Microsoft officials said late on June 27 that the new update experience — with clearer “upgrade now, schedule a time, or decline the free offer” – will start rolling out this week. Microsoft will also revert to making clicking on the red X at the corner of the Windows 10 update box dismiss the update, rather than initiate it, as it has done for the past several weeks.
If you had told me only a few months ago that Microsoft would be putting out a press statement extolling how it made sure that the close button on a window frame actually closed the window instead of initiating something crappy people don’t want, I’d have called you crazy.
Why do we let software makers get away with producing crap? Why does software suck so much?
..and if I like it I’ll buy it. Simples
why the need to control all the time. that attitude wouldn’t work with a prospective lover, and there might be more interesting things on the table there
With operating systems and app stores, can the owner developers all collectively just get over themselves already.
To your question, it doesn’t have to suck. If software was treated like the way tools are treated, you’d see innovation, but little change in functionality. This sort of ‘enhancement’ like removing the X button just makes life more difficult for a lot of people. If I don’t see utility in software, I typically don’t use it.
Software is seen as something that has to be sold as exciting new products, fashion statements, sexy interfaces, all hiding the fact that Apple, Google, and Microsoft want to control your user experience. Hell, I’d even let them control my experience if they made GOOD decisions EVERY time, but it’s just impossible for them to do so. I’d like to understand why Google Chrome eats so much god damned memory in my machine, and I’d like to understand why I can’t work as effectively under Windows 10 as I was able to under Windows 7 or even XP. This is known as a regression, a regression that is almost forced on the user. For which purpose, I’m not sure, but it makes the workforce slower.
At this change, if small in code, huge on professionalism
In my mind, this is a just the latest continuation/escalation of a trend that began in the mid-late 90s, when browser vendors realized that they could benefit from setting their own ad-laden “portal” pages as the browser default/home page. And I see that as an evolution of the older, Microsoft-style lock-in tactics – with the main differences being that it’s less likely to draw widespread ire because, hey, it’s just a default setting & users can still change it, right? But it’s almost as effective as true lock-in, because the majority of users won’t know they can change it, or at least won’t bother to figure out how to change it.
It’s neither the carrot or the stick, but a combination of aspects of both approaches – and done subtly enough that many users won’t realize/care how they’re being manipulated & herded. If anything, Microsoft only stands out because of how ham-fisted & obvious they are about it – especially when compared to Google and, to a somewhat lesser extent, Apple.
The worst offenders seem to be mobile apps that are tied to some sort of online/cloud platform – E.g. I’ve recently been using a fitness tracking app by the cutesy/cringey name of “Runtastic”* that’s filled with that sort of BS. E.g. most everything beyond the basic functionality only works if you have an account, and the “sign in” options appear immediately but there’s a 3-5 second delay before the “no thanks/don’t sign in” option appears, and the most prominent sign-in/register options want to sign in with a Facebook account (granting all sorts of permissions in the process, of course) with a small & easy to miss option for creating an account the “old fashioned” way with an EMail address, and registering for an account automatically signs you up for a 30-day trial of the premium/paid service (including XBox “achievement”-style “congratulations on your new record!” EMails), and after the trial ends they continue sending weekly “reports” which have all of the details blurred out & are really just ads trying to push you to the paid service, etc, etc, etc.
(*Which I insist on pronouncing as “runt-a-stick.”)
I think there IS plenty of non-sucky software out there – but there doesn’t seem to be much in the way new non-sucky software being built today. It seems that no one is willing to go to the effort/cost of building new software today, unless it’s part of some larger cloud marketing-data-siphon & SaaS perpetual-revenue-generation strategy. At least not for the mass market.
That’s what we get when people don’t want to pay for software. Ads, subscriptions, bad software.
Agreed. I feel a huge amount of sympathy for any small developer trying to make a living off commercial software today – E.g. I await & dread the day that EditPlus becomes no longer worth/financially viable to maintain & gets discontinued.
Free/Open Source software has filled in many of the gaps – but unless the project is large/important to get reliable funding from some sort corporate patron, many projects seem to be turning to installers that come bundled with “optional offers” (AKA garden variety “opt-out” adware) even if the software itself is still untainted. Or that’s taken out of their hands if the software is distributed by weaselly f**kers like SourceForge or CNet.
Must Separate Application [and Environment] Evolution from User Experience. If old or very busy users request an extra stable UI, then should provide. That’s an actual high value. Continuing monetization through additional working materials and tools, libraries, security updates, users requested tools and materials, filters, transforms, etc.
Lately, come on. Don’t make from your work an eternally young Mickey Mouse. Your art is done when is done. Don’t you get bored? Leave maintenance to a loyal Community.
” I feel a huge amount of sympathy for any small developer trying to make a living off…”
Don’t believe any small developer strong enough as to offer a chain-tool valuable enough as to ask for a regular tax. Small ones need to conglomerate [in and out of IT], and specialize. Able to become REAL complete-solution providers.
Oh, we’re pretending there’s no craptastically shitty commercial software out there now? LOL.
Who said or implied that – isn’t a bit of a stretch to infer that from a comment that merely refers to an unwillingness to pay for software?
Last I checked, there are ways to pay for software that don’t involve commercial distribution models – E.g. corporate patronage, individual donations to a open/free software projects, code bounties, etc. Not to mention open/free software that IS distributed under more-or-less standard commercial models, E.g. RHEL (yes, I realize that with RHEL you’re really paying for the updates/support more than the software itself – but I see that as a distinction without much of a difference).
From a UI point of view, I’ve always had an issue with close buttons on dialogs – they’re effectively buttons with no label – you have to guess what they do. So you look at the buttons for one labelled ‘Close’ or ‘Cancel’ and assume (rightly or wrongly) that’s what the close button will do.
Close buttons belong on windows, not dialogs.
Yep, totally agree here! But there is a precedent in that, every Windows dialog box other than this one that has a close button uses it to perform the same function as Cancel, so it would be reasonable to expect that to be the case with update dialogs too.
Some people at Microsoft probably thought of the update dialog as a “Reschedule update dialog” in which ‘close’ means “no, I don’t want to reschedule”. It makes sense from that perspective.
Still a terrible design from a user point of view however.
Yes, I think it makes sense. It didn’t actually initiate the upgrade. The upgrade had already been initiated and the dialog was just informing the user.
The problem was that, I guess, people had gotten so used to seeing a dialog that they quit reading what it said.
And yet, those users never opted to initiate in the first place.
I realize that. That was the result of Microsoft changing the type of update that Windows 10 was. It wasn’t actually the dialog initiating anything, which is what a lot of people are saying. As a matter of fact, for most updates you don’t get a dialog at all. I guess Microsoft figured they were doing people a favor by showing one (after training everyone to ignore them, of course!).
For the record, I do not agree with the way Microsoft is handling this at all.
Being an infinite resource, it’s hard to make any money by selling it. There is no great universal store, so all you get are the tiny single platform stores that quickly reach saturation, and create a race to the bottom. There is no easy way to prevent piracy, which is a real and present problem. You can’t sue people who pirate (I won’t say steal because even though I am a software writer, I know the difference) because suing your customers is a terrible idea.
The best way software makers have found to make a living with software is through rent seeking behavior – by placing artificial restrictions on use, which has its own drawbacks.
The real conundrum, the nut that’s hard to crack, is that it’s hard to make a living on software sales. And in capitalism, all the systems are set up to require profit – even living.
Please also ask Apple to revert the Finder’s maximize/restore button to what it used to do (no matter how much it was illogical already), and not an annoying full-screen button.
Are there any other places in operating systems that need improvements more urgent than fiddling with >30-years-old UI conventions?
right?
These two questions actually are separate things in this case.
The software in this case doesn’t suck. It wasn’t an accident or unforeseen flow-on effect of some change. This is clearly a design decision of the software maker.
Good point, I’d mod this up if I could (speaking of software sucking…). Software that sucks, but comes by it honestly is more forgivable than software that sucks due to deliberate inconvenience/value-lessened anti-features – at least IMHO.
I’m certainly not part of the knee-jerk “all commerce is evil” crowd, but it does seem that most large/successful software vendors (and technology companies in general) reach a point where the incentive to add deliberate anti-features starts to outweigh the incentive to make genuine improvements.
StephanBeDoper,
I’d upvote this if I could. Instead of competing to satisfy consumer needs, they rely on their market position and control to move ahead. It’s a real problem that corporations have become so powerful that free markets cease to work properly. Even governments that are supposed to be in place to serve the public are corrupted into serving corporate interests.
No I think the mistake was Microsoft not understanding what most users would expect to happen. I’m sure they did it on purpose thinking:
1) Everyone wants windows 10 for free
2) This was just asking them when to install, not if.
And honestly, can you imagine your self as the developer that actually did this? You have to suggust to your higher ups, that well Hey, uhm not everyone wants our free upgrade that we used to charge hundreds of dollars for…
So I’m sure for the developer it was by far easier to just do what the company wanted and expected to hear.
When I said “software maker”, I didn’t mean the literal person who made the software, but the organization from which it sprang forth.
Of course, I didn’t mean to imply otherwise. Just trying to help people understand that top down dictate that exists at large companies. Its not in your best interest to advocate for the best product for consumers. Its in your best interest to be the largest cheer leader.
So when they do stupid things, its easy on the outside to say ” what the hell were they thinking? That’s so dumb!” While the reality is there were probably a large number of people inside the company that was thinking the same thing, but said nothing.
Too little, too late, far too late.
You have lost me as a customer after 20+ years.
Windows 10 is an evolutionary dead end when used on a non touch system. When am I gonna get touch on my 2 4K screens that I have connected to my PC? Never.
Bye MS. It was a nice ride but the seats are far too uncomforable now.
To keep with that, they basically picked people out of their seats and stuck thumb tacks on them, then pushed them straight down on top.
Uncomfortable indeed!
They get away with it because they have a captured audience. Most of their customers are locked into the product and are forced to use it, getting milked in the process.
I guess that also explains why UIs suck more and more. Their design has been taken over by a new generation of developers who obviously have never done any serious, productive work on a computer.
By now, to me Cinnamon is the only desktop environment where I feel comfortable that clever people are working on it. It at least moves in the right direction while everything else goes downhill.
“…Their design has been taken over by a new generation of developers who obviously have never done any serious, productive work on a computer…”
That image is frighteningly hunting me also, Thomas.
Also unavoidable serious, productive work experience, OUT of computers.
Well, if being a developer does not include doing serious, productive work on a computer, then I wonder in what environment they do their coding!
I would rather think that their developers are not included in the decision making process, and that executives have too much say. This feature is definitely from a policy that was decided upon by someone other than a developer.
These are the first generations actually ‘physical-world’ diminished, just by the amount of time grabbed by virtual. Not saying that We previous generations had our own kinds of ‘virtual’ worlds. [Mine being books].
It’s pathetic Microsoft got themselves into a situation where they actually had to revert the X button behavior because they altered it in the most scumbag deceitful way. What an embarrassment.
Try to get a Japanese joke at first sight.
http://imgur.com/gallery/9LqhOl3
All of Us are building over previous foundations.