I opened Updates this morning, I didn’t start a search, but it automatically started downloading the .Net Preview for next month.
But it hasn’t installed it, it downloaded it and is asking whether I should install it now.
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As far as I understand, that’s not a .NET preview, that’s just a .NET update. Those are not scheduled on a cycle, they install when available (if I recall, that is actually something of a serious bug they’re patching.)
Yes, it is a preview of the March .Net update.
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What part of the word Optional is confusing you?
Have you listened to this week’s episode? The one this thread discusses? Preview updates are being automatically installed on numerous machines: reports are common now.
Can confirm that after opening up my laptop this morning, it’d already automatically downloaded & installed the preview update. It looks like WU waits for a longer standby period to trigger the background, unprompted, unwanted installation.
You and Microsoft suffer from the same affliction, it seems: optional updates should never be automatically installed under any circumstances, much less optional preview updates.
After this detour, we can return to this week’s episode: what part of the world “optional” is confusing Microsoft? 
And that’s the concern rightly raised by most home users. “Seeking” used to mean:
- Open Windows Update
- Click “Check for Updates”
- Stable channel non-preview updates will install
Now seeking has turned into stumbling:
- Open Windows Update
- Required, optional, and/or preview updates will now install
I think this is an unfortunate situation with a critical vulnerability in .NET Core. I think they have marked any update with .NET of late as critical in the hope to make sure the bad code gets fixed quickly. It may be this one if my Google-Fu is any good: Security Update Guide - Microsoft Security Response Center
Basically people have conflated preview and optional. This update was a preview, but not optional because of the security implications. I do not think, in general, MS is interested in pushing preview updates if there are not serious security concerns attached.
Sigh: how many more posts will we need to explain this? Read the KB article, friend. Some here have not done the listening.
KB4601554 — Cumulative Update Preview for .NET Framework 3.5 and 4.8
The February 24, 2021 update for Windows 10, version 2004, Windows Server, version 2004, Windows 10, version 20H2, and Windows Server, version 20H2 includes cumulative reliability improvements in .NET Framework 3.5 and 4.8.
.NET updates, if they include security fixes, will note them alongside a linked CVE as appropriate (example). A mislabeling of that would reflect quite poorly on Microsoft’s security reputation.
“Conflation” is again instead confusion on your part. Preview updates must be optional: what part of the word “Preview” is confusing you? 
This is not an Insider Preview device.
All required updates, and especially vulnerability fixes, need to complete validation. Again, I’m not sure what affliction is disrupting Redmond or anyone really aiming to redefine “Preview” and/or “Optional”, but there’s little to defend Microsoft here.
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Your link clearly documents what will happen, but not why. My assumption, as already stated multiple times, is that Microsoft does NOT consider .NET (itself an optional component) to be part of the normal Windows Update scheduling. As I also stated, despite being preview, I don’t think these are optional if you have .NET installed. Perhaps Microsoft will explain the scheduling if @MaryJo prompts them.
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The issue is that they are marked as optional, and a preview, but are installing without user asking it to download and install.
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Where are they being marked as optional? I have never seen any .NET upgrade marked as optional (when I have the .NET Core installed on the PC (because of the Powertoys).)
It’s a preview (basically a beta is what I read it as). It appeared in my optional list.
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You do not know that Windows 10 has arbitrarily forced unessential updates many times in the past? I’m not sure if we are even listening to the same podcast, 
We’d love to hear the explanation on many past updates.
Preview updates should and must be optional. Clearly, Microsoft wants to rewrite that definition with the behavior exhibited here and extensively discussed on the podcast.
You seem to be missing the thrust of the discussion: Microsoft screwed up by automatically installing this preview update.
- Security updates should never be “previews”. And I doubt it’s a security update.
- Preview updates should never be required (i.e., automatically installed).
These are prescriptive statements of what Microsoft should do. Not descriptive of what has happened. No one is disputing this preview update was forcibly downloaded and installed; we are disputing Microsoft’s choice to do that and your claims that it’s a security update are internally inconsistent (security updates must be validated) and not supported by any evidence.
There are zero reasons to force any update outside of a security update and various EOL lifecycles on feature updates (and even those deadlines are arbitrary in some cases). If it is security, Microsoft failed to validate a security patch is even more worrisome.
This “scheduling” (e.g., forced installs of preview updates) is plainly user-hostile, which is par for the course for bad Windows 10 updates.
Updates are a very complex thing, made even more complex by the fact that different people choose different system features, optional or otherwise. It seems like you have had a different experience than I have. I have a machine that STILL lists the update as optional, and doesn’t apply it. That machine has never had .NET core installed, so it doesn’t need the urgent fix. I presume what has happened is that if a certain file with a certain build number is on your machine, that the update moves from being optional to being urgent. The decision process probably doesn’t take into account that people think “preview” means “optional”… because the security of their system is affected they are getting an updated fix if it is needed. Perhaps it’s because they previously installed an optional preview in past months.
The problem is that these are supposed to be previews for professionals to see what is in next months updates. But they are being pushed to people who just open the updates settings to see if they have any outstanding updates, whether they want the, or not.
I get this several times a month, as I am constantly setting up new PCs, you check for updates and it installs all the outstanding updates + the Previews. It is rare that they are optional.
Yeah, I get the previews even though I’m not in the Insider program for Windows. I am on Insider for other Microsoft stuff though, such as Office.
These have nothing to do with the insider programmes.
The Insider programme is for people wishing to see what is coming in the next version of Windows.
The Previews are a bundle of changes that will flow through in the Second Tuesday update for the following month for everybody. They are supposed to be there for IT professionals to install on test machines, in order to see what is coming and whether it causes any issues with their standard software, so that they can release the updates quicker to their users, when the official updates arrive 2 weeks later.
This works fine if you have have WSUS. In my case, I’m setting some of these up in home office, so they aren’t in the domain to start with and I don’t want to cripple the VPN for everybody by pulling gigabytes of updates through it, so I tend to put the initial updates on directly through Windows Update and not WSUS.
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Microsoft update process is a bag!!
Hi guys. I think you guys do a great show. I just like to point out something that is across the TWIT shows that is a little bothersome. I live in Florida (not there at the moment) and we have been at 100% capacity at businesses (same thing Texas did) for months. Life is very much “back to normal.” There are several other states with the same rules. I feel like the hosts on your shows always seem to think everyone is “locked down in their home.” and @MaryJo always says “no one can drink inside a bar”
That is NOT remotely the case.
I know you are going to say something like “What about the COVID risk?” Well, Lets look at the numbers.
According to the NY Times, the top 5 states for per-capita deaths are
- NJ
- NY
- RI
- MA
- MS
4 out of top 5 there are “lockdown states”
IL (another big lockdown state) ranks #14. Texas (who has been at 75% for a long time before they moved to 100%) is ranked at #24. Florida (who has been 100% open) is ranked at 26th, just ahead of California who is the biggest lockdown state of them all.
So the states that have been open for a while have lower deaths counts and much lower unemployment rates and are “back to normal.”
Former JerseyShore Resident.
Exit 82 here 
I went the other way, though, and have been in New England the last decade. I’ll happily trade spots now given this weather. 
This is not the right data to be considering. NY was hit first and hardest (probably because of population density and the fact they have more commercial travel occurring in their hub airports.) Other states had the chance to learn from what happened early in NYC.
The correct data to be looking at is per capita cases, in particular over the most recent week. And if you sort the data correctly then you get a different picture (from https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/coronavirus-us-cases.html#states )
Again, NY is in a worst state because of the more infectious variants, probably again because of population density. But… surprise: All the top states are nearly tied for per capita cases…
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