From the Editor’s Desk: Technology Has Never Failed Me (Premium)

I owned personal computers—what we then called home computers—before I was even a teenager, and I was an early and regular consumer of technical books and magazines that covered this early passion. And I was convinced at that time that the authors of those books were technical gurus who had spent years learning and honing their skills, and that those books were the culmination of that work.

Years later, when I unexpectedly began writing my own books, I realized that I had had it all backward. Most technical book authors knew something about the topic going into a new writing project, I'm sure, but the learning and skill-building occurred while writing those books. In other words, the process of writing the book was what made them an expert. And that's absolutely fine because the readers of those books still received the same benefit.

Now that I've written around 30 books—I've lost track—and have committed what must be millions of words in front of readers, I guess I can be judged accordingly. Not everything I've written should be celebrated, of course, but I'd like to think I've made some kind of contribution, have helped some people get over whatever technical or conceptual hurdle. It's not a horrible life, and while I do sometimes wonder about the 9-to-5 schedule that so many of my friends and family have, I wouldn't change a thing.

Well, I would change one thing.

I've always been a fan of what I now think of as personal technology, of course, but I've also likewise experienced a lifetime of frustration because of it. Recently, I've observed that technology, literally built on a foundation of 1s and 0s, could thus be perfect, but so rarely works correctly that it more closely resembles magic than science. This has been an ongoing topic for me over the years—because of the crazy nature of the house we moved to in 2017, I touched on it then, for example—but the problem has gotten worse recently, which is not what I would have predicted. And that's especially true with Windows, the product that is somehow still at the center of my professional life after 30 years.

Expressing frustration with things that don't work properly is part of the job, though I am of course labeled as a complainer for pointing this out. But fixing or working around those problems is also part of the job, and it's one I take seriously. And Microsoft's escalating stupidity with Windows, which results in inconsistent user interfaces and feature sets across multiple PCs that are otherwise updated and configured identically, is a growing sore spot. When you are supporting others, it's important to be able to say, "If you do this, this will happen" and not, "If you do this, this might happen. Or maybe this."

But I keep running into problems. Some I figure out. And some I do not. And that is vexing.

I recently noted that I added over 100 pages and new content to the Windows 11 Field Guide in two months, adding three completely new chapters a...