Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

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gm10

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by gm10 »

thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:28 pm
gm10 wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 2:59 amBut I'm still curious about what you even mean with "A desktop environment that would be totally object oriented"?
I suggest you google it sometime, and then 'Pink', 'Taligent', 'Workplace OS'.
Those are names of failed OS projects and have nothing to do with my question. Anyway, I was only mildly curious, nevermind.
thenextguy

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by thenextguy »

Moem wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 5:28 pm I think it's fine to make a distro such as the one you're describing... but it should not be Mint. We all know Mint is not perfect. But it has an established user base, it is aimed at a certain group of users. Many of these users like that it feels like Windows in many ways, yet they all have reasons* not to want to use Windows.

Personally, I want a distro that I can use comfortably and easily, and that my mother (who is 80 years old, is smart but not techy, and has been using Windows for 20 years) can use comfortably and easily too... and since we're on the same distro, I can help her out now and then. I want it to be stable and conservative, not bleeding edge. I don't care about innovative and 'different'. If Mint were to change in the ways you are describing, it would no longer be for me. And the current audience would most likely leave in droves. Remember what happened to Ubuntu when it cooked up Unity? Mint happened, that's what.

It's fine if people do want a distro to be innovative and stand out. But Mint is not that distro. Let's face it, you seem to have picked about the least suitable distro for this! Have you looked at Arch?

Also, why don't you start your own team of five to six developers, and build it yourself? Go ahead, push that envelope... yourself, instead of telling others what to do.

* Free of charge, lower installation requirements, okay... but also: stability, no forced updates, more flexibility, no telemetry... to name but a few.
You are making my point for me. The whole Linux/BSD/free open source software movement is essentially stagnant and just keeps trying to keep up with Windows, following where Windows leads and trying to be as Windows-like (or, here and there, as mac-like) as possible, leaving Windows to innovate instead of innovating itself.

Every single distro is exactly like what you are saying about Mint. I.e., that it's not a distro suitable for, e.g., a new WM/desktop and that it's the least likely one for such a thing and try and rationalise it with the same reasoning as yours. That, my friend, is stagnation. And I wasn't even suggesting anything, certainly not a new distro, merely a way that Mint could promote itself by distinguishing itself through innovation and becoming even easier to use and set up for the end-user.

As for Arch, yeah, looked at it, and very quickly moved on. Like all the so-called more bleeding edge distros, far too wrapped up in its existing agenda. Which, AFAIC, sucks anyway.

Now, where your reasons for people not wanting to use Windows are concerned, I think I covered and demolished those before, but lets just summarize. Cost? When you can buy the Home Edition of Windows for the price of a sandwich and a coffee, and the Enterprise edition for the price of a restaurant meal and a glass of house plonk, that's a total non-issue. So are lower installation requirements - any machine built in the last 10 years can easily accommodate either Mint or Windows. Stability? Again, not an issue with either. More flexibility - where exactly? Forced updates - there are ways around those, but in any event, for Joe Average User out there they actually are a damned good idea. (And you can always set them to a delay in case you're worried about buggy ones, which have happened on occasion.) Now telemetry - yes, your one valid point I gladly concede. Although any such data are pretty much anonymous and not traceable to you, the principle does worry me. But it's always been there, to a greater or lesser extent, in most proprietary OSes, although in some - inc. Windows earlier - you could always circumvent those if you knew how.

As for starting my own team etc. - where TF did I "tell others what to do"? I did NOT! Not anywhere. I'm having to repeat myself here and say, all I did was make a suggestion how Mint could best promote itself. At least, IMO - to which I am perfectly entitled and which I am perfectly at liberty to voice. Especially so as it was perfectly well intentioned.

If people stuck with conservative, we'd all still be using PCs running bl**dy DOS or Macs with System 5 (at best)!
thenextguy

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by thenextguy »

rene wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 9:29 pm
Arch_Enemy wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 6:34 pm Already been done! It's called "Arch".
Well, no; if there's anything that Arch is not, it's innovative. I'd steer OP to e.g. https://getsol.us/home/
Exactly. And do. for Solus.

It's been a hell of a long time since any free/open source OS has been genuinely innovative, and that is tragic.
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Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by Moem »

thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:33 pm I wasn't even suggesting anything, certainly not a new distro, merely a way that Mint could promote itself by distinguishing itself through innovation and becoming even easier to use and set up for the end-user.
You can't promote yourself as the thing if you're not actually the thing, so Mint would first have to become the thing. And that thing happens to be not what Mint was made to be. So the team would have to switch goals. I simply don't think that is very likely to happen.
thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:33 pm telemetry - yes, your one valid point I gladly concede.
The other ones are equally valid to me, and I'm the person who decides which distro I use. You do not have to agree with them, but they are my reasons and you did not 'demolish' them even a little bit.
Mint allows me a lot more customizing than Windows ever did, and that doesn't go away just because you asked 'where?' I'll give you just one example: different desktop environments.
thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:33 pm all I did was make a suggestion how Mint could best promote itself. At least, IMO - to which I am perfectly entitled and which I am perfectly at liberty to voice. Especially so as it was perfectly well intentioned.
Sure. And all I did was tell you why I do not believe that your suggestions are a good match for Mint. You are free to tell us your opinions, and it's pretty normal that you'll get other people's opinions in return. Was that unexpected? If so, then what did you expect?
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thenextguy

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by thenextguy »

majpooper wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 9:49 pm I like your enthusiasm and think you ought to "go for it" your ideas are good ones. However you missed the starting point - Mint as the vehicle is off the mark IMHO. What you are really suggesting is a new innovative distro that needs to start with a blank slate not Mint ala Ubuntu ala Debian, why bring all that baggage along? The real challenge is how to build the team to accomplish what you suggest - who is the visionary, motivator, leader - the Steve Jobs - that can make that happen? Maybe it's you.
Sure, starting with a blank slate would always be the ideal. But then you might as well go the whole hog and start over from scratch - completely new OS, kernel and all, in fact, a hypervisor-based OS. Whether any such undertaking would be feasible or even sensible in a free/open source environment is highly debatable, even questionable. If I had the time and health (not to mention the financial wherewithal to sustain my family during the initial period!), I might even be tempted to make a start on something myself. Leadership's never been a problem here, nor vision and ability to motivate and inspire others to aspire to greater things.
majpooper wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 9:49 pm
thenextguy wrote: Tue Dec 11, 2018 3:38 pm You want Windows-like commands and menus - fine, so why not just stick with Windows? That's just the whole point of my post - all Linux distros have become so Windows-like, there's very little, at least on the surface, to distinguish them from one another or from Windows. What's the point in being a Windows clone when you could be your own magnificent self?
thenextguy wrote: Tue Dec 11, 2018 3:38 pm But the Linux movement, in a mad rush to try and gain more widespread acceptance went about it the wrong way by aiming to become Windows clones, instead of innovating right there and then and coming up with something better, more innovative, and far easier to use and set up than Windows,
It's not your concept I disagree with it innovative even exciting - I think you miss the point of Mint and the sentiment of Mint users specifically. Mint users for the most part do like Windows, OK there are a few who are like "oh, Windows is a good OS just like linux - they both have an important role to play Photoshop, blah blah blah." Just check out this forum and see what the prevailing attitude is concerning Windows and I think your question "why not just stick with Windows?" will become clear. To but a finer point on it, the typical Mint user thinks Windows sucks and their hassles with Windows is what drove them to linux and then to settle in on Mint. They came to linux because they wanted ". . . something better, more innovative, and far easier to use and set up than Windows..." and found exactly that with Mint, not to mention stability, performance, privacy and security improvements. I certainly cannot speak for the entire Mint community however I would suggest again perusing this forum you would come to the conclusion that Mint users would not agree with the perception in terms of linux that ". . .there's very little, at least on the surface, to distinguish [linux distro] . . from one another or from Windows."
No, the prevailing attitudes here are not lost on me. I've "lurked" around for quite a while to get that.

But Mint users, like all open source/free software OS users, and most particularly those venturing into forums and usergroups and the like, are a tiny minority in the grand scheme of things, and are almost never, ever typical Joe Average Users. (JAUs almost always stick with what they get on their systems, i.e., Windows, and don't even customise that in any way, shape, or form.) Most seem to have some kind of axe to grind. There are no hassles to be had with Windows, haven't been for a long time. Don't get me wrong, I think Mint is a great little Linux distro, I like it a lot, and so far it's my favourite modern Linux distro (I've been using Linux, on and off, for over 20 years, but always alongside other OSes) and I run it, along with another distro, in a Hyper-V VM (as well as using a Tails Live USB for most of my online activity), and although it is quite nippy and resource-frugal, more so than other distros I've tried, "something better, more innovative and far easier to use and set up than Windows," or offering "stability, performance, privacy and security improvements" - hell no, I don't really see any of that, not in Mint, not in any free/open source OS. Windows leads, and Linux etc. just tamely follow. See my further thoughts on all that elsewhere in this thread.

The sole, mildly innovative thing that happened in the history of the free/os OS scene so far was/is GNU/GNUstep, but look where it's ended up after over 20 years - nowhere exactly, alas. The idea of creating a free continuation of the NeXTSTEP OS and the OpenStep APIs was a sound one at the time, given that it would soon be subsumed into Mac OS X and crippled beyond belief as well as tied to Apple hardware. But now, it's dated and anyway tries to follow Apple and Cocoa. It started out with the wrong kernel anyway, Hurd should have been Mach-based, even according to the original creator ofthe project.

And I stand by my statement that there is - on the surface anyway - very little generally to distinguish any one Linux or other free/os OS from another or from Windows. That is not a matter of opinion, it's a matter of cold, hard fact.
thenextguy

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by thenextguy »

absque fenestris wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 10:36 pm
thenextguy wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 2:01 pm ... Windows, whose new UI was itself a clone of the NeXTSTEP UI. (Microsoft reverse-engineered it, changed things around a bit so it no longer quite looked like NeXT and added about tuppence worth of stuff... ...
...
...And no, The GIMP isn't bad, but it's a nightmare to use and most importantly it just cannot stand scrutiny against serious Windows apps like Photoshop, unfortunately...
Somehow I have never seen NeXTSTEP and MS Windows in any connection. What should Microsoft have copied from NeXTSTEP?
More or less the entire Workspace Manager. The dock, which also tracked running apps and document windows and showed the icons of running apps that were not docked and minimised doc windows along the bottom of the screen, was simply turned into the Windows Taskbar and Startmenu, i.e., just changing the metaphor slightly, the appearance. (And of course adding the System Tray, and later the QuickStart bar. They left out stripping off app menus and changed the Workspace metaphor for a Desktop one that could display icons without the use of a dock. And they also left out the FileViewer, plus the other utils of the WM like the Inspector etc.
absque fenestris wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 10:36 pmGIMP a nightmare? I like it, and also Krita and Scribus and Inkscape... and because Debian/Ubuntu/Mint is a bit lame, I use the latest versions under - ...the other OS. Mint users: feel free to crucify me...
If we are talking about nightmares, then PhotoShop & Co. is a good example of how a company can destroy good programs in a targeted and deliberate way.
Yes, I find The GIMP a nightmare to use. And e.g. its text utils are abysmal. In no way could one use GIMP or any of the other GFX apps professionally. And yes, I agree with you, PS is a nightmare in many ways (not least for Adobe having killed off/taken over just about all its competitors and not even made use of some of the excellent features that some offered that still stand out to this day!), but alas, it's the "industry standard", vastly over-priced too. One of my favourite GFX apps ever was Caffeein's 'TIFFany.app' under NeXTSTEP and OPENSTEP Enterprise for Windows NT 4 - they did port to MacOS X, but not sure what happened to that afterwards - probably also destroyed by Adobe. :/
absque fenestris wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 10:36 pmAnd yes, I would be interested in the fabulously good, innovative new desktop - is there anything more specific there?
Thanks for your interest, but at this point, it was really nothing more than a mere suggestion for how Mint could promote itself through innovation (eventually, once such a stable wm and desktop had been produced, i.e., not included in the distro until stable).
thenextguy

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by thenextguy »

jimallyn wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:04 am thenextguy, you might start with playing with various versions of Linux in VirtualBox. In VirtualBox, you can play to your heart's content without having to worry about screwing up your "daily driver." Maybe install one of the lightest version, maybe even one that is command line only, then figure out how to get a desktop on it. There's a book called "Linux From Scratch" that I have heard is quite useful for learning some of the insides of Linux. You can actually download the book:

http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/

And then there's Beyond Linux From Scratch, and Automated Linux From Scratch.
Thank you once again, jimallyn. I do run several Linux versions (and a BSD one) in VBs with Window's Hyper-V. I have Mint Mate and LMDE, plus another distro and BSD on my main machine, plus Mint Mate and another distro, also in HV VMs, on my laptop, and I also use a Live USB stick with Tails Live for most of my online activity - it's portable, anonymous/private, and simple to use on any of my computers and anywhere else. Plus, I've been an on and off (nowadays more on than off) Linux (and *BSD) user for over 20 years and other Unixes (NextSTEP, SunOS/Solaris, Irix.. even longer. :) Plus I used (and set up, manually in those days) X Windows servers and window managers under e.g. OS/2 in addition to distros like Slackware in those days, which was probably the hardest but also best distro then.

So all in all, I have a fair bit of experience with Linux. All the same, I'll check out that book (and the other two) when I get a chance - there's always something new to learn. :) Thx for the suggestion.
jimallyn wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:32 am Just glanced through the book. You would learn a LOT about Linux going through it. Might have to do my own Linux from scratch when I have time.
LOL! Hehe, that's a great idea - good to do something new, always. The day you stop to learn and do something new you're already on the road to oblivion. Always reach for the stars, for that impossible dream, friend, and you may just get there! :)
thenextguy

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by thenextguy »

gm10 wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:31 pm
thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:28 pm
gm10 wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 2:59 amBut I'm still curious about what you even mean with "A desktop environment that would be totally object oriented"?
I suggest you google it sometime, and then 'Pink', 'Taligent', 'Workplace OS'.
Those are names of failed OS projects and have nothing to do with my question. Anyway, I was only mildly curious, nevermind.
Hmm, not necessarily failed, more like, abandoned. Anyway, there you'll get a pretty good idea what a proper OO UI is.
thenextguy

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by thenextguy »

Moem wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 4:04 pm
thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:33 pm all I did was make a suggestion how Mint could best promote itself. At least, IMO - to which I am perfectly entitled and which I am perfectly at liberty to voice. Especially so as it was perfectly well intentioned.
Sure. And all I did was tell you why I do not believe that your suggestions are a good match for Mint. You are free to tell us your opinions, and it's pretty normal that you'll get other people's opinions in return. Was that unexpected? If so, then what did you expect?
I never expect anything but the unexpected. Of course one gets other people's opinions in return - that's a given and a prerequisite for meaningful discourse.
thenextguy

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by thenextguy »

thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 5:49 pm
absque fenestris wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 10:36 pm Somehow I have never seen NeXTSTEP and MS Windows in any connection. What should Microsoft have copied from NeXTSTEP?
More or less the entire Workspace Manager. The dock, which also tracked running apps and document windows and showed the icons of running apps that were not docked and minimised doc windows along the bottom of the screen, was simply turned into the Windows Taskbar and Startmenu, i.e., just changing the metaphor slightly, the appearance. (And of course adding the System Tray, and later the QuickStart bar. They left out stripping off app menus and changed the Workspace metaphor for a Desktop one that could display icons without the use of a dock. And they also left out the FileViewer, plus the other utils of the WM like the Inspector etc.
PS : Forgot to add, MS also 'adopted' - and adapted - the NeXT windows titlebar gadget glyphs.

So all in all, the Win 95 style interface was descended from the NeXT UI, and consequently, so are just about all the Linux/BSD UIs by copying the Windows one. Funny how things can go round and round in the same old circles...
MrGrimm

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by MrGrimm »

mediclaser wrote: Tue Dec 11, 2018 6:42 pm There's no better way of promoting Mint than having what it has now --> a strong community of users helping each other (especially the beginners).
AMEN!!!!
MrGrimm

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by MrGrimm »

AZgl1500 wrote: Wed Dec 12, 2018 3:26 am I got spit on with my very first help post in a few "support forums" with horrible language thrown at me for wasting their time because I did not research 15 years of their diatribe to find the answer to a problem.
got that right, told off more than a few windbags. bleep bleep bleep 1,000 word post for what could of be said in less than 4 sentences. i don't want some long unrelated spiel with the answer i was looking for at the very end if they actually post one.
MrGrimm

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by MrGrimm »

to be blunt you don't get the main thing about linux being similar to windows, and that is for simplicity of use. so one can EASILY go back and fourth between os's if they so wish. why do you think microsoft ran with the windows idea when apple wasn't interested, but now osx looks like windows, and that was done to get windows users to come over to mac.
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Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by rene »

thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:41 pm It's been a hell of a long time since any free/open source OS has been genuinely innovative, and that is tragic.
Why? And please don't answer that...

As others have mentioned you are with your "suggestion" at the approximately worst possible place you could be. Mint in its current form, i.e., through development of Cinnamon as a result of users rejecting GNOME3 and Unity, exists due to its demograpic not caring for innovation beyond the desktop metaphor of old; of having no use for having personal workflow upset for the sake of a buzzword, be it "task driven", "object oriented", or simply "innovative".

The fact that recent UI development has been form-factor driven --- and specifically has been rejected flat out for the old laptop/desktop form factor --- is testament to the fact that, a, innovation comes from/through hardware, not from software developers circle-jerking over design documents, and, b, that given existing form-factors, existing UI design is in fact quite up to the task. There's absolutely nothing tragic about that.

And as such, all for experimentation, but then DO so. Posting "suggestions" especially here on this specific distributions' forum is useless posturing.
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Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by jimallyn »

thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 8:33 pmSo all in all, the Win 95 style interface was descended from the NeXT UI, and consequently, so are just about all the Linux/BSD UIs by copying the Windows one.
I had heard of NeXT computer before, but never saw one until I did a websearch for it just now. To me, the UI looks a lot like the WIMP (Windows, icons, menus and pointing device) graphical interface developed at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) and first used in the Alto computer which was released in 1973. So what exactly is it that everybody is supposed to have copied from the NeXT computer?
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Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by rene »

I quite advise https://www.amazon.com/Barbarians-Bill- ... 0805057544 for an insider account of early Windows development. And no, as far as I remember NeXT does not feature. Classic Macintosh does...
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Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by lsemmens »

Just as a thought, How can Linux be "different from Windwoes?"
A few points for consideration
- way more stable
- updates that are not intrusive
- FOSS
- just about any app to do what you need

If your complaint is about the interface, How can you make it different? go back to the command line? the WIMP interface, unfortunately, is the ONLY choice for any OS - Yeah Apple. M$, (any other OS you can think of) still require the click of a mouse button to operate. The command line is still the same the world over. The only difference being the command names used.

If you love Windows so much, why, I might ask, are you here?
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Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by MrGrimm »

rene wrote: Fri Dec 14, 2018 3:09 am I quite advise https://www.amazon.com/Barbarians-Bill- ... 0805057544 for an insider account of early Windows development. And no, as far as I remember NeXT does not feature. Classic Macintosh does...
exactly
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Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by sgtor »

thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 6:30 pm
gm10 wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:31 pm
thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 3:28 pm
I suggest you google it sometime, and then 'Pink', 'Taligent', 'Workplace OS'.
Those are names of failed OS projects and have nothing to do with my question. Anyway, I was only mildly curious, nevermind.
Hmm, not necessarily failed, more like, abandoned. Anyway, there you'll get a pretty good idea what a proper OO UI is.
In theory Linux itself is using OOP principles. Debian is the object, Ubuntu inherits from Deb and becomes it's own object, Mint inherits from Ubuntu. Apply that to any other distro and you have OOP principles in action, theoretically.
thenextguy

Re: Promote by making Mint an Extra Strong Mint

Post by thenextguy »

jimallyn wrote: Fri Dec 14, 2018 2:52 am
thenextguy wrote: Thu Dec 13, 2018 8:33 pmSo all in all, the Win 95 style interface was descended from the NeXT UI, and consequently, so are just about all the Linux/BSD UIs by copying the Windows one.
I had heard of NeXT computer before, but never saw one until I did a websearch for it just now. To me, the UI looks a lot like the WIMP (Windows, icons, menus and pointing device) graphical interface developed at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) and first used in the Alto computer which was released in 1973. So what exactly is it that everybody is supposed to have copied from the NeXT computer?
Yes, your PARC connection is right - in fact, while still at Apple in about (IIRC) 1979, Jobs led a small team to get insights into the PARC's GUI (this was paid for by Apple, who also purchased a license to use the concept for Lisa and subsequently, the Mac). And what a waste of time and money that was, too - the Mac's OS wasn't really halfway fit for purpose and the GUI so basic it was beyond belief, until about System 6 at the earliest, some would say System 7. Hell, the Amiga that became available only one year after the first Mac - and had been on development from before the Mac - had a far more advanced OS, 32-bit, PMT, etc. etc. and a better GUI implementation too, without any visits to Xerox.

As for NeXT - far and away the best thing Jobs ever did - had far and away the best UI implementation, as well as the most attractive one (it still is/looks pretty good!), as well as sitting on top of a unix system. What's more it was the closest thing we've had so far of a OOUI.

Microsoft, in the process of developing a new UI for Cairo and Chicago, reverse-engineered NeXTSTEP's WorkspaceManager.app, the application that provided and managed the UI and provided its utils. When Windows 95 came along with its new UI, NeXT sued but the case was fairly quickly settled out of court with MS paying to license the code.

As to what MS did, I collate from previous posts -

"... Windows, whose new UI was itself a clone of the NeXTSTEP UI. (Microsoft reverse-engineered it, changed things around a bit so it no longer quite looked like NeXT and added about tuppence worth of stuff..."
"...The dock, which also tracked running apps and document windows and showed the icons of running apps that were not docked and minimised doc windows along the bottom of the screen, was simply turned into the Windows Taskbar and Startmenu, i.e., just changing the metaphor slightly, the appearance. (And of course adding the System Tray, and later the QuickStart bar. They left out stripping off app menus and changed the Workspace metaphor for a Desktop one that could display icons without the use of a dock. And they also left out the FileViewer, plus the other utils of the WM like the Inspector etc."
"PS : Forgot to add, MS also 'adopted' - and adapted - the NeXT windows titlebar gadget glyphs."

Of course, these changes also lost a lot of the OO.

The heritage was immediately obvious to any experienced NeXT user. Even when MS showed the first screengrabs/muck-ups of Chicago, I thought things looked surprisingly similar, not suspecting at that stage just how far they had gone.

So you see, in copying Windows, everybody's copying NeXTSTEP in a way. :)
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