Windows 8 thoughts & opinions: incomplete?

[Mystere]

You're confusing static links with Application tiles. Those tiles don't magically update on their own, they need an application behind them to do so. There is no Facebook app for Metro yet. When there is, i'm sure it will include the notifications and other things you're looking for. But it's unreasonable to expect pinning a generic link to the start menu to function like an app.

If you want to change the icon, then you change it in the link. When you pin the link it takes on the appearance of the icon associated with the link.

By the way, there's a feature in the desktop version of IE that lets you directly add a page to the start screen (and the page can somewhat customize the browser as well). click on the gear icon and choose Add to Start Menu.

 

[Kat]

I was countered in that Youtube stops once minimized, because "it's a video streaming site, why would you want to stream video minimized". Now although this is a really bad answer, and most of Youtube is music, here's another example. Open a streaming radio station or music media, then open the start menu. Your music will stop. So I'm forced to either download a radio app (which some of my internet sites don't have apps for) or use Zune.

Youtube is a video streaming site that just so happens to play audio. It's designed to WATCH movies, not listen to music. Lots of people have uploaded music, but they have to attach video to it in order to do that.

I have heard others talk about radio apps stopping when opening the start menu. I do not have that problem. I think it's also related to your broken install.

I have just attempted to duplicate this, and failed.

Everything seems just fine here (8 Enterprise 64-bit).

Both radio anf YouTube continue to play, whether
minimised or when on the Start Screen.

I fear that Mystere is correct re the broken install.

 

[Jayoneseven]

Advanced functionality is now just a right click or a pressand hold. Goodbye Tablet and laptop Hello Windows 8 Slate.

Please, go to your start screen and right click on your internet browser tab. Tell me where the "advanced functionality" is there. Windows 8 is the proverbial butterknife, and most of the computing audience are surgeons, or at least nurses. I feel as though I can't do anything in Windows 8... And did you really just make a profile on this site just to post that?

 

[Jayoneseven]

You're confusing static links with Application tiles.

I'm not confusing apps with static tiles, such as bookmarks. I'm saying that bookmarks are DECADES old, and that by now if I want to pin a website to my home screen it should come with a little more than a grayed out icon of my internet browser as the tile face! Windows 8 is tile based, everything about this OS is tiles, yet they are unforgivably bad! Unless they've been made by a professional and put onto the market place, where you can either purchase them or download them like I would on my phone, they aren't even tiles! It's a mockery, and I wouldn't even be happy with it on my phone!

My windows phone can add google to the start screen. In which case it pins a google logo to the start screen, and opens into the search bar nicely. It doesn't just put an internet explorer link there!! Don't you see what I'm trying to convey here? I was able to make bookmarks and pin them to my desktop when I was 12! By now I should be able to do so much more, especially when everything is about tiles!

Windows 7 was getting to the point where you could manipulate and work a program without even having it on the screen, but just by hovering your mouse over it on the task bar. The menu would pop up asking you what you'd like to do with said application. Windows 8 is taking 3,000 steps BACKWARDS and making it completely un-user friendly, and so that you have to open everything to try and glean the settings and options from it.

 

[Jayoneseven]

I was countered in that Youtube stops once minimized, because "it's a video streaming site, why would you want to stream video minimized". Now although this is a really bad answer, and most of Youtube is music, here's another example. Open a streaming radio station or music media, then open the start menu. Your music will stop. So I'm forced to either download a radio app (which some of my internet sites don't have apps for) or use Zune.

Youtube is a video streaming site that just so happens to play audio. It's designed to WATCH movies, not listen to music. Lots of people have uploaded music, but they have to attach video to it in order to do that.

I have heard others talk about radio apps stopping when opening the start menu. I do not have that problem. I think it's also related to your broken install.

I have just attempted to duplicate this, and failed.

Everything seems just fine here (8 Enterprise 64-bit).

Both radio anf YouTube continue to play, whether
minimised or when on the Start Screen.

I fear that Mystere is correct re the broken install.

There's a vital difference here. If you use your browser from the desktop and open the media there, it will continue to play. If you, however, open your browser through the app in the start screen, it opens as an app, and will close when minimized. That is my problem, not the desktop version. As I stated earlier, if I wanted to use the desktop versions of things, and play around in the desktop, I'd have kept Windows 7. I want to use the start menu for things, and get it working properly, not the desktop.

 

[Mystere]

Ahhh.. ok... I thought you had real issues you wanted to resolve, not that you are upset that Microsoft didn't magically read your mind and develop and OS exactly as you wanted it to be (not that you bothered to tell them anyways).

Your complaints seem to stem down to that fact that it is simultaneously different and the same, but both of these seem to be different and the same in ways you are not happy about. You complain that it doesn't do things any other os does. If you are so good at designing OS's, maybe you should take a crack it yourself.

Metro is a version 1 thing. Windows 1 was not perfect. Windows 95 was not perfect. Windows XP was not perfect. This isn't perfect either, but each successive version got better. You're comparing Metro to Win32, which is where the breakdown occurs. Metro is NOT the next version of Win32. It's a completely new OS that is growing from the ground up.

Maybe a future version will have desktop enhancements for those using it on a desktop, but version 1 means getting it all working on all devices. This is how software development works.

 

[Kat]

Ah, sorry, Jayoneseven, I misunderstood your problem.

My bad....:-(

 

[Jayoneseven]

Ahhh.. ok... I thought you had real issues you wanted to resolve, not that you are upset that Microsoft didn't magically read your mind and develop and OS exactly as you wanted it to be (not that you bothered to tell them anyways).

Your complaints seem to stem down to that fact that it is simultaneously different and the same, but both of these seem to be different and the same in ways you are not happy about. You complain that it doesn't do things any other os does. If you are so good at designing OS's, maybe you should take a crack it yourself.

Metro is a version 1 thing. Windows 1 was not perfect. Windows 95 was not perfect. Windows XP was not perfect. This isn't perfect either, but each successive version got better. You're comparing Metro to Win32, which is where the breakdown occurs. Metro is NOT the next version of Win32. It's a completely new OS that is growing from the ground up.

Maybe a future version will have desktop enhancements for those using it on a desktop, but version 1 means getting it all working on all devices. This is how software development works.

Dude look... if I went out tomorrow and spent money on a new mac, because I'm a fan of the phones, and when it arived it's screen looked like this:


And the only apps I could really get on it, other than butchered hotlinks and bookmarks I pulled up myself, were from the apple marketplace. I couldn't really do anything more than I can on a mobile device, and it runs just like a mobile device... I'd be pissed!
I didn't want them to read my mind, I wanted them t read the general population's minds. That's their job as marketing experts and ergonomic designers, to look at what people want, in a broad sense, and try to get there.
Windows 8 does not do this! In fact, from the mobile device, windows 8 is a step down in OS. At least on my phone I have a plethora of settings and options to change what I will. I feel like they really did just plug a mobile device OS onto my computer, not changing much to make it computer friendly, and charged me $40 for it!
It's not me being naive and thinking they can read my mind, no, it's what I've come to expect from Microsoft. Where's the cutting edge? Where's the innovation? Where's the out of the box thinking that I paid for with Windows 8? I don't see it... and I'm willing to bet that a high percentage of consumers won't either.
See... making something new and different is good if it works well, if it improves on the predecessor, and if it is generally more efficient at doing what it's predecessor did. Windows 8 is none of these things.

 

[Mystere]

I'm not confusing apps with static tiles, such as bookmarks.

Really? Then why did you complain that when you added the facebook bookmark it didn't have notifications on it? That seems to indicate you thought that linking a bookmark should make it a live tile with updates. But that can't work. You need an app to get live updates.

My windows phone can add google to the start screen. In which case it pins a google logo to the start screen, and opens into the search bar nicely. It doesn't just put an internet explorer link there!! Don't you see what I'm trying to convey here? I was able to make bookmarks and pin them to my desktop when I was 12! By now I should be able to do so much more, especially when everything is about tiles!

And that's exactly what Windows 8 does when you click the Add to Start Menu command in IE. It gives you an icon that's been customized by the site. Geez, come on... Why do you keep complaining about things the OS can in fact do?

Windows 7 was getting to the point where you could manipulate and work a program without even having it on the screen, but just by hovering your mouse over it on the task bar. The menu would pop up asking you what you'd like to do with said application. Windows 8 is taking 3,000 steps BACKWARDS and making it completely un-user friendly, and so that you have to open everything to try and glean the settings and options from it.

Windows 8 has not removed any of that functionality. It's still there if an app chooses to support it. Lots of apps do, such as Windows Media Player. WHY are you screaming that it can't do things that it can.

 

[Mystere]

Dude look... if I went out tomorrow and spent money on a new mac, because I'm a fan of the phones, and when it arived it's screen looked like this:

That's just it. Apple *IS* in fact going to be doing that. They are merging MacOS and iOS. It may take a few more years, but the two will eventually become the same, just like Microsoft is doing. Google is expanding Android to PC's with ChromeOS. Again, all the major competitors are moving to unify their interfaces.

And the only apps I could really get on it, other than butchered hotlinks and bookmarks I pulled up myself, were from the apple marketplace. I couldn't really do anything more than I can on a mobile device, and it runs just like a mobile device... I'd be pissed!

Well, you're going to be pissed then. Because that's exactly where Apple is moving to.

But that argument is BS anyways, because Windows 8 doesn't force you to only use Windows Store apps. So that argument is completely bogus. And the OS does exactly the same as a mobile device because Microsoft has made mobile devices so much more powerful with this release.

I didn't want them to read my mind, I wanted them t read the general population's minds.

Regardless, you want them to read peoples minds. That's not practical. And consider this. More people access the internet from a mobile device than all the computers ever sold, through history, combined.

Most people will only own a mobile device in a few years time.

Windows 8 does not do this! In fact, from the mobile device, windows 8 is a step down in OS. At least on my phone I have a plethora of settings and options to change what I will.

All I can say is a) you are basing your claims on a broken version of Windows. and b) Not living in any reality I am aware of. There is no OS on the market with more options than Windows has. Can you run Office on non-Windows 8 phone? No.

I feel like they really did just plug a mobile device OS onto my computer, not changing much to make it computer friendly, and charged me $40 for it!

You can feel whatever you want, that doesn't make it true.

It's not me being naive and thinking they can read my mind, no, it's what I've come to expect from Microsoft. Where's the cutting edge? Where's the innovation? Where's the out of the box thinking that I paid for with Windows 8? I don't see it... and I'm willing to bet that a high percentage of consumers won't either.

What you've come to expect from Microsoft? Really? Are you SURE you're not from an alternate reality?

See... making something new and different is good if it works well, if it improves on the predecessor, and if it is generally more efficient at doing what it's predecessor did. Windows 8 is none of these things.

Windows 8 does virtually everything Windows 7 did. *AND* you have Metro on top of it. So your comments are completely baseless.

 

[Jayoneseven]

Really? Then why did you complain that when you added the facebook bookmark it didn't have notifications on it? That seems to indicate you thought that linking a bookmark should make it a live tile with updates. But that can't work. You need an app to get live updates.

I'm saying why wasn't there an option to make it so. Why did I instead have to use a bookmark. I wasn't expecting the bookmark to do anything, because I didn't expect to have to use a bookmark.

And that's exactly what Windows 8 does when you click the Add to Start Menu command in IE. It gives you an icon that's been customized by the site. Geez, come on... Why do you keep complaining about things the OS can in fact do?

"when you use IE" so you're telling me Windows 8 will only work properly if I use IE? Not Chrome, Firefox, Opera.... Hmm wasn't there a court case about something like this recently?
I haven't done this because I don't use IE, haven't since I was young, but maybe I'll try now, even though it should not be the case that you have to use IE to make tiles properly etc.

Windows 8 has not removed any of that functionality. It's still there if an app chooses to support it. Lots of apps do, such as Windows Media Player. WHY are you screaming that it can't do things that it can.

I don't have "lots of apps", I'm commenting on the few I do have, the few I had on 7 that did these things, such as Zune. I don't like having to get into apps to pause my music, again years ago the ability was there to do so without opening them.

 

[symbiont]

Ahhh.. ok... I thought you had real issues you wanted to resolve, not that you are upset that Microsoft didn't magically read your mind and develop and OS exactly as you wanted it to be (not that you bothered to tell them anyways).

Your complaints seem to stem down to that fact that it is simultaneously different and the same, but both of these seem to be different and the same in ways you are not happy about. You complain that it doesn't do things any other os does. If you are so good at designing OS's, maybe you should take a crack it yourself.

Metro is a version 1 thing. Windows 1 was not perfect. Windows 95 was not perfect. Windows XP was not perfect. This isn't perfect either, but each successive version got better. You're comparing Metro to Win32, which is where the breakdown occurs. Metro is NOT the next version of Win32. It's a completely new OS that is growing from the ground up.

Maybe a future version will have desktop enhancements for those using it on a desktop, but version 1 means getting it all working on all devices. This is how software development works.

Jay it's not worth the effort arguing with him. This guy is one of those "I'll take anything you give me" people I've mentioned. I almost chuckled out loud in my meeting when I read the "If you are so good at designing OS's, maybe you should take a crack it yourself" statement. Really original there.
A lot of this stuff is common sense in OS development, which of course wouldn't have been common sense with windows 1, windows 95, or whatever other pre 2000 OS you want to throw out there. This is 2012, we live in a modern world with modern thinking, with very definite ideas about how software/hardware should work. He's saying excuse it because back in 1994 software didn't have that option either - why should it in this version in 2012? Amazing...
And it is not a completely new OS built from the ground up, it's a tweaked Windows 7 OS with a new "shell" along side it.

 

[Jayoneseven]

Windows 8 does virtually everything Windows 7 did. *AND* you have Metro on top of it. So your comments are completely baseless.

Virtually... so not everything. So there are things 7 could do that 8 s failing to do. And... what's that? It has Metro!? Oh please hold while I jump for joy!! Somebody has ripped my start bar off Windows 7 and replaced it with a cumbersome start page! Now I can die happy...

 

[Mystere]

I'm saying why wasn't there an option to make it so. Why did I instead have to use a bookmark. I wasn't expecting the bookmark to do anything, because I didn't expect to have to use a bookmark.

You just keep going in circles. First you say you didn't want it to do it, then you say you did, then you say you didn't... The only thing that will give you notifications is a Facebook app, and Facebook has not yet written one for Metro. When they do, it will do that. This argument is really stupid. You have either apps or links, links can't be live. Apps can.

"when you use IE" so you're telling me Windows 8 will only work properly if I use IE? Not Chrome, Firefox, Opera.... Hmm wasn't there a court case about something like this recently? I haven't done this because I don't use IE, haven't since I was young, but maybe I'll try now, even though it should not be the case that you have to use IE to make tiles properly etc.

Oh give me a break. The browser makes the icon. The Start menu displays whatever icon the browser makes. IE has the ability to do this automatically. Microsoft cannot magically make Google change its code to do this. Google is perfectly capable of creating links with web site icons in them, and the Start Menu will use them if they do.

This is a limitation of Chrome, and they can change it if they want. So argue with them. The OS is not the cause of the failure here.

Windows 8 has not removed any of that functionality. It's still there if an app chooses to support it. Lots of apps do, such as Windows Media Player. WHY are you screaming that it can't do things that it can.

I don't have "lots of apps", I'm commenting on the few I do have, the few I had on 7 that did these things, such as Zune. I don't like having to get into apps to pause my music, again years ago the ability was there to do so without opening them.

Zune still does what it did in 7. I really don't understand your point.

Virtually *EVERYTHING* windows 7 did, so too can Windows 8 do. Why do you keep insisting it doesn't?

 

[MaxPower2003]

The OS itself has no ads. None of the MS written apps have ads. Third party app developers don't get part of the profits of Windows 8. They need to make money somehow.

Not entirely true. The Microsoft Solitaire Collection app has ads. That one was written by Microsoft, no?

 

[Mystere]

Windows 8 does virtually everything Windows 7 did. *AND* you have Metro on top of it. So your comments are completely baseless.

Virtually... so not everything. So there are things 7 could do that 8 s failing to do. And... what's that? It has Metro!? Oh please hold while I jump for joy!! Somebody has ripped my start bar off Windows 7 and replaced it with a cumbersome start page! Now I can die happy...

You're really climbing out on a limb now. Yeah, there are some features that were dropped in Windows 8. Not many, but some. The vast majority of what Windows 7 did, so too does Windows 8. The list is not huge, and many of the features were replaced with other features (like live tiles do what gadgets did).

List of features removed in Windows 8 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Mystere]

The OS itself has no ads. None of the MS written apps have ads. Third party app developers don't get part of the profits of Windows 8. They need to make money somehow.

Not entirely true. The Microsoft Solitaire Collection app has ads. That one was written by Microsoft, no?

If true, it must be a recent update, I don't recall there being ads before. On the other hand, this used to be something you had to buy. Windows only had Freecell and Solitaire (some versions had spider solitaire as well). The new games are significantly expanded over their older counterparts.

 

[thenerdal]

Windows 8 does virtually everything Windows 7 did. *AND* you have Metro on top of it. So your comments are completely baseless.

Virtually... so not everything. So there are things 7 could do that 8 s failing to do. And... what's that? It has Metro!? Oh please hold while I jump for joy!! Somebody has ripped my start bar off Windows 7 and replaced it with a cumbersome start page! Now I can die happy...

You're really climbing out on a limb now. Yeah, there are some features that were dropped in Windows 8. Not many, but some. The vast majority of what Windows 7 did, so too does Windows 8. The list is not huge, and many of the features were replaced with other features (like live tiles do what gadgets did).

List of features removed in Windows 8 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Gadgets are better than live tiles though. No one on a desktop will be on the start page just to look at the live tiles. It works on a phone because you just get your phone out of your pocket and check quickly and put your phone back down.

 

[Jayoneseven]

You just keep going in circles. First you say you didn't want it to do it, then you say you did, then you say you didn't... The only thing that will give you notifications is a Facebook app, and Facebook has not yet written one for Metro. When they do, it will do that. This argument is really stupid. You have either apps or links, links can't be live. Apps can.

I'll go over this once more so you get the jist, you seem to be having some trouble with this one.
I saw the Windows 8 commercials and got this from it "Put all of your favorite rubbish in tiles that are personalized and customizable, making your hopepage truly yours". So... me, being naive, thought "awesome, everything just 1 click away!" So when I had installed it I thought "okay lets get facebook on this" I wasn't necessarily expecting to download an app, more... expecting the OS to do it for me, in some sense. When they've been barking about this for months, you'd expect to go to Facebook and "Install for windows 8!" and boom, you're done. I wasn't expecting it to be exactly like my phone and having to wait for devs to make an app for it, then put it on some marketplace. This is a desktop operating system, not a mobile device. I don't see how you aren't getting that... it should be different... it shouldn't be marketplace based with the dev's making apps to work with the OS.
So I instead made some crappy bookmark hotlinks, and have made do with those for now, but feel as though those tiles need a whole lot more interactivity to them. I had expected ( silly of me I know) that because the WHOLE OPERATING SYSTEM is orientated around these tiles, that they would be more than just apps.Silly of me I know... call me crazy... but I expected something else, some way to make your own, or to design your own.

 

[Jayoneseven]

Here's an example of the incomplete feeling of this OS.
I'm on desktop view, looking at music, and I think "let me check this online" so I go to start, which instead opens the start screen, where my browser is launched as an app, not as the browser fully. So I open youtube there, play the song, tab back to desktop and the song stops. This wouldn't happen if I had used the desktop version of the browser, but for that I'd have to find it and put it on my desktop, as the start button doesn't help me to get back into my computer files anymore, I go to any app and click "view in folder" and find the browser in it's program files, copy the shortcut to the desktop... just so I can use the damn thing how it's supposed to work!!You guys are just somehow so blinded by this that you think it's awesome, I think it's a piece of garbage I paid for. Why am I doing so much more work just to do mundane tasks? I can't even imagine trying to use this OS for work! The old start menu worked just fine, this one is cumbersome and gets in the way, as I've just explained.