Ever have a cut and put a bandaid on it? After a day or so, you put another bandaid on top of the first one. Another bandaid on top of that, and so on - for days. after a few days of this you have a bunch of messy bandaids, but the cut is probably still there.
That, in a nutshell has been Microsofts approach to software development.
I have spent 30+ years in software development and I have been amazed how good marketing has minimized poor technology.
About 40 years ago a man named Edsger Dyjkstra wrote an article, Go To's Considred Harmful. This was the moment where software development was looked at as an Engineering process not a game for geeks. Software is a corporate assett and must be treated as such. Unfortunately the folks at MS, not having a DP-savvy customer have been able to avoid that concept.
Every major software installation comes to a point where they must bite the bullet and rewrite the code. The regular patches and mods become so unwieldly that the software itself is no longer reliable. This is always an expensive proposition. However the expense of not doing the rewrite at the proper time can be much more expensive. Recently the folks at Apple finally came to that conclusion.
OS X - Apples current Operating system is a total rewrite from its predecessor, OS 9. The root of the code has been changed to UNIX and the resulting system is clean, elegant and safe.
Someone has finally noticed that at Microsoft.
Perhaps the competition from Apple, Google, Firefox, OpenOffice, et al, shook someone up.
I resisted making the switch from MS to Mac for years, then I spent an entire night recovering from a virus. At my sons insistant advice I went OS X on an IMac. I run a virus checker ever weekend. I've done this for a year or so. I am on a Wideband cable connection and never (or nearly never) turn my machine off. I have had no (none, zip, nada) viruses on my Mac yet.
I also run a program called Virtual PC, which emulated a PC on my mac. I have all the software access I need, and none of the risk. (I never connect to the internet as a PC)
Good Luck Mr. Gates, the cow is well out of the barn, you can close the door now
About Me
- The Flomblog
- Denver, Colorado, United States
- I'm a Vietnam Vet, Retired Mainframe Programmer, Retired College Adjunct Teacher, Published Author, Adult Boy Scout Leader, Republican, Jewish, married with two magnificent grown kids.