Please fire the person in Microsoft that thought the charms thing is ok
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It's a reason to why everyone is not happy about Windows 8, not the reality of it.
P.S.: just to make a point: I actually like the vision behind Windows 8. I just don't like how it's being implemented. An UI should always cater to the users' needs, and these needs wildly differ between desktop users and smartphone users. It's a great idea to have a common OS under the hood - but it should remain under that hood and not force the pecularities of one device on the use of a comepletely different one!
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P.S.: just to make a point: I actually like the vision behind Windows 8. I just don't like how it's being implemented. An UI should always cater to the users' needs, and these needs wildly differ between desktop users and smartphone users. It's a great idea to have a common OS under the hood - but it should remain under that hood and not force the pecularities of one device on the use of a comepletely different one!
UI's that cater to the users is always a model that has failed.
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Metro is unusable for desktops workstations. This is not a matter of taste, it is a fact. This is not a matter of some things needing to be done differently, it is a matter of vital libaries not supported by Metro. Even for Metro app programming (depending on type of app) you may need to work in desktop mode, because Metro doesn't support some developer tools. At least this was true half a year ago - not sure 8.1 changed anything about it, but I doubt that. Clearly, you are not a developer, or you would know this. Here is an old article bashing the Win 8 preview[^]. My experience so far, pretty much mirrors the descritpions in this article. I've found it to be very accurate so far:
Neil McAllister wrote:
The result is a twisted chimera of an OS that can't decide whether it wants to frustrate, annoy, or interfere.
Neil McAllister wrote:
smartphone app UIs are tailored to the devices they run on. A smartphone's primary input device is a tiny touchscreen. Big icons and easy controls cater to that. But on a PC equipped with a 22-inch monitor, a mouse, and a keyboard, you don't need to simplify the UI to such a degree. Metro forces the PC usage model to cater to the UI, rather than the other way around.
Neil McAllister wrote:
Apps aren't why people buy PCs. Apps are frivolous. The most popular ones are mostly games, gadgets, social networking clients, and other minor diversions. True, some people use apps for business. But the apps that help you do real work aren't the type you download for 99 cents while you wait for the subway. They're not what's driving the app sales revenue Microsoft craves. Consumer entertainment is the sweet spot.
I can only underline these realizations. They match my experience, and probably that of most desktop developers, too. If they don't match yours, all the better for you - but please don't assume we all share your perspective.
I have no problem making enterprise apps in metro mode for desktop workstations. As a 16 year programmer I cursed when I realised all the libraries were not there, but then realised the tasks where not impossible I just didn't know at that moment how to do it.
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I've had plenty of time to learn about the reality of W8 on my Ultrabook. It's almost as bad compared to W7 as Vista was claimed to be compared to XP. At least for any kind of professional work. I've spent hours to find(*) and set up my energy settings only to get them wiped on a regular basis for no apparent reason (I suspect Windows Update does it, but can't be sure). I regularly spend valuable minutes of worktime to locate the folder in Windows explorer that actually contains the files I stored from an application, because the whole "library" system is a total mess and makes it unnecessarily hard to locate files from without the application that stored it. I've spent more hours removing annoying remnants of the Metro UI popping up in desktop mode - just how often and insistently do I need to tell Windows I don't want it!? I've spent even more time trying to figure out how to make Windows and applications store data on my data partition, but I'm not yet done jumping through hoops. Why can't I just relocate the "My Documents folder to another path in a simple manner? W8 is a horror to set up in a specific manner. If you're fine with the factory settings, then you're in luck. If not, plan for some exhaustive sessions to even find the appropriate settings that *may*, under certain conditions, affect the system in the way you want - only to have those settings changed or reset by some obscure background "service" that you possibly didn't even want to run in the first place if you even knew it existed. Maybe some of these problems hail from the additional manufacturer-installed software, but by all indications the majority are built into W8. Just to make a point: I wouldn't want to run iOS on a desktop any more than I would run W8. W8 is a smartphone OS. It is not a desktop OS any more, even in "desktop mode": It may be usable for tablets - I don't own one so I don't know. But on my Ultrabook - without touch screen - it is still more of a hindrance than help. (*): when I said hours to find and set up, I meant stuff way beyond the 10 minutes to blank screen and 30 minutes to power down. There are several dozen settings spread over two different dialogs, several tabs and a badly ordered list of options with a terrible UI. It's somewhat intuitive once you've found all of it, but it's painfully easy to override an option in one place that you've set to a different value in another if you're not careful. Plus, as mentioned above - something in the system appears to reset some or all of the choices under
To move the documents folder. Right click on the documents folder. select properties. go to location tab. click the move button. Find folder in the dialog box that appears. Click ok or apply. Message box appears that reads "Do you want to move all of the files from the old location to the new location - Yes no cancel. In your case select no. Nothing is hard in windows 8 in fact its super easy once you have the experience. The only time I've lost settings within windows 8 is when I screwed up the install.
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UI's that cater to the users is always a model that has failed.
You do understand that UI stands for "User Interface"? :doh:
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You do understand that UI stands for "User Interface"? :doh:
A car is a user interface, the car that Homer Simpson build was good I must admit but the reality is users don't know jack about what they really what.
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To move the documents folder. Right click on the documents folder. select properties. go to location tab. click the move button. Find folder in the dialog box that appears. Click ok or apply. Message box appears that reads "Do you want to move all of the files from the old location to the new location - Yes no cancel. In your case select no. Nothing is hard in windows 8 in fact its super easy once you have the experience. The only time I've lost settings within windows 8 is when I screwed up the install.
Yes and no. What you describe (and what I already knew) is the way to move the user specific part of a specific library. In this example it will move the "My Documents" location for the currently logged in user. It will not move hte location for the public or any other user, nor will it move the location of the picture, audio, and other library files - you have to move all of them individually! And that's what I haven't found out how to do in 'one step'. It used to be super easy in W7, because it only required knowledge of moving files and folders rather than "libraries", and because that way you could move the entire document folder at once rather than each "sub library" individually. Thank you for proving my point.
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A car is a user interface, the car that Homer Simpson build was good I must admit but the reality is users don't know jack about what they really what.
That doesn't change that a UI needs to cater to the users needs! Whether they know them or not is a separate issue - you as a developer should know them however. And it appears MS has failed miserably in this regard.
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Inexperience
It might surprise you, but it is possible to dislike the OS for other reasons than inexperience. Also, I have yet to see any advantages of the new UI, even after finding out how to do things. How are the new ways to do stuff actually better, instead of only different? Difference only for the sake of difference is not exactly what I look for in a new version of an OS or other software. I can put up with a lot of learning time if there is something to be gained, I even learned to like the ribbon design in office quite a lot. But if the UX is changed heavily, I'd like it to actually make sense beyond "now we don't have to make different versions for tablets and desktops". Also, I'd like the company to consider cases like non-fullscreen, laggy RDP connections before implementing a UI in a server OS where I have to put the cursor on some precise pixel in the corner to open up menus because Windows key shortcuts don't work in that case.
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Yes and no. What you describe (and what I already knew) is the way to move the user specific part of a specific library. In this example it will move the "My Documents" location for the currently logged in user. It will not move hte location for the public or any other user, nor will it move the location of the picture, audio, and other library files - you have to move all of them individually! And that's what I haven't found out how to do in 'one step'. It used to be super easy in W7, because it only required knowledge of moving files and folders rather than "libraries", and because that way you could move the entire document folder at once rather than each "sub library" individually. Thank you for proving my point.
When you only select the documents folder it will only move the documents folder. This method stems from windows 95. There are many ways of mapping this in one command.
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That doesn't change that a UI needs to cater to the users needs! Whether they know them or not is a separate issue - you as a developer should know them however. And it appears MS has failed miserably in this regard.
I used to listen to users - I barely made any money. Then I found that if I program to get results - I make money. Every user will complain they have to learn something new, because its all about me me me, that day is over - get over yourself.
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It might surprise you, but it is possible to dislike the OS for other reasons than inexperience. Also, I have yet to see any advantages of the new UI, even after finding out how to do things. How are the new ways to do stuff actually better, instead of only different? Difference only for the sake of difference is not exactly what I look for in a new version of an OS or other software. I can put up with a lot of learning time if there is something to be gained, I even learned to like the ribbon design in office quite a lot. But if the UX is changed heavily, I'd like it to actually make sense beyond "now we don't have to make different versions for tablets and desktops". Also, I'd like the company to consider cases like non-fullscreen, laggy RDP connections before implementing a UI in a server OS where I have to put the cursor on some precise pixel in the corner to open up menus because Windows key shortcuts don't work in that case.
You have a lot of misconceptions of how things work, you make it seem so limited. The simple fact as a programmer I can not do what I can do in windows 8.1 in any other operating system. Everything is a lot easier then you are making it out to be, I don't have problems with running windows 8 in virtual machine windows and moving my mouse to a corner, if we change the resolution available to the window it's going to reduce it to one pixel, alt-tab is the left pane, right click is the top and bottom app bar, and the right pane has a shortcut I just don't know it off the top my head, besides everything else can be done without using the corners. For the average user telling them about the corners, makes it support a breeze as does everything else in windows 8. You just have to learn how, and to try to forget the past.
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I used to listen to users - I barely made any money. Then I found that if I program to get results - I make money. Every user will complain they have to learn something new, because its all about me me me, that day is over - get over yourself.
The point isn't to do everything the users say, the point is to understand their needs. I agree that complaints about having to learn something new are not important in that regard, but the complaints about Win8 have been raging since day one of the preview, and MS chose to ignore them all. Some, but definitely not all of them may just have been about "learning something new". But many were very valid complaints about real usability issues for desktop users. And these did and still do exist.
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The point isn't to do everything the users say, the point is to understand their needs. I agree that complaints about having to learn something new are not important in that regard, but the complaints about Win8 have been raging since day one of the preview, and MS chose to ignore them all. Some, but definitely not all of them may just have been about "learning something new". But many were very valid complaints about real usability issues for desktop users. And these did and still do exist.
I can see how there are a lot of things currently in the UI that don't work the way they are suppose to and affect the user experience, listening to the user at this point is just allowing the user to have creative input into the program not really addressing the issue and potentially road blocking the greatness that will come out of this UI if windows moves backwards.
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You have a lot of misconceptions of how things work, you make it seem so limited. The simple fact as a programmer I can not do what I can do in windows 8.1 in any other operating system. Everything is a lot easier then you are making it out to be, I don't have problems with running windows 8 in virtual machine windows and moving my mouse to a corner, if we change the resolution available to the window it's going to reduce it to one pixel, alt-tab is the left pane, right click is the top and bottom app bar, and the right pane has a shortcut I just don't know it off the top my head, besides everything else can be done without using the corners. For the average user telling them about the corners, makes it support a breeze as does everything else in windows 8. You just have to learn how, and to try to forget the past.
Colborne_Greg wrote:
I can not do what I can do in windows 8.1 in any other operating system.
So, what are the things Win8 lets me do that I can't do in any other OS? The problem I have with the start menu for example, is that I have to move my mouse very precisely because the area that I have to click is only a couple of pixels max, and there is no indication as to where it begins. It's not a natural "move to corner" motion when working in a windowed RDP, it's a "move awkwardly slow and don't sneeze because you might shoot out of the window" motion. Not impossible, but slightly annoying. That's my experience with pretty much all of the system - you can handle it, but there are some annoying tidbits and edge cases that just weren't there before and give the OS the impression of being a compromise between desktop and touch, while not being perfect for either. And while there are some good bits in there, I haven't found enough to justify putting up with the things that I don't like.
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Colborne_Greg wrote:
I can not do what I can do in windows 8.1 in any other operating system.
So, what are the things Win8 lets me do that I can't do in any other OS? The problem I have with the start menu for example, is that I have to move my mouse very precisely because the area that I have to click is only a couple of pixels max, and there is no indication as to where it begins. It's not a natural "move to corner" motion when working in a windowed RDP, it's a "move awkwardly slow and don't sneeze because you might shoot out of the window" motion. Not impossible, but slightly annoying. That's my experience with pretty much all of the system - you can handle it, but there are some annoying tidbits and edge cases that just weren't there before and give the OS the impression of being a compromise between desktop and touch, while not being perfect for either. And while there are some good bits in there, I haven't found enough to justify putting up with the things that I don't like.
time will hopefully solve that. it's kind of a catch 22 for the road to be wide open with abilities yet to be used and the user experience not be compromised.
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Yeah, it only works properly with full screen, since you need to pass by the screen corners. But if you're VNCing, you're smart enough to use Windows keys shortcuts (Win + C, Win + Tab, etc).
Win + C in my environment doesn't work. There is a Citrix in the middle and a lot of other complicated stuff, basically for security :)
Present anytime, anywhere: www.ccview.me Clipboard in the cloud: www.cloudclipx.com -- If I have 8 hours to chop down a tree, I spend 6 sharpening my ax! And I mostly do in CodeProject and Pluralsight!
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The charms bar is the task bar of the metro mode. Metro app programming is the point to windows 8. The desktop is only there for backwards compatibility. Your arguments are based on inexperience.
I disagree on the inexperience. It is not about "it is possible" or "it is meant to use it this way". What counts is: #1-) Is it easy to use, intuitive and clear (no, to the point that it is confusing on the dual mode) #2-) Clear action = reaction (no, unless you are a ninja mouse master)
Present anytime, anywhere: www.ccview.me Clipboard in the cloud: www.cloudclipx.com -- If I have 8 hours to chop down a tree, I spend 6 sharpening my ax! And I mostly do in CodeProject and Pluralsight!
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If you have two touch screens use the finger gestures on the edges of both screens to pull up the same menus. Corners applies to both screens. If you have to reposition your mouse - I recommend you change the sensitivity setting so you can move the mouse across the entire environment.
My 24 inch screen is more than an arms length away, because of its size. It is not touch, but if it was I would not be able to reach it. Also, have you heard Gorilla arm? And last but not least, how much time do you lose raising your hand and using it both on the screen and mouse? Not very efficient.
Present anytime, anywhere: www.ccview.me Clipboard in the cloud: www.cloudclipx.com -- If I have 8 hours to chop down a tree, I spend 6 sharpening my ax! And I mostly do in CodeProject and Pluralsight!
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It's a reason to why everyone is not happy about Windows 8, not the reality of it.
Correct. I love Windows 7 and I still have a few VMs in Windows XP. Both great. Vista = total flop. Win 8 = not yet a flop but dancing on the edge. Users have changed over the years. Microsoft cannot just pull the trick of forcing people to do what they think is right. Users have learned that systems adapt to them, not the other way round.
Present anytime, anywhere: www.ccview.me Clipboard in the cloud: www.cloudclipx.com -- If I have 8 hours to chop down a tree, I spend 6 sharpening my ax! And I mostly do in CodeProject and Pluralsight!