Microsoft has altered its Get Windows 10 nagware screen -- as promised -- and instituted the change without installing any new software on Win7 and 8.1 machines.
As of an hour ago, the Get Windows 10 nag messages, which have come under fire of late for their cavalier neglect of the "X" button, changed.
Now, on my test machines, the Get Windows 10 nag looks like the one in the screenshot.
If you click on the Decline free offer link, you get this screen:
So we now know how to turn off the nags. It only took Microsoft eight months to give us the switch Windows honcho Terry Myerson promised us back in October: "You can specify that you no longer want to receive notifications of the Windows 10 upgrade through the Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 settings pages."
Even more remarkable, to me, is the technology. I speculated earlier this week that Microsoft might be downloading the contents of the GWX nag screen every time the screen appeared -- a technique that one reader on AskWoody.com likened to polymorphic virus propagation.
That's exactly what happened. Microsoft created an all-new dialog and slapped it on Win7 and 8.1 screens without changing any software. The entire dialog, and all of the actions implemented by the dialog, came through a download that occurred when the dialog was opened.
Breathtaking.