The two things that made Windows a success has been Office and the software development tools, Visual Studio today.
Both suffer from a complete lack of adult supervision. Everyone and everything is crammed into these product lines with no planning or design. They are a scattered mess.
The third thing that has made Microsoft a success has been their server products; Exchange and SQL Server. SQL Server is becoming a mess and Exchange is a complete and utter failure of a product. With a brand new server with a fresh OS install Exchange fails to install. Install, a simple install. Exchange can’t do it. Then, once you spend weeks trying to get it to install, good luck configuring the thing so that it actually processes mail. Even Microsoft support can’t do it in many cases.
Microsoft is fast becoming useless to the computing industry. Open Source products have become just as good and just as viable.
P.S. Not to mention that some idiot put a tablet’s graphic interface on server products! The Windows 8 user interface had no business being on a server. Windows 8 also had hidden controls. Users just had to know where to click to get menus. They were not visible or obvious! Some bimbo thought that was a cute feature.
> Open Source products have become just as good and just as viable.
True. And as you say Windows is a scattered mess. They survive in spite of themselves. Metro is a gag. IMO their best days are behind them.