Friday Watercooler: My Divorce from Windows
- By Rick Butler
- CIN Open Forums
- 2 Replies
So, I've been in IT for about 35 years. There's not much that I've not done with a computer, both above board and well...(yeah, I won't get into all that).
But for the greatest part of my life, I've been using Windows. Like so many chained to Redmond, I started with Windows 2.0 and used every single version of Windows (even betas) since the film was sepia and Bill Gates didn't look so desiccated. I remember the shock of going from 3.11 when it was icons in windowed groups to 95 when the Chicago interface introduced the foisted the start button on the world. I remember CE, ME and NT and making the joke of putting them together, you get CEMENT. So many hours hearing that opening chime when booting up Windows.
Somewhere between the young ideological pimply faced youth with an incessant need of getting every IT cert in the world, to an old IT salt who probably could qualify as an IT Jedi Master, if I wasn't so angled towards the Imperial Empire, Linux has always ran parallel to me. Not completely out of my orbit, but it's one of those things in my IT toolbox that has been gently used over twenty years.
Like most Windows users who have flirted with Linux and then ghosted it after the first date, only to come back later when desperate for a cheap solution, I've found plenty of band-aid fixes that Linux helped me overcome. Need a firewall for the cost of an old out-of-date laptop? A quick FTP server to move some files around?
Linux's got you. Whatever you need, ol' Tux can get it done, if you want to do some reading.
You see, Microsoft is truly a mothership mentality - 'they are mother, they are father' (trivia: Where did that reference come from?). Microsoft provides all your computing needs - but you do it Redmond's way. Support is pretty much a breeze in the Windows world - a help file or a web page or an entire network (RIP MSDN) to get things done. They wanted and still want to be the end all solution to everything. Just don't go talking to penguins, okay?
So, when you do, it feels so dirty - almost like you're cheating on your partner as you say, "oooh, what's this Ubuntu thing", or "I want a Red Hat - it would look so dapper with my new trousers", you dither off into what my son calls "the dark side", spin up a VM (and if you're really naughty, you do it on Hyper-V), and play around with Linux. But the session ends, you turn it off, and get back to your work. You don't say much about it, you just walk back in the door like nothing ever happened. But you remember the experience - for next time.
Then one day, it hit me. Microsoft started wearing this new outfit called "Copilot" because it's desperate for a piece of that AI pie. Amidst ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and all the other players in the AI world, Microsoft wants you to be satisfied with Copilot - so it gets put into everything you do in the Redmond world, like it's done for the last 40 years. Whether it's MS Edge, vying for attention like a 15 year old girl (just try searching for 'download chrome' in an Edge browser, and observe how it tries to tell you 'bUt YoU dOnT nEeD ChRoMe!!1!), Office trying to Copilot your PowerPoint presentation every chance it gets, or Outlook wanting Copilot to help you write that long winded e-mail to your manager, Microsoft does everything it possibly can to keep you in its ecosphere.
Even with half-hearted attempts like Windows Scripting for Linux, or marketing campaigns like We
Linux, Microsoft doesn't REALLY want you using Linux. It wants Windows to be your everything. And now, with Microsoft moving down the road that Apple did, where you just share in the experience, rather than having any real control of your environment, Microsoft's models for licensing and subscription services make sure you are at home by 5pm for dinner, rather than dallying with that Linux person that you've been flirting with.
But sooner or later, the fatigue sets in. Microsoft continues to keep you anchored, the virtual spin-ups of Linux get more and more frequent. Ubuntu never looked so good. Cinnamon and Mint with that alluring aroma, or Arch if you have the mentality of a mad scientist, or CachyOS if you have a need for speed, Linux just keeps getting better and better. And for some reason, they don't have this need to be in your face like a Jack Russell terrier.
So, I loaded Linux up with the push to make sure that whatever I could do, I tried to do it on Linux. I went with Ubuntu 26 - widest support I could find and dropped it on my unsuspecting Alienware M18, with a 14th Gen Core i9 and 64GB of RAM. Partitioning off a few hundred gigabytes and leaving my Windows partition alone - for now, I spun up Ubuntu, letting Grub take over the bootloader, because this is supposed to be the Windows death knell in my life. And with the regular cleanups of getting used to a new environment, I was off to the races.
Well, it didn't take me long before I ran full long into a need for MS Office. Outlook - yeah, okay, web interface, since the modern Outlook is just a wrapper for web anyway. Teams was a challenge - in the end, run that in a browser too - which that's still taking some getting used to - and web Teams doesn't hold my settings like the desktop Teams (again, in a web wrapper, really). But it works well enough. I'm not over the moon about LibreOffice - but I can make it work, and there's MS Office on the Web if I need to do anything more intense - which, I really don't, nowadays.
And for my friend, @jasoneckert, yes, I did install Cowsay...just for you, my man.
Now, with this powerhouse machine, I would be remiss if I didn't game with it. So yes, I have Steam rolling. Now, word to the wise, do NOT use the App store to install Steam - get it directly from Valve. Seems the App Center version has a problem with in-game audio. It's hard to play Enshrouded with family and friends when you have to scream up the stairs, because the mic isn't working, no matter what you're doing. Save yourself the aggravation.
Now here's the gaming buzzkill - if your games require a kernel-mode anti-cheat, you're going to have to run those in Windows. User-Mode anti-cheats work alright, so I can still get my Sea of Thieves fix if I need to, and most all my other games work just fine. Sorry, but this isn't Redmond's fault, nor Linux - it's the game developers' fault for that - go scream at them. Don't use obscenities, though - we're all professionals here on CIN.
I have a couple other random irritations. Since much of my life has been stuck doing development and support for Anthology Student, the Security Console just doesn't make nice in Linux. Tried PlayOnLinux, tried Wine and Winetricks. But I think it being a Microsoft WebView2 app, it's just not working well. I want to say there is a solution - I just have to find it. Also, PowerShell is different and some modules, like the SharePoint SPS (I still have to SUPPORT Microsoft Azure and Windows) isn't loading right. Need to figure that bit out.
So, I think this is my "Year of Linux". We've heard that thrown around over and over - this will be the year of Linux, where the open-source community is going to stick it to Microsoft and their dominance of the desktop will come to an end - not sure if that will ever be true, but I can't wait for the rest of the world. I'm in Linux now, and in a few months, I'll reclaim my Windows partition space - once I'm certain everything I need is out of there. I've already loaded Mint on my Surface 5 (now that's just evil, right?) and running Commodore Vision OS on my older Alienware X17 with the CIN logo on the cover (that's a completely separate story). But I think I'm quite alright with my life on Linux. I even run Home Assistant on an old Lenovo laptop which is also Linux. I think this is my year, after the last 35 being shackled to Redmond.
Yeah, we'll never be fully free of the tendrils of Microsoft - they have their fingers into everything. But I feel a lot better about my computing life than ever being in Windows.
If you got to the end of this post after reading everything, well, I thank you. Sometimes I get the urge to write, rather than what Gen Z is doing and making TikTok videos for attention. And I think I'd prefer all your comments, rather than the ramblings of the less informed, so feel free to drop your thoughts below - this is a discussion board, after all.
Till next, my friends.
Rick
But for the greatest part of my life, I've been using Windows. Like so many chained to Redmond, I started with Windows 2.0 and used every single version of Windows (even betas) since the film was sepia and Bill Gates didn't look so desiccated. I remember the shock of going from 3.11 when it was icons in windowed groups to 95 when the Chicago interface introduced the foisted the start button on the world. I remember CE, ME and NT and making the joke of putting them together, you get CEMENT. So many hours hearing that opening chime when booting up Windows.
Somewhere between the young ideological pimply faced youth with an incessant need of getting every IT cert in the world, to an old IT salt who probably could qualify as an IT Jedi Master, if I wasn't so angled towards the Imperial Empire, Linux has always ran parallel to me. Not completely out of my orbit, but it's one of those things in my IT toolbox that has been gently used over twenty years.
Like most Windows users who have flirted with Linux and then ghosted it after the first date, only to come back later when desperate for a cheap solution, I've found plenty of band-aid fixes that Linux helped me overcome. Need a firewall for the cost of an old out-of-date laptop? A quick FTP server to move some files around?
Linux's got you. Whatever you need, ol' Tux can get it done, if you want to do some reading.
You see, Microsoft is truly a mothership mentality - 'they are mother, they are father' (trivia: Where did that reference come from?). Microsoft provides all your computing needs - but you do it Redmond's way. Support is pretty much a breeze in the Windows world - a help file or a web page or an entire network (RIP MSDN) to get things done. They wanted and still want to be the end all solution to everything. Just don't go talking to penguins, okay?
So, when you do, it feels so dirty - almost like you're cheating on your partner as you say, "oooh, what's this Ubuntu thing", or "I want a Red Hat - it would look so dapper with my new trousers", you dither off into what my son calls "the dark side", spin up a VM (and if you're really naughty, you do it on Hyper-V), and play around with Linux. But the session ends, you turn it off, and get back to your work. You don't say much about it, you just walk back in the door like nothing ever happened. But you remember the experience - for next time.
Then one day, it hit me. Microsoft started wearing this new outfit called "Copilot" because it's desperate for a piece of that AI pie. Amidst ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and all the other players in the AI world, Microsoft wants you to be satisfied with Copilot - so it gets put into everything you do in the Redmond world, like it's done for the last 40 years. Whether it's MS Edge, vying for attention like a 15 year old girl (just try searching for 'download chrome' in an Edge browser, and observe how it tries to tell you 'bUt YoU dOnT nEeD ChRoMe!!1!), Office trying to Copilot your PowerPoint presentation every chance it gets, or Outlook wanting Copilot to help you write that long winded e-mail to your manager, Microsoft does everything it possibly can to keep you in its ecosphere.
Even with half-hearted attempts like Windows Scripting for Linux, or marketing campaigns like We
Linux, Microsoft doesn't REALLY want you using Linux. It wants Windows to be your everything. And now, with Microsoft moving down the road that Apple did, where you just share in the experience, rather than having any real control of your environment, Microsoft's models for licensing and subscription services make sure you are at home by 5pm for dinner, rather than dallying with that Linux person that you've been flirting with. But sooner or later, the fatigue sets in. Microsoft continues to keep you anchored, the virtual spin-ups of Linux get more and more frequent. Ubuntu never looked so good. Cinnamon and Mint with that alluring aroma, or Arch if you have the mentality of a mad scientist, or CachyOS if you have a need for speed, Linux just keeps getting better and better. And for some reason, they don't have this need to be in your face like a Jack Russell terrier.
So, I loaded Linux up with the push to make sure that whatever I could do, I tried to do it on Linux. I went with Ubuntu 26 - widest support I could find and dropped it on my unsuspecting Alienware M18, with a 14th Gen Core i9 and 64GB of RAM. Partitioning off a few hundred gigabytes and leaving my Windows partition alone - for now, I spun up Ubuntu, letting Grub take over the bootloader, because this is supposed to be the Windows death knell in my life. And with the regular cleanups of getting used to a new environment, I was off to the races.
Well, it didn't take me long before I ran full long into a need for MS Office. Outlook - yeah, okay, web interface, since the modern Outlook is just a wrapper for web anyway. Teams was a challenge - in the end, run that in a browser too - which that's still taking some getting used to - and web Teams doesn't hold my settings like the desktop Teams (again, in a web wrapper, really). But it works well enough. I'm not over the moon about LibreOffice - but I can make it work, and there's MS Office on the Web if I need to do anything more intense - which, I really don't, nowadays.
And for my friend, @jasoneckert, yes, I did install Cowsay...just for you, my man.
Now, with this powerhouse machine, I would be remiss if I didn't game with it. So yes, I have Steam rolling. Now, word to the wise, do NOT use the App store to install Steam - get it directly from Valve. Seems the App Center version has a problem with in-game audio. It's hard to play Enshrouded with family and friends when you have to scream up the stairs, because the mic isn't working, no matter what you're doing. Save yourself the aggravation.
Now here's the gaming buzzkill - if your games require a kernel-mode anti-cheat, you're going to have to run those in Windows. User-Mode anti-cheats work alright, so I can still get my Sea of Thieves fix if I need to, and most all my other games work just fine. Sorry, but this isn't Redmond's fault, nor Linux - it's the game developers' fault for that - go scream at them. Don't use obscenities, though - we're all professionals here on CIN.
I have a couple other random irritations. Since much of my life has been stuck doing development and support for Anthology Student, the Security Console just doesn't make nice in Linux. Tried PlayOnLinux, tried Wine and Winetricks. But I think it being a Microsoft WebView2 app, it's just not working well. I want to say there is a solution - I just have to find it. Also, PowerShell is different and some modules, like the SharePoint SPS (I still have to SUPPORT Microsoft Azure and Windows) isn't loading right. Need to figure that bit out.
So, I think this is my "Year of Linux". We've heard that thrown around over and over - this will be the year of Linux, where the open-source community is going to stick it to Microsoft and their dominance of the desktop will come to an end - not sure if that will ever be true, but I can't wait for the rest of the world. I'm in Linux now, and in a few months, I'll reclaim my Windows partition space - once I'm certain everything I need is out of there. I've already loaded Mint on my Surface 5 (now that's just evil, right?) and running Commodore Vision OS on my older Alienware X17 with the CIN logo on the cover (that's a completely separate story). But I think I'm quite alright with my life on Linux. I even run Home Assistant on an old Lenovo laptop which is also Linux. I think this is my year, after the last 35 being shackled to Redmond.
Yeah, we'll never be fully free of the tendrils of Microsoft - they have their fingers into everything. But I feel a lot better about my computing life than ever being in Windows.
If you got to the end of this post after reading everything, well, I thank you. Sometimes I get the urge to write, rather than what Gen Z is doing and making TikTok videos for attention. And I think I'd prefer all your comments, rather than the ramblings of the less informed, so feel free to drop your thoughts below - this is a discussion board, after all.
Till next, my friends.
Rick
15-week structured learning program
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Applications Close: August 26, 2026
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Program Ends: December 18, 2026
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