Will the next Windows be Linux?

Hi Crash, nice to see you here.
All good points, and I for one would be delighted if this happened.

I can certainly believe that the MS developers are massively fed up with supporting such old legacy code. If there's one thing I've learned about software, it's that it almost always gets to a point where the code needs to be scrapped and re-designed. You just can't make old code do something radically different, and expect it to be tidy and maintainable.

Linux is good, Ubuntu in particular is very professional, but even I have to admit that there are areas where it's let down. In my experience, support for some graphics chipsets historically isn't that good, particularly Nvidia, where proprietary drivers were tricky to get working.

So maybe MS putting their weight behind Linux would be the catalyst to create a really outstanding, fully supported and smooth O/S, with all the wrinkles ironed out. I would pay for that. MS certainly has the resources to make that work, supporting all hardware variants.
Over the years Linux has proved itself to be adaptable, with its modular kernel design. In fact the whole system lends itself to being upgraded, and by an open source community. Imagine what could be achieved with the power and resource of a big company like MS.

I was in Best Buy yesterday, and one of the sales folks helping us had a Nokia phone....
I noticed that it was quite snappy and asked him how he liked it....
He said he preferred it over the other smartphone offerings....

but, then, he thinks a MS Surface is a "great tablet" ??

we were there trying to find a video adapter for a 2nd generation Surface to HDMI.... he got it for us, and we are happy.... the Surface belongs to my friend who I help with computer stuff.

Over the years, Windows has become too entrenched in business. Whether those users like it or not, they've made it work and there's no way they can risk abandoning it. Same reason Apple never had a chance of taking over.

Well, if those business installs can somehow 'migrate' to Linux under the guise of an ordinary Windows upgrade, I suppose it's possible... but it's not possible.

I don't think this issue is up to us...

This is so true jef.

Windows is dominant by default. For typical cpu users they see only two options. Apple or microsoft/windows.

I think more cpus need to ship with linux.

One of the biggest advantages with linux is its openness. I think everyone benefits when "everyone" has a voice. If u know what i mea.

A once-unthinkable alliance shows Microsoft is ready to play ball

Linux is open-source. Open-source is free. Red Hat Linux makes $2B, mostly from services that anyone can provide. Microsoft makes $93B mostly from proprietary products. There's no way that Microsoft (or Apple) is going to base its core products on open-source. No way. The stock price would go in the tank.

Adding a Bash shell to Windows empowers developers who need to use Linux tools. Several years ago, Apple wisely added a Bash shell to their proprietary (not Linux-based) Mac OSX, and consequently, such developers have been mostly buying Macs, instead of Windows-PCs. And I'm not talking about a few Linux geeks here or there. Entire engineering departments and big/medium/small software/IT-related companies buy Macs instead of PCs. And then if you're the IT manager for those companies, you might just go ahead and encourage (or mandate) the rest of the sales & marketing people to get Macs also so you only have to support one kind of OS. Microsoft was losing a lot of business by not supporting Bash. Problem solved.

RazzMaTazz said:

Linux is open-source. Open-source is free. Red Hat Linux makes $2B, mostly from services that anyone can provide. Microsoft makes $93B mostly from proprietary products. There's no way that Microsoft (or Apple) is going to base its core products on open-source. No way. The stock price would go in the tank.

Adding a Bash shell to Windows empowers developers who need to use Linux tools. Several years ago, Apple wisely added a Bash shell to their proprietary (not Linux-based) Mac OSX, and consequently, such developers have been mostly buying Macs, instead of Windows-PCs.

Click to expand...

Well actually Apple did a heck of a lot more than that. Sixteen years ago they changed the whole of Mac OS to be a UNIX based OS, not just a Bash shell. Steve Jobs coming back to Apple bringing NeXTSTEP with him, that's what happened. That's why it's called "OS X", to emphasis the UNIX base, and the difference from "classic" Mac OS. However what goes on with the OS X GUI is completely proprietary of course, but it is X11, X Windows compatible.

And here's the Apple open source for the Mach kernel, Darwin. BSD, etc. Which OS X and iOS does use.
https://www.opensource.apple.com/
...and FYI
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darwin_(operating_system)

I have to agree with RazzMaTazz on this. Microsoft can see there's a lot of application development going on that's done through a Bash shell so folding one into Win10 is just a way to keep developers from leaving Windows. This isn't Microsoft conceding anything to Open Source, it's just a move that's just a part of its documented history of vendor lock-in.

"Will the next Windows be Linux?" No. Not in the sense of a Windows-looking Linux distribution like Ubuntu, Fedora, Mint, et al.

"Will MS adopt a Linux kernel and bury it in proprietary code?" It's possible. But that would be a massive effort (like the NT revamp) so I won't hold my breath. As an end-user I don't sense any UNIX/BSD kernel advantage in the Mac OS over Windows.

I wouldn't read much into the addition of Bash to Windows.

It's very doubtful Microsoft will be moving away from its NT backbone any time soon. It's one thing to look at MS changing over to a Linux kernel from a consumer's point of view but from a business viewpoint that just isn't logical. Microsoft's dominance in corporate IT is still very, very strong and while Linux may be the top dog in big iron servers, in typical web servers, in SAAS (Software ss a Service), and its on the verge of taking over IoT (Internet of Things), all the big money is still tied into corporate contracts. The consumer market is huge but it's still dwarfed by corporate money. Online services and mobile devices are rapidly growing and steadily eating into MS's long-time cash cows, Windows and MS Office, but it's not like Microsoft is struggling to make money. Despite Microsoft's failure to get into the mobile market the fact is big business just can't change it's IT foundation in a timely fashion. It's one thing for a household with maybe a dozen at most devices to make a change, it's another thing when it's a matter of changing over hundreds of thousands of devices along with the infrastructure their networked into. Lots of companies are run off of Windows Servers, locked into Microsoft's proprietary Exchange, along with countless amounts of data tied into Microsoft's SQL databases. (... and don't ever forget these technologies are by design not openly compatible with similar, competing technologies.) For any company looking into migrating its IT to Open Source solutions as a long term way to save money and run more efficiently, there are dozens that will continue to retain their commitments to Microsoft and its NT-based systems. It's a complicated, expensive process that will rarely occur without problems. Change will eventually happen, it's just not going happen for several years. Even an entire nation like S. Korea, a leader in Asian tech, had spent decades crippling itself by basing its networking infrastructure on the IE and ActiveX. It was only last year, 2015, that there was real progress in upgrading past such outdated technology.

Microsoft working with Linux.

Oil mixing with Water.

One concern I have: Will increased popularity increase the malware risk?

Hands on with Ubuntu on Windows 10