Gates leaving for an interview to review and look forward to the development of the computer industry

Lead: Microsoft founder and chairman of the board of directors Bill Gates will resign from the position of Microsoft's chief software architect at the end of this month, officially withdraw from the company's daily management affairs and devote himself to philanthropy. Gates's departure meant the end of an era. A few days ago, Michael Miller, former editor of PC Magazine, interviewed gates. The two reviewed the development history of the computer industry over the past 30 years and looked forward to the future development direction of the computer industry.

The following is the details of this interview.

　　Part 1: Success and Failure

　　Muller:Technically, what do you think is the most successful? Is it to promote the use of PCs or provide graphical user interfaces?

　　Gates:The most important thing is to create the software industry and open the platform to everyone. Everything goes back to the basic language developed for Altair and the creation of libraries that people use to do things, such as Commodore pet, TRS-80, Atari 800, and Apple II. Before PC popularization, there was no software industry. The most amazing thing is that computers become so cheap and users need a lot of software. So someone starts to sell a lot of software and set a reasonable price for the software. In an age of expensive computers and a small number of computers, the magic of a large number of software and a low price is impossible. Before we promote the use of PC, most software manufacturing companies regard this as a sideline.

We mainly focus on the overall development of the software industry and have made some important contributions to it. We gradually developed the software industry platform from basic to DOS, from DOS to Windows, from windows to. NET internet, to modeling, "cloud computing" and natural user interfaces. As hardware performance is improved and some solutions become possible, software platforms are constantly changing. This produces very different results. We are building a software platform and a software company.

　　Muller:Over the years, you have talked about a lot of technologies that you think will be successful, such as tablet PC and speech recognition. However, the satisfaction of mainstream audiences with these technologies has not reached your expectation. What do you think of this? Is it software, hardware, or social issues? Why is it hard to believe the popularity of some things, while some things can only be more or less based on special fields?

　　Gates:Think about what Paul and I wrote when I created Microsoft. Half of what we wanted to implement through software is still ahead of us. For natural interfaces including language recognition and tablet PC "Digital Ink. In my opinion, they are not prepared for mainstream audiences. You can use "stubborn" to describe my point of view.

We must constantly upgrade software and hardware. The current interaction method-using the mouse and keyboard-still has an overwhelming advantage, but in the next 10 years, this interaction method will undergo profound changes, and I have no doubt about it. However, this change does not mean that the mouse and keyboard exit the historical stage, but is supplemented by introduction of speech, vision, ink, and other things. Out of trust in these new technologies, Microsoft is willing to invest billions of dollars.

Tablet PC is accepted by some special groups, but the annual sales volume is only several million, not tens of millions. I believe this number will reach hundreds of millions. That is to say, our sales target is 100 times the current sales target. This is what I want to see and I believe it will happen. At that time, every student will have a tablet PC that can access the Internet, allowing them to edit, create, record sounds and browse.

　　Part 2: long journey

　Muller:Why does it take longer time than many people think?

　　Gates:Everything takes a longer time. Why does the graphic interface take so long? Why does the network edge computer take seven to eight years? Then you will be exposed to the essence of the problem.

For graphic interfaces, if Steve Ballmer and I run around the country and hold a seminar on graphic interfaces, people will say, "No, it's too slow, it's too difficult to compile software ". The strange thing is that we are moving forward. Then it became so obvious in about a year that no one was discussing it. So it was one of the incredible things you had struggled for so long. At that time, no one would say, "Yeah, you're right ." When everything happened, they immediately said, "Why are you still discussing that? Of course that's right. Now we want to discuss your next thing ."

The earlier K Apple Mac server almost failed. The only reason for survival is that Apple and Microsoft's technical staff can compress some programs and maintain normal operation. Next, the 512 K Mac machine was born, and the sales volume was good. In the meantime, 95% of the companies that develop programs for Mac machines went bankrupt. Therefore, we did take the following measures: Switch to PC as the mainstream office equipment, switch to the graphical user interface, take over the data center, and switch to the PC-based server. I remember an article in Fortune Magazine saying that some workstations have grown above PCs. As a result, we develop PC-based systems with high capacity/low price. These systems have the same functions as those of those workstations. We have not only absorbed special functions, but also become a first-class office device.

These amazing things all happen in the information economy era based on software platforms. All these high-tech things require time to hone, and never succeed overnight. Some products are still improving, but they have already begun to emerge, such as tablet PC, network TV and natural user interface. They are the three products you know that cannot be implemented currently. If you are optimistic about the implementation speed of these things, it is our greatest support.

However, the good side for Microsoft and the situation we are facing is that what we need to do now is to launch these products as soon as possible. We will continue our efforts to update and improve. Taking online TV as an example: with the arrival of at&t, the company declared: "We want to build a video platform better than TV. The advantage of this platform is that it can be customized and targeted ."

Before the video platform becomes a social consensus, you only need to wait for 2 or 3 years. At that time, you can skip the content you are not interested in to watch new programs and watch more programs you like. At that time, people would say, "Aha, what a wonderful idea this is ." No, they will say, "Of course! Why is it any other way ?" Because any other method is stupid. The speed at which TV programs can be connected to families is quite limited. Today, at least in urban families in wealthy countries, such rules are changing.

Although it still takes a long journey, many things will eventually emerge. In terms of shopping methods and habits, before people fully accept products, changing the way people prefer will require a generation of people, regardless of the benefits of this technology. The telephone interface and the natural interface can play a promoting role, but all these things have technical problems with software and hardware, prices, and behavior things around them.

　　Part 3: riding on the waves of the Internet revolution

　　Muller:When you review the past and rethink about the entire Internet revolution, what is Microsoft doing in this process and what is wrong?

　Gates:The most important thing we have done right is that we have 0.1 billion PCs waiting for connection.

At that time, you must consider the connectivity costs at a certain stage and the protocols that should be accepted. It is the ARPA protocol generated from the university environment. Do you know this fact? I used many such protocols before I founded Microsoft. Sometimes a niche can be used to overturn those protocols. They are all very good protocols, but they must be effective. Therefore, mobilizing all personnel and units to create a large number of suitable environments means that connectivity is guaranteed.

We don't know which part of the music stick it will hit. Many people have publicly declared the "Internet year" over the years. We also support this statement. As our company continues to grow, we can see from university interviews that in a special environment, such as Cornell University, the university places course points online and Orders pizza through the Internet, we have crossed these expectations. Now, if you think of the population as a whole, you will have different groups that adopt different acceptance models.

　Muller:Your team spent a lot of time developing websites and network tools. In this process, what are the correct practices and mistakes you have made?

　　Gates:Many things are obtained through practice. We have acquired some things and it is time to reflect on them. As I said, in this party room, we are a group of cool people sitting in the corner with only half a cup of wine in their hands. Currently, a software company with only 10 employees has a value of $2 billion. A company engaged in AD loop playback is also estimated to be about $0.5 billion. My employees also turned their eyes on the loop playback of advertisements. They kept saying, "Can't we create 4th fist products ?"

If you have a clear idea of how to do things, countless funds will come along. This is strange because we are a group of people with sufficient funds who can develop excellent software within Microsoft. If you build a very popular software, you will create an ecosystem centered on it. This is our idea in 1975. When people have this idea, they are moving too fast. They didn't expect many others to take measures at the same time.

In the late 1990s S, we also fell into fanwe and acquired several companies. I still stick to my opinion on sidewalk: this is the website that includes the whole city. You can find all the things and businessmen on it and plan all things on it. Sidewalk will be applied more on mobile phones. This is undoubtedly a good idea. We created this company, but for Expedia, we paid $1 billion, mainly related to airline booking, not software. We created Expedia, Slate, sidewalk, and MSN, and acquired Hotmail and link exchange. I bet I can't remember all the crazy things I once acquired.

The correct measure is to help enterprises consider using networks. This is what they should do. In this regard, our performance is really outstanding. It is difficult for us to give a satisfactory answer to whether or not we need to firmly grasp something with more consumption potential. Search engines are representative of them. You will inevitably ask "Why does Microsoft provide better search services in the early stages ?" We cannot cover everything, and we do not want. We have done a lot, and our eyes are far behind anyone else.

So, it's like a sea. Some waves call from time to time, and some people happen to be on the waves. They started to play before you know about surfing. The founders of Google are indeed very smart, and they were on the top of the waves from the very beginning. Although Google is not the first company to get involved in search engines, it has a strong execution capability. They launched the adwords software and used it to create a world, it occupies a considerable market share. They did a good job. They have been ahead of the curve and maintain good execution capabilities in this respect.

The number of products sold by the software industry to enterprises has always exceeded the number of products sold to individual users. This kind of thing may never happen. Microsoft does focus on any effective product service, such as how to make employees more efficient, how to find problems in the IT department, And what aspects of the company's website development. Over the past few decades, we have established the ability to engage in in-depth conversations with companies, so that we can understand what they do with software and how they do it at any time. In this regard, we are in a very favorable position.

If you want to know why IT practitioners are much more efficient than they are now in ten years, I recommend Microsoft Research labs to you, and they will provide you with answers. There are more answers to interactive whiteboard technology and panel desktop, which can demonstrate future communication methods and how models allow you to express your thoughts. In addition, the question of why employees in some places are more efficient than employees in other places is a matter of benevolence and wisdom. In fact, it is hard to imagine what other areas you will refer to, because most people have less profound and extensive opinions on software development than IT practitioners. The economic value in this aspect is quite high.

This is a field that Microsoft intends to develop, but it takes a long time. First, we need to reverse the inherent ideas of those who ignore it, and then we must master the secrets to balance this relationship. Now, we often face the pressure from top to bottom to meet the construction needs, and even from the beginning of product R & D. What we do with Sharepoint, what we do with the. NET development platform, it takes some time to explore.

At this stage, the performance and security of the Windows platform have indeed improved. Taking Windows server as an example, its development level is indeed incredible. Currently, the host (mainframe) still has issues that are not related to performance, but the code we compile. We do not plan to rewrite the code. In terms of cost effectiveness, no one can do anything in front of the host. However, there is still room for further improvement. After all, the code can be rewritten. Windows-based servers and UNIX-based servers use the same hardware to perform the same work. The only difference lies in their code.

Part 4: cloud computing Prediction

　　Muller:Everyone is talking about topics such as software as a service and cloud computing. What are the effects of these technological trends on Microsoft's most famous desktop computing?

Gates: A question has long been raised, that is, "Where is computing? Tianya or adjacent ?". As the network bandwidth increases and the latency decreases, the division of computing tasks becomes more flexible. Time-based computing has created a terminal era with almost no local computing. No matter whether it is a character terminal or an IBM 3270 terminal or an X protocol, everything except Result Presentation is done on a centralized server. Before the emergence of the Internet, PC replaced the terminal. Except for some file and database storage operations, other operations must be performed on the local PC. Most tasks, including editing, presentation, and interaction, are processed on the PC. The advantage is that you can work offline and respond quickly without worrying about network latency. As we have grown from the time-sharing computing era, if we go back to use the terminal, even if it is more powerful, we will feel that it is not easy to use.

Now users have a better balance. Taking browsing a website as an example, although HTML is more complex than most presentation protocols, it still belongs to the scope of presentation protocols, and it returns to the terminal model. However, after adding active controls or local scripts to HTML, these Ajax tasks can execute some code. So this is a bit ironic. The Amazing website does not only use HTML websites, but uses local execution mechanisms.

We can focus on the advantages of local and remote methods to allow users to call subprograms on another computer on the Internet. Some existing development tools can remotely call a service, but make the user think it is to call a local subroutine.

The general trend in computer science is to write less code. What technologies can reduce the coding workload? Many existing technologies, such as Object-oriented Programs and "software as a service", use the idea of reusing sub-modules. When you want to create a map, you will say, "This is too troublesome and there is too much data. You only need to call a sub-module ". Now you can call Virtual Earth or Google Earth to get the desired results without considering the data and format issues. We need to upgrade this idea to a new height and simplify it. This new product has some work to do in program debugging, performance optimization, and offline work.

To give an extreme example, we can take the entire database of others and run it in the cloud, related issues involve computing management, computing capability, data owner, error mechanism, and error information. This is cloud computing, which has many significant issues and work. Microsoft invests the most in the commercial use of cloud computing, and has some good plans. Ray Ozzie will be disclosed next year.

However, this does not mean that local computing with fast response speed can only rely on the edge station, and not everything has to be solved through a terminal.

People are confused. There is storage in the cloud, files will be stored in the cloud and backed up, and computing in the cloud, which is also good. However, putting all the storage hosts in the cloud seems to be under consideration. The main reason for doing so is computing. computing is not infinitely free, and there are major problems in terms of latency, disconnection, and limited resource allocation. Now, we have moved most of the databases of some pilot customers into the "cloud" and managed them by us. In the next few years, some databases will begin to be migrated. Some people think the migration speed will be very fast, but I think it will be different.

There are two things to clarify about migrating data to cloud computing. First, the client can still work. After the storage host is migrated to the "Cloud", the client retains the cache. Second, you can still perform server-based computing, although it can also be moved into the "Cloud. It is just a different data center, but it may be large and involve a data exchange pool. In the early days, cloud computing programs, such as Amazon's S3 service programs, still need to consider multiple computers and their internal operating mechanisms.

Ray orzi will disclose a piece of our current work in PDC later this year, that is, how to easily write programs that run on a large scale in cloud computing after a real understanding of the operating mechanism.

　　Part 5: Unfinished windows business

　　Muller:Do you think you have any experience in windows? What do you think windows needs to be added in the next ten years?

　Gates:I once proposed a famous requirement called "Composite storage", that is, the operating system is not only a file system, but also a need to manage a more diverse object-type database. Your contacts, calendars, photos, music, and other things you love, and your grading of them are stored in an environment that contains more structures. You can easily find them on your computer and move them between various applications. We have not implemented this yet, but it will be implemented in our transition to cloud computing. We will design a special storage structure. For example, you want to move data between mobile phones, PCs, TVs, and automotive computers. You don't just want to move files. You want to move data that contains more structures. The hybrid storage or unified storage structure that can meet this requirement has not yet appeared, which is terrible. You may know that Apple and Microsoft are doing background string indexing, but it is only a small step and cannot build the entire structure.

The operating system plays an important role in human-computer interaction. We have installed Windows on Microsoft's desktop computer (surface), but there is still a lot of unfinished work on how to add a program model and interact with different types of programs.

Security needs to be improved. The current situation is actually a compromise. We hope to make some breakthroughs so that users can easily understand the risks arising from their operations. Users now receive a lot of information when using their computers, but they do not know how to respond. In addition, even with the current information feedback mechanism, users still perform some very dangerous operations. This is not a simple problem, but there is still a lot of work to do.

Currently, the upgrade of operating systems on different devices must be performed in sequence. You must upgrade the operating system on this machine before upgrading the machine ...... If you have multiple computers or even a room, you just need to say, "I want to install Adobe software on all the computers ", or "I want to copy that file to all computers ". The user hopes to complete the entire process. We are solving this problem, but there is no clue yet.

Among the above tasks, cloud computing can well complete some tasks. Your music, including your preferences, and your software can be stored in the cloud. If you buy a new mobile phone, it will be difficult to initialize it. Why? You just need to say, "Hey, I'm Michael Miller. Make this phone the same as my other phone ." Even if new mobile phones are produced or used by different manufacturers, something like a phone book and a calendar can be copied to each other. You do not need to start from scratch