Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hatred for Microsoft? I have none. I do hate the fact that we have an absolutely free operating system that works just fine but thanks to Bill Gates 90s shenanigans and aggressive and illegal market and business tactics we're stuck with a proprietary system that is totally unnecessary and as it continues that system becomes more and more invasive. And that system is a black box that you can't trust. Google started en…
> Hatred for Microsoft? I have none. When you post "M$" in a reply I automatically mark you as rabidly anti-Microsoft and usually stop reading. I'm not a fan of Microsoft, but childish acts such as those have no place in a rational discussion.
Windows 10 users are being banned from torrent sites
161–170 of 358 posts
Re: Windows 10 users are being banned from torrent sites
#162Shouldn't the built-in botnet/spyware push all major companies and goverments away from Windows? I don't know how they would be ok with all they're data sent/shared with them (and probably a dozen of US agencies). It's like buying a rooted by design system
Russia has already forbidden Windows 10 use on any governmental service.
Re: Windows 10 users are being banned from torrent sites
#163Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nothing about Linux on the desktop "works fine". It's horrible. UI seems to be one area that benefits--almost demands --a central planning authority. I'm reminded of Supported Features [1]. There is some great open source software out there. But I'm struggling to think of great open source software with a good UI. Not that I'm saying Windows is good mind you. My personal preference would be OSX, which you can view as…
> Nothing about Linux on the desktop "works fine". It's horrible. This claim is usually made by Windows users who don't want to invest any effort and time to learn another desktop -- which they had to do in Win8 anyway. Linux offers several nice desktops (KDE, Gnome, XFCE, E17, etc.) which we can freely choose from. I am a Linux user since the 90's and I have always used it as my primary desktop. It works perfectly w…
I used to make this claim as someone who had been using desktop gnu/linux for several years. I've been using OSX now for a year and so stopped making the claim. But it is really frustrating to hear people say "it works for me" to rebut claims that it doesn't work for most people. Such counters and arguments over them are basically single data points. If the point under discussion is "does desktop linux work well enough to gain massive amounts of market share?", then you need to run actual large scale trials comparing how hard it is for people to...
1) Start up a spreadsheet program and do things
2) Check social media and play some random video
3) Play League of Legends
4)
Some of these things are indeed comparably easy in, say Ubuntu (or were pre-unity) for me, but I was an MIT undergrad that hung around SIPB, the computer club. My massive amounts of tech privilege make it impossible to individually evaluate if the user experience someone has with spreadsheets is acceptable unless I put real study into it. The same is probably true of many HN commenters. So until someone spends the time and money to run actual user experience studies, we have no data to say that the linux desktop can take over the world.
Also, there isn't even one "Linux desktop". There is mint, Ubuntu+gnome classic, Ubuntu+unity, ubuntu+some weird xmonad setup.
Another argument I often see for why Desktop Linux has an advantage is that "Linux is free as in beer". But it is not. If someone making $15/hr takes more than 8 hours (not unrealistic, at least for an MIT CS student back in 2010) fiddling with things and trying to get them to work, then desktop Linux is more expensive.
Re: Windows 10 users are being banned from torrent sites
#164Earlier quoted context omitted.
"port their software to Linux". The main issue there is that there is not one single linux, the market is very fragmented. Getting the binary format right (which is the same across distros) is the trivial part, just set the proper compiler backend. The hard part would be getting all dependencies and especially IO sorted out. The wide range of display managers, audio drivers that needs to be supported to simply "port…
> display managers You mean "window manager", right? Why would depend on a specific WM unless you were writing a WM-specific utility where no decision would be necessary? Your application only needs to target X11, which is implicit when you use a pre-existing toolkit. > audio devices What audio devices? Just write to the default ALSA device. Better yet, delegate the problem by linking to something like OpenAL. I'm su…
But making sure that it runs under a sufficiently large number of distributions/versions of distribution is under GNU/Linux.
Re: Windows 10 users are being banned from torrent sites
#165Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Compared to my Android phone Windows 10 is absolutely mute. I think this says more about Android than it does about Windows 10. Windows 10 has crazy defaults, but so does android and many android apps want access to my info for no good reason (e.g. news apps wanting access to list my accounts, my phone number, my contacts, precise location etc.). Comparing privacy defaults of Windows to Android is not comparing it…
This is a main reason that I have avoided Android so far. The iOS permissions model is a far better model. At least with the next release of Android (Marshmallow) they are fixing some of this and hopefully you will be able to use apps without giving them access to so much info.
There was a noticable performance hit, but my phone is 3+ years old. It likely would not be as much on a newer phone.
Re: Windows 10 users are being banned from torrent sites
#166Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've deactivated all reporting and services that call back home (at least which I was aware of). In addition I've installed glasswire to check the network activities. So far I can assure you: Compared to my Android phone Windows 10 is absolutely mute. There're no noticeable differences compared to Windows 7. You seem to be more driven by your hatred towards Microsoft than by real privacy concerns.
Are you using 10 on a daily basis? My primary work machine is begging me to update, but I keep seeing reports of slowdowns and lockups.
I wouldn't update on a work machine however - no need to put your time at risk.
Re: Windows 10 users are being banned from torrent sites
#167Earlier quoted context omitted.
> but Windows stopped being my primary operating system ever since that whole Snowden scandal. Snowden released nothing specifically about Windows. No backdoors, no specific cooperation, only the NSA's bespoke malware (but they also have malware for everything under the sun, Linux, uEFI, RAID firmware, cell modems, etc). Sure, the NSA were spying on Microsoft by hooking the fiber lines between Microsoft's data center…
Microsoft was an early adopter of PRISM: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Prism_slide_5.jpg > same thing to Google So what? The claim was about not using Microsoft's products.
> So what? The claim was about not using Microsoft's products.
No, the claim was that Snowden revealed some Windows issue. That hasn't been shown. PRISM has absolutely nothing to do with Windows at all.
Where is this Snowden-Windows smoking gun? I haven't seen it.
PS - I find it odd that you'd link to that image instead of the main article which tells you exactly what PRISM is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)
Re: Windows 10 users are being banned from torrent sites
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not overkill when a company scans every single file you have in your PC, keeps those logs on its servers, and then eventually can and likely will share that information with others, from law enforcement to MPAA or even advertising companies. Microsoft has already admitted in its "privacy" policy that it can and will do such thing: > “We will access, disclose and preserve personal data, including your content (su…
You left out the circumstances under which they will share your data. > comply with applicable law or respond to valid legal process, including from law enforcement or other government agencies; > protect our customers, for example to prevent spam or attempts to defraud users of the services, or to help prevent the loss of life or serious injury of anyone; > operate and maintain the security of our services, includin…
Re: Windows 10 users are being banned from torrent sites
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
> but Windows stopped being my primary operating system ever since that whole Snowden scandal. Snowden released nothing specifically about Windows. No backdoors, no specific cooperation, only the NSA's bespoke malware (but they also have malware for everything under the sun, Linux, uEFI, RAID firmware, cell modems, etc). Sure, the NSA were spying on Microsoft by hooking the fiber lines between Microsoft's data center…
That whole PRISM thingy was the reason why I tried Linux. I didn't continue using it because I was scared for my privacy. I continued using it because it was awesome and satisfied every single one of my needs.
It was the theft of unencrypted data on dedicated fiber lines between data centers.
It actually didn't impact Windows, it impacted Hotmail, OneDrive, and other Microsoft "Cloud" services. Ditto with Google, Apple, et al.
Re: Windows 10 users are being banned from torrent sites
#170Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've been working 4 years on Ubuntu Linux now and I'm very happy about it. My life is much easier and I don't loose time fighting with my system. I have a Win7 partition that I boot now and then when I must use software that can't be virtualized well enough. In 4 years I've never lost work and I had only two crashes after messing with my GPU settings. If only the biggest proprietary software we available on linux (Lo…
How is Steam on Linux (+Wine) these days?