It is no secret that the two giants, Microsoft and Google, are not best buds. Recently they have started battling openly, and are not particularly shy of trying to one-up each other with their marketing strategies and gimmicks. This time Google is probably trying to send a message to XP users that they’ll not abandon its users till 2015. This comes on the heels of Microsoft’s recent announcement of end-of-support for Windows XP.
The announcement itself wasn’t as much shocking as depressing; most were already waiting for the other shoe to fall – for Windows tech support for Windows XP to be pulled. The tremendous pressure from users across the globe is probably what kept the tech giant from this move for so long. This time things do look more serious though, and the company desperately wants customers to start using later operating systems.
XP had been the most popular operating system in the Windows line for some time, enjoying the biggest majority of market shares for close to a decade. Even now it is the second only to Windows 7. The software giant has said that its Windows tech support of the OS will end on April 8, 2014. Probably this prompted Google to announce that it would continue patching and updating Chrome for XP for an additional year – until 2015.
Mark Larson, the Superintendent of Public Safety at Google mentioned in a blog post, "Our goal is to support Chrome for XP users during this transition process. Most importantly, Chrome on XP will still be automatically updated with the latest security fixes to protect against malware and phishing attacks."
This news may possibly bring smiles to XP users worldwide, but without basic security support, it would definitely be risky for them to continue using the OS per se. Supporting legacy software is often pretty rough and difficult – the code’s flaws are much better known by definition, and that tends to make computers running older, outdated tech significantly more vulnerable to malicious attacks. Apart from that, many businesses still depend on bulk licenses to keep their companies running, and the closer we get to that April 8th deadline, the more likely most IT departments will switch over.
For a good majority of people, that is probably going to mean huge change, and that definitely plays into Microsoft’s hands, catapulting the sales of new bulk licenses for its latest operating system.
The announcement itself wasn’t as much shocking as depressing; most were already waiting for the other shoe to fall – for Windows tech support for Windows XP to be pulled. The tremendous pressure from users across the globe is probably what kept the tech giant from this move for so long. This time things do look more serious though, and the company desperately wants customers to start using later operating systems.
XP had been the most popular operating system in the Windows line for some time, enjoying the biggest majority of market shares for close to a decade. Even now it is the second only to Windows 7. The software giant has said that its Windows tech support of the OS will end on April 8, 2014. Probably this prompted Google to announce that it would continue patching and updating Chrome for XP for an additional year – until 2015.
Mark Larson, the Superintendent of Public Safety at Google mentioned in a blog post, "Our goal is to support Chrome for XP users during this transition process. Most importantly, Chrome on XP will still be automatically updated with the latest security fixes to protect against malware and phishing attacks."
This news may possibly bring smiles to XP users worldwide, but without basic security support, it would definitely be risky for them to continue using the OS per se. Supporting legacy software is often pretty rough and difficult – the code’s flaws are much better known by definition, and that tends to make computers running older, outdated tech significantly more vulnerable to malicious attacks. Apart from that, many businesses still depend on bulk licenses to keep their companies running, and the closer we get to that April 8th deadline, the more likely most IT departments will switch over.
For a good majority of people, that is probably going to mean huge change, and that definitely plays into Microsoft’s hands, catapulting the sales of new bulk licenses for its latest operating system.
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