The old Control Panel is still there.
> Trying to disable things like Cortana never works right.
Cortana is a settable option. There's no reason to try to disable it.
*> Now we have "Settings" too, which is just a mess.
Settings is a clean, well-organized and simple app that does what most people want. It saves ordinary users from having to grapple with the Control Panel.
You'd probably do better if you spent more time in learn mode instead of in angry mode.
And you'd probably do better if you weren't condescending towards other people's experiences and preferences.
You say the Settings app is great, yet it's not great enough to replace the control panel? Redundant settings abound between the two?
There are many reasons to want to disable Cortana-not just turn it off, because it doesn't actually turn it off.
As far as search goes, my Windows 7 machine finds most settings too.
The Control Panel remains because a lot of hardcore Windows users would have bitched if Microsoft had removed it.
As usual, Microsoft would have been criticized for whichever decision it made. That's life when who have more than 400 million Windows 10 users.
It was simply intended as good advice.
If you think about it, there are good reasons for moving settings to a simpler, touch-sensitive, sandboxed app.
If you think about it, there are good reasons for moving settings from the Control Panel in stages, and for keeping the mouse-oriented Control Panel program around for people who have grown used to it.
If you've read the book, the anger is a System 1 rant and should be modified by System 2 thinking.