SORTED :) Windows After XP Sux big time.

[StainlessS]

Micro$oft's plan for world domination via subterfuge (again)

Visual Studio Code is designed to fracture :- https://ghuntley.com/fracture/

Meanwhile, from a product perspective, people will try out Gitpod and, unfortunately, experience product papercuts
in the expected value of Visual Studio Code and how users expect the product to function because the developer experience
of Gitpod can never match the seamless developer experience of Visual Studio Code or GitHub Codespaces because the
Visual Studio Code open-source source code is a venus fly trap that is designed to fracture and lure people in...

[StainlessS]

Google, Microsoft can get your passwords via web browser's spellcheck
Extended spellcheck features in Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge web browsers transmit form data, including personally identifiable information (PII) and in some cases, passwords, to Google and Microsoft respectively.

While this may be a known and intended feature of these web browsers, it does raise concerns about what happens to the data after transmission and how safe the practice might be, particularly when it comes to password fields.

Both Chrome and Edge ship with basic spellcheckers enabled. But, features like Chrome's Enhanced Spellcheck or Microsoft Editor when manually enabled by the user, exhibit this potential privacy risk.
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/google-microsoft-can-get-your-passwords-via-web-browsers-spellcheck/

I use FireFox, but now hate it on Android, If I wanted a Chrome look-a-like, I'de use Chrome.

[StainlessS]

Don’t Spy on Employees to Ensure They’re Working, Microsoft Says
Even though new communication tools are putting bosses in closer contact with employees, Microsoft wants execs to know that workplace surveillance is not the answer to boosting productivity.

https://www.itprotoday.com/end-user-platforms/don-t-spy-employees-ensure-they-re-working-microsoft-says

Micro$oft seems to have flexible views, considering that they sell a proxy server whose specific purpose is to spy on employees.
They can see where you go, bank acc passwords and everything else too, it pretends to be the employee machine and so everything gets decrypted for the proxy,
kinda like a man-in-the-middle malware software. (communication between proxy and employee may also be encrypted, so the employee machine thinks its safe).


Employee <== encrypt/decrypt == > Proxy-[EmployerSeesAll] <== encrypt/decrypt ==> Bank


My mate used to work as sys admin for a prestigious UK corporate employer using that proxy, just recently he got 'let go'.
He would never go anywhere he should not on work computers, neither at work, nor at home
[he had a bunch of work computers at home], and would even switch off his work phone when not at work
otherwise he was tracked wherever he went.
[1984 is a long time gone]

EDIT: Man-in-the-middle attack:- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man-in-the-middle_attack

EDIT: In FireFox, on Doom9 you will see a little padlock to the left of the URL, this is because it is using HTTPS and externally verified secure stuff, [it used to be green but no longer is, by default].
That closed padlock shows that you are not being passed though a spying proxy and that comms are secure.
If you hover over the padlock it will say something like "Verified by Lets Encrypt", meaning 'secure'.
If using FireFox and that little closed padlock is not there, then never access your bank account from there.

Micro$oft Internet Explorer (and presumably Edge) do not have that padlock thing, would be kinda silly of them to let employees know that they are being spied upon when
using a Micro$oft spying proxy. I guess that the dominance of HTTPS now (instead of just HTTP) is maybe part of the reason that M$ has changed its view,
and recognises that its spy proxy is no longer as viable/stealthy as it once was. [of course, an employer could ban installation/use of FireFox on their spying proxy network]

Wikipedia, HTTPS:- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTPS
HTTPS creates a secure channel over an insecure network. This ensures reasonable protection from eavesdroppers and man-in-the-middle attacks, provided that adequate cipher suites are used and that the server certificate is verified and trusted.
The FireFox padlock thingy is additional checking of security, over and above HTTPS, and implies secure communication between only two parties [no man-in-the-middle spyware].

EDIT: Apparently Chrome browser also uses the padlock whotsit.
And here, more on FireFox Padlock & other used symbols, from Mozilla:- https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-do-i-tell-if-my-connection-is-secure

[FranceBB]

Micro$oft seems to have flexible views, considering that they sell a proxy server whose specific purpose is to spy on employees.
They can see where you go, bank acc passwords and everything else too, it pretends to be the employee machine and so everything gets decrypted for the proxy,
kinda like a man-in-the-middle malware software. (communication between proxy and employee may also be encrypted, so the employee machine thinks its safe).

Hardly news, but yeah, you're right in mentioning it for those who might not know.

Let me also tell you this: if you use Microsoft Teams, HR will be able to read any message you send, including those sent in private groups and private conversations. There's a tool called eDiscovery which allows HR to search for any conversation made by every employee. For instance, if they go to your account and type "kittens" eDiscovery will show each and every chat (public and private) in which you mentioned the word "kittens" and will show the timestamp etc. Oh and don't think meetings are safe either: there's an option to search on transcripts too, so even if you said the word "kittens" in a meeting, it will be reported (but of course it will be shown as a transcription and HR will know that it might be wrong as it has been automatically transcribed by Microsoft.

Oh and of course they can see all your activities, like how many meetings you had in a day, whether you participated or not, if you turned the camera on (no, they can't see your face or the recording of the meeting, don't worry about that) and Microsoft will tell them IF you were actually looking straight into the camera or not.

I'll disclose something (which I shouldn't, but heck, I don't care). Some of my colleagues used to be called and contacted over and over again.
To avoid to be contacted during their coffee break (10 minutes, really, which is fair if you ask me), they used to put a "fake" meeting called "Coffee Break" so that they would appear all as "Red" so as "In a meeting" on Teams etc and no one would actually bother them for 10 minutes so that they could have coffee together.
Well, long story short, they were all caught and scolded.


Now, on to the proxies.
Almost ANY work-computer will have in its settings something that looks like: http:// something /autoproxy.pac

that "autoproxy.pac" is the auto-proxy.
What it does is basically match your Active Directory account and allow you to visit some websites or deny some others and rest assured, anywhere you go will be tracked as it goes through the company's proxy.
This happens anywhere, like literally in any company in the world.

Of course, depending on how much a company wants to "see" there can be different level of logs.
For instance, some companies install different kind of sentinel software to know if you plugged USB sticks to prevent you from "stealing" work-related documents, some others just disable USBs from the BIOS/UEFI, some others install stuff I won't mention for legal reasons but while they're officially meant to protect you from threats and protect the company's intellectual property, the amount of logs they keep and the number of times they "phone home" on your activities makes them essentially legal trojans. Like, they can keep a list of which programs you have installed, which programs you use most, how much time you spend on each program in a day etc.



As a piece of advice, people, IF it's a company laptop, use it for work-related stuff only and assume that everything you do is being recorded.
Behave like you should, like a good employee and nothing will happen.
DO NOT use it to browse your stuff, even if they're innocent stuff like if you wanna see a certain YouTube video or if you want to check which lineup your favorite sport team is gonna have for the game in the evening, 'cause perhaps nothing will happen, but everything is recorded and if they wanna use it against you, they will!


That's my 2¢

[StainlessS]

Not just 2c, gotta be at least a good 10c worth.
Scary 5h1t.

[Katie Boundary]

Long story short, everyone should have switched to Linux when extended support for Win7 ended in 2016.

[FranceBB]

Long story short, everyone should have switched to Linux when extended support for Win7 ended in 2016.

Yep, which is why I'm happily on Fedora 36 x64 with several VMs if I need Windows, including my beloved XP.

[Katie Boundary]

Virtual machines need better GPU emulation. Have you ever tried watching low-res videos at fullscreen in a VM? They use nearest-neighbor resizing rather than bilinear! And 3D gaming support is atrocious.

[FranceBB]

Virtual machines need better GPU emulation. Have you ever tried watching low-res videos at fullscreen in a VM? They use nearest-neighbor resizing rather than bilinear! And 3D gaming support is atrocious.

Yeah, I know, it's painful to watch.
The problem is that those features are driven by investors (I mean paying customers in case of VMWare and partners in case of Oracle). Unfortunately, given that they almost exclusively use them to host servers, databases etc, they didn't progress in GPU emulation that much as they don't care.
During the pandemic there's been one notable exception, namely VMware Horizon, which is essentially a special client that allows you to connect to servers running very specific VMs on ESXi that have some kind of NVIDIA passthrough (no, they don't passthrough the GPU directly, but they basically allow the VM to access a virtualized proprietary NVIDIA card with decent 3D acceleration support so much so that software like AVID Media Composer runs).
Anyway, that's unfortunately nothing a normal home user will ever have or use...

As to home user things, 3D support in Virtualbox is outrageous. Things improved slightly when they moved from the old VboxVGA to the new VboxSVGA, but still having an OpenGL wrapper between guest and host translating things back and forth is really really really bad, especially 'cause it's slow and unoptimized.


Well, in a nutshell, virtual GPU support in Virtualbox is appalling and there's nothing we can do about it... :(

p.s if you'll ever switch to Linux, DO NOT use an NVIDIA GPU. Unfortunately NVIDIA doesn't give a *bleep* about open source and all their drivers are closed source. Why is this a bad thing? Easy, it has tons of bugs and may (or may not) behave with newer kernels, so either you stick to the very same kernel NVIDIA built its drivers on OR you update and test your luck (hint: it might not even boot). There's the Nouveau project, but it's not an option 'cause NVIDIA made it impossible for the open source drivers to re-clock, so if you use the Nouveau drivers (although stable, sort of) the GPU will always run at the slowest possible clock rate, hence making everything useless. For this very reason, devs don't invest much time into Nouveau, so even support for things like OpenGL is not so great, let alone Vulkan... So, if you get NVIDIA, you'll end up stuck between a slow, poorly supported, stable open source driver OR a proprietary, potentially bugged, boot-failure-prone closed source driver. I made that mistake in 2016 naively thinking I could use CUDA and all the other fancy NVIDIA things on Linux just like I do on Windows and I regret it to this very day.

[Katie Boundary]

My desktop uses an nVidia card and it never had issues with Linux... speaking of which, I need to get around to nuking its hard drive and reinstalling everything again because that's apparently the only way to get rid of the Win10 bootloader.

[FranceBB]

My desktop uses an nVidia card and it never had issues with Linux...

Uhmmm... but it's not a modern card, surely, is it? O_O

[Katie Boundary]

Well the desktop was specifically designed and built to be compatible with XP, so it's a Geforce 700-series. Does that change anything?

[FranceBB]

Well the desktop was specifically designed and built to be compatible with XP, so it's a Geforce 700-series. Does that change anything?

It does.
Anything older than 900 series will have the re-clock enabled. In other words, the GPU will run at its maximum possible speed just fine 'cause at the time NVIDIA wasn't being a *beep* (bad word starting with the letter "d") and didn't require everything to be signed to interact with the firmware.

I have a GTX 950, so no luck for me... :(
But yeah, the things I said above luckily don't apply to you.

[Katie Boundary]

OK cool.

Going back to the subject of virtualization, isn't Virtualbox open-source? Someone should make a fork of it with a halfway decent virtualized GPU. Proper video scaling would also be nice so I'm not playing games in a 640x480 window on a 1600x1200 screen.

[FranceBB]

Going back to the subject of virtualization, isn't Virtualbox open-source? Someone should make a fork of it with a halfway decent virtualized GPU. Proper video scaling would also be nice so I'm not playing games in a 640x480 window on a 1600x1200 screen.

It is open source, but it's not a matter of making a fork, it's a matter of writing drivers, so it's even easier.
For instance, take Windows 98SE.
It isn't officially supported by Virtualbox, so there aren't any Guest Addition, therefore, it technically shouldn't even run, but it does 'cause people wrote graphic drivers for it to interface with the default VBoxVGA.
In the same way, someone could just write an open source driver for Windows XP to use VBoxSVGA instead of VBoxVGA and it would work just fine.
Why hasn't anyone done it?
Well, 'cause 90% of users are moaners who don't contribute and the remaining 10% is almost entirely made by Linux devs, so... :(

I'd love to contribute, but writing a driver is far beyond my skills, so the only thing I do is testing and bug reporting... :(

[Katie Boundary]

Well if we're going to write drivers, then we might as well just write ones that'll allow XP to run on modern bare metal.

[StainlessS]

Well, I finally did it.
Got the impulse to chuck my last XP machine, 10 minutes later it was in the skip.
Damn, cant test any XP stuff anymore, maybe I shoulda thought of that, too late now :(

[FranceBB]

Well, I finally did it.
Got the impulse to chuck my last XP machine, 10 minutes later it was in the skip.


Noooooooooooo :scared:


cant test any XP stuff anymore

The XP lovers community just lost one of his most valuable members... :(

[StainlessS]

I can probably pick up XP laptop for maybe £25.00 or not much more, and takes less space than massive tower case with lotsa drive bays.
Maybe I do dat.

EDIT:
Nope, CEX, Cash Converters, and MorganComputers.co.uk, dont got none :(
Well I've got 3 broken XP laptops, maybe I fix one of them and chuck the others. [Thinkpad].
EDIT: And there is always the car boot sales, I aint been to one since Wimbledon Stadium car boot closed and
they built a housing estate on it [not the tennis place, dog, and motor cycle racing stuff].

[Katie Boundary]

There's still quite a market for XP-compatible hardware. Never chuck anything. Sell it on eBay or craigslist.

[StainlessS]

Nah, I dont ever bother selling anything, might dump stuff at charity shop though, but laptops broken.
Guy at end of street fixes computers/laptops, I might dump em on him.
e-bay, nope, never used it, refuse to have any doin's with paypal.
(No idea what craigslist is, please dont tell me :) )

takes less space than massive tower case with lotsa drive bays.
At a car boot, I once saw a server case (I think, with only mother board and ginormous PSU) that I could easily have climbed inside and shut the door.
(mine was not as big a that)

EDIT: "ginormous", a cross between gigantic, and enormous.

[Katie Boundary]

No idea what craigslist is, please dont tell me

It used to be a site where people would try to find other people to catch STDs from, but 99% of the ads would just be from bots collecting email addresses to sell to spammers. Then FOSTA/SESTA happened and now it's just for finding boring shit like houses and jobs.

[manolito]

Since I have no intention to give up Windows 7 any time soon, this warning message ennoys me quite a bit. I found a REG entry in a German forum which disables this message:

Disable Chrome Win7 Warning.reg

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Google\Chrome]
"SuppressUnsupportedOSWarning"=dword:00000001



Cheers
manolito

[filler56789]

Since I have no intention to give up Windows 7 any time soon, this warning message ennoys me quite a bit. I found a REG entry in a German forum which disables this message:

Disable Chrome Win7 Warning.reg

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Google\Chrome]
"SuppressUnsupportedOSWarning"=dword:00000001


Just stop using Gluegow's Chrome, then problem = solved :p

Windows 7 is much greater than Chrome.

If you really need or want a Chromium clone, then I recommend Opera or Vivaldi.

[manolito]

Not sure if I understand you correctly, but all I want is to keep using Win7 together with Chrome without getting these annoying messages. I have no need for fancy chromium clones.

[filler56789]

I have no need for fancy chromium clones.

Then you shouldn't need Google Chrome as well. :)
But the registry trick is nice, of course.
Me too uses a similar registry trick to stop an annoying and useless splash message in the olde and goode Adobe Reader 11. :sly:

[StainlessS]

Tanx mani, might come in useful one day (when I get sick of Firefox).

[StainlessS]

These poor guys are getting scammed out of millions of dollars,
https://www.wired.com/story/cybercrime-hackers-scams-forums/

There is just no justice in the world.

[StainlessS]

Windows 10 permanently disable Windows Defender Antivirus.

EDIT: Below assumes that you use some other alternative anti-virus software.


"!!! README - BEFORE USE !!!.txt"

When YOUR antivirus is enabled, M$ Windows Defender antivirus should be disabled.
When you disable YOUR antivirus, then Windows AV will be re-enabled, You may want to disable BOTH.

So, with yours disabled and M$ AV enabled, do as below:

Before using the W10_PermanentlyDisableWindowsDefenderAntivirus.reg,

In Windows 10
settings/
Update & Security/
Windows Security/
Open Windows Security/
Virus & threat Protection/
Manage Settings/

Turn off Real Time Scan, and Anti Tamper Protection. (and click "dismiss" wherever it appears)

It is now TEMPORARILY disabled, but may switch back on after reboot (or an auto update).

So apply the registry edit & REBOOT, is now permanently disabled.

###########################
To undo,

With YOUR AV DISABLED,
apply the W10_ReEnableWindowsDefenderAntivirus.reg

REBOOT

Go to setting/ ... / Windows Security/
where it will likely show "Virus & threat Protection" is OFF, so Turn it ON.

Go into "Manage Settings", and just check that both Realtime Scan and Tamper Protection are both ON.

(I would also prefer to reboot again at that point)

##############################

You can check current status of Windows Defender AntiVirus in PiriForm's "Speccy", 'Operating System' TAB.
https://www.ccleaner.com/speccy/download
[ Same guys that produce the popular CCleaner software (Crap Cleaner) ]


"W10_PermanentlyDisableWindowsDefenderAntivirus.reg"

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

; Disable Settings Realtime Antivirus scan, and Tamper protection, then run the registry edit command.

; NEEDS REBOOT AFTERWARDS

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows Defender]
"DisableAntiSpyware"=dword:00000001



"W10_ReEnableWindowsDefenderAntiVirus.reg"

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

; NEEDS REBOOT AFTERWARDS, then re-enable Virus & threat Protection.

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows Defender]
"DisableAntiSpyware"=-

EDIT: There is also a GPEdit.msc (group policy editor) fix for W10 Pro, but above is perhaps easier and works for home too.
EDIT: I prefer to keep my Firewall and Windows Defender Firewall both active [at least at this minute I do], will maybe switch off later (busy doing loads of new setups).

[kalehrl]

There seems to a stripped down version of Windows 10 called AtlasOS:
https://atlasos.net/

[StainlessS]

There seems to a stripped down version of Windows 10 called AtlasOS:
https://atlasos.net/
Interesting,

By downloading, modifying, or utilizing any of these images, you agree to Microsoft's Terms. None of these images are pre-activated, you must use a genuine key.

Anybody actually tried this, I believe M$ owns GitHub, so is likely to be kosher.

EDIT: From on their forum:- https://forum.atlasos.net/d/71-activation-of-windows
Activate using your key

Make sure your key is pro
My main i7 machine is Home :(

EDIT: On GitHub:- https://github.com/Atlas-OS/Atlas

EDIT: Seems to be some kind of NtLite project, take official ISO image and strip bits out of it.
NtLite:- https://www.ntlite.com/

I have sometimes used NtLite (and older NLite for XP), can take lots of testing to do it right, these guys must have spent a long time and a lot of testing on it.

MSMG_ToolKit is a similar-ish thing to NTLite [The GUI aint as pretty as NTLite, text console based]:- https://msmgtoolkit.in/

[StainlessS]

Just a little hint here:

One of my pet hates about W10 (and W7) Windows Explorer [renamed/rewritten as File Explorer in Vista+] requires clicking upon folder to reveal contents
and so requires a click even when traversing folders with keyboard.
I've only just discovered that Open Shell Menu (fork of Classic Shell) has separate settings for the file explorer,
is the torquoise shell icon in uppen RHS corner.
Can change "Basic Settings", "Auto Navigate to the selected folder" and set to Always, and no longer has the brain dead W7/W10 behaviour.
[EDIT: Might also want to enable "Disable Breadcrumbs" and enable "Show Status Bar" if not set as such]

Anyways, I guess many already know this, but if I totally missed those settings, I presume that it is always possible that others have too.
Above one of the main reasons I always disliked Vista/W7/W10 file explorer,
I've used Classic Shell/Open Shell Menu since 1st installing Vista, and cannot believe that I've totally missed this bunch of settings until now.

EDIT: Not this link [latest is Beta], see link at bottom of post.
https://open-shell.github.io/Open-Shell-Menu/

Enjoy, I will.

Shell icon @ top RHS
https://i.postimg.cc/sXfvgR8d/Untitled-00.jpg (https://postimg.cc/Ffq9TwND)
It went a bit weird for me after change and until after reboot.

EDIT: Latest STABLE is OpenShellSetup_4_4_170.exe (I was using a recent beta by mistake)

Latest STABLE:- https://github.com/Open-Shell/Open-Shell-Menu/releases/tag/v4.4.170

EDIT: To see that Shell icon, you have to tick Menu/View/Options/Classic Explorer Bar.
[Thats why I've never noticed it before, musta switched it on by accident - I guess there is something to be said for reading the docs]

[Katie Boundary]

I'd be much more interested in Atlas if it came with OpenShell and other programs to restore the Windows Classic theme.

[StainlessS]

Oh no!, its started again.
Microsoft reportedly shows full-screen Windows 11 upgrade ads with two 'yes' buttons:- https://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-reportedly-shows-full-screen-windows-11-upgrade-ads-with-two-yes-buttons/

[hello_hello]

There's a few different stripped down versions of Windows 10 and 11 floating around, similar to Atlas. Tiny11 and and Windows X-Lite are a couple that come to mind.

The hard drive in my old Win7 laptop died a few days ago, so after I replaced it I installed Atlas to give it a try and it's been okay so far. I might replace it with one of the stripped down Windows 11 versions at some stage though.

And yesterday I finally pulled my finger out and built a new PC. I've put the full version of Windows 11 on it for the moment at least, but through Atlas I discovered Rufus (https://rufus.ie/en/). It's great for creating a bootable USB flash drive for installing an OS, and for Windows 11 it removes a couple of annoyances such as the Secure Boot requirement and the need to create a Microsoft account.

I'll confess I'm not overly hating Windows 11 so far, although I've only started playing with it today. I expected to hate it, probably even wanted to hate it, so I'm somewhat surprised I'm not hating too much. At least not yet.

[hello_hello]

I've played with it some more and I'm still not hating Windows 11 as much as I expected to, although the logic behind removing an optional "show desktop" icon for the taskbar eludes me.

I'm pretty sure I've disabled all the security annoyances I need to, except for the firewall nag that pops up after each boot. Anyone know how to disable that notification after disabling the firewall?

There's also an Edge security annoyance I haven't found a fix for... being questioned about the trustworthiness of downloaded files such as exe's.... although that's probably no big deal because I won't be using Edge for browsing anyway.

The Windows 11 taskbar and start menu were close to being deal-breakers. I'm not sure if it's been mentioned here, but ExplorerPatcher (https://github.com/valinet/ExplorerPatcher) can return the traditional taskbar buttons along with some other tweaks. I removed most of the crap from the start menu so it just opens up with an alphabetical programs list and none of the "recommended" crap.

I guess the days of opening menu items with a mouse click are behind us (referring to a program's menu bar items) and we'll spend the rest of our days navigating through iphone/android style menus no matter how dumb it is if you're using a mouse and monitor. Now if only there was a home-screen button like the one on my phone.....
Many/most sub-menus seem to ignore mouse clicks now and simply open when the cursor is hovered over them, so one of my favourite tweaks for fixing the menu hovering lunacy now breaks them instead (using a long value for HKEY_USERS\......\Control Panel\Desktop\MenuShowDelay).
Menu lists that expand/collapse by clicking on an arrow still respond to a mouse click, obviously, but so many more of them feels wrong to my brain for a desktop OS, although I'm not quite sure why that is yet.

Switching to Linux for my day-to day OS has been fairly painless so far. I've not used Linux before so I had no idea what the degree of difficulty would be. Obviously there's some learning involved but that's what search engines are for. I went with MX Linux rather than Mint because Mint doesn't include drivers for my MB and CPU/graphics yet, whereas MX Linux does, so that was the easiest way to jump that hurdle. The one program I didn't want to replace is working fine under WINE (aside from MPC-HC which I'll miss), so now I'm ready to tackle the frame serving obstacle.... Avisynth (and/or VapourSynth, which I haven't used before anyway).

The internet seems to be generally of the opinion that Avisynth running on WINE works quite well, but what about the native Linux version? I know nothing about installing or using it, or even if it uses the same plugins as the Windows version, so any advice would be very welcome.

[Emulgator]

And may i mention WinSetView for useful Explorer settings which are hard to tweak via registry in Win10
Finally getting rid globally of "File Type" column, making room for my preferenced columns: file name, file size, change date.

[VoodooFX]

The internet seems to be generally of the opinion that Avisynth running on WINE works quite well, but what about the native Linux version? I know nothing about installing or using it, or even if it uses the same plugins as the Windows version, so any advice would be very welcome.
For Linux you would need Linux plugins.

[Katie Boundary]

Oh no!, its started again.
Microsoft reportedly shows full-screen Windows 11 upgrade ads with two 'yes' buttons:- https://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-reportedly-shows-full-screen-windows-11-upgrade-ads-with-two-yes-buttons/

Windows isn't the product anymore... we are.

[flossy_cake]

Windows 11 upgrade ads with two 'yes' buttons:- https://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-reportedly-shows-full-screen-windows-11-upgrade-ads-with-two-yes-buttons/

It's not just that there are 2 yes buttons

It's that the word yes has been replaced with got it :mad:

[kromak]

Following this thread with interest. Although I stopped using Windows in 2010, part of it still misses it and someday, when I have time and more free space on HD, I will reinstall it.

I miss RealPlayer, Quick Time player, RealOnePlayer and even Windows Media Player, besides countless games and also hardware and gaming utilities :)

And I also follow this thread not only with interest, but also with sympathy :)
As a user of a very old linux distro, I definitely know how frustrating and annoying can be trying to use an old operating system with contemporary software :mad:

[StainlessS]

Was getting a
"Some of these settings are hidden or managed by your organization message showing on Privacy Settings page"
message from Windows 10 settings for Location,
I musta done something to disable location, but turning location back on in "OO ShutUp" (windows privacy blocker whotsit)
did not re-enable location stuff in settings.
OO ShutUp:- https://www.oo-software.com/en/shutup10

So, I found this with search,
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/some-of-these-settings-are-hidden-or-managed-by/0f43eb7c-b01b-4615-8cf7-db047ac044aa

And from it I extracted this registry editor stuff to force re-enable of just Location. (it would re-anable ALL telemetry stuff if following above link instructions).

ForceAllowLocation.reg (works OK on Home/Pro)

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\LocationAndSensors]
"DisableLocation"=dword:00000000
"DisableWindowsLocationProvider"=dword:00000000
"DisableLocationScripting"=dword:00000000

And after a reboot, it re-enabled my location again in settings.

Reason for wanting Location available to apps:-
I was trying to download W10 Home/Pro,
English International, 20H2, v2 (October 2020 Update) December 2020, (actual English version rather than the "English" version which is actually USA version).
I was using Heidoc Windows ISO downloader (allows to find Windows 10/11 current and older version ISO files for both x86 and x64, also for Dell ISO's and Office ISO's + more).

HeiDoc Main:-
https://www.heidoc.net/joomla/
Microsoft Windows and Office ISO Download Tool :-
https://www.heidoc.net/joomla/technology-science/microsoft/67-microsoft-windows-and-office-iso-download-tool

It provides with either download direct, or copies to clipboard the web address on M$ servers (you can check address is M$).
Anyways, for the said ISO's it was giving me some message from M$ about the ISO not being available in some regions (Russia ???),
and because location was OFF, would not give me the address of ISO. (hence my need to switch location on).

Anyway, perhaps of use to somebody.

EDIT: The ISO addresses provided by M$ are valid only for 24 hours.

EDIT: x86 Heidoc Windows ISO downloader, dont work properley on 32 bit system (Just hangs, long time broken, x86 on x64 system unknown if broken).

EDIT: If you use M$ ISO download site, it will only give you the most recent ver$ of W10 ISO link, you currently cannot download older version W10 ISO's.
The Heidoc utility is the only way I know of to obtain older W10 ISO's.
You should also do google search on the MD5, SHA-1, SHA-256, or SHA-512.
Here is one of the many HashCheck utilities:- http://code.kliu.org/hashcheck/
And another:- https://github.com/gurnec/HashCheck
https://i.postimg.cc/LnPp5fHJ/Untitled-00.jpg (https://postimg.cc/LnPp5fHJ)

[StainlessS]

Further to previous post,
EDIT: x86 Heidoc Windows ISO downloader, dont work properley on 32 bit system (Just hangs, long time broken, x86 on x64 system unknown if broken).
Just tried Hiedoc ISO downloader on x64 tablet/laptop, same thing, just hangs, but works fine on my x64 desktop machine.

No idea what the problem is.
Anyways, I can just copy the (valid 24 hour Microsoft) links and download lotsa ISO's for free in the pub.

I also had to force enable Location on my tablet/laptop, and it actually did not require a reboot for location to work ok after registry fix.

EDIT:
No idea what the problem is.
The Tablet version of the ISO downloader does seem to attempt to display some kind of an advert,
I think it is quite typical of some mobile devices being lumbered with ads where desktop apps are not,
so perhaps the problem lies in the fact that I have both AdBlock Origin ad blocker, and also have ads blocked via
the hosts file on both x86 and x64 tablets, think that is maybe why it stalls on my tablets.

[StainlessS]

By the same guys that do OO ShutUp posted 2 posts previous.

O&O AppBuster: Bust Apps you do not want!:- https://www.oo-software.com/en/ooappbuster


Did you notice that Microsoft, along with Windows 10 and 11, also installed a set of apps by default? Some of them make sense and are useful, but some of them are not manufactured by Microsoft, rather by third-party vendors. O&O AppBuster gives you the control back over your Windows again! Now you decide which apps you want on your computer. To make it as easy as possible for you, we’ve divided the apps into categories and give you tips on which apps you can safely remove or reinstall with one click and which ones you should leave.

O&O AppBuster is entirely free and does not have to be installed – it can be simply run directly and immediately on your PC. And it will not install or download retrospectively unwanted or unnecessary software, like so many other programs do these days – no crapware!

Seems to work just fine and maybe easier than using NTLite or MSGM_Toolkit to remove junk apps from a W10 install ISO.

You can uninstall an app (eg games) first for current user, and if nobody else is (no other account) is using it, then can remove entirely from the machine.
Last update about Apr/May 2022. (4/5/2022, which ever way around they post dates)
Removing apps from the computer makes then unavailable, they are deleted from their secret hiding places,
although for some you may be able to re-install via the MS Store.
(I've even managed to remove Cortana without any sign [so far] of problems, and Cortana is supposed to not ever be removeable)

Maybe a good idea to do a system restore point beforehand (although I never have).

https://www.oo-software.com/oocontent/uploads/tour/ooapb-en/04.png

Might be a good idea to run as Administrator, though (IIRC) it seems to work ok without that.

[StainlessS]

Here an old-ish (circa 2019) tutorial for using previously posted Heidoc Windows ISO downloader tool:-
https://dellwindowsreinstallationguide.com/downloading-all-mainstream-builds-of-windows-10/

[kolamorx]

In Windows XP, how can I get rid of the blue borders around a non-maximized window? (Like in Windows 10)
18379

[StainlessS]

I've no idea what you are talking about, but, for those that may,
best post your image on some image host, I use PostImages.org [no account necessary].
https://postimages.org/

Images can take forever to get admin approval on the D9.

[kolamorx]

The borders are the frames around the edge of the window. These consist of the top, bottom, right and left sides of the window.
How can I get rid of the borders?
https://i.postimg.cc/k5bdGNP2/s.jpg

[StainlessS]

(Like in Windows 10)
Just for us stupids, how do you do it in W10 ?

[StainlessS]

Maybe in Windows 10 you use that Snip And Sketch thing [I aint ever looked it and usually uninstall it during Windows setup].

Not sure if this is using the above Snip And Sketch thingy in W10, [no idea if works in XP]
How to take a screenshot of part of your screen

Here are instructions for taking a screenshot of part of your screen in Windows and on a Mac.
Windows

Press “Windows + Shift + S”. Your screen will appear grayed out and your mouse cursor will change. Click and drag on your screen to select the part of your screen you want to capture. A screenshot of the screen region you selected will be copied to your clipboard. You can paste it in any application by selecting Edit > Paste or pressing Ctrl + V, just as you’d paste a full-screen shortcut taken with the Print Screen key.

https://www.contractsafe.com/support/how-to-take-a-screenshot-of-part-of-your-screen

ALT / PrintScreen key copies to clipboard, the Active Window, but has Window border. [
https://helpdeskgeek.com/how-to/how-to-take-partial-screenshots-on-windows/

EDIT:
How can I take screenshots in windows xp or older versions?
https://www.quora.com/How-can-I-take-screenshots-in-windows-xp-or-older-versions

EDIT: Snip & Paste, * Free. Customizable. Portable.
https://www.snipaste.com/index.html#