This might be relevant to those who wish / have to use Windows 11:
This week, Microsoft made it very clear that it wants to block the popular BYPASSNRO workaround, used to skip the internet and Microsoft Account requirement checks during the Windows 11 installation OOBE (initial setup), although thankfully, the script can still be created using Registry edits.
A 7 step guide.
Ok, but how does this affect Linux?
Honestly, guys, gals and others, Microsoft is making it crystal clear they don’t want you to use their OS. It’s not your OS, it’s theirs. Stop trying mangle it into something it is not. If you need registry edits just to make the OS usable, it’s not worth it. It’s not for you. Please, please, please look at alternatives that respect you, your intelligence, your privacy and your data. One day Microsoft will push an update that will lock you out of your machine unless you create an account. Jumping through these hoops is just delaying the inevitable. Using an OS is not worth all this effort and stress.
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Thanks, now I’m depressed.
Question: what is the downside of making a throwaway ms account upon install and never touching that account again?
The unacceptable thing for me is that it requires internet access to use the operating system. That seems completely unnecessary.
Ah so after install and throwaway account is set up, you can’t log in to the computer if your internet is down or turned off?
No it’s that it won’t let you install and set up unless it can access the internet and you create or login to an account.
Let’s just not install windows?
Thanks. Handy to know.
(Just checking if this federates. Edit: it did immediately.)
It did!
How to setup your desktop as a desktop: only 7 steps!
fun fact Rufus already has all of this automated and even has steps to have the local account of your choice already as part of the image
Well, it’s only gonna be a matter of time before they remove this. I can almost guarantee that.
No, it’ll always exist because corporate and government contracts are not putting up with a requirement to have a Microsoft account.
That’s only something that poor people have to do.
Lemmy is the 1.45% user base on steam hardware surveys os section. https://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/Steam-Hardware-Software-Survey-Welcome-to-Steam
By far most people want to use windows. The people that are loud on here about Linux are the only ones that don’t so thank you for a solution that’s not the constant post saying just install Linux. Its not intuitive for almost all users aside IT people and enthusiasts.
But more intuitive than constantly working against Windows.
It’s not even viable for me. I simply cannot use Linux daily because all my jobs require software that doesn’t have a Linux version, or it does but it’s lacking necessary features, or there’s an alternative but I have to burn extra hours making it work with their systems/setup - hours I don’t have.
Or I have to use internally configured Remote Desktop profiles over a VPN (not to be confused with RDP), and you can’t do that specific use case on Linux because it requires using the company’s internal Windows Store with specific Remote Desktop installation.
Or I have to use a specific Outlook instance, locally installed, because somehow they’ve blocked web access (I still haven’t figured out exactly how they set this up).
After a 12 hour day, sure, I can switch back to my dual boot Linux instance and spend 1-2 hours for personal use. But the ratio is still Windows-leaning no matter how you slice it.
People are usually talking about private computers. Of course you can’t simply switch your employers OS.
Unless of course you’re self-employed so suddenly you have to start dual booting. Linux for gaming and work, Windows for windows-specific work lol
Windows intuitively making you jump through 7 steps to not have an online account. The reality sadly is most Windows users will just be pushed by Microsoft to use a Microsoft account to access their own PC.
Only 1% of Windows users who are IT people and enthusiasts will find out how to avoid being forced into internet based accounts.
If installing something like Linux Mint is not intuitive enough for someone, they probably don’t even know what they’re doing on Windows either.
I had a family member call me because they were having difficulty with a light switch. They’re not dumb, just set in their ways and can’t be bothered to learn something else. Plenty of these people don’t like change just because it’s different. They got confused when windows started doing the rotating desktop pictures because they didn’t realize it was still their desktop. Do I think they could eventually use Linux? Probably. Do I want to deal with even more questions? No. Could they install it themselves? Absolutely not without help.
You down vote me for saying the truth.
If you think installing Linux is hard you’ve either never done it and let other people dictate your opinions, you’re incompetent with computers or you can’t follow a simple step-by-step guide.
If you or someone you know sucks with computers, that’s fine. I get not moving someone from Win to Linux if they can’t understand the digital equivalent of tying their shoes. Just get a Chromebook if that’s the case.
Barring cases of disability, using Windows at a basic level is not hard. Most home users use it to browse the dust on the upper crust of the internet, write a doc, print shit and nothing more. I bet if you swapped Win for Linux on most people’s computers and riced it to look like Win 11 many of them would be none the wiser.
Also, if you’re a Lemmy user and you have a basic understanding of how this platform works I guarantee you have the basic capacity to successfully install Linux on an old computer.
You click a button, it’s as difficult as installing Windows since XP.
Honestly a lot of people just don’t realize how easy it actually is. They think it’s something arcane and strange
By far most people want to use windows.
Do they though? I’d bet a significant share do not “want” to, but they are stuck there, convinced there are no viable alternatives.
Recently needed to set up a Win11 VM. It worked after removing the network adaptor from the VM setup, and then using the bypassnro command.
Fucking Microsoft.
I work at an MSP 99% of all machines we deploy for our clients are windows based. The oobe /bypassnro is just mandatory for initial setup. Yes, there are ways around it post setup but it’s just that much extra to do.
Having a local admin account for domain or azure/entra joined is still very useful. I don’t get why MS refuses to accept this. (Money/data harvesting aside, we all know the real reason, just wish they’d just admit to it).
This. When the user hasn’t even showed up yet, setting up a local account out of the box saves a bunch of time.
“Linux is far too complex for the common person to use.”
Installing windows without your data being harvested: 7 steps, then editing registry files, uninstalling most of the programs that come with it and get reinstalled with every update, use this command prompt, download this program from a random website you’ve never heard of before…
Installing Linux without your data being harvested: Click continue.
Linux is so difficult you guys, no one could possibly learn the command line.
I’ve swapped back and forth between Linux and Windows a half dozen times now, and I can honestly say, both are a bitch to set up from a clean install.
Even with guides and autoloading scripts and whatnot, it’s still going to be a few days of pain while you try to figure out what else needs to be installed to use the computer the way you want to use it.
Or that’s how it works for me.
I mostly just wish more games were linux native.
can you explain why it takes you that long to set up a new linux install? for me a fresh install with a (really not complex) script to install my required software and copying over config files takes maybe one hour (excluding game downloads of course).
genuinely interested if your setup is that much more complex or where the difference comes from.
I’m counting game installations. Then there’s the fact that NoScript seems to reset every time I swap operating systems, so now I have to figure out what I’ve allowed and blocked before…
Then there’s the pruning of random shit that was auto installed. Some of that shit can take days to find.
But most of the pain is when I try to do X, and need to find a program that will do it. This happens in Windows and Linux, and either will have programs that work, but then I have to find the program and learn it, and then let enough time pass where I have to do it all over again.
The most recent example was a map making program for my Table Top RPG obsession. One program that’s a go-to under Windows (with possible Linux capability?) is called AutoRealm. Which hasn’t updated since 2013… But it’s still one of the most powerful fractal mapping programs I’ve ever lightly used.
Linux is so difficult you guys, no one could possibly learn the command line.
In the vast VAST majority of “normal” use cases, which I’d argue for most people it’s :
- Web browsing
- watching videos or listening to music
- editing text documents, spreadsheets, presentations
- playing video games
- managing files, e.g. moving them in directories, compressing them, etc
- keeping the system up to date
- using a printer
there are reliable ways to use a GUI. So… even though IMHO the command line is absolutely worth learning, one can perfectly use Linux my “just” clicking their way around.
Wyland & Nvidia drivers work yet?
Still using X11 as I’m on Debian stable but https://wiki.debian.org/NvidiaGraphicsDrivers#Wayland might help.
I work in IT (almost exclusively Windows) and have been using Linux on my private machines for 8 years now. I barely know anything about the command line. I don’t have to be a Linux nerd because it just works with the GUI. (KDE Plasma. Can’t speak for other DEs)
I work in IT
You are not a common user.
Maybe he really sucks at his job
Method acting approach to IT
it unironically sounds like a good approach for some roles, though?
I think our IT department is full of them, because they crash everyone’s computers every other month
He doesnt use the command line
Orrrrrr, hear me out, just click once and get an online account because you don’t care.
And yes, the command line is an issue to most regular users. My parents don’t grasp the concept of keyboard shortcuts for copying and pasting. I get a phone call every time they try to attach a file to an email, where they say the steps when they are doing it so they don’t fuck it up. If you use the computer to access a single webpage that’s bookmarked, youtube and ebay, maybe an hour every week at most, expecting them to have to learn a new system and a command line isn’t feasible. People like icons and clicking. If you managed to get rid of a keyboard and maintain functionality, they’d switch in a heartbeat. That’s why smartphones are so popular. That’s why kids preffer touchscreen over controller, and are basically unable to play keyboard and mouse anymore.
If you use the computer to access a single webpage that’s bookmarked, youtube and ebay, maybe an hour every week at most, expecting them to have to learn a new system and a command line isn’t feasible.
You don’t need to access the command line (nor even the system really) to do browsing. The same browser you use on windows is gonna work on Linux.
They are never going to totally kill local only accounts… Because corporate networks, automation, embedded systems, air gaped networks… all exist in abundance in the enterprise and government worlds.
L
I
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XBut that’s only 5 steps!
L I N U X I N U X L N U X L I U X L I N X L I N U
Damn, forgot about formatting. Well it looks dope on my screen, you’ll just have to imagine it.
Bought an old laptop for my daughter’s first computer. She’s going to just learn typing and some simple stuff. Not able to install Windows with a local account. Fedora KDE it is then.
