Running late for college, and the scooter is stuck in an update
1–10 of 62 posts
Re: Running late for college, and the scooter is stuck in an update
#2I get a similar thing teaching a coding club.
I'm not sure how the machines are set up, as I have an aversion to Windows from my time as an NT 'certified professional', but at least one machine will spend 10 minutes 'updating' during any class.
No doubt you can turn this off or set update time windows or whatever, but I'm not the admin for these machines. At least the updates generally work. For my kids' machines at home, almost anytime they boot windows, it will do an update, and a good percentage of the time, the update will fail, and brick the machine, requiring a complete re-install.
Re: Running late for college, and the scooter is stuck in an update
#3Software trying to update when it is started is such a common pattern, despite almost always going against user intent. When I start software, that's because I want to use it. It's pretty high on the list of times I don't want it to become temporarily unusable while it updates itself.
Doing the same with vehicle firmware is a sad but predictable state of things.
Re: Running late for college, and the scooter is stuck in an update
#4I get a similar thing teaching a coding club. I'm not sure how the machines are set up, as I have an aversion to Windows from my time as an NT 'certified professional', but at least one machine will spend 10 minutes 'updating' during any class. No doubt you can turn this off or set update time windows or whatever, but I'm not the admin for these machines. At least the updates generally work. For my kids' machines at…
So you're saying approximately 3 times a week you reinstall windows on your kids machines?
Re: Running late for college, and the scooter is stuck in an update
#5I get a similar thing teaching a coding club. I'm not sure how the machines are set up, as I have an aversion to Windows from my time as an NT 'certified professional', but at least one machine will spend 10 minutes 'updating' during any class. No doubt you can turn this off or set update time windows or whatever, but I'm not the admin for these machines. At least the updates generally work. For my kids' machines at…
So you're saying approximately 3 times a week you reinstall windows on your kids machines?
huh? They mostly use linux, and maybe Windows once or twice a week at most, to maybe every couple of weeks.
So for your stats, last year we re-installed the windows partition of one machine 4 times and another I think 2 or 3. Could be hardware problems, of course. But each time was triggered by a windows update, so maybe the update stressed the hardware to the point of failure, which linux does not.
Re: Running late for college, and the scooter is stuck in an update
#6I get a similar thing teaching a coding club. I'm not sure how the machines are set up, as I have an aversion to Windows from my time as an NT 'certified professional', but at least one machine will spend 10 minutes 'updating' during any class. No doubt you can turn this off or set update time windows or whatever, but I'm not the admin for these machines. At least the updates generally work. For my kids' machines at…
I think your kid’s computer needs a new disk, that seems odd.
Re: Running late for college, and the scooter is stuck in an update
#7I get a similar thing teaching a coding club. I'm not sure how the machines are set up, as I have an aversion to Windows from my time as an NT 'certified professional', but at least one machine will spend 10 minutes 'updating' during any class. No doubt you can turn this off or set update time windows or whatever, but I'm not the admin for these machines. At least the updates generally work. For my kids' machines at…
Windows has gotten pretty good at staying out of your way with updates if you have typical usage patterns. That is: either you turn it on at the beginning of the business day, it downloads updates in the background and installs them when you shut the machine down at the end of the day; Or you leave the machine on 24/7, get a couple prompts over multiple days about a scheduled restart with the option to schedule it, and if you don't react it just restarts in the dead of night (or rather, a reasonable prediction of when you won't be using the computer).
The rub is that this doesn't work as well in atypical setups like a lab. The machines are probably only on while students are using it, preventing the "install at night" strategy, and if your normal workflow includes restarts Windows will take that as a cue to finally install the update.
Of course all of this is avoidable by configuration, or by the user (restarting explicitly without updates). But the Home version hasn't always given you as much agency in this as the more expensive Windows versions.
Re: Running late for college, and the scooter is stuck in an update
#8Uber drivers would love this feature.
Re: Running late for college, and the scooter is stuck in an update
#9Software trying to update when it is started is such a common pattern, despite almost always going against user intent. When I start software, that's because I want to use it. It's pretty high on the list of times I don't want it to become temporarily unusable while it updates itself. Doing the same with vehicle firmware is a sad but predictable state of things.
I can think of several devices I own that never do this.
1) My LG webOS TV. Somehow it always does its thing in the dark. OS and application updates have never been visible to me.
2) My car. Even though it can update over wifi, and by other means, it never tries to do it unbidden. You have to invoke its maintenance mode, at the time of your own choosing, if ever.
3) Google/Nest Wifi, OnHub, et cetera. Always up-to-date, never noticed it updating at any time in 8+ years.
However, I can also think of devices where the updates are prominent. macOS, iOS, iPadOS, and Android are all in your face about OS updates, and Android will even throw up a notification that some app updates are available, as if I want to think about that. ChromeOS is a little better in that it silently downloads and installs updates, and they are applied almost instantly, but it does prompt you to apply them.
Re: Running late for college, and the scooter is stuck in an update
#10Honestly I've never understood any sort of software update or new user guide or changelog appearing when the user starts the software.
You know why I've just launched this game in Steam? Why I've just opened this shared meeting whiteboard software? Why I've opened my bank's banking app? Because this is the moment I want to use it.
If I open Skype it's because I need to be on a video call within the next 15 seconds. It doesn't matter what the popup says or does or how valuable it might be - I'm dismissing it, because I need to be on a video call within the next 15 seconds and it's between me and that.
How could a UX team possibly conclude that the precise moment a user shows unambiguous intent to use your product, is the best time to get in their way?