It's been five years since Windows 10 hit: So... how's that working out for you all?

[aum]

Most of the things Microsoft said would be great were not

 

 

Windows 10 was made generally available on 29 July 2015, introducing the concept of Windows-as-a-Service, a digital assistant called Cortana, a Universal Windows Platform for developers, Continuum to enable "a Windows Phone to become like a PC", and not forgetting the revival of the Start menu.

 

Following widespread disappointment with the radical new Start screen and touch-friendly application platform introduced in Windows 8, Windows 10 was two steps forward, and one step back, from the popular but ageing Windows 7.

 

Five years ago Microsoft was desperate to get its customers off Windows 7, so much so that the operating system was a free upgrade. But in this case free was an insufficient incentive, and Redmond also entered dodgy territory with near-enforced upgrades via a notorious Windows update called GTX or "Get Windows 10".

 

All but the most tech-savvy of users got this whether or not it was wanted. One reader told us at the time: "On every single one of our machines we said 'No' to the update. We uninstalled the KB that even asks for the update. Yet ... every single one of our machines has downloaded Windows 10 in the background and demanded to install itself."

 

Microsoft's extreme measures were because of a problem it faced: the burden of a huge installed base of users with a patchwork of different versions of Windows, made worse by the reluctance of many to upgrade to Windows 8. There was little chance of establishing a new application platform when so many couldn't or wouldn't run it.

 

Developers had a choice: make a Win32 application and have a large market, or develop for Windows 8 or UWP and have a smaller market. This remains an issue even today, with Windows 7 still having a nearly 20 per cent share of active Windows users, according to Statcounter, or approaching 30 per cent, according to Netmarketshare.

 

Those figures drop dramatically for certain territories – Statcounter puts the Windows 7 share at under 10 per cent in the UK, for example – and five years on, it is fair to say that most Windows users run Windows 10, especially the subset likely to install or buy new applications.

 

Windows 10 was just as radical as Windows 8, though in different ways. The goals of Windows 8 were to modernise Windows and enable it to compete with Apple's iPad on devices of different types and sizes, as well as to make Windows a more secure operating system with applications store-delivered and isolated from each other.

 

By the time of Windows 10, the company had lost faith in the tablet revolution, but still wanted to make a go of the secure application platform, which it adapted into UWP.

 

 

There was also the matter of Windows Phone, perhaps a more notable failure even than Windows 8. Traces of the Windows Phone design ethos remain in Windows, in the blocky UWP design style, but little else.

 

During the initial development of Windows 10, however, Windows Phone was still a thing, and the ability to run the OS on the phone as well as on larger devices was touted as one of the benefits of the new operating system.

 

Microsoft's strategy changed quickly. In April 2014, it acquired Nokia's phone division, supposedly heralding a new era in which Redmond would properly understand, support and progress its smartphone ambitions.

 

Little more than a year later, in June 2015 before the launch of Windows 10, the dream was over, some new Lumia models were cancelled, and Stephen Elop, head of that phone division left the company. Instead of Windows everywhere, it was to be Google Android and Apple iOS everywhere, with mainstream Windows confined to its desktop niche (though embedded Windows lived on in specialist devices).

Counting the score

What were Microsoft's goals with Windows 10 and did it achieve them? The scorecard does not look good. Here is a quick rundown:

 

Windows everywhere – desktop, laptop, tablets, smartphones and Xbox. We have to score this as a fail, despite some Windows 10 presence beyond desktops and laptops. The smartphone idea died, and Windows tablets never came close to the iPad's popularity or usability. One of the issues is that while Windows 8 was a good design for tablets, Windows 10 was not and still is not. Continuum evolved into discontinuum.

 

Windows as a service. The Windows chief at the time, Terry Myerson, promised: "Once a Windows device is upgraded to Windows 10, we will continue to keep it current for the supported lifetime of the device – at no additional charge. With Windows 10, the experience will evolve and get even better over time. We'll deliver new features when they're ready, not waiting for the next major release. We think of Windows as a Service … the idea of asking 'What version are you on?' will cease to make sense – which is great news for our Windows developers."

 

We'll grant that Microsoft has partially achieved this vision. Windows 10 is regularly updated, most users do upgrade where they can, and while this is occasionally painful, mostly it works.

 

The Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC (Long Term Support Channel) still exists for businesses who prefer the old model of occasional and optional big updates, though consumers have no escape. Great news for developers, though? The truth is they are still not that happy. And that is because...

 

The Universal Windows Platform has never fully taken off. The Universal bit made little sense after the abandonment of Windows Phone. The Windows Store at the launch of Windows 8 was a disaster, and for the launch of Windows 10, still not great.

 

The positioning of UWP has evolved, at one time distinct from Win32 (or classic Windows), but now being merged with it in what the company called Project Reunion. We'll score this one a fail.

 

Cortana, Microsoft's digital assistant. Another sad story. Cortana was another Windows Phone innovation, arriving in 2014 with 8.1. Cortana had several ingredients: the Bing search engine, a "Notebook" of information about the current user, speech recognition and AI.

 

Similar in concept to Apple's Siri or Google's Assistant, Cortana could answer questions, offer reminders, and perform actions like sending a text message or placing a calendar entry. In Windows 10, Cortana was built in, strangely integrated with the Start menu.

 

Today Cortana is in retreat. There is still a Cortana app, but integration with Start has ended (to the relief of many users), and the agent has been repositioned as a component of Microsoft 365. Cortana worked better on Windows Phone but dedicated devices running Cortana made no impact. Microsoft's naming department also applied the brand to some intelligence services. Despite a big investment, and to some extent foisting Cortana on Windows 10 users, we'll score this a fail too.

 

What about the revived Start menu? Users would, we suspect, have been happier with something more like that in Windows 7. This was especially true in the early months, when users with more than 512 entries found some or all of their application shortcuts missing. Ingenious workarounds were discovered, or users resorted to a third-party substitute.

 

Even when it worked as designed, the blending of local and internet search left users fuming when an attempt to start an application landed them on some random website instead. An additional panel offers the remnants of the Windows 8 Start screen, a customisable array of tiles. Fail.

 

The Edge browser, introduced in Windows 10, has not enjoyed a smooth ride. Despite better HTML 5 standards support, a clean user interface, a fast JavaScript engine called Chakra, and a leap in security when compared to Internet Explorer 11, Microsoft could not persuade users to adopt it in the numbers it hoped for.

 

Folks were frustrated by poor experiences on some websites, sometimes for no reason other than the site detected a Microsoft browser and delivered a downgraded experience suitable for IE, or did not work at all. In late 2018 Redmond abandoned its in-house browser engine and adopted Chromium within a revamped Edge.

 

There is a twist, though. Despite the innovations in Windows 10 being, for the most part, not great, things did not work out badly. The engineering of the core Windows operating system has steadily improved despite the cosmetics, and Windows 10 betters Windows 8 just as, in this respect, Windows 8 betters Windows 7.

 

DirectX 12 performed well, for example, continuing the PC's role as a strong gaming platform. Compatibility with countless legacy Win32 applications is good, and even applications created with Visual Basic 6.0 (released in 1998 and out of support since 2008) still mostly run on Windows 10 today. Windows 10 had annoyances but not to the same extent as Windows 8, and in the five years since its launch Microsoft has refined it.

 

One can also point to things in Windows 10 that have worked out well. Sign in to Azure AD (or Office 365) was not quite there at launch, but planned, and it works nicely for customers of Microsoft's cloud. Multiple desktops is a handy feature, though seemingly little used.

 

Microsoft has also pulled off something hardly hinted at in the first release, which is to make Windows 10 excellent for developers (by which we mean developers working on Windows but often targeting other platforms such as web, mobile or server applications), especially after the introduction of Windows Subsystem for Linux in 2016, a year after the initial release.

 

Many of the things Microsoft said would be great about Windows 10 have turned to dust, but even at launch it was the best Windows yet – although Version 7 aficionados may disagree.

 

In March, the company announced that it now runs on one billion active devices. Before the launch of Windows 10, Myerson told developers at the 2015 Build event that the goal was one billion devices "two to three years after launch".

 

Achieving that goal came late, but it was achieved. Despite everything that went wrong, Windows 10 succeeded in putting the company's desktop operating system back on track. Shame about the phone, though. ®

 

Source

[aum]

Another interesting read: Windows 10 is five years old - here's how it's evolved

 

Enjoy.

[zigzag]

Newer hardware didn't get drivers for previous versions of Windows. Is forced upgrade success?

[Karlston]

Windows 10 turns five years old

 

Hard to believe how much has changed in five years.

 

For a bit of nostalgia (not necessarily good nostalgia, mind you!) take a look at Terry Myerson’s announcement Hello World: Windows 10 Available on July 29

 

Terry (who’s long since gone on to greener pastures) turns the floor over to Cortana “the world’s most personal digital assistant”:

• We designed Windows 10 to create a new generation of Windows for the 1.5 billion people using Windows today in 190 countries around the world. Don’t know where that number came from, but five years later Microsoft claims that Windows 10 runs on “more than 1 billion devices around the world.”
• Microsoft Edge, is an all-new browser designed to get things done online in new ways, with built-in commenting on the web – via typing or inking — sharing comments, and a reading view that makes reading web sites much faster and easier. And we all know how well the original Edge has fared.
• Office on Windows: In addition to the Office 2016 full featured desktop suite, Windows 10 users will be able to experience new universal Windows applications for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, all available separately. Wonder what happened to that?
• Windows Continuum enables today’s best laptops and 2-in-1 devices to elegantly transform from one form factor to the other, enabling smooth transitions of your tablet into a PC, and back. That didn’t turn out so well, either, eh?
• Windows Hello, greets you by name and with a smile, letting you log in without a password and providing instant, more secure access to your Windows 10 devices. With Windows Hello, biometric authentication is easy with your face, iris, or finger, providing instant recognition.
• Windows Store, with easy install and uninstall of trusted applications, supported by the broadest range of global payment methods.

Kinda funny how well the original vision has fared.

 

 

Windows 10 turns five years old

 

[Karlston]

Windows 10 turns 5: where did it all go wrong?

It all started off so well…

(Image credit: Shutterstock)

 

Five years ago, on July 29, 2015, Microsoft released Windows 10 for most people – and while things started off well, after half a decade it feels like that early promise hasn’t quite paid off.

 

It’s a shame, as when Windows 10 launched, it genuinely felt like Microsoft had managed to right the ship after the serious misfire of Windows 8.

 

In case you’d managed to erase Windows 8 from your memory (good work if you have), that was Microsoft’s follow up to the immensely popular Windows 7, where Microsoft threw out all the goodwill it had clawed back by releasing an operating system that was supposed to work for people on both traditional PCs and laptops, as well as touch-screen tablet devices, but ended up being such a horrendous mishmash that it disappointed everyone.

 

In fact, Windows 8 was such a disaster that Microsoft skipped Windows 9 altogether to distance Windows 10 from its predecessor.

 

So, when Windows 10 launched, many people saw it a welcome return to form. The iconic Start menu, which had been a part of Windows since Windows 95, returned, after being dumped in Windows 8 for its unloved Start screen, which forced big, chunky icons onto everyone’s screens.

 

In many ways Windows 10 felt like a true successor to Windows 7. It no longer felt like two separate operating systems awkwardly taped together (though some elements of that dodgy fusion remain), and Microsoft promised some exciting new features, like advanced security, biometric Windows Hello logins and more.

 

 

As Microsoft’s blog post announcing the July 29 launch stated, “Windows 10 starts fast, resumes fast and helps enable batteries to last longer,” while Cortana, “the world’s first truly personal digital assistant,” would help you get things done just by talking to your PC. There was also a promise of the “all-new browser” Edge, which was “designed to get things done online in new ways.”

 

Windows 10 certainly seemed to promise a lot five years ago. The problem was, many of those promises fell completely flat.

 

 

(Image credit: Shutterstock / rvlsoft)

Free for all

One of the most eye-catching elements of Windows 10 was that it was being offered as a free upgrade to people using Windows 7 and Windows 8. Considering how much Microsoft usually made by getting people to pay for an upgrade, this came as a surprise, though many people had their concerns about why Microsoft was suddenly being so generous.

 

And, while many people liked the fact they could upgrade to the newest version of Windows for free, some of the concerns people had were borne out.

 

 

Firstly, it was clear that Microsoft was keen to get people off Windows 7 and Windows 8 as soon as possible. It made sense, as Windows 7 was nearing its end of life, and by having most people on a single operating system, it would be easier for Microsoft to release important updates and patches.

 

 

However, many people found Microsoft attempts to get them to upgrade to Windows 10 heavy handed and aggressive. Pop-ups encouraging people to upgrade were a common annoyance, and many people found that even if they didn’t want to upgrade, their version of Windows would download Windows 10 anyway.

 

 

There was further controversy when it was discovered how much information Windows 10 was harvesting from its users. Suddenly, Microsoft’s claim that Windows 10 was ‘free’ didn’t seem so free after all – there was a cost that you just didn’t know about.

 

 

While Microsoft did end up making it so users have slightly better control over what kind of data Windows 10 shares about you (though concerns still remain), that, along with Microsoft’s forcing of the new operating system on people, meant Windows 10 left a bad first impression for people.

 

 

(Image credit: Shutterstock)

Cortana, Cortana

While Windows 10 launched five years ago with some ambitious new features, many of them didn’t live up to the hype. Most noticeably of all, there was Cortana. A refugee from Microsoft’s ill-fated Windows Phone mobile OS, Cortana was supposed to compete with the likes of Apple’s Siri and Google’s Assistant. However, while a virtual assistant makes sense on a mobile device like a smartphone, on a desktop or laptop, it just didn’t feel natural.

 

Worse still, was Microsoft’s attempts to force Cortana onto people, adding it into the Start menu search box – and annoyingly popping up during the installation process of Windows 10. Anyone who has bought a new laptop, turned it on and found Cortana’s grating voice chirping away as you try to set up the damned thing, will understand quite how annoying it is. There were worrying flashbacks to Microsoft’s previous pest of an assistant – Clippy.

 

So, most people ignored Cortana as best they could, and it seems Microsoft has cottoned on to the fact, as with every update it seems to remove a bit more of Cortana from the OS. We’d almost feel a bit sorry for her, if she wasn’t so frustrating.

 

 

(Image credit: Microsoft; Future)

Taking it to the Edge

Another fail from the launch of Windows 10 was Microsoft’s Edge web browser. While many people thought Microsoft couldn’t come up with a more disliked web browser than its Internet Explorer, the company defied expectations with Edge.

 

 

While there were many improvements it brought over Internet Explorer, people just did not warm to it. Some websites didn’t play nice with its new engine, and many people were wary of using a web browser by Microsoft after their experiences with IE.

 

 

That didn’t stop Microsoft trying to make Edge loved, however, though in true Microsoft style, it went about it in a heavy handed way. Edge was baked into so many parts of Windows 10 that even if you chose a different web browser (as many people did, with Google’s Chrome becoming the most-used browser in the world), Windows 10 would still try to open up web pages in Edge.

 

 

Windows 10 would also have the habit of showing messages trying to dissuade you from changing your web browser. It all felt a little desperate, and instead of convincing people to stick with Edge, it managed to do the opposite and make them even more determined to jump ship.

 

 

Thankfully, Edge’s unpopularity became apparent to Microsoft, and in 2018 the company remade Edge using the Chromium web engine – the same one as Chrome. This brought a number of benefits to both Edge and Chrome, and it’s one of the better examples of Microsoft listening to the concerns of its users and doing something about it.

 

 

(Image credit: Microsoft)

Mobile legacy

While Windows 10 first appeared to be a break from Windows 8’s ambition to be both a desktop and mobile operating system, there are certain parts of the software where it feels Microsoft hasn’t given up. After all, Windows 10 is available on touchscreen devices like the Surface Pro 7 tablet.

 

And, although it’s done in a better way than in Windows 8 (it certainly couldn’t have been done much worse), there are still times when Windows 10 tries to do both – and fails.

 

 

For a start, one of Windows 8’s biggest problems was adding new apps that did the same thing as other windows or applications, but not as well. For example, the Control Panel is an easy to use tool that’s been part of Windows for decades, and lets you change various settings.

 

 

In both Windows 8 and Windows 10, there is also the Settings app, which – confusingly – offers some of the options and features that the Control Panel does, but in a more simplistic way. This means some options aren’t included, and that just ends up confusing users who are looking for certain setting.

 

 

And, while the return of the Start menu was welcomed by pretty much everyone, Microsoft still tried to keep some of Windows 8’s Start screen – with distractingly large Live Tiles, which are supposed to show interactive information of the app, but end up being mainly ignored by both users and app developers.

 

 

Microsoft also began adding adverts and pre-installed apps and games that no one wants – another reminder of Windows 10’s loose interpretation of ‘free’.

 

 

Then there’s the Microsoft Store – which was once the Windows Store. This is an app store similar to the Apple App store and Google Play. While ‘walled garden’ app stores are a thing most of us put up with on mobile devices, it’s a harder sell on PC, where users are used to downloading and buying applications and games from wherever they want.

 

 

And so it came to pass that Microsoft struggled to get people to use the Microsoft Store to download and buy apps. It didn’t help that the interface isn’t great, some apps that are free to download elsewhere cost money on the Microsoft Store, and there are annoying problems with downloading games, where if a download fails when you’re trying to download a 50GB file, you have to start downloading the entire thing again.

 

 

Games from the Microsoft Store also don’t allow mods – something that getting the game from a different store, like Steam – allows.

 

 

Even users who have to use the Microsoft Store – for example if they are using Windows 10 in S Mode, which limits you to just downloading apps via the store – hate the experience, as many popular apps don’t have UWP versions on the Microsoft Store.

 

 

Microsoft’s UWP (Universal Windows Platform) apps were designed as a way of allowing developers to make applications that could work on both Windows 10 and Windows Phone devices, as well as on Xbox games consoles, but unfortunately, not many app makers were too keen on the format, leaving the Microsoft Store to feel a little barren.

 

(Image credit: Shutterstock)

Update woes

Perhaps Windows 10’s biggest failing these five years is a rather recent one – a string of problematic updates that have been breaking more things than they fix.

 

We’ve been documenting them, and it’s quite concerning how almost every update for Windows 10 ends up causing issues for some people. Now, we must stress that not everyone experiences these problems, and very few experience every problem, but there’s a large number of people have found that their PC has begun misbehaving after an update.

 

 

It’s certainly given the impression that there’s something wrong with current Windows 10 leadership. Rather than having people excited about new updates that bring new features, many people now approach the Windows Update tool with trepidation. Could this be the update that breaks my PC?

Not all bad, though

 

I’ve suddenly realized that in this retrospective of the first five years of Windows 10’s life, I’ve been rather negative. And, while Windows 10 certainly does have its issues, and has disappointed in some respects, it’s not all that bad.

 

 

For a start, it really is a big improvement over Windows 8. It makes better use of modern hardware, so it boots a lot faster than previous versions, and generally feels a lot snappier.

 

 

And while I can’t say I’ve not seen a dreaded Blue Screen of Death during my time with Windows 10, the operating system certainly feels more solid than previous versions.

 

 

Also, despite the existence of the Microsoft Store, Windows 10 is still a pretty open platform with a huge range of apps and games available for it. Along with DirectX 12 support, Windows 10 is by far the best operating system for PC gamers.

 

 

And, while Windows 7 continues to remain popular, Windows 10 has slowly been gaining marketshare – and is now installed on one billion active devices as of March 2020. An impressive feat, even if it took slightly longer than Microsoft had hoped.

 

 

Windows 10 has also added some great features that weren’t even hinted at five years ago, such as the Windows Subsystem for Linux.

 

 

Microsoft has also brought its excellent Xbox Games Pass subscription to PC. For a very reasonable monthly subscription, this gives you access to hundreds of games, and offers incredible value for money. The only real catch is that the games have to be downloaded via the Microsoft Store.

 

 

And while Windows 10 updates can be hit and miss these days, Microsoft has kept to its promise of releasing major Windows 10 updates at least once a year, adding big changes and new features and all for free.

 

So, after 5 years, Windows 10 may not be quite where we – or Microsoft – wants it to be. But despite our annoyances with it, there’s a lot to be positive about – and a lot to look forward to in the next five years of Windows 10.

 

 

Windows 10 turns 5: where did it all go wrong?

 

[jbleck]

i still hate their idea to stop @ 10... 

there are always leaps that one can imagine, develop and release.

 

i mean... do u remember the jump from Win 98 to Win XP, or from XP to 7?

i'm starting to miss that feeling of "awe"

[x3r0]

8 hours ago, jbleck said:

i still hate their idea to stop @ 10... 

there are always leaps that one can imagine, develop and release.

 

i mean... do u remember the jump from Win 98 to Win XP, or from XP to 7?

i'm starting to miss that feeling of "awe"

Yep, got the feeling, I've been awed when replaced my DOS with 3.1, then to 95, to 98 SE, to 2000, then XP, XP to 7.

 

But if everyone notice, Android evolved much faster and remarkable rather than Windows, especially these years. I remember still hacking around, porting MIUI (before Xiaomi owns it) because how ugly Froyo, Gingerbread, even ICS was. Many Android vendor had to develop custom UI because how ugly the UI/UX of the stock ROM was.

 

But that changed drastically since Material Design was introduced. I had to admit, it borrowed a lot concepts from *ahem* IOS, but it was a good move. And now, it has evolved very beautifully and guess what: it was the same 5 years since Windows 10 was out. And Windows 10 today is... almost quite the same when it was out.

 

The most drawbacks are Android has not yet developed mature UI/UX for Desktop/Tablet. Back in ICS, they had different UI/UX for tablet (divided notification, dual hand operations, etc.), but it is gone for now, like they still entirely focused for mobile experiences.

 

Once they start focusing on Desktop/Tablet experiences again, and with ARM expansion to desktop, it will be a massive threat to Windows. The only things that keep Windows alive just: legacy applications, legacy servers, games, and some outdated peripherals that only offer Windows drivers. Anything else almost runs on Linux kernel.