Microsoft: Still a Thing

[Thad]

You’ll need a Microsoft account to set up future versions of Windows 11 Pro

Looks like they're finally killing the workaround that lets you create a local account if you're not connected to the Internet during setup.

Apropos of nothing: Windows 10 is supported through October 14, 2025, Google's pushing ChromeOS for obsolete computers, and Ubuntu and Mint are beginner-friendly GNU/Linux distros.

[Thad]

Here's a headline you wouldn't have seen twenty years ago: Microsoft open-sourced the code for 1995’s 3D Movie Maker because someone asked

[Mongrel]

[atog]

Corporate surveillance vs. an entire department copypasting the lyrics to "Take This Job and Shove It" into the signature field on every email or post

[Büge]

[atog]

call Shai-Hulud, find out

[Thad]

Whoa: UK’s CMA Blocks Microsoft’s Acquisition Of Activision Blizzard

[Thad]

Microsoft-signed “BGAUpsell.exe” pushes Bing on Windows and Chrome users

A new kind of Bing pop-up appears for some Windows 11 users, apparently generated by a Microsoft-signed executable separate from the OS's notification system.

Microsoft rep Caitlin Roulston told The Verge that this behavior was "unintended" and that the notification had been "paused" pending an investigation. It's unclear what the "intended" behavior of this notification was supposed to be.

[sei]

"You fools! It was supposed to be hidden in a DLL with other essential functions!"

[Thad]

Also I logged into work this morning and got a taskbar notification that Xbox controllers are now available in a variety of colors and just, just...what the hell are you doing, MS?

[Thad]

Windows-as-a-nuisance: How I clean up a “clean install” of Windows 11 and Edge

Among other things, it explains how you can still set up a login that's not tied to an online MS account.

The comments (once you get past the extremely helpful "just use linux/mac/whatever" posts) have some recommendations for third-party utilities that help with this stuff. I haven't tried any of them so I can't vouch for them but privacy.sexy and NTLite are two of the tools people have mentioned.

...I'm probably going to bite the bullet and install Win11 on a VM sometime soon. I need to do my taxes and TurboTax doesn't work in Wine. (I might be able to do everything online.)

[Mongrel]

We do our TurboTax online, yeah, but we're filthy poors enough that we don't need much in the way of the features you have to pay for and my understanding is that any complex taxes do require an install.

Not sure how wild your taxes will be after last year's estate roller coaster.

[Thad]

My taxes aren't particularly complex but my grandparents' are and the past few years I've used a spare license from the multi-license bundle they buy.

I still need to talk to my lawyers about the situation with estate taxes; not sure how that impacts this year. Since we won't actually be getting the payout until some point this year (I sure hope), that's going to mostly affect next year's taxes (and will hopefully be offset by the adoption tax credit).

[Thad]

Is the Arm version of Windows ready for its close-up?

tl;dr Maybe. It sounds like MS has made some real progress with x86-to-ARM translation.

Slack and Discord run OK on the Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3/Microsoft SQ3, and they'll run better on the X Elite. A lot of games just work, and Qualcomm seems confident that even recent-ish AAA titles will run fine (the company demoed Baldur's Gate 3 and Control in a recent tech session).

And some significant apps, like Adobe Creative Cloud, have Windows/ARM-native versions.

I'm still not going to go out and buy a Windows device, but this is still the kind of thing that stands to benefit everybody; breaking down compatibility barriers is a good thing.

[Caithness]

I wonder if they'll eventually bring Boot Camp back on the ARM Macs.

[Thad]

I don't think they even supported it on the Intel Macs for the last decade or so, but I guess stranger things have happened.