9 ms·

Yeah good on them, everyone needs to do this. It's nuts Windows is still the go-to for anything these days despite everyone knowing what a parasitic, buggy mess

by esskay 6mo ago

Yeah good on them, everyone needs to do this. It's nuts Windows is still the go-to for anything these days despite everyone knowing what a parasitic, buggy mess it is. "Easy" shouldn't be the excuse in this day and age. Big orgs and especially government entities should be hiring the people that know what they're doing and get off that crummy platform.

polski-g 6mo ago
It makes sense that everyone uses Windows for gaming, because you can't run games in your browser. It makes zero sense for businesses to use Windows if they're only doing PowerPoint and video conferences.
- embedding-shape 6mo ago
  It's almost like Microsoft might be offering something on top of businesses using Windows, that isn't as commonly available for other platforms. Or businesses are just clueless face-less entities who have no idea what they're doing. Probably the truth is a little bit of both.
  - hootz 6mo ago
    Microsoft offers ease of integration, in exchange for your company to be locked in forever in their domain.
  - prmoustache 6mo ago
    What Microsoftoffer is having only one contact / contract for a huge fraction of the IT needs of a company so I can understand it solves some headache vs building stuff from many bricks with as many contracts.
  - close04 6mo ago
    They offer a full ecosystem where everything integrates with everything else, especially the central pillar of identity. But you will pay for that in more ways than just money or lockin. If you work with their solutions, the more you dig into them with the help of MS people, the scarier it gets. So many "holy cow" moments. Businesses choose it because it works with what they already have, the existing tools, processes, skills and because Microsoft was always a safe choice by virtue of being almost implicit. They choose Microsoft because they're already deep into Microsoft, it's the option carrying the lowest risk and lowest short term cost. Switching to Linux is complex, expensive and risky. The transition is long and expensive, plagued with teething issues, your MS focused knowledge is redundant, the patience of your sponsor can run out before the move delivers anything of impact. Who wants to take such risks when they can just not rock the boat and call it a day?
- Gud 6mo ago
  No it makes no sense at all. I do my gaming on Arch. Windows sucks and I hope to see the demise of Microsoft during my lifetime(crosses fingers).
  - stunseed 6mo ago
    Most of their revenue is tied to other stuff though 1. Productivity / Business (~43%) Includes: Microsoft 365 (Office, Teams) - these can be likely ported to Linux if they're not already since they also work on MacOS? LinkedIn Dynamics (ERP/CRM) ~$120.8B 2. Cloud (~38%) Includes: Azure (runs on mostly linux, and moving cloud provider as a big corp is expensive, I don't see massive companies stuck in azure infra moving from it) Server products (Windows Server, SQL Server, etc.) ~$106.3B I fully support the demise of Windows as an OS But microsoft as a company has shifted away from Windows as their source of revenue, and will probably not be impacted too badly if it were to die completely.
    - ano-ther 6mo ago
      The French move will hit the Productivity/ Business segment. Their motivation is to limit extra-European dependence so they will look elsewhere for this. Similar to Germany with its DeutschlandStack and some migrations already ongoing.
    - ImJamal 6mo ago
      > Microsoft 365 (Office, Teams) - these can be likely ported to Linux if they're not already since they also work on MacOS? I thought the Mac versions were not a full fledged port and were missing features present in Windows.
      - p_ing 6mo ago
        You’re correct.
    - p_ing 6mo ago
      Azure services mostly run on Windows via Hyper-V, sans core networking.
- klabb3 6mo ago
  1. total abandonment of desktop as a platform, and the massive hurdles to distribute desktop software 2. move to Cloud and use electron wrappers because not even MS can bother making native apps on their shitty platform 3. Make Windows so shit that even hardcore power users can’t debloat it. The moat of Windows is gone. Games, office work, all the classic arguments, have basically vanished in the last 5-10 years. The only surprise is why more people don’t get in the life rafts, when the ship is listing at 45 degrees. Is it because there’s still an army of workers and institutional inertia trained in Active Directory?
  - sublinear 6mo ago
    Most consumers are primarily on mobile devices. Windows persists in the workplace where the cost to replace it is significantly higher than keeping it, and keeping it doesn't cost much to begin with. Part of that cost would be training, yes. The other part is finding compliant equivalents for the rest of the software they use. If the MFA, VPN, chat, email, etc. are all already vetted and designed to be compatible, there's no way they'd want to switch. Many policies regarding proprietary information disclosure are also built off this ecosystem and the certifications Microsoft's cloud already has.
  - usrusr 6mo ago
    4. putting Mac users in charge of the UI who are genuinely incapable of understanding how they are breaking continuity. That's like staffing a neurosurgery department with dentists. Or a dental clinic with neurosurgeons, it does not matter, you can have decades of experience working with a drill in the head area and still be the wrong person for the job.
    - klabb3 6mo ago
      Continuity with what exactly? IME Windows has been a mish mash of GUI frameworks to the point you teleport through time whenever you click around in control panel, since.. the XP era? I mean, I don’t disagree with you in principle, but the timing is like saying horse carriages aren’t keeping up with cars because they’re designed by car users. The Satya era can be good or bad depending on who you ask, but that’s for Microsoft as a company – windows as a product has had no coherence for a decade+, and that’s generous.
- bergheim 6mo ago
  This comment was wildly invalid even years ago. See proton, heroic launcher, etc, etc. Cyberpunks own benchmarking suite runs 30% faster (for whatever reason; my wintendo install is stock and nothing but nvidia drivers) on the ntfs windows partition on Arch.
- zecg 6mo ago
  Except today games all work and invariably markedly better on Linux. Even the games that stopped working on Windows for me work great, like https://www.protondb.com/app/2008510 https://www.protondb.com/app/2008510
- kombine 6mo ago
  Actually, it's the exact opposite. There is really no alternative to PowerPoint on Linux, unfortunately. I'm saying this as someone who's used Linux for 20 years now.
  - prmoustache 6mo ago
    There are decent alternatives on all operating systems, including Linux.
  - dotcoma 6mo ago
    If there’s no alternative to PowerPoint, that should be treated as a plus, not as a problem.
  - chocochunks 6mo ago
    Huh? There's a ton of PowerPoint alternatives that work on Linux. LibreOffice, OnlyOffice, Collabora Office, Calligra Stage, Google Slides, the online version of PowerPoint, more techy things like LaTeX Beamer or Reveal.js. Maybe these don't have perfect PowerPoint compatibility, or some niche PowerPoint feature you need but there's plenty of slide deck making options that work on Linux.
    - cs02rm0 6mo ago
      And then Canva, Prezi, etc. I can't understand the idea that there's no alternative to PowerPoint on Linux either.
      - prmoustache 6mo ago
        Presentation has been a solved problem for more than 2 decades already. Whenever we are talking migration out of the windows world, there is always a group of MS fanboys that pretend that you can't replace a software with another one if it doesn't even have the exact same set of features down to the smallest details while totally ignoring the interesting features the replacement can have. The reality is there are never 1:1 replacement and Microsoft would have never had any sort of success in the office area to begin with that sort of nitpicking.
- drooopy 6mo ago
  My Linux computer now is my main gaming machine. I purged my Windows partition a couple of years ago and haven't had the need to look back yet.
- surgical_fire 6mo ago
  The vast majority of my Steam library runs on Mint without issues (and some older games run actually smoother on Linux than they did on Windows). Not to mention my very large emulation library. I have no idea what you are talking about.
- breve 6mo ago
  Run your Windows games on Linux: https://www.tomshardware.com/software/linux/nearly-90-percent-of-windows-games-now-run-on-linux-latest-data-shows-as-windows-10-dies-gaming-on-linux-is-more-viable-than-ever https://www.tomshardware.com/software/linux/nearly-90-percen...
ChocolateGod 6mo ago
> It's nuts Windows is still the go-to for anything these days despite everyone knowing what a parasitic Linux still doesn't have anywhere near as nice and cohesive as Group Policy, Active Directory etc. Plus you can pay Microsoft to host it all for you on Azure.
- forinti 6mo ago
  Yes, liberty comes at a cost. It seems that convenience is no longer the main motivator for many people.
  - lionkor 6mo ago
    Convenience comes as a result of mass market adoption, for products for which convenience was not already the main selling factor. Look at cars; they were kind of difficult to drive and maintain 60 years ago, now they're super convenient to drive and maintain as you essentially just press buttons and look at screens to get all needed information about the car and drive it. It's probably something like "inception -> adoption -> convenience". For Windows it was the same, was it not? It wasn't absolutely convenient to use, it was just better (in terms of usability and features for the average consumer), and convenience came after (Windows XP, Windows 7). Sadly the functionality degraded, and now all that is left is convenience.
  - veber-alex 6mo ago
    [flagged]
    - cgio 6mo ago
      If you don’t depend on someone that’s freedom.
    - pjc50 6mo ago
      Freedom from suddenly being cut off is potentially important.
    - mechoblast 6mo ago
andrepd 6mo ago
The money governments sink into Microsoft could have funded a sovereign OSS ecosystem many times over.
booleandilemma 6mo ago
"Easy" shouldn't be the excuse in this day and age. I think "Easy" has been the excuse for everything humans do in every day and age.
derangedHorse 6mo ago
Problem is that people like having a similar interface for both work and non-work things, and Linux doesn’t have enough penetration into the consumer market to influence stakeholders. The first step is making Linux the default choice for hardware providers. Framework was one of those pioneering this but was underfunded imo
- port11 6mo ago
  I don’t think a lot of people still go home and use their computer for stuff. Most of my family will either rely on a phone or tablet to get anything done at home. I doubt they’d care about which OS they’re on. Corporate tightens their laptops beyond belief, so all they’re really running is Teams and Excel. This seems to be the case for a lot of friends I talk to, no one gives a damn about Windows anymore. Heck, my sister-in-law moved to Ubuntu of her own choices, despite having low tech literacy.
- blitzar 6mo ago
  The first step is making Linux the default choice for schools, the rest will take care of itself in 10-20 years
snowstorm82 6mo ago
I am skeptical about there is such "people that know what they are doing", nor would I trust such a claims. But with little twist I think I could onboard the idea with, "people who aim for analytical and open approach and reports". Thus opening the decision making under post analysis and future improvements so research body of knowledge would eventually turn the tide. I haven't installed or used windows much for last decade, but still I'm bit a shamed that each time I install Linux on some computer I live existing windows drive untouched and available for backup in case I need it for some reason.

by esskay 6mo ago

polski-g 6mo ago

It makes sense that everyone uses Windows for gaming, because you can't run games in your browser. It makes zero sense for businesses to use Windows if they're only doing PowerPoint and video conferences.

embedding-shape 6mo ago
It's almost like Microsoft might be offering something on top of businesses using Windows, that isn't as commonly available for other platforms. Or businesses are just clueless face-less entities who have no idea what they're doing. Probably the truth is a little bit of both.
- hootz 6mo ago
  Microsoft offers ease of integration, in exchange for your company to be locked in forever in their domain.
- prmoustache 6mo ago
  What Microsoftoffer is having only one contact / contract for a huge fraction of the IT needs of a company so I can understand it solves some headache vs building stuff from many bricks with as many contracts.
- close04 6mo ago
  They offer a full ecosystem where everything integrates with everything else, especially the central pillar of identity. But you will pay for that in more ways than just money or lockin. If you work with their solutions, the more you dig into them with the help of MS people, the scarier it gets. So many "holy cow" moments. Businesses choose it because it works with what they already have, the existing tools, processes, skills and because Microsoft was always a safe choice by virtue of being almost implicit. They choose Microsoft because they're already deep into Microsoft, it's the option carrying the lowest risk and lowest short term cost. Switching to Linux is complex, expensive and risky. The transition is long and expensive, plagued with teething issues, your MS focused knowledge is redundant, the patience of your sponsor can run out before the move delivers anything of impact. Who wants to take such risks when they can just not rock the boat and call it a day?
Gud 6mo ago
No it makes no sense at all. I do my gaming on Arch. Windows sucks and I hope to see the demise of Microsoft during my lifetime(crosses fingers).
- stunseed 6mo ago
  Most of their revenue is tied to other stuff though 1. Productivity / Business (~43%) Includes: Microsoft 365 (Office, Teams) - these can be likely ported to Linux if they're not already since they also work on MacOS? LinkedIn Dynamics (ERP/CRM) ~$120.8B 2. Cloud (~38%) Includes: Azure (runs on mostly linux, and moving cloud provider as a big corp is expensive, I don't see massive companies stuck in azure infra moving from it) Server products (Windows Server, SQL Server, etc.) ~$106.3B I fully support the demise of Windows as an OS But microsoft as a company has shifted away from Windows as their source of revenue, and will probably not be impacted too badly if it were to die completely.
  - ano-ther 6mo ago
    The French move will hit the Productivity/ Business segment. Their motivation is to limit extra-European dependence so they will look elsewhere for this. Similar to Germany with its DeutschlandStack and some migrations already ongoing.
  - ImJamal 6mo ago
    > Microsoft 365 (Office, Teams) - these can be likely ported to Linux if they're not already since they also work on MacOS? I thought the Mac versions were not a full fledged port and were missing features present in Windows.
    - p_ing 6mo ago
      You’re correct.
  - p_ing 6mo ago
    Azure services mostly run on Windows via Hyper-V, sans core networking.
klabb3 6mo ago
1. total abandonment of desktop as a platform, and the massive hurdles to distribute desktop software 2. move to Cloud and use electron wrappers because not even MS can bother making native apps on their shitty platform 3. Make Windows so shit that even hardcore power users can’t debloat it. The moat of Windows is gone. Games, office work, all the classic arguments, have basically vanished in the last 5-10 years. The only surprise is why more people don’t get in the life rafts, when the ship is listing at 45 degrees. Is it because there’s still an army of workers and institutional inertia trained in Active Directory?
- sublinear 6mo ago
  Most consumers are primarily on mobile devices. Windows persists in the workplace where the cost to replace it is significantly higher than keeping it, and keeping it doesn't cost much to begin with. Part of that cost would be training, yes. The other part is finding compliant equivalents for the rest of the software they use. If the MFA, VPN, chat, email, etc. are all already vetted and designed to be compatible, there's no way they'd want to switch. Many policies regarding proprietary information disclosure are also built off this ecosystem and the certifications Microsoft's cloud already has.
- usrusr 6mo ago
  4. putting Mac users in charge of the UI who are genuinely incapable of understanding how they are breaking continuity. That's like staffing a neurosurgery department with dentists. Or a dental clinic with neurosurgeons, it does not matter, you can have decades of experience working with a drill in the head area and still be the wrong person for the job.
  - klabb3 6mo ago
    Continuity with what exactly? IME Windows has been a mish mash of GUI frameworks to the point you teleport through time whenever you click around in control panel, since.. the XP era? I mean, I don’t disagree with you in principle, but the timing is like saying horse carriages aren’t keeping up with cars because they’re designed by car users. The Satya era can be good or bad depending on who you ask, but that’s for Microsoft as a company – windows as a product has had no coherence for a decade+, and that’s generous.
bergheim 6mo ago
This comment was wildly invalid even years ago. See proton, heroic launcher, etc, etc. Cyberpunks own benchmarking suite runs 30% faster (for whatever reason; my wintendo install is stock and nothing but nvidia drivers) on the ntfs windows partition on Arch.
zecg 6mo ago
Except today games all work and invariably markedly better on Linux. Even the games that stopped working on Windows for me work great, like https://www.protondb.com/app/2008510 https://www.protondb.com/app/2008510
kombine 6mo ago
Actually, it's the exact opposite. There is really no alternative to PowerPoint on Linux, unfortunately. I'm saying this as someone who's used Linux for 20 years now.
- prmoustache 6mo ago
  There are decent alternatives on all operating systems, including Linux.
- dotcoma 6mo ago
  If there’s no alternative to PowerPoint, that should be treated as a plus, not as a problem.
- chocochunks 6mo ago
  Huh? There's a ton of PowerPoint alternatives that work on Linux. LibreOffice, OnlyOffice, Collabora Office, Calligra Stage, Google Slides, the online version of PowerPoint, more techy things like LaTeX Beamer or Reveal.js. Maybe these don't have perfect PowerPoint compatibility, or some niche PowerPoint feature you need but there's plenty of slide deck making options that work on Linux.
  - cs02rm0 6mo ago
    And then Canva, Prezi, etc. I can't understand the idea that there's no alternative to PowerPoint on Linux either.
    - prmoustache 6mo ago
      Presentation has been a solved problem for more than 2 decades already. Whenever we are talking migration out of the windows world, there is always a group of MS fanboys that pretend that you can't replace a software with another one if it doesn't even have the exact same set of features down to the smallest details while totally ignoring the interesting features the replacement can have. The reality is there are never 1:1 replacement and Microsoft would have never had any sort of success in the office area to begin with that sort of nitpicking.
drooopy 6mo ago
My Linux computer now is my main gaming machine. I purged my Windows partition a couple of years ago and haven't had the need to look back yet.
surgical_fire 6mo ago
The vast majority of my Steam library runs on Mint without issues (and some older games run actually smoother on Linux than they did on Windows). Not to mention my very large emulation library. I have no idea what you are talking about.
breve 6mo ago
Run your Windows games on Linux: https://www.tomshardware.com/software/linux/nearly-90-percent-of-windows-games-now-run-on-linux-latest-data-shows-as-windows-10-dies-gaming-on-linux-is-more-viable-than-ever https://www.tomshardware.com/software/linux/nearly-90-percen...

ChocolateGod 6mo ago

> It's nuts Windows is still the go-to for anything these days despite everyone knowing what a parasitic Linux still doesn't have anywhere near as nice and cohesive as Group Policy, Active Directory etc. Plus you can pay Microsoft to host it all for you on Azure.

forinti 6mo ago
Yes, liberty comes at a cost. It seems that convenience is no longer the main motivator for many people.
- lionkor 6mo ago
  Convenience comes as a result of mass market adoption, for products for which convenience was not already the main selling factor. Look at cars; they were kind of difficult to drive and maintain 60 years ago, now they're super convenient to drive and maintain as you essentially just press buttons and look at screens to get all needed information about the car and drive it. It's probably something like "inception -> adoption -> convenience". For Windows it was the same, was it not? It wasn't absolutely convenient to use, it was just better (in terms of usability and features for the average consumer), and convenience came after (Windows XP, Windows 7). Sadly the functionality degraded, and now all that is left is convenience.
- veber-alex 6mo ago
  [flagged]
  - cgio 6mo ago
    If you don’t depend on someone that’s freedom.
  - pjc50 6mo ago
    Freedom from suddenly being cut off is potentially important.
  - mechoblast 6mo ago

andrepd 6mo ago

The money governments sink into Microsoft could have funded a sovereign OSS ecosystem many times over.

booleandilemma 6mo ago

"Easy" shouldn't be the excuse in this day and age. I think "Easy" has been the excuse for everything humans do in every day and age.

derangedHorse 6mo ago

Problem is that people like having a similar interface for both work and non-work things, and Linux doesn’t have enough penetration into the consumer market to influence stakeholders. The first step is making Linux the default choice for hardware providers. Framework was one of those pioneering this but was underfunded imo

port11 6mo ago
I don’t think a lot of people still go home and use their computer for stuff. Most of my family will either rely on a phone or tablet to get anything done at home. I doubt they’d care about which OS they’re on. Corporate tightens their laptops beyond belief, so all they’re really running is Teams and Excel. This seems to be the case for a lot of friends I talk to, no one gives a damn about Windows anymore. Heck, my sister-in-law moved to Ubuntu of her own choices, despite having low tech literacy.
blitzar 6mo ago
The first step is making Linux the default choice for schools, the rest will take care of itself in 10-20 years

snowstorm82 6mo ago

I am skeptical about there is such "people that know what they are doing", nor would I trust such a claims. But with little twist I think I could onboard the idea with, "people who aim for analytical and open approach and reports". Thus opening the decision making under post analysis and future improvements so research body of knowledge would eventually turn the tide. I haven't installed or used windows much for last decade, but still I'm bit a shamed that each time I install Linux on some computer I live existing windows drive untouched and available for backup in case I need it for some reason.