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Microsoft Is Putting Ads on the Mail App in Windows 10

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Re: Microsoft Is Putting Ads on the Mail App in Windows 10

#181
post #2

So, my uncle needs a new computer and he needs Windows 10 on it. How can I make sure that he is not being spied on and psychologically manipulated by ads right from the beginning? Is there a professional version of Windows 10 with none of those shenanigans I keep hearing about?

Does he need 10? Windows 7 still works fine, so does Elementary OS if that works.

If you use Windows 7 on modern processors (Ryzen/Skylake), Windows Update stops working so you won't get security updates.

Re: Microsoft Is Putting Ads on the Mail App in Windows 10

#182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consider FreeBSD and its ports model. You'll be building your own ports from sources but you needn't touch another package someone else built, if you don't want to.

No. I have no desire to have my primary means of installing software be to compile from source. That's retarded. Literally retarded, in that it is a backward concept from the before-times.

At some point aren't you going to have to choose between software requiring shared libraries and take the package-complexity or source build-hit, or have everything statically linked and take the program size hit?

Re: Microsoft Is Putting Ads on the Mail App in Windows 10

#183

I miss Windows 8.1. There, I said it.

What was good about it compared to Windows 7?

Here's unpopular opinion: start menu really did need a remake and I like the designs 8.1 had compared to 10. Also, IIRC 8 has some optimizations (including some tweaks to better support ssds).

Re: Microsoft Is Putting Ads on the Mail App in Windows 10

#184
Slight tangent, but @jammygit mentioned in this thread:

> "All I want is to be able to give companies my money in exchange for not being spied on, manipulated, or locked into some walled garden....Is my money not good enough for them?

Can someone elaborate a bit on this idea? Are we at a point where there is something more valuable than money itself? Data? Is this the point where Google et al can say "Nah, we actually don't want your flat out subscription fee cause that's pennies on the dollar compared to what we can get with our data collection efforts"

I've made snarky remarks to this kind of thinking in the past but I didn't take it too seriously. Does anyone else see this becoming a real problem?

If company XYZ offers service/product A, should I be able to buy that product/service flat out, (if I'm financially able) without bells and whistles even if company XYZ insists on adding bells and whistles? (i.e., data collection). Is that somehow a sort of right as a consumer?

Re: Microsoft Is Putting Ads on the Mail App in Windows 10

#185
post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may wish to consider that the voice in the installer is beneficial for accessibility purposes.

Fair enough. I did not consider that aspect. I'd still hope there would be a slightly less annoying way to accomplish that though.

As someone who's heard Cortana many times during initial setup, I understand. However, I also understand the tradeoff in favor of accessibility.

For larger deployments, there's a registry key and other options:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/customize/...

For other cases, I'd consider filing feedback requesting an easier way to mute during the setup process (if there isn't one already; I don't remember looking for that option and instead just muting the device using a hardware switch).

Re: Microsoft Is Putting Ads on the Mail App in Windows 10

#186
post #184

Slight tangent, but @jammygit mentioned in this thread: > "All I want is to be able to give companies my money in exchange for not being spied on, manipulated, or locked into some walled garden....Is my money not good enough for them? Can someone elaborate a bit on this idea? Are we at a point where there is something more valuable than money itself? Data? Is this the point where Google et al can say "Nah, we actuall…

Well, as it stands, most companies can collect both money and data. Most of the software we pay for also collects data. We're stuck with them because of lock-in, inertia or lack of alternatives. Why would you give up a situation where you can have your cake and eat it too? As for your last question, I don't believe you can expect privacy just because you pay for a program. It is up to the developers. If they still want to collect your data (with your consent of course) even though you're a paying customer, it may not be ethically exemplary, but it is their call. All you can do is switch software, which as I mentioned, is problematic in many important cases. Hence the borderline abuse.

Re: Microsoft Is Putting Ads on the Mail App in Windows 10

#187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. I like having software that is up to date and delivered direct from the developer. I like having portable applications that don't even need installation. I like being able to put applications on different disks. I like being able to have multiple versions of an application. There is not a single package manager in existence for Linux that gives me these things.

Snapcraft?

Not portable, can't install applications to different disks.

Re: Microsoft Is Putting Ads on the Mail App in Windows 10

#188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1. I hate package managers as an application installation paradigm wat so you prefer go to vlc.com for vlc, 7-zip.com for 7-zip, update them by hand or add custom system services constantly running for every program to install themselves, etc etc instead of a `pacman -S 7z vlc krita libreoffice [every other software you need]`

Yes. I like having software that is up to date and delivered direct from the developer. I like having portable applications that don't even need installation. I like being able to put applications on different disks. I like being able to have multiple versions of an application. There is not a single package manager in existence for Linux that gives me these things.

> I like having software that is up to date and delivered direct from the developer.

I really think your argument against package managers on Linux is incorrect. Many linux distributions provide "some recent version" of common tools, but of course you can get the latest package directly from the developers.

Nothing stops you from getting the latest packages directly from the developer (assuming the developer provides packages in the first place). Some developers even offer their own repository you could add to the package manager so you can stay up to date regardless of whatever version you don't like in the OS repository.

> I like having portable applications that don't even need installation.

You can build from source and run without installing. That's probably not quite what you mean though.

> I like being able to put applications on different disks.

No problem here. You can mount disks to wherever you want and you can install using a prefix path to those locations.

> I like being able to have multiple versions of an application.

Prefix path to the rescue here too.

Edit: answered more of your concerns

Re: Microsoft Is Putting Ads on the Mail App in Windows 10

#189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess you're assigning "walled garden" to macOS, but macOS is still UNIX underneath, and you can run any open software you want on it. I still think it's an excellent option for the privacy conscious. There are plenty of free software based operating systems that will take your money. Red Hat seems like the most obvious one.

I resurrected my late 2012 Mac Mini recently and "upgraded" it to Mojave. I can't even SSH into the box. The SSH daemon accepts connections, firewall is off, and login sharing is enabled. But the daemon refuses my key, my password. I can't even figure out how to get it to display the reasons for the denied access. At least on Linux I can turn off the daemon, turn on logging, turn the daemon back on, and get somewhere…

use ssh -vvv when you connect. Several types of ciphers were deprecated for security reasons over the past few releases, you can reenable them in /etc/ssh_config or /etc/sshd_config
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