[erikw]

I don't know that that will happen- not even Windows is as smooth as MacOS. But that's because Microsoft and Linux developers are tackling a more difficult problem- getting an OS to work with effectively infinite hardware permutations. Apple has given themselves an easier problem to solve, with just a handful of hardware SKUs and a few external busses.

That said, Android is pretty stable, because a given Android distro typically only targets a small hardware subset. But I don't think that's the kind of Linux distro that most people contributing to FOSS want to work on.

[3eb7988a1663]

Apple has also yanked backwards compatibility a few times. I bet Microsoft would love to trash a few legacy API decisions from decades ago.

That being said, I still think Microsoft should have developed a seamless virtualization layer by now. Programs prior to X year are run in a microVM/WINE-like environment. Some escape hatch to kill off some cruft.

[selkin]

Microsoft did both.

[gyudin]

Yeah, probably the problem is nobody has figured out how to monetize Desktop OSes properly.