Microsoft on a roll for terrible rebranding with Windows App Microsoft's breathtaking ability to rename things badly carries on with the Windows App, a hub to stream Windows from a variety of sources. Users might know the product better as the Remote Desktop client, but rebranding a product with a tag that makes sense would never do, so we have the Windows App. A one-stop shop for …
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I cannot upvote that enough.
I was thinking same during a discussion of people "Learning a new OS" . Learning? why should a user have to "learn" a new OS ? It should be , as you say , invisible.
It cant be that hard , all it has to do is present you with a menu of which program you would like to use.
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And yes the app name change this article is reporting is a fantastic own goal on this front. The new name is so unbelievably stupid I thought the article was badly written , or I was reading it wrong.
The biggest security issue I have with RDP is that our firewall correctly blocks mapping to shares on the remote system, yet is unable to block a copy/paste operation from local to remote, or vice-versa, while your remote session is open. This includes files, not just text or objects.
As I've said elsewhere, Remote Desktop is not RDP (mstsc.exe). It is another client for Azure Virtual Desktop (and other things depending on which version and what platform). And the article is incorrect, it has not become Windows App.
The Store version of Remote Desktop may be going. It is certainly the worst client for AVD by quite a margin. There is a version available for iOS, which handles RDP connections to Windows boxes. That may be getting replaced by Windows App, which is aiming to become the multi-platform, unifying client.
For the moment the Windows version of Windows App (confused yet?) is pretty useless as a client of AVD. It can't manage the simple task of displaying Remote Apps in alphabetical order. Or indeed, any discernible order.
MS put out a badly worded announcement that gave the impression that Windows App was replacing Remote Desktop (still not RDP), but have confirmed that is not the case. Remote Desktop client for Windows - to give the full name of the msi installed app - and its name will continue to sow confusion for the foreseeable.
The wife and I have both transitioned, to use a phrase, she is completely happy with the move, which surprises me somewhat, and her PC no longer loses WiFi connection and the printer works every time. A win-win, er, well, lin-lin, all round. And she no longer has to fret about anti-virus or the advent of Windows 11.
Searching for "rdp" will still find mstsc.exe. It will not find Remote Desktop, which is a completely different application. Which won't show up unless you have it installed (unlikely, unless you use AVD).
If you search for remote desktop and have Remote Desktop installed, then both will show up. Simples.
I'm afraid it's named that way because it's how Microsoft wants/would like/hope their operating system to be consumed next... Remotely, virtualized, cloudified, call that as you wish as long as the user pays a fat monthly subscription for it...
From that perspective, it might even be an apt name.
Microshit (now there's a name) must employ people totally without sense to name things. Oh, yes. It is the Mis-marketing department. They must sit around all day dreaming up this crap. They would have had a chapter all to themselves in the late Douglas Adam HHTG series, along with the telephone sanitisers, if Adams had come across them.!
Windows originally was an app, that you had to run from DOS, so maybe they're going back to their roots.
If you access another computer using the Windows app, can you then use the windows app on that computer to access the one you logged into it from and continually spawn remote sessions on each other this way until the computers slow to a crawl? If so, you can then persuade your boss that you really do need a new state of the art machine, or failing that be allowed to move to a sensible OS.
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Honestly. There's plenty of yanks thinking the less right party in Yankeeland is a commie, but look at this mess.
You've people in Microsoft, all a miss click away from being fired, inventing jobs for themselves. If they look to be busy then that's great apparently. No. It's not great. Because all they're doing is sat around scratching their arses and thinking "what applications haven't we touched yet?". Some dickhead then says "remote desktop looks a bit old..." and before the day is done there is a "plan" to revolutionise the Remote Desktop app in the year of our Lord 202bullshit.
Fuck sake just leave the damn thing alone and fix something that needs fixing.
Imagine a version of Windows 11 that had just what you needed to run programs for the Windows platform and looked like Windows 2000 or XP. No ads, no tiles, no telemetry, no compulsory logins to Internet servers, no nagware. And then that version of MS Office that runs locally and does not need to connect to anything (but can connect to things if you want) and has no clippy on steroids. Call it Windows 11 Stand Alone. Make it only available as an aftermarket full size iso installer that can install entirely offline. Charge $1000 per licence.
Would sell in the hundreds of thousands to people such as the commenters here. They'd be minted.
I quick check across a few search engines (google, bing, duck duck go) and the phrase windows app bring up the news stories and then a valid link is about the 3rd or 4th one down.
As for “windows app not workingl a fairly common phrase it doesn’t appear on the first page of the results.
This will make looking for help with it to be interesting…..
Ming you Cisco has some strange renames
Stealthwatch became “sna” or “secures network analytics” I still call it by the old name.
DNA is now Catalyst Centre even though the software hasn’t changed internally - yet
The coloured pencil department has a lot to answer for….
>The Windows App also requires a work or school account before it will start up, confirming that this is not aimed at consumers.
Huh? I mean of course, goes without saying, doesn't it?
If I understand what this App is all about, it sounds like a good thing.
Will this be the new standard way to access Azure, instead of a browser?
In other corporate marketing news, Volkswagon have decided to call their new car "Car", and their new van "Van".
Personally, I think Remote Deskop is actually the best name for the app. It tells you exactly what it does. It enabled you to access the desktop on a remote machine. It doesn't matter whether that machine is a pysical or virtual machine on your local network, or a VM in the cloud. You are still accessing the desktop.
I suspect the reason MS is doing it is that you can use the Remote Deskop app to access the desktops on other OSes. Actually, you can use it to access any software offers it's UI via RDP, so it you could use it to access a macOS desktop, a Linux one, a Unix one or any application. As long as they have an RDP server installed.
Microsoft don't seem to be blocking that actively, but they do not want you to do it. They want it drummed into the users head that they will use Windows.
This does not seem to be replacing RDP (Remote Desktop protocol) or RDP being renamed.
This seems like a new application to manage and save RDP logins/info in one interface, similar to Parallels Client (which supports both parallels and RDP).
Windows App is your gateway to Azure Virtual Desktop, Windows 365, Microsoft Dev Box, Remote Desktop Services, and remote PCs, securely connecting you to Windows devices and apps.
The underlying protocol isn't but Microsoft is trying to move people in terms of the app they use. From the official announcement:
"With this general availability launch, users of Remote Desktop clients for Windows, macOS, iOS, iPadOS, and web will transition to Windows App."
C.
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