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0 pointstombert4mo ago0 comments

And Linux won't arbitrarily irrevocably brick your computer because of an automatic update. In my opinion, having your computer bricked because of an automatic update is a very large change to adapt to.

I feel the need to constantly reiterate this; if someone who works on Windows Update reads this, please consider a different career, because you are categorically terrible at your job. There are plenty of jobs out there that don't involve software engineering.

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simonask4mo ago

> And Linux won't arbitrarily irrevocably brick your computer because of an automatic update.

To the average user, it absolutely will. Unless they happen to run on particularly well-supported hardware, the days of console tinkering aren't gone, even on major distros.

What's fixable to the average Linux user and what's fixable to the average person (whose job is not to run Linux) are two very, very different things.

tombertOP4mo ago

If you run a modern distro with a modern filesystem, you can at the very least have automatic snapshots that actually work, and you can restore to a previous state if an update breaks things. The same cannot be said for Windows.

fn-mote4mo ago

I'm not sure what you're referring to, but I would not give anybody good odds of booting from a snapshot on Ubuntu/ZFS.

I would expect that booting from an older kernel would work, possibly in recovery mode.

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bruce5114mo ago

I think (in general) the number of machines being bricked because of an update is about a rounding error from 0.

The biggest brick event in recent times was Shockwave, not Windows. Personally I've never seen a bricked machine, not at home, not at work, not at family.

Of course my anecdata is meaningless as is your annecdata. Ymmv.

tombertOP4mo ago

I say this in particular because the automatic update to Windows 11 bricked my mom’s computer, or at least it required me to nuke the machine and reinstall everything from scratch. You can look at the linked post from a few levels up if you want details.

This is the second time this has happened to my family from Windows, on different computers.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

0 pointstombert4mo ago0 comments

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simonask4mo ago

> And Linux won't arbitrarily irrevocably brick your computer because of an automatic update.

To the average user, it absolutely will. Unless they happen to run on particularly well-supported hardware, the days of console tinkering aren't gone, even on major distros.

What's fixable to the average Linux user and what's fixable to the average person (whose job is not to run Linux) are two very, very different things.

tombertOP4mo ago

fn-mote4mo ago

I'm not sure what you're referring to, but I would not give anybody good odds of booting from a snapshot on Ubuntu/ZFS.

I would expect that booting from an older kernel would work, possibly in recovery mode.

1 more reply

bruce5114mo ago

I think (in general) the number of machines being bricked because of an update is about a rounding error from 0.

The biggest brick event in recent times was Shockwave, not Windows. Personally I've never seen a bricked machine, not at home, not at work, not at family.

Of course my anecdata is meaningless as is your annecdata. Ymmv.

tombertOP4mo ago

This is the second time this has happened to my family from Windows, on different computers.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse