Every day, my work computers force a shutdown-update, take 20 minites, fail the update, recover from the failed update, and then force a 24-hour timer to do it again that I can’t turn off. IT doesn’t care.
If it’s happening every 24 hours it sounds like they’re the ones that set the policy.
I saw that happen once in a big presentation.
There was a team of students presenting their work to ~200 people. Right in the middle, a pop-up says updates are finished and the computer needs to restart. It has a helpful 60-second countdown, but “cancel” is grayed out, so all they can do is watch.
I was only in the audience and I still have nightmares.
Then it proceeds to take 10 minutes to boot. Happened to me before an important meeting once and i just couldn’t believe it. wtf makes Microsoft think they can get away with shit like this?
Probably that they very obviously are!
Just blame the users. Easy.
They think they can get away with it because they keep getting away with it.
wtf makes Microsoft think they can get away with shit like this?
I’d wager a guess it’s people dumb enough to constantly put up with shit like this?
Combined with myopic developers who always have the newest hardware and fastest connection.
Usually for large businesses like universities IT can choose when to push updates.
Some versions like Home and Education might lack the options, but most Enterprise versions and LTSC versions can let you delay updates via the menu or disable updates completely via group policy fuckery.
Still bullshit that they have to, though.
Shutdown -a or whatever the flag is should abort it if I remember correctly
Yeah -a for “abort” Still, an user shouldn’t have to know that
Because the alternative is people getting compromised and getting their computer crypto locked, accounts stolen or their bank account drained.
Other OSes can update everything while running and you just reboot to the updated system. Microsoft could definitely fix their update process they are not incompetent, they just don’t care.
The super duper shitty thing is that they could have canceled it by opening the Run dialog box and typing “shutdown -a”, so it’s not even like canceling wasn’t an option. M$ just decided to be dicks about it
M$ just decided to be dicks about it
A most concise yet comprehensive company bio.
Maybe? If I recall correctly, this was Windows XP. Also the computer was owned by the school, so the students didn’t have admin access.
That screen didn’t exist in Win XP. If it had, it would have been a different shade of blue. This is either Win10 though I suspect it’s Win11.
The event I’m referring to wasn’t OP’s photo. Mine was back in 2004 or 2005, long before Win10 was released.
Those kids are still wincing to this day
Is this a w11 thing? Or does o&o shutup in default settings disable stuff like that. I actually never have seen a forced reboot like that myself.
It sounds really shitty and i dislike windows alot.
It only happens if you neglect to install updates for a very long time, which is a pretty dumb thing to do. This is actually a non-issue if you just install the damn updates once they’re announced. Just update when shutting down. Also, using home edition is pretty dumb. With the pro version you’ll likely never run into this problem.
shutdown -acouldn’t help in that situation?For every 1 person who knows how to use the windows command line, there are 50 people struggling because they didn’t embed their video into their PowerPoint, or worse, their USB stick only contains a shortcut to their actual .ppt file
I mean, not to beat a dead horse but those are precisely the type of people who would push off an update forever if given the choice.
Not that a midday, mid work reboot is acceptable.
That’s a very generous estimate. I didn’t know about it and I work in IT.
I love these comments. If you need to use the command line (the largest argument people have against Linux) why are people still arguing to stay on Windows? Hell, Linux you don’t even need the terminal if you don’t want to use it and choose the right distro.
(I recognize that for schools and offices, people don’t have a choice. These students were probably on a personal laptop though, so they could have a choice. The issue is Windows comes as default and no one actually makes a choice. They don’t choose Windows. They just have Windows.)
Windows always gets a pass from it’s fans. They also tend to overestimate average users’ proficiency with computers (meaning windows) way more than linux users.
Most windows users would be afraid to change stuff on CP or Settings never mind opening up policy editor or registry editor.
They regularly fail to install applications on windows (a big part of them would probably not even try) or install something different than intended.
Usually they end up running million unnecessary things on startup, having completely unresponsive systems. They just shrug and cope with it till they pay someone to format their computer or they buy a new one.
The arrogance of some Linux users… You just can’t fathom that most people just want to use the OS their PC came with. These people don’t want to struggle with the incompatibilities that come with Linux systems. Troubleshooting Linux systems is a daunting task for most casual users. It’s great that you use Linux because fuck greedy corporations. But stop being so uppity about it. This toxic behavior is what steers people away from Linux forums.
You just can’t fathom that most people just want to use the OS their PC came with.
No they don’t they want to get a task done. The vast majority of users doesn’t know what an OS or a browser is never mind that there are alternatives.
These people don’t want to struggle with the incompatibilities that come with Linux systems.
Most people are simply not aware of Linux systems let alone linux system incompatibilities.
Troubleshooting Linux systems is a daunting task for most casual users.
No shit, troubleshooting windows is a daunting task for most casual users. They either nag/pay someone to try and fix it or simply cope with it. And windows fucks up all the time, especially for most users.
It’s great that you use Linux because fuck greedy corporations. But stop being so uppity about it. This toxic behavior is what steers people away from Linux forums.
People don’t just randomly get on Linux forums, especially linux memes forums. Nor is my previous comment in any way or form toxic. I just pointed out the blind spot of windows fans, you just can’t handle criticism.
The longer I use Linux, the harder it becomes to see where windows users are coming from. Its gotten to the point where seeing people use windows in public feels incomprehensible to me, like watching people go to work on a pogo stick instead of a car.
I’ve gone off the FOSS deep end so it doesn’t stop when I see Windows used in the wild.
The longer I’m here, the more I recoil at the sight of people using products from Google so casually and thoughtlessly.
I’ll feel visceral disgust when I see the soulless, dystopian corporate logos of Xitter, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, etc that wormed their way into a universal presence on social footers of websites or promotional emails or search engines… and everyone’s locked down devices, sucking up troves of data to map who you are, were, and will be. Even McFuckingDonalds has a clause in a policy saying they’ll measure your intelligence.
The greater the intersect between emotions felt while enjoying a cautionary fictional cyberpunk tale and those felt while experiencing reality… well, anyway you get the idea.
Tldr I need a hug from a penguin or cocaine from a bear or something holy shit
You, reader, go. Hug a penguin. Spread love to the world. Believe in the change you want to see. Be good to each other. And don’t let anyone or anything take who you are, were, or can be away from you, be it a corp, a government, or a bad day.
Have a good day
These comments are copy pasta perfection. Best part they are unironic 🤣😍
Hahaha thanks. I like being extra and colorful like this. It’s a good release in more ways than one
I feel the same way, but I feel it with lots of other topics in my life as well.
I daily drive Linux for both home and work. Windows is absolutely shit, yes, but when you’re using Linux as your primary system, the only interaction you have with Windows is through other people. And that interaction is only when people’s experience with Windows is noteworthy enough for them to mention anything about it. Its selection bias.
A similar thing happened with me when I visited home after having been gone for 2 years. I moved from the US to the UK over a decade ago. I’d go back every 6-12 months, but because of COVID it was over 2 years. It was during the vaccine rollouts too, and I was expecting this warzone anti mask/antivax everywhere. I saw a few people (like, over 3 weeks I saw less than a dozen) with signs protesting at intersections. And I saw one guy have an argument with his wife in the parking lot which she just eventually told him to stay in the the car if he wasn’t going to wear a mask while she went to the grocery store. Thats pretty much the opposite of what I expected based on the images I got for the previous 2 years through overseas media. You only get the lowlights.
like watching people go to work on a pogo stick instead of a car.
At least going to work on a pogo stick makes more sense in urban area. You can’t bring car into subway. Windows on the other hand…
Hell it looks ro me like they are driving a Flintstonemobile, where every time they stop using thier feet a boxing glove punches them in the face.
Three words: High Dynamic Range.
HDR is a tacked on feature in KDE that barely works. In Windows 11, it’s a set and forget thing. SDR gets mapped to HDR space, so you don’t have to constantly toggle it on and off when switching between content, like you have to do in other OSes. You can even upgrade SDR videos and games to true HDR, even if they don’t have native support. It legit makes content look more realistic.
And if you have a newer GPU, there’s also AI upscaling, which is great for watching HD and SD content on a 4K display. Pretty sure you can’t do that* at all in Linux, at least not in real-time.
But if you have an SDR monitor and/or an older GPU, none of this matters to you. Which in that case, there’s no reason for you to use Windows ever. But if your gear is newer, Linux is too outdated for you.
I’ll check back in 5 years. Maybe 2029 will finally be the year I ditch Microsoft products for good.
It’s expected for HDR to mature on Linux later this year. I’ll send you an update in December.
It’s expected for HDR to mature on Linux later this year.
HDR works on Steam Deck right now. It may take a while until it trickles down to distributions other than SteamOS and not every compositor may support it equally but in general support is there.
until it trickles down to distributions
Ancap spotted.Most distros don’t use Gamescope. Although if HDR support is in KWin, then you can just go and install KDE on rolling release distro.Most distros don’t use Gamescope.
Well, that’s the problem of the person making a general statement about all of Linux and not going into specifics.
You can even upgrade SDR videos and games to true HDR, even if they don’t have native support. It legit makes content look more realistic.
You are just applying filters. They look good, but they are incorrect.
These are nice, but on the other hand there’s the case where you have a limited time slot somewhere and windows randomly decides that it’s time to update, pop up a window to upload your data to “the cloud”, reboot, and bang, you’re f*cked.
Three words: High Dynamic Range.
Works fine on Steam Deck. (The comment you’re replied to is about Linux, not a specific DE, so your experience with a specific DE doesn’t really count as counter argument about Linux in general.)
And if you have a newer GPU, there’s also AI upscaling, which is great for watching HD and SD content on a 4K display. Pretty sure you can’t do they at all in Linux, at least not in real-time.
That is wrong.
I am utterly perplexed by the HDR talk, honestly. Why does it even matter? I’ve been consuming media on Linux for more than a decade and it looks perfect to me.
When people talk about making it look even better, I literally can’t imagine what they’re talking about. I mean, when people had black n white TV, they could imagine color. When I had a CRT and 3D games, it was easy to imagine better quality, but going from 1080p to 4k already does nothing. HDR just seems like marketing bullshit that people wouldn’t be able to discern, unless flicking between normal and HDR or having them side by side.
HDR is just a scam. It’s essentially automated brightness and contrast controls that is terribly done. I’ve seen HDR on brand new displays running HDR-capable everything and it just looks like someone can’t figure out how to set their monitor up correctly. It’s a buzzword created for crap technology that makes people want to spend more on essentially the same trash.
And as for scaling, look up FSR.
Windows is 100% obsolete and anyone who disagrees is just looking for excuses.
It’s essentially automated brightness and contrast controls that is terribly done
Brightness? True. Contrast controls? It seems you are confusing software HDR, which compresses HDR to SDR, and hardware HDR.
Hardware HDR is fancy word to say burning you eyes harder.
When you represent image as 3d vector field of brightnesses, it IS brightness control terribly done, but our eyes don’t care.
The point is it’s just poorly done automated adjustment of what should be done manually on your monitor, and it’s a laughable overpriced scam meant to take money out of the pockets of people who fall for tech buzzwords.
Today’s thesis is an improv on why windows sucks.
“FUCK MICROSOFT!”
Oh, so you know OP’s thesis name too!
No, I was referencing a scene from the show “Space Force” where the exact same thing occurs.
“Don’t turn off” is the worst kind of status message.
When it eventually hangs for various reasons, you actually do need to turn off your pc for it to complete or to let it roll back in an error state.
When “just hang in there” is still present on the third day you’ll start wondering why you bought that piece of furniture and won’t mind the consequences of turning it off.
What should it say instead?
Console output with status of the current operation, including error and warning messages
Not to defend Windows too much in a Linux community, but you can turn on verbose status messages for the screens you see during startup, shutdown, login and log off. It’s a setting that can either be turned on with the local or domain group policy, or by registry key.
Still though, it’s not as detailed as full console output, but is definitely more helpful than just telling you to wait.
Source please. I need this as I am forced to use Windows for work. Where is the registry key I need to change mlord
In group policy (local or domain):
Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > System > Display highly detailed status messagesAlso make sure that this policy is not set or set to disabled:
Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > System > Remove Boot / Shutdown / Logon / Logoff status messagesInstead of using local group policy you could use the registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System
“VerboseStatus”=dword:00000001If you do it through registry, make sure this key is either non-existant or set to 0.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System
“DisableStatusMessages”If you use Windows a lot, get used to the group policy editor. Your computer should have the local group policy editor on it. If you’ve never used it before, you’ll be surprised at how configurable Windows can be if you know where to look. They just don’t really give those options to the everyday user.
Thanks. That should also be fairly easy to automate. Might set it up as a powershell script so I have it on every Windows pc I am forced to use. Much appreciated kind stranger
The average user does not want to see that and does not need to see that. That’s how you end up with thousands of support requests of “why is my computer showing these errors?”
Things should be abstracted from the users by default. There’s no need for grandma to see a console output every time windows needs to update.
I disagree. I think that some aspects of the software should be open about what they’re doing to everyone. Otherwise people just get used to the idea that everything is a black box that they have no real control of. It also helps educate people on IT and its concepts overall.
Even if they can’t specifically tell what is going on, they can see something is going on. And as long as this does not make it harder to use, the more info the better.
This might take several minutes
…or itcould take several hours
Then failed half way through, and needed another hour to “reverse changes”.
It says “several” but I think it means “many”, important distinction to make there Microsoft.
“If you play your cards right and allow recall ;)”
or itcould take several hours
only if you have a shitty computer full of garbage. My windows updates only take 2 minutes or less. even feature updates only take about 4 minutes to reboot.
Windows is only shitty if you don’t know how to use it. Just because you know what the buttons do doesn’t mean you know how to use it.
Trigger warning! Updating my linux systems takes 15 seconds ;)
And you can postpone it to whenever you want, also post thesis defence.
You have to cut Microsoft some slack on mandatory updates. They’re still traumatized from the XP era when they were the platform of choice for botnets and “Windows security” was a laughing stock.
Tbh, if Linux had the same user base as windows had back then a large amount of people would postpone any update indefinitely and we’d be in the same shit.
Yeah it’s a different game when your user base is tech savvy and self-selecting. When you have to deal with a billion non-technical people you have to be a lot more protective.
But even so Linux seems miles ahead. It’s Microsoft who should be the most motivated to add things like AppArmor, Flatpak, immutable system, curated app repos, executable as a filesystem attribute etc. They’re doing none of that, they plateaued at UAC and bundling their own antivirus.
They tried. UWP and the Windows Store did loads to boost security and make the source of apps verifiable, but people hated it and barely used it, so the holes they were supposed to patch stayed open. The store itself did have the problem that part of its raison d’être was to try and take a cut of the sales of all software for Windows, like Apple do for iOS, and UWP made certain things a pain or impossible (sometimes because they were inherently insecure), but UWP wasn’t tied to the store and did improve even though it’s barely used.
executable as a filesystem attribute
This already exists. It’s labeled as “Traverse folder / execute file” in the UI.
NTFS permissions are also more powerful than the default Linux permission system. Instead of just being able to define permissions for a single user and single group, you can define them for an arbitrary number of users and groups.
I say “default Linux permission system” because you can actually use ACLs on Linux (
getfaclandsetfaclcommands), they’re just not used by default. They used to be common in businesses and schools, but these days everyone seems to store their files “in the cloud” and the permissions are managed there instead.curated app repos
This is what the Windows store is supposed to be. There’s also WinGet, but I’m not sure if it’s curated.
Troll successful lol
How does that “garbage” affect update time?
Bullshit, paid Windows shill. Even a brand new, high end PC on a fast internet with a fresh (non-OEM full of crap) install of Windows takes LITERALLY SEVERAL HOURS to fully update and often even minor updates will take at least an hour depending on what’s being updated.
Don’t give me that shit. You know it’s a lie. Windows is trash.
Cool ceiling tile
sponsored by Proxmox
That is an MS Teams Room system in the conference room, it runs Windows IOT. Whoever manages those rooms should have set the working hours of the room so it didn’t apply this update during business hours. By default the system updates at 2 or 2:30 AM, I forget… so might be a weird MS bug or someone fudged up a config
Source - installed a lot of these a few years ago.
I’ve always set windows to update around late hours.
But once in a while, Microsoft ignores that and does updates anyways. Usually just a quick min or two. But it’s still annoying.
My favorite windows update was when I was attending an onsite coding competition hosted my Microsoft. We were all in this large meeting hall that looked like a theater, and we spent first 10 minutes or so at the start of the competition just looking at Windows update, with the Microsoft rep apologizing to us, because his pc decided to do the “Forced update restart you cant postpone any more” literally two minutes into the presentation
When your dog food tastes like dog food
As a presenter would be mortified.
As an attendee, hilarious.
As an attendee, would be somewhat annoyed
As someone on the Internet, hilarious
That’s probably the presenter’s fault for not updating it earlier. Keep on top of your updates so they don’t force you to do it at an unfortunate time.
Well, aside from this I hope it all went well OP!
Much as I always feel Microsoft has made some horrible missteps around automatic updates…I also think many many users are vocally and unabashedly following horrible update policies.
The biggest one is “Fuck you, Microsoft, I don’t ever want to update.” A simple truth about Windows is that it is currently the most popular operating system in the world. If that OS was Unix-based, the resulting truth would still be true: The most popular OS is going to be the most common target for vulnerabilities, hacks, malware, and exploits. Far more than an antivirus, keeping that computer up to date is the most important step for keeping it secure.
This is true not just of computers used to manage your bank account and nuclear launch codes, but of the swarm of “convenience” computers sitting inside a campus network that could spread a virus to everything on the Wi-Fi.
So, looking at this image, it’s a shame on Microsoft moment if this update came from nowhere, or they once again blatantly ignored the configured update time. It’s a shame on the campus moment if someone was repeatedly closing the “Time to update” popup.
Other systems like ChromeOS and Silverblue do atomic updates in the background and then switch on next restart. No waiting at screens like this. Heck even the conventional Linux update system, while far from foolproof, doesn’t require waiting like this.
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So does windows for the most part
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Do you know how often users actually restart their machines without being forced?
Perhaps the solution is to figure out how to update without restarting. It is a hard problem, but a forced restart is the same as a crash from a user perspective.
Imagine if they replaced the crash screen with a fake automatic update.
Years ago there was a screensaver that showed a fake “upgrading to Vista, please wait” screen. Just wait for someone to leave their computer unattended, download and set it as the screensaver, and wait for their reaction when they’re back :)
That’s some oblivion on xbox shit right there. Hide a restart with a loading screen.
No Windows doesn’t do atomic updates in the background, that’s why there is the whole installing updates screen on reboot or shutdown.
Yes it does? As far as I’m aware even Linux can’t apply updates to an active system.
You vastly misunderstand both what I am talking about, and how updates work on both Windows and Linux.
You don’t press shut down and then get a blue updating screen that stops you from doing anything on Linux. Go and update a Linux system and you will see what I am talking about. You run it just like a normal command or program.
Also yes they update the files on the drive while the system is running.
Do you know how often users actually restart their machines without being forced?
If Windows would actually shut the fuck down when asked to do so, this wouldn’t be a problem.
I complained enough at my work about this that we shut off fast boot domain wide. I haven’t had to have a “I know that you just turned your computer on but I need you to restart it. No, not shutdown and turn on, restart. Yes, they are different things.” conversation in a couple years. Funnily enough I haven’t seen anyone complain about the significantly longer start up times. I guess people just expect that from windows lol.
I think people just don’t care about startup times. They do it maybe once per day (if they don’t sleep and resume), and they probably get a coffee or something while it’s starting up.
Walk in, press on button, hang up jacket and get stuff out of bag, type in password, grab coffee.
That’s a pretty common morning pattern I see.
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The issue is some updates don’t contain just security fixes, but rather privacy invading features and advertising that make the OS shittier.
In addition to what was said by somebody else about atomic updates, even a simple update via package manager on a regular distro will do all the work up front, and not take extra time on next boot. Before you reboot, most things will continue working fine - and most of the remaining things that might not can be worked around.
How did it go?!
I didn’t defend, but it went well
Well congratulations to the newly minted Dr!
the thesis was on why you should move to Linux
Should make that screen the first slide of the PowerPoint
One in the middle, including the pop-up notification about a pending restart before that. Hahaha nice
