- cross-posted to:
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- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
Let’s put it this way; when Microsoft announced its plans to start adding features to Windows 10 once again, despite the operating system’s inevitable demise in October 2025, everyone expected slightly different things to see ported over from Windows 11. Sadly, the latest addition to Windows 10 is one of the most annoying changes coming from Windows 11’s Start menu.
Earlier this year, Microsoft introduced a so-called “Account Manager” for Windows 11 that appears on the screen when you click your profile picture on the Start menu. Instead of just showing you buttons for logging out, locking your device or switching profiles, it displays Microsoft 365 ads. All the actually useful buttons are now hidden behind a three-dot submenu (apparently, my 43-inch display does not have enough space to accommodate them). Now, the “Account Manager” is coming to Windows 10 users.
The change was spotted in the latest Windows 10 preview builds from the Beta and Release Preview Channels. It works in the same way as Windows 11, and it is disabled by default for now because the submenu with sign-out and lock buttons does not work.
Everybody should learn about pihole.
That won’t stop in operating system ads.
Or pfBlockerng
Pfblocking?
https://www.patreon.com/pfBlockerNG is a addon for pfsense which is a router os for X86/64 machines. If you don’t want to block porn it will run on nearly anything. You can block all dns over tls or https. Many of the list you need can be selected in the gui.
https://docs.netgate.com/pfsense/en/latest/packages/pfblocker.html
It’s a component of the pfSense firewall, although calling it a firewall seems like an understatement. It’s also capable of routing, DDNS, IDS/IPS, and lots of other things.
Now I know what the menu is when clicking the profile picture. I wondered if I was going insane and misremembered how to log out. :|
Sure if added to Pro version will have a Group Policy to disable them. Really happy I went Pro for Windows 10.
Really happy I went
Pro for Windows 10with LinuxWhich flavor?
(quick disclaimer: I've been using Linux for over 20 years)
I use Gentoo because I’m a power user and like to customize my system. I don’t mind having to compile software from source, and I actually appreciate the benefits I get from it. I use a custom kernel, which I probably recompile once a week because I make changes all the time. I also appreciate the fact that Gentoo doesn’t force me to use any particular piece of software, e.g. systemd or sudo. I replaced both, I use OpenRC as my init and doas instead of sudo.
For new users I would recommend something simple like Linux Mint, Pop!_OS or Zorin OS. EndeavourOS is great for intermediate users, and it offers a great introduction into the world of Arch Linux. Fedora and Fedora Atomic, as well as derivatives like Universal Blue are really interesting as well.
No Arch? I game on linux as much as possible and went with same that Valve did for SteamOS. Work I use Windows 10 Pro and laptop FreeBSD.
SteamOS has the big advantage that it’s immutable. I have used Arch many times and generally like it, but I recently had a few Arch installations break repeatedly for no reason, and I don’t want to deal with that. So I went back to Gentoo, which has always been extremely stable for me. But I like Arch, and one of the distros I recommend is EndeavourOS, which is Arch-based. But it’s better for users with some intermediate Linux knowledge, because it’s pretty easy to fuck up on Arch.
FreeBSD is nice! I have an old laptop that I keep around so I can play with FreeBSD. I also used to run OpenBSD on the desktop for a few years, but I had another machine running Linux because I couldn’t do everything on BSD. But it was a really nice experience, and I still use OpenBSD on servers.
Yeah yeah, Linux is our saviour.
I call bullshit. Charge Microsoft criminally. Sue them into the ground! We will never get enough people to truly harm them just by leaving, so we need to FUCKING DESTROY ANY COMPANY THAT PULLS THIS BULLSHIT!
Sue them for what exactly?
Because I hate them. It should be a criminal offense to be on my bad side
Sue first, ask questions later!
- the legal department at Nintendo
I’m unironically beginning to view Microsoft as one of my favorite companies. They treat their cattle just right. Hopefully they’ll start arbitrarily deleting local files.
Is there anything the cattle won’t tolerate? LETS FIND OUT
Hopefully they’ll start arbitrarily deleting local files.
They already do that. If you click “yes” on everything they recommend like good cattle, they’ll upload the contents of your user folders to OneDrive and delete the local copies.
Yup, they already caught me once with that one when I was in a hurry and I had all these damn green check marks everywhere. I was so disappointed thought I had avirus. I will never use one drive just because of that.
Chilling in Windows 7
Keep that system airgapped.
Honestly that isn’t a terrible solution depending on what you use it for. If its just to play older games that is perfectly acceptable
On machines where I have to use windows I run start10 to replace the start menu with something a little more bearable. I imagine there’s a FOSS equivalent but I bought a license years and years ago so I’ve never bothered to search.
StartIsBack for me
Classic Shell/Open Shell.
OpenShell is the best.
I’ve been using Start11, which is better than the Windows 11 built-in one, but whatever makes the Start menu come up blank half the time and take 20 seconds to display anything must be embedded deep in the OS, because Start11 does it too.
They’re doing a good job getting people to move to Linux or MacOS
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Dang I thought Windows 10 would be safe from this for some reason. Silly me.
no security updates, only ads
Windows 10 already had ads, I don’t see why MS would be adverse to adding more.
Anybody remember Litestep (http://litestep.net/)? It was an open source shell alternative to the default Windows shell.
There’s actually something pretty similar for Windows 10 and 11. It even offers tiling. Not as great as a Linux desktop environment, but much better than the garbage Micro$oft ships by default. https://github.com/eythaann/Seelen-UI
Add PowerToys Run or Flow Launcher and you have a pretty decent, usable environment
Of course use the new Windows Terminal (preferably with WSL and a good Linux shell, but newer PowerShell with oh-my-posh and a few other modifications is also pretty decent if you need to use the CLI in a Windows environment for some reason)
Windows Terminal + PowerShell setup: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-aK2_WwrmM
I’m in the EU and use Windows 10 LTSC so I mostly clear off of this bulshit. A few months ago I bought a cheap refurbished laptop to use occasionally and decided from day 1 it would be Linux Mint only since I only use it for the basics.
A few months later and I’m surprised how far Mint came. It’s so easy to use. Customizing it was a bit harder but nothing major. And to my surprise…even games. I threw a couple of games at it and everything the computer can handle would run. I was from the time where gaming on Linux was a no-no.
When LTSC support goes, I’ll most likely go full Linux. The only problem is the Adobe software but maybe I can fix that with a virtual machine.
I tried that LTSC a couple years ago when I had a Nvidia card and I couldn’t get a driver install that would let me play the new release games.
With the craziness around Adobe products you might want to move away from Adobe at some point as well.
I do, unfortunately there are no efficient alternatives.
…decided from day 1 it would be Linux Mint only since I only use it for the basics
What kind of out of the ordinary things cannot be done with it?
I switched from Windows 3.11 and I’m still puzzled by this.
The way your comment reads, you’ve been using Windows 3.11 these past decades. 😂
Why fix what isn’t broken
Cannot be done with Mint? I’ve OS hopped every few years - currently running Windows 11 at work and Mint at home. I much prefer the Mint install. That said, I’m a video producer - and video production just isn’t there yet on Linux. CUDA’s a pain to get working, proprietary codecs add steps, Davinci’s linux support is more limited than it seems, KDenLive works in a pinch but lacks features, Adobe and Linux are like oil and water, there’s no equivalent for After Effects… I don’t doubt that there are workarounds for many of these issues. But the ROI’s not there yet. I’d love to see a video production focused distro that really aimed for full production suite functionality. Especially since Hackintoshes are about to get even harder to build.
I guess that’s a valid edge case. Although I thought that some professional editing suites had been ported (not Adobe’s, obviously). Apparently it’s not the case.
I always love when people pretend to be mystified that someone has trouble running programs on Linux when I, a non Linux user, see plenty of examples of people having trouble getting programs to run on Linux scrolling through “Everything” on Lemmy
Well, some people want to run programs on Linux that were written for other operating systems.
As it happens, it can be done, but it’s not the simplest way to do things.
It’s like buying a PlayStation and complaining it won’t run Super Mario properly.
What if those are the basics?
If those are your basics, have you considered running a Nintendo system?
I tried but Nintendo issued a DMCA takedown
We need to remind ourselves that there’s an entire generation that has grown up with smartphones and only touching a laptop or a desktop pc occasionally. For them, windows or chromeOS alone is a challenge. Linux is just an isekai waiting to happen when you cross that bridge of no return.
If they can’t bring the people to Win 11, they bring Win 11 to the people instead?
Just install Linux, it’s not that hard. Or at least get a Mac or a Chromebook…
I have been installing Linux on a number of my work PCs that I manage. Most of them are pretty straightforward, office products, printing, web, basic video player. But my personal PCs have so many different programs installed for different niche uses that it’s been a massive roadblock to me switching over. I know it’s coming because I’m not moving to Windows 11 even though my PC is compatible in theory. But man is it going to take me a lot of time to figure out all of the different screen capture, video editing, audio extraction and editing, disc imaging, photo editing etc. I know I can figure it out, but it’s about the time. I have a huge steam library too,but most of that should work.
Any of you playing Fallout London on Linux?
screen capture
OBS (same as is popular on Windows).
video editing, audio extraction and editing
I basically never do that sort of thing, but if I needed to I’d start out with Kdenlive and Audacity, respectively.
See also:
https://itsfoss.com/best-video-editing-software-linux/
https://itsfoss.com/best-audio-editors-linux/
disc imaging
For a task that basic, most of the time I just use
dd
.photo editing
GIMP and/or Krita.
I wouldn’t suggest GIMP to anybody: Photopea. It is very similar to Photoshop and is a webapp.
Was in the same place, got FOSS soft for almost everything so now I run Mint on my main PC and on my laptop too, with a little 100€ used think centre running photoshop (I’m starting to figure out krita/gimp but pixel editing is a bummer there IMO) and 3dsmax for when I need them.
Edit: no internet connection for that box ofc.
Just install Linux, it’s not that hard.
This is just but the small first step. I was basically checking what it will take to daily drive linux on my desktop, and there’s many little roadblocks that I’m just instead considering getting a Win 11 pro license next year and just turning off all the shit in gpedit.
- No RGB software for my gigabyte mobo (openrgb doesn’t have it).
- No AMD adrenalin unless I go with Ubuntu, which is just on the same path of enshittification as windows
- No steelseries engine
- No Sapphire trixx
- No microsoft office desktop/onedrive (means I gotta find an office replacement that also works on my apple devices and syncs)
Linux has come a long way, and it’s probably enough for some but it would be a massive headache for me still…
You know that you dont have to pay for a Windows license right? You can permanently activate it (and any version of office) with a script. I found some article a while ago talking about it, some official Microsoft tech support used it because they were frustrated with Windows, so it’s legit
I do computer repair/tech support for just a small business. I haven’t used Windows on a a personal machine in a looong time, but that script helps me when I get stuck at work
You can mount and sync your OneDrive files with rclone, which I think is much nicer than OneDrive, but maybe not easy to set up if you’re not comfortable with command line interfaces.
Yea, it’s definitely not for everyone yet. But the average user (who needs a browser, a file manager and maybe an office suite) has no reason to stay on windows besides the convenience of being installed already.
See and my friends give me shit for running KDE, soon they’ll have to click past a Viagra ad to do so.
I have to use a windows 11 machine for work, and it genuinely surprises me how terrible it is. I don’t understand the opposition to local accounts - if I’m working somewhere with public WiFi/capture portal, I have to use my phone as a hotspot first.
The PIN log in seems to roll a random number and decide each morning whether it is going to work or not.
I also got a laptop with 11 on it for gaming. So much spyware I’ve had to uninstall, configuring anything is a nightmare. I was trying to adjust my mouse sensitivity/figure out why the scroll wheel is either 0 or to the moon, but even when you dig into the control panel, half the settings are missing.
I also had to turn off my WiFi and google commands to make a local account, because otherwise Microsoft accounts are mandatory.
Every change seems to make the experience actively worse for the user.
Can’t stand them forcing onedrive on users as well as pushing online versions of the applications that are inferior in every way.