Microsoft Says It Will Release Two Feature Updates Per Year For Windows 10, Office (petri.com) 63
Microsoft is making a few changes to how it will service Windows, Office 365 ProPlus and System Center Configuration Manager. From a report: Announced today, Microsoft will be releasing two feature updates a year for Windows 10 in March in September and with each release, System Center Configuration Manager will support this new aligned update model for Office 365 ProPlus and Windows 10, making both easier to deploy and keep up to date. This is a big change for Microsoft as Windows will now be on a more predictable pattern for major updates and by aligning it with Office 365 Pro Plus, this should make these two platforms easier to service from an IT Pro perspective. The big news here is also that Microsoft is announcing when Redstone 3 is targeted for release. The company is looking at a September release window but it is worth pointing out that they traditionally release the month after the code is completed.
Why does Microsoft keep threatening us? (Score:1)
It is not like we do not know what to expect from them by now.
Re:And it... (Score:4, Funny)
Now Microsoft will have two yearly releases -- like Ubuntu has. I wonder if Microsoft will next introduce an LTS version of Windows.
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Of course they pretend to listen, the same way Apple pretends to care about the planet as said in a recent story
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You sound like you wish you were joking, but yes Microsoft did. They've had what they call an "LTSB".
You can't have it, though.
(I believe, a contract with them covering a minimum of 100 desktop licenses is needed, for the feature I had in Windows 98 of "don't install crap I don't want to")
In other words: (Score:1)
"Microsoft announced that it will make its bricking of random PCs a bi-yearly event!"
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Better Reliability? (Score:5, Interesting)
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Honestly that sounds better than what they've had for the last 10+ years: a troubleshooting applet that pops up spontaneously whenever something fucks up, spins for a minute acting like it's doing something useful, then tells you it has no idea what went wrong [youtube.com].
(Literally never in my life has that piece of shit solved a single problem.)
Don't Want 'Em (Score:5, Interesting)
Since 2013, all I wanted from Office and Windows was bug-fixes. Instead, their new "features" almost always amounted to taking some useful feature away, like how the Ribbon took away menus and truly customizable toolbars, like how the Start screen took away the Start menu in Windows 8 (ok, they fixed that, sort of), like how Settings continues to rob from the Control Panel with lesser capability, all messing up years of reliable workflow.
but the bugs remain. and File Explorer still doesn't have tabs. For what? 3-D in Microsoft Paint? There's plenty of that around already. Just fix bugs, Microsoft. Fix the damn bugs.
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Damn, I meant 2003! Fourteen years of this! Get off my LAWN!
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Now imagine those windows downgrades forced on you twice a year, no choice and you'll have to pay rent for them. Windows 10 is just so, so, bad. Make a desktop GUI like a mobile phone, to try to sell mobile phones and screw customer usability, not a problem, come into work one day and there it will be, no choice compulsory install. Remember how MSN would do full page ads, I mean full page, you could see nothing else, now imagine that on the desktop, how much could they charge for that full page ad and well,
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Damn, I meant 2003! Fourteen years of this! Get off my LAWN!
That's how I've felt about Office since 1997. The bug I remember from O97 is that if you had it on your second monitor, pop-up menus (in toolbars and such) would appear on the primary display...
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I personally LIKE the ribbon interface. The ribbon is a MUCH more efficient use of screen space compared to the old days where 2/3 of your screen could be taken up by various "toolbars". Since the advent of the ribbon UI, there's also been a considerable reduction in the number of nested dialog boxes. It took some time to retrain myself to use them, sure, but ultimately they have probably saved time by making settings more shallow. You can customize the ribbon UI probably just as much as the told toolbars, with the exception that you can't have a Word session open where you can only see 1-2 lines of text because you have a toolbar button for every function.
I know people who like the Ribbon, and there was a tendency pre-Ribbon for toolbars to multiply until they took up half the screen. But toolbars could be customized without limit.. you could even add pull-down menus, and a simple bitmap editor was provided to create your own icons. So, if you rely on a lot of macros, you could build custom buttons, ordered just right in a toolbar, nested in menus if necessary so a toolbar didn't get too long.
To my knowledge, you can't customize the stock Ribbon tabs... yo
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Yep, but you need to look at this from MSs viewpoint. If you stabilise your core product and start just putting out bug fixes people will exit the upgrade cycle and your profit goes bye-bye. On the other hand if you keep adding (cough) "exciting new features" (the hype carrot) and leave just enough bugs/irritants in the system to ever so mildly annoy people (the stick) you keep people hungry for the next release, and so the money keeps on flowing.
It's like built-in obsolescence for the software industry.
and I thought all they had to do was introduce a new file format.
oh. wait. they did that.
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Why do people think this will happen as MS says? (Score:2)
Reading Between the Lines (Score:3)
System Center Configuration Manager will support this new aligned update model
What does this mean, exactly?
SCCM has never needed to "support" an update model. Updates are published, WSUS picks them up, SCCM sees them in WSUS, and SCCM evaluates any ADRs you have set up (or you manually download updates, add them to groups, and deploy them). Later, you get a report about how compliance for a specific Patch Tuesday Software Update Group has fallen below your threshold of 99% (SCCM doesn't let you generate a report that expects 100% of your clients be up to date) because SCCM constantly forgets about a client's status for a deployment and never properly removes all the expired/superseded updates.
Will I need to update the MDT & AIK every 6 months? Will I need to update SCCM every 6 months? If so, how long will SCCM 2012 (non R2) be "supported" for whatever versions of "Windows 10"?
Setting up SCCM is a nightmare and a half and I am not going to fucking upend it every 6 months. The transition to 2012 SP2 broke all custom reports and the onyl fix was manually replication the new, unnecessary, and asinine SID translation layer they added to all the standard reports.
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are you being intentionally dense?
you don't run or manage SCCM, you have microsoft do it in your cloud first deployment model, with cloud first outsourced management vendors, and it along with all your os's and applications continually change just as you and your end users get used to it after bitching for 6 months.
this is the a way for MS to stop people from bitching about the same thing for more than 6 months. they tried a 18 month bitch cycle (8 to 8.1 to 10...) but their software engineers have realized
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I see "cloud first mobile first" on a regular basis where I work. It disgusts me.
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its interesting that no one says, productivity first, or functionality first, or support first and god forbid security first... but we do have a cloud first, mobile first.
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The icing on the cake is that they're saying 2 different things are "first".
Waffles first, pancakes first.
Good move on their part (Score:5, Interesting)
One of the things that "IT Pros" as Microsoft calls us have been complaining about is the unpredictable nature of updates to Windows 10 and Office. It sounds like this is a nod to the fact that not everyone is using cutting-edge software that updates at the same pace, or using common consumer applications. Corporate IT is still very different from consumer IT. Most places have started modernizing, but the reality is that big companies aren't ever going to be going at the same pace as web startups delivering a consumer phone app.
Large companies and niche users of Windows still need to deal with compatibility problems, and knowing that Microsoft isn't going to change the way the OS works randomly from month to month gives IT groups time to test applications. You might say that only LUDDITES use desktop software and that everyone is using Apps! But, even though Apps! are becoming more prevalent, companies aren't ditching every single desktop application. Some have been running for ages and don't really need Appifying, or require significant costs to Appify. Before Windows 10, Windows was all about backward compatibility and a stable platform. That changed as they were chasing the mobile phone market, but maybe they're seeing that they have to cater both the consumer and corporate user now.
If Microsoft really plans to not make money on client OS licensing for upgraded versions anymore, maybe this is also an attempt to rein in the constant stream of new feature development they must be doing. Adding features just for fun at a rapid pace is a recipe for security vulnerabilities...developers don't want to be bothered with writing something secure when something functional will do.
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no one asked microsoft to add features just for fun. MS did so to make you want to spend money previously. win10 is not free and if you have an EA its not gotten any cheaper.
Its time that MS made a split between consumer and commercial, Os and Application, they are too big and they are failing.
heck they could easily fix the negativity they have introduced with tiles and telemetry but no, some psychopath in charge can't admit to be wrong and every one has to suffer.
maybe they will figure it out after a while
Can we get better naming for the windows 10 update (Score:3)
Can we get better naming for the windows 10 updates like windows 10.1 10.2 10.3 or even windows 10 sp1 sp2 sp3
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Yes they have that but it needs to be more obvious.
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Look closer at those version numbers. Here is a hint: 1703 was released in March 2017. It's actually meaningful and better than just arbitrarily incrementing by one tenth.
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better idea (Score:3)
Strip windows to the minimum and move applications (Paint, Edge, ...) to the Windows store or whatever they use as a replacement for apt-get.
And also cleanup the mess that is c:\windows\winsxs (often dozens of gigabytes for no reason)
Re: better idea (Score:1)
Twice yearly roll out of incompatibilities - 1 (Score:2)
Written in bits - too much and a stupid lameness filter stops it.
Now that Microsoft has got a large number of machines being upgraded when it wants it can start to roll out code that breaks other systems; be they those who are still running old versions of Microsoft Windows (ie not 10) or those who run non Microsoft operating systems or applications. Eg Linux and LibreOffice. They roll out applications that handle a new file or wire protocol in March and then make it default in September, removing use of
They're positive (Score:2)
They don't know what's going to be in future feature updates, but they're sure as shit not going to be backwards compatible.
They couldn't be more obvious as trying to move to OS-as-a-Service aka "We own you, pay us every month".
I would like the "no telemetry" one next (Score:2)
Otherwise I wil continue to have zero interest in the Win10 spyware. Next up: The ability to block updates forever or my interest will still be very low indeed.