Microsoft: No More 'Patch Tuesday' For Windows 10 Home Users 141
citpyrc writes: According to the Register, Microsoft is making some changes to how it rolls out updates in Windows 10. Home users will receive updates as they come out, rather than queueing them all up on "patch Tuesday." Business users will have the option to set their own update cycle, so they can see if any of the patches accidentally break anything for home users before trying them out. There will also be an optional peer-to-peer updating mechanism for Windows 10. Microsoft announced a service called Advanced Threat Analytics, which employs various machine learning techniques to identify malware on a network. As a premium service, top-dollar customers can pay for Microsoft to monitor black-hat forums and alert the company if any of its employees' identities are stolen.
Always turn off auto update anyway (Score:1)
Especially Android, where the motto "change for change's sake" seems to be the MO of many devs ( Page, Brin, and Zuck boy, I'm looking at you).
Re: Always turn off auto update anyway (Score:1)
You'll probably not be able to turn it off, just like so many other forced things you'll must have on your system (one drive, Skype, store, weather, maps, etc).
Re:Always turn off auto update anyway (Score:4, Interesting)
Not sure how Win10 will turn out once it's final, but in the preview editions, you can't turn off autoupdate. You only control your reboot schedule, somewhat. If MS pushes out a patch, you either disconnect from the Internet or you download it, eventually. If you have to roll back a bad driver that you got this way, it'll keep making you redownload and reinstall the driver, again and again, and there's no practical way to stop it without some serious PowerShell hackery that might break Windows Update entirely.
It's one of Win10's worst features to date.
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On all devices that like to auto update.
Yup. Patch Tuesday is followed by Bluescreen Wednesday, "We're looking into it" Thursday, "We've been unable to replicate it here" Friday, "No wait a sec..." Saturday, and "We think we've identified an issue on some machines" Sunday. By removing that nice fixed timeline, users will have to record when each update is pushed out, wait a week or so for the third rev of the update that may actually resolve the issues to be released, and then manually install it. Ugh.
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Business customers will simply get updates after 'home users'. Home users will be crash test dummies who will simply be blamed for configuring their machines poorly or using it insecurely. M$ is running into harsher more competitive and demanding business market and hence is working to look better for them, so the monopoly market becomes a crash test dummy market (with all their machines reporting problems back, basically paying to be lab rats).
Interesting (Score:2, Insightful)
It's interesting how this habit by Microsoft has become embedded in the IT operations of many companies.
It will be cool to see if what the effects are (ie. what breaks) with this change since it's "process" change much more than an a technical change. Often, that's where the biggest challenges are since dependencies and other factors are often invisible at first glance.
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It's interesting how this habit by Microsoft has become embedded in the IT operations of many companies.
I always thought it was the IT operations of many big companies that precipitated "Patch Tuesday"
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I'd be interested in knowing how often Microsoft updates Windows Server Update Services services
Not to be pedantic, but the question is how often Windows Update updates Windows Server Update Services services.
Re:Interesting (Score:4, Informative)
Except that I don't want "all my machines" patched next Tuesday - maybe my Dev boxes on Tuesday, my QA boxes on Wednesday, and if all goes well maybe my production boxes on late Friday night.
Setting this up is already possible via group policy.
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This is slashdot hairy they will bash anything MS related :-)
There is neowin.net is the anti slashdot for Windows folks.
But what the issue is according to Neowin is slow ring is subscription only. Many who like XP and WIndows 7 do so because it rarely updates. Windows 10 will have even and odd releases where home users will get blasted with updates and eveyr release and businesses can choose just odds or evens for a price.
Windows updates have notorious problems for crappy old enterprise apps. Luckily I have
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My tests of Windows 10 (Score:2)
Last week, I finally managed to install Windows 10 Preview on my new Winbook tablet - one that has 2GB/32GB of space.
A few of the things I found strange. For instance, in Windows 7 and 8.1, I could set My Documents to any drive I wanted - it didn't have to be locked on C:\ Which is particularly handy in this setup, where I have a mere 32GB, and Windows 10 requires that you have at least 16GB of free storage space in C:\ to be able to install in the first place. I had done that in Windows 8.1, and now
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Not icon colors. In Windows 8.x, in the metro side, you had 'themes' where you could change the color of the background of the icons (not talking about the desktop here), and have some of the themes they had pre-installed. It would also be the color of the login screen (not the wallpaper when it goes into standby). When you go to Windows 10, the separate screen for metro is gone (which people had been demanding), but now, there is no way to change the background color of the login screen. I had selected
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I'm guessing that there will eventually be a special upgrade path for small tablets; it will be even more necessary for the models with only 16GB flash. Instead of doing the usual install to the primary file system, they will replace the recovery/boot partition. On small tablets the recovery partition serves both purposes; they boot directly from the compressed system image in the recovery partition rather than installing Windows in the usual way.
The tricky thing will be to implement it so that user data an
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The above ideas are good. But for tablets - particularly small ones, they should have something in the installer that detects whether an SD card is available or not, and if it is, prompt the user and ask him where he wants the default documents, pictures, songs, videos, et al to go. It's not an issue if a tablet has 256GB of storage. But for even a 32GB, that's a lot. I doubt that the 16GB tablets will be upgradable from Windows 8.1 - even the ones that are on 32-bit OSs, as opposed to 64.
As it is
Are you sure that option isn't already on? (Score:3)
>> Home users will receive updates as they come out
Are you sure that option isn't already on? It seems that a couple of my older Windows boxes already spend most of their cycles on downloading, processing (scanning) and installing countless updates.
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The summary said no such thing.
random breakage (Score:1, Insightful)
> Home users will receive updates as they come out, rather than queueing them all up on "patch Tuesday."
So random breakage, then, rather than breakage on a particular weekday. Sucks to be a home user.
> so they can see if any of the patches accidentally break anything for home users before trying them out.
"if"? It's inevitable.
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> Home users will receive updates as they come out, rather than queueing them all up on "patch Tuesday."
So random breakage, then, rather than breakage on a particular weekday. Sucks to be a home user.
I'd be surprised if you can't still set the auto-update to work once a week (or whatever you want). It's just that from now on the patches will be sent out constantly.
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In the current Windows 10 beta, the only option you appear to have under the setting Choose How Updates Are Installed is "Automatic" and "Notify to schedule restart". It appears you have no choice but to get the patches as they're released, with the only exception being if you indicate you're on a metered connection (possibly useful loophole there).
I'll admit, I was a bit surprised by this as well. I understand the logic of pushing patches out as soon as they're ready to home users. "Patch Tuesday" was d
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Nothing in that article suggests that patches are 'forced' on users, only that they are available when they are done, rather than once a month.
Re:random breakage (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, no kidding. I predict Microsoft is 100% guaranteed to mess up a LOT of machines. I don't trust *any* vendor's patches on day one, and Microsoft even less.
If Microsoft thinks they're not going to be pilloried by saying "fuck it, we're updating your machine and rebooting now" they're idiots.
If Microsoft just goes ahead and does them, they're going to create a support nightmare as they'll fuck up machines left and right.
When will Microsoft learn that there is a reason why we don't trust them?
Sorry guys, but I'll apply patched and reboot my computer when I choose to, not when some idiot in Redmond decides for me. it's my property, not yours.
Re:random breakage (Score:4, Interesting)
Score "troll", seriously? Who among us here hasn't had to fix breakage from a drive-by update?
Excitedly waiting for my computer to break (Score:5, Insightful)
Business users will have the option to set their own update cycle, so they can see if any of the patches accidentally break anything for home users before trying them out.
Looking at the The Register article, apparently Terry Myerson himself actually said the above. So home users are now officially crash test dummies for Microsoft's quality assurance? Cool, buckle me up.
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WSUS anyone? (Score:2)
"Business users will have the option to set their own update cycle"
I've had that for a decade now. WSUS has been pretty easy to manage.
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So is WSUS going to still be an option? Because we have some sytems that certain patches break critical applications, so getting most patches is better than none.
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For the last several years you'd use SCCM instead of WSUS, but to answer the "heart" of your question: Yes. You will still have fine grained patch pushout control.
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WSUS itself is simply a role that is included in most server versions of Windows. SCCM is a separate product (although very handy if you have a lot of PCs to manage) and parts of it are included for free in some volume license agreements.
At my workplace, our volume license agreement gives us SCCM for free for managing
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More info here about the WSUS successor, and how it ties into system centre etc:
http://blogs.windows.com/blogg... [windows.com]
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If you preferred the old way then only reboot on Tuesdays.
"Monitors black hat sites??" (Score:2)
I was going to dissect the security service for not taking customer data importantly, but the linked articles have no mention of "Microsoft monitoring black-hat sites for employee credentials" at all. I don't know where the Slashdot article editor got that.
Advanced threat analytics is from Microsoft's acquision of Aorato last November, who's main product protected against internal threats by warning of non-typical login activity:
A compromised employee's mobile device exposes the organization, through Act
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Aren't drivers in new Windowses required to be "signed" or somesuch, for your own safety? So you can't use "modified" drivers in the first place.
Home PCs are fast disappearing (Score:1)
During the hayday people bought window
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It'll be your smartphone itself. It'll be your work computer and your home computer all on one device with a bluetooth or some other wifi connection to pass video to a full sized monitor keyboard and mouse.
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It will and it won't be a tablet or chrome book or netbook that replaces it, it won't even be an iPad.
It'll be your smartphone itself. It'll be your work computer and your home computer all on one device with a bluetooth or some other wifi connection to pass video to a full sized monitor keyboard and mouse.
Aint matching my dual screen monitors and my raid 0 ssd and i7. Yes I am an IT professional, but others who need real work done at home (the original IBM PC users) will keep it run office and a real screen.
No a crappy docking station with the mobile version of office won't suffice. At that price you might as well get the real PC.
However, Windows 8.1 is great on a surface or tablet and Windows 10 can do both and run ported Android and IOS apps. My guess is it won't be phone vs pc. It will be one where a real
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I think there's three markets here: (and my numbers are complete bullshit)
1. Joe Public, needs a web browser and perhaps a word processor (90% of the old PC market)
Solution: a cellphone, perhaps with docking station and external monitor (TV)
2. Advanced office user and 50% of developers and gamers (9% of the old PC market)
Solution: Something like the Surface tablets, with docking station and external monitor
3) Real power users and gamers with more money than sense (1% of the old PC market)
Solution: Workstati
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Still number 1 and 2 need a filesystem. Yes the newer office tries to save to Ondrive by default but still. Even Joe Public does Turbotax and needs a real PDF saved and not gone tomorrow on his Android phone.
A good keyboard is good too.
PC gaming market is growing believe it or not according to a statistic by maximumpc.com. Basically the newer consoles are gimped with atom like cpus and a growing millennial generation. It is growing too as developers and video users do need real towers.
Also it is nice to hav
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Still number 1 and 2 need a filesystem. Yes the newer office tries to save to Ondrive by default but still. Even Joe Public does Turbotax and needs a real PDF saved and not gone tomorrow on his Android phone.
Agreed, and this is where Windows and Ubuntu mobile devices have an edge over Android and iOS.
PC gaming market is growing believe it or not according to a statistic by maximumpc.com. Basically the newer consoles are gimped with atom like cpus and a growing millennial generation. It is growing too as developers and video users do need real towers.
I agree, but the question is really how big is that part of the market?
Also it is nice to have storage options to hook into cameras,phones, and external disks.
And again, this is where Windows and Ubuntu mobile devices win and Android/iOS loses.
This is a fad like the netbooks.
And this is where I disagree, the tablet market is established as BOTH a replacement and an augmentation to the PC and I think it will grow as the power and capabilities of these devices grows. (Note that Microsoft is no longer losing money on the Surface.)
Not to say tablets will vanish, but rather they do not constitute a takeover. It is like the truck and SUV phase that started in the 1990s. Remember? Do we not have cars anymore? No we have both.
Which
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I can bog down a core i7 with 16GB ram, with a SSD external drive for dedicated cache, etc.....in seconds with one decent render or Photoshop project with 4-8+ Smart Objects open.
And more and more...if you are even a decent hobbits photographer, you depend on post to do your magic and you can overload a computer pretty quickly ev
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I certainly agree with all that, but I also think that there's a spectrum there as well. Not all hobbiest photographers will need a real workstation, though many certainly will. Are they in that 1%?
Or perhaps my numbers are off and it's more like 75% 20% 5%?
In any case, the vast majority of people I know who are not software developers or visual artists could do all of their computing on a Suface, and certainly 80% of them don't do much more than web browse.
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Seriously, how long will it be before tablets have 32GB of RAM?
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And, quite honestly, by the time you disable the Romper Room crap, get a classic shell, and set it up to feel like a more classic Windows desktop ... it's absolutely fine on a desktop as well. But 100% of the stuff they have for tablets is pretty much garbage on a desktop if you do actual work on your PC. I utterly loathe the metro interface, and gave basically turned it off. So all the money Microsoft is spending "innovating" seems like garbage to me.
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Windows 10 on phones will do this exact thing. Google "continuum windows phone 10" for demo videos etc.
It's pretty cool.
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I don't have to buy a home PC. I've already got one. And I have no plans to get rid of it, since neither iOS nor Android is even close to replacing it.
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Home PC's are going no where.
No my phone is not a real PC.
What is happening is PC's are for the working people again and professionals and not just those who want to access facebook and browse the internet. Second, as we saw for the first time with WindowsXP refusing to die last year is that pcs are now stable and fast enough for light work use so why upgrade?
Poor people who are not educated who want to twitter with their friends may want a tablet and a nice phablet phone, but my pc is not going anywhere. O
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Now... not many are buying home PCs.
Because most people already have a good desktop or laptop PC at home. PCs do not change as much as they used to, so you do not need to buy a new one (or even upgrade your current one) every year like you used to (unless you play games and really want to have as high FPS as possible). A PC now lasts for many years for common tasks like web browsing.
On the other hand, tablets and phones change a lot, while the hardware may not change as much (or rather, as noticeably), you cannot most of the time upgrade to a
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Maybe one day eventually. But students and people who actually do any work are still buying them. Usually in the form of a laptop, but often desktops if they value power and performance and longevity over portability.
There is a large exodus sure... grandma might not need a PC now that she has a tablet. But nobody is giong to write a 10 page essay on a tablet if they dont have to.
The keyboard can be worked around with bluetooth... but the ability to multi-task-- collaborate with you friends in skype, while h
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Hmmm, I'd like that "set your own schedule", too. (Score:2)
So can set updates to install a few weeks after they get rolled out to everyone else. That way next time there is an update that hoses people systems like last August's I can find out before I get burnt.
What's with all the fuss? (Score:1)
This change is for home users, and as far as I know, most home users already have automatic updates set on their machines. The only difference is that it won't be delayed to next Tuesday.
For those like me who manually check for updates every month or so, nothing will change. That is, as long as we can still decide which update to install.
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Because one's a push model and the other is a pull model.
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I should add 'effectively'; of course technically, both are pull models, but you don't control most of the process on windows.
another reason Windows users hate updates (Score:1)
Oh goody. Back to daily reboots. (Score:2, Offtopic)
Things may have improved, but you still have to reboot for far too many Windows updates for a daily update cycle to be anything other than frustrating as hell for most people. Microsoft used to be hated for that before "Patch Tuesday" was started. I guess they never learned their lesson, and are going to drag the public kicking and screaming back into the daily boot cycle.
What a shame they couldn't have learned their lesson and either started issuing patches that don't require reboots for the most triv
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Fanbois downvoting, eh?
Have you ever bothered to read the notes on Windows 7 updates? You'd be disgusted to realize how many of them "may require a system restart". Over half. WAY over half.
Home users = beta testers ! (Score:2)
Yay (Score:2)
Oh joy. Now I get to reboot the computer a whole bunch of times a month.
I really wish Microsoft would figure out how to write an operating system that doesn't require a reboot for every insignificant update. I'm sure the Linux people would be happy to teach them.
Patch Tuesday was flawed (Score:3)
The big problem with Patch Tuesday was that most exploits from the following Wednesday on wouldn't get fixed for a month. MS should get rid of that.
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Yeah, it's really a shame that there's only one Tuesday per month. If only they had picked a different day...
Oh, no... (Score:3)
So... they will have to reboot daily from this point onwards ?
And wait for extra 15 minutes before leaving work ?
Oh god. Bring back patch Tuesday.
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Thank you Google, for your inflexible 90 day deadlines that expired a couple of days BEFORE patch Tuesday.
You can bet this came out directly because of those issues that Google published a few days early This way Microsoft can have patches ready ahead of time before the deadline, instead of having to wait for patch Tuesday.
Google: FYI, Windows users probably make
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The word you are looking for is "fewer."
...and therefore fewer people to sell.
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Oh FFS its mind blowing how you can be on slashdot and still be too stupid to figure out that you can just switch to manual updates. This is seriously a problem for you?
Windows Update is broken (Score:1)
On some machines it says "this update couldn't be installed", after a fresh windows installation.
For win 8 you have to turn to the shitty shop (or is it called market?) to install win 8.1
Windows Update is a horrible nightmare, to my disappointment they still don't kill it and make it better.
btw, has anybody tried updating a windows phone? What a f*ck. "downloading update", "preparing update", "updating", "restarting", "after update
LOL Microsoft (Score:2, Troll)
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On my windows 10 box running 10074 right this second:
-hit start button on keyboard
-type "ping -t 192.168.0.1" and hit enter
result: command prompt window with ping running against 192.168.0.1
-close that window
-hit start button on keyboard
-type "cmd" and hit enter
result: command prompt window pops up at c:\users\myusername
-type "ping (IP)" and hit enter
result: pinging
Exactly the same as in windows 7. The only difference is that it is ALSO running a search in the background and popping shit into the results
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Still didn't feel completely ready for Primetime (yet, anyway), but 7 was good, I have hopes for 10.
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To be fair to you, it doesn't LOOK like it will work due to the search results UI popping up. Just hit enter and I just about promise it will work!
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You don't need a "friend" inside Microsoft to actually try out the beta, you know. Anyone can sign up, download it, and use it. Millions of people are using it right now, and we've heard NOTHING about such stability problems. Buy all the popcorn you like. Windows 10 may have it's faults, but instability is not going to be one of them.
My IT folks wait *months* before deploying updates (Score:2)
My IT shop waits at least a few weeks, if not months, before deploying updates. For critical security updates they usually wait about 2 weeks after the patch tuesday that it comes out on. For everything else, they eventually roll them out, but it can take a very, very long time.
I'm not sure exactly what kind of testing they're doing, or if they are just waiting for users to download the patch and see if it breaks things (resulting in a rollback from MSFT), but we never have the latest and greatest anyway.
Ho
So we're back to daily reboots then? (Score:2)
Back to the days of Windows 98? Or do they plan to stop requiring a reboot for every stupid little patch they release...
The Microsoft Register? (Score:2)
This is probably good, but they're spinning it... (Score:1)
"Business users will have the option to set their own update cycle, so they can see if any of the patches accidentally break anything for home users before trying them out."
Stripping away the spin, updates will come out as soon as they're ready (which is probably a good thing on the whole), and business users will have to test and deploy them at that time, whenever it happens, rather than having a monthly scheduled day to do so.
That "option to set their own update cycle" spin is nonsense. If you do that, e
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Looks like the Apple Watch is burning people, literally
According to the manual, you're supposed to apply thermal grease and a heat pipe to your wrist before wearing the watch.
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Even so, most of the time the updates come out, there usually is at least one that requires a reboot. Compare that to Linux where only a kernel update requires a reboot (and as I understand, in the latest kernel versions it no longer requires a reboot).