If updates were fully backwards compatible, they wouldn’t be upgrades, they would be addons.
Windows has been notoriously backwards compatible, because it is extensively used in any business and tons of those have old machines that need to work 20 years before they pay themselves back, and thus need compatible OSes to run it.
Lately, Microsoft is finally trimming the fat that has been dragging along for decades, while still maintaining the compatibility by making it optional.
Right but my point is that since some updates have broken their machines in the past, people have (somewhat justifiably) hesitated to update so readily. Imagine a surgeon prepping for the most complex surgery of their life early the next morning and is using the machine to prep… oops, the machine updated, the prep software no longer functions, now they stay up all night trying to fix their machine that wasn’t even broken to begin with, and the patient is at more risk than otherwise even if that works was successful. Ok so that’s hyperbolic but it relates (with less dire consequences) to so many far more common scenarios, like a teacher and their students all getting ready to go through finals week, but that very month sometime the machine decides it will not wait even a handful of hours until those busy people have a moment to update more risk free (maybe they are even responsible enough to not do their banking and such on it, so that access to their electronic notes is more important to them than some hypothetical risk of leaving a known vulnerability?).
Maybe I am missing something, like if forced updates only occur after years of choosing to delay the update (I left Windows behind years ago, except when forced to at work), but in general my own preference is that the machine should serve me, perhaps presenting me with a strongly worded warning if I do not comply, but the ultimate authority should be me, to decide my own timeframe.
And in case it’s not obvious, I am talking about personally maintained machines, not IT staff rolling out an update that they have properly vetted - that really is different, since while the check is external it still does exist, plus such a user does not really “own” that machine to begin with hence literally (read the contracts even) has no “rights” to complain, at least to Microsoft since that would be IT staff that made that choice, right or wrong.
If updates were fully backwards compatible, they wouldn’t be upgrades, they would be addons.
Windows has been notoriously backwards compatible, because it is extensively used in any business and tons of those have old machines that need to work 20 years before they pay themselves back, and thus need compatible OSes to run it.
Lately, Microsoft is finally trimming the fat that has been dragging along for decades, while still maintaining the compatibility by making it optional.
Right but my point is that since some updates have broken their machines in the past, people have (somewhat justifiably) hesitated to update so readily. Imagine a surgeon prepping for the most complex surgery of their life early the next morning and is using the machine to prep… oops, the machine updated, the prep software no longer functions, now they stay up all night trying to fix their machine that wasn’t even broken to begin with, and the patient is at more risk than otherwise even if that works was successful. Ok so that’s hyperbolic but it relates (with less dire consequences) to so many far more common scenarios, like a teacher and their students all getting ready to go through finals week, but that very month sometime the machine decides it will not wait even a handful of hours until those busy people have a moment to update more risk free (maybe they are even responsible enough to not do their banking and such on it, so that access to their electronic notes is more important to them than some hypothetical risk of leaving a known vulnerability?).
Maybe I am missing something, like if forced updates only occur after years of choosing to delay the update (I left Windows behind years ago, except when forced to at work), but in general my own preference is that the machine should serve me, perhaps presenting me with a strongly worded warning if I do not comply, but the ultimate authority should be me, to decide my own timeframe.
And in case it’s not obvious, I am talking about personally maintained machines, not IT staff rolling out an update that they have properly vetted - that really is different, since while the check is external it still does exist, plus such a user does not really “own” that machine to begin with hence literally (read the contracts even) has no “rights” to complain, at least to Microsoft since that would be IT staff that made that choice, right or wrong.