Wonder how long they'll keep trying to use this as a carrot to "upgrade" to Windows 11 before giving in an letting it run on Windows 10? Remember when it was impossible for the Xbox to function without Kinect but when customers rejected the platform due to he Kinect requirement, they suddenly discovered a way for the console to not need the Kinect?
Removing Kinect was engineering work though, it may not have been visible to people outside of MS, but internally there was work required.
There isn't any "letting it run" here, there is does Microsoft want to backport this feature to Windows 10? There are challenges with that as the hardware support is much more varied for Windows 10 than 11 and so there are impacts to consider ranging from the weaker hardware requirements for 10 to how these things are integrated in with the OS.
Source: I worked at MS, on the OS codebase in security.
Kinect / XBOX is much simpler than this as the hardware was at least known and standardized.
Also I get the feeling that everyone that cares about their long term career at Microsoft are now on Azure, as the future Cloud OS from Microsoft, so we end up with these gimmicks trying to sell needless upgrades.
Yet what they could do better than anything else would be to move away from COM / C++ mindset at WinDev, but alas, that is asking too much.
At that point Windows 10 will be EOL, so Microsoft would have a legitimate excuse to give no subsequent fucks. Anyone who needs or cares about manufacturer support will downgrade at that point.
As for the never-downgrade diehards, well, they were never going to downgrade anyway (source: me, Windows 7 machine as daily driver for non-gaming tasks).
I'm ignorant in this subject: why didn't Microsoft just make their own Android app store. Having to use and publish to the Amazon one feels kinda... weird
It's a "two turkeys make an eagle" kind of partnership deal, fairly typical in the industry.
When you're a big company and not a leader at something, it's not worth the investment to build a new solution, but your existing partnerships teams can be deployed to team up with another similar company in the hope that your lackluster offerings together will magically fuse into the product that neither was able to create.
If anyone wants to run Android apps on a desktop linux distro, I was reasonably successful with Waydroid. Can't compare with other alternatives though.
I am sure I am not alone in finding the lexical structure of the "windows subsystem for... " very unfortunate. Windows is the dom0 and the android or linux is the domU instance. Kinda.
It's windows hosted Android. or Android as a subsystem hosted on windows. Android running on Windows. But no, it has to be "for"
But I bet they workshopped it for hours in the marketing department and decided Windows had to come "first"
The reason it's named that way is because of Google's trademark on Android. Per Rich Turner @ Microsoft:
"As I mentioned earlier in the thread, it's not about positioning of words, it's about the legalities of trademark usage; we cannot lead a product name with a term trademarked by someone else."
This keeps coming up and I keep saying that, if the issue is the leading term, they could've just called it the Windows Android Subsystem. (I suspect the real issue is that "for" makes it clearer this is a third-party thing, but nobody ever mentions that.)
That's actually sort of false! WSL was originally designed for Android, to enable Android apps on Windows Mobile phones. (I have a Lumia which has a test build of this from back in the day.)
I'm unsure when the branding decision was made, but the possibility of again involving Android support was probably considered.
I am quite sure this has not much to do with Android, given that this, including the naming scheme, traces back to 1999 with "Windows Services for UNIX".
They should say "for Android apps". Boom. Makes more sense. I'm sure there are other phrasing tweaks that would also work.
But it's just like Microsoft to blindly settle on a name that doesn't make sense, based on advice from legal, and not probe it a bit more, or play with it to make more sense while still fitting the guidelines of legal advice, and to cite the legal guidance as the reason it has to be mediocre and cannot change. (Source: I once worked for MS.)
Edit: to be clear, I'm also reacting to the "windows subsystem for Linux", which they used the same justification for.
Android branding guidelines are very unlikely to matter at this point, given that it's descriptive use (not forbidden by trademark law in the first place) anyways...
I don't think that's what descriptive fair use means.
> Descriptive Fair Use: Found at 15 U.S.C. § 1115(b)(4), the descriptive fair use defense protects your ability to use ordinary words to describe your own goods or services, even if those words happen to be part of someone's trademark.
Since the Windows Subsystem for Android actually runs Android, "Windows Subsystem for Android" is a product name and not just a description, and "Android" isn't a generic descriptive term in this context, it seems to me that Microsoft is using Google's Android trademark in a way that isn't protected as fair use.
Right, I should have said "nominative" rather than "descriptive", at least as far as US law is concerned. It's directly below "descriptive" in your link.
Really I wasn't trying to name the exact defence but gesture at the principal that trade marks prevent competitors from using names that might confuse customers, but they don't prevent competitors (or anyone else) from talking about the product. It was just a coincidence that I used a word that happened to also be the name of a specific kind of fair use.
Until and through Windows 2000, Windows NT had subsystems for various platforms such as Windows Subsystem for POSIX and Windows Subsystem for OS/2. The Win32 environment is also a Windows Subsystem: Windows Subsystem for Win32.
Most if not all of the subsystems were removed from Windows XP onwards, except for Win32, due to obsolescence but the architecture and scheme came back in Windows 10 with Windows Subsystem for Linux and in Windows 11 with Windows Subsystem for Android.
As an aside, WinRT is a subset of Win32 and is not its own subsystem.
Which is... exactly about the positioning of words, if you can or cannot lead with a certain word.
Nevertheless, you are always allowed to use a trademark in a factual sense, as in "Windows can now run Android apps on the Desktop" (modulo some TM or R sign, I guess). That they gave this feature a marketing name at all is a marketing decision - it doesn't have to have a noun. Or it could use a cryptic, non-trademarked internal name like WOW64 does. Or you could go for "'nix subsystem" or "penguin subsystem" or "APK subsystem".
This is why I am convinced even if there we no legal reasons, they would call it "Windows Subsystem for Linux / Android". I think they want to psychologically distance the product from the Windows NT idea that you can have multiple types of applications on equal footing, instead of just "Apps" (see how they are muddling the names of Modern/WinUI/UWP/App SDK/... Apps). But in the end, no one can know and it is just interesting kremlinology...
As another perspective, your comment is the first time I read the terms "dom0" and "domU instance", and "Windows subsystem" is the only phrase in my vocabulary that uses the word "subsystem".
With that perspective, "Windows Subsystem for X" makes total sense in my mind. To me it means that Windows (as an operating system) has one (or more) Subsystems, and those subsystems are created for specific use cases, for example we have a Windows Subsystem for Linux, and another Windows Subsystem for Android, and they'll probably create more Subsystems in the future.
I'm sure it sounds wrong for people with your level of education and background, but to people like me it's actually very descriptive and straight forward.
A totally valid perspective. I am probably coming at this with prior-art in mind and you're coming at it (presumed, and no insult intended) from inside the MS ecosystem which is after all the core market. If the term makes sense for windows users, windows administrators it did it's job.
It's worth noting that subsystems are an old Windows concept dating back to the original Windows NT in 1993. The win32 API itself is a subsystem of the underlying NT system. And the WoW64 subsystem allows 32-bit Windows apps to run on 64-bit Windows. There used to be POSIX and OS/2 subsystems, as well.
I believe the "Windows Subsystem for x" nomenclature is a departure from the way MS previously described subsystems. That doesn't mean it is wrong, though. Just a bit inconsistent.
Subsystems are pretty old Windows tech and it's cool to finally see the Android one come back. AFAIK they started with an Android one before ditching it to pivot to WSL. I think there may have been an OS/2 subsystem for a bit at one point as well?
Microsoft is baffling bad at naming things. I sometimes think that they’re playing a game to see just how badly they can name their products before they start to lose money.
>You’ve got to be quite the gamer to understand the hierarchy of XBOX consoles.
I have the feeling Microsoft intentionally sought to create this confusion so they can move the old stock as well. Example: Young Billy wants an Xbox for Christmas so clueless parents/grandparents go to Walmart and purchase something made by Microsoft with Xbox written on the box, preferably on sale and at a cheaper price.
Calling it the "S Series" or "X Series" would make sense, but "Series" as the base name of the product line is just...I mean, what were they thinking? It makes absolutely zero sense.
Meanwhile Sony's over here with PS1, PS2, PS3, PS4, PS5, and all the sub-versions make perfect sense (base, slim, pro, etc).
I think the problem is that the name could be interpreted as a subsystem that runs on Android to provide a Windows API or services.
I had that issue with WSL; it sounds like it could be the name of an official WINE-like product from Microsoft. “For” is often used to specify the target.
I heard someone say it here at HN that the reason it's worded this way is to avoid copyright infringement issues if they were to lead the name with someone else's trademark.
>As I mentioned earlier in the thread, it's not about positioning of words, it's about the legalities of trademark usage; we cannot lead a product name with a term trademarked by someone else
Exactly the point. Were I describing the concept, I'd say 'It is a Linux subsystem for Windows', if I said 'a Windows subsystem for Linux', you'd think I meant WINE.
I hate the loss of clarity in our speech and I wonder what the cumulative effect will be.
I had the same difficulty making sense of, and internalizing, the naming.
What finally stuck for me is not to parse it as "(Windows subsystem) for ..."
but rather as "Windows' (subsystem for ...)".
Related rant: I don't like the "reverse-proxy" naming--it's not self-explanatory. It's only historical that client proxies came first and thus server-proxies are 'reverse' (other end). The proxy is a stand-in for a client or for a server, so client proxy or server proxy (or proxy-client or proxy-server). I've come to accept the historically arbitrary naming.
I read it more like "the (Windows subsytem) for ...", but the outcome is the same. Our language system, however, has a strong penchant for what's known as right attachment: constituents such as the prepositional phrase (in this case "for ...") are preferably attached below the preceding constituent, and that preference already takes effect at the preposition, so the decision is made before knowing the complete sentence. Because the sentence is ambiguous, you get stuck on the wrong interpretation.
Curiously enough, I have the same feeling about reverse proxy. Neither proxy reverses anything functional. A reverse proxy would be something that lets you talk to the proxied entity directly, a tunnel perhaps.
Without knowing what it actually is, the name gives me the assumption that I can start an Android instance through PowerShell, and it can do things in a kinda, but not quite native way
It's also weird that Google will allow you to run Android apps on Windows, but only a few select games via the Google Play Games beta (https://play.google.com/googleplaygames).
as someone who was around in the 2000s where MS utterly dominated the computing industry (thankfully now ancient history)
the chap in the comments complaining that the company dominating this specific market (Google) is being MEAN to Microsoft by not helping them out by supporting their competing platform really is quite amusing
> Google historically has never supported MS in any of their initiatives. This is the same company that tried to destroy Windows Phone by repeatedly killing the YouTube app that MS made and never developed any apps for the platform. They have zero presence on the Microsoft Store, even Apple has their apps on the MS Store. I heard of them doing shady things with the Edge browser as well.
meanwhile I'm still here waiting for my native Linux ports of Office and Halo?
> company dominating this specific market (Google) is being MEAN to Microsoft by not helping them out
Google is sp much more dangerous than mocrpspft ever was - they track near realtome location of billions of people. Theu have private data.
In its heyday, microspft had millions of computers, half of them werent even connected to the internet. Most were for business, and even domestic ones were usually on 3 hours a day for games or work. Peak of personal data was havong a few photos or assignment frok school. What were they going to do, steal your spreadsheet?
> meanwhile I'm still here waiting for my native Linux ports of Office and Halo?
As a developer I am waiting for all linux dudes to finish fighting it oit, but the drama has been going on for 15 years: numeroius Ui toolkits, wayland vs Xwhatever, some drama around repositories and flatpack, some drama around vendoring dependencies vs debianndevelopers supplying versions they choose, musl vs glibc, systemd, etc. You need to spend more effort on linux than you do on mac and windows combined.
This is why web and google has won, and sadly dektop apps are dying - endless infighting. And they have a way of praising it as innovation of alternatives, but havong 10 slightly different solutions is not innovation. Half of the battles seem to be ideological.
They strong arm with laptop manufacturers to nearly force users to pay for a Windows license for all device (non-Windows laptops exist, but let’s be honest, it’s insignificant).
They get into beds with gov to get license deals (with taxpayers’ money).
Not to mention the rampant telemetry on Windows that can’t ever be fully turn off.
And a paid-for Windows 10/11 has Tik Tok and Candy Crush ads?
Google and Microsoft are bad, no need to pick just one.
> They strong arm with laptop manufacturers to nearly force users to pay for a Windows license for all device (non-Windows laptops exist, but let’s be honest, it’s insignificant).
Google does the. same thing with android and olay store access?
Microsoft does tons on tracking by default, like tracking all the apps you open and pushing you to use a Microsoft account. I was surprised at how difficult it actually is now to the point where you have to enter a bogus username multiple times before being given the option to create a local account. Also, they integrate location tracking into whatever devices they can. You can see this is your Microsoft account as well. It is bizarre you think that they are somehow better. Microsoft's dark patterns are worse and the company historically has made far worse decisions than Google. I don't see Microsoft releasing an open source version of their operating system that projects like GrapheneOS and others can use. Microsoft constantly shits on their own developers and people that develop for Microsoft quickly learn that if they aren't paying you well for your time then open source is much better because at least that way you've learned a useful skill that doesn't have a lot of vendor lock-in.
Microsoft even to this day despite claiming they love Linux makes decisions and pays companies to specifically make it more difficult for things to run on Linux. Fortunately, now that Valve has been committing resources to Linux gaming things have been going pretty well with Linux desktop. It might not be for users that have to make any choices or understand anything but point and click, but it is amazing for people that can spend a little extra time learning and I think if people learn Linux skills early on it is far more valuable and less head bashing because there are great communities behind most open source projects unlike Microsoft who ignores their feedback.
you can state things as they are all you like. these people hate Microsoft because they were told to, and they're never letting go of it.
oh, also, Google can do no wrong to these folks, because if they admit that Google can do (or is doing) wrong, then they know they have to abandon their Google accounts, and they just can't do it. so, they stare their self-deception in the face in the morning when they brush their teeth and they bash on Microsoft at every opportunity because they drank slashdot like it was water.
There is a specific difference between "not helping" (your words) and "repeatedly killing" (the quoted words). It's certainly not about being mean.
Google is under no obligation to help their competitors. When they use their competitive advantage in one market (online video) to actively thwart competitors in an entirely different market (mobile OS) -- that's the sort of thing that gets the attention of antitrust.
> meanwhile I'm still here waiting for my native Linux ports of Office and Halo?
As far as I'm aware, MS is not actively blocking efforts to get things to work in WINE and similar projects. So there's a difference there from your Google example.
And yet, MS _is_ under active antitrust investigation for their intermingling of gaming platforms and studio games exclusives, relating to their attempts to buy even more major studios.
You're talking about the same Microsoft that periodically "helpfully" changes default browser back to Edge (from Google Chrome) and also resets search engine from Google to Bing?
While adding a very small, TINY little link you need to really look for to avoid having this reset?
Microsoft’s bad behaviour does not excuse Google’s bad behaviour.
As I noted, MS engages with anticompetitive behaviour and is undergoing investigation for that again.
The items you reference with browsers may be cause for concern as well. A crucial difference is that MS is _not_ a market leader in the browser space, they are a poorly performing underdog. So while concerning, it’s less of an issue than if Edge was doing well.
> So while concerning, it’s less of an issue than if Edge was doing well
I don't think it's wise to give a proven monopolist company a pass on monopoly behavior just because their products is not (yet) a market leader. They use monopoly behavior to become the market leader.
I agree. Which is why I find it concerning. It’s also a lousy way to treat your customers, I’m likewise annoyed every time windows yoinks my Firefox defaults.
I just find it significantly more concerning when someone like Google uses their monopoly power in one market to thwart potential new competitors in another market.
Both are bad. But blocking new entrants is especially bad.
> meanwhile I'm still here waiting for my native Linux ports of Office and Halo?
In fairness MS are now pushing Office365 which runs on Google's platform (Chrome) as a first-class target. And I'm sure we'd've seen Halo on Stadia if it had survived long enough.
> tried to destroy Windows Phone by repeatedly killing the YouTube app that MS made
Fair or not, this was actually quite a blow to Windows Phone.
Google blocked Microsoft's app (because it lacked ads) and insisted on collaborating only if the app was remade in HTML5, which MS refused to do. So they kept playing cat and mouse, releasing updates to evade the block and blocking them again, until MS gave up and replaced the app in an update by just a shortcut to youtube.com.
Ironically, most people seemed to switch to a third party app (I don't remember the name) that supported even more features against YouTube's ToS than Microsoft's, including no ads. I remember it being quite polished as well.
"Google recommends using Chrome" ... on Chromium Edge.
Uh. The Browser Wars are over. No one at the IETF will dispute Google's dominance. Google has won. I understand the lockdown has been a while, but can someone check over at Google HQ? See if anyone is minding the systems? It all seems awfully automated...
It really all started with the initial design of NT and then there was just a lull in the 2000s. Early NT had a Win32 subsystem, an OS/2 subsystem, and a POSIX subsystem (well and a security subsystem but that's there for different reasons). When they started WSL (now WSL 1) it used this original subsystem architecture from the 90s just now targeting modern Linux.
Then they found it didn't work as well as people wanted in terms of filesystem performance, low level networking, and PCIe device access so they switched to the more modern integrated hardware virtual machine model which is what WSL2 and WSA use.
Originally Microsoft wanted WSA like functionality (then called Astoria) for Windows 10 mobile but then they found the bridge toolkits to be the easier/better approach and cancelled it until bringing it back for desktop all these years later.
Bear in mind that that strategy backfired horribly for OS/2 - it was "a better windows than windows", but the result was that no-one bothered writing native apps for OS/2 when they could use the Windows API and get an app that ran on both.
If Microsoft keeps this in mind they will make sure to never make it too easy to install and run a Linux program, but still easy enough so that developers choose Windows for their own development machine.
Although I agree with the idea that VSCode is a Trojan horse, Atom had some severe fundamental issues (running everything in the UI thread) and would have come to an end no matter what.
The same that stops anyone building an alternative to the npm registry plus the extensions made by MS which won't be in that marketplace.
Like this
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31760684
it seems like this might be a goal, but i have been using WSL for ages for development and i can't imagine anyone would target user applications at WSL.
with my sample size of 1, if they added any extended functionality to WSL or WSA i wouldn't use it, i use that environment because it mimics the production environment I target, We wont be using WSL in production that would be Linux.
I don't see the use case for running Android on windows except for development and maybe a limited selection of apps. You wouldn't run WSA as a way to get the "locked down" benefits of Andoird on a desktop. Desktops also generally have far more limited sensors and other hardware features. I get Android on a phone because of the form factor, access to NFC, a flashlight, accelerometer sensors and so on Desktop can't have these.
Windows gets by business because of WSL, otherwise i would run Ubuntu or something, but windows is just less hassle for everything that isn't in the CLI (YRMV)
history is present, certainly, but that's all I see. History.
got anything recent? no one ever cites anything recent. meanwhile, Google and Meta are doing nefarious stuff today and no one cares... behavior only mattered in the 1990s, I guess?
one might say that the logic here is twisty turny, but in truth people just don't like Microsoft, and they won't admit that they have a very strong bias against Microsoft. I would not even comment on this of people just admitted their bias. but all I see are references to things which are approaching 30 years old.
it's apparently supremely bad when MS does something in the 1990s but things that go on today are fine. Unless it's Microsoft...
Everyone has their eyes focused on Microsoft waiting for something that may never come, but absolutely sure it will come, while they are ignoring everything around them.
> No personal attacks, please.
wasn't a personal attack. people aren't stupid, to me, actions are stupid, and things people say are stupid. I was attacking the opinion as stated, not the person. "stupid is as stupid does."
How so? Remote attestation and other SafetyNet features are a product decision to use. If a company has an app that only allows itself to be run on a device with SafetyNet isn't that on them? Google doesn't force you to use it.
I'm also surprised that the top post is about the ordering of some words, it never even crossed my mind, and really emphasizes how no matter what people will find something to be upset about. Like we can't have comments like, 'hey that's neat, I wonder how xyz technical challenge was figured out' I'm sure a lot of work went into this.
