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People will hate Windows 8

Ambious — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 21:06:00 GMT

Microsoft has given up all pretensions when it comes to the “Post-PC” era. They are in the game, and they’re going for broke. They want you to take off the shackles of fragmentation from your life and ascend to the cloud. The recently released ‘Consumer Preview’ of their next big “Windows” release suggests nothing else. It also suggests that a rumor that has been going around for some time now really is true: Windows 8 will be the last Windows operating system as we know it. It is the end of the line.

The Post PC Era

We are in it, there is no avoiding or denying that. People now easily use their phones and tablets for stuff that has been done with PCs forever. I have been a naysayer for quite some time now, especially regarding tablets, but now as I lay in bed trying to read up on stuff or just casually browse the internet, I find myself torn between the ‘small’ screen of my (no longer such a) behemoth of a 4.3” phone and my uncomfortably ‘huge’ 13” laptop. It makes me think that maybe a tablet is useful for something after all.

The personal computer has been dying for quite some time now, really. First came consoles and stole its gaming glory days (though not all of it and not for long), and then came the phones and the tablets and people suddenly had relatively affordable ’computer-like’ devices that were smaller, easier to use, lighter and even smarter and more target-oriented than the ominous multi-purpose PC. Heck, most of those devices are now much more ‘personal’ than the ‘personal computer’ ever could be.

The PC tried to evolve, got better and slimmer, smaller and faster, even cheaper. The “Mini-Laptops” - or “Netbooks”, would be the first attempt for the PC’s doomed salvation. People got on board because it was cheap, small and light-weight, something that did not yet exist in other forms. It had a long battery life and a small screen, but it was weak and incompetent next to its bigger and better counterparts. A compromise, to say the least.

Then (recently) came along the Ultrabooks; thin and powerful laptops with the power and comfort of a regular Notebook PC and the weight and battery life of a Netbook. The problem was, as it still remains – the high price that such a union demands.

The personal computer as we know it is slowly becoming obsolete; more and more people are now using their tablets as laptop replacements and the only reason others don’t make the switch is the lack of total compatibility with what they know and have now. Those people are going to get Windows 8 tablets and never look back, but the rest of the devoted PC users are going to hate every single bit of it.

The two faces of Windows 8

Windows 8 suffers from a severe split personality disorder. It wants to be a tablet so bad that it adopts Windows Phone 7’s Metro interface in favor of some basic Windows elements such as the Start Menu, context menus, and even actual Windows! On the other hand, it still hold on to some of its Windows functionality, so the whole thing is just a shell on top of the good old Windows we know and arguably love. The upside is that you can run any application you previously used to and years of adjusting and improving on the Windows frameworks and subsystems didn’t just go down the drain (as they did with Windows Phone 7, where even basic things like copy/paste, right-to-left or foreign language support are not integral).

Basically, you have two type of applications in Windows 8: Metro Enabled and ‘Legacy’ non-Metro apps. Legacy apps are ‘regular’ apps, the applications you run currently on your Windows 7 or XP based computer (If you’re using Linux or Mac you’re reading the wrong blog). Then the Metro apps are those designed specifically for Windows 8: Written in Silverlight, those programs run full screen, have no ‘minimize’ or ‘close’ buttons, hardly have ANY interface and try to give you as much information in as useful (and ugly) a way possible. They are completely tablet oriented, and can be installed from the Windows Market. It is basically Windows Phone 7 on a large screen and a better framework (Microsoft even went as far as to claim that any Windows Phone 7 app can be run on the Windows 8 Metro interface with as little as 10% code adjustment).

The sad thing is that on its own, each ‘side’ of this operating system is pretty much brilliant. Windows 7 wasn’t that bad to begin with, and the little touch-ups and improvements are probably more cosmetic than anything. Why change something that works, right? On the other hand, Microsoft have created a brilliant touch-oriented operating system with the Metro side of Windows 8; It’s intuitive, robust, open and easy to use and develop for. It integrates perfectly into the ‘Post PC Era’ task-oriented mentality, and every single person who tried it on a tablet was amazed.

It is just a shame that these two opposites co-exist in a single operating system. We already know that navigating ‘legacy’ Windows with touch is very uncomfortable, but just wait until you try to use a mouse and a keyboard with the Metro interface; it’s not just that it’s un-intuitive and uncomfortable but you also feel as if the system openly mocks and resents you for doing so.

As unholy as this union is, however, it is pretty much inevitable. Microsoft is trying to slowly and forcefully adjust us to the new world. It’s something that has been happening for a long, long time…

So long, Microsoft Windows.

If you examine Microsoft products in the past year you can see that they are all headed in the same direction; Metro is taking over everywhere and it seems as if the future is full of Tiles and Kinect sensors. There is nothing wrong with that, but Microsoft are thriving towards a more unified future (link is in Hebrew) where you streamline your work, your games and your media all across your different platforms. Your Xbox, your Phone and your Tablet are all one and the same in Microsoft’s future. This is their vision of the ‘Post-PC era’.

Windows 8, therefore, with its dual-existence, is the logical step in that direction. Sure, they could have separated the two systems into a refreshed “Windows 7” for PCs and “Windows Metro” or something similar for tablets, but then they wouldn’t have had the chance to force this change down our throats.

Many rumors are floating around that “Windows 8” will be the last operating system in the “Windows” family. Windows 8 is a transitional step between “Windows” as we know it today and that imagined future of a grand unified device-independent operating system that will transcend devices and ‘definitions’, and unite all of our post-PC paraphernalia under one big Metro-themed umbrella.

As for the common folk…

I sell computers for a living. When Windows Vista came out people hated it for many reasons, some more justified than others, but the main reason was because it was too different than what they were used to. When Windows 7 came out the changes were mostly cosmetic, but it wasn’t all that different than Vista. And still, people love Windows 7. The reason is the same: because it wasn’t that different than what they were – by now – used to. It was so similar, in fact, that Microsoft didn’t even advance the kernel version - Windows 7’s kernel version is actually 6.1!

So why will people hate Windows 8? Because of everything I wrote in this post. Sure, it’s great for tablets, but most people – at least today, separate their tablets from their PCs, at least mentally. I do not want the Metro interface on my PC when I am using a mouse and a keyboard. It is nice on a touchscreen, but it is impossibly annoying on a ‘regular’ PC. People will buy a new laptop with Windows 8 pre-installed, and they will search for the Start Menu or the desktop they are so used to. They will want a taskbar, Icons on their desktop and all that other Windows-y stuff.

Do not get me wrong – Windows 8 is with great potential, and I think that on a touchscreen tablet it will be mighty awesome, but for the PC it is just not natural, and it pretty much abandons the PC core mentality. People will buy new computers that are not touch enabled, and will regret it. People who do not even want touch on their computers, will simply hate the operating system.

I already do.

The most probable final names for Windows 8 (that will never be)

Ambious — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 23:59:00 GMT

It has been suggested recently by tech bloggers that the product currently codenamed "Windows 8", may not end up being called "Windows 8" at all. Here are some of the more commonly proposed names, that will probably never happen:

Windows 8

Why it's the most probable:

Do we need to say it? Windows 7 was codenamed "Windows 7" right from the get-go, and ended up being called that because it just made sense (though many would argue that it only made sense if you counted it a certain way. The Kernel itself is not even numbered '7' but rather '6.1'). Calling the following version "Windows 8" would make sense not just because it will FINALLY introduce some continuity to the Windows naming scheme (Windows 95 and Windows 98 are probably the only two consecutively named versions – not counting the Widows Server family). Also, marketing-wise, ask anyone who knows anything about marketing and they'll tell you that if you have a number in the name, the bigger the number the better the consumers think the product is (post in Hebrew). For example, when you go buy a computer, you'll obviously assume (correctly) that an i5 processor is better than an i3 processor, and you'll assume an NV550 is better than an NV520, without even knowing what those are. So obviously, if people are satisfied with Windows 7 and Windows 8 comes out, people will automatically – even subconsciously, think "8 > 7 therefor Windows 8 > Windows 7". It's also the reason so many people nickname the next generation of the Xbox360 'Xbox 720', even though that will obviously never happen. It just makes sense - people think in numbers, and numbers are easy to compare, catalog and – well, quantify.

Why it might actually be a bad idea:

I work as a computer salesman, and the number of times people have asked me if a computer came with "Windows 2007" is ridicules. Numbers can get confusing, especially if you haven't been using them consistently in the past: Is it Office 2010 on Windows 8? Office 10 on Windows 2012? Office Vista on Windows 2010? I've heard it all. Names are harder to confuse (at least in your native language), and generally easier to subconsciously associate to a desired feelings or concept. Windows ME wanted us to both welcome the new millennium and feel like the computer was an extensions of us (which it was every time we bumped our head on the keyboard out of frustration), Windows XP wanted us to XPerience our PCs, Vista wanted us to feel as if the entire world was on our desktop, and I'm guessing similar logic was applied to names such Sony's "XPeria" and "Vita" and even the "Nintendo Wii" – and don't even get me started with HTC products! On the other hand, the effect can backfire: I'm betting no company in the world will ever name another product 'Vista', which in many circles is now a synonym to failure and poor quality.

Windows ∞

Why it could work:

Someone on the web, I forget where, suggested this as a possible name for the new version. It has the '8' hidden nicely right there on its side, and the infinity symbol is something with very strong and powerful symbolism. It's actually not a bad idea, when you think about it. All the positive effects of a numbering scheme (taken to an extreme, for sure), with all the effects of an actual name. "Windows Infinity" enjoys the best of both worlds, with the only possible side-effect being the never ending jokes about how infinitely bad it is or how it's actually a reflection of Bill Gates' bank account balance.

Why it will probably never happen:

If Microsoft have been consistent with one thing in their naming scheme, apart from the consistency of being inconsistent, it's in naming products in the weirdest fashion possible. "Kinect" probably shining right there at the top alongside "Azure", "Bing" (which will forever make me think of Chandler), and "Zune" (Nobody's quite sure how to pronounce it, and either way it sounds REALLY bad in Hebrew, it's basically a profanity). Choosing a name that's creative, stylish AND makes sense is a very unlikely move for Microsoft. Windows ∞ will simply never happen because it's probably the best choice of all (if you don't want to 'settle' with "Windows 8").

Windows 360

Why it might happen:

There's this big and probably true idea on the web that Microsoft is unifying everything. With the introduction of Metro to the Xbox360 later this year, and reports of "Windows 8" possibly being able to run Xbox360 games, it's commonly assumed that Microsoft are preparing for the inevitable post-pc era by unifying everything under one big roof. While the 360 might not be the most synonymous name with "Microsoft", it does give that subconscious association we've been talking about - that it covers everything. Symantec used it with Norton 360, which is supposed to be a 'full and whole' package, and visually the number '360' makes most people think of a circle, which is a pretty perfect form in many aspects and makes people feel safe and strong. Don't be surprised if alongside the revelation of Windows 8 as "Windows 360", the Windows Phone name will also be changed to "Windows phone 360", as just another step towards Microsoft's big theorem of grand technological unification. If there's one thing the Windows 8 Developer Preview has shown us, it's that Microsoft sure are preparing for a Post-PC era, whether they like to admit it or not.

Why it will probably never happen:

360 is old news. It's been used, specifically by Microsoft, and it's turning into a cliché. So much so that whenever you see a '360' at the end of anything, you think to yourself "Who's the pretentious douche who decided to name their product with a '360'", and as the joke goes, you then do a 360° turn and moonwalk away.

Windows Tiles

What I'm dreading:

I'm actually dreading this one. Have you TRIED the Windows 8 Developer Preview?! The default interface method Microsoft would have you use HAS NO WINDOWS. Programs either run full screen or appear as 'widgety' tiles. No Windows, no maximize or minimize bar, no taskbar – not even an X to close a program! What I'm REALLY dreading is that they ditch the entire "Windows" family name and change it to "Tiles" or something similarly dreadful. It's not like they haven't been pushing this down our throats since forever; remember back in the Longhorn Beta how they talked about tiles on the sidebar? Somebody over there must be obsessed! They must have a nice kitchen floor, though.

Why it'll probably never happen:

It's a bland and confusing name. 'Tiles' are objects, elements - not something you associate with a wholesome product like an operating system. Besides, "Windows Tiles" is actually an oxymoron! There are no Windows, only tiles! And they'll never just call it "Tiles". Not until Windows 9, at least, as it's been rumored that Windows 8 will be the last of the Windows family operating systems. I was going to make "Windows Final" a segment of it's own, but I think that's pretty redundant.

Windows Metro

Why this one makes so much sense:

Do I even need to say it? We're getting the Metro Interface in everything Microsoft! Xbox360 is going Metro, The Zune and Windows Phone have gone Metro and actually made the 'UI Language' as Microsoft define it pretty popular and successful, as opposed to the products themselves which is a little ironic. Why not "Windows Metro"? It's supposed to be the culmination of all previously nearly-experimental Metro products, the best current evolution of the idea in the full glory of a PC or a tablet. Also, the word 'Metro' has a lot of symbolism to it – it's something fast, up-to-beat, always in motion, alive and dynamic. It's the fast paced world we live in, and it's ever-changing. It also has a very nice ring to it.

Why it might not happen:

The only reason I can think why you might not want to call the new version "Windows Metro" is that you'd rather go with "Windows 8". Also, the sure to follow "Windows Metrosexual" jokes. I won't even try to make those up, I'll leave that for the Macintosh crowd. Seriously though, 'Metro' is a name already used for Microsoft's design concepts, and I doubt they'll name the product after it. After all, they didn't call Longhorn "Windows Aero". Besides, the name 'Metro' wasn't thought of because of all its positive associations, it was just called that way because they ripped the font and concept off the Seattle Metro station signs and so that's how they called it. Come to think of it, I think there's a lawsuit hiding somewhere in there….

Why my blog looks like $H!T

Ambious — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 06:47:31 GMT

There was a time when my blog was the source of talk and inspiration in the Microsoft Israel community. It was the twilight days of Windows Vista and Windows 7 was in beta stages and gaining popularity, so I took the neat and clean Aero interface and based my blog design on that. At the time, it was the top of the line. I was even invited to Microsoft to give a lecture on blog design, and was referred by them to partner companies to help them design their own blogs.

Since then, however, a rich man hunted an elephant and it all started falling apart.

Let me explain:

While based on the Windows 7 Aero interface, I felt the design was still a little boring. I decided to add a little ‘random’ effect, something I do in most of my web designs, and added a changing background and a changing title. Every time you entered my blog, while the framing was the same, the background color, the title picture and the byline text would change and alternate. To achieve that I had to refer the stylesheet to an external JavaScript file, which would randomize the picture and return the resulting filenames to the blog who would then pull those images from the blog’s gallery (that helped conserve bandwidth).

Those script files were hosted on my website on GoDaddy, but then one day the GoDaddy CEO decided to become an *** and I decided to stop dealing with them. I immediately cancelled my automatically renewing domain and hosting plan, and deleted my files from their servers.

The result was that my blog design broke, but I decided it was time for a renovation anyway. Like Microsoft themselves, I became a fan of simplistic designs, and decided to redesign my blog – and since it was such a success to base my blog on Microsoft’s own design guidelines, I figured the best next step would be to follow Microsoft’s own logic and go Metro.

However, something else changed since the last time I redesigned my blog. I don’t know if it’s just that I’ve become busier or lazier – but I no longer have the patience to sit through an entire design process.

If you’ve never designed a theme for the aging Community Server platform, let me explain how it works. You have a variety of predesigned themes, and you choose one. Then you start moving things around and playing catch with the theme using CSS Overrides, which is a process that can take days, if not weeks. You move component by component, pixel by pixel, and between each and every change you refresh and check on your progress, and that’s all assuming you chose a good start design that somehow remotely resembles what you want to achieve.

Sounds painstaking, and it is. As it turns out, I no longer have the patience for that. Also, you’d think that a simplistic design language like Metro would be easy to replicate. It’s not – sometimes the simplest things are the hardest to achieve especially on a system as bloated and complex as Community Server.

The faster option would’ve been to redesign a blog from scratch and do my own design theme, but that would mean parting from the Microsoft blogging site, and lets admit it – blogging under the Microsoft domain has a little bit of prestige, and I’d like to still enjoy that little bit of status and connections I had left after burning whatever bridges I had before in this post-social-networking world.

I guess one day I may find a way around the frustration and limitations of the Community Server platform and finally give my blog a befitting and contemporary design. In the meantime, I just changed the theme to something remotely simplistic and toyed around with the color a bit to be as monochromatic and depressing as Metro is. Yeah, that’s right, I said it. But that’s something for a whole other post.

Blog deigns temporarily broken

Ambious — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 20:33:37 GMT

My blog's design is a bit unique. The title and background rotate randomly, something I have achieved by directing it to a script on my other website.
My website, however, was hosted on GoDaddy, and given the latest fiasco with their CEO, I’ve decided to remove my account and stop using their services.

Once I have a bit of free time (not likely to be soon, though) I’ll rework the design and fix it. In the meantime, I apologize for the broken look of the blog.

-Elad

Windows Phone 7 – Nokia’s Last stand

Ambious — Sun, 13 Feb 2011 22:07:31 GMT

The recently announced Microsoft/Nokia partnership seemed to have come out of nowhere, but somehow it also seemed natural; Nokia and Microsoft, both veterans in many high-tech fields, have been trying to no avail to infiltrate the smartphone market for years.

Microsoft recently reinvented their take on the smartphone world, a field at which they at one time excelled, but it was too little to late. While the software has a strong basis and a solid infrastructure, it doesn’t offer anything substantially different to convince people to make the switch.

Nokia on the other hand has dominated the ‘dumbphone’ market from day one. For years they were a household name that stood for extremely high-quality devices, and were always one grade above all the competition in terms of hardware, durability, user interface and subsequently market domination. The only field they lacked in was software, which at the time only meant bad PC sync programs, but it didn’t matter much in those days since ‘software’ had nothing to do with quality phones themselves.

With the rise of 3G and blackberry-esque smartphones, Nokia seemed to be on the right path (Nokia N95 was a shining example), but then came the iPhone and changed the rules of the game. To stay in the game and battle the rise of the iPhone, Nokia tried to tout the users with better devices featuring better hardware, incredibly superior functionality and tons of features the iPhone didn’t get until very recently, but nobody cared. The people, as it were, cared only about having a capacitive touchscreen. ‘Quality’ was out. ‘Cool’ was in.

By the time Nokia realized that the world was changing, it was too late. So late, in fact, that they failed on almost every front. Sure, their phones had 8MP cameras and HDMI outputs, but nobody would touch their software even by accident. Symbian was aging badly, and so Nokia’s Achilles' heel stayed the same as it was years before: Bad software. The problem is that in this day and age, software is everything. “The engineers at Nokia brag about the number of megapixels a new phone has,” said Nokia’s former head of design - Adam Greenfield. “But they don't understand that if you can't find the button to use the camera on the phone, it doesn't matter how many megapixels it is." And so it was that in less than a couple of years Nokia transformed from a market dominating giant to an ancient and discarded anecdote, something executives tell their children about to scare them straight.

On the other side of the conference table you have the Windows Phone 7 mobile operating system. Plenty has been written about it, and many a writer (myself included) have criticized it for being too little too late, and the people at Microsoft know that. That is why they forced the hand of many of their business partners to manufacture Windows Phone 7 devices, which for the most part were utter retail disasters (since most of these companies also sell Android devices, which are preferred by most).

With many analysts from several fields deeming Windows Phone 7 a failure and Nokia a sinking ship, it’s actually a very logical step for both companies to stand together. Nokia make extremely high quality devices, but lack the right software to infuse them with, and Microsoft made a not-too-bad mobile operating system, but can’t find a dedicated hardware manufacturer to really give them a boost. This new partnership, it seems, it just what the doctor ordered.

The thing is, that while it gives a fighting chance to both Windows Phone 7 and Nokia, Nokia’s stakes are much greater. If this venture doesn’t raise them from the ashes and saves them from total annihilation, nothing will. Microsoft, on the other hand, will survive. If Windows Phone 7 fails even under the Nokia brand, Ballmer will just reprimand himself and go one month without a salary as penance. Nokia, on the other hand, will completely vanish.

I hope this work. I have great respect and admiration for Nokia, and I hate to see them get left behind. That being said, the reality is that with Windows Phone 7 and Nokia both being relative failures, their combined value may not be much more than the sum of both parts, and may not be enough to remain relevant in the shadow of iOS and Android. Sooner or later, I guess, time will tell.

Windows 7 Device Stage: R.I.P.

Ambious — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 03:34:13 GMT

Those of you who have been following my blog closely (even those of you who don’t read Hebrew), know that there’s one particular feature of Windows 7 which I was overtly excited about. That feature is the much anticipated and eventually disappointing “Device Stage”.

Device Stage was supposed to be this window that pops up when you connect a device to your computer. Any device. The Window’s icon would be a photo-realistic icon of that device, and the stage would allow you to sync files, see battery and memory status, and even upgrade firmware and change ringtones. All in a built-in, 1st party, OS based unified interface. Sounds great, right? Finally, no more lousy 3rd party software that keeps crashing, no more compatibility issues, just one big unified bonanza of… unification.

The Rise and Fall of “Device Stage”

When the Windows 7 Beta 1 was out back in January, I roamed around a bit. Back at the time, the only device I could get Device Stage to launch for was my Nokia N95 8GB (post is in Hebrew), but even that had limited functionality – media transfer mostly. Around the internet I found several people who have had some luck with some other devices, but not much more than myself. On every release since then to date, the feature was completely missing. No matter how I tried to connect my devices, device stage would not launch. I addressed Microsoft developers with this issue early on (around Beta 2), and they said that when Windows 7 launches (November 22nd), the Device Experiences as they call them would be ‘activated’.

November has seen come and gone, and Device Stage is mostly non-existing. If you try to Google search it, most results are from January 2009 or even October 2008. So where did it go?

Romancing the Vendors

While as a whole Windows 7 is a great success on many aspects, “Device Stage” is a failure. It’s not that the platform isn’t good, it’s just that Microsoft should have anticipated it’s reception (or rather lack there-of) better, and ‘convinced’ the hardware manufacturers (“OEMs” or Vendors henceforth) to use this great platform to unify device integration with the Windows operating system (heck, if they could be convinced to use the same power/data connector for all future devices, why the heck not a single software synchronization platform?)

OEM Vendors, however, are particularly strong-headed when it comes to software. Most of them don’t want to let go of content control, and would rather use their own 3rd party software rather than Microsoft’s unified platform. Back in August 2009 I anticipated this failure, and I even approached some Microsoft personnel regarding this issue, and they all assured me that Microsoft are working closely with OEMs on this, and that once Windows 7 hits retailers, we’ll start seeing Device Stage experiences all around.

Bollocks!

When Windows 7 hit retail back in November I started plugging in my devices and found no sign of Device Stage anywhere. For weeks there was nothing, until Microsoft released a small update via Windows Update which gave it’s own devices (Mice and Keyboards mostly) some much needed experiences. But that was pretty much it.

Getting a new device – even a Windows Mobile operated one, to show up in the “Devices and Printers”, not to mention getting a Device Stage experience – is so rare it’s become a hunting sport on the internet. With the notable exception of most Sansa products and a very few and specific cameras and printers – hardly any devices use this feature.

It’s been several months now, and still nothing from neither Microsoft nor OEMs regarding Device Stage support. I hooked up some of my devices, and here’s all it gave me:

For the record, the devices I connected are:

Nokia N95 8GB
Canon PowerShot SX200 IS
HP iPaq rx5940 (Windows Mobile 5.0)

And some other devices I’ve tried with no success:

Cowon iAudio I7
Nokia E71
Nokia N96
HTC MyTouch 3G

And several others I can’t remember at the time.

Notable exceptions were any and all SanDisk products (with the Media Players having full experiences, and the storage devices having realistic icons only), and an Archos 5 PMP (with an icon only, no stage).

And still the biggest irony remains – Windows Mobile based devices still require Windows Mobile Device Center (à la Vista) and do not work with Device Stage, and there’s literally no online coverage of this feature working with anything past January 2009. Meh.

Still early, but a bit too late…

People who know me know I’m a big Microsoft defender, but even I can see that they really screwed the pooch with this one. Why develop a platform as rich in possibilities and as comfortable to use as Device Stage if hardly anyone gets to use it to its full extent? I’ve given them a couple of months before ‘officially’ declaring “Device Stage” a failure, and some might argue that it’s a bit too early, but more devices were compatible with Device Stage in Beta 1 (exactly a year ago) than today – two whole months after launch.

Windows 7 reception into the market is in full swing and the current months are crucial for it’s over-all integration into the computer world. Having Device Stage fully working at launch would have made a huge improvement even at that, since it’s a very ‘front-on’ feature that catches your attention as soon as you can use it.

And while Windows 7 is good enough to attract new customers anyway (especially since everyone is so anti-Vista, rightfully so or not), Device Stage would have been a vast addition to the ‘landscape’ of Windows 7 (I almost called it “the vista of Windows 7”).

Hopefully this situation will be rectified soon, before “Device Stage” joins OneNote and Windows Live Photo Gallery in the place where great software goes to die alone and un-heard of.

PAL vs. NTSC In the ears of a Pitch perfectionist

Ambious — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 20:36:00 GMT

Living in Israel, for years I’ve been living a lie. As you may or may not know, the broadcasting standard here is the same as Europe: PAL.

PAL is a broadcasting standard for analogue European televisions, VCRs, DVDs, game consoles, etc. ‘Broadcasting Standard’ is the definition of the analogue stream which is translated to the color separation method, the resolution, and the frame rate used by the broadcaster or device.

Most of the content in Israel comes from America, which uses NTSC – a different (and some would say inferior) broadcasting format. But you see, NTSC broadcasts at 23.976 frames per second, while PAL broadcasts at 25 frames per second. To broadcast American shows in Israel (or Europe for that matter), the content has to be converted from NTSC to PAL – which means the frame rate has to be accelerated. In that process, a most peculiar thing happens: the content is not only a tad bit faster, but the audio is also a bit higher-pitched.

Most people never even notice it, but I’ve always felt something was off. In later years, as I bought or downloaded soundtracks to shows I watched a lot and had memorized by heart, the show tunes had suddenly become strange and unfamiliar. I thought I was just imagining it, but after listening to the soundtracks for a while, I was certain that it was different than the aired version. At first I thought the show runners were simply ‘speeding things up’ by small percentages to gain more air time and squeeze more content in, but I didn’t give it much thought.

It wasn’t until online content became more wide-spread and shows started being available for download that I noticed it was something global. All shows sounded different on American television. People’s voices were lower, show tunes were on a different key altogether, and it seemed as if everything was in a much slower, lower-pitch.

It was especially noticeable on shows where the theme is played over and over again, like in Two and a Half Men or Scrubs. Two and a Half Men especially is a show that repeatedly plays the show’s main tune over and over again, and it’s harmony is almost a trademark. After watching 6 seasons of the show on television, I downloaded the first episode of the 7th season and thought to myself “That’s strange, they changed the tune – it’s lower pitched”. But it was too strange – it wasn’t just a different pitch, it was different altogether, but somehow the same.

It was then that it hit me – that every single show tune I’ve ever heard on television, every single song, every piece of music – it was all a lie! It was all converted from NTSC, which meant it was sped up a bit to fit PAL’s faster frame rate! All the show tunes, all the soundtracks, even characters’ voices – they were all off! They were higher than they originally were supposed to be!

I bet a lot of people noticed it too, but never knew to put their finger on it. Or maybe they did, and didn’t know why it was so. Now that I know, I surely do feel stupid. But hey, not everybody knows the difference between PAL and NTSC also comes into play in speed. I wonder if that’s why “45 minute shows” take only 42 minutes. We’ve been time robbed!
But at least we have less flickering.

Heroes over Europe?

Ambious — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 03:53:34 GMT

I mean really? Come on! Enough with the ______ over ______ flight games, already!

Device Stage: Is it too soon to worry?

Ambious — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 00:22:00 GMT

Ever since it’s announcement by Microsoft, my favorite feature of Windows 7 was “Device Stage”. The idea of being able to use any device I wanted with Windows without the need for heavy and broken 3rd party software was very appealing to me, and the concept seemed not only necessary, but also very overdue.

The thing is, that as builds advanced and Windows 7 got bigger and better, Device Stage somehow lost focus. I was starting to get worried, and so I addressed some people in the Beta team about it.

This is a conversation I had with a Microsoft representative from the Device Stage team in one of the Feature Focus online presentation:

Me: It's my experience that [hardware] manufacturers really like their own 3rd party apps, how sure are you that they'll all be jumping on to the [Device Stage] experience?

Sangeeta Ranjit (Program Manager in Documents, Printing and Device Stage team in Microsoft): The interesting thing about Device Stage is that they can still show or launch their own experiences, as we saw during the demonstration; they can add tasks to launch the browser that go to their online sites. However, they can also add tasks that launch their own applications, for example, let's say that HP have a status monitor application, they can add a task in Device Stage that launches that task or application, so really manufacturers are not loosing anything.

And on another occasion:

Me: What makes you so certain that manufacturers will provide Device Stage experiences for their devices? Are you planning to enforce or require manufacturers to do so, perhaps contractually obligate them?

Microsoft: No, we don’t plan to ‘force’ manufacturers to provide experiences, because Windows 7 is already showing signs of being a huge phenomena, and I think manufacturers are going to want to be part of that, without any need for encouragement on our part.

Ok, so here’s the thing.

Technically, we’re past RTM and quickly approaching GA (General Availability). NONE of my personal devices have Device Stage support on at the moment (using RTM), and even one device that DID have Device Stage support (link is in Hebrew) in Beta 7000 (albeit a bit limited), currently has NO built in device stage support whatsoever.

Device manufacturers are DEAD SILENT about releasing Device Stage packages, and it seems that only a selected few products even have their image in the Devices and Printers window, not to mention a full blown ‘Device Experience’ as Microsoft calls it.

The responses I’ve received from Microsoft have been VERY naive, and are reminiscent of the Vista days when Microsoft would just go “It’s going to be so great that we don’t even need to ask manufacturers to release drivers! They’ll want to do it themselves!” . Of course that was the downfall of Vista, and by the time Windows 7 came around they realized they had to squeeze the manufacturers months before RC to see ANY results by RTM. I’m feeling like Device Stage just isn’t a priority for Microsoft, which is a crying shame.

Microsoft are also naive in thinking that hardware manufacturers will WANT to use Device Stage, with or without their own apps. Manufacturers rarely rely on built-in operating system functions, good as they may be, and they always have some sort of trick of their own, something they spent a lot of time and money developing which they prefer to enforce down the user’s throat rather than use Microsoft’s solutions. There are notable exceptions to that rule though, such as the SanDisk Sansa line of products which is very Windows-Friendly, specifically when it comes to Windows 7. Every single SanDisk or Sansa device I tried – even old ones, all had Device Stage Experiences with them, or at least a full picture icon in the Devices and Printers. My SanDisk Cruzer appeared in all it’s glory in Devices and Printers in the right color even, as did several Sansa Clip and Sansa E200 devices I had lying around the store. All the MP3 players brought up the device stage experience, by the way, including the battery and memory gauges, the sync options, and in some cases – links to the device manual and software updates.

Nothing else seems to work, though. Not only did the devices not have built in ‘out of the box’ support, none of them had ‘experiences’ or even Device Stage Icons with them. Not my phone, not any other phone I tried (Including but not limited to Nokia N95 8GB, Nokia E71, Motorola Razor K3, some Blackberry who’s model I can’t recall, Sony Ericson, etc.), not a single Camera (I tried several Canon models, Nikon and Pantex models), MP3 Player (other than Sansa – I tried several Cowon, Meizu, and other players)…..

But the most disappointing, the most grotesque lack of ‘out-of-the-box’ support was for my Windows Mobile powered device, my HP TravelMate rx5940. The device comes with Windows Mobile 5, and Windows 7 didn’t even recognize it out of the box! In all it’s audacity, it started downloading the Vista-age “Windows Mobile Device Center”, which is the forefather of “Device Stage”, and launched it when the download was finished.

You read it right – a Windows Mobile device that is not supported by a platform for mobile devices on Windows. What an absurdity.

I’m starting to believe that this great feature is going to be a bust. I just see no way Nokia will give up “PC Suite”, and if they do incorporate some experience to Device Stage, it’s only going to be a link to download PC Suite. I don’t see it doing all the other nifty things Microsoft designated Device Stage to do, such as change the ringtone or update the firmware directly from Device Stage without any 3rd party software. And don’t even get me started on Apple….

I just hope that at least my Windows Mobile 5 device gets some sort of native Device Stage support, through an update maybe, because right now it’s nothing short of absurd.

SWAG - Stuff I got from Wendy :-)

Ambious — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 02:45:00 GMT

This one goes out to the entire team at the Microsoft Windows Beta team, and specifically Wendy who spearheaded the community aspects of the Beta program, making it an awesome program to participate in.

I was lucky enough to be randomly selected (from a bunch of guys who answered the Printing Management Service survey) to receive a bunch of gifts from Wendy and the Microsoft team, and here they are:

All the stuff together

Again, with labels:

Again, from a higher angle:

And now, to close-ups:

Ok, I’m not sure how they call this in English, but then again, from the height of my age (kidding) I don’t even remember the Hebrew name. I just remembered I had those as a kid in Kansas when I was three years old, except that the ones I had weren’t as cool:

The ergonomic pen, the USB-Powered Fish tank and the Frisbee took some trial and error to figure out., but they’re cool! The fish-tank is especially cool, being a ‘live light and water show’. My cats are gonna LUV this!

The next item is a multi-functional pen. You read it right – multifunctional. It’s a pen, but it’s also a bobble-head, and an LCD monitor anti-static dust brush. Sweet – except that it won’t stay standing up, the vacuum thingy is a bit dry, but it’s nothing a bit of water that dripped off the fish tank can’t fix.

The next couple of items I couldn’t quite figure out, so I had to have Wendy explain them to me :-P
I must be dead inside :-|

First is this spidery sticky thing. Basically, you throw it at anything like you would a Ninja star, and it stick to it. Sweet:

The rocket kept me feeling a bit stupid, as I had to have Wendy explain it to me, and I figured out how cool it was too late to use it against my co-workers. Anyway, I shot it at my cat several times and he played around with it, but every time I tried to take his photo while he was playing with it he just ran off (if you have a cat, you know how nearly impossible it is to get them to pose – they do what THEY want, when THEY want it). This is the best I could get:

And this is it. I wanted to take a photo with me in the T-shirt, but it’s a bloody 35 degrees Celsius (that’s 95 Fahrenheit!) and the T-Shirt is long sleeved and 100% ‘ultra’ cotton, so ….. computer says no.

That’s it.

I’d like to thank Wendy again for this great pack of stuff, and to everyone else at the Beta team for a great run and what’s looking up to be the most exciting Windows release since ol’ Bill debuted Win95 (I know, they say that about every release, but this one really has a good vibe about it).

Keep up the good work, and thank you for allowing us to take part in Windows history.

See you all at the Windows 8 Beta,

-Elad