Posts by Fignuts

Mozilla slams Microsoft for using dark patterns to drive Windows users toward Edge

Re: "with the added trust of Microsoft"

Rowan Atkinson best summed up my feelings toward Microsoft years ago in a skit called "Father of the Bride," in which he made the statement: "I wouldn't trust any of you to sit the right way on a toilet seat." For the record, this is far more than I trust Microsoft - and so long as their reach exceeds their grasp, I think we have some hope. The moment they actually become a competent, functional organization, that is when we need to fear. It's not that they don't have plenty of horrible intentions now - what saves us is they don't have the capability of acting on most of them due to incompetence. Thankfully.

That said, with the focus and drive on AI, I am worried it might actually overcome some of their natural stupidity.

Windows 10 users report app gremlins after Microsoft update

Error in article

In the article, the author states:

"The Register doubts the company [Microsoft] does much in the way of regression testing on unsupported hardware."

To be more factual, the line should read:

"The Register doubts the company [Microsoft] does much in the way of regression testing. Period. Full Stop."

I think the word "regression" may be superfluous as well.

What if Microsoft had given us Windows XP 2024?

The modern definition of "Innovate" and "Improve" are different than they used to be

It sure seems nowadays when I hear Microsoft use the words Innovate or Improve, the first thing I think is "Let's have a look-see what they have made better for Microsoft, and worse for the rest of us." This makes me somewhat nostalgic for the "bad old days!"

HP exec says quiet part out loud when it comes to locking in print customers

HP, just the latest in a long line

To paraphrase a well known movie: "The more they tighten their grip, the more customers will slip through their fingers."

The moment I heard that HP was bricking their multi-function devices (Print/Scan/Copy devices) if they didn't have ink in them was the moment HP became truly dead to me. Use your favorite search engine to look up "HP fails to derail claims that it bricks scanners on multifunction printers when ink runs low" if you haven't heard this whole story before. The last 4 HP computers I've used (thankfully 3 of them were work devices) were so problematic they were sent back, and my company is switching to a different vendor. It makes me wonder what RPM Dave Hewlett and Bill Packard are spinning in their graves.

It is surprising how little people learn from other companies' avaricious missteps. Xerox had a notorious history of trying to lock people into their products by leasing the device and rigidly enforcing usages patterns, supplies, etc. And just look where that got them. Another good example is Oracle - "Oracle famously doesn't have customers - only hostages" is the old saying; and look at people doing anything they can do to get away from them nowadays. Don't believe me? Search out "Oracle stock suffers steepest drop since 2002 on weak revenue guidance," or look up what Xerox stock price was in 1999 versus today: roughly $100/share in 1999 to roughly $15 now. The slow-motion train-wreck in progress that is so much of what IBM is today paints yet another portrait. I personally can't wait for the moment Microsoft's hubris is similarly rewarded.

Three signs that Wayland is becoming the favored way to get a GUI on Linux

Amen to the comment about XFCE!

I certainly hope the devs at XFCE can get their roadmap to include Wayland before it gets left behind. It is, by far, my favorite desktop.

'Extraordinary' pigs step in to protect Schiphol airport from marauding geese

Foul Fowl

I suspect there is a very good reason why these temperamental avian antagonists are called Fowl. It can't be a coincidence.

For those worried about Microsoft's Pluton TPM chip: Lenovo won't even switch it on by default in latest ThinkPads

If Blackadder were on the IT Crowd...

.. I'm pretty sure his comment would be something to the effect of: "Microsoft designing security hardware is like hiring The 3 Stooges to write your next workplace safety course."

Stop. Look... Install Linux? The Reg solves Microsoft's latest Windows teaser

A slight to Tim Berners-Lee

“The web itself was born and grew up on Windows” – Satya Nadella, Windows 11 announcement

I'm not sure history agrees with that statement in any way considering Microsoft purloined the code for Internet Explorer from Mosaic after Bill Gates backed off on his rhetoric:

"The Internet? We are not interested in it." - - Bill Gates 1993

"I see little commercial potential for the Internet for at least 10 years." - - Bill Gates 1994

"Today's internet is not the information highway I imagine, although you can think of it as the beginning of the highway" - - Bill Gates; excerpt from "The Road Ahead" in 1995.

To say the web was born and grew up on Windows is an outright falsehood and an absolute slap in the face to the work and legacy of Sir Tim Berners-Lee.

If Microsoft's attempts at revisionist history (optimistically) or outright falsehood (more likely) come out of announcement videos like today's, one can only wonder what else they are willing to mislead us on.

Tragic.

Gnome cofounder: Desktop Linux is a CHERNOBYL of FAIL

Apples and Oranges?

How Icaza be taken seriously on this? It's utterly daft trying to compare the experience of using the hardware and software developed by Apple to be completely compatible with each other to people using linux on everything from phones to rasberry pi to HPC clusters to grandma's laptop? Apple has nearly complete control over their entire ecosystem to the point that if you want to run their software, you need their hardware (pretty much anyway). That makes it a lot easier for them to control the experience from the perspective of the person using it.

On the other hand, getting your drivers to work with every piece of hardware in existance is no small task. Running linux on the desktop properly requires a bit of diligence in hardware selection. As always, you have to pick your battles. You can spend more money to purchase an Apple machine and know it's just going to work (again, mostly), or you can spend next to nothing, ensure what you want to run Linux on is well supported and again, it's just going to work (once again, mostly).

All desktop systems are to some degree a measure of "Semper In Excretio, Solum Profundum Variat." They are all irritating in one regard or another. Pick the system that annoys YOU the least. If you don't mind paying for an Apple machine and don't mind their closed-system mentality, then go for it. If you want to get use out of pretty much any piece of hardware, with or without some level of difficulty depending on how well supported it is under Linux, you probably can (other than bleeding edge). You either spend your time up front or your money.

At least when Linus Torvalds rants, it is because he is passionate about the work he does. And that said, him calling Gnome a wreck a while back tends to make me think this is a bit of urinary olympics more than an actual appraisal.