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General Forums => General Discussion => Topic started by: iago on March 24, 2006, 12:16:08 PM

Title: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: iago on March 24, 2006, 12:16:08 PM
Up to 60% of the code in the new consumer version of Microsoft new Vista operating system is set to be rewritten as the Company "scrambles" to fix internal problems. Note: this is code in the CONSUMER VERSION, not in the entire OS.  A lot of people on /. are taking that the wrong way.   read more (http://www.smarthouse.com.au/Computing/Platforms?Article=/Computing/Platforms/R7G5G6U4). 

Sounds like a HUGE task.  They're adding people from their Xbox team to Vista.  That sounds like a bad idea to me, it's a general rule in software development (vocalized in the book, The Mythical Man Month) that adding more people to a project nearing completion tends to slow it down.  See my signature. 

I guess we'll see how it goes!
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: ZeroX on March 24, 2006, 12:24:57 PM
Nearing completion? I thought 2007 was almost 9 months away? Iam sure they have time to fix any internal problemes they are having. Plus adding more people to the project will just make it better becuase of all the ideas they are going to have *cough* Halo 2 already installed when you setup Vista  :P *cough*
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: deadly7 on March 24, 2006, 12:39:35 PM
Quote from: ZeroX on March 24, 2006, 12:24:57 PM
Nearing completion? I thought 2007 was almost 9 months away? Iam sure they have time to fix any internal problemes they are having. Plus adding more people to the project will just make it better becuase of all the ideas they are going to have *cough* Halo 2 already installed when you setup Vista  :P *cough*
Nine months to fix more than five years worth of coding... right.
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: MyndFyre on March 24, 2006, 12:42:19 PM
I hope they're going to get rid of the retarded way the OS asks for permission to do a privileged task right now.  I have already gotten into the habit of just blowing right through it.
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: iago on March 24, 2006, 12:50:19 PM
Quote from: MyndFyrex86] link=topic=5302.msg61578#msg61578 date=1143222139]
I hope they're going to get rid of the retarded way the OS asks for permission to do a privileged task right now.  I have already gotten into the habit of just blowing right through it.

Then you aren't very smart.  When that comes up, you should stop and think, however briefly, to make sure that that's what you want to do.  It's particularily useful when you're using a program that shouldn't be doing privileged tasks in the first place.

Of course, it depends on what extent they do it to.  The only time I need to use root is to install a system-wide program or change a system configuration file.  Allowing any program to do that is just stupid. 
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: Warrior on March 24, 2006, 03:34:36 PM
This can be a good thing or a bad thing, remember the "5 years of coding" was restarted already. It was rewritten in the mid of it's Longhorn to use the Windows2k3 codebase so saying that it took them 5 years really isn't accurate. I think putting people from the XBox team is a great idea, they can focus on the media portions of the OS such as sound and video.
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: iago on March 24, 2006, 05:27:31 PM
Quote from: Warriorx86] link=topic=5302.msg61596#msg61596 date=1143232476]
I think putting people from the XBox team is a great idea, they can focus on the media portions of the OS such as sound and video.
There have been A LOT of projects that have gone down in flames due to adding people. 
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: Warrior on March 24, 2006, 08:34:00 PM
Quote from: iago on March 24, 2006, 05:27:31 PM
Quote from: Warriorx86] link=topic=5302.msg61596#msg61596 date=1143232476]
I think putting people from the XBox team is a great idea, they can focus on the media portions of the OS such as sound and video.
There have been A LOT of projects that have gone down in flames due to adding people. 

Yes however I doubt they will be making XBox devs kernel programmers, it's likely to help with multimedia deployment and improving things like the audio stacks and audio applications and even possibly the video portion.
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: Warrior on March 24, 2006, 08:47:31 PM
Additionally, here (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060324-6453.html) they recognize that it was indeed the media portion that needed reworking.
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: igimo1 on March 24, 2006, 09:34:18 PM
http://www.betanews.com/article/Microsoft_No_Vista_Code_Changes/1143232877

Slashdot editors overlook credibility of the source, Linux fanboys jump at the chance to bash Microsoft.
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: Warrior on March 24, 2006, 09:44:10 PM
Same thing I said, the 60% of rewrite was 60% of the MEDIA portion of the OS. Nothing to see here, find something else to bash Windows over.
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: Krazed on March 25, 2006, 12:03:19 PM
On a side note, for media portions of the OS, there is noone better to help with coding than the Xbox development team.
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: iago on March 28, 2006, 08:47:26 AM
Quote from: Warriorx86] link=topic=5302.msg61650#msg61650 date=1143254650]
Same thing I said, the 60% of rewrite was 60% of the MEDIA portion of the OS. Nothing to see here, find something else to bash Windows over.
Incidentally, that's exactly what I said in the first post.  The Slashdot post wasn't wrong, people who responded read it wrong.

Sorry I took so long to reply..
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: Warrior on March 28, 2006, 09:49:15 AM
What do you mean by Consumer version? It's been established it's the media portion that's being rewritten, anything else is wrong.
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: MyndFyre on March 28, 2006, 12:12:07 PM
Quote from: iago on March 28, 2006, 08:47:26 AM
Quote from: Warriorx86] link=topic=5302.msg61650#msg61650 date=1143254650]
Same thing I said, the 60% of rewrite was 60% of the MEDIA portion of the OS. Nothing to see here, find something else to bash Windows over.
Incidentally, that's exactly what I said in the first post.  The Slashdot post wasn't wrong, people who responded read it wrong.

Sorry I took so long to reply..

According to the article Topaz provided, the /. post *was* wrong.

Quote from: Warriorx86] link=topic=5302.msg62295#msg62295 date=1143557355]
What do you mean by Consumer version? It's been established it's the media portion that's being rewritten, anything else is wrong.
The business editions won't have media center functionality.  That will be in Home Premium and Ultimate.
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: iago on March 28, 2006, 02:42:52 PM
Quote from: Warriorx86] link=topic=5302.msg62295#msg62295 date=1143557355]
What do you mean by Consumer version? It's been established it's the media portion that's being rewritten, anything else is wrong.
I assumed it meant that the consumer version consists of stuff that's in the consumer version and not in the other versions.  Which is what you said.  And it's what the Slashdot article said.  I noticed that most people who replied to the Slashdot post seemed to think they were rewriting the entire OS, which is not the case.  It's a case of misunderstanding. 
Title: Re: Up to 60% of Vista to be rewritten?
Post by: Warrior on March 28, 2006, 03:28:04 PM
Agreed, I'm just mad at other sites who use Slashdot as a source then post some warped information. Weather or not he meant that is a different issue and I'm sure they didn't.