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Microsoft Killed the Start Menu Because No One Uses It
An anonymous reader writes "Microsoft recently killed the Start Menu, and their explanation for it seems fairly straightforward: no one used it. This may be a bit of an exaggeration, but Microsoft explains that use of the Start menu dipped by 11 percent between Windows Vista and Windows 7, with many specialized Start functions — such as exploring pictures — declining as much as 61 percent."
When you can't figure out the easy way to launch stuff, look in the Start Menu.
This is change for change's sake.
Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
Seriously, exactly what data and from where are they collecting it to figure this decline in usage.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
Once I started using Launchy that pretty much took away my need for the Start button.
Launchy plus the Quick Launch toolbar (for Windows XP) pretty much does the job.
Once in awhile I go to Start and am surprised by how much stuff I have installed.
This is why I'm still on Windows XP; I like the Start Menu and being able to group my applications by purpose in a *menu*.
I don't want them littered over the desktop or in silly toolbars.
Without the Start Menu, how do I shutdown?
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
People seem to want symbolic icons that represent the programs they want to run; they don't want to look through a long menu and read a bunch of text.
Really? Seems to be a common theme and maybe I'm just abnormal but I cannot stand interfaces with a dozen geometric shapes with random squiggles and colors that are different from every other interface with a dozen geometric shapes with random squiggles and colors.
Just put the damned labels in whatever language the system detects it's supposed to be in. Leave the squiggles and lines to the finger painting set.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
If you tap the Windows key and start typing, like in previous versions it will start searching for what you typed. So that still works the same, at least.
Yeah, I use a GUI because I love typing commands so much.
So in Windows 8 (for those that tried the demo, yes I downloaded the ISO and setup a VM to try it) they replaced the simple little menu in the start button with a whole screen monstrosity that takes the entire desktop. Taking over my whole desktop because I pushed the start button isn't the answer to this problem. IMO people don't use the start menu much because they put icons of their most used programs in the quick launch tool bar and on the desktop itself. Instead they take a simple menu, blow it up full screen and if you decide you don't want to pick a program and go back to what you have running, there is no logical way to do it (there isn't a close button that's obvious, ESC doesn't work, right click doesn't work). That's fucked up.
Gnome3 and Ubuntu's solution to doing away with the start button is far better than what MS has cooked up and I don't really like those either but I can see them working better). If I fail that badly using their "NEW AND IMPROVED" start menu I can't even comprehend how disastrous this will be for the less computer literate. The best part is, you cannot bring back the old start menu that I could find. It's not in the control panel, the options are gone from the right click menu, etc.
MS is making a huge mistake overlaying their Windows Phone 7 Metro interface on windows. This is a huge fuckup that's obviously being done to use the windows monopoly against the phone competition. It's going to backfire and damage windows just like Vista did.
It's not, since it doesn't look only in command names, but also in their human-readable descriptions; and not just from the beginning, but a match anywhere in it. It also searches other things that register with it, e.g. Control Panel applets (pretty handy - you can type something like "make text bigger", and it'll get you to the DPI settings; on the other hand, if you type "fdisk", it opens the partition manager, even though that's not called fdisk - so apparently there's some keyword-based system there). I believe it also looks in the standard Documents and Pictures folders.
I think KDE had something similar since 4.x, though.
People seem to want symbolic icons that represent the programs they want to run; they don't want to look through a long menu and read a bunch of text.
Want and use are two different things.
Its been proven by human interface design studies people have been trained to desire, even demand squigglie icons, but in actual use they simply read the text.
Some of it is cultural. If you live in a culture where literacy = two dozen or so glyphs, you probably don't use icons and just read the text underneath them, or, frankly, guess based on location and tool tip popups. If you live in a culture where literacy = ten thousand different glyphs, then you probably actually use icons.
Do you visually scan for an orange slime trail underneath and over a white blue circle, or the words "Firefox"? Most people look for the words.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Other than search and a few other minor things, the XP start menu is better.
I'm a CLI person to some extent*, so I'm sure that biases my opinions, but to me that's like saying "except for the fact that IPS panels have way better colors and viewing angles, cheap TN monitors are better than IPS."
IMO the search ability adds a world of different; I like the Vista/7 start menu way better than the XP menu solely on account of that. Sure, navigating through the menu sucks in comparison to XP, but the search feature not just closes that gap but blows past it.
* I actually hate most current CLIs, but they're the best we have at a lot of things, so I use them a lot of the time.
It's not a command line, it's a search box. Been that way for a while - it's actually surprisingly useful once you realize that.
Yes, and? I have one hand on the keyboard and one hand on the mouse. I move to the menu, click on it, click on the section I want and click on the application I want. It starts. I use the mouse to interact with the application.
Alternatively I can take my hand off the mouse, type some crap, hope Windows finds the right application and then put my hand back on the mouse again. Why would I possibly prefer that?
I assume you have used a search box before? Some newfangled web sites have started using them. Or are you still a Yahoo! Directory fan?
Yes, I understand, you're so totally l33t because you prefer inefficient UIs.
There is really nothing wrong with a start menu. Microsoft however never enforced a good practice with their start menu, the signal to noise ratio is VERY low. It's cluttered with company names, uninstallers and readme files. Why should I have to know the name of the company if I want to use a program, looks very much like advertisement to me. Instead of enforcing a good practice they have extended the start menu with "most used programs" which really doesn't cure the underlying problem, and to me it's even more cluttered. They should get rid of everything but the program starters in correct folders, Games in games folder and so on, one program has one menu entry, this was probably how it was meant to be by the original designer but never enforced. Look at Gnome, very simple, and very effective. And now MS have come to the conclusion that nobody uses their cluttered mess of a start menu, and are killing it. I say it could be fixed, but MS doesn't seem to know what's wrong with it...
The start menu was a nice one-click or one-key access to all your programs. But a combination of Microsoft watering it down + installers misusing the start menu have damaged its usefulness:
HOW TO USE THE START MENU
1. Don't use the start menu for branding. Example:
Start\Symantec Applications\Norton Antivirus\Norton Antivirus.lnk
should be
Start\Norton Antivirus.lnk
(*) This is usually committed with Sin #2 below
2. Don't make a group for one icon.
Start\Super Editor\Super Editor.lnk
should be
Start\Super Editor.lnk
3. Don't place icons in 3 places
- Quick launch
- Desktop
- Start menu
Put them in the start menu, and let the user decide what applications are important enough to put on their desktop.
4. Don't put multiple icons where 1 will do
Start\VideoLan\Documentation.lnk
Start\VideoLan\VLC Media Player.lnk
Start\VideoLan\VLC Media Player Skinned.lnk
Start\VideoLan\Readme.lnk
Start\VideoLan\Configure VLC Media Player.lnk
Documentation is part of the application. Skinned/non-skinned is an option within the application. Configuration is part of the application.
5. Don't put control panel icons on the start menu.
Ex: Start\ATI Catalyst Control Center.lnk
should be
Start\Control Panel\ATI Catalyst Control Center.lnk
6. Don't modify the start menu when I run your app or update it. Ex: I move Quicktime under "Junk" but it reappears whenever it updates. Another one is FinePrint which re-adds itself when the driver starts.
7. Microsoft: Don't limit the size of the menu menu then add a scroll bar. Windows Vista and 7 limit it to 1/2 the screen then add a scroll bar, even if everything would have fit just fine had it resized.
8. Microsoft: The icons need to be clickable size. A 16x16 icon at 1600x1200 is inappropriate when the app provided a 128x128 icon.
9. Don't forget keyboard support! This has gone down hill since Windows '9x.
10. Don't place icons under Start - Programs. Everything is a program. Just place them under "Start"
11. Don't place applications in the registry startup - place them in the start menu's startup group so that the user can remove it easily if necessary.
If you press the winkey, you can just start typing to bring up the program you want. "cmd" even brings up the command line. I find this easier than clicking anything, does this not work for you or have I missed something?
+1 IDisagreeSoHeMustBeATrollOrAnAstroturferOrAShill
Sadly as someone who builds and sells PCs I can tell you why nobody uses the start menu, its because THEY PUT EVERY DAMNED THING ON THE DESKTOP! That's why. I'll get these machines and literally you can't even tell what wallpaper they have for all the damned icons all over the thing.
As long as they have contextual search and Action Center i'll be happy. I can't even remember the last time I fired up start>all programs, its all Action Center and search. But personally i think Win 8 is gonna bomb as its TOO radical. While Win 7 was an easy sell showing the screencaps of Win 8 to over 100 customers so far NOT A SINGLE ONE has had a single nice thing to say about the Win 8 UI, nor has anyone said they'd be willing to run it. the closest I got was this exchange "That is a nice looking cell phone screen. is that Android? I've heard of that, its supposed to be nice....what do you mean windows? Windows what? Well that's just stupid! Why would I want to run a cell phone on my desktop?".
I think little Rita's reaction says it all. Not a single person i showed Win 8 to liked it, wanted it, or was even interested in trying it. it is just too radical and reminds too many of a cell phone. And I hate to break the news to MSFT, most folks hate their cell phones. Oh sure they won't let the thing go, but they can all name a dozen things, from bad reception to UI quirks that really piss them off. so having your new OS look like a cell phone? Not the way to get folks to love it.
Final prediction: Windows 7 becomes the "new XP" aka the OS that just won't die, Win 8 becomes Vista part II, and I get to spend a year and a half stripping windows 8 off and putting windows 7 on because nobody wants to run it, just as I had to do with Vista and XP. Oh fun, oh joy, thanks MSFT you clueless bunch of PHBs.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Windows + TAB + TAB + Enter = Shutdown
Actually, no - it's the last action you performed from the submenu. If that was a restart, it will restart instead.
The reason why people don't use the start menu anymore is twofold, and both reasons are due to Microsoft, not the users:
1: The menu is inconsistent. Things move around. People choose options easier by spatial cues than by reading the text every time. "Smart" menus are anything but. (This goes for the godawful "awesomebar" in Firefox too)
2: The user should not wait for the UI, but the other way around. To have to hover and wait or click again, and then find and hit little arrow keys to scroll through the full list, you slow down the user, without adding anything of value.
I've tried Windows 8 preview, but it took me half an hour to find out how to shut down, and I still haven't figured out how to navigate to and bring up the program I want to run. It's just not intuitive. "Try to look like an iPhone" is a recipe for failure unless you are an iPhone. This is why Gnome 3 fails so badly too.
Let's do a quick exercise in Microsoftian design: The week has 168 hours.
Shall we assume the typical adult male has 4x 15-minute sexual intercourses per week ? It's probably pushing a bit, but fine, let's exaggerate. That'll be 1 hour per week.
Shall we assume the typical adult male urinates 8 times per day (once every 2 hours while awake), and each event lasts 1 minute ? That'll be 8 minutes per day, 56 minutes per week. Let's round things up and call it 1 hour. We're exaggerating anyway.
166/168 = 0.9880. On our typical adult male, the penis is idle and unused 98.8% of the time. If the human body was designed by the Windows 8 design team, we would be dickless.