Windows Xp nears End Of Life (THANK GOD!) Zero Day Forever April 8 2014

[realjd]

I use Windows 8, and I can't see why anyone has issues with it. I have zero problems with the OS.

Functionally, Win 8 is fine. It's good and stable. My issues are entirely with the UI. If I can't figure out how to shut down the computer without using Google, there's something broken. It took me 20 minutes to figure out how to set a manual IP address on a Win 8 laptop. Windows 8.1 is better but still suffers from trying to shoehorn a touch OS onto a mouse interface.

Windows 7 was great and it's still what I run at work and on my desktop PC, but I'm very happy with my new MacBook.

[JREwing78]

I work for a provider of IT services for small businesses, so this is pretty much old news for me. We have been migrating end users to Windows 7 since it came out in 2009.

There's nothing wrong with Windows XP - as long as it never goes out to the internet. That's kind of a sticking point for most folks, who regard the internet as the "killer app".

Microsoft has long since exhausted any commercial value from Windows XP. They figure the 31% of the market still on XP won't upgrade until forced to - say, by a flurry of viruses and other malware infecting Windows XP computers. Those who won't upgrade by virtue of being cheap - well, Microsoft figures the "consequences" of not supporting non-paying users is a non-issue.

It's astounding that Windows XP has had the longevity it has - it came out in late 2001. That's longer than many marriages (including mine). Only recently have cars been able to routinely last that long.

Microsoft has made major investments in Windows XP to keep it viable, but it now has more patches in it than a city street in Detroit. They need to expend their energy in making their new operating systems usable.

[Zeffy]

My issues are entirely with the UI. If I can't figure out how to shut down the computer without using Google, there's something broken. It took me 20 minutes to figure out how to set a manual IP address on a Win 8 laptop. Windows 8.1 is better but still suffers from trying to shoehorn a touch OS onto a mouse interface.

Windows 7 was great and it's still what I run at work and on my desktop PC, but I'm very happy with my new MacBook.

Try Classic Shell for Windows 8 - it gives you a Windows 7 taskbar with full functionality and look and feel of the Windows 7 one. But yeah, when I tried to shut it down without it I did have trouble finding it (why the hell is it in a settings menu?), which is one of the main reasons I eventually made a shortcut to shutdown my PC (along with restart) on my desktop.

[SidS1045]

I would argue that if you have a business-critical program running on DOS that perhaps it's time to get a more up to date program.

There is no later version of this program that functions as its users need it to, and as I stated it is business-critical.

[hotdogPi]

Why is this called "Zero Day"? (as in the thread title)

[J N Winkler]

Why is this called "Zero Day"? (as in the thread title)

It is a reference to zero-day vulnerabilities (i.e., ones which have no patches yet and so are still at "day zero").  The thinking is that when support for XP ends, it will be "zero day forever" for it, since malware authors will be able to reverse-engineer patches for vulnerabilities discovered for other versions of Windows and use the results to attack XP since patches won't be developed for it.

[vdeane]

And, since many vulnerabilities affect multiple versions of Windows, many of these unused flaws being held by malware authors will affect Vista/7/8 as well (though not all of them).

Another point: it's counter-intuitive, but XP actually has more vulnerabilities than Vista and later versions do.  This is because it was engineered in an era when security was an afterthought at best.  Vista particularly was created with security as a primary goal, resulting in operating systems that are inherently more secure than XP ever can be.  It's also a major cause of Vista being perceived as bad - Windows couldn't introduce security concepts that had existed in the Unix world for decades without breaking some backwards compatibility and causing some user annoyance.

There are also a few interface conveniences that exist in Vista+ that don't in XP, like start menu search (which was supposed to obsolete the run command, and is curiously missing from classic shell applications for 8), the shortcut to the "new folder" command in explorer, the explorer "breadcrumbs bar", etc. that make using XP again annoying for me.

I also don't like that 8 removed most of the eye candy that 7 had, but that's a whole different thread (aside from the fact that XP doesn't have said eye candy either).

As for games, if they're old enough to not work on modern Windows versions, they're probably old enough that they could run just fine on a virtual machine hosted on a modern computer.  Business applications that don't have modern equivalents are probably a niche situation and most could probably all have the same solution.  Usually there's an equivalent somewhere, you just have to look for it (although it might have annoyances that the original didn't have).

[corco]

As for games, if they're old enough to not work on modern Windows versions, they're probably old enough that they could run just fine on a virtual machine hosted on a modern computer.  Business applications that don't have modern equivalents are probably a niche situation and most could probably all have the same solution.  Usually there's an equivalent somewhere, you just have to look for it (although it might have annoyances that the original didn't have).

I think the main issue is for large corporations with proprietary software. For instance, the hotel chain that I used to work at's software for managing reservations/accounting/all hotel operations wouldn't run on anything newer than XP, so for them it's a multimillion dollar upgrade to change operating systems because they'll have to rewrite their entire internal operating software suite, so they've put it off as long as possible. That's niche in that there's probably only a handful of companies to which that really applies, but those companies have thousands of computers. Presumably they knew that this day was coming and budgeted for that though, so I don't really feel sorry for them.

[Roadgeek Adam]

I still use Windows XP (was on SP1 or 2 for a long time, put SP3 on in September) because I am trained with this interface and really, for a computer that should've died years ago, this one is doing quite well since we put SP3 on. I tried 8 at a Best Buy in Wayne a few weeks ago, to say the least the UI was driving me nuts because I had no clue what the hell to do.

7 and Vista I've used and while Vista was a nice little upgrade, nothing kept me from XP, which is my favorite of them and still love using it. If something goes wrong, oh well. I ain't upgrading till the computer dies. I should add the fact, despite the fact I am 22, I'm not a techie most of this generation is, just never functioned well with modern tech.

[Duke87]

Windows 3.X runs fine in DOSBox.

Interesting, I would not have thought to attempt that!

Of course, since I no longer have access to a copy of Windows 3.X (thanks mom for throwing all that stuff away without asking me first), it doesn't really matter.

[corco]

I did Windows 3.1 for DOSBox a few years ago- it was fun. You can quasi-legally download Windows 3.11 from most Abandonware sites. I don't think it's ever been technically classified as Abandonware, but Microsoft isn't exactly chasing down the three people who want to have it- it's available for download without having to go to the internet's darkest underbellies.

On a related note, I attempted to install Windows NT 3.5.1 on a laptop not too long ago. It actually worked well- no wireless support or flash or anything but I was able to get an old version of Firefox going on it and get it running on the internet with a calbe.

[bugo]

As for games, if they're old enough to not work on modern Windows versions, they're probably old enough that they could run just fine on a virtual machine hosted on a modern computer.  Business applications that don't have modern equivalents are probably a niche situation and most could probably all have the same solution.  Usually there's an equivalent somewhere, you just have to look for it (although it might have annoyances that the original didn't have).

I think the main issue is for large corporations with proprietary software. For instance, the hotel chain that I used to work at's software for managing reservations/accounting/all hotel operations wouldn't run on anything newer than XP, so for them it's a multimillion dollar upgrade to change operating systems because they'll have to rewrite their entire internal operating software suite, so they've put it off as long as possible. That's niche in that there's probably only a handful of companies to which that really applies, but those companies have thousands of computers. Presumably they knew that this day was coming and budgeted for that though, so I don't really feel sorry for them.

This is true, but Steve Gum thinks it's a great thing.

[Scott5114]

As for games, if they're old enough to not work on modern Windows versions, they're probably old enough that they could run just fine on a virtual machine hosted on a modern computer.  Business applications that don't have modern equivalents are probably a niche situation and most could probably all have the same solution.  Usually there's an equivalent somewhere, you just have to look for it (although it might have annoyances that the original didn't have).

I think the main issue is for large corporations with proprietary software. For instance, the hotel chain that I used to work at's software for managing reservations/accounting/all hotel operations wouldn't run on anything newer than XP, so for them it's a multimillion dollar upgrade to change operating systems because they'll have to rewrite their entire internal operating software suite, so they've put it off as long as possible. That's niche in that there's probably only a handful of companies to which that really applies, but those companies have thousands of computers. Presumably they knew that this day was coming and budgeted for that though, so I don't really feel sorry for them.

I'll do you one better–the slot accounting system at work can only be accessed via some sort of IBM character-cell emulator, which apparently uses Telnet in some fashion based on some error messages it's thrown. That being said, since that's just the client program, we were able to upgrade to Windows 7 okay as far as I'm aware.

[Molandfreak]

"Let's try to make a single user interface to run on all your devices" -the concept of which Windows 8 was born. Don't get me wrong, it is a good idea in theory, but in principle when you use a mouse-keyboard device, it feels very obtuse and unnatural. Though I'm absolutely not an apple fanboy (I love my Alienware aurora with Win7), I do believe they had the right idea of bringing multi-touch concepts to a desktop interface, rather than pushing a tablet OS into non-touchscreen devices (or laptops and desktops in general; touchscreen laptops make my entire arm want to fall off after a while).

[english si]

"Let's try to make a single user interface to run on all your devices" -the concept of which Windows 8 was born. Don't get me wrong, it is a good idea in theory, but in principle when you use a mouse-keyboard device, it feels very obtuse and unnatural.

New Google Maps being a another example of this, though it has improved the UI since I tested it (any .com, rather than .co.uk, link and I have New Maps as they have deleted Classic Maps from the .com servers) and the main problem now is the awful cartography.

[Dr Frankenstein]

I agree with JREwing78; Windows XP, despite being Microsoft most popular and long-lasting OS, is now an ugly heap of patches and isn't worth maintaining anymore. As far as computing technology is concerned, it's obsolete, at least when it comes out of the box. It's gotten ridiculously long to get a new XP install up and running, especially with all those updates.

Like Duke87 said, there's a bunch of virtualization and emulation solutions available. DOS and Win16 apps work well in DOSBox, provided you don't need networking support; and if you do, there are ways to get Windows 3.11 to run in VMware, with Internet access and everything (you just need to spend some time setting up several drivers and updates). Otherwise, most recent versions of Windows run just fine in VMware, VirtualBox, Parallels, qemu, or bochs (if you're a masochist), and most of these have free versions.

By the way, Duke, I have almost all versions of Windows here, from 1.03 to 8-CP. I think I'm only missing Millenium Edition. I even have the original CD of NT 3.51 Beta somewhere.

[SteveG1988]

Those of you who are mad that Xp is dying.

Did you cry when they shut off analog TV?

Did you cry when Analog Cell Phone service was shut down in 2008?

Did you cry when they stopped selling VHS tapes?

Did you cry when windows 95-Me had support dropped in 2006?

Did you cry when it happened to 2000 Pro in 2008?

[corco]

Losing analog TV was fucking annoying for those of us in rural areas that got poor but still watchable reception because suddenly we had no reception- and what did we get out of that? The ability to watch HD over the air in a few major markets? Was anybody actually doing that anyway?

[SteveG1988]

Losing analog TV was fucking annoying for those of us in rural areas that got poor but still watchable reception because suddenly we had no reception- and what did we get out of that? The ability to watch HD over the air in a few major markets? Was anybody actually doing that anyway?

I only lost ABC when I use my antenna. 40 miles from the transmission site

[corco]

So you lost something you had before- that's why people don't like change.

I accept that progress is the price of living in a capitalistic society, and I'd rather have it than the alternatives, but it's important to make sure that the progress is actually useful progress.

[SteveG1988]

So you lost something you had before- that's why people don't like change.

I accept that progress is the price of living in a capitalistic society, and I'd rather have it than the alternatives, but it's important to make sure that the progress is actually useful progress.

THe problem is that 6ABC stuck on the VHF band instead of going to UHF, the limitations of VHF-DT were known, nobody knows why they didn't switch to UHF

[english si]

Did you cry when they shut off analog TV?

The switchover made our signal suck (it's now OK now it's completely done), having had digital TV for years before. However I didn't cry, as we got cable out of the loss of TV signal* and our 'unlimited' internet putting a cap on us and us struggling to keep it, even with heavily limiting usage (no streaming or downloading video or music).

Our complaints with the TV were much better received than our complaints when the internet company told us we would be capped for using too much, despite paying for unlimited internet, and when they complained that we were still using too much and were going to bill us more for breaking the cap. TV switchover people simply apologised and sent someone over to have a look, whereas Internet people just yelled at us, even when we agreed to pay half-as-much-again for their fastest broadband, even though we got nowhere near half the speed that we were currently paying for. We dropped them as soon as our contract ended.

*Ironically the change they made was designed to give people better signal on a multiplex that we had good signal on, but we lost it. We also lost a multiplex that we were supposed to have 'strong' signal for, but was always a little iffy. From all the channels, we dropped to half the channels.

[NJRoadfan]

Did you cry when they stopped selling VHS tapes?

The local Best Buy and office supply stores still stock VHS and cassette tapes.

[vdeane]

As for games, if they're old enough to not work on modern Windows versions, they're probably old enough that they could run just fine on a virtual machine hosted on a modern computer.  Business applications that don't have modern equivalents are probably a niche situation and most could probably all have the same solution.  Usually there's an equivalent somewhere, you just have to look for it (although it might have annoyances that the original didn't have).

I think the main issue is for large corporations with proprietary software. For instance, the hotel chain that I used to work at's software for managing reservations/accounting/all hotel operations wouldn't run on anything newer than XP, so for them it's a multimillion dollar upgrade to change operating systems because they'll have to rewrite their entire internal operating software suite, so they've put it off as long as possible. That's niche in that there's probably only a handful of companies to which that really applies, but those companies have thousands of computers. Presumably they knew that this day was coming and budgeted for that though, so I don't really feel sorry for them.

XP mode?

[SteveG1988]

Did you cry when they stopped selling VHS tapes?

The local Best Buy and office supply stores still stock VHS and cassette tapes.

They may sell blanks, but you cannot buy pre-recorded films.