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[Sergarr]

Microsoft announces feature nobody wants.
https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/7/17089850/microsoft-windows-10-s-mode-changes-2019

Place your bets-- place your bets.  According to Verge, MS intends this for corporations, schools, and other "lockdown preferred" environments, but how much do you want to bet that it will be insanely pervasive in the tablet and cloudbook space, and that it will be the bane of everyone's existence except microsoft?

Wait, it can't possibly be...

The new S Mode will lock down any copy of Windows 10 so it can only run apps from the Microsoft Store

Ok I'm so glad I've kept my Windows 7 and not got into this "free" Windows 10 cheese mousetrap scheme.

[smjjames]

Microsoft announces feature nobody wants.
https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/7/17089850/microsoft-windows-10-s-mode-changes-2019

Place your bets-- place your bets.  According to Verge, MS intends this for corporations, schools, and other "lockdown preferred" environments, but how much do you want to bet that it will be insanely pervasive in the tablet and cloudbook space, and that it will be the bane of everyone's existence except microsoft?

Wait, it can't possibly be...

The new S Mode will lock down any copy of Windows 10 so it can only run apps from the Microsoft Store

Ok I'm so glad I've kept my Windows 7 and not got into this "free" Windows 10 cheese mousetrap scheme.

Glad I'm still using Windows 8.1

[martinuzz]

The new S Mode will lock down any copy of Windows 10 so it can only run apps from the Microsoft Store

What does that even mean? What is considered an 'app'?
I thought apps were something on a mobile phone, which I don't have anymore for nearly 8 years.

[IcyTea31]

What is considered an 'app'?

An application. An executable plus any other files attached to it that form a whole. What we used to call (and I'd like to keep calling) programs and software. Windows 10 wants to be hip by calling everything an app, though I personally find that a rather unprofessional term.

[martinuzz]

So does that mean that soon I won't be able to run Steam anymore on win10, or browse bay12 with Firefox?

[IcyTea31]

Only if you install the S Mode OS. Windows 10 has the optional feature to block programs not from the store, but it's disabled by default. S Mode makes it mandatory for "security". There's probably some business customer somewhere who has a use for it, but I don't think a regular consumer has any reason to install it.

[martinuzz]

Ah. I was already thinking that Microsoft was going to doom themselves out of the market if all non-windows store programs users can't run them anymore on their home OS.

[Jopax]

What exactly would those users do if that were the case? Switch to Linux? Buy Windows 7 again?

MS has a pretty strong stranglehold on the home PC OS market, and I really doubt that's gonna change anytime soon, mostly because as the biggest fish in the pond most devs don't really consider developing for other systems, it's just not worth the dev time and cost.

Like, I really hate the direction they're taking this stuff, and would love nothing more than to have Win 7 again, but I just don't have any driver support for anything but Win10 on my current laptop, and even if I did, a lot of the programs I use are only on Windows platforms (or iOS, but that's exchanging an OS with a shitty dev direction with one that's arrived at the shitty dev destination), so it's not like there's much choice involved :V

[Dorsidwarf]

If Microsoft suddenly locked all their PCs to only run apps from the shitty windows store, it would A) be probbably days before someone found a way to crack that restriction B) would have tech users up in arms, generate a massive amount of bad press and probbably tank their share price a la Facebook losing 57 billion of value over privacy revaluations, and C) a major portion ofl non-casual users probbably would switch to some of the Linux based OSes,because... that’s what people do if you make it physically impossible to do what you use a computer for. Windows is the OS of choice largely due to convenience, and if they suddenly decide to massively inconvenience their entire user base and refuse to backtrack they’re going to lose market share, simple as that.

[Maximum Spin]

I'd just like to add that I've had significant success switching older, casual computer users to Linux Mint already just based on the shitty things Microsoft has already done in the past few versions to annoy them. It's definitely possible.

[martinuzz]

Linux, or Mac.

[Trekkin]

If Microsoft suddenly locked all their PCs to only run apps from the shitty windows store

That's not what they're talking about doing, though. They're just stopping the parallel development of 10 S so that 10 S machines are going to run Windows 10 proper in S mode. The danger here is more that people are going to buy S-locked devices without realizing it (or non-S locked tablets will stop being readily available) than that Microsoft is going to lock all PCs in an update.

[bloop_bleep]

Yeah, I've been thinking about moving to Linux for my next PC. Not gone with my laptop, but it had Win10 on already, AND since it's for uni work, I'd rather not wrangle with potential issues when I'm trying to avoid stressing out.

Dual-boot Windows and Linux. No need to wait for another computer.

[Sheb]

Yeah, I've been thinking about moving to Linux for my next PC. Not gone with my laptop, but it had Win10 on already, AND since it's for uni work, I'd rather not wrangle with potential issues when I'm trying to avoid stressing out.

You'd be surprised, at this point the only piece of software I'm really missing is the office suite (which I feel is way superior to libre office), so I jsut do my stuff on lbre office and then boot windows to fix the layout.

[martinuzz]

China's Heavenly Palace (Tiangong 1) will come crashing down to Earth.

Ever since the Chinese lost control of it's space station, it has slowly started spiraling down to Earth.
When in january 2017 it was still at 470km altitude, last wednesday it had come down to 196km, due to air friction (minute, at those altitudes, but still present) decelerating it's orbit.

The coming days it will decelerate faster and faster, as air friction increases, closer to Earth,
According to Joint Space Operations Centre, a US military organistation, it will come down to Earth as a big fireball coming sunday, with an error margin of one day.

Because of it's relatively small size (9m) compared to it's mass (well over 8 tons), it is expected that it will not completely burn up on re-entry.
It is expected that glowing hot fragments up to 100kg wil impact Earth.

When this occurs over inhabited areas, considerable damage or even loss of life can be expected.
Space experts however say that the chance of that happening is pretty small. It is more likely that fragments will hit the ocean, or uninhabited areas.

Over here (Netherlands), we're not worried. We're too far north on the planet. Mediterannean countries in Europe could get hit though.

Exact estimates of the impact area are as of yet too hard. Because the space station spins around it's axis roughly every 2 minutes, the air friction varies a lot, making it too hard to accurately predict trajectory.
More accurate predictions will likely follow when impact time draws closer.

It's not uncommon for space craft to crash down unto Earth, the Chinese most definitly aren't the first.
Just last sunday, Italians could watch  a Russian Sojoez rocket burn up in the atmosphere. No wreckage was reported to impact anywhere though, it is presumed to have fully burned up.
Sometimes wreckage hits land: In 1979, parts of the US Skylab crashed down in Australia, after an uncontrolled re-entry.
NASA was fined by the Australian authorities for illagaly dumping waste. NASA has never paid the 400 dollar fine.