[theolein]

BurpetheadX originally started a thread on this in the OS section, which was immediatley locked, but, while I seldom post here anymore, and even more rarely start threads, I was really bowled over by Microsoft's audacity this time. At Paul "I kiss Bill's behind" Thurrot's winsupersite ( http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase...eview_2005.asp ) there is an article on the latest builds of MS Longhorn, WinXP's successor. Some things are so obviously copied, even if only visually, from OSX, that I wonder how Microsoft ever manages to actually agree on a feature set before having to start from scratch again when the marketing department finds something new to Copy, Embrace and Extend™.

In particular, take a look at the new version of Windows Explorer, the Windows version of the Finder: http://www.winsupersite.com/images/s...er_demo_01.jpg
Notice the search boy on the top right? Now which OS have you seen which currently implements that? Notice the new Finder like favourites section on the left? How amazingly original of MS.

Then, take a look at the new search window: http://www.winsupersite.com/images/s...ch_demo_01.jpg
Which OS, known and loved by most of us, has had a similar type of search box for about a decade? You win a prize if you say any MacOS after about System 8.

Now it really starts to get blatant: http://www.winsupersite.com/images/s...ks_demo_01.jpg
If you take a look at the new "stacks" feature, those of you who were wondering what had happened to Apple's Piles feature (originally claimed by ThinkSecret to be in Tiger) can now breath a sigh of relief that MS Longhorn has found the Apple's prodigal son of GUI paradigms. Now, what will really be interesting is that Apple has a patent on this concept, and given that Apple has been known to get the lawyers rolling merely at the mention of some leaked project keyword, I wonder if Apple might not be in for a nice round of court monopoly with MS unless MS manages to cross licence some of their patents with Apple. Since MS tends to be incredibly greedy about anything, no matter how small, I tend to think that we'll have some nice court action instead.

And that's not all folks: http://www.winsupersite.com/images/s...lery2_LU02.jpg
Our merry tale continues with this feature where Longhorn will require an admin paasowrd to install an app, much as it is done in OSX. The originality of this is really making me see MS in a whole new light.

And, just when you thought that you could stomach no more of this wretched account: http://www.winsupersite.com/images/s...iability01.jpg
Notice those brilliantly designed transparent window frames? Do those of you who complained bitterly about how singularly useless this feature was in OSX 10.0 (which Apple wisely dropped by 10.2 IIRC) have a sense of schadenfreude when you imagine some poor sucker on WinLongPorn crying in frustration because his desktop is a mess of hard to find windows?

Let us hope that MS manages to keep us entertained in our strenuous wait for Longhorn's dramatic arrival as Microsoft WindowsOSX!

[bradoesch]

Holy crap is that ever ugly!! MS entends copy cat to copy crap.

[zizban]

MS takes every ui concept and uglifies it.

[Dimethyltrypt]

for a moment, there, I thought Apple had ported iSync to windows.

[ManOfSteal]

Kinkos® would be proud of this kind of copying...

[theolein]

Originally posted by Dimethyltrypt:
..snip...

for a moment, there, I thought Apple had ported iSync to windows.

I missed that one. Notice the wild and dizzy original icon in that screenshot!

I think this whole schtick is new, and possibly because MS wants to stop the losses of switchers buying Macs (especially minis) and coming to the world of OSX.

[kmkkid]

Originally posted by theolein:
BurpetheadX originally started a thread on this in the OS section, which was immediatley locked, but, while I seldom post here anymore, and even more rarely start threads, I was really bowled over by Microsoft's audacity this time. At Paul "I kiss Bill's behind" Thurrot's winsupersite ( http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase...eview_2005.asp ) there is an article on the latest builds of MS Longhorn, WinXP's successor. Some things are so obviously copied, even if only visually, from OSX, that I wonder how Microsoft ever manages to actually agree on a feature set before having to start from scratch again when the marketing department finds something new to Copy, Embrace and Extend™.

In particular, take a look at the new version of Windows Explorer, the Windows version of the Finder: http://www.winsupersite.com/images/s...er_demo_01.jpg
Notice the search boy on the top right? Now which OS have you seen which currently implements that? Notice the new Finder like favourites section on the left? How amazingly original of MS.

Then, take a look at the new search window: http://www.winsupersite.com/images/s...ch_demo_01.jpg
Which OS, known and loved by most of us, has had a similar type of search box for about a decade? You win a prize if you say any MacOS after about System 8.

Now it really starts to get blatant: http://www.winsupersite.com/images/s...ks_demo_01.jpg
If you take a look at the new "stacks" feature, those of you who were wondering what had happened to Apple's Piles feature (originally claimed by ThinkSecret to be in Tiger) can now breath a sigh of relief that MS Longhorn has found the Apple's prodigal son of GUI paradigms. Now, what will really be interesting is that Apple has a patent on this concept, and given that Apple has been known to get the lawyers rolling merely at the mention of some leaked project keyword, I wonder if Apple might not be in for a nice round of court monopoly with MS unless MS manages to cross licence some of their patents with Apple. Since MS tends to be incredibly greedy about anything, no matter how small, I tend to think that we'll have some nice court action instead.

And that's not all folks: http://www.winsupersite.com/images/s...lery2_LU02.jpg
Our merry tale continues with this feature where Longhorn will require an admin paasowrd to install an app, much as it is done in OSX. The originality of this is really making me see MS in a whole new light.

And, just when you thought that you could stomach no more of this wretched account: http://www.winsupersite.com/images/s...iability01.jpg
Notice those brilliantly designed transparent window frames? Do those of you who complained bitterly about how singularly useless this feature was in OSX 10.0 (which Apple wisely dropped by 10.2 IIRC) have a sense of schadenfreude when you imagine some poor sucker on WinLongPorn crying in frustration because his desktop is a mess of hard to find windows?

Let us hope that MS manages to keep us entertained in our strenuous wait for Longhorn's dramatic arrival as Microsoft WindowsOSX!

Not to be any kind of MS apologist or anything but...

1. Windows has always had a webview/taskpane with common places.

2. It's basically just the normal windows search pane put above the files instead of at the side.

3. I'll give you this one. It seems they have taken this from apple. But Piles were never implemented anyways.

4. *nix started this one, not Apple nor MS. All modern OS' should include this as a security feature imho.

5. This most likely isnt what Longhorns GUI will look like by release. This is just showing off the power of avalon. Plus the glass effect looks nothing like semi-transparent titlebars.



Sure MS isnt being very innovative, but all I see them doing is moving parts of it's old UI around to better suit the users needs, not to mimic OS X, and making it look a little flashier.



Chris

[Superchicken]

I'm not impressed at the copy cat act... I'm surprised at how badly those photocopiers at redmond worked! I mean Steve gave em warning too! How do you fuglify an interface that badly!?

[AppleOptionFour]

Redmond, start your photocopiers.

-Steve Jobs, WWDC2004

Like the quote? Click below.

http://www.spymac.com/gallery/show_p...22&nr=7019

[theolein]

Originally posted by kmkkid:
Not to be any kind of MS apologist or anything but...

1. Windows has always had a webview/taskpane with common places.

2. It's basically just the normal windows search pane put above the files instead of at the side.

3. I'll give you this one. It seems they have taken this from apple. But Piles were never implemented anyways.

4. *nix started this one, not Apple nor MS. All modern OS' should include this as a security feature imho.

5. This most likely isnt what Longhorns GUI will look like by release. This is just showing off the power of avalon. Plus the glass effect looks nothing like semi-transparent titlebars.



Sure MS isnt being very innovative, but all I see them doing is moving parts of it's old UI around to better suit the users needs, not to mimic OS X, and making it look a little flashier.



Chris

I think you're being very forgiving of MS.

The favourite places wasn't configurable unless you hacked the registry, at least in open save dialogs.

The moving of the search pane to that particular place really asks me why they moved it just there? Why not leave it at the side?

Piles might very well be implemented in a future release of OSX. Apple has a patent on them and the idea is not at all bad.

The admin password dialog, along with the concept of a useful non admin account, might come from *nix, the style of that one comes straight from OSX, if you ask me.

If the mess that MS made with XP, implementing the aliased corner Luna theme instead of the original Whistler theme to be more like OSX is any guide, the final Longhorn theme will mimic OSX as closely as possible.

And what about that Sync manager window from a few posts above? I don't see MS doing much in the way of innovative thinking there.

[RGB]

The search in the upper right mimicks the appearance of most web browsers now, and I wouldn't be surprised if IE 7 has it in the same spot too. It's not a reference to Mac OS, it's finally putting the search in an expected and effective spot.

[demograph68]

What could Microsoft do that wouldn't involve ripping off Apple while being innovative at the same time?

[Sarc]

I feel sick

[discotronic]

Originally posted by theolein:


http://www.winsupersite.com/images/s...iability01.jpg

You gotta love the fact that the app isn't responding. That is all Microsoft

[Krusty]

Originally posted by discotronic:
You gotta love the fact that the app isn't responding. That is all Microsoft

Did anyone notice the funny dialog ?

[discotronic]

Originally posted by Krusty:
Did anyone notice the funny dialog ?

[Mafia]

Originally posted by Krusty:
Did anyone notice the funny dialog ?

lol lthe first thing i thought about. nice show off of a crash.

[olePigeon]

Know what that reminds me of? Back in the Classic days after I installed Kaleidoscope, I'd put on some really cool looking theme. Then 2 hours later I'd turn it off because I got sick of it.

I'm wondering Microsoft will allow you to turn off all that crap and make it look normal? It's like having a really bad theme installed permanently.

[RonnieoftheRose]

Now you can use Microsoft Spotlight to choose the virus you want in no time at all!

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y15...astviruses.jpg

You'll be told beforehand how long until an app or the system crashes!

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y15...ashboombam.jpg

Best of all, with Longhorn SuperExtremelySpecial Edition Microsoft includes Microsoft Virus 2005!

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y15...se/msvirus.jpg

[xeo sez: img too big]

[Millennium]

1) The concept seems to have come more from certain popular Web browsers than OSX. Also, I'm not going to begrudge them the relative layout of two controls; there's a limit to what can be considered copying and what can be considered putting widgets on a page.

2) That kind of search window is pretty generic. If you think this is ripping off Apple, then design for me a search window with similar functionality that isn't a rip-off. No need to make it work, or even look pretty; a quick sketch will do.

3) Feh; let them have Piles. We need them copying more bad UI features; it will make them look worse in the long run. This can't really be considered Apple's concept, though; Tog came up with this harebrained idea after he left Apple.

4) Copying, or common sense? Windows should have been doing this since the very beginning.

5) See my third comment.

End result: two cases where the copying was arguable, one case that isn't copying, and two cases where they're ripping off bad ideas and so should be encouraged.

[Dimethyltrypt]

[CD Hanks]

I look forward to buying it.

[demograph68]

Originally posted by CD Hanks:
I look forward to buying it.

Me too.

[spacefreak]

Software makers, and pretty much most product makers, often design and build-in features that the market has deemed popular, useful, and necessary. This should be viewed as being no different.

I could sit here and post a point-by-point list "proving" that Apple copied features from Internet Explorer, or MS Word. We could also discuss Apple's skumming of Konfabulator and Watson, among other things.

People need to get over their insecurity of WIndows. If you don't like the OS, fine. But to rip Microsoft for adding security and search features that have been present in other OS's and applications for a while is weenie-esque.

[theolein]

Originally posted by spacefreak:
Software makers, and pretty much most product makers, often design and build-in features that the market has deemed popular, useful, and necessary. This should be viewed as being no different.

I could sit here and post a point-by-point list "proving" that Apple copied features from Internet Explorer, or MS Word. We could also discuss Apple's skumming of Konfabulator and Watson, among other things.

People need to get over their insecurity of WIndows. If you don't like the OS, fine. But to rip Microsoft for adding security and search features that have been present in other OS's and applications for a while is weenie-esque.

It might be, but it is fun.

Personally, I think Microsoft is slowly starting to get its OS act together. I'm pretty sure that Longhorn will be an big improvement over XP, even though XP was quite usable and stable for me on my Dell when I still had it. While I vastly prefer OSX, I certainly wouldn't die if I had to use a Windows machine again.

That said, the next year will be quite interesting in the OS world. MSFT's share price has been dropping steadily for over 4 months. I do seriously think MS is doing a certain amount of copying from OSX (not much but a bit definitely), but that's not what will make or break Longhorn's future.

Things like this:

Various versions:
Longhorn Starter Edition

Longhorn Home Edition

Longhorn Media Center Edition

Longhorn Professional Edition

Longhorn Small Business Edition

Longhorn Mobility/Tablet PC Edition

Longhorn Premium Edition
"A new product edition that bridges the consumer and business versions and includes all of the features from the Home, Premium, Pro, Small Business, and Tablet PC Editions (but not Starter Edition). The new Premium edition will also add value to Microsoft's business-oriented Software Assurance (SA) customers."

or this:

Hardware requirements:
Desktop CPU: 3 GHz Intel Pentium 4 processor with HyperThreading Technology 530 (or higher) or 3 GHz Intel Xeon processor with 2 MB L2 cache, or AMD Athlon 64, Sempron, or Opteron 100, 200, or 800 processor, single or dual-core versions.

Mobile CPU: 1.86 GHz Intel Pentium M processor 750 (or higher), or AMD Turion 64 Mobile Technology, Mobile Sempron, or Mobile Athlon 64 processor.

RAM: 512 MB of RAM or more, all platforms.

might however be more influential on how well Longhorn makes it in the market. The idea of parcelling up Longhorn into various versions including a new small business edition and a new premium edition is not going to go down well with the public or with companies. For one thing it's confusing, for another it's a painfully obvious attempt by the marketing division to make more money, since it is obviously not necessary from a technical point of view. I can imagine corporations being as (un)happy about this as they were about licencing 6, which single handedly lost MS more corporate customers than just about anything MS had done previously.

And the hardware requirements are pretty steep. I can see why MS originally considered only releasing an OEM version of Longhorn with new PCs.

[Big Mac]

4) I actually happen to like some of the elements in that security dialog.

[goMac]

Originally posted by CD Hanks:
I look forward to buying it.

I plan on buying it April 15th.

[CD Hanks]

Originally posted by goMac:
I plan on buying it April 15th.

2005 or 2006? Because the only thing planned on getting released by Microsoft this year around that date is XP64.

[goMac]

Originally posted by CD Hanks:
2005 or 2006? Because the only thing planned on getting released by Microsoft this year around that date is XP64.

You can get it here.

[CD Hanks]

Originally posted by goMac:
You can get it here.

OIC

WILL THIS RUN ON WINDOWS?

IT LOOKS PRETTY

MY OH MY

[meelk]

as a windows user I think it looks pretty nice. Not the color scheme I like, but I'm sure youll be able to change that around at least a bit (and probably a lot once people come to grips with the directx desktop programability). Having integrated search without a 3rd party program will be nice, and it will likely be just as fast as spotlight. I'm using copernic search now, and its blazingly fast. I'm glad they got rid of the utterly huge forward and back arrows they had up not long ago. I'd say it looks pretty good. probably the most useful thing is the way the new engine will render windows so you dont have to wait for windows to draw when you have a lot of heavy tasks going on, that in itself will be worthwhile to me.

[kcmac]

Originally posted by theolein:
Things like this:
Various versions:
Longhorn Starter Edition

Longhorn Home Edition

Longhorn Media Center Edition

Longhorn Professional Edition

Longhorn Small Business Edition

Longhorn Mobility/Tablet PC Edition

Longhorn Premium Edition
"A new product edition that bridges the consumer and business versions and includes all of the features from the Home, Premium, Pro, Small Business, and Tablet PC Editions (but not Starter Edition). The new Premium edition will also add value to Microsoft's business-oriented Software Assurance (SA) customers."

This has always puzzled me. I get the Marketing/make money angle. But really, when you buy OS X, you get everything. It caters to many different user levels but it is all there if you want more.

If MS finds it absolutely necessary to have versions maybe they should consider adding a couple more to the list:

European version (no media player)
Third world version (almost nothing at all)

After all, they already have them.

[AppleOptionFour]

Whats the difference btw XP Home and XP Pro besides all the Pros making fun of the people at home?

[kcmac]

Originally posted by AppleOptionFour:
Whats the difference btw XP Home and XP Pro besides all the Pros making fun of the people at home?

Check out this link.
http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase...p_home_pro.asp

(Thurrott warning)

[budster101]

There's five minutes I'll never get back.