The Technology Vent and Rant Thread

[badgoodDeb]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

Cunningham's Law.

That's also why games (that advertise themselves while I'm playing a game I like) always show rather poor playing. They want me to say "I can do better than that! See, here's an obvious choice you missed. And another!"

They want me to feel that strongly enough to download the game that is advertised, and interrupt the one I was playing.

[Sirtel]

My main laptop just updated to Windows 11 without asking my consent.

Oh well. It had to be done anyway, as Windows 10 support will end in October. I just postponed it constantly, as I didn't want to bother with customizing everything again. At least all my files and installed programs seem to be there.

Guess I'll have to spend a couple of hours today customizing.

My Windows tablet is probably going to update to Windows 11 too. Seems that Microsoft is getting more aggressive with pushing Windows 11 on folks. So far they always asked if you wanted it, but they didn't now.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

My main laptop just updated to Windows 11 without asking my consent.

Oh well. It had to be done anyway, as Windows 10 support will end in October. I just postponed it constantly, as I didn't want to bother with customizing everything again. At least all my files and installed programs seem to be there.

Guess I'll have to spend a couple of hours today customizing.

My Windows tablet is probably going to update to Windows 11 too. Seems that Microsoft is getting more aggressive with pushing Windows 11 on folks. So far they always asked if you wanted it, but they didn't now.

I disabled UEFI safe boot just to avoid it happening. If it somehow bypasses that, I'll be pissed.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

I disabled UEFI safe boot just to avoid it happening. If it somehow bypasses that, I'll be pissed.

After installing ExplorerPatcher for taskbar and start menu, I guess I can manage with Windows 11. Those were my biggest beefs with Win 11.

[Renate]

I hate the Start Menu.
I keep it totally blank.
The worst was when news recommendations were popping up.

Since I'm very boring I use a finite number of programs.
I just apply a hot key to these for easier starting.
But STILL, the Windows bug that has been around for decades causes a 3 second delay when using a hot key.

Hot keys are offered to all top-level windows, including ones that are not active in any sense. Hence the 3 second timeout. SMH.

When I hit a hot key I don't want any arbitration. I want it to start a program even if there are six instances running already. That's not too difficult is it? Apparently it is.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Renate

I hate the Start Menu.
I keep it totally blank.
The worst was when news recommendations were popping up.

I've never had any ads or recommendations in my Windows Start Menu. Ofc I don't use Microsoft News, as it has no edition for my country.

[ratinox]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

After installing ExplorerPatcher for taskbar and start menu, I guess I can manage with Windows 11. Those were my biggest beefs with Win 11.

ExplorerPatcher and Open-Shell go a long way to making Windows 11 tolerable, along with some tweaks from Winaero Tweaker. But I think that openSUSE Leap or Tumbleweed are worth investigating as full on replacements, Leap if you want something enterprise stable, Tumbleweed if you want to dip your toes in the waters of rolling distributions. I've been on Tumbleweed since early 2024 -- including gaming (Steam and Heroic) -- and I do not regret it.

Or, there's Ubuntu and a number of derivatives. Mint is my recommendation for a distro that generally works out of the box and has a familiar interface. Vanilla Ubuntu also works well out of the box but I'm very not a fan of the direction Canonical have been going with their desktop UI choices.

Only major speed bump with Linux is nVidia graphics but that's improved drastically in the past year or so.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by ratinox

I've been on Tumbleweed since early 2024 -- including gaming (Steam and Heroic) -- and I do not regret it.

I've been using Tumbleweed in a VM for about 8 years now. The only issue I run into every couple of years is that an update borks the VM running on VMWare Workstation.

Originally Posted by ratinox

Only major speed bump with Linux is nVidia graphics but that's improved drastically in the past year or so.

Still some oddities with nVidia but it's gotten a lot better. Now if the Qt developers would stop their fix one bug and introduce 2 others bug fix style, it would be even better.

[Solitaire1]

I posted this in the Reading Vent and Rant Thread by mistake:

Why does the situation with USB-C have to be so confusing? I thought that USB-C was supposed to simplify things by having just one universal connector that everything would use and would be compatible with every device (take a cable with a USB-C connector, plug it in to a device, and it will work). Unfortunately, the reality is far different. It seems like the only way to ensure that a cable with a USB-C connector will work with a device is to use the specific cord that was supplied with the device. To me, that isn't much different than having a specific proprietary cord that you have to use with a specific device.

Although my Sony Walkman Digital Audio Player (DAP) has a proprietary cable (WM-Port USB) one thing I can say for it is that when I plug it into my player it works every single time. They also made it easy to plug it in correctly (the connector has a clear indicator which side is up). Plus, Sony hasn't changed the cord since 2007 (although they have moved to USB-C in 2019) and I can use my original cord with my current Walkman DAP (released in 2018). Meanwhile, Apple changed the iPod cord twice while it was in production.

[Renate]

Type C is a guarantee that the plug will physically fit.
Presume more than that at your own risk.

[nana77]

Originally Posted by DNSB

I've been using Tumbleweed in a VM for about 8 years now. The only issue I run into every couple of years is that an update borks the VM running on VMWare Workstation.



Still some oddities with nVidia but it's gotten a lot better. Now if the Qt developers would stop their fix one bug and introduce 2 others bug fix style, it would be even better.

I'd always thought that that (common) quote was regarding open source drivers, whereas Nvidia's wasn't that good (but on a way to be better, maybe) compared to its proprietary ones; while AMD has better open source ones too.
Pop_OS! Has its own version that comes out within Nvidia's ones by default, also.

I'm glad to Valve that seemed to be the rare company that gave onto linux's ecosystem some monies, moving from a debian based OS to archlinux's (yes, the top ); and contributing to KDE's (because its OS has a full desktop, besides the gaming's behaviour which is the default one).
What makes me little ranting is not having understood why, any time I'd asked to some young apprendice at work, or even to someone whose might like technologies, if they knows that device Valve made (the Deck), supposing that a young guy would look for the various Nintendo's etc... and at least to know that Valve's devices' existence: none did.

Several devices, before USB-C, went unusable just because them micro-USB or charging port went unsoldered; at least that trouble that protocol seemed to have it solved .

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by nana77

Several devices, before USB-C, went unusable just because them micro-USB or charging port went unsoldered; at least that trouble that protocol seemed to have it solved .

That problem you've had with USB ports is not something that USB-C will solve. You can still have the same problem with USB-C ports. Maybe it was user error.

[ratinox]

Originally Posted by Solitaire1

I posted this in the Reading Vent and Rant Thread by mistake:

Why does the situation with USB-C have to be so confusing? I thought that USB-C was supposed to simplify things by having just one universal connector that everything would use and would be compatible with every device (take a cable with a USB-C connector, plug it in to a device, and it will work). Unfortunately, the reality is far different. It seems like the only way to ensure that a cable with a USB-C connector will work with a device is to use the specific cord that was supplied with the device. To me, that isn't much different than having a specific proprietary cord that you have to use with a specific device.

USB-C never promised compatibility, only a unified connector. Critics pointed out exactly these problems with putting incompatible USB and Thunderbolt protocols on the same connector.

Although my Sony Walkman Digital Audio Player (DAP) has a proprietary cable (WM-Port USB) one thing I can say for it is that when I plug it into my player it works every single time. They also made it easy to plug it in correctly (the connector has a clear indicator which side is up). Plus, Sony hasn't changed the cord since 2007 (although they have moved to USB-C in 2019) and I can use my original cord with my current Walkman DAP (released in 2018). Meanwhile, Apple changed the iPod cord twice while it was in production.

Apple had to do that. The original Firewire connector, while ubiquitous on Macintosh of the day, was almost non-existent on anything else. The Honda connector they adopted permitted both Firewire and USB protocols with one "universal" connector.

[PeterT]

One of my pet peeves is a small radio I have (I think XHDATA brand) that has a small rechargable battery and a USB-C port. It will however only charge if connected via a USB-C to USB-A cable from my Anker USB charger.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by PeterT

One of my pet peeves is a small radio I have (I think XHDATA brand) that has a small rechargable battery and a USB-C port. It will however only charge if connected via a USB-C to USB-A cable from my Anker USB charger.

Our dog used to have a tracker that charged via USB-C. But it only charged if it was low power. So I had to buy a low power USB-C cable. This is something I never had a problem with mini-USB or micro-USB.