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My late father, who was a software developer by trade before his retirement, had a desktop machine set up running Windows 7 (probably?) that he used for checkin

My late father, who was a software developer by trade before his retirement, had a desktop machine set up running Windows 7 (probably?) that he used for checking email, and buying stuff online. A few years later, when he had been diagnosed with cancer and was on chemo, it updated itself to Windows 10 without his explicit consent. It completely fucked up the install, and was unusable for him from then on. He was too tired to go through the process of getting it sorted out, and was thus unable to book a vacation that he had intended to take to recover from that round of chemo. Microsoft's unfriendly us-first, customers-second process robbed him of his last holiday and I will not easily forgive them for it. If a seasoned developer can be robbed of quality of life by this flavour of bullshit, what chance do the non-technical types stand?

gadders 4y ago
I installed Teams on my personal PC last week, and as part of the install Microsoft managed to change my whole windows install to use my Microsoft account to login, rather than my local account. It took me a while to work out what had happened and unfuck it all.
- 2muchcoffeeman 4y ago
  During the Windows 10 install they make it look like you needed to login with your MS account. They option to use a normal local login is right there but it’s named in some funny way so you don’t think that it’s the normal login. At first I thought this was just for the main admin account and let it slide, because I was only intending to use Windows for games (it’s not good for anything else). But when you want to create a second account, it tries to trick you into creating a new MS account. What a flaming POS.
  - vbezhenar 4y ago
    With Windows 11 there's no UI option to use local account at all. You need to press magic combination, launch cmd, execute some bat-file with unpronounceable name and reboot. Then this option appears. I mean, it's one Google search away, so not a big deal, but they do push hard for MS account.
    - bitwize 4y ago
      To run Android apps on Windows 11 you need a Microsoft account AND an Amazon account. The Windows Subsystem for Android comes with the Amazon Appstore app which is only available through the Microsoft Store.
    - bootsmann 4y ago
      The process is available (though you also need to click away a few nudges to get you onto cloud) using the normal setup if you use Pro instead of Home, with Home they basically force it on you, allegedly so they get to backup your BitLocker recovery keys. I think in general Microsoft is suffering from an incentive problem. Unlike Apple they don't really have any revenue stream from users except for the up-front cost of the installation but still incur costs for patching etc. so they do all this trickery to at least get access to data and metrics to improve their paid line of products (Office etc.)
      - CatWChainsaw 4y ago
        I believe this is about to change in 22H2 Pro. You will need internet and microsoft account to set up. And a Pro license is a $1000 markup on consumer laptops, from what I've seen.
      - capableweb 4y ago
        > allegedly so they get to backup your BitLocker recovery keys AKA so you can't really encrypt your own computer without someone else also be able to unlock said encryption "if they really have to".
        bootsmann 4y ago
        Idk what happens on the backend, so I wont engage in conjecture on how safe it is, but keep in mind that BitLocker is not available for Home users at all in Win10 and enabling it by default in Win11 does increase the data safety of the average user quite a bit because a petty thief will not be able to get any data from the device.
      - vbezhenar 4y ago
  - nerdponx 4y ago
    "Look, MS account signups grew!"
  - MereInterest 4y ago
    The last time I installed Windows on a computer, back in late 2020, that option would also be hidden if you were connected to the internet. Since the wifi configuration occurs first, ostentiably to start downloading updates while going through the setup, this was usually the case. The only way to get the local option back was to entirely shut down the machine, then start the process over.
    - OrangeMonkey 4y ago
      Exactly so. I have to unplug lab cables when flashing a machine or I don’t get a choice.
    - jkepler 4y ago
      What about Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC ? I recently installed it in a Qubes to be able to run some specific database software until I can export the data to an open, libre database. My understanding was that LTSC didn't require an account or even an activation code, but I've been able to run a trial iso I downloaded directly from Microsoft.
    - nyanpasu64 4y ago
      In my experience, shutting down and rebooting wasn't enough; Windows 10 still forced me to create a Microsoft account. I had to open a cmd on the installer screen and remove my home Wi-Fi network from the known network list, then possibly reboot.
- BLKNSLVR 4y ago
  For me, because I know this is subjective, fucking with Linux to make it work how I want is less of a hassle now than fucking with Windows to make it work how I want (again).
  - Rayhem 4y ago
    Reinstalling graphics drivers from a real TTY when the occasional update hoses them is far and away more preferable than, say, ads in the start bar (for me).
    - BLKNSLVR 4y ago
      ... or installing fucking candy crush by default (which, really, is just a long form ad). But maybe that's my inner (outer, now?) old man talking? I mean, Minesweeper, patience and a couple of others, maybe even a pinball game always came with Windows. Windows never came with fortune though, which is the best "I didn't ask for this, but would have if I'd known" default I've come across. Yep, old man is now outer and child is inner.
      - Mezzie 4y ago
        The difference to me between Minesweeper + Solitaire and the Candy Crush incident is that Candy Crush was developed by a third party and, more importantly, is designed to be addictive and separate users from their money. The point of putting Candy Crush on Windows machines was to lure new people into playing Candy Crush and hopefully giving King + MS money. Microsoft is providing access to its users to third parties for profit. The point of putting Solitaire + Minesweeper on the machine was to demonstrate the OS's capabilities + get people used to using either a computer or a GUI. Solitaire and Minesweeper were installed for the user, Candy Crush was installed for King.
  - endgame 4y ago
    I say to people that Linux is now the most usable of the big three. And not because it's improved.
- mcv 4y ago
  Microsoft accounts are the biggest clusterfuck they've produced in recent history. I hate them with a passion, and they keep pushing them no matter how much you keep rejecting them. You need to jump through lots of hoops to simply get a local account in Win 10, and then they keep harassing you about upgrading. When my son was ready for his own laptop, I originally set it up with a Microsoft Family account. That was a terrible mistake. Microsoft Family causes only pain and misery and completely fails at what it's supposed to do. Microsoft bought Minecraft and recently forced everybody to migrate from perfectly functional Mojang accounts to Microsoft accounts, which makes everything more complicated. My son's Minecraft account ended up on my wife's Microsoft account, and suddenly I'm called UnshavenFiber (though not entirely incorrectly, I've got to admit).
  - mysterydip 4y ago
    "If the older people won't change to our accounts, we'll capture the next generation." The minecraft acquisition was a great business move for them.
  - xvector 4y ago
    Also Microsoft stores the escrow keys for disk encryption and login on their servers when you use a Microsoft Account, and will happily hand it to the government on request.
  - gedy 4y ago
    I can't express how much the MS account thing totally ruined me from ever using or buying MS products again. Trying to make a PC have an account for my kids to play MS flight simulator was pure insanity. Never again MS.
  - jsperson 4y ago
    Oh the pains of Minecraft administration! I could write a book about cross platform incompatibility, Microsoft account dysfunction, billing issues, and upgrade blocking execution. We’ve spent $100s and it does nothing but get worse.
  - jerf 4y ago
    To clarify mcv's last statement... if you have taken the time to create local user accounts because who is using your computer is none of Microsoft's business, and then you make the mistake of buying Minecraft and logging in to it, Minecraft will automatically and with no warning [1] irrevocably tie that Windows user account to the Microsoft account used to log in Minecraft. I now have n+1 accounts on my Windows system because I had the kid who did that leave that account just to use Minecraft and created a new account for everything else. I'm pretty close to going to Linux on this system. It was the house game system but I just got a Steam Deck, which is fulfilling that role nicely, and that leaves Windows hanging on only by a thread of my personal laziness/business (depending on how charitable you are); everything else that system does is either equally doable by Linux or better done by Linux. [1] At least, no warning I saw and/or understood, and I think it's fair to say that if I didn't realize that's what going to happen, neither did 99%+ of the user base. I'm sure lawyers have their bases covered somewhere but I don't care.
mijoharas 4y ago
An automatic windows 10 install which broke her laptop is what made my partner ditch windows for good and switch to linux. It's massively reduced the amount of tech support I need to do, and when it does come up, it's much more straightforward for me to deal with.
- goodpoint 4y ago
  It's amazing how people tolerate the poor usability of windows - including the forced updates making desktop unusable for hour every month. ...and then even claim that Linux requires more effort. For power users, sure, but for basic users it's a different thing. EDIT: no point in dogpiling comments listing your favorite windows-only software. It is entirely besides the point of this comment.
  - martin_a 4y ago
    > including the forced updates making desktop unusable for hour every month. Patch day is once a month and takes 15 minutes at worst, sometimes only a reboot after the work day. edit: Not to mention how upgrading Firefox on Linux-based systems through the console forced me to restart my Firefox mid-day, because "it works that way". Never had that on Windows.
    - mysterydip 4y ago
      See how long it takes on a core i3 with 4GB RAM (to pull a cheap new laptop from walmart: https://www.walmart.com/ip/Lenovo-Ideapad-3i-14-FHD-Laptop-Intel-Core-i3-1115G4-4GB-128GB-SSD-Windows-11-in-S-Mode-Platinum-Grey-81X700FGUS/125496557?athbdg=L1100 https://www.walmart.com/ip/Lenovo-Ideapad-3i-14-FHD-Laptop-I... ) Not everyone has top of the line or even mid-range hardware.
      - rajamaka 4y ago
        With those specs I would guarantee the update actually takes less than 15 minutes on average each month. I don't remember an update adding more than 1 or 2 minutes on my i5 8gb to my restart time since Windows 11.
afroisalreadyin 4y ago
Very sorry to hear about your father's illness, and how the situation was made even the worse by such brazen disrespect for user experience. My parents also have to regularly go through what I think amounts to violence by their electronic devices, but nothing as horrifying as this.
- ehecatl42 4y ago
  This terrifies me, TBH. I'm almost 50 and a little bit technical (used to admin Solaris boxen), and I just know the day will come when I haven't a damned clue how any of this works any more. For the time being, I'm happy using Linux as a bootloader for Emacs; will that be enough to see me through to my personal end? I sadly doubt it.
  - calvinmorrison 4y ago
    Already happened to me, I have less and less idea how my linux system works now. I haven't kept up with all the various systemd rewrites, buses and random shit I don't know about and it's annoying when I actually want to do something has journalctl -xe ever dumped any useful information for anyone ever or am I just an idiot? when I restart nginx I want to know if it failed, why , what's the syntax error. instead old reliable /etc/init.d/nginx configtest no I have to dig around
    - ylyn 4y ago
      Then use a distro that doesn't use systemd.
      - calvinmorrison 4y ago
        Right, then I have to relearn my userspace setup... well maybe it's time - but I've been on debian longer long before I met my childs mother, before I even grew a single hair on my chest, before I had a bank account, a job, or a cell phone. But perhaps you are right, it's time to quit it
chii 4y ago
> it updated itself to Windows 10 without his explicit consent. it's bs how they can just do this. Microsoft thinks that just because they aren't legally liable for their software breaking a user's system, that they can just do anything like these automatic updates. I think it's really high time that there be regulation on software and their reliability - that is, some sort of consumer protection, where an update such as this breaking becomes a liability for microsoft. And of course, this doesn't just apply to microsoft, but apple and google and any other software manufacturer.
- mach1ne 4y ago
  We're actually lucky that the current global political & economic system allows governments to enforce this. Companies can weasel out of paying taxes to the country in which they operate, but they generally can't escape the local country's regulation with regards to how they render their services. All we need is political momentum to enact the regulation - and that's easier said than done.
HeckFeck 4y ago
This is the type of thing I imagined could happen, but hoped it never actually would happen. The worst example I had heard until today was an update that caused a friend to lose a good chunk of her dissertation. Windows 10 decided that final week was an excellent time for an update. She had no option of saying "no" and was just looking to use Word uninterrupted. Software is too important now for this level of user hostility.
- colechristensen 4y ago
  And this is why people buy macbooks. Apple products have a minimum guaranteed level of quality. There isn’t another computing hardware company which doesn’t have a “hot garbage” tier of products.
  - HeckFeck 4y ago
    And curiously enough, this was the moment she converted to being an Apple user. She expected and found the same quality on her Mac as she did on her iPhone. > There isn’t another computing hardware company which doesn’t have a “hot garbage” tier of products. There were many more vertically integrated software-hardware PC companies in the 80s. A true shame that some of the others didn't survive; I'd love to be writing this message on my 2022 Acorn RISC PC or Amiga. What we witness now is the end result of the Wintel monopoly.
    - another2another 4y ago
      >There were many more vertically integrated software-hardware PC companies in the 80s. >A true shame that some of the others didn't survive; I'd love to be writing this message on my 2022 Acorn RISC PC or Amiga. >What we witness now is the end result of the Wintel monopoly. A great point, BeOS was basically the last attempt anybody had at creating a new desktop OS, and when it failed, so did the last vestiges of anybody else's appetite for trying again. I love my Mac, but really enjoyed GEM on my Atari ST too.
    - hinkley 4y ago
      And people wonder why I still hold a grudge against Microsoft. We still live with the consequences of three decades of bad behavior. A little deathbed conversion doesn’t mean as much as some think it does.
Syzygies 4y ago
Conventional and unconventional behavior can both have unwanted consequences. We each pick our poison. Another senior here. As a child I scratched my father's guitar with a belt buckle I had been told to wear. I learned to distrust adult judgment, I still don't wear belts half a century later, and I have a successful research career for which I partly thank this errant belt buckle. I lost a potential life as a rock God, but I've been protected from ever buying Microsoft products. This story horrifies me but it doesn't surprise me; I made a fair trade.
- spillguard 4y ago
  For clarification, how did not wearing belt buckles translate to not buying Microsoft products?
  - Syzygies 4y ago
    Belt buckles taught me that conventional behavior can have unwanted consequences. Using Windows is conventional behavior.
- ozim 4y ago
  So you did not learn to weigh consequences correctly. Wearing belt keeps you from a lot more inconvenience than scratching a guitar. Besides unless it was IDK some kind of guitar that Jimmy Hendrix was playing I would not scold kid for scratching it - so much that he would stop touching guitars for life or stop wearing a belt for a life. Buying Microsoft products save you a lot of inconvenience as well.
Karawebnetwork 4y ago
My mother went/is going through similar issues. Removing windows and putting a user friendly Linux distro changed everything. No more invasive software in her way and her aging PC was brought back to life. At first we were a bit scared that there might be technical challenges with Linux that might appear but so far nothing of that sort.
psychphysic 4y ago
Sorry for your loss, such a horrible story. The small things really do make a difference and this isn't even small but a major nuisance. But... Are you really saying he didn't just buy a new laptop for his last holiday!? Just buy the new laptop, even if the plan was it'd immediately go to someone else in inheritance.
- stirfish 4y ago
  How? He used that computer to buy stuff online
  - Extropy_ 4y ago
    The internet is not the only place to buy things. It's also not strictly necessary to buy a computer solely to access the internet. For instance, you could ask your neighbour if you could use theirs for an hour or two or go use one at the local library. Especially if it's just to book a, what seems to be, very important trip while you're dying of cancer. EDIT: Grammar
  - psychphysic 4y ago
    He clearly told his son about it. And it's take not much more effort to order a laptop than to comment about it on HN.
- kemayo 4y ago
  To quote the parent post, "He was too tired to go through the process of getting it sorted out". I don't know if you've ever been really sick (or just been around someone who's really sick or suffering from chronic pain), but being on chemo is a thing that completely shuts you down. I fully believe that going out to the store and buying a new laptop and getting it set up was beyond what the parent-poster's father felt capable of. Similarly, going out to the library and doing it all from a shared computer would be entirely too much. Anything that's not the well-worn familiar path would feel insurmountable.
  - psychphysic 4y ago
naikrovek 4y ago
what in the world could that upgrade have possibly fucked up for an "email and e-commerce" machine. I completely understand how things get fucked up for engineers and serious tool users or users who have needs for very specific hardware that require very specific operating systems to run. but an email and e-commerce machine? what could possibly have broken email and e-commerce? also I'm very impressed that the very first comment I read on this article has twisted the topic of "value-add software that hardware vendors put on is garbage" blaming Microsoft in record time. It's amazing how good the vocal HN commenters are about things like this.
- howenterprisey 4y ago
  Presumably stuff got moved around and/or started working differently and the user didn't have the time/energy to figure it out.
jollyllama 4y ago
And yet you'll still get technical folks parroting mindlessly "Updates are good! Make sure you always update! Muh security!" No, updates are objectively not all good. Updates frequently break things. This is colloquially referred to as your user experience being "enhanced." Any solution begins with an honest appraisal of these realities.
dec0dedab0de 4y ago
I have been thinking about this a lot lately. I went through chemo less than two years ago, and while I don't use windows, quite a bit of technology became outright hostile to me. I even fell for a scam on Instagram and lost $40 trying to buy a gift for my son. I keep day dreaming about designing systems that focus on stable, simple, consistent interfaces. That don't even give application developers a choice in the interface. Where service providers aren't even tempted to become user-interface developers. If I could afford to take a year or two off, this is what I would work on.
- nemothekid 4y ago
  >That don't even give application developers a choice in the interface. Then you get the crowd of “indie developers” crying about how the platform has taken away user choice and that they should be able to use every API of the OS to do whatever they want, user-be-damned. Apple doesn’t go nearly far enough and every “indie developer” working in adtech constantly cries about the entire OS should be accessible to every application developer on the planet.
onion2k 4y ago
This is a good example of why there should always be an alternative way to access services besides a website or app. There's always an assumption that a computer or a phone is available to do things as simple as making an appointment right through to something as complex as planning and buying a vacation, which is fine up until it's not an option any more. In the past 20 years more and more companies have started to fail at this. It's practically impossible to do anything more complex than buying something from a local shop without access to tech now.
- twobitshifter 4y ago
  Travel agents still exist for this type of situation, but that’s not an excuse for an update busting someone’s computer
TheRealDunkirk 4y ago
> Microsoft's unfriendly us-first, customers-second process Fortune 1000-first, themselves second, and customers last. Thankfully, Apple has recognized that their devices and software are -- at least philosophically -- designed for people, not companies. A phone is a distinctly personal device. I think the reason Windows Phone flopped is that it was ultimately designed to deploy in corporate fleets, with all the usual "the company owns your device and everything on it" experience that most of us have with the corporate laptop. You can say that Microsoft's monopoly in businesses pushed Apple in this direction, but at least they have capitalized on the distinction, and didn't sacrifice user experience to try to court the "corporate purchaser." This is why I HATE Gartner "market share" numbers. It lumps in corporate purchases (to Microsoft's overwhelming benefit), which completely distorts the view of how people are using operating systems "on the ground." It's my gut-level impression that Apple is leading at least 4-to-1 in individual purchases, and Windows is something everyone but gamers just put up with to do their jobs.
- codalan 4y ago
  I don't even think they're F1000-first anymore. W11 is going to lose a lot of people, and some of those will be in that category.
- fomine3 4y ago
  I agree that it's F100 oriented, but you're in the bubble everyone prefer Apple.
alsetmusic 4y ago
That’s terrible. Why wasn’t someone able to help get the vacay scheduled on his behalf? Did he just not tell anyone until after it was too late?
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behnamoh 4y ago
I'm sorry to hear about this. I wonder if there was anything you could have done for him. Like, if you knew he was having such difficulties, why not drop by one day and book the vacation for him?
abawany 4y ago
It really does seem that Microsoft is now in the business of trolling its users. The degradation of "Pro" with ads and uninstallables (like frikking Xbox) is beyond disgusting. When a post mortem of its lost os dominance is done in the (hopefully near) future, I have a feeling that these anti patterns will features prominently. Edit: I'm sorry for your loss.
deathbyonecut 4y ago
Microsoft also decided to wipe my entire inbox because I didn't log into my hotmail account all the time. This was the first time an email company this big pulled some shit like this in the internet era. All my correspondence from my high school years to my mid-twenties were gone, including cherished back-and-forths with people that were now deceased. It felt like someone came and burned down my house while I was on vacation. Just thinking about it continues to paralyze me with rage.
nokya 4y ago
Sorry to read this, and my condolences. Everytime Microsoft forces its product upgrades (I'm not talking about security patches) on people and through shady dark UI patterns, it turns thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of peoples' lives into shit. The fact that they keep insisting on repeating this awful practice, year after year, even perfecting it at each iteration, can only be explained by a company being run by sociopaths, in my humble opinion. Microsoft has absolutely no sense of responsibility when it comes to its retail market, its product owners would rather compromise the integrity of any senior's computer to make it unusable than just accept the fact that most people on earth don't need a new Windows every two years.

gadders 4y ago

I installed Teams on my personal PC last week, and as part of the install Microsoft managed to change my whole windows install to use my Microsoft account to login, rather than my local account. It took me a while to work out what had happened and unfuck it all.

2muchcoffeeman 4y ago
During the Windows 10 install they make it look like you needed to login with your MS account. They option to use a normal local login is right there but it’s named in some funny way so you don’t think that it’s the normal login. At first I thought this was just for the main admin account and let it slide, because I was only intending to use Windows for games (it’s not good for anything else). But when you want to create a second account, it tries to trick you into creating a new MS account. What a flaming POS.
- vbezhenar 4y ago
  With Windows 11 there's no UI option to use local account at all. You need to press magic combination, launch cmd, execute some bat-file with unpronounceable name and reboot. Then this option appears. I mean, it's one Google search away, so not a big deal, but they do push hard for MS account.
  - bitwize 4y ago
    To run Android apps on Windows 11 you need a Microsoft account AND an Amazon account. The Windows Subsystem for Android comes with the Amazon Appstore app which is only available through the Microsoft Store.
  - bootsmann 4y ago
    The process is available (though you also need to click away a few nudges to get you onto cloud) using the normal setup if you use Pro instead of Home, with Home they basically force it on you, allegedly so they get to backup your BitLocker recovery keys. I think in general Microsoft is suffering from an incentive problem. Unlike Apple they don't really have any revenue stream from users except for the up-front cost of the installation but still incur costs for patching etc. so they do all this trickery to at least get access to data and metrics to improve their paid line of products (Office etc.)
    - CatWChainsaw 4y ago
      I believe this is about to change in 22H2 Pro. You will need internet and microsoft account to set up. And a Pro license is a $1000 markup on consumer laptops, from what I've seen.
    - capableweb 4y ago
      > allegedly so they get to backup your BitLocker recovery keys AKA so you can't really encrypt your own computer without someone else also be able to unlock said encryption "if they really have to".
      - bootsmann 4y ago
        Idk what happens on the backend, so I wont engage in conjecture on how safe it is, but keep in mind that BitLocker is not available for Home users at all in Win10 and enabling it by default in Win11 does increase the data safety of the average user quite a bit because a petty thief will not be able to get any data from the device.
    - vbezhenar 4y ago
- nerdponx 4y ago
  "Look, MS account signups grew!"
- MereInterest 4y ago
  The last time I installed Windows on a computer, back in late 2020, that option would also be hidden if you were connected to the internet. Since the wifi configuration occurs first, ostentiably to start downloading updates while going through the setup, this was usually the case. The only way to get the local option back was to entirely shut down the machine, then start the process over.
  - OrangeMonkey 4y ago
    Exactly so. I have to unplug lab cables when flashing a machine or I don’t get a choice.
  - jkepler 4y ago
    What about Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC ? I recently installed it in a Qubes to be able to run some specific database software until I can export the data to an open, libre database. My understanding was that LTSC didn't require an account or even an activation code, but I've been able to run a trial iso I downloaded directly from Microsoft.
  - nyanpasu64 4y ago
    In my experience, shutting down and rebooting wasn't enough; Windows 10 still forced me to create a Microsoft account. I had to open a cmd on the installer screen and remove my home Wi-Fi network from the known network list, then possibly reboot.
BLKNSLVR 4y ago
For me, because I know this is subjective, fucking with Linux to make it work how I want is less of a hassle now than fucking with Windows to make it work how I want (again).
- Rayhem 4y ago
  Reinstalling graphics drivers from a real TTY when the occasional update hoses them is far and away more preferable than, say, ads in the start bar (for me).
  - BLKNSLVR 4y ago
    ... or installing fucking candy crush by default (which, really, is just a long form ad). But maybe that's my inner (outer, now?) old man talking? I mean, Minesweeper, patience and a couple of others, maybe even a pinball game always came with Windows. Windows never came with fortune though, which is the best "I didn't ask for this, but would have if I'd known" default I've come across. Yep, old man is now outer and child is inner.
    - Mezzie 4y ago
      The difference to me between Minesweeper + Solitaire and the Candy Crush incident is that Candy Crush was developed by a third party and, more importantly, is designed to be addictive and separate users from their money. The point of putting Candy Crush on Windows machines was to lure new people into playing Candy Crush and hopefully giving King + MS money. Microsoft is providing access to its users to third parties for profit. The point of putting Solitaire + Minesweeper on the machine was to demonstrate the OS's capabilities + get people used to using either a computer or a GUI. Solitaire and Minesweeper were installed for the user, Candy Crush was installed for King.
- endgame 4y ago
  I say to people that Linux is now the most usable of the big three. And not because it's improved.
mcv 4y ago
Microsoft accounts are the biggest clusterfuck they've produced in recent history. I hate them with a passion, and they keep pushing them no matter how much you keep rejecting them. You need to jump through lots of hoops to simply get a local account in Win 10, and then they keep harassing you about upgrading. When my son was ready for his own laptop, I originally set it up with a Microsoft Family account. That was a terrible mistake. Microsoft Family causes only pain and misery and completely fails at what it's supposed to do. Microsoft bought Minecraft and recently forced everybody to migrate from perfectly functional Mojang accounts to Microsoft accounts, which makes everything more complicated. My son's Minecraft account ended up on my wife's Microsoft account, and suddenly I'm called UnshavenFiber (though not entirely incorrectly, I've got to admit).
- mysterydip 4y ago
  "If the older people won't change to our accounts, we'll capture the next generation." The minecraft acquisition was a great business move for them.
- xvector 4y ago
  Also Microsoft stores the escrow keys for disk encryption and login on their servers when you use a Microsoft Account, and will happily hand it to the government on request.
- gedy 4y ago
  I can't express how much the MS account thing totally ruined me from ever using or buying MS products again. Trying to make a PC have an account for my kids to play MS flight simulator was pure insanity. Never again MS.
- jsperson 4y ago
  Oh the pains of Minecraft administration! I could write a book about cross platform incompatibility, Microsoft account dysfunction, billing issues, and upgrade blocking execution. We’ve spent $100s and it does nothing but get worse.
- jerf 4y ago
  To clarify mcv's last statement... if you have taken the time to create local user accounts because who is using your computer is none of Microsoft's business, and then you make the mistake of buying Minecraft and logging in to it, Minecraft will automatically and with no warning [1] irrevocably tie that Windows user account to the Microsoft account used to log in Minecraft. I now have n+1 accounts on my Windows system because I had the kid who did that leave that account just to use Minecraft and created a new account for everything else. I'm pretty close to going to Linux on this system. It was the house game system but I just got a Steam Deck, which is fulfilling that role nicely, and that leaves Windows hanging on only by a thread of my personal laziness/business (depending on how charitable you are); everything else that system does is either equally doable by Linux or better done by Linux. [1] At least, no warning I saw and/or understood, and I think it's fair to say that if I didn't realize that's what going to happen, neither did 99%+ of the user base. I'm sure lawyers have their bases covered somewhere but I don't care.

mijoharas 4y ago

An automatic windows 10 install which broke her laptop is what made my partner ditch windows for good and switch to linux. It's massively reduced the amount of tech support I need to do, and when it does come up, it's much more straightforward for me to deal with.

goodpoint 4y ago
It's amazing how people tolerate the poor usability of windows - including the forced updates making desktop unusable for hour every month. ...and then even claim that Linux requires more effort. For power users, sure, but for basic users it's a different thing. EDIT: no point in dogpiling comments listing your favorite windows-only software. It is entirely besides the point of this comment.
- martin_a 4y ago
  > including the forced updates making desktop unusable for hour every month. Patch day is once a month and takes 15 minutes at worst, sometimes only a reboot after the work day. edit: Not to mention how upgrading Firefox on Linux-based systems through the console forced me to restart my Firefox mid-day, because "it works that way". Never had that on Windows.
  - mysterydip 4y ago
    See how long it takes on a core i3 with 4GB RAM (to pull a cheap new laptop from walmart: https://www.walmart.com/ip/Lenovo-Ideapad-3i-14-FHD-Laptop-Intel-Core-i3-1115G4-4GB-128GB-SSD-Windows-11-in-S-Mode-Platinum-Grey-81X700FGUS/125496557?athbdg=L1100 https://www.walmart.com/ip/Lenovo-Ideapad-3i-14-FHD-Laptop-I... ) Not everyone has top of the line or even mid-range hardware.
    - rajamaka 4y ago
      With those specs I would guarantee the update actually takes less than 15 minutes on average each month. I don't remember an update adding more than 1 or 2 minutes on my i5 8gb to my restart time since Windows 11.

afroisalreadyin 4y ago

Very sorry to hear about your father's illness, and how the situation was made even the worse by such brazen disrespect for user experience. My parents also have to regularly go through what I think amounts to violence by their electronic devices, but nothing as horrifying as this.

ehecatl42 4y ago
This terrifies me, TBH. I'm almost 50 and a little bit technical (used to admin Solaris boxen), and I just know the day will come when I haven't a damned clue how any of this works any more. For the time being, I'm happy using Linux as a bootloader for Emacs; will that be enough to see me through to my personal end? I sadly doubt it.
- calvinmorrison 4y ago
  Already happened to me, I have less and less idea how my linux system works now. I haven't kept up with all the various systemd rewrites, buses and random shit I don't know about and it's annoying when I actually want to do something has journalctl -xe ever dumped any useful information for anyone ever or am I just an idiot? when I restart nginx I want to know if it failed, why , what's the syntax error. instead old reliable /etc/init.d/nginx configtest no I have to dig around
  - ylyn 4y ago
    Then use a distro that doesn't use systemd.
    - calvinmorrison 4y ago
      Right, then I have to relearn my userspace setup... well maybe it's time - but I've been on debian longer long before I met my childs mother, before I even grew a single hair on my chest, before I had a bank account, a job, or a cell phone. But perhaps you are right, it's time to quit it

chii 4y ago

> it updated itself to Windows 10 without his explicit consent. it's bs how they can just do this. Microsoft thinks that just because they aren't legally liable for their software breaking a user's system, that they can just do anything like these automatic updates. I think it's really high time that there be regulation on software and their reliability - that is, some sort of consumer protection, where an update such as this breaking becomes a liability for microsoft. And of course, this doesn't just apply to microsoft, but apple and google and any other software manufacturer.

mach1ne 4y ago
We're actually lucky that the current global political & economic system allows governments to enforce this. Companies can weasel out of paying taxes to the country in which they operate, but they generally can't escape the local country's regulation with regards to how they render their services. All we need is political momentum to enact the regulation - and that's easier said than done.

HeckFeck 4y ago

This is the type of thing I imagined could happen, but hoped it never actually would happen. The worst example I had heard until today was an update that caused a friend to lose a good chunk of her dissertation. Windows 10 decided that final week was an excellent time for an update. She had no option of saying "no" and was just looking to use Word uninterrupted. Software is too important now for this level of user hostility.

colechristensen 4y ago
And this is why people buy macbooks. Apple products have a minimum guaranteed level of quality. There isn’t another computing hardware company which doesn’t have a “hot garbage” tier of products.
- HeckFeck 4y ago
  And curiously enough, this was the moment she converted to being an Apple user. She expected and found the same quality on her Mac as she did on her iPhone. > There isn’t another computing hardware company which doesn’t have a “hot garbage” tier of products. There were many more vertically integrated software-hardware PC companies in the 80s. A true shame that some of the others didn't survive; I'd love to be writing this message on my 2022 Acorn RISC PC or Amiga. What we witness now is the end result of the Wintel monopoly.
  - another2another 4y ago
    >There were many more vertically integrated software-hardware PC companies in the 80s. >A true shame that some of the others didn't survive; I'd love to be writing this message on my 2022 Acorn RISC PC or Amiga. >What we witness now is the end result of the Wintel monopoly. A great point, BeOS was basically the last attempt anybody had at creating a new desktop OS, and when it failed, so did the last vestiges of anybody else's appetite for trying again. I love my Mac, but really enjoyed GEM on my Atari ST too.
  - hinkley 4y ago
    And people wonder why I still hold a grudge against Microsoft. We still live with the consequences of three decades of bad behavior. A little deathbed conversion doesn’t mean as much as some think it does.

Syzygies 4y ago

Conventional and unconventional behavior can both have unwanted consequences. We each pick our poison. Another senior here. As a child I scratched my father's guitar with a belt buckle I had been told to wear. I learned to distrust adult judgment, I still don't wear belts half a century later, and I have a successful research career for which I partly thank this errant belt buckle. I lost a potential life as a rock God, but I've been protected from ever buying Microsoft products. This story horrifies me but it doesn't surprise me; I made a fair trade.

spillguard 4y ago
For clarification, how did not wearing belt buckles translate to not buying Microsoft products?
- Syzygies 4y ago
  Belt buckles taught me that conventional behavior can have unwanted consequences. Using Windows is conventional behavior.
ozim 4y ago
So you did not learn to weigh consequences correctly. Wearing belt keeps you from a lot more inconvenience than scratching a guitar. Besides unless it was IDK some kind of guitar that Jimmy Hendrix was playing I would not scold kid for scratching it - so much that he would stop touching guitars for life or stop wearing a belt for a life. Buying Microsoft products save you a lot of inconvenience as well.

Karawebnetwork 4y ago

My mother went/is going through similar issues. Removing windows and putting a user friendly Linux distro changed everything. No more invasive software in her way and her aging PC was brought back to life. At first we were a bit scared that there might be technical challenges with Linux that might appear but so far nothing of that sort.

psychphysic 4y ago

Sorry for your loss, such a horrible story. The small things really do make a difference and this isn't even small but a major nuisance. But... Are you really saying he didn't just buy a new laptop for his last holiday!? Just buy the new laptop, even if the plan was it'd immediately go to someone else in inheritance.

stirfish 4y ago
How? He used that computer to buy stuff online
- Extropy_ 4y ago
  The internet is not the only place to buy things. It's also not strictly necessary to buy a computer solely to access the internet. For instance, you could ask your neighbour if you could use theirs for an hour or two or go use one at the local library. Especially if it's just to book a, what seems to be, very important trip while you're dying of cancer. EDIT: Grammar
- psychphysic 4y ago
  He clearly told his son about it. And it's take not much more effort to order a laptop than to comment about it on HN.
kemayo 4y ago
To quote the parent post, "He was too tired to go through the process of getting it sorted out". I don't know if you've ever been really sick (or just been around someone who's really sick or suffering from chronic pain), but being on chemo is a thing that completely shuts you down. I fully believe that going out to the store and buying a new laptop and getting it set up was beyond what the parent-poster's father felt capable of. Similarly, going out to the library and doing it all from a shared computer would be entirely too much. Anything that's not the well-worn familiar path would feel insurmountable.
- psychphysic 4y ago

naikrovek 4y ago

what in the world could that upgrade have possibly fucked up for an "email and e-commerce" machine. I completely understand how things get fucked up for engineers and serious tool users or users who have needs for very specific hardware that require very specific operating systems to run. but an email and e-commerce machine? what could possibly have broken email and e-commerce? also I'm very impressed that the very first comment I read on this article has twisted the topic of "value-add software that hardware vendors put on is garbage" blaming Microsoft in record time. It's amazing how good the vocal HN commenters are about things like this.

howenterprisey 4y ago
Presumably stuff got moved around and/or started working differently and the user didn't have the time/energy to figure it out.

jollyllama 4y ago

And yet you'll still get technical folks parroting mindlessly "Updates are good! Make sure you always update! Muh security!" No, updates are objectively not all good. Updates frequently break things. This is colloquially referred to as your user experience being "enhanced." Any solution begins with an honest appraisal of these realities.

dec0dedab0de 4y ago

I have been thinking about this a lot lately. I went through chemo less than two years ago, and while I don't use windows, quite a bit of technology became outright hostile to me. I even fell for a scam on Instagram and lost $40 trying to buy a gift for my son. I keep day dreaming about designing systems that focus on stable, simple, consistent interfaces. That don't even give application developers a choice in the interface. Where service providers aren't even tempted to become user-interface developers. If I could afford to take a year or two off, this is what I would work on.

nemothekid 4y ago
>That don't even give application developers a choice in the interface. Then you get the crowd of “indie developers” crying about how the platform has taken away user choice and that they should be able to use every API of the OS to do whatever they want, user-be-damned. Apple doesn’t go nearly far enough and every “indie developer” working in adtech constantly cries about the entire OS should be accessible to every application developer on the planet.

onion2k 4y ago

This is a good example of why there should always be an alternative way to access services besides a website or app. There's always an assumption that a computer or a phone is available to do things as simple as making an appointment right through to something as complex as planning and buying a vacation, which is fine up until it's not an option any more. In the past 20 years more and more companies have started to fail at this. It's practically impossible to do anything more complex than buying something from a local shop without access to tech now.

twobitshifter 4y ago
Travel agents still exist for this type of situation, but that’s not an excuse for an update busting someone’s computer

TheRealDunkirk 4y ago

> Microsoft's unfriendly us-first, customers-second process Fortune 1000-first, themselves second, and customers last. Thankfully, Apple has recognized that their devices and software are -- at least philosophically -- designed for people, not companies. A phone is a distinctly personal device. I think the reason Windows Phone flopped is that it was ultimately designed to deploy in corporate fleets, with all the usual "the company owns your device and everything on it" experience that most of us have with the corporate laptop. You can say that Microsoft's monopoly in businesses pushed Apple in this direction, but at least they have capitalized on the distinction, and didn't sacrifice user experience to try to court the "corporate purchaser." This is why I HATE Gartner "market share" numbers. It lumps in corporate purchases (to Microsoft's overwhelming benefit), which completely distorts the view of how people are using operating systems "on the ground." It's my gut-level impression that Apple is leading at least 4-to-1 in individual purchases, and Windows is something everyone but gamers just put up with to do their jobs.

codalan 4y ago
I don't even think they're F1000-first anymore. W11 is going to lose a lot of people, and some of those will be in that category.
fomine3 4y ago
I agree that it's F100 oriented, but you're in the bubble everyone prefer Apple.

alsetmusic 4y ago

That’s terrible. Why wasn’t someone able to help get the vacay scheduled on his behalf? Did he just not tell anyone until after it was too late?

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behnamoh 4y ago

I'm sorry to hear about this. I wonder if there was anything you could have done for him. Like, if you knew he was having such difficulties, why not drop by one day and book the vacation for him?

abawany 4y ago

It really does seem that Microsoft is now in the business of trolling its users. The degradation of "Pro" with ads and uninstallables (like frikking Xbox) is beyond disgusting. When a post mortem of its lost os dominance is done in the (hopefully near) future, I have a feeling that these anti patterns will features prominently. Edit: I'm sorry for your loss.

deathbyonecut 4y ago

Microsoft also decided to wipe my entire inbox because I didn't log into my hotmail account all the time. This was the first time an email company this big pulled some shit like this in the internet era. All my correspondence from my high school years to my mid-twenties were gone, including cherished back-and-forths with people that were now deceased. It felt like someone came and burned down my house while I was on vacation. Just thinking about it continues to paralyze me with rage.

nokya 4y ago

Sorry to read this, and my condolences. Everytime Microsoft forces its product upgrades (I'm not talking about security patches) on people and through shady dark UI patterns, it turns thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of peoples' lives into shit. The fact that they keep insisting on repeating this awful practice, year after year, even perfecting it at each iteration, can only be explained by a company being run by sociopaths, in my humble opinion. Microsoft has absolutely no sense of responsibility when it comes to its retail market, its product owners would rather compromise the integrity of any senior's computer to make it unusable than just accept the fact that most people on earth don't need a new Windows every two years.