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> How do you deal with Microsoft's crap on a daily basis? I don't; I develop on Linux. Ignoring this, within my very limited usage of Windows, it seems to me t

> How do you deal with Microsoft's crap on a daily basis? I don't; I develop on Linux. Ignoring this, within my very limited usage of Windows, it seems to me that MS has become increasingly more hostile over the last few years or so. To answer with something actionable: I discourage people from upgrading to Windows 11.

SantiagoElf 5y ago
Windows is pretty much alive and kicking. The best it has been since Windows XP. WSL2, running Linux on Windows, VS Code, VS 2022, it's all good. Windows 11 is VERY solid and you can play lots of games on it too :) I am dead serious. I have been using Windows since 3, using betas of Microsoft products since Longhorn - right now, Windows is reaching it's PEAK in terms of performance, ecosystem. Sure, they will need 2-3 more UI/UX iterations, but who cares - I use the terminal, File Explorer, Visual Studio 2022, Office apps and Outlook :D
- kelnos 5y ago
  I started running Windows back with version 3 as well, but gave up after 2000. I won't run an OS that I can't trust, and and OS that pulls the kind of thing that happened to OP is not one that I can trust. I don't care how "solid" or performant it is. And I don't need WSL2 when I can just run Linux directly.
- rbanffy 5y ago
  > WSL2, running Linux on Windows, VS Code, VS 2022, it's all good. As someone who also has a Linux desktop and laptops in addition to the Windows machine, WSL is terrible next to the real thing. Unless you need software that only runs on Windows, I advise against using it as a reason to stay on Windows.
  - SantiagoElf 5y ago
    I have been using Linux since Redhat 6.2 back in 1998. I have had my share of xconfig edits, bash scripts, etc explorations. I am now reaching 36, I just like 'things that work' - like Windows. Windows works with all my hardware, with all my 7 laptops, with all my 2 towers, I can install Visual Studio 2022 on it, I can install Ubuntu in WSL2 and I can play Dota2/Civ/Baldur's Gate/Warhammer 40k Insquisitor Martyr/listen to Spotify/debugging/deploying to Azure/writing an email/writing a Presentation in Power Point. And then go back to my family - because not worrying about Wayland, that new driver or that new update or "that new thing "- suprsingly leaves a lot of time that you can spend with your family :) And of course I am using the .NET stack with Angular- all smooth, all good, no hassle, just smooth sailing :)
    - square_usual 5y ago
      It's not 1998 any more. Nobody worries about their linux setup unless they want to. My pop os tower has been set up and forget for years now.
      - SantiagoElf 5y ago
        kelnos 5y ago
        > That's the issue with Linux desktop users - they are fanatics and obsessed with their 'freedom of choice'... taking 2-3 hours per week to perfect their desktop with the perfect background and then post it on some Linux community site. Oh please, that's absurd. I probably spend 2-3 hours per year cumulatively on system maintenance tasks, and the rest of the time I get my work and play done. > Spending more time on forums defending their 'right choice' that doing actual work Pretty sure that's what you're doing right now. I don't think Linux is right for everyone, but your criticisms don't make sense. You're not even criticizing the platform itself, you're making up weird things about the people who use it, which kinda says a lot about you right there. > Let's move on. Been there, done that, moved on from Windows, never looking back.
        rbanffy 5y ago
        > they are fanatics and obsessed with their 'freedom of choice', by using desktop environments that mimic the same thing they migrated from :) Have you ever met a Linux user in person? I ask you because most Linux users I know just run whatever came with their distro and, when unhappy, change distro. I'm running both Fedora and Ubuntu and I'm quite happy with both. The biggest change was to use the Gnome wallpaper because I didn't really like the Ubuntu one. My Fedora laptop is mostly vanilla. > Spending more time on forums defending their 'right choice' that doing actual work ;) We just like to correct people who write some baseless criticism and attacks on our professional attitudes, because, you know, these kind of comment is not really nice. Or professional. Or even correct. > Been there done that. Windows just works. Let's move on. Been there, done that, Linux just works better, and keeps working. Let's move on.
  - misja111 5y ago
    Of course WSL2 can never be as good as running Linux natively. But as someone who needs software that runs on Windows, I like WSL2 a lot. For me the choice was native Linux + Wine or native Windows with WSL2. I have tried both, and I have to say that the WSL2 option runs much better in terms of both performance and stability.
    - rbanffy 5y ago
      > But as someone who needs software that runs on Windows It boils down to which OS you want to be the "second-class citizen" on your machine. With Wine, it's Windows. With WSL, it's Linux.
      - cesarb 5y ago
        > It boils down to which OS you want to be the "second-class citizen" on your machine. With Wine, it's Windows. With WSL, it's Linux. That equivalence is only valid for WSL1. Since WSL2 runs the real Linux kernel on a VM, the equivalent for it on Linux would be running Windows on a VM.
        rbanffy 5y ago
        > the equivalent for it on Linux would be running Windows on a VM. Not quite. When Windows is on a VM, you mostly run only Windows-specific software on it. Within the VM, everything works mostly flawlessly. Most platform-neutral software will be running on the Linux side, which makes accessing data from the Linux environment a non-issue. And don't even get me started on Windows-1252 and CRLF line endings. WSL2 still has some issues with VPN software and my company doesn't support it on my corporate Windows laptop.
  - Octabrain 5y ago
    > ...WSL is terrible next to the real thing... I am genuinely interested on knowing your reasons for saying WSL is terrible. Just for clarification, I'm a Linux/MacOS user but the times I've had to use WSL in the past whether experimenting at home or in some companies where I was force to use Windows, I though it is actually one of the most decent things Microsoft has created on its entire existence. It is easy to enable, to operate, it integrates well with the network stack of Windows (kubectl port-forwarding or docker run -p8000:80 works out of the box) it performs very decently (with exceptions on IO filesystem operations) etc.
    - rbanffy 5y ago
      > I am genuinely interested on knowing your reasons for saying WSL is terrible. It's just that it's poorly integrated with the host environment (because there is a host environment). On Linux and Macs, the Unix side is the machine itself. With WSL1, you have a Windows kernel pretending to be a Linux one (I kind of prefer this approach) but my home folder is not my Windows home folder, but terminal still opens the Windows home anyway. On WSL2 (which I can't use on my corporate laptop because the VPN software breaks something in DNS and networking I haven't had the time to debug) the Windows side needs a network share to get access to the WSL environment (which is not present until the environment starts - and there are other side effects whether WSL starts before the VPN or after). A Linux box (or Mac) is a so much simpler (to understand what happens) Unix environment it's not even funny. Having said that, when you overcome those impedance mismatches, it mostly works for the typical use cases. Like you mentioned, Docker works (I need to set a DOCKER_HOST variable to point to the Windows box). And Windows Terminal is excellent (double height and width chars are still missing, but they have overline support).
      - Dylan16807 5y ago
        Sorry about the VPN trouble (which may or may not be WSL's fault) but having to stick "cd ~" in .bashrc and not liking network drives isn't enough to get close to "terrible".
        rbanffy 5y ago
  - dudewritingcode 5y ago
    I own a XPS 9500 I can tell you that even though I have dual boot I use windows and wsl2. Ubuntu is worse than wsl2 at running exactly same stuff, even the X apps through Vcxsrv are snappier on Windows compared to Ubuntu. To that, add lack of features in Linux apps, Discord lack of Krisp for example, poor cpu usage for videos in and outside browser, really bad BT, poor wireless performance and others. I am a power user and I don't like windows but it's just better any way you look at it, apart from customization. However, even there it starts to catch up, with apps like PowerToys.
    - rbanffy 5y ago
      Let me guess: Nvidia graphics?
  - dboreham 5y ago
    Curious: in what way is WSL terrible? I've been using it daily for several years so wondering what I'm missing.
- smackeyacky 5y ago
  The tech that pushed me off windows on my dev machines was WSL2. My productivity lifted so much I started to wonder why I was using Windows at all for .NET development. Did the switch to debian a couple of months ago. First two days was weird, after that the only thing I use Windows 11 for is gaming, and Lutris is making me think twice about that too.
- 127 5y ago
  Yes, the bait in the hook is definitely more delicious.
- CodeArtisan 5y ago
  I find Windows 11 to be the most bloated of all windows version with such stuff as Microsoft store, xbox app, cortana, or security center getting nastier on the user; You turn them off in the settings panel but they still keep running in the background. Now you have to fiddle with obscure registry variables, manually turn off services, ... to get rid of them.
- hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
  > WSL2, running Linux on Windows, VS Code, VS 2022, it's all good. Actually, I decided to downgrade to WSL from WSL2. I often need to do some quick work in a Linux environment, and sometimes this even involves some files on my Windows machine, so WSL comes in handy. The problem is, WSL2 startup time is terribly long when compared to WSL. With WSL, i type wsl and a second later I run a couple of commands. With WSL2, once it has finally started, I already forgot what I wanted to do.
  - baq 5y ago
    I've got a wsl2 shell in startup and never close it; it consumes relatively little memory (<1GB) and 0% cpu when idle.
- hutzlibu 5y ago
  "The best it has been since Windows XP ... it's all good" As far as I remember, XP had no tracking and advertisement build in by default. And it left control on when to update and when to invoke antivirus with you. Is this really all good to you? Or are you so deep invested in windows, that you can just disable them? Because I surely can disable most of that shit, too - but it takes a while and one update later it can be all back.
- pcdoodle 5y ago
  I disagree. This is the dark ages for windows, basic users and power users alike.
- throw8932894 5y ago
  Sure. Trivial stuff like disabling automated updates on Linux takes single command. On Windows you have to find tutorials on some shady sites, dig into binary registry. And a few months latter this settings gets reversed anyway, because Microsoft knows better. Last solid Windows very Win Server 2003. PS: I prefer to update once a month in controlled mode.
- cies 5y ago
  > I am dead serious. Thanks for adding this, as I thought you made a joke. Ads, spyware, NSA backdoors, who still trusts them? Also alternatives are just too readily available these days.
- matheusmoreira 5y ago
  This user hostile mess is peak Windows? At least back then Microsoft had backwards compatibility as a core value.
- cerved 5y ago
  I'd say it's pretty far from all good. WSL2 has major IO issues outside of ext4, which is detrimental. It also doesn't support mounting NFS. It doesn't have systemd so lots of stuff doesn't work in a normal way. To get a terminal that doesn't f*#& up you need to switch code page to utf-8. Visual studio is almost as garbase as SSMS. Windows is a pain
prohobo 5y ago
Yeah, the answer is to simply not use Windows. I can only see there being an advantage for some game developers to be using it these days. Linux is actually a much better OS for techies: you can make it look nicer, have a better workflow, and you can really play games now that Steam Deck brought so much focus on Linux compatibility. Otherwise, Mac OS is doing just fine as well.
- unicornfinder 5y ago
  Indeed. I'm a web developer and my tools genuinely work better just under native Linux than they ever could with WSL etc.
  - makapuf 5y ago
    Would love to, but my employer has complex network settings (using 802.11X..), specific vpn client, im software, hw auth tokens with specific drivers and Windows shares and ntlm proxies all of which that makes integrating to the internal network with Linux a part time job. I gave up and set up a vm with Linux keeping windows do its thing.
    - flatiron 5y ago
      Any reason to not use wsl? I’m forced to either use windows/Mac at work and chose windows with wsl. Works reasonably well. I just live in WSL and use office (which is better than MAC office by a large margin)
      - makapuf 5y ago
        wsl needs to be administrator if I'm not mistaken, plus needs internal network which may/may not be allowed by the antivirus/firewall package, I prefer no to spend too much neurons on windows debugging / internals and keep them for linux
- adamddev1 5y ago
  Unfortunately laptop driver support is often rough. I used an XPS 9343 (one marketed as supporting Ubuntu) but I faced issues with popping speaker sounds and mobile data tethering sucking GBs of data for some crazy reason.
anthropodie 5y ago
It seems weird that when a company grows beyond one point they start these user hostile practices. Google is another example. When they are small they are more open to innovation than manipulating user into using their product. What goes wrong?
- rob74 5y ago
  These practices are nothing new for M$, they did that in the past (15-20 years ago) with IE, then got several slaps on the wrist, which made them cut back on it for a few years, but now they seem to be thinking that if IE/Edge is no longer the dominant browser they can start using these tricks again?!
  - thejynxed 5y ago
    Probably, since just like back then with IE, Edge is now baked into the OS as well.
- Shacklz 5y ago
  My probably a bit naive take: The MBAs take over and implement KPIs that might even be well-intentioned but are ultimately easiest to satisfy by cutting corners. For example: KPI that measures market share of Edge; instead of making Edge better to increase its share, just screw your users by making Edge default on Windows on every other update. I've seen it happen at my own company, and while I always had pipedreams that this isn't happening at the big tech players because there are too many smart folks around to stop that nonsense, I can well imagine that it boils down to these kind of bullshit reasons.
  - denton-scratch 5y ago
    If their MBAs set-up KPIs that reward this kind of behaviour, they need better MBAs. Instead of "get more people to use Edge", it should be "get more people to choose Edge". Neither people nor geese respond well to having stuff rammed down their throats. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foie_gras https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foie_gras
qbasic_forever 5y ago
Advertisements in the start menu around Windows 8 was my tipping point. It's just a trashy thing to see candy crush and other crap in there that I never asked for, never could remove, etc. I went to Ubuntu and now PopOS and haven't looked back in almost 10 years. Maybe they've cleaned things up and removed the crap in later Windows but the damage is done and I'm never going back.
- gurkendoktor 5y ago
  I doubt it, given that Microsoft now actually owns the Candy Crush IP.
  - xxs 5y ago
    not yet, the deal has to pass through a lot of regulatory bodies to become a thing.
  - muzz 5y ago
    No, the only "actually" is that a deal was announced to buy the company that has that. The acquisition won't be finished for months if at all (government may block based on antitrust concerns)
    - cerved 5y ago
      by months I think you mean years
- gvExwLi6sU 5y ago
  Had to install Windows 11 yesterday and the fresh install had Facebook, TikTok, Xing, Spotify and more on the start menu as shortcuts. No clue, if they are actually fully installed but I was able deinstall and remove them through the context menu. May vary for other contries as Xing is very specific and only relevant for German speaking countries.
  - ur-whale 5y ago
Bancakes 5y ago
The only problem I have on linux is nvidia drivers for laptops. Getting Optimus to work is already a pain but simultaneously running the low DPI high refresh laptop LCD and the high DPI 60Hz 4k monitor is impossible.
esarbe 5y ago
Same here. I gave up on Windows years ago, switched to Linux and have been happy with it ever since. Sure, there are some sharp corners here and there, but at least the operating system doesn't get out of it's way to stop you from fixing things. And since you have these sharp corners with any operating system, to the end user it doesn't really matter as long as they have any kind of informal support system (you know, the person in their extended family that 'knows' computers) I offer tech support for my extended family and was able to slowly migrate most of them to Linux over the years. I'm much less inclined to angrily yell at people nowadays. I've also grown back much of my hair.
tallmed 5y ago
Gnu/Linux doesn't have this problem.
kdtsh 5y ago
I finally transitioned to Linux on my work desktop at the end of last year, after using WSL for a number of years and Linux on my home desktops for ages. I found that managing a Windows 10 VM in virt-manager for all the Windows-specific stuff is fine at the moment - nothing in particular has broken in my workflow. I find there’s slightly less mental overhead, but I haven’t yet figured out a good way to manage little configuration changes made to text files. Only gripes are that I have experienced a few GNOME bugs with no explanation, like mouse gestures randomly breaking until I reboot - still, I just take this as an opportunity to reboot my computer. I also can no longer use Remote Desktop - VNC is too much of a pain and I can’t ‘steal’ my own session, and SSH forwarding is dead slow. (If anyone has a Remote Desktop solution for Linux that just works, I’d love to hear it.) I can’t imagine ever really using Windows 11 at this point, at least not for a few years and then in passing.
- nulbyte 5y ago
  Can you elaborate on your issues with VNC? I'm not sure what you mean by not being able to 'steal a session. Are you using Wayland or X11? I understand there may be some differences, but haven't explored them. GNOME has desktop sharing built-in. I believe it is VNC based, but maybe you'll have better luck with something built into GNOME. SSH forwarding works fine for single apps, but for a true remote X desktop, I've usually configured XDMCP in the past. If you use Chrome, there is also Chrome Remote Desktop (remotedesktop.google.com). It worked fairly well when I used it last, but that was a while ago.
  - AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
    > Can you elaborate on your issues with VNC? I'm not sure what you mean by not being able to 'steal a session. With RDP on Windows, if I stay logged in with programs running and walk away from my computer and remote in to it, I will get the same session I left open. Unlike VNC, this session will resize everything to fit my client's preferences because it isn't just passing screenshots or a video feed of the desktop back.
  - kdtsh 5y ago
    By ‘steal a session’ I mean be currently logged into my computer, either with the desktop locked or unlocked, and to jump onto another computer and log into the same session - so I get all my open programs, windows, etc. if that makes sense. The understanding I got was that this simply isn’t possible with VNC, or if it is it’d a major stuff-around. This really makes or breaks Remote Desktop for me. I’m using Wayland, which is the Fedora 35 default. I considered X11 but the experience isn’t quite as smooth for the day-to-day stuff in Fedora and I just didn’t want to work around odd quirks if I could avoid it. I tried the GNOME desktop sharing, but as far as I could see you need to be already logged in to jump in. Besides that it worked OK, though I recall screen resolution being a bit strange, like having 1024x768 or similar which is really quite small for GNOME’s big windows. I never looked into whether these issues I found were configurable, but they don’t seem to be easily accessible options if they are.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
Indeed. I, on the other hand, use Windows all day every day and I'm a vocal critic of the Linux Desktop, yet Microsoft has convinced me that it hates personal computing so much that the Windows Desktop will be the worse option (for my uses) in the near future. Hell, even outside of trashing the desktop experience, we've noted that we used to get support for our SQL issues directly from Microsoft employees and were escalated to engineers in short order for data corruption issues, we now deal with a third party company for support and they're basically worthless. We pay for this treatment. It's absurd.
pc86 5y ago
Do you have any advice for someone who currently develops about 90% on Windows and ~10% (or less) on Mac, and wants to switch to Linux? Other than "just do it and get through the initial pain" which I think is a totally valid response.
docmars 5y ago
Which distro do you enjoy using the most?
ffhhj 5y ago
There is also a Linux distribution called "WindowsFX 11". Try it out, very recommended.

SantiagoElf 5y ago

Windows is pretty much alive and kicking. The best it has been since Windows XP. WSL2, running Linux on Windows, VS Code, VS 2022, it's all good. Windows 11 is VERY solid and you can play lots of games on it too :) I am dead serious. I have been using Windows since 3, using betas of Microsoft products since Longhorn - right now, Windows is reaching it's PEAK in terms of performance, ecosystem. Sure, they will need 2-3 more UI/UX iterations, but who cares - I use the terminal, File Explorer, Visual Studio 2022, Office apps and Outlook :D

kelnos 5y ago
I started running Windows back with version 3 as well, but gave up after 2000. I won't run an OS that I can't trust, and and OS that pulls the kind of thing that happened to OP is not one that I can trust. I don't care how "solid" or performant it is. And I don't need WSL2 when I can just run Linux directly.
rbanffy 5y ago
> WSL2, running Linux on Windows, VS Code, VS 2022, it's all good. As someone who also has a Linux desktop and laptops in addition to the Windows machine, WSL is terrible next to the real thing. Unless you need software that only runs on Windows, I advise against using it as a reason to stay on Windows.
- SantiagoElf 5y ago
  I have been using Linux since Redhat 6.2 back in 1998. I have had my share of xconfig edits, bash scripts, etc explorations. I am now reaching 36, I just like 'things that work' - like Windows. Windows works with all my hardware, with all my 7 laptops, with all my 2 towers, I can install Visual Studio 2022 on it, I can install Ubuntu in WSL2 and I can play Dota2/Civ/Baldur's Gate/Warhammer 40k Insquisitor Martyr/listen to Spotify/debugging/deploying to Azure/writing an email/writing a Presentation in Power Point. And then go back to my family - because not worrying about Wayland, that new driver or that new update or "that new thing "- suprsingly leaves a lot of time that you can spend with your family :) And of course I am using the .NET stack with Angular- all smooth, all good, no hassle, just smooth sailing :)
  - square_usual 5y ago
    It's not 1998 any more. Nobody worries about their linux setup unless they want to. My pop os tower has been set up and forget for years now.
    - SantiagoElf 5y ago
      - kelnos 5y ago
        > That's the issue with Linux desktop users - they are fanatics and obsessed with their 'freedom of choice'... taking 2-3 hours per week to perfect their desktop with the perfect background and then post it on some Linux community site. Oh please, that's absurd. I probably spend 2-3 hours per year cumulatively on system maintenance tasks, and the rest of the time I get my work and play done. > Spending more time on forums defending their 'right choice' that doing actual work Pretty sure that's what you're doing right now. I don't think Linux is right for everyone, but your criticisms don't make sense. You're not even criticizing the platform itself, you're making up weird things about the people who use it, which kinda says a lot about you right there. > Let's move on. Been there, done that, moved on from Windows, never looking back.
      - rbanffy 5y ago
        > they are fanatics and obsessed with their 'freedom of choice', by using desktop environments that mimic the same thing they migrated from :) Have you ever met a Linux user in person? I ask you because most Linux users I know just run whatever came with their distro and, when unhappy, change distro. I'm running both Fedora and Ubuntu and I'm quite happy with both. The biggest change was to use the Gnome wallpaper because I didn't really like the Ubuntu one. My Fedora laptop is mostly vanilla. > Spending more time on forums defending their 'right choice' that doing actual work ;) We just like to correct people who write some baseless criticism and attacks on our professional attitudes, because, you know, these kind of comment is not really nice. Or professional. Or even correct. > Been there done that. Windows just works. Let's move on. Been there, done that, Linux just works better, and keeps working. Let's move on.
- misja111 5y ago
  Of course WSL2 can never be as good as running Linux natively. But as someone who needs software that runs on Windows, I like WSL2 a lot. For me the choice was native Linux + Wine or native Windows with WSL2. I have tried both, and I have to say that the WSL2 option runs much better in terms of both performance and stability.
  - rbanffy 5y ago
    > But as someone who needs software that runs on Windows It boils down to which OS you want to be the "second-class citizen" on your machine. With Wine, it's Windows. With WSL, it's Linux.
    - cesarb 5y ago
      > It boils down to which OS you want to be the "second-class citizen" on your machine. With Wine, it's Windows. With WSL, it's Linux. That equivalence is only valid for WSL1. Since WSL2 runs the real Linux kernel on a VM, the equivalent for it on Linux would be running Windows on a VM.
      - rbanffy 5y ago
        > the equivalent for it on Linux would be running Windows on a VM. Not quite. When Windows is on a VM, you mostly run only Windows-specific software on it. Within the VM, everything works mostly flawlessly. Most platform-neutral software will be running on the Linux side, which makes accessing data from the Linux environment a non-issue. And don't even get me started on Windows-1252 and CRLF line endings. WSL2 still has some issues with VPN software and my company doesn't support it on my corporate Windows laptop.
- Octabrain 5y ago
  > ...WSL is terrible next to the real thing... I am genuinely interested on knowing your reasons for saying WSL is terrible. Just for clarification, I'm a Linux/MacOS user but the times I've had to use WSL in the past whether experimenting at home or in some companies where I was force to use Windows, I though it is actually one of the most decent things Microsoft has created on its entire existence. It is easy to enable, to operate, it integrates well with the network stack of Windows (kubectl port-forwarding or docker run -p8000:80 works out of the box) it performs very decently (with exceptions on IO filesystem operations) etc.
  - rbanffy 5y ago
    > I am genuinely interested on knowing your reasons for saying WSL is terrible. It's just that it's poorly integrated with the host environment (because there is a host environment). On Linux and Macs, the Unix side is the machine itself. With WSL1, you have a Windows kernel pretending to be a Linux one (I kind of prefer this approach) but my home folder is not my Windows home folder, but terminal still opens the Windows home anyway. On WSL2 (which I can't use on my corporate laptop because the VPN software breaks something in DNS and networking I haven't had the time to debug) the Windows side needs a network share to get access to the WSL environment (which is not present until the environment starts - and there are other side effects whether WSL starts before the VPN or after). A Linux box (or Mac) is a so much simpler (to understand what happens) Unix environment it's not even funny. Having said that, when you overcome those impedance mismatches, it mostly works for the typical use cases. Like you mentioned, Docker works (I need to set a DOCKER_HOST variable to point to the Windows box). And Windows Terminal is excellent (double height and width chars are still missing, but they have overline support).
    - Dylan16807 5y ago
      Sorry about the VPN trouble (which may or may not be WSL's fault) but having to stick "cd ~" in .bashrc and not liking network drives isn't enough to get close to "terrible".
      - rbanffy 5y ago
- dudewritingcode 5y ago
  I own a XPS 9500 I can tell you that even though I have dual boot I use windows and wsl2. Ubuntu is worse than wsl2 at running exactly same stuff, even the X apps through Vcxsrv are snappier on Windows compared to Ubuntu. To that, add lack of features in Linux apps, Discord lack of Krisp for example, poor cpu usage for videos in and outside browser, really bad BT, poor wireless performance and others. I am a power user and I don't like windows but it's just better any way you look at it, apart from customization. However, even there it starts to catch up, with apps like PowerToys.
  - rbanffy 5y ago
    Let me guess: Nvidia graphics?
- dboreham 5y ago
  Curious: in what way is WSL terrible? I've been using it daily for several years so wondering what I'm missing.
smackeyacky 5y ago
The tech that pushed me off windows on my dev machines was WSL2. My productivity lifted so much I started to wonder why I was using Windows at all for .NET development. Did the switch to debian a couple of months ago. First two days was weird, after that the only thing I use Windows 11 for is gaming, and Lutris is making me think twice about that too.
127 5y ago
Yes, the bait in the hook is definitely more delicious.
CodeArtisan 5y ago
I find Windows 11 to be the most bloated of all windows version with such stuff as Microsoft store, xbox app, cortana, or security center getting nastier on the user; You turn them off in the settings panel but they still keep running in the background. Now you have to fiddle with obscure registry variables, manually turn off services, ... to get rid of them.
hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
> WSL2, running Linux on Windows, VS Code, VS 2022, it's all good. Actually, I decided to downgrade to WSL from WSL2. I often need to do some quick work in a Linux environment, and sometimes this even involves some files on my Windows machine, so WSL comes in handy. The problem is, WSL2 startup time is terribly long when compared to WSL. With WSL, i type wsl and a second later I run a couple of commands. With WSL2, once it has finally started, I already forgot what I wanted to do.
- baq 5y ago
  I've got a wsl2 shell in startup and never close it; it consumes relatively little memory (<1GB) and 0% cpu when idle.
hutzlibu 5y ago
"The best it has been since Windows XP ... it's all good" As far as I remember, XP had no tracking and advertisement build in by default. And it left control on when to update and when to invoke antivirus with you. Is this really all good to you? Or are you so deep invested in windows, that you can just disable them? Because I surely can disable most of that shit, too - but it takes a while and one update later it can be all back.
pcdoodle 5y ago
I disagree. This is the dark ages for windows, basic users and power users alike.
throw8932894 5y ago
Sure. Trivial stuff like disabling automated updates on Linux takes single command. On Windows you have to find tutorials on some shady sites, dig into binary registry. And a few months latter this settings gets reversed anyway, because Microsoft knows better. Last solid Windows very Win Server 2003. PS: I prefer to update once a month in controlled mode.
cies 5y ago
> I am dead serious. Thanks for adding this, as I thought you made a joke. Ads, spyware, NSA backdoors, who still trusts them? Also alternatives are just too readily available these days.
matheusmoreira 5y ago
This user hostile mess is peak Windows? At least back then Microsoft had backwards compatibility as a core value.
cerved 5y ago
I'd say it's pretty far from all good. WSL2 has major IO issues outside of ext4, which is detrimental. It also doesn't support mounting NFS. It doesn't have systemd so lots of stuff doesn't work in a normal way. To get a terminal that doesn't f*#& up you need to switch code page to utf-8. Visual studio is almost as garbase as SSMS. Windows is a pain

prohobo 5y ago

Yeah, the answer is to simply not use Windows. I can only see there being an advantage for some game developers to be using it these days. Linux is actually a much better OS for techies: you can make it look nicer, have a better workflow, and you can really play games now that Steam Deck brought so much focus on Linux compatibility. Otherwise, Mac OS is doing just fine as well.

unicornfinder 5y ago
Indeed. I'm a web developer and my tools genuinely work better just under native Linux than they ever could with WSL etc.
- makapuf 5y ago
  Would love to, but my employer has complex network settings (using 802.11X..), specific vpn client, im software, hw auth tokens with specific drivers and Windows shares and ntlm proxies all of which that makes integrating to the internal network with Linux a part time job. I gave up and set up a vm with Linux keeping windows do its thing.
  - flatiron 5y ago
    Any reason to not use wsl? I’m forced to either use windows/Mac at work and chose windows with wsl. Works reasonably well. I just live in WSL and use office (which is better than MAC office by a large margin)
    - makapuf 5y ago
      wsl needs to be administrator if I'm not mistaken, plus needs internal network which may/may not be allowed by the antivirus/firewall package, I prefer no to spend too much neurons on windows debugging / internals and keep them for linux
adamddev1 5y ago
Unfortunately laptop driver support is often rough. I used an XPS 9343 (one marketed as supporting Ubuntu) but I faced issues with popping speaker sounds and mobile data tethering sucking GBs of data for some crazy reason.

anthropodie 5y ago

It seems weird that when a company grows beyond one point they start these user hostile practices. Google is another example. When they are small they are more open to innovation than manipulating user into using their product. What goes wrong?

rob74 5y ago
These practices are nothing new for M$, they did that in the past (15-20 years ago) with IE, then got several slaps on the wrist, which made them cut back on it for a few years, but now they seem to be thinking that if IE/Edge is no longer the dominant browser they can start using these tricks again?!
- thejynxed 5y ago
  Probably, since just like back then with IE, Edge is now baked into the OS as well.
Shacklz 5y ago
My probably a bit naive take: The MBAs take over and implement KPIs that might even be well-intentioned but are ultimately easiest to satisfy by cutting corners. For example: KPI that measures market share of Edge; instead of making Edge better to increase its share, just screw your users by making Edge default on Windows on every other update. I've seen it happen at my own company, and while I always had pipedreams that this isn't happening at the big tech players because there are too many smart folks around to stop that nonsense, I can well imagine that it boils down to these kind of bullshit reasons.
- denton-scratch 5y ago
  If their MBAs set-up KPIs that reward this kind of behaviour, they need better MBAs. Instead of "get more people to use Edge", it should be "get more people to choose Edge". Neither people nor geese respond well to having stuff rammed down their throats. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foie_gras https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foie_gras

qbasic_forever 5y ago

Advertisements in the start menu around Windows 8 was my tipping point. It's just a trashy thing to see candy crush and other crap in there that I never asked for, never could remove, etc. I went to Ubuntu and now PopOS and haven't looked back in almost 10 years. Maybe they've cleaned things up and removed the crap in later Windows but the damage is done and I'm never going back.

gurkendoktor 5y ago
I doubt it, given that Microsoft now actually owns the Candy Crush IP.
- xxs 5y ago
  not yet, the deal has to pass through a lot of regulatory bodies to become a thing.
- muzz 5y ago
  No, the only "actually" is that a deal was announced to buy the company that has that. The acquisition won't be finished for months if at all (government may block based on antitrust concerns)
  - cerved 5y ago
    by months I think you mean years
gvExwLi6sU 5y ago
Had to install Windows 11 yesterday and the fresh install had Facebook, TikTok, Xing, Spotify and more on the start menu as shortcuts. No clue, if they are actually fully installed but I was able deinstall and remove them through the context menu. May vary for other contries as Xing is very specific and only relevant for German speaking countries.
- ur-whale 5y ago

Bancakes 5y ago

The only problem I have on linux is nvidia drivers for laptops. Getting Optimus to work is already a pain but simultaneously running the low DPI high refresh laptop LCD and the high DPI 60Hz 4k monitor is impossible.

esarbe 5y ago

Same here. I gave up on Windows years ago, switched to Linux and have been happy with it ever since. Sure, there are some sharp corners here and there, but at least the operating system doesn't get out of it's way to stop you from fixing things. And since you have these sharp corners with any operating system, to the end user it doesn't really matter as long as they have any kind of informal support system (you know, the person in their extended family that 'knows' computers) I offer tech support for my extended family and was able to slowly migrate most of them to Linux over the years. I'm much less inclined to angrily yell at people nowadays. I've also grown back much of my hair.

tallmed 5y ago

Gnu/Linux doesn't have this problem.

kdtsh 5y ago

I finally transitioned to Linux on my work desktop at the end of last year, after using WSL for a number of years and Linux on my home desktops for ages. I found that managing a Windows 10 VM in virt-manager for all the Windows-specific stuff is fine at the moment - nothing in particular has broken in my workflow. I find there’s slightly less mental overhead, but I haven’t yet figured out a good way to manage little configuration changes made to text files. Only gripes are that I have experienced a few GNOME bugs with no explanation, like mouse gestures randomly breaking until I reboot - still, I just take this as an opportunity to reboot my computer. I also can no longer use Remote Desktop - VNC is too much of a pain and I can’t ‘steal’ my own session, and SSH forwarding is dead slow. (If anyone has a Remote Desktop solution for Linux that just works, I’d love to hear it.) I can’t imagine ever really using Windows 11 at this point, at least not for a few years and then in passing.

nulbyte 5y ago
Can you elaborate on your issues with VNC? I'm not sure what you mean by not being able to 'steal a session. Are you using Wayland or X11? I understand there may be some differences, but haven't explored them. GNOME has desktop sharing built-in. I believe it is VNC based, but maybe you'll have better luck with something built into GNOME. SSH forwarding works fine for single apps, but for a true remote X desktop, I've usually configured XDMCP in the past. If you use Chrome, there is also Chrome Remote Desktop (remotedesktop.google.com). It worked fairly well when I used it last, but that was a while ago.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
  > Can you elaborate on your issues with VNC? I'm not sure what you mean by not being able to 'steal a session. With RDP on Windows, if I stay logged in with programs running and walk away from my computer and remote in to it, I will get the same session I left open. Unlike VNC, this session will resize everything to fit my client's preferences because it isn't just passing screenshots or a video feed of the desktop back.
- kdtsh 5y ago
  By ‘steal a session’ I mean be currently logged into my computer, either with the desktop locked or unlocked, and to jump onto another computer and log into the same session - so I get all my open programs, windows, etc. if that makes sense. The understanding I got was that this simply isn’t possible with VNC, or if it is it’d a major stuff-around. This really makes or breaks Remote Desktop for me. I’m using Wayland, which is the Fedora 35 default. I considered X11 but the experience isn’t quite as smooth for the day-to-day stuff in Fedora and I just didn’t want to work around odd quirks if I could avoid it. I tried the GNOME desktop sharing, but as far as I could see you need to be already logged in to jump in. Besides that it worked OK, though I recall screen resolution being a bit strange, like having 1024x768 or similar which is really quite small for GNOME’s big windows. I never looked into whether these issues I found were configurable, but they don’t seem to be easily accessible options if they are.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago

Indeed. I, on the other hand, use Windows all day every day and I'm a vocal critic of the Linux Desktop, yet Microsoft has convinced me that it hates personal computing so much that the Windows Desktop will be the worse option (for my uses) in the near future. Hell, even outside of trashing the desktop experience, we've noted that we used to get support for our SQL issues directly from Microsoft employees and were escalated to engineers in short order for data corruption issues, we now deal with a third party company for support and they're basically worthless. We pay for this treatment. It's absurd.

pc86 5y ago

Do you have any advice for someone who currently develops about 90% on Windows and ~10% (or less) on Mac, and wants to switch to Linux? Other than "just do it and get through the initial pain" which I think is a totally valid response.

docmars 5y ago

Which distro do you enjoy using the most?

ffhhj 5y ago

There is also a Linux distribution called "WindowsFX 11". Try it out, very recommended.