JorgeA

Builds your confidence that MS knows what it's doing, eh? You wouldn't be surprised to see TV commercials for a 2012 line of cars showing up a couple of months before the 2013 models came out. Clearing out inventory and such. But IE isn't sold, there's no inventory to clear out, so what the heck are they doing...? This would be the time to be promoting general awareness of the NEW browser and OS. You would think... --JorgeA

I'm with you here. "Modern" -- what a joke. Even if we limit the subject to the interface itself, it's a regression to a simpler UI with a much cruder look. What's modern about that?! Or is this another case of "what's old is new again"? --JorgeA

hoak, Wow, that was amazing. Approaching the 30-second mark into the video I was still doubtful about this -- and then the overlapping windows made their grand entrance! B) That's no merely "tiled" window manager as I've understood it! It's a cut (or two) above. Very impressive. I'm beginning to see why you like the concept so much. If Metro were anything like this, I could happily work in it... Thank you for the demonstration. Now, let me rephrase my poorly stated question about whether this sort of thing is available to the "average" PC user. Let's put it this way: when you write that -- -- I gather that this sort of sophisticated TWM isn't available to the public on the 'Net for general-purpose computing, be it for sale or free, as a disk or download. Rather, the best TWMs are proprietary ones used in specific settings for limited purposes. You provided a lot of links at the end of your last post. You know what my Web surfing wil involve tomorrow! --JorgeA

Fair enough, and I suppose 'self-serve' is a fair analogy to just about all things Linux, and currently that's really the only place anything is going on in the way of 'desktop' TWM development -- but eying is not trying and there are authentic Chinese buffets that are staggeringly good if you're brave enough to go beyond just eying! My experiences with exotic food haven't been exactly happy ones. All too often, when I've tried something exotic-looking, I've lived to regret it (sometimes barely). One time I had a Chinese something-or-other that had me up in the middle of the night with abdominal pains rivalled only by those caused by kidney stones. Another time I happily bit into a Mongolian beef stew that turned out to be the most disgusting, inedible meal I've ever tried! The saying goes that "whatever doesn't kill me, makes me stronger." In my case, I'd amend "stronger" to "wiser"! But we digress... Fair again, but in a TWM you still manage your own windows; you just don't have to do the same thing multiple times, and most even allow for cascading so that's not a feature or capability sacrificed... OK, I'm curious: In the model you're describing, can I overlap windows such that only little areas of each show on the screen at the same time -- let's say, the upper left corner of one window (which might contain a certain command I need to remember to enter); the middle (not left and right) portion of several lines of text for another window; the right column of a two-column book PDF in a third; and the bottom right corner of a fourth window... all while Task Manager is running in a Restored Down (not minimized) square while not obscuring any of the other parts of windows I want to see. Just to make sure, because tone doesn't necessarily come through in a written text: That's a totally earnest, sincere question. Sadly the most advanced TWM interface development is actually going on in production application interface design, though some of these features make their way up the food chain into some Linux TWM's -- there is no one TWM that really offers an encompassing example of 'Thee State Of The Art' as most are built to serve their Developer's pet wish interests that typically revolve around software development -- with almost nothing in the way of demos that will do much to impress the uninitiated. Bummer. I gather, then, that the most sophisticated TWM treatments aren't really an option for the average PC user? --JorgeA

Just asking, what does everybody think their chances are in this market? Is this gonna do it? Apple announcements are in the queue and I bet Samsung is going to revamp their 'droids as well. Well, if I were a 3-year-old (or had the worldview of a 3-year-old ), there's no doubt that I would pick the phone with the garish yellow squares! --JorgeA

I cannot believe that they have forced me into the position of saying that Apple and Android look nicer! Freaking squares and rectangles. Circles would have been better, or stars, or random blobs, or better yet simple user choice! What is just insanely ironic is that when you go to a party and there are 20 different smartphones, the Androids will all look different ( customized ), the Apples will look similar but still be different and definitely attractive, but the WP's will be the most uniform in appearance thanks to the gigantic blocks, and least attractive overall. Welcome to Big Blue, 21st century west coast division! Appearance is everything to the fickle consumer. Gazillions of dollars and hours of research have gone into appearance and packaging so that Jane public will grab box A instead of B since the product inside may vary only a little bit. Apparently Microsoft thinks they can just disregard this fact and people will flock to WP anyway. I have thought much the same thing. Put these side by side, and which one looks the most sophisticated? Or -- more to the point -- which one looks the least sophisticated? We can rant and rave all we want about judging a book by its cover and the clothes don't make the man, but in the end it's a matter of economics. Time is our most precious, limited resource, and we don't have the time to devote to investigating the details of everything that we might possibly choose out there. Life is too short. So instead -- and depending on the perceived importance of the choice we're contemplating -- we may use the heuristic method of evaluating the amount of effort that's put into the substance, by assessing the amount of effort that's put into the appearance. From our perspective as the potential buyer, if the maker doesn't care enough to make the product look good, it's reasonable to wonder whether he cares enough to make it a good product. That puts the cruder-looking product at a disadvantage, even if it actually works better. Then again, maybe MS is deathly afraid of Apple's lawyer corps and doesn't want to get accused of "stealing" their look. --JorgeA

Thanks for the additional links. Since you brought up a food analogy, let me extend it a little. Let's just say that, in my earlier post, I had eyed the offerings at the self-serve restaurant, and didn't find anything particularly appetizing. (Ending the analogy) Now I've watched the video, read the manifesto excerpt and your exposition, and clicked on the images in the Wikipedia article to take a closer look. I still don't find anything compelling about the tiling model. I don't mind managing my own windows -- I get to arrange them as I prefer. All that said, can you link me to demonstrations some of the more sophisticated TWMs in action? Thanks! --JorgeA

I never did see Minority Report, so I can't comment on that. However -- The Metro interface can sure stand a heck of a lot of beautifying. But the tiling model is inherently limited -- you can usefully have only a few tiles in a screenful, in a few predetermined configurations/positions. On the Desktop, you can set up your windows that way if you want, but also in so many other ways as the situation or your preferences demand. It's simply so much more flexible. In the end, the tiling model can't hold a candle to a real desktop that allows for multiple overlapping windows to be present on the same screen. It would be like going back to Windows 1.0. --JorgeA

Wow, I'd forgotten about that aspect of the PCjr. Now that you mention it, I do remember seeing some models enhanced that way. I never did decide if it was a brilliant concept or if it just made the machine look odd, with these "growths" coming off the side. Except for the spelling, there's an excellent comment to this article (previously linked to): Bring it on! --JorgeA

Good luck, and let us know what you find out! --JorgeA

This is good news for 8-skeptics, thanks! Interesting point about market saturation. After several years of iPads and Android tablets on the market, it's conceivable that we're approaching the point where most everyone who wants one of these thingies already has one. Microsoft -- a day late and a dollar short (thank God) It doesn't matter much if a failure of Win8 is blamed on the economic slowdown -- as long as it falls flat on its 2D interface and we can move past the walled-garden model that MS is trying to push on users! --JorgeA

Has anybody tried this, or do you know anything about it? I must confess that I'm leery of downloading something by a person calling themselves "Pwned." --JorgeA

So the Party Line has switched from the false comfort of "stop whining, you can still work in the Desktop" to the more brazen (but honest) "FU, the Desktop must die." If Metro/Modern/Nameless Crap Interface is what the future of Windows looks like, then my future is shaping up to look something like this: --JorgeA

Nice find. So IBM did use Charlie for all of their products, including the PCjr. I guess that's the one I was focused on at the time. Ended up buying a Sanyo MBC-550, which I then topped out with RAM and a second single-sided floppy drive. Eventually the FDDs got replaced by two quad-density, 800K drives. It still works! --JorgeA

I remember those Charlie Chaplin commercials. I seem to associate them in my mind with the introduction of the PCjr, and my memory didn't fail! Actually, that whole PCjr Wikipedia article is worth reading: there are a number of parallels between Windows 8 and Surface, and IBM's introduction of the PCjr -- from its massive hoopla and recruiting of media shills, to its image as a limited toy device. (Personally, I'd been saving my pennies to buy one of these things, but then passed on it when I saw that it had limited capabilities and was not very compatible with the PCs our magazine was using.) --JorgeA

That's a great word for it -- lobotomized. The slogan for Windows 8 is "Windows, Reimagined." More appropriate it would be to say, Windows, Lobotomized An excellent question. We'll see... --JorgeA

So, in your view, what they're hoping to do for salvation is to convert the commodified PC market into a closed system like Apple, where customers will eagerly pay premium prices for far-from-extraordinary devices. (As you can tell, I'm no fan of Apple... especially after our latest wrestling match with iTunes.) That's a very interesting theory! Maybe with (some) individual consumers, but I can't see serious users, enterprises, or IT folk rushing to get into jail Windows 8. So my suspicion is that MS's strategy is flawed. They're running the risk of destroying their success and dominance in the serious PC market for the chimera of cool. Just to make sure there's no confusion... note that I'm not questioning the validity of your theory -- what you say makes a lot of sense to me. I think you're right that this is MS's strategy. I'm just questioning the worth of their strategy. --JorgeA

I just came across a new method for skipping past the Metro screen when booting Windows 8. The blog post says that this works when "logging in" to Windows 8, but a commenter says that it also works when you launch Windows 8 from scratch. I have confirmed that it does work in the Developer Preview. (Sorry, I'm too lazy to uninstall my automated methods for bypassing the Metro start screen in the Consumer and Release previews. ) Keep the Enter button pressed down, and after a few seconds the Desktop is the next thing to appear on your monitor after the login screen. Just make sure to have the Desktop tile as the top left item on your Metro screen, otherwise you might find yourself in Metro IE10 or... the Windows Store. --JorgeA P.S. One note about IE10: When I booted into the DP to try out this manual method for going straight to the Desktop, I got a notice from Adobe that a new version of Flash Player was available. Clicking on the button to update took me into Metro IE10, which (as I suspected) then would not accept the Flash Player update. But even launching regular IE10 and visiting the Adobe website, I still could not download the updated Flash Player by selecting the "Run" option. It refused to finish the download, no matter how many times I hit "Retry." It was only after I chose "Save" that I was able to complete the download and then install the Flash Player update.

This is the sort of thing that can happen when your vendor controls, from its central servers, the things that you may do with the hardware that you paid good money for: they can take away features and capabilities at will, and your preferences count for nothing. Thurrott doesn't seem to have put 2 + 2 together. Zune is the kind of "walled garden" approach that MS is pushing on everyone with Windows 8. Does he really wish for PC users -- himself included -- to be at the mercy of The Powers That Be?? A disappointing turn for Paul. He was a Win8 booster at first, then he seemed to show the ability to actually think about its implications, but now he's gone back to full-fledged fanboyhood. --JorgeA P.S. A relevant observation in the comments section for the article linked above:

Thanks for the details, Tripredacus, I understand now. I like jaclaz's suggestion -- MS probably keeps tabs on "returns" or downgrades like that. --JorgeA

ClassicShell is great -- AFAIK it's the only program that allows you to re-enable lost features in recent versions of Internet Explorer. I'm using it in IE10 on my Win8 preview installs. As far as the new Start8 capabilities... consider that a feature set to add to the next edition of ClassicShell! (Full disclosure: I haven't tried Start8. When they first came out it had the Metro look and so a different Start Menu replacement got onto my CP and RP. The DP I left alone to keep the full flavor of the Metro sh*t.) --JorgeA

Apropos of the recurrent discussion in this thread about the dangers of the Cloud, data syncing, and cybersecurity/privacy, we have this "epic hack". The writer played his part in his own digital destruction, but the point remains that if even a supposedly savvy tech writer can fall victim to this sort of thing, what does that imply for the hundreds of millions of users out there who are less sophisticated than him? Windows 8 is intended to be the most cloud-friendly OS from Microsoft to date -- no, thanks! --JorgeA

This is great, MagicAndre -- a vast improvement over the previous version of Start8. It seems to be now an all-in-one "avoid Metro" package that includes 1) a regular Start Menu, 2) a Start Button, and 3) the ability to boot to the Desktop. Thanks for reporting it. Now, if someone were to devise a way to install Themes or Skin Packs on Windows 8 that are more interesting than the crude flat look that MS has decreed. Been looking for this all over the 'Net, and mostly I see promises, complaints, and frustration over Win8 from skin-pack developers. --JorgeA

So, the difference is that Samsung or Dell couldn't provide it pre-installed on their PCs, but a third party could offer it over the Web. (I guess it couldn't be sold via the Windows Store, eh? ) How about if among the pre-installed features and trial software that OEMs put on the desktop, they were to put an "offer" for a Start Menu replacement? Or maybe that's what you had in mind... --JorgeA

You're kidding!?! You mean that Microsoft is requiring OEMs to not put a start menu on their Windows installations? (How'd you find out?) Amazing. --JorgeA