filePro and Vista

[Fairlight]

Four score and seven years--eh, screw that!
At about Sun, Nov 26, 2006 at 12:41:18PM -0600,
Mike Schwartz (PC Support) blabbed on about:
> 
>    However, when we went in through Windows Explorer and looked at the
> original database file, it had not been modified (same byte length and
> date).  The instructor pointed out that Vista had created a "virtual update"
> to the file, which resided inside Lisa's "Application Data" subdir.  This
> file logged the changes that we made to the master file.  

Microsoft has odd ideas about change committing, and this result doesn't
surprise me at all.  For example, by their practises, I've received Word
documents which were not entirely readable by 'catdoc' on *nix systems.
Further, I've actually -generated- .doc files with Word 2000 which people
with Word on other systems could not entirely read -in Word-.  An analysis
of the file seemed to show at a glance that the original data was stored,
and then changes made at a later date were "tacked in" to a separate
segment of the file.  It seems that this is a discrepancy between Word 97
and Word 2000, as that's when different versions of Word couldn't utilise
the same .doc file and get all the contents--the 97 version would show
signs of dropping data that was actually there, just not where and as
expected.

This "diff" format to document storage is nuts, IMHO.  I'm -almost- looking
forward to the bloat of them going entirely XML, if only so this kind of
thing doesn't happen anymore.  The downside will be the 30%+ data size
inflation rate of encapsulating -all- data in an SGML.

>    The strong message presented was to make sure if you install applications
> like pre-Vista versions of Quicken or Quickbooks that you have to make sure
> all the data files get stored in the special "shared data" folders, or else
> Vista will go into this "virtual file creation" mode.

But is that a problem of Vista, or is that a problem of Intuit's software
being coded really poorly?  Granted, we use an ancient version of Quicken
here (3?) yet, but I've heard so many things about how awfully Intuit's
software is, both in implementation and in performance, that it wouldn't
surprise me if it wasn't just a lack of doing things properly and using
hard pathing.  It sounds, from your description, like they made some poor
design decisions from the start in Quicken and Quickbooks.  Much as I'd
love to trash a new MS product before formal release and sight unseen, I
don't think Vista can be blamed for that kind of scenario.  Besides which,
I'm actually starting to like XP, even over 2000 Pro.  And don't tell
anyone I actually said that.  :)  Faster loading, more robust HAL, better
PnP, and overall a bit of a step up from 2000.  Nowhere near what 2000 was
over 98se, of course.

I don't know why anyone would willingly leap into Vista, however.  Windows
2000 is now in a second phase of its life, but even that is supported
through mid 2010, as announced my MS themselves.  XP should likely be good
through 2015 before EOL.  What could possibly be added to XP (besides
better security) that isn't already there that makes it worth blowing that
kind of money on upgrading?  They even skipped the meat of what was to be
the cornerstone of the platform...that robust search tech they couldn't
actually get working within the specified timeframe.

Windows Vista:  The Search for More Money

It's probably less entertaining and more expensive than "Star Trek III: The
Search for Spock" was. :)

That's like saying we "need" another version of Word.  Hell, they haven't
needed a new version since Word 4.0 for Mac.  That was arguably the best
I've ever used in GUI form and Word 2000 on Windows still doesn't match
it in a lot of ways--in fact it's a step backwards in some.  I think
"innovate" is a synonym for "rejuvenate our revenue stream" these days.

mark->
-- 
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