6 ms·

What I find so frustrating is that Windows, under the hood, is so solid. It's just the UI with Bing/Ads/telemetrics/etc integration is so crap, like they've ru

by jmkni 3y ago

What I find so frustrating is that Windows, under the hood, is so solid. It's just the UI with Bing/Ads/telemetrics/etc integration is so crap, like they've ruined a solid OS with crappy surface level stuff.

FirmwareBurner 3y ago
It's as if, it's a product made by a giant corporation with over a dozen different teams of skilled people, with different managers and different visons on how their own team's work should impact the final product for their own career advancement purposes.
- veec_cas_tant 3y ago
  Sure. Apple is also giant and (probably?) fits those descriptors as well. Why is Mac so solid under similar circumstances?
  - nelsondev 3y ago
    Apple employs “Release Managers”, where a single person is ultimately responsible for deciding which features ship in new projects. Apple also, due to the hardware business, adheres to a release schedule where features must all be consolidated onto single branches (“convergence”), rather than letting individual teams ship incrementally.
    - roneythomas6 3y ago
      Not to mention Apple only has to support a limited number of hardware and they regularly drop support for older hardware with each new major release.
      - vladvasiliu 3y ago
        That may be so, but all the annoyances I have with windows don't seem hardware-support related. The laggy menus, the clock in the taskbar that slides to the right outside of view, etc. This can't possibly be related to the fact I have a shiny, brand-new Wi-Fi card.
        FirmwareBurner 3y ago
        >the clock in the taskbar that slides to the right outside of view, etc. What? I've never seen the taskbar clock ever move.
        vladvasiliu 3y ago
        How this usually happens is that there's a notification indication. I'd click on the clock to show the notification center, dismiss the notification, and the clock would slide "too much" to the right, so that almost half of it is outside the screen. A quick google search doesn't bring my issue up (I'll try to take a screenshot next time it happens, but I'm usually too annoyed of having to use windows to think about it). But it did bring up a separate issue, where the right-hand side icons area (system tray?) and the clock are moved down so that only the top of the date is showing. I've never had that one. I think these are lag-related, as in things move when something opens. But if the thing before didn't complete or something, the new thing happening doesn't get to remove the old one as expected. The other day, on a PC that was doing whatever it is that windows does when the CPU fan goes full tilt while pretending to be asleep (complete with the blinking power light), after waking it up, I managed to have both the notification center and the quick settings displayed. I mistakenly clicked on the notification, then immediately on the settings. The notification panel took forever to show up, and it showed while the settings panel was still showing.
      - veec_cas_tant 3y ago
        These issues from the original comment are not related to Microsoft supporting a wide variety of hardware: > ...the UI with Bing/Ads/telemetrics/etc integration is so crap...
        FirmwareBurner 3y ago
        Those issues are because some exec in Microsoft decided that they can monetize user data and since users already don't care their data being monetized by Google, then they themselves not monetizing it as well, means leaving money on the table since users don't care anyway. That's the logic. Using Windows web components is similar to using Google products.
  - Krasnol 3y ago
    Apple is not even on the same "giant" shelf as Windows, so the circumstances are not similar either.
  - pjmlp 3y ago
    I suggest hearing to ATP Podcast or Upgrade rants regarding how "solid" macOS happens to be.
  - FirmwareBurner 3y ago
    >Why is Mac so solid under similar circumstances? Where do you see MacOS ruining 30 year old binaries?
  - necovek 3y ago
    I've only used MacOS for a year and only recently (maybe that matters), and I get all the same crappy inconsistent behaviour I do on Linux and did on Windows ~20 years ago when I last used it. Apple has the benefit of controlling both hw and sw and still manage to mess it up. Random crashes, slowdowns for long running sessions, crappy UI (eg those labels not checking their checkboxes in Settings), network weirdness (both USB ethernet dongles/hubs and internal WiFi), my USB audio interface picking up garbled audio which requires reselecting audio interface for it to fix itself... Maybe I am doing something different, but it's even worse than Linux for the most part.
    - moonchrome 3y ago
      You haven't used Windows in quite a while have you ? Past Windows 7 it's been sliding downhill into bullshit UX, crapware, backend migration to Linux almost exclusively, etc. Random things on top of my head : MacOS doesn't come with candy crush, Instagram, TikTok, Spotify etc. prepopulating your start menu. Phone home telemetry and ads in OS ? Yummy Dealing with Windows dev environment is always a PITA eventually - unless you're doing stuff where Windows is first class citizen (like games). For backend stuff it's almost implicit that you're running on Linux in prod and macos is well supported because it's fairly similar. On Windows it's always some path issues, stuff randomly breaking between updates, missing/incompatible CLI, etc. Brew is pretty good. Chocolatey is garbage. MacOS is fairly visually consistent. Windows regularly has me in Windows XP era screens, reached through 3 inconsistent UX steps developed along the way. Even Linux is better in this regard. I like Linux when it works. Mac works more often. Windows is just a dumpster fire at this point.
      - FirmwareBurner 3y ago
        >Phone home telemetry and ads in OS ? MacOS also has telemetry. >For backend stuff it's almost implicit that you're running on Linux in prod and macos is well supported because it's fairly similar. Then Windows would be better than MacOS in this regard because WSL2 is exactly Linux, not just "fairly similar" to Linux. >stuff randomly breaking between updates What stuff broke for you between updates? Our entire DS team develops in windows + WSL2 and nothing broke for them in ~5 years. Maybe they know how to use a computer. Ultimately just use what you like and what makes you productive, no need to crusade for some big corporation. The OS is just a tool for your job, like a hammer.
  - rchaud 3y ago
    There's B2B Windows and B2C Windows. B2C is the license sold to OEMs, who will fill up the OS image with bloatware anyway to make a few extra bucks. Microsoft is just getting in on that now. B2B Windows is the stuff you would see for enterprise buyers with strict IT policies. Your experience will be mostly unchanged from "classic Windows".
- 6D794163636F756 3y ago
  I would like to refer you to Conway's law for business which states that, "Organizations, who design systems, are constrained to produce designs which are copies of the communication structures of these organizations."
  - FirmwareBurner 3y ago
    My point.
e40 3y ago
Really? Filesystem performance on Windows is absolutely horrible compared to Linux. It blows me away how, even using SSDs, the performance of git over large repos is at least 10x slower than a Linux box with the same CPU. It is the bane of my existence. It's not just git. rsync of a large directory takes >10x as long. This is with Server 2016 (and 2012 r2). My 2012 r2 machine had spinning disks and when I tested on 2016 with SSDs I was shocked the situation did not improve.
- adzm 3y ago
  This is true. I'm not sure what the obstacle is, and I know a lot of smart people have worked on it, but opening a ton of files and traversing a bunch of them in directories is very slow. Once the file is open, IO is just as fast though.
  - amlib 3y ago
    Unless you have antivirus software and god knows what analyzing the files, then IO is actually slower...
  - martinald 3y ago
    My guess is ACLs, which are enabled by default on NTFS but not (afiak) on most linux distros using ext4.
    - e40 3y ago
      Extended attributes are definitely turned on in my ext4 filesystems and to my knowledge I didn't do anything to turn them on.
      - martinald 3y ago
        Hmm that's true but I don't think much makes use of them? As in they are not set with anything. On NTFS they are used for everything.
  - WorldMaker 3y ago
ZanyProgrammer 3y ago
You forgot the mandatory MSFT accounts to sign in with no way around last I checked (a few months ago).
- bakuninsbart 3y ago
  Is this Windows 11? On 10 Pro you were just able to click past it. Need it for office though, I think.
  - zamadatix 3y ago
    Windows 11 Home requires you to get a working internet connection to continue. Windows 11 Pro doesn't as of the 22H2 version but it still has dark patterns. For Office you can still use other licensing methods, even for O365, but as a typical consumer getting it legitimately you'll de facto need a Microsoft account. Using "no@thankyou.com" for your Microsoft account (and any made up value for the password) allows you to skip this requirement in any version of 10/11 as someone got that account banned and the Microsoft workflow bails out since they naturally don't want to force onboard a banned user to a new account. This still requires internet during install though, it just works around needing to make an actual account. It's a shame how much of a dance the install process has become.
- darknavi 3y ago
  Last time I checked you could log in locally if the install process never detected an internet connection. A terrible work around but (at the time) a functional one.
  - Tijdreiziger 3y ago
    I’ve also heard that the following trick still works: enter the email address no@thankyou.com with any password, this account has been tried so many times that it’s been locked out, so the installer will let you continue with a local account
  - alpaca128 3y ago
    Afaik this doesn't work anymore on Windows 11 unless you change some configuration in the shell and reboot before doing the setup.
jwells89 3y ago
It's a bit surprising that there isn't a project that takes the old Windows "shell replacement" (LiteStep, etc) idea a bit further and replaces the majority of the Windows userland. That's probably more challenging now than it was in the XP-Vista-7 days but should still be doable.
- zdimension 3y ago
  An "alternative OS" built on top of the NT kernel would certainly be interesting. It would take a decade to a thousand-person team, but it would be interesting
  - Kamq 3y ago
    > It would take a decade to a thousand-person team By the standard conversion rate, I think that means 4 people could knock it out in 6 weeks.
BirAdam 3y ago
This. I use Tiny11 for this reason. The UI is still super inconsistent, but otherwise it’s fine. Mac bothered me by likewise becoming inconsistent, but also soldering everything so the machine is bricked when an SSD or battery dies. In the Linux world the UI has never been consistent, but what really bothers me is that everything is constantly changing unless one uses enterprise Linux, but then I don’t get hardware support so… Winders it is.
- jacooper 3y ago
  In my experience linux, specifically Gtk Apps, have the best consistency. It's the closest you can get to a fully styled system.
- hobobaggins 3y ago
  You don't get hardware support? I have had all kinds of hardware support (Dell, mostly Latitude and XPS) over the years and Linux was never an issue. We even run Gentoo and Void on some boxes (for the reason you state -- to keep things consistent over time) and they've never said anything about it.
- predictabl3 3y ago
  Imagine if a Linux user said this. The bar is so vastly different for windows and Linux users and by and large I try to keep my mouth shut because I dual boot and I know DAMN WELL which OS needs more handholding and has required fuck-it-start-over handling. God forbid you ever try to login to Win11 with low disk space, you're totally FUBAR and there are countless reports online of this EXACT FKING SCENARIO. Imagine for one second if Linux became COMPLETELY BROKEN if you ran out of disk space, it would be A JOKE. If manufacturer would consistently publish to LVFS, I would NEVER TOUCH WINDOWS AGAIN. And I play Halo every single day of my life. Sorry gaming on Linux is less of a complete pain in the ass than using windows. You paying attn MSFT? Your stock price is 80% of my life, so I sure hope so. "Everything is constantly changing"?! Are you FUCKING kidding me? What has changed in Linux is the past 15 years other than Wayland, which, I've been running for 4+ years and know what is BS and what isn't (DM me and I'll screen share stream my desktop at arbitrary scale factors at 240hz). I can run Gnome2, I can run kde3 for gods sake. Meanwhile there's crapware discussed here weekly just trying to get a basic Start Menu back in Win11, or constant complaints about ads, or regressions or ON and ON; do y'all have ANY self respect? Stockholm syndrome, laziness, take your pick, it's exhausting.
alberth 3y ago
Windows LTSC (no ads / bloatware) + SimpleClassicTheme + RetroBar is about as perfect as it gets. https://youtube.com/watch?v=1_7pqwf-gZM&feature=sharea https://youtube.com/watch?v=1_7pqwf-gZM&feature=sharea
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

by jmkni 3y ago

FirmwareBurner 3y ago

It's as if, it's a product made by a giant corporation with over a dozen different teams of skilled people, with different managers and different visons on how their own team's work should impact the final product for their own career advancement purposes.

veec_cas_tant 3y ago
Sure. Apple is also giant and (probably?) fits those descriptors as well. Why is Mac so solid under similar circumstances?
- nelsondev 3y ago
  Apple employs “Release Managers”, where a single person is ultimately responsible for deciding which features ship in new projects. Apple also, due to the hardware business, adheres to a release schedule where features must all be consolidated onto single branches (“convergence”), rather than letting individual teams ship incrementally.
  - roneythomas6 3y ago
    Not to mention Apple only has to support a limited number of hardware and they regularly drop support for older hardware with each new major release.
    - vladvasiliu 3y ago
      That may be so, but all the annoyances I have with windows don't seem hardware-support related. The laggy menus, the clock in the taskbar that slides to the right outside of view, etc. This can't possibly be related to the fact I have a shiny, brand-new Wi-Fi card.
      - FirmwareBurner 3y ago
        >the clock in the taskbar that slides to the right outside of view, etc. What? I've never seen the taskbar clock ever move.
        vladvasiliu 3y ago
        How this usually happens is that there's a notification indication. I'd click on the clock to show the notification center, dismiss the notification, and the clock would slide "too much" to the right, so that almost half of it is outside the screen. A quick google search doesn't bring my issue up (I'll try to take a screenshot next time it happens, but I'm usually too annoyed of having to use windows to think about it). But it did bring up a separate issue, where the right-hand side icons area (system tray?) and the clock are moved down so that only the top of the date is showing. I've never had that one. I think these are lag-related, as in things move when something opens. But if the thing before didn't complete or something, the new thing happening doesn't get to remove the old one as expected. The other day, on a PC that was doing whatever it is that windows does when the CPU fan goes full tilt while pretending to be asleep (complete with the blinking power light), after waking it up, I managed to have both the notification center and the quick settings displayed. I mistakenly clicked on the notification, then immediately on the settings. The notification panel took forever to show up, and it showed while the settings panel was still showing.
    - veec_cas_tant 3y ago
      These issues from the original comment are not related to Microsoft supporting a wide variety of hardware: > ...the UI with Bing/Ads/telemetrics/etc integration is so crap...
      - FirmwareBurner 3y ago
        Those issues are because some exec in Microsoft decided that they can monetize user data and since users already don't care their data being monetized by Google, then they themselves not monetizing it as well, means leaving money on the table since users don't care anyway. That's the logic. Using Windows web components is similar to using Google products.
- Krasnol 3y ago
  Apple is not even on the same "giant" shelf as Windows, so the circumstances are not similar either.
- pjmlp 3y ago
  I suggest hearing to ATP Podcast or Upgrade rants regarding how "solid" macOS happens to be.
- FirmwareBurner 3y ago
  >Why is Mac so solid under similar circumstances? Where do you see MacOS ruining 30 year old binaries?
- necovek 3y ago
  I've only used MacOS for a year and only recently (maybe that matters), and I get all the same crappy inconsistent behaviour I do on Linux and did on Windows ~20 years ago when I last used it. Apple has the benefit of controlling both hw and sw and still manage to mess it up. Random crashes, slowdowns for long running sessions, crappy UI (eg those labels not checking their checkboxes in Settings), network weirdness (both USB ethernet dongles/hubs and internal WiFi), my USB audio interface picking up garbled audio which requires reselecting audio interface for it to fix itself... Maybe I am doing something different, but it's even worse than Linux for the most part.
  - moonchrome 3y ago
    You haven't used Windows in quite a while have you ? Past Windows 7 it's been sliding downhill into bullshit UX, crapware, backend migration to Linux almost exclusively, etc. Random things on top of my head : MacOS doesn't come with candy crush, Instagram, TikTok, Spotify etc. prepopulating your start menu. Phone home telemetry and ads in OS ? Yummy Dealing with Windows dev environment is always a PITA eventually - unless you're doing stuff where Windows is first class citizen (like games). For backend stuff it's almost implicit that you're running on Linux in prod and macos is well supported because it's fairly similar. On Windows it's always some path issues, stuff randomly breaking between updates, missing/incompatible CLI, etc. Brew is pretty good. Chocolatey is garbage. MacOS is fairly visually consistent. Windows regularly has me in Windows XP era screens, reached through 3 inconsistent UX steps developed along the way. Even Linux is better in this regard. I like Linux when it works. Mac works more often. Windows is just a dumpster fire at this point.
    - FirmwareBurner 3y ago
      >Phone home telemetry and ads in OS ? MacOS also has telemetry. >For backend stuff it's almost implicit that you're running on Linux in prod and macos is well supported because it's fairly similar. Then Windows would be better than MacOS in this regard because WSL2 is exactly Linux, not just "fairly similar" to Linux. >stuff randomly breaking between updates What stuff broke for you between updates? Our entire DS team develops in windows + WSL2 and nothing broke for them in ~5 years. Maybe they know how to use a computer. Ultimately just use what you like and what makes you productive, no need to crusade for some big corporation. The OS is just a tool for your job, like a hammer.
- rchaud 3y ago
  There's B2B Windows and B2C Windows. B2C is the license sold to OEMs, who will fill up the OS image with bloatware anyway to make a few extra bucks. Microsoft is just getting in on that now. B2B Windows is the stuff you would see for enterprise buyers with strict IT policies. Your experience will be mostly unchanged from "classic Windows".
6D794163636F756 3y ago
I would like to refer you to Conway's law for business which states that, "Organizations, who design systems, are constrained to produce designs which are copies of the communication structures of these organizations."
- FirmwareBurner 3y ago
  My point.

e40 3y ago

Really? Filesystem performance on Windows is absolutely horrible compared to Linux. It blows me away how, even using SSDs, the performance of git over large repos is at least 10x slower than a Linux box with the same CPU. It is the bane of my existence. It's not just git. rsync of a large directory takes >10x as long. This is with Server 2016 (and 2012 r2). My 2012 r2 machine had spinning disks and when I tested on 2016 with SSDs I was shocked the situation did not improve.

adzm 3y ago
This is true. I'm not sure what the obstacle is, and I know a lot of smart people have worked on it, but opening a ton of files and traversing a bunch of them in directories is very slow. Once the file is open, IO is just as fast though.
- amlib 3y ago
  Unless you have antivirus software and god knows what analyzing the files, then IO is actually slower...
- martinald 3y ago
  My guess is ACLs, which are enabled by default on NTFS but not (afiak) on most linux distros using ext4.
  - e40 3y ago
    Extended attributes are definitely turned on in my ext4 filesystems and to my knowledge I didn't do anything to turn them on.
    - martinald 3y ago
      Hmm that's true but I don't think much makes use of them? As in they are not set with anything. On NTFS they are used for everything.
- WorldMaker 3y ago

ZanyProgrammer 3y ago

You forgot the mandatory MSFT accounts to sign in with no way around last I checked (a few months ago).

bakuninsbart 3y ago
Is this Windows 11? On 10 Pro you were just able to click past it. Need it for office though, I think.
- zamadatix 3y ago
  Windows 11 Home requires you to get a working internet connection to continue. Windows 11 Pro doesn't as of the 22H2 version but it still has dark patterns. For Office you can still use other licensing methods, even for O365, but as a typical consumer getting it legitimately you'll de facto need a Microsoft account. Using "no@thankyou.com" for your Microsoft account (and any made up value for the password) allows you to skip this requirement in any version of 10/11 as someone got that account banned and the Microsoft workflow bails out since they naturally don't want to force onboard a banned user to a new account. This still requires internet during install though, it just works around needing to make an actual account. It's a shame how much of a dance the install process has become.
darknavi 3y ago
Last time I checked you could log in locally if the install process never detected an internet connection. A terrible work around but (at the time) a functional one.
- Tijdreiziger 3y ago
  I’ve also heard that the following trick still works: enter the email address no@thankyou.com with any password, this account has been tried so many times that it’s been locked out, so the installer will let you continue with a local account
- alpaca128 3y ago
  Afaik this doesn't work anymore on Windows 11 unless you change some configuration in the shell and reboot before doing the setup.

jwells89 3y ago

It's a bit surprising that there isn't a project that takes the old Windows "shell replacement" (LiteStep, etc) idea a bit further and replaces the majority of the Windows userland. That's probably more challenging now than it was in the XP-Vista-7 days but should still be doable.

zdimension 3y ago
An "alternative OS" built on top of the NT kernel would certainly be interesting. It would take a decade to a thousand-person team, but it would be interesting
- Kamq 3y ago
  > It would take a decade to a thousand-person team By the standard conversion rate, I think that means 4 people could knock it out in 6 weeks.

BirAdam 3y ago

This. I use Tiny11 for this reason. The UI is still super inconsistent, but otherwise it’s fine. Mac bothered me by likewise becoming inconsistent, but also soldering everything so the machine is bricked when an SSD or battery dies. In the Linux world the UI has never been consistent, but what really bothers me is that everything is constantly changing unless one uses enterprise Linux, but then I don’t get hardware support so… Winders it is.

jacooper 3y ago
In my experience linux, specifically Gtk Apps, have the best consistency. It's the closest you can get to a fully styled system.
hobobaggins 3y ago
You don't get hardware support? I have had all kinds of hardware support (Dell, mostly Latitude and XPS) over the years and Linux was never an issue. We even run Gentoo and Void on some boxes (for the reason you state -- to keep things consistent over time) and they've never said anything about it.
predictabl3 3y ago
Imagine if a Linux user said this. The bar is so vastly different for windows and Linux users and by and large I try to keep my mouth shut because I dual boot and I know DAMN WELL which OS needs more handholding and has required fuck-it-start-over handling. God forbid you ever try to login to Win11 with low disk space, you're totally FUBAR and there are countless reports online of this EXACT FKING SCENARIO. Imagine for one second if Linux became COMPLETELY BROKEN if you ran out of disk space, it would be A JOKE. If manufacturer would consistently publish to LVFS, I would NEVER TOUCH WINDOWS AGAIN. And I play Halo every single day of my life. Sorry gaming on Linux is less of a complete pain in the ass than using windows. You paying attn MSFT? Your stock price is 80% of my life, so I sure hope so. "Everything is constantly changing"?! Are you FUCKING kidding me? What has changed in Linux is the past 15 years other than Wayland, which, I've been running for 4+ years and know what is BS and what isn't (DM me and I'll screen share stream my desktop at arbitrary scale factors at 240hz). I can run Gnome2, I can run kde3 for gods sake. Meanwhile there's crapware discussed here weekly just trying to get a basic Start Menu back in Win11, or constant complaints about ads, or regressions or ON and ON; do y'all have ANY self respect? Stockholm syndrome, laziness, take your pick, it's exhausting.

alberth 3y ago

Windows LTSC (no ads / bloatware) + SimpleClassicTheme + RetroBar is about as perfect as it gets. https://youtube.com/watch?v=1_7pqwf-gZM&feature=sharea https://youtube.com/watch?v=1_7pqwf-gZM&feature=sharea

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]