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Windows needs a change in priorities

den.dev

751–760 of 884 posts

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#751

Like every Windows user, I have had a lot of frustrating experiences with the abusive behavior and dark patterns that have taken over the platform. Like when they started having Skype silently run in the background logged in with the user's Microsoft account without any notice or human intervention, and removed the setting to disable it from launching at startup so that it couldn't be prevented. I had to completely u…

From my POV it has come to a time where the tradeoffs you make switching to Linux (xubuntu in my case) are worth it. A few days ago I had to do some helpdesk for a friend with windows 10. We suspected that one of his three drives failed, and windows just refused to start up, so I wanted to jump into recovery/safe mode and take a look. But for doing so you need to go through a ridiculous lenght rebooting the PC multip…

Try Manjaro with KDE.

Manjaro is way better than Ubuntu; KDE is way better than Xfce.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#752
post #460

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microsoft has a tick tock approach to consumer OS releases, where every other OS is “the good one”. Windows me - bad Windows xp - good Windows vista - bad Windows 7 - good Windows 8 - bad Windows 10 - good Windows 11 - bad For a bad release windows 11 is pretty good. This gives me hope that windows 12 will be their best ever. This is why it would have been smart of them to stick to windows 10 like they planned, but l…

>Microsoft has a tick tock approach to consumer OS releases Nice idea but it just doesn't fit. Windows 95/98/Me were all poor. XP was widely panned when it came out because existing hardware wasn't quite good enough and it was riddled with security issues. Rememebr SP2? Where did 8.1 go? Windows 10 is full of the stuff people are complaining about in this thread.

I disagree.

95 good. 98 bad.

2000 good, XP bad (for me), Vista bad, 7 good, 8 bad, 8.1 better but not great, 10 OK, 11 bad.

As always: https://www.badscience.net/wp-content/uploads/complicatedcov...

("I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that." -- Ben Goldacre)

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#753

Windows users need a change in priorities. FTFY. The OS has gone to shit, but people keep right on using it and complaining about how bad it's getting. What is your lame priority for sticking with it? Don't tell me gaming - get a console or VR headset, or steam on Linux. If you're that hung up on one game that doesn't run anywhere else then again you need to change your priorities. If it's using Excel or Word with a…

Unpopular opinion: I use Windows because it does what I want it to do. Not for lack of knowing alternatives - I've been using Linux on desktops and servers for well over two decades now.

I don't really care about the telemetry. For some reason, I don't see the in-UI ads people are complaining about. Yes, sometimes I'm annoyed by it. I'm even more annoyed when I run Linux on desktops. So what?

And don't get me started on just how condescending it is for you to be telling people their priorities are wrong because they are not yours. There's nothing wrong with sticking to Windows because that one game you're hung up on doesn't run on Windows. There's nothing wrong with using Excel or Word because that one extension you're using doesn't work or doesn't exist on LibreOffice. Telling people to "get a console or VR headset" for gaming instead of their Windows rig with the latest AAA-games that won't run on Linux (yet)? That's just obnoxiously ignorant.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#754

Windows users need a change in priorities. FTFY. The OS has gone to shit, but people keep right on using it and complaining about how bad it's getting. What is your lame priority for sticking with it? Don't tell me gaming - get a console or VR headset, or steam on Linux. If you're that hung up on one game that doesn't run anywhere else then again you need to change your priorities. If it's using Excel or Word with a…

> What is your lame priority for sticking with it? Don't tell me gaming - get a console or VR headset, or steam on Linux. Tell me you're not a gamer without telling me you're not a gamer. The desire to play with mouse + keyboard is reason enough to stick with a PC. Wanting to play in 1440p @ 144 fps is another. First-class support for Discord. Steam sales. I could go on and on about reasons to play on PC. Steam on Li…

Installing League via Lutris is not that difficult. It's certainly not as idiot-proof as it needs to be, but the average Linux user should be capable of following the relatively simple instructions provided by communities like /r/leagueoflinux. It also runs pretty well, at least for me.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#755
post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

WSL is a threat to open software. At best a gateway. Anyone who believes Microsoft has changed is at best naive and at worst a fool. We have decades of evidence to show that Microsoft doesn’t change. The sooner you move to a new platform the better. And don’t bring Microsoft with you.

Strongly agreed. WSL – both versions – are MS attempting its age-old "embrace & extend" move. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguis... I called it a distant relative of the NT POSIX environment and some senior MS bod disagreed and – when I said [[citation needed]] – eventually linked to a bunch of videos and stuff that say that WSL1 is a whole new translation layer and not a kernel personality…

> I called it a distant relative of the NT POSIX environment and some senior MS bod disagreed and – when I said [[citation needed]] – eventually linked to a bunch of videos and stuff that say that WSL1 is a whole new translation layer and not a kernel personality at all.

As far as I understand it, WSL1 was a complete reimplementation and did not use any code from the old POSIX subsystem/SUA/Interix. In particular, SUA had a number of long-standing limitations (like when replacing open files) which were probably unfixable without rewriting everything anyway. It allegedly is a continuation of Project Astoria which implemented only the minimum necessary part to make Android apps run, but was refocused to run all Linux applications.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#756

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's like being in an abusive relationship. Indeed, another way it's like an abusive relationship is people's reluctance to leave despite all they've experienced. I hear all the horror stories and then say "I've been using for ten years and it works well" and I get "oh, but I don't want to have to fiddle with things" (after discussions of how hard Windows is to get to do things). Linux has glitches but Microsoft mani…

While I don't necessarily disagree with the initial statement, I will say that Linux Desktop has its own kind of abusive relationship, especially if you have to deal with certain parts of the community. GNOME in particular is pretty user-hostile in both design and in its community interactions, and while you can use a different DE GNOME is the default for the most popular and recommended distributions. Personally I'v…

Hey you again. c:

>I have an Nvidia 1080ti

Fwiw, I used Linux with an 1080 Ti for years; it was the first card I tried Linux on. The only hitch is having to install Nvidia's proprietary drivers. Distros with GUI tools for drivers (e.g., Manjaro) make this easy.

The only problem was actually my G-SYNC monitor. It was one of those super expensive ones with G-SYNC hardware in it. It turns out those just go black if you're not using an Nvidia card && aren't running proprietary drivers.

At some point, I gave it and my 1080 Ti away and got an AMD card with FreeSync monitors. Funnily, the FreeSync doesn't actually work. (Luckily, I don't care that much about tearing, and it's less noticeable at >=144 Hz.) AND, with AMD, you don't have a nice GPU settings panel like Nvidia provides (as basic as it is compared to its Windows equivalent). I've noticed no other differences. Nevertheless, having the open source driver in-kernel and not worrying about installing it out of band is nice.

>no VR solution really works that well on Linux, even Valve's.

Yep, probably; tech is too new. I don't even try stuff like that until it's 30 years old and mainlined. ;D

>GNOME

Yeah, I don't know how anyone sane likes GNOME, and it's insane to me that KDE isn't the default DE instead. I reckon it's a combo of inertia, the fact that the GNOME faction were the GPL purists compared to TrollTech back in the day, and (enduring?) convergence/low-tech user adoption hopes.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#757
It's almost cute that people still think Windows as a product team cares what individual users want/need/buy. Individual opinions/license purchases don't seem to move Microsoft a millimeter in any direction. As others pointed out, examples abound with the horrible UI intrusions/dumb things that users have to work around just to get work done. My personal pet peeve is this persistent Windows 10 screen dimming/darkening that happens whenever I pull up a terminal no matter the settings changed via UI or registry. Also, having volunteers doing the (not always helpful or even right) troubleshooting for frustrated users isolates the devs from the stupid decisions they or their managers make. (speaking as a software developer myself: devs should be required to work support briefly in the section they'll be developing on so they understand user frustrations).

I believe the reason users still pay is so the price can justifiably be multiplied in bulk corporate purchases, otherwise they'd give it away for free to get more of that sweet, sweet data. So they can copy Google, poorly.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#758

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody at Microsoft who has decision-making authority actually cares. Acknowledging this is the first step. The second is figuring out what would make them care or how to remove them so someone who does care can take over. That's a much harder thing to do. Realistically Microsoft is in a similar position to the likes of Google and Facebook. They have such an entrenched monopoly, bought through years of ignored warnin…

What is wrong with Linux nowadays? I've used it as my main driver for long enough that I can't see the big problems that are preventing everyone from switching. Like, it seems easier than even WSL to me. Beginner friendly distos seem to have solved the package management problem, and there are adequate desktop environments, office suites, browsers, gaming, and everything else. If a person has good hardware compatibil…

I was a Linux network admin FOR the US Government, in a datacenter, and had to use Windows.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#759

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What part of installation is broken? It's literally a GUI that you can click "continue" on until you get to the pretty looking progress bar.

Application installation is broken. If software isn't hand-curated in the distro's repository and kept up to date by someone, then get ready to set up a dev environment and compile from source. Hopefully you will not break your entire system trying to cater to whims of whatever insane build environment it uses. This includes new versions that no one has got around to packaging yet. AppImage and Flatpak are making inr…

This reads like a comment from Slashdot, circa '97. If you have a "toxic" relationship with inept/malicious application software, break ties with it now just as you should from Microsoft.

Even under your rare worst-case scenario, recovery has never been easier with "live" flash drives. No need to live in fear of breaking something.

Re: Windows needs a change in priorities

#760

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody at Microsoft who has decision-making authority actually cares. Acknowledging this is the first step. The second is figuring out what would make them care or how to remove them so someone who does care can take over. That's a much harder thing to do. Realistically Microsoft is in a similar position to the likes of Google and Facebook. They have such an entrenched monopoly, bought through years of ignored warnin…

What is wrong with Linux nowadays? I've used it as my main driver for long enough that I can't see the big problems that are preventing everyone from switching. Like, it seems easier than even WSL to me. Beginner friendly distos seem to have solved the package management problem, and there are adequate desktop environments, office suites, browsers, gaming, and everything else. If a person has good hardware compatibil…

MS Office. That's it. That's the reason I went with a Mac instead.

Nobody is kicking MS off of that pedestal, and unless we get some significant anti-trust legislation, we aren't getting that on Linux.

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