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Twitter-er Swift on Security asked the question… https://twitter.com/SwiftOnSecurity/status/1312552344580747264 And scrolling down you can see many
[See the full post at: Patch Lady – what would you change about Windows 10?]
Susan Bradley Patch Lady/Prudent patcher
https://twitter.com/SwiftOnSecurity/status/1312552344580747264
I got a network protocol violation in trying to access the link.
I would have Microsoft copy the rest of Ubuntu’s release schedule and have every fourth release be a long-term support branch (for all versions, Home through enterprise) that gets five years of security and bug fixes.
I would restore full control over updates, as in every previous version of Windows. No deferrals, active hours, or any other silliness required, and certainly no need to use aftermarket programs to block Windows Updates. Do them when the hardware owner gives the ok, if the PC is so configured, and leave it at that. No “Update and shut down” or “Update and restart” choices that don’t include a non-update version or any of that nonsense.
I would reinstate professional testers and stop trying to use your own consumers against their will for that purpose. This is a paid product, so treat it as such.
There should be a single master OFF switch for all telemetry (not counting Microsoft Updates, CRL update requests, malware definition update requests, and that kind of thing; these things have their own settings and are not properly ‘telemetry’) that stays off once set. If people want to enable it to help MS out, that’s fine… I do opt-in for some telemetry on some programs by trusted developers, but the key word there is ‘opt.’
Also in the “treat it like the paid product it is” vein, I would have Microsoft commit to never having any ads in any product that costs money, whether they be paid app downloads that the users did not request, messages about OneDrive specials in the Windows Explorer “sync provider” field, “Get Office” app preinstalled, or any other such thing. If they want to have a free, ad-supported, telemetry forced on version for free, meaning no activation at all and available freely to OEMs without cost or paperwork, that’s fine, and they could include an upgrade to the paid version as an option, and that paid version should be ad and monetization free.
I would have all “apps” uninstallable, including MS Store, Edge, Xbox, and all the rest. Not “disabled,” in the way that IE supposedly could be in XP following the settlement with the US government (the thing still popped up as much as it ever had before when I “disabled” it), but legitimately removed. The apps could be brought back with the “add or remove Windows features” dialog– keep a section for “Apps” in there and have each app represented with a checkbox, which would cause Windows to redownload the app from MS and install it. It’s a lot more likely that someone will be able to get the app back by doing that than if they do as I would and use the nucler option (forcefully removing it with aftermarket programs and/or Powershell scripts, which are pretty much irreversible).
Because the MS Store would not guaranteed to be there, there should not be any important things (like nVidia control panel) that MS would attempt to have distributed only through their Store. If you want to have the store, fine, but don’t ever make it mandatory to get anything. People often liken the Store to Linux repos, but no program is ever ONLY found in any distro’s repo. It’s not the existence of the thing that I object to, but the way that it is forced on people. MS did this in 8 also, where the 8.1 upgrade was from the Store, not Windows Update. That should stop.
I would have the user interface of Windows 10 reflect the device in question. If it is a desktop or laptop PC with no touchscreen, it should have a pure mouse and keyboard UI that is the equal of the UIs found in Windows 7 or XP. If it has both a discrete pointing device and a touchscreen, it should ask the user what he wants. My suggestion would be that 2 in 1 devices use the mouse UI when docked and the touch UI when in tablet mode, but they should both be distinct and optimized for the platform rather than the half and half UI that has been there since Windows 8.
The “settings” app is inferior to the old Control Panel on mouse-based PCs, and its only reason to exist at all is to be a touch-friendly but less useful (as is the norm with touch friendliness) substitute. There’s no reason to accept the compromises and limitations of the touch interface when one is not using a touch interface.
I would have the first-run setup program (do they still call it OOBE?) of Windows 10 default to an offline, non-MS account, without the increasingly difficult hurdles to find it. My guess is the actual plan is to remove the option to have a local user account, and I’d definitely do a 180 on that one.
In short, I would have Windows 10 developed with what I consider the Golden Rule of operating systems, and that’s that an OS is meant to serve the interests of the owner of the hardware, as defined by himself, and no one else. No trying to sometimes serve Microsoft and sometimes the hardware owner. It has to be 100% hardware owner and 0% everyone else, Microsoft included. Most of these problems would self-resolve if MS stopped trying to have other people’s PCs serve their own interests with Windows 10.
Dell XPS 13/9310, i5-1135G7/16GB, KDE Neon
XPG Xenia 15, i7-9750H/16GB & GTX1660ti, KDE Neon
Acer Swift Go 14, i5-1335U/16GB, KDE Neon (and Win 11 for maintenance)
In other words, you’d make it a lot more like linux Mint! (Maybe some other distros as well; Mint is the one with which I’m most familiar.)
I have not used Windows 10, so the following might or might not apply, but I would like to be able to change the color of the “empty” space in a page at once: in all applications’ windows, by choosing my own preferred background color, as it used to be possible with the Windows 7 “Classic” view. Choose it using a color wheel, not just limited to a choice between black, white or some kind of grey. Personally, I am partial to a certain shade of beige that I find restful to my eyes.
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV
The Aero themes had no tearing, but the colors could not be changed as in Classic and all previous Windows releases.
You’re right about the desktop appearance options being more limited in Win7 relative to Vista. This is an area where Vista is superior to 7.
In Vista, when you right-click on an empty area of the desktop and select Personalize, you get an extensive menu of customization options. The first option is Window Color and Appearance, from which you can then click on the Advanced button to bring up the color settings for Windows Classic. (See screenshot.)
This is not possible in Windows 7 (at least through the GUI), as when you select Personalize from the desktop you’re taken to a Control Panel applet where the main section is for the selection of a theme and there is no evident way to tweak any of its elements.
BTW, the Appearance Settings in Vista offer eight “color schemes” (equivalent to “themes” in Win7), whereas only seven are available from the factory in Win7. The “extra” theme in Vista is one called Windows Standard (in addition to four high-contrast themes, Aero, Basic, and Classic). I believe that the Standard theme is like that of Windows 2000 while the Classic theme looks more like Windows 98.
It is possible to get a similar range of colours in Windows 7, by selecting Personalise and then Windows Classic. That then enables a similar menu of customization options as in earlier Windows OSes. That is absolutely what is missing in Windows 10, and means that I will be keeping W7 on my main system. I will not have an OS on my PC that does not allow me to control the screen appearance; any other aspects of W10 are secondary.
I have tried many ways to control W10 appearance, and the least worst is a basic black screen, but even there that is only a partial solution, for some screenshots, and which I do have on my tablet with W10 for limited use.
Garth
It is possible to get a similar range of colours in Windows 7, by selecting Personalise and then Windows Classic. That then enables a similar menu of customization options as in earlier Windows OSes.
I just tried doing that on my Win7 box. Here’s what the Appearance settings look like when using an Aero theme:
And here’s what the Appearances settings look like when in the Classic theme:
I couldn’t find where any additional customization options were offered under the Classic theme. Where should I look for them?
.
.
I couldn’t find where any additional customization options were offered under the Classic theme. Where should I look for them?
Under Window Color, second icon from the left at the bottom. The icon changed, which isn’t usually a thing that happens when you change a theme, so that’s how you can see at a glance that you have additional options.
Note that the Classic theme in 7 is not hardware accelerated and might result in a lot of visual tearing. I found this effect so annoying that it made Classic unusable for me.
Dell XPS 13/9310, i5-1135G7/16GB, KDE Neon
XPG Xenia 15, i7-9750H/16GB & GTX1660ti, KDE Neon
Acer Swift Go 14, i5-1335U/16GB, KDE Neon (and Win 11 for maintenance)
As Cybertooth wrote, use Windows Colors. Clicking on that opens up a small Window Color and Appearance window. In that, there are options for changes such as 3D Objects, Active Title Bar, Application Background, 21 options in all. Color choice available for most, size (e.g.icons) for some.
Note that as Windows advises, colors and sizes selected apply only if you have selected the Windows 7 Basic theme or an Ease of Access theme.
You can save different themes, and whereas default themes are stored in “C:\Windows\resources\Themes”, others may be stored in this location: %localappdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Themes.
Garth
Amen to @Ascaris’s comments.
If I wanted my OS to dictate how I must glean value from it, I’d buy a Mac.
Untested software that I have to pay for (e.g. Microsoft since Ballmer left) is garbage.
XAML/touch based UIs have always felt like a huge step backwards to me. The classic Win32 API interface looks and operates much more professionally.
Basically, I would have made Windows 10 an actual upgrade (improvements to Windows 7) instead of building an OS that feels like it is designed to make everyone hate it to the point that they switch over to a future SaaS cloud/spyware based offering.
Basically I agree with @Ascaris.
Specifically, I would do away with monthly updates altogether as we know them, and have a Service Pack released once or twice a year, supplemented when necessary by critical e.g. Zero Day hotfixes but not on a fixed monthly patching schedule as now. Both these things would be entirely at the option and preferred timing of the user who would exercise total control regardless of e.g. Home or Enterprise version.
All this would be based on Microsoft recognising that all people want from an OS is the ability to switch on their device and be able to run it without a second thought as to what the OS is about.
Totally agree with what @ascaris said. Personally all I want from an OS, is that:
a) …it just works
b) …it sits there like a church mouse, quietly and unobtrusively
c) …it’s subservient to my wishes
d) …it runs the software I want it to run
What I DON’T want from an OS, is that:
a) …it tries to sell me junk
b) …it tries to spy on what I’m doing
c) …it tries to make me run the software that it wants me to run
d) …every new update potentially breaks something that wasn’t previously broken, while only occasionally fixing something that was
I feel that Windows 10 is getting ever further away from that first set of criteria, and getting ever closer to the second
I also feel that MS feels empowered to get away with a lot of stuff under the laughable pretext that we as users have somehow “allowed” them to do that, having been forced into a specious agreement with them that has all the moral worth of an arranged marriage
What would I change about Windows 10?
I would revert it to Windows XP with security fixes and updated DirectX and driver support.
What I would change about Windows 10 is: I would add an option in the control panel to make Windows 10 mimic or appear as if it were Windows 7 x64 sp1 if it is installed on a workstation or desktop PC with no touchscreen. Something along the lines of: “If you are using a desktop computer with no touchscreen type display and would prefer that Windows 10 appear on your computer exactly as if it were Windows 7, press HERE.”
Yeah I would like a LTS version available to everyone. I use Windows for running software, I could care less about feature upgrades or some change in UI or revamping Control Panel for the sake of change. Just want a stable version of Windows.
At the very least, make updates less convoluted and more straightforward. A simple button to turn off automatic updates, like in the past. I update when I’m available and I have time to troubleshoot issues, not in the middle of the workweek when I have mission critical work to do.
Upgrade cadence should be no sooner than one new release a year. Twice a year is just way too much and offers no real benefit, aside from pushing out buggy releases all the time. Take the extra six months to clean things up, Microsoft; we don’t need to reinstall Windows every six months. Increase the support lifecycle for each new release to at least three years instead of the 18 months right now. Give people choice and time to use their systems.
Make the LTS version available for everyone. We have our reasons too, you know.
I’m now running Windows 10 Pro Version 2004 (OS Build 19041.508) fully updated. Woody says it’s not ready, but I have yet to find anything wrong with it.
Except for the radical structural changes made to the file system.
Except for the menu system (StartIsBack++).
Except for unused UWP Apps.
Except for the telemetry (O&O Shutup10).
Except for …………
From my Computerworld post on Friday:
I’m still not ready to put Windows 10 version 2004 on my main machines. The “E Week” optional, non-security patch, KB 4577063, fixes two well-known bugs and many dozens of lesser bugs (none of which were officially documented, by the way) in the latest released version of Windows 10. @mikemeinz has hit several replicated bugs in Win10 version 2004, and bug reports continue to hit my inbox.
And except for the still to my knowledge not fixed issue of corrupting Storage Spaces drives with parity… which Microsoft seem to think people will forget about and just stop using if they don’t talk about it anymore while offering a generous “workaround” of putting your drive in read-only mode if it is not corrupted yet while they take months figuring out what happened and how to fix it.
Am I allowed to be scared of updating to a latest release when I am probably in a very tiny minority of users running mirrored ReFS drives and that I don’t trust it is tested by the involuntary home beta testers? Since Microsoft moved the ability to create such drives only in the very expensive Workstation version after I don’t remember which feature update, not only I run more risk of issues due to others not likely to try it since you now have to have a very specific rare edition of Windows for it, but I now need to pay for this privilege of added risk.
Can you also make Windows search work properly, with no web searches if I don’t want to, quickly, presenting a long list of results instead of bloated icons and do what Google did in its early days and still find files even if you misspelled one letter in your search term? Come on, it must not be that hard.
I’m not going to talk about settings nightmare and lack of an integrated easily saveable complete configuration tool, useless quick new development of dubious value that introduces bugs and security issues, focus on monetization and aggressive pushing of Microsoft’s services that reminds me of 90’s PUPs, lack of an 5 years LTS version so I don’t have to review scattered new features and settings often because I likely won’t like what they do, non optional telemetry, low control over updates especially on home version, services overload, focus stealing, containerization, calculator, privacy, security, the awful Photo App that replaced the simple but quick and useful Windows Photo Viewer, color management or should I say the omission of color management and others issues I covered here in other posts.
Seff and others here have mentioned that they would like to see fewer, less frequent Windows 10 major “updates”. I would like to mention that Win XP had three and Win 7 just one, then known as “Service Packs”, in all the years they were supported by MS. But I don’t remember many users complaining.
Funny that, no?
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV
Probably going to get some hate, probably a lot…
Yes there are more. Some can be gotten rid of fairly easy, but many others require that you be a computer genius with a Masters Degree in Computer Science. Maybe then you could take Windows apart and modify it to suit yourself. For most of us, this is just not on our list of things we want to have to do.
I will just quote what I said here some time before :
I only want to use a stable, not always changing OS (Windows or others) for my work. But it is obvious Microsoft has no inclination anymore to produce a product for users like me.
Other things like complete control of updates have already been said by others much better than I ever could.
But there is one thing I would want restored : As I much prefer to use the setting “Open each folder in its own window”, I would want Windows to remember the size and position of every folder window I have ever opened, across reboots. This was available in Windows Vista and before, but lost in Windows 7 and later which I found very irritating. I used a small program called “Shell Folder Fix” which was written by someone for Windows 7 which offers a similar functionality (I can use Windows 7 effectively due to this program), but the author has since disappeared and the program has not been updated since. It still sort of works in Windows 10 but I don’t know for how long.
Hope for the best. Prepare for the worst.
I cannot begin to express how frustrated I am trying to cope with what I believe is sometimes referred to as “flat text”. I have named it “light gray on white”. The extremely poor decision on Microsoft’s part to go this direction began with Windows-7. As best I can figure out, they have completely taken away all the control over font selction, size, boldness, etc. that existed in XP. There was a little bit of control in early versions of Win-10 but that has now been taken away too.
And please don’t suggest that I look into the “high contrast” options – or whatever they are called. I have already looked there several times and that is such extreme overkill in the opposite direction as to be useless as far as I am concerned.
(I may have posted something like this before. I’m not sure I’m seeing everything that has been said in response to this question.)
I’ve been running XUbuntu quite a lot lately. It’s not perfect either, but I don’t think it causes the eyestrain that Windows does. I have the High Contrast addon for Chrome. Otherwise I wouldn’t be reading this thread. It messes up photos but otherwise helps quite a bit. Sometimes I switch it to “yellow on black” mode. Wish it had more color options and even more contrast. Now if there was just a “High Contrast” addon for Word, Excel, Filezilla, etc. The Crimson editor is not too bad, but that’s not an MS product either.
Bring back XP I say! If not the actual implementation, at least the design philosophy. It was the last MS product I was halfway happy with.
I agree. There is a lot of eye strain with Windows 10. “Light gray on white” is a very poor decision, especially for those who don’t have 20/20 vision. Vista was great in this respect. Even Windows 7 was better for reading the screens than is Windows 10.
You guys might want to look at System Font Size Changer
https://www.wintools.info/index.php/system-font-size-changer
I would likely be 100% Linux if it did not exist..
🍻
Just because you don't know where you are going doesn't mean any road will get you there.I’m not in charge; my name isn’t on the masthead. It’s therefore unlikely that my suggestions will be considered or read by those who can affect change in corporate policy.
All has been already said. What I am missing most is:
I also dislike:
Dell Latitude 3420, Intel Core i7 @ 2.8 GHz, 16GB RAM, W10 22H2 Enterprise
HAL3000, AMD Athlon 200GE @ 3,4 GHz, 8GB RAM, Fedora 29
PRUSA i3 MK3S+
releasing just one feature update a year and supporting each new feature update release for at least 2 full years (or 24 months) instead of a measly 18 months would be nice for the home & pro editions of Win10
the current pandemic health crisis has forced Microsoft to extend support for some old Win10 versions like the 1809 home & pro editions until November 2020, roughly about 2 years after the 1809 release came out
WaaS as Microsoft has implemented it today is old, tiring, disruptive, and high maintenance to both users and IT Support. There are too many moving parts and too many things that could go wrong to force WaaS on thousands of PCs within an organization. Microsoft intended WaaS to be ’empowering’ for both users and IT. Instead we see the opposite – WaaS ties us up with chasing our tails implementing feature updates, troubleshooting failed updates, and chasing after machines running old versions of Windows every 6 months or year. Windows has never been more fragmented as it is today with Windows 10.
Bottom line is WaaS needs a thoughtful redesign because today it is too disruptive for seemingly little benefit. If Windows 10 is the ‘last version of Windows,’ I can’t believe that Windows (WaaS) can never get any better than it is today. No wonder so many people (e.g., schools) are turning away from Windows.
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