Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Worried OEM 'Craplets' Will Harm Vista
elsilver writes "An article at the CBC indicates that Microsoft is worried that the assorted crap most OEM companies load onto a new machine may affect users' opinion of Vista. An unnamed executive is concerned that the user will conclude the instability of the non-MS-certified applications is Vista's fault. Is this a serious concern, or is MS trying to bully OEMs into only including Vista-certified apps? As for the OEMs, one "removed older DVD-writing software they found was incompatible and replaced it with Vista's own software." — do they get points for realizing it was both buggy AND redundant?"
I've always like to call that extra bloat by the name of "Circusware". When I power up a shiny new Dell, I always feel like I'm at a circus where there are all of those different games where you can win a small stuffed animal for the equivalent of $20 or $30 in game tickets.
More
It's the operating system's fault if an installed program causes system instabilities.
My guess: the era of pre-loading software and packing computers with shit as an "added bonus" is over. Most people know the things they like and they have internet access to download them. This was not true 10 years ago -- you wanted burning software with your cd burner, media player software for your camera, etc. But now these apps just mess everything up.
A company like apple, which monopolises the whole process to fit with their brand, is in a better position here. I mean, from a marketing perspective, all it takes is one lousy OEM company to install buggy shit on their computers and you can ruin the Vista brand.
It's not as if those "trial software" that is installed on consumer-end PC's does enhance the XP experience. Frankly, if my machine boots, the only thing that should show up is the "speaker" icon in the taskbar. All the other stuff needs to be activated by me and me alone. Same thing for non-necessary service. If I need it, I'll activate it.
Of course, OEMs (and Microsoft themselves) find it necessary to activate everything "for my convenience". No thank you...
The average use doesn't know better though :-/
What about the assorted crap Microsoft puts into a new install of Vista, wouldn't that affect users' opinions as well?
Analogies don't equal equalities, they are merely somewhat analogous.
So it's OK to add craplets such as Internet Explorer, but when an OEM wants to add something to the package it's not OK?
LINUX ONLINE POKER: Linux Poker
I'm sick of buying laptops, particularly for work, which come with bundles of shit preinstalled. It enrages me more when they won't even provide a proper Windows install CD so I can wipe and clean-install. Anything that spells the end of this policy is welcome.
Argh.
Good: Having seen the software that comes on new prebuilt systems, crapplets is an awfully nice term to call them. I wouldn't mind seeing them go the way of the dinosaur.
Evil: This is about as immune to abuse as a government controlled press.
34486853790
Connection too slow for X forwarding? Try "ssh -CX user@host"
In all seriousness, this is great news. I'm all in favor of Packard-Bell supporting a group home for the criminally insane and mentally handicapped, but don't have them write software. The first thing I do when I get a new computer is to wipe the Hard Disk, reinstall Windows, and one by one copy drivers I need off of the Manufacturers' website.
Having gone through several prefab Windows boxes in my time (Gateway, Dell, Sony mostly), it seems to me that the volume of crap applications that come pre-loaded and all of which run at startup time has increased dramatically, to the point that the first thing I have to do with any new brand-name PC is either uninstall all the bloat one-by-one or else wipe the drive and start from scratch with a fresh OS install. For a desktop PC, I can understand everyone telling me "build your own, then it will only have what you want on it." Fair enough. But what about portables? Is there a good laptop manufacturer who will sell me a "blank slate" laptop? Ordinarily, I would expect this sort of performance-hindering bloat to reflect badly on the manufacturer. I think MS is right to be worried that the PC makers might jump at the chance to shift the blame onto the new OS, rightly or wrongly.
Simply put, OEM distributors should provide the software on CDs as optional installs. Every time someone I've known has bought a new PC, they have asked me to 'clean it up', because 90% of the shit which gets pre-loaded isn't wanted.
By providing the original installation media without installing it, Microsoft is happy that the software doesn't come pre-loaded, the end user is happy that they don't have to remove stuff once they buy their computer, and the OEM distributor should be happy because they will get more customers from it. Everyone is happy, so why is it so difficult?
My computer came with XP and a preinstalled keyboard shortcut program. This program had the nasty side effect of crashing ANY fullscreen app that tried to launch, with the single exception of Jedi Outcast.
At the time, none of these other games I had were designed with XP in mind, so I immediately assumed that XP's compatibility was abysmal and I was NOT happy. Fortunately I was able to correct the REAL problem soon enough.
I never thought it would come from Microsoft since they want their OEM customers to be happy, but it's about time somebody raised a stink about the BS that gets installed by the OEMs themselves. Toshiba & Sony I believe are the worst culprits. They install so much shit on the computer - at least 10 startup items and services - it's a complete joke. And then when you encounter something like what Toshiba does to the built-in power management functions of Windows - they won't let you get to it! "Please use the Toshiba power management applet..." BYTE ME! You'd think they would want the overall PC experience to reflect well on their brand too, so slowing down everyone's brand new PC with a load of junk isn't the way to go.
Do or do not. There is no try. --Yoda
I see this as the sign of at least one (maybe both) of the following:
1) MS is finally seeing that trusting third parties to do the important stuff is bogus, and like Mac & Nintendo before it, is attempting to monopolize on the software so that the end-user experience is owed to MS:
2) Vista is such a drastic new paradigm that nothing works on it, ergo they want to hide this problem as long as possible.
Part of the reason for this is because I don't want to upgrade to Vista within 18 months, which I'll pretty much have to if I don't have an easy way to downgrade. However, even without Vista on the horizon I'd be doing this. The reason is that even buying PC's aimed squarely at businesses through business suppliers, I wind up with OEM builds which have all sorts of odd things on them. For instance:
Because of Microsoft's leaning on these vendors, I can't get a straight, simple Windows install CD with these PCs. Instead, I get an automatic "system restore" CD which includes all this extra rubbish. And the product key on the PC only works with CDs supplied by the vendor.
So what I'm working on now is my own automatic-building CD which installs a plain, boring Windows setup, handles drivers and installs basic stuff like office. I've spent the last 3 days on this solid, and it's soul destroying. You wind up spending half the day watching Windows install, getting to the end and finding that you made some simple mistake and now it's back to fix that, recreate the CD and try again. Ghost isn't really an option, as I've got more different hardware configurations than I know what to do with and I don't have the budget to replace every single desktop and laptop in one go.
A logical extension of Microsofts argument would be that NO outside software can be trusted, unless you pay the special fee to MSoft so that it's "certified", otherwise they'll refuse to take the blame for anything. That just reaffirms my belief in the parent posts argument, that it's the OSs fault.
..........FULL STOP.
Windows shouldn't be installed either.
So microsoft is trying to stop their own OS from being installed? Or is that not what they meant by craplet? Oh wait...
I'm with microsoft on this one. I'm the IT guy for a medium size company, and when we get a new windows laptop its a tradeoff between the time it takes to reinstall and hunt down all the drivers, and the time it takes to skim the pork out of the crap the OEM preinstalled for you (sometimes only to find out that all the BS cant be cleanly removed all the way and having to break out the windows CDs anyway....). I completely agree with MS' standpoint on this one, however I dont really agree-or-disagree with their reasons for it.
Is this a serious concern
:-p
Yes, I think it is... I remember a recent Dell laptop we got... It was so riddled with crap that at the first boot, before we had uninstalled a lot of stuff like antivirus tool *trials* and whatnot, we had confirmations and requests to do stuff basically whatever step we tried to take in Windows. Why can't these just set up their Windows installs with whatever drivers they need (drivers, not applications) and leave the user with a stack of CD's to install. They could even call the apps on those as "value added products" to try make the user feel like they get more for their money, if that would make the exec's happier.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
If only people didn't WRITE PROGRAMS to run on OPERATING SYSTEMS.
Eviscerati.Org: All Hail the Eviscerati
I worked for one of the leading crippleware-pre-installed-on-Windows companies that pre-installed software on something north of 80% of windows OEM computer out there.
We payed the OEMs handsomely for the privilige of reducing the functionality of our software - both in discounts and in revenue-share kickbacks for upgrades.
I'm pretty certain the money the OEMs makes from this crippleware *MORE* than pays for the cost of Windows (especially the discounted OEM windows) - and is the #1 reason HP, Dell, etc like Windows over Linux.
Get rid of the paid-for-crippleware, and OEMs will jump to Linux very quickly.
In the past I've delivered security/safety critical systems with Win2K components to customers. They weren't core 'must not fail, EVER' parts of the system, but they still needed to be reliable, if only for the sake of customer perceptions. They were completely clean Win2K installations, with the only other software being stuff that we'd written and tested, and the only time they went down was when we rebooted after doing software updates - typically every 6 months. So I can certainly see merit in what Gates is saying....
The era of preloaded crap on PCs loaded from the manufacturer is far from over. Companies like Google, the different ISPs, McAfee, Symantec, etc all pay good money to get their software pre-loaded on new machines and you see some of that savings in the end. It's my belief that this is part of the reason it's so hard to buy a machine from these places without a MS OS; they lose out on their profit from this software, from selling you the OS and so on.
The FIRST thing anyone should do before evaluating their new hardware is to uninstall all of the crap that comes with it, from lolMcAfee on down to Google Desktop/Search/Toolbar. Anyone that doesn't know or doesn't know how to do that isn't someone whose opinion I would accept on the subject in the first place.
One reason I like installing my own OS (say, Linux), or I got a Mac some time ago was the relative crap-freeness (the Mac comes with T-Online and AOL (both ISPs) stuff installed, at least in Germany).
Seriously, nobody *wants* any of that crap that comes from OEM, be it on the PC or on the cellphone.
Sell me hardware. Sell me a system (mobile OS, Windows, Linux). Just don't install any adware, trojans (hi Acer), or other crap.
First thing you do when you buy a new PC is remove all the terrible software installed by these OEMs. Same goes for the damn 'extras' CDROM shipped to people from their ISP.
Microsoft is dead correct, this software is virtually always terrible.
If only people didn't WRITE PROGRAMS to run on OPERATING SYSTEMS.
Hey, if Vista refused to run non-Microsoft programs, that would guarantee the Vista experience, right? Microsoft should show us all what "monopoly" really means by refusing to run third-party code.
>north
You're an immobile computer, remember?
Suprisingly, my Acer came with near-zero crapware. All they installed was some media-center software. Of course, that means jack-shit when you install Kubuntu over it.
Note to Acer: Stop partitioning the HD's in half.
"I think an etch-a-sketch with an ethernet port would beat IE7 in web standards compliance."
Sorry, that simply won't work. On many OEM laptops (many Sony, some Dell, some HP) you have components that simply won't work right with the default Windows drivers. The truth is that the OEMs actually do quite a bit of work digging up exact working versions of drivers; and debugging the dependances between them; and going back to the HW and SW vendors to resolve problems. I'd go so far as to say that you'd have a better chance of stock Ubuntu drivers working on your laptop than stock Windows drivers.
(yes, I know some of you will tell me you installed Win2K at work and it just worked - the business laptops without bleeding edge components seem to be more standardized - but try forcing a clean install on some multimedia laptop and I bet you go back to the OEM-reinstall-with-the-crap or you go to Ubuntu)
Dell, but they weren't excellent until I grabbed fresh drivers and the restore CD and did a clean install. I easily got a 10-15% performance boost on one of them, which I found kind of shocking. OEMs make money pre-loading some of this stuff, so I see their need/desire for it, but they really do need to be more selective. And how about just giving me the applications on a CD and letting me chose, would save me a lot of time.
It's funny that Microsoft is worried about distributors ruining their product, whereas Linux relies on distributors to make it into a usable product.
It's also funny that volunteer projects like Debian and Gentoo seem to have no problem making a great distribution out of widely scattered and disorganized software, whereas the commercial vendors who ship customized versions of Windows seem to be universally succeeding only in making Windows crappier to the point that you really don't want to use the customized version.
I guess that Microsoft middle road between providing just the bare bones like Linux and the FSF do on one hand, and providing a complete package, like Apple does, on the other hand, really isn't working well.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
In one breath, they're worried about the gigantic evil of uncertified applications (which is no different than any other OS launch) and in the next, Vista is "the most compatible operating system they've ever had." So which is it? Stable or unstable? Lead or nitroglycerine?
One of the 187.
The simplest solution already used by hundreds of users of newly purchased laptops and desktops with Windows XP is the PC Decrapifier. Originally named the Dell De-Crapifier the name was soon changed to support other machines "with crap" (I'm sure Dell didn't like their name dragged through the crap).
Although this is only for XP, I'll bet a version for Vista will come along soon. Or at least one could hope.
Linux Resources
This is Microsofts own fault. Back in the good old days, there were ads telling you to call 1-800-piracy (or whatever), if you bought a PC with Windows, and only got a restore CD, instead of a real Windows CD.
At some point they changed this policy,and now reward those manufacturer who sell systems with restore CDs. Of course the manufacturers jumped the chance, and included as many "craplets" as they could. And with most manufacturers shipping ONLY restore CDs and no install CDs, the only way to get a clean machine is to either buy a second copy of Windows, or replace your fully licensed OEM version with a pirated copy of whatever your friends are running (usually replacing XP Home with Pro, because that's what they have).
I call bullshit on this:
/dev/random > /dev/mem
cat
So, is linux buggy?
Something from userland? Here it is:
int main()
{
while(1) {
fork();
}
}
First of all, if you didn't go out and purchase another copy of Windows, you're violating the license agreement if you're not installing the OEM's OEM build of windows on that computer. You don't get to install an expensive retail build over your OEM build just because your company has access to developer licenses.
Secondly, there are sometimes dependancies between software components that are more subtle than the one-driver-at-a-time that the OEMs go through great lenghts to work through. Dependances between DVD hardware / firmware / and the user-level playing/authoring/burning software for example. Unless you match the builds of all of these correctly you'll have problems.
The licensing headaches and the technical messing around you have to do to make this work with windows just isn't worth the hassle.
Actually, I agree that most of this crapware should be banned, It always should have been. Plus the crap is on the restore image disks that PCs come with, so that there is no way to really escape it short of buying a separate copy of Windows at full retail price. I got burned on this on the last 2 PCs I got & it was so bad for the laptop, that I just reformatted the HD & installed Ubuntu, sending XP to electronic Hell.
... WinXP. What gives?
That said, whose fault is all this? MS itself has been pushing the restore images very hard. Seems like activation + WGA should be enough without inflicting a cripple-dick restore system on people. OEMs have razor thin margins, & the crapware helps that out. If MS is serious why don't they offer a deep discount to those who only install certified crapware or none at all. With an 80-85% profit margin, one thinks they could. Or arent they serious?
Besides, I though Vista was uncrashable, just like Win95, Win98,
If you want your life to be different, live it differently.
Beside the annoying trial crap that fills up diskspace, the worst stuff is the boot-time startup crap that cripples the machine and adds another 45 seconds to boot time. I'm not talking about system or server services here, but the third-party consumer applications like iTunes or Real-player. Msconfig is good for dianostics, but sometimes you have to hunt down offending start-up programs in the registry to permanantly turn them off at boot-time. MS should remove the "run" option from the registry for those sorts of things and require them to go into the old "start up" folder. That way, they will be easy to find, and a normal user can delete them without hosing the entire machine.
Maybe I should tag this article as "crap"?
Interestingly this was universally the first thing my friends & family noticed when I quit supporting their HP and Packard Bell MS Windows computers and forced them to update to iMacs. I always wondered why Apple doesn't bring that up in their adverts.
Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.
In related news Microsoft (MSFT) announced the "VCCP" (Vista Certified Crap) program.
The first thing I do to any machine purchased from an OEM is nuke the site from orbit. They install so much crap the brand spanking new machine you bought runs about as well as a 5 year old box thats setup properly.
Zanthor
It's more like a hand-cart with a sticky wheel.
Eviscerati.Org: All Hail the Eviscerati
$ cat /dev/random > /dev/mem /dev/mem: Permission denied
bash:
As for the forkbomb, have a look at "ulimit -u"
I agree with you that it's not always the OS fault, but a _properly configured_ operating system should not become unstable when it is running crappy code.
How do you do "ulimit -u" on Windows btw?
-- MartinG To mail me: echo kewyjlcxyzvjfxbqwh | tr bcefhjklqvwxyz
If MS gets what it wants on this one, I suspect PC costs will go up. Like it or not, I'm pretty sure Dell and company are paid to install all of that garbage. And considering how price competitive the US PC market is...at least some of that results in savings for the end customer. Basically, the PC purchase was subsidized by advertisements.
And what about Microsoft's own craplets? How come its so hard to get rid of MSN Messenger on some older PCs it shows up on? Hell, isn't it virtually impossible to uninstall most of the bundled software applications that come with windows? My windows 2K server box kept failing automatic update after I removed outlook express because it couldn't install an OE update. While I can understand Microsofts complaints here, and I even agree that some of the blame is going to be unfairly laid on them...it seems like they play this same little game when it suits them.
I really doubt we've seen the last of 'craplets'. OEMs aren't likely to toss that kickback anytime soon in such a low margin business.
On my Dell at work there is a little folder called crap. I have this folder on every Windows machine I ever got from a major OEM. In there, I put all the desktop shortcuts that clutter my desk. It tidies up my desktop, and if I should, by some slim chance, ever need the app, it's not uninstalled. I can still access it.
In all my years as a Windows user, not once have I ever had a need to open the crap folder.
Some of the crap is bad enough that you have to uninstall it, in particular, "support agents" and other annoying popup generators or Bob-like help thingies. Immediately uninstall. This roughly doubles the time it takes to setup a new box, so in a sense OEMs have already been harminng Windows like this for years. It's just that they usually don't destabilize the entire OS. I guess maybe they just weren't trying hard enough. Way to go, big OEMs. Thank God for "screwdriver shops" and "known to work well" hardware setups learned about online.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
I realize this is old news, but it's approaching the point where Microsoft will actually be able to enforce this. If you're not a "certified professional" with deep pockets willing to undergo (and pay for) MS certification for your software, then, eventually, your hobbyist programs (and mine!) simply will not run. Such lockout probably won't happen with this first version of Vista, but give it time. In fact some of the groundwork for locking out hobbyist computer users has already been set.
Stop buying garbage, consumer-level hardware from the major OEMs if you don't want consumer-level garbage software shoved in your face.
Let's pick on Dell, since they're what I'm most familiar with in my professional dealings:
Part of the reason many of their machines, -especially- the Dell Inspiron laptops, are so cheap is because the cost of the machine is being heavily subsidised by 3rd-party product placements. They also outsource technical support for consumer-level hardware to second-rate call facilities in India that don't have the capability to escalate problems to technicians in the United States.
If you buy a Dell Precision laptop, you'll get the proper media and you won't be subject to piles of shovelware. Yes, it's somewhat more expensive, but you get treated much better. The build quality of the Precision line is miles better, to boot; it's more likely to last the rigours of four, five years of use.
Always remember: You get what you pay for.
I've always loathed the junk installed on PCs from HP, Dell, Compaq back in the day, Packard-Bell ... but ... if these hardware companies, with their razor-thin margins, can't easily customise the boxes they sell ... then ...
What the hell would ANYONE be in the Windows box business anymore? To get yelled at and jerked around my Microsoft? I'd rather MS just buy my damn company and sell their own PCs outright. The era of Personal Computers is over - just let Microsoft expand their monopoly power and WIPE-OUT the remaining PC vendors.
Pathetic.
When AOL, Norton, Real and MusicMatch (among many others) pay Dell to include their incredibly bloated crapware on your new PC, Dell should be required to tell you that they paid... and how much.
Similarly, if the EU can force Microsoft to release Windows without a media player, they should also force the OEMs to offer computers with Windows only. They would cost a bit more, but it would be well worth it.
If it weren't for the pre-installed junk, I would have had nothing to do when I worked at Best Buy as a basic tech. When we sold new computers, we automatically hit every customer up for "System Optimization" (to remove the crapware), "Anti-Virus Package", and the labor charge for installing Windows system updates. On average about $60-$75. When I was ready to get fired, I watched the salesperson close the sale and convince the customer they needed every one of those things. Then I told them they didn't really and watched them walk out the door.
The solution to this is what we like to call 'building your own computer' and 'installing your own operating system'.
Every computer i've gotten recently have included an straight from Microsoft OEM version of windows. Same as the normal retail version, just with a scary "Don't ever sell this without a computer or Steve Ballmer will personally throw a chair through your window" warning. That's the one I reinstall. That version doesn't include OEM crapware with it, they normally include that on the "Packard Bell restoration CD".
That's the best description of those craptacular add-ons from OEM suppliers I've seen yet. Circusware, hehe. I remember the first time installing a retail copy of Windows on a home built PC. Startling in how clean it was. No trial anti-virus or AOL logos (okay, it was a while ago).
I thought it was interesting that Michael Dell asked how much people would pay to get a clean copy of the OS without all the bundled crapware. You can read it in this article: Zdnet blog
I would've asked how much it was worth to him to get me to stop building my own PC's and buy another Dell? The arrogance of the position that I would have to pay extra to get rid of crap I didn't want in the first place really chaps my undies. Screw you, Mikey. You can take your cheap ass hardware and OEM circusware, along with your call center techs who don't speak English as a native language, and stick it all right up your ass. Don't act like you have a right to my business. If you want my money, earn it you arrogant bitch.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
...OEMs are concerned that MS's one big craplet will turn their products into doorstops.
Am I hearing this straight? MS is complaining that OEMs are pre-installing craplets without asking the user? What about the fact that MS bullies the OEMs to install Windows craplet without giving the users any other option? Differently from all the other craplets, Windows is the only pre-installed software without try-and-then-pay scheme, you have to pay in advance for it, and a refund is so difficult that if you manage to get one, you are guaranteed to go on the front page of /.
Microsoft really wants those "craplets" to go... You know, the usual suspects: Firefox, Thunderbird, VLC... Please Microsoft, make the OEM stick with IE, Windows Mail (i.e. Outlook) and Windows Media Player!
AC
Isn't ulimit only applied to programs running from the current shell; ie. it's useless if something's run through X?
I had to look up and see if the fabric of the universe was tearing, because this is one of the times that Microsoft is right. Whenever my workplace buys me a new laptop, the first thing I do is dual boot it with Fedora. I used to just repartition the drive, but all the OEM crapware has forced me to wipe it clean and reinstall everything from scratch.
Microsoft is right that OEMs make Windows look worse than it already is.
M$ started the whole trend when they produced that God Awful pre-instalation program allowing vendors to insert their name and logo in almost as many places as the desktop.ini file shows up(seems like 347,936 at last look). It is still one of the worst craplets of all time. Nobody wants to see Dell or HP (or the local whitebox) logos on damn near every screen possible on a computer.
Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.
I usually just wipe the harddisk and install some sane OS, but that might just be me
Your attitude will change immediately
/ 23/45481.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/oldnewthing/archive/2003/12
It must suck to be a computer manufacturer.
*XP is released, Dell sells a billion computers*
Customers: Why the hell won't your computer allow me to edit my pictures, and why do I have a virus?
Tech Support: Well you need to install this third party software and...
Customers: AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's too hard!!!!!!!!!!!! Do it for me!!!!!!!!!!!
System Builders: OK, it's all installed.
Customers: Why the hell is my computer so slow?
Tech Support: Well you said that you wanted us to install this software for you and...
Customers: AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Make my computer faster!!!!!!!!!!!
System Builders: OK, it's a bare build again.
*Vista is released*
Customers: Why the hell won't your computer allow me to edit my pictures and why do I have a virus?
How about removing the craplets that is built-in with Vista first before going after OEMs?
I think you're missing the point. The crapware was subsidizing your purchase. If he doesn't include it, he either loses the money, or he passes the difference along to the customer.
Think of all the people who talk about how they'd be willing to pay for tv shows without commercials (regardless of whether they'd actually shell out or not). Do you make the same argument in that case?
JOIN US FOR PONG!
This is only a problem for Consumer OEM PC's. If you buy a true business class PC then there is little to no crapware installed. I have standardized our Company on HP systems and their business desktops and notebooks have very little that needs to be removed. However their Home computers are different. I bought an HP Consumer laptop for my parents for Christmas and I spent 2 Hours removing all the unecessary Crap. It is the same problem with AntiVirus software. Both Symantec and Network Associates make a corporate AV solution that is easy to use, configure and control. Their consumer programs on the other hand are almost as bad as a Virus. They have constant Pop ups, they always tell you that you are in DANGER DANGER!! you better renew or your system will crash. I have never been able to figure out how to schedule them to do anything. I cannot recommend for anyone to buy any product with Norton in the name.
The ulimit is a property of each process which is passed on to any children that it spawns. This works for any program, not just a shell. There is no reason why you can't ulimit your window manager: then, every program it launches will also be subject to the same resource limits.
>north
You're an immobile computer, remember?
So, if Microsoft starts to block theese Craplets, does that mean the OEM people will be getting Turdburgled ?
I just want to make sure I have my terminology right for when the shit hits the fan.
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
Wait... isn't that -including the OS- the reason why Ms has become what it is?
windows has perfectly good resource managment. limit -u won't stop a fork bomb grinding user space to a halt though. bottom line, no way to stop poorly written apps fucking up the users experience.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
They will no longer support Craplets like Outlook, Explorer, etc?
you can avoid the bloat situation by making sure you buy from the business section of their catalog/website. The business machines come with regular install CD's and clean images. However, you will have to purchase the items with a business credit card.
Craplet (krp'lt', -lt) n. A software application that is present under the following Microsoft Windows registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurI occasionally do a little freelance computer repair work, and 99% of the time I'm removing popups from startup that are either from adware or from missing adware. I'm also nearly always asked what can be done to make said computer run faster, and so I take a little look and see that immediately after login the pc has 110% ram usage, and 20-50% cpu usage. Typically it's a cut-price pre-built pc with 256MB of ram and several peices of crapware that use a good 50-100MB between them. I clean a few off that they don't want and recommend them to get some more ram (another 256MB is under £20, even at pcworld) if they want to play games newer than 5 years old on it.
I'm always thanked for how much faster the pc is afterwards. In one case they actually thanked me for making it quieter because I removed something using 100% of their cpu and forcing the fans to full speed.
Try Dell Business PC's/Laptops. They come with clean images and regular OS cd's.
>Suprisingly, my Acer came with near-zero crapware
/me loves that Acer understands my "needs".
In my experience, my Acer had about 20 junk startups installed on it from the factory (yes, I do consider a "special" Acer versions of windows power management, keyboard manager, etc... junk).
But the best part is, who cares about crapware when the machine comes with a rootkit preinstalled!
Awesome!
Hell, MS, why not just only allow "certified" apps to actually run on Vista?
Sounds to me like someone isn't confident in their product. If the are smart, hook Dell up to a deal that prevents them from pre-installing OSX when Apple really decides to go for the throat. That one is in the mail.
I did RTFA and several of the comments and noticed one interesting thing. Microsoft wants it boths ways because they want every system builder (disclosure:I work at a sysyem builder and regional distributor) to preload a 60 day trial of Office 2007 of every new system with Vista.
"It is not my intent to offend, but if offense is taken, the fault lies with the audience." attributed to Patrick Henry
hurrah! Me too. My acer laptop didn't even get to boot XP, so I've no idea as to how much crapware was preinstalled. I put ubuntu straight onto it first boot.
Are you sure? http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/08/05 15200
My Compaq laptop came severely cluttered with OEM-pre-installed turds, including twenty-some "games", which had to be uninstalled one-by-one. Since I get to work with clean Microsoft Volume Licensing copies of WinXP Pro at work, this did not change my opinion of the OS itself. It did make the OOBE quite irritating, though, and I'm sure that this sort of thing impacts people's opinions of Windows. Funny how Microsoft hasn't cared about rampant Windows XP crappification but now that they want to promote a new OS, it matters.
FWIW, I think that Microsoft should at least pressure OEMs to provide customers with the <em>option</em> of installing a relatively clean copy of Windows from the recovery discs/partition, as a non-patronizing alternative to the industry standard OEM junkfest.
Absolutely everyone hates craplets and Microsoft's concern is valid. Not that they can do anything about it.
I'm pretty certain the money the OEMs makes from this crippleware *MORE* than pays for the cost of Windows (especially the discounted OEM windows) - and is the #1 reason HP, Dell, etc like Windows over Linux.
Get rid of the paid-for-crippleware, and OEMs will jump to Linux very quickly.
Only because the OEM and crippleware folks can write stuff and preinstall it on Linux just as easily as windows. Wiping and reloading from basics only works for the slashdot crowd. OEM reload software is typically a discimage of the OS and apps that they preinstall. It's not a solution for average users to speed up their machines.
Microsoft recently bought them out, but sysinternals usually has the answer to things like this:
l ities/Autoruns.mspx
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/uti
It enumerates pretty much everything set to launch at start up and gives you the option to turn it off.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
My primary problems with the Windows operating system isn't the operating system itself; it is the immense amount of crap that is packaged by default that slows startup, causes instability, etc. A fresh install of Windows XP, by and far, performs well even on legacy hardware. But an OEM install on the same machine most likely crawls.
I was surprised at how much crapware there was on a stock mac. I would have thought that the macs would be delivered without hyperactive trials. For your convenience, Macs come preloaded with adobe reader, flash, google and trials of office and omniware (at a minimum).
Best advice for any new machine, reformat it and re-install the OS.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
The best advice on a new machine is to re-install the OS. Unfortunately with some very low-end PCs, there isn't a re-install disk.
For corporate environments, Dell, HP (etc.) will pre-load a specified image with the corporate setup. Alternative is to use ghost or similar to build your machines.
The manufacturers get a couple of dollars for each crapware loaded (does any one know the real amount?) On Dells, the Optiplex (business line) has less crap than the Dimension (consumer), but they've started putting crapware on the Otiplexes. A recent machine came with Google desktop & search pre-installed, a search URL redirector (which was a pain to remove) and various manufacturer's links.
Just reformat the thing, then you know you have a clean install. (It takes about 20 minutes to install XP, and then about 140 MB of downloads & countless reboots to bring it up to date.
Equally annoying, why do the pre-load a 6 month old version of the OS>
Just wanted to say that I ordered the XPS1210 notebook from Dell a few days ago. I configured it online to get an idea of what I was looking at, and then I called to see if I could have the bloatware/craplets removed. I was specifically concerned about the 6-month subscription to AOL/Compuserve/Netzero, the included trials to some Corel imaging software (why? this is what GIMP is for :P ) as well as the included 15-months of McAfee Antivirus - I already pay a technology fee to my University for Trend MicroScan which is REQUIRED to be installed to access the network on campus, so why on earth would I want to pay for a subscription to McAfee?
Anyway, I asked rather nicely and the guy put me on hold for about 10 minutes while he spoke with his supervisor, and he came back on and said that they would remove all of the additional programs EXCEPT for the basic Microsoft Works bundle - and knock about $70 off the price! He said that the amount is basically what McAfee costs, since all of the other programs are free or trials anyway.
I didn't want Works either (OpenOffice!) but I figured that I should take what I could get.
All in all, it was a pleasant experience. Next time I will try ordering sans Windows. Unlike many of you, I've had very very few problems with XP, plus it's required for classes... though that certainly won't keep me from having a Linux partition anyway. :)
Why not have a go at setting up a RIS server? It's extremely easy to set up and (as long as your client machines have PXE compatible NICs) it cuts install time considerably. Teamed with Active Directory (Group Policy) to publish or assign applications to workstations you'll have done most of the donkey work just by carrying the machine to the desk it's going to live under.
o ws2000pro/deploy/depopt/ris.mspx
Look into it: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/wind
I use a Windows 2000 RIS Server to deploy Windows XP Professional and Windows Server 2003 without issue.
...on my new PC: Microsoft Windows (any version). I just would like to tell wich OS i want with my PC and in wich version... but that craplet seems to be impossible to get rid of.
Pls. don't give me the "but you can, you have to...", no, PC's should be sold without an OS. the OS should be an option and it should be free to choose which OS you want to have installed when you buy a PC...
I've had to work out my own solution to the "crap". When I get a new computer, I wipe the drive and install the OS from scratch. Yes it's a hassle, and it takes too much time and I shouldn't have to do it, but the alternative is dealing with a bunch of junk that's incompatible and buggy.
The bigger problem comes with the computers I bought that only had those "Recovery" disks instead of actual Windows installation disks. The last time I dealt with one of those I actually went out and bought a copy of Windows (on top of the one that came with the system) and installed from the copy I purchased. I complained of course (it was Dell) but they didn't seem to care and wouldn't consider sending me Windows disks even though I'd paid for a Windows license. That was the last Dell I bought.
That was just one of the reasons that I know only buy computers from companies that include full versions of Windows. Or better, no OS at all.
Since Microsoft has all the power in this equation, I blame them for not putting more pressure on their "partners" to do the right thing.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Yes and no and it depends on what you define "Operating System" is. If you think of OS in terms
of the kernel and maybe some userland to configure and startup the system then Vista
better be ready to take whatever abuse is coming its way from _user applications_ or it sucks.
Note though that any OS is automatically excused if you muck things up with broken third party kernel drivers
etc.
If however you think the desktop, the internet browser and maybe even the mail application are part
of the OS then you can't be helped. Desktops and for the most part modern applications are made to be
extensible and if somebody decides to plug something into the desktop that takes away the focus from
the text window you're typing into to display an advertising popup and crashes the desktop every
ten minutes or so then that too isn't the fault of the "greater operating system".
Looking at Microsoft's "Vista" specifically however, I can fully understand Microsoft's concern for crapware
spoiling the "Vista Experience" (don't laugh) but they're conveniently forgetting all the DRM crapware
they built into it. Expect an increase of dual boot systems as people offload their "premium content
consumption" (their words) to more convenient operating systems.
Companies pay to have their crap pre-installed and dell etc, use that money to make Windows look as cheap as Linux.
So i wouldn't complain too much if I was Microsoft.
Matt.
FTA:
"The success of Microsoft's first major revision to its operating system in years could rest on whether or not the uncertified applets cause widespread malfunctions in consumer versions of Windows Vista that ship with new PCs starting Jan. 30."
I thought this is suppose to be the most stable and secure OS that MS has release to date. If it is so stable; then how is an app going to affect the whole system "widespread malfunctions". Can some one please explain this to me? I am being serious.
A software company whose product we sell, scolded the managers where I work for putting their software on crappy Taiwan terminals (integrated POS). They insisted to maintain the image of the software we resold for them that the terminals needed to be better quailty, or at least proven to work over time.
BSOD's to a fat, toothless waitress in the sticks is not the fault of the terminals or Windows but the software product they see everyday and call their system by. It wasn't the apps fault, but that is what people "see".
I can see Microsoft's point. Most people put crappy hardware, software, drivers, and whatever on their machines wihtout any thought and then blame Windows. Windows and Microsoft really are not to blame, the people who have a new compy starting with 600MB of RAM used to start the computer are to blame for sure and Microsoft should protect themselves from this habit. OEM's unlike us put a lot of crap on there computers, we put none. Just make the machine do what its supposed to do. But you gotta upsell I guess to the everyday sloths on the PC.
If I were the OEM, I'd be worried that Vista will make users think my hardware is crap.
Understanding is a three edged sword. - Ambassador Kosh Naranek, Babylon 5
No offence, but what's wrong with this? People generally care about the aesthetics of the things they use every day. Well polished things are generally made better, and any degree of interface simplicity when compounded over millions of repetitions adds greatly to productivity.
[snip]
Window's interface has been a bottleneck to productivity for years. That thing's a sewer of random accumulated refuse, and any movement to clean it up is a positive development.
People are drawn to flashy interfaces. If that interface happens to be a beautifully streamlined, productive interface, so much the better but it doesn't have to be that way. Witness the ever-marching stream of faked flashy interfaces (probably running Flash!) on CSI - people seem to believe that that actually represents the cutting edge of scientific software.
Install Beryl or Looking Glass on a laptop and use it for presentations at a conference. You can absolutely guaranteed that there will be a queue of people asking about it after your talk. That it really does very little to improve productivity is totally irrelevant - it looks cool.
Interface design for maximum productivity seems (to me) to revolve around two concepts - discoverability and consistency. You must be able to figure out how something works by using the interface and once you have solved a problem once, you should be able to use that knowledge in all similar situations. Using the 3D capabilities may or may not aid in that interface. Will Vista be an improvement in UI from a productivity perspective? Only time will tell.
Cheers,
Toby Haynes
Anything I post is strictly my own thoughts and doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the opinions of IBM.
So, since when has the /. crowd began thinking that what Microsoft thinks should be in their OS is what should be in their OS?
I mean, now and then some company sues Microsoft due to Windows coming with a built-in software (media player, browser, whatever), with said company maintaining that this doesn't allows manufacturers to replace them, what blocks competition etc. etc. etc. And slashdotters are usually happy when that happens. Now, however, when manufacturers do include "competition", in the way of these 3rd party addons, some of which are actually alternative browsers (even if was crappy and used MSHTML core, AOL still was an alternative browser), then suddenly manufacturers being able to add 3rd party software isn't good anymore.
Please note: wishing that Windows came with Firefox, Opera, Thunderbird and OpenOffice pre-installed requires you first accepting the idea that manufacturer including 3rd party applications is in and of itself a good thing. What doesn't precludes you from despising poor choices, of course.
I suggest you make your mind. Either manufacturers including competition is good, or it isn't. You cannot have it both ways.
Conservatism: (n.) love of the existing evils. Liberalism: (n.) desire to substitute new evils for the existing ones.
UNINSTALLING PROGRAMS IS HARD. THAT'S WHY I REFORMAT INSTEAD. IT IS HARD TO REFORMAT WITHOUT INSTALLATION DISKS.
Gee, you got modded up insightful for posting the most uninsightful comment I've heard all day. Maybe you could get a job with Ric Romero and you two could read the exact same shit back and forth to each other all day long.
MS *should* be worried about this. People, including many Slasdotters, have been attributing blame for years to MS for instabilities in the OS that are actually caused by shit 3rd party drivers.
How about a shell extension that trashes Windows Explorer? How about a program that pummels the users with weird Message Boxes because it doesn't handle permission errors gracefully when it tries to write into Program Files on startup?
The reason that Vista took so friggin long is because it needs to be compatible with pretty much every two-bit program out there. Unlike Linux, Microsoft doesn't have the luxury of telling programs to "fuck off" when they act in weird ways. And we're not talking about things that can be caught by simple memory protection; that problem has largely been solved since the NT4 days.
Its possible to make a user's life miserable on a modern operating system.
I wouldn't buy a computer from you either nor would I tell any of my less computer savvy relatives. I believe in Bundling software but I believe in it being bundled on a CD/DVD. Just do the base install of the operating system and hand the users a CD/DVD that will automatically install applications on Demand. I know writing a nice installer script and keeping your CD/DVD up to date is a big hassle. However that is what the user should get if I ask for Windows Xp on my system that is what I am expecting nothing else. You want to give me other software sure put it on a CD.
Just because you feel like "helping your users out" by installing Software you think would be helpful for them doesn't mean you are really doing anything useful. Bundling should always be "Options". I should never have to uninstall crap that "You" decided I need.
Regardless of you not getting a kickback or not means nothing to me. I don't care if you get kickbacks for everything you bundle, good for you. I for one have no problem with people making money. However I do have a problem with shit being forced on me.
When a user gets a computer they should get only the following things.
And if you want.
It is not rocket science here and MS has ever right to complain. All that crap that gets loaded seriously leaves a bad taste in the users mouths
I use Debian and Windows.
I do have to say if I do Compile and install my own packages for Debian I am reminded time and time again by other Debian users that I should use the existing package or make sure I do things the "Debian Way" Is it a few more hoops to jump through for compiling my own software? Sure it is, Is it worth it? I believe it is, So I do it. If however I don't do it and I screw something up on my system it is "My Fault" I realize this but not everyone does. If I blamed Debian for a package I installed myself that causes my System to Freeze(yes I have done this before) and X crashes who's fault is it and who gets blamed. People Blame Microsoft now most Blue Screen's of Death are caused by Third Party Software is this Microsoft's fault? No the software writer is responsible. Sure MS could do better protecting their operating system from these crashes, but when it comes down to it, The responsibility is the Software Developers. Yet they do not take the blame. I think MS should require certain things for any software installed on the system. Developer Either Company or Actual person who made the software and a contact address. Then they could display it anytime the software does somethign horrible. That way they can put the blame to the true source and save face a bit.
but just kinda.
it's a sad day for MS when i'm more likely to believe they are up to no good than i am to believe they had a good idea.
i hate all the shite that comes installed on an OEM pc, and i am sort of glad that someone like MS does too. since they have the testicles of every major PC manufaturer firmly in their grasp, perhaps something can be done to stop the spread of "craptastic free offers". but in my heart, i am pretty sure that MS is just using this leverage to push one of it's apps or services instead of someone else's. if someone from google or the FSF said the same thing, i would probably accept that there is no sinister motive, but with MS, i have real trouble.
it's also a sad day when i, the leader of the "anything but microsoft" camp, am feeling sort of bad for MS and the position they have gotten themselves into. many of us distrust them and always assume that there is a malicious reason for everything that they do. this mistrust is far from unfounded. they got to where they are with their questionable business practices and anti-competitive behavior, it's not like we all woke up one morning and said "i suddenly hate microsoft".
vista is one of two things: proof positive that MS can't make anything but dancing bologna, or proof positive that they have seen the error of their ways. i'm pretty sure that it's the former. the problem is, even if it is the latter, won't we all just reject it any way? and if we do, will any of us even care?
sarcasm:
-noun
1. harsh or bitter derision or irony.
Microsoft has managed to get 90%+ of the desktop market share through monopolistic practices and bullying every hardware vendor around. Now they're complaining that the hardware vendors have some autonomy. Geez, cry me a river.
Microsoft can stop craplets the same way Apple can: they can make and ship exclusively on their own hardware. That would greatly improve the quality of Microsoft products, and it would free up Dell and other companies to come up with their own OS solutions. I think that would be altogether better for everybody.
But, of course, Microsoft would stop making money hand over fist, so they won't do that. They prefer the current monopolistic environment, it's just not monopolistic enough for them.
I happen to like the sony "TX" line of laptops, so we bought a bunch of them for my company. It took me about 3 hours to uninstall all the CRAP sony puts on to "add value" to that machine. For example: anti-virus software that will expire in 30 days an alternate CD-ROM burning software that doesn't work as well as MS stock functionality--and breaks it a bunch of other "trial ware" I don't remember some media player (Real? I forget) that I didn't want At the very least, sony should have 1 click to completely remove all non-Microsoft "added value" or (even better) put it all on a separate disk that I can choose to install. Microsoft has a real problem because they don't make the hardware, too. Companies like to try to "add value" by installing craplets that often ruin the XP (and now Vista) experience. I now have Vista RTM running on my laptop. It supported all the hardware out-of-the-box. That TX has never worked better, and it's simply a stock version of Vista with no sony Craplets.
Oh yeah.
Not to mention that most machines with OEM-Windows-license come with the most destructive "Craplet" ever known. Pre-installed.
It's called "Norton Internet Security" and will turn any modern computer into a C64.
An unnamed executive is concerned that the user will conclude the instability of the non-MS-certified applications is Vista's fault.
If Microsoft can force the OEMs to sell their OS on every machine, they should bloody well be able to force them to sell Vista without all the crapware added to it.
Failure to do so, and the resulting user opinion of Vista, will be entirely Microsoft's fault.
captcha: "culpable"
Look Microsoft is trying to compete with OS X and how it has the same feel no matter what machine your on ( more or less ). The majority of people who get Vista are going to buy it with a PC from an OEM company like Dell. Those are the people who are likely to think Vista is unstable rather then the software that it comes with. Everyones acting like Microsoft doesn't want any software on it that isn't certified. Microsoft just wants the OEMs to be more careful when they put 'crap' on the machines because they are the majority of users who use Vista. People who go out and buy Vista or download it off the internet are going to know if they install something and it makes there computer run like crap that its not Vista's fault.
I meean Dell, HP, Lenova, etc should be required to put more effort into making sure the stuff they put on the machines don't make it unstable. They owe it to there customers and Microsoft.
http://seanism.com/
How do you do "ulimit -u" on Windows btw?
I believe there is a setting you can configure in a GPO that limits the amount of threads/memory/etc per user in Windows.
Ford was worried that the aftermarket fuzzy dice hanging from the rear view window might cause people to have a negative perception of the Pinto.
My Acer desktop with Windows XP I bought about 2 years ago also came with minimal crap. They had a CD for a trial of Norton anti-virus. I bought it from Office Depot at a very good price, using coupons and rebates. I had a tech support question, it was answered on the phone very quickly. I will certainly consider Acer in the future if they have not changed.
I am not a Microsoft fan, by any means. But the crapware OEM put on computers is stupid, rude, poorly thought out attempt to 'differentiate' their machines, that I have NEVER found usefull. Anything that gets rid of that junk is good in my book.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
My opinion of Windows Vista is affected by how crappy Windows Vista is, if it gets put on my new Mac I will definitely have an even worst opinion of the operating system.
I haven't tested it, but i hear the overhead due to the drm is obnoxious. Users should stick with windows 2000 and XP until the wine project progresses sufficently to replace windows alltogether. Upgrading is not recommended, as it will likely break compatibility with windows 2000 and XP and you'll be stuck on the windows platform. VM's don't totally replace windows as some features including active X and some with issues with usb not operating. wine should eventually be able to run windows applications flawlessly and windows users looking to escape the virus and malware and the drm scene, should consider not buying a new pc with vista installed and not upgrading even if it's offered.
Please don't take this as flamebait, but how are we defining crapplets? Software that I don't want that is preinstalled for me? Well, in that case wouldn't XP or Vista, at least in some circumstances, fit this definition? Just because I *have* to pay for it doesn't mean I *want* it. Yet Microsoft strongarms PC vendors into preinstalling Windows and then passing the cost on the consumer. If I want an ubuntu box, for example, then to me Windows is an unwanted "OEM Crapplet".
Now that I got that off my chest, I do have to agree. The amount of garbage that is Preinstalled is atrocious. What's worse is that it's all trial software that bugs you until you buy it or uninstall it. Gimme a break! Trial programs are nothing more than ads. That's like buying a new TV and having to watch an hour of ads before you can watch any shows. It really is insulting and really not helpful at all. Not that it will *break* Vista, it sure as heck will continue to ruin the user experience.
blah blah blah
Right, that's why those limits should be put in /etc/limits
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 Whoops, silly middle mouse button...
Microsoft do realise that Windows PCs would be much more expensive without all this preinstalled nonsense that effectively subsidises them, don't they?
My first troll rating! In... good Lord, what took me so long?
Eviscerati.Org: All Hail the Eviscerati
1. Buy box.
2. Reformat drive.
3. Install OS clean from media without all the crap, or use an existing corporate image.
But the idea of blaming third-party products for Vista's perception problems is the clumsiest FUD to come out of Microsoft's spin-doctor department in years. They have bugs that log to system files in WinXP that haven't been fixed for THREE YEARS or longer, so I don't buy the "it's the driver" excuses any more.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
If forced I'd side with MS on this one, the bloatware that OEMs pile onto the new systems is crippling. However if MS wants to do this without infringing on the OEMs rights to change the product and individualize it as they see fit, they should just negotiate that the manufacturers must also include a base-level OS install disk so that people can choose to change it with ease if they see fit. Media is cheap.
By contrast, I got a new MacBook Pro this week. I started it up, was prompted to transfer files from my older Mac, connected the two machines with a FireWire cable, and an hour later I was up and running with all of my files, music, video, and programs. And best of all, no third-party junk. All in all, an outstanding experience and a huge contrast with the Dell Windoze experience.
I suggest you consider that Dell (and others) are getting PAID by the vendors of the crapware! This is part of the reason a Dell computer is cheaper than putting together the parts yourself (even in quantity). Co-op marketing deals, bundle deals, etc.
Having it on a cd-rom or menu that nobody ever loads would make it worthless.
now now now now-now-na-now now-na-now-now-now-now
I bought a new Lenovo Thinkpad for my wife a few months ago. I was shocked at the OEM setup. I kid you not when I say that the task bar had 12 icons in it for apps that ran on boot (many hidden by the 'unused icon' feature in XP). When I went to the Run portion of the registry, it had 30+ entries in it for executables to run on log in. Add to this a desktop shrewn with icons, and a battery meter took up another 15% of real estate on the task bar. It was ridiculous. I ended up cleaning out probably 95% of all the auto-start apps -- they were mostly auto-updaters for crap applications, or resident launchers that supposedly sped up the launch of apps that my wife wouldn't ever use anyway.
I sincerely hope MS can reign in this kind of setup...
'... all the assorted crap OEMs load...'
Hmm.
* Windows Media Player
* Windows Movie Maker
* CD burning wizard
* Zip files wizard
* Outlook Express (you try explaining why it's needed on a server OS, or removing it...)
* MSN
* Windows Messenger
I'm sure I've missed something, please feel free to enlighten me.
Greg
(Inside a nuclear plant)
Aaaarrrggh! Run! The canary has mutated!
Windows' answer to "ulimit" is a "Job" object. You may have to check MSDN because it's not well-exposed on the user side even though it's been around since Win2k. That's actually how Windows keeps reigns on secured screen savers. Killing the Job object kills all processes in it so that a screen saver can't leave child processes laying around if it crashes or something.
If you look up SetInformationJobObject you'll see that there's quite a vast array of limits you can put on a process or set of processes. It wouldn't be hard to write your own ulimit command with a page full of code.
dom
Is that an UltimaII quote? Hmm, I like this memory...
damaged by dogma
I work in an IT department, and I've had so many people comment to me about how Windows XP will crash after sitting unattended for a few days, or how slow their new PC is, how often it crashes etc... To me, this is almost unheard of - my home PCs (some on XP) and the XP workstations at work are fast, stable, and generally well capable of whatever I ask of them.
/. though...)
Still, I've worked on totally dysfunctional home systems that have 8-20 things in the system tray, most of them bundled expired trial versions of software that came with the computer, and these things crash left and right, churn away at simple tasks, using virtual memory almost exclusively. After seeing these VERY VERY COMMON OEM systems, I can easily see why so many people still hate Windows. The worst offenders in my books are bundled trial versions of antivirus software - these massive resource hogs not only slow down the system brutally with incessant resident scanning (needed, I suppose, for those who don't scan otherwise) and after a short while they expire, but it still takes a crowbar and a blowtorch to uninstall them! They're locked into the PC/OS so tightly that the average user really needs a PC technician to get it off. Most I guess either wind up with an expired scanner and no replacement, or they end up paying for updates on the scanner they can't uninstall otherwise!
"PC DECRAPIFIER" SAVES LIVES. GOOGLE IT IF THIS SOUNDS LIKE YOUR PC. (Probably not many on
Of course, if you're technically adept enough, it's still best to bite the bullet and just install a fresh copy of the OS then patch it up to date and install all the apps you want.
I think that the key word there was "workstation". Computers sold to the business side of the market have far less of a problem with this sort of thing. Take note when buying your next computer.
Eliminate the Crippleware and Craplets, and the OEMs will paint racing stripes on their cases, call it a valuable new feature, and charge what they lost in "incentives" from the junksoft companies, while still shipping Windows. They have an entire industry of people reading scripts over the phone to deal with tech-support questions, and they don't want to pay the fees to recreate that with a completely new OS.
Make Linux more pleasant to use, have it support more apps end-users care about, and get someone to break the threat of Microsoft pricing retaliation, and OEMs might move to Linux. Get Stallman a suit, haircut, and beard-perm, and they might move more quickly.
the more accurate the calculations became, the more the concepts tended to vanish into thin air. R. S. Mulliken
The problem isn't the OS becoming unstable. It's the craplets becoming unstable, crashing and the lusers thinking that the crash message is "Vista crashing".
/dev/random > /dev/mem" and people complained Linux crashed, who would you blame? Linux or the OEM?
Note that you are actually defending Microsoft when you say a "properly configured" operating system because their fundamental complaint is the OEMs aren't properly configuring stuff and it reflects badly on MS rather than the OEMs.
If an OEM was preloading a linux box with a script that said "sudo cat
I know it's unpopular to defend MS on Slashdot, but MS is right on this one. If an OEM ships unstable apps that make Vista look bad (as opposed to letting Vista look bad all by itself) then MS has every right to bitchslap the OEMs.
Fear: When you see B8 00 4C CD 21 and know what it means
If Microsoft OS designers took the Operating Systems Design 101 classes many universities provided over the years, they wouldn't be in this situation. Think about it. Why do Windows users think that when an application crashes or has problems, it is the operating system causing the problem. And if THAT is still the case for their latest OS release, they deserve getting blamed for the failures.
Device drivers are another story but still, tech support should be able to troubleshoot the problem instead of telling most people to reinstall the OS.
Forcing developers to get MS certification is just another way to control the development market and allow Microsofts own developers advantages when they feel they want the market. It is interesting how Microsoft is already concerned about who will get blamed for poor user experiences with their NEW operating system. I guess businesses must be having a grand time with it already.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
I crapplet was misspelled in the article heading title: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crapplet
~ In Trust, We Trust ~
Comment removed based on user account deletion
You know, of course, that installing a Linux is way easier than installing Windows, right?
My girlfriend had a problem of a rotten Windows install and I remade her machine in front of her. It took far too many hours to even arrive at a clean install of Windows plus Office from the original (non-restore) disks. More if I count the time to slipstream SP2 into the original disk and running Windows Update for all the stuff.
I then installed Ubuntu on a secondary partition I kept. It took far less than one hour to have Linux and OpenOffice running. A little bit more counting the upgrades that came down the wire.
It is so much easier to set up a modern Linux box I don't know why many users who have no real reason to use Windows (are neither corporate slaves nor heavy gamers) endure it.
http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
I've always liked 'Shovelware' for describing this particular scourge.
Invoking the term "Craplets" is, at best, a new MicroSoft strategy to acquire by word of mouth that which they are no longer allowed to acquire through licensing terms. At worst, its setting up an excuse for Vista's failure.
Its hard to believe that so many people don't see this as yet another Microsoft strategy to shore up their "monopoly" position. I assume that at least some of the people responding are Microsoft trolls (e.g. paid advocates for their software).
Yes, OEM's often add a lot of non-Microsoft content to their machines, and yes, some of it is badly written (the same can be said for a lot of the Microsoft content), and yes, OEM's often get paid to put some portion of the non-MS content there. PC's are competitively priced commodities and it can be very difficult to turn a profit on a machine without resorting to this kind of product advertising. But a lot of useful software usually gets included as well, especially since Microsoft consent decrees have put a stop to the old Microsoft practice of banning the addition of some competitive products to the machine.
OEM's can put Firefox, Opera, Netscape or some other non-MS browser on the desktop today. One wishes that more did. There was a time when OEM's couldn't ship Netscape or other competitive browsers on new Windows shipments because they'd have to pay a penalty to Microsoft if they did. That's why Netscape is no longer a company.
There was a time when Lotus 123 was the leading spreadsheet, Wordperfect was the leading word processor, and so on. Microsoft wrote licenses that penalized OEMs for shipping the competitors and, for a year or so, made Word and Excel available to OEM's as a part of the Windows bundle. Just who couldn't sell a copy of their software for over a year (Lotus and Novell). Guess who leveraged an operating system monopoly into a monopoly in Word Processing and Spreadsheets (Microsoft). Guess which spreadsheet is still better (123). Its sad. It really is.
Yes, AOL, Earthlink, and others frequently litter the new desktops, and that's one of the reasons why MSN hasn't become yet another Microsoft monopoly. Overall a very good thing.
Yes, Quicken is frequently shipped on new machines, and that's one of the reasons why Microsoft Money hasn't become yet another Microsoft monopoly. Again, a very good thing.
The same is true for other software.
I don't plan to move to Vista. Heck, the only reason I own XP licenses is that I contracted to do some programming on the platform. MS software never improves. It just acquires more sources of failure. I've been systematically moving to Linux and MacIntosh. Nothing I've seen about Vista so far has done anything but increase my determination to move Microsoft off my machines.
Davis http://davis.foulger.net
This is why I'll only buy a Mac.
E.g., I'm looking on The Register and they have a title like "Acer Preloads Vulns On Computers." And since The Register is light on the details and misses the poing (they parrot the "turns on 'safe for scripting'", but miss the _real_ problem there), I had over to F-Secure's site to see what this is about then.
The short and skinny is: Acer helpfully preloads your laptop with a handy little ActiveX control that downloads updates from their website. The problem: it will just as cheerfully download and install anything else. If the user visits some malicious web site, it just needs the right HTML code there to install anything it wants to on your computer. A rootkit, a spam bot, a keylogger, whatever. Take your pick. It can download those for you, just because the website told it to.
The icing on the cake (and the bit The Register picked) is that Acer's preloaded ActiveX control is marked as "safe for scripting", so you won't even be asked when it gets invoked. Wouldn't want the users to have to click "yes" when downloading Acer's driver updates, after all. But then you also don't have to click "yes" when it downloads a keylogger onto your machine.
What does Jack Average see at the end of the day? "Crap Windows! Fucking MS software! It runs like crap and uses my DLS connection to full."
Note that we didn't even have to assume a clueless Jack Average for that to happen. Let's even assume he's pretty savvy for a non-CS guy. He doesn't enter his email on all those "enter your email for free porn" sites, he checks the URL on those "verify your PayPal account" emails, and generally does most of what his nerdy son told him to. (Well, except switch to Linux, maybe.) And he's smart enough to click "no" when some web site offers to install some IHakU codec on his machine. Too bad Acer's software isn't that smart. It just takes one site that knows about that ActiveX control to install whatever it wishes on Jack's computer.
So, yeah, whatever your opinion of MS may be, some of these OEMs and their crapware are actually far worse.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Since the crash message is provided by Windows, if users are likely to confuse the crash message presented when an application crashes with a Windows crash, isn't that the fault of MS for designing error feedback that isn't sufficiently understandable?
The right of OEMs to install their own stuff was one of the concessions which Microsoft agreed to in their antitrust case. It seems that they are trying to wiggle out of it now. I agree that they have a point to some degree but this wouldn't be a problem if they were not a monopoly in the first place.
I got an XP laptop less than a year ago. It had Bluetooth built in. I couldn't just run the XP bluetooth stack, but had to install some crappy Toshiba Bluetooth stack. It's not "Windows Certified" and various things don't "just work" with it.
This is the real advantage Apple has. They have a limited set of hardware that they work with, their own. Apple is small enough int he marketplace that they don't get in trouble for being monopolistic.
Microsoft rose to market dominance due to its preinstallation on machines that are sold. If they are worried about a bad user experience on preinstalled computers, they should refuse to sell their OS to OEMs and just sell their OS in a box, to be installed. That would level the playing field somewhat with Linux distributions, although it is a little late for OS/2 and BeOS to rejoice about that.
Azuerus frequently does flakey shit on my Ubuntu box after I installed some Java JDK..
Does this mean Ubuntu sucks?
I frequently have to `rm -rf ~/.az*` on my box to get it to come up and stay up. It's a bug of some kind.. I just don't know of what kind. Basically I put new torrents in, it loads up, finds my old torrents, displays the GUI, then closes. I still haven't figured it out.I don't even know if it's related to my JDK install. I just know it bugs the fuck out of me and if I was a user "trying" Ubuntu, I would blame it on Ubuntu and not Azuerus.
Make a reality check, buggy software can make people think their computer is slow / old / shitty, it may have nothing to do with an OS. Are you saying that in Linux it's *impossible* to write buggy code? OO.o will open an XLS spreadsheet in Word if the file is corrupt. Gnumeric will flat out crash. Instead of giving a real error message like "looks like corrupt files here buddy". Does this mean OO.o is buggy and thusly Linux in general is buggy?
I guess so, following your mentality.
oh, and to answer your question -- how does Windows know what the user was donig? That's what the app is for. I want to make some assholish remark towards your attitude... but none are fitting for your lacking of a clue.
Do GPO's work in "consumer" versions of Windows?
'Yes, firefox is indeed greater than women. Can women block pops up for you? No. Can Firefox show you naked women? Yes.'
Isn't it the job of the OS to ride herd on ill-behaved apps and prevent them from rendering the system insecure and unstable?
You know, of course, that installing a Linux is way easier than installing Windows, right?
My girlfriend had a problem of a rotten Windows install and I remade her machine in front of her. It took far too many hours to even arrive at a clean install of Windows plus Office from the original (non-restore) disks. More if I count the time to slipstream SP2 into the original disk and running Windows Update for all the stuff.
You are kinda of missing my point. You and I are slashdotters. We could just as easily wipe and reload any OS on a computer if we have the proper install media at hand. (We usually have our own restore copy of the current windows and linux just for geek cred.) We are not the target audience this is aimmed at. What would your girlfriend had done had she not had you to do it all for her? Here are the likely steps: call tech support and have them stick the restore media or reimage the drive from a hidden partition. She waits for it to reload. Linux would be faster unless its a straight disc image and then who knows. Well, what's the result? Factory default OS, apps, and BLOAT. As an OEM, I can preload damn near any adware/spyware/support programs and your average user won't uninstall it if has my company's name on it. You or I as slashdotters could remove the bloat or wipe and have clean media to reload from. Your girl friend unless she lucked out wouldn't have a seperate OS install or a restore that let her pick just the apps that she wants. It seems to be slashdots refrain is Linux is holy and we can't have adware or spyware because we are Linux and not evil MS Windows, which is dead wrong. If Dell, HP, or Gateway started selling desktop linux boxes by the million, they'd all have Linux adware, crapware, and spy ware pre-installed on OEM restore discs. Being Linux doesn't make us imune from this.
There has been an issue for some time now. You purchase a Dell computer and have plenty of "Try this now for 30 days" bull crap. All that crapware results in a slower computer. Does that mean the user blames Microsoft or Dell computers for there PC running slow?
The greatest revenge in life is massive success.
I just love starting my morning with a big hot heaping bowl of Craplets and a couple slices of toast! Best served with a side of Vista.
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
Microsoft should make a better dialog when a program crashes. "Crapware v1.0 has quit unexpectedly. This is probably due to a bug in Crapware." And get rid of the stupid "report this to Microsoft" button (or whatever it's called). Is that even useful?
After 3 days without programming, life becomes meaningless
- The Tao of Programming
If Microsoft was really really concerned then they would issue a MS Computer. BillG keeps saying that hardware is just a commodity and MS has gotten more and more into hardware (XBOX, Optical Mice, Keyboards, cameras, game controllers, and the Zune) so why not just release a Microsoft "reference" desktop and laptop implementation? Yes, MS did release a Vista design guide but nothing speaks to setting expectations like a reference implementation that is on the market. So until MS does that its easy for MS to blame the OEMs and its easy for it to sound like lip service.
Last thing, doesn't anyone else think its weird how organised and polite the MS defenders are on Slashdot and just about every other discussion group where Vista shows up? Personnaly I think MS has hired a bunch of people to monitor and "steer" these discussions. I'm surprised slashdot doesn't discuss "who are the people who defend MS"
If you want Vista to run well,don't load OEM software on it. .dlls and grow your registry by adding more bothersome entries.
In fact if you want it to run well and achieve long stable life,don't put any software on it.
Software will only add more
Microsoft may in fact release Vista Turbo,which doesn't allow software installations and promises maximum performance from your computer and network.Look for Vista Server,Which won't allow network users to slow its performance either.No software,no users,no problems.
Microsoft is about solving problems.All this sprang of course from the need to make it virus proof.If you can't do anything with it,you can't get virii.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Yes.
This whole thread is like one big ad for Apple.
Funny, it seems between the 8 machines I just booted up this week alone, as the machine (from dell, 3 latitudes, 3 optiplex's and 2 dimensions) got higher up in terms of hardware so to did the oemware. The laptop being the lightest software wise came with only Intel's wireless goof, and maybe a dell support thing or two. The optiplex's came with a wonderful plethora of useless dell related propaganda, and finally the Dimension even came with its own happy copy of Norton, and a virtual plethora of un needed Dell Media software.
Did someone say cake?
http://www.jetta.com/
I bought one a few years ago specifically without Windows installed. The drive came blank and they shipped a driver cd. Saved about $80 by taking the OS off. They also replaced the defective monitor that only had a single dead (bright green) pixel which was actually within manufacturer spec. It also happens to be a fantastic machine, in my opinion. Extremely reliable.
A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything. - Neitzsche
Enough bullshit in nearly every post about pre-installed apps and no 'original' sindose CD/DVD already. What's the chance you'll buy anything with exactly what you / your customers need? Zip! Who needs an old OEM sindose, Linsux CD anyway? You guys not have enough coasters already? It's not that bad - e.g. for XP 1. Backup the drivers, (using one of *many* utils on 'net) 2. Backup the serial no. (so it matches the sticker on the machine - using one of *many* utils on 'net) 3. Load your previously-prepared sindose 'streamlined' CD (with all required apps, drivers, updates, rootkits, keyloggers...). Use 'unattended' mode (for poster who was bitching about it taking all day and then having to do it again 'because I've hit the wrong key' ...idiot
4. Go and do something useful, (backup Exchange server, feed cat, shag partner, secretary, cat...)
5. If you've been too lazy to automate it, or don't have corp activation codes for XP, insert correct serial nos & activate.
2. ?
3. PROFIT!
We're not talking about crappy programs here. We're talking about apps that dig themselves deep into the code and replace (or worse) try to work alongside Vista code. I don't care what anyone say -- MS can't be responsible if a crappy OEM (*cough* Dell *cough*) installs the newest version of Symantec that digs itself into the kernel. Think if a computer manufacturer shipped a Linux box and swapped the kernel out without their own version (chock full of crap). Windows (or any other OS) can't dodge that bullet.
In a lot of cases, these are no longer Windows boxes. Their "Windows + Cruft" boxes. And you can bet if OS X/Linux/FreeBSD really REALLY takes off as a desktop OS, and OEMs start selling boxes en masse, they'll be itching to install crap deep into the system for a signed check.
In the enterprise environment I work in, our standard is to strip out all crapplications that come with hardware drivers because they result in user confusion, unnecessary clutter in the system tray, and/or bloating of what's loaded in memory. I wish Microsoft would use their big stick to require hardware vendors to provide drivers that contain ONLY drivers with no crapplications.
Sure, people SHOULD be able to distinguish between Microsoft OS applications and third party ones, but there are lots of users who think everything on the computer is "Microsoft". I've come across those people before, and it's not pretty.
Supposedly, Microsoft does in fact send those crash reports back to ISVs and they sometimes fix their products because of it. They could definitely make that dialog clearer as to what happened and who is at fault, though.
Linux doesn't make anyone immune to crapware, but it is still easier for us to just boot from the live CD and run setup, do the next-next-finish dance and be done with it than it is to restore a Windows machine from the installation CD.
It's not only easier for the geek. It is easier for anyone. Installing Windows XP from a pre-SP CD is a nightmare no non-geek should ever be exposed to (even if it could help my personal favorite in this one). That alone would make me either move to Linux or go out and buy a Mac.
Of course, installing your own OS is kinda declaring independence from phone support, but people need not to be afraid - it's not hard at all. And, besides that, I never, ever heard of a problem solved by phone support.
http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
How long do you think it'll be until MS makes their own PC?
No, I will not work for your startup
Maybe the PC OEM's can also install a program called "SqueegeeMan" that will offer to clean off the craplets that were squirted on your Windows, for a fee, of course.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
Ya know, Microsoft forces all sorts of other things down OEM's throats including; Windows tax on every machines they sell, lack of (re)install disks for the OS and crippling licenses that exclude any non-M$ software. Then why in the hell haven't they cracked down on this before? I mean, it isn't like Vista is the first/only M$ OS crippled by this bullshit (hell, this was happening back in win95 days), so why are they just now worried about it?
Could it be that Vista itself has such poor performance without craplets that they are already setting themselves up a scapegoat?
Windows is never going to be ready for the desktop, because you have all the incompatibilities generated by the different OEM "distributions", and those that only serve to confuse users. When you're using "Windows", you expect to be using Windows not "HP Windows" or "Dell Windows" or "MDG Dollar-a-Day Windows". The only way Windows is ever going to be useful on the desktop is if all the vendors can agree on a single environment.
Go Microsoft!
http://outcampaign.org/
Why would anyone think that we'd regard the presence of craplets as reflecting badly on Microsoft? After all, there are so many OTHER reasons!
That's one of the reasons why I build my own PCs and why I don't like laptops. Not only they come with Windows, but they come preloaded with all sorts of bull****. A Taiwanese company's round media player that sits on the desktop? How ****ing nice. I always dreamed of having one. :rolleyes: Then you have Intel's wireless crap, "multimedia" keyboards crap, mouse drivers crap, and all the trash everyone wants to place on your system tray, desktop, quick launch bar and Explorer contextual menus, complete with a 6 MB auto-update process for each, their terribly ugly, non-standard interfaces to impact lusers and complete idiots. Seriously, you can tell a person's intelligence by looking at his system tray: the fewer icons the smartest the person. Now that we've got anti-malware tools, we should write an anti-crapware tool that gets rid of the hundred of utterly ****ty system tray utilities and auto-update processes.
I was about to say 13256278887989457651018865901401704640, but it appears this number is private property.
On the one hand, you want OEMs to be free to bundle valid software, including valid replacements for Microsoft's own half-baked accessories. Some OEMs bundle Eudora, for instance, and that's much better than leaving the users with Outlook Express. Office suites (in some cases MS Office and in other cases alternatives) are another popular bundle item, and again that adds value. Even if you're not a big fan of Corel WPOS, as indeed I am not, it's still definitely better than the WordPad, Cardfile, and no spreadsheet whatsoever, which is what comes with Windows if the OEM doesn't add anything. Even Microsoft recognises that not every user is going to be willing to buy MS Office, and yet they might like to be able to type up documents. So you want OEMs to be able to make that kind of addition. And obviously you *have* to allow drivers for the hardware, and the OEM is the immediate source for such things. They should be bundled.
On the other hand, some OEMs can't think of anything they'd rather bundle than WeatherBug and its ilk, and that's just sick and wrong. These sorts of offerings have already significantly harmed many users' opinions of Windows XP, and I can certainly sympathise if Microsoft doesn't want that happening with Vista. (In the past some (e.g., Packard Bell) have been known to bundle even *worse* dross, such as shell replacement environments that make MS Bob look positively heartwarming by comparison, but I haven't seen so much of that recently. I think WeatherBug and so on are just about the worst OEM-ware I've seen bundled with Windows XP. Oh, and Outlook Express, but Microsoft has nobody but themselves to blame for that particular atrocity.)
Allowing OEMs to bundle whatever they want is a double-edged sword. You have to take the good with the bad. Of course, Microsoft could punish OEMs whose bundles are extremely terrible by refusing to deal with them any more, but this would be a dangerous time for Microsoft to do that. They *might* go out of business and take their nonsense with them, but on the other hand they might *not*, and that would mean significant (and possibly even large) OEMs (other than Apple) distributing entry-level PCs with a non-Microsoft OS, and Microsoft does not want that.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
And while this payola lets the OEMs sell the consumer-level systems at a more-competitive price, the buyer soon pays out the difference, as they have to get a tech to come spend a couple hours uninstalling craplets and crudware.
At a guess, the OEMs make about $5 per pre-installed craplet, and about 20 craplets seems to be standard, so the system can be offered at a $100 "discount" without the OEM losing anything on the deal. If it takes two hours of a tech's time (at the typical $75/hr), the consumer winds up paying $50 MORE than they would have for the un-cluttered system. But sales are made on PERCEIVED shelf price, not on actual cost to the consumer, so this practice will continue, and more'n likely just get worse.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
The XP Decrapifier? I am assuming it works as advertised and nuked the system registry? One can only hope.
Windows assumes you are an idiot...Linux demands proof.