JorgeA

Here's how I use the Start menu in Windows 10 Insider Preview The writer never says how exactly he managed to remove the tile panel, and remarkably no one in the comments section thinks to ask. Am I missing something? I don't remember Microsoft adding the ability to remove the right panel in the TP. And, curiously, there is no watermark down on the right to indicate what version of the TP this is supposed to be, nor does the writer say. What gives?! --JorgeA

While researching my previous post, I got the little pop-up that you can see at the bottom right corner of the image below: WTF?? You mean that if I had a webcam on this computer (say, if it were a laptop), some stranger at a store would be able to see me??? Presumably one would have to agree to this explicitly first? One more reason to disable webcam functionality. --JorgeA P.S. Turns out to be a case of poor wording. The explanation is given by clicking on "What's this?" What they mean is that while you can see the store associate during the chat, the store associate can't see you. But the way it's written, it sounded to me like a complaint that, because they couldn't see me, I should enable (or get) a camera in order to conduct the chat.

Clearly you need a Surface tablet that just happens to be able to replace your laptop. Microsoft USED to be a software company. Their name has "soft" in it. Yeah, I can't wait to replace my laptop with a 750GB HDD and a Core i7 processor that I paid less than $600 for, with a $1549 Surface Pro 3 sporting a 256GB SSD and a slower Core i7 processor. EDIT: and that doesn't even include a keyboard, for which I'd have to shell out an extra $129.99, bringing the price to $1679. You know, I've been thinking and reading and arguing about this whole thing -- including multi- versus single-tasking -- for more than three years now. But it just now struck me that, after three decades of OS development, we are in effect being herded back into the DOS model (single-tasking). --JorgeA

I have a complete set of the episodes from that series. It was recorded in Windows Media Center, a capability that users who go with the flow and let Microsoft have its way with them will lose when it pulls them into the Win10 vortex. --JorgeA

Paul Thurrott weighs in on this "Windows as a Service" idea, with some skepticism: --JorgeA

Thanks for showing an example of Acrobat's new UI. What, do they think it's mainly pre-schoolers who'll be using that software? Or perhaps they think that people will be editing PDF files on their phones. I'm glad that @Formfiller gave us the heads-up on this "improved" UI. At least in the case of Acrobat, customers have an easier time avoiding the company's declining products compared to Windows users. Here are a couple more choice comments from the Adobe thread: --JorgeA

LOL It's amazing the number of irrelevant "features" they're putting on my laptop with Windows 10. A look at the Notifications flyout is enough: pray tell, o wise and bountiful Gods of Redmond, why on earth would my laptop need to be put in "airplane mode"?? Let me whisper a little secret in your infallible ears: IT'S NOT A PHONE, IT CANNOT RECEIVE PHONE CALLS!!! Why does my laptop need "rotation lock" -- do you know anybody who turns their laptop screen to view it sideways? Hey, given that my computer lacks touch capability, if I put it "tablet mode" will that render it completely useless? We were told that one of the cool new features of Windows 10 was that it would select the interface depending on the type of hardware. So why are all of these options shown for PC users? They are bound to confuse and perplex some users and to annoy many more. Meanwhile, they are taking up space on the Notifications popup and claiming a piece of our attention every time we open it. --JorgeA

It's official, Windows 10 users are all going to be forced to march in lockstep with Updates: Piecing together the Windows as a Service puzzle for Windows 10 One single kind of customer gets to decline some (not all) of Microsoft's windows goodness: So they, too, are still subject to whatever problems these forced updates may bring. Unbelievable. It's been said that one big reason for this new update policy is to save on costs as Microsoft will eventually (when all support ends for Vista/7/8.x) be maintaining only one version of Windows. But if so, then this is a remarkably shortsighted decision. The billions in lost business from alienating hundreds of millions of customers is bound to swamp whatever few millions they might save in programmer salaries. --JorgeA

OIC !! --JorgeA

This Really Takes the Cake Dept.: Never had a problem with a Windows Update -- seriously?? --JorgeA EDIT: added missing link

^^ Say what? --JorgeA

OMG, is that a hint as to their view of Windows users? Or maybe it's a hint as to the kind of audience they're going after. Wonder how long before one of the AV vendors interrupts an installation of Win10 over Win7 as a PUP... --JorgeA

Here's a quote that jumped out at me from Part 2: Yup, the idea is to turn you into a serf paying rent for your license every year, where before you paid for it once and then owned it forever. I fire up my MS Office 2000 suite once in a while, for one reason or another. And my main work machine has Office 2007 on it, works just fine and I don't miss any of the new features that have been added since. --JorgeA

^^ Gotta run today, but I'm looking forward to reading these articles. Maybe MagicAndre can fix any translation errors for us. --JorgeA

Looks like I won't be earning further "achievements" (or whatever they call them) as a Windows Insider anytime soon. The current "quests" are to "upload and play your music from OneDrive," "record a game clip," "try out the new Alarms & Clocks app," "manage your mail with gestures," and "get movies & TV from the Windows Store." I have an idea for a new "quest": search for, then download and install a real Start Menu. Maybe I'll submit it to the Feedback app. --JorgeA

I'm pretty sure that's for a URL to open in your default browser or a \\SERVER network location. Thanks for the scoop. Guess it's yet another way they're, uh, encouraging us to "expand our horizons" to the Web instead of limiting our vision to our own private stuff. --JorgeA

The cynic in me is itching to say that that happened to you because Microsoft would REALLY REALLY prefer that you used OneDrive instead of your own local storage... I don't have a NAS system, only USB drives plugged directly into the Win10TP 10074 laptop, and they do show up fine. So far. FWIW, the rest of my network also shows up normally. --JorgeA

Considering the general thrust and tendency of the Windows UI since Metro in Win8, I guess the idea is that they assume that you, the user, are probably a 3-year-old with limited coordination and control of your fingers, therefore you need gigantic blocks to make sure that you manage to poke them somewhere. --JorgeA P.S. BTW, what's that bit in the Run dialog about an "Internet resource"??

IMO @Formfiller has the right best attitude for going into combat with these yahoos: he approaches it as a sport or game. Me, I would have a heck of a time keeping my cool (as happened to @NoelC). Worse than trying to reason with an alcoholic, it's like trying to talk to a roomful of seven-year-olds: unless you happen to be the teacher, they'll taunt you and make fun of you and keep repeating the same cr*p over and over again. You see it in Neowin too, maybe worse there. The amazing thing is how such a cult has managed to emerge for Microsoft. I mean, they were always the serious, dull, rational business-oriented company in contrast with Apple, which was the "fun" company with the fanatical following. (Those Apple TV ads contrasting the PC guy in a suit to the Apple hipster in jeans had a kernel of truth to them.) How on earth did that happen?? Maybe the Insiders forum is more congenial to people like us. Not only does our side seem to be dominating the discussion there , but by and large it's reasoned and mutually respectful. With the occasional outbreak of Stalinism by the mod... --JorgeA

Google Will Still Support Chrome On Windows XP Until The End Of The Year Never mind the editorializing in the article about using an "antiquated and insecure" OS, the question is: what (if anything) will XP users do when, sooner or later, all major and minor browsers stop issuing updated versions for Windows XP? Will you stay on the last version that supported XP and try to increase your defenses some other way? Will you move to a more recent OS? Will you take some other measures? Just curious. --JorgeA

Whew! I'm glad that you said that about the Apps list in Classic Shell under 10074 -- the same thing happened to me and I thought that maybe some tweak I'd made had broken it. Normally, the apps not showing up wouldn't bother me in the least; in fact, we could view it as one way to dispense with all of those Metro cr*pps. But during this preview phase I do want to be able to get to the feedback app and Insider Hub. IIRC one of the Classic Shell developers said in their forum that they intend to make CS work with Win10 once it's "stable." --JorgeA

Apparently the latest Win10 build includes some improvements to the Start Menu: Windows 10 build 10114: Start menu has more customization options, can turn off the 'ad' If the part about "displaying recently opened items in the Start and taskbar" is a resuscitation of the Recent Items list, that for me would be a significant improvement. Still a long way to go, though. The Win10 start Menu won't be satisfactory for my purposes until they let me replace the tiles in the right panel with links; let me decrease the width of that panel; let me disable Web search from the search bar and do only local search on my computer; and put the items listed in the left panel closer together to minimize the amount of scrolling required. Which probably means that if I ever have to use Win10 on a daily basis, I'll be using Classic Shell or StartIsBack. --JorgeA

And another bit of Windows news: 'Windows 10 is the last version of Windows' Along with the previous post, the status of the Windows user seems to be evolving from that of "owner" (where you pay once and never again) to that of "renter" (where you must pay regularly, over and over again, on pain of loss of use). Unless Windows is turned into a "free" product, in which case we become "the product." --JorgeA

The Windows rumor that refuses to die (and probably for good reason): Windows Cloud operating system to arrive in 2020, according to new rumor Bet the NSA would be delighted with such a development: everything you do on your computer will go through their men-in-the-middle. And imagine the possibilities for remotely controlling the devices of political opponents and other inconvenient people. Talk about a "kill switch." --JorgeA

^^ Any of those suggestions for NCI will do... --JorgeA