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Microsoft's full-screen reminders – upgrade to Windows 11 are back

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Re: Microsoft's full-screen reminders – upgrade to Windows 11 are back

#41

Post by type0 »

cypress66 wrote: post #12
rav3ndust wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

just out of curiosity, what's wrong with the more 'traditional' Linux desktops, such as Plasma or Cinnamon?

Most distros can't even recover from a shutdown while updating (windows handles it since Vista).

Funny you say this, my windows can't seem to recover from updating. Several times it has been stuck for more than one hour at which point I yank the power and try updating some other time. Even the most slower linux distros update in minutes and never failed me for more than a decade.

Re: Microsoft's full-screen reminders – upgrade to Windows 11 are back

#42

Post by belthesar »

hot_gril wrote: post #10
rsolva wrote: post #7

These fullscreen messages are so confusing to elderly people, most of my support calls from family and friends are related to the weird and unpredictable updates and invasive popups, or the consequences from these. I have slowly been moving them, one by one, over to Fedora. I still get support calls, but not related to the OS, more like, "how do I add an attachment to this email, I forgot."

Would've never thought of having a non-tech-understanding person use GNU/Linux before, but nowadays I think Windows has managed to close the gap on its own by becoming horrible. Though there are other options like iPad or Chromebook.

I had my grandmother running on Linux since 2008, and she loved it. She wasn't gonna get a virus, she didn't have root/sudo capability on her user, which meant she wasn't going to break anything, and she had ad blocking in her browser. She was told two things: "1. If something wants to install something or update something, say no. If it keeps asking, call me. 2. You can't break this." This removed the fear she had using a computer, and went from "too afraid to turn it on lest she hear the sighs and frustrations of her now late technophile husband" to "doing everything from social media to online shopping". The last machine she had was an Asus Chromebox I bought her when the machine she was using was just not able to keep up anymore. She used Google Apps for word processing, Gmail for email, and had a ball.

Sibling commenters have it right - if a computer is an appliance to them, then going for the simplest, least likely to accidentally mess up option is the best one.

Re: Microsoft's full-screen reminders – upgrade to Windows 11 are back

#43

Post by prng2021 »

simonblack wrote: post #39
jqpabc123 wrote: post #2

Too bad Linux still can't offer a desktop alternative that is widely acceptable. Personally, I am contemplating moving to a server version of Windows on my desktop. This AI nonsense looks like just a privacy invasion scheme.

Too bad Linux still can't offer a desktop alternative that is widely acceptable. Well, yes it can. But the choice of Desktop whether that be Linux, MacOS or Windows is just a matter of familiarisation. I have the exact opposite view to you: "Too bad Windows still can't offer a desktop alternative that is widely acceptable." but that is because I have been using a Linux Desktop for over 20 years. I've been using the L…

I haven’t used Windows in over a decade and hate it but if you think Windows is not widely accepted for desktop users on planet Earth while Linux is, you live in an alternate reality.

Re: Microsoft's full-screen reminders – upgrade to Windows 11 are back

#44

Post by petre »

wkat4242 wrote: post #20
jqpabc123 wrote: post #2

Too bad Linux still can't offer a desktop alternative that is widely acceptable. Personally, I am contemplating moving to a server version of Windows on my desktop. This AI nonsense looks like just a privacy invasion scheme.

I really like plasma. But above all I love that there is choice. I could never deal with gnome 3. If Linux were to pick that as the one standard desktop I just would leave the platform.

I moved from a Mac to Gnome 3 and think it's fine, at least compared to MacOS or Windows.

Re: Microsoft's full-screen reminders – upgrade to Windows 11 are back

#45

Post by wkat4242 »

hot_gril wrote: post #33
wkat4242 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually moved away from Mac because it's so opinionated just like gnome. But what's the problem with having choice?

It adds complexity, especially for new users and even more for corporations. There's maintenance burden as different DEs fall out of favor, things become incompatible, and you have to migrate. Even sticking to one Linux distro, the default DE can change across versions. If you want to troubleshoot online, you can't Google "how to do X in GNU/Linux," you have to specify the DE and version too. Vs with Mac or Windows i…

> how to do X in GNU/Linux

That's because GNU/Linux isn't an OS. The distributions are distinct OSes. They just have a lot in common.

> It adds complexity, especially for new users and even more for corporations. There's maintenance burden as different DEs fall out of favor, things become incompatible, and you have to migrate.

Corporations can easily mandate whatever distro and DE they please on their internal systems. Not an issue.

The maintenance burden is on the distros and they can choose which DEs they support. They don't have to offer them all. In fact some distros come with a single DE only.

I know the wishful thinking that Linux would be a single system that would make it big with consumers. But if that happens, people that love Linux now will absolutely hate it. It will be unrecognisable. All the power and control will be gone because consumers don't want that. They must want to pay someone and trust them.

Case in point: ChromeOS. It's exactly that: Linux for the masses. How many Linux fans actually use that because it's Linux?

Re: Microsoft's full-screen reminders – upgrade to Windows 11 are back

#46

Post by nolist_policy »

wkat4242 wrote: post #45
hot_gril wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It adds complexity, especially for new users and even more for corporations. There's maintenance burden as different DEs fall out of favor, things become incompatible, and you have to migrate. Even sticking to one Linux distro, the default DE can change across versions. If you want to troubleshoot online, you can't Google "how to do X in GNU/Linux," you have to specify the DE and version too. Vs with Mac or Windows i…

> how to do X in GNU/Linux That's because GNU/Linux isn't an OS. The distributions are distinct OSes. They just have a lot in common. > It adds complexity, especially for new users and even more for corporations. There's maintenance burden as different DEs fall out of favor, things become incompatible, and you have to migrate. Corporations can easily mandate whatever distro and DE they please on their internal system…

I do, IMHO as MacBooks are/used to be for developers, Chromebooks are for Linux developers.

Re: Microsoft's full-screen reminders – upgrade to Windows 11 are back

#47

Post by wkat4242 »

nolist_policy wrote: post #46
wkat4242 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how to do X in GNU/Linux That's because GNU/Linux isn't an OS. The distributions are distinct OSes. They just have a lot in common. > It adds complexity, especially for new users and even more for corporations. There's maintenance burden as different DEs fall out of favor, things become incompatible, and you have to migrate. Corporations can easily mandate whatever distro and DE they please on their internal system…

I do, IMHO as MacBooks are/used to be for developers, Chromebooks are for Linux developers.

Really? You don't mind Google's extensive datamining and lockdown of the OS?

I would never ever consider using that. I'm surprised also, in our company nobody uses chromeos. But we have thousands of linux laptops and hundreds of Macs.

Re: Microsoft's full-screen reminders – upgrade to Windows 11 are back

#48

Post by wkat4242 »

petre wrote: post #44
wkat4242 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really like plasma. But above all I love that there is choice. I could never deal with gnome 3. If Linux were to pick that as the one standard desktop I just would leave the platform.

I moved from a Mac to Gnome 3 and think it's fine, at least compared to MacOS or Windows.

I can imagine, but I moved away from macOS precisely because I found it too opinionated.

It was actually much better in the past, when it was more of a Unix with a fancy GUI bolted on. These days it's becoming more like iOS, "Trust us, we know better than you how things should work, you must use it like we intended". That's not how I am. I have very strong ideas on how my computer should work.

When I look at Gnome I see the exact same ("you're using it wrong") attitude in the developers. That will never fly for me. That's why I love KDE because they embrace choice.

The thing is that even with KDE my desktop is quite heavily modified. I use a 3x3 desktop grid with fullsize windows and I remapped the keys on the numpad to be quick desktop selectors without modifier keys and added other quick keys for tab shifting and window to desktop reassignment, so I can control most things fully with the keyboard. Also remapped other things like KDE's Activities for even more flexibility. Also I modified the look and feel very heavily.

But I didn't need a single plugin for KDE at all to make this possible! Every time I want to do something outlandish I look around and there is a setting for it. It's amazing. For Gnome (yes I did use it at one stage) I needed a bunch of plugins to do even the most simple things like make the window toolbars not so insanely big, to put virtual desktops in a grid, to add a dock etc.

These are some things I used to do in macOS but they removed for example the ability to put virtual desktops in a grid (they are now in a row only) and they added this horrible full-screen option that doesn't do what I want. It felt like every update apple was trying to saw the legs of my chair from under me. I was getting so sick of it.

But anyway I would never be on board the linux train if Gnome were the only option available. And even if it were to become one I (and I'm sure many others) would keep alternatives alive. I'm just not a team player. I don't get with the program.

Re: Microsoft's full-screen reminders – upgrade to Windows 11 are back

#49

Post by rsolva »

tapoxi wrote: post #14
rsolva wrote: post #7

These fullscreen messages are so confusing to elderly people, most of my support calls from family and friends are related to the weird and unpredictable updates and invasive popups, or the consequences from these. I have slowly been moving them, one by one, over to Fedora. I still get support calls, but not related to the OS, more like, "how do I add an attachment to this email, I forgot."

I can see it now... "How do I share my screen?" "Well grandma, the Google Chrome Flatpak you're using defaults to Xorg so it runs in XWayland, which means it can't see the desktop because the rest of your shell is native in Wayland. If you go to chrome://flags and set prefered-ozone-platform to wayland it might work, but some people in this reddit thread also mention you need to install xdg-desktop-portal-gnome so it…

Yeah, this used to be a problem, but it has been working fine since Fedora 39. I can share a single window or the whole screen with the video conferencing tools I'm using, mainly Signal, sometimes Google Meet, Teams (both in Firefox running natively on Wayland) and Zoom.

Flatpak has made it so easy to install most common apps, just press the Super key, search for the app, click on it in the list and "Install". Usually takes less than 10-30 seconds from start 'till the app is installed and running. Very grandma-proof, actually!

EDIT: But I will say that the road to where GNOME / Fedora is today has been a bumpy ride, like a car that is under maintenance while driving :) It's the FOSS / Linux way. In the end, the result is actually quite amazing and user friendly.

Re: Microsoft's full-screen reminders – upgrade to Windows 11 are back

#50

Post by rsolva »

hot_gril wrote: post #10
rsolva wrote: post #7

These fullscreen messages are so confusing to elderly people, most of my support calls from family and friends are related to the weird and unpredictable updates and invasive popups, or the consequences from these. I have slowly been moving them, one by one, over to Fedora. I still get support calls, but not related to the OS, more like, "how do I add an attachment to this email, I forgot."

Would've never thought of having a non-tech-understanding person use GNU/Linux before, but nowadays I think Windows has managed to close the gap on its own by becoming horrible. Though there are other options like iPad or Chromebook.

Linux (in my case Fedora) has been fantastic, especially for the non-techs who have not gotten used to Windows or a Mac! All they need is a browser (with adblock) and maybe a simple word processor. Fedora does not nag about updates, it just chugs along and keeps everything up-to-date in the background. Major OS-updates is a one click in the app store, which I do once a year-ish. Soooo much less hassle then MacOS and Windows!
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