Microsoft intercepting Firefox, Chrome installation on Windows 10 Insider build - <AUTHOR> https://www.ghacks.net/2018/09/12/microsoft-intercepting-firefox-chrome-installation-on-windows-10/ <comment><USER2> The battle for control of the user. The pressure to create/preserve market share seems to be rising.

When e.g. you look how aggressively Google is trying to switch me to Chrome from my Firefox on all of their properties, a new low was set. But from my insider buddies at Google, that strategy is working well.

This here from MSFT dials it up another notch. With the anti-trust cases in the EU, they probably will be able to geo target this feature so that from the EU all will be fine and dandy, but the rest of the world will get scared into switching to Edge.

<comment><USER3> I wish Mozilla would include a default content blocker to block Google's attempts to steal Firefox users. But then I also wish Windows blocked automated Google Chrome installs that steal default browser included as bundleware with free antivirus apps, Java, etc. I'm tired of walking a parent through uninstalling Google Chrome (that they have no idea how it was installed) and getting Firefox set as their default browser again.

<comment><USER4> Hasn't Windows 10 essentially solved that problem by not letting any application change the default browser setting, instead only letting them open the correct settings panel? Or is there now a way around that?

<comment><USER5> It helps to some extent. But then again, Windows itself keeps changing my default media player and image viewer back to the Microsoft defaults, so I don't trust those settings to be as immutable as I would like them to be.

<comment><USER6> And the default PDF viewer... Apparently some Windows updates change the user- defined PDF viewer to Edge.

<comment><USER7> It's because "Feature Updates" are actually in-place OS upgrades. They're essentially reinstalling Windows and migrating applications and settings, but also choosing to not migrate some of them.

<comment><USER8> Is that true? Does that mean that applications with a more complex setup will break with every feature update?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> In threads about github etc, many were claiming Microsoft are a completely different, and better company, with a fine open approach to business these days.

Seems nothing much has changed in their approach in 30 years.

<comment><USER10> They are as open as Intel, AMD, ARM, Google, Apple and IBM, the beloved ones from FOSS.

<comment><USER11> > the beloved ones from FOSS.

I don't recall these being "beloved". This sounds like a troll to me.

Sure Intel do FOSS graphics driver development, but I doubt they've ever been beloved due to their constant scandals (ME and Meltdown recently, and further back there's ClassMate, Itanium/Itanic, etc.)

AMD promised open drivers. We're still waiting.

ARM systems are usually locked down and full of blobs (e.g. for graphics, etc.). Plus ARM don't make chips, they just sell licenses to their designs to third parties, which is completely anti-FOSS.

Google do support a lot of FOSS development, but their online monopolies and spying infrastructure have always kept people suspicious.

Apple has a habit of turning liberally licensed FOSS into proprietary software (e.g. OSX is based on Mach and BSD, Safari is based on KHTML, etc.). Their mobile OS also requires programs to be signed, and they charge a $99 fee for developers to get a certificate.

As far as I'm aware IBM have historically been the enemy. They certainly pushed Linux forward around the millenium, but since then I've not come across them outside bloated "enterprise solutions" that I doubt many in the FOSS world would consider relevant.

<comment><USER12> > AMD promised open drivers. We're still waiting.

No, we aren't. AMD's promise was fulfilled quite a while ago. They officially contributed, and work on, a FOSS driver for the Linux kernel, and also for Mesa. One of their devs is one of the most active Mesa committers this year alone.

AMD are more committed than Intel is, it would seem, given that AMD's drivers are far better quality than Intel's.

<comment><USER11> I'm happy to be corrected; for the record I searched for this before posting, and found things like [https://linuxconfig.org/how-to-install-the-latest-amd- radeon...](https://linuxconfig.org/how-to-install-the-latest-amd-radeon- drivers-on-ubuntu-18-04-bionic-beaver-linux) which are very recent and talk about installing AMD proprietary drivers.

(I haven't been tracking this closely since I've avoid NVidia and ATI (hence AMD) graphics for about 15 years, due to their driver blobs)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This annoys me, but in the end, I can click the "no thank you" button and it all goes away. I do think their claims to be the "faster and more secure" browser are dubious at best. But at least MS allows other browsers to be installed. iOS will give you a Chrome lookalike with a WebKitWebView engine, and no v8 JS engine. (I'm not calling JSCore bad). It's like saying, you can have any browser you want, as long as it's Safari. I get _why_ they do it, but it's an anti-competitive practice.

<comment><USER14> It feels like you're giving Google's ChromeOS a pass here.

<comment><USER15> You can install run Android apps on many Chromebooks now, so you can install Firefox if you want: [https://www.techrepublic.com/article/how-to-run-firefox- quan...](https://www.techrepublic.com/article/how-to-run-firefox-quantum-on-a- chromebook/)

<comment><USER16> You can also install linux or on some even windows if you want

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Good to see the new trustworthy Microsoft in action.

Coming soon: github.com "best viewed in Edge".

<comment><USER18> Better, they might end up blocking other user agents, or give specific features you can only use with Edge. They love doing that.

<comment><USER19> I don't think they'll end up doing that for the same reason that Google didn't put the Dart VM in Chrome. Nobody wants to be the one to start the nuclear war.

<comment><USER20> Google has done this before. When they blocked Hangouts in non-Chrome browsers, spoofing your User Agent would allow it to load and, probably predictably since I'm making this comment, Hangouts worked absolutely fine in Firefox. Not sure if it still works these days, but I don't use Hangouts anymore.

There's also the whole Shadow DOM v0 stuff with YouTube that more or less artificially slows down rendering in non-Chrome browsers.

Google is just more subtle about it.

<comment><USER21> I have never had this problem with Hangouts in Firefox. Hangouts has a million bugs on its own, but it works similarly poorly in Chrome and Firefox and has for a long time as far as I can tell.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Apple do it too: if you run Firefox or Chrome on a new macOS install a notification appears trying to sell you on the idea of Safari.

<comment><USER23> Let's talk about how with iOS you can't change the default web browser, email, or calendar apps? If you remove Mail.app, install something like Airmail, and then click on a mail link, you're prompted to reinstall Mail.app.

I don't like this move by Microsoft, but they called out on shit like this more than other tech companies it seems.

<comment><USER24> That's a solvable problem, if anyone cared enough to solve it. Write a 3rd party browser (yes I realize that it would be a shell over WebKit) and allow the user to choose which app handles third party urls like mailto and maps links.

Chrome for iOS already does something similar but you only get to choose between gmail and the native mail client.

<comment><USER25> You really do not know how this works on Android, do you?

<comment><USER24> Yes I do. But we weren't talking about Android.....

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Maybe Microsoft should address the reasons why people do not switch? Look, Edge is a fine browser - it's fast, stable, and easier (compared to IE) to build websites for.

But it's not cross platform. I use a Windows desktop, Debian laptop, and Apple phone. Edge is available on exactly one of those platforms, while Firefox and Chrome are available on all of them.

Until that is fixed I will not consider edge, despite how fast or "secure" it may be over the competition.

Edit: seems that Edge is available on the App Store[1], and Linux requires a Wine workaround. I prefer native support, without hacks or clunky install processes.

[1][https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/microsoft- edge/id1288723196?...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/microsoft- edge/id1288723196?mt=8)

<comment><USER27> If I'm not mistaken safari is the only iOS browser, all other browsers are just a skin for it. So thanks to apple there is _no_ cross-platform browser that works on all your devices.

Unless you count safari, if they still bother porting that outside iOS/OS X. In which case that wouldn't be preferable anyway.

There is nothing wrong with running different browsers on different operating systems.

<comment><USER28> It really doesn't matter if Firefox on iOS is just a skin around Safari if it integrates with the Firefox services and syncs bookmarks, history, etc. Right? Isn't that the value you're getting out of the mobile browser, not the rendering engine?

<comment><USER29> > Isn't that the value you're getting out of the mobile browser, not the > rendering engine?

Cannot comment on iOS, but the main value of Firefox on Android (vs. the default Chrome) is that it runs extensions, particularly uBlock Origin.

<comment><USER30> Shared login data is probably the top one for me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> What I don't understand is how companies with hundreds of deployments are still fine with crap like this? You can't disable updates. Computers are rebooted without asking. It's ridiculous.

<comment><USER32> Businesses don't use the Home version. The "higher" editions have more control, and in a business setting you can manage those settings centrally.

<comment><USER33> You mean the pro version.... Oops, sorry you need candy crush, you need the Enterprise version to get rid of that!

<comment><USER34> Not even enterprise gets rid of that crap.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> I am not exactly happy about this, but this isn't behavior that makes them stand out from the pack. Google constantly nags me about visiting their sites in Edge, and I understand that the situation is much worse on iOS.

But if Microsoft wants to convince people to use Edge, they should start by dumping a bunch of resources into sanding down the rough spots and applying some spit and polish. It's like 90% of a satisfactory browser at this point, maybe even 95%, but the remaining bits can be really, really frustrating.

</comment><comment><USER36> I don't understand why so many of you highly intelligent people subject yourselves to this kind of stuff.

Here we are complaining about Microsoft, Google, and Mozilla's behaviour. Arguing about openness, paying for software, market share. You control exactly two of those things. You control what you pay for, and your choices affect market share. Yet you're complaining about the level of open-ness of companies who aren't trying to be open, hoping that someday it will change.

They don't change because their customers arbitrarily WANT them to change. They change when their market share is threatened and they are FORCED to change.

You want to make the Windows team listen? Stop using Windows. You want Mozilla to stop using Google as their default search provider? Change your default search provider manually. You want Google to stop spying on you? Stop using Android.

A lot of people will argue that it's not practical, too much effort, too costly. That's fine, but don't expect anything to change. You're acting like sheep so you're being treated like sheep. In one breath you say "companies only care about their bottom-line!" and in the next you whine "Microsoft is upselling me, Googleplex is tracking me, Firefox is in bed with Google!"

Well, that's because Microsoft pushed Windows 10 in your face and you ate it. Google tells you they'll sell your info and you let them. Firefox tells you they're gonna hop into bed with Google and you said nothing about it. You're screaming, but they have headphones on that are made up of your cash. When you speak softly and carry a big stick, these companies will listen.

<comment><USER37> Too bad the open source world has consistently failed to create a good UX... not because it can't but because the OSS community is still full of people who have a fetish for complexity and who actually look down on good UX.

<comment><USER38> When "good UX" (highly subjective, btw) means limiting your ability to control and optimize your own workflows, yes, some people reasonably choose control over a low learning curve pre-baked option.

Catering to people who want a super easy streamlined experience is hard. They want rigorous QA, tech support, and broad compatibility, all of which are very expensive goals to chase with diminishing returns.

<comment><USER37> I don't think the core of UX is really that subjective. It's all about consistency, polish, and most importantly cognitive load. _Eye candy_ is highly subjective but that's not what I'm talking about.

<comment><USER29> I think you're being downvoted because there is an ambiguity in what "subjective" refers to here. The core criteria of good UX are not subjective, as you say. But whether a certain UX qualifies as good under those criteria depends highly on the audience.

A good video-editing UX for amateurs looks _completely different_ from a good video-editing UX for professionals.

Long-time users of vim or emacs love their editors because of their UX, while many new users hate them for the same UX.

<comment><USER38> Yes, that's a good distinction to make that I didn't capture well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Remember the quaint old times when the very last vestiges of anti-trust still existed in the US and MS got in trouble for this?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp).

<comment><USER40> Lol, Google does this on every site they own since like 2008

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Things are moving so fast that companies know they can run from any lawsuits faster than they can be constructed. And yes, lawsuits are huge deals that require a lot of preparation, especially if initiated by the FTC/similar. And there isn't much appetite for regulation coming from Washington. Get ready for madness to increase.

</comment><comment><USER42> For that matter, Google is not much different.

A few months back, I had to log into my Windows partition, something I avoid as much as possible. I wanted to install firefox. So I get on IE, search for "firefox" on google.com. Above all the results, the top prominent ad slot is for Google Chrome.

Google stoops just as low as Microsoft.

</comment><comment> V-2 "Don't want to be _warned_ in the future?"

Does that imply that having MS Edge installed is something to be _warned_ about, or that installing Firefox/Chrome is somehow bad for your PC?

<comment><USER43> I agree, I personally read this as very threatening. In general I find that Microsoft's messaging has lost touch w/ reality. Remember when MS used to say "please?" \-- ever notice how nowadays instead of _asking you_ they _command you_? "Don't turn off your PC", "We're getting things ready", "This may take a while."

I've noticed this trend since Windows 8, but it's gotten really bad in Windows 10. Their messaging has become very anti-user.

My personal favorite from more recent builds of 10: "Windows is a service, and regular updates are an important part of keeping it running." Oh really? A service? My mistake, I thought I had licensed an operating system.

<comment><USER44> They want your money all the time now not just when they actually make a better product.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER45> Seems Microsoft learned nothing from the anti-trust cases of the 90's

<comment><USER46> Well they did learn to sell a better image convincing even the ever-cynical HackerNews apparently, looking at the threads of last months.

<comment><USER47> Hacker News has been plagued with PR companies pushing the content it wants you to see for some time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> If they show that screen in Norway they will have to be able to prove that it is faster and safer than the others. If not it's misleading marketing according to the law.

They can say "one of the safest and fastest" browser though.

We've had a number of cases like this over the years where a company makes a statement like "the best pizza in town" and they can't prove it and have to change the text.

<comment><USER30> This is when you get tiny quotation marks added to signage -- "BEST PIZZA EVER" (according to A N Owner).

I'm actually OK with non-measurable claims, "best" is abstract, the best pizza is the one in your hand, or something.

Now, "biggest"/"fastest"/"$weight"/"$size"/etc. well they better damn well be just that, if you're "footlong" is ever less than a foot (not on average either!) then I want your company crushed until it bleeds money.

<comment><USER49> > This is when you get tiny quotation marks added to signage -- "BEST PIZZA > EVER" (according to A N Owner).

Not sure that will fly in Norway.

Not really into consumer protection laws but I live in Norway and we had this[0] discussion 3 weeks ago about the use of the word "free" and I guess they might be equally picky about "best" as well (a good thing IMO).

[0]: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17816096](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17816096)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> Remember getting downvoted on Hackernews for pointing out that you don't trust their new image of "openness" and what not a month ago? People praising the new line of the new CEO and analysing that there would be nothing to fear from Microsoft anymore (github contret) - That didn't age too well...

<comment><USER10> I trust Google less than Microsoft, for example.

<comment><USER50> I would put them on the same pedestal.

I deal with Microsoft a lot. They are back to 90s Microsoft mode. You should be skeptical of anything they say.

<comment><USER10> Me too, given that a big part of my job is done on MS stack.

Not all of us had a problem with 90s Microsoft mode.

Every time I have to deal with Android development chores I miss MS tooling.

<comment><USER50> From a technical side, 90s Microsoft was great. From a business/trust side, not so much.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> They don't just intercept the installation.

Yesterday an old neighbor phoned me that after an update he lost everything and he could not connect to the Internet anymore. He spent most of his life without computers and clearly is not a tech guy, but he's also not an idiot and if some update warned of software deletion he would not allow it. Long story short and in his words because I wasn't there, at every boot a requester told him he had to allow an update, so he allowed it. The PC then kept making its own business for some time and when he logged in back, everything was gone. I took a look at the machine in the evening and yes, the desktop was just like it had been freshly installed, with only the background and profile avatar and credentials exception. The system also left a file on the desktop containing a list of the deleted software; there were about 5 or 6 entries and both Firefox and Chrome were on that list. Luckily all his documents were still in their directory, but after reinstalling Firefox, all his bookmarks and saved passwords were gone without a single warning and no way to recover the profile data. I won't go further describing how annoying then became Edge in remembering us it's the best possible web experience. Just no thanks, he'll stick with Firefox (Chrome has become suspicious as well), and the Migration to Linux is about one week away; he won't be the first 70+ years old user I convert.

<comment><USER52> I think your neighbours machine went into some issue and did an automatic restore to some working state, which probably was the first login state. The files remained but the rest of the software got removed that probably don't ship with Windows. So maybe this one was not MS trying to remove your open source browsers, but just doing a system restore using an image.

<comment><USER51> A system restore from an image would wipe everything, luckily all user documents were intact, including user login, password and desktop background. But all personal data pertaining to 3rd party browsers was gone (all passwords, all bookmarks) which suggests that an algorithm decided that something in the user folders had to stay and something else had to go.

<comment><USER53> Sounds like Windows 10's "Fresh Start" feature. [https://www.microsoft.com/en- us/software-download/windows10s...](https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software- download/windows10startfresh)

I could easily imagine someone stumbling onto this and running it. (Windows Security -> Device perf & health -> Fresh Start).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> Is this really so different to what Windows 10 has always done though? When you run Chrome/FireFox for the first time, it will tell you that Edge is amazing now and that you should consider using it instead. It seems they're just showing the recommendation earlier now.

<comment><USER55> Oh, wow, didn't know about those (still on Win7 on my gaming desktop). I really don't know how people can stand all these notifications, I can barely stand the actually useful ones.

<comment><USER56> I just have them turned off, no big deal.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Valve and their Steam client may be next... "You already have the Windows store which is the safest way to buy games...". It's coming.

<comment><USER29> Which is exactly why Valve pours so much money in making Linux a palatable gaming platform. They want an exit strategy when something like this happens. Or when MS decides that the Windows Store is not only the safest, but now also the _only_ way to buy Windows software.

<comment><USER18> Yes, I am clearly aware of that. This is why they are investing so much and they pretty much have a good plan now since Steam Play/Proton can already run many Windows games right from Linux.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER57> Last night, on my new Windows 10 machine, I received a notification "You got a message on your phone; Want to see phone messages on this PC too?" I've never installed Microsoft's phone app, and there's no way it could possibly know I just got a message. In fact, I didn't just get a message at all, and hadn't for hours.

So, they're lying. They're straight-up, bold-faced, red-handed, lying to their customers to get us to install their spyware which reads and syncs your text messages.

I'm finished with Microsoft. They're such a garbage company and always have been.

<comment><USER58> I'd be interested in knowing more about how this particular connection was made. Do you have any educated theories on how the message was inferred?

<comment><USER57> "We want people to install our phone app. Lets tell them they just got a message, people get messages all the time so we'll probably be right, and it'll seem like the feature is already working so all users have to do is click a button."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> A zebra doesn't change its stripes. This kind of behavior (in a general sense) is a good example of why people were so worried about Microsoft acquiring GitHub.

Remember, the scorpion ends up stinging the frog in the end, because that's it's nature.

</comment><comment><USER60> I think the mods should modify the title to indicate that this applies only to the insider build (so far).

<comment><USER61> Should they? You're technically correct but...

1) All the Microsoft haters are going to latch on to this and cite it as an example of how truly evil is regardless.

2) It might stir the pot enough to encourage Microsoft to reconsider.

<comment><USER62> > 1) All the Microsoft haters are going to latch on to this and cite it as an > example of how truly evil is regardless.

I don't understand. Why should this not be cited? They shipped this code to their customers. A limited release doesn't mean it unhappened.

<comment><USER61> Those customers signed up for it. It wasn't a random sampling. It's similar to running a Firefox Nightly or being part of an open Beta.

Microsoft's Insider program is an opt in where you get to try out potential features. There's a history of features being pulled from the channel, their Sets feature was pulled in June.

<comment><USER62> That's a fine reason to discount bugs, and realize nothing is set in stone. But this is an intentional feature, and the problem is the intent itself.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER63> I'm not saying it's right, but there's a chance Microsoft is feeling emboldened to get away with it based on Google's success steering search users to their own products.

In the beginning, it was just Microsoft.

<comment><USER47> Does Microsoft not have a competitive product on mobile devices? Hmmm.. wonder why.

<comment><USER63> That story's a lot more complicated, and a lot of it can be blamed on Evan Spiegel and Snap. [https://www.youthhealthmag.com/articles/31188/20160109/snapc...](https://www.youthhealthmag.com/articles/31188/20160109/snapchat- app-windows-phone.htm)

Interesting follow-up there is that Facebook, in lifting so much of Snapchat for use across Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger, has been giving Evan & team a pretty terrifying karmic kick in the rear... and though there might not be a connection here, Microsoft _does_ own 1.~% of Facebook, after all.

Disclosure: own shares of SNAP; probably not selling soon (it either wins by chance or I write the whole company off as a loss). I don't exactly have the best opinion of the company.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER64> When I see things like this, it makes me wonder how they detect a specific installer, or if it's just something as mundane as hooking writes to change the default HTML file association.

Still, the blatant advertising is repulsive.

No, Edge is _not_ faster than Dillo or NetSurf ;-)

<comment><USER65> Could it perhaps be done with executable signing? If an installer is signed as "Mozilla" perhaps, you might know you have a Thunderbird or Firefox install.

</comment></comment><comment><USER66> The UI/UX is the war territory, everything that is behind doesn't matter. The browser is the new and more engaging TV. People engage in fierce discussions about centralization vs. federation vs. decentralization but every approach is killed by the final UI or aggregator where the user interacts.

</comment><comment> dao- > A user who initiates the installation of a browser does so on purpose.

That's not quite true, considering how Chrome ended up on many PCs, e.g.: [https://www.ghacks.net/2012/02/26/avast-7-will-install- googl...](https://www.ghacks.net/2012/02/26/avast-7-will-install-google- chrome-if-you-do-not-pay-attention/)

</comment><comment><USER67> "We know what you are up to... Please do what we want you to do instead."

That's kinda the impression I get, there is definitely no sense of "security" or "privacy" in this or in the first run of Chrome or Firefox messages that also tend to show up.

It sounds more like "if you follow our recommendations we won't be so obvious about us monitoring what you do."

</comment><comment><USER68> Presumably Microsoft can substantiate the claims that Edge is both faster and safer than Firefox and Chrome.

But if not, I don't think the UK Advertising Standards Authority's remit includes adverts built into already-installed software.

Microsoft can claim anything, whether true or not.

<comment><USER69> Edge may well be faster in some cases but now way is it safer. It takes Microsoft weeks or months to fix bugs that Firefox and Chrome fix in days, or even hours.

</comment></comment><comment><USER70> Is the reason this matters to these companies because of the built-in search providers and the money that comes from guiding users to a particular search engine through those defaults?

<comment><USER71> Could have a lot to do with ecosystem adoption. A Windows 10 user could get used to Chrome and its apps and plugins, and thus pave the way for a Chromebook purchase over a PC with Windows preinstalled the next time they're shopping for a new computer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER72> I look at this crap and I think, good grief, this is just such a waste of developer time, user time, computer resources, etc. Think about this. Someone had to add code to the OS to specifically check for this and pop up this message. Wow. Our industry is taking a dump. It's truly sad.

Oh and not to mention that any code could potentially be buggy and lead to yet more malware infections. Not something Windows needs help with!

</comment><comment><USER73> I particularly dislike marketing that uses terms like "safer", "faster"...compared to what? If you dig far enough into the fine print, it is usually clarified as "...compared to our last crappy version" but the _implication_ is that the product is superior to _any_ alternative. That kind of phrasing is garbage and has no place in a user warning, much less anywhere else.

</comment><comment><USER74> I think this sets a dangerous precedent. Till now it seemed that the desktop was the last mainstream open computing platform due to it's legacy rooted in standardisation, but that seems to be moving too. While iOS anyways treats users as clueless and prefers being their "savior" instead of giving them power, atleast their attitude can be justified in that mobile makes computing available to people who have no time for understanding computers and need to be protected. But I think even iOS doesn't intercept your downloads. Neither does Android, the business model of which is supposed to be forcing people to consume Google's services.

If an OS will intercept your download, and guide you towards a "better way", how will a competing product even gain marketshare.

<comment><USER75> > how will a competing product even gain marketshare.

One of the reasons against developing for the desktop.

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> > on a recent Windows 10 version 1809 Insider build

> While there is certainly a chance that Microsoft is just testing things in > preview versions of Windows, it is equally possible that such a setting will > land in the next feature update for Windows 10

Still don't like it, though.

</comment><comment><USER77> Oh boo hoo. Windows asks you if you wouldn't rather use the installed Edge browser. Could it lead to them "intercepting" installs and disallowing them in the future? Yeah, maybe it could. I'll worry about it when it does.

</comment><comment><USER78> I'd say this is defiantly unethical yet I feel like this can actually be considered a good thing to exist: the web being monopolized by just one major browser/engine (which is Chrome/Blink/WebKit nowadays) is obviously a problem so anything than can increase presence of alternative browsers/engines can be considered a contribution to the web ecosystem diversity (although, honestly, I wouldn't recommend any of my friends/clients to use a Microsoft-made browser as these have a strong history of being far behind the web standards progress and exposing system vulnerabilities via ActiveX).

<comment><USER29> > [Microsoft-made browsers] have a strong history of being far behind the web > standards progress

They've catched up quite a bit on that front: [https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft- edge/platfor...](https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft- edge/platform/status/)

Also, IE before version 6 had a history of being extremely innovative (DHTML, anyone?). That's part of how they won the first browser wars (that and pushing the browser through their OS).

> and exposing system vulnerabilities via ActiveX

Now that's just baseless fearmongering. Edge supports neither ActiveX nor Java Applets. That's why IE is still around: for legacy websites in corporate intranets that still require this junk. I'm not sure if IE is installed on non-Enterprise SKUs of Windows 10, but it would surprise me if it was.

</comment></comment><comment><USER79> "Switch to Chrome, a smarter browser Google recommends using Chrome. Try it?"

Every. Single. Time I open Google using Edge. And Chrome is just as annoying wanting to be the default browser.

How is this different to a prompt when I install Chrome?

Both are highly annoying.

</comment><comment><USER80> A few days ago I tried to install LibreOffice because a (legal) copy of MS Word gave me trouble and I needed a fast solution. However max. download speed I could reach was ~50k/s, bringing download time to almost an hour. Net speed test on the same computer reached full speed with no problem. Download from another (Linux) computer from the same URL was a matter of minutes. All of the mirror sites I tried had a similar speed.

I thought it was just some weird misconfiguration, but now I wonder... Could MS be actively slowing down downloads from LibreOffice to discourage users from using it?

</comment><comment><USER81> Mozilla and/or Google would do well to figure out how their installers are being detected (filename? Verisign certificate?) and simply change them. It's harder to push an OS update than rename or re-sign a file.

<comment><USER82> It'd be fairly difficult if the detection was registering a web browser with the operating system...

<comment><USER81> Maybe? There is an existing nag screen for that (default browser selection).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER83> I prefer this than the prospect of Google controlling 90% of browsers worldwide.

</comment><comment><USER84> While on principle I think this is bad, I think overall MS should encourage more users to switch away from Chrome. Chrome has +80% marketshare and quite frankly, Google is abusing their monopoly on the browser market willingly, otherwise they'd push for a more diverse market.

While this is quite the abuse of marketshare in OS to push Browser marketshare, I don't think the EU will care that much considering that Edge is a niche product, they will care once they do have a sizable chunk of browser marketshare.

<comment><USER85> It's an issue because of Microsoft's share of the pc market regardless of their share of the browser market. Its abusing a monopoly that is an issue not how successful this abuse is.

<comment><USER84> In the EU how successful the abuse is does somewhat matter. The EU doesn't like it when you have two monopolies and use one to reinforce the other. They're generally fine with leveraging one to get an advantage in another market space as long as you don't fall in the above category, ie as long as you aren't a significant portion of the market.

I do sort of agree in this case because it creates more competition in the market (ie Chrome vs Edge) which is healthy.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER86> The other browsers should counter with a message of their own: "Ignore Microsoft Edge's pop-up spam, our browser is really better. Tell Nadella to shove it."

</comment><comment><USER87> This isn't much different that what both Windows and macOS do whem trying to scare users into using app store software only. Macs use some rather scary language (scary when you are not a "computer person") to dissuade people from installing binaries from outside of the app store ecosystem. Microsoft does the same thing, even worse if you have one of their Windows 10S versions which locks you to app store software only.

</comment><comment><USER88> They've been trying similar things for months. Still, Edge isn't taking off and IE11 sticks around.

IE11 is not going to die this way. Why can't they do what the Chrome Frame did years ago, and just offer Edge-inside-an-IE11 frame so we can finally move forwards JS-wise? I don't mind adding a dozen custom headers and meta tags this time around, but please, come up with a way so every-day-web-developers can get away from IE11's constraints

<comment><USER64> I wish they would just keep the IE UI, and have Edge be the rendering engine.

The only reason I like IE over other browsers is because its UI hasn't changed much and remains relatively un-dumbed-down and un-mobile-apped like a Windows application should. Its configuration dialogs are also standard ones.

</comment></comment><comment><USER89> > "Companies like Google or Microsoft have used their market position in the > past to push their own products."

The article lost its credibility in the opening paragraphs.

<comment><USER90> > The article lost its credibility in the opening paragraphs.

How?

Microsoft was fined for bundling IE.

Google have not been punished yet but will hopefully IMO soon be for abusing their position to push Chrome.

Edit: Two remove all doubt; I do not intend to defend any of these two. This is abuse of market position by both of them IMO.

</comment></comment><comment><USER91> No different from Google docs nagging me with a popup to install Chrome whenever I open a Google docs document. And no option to disable it, it seems.

</comment><comment><USER92> I use windows but not edge or IE, and putting my tinfoil hat on, my Chrome performance has taken a dump recently... MEANWHILE.. edge is blazing fast. I feel like something is going on. I don't want to use edge, but it's like my internet is broken if I try to use chrome. It literally takes 30 seconds to get to the page on Chrome, and instantly on MS Edge... IDK what to do about it though.

<comment><USER93> Use Firefox

</comment></comment><comment><USER94> I wish I could set that up for Chrome on win7 so my parents don't end up with it every time they update some completely unrelated software.

<comment><USER47> Chrome doesn't come packaged with very much software, and if it is then you're probably installing the wrong software or they're just checking yes to everything and you have bigger concerns.

<comment><USER94> I'm pretty sure it's some update. My guess is Avast. Other then that, I have no problems. They use this laptop only for Skype. Even mails run only through another laptop with mint on it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER95> While I don't like this tactics, especially relating to Firefox, when Google tries to install Chrome from its websites, I can understand why Microsoft wants to fight back. I've used Edge a few monthes and those Chrome suggestions were really annoying. Now Firefox is other matter and I think, Microsoft shouldn't touch it.

</comment><comment><USER96> All these companies that use this, it's better, safer messages are really annoying. I thought Google's "get chrome" links and buttons everywhere are bad, but intercepting an installation is probably even worse. These companies really should just build better products. My main browser is Firefox, and that wont change.

</comment><comment><USER97> Just now Google decided that their News (or how it's called) app on my phone should show notification for an article, first time in two years that I have this phone. And who would have guessed - it was about this issue. Google is so afraid that MS and Mozilla may slightly sway Google's hold on the Internet? :)

</comment><comment><USER98> Note that according to [1] they've disabled those again.

[1]: [https://www.onmsft.com/news/microsoft-quietly-takes- controve...](https://www.onmsft.com/news/microsoft-quietly-takes- controversial-edge-ads-offline-says-its-part-of-insider-testing)

</comment><comment><USER99> I hope Windows 7 will somehow live forever.

</comment><comment><USER100> It would be nice to have some views from those that keep claiming that 'Microsoft has changed'. All I see is a nicer wrapping around the exact same company. Not that Google is any better with their incessant pushing of Chrome (including fucking up the way their websites work with other browsers).

</comment><comment><USER101> Sounds like Microsoft has now disabled the feature: [https://twitter.com/FPresencia/status/1039899988837511169](https://twitter.com/FPresencia/status/1039899988837511169)

</comment><comment><USER102> It is this kind of bullshit that makes me glad I switched to macOS a few months ago. Windows is a good OS but for all the progress Microsoft makes in other areas they fuck things up with this kind of crap that just make using Windows a crappy experience.

</comment><comment><USER103> I don't like this behavior (deceptive assertions). However:

The user being actively steered away from an alternative browser, is unlikely to expose the user to 3rd party risk. It might expose them to personal data being collected by Microsoft.

Whereas, for example, Apple's latest hardware with Secure Boot, lacks both an Apple signing service for UEFI applications, and the Microsoft UEFI public certificate (which near as I can tell all non-Apple x86_64 hardware does have). Linux distros get their shim pre-bootloader signed with the Microsoft UEFI key, that's how they can leverage Secure Boot. But on the latest Apple hardware, no Linux for you unless you disable Secure Boot. I've found no support document how I can add enroll a key, either my own, my distro's, or Microsoft's public UEFI key.

I think the Apple case is provably worse, it does expose users to 3rd party malware.

</comment><comment><USER104> Can someone who is part of a bigger organization describe to me how this might happen, and what is the ultimate intent? Who would make such a decision and why isn't there any push back along the way to implementing it?

<comment><USER105> Pointy-haired boss: "I've been looking at our numbers and they aren't great - Google is getting a lot of installs via their Chrome ads on Google properties. Is there anything we can do to stop them stealing users from Edge? We control the desktop, right?"

Engineering lead: "I'll ask the Edge team to add an overlay when the user visits a Chrome download URL, but that might change. The installers are signed though, so we could check the package name and author at install time..."

Boss: "Great! Go for it- give me a timeline, this has highest priority for the realease in N weeks"

</comment></comment><comment><USER106> Only suckers trust Microsoft. That may be glib, but it's 100% true.

</comment><comment><USER107> It might as well say: "We monitor your every move, and highly disapprove... Click here to return into our good graces, and be fairly confident we won't mysteriously brick your system."

</comment><comment><USER108> Mozilla should add a counter install interception notification:

> "You appear to be installing Firefox on Microsoft Windows, there are less > painful alternatives you know!"

</comment><comment><USER109> Isn't this just asking for another anti-trust suit

</comment><comment><USER110> I have a laptop with windows on it for ONE program: Fusion360, which apparently does not run on Wine at this time. Windows 10 is so much worse than Windows 7. it's become, like a "phone," a personal consumption terminal.

I remember when my old job blocked my installation of Tor. "Unwanted software detected." Why wouldn't a company want people browsing with Tor? The surveillance is increasing. Not as bad as China, but I hope I go to the grave with something more positive to say than "not as bad as China."

<comment><USER61> > Windows 10 is so much worse than Windows 7. it's become, like a "phone," a > personal consumption terminal.

How have the added convenience features added to Windows 10 that do make it more accessible like a phone, equate to a reduction in your ability to work on it?

I use Windows 7 as my primary workstation and I am constantly annoyed by the rough edges. I'm looking forward to my company migrating me to Windows 10.

Bluetooth support in Windows 7 is horrid. The stack is proprietary to the vendor and device support is unstable at best. Intel provides proprietary drivers to Lenovo but doesn't change the Device IDs so Windows Update tries to install the bog standard Intel Drivers. Their proprietary drivers don't support Bluetooth 1.0 devices and their standard ones don't support A2DP.

While the Win 7 Startmenu's layout is ideal, the implementation is crap. Pinned Apps and the quick access flyouts are the last thing to load (upwards of a minute after logging in). The search prioritizes documents over Apps and Control Panel so you're twiddling your thumbs waiting if you search for "Add remove programs".

File Explorer can't make up it's mind if it wants you to use Favorites or Libraries more. It enumerates Network Devices in the Navigation Pane just cause. The Libraries in the Navigation Pane doesn't show all of the libraries you have setup, it gleefully shows Videos and Pictures which I'm pretty sure no one has ever used but leaves out Documents and OneDrive.

Ever tell your laptop to shutdown or hibernate, waited for desktop to fade away to the throbber screen, then shut the lid? That's always fun because when you open it up later it wakes up from sleep and finishes shutting down or hibernating.

<comment><USER43> >How have the added convenience features added to Windows 10 that do make it more accessible like a phone, equate to a reduction in your ability to work on it?

Because they've implemented those features in a managed runtime that is slow as molasses. I have 64 GiB of RAM, a high-end enthusiast CPU (Skylake-X), an NVMe drive, a high end GPU -- and the start menu _lags_ , and sometimes loses keystrokes altogether. Search was completely broken for me between builds 1607 and 1709 (the start menu would not find recently installed apps, it would not find any files _at all_ , etc.)

This completely disregard for performance and consistency infects every part of the operating system they "update." \-- The new control panel's VPN applet frequently gets out of sync w/ the actual state of the tunnel, and the connect/disconnect controls stop working. There are many things you can't even _do_ with the new control panel. There are many instances where you have to wait for the control panel to fail it's happy path (e.g: printer auto discovery) before it just gives up and presents you a link to the old printer adding wizard.

Then let's talk about their updater: I've already told you I have what I consider to be an enthusiast-class workstation, yet the last major update took _over an hour_ to complete. What is it _doing_ w/ nearly an hour when it has 50,000 IOPS and 300Mbit/s of WAN at its disposal? Any Linux distro I have _ever_ used can basically finish an installation as fast as it can do IO, meanwhile the Windows updater doesn't even in-flight a second download while the previous package is installing, and then it proceeds to waste my time with three to four reboot cycles.

Then, after these updates are finally finished, they pull stunts like in the OP. When it did the Fall Creator's Update (1709?) it reset my default browser to Edge. (Nevermind that part of my job is web development, and I'm very particular about the suite of browsers I have installed & how I have them configured.) -- I've had Windows tell me I'm running out of RAM when I have >30% left. (That's _20 gigabytes of RAM._)

This is absolutely insane, I have lost so much productivity to this pile of trash. I have never regretted an OS purchase from Microsoft before, but I regret this purchase, and that is coming from someone who owned _Windows Me_ and Vista.

<comment><USER61> It really sounds like you have a problem with your system affecting performance. I have encountered none of the issues you describe. I even have an Intel Celeron 2957U with 6GB of RAM and an integrated GPU doing CAM/GRBL related tasks over RDC that runs like a top.

I also get the impression that you're primarily a Linux user who has to use Windows and is just latching on to any reason to complain about it.

> Because they've implemented those features in a managed runtime that is slow > as molasses.

To my knowledge the Windows 10 UI is written using the C++ Runtime, not a managed one. The use of XAML is not an indicator of a managed language, UWP Apps can be written in C++.

> There are many things you can't even do with the new control panel.

Microsoft is gradually migrating features from the Control Panel over to the Settings App. As such the Control Panel still exists and is readily accessible.

> There are many instances where you have to wait for the control panel to > fail it's happy path (e.g: printer auto discovery) before it just gives up > and presents you a link to the old printer adding wizard.

And for most people the happy path works and is significantly easier to deal with. Not everyone is comfortable editing CUPS config files.

> the last major update took over an hour to complete.

How long does an distro-upgrade take you? Because that's the equivalent procedure. It really sounds like a problem with your system because the Spring Creators update too about 15 minutes on my systems.

> meanwhile the Windows updater doesn't even in-flight a second download while > the previous package is installing

Windows 10 downloads all of the updates prior to attempting to install any of them so... what are you talking about?

> I've had Windows tell me I'm running out of RAM when I have >30% left.

Again, that sounds like you have something else going on and you're just blaming the thing you despise for all your woes.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER111> This is only on insider builds, fwiw...I would be more worried if they pushed this to the general builds. I bet it never makes it that far.

</comment><comment><USER112> I've been getting more and more dissatisfied with Win10. I wish i could migrate to linux but Steam/Games is still an impeditive.

</comment><comment><USER113> Nobody is going to give a crap about Edge until it is an open source project like Firefox and Chromium. Releasing Chakra is not enough.

<comment><USER114> Like releasing Chromium is enough? Seems like a double standard to me.

<comment><USER47> Chromium is great and everything works... even Mozilla's old CEO and JavaScript creator switched Brave to Chromium. Not that it matters what their old CEO does, given his history.

<comment><USER114> Right, but Google pushes its closed brother. Why does chromium give them a pass?

<comment><USER47> Where do I download the open source version of Safari, IE or Edge?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER115> I can't imagine the EU and US antitrust regulators being very happy about this, if it ever becomes widely deployed.

</comment><comment><USER116> Just Microsoft continuing to boil the frog slowly as every big company seems to do with the influence they already have.

</comment><comment><USER117> This has anti-trust written all over it, again.

</comment><comment><USER118> What are the differences on this matter between the European Union competition law and the United States antitrust law?

</comment><comment><USER119> If this lands, they will get another x billion dollar fine from the EU. Looks like the fine needs to be set higher...

<comment><USER120> Does Windows still give you the popup with a choice of browsers to install in the EU? I remember seeing it some years ago, but since then I've only used Windows a few times with a business version in a VM, so not sure if that's still present.

Seems like if they were forced to do that, there's no way they would get away with this, but I'm not sure if that ruling still applies.

<comment><USER121> They were fine 561 million euros for letting that lapse in 2013.

Windows 10 still has N variants for Europe to comply with those rules.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER122> Didn't Microsoft get sued for this kind of behavior? I thought they'd stopped employing these tactics.

</comment><comment><USER123> It looks to me, they are getting desperate

<comment><USER90> Yep. I wish they'd rather lobbied the correct instances to punish Google for abusively pushing Chrome instead.

If this goes through that will be a whole lot harder to do with a straight face :-/

</comment></comment><comment><USER124> Again:

This is why computing is going off the rails, and computational literacy is critical.

The computer belongs to the User. It's sole purpose is to compute, FOR THE USER. If your software is running on someone else's machine. And you want data exfiltrated back to you, normatively speaking, you should ANNOUNCE your intention, EXPLAIN it, and ASK for permission, this includes honoring their decision if they say NO.

The industry has clearly been sliding down a slippery slope in which businesses have unilaterally decided that running THEIR software exempts them from having to respect the User.

This is madness. If a society operated on the types of practices that are considered "appropriate" in computing, we'd be liable to label them as savages.

Keep your interbusiness competition OFF MY MACHINE!

(Thank God for Linux From Scratch!)

<comment><USER125> Microsoft's ultimate goal seems to be to be able to manage your computer as if it was part of their cloud. And a fine goal it is (for them). It's the best of both worlds, they control it but you pay for it.

<comment><USER126> Which actually sounds kind of OK to me. There are some users who can't manage their own machines and don't want to. There's a reason most companies have a central IT department.

The problem is twofold:

1\. There should be a single checkbox that says "keep your grubby mitts off my machine." As it is now, users must proactively keep Microsoft out. Even then updates can give Microsoft the keys again.

2\. Microsoft cannot be trusted to work in the user's interest. They always steer the user towards Microsoft products.

<comment><USER127> Checkbox seems unlikely, but this would be a reasonable way to distinguish between the "home" version of the OS for normies and the "premium" version for power users.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER128> In the words of Raymond Chen, "I bet somebody got a really nice bonus for that feature."

</comment><comment><USER129> I really wanted to try out Edge. But there are no extensions of any sort. With out the password/bookmark managers and all, how can anyone get started in this thing. I switch back and forth between firefox and chrome because of the cross platform extensions. Microsoft should pay developers to bring their products to edge. At least the popular ones.

<comment><USER130> I can't tell if you're joking. Why would you want to use a single-platfrom, closed-source browser? We've been there, done that. You say you use Chrome and FF for cross platform features so you must have cross platform concerns. Anything they do to encourage developers and users to support it would be a huge step backwards for the world.

<comment><USER131> closed-sourced problems aside, a common plugin ecosystem is really all most users would need to feel at home (if those plugins sync data between installations). if i have my password manager available in two browsers, it doesn't matter much that the "back" button looks a little different on my phone versus my laptop.

i still won't use edge personally, but for other reasons.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER132> iOS doesn't even allow alternate browsers that aren't just wrappers for their engine.

<comment><USER133> You cannot upload to AppStore yet there are efforts to build Servo and _real_ Firefox for iOS: [https://github.com/servo/servo/issues/18154](https://github.com/servo/servo/issues/18154)

</comment></comment><comment><USER134> They are also intercepting iTunes downloads and redirecting to the MS Store!

</comment><comment><USER135> Ghacks.net is a crappy page...

Notifications? No Startside? No Tracking everything? No

</comment><comment><USER136> Who cares, really? Windows is mostly used in the offices, and at that, the places too cheap to afford Macs. The home user and all semi-advanced tech companies have long switched off Windows. Windows is irrelevant at this point.

<comment><USER137> If you're a PC gamer (and there are millions of them) you are almost certainly playing on Windows, because you kind of have to.

And most business that are not big-tech (as in, most of the world's businesses) are still utterly invested in Windows and Microsoft.

Enterprise has always been Microsoft's biggest cash cow.

</comment></comment><comment><USER138> Does that happen for unattended installation too (chocolatey)?

<comment><USER47> Yes, on first launch it prompts you to change but instead suggests that you use Edge.

</comment></comment><comment><USER139> for all the talk about new MS, the new MS looks strangely like the old MS :)

</comment><comment><USER140> Linux.

Companies like this stifle innovation.

<comment><USER141> > Companies like this stifle innovation.

Perhaps. But then again, I'm using my iPad to draw with Procreate, and it's the best experience I've had (both software and hardware). I'd argue in this case Apple is quite innovative.

Things are never black and white.

</comment></comment><comment><USER130> Just uninstall Edge.

</comment><comment><USER142> Classic Microsoft

</comment><comment><USER143> Wow, this is a new low, even for Microsoft

<comment><USER7> On the contrary. As those of us who lived through the 90s keep trying to tell you youngsters, this is Microsoft's default operating level of low.

<comment><USER65> Ha, good point, there was even a whole anti-trust case against them by the US government in 2001.

<comment><USER137> And the EU.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER144> People still run windows?

</comment><comment><USER145> Tsk, tsk ... did we catch someone falling back into his old behavioral patterns?

<comment><USER146> Back? Never left them, it merely improved its PR efforts.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> If only Linux users would pay for desktop software, maybe we could have a Year of Desktop Linux someday, instead we got Android and ChromeOS with their stores.

Right now is it not worthy to build a business selling desktop software to Linux, unless we are talking about enterprises, movie studios and a few other niche markets that migrated from UNIX workstations to Linux desktops.

<comment><USER147> Dude, no one pays for desktop software on Windows either, and it's doing fine.

<comment><USER148> Just going off of the AAA game market your statement is obviously incorrect. That doesn't get into productivity software, engineering applications (CAD, 3D modelling, etc), or the very large variety of enterprise desktop software to name just a few markets.

Not everything is a web app these days and many people still prefer to own their software instead of being a recurring revenue source for the same functionality month after month.

<comment><USER149> People pay for games and specialized professional software -- indiscriminate of platform. Outsize of those sectors you'll be lucky to sell a piece of software not attached to a service.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER150> Would Google allow edge on a Chromebook?

Microsoft has fallen in the market-share of OSs, can no longer be considered monopolist move.

But yes, it's a new low, there was never a "new Microsoft" just better PR.

<comment><USER151> ChromeOS allows the installation of Android apps which includes a variety of alternative browsers.

<comment><USER152> Including Edge - [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.microsoft....](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.microsoft.emmx&hl=en_US)

<comment><USER153> That's ... hilarious. I'm actually excited to try this on my Chromebook which is eligible for Android/Play apps. I'm not getting my hopes up though.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Clojure at a Newspaper - <AUTHOR> http://www.pitheringabout.com/?p=1018 <comment><USER2> I can add some more details here, because I'm still at the MailOnline :)

The CTO, Clifton Cunningham, did help by giving us the space to create new things. For example we also work on our own Javascript library for building the in-house CMS - [https://github.com/MailOnline/milo](https://github.com/MailOnline/milo)

However, Clojure (we also use Node.js BTW) really does work for us. In the 11 months since Jon's blog post, the code has grown (I guess 30-40k LOC across several processes) but it also does much more too. I think Clojure helps because it gives more freedom to refactor/factor the code in the way the team want.

For example a decision could be made to create a microservice for a commonly used URL or API. Sure you can do that in other languages, but it just seems easier with functional languages, I think because the composed functions seem easier to lift and shift. I've no evidence for this, just gut feeling. I spent years doing Spring/Hibernate etc and really don't miss it.

We'll definitely continue to support Clojure and other functional languages.

<comment><USER3> With 30-40k LOC, could you please share the extent to which you feel protected when refactoring given that Clojure is dynamically typed? Some of my colleagues argue that often times a static compiler is the only thing keeping the ship upright in a large org with a big codebase, and unless your team is small and very smart, it would be foolish to use a dynamically typed language.

My experience can't help me much, but I sure want to try it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Not to talk down Clojure, but it sounds like the real success here was being able to reinvent existing systems, and having a CTO willing to give you the space to do it.

After all, the majority of sites like this are getting data from <data store>, squeezing through <template> and delivering to the user's browser. The language you do that in will have a much smaller effect than, say, your caching strategy (particularly at a high volume site like MailOnline).

<comment><USER5> Conventional wisdom holds that rebuilding an old system is fraught with pitfalls. Executing is nontrivial and has zillions of decision-points where things could've gone radically differently.

Evaluating impact of tool choice requires experience and is intertwined with other factors. My experience tells me that Clojure's use is significant.

<comment><AUTHOR> The CTO talks a bit about the rebuild at his talk on using Node:

[http://youtu.be/HGH66JhUkis?t=8m59s](http://youtu.be/HGH66JhUkis?t=8m59s)

The old system was 155,000 lines of Java and similar. The team before him tried to rebuild using J2EE and XSLT and failed to get anything working in 8 months of trying. They then reorganised and rebuilt the system in about 4000 lines of Clojure:

[http://youtu.be/HGH66JhUkis?t=16m3s](http://youtu.be/HGH66JhUkis?t=16m3s)

<comment><USER6> Sounds like us, 150k lines of Java/Escenic. Can't wait to move away from that hell hole.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Pure functional transformations over immutable, persistent data structures like Clojure's are an absolutely no-brainer for this type of apps where you get data from a database system > transform > display like HTML, JSON, etc.

I encourage anyone used to an object oriented approach of doing this to give Clojure a try. I used to do this for years in an MVC setting - it's a huge effort for no benefit whatsoever.

</comment><comment><USER8> A follow-up which describes some of the technical pit-falls they encountered is also posted on his blog: [http://www.pitheringabout.com/?p=1041](http://www.pitheringabout.com/?p=1041)

</comment><comment><USER9> Great language, great community. Glad to see its adoption spreading.

</comment><comment><USER10> Interesting. I wonder which library the author used for Elasticsearch, if any. For example, there is the official Java library ([http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/client/j...](http://www.elasticsearch.org/guide/en/elasticsearch/client/java- api/)) and several Clojure libraries (e.g. [http://clojureelasticsearch.info/](http://clojureelasticsearch.info/)).

<comment><USER2> I haven't been in our Clojure code for over 6 months, but I'm pretty sure it's still [https://github.com/clojurewerkz/elastisch](https://github.com/clojurewerkz/elastisch)

<comment><USER8> In answer to a comment on the article the author states that they're using Elastisch with the native driver (which provides 5X better performance than the RESTful driver).</comment></comment></comment>


Self-control is a limited resource, use it sparingly. - <AUTHOR> http://www.miller-mccune.com/blogs/news-blog/the-down-side-of-self-control-3922/

<comment><USER2> A similar study of weight-lifting would conclude that it weakens you: after all, doing some squats leads to fatigue. Frequently an activity that causes effect X in the short term leads to its opposite when repeated over long periods; see drug habituation, the effects of physical exercise, the effects of intellectual efforts, etc.

This study tells us that self-control might be a bit like a muscle, in that its use acutely makes it weaker. But do we chronically adapt to its use, and become stronger once the temporary fatigue has passed, as with so many other forms of stress? Intuitively, from my experience, we do, but it might be interesting to study. Either way, this possibility makes this study insufficient basis for advice to "use it sparingly."

<comment><USER3> We don't gain a greater capacity for self-control, though, do we? It appears to me that what happens is that at some point, a thing that once required an exercise of self-control to resist no longer does. It is as though the weight has been lifted, not that our strength has increased.

The chronic adaptation, in other words, is habit. The process of intentionally breaking old habits and establishing new ones seems to always be particularly taxing, but maintaining an established habit, regardless of what it is, is easy. (Ignoring external factors, of course.)

With that in mind, it would be good advice to conserve the limited resource, or at least acknowledge it's variable availability and adjust your expectations of your own abilities in accordance. I'm certain there are many among the ambitious folk of HN who have taken on too many new and exciting challenges at once only to find that they turn into new and exciting chores that we can't even force ourselves to do, instead turning to the things that _don't_ require self-control instead.

We call that procrastination and treat it like a challenge to overcome, too, but if it's a symptom of _depleted_ self-control (and not a weak self-control "muscle"), then we'd be better served by being miserly about how we spend it than by taxing it unnecessarily. In that sense, there is a meta-adaptation in how you consciously manage your attention.

<comment><USER4> "We don't gain a greater capacity for self-control, though, do we? It appears to me that what happens is that at some point, a thing that once required an exercise of self-control to resist no longer does."

I find that I do gain ability in self-control. As you mention, the same task becomes effortless, but also, new ones become easier to confront. Practicing self-control has, for me, led to it becoming easier in general.

<comment><USER3> I'm wondering if most of that is attributable to conscious/rational factors, though, and not the ego depletion phenomenon examined in the study. How much of it is learning to recognize patterns that presage tests of will and dealing with them by some optimized heuristic that doesn't tax willpower much at all? A sense of temptation. An awareness of our position on a slippery slope. Experience.

The test would be to see how you perform with novel depleting tasks (like writing without certain letters) where no such learned heuristics might apply.

That's what I mean by a meta-adaptation. It just makes more sense to me that you can learn to manage the demands on your self-control than to boost the total supply of it. It's more like time, to me.

It may of course be some mixture of both, but I always find it interesting when people's mental models of seemingly universal experience differ.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> There is a lot more evidence.

<http://lesswrong.com/lw/10x/the_physiology_of_willpower/> \-- exerting willpower leads to glucose-depletion.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=848839> \-- this topic has been on here before, though it was a different paper.

<comment><USER6> thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I've experienced what the article describes first hand when my son was born two months ago. For whatever it's worth, here are my 2c for other HN readers who are babying a startup while starting up a baby:

Even after my sleeping patterns returned to normal, it was harder to deal with some of the more annoying parts of startup-life. Here's what it took to get my work stamina back on track:

I'm now doing one thing at a time, wholeheartedly. I don't think of work when with baby. I don't think of baby when at work. Sounds trivial, but easier said then done. I use whatever self-control I have left on this.

I separate work and home with an indulging buffer activity. Preferably something that also nourishes the body like mild exercise (but even if not that's ok). What works now is biking a few miles between home and work, with a short pit stop at my favorite coffee shop.

Took me a couple months to get this to work, and it takes energy to keep it optimized. But when it clicks right, be prepared for a powerful feedback loop of goodness.

</comment><comment><USER6> interesting. i realise that there must be much more evidence and study than is contained in that article, but it struck me that for the particular experiment they gave the people with the harder task may have a stronger sense of being "owed" something, since they made more effort, and that maybe this stronger sense of entitlement leads them to take more rewards...?

<comment><USER8> I agree, there must be more. It occurs to me that one might simply have a greater incentive to cheat on the second test as it involves money.

<comment><USER9> The incentive to cheat on the second test is the same no matter how hard the first task was.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This explains some aspects of corporate politics quite nicely.

</comment><comment><USER11> Interesting. Anyone think this correlates to top athletes cheating on their wives? Most notably, Tiger Woods and Michael Jordan.

Also, with a small n of 84, I think more experiments should be conducted in this area.

</comment><comment><USER12> My speculation is that 'willpower' or 'vitality' relates directly to the available reserves of neurotransmitter(s) in your nervous system.

Notes:

If you try to do something bad (that part of you knows is wrong), this will set up repetitious, conflicting thoughts which act to deplete willpower.

Willpower is replenished by sleep.

Activities seemingly opposite to those activities which require willpower are known as _pleasures_. However, my guess is that these also drain neurotransmitters, rather like revving an engine in neutral.

Therefore the way to maximise useful activity is to:

(a) do something that is genuinely in accordance with your highest wishes and values (b) _decide_ that it will be your sole source of pleasure and entertainment</comment>