you claim it is, because the OS being a "lemon" would require flaws in the OS itself. MS has done nothing but add some of the features of Tiger, because copying the OS completely would require a complete rebuild from the ground up. If you look at the broad picture, 10.4 is not too different from 10.3, with the exception of a few features that were added.
It's a good idea to know what you're talking about before you go posting rubbish like that. Go out and actually use Tiger for yourself. You'll know why it is so much better than anythig else out there, and you'll realize that MS cannot possibly "copy it in every infinite detail".

 

[BGil]

oh, great. now the ONLY good thing i had to say about vista is gone. was it like that (without the start word) at some point or did i just imagine that the button would have been more stylish? anyway, my bad. i was mistakenly thinking that the new windows would somehow look better than the old.

there were some leaked Longhorn Alpha builds without "start" but none of the public builds ever had that. There was also a taskbar where the buttons were centered, a bunch of 3D icons (you can spin them around) and 3D views and a bunch of other stuff.

 

[BGil]

it doesn't matter. really. it's all about ORIGINAL IDEA.

And that's where we will just have to agree to disagree.
Using a car analogy...
I'm sure someone came up with the idea of a truck before Ford made one but that doesn't mean that the Toyota Tacoma isn't a copy of the Ford Ranger. It's made to look very very similar because the Ranger is the best selling truck in the owrld (or was at one time).

fwiw, it was microsoft who copied the button thingy. they just moved it 180 degrees as everything else they do... just like the desktop icons (from right to left) and the apple menu (from top to bottom), for example. they also have a tendency to add unnecessary things (the window menu for example, which has ever so useful commands like "move" and "size" in addition to the commands they have their three buttons for) and to keep things they have made redundant (the "resize"-corner in bottom-right corner for example, which is the original apple-way of resizing, that is completely unnecessary as windows' windows can be resized from every border and corner). THEY JUST NEVER GET THE POINT ABOUT THE THINGS THEY COPY, SO THEIR SPECIFIC IMPLEMENTATION IS LACKING. that's the gripe about windows. it's hard to use, because people are not be able to use their intuition. with mac, they can and that's why it's so easy to use.

I thought you said they licensed that stuff? But anyway, I believe the "move" and "size" stuff is for people who want to use the GUI with only a keyboard. On channel9.msdn.com there are some videos of Microsoft programmers just working with the system and the speed they can fly around and do thing is absolutely amazing and all that without a mouse. It's not something that gets in the way at all so I see no harm in it. But I agree Apple is generally better at creating user interfaces. But I think the Mac is much harder to learn to use. There's very little that's intuitive about the way it's laid out at all. There's a very low degree of "discoverabilty" on the Mac and Windows is definitely superior in that respect. That's one of the gripes about Windows from advanced users... its often designed for complete newbies (wizards for example) whereas the Mac is designed for more advanced users. Take the way the icons and names for keyboard shortcuts aren't even on the keyboards that most Macs ship with (the option key, shift, command etc) and how control clicking is completly non-discoverable to a newbie.

I have a Dell box running xp at work. My server folder has 15 Gb of data. When I use the search feature in xp that little dog runs forever before it finds something ( if it ever does) so I turn to my powerbook to find what I'm looking for.

It feels as if navigating a hard drive in XP was bolted on to the system as an afterthough

Turn on indexing (turn off searching system files and other options) and the searches will become instant.

That reminds me.... Beagle was demonstrated before live audience before Apple introduced Spotlight... But I'm pretty sure that fact doesn't stop Mac-users from calling it a "copy" of Spotlight?

Again, XP's search has live quieries too. That's 2001. I'm sure Windows 2000 has them also. BTW, it only works on XP installs with NTFS drives if you're using FAT32 then it won't work.

BFS was virtually the same as Spotlight too. In fact, the guy who built Spotlight is Dominic Giampolo (sp?) and he was the one who built the BFS system.

but there are only two commercially available major software titles that currently don't have mac support: the autocad, and 3d studio max

You're kidding, right? Only two?
Acid, Soundforge, any Avid HD stuff, PPRO, SoftImage, Cakewalk (anything from them), GigaStudio, MainConcept stuff, Nero, most of the Office server line, Visio, OneNote, most of Macromedia's non-MX suite apps, Audition, Encore, Liquid Edition, SQL Server, lots of relational database systems, tons of games, tons of media players, TiVo-to-GO, lots of Google stuff, and on and on...

Your premise is that Apple copied Windows, so it never mattered if Windows had something before Mac OS X, it only mattered if Windows had it first... before anything else.

For example... Journaling. I have a 1991 SGI IRIS Indigo that has a Journaled file system on it (XFS). That predates Windows using any form of Journaling, so Apple couldn't have copied Windows for that. NEXTSTEP had context sensitive icons back in 1990, Apple couldn't have copied that from Windows. Video hardware acceleration (decoding, de-interlacing etc.), hardware accelerated image processing are all part of what made SGI leaps and bounds beyond any other systems on the planet back in the late 80s, early 90s... Apple couldn't have copied that from Windows.

Of course Mac OS X is based on the original NEXTSTEP operating system... which dates back to 1987, so that is when true multitasking was first introduced into the line. Of course that was about the same time as OS/2 was released... but it was limited by the 286 processors (16 bit) that it was written for while NEXTSTEP was designed for the 68020/68030 processors (32 bit) and didn't have to jump through Intel's memory hoops to get things done.

And many of the advance features of Windows today are a direct result of OS/2. We shouldn't forget that NT was based on the IBM/Microsoft OS/2 project (and when Microsoft left the partnership with IBM, the new project was originally called OS/2 NT).

Sadly, Microsoft broke off working with IBM before Journaling was introduced into OS/2 Warp.

Again, you go off talking about NEXTSTEP as if it was Apple with that technology. Furthermore, you said I said Apple copied Windows with journaling when I didn't... I SAID MICROSOFT IMPLEMENTED IT BEFORE APPLE IMPLEMENTED IT IN OS X.

You didn't look to closely at the screenshot, did you? What you would have seen was Digital Librarian bringing up files that didn't have the search word in the file name.

And upon closer inspection you might have noticed what file types it was searching through (in that shot it had looked within rtf, rtfd, and ai). NeXT had made it known to developers that they could create a parsing service for Digital Librarian to be able to search content within proprietary document formats.

A hand full of document types that Digital Librarian could index...
<snip>
Unless you think Windows 3.0 had anything like this?

No but NT did. But anyway, that isn't desktop search (good job on the saved searches though) that's file search. Emails, contacts, tasks, live queries...
Then look at how Spotlight works (internally) and look at how Indexing Service works and you'll see a ton of similarities. You act like they just ported the digital librarian to the Mac and called it a day when that's not true at all. (BTW the reason Apple acquired NEXT was to make an OS that would compete with the upcoming NT based line of consumer OSes from Microsoft). They created an implementation that mirrors as much of the Microsoft implementation as they could possibly implement. Likewise with CoreVideo. All you have to do is go to the CoreVideo/Image site on Apple.com and see how it mirrors DX a lot more than it does anything else.

You know, the fact that you have no idea what is going on in the world outside of Windows is going to lead you astray every time.

The simple fact that SGIs were doing these things back in 1990 shows that the idea wasn't new at all.

And of course the fact that Microsoft license the rights to the patents of all this technology from SGI back in 1998/99 must be... what, coincidence?

You have very little knowledge about the Microsoft implementation if you think they licensed it from SGI. Microsoft created the spec that Nvidia and ATI use to support those features and CoreVideo and CoreImage both use that spec. Microsoft created the spec for DXVA (1 and 2) and so when Apple decides they want to hardware accelerate H.264, MPEG-2HD, and WMVHD in Leopard they'll be using the Microsoft defined spec there too. When Apple moves to the unified shader model, guess what? They'll be using a spec (partially) designed by Microsoft. And as you said, NEXT and SGI had their own implementations (and graphics processors IIRC).
This is absolutely a Microsoft innovation being used by Apple. You can bring up SGI all you want but SGI nor NEXT wrote the spec that Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, and ATI all use for these particular features.

You were saying that Microsoft's indexing search abilities were what Apple copied... and I have pointed out that Apple didn't need to copy Microsoft in this area, they had acquired the concepts from NeXT.

Not only did Apple acquire the "concepts" from NEXT but also the "specific implementation" but notice that they don't use it. They use the one that is more similar to Microsoft's Indexing Server/Service, Windows Desktop Search, SharePoint, Office, and Longhorn/Vista.

You're flat out wrong and you bringing Next and SGI into the conversation just serves to prove that Apple isn't using their implementations at all, there using the ones similar to what Microsoft laid out.

 

[matthew24]

You could discus for hours who did what first, in the end only one thing counts: Who has the best implementation, in this sense Apple learned a lot from everything that went wrong with usability and management-ability in Windows. 'MS defies simplicity', here lies Apple's strength to present complex issues in a simple way.

 

[RacerX]

Again, you go off talking...

Well, I have yet to see you counter anything with research (a prerequisite for this conversation to continue), so there is no sense in wasting any more time on you.

At least the actual history of this stuff is out, and your FUD has been soundly countered.

Better luck next time.

 

[beatle888]

wow. ok well since the mighty mouse is out this thread will slowly fade.



thanks for all the reading material RacerX. i really enjoyed your posts. i cant really comment on BGil. i cant believe he doesnt see NeXT as part of apple. i think it would be hard to separate the two. i mean come on. steve founded apple+NeXT and what do we have today? apple+NeXT=OSX

anyway, thanks.

 

[Tahko]

Because none of those 10 are what the user needs/wants? Or because the apps he currently owns would not run on OS X, forcing the user to re-purchase the apps? Or what about games? Sure, OS X has games. Quite a few in fact. But what if those games are not what the user wants to play? Hell, one of the reason why my in-laws refused to move to Linux or OS X, was that none of the little games (that their kid liked to play) they got from cereal-boxes wouldn't work anymore.

Yes, OS X has Doom 3 (for example). But I don't care one bit about Doom 3. The games I like to play are NOT AVAILABLE on OS X. Nor are they available on the consoles. I find it 100% irrelevant how many games there are for OS X, if I'm not interested in those games!

It seems to me that some of you guys are not living on the same planet as rest of us are. One recurring suggestions seems to be to get a PC for fun & games, and Mac for serious work. So according to you, the user should have two computers (at twice the price)? If he wants to play games, he loads up the Windows-machine. If the then wants to type a letter (for example), he shuts down the Windows-machine, and boots up the Mac. Do you have any idea how tedious that would be? Instead of going through that extra hassle, why not simply type the letter in the Windows-machine? Fact remains that there's something Windows can do, that the Mac can't do: play games. And Windows can do the things the Mac can do (word-processing, email, net-surfing, etc. etc.). Os it's only logical that people stick with Windows.

Reality called, he wants you guys back.

According to me? Oh shut up.. I switched because I don't play any other games than GT2 & Tony Hawk 2 on my Playstation. Why? Because every single time my computer has to do 3D processing it starts to overheat. Also, this PC is absolutely noisy. And finding +10 viruses regularly each month is major bugger. Only games I played on PC when it worked were CS, Diablo II, Warcraft3, Starcraft, Morrowind & Victoria. 3 games on my shelve ready to put on upcoming ibook which I most likely wont play anyway. I played CS last time when I was 16. That is like 4 years ago.

Earth calls you, everyone isn't a fricking gaming maniac or CAD designer.

 

[skibummer]

Playing with Vista

I work with some Programmers at a University, and we have been playing around with this release for a few days. Doesn't run faster than XP, it seems to be a processor hog, my guess is that there is no solid rendering engine for the GUI.

Interestingly, a "Portible Media Devices" control panel is new and links to a webpage that suggests mp3 players... all of them except iPod of course.

Nothing spectacular, they just made it look nicer. Other than the icons on the desktop/start menu they are all the same (Control Panels, etc..)
One noticable touch is the opening/closing windows with a scaling effect. This happens on every window though. It gets annoying when going through a wizard with lots of windows, every single new window in the wizard goes through the transition.

The close, min, and max buttons are blank, and appear with the shapes when a mouse passes over them like in OSX (Surprise!)

Also the title and tool bar are transparent, and blur the picture/text behind it. The only thing this does is look pretty, and steal ~30% of the processor-even on a 3.2ghz p4. Of course for the average "Change is Bad" windows user, you can hit 'classic mode' and it looks like windows 98 again.

 

[AidenShaw]

This is a "plumbing" release

I work with some Programmers at a University, and we have been playing around with this release for a few days. Doesn't run faster than XP, it seems to be a processor hog, my guess is that there is no solid rendering engine for the GUI.

Note that even Microsoft calls this a "plumbing" release - it's about getting new APIs into the hands of applications developers, so that Vista-enhanced applications can be ready.

It's not about the final user interface - not surprisingly, that'll be built on the plumbing that's in Beta 1. Beta 2 will have many GUI changes, and be much closer to the final.

Also, early beta releases are compiled with lots of debugging code, and are therefore rather CPU intensive. Many optimizations (and hardware accelerations) wait for Beta 2 and the Release Candidates.

 

[weezer160]

Along the lines of the whole OS wars, I always find it interesting that PC users, when they first jump on my Mac, always seems to act all frustrated and irrated, like they don't know how to launch the browser, or something simple like that. I honestly don't know if they are just "acting" or actually "challenged." Granted one must have a basic understanding of how the Mac works (ie. Menus are always in one place, not at the top of each window), but I, personally, find it odd that people who use PC exclusively Mac the make out to be much more difficult to use than it really is. I mean, we all know running windows is a lot like trying to run a nuclear power plant; takes planning, great deal of time to understand. I can't even customize the tool bar in XP without having to go search for this or that, whereas it's just drag and drop with the dock. Has anybody ever found out how to clear the cookies on IE? Takes forever! Anybody notice this besides me?

One more thing: why is it I have a better understanding of a windows PC than people who use them extensively? Anybody else experience this as well?

 

[JFreak]

I always find it interesting that PC users, when they first jump on my Mac, always seems to act all frustrated and irrated, like they don't know how to launch the browser, or something simple like that. I honestly don't know if they are just "acting" or actually "challenged."

that's because they can't find their start menu from the bottom left corner. once they realize that's missing, everything else becomes sooooo hard.

Granted one must have a basic understanding of how the Mac works (ie. Menus are always in one place, not at the top of each window)

learning that takes five seconds, if that even has to be taught. it's the UNLEARNING of bad windows habits that take longer time. like not having the one fullscreen window. (i find it intersting that windows users like to bash with the multitasking point while they seem to not ever take advantage of it, really.)

Has anybody ever found out how to clear the cookies on IE? Takes forever! Anybody notice this besides me? (...) have a better understanding of a windows PC than people who use them extensively? Anybody else experience this as well?

it takes few seconds and everybody knows how to do that. i wouldn't brag on windows knowledge if clearing cookies is so hard...

 

[JFreak]

Also, early beta releases are compiled with lots of debugging code, and are therefore rather CPU intensive. Many optimizations (and hardware accelerations) wait for Beta 2 and the Release Candidates.

debugging slowdown is not that big during beta stage, it's a major factor during the alpha stage when new features are being developed. the purpose of a beta stage is fixing found problems, and debug code is being used where absolutely necessary. finished modules don't have any, and there are more finished modules than work in progress, otherwise that would be alpha.

entering beta means freezing features. in other words, all hardware accelerations are enabled during beta (because that's a feature, and there can only be new features during the alpha stage), and if the final feature set changes during the beta stage, it means that some features are dropped rather than added.

moving from alpha stage to beta stage means basically that every included module has been finalized in such a way that extensive debugging code is not necessary anymore. granted, there are some, but not that much one could expect final version to be noticeably faster than the beta build.

release candidate is just a special name for a beta build. it means that if there are no showstoppers found in certain timeframe, then the build will be released for manufacturing. if showstoppers are found, they are fixed and the fixed build will be declared a new release candidate. this will go on until no showstoppers are found, or in microsoft's case, until the certain deadline has been met anyway, release candidate is as good as retail build.

 

[AidenShaw]

you don't follow Microsoft releases, do you?

debugging slowdown is not that big during beta stage, it's a major factor during the alpha stage when new features are being developed. the purpose of a beta stage is fixing found problems, and debug code is being used where absolutely necessary. finished modules don't have any, and there are more finished modules than work in progress, otherwise that would be alpha...

Sorry, but this doesn't map into Microsoft's practices. Beta builds use different libraries, have much more checking code (the __ASSERT run-time test is enabled during beta, and ignored for RC and release builds, for example).

During beta, it's much better to get a message that ("Assertion failed: Pointer is NULL at line 348 of module foo.cs, routine socketopen, called from line 295 of module bar.cs, routine openconnection") than a report that ("my window hung"). The test code is definitely there so that much more useful bug reports can be provided.

When Windows releases, Microsoft does two builds. The release build is what's sold, but they also build a debug build of the final bits. This is shipped to MSDN members as the "checked build". If you're developing low-level or privileged Windows code, you do much of your testing with the checked build - since it performs extensive argument testing when you're calling system APIs. You get a debugger trap with ("argument 3 to OpenSocketByName is invalid"), rather than a BSOD.

Look at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/d..._ed42a8a3-c60e-4d73-91e6-ebc2757a69ce.xml.asp

The checked build (or debug build)

The purpose of the checked build of Microsoft Windows is to make identifying and diagnosing operating-system-level problems easier. The checked build differs from the free build in the following ways:

• Many compiler optimizations (such as stack frame elimination) are disabled in the checked build. Disabling such optimizations makes it easier to understand disassembled machine instructions, and therefore it is easier to trace the cause of problems in system software.
• The checked build enables a large number of debugging checks in the operating system code and system-provided drivers. This helps the checked build identify internal inconsistencies and problems as soon as they occur.

and http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/d..._676ed826-9b2c-4e71-9cf0-5889c18ddaa4.xml.asp

For each platform and operating system, there are two build environments: one for building free binaries and one for building checked binaries.

In the free build environment, the Build utility generates a build product that is optimized for release, similar to a retail build created with Microsoft Visual Studio.

In the checked build environment, the Build utility generates a build product that has a number of features that facilitate testing and debugging:

• In the checked environment, the Build utility does not optimize the code it creates.
• Checked binaries (products built in the checked environment) typically have extra tests in the code to catch errors.
• The checked environment also defines the DBG preprocessor constant, which controls whether certain debugging routines are called. For more information, see Conditional Compilation and the Build Environment.
• In some checked environments that build binaries for Windows XP and later operating systems, the VERIFIER_DDK_EXTENSIONS environment variable might be defined by default. This activates the Call Usage Verifier tool.

All drivers should first be compiled and tested in the checked environment. Builds must be recompiled and retested in the free environment after they are complete and have been demonstrated to work

.

It's all about getting as much information as possible when something goes wrong in the Beta - it's not about giving the bitheads who are testing the plumbing the fastest system possible.

 

[polsons]

Riiiiight.......

Whoever told you that it was harder to use than 10.3 is full of it. Stop listening to heresay and get on a Mac yourself. Microsoft can't possibly copy the "lemon" as you claim it is, because the OS being a "lemon" would require flaws in the OS itself. MS has done nothing but add some of the features of Tiger, because copying the OS completely would require a complete rebuild from the ground up. If you look at the broad picture, 10.4 is not too different from 10.3, with the exception of a few features that were added.
It's a good idea to know what you're talking about before you go posting rubbish like that. Go out and actually use Tiger for yourself. You'll know why it is so much better than anythig else out there, and you'll realize that MS cannot possibly "copy it in every infinite detail".

I actually think OSX isn't all that bad, it's just that those who use it are so timid and insecure, that they continue to stumble their way through life with their head firmly wedged up their arse. No thanks.... I'll stay and play with the real boys.

....Oh yeah.. I did get to play with FCP for the first time last night. Compared to Premiere Pro it's crap. If Apple can't get it's premiere app right after v5, maybe it should get out and leave DV to those who can.

 

[Panu]

Windows Vista and XP

Windows Vista is currently in beta 1, which is a limited beta, by invitation only. I am a Windows Vista beta tester, and I also own an iMAC with Tiger. Beta 1 does not include the final user interface. That comes in beta 2.

There are features in Tiger that have counterparts in Windows Vista, but Microsoft can't possibly be copying Apple (or the other way around), because the lead time on development is too long and Apple's security is too tight. For example, Windows Vista has a search feature similar to Spotlight, but more capable. Microsoft demonstrated a prototype of this feature a year before Apple announced Spotlight. Microsoft's virtual folders pretty much the same as Apple's smart folders, but Apple's smart folders resemble a better implementation of Outlook 2003's earlier search folders. So I don't think anyone is copying anyone else; I think that this is a natural evolution of OSs. This is not unprecedented: Three people independently and simultaneously invented calculus. One difference between the two is that Microsoft is partly task oriented, while Apple is still program-and-document oriented.

So far as any competition between Windows and OS X is concerned, I think the latest OS is going to be the one that has the better implementation of these emerging features.

As I said, Beta 1 is a plumbing beta. This beta is about what is under the hood.

The user interface is not complete in this beta, nor is it supposed to be. Occasionally one sees bits of XP poking through. If you set the properties of the task bar, the dialog box shows the XP task bar, not the Vista task bar, for instance. The icons also seem to be in transition--some icons look chunky when they are enlarged, others look slick. There is a mixture of icon types in the control panel. The help feature contains things like "insert text here." I wouldn't make any judgments about Vista's final appearance or its user interface until beta 2.

I can say that Vista is at least as fast as XP even in beta, and the beta is stable enough to use.

I like Vista very much, and I'm looking forward to beta 2 and the final product. I like Tiger, too. I guess you could say they are like children; I love them both equally in different ways.

I should add that I posted this using IE7 in Windows Vista.

 

[Doctor Q]

Well that didn't take long

Macworld link

First family of Windows Vista viruses unleashed

An Austrian hacker earned the dubious distinction of writing what are thought to be the first known viruses for Microsoft Corp.’s Windows Vista operating system. Written in July, the viruses take advantage of a new command shell, code-named Monad, that is included in the Windows Vista beta code.

 

[JFreak]

Oh yeah.. I did get to play with FCP for the first time last night. Compared to Premiere Pro it's crap. If Apple can't get it's premiere app right after v5, maybe it should get out and leave DV to those who can.

A BIG LAUGH

premiere is for home videos, period. there are internationally distributed big buck films made with final cut pro, in case you didn't know. it's YOU who cannot play with pro's if you comment things like this.

i'm still laughing

 

[dgdosen]

See, that is the difference between you and I. You are posting in this forum trying to show that Apple copied from Microsoft to push Windows as the pinnacle of computer technology. I, on the other hand, don't care if Apple was first... only that the correct history of the concepts is known.

Actually, it reads to me like you're baiting the guy.

 

[polsons]

Yeah... like you use a computer designed by Fisher-Price, so you would know.

Premiere Pro is an app for DV and doesn't claim to be anything more than what it is. And just like everything that comes from Adobe, it is the best in it's field. (And at least it has a UI designed this century, not last). FCP is an app for tight-arses too stingy to spend their money on an Avid system like the real boys use. Still doesn't change the fact that FCP is crap.

One of the things that pisses me off about Mac users is their 'holier than thou' attitude 'MacOSX' is the best OS because they say it is. Apple is the only developer in existence that sells you the 'beta' and claims it to be the final product -or at least they do until the day after you've paid your money when they then tell you about the 200gig of updates you have to download before your new OS will boot-up. The Apple experience..... buy a shiny new Powermac today, feel ripped-off tomorrow.

I'm always amused that Mac evangelists conveniently evade the most crucial fact in this argument. Your royal holiness is not only the iCEO of your bubblegum and fruit company, but a majority partner and CEO of the industry's premiere animation house. A company in which your royal highness has absolute authority over day to day decisions.

Problem is, Pixar has never used 'PowerPC' or 'MacOSX', and Pixar will never use 'PowerPC' and 'MacOSX'. Just like every other animation house in existence, Pixar uses 'Intel' and 'Linux' because they know with absolute certainty that both are exceedingly superior to the crap Apple dishes out.

So what does that say to the 95% of non-MacOSX users. Just one significant thing. ....I'm Steve Jobs the iCEO of Apple and I think everyone should buy an 'iPod' to make me richer.... Oh! by the way I'm also the CEO of 'Pixar' and we don't use Mac's because I think 'MacOSX' is absolute crap.

Maybe Mac users should stop Steve Jobs sh_tting in their own backyard before they try and convince me just how good 'MacOSX' is. No matter how crap you think 'Windows' is, at least Bill Gates uses it. ..And no doubt so does Steve Jobs on his Sony Vaio..

WWDC 2007... Intel Powerbooks and Powermacs designed by ex-Sony engineers I read (so where's that stupid pommy git and his crappy designs now then - probably telling Colgate, brushed aluminium toothbrushes are the next big thing ...Brand them iBrush and overprice them 20 times... Mac users will buy them by the box load) WWDC 2009... Intel Powerbooks and Powermacs running 'Windows Vista' WWDC 2011... Apple.. a division of Microsoft Corp.

Get used to it. The game is over and you've lost. Maybe you should get a job and save your money for the 'Windows' version of Apple's cutting edge app -and I bet you take that statement seriously- 'iLife'. It's probably coming much sooner than you think. But then, just maybe consumers will warm to Apple's next world shattering innovation. Apparently it's a wooden stick with lead in it. I think Apple's calling it the 'iPencil'. ... Oh sorry!... one of Bill's distant relatives already invented that 200 years ago.... but don't worry, iPod users are too brain dead to know.

Better still just go back to playing with your Fisher-Price toy