Signs of Sanity (Premium)

Recent builds of Windows 10 19H1 offer partial solutions to some long-time problems with this platform. To be clear, neither goes far enough. But they are both steps in the right direction and a sign, I think, that Microsoft is finally listening to feedback.

The first change was something I noticed the other night in Windows 10 Home on the then-most-recent Windows 10 Insider Preview build: It is now possible—or, will be possible when Windows 10 19H1 ships—on Windows 10 to pause Windows Updates for 1 to 7 days. I was so excited about this change that I pinged Mary Jo when I saw it, because we often complain on Windows Weekly that Windows 10 Home users are guinea pigs when it comes to Windows Updates. In Windows 10 to date, it was impossible for these users to effectively prevent updates from installing. In fact, we discussed this on the most recent episode of the show.

Not that it matters, I guess, but I don’t know when this change was implemented. When I wrote my rundown of everything that was right so far about Windows 10 19H1, I didn’t see this being called out in any of Microsoft’s build announcement blog posts beyond a general “simpler way to pause updates for seven days.” That is, I didn’t know this would be made available to Windows 10 Home as well as Pro. Here’s what it looks like.

So that’s good news. But Windows 10 users should all have the same capabilities for pausing and deferring updates, and I’d still like to see that happen. For now, I’ll chalk this one up as a minor victory.

This next one, while still only a partial fix, is also a minor victory. And like the issue above, it’s one I’ve personally championed to the point where I’ve gotten in arguments with misguided Microsoft employees who a) don’t understand the problem despite my explanations, and b) believe that any Accessibility addition to Windows is a good one, even if that addition is annoying or pointless for virtually everyone who uses the platform.

I am referring, of course, to Cortana’s obnoxious voice-over scatting during the first screen in the Out of Box Experience in Windows Setup, which is delivered an incredibly high volume and routinely scares the crap out of unsuspecting users.

“Based on feedback, if you clean install Pro, Enterprise, or Education editions of Windows, the Cortana voice-over will be disabled by default,” the Microsoft release notes explain. “Screen reader users can still choose to start Narrator at any time by pressing WIN + Ctrl + Enter.”

As Mehedi noted, the feedback that Microsoft is most likely responding to is from IT pros who need to provision multiple PCs at once in a room. You can only imagine what a cacophony it is when multiple PCs starting screaming and scatting at the same time.

But Microsoft’s inability to understand why this feature would be annoying to IT is only part of the problem, and this, again, speaks to a misguided desire to simply add any Accessibility feature to Windows, no matter the cost.

I’ve argued this point to Microsoft on Twitter, and in private, and I’m tired of them not understanding this. So I will explain it, again, here.

My son is deaf, so I understand the needs of the handicapped community and the benefits of Accessibility. But as the parent of a handicapped child, I’ve only wanted one thing for my son: For him to have as normal an experience as possible. Not a special experience. Not anything extra. Just the same experience as everyone else.

That said, there are certain realities to being deaf, in his case. My son has always been very athletic, and he has competed in sports like soccer and basketball. But because he has two cochlear implants in his skull, he will never be able to play sports like hockey or football. The risk of permanent injury—and the loss of his artificial hearing—is just too high. There are just some things he can’t do.

On that note, the Cortana screaming scat in Setup is wrong for a number of reasons.

First, it annoys the 99.99+ percent of people who don’t need or want this functionality; this is a direct affront to my “optimize for the every day” philosophy.

To turn it off, you need to know to click the tiny microphone icon at the bottom of the screen, and not the speaker icon, which seems like a more obvious choice.

Those users who are blind or so vision-disabled that they cannot set up Windows 10 will have assistance from those who can perform this process for them, and there are still parts of Setup you can’t complete via voice. (Plus, how often does this need to happen anyway? There are far more common activities to focus on.)

And finally, this problem has already been solved, in superior form, by Apple: In macOS, the voice assistance features don’t come on until you’ve sat at the first Setup screen for 60 seconds. That’s the right approach to this issue.

Microsoft’s tone-deaf (sorry) response to my complaints has always bothered me. So, I’m glad that they’re sort of fixing the problem now, even though they continue to ignore my common-sense complaints. But like the issue above, this is only a partial solution because Cortana voice control will still be enabled in Windows 10 Home. Sorry, guys, you continue to be Microsoft’s bitch. And that sucks.

What Microsoft should do, of course, is copy Apple. The company that figured out the right approach to Accessibility years ago.

Anyway. Two half-hearted victories are better than none. I’ll take whatever I can get.