What’s wrong with the Windows Insider program

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A list of my pet peeves. Any suggestions? InfoWorld Woody on Windows
[See the full post at: What’s wrong with the Windows Insider program]

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>after Microsoft’s massive layoffs in mid-2014, when the company’s software
>testing groups were especially hard hit, the quality of its updates declined.

That’s kind of a “well duh” outcome, and would have been especially obvious to anyone in the software business, especially INSIDE MICROSOFT.

Therefore we must conclude that Microsoft willfully chose to deliver lower quality products.

Some Marketeer probably said “hey, our products are taking longer to release than Google’s or Apple’s, and it’s because we’re taking too much time to ensure they’re working properly before release.” Of course the real failing came when upper management chose to even begin to listen to that horse****. They all have their heads up in the cloud. Or somewhere.

And now we can clearly see that pushing alpha software right off the programmers’ desks onto “insider” users to “test” it has done no less than turn Windows into something no one can rely upon for business and serious computing needs.

Users are not professional quality engineers and never will be. And the world does not need sub-yearly operating system releases.

-Noel

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Let’s hear it for the unpaid beta testing workforce!

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I think that be you, Woody?

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HA! Back when MS handed out beta tester ids, mine was 117868.

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It looks like end-users are the insiders and Microsoft are the outsiders of their Windows OS.
Alternatively ask Cortana!
Perhaps she is the next-gen support system.

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***Almost October first!

Will the “big day” bring the “need” for a NEW “Magic patch”??? In our worst nightmares! Hoping this never happens again!

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You really need to make up your mind whether the fast/slow rings are beta or not.

You start the article by stating quite definitely that they’re not.

Then you proceed to infer in about 10 different ways that they are.

You can’t have it both ways.

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The fast and slow rings are building toward a new version of Windows 10. In the traditional sense of the term “beta” – where testers have influence in how the final product works – they, demonstrably, aren’t betas. They are, however, marketing betas.

In the traditional sense that “betas” are also designed to catch bugs, the fast and slow rings have also, demonstrably, failed.

Terminology aside, what did you think of the six points and recommendations?

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You didn’t have any recommendation for perceived problems 1 or 2.

I see problem 3 as a complete non-issue. And right now the version numbers are identical for the latest builds on desktop and mobile. (I care deeply about Windows Mobile betas too.)

Release Preview seems to me like a fine name for what it is. (If fast/slow aren’t betas, there’s not so much difference.)

I can see the logic in a patch preview for CBB, but I’m not sure how much it would get used.

You had no recommendation for problem 6 either. If they aren’t betas then the fast/slow rings can’t be failing.

Do you really think Insiders have influenced nothing at all? (Because that’s what you just said.)

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Problem 1: Create a “bail out” option for Insiders.

Problem 2: The “ring” system needs to be re-thought. If Windows-savvy columnists don’t understand the ring system – demonstrated in those two pull quotes — it’s too complex.

Problem 3: But the version numbers aren’t identical. 14393.221 vs .222, 14393.187 vs .189. And the confusion is rife – e.g., PCs won’t run on .222, Mobile won’t run on .187. Simply prefixing or suffixing the builds with an identifier (e.g., “14393.222M”) would help.

Problem 4: “Release Preview” is used in many different ways. Confusion ensues, even with those who are supposed to understand and explain this stuff.

Problem 5: I think MS needs previews for all cumulative updates, regardless of which branch they concern.

Problem 6: You’re right. I don’t have an answer.

Yes, I believe that Insiders have had essentially no influence on the key decisions made about Windows 10, and the way MS has assigned priorities. Case in point: Mary Branscombe’s campaign for placeholders. Case in point: Ongoing problems with Skype. Windows cognoscenti (and officially designated Insiders) should provide input earlier in the dev cycle. By the time a feature hits the Fast ring, it’s too late.

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I think MS will bring Windows 7 & 8 up to the level of excellence that has been shown in Windows 10

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You are right. The Insider Program has been ineffective at catching major problems. I am partly responsible in that I joined the program for my own benefit, not Microsoft’s (although I did find some bugs). I have been supporting (gratis) club members, family, friends, neighbors, etc. I wanted to see what was coming down the pipes, and in the end became the the leader of the GWX movement among my “clients” b/c I didn’t feel Win10 was ready for the “Average User.” Average Users are NOT capable of being Beta testers.

In the Insider Program, I saw a lot of “put Messaging everywhere back” or “I don’t like the color” instead of actual testing. So, you are right again, it has been a marketing ploy more than an actual testing program. But there is no real way to change that if there is no control of who signs up.

You are right again to say that there needs to be testing for the current User version 1511. But I don’t think the problems stops with Win10. MS has issued an abundance of bad patches for Win7 and Win8 lately too. And for other products such as Office (all versions).

I don’t believe free (for MS) Insider Programs are the way to go for MS to achieve quality control over the OS or the updates. I think they need to re-establish a bonafide testing program with qualified people instead of outsourcing the testing to the public. The public, in general, do not have the knowledge to be testers.

Yes, reviving the in-house testing group would probably have an impact on MS’s bottom line. But until they do, what they have is outhouse quality control.

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Bottom line: Windows 10 should not have been put out to the masses until it was at least 85% pure. After that the remaining bugs could be worked out of the Win 10 OS. Second bottom line: Leave Windows Vista OS, Windows 7 OS, Windows 8 & 8.1 OS’s out of convergence with the new Windows 10 OS. If the convergence of OS’s must occur then it can be with a relatively clean slate and no muddy water. You can’t pour a bucket of muddy water into a bucket of muddy water and end up with a bucket of clear water.

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>I believe that Insiders have had essentially no influence on the
>key decisions made about Windows 10

Absolutely. If they had, we’d have had Aero Glass back without having to hack it in via 3rd party stuff.

-Noel

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Ha, I was ID 135502 and was the worse Microsoft rah rah boy. Started testing around the DOS 6 ~ Windows 3.1 days. Was an active Windows developer for something like 30 years?

Beta testing used to be great; I’d find a bug & they’d assign an actual American engineer to sort it out. I think I still have a pile of 3.5″ floppies with custom patches somewhere in the garage.

Unfortunately I’ve pretty much given up on Microsoft. I shouted from the mountaintop about the problems with Vista, and again about Windows 8.

I gave up on beta testing for Windows 10 for the obvious reasons. Anyway they ended up shoving in a lot of changes right at the end that nobody got to test.

With the advent of their forced Faustian bargain of the ‘free’ update in exchange for unblockable telemetry, I’ve recently decided to become a Luddite and go back to Windows 7. Actually I ran across this article while researching building a pinned-down Windows 7 image that I’m going to base all of my machines on. The Annaversary Update broke every machine it was allowed to infect. So instead of being at the mercy of Windows Updates, especially now that they’re only going to publish massive roll-ups with no documentation, I’m going to play OS time machine games using VMware Workstation from a Ubuntu host.

Yeah, it’s a sad story. I’ve gone from being one of their biggest supporters to their biggest haters. This telemetry that bypasses their own firewall just bugs the heck out of me – I see the traffic at the hardware firewall but blocking it seems to be problematic and breaks things. But I’m not really a network engineer so I’m probably not doing it right.

Anyway, thanks for keeping us in the loop, Woody. Hopefully we can identify & evict the telemetry updates and lock that image down until either Microsoft comes to their senses (wont happen) or something better comes along.

Actually I’m contributing to the decentralized web effort as a hobby and it’s pretty clear that entirely platform independent ES6 JavaScript with stuff like three.js + node.js is the future and I (we?) can finally dump the crusty old past and move into the future.

My $0.02.

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Fascinating story. Hang in there and keep me posted…

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What is Aero Glass doing other than slowing down the computer? Is it required for Desktop Composition?

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Current fast ring build is 14936.1000 for both PCs and Mobile.

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Re: DaveG aka 135502

https://www.askwoody.com/2016/whats-wrong-with-the-windows-insider-program/comment-page-1/#comment-100353

“…ES6 JavaScript with stuff like three.js + node.js is the future…”

It’s all Geek to me. Any JS links for dummies?

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It would not be difficult to build a reasonable argument that MS’s tilting at the windmill of OS convergence actually impeded their efforts to penetrate the mobile phone/tablet space. They tried to “bigfoot” the Windows x86 overhead into a computing space that really did not require it and failed. In doing so they have also poorly served the needs of the more serious desktop environment. Just my opinion.

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I agree completely. And the #1 fallout, aside from Win10 Mobile, are the Universal apps.

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Apps were becoming more OS agnostic already with the browser functioning as the OS. UWP was always going to be a hard sell to developers because MS was seen as trying to create a walled garden with W10. We may see some interesting news from Google early next month on their new pc OS which merges Chrome and Android. Code nameed, Andromeda, it could be very interesting on the laptop which is rumored for late next year.

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I’m greatly anticipating Andromeda!

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I think one of the biggest issues is the confusion behind version numbers and codenames, etc. is it 1511 or TH2? Is it AU or 1607? Even if from a programming standpoint, it doesn’t make sense, they need to vastly improve the naming/numbering scheme in order to really make sense to the public at large.

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Here here.

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