JorgeA Posted December 1, 2015 Share Posted December 1, 2015 Bottom line is this: At various points we've chosen to jump off the bandwagon. It's because the band insists on playing only kazoos and the wheels are wobbly. That's a great analogy! If I may modify it a little, you could say that Windows was a symphony orchestra and now they insist on playing kazoos and jaw harps. --JorgeA 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vinifera Posted December 1, 2015 Share Posted December 1, 2015 What's ironic is that before I expunged that crapware from my system, Microsoft wouldn't let me even try to run it with UAC turned off. Assuming that's an indication that Microsoft doesn't trust it's own Metro/Modern/Universal/XAML Apps... Why? Maybe because at some point it could deliver adware? this is actually interesting thing to tinker abouteither they want to impose people to use UAC (or you get no metro crap)or either .NET or UAC itself is now a real security risk by that I mean the whole backdoor shit and data mining Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rn10950 Posted December 1, 2015 Share Posted December 1, 2015 BTW I ended up reinstalling Windows 10 because of the dreaded "CRITICAL_PROCESS_DIED" error. (emphasis added) What's ironic is that before I expunged that crapware from my system, Microsoft wouldn't let me even try to run it with UAC turned off. Assuming that's an indication that Microsoft doesn't trust it's own Metro/Modern/Universal/XAML Apps... Why? Maybe because at some point it could deliver adware? this is actually interesting thing to tinker abouteither they want to impose people to use UAC (or you get no metro crap)or either .NET or UAC itself is now a real security risk by that I mean the whole backdoor s*** and data mining I see this as an upside... you can kill two birds with one stone. Disable UAC and take Metro with it. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoelC Posted December 1, 2015 Share Posted December 1, 2015 Oh, I agree. Whatever management could decide that a system REQUIRES UAC to run is proving in that ONE DECISION that they are not capable of creating a serious operating system. I personally believe Metro/Modern/Universal/Apps will fail, just like all other such past initiatives at Microsoft. Then there will be a "return to traditional strengths" period. But will it be too late for Microsoft as a company by then? Time will tell. -Noel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JorgeA Posted December 2, 2015 Share Posted December 2, 2015 That's ingenious, I love it!! --JorgeA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JorgeA Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 Editorial: It's time to stop making excuses for Microsoft's mobile efforts For what seemed like an eternity, Microsoft's share of the global smartphone market stubbornly hovered at around 3-4%. Earlier this month, though, independent industry analyst Gartner revealed that Windows Phone share had slumped to just 1.7%. When BlackBerry suffered this kind of painful decline, most objective commentators rightfully lambasted the company for its failures. But in the case of Microsoft’s failure to deliver in mobile, there are still those who maintain that this is all part of some grand plan, a master strategy that will soon become clear, validating those who stuck with Windows handsets after all these years. Call me a cynic, but I can’t see any basis for that position beyond wishful thinking. Former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer thinks universal app strategy 'won't work' Steve Ballmer may not be running Microsoft anymore, but the former CEO of the company clearly has some opinions on its current Windows 10 app strategy. Ballmer believes that the universal app platform that Microsoft is currently following is not the way to go, and that the company should consider having Windows Phones run Android apps. IMO they should drop the whole effort to shoehorn a desktop OS into a mobile shell and leave Windows be. Ballmer is on to something here, but the right approach is to drop the mobile OS pretensions altogether and make apps for Android. --JorgeA 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoelC Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 I never had much respect for Ballmer, but apparently - given the above statement - he wasn't actually in charge. THAT is probably the problem right there. The guy who's supposed to be in charge isn't. -Noel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
helpdesk98 Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 Microsoft = The Borg Assimilate NOW! It as easy as upgrading to Windows 10 and signing in with your Microsoft Account. out of curiosity dose disabling UAC in W8/8.1 kill metro? that might be quick (temporary until I can get to the clients workstation) way to kill it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoelC Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 out of curiosity dose disabling UAC in W8/8.1 kill metro? that might be quick (temporary until I can get to the clients workstation) way to kill it. The question is asked a bit too simply, but in general yes - Windows 8 and newer will not run an App (except certain system functions, like Settings) with EnableLUA set to 0. It does appear that quite a bit of background activity still occurs with UAC off, though. I've actually had to uninstall and deprovision Apps to get that stuff to stop. Whether I would in general advise disabling UAC on another user's system, where I don't have good knowledge of the user's level or expertise, and without having set up a much more effective overall security strategy... I don't think I would. -Noel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JorgeA Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 More reasons to turn Windows into a mobile OS: Tablets are doing worse than laptops On the other hand, tablets continue to sink. The devices which are still limited to browsing and entertainment, have very little to offer in terms of functionality, and are thus being replaced by smartphones, which grow in size with each passing year. TrendForce has lowered its tablet shipment forecast for 2015 to 163.4 million units, representing a year-on-year decline of 14.9 percent. "Our estimation indicates that a total of 153.4 million tablets will be shipped in 2016, down 6.1 percent year on year". Great comment down at the bottom: Where are all those tech analysts that told us the PC is dead & tablets is the future. --JorgeA 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JorgeA Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 Meanwhile, in Palo Alto: Facebook will stop tracking Belgian web users who shun the social network Privacy issues in relation to Facebook make frequent appearances, but they tend to focus on instances of the social network using the browsing and account data of logged in users. However, a recent court case in Belgium highlighted the fact that the site was tracking people who accessed public Facebook pages either without a Facebook account, or without logging into one. [emphasis added!] A couple of years ago questions emerged as to whether this was going on, and IIRC Facebook said that it was some sort of coding error. (Yeah, right.) Now the tracking seems to be confirmed. facebook.com is in my Hosts file. --JorgeA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JorgeA Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 Windows 10's privacy invading features aren't gone in Threshold 2 Since the launch of Windows 10, there have been various concerns relating to privacy. Some would dismiss this as little more than paranoia, but a lack of transparency about what was happening in the background broke a lot of people's trust. Many hoped that the release of the Threshold 2 update this month would address this, but in lots of cases it was actually a backward step. In the RTM release of Windows 10, there was a service running in the background called Diagnostics Tracking Service (also known as DiagTrack), and people concerned about privacy -- who were in the know -- disabled it. In Threshold 2, this service is gone. A cause for celebration you might think; but think again. The service is still there, just under a different guise. --JorgeA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoelC Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 (edited) Apparently Microsoft's "wear the users down" strategy is working. It's not surprising. According to StatCounter.com, Windows 10 adoption continues to rise. There is no evidence of a "roll off" in usage. The curves are more or less linear, and imply Windows 10 will become the dominant operating system by some time in 2017. Windows 7 usage continues to fall (though, surprisingly, 8.0 and 8.1 are holding a bit more level than 7). Clearly, no matter how much we try to educate the world, there's really nothing we can do about this. OSX usage is rising, but you can be sure Apple will stumble at some point. They always do. Individually the smart folks amongst us can shun the new Windows 10 system for now, sure, but that's not going to keep. End users - even those with literally YEARS of experience with Windows, and who use Windows at work, are being herded right along, and we're going to find ourselves in an era where Windows 10 is the dominant operating system. Projecting the curves forward, and barring unforeseen developments (like the Justice Department shutting Microsoft down or a new OS company emerging from the woodwork), my extrapolations: This is a bit like predicting where hurricanes will go. Perhaps I should have included error cones... -Noel Edited December 4, 2015 by NoelC Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoelC Posted December 4, 2015 Share Posted December 4, 2015 (edited) facebook.com is in my Hosts file. --JorgeA Keep in mind hosts does not do partial domain matching (as far as I know). From my current hosts file, compiled from online sources 3 days ago: Microsoft Windows [Version 6.3.9600]© 2013 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. C:\TEMP>fgrep -i facebook c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts. 0.0.0.0 www.facebook.com0.0.0.0 connect.facebook.net0.0.0.0 graph.facebook.com0.0.0.0 15817.facebook.profilephdid.com0.0.0.0 7765817.facebook.profilephdid.com0.0.0.0 applications.facebook.com.install.55211987.4lgeri.com0.0.0.0 creative.ak.facebook.com0.0.0.0 facebook.com.accounts.logins.userids.349574.23ud82.com0.0.0.0 facebook.com.accounts.logins.userids.355111.23ud82.com0.0.0.0 facebook.com.linkedstate.in0.0.0.0 facebook.khmerinform.com0.0.0.0 facebookanh.muzik123.net0.0.0.0 facebookgameappg.co.vu0.0.0.0 facebookinc.122.2o7.net0.0.0.0 facebookside.wapka.mobi0.0.0.0 facebookum.com0.0.0.0 facebookvivn.com0.0.0.0 freefacebookhacking.com0.0.0.0 hackfacebookprofiles.com0.0.0.0 mfacebooks.com0.0.0.0 oyunlarfacebook.somee.com0.0.0.0 pixel.facebook.com0.0.0.0 socialfacebook.com0.0.0.0 th-facebook.blogspot.ca0.0.0.0 www.facebook-pictures.com -Noel Edited December 4, 2015 by NoelC Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JorgeA Posted December 5, 2015 Share Posted December 5, 2015 More -- and more tantalizing -- details about Steve Ballmer's performance at the Microsoft shareholders' meeting: Ballmer: Microsoft’s cloud revenue report is ‘bµ//sh!t’ When it comes to Wall Street, though, former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer had some harsh words for the company at its annual shareholder’s meeting, Bloomberg reports — specifically, that Microsoft should disclose margins and sales numbers for both its cloud and hardware businesses. “It’s sort of a key metric — if they talk about it as key to the company, they should report it,” Ballmer said to Bloomberg. He characterized as “bul*****” the company’s use of an annualized revenue run rate, which describes sales over a certain period of time extrapolated to a yearly rate, instead of pure revenue numbers by division, which would give a clearer picture of how each of the company’s individual businesses are actually performing. And it’s clear Microsoft is doing this for a reason. Hardware has never been as profitable for the company as software like Windows and Office has, and cloud services are also known to be less profitable as well. The Bloomberg report also said current CEO Satya Nadella addressed a question from the audience regarding the lack of Windows Phone apps. Nadella said that the company wants to court Windows developers by letting them write so-called Universal Apps that work across all devices, including computers, phones, and tablets. In response, Ballmer said “That won’t work,” and that Windows Phones need to run Android apps in order to stay competitive.[emphasis added] Interesting bit about the profitability of hardware and cloud vs. software. And which areas, therefore, have the wise men at MSFT chosen fo focus on? The blog author makes an insightful observation early on: You could argue the way Windows 8 forced tablet mode on desktops, Windows 10 seems to force the cloud-like “always updated” model on desktops. Now why didn't we think of that? I mean, we've mentioned cloud computing here many times, but at least to me it never jumped out as the "theme" underlying what they're up to. Maybe it's because there so many things wrong to keep track of with Windows 10... --JorgeA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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