To potentially be in a worse place than you started. But, hey, sunk costs and all that. Honestly, what is the savings really going to be after Google cranks up your per-user costs when they have captured enough of your data so that you can't switch back?

Microsoft makes money on Windows and Office because it is good enough for the job and has a decent ROI. It's their core business. Sure, they want you on Azure. But, hey, you want on-premise? Happy to sell it to you as well.

Google Workspace could be left to languish in the dust and it wouldn't affect the bottom line that much. Bonus, all your documents are strung around on their servers.

And no, you aren't getting rid of those spreadsheets anytime soon. They can take full advantage of a local machine and they make sense to the people that use them. It costs less to just keep the machines and licenses up to date versus trying to make an application that is essentially a specific spreadsheet, but has to run on pretty expensive computing resources for no actual gain.

Being able to run a local client on a local copy of a document is a good thing.

Multiple tabs are good. Markdown support is fine. And, of course, just more marketing shoving AI into every crevice.

There is a good OS lurking around in Windows, but, it is buried under too much slop.

Here's hoping a true Pro version becomes a thing.

I use Windows as my daily driver (it is what works best for me and I came from Linux) and AI is a big distraction for them. The CEO has become obsessed with AI and how them not being leader threatens the whole company and is pushing AI where it doesn't want to be and where nobody wants it.

Eroding Windows and Office with AI slop is a much, much larger threat to actual business model than OpenAI, et al. will ever be. Microsoft is fortunate that they have the opportunity to go backwards (with a few new things and fixes) to keep market share.

Making a much less-sucky Windows Pro isn't hard. Fix backup and update image backup and restore. Undo the dumbing down of OneDrive; don't sync any folders by default, but allow sync of any folder. Allow local accounts, make OneDrive and Copilot anything opt-in via installing from the store (or winget). Get any web stuff out of the shell whenever possible. Get Control Panel replaced with a workable solution.

Way easier and cheaper than gluing in AI slop willy-nilly, I would think.

While it is easy to hop on the bandwagon, this isn't an issue that strikes at the heart of the shell. It was a set of app packages that didn't get setup in time. There's already a workaround (run a script to register the packages). A notable mistake, but not a fundamental flaw.

Microsoft management buying into way too much AI hype; that will ruin Windows and Office. They have to hope there are enough developers to keep the AI rot at arms length so they can just remove it and you know, just make things work better?

Java is adopting a lot of C# features, with varying success[1]. As such, more developers are seeing the advantages of those features so why not just use C# where it is way more refined. The cross-platform story is pretty complete. The runtime and the tooling. VS Code works. IntelliJ fans have Rider. The dotnet command tool does the things you need it to.

Some things in Java are just clunky. Building and package management can really become a nightmare. You have choices where you don't really want them.

Microsoft is doing a better job stewarding the platform than Oracle, and as unpopular as Microsoft can be, it is nothing compared to the ill will that Oracle has brought. Microsoft has unhappy customers; Oracle has paying prisoners. The main challenge Microsoft has to overcome is the older versions of the platform itself. As an example, some developers think Entity Framework only works with SQL Server. That was never the case. EF Core works swimmingly with a lot of databases, with Postgres support becoming a notable highlight.

[1] Choices like type-erasure for generics, not having auto boxing and unboxing really makes for some clunky APIs. You have things like

IntStream mapToInt()

C# has

IEnumerable<T> Select(...)

where T can be int, string, whatever. Async and await alongside IO libraries that are non-blocking by default is another win. Sure, function coloring, but it's been a feature for ten years and it just works.

They have a massive supercomputer initiative that allows them to understand how to maintain the actual fissile materials and the elements that set up them off effectively via a highly complex computer simulation. Been working on it for 30+ years.

You don't need direct testing to keep MAD in place because betting somebody else's stuff is broken and yours isn't doesn't add up. You can't even even fade a "failed test" because it might be a bluff to draw you out.

This is just another distraction tactic.

So, engineers don't have the same skill set as marketers.

Well, I'll be damned.

Of course, every project starts on a completely even playing field and having access to certain networks and resources has nothing to do with initial success in the area. It's just down to marketing. Wait, how do I find good marketing people...

You have to get lucky. You do need to work just to roll the dice, Some people have to do *way less* work to get that first roll and they aren't the business experts they think they are.

So, the most popular language is one that will no longer bootstraps itself in any significant anyway (remember, PyPy is a thing).

TypeScript creates JavaScript, that code uses an engine and the engines for JavaScript aren't in written in JavaScript. However, the TypeScript compiler was written in TypeScript.

Emphasis on was. It is being ported to Go to address fundamental performance issues. And, yet, if you have a concern about the size or performance of any web app or application based on Electron and the like, you are just out of touch with the new realities. Not that you could find programmers to write native apps these days anyway.

Reinventing the wheel is a given and is even acceptable if the new wheel isn't fundamentally worse than the last version. But, here we are.

It is tiring to hear the executives that are clearly so out of touch with the day to day realities of programming demanding anything out of a workforce. Doubly so for reinforcing the amount of money sloshing around because "AI is the best".

If there was even a hint that AI could provide real, sustainable gains in productivity, you wouldn't have to tell the workforce to use it, they'd being using it already.

And nothing will provide 500% gains. Essential complexity still exists, AI does nothing to address that.

All this is pressuring workers to do more with even less time because if they don't, the big AI will take your job.

The whole economic model here is clearly to reduce the number of entry-level programming positions with the notion that eventually, you don't need very many programmers at all and the labor market that is left will be captive.

When that doesn't work (and it is very likely that it won't), there will be cries for more workers, outsourcing and visas because the pipeline for newer talent dried up again. Which will lead to unreasonable salary demands for so called "rockstars" until the next bust cycle.

Software developers refuse to organize for consistent, reasonable long term salary growth thinking that they will always be the next one to cash out big and never the person that gets laid off. And so the cycle continues...

Firstly, requiring physical access is a massive barrier. You'd have to have a massively lucrative target to even risk trying to find what machine in a data center to (reading an article)...

Put in a device that sits between the memory and the CPU. Yea, nobody is going to notice somebody replacing all the memory in a machine with some random parts. Oh, of course that doesn't mess with the signaling at all and the BIOS will post perfectly with some janky ribbon cable setup.

And then, just sent the data via cellular internet from inside a metal box inside a metal box inside a big old building? Just hope nobody notices a random extra CAT 6 sticking out randomly from the box?

Look, research is all good, but security also lives in a practical context and I doubt Intel or AMD are really worried about this at all.

Sure, the tariffs are doing their work here, but it's not just that.

If you have to go to one and only company to make your products, you are at the mercy of what they want to charge you and they will extract as much profit out of you as possible. TSMC is almost in that position right now and Intel is the best hedge against that happening. So what if some of this is government pressure to keep advanced fabs in the US. Fine by me.

The real wrinkle here is when for demand for AI compute contracts (or just collapses) and there becomes a big glut in fab capacity. I understand I am saying when here just to be hopeful, but so be it.

Not that data ownership and control isn't a big issue that needs to be addressed. It is.

The issue is how social media has injected itself into our culture. So many people, without a single thought, document their day to day in the form of text, photos and videos with no thought to why and to what the consequences are. Because they have been trained to do so. To support levels of consumerism that are not sustainable in the long term.

The solution is sociological. We have to put social media and related technology at a proper distance. Banning access to smart phones in schools is a start. It needs to be coupled with a lot of media literacy, parental and governmental support to reduce and largely eliminate the usage of social platforms by those under 18.

And no, this isn't about unworkable laws for age verification. We have to break some fundamental patterns here. Because the impact on our overall health and functioning as a society as a whole is being negatively impacted to a degree we can't ignore.

The work structure isn't sustainable. Sure, China may have outlawed the practice just to look good to the rest of world, but it could also be because it will destroy your workforce. It will make them ill and will kill them prematurely.

Or, they get organized and some heads start rolling down the streets. Always a possibility.

Well, for a few people, they feel more empowered by taking other people's lives. It's the ultimate sense of control. A sense of power that is enabled by access to firearms without necessary background checks and ongoing certification and training.

Are their campaigns on how to recognize when you aren't able to use a firearm safely because of your emotional state? Mental health resources to call to help you de-escalate and manage your emotions better? Laws that would allow people to report their concerns to authorities so that intervention could occur?

Never mind resources that would help you with those things before you ever thought about getting a gun or getting access to one, because feelings are for snowflakes, I guess.