It isn't really the end of Windows - it's the end of Windows' dominance of Microsoft mindshare.<p>Windows 10 was the giant step in that direction - an always updating, maintenance mode, single OS that MS will need to support. Arguably until Win 7 dies out they won't be entirely there but once they are, maintaining Windows is a much simpler affair than yesteryears.<p>None of this means Windows itself is dying - it only means the OS has matured enough for the needs of present and any future needs will be addressed as and when they arise - instead of inventing the future they will abide with it on their own schedule.<p>This allows Microsoft to focus on things that truly matter for the future without killing Windows or spending a lot of resources on advancing/supporting it. It's not hard to imagine Windows stays a very dominant client OS for a long time to come - even if the overall PC market share continues to decline, because none of the alternatives are there and nobody is going to invest the resources to get them there.<p>I will also add that Satya's success lies in speeding up this strategy that started late under Ballmer and also in executing so well on it. Considering the scale of what MS is doing - Office ports to iOS, Android, Windows 10 releases, Azure, ton of other Enterprise stuff (Exchange, O365, Development tools, cross platform stuff like .NET Core, VS Code etc) - the change of course and the success they are having with it all - you can't argue it's not a phenomenal achievement.
I still can't wrap my head around everything that was wrongheaded about Windows 8, and I was working there for most of its dev cycle.<p>One wonders what would have happened if they just sort of let Windows be Windows. I.e. if they had continued iterating on core stuff but left UI and general philosophy resembling Win7's trajectory and not tried to force people into WinRT/UWP/store.<p>Even though Win10 attempted corrective action it always struck me that it was still accepting the fundamental thesis of Win8. They still kept with the Orwellian redefinition of phrases like "Windows app" to mean very recent, immature and unproven technology. They were still talking about ARM devices that don't let you do a straightforward recompile of old code. They were still pushing the Store as the only means to distribute software, where even Apple has not succeeded in changing people's habits on the desktop.<p>I hope that with a weaker organization, people keeping the lights on for Windows will know to not shake things up too severely and ease up on pushing some of these silly ideas. I somehow doubt it. I've been hoping for that for... 7 years?
This seems like a ridiculous strategy. Who would abandon an ecosystem that they own over 80% of? If they're spending too much money on it, stop adding features and harden what they already have. It's increasingly clear that macOS isn't business-level stable, and Linux isn't polished... No one has an Android device on their desk at work. Maybe if they stopped trying to take over the world they would realize that they already own a huge part of it. If they don't care, they should sell it to someone who does.
I'll be interested to see how this bifurcation of the Windows team plays out. Windows 10 has been a mixed bag - some nice new features but also a lot of half baked buggy stuff. The evergreen nature of Windows 10 feels like the right move, but I'm worried they're going to let the OS stagnate. There's already a lot of low hanging fruit they could clean up with an update, but haven't.<p>I'm not a huge fan of using my tablet or phone for things. I almost always prefer using a "real" operating system. I know that puts me in the minority to an extent, but I'm not the only one. The problem is, neither major desktop OS is moving in a direction I like. I guess I'm just getting old and cranky.
> Smartphones first addressed needs the PC couldn’t, then over time started taking over PC functionality directly<p>I still don't understand how anybody gets any real work done on a smartphone.<p>Has work suddenly gotten so simplistic that most people really don't need a keyboard? They're dragging and tapping and writing IM-like sentence fragments riddled with autocorrect typos? And this is acceptable? Seriously?
So are mom and pop businesses using Chromebooks and Ipads to do their accounting now? Last I checked Windows was still pretty dominant in both Enterprise and midsize businesses, though I could see a food truck being run from a phone (theoretically).
Microsoft is squandering the decades of work humans put into drivers, an OS codebase that is unique and omnipresent, and if they can't see how useless and crap all their other services are without the conceptual core that powered their rise to sucess, then they will die.<p>- windows domains
- group policy
- roaming profiles
- drivers written for in-house equipment, ranging from machining to mass spectrometry, done over decades, and basically compatible back to NT 4, until M$ screws everything up...<p>They just don't know where their bread is buttered, and their bean counting practices are evidently obscuring it, as they keep doing stupid crap decisions like Office365.<p>They should stabilize and streamline what they already built...
When my child gets older and leaves home, I won't be saying its the end of him. He has just matured.<p>Similarly, this just marks the maturity level of Windows, where there really is no significant innovation in operating systems release after release. Nothing like win 3.1 -> win 95 etc. Its been that way for a while. Obviously its cash that motives this move from Microsoft, however I wouldn't want Microsoft changing the location of the start menu every release just to stir up the market and justify a release (for example) every year.<p>I remember a cherished time where the next operating system release felt like an upgrade to myself as well as my PC. I could do more than before. No longer. We have it all nowadays and have became spoilt.
Just because Microsoft is desparate to unshackle themselves from a loss-leader doesnt mean its about to happen anytime soon, albeit an announcement like this will certainly goose the stock. The only person angrier about missing the app-store cloud-based moneytrain is likely Larry Ellison whos already furiously trying to saw off the Oracle Database boat anchor.<p>You're going to need to convince your channel partners this is a thing that has to happen, and you're going to expect a revolt because so many tertiary industries are contingent upon Windows and its licenses. The tear-down for everything from the Windows app-store to the ballmer-era brick and mortar "windows store" is going to be significant. There are also laboratories, power plants, hospitals, and prisons that all rely heavily on Windows, so expect to be on the hook from state level government for quite a while...the "end" of windows also confirms the wastefully squandered effort to get Germany to obsolete its massive and very functional Linux deployment.<p>You'll also need to have a substantive marketshare in, say, cloud in order to start deprecating Windows. Outside of Redmonds own inflated reporting, Azure isnt exactly a competitor. Most devs would rather walk off a cliff than learn a new API --one that only Microsoft uses-- for cloud that is not EC2 compatible in any way. Conversely there are more than 40 providers of cloud services that all managed an EC2 api for objects.
I think its impossible to understate how much damage Ballmer did to Microsoft. That being said: I think Microsoft is in a fantastic position right now under Satya.<p>Windows isn't going anywhere, and they're accepting the reality that it might just be a "portal" into web technology in a similar vein to Chromebooks. This is a reality Apple refuses to accept, for better or worse. But, Windows still comes with those massively powerful internals that enable more powerful professional experiences for the users that need them.<p>This is, really, the only platform in the world that champions both. MacOS obviously has those powerful foundations and can run webapps natively, but its not something christened by Apple. iOS is the same way, but with less powerful foundations. ChromeOS? Android? Linux Desktop? They're not even considerations in this world.<p>Then you consider the massive success of their Xbox and Azure divisions, and I think anyone who bets against Microsoft right now isn't doing it cogently. They have a lot of legacy and Ballmer's strategic mistakes to get right, but I legitimately think they'll come out of the next 5 years in a better financial position than Google.
Better title would be the end of the Windows Division at Microsoft. Certainly not the end of Windows - it's an enormous revenue generator for Microsoft. But I believe it shows that they believe the future lies within Azure, AI and Microsoft 365. This will probably help them focus.
I'm surprised no one mentioned this but the biggest takeaway for me is that it moves Windows one step closer to becoming open source. We're still many steps away and it's going to be more like the hybrid model of Android or even OSX/iOS/Darwin and but it seems much more feasible now, even if it starts with baby steps.
Early Windows was a great platform for the users that it served. But every few years, the Windows product itself had one of those "off years." It arguably started with NT 4.0 for workstations, then again with Windows ME, then Vista, and then arguably 8.<p>This interleaving strategy was okay when they were the only market player, but now that there's actually good competition in the computing space (read: smartphones and chromebooks), it's not so good. All of the little sacrifices that Windows has to make to move itself forward are cuts that make people reconsider using it in the first place.<p>I honestly wonder what world it would be if every Windows release had "stuck the landing." If we had a super solid Vista and a super solid Windows 8, would Microsoft even be in remotely the same position as they are now? Probably not, because it would actually have been the preferred choice, and not just the default.
To read things like this and everyone's comments, you would think that Microsoft isn't making a mega-ton of money every quarter, which they are. Everyone keeps talking about Azure and AWS like there isn't room for both and that Azure hasn't been growing like crazy.<p>Amateur tech punditry at its finest.
I would love for Microsoft to launch it's own Android-compatible ecosystem, starting from the open source base of Android and building alternatives to Google's proprietary technology (location & mapping, email, browsing, app store etc.). They are one of the few companies who have the capacity to do that and already have products in place to cover 80% of what is required.<p>While I'm not exactly a fan of Microsoft, there is nothing I dread more than a closed platform controlled by a single company, and Google is moving more and more aggressively in that direction. There is now a whole industry dedicated to installing hacked Google products on devices Google does not approve of.
Microsoft's Windows and Office products are now in the product position of commercial trucks. Every business of any size has some commercial trucks. Businesses buy them, use them, maintain them, and replace them when necessary. They're not exciting, but they get the job done. Nobody thinks about them much.<p>Microsoft should just accept that they sell a commercial product for businesses and make a good solid product that needs little attention and gets the job done. Like Mack trucks.
What I don't understand is, with Apple and Microsoft moving to "services" business-models, who do they see as providing the hardware for this future they envision? I don't think we are near the point where either laptops or phones are a commodity. If nobody want to make hardware their first priority, how is anyone going to ensure the best experience for the customers using their serviceS?
So clearly the market has chosen, and walled gardens where users don't have the freedom to run their own code or apps, their own OSes prevented with locked bootloaders, locked apps (no ability to interfere with apps running on YOUR device, e.g. read their data), ... and so on is now the default policy.<p>Never again will one app be compatible with others without a business agreement between them ... because that just can't be allowed (dixit $100 million per year+ managers at these huge companies, and I'm sure it's 100% coincidence that this would allow small companies to compete with them. Totally unrelated to this decision). Can't work in the cloud, can't work on android, can't work on IOS. And for that matter, can't work on UWP.<p>And of course let's not forget that the massive cost, that everyone's data is now 100% accessible to law enforcement and civil courts (and thus to anyone with the money to sue you) is just acceptable damage. After all, that doesn't affect $100 billion plus companies much at all.<p>Their argument is that it can make web banking unsafe. Yes ... that's true. It can.<p>What is does 99.999% of the time however is enforce the market dominance of really large players.<p>But, like people walking into a camp during WWII, nobody holds a moment of silence when they enter the compound with the large barbed wire. Nobody regrets what's happening when they lock the gate. Only years later, when all the bodies are found ... then we stop and think.<p>This is them locking the gate. Now comes years and years of really really bad applications, and exploiting the lockin.<p>And yes, the only system not in a locked ecosystem is the PC ecosystem (needless to say, this is the ecosystem that ALL of these large companies use, MS, Google and Apple, for themselves. And now they're locking it for the rest of us)
Windows desktop was always driving demand for Windows enterprise, why else would you need exchange servers and CIFS/SMB file servers? Who would buy MS SQL server licences without the larger lock in effect? Maybe they think that the cloud has broken this dependency, but I think they are bringing ruin over the house of Redmond (in the long run)
About that reorganization :<p>"Today, I’m announcing the formation of two new engineering teams"<p>"Windows: Joe Belfiore will continue leading our Windows experiences and will drive Windows innovation in partnership with the PC and device ecosystem"<p>How does this exactly means they are giving up on Windows ?! Seriously, wishful thinking much ?
Windows is still a mess... inconsistent interface, multiple ways to configure the same thing, the registry.....<p>I know it's not the same market circumstances but this feels alot like the decision to stop development of ie6 after Microsoft beat Netscape.
Windows used to be the biggest market differentiator for Microsoft. What does Azure do that Amazon or Google can't? What would make Microsoft uniquely different if it had no Windows?
Microsoft really should have pursued creating a version of Windows specifically for gaming. I imagine there are lot of users who only use Windows for that purpose.
I think it would be better titled :- windows is dead, long live windows!<p>I think this article better explains things <a href="http://www.zdnet.com/article/heres-how-and-why-microsoft-is-splitting-up-windows-in-its-latest-reorg/" rel="nofollow">http://www.zdnet.com/article/heres-how-and-why-microsoft-is-...</a>
There's a book "Zone to Win" by Geoffrey A. Moore that describes these various transitions for Microsoft and it suggests that it's intentional to transition one business unit at a time.
If windows 10 is the end then i think It's safe to say I will never be returning to windows for as long as I can help it.<p>Between it's spyware and its tendency to just do things without telling you, without giving you an easy way to stop, it is just not something that feels comfortable enough to use anymore for power users.<p>It feels like whatever I gain in convience, is lost when trying to figure out what windows is doing with all that CPU/RAM/Network usage or how to disable some new service that I have 0 interest in.
I'm excited by the end of Windows, or really the end of dominance of desktop OSes. This means we will have the freedom to innovate again and do some really wild things.