Re: Goodbye Windows XP, i still get nistalgic over you.
It's not just dos 16 bit applications, for all I do disagree with you that microsoft should spend the money, to import them into this so called superior new hardware (though if it is so superior why doesn't it do anything better).
Ever since windows vista we've had comments on this forum "whow do I run this game?", "what is happening to vb support?" "so and so runs slowly", "I can't install such and such" etc etc.
The newer versions of windows just seem to cause trouble with the existing corpus of games, particularly with vb6.
Now I'm sure people will say vb isn't being supported by microsoft and so on, but that doesn't help, since the plane fact is there are more things that don't run correctly on windows 7 plus than don't run on Xp. While of course you can run Xp in a virtual machine, well why would I want to run another operating system which will take time to learn if I've got to run xp in a virtual machine anyway?
When a newer operating system actually is worth the trouble and will let me do something better I can't do on Xp, I'll certainly upgrade and take the virtual machine option, but I just struggle to see the real bennifit. Myself I think this won't happen until touch screen support, since that is a positive, absolutely different change which provides a great deal of bennifit to everyday interface use, as well as games etc which you certainly couldn't get on an older os.
About the tablet thing, well again, this seems part of a modern tendency with interfaces I've seen on everything from Iphone to facebook and in Itunes. Instead of letting you customize what information is shown through lists, menus, windows etc, the tendency is to chuck everything at a person at once and have it all sprawling out in one huge clump. For a sighted person this probably is a good thing since it's like having everything layed out on a table and a person can visually track the position of all objects. using a conventional screen reader however it's a pain in the arse since it means tracking things like trees, moving ribbons, morphing contextual information etc which doesn't stay logically similar or have an easily memorable position, as well as often getting you lost in a lot of controls and information you don't! want. Of course, they aren't impossible, but as compared to say a basic list form in windows xp they are far less instantly intuative.
This is where touch screens can be a major bennifit since they allow spacial relationships and quick navigation which isn't possible in such a huge mass of stuff using a conventional screen reader with even a comprehensive ability to move around the screen.
of course, this wouldn't matter if interfaces were customizable, but again, customization in interface doesn't seem to be a priority thes e days anymore than backwards compatibility is, which is again something I blaime microsoft for.
Regarding emulation etc, well frankly yes, I do! expect microsoft to spend thousands on development when it comes to supporting those tools and previous systems such as vb, ms dos etc which have been staples of their own library. Saying "oh use a virtual machine" or "leave it to open source" is frankly lazy, and it's not as if microsoft is a stuggling indi developer with limited time and resources, they're the richest company in the world and thus should theoretically be creating the best product, this is why they can be more readily blamed for not living up to expectations, and especially for trying to force people to buy their cruddy new systems by dropping support for newer hardware, neglecting security etc.
I will say this is one area where Apple score over Microsoft since when they update an os they don't drop everything that ran with the previous ones, ---- about Linux I don't know, though i suspect with so many alternatives backwards compatibility isn't a problem there either.
Now of course, if your a tecky and enjoy playing with computers just for the sake of seeing how they work, it's a different question, and I can appreciate that difference in priorities, though I'm afraid as someone who sees a computer just as a tool for doing various things i'm a little amazed that if all this 64 bit hardware and faster processors and all the rest of it is so much better, why won't it do! anything better.
The differences between vhs and dvd are obvious to anyone, ---- indeed even I! can see the improved picture quality with my severe limitations on eyeballs. I don't know about the current generation, but the differences in production and processor quality between 8, 16, 32 and next gen consoles were also pretty obvious, ---- albeit complexity in graphics meant I was myself unable to take advantage of most of these changes, and that from what I've heard from people who follow gaming developments the technological and software progression has somewhat ground to a halt of late.
Given these changes in areas of technology, I find it actually quite surprising that I can't! see any bennifits in other os, and as I said with windows 7 after our last discussion on this subject I did have a good look, (why I'd also very much like to try out a mac, and intend to when i can).
URL: http://forum.audiogames.net/viewtopic.php?pid=157657#p157657
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