• @[email protected]
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    32 years ago

    Just wait until you use Edge or accidentally the weather widget. You’ll be immediately bombarded with toxic political and celebrity news.

  • @[email protected]
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    222 years ago

    Uga uga i dont know anything to do with computers but linux good windows bad give me upvote now uga.

  • StrikerM
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    62 years ago

    I have decided to close this comment section due to ops toxic behaviour. Honestly, I should of intervened much sooner

  • Pantsofmagic
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    82 years ago

    The one folder where this is really painful is the WindowsApps for Windows store stuff. I had one situation where I reinstalled Windows and I had a couple of hundred gigs of games in a WindowsApps folder. The new install wouldn’t use the folder, so it became wasted space. The new install also wouldn’t let me delete / reclaim the directory no matter how much dicking around with permissions I did. I think I had to kill it from either Linux or a USB Windows installer command prompt.

    • Redex
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      62 years ago

      Yeah, I don’t agree with the post, I think for an OS like Windows, which is used by a lot of non-techy people, things like OP’s post should be the norm, you shouldn’t be able to brick your sistem easily.

      But I feel your pain for windows apps, they’re such fucking cancer. I had the same problem when I tried to uninstall Sea of Thieves because the installer / Microsoft Store app was broken.

  • @[email protected]
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    232 years ago

    I dont even know anymore. These “Windows bad” posts get so stupid by now I can only assume it is satite at this point. Im just waiting for “Task Bar is 20px high instead of 21, literally unusable”

    • @[email protected]
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      52 years ago

      Yeah, like linux doesn’t do this shit all the time. Permission denied always. I’M YOUR FUCKING GOD, DON’T EVER DARE TO GIVE ME PERMISSION DENIED.

  • @[email protected]
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    2 years ago

    I hate windows too but this is something normal that also happens on Linux. Take a drive from another system and you won’t be able to edit its protected files without root access.

            • @[email protected]OP
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              32 years ago

              because a non administrator shouldnt be able to mount drives and other admin operations. an admin should be able to do anything on that machine

              • SuperFlue
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                122 years ago

                ACL’s are an integral part of most filesystems.
                So yes the drive absolutely has a say in this (technically the NTFS filesystem) in combination with the OS’s filesystem driver.
                The Windows folder is set to be owned by the TrustedInstaller SID (S-1-5-80-956008885-3418522649-1831038044-1853292631-2271478464) which is a “well known” Security Identifier.
                This identifier is the same accross Windows systems in a similar way root is UID 0 on Linux.
                Therefore the access rights for TrustedInstaller persists across Windows installs, and also other rights that are defined on the filesystem object.

                Linux uses mainly POSIX ACL which is “fairy simple”, while NTFS ACL can be very complex.
                Should also note that the the UNIX and UNIX-like world there is also NFSv4 ACL which is comparable to NTFS ACL.

                But the basic idea persists across almost all filesytem ACL.
                The user that is running the command must have the right user ID (that is UID/GID in Linux and SID in Windows) that has the correct access rights to do the action you want.

                With Windows administrator rights you can indeed delete everything if you really want.
                But then you have to give your administrator account the right access tokens or you need to impersonate the account in question (both of which are possible if you have an local administrator account, but does require the techincal know-how).

                In Windows a lot of these things are in place both to prevent users from shooting themselves in the foot, but also to provide defence-in-depth against malware.

          • Muddybulldog
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            252 years ago

            The drive doesn’t have a say. The permissions surrounding the TrustedInstaller account have a say. The account existed on your first Windows install and also on your new one hence the permissions and associated restrictions persevere. This is expected behavior.

      • @[email protected]
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        2 years ago

        That’s really bad logic and you’re missing the point here. trusted installer is the owner of the folder. The fact that it’s an old windows drive or that your an admin makes absolutely no difference. It’s a file system ACL, those ACLs don’t just magically disappear from the drive when it’s no longer the system drive.

        Take ownership of the folder, add your account or the everyone security identifier with full access permissions and then delete it.

        I’m sorry to say this but the fact that you’re complaining about this is more a reflection on your lack of understanding of how file system ACLs work, in any OS, than anything else.

        The braincells were not there to begin with, you didn’t lose them. <= that’s a joke, I’m not trying to be mean.

  • @[email protected]
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    42 years ago

    Every other time I use windows, there’s some convoluted ‘issue’ that takes an hour of Googling and trial and error to fix. So frustrating. If you just use a browser and a few light apps to do your job (everyone except developers, in my company), save yourself a ton of wasted time and use a Mac.

    • @[email protected]
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      152 years ago

      Every other time use Mac OS, there’s some convoluted ‘issue’ that takes an hour of Googling and trial and error to fix. So frustrating. If you just use a browser and a few light apps to do your job (everyone except developers, in my company), save yourself a ton of wasted time and use a PC.

  • guajojo
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    572 years ago

    This is perfectly normal, what you’re looking for is a more insecure OS maybe?

      • @[email protected]
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        72 years ago

        Because what people want is often very, very stupid. And also because the difference between “you” and a malicious app acting like you is non-existent. If you can easily change vital files, so can any drive-by app you accidentally run.

  • @[email protected]
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    812 years ago

    Of the many grievous faults of Windows to pick on, file system permissions like this are not one.

    As admin you have permission to change ownership and override permissions. And a relic copy of the OS folder is going to have some of the most restrictive permissions possible.

    I would expect similar behaviour on any modern OS.

    • @[email protected]
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      32 years ago

      Actually ACL on Windows is very bad. Recursively changing owner of directory can take minutes, same operation on any UNIX-like OS takes seconds.

    • @[email protected]
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      132 years ago

      OP is probably young and doesn’t remember the pre-Vista days, when viruses ran rampant because the concept of admin rights didn’t exist yet.

      • @[email protected]
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        32 years ago

        Oh, it existed. It was just much more difficult to use and required an understanding of what you’re doing to set it up first.

        The UAC version from Vista+ is implemented by default and far easier to run/manage for the typical end user. Most users find it hella annoying, but it’s easier than the alternative, since they’ve never used the alternative, they don’t know that.

        Basically, you’d have to create an admin account, and a user account, then intentionally not use the admin account except for admin things… I did this, and it kept me out of trouble in a couple of close calls. Windows power users trend up like to endorse or brag(?) About how often they reinstall, and bluntly, I almost never reinstall my PC. I just don’t bog it down with garbage constantly. :)

  • @[email protected]
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    172 years ago

    Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. Unfortunately it seems that you cannot be trusted with installation :(

  • @[email protected]OP
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    2 years ago

    and yes this is another drive with a different windows folder im not trying to break the system.

    • Sonotsugipaa
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      212 years ago

      Don’t worry, you don’t need to try in order to break Windows

    • @[email protected]
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      322 years ago

      It’s the same for Linux though, if you mount any drive, your user or rather UID/GID needs appropriate permissions to perform any action. Can even happen that you mount a disk with your old home directory somewhere and can’t access it because your UID changed between installations (though it’s 1000 for most people).

        • Carighan Maconar
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          172 years ago

          You can nuke a linux-permission-controlled folder from an account that does not have that permission? How did you misconfigure your linux to allow that?!

            • Carighan Maconar
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              102 years ago

              Aaah, I get it.

              Yeah of course that works. If you disable the entire permission framework, naturally permissions can no longer stop you (this is where something like Bitlocker would step in so that even if someone takes the physical drive out they cannot just read from it).

              But importantly the same would of course work the other way around. Linux permissions mean fuck all if there’s no Linux around to enforce them, you can just delete whatever then.

              • @[email protected]OP
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                12 years ago

                but thats the thing that confuses me, what is the point of these permissions if you can just go around them with another os? this is just a limitation for windows itself, i dont get it

                • Carighan Maconar
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                  62 years ago

                  Well how else would that work? You need a piece of software to enforce the permissions. Once that Software is gone, nothing exists to stop you.

                • Arakwar
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                  62 years ago

                  You’re a sysadmin, you’ll figure it out one day. But here’s a clue : why would you need to protect a windows folder from being written into by windows-based malwares from a linux OS ?

    • @[email protected]
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      102 years ago

      You can use a tool called “winaero tweaker” and there enable an option called “take ownership” then when you right click the folder, you can take ownership of it and do whatever you want with it. Just be absolutely sure that it’s not your main windows installation otherwise it’ll be painful.

      • @[email protected]OP
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        122 years ago

        thanks,i just switched back to linux and did it from there. personally using proprietary software to make proprietary software more usable sound like the plot of a horror movie.

  • @[email protected]
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    2 years ago

    What’s wrong with this? Every OS has permissions that stop users from messing with system files.

    • @[email protected]OP
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      2 years ago

      this is not the system folder, different drive, old windows install and no not every os has this. luckly…

          • @[email protected]
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            62 years ago

            Back up the folders and format the disk. If you’re deleting system files and folders, you’re clearly not running the OS from this other disk. Why waste the space on unneeded system files?

      • lemmyvore
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        712 years ago

        If you try to access an old Linux install you could run into the exact same problem. Both Linux and Windows nowadays use filesystems with permissions embedded into them, so if the user on the new install doesn’t match the old one you’ll have a problem.

        • @[email protected]OP
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          52 years ago

          but i just tried i can delete system folders from a different linux drive with no problems

            • @[email protected]
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              52 years ago

              This breaks the system, depending on your current directory when running it. I had an intern do this to a server while in /. We were able to recover through some tomfoolery, but only because he was still logged in. No one else could get into the system after he destroyed the permissions.

          • @[email protected]
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            172 years ago

            Certainly not without using sudo right? It’s the same in the windows land, the UAC dialog is windows’ equivalent of sudo.

              • @[email protected]
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                142 years ago

                Probably due to some sort of idiot-proof protection to prevent people from deleting their windows folder from explorer. Try running a CMD shell as administrator and delete it from the command line instead.

        • @[email protected]OP
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          52 years ago

          i just deleted what i needed with another os, i didnt want to format it i needed some space and wanted to keep some folders

      • Fushuan [he/him]
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        132 years ago

        laughs because it has the same level of protection as other OSs and thus is quite secure in that regard, right?

        • @[email protected]
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          22 years ago

          Laughs in Linux because if I really want to mess things up it wont stop me unless I am not root. Administrator on Winshit means nothing at all, no control over your system.

          • Fushuan [he/him]
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            142 years ago

            You do realize that in this very post they explain that if you mount an old linux drive with another user, you can’t delete stuff either until you remove the flags or change the owner of the old drives’ files?

            You can do the same in windows, too.

            They are not trying to access their own Windows folder, but that of an old drive.

            • @[email protected]
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              12 years ago

              Maybe you didnt see I responded to a comment that says that every OS has such dumb mechanisms as mentioned in the post which is def not true. I use Arch btw.

              • Fushuan [he/him]
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                72 years ago

                You mention Linux in your comments, but this same thing happens in Linux too! It’s the third time I’m writing this in this comment chain, I’m gonna assume you are a troll since you can’t be this dense. The top comment of this post explains why this also happens in Linux, I mentioned it first and then have you an example. If you can’t ocess that information it’s not my problem. Have a nice day.

  • @[email protected]
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    312 years ago

    It’s still a protected folder even if it’s not the active OS and that’s a good thing…? It will permanently break the install, how is Windows supposed to know you’re never going to use it again? It doesn’t see you as the owner and prevents you from messing it up.

    But if you’re sure you want it gone, you need to Take Ownership