I have heard, but never in any way verified, that there was code that tried to identify whether you were running 95 or 98 by looking for a version starting with 9. If true, it would mean some code might treat Windows 9 as 95/98.

It’s worth noting that much of that time was during a lockdown and subsequent years involved working from home. Also in the intervening time I bought my wife an EV, which provides most of my transportation.

The gas vehicle is used about once a week to pick up heavy or large things or to take large boxes to the recycling area; plus there are occasions where my wife is out in her EV and I have to go somewhere. During these occasions I am grateful to have my own transportation.

It’s true that I don’t get much use out of the car, but I live in a fairly rural area. The closest non residential building that I know of is 2-3 miles away and I have limited mobility due to an injury. There’s no presence whatsoever of any Uber type services; I don’t even know of a taxi industry, though there likely is one. If I didn’t have reliable transportation I would be pretty screwed. Even during the week or two between when my Flex broke down and I replaced it, I had to cancel two doctor appointments and miss other things I wanted to do.

I probably would survive if all we had was my wife’s car, but I would lose to a lot of convenience and my schedule would definitely get more complicated.

Who are you, who are so wise in the ways of science infotainment development?

This is useful information and the depth of your knowledge is impressive. Not that I expect operating system expertise from a car salesperson who has no reason to have any, but my salesperson told me it was still Microsoft. Thank you.

Suddenly I miss the Flex just a tiny, tiny bit less.

Honestly, it was a car, a thing; I can’t claim legitimate pain. It makes me a little sad on occasion, but overall in my life it won’t matter. My mom, who loved aphorisms, would have said “by the time you’ve been married twice, you’ll forget all about it.” I plan to maintain my first and current marriage, but the sentiment fits.

I am very sorry for the loss of your Element! I was only in one once, but I loved the way the dials worked. Perhaps this humorous lyric from the song “Swagless” by Spose might provide some comfort:

I could sign and drive a boxy Honda SUV and not be in my element

219,000 is pretty solid for any car. I think I bought my Flex at 83,000 miles and sold it at under 100,000. Maybe the starting mileage was 73,000, but somewhere in that vicinity. That included using it as my primary transport vehicle when moving across several hundred miles (which, TBH, is probably what killed it - but I appreciated that I was able to use it and its vast cargo capacity.)

With reference to the toast at the end of the comment, I’ve always loved boxy vehicles. As a kid, my favorite vehicle was my dad’s 1984 Toyota Celica (though his was maroon, unlike the picture). It’s also the car in which I learned to drive a manual.

They don’t make many boxy cars anymore. The first time I saw a Flex was on the highway and I said to my passengers “what was that?! I want one” then several years later I had referenced it so much my wife said to me some form of “FINE, shut up about it and go buy one.” Several hours later I drove home my favorite vehicle so far.

Thanks for the response!

Sure, and for the eight years I owned it before it broke down beyond being worth repairing, I had no problem with those. The infotainment system did kinda suck, but it was a 2014 so I think it would get some leeway for that even if it weren’t Microsoft powered.

The emblem just offended my sensibilities. I never pulled it off, though, because the friends who rode with me all knew how passionately I feel about Linux (they mostly also work with it - I try not to proselytize to the disinterested) and found it funny.

According to KBB, the car was worth $8k when it broke down. I put almost double that into repairing the same part of the engine at three different mechanics before giving up. Sadly, for some silly reason, Ford no longer makes the Flex. I think the Explorer is pretty close, but I couldn’t find one close enough to test drive. I would have loved to convert my car to an EV, but I wouldn’t trust my own work on that front and didn’t want to pay as much as would cost to have a professional do it.

Every time I get into my new vehicle - a 2024 Ford Edge - I think to myself how much I miss the Flex. That said, I did get a great deal on the Edge.

Until recently, I had a Ford Flex.

The only thing I didn’t like about it was the proud “powered by Microsoft” emblem (and its implications).

I was actually wondering, when the previous commenter referenced the setup menu, if the shift+F10 thing still worked. I know it brings up the command prompt in the install interface, but in case you didn’t know, it also brings up the command prompt in general use Windows. (Or it used to. Again, I’m very out of date on the subject.)

I think “not hard, just annoying” means that anything tech related is out of reach for most people, unfortunately. Plus, to be honest, most people probably won’t care about or see a problem with Microsoft forcing an online account on them. I’m happy they’re happy, but their privacy ends not with a bang, but a whimper.

Ah, fair enough.

I haven’t used, or especially installed, Windows in years. Wasn’t sure if what I described was still the case. Good to know there’s still a way, though, in case I get desperate!

This may not still be true, but previously if you disconnected or removed the NIC during installation, after some haranguing you could setup a local account. (Note that this is still obviously bad, but if you need a solution, it might provide one.)

Fair enough, I can respect that.

Nowadays most Linux users seem to use ssh user@host. When I was getting started, that didn’t exist (or at least I was unaware of it) so I still frequently use the -l flag instead.

Nothing wrong with it, just that at least I mostly encounter its use by experienced users.

You, like me, must be old.

I also frequently pass -l to the ssh command.

https://youtu.be/Fow7iUaKrq4

My culinary knowledge is not sufficient to usefully comment on this.

Ah, I apologize, I did not intend to mock. Both sound potentially appealing. Thanks for the clarification!

Fair enough.

I generally agree with you, but wasn’t SELinux primarily the NSA and Tresys? I know it’s a primarily Red Hat thing now, but I think it would have existed in some form without them.

It is entirely possible I’m misinformed.

I didn’t know what lard bread is, so I looked it up.

I discovered it was bread with prosciutto baked in. I thought it sounded unappealing.

Then I thought of “making bacon pancakes” and thought I should open my mind.

edit: added a missing word.

git cash pop