Warmed-over Vista
<p>OK, it&#8217;s now definite.  Windows 7 is gonna suck, and suck <em>hard</em>.  </p>
<p>The plausible suspicion all along has been that it&#8217;s the Vista codebase with a superficial paint job.  Now it appears there are <a href="http://dotancohen.com/eng/windows_7_vista.html">holes in the paint</a>; the public Windows 7 beta describes <em>itself</em> as Vista.</p>
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<p>A <a href="http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/01/31/1440252">Slashdot article</a> parses the hints that there will be no beta 2, nor a release candidate 2 &#8211; they&#8217;re going to go straight to a full production release within a few months.  There is no possible way for Microsoft to address architecture-level problems, fix the driver model, or claw back their lost application compatibility in that time.  In effect, Windows 7 will be a Vista service pack with a fancy new brand on it.</p>
<p>Microsoft is behaving as though it believes that Vista&#8217;s problems were nothing but PR, and that by rebranding and spinning up the hype engines they can overcome those.  The results when this strategy collides with reality should be &#8230; entertaining, to say the least.</p>
