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Windows needs a change in priorities

den.dev

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Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#371

Post by dend »

ripley12 wrote: post #239
dend wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I mentioned in the blog post - both Notepad and Task Manager aren't that inconsistent with the rest of the OS. Notepad is just a giant text box. Task Manager is a compact, tabbed view (tabs didn't go anywhere in the latest version of Windows) that now became Fluent-ified and in the process now looks very wasteful of vertical space. Above all, I think the problem is in priorities - Notepad and Task Manager _should_…

> when so much focus is assigned to those instead of the core pieces of the OS Do you have any evidence that Notepad and Task Manager required "so much focus"? The new Notepad's about as bare-bones as the old Notepad, it just happens to use XAML Islands for the UI. It would be surprising if it significantly detracted from other efforts.

It's all about contrast to everything else. If my house roof is leaking and instead of fixing that I put a limited amount of resources I have into repainting my office and installing a fancy new European faucet, and then go and tell everyone about it - that says a lot about my priorities.

Yes, I am fully aware of the fact that different teams do different things at a big company, but funnily enough when asked about high-priority issues the answer is almost universally "We don't have enough time and/or developers to tackle this right now." But there is magically time for MSN toolbars and Notepad tweaks.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#372

Post by RussianCow »

fartcannon wrote: post #113
McAtNite wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m desperately wishing for Valve to have success with the Deck so that Linux gets better attention from game devs. The last Windows machine in my environment is exclusively for PC games, and I honestly can’t wait to install Linux over it.

Just start now. Think of unsupported games as you think of games for Nintendo and Sony machines. Your financial support of gaming on Linux will encourage developers to support it. Waiting just keeps the status quo.

I did this a few years ago with the same mindset, thinking I’d still regularly boot into Windows, but I haven’t done so in probably over a year. I was surprised at how little I missed the games that don’t run (well or at all) on Linux—probably because there are so many good options these days.

At this point I’m thinking of deleting my Windows partition altogether.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#373

Post by ripley12 »

dend wrote: post #371
ripley12 wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> when so much focus is assigned to those instead of the core pieces of the OS Do you have any evidence that Notepad and Task Manager required "so much focus"? The new Notepad's about as bare-bones as the old Notepad, it just happens to use XAML Islands for the UI. It would be surprising if it significantly detracted from other efforts.

It's all about contrast to everything else. If my house roof is leaking and instead of fixing that I put a limited amount of resources I have into repainting my office and installing a fancy new European faucet, and then go and tell everyone about it - that says a lot about my priorities. Yes, I am fully aware of the fact that different teams do different things at a big company, but funnily enough when asked about h…

OK, no evidence. Got it.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#374

Post by astrange »

srvmshr wrote: post #336
ryandrake wrote: post #297

There's been a big shift in the whole software industry from "enable what the user wants to do" over to "we want the user to do this". Back in the '90s, we would go out, talk to customers, find out their needs, gather requirements, and write software that enables them to do what they want to do. Now, in a lot of software companies, it's the opposite. Product leadership starts with "What do we want users to do?" and t…

That misguided notion of product features and integration, where the user has minimum role, started out at Apple. The standard pattern used to be talking to OEMs and discussing what users wanted from them. That review phase generated update ideas for next release and so on. Apple turned that question on its head and made it "the one last thing" show business. We have employed a generation of PMs now who idolize Steve…

Note that Apple doesn’t have PMs.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#375

Post by [deleted] »

zaphirplane wrote: post #356
ryandrake wrote: post #297

There's been a big shift in the whole software industry from "enable what the user wants to do" over to "we want the user to do this". Back in the '90s, we would go out, talk to customers, find out their needs, gather requirements, and write software that enables them to do what they want to do. Now, in a lot of software companies, it's the opposite. Product leadership starts with "What do we want users to do?" and t…

It’s probably driven by all the unicorns and massive tech companies that got where they are by building what they think the customers will want. Not defending, but I do recall the ford quote of “If I’d asked customers what they wanted, they would have said ‘a faster horse’”

[deleted]

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#376

Post by yoyohello13 »

dimgl wrote: post #299
ficiek wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Linux still barely works in 2022 I have had zero problem running linux as my daily driver for the last 10 years, care to explain your comment? The only problem that I have is that video games don't always work because the developers don't care.

I see this argument in every thread about Linux. There's always this one magical user where everything "just works", has had 0 issues and everything's just dandy.

I’m not going to lie and say Linux is problem free, but “barely works” is a massive exaggeration. Linux works just fine. Windows isn’t problem free. I use windows for work and it’s often a roll of the dice whether my monitors will got to sleep properly, or if windows will deign to recognize my keyboard on boot.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#377

Post by kyriakos »

Gigachad wrote: post #354
ryandrake wrote: post #297

There's been a big shift in the whole software industry from "enable what the user wants to do" over to "we want the user to do this". Back in the '90s, we would go out, talk to customers, find out their needs, gather requirements, and write software that enables them to do what they want to do. Now, in a lot of software companies, it's the opposite. Product leadership starts with "What do we want users to do?" and t…

The skype thing kinda makes sense. People want software which just works without configuration. When you sign in to an iphone or macbook, it immediately sets up facetime which is always active waiting for a call in the background. No one complains because this is expected and it has always happened. But then Microsoft wants to give their users the same conveniance as Apple users get with their "just works" setup and…

I see your point but maybe the reactions are because most of these efforts feel half baked? For example they are forcing teams on users, which I use as a daily driver at my work and I feel that it's the worst piece of software I have to use.

On top of that the way things are integrated always looks and feels forced. Like going into lengths to hide control panel in windows 10 even if it's still there and while the settings app which replaces it only has a fraction of the functionality.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#378

Post by bstar77 »

Windows doesn't need to change a single thing, it's just doing it's thing and it's been doing it for ages. There are actually viable alternatives these days if you don't like it.

Windows has always been an inferior OS, but I don't worry or complain about it. It hasn't been on my radar for over 15 years. I've spent that time learning *nix patterns instead of dealing with Windows quirks. That choice has paid massive dividends.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#379

Post by pndy »

ficiek wrote: post #250
shp0ngle wrote: post #238

Well, what are you going to do. Not use Windows? Linux still barely works in 2022 (and if one distro will become really popular, with a big investment of money like Ubuntu did once, they will ad ads, like Ubuntu added Amazon), and MacOS works just on Apple HW (and has ads for Apple services baked-in too, just less obnoxious). You can use ChromeOS! Which is literally ad tech. Pick your poison.

>Linux still barely works in 2022 I have had zero problem running linux as my daily driver for the last 10 years, care to explain your comment? The only problem that I have is that video games don't always work because the developers don't care.

Not the parent comment but I'm getting random freezes on two different machines with different guts; sometimes system resumes and sometimes it requires a hard reset. Doesn't matter if its Manjaro or Linux Mint or Fedora, or which kernel I'm using.

My GPU is no longer supported and I couldn't revert to last working Nvidia drivers in Manjaro because things were changed. Not sure how the open source version is capable of rendering 3D or compatible with Lutris/Wine.

It's not the "barely works" in my case but there are issues around that are giving me a feeling I'm using Windows 98 and ME again.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#380

Post by tcmart14 »

freeone3000 wrote: post #278
tcmart14 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the issue here is not inherently with Linux. It is more so with vendors of printers making drivers. If Brother feels that there are enough people running Linux and want to own a Brother printer, they will make the driver. Maybe that is the issue we need solve, or at least the part we need to be vocal about. If brother gets a significant number of emails asking for linux support, perhaps they will finally make lin…

I think it's interesting you chose Brother here, because Linux support is a first class citizen -- they not only offer CUPS drivers, they offer Deb and RPM packages that also set up dependencies.

I just picked the first vendor off the top of my head and Brother came to mind. Feel free to replace it with any other vendor/manufacturer. In no way is it meant to single out brother as being poor on Linux.
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