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Don't tell people to turn off Windows Update

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Re: Don't tell people to turn off Windows Update

#91

Post by keldaris »

CydeWeys wrote: post #4

I love the way he's compared the people who tell you to turn off auto-updates with anti-vaxxers; it's quite an apt analogy. Microsoft shares part of the blame here for pushing features that the user clearly doesn't want through updates (especially to the major OS version). Look at the recent ads in Windows file explorer for one example. A lot of the advice to turn Windows Update off is a misguided response to Microso…

Personally, I run a single Win10 desktop (all of my laptops are Linux-only) that I update roughly annually, by allocating an entire day for going through the updates one by one and getting rid of any Microsoft malware along the way. I am far more concerned about Microsoft's own malware than any ransomware floating around the Internet.

Of course, I've also had SMBv1 disabled for many years (there's no reason to retain support for it unless you need to support WinXP machines, in which case you have my condolences), the desktop sits on an isolated subnet with a very restrictive router and firewall in front of it and all telemetry, Cortana and other malware has been eviscerated via group policy and other settings, along with router-level blocking of telemetry and update servers.

I fully understand that my case is atypical and the average user isn't going to follow comparable precautions, so I don't actively recommend my approach to anyone else, but it works great for me. Apart from wasting about a day per year on maintenance, I'm as happy with the OS itself as I've ever been with any Windows version, and it fulfills my Windows development and occasional gaming needs just fine. Obviously, I'm much less happy with Microsoft as a company for forcing me to go through such lengths to make their OS into something I'm comfortable using.

Re: Don't tell people to turn off Windows Update

#92

Post by Belphemur »

m_fayer wrote: post #80
kefka wrote: post #9

And the reason why people were suggesting to turn off Windows Update was precisely because of malware payloads directly from Microsoft. "Do you want to upgrade to Windows 10? Press the hidden button to cancel, otherwise upgrade commences." This is how malware works.... But published and pushed by MS's own channels. And his jab at people who say that turning off WU is similar to anti-vaxxers is completely inane and fa…

Less egregious but still awful: updates that then have ngen randomly consuming half your cpu for hours because ms is too cheap to make native .net binaries remotely.

And also taking multiple Gb of your hdd for the sake of optimizing a one time executed update.

When you have a small SSD it sucks.

Re: Don't tell people to turn off Windows Update

#93

Post by OJFord »

vezycash wrote: post #16
kristianc wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article points out that you can set hours when Windows will update.

What if Microsoft instead fixed the need to restart for almost every update?

I haven't used Windows since 7, but then it just did whatever it could (perhaps only download) until shutdown/restart. It might've asked if I wanted to, but I just said no, and then it did it's thing whenever I was shutting down anyway.

Is it not still like that? MacOS seems worse to me, since restarting when an update exists isn't sufficient: you have to remember to go back to the update and click 'update & restart'...

Linux handles this best though, by a long shot.

Re: Don't tell people to turn off Windows Update

#94

Post by nu5500 »

4ad wrote: post #3

Well, this would be so much easier if: 1) Windows update installed just security updates instead of potentially disruptive crap "features". The epitome of that, is of course forced update to Windows 10. Ads in Explorer is a close second. This would reduce the frequency of updates significantly as well, which would also help. 2) Windows update would use a sane default of not rebooting you while you are in the middle o…

I am not sure that it's really feasible to decouple feature and security updates though. With Microsoft releasing two major feature updates a year, how many variations of this can they support if anyone along the way decides to freeze their current set of features and only get security updates for them? Regardless, as a heavy Win10 user across several machines I've found the whole "disruptive" / "spyware" / "crapware" FUD being pushed by some HN posters to be way overblown. Yea, there have been a few annoyances such as the OneDrive ad that showed up a month or two ago, but these are all extremely minor compared to the mountains of advertising and tracking crap we get hit with every day from web sites, apps, and search engines.

Re: Don't tell people to turn off Windows Update

#95

Post by rhodysurf »

kristianc wrote: post #8
chrisacky wrote: post #2

I was on a internal Slack call with team the other day, I ended up having to restart to Windows to do a screenshare and switch to Skype. I ended up having to delay my working day by about 45 minutes while Windows decided to do a mandatory update without any granularity of choice on when is convenient for me. That's what is frustrating. I ended up being unproductive for a whole hour because Windows forced an update on…

The article points out that you can set hours when Windows will update.

This still isnt always useful. I work in an office that creates and runs CFD software. It often takes days, or weeks to run and the recent windows "feature" of rebooting when it wants to update with no way to shut it off has killed so many peoples work in progress. Its insane there is no ability to only update manually.

Re: Don't tell people to turn off Windows Update

#96

Post by astrobe_ »

dozzie wrote: post #56
pawadu wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

software: can upgrade binaries and libraries without affecting already running programs services: they are specifically designed to be updated and restarted kernel: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ksplice

> services: they are specifically designed to be updated and restarted I write plenty of daemons (you call them "services"). What exactly do I write specifically for them to be able to continue to run when a library is upgraded?

    gcc --static

Re: Don't tell people to turn off Windows Update

#97

Post by throwanem »

setq wrote: post #63
throwanem wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How nice for you! Having active hours be ignored, and the machine update itself in the middle of a workday, has happened more than once to me. (Once would be enough.) It's happened more than once to a lot of other people, too. How far do you expect to get with this argument by implication that that's not the case, and we're all just full of it?

That only happens if you put the updates off of they've been there for a couple of days and you have something running that makes it assume that the machine is still active. People seeding torrents overnight seems to be the only place I see that not happen. See update notifications? At the end of the day, restart and install the updates. It's not rocket science. It doesn't just hit patch Tuesday and then reboot immed…

> That only happens if [case that isn't the only one where this happens]

The whole point of active hours is that, when updates are pending, they install and the system reboots outside the hours in which I've expressed the desire to have my machine not reboot itself. Yet I've lost count of the number of times where this does not happen - I see an update notification, shrug and assume it'll be applied in the window I've set, and take no action - only to find the next day that the updates haven't been applied, the reboot hasn't been performed, and if I don't interrupt my work day by applying updates and rebooting immediately - which rarely takes less than 15 minutes, not counting getting all my tools up and going again - then I can rely on losing some work, and a lot of time, later on, when something important needs doing on a deadline. And that's insane! If for whatever reason the updates legitimately can't be applied in the window, the right action in response is to wait for the next window, and not to fuck-start my workday. That is always the wrong thing to do.

I mean, I get what you're saying, right? If active hours worked as claimed, you'd have a real point here. But they do not work reliably at all, and that's a whole 'nother issue.

Re: Don't tell people to turn off Windows Update

#98

Post by bigbugbag »

CydeWeys wrote: post #4

I love the way he's compared the people who tell you to turn off auto-updates with anti-vaxxers; it's quite an apt analogy. Microsoft shares part of the blame here for pushing features that the user clearly doesn't want through updates (especially to the major OS version). Look at the recent ads in Windows file explorer for one example. A lot of the advice to turn Windows Update off is a misguided response to Microso…

The anti-vaxxers analogy is utter nonsense and reads like a poor attempt at hitting the credibility of people disabling windows update.

The anti-vaxxer movement makes no sense outside the backfire effect, in almost all cases it has little to no basis or justifications. On the other hand there is a long history of very valid reasons of distrusting windows update and disabling it.

Using windows update to force people into windows 10 is only one of the most recent examples that windows update is by Microsoft and for the interest of Microsoft not the user. This is totally different from the system update you have with apt and Debian.

Re: Don't tell people to turn off Windows Update

#99

Post by belorn »

sangnoir wrote: post #68
CydeWeys wrote: post #4

I love the way he's compared the people who tell you to turn off auto-updates with anti-vaxxers; it's quite an apt analogy. Microsoft shares part of the blame here for pushing features that the user clearly doesn't want through updates (especially to the major OS version). Look at the recent ads in Windows file explorer for one example. A lot of the advice to turn Windows Update off is a misguided response to Microso…

> Microsoft shares part of the blame here for pushing features that the user clearly doesn't want through updates (especially to the major OS version). Look at the recent ads in Windows file explorer for one example. A lot of the advice to turn Windows Update off is a misguided response to Microsoft's own bone-headed moves in recent years to install bullshit that the user doesn't want. Vaccinations are awesome, but M…

If we look in the past we also have snake oil which is said to be a major cause for mistrust for doctors and medicine. Government had to step in and issue regulations in order for the public to regain trust and vaccinations is one of the very few remaining trust issues between the public and medicine.

If we want people to regain trust in auto-update there need to be something that prevent abuse. If that is regulations, liability laws, or just industry practice will be up to the future to decide. Until then a person will have to rational decide on auto-update as past people did with the uncertainty of not know what is snake oil and what is real.

Re: Don't tell people to turn off Windows Update

#100

Post by atemerev »

Is it really hard to develop a ksplice / kexec analog for Windows kernel? (Yes, it is. But with Microsoft's dedicated research and resources, it should be possible.)

Interruptive updates are _the_ reason many people choose Mac OS X over Windows. Updates are, obviously, important. Restarts (and notifications) are bad and will be postponed and ignored, no matter how hard we try to educated users. Solution: throw all resources to minimize restarts during updates, make everything as automated as possible. I realize that it is harder to do for Windows, due to their idea of putting everything to the kernel, but this only exaggerates the urgent need for something like ksplice to be integrated.

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