technology
Many members of the tech industry have had July 29th circled in red on
their calendars for last year or so, as that marks the day that
Microsoft will either be the greatest tech company ever or the biggest
joke in recent time. Why? Because of an ambitious idea that would make
their product basically mandatory.
When Microsoft announced its new Windows 10 operating system and
offered users of older Windows iterations the option to reserve their
free copies of the new OS, they left out one important detail: all future updates are basically mandatory,
and happen without the users’ direct-action permission. It was one of
those “implied consent” situations: signing up for Windows 10 locked you
into whatever the company issued next.
That didn’t sit well with some people, so then the opt-out tool was unveiled. This meant that your computer would still download and install the updates, but that you had the option to uninstall and hide the update in order to prevent it from reinstalling itself.
But a new problem cropped up. Early testing users who tried to uninstall a program from the Control Panel were met with a surprise when the Control Panel simply crashed. Microsoft issued a bug fix for that the day before the long-anticipated launch date of Windows 10. According to initial reports on that bug fix, it does seem to solve the problem.
Users don’t have to wait for Microsoft to send out updates, though. Once Windows 10 is installed and running, it’s a simple matter of following a few steps. According to Lance Whitney in an article for c/net, “You can also grab any new Windows updates yourself rather than waiting for them to be installed. To do so, click the Start button and then click on Settings. From the Settings screen, select the category for Update & Security. From the Update & Security screen, click the setting for Windows Update if it’s not automatically selected. Click the button to check for updates. Windows then proceeds to download and install any available updates.”
That didn’t sit well with some people, so then the opt-out tool was unveiled. This meant that your computer would still download and install the updates, but that you had the option to uninstall and hide the update in order to prevent it from reinstalling itself.
But a new problem cropped up. Early testing users who tried to uninstall a program from the Control Panel were met with a surprise when the Control Panel simply crashed. Microsoft issued a bug fix for that the day before the long-anticipated launch date of Windows 10. According to initial reports on that bug fix, it does seem to solve the problem.
Users don’t have to wait for Microsoft to send out updates, though. Once Windows 10 is installed and running, it’s a simple matter of following a few steps. According to Lance Whitney in an article for c/net, “You can also grab any new Windows updates yourself rather than waiting for them to be installed. To do so, click the Start button and then click on Settings. From the Settings screen, select the category for Update & Security. From the Update & Security screen, click the setting for Windows Update if it’s not automatically selected. Click the button to check for updates. Windows then proceeds to download and install any available updates.”
