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Windows quality update: Progress we've made since March

blogs.windows.com

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Re: Windows quality update: Progress we've made since March

#241

Post by bavell »

GeneralMaximus wrote: post #206
irishcoffee wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The day I can’t make a local-only account on windows (for personal use, work is a different matter unfortunately) is the day I stop using windows. It’s irritating enough that new linux installs want me to add accounts. I can skip it, which is nice, but just don’t show the screen. If you’re installing linux you either know what you’re doing or you don’t: if you do you know it’s possible and don’t need it jammed in you…

I don't even want a local account, I just want to be able to set a custom username for my account instead of some autogenerated jumble of letters. My Microsoft Account email is "contact@ ". If I set up a new Windows 11 computer using this account, Windows picks the first 4 letters of my email address and sets that as the username. So my username becomes "conta", and the path to my user directory becomes "C:\Users\con…

> I'm not a Windows user—I only use it for gaming—so I don't really know how to get around this issue.

5ish years back I used to have a PCI passthrough via OVMF [0] setup for my GPU and my windows VM (Arch host) so I could game on windows.

Then I realized Proton/wine had gotten good enough to play all my games (I don't play AAA competitive shooters) and I dropped the VM and never looked back.

I would encourage everyone to give Steam/Proton on Linux a shot if you haven't recently and see if you're able to drop windows for good. These days, I don't even look at compatibility - 95% of games work OOTB and the other 5% work by changing the proton version (i.e. proton-ge). YMMV of course but I've been much happier without windows on my system.

[0] https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/PCI_passthrough_via_OVMF

Re: Windows quality update: Progress we've made since March

#242

Post by noosphr »

heresie-dabord wrote: post #228
sagacity wrote: post #81

I recently got locked out of my machine because logging in with the mandatory Microsoft account-backed primary user of my machine didn't work anymore. It said I was offline and I had to use the "previous password" even though I didn't have a previous password for that account. Hacking around in the recovery console to add another administrator user worked, but then I couldn't reset the original user's password becaus…

> I can use Linux but I have decades of Windows muscle memory and I do a bunch of DirectX programming. I see a likely inversion of motives here: you earn your living coding or otherwise are deeply vested in Windows, so you are committed for survival to Windows and to fixing the absurd account problem that MSFT has inflicted on you. The expression "muscle memory" here just means the cognitive load of working with a te…

My Ubuntu servers have been in an undefined state since canonical botched a regular upgrade to 26.04 LTS due to the ongoing DDOS. Their status page says everything works. A simple ping tells me nothing works.

Let's not pretend Microsoft has a monopoly on idiocy in the software world. All major Linux distros are hell bent on repeating the mistakes of Windows. Especially since the people in control of the stack (minus the kernel) are the rejects who couldn't make it in Microsoft and Apple in the 90s and 00s but really wanted to.

Meanwhile my small happy place with OpenBSD and Guix just works.

Re: Windows quality update: Progress we've made since March

#243

Post by arcatech »

ptspts wrote: post #212
gausswho wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even aside from the malevolence, Windows is rotten from the thirty-year old metaphor that it started with: windows themselves. The job of positioning and resizing applications is a confusing mix of responsibility between the user and the system. Once you've switched to tiled window managers, examples like these sound like Stockholm Syndrome.

I hate tiling window managers. After I start a program, I move and resize its window to the perfect position, and it stays there for weeks. I don't ever want it to be moved or resized automatically, which is what tiling window managers do by default.

It sounds like you’re both agreeing that windows should be controlled by either the user OR the OS, not both.

Re: Windows quality update: Progress we've made since March

#244

Post by ninjagoo »

qingcharles wrote: post #24

They talk about improving memory footprint and performance, but simply removing (or making optional) the massive amount of cruft and telemetry in a default Windows 11 install would go miles. Installing Tiny11 and then running a debloat over its corpse results in a much faster and less memory hungry default clean install.

> They talk about improving memory footprint and performance, but simply removing (or making optional) the massive amount of cruft and telemetry in a default Windows 11 install would go miles.

Executive management at MS must be seeing interesting (migration) numbers on their dashboards, so they've gotten involved in white-washing their reputation without changing business strategy, hence the executive-level manifestos and platitudes coming out as of late.

I'm sure they see the EU/Worldwide decoupling from US companies as definitely-going-to-happen and they have no control over that, so retaining US consumers becomes even more important, but the first attempt will be at improving reputation without changing business strategy (ads, data monetization, ai are the future revenue drivers). And only if that fails will the business strategy change.

Re: Windows quality update: Progress we've made since March

#245

Post by zombot »

embedding-shape wrote: post #122
theandrewbailey wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Regaining trust is extremely hard after you've crossed an edge. Microsoft needs to learn consent. Everywhere there's a Yes and "Remind me later", there has to be a No. And the No has to work and be remembered forever, not forgotten after the next update. Using Windows has to stop feeling like you're being roofied all the time.

Good luck with that. I have a Windows computer I sometimes have to run stuff on overnight, like renders or what not. I've disabled everything I can related to Windows Update, plus setting "Active hours" or what not, so the computer doesn't reboot because of updates in the middle of the night. Today I woke up, went to check the progress and wouldn't you know, Windows Update updated the computer and rebooted, and what…

Have you tried using a program that regularly simulates keypresses or mouse movements so the computer thinks the user is still active? The `SCROLL` key for instance can be pressed without causing unwanted side effects, but it stops my Windoze VM from going to sleep.

Re: Windows quality update: Progress we've made since March

#246

Post by sigseg1v »

sagacity wrote: post #81

I recently got locked out of my machine because logging in with the mandatory Microsoft account-backed primary user of my machine didn't work anymore. It said I was offline and I had to use the "previous password" even though I didn't have a previous password for that account. Hacking around in the recovery console to add another administrator user worked, but then I couldn't reset the original user's password becaus…

I used Windows since my first PC on 3.1. But recently it just became too much. Switched over to Mint for just over a year now and loving it. No issues at all for development or gaming. The machine just works. No lag at the lock screen, typing in your password and hitting enter has the desktop loaded instantly. It just works the way you expect and with the performance you expect. I used to defend Windows but I cannot say the same about it anymore.

Re: Windows quality update: Progress we've made since March

#248

Post by noosphr »

cbdevidal wrote: post #105
sagacity wrote: post #81

I recently got locked out of my machine because logging in with the mandatory Microsoft account-backed primary user of my machine didn't work anymore. It said I was offline and I had to use the "previous password" even though I didn't have a previous password for that account. Hacking around in the recovery console to add another administrator user worked, but then I couldn't reset the original user's password becaus…

Also years of Windows muscle memory here, especially the keyboard shortcuts. I’ve used Windows since 1997. I’ve decided I’m done. A new PC arrives in a month. It’ll be running Ubuntu. I’m done. Maybe there is a Linux language similar to DirectX you might transition to? Maybe test code in a VM? (Although that gets you right back into Win11.)

>It’ll be running Ubuntu. I’m done.

https://status.canonical.com/

You're in for a bad time. It's been three days and they still can't get updates to work.

Get Debian if you must. Use something sane like Guix and OpenBSD if you can.

Re: Windows quality update: Progress we've made since March

#249

Post by underlipton »

colechristensen wrote: post #106
neya wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's always the MBAs. The organizational structure incentivises them on the wrong metrics. So they adapt and optimize for that. In real life, after a while, you hit a plateau with features and market demand. What these MBA clowns love to do is take what's already perfectly fine and mess it up and create a road map for it to fix something to being it the way it was, so they can justify to their higher ups they are "ad…

They want to be Apple. Apple sells hardware, services, and takes a huge cut being a software store. Microsoft sells software. They turned office into a service but it's still software. Nobody really wants to use their store. Their hardware is a cute little side hustle. Microsoft's strategy for turning into Apple is kneecapping their own software.

>Their hardware is a cute little side hustle.

It didn't have to be. The same toxic dynamics that compromised their software poisoned their hardware, but they had too many products, or eras of a product, that Just Worked(TM) for it to have been a fluke. Someone knew what they were doing. They were screwed over by competing interests.

Zune people loved their Zunes. Windows Phone 8 people loved their Nokias. I've seen Surface Pro 2s "boot" to the same session for half a decade (that is: put it to sleep, stick it in a drawer for a year, take it out, plug it in, turn it on, all of the same files and folders and apps are open; I've NEVER seen this happen with any other device, they always lose state after enough time unplugged). And it's crazy how badly the Courier/Surface Duo was botched, given the excitement for it. Even newer Surfaces are great for the first year, before all of the compromises and poor engineering decisions make themselves known.

Imagine if it had been managed by someone who actually cared about their users, instead of people who treated them like marks and rubes.

Re: Windows quality update: Progress we've made since March

#250

Post by ninjagoo »

Executive management at MS must be seeing interesting (migration) numbers on their dashboards, so they've gotten involved in white-washing their reputation without changing business strategy, hence the executive-level manifestos and platitudes coming out as of late.

I'm sure they see the EU/Worldwide decoupling from US companies as definitely-going-to-happen and they have no control over that, so retaining US consumers becomes even more important, but the first attempt will be at improving reputation without changing business strategy (ads, data monetization, ai are the future revenue drivers). And only if that fails will the business strategy change.

Posted this originally as a reply to a comment, but I think it should be its own top-level comment.

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