Comment by Zhyl
8 years ago
This isn't surprising, really. Windows Phone has been poorly for a long time.
While I understand Microsoft's efforts at trying to approach the mobile space, it does seem that it's often at the expense of their core product - very similar to how Google nearly crippled their core offering by integrating everything with Google+.
I'm impressed that despite all of this, though, they've managed to keep desktop dominance, even with the rise of of Chromebooks and Macbooks.
Windows is extremely well sunk into the enterprise market, and neither Linux nor Mac are at all focusing sufficiently on it to displace them.
Linux isn't user friendly enough, and Mac's support policy is a complete no go for enterprise.
If a Ubuntu in 2017 isn't user friendly I really don't know what that phrase is even supposed to mean.
As someone that only works on linux systems....
The state of Linux is not great. We still can't get the basics like sound, wifi, etc out of the box. I get why it's a problem, and it's generally not the fault of Linux devs, but it's still a problem that turns people away.
I really want to see Linux take over on the desktop, but turning a blind eye to our problems is a poor way to do it.
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I just installed the latest version of Linux Mint and the default graphics card driver had a bug that caused my entire system to freeze after a few hours of inactivity.
To be able to replace Apple or Microsoft, not only do you need user friendliness for how the machine works, but you also need to get rid of all the miscellaneous tech and configuration problems that crop up.
As I understand it, Linux laptop sleep/suspend/hibernate is still a big PITA.
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I lost access to my netbook $HOME, when Ubuntu just refused to acknowledge the existence the file system after freezing in X.
It required a boot direct into the GRUB root console and running fsck from there.
Not something that regular macOS and Windows users expect as user friendly.
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Just one example: every few weeks I need to manually remove old images as described here [0], otherwise security updates won't be installed. Four versions and four years later, it's still not fixed.
[0] https://askubuntu.com/questions/298487/not-enough-free-disk-...
Publishing software – especially close source software – for Linux has always been, and still is, a huge pain. Beside all the nightmarish things you have to do to package something.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PmHRSeA2c8&feature=youtu.be...
Ubuntu did not enable the energy saving options by default on my notebook and did not install the wifi drivers out of the box.
Which was a "bit" painful because the office is wifi only and getting online then is impossible. Had to hunt down the driver, put it on a stick and install them. Never again.
And the laptop was 5+ years old ...
The unfortunate reality is that the most friendly thing one can do for users is never ask them to change.
I use Ubuntu but after spending a day trying to fix display drivers I can confirm it's not user friendly. An OS is more than just the software, but the support received from other software/hardware companies.
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Every enterprise I have worked at had both linux and mac available to developers. Is this not your experience? You seem to present as truth the opposite of what I have lived.
"Developers" are a miniscule share of "enterprise". We are talking about the billion computers on corporate office workers' desks, not about the maybe-a-million computers of web/network/systems developers.
Counter-anecdote: every place I worked at including 4-5 major companies in various industries had compulsory windows desktops for everyone. The few of us that also had a Linux (or AIX/HP-UX/...) machines that we did our work on, SSHd into those machines.
I never worked on an enterprise with GNU/Linux worstations on their IT policy, on some companies IT tolerated rebel developers provided they took care 100% of integration issues with the company network and official tools.
Macs are usually only available to upper management, unless required for iOS development, in which case they are part of a pool shared among project teams.
Is this not your experience?
Not at all. Linux can sometimes be made available on servers if necessary, but if you want Linux on your desktop you have to use a VM (ideally without telling IT). Never worked at a large place where Macs where readily available. Macs used to be more popular ~10 years ago or so with the marketing and communications people doing a lot of DTP and design work, but even that seems to have greatly decreased.
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In my (bigcorp) experience, its all windows all the way with macs available only to developers who have a need (iOS dev usually).
And don’t forget that developers are a tiny minority of employees.
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Developers make a very small percentage of overall enterprise market.
What OS were the other 98% (i.e. non-devs) of employees using?
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Partner has a Chromebook, and it's really rough around the edges. 'Simple' things like file management/association is a pain. And it's been pretty buggy. Vanilla OS with no 3rd party plugins. If the OS is neglected and not matured it could easily go the same way.
They have a lot going for them in the desktop market still. Apple targets only the high end market (at least in terms of prices), Chromebooks come with a set of constraints that many can not overcome.
>I'm impressed that despite all of this, though, they've managed to keep desktop dominance, even with the rise of of Chromebooks and Macbooks.
It's simple: Chromebooks are crippled by the mostly-web concept and Macbooks only cater to (a part of) the more affluent end of the market.
I worked in IT support for a while, and saw that many business apps are expected to come with a browser interface now. If companies could be weaned from their dependence on Office then Chromebooks would take off. Eliminating the support issues for Windows would be a big deal.