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Windows Infinity

Wudang said:
Not so. How many people installed Vista? I still use XP at work and like many corporates we're skipping Vista and straight to win 7 RSN. If reports I hear are true we probably won't go to 8 as the training curve would be a major hit.
I'm sticking with XP. I guess I better lay in a copy of 7 in case my next machine only comes with 8. From the sound of it, however, 7 will be around for awhile.

~~ Paul
 
gumboot said:
I personally found Windows Phone 7 to be incredibly intuitive and well-designed. You virtually never have to refer to a user manual because everything works exactly the way you naturally guess it might work.
Oh good, then you can explain to me how the whole libraries thing works. My wife save a file from Word, then tries to find it from Explorer. No luck. Then I try to find it from a DOS box. No luck. Where the hell is it?

~~ Paul
 
Moon-Spinner said:
oh yes, one more thing, I'm discovering that using shortcut keys is easier than using the mouse to navigate to where you want to go. I'm compiling a list of shortcuts already...
Whew, it's a good thing we got rid of the command language. It's so much easier to remember completely non-mnemonic shortcut keys!

~~ Paul
 
I installed Window 8 on a laptop, I'm thinking of carrying it around everywhere I go, just so I can say to people "Want to see something REALLY scary?!! Check this out..."
 
Why would I think that? After years of them making new software harder to use than earlier iterations, it's what I expect.
With a few exceptions that crop up, every now and then, I think Microsoft's software generally gets easier to use over time. Every version of Windows, (again, with the exception of some specific features) has generally been easier and more intuitive than the last. This Windows 8 thing seems to be reversing the trend: Most of it is perplexing.

The whole reason Windows introduced a taskbar was because people didn't see where applications went when they were minimized in Windows 3.1. It's wasn't intuitive to check the desktop behind all the other open windows.

Now with Win8 and Metro, people are, once again, going to scratch their heads about where things go when a lot of their apps are off the main screen.

But that whole restructuring of the menus that made Office so much harder to use is embarassing.
The new Office Ribbon took some getting used to, but I think it is actually faster, easier, and more productive than the old menu system. And, everything you need to do is still there, somewhere.

Although, I agree that they should have kept a "legacy menu" option in the programs, like they do for Internet Explorer.


Win 8 is different: For the desktop PC, it NOT faster, easier, or more productive. It is being changed for the sake of consistency with a completely different form factor of computing devices: tablets. And, that has Interface Design Disaster written all over it! And, worst of all, a LOT of basic things are taken out, in the process.

I sincerely hope that, by the time Win 8 comes out, they give you the option of placing the classic Desktop front-and-center, with the classic Start menu; which would also place Metro as an "app" inside it.
And, for those devices where Metro makes sense, they can use the option of what is in Windows 8 now: Metro is front-and-center with the classic Desktop as an "app" inside of it.


On a less important note: Does Metro have to be so flat-and-solid-color looking? Didn't they learn the Baby Blocks interface looks terrible, when they did it for the Office application icons back in 2000?
And, if they actually did make Metro look sexier, would it be considered Metrosexual?
 
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Oh good, then you can explain to me how the whole libraries thing works. My wife save a file from Word, then tries to find it from Explorer. No luck. Then I try to find it from a DOS box. No luck. Where the hell is it?

~~ Paul


I don't know what you're talking about. There's no libraries on Windows Phone 7.
 
Is it possible that Windows 8 has been developed for tablets and phones first which is why this initial test release appears to be more designed for those systems, and that the desktop PC aspects are still being worked on?
 
I sincerely hope that, by the time Win 8 comes out, they give you the option of placing the classic Desktop front-and-center, with the classic Start menu; which would also place Metro as an "app" inside it.
And, for those devices where Metro makes sense, they can use the option of what is in Windows 8 now: Metro is front-and-center with the classic Desktop as an "app" inside of it.

This is basically my feeling. I'm guessing that there will be ways to bring back a "Classic" interface for those using it on desktop computers, and the newer look for those using it on tablets.

After test driving Windows 8 this past week, the one thing I think would make more sense than moving the cursor to various corners to try to bring up other menus would be to allow a Right Click anywhere on the desktop, which would then bring up a menu with all the basic options of where you want to go (ie: Settings, System, Applications, Shutdown, etc.). I haven't thought it through as to what the choices should be, but you get the idea. It's a bit confusing the way it is now.
 
This is basically my feeling. I'm guessing that there will be ways to bring back a "Classic" interface for those using it on desktop computers, and the newer look for those using it on tablets.

Apparently there's a Red Pill Option built into the operating system to do just that.

P.S. Red pill, from the movie Matrix, very funny. :D
 
the one thing I think would make more sense than moving the cursor to various corners to try to bring up other menus would be to allow a Right Click anywhere on the desktop, which would then bring up a menu with all the basic options of where you want to go (ie: Settings, System, Applications, Shutdown, etc.).
I haven't used OS/2 in a looong time, but this sounds vaguely reminicent of that.
 
Fluxbox, Openbox, Enlightenment 17 and others use that. There are some linux distros and possibly BSD ones that come with that or can have them added to it.
 
Here is a person trying to use Windows 8.

Yep, this is how I spent the first ten minutes with Windows 8, I finally threw in the towel and went to the internet to find out how to get anywhere in this system. What a joy - LOL
 
In the longer version, he talks about how he's used to Windows XP.
 

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