Tim Sweeney says Microsoft is lying about some supposed Win 10 advantages, calls UWP "woefully inadequate"

[Delicieuxz]

 

Tim Sweeney: Microsoft UWP is still 'woefully inadequate'

 

Quote

Microsoft cited protection from malware and other malicious code being injected into games as a benefit of UWP's safer sandbox. That safety comes at the cost of making games harder or impossible to mod without built-in developer support, however. And anecdotally, I've used mods in many, many games, but I don't think I've ever gotten a virus from one.

 

Sweeney called malware "an excuse." 

 

"All of the things that Microsoft can do to make Windows more secure, they can do without forcing everybody to sell their stuff through their store," he said. "And so, all of these claims that they’re forcing people into the Windows Store and adding friction to non-Windows Store software purchasing, it’s just a lie when they say that they’re doing that to secure users. Those are two completely separate issues that they’re only conflating because it’s the only possible excuse they can use for their efforts. But yeah, UWP is a very, very long way from being able to support the kind of openness and flexibility of PC games today.

 

"Modding is one issue, being able to load code by modders into your process and have that become part of the game experience. It’s a fairly complex ecosystem. And also the ability to run tools, the Unreal Editor, Photoshop, Microsoft Visual Studio, or even Microsoft Word—none of those apps run on UWP. Microsoft Word does not run on UWP. It’s not even in the fucking Windows Store, because the Store and the UWP foundations are not capable of supporting that level of app.

 

"So, they’re trying to force this thing on the industry and it’s woefully inadequate for the tasks they’re trying to serve it for. What it has worked well for are these small apps like the Twitter client, or the Dropbox visual client, which are mobile levels of app functionality, as opposed to desktop levels of app functionality."

 

...

Sweeney mentioned that both Unreal Engine 4 and Unity support the open Vulkan renderer, an alternative to DirectX, which is key for Linux support.

 

This line from Sweeney: "And so, all of these claims that they’re forcing people into the Windows Store and adding friction to non-Windows Store software purchasing, it’s just a lie when they say that they’re doing that to secure users."

 

... for me, basically sums up Microsoft's propaganda to push people towards using Windows 10, since the forced-installations. Microsoft has been doing many aggressive and abusive things to get people to use Windows 10 and its Microsoft's services, and then lying to everybody's faces about why they're doing those aggressive and abusive things. Things such as in-OS ads, default applications resetting, forced updates, bloatware Microsoft apps, Cortana constantly stealing any data a person enters into it and sending it to Microsoft, hard-to-disable persistent background data-collection...

 

There are a lot of things about Windows 10 which Microsoft has claimed represents enhanced security, but which is actually only there to coerce Windows owners into using Microsoft services, to generate Microsoft money - with perpetually generating Microsoft money daily being what I think was the entire purpose behind Microsoft's repackaging of Windows 7 / 8 as Windows 10, with tons of monetization gimmicks built in.

 

Ironically, despite all Microsoft's propaganda to get people to think that they're somehow safer on Windows 10, the hard evidence appears to be that Windows 10 is actually significantly less secure than Windows 7, and that in just its second year of release, Windows 10 is even already Microsoft's least-secure Windows OS, ever:

 

 

Top 50 Products By Total Number Of "Distinct" Vulnerabilities in 2016

Here's a historical chart I've put together showing the number of security vulnerabilities discovered for each of the included Windows OSes, by year.

 

 

            1999----2000----2001----2002----2003----2004----2005----2006----2007----2008----2009----2010----2011----2012----2013----2014----2015----2016----2017
---95      13-------31---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---98      11-------15--------7---------12------------------12------17------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
98se      -----------6--------6---------12----------------------------18-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---NT      64-------28------24--------23--------18-------24--------------------------------------16----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2000      18-------31-------43--------42--------31-------41------68-------42--------30-------24-------75-------45--------------------------------------------------------------------
--ME     ----------------------7---------10---------------------------15-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---XP     ---------------------10--------34--------22-------44------66-------56--------34-------34-------89-------98------101-------43-------87-------------------------------------
Vista      ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------31-------29-------76-------86-------95--------42-------95---------34------136------125---
-----7     -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------64------102-------44-------99---------36------147------134----
-----8     --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------58---------38-------146--------------
---8.1     --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------38-------151-----154----
----10    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------53------172---

 

In 2016 Windows 10 was not only the the least secure Windows OS, but it also set the current all-time record for number of most security vulnerabilities of any Windows OS, ever.

 

I think that the loss of security in Windows 10 is certainly due to Microsoft's firing of thousands of test engineers in recent years, in pursuit of increasing their profit margins - the same motivation that produced Windows 10 as a perpetual machine for what I think can only reasonably be described as data-theft. I think that no number of security features is going to compensate for big declines code-quality due to massive testing engineer layoffs.

 

Quote

In the last 3 years, Microsoft has fired around 20,000 employees (many of whom were testing engineers), has changed management, has rearranged internal development and testing structures, has completely shifted business strategies away from software-first to monetization-first, and as a result, is no longer capable of quality product design, or of producing competent software releases. As ridiculous as things seemed to be under Ballmer, Microsoft is a not the same company today, for the worse, and Windows is not the same product anymore, also for the worse. The new Microsoft didn't design and develop the Windows IP, and has simply inherited the Windows IP, and is now just looking for how they can exploit and prostitute every cranny of it. It's just like when a pharmaceutical company buys the rights for a drug that they didn't research or develop, and then jacks the price up by 5000%. Or, it's like when a big publisher buys a developer of a popular game, and turns their game into a dumbed-down, overly-generic version of its previous form.

From the blog post: Why I find Windows 7 to be a better OS than Windows 10

[Kherm]

The "UWP is inadequate" line from Tim Sweeny is possibly the only true thing he has said about Microsoft.

 

UWP is very bare in terms of game support. 

[CommandMan7]

Waiting for Microsoft to crash and burn... GG

 

Everything they do sounds like its from a documentary on a failed company or some shiz

 

It's super obvious they have enough of a monopoly to abuse it.

[zMeul]

I keep hoping that Linux gaming and Vulkan as an real alternative will happen .. but it's still fumbling around in the dark

[SCHISCHKA]

2 minutes ago, zMeul said:

I keep hoping that Linux gaming and Vulkan as an real alternative will happen .. but it's still fumbling around in the dark

has CSGO and rocket league. Theres no reason to see a Windows machine at a LAN

[zMeul]

Just now, SCHISCHKA said:

has CSGO and rocket league. Theres no reason to see a Windows machine at a LAN

two of the games I give less than a flying fuck about

[Sakkura]

Counting the number of discovered vulnerabilities is not an accurate way to measure how secure an OS is. There's no way Win 10 is as insecure as earlier Windows versions. Think Windows ME.

[zMeul]

2 minutes ago, gabrielcarvfer said:

Windows 10 have more flaws discovered, but they force updates as soon as they fix it, so you don't have people many years after it's discovery without thousands of patches released.

that's a fallacy, Windows has exploits and other vulnerabilities unpatched since the early days of the internet

[Notional]

[Trik'Stari]

I really want to see Microsoft lose a bunch of business or money in some way.

 

They need a kick in the ass

[dfsdfgfkjsefoiqzemnd]

9 minutes ago, gabrielcarvfer said:

while previous Windows you could choose not to install them at all.

True.  There were people who never updated.  There also were people who updated what was needed and avoided feature updates that didn't add anything they needed.  But most people did install the security updates ... at least until MS decided to use a critical security update to install ads into IE.

 

Funny how Vista (which is now a month away from EoL) has fewer vulnerabilities than all the others.  Which was the best version of Windows again?

[Trik'Stari]

7 minutes ago, valdyrgramr said:

Wouldn't really hurt them like it would Apple.

It would be amazingly awesome to see it happen to both, to be honest.

 

I don't see that happening any time soon.

[2FA]

1 hour ago, Sakkura said:

Counting the number of discovered vulnerabilities is not an accurate way to measure how secure an OS is. There's no way Win 10 is as insecure as earlier Windows versions. Think Windows ME.

I know right. Windows 9* you could log in without knowing the password.

 

EDIT: Obviously a little more to it than just pressing enter but it was still stupid simple. 

 

[SCHISCHKA]

1 hour ago, zMeul said:

two of the games I give less than a flying fuck about

sorry no minesweeper or solitaire, but this game would be more suited to your choice of language "flying fucks"

Also available for linux

[Hawx]

2 hours ago, Delicieuxz said:

... for me, basically sums up Microsoft's propaganda to push people towards using Windows 10, since the forced-installations. Microsoft has been doing many aggressive and abusive things to get people to use Windows 10 and its Microsoft's services, and then lying to everybody's faces about why they're doing those aggressive and abusive things. Things such as in-OS ads, default applications resetting, forced updates, bloatware Microsoft apps, Cortana constantly stealing any data a person enters into it and sending it to Microsoft, hard-to-disable persistent background data-collection...

 

There are a lot of things about Windows 10 which Microsoft has claimed represents enhanced security, but which is actually only there to coerce Windows owners into using Microsoft services, to generate Microsoft money - with perpetually generating Microsoft money daily being what I think was the entire purpose behind Microsoft's repackaging of Windows 7 / 8 as Windows 10, with tons of monetization gimmicks built in.

 

> When Delicieuxz makes a new Windows 10 news thread just so he can copy and paste the same debunked argument over and over again

 

As someone that's been working with UWP on a daily basis for a few months, it's actually a pretty nice platform for developers. Throw in something like Template 10 and you can spit out UWP apps with relative ease. The problem with UWP isn't the platform itself, but rather microsoft's distribution methods. An easier way to use UWP via third party installers and Microsoft cleaning up the store would go a long way with adoption.

 

If Microsoft can improve UWP to be on par with Win32 for end user ease-of-use, I can totally see it becoming the primary development target within 10 years.

[RagnarokDel]

Tim Sweeney is so bias'd against Microsoft, he should be a "Microsoft expert" for Fox News.

2 hours ago, SCHISCHKA said:

has CSGO and rocket league. Theres no reason to see a Windows machine at a LAN

This is perhaps the dumbest shit I've ever read as an argument for Linux.That's what? about 0.0001% of gaming scenarios?

[SCHISCHKA]

10 minutes ago, RagnarokDel said:

Tim Sweeney is so bias'd against Microsoft, he should be a "Microsoft expert" for Fox News.

This is perhaps the dumbest shit I've ever read as an argument for Linux.That's what? about 0.0001% of gaming scenarios?

prove it is dumb without making up numbers, because when you give someone who is a qualified computer scientist a made up number you do not appear to rank very highly in intelligence. You are not trying, you are making things up and you are attempting to start a flame war with a personal insult. CSGO is the number one game played at LANs i attend and I have had no issues bringing linux to a lan over the last couple of years

[RagnarokDel]

6 minutes ago, SCHISCHKA said:

prove it is dumb without making up numbers, because when you give someone who is a qualified computer scientist a made up number you do not appear to rank very highly in intelligence. You are not trying, you are making things up and you are attempting to start a flame war with a personal insult. CSGO is the number one game played at LANs i attend and I have had no issues bringing linux to a lan over the last couple of years

I dont care whether CS:GO is the most played game at lans, that's irrelevant because LANs themselves are a statistical minority. So saying there's no reason to have a windows machine at a lan when it is a niche sector of PC gaming is like saying you dont need a tesla to go off-roading. Sure buddy but most people dont do off-roading in the first place.

 

PS: I didnt insult you, I insulted the argument you made.

[SCHISCHKA]

1 minute ago, RagnarokDel said:

I dont care whether CS:GO is the most played game at lans, that's irrelevant because LANs themselves are a statistical minority. So saying there's no reason to have a windows machine at a lan when it is a niche sector of PC gaming is like saying you dont need a tesla to go off-roading. Sure buddy but most people dont do off-roading in the first place.

sorry but your not making sense. I was talking about LANs and you responded to a comment about LANs. LANs are a business now its not a nerdy niche thing anymore it even gets TV coverage. You wont see a tesla off-roading because they are not off road cars. You will see linux at a lan because Valve has brought gaming to Linux where we can use linux in competitive gaming. This is not interesting to me; you're just making things up

[rhavimarques]

3 hours ago, Delicieuxz said:

Here's a historical chart I've put together showing the number of security vulnerabilities discovered for each of the included Windows OSes, by year.

 

 

            1999----2000----2001----2002----2003----2004----2005----2006----2007----2008----2009----2010----2011----2012----2013----2014----2015----2016----2017
---95      13-------31---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---98      11-------15--------7---------12------------------12------17------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
98se      -----------6--------6---------12----------------------------18-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---NT      64-------28------24--------23--------18-------24--------------------------------------16----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2000      18-------31-------43--------42--------31-------41------68-------42--------30-------24-------75-------45--------------------------------------------------------------------
--ME     ----------------------7---------10---------------------------15-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
---XP     ---------------------10--------34--------22-------44------66-------56--------34-------34-------89-------98------101-------43-------87-------------------------------------
Vista      ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------31-------29-------76-------86-------95--------42-------95---------34------136------125---
-----7     -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------64------102-------44-------99---------36------147------134----
-----8     --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------58---------38-------146--------------
---8.1     --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------38-------151-----154----
----10    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------53------172---

 

In 2016 Windows 10 was not only the the least secure Windows OS, but it also set the current all-time record for number of most security vulnerabilities of any Windows OS, ever.

 

i really don't think this is a fair comparison. How many millions more windows 10 machines are there then all the other ones? I really don't understand all this absurd hate on windows 10. Its definantly not perfect, but in my experience it runs much smoother then 7 does, even if it does lose on benchmarks and a few fps in games, i've had far less crashes and whole system freezes in 10 then ever before.

 

Windows 10 is the least secure windows OS because its the most used, i'm sure if you swapped the w10 userbase to linux you'd find crazy security holes too.

to me this just sounds like that old apple claim from the early 2000s "there's no viruses on apple" - well yeah, nobody bothered to make them.

[RagnarokDel]

8 minutes ago, SCHISCHKA said:

sorry but your not making sense. I was talking about LANs and you responded to a comment about LANs. LANs are a business now its not a nerdy niche thing anymore it even gets TV coverage. You wont see a tesla off-roading because they are not off road cars. You will see linux at a lan because Valve has brought gaming to Linux where we can use linux in competitive gaming. This is not interesting to me; you're just making things up

the NHL, NBA, NFL, MLB, EPL are all major leagues that receive TV coverage. That doesnt make them anywhere close to the majority of the playerbase, not even close.

 

Let's take a game like League for example, only the highest ranked players will actually make it to those TV covered lans.

 

 

I do believe I'm being generous by including Diamond 5 and yet In what world is this a  majority? Even if we dont talk about professionals. It's completely ridiculous to assume it's most players. You're making the argument as your personal experience. If I go to lans, everyone else does, right? No. Your opinion on the subject is completely biased and skewed.

[bobhays]

57 minutes ago, RagnarokDel said:

the NHL, NBA, NFL, MLB, EPL are all major leagues that receive TV coverage. That doesnt make them anywhere close to the majority of the playerbase, not even close.

 

Let's take a game like League for example, only the highest ranked players will actually make it to those TV covered lans.

 

 

I do believe I'm being generous by including Diamond 5 and yet In what world is this a  majority? Even if we dont talk about professionals. It's completely ridiculous to assume it's most players. You're making the argument as your personal experience. If I go to lans, everyone else does, right? No. Your opinion on the subject is completely biased and skewed.

I'd like to point out that he's not arguing for a majority, just a significant portion. That being said, your are very right in that the proportion of windows to linux gamers is ridiculously high.

 

As stupid as this may sound, in recent years I've recommended linux more often to casual users than to power users. A typical consumer just cares about being able to play some media files, run spotify, and a browser. Things distro's like ubuntu excel at because of a simple UI and no terminal use required. Power users on the other hand often need specific programs that don't have linux versions (including most games).

[Humbug]

3 hours ago, zMeul said:

JoI keep hoping that Linux gaming and Vulkan as an real alternative will happen .. but it's still fumbling around in the dark

it is not fumbling around in the dark. The pace of progress in the Linux gaming ecosystem is very good. A few short years ago before GabeN started pushing things behind the scenes almost nothing worked from graphics drivers to gaming peripherals and there were almost no games. Even my r9 290 two years did not get utilized properly in Linux, it stayed cool and comfortable without being stressed with draw calls cause the driver bottlenecks were so bad lol. Today I can load up Ubuntu, mint or fedora etc and install steam and play civilization VI, ark survival, rise of the tomb raider, all of the valve games, witcher 2, rocket league, ARMA, shadow of mordor, cities skylines, Kerbal space program,  borderlands 2, dying light, dirt rally, elite dangerous etc . And devs find it easy to distribute to Linux. All the major engines continue to make big strides on Linux which is why so many indie games now support it. you can even now play doom on vulkan on Linux via wine with the same great performance... look at how things were a few years ago and how they are now, look at how many people are now working at improving that infrastructure. That's why things are getting better so fast. Imagine how things will be in another 3 years.

 

if you want Linux gaming to be as synonymous with pc gaming as windows well that's a different story... For that to happen the general desktop/laptop market has to start adopting Linux in a meaningful way for non gaming applications. It needs to be more commonplace and accepted by general pc users. Unless companies like canonical and the mint guys etc can make that happen...

[RagnarokDel]

4 hours ago, bobhays said:

I'd like to point out that he's not arguing for a majority, just a significant portion. That being said, your are very right in that the proportion of windows to linux gamers is ridiculously high.

 

As stupid as this may sound, in recent years I've recommended linux more often to casual users than to power users. A typical consumer just cares about being able to play some media files, run spotify, and a browser. Things distro's like ubuntu excel at because of a simple UI and no terminal use required. Power users on the other hand often need specific programs that don't have linux versions (including most games).

I use ubuntu on my htpc, I got nothing against Linux. It's just some of the claims he's making are just baseless.

[zMeul]

5 hours ago, Humbug said:

-

they're all ports, horrible ports

they're all OpenGL ports, for very few exceptions their perf isn't even mimicking Windows

 

Doom on VUlkan ... it needs to be ran on a modded BETA build of Wine

 

when AAA developers will actually provide natively developed Linux variants of their games and/or Vulkan support, then and only then I'll trow the Windows disk out the window