back to article Microsoft: New icons, new drivers, AI! Everything is awesome!

As its services tottered once more last week, the gang at Redmond kept themselves busy tinkering with Office while Intel announced some changes to graphics drivers in the post Windows 10 October 2018 Update world. Office 365 gets more intelligent Microsoft continued the policy of continually updating its bread-and-butter …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Office 365 gets more intelligent

    So it has doubled it's IQ from 1 to 2 then ?

    1. katrinab Silver badge
      Headmaster

      Re: Office 365 gets more intelligent

      No, it has doubled its[*] IQ from 0 to 0.

  2. Dan 55 Silver badge
    Meh

    AI or document search?

    Microsoft continued the policy of continually updating its bread-and-butter productivity suite, Office 365, by whacking it repeatedly with an AI stick for collaboration purposes. [...] If you write to-do items (by, say, writing TODO: finish this), the word processor will automatically track them and allow writers to navigate back to the correct spot.

    Has AI learnt how to jump the shark yet?

  3. Waseem Alkurdi

    FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

    Modern Drivers (also known as Universal Windows Drivers) are single driver packages designed to run over multiple PC types.

    I'm NOT taking this.

    The conspiracy theorist in me is screaming, "MICROSOFT IS KILLING LEGACY DEVICES!!!!!".

    And the rational guy in me is, oddly, nodding in agreement.

    1. N2
      FAIL

      Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

      But thats one of their objectives, to junk perfectly good hardware.

      Meanwhile spouting environmental bollox.

      1. bombastic bob Silver badge
        Meh

        Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

        it's probably a way (in their minds) of driving you to the "New, Shiny" when your perfectly good (10 year old) machine running 7 does the job faster, better, etc.. Require these 'new drivers' for ALL of the newer video hardware, and then vendors stop supporting 7...

        By them 'driving' [bad pun] the drivers to "their new model", you could ALSO be stuck with the VESA driver [if they even bother to support THAT any more]. I actually ran into that problem when I migrated an XP laptop to windows 7. I needed a winders laptop for various things, and had that old one laying about, and used it (I had previousl put FreeBSD on it, but put it back to XP after getting a better latop). Unfortunately the XP video driver WOULD! NOT! WORK! in windows 7, when 'needs' basically forced me to update it from XP to 7. The VESA driver DOES work, but without any acceleration, so no playing videos on it any more. That machine is still useful, but uses the VESA driver, and not the old OEM driver.

        So in a way this is just a re-hash of OLD problems.

        Meanwhile, Linux and FreeBSD continue to support old hardware pretty well.

        Also worth pointing out: does 'safe mode' let you easily pick a VESA driver for your video, just so that you can get your hardware to work, for whenever 'Windows Update' pooch-screws your computer? It used to do that, sub in the VESA driver when in 'safe mode', but I haven't put Win-10-nic on any physical hardware [and don't plan on doing so, either].

        1. Aladdin Sane

          Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

          'And all those exclamation marks, you notice? Five? A sure sign of someone who wears his underpants on his head.'

          Terry Pratchett, Maskerade.

          1. Waseem Alkurdi

            Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

            'And all those exclamation marks, you notice? Five? A sure sign of someone who wears his underpants on his head.'

            Terry Pratchett, Maskerade.

            I know that my choice of title was rather rash, but have you bothered to read beyond the exclamation marks that gave you the knee jerk reflex?

      2. RachelG

        Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

        Wait, isn’t that Apple’s unique brand of evil? (You’d think, from the comments under those articles)

        Joke alert, because I can’t select the comment icon on the reg mobile site ;-) (Also can’t post emojis it turns out)

        1. nematoad

          Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT

          "The things come from Windows Update, so no more installing drivers from disks..."

          Oh, do Windows users still have to do that? Sorry for asking but as a Linux user I thought that that sort on nonsense was well and truly buried.

          1. Matt 13

            Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT

            Yes, like touch screens have worked so flawlessly with the built in Linux driver support...

            or the penguin fanatics asking if Linux drivers are available for every new shiny laptop that's reviewed on here!! hardware needs drivers, especially if one is to leverage all aspects of an exotic bit of equipment.

            Linux is good, it has its place, but perfect in every way, it is not!!!

            1. Waseem Alkurdi

              Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT

              Yes, like touch screens have worked so flawlessly with the built in Linux driver support

              Ah, that.

              This isn't an issue of Linux kernel drivers. It's an issue with userspace.

              There simply isn't a window manager/desktop environment yet out there that supports touch properly.

              The drivers are there. Half these are connected on an internal USB bus anyhow. And even i2c is picking up in terms of support.

            2. Teiwaz

              Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT

              Yes, like touch screens have worked so flawlessly with the built in Linux driver support...

              or the penguin fanatics asking if Linux drivers are available for every new shiny laptop that's reviewed on here

              New ones, not often - but manufacturers will insist on making their stuff run on weird esoteric hardware and they rarely to never provide drivers for Linux and are often not even helpful to projects that are trying to fill in for them.

              'Linux is perfect, it's the rest of the world that's flawed.

              1. jake Silver badge

                Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT

                As a Linux user/contributor these last 25 years (and BSD quite a bit longer!), quite frankly I don't really want a touch screen. I spent the last 50ish years training my nearest & dearest to keep their greasy mitts off my monitor. Why would I wish to encourage that anti-social behavio(u)r now?

                1. Waseem Alkurdi

                  Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT

                  quite frankly I don't really want a touch screen.

                  Your opinion, but ... just try them.

                  You can get anti fingerprint touchscreens like the ones on newer phones.

                  1. jake Silver badge

                    Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT

                    I've tried 'em. I don't like 'em. But then I don't really like using a mouse, either ... anything that takes my fingers away from the keyboard just slows me down.

                  2. Ali 4

                    Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT

                    It's pointless replacing my Dell 24 inch monitor with a touchscreen. My arms wouldn't be long enough to reach it without stretching over my desk.

                    P.s. Windows 7 for ever!

        2. jake Silver badge

          Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

          "Also can’t post emojis it turns out"

          Thank gawd/ess(s) for that!

        3. Dan 55 Silver badge

          Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

          Apple just had the kext signing thing making hardware obsolete but even so there's a workaround.

          Lately MS just can't leave drivers alone. There have been nearly as many updates to drivers since Windows 10 was launched than in the whole history of Windows since before Windows 10 (6 vs 8).

          Which developer is going to keep on top of that? MS needlessly makes hardware obsolete, which is irresponsible given what we know about the environment.

      3. katrinab Silver badge
        Flame

        Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

        Like my 16 y/o printer, which after a bit of prodding, works just fine with 64-bit XP drivers

        1. jake Silver badge

          Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

          My late '70s daisy wheel worked on Slackware out of the box. Took a little rubber chicken waving to get my early '60s 1403 to work, though.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

      >The conspiracy theorist in me is screaming, "MICROSOFT IS KILLING LEGACY DEVICES!!!!!".

      It's happening with AMD, their HD2000-HD4000 cards don't work with the October update properly.

      https://bit-tech.net/news/tech/software/microsoft-blocks-windows-10-october-2018-update-over-intel-sound-issue/1/

      Works fine with Linux though.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: FUCK YOU MICROSOFT!!!!!!!

      I put Win 10 on a dual boot laptop thats really just a knockabout workhorse. Mint/Windows

      My reason, I thought that the time will come when they pull the lenovo update software. Its not supported but its a handy little repository anyway. Win 10 works fine (as fine as it can) from fresh install without this so ok. We'll see how nice it plays.

      I'm no expert but HD2000/4000 will be the gen before my the HD3000 i5 variant in mine so sound likes my trusty laptop will soon on the endangered list.

      Brilliant. In the same month I finally relented and bought a Win 10 licence Microsoft essentially put me on notice because of the age of my equipment.

      Gotta love 'em.

  4. Waseem Alkurdi

    Who will actually maintain those legacy drivers is open to question.

    The community nobody.

  5. Kane
    Windows

    Hah!

    'Microsoft's designers reckoned the updates are the "result of many iterations, a lot of research and testing, and plenty of late nights and weekends".'

    Not like the October updater for Win10, yeah?

  6. SVV

    Signing into Outlook on the web just got easier!

    How the hell is having to remember the URL http://t.co/P5TTNEYOSt in any way "easier"?

    I can't be the only one who hates these garbled redirect URLs and believes that they're going to redirect me to some machine wrecking malware site. Why have they become a thing? Stop it now!

    1. David Nash Silver badge
      WTF?

      Re: Signing into Outlook on the web just got easier!

      Funny how the link to outlook.com changes into http://t.co/P5TTNEYOSt when you hover over it (no I won't be clicking it).

      Why? What's the benefit?

  7. }{amis}{
    Trollface

    Or a small electric jolt via the clicker.

    Only a small one?? in my experience people like that won't notice their idiocy unless they are twitching and smoking like a cartoon villain!

  8. DanX

    So...

    You are writing a letter levels of clever restored to the system?

  9. graeme leggett Silver badge

    New icon design

    "We also used gestalt principles to further emphasize key product changes"

    I think I get what they mean, but I'm sure they could have used more understandable language to say something along the lines of - "we bore in mind that these programs are all related to each other and that the apps have changed over the years"

    As opposed to readers thinking "Gestalt - isn't that what the Borg are...or was that thingy's lot in DS9"

    1. Teiwaz

      Re: New icon design

      As opposed to readers thinking "Gestalt - isn't that what the Borg are...or was that thingy's lot in DS9"

      Dunno. Most definitely 'Legion' from Red Dwarf though - the only solution must be therefore to render everyone but the single competent Microsoft employee unconscious, assuming they have one, otherwise pick the least annoying.

      1. Aladdin Sane

        Re: New icon design

        I always think of Anne McCaffrey's talents universe.

      2. Robert Carnegie Silver badge

        Re: New icon design

        The Fendahl in 1970s "Doctor Who" were a "gestalt" organism, and not one to get involved with. The Time Lords uninstalled the lot of them, but one escaped...

  10. Smoking Man

    Don't need no AI.

    Some REAL Intelligence helping to get Windows Updates right the first time would be appreciated though.

  11. Fading
    Windows

    TODO:......

    Format C: /X

    Only a matter of time before hidden tags cause chaos.......

  12. Ochib

    I see that you are writing a TODO list

    It's the return of Clippy :) :) :)

  13. Shadow Systems

    Ummmmm...

    "a complex process that can result in system instability".

    *Cough*WindowsUpdates*Cough*

  14. Ken Moorhouse Silver badge
    Coat

    Re: automatically email users @identified in a TODO with a link

    As someone earlier (Fading) suggested: a sure way to cause security problems. (Acks to SVV too: I avoid link redirects like the plague).

    I've not got the mind of a hacker, but one way that comes straight to mind to facilitate such mischief is to put lots of entries into a spell check dictionary, all of them replacing a valid word with TODO. If it is possible to change the trigger word to something else, then this is another.

    Conversely those making a typo such as TOTO might end up holding the line for a long time for a response from a friend, but then It's not in the way you look or the things that you say that you do.... (I'll get my coat)

  15. FozzyBear
    Mushroom

    Office 365 gets more intelligent

    Seriously, I don't need or want any of these bells and whistles (AKA bloatware) in Word or any of the other office products. I had all the functionality I needed plus more in office 97.

    Microsoft in all seriousness just fuck off with all this shit. I had to endure Clippy, I'm still annoyed with the ribbons. Now some lazy git will add "to do" items in their word document related to some project, rather than use the proper tool. This is NOT collaboration, this is rewarding laziness in the office.

    Congratulations you retards, you have just made every IT workers job that much harder.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    New Icons

    Well, the new icons give you SOME sense of what they're about. Sometimes. Excel is vaguely grid-like. Word has lines of text, Powerpoint has a piechart. Teams has two people. Outlook has an envelope.

    But they are NOT more descriptive than the 2013 versions (at least they're not all black and white like application menu icons!!)

    What the eff are "Y" and "S" though?

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