So I try to start a piece of software that accesses a classic serial port.
The software locks up. The process becomes unkillable. Because, you know… because. Microsoft has not yet discovered kill -9 I guess.
(Yes, I know that unkillable zombie processes exist under Linux/UNIX, too. But in the past 25 years, I remember exactly one (1) occasion when a Linux process was truly unkillable, hung in a privileged kernel call, and actually required a reboot with no workaround. On Linux, this is considered a bug, not a feature. In contrast, on Windows this is a regular occurrence. Then again, on Linux I have fine-grained control and I can update pretty much everything other than the kernel binary, without ever having to reboot.)
Ok-kay… this means Windows has to be restarted. Fine. At least let me check if there are any Windows updates. Oops… error, because an “update service is shutting down” or whatever.
Oh well, let’s restart. The browser (Edge) will remember my previously opened tabs, right?
After restart, another program tells me that it has an update. Clicking on the update button opens the browser with the download link. Fine. Just checking, in the browser history all my previously opened tabs (lots of them) are still there. Good.
Meanwhile, Windows Update does come to life and tells me that I need to restart my system. Couldn’t you freaking tell me this BEFORE I restarted?
Oh well, might as well… restart #2.
After restart, let’s open the browser. History… and all my previously opened tabs are gone. The only thing the bloody browser remembers is the single tab that contained the download link for that application.
@!##%@#!@. And @#$$!@#$@!$. And all their relatives, too. Live or deceased. And any related deities.
Oh well, let’s restore the bleeping tabs manually; fortunately, I also had most of them opened in Chrome, so I could reopen them, one by one, in Edge. (Maybe there’s a more efficient way of doing this, but I wasn’t going to research that.)
Meanwhile, I also restarted Visual Studio 2019. It told me that it had an update. Having learned from previous experience, I shut down a specific service that was known to interfere with the update. It proved insufficient. When Visual Studio was done updating, it told me that “only one thing” remains: a teeny weeny inconsequential thing, ANOTHER BLOODY RESTART.
Because, ladies and gentlemen, in the fine year of 2020, the great software company Microsoft has not yet found a way to UPDATE A BLEEPING APPLICATION without restarting the WHOLE BLEEPING WORLD. Or at the very least do me a bleeping failure and warn IN ADVANCE that the update may require a restart.
My favorite coffee mug survived, but only just barely. I almost smashed it against the wall.
So here we go… restart #3.
It was nearly two hours ago that I innocently tried to turn on that program that required access to the serial port. Since then, I probably aged a few years, increased my chances of a stroke and other illnesses related to high pressure, barked at my beautiful wife and my cats, almost smashed my favorite mug, lost several browser tabs but also my history in some xterm windows, and other than that, accomplished ABSOLUTELY NOTHING.
Thanks for nothing, Microsoft.
And I actually like Microsoft. Imagine what I’d be saying if I hated them.