OT Windows 10

[rbowman]

Considering the Whack-A-Mole game you need to play to keep 10 off a 7 machine, I see no way a relatively naive user is going to avoid MS re-introducing the spyware.

[Don Y]

And you are relying on Windows to honor your wish NOT to enable updates.

Do you likewise rely on windows 10 NOT to track your activities -- simply because you *told* it not to? Which activities constitute tracking in YOUR mind? Are you sure MS doesn't have a rationale for those *particular* activities "to provide better service", "to assist in troubleshooting problems", "to..."?

You said: "If you're going to enable Windows Update then you're probably leaving your students to be tricked into Win10." I replied: "I can remove the executables so the updates never happen." I.e., so windows can't even *chose* to IGNORE the "disable updates" setting (cuz you are relying on windows to do what you've told it to do). As such, there (should be) no way for updates to be offered -- unless a user visits a MS service (web page, etc.) that tries to explicitly offer that option.

But, the effect of disallowing Windows 10 (via update or any other means) forces: "any hardware that is received as a donation must have driver support for the older OS's." As donations get NEWER (simply a consequence of the passing of time), finding drivers for that NEWER hardware for OLDER OS's becomes problematic -- they probably NEVER write an XP driver for hardware on a machine released in 2016!

[You can verify this by trying to purchase a "current" machine and seeing for which OS's it offers support. Of course, you *may* be able to get older drivers for SOME of the hardware (with some effort and some risk of uncertainty). Or, you may be completely SoL.]

(By extension, which drivers are simply not available for machines designed in 2013 -- which are now being donated for these uses?)

You're conflating two different issues. Please reread my comments (restated here).

[Don Y]

The XP machines were relatively easy, by comparison, to "control". As all the updates -- that would ever exist -- were already released (by MS), it was safe to install them and disable the update service entirely (there's nothing more to update, why even try??)

[Yeah, maybe root certificates, eventually]

Students who were too-smart-by-half and tried to update using a copy of a Win7 CD that a friend happened to have were essentially "on their own". If I received a call about a "broken computer", I simply repeated the instructions that I provided with each machine: "reboot, press this, click on that, wait 4 minutes" and they'd soon "discover" that I'd undone all of their changes and restored the machine to the state it was in when they received it (from me).

It doesn't take long for them to realize that there's no support for the upgrade that they think they want -- at least, not from the freebie computer guy! :>

[At the same time, there was nothing that prevented them from trying this! Or any *other* use/OS/etc. *I* just don't want to be taxed with supporting their adventures!]

[Don Y]

How do I create a table heading that spans two columns? How do I set the shading for every other row to be light/dark? How do I import this photo that I downloaded from Wikipedia into my report? How do I print JUST page 3 of my report? How do I connect to the printer that my host/foster family has installed at their house?

And *which* student should get that machine? Will his first period teacher be accommodating (whereas all the other students are working under Windows)? What about his second period teacher? Third period? etc. What about the teachers he has for the second half of the year? Or, next year? Or, at the NEW SCHOOL that he's now attending (because a space in a foster home in a different school district on the other side of town opened up, suddenly)?

[clare]

The secret is NOBODY gets a "free" computer. Make them put some effort into getting one.- even if it's a dollar and acheiving a scholastic goal, or X hours of "community service". Something they can afford - but something that equates to some effort/sacrifice on their part. Then things get taken care of.

Something that has no cost has no value to many people.

[clare]

What utility did he use to determine there were 5000 "callouts" in 8 hours? What (not spamware laded) utility can I run to see what is happening on mine???

[Don Y]

The "cost" is continued attendance and good performance at school. They are graded monthly -- far more frequently than "regular students". And, in addition to grades, they have to evoke recommendations from EACH of their teachers. Piss off one and you risk being expelled from the program.

(which also provides food and housing assistance)

Granted, folks are usually hard pressed to relate the two in their minds -- humans are notoriously ineffective at coupling even trivially disjointed causes and effects.

The cost *I* chose to impose (to protect my time/effort) was the risk of losing all of "their files" when/if they screwed up the machine (by unsafe practices, etc.). I.e., I'll give you a way to "fix" your machine -- but it will COST you those things that *you* apparently valued (valued enough to download, install, etc).

Of course, the agency could adopt a different policy. But, as I'm not an employee, I wouldn't be obligated to *implement* it!

(and, my reasoning is reasonably convincing -- not "arbitrary". After all, these kids will eventually have to deal with The Real World; there are few Mulligans, there!)

[Don Y]

Enable logging in the firewall. It will log either (or both or neither) successful connections *or* unsuccessful (dropped) connections.

Of course, a rootkit (i.e. MS!) could chose to hide data that it doesn't want you to see! For this machine, I monitor the log of the firewall in my router to see what's going on (outside and inside)

[BQ340]

Why teach them outdated stuff?

MikeB

[Frank]

I had to turn off several privacy settings that were either intrusive or collected data taking an extra minute to shut down.

My only disappointment with Win 10 was their taking off several time wasting games and making you go to their ap store to get them for free. Not super intrusive but you will get a pop up ad at the end of the game and they tell you you can make it ad free by paying $1.49 a month.

I think Apple and Android are in the up sale business and MS has joined them. Future software upgrades will be free but won't be free of them trying to up sell you aps.

Otherwise I'm happy with Win 10 and have not had any serious issues since starting to use it.

[Mayayana]

| What utility did he use to determine there were 5000 "callouts" in 8 | hours? | What (not spamware laded) utility can I run to see what is happening | on mine???

I was going to refer you to the article, but when I went to look I saw it had been deleted! Sorry about that. I didn't know I was sending you to a stripped link. When I looked up the user link it claimed that user had never made any submissions. I then went to archive.org for a copy. They had one, but said the machine that serves it is down:

Weird. I always save such things, because URLs are often altered or moved. But I also found an archive linked from the comments on that page. It explains how the whole thing was done:

He has some sort of customized router and installed Win10 on VirtualBox, on Linux Mint, so that he could track all activity. The problem with tracking it from Win10 itself is that Windows can no longer be trusted. Some IP addresses are now hard-coded, so that a DNS lookup is not even needed. (That actually started many years ago with Windows Media Player.)

To the extent that it might be possible to catch some of the traffic, you could try TCPView from sysinternals. You might also try a firewall. But that's tricky. The firewall would depend on Windows networking functionality, and most are not detailed enough to tell you what's going out, much less what the data is.

I think there are other utilities to record the actual data going in and out, but I've never tried anything like that.

[philo]

None of the above can be accomplished by Windows or Linux on their own, all that kind of stuff is dependent on which application you are using.

[Don Y]

Exactly. The OS is just a scaffolding.

Now, how do I run Office 2K13 on Linux?

[>>>Ashton Crusher]

Win10 is fine. They are being spied on constantly by all the apps they are using on their smart phones. I can't believe the hysteria that has been created over win10 "spying".

[philo]

Never figured kids would need much more than a word processor. I had no idea you were talking about running spread sheets which I thought was college level.

Microsoft Office will need to run on Windows machines and will cost quite bit of money. I thought you just had a small budget, but if you have a lot of money then sure, get Win10 machines and all necessary software.

That said, even if you have a large budget, why waste money?

You should easily be able to purchase a new machine with Win10 installed, for less money than you could build yourself and purchase the OS separately.

It's for that very reason that I rarely build machines any more, I just refer my friends to Dell. Thus far, zero complaints/

[Don Y]

"Homeless teens". I.e., no job, no (formal) place to live. They have "reagan phones" (free) -- no smart capabilities.

[Don Y]

Schools now do *lots* of stuff on machines that was previously done with scraps of paper, index cards, etc. Many school districts even provide "courseware" (what we grew up calling BOOKS) in electronic form. So, you have to be able to support whatever DRM the courseware provider has adopted.

Microsoft makes available certain pieces of software to 501(c)3's for peanuts. No doubt, they write off the difference between the few dollars they charge (us) for a volume license against the list price for that same software license.

(you get no media -- just a *single* master disk and a number written on a form telling you that you are legally entitled to install the software using *that* license key on N machines)

We get machines for free. Businesses go through periodic "upgrade cycles". So, you may end up with 50 of a particular machine. Or,

20 of one type and 40 of another. The next donation may be of an entirely different machine, etc.

(Many of businesses have *thousands* of seats so there is no shortage of HARDWARE. Some businesses are obligated to dispose of their surplus equipment *to* non-profits -- that's the case with some of the hospitals, here... a few thousand seats going up for grabs every few years!)

But, you ("I") have to do all your own record keeping. I.e., I have to keep track of which machines have which software, which drivers, etc. I have a large collection of "install disks" as each was intended for a particular make/model machine.

Once I have built a system, I image the disk and store that image on a server, here. So, if I encounter ANOTHER batch of those same machines next week/month, I don't have to do any of this legwork, again!

[clare]

Until I can see exactly what the guy supposedly used to log the activity, I put very little stock in what he said.

[Mayayana]

| Until I can see exactly what the guy supposedly used to log the | activity, I put very little stock in what he said.

It's at the link. Did you read it? In any case, it's up to you what you want to think about Win10. But if you think it's not spyware you're fooling yourself. Microsoft even says in their terms that some data sent back to them is not optional.

[Muggles]

Exactly!