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Microsoft plugging more ads into Windows 11 Start Menu

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Re: Microsoft plugging more ads into Windows 11 Start Menu

#501
post #401

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Install Arch, get everything working, and DO NOT install updates. I've never had another distro that would randomly render itself unbootable or break core functionality with such frequency with the simple weekly application of updates. Really distressing.

Wow. I have used Arch as my main system for 6 years now (was Gentoo before) and never had anything of the sort. How does this even happen?

It happened to me on Arch during the switch from init to systemd.

Update was documented, but I didn’t look. Did my `pacman -syua` as I normally did on a daily, and rebooted to a totally borked system. This is when I was a grad student and really needed that laptop that week.

I still love Arch, but I can’t trust it anymore as a daily driver.

Re: Microsoft plugging more ads into Windows 11 Start Menu

#502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everytime my BT headphones connect, Apple Music opens up. Own and iPhone and you are reminded quite often of the benefits of an iCloud subscription. Try setting up an iPhone w/o an apple account for that matter, or using an Android phone (that hasn't been de-googled) without a Google account. Not to mention, users expect their files to be with them everywhere. IMHO Microsoft should make OneDrive free with some obscen…

> Everytime my BT headphones connect, Apple Music opens up. https://github.com/tombonez/noTunes > noTunes is a macOS application that will prevent iTunes or Apple Music from launching. Simply launch the noTunes app and iTunes/Music will no longer be able to launch. For example, when bluetooth headphones reconnect. You can toggle the apps functionality via the menu bar icon with a simple left click.

I'm quite sure there was a way of preventing this without having a random app running. I actually did use itunes, and later music, but also used that key for other purposes, like Spotify. iTunes / Music never came up on its own when I used my BT headphones (Sony and Shure).

I don't use a mac anymore, so don't quite remember the specifics, but a quick search brings this up (old, so may not work anymore): https://www.howtogeek.com/274345/stop-itunes-from-launching-...

Re: Microsoft plugging more ads into Windows 11 Start Menu

#503
post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hilarious how the first Linux user's response to a Windows user's unease is immediately "open the terminal" As long as that's how it goes, it will never be the Year of the Linux Desktop.

Typing (or pasting) a command into a terminal will always be more reproduceable than anything GUI.

I did this on Windows too. Why even bother giving someone "click here then here the look for this menu on the right" when I can just send them a PowerShell script.

Re: Microsoft plugging more ads into Windows 11 Start Menu

#504

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can do all of those in Linux. For example, here's how to set the background to a solid color. Open a terminal and type the following four commands: gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.background picture-options 'none' gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.background primary-color '#004000' gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.background secondary-color '#306030' gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.background color-shading-type 'ver…

I'm not sure if this is satire or not.

You can do it in the dconf editor UI but showing the commands is way easier.

Re: Microsoft plugging more ads into Windows 11 Start Menu

#505
post #75
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's obvious what are they thinking: "This gives us conversions, this gives us money, what are you gonna do, pay 3000$ for a Mac?"

Gonna move to Proton, thank you.

I'm loving Proton on Ubuntu.

Re: Microsoft plugging more ads into Windows 11 Start Menu

#506
post #96

MS Windows is the daytime television of operating systems: If you're still using it in 2023 you have only yourself to blame. It's not like there aren't better options at your disposal...

"It's not like there aren't better options at your disposal" For what exactly? For many, many things, windows is your ONLY option. Switching to Linux or Apple would mean kissing away so much software availability.

If you can't you can't but once you're over the hurdle it's bliss.

Re: Microsoft plugging more ads into Windows 11 Start Menu

#508

Move over to linux. KDE has the eye-candy, XFCE has the simplicity and OpenBOX is distraction free. Games work well and so do dev tools.

What's the best distribution to get "all your modern hardware works out of the box" alongside KDE (which I like a lot better than GNOME or Cinnamon)? I used Linux Mint, added KDE, but had issues[0] that were showstoppers. Everyone blamed my Nvidia GPU, but that's what my laptop has and it would be very expensive to replace with a comparable all-AMD gaming laptop. As a "non-expert" Linux user, deciphering the distribu…

Probably Fedora KDE edition. IBM may eventually ruin them but for now the Redhat folks are by far the best system integrators for Linux.

Re: Microsoft plugging more ads into Windows 11 Start Menu

#509

It’s funny for what is essentially a ‘file manager’ Microsoft makes it hell to manage your files. My friends and family and constantly confused by the 10 different interfaces there are for file management. Desktops are a mess of of half trash files. The cloud integration the file explorer is a confusing mess. The UI for saving a file from Office is the absolute worst. I’ve had to help someone just save a file and it…

Agreed. That OneDrive thingy my company foolishly employs is making the file ""manager"" only bigger, not better. One of my favourite is how it overrules me in renaming a file. Half way into renaming it decides I will not rename it and just clears my editing, or exits editing mode. Refreshes or something, ruining what I do along the way. Renaming files is a hit or miss thing, unpridictable. Something pretty essential…

The business version of onedrive is just a shell around SharePoint which has a bunch of awkward character restrictions. This is the cause of that. I don't use consumer onedrive but I wouldn't be surprised if it doesn't do this.

Re: Microsoft plugging more ads into Windows 11 Start Menu

#510

The only reason I use Windows in 2023 is for video gaming. Every other non-gaming PC I own is running Linux. Windows has become inferior to Linux in every other way. More upgrade headaches, worse resource utilization, worse desktop environment, more crashes, data collection, and now embedded ads. These technology companies have really demonstrated over the past few decades that they are unable to maintain reliable pr…

If it weren't for games, I'd swap over too. But having to swap between either physical computers or dual-boot is just asking too much for me. I like my convenience. Having one OS that does whatever I want is good. Linux is getting closer with stuff like WINE, but I play too much obscure, old, heavily modded, or just games that have issues as it is - and don't want to add the OS into the mix. I like not having to worr…

> having to swap between either physical computers or dual-boot is just asking too much for me.

Funnily enough I found myself in the same situation but with the reverse outcome. The computer I currently use daily dual-boots Fedora and Windows 11, but I don't think I've touched Windows in months, probably not since I first set it up actually.

I do sometimes get issues with very specific games, but my philosophy is that I'd rather miss out on a piece of software than have it tie to me a specific OS, though it sounds like your more into gaming than me so I can see why that'd be more of an issue for you.

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