I worked on two major projects that rolled out for our clients on Windows 2000 when it was legal for us to do so. Prior to that, we had developed the applications in house with pre-release version of the OS. We were satisfied with the product and our testing proved that the servers would operate reliably under load. This is certainly not the norm at most companies. Corprate decision makers prefer to wait a few service packs before deploying. Additionally, their in-house IT staff has to go through training and certification and become comfortable with the new products, a lengthy process. In my experience, migration tends to begin with small, more adaptable companies and work it’s way up to the behemoths. The very small companies will be happy with their COBOL or Win 3.1 apps forever.
I’ve also worked on projects that were released when applications went from beta to production versions. I’m waiting for the go ahead to publish some application components in the form of .Net services right now. Our clients expect innovation and we give it to them even if it means butting heads with stagnant, in-house staff. (which seems to be constantly) We also typically work with pre-release versions of software for months. Microsoft counts on its developer network to “sell” new technologies to their clients. We’re not shills (at least, I’M not). It wouldn’t be good for our revenue stream if we persuaded a company to go with a product that was overpriced or didn’t meet their needs or worse yet, wasn’t ready at the time of release. We’d be out of business in a heartbeat. I woudln’t recommend the products if the solutions could be developed more quickly or more reliably with other technologies. This is true of most of our projects, but if they want Java, damnit, they’ll GET Java as long as the check clears.
The changes between Win2k and WinXP are more significant than some of the other posters suggest. It is substantially more than an “incremental upgrade”. When you look under the hood, there are some very interesting things going on, particularly the addition of the Framework. It will involve a fundamental change in the way most developers think about writing applications and providing those services to the end user. I find it very exciting, but most people will never know about it (or care).
Well, I’m sure not buying it. The thing about the WPA affects guys like me who changes over the entire system every 3-6 months. I don’t want to call MS every time and wait through 50 minute queues just to run an OS.
Thanks for those replies. So, maybe I can summarize that even though IT managers aren’t going to roll out XP on Oct 26, that’s standard operating procedure and has nothing to do with the inherent attractiveness or not of XP.
Personally, I really want to see the .NET stuff start coming out and if it’s really useful
Being Microsoft, of course, they have broken any open source use of WebDAV with XP, which is currently annoying my company, which had plans to make heavy use of WebDAV, now scrapped. This gets into the politics behind .NET. (Diablo II, its a new box from AlienWare. I don’t think its just the software though (i.e. Diablo II) since it locks up on 3GL screensavers as well. My guess is that its an interrupt problem with the GEForce card.)
ChinaGuy, IT would like OSs to stay as stable as possible. Its really people intensive to roll a new OS, and (unless its really minor - like 95 to 98) a huge productivity hit for the end users. In a big company there are always some cowboys (the engineering department in most companies is notorious), that will roll a new OS with its release date. The problem with XP is that most of those heavy hitters are already using 2000 on their desktops and are seeing XP as a step backwards.
Another group of people who won’t upgrade to XP: Those who like to casually pirate the software. I’m not talking about the hardcore hackers - I expect XP’s authorization system to be cracked within hours or days of its final release, if it isn’t already.
But Microsoft claims that Product Activation is aimed at stopping the casual pirates - people who buy a copy then give it to their mom and dad to install, their kids, friends, etc. Well, if this really is effective against them, then those people have a strong disincentive to upgrading to XP.
What Microsoft should worry about is the early adopters. These are the people who buy every OS as soon as its released, and they are exactly the same people who are most pissed off about WPA, because they are also the same people who change their hardware configurations a lot.
So, it seems that businesses won’t upgrade, the power users won’t upgrade, the hackers will steal it, and the percentage of users that install multiple copies of their purchased OS also will not upgrade.
Who’s left?
BTW, our company also dropped our upgrade and maintenance contracts with Microsoft because of changes to their pricing structure that made them much more expensive, and also partly because I think upper IT management has decided to get off the upgrade bandwagon because of the dubious nature of many of Microsoft’s new products. Given the size of our company, that’s going to cost Microsoft tens of millions of dollars at least.
We’ve also decided to dump MS Exchange and go to other alternatives despite the significant cost of doing so, because of changes to Microsoft’s licensing.
I think Microsoft is heading off in a bad direction.
I just wanted to toss this [urk=“http://www.cnet.com/software/0-6688749-8-7004399-1.html”]CNET page about Windows XP in here. It has a lot of useful information about WinXP, and also gives details about what changes will trigger the WPA.
A short clip from the article about WPA:
6 out of 10 devices used to determine what a ‘machine’ is doesn’t sound all that bad. It’s still a hassle for those like capacitor who completely change their system, but for those like me who upgrade a part maybe every few months, it won’t be a hassle at all.
If you change a network adaptor to a firewire port, that counts as two changes from what I understand. Do those type of changes three times, that’s 6 just like that.
Yeah, but if you change your graphics card, your processor, your HDD, and add a TV Tuner, you’re still good. And you can keep changing those devices as much as you want, and it still only counts as one change.
All I’m saying is that this method is not too unreasonable. I still don’t agree with WPA.
If you want to talk about software releases which should be highly anticipated (and, by extension, embraced by the public), there’s a long list of stuff that precedes Windows XP … and most of them aren’t from Microsoft.
Yeah, but in order to get it, you need to wade your way through 300 pages of “VOTE HERE FOR BEST WAREZ”, “SEE BRITNEY SPEARS NAKED!” and “XXX HOT PORN GIRLZ BREASTS XXX”, and not to mention an infinite number of pop-up ads, fifty porn links added to your “Favorites” directory, and your browser set to “Sexxxy Hot Dick Anal Sluts” as the start-up page.
I’m sorry, but I’ll take my chances with Microsoft…
I am not sure if any consumers are eagerly waiting for XP. The only people who are anticipating XP (to sell lots of copies) are Bill and co. Most companies aren’t even up to 2K yet, as there’s little incentive to do so. Active Directory? I can do that stuff and more with NDS, which works across platforms thank you very much. So what can XP offer? Not much.
Most SME’s won’t go to 2K or XP as they have no need for it. Existing networks serve the daily needs. Same with existing office productivity suites. Most large corporations won’t go to 2K or XP because of 1) cost 2) operating procedure.
Urban, are you a fellow Netware person? We seem to be getting rarer than hen’s teeth.
I think the weak economy has been the best thing for Novell (and not good for Microsoft) in that I’m seeing a lot of companies that would have switched now looking more closely at the cost/benefits and seeing a lot of costs and few benefits. Eighteen months ago, who cared? - Spend the money, more falls out when you shake the money tree. Now companies are being much more conservative with Return on Investment.
