[driven]

I found this article today:
http://www.wincustomize.com/articles.aspx?AID=70936&u=0

I'm not sure I agree with # 5 (and #5 is in conflict with #8).

However: The article/list does highlight some of the things that annoy the piss out of me with regard to Windows. (Disclaimer: I make my living authoring software for Windows and have done so for a very long time ... C,C++, C#).

That said: I wonder if we came up with our own list for OSX how would we look? I can't think of anything quite as irritating as the multi-tasking issues or file handle issues that are mentioned, but I'm sure we've got dirty laundry too.

[- - e r i k - -]

Well you can check out the Wishlist-thread in the Mac OS forum. It's not much useful coming out of it though.

[Goldfinger]

What are "handles" in Windows ?

[theolein]

Handles are pointers, or references, to OS objects, like Windows, Files, Fonts etc.

I don't think Microsoft will stop including goodies in the OS. Apple is even worse, or even better in this regard, depending on your viewpoint, but they have to do it in order to create selling points for the OS. MovieMaker might be a POS, but its MS' idea of countering iMovie, and Although Apple's Zip function is far simpler and easier to use than Microsoft's, Apple probably included it to counter Microsoft. These things always come at the cost of some third party developer. Aladdin's Stuffit has suffered greatly since both major OS makers included their own archive functionality, but I suppose that's just one of the risks that a developer has to take. The Konfabulator and Watson stories are well known examples and Apple's Spotlight is sure to kill many OSX third party search engines, such as the one from Ambrosia, but it's probably part of the process that a developer has to be flexible enough to either find and alternate product or add value to an existing one.

As for Windows multitasking, handles and Windows memory handling, I suppose we'll just have to wait and see. It's well known that Windows is not very good when it's operating near its limits, both in multitasking and max memory terms, but I don't know just how much Microsoft can change, since making too deep changes will wreck their legendary backwards compatibility, which is part of the reasons they're as popular as they are.

[driven]

Great point theolein.

To use an example of what can happen when you sacrafice backward compatibility in the Wintel world: The success (or lack thereof) of Itanium. AMD nailed it with the AMD64 and forced Intel to respond with their own 64 bit extensions on the P4. The same thing can easilly happen with Windows. Look at OS/2 .... didn't run Windows 95 apps ... went nowhere.

Apple seems to be the exception that proves the rule. They have (several times) totally changed their platform (hardware & OS) and have been successful at doing so. Go figure. That kind of shift in the Wintel world simply could not happen for whatever reason.

[theolein]

Yeah, the Itanium debacle is an excellent case in point. It's also damn downright alarming at just how inflexible the x86 platform is when it comes to change, given that x86 itself, as an instruction set, dates back to the early 80's. (I know it's not x86 internally in the CPU's anymore) The problem is one of Microsoft and Intel's making, though. They have such a huge monopoly and such a huge client base, that it is extremely difficult for both of them to make any form of radical change in the os or the hardware. Any major deviance from the well trodden path is an open invitation to the legions of hungry competitors to come up with an "improved" but classical version of the soft or hardware.

Even Microsoft is not immune to this, since many of their innovations have been utter failures in the market, often for compatibility reasons. Even though .Net is the future way to go, according to Microsoft, you can be assured that Win32 compatibility at the OS level will be needed for about 6 or 7 years.

The reason Apple can and has done this is because they are tiny compared to the the Wintel world, and because they control both sides of the equation. No one else can make OS9 compatible hardware or OS level stuff (Ok, no one really needs OS9 stuff, but there are still a significant number of designers who use it), but if they could, you could be sure that OSX would have a slower and less successful introduction as someone would be making OS9 capable machines and others would be improving the OS, bit by bit, and some people at least, would have gone down that path.

[olePigeon]

Originally posted by Goldfinger:
What are "handles" in Windows ?

It's a collection of fat tissue around the waist, sometimes referred to as "love handles." It means Windows is OLD and UNATTRACTIVE.