Microsoft should stick to its guns and keep the Start button gone

Op-ed: If Redmond wants Metro apps to succeed, it needs education, not capitulation.

Read the whole story

 

[drfisheye]

candlesayshi[/url]":14jsntw6]

zer0x1A4[/url]":14jsntw6]Hey remember when you were able to go directly from a working directory in Windows to the Command Prompt in that same directory? Ya know - way back in Windows 7, where all you needed to do was hold shift + right-click in that folder and there you had a simple option to "open command window here"? ... yep that's gone in Windows 8 as well

Aw... I do remember that... because it's still in Windows 8.

Indeed. And File > Open Command Prompt also works. Or Alt+F > P.

Edit: oh, and you can even add the Open Command Prompt icon to the quick access toolbar on top, saving you one click. Something you couldn't do in Win 7. So the property is more accessible, easier to find and more efficient than Win 7. But lets just hate Win 8 anyway.

 

[thenightisdark]

Wow, okay, I remember setting my IRQ settings to get sound to work, making sure the joystick IRQ didnt overlap and remove the sound.

And I like windows 8. Am I really in the minority, someone who knows how a computer works does not overlap with people who like windows 8?

I do not miss the start button at all.

I push the button on the front of my computer when i want to turn it off. once. The computer goes off.

I do not use metro, much. It is trivial to avoid it, I forget metro exists sometimes.

 

[AxMi-24]

Vi0cT[/url]":jh19chr4]I
If iOS keeps improving and the devices keep getting more powerful processors Microsoft will lose the users that use applications that aren't too resource intensive (Microsoft's flagship Office Suite for example) on Windows to iOS and then the ones doing really resource-intensive tasks will ask themselves “Well there's Windows and Windows Phone, but there is OS X and iOS for iPad and iPhone, and they have apps that offer integration with this application that happens to be the one I use in my workstation” which one will that people prefer in the long term?

That's not going to happen. Try using word or excel on a touch only device and see how far it gets you. Nobody is going to make a touch interface work well for that. There is a reason keyboards have been used since the first typewriter. They work fast and efficient for inputing a lot of text. Touch can work for a bit here and there but not for real typing.

So MS has nothing to worry from that. However they do have to worry when they mess up the UI to the point where people start having issues using the software (the new office is terrible as everything looks the same and it's really annoying to use).

 

[superslav223]

Once again Peter is defending the dumb idea that is Windows 8 while most of us predicted the poor public reaction when it was clear they were going to force Metro.

A start button makes Windows 8 less consistent? Sure Peter, because Windows 8 is such a consistent UI.

Open a file in the desktop - Sometimes a program in Metro handles it, sometimes it is the desktop.

Open a file in Metro - Sometimes a program in Metro handles it, sometimes it is the desktop.

Open a webpage in Metro IE - Sometimes it can handle it, other times you are kicked to the desktop version of IE. Funny enough Microsoft's own Silverlight can't be handled in Metro while Flash can.

Peter the problem isn't education and that can be seen endless number of poor user reviews from adept users. They want the start menu back and not Clippy 2.0. Metro is gawdy, distracting and poorly organizes program files when compared to the start menu. The "fear of change" argument falls flat when Android and iDevices are selling like hotcakes despite having a different UI. Yes Peter there is such thing as poor UI design. You and Sinofsky don't seem to get that.

Windows 8 is a flop and as I said last year you can either accept this now or later. It's just a dumb idea that hasn't gotten them anywhere. Sticking with Windows 7 would have made them more money and without putting further strains on their relationship with business customers.

 

[Vi0cT]

AxMi-24[/url]":2aw7hymy]

Vi0cT[/url]":2aw7hymy]I
If iOS keeps improving and the devices keep getting more powerful processors Microsoft will lose the users that use applications that aren't too resource intensive (Microsoft's flagship Office Suite for example) on Windows to iOS and then the ones doing really resource-intensive tasks will ask themselves “Well there's Windows and Windows Phone, but there is OS X and iOS for iPad and iPhone, and they have apps that offer integration with this application that happens to be the one I use in my workstation” which one will that people prefer in the long term?

That's not going to happen. Try using word or excel on a touch only device and see how far it gets you. Nobody is going to make a touch interface work well for that. There is a reason keyboards have been used since the first typewriter. They work fast and efficient for inputing a lot of text. Touch can work for a bit here and there but not for real typing.

So MS has nothing to worry from that. However they do have to worry when they mess up the UI to the point where people start having issues using the software (the new office is terrible as everything looks the same and it's really annoying to use).

I'm using the people that will actually do it as example, take into account that you can connect a keyboard to the iPad. So students and normal people that doesn't require all the functionalities that the full Windows Office Suite offers can jump.

For heavy work there's an Office version available for OS X so it's more about interoperability between devices and ecosystems than about the product itself being available in Windows or OS X.

Also I forgot to give a reference frame but I'm first talking in the mid-term, like 4-5 years from now (as it's obvious that current Enterprise customers wouldn't be changing platform now) and then in the long term, something like 10-12 years from now when everyone will get the chance or may have the need to update the hardware platform.

About the new Office Suite UI, well it's bad I mean it's a basic rule (in a whole lot of languages) to only use upper case in some situations and not everywhere. (Included my native language, Spanish )

We're talking about Office here but think about other Professional software available in both platforms from Adobe, Autodesk, Avid, Dassault Systèmes, Magix, Etc.

 

[JGoat]

Cartigan[/url]":1bnehjzx]
That the backend is Windows is beside the point. What they are trying to sell people is Metro.
Besides, you said "but it wasn't designed for [touch interfaces]" and that is false, false, false. Metro - the first thing you see and what they are actually trying to sell your ass - is designed for touch screens. The up-front UI is 100% designed for touch screen driven systems

So because you see the start screen first, the desktop portion isn't what they're selling me, a desktop user? How fascinating. I bought many licenses for the improvements they made to what you call the backend. Desktop is hardly backend though, it's where I spend 99% of my time in Win8.

 

[drfisheye]

alohadave[/url]":3r8xgw8k]

scotts13[/url]":3r8xgw8k]Of course, you need to be able to do this. I've given up on getting Windows back to the Win 2000 interface.

Heh, for a long time I changed all my XP computers to 2000 style menus, but after a long time, I've found that the XP menu works pretty well when you get used to it.

Here's the big problem for me, and it's the same reason why I didn't look that seriously at OSX last year (when I was thinking of getting a new laptop), lack of customizability. In OSX, you have 2 color schemes, blue or grey. Without buying a third party package, you cannot customize the desktop to look like you want. Fine, Windows lets me do that.

Fast forward to November when I buy a new laptop with Win8. A couple of themes, but no real control over the desktop. No, individual control over color selections that have been possible since Win3.1. Not even any of the classic themes.

Windows 7 is the same as Windows 8 in this regard. You can select a theme (out of a large gallery), a background and a color. That's it for both of them. Or you go back to the basic Windows 95 like theme, then you can select more

 

[drfisheye]

superslav223[/url]":29o3exi4]Sticking with Windows 7 would have made them more money and without putting further strains on their relationship with business customers.

So MS would have sold more than 100M copies of Windows 7 in the last 6 months if they hadn't released Windows 8? Everyone would have wanted PCs instead of iPads?

Edit: fixed typo. Still confusing then / than....

 

[saru-kun]

TIMMAH![/url]":13to2oic]

MatthiasF[/url]":13to2oic]

They don't support POP3 because they don't want you downloading anything to your device. There's this thing called The Cloud trying to be shoved down everyone's throat. Perhaps you've heard of it?

Well this would be a dealbreaker for me as my primary email account is with Time Warner and all they support is POP3. I think it's shortsighted on MS's part to just assume this can go away.

POP3 has been obsolete for almost 30 years... IMAP came out in 1986. So you should really complain to Time Warner, not MS. I have to assume their webmail interface isn't very good, or you would be using that. A web browser is the standard email protocol at this point.

 

[DrPizza]

superslav223[/url]":30590e45]
Peter the problem isn't education and that can be seen endless number of poor user reviews from adept users. They want the start menu back and not Clippy 2.0. Metro is gawdy, distracting and poorly organizes program files when compared to the start menu. The "fear of change" argument falls flat when Android and iDevices are selling like hotcakes despite having a different UI. Yes Peter there is such thing as poor UI design. You and Sinofsky don't seem to get that.

Adept users that can somehow cope with no on-screen Start button, and a launcher that's full-screen. If Windows 8 is as bad and unusable as you claim, why are other operating systems that do the same thing proving so successful?

 

[Vi0cT]

DrPizza[/url]":klxxcpjq]

superslav223[/url]":klxxcpjq]
Peter the problem isn't education and that can be seen endless number of poor user reviews from adept users. They want the start menu back and not Clippy 2.0. Metro is gawdy, distracting and poorly organizes program files when compared to the start menu. The "fear of change" argument falls flat when Android and iDevices are selling like hotcakes despite having a different UI. Yes Peter there is such thing as poor UI design. You and Sinofsky don't seem to get that.

Adept users that can somehow cope with no on-screen Start button, and a launcher that's full-screen. If Windows 8 is as bad and unusable as you claim, why are other operating systems that do the same thing proving so successful?

Want to add something here. Don't want to repeat myself, so it will be short.

Peter I believe that he's having double standards, I mean he's comparing iOS and Android with Windows 8, which is fair and correct, the mistake he's making is that he's comparing iOS and Android on a tablet vs Windows 8 on desktop that's not fair we should be comparing Apples to Apples right?.

That the Windows 8 UI got some compromises against the Aero UI in the desktop, that's true, again I did a big post in the page 9 giving my personal experience. However comparing Metro on a desktop against iOS and Android on tablets is like comparing Aero against Android and iOS on a desktop.

 

[graigsmith]

I think they should add it back, as an option at least. I think it should take users to the full screen windows 8 start menu. The new one that microsoft has created with all the live tiles. That way its at least obvious that it's the new start menu. But if they didn't add it, I wouldn't care too much as i'm using a mac or ipad these days anyways. I really don't give a crap what microsoft does.

 

[aaronwe]

Nope nope nope.

Microsoft should bring back the Start button on the desktop AND add the start button in Metro, at least on devices (i.e. non-tablets) that don't have a hardware Start button on the screen bezel.

No matter how hard Microsoft tries to educate, users won't like having to deal with a non-visible UI element, particularly one so crucial as the Start button. Gestures are great for interacting with stuff that's already on screen, but totally unnatural for bringing up interface elements out of nowhere.

Yes, it's very bad that the Start button comes and goes from the screen, but that's a reason to ADD it in Metro, not a reason to hide it from the Desktop.

 

[jimjimjimjimjim]

riverlaw[/url]":3o926qdk]I installed win 8 for games. I had to google how to shut it down. That was awesome. Way to force crap on you customers just so you can catch up on touch screen apps.

You didn't Bing for that?

 

[tjukken]

Anyone else who downgraded to Win 7 notice that PC manufacturers only have Win 8 specific drivers on their sites now? Now why would a laptop manufacturer, who wants to sell as many units as possible, try to stop people from downgrading? Seems fishy to me..

 

[pqr]

[moonsharksays]Peter's original copy used the word "complainants". It was changed during editing to "whiners". That change has now been reverted, reinstating Peter's original wording.[/moonsharksays]

Wow, you sure keep your writers on a short leash!

 

[krimhorn]

I've said it before and I'll repeat it here: Windows 8 should have been two editions: Tablet and Desktop. Metro is a brilliant UI in the portable, tablet arena. It's a terrible UI for the desktop arena.

Windows 9 is where the two OSes (which wouldn't differ below the UI level) should have merged. With an additional innovation for developers: an easy way to select which controls they want in one UI to be moved to a UI project targeted for the other paradigm. So a desktop application developer could be guided in choosing which controls/menus they wanted to use in a tablet version of the app and only have to work on layout and UI logic twice. Everything else would port over behind the scenes. There might be some limitations as to what the background code can do in that type of case, but it's better than having to write a second version of the application from scratch.

Alongside a simple way to help developer build both interfaces would be a "smart" way for the portable computer to identify whether it should be used in 'tablet' mode or 'desktop' mode. If most of the applications on the system had a Metro and a Desktop UI then they'd present the appropriate UI for the manner in which it was being used. Of course users should have the option of switching to whichever UI they prefer in each application (F11 anyone?).

Have a keyboard and mouse (or trackpad keyboard) plugged in? Desktop UI. Have the computer attached to an external monitor as well? Desktop UI. None of those are true or it detects that it's being held askew? Tablet UI. That's the future of computers. Ones that conform to the use case that the user is currently using.

Multi-application snap is great. As is flexible sizing. However, if Microsoft continues down this road all they're going to do is end up recreating the same Windows interface that they claim they're trying to get away from. Only with a lot less flexibility and utility. It would have been far simpler (and come with less user frustration) if they'd accepted that Windows 8 was not the right point to unify the OS for reals and that it's never going to be the right time to have a UI designed for one interaction paradigm try to work in all interaction paradigms.

Oh, and the Start Button? That wasn't the issue. It was the lack of the Start Menu and the way that the Start Screen completely destroys your mental and visual context by completely overlaying the applications you're using. It's the visual modality that's the problem. Not the interactive modality.

 

[ampillion]

NucularHolyWarrior[/url]":l33r4qj9]Ignoring Metro is not an option, but thankfully moving to Linux is.

Linux is not an option either since a lot of software and hardware I use are dependent on Windows. Thankfully, I'm moving back to Windows 7 which is the best option of the three.

 

[pocketdrummer]

If Microsoft wants to fix Windows 8 they'll stop making it ALL ABOUT TOUCH and start making it work for the intended platforms. I don't see hybrid laptops taking off as much as they think they'll take off. Tablets, however, have already begun to do so. Desktops will NEVER be a popular touch platform, and you shouldn't expect businesses to update their monitors with overpriced touch-capable monitors.

The problem with Windows 8 is that they still think they can make one interface to rule them all. They can't. Apple realized this and they've tailored OS X for the intended platform and built up the iPad from a MOBILE PLATFORM THAT IS ALREADY TOUCH CAPABLE! This should have been obvious to Microsoft.

The Start button is irrelevant. It's not that people can't find it so they hate the OS, it's what happens AFTER they launch the start screen. Why does anyone with a 22+" monitor need a menu that takes over the entire screen? Why would you need a full screen app? Why would a computer with a mouse and keyboard EVER use gestures (unless you count browser style gestures with a button dedicated to that function). Forcing a mouse user to swipe their mouse on one end of the screen is awkward and ruins workflow.

Microsoft should give Stardock a cut of every sale. The only thing that makes Win8 even remotely appealing is Start8 and ModernMix.

 

[netblaz]

metro was designed by accountants from the ground-up. if it'd worked out the way microsoft wanted, they'd have shuffled everyone into an app store and would already be collecting 30% on everything, microsoft would be getting awards for "radical new design," and they'd have a foothold in the phone/tablet market. bling bling, skyrocketing stock.

thank the gods, none of this has come to pass. after years of hearing people talk about american idol, i feared the public would just swallow this too, but apparently there are limits regarding how far you can lead consumer cattle down the garden path.

if the new xbox is anything as greedy as the rumors are painting it, i pray people will reject that as well. 'cos if they don't, it'll be worse next generation.

 

[TomXP411]

WaveRunner[/url]":qqr3rvtb]

TomXP411[/url]":qqr3rvtb]

Cartigan[/url]":qqr3rvtb]Impressive trolling, sir.

Quite.

I'll let the moderators decide that one... thanks.

Nah, that is not the kind of trolling that will get one modded/banned. I can even respect someone that can eloquently state a dissenting and/or ridiculous viewpoint.

Now the dude posting the picture of the Texas Governer deep-throating a corn dog and saying it was Hitler... that guy needed to get banned. So does the guy who comes in to every thread and insults everyone while disagreeing with him. If you don't agree with him, you're just a stupid fanboy who doesn't deserve an opinion.

Come to think of it, I haven't seen him lately. Maybe he can't figure out how to call Windows lovers fanboys on a Windows thread. Come in and tell us we should be using Macs, perhaps?

 

[TomXP411]

netblaz[/url]":2os04m47]thank the gods, none of this has come to pass. after years of hearing people talk about american idol, i feared the public would just swallow this too, but apparently there are limits regarding how far you can lead consumer cattle down the garden path.

Example; I use Skype regularly. I insisted on getting the desktop version, since the Metro version takes up the whole screen, and I need that screen for other stuff.

Windows is called Windows because of the windows on the screen. Take away the windows and it's not Windows any more... it's just screens. Maybe they could call it Screen Doors, instead.

 

[Hey It's Todd]

Richard Head[/url]":2iy2fw23]Why not just give people the choice of enabling either a traditional start menu or the new metro start screen? People on laptops and desktops can continue using the start menu, while those on tablets can use metro. Choice is good. Forcing something down peoples' throats they don't necessarily want is not.

Because one of the longtime criticisms of Windows is bloat - there are often many ways to accomplish the same thing, from the end-users' standpoint as well as developers'. IMO, Modern UI is a chance for a cleaner break from a lot of legacy stuff than other releases of Windows. Ripping out the program menu from the UI, and correspondingly the codebase, represents a change of attitude that I applaud. This particular choice of where to streamline may not be universally loved (intentional understatement there), but I wish they'd have been doing more of it over the last decade or so.

As I understand it, the core of the OS has been modularized to a much greater extent than earlier versions, allowing for a more piecemeal approach to building different versions - desktop, phone, Xbox, server, etc. I'd like to see the cleanup extend to other areas, such as dropping freaking metafiles and a lot of image formats, for example. Clean up some old codepaths to optimize the experience for the masses, and use virtualization to support old/obsolete hardware/software and call it a day, I say.

Myself, I rarely use the start menu in Windows 7, save for getting to the Control Panel now and then. I've been using Launchy for years, hooked up to the Windows+ENTER key combo. If it supported aliases, I might never click the button again.

 

[althaz]

Bongle[/url]":33pybzwe]

These include more personalization, a Settings app that doesn't force you to use Control Panel, richer multitasking with more apps visible on-screen, multimonitor support, and unified search.

None of these things have ever been done before. Truly amazing.

Honestly, at my work we looked into adapating our (admittedly older) current codebase to be at least partially WinRT-compatible and it was effectively impossible. It would've taken a complete rewrite of even the most basic features to abide by the windows-store requirements (they ban a lot of very common WinAPI calls and you have to use more modern versions*). I imagine many software shops with legacy codebases are the same.

*I don't begrudge them for this, it makes sense as a way to enforce smooth-running applications, but it's a very blunt instrument that probably explains why their mail client is lacking key features. It was probably a rewrite rather than an upgrade to their existing codebase.

I *loved* the comment where someone had to Google how to shut down their new Win8 computer. If *that* isn't an EPIC FAIL on the part of MS (even worse than the original "click on Start to select Shutdown" ridiculousness) I don't know what is...

I had to google it as well. After that, I had a couple coworkers take the "Windows 8 shutdown challenge". Average time to find the command: about 90 seconds.

To be honest, this just goes to show that you work with a couple of morons. Don't get me wrong, the shut-down command SHOULD be easily accessible (there ought to be a power button on the start screen, IMO, that allows shutdown/sleep/restart/hibernate/get me a coffee), but if you don't know what Alt-F4 is, you're a very long way away from being halfway competent in basic computer usage.

 

[paradox00]

I really don't understand the logic that leads to the conclusion that the taskbar should be poorly designed for desktop users to remain consistent with metro apps which are poorly designed for desktop users. The solution is not "sticking to your guns", it's making metro apps easier to use on the desktop. No user should ever have to ask how do I get out of this app, and the start button shouldn't remain gone for the sake of teaching users to use hot corners.

The obvious counter to statements like "the taskbar shouldn't have a start button because metro apps don't have one" is that metro apps should have a start button because the taskbar has one. Both methods achieve the desired consistency, but only one solves the problem of metro being non-intuitive on the desktop. I'm not sure why you'd choose the solution that doesn't address the problem.

I'm not suggesting that metro apps should have a persistent icon per say. One way the start button could be incorporated is something similar to hot corners, it would only appear if you moused over to the lower left corner. To make sure people know the button is there, it could appear when you first open the app, then fade out after a couple seconds. We've been able to hide the taskbar for years, so thins wouldn't be completely out of the ordinary for people. For even greater consistency, metro apps could simply have the taskbar at the bottom, start button and all (with an option of hiding it of course). That might actually be the best option, as it would allow users to switch seamlessly between metro and traditional apps. Even if you consider my suggestion terrible (there are certainly other options for improving metro apps), my point is simple: it's not the start buttons fault that meto apps are non intuitive for mouse based users, so it makes no sense to make it take the fall for Metros failings.

 

[superslav223]

drfisheye[/url]":nkordxli]

superslav223[/url]":nkordxli]Sticking with Windows 7 would have made them more money and without putting further strains on their relationship with business customers.

So MS would have sold more than 100M copies of Windows 7 in the last 6 months if they hadn't released Windows 8? ?

Edit: fixed typo. Still confusing then / than....

Yes, especially if they had offered $15 versions to people with pirated copies of XP.
http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2012/10 ... r-just-15/

That "loophole" stayed open an awful long time.

 

[Cartigan]

DrPizza[/url]":2biea1wt]

superslav223[/url]":2biea1wt]
Peter the problem isn't education and that can be seen endless number of poor user reviews from adept users. They want the start menu back and not Clippy 2.0. Metro is gawdy, distracting and poorly organizes program files when compared to the start menu. The "fear of change" argument falls flat when Android and iDevices are selling like hotcakes despite having a different UI. Yes Peter there is such thing as poor UI design. You and Sinofsky don't seem to get that.

Adept users that can somehow cope with no on-screen Start button, and a launcher that's full-screen. If Windows 8 is as bad and unusable as you claim, why are other operating systems that do the same thing proving so successful?

Name one of these operating systems.

 

[superslav223]

DrPizza[/url]":1i72b7ar]

superslav223[/url]":1i72b7ar]
Peter the problem isn't education and that can be seen endless number of poor user reviews from adept users. They want the start menu back and not Clippy 2.0. Metro is gawdy, distracting and poorly organizes program files when compared to the start menu. The "fear of change" argument falls flat when Android and iDevices are selling like hotcakes despite having a different UI. Yes Peter there is such thing as poor UI design. You and Sinofsky don't seem to get that.

Adept users that can somehow cope with no on-screen Start button, and a launcher that's full-screen. If Windows 8 is as bad and unusable as you claim, why are other operating systems that do the same thing proving so successful?

Adept users can cope with anything, but only an idiot would create a product that needlessly annoys them.

Windows has a lock on the market so let's not kid ourselves about what other operating systems can and cannot do. If you want to run Windows software then you need Windows, period. They have a lock on the market, it's not like people walk into Best Buy and pick from 5 different laptop operating systems.

But more importantly it's not simply about what I want. You know as well as I do that feedback was overwhelmingly negative on the Windows 8 blog. Amazon reviews for Windows 8 are worse than for Windows 7. All the evidence is there, it just isn't a good UI. Taking your start menu icons and spreading them out randomly as larger tiles does not improve productivity. Neither you nor Microsoft has explained how Windows 8 improves productivity. In fact Sinofsky avoided that question and in fact deleted quite a few comments where people showed exactly how task A took longer mouse strokes or more clicks with Windows 8. This is all just a dumb plan to boost Microsoft's position in the tablet market and it has FAILED. Surface RT is a flop and the Metro market is crap for developers.

Stupid: Let's force Metro to boost app sales even if desktop users don't like it and then we'll have an app market.

Smart Let's serve customers by creating a tablet that actually appeals to them.

Why do you keep defending these stupid plans from Redmond? Xbox One, Windows 8 and Kin are all evidence that someone at the top keeps green-lighting stupid ideas. Gee whiz who could that be?

 

[firsttimeposter]

superslav223[/url]":2gada5eu]

DrPizza[/url]":2gada5eu]

superslav223[/url]":2gada5eu]
Peter the problem isn't education and that can be seen endless number of poor user reviews from adept users. They want the start menu back and not Clippy 2.0. Metro is gawdy, distracting and poorly organizes program files when compared to the start menu. The "fear of change" argument falls flat when Android and iDevices are selling like hotcakes despite having a different UI. Yes Peter there is such thing as poor UI design. You and Sinofsky don't seem to get that.

Adept users that can somehow cope with no on-screen Start button, and a launcher that's full-screen. If Windows 8 is as bad and unusable as you claim, why are other operating systems that do the same thing proving so successful?

Adept users can cope with anything, but only an idiot would create a product that needlessly annoys them.

Windows has a lock on the market so let's not kid ourselves about what other operating systems can and cannot do. If you want to run Windows software then you need Windows, period. They have a lock on the market, it's not like people walk into Best Buy and pick from 5 different laptop operating systems.

But more importantly it's not simply about what I want. You know as well as I do that feedback was overwhelmingly negative on the Windows 8 blog. Amazon reviews for Windows 8 are worse than for Windows 7. All the evidence is there, it just isn't a good UI. Taking your start menu icons and spreading them out randomly as larger tiles does not improve productivity. Neither you nor Microsoft has explained how Windows 8 improves productivity. In fact Sinofsky avoided that question and in fact deleted quite a few comments where people showed exactly how task A took longer mouse strokes or more clicks with Windows 8. This is all just a dumb plan to boost Microsoft's position in the tablet market and it has FAILED. Surface RT is a flop and the Metro market is crap for developers.

Stupid: Let's force Metro to boost app sales even if desktop users don't like it and then we'll have an app market.

Smart Let's serve customers by creating a tablet that actually appeals to them.

Why do you keep defending these stupid plans from Redmond? Xbox One, Windows 8 and Kin are all evidence that someone at the top keeps green-lighting stupid ideas. Gee whiz who could that be?

So if you want to run iOS software, you need to buy iOS device. If you want to run Android software you need to buy Android device. If you want to run Blackberry software, you need to buy Blackberry device. Windows DOES NOT have a lock on the market. People are already buying MILLIONS of devices with NON-MS OS. There is plenty of choice on the market. Go to any PC store and you will find iOS and Android tablets which are increasingly used as the main personal computing device. There is choice and people are already buying non-MS OS.

What you are saying is that MS should sit back and rest on its laurels. Tablet computing IS the future. PCs are in decline and if MS just focuses on the desktop, Windows runs the risk of going the way of Windows Mobile. MS focused on businesses and power users with Windows Mobile. We all know what happened when iOS which focused on consumption came around.

You must remember that the average joe does not care about productivity. The average joe browses facebook, watch youtube and writes some emails. Why do you think MS needs to explain productivity when most users don't care about it?

BTW, creating a OS from scratch in a market already dominated by other OSs just doesn't work. Look at how WP is struggling. W8 was the best option for MS to get into the increasingly important tablet market.

 

[scotts13]

saru-kun[/url]":t0julcef]

POP3 has been obsolete for almost 30 years... IMAP came out in 1986. So you should really complain to Time Warner, not MS. I have to assume their webmail interface isn't very good, or you would be using that. A web browser is the standard email protocol at this point.

REALLY? The introduction of IMAP is not an indicator that POP3 is "obsolete"; they're different ways of doing things. Don't have figures handy as to number of users, but most people I know who are serious about email, including attachments and such, use POP3 through an email client, not a web page browser.

 

[has]

PsychoArs[/url]":5e771n4i]A hidden interface is a bad interface. Period.

The hot-corners and charms bars and windows-button-that-is-invisible on Win8 is bad, bad, bad interface design. It's counter-intuitive and less accessible. You find it by accident, not by exploration. It's scattered and distributed over multiple screen areas.

Yes and no. Getting crap out the way is often a good thing, since all that clutter sucks up screen estate and distracts from the current task at hand. Traditional Windows UIs from 3.1 to 7 have always ground my gears with the sheer constant volume of visual noise: everything shouts at you, from the smallest, most trivial button upward, and all in a great sea of eye-searing chrome that becomes more outrageous with each new release. The Win7 control panel is clearly designed by a committee that believes the best way to deal with the poor top-level navigability is to add shortcuts for specific tasks, and then add more shortcuts to deal with the trouble of navigating those, and so on, as if that can ever fix the poor top-level categorization and display that's the real root of the problem. Compare with OS X's System Preferences: clear icons, one or two word labels; an absolute minimum of essential information with fast drill-down and adaptive search+highlighting to make it easy to locate the appropriate panel. And don't even get me started on the great seas of shortcut icons that have progressively engulfged Office apps until there's more toolbars than editing space; a consequence, I suspect, of the poor 'scrubbability' of Windows' menus that makes them excessively tedious to visually explore. (The accursed ribbon is no solution either: while it does re-compact this sprawl a bit, its utterly undisciplined layout and random mixing of icons and text makes it even harder to visually search.)

Win8's obviously far from fully baked, but it's the first time I've ever seen Windows try to reverse this two-decade trend, and for that alone MS deserves credit. Compare to OS X's UI stagnation or Linux's lack of independent HCI R&D, and MS starts to look like an actual innovator here. That said, it's also obviously the first time MS have really genuinely tried to design UI, and they're clearly struggling with the unfamiliarity of the problem space and still climbing the learning curve.

The #1 problem I've found in using Win8 isn't that stuff is hidden out the way when it's not being used, it's that the interface generally lacks cues to indicate where it is hidden, which in turn would imply how to reveal and/or trigger it.

For example, on Win8 phone it's often not obvious if swiping from left/right will take you between screens or not, nor is it always obvious from surrounding context whether a piece of text will perform an action when tapped or is simply static. This is not to say that there should be arrows or buttons or other fixed cruft to indicate this as that just trades one set of problems for another. But maybe if there was a standard 'query' mechanism - say, pressing and holding for a second or more - that would cause the live text and swipable edges to pulse momentarily, that would provide easy cues to the 'learnable behaviors' that users can pick up in their own time and greatly reduce the disconcerting feeling of being lost and adrift with no assistance.

Similarly, with, say, a touchscreen laptop where you can hop between touch and trackpad, it makes sense to rely on different user actions to access the same features - e.g swipe from the right or mouse into the right-hand hot corners to bring up the charms - since direct+absolute and indirect+relative pointing mechanisms have different strengths and weaknesses (e.g. the former is more expressive but the latter can exploit Fitt's). But there's no easy cue when switching between input modes to remind you where the triggers can be found (e.g. pulse the active edges when in touch versus pulse the hot corners when in mouse/trackpad mode).

That's all that's really needed: just a cued reminder where to go to find the interaction triggers. From there the rest is explorable and learnable, and all without wrecking the great noise reductions that have so improved the visual aspect. Yes, a better static tutorial as Peter suggests wouldn't hurt, but the real trick that future Win releases need to achieve is making the UI incrementally reveal its available behaviors in a smooth, measured process of discovery rather than the wall-of-noise approach of Win7 and earlier or the jerky, all-too-often disconnected jumps of Win8.0. Given that MS products tend to hit their stride by v3, fingers crossed for the next release after this.

 

[Cartigan]

scotts13[/url]":ebc6r83c]

saru-kun[/url]":ebc6r83c]

POP3 has been obsolete for almost 30 years... IMAP came out in 1986. So you should really complain to Time Warner, not MS. I have to assume their webmail interface isn't very good, or you would be using that. A web browser is the standard email protocol at this point.

REALLY? The introduction of IMAP is not an indicator that POP3 is "obsolete"; they're different ways of doing things. Don't have figures handy as to number of users, but most people I know who are serious about email, including attachments and such, use POP3 through an email client, not a web page browser.

And what does that have to do with IMAP? If you were "serious" about email, I have no idea why you would use POP3. Unless you only ever accessed the mail from one location. Or are making unnecessary copies.

 

[parawizard]

I have many gripes with Windows 8 and Microsoft's choice to make two completely different environments.

1) Metro apps are lacking features
2) Metro apps will continue to lack features as developers have to maintain a completely different piece of software
3) Metro gives desktop users no advantages. For me It is another screen that I click desktop
4) Metro apps have to be alt-F4'd after opening a file else the app stays open and you cannot alter the file
5) Metro apps are the default apps to open many file types while in desktop mode
6) Settings between desktop and metro are incomplete and fairly annoying
7) Metro split screen is fairly useless (At least it is now going to be flexible)
8) There has been no improvement of the interface in desktop mode for large monitors (I use a 30" Dell)
9) Metro integration into desktop with the hover right side bar makes no sense and covers part of the screen.

I have finally moved back to Windows 7 x64 and to my relief I am only missing core changes like the way windows 8 hibernates, file transfer gui changes, inclusion of MSE etc. I would love it if I could away using Ubuntu instead of Microsoft's new interface.

Oh well.

 

[pastoralchicken]

Obvious troll is obvious. Nothing in this entire article makes a rational argument in any direction. Another shallow attempt at pages views by Ars through intentionally taking the unpopular view.

The Peter Bright way, and the reason I let my subscription lapse. He's a useless troll. Ken says he isn't though, so it must be true!

 

[Porcodio]

250 Million total "apps" downloaded.
250 Million start menu "apps" downloaded.

hue hue

 

[wickerbill]

I never use any metro app and given the software we use at our business, probably never will. Metro might be a good tablet interface but it's awful for for desktop use. I have start 8 installed so I never see the start screen either. I tried it and didn't like it and don't miss it. Windows 8 is a great desktop OS even when totally ignoring the metro interface.

 

[AxMi-24]

firsttimeposter[/url]":30pee4nv]

superslav223[/url]":30pee4nv]

DrPizza[/url]":30pee4nv]

superslav223[/url]":30pee4nv]
Peter the problem isn't education and that can be seen endless number of poor user reviews from adept users. They want the start menu back and not Clippy 2.0. Metro is gawdy, distracting and poorly organizes program files when compared to the start menu. The "fear of change" argument falls flat when Android and iDevices are selling like hotcakes despite having a different UI. Yes Peter there is such thing as poor UI design. You and Sinofsky don't seem to get that.

Adept users that can somehow cope with no on-screen Start button, and a launcher that's full-screen. If Windows 8 is as bad and unusable as you claim, why are other operating systems that do the same thing proving so successful?

Adept users can cope with anything, but only an idiot would create a product that needlessly annoys them.

Windows has a lock on the market so let's not kid ourselves about what other operating systems can and cannot do. If you want to run Windows software then you need Windows, period. They have a lock on the market, it's not like people walk into Best Buy and pick from 5 different laptop operating systems.

But more importantly it's not simply about what I want. You know as well as I do that feedback was overwhelmingly negative on the Windows 8 blog. Amazon reviews for Windows 8 are worse than for Windows 7. All the evidence is there, it just isn't a good UI. Taking your start menu icons and spreading them out randomly as larger tiles does not improve productivity. Neither you nor Microsoft has explained how Windows 8 improves productivity. In fact Sinofsky avoided that question and in fact deleted quite a few comments where people showed exactly how task A took longer mouse strokes or more clicks with Windows 8. This is all just a dumb plan to boost Microsoft's position in the tablet market and it has FAILED. Surface RT is a flop and the Metro market is crap for developers.

Stupid: Let's force Metro to boost app sales even if desktop users don't like it and then we'll have an app market.

Smart Let's serve customers by creating a tablet that actually appeals to them.

Why do you keep defending these stupid plans from Redmond? Xbox One, Windows 8 and Kin are all evidence that someone at the top keeps green-lighting stupid ideas. Gee whiz who could that be?

So if you want to run iOS software, you need to buy iOS device. If you want to run Android software you need to buy Android device. If you want to run Blackberry software, you need to buy Blackberry device. Windows DOES NOT have a lock on the market. People are already buying MILLIONS of devices with NON-MS OS. There is plenty of choice on the market. Go to any PC store and you will find iOS and Android tablets which are increasingly used as the main personal computing device. There is choice and people are already buying non-MS OS.

What you are saying is that MS should sit back and rest on its laurels. Tablet computing IS the future. PCs are in decline and if MS just focuses on the desktop, Windows runs the risk of going the way of Windows Mobile. MS focused on businesses and power users with Windows Mobile. We all know what happened when iOS which focused on consumption came around.

You must remember that the average joe does not care about productivity. The average joe browses facebook, watch youtube and writes some emails. Why do you think MS needs to explain productivity when most users don't care about it?

BTW, creating a OS from scratch in a market already dominated by other OSs just doesn't work. Look at how WP is struggling. W8 was the best option for MS to get into the increasingly important tablet market.

Hell no! They are being used as consumption devices. They compete with a TV much more than with a PC. Fact that you can game and watch videos does not make a PC same as a tablet.

Just because the average idiot doesn't get above consumption is not the reason to throw all other users under the bus. Especially as those other users tend to have skills to fuck you up for real by switching to a completely different platform once you piss them off enough.

Intelligent move by MS would have been windows 8 with start meny and something like modernmix so that PC users still can access apps (if there were any decent ones) but you don't mess up the complete work flow for every single person using their PC in a manner that is more advanced than watching a video and being a retard on facebook or twitter.

 

[Shannara]

I can see the author laughing up a storm typing this article. April fools is already over for this year ...

 

[Evilsushi]

I think, I am starting to understand the Hate of windows 8.
1) "can't find the power off" (lack of education)
2) "having to swipe with a mouse" (lack of education) there is nothing in Metro that requires swiping with a mouse unless you have no scroll wheel which would also require you to swipe in 7 or below it would just be vertically instead.
3) Can't find x setting (fixed in 8.1) but people are still complaining about it.
4) segregated search (fixed in 8.1) but people are still complaining about it.
5) full screen UI ( personal choice) personally I work full screen or 50/50 pretty much 100% of the time so this doesn't actually bother me at all. I have a 30" and 24" monitor and I want to use every inch of it for the program I'm in (typically Visual Studio) not looking at partial windows or the pretty picture on my desktop. The 50/50 split solves any of my previous complaints here.
6)Hot corners confusing hard to find (lack of education).
7)Hot corners a PITA in multi-monitor situation. I will agree with this one, but I think it could be fixed easily if they just made the corner pockets "sticky" so they capture my mouse better.
8)Touch UI on desktop (Lack of education) there is nothing touch only or specific on Metro. I have multiple monitor desktop (non touch), 17" laptop (non touch), and a tablet (touch) and I get around fine on all three and I use a mix of modern and legacy on all three.
9)Distracting Context changes (Personal Choice) I have ADD, and personally never found the context change distracting.
10)Start screen doesn't provide all the information the old start menu provided (mostly Fixed in 8.1) but people keep making inaccurate criticisms of it. The things still missing in 8.1 all apps view are the my computer, my documents, etc... stuff the all apps view provides alphabetized, hierarchal, most used, etc.. views of all apps and you can set this as the default start screen.
11)Track pad gestures too sensitive (no one actually complained about this one this is my personal experience)
12)Metro apps are toys and can't provide real functionality. (Lack of education) Can't is a strong word, don't might be more accurate but there is nothing inherent to metro that relegates them to consumption only. Microsoft's guidance on UI conventions doesn't prohibit on screen controls but it does encourage developer to keep them minimum.
13)Hidden GUI controls (Lack of education) while the controls are hidden they are very consistent, Left side is OS level navigation, Right side is the Charm bar, which includes Search (In app or System Wide), Share (send to email, facebook, onenote, Txt msg, Other apps) Windows (takes you to start screen), Devices (Printing, external device) Settings (In app settings or System Settings). Top is in app navigation, bottom is contextual menu for current screen.

Overall, I think Peter is right, Microsoft's biggest problem is they did a poor job of educating the consumer. The stupid start up animation is woefully inadequate. I found the people that hate 8 are MOSTLY because they don't know how to do anything because so much of the UI is hidden (but logical and consistent). I very simple 5 minute introduction does wonders to change peoples attitudes. I don't think adding the start button back is a bad Idea, just give me the option to turn it off because I don't want it.

 

[alohadave]

12)Metro apps are toys and can't provide real functionality. (Lack of education)

How can inadequate apps be blamed on lack of education?