this post was submitted on 19 Jun 2024
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They tried Windows on Itanium and on Alpha. I think the biggest issue is even though the OS could be recompiled, most apps are not compiled at install in order to take advantage of the underlying platform. You saw a similar issue with the original Surface being ARM only. Sure the OS was there but people couldn’t run the Windows apps they were used to and Microsoft got held responsible rather than the developers.
Alternatively you’d have to put an x86 emulation layer which would slow apps down and people would again ask “why?”
One of the great advantages of software distributed with the source code is the flexibility to move to different platforms and architectures. I wonder if moving to a snap/flatpak model will change this flexibility in the future.
They tried that, it's called UWP. A lot of programs don't want to be distributed through the microsoft store though, forcing them to use "old" .exe's
God knows I don't want that crap either. They're always bastardized versions of full apps.
Emulation worked (and still works) great when Apple switched from x86 to ARM. It can be done.
Also when Mac went from PPC to x86
Hmm I wonder why MS has spent so much time converting office apps to run on webview2…
Microsoft has always embraced their own migration. They converted their apps to UWP. They’re making them platform agnostic with webview2. If you want to run just their software on any architecture that’s fine, but Windows and x86 have been co-mingled and anyone who installs Windows expects their 3rd party software to just work.
They’ve also been pushing PWA hard. A lot of apps run on webview2 even in specialized industries.
I won’t be surprised if we see a larger push to non-x86 and if it’s arm then it’s also possible to go risc-v if app support is there.