Classic Shell. You know it makes sense.
More than half of Windows 8 users just treat it like Windows 7
For all Microsoft's hype about The Interface Formerly Known As Metro (TIFKAM), more than half of all Windows 8 users ignore the new Start Screen and treat the OS as if it were Windows 7, according to a study by PC management firm Soluto. Soluto chart tracking Windows Store app use How many Windows 8 users launch a Windows …
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Friday 24th May 2013 08:55 GMT billranton
Re: I prefer simply not to buy it.
Yes definitely. Also, if you really want to justifiably despise something, you must masochistically immerse yourself in its filth as I have been doing with my new laptop for a month now. There's no telling what I'll be capable of by the time Win8.1 is released.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:27 GMT Khaptain
@AndrueC
No OS should ever require 3rd party programs in order for it to become useable.
TIFKAM appears to have been designed by Microsoft in order to follow Microsoft's strategic plans, it seems very difficult to believe that many actual objectively thinking users were consulted during it's developement.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:03 GMT Don Jefe
Yes Windows 8 is perfectly usable and so is a 1983 Chevrolet Chevette but the experience sucks. MS has spent decades getting into the minds and hearts of the vast majority of PC users by using a fairly consistent layout. For them to do something so radical at a time when OSS options are becoming somewhat usable for the average Joe was just stupid. I'm OK with change and learning new things about a software package can be fun but TIFKAM is pants. So are Chevettes.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 13:52 GMT Chad H.
Re: So regulator...
It takes up the entirety of my screen, covering the video I'm watching, the chat I'm regulating, and whatever else I may be doing. I am forced out of all of that until I find the program I want.
all this to launch a menu that should at worst be no more than a 3rd of the screen.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 17:17 GMT The_Regulator
I think you are missing my point. I launch my desktop apps from my desktop taskbar and my metro apps from start unless I want to run control panel or something similar that I use infrequently which is shortcutted to start.
I do not put my legacy apps shortcuts on the start menu generally if I use them on a regular basis.
Essentially I use metro only for consumption eg news, weather, sports etc. I use legacy desktop for creation and productivity and it works great for me.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:41 GMT Khaptain
Re: Deep breath now...
@Panser and the Regular
If TIFKAM is so usable then why are MS deciding to do a u-turn and give us back, at least partially, the existing start menu. ????
So calm down ladies, when MS also admits failure then there was obviously something wrong somewhere along the line and it can't always be the users fault.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:04 GMT dajames
Re: Deep breath now...
TIFKAM is perfectly usable, it just isn't the interface people are used to.
It is usable, sure, but not perfectly so.
What angers users is that it replaces something that was more usable (though still not perfect). Products are supposed to improve as theye evolve, not deteriorate.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 23:59 GMT h3
Re: Deep breath now...
Linux is a great example of things deteriorating completely on the desktop.
The default for pretty much every distro is sacrifice 50% of your 3d performance for pointless desktop effects.
Pulseaudio makes it so sound is just wrong.
Microsoft has not killed performance of anything for Windows 8 or done anything particularly badly that affects me all that much.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 01:45 GMT James Anderson
Re: Deep breath now...
Things you cannot do in the "modern" interface that you can in the "ancient" interface.
View twi screens together.
Switch apps with two keystrokes or one mouse click.
Find an application in a submenu with three mouse movements.(as opposed to searching for the right tile in multiple start screens).
Etc. Etc.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 14:51 GMT Robert Helpmann??
Re: Deep breath now...
Things you cannot do in the "modern" interface...Switch apps with two keystrokes...
I emphatically do not like the new GUI, but ALT-TAB still works. In fact, it was one of the few familiar things I found when using a friend's new laptop. Not so sure about the rest of the comments as I stopped using the machine as quickly as possible. She said it took her about a week and a half to get used to it. She is a non-IT type.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 04:48 GMT Gray
Re: Deep breath now...
especially worrying to Microsoft, which has already spent mega-millions on marketing Windows 8's new UI, apparently to little effect.
TIFKAM violates a basic principle of human nature, which Microsoft seems unable to grasp as it flings good money after bad: no matter how much they sugar-coat and garnish a turd, people still don't like it.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 09:32 GMT Dinky Carter
Re: Deep breath now...
I really like my Windows Phone, but TIFKAM is just complete shite on a desktop.
Full screen apps are non-sensical on a desktop (drag 'n' drop???)
And even such basic functionality as being able to choose the default app background colour is now gone (we have to live with retina-burn white)
Windows 8 has to be one of the biggest retrograde steps in recent computing history.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 13:19 GMT Paul Shirley
Re: "TIFKAM is perfectly usable, it just isn't the interface people are used to."
Metro is a UI designed down to the least common denominator, one designed for what a small screen touch only device is capable of (and I'd argue crap like magic corners is inherently bad design even there).
Not just different, it's an impoverished UI, hamstrung by it's assumptions:
1: that it has to look the same everywhere (a pure marketing requirement with no real reason to exist), where 'everywhere' leaks strongly into desktop mode (so even functional window chrome had to go)
2: that it has to behave identically everywhere, regardless of the quality or precision of your input devices
3: that fullscreen is always the 'right thing', whatever the hardware, whatever restrictions it causes
There's a more subtle assumption: that desktop=legacy mode. Legacy modes inevitably become 2nd class, with degraded support and allowed to rot before being dropped completely - at least in the minds of the managers and developers maintaining them... and Win8 desktop mode is showing signs of neglect, from the hastily crippled chrome and theming options to the astonishing bugginess of File Explorer to the almost random organisation of settings and on and on.
The real issue here remains the same, if I'm using an 'interface people (aren't) used to' there's no reason it should be a Microsoft interface. If users are increasingly using reduced function devices instead of PCs, Microsoft are screwed because traditional Windows doesn't work there.
Everything in Win8 has to train users to use the impoverished Metro UI that does work on new devices. Metro can't be allowed to work better on a PC than a tablet and desktop has to be subtly (and not so subtly) degraded to make Metro more attractive. It's cynical, desperate and failing.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:55 GMT Schultz
@Khaptain: Third party applications are just fine.
There is nothing essential about the start menu that would require it as part of the OS. There is no need to buy into the MS propaganda that this or that function must be an essential part of the OS, at best those were essential functions to embrace and suffocate the competition.
I like my software modular and I like choice.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 23:56 GMT h3
There really is no difference between the Metro screen and the start menu in any ways that matter.
Using the windows key or ctrl + escape and then just typing part of the name is the same on both OS's
windows + r still works (for stuff like regedit or cmd where it is quicker).
windows + x has most of the rest of the useful stuff.
I use the Metro Mail app for personal mail that is it. (Used to brilliant when gmail activesync worked. No way to get it back after a system refresh though so the cloud sync of setting is completely pointless).
My TV is not certifed for Windows 8 or I might have used that feature.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 08:40 GMT MacGyver
@h3
"There really is no difference between the Metro screen and the start menu in any ways that matter."
Other than efficiency. I very rarely use the keyboard, and most of the functionality you listed needs the keyboard and to add insult to injury they want two hands to issue the key combinations. Which blows my mind in the fact that this is supposed be designed for computers lacking keyboards. That just screams poor design.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 12:16 GMT Anonymous Coward
I want an operating system...
Not a computer that needs psychoanalysis to get it working.
You know like "The ON button" and "The OFF button".
But noooooo the management of Microsoft, insist that you stick the tooth brush up your arse to clean your teeth...
This is what an epic idiot trip their OS's and software have become.
Stupid new ways, to do plain old things.
For the profit margin that's why. For the profit margin.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 14:15 GMT Tom 13
Re: criticising Microsoft for creating a market opportunity
It's the correct application of the word "required" that presents the problem. Stacker wasn't required for Windows 3.x to work, but some users thought it made the software better. QEMM wasn't required for Windows 3.x to work, but it was a pretty handy tool for most users, even as MS kept breaking it to kill it because their tool was crap.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:21 GMT Anonymous Coward
@Khaptain
"TIFKAM appears to have been designed by Microsoft in order to follow Microsoft's strategic plans, it seems very difficult to believe that many actual objectively thinking users were consulted during it's developement."
Oh, but it isn't, Microsoft actually consults its users all the time. If there's one thing Microsoft does "right" (sort off) it's providing a platform for their users to share their opinions on the matter. And for their entire range of products too; from Windows (through their Windows blog) right down to their development products, for example through the Visual Studio UserVoice site.
What does seem unbelievable though is that Microsoft actually pays any attention to all the feedback they've been getting.
There are some exceptions, but even those show how stubborn Microsoft actually is. For example; while a regular suggestion for Visual Studio 2012 ("VS2012") gets approximately a few hundred votes (500 - 600) the suggestion to bring back colours to the interface quickly grossed in a few thousand during the first week. Yet only after approx. eight thousand votes did someone at Microsoft suddenly wake up and considered to write a theme editor module for VS2012 which allowed users to change the colour scheme as they deemed fit. They also added a few more themes apart from the default 2 (which were called "dark" and "light"). At this moment the suggestion in question has gotten thirteen thousand votes and the number still rises.
Microsoft is consulting their users all right, the only problem is that they're totally ignoring what is being said.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 09:47 GMT T. F. M. Reader
Don;t attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by normal projetc management.
"Yet only after approx. eight thousand votes did someone at Microsoft suddenly wake up and considered to write a theme editor module for VS2012"
Maybe the project was behind schedule, and when they reviewed the remaining development effort and plans for QA they started striking features off the list, and a "theme editor module" didn't survive the purge. On a later date, and when faced with vocal demand from thousands of users, the requirement was re-prioritised, resources were re-allocated, and the "theme editor module" got back on the list.
Don't we all witness similar scenarios in our own organizations?
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 12:32 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: @Khaptain
Actually, they stopped development stage user UI testing after Windows 2000. They listen to feedback now only after releasing the product. Both Vista and 8 have suffered from this. Windows 7 (and 8.1) are the results of the feedback. This seems to be a bass-akward way of development, but maybe they view bad PR to be better than no PR.
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Friday 24th May 2013 12:37 GMT GrumpyOldMan
Re: @Khaptain
But are those 'users' it listens to all MSDN subscribers who do the alpha and beta testing, IT guys who have to fix the bugs or fix the UI so that users can use it, or are they - if the ads are to be believed - Mrs Jones who's a mum with that oh-so-cute little girl in an immaculate house in a nice suburb somewhere but seems a little bit too computer-savvy to be believable? If MS really do listen to their users why do we still have the ribbon? Having said that it took me a year to get off Windows 3.11 and on to Windows 95, then ages to shift to 98. I went NT4 not long after that and then to 2000 Pro at work which was great. Again, XP took me aeons - SP1 was well and truly out - but then took me ages to get off it and on to Windows 7 which I really like and intend to stay with now. So in about 4 years I may dip my toe into Windows 8. Or not...
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 08:05 GMT Grey Bird
3rd part desktop manager/start menu
I know this will probably get a lot of downvotes but... Linux has had to use 3rd party desktop managers/start menus since it started using a gui. Xwindows, KDE, Gnome, xfce, etc. are _all_ 3rd party code and not native parts of Linux. So I don't see using a 3rd party desktop gui as a big deal. I really like DesktopX and Windowblinds! :-) That being said, I don't currently have any plans to "upgrade" to Win8 ever. If I bought a windows tablet it might be usable, but it just doesn't appeal to me. I've used Windows since 3.1, and MS-DOS before that. I've used various flavors of (maybe I should say flavours) Linux and Mac OS. Even a little bit of actual UNIX and DEC and way back, CP/M, but I just don't see the appeal of TIFKAM.
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Friday 24th May 2013 05:13 GMT John Tserkezis
"No OS should ever require 3rd party programs in order for it to become useable."
You must be very easily pleased.
I've replaced the built-in windows copy routine, because it's a little bit buggy, and doesn't offer features I need.
I've replaced the delete routines - strictly not needed, but the extra reporting is nice.
I've replaced windows explorer, because, well, it doesn't come close the to productivity levels I have now.
I've replaced the built-in browser, because it was Internet Exploror, do I need any more reason than that?
I've replaced the "built-in" email client - which they force you to download - because mine is better.
I've replaced Media Player. Because I can.
I've installed my own security manager. Not that hard to get better than BitLocker.
I've replaced my command prompt. Batch scripts feature heavily here, and beating DOS isn't hard.
I've replaced the bulit-in CD/DVD burner. Mainly because I want to get work done the way *I* want to.
-- And that's just replacing the built-in utilities - wanna get me started on actual add-on productivity software?
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:18 GMT Anonymous Coward
No it doesn't
True, Classic Shell makes Windows 8 useable, but consider this analogy that doesn't involve software of any kind.
You buy a new car.
It is a tad faster than your old one, corners very slightly better and returns a slightly better fuel consumption.
Would you then expect the dashboard and controls to be so awful that you would willingly go down to your local Classic Shelby motor mart to have the gear shift taken down from the roof and reinstalled on the prop tunnel, the square steering knob replaced with a round wheel and the dashboard you had to rotate to view one dial at at time, replaced with a couple of convetional instruments.
Would you find that accceptable?
What would you think of people suggesting that you were just being a bit of a traditionalist in your reaction to a new and exciting way to drive a car?
I submit you would be asking the manufacturer to put the gear shift on the prop tunnel, make the steering wheel round and have the instruments in view at all times.
That, friends, is the real-world analogy of the excerable wonder of Win 8. A product only loved by those managerial staff who should be leaving on the "B" Ark and the kind of prople who use the word "Leverage" as a verb.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 12:05 GMT Shades
Re: No it doesn't
"to have the gear shift taken down from the roof and reinstalled on the prop tunnel, the square steering knob replaced with a round wheel and the dashboard you had to rotate to view one dial at at time, replaced with a couple of convetional instruments.
Sounds more like an old school Citroen!
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Friday 24th May 2013 16:57 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: No it doesn't
> You mean the kind of "prople" who write the Oxford English Dictionary? The OED has both noun and verb forms for "leverage".
"Leverage" is a fairly recent addition from our American cousins, inexplicable because there is a perfect word that already exists for the purpose, that being "lever".
You lever something with a lever. You don't need to leverage it.
Why not go the whole hog and leveragitate it?
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 11:46 GMT Nigel 11
Re: Real Solutions
The solution is not to use Classic Shell or Start8. It is to not buy Windows 8. At. All.
The problem with that as a corporate user is that we have downgrade rights, and that the hardware sold with Windows 7 costs MORE than the same hardware with Windows 8. And since we always blow away whatever crapware a PC ships with by re-installing our customized image, we're "buying" Windows 8 if MS cares to view it that way.
However, I'm sure that they can count activations and work out the truth of the above. If they want to. MS has (maybe had) an "Emperor's new clothes" problem.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 23:27 GMT Daniel B.
Wrong joke.
"There are more Windows 8 users than Linux on desktop users combined. Deal with it."
THIS is the actual joke that should be put to sleep. It's not even funny, given that Android+Linux tablets probably outnumber Win8 installs, including Tablet versions.
(Not to mention that Linux servers still outnumber Windows Servers as well.)
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 07:07 GMT cyborg
Re: More than half?
> There are more Windows 8 users than Linux on desktop users combined. Deal with it.
All I know is that when I bought my parents a laptop for Christmas that they knew enough about Windows 8 to mention that they would prefer not to have it. These are not technical people. They have used Ubuntu on an old XP PC I upgraded and dealt with it fine but wanted Windows because that's easier for them (as far as they understand any of this) because that's what other people use. And they knew from a position of not really having the knowledge or experience to really form a view otherwise that Win 8 was not for them.
Is there anyone out there who isn't paid to do so singing the virtues of Win 8? Or are people just using what comes with their machines because if they had a choice even those with a small amount of knowledge will be avoiding Win 8? You know, like this survey is showing.
I hardly think market inertia is anything for an MS fanboy to be getting wet about. Win 8 is clearly not winning any friends.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 12:40 GMT cyborg
Re: More than half?
@AnoymousCoward
I never asked them so I really don't know what caused them to be wary of Win8. Never really crossed my mind - first thing I thought was "well I was going to go for Win7 anyway on that assumption but I'm surprised that you'd even be thinking about it." They read The Sun (ugh) so I don't know if there's anything in there that has warned them off and I'm not aware of anyone of their friend's having a Win8 device.
Maybe those adverts for it really put them off. In which case <insert Eadon caps MS FAIL shouty text>.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 10:52 GMT Dan McIntyre
Re: More than half?
"Is there anyone out there who isn't paid to do so singing the virtues of Win 8? Or are people just using what comes with their machines because if they had a choice even those with a small amount of knowledge will be avoiding Win 8?"
Yup, me. I've been using Win8 since the first preview version on my laptop and main desktop at home and love it. Once the final release version was out I upgraded all our machines at home to it and have had no problems other than my Mrs moaning a bit about not knowing how to use it on her laptop.
And to address the point about just using what comes with a machine, none of our machines were Win8 machines previously, I made a conscious decision to install it on them all. Our teenage boys love it as they say it is just like their X boxes.
And as for me, I'm an IT professional of 13 years, as well as a freelance writer on disability and employment issues.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 12:11 GMT jason 7
Re: More than half?
@cyborg
"All I know is that when I bought my parents a laptop for Christmas that they knew enough about Windows 8 to mention that they would prefer not to have it."
I have heard the same thing from some of my customers when I offer to put Windows 8 on a new build for them.
I ask them simply "why?".
The answer is always "Er well I dunno, I just heard it's not very good?" Hmmm okay.
I then explain the changes and they are happy to go ahead. Haven't had any issues yet.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 07:22 GMT darklordsid
Re: More than half?
No longer, since the moment MS mixed up mobile and desktops.
There are more Linux based (and its Linux kernel based Android mobile counterpart) machines than Windows based machines.
And I'm not talking of W8 alone.
The blow for MS business model was immense, and the best has jet to come...
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 19:11 GMT Shades
Re: More than half?
"There are more Linux based (and its Linux kernel based Android mobile counterpart)"
Oh god, this again. In the eyes of "normal" people Android is as much Linux as a Jaguar X-Type is a Ford Mondeo (in an old frock). Hell, from many comments on El Reg many people still don't differentiate Android, as an OS that can be used on a multitude of hardware, and the manufacturer of their current handset upon which it runs (to some people Android = Samsung). To most people Windows is Windows, Android is Android and a Jaguar X-Type is a Jaguar X-Type.
You're comparing A with B + C.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 07:27 GMT darklordsid
Oh, I guess loading a pathetic single window environment lacking windowing function common since Windows 1.0 is faster than loading a proper desktop manager.
If it's a so clever idea why not skipping all that useless GUI paraphernalia and directly boot in Power Shell for next version?
Or maybe for next-next one we can also skip the useless bundle of the command interpreter and load only hardware microcode, that's even faster - so, clearly, it is an huge evolution!
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 20:06 GMT Roland6
Re: launching into TIFKAM is quicker...
Haha obviously not used the Store app - it takes for ever to load because of the stupidly large start page that it has to full download before it will display anything, then presenting the content it in a totally stupid a way (infinite horizontal scoll) for browsing.
As for boot, once the system is up and running both Desktop and TIKFAM are loaded and given that shutdown is hidden away MS don't really intend you to be constantly booting the system...
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 12:21 GMT jason 7
Re: Trivial
Epic Fail for another reason.
I agree that the effort required to negate all the rage about Windows 8 is trivial and takes all of about 4 minutes to rectify. Yet it seems so many supposedly IT guru types just don't seem to get it.
"Oh you shouldn't have to modify an OS to use it! FAIL!"
Right so all you guys just install your OS and leave it at that? You don't do any tweaking or install any third party software at all? I really don't think so.
If the damn thing was incompatible with 90% of hardware and software, molested your mother or was BSOD'ing all the time I could understand the rage. But just a few minor UI tweaks to make it all better?
Never in the history of computing has something so pointless been argued over by so many that shouldn't find it an issue in the first place.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 12:46 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Trivial
Self styled IT guru types. What puzzles me is why we get such a high proportion of comments here from primarily Linux users on Windows usability when desktop Linux has negligible presence in the real world. Desktop, sure Linux is a real force in server space and as part of Android but that's not the point.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:01 GMT Andus McCoatover
OK. What's wrong with XP?
<old-Git-mode> (Or, should that be "Jit" ? )
I'm currently reloading XP on my decrepid old machine, over Linux Mint for various reasons*.
I don't need 'eye-candy', an "enhanced user experience" - as I've argued before, I wanna browse the web, write job apps, be aware via Gmail when the rejection letters come in, and calculate when, in the next millenia I can afford to take the missus to Bognor. Few need more. </old-Jit-mode>
* Got over the fallacy that Google Chrome on Linux (Mint-13) has an inbuilt Flash player. It doesnt. Tried all weekend on so many forums to follow advice to getting flash working on any browser. It doesn't. Even the bloke who wrote 'flash-aid' for FF to get it going has withdrawn the add-on from FF's repository.
Windows XP from now on. Libre office. "That'll do, pig!".
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:17 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
Well, I'm a Debian fan, I don't run Windows and I don't run Chrome. I'm not going to suggest you don't use XP though. However I'm curious, can you not install the nonfree plugin and make it work? On Debian I gave up on anything but the nonfree one, because it just works. However, Adobe really needs to allow you to select the audio device, because only having the option of "default" is just annoying (especially if you have a asskwards HDMi setup like me).
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:53 GMT asdf
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
More proof why its a good thing Flash is going away (not near fast enough though especially with Adobe quickly dropping support for the legendary malware portal). Still I had no problems with flash working out of the box on my Mint 13 install. Of course I was running the 64 bit version on Cinamon and I actually installed Google Chrome off a deb I downloaded from Google and not Chromium from the repositories. For an older machine it might make more sense and be less hassle to run Xubuntu (or perhaps Mint XFCE haven't tried it though) instead.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:35 GMT M Gale
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
Meh, horses for courses. Personally I bloody hate OS X's UI, with the unified confuso-menu, and the dock that wants you to think a shortcut to a program and a running program are the same thing. Don't even get me started on those bloody hot corners, and Finder.. god, you actually like that thing?
As far as the direction KDE's going in, you'll probably find they have the least "radical and exciting" look to them of all the Linux (and other) desktop environments. If you could use KDE3, you can use KDE4. It's just prettier, and with plasma widgets.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:47 GMT asdf
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
Sorry for pulling original post but it was so off topic to be hard to defend but will reply.
>with the unified confuso-menu
Agree that is very bush league and very 1991ish you can't hide the thing easily but can be done with some hacks on a per app basis at least.
> Finder.. god, you actually like that thing?
No Finder is garbage and pain the ass in general but in Mac OS you end up having to use a file manager a lot less.
>you'll probably find they have the least "radical and exciting" look to them of all the Linux (and other) desktop environments. If you could use KDE3, you can use KDE4. It's just prettier, and with plasma widgets.
I have never liked KDE and its bloat ever (did like K3B back in the day when free burner software was rare, almost worth a gig in KDE libraries for it). I tried it again recently because the other major desktops were such a mess and couldn't stand the thing. Cinnamon and MATE were useable at least but for my workflow (homeflow) were just not near as polished and were a bit jarring.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 23:29 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
"Personally I bloody hate OS X's UI, with the unified confuso-menu,"
If you assume that menu bars have to be associated with windows, then, yes, OS X's menu bar will be extremely confusing to you. (As in: "what window is this thing for?") But if you can get past that mental limitation and realize that in OS X, menu bars are associated with *applications*, then the menu bar's location and operation make perfect sense and I don't see how it could be designed any other way.
"and the dock that wants you to think a shortcut to a program and a running program are the same thing."
And what's wrong with that? When you click on a program, that means you want to use the program. Whether or not it's currently running is irrelevant.
" Don't even get me started on those bloody hot corners, and Finder.. god, you actually like that thing?"
The hot corner stuff isn't enabled by default so why complain about it. As for the Finder, what's wrong with it? I can think of a few things I would change but it's a million times better than Explorer on Windows. Don't get me started about Explorer... it takes as long (or longer) to "prepare to copy/delete" files as it does to actually copy/delete them. It doesn't present an easy way to unmount volumes. It takes ages calling 3rd party code to generate previews of files which is usually not useful and sometimes a horrific security hole. Its search features are so slow and confusing as to be pointless. etc.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 23:36 GMT Daniel B.
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
"Personally I bloody hate OS X's UI, with the unified confuso-menu,"
Um... in fact, the ever-present menu bar is the original paradigm. That feature has been there since at least System 3, maybe even the first Mac there ever was. And all of those pre-date Windows. Sure, some of the later UI changes aren't nice, but they're still much better than the toy UI rammed into Win8.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 04:39 GMT hungee
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
It is always hilarious when Mac enthusiasts compare the latest versions of Mac OSX to Win XP which was around before Mac OSX in its current form existed. Yes, XP was slow, it was over ten years ago that they made it.
The reason I use Win8 (while ignoring TIFKAM)? Faster, better, stronger. Awesome usability (some which were present in Mac OSX first admittedly) other features that have no parallel, such as the detail in task manager and file transfer. The unified search which is better than anything else I have seen on any system. The subtraction of shadowed and aero makes the GUI better IMO and uses far less resources.
Cue downvotes. But for this windows kid I would say, don't believe the hype
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 23:21 GMT M Gale
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
If you assume that menu bars have to be associated with windows, then, yes, OS X's menu bar will be extremely confusing to you. (As in: "what window is this thing for?") But if you can get past that mental limitation and realize that in OS X, menu bars are associated with *applications*, then the menu bar's location and operation make perfect sense and I don't see how it could be designed any other way.
I'd rather just have a UI that's easy to use. No, I don't mean TIFKAM.
When you click on a program, that means you want to use the program. Whether or not it's currently running is irrelevant.
You might have a terabyte of RAM and a ten-SSD stripe array plugged directly into the PCIe bus on a 16x slot, but I don't. Even if I did, I want to know what is running and what is not. At a glance.
Also, ever clicked the wrong button before? I'm assuming you're human and not a General System Vehicle or other synthetic intelligence that might be a few thousand times more accurate than your average meat-sack.
The hot corner stuff isn't enabled by default
Yes it is. Top right corner, zooms everything out and shows all of the windows. Sounds like a handy thing until you keep tripping it by accident.
And don't get me started on Explorer either.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 13:15 GMT jason 7
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
Erm I agree with you. I don't use Macs much at all (I had a 512K Mac in the late 80's) and this week I had to install some software on a customers new 13" Macbook. Apparently she "didn't have a clue how to do it!" Well not having a DVD drive and her buying the DVD version didn't help her much.
Have to say not the most fluid or intuitive 30 minutes or so I've had with a computing device.
The Macbook just kind of sat there as much to say "okay what you gonna do?"
I got there in the end but it did seem I had to ask her for her password every 20 seconds (she wouldn't tell me).
Yes lovely hardware but I think Mac fans might be living on past glories if they think OSX is still the slickest/easiest OS around. It all felt a bit old fashioned to me.
I'm sure with a serious overhaul it could get back up there.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 17:35 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
"The Macbook just kind of sat there as much to say "okay what you gonna do?""
"Yes lovely hardware but I think Mac fans might be living on past glories if they think OSX is still the slickest/easiest OS around. It all felt a bit old fashioned to me."
Yes, you do need to know a few basic things to operate a Mac, like how to switch to the Finder and bring up a window of drives that you have inserted/connected. Otherwise, yes, it will just "sit there." And it will ask for your password when you are doing something that's a potential security risk. (What questionable software were you using, that it required an installer?)
Microsoft's design goal with Windows seems to be "make it so an idiot can bang his forehead on the keyboard and get it to do something."
Apple's approach is a little more nuanced.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 03:20 GMT Chairo
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
Well - once MS pulls the plug sometime early next year, there will be no patches any more for XP. As long as you can live with an unpatched system, that might still be OK. I wonder, however, what will happen to the activation servers. Does anyone know, if they are going offline, as well?
Btw: I'm running Firefox on Ubuntu "precise pangolin" and Flash is running. (Not running well, or running stable, or anything - we are talking about Flash, anyway).
Coat - the one with the patches, please!
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 05:53 GMT Andus McCoatover
@Chiaro: Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
It's not the activation servers I'm worried about - there's plenty on the internet on how to circumvent that.
It's the 'fresh install' and stuck with IE6, SP2, and no access to patches upto the time they killed it.
'wget' to the rescue, before they take them down? maybe, then a nice big fat Pirate Bay-style torrennt will emerge somewhere....(viruses, warts an' all)
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 07:50 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: @Chiaro: OK. What's wrong with XP?
>>It's the 'fresh install' and stuck with IE6, SP2, and no access to patches upto the time they killed it
An XP pro restore disc came with this HP laptop, it uses strings from the BIOS to activate.
Grab the strings with dmidecode. (Linux)
Make a VirtualBox fake BIOS with a 15 line script. (from the VBox forum)
Use ninite (Windows) to slipstream SP3 into the .iso
Voila! I can now run XP pro SP3 on any machine that supports virtualisation.
I must remember to get the final updates next year and export the VM as a backup.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 07:29 GMT Mystic Megabyte
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
Running Ubuntu 12.10 here, Flash is working fine in Firefox and Chromium.
It is a shame that the FlashAid add-on is no longer available, maybe it will return.
I can always run XP in a VM if it's needed, which is rare these days.
This laptop is about five years old, not what you'd call state of the art.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 07:39 GMT jubtastic1
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP? - Re: Flash
My main desktop doesnt (can't) run flash, I've noticed that HTML5 playback is gaining ground now, used to be that you'd get it on mobile/tablets while the same page on a desktop would insist you used flash, but HTML5 playback options are appearing.
My advice is that even if your system can run flash you should uninstall it, use a flash less browser for everyday and keep chrome around for the sites that insist upon it.
With no mobile support Flash is dying on its arse, and every browser that runs without it hastens its departure from the desktop.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 12:33 GMT Nigel 11
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
Quite a lot is wrong, but the faults are well-hidden "under the hood" to use a car analogy. Your mechanic (IT staffer) deals with the bad bits. You use the UI, which is actually rather good (and I say that as a 75% Linux user). You don't know anything of the bad bits until it breaks down.
Windows 7 is much better under the hood, but regrettably changed the UI in a lot of ways which didn't make it better, just gratuitously different. It was an annoyance, but soon enough one got used to it. Same level of annoyance as buying a new car from a different manufacturer. Major stuff the same, minor controls all different but same basic functions once you find them.
Windows 8 is slightly better than Windows 7 under the hood, but the UI sucks mightily. Square steering wheel, pedals swapped around, instruments that require you to take both hands off the steering wheel to use them ... like someone resurrected the controls from a Model T Ford and piled a load of 21st-century stuff around them. Couldn't happen with a car, because that sort of change would kill people.
MS can still rescue itself. It should give XP at least one year longer before ceasing bugfixes, and develop a smooth migration path from both XP and 7 to Windows 9 for techies and unskilled users alike. But they are walking ever closer to a cliff edge with their eyes shut.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 16:44 GMT Roland6
Re: OK. What's wrong with XP?
Well a big thing in XP's favour is that, provided you can keep your system running you will continue to have access to all those DRM encumbered media files ... (see http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/05/22/acetrax_closure_drm_woes/ )
Also if the rumours about 'Blue' are to be believed, it will be an easier user experience migration from XP to 'Blue', so why rush into Windows 8?
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:04 GMT Hoagiebot
I have Windows 8 Pro installed on a little Intel Atom-powered Acer Aspire One netbook, and the desktop side of Windows works great on the thing. However, due to the netbook having a maximum screen resolution of 1024x600, which is below The Interface Formerly Known As Metro (TIFKAM)'s minimum screen resolution requirement of 1024x768, absolutely no Windows Store app will load. None. Nada. And you know what? I really don't feel like I am missing out on a thing.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:11 GMT The lone lurker
re:screen res
Go into regedit and search for "Display1_DownScalingSupported"
Change all instances to "1" and reboot, you can now select higher resolutions on your netbook... Some things will look slightly strange as you cannot magically create pixels but for browsing etc. at arms length the higher vertical resolution is a godsend!
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:47 GMT Robert Carnegie
Re: Go into regedit and search for "Display1_DownScalingSupported"
If that works, it's extremely useful. On my little Fizzbook Spin, there is no clue that that could happen. Thank you! And, Microsoft, you're morons! Do you just want me to buy a new PC... oh. Oh, I see.
One catch... I've used PCs that implemented display scaling in hardware, I think. Samsung Q1 specifically. Maybe it depends on the PC having that capability.
By the way, my Spin - the first of two models issued, I think - also gets confused about touch if I rotate the Windows 8 display orientation to portrait. Touches on the screen behave as though the screen image is landscape, so -this- corner becomes -that- corner. So, any more ideas...?
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 09:48 GMT Hoagiebot
Re: re:screen res
I was well aware of the display "downscaling" registry trick, but I can't consider it to be a serious long-term solution. Have you actually tried to work on a screen that has downscaling enabled for any significant length of time? It's not a pleasant experience! Downscaling a 1024x768-resolution image onto a 1024x600-hardware-resolution screen squishes the image and makes it fuzzy. It's fine to have downscaling enabled for a few minutes as a way to open a Windows Store app just long to configure its settings, such as setting your location in the Windows Store UI weather app so that the "live tile" displays the correct weather for where you are, but there is no way that you can use downscaling for any length of time because it makes all of the text being displayed on the screen fuzzy to the point that it becomes significantly more difficult to read text that has been rendered in smaller font sizes. Because of that, I would hardly call enabling downscaling a truly viable work-around-- it is much more like an emergency MacGyver-like solution that you can get away with for a short period of time when you find yourself in a pinch.
Since getting my location set in the weather app so that I can see my local weather info in the live tile was the only "Windows Store" UI-related thing that I ever felt truly compelled to do, I just stay in my netbook's 1024x600 native resolution and use the traditional desktop nearly the entire time. Heck, if Windows 8 still supported sidebar gadgets like Windows 7 and Vista did I would place my weather gadget on the desktop and never have a compelling reason to switch back over to viewing the TIFKAM side of things again.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:08 GMT Adam Trickett
Is anyone but Steve surprised?
It's hardly surprising in the main.
I am surprised that tablet users aren't using touch more though. However if you've bought a Windows tablet then you are more likely to have a Windows "mindset" and legacy software, which isn't touch driven.
I don't really care, I don't use Windows at home and work have made it quite clear that the switch from XP to 7 was painful enough and we won't be upgrading to 8.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:23 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Is anyone but Steve surprised?
I'm not sure about the mindset, but I think more people mention that it can run legacy software, than actually run legacy software. I have yet to see anyone in a private atmosphere running legacy software on one, but then again, I've only seen about 5 people using them :-/
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:21 GMT phr0g
Not surprising
If you buy a 2 GUI system that has an almost infinte amount of software of any type you want readily available for the old one and mainly repeat recreational stuff available for the new one then that's gonna be what the majority use.
Hell I am a Windows developer, and we are all swapping to Windows 8 on non-touch machines at work. It's painless enough once you've gone through the first 10 minutes of "What the heck". Some people install Classic shell, some don't. Makes little difference in the scheme of things.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 04:18 GMT phr0g
Re: Not surprising
"Be honest here, do you really have a choice?"
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Personally, no, but of course we could leave the systems on Win7 of course, but then Win 8 brings with it the advantages of native Hyper-V support.
All work is done on VMs sitting on our SSD drives which in turn are running various Windows Server versions.
But either way I have Win8 on both my laptop and desktop at home. On one I am testing Classic Shell, but it makes little difference to be honest, apart from slowing down the access to certain functions.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 20:27 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Not surprising
Somehow you have 2 down votes, for what I do not know, but I do know the voting on this site is amazingly useless.
Anyways, I figured since you were a developer, you would have to. I don't remember the specifics, and I could be wrong (probably am..70/30), but I thought you had to upgrade to 8 to develop certain mobile apps for either their current mobile OS, or the next due out. Again, I don't know, I'm a *nix user, but I imagine that is in the works somehow. This isn't a stab at windows, but if they want a brighter tomorrow, they are apparently going to have to start forcing upgrades one way or the other.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:32 GMT The_Regulator
Your right it makes no difference, its just like using a better version of Windows 7 with the option to use apps if and when you want or need to.
I've been trying to preach that for a long time but finally we have some illustrated facts that back up the theory.
So with the above being true really all the complaints about TIFKAMare somewhat nullified. If you don't like it don't use it and shut the heck up...
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:06 GMT Schultz
Re: Not surprising
I agree, win8 works quite well replacing older windows systems. After a few weeks, I completely gave up on TIFKAM, it was just too much hassle for simple stuff (e.g., copy/paste) that worked just fine before.
TIFKAM might be useful in a world with VGA resolution, where multiple windows might overcrowd the screen(although I remember coping just fine with Windows for Workgroups back in the days).
MS developed TIFKAM for its own agenda: to push into phones and pads. They didn't develop it to be useful. Funny that such a strategy should fail :).
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 17:43 GMT asdf
Re: +1 for "nut huggers"
Would love to take credit but that term is fairly old here in the states. It originally referred to the ridiculous short shorts NBA players in the 1980s wore like Larry Bird but it wasn't long until it became an insult to refer to people who cling in the same matter to products/companies etc.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:23 GMT Dana W
Good.
Can you blame them? Its every bit as stupid and useless as Launchpad. The only difference is Launchpad can be easily ignored.
Seriously, I'm glad you guys are getting your desktop back. I can't imagine having to use the interface formerly known as Metro. It would be like starting my Mac and having Launchpad as my default. I'm happy they finally LISTENED for once.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 23:41 GMT Daniel B.
Re: Good.
TBH, they tried to pull a Jobs with Sinofsky, plugging their ears to the zillion devs/beta testers who told them TIFKAM sucked. The difference is that they lacked the Jobs RDF, and that even Jobs knew better than to make Launchpad mandatory, or Gatekeeper, or having the iStuff apps use iCloud exclusively.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 16:43 GMT Pascal Monett
Re: I'm happy they finally LISTENED for once.
Ten thousand testers with bullhorns is hardly what I'd call LISTENING.
The failure of TIFKAM as it is now called is a surprise for no one. Microsoft was warned well in advanced, but bull-headed its way through as it always does.
Money talks, and money is the only thing Microsoft is paying attention to. Now that TIFKAM is indeed gearing up to be the Waterloo that users said it would, MS is suddenly trying to do something else, like actually PAYING ATTENTION to what has been said and repeated in its own forums.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:32 GMT RISC OS
Metro appps suck balls
They are shit, filled with adverts, all of them trying to get you to buy full versions. I haven't yet seen an app that made me want to use it excet for cut the rope
Some are so bad that they are damaging MS. cheap factory produced database apps that all do the same thing an look like they wre made in 5 minutes... most of them make iBoobs looks advanced and useful.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 23:49 GMT Eddy Ito
Re: Wait, something's missing here...
Really? Fine.
"See, I told you that nobody would use M$ Metro. I said it back before XP was even released that W8 SUX SOX, M$ EVIL, BLAH, BLAH, Privacy, Google & Apple not as bad, roll your own kernel only, I told you so! M$ METRO FAIL. EVEN M$ FAIL FAIL. I told you so. FAIL."
Feel better?
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 00:11 GMT Steven Roper
Re: Wait, something's missing here...
Eadon isn't here precisely because this topic is about Windows 8. He has nothing to gain by posting here, because his modus operandi as a troll isn't to rant about Windows 8, it's to derail forum threads that have nothing to do with Windows 8 with utterly irrelevant rants about Windows 8.
His objective is to get everyone posting about what a wanker he is and how sick they are of his irrelevant posts and thus obliterate the topic of discussion with anti-Eadon flaming. That's what trolling is all about, and that's exactly what he is. If he posted here, his posts would simply be lost in the general anti-Windows 8 noise, so his trolling here would be a waste of time.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:39 GMT Keith 72
You could call that a success.
It's a hybrid desktop/tablet OS. These numbers show, unsurprisingly, that desktop users can clearly still use Win8 almost exactly as if it were Win7. So they're productivity won't have been seriously impaired by being forced to switch to a tablet mindset. Once you get used to a couple of different interface quirks, it's just Win7 but slightly better and it has a few new toys you can play with if you chose to.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 23:23 GMT Ben Tasker
Re: You could call that a success.
These numbers show, unsurprisingly, that desktop users can clearly still use Win8 almost exactly as if it were Win7
No they don't. All they show is that TIFKAM apps weren't opened very often.
Whilst I'm inclined to follow your line of thinking and assume the users were using 'legacy' software the rest of the time, but an assumption is all it actually is. We could also claim that the stats show that users sat dumbfounded for most of the day, only managing to open 2 apps at all (on average).
It's pedantic I know, but we all criticise the marketers who twist stats by making convenient assumptions, lets not start doing it ourselves
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 13:05 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: You could call that a success.
Metro works well for full/split screen apps with a huge benefit that the same programs can be used on tablets. Maybe some on phone and XBO too.
Theres rarely a reason to close many of them either, except to declutter.
Windowed apps remain essential in many use cases. Windowed web apps too. Windowed != legacy apps. My main gripe with Windows 8 is the lack of a modern category of desktop apps.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:40 GMT Not_The_Droids
The big news here
The big news here isn't that 61% launched a TIFKAM app less than once per day... but that it implies that 39% launched a TIFKAM app once or more a day. To a marketdroid, that's a number that will be on the upswing. Just wait until we have 45%! 50%! wOOT wOOT! The glass isn't 61% empty... it's 39% full.
No really, I don't live on another planet.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 12:23 GMT druck
Re: The big news here
Some users launched more than one TIKFAM app a day? How can that be?
I my case it was probably true, on the first day I got the new laptop I launched perhaps 8 or 9 apps, found them all to be utterly utterly dismal, and never touched them again. By the end of the week I'd replaced Windows 8 with Linux. So while I was I Windows 8 user, I was launching more than 1 a day.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 21:40 GMT Jason 24
How long are these apps actually kept open for?
I know the only time I open a metro app is when something has reset the file type associations and it's defaulted back to the music player or picture viewer for mp3s and jpgs.
It's open for about as long as it takes me to hit alt+f4 before changing the association back.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:24 GMT asdf
well
There is one good thing about TIFKAM. It signaled to the world that Microsoft has given up on the abomination that is Windows Presentation Foundation. COM and Win32 API (and MFC, ATL, etc) are old and not sexy but that is still the plumping being used to develop a lot of windows apps including the vast majority Microsoft release. In fact the one major app they released using WPF was VS 2010 and it was dog slow, buggy and generally shit.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:36 GMT Aoyagi Aichou
Those numbers
They seem a bit low to me. 10k stations is nothing, really. It could as well be a single company (which for whatever reason decided to go with Win8) and I bet Microsoft has statistics that would show entirely different numbers (or they would be represented as such). And even if the percentages would be similar on much larger scale, I simply can't see Microsoft doing one full step back. They've grown too arrogant for that.
But it's a good thing that people who don't like TIFKAM don't have to use it because of things like Classic Shell or because they can stay in Windows 7, which is still supported.
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:55 GMT asdf
Re: Those numbers
>But it's a good thing that people who don't like TIFKAM don't have to use it because of things like Classic Shell or because they can stay in Windows 7, which is still supported.
I mean it always good to have a workaround to a problem but Microsoft needs to be hitting it out of the park with their customers right now especially in mobile, not forcing their customers to downgrade or buy a 3rd party app.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 12:43 GMT El Andy
Re: Those numbers
I have to agree. If you read the actual report it has a very obvious anti-Windows 8 bias throughout. And the section on their "methodology" is very light on details about where the PCs being monitored were. I'm not convinced in any way that it necessarily indicates a representative sampling of people at all (which doesn't necessarily mean the results are wrong, just inconclusive).
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Wednesday 22nd May 2013 22:59 GMT Anonymous Coward
i dont mind windows 8, but am using startisback exclusively.. I hate the metro interface.
i dont use any metro apps provided by MS, and only ever use one app thats not. it monitors my DSL data usage, and only because the old desktop widgits from win7 no longer work...
Windows 8 has also caused massive headaches for us at work with the official version of checkpoint encryption sanctioned by the DSD EPL not functioning with it.
microsoft.. why not offer a version that windows users knowa nd like, and keep your metro interface for those who choose to use it..
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 04:35 GMT johnwerneken
I agreee it IS Win7
LOL. Not having a tablet, I must guess that touch tiles add SOME convenience with tiny but touchable screens. I sense that the store aps are basically the sort of thing people put on phones - where is the nearest MickyD's, that sort of thing. At least, I have not found any others, except dubious cutdowns of traditional Win aps, like the Metro version of mail. So it's not clear that any of tiles, touch, or the store aps are of much use.
That said, the IDEA apparently DOES have use: it's what Apple is doing with the MAC, making it as much as possible resemble iOS, because clearly getting ONE interface to work almost everywhere would have various benefits, to uses, to developers, and to system vendors. Maybe someone should check and see what MAC people do with touch screen MACs.
As an updated win7, win8 ROCKS, in speed, in stability, and in some relevant extras, including ISO mounts and VMs without needing anything third party.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 09:07 GMT danny_0x98
Re: I agreee it IS Win7
WWDC is around the corner, but as yet, there are no touch-enabled Macs. That said, gestures have been added for those who use a trackpad, and I chose a trackpad rather than a mouse the last time I bought a Mac in 2011.
As far as Apple's strategy at unifying (though not absolute unification), if one is merely an observer then one may possibly be confused by tech punditry hysteria, conflation, and dire speculations. I don't think OS X and iOS will be exactly the same. Still, 65-70 million is the total number of Mac buyers for all history. They sell in excess of that number of iOS devices every three months. Leveraging mobile user interface elements, where it makes sense, seems smart because the Mac will seem more familiar than a Windows system. Now, pcs are going to skew to power users as tablets continue to grow, so there are limits as to how optimized for single task a desktop os should be.
Microsoft, though has inverted the strategy. They are trying to prep desktop users for the Microsoft mobile interface, to make the Microsoft mobile look and feel be the familiar one. Maybe that's me being just an observer relying on the tech press. If the strategy is fairly stated, It seems to me that an obvious flaw with the plan is that Windows users have been buying iOS and Android devices in large numbers, so the different look and feel is not a problem.
This isn't the first time the desktop has changed and we cannot be surprised when we hear yells, since it happens every time. Even in Mac land. Times are changing, and there are now ways to go with "leave it," when offered the cliched choice of arrogant customer disservice. We'll see what happens.
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Saturday 25th May 2013 02:52 GMT M Gale
Re: I agreee it IS Win7
"As an updated win7, win8 ROCKS, in speed, in stability, and in some relevant extras, including ISO mounts and VMs without needing anything third party."
Have you actually tried running Windows 8 in a VM?
It's a bloody horrible mess of bugs and glitches, and if you should dare try Seamless Mode... well, just watch TIFKAM fall apart completely.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 04:54 GMT DryBones
Much ado about nothing...
TIKFAM is a full-screen Start menu with enough space for each program icon to also display information, live-tile style. That's it. Much nerd-rage about nothing. Even with Windows 7 people were well on the way to not really touching the Start menu. Pin your most common programs to the bottom bar, put the rest on the Desktop, and hardly ever open the Start menu. Need to find it fast, Windows key and type the name. Exactly the same with Windows 8.
I have seen people with so much cruft on their machines that the Windows XP Start menu takes up the entire screen, all full of masses and masses of tiny little icons, so really the only thing that saves you from (gasp!) losing most or all of of your working space for a few seconds (horrors!) is pinning or placing your shortcuts on the Desktop. Apples to apples, TIKFAM wins because both are used as little as possible, but it looks prettier when you do.
Know what I don't miss? The absurd delay between telling the machine you want to open the All Programs listing and it actually showing it. It's like it had to rebuild it every single time. The listing should have been built and saved to a prerendered structure, updated only when something is installed or removed, and other than that not faffed with.
I imagine there'll be downvotes, rather a number judging from previous posts, but the only thing I fault Microsoft for at this point is doing a piss-poor job of educating about the changes. That install tutorial was PATHETIC.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 06:40 GMT Richard 12
Re: Much ado about nothing...
What's missing from the TIFKAM Start Screen?
For a start, Folders.
Without folders it rapidly becomes impossible to find anything you need but don't use often.
Even the search bar may not help because it relies on you knowing what something is called and not what it does or is related to.
- for example the IBM Rational ClearCase Client is called "Remote Client"
Brilliant. So I type "IBM", "Rational" or "ClearCase" and I won't get it. If I type "Client" it'll appear, along with a stack of other programs and I have to recognise the icon or figure it out because it's not Git Client, Mail Client etc.
Or I could just look in the "IBM Rational ClearCase" folder that's created by default, and suddenly the name makes sense!
I could even put that into a Source Control folder along with the others I use more often if I wanted.
Most people have a small number of applications they use every day, but many also have a large number they need once or twice a month (or less)!
A GUI is supposed to be less typing and offer hints that a command line can't.
Essentially, what you're saying is that TIFKAM is just a pretty command line launcher with none of the power.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 19:29 GMT DryBones
Re: Much ado about nothing...
Richard :TIFKAM makes icon groups with the "folder" name above them. So a little scrolling to the right and there's the group and icons. Zoom out a little to go faster then zoom back in. Not the same, but it is there.
Roland: No argument about the lack of documentation and user training that Windows 8 has from me. If they'd just said "Windows key gets you in, Windows key gets you out" and possibly demonstrated it... Yeah, silly. I just find it hard to believe that so many companies that build UIs seem to know nothing about UI design. Because they all seem scientifically designed to suck.
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Friday 24th May 2013 10:51 GMT Richard 12
Re: Much ado about nothing...
That's not a folder (or directory in old language). It's useful, but doesn't serve the same function - it's got more in common with KDE plasma widgets.
I've got something like hundred items in the Start Menu on my Win7 machine. (It's relatively hard to work out)
- More than half are actually the 'uninstaller' or 'configuration' that I will probably only ever run once. They're still there though, and they'd still be be there in the Start Screen, given the same prominence as the actual application they relate to.
So, tell me, how many screenfuls worth of scrolling is that under TIFKAM? Ten to twenty? That's not "a little"! Zooming out doesn't help unless I recognise the icons because the text becomes unreadable. (It's hard enough to read normally)
If I start rearranging things to move those "only ever run once" off to the end, I'll lose any sense of "this is the config tool for that". If two happen to have similar name and icons...
It's just two 'menufuls' of folders on Win7's Start Menu, and the stuff I've used 'a lot' turns up at the beginning without user interaction. If I want I can rearrange it to squash it even smaller, while stil maintaining a sense of "This relates to that" because folders can contain folders. That is a good UI.
The TIFKAM Start Screen is a reasonable UI for a tablet or a phone where somebody's probably only going to have ten to twenty "apps" and will only install anything from a unified interface that provides both installer and uninstaller (like Synaptic or an app store).
It doesn't work for a Windows desktop, where a lot of applications aren't well behaved and many (eg Office!) have multiple components.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 18:28 GMT Roland6
Re: Much ado about nothing...
>What's missing from the TIFKAM Start Screen?
Lots!
On a brand new HP laptop, I only discovered it had a "Getting Started" guide AFTER I had installed Classic Shell, as it clearly appeared as a menu item in the 'Apps' listing. Likewise the first I knew that Win8 included a reader was when I downloaded a PDF and opened it!
What also throws new users is getting out of apps, so for example people click on mail - thinking that because Outlook is installed they will be able to access their mail box through this, and get an error message, but no obvious way to go back to the TIKFAM start screen.
Basically the team that thought up TIKFAM and it's integration with the Desktop hadn't read a single book on HCI and UI and specifically were totally unaware of the work of Donald Norman.
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Friday 24th May 2013 16:15 GMT Chad H.
Re: Much ado about nothing...
"I have seen people with so much cruft on their machines that the Windows XP Start menu takes up the entire screen, all full of masses and masses of tiny little icons, so really the only thing that saves you from (gasp!) losing most or all of of your working space for a few seconds (horrors!) is pinning or placing your shortcuts on the Desktop"
No, thats the only thing that stops THEM. those of us with a decently organised start menu like our videos not being interupted as we work.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 05:49 GMT Anonymous Coward
In daily use, the lack of a Start button is fine. The fury over it is just a sideshow, in practice <Win>-W-type and <Win>-E-type work as well and quickly as well as <Win>-type. It's not better, either, just that this is not the issue.
The real issue is the task switching between the old and new apps. This is the reason I almost never launch Metro apps. This is the reason why I don't even look for apps in the Windows store - I know I would not use them in practice. Even decently well working apps like Netflix gather dust since the task switching between Metro and desktop is so clumsy, even archaic - and switching between Metro and Metro it is not really much better.
So I really don't care if Windows 8.1 brings back the Start button or not. Really. But if they don't reduce the seams between Metro and desktop, the Metro world will just remain as it is now: a huge growth hanging off the side of Windows proper, just gathering dust and occasionally surprising the user when it pops up.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 22:46 GMT Roland6
@AC The real issue is the task switching between the old and new apps.
ModernMix (http://forums.theregister.co.uk/forum/4/2013/03/08/modernmix_saves_windows8/ )
This combined with a configured Classic Shell makes the switching between TIKFAM and desktop more logical and less invasive to a user's activity.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 08:15 GMT FatGerman
Errrr... define "launch"
This sounds like another meaningless set of numbers to me. Define "launch". I only "launch" my email program once per day but then it keeps running all day and gets used several times an hour. Similarly my browser. If I was using TIFKAM I'd be registering about 3 "launches" per day (given that there aren't yet TIFKAM versions of code editors or photoshop or etc etc) but that doesn't mean I'm not using the interface* and it doesn't mean I won't use it more when TIFKAM versions of the apps I actually want to use are released.
*I actually use a Mac, but from what I've seen of Win8, it looks like a pretty nice touch interface with some nice features. Shame that touch interfaces are useless for real work, but hey....
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 09:19 GMT JDX
Almost nobody using Windows Store apps, survey finds
Not surprising. However I think the whole concept of a desktop app-store is to blame, not MS' implementation - I would expect to find the Mac AppStore isn't used much and that is a MUCH more integrated ecosystem. Similarly, the Chrome AppStore for PCs.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 09:21 GMT Steve78
Pile of pony!
The survey is bollocks. Almost no one uses Windows Store? Well maybe the users surveyed had this particular feature locked down, as you would expect in a corporate environment.
Any Admin worth his salt wouldn't allow his users to install all sorts of shit on their PC's, so why make an exception for Windows Store?
And most users treat Windows 8 like Windows 7? No shit! Nearly all tasks and applications run from within the desktop.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 09:37 GMT 0laf
I feel dirty but....
I saw a Dell Win8 tablet used in anger the other day. It worked really well. Non-techy user were being given the choice of the Dell or an iPad. They threw out the iPads within 10min the Dells were so much more practical. Enterprise compatible, removable batteries, sd card slots, more OEM storage no MDM needed.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 10:13 GMT Radium
The really odd thing I find about the survey is this:-
There's no mention at all of Internet Explorer, which surely must be the most used Metro app out there. Did Soluto simply not give people the option of choosing it?
Personally, it's the app I use more than anything else on Windows 8, so the numbers I can't really see the use of these numbers.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 11:13 GMT Chris Long
Ed Zackary
Counting the number of times someone launches an application is a terrible metric for working out how much they use each app. I admit I haven't read the survey itself but presumably the writer of this article did... why no comment about the methodology?
The applications that people use most (email, browser, spreadsheet, IDE, whatever) are likely to be precisely the ones that they launch least often - you launch once when the machine starts up and keep them running all the time. I hear that the kids these days rarely shut machines down fully, just letting them sleep/hibernate, further reducing the number of launches (and partially excusing the relative difficulty of doing a 'shut down' in Win 8).
Seriously, you can't report on such an (apparently) flawed survey without comment...!
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 11:20 GMT Yet Another Commentard
Re: Ed Zackary
Indeed. Most of the TIFKAM applications launched will be because the desktop default lobs you back into TIFKAM land. Which is dumb and just cynical "use our store so we get more cash off you" marketing. I've paid (well, my employer has paid) for the OS, now clear off.
Once I'd put all the defaults back to nice, proper desktop applications I go nowhere near TIFKAM other than on boot, and hit the "Desktop" tile. Maybe the most popular TIFKAM app is "Desktop"?
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 11:33 GMT Chris Long
Re: Ed Zackary
Having now read the (extremely flimsy) report, it's clear that it's pretty worthless. Here are the headline and the first sentence of the report:
"How often are Metro apps used?
We found that, on average, a Windows 8 user will launch a Metro app 1.52 times a day."
So they've already conflated 'how often are apps used' with 'how often are apps launched' within the first twenty words, and it doesn't get any better. Add to that that this survey only covers professionally-managed (ie corporate) devices and it's really not telling us anything useful. Excellent click-bait, though.
I also found this interesting:
"We took the 200 most popular Windows 8 OEM-branded PCs. This sample included 10,927 PCs, representing the following vendors (in alphabetical order): Acer, Apple, Asus, Dell, HP, Lenovo, Samsung, Toshiba."
Really? Apple?
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 10:13 GMT Zippy's Sausage Factory
For me the big fail is reliability and stability. The number of crashes, hardware driver failure and blue screens per day I was getting on my PC was more than I'd ever had before I upgraded it from Windows 7, so I moved it back to Windows 7.
Really, for me, TIFKAM is a minor point. Windows 8 is about the least reliable version of Windows I've used since Windows 3.0. Definitely not ready for release to manufacture.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 13:42 GMT Paul Shirley
I wouldn't go so far. After XP->Win8 I'd describe it's stability as 'different', not better, not lower, just falls over on different things... although right now it's still showing lower uptimes than XP SP3 AND I deliberately detuned the hardware a while back to rule out hardware problems, with no improvement.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 12:42 GMT Gordon Fecyk
It's still early.
Seven months. Of course the early users are going to spend more of their time in the desktop.
And who needs "classic shell" when one can put a toolbar on their desktop taskbar that points to %allusersprofile%\Start Menu? (OK, %allusersprofile%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu then.) No extra software needed.
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Saturday 25th May 2013 03:02 GMT M Gale
Re: It's still early.
And who needs "classic shell" when one can put a toolbar on their desktop taskbar that points to %allusersprofile%\Start Menu? (OK, %allusersprofile%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu then.) No extra software needed.
Because while a similar hack works to replace the crappy pin-to-taskbar thing with the much more easy to read Quicklaunch bar that's been around since XP, trying it to get a Start Menu results in a hollowed out, ugly (uglier?) shell of a menu with no programs sent to it when they are installed, and no automatic placement of commonly used shortcuts right under a winkey press.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 13:13 GMT Jim Willsher
Fantastic
Fantastic. As an employee of a Microsoft Partner I've just received an email promoting their Windows 8 app-creation utility called Joshfire (No, I didn't just make up that silly name). And I quote:
"Even better, for the next 6 weeks Joshfire is free. And what's more, if you're one of the first 250 to create an app with Joshfire, we will give you a lovely Microsoft British & Irish Lions commemorative toy. "
Fantastic. So if I create an app to help dig Microsoft out of the hole they are in with Win 8 apps, I get a free fluffy teddy. Let me drop everything and get started right away.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 14:36 GMT Buzzby
As I Like It
In BT I grew up with DOS to Win XP and also HI nets. There was also a large VAX cluster and all the command line exchanges, sysX & axe10.
I am too idle to go to Linux, windows it is, my son is a heavy gamer. I do not want win8 with that to me silly UI.
I bought a vista pc which I later upgraded to 7. Good enough for me I think.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 15:57 GMT Badvok
Probably no point commenting on this article now that my comment will appear at the bottom of the fourth page of the usual comments, but it will make me feel better to get it out of my system so:
How come this survey only counts 'Launches', rather than time actually spent in a metro app versus time spent in the desktop? Why is there no breakdown of what desktop apps are being used and for how long? I thought the whole point of the new UI was that you never actually closed an app, so doesn't this mean that a user may simply be switching back to an app rather than re-launching it?
Seems like the outcome of the survey shows exactly what they wanted it to show rather than anything meaningful.
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Thursday 23rd May 2013 23:05 GMT Asok Asus
No big surprise
This is a powerful indication that the Windows 8/Windows RT/Metro UI/Apps Store ecosystem has been a complete and total disaster for Microsoft, almost totally alienating PC users while simultaneously failing to move the needle one iota regarding Microsoft's "strategy" to try to become relevant in mobile computing in any fashion whatsoever.
No big surprise of course. Over a year ago tens of thousands of advanced testers told Microsoft that Metro UI was a no-go on the PC and that if they persisted with trying to shove Metro UI down peoples' throats as well as trying to cripple the desktop that Microsoft would be facing the biggest disaster in their history, as well as killing their PC OEMs in the bargain.
And so here we are. Just as predicted.
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Friday 24th May 2013 08:04 GMT airbrush
I Like the new settings but its a job half done..
Havent found a use for any metro apps. Configuring stuff in the metro interface is much clearerl but they've left many of the settings in the old windows 95/vista dialogs, probably because the ui doesnt work well in metro. Unfortunately this makes windows feel disjointed where you have to jump all over the place to set stuff up. I did look in the windows store once. I think ms started to go off the tracks when they tried to switch to 2 year releases so now we have an os with a muddle of windows 95, vista and now windows 8 design rather than a complete over-hall like with NT4/95.