Whatever happened to "Windows 10 will be the ever-evolving OS that will never have to be replaced?" COVID got 10 as well?
It has been from the beginning ALL ABOUT THE MONEY! Just like phones, upgrade to the next is not always better. I liked Windows 7 and XP, BUT IF YOU DON'T UPGRADE, WE WILL NOT SUPPORT YOU! I could swear they even sabotage the old system. It took 3 days to figure out, but the old laptop that's not compatible is back to normal. (for now?) If I go back in time, I'll bring my Win 3.0 version!
It's always about the money! On a tangent, take CARB, California Air Resource Board. They manage everything concerning the air breathed in California. I drove a truck for about 20 years and my own the last 15. My last one was a 2005 which, in 2009, was determined to be outdated concerning its legal ability to operate in CA. Well, guess what, they had a waiver that I could get for about $500 a year. I asked, "What about your precious air?" They said, "The funds from waivers helps us fight the pollution." Cache 22! I say Cache because that's what it is. CDL or, Commercial Driver's License. "They" said that once everyone got the US wide CDL then all drivers and all states would be under the same regulatory program. Before CDL you had to have knowledge of every reg in every state if you wanted to operate there and pay assorted fees and fuel permits and have an "authority" sticker and fuel sticker, if the sate required one, on a certain location on your truck or bumper or windshield. I got several tickets and fines in my first year. Anyway, the states were united into the IFTA, International Free Trade Agreement, program. Thanks Bill! So, when I took my first CDL test, and passed, they said, "That'll be $194.00 please." That was for 4 years, and my FL license used to cost $40 every two. When truck owners paid the $1,679 for the annul Apportioned IFTA plate each state got a portion of the registration fee. All is well? nope! CA, CT, NY, OR, WA, VT, WV, etc, etc... had their little differences that were sure to make the unsuspecting driver get a ticket and fine for non compliance of something hidden in the fine print. Laughing under my breath because "it's always about the money" and all the sates were getting a share of the loot. Oh, the 2290 tax. A federal tax paid by commercial vehicle owners for road maintenance. Why? Everyone who buys gas or diesel pays a road use tax and I guess gov thinks trucks need to pay more even though the owner buys a helluva lot more fuel than you do. I averaged buying around 26,000 gallons of diesel a year so I paid around $7,000 in road use taxes and the 18 wheelers' owners pay $500 /year for 2290. It's always about the money. Sorry, I haven't complained about that in the 8 years since retiring. That was fun, thanks for your time.
The main shack computer, a desktop, runs Win 11 because it's less than a year old and I couldn't buy it with 10. It's not as bad as I thought it would be, but on the other hand I haven't found a single truly useful feature that was new in 11. Zero upside. Change for the sake of change. Too many product managers and software engineers at Microsoft with not enough to do, it appears. My primary personal laptop still runs 10. It qualifies for 11, but I will drag my feet until October 2025 and see if Microsoft sticks to its schedule or capitulates and extends the lifetime of 10. Eventually the personal laptop will have to be replaced and then I guess I'll have to take 11 (or 12?) on it.
From my friend and colleague, Steven Vaughan-Nichols: https://www.zdnet.com/article/the-w...ys-to-save-your-old-pc-in-2025-most-are-free/ You could also continue down the Microsoft timeline. I have one VM and one laptop running Win11, only to support my volunteer work. When they say that Windows 10 support ends October 2025, I say it ended a very long time ago. Most of the additions are telemetry to track you, and the TPM problem that trips up @W7UUU's upgrade is hogwash. Time to take the hook out of your mouth and go swimming again. 73 Tom W9YW
Woops, my bad. I retired 9 1/2 years ago. Man does time fly. I appreciate the likes. Trucking is interesting and I met drivers from practically every vocation who wanted an "out" from something and the open road gives that. And you can make a good living if you don't mind the time away from home. Now I don't leave the house except for appointments and grocery store visits. AR is perfect for me!
I've moved all my PCs that are capable of running W11 to it now. Subjectively, I think it runs slightly faster than W10 on the same hardware, but there's not a lot in it and the fact that the machines are running on a fresh install might account for most of that. I strongly dislike the W11 user interface, but a copy of Start11 from Stardock soon fixes that. Martin (G8FXC)
you know.... MS makes these forced obsolescence changes because we allow them to happen. Yes, they do have a lot of power, but they depend on our money. If we stop paying for their "new and improved" (and more intrusive) products, their stockholders will certainly take notice. Unfortunately, the vast majority of folks are sheep..... and would rather give away their privacy and money, than actually do anything about it. The tuth is that we do not have to use their products if we don't want to, and certainly don't have to put up with their BS.
As I've said many times, we use applications, not operating systems. We choose a set of applications that best meet our needs, then the operating system that best supports them. In many cases, that is Windows. Martin G8FXC
The application developers think just like those that use Windows. What if major developers like Adobe, Java, Python, and others refused to write for Windows and instead write for Linux? Windows would soon be a second banana in the O/S world.
I'm an application developer and developing applications for Linux is a thankless task. The development tools are not there in the first place and, assuming you are willing to fight against a toolset that would be considered obsolete by Windows developers, you are then faced with a customer base that expects everything to be free... Martin G8FXC
There's a line from a ditty written by Irving Berlin. It goes, "Anything you can do, I can do better than You can do..." I'm glad you're a developer and are happy with Windows and Microsoft Developer relations. I still do a bit of code now and then. I research application models even more. I understand C++, C#, py, and dot-net, among others. To understand the FOSS model, you need to reconsider the ones you're comfortable with, and it's plain that you don't want to do this. That's OK-- revenue is revenue. There are many that disagree with your stance. I'm one of them, having started at Byte writing about Linux Business in 1995-- almost 30yrs ago. It's a different culture, a different ideal, a different business plan than what Microsoft promises. My most profound disagreement, however, is with tooling availability and sophistication. One day, perhaps over a libation, I can show you the differences. For now, I understand that you're firmly in the Microsoft camp. When I co-wrote Windows NT Networking and other Microsoft-focused books, I believed what you believe. I was the Windows In The Enterprise columnist for Windows Magazine. Long ago, my late friend Leith Anderson took Oracle's developer network to Redmond. Leith is gone, but his vision of MSDN worked and evolved. He was frustrated enough with Microsoft that he left to join HP as VP, then when HP cozied to Microsoft, said "screw it", and bought a custom golf clubs business. Developers and apps are important. I open a Windows session only when I have to, these days. I have a nice VS environment at the ready, but I swim in a different ocean-- FOSS. FOSS is agnostic and takes no side, save clear exposed readable code. It's model doesn't ask for money or anything except adherence to the GPL or perhaps another actually free license (some are not free but claim it). Revenue is made in a different way. There are thanks, either way. I don't need thanks, but they help. I have to eat, too. 73 Tom W9YW
I am sticking with Win 10. Updates permanently turned off. The Walmart china laptop asks perodically to upgrade to Win 11 and I refuse each time. Smooth running with no updates.
Major developers have family, house payments, car payments, credit card payments, and also want to buy cool stuff like new radios, or something boring, they are not going to give up their income to write opensource. What we need to do is start showing the average computer user that Linux is fully functional as is, there is 100% no need for grandma to use the terminal, only install the GUI programs that are needed from the software center, and don't look back. Windows will lose is market for home computer use, and need to look elsewhere. From my understanding a lot of servers are already running Linux. And for the kids, a lot of Video games already have been ported to Linux.
Maybe. At the moment, the most popular Linux distribution is Ubuntu. Gnome Ubuntu might require just as much hardware capabilities as a new(er) Windows machine. The really old four-core 8 GB RAM PC I'm using right now runs Lubuntu, and even its "minimal installation" piles on useless programs that I have no use for and have to figure out how to uninstall. Grandma (or some other "average" computer user) might be okay with a computer that a Linux-literate person has pre-programmed to use as a browser and email client. Once something doesn't work however, the labyrinthine GUI "solutions" are far more complex than the CLI. An "average" computer user will hit a wall when the CLI is absolutely necessary, and call the Linux literate person to untangle the mess. I have enough bother untangling Windows problems everyday. I just don't see a way to use any Linux desktop environment without resorting to the CLI. Linux desktop environments have a long way to go before the terminal is sufficiently "hidden", such as with macOS. 73, Jordan AB2T
