Microsoft's ongoing struggles with QA and Edge

After a terrible month of QA issues with Windows 10's 1809 update, and following revelations that those issues aren't actually over yet, even after 1809's re-release, comes news that Microsoft's other flagship product has similar issues. As reported by betanews:

Microsoft's update procedure for Windows 10 has been a little, er, wobbly of late. The Windows 10 October 2018 Update proved so problematic that it had to pulled, and even the re-released version is far from perfect.

Now it seems the cancer is spreading to Office. Having released a series of updates for Office 2010, 2013 and 2016 as part of this month's Patch Tuesday, Microsoft has now pulled two of them and advised sysadmins to uninstall the updates if they have already been installed.

In both instances -- KB4461522 and KB2863821 -- Microsoft says that the problematic updates can lead to application crashes. While this is not as serious a problem as, say, data loss, it does little to quieten the fears that have been voiced about the quality control Microsoft has over its updates.

So, the bad news is that Microsoft's attempts to reassure consumers and Enterprise customers that their quality assurance procedures really are up to the challenge of delivering software-as-a-service seem to be failing. What's the good news?

Apparently, the good news is that Edge has failed so hard that Microsoft is now collaborating with Google and Qualcomm to bring the Chrome browser to Windows 10's ARM version. Yes, really.

OK, this is just embarrassing

Offered without any ado... this report, from Softpedia:

Microsoft has just released a free AV1 video codec for Windows 10 devices, and users can download it right now from the Microsoft Store.

Available as part of an early beta program, the codec is available for PCs, Surface Hub, and HoloLens, as Microsoft itself explained in the Store.

Oddly enough, the codec can only be installed on devices running Windows 10 October 2018 Update, which is no longer up for grabs after Microsoft pulled it last month. The October update came with several major bugs, including an issue that could have caused the removal of user files stored in libraries.

So.... any idea when your October 2018 update will actually be available, there, Microsoft? You know, just in case people want to actually use this new AV1 codec that you've just released for that same update, knowing that it's not actually available to Windows 10 users?

GG, Microsoft. GG.

Meanwhile, back in Windows 10

With Windows 10's 1809 update still M.I.A., and having had a very bad month in October, Microsoft were likely hoping to put the worst of their WaaS woes behind them. They've been busy hyping the latest 19H1 update's build and its features, and saying nothing at all about the ill-fated 1809 update, which is looking more and more like it also won't release until the first half of 2019.

But the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry, and Microsoft's plans for Windows-as-a-Service are increasingly looking like they were poorly laid from the very start, so it should surprise nobody that Windows 10 has another issue. And, wow, is is a doozy, as reported by Gordon Kelly at Forbes:

Spotted by The Register, Microsoft’s activation servers have started accidentally downgrading expensive Windows 10 Pro systems into cheaper Windows 10 Home PCs, then invalidating their licences. Needless to say, that's a nasty financial hit (Home is $119, Pro is $199) and affected users are furious.

[...]

And it’s not just upgraders being affected. Problems with automated Windows 10 Home downgrades are being reported with fresh installs on different Windows Pro versions as well.

“Same issue on Dell computers running Windows 10 Pro 1803 that we just bought. Need to deploy to clients but they won't activate,” explained another user on Reddit.
Microsoft’s response? It’s not great.

On its official Answers page, Microsoft warns there is a “temporary issue” with the company’s activation server but has not disclosed any further details. As for users calling Microsoft’s call centres, the response is to simply wait for a fix.

Cue the expensive class-action lawsuits in 3... 2... 1...

Windows 10's allegedly superior security

It seems that Microsoft's bad month isn't over yet; even as their beleaguered 1809 update continues to crawl its way back to re-release after two data-deleting bugs came to life, MSFT have yet another Windows 10 problem. As reported by TechRadar:

Windows 10’s security woes appear to continue, with a bug apparently found in the code for UWP (Universal Windows Platform) apps that could allow hackers to access your hard drive and steal your data without you knowing.

What’s particularly worrying about this bug, which is explained in depth by Sebastien Lachance, a senior developer who specializes in Windows apps, on his website is that Microsoft has been extolling the security virtues of using UWP apps in Windows 10 (as opposed to regular programs and applications) due to them being run separately from the rest of the operating system.

While UWP apps should run in what's known as a ‘sandbox’ mode, so that they don't have access to your files and folders, the broadFileSystemAccess API allows apps to access your hard drive and files. In legitimate apps, this is necessary if it needs to be able to open, edit and save files to your PC (such as with an image-editing Windows 10 app).

When an app uses the API and makes use of this feature, a window is supposed to appear alerting users and asking for their permission. However, the recently-discovered bug means this doesn’t happen. So, users don’t get asked for permission or alerted to the access, and the apps are granted full system access by default.

Don't worry, though -- it gets worse! Because this isn't even the only Windows 10 security issue that came to light today.

Microsoft's "fixed" 1809 update has another data-deleting bug

Have your facepalm ready, and then read this reporting from Jason Evangelho at Forbes:

Apparently I'm not done beating this dead horse yet. That's because yet another file-deleting bug has surfaced in Microsoft's Windows 10 Build 1809 update. The same update Microsoft pulled from public circulation because it was wiping entire user folders from existence. The new bug centers around Microsoft's Unzip application, and seems to present itself in two distinct forms.

There are entirely too many situations where this could lead to data loss with varying degrees of severity. Here's how one Reddit user describes the issue:

"The issue is that in 1809, overwriting files by extracting from an archive using File Explorer doesn’t result in an overwrite prompt dialogue and also doesn’t replace any files at all; it just fails silently. There are also some reports that it did overwrite items, but did so silently without asking."

Other users are confirming the same issue, and there's currently an entry about it on the Windows 10 FeedbackHub.

Really, what were we expecting?

No word yet on whether Microsoft will actually delay 1809's redeployment over this issue, as they've yet to issue a statement on the subject that I've been able to find. Unlike the previous data-deletion issue, this one can be worked around by simply using 7zip, or some other third-party unzipping application, rather than Windows 10's built in archiving functionality.

Still, there's really no way around it; for an update that's already been pulled due to another (much more serious) user data deletion issue, and which has also been plagued with reports that users are having BSOD issues, it really seems like it's time to simply pull the plug on 1809 entirely. Just admit that it's not ready for release, cancel the fall roll-out, finish fixing the fucking thing, and then re-release it in the Spring. The current 19H1 release can be pushed back to next fall, if necessary, thus benefiting from extra development and testing time -- time that Microsoft clearly needs in order to deliver reliably bug-free products.

Yes, that would mean delaying the much-hyped "feature" that allows users to delete more of Microsoft's own bloatware, but MSFT clearly didn't think that was much of a priority before now, and are only making half-hearted efforts in that direction, anyway (when they start allowing users to remove Edge and Cortana, in addition to Groove Music and Paint 3D, let me know, but until then, I'll continue to say they're not really serious about bloatware). And delaying both 1809 and 19H1 would allow them to make the necessary internal changes to focus their team's attention on the quality and completeness of these releases, something which is sorely lacking now.

Microsoft's "fixed" 1809 update still has serious problems

Faced with the rapidly-escalating PR nightmare of their data-deleting 1809 update to Windows 10, Microsoft first halted the update's rollout, and then hastily patched it before continuing onward. It looks like they once again skipped crucial testing phases, though, because the updated update has issues of its own, including an apparent BSOD issue. That's right, years after Windows 7's stability had largely succeeded in relegating the Blue Screen of Death to Windows history, MSFT's cascading Windows-as-a-Service failures may now have resurrected it as a modern reality.

From Neowin:

Earlier this week, Microsoft pushed out its monthly set of updates to various versions of Windows 10, including version 1809. It seems, however, that this patch carries its own major problems. Users all over the internet are reporting that their devices are getting into a blue screen of death (BSOD) after the update, preventing them from booting.

[...] 

The problem doesn't seem to affect just the feature update released last week, but users on the April 2018 Update are apparently facing similar issues. While most people reporting the error are using HP devices, Neowin user Mike Steel heard from Microsoft's support that it actually affects other brands as well and that the patch has since been pulled from Windows Update.

The number of issues found in the latest release of Windows 10 seems to suggest that Microsoft needs to rethink the way it deploys its updates. It also may leave some wondering if the Insider program, which is meant to help shape the operating system, has lost its way over the past four years.

Yes, Microsoft, you've also earned a facepalm. Congratulations?

To say that the Insider program has "lost its way" seems to be overly generous; it's increasingly clear that the Insider program is simply not an adequate substitute for the sort of disciplined, rigorous testing that MSFT  simply doesn't do anymore, having laid off their product testers.

It's long past time for MSFT to simply admit that their Windows As A Service strategy simply doesn't work, and that using their WX 10 Home user base as involuntary guinea pigs, trouble-shooing the OS for the benefit of Microsoft's valued Enterprise customers with no choice or compensation, is not only unethical, but actively damaging. And that damage isn't limited to WX Home users; MSFT's brand and reputation deteriorate further with each new failure of their WaaS regime, and especially undermines their efforts to convince potential Enterprise customers that WX+WaaS is just fine.

WX+WaaS is not fine; it's broken, a fact which is becoming more evident as each new failure is triggered by MSFT's failure to recover from the last failure.

Extremely. Bad. Timing.

To say that Microsoft isn't having the best month would be quite an understatement, at this point. With Windows 10 (WX) losing ground yet again to Windows 7 (W7) in global usage share, and MSFT pulling WX's 1809 update because it was permanently deleting user's data, it's turning into the roughest month that the Windows team has notched in years. So.... what better time for people to discover that MSFT stealthily increased prices a few weeks ago?

That's right, dear readers, in a move which was obviously planned months ago, and obliviously enacted at the start of this increasingly terrible month for Microsoft, they really are hiking the price of WX's Home version. Yes, you read that correctly: the Home version. Yes, really.

From MSPoweruser:

If you are one of the rare buyers of the OS (e.g. you want to install it in Bootcamp on your Mac) then you will find the Windows tax has just seen an increase.

Windows 10 Home will now set you back $139, a $19.01 increase over the earlier $119.99 price. It is not 100% clear when the price increase went into effect, but near as we can tell it was some time in early September.

[...]

Given the recent quality issues with Windows 10 recently do our readers think the price increase is justified?

That's a really good question, MSPoweruser! Let us spend several hundred words exploring a very detailed answer to it... jk, the answer is obviously no. Hell, no. Fuck, no. Are you kidding me? No!

That this change was rolled out quietly, rather than receiving any sort of announcement, is not nearly as surprising as the fact that it happened at all. What are they smoking in Redmond, and can I buy some locally? Because stuff like that is about to become legal in my neck of the woods, and I'm thinking that Satya Nadella's team must really have a line on the good shit.

What Microsoft should have done... but will never, ever do

In the wake of the bungled 1809 update rollout, people are already asking what Microsoft should have done differently, or could/should do differently going forward. PC World has some pretty reasonable-sounding thought on that subject:

Microsoft strives to make milestone upgrades sound as innocent and painless as possible. But as any PC enthusiast (and our Windows upgrade guides) can tell you, tinkering with the very core of your operating system carries inherent risk.

[...]

The Microsoft’s Windows 10 upgrade prompt whitewashes the severity of major updates, and doesn’t make it obvious that significant surgery will occur underneath the hood, let alone the risk that major surgery entails. It just sounds like you’ll wait a little more than usual after you reboot and get rewarded for your patience with cool new stuff. And to be fair, that’s all that happens in the vast majority of cases.

[...]

As the disastrous October 2018 Update proves, there’s enough risk present in major operating system upgrades that Microsoft needs to make users aware of it. Milestone upgrade prompts like the one cited above from the Fall Creators Update already get custom text, so all Microsoft needs to do is add “We advise backing up your data first” to it. A handful of words can prevent a heap of headaches.

That sounds pretty reasonable. Hell, it is pretty reasonable. It's also never going to happen, because Microsoft's future plans all rely on Windows 10 being delivered as a service, and on pushing cloud versions of everything on users who have been reluctant to adopt them.

WX 1809 update negligence gets worse

So, do you remember that "bug" in the 1809 update, that finally prompted Microsoft to pull it yesterday? Well, here's the thing about that... funny story... it's not new. As reported by ZDNet:

As ZDNet reported yesterday, the Windows 10 October 2018 version 1809 upgrade hasn't gone well for a bunch of users who lost documents and photos after updating.

What's worse, it appears that Microsoft may have let this bug slip through testing with Windows Insiders during the preview of Windows 10 version 1809.

As noted by MSPoweruser, Windows insiders hit the exact same snag during Microsoft's preview phase of the Windows 10 version 1809 when updating from version 1803.

For some unknown reason, moving up to Windows 10 version 1809 may delete all the files in user folders. The folders remain, but the files within them are gone, leaving users in potentially a worse pickle than ransomware victims experience.

WX's spring update was delayed from its originally planned April launch into May by an unspecified-but-serious issue, but Microsoft never did say what the issue was. Apparently this was the issue, and it's certainly enough of an issue to have justified the delay of the 1803 update's rollout. The fact that WX still has this issue, though, and that Microsoft didn't think it important enough to delay the 1809 update's rollout, elevates this from incompetence to malice. It's simply mind-blowing.

And the only defense against this happening to you, both with this update and with and and all future updates, is Microsoft's OneDrive cloud storage service, which is not free if you need to back up more than 50GB of data. It's as if Microsoft is engaged in a low-key shakedown of the entire WX user base. Holy ransomware, Batman! Except this ransomware is your OS, and thus can't be avoided.

I've said it before, I'll say it again, and I'm not alone in saying it: I don't care if it comes from Microsoft, Windows 10 is malware.

OS usage share stats for end-September (Yes, there actually is news to report.)

Okay, yes, I know, I said that I was all done following Windows 10's monthly crawl to parity with Windows 7. That declaration is looking to have been premature, however, since this appears to be the month when things actually got interesting again.

First, Windows 10 (WX) vs. Windows 7 (W7). Last month, WX looked to finally be on pace to equal W7 by November, to such an extent that even I was willing to posit that they might actually make it this time. That was then, though, and this is now, and in the now, WX has once again lost ground to its much, much older cousin. As reported by Wayne Williams at Betanews:

Usage share monitoring service StatCounter saw Windows 10 overtake Windows 7 back in February, and its latest figures put the new operating system on 50.07 percent, well ahead of Windows 7 on 37.2 percent.

Rival monitoring service NetMarketShare disagrees however. While Windows 10 gained significant share in August, at Windows 7’s expense, the latest figures, for September, show a reversal of fortune.

According to NetMarketShare, in September, Windows 10 went from 37.80 percent to 37.44 percent, a fall of 0.36 percentage points.

In the same time frame, Windows 7 gained 0.61 percentage points to sit on 40.88 percent, 3.44 percent ahead.

Based on last month’s figures, I predicted that Windows 10 would take the lead by November, or possibly as early as October, but that no longer seems to be the case. It's now more likely to be the start of next year, but we shall see.

In case you're wondering what that looks like, here's the graph from NMS:

W7/WX still leads everyone else by a large margin, but Linux now clearly leads the "everyone else" pack.

I'd previously pegged ±0.5% as the threshold for significance, which these changes just barely exceed. That said, it does mean that the "by November" prediction for WX/W7 parity will likely be missed for a third straight year, which has to be slightly embarrassing for Microsoft.

This development isn't nearly as interesting as the month's OS usage changes among Steam users, though.

Hostility, demonstrated and quantified

Just in case you were thinking that my post last week about Microsoft's naked hostility towards Windows users was a touch on the hyperbolic side, today comes a great piece from the normally very MS-friendly Windows Central which illuminates the problem nicely:

Before Windows 10, a clean install of Windows only included the bare essentials a user would need to get started using their PC. That included software built by Microsoft, such as Mail, Paint, and its web browser, and it never included "bloatware" or "trialware" that one might find on hardware purchased from a third-party OEM that preloaded all kinds of crapware.

[...] With Windows 10, a clean install stays that way for about two minutes, because the second you hit the desktop, the Microsoft Store immediately starts trying to download third-party apps and games. And these apps keep trying to install themselves even after you cancel the downloads.

There are six such apps, which is six too many. These apps are often random, but right now they include things like Candy Crush, Spotify, and Disney Magic Kingdoms. You should not see any of these apps on a fresh install of Windows 10, yet they are there every single time.

[...] The only way I've found that gets rid of them permanently is to let them install initially, without canceling the download, and then uninstall the apps from the Start menu. If you cancel the initial download of the bloatware apps before they complete their first install, the Microsoft Store will just attempt to redownload them later and will keep doing so until that initial install is complete.

[...] For comparison, I recently did a clean install of macOS High Sierra on a Mac, and that experience was sublime. Once I hit the desktop, I didn't need to go in and start uninstalling extra bloatware that was automatically trying to install itself. All the apps that show up on the OS are Apple-made and not considered bloatware.

Writing as someone who recently spent most of a day doing a clean install of Windows 7, I can honestly say that this experience hold zero appeal for me; the fact that it will take less time to get to the point where the bloatware starts installing itself is simply not enough incentive.

Why not Windows 10?

Given that my recent foray into PC Gaming on Linux were... underwhelming, shall we say, some of my readers (yes, all three of you) may well be wondering why I don't just bite the bullet and switch to Windows 10 already. True, the "free upgrade" offer has ended, and Windows 10 will not cost money, but I was honestly always going to want more control over my PC than WX Home offered, which would always have meant a Professional license... in other words, Windows 10 was always going to cost me something up front.

So, why not just switch already?

It's a good question, and one which I've struggled a bit to answer myself this past week. Was I just being stubborn? Or did I still have concrete, valid reasons for sticking with Windows 7, while hoping that Valve and Steam Play would be able to solve the Linux gaming performance problem at some point during the upcoming year?

Today, though, I had a eureka moment, when I found my nebulous reasons for sticking with W7 suddenly crystallized into a single paragraph by Paul Thurrott. He was writing about Microsoft's decision to de-escalate some of WX's advertising bullshit. After downplaying the reversal as "not much of a win," he goes onto describe  Microsoft's approach to Windows consumers thusly:

Everything else that is still wrong about Windows 10 is still in the product and will move forward with version 1809.

In other words, the slippery slope I first warned about way back in 2012, when Microsoft quietly began its first sneaky advertising additions to Windows 10's predecessor, is still very much an issue. And has escalated over time. The ongoing and unnecessary compromises to Windows 10---rampant advertising, attempts at pushing users to Microsoft Edge, pre-bundled crapware, and more---continue unabated. There is no major software platform that is this hostile to its own users. [Emphasis added.]

"That's it!" I thought. "That's the reason!" It's not just WX's ongoing issues, which I could probably live with or work around, it's that Microsoft treats all but their largest Enterprise customers with thinly veiled contempt, most of the time, and has done so for years. Sure, maybe this latest half-hearted walk-back marks the beginning of a trend towards less bullshit in Windows... but I'm not planning to bet money on it.

Seriously, fuck Microsoft at this point. If Valve can get Steam Play working well enough to provide a moderately decent gaming experience on Linux (or, hell, SteamOS), I'll put up with some performance issues, rather than give Microsoft the satisfaction.

They're not going to make it...

Since I haven't been watching the monthly market share numbers as intently as I used to, I really didn't have the correct context in which to place this bit of news when it was first posted last week:

With the Windows 7 end-of-support clock slowly winding down to January 14, 2020, Microsoft is announcing it will offer, for a fee, continuing security updates for the product through January 2023. This isn't the first time Microsoft has done this for a version of Windows, but it may be the first time it has been so public about its plans to do so.

Windows 7 still has a large share of the overall Windows market, especially among business customers. Moving off older versions of Windows is a slow process, even with advance planning, for companies with multiple thousands of Windows desktop machines.

The paid Windows 7 Extended Security Updates (ESUs) will be sold on a per-device basis, with the price increasing each year. These ESUs will be available to any Windows 7 Professional and Windows 7 Enterprise users with volume-licensing agreements, and those with Windows Software Assurance and/or Windows 10 Enterprise or Education subscriptions will get a discount. Office 365 ProPlus will continue to work on devices with Windows 7 Extended Security Updates through January 2023.

[...]

This time around, the ESU program is being run out of Microsoft's Volume Licensing Unit and Core Windows Engineering "is producing these updates like a product," [Jared Spataro, corporate vice president of Microsoft 365] explained.

"We want to encourage people to get off Windows 7, but we want to make it more than something punitive," he said.

This was the second move that Microsoft made in a direction of accommodating the "slow process" of operating system migration at scale; they also announced that they're slowing the pace of forced Windows 10 updates, which was another pain point for Enterprise customers.

Some businesses have complained that they need more time and flexibility to update Windows 10, and IT admins are tasked with ensure apps work with the latest update. Microsoft is releasing new cloud-based tools to ease app compatibility testing, and the company is also giving IT admins more time to update. All currently supported feature updates of Windows 10 Enterprise and Education editions will be supported for 30 months from their current release. The existing policy is 18 months, so this bump brings support closer to what IT admins were used to in the Windows 7 and earlier days.

Interesting, yes? Now for the context: Windows 7 (W7) doesn't just have a large share of the market. W7 still has over forty percent of the market, according to the latest numbers from NetMarketShare.

No, Microsoft, it won't. It really, really won't.

From Simon Sharwood at The Reg:

Microsoft says 'majority' of Windows 10 use will be 'streamlined S mode'
Which is just-about an admission Win 10 is a mess

No, Microsoft, it won't.

I mean, we've known for a while that Microsoft would really, really like for S mode, and thus their digital storefront, to be the way that a majority of users experience Windows; this has always been the plan, so it's no surprise that MS see this as the best possible outcome... for them. The only surprise is that they're finally speaking openly about their desire to make this happen, in spite of the fact that consumers' rejection of this vision of personal computing has been pretty much total, up to this point.

Consumers have made it very plain that they do not want this. So much so, in fact, that Microsoft's latest aborted attempt to push it on them anyway has now been walked back. But don't expect MS to stop trying. Forcing every PC user on Earth into their walled-garden Microsoft Store ecosystem is, very plainly, MS's entire plan for Windows, and they will try again.

The Reg's reporting doesn't include anything much that Thurrott.com didn't already cover yesterday, apart from this bit of editorializing:

"We expect the majority of customers to enjoy the benefits of Windows 10 in S mode," Belfiore wrote. Which is hardly a ringing endorsement of Windows 10 in its dominant configuration!

Which is completely accurate - after all, MS wouldn't be having to push WX so hard if it were good enough to sell itself on the product's merits. That isn't, however, the point. The point is that MS want "S mode" to supplant a Windows in which consumers retain control over their PCs, and the software that gets installed on them, and instead relies on Microsoft to serve up everything. The point is raw, naked greed; it's MS wanting to be Apple, with their own iOS-style App Store.

The fact that MS want it to happen, however, doesn't mean that it will happen. Because for all its issues, Windows 10 is still better than its "S mode" counterpart, which is why Windows 10 S flopped in the first place. Making S mode an option for all WX users doesn't do anything to make it more attractive to those users, or alter the fact that the "Universal Windows Platform" has utterly failed to be a thing. The "benefits" of S mode are non-existent; the experience of using S mode is shit, and there's nothing happening which will alter that in any way at all.

Sorry, Joe.

MS tiptoes back from the "S Mode" edge

Well, colour me surprised if Microsoft didn't hear peoples' howls of outrage and walk back a terrible decision before it had even gone live.

From Thurrott.com:

Microsoft now says that it will no longer charge customers who wish to upgrade from Windows 10 in S mode. The revelation comes after a bizarre tweet in which Microsoft’s Joe Belfiore confirmed Thurrott.com’s exclusive story that it would kill Windows 10 S and provide S mode in all mainstream Windows 10 versions.

Now, Belfiore is providing more information and is doing so via a more traditional means: A Microsoft corporate blog.

“We’ve received feedback that the [Windows 10 S] naming was a bit confusing for both customers and partners,” he writes. “Based on that feedback, we are simplifying the experience for our customers. Starting with the next update to Windows 10, coming soon, customers can choose to buy a new Windows 10 Home or Windows 10 Pro PC with S mode enabled, and commercial customers will be able to deploy Windows 10 Enterprise with S mode enabled.”

[...]

Best of all, however, Belfiore now says that Microsoft will no longer try to charge customers to upgrade from S mode. (Today, the upgrade from Windows 10 S to Windows 10 Pro costs $50.) So you can upgrade from the hobbled S mode in Windows 10 Home, Pro, or Enterprise to the “full” version of whichever OS product edition for free going forward. This is absolutely the correct thing to do.

Microsoft's previous ruminations on their upcoming S Mode, its costs, and its lawsuit-avoidance carve-out for the antivirus software industry, were indeed bullshit, and S Mode is still bullshit, but at least Microsoft won't be charging gamers extra for wanting to install games on their new PCs anymore. So, yes, absolutely the correct thing to do, and it's only taken them three tries to produce an S Mode strategy that the market might actually accept.

Of course, this latest change also makes it even easier to ignore S Mode entirely, now that it's not being rammed down users' throats anymore, so it won't do anything to make S Mode relevant to consumers. Which means that S Mode is still a failure; Microsoft is just finally admitting failure, is all, rather than insisting on charging consumers extra to help cover their failure's costs.

It's tough to give Microsoft much credit, though, for belatedly doing something the less-shitty thing on their 3rd attempt, and only after the outcry made it clear that their anti-consumer bullshit would not fly. It's tough to even call this a win for consumers; Microsoft may have backed away from the edge this time, but there will be a next time, and a next one after that, so have we really won anything other than a temporary reprieve? Because it sure doesn't feel like a win.

I doubt that the overall goal, i.e. forcing consumers onto the Windows Microsoft Store to buy all of their PC software, has changed, however. With UWP failing, and Progressive Web Apps being a Google-led trend that Microsoft can't monopolize, it's tough to see how they'll be able to force the ecosystem issue, but mark my words: they will try again. Whether on some other ground, or on this same ground once it's swept clean, they will try again.

For now, though, saner heads appear to have prevailed. It's not much, but I'll still take it.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose...

Do you remember when Microsoft's vision for Windows 10 involved blocking normal program installation by default? When they had to make a big deal of the ability for users to enable "side loading," as if it was some sort of fucking gift that Microsoft were giving us out of the goodness of their hearts, rather than because Windows Store was a wasteland of shit that consumers wanted no part of?

They didn't stay backed down for long, though. It was only six months later that they were announcing Windows 10 S, a gimped version of the OS which didn't even allow the option of turning side-loading on unless you paid to upgrade from WX S to WX Pro. They ended up making upgrades free for the rest of 2017, because the Windows (later Microsoft) Store was still a wasteland of shit that consumers wanted no part of. Oh, and WX S was also unusably bad, because there were no apps for fucking thing.

Well, it turns out Microsoft still isn't done trying to force Windows users onto their horrible, horrible digital storefront for fucking everything, because they're trying yet again to do exactly that. Just, you know, not with people who've already switched over. No, it's only new WX users who'll get fucked.

From Tech Republic:

Windows 10: Get ready for more PCs that only run Microsoft Store apps by default

Microsoft is planning to update all versions of Windows 10 to incorporate S Mode, which will limit the machine to only installing apps from the Microsoft Store, according to a leaked roadmap.

Because of course they are. This has always been the plan.

Do you remember when WX was supposedly on pace to surpass W7 by November?

NMS's end-of-January numbers are out, and once again, WX has managed modest gains at the expense of Windows XP, while W7 and W8.1 remain mostly unchanged. And, no, WX still hasn't caught up to its nine-year-old rival.

WX gained, of course, from 32.93% to 34.29% (+1.36); W7 ticked down, from 43.08% to 42.39% (-0.69); W8.1 ticked down slightly, from 5.71% to 5.56% (-0.15); and XP slid the most, from 5.18% to 4.05% (-1.13). Except for W8.1's, all of these results are above the ±0.5% "noise threshold," but WX's gains are not enough to encompass the losses of W7, W8.1, and XP. Some of those former Windows users are going elsewhere.

Where are they going, you ask? By the looks of it, Apple. Windows' overall market share slid from 88.51% to 87.79% (-0.72), while MacOS grew its overall market share from 9.02% to 9.95% (+0.93), propelled by MacOS X 10.13 (from 3.53% to 4.46%, +0.93). An overall decline in Windows' user base probably isn't something that Microsoft want to see; yes, WX gained more than a percentage point to start the year, but the fact that those gains are mostly coming at the expense of the 16½ year old XP, rather than the market-leading W7, can't be good news, either.

Reminder: Windows 10 is malware

Was it only two days ago that I was writing that WX still had quite a way to go, in spite of its brand-new Diagnostic Data Viewer? How nice of monopolist Microsoft to provide me with a timely demonstration of exactly what sort of issues WX still suffers from, as reported by WindowsReport:

Many Opera users recently complained on Reddit about Windows 10’s pushy behavior when it comes to using the Edge browser.

More specifically, users reported that the OS opens a new tab on Opera aimed at advertising Edge. Using the browser of choice of many Windows 10 users simply to promote Edge is indeed a bit strange.

After unlocking my Windows 10 computer, I discover that Windows has decided to open a tab in my Opera browser solely to advertise Edge browser to me.

This unexpected Edge ad made many users angry. They asked Microsoft to stop telling them what browser to use.

MSFT need to stop this nonsense, no one should be forced to use edge period.

Yep... that is some bullshit.

Windows 10 can still be had for free, weeks after they claimed to have closed the last free-WX loophole

BTW, I've just decided to start abbreviating Windows 10 to "WX," which is both shorter and consistent with GWX branding already used by Microsoft. For brevity and consistency, I'll also be using "W#" for earlier versions (i.e. W7, W8, W8.1), and simply adding the appropriate suffixes for other flavours of WX when needed for clarity (WX-Home, WX-Pro, WX-Core, WX-S, etc.).

It took Microsoft until two full weeks after their Dec. 31st deadline, and change, to finally close the Assistive Technologies loophole, which allowed users to upgrade to WX for free if they were willing to say that they used any kind of Assistive Technology... up to, and including, hot keys. You might thing that the end of the last of the Microsoft's officially free WX offerings would mean the end of stories about how you can still get WX for free.

Well, you would be wrong. Check out the "most relevant" result that Google News returns for "Windows 10."

Yes, that's Forbes, with yet another piece on how WX can still be had for free, now two weeks after the last free WX window was allegedly closed.

Windows 10 was free for a year after launch for anyone who had an older version of Windows. For those who missed this transition period it was possible to get an upgrade right up until the end of 2017, a loophole Microsoft has now closed - although it wasn't much of a loophole, as the company knew all about it.

However there are other ways to upgrade to Windows 10 that don't involve getting the upgrade assistant from the official site.

Yes, apparently this has always worked... meaning that this also isn't much of a loophole, since Microsoft clearly also knows all about it, i.e. working as intended.

It's unclear as to why this works, but if you have a product code for an old version of Windows 7, 8 or 8.1 you should be able to enter this into a copy of Windows 10 and get an activation. You will be given access to the version of Windows 10 that matches the original product key. So Windows 8 Pro will get Windows 10 Pro, while Windows 8 Home will get, you guessed it, Windows 10 Home.

Hmmm.... so it's possible to upgrade from W7-Pro to WX-Pro? It's a shame the GWX app didn't work the same way; I might have been tempted to switch.

Right about now, you might be wondering why Microsoft would still have a WX upgrade left open that's large enough for an auto-truck to drive through? Well, Microsoft themselves are pretty quiet on the issue, but Forbes' Ian Morris has some ideas:

As I pointed out in my article about the closing of the accessibility loophole, I don't think Microsoft really cares about end users getting free upgrades. It makes more money from OEM sales of Windows 10 on new laptops and revenue from corporate users than the slender pickings of home users. Indeed, Microsoft makes more money - and more margin - on selling cloud offerings these days.

Windows isn't a cash cow when it comes to home users, so I suspect there's a lot of give built into the system.

Which makes a lot of sense, actually. It's just a shame that Microsoft are being so disingenuous about it all. I mean, they could easily partner with PC-OEMs to promote new PC sales ("Get the most out of Windows 10 with the latest AMD/Ryzen hardware!"), while also continuing to let tech-savvier users upgrade for free if they still want to... and without the fucking hard sell, this time. Because, honestly, the hard sell of the GWX campaign was a big part of the continued appeal of W7, which culminated in Microsoft simply switching over users who didn't take active steps to avoid the unwanted "upgrade," even after they'd repeatedly refused Microsoft's malware-laden Home version of WX.

Hell, Microsoft even have a better product to give away than they did a few years ago, with more features and (crucially) better privacy protections, and even better privacy tools due to be added to the platform in a couple of months. And if I can also use my W7 Professional license to upgrade to WX-Pro, rather than the gimped Home version, to gain even more features and even better privacy tools... when, that becomes one hell of a sales pitch, doesn't it?

So, what's the problem?