Do it all again when msft undoes your work on the next update
Not even next update. I ran a debloater script that removed OneDrive and within two hours it had been reinstalled with no intervention from me.
Is there no solution to this?
My first thought is an IP ban list outside of the computer itself. Put it on your home router maybe.
I guess it could be getting installed from a binary that exists on the OS already.
I haven’t used windows in a long time. But it’s wild how much work people have to do to decide which programs are or are not installed on their PC.
Is there no solution to this?
Linux…
That’s been my solution. The nerd in me just wants to know. I feel like windows and “windows debloat scripts” or the like have gotten worse together. It’s like all the people that use to write cool programs or apps for Windows left for Linux and never looked back. (Except the game cracks I guess? Maybe that’s even dead now though idk)
I mean, it’s a good thing. But, it surprises me how awful the nerd support is for Windows now. I guess it’s so annoying to work with that no one even bothers anymore.
It just feels like something that should have a universal solution by now.
Group policy settings will let you kill it off permanently. But windows likes to reinstall things every time there is a minor update to the OS, and if you don’t have a group policy setup it’ll do it too.
It’s like all the people that use to write cool programs or apps for Windows left for Linux and never looked back.
I have no idea if it is true, but it would make a lot of sense. Why spend your time fixing MS’s for-profit shit, for free, when there is a viable open source alternative?
I wonder if there will come a tipping point? MS is making Windows really hard to love, so who in the altruistic group will stay on Windows when the mythical Year Of The Linux Desktop truly comes?
The solution for a lot of these random issues with reinstalling stuff is to not use weird scripts to do things you can just handle normally.
Just uninstall it like a regular app and it doesn’t come back on its own from my experience. I’ve literally never had it come back on any of my systems, my family’s, or customers, by doing it that way.
I don’t have that issue with script either, my guess is that’s a regional thing, do you live in the EU too?
then quit using it. take off your leash.
Shift + f10 for cmd. Then do “start ms-cxh:localonly” and hit enter. Enjoy local user profile without internet.
start ms-cxh:localonly or one of those rufus unattended things are the only ways i could ever set up Windows anymore, their stock config is some bullshit
True, but from my distro-hopping I learned there are quite a few Linux distros that throw tantrums when you try to install w/o wifi, and some ISOs that flat out don’t allow it. I’m not technically sharp enough to find the link, but this and most of my other problems with Linux went away when I stopped using distros built with systemd.
CachyOS is fast, sure. But have you tried Void? MX? Artix? PCLinuxOS? All very fast, and way fewer tantrums/stability issues. Systemd acts like a bureaucrat that checked out long ago, but keeps the job because of the benefits and does it as spitefully as possible. It’s about what I’d expect from a corp like Red Hat, and one day it’ll ask for your government ID to install.
The Linux community should get serious about systemd and how it talks to newcomers about it. It’s annoying now, and it’ll be a liability later.
You can install them all without WiFi easily by plugging in an ethernet cable. Easy.
I meant to say internet. Tysm for correcting me. I’m truly grateful and humbly request that you take an unchaperoned bath with my teenage daughters.
Until people can buy a computer CHEAPLY and easily at Walmart with a distro preinstalled, Linux isn’t going to make a lot of headway very fast. They are too lazy to be bothered to download a distro, make a bootable iso, wipe and do a fresh install.
And yes, they are that lazy unless really pushed to do it.
For most of them it’s not “laziness” but ignorance. They don’t know it’s an option, they don’t know why you’d want to do it, and the don’t know how to do it.
Oh, they are at least dimly aware they could do something else. But they choose not to because they resist learning.
We call this “monopolistic behavior”
Whatever comes with the thing is going to be most popular by default. Windows knows this. Apple knows this. Linux simply doesnt have the funds to buy out manufacturers
That’s the link you need to break. Until then, Linux is stuck as an also ran.
I guarantee if I sold a normie a KDE laptop theyd have no idea until they needed to run an exe, then theyd review bomb me for selling them a scam laptop
That’s the refusal to learn. People really hate learning anything new these days. And that includes many here.
Still, there is hope. With the common idea of “App Stores” really taking hold with users, thanks to the ubiquity of cell phone ownership and Chromebooks, users are comfortable with a software manager that gets referred to as App Store. And distros are starting to act upon that by simply rename their software management software and adding a colorful friendly UI to it. It’s marketing.
There are 1000’s of programs available that can meet almost every “regular user’s” daily needs. What is lacking is a universal packaging format that is easy to use. Ubuntu has their “we dropped the ball” Snaps and Fedora pushes Flatpaks. AppImages also exist, but not to the extent as Flatpaks and are a bit more of a hassle to use than a Flatpak. And it appears that Flatpaks are currently leading as the universal software management race. If all distros were to agree to one package format, that would remove one of the biggest hurdles and kills the .exe argument. And that seems unlikely at this point in time. Even die hard Linux users will argue against it. But until at least the most common distros hop on that bus, Windows users will resist your KDE laptop.
they used to sell them, but it was all shit-tier hardware and didn’t sell.
They dabbled with no commitment. And at that time people were always looking for the next faster machine. We could actually afford to. So low spec machines were not a viable sales point.
You mean headway… on the desktop.
Even when I offered my father to do this for him, even picking Zorin OS (since it seems to be decently close to a Windows look and feel). He refused stating that he’s not techsavvy enough to use it.
My conspiracy theory/pattern recognition shows that anyone unironically using the words “Tech Savvy” in 2026 are either well meaning pirates or just straight up ignorant on purpose. Computers have been mainstream at the very least for 2 decades and you havent bothered to learn anything about them??
Do you know the Secretary Problem?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secretary_problem
Your father’s been using computers for some number of years. It’s possible he’s been using computers for longer than he will continue using computers. From his perspective, the current edition of Windows is better than anything that’s come before it, so it’s the rational choice to stick with it until the end.
To get around this, you would basically need to set up a second machine with Zorin so that he can get some context before making a decision. That way, in the very realistic scenario where he decides it’s not for him, he hasn’t lost anything.
Us old people are often adverse to learning new things. It’s not a surprising thing. You are getting the same way yourself about some knowledge.
mfs will learn powershell to debloat windows 11 and wade through regedit but the intuitive linux terminal is STILL too goddamn scary
intuitive linux terminal
Which one is that? Powershell is way more intuitive than bash and I like bash.
Powershell is just json with jq abilities
But it is intuitive. There’s no arguing that.
bash is more intuive than pwsh imo.
See my other response on this thread for my reasoning. If you still disagree I’d love some guidance on how to use bash more intuitively.
Is it? I find them both equally unintuitive tbh. You really just have to memorize the commands you frequently use, or keep looking them up.
Powershells commands are “Verb-Noun” and it makes it easy to search for the command you need. For example Get-Help Get-* will give you a list of all the “Get” commands and a brief description of what they do. Get-Verb will list the approved verbs so you know what verbs to search for. All within the shell. If there’s anything like that in bash I haven’t found it. I always have to search the web to figure out what I’m trying to do with it. Which can be annoying if I’m working directly on a headless system. Powershell also has aliases built in for bash and cmd commands so you can use those if you’re familiar with them. I hate Microsoft but it’s one thing I have to give hand to them.
That’s not to say bash is bad. It’s great. It’s just not nearly as intuitive.
In bash if you type the verb, then hit tab it will list the possible options, right? Is that not the same kind of thing?
Tab completion isn’t really what I’m talking about here. Powershell’s intuitiveness comes from the ease of finding the command you need. For instance if you type “copy” into bash and hit tab you’re not going to get anything. That’s because the command for copying a file in bash is “cp”. Now, how do you find that out using only the shell? You can use apropos, but who’s going to be able to figure that out without a web search? I had to try several variations of “find commands in bash” just now to get Google to mention it. Most things in bash are like this, there’s no real naming convention and most of the time the names are pretty meaningless by themselves. It’s a big barrier for people who are new to it or only use it sporadically.
Conversely, typing “copy” into powershell and hitting tab you will get a number of options which shouldn’t take much for a beginner to locate copy-item from there or you can find it via the previous methods I mentioned.
I genuinely think you may just be more familiar with PS. I use “Get-Printer” all the time, but it’s not like I was able to discover that command or syntax without web searches. Same with “cp” in bash. I had to learn it and use it, but I’m never going to forget it now. Something that seems inconsistent/unintuitive to me in PS, is some commands specify an object with:
-Name ="the name"Other times it’s like:
Name "the name"I keep a notebook handy for things that I use as frequently as several times a week.
Searching commands online is a perfectly valid way to find things, especially if you don’t know how to discover them within the shell. My point is that powershell is fantastic for that and bash is not. Years ago, I read maybe 1/3 of a powershell book and it was enough to set me off and figure most things out on my own from there. It’s rare I have to go online to find something. I’ve read/watched quite of bit of bash content over the years and I can’t say the same. I still struggle with it or have to go back and check my notes all the time. I am more familiar with powershell but I’ve been using bash quite a bit longer. For me that highlights what I’m talking about here in terms of intuitiveness.
As for the inconsistency issue, I’m sure there are inconsistencies in either shell but I’d need more information to explain this one, the only time I can recall something like what you’re referring to would be commands where -Name is a parameter, vs something like a -Filter parameter where you entering name as what you’re filtering for but that would need more than -Filter Name “name” to work(I think). For the most part I find powershell to be very consistent once you understand what’s going on. Bash as well, but it’s harder to get to the “understand what’s going on” stage.
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My main gripe is the clicking.
Clicking clicking clicking.
I’ve got keybord navigation down to an art-
But sometimes you have to click.
You have to move your hand from your… Keyboard, let’s say, and switching to mouse, and that split second matters because it throws everything out of rhythm, causing friction where none is needed.
Clicking, clicking, clicking.
That’s my main gripe.
The clicking.
I am Anna, and this is my testimony.
Commit your testimony to an archive.
You could even name it… Anna’s archive.I’m not a comic book villain. Do you seriously think I’d explain my masterstroke to you if there were even the slightest possibility you could affect the outcome? I registered that domain 35 minutes ago.
AFAIK the BypassNRO method doesn’t work anymore, instead:
“When it asks for one’s Microsoft account, press
Shift + F10, and typestart ms-cxh:localonly. This prompts the window to create a local account instead. 🖕” ―Bypass Windows 11 Microsoft account promptWorked for me yesterday, but this was on a laptop just booted, no connection to internet so there’s no telling what version it was on.
If the install media is old enough it will still work.
If you’re installing pro, you can just say it’s for work and click “join a domain instead” and then just never join a domain
I had to use bypass to get around the network part. Because for some reason it wouldn’t let me go past that step, and it also doesn’t offer static ip settings. We don’t have dhcp for our main network.
It’s even worse for notebooks. I had several new machines where Windows Setup didn’t even have the required network drivers.
And “install” is literally optional
Windows: We built in the dark patterns so you don’t have to worry about 3rd parties fucking with you because you are already fucked!
Using Windows for me is a cumulation of annoying little things that becomes too big to ignore. Another thing you can add on that list is fiddling with keyboard layouts if you don’t use the default US one. And be sure to delete them all except the one you want to use, even the sub layouts, because accidentally hitting a key combo could switch it back to the default US one.
It’s a specific pet peeve that I have against Windows. I’ve had so many calls (I do tech support) from people that had their computer suddenly not making the characters they wanted, sometimes only in specific programs, just to discover that they reverted to the default layout by hitting Win + spacebar at some point.
Ran into this shit yesterday trying to set up a laptop for someone where I had no internet access.
Imagine having everything ready to go on a USB drive and you can’t get past the second screen unless you find WiFi.
At least this command still works, but damn.
Video games have gone this way too. Pop in disc or cartridge, go to play, forced to download updates that fix what was shipped in a broken state.
And then they have the gall to point to sales of physical media being down.
Like, if you make your physical media shit on purpose, you can’t use that to support your argument for digital-only distrubition. It’s actually infuriating.
For the record, the majority of games ship on disc. If you had auto updates off or no internet, the game will play after installing.
If you use Rufus you can create the USB that automatically bypasses the Internet requirements. Still annoying af though.
windows didn’t have the drivers for my mobo, so i could use neither ethernet nor wifi.
imagine having to have a usb to ethernet dongle ready to set up windows.
what a fucking shitshow…
Yup. I have a whole bunch of devices to bypass random shit to setup client devices on site.
I work in IT and half the time spent deploying a new device is getting around Windows’ bullshit.
You can’t be serious, or you must not support Windows much.
I don’t think much of my workplace’s Windows desktop “engineer” but even they’ve put together (and keep updated) an image that can get from blank drive to fully installed, updated, baseline programs for our company installed, all settings tweaked to get rid of 90% of the dumb Windows bloat (have to leave the shit the execs like in place) in 30 minutes unattended.
The server builds my team oversees are 10 minutes setups, if that.
Like, I’ve been desktop support, and installing and configuring the department specific programs could be such annoying shit that you’d end up saving more time reimaging when something fucked up than to try and fix it, but the initial OS install was rarely the issue. Maybe for the first few days with entirely new hardware while we figured out the right drivers, but that was it.
Linux is leagues better than Windows, but some of this shit I keep seeing in these Linux communities is batshit. You personally not being familiar with Windows isn’t a reason it sucks, any more than people saying Linux is complicated is a reason for them to hate Linux.
I am not unfamiliar with Windows in any sense thank you. Windows is objectively bad, there is no good reason that one must maintain their own custom image to install an operating system to a usable capacity because the vendor image is so disgustingly bloated that getting any real-world use is a chore.
And it’s not even recent Windows enshittification that is the problem, it is the foundational architecture of the NT system. With a Linux operating system, you install, and you’re done, on Windows, you install, then you need to go out and do 15+ updates that for some reason aren’t done during install, then you need to go out and get all your drivers for your hardware. It’s poorly designed, slow, clunky, and, especially considering that Windows doesn’t have a package manager and a curated software repository (Winget + MS Store does NOT count), unbelievably insecure.
My organization has pretty much decided that Windows is on the way out, it’s just going to be a very long time for us to transfer to Linux-based operating systems. Even after getting Windows to a just-about acceptable standard, it’s still far heavier than any Linux-based OS would be, which for our thin clients is genuinely proving a problem as many of our staff have high memory usage workflows and are frequently seeing programs crash due to memory limitations.
Unless you are severely, clinically deluded, there is no way you can genuinely state that what you hear in Linux communities is “batshit”; everyone knows Windows is dying, even Microsoft…
He’s talking about corporate environments that have the resources to have done the work to make Windows work, they’re not starting from zero - they’ve either got an SCCM environment with a PE that has all their configs and drivers preloaded or they’ve worked hard to make intune autopilot work (which still requires either the OEM or a curated image for the hardware configs).
He’s not talking about setups that are doing installs 1:1
It could also be a pre-prepared disk image.
If someone asked me to install Windows for them I’d very politely tell them to get bent.
I use this when I have to install windows.
https://schneegans.de/windows/unattend-generator/Fully automated the install
Next time during setup do this: 1.don’t connect to a network
- Either shift+f10 or Ctrl+shift+f10 to bring up a command prompt.
3.Type: start ms-cxh:localonly
-
Hit enter and the create user box will pop up.
-
You can now create a local user account.
Network installers
NixOs is in shambles
Every time i see a comment about NixOS it makes me even more wary about trying it.
Everyone jokes about Arch being the ‘from the ground up’ OS, but Nix feels like it embodies those memes.
Yeah nixos is a lot of learning and a lot of writing and tweaking .nix files.
That being said, once you have a setup you like that works it means installing on a new machine is mostly just running a couple of install commands and all your apps/settings/environment secrets/anything you’ve declared in your nix config (like dotfiles for apps unsupported by home-manager) come with you and are version controlled on the system and in code.
But it doesn’t work like a normal Linux system, there is no /bin/bash among thousands of other things, so it’s for a niche audience where it’s either a server with infra as code or a desktop that requires a lot of work to maintain but has some incredible advantages (like generations)
Yeah it was my pipeline. But be wary, this is a hard path to take. The os is great. The package manager is great. The nix config language? Hahaha welcome to hell! It takes at least 6 months to get comfortable with it. And still, sometimes you can still come across a config file that will be totally alien to you. And when you need something not in the repos… time to learn how to package stuff!
It’s not to discourage you, but be warned. It takes time. I had 5 attempts at it before it became my daily driver.
Keep a working distro on the side. And when you start your computer, think about what you want to do. If you think you can do everything you want today in NixOs, boot it. If you have a lot missing/do not feel like configuring it, boot the other distro. Just start small. Do some little challenges like turning your config into a flake, create a nix os module, split your configuration in smaller more maintainable files, create a systemd service, wrangle with that damn home manager that keeps making everything so confusing.
And arch is actually the one from scratch. NixOs is intimately linked to systemd. Nix also requires some base dependencies like git and curl, so it’s not from scratch. However you could argue that NixOs is a “make a distro from the kitchen utensils and a recipe”.
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I mean you don’t even have to install, just boot the iso and click try now
I recently had to install Windows 11 from a USB for a friend building a PC. The last time I did that was Windows 7, and oh boy, has that process been enshittified to hell since then.
Honestly, I think I will refuse to install Windows when helping with future PC builds, just because it was such a pain-in-the-ass. The amount of adware you had to actively refuse, through a maze of dark-pattern designs was borderline dystopian.
