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The 30 Best Features of Windows

Barence writes "PC Pro has picked out its 30 best features of Windows 8. Its countdown includes features such as the revamped Task Manager, the option to run ISOs and VHDs natively, and Windows To Go, which allows you to take a portable installation of Windows 8 with you." They've also listed ten features they'd like to see added to Windows 8, "including the return of the Start button on the desktop, virtual desktops and one-click sharing of optical drives."

73 of 470 comments (clear)

  1. The real news by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Is that Windows 8 has 30 features

    1. Re:The real news by ozmanjusri · · Score: 5, Insightful
      It doesn't.

      There's almost nothing in that list that hasn't been available on other platforms for more than a decade. One item (Kinect for Windows) has no relevance at all to the new OS, apart from being available at the same time.

      Don't waste your time clicking through all the advert-ridden pages of banality. I'm sure even Microsoft will offer more novelty than this semi-article suggests.

      --
      "I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
    2. Re:The real news by recoiledsnake · · Score: 4, Insightful

      >There's almost nothing in that list that hasn't been available on other platforms for more than a decade

      How does that stop something from being a feature?

      --
      This space for rent.
    3. Re:The real news by ozmanjusri · · Score: 2, Insightful
      Apologies.

      I should have phrased it as "interesting" features.

      --
      "I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
    4. Re:The real news by c0lo · · Score: 5, Funny

      Is that Windows 8 has 30 features

      It doesn't. Actually, the bad mouths say there are 2 features and 28 bugs.

      (takes cover)

      --
      Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
    5. Re:The real news by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Where's the list of the 30 features that we wish we could uninstall, but can't?

    6. Re:The real news by thegarbz · · Score: 4, Informative

      There's almost nothing in that list that hasn't been available on other platforms for more than a decade.

      Half of those features are actually available on my Windows 7 installation already. Support for USB3.0 devices, not rebooting / nagging to install updates, builtin antivirus, quick search, device synchronisation, 3G support, split screen multitasking, the ability to turn wifi off with a click of a button rather than a hardware switch, and the ability to auto mount ISOs, all of that works just fine on my Windows 7 install.

      In fact judging by Microsoft's early attempts at WiFi integration, and CD burning I predict that Windows 8 will be shit at all of the above.

    7. Re:The real news by cinky · · Score: 2, Informative
      I'm tired of this. really I am. how long have you been using windows 8? I'm using it on both of my workstations since developer preview came out...

      they've made the desktop as functional as windows 2000 with a crashed explorer. yay!

      huh? my desktop looks just like my desktop in windows 7. BTW if you really hate the metro interface you can turn it off and have a plain old windows 7 with the more efficient windows 8 core. anyway don't want it? don't use it but stop spreading false information. 10 years ago it was microsoft who spread FUD like crazy - now it's the ubuntards...

    8. Re:The real news by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

      no-one else is doing it on mobile platforms.

      Android, iOS, WP7, BB and Symbian don't do it. I suppose there is WinCE, but it isn't really in the same market (i.e. phone/tablet OS).

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    9. Re:The real news by Krneki · · Score: 2

      >There's almost nothing in that list that hasn't been available on other platforms for more than a decade

      How does that stop something from being a feature?

      It didn't stop Apple, that's for sure.

      --
      Love many, trust a few, do harm to none.
    10. Re:The real news by roc97007 · · Score: 2

      ...I'm wondering, does Windows count as an "other platform"? I've been able to do some of that stuff, like run ISOs natively, for some time on XP and 7. The news is not that the feature is available, even on Windows, but merely that the feature is now built in, which means it'll have some degree of lameness, I'll get frustrated with it, and go back to the products I was using. (Similar to firewall, malware remover, CD burner, video editing, a dozen more.)

      --
      Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
  2. Re:Oh, yeah! by wordsnyc · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I was honestly not aware that Windows doesn't have "virtual desktops." Stunning. It's like a TV with one channel.

    --
    Sent from the iPad I found in your car.
  3. Re:Oh, yeah! by hobarrera · · Score: 2

    I'm honestly in doubt as to wether this is an attempt at being funny, or plain old spam.

  4. Windows 8 by Jeremiah+Cornelius · · Score: 2, Funny

    Computing redefined for people who REALLY like glossy magazines and coffee table books.

    --
    "Flyin' in just a sweet place,
    Never been known to fail..."
  5. Re:Oh, yeah! by Walt+Dismal · · Score: 2

    Indeed, this spammer is posting in multiple places using mulitple accounts.

  6. That PC Pro site is awful by mfearby · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm not clicking through 8 pages, each of which seems to load a popup, just to read a list of 30 items. And judging from the first couple of pages I could stand to look at, the article is hyping up some very un-newsworthy information indeed! There's nothing worse than a site with tid bits of "information" surrounded by an orgy of advertising. Get lost!

    1. Re:That PC Pro site is awful by billcopc · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Adblock is your friend.

      So is not getting your primary information from sites that exist solely to farm clickthroughs from aggregators like our once glorious /.

      --
      -Billco, Fnarg.com
    2. Re:That PC Pro site is awful by ignavus · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I'm not clicking through 8 pages, each of which seems to load a popup, just to read a list of 30 items. And judging from the first couple of pages I could stand to look at, the article is hyping up some very un-newsworthy information indeed! There's nothing worse than a site with tid bits of "information" surrounded by an orgy of advertising. Get lost!

      Any article devoted to touting the "30 best features" of any commercial product already sounds to me like advertising, without the added "benefit" of third-party advertisements.

      But then, the technology press is full of advertisements masquerading as independent articles.

      --
      I am anarch of all I survey.
  7. Features already present in previous versions by goonerw · · Score: 4, Informative

    Yet another "click here dozens of times so we can get more advertising revenue" article. This could have been done in 3-4 pages, not 10+.

    They also clearly haven't used Windows 7 as it has the ability to mount VHDs as well. (Windows 8 improves upon that by adding ISO mounting support) The way they wrote that "feature" is as if the VHD mounting is absent in previous versions.

    --
    LOAD ".SIG"
    PRESS PLAY ON TAPE
    1. Re:Features already present in previous versions by larry+bagina · · Score: 5, Funny

      Windows 8 lets you install Linux!

      Windows 8 throws a meaty bone to power users – namely, the ability to run ISO and virtual hard disk (VHD) images natively. It’s possible, for example, to download the ISO of a Linux distribution or another piece of software to the desktop, double-click to “mount” the file, and run the setup executable without having to physically burn the ISO to disc.

      --
      Do you even lift?

      These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.

    2. Re:Features already present in previous versions by Tr3vin · · Score: 5, Informative

      /posted using a BSD-derivitive, the One True Modern OS! OS X!!

      So, BSD (which predates the mid-90's by a bit) with more pretty colors and a much larger memory footprint? That OS X?

    3. Re:Features already present in previous versions by Aug+Leopold · · Score: 5, Funny

      Truthfully it only has one color, Brushed metal.

    4. Re:Features already present in previous versions by catmistake · · Score: 2

      /posted using a BSD-derivitive, the One True Modern OS! OS X!!

      So, BSD (which predates the mid-90's by a bit) with more pretty colors and a much larger memory footprint? That OS X?

      Obviously, you are not familiar with sarcasm. You must be new here?

  8. Re:Oh, yeah! by Zocalo · · Score: 3, Informative

    Spam, with a dubious download awaiting if you should happen to visit one of the many links to the site in the post. "MyCleanPC.com", along with sister site "DoubleMySpeed.com" were exposed ages ago as a scam, despite a veneer of legitimacy provided by some TV adverts. Just another one of those so called "security tools" which then proceeds to find a lot of problems with your PC and then requires you to "register" to fix the so called problems.

    --
    UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
  9. Ten features we'd like to see in PC Pro stories by sootman · · Score: 5, Informative

    10. Quit whoring for pageviews with needlessly split up articles

    Prev 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Next

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  10. How about discussing features that matter? by mlts · · Score: 5, Insightful

    To me, where BitLocker or another disk encryption tool means the difference between a hardware write-off and insurance claim versus having to report to every manager up a chain, as well as the press, I consider the basic Windows 8 security upgrades to BitLocker important.

    It would be nice if they would allow non-TPM encryption without a USB flash drive, because not many machines have TPM/TCG compatible motherboards these days.

    However, I can deploy images that are already BitLocker encrypted, or just tell the machine to encrypt used space in Windows 8. With the new hardware encrypted HDDs, I can have BitLocker deal with those as well.

    Yes, this is boring, but anything that ensures that an attacker isn't going to get data should a laptop be stolen is important for day to day IT.

    1. Re:How about discussing features that matter? by cheater512 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Err it sounds like you could save yourself a few headaches with Truecrypt.

    2. Re:How about discussing features that matter? by Bacon+Bits · · Score: 2

      What machines are you using? I'm mostly familiar with HP and Dell, and just about every business-grade machine they sell (laptops, desktops, servers) has Bitlocker-compatible TPM built-in.

      I was wondering the same thing. I work at a school district, and every desktop and laptop the district has purchased in the last 4-5 years (meaning every computer in use other than a few oddball donated models) has had a TPM module. I know because we had consistent problems with them under Windows XP and they had to be disabled, only to be re-enabled when the machines were migrated to Windows 7.

      --
      The road to tyranny has always been paved with claims of necessity.
    3. Re:How about discussing features that matter? by SuricouRaven · · Score: 2

      The TPM is an Intel feature. It started off as rather evil - intended to serve as both a crypto accelerator, machine ID and enabler for hardware-based DRM measures like disabling the machine if it detected an unauthorised OS. Same as Microsoft's Secure Boot will. It got watered down in implimentation though, so all that's left is a secret key store and crypto-accelerator. No more cryptographic signing of the OS bootloader. At least not until MS brings it back with Secure Boot.

  11. Lets break it down by HeliumHigh · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I agree with number 1 (Bring back the start button) if only for consistencies sake. Windows has had a start button for years and years, and most graphical operating systems have some a main system button in one form or another. Why fix it if it ain't broken? (An argument that could probably be applied liberally to 8's new GUI...)

    Number 2: Blu-ray support would be nice, but I actually like how they have removed most of the optical media licensing crap to the media/media pro packs (or whatever they are called). By the time 8 is out, I would bet a majority of consumer-grade computing devices won't have an optical drive. Blu-ray should be supported in the media pack, but I have no qualms if it isn't in the default stack of cards.

    As for number 3 (One Click Optical Drive Sharing), I think this might be the most valid criticisms on the list, mainly for the same reasons stated above: optical drives are going away. I currently have one optical drive in the house and have it shared via samba and few other ways, but this is a read-only approach.

    Number 4 (Drag to open) doesn't seem like a very harsh criticism, it feels more like list padding. I don't use drag and drop for just about anything after having found the keyboard is much faster though, so I should recuse myself from commenting on this one.

    As far as Virtual Desktops go (Number 5), it is technically unfeasible, for reasons I don't quite remember. Something to do with the way Windows handles windows which has escaped me for the moment. Nevertheless, there are third party applications of varying quality that already implement this, to a varying degree.

    Bring back visualbasic? (Number 6) No. Just no. That thing was a mess. Friends don't let friends script VB, drunk or otherwise.

    Number 7: Fonts preview app: I have the win8 consumer preview running in vmware right now, and the font folder looks pretty much untouched from win7. It still lets you preview installed fonts. More list-padding?

    I've got an easy fix for 8 (Dual-pane explorer). Use two explorer windows, one on the right one on the left. Or feel free to use something like Total Commander or its variants. They still make those, right?

    As for 9, I'm sure Microsoft is going to give a little polish to the out-of-box-experience. Just cause the alpha doesn't have it, doesn't mean it won't be there.

    10 is valid. I don't like where the shutdown button lives on win8. Move it up one level, just so that it is a little easier to find. I don't like to hunt and peck for a basic system function.

    1. Re:Lets break it down by Osty · · Score: 2

      As far as Virtual Desktops go (Number 5), it is technically unfeasible, for reasons I don't quite remember. Something to do with the way Windows handles windows which has escaped me for the moment. Nevertheless, there are third party applications of varying quality that already implement this, to a varying degree.

      Actually, virtual desktops should be trivial to do, and I'm surprised it hasn't been done yet. The key is Remote Desktop. Since XP/Server 2003, even your local console login session is essentially a remote desktop session, just optimized for being local. There's no reason why there couldn't be four or so local RDP sessions available to switch through on demand. It's effectively Fast User Switching, just without the actual user switching. It would even fit well with the RDP licensing for client OSes, where you can only have one login session active at a time (try it -- if you log in remotely, your local session locks). Processes in inactive sessions still run just fine, so the fact that your virtual desktops would technically be inactive RDP sessions would not affect running programs. Moving apps between desktops would be tricky or impossible, but on the other hand separation between desktop process spaces is potentially a good thing.

      There are already hacks that allow multiple remote logins by the same user and multiple active logins, so in theory you could fake this yourself by connecting a couple of local-remote sessions and switching between them as needed.

      Bring back visualbasic? (Number 6) No. Just no. That thing was a mess. Friends don't let friends script VB, drunk or otherwise.

      Depending on the goal (the article was very vague, just asking for "a simple app development language"), this is either solved by Powershell (replaces batch script and vbscript) or by the new WinRT runtime with its Javascript interface and Expression Blend support for easily building GUIs. VB6 needs to stay dead, and IMHO VB.NET may as well follow it since there's really no benefit to using it over C#.

    2. Re:Lets break it down by sensationull · · Score: 3, Informative

      Click with the mouse wheel or the middle (centre) button, this will trigger a new instance or right click then click the app icon just above unpin.

  12. I don't care if it has 100 new features by scottbomb · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That abomination that is Metro is enough to kill the deal for me. I will use Win 7 until it's end-of-support. Meanwhile, I'm dual-booting Xubuntu so that when 7 comes to an end, I'll already be comfortable with a different OS.

    1. Re:I don't care if it has 100 new features by Joce640k · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Wow.

      Are you really THAT hateful toward a redesigned Start Menu?

      Yes. When it's designed for use on tablets with touchscreens and I'm sat at a desktop machine then it's going to suck rocks.

      --
      No sig today...
  13. Poorly written article by bertok · · Score: 4, Informative

    Half of those "new" features are already in Windows 7, like AppLocker. I have USB3 support now. Sure, it's not "native", but it works, so who cares?

    A lot more interesting are the new features under the hood of Windows 8 server. Take a look at this article for example: Optimizing for Latency-Sensitive Applications: scenario overview.

    Sure, it's not visible or shiny, but wow those are some big changes!

  14. Too Bad... by RamenJunkie · · Score: 3, Funny

    It's too bad that one of the features of Windows 8 isn't "Not a piece of crap".

  15. Re:True #1 Feature! by cupantae · · Score: 5, Interesting

    As a Linux user, let me say, this is not insightful, interesting or informative. It's flamebait.

    #1 Feature: You *don't* have to run it!!!!! Stick with Win 7, or Linux, Mac OS X!

    Gosh, how clever.

    Remember, Windows 7 is really Vista ver. 2.0.

    Remember that thing that's not true, you mean? Think of what made Vista a failure before opening your mouth.

    Windows 8 will be another Windows ME, or Vista...

    It might be a failure. You could check out the missing features, if you'd like to try R'ing a FA.

    Don't pay to be a Beta tester for Microsoft operating systems!

    You can do that for free. It's called a developer preview.

    --
    --
  16. And? by ifwm · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "The 30 Best Features of Windows"

    "Not a single *new* feature"

    Why would you be looking for new features in an article about the best features? You are aware they're not the same, right? And often, new features don't work very well right? So, from a logic standpoint, I'd expect many of the best features of most OSes to be anything but new.

  17. Re:8p for W8 by desdinova+216 · · Score: 4, Informative

    if you click the link marked print this you will get everything on one page, yes it pops into another window....

  18. In other words... by maccodemonkey · · Score: 2

    ...features that have been in every other operating system for years.

    I can't believe people get excited for this. Now we have to deal with all the fanboys who every time they see these things in other operating systems are going to yell about people ripping off Microsoft.

  19. Windows 1.0 by jfdavis668 · · Score: 2

    I tried to come up with the 30 best features of Windows 1. I don't think it had 30 features, even counting startup and shutdown.

  20. Re:Oh, yeah! by ifiwereasculptor · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It has to be a joke. First because some are quite funny (my favorite is the one where the guy had cancer and his family left him, but then he found MyCleanPC and everything was dandy). Second because creating multiple accounts to post on /. is a bit time consuming, especially given that this is arguably the worst site for spamming that sort of scam - it has a very high incidence of tech-oriented nerds, way too many running OSX, Linux or something weirder, and very few grandmas.

  21. My long awaiting features by devent · · Score: 3, Interesting
    #1, delete opened files.

    It is so annoying everytime if I just want to look at a file or to open it in different editor, or delete I file I need first to search the app that opened it. In Linux you just open the file with whatever you want, move it, delete it, etc. no problems.

    #2, virtual desktops.

    If I work on a project and then want to look something up, or someone comes with an USB stick and I need to copy it, and open the files, I just switch the desktop. It's like you have one table full of stuff, then you go to a different table to eat your pizza, and then you go back to your work table. You don't put away your work stuff so you can eat the pizza, you just go to the kitchen table.

    #3 Fast file system checks.

    The fsck on Linux takes only 20 seconds for 100GB (ext4) why does Windows need minutes for a check?

    #4 A good command prompt

    I really hate the 1990 DOS command prompt. Can we please have a modern command prompt in the year 2012? A modern cmd prompt is: any true type font, any size also full size, completition of commands with tab key, searchable history of cmds, different background, different text color, etc. For an example of a modern cmd prompt, see Konsole (KDE).

    #5 Ease change of the desktop environments

    I mean a complete change, not just like a theme. I really like to replace the whole Windows desktop with KDE.

    #6 Good SSH integration.

    In Linux I can type in anywhere: ssh-add and it adds my ssh key for every program. Why can't it be that easy in Windows?

    --
    http://www.mueller-public.de - My site http://www.anr-institute.com/ - Advanced Natural Research Institute
  22. Re:Not a single *new* feature by FrootLoops · · Score: 3, Informative

    Perhaps you read the title as "The 30 Best New Features of Windows 8", as I did, which is not what it says. Regardless, I found some interesting:
      * Split-screen for Metro-style apps
      * Trial periods built in to the Windows store
      * Picture passwords
      * Windows To Go booting from removable drives

  23. Re:Oh, yeah! by dc29A · · Score: 2

    3d party tools? All of them are either slow, buggy or have some very weird behaviours.

    Oh and I plugged my second monitor on my Ubuntu box, didn't even had to configure anything, it detected it. Took me a whole 5 seconds to get it running. Flawlessly.

  24. Hide The Features by tverbeek · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Clearly Microsoft hears complaints from users that computers are too complicated. Their solution, unfortunately, is to keep hiding things. Like that helps.

    I think it started with "personalized menus": the menu items you haven't used in a while get hidden... which rather defeats the purpose of menus, because you're less likely to remember seeing those less-used features to know they exist, and when you go looking for them, they're concealed. Filename extensions apparently confused some people, so now they're hidden... making it easier to trick people with trojans disguised as Word documents, befuddling them when they see two files (of different types) with the same name, and rendering files "unopenable" if they get saved somehow with the wrong (hidden) extension. They've been doing it with IE in a big way: taking buttons off the standard toolbar, removing button labels, and recently hiding the whole damn pull-down menu bar! The MS Office "ribbon" left me scratching my head trying to find the "print" button (or menu option) the first time I encountered it. The Start button has lost the word "start"... not exactly hidden, but no longer as easy for newbies to find when told to click on it. In Win7 (maybe it was Vista), the "log off" and other I'm done-using-the-computer options are now hidden under a non-descript arrow button. And now in Win8 (which I've looked at in preview only long enough to get frustrated trying to re-orient myself) they've hidden the Start button altogether, and made Shutdown even harder to find.

    Instead of actually simplifying the system, what they're doing is the equivalent of sweeping the complexity under a rug. It's still there. And often you still need it. But it's harder to get at. They're shoving more and more features into the system... then hiding them away. Along with a bunch of the old ones. Eventually it will get simple enough for my aged mother to use it... but by then I will find it totally unusable.

    --
    http://alternatives.rzero.com/
  25. The List by TranquilVoid · · Score: 4, Informative

    Here's the list not spread over 9 pages. I'm surprised there are 30 new things worth commenting on.

    #1. Interactive tiles

    #2. Task Manager

    #3. Run ISOs and VHDs natively

    #4. No new hardware requirements

    #5. Airplane mode

    #6. SkyDrive integration

    #7. Windows Store

    #8. Interactive lock screen

    #9. Split-screen apps

    #10. Split touch keyboard

    #11. App contracts

    #12. Fewer surprise restarts

    #13. Cross-device synchronisation

    #14. Improved 3G support

    #15. Built-in antivirus

    #16. Picture passwords

    #17. Instant search

    #18. Windows To Go

    #19. Secure Boot

    #20. Revamped Explorer

    #21. Restore PC

    #22. Thumbnail previews

    #23. Metro groups

    #24. Kinect for Windows

    #25. AppLocker

    #26. Reset PC

    #27. File copy revamp

    #28. Faster boot times

    #29. Native USB 3 support

    #30. Panoramic background images

    1. Re:The List by bmo · · Score: 4, Informative

      Thank you for your enumeration. I will respond to these one by each.

      #1. Interactive tiles
      "The Metro start screen may not be everyone's cup of tea," Well, that's putting it very mildly.
      Metro specific. Start screen specific. Who cares. Just get that start screen out of my way, plox.
      #2. Task Manager
      Improved. Decent. One of the nicest task managers I've used. Now if only someone could port htop to Windows.
      #3. Run ISOs and VHDs natively
      About friggin' time. Linux has been doing this since forever ago. But you won't be able to play DVDs out of the box. Noooo.... You need to buy the Plus Pack for that. It's as if it's really 1998.
      #4. No new hardware requirements
      Well, considering the bloat going from XP to Vista/7 one would hope not. It's still too big for virtualizing.
      #5. Airplane mode
      Woopdedoo. Here is my airplane mode: Put on headphones. Listen to music. Sleep. Ignore person in seat next to me as much as possible.
      #6. SkyDrive integration
      This should be expected. SkyDrive doesn't suck.
      #7. Windows Store
      But forget about buying non-metro apps in it.
      #8. Interactive lock screen
      Tits on a bull useless. A lockscreen should show nothing but a prompt for a password and possibly the screensaver. It's a lockscreen for a reason.
      #9. Split-screen apps
      Don't we call these things windows? *looks* OH REALLY. IFRAMES ON THE DESKTOP. KILL IT WITH FIRE.
      #10. Split touch keyboard - an on-screen keyboard that is divided up into left and right sides
      Saying this to a touch-typist gets you nothing but ridicule.
      #11. App contracts
      KDE has had something like this since forever ago.
      #12. Fewer surprise restarts
      How about none? Please? The only surprise restart should be a STOP error, and at that point, it's a hardware/driver issue. All other restarts should be optional, like in sane operating systems.
      #13. Cross-device synchronisation
      Marketing fluff that means "rsync"
      #14. Improved 3G support
      But how does this help me as a desktop OS?
      #15. Built-in antivirus
      It would be nice to not need this, wouldn't it?
      #16. Picture passwords
      Only useful on touch devices.
      #17. Instant search
      Oh, you mean like what Linux has had since forever ago. Also, see Dolphin, Semantic Desktop etc.
      #18. Windows To Go
      Live distribution. "Innovation" as if Knoppix never existed.
      #19. Secure Boot
      Something that is designed to lock out other OSes from "windows certified" devices, enabled by default and unable to remove. Also: the army is always fighting the last war. Most malware runs in userspace now.
      #20. Revamped Explorer
      It still sucks.
      #21. Restore PC
      Only Windows users think it's normal to re-image the machine every quarter.
      #22. Thumbnail previews of active applications
      Woop, de, doo. old news, even on Windows. "But it's android style!!!!!" Wait, who is doing the innovating here?
      #23. Metro groups
      UI specific. Metro sucks. Therefore MetroGroups sucks.
      #24. Kinect for Windows
      This is actually useful and a Good Thing (TM)
      #25. AppLocker
      Listed, but article does not describe what it is, something to do with policies, therefore it is meaningless to the end user. This is a stretch, especially in an article targeted toward end users.
      #26. Reset PC
      dd if=/dev/urandom of=/dev/sda ; walk away, get lunch.
      #27. File copy revamp
      A user interface deal that does nothing about the suck-ass throughput when copying non-trivial amounts of files, like moving movie archives from one drive to another.
      #28. Faster boot times
      Yeah, well, this will be nuked by the user as soon as he or she installs $BONZIBUDDYCLONEOFTHEDAY from the app store. Purple gorillas for everyone!
      #29. Native USB 3 support
      In modern operating systems, this is pushed out with a kernel module update on existing systems. No idea why you would need an entire OS upgrade just for usb3.
      #30. Panoramic background images
      Oh my fucking god, we need this. We need this so much. TAKE MY MONEY ALL OF IT

      --
      BMO

  26. Windows to GO... by stanlyb · · Score: 2

    I have to admit, i LIKE this feature. Everybody with me: Windows TO GO GO GO.

  27. Empathy for the Start button by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 5, Funny

    ten features they'd like to see added to Windows 8, including the return of the Start button on the desktop

    It's called the Stockholm syndrome, an "apparently paradoxical psychological phenomenon in which hostages express empathy and have positive feelings towards their captors, sometimes to the point of defending them"

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  28. MyCleanPC! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    I really hope Windows 8 includes MyCleanPC by default!

  29. Print page links! by antdude · · Score: 2

    Use them! Although they do prompt to print or not. :P

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  30. Re:Revolutionary idea I'd like included... by darthdavid · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Here's the problem with unified Console/PC multilayer: the mouse and keyboard. It's a much better interface for certain types games and if you let console and pc gamers into the same sandbox the console users are gonna get their heads kicked in and not have a very good time of it.

  31. Re:Oh, yeah! by symbolset · · Score: 4, Funny

    For as long as I've been here slashdot has been a proving ground for bots of various types. Goatse guy is actually a key Debian developer doing counter captcha research. This one's developer just has a different sense of humor.

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  32. Re:Oh, yeah! by nabsltd · · Score: 3, Informative

    Even having used them myself, I don't get the appeal of what basically amounts to a poor-man's alternative to having multiple monitors.

    For me, the problem is that multiple monitors don't give me enough real estate compared to virtual desktops. I run the Microsoft-written "TopDesk" at 11x3, so that means my total desktop space is 21120x3600 pixels.

    I can have a dozen programs maximized without having to hunt through them (one keystroke plus one mouse click gets me to any open window). In addition, it's easy to group sub-tasks together onto one desktop. So, I can have 3-4 terminals open to a Linux machines to configure nfs client and server, and video and audio editing software also open, yet neither group of windows interferes with the other. In addition, my e-mail client, web browser, and a spreadsheet are also open without getting in the way of any other tasks.

    I can also easily configure windows to always open in the same location, which can be a problem with multiple monitors. Then, too, moving windows around from one desktop to another is much easier, as I have the overview of the whole workspace, and can move the window using that (and that has shortcuts that allow me to snap the window to special places).

    There's nothing wrong with multiple monitors (although it can be an issue when you use a KVM as I do), but adding virtual desktops gives you another whole level of window management tricks to employ.

  33. Re:True #1 Feature! by Barbara,+not+Barbie · · Score: 4, Informative

    I tried it, and it really is the worst product Microsoft has ever made. Metro is awful, and the Win8 desktop is a step backward. And it's a memory and resource hog.

    Please, don't take my word for it - download it yourself. It makes Unity look almost good.

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  34. Re:True #1 Feature! by hairyfeet · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I have to agree, after running both the dev and consumer previews, as well as setting up a machine with consumer preview in the shop to let common folks try it there is one thing we could all agree on and that is "Metro UI sucks on desktops".

    Maybe it'll be nice for tablets and smart phones, who knows, but considering that MSFT owns less than 5% of the smartphone and tablet market and 90% of the desktop taking a big old dump on the desktop for a shot at smartphones is a DUMB fucking idea. I ran it for nearly a month on my home desktop before I wiped it, Metro UI just seemed to be fighting me every step of the way. And I agree with you on the suckage of resources as well, all the updates of those stupid always on metro "apps" slammed my network constantly and the thing was blowing through more than 2.2Gb of memory. Compare this to win 7 with all the bling, aero, AND more than a half a dozen tray apps and it would top out at a little over 1.3Gb.

    So please, everyone who doesn't believe, try it for yourself here and you'll see what all the hate is about. Some have pointed out I hated the QL on win 7 but TBH after seeing what a slow uptake there was on Vista i didn't think companies would jump to support the new QL like they did. Without practically every application supporting jumplists the Win 7 tasklist would have been IMHO a serious step back over the XP QL but I'll be the first to admit now that its widely supported the Win 7 way is nice.

    There is just NO way that I can see that one can take a cell phone touch based UI like win 8 and make it a nice experience for your average laptop or desktop user, the differences between designs is just too steep. Watch the MSFT videos talking about win 8 for yourself and count how many times they say "touchscreen". last one i saw i quit counting at 30. Now does ANYBODY think with the x86 PC business being so damned cutthroat they are just gonna eat the $100+ cost per unit to include touchscreens?

    I'm sorry but win 8 is a BAD design and I'm just glad I've gotten the majority of my customers as well as my family onto Win 7 so we can all just skip win 8 completely. Touch UI is fine and dandy for a tablet, much better than the pen approach, but I have NO desire to poke my netbook or desktop all damned day. As for TFA frankly I don't see much there that can't be had for free with third party products such as process explorer for Task manager. BTW check out #4, even for the "old kit" they used for Win 8 was a touchscreen laptop! Seriously how many current laptops and desktops are touchscreen? 2%? 3%? Kinda sad when even the ones plugging the OS aren't putting it on non touch devices...hmmm...wonder why?

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  35. Re:Oh, yeah! by fluffy99 · · Score: 2

    Virtual PC is support on other versions, it's just the XP mode that required Pro or better. I prefer VirtualBox myslef, although it does still have a few quirks under Windows and the really powerful features are only accessible via command line (like making a virtual disk immutable).

    Speaking of virtual disks, Windows 7 supports booting a to a VHD. The functionality is there but not exposed or easily setup. So technically it's not a new feature.

  36. Re:Scroll Volume Control by fluffy99 · · Score: 2

    I'm fine with click the tray icon and roll the scroll wheel. You make it sound like that extra click is a tragedy. Given how tray icons work, this makes sense, btw. Otherwise explorer would have to catch what your doing and pass it to the tray icon.

  37. Re:Oh, yeah! by jaymemaurice · · Score: 4, Interesting

    X is awesome but seems nobody knows how to really use it. I run Cygwin with X on Windows and everyone keeps asking me what operating system I am running when running Unix apps and Windows apps at the same time.

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  38. Re:Oh, yeah! by jaymemaurice · · Score: 4, Funny

    My problem with multiple monitors is they seem to be contageous. They are like a herpes or something. In the office and soon as one person hooks up the second monitor, it starts to spread amongst their department and then others. Eventually someones symptoms get worse and they spring up a 3rd or someone presents differently with a 90* rotation... soon it's this big pissing match of who has the most productive workspace. Next thing you know, you have a 2x3 grid of 30" super high-res monitors and your open gl screen saver won't work because some limitation at 4096 pixels... and all windows in the center monitor because it strains your neck to look so far left or right.

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  39. Re:Oh, yeah! by lightknight · · Score: 3, Funny

    It's Netscape, isn't it? ;-)

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  40. Re:features won't matter by rhook · · Score: 3, Informative

    You just showed that you know nothing about modern versions of Windows. DOS is long gone (the command prompt is not DOS) as are some of the old Windows APIs. In fact XP Mode is free for the Professional, Ultimate, and Enterprise versions so that businesses can run legacy apps.

  41. Re:Oh, yeah! by Bert64 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The third party tools don't work very well, primarily because they are hacks and 99% of software isn't designed to work with them, including the base window manager...
    OSX used to be the same, under 10.4 and earlier the virtual desktop hacks were buggy, didn't fit in well with the rest of the system and most apps didn't expect them to be running. Since spaces was included by default in 10.5, osx apps awareness of multiple desktops has improved massively.
    X11 has always had virtual desktops, so its support for them tends to be the best of the 3 by far.

    I can understand how you would find virtual desktops less useful, having only used very poor implementations of them...

    As someone who has access to a desktop with 4 screens, i actually find virtual desktops to be better than physical screens in most cases... Off the top of my head:
    Less head movement, all the virtual screens are in the same physical place so i dont have to keep adjusting my viewpoint and dont get distracted by movement out the corner of my eye...
    Works on laptops - i use a laptop for a lot of my work, and it would be impractical to carry a second screen around with it..
    Lots more - you can have many virtual desktops - i tend to have 16, a similar number of physical screens becomes completely unwieldy both to physically look at, and to drive (you'd need a system full of videocards, or a cluster using something like xdmx).

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  42. Re:Almost virus and malware free? by jaymemaurice · · Score: 3, Interesting

    No sorry, I am not. I wish I was because I am sure to get down modded for my blasphemy.

    Entry points:
    http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/search-results?query=LINUX&search_type=all&cves=on

    Hooks:
    any shell script/start-up script (many execute with user write permission out of your home folder) do you have a compiler on your system?!

    The only thing saving linux from beeing rooted often is its userbase. Does Linux have anything like windows SFC? No not really. At least there are only a handful of auto-run methods in windows and a subsystem that does a somewhat decent job of enforcing no new hooks are created.

    Sad fact is because Linux is so open it's mostly a race between white hats and black hats. Add desktop users and desktop apps into the mix and there will be more black hats and a longer delay between applied fixes.

    You may argue that most linux problems are third party software or configuration, but I can argue the same for Windows.

    That said, I use both... but in by no means is my descision to use either based on this false sense of securtiy about the mal-ware eco-system.

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    120 characters ought to be enough for anyone
  43. Re:There are only three features I'd like to see t by benjymouse · · Score: 2, Informative

    1. Proper CLI. Enough is enough, just fucking give up and port zsh and ship the OS with a suite of unix-like CLI tools.

    Ahem, zsh doesn't hold a candle to PowerShell. PowerShell being truly object oriented ties in much better with Windows than any unix-like shell ever could. Already it is much more powerful than even the feature-rich zsh. Instead of special case galore, PowerShell has more generic features and very high consistency.

    Examples of generic features: Commands do not have switches or options to control their output, like e.g. ls or ps. Instead PowerShell includes a few "formatting", output and conversion cmdlets such as Format-List, Format-Table, ConvertTo-Csv, Out-GridView. You know, back to the "commands should do one thing good and one thing only". Why would commands to navigate the file system need to have output options?

    Another example of how PowerShell simplifies through generic features: Through providers external hierarchies can be mapped to a PowerShell "drive" where you can then use the very same cmdlets to navigate and manipulate it (cd, ls, rm). This is not the Unix "map everything to a file" idea; the items in the hierarchy are still very much their own types which may expose their own properties and methods and often have their own access control. Yes, you can now "cd" into the registry or the cert store and manipulate the objects using familar and consistent commands.

    And Windows 8 will come with PowerShell 3 which sports workflows. This allows robust, suspendable and resumable scripts which can even script across machine restarts. This is not the Unix "suspend process" - this is actually suspending to disk and resumed days later or may be even resumed on a *different* machine, still picking up the state, variables and progress from when it was suspended.

    While they're at it, kill the drive letters and switch to using slashes in paths.

    Uhm. Between Libraries and PowerShell that's pretty much done. After libraries drive letters don't really matter any more. And PowerShell allows both backwards and forward slashes.

    2. Full blown native PDF support, like in Linux and Mac OS X.

    Yeah, well.

    3. SSH

    OpenSSH exists for Windows. You can use PowerShell across SSH, but PowerShells built-in remoting features (based on WinRM) are much more powerful, for instance multiple remote sessions (not just piping to/from a remote shell but actually marshalling stuff such as return codes, exceptions, progress and events back to the controlling console so that it can be meaningfully scripted), fan-out remoting (executing same script block on multiple remote hosts simultaneously and consolidating the results back to the controlling console), implicit remoting (importing commands of a remote session to create "local" commands which will implicitly execute on the remote host) etc.

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  44. Re:Third party FTW by dbIII · · Score: 2

    Lots of network stuff, but mostly coding back then - nothing complicated than needed OpenGL, just vanilla X. The win2k desktop pissed me off so I spent the 15 minutes setting things up to get a *nix server to manage the windows and give me multiple desktops.
    Using X on MS Windows is very common even today in environments with high performance computing in the server room. There's a huge number of applications related to mineral exploration that were never ported to MS Windows and are run remotely using exceed, xwin32, cygwin or whatever. VNC is improving with things like VirtualGL+TurboVNC but until recently X was miles ahead.

  45. Ya I've always loved that one by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If Linux gets something Windows or MacOS have had for years, like, day, the ability to play sound from more than one program at a time without special setup or hardware mixing, that is a major improvement, something to be lauded, etc. However if Windows gets a feature something else has had, it gets looked down on, as though the first OS to get the feature should be the only one, ever.

    1. Re:Ya I've always loved that one by asdf7890 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I have a pretty ordinary Debian Mint desktop, and I just tried playing a video in VLC and previewing music files with Nautilus at the same time. It worked fine - both played without missing a beat.

      He was making reference to something that long ago was a significant issue. IIRC as late as the early 00's it was a problem - and while the sound system was maturing rapidly at that point there were a couple of solutions floating about and were not mutually compatible, not always stable, and none were particularly widely supported.

      While Linux and other unix-a-likes were ahead of the game in server related areas for a long time; there are a lot of things in desktop environments that just work out of the box now and that we therefore take for granted that either did not work at all or did not work without much user effort five or ten years ago (when they were working well enough in the Windows desktop world).

      I'm a Linux fan myself, but he does have a point: the threshold beyond which something constitutes and innovation rather than imitation seems a lower in one direction than the other. This might be completely unfair though: Linux (and xBSD and others) are community efforts without the money thrown at desktop use Windows sees (most of the investment made in Linux related areas by companies is still aimed at server environments not desktop ones (I'm not counting Android here as doesn't fit in either category IMO)).

  46. Re:slashdot is pushing windows, w t f by jones_supa · · Score: 2

    I see this as a positive thing. It is retarded to look at the world through Linux-glasses only.

  47. Re:True #1 Feature! by hairyfeet · · Score: 2

    Uhhh...Dell tried that recently with a convertible tablet, remember? The problem is a 17 inch touchscreen runs $300+ at retail and a 24 inch non touch runs $150. Now which do YOU think the customers will choose? The simple fact is capacitive touchscreen tech is NOT cheap ATM and there is no way in hell the OEMs are gonna eat that cost and as we all know resistive screens suck.

    The mistake, which i believe will be a fatal one for Win 8, is that the vast majority of panels being sold on desktops and laptops were built originally for HDTVs and people aren't gonna want to get their greasy fingers all over their HDTV when they have a remote. this is why you have seen the resolution for laptops fall, as all these small panels are built for everything from dorm HDTVs to headrests for SUVs so it saves the OEMs money to simply use the economies of scale. That isn't gonna change simply because MSFT releases an OS, nor will it get people to shell out larger sums of money, not when the competition will sell them a non touch screen laptop at hundreds cheaper.

    As you have pointed out we have had convertibles so long its "a blast from the past" yet they have NEVER caught on, even though both Vista and 7 had frankly damned good touch support...why? because given the choice of two laptops, one with a touch screen at $200 ore more higher than the one next to it without most will choose without. Ask Dell, HP, Acer, Asus, etc what their best selling units are and i bet my last dollar they are the $400 and under units. Makes sense because for most users even an Atom or E350 will do the vast majority of tasks they have such as FB and webmail.

    If the rumors are correct Win 8 is as high as Win 7 to OEMs so we are talking $35 for Starter and $50 for Home so where are they gonna get the money to still hit the price points they need? Dell makes on average $8 a sale for the low end so there isn't any fat to be trimmed friend and MSFT can't just "demand" they all switch to touch because as they saw with netbooks if they act like dicks the OEMs WILL go to Linux.

    So I'm sorry friend but I just don't see it happening. MSFT has been pushing touch support for years and their numbers don't register. I personally believe this is Ballmer's "Hail Mary" trying to literally force his way into the ARM market because every previous attempt has been a flaming failure. But trying to get there by forcing the users of every non touch device to have a worse experience simply isn't the way to go and frankly i wouldn't be surprised if this fails if it ends up Ballmer's swan song at MSFT. Because honestly i just don't see the board putting up with another billion dollar failure with his track record.

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  48. Re:Oh, yeah! by ByOhTek · · Score: 2

    How are they a nightmare to get working flawlessly under Linux? With KDE/XFCE/Gnome/WMaker, they seem to work just fine immediately.

    Also, MS provides their own multi-desktop. You don't need to go to 3rd parties. It's not the greatest (imagine the *nix variants, but somewhat sucky), but it's free, and does the job... mostly.

    Also, am I the only one who thinks the vast majority of these great new features have been on available in FreeBSD, Linux, and probably every other *NIX system out there for at least 10 years?

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  49. Re:Hiding things can help by tverbeek · · Score: 2

    An overabundance of options to choose from is definitely off-putting to people, and it makes sense to avoid that. I'll even concede that Microsoft's past-and-future treatment of IE as the web browser has some small benefit to the unsophisticated user. But hiding features - things that people are forced to go hunting for - is a different thing, and it's what I'm getting rather sick of.

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