Windows needs to be two versions.
Business/Enterprise/Legacy (LTSC) and Consumer/Creative/Gamer (think macOS).
It doesn’t need to be harder than that.
Then Microsoft could start to move the Consumer version forward just like Apple has done with macOS the past decade. I mean tightening up security by removing legacy components, removing Control Panel, getting common software into the Store (like Chrome) etc. Consult with Craig Federighi to get a good balance between features and security.
It isn’t rocket science. Apple has done it. They even found time to develop a decent SoC…
It isn’t about developer buy-in (although, that is good to have). Apple provided a viable path forward for macOS application devs, not a crazy UWP rewrite proposal.
You may call macOS legacy. Would you call it insecure? After all, that’s the real question.
ragingthunder
<p>Vertical integration vs horizontal integration </p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#616605">In reply to hrlngrv:</a></em></blockquote><p><em>"But MSFT can make so much more money with umpteen different SKUs"</em></p><p><br></p><p>So — you could argue the same about anything. Different choices of car, where the only differences are the features available inside. Different CPU families. Different brands of food and drink items in shops, from the big-brands to the own-brand. Microsoft are hardly alone in choice-for-the-sake-of-choice.</p><p><br></p><p>And at-least most SKUs thesedays make-sense: "Home", "Pro", "Pro for Workstations" (okay, that one is unnecessary… just add the extra CPU and RAM support to Pro and higher!), "Education" and "Enterprise" (virtually identical feature-sets, but licenced to the relevant customers). Sure, there is also "10X" and "IoT", but you'll only encounter those on specific hardware. It's a lot better thesedays than the pointless SKUs of "Starter" (can only run 3 apps at a time), "Home Basic" (cannot use the full Aero), "Home Premium" of the Vista and 7 days, not to mention Vista also had a "Business" SKU that was different from "Enterprise", and back-then, higher SKUs would not-necessarily also have all the features from lower ones!</p><p><br></p><p><em>"As for getting common software into the MSFT Store […] 3rd party developers seem to have damned little interest in retooling their software for the MSFT Store."</em></p><p><br></p><p>As I've said many-times before, Microsoft should stop insisting software has to be rewritten into the "Modern UI" installer format, and just accept .MSI versions of installers for Win32 apps into the Store. Then, finally, things like <em>Google Chrome</em> and <em>Firefox </em>could finally be installed by it.</p><p><br></p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#616722">In reply to hrlngrv:</a></em></blockquote><p><em>"I figure MSFT taking any cut of revenues puts off a lot of ISVs"</em></p><p><br></p><p>For paid-software, sure, I can see an issue there — on iOS, they have to. On Android they don't — but most users do not want to install an .APK manually. On Windows, installing software manually has always been the way. But for <em>free </em>software, Microsoft really should get more-listed to encourage the Store as a "go-to place" for users. Currently, in my experience, it's a "why bother, as nothing I use is actually in there".</p><p><br></p><p><em>"certainly most B2B ISVs who know full well their business customers disable access to the MSFT Store on their employees' work PCs"</em></p><p><br></p><p>Yup! Locked-down for all our staff, except higher-ups, like directors. We publish apps internally via <em>Software Center </em>and <em>SCCM</em>. Though this won't be true for home-users or most small-to-medium sized businesses…</p><p><br></p><p><em>"There are just things Apple can do which MSFT can't, and it's unlikely anything would alter that"</em></p><p><br></p><p>Well, Apple can do it on iOS and iPadOS (or things like Apple TV and Apple Watch) platforms, sure, as sideloading is only an option for large enterprises, and for most of their userbase, only the App Store can be used to get apps onto those devices. But for macOS, users report the App Store there is a similar-picture to the Microsoft Store on Windows: not many apps, lots of unofficial ones, or rip-off duplicates. Because again, on macOS — at-least, currently — it's always been the norm to download and manually-install, and this isn't (yet!) locked-down</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#616622">In reply to hrlngrv:</a></em></blockquote><p><em>"A minimal Windows onto which all sorts of subsystems could be added"</em></p><p><br></p><p>I may have the name wrong but isn't there something called "Windows Server Core", which is essentially what you're suggesting where you don't even have the Shell (no Desktop or File Explorer) by-default, and do everything via PowerShell or the Command Prompt, and if you do want the shell enabling, you do some sort-of "DISM enable-feature" command to install that component?</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#616616">In reply to wright_is:</a></em></blockquote><p><em>"We already have that and it frustrates me!"</em></p><p><br></p><p>Okay, so two points on that:</p><p><br></p><p>There is nothing-wrong with having a "Home" version of Windows which has features missing like "Hyper-V", "Device Guard", "Enterprise Mode Internet Explorer", "AppLocker", "BranchCache", "App-V" or "UE-V". Most non-geek, regular-people won't have even heard of most of them, and even if you were to educate them on what they do, the vast. vast majority would still have no-use for them. Can everyone please stop trying to get complicated features put into the <em>Home </em>edition, where they would likely just cause confusion for users who stumbled-across them, and at worst, they could misconfigure them and lock themselves out of an app or part of their system.</p><p><br></p><p>BUT there <em>are </em>feature-differences between "Pro" and "Enterprise". So if you use a device at-work with <em>Enterprise</em> and your home-machine only has <em>Pro</em>, then I could understand an argument. In the old-days of Windows Vista and 7, this didn't used to be an issue, as the "Ultimate" edition was more-or-less "Enterprise, but for IT enthusiasts". Maybe the solution here is that <em>Windows 10 Ultimate </em>should become a thing? </p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#616721">In reply to hrlngrv:</a></em></blockquote><p><em>"Anyone using an at-home domain" </em>… is again an IT pro or geek, and not the vast, vast majority of the everyday home users. Things like "HomeGroup" were a better idea for them — after-all, what would most home-users want to share between family-members? Mostly just files and devices, like printers. And thesedays, most home-printers, even cheap ones, support Wi-Fi and you can connect them to your router directly, then install them in Windows to use Wi-Fi.</p><p><br></p><p>As for <em>"there is no legitimate reason for Home to lack full-disk encryption" </em>I'd absolutely agree there. macOS offers it. But Windows 10 Home only offers it IF you are running a 64-bit version; are using UEFI, not legacy BIOS, and; have a TPM and it is enabled. If all of those are true, then you will find "Device Encryption" in the Settings app which will then do full-device encryption.</p><p><br></p><p>But yes… I really don't know why they can't just offer software-based BitLocker for Home where it unlocks based on your Windows login credentials, either at the login-screen, or at a pre-boot screen.</p><p><br></p><p>I'd suggest looking into <em>VeraCrypt </em>as a free alternative</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#616721">In reply to hrlngrv:</a></em></blockquote><p>(Another option for Home users would be if their device has an SSD that supports self-encryption: in which case install the software for that drive, such as Samsung Magician, and then tell it to self-encrypt. Maybe this is something Microsoft could add built-in support for, as then the whole disk would be encrypted, but not by BitLocker?)</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#616629">In reply to 2ilent8cho:</a></em></blockquote><p><em>"I much preferred Windows when they had separate Consumer / Enterprise or Workstation class OS's. Like Windows [95/98/98SE/Me] and Windows [NT4/2000]."</em></p><p><br></p><p>Oh please no let's not return to that. Back then the "enterprise" versions would require greater RAM, CPU speeds and HDD space than the "consumer" 9x series. Not to mention the 9x series had a true DOS environment and 16-bit support, so some games and apps would not run on them, but on the 32-bit NT series. And many drivers written to access the hardware directly ("VxD") would only work in the consumer series. The consumer ones couldn't read or write NTFS volumes (unless they were shared via a network; but a local, USB drive in that format, no). Any app could write into an area of RAM on the 9x/Me series and potentially bring the entire system down (I think macOS 9 and lower were the same). You had differences in built-in apps (64KB file-size limit in Notepad on 9x/Me, which wasn't present in NT4/2000, for example). And then other differences, like which versions of the UDF file-system on optical-media each would support.</p><p><br></p><p>Realistically, all you have thesedays for most consumers of Windows 10 is just "you can't run this app as it's 64-bit, and you have a 32-bit Windows 10 install" (which is an ever-diminishing issue, as OEMs are not allowed to preinstall 32-bit since Version 2004) or "this old device only has a 32-bit driver, so you can't use it on Windows 10" (which has been true since 64-bit Windows XP).</p><p><br></p><p><em>"We also do not need Windows Home, Basic, Starter, Professional, Workstation, Ultimate, Enterprise and what other SKU's Microsoft have pumped out over the XP, Vista, 7, 8 days."</em></p><p><br></p><p>You'll be pleased to hear you don't have most of them now: "Starter", "Home Basic" and "Home Premium" no-longer exist: there is just "Windows 10 Home" (referred to as "Windows 10 Core", internally). "Pro" and "Enterprise" still exist, and there is a rather-pointless new one called "Pro for Workstations" which essentially is only needed if you have a device with 3 or 4 physical CPUs; more than 2TB of RAM; or you really, really want to use the new ReFS file-system on your system-partition. Otherwise, just use "Pro".</p><p><br></p><p>But most of the pointless SKUs from the Vista and 7 days have now gone, and for some of the new ones, like "10X" and "IoT", you'll only encounter them on specific hardware.</p>
dftf
<blockquote><em><a href="#616687">In reply to codymesh:</a></em></blockquote><p>By "broke compat" I assume you mean the removal of some DOS support, such as the ability to reboot into "MS-DOS Mode". Yeah, that wasn't good at the time, but I'm not sure how moving to <em>Windows 2000 </em>was the answer, given that was a pure 32-bit OS with only emulated MS-DOS support, no support for VxD drivers and only emulated support for 16-bit apps.</p><p><br></p><p>People may have moved as "Windows 2000" has a year in the name, like "Windows 98 Second Edition", and so logically it feels like the follow-on; and indeed, that is what Microsoft was aiming for it to be. But merging NT and 95/98 took longer than expected, so it didn't finally happen until <em>Windows XP</em>.</p><p><br></p><p>But <em>Windows Me </em>is actually the follow-on to <em>Windows 95/98/98SE</em> and will have better app and driver compatibility than <em>2000</em> would do</p>
dftf
<p><em>"Windows needs to be two versions"</em></p><p><br></p><p>Okay, from reading the comments there are one-of-two ways commentators are interpreting this:</p><p><br></p><p>(1) "We should have a true consumer line, like in the days of Windows 95/98/98SE/Me, and Windows NT3.x/4.x/2000"</p><p><br></p><p>No thank-you.</p><p><br></p><p>Sure, it's nice to look-back on the Windows 9x days, or even boot one in an VM and play-around, but seriously: back then, you'd have even-more differences than with Windows 10 editions today. Only 9x/Me had true support for 16-bit apps and MS-DOS apps (Me less-so on the latter); NT and 2000 would only emulate both. "VxD" drivers, which could bypass the kernel and speak to hardware directly, were only supported on 9x/Me. You'd have differences in the built-in apps between the two (64KB file-limit in Notepad on 9x/Me, or apps called "Phone Dialler" or "CD Player" on both 98SE and 2000, even though their UI and feature-set could differ wildly. Or MSBACKUP on 9x/Me versus NTBACKUP on NT/2000, with incompatible file-formats). No NTFS support on 9x/Me, unless the drive is read as a network-share (not locally). Not to mention way-different hardware requirements (try getting NT4 to run on 4-8MB of RAM, or 2000 on 16-32MB). Oh, and various apps you could download from Microsoft, like <em>Windows Media Player</em> or <em>Internet Explorer</em>, you'd have to download a specific version for your OS: thesedays, it's usually just "32-bit", "64-bit" or "ARM64" choices. How is any of that better than Windows 10 differences today?</p><p><br></p><p>(2) "It was easier in the Windows XP days: I wish we could go-back to the times of just <em>Home </em>and <em>Pro</em>".</p><p><br></p><p>How quickly you forget!</p><p><br></p><p>Sure, <em>Windows XP </em>may have started-out with just "Home" and "Pro", but you're forgetting: "Home Edition ULCPC" (low-cost netbooks); "Professional Blade PC Edition" (blade devices); "Starter Edition" (for third-world countries: limit of 3 apps open at once, 512MB RAM max and only lower-end CPU models); "Media Center Edition" (of which there were four versions; similar to how Windows 95 was updated over its lifespan); "Tablet PC Edition" (self-explanatory); "Windows XP Embedded" (that would be the IoT edition, now); "Windows Embedded POSReady 2009" (used on things like checkouts); "Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs" (similar to <em>Starter</em>, but available in all countries, for old PCs used in enterprise environments) and not to mention two different 64-bit editions: "Windows XP 64-Bit Edition", for Intel's now-discontinued <em>Itanium </em>processor line, and later "Windows XP Professional x64 Edition", for the ARM64 architecture most laptops and desktops still use today.</p><p><br></p><p>By my count, that's… 11.</p>
dftf
<p><em>"Apple provided a viable path forward for macOS application devs"</em></p><p><br></p><p>Well… Apple's "viable path forward" usually boil-down to telling their dev's "look, we're going to be doing a major change: you must update your apps or your screwed, okay, thank-you, goodbye". They did this when macOS 9 went to macOS X, and the "classic" environment (which ran macOS 9 apps) later got dropped. Then again from PowerPC to Intel in 2006 via "Rosetta", which was dropped a few major OS versions later. Then on iOS, when it went 64-bit only, so no 32-bit app would runs or even appear in the App Store to be installed. Then again with macOS recently in "10.15 Catalina", which ended support for 32-bit apps. And eventually, "Rosetta 2", in the latest macOS 11 "Big Sur" will cease to be a thing, and no Intel apps will run on future "Apple Silicon" CPUs, only ARM ones.</p><p><br></p><p>So saying Apple "provide a viable path forward" is putting it politely! It's "our-way-or-the-highway" essentially.</p><p><br></p><p><em>"You may call macOS legacy."</em></p><p><br></p><p>I'd call "classic" macOS (9.x and older), or any PowerPC versions of macOS "legacy" thesedays yes. Just like I'd consider anything below Windows 7 "legacy" in the Windows world, along with all current 32-bit installs of Windows 10 (as many new apps and drivers are 64-bit only, so people only use them for 16-bit app support, or devices that only have a 32-bit driver. There's no-other real-reason to, except if the device only has a 32-bit CPU, but I'd imagine such devices are rare now, or won't be long before they finally fail).</p>