
After Announcing Plans To Destroy Microsoft Windows, HP CEO Pulls A Gutsy Move - circa
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/announcing-plans-destroy-microsoft-windows-011240408.html
======
rayiner
Who cares what software it runs, the interesting thing here is the memory:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memristor](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memristor).
If they manage to bring this to market, it'll really turn around their
reputation as a company that's lost its R&D roots and become just another
clone manufacturer. That's the bigger strategic move here: creating product
differentiation using technology your competitors don't have.

~~~
jarrett
I care if it runs a Unix-like operating system. As an engineer, my life is
made so much easier when standard Unix stuff is available. And I'm rather
miserable when I have to rewrite something to account for the absence of
standard Unix stuff.

For end-users, a Unix-like system can be perfectly usable. OS X runs on
Darwin, which has slightly less Unix support than I'd prefer, but still waaaay
more so than Windows. Ubuntu is, in my opinion, just as easy for the non-
technical to learn as Windows or OS X.

Given the benefits to developers, and the absence of a downside for end-users,
I see no reason not to root for Unix on The Machine.

Now, it doesn't have to use the Linux kernel, GNU utilities, or any of the
other familiar building blocks. It just has to _act_ like systems that do.

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adwf
I don't think this is really a plan to destroy Windows. Sounds more like
they're just working on the open source OSs because it's easier to do while
the Machine is still largely theoretical.

If it does ever come to market, I'm sure they'll end up working with Microsoft
in some form to create something together. But that requires all sorts of
legal business agreements, which you can completely avoid in the early stages
by working on own-brand or open-source systems.

~~~
melling
Are these going to be expensive server computers? I would think so for the
first several years. They must be high-margin machines for HP to throw money
at it.

Anyway, what kind of a market would there be for Windows in this market?
There's a Windows supercomputer OS but it don't think it's used much, for
example.

~~~
adwf
Well if it's as revolutionary as the hype suggests, they could be looking at
all market segments. Given that they're working on an Android version, they
must at the very least be thinking of its possibilities on mobile.

But you're right on the the server front. If that's the way they're going,
then I doubt Windows will get much of a look-in (unless MS make it
themselves).

EDIT: I guess a lot of this boils down to whether they'll be going with a
standard open system like exists in the current PC market. Or whether they'll
be locking the hardware like Apple. If it's the former, then anyone can make
an OS to fit.

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noonespecial
I don't want a "brand new operating system _based_ on Linux". I just want it
to _be_ Linux.

When companies say stuff like this it usually just means their gonna help
themselves to all of the great free stuff everyone contributed and then make
their machine a thorn in the community's side with all kinds of binary blob
drivers that only work with one kernel/release.

~~~
shirro
From a familiarity point of view so do I but progress in operating systems and
languages hasn't moved on much for decades. Linux is the pragmatic solution
for now and for some time to come but if my kids' kids are still using vim on
a unix-like system to create software in a c-like language for an Intel
compatible CPU architecture I am happy to entertain the possibility that we
may have fucked up somewhere.

We badly need a Xerox Parc again doing stuff because they can and not because
they must. So much technology came out of places like that and Bell Labs and
we seem to have lost that.

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acomjean
HP-UX? Hps unix variant. It had some good features and some odd issues. One of
my least favorite OSs.

HPUX did have an add-on (Real Time Extensions?) to allow you to disable
processor interrupts on select processors providing almost realtime
mainframe(superdome) computing (some system calls were verboten in this mode).
Of course a crash would mean a reboot. Grouping processes to processor sets
(psrsets) was kind of neat.

So they did try and its not like they didn't have experience with OS
development before. Starting with Linux is probably a better bet for them.

~~~
gaius
HPUX is _light years_ ahead of Linux on workload management, seriously. HP
have an amazing portfolio of OSs, HPUX, OpenVMS, Domain/OS, NonStop, etc.
Linux is the lowest common denominator, in 2014 it's barely where these were
in 1994...

~~~
viraptor
I think your post needs a use case qualifier.

[For some server work] Linux is the lowest common denominator, in 2014 it's
barely where these were in 1994...

What's the status of nvidia graphics support on all of those systems? Or
laptop suspend support?

~~~
Aloha
I'd argue that's the problem with Linux, its trying very much to be all
things, to all people, rather than a really good desktop system, a really good
server system or a really good mobile system.

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stackcollision
I've never used a piece of software from HP that I've thought was of any
quality. We use several of their enterprise development tools where I work,
due to an ancient contract and some political contrivances, and nobody is
happy with them.

And don't even get me started on their printer ride-alongs. It's just a
printer, HP. I don't need 10 programs to use it.

~~~
monksy
What were the enterprise tools?

~~~
cgio
I guess hpqc for quality control

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outside1234
What, its not going to run PalmOS?

I think someone should remind Meg that 70% of Enterprises run their
infrastructure on Windows.

Also, their laptops are terrible. Can they fix the stuff they already have?

~~~
tormeh
They run the computers with screens on Windows. All the servers and rack-
mounted stuff is mostly Linux these days, as far as I know.

~~~
outside1234
70% of Enterprise servers are Windows.

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jmpe
HP's claim isn't rediculous if you consider that they're not developing
memristor tech to replace flash storage. They want to unify mass storage
drives with DRAM. You do need an O.S. that can be partially rewritten, because
the system can remain in the state where you switched it off. Richard Stanley
Williams is the name to Google if you want insight into their roadmap.

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ianstallings
They make good hardware, usually. As for software? We shall see. I think
they'll forgive us if we say we've heard this all before.

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jordan0day
"operating system research which we think has been dormant or stagnant for
decades"

Is as much of a dig on unix/linux as windows, is it not?

~~~
rbanffy
It's a sad fact that the two dominant OSs these days are a copy of Unix and
the bastard child of VMS.

I'd love to see some fresh approaches to this old problem.

~~~
kyberias
Oh, the old comparison of Windows NT and VMS. I never thought that was fair by
a long shot. Are there some actual real evidence of NT/VMS similarities other
than some of the original team members?

EDIT: So you "really don't like Microsoft much". Maybe that's all I need to
hear.

~~~
mhurron
[http://everything2.com/title/The+similarities+between+VMS+an...](http://everything2.com/title/The+similarities+between+VMS+and+Windows+NT)

The similarities between VMS and Windows NT

DEC thought they were pretty similar.

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ihaveone
Linkbait. Windows would have to be re-coded, which is easier with open-source.

~~~
rbanffy
Not quite.

Windows, like Linux, assumes a certain architecture: one or more processors
connected to volatile memory that holds transient data and much slower
persistent storage that is required to preserve a consistent state for long
periods.

You don't see "Windows for D-Wave computers" and you won't see "Windows for
HP's The Machine".

Any new OS will have to, at least, have a POSIX API if it wants to be used
from day one, but, from that point, HP is free to invent.

I wish them luck.

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laydros
This is link bait. HP is just doing what we used to do until the 90's, making
an OS tied to the hardware to optimize things. They have done this before.

Banks are still heavily run off of mainframes and IBM Power servers that
aren't standard x86 running Windows or GNU/Linux.

This isn't a plan to destroy Windows, I expect most of the market that would
be interested in "the machine" is currently running a mainframe or some unix
variant/clone right now.

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blahshaw
Seems like a pretty sensational article. Using open-source technology is not
an attempt to "destroy Windows," and I wouldn't classify memristors as "new
technology," since they've been around since 2008 [1].

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memristor](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memristor)

~~~
noedig
Memristors are new technology considering that you can't buy a computer that
uses memristors yet.

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higherpurpose
I bet they've been waiting to do this for quite a while. Why? Because this is
_exactly_ what Microsoft did to them with Surface, two years ago. HP clearly
hasn't forgiven Microsoft for that stunt, and since then it has only tried to
strengthen the relationship with Google and put more ChromeOS/Android devices
on the market.

~~~
ntakasaki
Well, if you go further down the memory lane you'll see that it was HP that
fired the first shot.

[http://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2011/03/webos-...](http://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2011/03/webos-to-ship-on-all-hp-pcs-from-next-year/)

Look at Lenovo which is actually innovating instead of resting on its laurels
like HP and churning out the same cookie cutter crap year after year and
expecting profit to stay up. The Surface is a red herring, actual innovation
is still rewarded, for example see the Lenovo Yoga line of laptops.

[http://www.cnet.com/news/lenovo-earnings-soar-on-solid-pc-
sm...](http://www.cnet.com/news/lenovo-earnings-soar-on-solid-pc-smartphone-
sales/)

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SurfScore
Couldn't they have come up with a better name for a super-smart computer than
"The Machine?"

~~~
kqr2
Maybe it's an indirect reference to the all encompassing Machine in E.M.
Forster's story:

[http://archive.ncsa.illinois.edu/prajlich/forster.html](http://archive.ncsa.illinois.edu/prajlich/forster.html)

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Globz
Competition is good, if its not HP it will be someone else but they are at
least going in the right direction. We have to break free from Windows and
move to something much much better.

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shearnie
Microsoft will rebuild Windows and contribute to the open market of OS's.

They'll also rebuild Azure so their data centers will use memristors.

~~~
rbanffy
How would you rebuild Windows into something that runs on a machine where
there is no volatile memory and no distinction between memory and persistent
storage?

Whatever results from this would only be called Windows for marketing reasons.

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gaius
_a brand new operating system for The Machine based on Linux_

If HP are making their own Linux distro then their target is Red Hat.

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theforgottenone
If HP can pull this off, it will be as big a wave as the PC, the Web, and the
Mobile ones, if not bigger.

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femtards885
Wait, the same HP that tossed aside PalmOS? The same HP that gave us HP-UX?
Wait stop, I am laughing too much, the coffee shot out of my nose.

Glad to see you pushing the memristor, but really, have any of the board
actually, like, you know, used an HP laptop recently? Mine waa awesome as a
backup oven, the overheating at last useful, but otherwise?

~~~
rbanffy
> Wait, the same HP that tossed aside PalmOS?

No. That was Leo Apotheker, the Idiot.

> The same HP that gave us HP-UX?

You may not like HP-UX, but it does some of the neatest tricks in workload
management I've ever seen.

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wfjackson
I wonder what happened to their prior plans to destroy the iPad.

~~~
viraptor
Leo happened ;)

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ethana
Sensational! On the edges of my seat!

