I've been looking at the various desktop search engines available and I decided to (loathe the thought) see what Microsoft has to offer with there Toolbar. While at the site that had the little animated demos of the Toolbar's various features, I found the statements made about, and questions asked of, the current state of Windows and some of MS's core applications to be, at least, humorous:
Browse with tabs:
Ever been frustrated managing all those open Internet Explorer windows?
Block pop-ups:
Unsolicited pop-up ads are annoying and may introduce spyware to your computer.
Search your PC:
Ever been frustrated trying to find something on your PC?
Where do they get off asking, me the consumer, if their products are this way like it's some new, divine revelation from the heavens? Am I wrong for expecting an apology when they announce that their product causes frustration? They used the word 'frustrated' twice in describing how users might react to these products! These are the kinds of statements/questions I'd expect a 3rd-party vendor to make who knows there product is a patch for someone else's shoddy product.
What's that Microsoft? You mean you guys *really* didn't know you're software was this crappy and you think that I'm just as unaware as you? Well, really, I'm glad you finally know; and it warms my heart to see that you are willing to do something about it by making me download and install yet another product of yours. Thanks.
As a counter-point, I am actually looking forward to Vista, which from what I've read and heard will provide the solutions to these dilemmas in one package (as soon as Win FS is available that is); hopefully they'll get it right this time.
-Zach
2 comments:
Oh the frustration abounds, but I remember when software browsers were simple, less technical - and very un-imaginative.
As a programmer, I can appreciate the time when Netscape and IE were going at it, head-to-head.
This was a while ago, and those of you who were so young that you may not have had computer or Internet access, this may not ring a bell.
However, as a programmer at that time, it only took a moment to find out which technology allowed me the most rich and flexible web application/we site and which offered the most forward thinking architecture and that was Microsoft's upstart Internet Explorer.
Oh, back in those days, when Novell dominated the business client/server network and demanded huge fees, as did the awkward and frustrating to use UNIX systems; or if you went with a rinky-dink peer to peer network that was a real hassle to set up and keep working. Microsoft offered huge relief here too!
An easy to use interface that actually was intuitive enough for my clients, the small business owner/user, to also provided what other systems were reluctant to: “free” and robust network interfaces that included interfacing with other types of systems as well as an easy to use GUI to navigate them.
But I digressed from the browser war; IE offered a plethora features. Features that would allow a web interface behave almost like a standard windows interface. Nothing at that time offered multiple window management, messages between browser windows, drag and drop, dynamic content control as a few of the more amazing things that IE handles easily. ActiveX technology was answer to Java Applet technology, and again I saw a huge improvement for allowing users to experience powerful interfaces that could manage literally “any business or entertainment task”
Microsoft continued to lead the fight against “mundane, boring and expensive” with innovative GUI features such as floating button bars, dock-able controls, and side utility panels for searching, multi-media as well as dynamic data exchange that allowed your browser to become “a spreadsheet, a word processor, a file explorer or your favorite game”.
Yes, there were bugs and these continued to be fixed on an aggressive, proactive way, and heck – what did all this increase of functionality cost me? Nothing! Microsoft didn’t “piece meal” the extras at an increasing “ad-on” cost like every other software maker was; a-hem, IBM, Sun Microsystems, Novell, and all the different UNIX flavors that existed at that time
Mac’s were also really progressive with some items and interfaces, huh, so I hear. Nope I never worked for one business that ever had a Macintosh computer until I came to a shop with artists in it. But even now Windows computers dominate this shop. But forget running the most widely known/best: business, accounting, office, specialty, development or gaming software… But man those graphics are just superb aren’t they? I guess.
I used to listen to all the gripes that users had and still do when they remember “the good o’l DOS days”, I mean what was Bill Gates, the richest and, in my humble opinion, most visionary person in the computer world, thinking anyway? I can hear them now reminiscing over being able use the INT 21h for catching a single keyboard stroke or catching a hardware interrupt to capture a single incoming character over the modem line. Bill Gates betrayed us!!! is the message I would hear reiterated over and over again.
I’d listen to UNIX gurus, who looked like they hadn’t bathed in 6 months blather on at the marvelous power of C-shell, Korn shell, etc scripts. It boggles the mind because they never cared about the user because no one but them could write or run these scripts. Yes, I had to learn these scripting languages on this old SCO UNIX box so I know about them. Yes, you could do some little tricks with them, but in the end they were worthless because they didn’t fill the need. They might have been job security at one time, but all these boxes got replaced with Windows servers and windows applications that were much more powerful and full-featured.
And still I heard the gripes about how I never had to restart my Novell server! Yeah, I worked on them too. Yes, I did spend many hours hoping a preying that we could fix the problem with the Novell server. Un-mount the volume (all the files would go away to Never-Never Land), run some disk utility that told you absolutely nothing that was of help to tell you what was going wrong until the very end, and then prey to God that it fixed it right and that you could re-mount the volume to see if all the files were still there. Those were scary times…
There was so much angst toward Microsoft because they were so widely used and successful. I guess they were the first Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart gets some bad publicity too for being too successful. While we’re at it, the USA gets the same bad publicity for being the best at many things.
Unfortunately corporate America, and a large number of shadier types, and even whole crime organizations are started taking advantage of the openness that Microsoft offered in its software – and particularly the browser. Many software tools that Microsoft gave me are now unavailable now because they have and are being used in nefarious or annoying ways.
Yes, if I was in high-school or just graduated, I’d think that Windows is the worst software in the world too - just because…
I am happy not to use Microsoft. Good ol MAC.
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