When I was setting up my new computer late last year, OneDrive wanted to sync everything in my user folders to OneDrive. No idea why. I knew it'd never fit everything anyway. To get it to stop, I had to create a brand new user account without a Microsoft account attached, move everything over to the new account, and delete the old account.
Now, I only have OneDrive sync my college stuff (homework, projects, notes, PowerPoints, etc.). Nothing else syncs to OneDrive. I backup my PC using a program called Backblaze instead.
IIRC, there is a setting to just make it open an Explorer window every time and skip all the crap. I'm on my phone, so I don't want to look for it rn, but it's only a few clicks.
(It might just skip the OneDrive step; I don't have documents this way often, so I can't recall off the top of my head.)
Ironically, I just passed Explorer to save to a OneDrive folder, but it's faster and easier to get to the right spot with a classic Explorer "save as" window.
I uninstall One Drive, and every other Microsoft product that they will let me uninstall, as part of my Windows install process. Then I disable anything else that I can. Microsoft is doing everything it can think of to convince me to finally make the switch to Linux.
I have run Linux on servers and I even have one machine running Linux as a workstation but I'm very confortable in Windows. I've been with Microsoft since the MS-DOS 3 days.
I don't know your use case, but I'm less skilled with computers than you (I'm currently trying to build my first ever home server as a hobby) and i can use it easy.
I'm my sure that all of the tools that I use will run in Linux. I'm using Visual Studio to write Great Cow BASIC. I'll probably give it a try and see what happens. I have several pieces of software that are quite old (AutoCAD 2001, PhotoShop CS4, etc) that I keep around because they aren't the new subscription based everything you produce is ours bullshit. I guess I could run windows in a VM to run those.
Do it. Earlier this year I was exactly at the point you are now, coming from using Microsoft since MS DOS days. I'm glad I did the switch and haven't looked back since. It was far easier than I thought it would be. If you know how to uninstall Microsoft bloat you can easily learn to use Linux.
I'm not sure that all of the tools that I use will run in Linux. I'm using Visual Studio to write Great Cow BASIC. I'll probably give it a try and see what happens. I have several pieces of software that are quite old (AutoCAD 2001, PhotoShop CS4, etc) that I keep around because they aren't the new subscription based everything you produce is ours bullshit. I guess I could run windows in a VM to run those.
I occasionally use Autodesk Inventor and Photoshop still. I've got a Windows 10 LTSC virtual machine set up just for that. I don't even let it connect to the internet. Any file I need to work on in there I just drag and drop them in and out of the VM. It's like keeping a pet Windows that you can use whenever you need it but it's kept confined in a vivarium so it cannot wander into your house and crap some bloatware on your carpet.
Another amusing analogy I have for it is that I'm keeping it locked in the Matrix. It thinks it's enjoying a big juicy steak but really it's locked up in a virtual world so it can be used by me without ever being able to seeing or affecting the outside world.
I do that with Linux. I have a couple of Linux VMs that I use for one thing or another. Maybe it's time to bring Linux forward and push Windows into a VM.
Looks like you're unlucky enough to have just the wrong versions of those software. PS CS4 is rated Bronze on winehq, and AutoCAD 2001 is garbage. Yet 2000 and 2002 are both gold. CS5 is silver, and CS2 and CS6 are both gold
Just my luck. I bought the AutoCAD for a project at work and took the keys with me when I left. I was the only person who ever used it. I became fairly comfortable with it and still use it rarely when I need to design something. The last time I used it was a couple of months ago to design new front step stringers for my parents house.
The PhotoShop I only use for producing all white versions of my customer's logos with transparent backgrounds for presentations wit cover slides with dark backgrounds. I got hat through work as well. I was having sex with a woman from the creative department who would request the disks and keys and let me copy them. Given that I had very limited use for it I never bothered to try to update it after I left and we stopped havign sex.
Maybe I cuold find someone to have sex with for PS CS 6.
Visual Studio (not Code) does not run on Linux, a fact about which I am a little bit angry since Malware-Dev has not published his devkit for Space Engineers ingame scripts for anything else. I've heard that Photoshop works in Wine now although I've not had a chance to try it myself. Linux works for 99% of people nowadays, but I think it's safe to say just from this thread that you are not 99% of people.
I'd still suggest giving it a shot, though, if for no other reason than to see if you can. All else fails, as you say, you could run a VM. The tooling for that is pretty solid nowadays since for a while it was the only way to game on Linux, doubly so now that Nvidia drivers let you demonstrate the power of flex tape by sawing your GPU in half and give half to the virtual machine (it creates two virtual PCIe devices which appear to the Linux host to be entirely separate GPUs, each with a fixed portion of the available VRAM -- previously the only way to get 3D acceleration in a VM was to buy two graphics cards and give one to Windows). I've not had to do it in a while so it may have gotten better, but last I tried, it was a M A S S I V E pain in the backside to set up but after that it was smooth sailing.
Oh yeah, I remember how it bitched I didn't have enough room because it was trying to clone my fucking documents folder without being asked.
And heaven forbid actually using it. I stored work files on a paid account and it cloned it locally on my laptop nearly killing my 500gb hard drive I the process. Again, unprompted. It's such a garbage system.
I uninstalled this crap the moment I saw it appear in Windows Explorer. I never knew it was that bad. It was the rule back when I was still using Windows. Whatever Windows Update installed without my consent, it got deleted immediately.
My God I hate this. My wife will tell me she’s confused and can’t find any of her documents, and lo and behold the Microsoft somehow enabled OneDrive and either replaced everything on the computer with her account, or moved everything from the computer to God knows where.
