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Microsoft has removed the “use offline account” option when installing Windows

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Re: Microsoft has removed the “use offline account” option when installing Windows

#121

Post by EugeneOZ »

GlenTheMachine wrote: post #100

...and from what I can tell, their online account security is craptastic. Here’s a true story that happened to my family. My son is the only person in the house who uses Windows. For his game machine. He set up a Microsoft online account. It got hacked - someone set up a fake family and managed to get my son’s account listed under it as a child. As a consequence, he couldn’t install any new software. I’m not sure wha…

Astonishing story, thanks for sharing. It actually says a lot about their level of customers support and care.

Re: Microsoft has removed the “use offline account” option when installing Windows

#122

Post by runn1ng »

userbinator wrote: post #103
runn1ng wrote: post #85

Buy pirated Windows LTSC on ebay (or actual, if you have 260 usd to spare), it solves most of Windows 10 problems

If you're going to pirate, might as well pirate Windows Server, which is basically the same kernel with a far less offensive (and bloated) userland configuration.

Isn’t LTSC better as a desktop? It’s just Windows 10 without the user hostile crap.

But I have never run Windows Server

Re: Microsoft has removed the “use offline account” option when installing Windows

#123

Post by craftyguy »

mastazi wrote: post #63

This is incredibly bad. In general I have a positive opinion about what MS is doing lately, but Windows is a glaring exception, it’s getting worse and worse at an alarming rate. In the last two months we had two consecutive updates that broke basic functionality for users who disabled web results in Windows Search (which is a very common setting among those who care about privacy) https://www.zdnet.com/article/window…

> which is a very common setting among those who care about privacy

Sorry, but if you use microsoft products you either do not actually care about privacy, or do not understand how microsoft is not taking your privacy seriously.

Re: Microsoft has removed the “use offline account” option when installing Windows

#124

Post by shaklee3 »

JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #44
xeeeeeeeeeeenu wrote: post #41

I don't understand why so many people on HN praise Satya Nadella. I guess good PR is worth much more than actions. Before Nadella, Windows wasn't nearly as user-hostile as it is now. There was no mandatory telemetry, there were no forced updates, end users weren't treated as betatesters and QA wasn't non-existent. And now they are taking away the ability to use Windows without Microsoft Account. Of course there are a…

Most people on HN, I would postulate, don't use Windows. We might use VS Code, we might use Azure, but we aren't using Microsoft's operating system.

I use vscode on Windows with the remote ssh plugin. It's amazing, and I'd never go back. I can kick of compilations of large projects on an 80-core server instead of my laptop. When I need to, wsl works great for small compilations.

Re: Microsoft has removed the “use offline account” option when installing Windows

#125

Post by non-entity »

nickjj wrote: post #61
JMTQp8lwXL wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people on HN, I would postulate, don't use Windows. We might use VS Code, we might use Azure, but we aren't using Microsoft's operating system.

You'd be surprised about this. A ton of developers use Windows even if they are developing software that runs on Linux servers (myself included). Especially so in the last few years with WSL being quite good and Docker being available. 2019's Stackoverflow report for OS usage put Windows at 49.3% for "Professional developers" with MacOS at 29.2% and Linux at 25.3%. I happen to have a few tech courses on programming a…

occasionally I'll reinstall Windows for something and use it as a daily driver for a while out of laziness

Re: Microsoft has removed the “use offline account” option when installing Windows

#126

Post by craftyguy »

mastazi wrote: post #89
snagglegaggle wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is bad, but I do not think you are stuck. But there are two fronts -- business offerings are going the same way. There is lots of pressure to use almost exclusively MS hosted services. And, in that market, not everything has a good replacement.

The reason why I feel like I’m stuck is based on my personal use case. Basically I need two things: A. Being able to use some proprietary software not available on Linux B. Being able to self build so I can select the HW that works for me With Linux I lose A and with Mac I would lose B. I’m thinking that a combo Mac Mini + Tower PC with Linux could work, but using two OSes at the same time, even with shared NAS, KVM…

> A. Being able to use some proprietary software not available on Linux

What software is this? Perhaps it runs under Wine?

Re: Microsoft has removed the “use offline account” option when installing Windows

#127

Post by mappu »

mastazi wrote: post #89
snagglegaggle wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is bad, but I do not think you are stuck. But there are two fronts -- business offerings are going the same way. There is lots of pressure to use almost exclusively MS hosted services. And, in that market, not everything has a good replacement.

The reason why I feel like I’m stuck is based on my personal use case. Basically I need two things: A. Being able to use some proprietary software not available on Linux B. Being able to self build so I can select the HW that works for me With Linux I lose A and with Mac I would lose B. I’m thinking that a combo Mac Mini + Tower PC with Linux could work, but using two OSes at the same time, even with shared NAS, KVM…

If your proprietary product is in any way niche (i.e. not the usual adobe/autocad example) I would suggest petitioning the company to support Linux (or web) clients. Software developers are often pro-Linux and a few customer suggestions might be enough to force the issue.

Re: Microsoft has removed the “use offline account” option when installing Windows

#128

Post by userbinator »

ekianjo wrote: post #23
npmaile wrote: post #13

I understand correcting the title to be more accurate to the situation, but I think the discussion should be focused on how Microsoft is taking power away from users, and has business incentive to do so. I don't like that the greater tech community rallies behind Microsoft for doing some basic contributions to open source and then hand waves away moves like this. Edit: the comment section has shifted and I'm less dis…

Open source contributions for Microsoft are just like charities for big corporations with despicable practices. They can use it to say "hey we are not that bad, after all we support FOSS!"

MS has been open-sourcing a lot of stuff in the past few years, which I see more as meaning that their IP has little intrinsic value anymore. MS used to sell software, so code was sacred and not meant for others to see; now it's more about services, so code doesn't really matter much anymore, and if it's code that can help people use their services, open-sourcing makes sense.

You can see this with Google, Facebook, and all the others which release huge amounts of FOSS; they are not in the business of selling software either.

Re: Microsoft has removed the “use offline account” option when installing Windows

#129

Post by ViViDboarder »

mastazi wrote: post #89
snagglegaggle wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is bad, but I do not think you are stuck. But there are two fronts -- business offerings are going the same way. There is lots of pressure to use almost exclusively MS hosted services. And, in that market, not everything has a good replacement.

The reason why I feel like I’m stuck is based on my personal use case. Basically I need two things: A. Being able to use some proprietary software not available on Linux B. Being able to self build so I can select the HW that works for me With Linux I lose A and with Mac I would lose B. I’m thinking that a combo Mac Mini + Tower PC with Linux could work, but using two OSes at the same time, even with shared NAS, KVM…

You could go the hackintosh route. Though I haven’t tried it in a decade or more, I’ve seen some people with pretty cool setups. Certainly more work to maintain than just Linux or an official Mac.

Re: Microsoft has removed the “use offline account” option when installing Windows

#130

Post by andrerm »

JoshMnem wrote: post #74
xeeeeeeeeeeenu wrote: post #41

I don't understand why so many people on HN praise Satya Nadella. I guess good PR is worth much more than actions. Before Nadella, Windows wasn't nearly as user-hostile as it is now. There was no mandatory telemetry, there were no forced updates, end users weren't treated as betatesters and QA wasn't non-existent. And now they are taking away the ability to use Windows without Microsoft Account. Of course there are a…

They watch what companies like Google get away with to see how far they can push things. > Activity history helps keep track of the things you do on your device, such as the apps and services you use, the files you open, and the websites you browse. Your activity history is stored locally on your device when using different apps and features such as Microsoft Edge, some Microsoft Store apps, and Office apps. > If you…

> In some cases, your ability to access or control your personal data will be limited, as required or permitted by applicable law. How you can access or control your personal data will also depend on which products you use.

> Not all personal data processed by Microsoft can be accessed or controlled via the tools above. If you want to access or control personal data processed by Microsoft that is not available via the tools above or directly through the Microsoft products you use, you can always contact Microsoft at the address in the How to contact us section or by using our web form.

Same source.

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