4 ms·

Well, it's a mix. There are a ton of captive Windows users, corporate employees, gamers, people working with Microsoft technologies, etc. But there are also ex

by oblio 3y ago

Well, it's a mix. There are a ton of captive Windows users, corporate employees, gamers, people working with Microsoft technologies, etc. But there are also experienced Windows users and frankly a lot of the garbage added isn't that big of a deal. Yeah, it requires a bunch of configuration work, but after a few hours you can get Windows to more or less work how it's always worked.

dataflow 3y ago
> But there are also experienced Windows users and frankly a lot of the garbage added isn't that big of a deal. I've been exactly one of those users, at least until Win10. I'm dreading 11.
- munk-a 3y ago
  Windows 11 broke basic task bar customization - how do you so completely ignore your users? Pinning my taskbar to the side of my monitor is the hill I'll die on.
  - acquacow 3y ago
    They have been putting features back into it each update though. We finally have the ability to ungroup open task bar entries again/etc.
    - magicalhippo 3y ago
      I got a new work laptop just before xmas, and since I'll mostly be using it to RDP to my workstation I figured it was time to give Windows 11 a whirl. I'd been holding off primarily due to the taskbar stuff, and was pleasantly surprised that the grouping options were back, and there was an option to move the start button to the left. A couple of minutes of customizations and it now feels quite familiar. Only thing that slightly annoys me is the icon-only elements in the Windows Explorer context menu for copy/paste. Back in the days the saying was to never install Windows until the second service pack was released. I guess the same still applies, just without the service pack name.
  - bluecalm 3y ago
    It's not 100% reliable but there is a nice script called buttery taskbar. Check it out, it makes taskbar situation manageable. You just need to restart it sometimes.
  - philistine 3y ago
    I've been on a Mac since 2007, with my Dock on the side of my screen since the second I got my first iMac. If they ever prevented me from putting my Dock on the side, I would stop buying their products. I feel your pain.
ekianjo 3y ago
> but after a few hours you can get Windows to more or less work how it's always worked. until the next update rolls out
- oblio 3y ago
  There's a nag screen every 4? 6 months? It takes me about 5 minutes to take care of it. Oh, I'm fairly sure I have the Pro edition. Hardly anything life changing or that would require a ton more work to set up a new workstation, instead.
  - jdewerd 3y ago
    "Just ignore the cloud features, it's fine." "Just ignore the ads, it's fine." "Just unplug ethernet during setup to get the option to ignore the cloud features, it's fine." "Just edit the registry to ignore the cloud features, it's fine." (sound of boiling water increases)
    - oblio 3y ago
      > (sound of boiling water increases) There's a chance I die before the water boils over.
      - ekianjo 3y ago
        Famous last words
  - kibwen 3y ago
    The joke from Windows users used to be "Linux is only free if your time has no value." The irony there is that I've spent more time in the past 12 months fighting to get software working on Windows than on Linux (and it was Xbox Game Pass, which is from Microsoft themselves!).
    - Calavar 3y ago
      Yep. Microsoft has forgotten what their value proposition for Windows is. Once they started to see it as a tool that extracts value and not a product that provides value, everything started to go downhill. I think there is a real opening for a startup company that can create a Linux Distro that is Wine centric, letting users migrate over and still use all their current Windows software.
eightysixfour 3y ago
> But there are also experienced Windows users and frankly a lot of the garbage added isn't that big of a deal. Yeah, it requires a bunch of configuration work, but after a few hours you can get Windows to more or less work how it's always worked. Yeah, people like to complain about the amount of time they spend getting Windows to work they want, but they’re willing to spend hours trying to get sleep to work in Linux. There are plenty of scripts out there to disable as much or as little of the telemetry and everything else as you want, using the Pro or Enterprise editions lets you skip the cloud, and then it just… works. There’s a certain give and take with all OSes about how much you adapt to it and how much it adapts to you. At work I use a Mac, I have two Linux servers in my closet, and my personal machine runs Windows. They’re each the right tool for their respective jobs, for me.
- fsflover 3y ago
  > but they’re willing to spend hours trying to get sleep to work in Linux. There is no need to set up the sleep for Linux if you choose a supported hardware and not a Windows-certified one. Complaining that Linux doesn't work on the latter is like complaining that MacOS doesn't work on it.
  - eightysixfour 3y ago
    I wish I had written this into the original comment because I knew someone would say this. No it isn’t - MacOS and Macs are a singular product sold together. Windows and Linux are OSes that are downloadable from the web or buyable from stores and Windows consumer hardware support is simply better. And that’s okay, there are people who will seek devices that support it better, but I am not one of them, I will just virtualize it or run it in WSL. If Linux had 30% desktop market share that would change, but it doesn’t. FWIW, I agree with most criticisms of Windows. It is clear Microsoft no longer treats Windows the OS as a product, they treat every individual piece of it as a product, and that’s resulting in some weird, ugly, user hostile shit, but I can still get rid of it in no time at all and have a better personal OS. I think of it like adding unlock to a browser. If it continues down its current path, I may be willing to switch, but it hasn’t passed the value/pain curve point for me yet.

by oblio 3y ago

dataflow 3y ago

> But there are also experienced Windows users and frankly a lot of the garbage added isn't that big of a deal. I've been exactly one of those users, at least until Win10. I'm dreading 11.

munk-a 3y ago
Windows 11 broke basic task bar customization - how do you so completely ignore your users? Pinning my taskbar to the side of my monitor is the hill I'll die on.
- acquacow 3y ago
  They have been putting features back into it each update though. We finally have the ability to ungroup open task bar entries again/etc.
  - magicalhippo 3y ago
    I got a new work laptop just before xmas, and since I'll mostly be using it to RDP to my workstation I figured it was time to give Windows 11 a whirl. I'd been holding off primarily due to the taskbar stuff, and was pleasantly surprised that the grouping options were back, and there was an option to move the start button to the left. A couple of minutes of customizations and it now feels quite familiar. Only thing that slightly annoys me is the icon-only elements in the Windows Explorer context menu for copy/paste. Back in the days the saying was to never install Windows until the second service pack was released. I guess the same still applies, just without the service pack name.
- bluecalm 3y ago
  It's not 100% reliable but there is a nice script called buttery taskbar. Check it out, it makes taskbar situation manageable. You just need to restart it sometimes.
- philistine 3y ago
  I've been on a Mac since 2007, with my Dock on the side of my screen since the second I got my first iMac. If they ever prevented me from putting my Dock on the side, I would stop buying their products. I feel your pain.

ekianjo 3y ago

> but after a few hours you can get Windows to more or less work how it's always worked. until the next update rolls out

oblio 3y ago
There's a nag screen every 4? 6 months? It takes me about 5 minutes to take care of it. Oh, I'm fairly sure I have the Pro edition. Hardly anything life changing or that would require a ton more work to set up a new workstation, instead.
- jdewerd 3y ago
  "Just ignore the cloud features, it's fine." "Just ignore the ads, it's fine." "Just unplug ethernet during setup to get the option to ignore the cloud features, it's fine." "Just edit the registry to ignore the cloud features, it's fine." (sound of boiling water increases)
  - oblio 3y ago
    > (sound of boiling water increases) There's a chance I die before the water boils over.
    - ekianjo 3y ago
      Famous last words
- kibwen 3y ago
  The joke from Windows users used to be "Linux is only free if your time has no value." The irony there is that I've spent more time in the past 12 months fighting to get software working on Windows than on Linux (and it was Xbox Game Pass, which is from Microsoft themselves!).
  - Calavar 3y ago
    Yep. Microsoft has forgotten what their value proposition for Windows is. Once they started to see it as a tool that extracts value and not a product that provides value, everything started to go downhill. I think there is a real opening for a startup company that can create a Linux Distro that is Wine centric, letting users migrate over and still use all their current Windows software.

eightysixfour 3y ago

> But there are also experienced Windows users and frankly a lot of the garbage added isn't that big of a deal. Yeah, it requires a bunch of configuration work, but after a few hours you can get Windows to more or less work how it's always worked. Yeah, people like to complain about the amount of time they spend getting Windows to work they want, but they’re willing to spend hours trying to get sleep to work in Linux. There are plenty of scripts out there to disable as much or as little of the telemetry and everything else as you want, using the Pro or Enterprise editions lets you skip the cloud, and then it just… works. There’s a certain give and take with all OSes about how much you adapt to it and how much it adapts to you. At work I use a Mac, I have two Linux servers in my closet, and my personal machine runs Windows. They’re each the right tool for their respective jobs, for me.

fsflover 3y ago
> but they’re willing to spend hours trying to get sleep to work in Linux. There is no need to set up the sleep for Linux if you choose a supported hardware and not a Windows-certified one. Complaining that Linux doesn't work on the latter is like complaining that MacOS doesn't work on it.
- eightysixfour 3y ago
  I wish I had written this into the original comment because I knew someone would say this. No it isn’t - MacOS and Macs are a singular product sold together. Windows and Linux are OSes that are downloadable from the web or buyable from stores and Windows consumer hardware support is simply better. And that’s okay, there are people who will seek devices that support it better, but I am not one of them, I will just virtualize it or run it in WSL. If Linux had 30% desktop market share that would change, but it doesn’t. FWIW, I agree with most criticisms of Windows. It is clear Microsoft no longer treats Windows the OS as a product, they treat every individual piece of it as a product, and that’s resulting in some weird, ugly, user hostile shit, but I can still get rid of it in no time at all and have a better personal OS. I think of it like adding unlock to a browser. If it continues down its current path, I may be willing to switch, but it hasn’t passed the value/pain curve point for me yet.