When will they ever learn?
Its sometimes fun to watch this drama from the otherside. Windows is ‘that other OS’ for me now. I was switching between Linux and Windows a while ago, and made a permanant switch around 2021-ish (I think). I only use Windows at work as I don’t have a choice, and in certain instances where I’m forced to use a Windows device e.g. for online exams, etc…
Funnily enough I actually have Firefox open by default whenever I boot up my PC.
I have no taskbar or desktop items. I always default to a specific workflow of pressing the windows key (or whatever we call it for Linux), and searching for everything. I have since early windows 10.
I realised that 90% of the time, I was opening Firefox, so now it just opens. I have a pretty minimal toolbar setup for it, so it’s basically just an address bar that automatically focuses when I start typing.
One day I’ll set up something where I have multiple search hotkeys for web search, file search, application search, music etc, that will sort of replace this.
@echo off timeout /t 60 /nobreak >nul tasklist /fi "imagename eq msedge.exe" | find /i "msedge.exe" >nul if not errorlevel 1 ( taskkill /f /im msedge.exe >nul 2>&1 ) exitMy first thought was Power Automate, the same thing is probably pretty easily doable with it.
Ye olde active desktop for you noobs
I dual boot Linux with windows 10 for more than 10 years now, networking from windows is just unacceptable for me, on Linux you can also add any games that you want, if Adobe wouldn’t keep resisting I would be totally free of Windows! They were always trash
Maybe you can try Adobe through CrossOver Linux’s demo and see if it works? They contribute lots of work towards Wine, but also sell a more ‘hacky’ commercial software that isn’t as strict about how it does stuff.
After switching to Linux, I will try out their software and decide whether to buy a lifetime license.
I ll check it out for sure, thanx!
Mint guy here, since 6 months ago, best choice I have done. If you make some research, in few time you realiese you do not need Microsoft to live in the majority of the cases.
When I bought a new gaming PC a few weeks ago (where I live the pre-builts that were assembled before rampocalypse are still at a reasonable price until the stock runs out), I asked if I could get it cheaper without the Windows 11 license. The sales guy said, “well, it’s already installed.” I told him, “I’m literally going to take it home and wipe it for Bazzite.” He said, “good call, but seriously, they’re practically giving these licenses away, so even if we could it would only take like $20 off the purchase price.”
Kind of a bummer to waste that $20, but honestly the satisfaction of hitting “reformat” on a brand new, slop-infused, bloatware-infested, data-harvesting-ready SSD and watching it all vanish before I even used it was almost worth the money.
EDIT: Not to mention, I got back a significant amount of space. 15+ GB.
Same. When bought a new laptop recently, I didn’t give a single chance for Windows to run. The first time I launched it was with Arch installation flash drive plugged in.
I ran windows on my new build (it was cheaper to get someone else to build it than to buy the same exact parts myself 😩) just to make sure everything works and my god, I could barely get past the setup before getting annoyed. Linux is just waaaay easier to deal with, even with having to troubleshoot driver installs. Windows is set up now to where you can’t really do anything to your own computer.
Linux storeage system just works better. I use CachyOS. In Windows, I could only play like 2 games, until my ssd would get full. But Linux is so unimaginably light-weight that I can play a lot of games, and still have a few GB space left. Linux is just plain better.
I have an idea. Linux should start automatically everytime you boot you PC.
IDK that seems pretty invasive
Perhaps just GRUB and waiting for my input one extra time to confirm I actually want to use my PC at that time
I just have one kernel and one Distro with secure boot. So I directly use UEFI.
Some senior VP obviously has his annual performance bonus tied to increasing Edge market share, and is pulling shit like this to artificially inflate the numbers.
Ditto for Bing, Copilot, etc.
Inb4 it runs in the bg putting up randoms websites in the background without any UI “agentically”
Oh wait…
Is this…is this just an even worse active desktop?
I honestly might switch to Linux. I know people say that a lot, but gaming has been the only thing keeping me on Windows.
But I’ve also come to realize I just don’t have that much free time to game any more. Most of my computer use is putting YouTube on in the background or web browsing. I still occasionally game, but Linux support keeps improving and even if I only pick Linux supported games… I still won’t have enough time to play them all.
I recommend installing Ventoy on a USB stick, then putting some ISOs on there of various distros to try. Like CachyOS, Bazzite, or perhaps Kubuntu.
You can boot into them straight from the Ventoy USB stick without having to format the USB between new tests.
And if you end up liking one over the others you can install straight from the stick.
You can do it, I believe in you random internet stranger!
Flash a distro onto a usb and boot from that to test drive it and ensure your hardware is compatible - zero risk.
Gaming works great on Linux now and often better. The only scenarios I can think of where things are majorly behind are competitive games with anti cheat that doesn’t work on Linux and anything requiring peripherals with custom software, for example SIM racing. This means that the vast majority of games work great!
Sim racing works great for me. Anything from Moza, Logitech, and even my PXN wheel “just worked” out of the box on cachyOS. Bazzite is now getting wheel support. I did have to add USB descriptors for udev rules on my simmsonn pedals, and also learn to always disable steam input and use glorious eggroll proton. JacKeTus did a fantastic job with the ffb driver and I see him on matrix ALL THE TIME helping newbies and getting stuff working.
I’ll be that guy, use bazzite. Unless your doing advanced shit or VR it’s basically everything you need in a simple package. Shit I didn’t even have to install drivers for my… well everything.
Only annoying thing I’m finding is my Firefox audio goes wonky sometimes while using the built in audio booster (FF extensions that boost audio were even worse) but rebooting Firefox fixes it.
I game often, and 100% on Linux. Unless you’re doing competitive multiplayer games with kernel level anti-cheat (read: rootkit malware), games run perfectly fine.
Good news!
Apparently DeNovo’s been hacked!
P.S. I’m shit at games… so I don’t know if this actually really matters 😝
The Denuvo workaround only runs on Windows and creates the mother of all security holes.
There are two exceptions to this still, STALKER Gamma doesn’t work on Linux still and SKSEx64 doesn’t work either. Also modding Baldurs gate 3 through Nexus is fucky.
I switched to Linux a year or two ago. Pretty much every game I’ve played has worked fine. (Elden ring, guild wars 2, nioh2, pillars of eternity…)
Even non-steam stuff was basically click and go with Heroic launcher
As long as you don’t jump on AAA title games on launch day, you’ll be fine gaming on Linux.
That, or if you are a fortnite, LoL addict… Those don’t work for reasons totally up to the devs.
You can test most Linux distros using a “live” image on a thumb drive. If you put Ventoy on a drive, you can try as many ISOs as you can fit on the drive.
Bazzite or Fedora are both really good places to start.
I don’t consider myself to be an advanced PC user, but even I was able to get Arch Linux to run with some googling and tinkering as my first dive into Linux. I really think you should make the switch if you don’t have any work restrictions. I dualboot still, just in case, but I can’t remember the last time I needed to use Windows.
Like you and the others say, if you have limited time gaming or don’t play AAA on launch day, that’s just one more reason not to use Windows! Good luck!
Doesn’t “consider [themselves] to be an advanced PC user…”
Picks Arch as their first Linux distro.
Found Linus Sebastian.
I only did it to try to impress people online lol.
Everything is like a Hodge Podge of fixes just to make it work, so if anyone asks me about the inner workings of everything, I wouldn’t be able to answer like 75% of it. I’m still learning.
Nah, he would have removed his DE.
Lol that loser can’t even install popos right
Come on in, the water is great!
Zorin OS is a good one if you want a nice UI transition from Windows or Mac.
I just gonna go live in the woods and take up bird watching or something.
Your scenario sounds like mine. Don’t game much anymore and definitely don’t play triple A crap that requires kernel.level anti cheat. Been on bazzite for about 6 mos and everything has been great. So much better than Windows.
Pop_OS has been a piece of cake to use. Switched last year, never looking back.
Why would my browser Downloader need to start again after I download other browsers?
I want Edge to fuck off.
#linux
If you’re stuck on Windows for work or whatever, just disable Edge’s executable in Group Policy. Let Microsoft fight Microsoft.
If you’re stuck on Windows for work or whatever, you probably don’t have rights to do that.
If you are a cog in the corporate machine then yes, probably. Ask your IT people. But in my case in particular (and probably lots of others) I’m saddled with Windows at work because some of the software we need to use doesn’t work in Linux. And no, it doesn’t work in Wine either before the inevitable comment appears. I try about once a year to see if the new versions have gotten compatible enough. The answer is consistently no.
Although windows will still try to open edge and will blank out your default browser just to spite you. Absolutely infuriating.
I used to replace the edge .exe with a copy of firefox .exe, then write protecting everything in that directory and disabling scheduled updates and that seemed to work (for a while at least.)
Not that I’ve seen, at least not in the IoT versions of 10 and 11 we’re currently running. Although there are some hard-coded functions wherein Windows will disrespect your default browser assignment no matter what, such as pressing F1 for help in Explorer. Since we have Edge disabled entirely on all machines here, instead when you do that nothing happens.
Will you describe more ? How to do group policy?
Group policy is edited on a local per-machine level using the Group Policy Editor, or gpedit.msc (stick it in your Run box).
Computer Configuration \ Windows Settings \ Security Settings \ Software Restriction Policies \ Additional Rules
Right click and add a new path rule. Then disallow Edge’s path. On the machine I’m sitting at it’s c:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft\Edge\Application.
Just disallow everything in there (*) and any time something tries to launch Edge in your face you’ll get this:
Look at me. I am the administrator now.
If you are on a non-Pro version of Windows and don’t have access to the Group Policy Editor, you can just use this which is considerably less hassle.
gpedit.msc
Why does everything microslop does feel forced?
They cosy up to the Donny, …which tracks.
Because it is. The question is why a good product needs to be forced on users.
Because they’re the Oracle of OSes. They only exist to supply lucrative corporate contracts.
Ooh, does that mean that we’re in for a big “actually we’re restructuring our licensing all the sudden and everyone owes us 10x, effective as soon as you renew” rug pull? All the cool silicon valley mega corps are doing it!
People are annoyed with this I was already annoyed back in windows xp when I originally switched to Linux.
No means no, Microsoft.
