Microsoft Is Amazing

[yogi]

I never was all that enamored with Windows 10, but perhaps it's time for me to adjust my thinking. As you may recall my experience with "Windows As A Service" is via Microsoft's beta testing program. They call it their Insider Program, which means I'm an insider, of course. Being such gets me the latest nightly build of Windows 10, which is released roughly once a week. As is the case with all beta software, some of it may not be working up to par. Thus, Microsoft provides a Feedback application wherein you can tell them what you like and don't like. It's interesting to read the feedback because it gives an insight into exactly what kind of people are using a product of unknown quality. It's a lot like using Linux, but Microsoft is being more honest about what they are doing.

Anyway, I'm currently on the 16th iteration of Windows 10. I've provided feedback in the past, both good and bad, but stopped doing so about six months ago. I just got lazy and became too involved with my personal life. However, I have been keeping up with their Insider's Blog and have been updating to the latest and greatest beta release. Somewhere around two or three generations back, the gurus in charge of the Insiders Program decided to make a small change in their browser app. They fixed it so that you could not make any browser other than the native 'Edge' browser the default. I've been ignoring that because I use WaterFox (a clean version of FireFox) and have it set to perform more or less only one task. But, Mozilla keeps advising me that FireFox is the bees' knees and I should try it. I didn't want to mess up my main system (Windows 7 desktop) with a new browser which prompted me to install it into Windows 10. I removed all of the old browser and installed Firefox 56, or something. It works well and I'm still evaluating most of it, but I neglected to change the setting inside FireFox which makes it the default browser. I figured I'm beta testing Windows and should use their recommended software as default, but I kept getting these annoying notifications from FireFox saying I should make THEM the default. I put up with those messages for a while because I was not sure I'd keep FireFox on the laptop. After a few weeks I caved. I tried to set FireFox as the default browser.

Checking the option box from inside FireFox took me to the Windows 10 settings. From the settings I could set my default apps. Sure enough, Edge was the current default browser. The pull-down menu listed Firefox as a possible alternative, but when I selected Firefox I got a notification. It said Edge was designed to work with Windows 10, and won't I please try using Edge first. I clicked the "change anyway" button and was brought back to the base settings page. There was no way to use any other browser as a default, which is what they said they were going to do in their blog way back when.

Frustrated by all this I went to the Feedback Hub app and to my surprise found only one other chap who was looking for an answer to the same problem. All the answers I could find simply explained how to go into FireFox and change the option. But, I already knew that does not work. I then commented on the sole questioner's entry. I said something to the effect that apparently Microsoft in it's infinite wisdom made it impossible to set any other browser but Edge as default. I further stated that this isn't going to make me use Edge any more in spite of the setting I can't change. I left the Feedback app in a huff.

I realize that I'm a single 'nobody' allowing Microsoft to gather my personal use information for whatever purposes they chose to do with it. They claimed all along that they ONLY use the telemetry to improve the product and sell it to nobody nor use it for nefarious purposes. Yeah. Right. Less than a week after I left my sarcastic remark in the Feedback app, a new release of the evaluation copy for Windows 10 came down the fast lane of my update schedule. No big deal. It was Thursday and that's typically when it happens. After the update completed I went into Firefox first. I changed the option to make Firefox the default, and nearly died on the spot when it accepted the change. I went over to the system settings, and sure enough. Firefox was now the default browser.


Coincident? I think not.

[Kellemora]

There may be a legal issue about msWin10 blocking other compatible web browsers.
Part of or spin-offs from the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act, maybe?

[yogi]

I know that the Edge browser is suffering from the same lack of acceptance as was Internet Explorer. Microsoft would be more than willing to encourage people to use it any way they can. They are particularly demanding in Europe about not being tied to Microsoft's whims, and that was the inspiration for Magnusun-Moss, I'm sure. However, for all intents and purposes the version of Windows I'm using is experimental. I doubt the law applies to Insider editions - there are no warranties with beta versions after all. I agreed to help Microsoft debug their lame browser, and I'm not forced out of using anything else. It's just that I could not set FireFox as the default browser until sometime after I made that comment in their Feedback Hub. I'm getting the impression that they actually read what people put there.

[Kellemora]

I saw on another website they released an upgrade for Win10 that is supposed to fix a lot of the problems most folks are having with it. Especially those who upgraded from Win7 or Win8 to Win10 and didn't install a fresh version.
I know my wife's computer is lower than molasses in the dead of winter, and it has a faster CPU, more RAM, and a faster HD than anything I have, other than the Silver Yogi of course.
I would die of frustration if I had to use her computer for anything serious.

[yogi]

The first Windows Insider Preview installed fresh and wiped out the Windows 7 that was on the laptop. I've had the misfortune of trying to recover a few times since, but have never been able to do it successfuly. Thus I've made a couple or three fresh installs of Windows 10 on my own. I have the latest .iso so that I don't have to download anything but the updates since the .iso was released.

I don't know what to tell you about slow computers. Microsoft has recently made a few critical updates to eliminate a processor problem Intel has had since day #1. That has affected both the desktop and the laptop but not significantly. The system response on the laptop is fair and one day I might try installing Win10 on my super computer just to see how fast it is. I'm pretty sure that when I can't use Windows 7 anymore I'll be migrating to Linux Mint; I love the Cinnamon UI nearly as much as Windows. LOL I haven't decided yet exactly how I'll configure things, but I know that I'll have a very hard time justifying paying for a Windows 10 license. Besides, I like surprises and will probably stick with the beta OS until they end the program.

[Kellemora]

I did some calculating a couple of years ago on how much it would cost for me to switch to Windows and buy all the proprietary programs like the Linux ones I use now.
It came out close to 6,000 dollars if I recall correctly.
Plus a few of the things I do on Linux simply cannot be done on Windows. Tried to do same on Debi's computer a couple of times and never found a way to get them to work.

As far as desktops go, I prefer the Mate desktop over Cinnamon. It's more like the old Windows XP desktop.
I don't have a Schmartz-Fone, so am not used to having a desktop cluttered with program icons. I prefer the Tree type of layout.

[yogi]

If you think $6k software conversion costs would be a lot for your individual purposes, think about what it costs big companies to simply upgrade. Of course most of them benefit from bulk discounts of the licensing, but they still are spending tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars just to keep current. I agree fully with your conclusion to not move over to Windows if it cannot perform the tasks you need to do.

I'm pretty sure that Linux Mate was indeed designed with Windows XP in mind. If I recall correctly that was a talking point when it was first introduced. I find it awkward to use, but I am in love with the tree directory structure prior to Windows 10. I think perhaps Linux Mint is a good compromise in that regard. Then again, my needs are minimal. The only reason I'd keep a copy of Windows running after my version reaches it's end of life is to play the games that will not play on Linux. In fact one or two won't play on Windows 10. I don't like the idea of using X-box which is what Microsoft is building into their latest and greatest.

[Kellemora]

We have numerous PC games for Windows XP, plus my wife has hundreds she bought as on-line access through BigFishGames.
Of the ones we have on CD that will no longer work on Windows10, they will still work in Wine on Linux. Plus one other Linux gaming platform I forget the name of off hand.
Windows 7 did have a selector to select which version of Windows you wanted to run something in. If it is Win10, we've never found it.
The benefit of having the on-line games is you can download them to play, and they somehow make the older games work on Win10, although the size is not right, even if you change your screen resolution back to the CGA days sizes, hi hi.

I may not use a program but perhaps once or twice a year, like CAD/CAM.
Or every couple of months to design a new book or portfolio cover.
I do work on photo's quite often. Restore old photo's and the like.
I also do a lot of genealogy work as well.
And a lot of accounting.
AutoCAD, PhotoShop, msOffice, Genealogy Software, and Quickbooks Pro, alone will set you back about four grand.
I find some of the Open Source software to be more logical and easier to use than proprietary software, but not all.
I don't particularly like Gramps as much as I did Family Tree, but Family Tree went way out of my price range long ago. So now, everything is placed on Ancestry, which is not a genealogy program, merely a way to display genealogy records.

You probably remember all the things we could not do any longer after the frau upgraded to Win10.
Most of our photo files are saved as tiff files to prevent data loss. Win10 cannot open a tiff file.
Heck, it can't even open ms's own PCX files anymore. At least Linux can open all imaging file types with ease.
But the best part is, Open Office and Libre Office, plus QCad, Gimp, and GNUCash are all FREE, as is Linux.
Although I do donate a little when I can to help cover the programmers design time.

[yogi]

I know that you mentioned in the past that you had trouble viewing .tiff files in Windows 10. I don't understand why that would be the case. https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/win ... 7af315d237 I figured it would be a normal function for Microsoft Photo Viewer; that's how it's done in Windows 7. Apparently they carried it over to Windows 10 and you can change the file association to Paint if you care to. Unfortunately I don't have any .tiff files to verify my suspicions.

As usual, you don't have to use the native Windows software. There are third party offerings for editing images and all you need to do is find one that can handle .tiff. You would still need to change the file association, but to your third party app in this case.

Early on in my first experiences with Linux I thought I'd learn GIMP and use a FOSS image editor. I'll admit that GIMP is quite a versatile program, and versatile to the point of almost being useless. Doing simple things like saving a .gif to .jpg became a project instead of a few mouse clicks. GIMP did everything I could want to do, but it was cumbersome doing it the GIMP way. I guess they had problems with doing things that somebody else didn't copyright already, and I abandoned GIMP for PSP in Windows. It cost me $65 for PSP Pro, and I don't regret it. For my purposes it's a lot easier to use than GIMP. To be fair, however, the learning curve in PSP takes as long as it does in GIMP. It just seems easier to use once I get past that.

I am not surprised that old gaming programs will run in Linux WINE. I've done it myself using their XP or Windows 7 compatibility mode. The problem is that WINE is very limited in what it can do. I had a game installed in WINE that would make calls to open a browser. WINE could not handle anything but IE 6 and I could not figure out how to upgrade to a real browser. Using Play On Linux wasn't any better. By the time I looked into it I was already frustrated with WINE and perhaps didn't give it a fair evaluation. In any case both WINE and PlayonLinux were very buggy and not the kind of thing I wanted to deal with. If a game is specifically designed to run on Linux, then it works well. Playing a Windows game inside of Linux is risky at best.

[Kellemora]

I used to have a WindowsXP graphics conversion program that worked perfectly all the time.
It is how I converted my large hi-resolution tiff files to jpg's to copy them to CDs for distribution to family members.
The program could convert any known image file to any other image file, except vector graphics. Didn't matter if it was Apple/MAC, or ms image files, like pcx.
One of the reasons I stored most of my images as tiff, is because this was the output of the early scanners I owned. I also learned that tiff was a lossless file saving system. So this is what all of my primary image files are saved in.
Good thing too, because when I got hit with the ransomware, it only affected jpg and pcx files, didn't touch a single tiff file.

I rarely if ever have time to play PC games anymore. But if I do, I just play what the frau has on the desktop on her PC.
We have a few games that would not work in Wine, or Play on Linux either.
This is why I set up a Virtual Box and installed Windows XP on one of my Linux computers. I also installed Windows 3.0, Windows 3.1, Windows 3.11 and three versions of Windows XP. XP, XPpro, and XPproMCE.
Unfortunately, that was on one of the computers that died a few years ago.
I never fully became proficient at using Virtual Box, it always gave me some problem I couldn't find a solution for.

A number of years ago when we talked a lot about VB, I took a clean computer and loaded a basic Linux program and then installed Virtual Box. Then all the OSs were set up in Virtual Box, including the several Linux versions I was trying out.
My thought was backups would keep everything simple and easy to restore. But I learned this was only true if you create a new VB of an identical size, or possibly larger before you tried to restore.
But the biggest problem I had was I found I could not print to printers, or connect to other computers on the LAN, even though I had no trouble connecting to the Internet.

Now I just do everything on Debian! I do have Linux Mint on one machine, I like it, but it won't install on all my computers for some reason. Same DVD is used for the installs, so it's not the DVD. Since Debian installs on all of them, this is the one I use as the main OS on each computer.

[yogi]

I'm still not comfortable with the concept of virtual machines. I get the main idea, but it requires thinking out of the box to appreciate the "virtual" part of the VM. System images or recovery disks in the virtual world are pretty much the same as in the real world. You do indeed need to create a virtual disk before you can restore or transport an operating system. And, yes, the new virtual disk must have the capacity to take the image you try to give it. Snapshots can be reinstalled on the existing machine, but then you lose all the work after the snapshot was taken. This actually works out well if you are doing risky experiments and need to go back to a point before the experiment. It's better than the Windows' restore point feature.

Virtual printing is no problem. The same drivers you would use on real machines work in virtual machines. I make my VM's with a bridged network interface instead of creating a virtual network card. I end up using the host's card for all network operations in this case. This comes in handy when I want to mount shared network file systems - such as my NAS. I have also created shared file storage via the VM software. That's a little trickier given it has to be preexisting. It may be possible to create shares with VM software exclusively, but that's one of the things I've not figured out yet.

Oddly enough I never used Linux as a host for virtual machines. This could explain why I don't have some of the problems you have seen. I'm thinking that using Windows 7 as a host for Linux VM's would be one way to extend the life of the obsolete Windows OS. Then again, that would be like running WINE on Linux; good for only certain things.

[Kellemora]

I thought you were running this website in a Virtual Machine?
Maybe I'm thinking of another website?

Wish I was smart enough to create a Cluster, hi hi.

At my age, and after two heart attacks, I'm just trying to make sure all of my important data is available to read by others on Windows machines. I have massive photo files with images for numerous relatives and ancestors, etc. Not to mention all the other data I'm always asked for things from.

Hoping to get everything saved to one place, and only have one backup of that place, while keeping all of my other saved places for my own use.

[yogi]

There was a time, back around the Windows 98/Vista era (I forget which) when I hosted my own web site. Apparently the hosting software was native to the version of Windows I was running at that time. It worked fine until hacking became entertainment for the average high schooler. In that circumstance it may have made sense to run a web site inside a virtual machine in order to sandbox it and prevent hacking into the host computer. When Brainformation Forums was in it's prime, there were way too many users for me to tie up my own computer. I could not afford to buy a dedicated server back then. Thus I found a hosting service that served me well for the entire life of this web site. All I know is that they are using a Linux based server per my request.

A dozen years ago Microsoft could not be trusted to serve a tennis ball, much less an enterprise business website. Today Windows servers are pretty well matched to Linux performance. But, rightly so, Microsoft is focusing on its core competency instead of trying to compete with the likes of IBM. Software is what Microsoft does well, and that is what "The Cloud" is all about. Thus, Microsoft (Azure) is right up there with the big guys. You can rent storage space in the cloud, but you can also rent virtual computers on which to run your business. If you can afford it, it's a grand idea, virtually.

You have asked about cloud storage a time or two, and I'm certain that is where the future is. You would have quite a task ahead of you to convert 5.25" floppies into cloud storage quality data, plus making it readable by anyone with a smart phone would likely be cost prohibitive. However, that is your legacy. It may be worth the effort to preserve your life's work, perhaps with a little help from an expert in such things. Then, too, like everything else it's likely to be very expensive to do such a thing. So, I'm guessing your only recourse is to save the old data AND the old hardware on which it works. Spend your time writing manuals on how to retrieve the data from the vintage equipment. It would be up to the reader to figure out how to preserve it beyond that.

[Kellemora]

Most of the old programs have been replaced with new. It was all the data I had stored on 5-1/4 floppies I worried most about. But I did take the time to move almost all of them over to CDs which I stored, only to find CDs are NOT for permanent storage. A good portion of the CDs I made are no longer readable. Fortunately I still kept the 5-1/4 floppies and used an older machine that a 5-1/4 drive still worked in and spent a few days copying almost all of those with data to a hard drive, then backed up the hard drive to an external, and to the NAS that fried. I still had the external and backed it up again.

The frau bought a VHS to either CD or DVD recorder, forget which now. She copied all of her home videos, and quite a few of the VHS movies we bought. Almost all the home videos copied just fine. But only a few of the VHS movies copied. Don't know if there was a feature on the VHS tape that prevented copying or if it was just too much going on, or just bad media.
By my way of thinking, the device should record what we see on the screen, or at least show us on the screen what was recorded, not what the VHS is putting out, so we know it was working. It should work like a screen shot, but I don't think they work that way at all. Don't much matter now, that machine broke before it was even a year old.

Back in the WindowsXP days, I purchased an elaborate program to write sheet music, only to learn you could not print out the sheet music. It looked like a sheet music page, but played the music as a MIDI and allowed you to adjust the instruments until it sounded exactly the way you wanted it. You could then export the song as a MIDI file without the sheet music part going with it.
Almost as soon as I got done doing over 150 songs by hand, a note at a time, and getting them just right. MIDI players changed how they worked and the songs sounded horrible.
I went back and fixed a few of them so they sounded good on the new MIDI player, and thought this was a good time to convert them to MP3. None of them sounded anywhere near what I expected doing the conversion.
I was fortunate and found an old MIDI player and simply played each piece of sheet music and recorded directly from the speakers. At least now I had a digital copy of several of my favorite songs.
I've seen several MIDI music score writers still out there and available, most of the good ones are for Windows of course. But I don't have time to start messing with anything else right now. Way too many irons in the fire already!

[yogi]

If I understand it correctly, screenshots are captured pixel by pixel. The pixel data is stored in memory as raw data and then sent to some formatting routine, i.e., jpg, gif, png, etc. to make it ready for storage. I won't pretend to know how VHS is formatted, nor any of the others, but streaming video is not simple. DVD, CD, tape, hard disks, et al, are just memory spaces in which to store the formatted data you have collected. Thus the conversion from VHS to any other format is a process separate and apart from the formatting of a given storage device. That is why I suggested keeping the old hardware alongside the old data storage devices. They are compatible. Today's memory devices and storage techniques may or may not be compatible. But, it seems that you already know that.

About a dozen years ago I found some 8mm movie reels that I shot when I was a teenager. I don't know how many thousands of feet of movies I have on celluloid , but only a few hundred of it was of interest to me at the time. I took the reel of interest to a fellow who claimed he could copy it to a CD formatted disk. It was expensive but the memories on those films made it worth it. He had a setup where he could project the 8mm onto a small screen inside a box. He then captured that screen information (probably with a web cam) and saved it to a CD. He added music and some titles to the track. The end results were stunning given that I figured it would be impossible to play back the very old 8mm originals. He said it will last forever as long as I keep the film stored inside the metal cans. That's nice ,but I don't have a working projector nor am I familiar with video editing.

You are correct to say CD's do not last forever. They deteriorate over a short period of time, although I've never had one fail due to old age. Then again, I've not tried to play back that 8mm film conversion from the CD in many years. I should check on it and move it to a hard drive for safe keeping.

I worked with a fellow who was a music synthesizer enthusiast. He also took a liking to those expensive Apple computers: Lisa, I think, was her name. Apparently Lisa could create and playback sheet music. I don't know about printing it out. It's possible printers were not invented yet in those days. LOL He loved it and did a lot of composing with whatever software he had. There were some quirks in the software, but I don't recall what he complained about. Regardless, I'd find it hard to believe that something better is not available today in 2018.

[Kellemora]

The third large 11x17 flatbed scanner I purchased, not only had an area for 8 Slides at once, but also Negatives from 8mm up to size 620 film. The Negatives area was the full width of the scanner, and backlit. So, if you had an 8mm filmstrip or roll, you could copy 11 inches of it at a time, then stitch it back together again.
I did not buy the software program that allowed one to play or edit filmstrips, but I remember the documentation regarding same showed it had extensive capabilities. Speed of playback, ability to add sound, remove scratches, etc.
At the time, I though almost all video software could handle it, so never saw a need to fork over the big bucks.
I really never got into video anything, as for as shooting or editing videos.

The main reason I bought the 11x17 scanner in the first place was to copy my sheet music so as not to take the originals with me on gigs. Almost all sheet music is printed on large sheets probably to prevent easy copying.
A number of years later when I was working at the Loop Lounge as a musician, I reduced the size of the sheet music images so they printed on 8-1/2x11 paper. When you are used to seeing something in one size, then look at it at a slightly reduced size, it can throw you off when playing. Twice someone stole a couple of my self-printed binders while I was taking a break. If they intended to copy and distribute them as fake books, I hope they got caught.

[yogi]

The notes of music can be difficult to read if they are too small. You are trying to read the notes at a distance much greater than a book would be read, for example. It's likely not a problem for young people with good eyes, but the more seasoned players would appreciate the large paper format. The world is full of crooks and the ones who stole your sheet music are just as vile as the rest. In some respects it could be a compliment. They must have liked your music enough to want their own copies.

11x17 sounds like a standard drafting paper size. A-size?? I can't imagine using a scanner of that size to copy even 50 feet of celluloid. The process of piecing it all together would be painful even with the appropriate software. At one time i purchased a single slide copy machine. All my wedding photos are on Kodachrome and I thought it would be great if I could put them on CD/DVD instead. I ran into an unexpected problem because the slides apparently were intended to be copied without the paper frame they are put in at the professional processing store. Thus the copies were slightly out of focus. Plus, the color was not true. I spent hours, literally, trying to 'shop' a few of them, but it was very poor quality and nothing like the original. A few years later I met somebody who does that kind of thing for cash. He advised me that I had to get specialized pro equipment to do a good job. My $100 copier was junk. I could not argue with him on that point.

[Kellemora]

Hmm, both my Musetek and Microtex scanners had a raised spot to set the slides over. It had curved internal corners and a lot of my slides were square cornered. But they all came out in perfect focus and for the most part, the color was true.

I too used the white box method when I had a slide projector, but only got fair results due to the poor quality of the digital camera.

I could never afford an 8mm film scanner, I didn't have that many to scan anyhow.
Even on my 11" scan width 8 and 16mm slots, it seems it only took around 1/2 hour to do an entire home camera size reel, the stitching was automatic as long as you kept advancing the film.
However, most of the times I used it, it was to select only certain segments to get a single still image I wanted for a photo album.

Of all the actual photographs I scanned in those early days, I redid all of them I could when I had more advanced and higher resolution scanners. Now all the photo's are saved in file folders under each persons name, and in some cases under events also. The nice thing about having digital copies is, you can save a copy under each title you need to save it under.
Like a group photo can be saved under each persons name in the photo.

[yogi]

Most likely your slide scanners were of a better quality than the one I picked up. Of all the film photos I have, or had, the only ones I'd personally want to preserve are the pictures of my wedding. That was kind of a special day. Perhaps my two daughters would like copies too, but I doubt they would not get much viewing. Every time I thought about reproducing them, I could not justify the effort.

I never considered capturing stills off the 8mm films. That too seems like a lot of work for very little return. When mom passed away she left behind literally thousands of photographs. I saved maybe 10% of them, and even those are packed away and out of sight. Now that I think back on it, I'm convinced it would be pointless to preserve all the photographs I have. The good news is that most of my collection is in digital form. Nobody is going to ever find them on my computer and they will not be burdened with the task of sorting them out. They'll just toss the computer into the recycling bin and end that story.

[Kellemora]

I still have thousands that are not yet organized the way I would like.
Many group photo's because I don't know everyone in them, and tons I scanned and put into a folder unsorted.
Everything takes time, so I do what I can when I can.
For each of my cousins, and immediate family, I made a special collection.
It wasn't that hard, because the only person in the groups of pictures that changed was the bottom most family.
And if I did have photo's of the wife or husbands family, I added those also.
It was nice for many to see the images of their ancestors.
I used to publish like a telephone and address book for those living, and included a family tree in the back.
Seems not to many were interested in getting it anymore so I quit doing them.
I put our family tree online on Ancestry and sent each family member a link to it.
I don't think a single person bothered to go look at it. Sad really.