
Why is there still a registry in Windows 7? - Flemlord
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2351198,00.asp
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thinkzig
"If anything will drive people to Linux, it will be this Registry-centric
architecture of Windows."

Wait... what?

This whole article is laying things on a bit thick, but this quote is
especially hard to swallow.

The two groups of people that primarily buy Windows are individual consumers,
like my dad, and corporate IT decision makers, like my boss.

I can't imagine either man saying to me, "I'd love to stay with Windows but
its damn Registry-centric architecture is something I just can't get past.
It's sure making Linux look pretty attractive."

There are plenty of legit reasons for choosing or not choosing to use Windows.
I have a hard time swallowing that its Registry-centric architecture is high
on most people's lists.

~~~
tokenadult
But might your dad (or your boss) say that the upgrade to Windows 7 is so
troublesome that they might just as well switch to Linux? I've been amazed at
how easy a switch to Linux (by other family members) has been in some cases I
have observed.

~~~
wvenable
Switching to Linux is as easy as switching to Windows 7 -- both options
require reinstalling your operating system and all your applications.

~~~
tptacek
Switching to Win7 doesn't require you to _give up_ all your applications.

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ams6110
"Microsoft has a problem—the whole industry has a problem. Everyone needs
Windows 7 to be a huge success. In the past week, even Intel has been
bemoaning the fact that nobody is upgrading machines like they used to."

I really don't think this has anything to do with Windows 7 specifically.
What's happening is that PCs have reached the point where even a machine
that's a few years old running Win2003 is entirely adequate to do the things
most people and businesses want a PC to do: run Office, read email, watch
YouTube, surf the net.

The value-added argument is just no longer convincing for many consumers,
especially in this economy.

~~~
rbanffy
"Everyone needs Windows 7 to be a huge success."

Well... I sure don't. In fact, I wish it fails big and drives the market
towards greater diversity.

But that's me.

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dasil003
I clicked the link because I was interested in the topic. Then I saw Dvorak
wrote it and I had to close it with extreme prejudice. Dvorak is one of those
writers that I consider hostile to intelligent discourse. He is a master troll
who knows how to get page views by making people who understand the things
he's talking about waste thousands of man hours formulating pointless
rebuttals. If he could be banned from Hacker News it would be in everyone's
best interest.

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windsurfer
Backwards comparability? Windows is a platform. If Microsoft revamped the
whole thing, it would turn into a whole new platform.

And as a side note, Gnome has gconf. That's an awful lot like the registry,
just with XML and directories.

~~~
donw
Apple did this, with OS X. Microsoft could easily do this, and write the
compatibility layer to allow 'legacy' applications to continue running for the
next N years.

They don't have the balls to take the risk, though.

~~~
sigfrid3141
Actually, I think MS's approach here is riskier. By not providing an upgrade
path and admitting up front that many things will break they are essentially
saying "OK XP users, you will have to do a clean format, reinstall everything,
and it will be a pain, but it is worth it because of how amazing Win7 is."
Providing a compatibility layer requires fewer balls because people have to
make less effort to switch.

~~~
daemin
Firstly since when is upgrading any OS while skipping a version easy to do?
It's even difficult in Linux from what I've seen and experienced.

Secondly there's a migration tool available on the install DVD which saves all
of your documents and application settings, meaning that you don't have to
spend a lot of time configuring your applications again.

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tokenadult
"At some point, maybe soon, the Registry will be the death of Windows. At some
point people will simply refuse to go through this sort of upgrade process to
accommodate what is essentially a mediocre architecture based on ideas from
the 1980s."

If I remember correctly, the story of how the Registry was invented (for the
first version Windows NT) was told in the book Show Stopper!: The Breakneck
Race to Create Windows NT and the Next Generation at Microsoft by G. Pascal
Zachary. The rationale for the registry didn't inspire confidence (in me) at
that time, and now the registry seems to be an idea whose time has passed.

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zokier
Imho he doesn't make a lot of sense. First, he is claiming that Windows 7
breaks more backward compatibility than previous Windowses. I find it very
hard to believe that Vista->7 upgrade would break more applications than
XP->Vista, especially at the time when Vista was released.

Secondly, he is saying that registry hinders portability of applications.
Well, that's kinda true, but on the next paragraph he is already promoting
Linux-based systems as alternative.

Just try to install an application on usual Linux OS and then move it to
another system, with all configuration data. Just for extra fun, install it
originally with classic configure-make-make install-method, lose the source
tree and move it another distro (or different version of same distro).

Registry may not be perfect, but it isn't that bad either. Worst part is that
many applications abuse it a lot, causing all kinds of problems, but would
flat configuration files really solve the problem of misbehaving apps?

If registry would be bit more organized, and had some inline documentation it
actually would be much better.

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mhansen
There is still a registry, because the registry is still a great idea.

Dvorak argues that the registry is 'a pile of junk clogging up the machine'.
The registry is a tree data structure - more nodes won't 'clog it up', it'll
still take the same number of operations to get anywhere in the tree

~~~
didroe
Yeah, the registry is great. It would be much better though if the data was
stored in application specific data files. They could still provide a unifying
API but make it really easy to remove an application.

~~~
j_baker
Correct me if I'm wrong, but it wouldn't really be a registry then, would it?

~~~
didroe
Depends on what your definition of _registry_ is. If the current registry is
stored in two non consecutive disk blocks (due to fragmentation), is that
still a registry? Think of per application files as disk blocks, with the
registry API caching those into memory and operating as if it was a single
database.

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derefr
It sounds like the author of the article is pining for NeXT/OSX App bundles,
though he doesn't seem to know they exist. Anyway:

The Registry in windows was a /proc-alike database for twiddling system and
driver settings, except slightly smarter in that it was automatically
persisted to disk. Application-writers hijacked it to store their own
applications' settings. At this point, if HKLM/Software and HKCU/Software were
just transparently transformed into configuration files stored in the user's
Profile folder, I don't think any harm would be done. The rest of the
registry, though, is actually centralized by necessity (though you could argue
that nodes for the kernel and the shell should probably live in separate
hives.)

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bjmarte
Wow. I always knew Dvorak was insane but this is insane++. I don't even know
what he is talking about:

1) Is he talking about the upgrade path from XP to Windows 7?

2) Does he know that there is an upgrade path from Vista to Windows 7?

3) Does he know that all three versions use the registry so it clearly has no
impact on upgrade paths?

4) Is he advocating that microsoft make smaller changes in order to provide an
upgrade path to older versions or is he advocating they make bigger, breaking
changes like getting rid of the registry?

5) Is somebody checking his pill box to see if he took his medicine? Because I
am sincerely worried for his health.

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jsares
I've been using the RTM and so far I plan on installing XP on my newish
notebook that came with Vista. My biggest issue with Vista is the way it keeps
pinging the hard drive:

[http://forums.techarena.in/windows-vista-
performance/974285....](http://forums.techarena.in/windows-vista-
performance/974285.htm)

I could never get it to stop completely and it runs down the battery and
causes extra noise and heat. And its the same thing with Windows 7.

I'm going to pay $140 for a XP 64bit license. I would love to downgrade but MS
doesn't offer that for Vista Home.

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j_baker
The idea that Microsoft could remove the registry without breaking millions of
applications is a pipe dream. Say what you will about Microsoft's love of
backwards compatibility, but they'd lose customers if half of your
applications broke with Windows 7.

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TFrancis
How about using GUID as another namespace on top of registry's key value?

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ori_b
Why? Compatibility.

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calcnerd256
Wait a sec, this is a Dvorak article. Oh, you got me; clever.

~~~
DOA
IMHO the reason people never give upgrading OSX a second thought is the
learning curve. Apple does not change where things are for no reason.
Microsoft seems to be supporting bloated IT departments with needless changes
to system setting menus. Someone has to learn and then teach where they were
moved. Case in point: My Mom (82 years old) upgrades her Mac with every OS
apple comes out with and never misses a step. Her needs are quite similar to
my Wifey who teaches yearbook at the local school. Both use Photoshop,
excessively email, make slide shows and albums. Wifey is running XP because
Vista required learning new places for the same old or slightly upgraded
settings. I doubt she will change to Vista until Microsoft forces her to for
the same reason. You can guess who is having a good user experience.

