back to article Folders return to Windows 10's Start Thing

Because it’s not complicated enough already, Windows 10’s Start menu will support folders in a forthcoming release. The Windows 10 Redstone 2 release, also dubbed the “Creators Update”, will allow apps to be nested, much as with Windows Phone 8, and the mobile edition of Windows 10. The update is expected around April, and …

  1. bazza Silver badge

    Unbelievable

    All those wasted, fruitless and ruinous years of shoving the PC industry down the tubes with comical, immature user interfaces that no one on the entire planet wanted. They'd already got what had to be one of the best desktop UIs (Win7) ever. If it's coming back, it feels like it's doing so through shear osmotic pressure rather than any kind of coherent plan. Whatever next - Aero? Carousel?

    Sigh....

    If they did something now that had Window 7's UI, none of that advertising / snooping nonsense that is the final ruin of Windows 10, and a tabbed Windows Explorer, I'd happily pay £100 for it.

    1. Will Godfrey Silver badge
      Unhappy

      Re: Unbelievable

      Risky.

      As soon as they got your money. They'd do a hidden forced update that removed everything you wanted.

      1. Updraft102

        Re: Unbelievable

        The removal of forced updates would have to be another feature they'd add back in as well.

    2. GrapeBunch

      Re: Unbelievable

      If they did something now that had Window 7's UI, none of that advertising / snooping nonsense that is the final ruin of Windows 10, and a tabbed Windows Explorer, I'd happily pay £100 for it.

      You already have it. It's called Windows 7. And you might have paid 100 quid for it. Except for the tabbed Explorer. I use xplorer2, which isn't tabbed, but has two panes and is very sweet. But I believe there is a tabbed and free equivalent. Or three.

      PS: Windows 7 is far from perfect. Because Moore, they've had to take one step forward and two steps back with each OS iteration in order to incentivate you to buy the next OS. Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware? It could be argued that the best thing about 10 is that the new model frees them from that warped hamster wheel so they can give us "The OS We Always Wanted To Give You". Registered Trade Mark, ha ha.

      1. This post has been deleted by its author

        1. Danny 14

          Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

          I remember going from 98 to 2k and marvelling at the lack of crashes. I also remember server 2k being utter lightyears better than nt4. XP was even better and 2003 was brilliant. Then came vista (although server 2008 was fine)

          1. This post has been deleted by its author

            1. druck Silver badge
              Angel

              Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

              Def wrote:

              I hated the Walt Disney UI of XP,
              Disney would be less infantile, XP is Telly Tubby land, and no mistake.

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

                Yeah, but it worked and you could get to any program on there quickly without having to remember what it was called. And it didn't try to sell you stuff or divert you to some crappy store.

              2. Nolveys

                Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

                XP is Telly Tubby land

                I guess that would make Windows 10 equivalent to Wonder Shozen.

                1. Anonymous Coward
                  Anonymous Coward

                  Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

                  It occurred to me that I may have seemed to disapprove of Explorer++ earlier on in the thread, but that is not the case...it does crash periodically -for me, anyway hence the warning- but it's way better than the native W7 explorer because you are definitely in the tree window or the file window (in the default view). Deleting your My Documents folder with the W7 one because you thought you had a file highlighted in the other pane is the sort of thing you only do once and then look for another solution.

                  I would recommend it and the tabs are very useful. It is a bit delicate, and doesn't adapt well to clicking impatiently between folders containing 100K+ files and being told to "come on you fucking pansy, display the bastard"; but I have not been able to ascertain whether it's the abuse or the sheer volume of data that's causing the revolt.

              3. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

                At least with XP you could customize the UI. I used the "Zune" theme that despite its name was good enough (black, smaller title bars, maybe the orange color used was not ideal, but didn't look too bad either).

                Now Nadella decided you shall never tailor the interface to your tastes and needs. He knows better. All Windows user must share the same dull flat pastel UI design, because the web dictated it, and you need to be part of the collective. Originality is not welcome.

            2. RandomFactor
              Stop

              Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

              "I seem to recall 98SE could run for about a week at a time before needing a reboot. (At least, that's roughly how often I rebooted my machines at work.)"

              Interesting tidbit - the actual limit in 95 and 98 was 49.7 days at which point it would lock up regardless. They fixed it in 98SE I think. Not that anyone realistically approached that limit due to the system becoming angsty and crash prone within a week or so anyway.

              Nowadays my Windows machines run until patch forced reboots.

              1. herman

                Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

                "Nowadays my Windows machines run until patch forced reboots." which is still much less than 49 days. I had multiple *nix servers run for more than 4 years, without ever rebooting - they eventually had HW failures, so they literally never rebooted.

            3. Sorry that handle is already taken. Silver badge

              Re: "I hated the Walt Disney UI of XP"

              net stop themes

            4. Updraft102

              Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

              "I stuck with Win2K all the way through to 7. I hated the Walt Disney UI of XP,"

              And the ten seconds it takes to deselect Luna after an XP installation and go back to the same UI of 2k was too much?

            5. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

              We've a machine in a concrete lab that runs 98 and has been running the best art of a year. Every time we power cycle it's a lottery that it will start.. (we have backed it up to a CF based IDE interface hard drive...)

              As it has no USB, no internet its message at the start saying that we've not updated the virus definitions for 4500+ days is quite endearing...

          2. Christian Berger

            Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

            Well a Win2k or XP with all the security bugs removed would be great. Unfortunately for some reason Microsoft refuses to fix the bugs.

            It's an unfortunate trend, that software now seems to remove more and more useful functionality, but still gets bigger and bigger.

            1. kain preacher

              Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

              The reason why the gave for NT 4.0 is that it would require a rewrite of the kernel. W2k said it would break the TCP/IP stack

        2. bombastic bob Silver badge
          Devil

          Re: Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?

          you know, 7 works just fine on a 10 year old laptop. thing is, the software that RUNS on 7 is just as piggy as evar... (like devstudio, for one)

          I had FreeBSD running on that same machine, at one time. It ran fine as well. The gnome 2 desktop does well enough on the older hardware, *WITH* nice 3D skeuomorphic appearance (the way 7 is). That laptop came with XP on it [also worked well].

          So _WHY_ do we need Win-10-nic ???

      2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        Re: Unbelievable

        "Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?"

        KDE

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Unbelievable

          Didn't like KDE 4 but then found Trinity TDE fork of KDE 3

          1. Eddy42

            Re: Unbelievable

            Is it me or would the forced update that brings the removal of forced updates be THE ONLY forced update we would all embrace?

            I bet someone would sue when they got malware from freemovies.com claiming the OS should have patched itself. I don't think we're going to win this one now.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Unbelievable

          @Doctor Syntax - Xfce

          1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

            Re: Unbelievable

            "@Doctor Syntax - Xfce"

            Sort of OK but somehow I always find myself replacing it with KDE. Unless they've changed it Xfce seems to have its own opinion about where icons sit on the desktop and it doesn't always agree with mine.

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Unbelievable

            @Esme & @Doctor Syntax

            Ok ill referee here. XFCE wins vs KDE.

            To me at least, KDE just looks and feels a bit naff out of the box.

            That said, I use Gnome3 so what do I know?

            I also find Gnome3 scales up to 4K better.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: Unbelievable

              Ok ill referee here. XFCE wins vs KDE.

              Just try XKCD Linux.

        3. Not That Andrew

          Re: Unbelievable

          ""Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?"

          KDE"

          Trinity, you mean. Modern KDE is slightly bloated compared to KDE 3, although slightly more usable IMO.

        4. The Real Tony Smith

          Re: Unbelievable

          >>Re: Unbelievable

          >>

          >>"Can you imagine Windows 95 going at the speed of today's hardware?"

          >KDE

          Try KDE-3, now known as Trinity Desktop Environment

          https://www.trinitydesktop.org/

      3. drouel

        Re: Unbelievable

        wow so stuck in the past you guys are incredible. I think I know what your issue is with the UI, windows 7 was made for you! it is true in many cases its hard for an old dog to learn new tricks, but hey, power shell isn't exactly new now is it. its a point and click interface no matter how you make it look. you can even teach corona a few things. to make your computing life easier. voice commands while reading the news for example

      4. david 12 Silver badge

        Re: Unbelievable

        Just dropped by to remember that "Windows" had tabbed browsing. The put the tabs along the bottom of the screen. It was an active desktop / iOS / Android kind of idea, where the web browser was the desktop, and is the window.

        The idea wasn't successsful, because people wanted multiple windows on the desktop, and using a single menu frame for all windows isn't effective. People liked having the tabs and everything else on the application window, not on the desktop window.

        MS had a really good desktop gui design in Win95, but for whatever reason they've always been torn between providing what their clients wanted, and providing what their internal programmers and designers wanted. The idea of putting all the browser tabs at the bottom of the screen window cleans up the desktop, makes the browser frames cleaner. It's an inportant aspect of touch-pad design, and it's the same thinking that lead to the edge browser ui, and the unloved visual studio 2012 skin.

      5. Luiz Abdala

        Re: Unbelievable

        2x Explorer Z1 still works perfectly on Windows 7. Totally free on the CNET repository.

    3. A Non e-mouse Silver badge
      Joke

      Re: Unbelievable

      If it's coming back, it feels like it's doing so through shear osmotic pressure rather than any kind of coherent plan. Whatever next - Aero? Carousel?

      Clippy

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Unbelievable

        Explorer++ - Crashes periodically (for me...YMMV), but is free and has tabs.

      2. bazza Silver badge
        Mushroom

        Re: Unbelievable

        "Clippy"

        AAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHH!

        </livinginfear>

        No. Not even MS could be that mad. Ooops, perhaps that'd have been better unsaid, lest they get an idea...

        1. Andy Non Silver badge

          Re: Unbelievable

          "Clippy"

          AAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHH!

          </livinginfear>

          It looks like you are having a heart attack. Would you like me to help you with that?

        2. This post has been deleted by its author

      3. Old Handle

        Re: Unbelievable

        You realized they did bring clippy back, in a sense, right? I mean, I have no first-hand experience whether Cortana is as annoying, but on some level it's the same concept.

      4. John H Woods Silver badge

        Re: Clippy

        Bob

        1. herman

          Re: Clippy

          Just for shitz and giggles I installed MS Bob in a VM some time ago. It was hilariously useless.

      5. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Unbelievable

        Except now Clippy is a hipster - 'are you sure you meant to use fonts and not artisanal squid ink?' etc

      6. Updraft102

        Re: Unbelievable

        "Clippy"

        I've read several reports of people being "reminded" that Edge is more thrifty with power and more secure when people have installed or used (I don't know the details; I gave up on 10 a long time ago) other browsers in Windows 10.

        "It looks like you're trying to install Chrome. Would you like some information about why you should use Edge instead?"

        (user looks for the NO button, but finds it's as much missing as the Cancel button was on GWX.)

        "Okay! I'll take that as a YES. Here's that information you wanted."

      7. N2

        Re: Unbelievable

        If it's coming back, it feels like it's doing so through shear osmotic pressure rather than any kind of coherent plan. Whatever next - Aero? Carousel?

        Bob?

    4. TVU Silver badge

      Re: Unbelievable

      "If they did something now that had Window 7's UI, none of that advertising / snooping nonsense that is the final ruin of Windows 10, and a tabbed Windows Explorer, I'd happily pay £100 for it."

      I agree - the Win 10 interface is still cluttered and my recommendation to civilise it is to install Start10 which is available at small cost.

      1. RegGuy1 Silver badge

        install Start10 which is available at small cost.

        FFS, no!

        Don't you see? By sucking up to M$ you are moving into the pay for everything world?

        Just format the hard disk and remove the virus. Then put on Linux. it's free. Works everywhere, and gives you everything you need WITHOUT having to pay a penny.

        Of course if you have more money than sense...

        Oh, and Happy New Year, even to Windows users.

        1. MrKrotos

          Re: install Start10 which is available at small cost.

          "FFS, no!

          Don't you see? By sucking up to M$ you are moving into the pay for everything world?

          Just format the hard disk and remove the virus. Then put on Linux. it's free. Works everywhere, and gives you everything you need WITHOUT having to pay a penny.

          Of course if you have more money than sense...

          Oh, and Happy New Year, even to Windows users."

          Oh really? Then you wont mind posting a link to your FREE software to run an enterprise email system then? Yeah thought not!

          Or maybe a 1 page step-by-step guide on installing "Linux" (all dists) seing as its so easy install?

          Because Linux installs on everything with no issues at all! Lol yeah right!

          1. Eddy42

            Re: install Start10 which is available at small cost.

            Re: Oh really? Then you wont mind posting a link to your FREE software to run an enterprise email system then? Yeah thought not!

            There are many free mail systems for Linux/*Nix which are suitable for Enterprise. I think you may be thinking of a PIM like Outlook (including calendaring and all that stuff). All of this stuff can be done in Linux but not necessarily in one application. I find this is better as I can pick and choose the right tool for the job. MS Outlook has been THE ONLY reason Enterprise hasn't moved to Open Source solutions - because no one dares investigate other options - soon it will all be Cloud and people won't know whether it's linix/windoze or whatever - why do you think Microsoft has rushed to support Linux on Azure?

            Re: Or maybe a 1 page step-by-step guide on installing "Linux" (all dists) seing as its so easy install?

            Because Linux installs on everything with no issues at all! Lol yeah right!

            The rule of thumb is this - if you can't install Linux off a Live CD and click Install, then you shouldn't be installing an OS at all. Go and buy an Android tablet. Don't come complaining that all that extra functionality and freedom in Linux is overly complicated because you've been weaned on an operating system that held your hand all the way and forced it's way on you. I like Windows, it's a nice operating system for some things (e.g. playing games - let's face it my Windows PC is just an Xbox One now with a file manager) - but you shouldn't discount the most reliable platform in the X86 world just because you don't understand it. Why people use Windows as a Server OS is beyond me...

            1. This post has been deleted by its author

          2. herman

            Re: install Start10 which is available at small cost.

            SME Server for one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SME_Server

            If you cannot install that one, then you should have your geek card confiscated.

    5. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Unbelievable

      I don't actually mind the 'flat' style / look of W10. But you're right, all any of us 'wanted' was a refresh of stuff that works, not surgical and pointless excision of things everyone uses to Get Stuff Done.

    6. Random Handle

      Re: Unbelievable

      "All those wasted, fruitless and ruinous years of shoving the PC industry down the tubes with comical, immature user interfaces that no one on the entire planet wanted".

      Any UX Professional will proudly tell you that The First Rule Of Usability is 'don't listen to users'.

      Any engineer will tell you that usability is inversely proportional to UX Professional input - before wandering off swearily murmuring about how engineering managed just fine for the first 10,000 years...

      1. Updraft102

        Re: Unbelievable

        "Any UX Professional will proudly tell you that The First Rule Of Usability is 'don't listen to users'."

        I think Microsoft must have far too many UX Professionals on staff then.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Joke

        Re: Unbelievable

        The second is "don't listen to designers". Especially if they have "web" anywhere in their CV.

      3. Hans 1

        Re: Unbelievable

        >Any UX Professional will proudly tell you that The First Rule Of Usability is 'don't listen to users'.

        Obligatory xkcd

        https://xkcd.com/1770/

    7. werdsmith Silver badge

      Re: Unbelievable

      I really couldn't give as hit about the UI of an OS. I use it for about 3 seconds and then my application is launched. The UI of the application is million times more important. The productivity and time spent is in the application. Who spends time faffing around with their OS?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Unbelievable

        "Who spends time faffing around with their OS?"

        KDE and XFCE users.

    8. herman

      Re: Unbelievable

      It is actually a marketing trick. They are gradually making Windows so damn bad, that people will pay to get a better one.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Flame

    Windows 10 can F*CK right off...

    Even if they DO bring folders back in 2017...

    1. Planty Bronze badge
      Stop

      Re: Windows 10 can F*CK right off...

      "Windows 10’s current Start menu/screen thing is a complex hybrid of the Windows 8 start screen and the Windows XP/7 menu."

      Everything about windows 10 is a nasty bodge. Many places in the OS are you going between new and old ways of doing things. Play around with WiFi settings for example (which given the pathetic broken nature of WiFi in win 10, is very often).

      I didn't things could get any worse than windows 8, but Windows 10 is living proof it can...

      1. SVV

        Re: Windows 10 can F*CK right off...

        "Everything about windows 10 is a nasty bodge."

        Worse than that it's a nasty bodge that was thrown together in a panic when the scale of the Win8 disaster became clear to MS after they finally stopped being in denial about what a disastrous mistake it was..The nasty bodge was then released before it was properly finished. A consistent and usable UI, reliability and so much else was missing, hence the continuous stream of patches released since as they ricochet about towards something that will start to look like a finished product.

        The air of denial still emanating from MS proves that they are still in semi panic mode, and it all feels a bit too much like desperation for me to have any desire to actually risk trying to use it as my desktop OS.

        Personal experience has shown that working in such an atmosphere of "trying to quickly make it better under pressure" leads to buggy, incosistent software that hangs around for years as you leave the hastily cobbled together bits alone that mostly work to fight the next fire. And so the "clean Windows rewrite from the ground up" becomes a buggy, inconsistent rush job that will now hang around for years to come whlst being tinkered with to release occasional "best ever" versions, leaving users n exactly the same position that all previous incarnations of Windows did.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Windows 10 can F*CK right off...

        Regarding Networks, the main thing I'm always trying to find out is if I've managed to connect (via wired lan) at 1Gbps, not 100Mbps, yet this obvious bit of info, is about 5 menus deep in Windows 10. Give the throughput speed right there in our faces, Microsoft.

    2. el_oscuro

      Re: Windows 10 can F*CK right off...

      1984 called. DOS 3.1 wants its folders back

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        1984 called. DOS 3.1 wants its folders back

        I think you mean directories.

  3. Len Goddard

    Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

    Dumped that pile of shite for Classic Start Menu - first thing I put on the system after the Win10 install finished.

    Then a decent browser and a proper command shell.

    1. Jeffrey Nonken

      Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

      Classic Shell is what I use on every Windows PC I own, except that I personally am stuck in the year 2000. ... For Windows menus, anyway. But Classic Shell gives you all the choices.

      Also stuck at Windows 7. Have exactly one WX system, at work, for testing our USB devices against WX. It spends most of its CPU cycles running a Killing Floor 2 private server.

    2. oiseau
      Linux

      Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

      "Dumped that pile of shite for Classic Start Menu ...

      Then a decent browser and a proper command shell."

      Hmmm ...

      Why don't you just get youself a nice Linux distribution and save yourself from more grief?

      Happy New Year

      1. Mage Silver badge

        Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

        I tried Classic Start Menu. It's not even polishing a turd.

        Win 10 is STILL like Win2.0 and inferior to Win95, XP, Win7 (with no Aero) with it. Why bother when win7 is still supported and Linux Mint with Mate & Redmond theme is better?

      2. Captain DaFt

        Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

        "Why don't you just get youself a nice Linux distribution and save yourself from more grief?"

        Maybe because, like millions of people/businesses stuck on Windows, the software they want/need doesn't come in a Linux version?

        I was lucky. Never was much of a mainstream gamer, and always shunned Windows only software for alternatives that did the job with less hassle/expense for me.

        Switched over from 2002-2006, wittling away at Windows dependent software over time as Linux offerings improved by leaps and bounds, and never looked back.

        These days, most mainstream Linux distros are easier to use for newbies in every way than current Windows offerings, but the main software houses still write for Windows, so MS still has that lock-in.

        No, seriously. I can jump from one distro to another, each with wildly different UI setups with few problems, but am totally lost on any Windows that's not 7, or XP and earlier.

      3. Len Goddard

        Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

        "Why don't you just get youself a nice Linux distribution and save yourself from more grief?"

        Well, I use linux Mint XFCE on a NUC for all my serious computing needs. The Win 10 box is a gaming rig and runs some AV stuff it is still difficult to do on linux.

        As for the start menu, most of my commonly used programs are started as icons from the desktop. The cascading menu system classic start menu gives me is basically there for little used programmes which I can't remember the name of. When I was using Win 7 the whole system looked like Win 2K which is how I like it but Win 10 amongst its other faults is far less customisable. Generally I find that the less dependent I am on MS programs and utilities the more stable the system remains.

      4. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

        Except linux does not run what I need.

        1. Hans 1
          Linux

          Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

          >Except linux does not run what I need.

          Yes, YMV or so it appears, I think Windows does not run what I need, actually, it runs a gazillion processes in the background I don't need that use up resources ... even after I have stopped all services I do not need.

          One thing, regarding pinning apps to the dock on Windows is a nightmare in gnome 3.

          Imagine:

          I have LibreOffice installed from the repos and I would like to test a newer version from the libreoffice website ... I download, install it (to /opt) and start swriter, for example, I pin that to the Gnome 3 dock and close it ... re-launching it from the dock opens the version from the repos ... pretty sure it uses a .desktop file somewhere ... but, FFS. I need to check if there is a bug for that, sorry Gnome guyz, have not had the time to check, yet ...

          Mind, this morning, my Windows 10 system was asleep and I wake it ... it asks for password ... I type password, it tells me my password is incorrect (I know for sure it was not), retry and same, I check usual suspects ... CAPS-LOCK, keyboard layout (US English Windows in France thinks I need French keyboard ... nobody does), nope, English layout ... I decide to restart the box (reboot fixes everything, right ?), the login manager vanishes and appears again, less than a second, I think "WTF", type my password, and get to the desktop ... I start working and about 3 minutes later (YES, 3 minutes!!!!- I was already programming, it might have taken longer, I don't keep my eyes on the clock, but I had already checked email, theregister headlines, opened vpn etc and was typing away in vim!!!!!) the MozartF*ck*r thinks it is perfect timing to honor the previous "restart windows" request .... sometimes, I think I need anger management training.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

            > I decide to restart the box (reboot fixes everything, right ?), the login manager vanishes and appears again, less than a second,

            That sounds like a Trojan now has your password and took 3 minutes to gather all your info and send it off somewhere. It then activated the reboot so that the evidence of its collecting is removed.

          2. Hans 1
            Windows

            Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

            It happened again this morning.

            I put laptop to sleep by closing lid.

            I open lid, click, and the login manager appears.

            I type password, I know for sure password is correct, I retry ... same, wrong password or username.

            This time, I select Sleep from menu, wait for it to sleep (almost immediate), hold power button to wake up from sleep, enter password, all fine ... Do I open a support request ?

    3. This post has been deleted by its author

      1. Danny 14

        Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

        It took some wrangling but since anniversary edition you can control the start menu AND pinned taskbar with GPOs now. Quite palatable. Plus if you have enterprise you can stop all the extra shite being installed after updates too.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

          Well done for using GPO's.

          The average user would go 'GPO?' That's the Post Office Iniit?

          They more than likely have a version that does not support the luxury(sic) of GPO's.

          Carry on basking in the luxury of Enterprise W10 with GPO's and controlled updates.

          The rest of the world who run basic editions of that shite product are meanwhile kicking the screen, swearing all sorts of nasties at Bill Gates (many think he is still at the helm) and tearing their hair out.

          I've rescued three average users since the beginning of December. They now run Linux but it looks like Windows 7.

          The sheer number of comments here that basically loathe W10 is testimony to the crap that Redmond has foisted on the world.

          If it wasn't for the sheer cost of entry more and more would have gone over to Apple. That is another thing though.

          1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

            Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

            "The sheer number of comments here that basically loathe W10 is testimony to the crap that Redmond has foisted on the world."

            Normally I'd take a comment like that with a large pinch of salt because of squeaky wheel syndrome (just look at user/buyer comments on almost any review site, unhappy people complain but happy people rarely cmpliment) but having just had to spend a day sorting out a friends brand new W10 laptop, I can't help but agree. It seems the marquee mouse draw/select, shift and control method of selecting multiple files for copy/move/delete has gone. Or only works in certain view modes. Or is off by default. Or something. It might be related to whether the device has a touch or screen or Windows thinks ut has (it hasn't)

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Facepalm

            Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

            swearing all sorts of nasties at Bill Gates (many think he is still at the helm)

            Yep… I've told some people "Bill isn't in charge any more" … on numerous occasions, to no avail. They still blame the original CEO that vacated his seat more than a decade before!

      2. Test Man

        Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

        Def - LOL useless. Windows 95, 98, Me, NT, 2000, XP - faff around organising stuff to lessen the time to find stuff

        Windows Vista, 7, 8, 8.1, 10 - simply WIN+part name of program/file/resource *click* DONE.

        1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

          Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

          "Windows Vista, 7, 8, 8.1, 10 - simply WIN+part name of program/file/resource *click* DONE."

          So, reverting back to DOS command line execution with command completion but partially hidden by a sort of GUI interface.. Yeah, that's great for people who don't know the name of the programme executable and have spent the last few year (or 10) clicking icons with no need to know the actual program name.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

            Moreover it does work properly only if the application is registered properly (see https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee872121(VS.85).aspx), In this case also more mnemonic "friendly" names can be used (you can type "Word" instead of "winword" - they can be localized as well).

            Just, still many developers don't register applications properly, especially smaller ones.

      3. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

        Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

        "Windows 95, 98, 2000, XP: Spend ages traversing the Programs tree looking for the thing you want to start. Or spend a week creating your own shortcut tree at the top, and then traverse that instead."

        You make that sound like a huge an onerous task, and yet "Everything I use regularly is pinned as a tile and organised how I like them." isn't. If pinning them and re-ordering them the way you want was so simple, quick and easy, then you don't have so many frequently used apps that sorting out a start menu would be any more trouble. Now, maybe if Windows could keep the top 5 or 10 most often used apps at the top of the start menu automatically, that might actually be a useful feature. Or even just the 5 or 10 most recently used ones.

        1. Updraft102

          Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

          "You make that sound like a huge an onerous task, and yet "Everything I use regularly is pinned as a tile and organised how I like them." isn't."

          Well said.

          Organizing the Win 95-style cascading menus is easy-- you can drag and drop things from the desktop or any file explorer window right in there, and it automatically creates the shortcuts for you. You can drag and drop any menu item to anywhere else... don't like how WordMangler 1.0 is hidden under "Doofygoof Enterprises" in the menu? Change the name of the Doofygoof "folder" (program group), or just move the shortcut out of the folder for easy access. Modifying the expanded start menu via drag and drop is very easy and quite fast-- and as I understand it, no longer possible in Windows 10 (unless you have Classic Start or something that functions as well as it does). I've never used the Win 10 start menu for any length of time; a couple of minutes with it was all I needed to realize I never wanted to see it again.

          As for my frequently used programs, I have launchers for several of them in the Quick Launch bar in the taskbar (Firefox, Thunderbird, Metapad, Calculator, Everything, my music folder (not to be confused with the unused My Music folder), and Show Desktop. For other things, I prefer icons on the desktop; for still others, I prefer to place the links on the top part of the start menu. I know where each of them is even if I am having a I-wish-I-was-not-this-close-to-being-a-senior moment and I don't remember the name; I am a spatial thinker, so as long as the position remains constant, I will be fine.

          Ever-changing menus like the Win 7's most used programs are not ideal for me. I'll manually place the program links at the top of the start menu; it takes about three seconds, and once it's there, I remember it by its location.

        2. kain preacher

          Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

          On my version of windows it does. It lists the top 6 most used programs.

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

      Does anyone even use the Win10 start mess?

      Advertisers do, that's about it.

    5. RandomFactor

      Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

      "Dumped that pile of shite for Classic Start Menu - first thing I put on the system after the Win10 install finished.

      Then a decent browser and a proper command shell."

      Same - ClassicShell...decent browser...

      Powershell is actually quite nice if your needs are windows-centric.

    6. Rattus Rattus

      Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

      I actually kind of liked the original Windows 10 start menu, once I'd set up tiles and things to my liking. Then the Anniversary Update came along and totally screwed the menu up.

    7. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

      I'm still on Vista, but my next upgrade will most likely be Win10. I'm not oblivious to the ongoing trends at PC/electronic shops everywhere...

      And yes, I agree with installing Classic Shell. Don't forget to use a LOCAL account instead of a Microsoft account. And turn off all the telemetry/ data collection settings.

      I'm surprised Microsoft hadn't yet followed Apple's example in releasing its OS.

      Every year or every two years, a point release. For 2017's Creator Update... that should be Windows 10.2... as a standalone release. Next release is Windows 10.3 Similar to the OSX naming scheme.

      And new users don't have to download all the previous 'service packs' after a fresh installation.

      'Redstone' or 'Creator Update' sounds clunky and silly. If it's deliberately done as a veiled reference to Minecraft, I am not impressed.

    8. Eddy42

      Re: Does anyone even use the Win 10 start mess?

      Wow - you're half way to Linux already...

  4. djstardust

    Stardock Start10

    That is all.

    Windows 7 goodness all over again and no sign of that stupid start menu.

    Worth $5 no question.

    1. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Unhappy

      Re: Stardock Start10

      even if I use that, or classic shell [which is FREE last I checked], it DOES! NOT! FIX! THE! 2D! FLATSO! FLUGLY! [nor does it fix the 'settings' vs 'control panel' horsecrap]

      and the adware+spyware and FORCED UPDATES are _STILL_ there

      1. Updraft102

        Re: Stardock Start10

        To fix the ugly flatness, you'll need a different Windows theme. Back when I was still using Windows 10 on my test machine, I had my custom Windows Classic-style theme working there fairly well. It needed some tweaking to make it perfect, but it disguised Windows 10 and made it look more like what I use on 7. It wasn't a complete reprieve from the ugliness that is 10, though; my theme affected the Win32 bits of Windows 10 and returned the skeuomorphic appearance for them... but the cr'apps' stubbornly refused to play along, retaining their drab, ugly, flat grayness (which was never a match for the vast flat expanses of painful, retina-searing white pixels in the Win32 bits with the stock theme either).

        If I could "just avoid using the apps" as the Windows 10 promoters say, that would be one thing, but you can't. You can change all of the defaults from the picture viewer app, Groove, Edge, back to the good old versions (which are still included with 10)... that is, until one of the forced updates comes through and decides to reset everything to the default settings (from all of the privacy settings you carefully set to allow the minimum telemetry only to your choices for default 'apps').

        with some things (like the calculator, solitaire, etc.), MS has completely removed the native Win32 programs and replaced them with hideous, inferior app versions (some of which pester you with ads now), and to fix that, you'd have to copy over the old versions from another version of Windows, as far as I know. I don't know if these get reset with updates, but it would not surprise me.

        Then there's the third category of 'app' appearing things, like Settings. They're now part of the OS, and there are no Win32 versions. You're just stuck having them stubbornly disregarding all of the theming you may have applied, not to mention the UI conventions (like menu bars, no hamburger menus, well-utilized space that doesn't have comically oversized controls and vast amounts of space that could be doing something useful but is instead just sitting there) that have been in place for decades because they work for mouse and keyboard PCs.

        It was an improvement, incomplete as it was, and it made Win 10 semi-tolerable for shorter periods of time when I was testing it...

        .. until Threshold 2 broke something, and my theme no longer worked at all.

        That proved to be a metaphor for the whole thing. Just when you think you've gotten Microsoft's stupidity beaten back, MS moves to block you from making their product more tolerable to yourself.

        That was when I formatted my test PC's SSD and repurposed it as a Linux boot device in my main PC. I had been continuing to monitor 10 with the expectation (or at least the hope) that it would eventually evolve into a decent product, but TH2 removed any such illusions.

  5. Khaptain Silver badge

    Windows Key + Keyboard

    Since Windows 7 I have become so used to hitting the Windows Key + plus typing the name of the program that I want that I almost no longer use the Start Menu as such..

    Even if they do bring folders back or whatever marketing catchphrase they will name it, I presume that it won't really change anything that will truly make a difference, at least not for me..

    I like W10 a lot, even though it absoultely refuses to install the Annivesary Update in my "Microsoft" Surface Pro .....gggggrrrrrrrrr And from what I have gleaned from the various forums I am certainly not the only one..... Whether I want to or not I am stuck with 1511-10586.713

    I wish they would sort out the update nightmare before adding folders........

    1. keithpeter Silver badge
      Pint

      Re: Windows Key + Keyboard

      "Since Windows 7 I have become so used to hitting the Windows Key + plus typing the name of the program that I want that I almost no longer use the Start Menu as such.."

      @Khaptain: depending on the programs one needs to use, I find that this works on [ linux | gnome | xfce4 | dwm* ] just fine at home, as well as on Windows 7 and Windows 10 for Education at work.

      Once in the software I use most (Firefox, Libreoffice, GIMP, R, texlive | miktex, Audacity) I find I lose track of which system I'm using quite often.

      *dwm: you need to edit the config.h and recompile.

    2. AMBxx Silver badge

      refuses to install the Annivesary Update

      Every PC I have that was upgraded to 10 using the nagware has this problem. Only solution appears to be a new install.

    3. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

      Re: Windows Key + Keyboard

      Since Windows 7 I have become so used to hitting the Windows Key + plus typing the name of the program that I want that I almost no longer use the Start Menu as such.."

      Great for the commonly used stuff. But what's the name of that Epson scanner programme? Oh, it broke, I just bought a Canon instead. Now I just got used to the Espon one, but what's the Canon one called? Or any of the other dozens and dozens of programmes not used everyday. Like I said above, it's a reversion to a DOS command line with a semblance of GUI overlaid. The whole raison d'etre of GUI is so the user can "intuitively" point'n'click and not have to remember esoteric command names which may change from version to version (not going near the icons changing their "look" in every new version!!)

      1. Terry 6 Silver badge

        Re: Windows Key + Keyboard

        This thread is sort of blending into this one;

        Twas the week before Xmas ... not a creature was stirring – except Microsoft admitting its Windows 10 upgrade pop-up went 'too far'

        And the same comment there applies here, as John Brown (no body) points out, frequently used programmes are easy to find. Occasionally used ones less so. And, as I pointed out in that thread, too many software publishers think that their own unhelpful names are more important than the programme's actual name ( e.g. Hornhill Stylepix) let alone providing a descriptive name. So finding that useful programme that you last used six months ago isn't going to be quite that easy.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    You tease !

    I thought MS had finally fixed the Start Menu until I read the article and realised this was only for "apps".

    Guess I'm stuck using toolbars to get a working menu system.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: You tease !

      Didn't you read the support docs? Having a usable interface costs extra and is only available to subscribers. The only thing you should have running is a single browser window to O364.co.uk

    2. Updraft102

      Re: You tease !

      Just for apps?

      What are there, like ten of them?

      I should not think they'd be in need of much organization, being so useless and all.

  7. Fuzz

    brought back

    Microsoft aren't bringing back anything here.

    What they're doing is adding the start screen tile folders from Windows Phone that have been on Windows phone since 8.1

    Folders on the start menu for shortcuts already exist. I think they came back in 1607 or maybe even 1511.

    1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

      Re: brought back

      "I think they came back in 1607 or maybe even 1511."

      Really? I bet the GUI was slow back in those days, what with pen and ink being the primary display device. IIRC the refresh rate was measure in hours per frame.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Coat

        Re: brought back

        "I think they came back in 1607 or maybe even 1511."

        Really? I bet the GUI was slow back in those days, what with pen and ink being the primary display device. IIRC the refresh rate was measure in hours per frame.

        Yep… network bandwidth was pretty good for the time… it'd maybe take several months to ship a large volume of books across the Atlantic… but latency was huge and the packet loss was horrendous when you consider hap-hazard longitude estimation techniques like "dead reckoning".

    2. kmac499

      Re: brought back

      FFS M$ just dump the tiles and gives me a classic I/F option. Which by the way I/F stands for Interface which is what the graphical desktop metaphor is.

      For those of you using the almost acronym 'UX' let me tell you, my "User eXperience" of your carefully designed interface is it's fucking atrocious. Should you feel the need to play with a paint box sod off and design packaging for tins of beans.

      1. Captain DaFt

        Re: brought back

        "Should you feel the need to play with a paint box sod off and design packaging for tins of beans."

        Oh crap no! They'd end up putting them in sardine tins and labeling them "Asparagus" because it's "trendier", or some even worse nonsense.

  8. DNTP

    What I am going to push, 2017 edition:

    Simplified, functional Win10 start menu

    Windows 7 theme for WIn10

    Windows 7 reinstalls

    Ubuntu (with a Win7 theme to keep the users happy/familiarized)

    1. Lee D Silver badge

      Re: What I am going to push, 2017 edition:

      Classic Shell.

      Deploy it now, deploy it again on 10, 11, 13, whatever Microsoft wants to call it.

      That a bit of freeware does a better job for EVERY USER on my system than Microsoft's own tools is telling.

      And all MSI-deployable and GPO-controlled.

      1. Stuart Elliott

        Re: What I am going to push, 2017 edition:

        The problem with that, is if everyone used Classic Shell, there'd be no-one left to whine how bad it is, and how you should be switching to *insert preferred flavour of *nix here*, and Microsoft would think everyone is happy with their efforts.

        1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

          Re: What I am going to push, 2017 edition:

          " and Microsoft would think everyone is happy with their efforts."

          But surely MS knows exactly who installed Classic Shell from their snoopinghelpful monitoring.

    2. Updraft102

      Re: What I am going to push, 2017 edition:

      The Cinnamon desktop is a lot more familiar to Windows users than Ubuntu's Unity. The MATE desktop is also quite similar, though I like Cinnamon the most (YMMV). I'd suggest Mint, as it's a derivative of Ubuntu and is basically Ubuntu underneath (ie nearly all of the online tips you read about Ubuntu work perfectly on Mint also)

  9. fobobob

    Take it all away...

    ...then give little bits of it back over time while reminding you just how lucky you are.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    With so mamy complaints...

    ... how long can they keep their head turned?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      @MyBackDoor

      how long can they keep their head turned?

      Until that time when they realize the effects it's having on their wallet (income).

  11. JeffyPoooh
    Pint

    "It’s a mystery why Microsoft..."

    No mystery at all.

    Starting at Win 8, somebody at Microsoft decided that GUI design was now a religion, and they imposed *their* peculiar religion on everyone.

    Not just bad decision making, but demonstrably stupid.

    If I recall correctly, they actually did fire somebody.

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: "It’s a mystery why Microsoft..."

      "somebody at Microsoft decided that GUI design was now a religion"

      They so it working so well for Apple.

    2. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Devil

      Re: "It’s a mystery why Microsoft..."

      I think there are several explanations, all converging:

      a) Ballmer's "take over the world" approach, wanted something unique and patentable that could be used to squeeze out competition forever

      b) Sinofsky's "new, shiny" approach to the GUI created the tile screen, because he failed to see EXISTING INSTALL BASE as "important". _EVERYBODY_ was on a slab or phone now, right?

      c) The marketing guy who was canned early last year [forget his name] was a big part of this. His market research was *WAY* too narrow in scope, basically interviewing shills and fanbois to get feedback, and ignoring "the rest of us". Keep in mind THAT guy was around for several F-ups, including Vista, "The Ribbon", Silverlight, Win "APE", _AND_ Win-10-nic.

      d) Senior development staff "now retired" - and ONLY! ARROGANT! MILLENIAL! CHILDREN! seem to be running the asylum... (it's THEIR TURN to do it THEIR WAY, now, and those old guys just DID NOT KNOW WHAT THEY WERE DOING, so NOW it will be done *PROPERLY* by YOUNG people!!! W00T LOL text-text-text 4" rules)

      e) FIRING of the testing groups, so that end-users become "the new testers" for Enterprise. Not even PRO users escape, THIS time!!!

      yeah, all of that ARROGANCE and WRONG THINKING had to come from SOMEWHERE, and it happened right there in Redmond, with a capital T and that rhymes with 'C' and that stands for CRAP (which is what Micro-shaft has been EXCRETING these past few years)

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I must dig out a Win 7 install.

    So far I've been quite happily using a Win XP VM as it worked for the limited time I had use for it but I think I may migrate to Win 7 now. At my speed of migration, I should hit Win 10 in about 5 years or so :). Or maybe Win 8.1 - apparently that also has a relatively sane start menu (I haven't been following the mess too much, too busy - recommendations welcomed).

    Time to hit the 2nd hand boards to search for an install disk or archive with a valid license key..

  13. Geoffrey W

    New Years Resolution - I resolve not to respond to any more stories about Microsoft or Windows 10, or to troll stories about Linux. Happy new year Penguins; may your beaks be sharp and your buckets full of slimey fishies.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      > Happy new year Penguins; may your beaks be sharp and your buckets full of slimey fishies.

      Windows users may not like being called "slimey fishies".

  14. Johnny Canuck

    17 inch penis!!

    A 16 inch duck with a 17 inch penis! Good god. What are the females like?

    1. This post has been deleted by its author

    2. Captain DaFt

      Re: 17 inch penis!!

      "What are the females like?"

      And now, young padawan, you have learned the reason why ducks waddle funny when they walk. ☺

    3. Michael Thibault
      IT Angle

      Re: 17 inch penis!!

      It's a head-scratcher!

      In-air re-fooling, perhaps?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: 17 inch penis!!

        Well, it gets you 17 inches on your way to the mile high club, I guess..

        1. Unicornpiss
          Coat

          Re: 17 inch penis!!

          It's like the nose of the old Concorde in flight--it folds up or down for visibility or aerodynamics..

          Gawd, that would be a sight for birdwatchers...

  15. Salts

    Well a few months back...

    Something went wrong and my last windows 7 machine got auto upgraded, I was going to keep windows7 but could not be arsed to reinstall, so I waved a 'fond?' farewell to windows.

  16. Michael Habel

    With the exception of the Master Race...

    Is there even a reason to use Windows anymore? For crap like this, I find that my Tablet is more than enough to get the Job done. And for the rest of it a Linux based PC does everything else (Compile Builds, or GIMP, and Krita for my Graphic Photoshoop needs).

    Plus the fact that's free, as Beer, and I have greater control over my own Personal System. Both of which you lack on any Windows, but with Windows X doublly so. But, even if you are some Master Race Freek. Why would you want to use Win X for?

    1. fredesmite

      Re: With the exception of the Master Race...

      The Great Evil empire still has control what is sold on x86 machines .. you still have to pay the $100 MS tax when you buy a PC laptop even if you want to put "Free" Linux on it

      1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        Re: With the exception of the Master Race...

        "you still have to pay the $100 MS tax when you buy a PC laptop even if you want to put "Free" Linux on it"

        Not universally true but you'll generally find that the MS-free pox is dearer because the additional crapware that's normally installed with Windows offsets the tax. And you're going to blow away all of it anyway so who cares?

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: With the exception of the Master Race...

      Office and Outlook. That's it. Yes, LibreOffice and <insert choice of mail client> exists. But they are just not yet good enough to score really significant design wins...the ones that get written up in Forbes as saving the organization big bucks. When someone like Ford, Boeing or AT&T successfully dump Office/Outlook, then the ball really starts moving. Until then, it's El Reg readers and other brave souls only.

      I try really hard to use Linux for everything, but it's always Office and Outlook that drag me back. Horrible.

      1. Terry 6 Silver badge

        Re: With the exception of the Master Race...

        It's Outlook which has kept me docked on Windows for so long.

        For once this is not a moan about Microsoft . There has been nothing, certainly nothing "mainstream", to replace Outlook. Email programmes, with address books, lots. Calendar programmes, squillions. Programmes that integrate the email with the calendar, and syncs it across various devices, adding appointments into the calendar when required. Not much - if anything.

      2. Tannin

        Re: With the exception of the Master Race...

        There are good reasons to use Windows, reasons inbvolving programs which are absolutely positively superior to anything available on 'nix. Office and Outlook are not, repeat not, repeat not amongst them.

        1. Terry 6 Silver badge

          Re: With the exception of the Master Race...

          Office, maybe not. Though I've had formatting issues in LibreOffice that have sent me scurrying back to Word from time to time. (Can't remember what it was).

          Outlook held me for a long time. Most recently because I have and love my Windows phone - but even before Outlook's integration was really useful. Thunderbird with Lightning does seem to be good enough now. Though even that is an afterthought by Mozilla. I don't get why it wasn't in there all along!

          As to the 'phone. The one good thing you can say about Microsoft is that they aren't Google. I never understand why the commentards don't make the fuss about Google/Android that they do about MS/Windows. Dammit, Google are practically sitting on our shoulders when we use their phones/search/email.

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Maybe it's because I like cutting edge hardware and have a lot of it, but no Linux distribution is as out-of-the-box ready to run as Windows 10. Every time I try Linux, I end up going down deep rabbit holes of compatibility woe. And, Excel rules all software for all time, QED.

    1. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Trollface

      "Maybe it's because I like cutting edge hardware and have a lot of it, but no Linux distribution is as out-of-the-box ready to run as Windows 10"

      thanks for the 'shilling'

      1. fredesmite

        Fedora and Ubuntu run great on laptops

        1. fredesmite

          who are aholes who down voted a truthful statement?

    2. GrumpenKraut
      Pint

      > And, Excel rules all software for all time, QED.

      Yeah, rrrrrrrrrrrrright.

      Anyway, a pint for "2016 finally fecking over pretty soon." -------------->

    3. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      "Excel rules all software for all time, QED."

      Was that you using Excel as a todo list in the recent story about the migration that went well? (As in down the well).

  18. Christian Berger

    The sad thing is something different

    As a more professional user I personally do not care much for Windows. However Windows used to be one of the reasons why PCs were so cheap. That way you can spend only a few hundred Euros on a high quality PC, ditch the current version of Windows and install whatever operating system you want.

    With the move to Android we see a fragmentation of the market. Every Android device is incompatible to the other. That's why it's so hard to get other operating systems for those. We now even allow hardware manufacturers to lock down their boot loaders to actively prevent you from running your own software.

    1. Michael Habel

      Re: The sad thing is something different

      How else will they convince you to buy the next shiny thing then?

  19. Miss Config
    Windows

    "Windows 10 could let users pause automatic updates"

    According to at least one blogger ( Winaero ).

    It's in the latest preview build for Insiders. Stop an update for 35 days anyway.

  20. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    On the fly change form start menu to start screen?

    My employer has the start menu set on its corporate build. This is fine for most things but I would prefer the start screen view when searching for a little used program. Is there a way to switch from start menu to start screen on a one-off basis? (What I don't want is the setting changed either permanently nor for the remainder of that session.)

  21. Unicornpiss
    Pint

    "Classic Shell"

    Pure bliss. Makes Windows10 (and previous versions) much more usable and less aggravating. Do you like Windows XP's cascading menus, Win 7's "folder" menus, or even the debacle that is Windows 8's menu system? They're all there along with many other customization options, plus the native Windows menus at a click. And rock stable. Really, these options should have been included with every Windows OS at least after 7. Why punish your user base because of some fool's idea of a "new paradigm" or whatever? Really, if there was a Nobel Peace Prize for software developers, I would nominate the creators of Classic Shell.

    But apparently marketing people rule the roost at MS and are notoriously hard to educate.

    1. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Pirate

      Re: "Classic Shell"

      "But apparently marketing people rule the roost at MS and are notoriously hard to educate."

      Ack.. Let me into the Halls of Redmond carrying a Clue-By-4, a Clue-bat, a Cat-5-o-9-tails, and a few other odds and ends, and maybe I can "educate" them a bit...

      or not. they may be beyond hope.

  22. NonSSL-Login
    Facepalm

    How to make a customer happy to buy something they already owned years ago

    Over the next 5 versions of Windows they will add and remove what customers want and the final product will basically be Windows 7. With MS/NSA Telemetrics/Spyware built in.

    From the start it was obvious that no one wanted a tablet and phone interface on their PC. M$ decided it could have a single interface across all devices and claim all the benefits for developers. Now Windows phones are as good as a dead duck in the water and Windows is stuck with the phones interface. You could not make this stuff up.

  23. fredesmite
    FAIL

    Why do they continue to make a piece of shiiite worse?

    The last time I touched a windows turd it stunk .. why does MS keep regressing it into something worse?

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    I see the Xmas spirit has run dry...

    This is going to sound like I am an MSFT shill, but bear with me. Yes, Windows 10 is a bodge job. Try explaining, for example, where a user should look for wireless settings, and its obvious that they collided the Win 7 truck with the Win 8 one and prayed the results would be shippable.

    But: what exactly was Satya Nadella to do? He inherited a giant, no, colossal steaming pile from Ballmer. Share price down. Late in mobile after the disaster of WinMo. Late in public cloud. Linux on AWS the de facto choice for all the new innovative companies. Bankers and press circling waiting to write Microsoft off. Windows 8 / Metro universally hated. Security issues cropping up like whack-a-mole. Apple resurgent.

    I am not a huge fan of Win 10. But I give Nadella a lot of credit for turning Microsoft around and doing something --albeit imperfectly-- on all the platforms that matter. Can you imagine Ballmer greenlighting Outlook on Android or SQL Server on Linux?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I see the Xmas spirit has run dry...

      "But I give Nadella a lot of credit for turning Microsoft around and doing something --albeit imperfectly-- on all the platforms that matter."

      Do you also give him credit for organising the most aggressive and underhand campaign to force "upgrades" on people's computers against their wishes? And I suppose the telemetry/spyware wasn't his fault either?

      1. Cameron Colley

        Re: I see the Xmas spirit has run dry...

        Why give him credit at all? You're giving somebody credit for taking the job of head of a company hell-bent on stifling growth in the technology industry and forcing people to use horrendous interfaces all because "share prices"? You're giving a man credit for trying to make as much money as possible and fuck everyone else?

    2. Updraft102

      Re: I see the Xmas spirit has run dry...

      Has it turned around, though?

      Investors aren't always very bright. In the 1990s, anyone with some silly idea could hang out a shingle and have investors lining up to throw money at people that have never run a business, and who don't have a product or a business plan. If they got out at the right time, they got rich instantly, even though their business, per se, never existed. That's how we got the dot-com bubble.

      A similar thing happened with real estate prices in the US in the years leading up to 2008. Investors thought the only way to go was up; real estate prices were skyrocketing, but they still thought it was a good investment to buy a property for $300k now that used to cost $150k a few years ago, because it was just gonna keep going up and up and up...

      Irrational exuberance and excitement on the part of foolish investors can drive stock prices up, but it's only temporary unless there is something of value backing up all the hype. What does Microsoft have? They've managed to squander all of the trust they'd gained since they supposedly became the new, nicer, non-predatory Microsoft. They've made themselves the most hated company in the world to their own users! It's the people from outside looking in that think they see innovation; from the inside, it looks like being thrown under the bus.

      How much can you abuse your customers before it causes harm to the company? Surely, whatever the answer, it would be something less than what MS has already done to its customers. That, I will admit, MS has turned around; I would say more of Microsoft's long-time users than ever before now hate and distrust MS.

      It's true that MS has spared its valuable enterprise customers from the abuse... but I would have to imagine there would be some bleedover effect. Surely many PHBs somewhere have heard all of the negativity about Windows 10 and decided not to upgrade at this time because of it, instead waiting to see if Windows 7 gets an extension on updates like XP did. Maybe all of the aggression MS has shown its home customers has given some PHBs pause about trusting such a company for their cloud services; there's always Amazon, Google, and others.

      It seems to me that abusing their home and SOHO users is bound to harm Microsoft's relationship with the customers that actually still matter to them (the corporate ones). It hasn't shown yet; we're still in the irrational exuberance phase now. For all this talk of innovation, I just don't see it... the cloud is nothing new. It's just a new name for something we've had for decades! Windows 10 isn't innovative... it's crap. As I just posted in another thread (in a triumph of sarcasm and snark), at the rate of growth Windows 10 has shown since the end of the free upgrade, it will take it 36 years to reach parity with Windows 7.

      If 10 was any good, MS would not have had to force home users to take it for FREE. Now that there's no more upgrade push, any increase in Win 10 market share will be nearly entirely the result of sales of new PCs with Win 10 preinstalled, and Windows 10 will continue to be a drag on those sales.

      I am beginning to think MS may be backed into a corner again regarding security updates, as they were with XP. For all of the talk of MS not wanting 7 to be the next XP, it's shaping up to be a lot worse... when XP support was set to end, there was still another "good" version of Windows out there for people to migrate to (and a lot did). There's no such good version waiting for people upgrading FROM 7, though, and that means a lot of the people who (sometimes reluctantly) moved on from XP will not be moving on from 7. I know I won't, if 10 doesn't make a big U-turn before it's time to give up 7!

      1. Terry 6 Silver badge

        Re: I see the Xmas spirit has run dry...

        A point we forget, and Microsoft seemed determined to ignore, is that even if Win 8+ had been as good as they should have been, for most users Win 7 was already more than good enough, so there was no real need to change. And since for those that jumped in and made that change (fanbois or experimenters ) it turned out to be awful, another change was hardly going to ignite any enthusiasm without a really, really amazing offer. There was no such offer.

        Microsoft seemed to have decided not to offer anything that users would want enough to take the jump - maybe they are incapable of knowing what users want, maybe they didn't wish to supply it because it wouldn't make them any money, and have decided to use brute force instead of persuasion.

        Which is also, of course, why SaaS is so attractive to software companies, it's the gift that keeps on giving (to them).

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I see the Xmas spirit has run dry...

      Nadella made mistakes even Ballmer couldn't make... while not correcting any of those Ballmer made.

      Windows 10 didn't solve 8.x issues but added big ones of its own. MS market share in mobile is lower and going to zero. Killing the Lumia line after a so expensive acquisition (and sending skills to competitors) may not have been really smarter - especially when keeping on working on Continuum and the like. Surfaces instead slowly found their way (but 10 on tablets is worse than 8).

      It won't be some cloud and some fake "Linux friendliness" to save Microsoft - if the OS is no longer appealing for users and developers, any other product won't be any longer. Once you get used to bad UIs, and lame applications, you are ready to use Linux. After all, it's free and there's no "telemetry".

    4. kmac499

      Re: I see the Xmas spirit has run dry...

      "But: what exactly was Satya Nadella to do?"

      Well here's a thought.. How about re-releasing Win7 people seem to like it..

  25. Shane 4

    pr0n folder and you know it!

  26. fredesmite
    FAIL

    More MS turds

    Ubuntu and Fedora works great on laptops .. and includes the folder Icon

  27. Updraft102

    It's 'innovation' like this

    ...that is the reason that Windows 10 is growing like wildfire*. At the rate it's been gaining absolute market share since the end of the free upgrade period, as reported by Netmarketshare.com, Windows 10 will reach parity with Windows 7 in only 36 years! Windows 10 is INDEED the fastest growing Windows version ever!

    But not this past month. The fastest growing Windows version in the last 30 days (again, in absolute market share) was... Windows 7! Even scrappy little Windows XP managed higher growth relative to its numbers last month than Windows 10.

    Well done, Microsoft, WELL DONE! Let's all have a round of applause for Satya Nadella and all of his innovation! You have truly taken all of our breath away (or maybe that was just the smoke from that wildfire I mentioned).

    There will probably be a spike in Windows 10 activity next month, as any PCs given as gifts will nearly always be infected with Windows 10 right out of the box, and it will take the recipients some time to disinfect them and get them ready for regular use. Sadly, some people will just use these PCs in their malware-infested state forever... we must all do our best to reach out to them and let them know that help is available for their sick computers.

    * In a rain forest, during the monsoonal rains.

  28. This post has been deleted by its author

  29. Terry 6 Silver badge

    F****ing Windows 10 F****ing Microsoft

    Sorry ( not sorry actually) F***ing Microsoft B***ards.

    I've been posting quite calmly about the truly annoying nature of Win 10. Then not an hour later I get an urgent summons to the computer room from my wife.

    We have a shared family PC. A partition contains the family photos. Ditto documents. Then each of us has our own partition with our own stuff. Including folders for photos, documents etc.

    Nice, simple organised.

    Microf***ingsoft has taken upon itself to reorganise the folders and links to them back to some kind of default - restoring the default hidden and buried folders, so that suddenly in the "My Computer" window an icon pointing to folder C:\users\buried-two-levels-down\photos appears under the w:\photos icon. Suddenly wife in panic because all the work photos she's just saved have apparently vanished. Not actually vanished. They've just been saved buried in this newly recreated f***ing folder that has an identical default icon and name that has appeared below the correct one in the folder tree. In effect Microf***ingsoft have decided to try and make us all use their stupid c:\user\username\.....\stupid location for our data and no other places. Presumably because they want us to use their f****ing stupid "libraries". F****** B***rds.

  30. RW

    The situation is rather like biological evolution. Most organisms are already very close to the optimum, so any large mutation is almost certain to produce organisms less well adapted. Only very small mutations have a chance of success.

    Just so UIs. At some point (possibly Win3.1) UI design reached a state of "best", and all changes since then have been counter-productive. But M$ can't make money on software without lots and lots of software churn so they keep fiddling and fiddling and fiddling with things, having bright idea after bright idea. [note sarcasm] Gee, Ma, where'd all that money come from?

    Apple had the right idea in the early Macs, where the details of the UI were specified in great detail and what worked in one program worked in another.

    The question remains, what is the optimum design?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Agreed. UI design on all platforms seems to me to be taking a backwards step every OS version.

      i personally hate the hiding of window control elements, declining customisability and flattening the UI.

      I guess which was *best* is subjective, disappearing ability to customise a UI to one's wishes or needs manufacturers an additional obstacle which need not be there, but the memo already went out to the designers...

      In many projects there's a point where a a goal is pretty close, but constantly going up to it and tweaking it, almost always ruins it, with the cummulative mess left thereafter.

      " Dear OS UI designers: Options: give people options dammit, make defaults sensible, because not everyone is an incapable grunting prole, some of us have been doing computers since the 1970s and you're pi**ing a LOT of people off with no realistic way to register (sic) their disenchantment with recent OS GUI design. Yes i can change window managers on Linux / BSD etc, but they're not going to run on Windows or Mac, (you kind of could on Mac, but not really) and VMs aren't the way to go.

      bring back customisation so we can put a 3d or pretty desktop environment on our computers, even if you designers want to force a flat 2d UI with no controls onto the great unwashed "

  31. Boonie

    Irrelevent

    Thank god for Directory Opus.

  32. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Does it really matter?

    First thing I do on Windows 10 is to install Classic Shell and get rid of that horrendous tile appendage to the Start menu.

    Not using a Microsoft account, so Cortana, Onedrive and the Microsoft app store are irrelevant to me.

    Evidently, someone at Microsoft still believes that Windows has a fighting chance in mobile, and shoving their precious Metro tiles onto the users' faces will help their cause.

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    win 10 grrr

    tiles should be for tablet and touch screen kit

    start menu like 7 should have remained for desktop spec pc with keyboard and mouse.

    hate windows 10 UI with a passion.

  34. MrKrotos

    IT Pros

    I do find it funny that the people I hear moaning about "Windows 10" are "IT Pros", a lot of the non-IT people I know love Windows 10.

    Does make you think doesn't it!

  35. Ilsa Loving

    Explosive duck penis

    An explosive duck penis is a perfect analogy for Microsoft's Windows strategy. They are blindly following every alley they come across, but you know the end result is that they want to screw over the user.

  36. Balcom

    Be still my beating heart!

    All we need now is the return of proper text size adjustment & colour for the 15 or so Active Title Bars, Scroll bars & Menu's etc., that we had in Win XP & 7 instead of the pathetic 5 text only adjustments in Win 10.

  37. Stevie

    Bah!

    Where do I click to switch the bug-ugly tiles off and return to the days of the user-selected desktop icons?

  38. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    More UI crap ..

    2017 and even single board computers costing the price of a curry or two have enough horsepower run a reasonable GUI, desktop and laptop hardware has more still, so now we've the processing power available, lets ditch some of the useful UI elements that we set as defaults a few years back when we er, didn't so much, maybe.

    The bubble that OS UI designers live in needs bursting soon, i missed the meeting when Windows, KDE 3, and Gnome all decided within a year or two of each other to hide UI elements and flatten the windowing system. Seems OS X designers were a little late too, but eventually they caught up with the rest of the kids and set about removing some depth and flattening the UI too, Interestingly the shadows under windows in OS X still remain, but they'll be next to go.

    I hate Android and IOS, but i believe Android's UI is going to get window buttons or something.

    What the hell is happening. Occam's razor tells me they just want things like desktop machines to just become media consumption devices like tablets. UUugh. somebody stop them..

    Windows 8.x was/is a UI disaster, lack of customisation and discoverability dropped, flat, oversized Fischer-Price window decorations and borders were here and it all went 2d as well.

    I'm sure Jony Ive's opposite number in the OS X (sierra+) UI dept is sat around with miserable millennials and beardy SJW types all discussing ways to make UI's more bland and uninspiring.

  39. Delbert Grady

    Windows long tiime fails

    Have they still got 'Format' directly above the 'Eject' in the right click menu on Win8 and 10 ?

    i have a Windows computer, but i refuse anything after Win7, so disgusting is MS and its toy OS.

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