Category — News

Windows 7 is the newest Operating System (OS) from Microsoft.  It is currently in the beta stage of production, but will soon be in the release candidate stage.  While the new OS isn’t expected until late 2009, early 2010 Microsoft is going to need to do a number of things in order to make this OS a success.

Microsoft screwed up the launch of Vista so bad that even still, most computer users have a negative perception of Vista even if they have never used it.  Microsoft needs to give Windows 7 away for free or it could face a large decline in the number of users who use Microsoft products.

Here are 5 reasons why I feel that Microsoft should give Windows 7 away for free:

1. Windows Vista was a mess
   Microsoft really messed up with the launch of Vista. The prices were too high, there were too many versions, Device Drivers weren’t there (technically not their fault), and hardware support for the OS was abysmal. Because of this people didn’t like Vista and in turn, didn’t switch over to Vista. If Windows 7 were free more people would switch, even if they’re just trying it out.
2. Linux has become much more user friendly
   With Ubuntu and Fedora (and many other distributions) becoming increasingly user friendly, the Windows operating system has a lot more competition than the days of 95, 98 and XP. If Windows wants to compete against free operating systems, they need to offer something to the end users.
3. Perception of Microsoft is extremely low
   People dislike Microsoft. They have for a really long time, but with the disgrace of Vista I think this dislike has hit a new all-time low. People are fed up with paying high prices for software and are looking for change.
4. The current economy
   With the way the current economy is going, people just can’t afford to switch to a new operating system. People are more likely to stick with XP than they are to dish out $100+ to spend on something new. If Microsoft wants Windows 7 to be adopted quickly, they are going to need to give it away.
5. Microsoft Can Afford It
   Microsoft has been leading the OS market for many, many years now and can afford to give Windows 7 away. While they would notice the loss in income, they do have other sources and would still remain profitable in the end.

There are a number of things Microsoft should do to make sure it’s adopted well by users. They should only offer 2 or 3 versions (Regular, Business, Ultimate) and the price should be $0.  Microsoft could still make money by selling Windows7 to companies like HP and Dell to put on their computers, it would just be free for consumers like us.  But this is just me talking, what are your thoughts? Should Microsoft give Windows 7 away for free? Will you switch to it?

Here are a couple of our articles from this week that we think you should check out if you haven’t already. There are more links to sites around the web after the jump.

And don’t forget that we’d like to hear from you. If you have a blog and you have a good article, let us know about it (we might link to it if we like it too…and this site is nofollow free!). If you’d like to write a guest post for us, we’re up for that as well.

• Fear the Documents
• How To Motivate the Unmotivated
• 5 Tips to Overcome Language Barriers

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Here at devjargon, we have just finished our first full month of existence (we pre-posted for May and launched on June 6th), and has it ever been fun.  We’ve had a number of great posts, talked with a number of great people and had traffic beyond what we’ve ever had in any of our previous blogs.

Here are a few of our favourite posts this month:

• Love to Fail: 3 Tips to Help Learn From Failure
• 15 Reasons I Became a Developer
• 10 Things To Do With Your Old Computer
• Turn Off Post Revisions from Wordpress 2.6
• Setting Time Aside for Life

We’re also please to have release our “Ask Us” section that allows you as readers to ask your IT related questions.  We just launched it recently so we haven’t gotten any enquiries yet, but you could be the first.

Not only have we posted a few good articles, we’ve also read a number of great development blogs from around the blogosphere.  A couple fo my favourites are: Girl Developer, I Hate My IT Guy, LinuxHaxor, Coding Horror and many, many more.

Just before we end this post I’d like to shout out to our first sponsor Laptopical. If you’re planning on buying a laptop any time soon, I’d check them out first because they have a number of in-depth laptop reviews that are worth checking out.

We’re looking forward to August and have a number of great things planned for this blog, so stay tuned.

Devjargon is coming up on our 2 month anniversary and we’re still going strong. We’re still looking for guest posts so you can drop us a line at our contact page.

One new thing we’ve added is the “Ask Us” section. Here you can ask us anything about technology, software development, programming or really anything you want, and we’ll answer them as they come in. We’re really excited about this and we hope we can help you with your questions. Here are our favourite articles this week:

• 11 Tips to Make You More Efficient
• Setting Time Aside for Life
• 6 Great IDEs for Development

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Another week has passed here at devjargon and we’ve had great success. This week our top three posts have been.

• What To Do With Your Old Computer
• Turn Off Post Revisions
• Tips for Personal Growth

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This week has been a great week for us here at devjargon as well as around the blogosphere. We’ve had a number of great articles and comments here and have seen a number of great articles emerge around the web. Here’s an outline of some of our great stuff this week.

• 15 Reasons Why I Became a Developer
• Create Software: Getting the Requirements
• Love to Fail: 3 Tips to Help Learn From Failure

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Management is a critical part of any project, often impacting the final success and quality of the project. As far as developers are concerned, there are two main types of management: project management and resource management.
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