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Windows Terminal Source Code

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Re: Windows Terminal Source Code

#61

Post by Genbox »

Lammy wrote: post #21
whywhywhywhy wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ok, what do those do?

There are some pretty detailed comments on many of them if you click through to their call sites, and more can be inferred from the file names of the callers. Let's take a look at `windowio.cpp` for example. This most-generic event fires every time you type any input character on the keyboard: https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/blob/57c3953aca49f68ac... It also has more-specific events for several different ways o…

What you are stating is incorrect.

Each of the calls you link to sets a boolean here: https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/blob/57c3953aca49f68ac...

It does not transmit what you copy, search for or when you clicked/resized/closed the window. It simply stores a true/false value saying "feature X was used". In some cases, like with find/replace, it also stores the average length of things you searched for. That is a common way for developers to get an idea if performance characteristics due to the longest common substring problem[1]

You are trying to spread misinformation here to make Microsoft look like a bad guy. There is nothing sinister going on here, it is just ordinary metric collection.

But don't take my word for it. Take for example the "we can see it log every time you resize a console window" statement. In the link it calls SetWindowSizeChanged()[2] which again calls SetUserInteractive()[3] and it just sets a boolean to true.

So there is no "log every time it resize a console window". It simply sets a variable to true, which presumably the Windows Terminal dev team use to see how many users use the console with interactive sessions.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longest_common_substring_probl...

[2] https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/blob/57c3953aca49f68ac...

[3] https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/blob/57c3953aca49f68ac...

Re: Windows Terminal Source Code

#62

Post by Maursault »

melony wrote: post #57
Maursault wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple should follow MS's example and open source its Terminal.app This is bellyaching about nothing. Instead, Microsoft should follow Apple's example and open source the operating system . The only part of macOS that is not open source is the GUI, i.e. Quartz Compositor, and the gui applications. Microsoft, meanwhile, is an incredible slouch when it comes to open source, only very recently changing their hostile "e…

Mac without the userland is mostly useless. At that point you might as well switch fully to FreeBSD.

This is a straw man, and also not entirely accurate. Darwin is BSD, and in theory just as useful as BSD, or FreeBSD, NetBSD, and useful to developers, and to anyone that can figure out how to install it and use it. [1] Meanwhile, Windows without hardware less than 2 years old is absolutely worthless. Thus, Linux.

[1] http://www.puredarwin.org/

Re: Windows Terminal Source Code

#63

Post by disruptiveink »

babypuncher wrote: post #47
Guillaume86 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just glancing through them it looks like perfectly reasonable telemetry collection, not sure why you call that spying.

We have a habit of diluting words to the point where they are meaningless, and I think it does more to hurt important causes than support them. By labeling all forms of telemetry as "spying", we just make it so people are less likely to take actual claims of spying seriously.

That is what it once meant. "Spyware" was the term used for any process that called home regarding any information about you, your computer or your usage in the background. Calling home for anything other than "Check for updates" menu items or other actions where calling home was the explicit action the user wanted would get your name tarnished in the media and added to the signature list of software built for the sole purpose of finding and forcefully removing software like that.

Practically any Android app these days would be considered "spyware" if we were still applying the "spyware" definition of the early 2000s. And we would be better off if we had never stopped.

Re: Windows Terminal Source Code

#64

Post by nyolfen »

winterm looks very nice but it often screws up character alignment if you resize the window. it happens so frequently that i gave it up, because at least once a day i could no longer tell what i was typing or trying to copy. i'm a happy customer with alacritty windows builds, but i wish it had tabs.

Re: Windows Terminal Source Code

#65

Post by dpool »

nyolfen wrote: post #64

winterm looks very nice but it often screws up character alignment if you resize the window. it happens so frequently that i gave it up, because at least once a day i could no longer tell what i was typing or trying to copy. i'm a happy customer with alacritty windows builds, but i wish it had tabs.

You're probably already aware of this, but just in case you're not (or someone else reads this that's curious), running tmux (src: https://github.com/tmux/tmux/wiki) inside alacritty will give you tab functionality along with the ability to horizontally/vertically split and a host of other fun features.

Re: Windows Terminal Source Code

#66

Post by nyolfen »

dpool wrote: post #65
nyolfen wrote: post #64

winterm looks very nice but it often screws up character alignment if you resize the window. it happens so frequently that i gave it up, because at least once a day i could no longer tell what i was typing or trying to copy. i'm a happy customer with alacritty windows builds, but i wish it had tabs.

You're probably already aware of this, but just in case you're not (or someone else reads this that's curious), running tmux (src: https://github.com/tmux/tmux/wiki ) inside alacritty will give you tab functionality along with the ability to horizontally/vertically split and a host of other fun features.

yes, i'm still a tab clicker though :)

Re: Windows Terminal Source Code

#67

Post by disruptiveink »

tambourine_man wrote: post #26

Apple should follow MS's example and open source its Terminal.app It's a decent terminal emulator, but could use several enhancements and the community could help. For some reason I haven't changed to iTerm yet, even though it's been objectively better in every way for years. Even the minor gripe I had with font rendering is fixed. There's something about using default apps as much as possible that appeals to me. But…

I was a Terminal.app user since Tiger, only recently had to switch to iTerm 2 as since Big Sur it forces anti-aliasing on non-HiDPI displays, even when turned off in the settings (I like non anti-aliased Monaco 10pt). It looks like a bug, but hasn't been fixed since.

Re: Windows Terminal Source Code

#68

Post by justusthane »

nyolfen wrote: post #66
dpool wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're probably already aware of this, but just in case you're not (or someone else reads this that's curious), running tmux (src: https://github.com/tmux/tmux/wiki ) inside alacritty will give you tab functionality along with the ability to horizontally/vertically split and a host of other fun features.

yes, i'm still a tab clicker though :)

tmux has mouse support!

Re: Windows Terminal Source Code

#69

Post by jiggawatts »

donmcronald wrote: post #31
mftb wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for doing this. Looking over some of the actual call sites and there commentary was interesting. For all the folks who say it's all totally innocuous (or even beneficial). Even if it is, I can tell you, I have no interest in my computer doing this while I'm using it.

I've always wondered what the performance impact is. Windows 10 feels so slow compared to Windows 7 and earlier that I'm constantly wondering how much of my life is being allocated to telemetry.

The impact is absolutely noticeable, just difficult to attribute.

Every time I rebuild my laptop it has these “mysterious” slowdown periods that force me to dig through the metrics to see what is the culprit.

About 80% of the time it’s telemetry.

The worst one is actually the Intel driver installer which has telemetry that is so far beyond obnoxious that it’s an embarrassment to every so-called “engineer” involved.

Shame.

Shame.

Re: Windows Terminal Source Code

#70

Post by jiggawatts »

Genbox wrote: post #61
Lammy wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are some pretty detailed comments on many of them if you click through to their call sites, and more can be inferred from the file names of the callers. Let's take a look at `windowio.cpp` for example. This most-generic event fires every time you type any input character on the keyboard: https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/blob/57c3953aca49f68ac... It also has more-specific events for several different ways o…

What you are stating is incorrect. Each of the calls you link to sets a boolean here: https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/blob/57c3953aca49f68ac... It does not transmit what you copy, search for or when you clicked/resized/closed the window. It simply stores a true/false value saying "feature X was used". In some cases, like with find/replace, it also stores the average length of things you searched for. That is a…

Every group implements their own telemetry. Every group goes through the same “learning process” of making it asynchronous and correctly dealing with proxies, firewalls, etc…

Inevitably mistakes are made that either slow down computers or outright freeze apps that can’t connect to some telemetry endpoint.

Security teams around the world feel like they’re holding back the tide with a broom because EVERY piece of software is contributing to a veritable firehouse of information sprayed all over the Internet from every endpoint on the network.

This is not okay.

It’s not Microsoft’s computer.

It’s not their network.

It’s not their data.

How is this not clear?

How can you be so apologetic?

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