Microsoft Archive

Microsoft released their Developer Preview of Windows 8 the other week, aka Windows 8 pre-beta, and some are saying the OS release is “too late,” even as its dubbed pre-release. But as Microsoft continues to improve their operating system, they are under much scrutiny for their “new” aim.

Back in June when Microsoft revealed Windows 8 at the Taipei Computex 2011 in Taiwan, Windows’ President Steven Sinofsky’s demos showed a promising redesign, with the new Windows store and completely new desktop view—but as other systems continue to evolve, Microsoft’s concepts aren’t really new at all—in fact, they’re quite behind what other brands are moving towards.

Criticisms of the new Windows 8 include the picture password login feature, where touch inputs and gesture patterns are used to access, the cloud feature, and their creating a “common class” of software.

On a Windows 8 Beta forum, a business operator for Universal Secure Registry named Kenneth Weiss criticized the new password feature as having major flaws, such as “one can record the touch pattern on the screen from a long distance, so [that] can compromise the security of the system.”

Windows 8 hopes to create a common class of software by transforming handheld games to the PC, which is a cool concept, but “[t]here’s a way to play ‘Angry Birds’ on a PC, but folks seem to have more fun holding it in their hands. Handheld games are handheld because they are handheld. [...] You can’t just expect it to be as functional or as practical; anything that should scale must be redesigned for scalability”

And while their cloud concept is quite obviously utilizable and desirable, “key components of Windows’ original value proposition would be put into play[,] [take for example] [the] many home offices run on Windows because they need to run the same Microsoft Office [...] that’s in their workplace. A fully capable Office Suite in the cloud may (and most likely will) find itself challenged by other fully capable cloud-based suites whose cross-platform nature will make Windows dependency seem like a handicap.”

On a lighter note, the Windows Phone has shown success, as the Windows Marketplace recently hit over 50,000 applications, 17,276 apps uploaded in the last 90 days alone—faster than it took the Android market to reach the 50,000 milestone.

Overall Windows 8 has great contemporary features, but much of them have already been done and are succeeding already in the tablet market, making the February launch somewhat of a “time warp.”

(via Read Write Web; photo via Windows 8 Wallpaper)