Posted on 03/07/2015 5:30:46 PM PST by dayglored
Really .. you mean that you believe I’m not capable of getting a notice from Microsoft that they have sent me a file telling me there is an update ..???????
And then .. you believe I’m so ignorant I cannot execute the updates ..?????????
This attack is so stupid .. and so infuriating .. that I’m gone.
Good BYE; and if that’s what you wanted to accomplish; you did.
Have fun irritating and annoying everyone else.
> That “unsupported” operating system [XP] still runs the strong majority of operating hardware! Not supporting it leaves holes through which the supported systems can be damaged. Microsoft remains a joke.
Well, I don't disagree that Microsoft has largely become a joke, but I side with them on XP. In fact I wish sometimes they had the ability to reach out to those XP systems that are still connecting to the Internet, and disable their ability to communicate past a NAT router. Yes, XP runs a ton of mission-critical industrial gear. You know why? Because designers of that gear were STUPID and took Microsoft's bait. "Base your product on XP!" That's INSANE. Believe me, I know, I was there, I watched it happen, I advised clients to avoid basing a manufacturing product with a 15-20 year lifetime on an operating system that probably wouldn't last a decade, if that. But did they listen? NO-o-o-o-o-o-o....
The people who thought it was a groovy idea to design a long-life product around a short-life operating system were STUPID. The people who bought those products, seeing that they were based on a short-life operating system, were either stupid or naive as hell.
Now, that said, my last employer bought a fancy Agilent digital oscilloscope based on XP. It runs fine and it will continue to run fine, and not get in trouble, because it never gets on the internet. It doesn't get patched, it doesn't do any browsing outside the office filesystem, and unless something gets loose in the corporate LAN (in which case a futzed oscilloscope will be the least of their problems) and attacks the scope across the network, I expect it'll be fine until the power supply takes a dump.
The same is true if it were running a milling machine or a conveyor belt.
** The problem is all the home and small business computers that are running XP ON THE INTERNET. Those are dangerous. They have to get taken off the Internet.
(Takes deep breath)
> Microsoft provided several YEARS of warning. They even extended support well past the original sunset date. Choosing to stay on an unsupported OS is a gamble. Regardless of your OS choice, every provider sunsets support for older operating systems.
Yes, exactly. I suffered with my clients and users who tried to switch to Vista, and especially when Vista started getting shoved down our throats. I expected it to show up in my morning cereal. Finally there were the "XP Downgrade options" and whatnot. THAT was when Microsoft should have done the right thing (much as I would have hated it personally and professionally), owned up to the fact that Vista was a loser, cut off XP as originally planned, taken the market hit to OS-X and Linux, and brought out Win7 immediately. IMMEDIATELY. But that was Ballmer in charge, and he can't admit he's wrong until many years after it's too late, if ever.
And so now Microsoft is a joke. They're still making money and they'll be around a long time yet, but nobody takes them seriously as the market leader, regardless of their still-impressive market share. They lost the critical battle.
And that battle was all about XP. They let it live too long, then they gave it another zombie lifetime, and now they can't kill it. But that should be their main objective. If they can convert those XP users into Win10 users they'll be back in the game bigtime. They could offer Win10 for free to XP users, if they'll just prove their XP machine is gone (make it a rebate if necessary).
But no-o-o-o-o can't do that. At this rate XP will still have a greater share than Vista for the next 5 years, maybe forever. Fools. They make the Internet more dangerous for all the rest of us.
Okay, rant over. :)
..
>> “The problem is all the home and small business computers that are running XP ON THE INTERNET. Those are dangerous. They have to get taken off the Internet.” <<
.
You sir are a thug!
There was never any reason beyond their bottom line why they couldn’t have simply fixed all their sloppy bugs in XP, and never offered anything more than simple add-on functionality packages to XP.
Nothing they have given us after XP is an improvement. Win 7 is an equal, but hardly an improvement, and
vista and Win 8 are crap!
You can happily continue to support super-socialist Bill Gates, the felon that stole DOS from its rightful owner, if you wish, but do not ask me to join your insanity.
.
..
>> “The problem is all the home and small business computers that are running XP ON THE INTERNET. Those are dangerous. They have to get taken off the Internet.” <<
.
> You sir are a thug!
Umm, no, I’m not. I’m a professional system adminstrator. After spending most of my professional career as a computer systems design engineer, on spacecraft, industrial, and commercial applications, I decided to take a decade before I retire tending the few hundred computers in a small software firm. I know Unix, Linux, OS X, and Windows machines at a deep level, having designed hardware and written software for them all, and having cared for a few farms that include all of them. I dare say I know what I’m talking about. You’re welcome to check at the end of my FR profile page if you want further details.
I’ll ask you to please refrain from making a further ass of yourself with name calling. Deal?
> There was never any reason beyond their bottom line why they couldn’t have simply fixed all their sloppy bugs in XP, and never offered anything more than simple add-on functionality packages to XP.
Not true. XP’s internal architecture is deeply flawed, and simply cannot be patched past the point where it has been. To bring it up to snuff would be a major rewrite, and not remotely worth it. The later releases had substantial improvements in security and stability that are not possible with XP.
The later GUIs sucked, we can agree on that. But I’m speaking of the actual underlying operating system, not the glitzy bullshit the user sees.
>Nothing they have given us after XP is an improvement. Win 7 is an equal, but hardly an improvement, and vista and Win 8 are crap!
We can agree on that, if you’re speaking of the user interface primarily. For example, I absolutely loathe Win 8’s UI, but I recognize that under the hood, it’s quite an improvement over its predecessors. You apparently do not care to look under the hood. That’s your right, but it limits your knowledge and understanding of what you think you’re talking about.
Something you should understand. I don’t much like Windows. I’m mainly a Unix fan, who tolerates Windows, uses Linux extensively by choice at work, and Mac OS X by choice as well as the others at home. I don’t play favorites, because I am interested in finding the best tool for any given task, and getting the job done. The reason I think XP should be kept off the Internet is that I have to deal with its damage every day and I know its problems all too well. The same is true of, for example, OS X 10.2, and early releases of Linux. Software becomes obsolete because times and conditions change, and after a while you just can’t keep patching.
> You can happily continue to support super-socialist Bill Gates, the felon that stole DOS from its rightful owner, if you wish, but do not ask me to join your insanity.
My, my. You know, I had been designing computers and writing system software for nearly a decade when Gates paid for QDOS (for a price that was, indeed, a steal). I didn’t like him than, I didn’t like him a few years prior to that when he whined about us hobbyists and homebrewers using his software, and I especially don’t like him these days. I would think that would be obvious to you, if you had bothered to find out anything about the fellow FReeper you called a “thug”.
Good night, Sir, I have no more interest in you or your comments.
Sir, you need to not speak on things about which you are not knowledgeable. From a technical perspective, there's a reason they can't "fix all their sloppy bugs in XP," and I only have to point to this VERY ARTICLE as a corollary for that reasoning.
When a company programs an operating system, they have to take into account numerous factors: usability, platform compatibility, interoperability with other operating systems, kernel-level software interaction, etc. When Microsoft wrote XP, they allowed any and all programs to directly address the kernel, the very core of the operating system. This meant that at any given time, an installed program could go berserk and break the OS, hence the reason blue screens of death were so prominent in Windows platforms pre-Vista.
When Microsoft released Vista, they released an operating system that was fundamentally different from anything previously. Vista, Win7, Win8, even all of their Server operating systems since Windows 2008 have been running on a kernel that no longer allows direct addressing. This means that you have a much more stable operating system platform, because any errors from a program-level are handled at a different abstraction layer, thus only affecting a small portion of program's operating environment vs. the entire operating system.
Of course programmers HATED this. It meant that they actually had to code properly (*GASP*), and it also meant certain programmatic changes to the operating system such as UAC became very visible to the end user in the form of windows asking for permission to continue. You hated them, but they are the same mechanism used by Apple to keep their end users safe, albeit a little less chatty.
In reality, Microsoft made the choice to make their operating system platform much safer and more stable in lieu of ease-of-programming for software developers. This ensures the very engine of your computing experience runs relatively smooth while any programs that you install run as auxiliary components that are "bolted on" to the operating system itself. In reality, sir, Microsoft did EXACTLY what you suggested they do: they fixed all of their sloppy bugs.
never offered anything more than simple add-on functionality packages to XP
This is also incorrect. As I just finished saying, due to the nature of the XP operating system, Microsoft had to literally patch their kernel to disallow access to certain critical functions of the operating system. As time has gone on, Microsoft has patched so many flaws to the XP kernel that you have little more than a smoldering husk of the original. And this brings me to my final point:
Take a look at the article in question here. Over the last few months, we've heard incessant stories about how common encryption methods are now at risk. SSLv1 is one security example that's been identified recently as no longer safe just as RC4 before it. SHA1 hashing is no longer considered "strong enough" for encryption security just like MD5 before it. Not many Mac users out there are still using OS 9, and I guarantee that Apple isn't writing vulnerability fixes for it or any of its predecessors any more. Your anger is directed at Microsoft for moving on, something that every operating system developer has already done. Your anger is directed at Bill Gates who retired from Microsoft in 2008, leaving it to Steve Ballmer, who I agree mishandled a lot. Satya Nadella, the new CEO, is doing a great job rebuilding the Microsoft brand by standing firm on his commitment to stop the garbage with old support. Microsoft no longer supports XP. They stop supporting Server 2003 in July. They'll no longer support Internet Explorer versions earlier than 11 as of January of 2016.
I don't care what ANYONE in this thread has to say in defense of their use of XP. People like dayglored and I are NOT here to browbeat for your use of the OS. If I were a betting man, I'd say that dayglored probably even liked XP, I know I did, but EVERYTHING changes, guys. I'm sorry you don't like the current crop of Windows operating systems. Go buy a Mac or find a Linux distro you like. The fact is (and this IS FACT) Microsoft's legacy operating systems are NO LONGER SAFE. You can burying your head in the sand, throw a temper tantrum, avow that "it won't be you," but the bottom line is that you are putting your personal information at risk. Don't shoot the messengers here, guys. You HAVE been warned.
> If I were a betting man, I'd say that dayglored probably even liked XP, I know I did, but EVERYTHING changes, guys.
Correct. I reluctantly switched from Win2K to WinXP when XP-SP2 came out, because it was clear that 2K would never get that level of improvement in security, and the changes necessary for apps to work with SP2 were substantial enough that the older programs were getting left behind in droves.
I stayed with XP for many years, through SP3, hated and ignored Vista for its UI and slowness (although I had to deal with it plenty for my clients and fellow employees), and only started switching my personal machines over after Win7 had stabilized. I view Win7 as Vista-Fixed -- they're very similar in most respects but 7 is much more tractable to the user. I recommend 7 highly, even though I'm not a Windows partisan. I haven't bothered with 8.x (again mainly because of the UI being abstruse, though I get to maintain plenty of instances at work and with friends/family). I'm playing with 10.
I'm 63 and I don't expect to be too active in the engineering/admin scene past another decade, but I expect I'll have a chance to see a couple of successors to Win10 before I, like WinXP, can no longer be patched back into suitable operation.
My last (offline VM) instance of XP was retired about a year ago, after I had ported the last of my old utility programs. XP is a dear old family member who has at last become a respected but quite enfeebled nuisance and a danger to himself and others, who needs to be cared for safely in the house until he finally expires. Running around outdoors and driving the car on the highway, falling over and getting in accidents, isn't good for him or the rest of us.
Thanks again, and have a great day!
.
If you ever get tired of puffing and pounding your chest, you can simply look at the fact that MS was able to design Win 7 and 8 to offer “XP mode” to run existing software written for that platform, thus a step obviously can be added to fool the XP applications. That same step could have been patched to the existing platform.
And Gates didn’t ‘buy’ dos from its owner; he bought the chance to purloin the code from a second party. That is called conspiracy when a second party is the enabler.
.
Now, that’s more like it! :o)
.
Do you know ANYTHING about what you're spouting off about? The "XP Mode" that came with Win7 was a SEPARATE VIRTUAL MACHINE because it wasn't possible to mix the two safely. Good lord, go look it up, I will not waste my time typing an explanation. Here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Virtual_PC#Windows_XP_Mode
> And Gates didn’t ‘buy’ dos from its owner; he bought the chance to purloin the code from a second party. That is called conspiracy when a second party is the enabler.
What "second party"? Geez, learn your freakin' history of Microsoft and Seattle Computer Products: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_Computer_Products
"...Microsoft, seeking an operating system for the IBM PC, bought the rights to market the system [QDOS] to other manufacturers for $25,000 that same month. On July 27, 1981, just prior to the August 12 PC launch, Microsoft bought the full rights to the operating system for an additional $50,000,.."
Now please stop making crap up. Or if you still think you're right, provide some reputable citations for your claims.
.
You’re talking in circles.
If it operates, it is a success, not an impossibility.
.
Geez.
Suggestion: Do yourself a favor. Go learn something about computers. Then come back and look at what you've written. The laugh will do your heart good.
Best of luck. Good night.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.