Solutions under Windows – the proverbial needle in a haystack
As long as everyday situations are concerned they can, as a general rule, be
solved rather quickly under Windows – but once everyday occurrences aren't
concerned any more, it is hard to come by usable information, and no matter
what is entered on Google, only unusable information seems to be dug up. On the
second glance, however, this information can be used, but some basic knowledge
of computers in general and Windows in particular is required – but anyone who
lacks this prerequisite easily is at a loss.
To have a look at the help provided by Windows
proves to be a wild-goose chase all too
often, because no matter what you try, it just won't work, and that one
has to tediously search for some settings doesn't really make things any
easier.
After all the documentation innately provided by Windows can be called sparse
at best and at most deals with elements and situations that are commonplace.
But as soon as things get more specific, things look rather bleak again in this
respect, particularly since someone who has difficulties with this matter is
going to wonder what is requested of him. The only viable thing to do would be
asking someone who is well-versed with it – but if said person doesn't have
time to spare or is otherwise indisposed, it's especially hard to know what to
do.
When helpful features remain unused...
This can quickly happen when John Q. Public is facing something hitherto entirely unknown. Unfortunately Windows possesses the unnerving trait of driving even those folks crazy who are moderately-versed with this matter, because some settings are possibly located at another place than expected or contrary to expectations something doesn't work the way it is supposed to. On top of that virtually every action that influences the system requires a reboot of the system, because various system components cannot be reinitialized on the fly – in contrast to to e. g. Linux that usually requires a reboot only when the system kernel has been updated.
On top of that there are a few problems that affect the system really badly. If at all, this problem preferredly shows up when installing any drivers, and especially the graphics driver seems to be a favorite cause. Here it may happen that old versions aren't uninstalled correctly or not at all or something goes wrong with installing the new driver – anyway, the system gets tangled up with zombie files and ceases its operation. This is a real problem for anyone who is ill-versed in this matter, and where Windows 7 spat out at least some information that was helpful in researching the cause, Windows 8 proves to be considerably more taciturn as far as information to the cause of the error is concerned.
Interaction with other systems
Here Windows still displays a few minor quirks, but the overall situation has
improved significantly. Whereas Windows 95 hadn't really treated the system
configuration gingerly, which did an eventually installed Linux or OS/2 in
when the systems had been installed in the wrong order, since at least Windows
98 SE this hadn't been an issue any more aside from the installer of Windows
wrote the default boot code to the MBR, which simply overwrote a LILO or Grub
that had been installed therein. This, however, could be averted by writing the
boot loader to the partition to be booted (usually the root partition of Linux)
instead of to the MBR – which could lead to problems with booting Windows up to
and including Windows XP.
There have also been some changes on the system side, and the interaction
between Windows and Linux has become increasingly easier. Where Windows up to
Windows Me has done its own thing as far as interaction with other boxes is
concerned – which in turn has led to the development of Samba on the Linux side
so that Windows could be integrated into a network composed of Linux boxes –
there aren't just interfaces specific to Windows available any more, but one
may now choose so that the choice of interfaces solely depends on the system
running on the server. If necessary you may be required to use interfaces
specific to Linux on server A to access, for example, a network printer whereas
server B mandates the use of interfaces specific to Windows to mount e. g. a
network drive.