Has Microsoft's Latest Release Won The Market Over?
Once dubbed 'Longhorn', Microsoft's Vista wasn't looking like a brilliant plan from the start. Having said that, the most famous 'Wii' had a prior name of "Revolution" before Nintendo took a decision to have a rename - now the console system is becoming the most popular system across the world. Will we see a similar thing with Vista?
Vista has been heavily criticised for a whole range of things, spanning from it's "graphic hungry" interface to it's "slow file operations", but what may we expect to see for the history of the Operating system - can we realistically expect to see the shiny Vista icon staring back at us as we login on our computers across the world?
We also have to look at the ever-growing open-source Operating systems, including "Ubuntu" and "Fedora Core" (Both shown above in the image caption"). These are becoming a real hit within the geek community, as they are able to feel like they can work with the OS and they are truly the one's controlling what's going on. Might we expect these "projects" as they were, and other such "flavours" of Linux to grow and dominate the market?
I believe that we really have to look at our target audience. The everyday people, not the Graphics Designers or the Computer Coders who sit behind a computer for hours on end, but those who simply need a computer to function and meet their simple demands on an everyday basis. And I feel for that reason, and that reason alone, we may see nothing but a rise in the demand of Microsoft's Latest.
It all really comes down to file-types. What's the most used Office Suite? You guessed it, Microsoft Office! Now some companies are actually trying to make software that can run, display and save in Microsoft's .doc filetype, but Microsoft are responding - releasing the .dotX out for their new Suite Office 2007. This is neither backward compatible (will not work on older Microsoft Office versions), nor will it run on anything other than Microsoft operating systems. Clearly, Microsoft are not taking too kindly to other companies having their own "crack" at it.
For this reason, I feel that many will simply avoid the change from Microsoft to any other operating system. Granted, if you are working with graphics, media or anything requiring high-end technology, you will be looking at Apple's MacOS, but simply on an "Average Joe" perspective, I simply cannot see a change.
I see Vista as somewhat a politician of Operating systems. It will be heavily criticised and complained about by a large majority of the people, but it will be lived with, and used by thousands despite this.
Apple are certainly within the best chance of knocking Microsoft off their pedestal, but again their downside is price and again we see the barriers of demand, in that Apple will only put their Operating system on and Apple machine. This means essentially that Apple are price-setters and thus their prices are lacking competitiveness, making them able to set price too high. There is no disputing that Apple will provide you with a better Operating System all around, it will run faster with the same specifications as a Windows Vista machine will, and will provide you with a feature-packed, fully working Operating system, but their negatives will not be overlooked.
Fedora and Ubuntu along with similar "flavours" of Linux have now even joined up with the Beryl-Project to offer a brilliant Graphical interface, which perhaps even supersedes that of the Vista alternative, gives users that would ordinarily be seeking something "smart" and "shiny" to show off to their friends about, another path to look down. Up till recently however, Linux has been tarnished with the geek brush as whilst it has the ability to be edited quite considerably, it has required use of the Kernel. This is similar to MSDOS and has prevented users of a non-computer background from really getting stuck in with Linux - until possibly now. Ubuntu's latest release (Version 7 / Feisty) includes a Graphical interface similar to those on it's rival operating systems. This could be a key-break through in breaking the stereotype of Linux as "The geeks Operating System".
In truth, I can see neither Apple nor Linux ever truly conquering the giant that is Vista, but with your support and help (people power), you can truly make a difference. If Vistas faults and attitude truly does annoy you, only you can make a difference, by standing up.
Ian Clark
Have Your Say
Great article Ian, loved it! You really look at every area of the OS argument!
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Great Article! Some people say that Vista, compared to OS X, is quite a bad operating system. It's countless bugs and severe lack of driver support have caused many to be upset with the new version of windows, and yet, i have experienced no problems with it. I'm not saying vista is perfect, but like you said in the article, no operating system can conquer it.