
Windows Springwatch
By Windows insider, Willie Mc Boingboing.
Windows 10 Springwatch – as it shall henceforth be known – has entered its second week and Microsoft has dropped the first clue as to what caused the delay: bugs. Though Microsoft has never actually confirmed a release date or name for the elusive Windows 10 Spring Creators Update (aka version 1803), many expected it to arrive …
A total mistake for four reasons:
1) Totally unrepresentative of real Windows users.
2) Leads to lazy QC / QA as mentioned.
3) You can't improve products by testing, but by improved design & implementation
4) Focus groups, such programs, become echo chambers and encourage "design" by committee instead of a handful of experienced experts.
Started in 2014, but the rot set in as MS about 10 years earlier.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Insider
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@Shadmeister
Once you get a BSOD, does Microsoft ever correct the issue in the next build, or if you are BSOD, you are permanently BSOD'd ???
Of course you aren't permanently BSOD'd! If you're hopelessly stuck using Windows, you take out the thumb drive with Clonezilla (or whatever you use) and and roll the HD back to the last more-or-less working Windows version.
If you're not hopelessly stuck using Windows, you install Linux and quit worrying about BSOD's.
"are in effect saying, they roll out the updates, knowing full well that they will brick some users."
just to play devils advocate here, Its near enough impossible for Microsoft to test the build for every variant of machine that will run windows.
I would bet that the machines that will not have issues are going to be the machines made by or for Microsoft, and most popular builds from the top 5 manufactures as sold to businesses.
this is where apple do have an advantage over Microsoft. because apple have a limited hardware list they can tailor the os for a perfect fit. The problems you get with apple though is when 3rd party software fails after an OS update, they will shrug and say "tough shit, buy newer software"
just to play devils advocate here, Its near enough impossible for Microsoft to test the build for every variant of machine that will run windows.
I know I'm repeating myself, but why don't common Linux distros have these problems? You can take a stable release of RedHat, Debian, or pretty much any popular Linux OS, install it on any non-exotic hardware (aka anything Dell) and it just works. You can update it and it just works. You can update the kernel and it just works.
The old "MS can't possibly test for every hardware combination" claim is just nonsensical.
Win 10 upgrade to newer Win 10 on two machines: No sound card. Search Windows update, still nothing. Search windows.old folder and the driver there worked.
Linux 17.x to 18.x: Updated various netbooks, laptops deskstops: AMD, Intel, integrated Graphics, GPU cards, Broadcom, Scanners, printers (MFC & Colour Laser), USB sound boxes, Wacom tablets. All worked.
Win7 installs wrong drivers for the Wacom & Creative USB Sound box.
@Barry Rueger
Sure, if you take the stable release of it, it'll work the vast majority of the time. Just like Windows.
If you take the dev release or the nightly release, you're more likely to experience issues.
The article is saying that a stable release is being delayed because of an issue found on the dev release which, while inconvenient (YMMV), is the accepted cost of doing business.
"You can take a stable release of RedHat, Debian, or pretty much any popular Linux OS, install it on any non-exotic hardware (aka anything Dell) and it just works. You can update it and it just works. You can update the kernel and it just works."
tell that to my hp laptop that has a reasonably fast AMD quad core, with a ATI GPU...
yes, it works when I run debian, ubuntu kali or whatever but not if I want to actually make use of the GPU... I need a degree in linux guru and install arch on it if I want to make use of the GPU...
you can blame ATI for withdrawing support, but it still does not change the fact that large numbers of machines will just not run linux.
The solution is easy, buy a laptop from system 76..
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Not always in my personal experience. I has an old Dell machine lying around, so I got a TP-Link wireless adaptor and tried Xbuntu on it to use as a simple email-and-browsing machine.
In spite of the packaging on the adaptor, it wouldn't run "out of the box", so I had to download and compile the drivers myself. I them had to rinse and repeat every time there was a minor update to the kernel. These updates often seemed to require a reboot (more often than my Win-7 laptop).
The system also was unstable - it often wouldn't recover from hibernation or sleep, requiring a restart. This was probably due to the old NVidia graphics card, which I later found out was dodgy.
I discovered the problem when I gave up on Linux, and installed Windows 10, which then BSODed with enough information for me to figure out it was the card.
Yes, I know that I probably did many things wrong, and a Linux buff would have figured out the card problem, but I'm a software developer, not a technician/engineer. I never even got as far as trying to write code for Linux.
"I know I'm repeating myself, but why don't common Linux distros have these problems? You can take a stable release of RedHat, Debian, or pretty much any popular Linux OS, install it on any non-exotic hardware (aka anything Dell) and it just works."
You seem to be repeating FUD or fake news then.
How about when the Linux distro permanently bricks your Samsung or Lenovo laptops?
So Linux is fine except when using Samsung, Lenovo or Dell (according to you) hardware. Got it, thanks!
>I know I'm repeating myself, but why don't common Linux distros have these problems? You can take a stable release of RedHat, Debian, or pretty much any popular Linux OS, install it on any non-exotic hardware (aka anything Dell) and it just works. You can update it and it just works. You can update the kernel and it just works
"it just works" is certainly not the first thing that springs to mind when thinking about installing Linux.
That aside, Linux is installed on FAR fewer home PCs than Windows, by people who are on average FAR more knowledgeable about how to set their system up. I don't think it's a fair comparison. And I'm sure Linux MUST brick some people's machines but because there are fewer of them and they will spend time fixing it, we don't hear about it as much.
YAWN! The constant claims of the flawless perfection and bullet-proofness of Linux is beyond unimpressive, tiring and insulting to others intelligence.
Maybe it is the exotic hardware that causes the problems?
Are you telling me that Linux never, ever has problems with releases, patches or kernels? I remember several times reading articles about Linux having trouble with new kernels.
Nobody ever runs into a hardware incompatibility problem with Linux?
Claims like that are nonsensical!
We already know what is approved - it's running supported hardware with WHQL drivers. The only thing better than that is knowing what machines the developers are using and buying that, which is the way it used to work (and still does work in the case of OpenBSD).
Of course WHQL isn't perfect, but it's better than it used to be.
Yes, Windows Insider/beta/Linux rc kernels/-current on BSD are naturally less stable than release, *that's the point*. It's possible that people who use beta builds are a little unrepresentative, but that by itself is likely to improve things due to unusual hardware or software configurations. The only 'standard' Windows install I have at home is a Windows tablet..
Personally I don't use Windows enough at home to bother with the insider program, at work it's Enterprise (and I wouldn't want to use anything that wasn't as stable as possible). For OpenBSD I do tend to track -current, as it's remarkably solid (more so than Free/NetBSD where I wouldn't follow anything other than the stable branch), but does involve reasonably regular re-installs and application updates.
"Once you get a BSOD, does Microsoft ever correct the issue in the next build, or if you are BSOD, you are permanently BSOD'd ???"
I've had issues with Edge accepting any input (scroll or click) as well as my fingerprint scanner not working on Insider Builds. I started on Fast ring. When it first broke I tried the slow ring, then falling back to production. Still no go. I needed to reinstall from USB.
I did give feedback multiple times via multiple channels.
I have tried insider builds a couple times since then with the same results.
I was on Insider builds so I could get Onedrive files on demand, mainly. Timeline and some of the other new features look helpful but I'll wait.
No. Because proper programs use properly selected, statistically significant people and are properly analysed. There is too much of a self selection bias, too many people, too much analysis by telemetry and software algorithms set up to tell the managers what they want to hear.
+
They'd be better off without it. Four years of stupidity of Win10 GUI and slurping proves it. They are still designing for a new platform that no-one wants and mobile/tablet, which is dead for Windows.
What sells windows (apart from being pre-installed) is ability to run stuff even from 16 bit windows. Legacy & Business applications. People using just email, web and Office for home use are not depending on windows at all.
Since 2004, MS has concentrated on the wrong things.
Yes there are also PC Games. The Xbox family was supposed to be the future for that.
"What sells windows (apart from being pre-installed) is ability to run stuff even from 16 bit windows."
Good luck with that. Almost all PCs sold these days run the 64-bit version of Windows, which, natively. completely lacks 16-bit support.
That just leaves businesses making a choice between very legacy software and running modern, more memory hungry, applications within a limited address space.
Which is why MS supplies a free 32 bit VM with XP for certain versions, or did, which supports NTVDM and WOW32-16.
There ARE 64 bit OSes that run 32bit and 16 bit x86. MS 64Bit Win7 & Win 10 is less compatible with even 32bit Win applications than an x86 atom tablet with USB keyboard and 32bit Win 10.
MS HAS lost the plot. That's why my day to day laptop is now Linux Mint for last year (Been using Linux since 1999 and spent many years supporting & selling Windows). I do have a 64 bit Win desktop (for testing) and a 32bit Win 10 x86 Tablet (novelty value/tests) as well as boxes & laptops with WFWG3.11, Win98, Win2K, XP and Win7. No Windows server for some years (since WSUS or what ever it was called was ditched. We had IIS & MSQL as well as MSQL & Apache on Win2K Advanced Server).
I don't run Sage etc now, so no longer need Windows.
"Which is why MS supplies a free 32 bit VM with XP for certain versions, or did, which supports NTVDM and WOW32-16."
The XP Mode was as you said a virtual machine, and MS just provided it for backward compatibility with software that refused to work with Win7. It didn't integrate with the Windows 7 host, you could achieve identical system with e.g. VMWare Workstation under Linux.
I'm running 8-bit software on my C64 emulator perfectly fine but that's not a Windows feature, is it?
"There ARE 64 bit OSes that run 32bit and 16 bit x86."
Natively - which ones?
MS had to drop 16-bit support from 64-bit Windows because the x86 CPU's couldn't execute in 16/64-bit modes at the same time. Blame AMD.
"MS 64Bit Win7 & Win 10 is less compatible with even 32bit Win applications than an x86 atom tablet with USB keyboard and 32bit Win 10."
What on earth are you referring to?
Umm... 64bit Windows uses the WoW (Windows on Windows) subsystem to run 32bit and 16bit apps via emulation. This is why Microsoft is able to run x86 apps on ARM64 Windows simply by updating WoW to run on ARM64.
Now before someone jumps on me - on x86, 32bit apps are run with some amount of emulation (API's) and some amount of native 32bit instruction set. I believe 16bit is fully emulated. On ARM64, everything has to be fully emulated.
@Lost all faith - It is the over reliance on external alpha and beta testers that is the problem. A proper internal test program would catch a lot of the problems before the alpha and beta testers ever see it. Also, a well designed program would deliberately try to break the code and find the errors.Your typical external testers are not likely to try to break the code. Also, the equipment available to the external testers is rather limited; maybe a couple of printers, a scanner, a couple of laptops, etc.
@JDX - yes, that's pretty much it. There's a "fast" stream that gets every release as it's put out, a "slow" stream that gets only the most stable/complete of the "fast" releases from the previous couple of weeks, and finally a "release preview" stream that lets hardware and software devs do meaningful pre-release compatibility testing.
The problem, mentioned above, is that the non-preview trains attract the sort of person who only wants "the latest thing", and whatever bugs they do file are usually against third-party developers for "not being up to speed". I never knew such people existed until I wrote my first smartphone app, and then got loads of bogus bug-reports from people running "custom", pre-release or otherwise unsupported, firmware (in which lots of the normal features of the device didn't work properly, but hey, you get this faster launch-time)
Bug reports on fast builds aren't really useful either, because the fast releases often gain, drop and then regain functionality as development progresses, and nobody seems to read the release logs that say this. And if what I've received from my few users is typical of what MS receives, I wouldn't be surprised if they binned them all to avoid wasting the QA managers' time trying to decipher them.
For Microsoft's sake, they should make all "insiders" do an online course on writing a bug report before they can sign up - enough to know that a bug report needs all of "Title, Environment, Steps to reproduce, Expected Result, Actual Result" and optionally: "Logs/Evidence of failure, Notes of any similar, non-failure case". If the "price" for early access is helping find bugs, at least give some help to the users to be helpful. (This should apply to any vendor offering early-access builds, not just Microsoft.)
"Insider" builds are of use to third-party devs, but we're usually too busy actually writing software to properly participate in the program.. I've only logged bugs when they've directly stopped me from doing something.
Not remotely.
You are focusing on one very narrow aspect.
Also unlike Vista, Win8, Win10: if Ubuntu / debian / Redhat / Suse etc mess up badly then some savvy folk will say "Fork YOU!" Hence CentOS (not exactly a fork) and now Linux Mint has overtaken Ubuntu (largely because of Unity & Gnome). There is also Free BSD, Open Solaris, Open VMS, and a Linux without Systemd.
See also: MySQL vs MariaDB, Hudson vs Jenkins, OpenOffice vs LibreOffice
@Mage
So what you're saying is that the Windows insider programme is a bad idea because it means that bugs like this that affect system stability are found before patches are rolled out? How Dare They. It's almost as if they're aware that bugs are bad and that their software should be tested by as many people as possible to see if there are any issues like this.
1) Unrepresentative of standard windows users, but on a much wider array of hardware than the in house testers will have access to
3) You improve products by finding out the problems (by testing) and then using that knowledge of problems to improve your design & implementation
I agree with point 4 and don't necessarily agree with point 2 but don't have any good arguments against it currently.
on point 1 is not just the hardware question, is the changes driven by insider program these people do not represent the user base in anyway and their input drives change that is the big issue, but that is the Net these day in a lot of technical communities around vendors they are usually fanboi's or tweekgeeks that that don't represent what the core users of the product desire.
Even on here you will see the various rabid rants from the usual sycophantic loons in a matchbox, modern users want stability, speed, security and functionally but above all they want Choice and you wont get that input from the insider program.
You test to see if the product is compliant with design or if implementation is correct. It doesn't work if "so called" testing is instead of defensive programming and good design and the underlying problem isn't addressed. MS seems to be mostly using automated telemetry to see what kludges and patches to do.
You can only find mistakes by testing, not improve product, and uncontrolled use by millions is just poor unpaid crowd sourced tests of a very low value.
Insiders are nothing more than a bunch of fanboys (girls?) who think they're cool to be inside SatNad's 'fast ring' and getting first access to all released code. They also are the primary focus group 'committee' providing feedback (Win 10's UI and cumulative feature additions e.g. Paint 3D were mostly due to them).
It's cheaper to let them do the dirty job, and push shoddy code to end users, than to hire professional testers.
Ship it and fix it along the way, such a malaise these days, especially with this new Microsoft.
SatNad's head is so far up the Azure Cloud ass.
@K
The Windows 8 UI change was down to two people: Steven Sinofsky and Julie Larson-Greene. It was a corporate decision but those two sanctioned and led the development of Windows 8 till RTM.
I'm not sure if the videos are still around (so many years, how time flies!) but you can check those Sinofsky-led keynotes leading up to the release of Windows 8.
Just realised yesterday that Win 10 no longer recognises my Bluray/DVD drive. Or, to be precise, Disk Management and Device Manager report it as being there and working properly, but File Explorer and all other applications just don't know it's there.
It seems that this is a common problem that has being occurring for years. There isn't a proprietary driver for the device, so the generic Windows driver is used. And it must have changed recently.
Have tried all the suggested fixes. Changing the drive letter, uninstalling and rebooting, registry edits, swapping the SATA connectors around on the motherboard, etc. Only one which worked in any way was moving the SATA connectors around, but that only worked sometimes, and for one use of the drive only.
If anyone knows of any other solutions, please reply.
@Doctor Syntax
Use more up-to-date hardware. The fashion there is to leave optical drives out "because there's no demand" as I was told when I asked about it.
Jeez, that was really helpful. I appreciate that there may not be demand nowadays, but there is a vast installed base of optical drives around the world, which will continue to function for years to come.
@Greg D - thanks, but sticking a disc in doesn't help. The disc access light comes on for a few seconds, then goes out. The disc doesn't spin up.
@javapapa - let me introduce you to Doctor Syntax. I feel that you two are made for each other...
@Greg D - thanks, but sticking a disc in doesn't help. The disc access light comes on for a few seconds, then goes out. The disc doesn't spin up.
But now I find that if a stick a disc in and then fire up Disk Management, that seems to force it to find ALL the drives - and the optical drive is there and ready for use by everything!
So thanks again - you pointed me in the right direction. And my olde librarie of ye ancient DVDs is not yet a collection of coasters and bird-scarers :)
It won't show an empty drive any more (new unannounced features, I love em).
Stick a disk in and it'll show up (or assign a drive letter in diskmgmt.msc as you've already poked around in there!).
It's nearly as annoying as the "lets start all your applications you had open when you shut down" shutdown button behaviour they put in, with all the fanfare of a master ninja. Why would I want my computer to do that when I shut it down? I'd use hibernate or sleep for that ffs.
They've obviously been booting up OS/2 2.0..
One of the first things most OS/2 users did was edit CONFIG.SYS to include the line SET RESTARTOBJECTS=STARTUPFOLDERSONLY as otherwise it restarted all the applications open at shutdown. Apps were supposed to automatically save state on shutdown (but mostly didn't), and basically it was too annoying to do anything other than re-open your desktop folders and startup programs.
If they start doing per folder wall paper, using the right mouse button to drag and drop, and add REXX as a scripting language you'll know where it came from.
This. It's annoying, especially if you've gotten one of those fancy optical drives without an eject button. ;) Me, I don't mind quite as much, but then, the windows 10 machine I have (referred to here at [RedactedCo] as 'Patient Zero') doesn't have an optical drive.
You can also try this:
Open File Explorer, View tab of ribbon, Options. That will open the Folder Options dialog.
Under view tab:
Un-Check "Hide Empty Drives" (along with any other preferences- I rather like seeing the damned file extensions, so I uncheck that as well, and show hidden files, folders, drives), Apply, OK.
That *should* bring it back...
Only yesterday a friend was asking me for advice on selecting a new Windows laptop and keeping it in good running order. Top of my list of advice was to disable Windows updates. For me auto-update is a ticking timebomb....one day a machine is running fine, the next it's BSODed into oblivion because Microsoft have forced it to take an update that the user has managed quite happily without up to now.
"Only yesterday a friend was asking me for advice on selecting a new Windows laptop"
my advice would be to buy a machine that has a good track record of reliability... for example, more or less anything but acer. I find Lenovo and HP to produce laptops that work and suffer few ill affects from MS updates...
one cock up from acer was an issue with cooling. After about a year or so, the machines would start over heating. The issue was the heat-sink. The gap between the blades were so small that dust would start to build up. It was worse if the laptop was in a more humid environment where the dust got sticky and clog up.
the result was a laptop that would work for a little while then boom BSOD.... The fix was to strip out the heat-sink and give it a very thorough cleaning. then a dip in a sonic bath, then a dip in isopropyl alcohol. dry thoroughly in a warm oven. and then you were good for another 12 months....
the quick fix was a quick suck with a dyson in the hot air outlet... you were good for a week or two...
my advice would be to buy a machine that has a good track record of reliability... for example, more or less anything but acer. I find Lenovo and HP to produce laptops that work and suffer few ill affects from MS updates...
Funny you should say that, but I did steer them towards HP. They'd already found out the hard way that Acer is not the wisest choice. And after suffering that f***ing annoying Yoga advert on the tellybox, I don't feel inclined to say any kind words about Lenovo.
I think the only thing Acer are good at is making laptops that have a high spec list at low prices.. So when you are looking at a new machine it can be hard to justify paying £150 more for a computer with similar specs...
but less than 6 months into ownership and the battery holds less of a charge than a 200pF capacitor and half the keys have popped off the keyboard, then 12 months in the power supply melts the plug where it plugs into the computer and the usb sockets are as baggy as an over worked lady of the night.... you know where the extra £150 goes....
How about Mix-'n'-Match?
say, a flavour of Linux as your Internet-facing machine. It would have no other apps other than the browsers, e-mail client etc. and contains no private files.
Win 7 64-bit (without Internet access) for the machine that runs Office 2012 (or whatever version you have),
Win XP (without Internet access) for the really old games, if you don't want them on the Win 7 machine,
Mac OS X (without Internet access) on a Mac Mini / hackintosh for home video-editing and photos (obviously you'd have a beefier Mac if you're doing more intensive or professional graphics work),
all connected by a LAN to a NAS as needs be.
That pretty much what I do but it's macOS that faces the Internet. ubuntu LTS as a VM gets Internet access too. Windows 10, 7, XP, and even 2k (for some legacy lab units) all run host only. Years ago I used a Linux host on my Sony VAIO but moved to the Mac for Adobe apps when I got into photography.
I can outtype notepad
I keep getting screens overlayed on my machine whinging about security updates it claims it ant do as it needs gigs of hard drive (which it actually has)
It consumes tons of memory even before it functions and this increase over time
It updated itself 3 times last week moaning all the time it needed to again / taking 45 minutes a time during boot when I wanted to use the damned machine
Frankly I think Microsoft should offer all those who have had this monstrosity inflicted on them a free upgrade to windows nt or better still linux
Busy with factory reinstall of a Win10 Lenovo laptop - it got bogged down for some reason. Slow to start, slow to get the desktop ready for user interaction.
And I did not load the usual bevy of malware/crapware/bloated apps, it have Firefox, office 2013, and one or two other apps... but it just got slow.
Maybe it is the hard drive moseying on over for a nice pension somewhere. I have replaced it with an SSD anyway.
"Busy with factory reinstall of a Win10 Lenovo laptop - it got bogged down for some reason. Slow to start, slow to get the desktop ready for user interaction."
Busy upgrading Windows 10 Lenovo laptop to Linux Mint @ 16:16 BST - will post back when installed and fully updated (get ready for a red face when it goes horribly wrong :-) )