7 ms·

Hasn’t the problem of Windows updates being partially installed been solved?

52 points by nikbackm 11y ago

keithpeter 11y ago
"If the role of an internal developer conference is to encourage discussions among teams, then that one certainly succeeded. Because discussions most definitely ensued." Been there, got the video, in less exalted company. Is the book simply a repackaging of the blog posts or would it provide a more coherent view of the history of the Windows project?
- ygra 11y ago
  The book just contains selected blog posts, as well as two downloadable appendices with more stories that haven't been published on the blog.
frik 11y ago
The Windows update used to be okay in Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7 and 8. But Windows 10 with its forced update that has negative wait effects after every reboot is unbearable. Also Linux don't need a reboot for 99.9% of its updates and updates only the files that have changed. Something like Threshold 2 update for Win10 and all its problems like downloading 2+GB, doing a complete OS re-installation (WTF), loosing drivers and applications and settings is laughable in 2015. Also the new OldNewThing blog software isn't that great.
- creshal 11y ago
  > The Windows update used to be okay in Windows XP Nostalgia much? How many times did e.g. .NET updates force XP computers into endless loops, or just killed the OS? Windows Update has always been a barely functional, embarrassing mess. It's just that seems to be stuck in 2001, while others finally managed to sort their crap out.
  - dingdingdang 11y ago
    > It's just that seems to be stuck in 2001, while others finally managed to sort their crap out. Those others do not include Apple as anyone who's been indefinitely waiting for "installing" OSX updates can confirm - and the OSX fixes needed have the same weird incantation like qualities as the fixes for Windows updates (i.e. remove update, then restart, then run again, then panic, redo-sequence). No particular hate meant for Apple or MS.. but seriously, learn how to write a basic update mechanism that do not include random-fail-over.
    - givinguflac 11y ago
      I've managed a ton of Macs and can't say I've ever come across the need to remove an update, or really any issue with updates failing, but maybe I'm lucky?
    - revscat 11y ago
      I manage Macs for myself and my family, as well having used many through my employer over the years. I have never seen what you describe.
    - headShrinker 11y ago
      I manage Windows and Mac networks. Mac updates may take up to 5 minutes to discover necessary updates, resulting in 5 - 10 package downloads, even on machines that haven't been regularly updated. Windows, depending on the version can take upwards of 20 - 30 minutes, with up to 50-60 package downloads, and on machines that haven't been updated recently, 1 - 2 hours, and hundreds of package retrievals. > OS X fixes needed have the same weird incantation like qualities as the fixes for Windows updates I find your statement inaccurate. Even if the update operations are fairly similar in Windows and OS X, the latter's update system seems fairly efficient. OS X doesn't have the libraries and dependences hell that windows does. The update model fits well in to the OS X environment, not well at all in Windows. Also, Mac updates that update system files are 'rare' and usually only require one reboot. Windows often requires 2 or 3 reboots. Again, I believe this is because of the dependancies and libraries Windows is forced to maintain and keep up to date. Mac's don't hang on update or install, frankly, Ever, unless there is something very wrong.
- JoBrad 11y ago
  There has definitely been a trade off. I recently had to install Win 8 on a Surface, and had all but forgotten the days of a fresh install needing 100+ updates, which require multiple download/install/reboot/repeat cycles. Win 10 has less flexibility for deciding how the update happens, but I also almost never reboot anymore. I can probably count the number of times I've had to reboot for Win 10 on one hand, whereas it was a given for nearly every update pre-Win 10. Having said that, your point about needing a reboot at all is well taken.
- justinsaccount 11y ago
  > updates only the files that have changed No linux system that I ever used worked that way. The only system I've seen that did that was solaris, and that patching software was a disaster. Systems like dpkg and rpm replace the entire contents of a package when there is an update. The benefit of this is that if things are very out of date or a package is corrupted, the only thing you need to do to get things up to date is (re)install the latest package. Packages on linux are fairly granular, so in practice doing full individual package updates is not a huge problem. I have 2300 packages or so installed on my laptop and all but 100 or so are under 10M. Google did a lot of work optimizing chrome package updates, but I'm not sure if most distributions are prioritizing this sort of thing anymore.
  - blinkingled 11y ago
    Correct of course, however at least Fedora does delta RPM updates now a days so full rpm downloads for updates are rare. Most drpms turn out to be few hundreds of KB.
    - justinsaccount 11y ago
      That's interesting.. I looked up how it is implemented. They seem to pull down the updated bits, merge them with what is currently on the system to reconstruct the new package, and then install that. That would save bandwidth, but not make the actual operation of installing the new package any faster.
- yuhong 11y ago
  Yes, that is basically an in place upgrade, but Pro users can defer it (this is called CBB). And when a new build is not being installed, the amount of time spent on each reboot should be much less due to less processing being required after each cumulative update.
frou_dh 11y ago
Recently I was surprised by how long Windows Update took to simply decide which updates were available. When rejuvenating a relative's Vista machine that hadn't been online for about 6 years, it took WU more than 2 days of fully pegging the CPU to finally deliver the news that ~200 updates were available. What was it doing all that time? Some kind of solver?
- pavs 11y ago
  Even though I dnot use windows anymore, I have done this many many times with Windows Vista and Windows 7. It never took more than few hours. Even though few hours pretty freaking long. Taking couple of days doesn't sound like normal.
- Pxtl 11y ago
  There was a brutal bug in Vista on some machines where it would peg the CPU for hours during update check on start-up. Users learned to never fully reset unless it was critical. I saw it personally in multiple machines, and I'm a dev not an admin - I only use a handful of computers.
- DavideNL 11y ago
  This is the thing that amazed me most when switching from Windows to Mac, no more endless updating and rebooting. Updates seem less frequent and also less time consuming. I noticed the same thing you describe on Windows 7 by the way.
- ivank 11y ago
  https://superuser.com/questions/890038/why-is-checking-windows-update-so-slow https://superuser.com/questions/890038/why-is-checking-windo...
  - adrtessier 11y ago
    So others don't have to click through to this: "Windows 7 uses Component-Based Servicing [1], which means Windows Update has to work ridiculously hard to determine file and component dependencies/inter-dependencies, maintain side-by-side versions of older files/components, while still making it possible to uninstall individual updates/components but without breaking any other updates/components, all the while taking into account supercedence and god knows what else. The code that does all this must be hellishly complex." [1] https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc756291(v=ws.10).aspx https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc756291(v=ws.10...
cm3 11y ago
Having talked to many Windows users, I'm convinced that they never experienced the package and release management process of Linux distros before. If they did, they would constantly complain about Windows. With many Linux distros you can even update packages as part of the installation process, giving you a fully up to date distro. There's no reason for Microsoft to do anything less since they require serial keys, activation and network connections anyway. Compare the time it takes to remove or install a component (application or library) and you will be very disappointed in Windows. No matter how fast your disk or cpu is, Windows finds a way to make you wait half a weekend. This is unacceptable, but nobody complains loud enough for Microsoft to reconsider. Windows software management is a total mess and it got worse with newer Windows versions. But other parts of Windows get better with each release and it's mostly the kernel land. This seems to be a case of different teams having different culture (Windows kernel, Windows shell, Windows installer, ...). Take Windows 2003's desktop, put it on Window's 10's kernel, and you have a nice system.
- J_Darnley 11y ago
  Package management on Linux can be summed up as: use this old, custom patched version we provide or build from source. The alternative is just Windows style software distribution: find a random exe on the internet and run it.
  - heinrich5991 11y ago
    Some distros provide unpatched software that is up-to-date. :)
    - J_Darnley 11y ago
      Perhaps I should have used those years ago instead of becoming jaded and cynical.
      - washadjeffmad 11y ago
        The trade off to having stable, secure packages has always been not getting new features. For example, in LTS releases, major versions are frozen but perpetually updated and patched for the lifetime of the distro. In more bleeding edge rolling release distros, you receive (or compile) sometimes major version updates of software within a short time after their public release. In those distros you can still freeze your packages at certain versions, but it's not quite the same as making sure every library and component in the system is getting the same treatment. Try manjaro (https://manjaro.github.io/ https://manjaro.github.io/). It uses pacman (like Arch) and yaourt (for AUR, building from source). Their driver and kernel management makes switching between free/non-free drivers or different kernels easy. And they're pretty close to bleeding edge; I've been running kernel 4.2 with Xorg 1.17 (released 2015/02) for months, and up to kernel 4.4rc4 and Xorg 1.18 are available in the repos.
NickHaflinger 11y ago
I don't have such a problem, I have been Microsoft free for years ..
sixothree 11y ago
Recently after Windows 10 performed an update it notified me that it had uninstalled a VPN client because of incompatibility. Personally I would have preferred it not perform the Windows Update and allow me to connect to my client's network considering that's one of the requirements of getting paid by the client. This is exactly why I keep a Windows 7 VM ready.
- yuhong 11y ago
  Was this after the 1511 upgrade? I think you can go back to a previous build pretty easily in Win10.
ikeboy 11y ago
My system somehow lost all the original installation files for my programs. Now whenever I try to update a program, it fails on the "removing previous version" step. Insane.

52 points by nikbackm 11y ago

"If the role of an internal developer conference is to encourage discussions among teams, then that one certainly succeeded. Because discussions most definitely ensued." Been there, got the video, in less exalted company. Is the book simply a repackaging of the blog posts or would it provide a more coherent view of the history of the Windows project?

ygra 11y ago
The book just contains selected blog posts, as well as two downloadable appendices with more stories that haven't been published on the blog.

frik 11y ago

The Windows update used to be okay in Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7 and 8. But Windows 10 with its forced update that has negative wait effects after every reboot is unbearable. Also Linux don't need a reboot for 99.9% of its updates and updates only the files that have changed. Something like Threshold 2 update for Win10 and all its problems like downloading 2+GB, doing a complete OS re-installation (WTF), loosing drivers and applications and settings is laughable in 2015. Also the new OldNewThing blog software isn't that great.

creshal 11y ago
> The Windows update used to be okay in Windows XP Nostalgia much? How many times did e.g. .NET updates force XP computers into endless loops, or just killed the OS? Windows Update has always been a barely functional, embarrassing mess. It's just that seems to be stuck in 2001, while others finally managed to sort their crap out.
- dingdingdang 11y ago
  > It's just that seems to be stuck in 2001, while others finally managed to sort their crap out. Those others do not include Apple as anyone who's been indefinitely waiting for "installing" OSX updates can confirm - and the OSX fixes needed have the same weird incantation like qualities as the fixes for Windows updates (i.e. remove update, then restart, then run again, then panic, redo-sequence). No particular hate meant for Apple or MS.. but seriously, learn how to write a basic update mechanism that do not include random-fail-over.
  - givinguflac 11y ago
    I've managed a ton of Macs and can't say I've ever come across the need to remove an update, or really any issue with updates failing, but maybe I'm lucky?
  - revscat 11y ago
    I manage Macs for myself and my family, as well having used many through my employer over the years. I have never seen what you describe.
  - headShrinker 11y ago
    I manage Windows and Mac networks. Mac updates may take up to 5 minutes to discover necessary updates, resulting in 5 - 10 package downloads, even on machines that haven't been regularly updated. Windows, depending on the version can take upwards of 20 - 30 minutes, with up to 50-60 package downloads, and on machines that haven't been updated recently, 1 - 2 hours, and hundreds of package retrievals. > OS X fixes needed have the same weird incantation like qualities as the fixes for Windows updates I find your statement inaccurate. Even if the update operations are fairly similar in Windows and OS X, the latter's update system seems fairly efficient. OS X doesn't have the libraries and dependences hell that windows does. The update model fits well in to the OS X environment, not well at all in Windows. Also, Mac updates that update system files are 'rare' and usually only require one reboot. Windows often requires 2 or 3 reboots. Again, I believe this is because of the dependancies and libraries Windows is forced to maintain and keep up to date. Mac's don't hang on update or install, frankly, Ever, unless there is something very wrong.
JoBrad 11y ago
There has definitely been a trade off. I recently had to install Win 8 on a Surface, and had all but forgotten the days of a fresh install needing 100+ updates, which require multiple download/install/reboot/repeat cycles. Win 10 has less flexibility for deciding how the update happens, but I also almost never reboot anymore. I can probably count the number of times I've had to reboot for Win 10 on one hand, whereas it was a given for nearly every update pre-Win 10. Having said that, your point about needing a reboot at all is well taken.
justinsaccount 11y ago
> updates only the files that have changed No linux system that I ever used worked that way. The only system I've seen that did that was solaris, and that patching software was a disaster. Systems like dpkg and rpm replace the entire contents of a package when there is an update. The benefit of this is that if things are very out of date or a package is corrupted, the only thing you need to do to get things up to date is (re)install the latest package. Packages on linux are fairly granular, so in practice doing full individual package updates is not a huge problem. I have 2300 packages or so installed on my laptop and all but 100 or so are under 10M. Google did a lot of work optimizing chrome package updates, but I'm not sure if most distributions are prioritizing this sort of thing anymore.
- blinkingled 11y ago
  Correct of course, however at least Fedora does delta RPM updates now a days so full rpm downloads for updates are rare. Most drpms turn out to be few hundreds of KB.
  - justinsaccount 11y ago
    That's interesting.. I looked up how it is implemented. They seem to pull down the updated bits, merge them with what is currently on the system to reconstruct the new package, and then install that. That would save bandwidth, but not make the actual operation of installing the new package any faster.
yuhong 11y ago
Yes, that is basically an in place upgrade, but Pro users can defer it (this is called CBB). And when a new build is not being installed, the amount of time spent on each reboot should be much less due to less processing being required after each cumulative update.

frou_dh 11y ago

Recently I was surprised by how long Windows Update took to simply decide which updates were available. When rejuvenating a relative's Vista machine that hadn't been online for about 6 years, it took WU more than 2 days of fully pegging the CPU to finally deliver the news that ~200 updates were available. What was it doing all that time? Some kind of solver?

pavs 11y ago
Even though I dnot use windows anymore, I have done this many many times with Windows Vista and Windows 7. It never took more than few hours. Even though few hours pretty freaking long. Taking couple of days doesn't sound like normal.
Pxtl 11y ago
There was a brutal bug in Vista on some machines where it would peg the CPU for hours during update check on start-up. Users learned to never fully reset unless it was critical. I saw it personally in multiple machines, and I'm a dev not an admin - I only use a handful of computers.
DavideNL 11y ago
This is the thing that amazed me most when switching from Windows to Mac, no more endless updating and rebooting. Updates seem less frequent and also less time consuming. I noticed the same thing you describe on Windows 7 by the way.
ivank 11y ago
https://superuser.com/questions/890038/why-is-checking-windows-update-so-slow https://superuser.com/questions/890038/why-is-checking-windo...
- adrtessier 11y ago
  So others don't have to click through to this: "Windows 7 uses Component-Based Servicing [1], which means Windows Update has to work ridiculously hard to determine file and component dependencies/inter-dependencies, maintain side-by-side versions of older files/components, while still making it possible to uninstall individual updates/components but without breaking any other updates/components, all the while taking into account supercedence and god knows what else. The code that does all this must be hellishly complex." [1] https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc756291(v=ws.10).aspx https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc756291(v=ws.10...

cm3 11y ago

Having talked to many Windows users, I'm convinced that they never experienced the package and release management process of Linux distros before. If they did, they would constantly complain about Windows. With many Linux distros you can even update packages as part of the installation process, giving you a fully up to date distro. There's no reason for Microsoft to do anything less since they require serial keys, activation and network connections anyway. Compare the time it takes to remove or install a component (application or library) and you will be very disappointed in Windows. No matter how fast your disk or cpu is, Windows finds a way to make you wait half a weekend. This is unacceptable, but nobody complains loud enough for Microsoft to reconsider. Windows software management is a total mess and it got worse with newer Windows versions. But other parts of Windows get better with each release and it's mostly the kernel land. This seems to be a case of different teams having different culture (Windows kernel, Windows shell, Windows installer, ...). Take Windows 2003's desktop, put it on Window's 10's kernel, and you have a nice system.

J_Darnley 11y ago
Package management on Linux can be summed up as: use this old, custom patched version we provide or build from source. The alternative is just Windows style software distribution: find a random exe on the internet and run it.
- heinrich5991 11y ago
  Some distros provide unpatched software that is up-to-date. :)
  - J_Darnley 11y ago
    Perhaps I should have used those years ago instead of becoming jaded and cynical.
    - washadjeffmad 11y ago
      The trade off to having stable, secure packages has always been not getting new features. For example, in LTS releases, major versions are frozen but perpetually updated and patched for the lifetime of the distro. In more bleeding edge rolling release distros, you receive (or compile) sometimes major version updates of software within a short time after their public release. In those distros you can still freeze your packages at certain versions, but it's not quite the same as making sure every library and component in the system is getting the same treatment. Try manjaro (https://manjaro.github.io/ https://manjaro.github.io/). It uses pacman (like Arch) and yaourt (for AUR, building from source). Their driver and kernel management makes switching between free/non-free drivers or different kernels easy. And they're pretty close to bleeding edge; I've been running kernel 4.2 with Xorg 1.17 (released 2015/02) for months, and up to kernel 4.4rc4 and Xorg 1.18 are available in the repos.

NickHaflinger 11y ago

I don't have such a problem, I have been Microsoft free for years ..

sixothree 11y ago

Recently after Windows 10 performed an update it notified me that it had uninstalled a VPN client because of incompatibility. Personally I would have preferred it not perform the Windows Update and allow me to connect to my client's network considering that's one of the requirements of getting paid by the client. This is exactly why I keep a Windows 7 VM ready.

yuhong 11y ago
Was this after the 1511 upgrade? I think you can go back to a previous build pretty easily in Win10.

ikeboy 11y ago

My system somehow lost all the original installation files for my programs. Now whenever I try to update a program, it fails on the "removing previous version" step. Insane.