DonaldG

I don’t know about you folks but I am sick & tired of seeing the Microsoft Bashing Party issuing derogatory comments like Micro$oft or Microsquash.

How many of them are running a Microsoft product from choice? I guess just about 100% of us have either used or have an MS product that we have learnt from.

Why do they bash MS? Are they sheep jumping on a trend to show that they are ‘one of the boys’. Or is it a jealousy for the success of Bill Gates & MS?

After seeing many unsupported derogatory comments, I would like to redress the balance a bit. I support MS. I use a most of their products & their products and have contributed my fair share of funds to support Bill in his luxury. He deserves it. I seriously mean that.

Those who disagree just stop & think for a moment. Without entrepreneurs like Gates, Jobs, Wozniac, Sinclair etc we wouldn’t have that fun, use & enjoyment we have.

Over the last 28 years, I have owned many machines from the good ol’ ZX80 through to my Quad Core machine.

The ZX 80 taught me basic & assembler programming, enough to earn money to buy an Apple 2E (at £2000!)- That taught me many more skills & for years I was an Apple Walla! Then I was given a 286 PC running dos3.2. Wow, what a machine, fast as greased lightning! I upgraded to an Amstrad with a GUI of Windows3.1

Please stop complaining that MS programmes are buggy. ALL software has bugs. There is no coding in the world that can cope with every combination of hardware/firmware/software. Even the best (apparently) behaved software will have conflicts somewhere down the line.

The moaners will latch on to a conflict and scream “Bugs, crap, useless, shoddy, full of holes etc”. To them, I say “Can you do better? If you can, then why don’t you have Bill Gates wealth?

I do speak with some knowledge of programming – I have advised & written software for the US Government (USGS at San Diego University for radio tracking Rosy Boas & Rattlesnakes in the desert research area at San Pasqual behind the Wild Life Park). I know the difficulty of de-bugging even small programmes, let alone the monster codes of what we all use without thinking.

All Operating Systems, be it Apple, Microsoft, Linux or what-have-you, will give the odd hiccup from time to time. Ever thought that it might be that YOU have messed with bios settings or other configuration setting (including video/sound settings) that have caused you blame the OS? Could it be that your favourite game alters certain settings and not return them back after a session of zapping the aliens?

I say a big thank you to Bill & MS and all the other software companies out there for hundreds or even thousands of hours of fun and frustration!

Let’s stop this MS bashing!

I have spoken...

(BTW – If you are reading this Mr Gates, Sir, please PM me & I will send you my delivery address! )

ashumann12

Feel better now? I agree, I have heard nothing but ill about Vista. Personally I feel it is better than XP and a far cry from Me. Vista has only been out for a little over a year and already have SP1. I have some problems, but don't we all? Good for Bill, he started at the bottom and has worked his way up. I can only hope my son will take his place latter on (so that he can take care of me in my old age!)

Tumbleweed36

Nice and refreshing treatise on Microsoft. Negativity which we see and hear from time to time does get old when the good that has been done far outweighs the negative aspects of new products.

We must all understand that risks of failures and real time disappointment are part of progress as development trandscends barriers in each stage of introduing new products and concepts. Without those failures along the way, there would be no progress toward future innovation and ideas becoming a part of the real world.

I for one, appreciate the futuristic vision that Mr. Gates has chosen to develop and introduce in to the market. Much of the criticism is unwarranted and not needed. We need to be thankful for what has been given to us through development of a vision by this individual. That is my two cents worth.

Done_Fishin

Whilst I have to agree with everything you say ... I also reserve the right to criticise when I see problems / bugs travel from one edition of windows to another, especially when I am reading about it .. I haven't got a clue as to whether I am suffering or not since I haven't got a clue on how to check .. I just read the info .. make notes.

Microsoft have come a long way I agree, and they have a long way to go yet .. If it weren't for the "buggers" out there who insist on abusing the "flaws" we wouldn't require the "debuggers" to fix the problems that are showing up, which in turn could quite possibly mean that we wouldn't have the quality that we are now seeing ... whether it works smoothly or not !!

It's an ill wind indeed that blows no good!

forcifer

i get exactly what your saying but being a critic doesnt mean you have to do better. i really dont think an art critic who doesnt like the mona lisa, any famous art painting (they exist) could do better. but they will still say how bad it is, wont they?

Tumbleweed36

Great point Done_Fishin. I think you can have honest criticism without Bashing. My impression was that Donald G was specifically talking about bashing. When it comes to honest criticism, then I am as guilty as anyone. That quest of "what if" or "why not" is what makes products better and more advanced. I would hate to see that stop and the product development stop. Therefore, I agree with what you said and those are salient points in this discussion.

DonaldG

You are spot on Tumbleweed. It is the gratuitous bashing just because it is the fashion/trend, that I hate.

You have all seen it: 'Microshite' etc... or someone pops up saying words to the effect that "Don't use Vista, it crap - I went back to XP."

That is the sort of bashing I detest. Sure genuine constructive criticism is what makes the world of difference.

forcifer

ahh yes very true. vista isnt even that bad. its more of people are doing what the read, and instantly even something that isnt vista's fault (see: crappy hardware) you blame on what you want to blame, which is vista. i use vista and will never go back to xp because i feel vista is an upgrade.

Done_Fishin

Does that mean I can no longer say Microsoft SVISTA which, when translated from the greek, gives the impression you're saying Microsoft "delete it"

sinclair_tm

Here, here. I agree with you on the bashing thing, and in fact, if you see any in the Mac section, you'll notice that I try to but the kabosch on it. I am a big Apple fan, and it is my system of choice. But I do correct others when they start bashing Microsoft, why? Well simple, look at what they have done with Windows. They have made a miracle, an OS that will install and run on about any combination of hardware out there. Has anyone else done that? Nope! Not even *nix can do that. For that you need to find the right distro, and then hope that you can find drivers for your hardware that will work with the distro you choose. But you get a Windows XP SP2 CD, stick it in the computer, and after a couple hours have a relatively stable OS that can do quite a lot. The only reason Apple's OS X is more stable is because they control the hardware the software goes on. So we do need to give Microsoft the nod for giving us an OS that can run on all the crazy hardware combinations that we can come up with. And I'm sure that someday Vista will be as capable as XP has been. I don't use it because a). my computer is a little on the old side for it, and b). there are somethings that I do not like how it handles some software, and I have not heard that there is a way to change that yet.

And no, Hades has not frozen over.

Cellus

Not to mention, besides Mac OS, Windows makes it ridiculously easy to install and get working the myriad of non-standard following, shoehorned hardware out there. People gripe and moan about trying to find device drivers for the odd thing, or having problems with it. They should try doing the same thing with the same hardware with the same support with Linux, and then we'll see a shift.

Don't get me wrong, it took them a heck of a long time to get into the secure code bandwagon, and they have some mighty thick corporate blood, but people have to realize that the king of the mountain they are yelling at... is the king of the mountain. If they stunk so much, why do they do so well? Because they facilitate the non-powergeeks and professionals extremely well.

Teaching an end user how to use a Windows operating PC and, say, Linux is like day and night.

Addendum: I would also like to note to every professional out there. Microsoft, both in its glory and "non-glory", gives us work.

ashumann12

I did try KUB but was totally lost. In all honesty, I didn't try very long, and fell back to the more comfortable MS. Maybe later when I have more time and a better understanding.

Glaswegian

Some excellent points indeed. I've been an MS user for years - sure it's not 100% perfect, but I'm still struggling to find something that is. I love Office and all the things you can do with programmes such as Excel, Access and so on. Sinc makes a good point - since I've been building my own systems, I know that, when I've put it all together, I simply put in the XP CD and hey, everything works! To me, the bashers are simply jealous. Do I sometimes wish I'd created Windows? You bet I do!

karusho

I believe that one of Microsoft's stronger points is that no matter how bad they screw up, they manage to bounce back very quickly.

When Vista first came out, I tried it, and I was horrified at how unstable it felt. Now that I've upgraded to SP1, I can only find that it seems better for me than XP SP2.

Recently, I acquired a copy of XP no service pack, and I found that it was just as unstable stable as, if not more than, Vista no service pack. I will agree that XP SP2 is one of the most stable operating systems out there, but before people bash Vista, remember that XP started the same way.

ebackhus

I didn't migrate from 2000 to XP until SP2 was released. I've been using XP now for years and like using it! It works well with my hardware and gives me the features I need to get my work done while allowing me to have fun later. If I install a bad driver I can simply tap F8 and boot into a version of the OS made before the change and keep going.

I do own a Mac and it runs OS 10.3.9 (I think...) but it's a slower machine and lacks built-in wi-fi. Sinc, if you have an older Airport card I might be willing to send you some cash! I can run some of my older Mac/Windows games on it with no problem and surf the Web when I connect it to my network.

I've built a few Linux machines that had Ubuntu and PC Linux OS on them. I had a bit of a hard time getting drivers to work and some of my hardware that performed flawlessly in Windows performed poorly if it worked at all. On the flip side I found that Linux was much "easier" on my hardware based on the lower temperatures I was recording.

Each OS has its merits and each person is entitled an opinion. I just think that going to town on any developer or development community is dumb! It won't change things and only serves to make that person look like a fool.

sobeit

You think microsoft bashing is bad now, wait until the next release when parts of the new microsoft os will be subscription based.

forcifer

yup windows 7 going to be "modular".

TheAtheist

I think any consumer has a right to make constructive critisms of any service someone is providing to them, to ensure that the service is improved. Not bashing it, but pointing out what works well and what does not. The only major critism i have of microsoft right now, is their willingness to leave XP support in the next year or so, neglecting a large proportion of their user base, which may become a PR disaster.

EnglishPaul

I am no IT professional. I am a happy user of MS products, but I have had my fair share of MS frustration.
I will continue to hold bad views on MS however. This is more about their attitude than their products. I remember in the early days they were very aggressive at either squashing competitors or just plain assimilating them. To this day they have adopted strong arm tactics to hinder their competitors. And their attitude towards customers can't be good when it is only with the service packs that the OS becomes more usable than infuriating. They make the public beta testers, and with no guarantee that the issues will soon be resolved.
Yes they have done great things. Yes they have been revolutionary. But you also need to look at how they have done it.
Our understanding of how humans cope with extreme cold is largely built on Nazi experiments, many of which were brutal and often fatal. It pushed forward human knowledge greatly, but at what cost. We have benefited because of them, but should we thank them? MS is nowhere near that extreme, but I think some distrust of them is warranted.
I have only seen this from a distance, and am happy to be corrected, but this is my current view.

DonaldG

Not sure I like the referenced to the Nazis as it is totally irrelevant to this subject.

With respect to their competitors, put it this way:

Image YOU invent something that is absolutely revolutionary. You get patent lawyer to protect YOUR invention and you go to sell it. It becomes a huge success & every one in the world wants one. You deserve the cash & the glory that YOUR invention has earned for you.

Why should YOU be forced to give the YOUR trade secret to your competitor. Its YOUR invention not theirs. Why should the competitor and earn cash from YOUR hard work. When all said & done, they are in COMPETITION with you.

If it were a race, would you stop to let them catch up?