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Useless Windows 10 Features

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Re: Useless Windows 10 Features

#401
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then pirate it. What do you care? This is like pirating a show they refuse to put on Netflix. They don't give you the option to conveniently buy what you want, so pirate it. Instructions on how to activate your installation of LTSC here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19420337

How would you feel if I gave detailed instructions on how to rob _you_?

[deleted]

Re: Useless Windows 10 Features

#402

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Windows 8, the Store and the not very good WinRT apps launched together. If they had launched with support for Win32 maybe it could have gotten traction. All your favorite desktop apps could be updated in a fell swoop without leaving junk on the system tray, extra updater services, or prompting you. But they assumed that WinRT would be successful and have popular apps, and instead what they got was a store to inst…

All they needed to do was get a few popular apps available and people would get used to using the store. On a fresh Windows install, I usually want to following: - Firefox - office suite (Libre Office for me, Office for my wife) - games (Steam) - backup software - video chat - image/video editing Some of these could work just fine with WinRt, others don't. If most of my frequently used programs aren't available throu…

> All they needed to do was get a few popular apps available and people would get used to using the store.

Maybe. But personally, if the store was successful then it would make Windows even more painful than it is now, because inevitably applications would just release to the store and not supply standalone installers. And I really, really want standalone installers.

Re: Useless Windows 10 Features

#403
post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any default GNOME environment does this. > You literally click and drag the mouse upward to get the login screen. Yeah, you can, but hitting a space bar before typing in your password is so much easier. I think any "normal" key (as in letters, numbers, space) would work, but I'm not near a system to check.

You can just start typing your password, it'll automatically unhide and put what you typed in the password field. Or you can press Esc to just unhide without starting to type your password.

If your password starts with a space, then you have to either tap an extra space, or hit escape as you mentioned.

Re: Useless Windows 10 Features

#404

In other news, I still cannot disable Windows update on the home edition. I've spent hours and hours and virtually every solution I can find other than giving MS more money to upgrade. Updates keep failing on my machine, which means it just tried again the next day and forces a restart, closing everything I have. Fails day after day after day. I'm not sure why, I frankly don't care. Just ridiculous how impossible it…

I have the opposite problem -- I can't make Windows update actually do its thing. It's not a problem that I really want to be solved, though.

Re: Useless Windows 10 Features

#405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I say this in all seriousness, Linux is probably a better experience if that's all she does. Give something like Ubuntu or elementary os test run with a live version and see if she's missing anything you'll either find out she needs Office specifically or it will probably work for her. Linux right now is in a great spot for people who need little customization and people who really love to tinker. If you're in the mi…

Story: when my partner's several year old computer was running slowly, I convinced them to try dual booting Linux. Encountered a few problems here or there, but I could help with those. A couple years on, they wiped the old Windows partition because they weren't using it any more. Today they're still using the (now 6-7 year old) computer because it's running fast enough. On the other hand, they ended up learning some…

When my daughter was a teenager, I bought her a laptop and put Debian on it, configured to mimic the Windows look-and-feel. She never noticed, until the day that she wanted to install a AAA game.

Re: Useless Windows 10 Features

#406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know at what point Fedora loosened up re the FOSS strictures, but the version I installed (30) did have non-free apps/codecs available by default, including for mp3s.

MP3 patents expired in 2017, so Fedora does include them now. So did AAC and AC3.

Yes of course. Wasn't there also some policy change at some point regarding what's available in the store by default? I had a vague memory of that but could be wrong.

Anyway, the upshot is that at least based on my experience (limited as I'm not a big media consumer), media playing does just work OOB with current Fedora.

Re: Useless Windows 10 Features

#407
post #18

I honestly think that the new tab/news/spam page in IE/Edge is (and has been, forever) the single biggest factor driving people to Chrome and Firefox. Every time you open it you’re greeted with all this complete junk, making the whole experience stuttering and slowing down your flow. I dread having to open IE on systems with no alternative just because it’s always so bad. Edge might actually be pretty good, but I wil…

What's fun is that it's even the default on Windows Server systems. Why I'm forced to watch CSS animations on msn.com over an RPD session instead of defaulting to about:blank, I'll never know.

Because the layman windows server user would think the internet is broken if it stayed stuck on a blank page.

By the way, it should be easy enough to change the home page with a group policy or something if anybody actually cared about that. Companies usually change the homepage of all desktops to the intranet homepage.

Re: Useless Windows 10 Features

#408
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone can buy LTSC for a few hundred dollars. I cobbled together a post last year on acquiring it: https://tinyapps.org/blog/201811300700_windows_10_ltsc.html However, it does require a willingness to enter into a VL agreement with Microsoft.

Would Window 10 for Workstations be an alternative? I believe it is ad-free, although if someone could confirm that it would be helpful. https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/p/windows-10-pro-for-worksta...

That link implies RDMA SMBd is not available on regular Windows 10 Pro. I wonder if that’s really true.

Re: Useless Windows 10 Features

#409
post #18

I honestly think that the new tab/news/spam page in IE/Edge is (and has been, forever) the single biggest factor driving people to Chrome and Firefox. Every time you open it you’re greeted with all this complete junk, making the whole experience stuttering and slowing down your flow. I dread having to open IE on systems with no alternative just because it’s always so bad. Edge might actually be pretty good, but I wil…

To you but I don't think that's true for the laymen. I've seen a few old neighbors that expects a news as homepage. Some people are extremely confused about internet, a webpage, a tab, a link .. a bookmark. A news page sounds logical and/or familiar enough it seems. If you remove it they may even despise you.

This statement is accurate based on my interactions with general users.

It's not just "junk news" though. People can and have been caught out by things like Microsoft tech support scams, fake virus alarms and prominently displayed on the Microsoft news feed. I've reported to Microsoft before direct links to ransomware advertised on their news feed.

Re: Useless Windows 10 Features

#410
post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sticky corners (with 2 monitors) annoy me more. Drag your mouse pointer to the top corner of the screen, trying to take it to the next monitor - nope, it gets stuck. It goes from annoying to very frustrating when I am trying to click at the top left of the window on my 2nd screen, but someone at MS decided the mouse will get stuck on the X and close my current window instead. I have very good mouse accuracy from year…

In Win7 several of the mouse behaviours like this can be disabled in Control Panel -> Ease of Access Center -> Make the mouse easier to use. (Seems to be targeted for people with disabilities, but heck... if that's what it takes to disable this crap.) Win 10 will likely have something equivalent.

There is a setting, but it's not very fine grained and turning it off also turns off other useful settings. I can't remember which exactly, I just know I reverted fairly quickly since it was even more annoying.
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