Re:Microsoft to stop producing Windows versions
by semi-extrinsic on Sunday May 10, 2015 @05:18PM
(#9521353)
The problem isn't that Bob in Marketing's box doesn't work for a few days. It's that Bob (along with 90% of everyone over 25) hates user interface changes and works slower the first two-three months after a change. If MS starts throwing changes at him every 6 months that's a 15-20% decrease in Bob's productivity.
Re:Microsoft to stop producing Windows versions
by the8472 on Sunday May 10, 2015 @05:40PM
(#9521446)
Maybe a continuous flow of changes will ingrain the process of adapting to changes into them a little more.
Re:Microsoft to stop producing Windows versions
by teacup50 on Sunday May 10, 2015 @06:04PM
(#9521546)
It'll inure them to the cost, but it won't make it any cheaper.
Re:Microsoft to stop producing Windows versions
by the8472 on Sunday May 10, 2015 @06:15PM
(#9521593)
On the other hand you could see it as simply spreading out the changes you would get from major updates every few years.
Incremental changes to the OS may only impose a small cognitive burden of adapting at any given time instead of presenting a seemingly insurmountable obstacle all at once.
Frog and a boiling pot of water.
Re:Microsoft to stop producing Windows versions
by thesteamboat on Sunday May 10, 2015 @06:36PM
(#9521673)
Frogs try to jump out of boiling water. I understand you mean it metaphorically, but like the expression "you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar" it has no scientific basis.
Re:Microsoft to stop producing Windows versions
by the8472 on Sunday May 10, 2015 @06:47PM
(#9521725)
I did assume that the reader is familiar with the metaphor irrespective of its truthfulness.
"Darmok and Jalad... at Tanagra."
Do you catch more flies with rotting flesh than with sterilised water?
> if Bob in Marketing's copy of Microsoft Word stops working for a day or two while Microsoft patches something
Why would such a problem only hit one user, in a place that rolls out an SOE?
Re:Microsoft to stop producing Windows versions
by rossng on Sunday May 10, 2015 @05:50PM
(#9521490)
Okay, that was a bad example. It's likely to be small, obscure features that break (assuming that major stuff will be caught by good automated testing). Not many people will rely on that specific functionality, so not many people will be affected.
A significant proportion of 'change management' is pointless, box-ticking bureaucracy and achieves nothing. Just look at any large company's mostly semi-broken IT systems!
Critical infrastructure probably shouldn't be running on desktop Windows anyway, so it's not going to affected. At the other end of the spectrum, if Bob in Marketing's copy of Microsoft Word stops working for a day or two while Microsoft patches something - well, who cares. Hopefully the benefits from a rolling-release system will outweigh that.
Hopefully continuously-updated operating systems will encourage enterprise software vendors to avoid using undocumented/non-standard features, and we'll all be better off.