Discussion
askonomm: Pretty sure it's just that Windows is horribly broken, privacy-invading, ad-ridden malware disguised as an operating system. I swear it seems like nobody at Microsoft not even once have asked the actual users for what they would like to see in the OS.
jmclnx: And to add to this, proprietary OSs are about to get worse and can blame the politicians for it.With these new age laws, these systems can legally ask for personal information, and I am sure as time goes, information required will expand.As for Linux, seems systemd is all in on this, as for the BSDs, I doubt they will enforce these new laws.
goalieca: Windows was fiercely hated for a long time for being extremely buggy, low quality, high price, weak security (a later concern), and Microsoft’s general anti-consumer and anti-competitive practices.Things improved slightly for a while and maybe the generation of Mac/linux using tech workers never suffered through the worst of it, but Microsoft seems to be back on track with their old ways.
pydry: Actual users are less important to Microsoft than execs who actually purchase the licenses.
forinti: Plus it's hard to buy a computer without paying the MS tax, unless you build one yourself.That's an issue I would like to see legislated! In fact, in my country there is a law that prohibits bundled purchases: it's just that the authorities are not tech savvy enough to see it when it pertains to computers and Windows.
surgical_fire: Personal Computing was never in a better position.Linux is a joy to use. Alef hosting is easy as hell, with an abundance of tools and applications available. You can buy old refurbished machines that are still pretty amazing home servers for cheap.Hell, even AI help with that. It's pretty good at making scripts and detailing step-by-step what you need to to get things running.
fouc: [delayed]
surgical_fire: You can lie when it requests for personal information.I always identify myself as "Conan, The Barbarian" when creating account.
gostsamo: why I should be the one bothering with that though? and what happens when it starts requiring internet connection and biometric age verification?
jmclnx: of cource you can, but in the future ? Maybe you will be required to upload an ID.
iamnothere: Big tech apologists: “while I used to enjoy playing Starcraft on Windows XP, it’s become clear that computing is no longer ‘personal’ and society needs some guardrails around it. I’m okay with sacrificing some liberties to protect the children.”
expedition32: Personal responsibility is dead in Silicon Valley.Honestly those people can buy an Apple device. Got my mother one- just email and a web browser.(But I have to give MS credit: you can still disable BitLocker and their ridiculous smart screen. I am using my PC the same way I've always used it).
mancerayder: When is gaming on the latest hardware going to be mature enough to move off this garbage operating system?Can I play Kingdom Come II on Mint now? If not, are we moving there?
gregoryl: KCD2 works fine on Linux.
jordanb: Microsoft cleaned up when they got hit with antitrust and then started feeling a bit of competition when operating under consent decree. That's all "behind" them now and the Google settlement put antitrust to bed.
lallysingh: I had to restore my son's desktop PC last night from a USB stick. It didn't even have drivers for graphics over 800x600 or the wifi card. I was flabbergasted. It's windows 11, 2026, a 6-month old PC. I genuinely don't know how someone could sell something this awful with a straight face.Windows was only ever better than DOS, by the same vendor. It's been awful compared to any competitor it's ever had. Really. I don't see a non-gaslighting argument for Windows anywhere.
tenuousemphasis: I use a SteamOS distribution for all my gaming, Bazzite. KCD2 works perfectly. The only game I haven't tried to get running yet is Star Citizen.
ballstein: The company never made good software
josephg: Nah. I think the problem is that windows and macOS did everything users wanted them to do about 10-15 years ago. Everything since then has been lipstick on a pig.If windows were a building, they need to stop tacking on more rooms like it’s a gaudy McMansion. If they really wanna keep working on it, work to make what’s already there more beautiful. Optimise. Reduce the install size. Clean up some of the decades of tech debt. Unify the different generations of UI toolkits. Write documentation. Port security critical parts to rust, where appropriate. Refine, don’t reinvent.
Throaway1975123: and it made the pig actually uglier!
intrasight: In a couple years you won't have to bother with that. The device will connect to the ID chip embedded in your body when you're born. And this will be a one-time hard-wired coupling for that device when it is first turned on.
intrasight: 1. There are plenty of computers sold with Linux installed.2. You absolutely should build the computer yourself. You get a much better computer with best of class parts. And you learn something.
moomin: What I learned is that I am no good at building computers.
rbanffy: > 1. There are plenty of computers sold with Linux installed.Compared to what?
rbanffy: Microsoft has a handful big clients - Dell, Lenovo, HP being the top three. They are the ones that make Windows be the default operating system on everyone's computers and they need to be happy, not the person who buys the computer. When the computer becomes unusable, they'll just get another from the same brands and everyone, except the user, are happy.Corporations don't run Windows. They run Outlook, Excel, and Teams. Windows and generic PCs (or thin clients and VDIs) is just the cheapest way to achieve that goal.
zecg: ...for people who insist on using only Windows on their personal computer.
rbanffy: Nobody passionately hates Chromebooks.
moi2388: I do
frizlab: Me too
sli: I'm absolutely sure there are people who do. Chromebooks just have a practically nonexistant market share compared to Windows, and a lot of those users being kids being issued school laptops probably doesn't translate to a lot of visible complaining about Chromebook-specific problems.
neonstatic: > They are the ones that make Windows be the default operating system on everyone's computersI've got to disagree. Macs are a fantastic option as long as the software needed to do actual work is available. That's the real bottleneck and it's not something Dell, Lenovo, or HP have any power over.
Sharlin: That… does not follow. Corporations simply aren't going to start buying Macs for all of their millions of rank-and-file corporate drones. Even if they wanted, and they don't, they're tied to the Windows ecosystem in all sorts of ways, even though the software lives on someone else's computer these days.
rbanffy: I respect you. It's very hard to be passionate about something as bland as a Chromebook. It's like being passionate about tofu, or toothpaste, or baby shampoo.
rbanffy: They still ship a lot more computers than Apple. For most of the world, Apple is a niche product. I use it, and I love them, but let's not fool ourselves into thinking corporations will start buying Mac Minis to replace their desktops and thin clients anytime soon.
drcongo: I often wonder whether anyone at Microsoft actually uses Windows as their daily OS, and if they do, how have they not noticed what a sack of shit it is? And then I think, well if they were using linux or macOS as their daily OS, they'd definitely notice what a sack of shit Windows is. The only possible answer at the end of this is that they know what a sack of shit it is but don't care because nobody at Microsoft has any taste, conscience or values.
chuckadams: With Windows 10, I thought MS had turned a corner. But then came Windows 11, and turning two corners means doing a 180.
nehal3m: A 180 would imply a different direction than the original. I’d say they did a fakie 360 faceplant.
oldnetguy: Which version because I have been using it and it "functions" but it's not a joy.
rbanffy: I really love Fedora and GNOME. It looks nice, it's reliable, and stays out of the way. That's all I ask from an OS.
throwaway27448: > did everything users wanted them to do about 10-15 years ago.Certainly not; not by a long shot. Besides, most users don't even understand the potential of software. But why bother improving it if you still make money shipping crap?
nickburns: [delayed]
rbanffy: I recently helped liberate about 70 EOL'ed Chromebooks. Now students in a college near me will get free laptops they can actually use for college work, running the latest and greatest Linux distros.
card_zero: Oh well that's a different matter. Nobody hates acceptable cheap hardware.
chuckadams: Yah, a 180 would actually be a good thing, but I guess it depends on your reference point. Like people, the analogy breaks when tortured. I like yours better overall :)
WarmWash: Users want a one time payment of $150, for a 50 million LoC software product, and then get 10 years of support.Everyone here slinging mud, while getting paid out of the SaaS pot. Would windows be a better product if it was user focused but cost $40/mo? From Microsoft's POV it would probably kill numbers.
card_zero: What? I passionately hate Chromebooks, firstly because they were conceived as a power grab by Google to get people to do everything through online Google services instead of locally, and secondly in a more personal way when I actually had to use one, in a remote hostel with ropey internet.
DazWilkin: I strongly prefer my Linux machine but use Windows mostly so that I can run Quicken. I feel doubly trapped: can't get off Quicken and thus can't get off Windows.I'm only very slightly less reluctant to get an Apple machine (though the M* chips tempt me) and there will probably be incompatibilities between the versions of Quicken.I think I should probably rip off the band-aid and migrate to:+ spreadsheets (more control/future proof) + gnucash or similar (and risk that going unmaintained) + Wine + something I've not considered
diogenes_atx: Do you need to run Quicken locally on your PC? Can you just use the cloud version of Quicken?
rbanffy: > It's been awful compared to any competitor it's ever had.TBH, Windows 3.1 was reasonably nice compared to macOS 7, and much faster than OS/2 or Solaris 2.1 on the same hardware.
II2II: Faster than OS/2, sure. Now try to download a file in the background while doing work in the foreground. You would be lucky if your Windows 3.1 communications application could complete it without multiple retries.The two operating systems were trying to solve different problems, and had different system requirements because of that. Windows 3.1 was fine for running multiple interactive applications since neither application would be doing real work in the background. When Windows 95 entered the picture, that changed and its system requirements weren't all that different from OS/2.And that is just one example. Windows 3.1 didn't provide much in the way of memory protection. (From my recollections, it could detect a memory access violation. At that point it would blue screen.) One of OS/2's most noteworthy features was memory protection. All of a sudden you could use your computer for an entire day without losing work from crashing. Yeah, OS/2 would happily terminate an application (rather than the OS) when there was a memory access violation. On the other hand, it made it much easier for developers to detect and address such bugs.On that last point: I have fond memories of bringing OS/2 boot disks to my high school programming classes after the upgrade to Windows 95 (and, when they started refusing to let me boot OS/2, they let me use the NT server). There was a world of difference between programming under OS/2 or NT verses Windows 95. No one bothered to try programming under Windows 3.1!
DazWilkin: I was unaware that there is a cloud version and will investigate, thanks!
surgical_fire: Are you claiming Linux is becoming always online?That's one hell of a claim.
gostsamo: if it is governmently mandated that it is, it might become, at least the user facing distros.
