[H-GEN] FW: [linux-biz] MS Fantasydows 2000? Implications for Linux? (lon gish ;)

TRIGGER Peter (QSO) ptrigger at powerlink.qld.gov.au
Sun Apr 19 18:47:39 EDT 1998



> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Magnus Lycka [SMTP:magnus.lycka at tripnet.se]
> Sent:	Wednesday, April 15, 1998 11:48 PM
> To:	linux-biz at lege.com
> Subject:	[linux-biz] MS Fantasydows 2000? Implications for Linux?
> (longish ;)
> 
> It's 1998, and Windows 98 should arrive soon. Lately there has been a
> lot of media coverage of Microsoft here in Sweden: Nathan Ryhrvold
> (sp?)
> appeared in the morning paper, and this morning I heard about MS's
> visions on the radio. Not a word about Win98 though. The cheering for
> Win98 seems to have stopped at least half a year before the products
> arrival.
> 
> Today they are speaking, not even of NT5, which was on their lips a
> month ago, but of Windows 2000, and all the revolutionary features
> that will include. Nathan was basically mentioning all the stuff their
> "Advanced Interactivity and Intelligence" researchers work with. See:
> 
>     http://www.microsoft.com/directx/pavilion/future/msresearch.htm
> 
> The desktop should be replaced with a nice face, and the computer
> would
> converse with you and understand everything you said, and whether what
> you said was meant for the computer or someone (something?) else.
> Keyboards would be long gone.
> 
> On the radio they talked about how they had hired the big brains at
> Xerox PARC etc, and how they envisioned homes filled with hundreds of 
> computers that could hear and see us and make life simpler. Making
> sure
> the kids won't climb up on the stove etc. Sounded a bit too close to
> 1984 to me, but otherwise it seemed a lot like the contents of a 16
> year 
> old article by Dr Carter Compton Collins I've saved. (Although he had 
> done it with one 8080A with 64kB RAM and a 750kB floppy. He basically 
> used micro switches under the floor boards to keep track of where
> people 
> where instead of video cameras and advanced image analysis.)
> 
> Anyway, it seems completely obvious to me that, while these things are
> certainly exciting:
> a)	Microsoft will certainly not have such stuff available in
> 	year 2000 or even 2003.
> b)	This will not replace the kind of computers we use today.
> 	You don't want a silly face instead of a grid for your spread-
> 	sheets.
> 
> What are MS doing? Just spreading smoke screens it seems, and not for
> the first time either... Why right now, and why this kind?
> 
> Well, Windows 98 is obviously no revolution, and I guess NT5 won't be
> the great quantum leap either. Just as with the grossly premature
> ravings about NT that managed to kill OS/2, it seems MS is trying to
> make people forget about the immediate future and stick with Windows
> hoping that they will deliver something superior some day...in the not
> so far away future...
> 
> Still, it's far from saying "We'll soon have something a bit better
> than
> this OS/2 real soon now" to saying "We'll soon have something which is
> like StarTrek." Do people believe that the turn of the century will
> bring us directly into the science fiction age and that product
> developers will do several years work over one night? (As if we
> wouldn't want to have a party that night as well as everybody else!)
> 
> There is certainly nothing similar to what they are describing on the
> market today, so it's not really the approach they've used to stop
> people from buying OS/2, or getting on the internet before they were
> ready etc. Are they just trying to pretend that they are an innovative
> company that forms the future? Like in their ad campaign (nicked from
> InfoWorld online):
> 
> "Every wave of innovation and integration creates another wave of
> great
> ideas," the ad stated. "Imagine if someone had tried to stop
> innovation
> in automobiles in the 1920s, or TVs in the 1950s. In the same way, no
> one
> should try to freeze software innovation in 1998." 
> 
> It might simply be an attempt to aquire goodwill among people. I can
> well imagine that many people outside the profession actaully thinks
> of Microsoft as an innovative company, a company that brings us
> forward 
> in the technical development.
> 
> Still, it certainly seems Microsoft sees big threats right now, and I
> don't think it's just a matter of DoJ and friends. (Why would that
> lead
> to marketing efforts in Sweden?) I think MS sees big threats on the OS
> market.
> 
> With the vision of hundreds of computers in the home etc, one might
> think they see a threat from Java and others such as Lucent with their
> Inferno.
> 
> But why the vision of something that will replace Windows on the
> desktop
> in the office? Why give the impression that Office97 will soon be
> completely obsolete? That seems a tad dangerous. Why describe
> something
> that replaces the whole WIMP concept? There aren't many competitors on
> desktop OS's today, and I don't think they are very scared about
> MacOS,
> BeOS or OS/2. Sure, they have to stay sharp to keep their market, but
> somehow I start to think that it's free Unix that is beginning to look
> like a threat. Maybe the Netscape+Linux combination?
> 
> I don't know, but I think we might have something to learn from MS
> here.
> 
> I think the Linux community needs these kinds of visions as well. I
> don't
> think it would be ethical to try to sell that kind of vapourware, but
> I
> think we should have the visions in mind. I think we have the skills
> and
> intelligence to realize that most of these visions won't turn out the
> way
> they are described. Halfway through implementation we will realize how
> impractical they are. When they are developed by people who dream
> without
> thinking they often turn out really pathetic.
> 
> Ericsson has a site where they describe how you (in an undefined
> future)
> would be able to move your notes from your desktop to your hand
> computer
> with a simple arm movement. (Drag'n'Drop without a mouse so to say.)
> Thus
> you could bring your notes to a meeting, or work on the beach. For me
> it's
> completely absurd to imagine a system that which can draw conclusions
> from
> my arm-waving but can't provide a remote connection so that I can
> reach
> any information I want, whether I waved my arms at my office or not.
> For
> heavens sake, my Nokia 9000 is superior to what they describe. 
> 
> Still, even if we have a better connection to reality than many silly
> 'visionaries', we shouldn't forget to raise our heads and look into
> the
> future. If we just make an effort to 'catch up' with Microsoft
> regarding
> applications and desktop, we'll always be lagging behind.
> 
> I certainly think we need to have really creative people working with
> user interface issues, from a perspective that aims far beyond WIMP.
> I'm sure that issues like natural language processing, speech
> recognition,
> speech synthesis, advanced graphics etc will play a larger role in the
> future, and we should not try to catch up with MS, we should beat them
> to the future.
> 
> I suppose that when the Merced (or what ever it's called now) appears,
> these things will suddenly be doable in another way... It would be so
> nice
> if the Linux community could exploit Merced faster than Microsoft
> could. I
> don't think it's likely to happen, because I don't think we'll see a
> lot of
> Merced h/w until there is a MS OS running reasonably well on it... but
> it
> would be nice...
> 
> As Eric Raymond pointed out in the excellent interview in Salon
> Magazine,
> Open Source development is trickier for bleeding edge stuff than for
> mature stuff where stability is more important than features. Still,
> even if there will have to be commercial components involved, I think
> it's important that Linux is prepared for these things, and that there
> is a structure in which these systems fit: Hooks where we can connect
> these components. Besides, I thought most of the research on NLP, SR
> etc
> happened on universities, and they oughtn't be foreign to the open
> source
> concept!?!
> 
> 
> 
> 	Magnus
> 
> --
> Magnus Lycka, S/W Engineer, M.Sc.E.E; Folktrov. 6C, 907 51 Umea,
> Sweden
> Tel: +46(0)90 198 498, GSM: +46(0)70 582 80 65, Fax: +46(0)70 612 80
> 65
> <mailto:magnus.lycka at tripnet.se>
> <http://www1.tripnet.se/~mly/>
> 
> 
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