
Anomalous CPU utilization on Windows build node caused by ads - luu
https://twitter.com/shipilev/status/1149679913974280193
======
jtdev
A related observation: I have between 4-8 *nix, MacOS, iOS, machines running
on my home network at any given time. I’m using piHole (with base config) to
block ad traffic. My blocked percentage hovers around ~10%... until I boot up
my one Windows 10 machine, which spikes the blocked ad traffic to ~25% and
remains that high -with zero applications running mind you - until I shutdown
the machine, after which it quickly drops back ~10%. It seems that Windows 10
is essentially an ad and surveillance OS built for mining user data at this
point.

~~~
dzink
I’ve seen less on the Windows 10 Pro version (switched off all datasending
features on install).

~~~
parliament32
Enjoy having them silently re-enabled on the next update. Enterprise is the
only version where you can actually disable and it'll stay disabled, because
most regulated corps would consider "telemetry" a data breach.

~~~
jrockway
There was one update that turned Cortana back on. I think it was the major
feature update before the "Creators Update". It was the one where everyone (or
at least me) thought they got hacked like in a movie. My computer was randomly
turned off. I turned it back on and instead of the login screen, it just was a
glowing "All your files are exactly where you left them..."

Took me like 5 minutes of not being able to use my computer to get through,
only to find that I wasn't hacked... but that was something Microsoft hired
and paid employees to do.

With that in mind, they haven't done anything like that since. Hopefully
people are super mad about it.

~~~
sandworm101
>> Hopefully people are super mad about it.

Unusual windows activity, random rebooting associated with "updates", is a
force of nature. People are beyond anger. They just accept it as part of the
natural world. Linux guys like me are the angry man standing on the corner
saying that the world doesn't need to be this way, that we can choose not to
live like this. But if you believe that something is natural and unavoidable,
eventually that guy in the corner looks genuinely crazy.

------
jchw
The duality of modern Microsoft is absolutely astounding. How they can
simultaneously do incredible things for Github, and open source Windows
components, while continuing to not fix the most user hostile Windows ever
produced, is completely bonkers.

My litmus test for whether Windows is finally fixed is whether of not it’s
possible to install it without Candy Crush, but unfortunately without killing
the network and applying a registry patch as far as I know it can’t be done.

~~~
zarathustraa
> _My litmus test for whether Windows is finally fixed is whether of not it’s
> possible to install it without Candy Crush_

[https://mspoweruser.com/rejoice-windows-users-candy-crush-
is...](https://mspoweruser.com/rejoice-windows-users-candy-crush-is-finally-
gone/)

What's you new litmus test?

~~~
fortran77
Mac OSX comes with chess. What's the difference?

~~~
pseudalopex
Chess doesn't encourage spending money.

~~~
esmi
Looking over my library I’d have to disagree about that. :)

------
Razengan
Things like these is why most Mac converts never want to return to Windows.
Not just the issue in TFA/post, which may seem trivial, but the overall
“telemetry” debacle and experiences like jtdev’s comment.

For all their claims of having reformed, Microsoft will always be that ex you
don’t want to do anything with ever again.

There are worse horrors than the lack of a physical Escape key, waiting on the
other side of the fence.

~~~
ctrl-j
I love the idea of Apple being more privacy focused, and helping us keep our
data more secure. I have a touchbar macbook pro, and a headphone-jackless
iphone. I just wish they wouldn't beat me with their opinionated hardware and
software choices.

Deprecating open gl. Eliminating 32-bit support. Forcing me to use dongle
after dongle (ethernet, usb-A, HDMI, and SD card)

Magic mouse has such a terrible sensor, not to mention the charging port
location. I actually replaced it with a logitech because it's pretty much
unusable for any precision work.

Heck, I bought an eGPU enclosure recently because I had a set of nvidia cards
lying around.. I can only use it in bootcamp though, because of course macs
only support AMD cards...

Microsoft may be an abusive ex, but apple is pretty much the same melody with
different lyrics.

~~~
Razengan
Perhaps we should all keep and maintain a Linux machine in the event that
Apple and Microsoft both decide to screw us over.

~~~
chefandy
Linux machines are fantastic if you don't need to use commercial software for
things like graphics, as many web-focused developers do.

~~~
semi-extrinsic
Between Gimp, Inkscape and Krita, what are the things not covered in this
domain?

~~~
ctrl-j
For some simple photo manipulation Gimp works - but it seems a lot harder to
use. Plus it's missing non-destructive adjustment layers, and the brush engine
is nowhere _near_ as advanced as photoshop.

Inkscape is similar - everything is a little harder to do - and there's some
basic things that don't seem to be in the application at all. Does Inkscape
support multiple artboards yet? What about exporting multiple resolutions
without duplicating the assets? The symbol support also was very lackluster
when I used it last.

Krita lags horribly every time I've tried to use it.

I like the notion that there are open source replacements for these systems..
and I'd _love_ to drop my $50+ per month subscription - but the alternatives
aren't yet equivalents.

~~~
komali2
You're not wrong, but we all know why it's not better: nobody's paying to make
it better, so the only way to get it better is via adoption and a larger
community actively trying to make it better.

Basically, yes, it hurts, but maybe try using it more? It's certainly better
than _nothing_ , which is what we may have if, I dunno, Adobe collapses or
something crazy and all our Photoshop licenses suddenly stop working.

~~~
Avamander
You can use such stuff more if you don't want to be productive, and this is
coming from a 100% Linux user for nearly half of my life. Unless you write
code then the contributions are basically useless.

------
skrebbel
So the objection is that Internet Explorer has msn.com as its default
homepage. This is fair, it's ridiculous and a relic from a long gone age.

But so is Internet Explorer. What kind of super old Windows version were these
people running? What caused IE to open out of the blue? Windows has plenty
flaws but randomly open browsers is not one I'm familiar with.

~~~
nathankunicki
The comment on randomly opening windows is fair (I don't see what caused it
either), but this was a build VM, not a workstation - there is no reason to
upgrade the browser. A more pertinent question is why are MS still shipping IE
by default.

~~~
shawnz
It was a "build VM" running the client edition of Windows. Do you install
Ubuntu Desktop on your build VMs and expect Firefox not to be bundled?

~~~
hrktb
TBF it costs licensing money, like twice as much. Yes, I know, it could be
chalked up as cost of doing business, I’m just saying it’s a different
question than just choosing between free linux distros for a VM.

~~~
shawnz
Agreed, I'm not saying that everyone needs to be using Windows Server for
every build task, I'm just saying that it's silly to complain about Windows
client being engineered for clients by default. If you're knowingly going to
take that cost-cutting measure then you ought to accept that the default
config will have to be tuned for your use case.

------
AaronFriel
OP should install Windows Server Nano or Core to run these or use a non-
interactive user session to run builds, e.g.: by running a service with a
service account instead of a login session with a user account.

The OP is making the equivalent complaint of running a full Ubuntu shell
complete with the Ubuntu One store running in the background after starting up
Gnome, and complaining that Canonical owes him CPU-time.

Well, yeah, you logged into a interactive user session in a desktop user-
oriented operating system!

This is the case of the person who goes to a doctor and says, "It hurts when I
do this". The answer: "Then don't do that!"

~~~
the8472
> Well, yeah, you logged into a interactive user session in a desktop user-
> oriented operating system!

While it certainly is preferable to use a headless session even a desktop
session should quiescence by default, otherwise the operating system would be
wasting gigawatts across its install base.

------
jimbobimbo
I sympathize with the pickle, but this sounds more like a case of
misconfigured build node. Why Internet Explorer is even on it? If OP RDP'd to
the machine and saw IE window open, wouldn't this mean that build processes
are running under whatever account _interactively_? Why?

~~~
FluffyKitty
Yeah, I have to agree here. If this is a build server, I'd argue that they
should be running Windows Server and just disable the UI all together.

~~~
3minus1
Maybe it runs selenium tests as part of the build process

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peterwwillis

      @shipilev Dear God, @danluu posted this at HackerNews, and now I have
      people blowing this out of proportion and/or implying I should feel
      bad about "misconfiguration". Jeez, it is at-home build node, not 
      the enterprise build farm. Most of the time I'm surprised it works
      without problems :D
    

Tweets don't make great HN content. They're not fully-formed articles, they
don't provide context, they miss critical information, and people _always_
over-react to them.

------
penagwin
I see people talking about ad farming - but this seems like for whatever
reason IE was opened - and it's default home page is MSN, which has ads.

Not saying that IE should've ever been opened in the first place but this
doesn't sound very malicious? It is pretty sad how much resources pages like
that take though.

------
blinkingled
Server editions have IE/edge in locked down mode by default and all the crap
removed so he should just stop running builds on client versions of Windows?

~~~
hrktb
For anyone curious like me, the standard editions are 139~199$ for the
license, 501~6155$ for the server editions.

So the price to not get ads every update is 300$ I guess.

------
yellowapple
Microsoft's hard-on for shoving ads down its users' throats is exactly why the
only versions of Windows I'll touch nowadays (and probably ever again) are the
following:

\- Windows 2000 and prior releases \- Windows 10 LTSC (formerly LTSB) \-
Windows Server

And this would be only in cases where Windows is absolutely necessary;
otherwise, why take that risk when Linux (and more recently OpenBSD) has been
nice and good to me as a daily driver for 10 years now?

------
ufmace
This sounds pretty bizarre. I wonder exactly what version of Windows they were
using? Sounds like maybe not a server version? I've run a bunch of Windows
computers, and while they have some annoying habits, I've never had one
spontaneously open a IE window on me. Maybe he got malware on it somehow?
Though getting malware on a server would be very disturbing.

Most of my most-annoying OS features are around updates these days. Windows
Update loves to just spontaneously force-reboot whenever it feels like it, too
bad if you had some unsaved files or some process you intended to leave
running. OS X is nicer about its OS updates, but the Mac App Store seems to
like to silently download and install updates whenever it feels like it.
Pretty annoying when you're trying to do something on your last few % of
battery, and it decides to burn up the CPU updating XCode or iTunes or
something, with no indication what it's doing or how to make it stop.

------
fortran77
The ads were because they had, for some reason, launched a browser, and the
default homepage had ads. I'd like to know how this browser launched and why
before I'd point fingers.

Windows does have an annoying feature (which can be turned off, but it's not
obvious) where apps will relaunch after reboot, perhaps that was the cause,
but we don't know.

------
IronWolve
Everything wants to startup and run in the background on windows, all those
game update installers (steam/orgin/etc), adobe products, drivers, apps, its
crazy. Not even counting all the win10 apps.

------
nailer
As the response notes, this should be a headless Windows installation.
Installing and running a GUI and IE are the results of choices made by the
Tweeter.

------
chvid
Maybe don’t use windows for your build machine.

~~~
sam_lowry_
He is building JDKs for Windows, mind you.

------
jquast
does anyone else think that windows defender is a surveillance tool, not a
security tool? To hash all known files, so that when a file is later deemed
illegal, it can be traced back to its origins using this private file hash
database? wikileaks, etc.

------
yrro
Why are people still trying to use non-Enterprise versions of Windows for
serious work?

------
Causality1
Leaving Internet Explorer installed on a Windows machine is like buying an old
building and not removing the "whites only" sign from the bathrooms.

------
draw_down
Say whatever you like about Apple, they don’t do this.

------
kitchenkarma
Windows is just a spyware at this point. Never use it for anything serious.
Microsoft having more money that they can ever spend, play the "good person"
and seduce developers with shiny things, but the underlining strategy to f*ck
everyone hard is in play at all times. Don't be a fool.

~~~
DoofusOfDeath
> Windows is just a spyware at this point.

I'd encourage you to avoid hyperbole, in the interest of keeping the
discussion productive.

------
simplyinfinity
The guy probably has infected machine... which is far more likely than MS
runing ad farm

~~~
specktr
Have you used windows 10 recently? I didn't realize how bad it was until I
installed a fresh copy of windows 10. My backup windows machine has so many
registry patches to disable the crapware that I didn't recall how bad it truly
is by default.

~~~
parliament32
Ads in the start menu and on the lock screen are apparently perfectly normal
to end users now. It's honestly just sad.

~~~
ijpoijpoihpiuoh
I don't see any ads on my W10 machine and I haven't done anything to disable
them. Where are you seeing this?

~~~
specktr
In the start menu. It could be that there are different definitions of ads.
But on my windows system I get ads for games and other applications that they
want me to install. I think they even install some of them like candy crush
without asking me first (I disabled this in registry). Figured companies pay
microsoft to promote their apps.

