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Really? Then you better not tells the guys at VLite who have been doing it since Win2K (formerly NLite for NT) or the guys at RT7Lite who have made a tool so simple your grandma can use it. Oh and FYI but you have been able to uninstall IE since XP SP2, its under Windows Components in Add/Remove on XP or Programs and Features on Vista on up.

So maybe you ought to actually try something before you go spreading FUD since its obvious you probably have touched a Windows machine since WinME considering how badly out of data your supposed info is. Oh and in case you are wondering Yes Virginia you CAN change Windows Shells, there are about a dozen free ones to choose from but I prefer AstonShell for their secure desktop which is light and easy peasy to lock down with GPOs.

So I'm sorry but the ONLY thing Linux has going for it is "free as in beer" and that is if and ONLY if your time is worthless, otherwise you get the "fun" of breaking updates or the "interesting challenge" of Black Screens Of Death thanks to Linux hanging onto a 40 year old client/server paradigm that hasn't been relevant for the vast majority in over 25 years. I'm sorry but there is no comparison, I can place Windows and OSX in the "Hairyfeet Challenge" and they'll both come out with flying colors, Linux will have at least one if not several drivers crapped on and wasted thanks to updates not caring about drivers. Don't say "If they were only in the kernel" because that is bullshit the kernel drivers are ONLY decent on relatively new and relatively popular devices, the rest are half baked and poorly maintained.

Now I could set down and show you mathematically why Linus' "Let the kernel devs do it" can never work in a billion years but since you are just gonna call me dirty names anyway why bother? I'm sure any response i get will just be the circular logic Linux fans love which is why I have all Linux articles blocked. isn't it funny how we give the FOSSies their own section yet that isn't good enough, they HAVE to come preach their religion in articles that have nothing to do with them? I think the fact that more people are willing to risk thousands in fines and even jail time to steal the other guy's OS rather than take yours ought to frankly be all that needs to be said, your product simply doesn't measure up, sorry.

Yeah windows 8.1 sucks ass because Ballmer has a giant boner for cellphones but ya know what? You take a lousy $30 over to Aston Shell and tada! You now have an OS that will look and act just like windows 7 (Or OSX, or XP, hell you can even go Win9X if that turns your butter) that will be updated for TEN YEARS without having the drivers shit all over!

And the FOSSie faction better not feed us the stable kernel ABI nonsense koolaid slurping or "works for me" horseshit or I WILL wallpaper this page with everything from major OEMs like Dell to user after user finding the same thing,Torvalds and crew shitting all over the drivers.

Riddle me this FOSSie faction, if Torvalds is such a fucking genius when it comes to drivers how come NOBODY uses his design? I mean fucking NOBODY,Not BSD,Solaris, OSX,iOS,Android, fuck even OS/2 Warp had a stable ABI, you know the ONLY person who doesn't use one? The same one who is doing the same jerking off bullshit he's been doing since 1993,Linus "I'm too full of myself" Torvalds. well I'll say the same thing about him that RMS said about Jobs, I won't be glad when he's dead but I'll be DAMN glad when he's gone. Mark my words not a month after Torvalds gets his ancient smug ass out of the driver seat the next guy will bring an ABI and tada! Shit will "just work" and he'll be hailed as a fucking genius!

In a way Linux and windows have more in common now than ever, because its NOT the software that is holding it back, its the assholes running the show that screw everything up for the rest! funny that MSFT puts out the most hated OS since WinME and Linux has gained NO SHARE,not a fucking inch, hell there are more people stealing the other guy's product than will take yours for free....how much of a fucking cluebat do you gotta get hit upside the head with? if you give your product away for free and people would rather risk thousands in fines and even possible jail time to steal the other guy's wares than take yours? Then YOU SUCK and should listen to the damned people and fix that shit!

Hell put ME in charge of the damned company, i'll right it in 3 or all they'll pay is my room and board, I'd right that ship so damned fast they'd be asking if I was the new Steve Jobs.

And yes BEFORE in the early alpha builds (if you look around the net you can grab a copy to try it yourself) there was a simple .reg entry that allowed you to switch between metro and a bog standard Windows desktop, not the crippled "desktop mode" horseshit, but an actual honest to god Win 7 desktop minus the Aero gloss, and old Snickerdouche found out the .reg file was quickly being passed around so not only did he kill the reg entry, he even gutted the original desktop code so the ONLY thing you could get was that crippled half ass "desktop mode!

But most people don't know there IS a way to get an actual usable desktop in Win 8, in fact in Jan when I pick up my copy so I can learn how to deal with the Win 8 fuckups its the FIRST damned thing i'm gonna do to it! It costs $30 but its the best damned 430 you ever spent, its called AstonShell and it will give you the "look and feel" of damned near ANY WIMP UI that has ever been made, from Win9X-Win 7 on the MSFT side, hell even KDE or gnome or OSX if that melts your butter. They have a 30 day free trial so you can download the trial version of Win 8 and slap it on to see for yourself, but its a HELL of a lot nicer than that damned "LOL I Iz A Cellphone LOL" UI that is win 8.

In the end you're right though, you can't stick a damned marketing drone at the head of an engineering company, it just doesn't work. As I said with the bulldozer sticks what works great on one device does not automatically mean it'll work great on another completely unrelated device, and that is Win 8 in a nutshell, bolting a Caterpillar stick onto a car and calling you a Luddite when you point out it wasn't as good as what you had. I'm all for updating the WIMP UI but to make it better, not gut it. More visual feedback to the user for example, maybe even design keyboards with an actual knob like on digital audio workstations so the user could have actual tactical feedback when performing actions.

Finally office shows the same damned arrogance Snickerdouche showed during his reign, let the USER choose which is best! While I personally don't mind the ribbon (because i just killed the damned thing and made my own customization to the minibar to have what I use most in the same spot for muscle memory) I can see that with users that have never used office the ribbon is a lot more hand holding.,....that's nice for the NEW users, but what about those that have spent fricking decades giving their money to MSFT and have the muscle memory down cold? In the height of arrogance they fucked them over to give new users a simpler UI. If they would have simply allowed a simple switch, even buried in the options, that could be controlled by GPO so that old hats could have the classic UI while the newbies got the ribbon not a single thing would have been said.

But in the end that is why Ballmer has to go, its arrogance. To use a /. car analogy he sees Ferrari keeps selling so he slaps a ripoff of the Ferrari front end to a Ford along with a $100k price tag and is amazed, amazed i tell you, that nobody wants his $100k Ford. Apple is a completely different market, with users that wouldn't take MSFT anything on a bet, so by forcing Windows to be an ersatz iOS all he is doing is keeping his customers from buying his product while the Apple customers laugh at them as they buy their iPad. But instead of paying attention and listening to his customers he fragments the fuck out of his userbase for no damned good reason, IE, DX, burns customers with dumb moves like killing Windows messenger for Skype (You watch, numbers of users switching to yahoo or Google is gonna jump when that dumbshit happens) and is shocked that the stock tanks.

hell even their mobile division is savable, they have one of the most powerf

Or they could just pay a site license for Aston Secure Desktop or Astonshell and call it a day. Nice thing about Aston is between it and XYplorer you can have a fully customized shell that works on anything from XP- Win 8 and is the exact same no matter which OS you are using.

Uhh...you can make Windows anything you want, it just ain't free. here you go, it takes less than 30 seconds to install and its "clicky clicky next next next" simple and you even get a 30 day free trial. If MSFT is stupid enough to cancel Win 7 sales for Win 8 (which I personally doubt seeing as they recently upped the EOL date of all version of Win 7 to 2020) the users can easily get any desktop they want from Win98 to KDE if that floats your boat, but more likely MSFT will let the OEMs sell Win 7 on non touch screen devices while including a Win 8 "upgrade disc" so as to count as a sale while the user chunks them just like the XP buyers chunked those Vista discs.

I have used AltDesk since around 2001. It was the closest I could find to the old FVWM pager and easily allows apps to be moved from one desktop to the other.

Yeah if its one i'm actually gonna keep i get Aston and put on it, its what I run on my XP nettop and is quite nice. of course i'm not gonna blow $30 a pop on some off lease boxes i'm selling but hate dealing with that Fisher price UI (And nooooo, switching to the fugly as fuck Win98 UI isn't an improvement, thanks ever so) so it looks like I'll be hacking MSStyles.dll and putting on a nicer theme. And no you're not alone, many of use can't fricking stand the Fisher price UI, I like the Win 7 UI, Vista Black was okay (too bad the OS attached to it blew chunks) and KDE had a nice silvery look, but that blue is just fucking horrible to look at for any length of time. Whomever picked that shit out must have been color blind!

Watch me get hate for saying this next part, but fuck if I care, i just wish the Linux community would get all on the same page, quit all this damned rivalry and 50 bazillion distro crap, and actually make an OS usable by the masses, is to too much to ask? I need a rock solid OS that is as easy to use as Win 7 or OSX and gives a minumum 7 years support without dealing with that apt-dist-upgrade clusterfuck as I've yet to see a machine actually upgrade without having drivers broken. I know you will never get a stable ABI as long as Torvalds has a pulse but can't you either make a REAL LTS or find a way not to shit all over the drivers during an upgrade? Hell there isn't even a 'find drivers" or "rollback drivers" button and Windows has had that for a decade!

Look, this is your chance geeks, for the first time in history all the stars are aligning, the XP dieoff is filling shops like mine with insanely overpowered laptops and desktops, Ballmer is gonna shoot MSFT in the head trying to turn Windows into WinTab, most people only care about online stuff now, you've never had a better shot, all you have to do is accept the fact the world isn't a bunch of damned programmers and get rid of the fiddly bullshit and CLI wanking off, that's all. you wanna keep the wank fest in server fine, all well and good, but you ain't never gonna sell that Bash crap to the masses. you gotta "think different' to steal a line, think iOS and Win 7, call it dumbing down if you like, just give us something simple, easy to use, and supported 7 years. Make it so my grandma could run it with ZERO help from me,lots of big icons and pretty pictures and wizards. Hell my 71 year old clueless dad installed his own Win 7 and everything ran OOTB with ZERO input from me, that is what you need to shoot for, an OS that even the clueless can run.

You've got most of the basic parts already, KDE is VERY pretty and consistent, you've got most of the guts and drivers written, you just need to put it in a friendly package and stop updates/upgrades from tearing the thing apart, that's all. you have until Apr 2014 but the sooner the better as all us shops are scrambling for Win 7 Start CALs simply because we can't find a Linux that fits the bill. give it to us and you'll have a support network that makes the Apple stores look like a bad joke. We WANT you to succeed, we really do. But with the mess you have now literally we'd go broke trying to support you. you could use the XP dieoff to take a HUGE bite out of MSFT's ass, you just gotta want it and be willing to change, are you?

Question: What is wrong with the Win 7 UI? Because after killing Aero and making my own pure black theme it seems quite nice and low resource to me. the breadcrumbs and jumplists alone make it worth upgrading IMHO, and its memory management seems much better than XP or Vista. I've been running it since Oct 09 and even though I've changed out every single piece on this machine its not given me a bit of trouble whereas the XP that I had for dual boot is had to be hacked to use a RAM disk simply because it won't save a page file, the motherboard swap was one thing too much for it.

As for the ribbon? don't use it. I'm running the positively ancient Office 2k, it runs just fine on Win 7 X64 and with the converter pack opens office 2k10 files just fine. I do have office 07 on my netbook but i just set it to minimize the ribbon and made my own custom mini bar that has the functions i use so its actually a little faster than my office 2K when it comes to quick edits but what can i say, i'm a creature of habit.

but if you want Win 7 to act like XP friend, it really ain't hard. Just go get Aston and you can frankly make Windows be like anything you want. they got Win98, XP, hell even KDE and gnome if that melts your butter. i use it on my XP to give me a more modern UI, runs great and is low resource. Its got a free 30 day trial so it isn't like it costs anything to give it a spin. But if you think you don't like Win 8 you REALLY ain't gonna like what they seem to be getting ready for at Apple, think iOS on the desktop, with everything app store. That is why I'd suggest getting Win 7 set up your way and then batten down the hatches, because Win 8 is gonna suck and Apple is gonna end up iOS. Thank goodness Win 7 is supported until 2020, i can skip 8 on my main system like i did vista.

Why does everyone freak? it isn't like there aren't ways to turn the crap off ya know. hell there are plenty of third party hacks that will turn Windows 7 into the Win98 dull grey nasty look if that is what floats your boat. Hell if you want Win 7 to look like KDE, OSX, or shit grey Win95 just pay a whole $30 for Astonshell and call it a day. Have it running on my older XP boxes and it is great!

Personally i just turn off the ribbon in Office 2K7 and customize my own most used commands on the mini bar and there ya go, cuts out the BS and makes it work MY way. But as long as they have the default two pane like in Windows 7 (which from the screenshot it appears to have) along with breadcrumbs and jumplists what's the big?

I'd say the new Windows 7 UI is probably the best thing since Win95 when it comes to UI design. Its fast, its intuitive, it lets people like my dad get more out of the OS while amazingly enough not crippling power users such as myself. it is fricking brilliant!

Sadly if there is one thing we have learned about MSFT under Ballmer is anything they do that is good WILL get fucked up in the next version, its like a law or something. This is one thing windows has a hell of an advantage over Linux in, in that if you don't like Windows 8? fuck it, just skip the thing like many skipped Vista. The support cycles are long enough (Windows 7 is getting supported until 2020) and third party support great enough one can simply ignore the shitpile releases and wait on the next good one with no penalty. Hell it isn't like you can't go to newegg right this minute and get an OEM copy of XP if you don't like Vista or 7, and I'm sure the same will be said of 7 when 8 comes out. If you don't like it or want to customize it? Meh just skip the thing.

Personally I'll be waiting until at LEAST SP1 before I even consider Win 8, and that is if I get one of those $50 upgrade deal like with 7, otherwise i might not even bother then. I mean why bother? Win 7 X64 runs everything, works with everything, and I have more RAM and CPU than I know what to do with as it is. let Ballmer cock up Win 8 like he did Vista, won't phase me or my customers any. if it ain't broke don't fix it I say.

Ya know, I've heard Linux guys blab about this one for but you know what? We Windows users DO NOT WANT and have no desire for alt tabbing all over the damned place. I mean I have to deal with users that won't open control panel because they think it is scary, can you imagine what kinds of support calls you'd be getting if shit could open on desktop 3 and they are on desktop 1?

But if you truly want that shit you CAN have it without a bunch of hacky bullshit. Hell you can even have the desktop look and act like KDE on gnome if you want. As with everything in Windows (and Apple from what I've been told) you simply have to pay a third party for that, as natively you get one way and one way only.

So here you go friend have fun, no need to thank me. The program you want is fourth from the top, they even have a 30 day free trial. light on resources, solid as a rock, but if you want the whole smash I'd go ahead and pick up the shell replacement along with the virtual desktop, as they really mesh together well and give you pretty much complete control over the UI. Personally I like the new Windows 7 UI enough it is the first time I've ever not switched out my shell, and this is someone that ran BB4Win way back in the day since I hated the Win UI. I'd say they finally nailed it so most likely they'll completely bork it up again for Windows 8, sigh. At least Win 7 is supported until 2020 so by the time Windows 9 rolls around it ought to be good again.

If only 3% of the 32 million did he'll make enough to live decently while working on the program.

BTW we have a somewhat modern version of the old shareware model in Giveaway Of The Day. The way it works for those that haven't tried it is each day a single different program is offered free and they give you this app for free, you can load it as many times on as many PCs as you own that day, and they usually offer along with it a chance to get a more powerful program or other offerings at a greatly reduced price.

Now I can say from experience this model works, as I have bought quite a few programs that I originally tried on Giveaway Of The Day like Astonshell which is great for older XP machines like my nettop and gives me useful gadgets like a CPU/RAM/Net throughput meter while using less resources than the default Winshell, or Paragon Drive Backup which is an awesome desktop and server imaging and backup program which I doubt I ever would have found without it being on GAOTD.

So you can still make good money with the shareware model today, you simply have to make a good and affordable product while more importantly getting it noticed. With GAOTD I can try apps easily without worrying about bugs and backdoors, and if I like it or need to add it to another machine later I can just buy a copy like I did with the above.

And Indie game designers? Giveaway Of The Day has a sister Game Giveaway on weekends and would be happy to offer it more often if they had more indie games, so you might want to contact them about getting your game featured. It is good exposure and if you offer at a fair price many of us WILL buy from you, just make it easy, make it affordable, and make it fast. Oh and NO PAYPAL as many of us will take one look at "Paypal only" and just walk away. There have been several programs I tried on GAOTD I wanted to buy and had my CC out but when I saw Paypal only I just closed the browser. No way I'm trusting my card to those crooks.

Not to mention trying to jam a full heavy Linux DE (which according to some of the links followed through TFA is pretty crippled and unusable as a replacement shell, due to so many core features being broken) into a place it was never meant to be simply to use some KDE apps doesn't make much sense.

After all many of the apps on Linux are cross platform (which is one of the nice things about Linux, so many of the apps will run anywhere) and for the ones that aren't there are a myriad of other choices that don't involve dumping a ton of KDE dependencies into Windows, such as dual booting or one of the several free VMs such as VMWare Player which already has the Kubuntu LTS VM ready to go so all one needs to do is simply download and run this or one of several versions of KDE Linux as easy as downloading and running an app on Windows.

So it just doesn't make any sense to me this late in the game. If it were 2002 when you had so many screaming obscenities over the XP "Fisher Price" GUI I could see it, but the Windows 7 GUI is nice and for those staying on XP there is a really nice replacement shell that is stable as a rock and can make Windows look and behave anyway you desire, and TFA said the really popular apps like Amarok are getting Windows stand alone installers. So why would you want to dump nearly a GB of dependencies (that is how much it was when I ran it a couple of months back) for a few apps with so much of its core being unstable?

Maybe I'm missing something but other than saying "we must because we can" it makes about as much sense to me as trying to rip out the Windows 7 DE to run it in Ubuntu. Wouldn't it simply make more sense to run the DE in the environment it was designed for where it can have full functionality and a level of integration it will simply never be able to have on Windows? it isn't like you can't get KDE for absolutely free in Linux. And with so many show stoppers you certainly wouldn't want this to be a Windows users first experience with KDE.

Uhhhh...you actually can have a lot of the nice Ui features, including the built in search and gadgets, for just $30 with Aston Shell. It also works great on old hardware, as that 1.8GHz Sempron I was talking about is running it with the windows 7 UI. Nicer than the Xp Fisher price and I like the CPU/RAM gadget that lets me see when something is hitting the processor.

While I mainly went Windows 7 for X64 support, I can see why some would just stick with what they got. If it ain't broke, why fix it? You can even get a copy of Windows XP X64 at Newegg, which if your hardware supports it is quite awesome and is low resource usage. my oldest is running it with XP 32 in a dual boot as his P4 doesn't seem to like windows 7, and it is damned fast and stable as a rock, which is understandable since it is merely win2K3 server with an XP shell. For college work and playing his MMOs he frankly doesn't need faster than his 3.6Ghz P4, so I'll probably just get him one of those HD4650 AGP cards (I have the PCIe version and it runs Bioshock II and every other game just great) and say forget building him and his brother new machines for a couple of years yet. again, if it ain't broke?

Oh believe me, fellow tinkerer, I know of which you speak. One of the things I miss about the old win9x was the way you could go into DOS and strip it down like a used Buick and hot rod the hell out of it. While everyone else ran the sucky windesktop I was running Blackbox WM (remember THAT one?) with Midnight Commander for my file manager. While I love the fact that my windows 7 is rock solid stable you just can't really tinker with its guts like you can Win9x or win3.x before it. BTW you can STILL get rid of the shell in Windows, just use Aston Shell and you can customize the look and feel to be anything you want. I have kinda a cross between windows 7 and Mac on my XP box, and aston actually uses less resources than the standard shell.

But as far as Linux goes, while I like to play with it occasionally working retail I'd say the problem is the lack of the "must have" apps. Every customer that walks through the door has some program be it iTunes, their digicam app, Quickbooks/Quicken, some "must have no matter what" that is either impossible or a major PITA to get running on Linux. As long as the apps folks use everyday aren't available on Linux then windows will continue to dominate. While I would love to see that change with RMS and the FSF complete and total hatred for all things proprietary I doubt that will ever happen. The big corps won't release their code, and Linux will never make it easy for those that don't to run their apps, like the lack of a hardware ABI for drivers and a Linux standard that allows the "write once, run for years" like you have on Windows and Macs.

Damned shame, because the KDE and GNOME desktops are getting pretty nice, but like I had with OS/2, it doesn't really matter how nice your desktop is if the software you need to work won't run on it.

You can and make it look like anything from Win98 to a Mac, for a whole $30. Not really a big deal.

Sure it does but just like everything else for Windows you need a third party tool. This one is free and has nice features but if you need a really loaded virtual desktop experience I would recommend AltDesk which is rock solid and has drag and drop between desktops (which is what it sounds like the OP is looking for) and it can be used standalone or integrated into AstonShell which is a really nice shell for Windows.

So yeah you can do virtual desktops in Windows, have been able to for quite awhile, you just use third party tools. Which lets be honest most folks don't use much of what Windows has built in when the third party tools are so much better. It would be like using NTBackup instead of say Acronis. Just lame.

I'd have to put my vote in for AltDesk as being the best virtual desktop I've seen for Windows. Not free but works on every version of Windows from 98se to Windows 7 64bit, plenty of hotkey customizations, and if you really want to get fancy integrate it with Aston 2 for a truly custom desktop any way you want it.

After trying Altdesk and AstonShell on my Win2K years ago I don't think I could go back to the 2K/XP way of doing things. I'm using Windows 7 with Rocketdock to replicate some of the functionality I had on my old Astonshell but I think I'll probably go back to Aston. It is just too easy to customize the workspace for YOUR way of doing things. Both have free trails if anybody wants to give them a spin for 30 days and both are really nice and solid pieces of software that let you customize your Windows experience far more than I thought was possible.

For multiple desktops in Windows i would have to give AltDesk two big thumbs up.

I'd have to put my vote in for AltDesk as being the best virtual desktop I've seen for Windows. Not free but works on every version of Windows from 98se to Windows 7 64bit, plenty of hotkey customizations, and if you really want to get fancy integrate it with Aston 2 for a truly custom desktop any way you want it.

After trying Altdesk and AstonShell on my Win2K years ago I don't think I could go back to the 2K/XP way of doing things. I'm using Windows 7 with Rocketdock to replicate some of the functionality I had on my old Astonshell but I think I'll probably go back to Aston. It is just too easy to customize the workspace for YOUR way of doing things. Both have free trails if anybody wants to give them a spin for 30 days and both are really nice and solid pieces of software that let you customize your Windows experience far more than I thought was possible.

For multiple desktops in Windows i would have to give AltDesk two big thumbs up.

I haven't had any trouble with Aston and tray icons in the last 2 versions. Yeah in the old days they had some problems in that area but they seemed to have fixed the bug nicely. Now it is VERY stable and frankly a joy to use. It is nice to have a much more sensible desktop and file manager and have it be the same across my Win2K and my WinXP boxes.

I don't know if it will show up with the funky way Slashdot treats characters, but here is the code that I use in Win2K/XP in Aston to replace Explorer with Xplorer2. Like I said I have NO clue about Vista, as my customers hate it as do I so I don't use or stock it. I have been selling newly built XP boxes as fast as I can get in the parts. Anyway the code is....

"C:\Program Files\zabkat\xplorer2\xplorer2_UC.exe" ::{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}

Just pick "edit element" by right clicking on the icons and set your desktop elements to "application or document" instead of my computer,my documents, etc and paste that code into the application box at the top. If you are using Xplorer2 lite just replace with its path in the above code. This will keep your icons from launching Explorer and instead will launch Xplorer2 with your drives and documents loaded. Xplorer2 is just SO much nicer, and with Aston you can have your Windows shell YOUR way, be it Win9x or Mac or even the Vista black if you prefer, as well as dozens of original designs. They have a free trial so why not give the latest version a spin? If you already use Xplorer2 you are just a couple of clicks from having a completely sane and low resource using Windows experience that is the same across Win98-Vista. Definitely worth the little bit of time it takes to give it a spin around the block and kick the tires.

I personally use Xplorer2 as a file manager with Aston as the shell, not only because it uses less resources and is less buggy than Windows Explorer, but it also fixes that stupid explorer bug. Xplorer2 by default shows the file names but when you click rename it highlights ONLY the part BEFORE the dot3, allowing me to quickly rename without having to constantly type .txt,.jpg,etc. It also gives me the classic two pane commander style layout which has always made more sense to me than Windows Explorer. I just use a little command hack in Aston that tells it to launch Aston instead of Explorer and I never have to deal with that fugly mess.

Heh, I was replying to this post to note that Vista selects before the dot, but I guess its just xplorer2 :) I changed to it aswell after I started using Vista, before that I used Turbo Navigator from Win98 times. However it kinda broke with Vista's UAC, and doesnt pop up that admin accept dialog. Now I've learned the nice sides of xplorer2 too aswell tho.

I should probably try Aston Shell aswell, I hope they're fixed tray icons now a days tho. Before they didnt have any (or atleast good) support to those and you just didnt see them.

As a PC repairman with nearly 15 years in the biz, allow me to answer your questions. First of all, there is a REASON,right or wrong, why show file extensions is turned off by default. Because folks just hit "rename" when they want to change the name of something and every version of Windows(don't know about Vista, customers hate it so i don't stock it) allows you to rename the file AND the file extension by default. Most folks then just rename the file, say "sally's trip" and then when it doesn't work because they have tossed the .jpg, .raw, whatever, they tend to get pissy.

As for "do they put everything in My Documents"? They save wherever the default saves to. I have seen desktops sp buried in .exe files you couldn't even tell what kind of wallpaper they had because Firefox by default saves to the desktop. So since many of the most popular programs save to "My Documents" by default, that is where their files are. But there isn't any planning on the users part, they simply hit save and have no fricking clue where it went after that. To access the file they simply launch the program that made it.

I personally use Xplorer2 as a file manager with Aston as the shell, not only because it uses less resources and is less buggy than Windows Explorer, but it also fixes that stupid explorer bug. Xplorer2 by default shows the file names but when you click rename it highlights ONLY the part BEFORE the dot3, allowing me to quickly rename without having to constantly type .txt,.jpg,etc. It also gives me the classic two pane commander style layout which has always made more sense to me than Windows Explorer. I just use a little command hack in Aston that tells it to launch Aston instead of Explorer and I never have to deal with that fugly mess.

But most of my customers can't honestly tell you where ANY of their files are, or even what the extension is. They just know to launch their picture software and the file is listed there. Which is why you have to be careful not to use anything like Crap cleaner as it will clean recent lists which blows their whole system to shit.

That one billion users world-wide have settled on the Windows GUI with minimal customization ought to tell him something.

Now as far as KDE goes, I can't wait to give it a spin once more packages are released and it becomes more stable. Until then I have the KDE look and speed thanks to Aston and Xplorer2 Lite. I simply tell Aston not to use Windows explorer when it is installed and instead use Xplorer2. Between the two of them my pc is only consuming 9Mb of ram and 2-4% cpu, on a 1.1Ghz celeron. It is great for older machines like this, as I can have a nice shell (they have skins for KDE, Gnome, Vista, XP, and Mac OSX as well as many originals) without it bogging down like it would with explorer. Xplorer2 Lite is free and Aston has a free trial period if you want to give it a whirl and see if it is right for you.

I wish the KDE guys much luck and success and hope that this will be the start of true platform independence. I am looking forward to the day I can run all my favorite KDE apps on both Windows and KDE.

And as far as Vista goes, I ran it for a week then tossed it. My gamer box has a 3Ghz Celeron, 2Gb of ram, and a Geforce 6200(I know it isn't hardcore, but it's plenty for what I play) and while XP ran like a screaming Demon on it(and is running even faster with SP3) Vista took four times as long to boot, bugged me constantly with UAC, and was thrashing the drives so bad I thought they would burn up. There is no reason for a pc with 2Gb of ram to thrash 24/7. And I couldn't get it to drop below 15% idle, even tweaking it. So I think I'll just sit this OS out and hope that Wine or Cedega get the Dx9 and Dx10 goodness going before I have to make the jump to 64bit. But just in case they don't I'll be picking me up a copy of XP X64 just in case.

Windows NT has always supported multiple desktops under the hood, and MS has had a powertoy that exposes this for ages.

There's many other third-party virtual desktop managers around, if you look, even for Vista.

And if you want to replace Explorer with Xplorer2 when clicking on desktop links, simply switch the link under "edit element" to application or document and put in the following code. By using this I never have Explorer load which keeps my resources for my apps and not my desktop

"C:\Program Files\zabkat\xplorer2_lite\xplorer2_lite.exe" ::{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}

This loads xplorer2 with My Computer as its starting point. And since Xplorer2 uses a two pane tree view where I need to go is never more than two click away.

I use AstonShell's AltDesk http://www.astonshell.com/altdesk/

15 dollars with a 30-day demo. It's really lightweight, and even runs off a portable drive! You can drag and drop windows between workspaces from the bar, and that T-Bird=>Firefox SHOULD jump over to Firefox (I remember it did when I last booted into windows about 2 months ago). I'm perfectly satisfied with Ubuntu/CF, although links to webpages don't move the desktop :(

http://www.astonshell.com/aston/.

Indeed. I used to change my shell every other week or so for a few months, just to try something new and tinker.

I found that LiteStep was a PITA to use. Too much playing with config files.

SharpE was a decent and simple to use. Same with geOShell.

AstonShell is a nice shell with lots of features, but it costs money and it can't do anything that LiteStep can't.

I tired BlackBox for windows when it was first released and liked it quite a bit. Very minimalistic.

There is quite a lot of shells to choose from, though, sadly, not as many as there used to be. DarkStep was a stripped down LiteStep shell that I REALLY liked, but the maintainer abandoned the project many, many years ago. Seranade looked promising, but the site doesn't even exist anymore.

And I run blackbox on my windows machine. Though, I can do have other options, too, such as Xoblite (a blackbox fork), LiteStep, or Aston, which I find consumes even less memory (abouy 3-4 mb worth), while giving me fancy plugins, transparency, and all that fun stuff. Hell, even GNUstep/Etoile does windows. And I'm pretty sure I've seen WindowMaker ports, as well.

Oh, yes, and you can also strip down windows by either hacking up the registry, or using fancy third-party Frontends. I recall sliming 9x to a 45mb install, and XP to about 1-200mb, by stripping out unecessary components and services (e.g. Outlook, Mediaplayer, explorer, etc). I haven't tried Vista as of yet, nor do I intend to in the near future, but I know that many of the alternate WMs havebeen ported.

Really, I'm trying hard, but I can't quite seem to get your point. Windows has had the option to swap outthe default explorer shell in favour of another, since NT4, and the process is painless. So, with that in mind, if your criticism is a fair one, would it not be just as fair to argue that Ubuntu is bloated because it installs Gnome by default?

Of course it isn't, you can't, however, have it both ways.

FWI: I'm not fanboying, but I do use a Windows desktop alongside my Unix boxen boxen, and I realise that each has their strengths and weaknesses, each their uses, and not one is unilaterally "better" than the other in all respects.

1. Vertical montor. Look at all the delicous, delicious code.
   
2. Blackbox.
   
3. A menu shortcut for opening 4 xterms, three on the left and one tall one on the right, filling all the space on the screen. I should have one for an emacs and three xterms (like in the above screenshot), but I don't.
   
4. Nine virtual desktops, each one accessible via Ctrl + Shift + one of the letters in the 3x3 block at the left edge of the keyboard (QWE / ASD / ZXC). I think of them as a big 3x3 square, and certain applications always live in certain places. A web browser is always in the top center (Ctrl-Shift-W), programming is in the left center (Ctrl-Shift-A), etc. I can keep as many applications open as I need, all full-screen, and I can shift to the one I want quickly with one (non-mousing) hand. Thinking of the desktops spatially makes it easier to remember where things are.
   

Konqueror would be integrated as a component of X and would run under the root account

Neither IE nor Windows Explorer are integrated into the Windows display subsystem, and neither of them run as the SYSTEM account (the closest parallel to root). It is also possible to replace Windows Explorer as the desktop shell (see for example Aston Shell, although there are others); from memory, there is a registry key that specifies the program to launch on logging in. By default, it starts explorer, but that can be changed.

I know I know, not entirely accurate

Not even close really, but thanks for trying - you're the first to bother :)

I don't have a dual-headed setup at work, (although I could if I wanted to), I use mostly a wireless laptop. Most of my wireless clients (laptop, pda) are Windows... using programs like putty, filezilla, and vnc, and the best multi-desktop util in the world called AltDesk. (http://www.astonshell.com/ - not free but only $15 to register). Vim for windows (or another good text editor, emeditor free) also comes in handy.

But my machine at home is linux (and actually my first workstation at work was a Win2k machine until the power supply blew up, switched to Linux and had it dual-headed for a while).

But my Linux workstation at home is mostly fluxbox with about 5-6 desktops, things like ssh, screen (of course), firefox, thunderbird, umm vim, gkrellm, grdesktop, to name a few. Fluxbox is small, fast and awesome. It's easy to configure and the "mouse wheel through desktops" comes in handy, available via keys if your hands are nowhere near the mouse. Of course VMware (player or otherwise) can be a help too.

I'm a big proponent of "the right tool for the job". And when it comes to popular key-combinations (alt-arrow keys to cycle through desktops for example), my setup makes it nice to use the same keys to change desktops on Linux in fluxbox that I use in Windows under AltDesk.

And screen+ssh is definitely a killer combo. I had took a class over the summer at a local university, and they had Windows 2000 Server PCs. I downloaded the putty, filezilla, and vnc viewer executables, that's all I needed. None of these utils installed, they kept their configurations in a neat place, and when I left, everything was removed and cleaned up. It makes it extremely easy for remote management from anywhere when the majority of your work is on the internet.

The problems on show here are ours, not theirs.

While I do agree a bit with this, we do need to keep in mind that it is a completely different Operating System which is not the one they are use to using. I think you'd see similar results if you take a person that has only used Windows and put them on a Mac, or vise versa.

What we need is people that are well trained on all Operating Systems and be able to compare them without zealotry or bias. We know that MS or Apple won't change their OS layout unless 3 million people complain, but with OSS its a little easier to make that change.

I use Linux all the time because that's what I like, and when I have to use Windows I've replaced the typical layout with http://astonshell.com/ because I can't stand the regular Windows interface. Even though Aston runs over Windows it completely changes the dynamic and requires relearning. Things are never as black and white as people seem to think they should be.

"Buyers of new 64-bit computers will undoubtedly opt for Longhorn's enchanting interface and new device support--especially if security improves."

1. MS Powertoys - In addition to many other things, this will assist you with relocating your document and data directories. Also, you can speed up the menu response times considerably
2. ATNotes - Best free sticky notes I've came across!
3. Stardock/Object Desktop - Tons of GUI-related tweak and skinnig options
4. XP Smoker - Good all around hardware/software tweaker
5. AutoHotKey - Omigod! I just discovered this. Get it now!! It's probably the closest to Appescript I've seen yet for the PC, it's OSS, and it's awsome!!
6. AltDeskOne of the better virtual desktop programs I've found for the PC. There's better and faster ones out there, but this is one of the few who's behavior I like w/multiple monitors

Anyway... Plenty of other tweaks and programs out there, but this is probably plenty for now. I really should finish that book I keep starting about this crap install of trying to cram it into threads anyway... 8)=

My original point was/is that Raid 0 is a great technology, and can greatly speed an already great system. But if you're the type of person who just will setup a box once with Raid 0 for everything, never consider backups, or other methods to really take advantage of your PC's technology

"Microsoft makes the one and only window-manager," Never heard of AstonShell? It's rather nice. Not FreeSoftware, but also not Microsoft.

>>If I don't like the windows manager, I can choose another one. > >Why can't you do the same in Windows? I've recently used Geoshell a lot and it was a real cool minimalist (much more so than KDE or Gnome) Explorer replacement. There are dozens more, and this community is actually thriving in these days. :-) Cool. I didn't know that there was so much activity in that area these days.

I love geoshell. I also used Aston shell untill my free trial wore out, and I loved it too. Here's some links:

geoshell (free)
Aston Shell (cool, but less free)

And I'm sure there's plenty of others if you look for them.

I can't stand the default Windows Explorer setup.

Then ditch Explorer and use geOShell (free [beer, and I think speach]) or Aston (cheap, and easier to use).

So my understanding of the state of the art, as understood by real UI people, is that windows should tile on the screen instead of overlapping. If your windows don't all fit on the screen, you need a new screen.

This is the way I do it: Have 9 virtual screens (natively in GNU/Linux or via Altdesk on Windows), with each screen bound to one of the keys in the 3x3 square defined by Q-E-C-Z (Ctrl-Shift-q for screen 1, C-S-e for screen 3, C-S-a for screen 4, etc.)

Rows are for machines: Q-W-E is the local machine, Z-X-C is shells and windows on my home machine, A-S-D is shells and windows on other machines. Columns are applications: Q-A-Z is random shells and small applications, W-S-X is full-screen apps (e.g. web browser & email client), E-D-C is programming (Studio or emacs + shells depending).

I've found that hitting C-S-whatever becomes pretty much automatic when I want to get to a particular app; there are a couple of overlaps (sometimes I'll have email and web both open at home, so I'll have to say C-S-x then click in the taskbar), but on the whole I can juggle quite a few programs without ever having to hunt through the taskbar.

There are still more features.

CD-ROM drives
webcams
printers
digital video cameras
external DVD burners
wireless mice
fax/scanner/copier

You want to compare KDE and Gnome to Windows or MacOS? Then try actually looking at the software element instead of the physical box. Because comparing phsyical adjustable glass shelves to the core software operating element of a computer isn't the right comparison.

If I want to change the GUI of Windows and keep the kernel, (like keeping the Linux Kernel and choosing a different Window Manager) I can simply go out on the web and pick a new shell. Such as LiteStep or AstonShell or any of the dozens of others that tickle my fancy. Or if I just want to change the Desktop look, I can download any one of the many thousands of themes that exist for Windows. Here's an example link (Many of which will extend the capability of the Window frame to add features such as window shading, pinned windows, translucent/transparent windows, etc..)

Are you Linux Zealots really that blinded by your own childish desire to be "l33t", "unique", and "nonconforming"? News flash: There are millions of other childish, nonconforming rebels out there ... just like you.

Go take a bath. You'll feel better.

From Astonshell, www.astonshell.com

I had to use Windows NT at work, and really missed the virtual desktop functionality I got from pretty much all the X window managers, and searched until I found AltDesk. I've used it on Windows 98, NT and 2000, and it works great. I assume it also works on XP, though I've never tried (I don't use XP).

The only downside is it's shareware, and costs $15 to register, but it works great and I've never had it crash my computer.

BTW, it gives you up to 256 virtual deskops, can be activated by the mouse or a key combination, allows you to make applications "sticky", meaning they appear on all desktops, and is skinnable.

Replacement for Windows Explorer. Here is their homepage if you are curious. I think I originally read about it in a slashdot comment.

"Your desktop looks cool. I got a laptop that can't seem to run anything but winders, and I'd love to get ahold of whatever you used to give yourself multiple desktops and such. Mind linking to the base software? (Hey, I don't mind paying if it works worth a crap.) "

Here you go. For $40 you get both the desktop replacement & the multi desktop app. I've used them for like 3 months now and I only have one complaint. It messes up Windows XP's suspend mode. Something doesn't come back out properly. Suspend mode worked great until Aston was installed on my laptop. Oh well. Just wanted to warn ya. Other than that, I've had no instabilities with either the desktop or desktop switching apps.

The desktop switching app (Altdesk) is the best thing that's happened to my interface in a long time. It works the way the task bar should. It was worth it just for that.

I think you'd be surprised at how your computing needs change once you start using the two apps. I can tell you I'm a lot more organized + productive with them. ;)

• Windows is not very changeable partly because the standard windows user will learn to use the interface given to him/her.

Ultraedit won me over last summer. Also, one of the only shareware programs I ever purchased (another one I bought, for those the want Windows multi-desktop check out Altdesk) Anyway, it's also tremendously useful if you frequently modify text files over ftp. You can open, work, save all through FTP. I have never encountered anything better.

Well, it's been done with Aston and LiteStep, so it shouldn't be too hard for someone to port GNOME or KDE, especially if they get the native Win32 widget bindings for GTK2 working like they planned to.