Microsoft Takes First Step to Abandoning Win9x Code Entirely

[Ed Hansberry]

<a href="http://news.com.com/2100-1001-963777.html">http://news.com.com/2100-1001-963777.html</a><br /><br />The latest beta of Office 11 works on two operating systems, Windows 2000 SP3 and Windows XP (Home and Pro.) With ActiveSync 3.5, Office XP, Money 2003 and a few other apps, Microsoft has been weaning customers off of Windows 95 but this is the first move to abandon an OS as recent as Windows ME which is only 2 years old.<br /><br />The problem for MS has been that Windows 95 still had some Windows 3.x and DOS code in it and Win98, Win98SE and WinME just built on that. Windows NT has always been infinitely more stable and MS finally killed Win9X in 2001 with the release of Windows XP, an OS that has deep roots in Windows NT and shares only a look and feel with Win9x.<br /><br />In the long run, this should be good. Office XP has so much code that installs for Win9x and other that installs for WinNT based OSs. This will allow the Office team to focus on essentially one operating system, which will lead to greater stability, I hope. If this is an indication of where things are headed, look for other Microsoft apps like ActiveSync, Money, Project, etc. to follow suit.

[that_kid]

I'm glad they are doing this. I've been trying to get some of my friends off of win9x for some time now. All their crying about blue screens, simple programs bringing down the whole OS and such is just enough to make someone go mad. They need to come over to the stability side of things.

[vincentsiaw]

i also glad microsoft do this action, but doesn't it mean forcing more people to buy more of the XP?

[ThomasC22]

I admire that Microsoft is at least warning people in advance rather than just springing this on them like they usually do. They cut Microsoft Mail out of Outlook XP without even mentioning it (although it gave me an excuse to convince my boss to buy Exchange Server so it isn't all bad).

I do think this was probably more a technical thing, if Office is based on XML and the .NET platform it would probably help stability if it wasn't running on Win98 and such.

I do agree with the article though, this is far more likely to make people not buy Office 11 than it is to make people buy Windows XP.

As for will I upgrade, I'll have to see. My main problem with office right now is I don't see all that much improvement (truth be told most of my users wish we had stayed with Office '97 and their probably right).

[sub_tex]

thank god for ditching the 9x platform. How people can work in those OSs is beyond me. Watching your RAM slowly disappearing just from having the machine on all day............("i have to reboot this to get my RAM back" --- AA!)

so bad.

I agree, though, that most will just not upgrade as long as they can.

[Woodster]

I think this is a great idea although open-source advocates like News.com (which is constantly showing their bias torwards MS) is making a big stink out of it.

Here are my feelings:

- If you don't know the difference between all the versions of Windows, then this won't matter to you because you''ll do just fine with all the other versions of Office or Works

- If you know the difference then your an idiot for running anything less than Windows 2000

- Keeping Office to one code base can only be good for everyone (less bugs, more features, more stable, etc...)

[JonnoB]

- If you know the difference then your an idiot for running anything less than Windows 2000


I have said the same thing to people I work with... and they look at me puzzled. Some actually believe that their Win98SE system is more stable as-is than upgrading to WinXP. One who bought a new PC actually tried to downgrade. Unless someone has an old - I mean really old (greater than 24 months) PC or the lack of funds to upgrade, there is no reason to not run at least Win2k. You have no room to complain.

[toshtoshtosh]

X-scale optimizations! X-scale optimizations! X-scale optimizations!!

Ok, just kidding...

[Ben]

The reason why I still run Win98SE is simply one of cost - I build my own computers and I'm told this means that I don't qualify for OEM copys of winodws, therefore I'm looking at £70 just to upgrade to WinXP home, and there is no student version of WinXP yet which I would qualify for. If microsoft really want to ween people off of Win9x I think they need to start shipping cheaper upgrades for the home user like myself. There is also the problem that although MS have WinNT based versions of all their software a lot of other software developers haven't caught up yet e.g. the college I'm at is holding off moving to Win2k or WinXP because the software developers for a number of popular education titles simply don't properly support WinNT systems or are providing no cheap upgrade path to go from Win9x based versions to WinNT based versions.

[sweetpete]

As for will I upgrade, I'll have to see. My main problem with office right now is I don't see all that much improvement (truth be told most of my users wish we had stayed with Office '97 and their probably right).

If you're using Exchange and Outlook, I have to say that you will love the upgrade. Going from Office 2000 to XP was not a good experience for me, but have a look at the new Oulook interface and you'll know what I mean. It's made working with email so much easier, I can't explain. If you need a good screenshot check out this one. (http://www.slipstick.com/outlook/ol11.htm)

[ThomasC22]

If you're using Exchange and Outlook, I have to say that you will love the upgrade. Going from Office 2000 to XP was not a good experience for me, but have a look at the new Oulook interface and you'll know what I mean. It's made working with email so much easier, I can't explain. If you need a good screenshot check out this one. (http://www.slipstick.com/outlook/ol11.htm)

I actually did see that and really liked the interface but what concerns me is the rest of office. Microsoft has made a point of saying the most significant changes would be made to Outlook and it looks like they've done a good job but what I've found is that every change they've made to Word and Excel in the last 5 years has done nothing but make it harder to operate for my users.

So, no matter how good Outlook is, if they add more clutter to the other Office apps I may have to pass.

[sweetpete]

So, no matter how good Outlook is, if they add more clutter to the other Office apps I may have to pass.

You will probably be able to upgrade to OL11 with your Exchange license anyway so don't worry :lol: (you can do this with Outlook 2002 right now).
I know what you mean about users having trouble with the new changes, but the XDocs integration into Office11 and the switch to XML that is being reported are huge when it comes to having useful data (docs, spreadsheets) that you can use elsewhere.

[Rob Alexander]

If you're using Exchange and Outlook, I have to say that you will love the upgrade. Going from Office 2000 to XP was not a good experience for me, but have a look at the new Oulook interface and you'll know what I mean. It's made working with email so much easier, I can't explain. If you need a good screenshot check out this one. (http://www.slipstick.com/outlook/ol11.htm)

Thanks for the URL. Some of the features look excellent, particularly the search folders feature, which all by itself would make this worth an upgrade fee. But I wouldn't want to see my mail headers in that today/yesterday view or read my mail in any kind of attached pane. Can I still go back to just showing a regular inbox and having each message open in its own window when I double-click on it? The reviews were telling us about what was new, but didn't tell us how much of the new stuff was optional.

[sweetpete]

Rob,

Without going into too much detail (I'm under NDA for the beta), I can assure you that MS would not make radical changes without allowing for some configuration to the way things were. If you look at Windows XP and the Luna interface you'll see what I mean (you can have it XP style or classic style, though classic isn't exactly like Windows 2000).
I was also a bit hesitant at first when I saw the screenshots. :? Take a look at this link (http://www.fawcette.com/reports/mec/2002/10_10_02/pcardoza/) that I found at the bottom of the original link I posted about. It goes into more detail about the new views and groupings. There has been a lot of work done towards usability and the way you work with and use email applications. I think they have made GREAT strides finally with OL11 ... now lets hope for good stability in the final product. :P