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A Serious Proposal To Fix Windows 8
GMGruman writes "Windows 8 is simply not selling, and everyone but Microsoft knows it's a mess of an OS. And the Windows 8.1 'Blue' that Microsoft revealed some details of late last week doesn't address the fundamental flaws. So a team at InfoWorld worked up a serious proposal to rework Windows 8 for both PCs and tablets that fixes those flaws and lets Microsoft's true innovations break free of today's Windows 8, complete with mockups of the proposed Windows 'Red.'"
Nice objective summary
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
I have now worked with Windows 8 now since last october, and it is working just fine for me. I have had no problem getting around the new interface.
The suggestions involved are klunky and the idea of splitting it into 3 OSes is going the wrong way. Windows RT is a disaster because it lacks app compatibility. MS needs to retire it and fully embrace x86 now that intel has fixed it with Haswell.
All that needs to be done to "fix" the start menu issue is make it so the task bar never goes away and the desktop background stays persistent but faded out. You click "START" and tada, the tiles appear right on top of your desktop. It is a simple solution, should be easy to present and works equally as well in mobile touchscreens as it does mice.
Windows is notr going to die soon but its days are numbered. Even in terms of desktop experiece they should simply learn from competitors. This company has myriads of ressources, they could hire the best designers and make a difference, they chose not to.
Please people, the "elephant in the room" is right in front of your face.
Maurice W. Hilarius Voice: (778) 347-9907
then microsoft isn't interested.
the whole point is to get people to use metro apps. to pay for metro apps. to get a cut of metro apps sales.
thus the push towards the metro ecosystem. supposedly it would also fix problems with some malware and so forth, but the real dollar bills would be from getting a cut from everything that is run on the pc. that is a huge pie. unsurprisingly traditional sw makers are asking why the fuck should they bow to that and are moving to subscription models partially as a backup against ms possibly being so stubborn as to force sw to be downloaded from their market sometime in the next 5 years or so.
they could easily do that if metro apps would have started to gain a lot of traction, too bad people don't like metro enough.
the simple fix would be to ship it with possibility to multitask metro apps and to run them in windows as default features, but then people might start asking why bother with metro apps at all. it's not like it's impossible to make touch friendly apps - with esentially the same api's - that aren't constrained to running inside metro vm.
(written on a windows 8, it's so nice that it comes with a pdf reader. too bad you can only run the piece of shit fullscreen and view just one pdf at time! and the fuck does some fucking single player games need my windows account and facebook for? ??).
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
where are the sales figures for Windows 8 compared to other OS?
If it is simply a shitty GUI on an improved kernel and stack then I will deal with it.
What little Windows development I do is at least 50% command line anyway. My GUI apps simply are wrappers (and quite ugly thank you).
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
how is it 10,000 Microsoft engineers and managers couldn't pour piss out of a boot if instructions were on the heal?
I don't know about that. On OSX, there's now an option to full screen apps. Which is great when I'm working in a graphics app or I want an insular terminal experience with no distractions. The problem is that the metro UI is kind of a mess. Charms aren't obvious and the whole thing with gestures is unintuitive. The snap together UI is neat for multiple apps at once, but, that is a slight plus in the face of so many fails.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
Between Windows 8 and trying to turn the Xbox into some sort of kludgy, half-assed DRM'ed TV tuner instead of a game console, I sometimes wonder wtf is going on in Redmond. Has Steve Balmer just checked out to lunch or something?
The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
You left out one option: Windows 7.
Beware of the Leopard.
and replace it with what?
DOS 6.22 of course, with Windows 3.11 for workgroups. I suggest also installing Trumpet Winsock in order to be able dial in to what is known as "the internet. Obviously you'll need to buy a modem for that.
the growth of OSX showed that the usual linux trope about there being no possibility for a competing desktop OS to succeed was bollocks
You do realise that (a) MacOS is very old and already had a very well established software base, and (b) Microsoft Office which is at about the 99.9% monopoly level has supported MacOS (X and pre-X) too?
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Microsoft should hire Infoword's writers as design consultants. Inforworld's staff doesn't have the luxury of being out of touch with users.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
InfoWorld reads like a woman's magazine you find at the checkout isles. Look today
"Don't trust anonymous
e-currencies like Bitcoin"
"Let's be clear: Cloud computing
will shrink the data center"
"Batten down the hatches -- it's
Microsoft reorg season"
"The right way to manage BYOD"
"Big Brother tech might be
America's last hope for health"
"Read me to learn how to suck a man"
Second option: Windows XP. It's patched, simple to use and stable. The complete opposite of Windows 7.
Whenever we have issues with Windows 7 I always tell folks, "If we could upgrade to XP, all these problems would disappear."
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
I had it with Microsoft's strong-arming me anytime they feel like, and other tactics they can afford to use as a monopolist. Windows 8 has the chance to be the straw that breaks the proverbial camel's back.
So please Microsoft, don't listen to these proposals - push right ahead with Metro and a GUI that lacks discoverability. That way, maybe, you'll finally your journey into craphood, where you belong.
People that believe Windows 8 is broken wrongly assume that Windows 8 was a misguided attempt at refreshing the Windows user interface that went awry.
Microsoft's goal with Windows 8 is twofold:
1. Leverage their substantial marketshare in the desktop PC space to develop an app ecosystem for their tablets and mobile phones
2. Kill the relatively open Windows desktop application ecosystem and replace it with a walled garden with Microsoft as its gatekeeper
Microsoft isn't stupid--they understand that Windows 8 isn't popular, they just don't care. They know that consumers will flock to Windows PCs because they're cheap, and they know that businesses will stay with Windows PCs because Windows 7 is still available and they're locked into Microsoft's server products in any case. The only markets where Microsoft is struggling is the IaaS and mobile markets, and those are the markets where Microsoft is concentrating their resources.
Barring a sudden and titanic shift in the desktop computing market, Metro is here to stay. The people who find that unsettling should prepare to move away from Windows.
In "good design", motion is supposed to direct your eye to important interface elements.
Panes or "Tetris Elements" or whatever they fucking call the distracting moving, flipping visual mess in Metro has been designed solely for distraction. Every task in Windows 8 takes longer amongst the worthless visual clutter begging for your attention. Why is this box jumping and drawing my eye? I don't know, it's not showing me anything new, and meanwhile I need to flip through another six pages of Tetris to find my bloody app.
From Win 7 to Win 8, the differences are simply too huge.
We've been using a desktop PC for about 20 yrs and basically, the core Win OS hasn't changed all that much. Start Button, Control Panel, etc..
I believe that as long as you have PCs operating with keyboard/mouse that you should be able to have the Win 7 experience. And then again, if possible, the Windows Classic experience without all the frills and thrills.
Well, that's my opinion anyways. It would make sense and it wouldn't be rattling user's cages so to speak.
Microsoft wants to get into the mobile world with their OS. Great, no problem, bring it on, but, maybe, they ought to make it a separate OS. It's going to be a while before a 'one solution' fits all approach will work when it comes to computing. For once, Microsoft should look at how Apple does it. It might LOOK all the same, but it isn't.
It's done. If you want a Start menu, pay $5 to Stardock.
Why pay anybody anything? Classic Shell is free.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
I bet a large percentage of Mac owners also have a Windows PC/Bootcamp partition/VM as well. I know I do and everyone I know with a Mac does too. Macs also have had some presence in the market since before Microsoft even had a GUI or a monopoly and therefore have been in a better position than Linux or indeed any other competitor that arrived in the 90s.
The main reason why Linux on the desktop hasn't been very succesful is largely a marketing problem in my opinion. Specifically, there is basically nobody who properly markets Linux, so a lot of people have never heard of it and even those that have largely think it's a command-line only hardcore-geek thing. Linux needs an image change and it is slowly happening - look at steam etc. I would also be very interested in your reasoning as to why GNU/Linux isn't very good.
Linux. BSD. Haiku. ALMOST ANY OTHER OS. you're damn proposal to make thing the way you like can actually be acted upon.
The best way to "fix" windows, is to say "fuck it" and not use the shit.
I suggest also installing Trumpet Winsock in order to be able dial in to what is known as "the internet"
Don't be silly. Use the AOL CD that arrives for free on your doorstep. Every day!
To Terminate, or not to Terminate, that's the question - SCSIROB
It links you in the third paragraph to "20 things you will love about Windows 8." Number 9 is the "Charms bar." On page 3 they suggest "The Charms bar is eliminated".
What are the "true innovations"? All I use Windows is to start up my games, I wish there would be some minimal Windows that just shows the desktop where I can double click on the Game I want. For everything else I use Linux.
If I would compare Windows 7 with Fedora Linux with KDE the Windows would look pretty bad. It is missing almost everything I use in Linux. If my games would run on Linux I would happily nuke Windows 7 in favour to some GB of more space.
http://www.mueller-public.de - My site http://www.anr-institute.com/ - Advanced Natural Research Institute
> - OSX - anybody who tells you that this is somehow a better working environment than ms windows honestly is just lying.
Quit trolling. Do you even _use_ OSX on a daily basis?
I've been using computers since the early 80s and have used a ton of OSes: Apple DOS 3.3, Apple ProDos, DOS 2.x - 6.x, Win3.1 .. Win8 (inclusive), Irix, BeOS. For the past 2 years I've been using OSX as part of my day job.
My thoughts based on _experience_: As a power user OSX is pretty darn good. You can Alt-Tab into & out-of games all day long without _any_ hiccups. On Windows alt-tabbing back INTO the game almost always forces a 1 or 2 second hiccup. The way Windows manages devices & scheduler in Windows is wonky.
+ The UI is good. Clean and (mostly) well designed (although Apple appears to be making more and more bone-headed decisions lately.) The 4 hot-corners of the desktop (Expose) is fantastic. Borders are only 1 pixel thick in OSX in contrast to the fugly 8 pixel width on Win 8. OS also has the advantage that MS Office shows the menu bar ALONG with the stupid ribbon.
+ On the MBP the trackpad blows away any Windows laptop I've tried.
+ BSD under the hood which makes porting to Linux helluva a lot easier for command line apps. XCode is a decent IDE.
- OSX Virtual Memory still stinks (I've been able to completely hard-lock OSX once about every 6 months) on 10.6 and 10.7.
- GPUs have always sucked on the MacBook. TF2 with everything turned down and barely able to get 20+ fps on a 3 yr old 17" MBP.
= When needed the majority run Windows in a VM (Parallels) and we have a few dedicated Windows boxes. A lot of developers (~20) also run Linus inside a VM (VMWare or VirtualBox) (no Plus nor Neg, equal = tie)
We have an office of ~70 people who use OSX on a daily basis and would also basically agree you are completely talking out of your ass. So yes, OSX is _good_ enough for daily use.
Besides, Linux _already_ won on the mobile space.
http://techland.time.com/2013/04/16/ios-vs-android/
s/Linus/Linux off-by-character-typo :-/
The start menu shown there is way too too small to work with touch. What microsoft isn't getting is that nobody gives a fuck.
Lots of people, obviously. Probably millions. Why'd you ask this question about a statement that had a clear answer?
The easiest way to fix Windows RT is to make the desktop actually work, and allow running unsigned ARM code. Let developers recompile their programs for ARM, and they will do it.
Maybe throw in compatibility for Windows CE programs, or better yet, throw in an X86 emulator.
DOS 6.22 of course, with Windows 3.11 for workgroups.
Hmm, interestingly 3.11 x 2 = 6.22, I never noticed that before. :)
Does it mean, by induction, that Windows x-1 is better than Windows x?
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
but it works realy well for tablets and touch-enabled devices.
How nice for you. But some of us need a desktop to actually get some work done. And there, it sucks.
Have gnu, will travel.
Windows 8 is selling extremely well.
New PCs are what isn't selling, and that has nothing to do with Windows 8, no matter what the Slashdrones like to believe. That has to do with Moore's Law finally outpacing the needs of software, the change to near universal consumption on computers.
Hardware vendors need to make upgrading hardware compelling. Microsoft can't do that -- they're selling plenty of upgrades, as it is.
It doesn't matter to him, so why should anyone else care when the world revolves around him?
Specifically, there is basically nobody who properly markets Linux, so a lot of people have never heard of it and even those that have largely think it's a command-line only hardcore-geek thing
So of the people who have heard of Linux properly categorized it as a hardcore-geek thing? OK, perhaps not hardcore-geek, maybe even casual-geek, but certainly not a non-geek thing.
In my office, I'm the 'IT-guru' simply because I know how to fix the margin settings in MS Word or how to get an excel table to properly import into Powerpoint. THAT is technical wizardry to most people, so think about how non-geek friendly Linux really is.
Unless the marketing is cleverly disguised training-infotainment that teaches people the differences between what they do now, and how things work in Linux, most people will balk at something as simple as having the window min/max/close buttons on the left hand side of the window.
The only way I've found to ever successfully switch someone from one OS to another is to completely eliminate any possiblity for that person to use their original OS. Including myself.
Switching from iOS to Android? Had to switch to Verizon before they had the iPhone so my old iPhones were either sold or used as home remote controls.
Switching from WindowsXP to 7? Upgraded to 16GB of RAM, (some other incompatabilities as well)
Switching to Windows8? Installed on the 'kitchenPC' and..... oh who am I kidding. I need to get XP on that machine ASAP. Even with a multi-touch pad that damned thing drives me nuts.
Switching to macOS? Install Windows 8 on your kitchenPC.
Out of modpoints but really liked a post? 1BDkF6TtmmeZ3yqXbz9yhdYVqRYnwFoXDj
Sigh I miss the days when AOL gave a free Floppy Disk every day on your doorstep. That way you just take it Re-Format it and you have extra storage. When they went to CD's it was a sad day for me. They could have at least made them on CD-R so I can burn a new partition on it to store stuff.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
If Microsoft kept Metro on tablets and phones only they'd have a solid update for Windows Mobile. Instead they shoved it on the Desktop as well and it's generated a lot of annimosity. If they really want a solid desktop release they need to take Windows 7, apply under the hood updates, and leave the interface alone for the most part. If they really want to have their flat color Windows 8 desktop style then it can be added as an extra theme that is selectable in the release.
Given reality however I'm planning for a no Windows future after 7's support ends.
~~ Behold the flying cow with a rail gun! ~~
My attempt to sift through the ads was to click on the slide show. Expected to be tortured with one slide per ad-laden screen. Was not expecting zero slides per ad-laden screen, until I turned on javascript. Anyway, went that approach, glanced at each slide until it got to Mobile, and I was done. Nothing to see, moved on, but even the "print" version of that article was unreadable -- had a box outline overlay thing on top of the text and it didn't go away as I scrolled. They need to work on their "print" mode...Still, I survived the article and am off to get the tattoo.
I come here for the love
Yes, it comes with a Reader app for Modern UI which supports PDF.
If it were only a marketing problem, Linux would be doing a lot better on the desktop. Truth be told, people love to say they use Linux and working in IT, I expect most people to know what Linux is.
Except there are lots of distributions of Linux and they don't necessarily work the same. Installing software generally involves using a package manager which will hopefully get you everything you need. Simple tasks are more complex on Linux (to install minor applications, often I'll need to know exactly what Kernel I'm using (something the user-friendly Linux installers go out of their way to hide) whereas with Windows, I just need to know that I'm using Windows).
And that's all ignoring the Windows "it just works" factor. Try going into BestBuy and picking up the cheapest printer/external DVD drive/scanner and see if it automatically detects in Linux. Most of the time, it'll be recognized in Windows, but it'll probably only be recognized without some real work about half the time in Linux.
Windows 8 is still trash because MS wants everyone to sell everyone what they want us to use (rather than what we actually want to use (a problem that will also likely hit them with the XBox One)), but Linux isn't really viable on the desktop either for the average person.
I thought that's never been a consideration before.
Paging out every single item from VRAM just because you have to draw the desktop is like dragging everything from your sitting room into the hallway because you want to put on your socks in there.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
Does it mean, by induction, that Windows x-2 is better than Windows x?
FTFY.
Microsoft support for WinXP expires April 8th, 2014.
I tried Windows h8 for about a month when they were selling it for cheap and then went back to Windows 7. I might wait for Windows 9 since they M$ doesn't seem capable of releasing consecutive quality versions of their flagship product.
let Metro apps run in a window on the desktop + add back windows 7 start menu. With only 1 control plan is realty all they need to do.
So, M$ has the franchise for the most popular (not saying best or worst), but the most well known user interface. That is the key thing they have. So why do they change it into something that no one recognizes. The "upgrades" to the Office interface have made it unusable. Now they do the same to Windows... Looks like they are throwing their franchise away to me.
It's probably a good thing that we can all see this matter differently. The guys at Inforworld seem to want a very clear distinction between how a Desktop PC works and how "other devices" work, even imagining a hybrid operating system UI for the devices that today are not exactly desktops and are not exactly tablets. /. A few days after we saw multiple hybrid products and prototypes at Computex, many of them using Windows 8 on machines with varied configurations. Would the people at Infoworld adjust their OS everytime someone comes up with a valid hardware prototype? Or would they react to wherever the OEMs are doing and adjust Windows whenever some new OEM design becomes successful enough? In either case, they are not acknowledging that Microsoft has and wants to have a say in how their product is used.
This idea shows up on
It seems the people at Infoworld gathered the common gripes and made a mock-up of how things could stay the same as much as possible, disregarding any aspirations that MS may have to develop their products towards what will sell in the future.
By extending the idea of Personal Computer to include smartphones and tablets, within 10 years we will be looking at a PC market with a majority of devices without any MS product, unless Microsoft seriously increases sales of Windows Phone and Surface. It looks like people at Infoworld haven't noticed that these products do not have and do not need to show any familiarity with the old desktop and icons UI.
Windows blue is looking like a a gradual change to what feedback MS got from Windows 8, without detracting from those objectives of helping them get a stronger position on the tablet/mobile market. This Windows red mock-up would be 10 steps backwards on that route, leaving Windows in an shrinking island of "desktop" users, without a clear route for linking them with other devices, which is possibly the best thing about Windows 8.0
So Microsoft is following the Open Source projects in crowdsourcing the design process. They also seem to adopt "release early, release often".
The only missing bit seems to be github upload.; And maybe a public bug report system, with #1 bug along the lines of "Linux has a majority market share".
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Comment removed based on user account deletion
I've got to disagree. Installing DR-DOS 7 and QEMU is really a much better option.. Although now that I think about it, that's almost the same as Windows 8. You can only see one app at time right? hmmmm...
My anecdote from supporting Mac home users: No, not even a small percentage have anything Windows on their machine. Maybe an old laptop for running some old version of Quicken.
And fully functioning hardware vendor support.
Don't get me wrong, I love linux. I would run linux over windows for almost anything server related. On the desktop I just can't find fully functional, fully supported linux notebooks with the build quality I have come to expect from the likes of Lenovo/dell/asus/apple.
You always have to give up something to run linux. Sometimes it's trival (I can't use hybrid graphics) and sometimes it's non-trivial (no 3d, wireless card will never work).
Linux is my goto choice for servers and relegated to a curiosity for my desktops.
Just install Linux and run your Windows programs under Wine for the ultimate experience that will turn MS users green with envy, while you keep your green in your wallet.
Put the Applications folder in the dock. Install new apps, shows up in folder. One click access to EVERY application. No stupid separate Start Menu folder which may or may not contain an alias to some apps.
Or just press [Command]+[Space] and type away... On Windows 7 IIRC you hit [WinKey] to get the start button and type away. I never use the mouse to launch apps.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
If by large percentage, you mean less than 10%, sure.
Very few of my clients have either boot camp or a VM set up, and the ones that do use it for one app. Most Mac users HATE having to deal with the GUI abomination that is a MS operating system.
[OT]
An American, an Australian and a German walk into a bar. The American greets the bartender and says "I'll have a Budweiser please." The Australian says "I'll have a pint of Fosters, mate." The German considers things for a moment and says "I think I will have a mint tea, if you have any." The American and the Australian question the German's judgement, and in reply he simply shrugs and says "well, it's not like you're having a beer".
I like the idea of the tiles over the desktop. Kinda transparent so you can still see whats open.
What kind of crappy employer do you have that has already switched to Win8? Just about every larger company out there has passed it up.
I tested for Vista and 7. After those beta programs ended I went straight back to XP. Compared to Vista and 7 (can't speak for 8) it's very lightweight and can install on just about anything out there.
The biggest issue now is finding drivers for newer laptops, especially for the audio.
Oh noes! Windows 8 is slightly different.
I hate thing that are slightly different. Kill it with fire!
Don't make me learn new things!
I mean for god's sake my wonderful Start menu is now an evil, awful Start *screen*.
This is *literally* the end of the world!
"OSX isn't used by anybody except the fanboys"
Hmm, I just walked across my design company's open-plan office floor and saw a Mac Pro under every desk and not a single fanboi was found.
"Linux users use Windows exactly because our lives depend on it."
Can't decide whether to go with "Drama Queen" or "Pathetic 1st World Problem". I use Linux, OS X and Windows pretty much every day and couldn't care less. Ok, made up my mind, I've going with "Grow Up".
Hmm, then how is Apple the #1 laptop vendor?
Because they are the only vendor that can make hardware for their software whereas Android, Linux and Windows are just software that runs on non-prejudicial hardware built by countless vendors. Apple exists in a walled garden, if you want apple then you must buy an Apple product. If you want Linux or Windows then you can buy literally any modern hardware and run it legally. That Apple outsells Asus means nothing. The combined sales of Asus, Acer, Toshiba, Dell, and every other vendor that is not Apple is what you have to measure apple against if you want to point to Apple's market share as a hardware victory.
As for software, OS X barely beats out Windows Vista. and has only slightly less than double the adoption than Windows 8, despite advantages in both time on market and perceived quality
And the #1 tablet vendor?
Same answer. Apple dominates the mobile device market at 59%. However, Android since its inception has dominated Microsoft in the same way MS dominated Apple on the desktop. It will take a few more years, but eventually Apple will lose give most of its ground to Android. The only reason apple does not fall faster in mobile is because building your own mobile devices is generally out of reach for the majority of people. If mobile devices (and laptops) were as standardized as desktop PCs then you'd see a massive hobbyist market slapping free Android on their designs. The only thing Apple really excels at is superficial uniformity, giving the same appearance in all of its designs, making it uniquely suited for use in large institutions such as schools. Granted it helps if the school's administrators are themselves Apple fanboys.
And most tech conferences, the attendees all have MacBooks.
At most adult movie conventions the attendees all have erections, your point? Certain things cater to certain demographics. Perhaps tech conventions simply attract Apple fanboys more than other OS enthusiasts in the same way porn conventions attract men more than apes. The market segment using non-Apple products don't have the luxury of time to travel about, they're busy working.
but it works realy well for tablets and touch-enabled devices.
How nice for you. But some of us need a desktop to actually get some work done. And there, it sucks.
I don't think it was the GP's decision for MS to (unwisely) try to unify desktop and touchscreen interfaces into one OS. He just pointed out that it worked well for him on a tablet. (And that he didn't like it on a desktop.) Why put the hate on him? You got the wrong guy. He didn't ruin your desktop.
BTW: Hey, Ubuntu team? You seem to be going in the same direction of merging tablet and desktop interfaces . . . I hope you're studying this debacle and learning from it.
I am not a crackpot.
I bet nobody thought they'd see the day when an OS comparison favoured Vista!
And therein lies the difference. While OSX never had it, in Windows it was added and then taken away. Wouldn't you complain more loudly about a feature that was removed than about one you'd like added?
I RTFA, and all I could think about is BITCH BITCH BITCH BITCH.
The amusing thing is that it is a trend no one seems to admit to.
Vista comes out - Everyone says: "But it sucks and it breaks compatibility!" (Yes, it sucked initially, but it was decent enough [emphasis on decent] right before 7 came out.)
7 comes out - Everyone says: "But Vista sucked! Why would I leave the stability (editor's note: HAHAHAHAHA!) of XP for 7 when it is just an update to the terribleness of Vista? (7 was great on release and is still great to this day.)
8 comes out - Everyone says: "WTF, why would you change everything? Screw you MS!" (Not touching this. I like 8, that's my final comment on the subject.)
And meanwhile, there are still arguments from folks that people should stay on XP as opposed to moving up to at least 7.
So BITCH BITCH BITCHing is the standard OP regarding their releases from the past half decade. Which is probably a part of the reason they don't care too much about catering to every users' whim in terms of "improvements." They know people will bitch some more anyway.
I would definitely agree on the touchpad thing. I haven't seen a single Wintel-laptop touchpad that's been even half as good as the touchpad that came with my iBook G4 or anything they've released since. However, may I suggest turning off Expose Hot Corners and binding your middle mouse button to Mission Control?
Games are the Achilles' Heel of Mac OS X. World of Warcraft not only doubles it's frame rate under Windows/Boot Camp, but it's image quality improves in a dozen very subtle ways - like ground clutter fading in instead of popping in.
Though when I take off my socks, they leave of their own volition.
Thanks for the link. And no need to enable JS to read it.
I come here for the love
Windows 8, ain't so bad....but it's a fairly big change. It has lots of little improvements and refinements that are rather cool. And while Windows 7 is my favorite OS ever, followed by OS X Jaguar for performance. I think Windows 8 has potential if they fix a few quarks. And perhaps 8.1 will do that.
A few simple things would allow W8 to (W-eight) to shine.
> The grid menu for apps etc is in fact really nice. EXCEPT, re-arranging and setting defaults kind of sucks. Let me simply "PIN" apps in specific squares. The whole tabbing of pages is awesome. I'd love to have menu grids for my different workflows. Fun. Development. Photography & Design.
> Metro, really hate the fields that have no really design designation give me borders or increased shade differences so I know WHERE the email, fields, etc are.
> Metro apps display full screen. And this gives the perception of a loss of control. Loss of desktop. I think if there was simply a narrow translucent border that gave the feel that Metro apps were merely an overlay being displayed on your screen. People would find it much more comfortable. If not as aesthetic.
That said, many of the settings and interfaces finally make sense. Questions are much better phrased.
Less of the ambigious statements like "This file already exists would you like to overwrite or keep the old version?" Ok/Cancel. [Seriously, how the !@#$ are you supposed to answer a question like that. You can't. And Microsoft has done a lot to eliminate those issues.]
Strikes me as an assinine proposal, just like the submitter's statement "everyone but Microsoft knows it's a mess of an OS"
If you don't want to use Metro, don't. Its really easy Click the desktop icon. There, its gone! There are even ways to boot directly to desktop. Windows 8 works great - it is fast and more stable than even 7 was. But at least there wasn't excessive whining about a start button.
TMI
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
Sales figures say otherwise.
No it's not. Another Microsoft shill.
I run a network that is primarily windows servers (AD, DFS, Exchange, PPTP, etc) and I use a Latitude E6230 docked to 2 external monitors running Ubuntu 12.10 with the unity desktop. I'm the senior sysadmin here and I can do my entire job (more efficiently than on a Win7 desktop I might add) using the hybrid touch/desktop unity interface in Ubuntu.
So I see what MS was trying to do, and it is possible, they just failed. I think the key is to make the desktop and touch versions similar... not identical.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
It's ok that OS X has never had a Start menu.
Mac OS X, since the early version has excellent support for keyboard shortcuts. (Albeit tricky to configure.) And applications are always installed in one single location on Mac OS X - unlike Windows where some are in Program Files, some in Program Files x64, some in Windows, some in system32, etc. And applications on Mac OS are represented with a single user-friendly icon - not a folder with pile of subfolders where you still have to hunt for the proper executable. Bonus: the Dock (now also in Windows since 7) was always there to quickly access often used applications.
And finally, since the introduction of the whole-OS-and-hard-drive search function, it is a matter of pressing Cmd+Space, typing application name and pressing Enter. (Bonus: pressing Cmd+Space and searching doesn't steal focus, pressing Win to access Win7 menu's search does still the focus from active application. (Win8 - it's not only steals focus, it's switching whole desktop to different UI mode.) Some Windows applications have problems properly restoring focus where user left it before Alt+Tab or the focus steal.)
All in all, Mac OS was made from ground up to live without the Start button. And as such, many functions are provided to access applications and whatnot quickly. On Windows, the MSFT never really bothered to figure out how users actually use the frigging Windows. Metro is not about improvements for the user - it is about sneaking Windows into the tablet market.
P.S. Do not get me wrong. I'm not huge fan of Mac OS X interface. For example, its nested switching between windows (first switch between applications, then switch between windows; and no, Expose is not the answer) is a horrible cludge.
All hope abandon ye who enter here.
I've recently been made to switch from a Win8 machine to a brand new OSX machine. The Win8 machine has three monitors, 256ssd, 16bg ram, i7. The OSX machine is a Macbook Pro Retina i7 256ssd, 16bg ram with two external monitors. There are some cool things about OSX but there are many stupid things about OSX. And they're not stupid like "this is different" stupid, they're stupid like "this shit is stupid". Because I'm feeling verbose I'll list the really stupid low hanging fruit. And at the end I'll list what I really enjoy about it.
OSX
Keyboard (external mac? keyboard)
OSX Windows
* Is this green control box maximize or what!? It seems like sometimes it wants to maximize height and width, and other times it will only maximize height. Be consistant. No, actually, always maximize both!
OSX Finder
Apple Magic Mouse
Which is exactly how things work in Windows 8 as well, you just "type away" on the start "screen" rather than the start "menu."
Outside of running "Metro" apps in Windows, this "serious proposal" doesn't seem to have any "serious" ideas for improving Windows 8. It just comes off as yet another set of idiots who want to cry because things change sometimes. In actual use Windows 8 and Windows 7 are basically identical if you don't use the touch controls, some of the stuff just looks different.
I run Linux on 3 desktops (2 home, 1 work), and I don't have any hardware problems. I also have Linux installed on my work laptop (Dell something or other) and everything works perfectly. I haven't had to give anything up or even work hard at getting any hardware functional. A few years ago, I would have somewhat agreed with your assessment, but not today.
God is imaginary
"everyone but Microsoft knows it's a mess of an OS"
Huh?
You may not like the UI, but I'm not hearing that 8 is flaky or unreliable, any more than 7. The complaints are focused on the UI, and RT marketing.
And if there is a mess under the hood that I've managed to not pay attention to, Microsoft knows it better than you think. You can call them stupid for their decisions, but they are not oblivious to reality. Just trying to bend it to their will. Claiming "everyone but Microsoft knows it's a mess of an OS" is just stupid. Stick to the reality of the situation, that's bad enough.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
The main reason why Linux on the desktop hasn't been very succesful is largely a marketing problem in my opinion
Marketing is not the only problem. From ActivInspire for Linux:
Terminalmetode
Type:
wget http://www.activsoftware.co.uk/linux/repos/Promethean.asc
sudo apt-nøgle tilføj Promethean.asc
Hvis alt går som planlagt, vil den sidste linje du ser være OK
(Sørg for at indtaste teksten som den er – især det store P i Promethean)
I did not translate anything from the page. The last line says that you should make sure to type the text exactly as shown, including the capital P in Promethean.
You want the taste of dried leaves boiled in water?
Have you even used Windows 8 on a desktop? Care to explain how the workflow is different in any meaningful way? Because I've been using Windows 8 exclusively for months at work and have found it to be 5% "different," 5% better, and 90% identical.
You clearly haven't used Windows 8 and are making a fool of yourself.
Windows 7 and Windows 8 are so fucking similar to use. Have you even touched a Windows 8 desktop? The parent isn't insightful, it's ignorant as shit.
Personally I actually like 7, Vista was shit, 8 is shit. 7? pretty good actually, better 64bit support than xp, it does take a bit more of a modern computer, but I have not been on a single core Pentium 4 for quite some time, so it works out just fine.
Dos 6.22 + Win 3.11 = WinDos 9.33
As an American, I would +5 funny that if I had mod points left over. Budweiser is crap.
It's simple just put an option in control panel to revert to "classic" windows 7 just like you can revert to Windows classic in Windows 7, Vista, and Xp .
It's not that they tried to innovate and missed the mark it's their my way or the highway attitude. They try the Apple thing of "We know better what you want" without the design chops of say a Jony Ive. That only works for Apple because often but not always they do know.
As someone who used to repair computers for a living, I have one thing to say to Microsoft:
UPDATE THE PACKAGE MANAGER
It's the elephant in the room that's been slowly crippling the Windows user-experience since Windows XP. I couldn't believe it when I noticed they still didn't implement this in Windows 8 in some sort of way.
When users are bombarded with individual update-notifiers from 20 different vendors every day, users:
- become numb to them and start to ignore them
- don't notice the included adware and bunled software that's pushed to them. (Gee, I wonder why Google Chrome's taking so much of the browser marketshare...)
This behavior is a big part of what's causing Average Joe's laptop to turn into an unusable turd, filled with adware and virusses. He concludes his computer is old and broken, Windows must be shit and takes out a loan for a Macbook. Goodbye customer.
Microsoft needs to centralize this process the same way Android did. Updating 3rd party software, changes in privacy and adware offers should all go through a unified interface from the package manager. Installing software through an official app store should become default with an easy opt-out, so Windows stays an open platform but at the same time the Average Joe is protected from taking too many risks.
Hmm, interestingly 3.11 x 2 = 6.22, I never noticed that before. :)
7 + 1.1 = 8.
Winner!
I will not mourn that which I never had to lose. - Unknown
That's silly. Linux hasn't been successful (non-server, that is) because it has no installed base of applications that companies and people rely upon. I don't like it, I wish one could run any app on any OS, but that would require GUI standardization that people wouldn't accept because they'd have to change the way they did things.
After having spent a fair amount of time with Linux, it just isn't ready for that segment of the pop. between point and drool and full raging geek. You either crawl into bed with it or use it as a web-email system.
8.1
Bye, bye, Ms. Karma Pie!
I will not mourn that which I never had to lose. - Unknown
Windows 8 has some real usability issues for the average person but that's mostly cosmetic and having used Windows 8 with one of the many Start Button replacements I don't find it too difficult. However, my main complaint is that Microsoft has not done enough to fix the sluggish performance of Windows on machines that by the standards of ten years ago are practically super computers. When Windows XP on a 3.2Ghz Pentium 4 with 3.2GB of ram and a 500GB Western Digital Black Edition drive is much (much) more responsive than Windows 8 x64 running on a Socket 2011 system with an i7-3820 3.6Ghz cpu with 16GB of ram and a 2TB Western Digital Black Edition drive there's something seriously wrong under the hood.
There was an article here on Slashdot four or five years ago referencing a blog post by a Microsoft Kernel developer (I looked but couldn't find it in order to provide a link) but the blog post essentially said that the Windows kernel was just not written to take advantage of multi-core / hyper-threading enabled cpu's and that the kernel needed a complete overhaul to fix the problem. I also seem to remember that within days the blog post had been taken down, apparently Microsoft doesn't like it's employee's criticizing their products.
Windows always struck me as rinky-dink, sort of something a Bill Gates would be satisfied with but always made me click too often and hide stuff obscure places. There's no rhyme or reason to that interface which is part of the reason they thought TIKFAM would be a good idea.
Metro is just a bunch of tiles much like the icons on the desktop, so basically the metro start menu is just another desktop that is used to launch programs. For years administrators have been looking at the clutter and the state of disaster that is most users desktop and told them it's bad. Now MS has come out and given users the clutter right out of the box. I know this has been said but I agree with it in total that Windows 7 was just a mature OS. Seeing where my IT lively-hood is going, I just want out. I expect to put up with dumb users, but the reroll that MS is doing every other Windows release is getting old.
Windows 7 and Windows 8 are so fucking similar to use. Have you even touched a Windows 8 desktop? The parent isn't insightful, it's ignorant as shit.
Funny, I don't remember any "Charms Bar" appearing out of fucking nowhere when I move the pointer to a mystical magical unmarked spot on the screen in Windows 7. I also don't recall TILES TILES TILES MOAR TILES being the stubbornly dominant design theory, nor confusing and inconsistent ways of representing what's clickable and what isn't (i.e. the settings screen in 8). Could you show me where those are in a stock install of Windows 7?
Lots of people, obviously. Probably millions.
Lots of us don't care at all at home - nothing but Linux boxes: laptops, desktops and servers (2 in each category).
However, at work it's all Windows 7[*], and probably will be for some time. Not Windows 8; we don't have any (outside the odd test machine), and likely will continue that way. In fact, Windows 8 had already out a while when I recently got a new laptop with Windows 7 Enterprise on it.
[*] More than 10^5 laptops & desktops. Some of the "desktops" run Windows Server 2008. Our real servers run a variety of things, but more run Windows in some form or other than Linux or Oracle's bastardized shitpile.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
Sigh I miss the days when AOL gave a free Floppy Disk every day on your doorstep. That way you just take it Re-Format it and you have extra storage. When they went to CD's it was a sad day for me. They could have at least made them on CD-R so I can burn a new partition on it to store stuff.
I tried that theory, too, but after a while it became clear that either AOL used low-quality crappy floppies or the USPS didn't care much about them in transit (or both), given I kept getting bad sectors out of them when I reformatted them.
Demanding constant attention will only lead to attention.
Actually you'd be surprised what some of these larger companies do. Take Gallo for instance. I had a temp job with them where I took brand new out of the box windows vista machines, hooked 20 at a time to 5 KVM stations and proceeded to PXE clone an already setup machine they had to every one of them. Point being, every time I unboxed a new Vista machine and set it on the table my opinion of Gallo Winery slipped ever farther south because most companies knew better than to jump on the vista bandwagon.
Whenever a player quits EVE to go play WoW, the Average IQ of both games increase.
Reminds me a lot of the ol' Windows 3.11 Program Manager style interface.. just with a Win95 style start button/taskbar added. Maybe that's the way to go. I would prefer to group my deskop icons better into categories.
Look back up at my post, now look back down, you're on the Internet. Now look back up. I'm a signature.
Nice, the "you're holding it wrong" defense.
Sales figures said Vista was doing great as well. Since all new machines are required to come with Windows 8 and not Windows 7, what did you expect the sales figures to say? That's why people put far more stock in web hits when it comes to market share, since those will show when people overwrote what they "bought" with Windows 7 or Linux.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
Actually, 7 works fine on my Asus netbook. XP? Great. 7? Just fine. Vista? Doesn't run at all.
Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
Classic Shell makes Windows 8 tolerable, but it doesn't fix the OS's more serious flaws. Microsoft took Windows all the way back to 1.0 by eliminating overlapping windows with the modern interface. Even with classic shell installed, that flaw is not fixed.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Mac OS X, since the early version has excellent support for keyboard shortcuts. (Albeit tricky to configure.) And applications are always installed in one single location on Mac OS X - unlike Windows where some are in Program Files, some in Program Files x64, some in Windows, some in system32, etc. And applications on Mac OS are represented with a single user-friendly icon - not a folder with pile of subfolders where you still have to hunt for the proper executable. Bonus: the Dock (now also in Windows since 7) was always there to quickly access often used applications.
The Windows 8 start menu is populated with all newly installed programs and apps, hiding the extraneous bullshit under deeper layers that must be accessed specifically (as opposed to crowding your screen/menu with garbage like help files and uninstallers). Furthermore, it eliminates the need to care about where it is installed (unless you want to configure that, in which case that functionality still exists in normal programs, but not in store apps [at least not that I'm aware of]).
Hence why I love it (especially after using OS X for some time) and find 7 inefficient by comparison.
With them as the cable company...comfortably raking in the dough without having to do a thing to earn it. All the while, locking out every competitor they can.
A friend of mine bought one. Then was so disgusted with it, he had to go back and purchase windows7. Nice for MS to get the extra pip. And sad for MS because he is doing his best to never ever purchase another MS product.
"My design company's open-plan office floor": You didn't have to say apple fanboi, it's assumed by that statement.
Well of course there's going to be exceptions here and there, but surely Gallo was very unusual this way at the time. As you said yourself, most companies knew better than to jump on the Vista bandwagon.
These days, surely it's worse; after the Vista debacle, the bigger companies are probably all very recalcitrant in migrating to new Windows versions. Most people seem to like Win7 just fine as a replacement for the very aged WinXP, but Win7 hasn't even been out all that long, so I seriously doubt that there's any significant number of companies moving to Win8 now. And don't forget, migrating to a new Windows version isn't that easy for a large (or midsize) company; it's not like Joe Homeuser who can switch to anything in a few hours. For many large companies, migrating to a new OS takes several years of planning and testing.
You _do_ realize my Titan has 6 GB of RAM, right? Why the smeg should the OS simply invalidate _all_ of the GPU RAM when clearly there is enough??
That's idiotic design.
The 8 pixel border helps to highlight and delineate the window from the background or other windows.
Why OpalCalc is the best Windows calc
Anyone who has followed Windows knows every other incarnation sucks. Win7 was (is) a very nice piece of work. Win8 is doomed. No one will buy another Windows until Win9 comes out.
A properly configured XP system stripped of a bunch of crap will run circles around a W7 system.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
This is the only OS in the world that people complain about NOT having a menu to access applications. It's ok that OS X has never had a Start menu. And I thought Windows was dumb, Linux rules. But all these "expert" users who claim to run Linux or OS X as their primary OS sure seem distraught by something that shouldn't affect them often because, after all, they wouldn't use Windows if their life depended on it.
Mac has friendlier ways of opening applications (and this comes from a guy who hates OS X).
User-friendly linux distros have similar buttons on the bottom-left or top-left corner (depending on the distro).
Why do care if I don't use windows?
I don't use Mint, but I still care about it, because it's something non-tech-savy people (like my mom, gf, etc) can use.
The same applies (applied) here.
A lot of us Linux users use Windows exactly because our lives depend on it. Linux at home, Windows at work. When Microsoft makes our jobs harder than necessary, yes, we are going to complain. "But you get paid for it" - yeah, but I don't get paid more just because my job got harder.
"Their lives depend on it"? I haven't used windows in 4 years. Am I dead?
"Getting paid for it" isn't an excuse. The IT market is full of jobs and there's huge demand for decent IT people. If you boss wants you to use windows, you either (1) quit, or (2) use windows because you don't have a problem with that.
I have never had an issue installing a printer in Linux. Scanners can occasionally be a pain, but I do not remember it being too difficult.
Nor have I ever needed to know the kernel version when installing via package manager.In fact I cannot recall ever needing to know the kernel version installing outside of the package manager either.
But that is all just some personal experience from the past few years. YMMV probably depending on what you are trying to do with what distro. Which that would be a valid complain, Which distro for which users.
let Metro apps run in a window on the desktop + add back windows 7 start menu. With only 1 control plan is realty all they need to do.
You can get the first two for $8 right now. I just did this for my parents who said, "Learning something new at this point just isn't a good idea."
I will not mourn that which I never had to lose. - Unknown
Even with classic shell installed, that flaw is not fixed.
Bypassing Metro and booting straight to desktop fixes it pretty well as far as I'm concerned. If and when I find myself a) using Windows 8 myself and b) unable to do without some Metro-only app, I'll have to come up with a new plan, but until then, problem solved.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Actually you'd be surprised what some of these larger companies do. Take Gallo for instance. I had a temp job with them where I took brand new out of the box windows vista machines, hooked 20 at a time to 5 KVM stations and proceeded to PXE clone an already setup machine they had to every one of them. Point being, every time I unboxed a new Vista machine and set it on the table my opinion of Gallo Winery slipped ever farther south because most companies knew better than to jump on the vista bandwagon.
There was nothing wrong with Vista, especially on a new system. Microsoft changed to a new hardware driver format in Vista, announced it and was willing to help vendors create and test their drivers on it. Vista got a bad rap because the hardware vendors didn't believe Microsoft's release dates and didn't have new drivers ready for current hardware. When users went to upgrade, they either had to find a way to use the old NT drivers (turn driver signing off) or buy all new devices. In most cases, vendors just wrote off older hardware and only released Vista drivers for new hardware. New systems out of the box were fine, upgrading an existing system was likely to fail miserably.
Windows 7 was essentially Windows Vista with a few GUI changes. The reason why Windows 7 did so well is because most hardware vendors had released drivers that would work with Vista.
One feature is massively broken in some ways: The entire Windows Store and "metro" app feature; the core feature of Windows 8.
If you are running Windows 8, take a look in C:\Program Files\WindowsApps sometime. Notice anything? The *version* of each app is included in the directory name of the app.
So you get fun things like: - Multiple copies of the same application eating up disk space, because the Windows Store service doesn't uninstall the old version - Pinned shortcuts on the Start Screen don't (or don't always) update to the latest version of the metro app. It can still point to the older version
Other problems I have with it in general: - Metro apps are user profile specific (despite being installed in C:\Program Files) - The update process is a manual, GUI driven event by the end user; there is no way to manage it for several machines - Updates can just fail to install and the only recourse is to (again, manually) uninstall the app and re-install it from the Store - LOB or home made apps can only be installed with a 30 day temporary developer license. Installing the dev license requires running a PowerShell script with Admin rights (okay so far) that launches another GUI driven event that requires putting in your Live Account information with no way to automate it for easy install. - To side load a LOB app you have to pay for a separate license, which you can't do if you have an SPLA agreement (of any kind).
And don't get me started on how the Start Screen layout is actually stored and all the files you need to grab for it. To me its bad enough that, on a machine with 16 Store Apps installed, I have 1650+ MB (42888 files) in over 60+ directories, including at least two versions of most applications (Microsoft's official "Bing" apps and third party apps). Any uninstalled applications get put in a "Deleted" sub-directory and not removed from my computer, as far as I can tell.
Better still, there are two resources used by all apps: VCLibs and WinJS. Both of these also are in the C:\Program Files\WindowsApps directory and each time there's an updated version, it gets a new copy and the old one remains. On an x64 system, you get both the x86 and x64 versions as well!
And this is a sliver of the headache Windows 8 has been giving me professionally since it was released. I could write a 30+ page report on issues I've had and why and almost all of it is "by design".
Yeah, I'm going to end up doing that. This mouse was provided by the company so I'm stuck with it until I get another one. The critiques are still valid I think.
Vista was a decent OS and Win 7 wouldn't have even developed without using Vista as a stepping stone. However, the Vista migration that I stated was implemented roughly 3 months after Vista hit the shelves. The systems were loaded with an over abundance of RAM (6GB I recall) and needed every MB of it to run anywhere near as well as an XP machine with 2GB of RAM. Back when I assisted with the migration you couldn't even get Vista to run on a system with less than 2GB of RAM and a decent dual core processor. In stark contrast I was able to install Win 7 on a laptop with a 1.6GHz processor and 512MB of RAM. The installation actually ran well if not pretty. Correct me if i'm wrong but Vista still need at least 4GB of RAM to run properly.
Whenever a player quits EVE to go play WoW, the Average IQ of both games increase.
Who's going to be the first to implement this "windows red"-mock-up as an X window manager plus whatever other apps are needed to glue "the user experience" together?
it should be built in and not some 3rd party tool that MS can mess up with an system update.
Yeah, because that was my only complaint./s My point was there was a lot of unused keys and they've removed a lot of keys that are very useful (alt, scroll lock, insert, num lock). But you're free to try and spin my comments however you like.
Windows 8 is doing incredibly well, about as well as Windows 7 did. The difference is that people are just upgrading their OS on their existing hardware instead of buying new hardware. That is possible because for the first time the new OS requires LESS resources that the previous one. Windows 8 is doing just fine.
It's selling about as well as Windows 7, the best-selling OS in history. The only thing that's not a success is the new hardware. Windows 8 requires fewer resources than Windows 7 so people are upgrading instead of buying new. That's not good for OEMs but it's great for Microsoft and for Windows overall.
And you're an anti-MS "shill" yourself... See how that "accusation" works both ways? Just admit it, you've got a deep-seated hatred of MS. Just let.it.go. and wallow in your own hatred.
And smaller - we're hovering around 100-150, and there's no way in hell we'll be going to Windows 8 anytime soon.
I personally liked the CDs too - at least when they came in the DVD-style cases. Raided a Free AOL CD stand at a Circuit City (lol) and had plenty of sleek, black cases for my burned discs.
I know two people who use BootCamp, and one only uses it for Guild Wars (period). Personally, I've had no reason to have it or a VM on my Mac, although I've had Linux as a dual-boot option. If I can't do it in OSX, Linux, or Wine, I reevaluate whether it needs to be done at all.
Decline isn't surprising - it's going to be a while before the numbers really even out. I know I hopped on it just to see what happened in the first weeks, but I've since gone back to doing the stuff I normally do instead of seeing if X is available on Steam for Linux yet.
I ran Vista for some time with 2 GB of RAM. Ran fine.
Also, the minimum requirements were 512 MB (home basic) or 1 GB (everything else). Windows 7 requires 1 GB.
How about "any time you open a PDF, it kicks you into a full-screen Metro app"? No, Microsoft, of course I didn't want to be able to look at "walk.pdf" and "chew_gum.pdf" at the same time, please go into your dain-bramaged fullscreen mode.
Yeah, the full screen PDF reader sucks. It was way better in Windows 7 when any time you opened a PDF it would say "wtf is this I don't know how to show you that!"
Though I do wish there was a way to just say "move all audio and video associations that are with your crap-ass metro players to WMP". (Installing a 3rd party player missed some, so I'm occasionally still surprised by the Metro player.)
I look at Windows 8 and makes me miss Win7 GUI. This however is an improvement over Win7 and is by far the best UI mock-up for Windows 8 I've seen. Microsoft should just hire this guy.
Those are only good for use as coasters!
Me? I roll with the AOL floppy disks! Premium MO disks, that just need a little bit of tape put in the corner! After you use the first one to get "On-Line" access, you can use the additional floppies they keep on sending to put all those newsgroup binaries on! The RAR files are conveniently 1.44mb in size even!
I'm not an OSX user. Is this true?
And if it is, people put up with it?
Fascinating!
You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough. - Blake
... my design company's ...
Sounds like Apple's traditional audience. Maybe not so rabid as to have bumper stickers and tattoos but still not a stretch from their default user base: creatives, educators, liberal arts, and soft sciences.
I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.
Not a fan of Classic Shell and how it looks/operates. But I haven't gotten Start8 either due to procrastination. Start menu is basically a convenience you use on occasion, not constantly, so you can live without it if you don't mind grumbling (and at my age, grumbling is my primary hobby).
But there's nothing in Metro you need or want. Skip it entirely. All built-in metro apps are buggy or poorly designed (though will likely be refreshed in 8.1), and you can't even get free third party apps without first signing up for an official Microsoft Account (unsure if there are alternate ways to get apps like you can on OS X without going through apple's equally stupid store). Most everything you can do in metro you can already do better in a web browser or with a desktop application.
* I have to sign up for iTunes to keep my computer updated!? * I HAVE TO GIVE ITUNES MY CC# TO KEEP MY COMPUTER UPDATED!? * I have to restart my computer to keep it updated? I thought this was Unix?
As of Lion, you sign in with an Apple ID. That is not iTunes, but iTunes also uses this ID. You do not need a credit card number to update your OS. That is only required for purchases in the App Store. If the update involves a kernel, kernel extension, Aqua/Quartz or other core component modification then yes, you will need to reboot. You probably have to reboot for updates more often than in a modern Unix due to the GUI integration, but generally less so than in Windows.
Keyboard (external mac? keyboard) * Why is the keyboard all fucked up? Two keys labeled delete? Is there some aversion to calling a backspace key a backspace key? * Where the fuck did insert go!? You know some people actually use insert! * For that matter where is num lock and scroll lock? Again, I use those keys! * Why redesign the num pad into a Apple(TM) num pad and move all the keys around? * The behavior of the home and end key is stupid! They jump to the end and beginging of the document instead of the end and begining of the line! What gives them the right?! * They remove essential keys like insert but I have F1-F19!? And an eject key on a system that doesn't even have an optical drive? (not that they knew that about my system, so a small pass there.) * Seriously? No Alt key? WTF, I thought this was UNIX! How the fuck am I supposed to use EMACS!?
It sounds like you are using the mini bluetooth wireless keyboard. You would probably prefer the full-size keyboard which has many of the keys you are concerned about. The behavior of the home and end keys is the way they have historically always worked in computing. It was Microsoft that changed the behavior in Windows and got people used to the different behavior. It was also Microsoft that changed the behavior of the Control key from its original usage of sending actual control codes. Apple retains the original behavior and introduced the Command key which works like the Microsoft Control Key. To move to the Beginning / End of a line, use Command+Left or Right Arrow. As for Alt, this is actually more correctly referred to as the Meta key. The Option key on the Apple keyboard provides this functionality, and it's is conveniently in the exact same location as the Alt key on PC keyboards. Of course, if you hate the Apple keyboard so much, there's nothing stopping you from using any USB or Bluetooth keyboard with the Mac, they're all supported and OS X understands how to map PC-specific keys to their OS X equivalents.
OSX Windows * WIndows present resize mouse cursors on some windows edges that cannot be resized! Inexcusable! I should be able to resize the window from any edge. And for god sakes, if I can't resize it from that edge don't show me a fucking resize cursor and make me think I'm losing my mind.
As of Mountain Lion you can resize any resizable windows from any corner. If you're getting a resize cursor than you should be able to resize it. I'm not sure why you're having this experience but if you are indeed experiencing a bug related to this it might be worth bringing up to Apple Support so that they can be made aware of it.
* What the hell is up with this full screen arrow. Useless shit. It removes all the windows from my other screens and throws up a lame gray background. Lame.
When you full screen an application, a virtual desktop for that application window is created on the fly. Your other windows are still there on their original desktop. You can still Opt-Tab back to them or use Mission Control/Expose. I don't understand
Being unable to do without something is not a burden. You just learn to not use it; and if you've never used it there's nothing to learn. It is almost inconceivable to me that there might be something new on metro that becomes a "must have".
There are some serious ideas here. Putting start menu back is serious, even if some elitist power users think that no one on the planet needs it. Also combining all the control applets into a single control panel is a serious idea, unlike the divided world with Windows 8. Dumping charms bar is a serious idea as there's no real need for it to be a separate hard to find pop-out bar.
Things change sometimes, that is true. Sometimes for the better. However in Windows 8 case it is clearly a matter of things changing for the worse Windows 8 is a disaster. Catching the flu is change too but I don't hear flu fans gushing about how great it is. I don't mind that things look different in Windows 8 desktop (I never liked aero much anyway, and after hacking the registry the W8 style looks ok to me). But mandating the boot up to metro is a stupid change. Removing the start menu that millions of users make use of daily is a moronic and hostile change.
Often the company itself doesn't make the decision, but the embedded IT bureaucracy does this. I've often seen IT groups completely out of touch with the larger company's goals and operations. So it seems highly likely that some IT VP will just read a directive from the Microsoft mother ship that they must upgrade to Windows 8 and they'll start pulling out the purchase orders without ever once consulting with anyone else.
I'm using OS X for development, along with a huge chunk of the company. And lots of Linux machines (especially for production servers). For OS X basically it's a very nice compromise: you have a full Unix system right there that every developer knows, plus ability to run Office that the enterprise drones insist upon. I don't see many on the programming side who prefer Windows.
Ahh, so because you are happy with it, everyone else should just be happy with it too? Get off your high horse, before someone knocks you off of it. Ohh, and get over it.
I agree that not everyone with a brain will automatically hate Microsoft. However I find it extremely bizarre that someone with a brain will jump so quickly to defend Microsoft's mistakes.
Or Windows 7 Service Pack 2 (or 3 or 4). There are a lot of things in Windows 8 desktop that I really like. Overall it's pretty good. However it all gets corrupted by the presence of metro which is just a clearly wrongheaded design. However if you rip out metro is there really enough left to justify calling this a new OS release? Though perhaps there is more different just in desktop between 7 and 8 than there was between Vista and 7.
Windows 0 for the win!
Regular control panel that is as hard as hell to find the first time. Plus a missing start menu, which you can work around but it always feels like you're working around a missing feature.
Charms bar appears a lot of me when I don't want it to. Just letting the mouse drift to the corners will do it, or overshooting a menu item if it's near the upper or lower right. It pops up in some games I play too.
But you can get Linux or BSD for it, which is a very good replacement.
I have no itunes on my mac, and I hae no apple ID at all. It updates just fine.
I can't type a path in here?
Did you try shift-command-g, or from the menu Go->Go To Folder...?
It is nice that you never use the mouse to launch applications, most people I have worked with don't really know how to "use computers properly", they rely on thnigs like the start menu and mouse interaction....
I have worked with many people over the years that are just shocked at what I can do with a computer, I am much faster and do things that they didn't even know were possible etc...a few years ago I even came across a guy that didn't know any shortcut keys beyond pressing the "start" button on the keyboard when I showed him Ctrl+C and Ctrl+V he was amazed, so just because you know how to "use computers properly" millions of people don't and are confucsed by change
I maintain that Windows 8 is not that bad, but it only lasted 4 days on my new laptop until Linux was instlled. I tried to give it a week but it was just annoying using a touch focused OS on a non-touch device.
As soon as I received my computer (from my company) it was asking me to update three programs. One was the OS (I think) the other two were built in apps that required I put in my CC# to update. It did make me create an iTunes account (I have the spam to prove it), if there was a way to opt out of this it wasn't obvious and I looked hard. I think the apps were iphoto and imovie. I canceled out of giving my CC# several times, I didn't want to give it up for no reason, but I couldn't "activate" my account until I did, and until I activated the account I couldn't get rid of the "you need updates!" message. That I even need to create an account at all is pretty lame, that I have to enter a CC# to update other software is super lame.
I have the full sized keyboard. It lacks the keys I mentioned. I use emacs a lot and by using iterm2 I can replace option with alt, but that's hardly the same as having an alt key because it then disables option. It does not have an insert key, scroll lock, num lock, pause etc.. but it does have 19 F keys that have no apparent function. I tried switching to a PC keyboard, but it lacked the command key so that didn't work out very long. I've resolved to just getting used to it. But the lack of these keys is pretty crappy. Especially the insert key.
The issue is that the button is useless. I don't know why anyone would ever use it given that it hides all the windows on your other screens. I don't much care what it technically does. What it effectively does isn't terribly useful. Seems a little like a crippled maximize button. How exactly is it useful?
So it's called the zoom button, but it doesn't zoom? That really doesn't make any sense, but ok. It really should be optional how you want it to behave if anything. The unpredictable behavior makes me hesitant to use it. For example, on chrome it resizes vertically only (apparently no web pages can benefit from extra width?), but in my IRC client it resizes both. Why? Who knows? It just does. You're going to be flipping a coin on any new program you install as to what this button actually does. That, in my opinion, is bad design. It doesn't have a maximize button? Well it really should, that would be helpful.
Which would be halfway good if it showed the path to the folder you were currently in or had tab completion. As it is, Finder really sucks and I'll more often than not just use the console. I don't really like nuCommander either.
Yeah... I sort of am forced to use it, for now. It's provided by the company I work for. I don't think they'
I hate the giant border in Windows 8. Same as Windows 7 but Windows 7 at least has preferences to shrink that down. With Windows 8 you have to use the registry to shrink the borders. I can not really understand why they would remove that option. I really like the no-border style of OS X, and it seems like it would fit nicely into the Windows 8 desktop UI look. Both Windows and OS X seem inherently opposed to the concept of user customization. (ie, why remove aero instead of disabling it but allowing it as an option if someone still wants it?)
There was nothing wrong with Vista SP1, especially on a new system.
There fixed that for you.
Vista itself was insanely slow, buggy, spent the best part of any idle time on the computer thrashing the harddisk and CPU, not to mention being completely unable to transfer large numbers of files across a network due to a broken network stack (really? 2 hours to copy 4GB of photos on 100mbit?), and none of that had to do with drivers. Windows 7 was more than just a simple GUI change. They did quite a bit of work under the hood as well.
and replace it with what?
Windows ME.
Seriously try it. It has great innovations that Windows 8 is missing like a fully featured window manager, the ability to shutdown your computer with less than 3 clicks, and when you're getting frustrated it senses your frustrations and resets itself with a nice calming blue screen.
First of all, you should try DoubleCommand. It helped me with changing key behavior across the OS.
Secondly, when creating an account with iTunes, there is an option for Payment method "none".
Apart from that I agree almost completely with your list. Well I guess I could add some things:
*Windows*
- I have 3 monitors and multiple app windows open at the same time. My workflow requires me to click (or right click) on one window, then to the other etc. On all other window managers I use, this is easily done. For OS X, if I have one application "active", then I have to left click on the window of another app to "activate" it, then I can click or right click in that application. To me, this is "1995 called and asked for their window manager" bad and it is significantly impacting my productivity.
- Dock. Crap. I have even noticed that it sometimes gets the "program is running" highlight wrong! It doesn't do much else. How about giving us something like a taskbar - no, expose is not always useful to locate an application window when you have multiple applications over many monitors. Also I am having trouble finding the window I am looking for if I have multiple windows open for an application (expose sort of stacks them) - all that space taken by the dock could be used to help perhaps something like that.
*Multiple monitors"
- Sometimes I need to move applications from one monitor to the other (especially if I am sending the 3rd monitor output to the room next door with the projector and an application starts there instead of on a monitor in front of me). For windows there is a keyboard shortcut. OS X had something possibly better, spaces. They took it out in Mountain lion (because of course you don't need multi-monitor functionality when we are trying to migrate you to an ipad?) so now I have to pay for it.
*Keyboard / Mouse*
- I have the wireless keyboard, so I have different issues than you. In fact I envy you. You have 2 "delete" keys? I don't even have ONE! So, for the wireless keyboard they got rid of Insert, Home, End, Pg up/down and also Delete! At least, unlike yours, mine has "alt".
- Reversing the mouse scroll wheel direction - brilliant! (not)
*USB/CD/DVD transfer rate*
- Whenever I try to transfer files from/to my thumb-drives (pretty expensive ones too, different brands) on my Mac Pro, I get speeds less than 1MB/sec. If I fire up a Win XP VM right there, I can transfer through it (to/from the same Mac filesystem) dozens of MB/s. Reproducible every time, hasn't seen any difference since Lion. Similar but less pronounced is my experience with CD/DVD transfers. On the same machine I can read CD/DVD data at least 2x faster through windows. How? Why? It does not make any sense!
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
As an Australian, I would +5 funny that if I have any mod points. Fosters is crap.
Allow uninstalling metro completely.
Maybe at a few companies (companies are all different, after all, just like people), but not at many, if you look at the adoption figures for Win8. Also, companies usually treat IT as a cost center, and because of that, they frequently try to cut its budget to the bone because it doesn't actually generate any profit for the company (though its operations are essential for the operation of the business and making money). So if the IT manager tells the CEO that he wants a bunch of money for the latest MS upgrade, when they just spent a fortune upgrading to Win7 a couple years ago, that's probably not going to be well received. Heck, one of those hack-n-slash CEOs will see that as an opportunity to cut the IT budget, sack the IT director, have this shown to be a giant cost savings and improvement to the company's bottom line, and justify a big bonus for himself.
I'm not an OSX user. Is this true?
And if it is, people put up with it?
Fascinating!
No. It isn't remotely true. Unless you've purchased one or more applications through the Mac App Store, in which case you would have had to set up a valid credit card to open an account and purchase the software in the first place.
At worst, if you have no purchased apps, Software Update will ask for a (free) valid AppleID in order to update some bundled apps like iPhoto (part of iLife which comes bundled with all new Macs). An AppleID is simply an email address and password that is registered with Apple. Setting up an AppleID does not require a credit card number.
If you just have a basic installation of OS X without the bundled apps, or if you choose to only install the system updates, the Software Update app won't ever ask for any kind of authorization, account or credit card numbers.
The GP is talking out his ass on this particular point, or severely misunderstanding something. The rest of his points are mostly correct though. Mostly.
Apple is not the number one laptop vender. Lenovo is at the moment, and i'm pretty sure del and hp still make more than apple any way. As much as you see macbooks on all the tv shows, movies and coffee shops it dosn't mean wide spread appeal.
Rocket Surgeon.
The following is from a reply I posted a little earlier to the same comment:
/Users/ was /home/ really.
As soon as I received my computer (from my company) it was asking me to update three programs. One was the OS (I think) the other two were built in apps that required I put in my CC# to update. It did make me create an iTunes account (I have the spam to prove it), if there was a way to opt out of this it wasn't obvious and I looked hard. I think the apps were iphoto and imovie. I canceled out of giving my CC# several times, I didn't want to give it up for no reason, but I couldn't "activate" my account until I did, and until I activated the account I couldn't get rid of the "you need updates!" message. That I even need to create an account at all is pretty lame, that I have to enter a CC# to update other software is super lame.
As for my critique about the file system, I just wish
I have the full sized mac keyboard, and option does say alt on it but it doesn't behave like the alt key (maybe if I hold down the fn key that replaced insert?). When using emacs the alt (meta) key is essential. The removal of the other keys is pretty bad with insert at the top of that list.
You do realize that you can set Windows Media Player as the default program for all supported filetypes from the "default programs" dialog, right? No, of course you're too fucking stupid to know anything that simple.
Again, is there anyone who would care to explain how Windows 8 is in any meaningful or significant way different to use than Windows 7? It's fucking not and anyone who has actually used it would know that.
Steam itself sure. But do all the games for sale on Steam work on Linux?
* No, you don't need a CC# or iTunes account to keep OS X updated. You've misunderstood something. Badly.
* I've never seen an OS that doesn't need to be rebooted when doing things such as kernel updates. There are many software updates in OS X that do not require a reboot and oftentimes don't even require an administrator password to be applied.
* The Option key is the Alt key. It's even labeled that way on the keyboard.
* I haven't used the Insert key in like 20 years. Are you using Wordstar or something? Anyway apparently Fn+Enter is supposed to do the trick, on the full size keyboard. I'm sure it could be assigned to a function key on a laptop keyboard.
* The "Clear" button on the number pad is in the same place and functions as a Num Lock key if you're using the keyboard with Windows. In OS X of course there is no need for a Num Lock key since the number pad never pretends to be anything but a number pad.
* Scroll Lock is F15 on the full size Apple keyboard. Otherwise it's Fn+Shift+F12.
* Yes, the Home and End keys actually go to Home and End on the Mac. The beginning and end of a line can be reached with Cmd+Left and Cmd+Right, respectively. This seems pretty intuitive to me.
* As of Mountain Lion all windows can be resized from corners and edges. If you're seeing a resize cursor you should be able to resize the window.
* No, on the Mac the green "zoom" button has never been a maximize button, and coming from Windows myself I empathize with your maximize button withdrawal pangs. A partial solution is available in the form of a SIMBL plugin called SizeWell. It lets you turn the green button into a true maximize button that works well in almost all apps. SizeWell also lets you resize windows in various other ways through a context menu or keyboard shortcuts. Works great and it's free.
* For nearly a decade I've been replacing the old one-button Apple mouses with basic Microsoft scroll mouses (the only good product Microsoft makes). I've never had any trouble producing a right-click with the Magic Mouse like you're describing. All you have to do is lift your index finger when clicking. But if you can't learn to lift your index finger when right-clicking or have some other reasons you don't like the Apple Magic Mouse, there's nothing stopping you from using a different mouse. With the IntelliPoint drivers you can even use the ones with several buttons and adjustable dpi. But any basic USB scroll mouse will work perfectly with no drivers.
* In the Finder, click Go -> Go to Folder or Shift-Cmd-G to specify a folder to go to. This can be used to open even hidden folders like "~/Library".
* I've been using OS X for a decade and haven't seen copy/paste misbehaving as you indicate. Certainly nowhere near the realm of "50% of the time". Would love to know what you're talking about. Keyboard shortcut usefulness and consistency is one of the things that drew me to OS X years ago, and helps keep me here.
* I also haven't had the multi-monitor issues you seem to be having. Once I set up an external monitor's settings I've never had one lose its settings. And are you saying you have to force-reboot your Mac if you wake it up with no external monitors attached? I've never encountered that myself. I've always been amazed by how well OS X deals with dynamically attaching and detaching monitors.
* No, it isn't FreeBSD. Some minor elements of the OS were taken from FreeBSD years ago, but the kernel is based on a Mach microkernel architecture and the OS is very much its own beast with its own filesystem conventions which have been refined for over a decade new. The Mac OS X filesystem makes just as much sense as anyone else's filesystem. It's just different.
How dare you imply Australians actually drink Fosters. We foist that shit onto the rest of the world.
Sales fiqures arn't the best way to guage a products worthyness. Microsoft could of come out with the absoulte best OS possible for phones (i don't know what that is, but lets just say they did it) and it's not like everyone is going to drop their apple and android devices and jump over. There is so much fanboiness around at the moment, a windows phone could be able to teleport people any where they want, and you would still have people telling you the static list of apps on an iphone is better.
Rocket Surgeon.
Sorry, but infoworld's take on it is horrible apart from ModernMix idea. Windows 8.1 + if MS implemented ModernMix's resizable metro apps strategy would be perfect.
* I have used OS X (and OS 9) and I never had to enter a CC into anything. Ever.
* One is delete the other way. There is an icon there
* Opt/Alt is the same, you can set that in iterm2 (and terminal)
* All F keys there -> I use them for the expose stuff.
* I have no problem with the num pad. It has a clear key and a , and . key. How awesome is that?
* I agree on a tons of other things (fullscreen sucks donkey balls in Lion, there is still no proper full screen window mode, this "+" thing still pisses me off, memory management is often shit as crap)
* Finder is shit as fuck and it gets worse with every release. Ever tried to do two actions at the same time, Finder is useless. Was not that way in Leopard, they fucked that up for good in Lion and I doubt they will ever fix that.
* btw type in path is cmd+shift+G
* Never used an Apple mouse, only normal ones with normal buttons.
* where is copy/paste not working? I never had a problem with that. Just remember cmd+shift+opt+v pastes without format
* yes, HFS+ is so old it still thinks its 1900 here. And again there is no sight to fix this old crap one
"Freiheit ist immer auch die Freiheit des Andersdenkenden" - Rosa Luxemburg, 1871 - 1919
Sigh.
Trumpet Winsock on DOS. I have to sadly, sadly admit that we still have NEW devices running that. And sell them to customers. Costs a lot of money too, about 150k$.
We manufacture a system that contains some components that we outsource (think large industrial switching cabinet). We control the outsourced system with TCP. That machine runs...DOS and Trumpet. The problem? No multitasking means that you can only open one connection at a time and because Trumpet is too stupid to detect a failed TCP connection you have to reboot it. Which means 20 minutes for the machinery to cool down.
The engineer who is responsible for designing that thing works only from 2 in the morning until 10, and he said he will move to Linux some times when he has time. He has been maintaining this thing since the early 90s.
There is also the hassle of trying to remember how to get into a DOS command line when the machine boots. Wat it Alt-F6? Ctrl-F6? I sure knew this 25 years ago, but this IS 2013!!!
The dangers of excessive individualism are nothing compared to the oppressiveness of excessive collectivism
Hmm, I just walked across my design company's open-plan office floor and saw a Mac Pro under every desk and not a single fanboi was found.
Well, of course not. They're all getting ready for WWDC next week. You'll lose them again in September when they lineup for the new iPhone. I hear it has a better camera.
So tell me what the keyboard shortcut to search for apps in Windows 8 (seriously). In Windows 7 it's [Windows Key], in OS X it's [Apple]+[Space]. As far as I can tell there's no equivalent in Windows 8.
I switch between Windows 7 and OS X every day. On either system, I can open Chrome by pressing the key combo and typing 'chr' + [Enter]. It seems Windows 8 requires mouse interaction to open an app. Sure, this was true back in Windows XP, but my productivity went up significantly on Windows 7.
Some of my coworkers got Windows 8 laptops, they struggle with them, and I struggle to help them. Par for the course for a new OS, but I'm really having trouble seeing how their Windows 8 laptop is any better than their previous Win7 laptops in terms of productivity. They all seem to prefer using Macs over their new laptops, and I can't blame them (it's what I use at work).
The right to protest the State is more sacred than the State.
Well, gosh, if that's the metric we're using here, then the DECstation I used in college had 3 mouse buttons, and is therefore the superior, most usable machine/OS. ULTRIX4LYFE, YO.
----
"I used to listen to Null Device before they sold out."
It's fucked. Game over.
Onto Windows 9, or as Steve Balmer likes to say "Not nearly as fucked up as 8, but still a clusterfuck hole extravaganza of epic proportions".
Microsoft didn't make all those changes so they can let the consumer come out with fixes and ideas that would cost time and money for them to develop.
So, if you don't like it (I hate it) why the FUCK are you DUMB enough to use "Modern UI" apps? I am sorry for the twice four letters, but is someone forcing you? I've been running Windows 8 since some time early this year. I never run Metro apps? Why would I, they are crap apps, they do not overlap properly (though you could always fix that too, Stardock has a tool that allows you to run Metro apps in a window, but then again, why run the metro apps?), they do not contain much useful functionality. They are simply a waste of space, time and $$$s.
I do have some metro apps installed, mind you, the live-update tiles are nice for "information at a glance", but I probably haven't "glanced" in a few weeks. To me, Windows 8 behaves, runs (albeit a little faster) and looks exactly like Windows 7.
Please list all the "serious flaws" you see when running Windows 8 in desktop mode. Name ONE SINGLE thing you don't have that you had in Win7, Vista or XP. Just one.
And there, it sucks
Serious question. How does it suck? I use Start8 to get a Start menu. I never use Metro apps, they all suck, so why would I? I also do not engage in self flagellation. Why would I? It hurts. This means I stay 100% within the desktop - though, I'll admit, I have some Metro apps installed (but do not open them) and they populate the Start screen with "at-a-glance information". I some times, but quite rarely these days, the novelty's worn off, glance at the start screen just to pick up some of this info (weather, stocks, news). But other than the occasional glance, Windows 8 looks, acts, behaves, works exactly like Windows 7. If Windows 8 sucks on the desktop, so does Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP and Windows 2000.
An Aussie friend from college routinely told us: "Fosters - Australian for crappy Yank beer."
And I agree. Godawful stuff.
How does it suck? I use Start8 to get a Start menu. I never use Metro apps, they all suck,
I think you are starting to answer your own question here.
If Windows 8 sucks on the desktop, so does Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP and Windows 2000.
They all suck equally. But you've had to patch the Windows 8 UI and forego Microsoft's vision of the future just to get back to the old suckiness we've all become accustomed to.
Have gnu, will travel.
After playing around some time with W8, all I can tell is that it feels good, it's easy, and well desgined. I would recommend it to almost any common end user.
I would recommend Windows 8 to almost any common child, whose parents are able to afford something a bit better than a VTech digital learning device from Toys "R" Us with a bit more actual utility and Internet capability. Then again, hell, probably even cheap-ass VTech computers have Internet connectivity these days. Just don't expect to learn any real, actual programming with stock Windows... but I guess it's good for all the other most common end-user stuff. The vast majority of semi-competent to mostly-clueless adults can continue to use Windows 7 or OS X, while those with a bit more knowledge and/or courage can delve into Linux (or possibly even BSD).
Vista did have some rather annoying issue though. Perhaps my biggest annoyance was that that it had a re-occurring problem with forgetting custom folder settings for a particular folder, and sometimes applying those custom folder settings to a completely different folder. Just Google "vista forgetting folder settings" and you'll see what I mean. Supposedly the problem was finally resolved in SP2, but by then I had moved to Windows 7 which didn't have the issue.
Vista was perhaps a necessary OS to act as a stepping stone between XP and 7, but it had too many initial problems (both resource wise and bugs like the one I mentioned) such that its reputation was ruined even after a couple of service packs seemed to fix most things. Windows 8 might be another necessary stepping stone towards a more refined version of Windows that everyone can enjoy, but Microsoft can't keep pissing people off for ever.
In order to make any operating system I use not suck, I have to add third party tools. This goes for the Ubuntu installation I use for jBoss development, it goes for Win XP, Win 7 and Win 8, it goes for iOS on my iPad and for WP8 on my Nokia 920. In that, Windows 8 is no different from any other operating system.
I just don't get the incessant WHINING we have heard from the anti-Windows 8 crowd just because Microsoft moved your cheese a thousands of an inch. Honestly, the only reason people are bitching and moaning about the lack of a start menu in Windows 8 is because it is fashionable to so. You are all a bunch of pizzing, moaning and whining lemmings unable to form opinions on your own.
Americans for the last 20 years haven't drunk Budweiser or Fosters. We have the best beer in the world here now. Anyone who thinks we all drink Budweiser is either an American over 40, not an American, or poor (college students, like me when I was in college 10 years ago, included).
Just because the U.S. is a republic does not mean it is not a democracy. Democracy/republic are not mutually exclusive.
Hmm, I just walked across my design company's open-plan office floor and saw a Mac Pro under every desk and not a single fanboi was found.
I can attest to this. I HATE MACS. I love Windows (fuck you /.! :) And I and every engineer at my work use Macs.
Just because the U.S. is a republic does not mean it is not a democracy. Democracy/republic are not mutually exclusive.
The main reason why Linux on the desktop hasn't been very succesful is largely a marketing problem in my opinion.
Absolutely not. Linux with GNU tools is an awesome incredibly stable and useful environment; however, it is not graphical.
Back when XFree86 was around, configuring X was somewhat of a black art with scary warnings about causing hardware damage to your monitor/display. Not usable by the masses.
XOrg came around and made basic configuration easy but window managers like Blackbox or FVWM were not really acceptable to the masses.
Gnome with XOrg was pretty nice until the devs started to think that everything would be nicer if nobody could configure it... and they eventually just entirely jumped off the deep end with Gnome 3. Dead. Dead to everyone, not just the masses.
KDE was pretty nice around rev 2 or so. They kept improving it into version 3 but there was always something just a bit buggy about it. Font rendering would go whacko sometimes. Window redraws would stop halfway through. All sorts of weird stuff that would occur regularly but each individual instance was rather rare. KDE went off the deep end too and still has the weird bugs that pop up rarely but regularly. Using dual monitors makes them pop out even more often. Again, not usable by the masses.
I can foresee people getting upset that XFCE is not even being considered. Deal with it. It is not an environment for the masses.
In short, there was only a very short time period in the early 2000's that Linux on the desktop could have ever won and that was with Gnome and XOrg. It is a huge mess now and will continue to be so for the forseeable future... especially with the arguing and fighting over the implementation of a new windowing system.
"Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen
Well, enough people whined that Microsoft offered to bring back the start button. Not a full start menu, just the button. I guess they figured it will take a few more O/S revs to herd their user base into their preferred direction. Meanwhile, every Linux distro I've used has had the ability (and utilities) preinstalled to allow me to customize the UI. No extra downloads needed. Apple, meanwhile seems to have a knack for understanding their users. At least through Jobs' reign, they built intuitive UIs that, while people might have found them novel, didn't piss them off. The loyal fan base wasn't disappointed by buying into the 'Apple Way'.
When Microsoft manages to upset their rank and file user base, something is wrong. Not just the geeks, who can fix the interface with a s/w install or registry edit. But grandma, who bought into the whole 'Microsoft knows what's good for you, so shut the hell up' corporate attitude.
Microsoft's only defenders seem to be their development community. Who want to build apps to one UI standard rather than desktop and tablet. But market share isn't built by catering to the people who know their way around Sourceforge and Github. And grandma is getting on my nerves, asking me to fix her Win 8 PC. She's damned close to getting Ubuntu on my next visit (or if I'm feeling evil, Slackware).
Have gnu, will travel.
You have a few valid points, although most are more about the under the hood details or subjective choice in software rather than user interface experience.
Which is horrible. It isn't intuitive, it lacks basic features that every other OS seems to have, doing simple things is made far more complicated than it has to be. It has to be on of the worst designed UIs in recent history. Coming in 3rd after Windows 8 and Gnome 3/Unity.
If you ignore ACs because they are anonymous - you're an idiot.
Well, enough people whined
People always whine when you move their cheese. They did when XP was released (what kind of Fisher Price shit GUI is this), they did when Vista was released, the even whined when Win7 was released (where is all the glorious bling I loved from my beloved XP and Vista). People whine when you move their cheese.
Fun fact: XP had a slower up-take than Win8 has, and people whined every bit as much about XP as they do about Win8.
They are in the US. We lost the republic long before I was born. They took away the right to drive around 1941. We lost the 2nd ammendment in 1934. Any time the majority can vote away anyone's rights you have a democracy that is not a republic. It is possible to have a republic where a democratic process does things that don't take away people's rights which is what we should have. It hasn't been that way for a long time.
the question is, can visual studio be fixed? metro is such a horrible interface and yet now applications are following suit by uglifying. It really gets bad when it affects your work flow: - bad icons, making stuff hard to find and use - pending checkins with absolutely attrocious "wizardizing" getting in the way Are Microsoft Programs going the QuickTime route. Nice (which is debatable) looking but unusable?
Specifically, there is basically nobody who properly markets Linux, so a lot of people have never heard of it and even those that have largely think it's a command-line only hardcore-geek thing
So of the people who have heard of Linux properly categorized it as a hardcore-geek thing? OK, perhaps not hardcore-geek, maybe even casual-geek, but certainly not a non-geek thing.
In my office, I'm the 'IT-guru' simply because I know how to fix the margin settings in MS Word or how to get an excel table to properly import into Powerpoint. THAT is technical wizardry to most people, so think about how non-geek friendly Linux really is.
Unless the marketing is cleverly disguised training-infotainment that teaches people the differences between what they do now, and how things work in Linux, most people will balk at something as simple as having the window min/max/close buttons on the left hand side of the window.
Linux is not really that bad any more, especially with the maturity of KDE, and they wouldn't really notice the differences aside from not being able to go to Staple/OfficeMax/OfficeDepot/BestBuy and pick something up and have it "just work".
The only way I've found to ever successfully switch someone from one OS to another is to completely eliminate any possiblity for that person to use their original OS. Including myself.
That has generally been the consensus with any kind of conversion, supported by various studies. Companies that successfully transition off a Microsoft technology (Windows, Office) generally have to do just that - remove all possibility of going back. People adjust, after some time complaining; then they start rejoicing - but they'll continue to complain about missing their forced Coffee-breaks.
Switching from iOS to Android? Had to switch to Verizon before they had the iPhone so my old iPhones were either sold or used as home remote controls.
Switching from WindowsXP to 7? Upgraded to 16GB of RAM, (some other incompatabilities as well)
Switching to Windows8? Installed on the 'kitchenPC' and..... oh who am I kidding. I need to get XP on that machine ASAP. Even with a multi-touch pad that damned thing drives me nuts.
Switching to macOS? Install Windows 8 on your kitchenPC.
Now that's just funny...especially that last one.
Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away. - Elvis Presley (source: imdb.com)
Nor have I ever needed to know the kernel version when installing via package manager.In fact I cannot recall ever needing to know the kernel version installing outside of the package manager either.
VMware can be a PITA - you have to know the kernel version as you might have to fix their driver modules after so long due to breaking when there have been changes to the kernel. I use VMware 8.x at work on a relatively new kernel (3.8); had to fix source to make it work.
Still, running it on numerous systems - VMware is certainly the exception, and that's probably due to it being proprietary software that has to interface with the Linux Kernel to do its job.
Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away. - Elvis Presley (source: imdb.com)
What a surprise. Just finished a three day workshop for a tablet app for a global, six billion dollar company. Guess what platform they picked to deploy to 45,000 employees? Yep, Windows 8. On Helix.
No I don't work for Microsoft, yes I run a stack of Ubuntu servers.
Seems that Corporate America isn't listening.... Why did they pick Windows 8? Metro. The tablet features. Active Directory integration. Ability to remotely wipe a device. Security. And, believe it or not, ease of use,
They evaluated iOS, Android, and Linux.
Murphy was an optimist
FWIW I'm still on Windows 7 on my primary desktops, and Linux. I do have to work with Windows 8 on occasion, and I have to deal with friends whining about it when they buy new computers with it preinstalled.
Why the FUCK are you DUMB enough to make that post, assuming I run Windows 8 on my own PC? I'd sooner run Vista. In fact I still have one PC with Vista on it. Compared to the total clusterfuck Windows 8 is, Vista is damned near flawless.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Could you mention a flaw that is not related to running metro apps? I mean, if you run metro apps, your friends I mean, you are too stupid to operate anything more tecnincally advanced than a 1980s Timex calcualtor watch. So, what are the flaws? We've covered the start menu, which is easily fixed. Metro apps are not relevant. What are the flaws?
You have two choices: the Windows key, or Win+Q.
In the Start menu, just start typing and it will pop up application search. Or if you'd rather go to the Search charm directly, Win+Q will take you there.
All my liberal friends think I'm a conservative, all my conservative friends think I'm a liberal.