“In its manic bid to keep Windows Vista on track despite constant development delays, Microsoft could cancel its eagerly anticipated Beta 2 milestone and simply utilize Community Technical Preview (CTP) releases until Release Candidate 0 (RC0) is ready in March or April 2006. According to my sources, this plan would allow the company to continue plotting the final release of Windows Vista for the third quarter of 2006,” Paul Thurrott reports for Paul Thurrott’s WinInfo. “Microsoft has now rejiggered the Windows Vista development schedule so many times it’s almost comical.”
MacDailyNews Take: No “almost” qualifier is necessary, Paul; it simply is comical. And “eagerly anticipated?” By whom, exactly? How many people do you know that eagerly anticipate train wrecks? Is it even possible to keep a train wreck “on track?”
Thurrott continues, “But the previous major change, in which Windows Vista Beta 2 was delayed from December 7, 2005 to the end of the year and then until January or February 2006, at least kept all of the products major milestones intact. Now, it’s clear that the company feels it can get the feedback it needs with CTP builds, which are released in a more timely nature than major beta builds… What’s not known, of course, is how this change will affect the public release of a Windows Vista beta build.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Are these constant slips and delays really surprising to anybody? After all, it took Microsoft eleven years to produce an upside down and backwards bad fake of the original Mac OS, so it shouldn’t be too much of a shock that even after they’ve grown rich beyond imagination (monopoly abuse is like printing your own money), it’s still taking them many years (currently over 5 years and counting) to produce a bad fake of Mac OS X.
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Thurrott: Microsoft’s Windows Vista Beta 1 vs. Apple’s Mac OS X Tiger (Part 2) – November 29, 2005
Thurrott: Microsoft’s Windows Vista Beta 1 vs. Apple’s Mac OS X Tiger – August 29, 2005
Thurrott: Apple Macs offer a safer computing experience than Microsoft Windows PCs – July 20, 2005
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If they are pushing this hard to get it out in ’06, that defintely means it won’t be ready to actually use until ’08 (after SP1 or SP2)….
Maybe they should get some of the XBox 360 team to help with the coding. No, hang on they’re needed to remove the bugs from rushing to market too!
MW: ‘turned’ as in MS is about to be in-turned.
But will monkey-boy dance for us when Long-uhhh Short — uhhhh Vista finally is released ???
or …
Will he throw a chair ???
I have it on good authority that Vista’s major new feature …
…… will be to change the color of the of the Blue Screen of Death …
To …. Brown !!
Why don’t they just switch to OS X? M$ had every legal right to do so.
Every time I hear the word “Vista” I touch myself. oohh.
Skipping a second Beta release is pure stupidity at its finest. Only someone who has lived his/her entire professional life in marketing would gamble a major production release without thorough testing just to keep on some unrealistic schedule. I wouldn’t want to ride that missle when they light the fuse!
HEY HEY! Windows Vista has NEVER been delayed! EVER!
Longhorn on the other hand…
<b>Celebrate Windows 20th Anniversary!<b>
http://homepage.mac.com/hogfish/iMovieTheater3.html
Say “Vista” again, Stevie B!!! Uuoohh…
>By whom, exactly? >
Come on MDN, get it right. By who exactly, surely?
Censor that!
Blimey, how many builds do they need exactly? Why not just announce a launch date and get on with it like Apple does. If they would just say the second half of 2006 they would make things a lot easier for themselves, instead of specifying each build date.
ok…let’s hope MSFT implodes
but let’s not forget that they did kick Apples’ butt a few years ago with the NT release
so maybe a little respect
“If they are pushing this hard to get it out in ’06, that defintely means it won’t be ready to actually use until ’08”
Actually i think you are incorrect. I envision one day in mid ’06, a sweaty steve ballmer running through the aisles of Microsoft as a giant ice cream cone melts down his wrist, yelling “Stop working now and go to Golden Master or I’ll f’ing KILL you”
So yeah, it will SHIP in ’06 but it won’t be FINISHED in ’06.
Ron: “by whom” is correct in MDN’s usage. If you can replace it with “him”, you should say “whom”. If you can replace it with “he”, you should say “who”.
When you publish a daily blog read by thousands, we’ll listen to what you have to say. Get a life.
“upside down and backwards bad fake of the original Mac OS”
Which outsells the original 30 to 1 btw. Being first ain’t always being best.
“…it took Microsoft eleven years to produce an upside down and backwards bad fake of the original Mac OS…”
i guess what this really means is that Windows is the “Bizarro World” counterpart of Mac OS…
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http://www.hillcity-comics.com/graphic_novels/new_graphic_novel289.htm
“…outsells the original 30 to 1 btw. Being first ain’t always being best.”
If you’re insinuating that Winblows is better (than nearly any other operating system) because it has greater market share you’re a dumber dumbass than the average dumbass. It’s as if you’re trying to make an argument for mediocrity and that’s just… well… dumbassed.
No matter how crummy or good of a copy of Mac OS X Vista turns out to be, people will buy it or purchase cheap boxes pre-loaded with Vista, feeling smug and superior. Mark my words!
Apple needs to get it’s act together and saturate TV, print and net with ads once they get the Intel chip computers on the market.
If they don’t, we’ll be in pretty much the same shape market wise as now.
So say we all.
When you compare Apple’s successful innovations with Microsoft’s, it’s clear that Microsoft uses doublespeak. Key words like “pipeline” or “innovation” really need to be prefixed by “lack of….” With all the pressure to deliver, Microsoft can’t afford to delay Vista’s release again, but it also can’t afford to deliver a clunker. Well … something has to give, and someone will have to pay for it.
Mac Daddy wrote:
“Skipping a second Beta release is pure stupidity at its finest.”
… or pure desperation at it’s worst. I thought betas were supposed to be a natural part of the development cycle; you shipped what you had for evaluation (versus making it some sort of special release). What you have at beta better be good enough for others to see.
If things are so bad inside MS that they’re eliminating deadlines and cutting development steps… my God. Why doesn’t MS just kill Windows right now, and start using Mac OS X as their platform?
“Only someone who has lived his/her entire professional life in marketing would gamble a major production release without thorough testing just to keep on some unrealistic schedule.”
Only someone leading a very, very sick company could promise the Holy Grail to the world, have the project utterly fall apart, and still keep his job. We’ve went from Longhorn being the cure of all ills, to Vista crumbling into a corporate cut-and-run. How much patience does the world have left for Microsoft’s morass?
Is Vista the next Copland? Is Ballmer the next Amellio? See SB exhort his minions to find a way to shred the fabric of time and space all the while screaming, “If THEY’d never stole that limey Ives’ soul this never would’ve happened! I want Jobs dead! Before he sold Next, Dammit”, While Gates rocks in the corner murmering, “I’ll talk to Linus, yeah, that’s what I’ll do. He’ll know what to do…”
Stay tuned for the next exciting episode of Steve vs: Steve…
With all the time MS is spending on VISTA, I have to wonder WHAT kind of software package it will turn out to be (scary thought here).
If APPLE spent this much time on it, we would have mind control over our home entertainment centers, colonies on Mars, and MS would be an old nightmare.
Vista will be out in the second half of 2006
Analyst will drool enough to cause floodings that make Katherina look like a drizzle
The world will get infested with mosquito’s and other insects
Uncle F will add to the odor by doing his monkey-dance
Beware, the end of the world is near
Send me your money and I’ll pray for your soul
theres one scary thought
How exactly is it possible for all of your betas to be either delayed or cancelled, and still release your final product on time?
Strange thinking going on here…