17 ms·

I heard some people having a decent time with Edge in the past with some features implementations. Not that I would use it myself, but I'm firmly convinced thes

by 0x_rs 5y ago

I heard some people having a decent time with Edge in the past with some features implementations. Not that I would use it myself, but I'm firmly convinced these childish plays only ruin whatever good work was done on it. Who on Earth would continue using a browser that has such hostile behavior and dark patterns all over the place e.g., buy-now-pay-later at browser level? It's so hard to trust Microsoft anyway, I'm glad 11 is such a tranwreck dead on arrival. Makes it easier to discourage people from using it, ever.

nojito 5y ago
How is this any different than what google does in google app?
- dgellow 5y ago
  They are both bad.
  - kgwxd 5y ago
    Phone OSes got/get away with it because they came out of the gate doing it. MS and Apple have been trying to convert their PC OSes into the same thing ever since. They're envious of Chrome OS. "Compatibility", "standards based" and "open platform" used to be badges of honor. In my opinion, MS and Google would be better off sticking to being open, because if everyone is forced to chose between walled gardens, Apple is going to beat them both every single time.
    - mook 5y ago
      I've been using Firefox as my browser on my Android phone for something like six or seven years now (I guess I'm weird). I don't recall any hard pushes to switch to Chrome. Using a non-Blink browser there is probably rare enough that making people switch isn't worth it. The websites don't seem to want to support Firefox, so Google definitely isn't blameless, but we should probably at least blame them correctly.
      - kgwxd 5y ago
        Oh snap, I misread the original comment and went off on the wrong rant, they didn't even mention phones :/ I use FF on Android too. Android is better than others. I have Chrome disabled on my phone and there are some things that just won't open without it. It won't let me shut off the "Play Protect" nag every single time I install or update something from F-Droid. I've accidentally turned it on countless times. But it is the least worst of the mainstream mobile OSes.
        Sunspark 5y ago
        Try the Samsung Internet Browser.. It will give you the benefits of Chromium but with a better user interface.
  - nojito 5y ago
    How so?
- pc86 5y ago
  Where did they imply it was different?
- paulryanrogers 5y ago
  One was already found guilty of abusing their OS near-monopoly on desktop.
- sixothree 5y ago
  Based on recent Firefox post, HN seems to agree firefox is going down the wrong path and not worth using; but that google and microsoft are evil. They do seem to agree that semicolons are good.
tapoxi 5y ago
Outside of requiring a newer PC I don't think Win11 is a trainwreck at all, I was auto-upgraded to it a few weeks ago and it's been fine. Auto HDR is neat for games and there's been a UI refresh, other than that it's basically Windows 10.
- 0x0nyandesu 5y ago
  Every windows since 7 has been a train wreck by my standards. The amount of times I've had a system update just clear my windows profile is objectively abysmal and yet every HN thread someone will go and defend them. No one cares about HDR. How about some decent data retention? I get better frame rates in Linux running wine than I do in windows 10 since the 2020 updates.
  - orev 5y ago
    Not saying that there aren’t issues, but the fact that billions of people use Windows and don’t routinely have their profiles wiped out with every update points to a specific issue with your setup; not a systemic Windows problem.
    - 0x0nyandesu 5y ago
      Oy vey. You're objectively incorrect. It's definitely a Microsoft issue. They use the old OS upgrade procedure to do quarterly updates now which means if it finds a Users directory it will rename it to Users.old and make a new one. However if it does two upgrades in a row in the background without telling you the old Users.old will be deleted from your disk. Now all it would take them is a second to check the sizes of both and not remove the one with actual data but ya know that would be a actual useful feature. And before you complain about to me about my "setup"... The scenario I described above is entirely common in IT departments the world over. Now please stop blaming victims and start blaming the people that have the power to change things.
      - AshleyGrant 5y ago
        citation needed I just upgraded to Windows 10 21H2 last week, after upgrading to 21H1 a couple weeks ago. I'm looking at my C:\ drive with hidden files viewable and there is no "Users.old" or "Windows.old" folders. This is on Windows 10 Pro using my personal Microsoft account, but the PC is managed through Intune so I can access corporate resources. What I'm saying is, to use your own words, "you're objectively incorrect."
kgwxd 5y ago
Windows releases always alternates between horrible and good enough. 11 will fester on some machines for a while like 8, Vista and ME did. Enterprise will stick to 10, and anyone who cares enough to fight dark patterns every time Windows update runs. 12 will likely be good enough for everyone to upgrade. 14 (they'll skip #13) will be garbo, 15 will be ok. Sun goes up, sun goes down.
- hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
  Yeah, I think actually 11 is just a testing ground for 12.
  - ZetaZero 5y ago
    Exactly. Like Vista was laying the table for 7.
- annoyingnoob 5y ago
  My experience with 11 is that is just like 10 but with bad UI changes. 11 is stable and runs everything I need. I think 11 is more about changing hardware requirements, requiring a TPM. The UI garbage seems more like an opportunity to try new things, they'll figure out that people don't like these new things.
  - stronglikedan 5y ago
    > people don't like these new things I personally don't like the lack of old things. Namely being able to drag to the taskbar. That's baked into a lot of my workflows, and I can't believe they removed such a useful feature.
  - manbart 5y ago
    Yes, the UI is why I’m not planning on upgrading. I prefer the square windows of 10 to the knock-off MacOS theme that is 11. If I wanted MacOS I would be running it
    - 5y ago
loudtieblahblah 5y ago
i just don't see the point, from a consumer perspective, in all the major players fighting over who's version of Chromium is the most preferred. I get why the company's care - i just don't get why anyone else does. Firefox, for all it's modern faults, is the only browser that's actually different in any substantial way.
- archontes 5y ago
  The substantial difference that I experience is that it is incapable of utilizing hardware acceleration for youtube videos using an nvidia graphics card in a linux environment, and that I don't get tab-to-complete search in the bar.
  - ubercow13 5y ago
    Seems more useful than Chromes search bar which has tab-to-go-to-google-search-and-generate-ad-revenue. At least Firefox has down-to-find-what-I-actually-want-from-my-bookmarks-and-history.
    - archontes 5y ago
      "You shouldn't want that thing that you want." No. If I type eba{Tab}query, firefox should search ebay for query. If I have to go to settings once and tick a box to enable this functionality, I will. I won't stop wanting what I want.
      - ubercow13 5y ago
        I don't understand, Firefox has this functionality. For example I have it set up so if I type 'y cats' it will search Youtube directly for cats. You can do the same with ebay. Similarly if I type 'yout<tab>cats' it will do the same search. Also, if you like it so much, you can configure Firefox to not put things like bookmarks and history before search results in tab-complete search suggestions. Firefox's address bar is strictly superior as far as I can see. The only thing it's missing vs Chrome is dark patterns.
xattt 5y ago
I’m waiting for MS to implement an feature where they mirror side-by-side in Edge whatever you are doing in another inferior browser.
belorn 5y ago
> Who on Earth would continue using a browser that has such hostile behavior and dark patterns all over the place Every kind of technology today has clear and visible dark patterns. In the past it was advertisement everywhere and now it is user-hostile design. See any discussion about smart tv, subscription services, webshops, smart devices, phones, apps or any other technology topics and the issue of dark patterns will pop up. It is a race to the bottom, and I can see the rationale by Microsoft. They are doing the same thing as google is, just a slight step further. If people switch to Apple then third-party browser must use iOS WebKit framework, and reportedly have their performance limited to make safari better in comparison. They could go linux but then people complain about a lack of polish and compatibility with programs/hardware that they use and so return back to either windows or mac. As a person who have been working with computers for my whole life and used to be quite excited by new technology, it is quite often that I get tempted to become a farmer and leave behind the dark world of technology.
- theturtletalks 5y ago
  Once one company implements a dark pattern, it doesn't take long for other companies to follow suit and claim it's in the spirit of competition. Instagram's log-in to view anything (even public pages) is everywhere now. If you go to Twitter and click a person's name or click a tweet, you get a log-in pop-up.
- fartcannon 5y ago
  There is no darkness in the world of FOSS, it's an actual, currently functioning, computing utopian dream. Let Caeser have his awful stuff. We can all push for fun, and free computing.
  - npteljes 5y ago
    I agree, I honestly feel like the FOSS world is tech's last bastion when it comes to this stuff. There's a lot of bullshit too but it's nowhere near the mass surveilled dark-pattern galore the current tech era is.
    - 5y ago
pjmlp 5y ago
Agreed, I don't plan to ever install it.
kingcharles 5y ago
Edge isn't a bad browser now, but that's a testament to the underlying Chromium. It still crashes way too much for me to use as my primary browser, and I only keep it because it is a better PDF reader than Chrome and I've not had time to find a replacement.
redconfetti 5y ago
I've stopped using VSCode and have started using VSCodium instead. Also, I dropped Chrome and Firefox in favor of Brave. Microsoft and Google both are evil.
- rnd0 5y ago
  You might want to look deeper into Brave, I'm not convinced they're not evil in their own way. Personally, I'm looking into Vivaldi; though I haven't switched over yet.
JamesBarney 5y ago
> Who on Earth would continue using a browser that has such hostile behavior and dark patterns all over the place e.g., buy-now-pay-later at browser level? Almost every single person that I can think of in my life does not give a shit about an edge reminder. The one that does doesn't use Windows anyway. Hackernew is a unique audience.
- sixothree 5y ago
  Agreed. Have you tried using google products without a google browser? It's _worse_. Much much more annoying.
brutal_chaos_ 5y ago
Edge almost got me to switch to using Windows with WSL. No joke. Windows was looking good with the new WSL2 on the way and a browser that wasn't sucking. Edge was enticing as Firefox has been going downhill for years (still is, and I still can't find a replacement. Vivaldi was close, but is closed source and has some serious UI lag issues on Android). I, an avid opensource user and believer, was considering a switch back (I like gaming too, so that would have been a nice boost to ease of game play). I let time slip before I made the change and well, I'm glad I did. I would have run Windows for about 6 months just to move back after some "updates."

by 0x_rs 5y ago

nojito 5y ago

How is this any different than what google does in google app?

dgellow 5y ago
They are both bad.
- kgwxd 5y ago
  Phone OSes got/get away with it because they came out of the gate doing it. MS and Apple have been trying to convert their PC OSes into the same thing ever since. They're envious of Chrome OS. "Compatibility", "standards based" and "open platform" used to be badges of honor. In my opinion, MS and Google would be better off sticking to being open, because if everyone is forced to chose between walled gardens, Apple is going to beat them both every single time.
  - mook 5y ago
    I've been using Firefox as my browser on my Android phone for something like six or seven years now (I guess I'm weird). I don't recall any hard pushes to switch to Chrome. Using a non-Blink browser there is probably rare enough that making people switch isn't worth it. The websites don't seem to want to support Firefox, so Google definitely isn't blameless, but we should probably at least blame them correctly.
    - kgwxd 5y ago
      Oh snap, I misread the original comment and went off on the wrong rant, they didn't even mention phones :/ I use FF on Android too. Android is better than others. I have Chrome disabled on my phone and there are some things that just won't open without it. It won't let me shut off the "Play Protect" nag every single time I install or update something from F-Droid. I've accidentally turned it on countless times. But it is the least worst of the mainstream mobile OSes.
      - Sunspark 5y ago
        Try the Samsung Internet Browser.. It will give you the benefits of Chromium but with a better user interface.
- nojito 5y ago
  How so?
pc86 5y ago
Where did they imply it was different?
paulryanrogers 5y ago
One was already found guilty of abusing their OS near-monopoly on desktop.
sixothree 5y ago
Based on recent Firefox post, HN seems to agree firefox is going down the wrong path and not worth using; but that google and microsoft are evil. They do seem to agree that semicolons are good.

tapoxi 5y ago

Outside of requiring a newer PC I don't think Win11 is a trainwreck at all, I was auto-upgraded to it a few weeks ago and it's been fine. Auto HDR is neat for games and there's been a UI refresh, other than that it's basically Windows 10.

0x0nyandesu 5y ago
Every windows since 7 has been a train wreck by my standards. The amount of times I've had a system update just clear my windows profile is objectively abysmal and yet every HN thread someone will go and defend them. No one cares about HDR. How about some decent data retention? I get better frame rates in Linux running wine than I do in windows 10 since the 2020 updates.
- orev 5y ago
  Not saying that there aren’t issues, but the fact that billions of people use Windows and don’t routinely have their profiles wiped out with every update points to a specific issue with your setup; not a systemic Windows problem.
  - 0x0nyandesu 5y ago
    Oy vey. You're objectively incorrect. It's definitely a Microsoft issue. They use the old OS upgrade procedure to do quarterly updates now which means if it finds a Users directory it will rename it to Users.old and make a new one. However if it does two upgrades in a row in the background without telling you the old Users.old will be deleted from your disk. Now all it would take them is a second to check the sizes of both and not remove the one with actual data but ya know that would be a actual useful feature. And before you complain about to me about my "setup"... The scenario I described above is entirely common in IT departments the world over. Now please stop blaming victims and start blaming the people that have the power to change things.
    - AshleyGrant 5y ago
      citation needed I just upgraded to Windows 10 21H2 last week, after upgrading to 21H1 a couple weeks ago. I'm looking at my C:\ drive with hidden files viewable and there is no "Users.old" or "Windows.old" folders. This is on Windows 10 Pro using my personal Microsoft account, but the PC is managed through Intune so I can access corporate resources. What I'm saying is, to use your own words, "you're objectively incorrect."

kgwxd 5y ago

Windows releases always alternates between horrible and good enough. 11 will fester on some machines for a while like 8, Vista and ME did. Enterprise will stick to 10, and anyone who cares enough to fight dark patterns every time Windows update runs. 12 will likely be good enough for everyone to upgrade. 14 (they'll skip #13) will be garbo, 15 will be ok. Sun goes up, sun goes down.

hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
Yeah, I think actually 11 is just a testing ground for 12.
- ZetaZero 5y ago
  Exactly. Like Vista was laying the table for 7.
annoyingnoob 5y ago
My experience with 11 is that is just like 10 but with bad UI changes. 11 is stable and runs everything I need. I think 11 is more about changing hardware requirements, requiring a TPM. The UI garbage seems more like an opportunity to try new things, they'll figure out that people don't like these new things.
- stronglikedan 5y ago
  > people don't like these new things I personally don't like the lack of old things. Namely being able to drag to the taskbar. That's baked into a lot of my workflows, and I can't believe they removed such a useful feature.
- manbart 5y ago
  Yes, the UI is why I’m not planning on upgrading. I prefer the square windows of 10 to the knock-off MacOS theme that is 11. If I wanted MacOS I would be running it
  - 5y ago

loudtieblahblah 5y ago

i just don't see the point, from a consumer perspective, in all the major players fighting over who's version of Chromium is the most preferred. I get why the company's care - i just don't get why anyone else does. Firefox, for all it's modern faults, is the only browser that's actually different in any substantial way.

archontes 5y ago
The substantial difference that I experience is that it is incapable of utilizing hardware acceleration for youtube videos using an nvidia graphics card in a linux environment, and that I don't get tab-to-complete search in the bar.
- ubercow13 5y ago
  Seems more useful than Chromes search bar which has tab-to-go-to-google-search-and-generate-ad-revenue. At least Firefox has down-to-find-what-I-actually-want-from-my-bookmarks-and-history.
  - archontes 5y ago
    "You shouldn't want that thing that you want." No. If I type eba{Tab}query, firefox should search ebay for query. If I have to go to settings once and tick a box to enable this functionality, I will. I won't stop wanting what I want.
    - ubercow13 5y ago
      I don't understand, Firefox has this functionality. For example I have it set up so if I type 'y cats' it will search Youtube directly for cats. You can do the same with ebay. Similarly if I type 'yout<tab>cats' it will do the same search. Also, if you like it so much, you can configure Firefox to not put things like bookmarks and history before search results in tab-complete search suggestions. Firefox's address bar is strictly superior as far as I can see. The only thing it's missing vs Chrome is dark patterns.

xattt 5y ago

I’m waiting for MS to implement an feature where they mirror side-by-side in Edge whatever you are doing in another inferior browser.

belorn 5y ago

> Who on Earth would continue using a browser that has such hostile behavior and dark patterns all over the place Every kind of technology today has clear and visible dark patterns. In the past it was advertisement everywhere and now it is user-hostile design. See any discussion about smart tv, subscription services, webshops, smart devices, phones, apps or any other technology topics and the issue of dark patterns will pop up. It is a race to the bottom, and I can see the rationale by Microsoft. They are doing the same thing as google is, just a slight step further. If people switch to Apple then third-party browser must use iOS WebKit framework, and reportedly have their performance limited to make safari better in comparison. They could go linux but then people complain about a lack of polish and compatibility with programs/hardware that they use and so return back to either windows or mac. As a person who have been working with computers for my whole life and used to be quite excited by new technology, it is quite often that I get tempted to become a farmer and leave behind the dark world of technology.

theturtletalks 5y ago
Once one company implements a dark pattern, it doesn't take long for other companies to follow suit and claim it's in the spirit of competition. Instagram's log-in to view anything (even public pages) is everywhere now. If you go to Twitter and click a person's name or click a tweet, you get a log-in pop-up.
fartcannon 5y ago
There is no darkness in the world of FOSS, it's an actual, currently functioning, computing utopian dream. Let Caeser have his awful stuff. We can all push for fun, and free computing.
- npteljes 5y ago
  I agree, I honestly feel like the FOSS world is tech's last bastion when it comes to this stuff. There's a lot of bullshit too but it's nowhere near the mass surveilled dark-pattern galore the current tech era is.
  - 5y ago

pjmlp 5y ago

Agreed, I don't plan to ever install it.

kingcharles 5y ago

Edge isn't a bad browser now, but that's a testament to the underlying Chromium. It still crashes way too much for me to use as my primary browser, and I only keep it because it is a better PDF reader than Chrome and I've not had time to find a replacement.

redconfetti 5y ago

I've stopped using VSCode and have started using VSCodium instead. Also, I dropped Chrome and Firefox in favor of Brave. Microsoft and Google both are evil.

rnd0 5y ago
You might want to look deeper into Brave, I'm not convinced they're not evil in their own way. Personally, I'm looking into Vivaldi; though I haven't switched over yet.

JamesBarney 5y ago

> Who on Earth would continue using a browser that has such hostile behavior and dark patterns all over the place e.g., buy-now-pay-later at browser level? Almost every single person that I can think of in my life does not give a shit about an edge reminder. The one that does doesn't use Windows anyway. Hackernew is a unique audience.

sixothree 5y ago
Agreed. Have you tried using google products without a google browser? It's _worse_. Much much more annoying.

brutal_chaos_ 5y ago

Edge almost got me to switch to using Windows with WSL. No joke. Windows was looking good with the new WSL2 on the way and a browser that wasn't sucking. Edge was enticing as Firefox has been going downhill for years (still is, and I still can't find a replacement. Vivaldi was close, but is closed source and has some serious UI lag issues on Android). I, an avid opensource user and believer, was considering a switch back (I like gaming too, so that would have been a nice boost to ease of game play). I let time slip before I made the change and well, I'm glad I did. I would have run Windows for about 6 months just to move back after some "updates."