Windows 10 sunset – consequences for development? Is Linux an actual option?

[fernewelten]

(Pertains to Engine development as well as Editor development)

So MS is sunsetting Windows 10, and it will only get security updates for the next few weeks (with exceptions).

I'm one of those having a box that would be perfectly able to run Windows 11 as far as the mainboard, memory, UEFI, CPU are concerned – but it mustn't for 'political' reasons, i.e., because ageist Microsoft deems the CPU to be too old although it could actually do the actual job.

So that means that I will be in the lurch in a few weeks' time. (I might be able to postpone the inevitable and buy another year by buying extended support for some money.)

I'm pondering the ramifications of this, specifically as concerns AGS development.

I might consider switching to a Linux variant, probably Fedora or Mint. This will probably entail switching the whole toolset, which is currently centred around MSVS, probably to gcc, gdb & co.

My knowledge of those is extremely dated: The last time that I worked on Linux is decades ago, at a time when you still had to recompile the kernel in order to get a decent keyboard layout. It will probably be akin to meeting your highschool sweetheart in your fifties again, after you and she have gone through a dozen other partnerships, picked up strange spleens, gained some stones and lost all your looks.

Is this even being done? Are there currently developers of the AGS that actually work from a Linux box? How do you debug or write for the Editor?

Are there others in a similar rut? How do you plan to cope?

[Crimson Wizard]

I guess I'm an idiot, because I'm still on Windows 7. Every time I am reminded that I need to upgrade I think about all the things that I will have to reinstall, the new system ui i will have to get accustomed to... and quite likely upgrade my PC too... and postpone again.

I have to use an older version of MSVS for development (VS 2019 is the last that works on Win7).

[eri0o]

for engine or command line tools development outside of Windows (and even on Windows honestly), I use JetBrains CLion. It used to be paid but has since been made free for non-commercial use. It's a great IDE that has easy to click around interface (I configure it to use it's classical interface but it does have an alternative VSCode like interface).

Other than this I have switched to a Windows 11 notebook. I still have my Windows 10 desktop and all it takes to upgrade to Windows 11 is flipping on the TPM on it's motherboard config in the boot screen.

Regarding the CI we moved it to use VS2022 which works just fine building the VS2019 projects, and if we want to, in the future change for VS2022 projects it should work just fine.

I think there's some way to run Windows 11 in unsupported hardware but honestly I haven't had the need so I haven't experimented with it.

Outside of this I played with the idea of building Editor and Engine on Windows 11 ARM (which is free for now) to be able to run it in a Mac computer or Raspberry pi 5. The engine builds and runs just fine. The Editor is a bit trickier since we have some dependencies that require elimination (irrKlang) or update (magick). Other than this, the .NET Framework needs to be upgraded to 4.8.1.

I guess for other alternative would be to use a VM for development.

Edit: https://support.microsoft.com/en-au/windows/windows-11-on-devices-that-don-t-meet-minimum-system-requirements-0b2dc4a2-5933-4ad4-9c09-ef0a331518f1

It looks like Windows 11 does install in unsupported hardware, it just asks you acknowledge what you are doing once.

Edit:

Oh right, the other heads up about windows 11 is the note I got new had that install that is incomplete but has a wizard so it does the final steps with you. It by default tried to force me to have a Microsoft account set on the notebook, which is not something I wanted for many reasons. There's a way to bypass it that can be found in many websites, I don't remember the details but I had to use shift+F10 to be able to open cmd.exe during install and also I had to do so without been connected to the internet. In the command line I typed OOBE\BYPASSNRO and then had to reboot and at some point a new option appeared that let me skip the requirement for an online account. I also am running the Pro version, which allowed me to disable quite a few things of the OS that are annoying. I also used a regedit command to use the old right click menu. I don't remember all the configs but I had to do quite a few configs to be able to make Win11 less annoying.

[fire7side]

My old desktop was getting really slow.  Solid state drives are so much faster.  I got it for $600 I think on Amazon.  Got the same old monitor, which is fine.  It was actually taking minutes to boot up.  I'd go and do something else, but glad to see it go.  I'm not sure how old it was in computer years, but a lot.

[Crimson Wizard]

My old desktop was getting really slow.  Solid state drives are so much faster.  I got it for $600 I think on Amazon.  Got the same old monitor, which is fine.  It was actually taking minutes to boot up.  I'd go and do something else, but glad to see it go.  I'm not sure how old it was in computer years, but a lot.

Excuse me, but how is this relevant to the topic discussed here?

[eri0o]

One pain of newer Windows, is for the before SDL versions of AGS, for some reason the allegro version of AGS on Windows occasionally causes my computer to lock when debugging. It's been sometime now, and I don't remember the conditions, but sometimes when hitting a breakpoint in VS when debugging the 3.5.x and before era of the source code it has this issue. Thankfully this issue doesn't happen since 3.6.x and the switch for SDL backend. If I remember correctly this didn't happen in Windows 7 after doing a workaround - which I forgot what it was.

[Crimson Wizard]

One pain of newer Windows, is for the before SDL versions of AGS, for some reason the allegro version of AGS on Windows occasionally causes my computer to lock when debugging.

This is solved by changing a value in windows registry called "LowLevelHooksTimeout". It's 5000 (milliseconds) by default, and I used to change it to 10 or 5 when debugging old versions. Unfortunately it gets reset on its own after some time.

[Danvzare]

I guess I'm an idiot, because I'm still on Windows 7. Every time I am reminded that I need to upgrade I think about all the things that I will have to reinstall, the new system ui i will have to get accustomed to... and quite likely upgrade my PC too... and postpone again.

I have to use an older version of MSVS for development (VS 2019 is the last that works on Win7).

I am so glad I'm not the only one. 
I mean... I do have a Windows 10 laptop... and I know I'm going to have to upgrade sooner or later, especially since my Windows 7 computer is practically falling apart. (The amount of incompatibilities I'm running into now, is getting annoying.)
But it's still nice to know that I'm not the only one.

So MS is sunsetting Windows 10, and it will only get security updates for the next few weeks (with exceptions).

I'm one of those having a box that would be perfectly able to run Windows 11 as far as the mainboard, memory, UEFI, CPU are concerned – but it mustn't for 'political' reasons, i.e., because ageist Microsoft deems the CPU to be too old although it could actually do the actual job.

You do know there are easy ways around BOTH of those problems... right?
You want Windows 10 security updates up to 2028? It's just a few simple steps.
You want Windows 11 on a computer that Microsoft won't let it be installed on? It's a little more complicated, but there's plenty of workarounds.

Then again, I suppose it depends on what you're using the computer for.

[fernewelten]

You want Windows 10 security updates up to 2028?

That would be the ideal. As far as _I_ am concerned, my box is fine just as it is. It will probably still cover my needs even in 2035, but I suppose there's an end to anything.