I'll throw this question into the mix: What would happen if Microsoft decided to ditch their own kernel OS and go with a BSD or Linux-based OS? How portable would Sonar code be? Recall when Apple ditched PPC (OS9) for BSD (OSX). It did wonders for their market share!
 
Hopefully that will not happen for quite some time for our sake, but I'll be honest, I seriously believe Microsoft should do that. There's a lot it would break, but there's a lot it could fix, such as people's perception that Windows = Weak Security.

brconflict
I'll throw this question into the mix: What would happen if Microsoft decided to ditch their own kernel OS and go with a BSD or Linux-based OS? How portable would Sonar code be? Recall when Apple ditched PPC (OS9) for BSD (OSX). It did wonders for their market share!
 
Hopefully that will not happen for quite some time for our sake, but I'll be honest, I seriously believe Microsoft should do that. There's a lot it would break, but there's a lot it could fix, such as people's perception that Windows = Weak Security.

I kinda of hope MS DOES do something like that.  With their history, my HUGE *assumption* is that they would provide some great tools and APIs to make the transition as straight-forward as possible for Windows software vendors.  Sort of a dual universe kernel.  Back in my younger days I was building software on Pyramid minis that had dual universe kernels.  SVR3.2 & BSD4.3 in the same kernel - with the ability to mix/match libs between the two!
 
What was the OP again? 

I'm sure many would be eager to get rid of the awful registry. Granted, I've got no real love for Mac's. They are clumsy in some ways and expensive.

brconflict
I'll throw this question into the mix: What would happen if Microsoft decided to ditch their own kernel OS and go with a BSD or Linux-based OS?.

The screams from the millions of corporate/government Windows, MS Exchange users and game players would be audible from the moon.

Unless the "new" Windows allowed backwards compatability with existing software, including the installers (which means retaining the registry and existing directory structure) "new Windows" would be dead in the water. Lots of corporate users only recently began the process of upgrading from XP to Win7 because, in part, they were concerned that their custom applications might not be 100% Win7 compatible and unknown bugs might surface. For the same reason they tend to resist implementing Windows updates for the version of Windows they use.

The consequence is unblocked security vulnerabilities, but they calculate the risk of being bitten by one is less than the cost of constantly assessing updates, amending their custom software setup then implementing the updates across maybe thousands of PCs and dealing with the resulting helpline calls.

As for gamers who might find their entire collection no longer works....

Apple managed to do the change from PPC to OS X largely because they don't have that huge corporate user base outside audio/video/graphics/dtp, which constitute a small part of the total market. Though even now you'll find some people still using 15+ year old Macs and demanding the return of the PPC based hardware and the OS that went with it...

tlw

brconflict
I'll throw this question into the mix: What would happen if Microsoft decided to ditch their own kernel OS and go with a BSD or Linux-based OS?.

The screams from the millions of corporate/government Windows, MS Exchange users and game players would be audible from the moon.

Unless the "new" Windows allowed backwards compatability with existing software, including the installers (which means retaining the registry and existing directory structure) "new Windows" would be dead in the water. Lots of corporate users only recently began the process of upgrading from XP to Win7 because, in part, they were concerned that their custom applications might not be 100% Win7 compatible and unknown bugs might surface. For the same reason they tend to resist implementing Windows updates for the version of Windows they use.

The consequence is unblocked security vulnerabilities, but they calculate the risk of being bitten by one is less than the cost of constantly assessing updates, amending their custom software setup then implementing the updates across maybe thousands of PCs and dealing with the resulting helpline calls.

As for gamers who might find their entire collection no longer works....

Apple managed to do the change from PPC to OS X largely because they don't have that huge corporate user base outside audio/video/graphics/dtp, which constitute a small part of the total market. Though even now you'll find some people still using 15+ year old Macs and demanding the return of the PPC based hardware and the OS that went with it...

I don't believe this ever stopped Microsoft before--more, just slowed the process. Remember, Vista was a huge issue for them, but the only thing it managed to do was keep XP around until two years ago. Also recall the debacle of moving from Windows 98 to 2000 and through the failed attempt with (Me). Further, today, in order to run MSDoS programs, you need an emulator like DoSBoX. It may take time, but if they want to make the change, they will. I heard they did consider a Unix kernel at one time to make their OS code easier to develop and support, but it would be a serious risk to their stronghold in the market.
 
For Apple, true, they were nearly gone under because of losing market share before bring Jobs back with his NEXT OS, largely Unix-based. They knew Apple couldn't regain the market under their own PPC OS any longer. I'm sure that transition was easier.

The process of getting to XP lasted from the decision that Win95 and NT4 would share the same look and feel as the start of the process to merge the diverging Windows and Windows NT approaches into a single OS with verying levels of facilities - home, pro, etc. XP was the end result.

Vista, from my experience of it, was pretty good. Ran faster than XP on the same hardware and handled audio work better. It suffered because it looked different and because beta versions prompted all kinds of silliness by people posting stuff about it on the internet, much of which wasn't even true. Rumour+gossip+journalists often = accepted fact no matter what, so bye-bye Vista, hello Win7 (using pretty much the same code as Vista with a more old-fashioned interface).

To me the really big MS switches at a low level were shifting from 16 to 32 bit then making 64 bit OS versions available and the shift to "NT for all" because their previous "domestic" versions of Windows, like Windows3.x, had no concept of user-level security at all. At each stage some applications no longer worked (or the installer didn't), but most did.

For MS to move to a completely different system entirely, be that Unix-like or something else, would, if possible, take many years and I suspect there'd be few takers for the early versions because there'd be little software for them. The biggest customers would probably be the last to make the switch for the reasons I've given, and it's the big customers who hold the greatest clout - e.g. MS agreeing to continue to maintain XP after the announced "that's it" date. The need to learn the new MS OS then reconfigure their LANs and WANs accordingly would be a huge off-putter.

Apple's business model is very different to Microsoft's, largely relying on hardware sales and not just in the laptop/desktop market but they have a strong presence in the tablet, media player and phone markets as well. Apple give away OS X, their equivalents of Word, Excel and Powerpoint and provide a decent package of applications with the OS which integrate very well with those provided with iOS. The server version of OS X costs the price of a CD. Logic Pro X is very cheap for a "real" DAW etc.

Apple can use the software as a way to encourage purchase of the hardware. MS, besides a few peripherals and their attempt to get into the tablet market, rely entirely on selling/renting software. Big difference.

I'm not saying MS won't decide to go down a completely new road, they might. I just find it hard to imagine them doing so, at least as anything other than a very, very long term process.

Totally understand all of that. What we've both pointed out, however, is Windows does change. To re-iterate my original point, when/if MS changes something major, the more portable the Sonar code becomes, the easier that process can be. It will have to be slow because people and software are slow to adapt. That opens the door to opportunities for others to move faster than Windows.
 
I don't think any of this means anything to CW, so I've not pushed too hard for Mac based Sonar. I would use it, however, since my laptop is a MBP. What other purpose is there for wanting Mac support? The only one I can think of is that Apple has done a great job ruling the laptop market, and I'd speculate less than 10% of artists using Macs use Sonar.

Who knows? in the future MS might end up acquiring Apple. You might say never, but stranger things have happened.
Did you know that Apple and MS sit across from one another in Boston? They wouldn't have far to go.
If you build it they will come. This is my opinion. I think there IS a market in Apple territory for Cakewalk products. Yes Logic is 225.00 but Logic isn't Sonar. Some Cakewalk products run on Apple...so the door is already cracked.
 
Someone threw numbers out there and added that it's too much of a headache for the developers. I agree, so hire another team and take the load off of the other guys. I think those numbers can be lowered a LOT. Let the PC people continue to do what they do but start a team to develop for Mac. 
Great marketers create a market for their products.
 
Bitwig is running strong now, who remembers when Studio One came along? Both of these guys rose right from the ashes...a few guys who were good programmers/coders and who made it run on both platforms. Even if the whole foundation is different, once you get it to a point you can use some of the same features. Starting from scratch you could remove the little things that might be hanging up PCs in some cases. Cakewalk was started as a hobby and then a small business...it didn't begin with a half million dollars. Start at point A and methodically work it. You've got a school full of geniuses right down the road ( MIT). Grab a few of those guys who like to code. It isn't as difficult as you make it to be imho.