40% of Microsoft's own employees tested Windows 10 before launch

[AlTech]

40% of Microsoft's staff tested Windows 10 Desktop version before launch.

 

 

 

Microsoft launched Windows 10 to the users across the world on July 29 this year. Before this, however, the operating system was being tested by the Windows Insiders for several months. Turns out, it wasn’t only the Windows Insider community, helping Redmond based tech giant to improve its next operating system. Microsoft had apparently started testing the new OS on computers being used within the company to test how the operating system worked in real-time. The company had its own internal rings for Windows 10 which received the test builds before they were even rolled out to the Fast ring Insiders.

 

 

This is what Microsoft had to say:

 

Prior to product release, there were 38,000 users, roughly 40 percent of employees, internally running Windows 10. Microsoft IT used flighting (delivering pre-release builds of Windows 10 through Windows Update) to make sure that early adopters were running the latest builds as they became available.

The early adoption community is closely tied to a moderated internal community support forum, where users could report issues and seek assistance from other users. Microsoft IT was able to gain early insight by watching the threads to identify issues as they surfaced.

 

Using the in-place upgrade eliminated the need to build a complex zero touch deployment image. Microsoft IT didn’t have to create packages to deal with data migration or application reinstallation—everything just worked. The upgrade had a 97 percent success rate, and in the few instances that the upgrade failed, it simply rolled the computer back to its previous operating system. Microsoft IT saw a 35 percent reduction in help desk calls for setup, which was over the 10 percent reduction goal. Microsoft IT was able to deploy 95 percent of employees in three months by using the in-place upgrade and received user feedback that it was a great experience.

 

 

Yay! Now if only this happened with Windows 10 Mobile. We would have had the final version already.

 

http://wccftech.com/windows-10-was-tested-by-38000-microsoft-employees/

[Arty]

So did 2 Million of us.

Starting 10 months before launch.

 

Night Theme Fix Bro.

 

My success rate is 96% on 25 Pc's so MS did something right for once. 

and that 1 pc was my fault . Tripped on the power kid while it was installing. 

[PlayStation 2]

40% obviously wasnt enough because its a piece of shite

[Clear17Mud]

40% obviously wasnt enough because its a piece of shite

well you cant expect people doing real work to switch to beta software...

[AlTech]

well you cant expect people doing real work to switch to beta software...

Unless it's stable or unless they didn't really use it much

[AlTech]

Also +1 to Microsoft for telling us that you have roughly 95,000 employees. I'm a little surprised. I thought they had way more.

 

EDIT: Found this out doing some math. 38000/40 (to find 1%) then multiply by 100 = 95,000.

[EarthboundHero]

So did 2 Million of us.

Starting 10 months before launch.

 

Night Theme Fix Bro.

 

My success rate is 96% on 25 Pc's so MS did something right for once. 

and that 1 pc was my fault . Tripped on the power kid while it was installing. 

Does the night theme work good?

[Arty]

Does the night theme work good?

Yes?

[EarthboundHero]

Yes?

I thought you were talking about Windows 10's hidden night theme. Not the forum. I just woke up.

[Arty]

I thought you were talking about Windows 10's hidden night theme. Not the forum. I just woke up.

Both are very nice .

[Clear17Mud]

Unless it's stable or unless they didn't really use it much

beta inherently means unstable...

[byalexandr]

My beta experience was very good, except the Nvidia drivers at the time were shite.

[AlTech]

beta inherently means unstable...

Nobody ever proclaimed it to be a "BETA".  I know what Beta means. Both in Latin and in technology. In Latin it means unfinished. In the tech world it is code word for "buggy piece of shit".

[Dabombinable]

Nobody ever proclaimed it to be a "BETA".  I know what Beta means. Both in Latin and in technology. In Latin it means unfinished. In the tech world it is code word for "buggy piece of shit".

Wait, does that mean Arkham Knight and FO4 when were released were actually paid beta?

[Nowak]

Wait, does that mean Arkham Knight and FO4 when were released were actually paid beta?

Everything you pay for is a paid beta, when you think about it. Hardware, software, tech, that random vase your mother bought the other day... some day, a better version is gonna be released. And then that too is a paid beta for the next version.

[AlTech]

Wait, does that mean Arkham Knight and FO4 when were released were actually paid beta?

I wouldn't even call Akham Knight a paid beta. I'd call it a paid alpha. FO4 for all intents and purposes is a paid beta.

[Dabombinable]

I wouldn't even call Akham Knight a paid beta. I'd call it a paid alpha. FO4 for all intents and purposes is a paid beta.

I never thought of that. It did take WB a while to get the game released again in a better but still buggy state. And thinking back to Skyrim, Morrowind and FONV-I think most if not all Bethesda games are paid beta, though at least they don't try to scam people with pre cut DLC like Expectorating Assholes. (aka: EA, the blob, scumbags, the great devourer of games studios).

[GoodBytes]

Nothing new. Microsoft call it "Dog feeding". Microsoft asks every software developers employee to test their software on a daily basis, live with the issues to push reporting, and bugging who ever is responsible to fix the issues. They use alpha builds of Office as well.

40% is probably most of the Windows and Office team computers (HR, marketing, lawyers, contracted work for custom software, IT, etc.) probably don't.

I do think that Windows 10 Mobile is being tested by employees. Probably much less, but still is.

The problem is that if you follow closely the development of the OS, you can a see that Microsoft focused all its energy on Astoria (Android sub system on Windows Phone). However, the approach they took seemed that either they didn't have the expertise for, needed more time, or simply not good as initially thought (many times things look really good on paper, and despite extensive details put on paper, and thought out, it end up not performing as expected. The cost of R&D). So, Windows 10 Mobile only got polished until the very last 2x build, where they removed the Android subsystem, and started to focus on big fixes and polish instead of trying to make the Android bridge work.

[AlTech]

Nothing new. Microsoft call it "Dog feeding". Microsoft asks every software developers employee to test their software on a daily basis, live with the issues to push reporting, and bugging who ever is responsible to fix the issues. They use alpha builds of Office as well.

40% is probably most of the Windows and Office team computers (HR, marketing, lawyers, contracted work for custom software, IT, etc.) probably don't.

I do think that Windows 10 Mobile is being tested by employees. Probably much less, but still is.

The problem is that if you follow closely the development of the OS, you can a see that Microsoft focused all its energy on Astoria (Android sub system on Windows Phone). However, the approach they took seemed that either they didn't have the expertise for, needed more time, or simply not good as initially thought (many times things look really good on paper, and despite extensive details put on paper, and thought out, it end up not performing as expected. The cost of R&D). So, Windows 10 Mobile only got polished until the very last 2x build, where they removed the Android subsystem, and started to focus on big fixes and polish instead of trying to make the Android bridge work.

The IOS bridge is doing good. I have a feeling that they haven't been pushing out much mobile builds cos pretty much nobody uses windows phones. 2.5% of smartphones users use this (as of 2015Q2) . Microsoft probably has a BYOD policy cos otherwise they would have had the same thing done with Windows 10 Mobile. Lots of feedback would have been given but no they literally have been hounding insiders for feedback on it. 

 

 

As usual Microsoft's thought process is second to none. But their execution is lacking. Oh and by the way, they started pushing windows phones as the perfect phones for business. In fact going so far as to provide small businesses with Mid range windows phones to all employees. And the're apparently making the employees more productive.

[GoodBytes]

The iOS bridge is doing well, yes, but it requires a lot more work on the developer side, and recompiling.

The Android one, if you used no Google service or things like Google Maps or Ad on it, you would have been able to run it directly on Windows 10 Mobile device. While it is actually not many apps on Android that would work out of the box like that, as many uses Google services or ad platform, it would require little effort from developers to convert Google service/ad platform to Microsoft ones. In other words, possibly less than 1h work to port an Android app from Android to Windows Phone, add maybe a week or two of testing for the developers that cares about doing the extra mile on the platform.

[as96]

40% obviously wasnt enough because its a piece of shite

It's not that bad.

[MrDynamicMan]

Tripped on the power kid while it was installing.

whats that? Some poor immigrant child in a hamster wheel?

[Arty]

whats that? Some poor immigrant child in a hamster wheel? /s

cord*, tyop

[MrDynamicMan]

tyop

whats that? An erotically inclined scene involving the OP and Ropes?

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

[Doobeedoo]

I thought it was more, W10 had issues in early testing but it got better quite a bit. Looking forward for future improvements and under the hood optimizations.