The US Department of State is still using 13-year-old operating systems

[Ben Myers]

yes, of course the telemetry. Tell me, why does Microsoft need to be spying on the US government? What 'app' could possibly warrant the government needed spied on? Windows has been trash for years. The first iteration of Windows 10 was actually pretty good, then they kept changing things and trying to implement features no one asked for.

Welcome to the world of MicrosoftThink. What Microsoft has done with Windows and its usability has been perplexing for many years, especially the waffling back and forth between good and downright awful releases. Windows 2000 (very good and straightforward) , Windows XP (good for its time), Windows Vista (stunk), Windows 7 (quite good), Windows 8 (whuzzat? wretched), Windows 10 (cleaned up somewhat simplified again), Windows 11 (continuous beta releases in disguise as regular products). Let's be kind and simply say that the people who make the decisions about Windows' look and feel are tone deaf. More than anything else, Windows 11 is Microsoft's operating system designed to sell, sell, sell (mostly its) products and our information hoovered up. It continues the nightmare of Windows software design and architecture.

 

[yRaz]

Welcome to the world of MicrosoftThink. What Microsoft has done with Windows and its usability has been perplexing for many years, especially the waffling back and forth between good and downright awful releases. Windows 2000 (very good and straightforward) , Windows XP (good for its time), Windows Vista (stunk), Windows 7 (quite good), Windows 8 (whuzzat? wretched), Windows 10 (cleaned up somewhat simplified again), Windows 11 (continuous beta releases in disguise as regular products). Let's be kind and simply say that the people who make the decisions about Windows' look and feel are tone deaf. More than anything else, Windows 11 is Microsoft's operating system designed to sell, sell, sell (mostly its) products and our information hoovered up. It continues the nightmare of Windows software design and architecture.

so I'm confused as to what exactly type of point you're trying to make. Are you saying that the US government should replace machines that are working fine so they can use some app, that does the exact same thing their current software does now, so said app can run on Windows 10 machines?

The users have to be as dumb as the makers. Stupid logic like this is why I switched to Linux a few years ago.

 

[Ben Myers]

so I'm confused as to what exactly type of point you're trying to make. Are you saying that the US government should replace machines that are working fine so they can use some app, that does the exact same thing their current software does now, so said app can run on Windows 10 machines?

The users have to be as dumb as the makers. Stupid logic like this is why I switched to Linux a few years ago.

Quick summary. The US State Department is severely limited in its ability to do its job by its very old and not very capable software running on Windows XP. Do not make the assumption that they will use the same apps in 2023 that they used when XP first shipped in 2001. The change in the number of products and product enhancements since 2001 makes for a far more productive computing environment today. I would consider giving up on computers altogether if forced to use XP. However, if and when people pay me big bucks so they can continue to use XP, or Windows 2000 or even DOS, I'm good with that.

The software to allow people to communicate well with one another is just one reason to use modern software. You think they use some sort of email with XP? Let's not forget about Teams, Messenger, data available in the cloud, and others, all of which mandate use of modern hardware and software.

So you are using Linux. Great! But you are not running a 2001 version of Linux, are you?

End of discussion.

 

[yRaz]

So you are using Linux. Great! But you are not running a 2001 version of Linux, are you?

I'm so happy you asked! So while I'm not running a version from 2001 I still have things that I've made that are running the original version of Linux I installed on them. That RC car I built is still running the same version of Linux I put on it back in 2009. My laptop still has the same version of Linux Mint 17 on it I installed several years ago. As far as an email machine, it's more of a pain to install a new OS on it than just use it as is. I also have the same version of FreeNAS running that I installed in 2013. That is actually something I'm terrified to update because I could lose around 12TB of DATA so I will only be installing a new NAS version on a completely new machine.