JorgeA Posted November 11, 2014 Share Posted November 11, 2014 Thanks jaclaz, I'm beginning to understand the uses of multiple desktops. There are times when I have about as many windows open as you just described. In my case, most of the desktop "tidying up" is accomplished by Windows 7's ability to group windows of the same application under the same Taskbar icon, or (in the case of a browser) by the use of browser tabs. I guess that I've never reached the point where I wished I could distribute all these open windows into separate desktops, but now I understand better why somebody might want to do that. And if I ever start using Windows 10 as my main work OS, I might even give them a try. Now, regarding that dedicated "task view" button on the Taskbar for switching between desktops -- if it were a permanent (unremovable) button, would you find that a worthwhile use of Taskbar space, or not really? --JorgeA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JorgeA Posted November 12, 2014 Share Posted November 12, 2014 On the Win10 Microsoft forums, there's a new rising star in the ranks of Windows 8.x critics. IMO she (he? could be a pseudonym) offers some of the most cogent and incisive critiques of the Win8 worldview that I've seen to date. An example: [...] The 10,000+ PCs at my college all either run Windows 7 natively or as a 'shell' atop Windows Server 2003. All the systems using Windows Server 2003 are around eight years old, and are gradually being replaced with new systems running Windows 7. All classroom computers run Windows 7, while the 'junkers' can only be found in the open-access areas. (The school also has 3000+ Macs, all running the latest OS versions.) I've talked with quite a few of the IT guys and, even though some of them use Windows 8/8.1 on their personal systems (most with similar mods to what I use), they refuse to use anything other than Windows 7 on classroom computers. Many are also investigating the Windows 10 TP, and all that are have dubbed it "Windows 8.2" - even the Windows 8/8.1 users are telling people not to bother with it. The general sentiment boils down to "If it ain't broke, don't mess with it!" (They actually use much stronger words in place of 'mess', but this is a public forum so I'm not going to quote them verbatim.) Microsoft developed the world standard for computer OSes way back with Windows 95 - so entrenched that even Mac and Linux have largely followed suit. Nobody truly in-the-know wants or can afford the productivity hit from trying to introduce a non-standard operational paradigm into their workflow - that means Windows 7 (the newest of the REAL Windows) for computers and Android for mobile devices, with no bleed-over between them. (Particularly as businesses can't rely on third-party mods to make Windows 8.1 behave properly on desktop systems.) The numbers speak for themselves - only recently has Windows 8 and 8.1 combined managed to match the number of systems still running XP. Even with the number of computers in use continuing to grow by leaps and bounds, Windows 7 has maintained a 60% market share almost since it was first released. Meanwhile, 8 and 8.1 are both floundering in the same pattern as Vista, Me, and all the other failures. People (and Microsoft in particular) need to face facts. When it comes to actual computers, nothing is going to replace the paradigm established by Windows 95 because that's what anyone sitting down at a computer or opening a laptop expects. If Microsoft continues down their current path with Windows 10, they're going to lose their market dominance. They've already cost themselves dearly in the console market with stupid decisions - the fact that they back-tracked on nearly all of them doesn't change that they went ahead with them in the first place. They're steadily losing prominence with their Office products, Internet Explorer is a joke, I don't know anyone who uses Bing, and they're not even an "also ran" in the mobile OS market. I can understand why they want to fight for a share of the mobile OS market, but sacrificing their dominance with computer OSes can only end badly. Almost every sentence in there deserves to be highlighted. --JorgeA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaclaz Posted November 12, 2014 Share Posted November 12, 2014 Now, regarding that dedicated "task view" button on the Taskbar for switching between desktops -- if it were a permanent (unremovable) button, would you find that a worthwhile use of Taskbar space, or not really?Cannot say.By instinct, I tend to "hate" *anything* that is "fixed" or "unmovable" or "not customizable".2/3 to 3/4 of the way I personally setup my desktop/environment is aimed to NOT use (or use the least possible) the mouse[1], I do *almost* anything via keyboard, and thus I use "hot-keys" to switch between workspaces.jaclaz[1] to make it clear, if there is a "wrong" usage paradigm in *any* graphical interface is the "move your hand from the keyboard to get the mouse (to click on a stupid button) and then get it back on the keyboard", when you are using (say) a graphical/design program, i.e. you use "only" or "mostly" the mouse, it is if course perfectly OK, but when you are using a mainly keyboard driven application (let's say Excel or any other program where you massively input data or formulas) it is a nuisance this mouse/keyboard/mouse/keyboard alternation. As well, once you have typed the data, using the mouse to change fonts/formats/applying highlights, etc. is very convenient, again it is a matter of personal habits, I tend to create any document in a "unformatted" way and only once the data input is over, I "switch" to "graphical" mode and apply formats/make it "pretty". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoelC Posted November 12, 2014 Share Posted November 12, 2014 (edited) On the Win10 Microsoft forums, there's a new rising star in the ranks of Windows 8.x critics What stands out to me... "...30+ years..." Even though she's a youngster (at 8 to 10 years my junior) she appears to acquired some wisdom. Trouble is, telling it like it is is no longer considered a popular thing to do, and high tech folks are notoriously insecure. -Noel Edited November 12, 2014 by NoelC Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tripredacus Posted November 12, 2014 Share Posted November 12, 2014 Thanks jaclaz, I'm beginning to understand the uses of multiple desktops. I see the usefulness of multiple desktops to be roughly equal to just having multiple monitors. What jaclaz describes is a similar setup to my own uses, except that I am using monitors rather than switching around desktops. And my only experience with switching desktops was a short time with Ubuntu, where their desktops are like some 3D cube sitting inside your monitor you could flip around. My lack of understanding, however, is whether it is more efficient to use multiple desktops, as in... how the OS itself handles the things currently not seen. As with multiple monitors, everything is in the current (interactive) session with the user. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoelC Posted November 12, 2014 Share Posted November 12, 2014 (edited) I see the usefulness of multiple desktops to be roughly equal to just having multiple monitors. Well put, and it touches on something that doesn't find itself discussed much... How much information do you need access to at any one time in order to make your computing experience useful? With 3 monitors myself and 4960 x 1600 pixels of desktop space, I still find myself occasionally wanting for more space. I postulate that the amount of desktop space (whether physical or virtual) that you need is related to the complexity and what I call "thought depth" of the work you're doing. I believe it's also related to how well your mind juggles short term memory of details, though at some level of complexity we all fall down. Using software development as an example (my focus), when you're working to implement something very complex, where even the concept of what you're doing is starting to stretch your capabilities (imagining, for example, multiple dialogs interacting across multiple systems in time and space, such as you might have with web-integrated software), then it's handy to have a whole bunch of reference materials right out where you can see them at a glance. And tools that help you along every step of the way. What would we do, for example, without Visual Studio's "auto completion" facilities? Did YOU remember that the value you need from the structure is spelled exactly "nCountV"? Ever lose your train of thought fighting with your system to get just what you need shown? Of course you have. We all have. Multiple desktops may well be helpful for that, but frankly multiple monitors do probably trump that concept. It seems to me that advancing the state of the art in high tech today is not about doing one simple thing at a time with big fonts, but doing complex things that are just barely possible using LOTS of screen space and tiny fonts. The world already has enough Weather and Clock and Calculator apps (though amazingly none are yet particularly good). -Noel Edited November 12, 2014 by NoelC Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaclaz Posted November 12, 2014 Share Posted November 12, 2014 Let's say that switchable desktops/workplaces is the poor man's (or the cheap man's ) way of having multiple monitors, beside the cost of more monitors, there is the need for some space for them (which may or may not be available). It seems to me that advancing the state of the art in high tech today is not about doing one simple thing at a time with big fonts, but doing complex things that are just barely possible using LOTS of screen space and tiny fonts. Yep. The world already has enough Weather and Clock and Calculator apps (though amazingly none are yet particularly good). And - to restate the obvious - I have a hardware device that I call "window" which is an exceptionally accurate way to check the weather by simply looking through it, and another couple small hardware devices called "thermometer" and "barometer" devised more than 500 (five hundred) years ago and that have historically always worked, needing NO batteries, nor to be "plugged" or "connected" to anything. The combined effect of these three devices is to have a "good enough" representation of current weather and also a "reliable enough" forecast of it in the immediate future. I also sport (on my wrist) a device called "watch" that is seemingly very accurate in telling me the time, and while I do use a Windows calculator you will have to pry out of my dead hand my (now some 25 years old ) HP pocket calculator. I am old fashioned, I know , but I do have as well Weather, Clock and Calc apps on my phone and having yet another of these apps on my desktop, possibly constantly updating (and thus distracting me from what I am doing on it) is around place 1.256.784th :whistling: in my priority list of things I would like to have. jaclaz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoelC Posted November 12, 2014 Share Posted November 12, 2014 (edited) To ask an obvious open question of those who think working on a tiny tablet is a viable way to "get things done"... Would a whole bunch of virtual desktops on a tablet yield a workable environment? I don't see how. At the surface it seems interesting, but if you look any deeper than the "gee whiz, I'd love to have a little tablet of my very very own because it's neato" part, the Observed Reality of the Actual Universe in which *I* live just doesn't support this putting enough info on screen to be useful at all... -Noel Edited November 12, 2014 by NoelC Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoelC Posted November 12, 2014 Share Posted November 12, 2014 Of course, one could use a smaller font and do like they did in the film "Brazil"... -Noel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tripredacus Posted November 12, 2014 Share Posted November 12, 2014 Your Surface example is silly because no one would buy a tablet to do that kind of work. Let's be honest, MS isn't marketing these products to people like us, that's why they seem to be "toys" and not something that can replace our existing computer setups. But for most of the people in the world, they aren't using their computers for technical reasons, be it for job or for fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NoelC Posted November 12, 2014 Share Posted November 12, 2014 Your Surface example is silly ... You know it and I know it but there are a whole host of people (think Dilbert denizens) who claim it's the next big thing in computing. I can't help but think that if only more such people would face reality the future of computing might be saved. -Noel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JorgeA Posted November 12, 2014 Share Posted November 12, 2014 Ever lose your train of thought fighting with your system to get just what you need shown? And that was the first problem I noticed with the Metro Start Screen three years ago: it covers everything up when you're trying to follow complicated instructions that tell you (for example) to open this or that application and then select X or Y choice there. Short-term memory being what it is, it's useful to be able to still see the instructions with the Start Menu open, to refresh your memory as to what to do after opening the program so that you can proceed without interruption. --JorgeA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JorgeA Posted November 13, 2014 Share Posted November 13, 2014 (edited) Microsoft's Windows Update woes continue: Microsoft patches Windows, IE; holds back two updates Microsoft today released 14 security updates to address 33 vulnerabilities in Windows, Internet Explorer and Office. Two updates scheduled for release today (MS14-068 and MS14-075) were withheld and their release date is yet to be determined. Unless Microsoft gets a handle on these growing problems with Windows Updates, it will lead to disaster if and when they get around to implementing their vision of "Windows as a service" automatic updates keeping everybody on the same (numberless) version of Windows. In a possibly related development, yesterday I manually went into my Win10TP Windows Updates, and it reported four available updates (not for Windows Defender). But I held off on installing them because the "More information" links led to error pages and I'm no longer in the habit of installing Windows Updates willy-nilly without knowing what they're about. Next time I checked for updates, they were no longer listed. Nor do they show up in the list of installed updates or in Update History. Very strange, and not very reassuring. Also, check out this thread in the Microsoft Community: I spent half a day yesterday trying to fix my own, as the windows vista ultimate side started to perform very strangely, and I suspect after an auto update from a service pack from windows.The machine went thru several cycles of BSOD, whereby I after I went thru safe mode and deleted the stdriver32.sys from the System registry seemed to fix the problem. However, after that it seems that subsequently my sound and audio stopped working entirely as all the drivers with the "blue tooth peripheral" appeared to have the yellow error signals in the device manager.I've also noticed that the windows personalization has been automatically changed from the the windows vista "look", and reverted go the windows classic look, but when I went to the control panel to edit, the aero and Vista ultimate options have disappeared. [boldface in original; underline added] Maybe MSFT is trying sneakily to kill off Aero Glass even in those versions that have it... --JorgeA Edited November 13, 2014 by JorgeA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JorgeA Posted November 13, 2014 Share Posted November 13, 2014 (edited) More indications of MSFT's growing user-hostility: Is it possible to create an installation media for windows 8.1 as update version of Windows 8 Q:I was able to create an ISO file on a DVD using the "Create Media" button from the Create-Reset-Refresh-Media webpage. However, the installation procedure on this webpage requires the computer to already have an operating system installed. Can you recommend an installation procedure for rebuilding a desktop computer? We have 2 desktop computers from our customers whose motherboards went bad. We have to rebuild & replace them with brand new motherboards which obviously do not have any operating system installed. Can you give me step-by-step instructions to:Create a bootable installation file of Windows 8.1 Install Windows 8.1 on a clean motherboard with no current operating system A:No. You may have to purchase Windows 8.1 And: Computer is trying to dowload Windows 8.1 without giving me an option Q:Last month, I got a message that asked me to install Windows 8.1. I have an HP Pavilion 20 desktop. At first, the message gave me the option, "Remind me later". Then, the message gave only two options to install in either 2 hours or 4 hours. I did not click on "OK"; however, the program started to install after two hours; and I had to call a technician who had to restore my computer to factory settings. I lost my emails and documents. Now, the computer is doing the same thing. The message is once again giving me two options to install without an option to decline the installation. Comment:This was the most terrible thing MS has done since the comments at the GHCWC conference. My wife depends on 8 and Dell's vQuest VPN to do EMR and billing for her work from home. When MS sneaked that update in it crashed her system!!!! The technique used was similar to that used by the malware distributors. Bearing that comment in mind, it's curious that at least one anti-virus suite flagged TP updates as malware. --JorgeA Edited November 13, 2014 by JorgeA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaclaz Posted November 13, 2014 Share Posted November 13, 2014 Yep, the latter (failed) auto update issue has provoked more than a little (justified BTW) resentment towards MS. A few interesting related stories have been posted here:http://www.eightforums.com/windows-updates-activation/53755-forced-upgrade-windows-8-1-a.html jaclaz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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