You know how after you’ve been in an unhealthy relationship for a while, and you’ve decided to break it off, but haven’t actually done so yet, it still feels like a weight has been lifted off your shoulders? You’re not exactly looking forward to the breakup, and you’re a little apprehensive about how things will be afterward. But suddenly the little things no longer annoy you, because soon, you won’t have to put up with them anymore.
Maybe you even begin to notice new little quirks that annoy you, things you’ve put up with for far too long without even realizing it, but, as “How I Met Your Mother” taught us, once you notice them you can’t un-notice them. But that’s okay too, because those will also soon be a thing of the past.
My time on my home PC is split about 50/50 between Ubuntu and Windows these days while I continue to make the transition. Simply logging in to Ubuntu is great; it takes about 5-10 seconds after I type my password before Ubuntu is ready for me to be productive. The 2-3 minute startup ritual that Windows performs just to log me in doesn’t really seem as painful anymore, because it will soon be gone. Yeah, Windows runs much better when freshly installed too, but without a system registry and an arms race of apps that all try to get in your face the most by starting system tray applets and other cruft, I’m hoping Ubuntu is much better about staying quick and responsive.
Yesterday, I installed the Funambol portal plugin on my Windows Mobile 6 phone under the hopes that their “push email and PIM data synchronization” would actually work well and be useful (they don’t and aren’t). Before installing it, I decided to uninstall a few other apps I’d tried, so I opened the Remove Programs screen and picked one using the directional pad (which is easier than pulling out the stylus or trying to fingernail-tap). Then I picked another one to uninstall (or so I thought), then tapped Remove, but Windows had pulled the ol’ focus-item-is-different-from-selected-item gag! Oh, you zany Windows, I removed the wrong program!
So today I decided to remove Funambol. After I selected Remove and waited a minute or so, I got the following message: “The selected program was not fully removed. Do you want to keep it in the list of installed programs?” So I assume my two choices really are: keep it in the list of programs and have a link to a mostly-removed app cluttering up my menu forever; or remove it from the program list and forever kiss goodbye to any hope of “fully” removing it. I chose the latter, which didn’t actually remove it from the Start menu anyway, so now I have a shortcut to a program that can’t be killed once started which just displays an empty box with an “OK” button in an infinite loop. Oh, Windows, you slay me!
I’m not sure how I’ll manage without ten-minute Windows Update sessions, or being nagged every five minutes to reboot because of an update to some non-essential app which is nonetheless deeply integrated into the OS, or “requesting” a reboot of my computer only to be vetoed by a slew of userland apps that each need to ask whether I really want to quit. But I think I’ll manage.
I really don’t know why I’ve subjected myself to this crap for so long. Of course, Ubuntu’s UI is also far from perfect (why can’t I right-click a launch menu item and edit its properties?!), but I am eagerly looking forward to my breakup with Windows, as soon as it moves its shit out of my apartment and I change the locks. Maybe we can still be friends, awkwardly exchanging pleasantries when I run it inside a VM from time to time to test a website I’m working on. I guess time will tell.
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