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Friday, November 6, 2009
Windows 7, Same As It Ever Was
Many years ago in some discussions with Microsoft I was asked what they should do to get companies to upgrade from Windows 2000 or 2003 to Windows 2007, I don't recall exactly, but the answer was the same from me.
Make it an in place solution and they will follow, like IBM does with Domino.
Now it is true, you may be out of luck if trying to install Domino 8.5.1 on a Windows 2000 server(it works, but unsupported) as one client found.
But this is a rare case. After all, that OS is now +/- 9 years old .
But every Domino version in memory just installs over itself, from version to version. Like any product should. Exchange however needs an OS refresh first.
Now look at Windows 7 and what do we, as consumers at home get? An error message when we try to update our XP machines to Windows 7. And it then proceeds to tell you there is no path from XP to Window 7.
You know this already, but what do you tell consumers? Buy new equipment? In truth it is probably cheaper in many ways to do so.
Microsoft still doesn't get the fact that the reason so many people stayed on Windows and Exchange 2000 or 2003 is the headache and cost of doing what could be a simple upgrade.
The IBM way for Domino makes it so simple, I even did a video of a server being updated in 3 minutes. If Microsoft had done that, where would the apple commercials be? And where would the majority of the world?
IBM continues to win customers by showing how resources can be used, not wasted, to build productive environments that can be maintained for years to come.
Corporations and individuals do not have an IT "Old Age Home" where they maintain extinct Operating Systems and other software just in case they need old data. Some keep those machines running forever, but at what cost? My data, as I have said many times, is still accessible to me just like it was in 1993 when I first started using Lotus Notes.
That is Data Mining.
Nice reference to "The Talking Heads" but the reason for my post ... I am compelled to chortle after reading this Keith. I am, as I type, watching two of our MS Windows Admins scratch their craniums pondering the fact that MS Exchange 2003 can't install on an older W2K server and they are now looking at migrating to W2K-3 or right to Windows 7. Oh, the joy! :-)
ReplyDeleteYes, for most of us it's really easy to upgrade a domino server, but for what reason even in the yellow cloud so many companies stuck with their old version <= 7?
ReplyDeleteI think one point is, that even after 2 (?) years the development stage and complexity of the "standard" client still stops a lot of upgrade efforts.
Peter
Didn't even think of the Talking Heads at the time. But hey it is a reality that Microsoft has put some of us through.
ReplyDeleteAs to client updates, there are many reasons for it, and I have discussed some in the past.
There is no excuse for not upgrading ones servers. Really, it's not that big of a deal....just test it first of course.
Clients to get updated requires hardware: disk space, ram.
Defined upgrade path, smart upgrade, a website, at login, via some 3rd party software, Citrix, auto-updates, restarts, ids, passwords and a million other reasons.
You will update Windows which is a bigger PITA so don't say it's about the Eclipse side.