Microsoft's Build 2012 developer conference sells out in an hour | Hacker News Reader

Microsoft's Build 2012 developer conference sells out in an hour

zdnet.com

36 pointsmarcieoum22 comments

Crazy prediction- they announce Windows 9 here.

My thinking?

1) In order to compete with iOS, OSX and Android, Windows has to move to a yearly release schedule.

2) Rather than sell boxed copies of Windows for $119 every 3 years, why not sell an upgrade from the previous version for $40 every one year?

3) Only supporting upgrades from the previous version would push a steeper upgrade curve, which allows developers to target the newer features (as it is now, Windows developers have to wait eons to leverage new features).

4) Windows Phone team was able to do it. Normally I'd say that Microsoft is too slow to adapt, but the Windows Phone team was able to do it, so I won't count out the Windows 8 team.

So, why announce Windows 9 at Build?

The current $40 Win8 upgrade (from XP, Vista, Win7) expires January 31st. My guess is that Microsoft wants to get everyone on board to Windows 8 then do upgrades only from Win8 to Win9.

To do this, they need to announce Win 9 before the upgrade to Win 8 expires- tell everyone to upgrade ASAP or they'll have to pay full price for Win9.

It's just a hunch though. If not Build, then CES. But my understanding is that they're not participating in CES anymore.

Odd.

1. As a developer I feel that would be a disincentive for me to start developing for Win8 when Win9 is in the pipeline just a few months away. Which one do I actually develop for?

2. Win8 is unproven. I couldn't imagine Win9 would be in a stable enough conceptual stage for it to make sense for them to announce it. They haven't even received wide consumer feedback on Win8 yet and so many things are still up in the air with the OEMs it seems.

If anything it could be Win8.5 -- some cool new additions but 90% of the foundation is the same.

An 8 SP1 release is definitely a strong possibility (but not as fun to theorize!).

I'd say that the largest hole in my theory is that Microsoft has fairly high support standards- something like supporting the OS for 10 years after release. If they release a new version every year then that makes patching and support an absolute nightmare. Service Packs since they are free do not (AFAIK) extend the support life of the product.

I disagree with the developer aspect- you target what customers have, but keep an eye on what's coming up. Same thing goes for iOS and OSX developers. As it is now with the Windows ecosystem, it takes eons after the OS is released to actually have enough traction to make sense targeting it.

>Rather than sell boxed copies of Windows for $119 every 3 years, why not sell an upgrade from the previous version for $40 every one year?

But would people actually upgrade? I think for the general population the current OS is "good enough", why would they pay $40 to break something that works perfectly? (Non-techies _hate_ updates)

>In order to compete with iOS, OSX and Android, Windows has to move to a yearly release schedule.

Maybe they'll just update the "metro" portions every year? Just the UI while keeping everything underneath the same?

>But would people actually upgrade?

Yeah, that's the question. Only supporting upgrades from the previous version puts the pressure on- want Win9 but don't care about Win8? Well, if you upgrade to Win8 for $40 then Win9 is another $40 upgrade. Otherwise it's gonna be $120 to go straight to Win9.

Also- the $40 number is just based on the current Win8 upgrade price.

I am not sure whether non-techies hate updates. What they hate are _update pains_. And those are larger when you update your software every few years and not all 300 days.

The biggest problem for Microsoft is that they serve the business market as well, where every update has to be checked for compatibility, but that can be solved by long term service releases.

I am not sure whether the parent is right, but I wouldn't rule it out.

They don't have to announce any new products. If you look at the current Microsoft ecosystem, there are a huge number of product releases happening now; Windows 8, Server 2012, VS 2012, Powershell 3.0, etc... If you are in a Windows development shop or corp, there's an insane amount of new material to evaluate this year. Very little sleep for some over the next several months.

The windows phone team would be more impressive if they supported existing models.

I bet a lot of people just wanted to come along in case they get a free Surface or Windows Phone 8 at the end. ;)

As for the success of Windows 8, I think it's simply not possible to estimate how well it'll be received by the average Win7 user. Microsoft is releasing so much new stuff this year - most or all of it designed to work together - that I don't think it's valid to look at just one thing (eg the 'schizophrenic'-style UI of Windows 8/RT) and claim that because it's not awesome, the whole new direction that Microsoft is taking will invariably set them on a downhill path.

The data simply aren't in yet. It'll be an interesting 6-ish months before we'll see how this multi-billion dollar experiment will work out.

So much for lack of interest in Windows 8. I'm starting to think Windows 8 is going to be a successful operating system once people get use to the Metro interface.

Don't you mean "Windows 8-Style Interface?"

I think it's "Windows 8 interface". Though I think I'd rather just keep calling it Metro. (Seriously, Microsoft should have told Metro AG to shove it.)

Given the amount of debate around Metro, I don't think people I've discussed with will stop calling it that way.

(BTW isn't that 'Modern UI' lately?)

The fact that the conference quickly sold out doesn't mean anything in my opinion. Developers might have an interest in Metro, but I doubt the public will (on the desktop). I think Windows 7 will remain relevant much longer than XP was/is.

All it takes is 5000 people and the event sells out. Don't forget attendees leave with very expensive swag with them and I expect Microsoft to give away Surface tablets. If that's not enough, Windows 8 will be bundled with just about every PC sold, so, its safe to assume Windows 8 apps will have a market.

Also, they couldn't afford not having it sold out after Google's IO.

I also notice the timing coincides with the expected iPhone 5 launch. Tech media must be struggling to cover both events.

Right. It couldn't possibly be that 5000 people actually wanted to go.

Developer interest and public interest, unfortunately are usually in two different ballparks. I love tilling window managers, but my dear old mother probably wouldn't. Anyhow, my employer just bought passes for all senior and junior developers, so, through a bit of anecdotal evidence here, I bet quite a few developers are only attending through their employer.

>I love tilling window managers, but my dear old mother probably wouldn't.

You'd be surprised. Sure they'd hate to use ratpoison but the concept holds ground. I've heard people ask if Win7 could do Aero Snap all the time automatically.

Yeah, I shown my friend once the use of using Super+Direction to snap it in certain directions, he was hooked. For those that don't have multiple monitors or work on laptops, I'd take tiling Aero/Metro any day of the week.

It's a pretty small venue if they hold it on campus where PDC 2010 was held. I'm guessing 1000 at the most. Not anything like Build in Anaheim last year which held 5000.

I am wondering why is this being discussed on HN today, after 4 days?

Microsoft technologies seem to be surprisingly popular here. It kind of makes sense: releasing early and iterating quickly is a strong theme within startups and the Microsoft stack, while not my favorite one, is familiar to a lot of developers. If it takes you one month to learn and one month to develop a first release on a stack like Rails of Django, you'd still release first if it took you 45 days to develop on a stack your developers are already familiar with.

You still have the challenges of scaling on Windows, but, by then, you already know whether you'll need to.

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