Microsoft's Windows 10 Upgrade Screen Interrupts Meteorologist's Live Forecast (hothardware.com)

Reader MojoKid writes: If you're a Windows 7 or Windows 8 user who hasn't yet upgraded to Windows 10, you've probably been bombarded at some point by Microsoft to upgrade, and not always at the most convenient times. Such was also the case with one meteorologist who saw a Windows 10 upgrade prompt show up during a very inopportune time -- right in the middle of a live forecast. Metinka Slater, a meteorologist with Des Moines CBS affiliate KCCI 8, was going about her business, giving viewers a rundown of the 12-hour rainfall totals in the area when a nagging Windows 10 upgrade screen popped up, just like it has for thousands of everyday Windows users. But rather than get flustered or give into Microsoft's demands, Slater laughed off the annoyance. "Ahh, Microsoft recommends upgrading to Windows 10. What should I do?" Slater joked. "Don't you love when that pops up?"From the looks of it, either the concerned computer is running Windows 98, or is using classic theme.

Comments

Here's a good idea

[Nidi62]

The TV station should send an invoice to Microsoft to bill them for the advertising time.

Re:Here's a good idea

[Mr.Intel]

Having worked IT for a TV station, i can tell you that the weather graphics workstations are often NOT on the local AD domain. This is deliberate and the local IT guy usually doesn't "own" that particular workstation. It's usually up to the weather guy and weather software vendor to provide support. Likely, this little insightful nugget was lost on that pair or they simply didn't care. Either way, it might not be the IT guy's fault at all.

Re:Here's a good idea

[Anonymous Coward]

> This is the TV station's fault for not deploying their computers correctly.

Captain Perfection Has Spoken.

I say it's Microsoft's fault for being so annoyingly intrusive and persistent.

Re:Here's a good idea

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry but I have to say stfu with all this MS defending. If Microsoft wasn't trying to shove Win10 down everyone's throat via that deceptive dialog, none of this would be an issue. Enterprise or home edition, doesn't matter. Full stop.

Now if it had something to do with security or other non-marketing issue then yeah, slam their IT dep't. But this is solely under the purview of marketing.

TL;DR: Don't embarrass yourself by defending Microsoft's stupid marketing fuckup.

Re:Here's a good idea

[danomac]

There are plenty of reasons to have machines not connected to a domain. But you can still enforce policies locally as long as it's not a Home edition of Windows. What I mentioned originally works on non-domain-joined machines as well.

By IT support I'm referring to local IT and any external support (like you've mentioned.) This was totally preventable and if the weather software vendor is providing the machines they should have been aware long ago.

Re:Here's a good idea

[theskipper]

That's not true. As a matter of fact I'm trying to catch up on paying hundreds of invoices right now that were emailed to me recently. Only inconvenience is it's a pain to unzip each one.

Oh there's another one...back to it.

Re:Here's a good idea

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the user's fault when their software is working against them?

Microsoft apologists always blame the user for Microsoft's low quality software. When Microsoft produce a trainwreck of a UI apologists blame users for not being able to learn how to use it. When Microsoft produce an operating system that collects your data and users object, apologists say it's the user being stupid and that data collection is fine. When Microsoft intentionally breaks Windows 7 in a variety of ways it's the user's fault for using ancient software.

Software you buy should be working for your benefit, not Microsoft's benefit. They shouldn't be hijacking your computer to try and force you to upgrade to Windows 10. They shouldn't be redesiging their UI to try and sell things through the Windows Store so they can take 30% of the proceeds. They shouldn't be treating your as a source of information to be harvested.

it's not the user's fault when Microsoft's software produces failures like this, it's Microsoft's fault.

Re:Here's a good idea

[Jason Levine]

Thankfully, you should be able to pay them with all the money from those dead Nigerian princes.

As a side note, is "Nigerian prince" the world's most hazardous job? They're constantly dying off!

Re:Here's a good idea

[chispito]

Why mod this down? He's right.

If a Linux system message popped up during a live broadcast, people (here) would assume that the machine was misconfigured for their use case. There is a wealth of information on the Internet about how to deal with these messages, and if you don't have proper IT support to configure systems in your broadcast tool chain, you are clearly doing it wrong.

Re:Here's a good idea

[mysidia]

This is the TV station's fault for not deploying their computers correctly. This issue has been known for months and months now and a fix has been around for quite a while.

Not an initial deployment issue.

A surprising unwanted behavior introduced in a patch, that the administrator would not have noticed, unless they were reading many online articles about it.

If anybody's fault it's Microsoft's for not having provided the option Years ago, so they could opt-out of Nag Screens and Auto OS upgrades at the time of initial deployment, not AFTER deployment, with a new Opt-Out being required for Novel unwanted behavior.

However, I would just say it's an understandable accident that anybody could make. It's nobody's "Fault" other than Microsoft management/marketing deciding to introduce the Novel behavior with a NEW Opt-Out option, instead of one that could have been selected Along with the option to turn on Automatic Updates.... back in 2012, 2013, or 2014.

Re:Here's a good idea

[sexconker]

What about AllowOSUpgrade in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WindowsUpdate\OSUpgrade ?
This was the original, official way to control it. They then decided to ignore anyone who set AllowOSUpgrade to 0.

Then they put out the second piece you mention.
The registry location for this is DisableOSUpgrade in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate .
However the client needs a specific update installed for the setting to actually do anything. This update is not pushed out to WSUS servers, and thus is not pushed out to the majority of clients in a managed domain. It's only available via regular ass Windows Update. Further, there are no complete ADMX/ADML files available containing this definition so you can't set it via Group Policy Editor. They reluctantly put out updated ADMX/ADML files containing the definitions, but they were older, incomplete files. You have to take your existing policy definitions and manually merge the DisableOSUpgrade pieces into them.

<string id="DisableOSUpgrade_Title">Turn off the upgrade to the latest version of Windows through Windows Update</string>
<string id="DisableOSUpgrade_Help">Enables or disables the upgrade to the latest version of Windows through Windows Update.

If you enable this setting, Windows Update will not offer you an upgrade to the latest version of Windows.

If you disable or do not configure this setting, Windows Update might offer an upgrade to the latest version of Windows.</string>

<policy name="DisableOSUpgrade_Title" class="Machine" displayName="$(string.DisableOSUpgrade_Title)" explainText="$(string.DisableOSUpgrade_Help)" key="Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate" valueName="DisableOSUpgrade">
<parentCategory ref="WindowsUpdateCat" />
<supportedOn ref="WU_SUPPORTED_Windows7_Or_Win81Update" />
<enabledValue>
<decimal value="1" />
</enabledValue>
<disabledValue>
<decimal value="0" />
</disabledValue>
</policy>

If you already have one of the GWX updates installed you're fucked. DisableOSUpgrade didn't come about until hundreds of millions of machines had already been infected with GWX.

The DisableGWX piece you mention is the official way to suppress the GWX dialog. It does NOT remove GWX, it merely hides the popup. Anyone who has GWX still has it, and likely still has Windows 10 downloaded. The upgrade procedure can be initiated without the GWX dialog.

On top of all this, they bundled Windows 10 ads into an IE security update. The ads allow users to initiate the update process, regardless of DisableGWX, DisableOSUpgrade, or AllowOSUpgrade. The only thing saving you here is making sure users do not have the privileges to run the EXE located at http://www.microsoft.com/en-us... . I believe this installer will look for the Windows 10 installer in the default download location that GWX uses the same way the official "Media Creation Tool" for clean installation does.

This means that if a machine had GWX at one point (and most Windows 7 machines have had it), it likely already downloaded Windows 10. Nothing you mentioned removes GWX or the Windows 10 download. A privileged user running IE will see a Windows 10 ad. In 3 clicks and just a few seconds, they can install Windows 10.

Yo

Re:Here's a good idea

[Karlt1]

Why should any business have to go through this to disable spam that came with the OS?

Re:Here's a good idea

[UnknownSoldier]

Because's Microsoft didn't try to pull this upgrade ad shit with Windows XP, WIndows 7, or Windows 8 -- it wasn't until Windows 10 that they started spamming everyone.

The blames lies with both parties:

* Microsoft for spamming ads
* Anyone dumb enough to use Windows 10

Re:Here's a good idea

[execthis]

Just install GWX Control Panel which not only disables it all, it can actively monitor in the background to prevent it ever becoming enabled again by Windows update.

Re:Here's a good idea

[bigfinger76]

This wasn't a system message, or an error. This was an advertisement/nagscreen.

Re:Here's a good idea

[michelcolman]

That might work. Just send a mail to the invoice guys telling them to contact your financial manager at the nigerian address.

Re:Here's a good idea

[Man On Pink Corner]

The fact that it lacks a "Don't remind me again" checkbox places it into the category known as "dark patterns."

Put simply, if Windows 10 is really that great, why does Microsoft have to borrow tactics from Ukrainian malware authors to shove it down our throats?

Giving you the forecast, indeed

[Anonymous Coward]

Cloudy with a chance of forced update installs.

Missed opportunity

[mrchaotica]

If only the meteorologist had said "and this is a perfect example of why Microsoft is shit and should never be used for anything important," it would have been great.

Re:Missed opportunity

[PopeRatzo]

and this is a perfect example of why Microsoft is shit

To be fair, the TV station was in Nebraska, so they're probably still using the old-fashioned ethanol-burning, chain-driven computers.

Can't Be 98

[Anonymous Coward]

From the looks of it, either the concerned computer is running Windows 98, or is using classic theme.

Since Microsoft isn't offering the free upgrade to anyone below Windows 7, that kinda narrows it down.

Re:It's their own fault for refusing to upgrade.

[smooth wombat]

Exactly. Just like car dealers should be able to lock you out of your car if you don't come in for a service notice or upgrade to your software.

Win/win situation: the dealer gets more business and users get more apps!

Updates are just as bad

[DidgetMaster]

After installing Windows 10, you get updates pushed to you on a regular basis. During a demo, I needed to reboot. The update facility decided that would be a perfect time to spend about 10 minutes updating my machine. It did not give me a choice to postpone it to a more convenient time.

Re:Updates are just as bad

[KiloByte]

If the tech -- and the software company you patronize -- are so incompetent to not know how to do updates without inconveniencing the users, that's not the user's fault.

Re:Updates are just as bad

[__aaclcg7560]

If your machines require a "nightly maintenance window", maybe that's a sign that your OS isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Not necessarily. You don't want ~80,000 Windows systems updating at the same time. It's better to spread out the load over the course of a week.

Re: Updates are just as bad

[MobyDisk]

DidgetMaster didn't say it restarted spontaneously.

When restarting on Windows 8 and 10, if there are pending updates that require a reboot, there is a "restart and apply updates" and another "restart witout updates." Unless the user is paying attention it is easy to click the restart and apply updates option.

Re: Updates are just as bad

[sexconker]

Under Windows 10, you can only postpone updates for so long. After some unknown amount of time, they are forced upon you, regardless of what you are doing.

Re:Updates are just as bad

[sexconker]

If your machines require a "nightly maintenance window", maybe that's a sign that your OS isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Not necessarily. You don't want ~80,000 Windows systems updating at the same time. It's better to spread out the load over the course of a week.

creimer, creimer, creimer...

80,000 Windows machines updating at the same time is nothing. If you're managing these machines, you're using SCCM+WSUS or a similar 3rd-party suite. They all have a staging step where shit is downloaded to the client before the installation time. In an SCCM+WSUS environment, you first sync your server with the MS catalog plus any other 3rd party catalogs if you're also using Update Manager, then you create a software update group containing those updates, then you deploy them to various groups using various rules regarding the user's interaction with the process, along with an installation deadline. Deployed updates are published to your distribution point(s). In a large environment you would have multiple sites or at least multiple distribution points.

The clients then, on their own schedule, with offsets, contact the site server and ask for their policy and check to see if any updates apply to them. They then see the new updates, see which distribution point they're on, and download them. Depending on what level of user interaction you chose, the user will see a balloon notification stating that software changes are required and are being downloaded. They can click the icon in the system tray to view details, install now, or schedule installation. If they don't, the installation behavior set up in the deployment takes effect when the installation deadline you configured hits. Things can install, install and restart, or wait for the maintenance window. You can specify any maintenance window you want, such as 2 AM daily, noon every Saturday, or whatever. You can specify multiple maintenance windows. Each collection of computers can have their own set of maintenance windows. Users can specify their own window, if you let them, by specifying the times they work and times they don't.

All of this can be automated quite easily. The end result is on patch Tuesday you automatically sync with the MS catalog sometime around noon (after they put shit up), a bit later you automatically create the software update groups, download the updates, and publish them, some time later clients fetch the updates from your various distribution points, or an alternative download location if their regular DP happens to be down, and some time after that clients are prompted to install them or schedule the installation. If they hit the deadline shit happens regardless or is scheduled for the next maintenance window, depending on what you told it to do. When the maintenance window hits, any remaining tasks, such as installation or restarts happen.

Getting 80,000 machines to do this at once isn't an issue. They pull the downloads from local DPs using BITS. You can set bandwidth limits on BITS if you want, but it's already at background priority and clients download at staggered times from whichever DP is most available (or you specifically told it to use). This all goes down transparently over your LAN. You only download one copy of each patch over your internet connection.

If you don't want to pay for SCCM, WSUS is free and will give you much of the same benefit.

Waiting

[Anonymous Coward]

Waiting for the inevitable live "I'm done installing Windows 10 behind your back, I'm going to reboot now. Screw your unsaved work!", followed by the inevitable "I'm terribly sorry, but it seems that I can't boot. And no, I won't tell you why, but if you are feeling lucky, you can try the system restore function that doesn't work. Or stare at the screen, that's good too".

Because if you're going to fuck your customers systems, you better make sure that they can't AT LEAST drop to a console and try to unfuck the system. You have to be thorough about these things.

Yes, I'm bitter. I've had to deal with this twice already.

Re:Classic theme

[mrchaotica]

I actually like the Windows 7 theme. (Can't say the same about XP or 10 though.)

Read the second sentence too, idiot

[raymorris]

> You're either a liar or an idiot.
It seems you're the idiot who can't read more than one sentence, and you're a jerk too.

Try sounding out these words, we'll wait:

> > During a demo, I needed to reboot. Windows decided this would be the perfect time ...

In case you're not aware, Windows installs updates when you shutdown or reboot. This can be rather annoying when you're in a hurry to leave. You work until time to leave the office, then click shut down on your laptop to leave. At which point Windows pops up with "Installing Updates. Do not unplug or shut down the computer. Time remaining: 12 minutes. "

Re:Read the second sentence too, idiot

[DidgetMaster]

To prove the speed of the product I created. I am building a new general-purpose data management system that is designed to replace file systems and databases. It is lightning fast and manages metadata in a very efficient manner. I wanted to show that the speed wasn't just fast because I had everything loaded into memory or disk caches so I rebooted the machine to show how fast I could get the containers (with tens of millions of objects in them) mounted and do queries against them when we had to load everything from disk.

Re:Classic theme

[Anonymous Coward]

When XP came along, everything was all bubbly and cartoonish looking. Two or three minutes of that and no thanks, I turned on Classic.

When 7 came along, it had Aero and everything was trying to be translucent and glassy and OSX-y. I disabled that in favor of Classic.

When 8 came along, Metro was introduced and suddenly everything was somehow even more flat/square/boring than Classic View. It's like the entire experience was designed for touch screens or people who hadn't ever used a mouse before. I disabled Metro in favor of Classic.

If you want to call me stuck in the 90's, that's fine. But Classic view is by far the most productive and functional interface in Windows, for me.

"That's cute" - Preston Garvy

[netsavior]

another settlement needs your help!

Re: Classic theme

[pgn674]

Most people in my area referred to the XP default theme as the "Fisher-Price Theme." In Windows 8, when there is a CD in your drive, the associated message says something like "Tap here to eject CD." It said "tap," even when you didn't have a touch screen. That is when I knew Windows 8 was designed for touch screens first.