Windows 7 to be the end of the line?

Stephen Withers
Wednesday, 21 October 2009 10:20

IT Industry - Development

An academic has predicted that Windows 7 - which ships later this week - may be Microsoft's desktop OS swan song.

Associate Professor Sanjay Chawla, head of the University of Sydney's School of Information Technologies, said that desktop computing is becoming less important as cloud computing and virtualisation become increasingly commonplace.

"Users won't need new, more powerful operating systems for their desktops if the tasks they need to perform can be done by cloud computing," said Chawla.

Cloud computing and virtualisation "expand the Internet from a communication medium to a computing platform in its own right," he added.

While cloud computing does have a number of advantages - including the ability to access programs and data from practically any computer and many handheld devices, the removal of the need to update applications, and a reduction in the cost of the hardware needed to run heavyweight applications - it also has drawbacks.

"The downside of emerging systems is the lack of trust in cloud computing. People need more convincing their data is safe in the 'cloud' before they commit to it. The privacy offered by desktop operating systems means they still hold a lot of appeal," said Chawla.

There's also the issue of the bandwidth required to support cloud applications, and the cost of using it (which can be considerable for those who rely on wireless connectivity).

What else did Chawla have to say, and what was Microsoft's response? See page 2.