"What the hell? There's people still using Windows 7?" If by "still using Windows 7", you mean "refusing to play the corporate feudal game and knowingly install analytics software onto our home computers" then, obviously, yes. Windows 7 was the last vestige of Windows 98—arguably the best operating system in the world—and the last Windows iteration not to treat its users like blithering idiots. Despite incessant hounding from Microsoft to upgrade to Windows 8, then to upgrade to Windows 10, then to refrain from using the internet for about 2 weeks because Microsoft was forcing Windows 10 onto people without the option to stop it or roll it back, my studio still runs on Windows 7. For as long as I'm able to keep my studio computer running, cobbling together new parts here and there, I'll never stop using Windows 7 either.
That having been said, Firefox is about 28 days away from totally abandoning 7 and 8. They ended mainline support in v.115 and initiated extended support for security updates. New features introduced in v.116 however were not rolled out, and now, it's zero-hour. Last June, Mozilla announced that, in September 2024, all further security patches for 115 would cease, effectively pulling the plug on Windows 7's life support.
All is not lost, however! If you're like me, you can still maintain your privacy and security online by simply making yourself a Linux boot drive. The process is not complex and all it takes is a flashdrive with 4 or more gigabytes of space on it, a program called Rufus, and a copy of Linux Mint. How easy is it? It's 9:00 AM central time right now. If you were to start making your boot disk right now, you would be using Linux at 9:07 AM. For your convenience, I've written a guide on how to do just that! I'm being completely serious when I say that it's one of the easiest possible things you can do. You don't need to give up Windows 7, you don't need to install any software (except Rufus), you don't need to do any disk partitioning. All you do is change your computer's boot order and load up a Linux Mint live session from the flashdrive! Firefox is already included in Mint 22, so all you need to do is connect to the internet to get back to business as usual.
You don't need to go dark just because you still run Windows 7. Linux is there for you.
This entry was composed on a live session of Linux Mint 22, running from a Lexar S60 64 GB flashdrive, on a Lenovo T430 with Windows 7 installed.
--2 August 2024--