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WINDOWS 7 THREAD (ongoing)
zridling:
In many ways, Midori is already being built by Google. I don't think the OS will ever go away, but this decade has rapidly advanced toward a webcentric computer rather than an app-centric one.
As software gets bigger, it exponentially more difficult to organize. Once it's big, as in XP-big, then it's much harder to get consumers to move to Vista-big. In other words, the days of the dominant software vendor dictating where the market will go with a single new product are gone. Too many Windows users were happy with XP and and too many new Vista users were unhappy with their choice.
Microsoft is rethinking the whole enterprise. And that's a very good thing.
Carol Haynes:
I am not too happy about the idea of a webcentric OS on my computer. There are a number of issues including connectivity (there are still loads of people in my area on dial up because broadband is unavailable to them, plus what about the cost of mobile broadband - in the UK it is still ridiculously expensive) and application quality.It is impressive what you can do with some online apps but they are nowhere near ready to replace desktop apps, and what about large scale apps like video and photo editing?
It seems to me that as media quality improves exponentially (in terms of digital photography, video and audio) and the file sizes get larger the web will be unable to cope with dealing with such files.
It is going to take a large scale change too in the ISP infrastructure as currently most ISPs offer fast download speeds on broadband (though noticeably worse in the UK than the rest of Europe) but upload speeds are painfully slow. I presume this is to stop consumers realistically hosting websites and web applications in their homes but it also means that any sort of data transfer up to an application site is currently impractical unless you have a lot of time to waste and drink a lot of coffee!
Darwin:
I am not too happy about the idea of a webcentric OS on my computer.-Carol Haynes (October 21, 2008, 03:20 AM)
--- End quote ---
Nor am I. I thought this was a terrible idea 15 years ago and think it is a worse idea now. Accessibility is, obviously an issue, but security has only become a greater problem in the past few years. :down:
superboyac:
Can someone here point me to the correct thread for a webapps vs. traditional software ? Sorry, I just couldn't find it.
zridling:
I am not too happy about the idea of a webcentric OS on my computer. There are a number of issues including connectivity (there are still loads of people in my area on dial up because broadband is unavailable to them, plus what about the cost of mobile broadband - in the UK it is still ridiculously expensive) and application quality.It is impressive what you can do with some online apps but they are nowhere near ready to replace desktop apps, and what about large scale apps like video and photo editing?-[b]Carol Haynes[/b] (October 21, 2008, 03:20 AM)
--- End quote ---
Boy, are you absolutely right, Carol. Internet access here in the US is still too expensive, and it's the one thing for which the price never goes down. And typically, upload speeds in the US are 70-80% slower than download speeds, which makes the whole exercise a waste of time. Richard Stallman of the FSF has the same concerns, including vendor lock-in issues. Open formats using open standards should prevent a good deal of worry for data portability.
But the speed issue is a real one. The first response has been to allow webware to include a local version on your HD, so that when you're not connected, you still work just as if you're using regular desktop software. For Google and Zoho, for example, when you log on, your local files can be set to auto-sync with your online files, giving you the best of both worlds -- HD crashes? Your data is elsewhere and can be retrieved. The web vendor garbles your data? You've got a copy on your HD.
Perhaps 'Windows Strata' -- Microsoft's rumored cloud OS -- will address these very real concerns. Computing should always become faster and less encumbered. Never the opposite.
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