Windows is a very large task, for which HLL's are absolutely justified. Written in ASM, however, it would be faster, and probably have gotten a lot more thought and planning. I believe I agree with you, that, despite the fact that processors have become MUCH faster and memory size, available at reasonable cost, has become MUCH larger, M$ has been unable to make the "new" version behave any faster than the "old" versions of their tools that used Win3.x.

A part of the problem is that they (M$) use their own tools. They have to do that, because they'd like others to pay for the development of those tools. It all starts with the tools. If the original tools are "not so good," then the work product isn't either. The fact that their output is much, Much larger than it once was is as much a product of the fact that memory, fixed disks, etc, have gotten larger, too. They (M$) need the extra space, but it also is burdensome to manage that extra space. Nothing's free.

As for the age of the developers themselves, well, it may be different in your part of the world, but, here in the U.S. the notion of "doing a good job" died off in the '70's. Now, it's all about getting paid ... more and more... It's readily observable in the "professional" culture, that a team is assembled, and, of the six or eight people on the team, two do the work, and the rest fight over who'll take credit. Nobody is really concerned about the product quality. In the aerospace industry, for example, the last person in the chain to be the least bit concerned about product quality and reliability is the "product integrity engineer," who's usually a low-level, two-or-three years out of college, engineer, with little experience. Everyone senior to him is concerned, principally, with schedule and, to lesser extent, with budget. There's a thing called the "Peter principle," too, and it still reigns supreme.

I remember one time I was spending lots of time at a client's location, and I was the only one who didn't spend time on the phone, particularly on his personal cellphone much of the day. Listening to the others shouting into their phones about matters totally irrelevant to the work we were purportedly performing didn't help my productivity either.

My belief is that one goes to work to sell and provide his services to his client/employer. If he can't leave his personal life behind while he's at work, he shouldn't offer his time. When I pay for a person's time, I expect to benefit from all of it, and not just the small portion that today's youngsters think they should provide. I don't care how old a person is, but I do concern myself with his/her work ethic. If someone has a complicated life that can't be left behind, yet can perform his/her work adequately, I prefer to have him/her do it elsewhere, paid by the job rather than by the hour/month/year. That way, I, at least, don't have to listen to arguments between husband and wife, or between mother and childcare provider.

BTW, I quite frequently use and old system that runs DOS/Win3.1 and on which I use the early version of M$OFFICE that was provided to me by M$, though I scarcely know why. I find it quite "snappy" when using WORD or EXCEL. It's even pretty good using ACCESS. There are lots of really useful tools that work fine under DOS/Win3.x that won't work under 2K, XP, or later. That system always "wakes up" ready to go to work, and has never had a virus problem since it's not net-connected, and no new software has been installed on it since about 1994.

BTW, I had no intention of starting a "food fight" and, further, believe this discussion has wandered int the realm in which a separate thread under CHAT might be warranted.

RE