8 ms·

Recall going back into Windows

110 points by cratermoon 2y ago

throw310822 2y ago
Yeah. And yet the ability to remember and recall your activity is a fantastic feature for almost all users. The times of operating a dumb machine that has no episodic memory and no context awareness are over. Of course this poses a new gigantic set of problems, but they will need to be eventually solved. A question that comes to mind is this: can we give machines intelligence and memory, without extending to them at least the rights of their owners or operators? For example, if my computer starts recognising me and storing episodic memory of past interactions, these memories should be considered as private as those of a person.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- cratermoon 2y ago
  To borrow a turn of a phrase from Charles Babbage, I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such an assertion.
  - throw310822 2y ago
    Maybe you could try to express yourself in your own words. Let's separate the two aspects, usefulness and risks, and argue: 1) why is this not a useful feature 2) do you really expect computers in the future to remain dumb tools without episodic memory and contextual awareness 3) if you answered no to 2), then how do you imagine the privacy and surveillance concerns can be solved? Or all you care about is sticking to your old dumb calculator, muttering "over my dead body", while the rest of society moves on?
    - cratermoon 2y ago
      Can you please elaborate on "episodic memory and contextual awareness"? Those words sound like a confusion of ideas with about as much substance as marketing copy for a vaporware.
      - throw310822 2y ago
        Episodic memory: remembering your past actions and things that happened to you. Contextual awareness: integrating the information you have with your understanding of what is happening. Absolutely trivial examples of interactions requiring them: "where did I put that file I was working on yesterday?" "Can you reopen that web page I was reading last week about Egyptians, the one with the red background?" "What is this notification, is it something important?" "Delete the intermediate versions and keep only the final one" Etc.
        cratermoon 2y ago
        I can do all those things now, and I don't need a hyperscale copyright theft and climate-destroying linear algebra calculator to do it.
- nhinck3 2y ago
  [flagged]
Bender 2y ago
Have any other popular operating systems implemented something similar recently? If so that would be quite the tell that Microsoft are being coerced into this.
- cududa 2y ago
  I mean Apple is attempting to implement “Siri personal context”/ originally expected to ship it in March -/ seemed similar to recall.
  - LinuxBender 2y ago
    Sounds related. So now we must summon the combined power of HN to find the simplest way to hobble this behavior on Mac and Windows without entirely breaking the OS itself and that our overlords would find entertaining.
    - walterbell 2y ago
      Siri can be disabled on iOS and MacOS by Apple Configurator MDM, which generates an XML policy file that can also be generated by any text editor or shell script.
    - Aurornis 2y ago
      > So now we must summon the combined power of HN to find the simplest way to hobble this behavior on Mac and Windows without entirely breaking the OS itself Hopefully the combined power of HN can figure out how to not enable this opt-in feature.
      - Bender 2y ago
        Hopefully the combined power of HN can figure out how to not enable this opt-in feature. Feature toggles like this can be enabled on a single OS update, a single dial-home to the mother-ship. If the code is there I assume it is running. The only winning move is not to play. So ... a bit off topic, but I want the opposite from OS vendors. The OS installation should take at most 3 minutes. Any features or geese that lay golden eggs that I desire should be a checkbox in a list of optional services. If I do not select anything the OS should not be bigger than 3GB for a desktop or 1GB for a server and even that is quite a bit bloated. If code is discovered on a machine that the administrator or owner did not intentionally install that needs to be treated as a security incident meaning "all hands on deck" and "all lawyers on a conference call with the OS vendor". As a bit of a tangent, done right I should be able to click a button in Ansible and completely re-install the OS to a fleet of 100K bare metal servers in less than 10 minutes across 4 data-centers per region not counting POST time. Once the database OS is up their tamper-proof backups automatically restore, app servers grab their code and in 30 minutes every data-center is up and running. The first people in should be the customers and they might ask if we had a network blip. That comment was for CISA. Make the above step 1 in chaos monkey tests for all corporations and governments and make live testing required by law to be publicly traded. This testing must be performed annually in a staging environment in every data-center to remain listed on the stock market or remain funded in government budgets. If code exists on a machine that need not be there it's a security incident. Let's not have another Sony/Tri-Star.
Henchman21 2y ago
Well, that'll be the straw that broke the camel's back for me. Its bad enough I get ads for games in the notification area in Win10 -- even though I have it all disabled through group policy. Looks like this finally is the year of the Linux Desktop!
- tgmatt 2y ago
  As someone that ditched Windows for Linux over a year ago, I have to say I haven't really looked back. I can do anything I need to, and I don't need to worry about all this garbage. I can play all the games I want to play, even brand new releases, usually with little to no tinkering. If you're technically minded, and are at least somewhat familiar with Linux, I can't recommend it enough. I wouldn't recommend it for a layman though; I did have to do some initial tinkering to get it spot on.
  - xethos 2y ago
    > I wouldn't recommend it for a layman though; I did have to do some initial tinkering to get it spot on. The flip side of this is that regular computer users don't actually have preferences nearly as strong as anyone browsing this site. If one is technical enough to have an operating system preference, they're technical enough to manage Linux Mint. It may not be their preference, but they'll be able to manage As always, the only groups that're really in trouble are "Knows just enough to be a danger to themselves and is entirely unwilling to learn something new", and those that depend on poorly supported, or unsupported, specialty hardware or software
    - cosmic_cheese 2y ago
      I would second the recommendation for Mint, or really any distribution that includes Cinnamon as its default DE (as long as it’s not a bleeding edge distro like Arch). Cinnamon is probably the closest out of the box approximation to a traditional Windows desktop out there, leaning more towards Windows 7 than 8 and beyond. I’m sure there’s a KDE fan writing up a reply right now, and while it’s also Windows-like, it’s considerably more indiosyncratic than Cinnamon is and has a bunch of bells and whistles that while great for power users have a decent chance of tripping up novices. Cinnamon doesn’t rock the boat at all which is exactly what makes it appealing here.
defrost 2y ago
On Thursday, the company said it was reintroducing Recall. It currently is available only to insiders with access to the Windows 11 Build 26100.3902 preview version. Some of those insiders with preview will also be active contributors (200+ contributors, 6 million users) to the Chris Titus Winutil project, an open source PowerShell GUI collection of open scripts and registry toggles to streamline common installs, sanity restrict updates, control windows features (such as Recall), access classic control panels, and custom build your own tweaked install ISOs and clean VM images. Good for gamers, developers, custom minimal window images, etc. ( "The best thing you can do for a gamer is strip everything non-essential from the OS" .. which is exactly what winutil streamlines and simplifies - along with a wealth of other user chooses options. The MicroWin tab allows a user to create their own minimal stripped out install ISO ) See: https://github.com/ChrisTitusTech/winutil https://github.com/ChrisTitusTech/winutil Improved for 2024 (18 mins): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_AaHXrelTE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_AaHXrelTE Windows Utility in 2025 (7 mins) (Addresses upcoming Recall V2 release): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuaNw8Tpn7Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuaNw8Tpn7Q
- shepherdjerred 2y ago
  LTSC is also a good alternative https://massgrave.dev/windows_ltsc_links https://massgrave.dev/windows_ltsc_links
  - throwaway48476 2y ago
    Ltsc is much better but the rot had spread to the core os, Explorer is laggy and artifacts when you scroll.
- bradac56 2y ago
  Good for gamers? You must not actually play any games. The best thing you can do for a gamer is strip everything non-essential from the OS and let us enjoy the damn game. Windows used to be a great gaming platform but now I run nearly everything in ZorinOS except for Tarkov which has it's own hardware sandboxed stripped down Win11 drive.
- 2y ago
AceJohnny2 2y ago
Companies run Windows 11, right? How do they control what features are enabled? How can users leverage that control?
- walterbell 2y ago
  Group Policy?
- beefnugs 2y ago
  Hard to say that many even do really, hardware manufacturers in POS and medical are still shipping win10 IOT
vachina 2y ago
You can fix this by switching your primary computing device to Mac or Debian based PC.
- mmcnl 2y ago
  And what about Apple Intelligence that "draws on your personal context" and actually outright admits your data is going to the cloud? (There's no such thing as "private cloud". It's still someone else's computer which you can't operate yourself.) How is that better?
  - ZeroTalent 2y ago
    Apple Intelligence and Siri are opt-in.
    - mmcnl 2y ago
      So is Recall.
      - vachina 2y ago
        If you’ve used a fresh copy of Windows you’ll know how aggressive their opt-in menus are. Its like browsing a ad-laden pornsite.
        ZeroTalent 2y ago
        In my experience, the only Windows flavor I can use is LTSC.
Animats 2y ago
Is this something Homeland Security demanded?
- blitzar 2y ago
  Its worse than that ... Corporate customers demanded it for employee "monitoring and metrics".
walterbell 2y ago
How did we get here? A 20-year lifelog. 2003, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA_LifeLog https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA_LifeLog >The objective of the LifeLog concept was "to be able to trace the 'threads' of an individual's life in terms of events, states, and relationships", and it has the ability to "take in all of a subject's experience, from phone numbers dialed and e-mail messages viewed to every breath taken, step made and place gone". 2007 Microsoft Research, https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/video/the-microsoft-sensecam-and-other-lifelogging-devices/ https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/video/the-microsoft... > The SenseCam is a personal, wearable camera developed by Microsoft Research in Cambridge, UK, and used as a lifelogging device in projects like MyLifeBits.. based on wearing the SenseCam for lifelogging of ‘events’ during your day, and generating a fast-forward movie of the event as the memory recall interface. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/project/mylifebits/ https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/project/mylifebits/ & https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MyLifeBits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MyLifeBits > MyLifeBits is a life-logging experiment begun in 2001. It is a Microsoft Research project inspired by Vannevar Bush's hypothetical Memex computer system.. The "experimental subject" of the project is computer scientist Gordon Bell.. For this, Bell has digitized all documents he has read or produced, CDs, emails, and so on. He continues to do so, gathering web pages browsed, phone and instant messaging conversations and the like more or less automatically. The book Total Recall describes the vision and implications for a personal, lifetime e-memory for recall, work, health, education, and immortality. Lifelogging has been referenced by 10,000+ academic papers over two decades, https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=lifelogging https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=lifelogging
- LinuxBender 2y ago
  Here [1] is a documentary that talks about LifeLog and the origin of other related platforms as well. [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3Xxi0b9trY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3Xxi0b9trY [video][44 mins][documentary]
- wmf 2y ago
  I'm also reminded of Gelernter's Lifestreams.
chinathrow 2y ago
They (MSFT) really have no shame at all. I really need to switch my parents to Linux...
- sexy_seedbox 2y ago
  The recent push to shove Copilot down your throat in every Microsoft product does not help.
- orionblastar 2y ago
  When my father was alive (He died in 2010), I gave him a Linspire Live CD to boot if Windows XP ever failed for him. He used to work with AT&T as a phone installer and worked with 1ESS computers and UNIX. He liked Linspire Linux, and I paid for a license. It looked like Windows, so it was easy to adapt to the GUI, and he knew what to do in a Linux CLI shell. I got a Windows 10 PC that takes 30 minutes to boot up, and bought a $2000 Windows 11 PC from Microcenter to replace it. I will install Debian Linux on the Windows 10 PC when Windows 10 expires in October 2025.
  - MLij 2y ago
    For me AppData\Local\Temp in the users folder was the culprit with slow boot. Deleting it solved it for me. It probably is safe to delete, but check https://superuser.com/questions/571901/is-it-safe-to-delete-appdata-local-temp https://superuser.com/questions/571901/is-it-safe-to-delete-.... That said, I'll probably ditch Windows as well if I can find a suitable solution for remote desktop.
- erikerikson 2y ago
  Mine have lived Chromebooks
dangus 2y ago
Not only is this article light on content but I think it's actively disingenuous. First off, the title is editorializing users' reaction to the feature. Apparently even the 99% of Windows users who have never heard of Windows Recall (a preview feature not even available yet and not even compatible with most people's existing PC hardware) are "groaning" over it. But I'm sure if I sit here and argue that people will like the feature it would be a lame argument, and I might even agree with you. Still, the other problem with the article is that it brings up factually challenging issues with the feature: > First, even if User A never opts in to Recall, they have no control over the setting on the machines of Users B through Z. This isn't a problem unique to an AI feature. If you send intimate photos or passwords to someone else in the pre-AI world that was still a big security problem. Windows Recall does not meaningfully expand the risk of those actions. > That level of detailed archival material will undoubtedly be subject to subpoena by lawyers and governments. If a government or a subpoena gains access to your system, the presence of an AI categorization system is not going to make any meaningful difference to their ability to extract data stored on it. Those types of actors have their own analysis tools that probably won't even bother with Recall as they are almost certainly more sophisticated. Not only that, you can say the same things about standard backups: anyone taking a standard not-AI-enabled backup like Time Machine or Windows Backup would have the exact same problem of having previously deleted data available for search and seizure. The typical person's cloud data exposure is arguably much worse than Recall since it's physically stored on someone else's server, a company who may comply with subpoenas where you might choose not to, which Recall snapshots only exist on your local machine. But, okay, let's say you're still not on board with my arguments. I think the last argument I have to make is the biggest problem of this article, which is that it's operating under the base assumption that Microsoft hasn't thought of any of this. > Threat actors who manage to get their spyware installed on a device will no longer have to scour it for the most sensitive data stored there. Instead they will mine Recall just as they do browser databases storing passwords now. The article is just assuming that Microsoft has done nothing to secure this especially since the last time they pulled the feature. But Microsoft has a very detailed page that gets into how this all works: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/privacy-and-control-over-your-recall-experience-d404f672-7647-41e5-886c-a3c59680af15 https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/privacy-and-cont... This article points out: 1. Processing and data storage is local 2. The user has control full control over all the settings and they're secured (cannot be changed without authenticating with Windows Hello) 3. There is a huge list of exceptions where content is excluded from snapshots (e.g., incognito browsing, passwords, etc). 4. Saving, deleting, and all features related to the > No internet or cloud connections are required or used to save and analyze snapshots. Snapshots and associated data are stored locally on the device. Recall does not share snapshots or associated data with Microsoft or third parties, nor is it shared between different Windows users on the same device. Windows will ask for your permission before saving snapshots. You are always in control, and you can delete snapshots, pause or turn them off at any time. Any future options for the user to share data will require fully informed explicit action by the user. But this article is just interested in producing drama and calling a new feature that actually has unique functionality and zero dependence on cloud "enshittification." Okay, if you say so!
nextworddev 2y ago
Wait people are complaining about this but not OpenAI’s memory feature?
- booder1 2y ago
  Cause OpenAI is not installed by default as part of your operating system?
- SirMaster 2y ago
  Because OpenAI memory can be turned off and is not necessary to use at all? But the whole point of recall is to store and remember past information. Plus you have a lot more control of what you send to OpenAI with memory enabled, and you can even temporarily disable it. With recall on it's just taking random screenshots and you don't really know what it was all given. I dunno, it doesn't feel like the same thing at all to me.
  - Aurornis 2y ago
    > Because OpenAI memory can be turned off and is not necessary to use at all? This Windows feature is opt-in, off by default, and not necessary at all. Are all of these angry comments from people assuming it just comes enabled?
    - eviks 2y ago
      Or assuming having it installed everywhere increases the chance of it becoming enabled
    - cratermoon 2y ago
      You'll be opted in against your will by people who have it on their machines, any time you electronically interact with them.
asperous 2y ago
It appears this will be an opt in feature. Honestly it will probably help some people "hey where did I put that file?" but yes at a tremendous cost to privacy and security for those who use it. I am also weary that it is opt in "for now".
- eviks 2y ago
  How will it help there? It will just make stuff up. In the meantime you already have tools for instant search by name and more complicated option with content search
- Gigachad 2y ago
  Microsoft’s idea of consent is “Yes” and “Ask me again tomorrow”
  - hulitu 2y ago
    > Microsoft’s idea of consent is “Yes” and “Ask me again tomorrow” Not only Microsoft's. I think Google were the first who introduced this crap. Now everybody is using it because users don't matter. I think the UX of the future is: Please enter your card number and let us take what we want.
- darth_avocado 2y ago
  Okay but that doesn’t help if it is a corporate laptop and the corporation requires you to opt in. Then somehow abuses the recall feature at every point? Took a 5 min break? Fired for cause 1 day before you get your bonus. Took a few mins longer to complete a task? Withhold promotion for another year. Opt in isn’t really opt in.
  - kyriakos 2y ago
    Corporations already do that, they don't need recall. The amount of spy ware disguised as security software that comes installed by IT on a corporate laptop is insane. You have to experience it to understand.
- 2y ago
geor9e 2y ago
I love it. I am going to enable it immediately. Bring on the new paradigms.
fluidcruft 2y ago
This seems like an add-on feature people should have to purchase. I don't understand how Microsoft can keep shoveling shit at us that we don't want to buy.
- throwaway48476 2y ago
  But then basically no one would buy it.
  - fluidcruft 2y ago
    Perhaps Microsoft should redirect their efforts toward features people do want to buy.
    - hulitu 2y ago
      > Perhaps Microsoft should redirect their efforts toward features people do want to buy. Or fixing bugs...
throwaway48476 2y ago
Windows is so horrifically slow now. Somehow they added input lag to notepad and Explorer. Microsoft got rid of all the competent people years ago so now every new feature or product is electron based and bolted on. No one there is capable of refactoring core apps like office. It would have been better if they'd done nothing. I've switched to mac and linux.
- watermelon0 2y ago
  They rewrote Notepad a few years ago. IIRC it's still possible to get back the original notepad.exe. Additionally, they managed to refactor Outlook to Electron/webapp, which allows them to share the codebase between Windows/macOS/web, and deliver unified experience ... which might be a downgrade for Windows/macOS users.
  - throwaway48476 2y ago
    They also removed outlook features from the 'classic' edition.
vijucat 2y ago
I blocked Windows Update on my Windows 10 when I heard that they are removing the feature where you click on the time and it shows a clock with seconds. This has to be the most patently malicious jab at users to make them switch to Windows 11. I am sure this will be ineffective since Windows often bypasses your attempts at stopping Windows Update. Frustrating to say the least.
stevetron 2y ago
Recall sounds like the kind of innovation that would come from the Trump administration or the DOGE team. Except I can't imagine the Trump administration would be this creative.
xyzal 2y ago
They must have some secondary intentions I guess. Like implementing capability for 'summarize daily activities of my subordinates and mark the least productive ones'.
dustypotato 2y ago
Funny but google silently rolled a feature like this on Android already and somehow it went under the radar
- an_guy 2y ago
  What is it?
  - shpx 2y ago
    It's not the same. Android will "save and process helpful details" of screenshots you've taken. Windows Recall automatically takes a screenshot every 3 seconds (and also "processes helpful details"). https://www.theverge.com/2024/7/2/24190730/google-ai-pixel-phones-recall-like-feature https://www.theverge.com/2024/7/2/24190730/google-ai-pixel-p...
replete 2y ago
Recall was enabled by default for me on a fresh windows 11 pro installation back in October. A couple of months ago I opened the Clock app in an important meeting, to run a timer, and had to wait 10 minutes for it to update itself. For real. Same thing happened when I opened sound recorder. It's probably not going to get better at this point. It's only going to have increasing amounts of online services integrated into the OS. The writing was on the wall when Windows 10 Enterprise shipped with Candy Crush
_Algernon_ 2y ago
Switching all my personal computing to Linux at Windows 7 EoL keeps paying dividends.
akho 2y ago
Seems like an interesting feature. It’s not easy to see how this is immediately useful; people in this comments section are complaining that this is not a feature they’d pay for, but it looks like something that becomes seriously useful only after years of runtime and terabytes of screenshots. These kinds of things cannot be sold. On the one hand, MS Research seems to have a long history with lifelogging. On the other, MS aren’t capable of implementing decent search in Outlook; I very much doubt their ability to do the same in this more complicated setting. I don’t think Windows has any privacy-conscious users at this point (outside corp contracts where this will be limited), and they generally seem to be doing everything they can to get out of the home market, so the moment is chosen well.
- hulitu 2y ago
  > but it looks like something that becomes seriously useful only after years of runtime and terabytes of screenshots. Yes, it is useful, but not for the user, for the CIA.

110 points by cratermoon 2y ago

Yeah. And yet the ability to remember and recall your activity is a fantastic feature for almost all users. The times of operating a dumb machine that has no episodic memory and no context awareness are over. Of course this poses a new gigantic set of problems, but they will need to be eventually solved. A question that comes to mind is this: can we give machines intelligence and memory, without extending to them at least the rights of their owners or operators? For example, if my computer starts recognising me and storing episodic memory of past interactions, these memories should be considered as private as those of a person.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
cratermoon 2y ago
To borrow a turn of a phrase from Charles Babbage, I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such an assertion.
- throw310822 2y ago
  Maybe you could try to express yourself in your own words. Let's separate the two aspects, usefulness and risks, and argue: 1) why is this not a useful feature 2) do you really expect computers in the future to remain dumb tools without episodic memory and contextual awareness 3) if you answered no to 2), then how do you imagine the privacy and surveillance concerns can be solved? Or all you care about is sticking to your old dumb calculator, muttering "over my dead body", while the rest of society moves on?
  - cratermoon 2y ago
    Can you please elaborate on "episodic memory and contextual awareness"? Those words sound like a confusion of ideas with about as much substance as marketing copy for a vaporware.
    - throw310822 2y ago
      Episodic memory: remembering your past actions and things that happened to you. Contextual awareness: integrating the information you have with your understanding of what is happening. Absolutely trivial examples of interactions requiring them: "where did I put that file I was working on yesterday?" "Can you reopen that web page I was reading last week about Egyptians, the one with the red background?" "What is this notification, is it something important?" "Delete the intermediate versions and keep only the final one" Etc.
      - cratermoon 2y ago
        I can do all those things now, and I don't need a hyperscale copyright theft and climate-destroying linear algebra calculator to do it.
nhinck3 2y ago
[flagged]

Bender 2y ago

Have any other popular operating systems implemented something similar recently? If so that would be quite the tell that Microsoft are being coerced into this.

cududa 2y ago
I mean Apple is attempting to implement “Siri personal context”/ originally expected to ship it in March -/ seemed similar to recall.
- LinuxBender 2y ago
  Sounds related. So now we must summon the combined power of HN to find the simplest way to hobble this behavior on Mac and Windows without entirely breaking the OS itself and that our overlords would find entertaining.
  - walterbell 2y ago
    Siri can be disabled on iOS and MacOS by Apple Configurator MDM, which generates an XML policy file that can also be generated by any text editor or shell script.
  - Aurornis 2y ago
    > So now we must summon the combined power of HN to find the simplest way to hobble this behavior on Mac and Windows without entirely breaking the OS itself Hopefully the combined power of HN can figure out how to not enable this opt-in feature.
    - Bender 2y ago
      Hopefully the combined power of HN can figure out how to not enable this opt-in feature. Feature toggles like this can be enabled on a single OS update, a single dial-home to the mother-ship. If the code is there I assume it is running. The only winning move is not to play. So ... a bit off topic, but I want the opposite from OS vendors. The OS installation should take at most 3 minutes. Any features or geese that lay golden eggs that I desire should be a checkbox in a list of optional services. If I do not select anything the OS should not be bigger than 3GB for a desktop or 1GB for a server and even that is quite a bit bloated. If code is discovered on a machine that the administrator or owner did not intentionally install that needs to be treated as a security incident meaning "all hands on deck" and "all lawyers on a conference call with the OS vendor". As a bit of a tangent, done right I should be able to click a button in Ansible and completely re-install the OS to a fleet of 100K bare metal servers in less than 10 minutes across 4 data-centers per region not counting POST time. Once the database OS is up their tamper-proof backups automatically restore, app servers grab their code and in 30 minutes every data-center is up and running. The first people in should be the customers and they might ask if we had a network blip. That comment was for CISA. Make the above step 1 in chaos monkey tests for all corporations and governments and make live testing required by law to be publicly traded. This testing must be performed annually in a staging environment in every data-center to remain listed on the stock market or remain funded in government budgets. If code exists on a machine that need not be there it's a security incident. Let's not have another Sony/Tri-Star.

Henchman21 2y ago

Well, that'll be the straw that broke the camel's back for me. Its bad enough I get ads for games in the notification area in Win10 -- even though I have it all disabled through group policy. Looks like this finally is the year of the Linux Desktop!

tgmatt 2y ago
As someone that ditched Windows for Linux over a year ago, I have to say I haven't really looked back. I can do anything I need to, and I don't need to worry about all this garbage. I can play all the games I want to play, even brand new releases, usually with little to no tinkering. If you're technically minded, and are at least somewhat familiar with Linux, I can't recommend it enough. I wouldn't recommend it for a layman though; I did have to do some initial tinkering to get it spot on.
- xethos 2y ago
  > I wouldn't recommend it for a layman though; I did have to do some initial tinkering to get it spot on. The flip side of this is that regular computer users don't actually have preferences nearly as strong as anyone browsing this site. If one is technical enough to have an operating system preference, they're technical enough to manage Linux Mint. It may not be their preference, but they'll be able to manage As always, the only groups that're really in trouble are "Knows just enough to be a danger to themselves and is entirely unwilling to learn something new", and those that depend on poorly supported, or unsupported, specialty hardware or software
  - cosmic_cheese 2y ago
    I would second the recommendation for Mint, or really any distribution that includes Cinnamon as its default DE (as long as it’s not a bleeding edge distro like Arch). Cinnamon is probably the closest out of the box approximation to a traditional Windows desktop out there, leaning more towards Windows 7 than 8 and beyond. I’m sure there’s a KDE fan writing up a reply right now, and while it’s also Windows-like, it’s considerably more indiosyncratic than Cinnamon is and has a bunch of bells and whistles that while great for power users have a decent chance of tripping up novices. Cinnamon doesn’t rock the boat at all which is exactly what makes it appealing here.

defrost 2y ago

On Thursday, the company said it was reintroducing Recall. It currently is available only to insiders with access to the Windows 11 Build 26100.3902 preview version. Some of those insiders with preview will also be active contributors (200+ contributors, 6 million users) to the Chris Titus Winutil project, an open source PowerShell GUI collection of open scripts and registry toggles to streamline common installs, sanity restrict updates, control windows features (such as Recall), access classic control panels, and custom build your own tweaked install ISOs and clean VM images. Good for gamers, developers, custom minimal window images, etc. ( "The best thing you can do for a gamer is strip everything non-essential from the OS" .. which is exactly what winutil streamlines and simplifies - along with a wealth of other user chooses options. The MicroWin tab allows a user to create their own minimal stripped out install ISO ) See: https://github.com/ChrisTitusTech/winutil https://github.com/ChrisTitusTech/winutil Improved for 2024 (18 mins): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_AaHXrelTE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_AaHXrelTE Windows Utility in 2025 (7 mins) (Addresses upcoming Recall V2 release): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuaNw8Tpn7Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuaNw8Tpn7Q

shepherdjerred 2y ago
LTSC is also a good alternative https://massgrave.dev/windows_ltsc_links https://massgrave.dev/windows_ltsc_links
- throwaway48476 2y ago
  Ltsc is much better but the rot had spread to the core os, Explorer is laggy and artifacts when you scroll.
bradac56 2y ago
Good for gamers? You must not actually play any games. The best thing you can do for a gamer is strip everything non-essential from the OS and let us enjoy the damn game. Windows used to be a great gaming platform but now I run nearly everything in ZorinOS except for Tarkov which has it's own hardware sandboxed stripped down Win11 drive.
2y ago

AceJohnny2 2y ago

Companies run Windows 11, right? How do they control what features are enabled? How can users leverage that control?

walterbell 2y ago
Group Policy?
beefnugs 2y ago
Hard to say that many even do really, hardware manufacturers in POS and medical are still shipping win10 IOT

vachina 2y ago

You can fix this by switching your primary computing device to Mac or Debian based PC.

mmcnl 2y ago
And what about Apple Intelligence that "draws on your personal context" and actually outright admits your data is going to the cloud? (There's no such thing as "private cloud". It's still someone else's computer which you can't operate yourself.) How is that better?
- ZeroTalent 2y ago
  Apple Intelligence and Siri are opt-in.
  - mmcnl 2y ago
    So is Recall.
    - vachina 2y ago
      If you’ve used a fresh copy of Windows you’ll know how aggressive their opt-in menus are. Its like browsing a ad-laden pornsite.
      - ZeroTalent 2y ago
        In my experience, the only Windows flavor I can use is LTSC.

Animats 2y ago

Is this something Homeland Security demanded?

blitzar 2y ago
Its worse than that ... Corporate customers demanded it for employee "monitoring and metrics".

walterbell 2y ago

How did we get here? A 20-year lifelog. 2003, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA_LifeLog https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA_LifeLog >The objective of the LifeLog concept was "to be able to trace the 'threads' of an individual's life in terms of events, states, and relationships", and it has the ability to "take in all of a subject's experience, from phone numbers dialed and e-mail messages viewed to every breath taken, step made and place gone". 2007 Microsoft Research, https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/video/the-microsoft-sensecam-and-other-lifelogging-devices/ https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/video/the-microsoft... > The SenseCam is a personal, wearable camera developed by Microsoft Research in Cambridge, UK, and used as a lifelogging device in projects like MyLifeBits.. based on wearing the SenseCam for lifelogging of ‘events’ during your day, and generating a fast-forward movie of the event as the memory recall interface. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/project/mylifebits/ https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/project/mylifebits/ & https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MyLifeBits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MyLifeBits > MyLifeBits is a life-logging experiment begun in 2001. It is a Microsoft Research project inspired by Vannevar Bush's hypothetical Memex computer system.. The "experimental subject" of the project is computer scientist Gordon Bell.. For this, Bell has digitized all documents he has read or produced, CDs, emails, and so on. He continues to do so, gathering web pages browsed, phone and instant messaging conversations and the like more or less automatically. The book Total Recall describes the vision and implications for a personal, lifetime e-memory for recall, work, health, education, and immortality. Lifelogging has been referenced by 10,000+ academic papers over two decades, https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=lifelogging https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=lifelogging

LinuxBender 2y ago
Here [1] is a documentary that talks about LifeLog and the origin of other related platforms as well. [1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3Xxi0b9trY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3Xxi0b9trY [video][44 mins][documentary]
wmf 2y ago
I'm also reminded of Gelernter's Lifestreams.

chinathrow 2y ago

They (MSFT) really have no shame at all. I really need to switch my parents to Linux...

sexy_seedbox 2y ago
The recent push to shove Copilot down your throat in every Microsoft product does not help.
orionblastar 2y ago
When my father was alive (He died in 2010), I gave him a Linspire Live CD to boot if Windows XP ever failed for him. He used to work with AT&T as a phone installer and worked with 1ESS computers and UNIX. He liked Linspire Linux, and I paid for a license. It looked like Windows, so it was easy to adapt to the GUI, and he knew what to do in a Linux CLI shell. I got a Windows 10 PC that takes 30 minutes to boot up, and bought a $2000 Windows 11 PC from Microcenter to replace it. I will install Debian Linux on the Windows 10 PC when Windows 10 expires in October 2025.
- MLij 2y ago
  For me AppData\Local\Temp in the users folder was the culprit with slow boot. Deleting it solved it for me. It probably is safe to delete, but check https://superuser.com/questions/571901/is-it-safe-to-delete-appdata-local-temp https://superuser.com/questions/571901/is-it-safe-to-delete-.... That said, I'll probably ditch Windows as well if I can find a suitable solution for remote desktop.
erikerikson 2y ago
Mine have lived Chromebooks

dangus 2y ago

Not only is this article light on content but I think it's actively disingenuous. First off, the title is editorializing users' reaction to the feature. Apparently even the 99% of Windows users who have never heard of Windows Recall (a preview feature not even available yet and not even compatible with most people's existing PC hardware) are "groaning" over it. But I'm sure if I sit here and argue that people will like the feature it would be a lame argument, and I might even agree with you. Still, the other problem with the article is that it brings up factually challenging issues with the feature: > First, even if User A never opts in to Recall, they have no control over the setting on the machines of Users B through Z. This isn't a problem unique to an AI feature. If you send intimate photos or passwords to someone else in the pre-AI world that was still a big security problem. Windows Recall does not meaningfully expand the risk of those actions. > That level of detailed archival material will undoubtedly be subject to subpoena by lawyers and governments. If a government or a subpoena gains access to your system, the presence of an AI categorization system is not going to make any meaningful difference to their ability to extract data stored on it. Those types of actors have their own analysis tools that probably won't even bother with Recall as they are almost certainly more sophisticated. Not only that, you can say the same things about standard backups: anyone taking a standard not-AI-enabled backup like Time Machine or Windows Backup would have the exact same problem of having previously deleted data available for search and seizure. The typical person's cloud data exposure is arguably much worse than Recall since it's physically stored on someone else's server, a company who may comply with subpoenas where you might choose not to, which Recall snapshots only exist on your local machine. But, okay, let's say you're still not on board with my arguments. I think the last argument I have to make is the biggest problem of this article, which is that it's operating under the base assumption that Microsoft hasn't thought of any of this. > Threat actors who manage to get their spyware installed on a device will no longer have to scour it for the most sensitive data stored there. Instead they will mine Recall just as they do browser databases storing passwords now. The article is just assuming that Microsoft has done nothing to secure this especially since the last time they pulled the feature. But Microsoft has a very detailed page that gets into how this all works: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/privacy-and-control-over-your-recall-experience-d404f672-7647-41e5-886c-a3c59680af15 https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/privacy-and-cont... This article points out: 1. Processing and data storage is local 2. The user has control full control over all the settings and they're secured (cannot be changed without authenticating with Windows Hello) 3. There is a huge list of exceptions where content is excluded from snapshots (e.g., incognito browsing, passwords, etc). 4. Saving, deleting, and all features related to the > No internet or cloud connections are required or used to save and analyze snapshots. Snapshots and associated data are stored locally on the device. Recall does not share snapshots or associated data with Microsoft or third parties, nor is it shared between different Windows users on the same device. Windows will ask for your permission before saving snapshots. You are always in control, and you can delete snapshots, pause or turn them off at any time. Any future options for the user to share data will require fully informed explicit action by the user. But this article is just interested in producing drama and calling a new feature that actually has unique functionality and zero dependence on cloud "enshittification." Okay, if you say so!

nextworddev 2y ago

Wait people are complaining about this but not OpenAI’s memory feature?

booder1 2y ago
Cause OpenAI is not installed by default as part of your operating system?
SirMaster 2y ago
Because OpenAI memory can be turned off and is not necessary to use at all? But the whole point of recall is to store and remember past information. Plus you have a lot more control of what you send to OpenAI with memory enabled, and you can even temporarily disable it. With recall on it's just taking random screenshots and you don't really know what it was all given. I dunno, it doesn't feel like the same thing at all to me.
- Aurornis 2y ago
  > Because OpenAI memory can be turned off and is not necessary to use at all? This Windows feature is opt-in, off by default, and not necessary at all. Are all of these angry comments from people assuming it just comes enabled?
  - eviks 2y ago
    Or assuming having it installed everywhere increases the chance of it becoming enabled
  - cratermoon 2y ago
    You'll be opted in against your will by people who have it on their machines, any time you electronically interact with them.

asperous 2y ago

It appears this will be an opt in feature. Honestly it will probably help some people "hey where did I put that file?" but yes at a tremendous cost to privacy and security for those who use it. I am also weary that it is opt in "for now".

eviks 2y ago
How will it help there? It will just make stuff up. In the meantime you already have tools for instant search by name and more complicated option with content search
Gigachad 2y ago
Microsoft’s idea of consent is “Yes” and “Ask me again tomorrow”
- hulitu 2y ago
  > Microsoft’s idea of consent is “Yes” and “Ask me again tomorrow” Not only Microsoft's. I think Google were the first who introduced this crap. Now everybody is using it because users don't matter. I think the UX of the future is: Please enter your card number and let us take what we want.
darth_avocado 2y ago
Okay but that doesn’t help if it is a corporate laptop and the corporation requires you to opt in. Then somehow abuses the recall feature at every point? Took a 5 min break? Fired for cause 1 day before you get your bonus. Took a few mins longer to complete a task? Withhold promotion for another year. Opt in isn’t really opt in.
- kyriakos 2y ago
  Corporations already do that, they don't need recall. The amount of spy ware disguised as security software that comes installed by IT on a corporate laptop is insane. You have to experience it to understand.
2y ago

geor9e 2y ago

I love it. I am going to enable it immediately. Bring on the new paradigms.

fluidcruft 2y ago

This seems like an add-on feature people should have to purchase. I don't understand how Microsoft can keep shoveling shit at us that we don't want to buy.

throwaway48476 2y ago
But then basically no one would buy it.
- fluidcruft 2y ago
  Perhaps Microsoft should redirect their efforts toward features people do want to buy.
  - hulitu 2y ago
    > Perhaps Microsoft should redirect their efforts toward features people do want to buy. Or fixing bugs...

throwaway48476 2y ago

Windows is so horrifically slow now. Somehow they added input lag to notepad and Explorer. Microsoft got rid of all the competent people years ago so now every new feature or product is electron based and bolted on. No one there is capable of refactoring core apps like office. It would have been better if they'd done nothing. I've switched to mac and linux.

watermelon0 2y ago
They rewrote Notepad a few years ago. IIRC it's still possible to get back the original notepad.exe. Additionally, they managed to refactor Outlook to Electron/webapp, which allows them to share the codebase between Windows/macOS/web, and deliver unified experience ... which might be a downgrade for Windows/macOS users.
- throwaway48476 2y ago
  They also removed outlook features from the 'classic' edition.

vijucat 2y ago

I blocked Windows Update on my Windows 10 when I heard that they are removing the feature where you click on the time and it shows a clock with seconds. This has to be the most patently malicious jab at users to make them switch to Windows 11. I am sure this will be ineffective since Windows often bypasses your attempts at stopping Windows Update. Frustrating to say the least.

stevetron 2y ago

Recall sounds like the kind of innovation that would come from the Trump administration or the DOGE team. Except I can't imagine the Trump administration would be this creative.

xyzal 2y ago

They must have some secondary intentions I guess. Like implementing capability for 'summarize daily activities of my subordinates and mark the least productive ones'.

dustypotato 2y ago

Funny but google silently rolled a feature like this on Android already and somehow it went under the radar

an_guy 2y ago
What is it?
- shpx 2y ago
  It's not the same. Android will "save and process helpful details" of screenshots you've taken. Windows Recall automatically takes a screenshot every 3 seconds (and also "processes helpful details"). https://www.theverge.com/2024/7/2/24190730/google-ai-pixel-phones-recall-like-feature https://www.theverge.com/2024/7/2/24190730/google-ai-pixel-p...

replete 2y ago

Recall was enabled by default for me on a fresh windows 11 pro installation back in October. A couple of months ago I opened the Clock app in an important meeting, to run a timer, and had to wait 10 minutes for it to update itself. For real. Same thing happened when I opened sound recorder. It's probably not going to get better at this point. It's only going to have increasing amounts of online services integrated into the OS. The writing was on the wall when Windows 10 Enterprise shipped with Candy Crush

_Algernon_ 2y ago

Switching all my personal computing to Linux at Windows 7 EoL keeps paying dividends.

akho 2y ago

Seems like an interesting feature. It’s not easy to see how this is immediately useful; people in this comments section are complaining that this is not a feature they’d pay for, but it looks like something that becomes seriously useful only after years of runtime and terabytes of screenshots. These kinds of things cannot be sold. On the one hand, MS Research seems to have a long history with lifelogging. On the other, MS aren’t capable of implementing decent search in Outlook; I very much doubt their ability to do the same in this more complicated setting. I don’t think Windows has any privacy-conscious users at this point (outside corp contracts where this will be limited), and they generally seem to be doing everything they can to get out of the home market, so the moment is chosen well.

hulitu 2y ago
> but it looks like something that becomes seriously useful only after years of runtime and terabytes of screenshots. Yes, it is useful, but not for the user, for the CIA.