5 ms·

>Another big "fuck you" and taking away control over own machines. Considering how poorly the average end user maintains their machines and the sheer quantity

>Another big "fuck you" and taking away control over own machines. Considering how poorly the average end user maintains their machines and the sheer quantity of malware out there, taking away control over their own machines is the kindest thing MS can do.

tdkl 10y ago
I'm not talking about end-users, but admins.
Silhouette 10y ago
But what about people who aren't average users and do know how to look after their machines properly? Microsoft have caused a huge number of serious problems with Windows 7 updates over the past year, many of which could be avoided by not installing a bad update.
- digi_owl 10y ago
  Welcome to modern personal computing. There are only two types of people, users and developers. And developers consider all users drooling idiots that needs to be protected from themselves. Power users, admins, none of those exist in the eyes of the developers. And you see this across the board, from Microsoft to Apple, and even among the Linux user space developers.
  - Silhouette 10y ago
    That's really no excuse. We're developers, and yet we manage not to abuse our users or treat them like idiots. If our little company can do it, I'm sure others can.
- GrumpyYoungMan 10y ago
  >But what about people who aren't average users and do know how to look after their machines properly? Callous as this may sound, what about them? As technical professionals, you know as well as I do that we have to design for the worst or average case, not the best case. Put another way, wearing a seatbelt is mandated by law, no matter how good a driver one is. And don't get me wrong; I find the additional restrictions on consumer versions of Windows 10 to be tremendously irritating too. But that doesn't change anything.
  - Silhouette 10y ago
    It seems likely that most of the user base of Windows 7 Pro is in that category. It's the version you get as a power user or small business, when you need more flexibility and control than the Home version offers but you aren't big enough for Enterprise and all that comes with it. So even the average user of Windows 7 Pro probably is technically competent and probably does have good reasons for using that version. Obviously Microsoft can choose to shaft those people anyway. After all, what are they going to do, sue? However, in doing so, it's going to further alienate a substantial and influential part of its user base. There are going to be consequences for that in the long term, or possibly even the not-so-long term if they start bundling essential security updates with other potentially undesirable things very soon as part of this exercise.
ocdtrekkie 10y ago
This encourages worse behavior. If an update breaks your XP era business software, and it's cumulative, you now have only one choice: Stop using your business software or stop updating Windows. Most businesses will stop updating Windows. Rather than blocking one bad update. I actually had a vendor tell me LAST WEEK that the solution to their software not working was to uninstall one Windows Update from two months ago temporarily while the issue is resolved. That's a plausibly reasonable scenario, unless, as you can guess where this is going, you have Windows 10 deployed. Then the "solution" becomes "remove all cumulative updates for the last two months", which is a colossal joke and non-option to which my answer was "uh... no".
berberous 10y ago
You are 100% correct, but there should be an option, which the vast majority of people will never both to look for, for power users to switch back to individual updates.

tdkl 10y ago

I'm not talking about end-users, but admins.

Silhouette 10y ago

But what about people who aren't average users and do know how to look after their machines properly? Microsoft have caused a huge number of serious problems with Windows 7 updates over the past year, many of which could be avoided by not installing a bad update.

digi_owl 10y ago
Welcome to modern personal computing. There are only two types of people, users and developers. And developers consider all users drooling idiots that needs to be protected from themselves. Power users, admins, none of those exist in the eyes of the developers. And you see this across the board, from Microsoft to Apple, and even among the Linux user space developers.
- Silhouette 10y ago
  That's really no excuse. We're developers, and yet we manage not to abuse our users or treat them like idiots. If our little company can do it, I'm sure others can.
GrumpyYoungMan 10y ago
>But what about people who aren't average users and do know how to look after their machines properly? Callous as this may sound, what about them? As technical professionals, you know as well as I do that we have to design for the worst or average case, not the best case. Put another way, wearing a seatbelt is mandated by law, no matter how good a driver one is. And don't get me wrong; I find the additional restrictions on consumer versions of Windows 10 to be tremendously irritating too. But that doesn't change anything.
- Silhouette 10y ago
  It seems likely that most of the user base of Windows 7 Pro is in that category. It's the version you get as a power user or small business, when you need more flexibility and control than the Home version offers but you aren't big enough for Enterprise and all that comes with it. So even the average user of Windows 7 Pro probably is technically competent and probably does have good reasons for using that version. Obviously Microsoft can choose to shaft those people anyway. After all, what are they going to do, sue? However, in doing so, it's going to further alienate a substantial and influential part of its user base. There are going to be consequences for that in the long term, or possibly even the not-so-long term if they start bundling essential security updates with other potentially undesirable things very soon as part of this exercise.

ocdtrekkie 10y ago

This encourages worse behavior. If an update breaks your XP era business software, and it's cumulative, you now have only one choice: Stop using your business software or stop updating Windows. Most businesses will stop updating Windows. Rather than blocking one bad update. I actually had a vendor tell me LAST WEEK that the solution to their software not working was to uninstall one Windows Update from two months ago temporarily while the issue is resolved. That's a plausibly reasonable scenario, unless, as you can guess where this is going, you have Windows 10 deployed. Then the "solution" becomes "remove all cumulative updates for the last two months", which is a colossal joke and non-option to which my answer was "uh... no".

berberous 10y ago

You are 100% correct, but there should be an option, which the vast majority of people will never both to look for, for power users to switch back to individual updates.