6 ms·

Nah, few enterprises have asked for any of this trash either. I'm pretty sure that most of them would be perfectly happy with a windows 98 style GUI, that suppo

Nah, few enterprises have asked for any of this trash either. I'm pretty sure that most of them would be perfectly happy with a windows 98 style GUI, that supported modern hardware. They don't want all this churn either, they want something that is stable, doesn't change very fast and doesn't require them to constantly retrain their staff or waste their IT admins time fighting with whatever new options require a new set of group policies. AKA, the new control panel that has been evolving.. most users are likely locked out of it for anything more advanced than changing the sound volume, its the IT nerds that need to figure out the optimal set of setting and push it out. Which is work that the C*'s would be more than happy to not have to pay IT staff to perform.

iJohnDoe 3y ago
I think the point was that the big enterprises pay for licenses that don’t display this garbage. The rest, Microsoft is trying to monetize. I agree big time. We pay for licenses so none of this crap is shown. However, most businesses get the Windows license that is included with their hardware purchase and this crap is shown to them.
- linguae 3y ago
  The sad thing is that you'd think the revenue coming from license sales to OEMs would be enough for Microsoft to not resort to these blatant attempts to make Windows an advertising platform, but I guess it's not.
  - iJohnDoe 3y ago
    Much agreed. It would take a bit more class within Microsoft these days to realize that and maybe they just aren’t ready to take the step in the right direction yet.
  - nobody9999 3y ago
    >The sad thing is that you'd think the revenue coming from license sales to OEMs would be enough for Microsoft to not resort to these blatant attempts to make Windows an advertising platform, but I guess it's not. I'm not defending Microsoft here, but just about everyone else is doing that same thing (and not just tech companies, auto, appliance, consumer electronics manufacturers and many others are doing this), so why wouldn't Microsoft do so as well? Microsoft isn't the problem per se. Rather it's the lack of effective privacy regulations. GDPR (sadly, I'm not in the EU) is a start, but is still far too weak to reverse the perverse incentives that lead to your coffee maker[0][1] spying on you. Yes, that example is (I think) an outlier, but I used it to point up just how widespread this sort of thing is. But we shouldn't let Microsoft off the hook for that reason. We should bash them (and everyone else who does this kind of thing) and do our best to vote with our wallets/feet. Failing that (for whatever reasons), as others have pointed out, Pro/Enterprise versions of Windows allow you to turn this garbage off. [0] https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jun/14/chinese-smart-coffee-machine-threat-data-security/ https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jun/14/chinese-sma... [1] I'd note that the article linked in [0] has some pretty blatant China bashing^W^W jingoistic undertones. That said, concern over this sort of thing out of China is definitely a concern, but less so (at least to me) than the US/Western corporations that are doing at least as much of this disgusting stuff. Edit: Clarified prose.
  - ezconnect 3y ago
    They in it for the profit. They would not shy away from a revenue stream. Users can still clean it up.
- TheRealDunkirk 3y ago
  As they say, "That's what you get for thinkin'." My Fortune 250 leaves all this crap on by default. Launching Edge takes THIRTY SECONDS from a cold start on a brand new, nicely spec'd Dell laptop. I'm not clear if that's some sort of crazy "security" BS they've layered in (they're always making things worse), or the thing just phoning home to Microsoft. I keep thinking they must have gotten a big discount for NOT doing the sane thing, and turning this garbage off.
Rimintil 3y ago
Windows has always had this churn. Upgrading from NT4 > 2000 > XP > Vista, etc all required a time investment to figure out new features, group policies, creating an image (Autopilot removed this requirement), etc. Win 11 changing the Settings CPL doesn’t change the overall body of work required.
smaudet 3y ago
It is somewhat strange then that enterprise linux is not more common, you get stability and configurability. I mostly put this down to bad salesmanship/C*s tending to be effectively technological cavemen...perhaps there are backroom deals we are not privy to, though.
- einherjae 3y ago
  Except you dont, not in termos of unchanging UX. Gnome reinvents itself too often… I’m surprised XFCE isn’t pushed more as an option.
  - justinclift 3y ago
    Wouldn't enterprise desktop folk go with the longer lived commercial distro's or LTS releases? Doing a quick check, Red Hat still has a "Workstations" product for RHEL: https://www.redhat.com/en/technologies/linux-platforms/enterprise-linux/workstations https://www.redhat.com/en/technologies/linux-platforms/enter... Hmmm, I thought they used to have a non-"workstation" desktop oriented flavour too, but maybe that's been discontinued or rolled into the Workstation thing above.
- gyulai 3y ago
  > It is somewhat strange then that enterprise linux is not more common, you get stability and configurability. Subjectively, I am under the impression that, in the enterprise desktop space, Linux is a more serious competitor to Windows than mac OS is. For example in public administration: At one point the city government of Munich had replaced over 12000 desktops from Windows to Linux [1], and you keep seeing ideas to do similar things pop up in political party manifestoes and position papers like [2]. It is also not uncommon for large universities and research facilities to run on Linux. Meanwhile, an enterprise running hundreds or even thousands of mac OS devices is something I've never heard of. I think, in the past, enterprises were a bit more locked-in than they were now because they ran Windows software that they custom-developed, or off the rack but very niche and available for Windows only. But with the trend over the last two decades having gone towards writing that kind of software as web-based software, I think that element of lock-in is gradually but steadily decreasing as well. The problem is that, once this competitive threat against Microsoft reaches critical mass, it's a bit too easy for Microsoft to counter the threat by simply backpaddling on the trash. In the meantime they just want to milk the cash cow as much as they can possibly get away with. De-trashing an OS is easy. Meanwhile, they are working hard to make sure that Windows is the OS that runs the widest array of software on the widest array of hardware, which is not so easy (anything Windows from ancient to modern, Windows subsystems for Linux and Android). Windows emulation on Linux is also making massive progress, thanks in part to Steam, but I guess that structurally, it will always be easier for Windows to emulate Linux than for Linux to emulate Windows. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LiMux https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LiMux [2] https://www.transformation.gouv.fr/files/presse/Declaration_common_values_challenges_european%20public_administrations_1.pdf https://www.transformation.gouv.fr/files/presse/Declaration_...

iJohnDoe 3y ago

I think the point was that the big enterprises pay for licenses that don’t display this garbage. The rest, Microsoft is trying to monetize. I agree big time. We pay for licenses so none of this crap is shown. However, most businesses get the Windows license that is included with their hardware purchase and this crap is shown to them.

linguae 3y ago
The sad thing is that you'd think the revenue coming from license sales to OEMs would be enough for Microsoft to not resort to these blatant attempts to make Windows an advertising platform, but I guess it's not.
- iJohnDoe 3y ago
  Much agreed. It would take a bit more class within Microsoft these days to realize that and maybe they just aren’t ready to take the step in the right direction yet.
- nobody9999 3y ago
  >The sad thing is that you'd think the revenue coming from license sales to OEMs would be enough for Microsoft to not resort to these blatant attempts to make Windows an advertising platform, but I guess it's not. I'm not defending Microsoft here, but just about everyone else is doing that same thing (and not just tech companies, auto, appliance, consumer electronics manufacturers and many others are doing this), so why wouldn't Microsoft do so as well? Microsoft isn't the problem per se. Rather it's the lack of effective privacy regulations. GDPR (sadly, I'm not in the EU) is a start, but is still far too weak to reverse the perverse incentives that lead to your coffee maker[0][1] spying on you. Yes, that example is (I think) an outlier, but I used it to point up just how widespread this sort of thing is. But we shouldn't let Microsoft off the hook for that reason. We should bash them (and everyone else who does this kind of thing) and do our best to vote with our wallets/feet. Failing that (for whatever reasons), as others have pointed out, Pro/Enterprise versions of Windows allow you to turn this garbage off. [0] https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jun/14/chinese-smart-coffee-machine-threat-data-security/ https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jun/14/chinese-sma... [1] I'd note that the article linked in [0] has some pretty blatant China bashing^W^W jingoistic undertones. That said, concern over this sort of thing out of China is definitely a concern, but less so (at least to me) than the US/Western corporations that are doing at least as much of this disgusting stuff. Edit: Clarified prose.
- ezconnect 3y ago
  They in it for the profit. They would not shy away from a revenue stream. Users can still clean it up.
TheRealDunkirk 3y ago
As they say, "That's what you get for thinkin'." My Fortune 250 leaves all this crap on by default. Launching Edge takes THIRTY SECONDS from a cold start on a brand new, nicely spec'd Dell laptop. I'm not clear if that's some sort of crazy "security" BS they've layered in (they're always making things worse), or the thing just phoning home to Microsoft. I keep thinking they must have gotten a big discount for NOT doing the sane thing, and turning this garbage off.

Rimintil 3y ago

Windows has always had this churn. Upgrading from NT4 > 2000 > XP > Vista, etc all required a time investment to figure out new features, group policies, creating an image (Autopilot removed this requirement), etc. Win 11 changing the Settings CPL doesn’t change the overall body of work required.

smaudet 3y ago

It is somewhat strange then that enterprise linux is not more common, you get stability and configurability. I mostly put this down to bad salesmanship/C*s tending to be effectively technological cavemen...perhaps there are backroom deals we are not privy to, though.

einherjae 3y ago
Except you dont, not in termos of unchanging UX. Gnome reinvents itself too often… I’m surprised XFCE isn’t pushed more as an option.
- justinclift 3y ago
  Wouldn't enterprise desktop folk go with the longer lived commercial distro's or LTS releases? Doing a quick check, Red Hat still has a "Workstations" product for RHEL: https://www.redhat.com/en/technologies/linux-platforms/enterprise-linux/workstations https://www.redhat.com/en/technologies/linux-platforms/enter... Hmmm, I thought they used to have a non-"workstation" desktop oriented flavour too, but maybe that's been discontinued or rolled into the Workstation thing above.
gyulai 3y ago
> It is somewhat strange then that enterprise linux is not more common, you get stability and configurability. Subjectively, I am under the impression that, in the enterprise desktop space, Linux is a more serious competitor to Windows than mac OS is. For example in public administration: At one point the city government of Munich had replaced over 12000 desktops from Windows to Linux [1], and you keep seeing ideas to do similar things pop up in political party manifestoes and position papers like [2]. It is also not uncommon for large universities and research facilities to run on Linux. Meanwhile, an enterprise running hundreds or even thousands of mac OS devices is something I've never heard of. I think, in the past, enterprises were a bit more locked-in than they were now because they ran Windows software that they custom-developed, or off the rack but very niche and available for Windows only. But with the trend over the last two decades having gone towards writing that kind of software as web-based software, I think that element of lock-in is gradually but steadily decreasing as well. The problem is that, once this competitive threat against Microsoft reaches critical mass, it's a bit too easy for Microsoft to counter the threat by simply backpaddling on the trash. In the meantime they just want to milk the cash cow as much as they can possibly get away with. De-trashing an OS is easy. Meanwhile, they are working hard to make sure that Windows is the OS that runs the widest array of software on the widest array of hardware, which is not so easy (anything Windows from ancient to modern, Windows subsystems for Linux and Android). Windows emulation on Linux is also making massive progress, thanks in part to Steam, but I guess that structurally, it will always be easier for Windows to emulate Linux than for Linux to emulate Windows. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LiMux https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LiMux [2] https://www.transformation.gouv.fr/files/presse/Declaration_common_values_challenges_european%20public_administrations_1.pdf https://www.transformation.gouv.fr/files/presse/Declaration_...