Windows 8: A Critical Analysis by Intact CEO Larry Aultman

Results:

There is no compelling reason to install Windows 8 in your business at least through second quarter 2014. Application developers are currently fully engaged in writing applications for Windows 7 and for cloud computing. Applications being developed for business are still largely targeting the current Windows 7 system. This shortage of developers for Windows 8 applications will slow its adoption.

Factors Affecting Adoption of Windows 8:

• Shortage of Windows 8 application developers
• Stiff competition from other device types
• Plentiful and very capable existing business applications on Windows 7 system
• No hardware upgrade induced need to move to Windows 8
• Developers are turning to browser based applications at expense of installed applications that lessen the need to move to a newer operating system such as Windows 8

Technologies to Monitor

Many companies are planning their purchases for fiscal 2014/15 as most are done with the 2013/14 budgets. Microsoft is experiencing large adoption rates for it software as a service (SaaS) of Office365. This will be a compelling factor within a year to adopt the new Windows 8 or its antecedent. CIO’s should watch the Microsoft Windows Azure platform as a service (PaaS) as it will eventually provide low cost application development opportunities that favors the Window 8 model. Microsoft’s Windows Azure and Office365 are feeding on the current Windows 7 and Windows Server (cannibalization) models. Windows 8 is a transitional product.

Analyst BIO:

• A Windows product user since version Windows 3.0
• A professional developer of Windows applications
• A company owner who makes buying decisions
• A former CIO at Florida Department of State

Throughout my 30 year career I have made the bulk of my living working with systems based on Microsoft Windows products. I am considered an expert in Microsoft systems including, their developer tools Visual Studio and .NET, their data products SQL Server and Azure, and their operating systems Windows and Windows Server plus now the Azure platform as a service. For my professional credentials see me on: linkedin.com/in/laultman

Analysis Background

I am a consumer and consultant specializing in Microsoft products for a long time now and have seen many cycles in the business market. When you are in the trenches every day you began to see patterns. This is true of Microsoft products like other companies. One can rightfully assume that Microsoft intends to stay relevant in the markets in particular the enterprise and consumer. Since I work mainly in the enterprise area I shall leave the consumer reviews to others. However that said, the consumer products including Windows in home settings has served as a healthy training ground for individuals who also are employed and use Windows in their everyday work experience. The sphere of influence of Windows for the enterprise extends deeply into the consumer space.

Microsoft 3-Year Cycle

An operating system is a difficult thing to develop; it takes a long time to implement. Microsoft has been on a roughly three year cycle in major releases since the early 1980’s. Business leaders (CIO’s) are accustomed to this cycle many skipping the first releases of major upgrades. Like my father told me about new cars, “Don’t buy a new car after a major model change they don’t know how to make them.” That belief is held by most business leaders and in particular CIO’s. Change is good and at the same time change can be expensive.

Microsoft, I am sure is aware of this phenomenon. Major changes in the operating system reflect the underlying changes in hardware and/or usage demands. For example the changes in microprocessor technology (8, 16, 32, 64 bit to the multi-cores) required extensive changes in the operating systems. The purchasing cost of new hardware and its new operating system were tightly linked. Naturally the hardware must exist prior to the operating system change. In the recent past the cost of computer hardware limited the enterprise’s march into the future and by extension limited the growth and development of new operating systems.

Windows 8 is the first major release of a Microsoft operating system not tied to a corresponding change in the underlying processor technology.

Implications to the CIO

Practically all purchasing of computer equipment is on the three year cycle. CIO’s have been phasing out Windows XP to Windows 7 as they replaced their desktop computers to 64 bit hardware. In the mind of the CIO (I can speak with authority here) there is no compelling reason to move to Windows 8 at this very moment.

Windows 8 is the first major release of a Microsoft operating system that is ahead of the hardware platform it is intended to run upon.

The technology pundits seem to toss Windows Vista up as a failed system and tag Window 8 as another failure. I take a different view entirely. Windows Vista was released alongside Windows XP SP3 which was a major release in the XP series. There was no compelling reason for a CIO to move to Vista while Vista did represent the future of the Microsoft Windows line from which Windows 7 was born. Like Vista before it Windows 8 is breaking new ground even when there is no compelling reason for a business to adopt/implement it.

CIO’s are keenly aware that the platform landscape is changing again in the form of the “device” where the processors are not Intel based, or the device is running something other than Windows. This furthers the “wait and see mentality.” As a CIO there is an expectation that the device market will shake-out as markets have in the past. The safe bet then is to wait.

Things are changing again, with adoption of cloud computing.

How does cloud computing change the face and change the landscape for operating systems? In a word, virtualization. This will occur in two major waves. The desktop computer operating system will be virtualized in servers to further diminish the reliance on hardware. While virtualization in local servers is not cloud. The technology is very “cloud like” in terms of management and perception. The second wave is the ultimate movement of the actual “compute” functions to cloud computing making the concept of installed applications needing a powerful local operating system less relevant.

Five Month Trial Results:

The trial was simple. Purchase several copies of Windows 8 and run it in everyday normal use to see and feel how it works alongside Windows 7. The use case also included Apple iPad and iPhone as points of reference.

The Windows computers did not feature touch screen capability as this is likely the most accurate scenario that a CIO considering Windows 8 is likely to face in the enterprise for a considerable time to come (it took forever to get rid of the old CRT screens for flat ones and getting companies to spring for touch is not likely anytime soon.)

Windows 8 Usability:

There is no doubt that Windows 8 is decidedly different. Observations of work patterns show that users of current Windows 7 often will opt for the mouse when their hand is already on the keyboard where just a keystroke could cause the desired action. Windows 8 reduces the mouse interactivity favoring keyboard actions such as typing the name of an application instead of menu bound clicks or icon short cuts. While it seems at first the “Windows key” is a distraction it quickly becomes natural when shifting between processes.

If your work involves Windows 7 installed applications you may find the missing “Menu” button a trial. The simple solution is to install short cut icons on the desktop or pin your applications onto toolbars. Remember Windows 7 lets you make toolbars as does Windows 8. So those applications that you use the most are either a click or a few key strokes away. In actual operation placing Windows 7 applications on toolbars saves time both on Windows 7 and 8.

Windows 8 automatically shifts to Windows 7 mode when a desktop application opens. The redefined “Windows” keyboard button is the “Start” menu. Instead of reaching for the mouse just hit the key. This is the same pattern for iPad and iPhone. Like those devices you should put the applications you use most often on the start menu.

Once the fact that the “Windows” key is the “Start” menu sinks in to your head the use become little different from Windows 7. In practical use in the business where applications are Windows 7 you will rarely use the Windows 8 screen other than to start other applications. Again in practical terms the use of toolbars eliminates the bulk of the need to ever go to the start menu.

Windows 8 Performance:

Users of Windows 8 in desktop and laptop settings reported usage as indistinguishable from Windows 7 in the same settings.

Windows 8 User Experiences:

Overall the use of Windows 8 was positive. Given the opportunity to switch back to Windows 7 at the end of the trial workers decided to stay with Windows 8. The built-in security and the fact that the built-in applications had grown on them were deciding factors in staying with Windows 8.

Installation of Windows 8 was an issue on older equipment. No successful upgrade was achieved. In one case the BIOS had to be upgraded and the disk controller has to be downgraded to IDE from SATA resulting in a complete formatting of the system. In another case the upgrade path caused certain drivers to conflict that caused the system to “hang” with the disk drive at 100% for about 30 minutes after each boot. It worked normally after that 30 minute hang time until the next boot. This was cured by eventually doing a “clean” install. Finally on a laptop purchased in 2009 with Windows 7 preinstalled Windows 8 would never install.

Final Comment:

Windows 8 works very well. It has never “blue screened”. It has run all applications that ran on Windows 7. Aside from the new Start menu it works exactly as expected. Office 2010 and Office 2013 both work well. Visual Studio 2012 runs with no problems. There is a definite need for more native Windows 8 applicat

Articles and News

I have been getting some interesting opportunities to speak and have gotten a few mentions in several articles of late.

CIO.com and CIO Magazine article: Florida CIO Takes Election to Cloud

http://www.cio.com.au/article/442205/florida_cio_takes_election_cloud/

E Government: The Programming CIO Gets Radical (My team called me the “Programming CIO” because unlike many CIOs I actually write code.

http://www.govtech.com/e-government/The-Programming-CIO-Gets-Radical.html

Microsoft Case Study about my methods and the process of transforming a government agency’s development model to a modern Agile development model.

http://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Case_Study_Detail.aspx?CaseStudyID=710000002324

Cloud Computing the CIO’s Dilemma

If you are a CIO today you most likely are facing a quandary – go to some cloud solution or be left behind.

Cloud computing has quickly become the “Internet” sized boom of the 21^st century. By this I mean fortunes for company and businesses will be made or lost depending on your play in the computing game. Already wireless data networks (smart-phones, devices, etc.) have revolutionized the data demands. These new demands swamp traditional client/server systems and make previous licensing models of the software vendors untenable.

Business and government face interesting situations today having to provide data to consumers at an exponentially increasing rate in the midst of a major global financial recession. Companies that currently provide software and services are scrambling to position there products in this quickly evolving cloud market place. Like the Internet boom in the 1990’s where every company on Earth it seemed was an Internet company; every company that provides enterprise software, datacenter services, and networks is somehow “cloud or cloud-ready.” The cloud hype is a bunch of smoke and mirrors.

 

I think most cloud hype is simply warmed over stew!

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce is certainly involved in the discussion of cloud computing setting the parameters of what cloud computing means in economic terms.  Companies care about this.

As Chief Information Officer (CIO) for Florida Department of State I too care.  Years ago (1980’s) a director of a government agency for which I contracted made the statement; “Nobody at my level gets fired for buying IBM.”  Translated, even if you fail and you bought from the right provider you could not lose.  That is still very true in the minds of CIO’s today.

Hypothetically speaking, say the CIO of a company has a substantial investment in Oracle or Microsoft enterprise software and has a significant investment in an in-house datacenter.  Further suppose this CIO has mission critical systems that are considered legacy or even mid-life systems that will need replacing in the next five years.

Given the hypothetical case above that CIO more than likely has a staff that is heavily invested in those systems and whose skills are now degraded with respect to the rest of the world.  I heard one CIO spin it thusly, “My programmers have concentrated knowledge of our systems.”  Which means they are without value outside that specific environment.

The problem for the CIO facing system replacement trapped on old technology while trying to meet demands of an exploding data demand is, “where is my next move.”  Should he warm over the old system technology or go radical and make the leap to emerging cloud systems?

 

This is truly the central quandary of the CIO, stay safe or make a move.

Having the opportunity as a business owner, as a consultant, and now as a CIO, I have some insights to the problem that I want to share.

Consider the strategic objectives of the organizations:

• For profit company – objective is to make money
• Not for profit company – objective is to provide a service to a specific group
• Government entity – objective is to govern (providing services as well to populations)

In each of these cases the CIO is faced with a plethora of possibilities.  The choices will be bound by the objective.

Insight 1 – All organizations have some sense of strategy.  That might be to wind-down the operation but generally business or government is expected to continue operation for long periods of years.  They have a sense of strategy it may or may not be explicitly defined.  If not then it must be discovered or developed.

Insight 2 – The CIO has a sense of how long his tenure will be.  It is interesting to note that the “street” pegs the CIO churn rate at about three years.  Like coaches or pastors he has a lot to do in a short time to make any real difference.

Insight 3 – Cloud computing is changing the possibilities for companies when it comes to using data in new ways.  Along with cloud computing is the mobile device and their mobile apps.  These are placing new demands on IT services that CIO’s just five years ago did not perceive.

Insight 4 – IT services customers internal and external have an insatiable demand for more data faster on more devices.

Insight 5 – IT companies as providers of software products, software tools, hardware (servers and network) all are looking at cloud as the “next big thing.”

I have strong opinions on cloud computing as do most CIO colleagues of mine.  Relying on NIST [1]as the authority defining what cloud computing is and thus how to evaluate a product offering claiming to be “cloud” is at the core of the CIO dilemma.   At this early stage of cloud development, a CIO should follow very strictly the definition of cloud computing of NIST.  Strict adherence allows the CIO to cut through the hype and ask definitive questions of the service provider.  In my review of products claiming to be “cloud” provisions many are simply not.

 

Cloud products vary greatly but fall into distinct categories.

A product category claiming to be a cloud product that is clearly not is any software that can be run in a virtual machine (VM) in your current datacenter.  Just because you are able to acquire a VM instance in a cloud environment does not then make that product a cloud software product.  A simple example of such a product is Microsoft Access.  I will run in a VM and that VM could be in the cloud but that does not make Access a cloud product.  However a product that either exploits the cloud infrastructure or platform or provides a service that is dependent on the cloud, meaning that it has no value outside the cloud environment is a cloud product.  Gladinet is an example of such a product that provides access to cloud services but without a cloud is practically useless.

Software as a service (SaaS) is another one of those most abused product categories.  The CIO should recognize how the service provider actually engineers the service.  For example SalesForce.com is a recognized SaaS provider that is cloud based.  Who SalesForce uses for their cloud provider is likely hidden from the end user.

What I find at companies and in government agencies are a lot of job functions that could be accomplished using off the shelf solutions.  Many of these no doubt will likely become cloud applications like Microsoft Office365 or Adobe’s new product refactored for SaaS.  Oracle is perplexing in its products that claim to be cloud.  The distinctions are possible if the organization is building its own “cloud” which I categorize as just another datacenter.  But Oracle doesn’t address the rest of the application suite that organizations must have.  Naturally all manufacturers claim to be private cloud providers but in my estimation the differentiations lie only in the licensing and service level agreements not in the product.

For practically all CIO’s creating a “private cloud” as defined by NIST is not likely except in the largest corporations.  Even state governments will struggle with economies of scale if attempting to create a private cloud.  It is possible that several states might ban together to create a “community cloud”.  Again that is most likely above any single CIO to decide.

The result is that today CIO’s should look to public or existing demonstrated community clouds if wishing to take that leap.  A comfortable step for most CIO’s is infrastructure only.  That solves a lot of problems for the short term.  However this gives the CIO no advantage for the future.  To truly embrace the cloud and what it has to offer the CIO must be willing to write new applications that exploit cloud environment.

 

[1] NIST: http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/nistpubs/800-145/SP800-145.pdf

Getting a Job and Other Issues

I have been at the Florida Department of State for 18 months and accomplished the mission I was assigned.  There is plenty of work to do and I really enjoy it thus I am not in any real hurry to leave.  BUT…

At this point in life I must look for the right position.  I promised the Department a year and I might make it two. I am though putting myself back on the job/consulting market.  I am cranking up my network of associates, friends, and colleagues to begin the hunt.

It occurs to me that after 30 years in business I have never really had an interview.  I have always either found my customer or been recommended for the job.  I never have been on the job market train.

So I am fishing for ideas and contacts. My bio is on linkedin.com.

Azure Means Clear Blue Sky

Clear Blue Sky Does Not Mean the Winds Are Not Blowing

Cloud computing is changing software development at a remarkable pace.  I spent the afternoon looking for accounting libraries.  You would think that it would be easy (lets face it accounting has been done before).  Nope! If it isn’t “cloud” it isn’t available.  I love cloud computing but – boy it feels like starting over.

If your company is considering cloud computing (and it shouldmust be) then I want to talk to you as your consultant.  I can save you a lot of time, effort, and distress not to mention a lot of money.  You simply don’t have the time to organically grow the knowledge in-house.  You need an injection!

Florida Election Watch 2012 Major Success

The election of 2012 is in the books.  Florida Department of State pioneered cloud computing at the state government level.  Since October 2011 until the November 6th, 2012 election I put together a winning team who in twelve month’s time created an Azure cloud solution while conducting the Presidential Preference Primary, the Presidential Primary and finally the General Election; all in the cloud.

Unlike other states reporting sites Florida’s site was 100%.  Cloud works and it lowered the cost of the election!

Then numbers tell the story…

Impressive, don’t you think?

J. Larry Aultman–Resume (CV)

Executive Statement

C-Level management leader with empirical experience creating value for companies or government

I work with senior management in the private and public sectors saving real money through efficient use of IT service and making money for companies with a thorough understanding of their business needs. I know business and I know government. This unique perspective sets me apart. As a business owner I know IT’s value – I write the checks. As a government worker I understand government’s unique IT challenges – I approve the purchases. In both cases I find the value points. I am most respected for my honesty and integrity by others while I consider myself to be a very strong IT resource.

I am energized by challenges. With an engineering mind I find the real issues and work on those. I understand the importance of the players winning. I win by helping them see the solution to problems.

Experienced and Entrepreneurial

In the past five years I have worked on a Rackspace cloud conversion for my company, two Azure Cloud solutions one at the Florida House of Representatives, Redistricting Committee, and currently as the CIO for the Department of State taking the most mission critical divisions to Azure Cloud.

Cloud computing promises to save money; private and public. It can. I know because I have done it in my own business and in Florida Department of State. But it is not a silver bullet! Companies need someone like me who has already blazed the trail, charted the uncharted, found real savings and earned real dollars. The cloud will not wait on companies to “figure it out”, those will be left behind.

My company completely eliminated the server farm saving a ton of money while increasing product reliability in moving to the cloud. Notice I didn’t say by “moving my apps” to the cloud. Because I didn’t; I modernized some, rewrote others to actually take advantage of the cloud.

Florida Department of State like many agencies or private businesses has legacy applications and is looking to the cloud as an alternative. I work with the Secretary of State, the Chief of Staff, and management on down the line to methodically create cloud solutions. Seems easy and straight forward; it is not. This year I pulled together five divisions’ IT into a single IT unit, created a vision, strategy, and goal for IT. Since there was no system for development, I had to create that too. Working closely with the senior management and with their complete support the Department now has the Division of Elections’ Florida Voter Registration System deployed as an Azure Cloud service. At the same time I formed a team to modernize the Division of Corporations’ Sunbiz™ into an Azure Cloud service that goes online January 2013.

The simple sentences above don’t capture the magnitude of the cloud transformation at the Department of State. Before mentioning the word “cloud” to management I had to understand the depth of problems and to be absolutely sure that I could “pull it off”, as failure was not an option.

Leadership

Casting the die to jump to cloud I found an untrained staff with a mentality of “we’ve never done anything like this before”, “this is government – nothing changes”, “they will never let you do this”, and “we can’t because it is too hard”. It was a house of “non-believers” and “know-it-all’s” there to ensure failure. In short I had to sell the concept from top to bottom, become its greatest champion, and show a fearful, underpaid, and intimidated group of people that the cloud is simply just another computer. Maybe I left out a few facts early on, but now 17 months later there is no stopping my team. My team has overcome all obstacles, has broken down years of complacency, and is set free to think. Communications between business units and IT has never been better. Some had worked in the Department for over a decade and never met face to face.

Involved

While creating an Azure cloud solution for the Department I also became a charter member of the State Information Technology Workgroup, an interagency advisory board to develop IT strategy for enterprise services. I moderated a panel at the Cloud Computing Conference in Miami with fellow panelist NASA Goddard CIO, Adobe Developer Evangelist, EMC CTO of Healthcare, VMware Director of Healthcare Solutions.

I also am a member of the State CIO Council. I am our Department’s lead negotiator and subject matter expert on Florida’s One-Stop Business Registration Portal; a five agency project to streamline business formation in Florida. This is a high-profile initiative of both the legislative and executive branches.

Forward Thinking

I believe that the future of computing technology for the next couple decades will be based on distributed computing systems (cloud). I further believe that devices (mobile and embedded) are the inevitable wave of future human/machine interfaces. This is certainly true now in consumer technology devices and will fan out into industrial and government very rapidly.

leave me a comment…