More Eye Candy Coming To Windows 10

jones_supa writes Microsoft is expected to release a new build of the Windows 10 Technical Preview in the very near future, according to their own words. The only build so far to be released to the public is 9841 but the next iteration will likely be in the 9860 class of releases. With this new build, Microsoft has polished up the animations that give the OS a more comprehensive feel. When you open a new window, it flies out on to the screen from the icon and when you minimize it, it collapses back in to the icon on the taskbar. It is a slick animation and if you have used OS X, it is similar to the one used to collapse windows back in to the dock. Bah.

Comments

Re:how pretty

[pooh666]

Indeed. I turn off all animations they waste time and resources. How about making it super easy for me not to have to do searches for files all of the time? More intelligent awareness of what I did last time when I opened a file from one folder vs another. LESS visual BS that just looks pretty but leaves me entirely confused as to how to do my work. FRICKN OFFICE MENUS MUST DIE.

Re:how pretty

[DocHoncho]

As long as you can still turn them off. Just one more thing to add to the post-install de-crapification checklist.

Re:how pretty

[Hognoxious]

Controls that you can actually see before you activate them.

The flat thing needs to go away

[ErichTheRed]

I know, I know, Apple did it so it must be cool right? I really want the ability for people to change themes as they see fit come back. If you are on a low spec phone, tablet or PC, or just don't like effects, you should be able to turn them off. But if you want more effects, you should have the option. You could easily turn off the Aero Glass effect in Windows 7 and either stay with the less-transparent Windows 7 GUI or even go all the way back to Windows Classic. Why can't we have that option again?

Re:The flat thing needs to go away

[Anonymous Coward]

This would add more work for Microsoft. Microsoft has been struggling with ever increasing monitor resolutions, i.e. the HighDPI issues that todays display cause. They have designed the Modern UI to be mostly resolution independent, whereas their own software sometimes broke with the "make text larger" solutions they had employed since XP.

There new UI for the desktop is designed to scale better, but they would need to redo all the assets and possibly reprogram the old code that makes up those old UI choices, which would almost certainly cause compatibility issues with older software.

Now, I give Microsoft some credit for being able to run software written for Windows 98, but seriously, sometimes they need to let go. One of the major sources of program bloat in Windows is from its compatibility layers. We went from an OS that could be striped down to a 500MB install with Windows XP to the very next version needing 15GB with Vista. And it hasn't gone down since, even when they put Windows 8 on a 32GB SSD in the SurfaceRT.

This is what I say needs to be fixed. Have a compatibility layer that is optional for users to install, but don't put it in by default. They already have an equivalent with .Net. Windows 8 comes with .Net 4, but the user can install a compatibility layer for .net3.5 for older software. It is even downloaded from the Windows Update service, so it takes up little space unless needed.

OS X had Classic and Rosetta that did similar things, allowing running OS 9 and earlier code or PPC code respectively. After the first few versions, both had to be installed explicitly by the user, thus was not taking up space or holding back newer OS features and newer Programs. Both were discontinued after a few generations of hardware that decreased the burden on Apple to produce better OS/Programs without as much concern for backwards compatibility.

And no, I don't care that you want to run your Windows 95 games in Windows 2020, Windows has the advantage of being one of the two most widely virtulizable OSes in production, so download Virtualbox and have fun.

Re:how pretty

[Mr_Wisenheimer]

Well, scientists for one. It might explain why so many of them have switched to OSX as their *NIX of choice. I remember a lot of Linux desktop managers struggled with doing basic things like properly rendering Mathematica and allowing it to accelerate graphics with open GL whereas on OSX and Windows, it just "worked" pretty much 99.9% of the time.

Linux itself (the actual kernel) is very stable, maybe even more stable than the base Windows NT kernel. But as a desktop operating system? There's a reason why most people shell out good money for OSX or Windows, and it is not just because they look pretty (which many Linux desktops do these days as well).

Aero?

[SeaFox]

Can we have our transparency back?

Re:Ridiculous

[Anonymous Coward]

Dude, 'grok' has been around since 1961. Where the fuck have you been? It's over half a century old. Additionally, it's pretty damn standard amongst folks with half a brain.

Helpful to newbies

[Tablizer]

If done right, such animations can be helpful to newbies, showing the relationship between the icon and the newly opened window (versus say a randomly popping message or spam). But after a while such "training wheels" get annoying and slow you down.

Re:There's a reason...

[chihowa]

If you're visualizing large or dynamic datasets, a hardware accelerated animation adds all sorts of value. Not everyone can produce meaningful conclusions from screenfuls of cascading text.

Re:Will Microsoft ever learn?

[JDG1980]

I wonder when Microsoft will learn that a lot of us would rather use our CPU and GPU cycles for something other than eye candy? While computers can be used for fun purposes, we shouldn't all be left with the feel that what we have is little more than a technotoy.

Windows has always offered the option to turn off animations. (System Properties -> Advanced System Settings -> Performance gives a bunch of checkboxes for this on both Win7 and Win10.) Flip it around: why shouldn't those of us with good mid-range or high-end desktops be able to use a small portion of our CPU and GPU power to make things look nicer? Why should we be hamstrung to what the crappiest tablet with a half-dead battery can handle?

Re:Will Microsoft ever learn?

[Jake Dodgie]

This, This, this, I liked Aero, I had a PC that could run it, I like buttons that look like buttons that click whan you push em and have a bit o shiney hi-light.
I like translucent effects and stuff showing through.
Who really likes flat blah square windows with little indication as th who has focus and whats on top.