Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Windows XP/archive1

Windows XP
This was listed once before. There are now many more images and some of the lists have been coalesced into prose. - Ta bu shi da yu 02:35, 2 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Support. My main issues with it seem to have been addressed -Exigentsky
 * Support There is nothing wrong with it, it is nice, comprehensive and screenshots. Squash 05:31, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Oppose - Certainly better than the last time I looked at it, but it has a completely inadequate lead section for an article its size and sections that are almost completely composed of a list, such as ==New and updated features== bug me (some more prose would be nice). Theses issues should not be hard to fix. --mav 05:32, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * I'm unsure how to resolve the new and updated features section. I would have thought that this would have been the best place for a list! Some suggestions on how to resolve this would be very much appreciated! The lead section I will attempt to resolve... - Ta bu shi da yu 06:06, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * I'm always surprised how nominators of technology articles seem to find it hard expounding on the features of software. As I did a lot of research on Windows XP (in order to convince my father I didn't want XP just to keep up with the Joneses), I've expanded the feature section as best as I can. A bit more work is needed, but I'm quite pleased with what we've got now, especially in the kernel section; for something quite crucial, that part was quite lacking until I expanded it based on my research one-and-a-half years ago. Johnleemk | Talk 10:44, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Wow! Fantastic work John! I think you just single handedly fixed up the issue that I could work out how to resolve, and with style! The tricky part was when I started working on this it was a anti-MS POV screed... now it is something much more usable and friendly to read :-) Also, that lead section looks extremely good, and you beat me to it for fixing it up! Well done! Ta bu shi da yu 12:11, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * The new subsections in the features section are certainly an improvement on the list, but now the TOC is overwhelming and most of those subsections are stubs. Giving a more logical organization for the subsections and greatly reducing their number would be great. Those new subsections could be ===Underlying OS===, ===User experience===, and ===Interoperability=== (or something to that effect). Getting close. :) --mav 00:05, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * How is it now? Johnleemk | Talk 07:32, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * It is great. Support. --mav 06:10, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Support. Looks like the needed issues have been addressed.  --L33tminion | (talk) 22:33, Feb 5, 2005 (UTC)
 * Support. It looks really good! --Neigel von Teighen 22:35, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Support - good article Brookie 16:52, 6 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Support - Good article PPGMD 15:44, 7 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Object. The article seems somewhat POV, slightly tilted in the sympathetic direction. That may be just me. But what is apparent is that over half of the references are from MS themselves and the rest, not too many appear to be critical, lets say its 50/50 for those.  That leaves the references heavily tilted overall in MS's favor. I have a hard time believing if the references are POV tilted, that the article is not somewhat too. For ex in the criticisms section nothing is said about the estimated total costs of security/adware/virus problems and the allegation that MS has not just a bad security record, but their design choices actively caused the poor record, and could have been expected to have that result.  As I understand it that is a well supported POV that should be mentioned. - Taxman 23:20, Feb 8, 2005 (UTC)
 * Taxman, this is just not the case. There is a whole section devoted to "Common criticisms of Windows XP". It deals with spyware, product activation, security issues and the integration of features into the O/S as anti-competitive. These have all been battled out over a lengthy period of time and we finally have a neutral article. The rest of the article deals with matters of fact, or else the opinions of others have always been referenced (no more weasel words!). The reason there are so many Microsoft references is because the primary source of information about Microsoft's product is, well, Microsoft. Most of those Microsoft references are support knowledgebase or MSDN articles. If you look at the context of the references, you will see that it is not slanted too much to the advantage of Microsoft. I'm confused about why you think that the article is POV. Now I would like to challenge you to provide a source for the total costs of security/adware/virus problems. Also, the allegations you speak of: who said that?! Unless you can provide the sources to us, I really think that these are not actionable! I mean, you vaguely say that there are design decisions that are fundamentally flawed, but no mention of what they are! Which design decisions are you speaking about? - Ta bu shi da yu 23:35, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Try not to be so defensive, I'm just calling them like I see it. I see the common criticisms section, It just seems a bit whitewashed and as I said the references are tilted heavily in MS's favor. Are there any of those references that are overtly negative about XP and are from reliable sources? If so, it is few compared to the positive ones. As to the cost of spy/adware and viruses, that is often quoted and various studies are done on it from time to time. Perhaps the famous monoculture paper would cover that. I'm not saying it would be easy to find a reliable one, but who said it was easy to write a FA? I thought the design decisions resulting in the poor security record was common knowledge. Off the top of my head I can think of several: The tight integration of IE into the OS is responsible for much of the malware and exploits. Anyone could have seen that coming. The fact that running basically as admin all the time is practically encouraged, and it is very difficult to get anything done on the OS not as admin. That results in lots of issues and makes security exploits easier.  The decisions in Outlook to make software in messages easy to run without consent, etc. I could be slightly off base on some of that, but I am no MS specialist and I can pull that off the top of my head; there is certainly more along that vein out there. - Taxman 00:32, Feb 9, 2005 (UTC)
 * I don't think I'm being too defensive here. I'd like to know why we should be adding the monoculture paper into the article about Windows XP! Surely this isn't the appropriate article? That should be going into Microsoft Windows or even into Microsoft. This article is purely about the operating system, not a soapbox for criticism of Microsoft's dominance or the monoculture argument (btw, I agree with that argument). We already have plenty on the spyware issue, however you keep saying that there are various papers on that issue. Name one. The admin account is a good point however, will add some info on this. Which I have now done (will fixup the references section). Now why are we talking about Outlook? That's not Windows XP, that would be Microsoft Outlook (mind you, they've patched the altest releases so you can't run executables directly...). The tight integration of IE to the operating system is not specific to Windows XP, so it should be discussed in the umbrella article, Microsoft Windows. - Ta bu shi da yu 01:51, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)
 * Oh, incidently, if you cared to look at the non-technical references, you will see that there are quite a few critical references to Windows XP. I can read 14 references that have criticisms or highlight real problems to Windows. The Microsoft references are sources for our information about the operating system: a fair thing I think as Microsoft makes the product. In fact, there are more critical references than their are positive reviews of Windows XP in there! I can read five positive references in the current list. - Ta bu shi da yu 02:03, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)