[oedenfield]

MS employee here - the new Microsoft is: Enable (make sure open source runs well on MS platforms) Integrate (make sure MS platforms work well with open source) Release (release key MS technology into open source) Participate (commit MS engineers to participate in communities)

[loudmax]

That's encouraging, and it's fantastic that MS is moving in that direction and that new stuff like VS Code runs Linux. But outside of Silicon Valley, a lot of the world still depends on old stuff like MS Office and SharePoint. Outside of the startup scene the biggest challenge for many of us running Linux is still working around Microsoft's proprietary protocols and file formats.

Please continue moving in this direction. There's still a ways to go.

[tunap]

Yeah, but turning workstations into spyware platforms is not the direction anyone outside of big data would consider anything close to the right direction. They are looking to make large inroads into server side where they have historically struggled, and are succeeding, until they control and dictate that market, too. They are patient and calculating, give it time.

[BentFranklin]

Nice of you to say but what about this:

https://eugene.kaspersky.com/2016/11/10/thats-it-ive-had-eno...

Obviously Kaspersky isn't open source, but the tiger's stripes certainly haven't changed.

Also, Microsoft bundling Windows 10 upgrade malware into its security update channel has turned me off Microsoft, probably forever. Still don't understand why installing 10 after being told not to isn't a CFAA violation.

[ocdtrekkie]

Kaspersky's claims that Microsoft doesn't give them enough time to ensure their software is compatible doesn't really ring true for me, because between the Release Preview, Slow, and Fast rings, people can get their hands on Microsoft OS versions long in advance of Microsoft pushing them out to consumers.

Having a limit on the number of antivirus products a computer has makes sense, antivirus software often causes conflicts with other antivirus software, and a large amount of security software on a PC causes it to run very slowly, as duplicated scanning efforts take up a majority of drive performance on the slow 5400 rpm hard drives shipped with most consumer PCs today.

To be clear: Antivirus companies have acted like a plague on Windows computers for a long time. They use scare tactics to convince people to spend money on placebo-effect tools that rarely protect them from the type of malware they actually are likely to encounter.

One of the favored strategies is to bundle on new PCs with a short trial, and then tell people they won't be protected unless they subscribe. People aren't told that if they just remove the third party product that was preinstalled on their PC, they'll have perfectly serviceable antivirus.

That isn't to say Windows 10 doesn't have issues that still bother me, but let's just say that Kaspersky crying about them doesn't bother me much.

[guardian5x]

That's actually an example of Microsoft making Windows better and offering standardized APIs for anti virus companies. Of course not everyone of them likes it, they have a tradition of messing with the OS in bad ways.

[blahi]

Kaspersky and all of the AV vendors deserve to get wiped out.

[BentFranklin]

I'd like to know why you think that, and also if you think that W10's unstoppable updates is the right way.

[intern4tional]

Not the grandparent, but I think the issue is that people want clients to have an uptime that is comparable to a server.

Windows Server has controllable updates and reboots. Win 10 - is a client OS and wasn't designed with the same level of hardening and shouldn't have the same uptime requirements.

The challenge is convincing the general public of this; people want a Ford Fiesta with the speed and features of a Audi R8, meaning they want the best of all worlds at reasonable cost and no penalties.

By forcing updates on clients, MS has eliminated a generation of machines being owned by various botnets. They've also made it relatively cheap to get a server in Azure should you have a temporary need for uptime (like a research project for a week).

That aside, some portions of those updates are bad (like removing functionality, pushing telemetry, etc), but the overall strategy of auto updating isn't a bad idea if they can convince people to adjust to it and use Server when they need stability.

[ionised]

Probably not wise while Windows Defender is so crappy in terms of analysis and detection.

[SSLy]

>Release (release key MS technology into open source)

Will you help wine devs with some source code?

[brongondwana]

Hi there MS employee - can you tell me if you're ever going to send anyone to CalConnect events again? We've been struggling to get contact with anyone we can talk to about making sure IMIP interoperates, even just the basics.

Of course there's still the licensing situation of FAT32, ActiveSync, etc - it's hard to interoperate when the other party will only speak restricted protocols.