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The only direction Windows should go is being more modular and less features. Speed is probably the only feature all users want. So make all features modular with advanced user being able to remove and get a lean and mean OS. We want less, we want speed. P. S. It is about time to upgrade the File System. It is too slow...
For every egregious user-hostile behavior, you can search and find a ton of forum threads where people discuss at length how to reverse or mitigate them. The fact that Microsoft is aware of this and continues to prioritize this kind of abusive growth hacking over user trust, knowing fully how that impacts the company's reputation among enthusiasts, is perhaps more damning than the actual practices.
Nobody at Microsoft who has decision-making authority actually cares. Contempt for the users is so deep in the DNA that this will never get better. It's disappointing, because it ultimately undermines all of the great effort that people elsewhere in the company have put into features like WSL that might otherwise make the platform attractive to modern developers.
It creates a really adversarial posture between the user and the platform. When they introduce new features, I'm reluctant to even try them because I don't trust their intentions. It's like being in an abusive relationship.
The only direction Windows should go is being more modular and less features. Speed is probably the only feature all users want. So make all features modular with advanced user being able to remove and get a lean and mean OS. We want less, we want speed. P. S. It is about time to upgrade the File System. It is too slow...
I bit the bullet and upgraded to Windows 11 late last year thinking it must be an improvement over Windows 10. It turned out to be a big step backwards.
- Changing the default browser is a lot of work instead of a single click.
- I can't move the task bar to the side, even though almost every monitor nowadays has much more horizontal space than vertical.
- All apps are not readily accessible from the start menu; I have to click another button to get to them.
- I have a 2-in-1 laptop, and turning it into tablet mode is wonky.
- I can't choose to not have grouped buttons on the taskbar.
- The context menus UX is horrible. Some context menu items are now two clicks away instead of one. Also what's with the excessive rounded corners and slim selection padding?
- The stacked notifications is confusing, and always shows the calendar when I open the notifications panel.
- Lots of crap pushed on me, like chat (aka Teams), widgets (which require a Microsoft account), 3rd party apps that look like they're installed but actually get downloaded/installed on first use.
I was able to fix a lot of those issues with ExplorerPatcher [0]. However, one day after a Windows update, Explorer didn't start at all after login (black screen, I thought Windows was hosed). This has since been fixed. But I decided enough is enough, and finally "upgraded" back to Windows 10.
The only good thing about Windows 11 is wslg, which provides out of the box support for Linux GUI apps (not available on Windows 10). But I can get the same result with an X server and some work.
[0] https://github.com/valinet/ExplorerPatcher/wiki/All-features
You've got to admire Microsoft's support of open source software. They're doing their best to push users to Linux! By making their UI as ugly and difficult to use as possible so that users don't feel too much of a bump in usability when they try Linux. I'm sure MS can get the job done and kill off their OS with just a few more years of obnoxious bullshit forcefully shoved into their operating system!
Not only that, but shipping Microsoft Office onto the Mac makes it so much easier to leave if you're not playing video games.
When I worked at apple I wasnt the only person who ran office in a windows vm. It was a supported config.
If they shipped a version of Windows sporting the Windows-11 kernel, so running all the recent software, but with Windows 2000 UI for a thousand dollars I would buy it immediately.
This article nails a lot of the issues with Windows 11. I bit the bullet and upgraded to Windows 11 late last year thinking it must be an improvement over Windows 10. It turned out to be a big step backwards. - Changing the default browser is a lot of work instead of a single click. - I can't move the task bar to the side, even though almost every monitor nowadays has much more horizontal space than vertical. - All a…
The people who worked on the design use Macs. Seriously.
(edit: from throwaway as a protective measure)
There are a few companies flirting with this dangerous line right now and it opens them up completely for disruption, which is the opposite of what they want.
Windows at this point is a ball and chain around even Microsoft's leg. They pivoted to a "cloud and services" company under Nadella because they can't make money off Windows anymore -- except by strip-mining its reputation and ubiquity by turning it into adware/spyware. Truly we live in the worst timeline.