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Win 8 Ditching Start Menu for a Start Screen

Guys...what's all the bitching about? Paul Thurrott already confirmed that there WILL be an option to go back to the Windows-7 style start menu and desktop.

The new UI is a checkbox feature, which I imagine will only be enabled by default on devices with a touchscreen or pen-input device installed.
 
mas said:
the key difference here between usable and unusable is configuration, customisation. when the ribbon is configured to fit YOUR tasks, then it's useful. if there's no way to configure or get rid of it, eg. the win7 explorer ribbon, then it's worthless. a "toy" wasting space, or just making common tasks infinitely harder and more time consuming.
Click to expand...

Huh? "Infinitely more time consuming"? Ridiculous, all Microsoft did was take the stuff in on the right side of the Start Menu and put it in the Windows Explorer Ribbon, some things are easier to get to and this is still a dev preview, it's quite possible that more customization will be added to ribbon. Another thing, yeah everyone seems to hate tablets, but tablets are the future it looks and the ribbon make Windows Explorer MUCH more touch friendly.

mas said:
and speaking of windows explorer, well lookie here what ms just happens to be planning for windows 8, RE-enabling old features that they apparently give a shit about now:

http://www.askvg.com/microsoft-talk...indows-8-addition-of-ribbon-ui-and-up-button/
Click to expand...

Not sure what you're point is here, the source of your link was from Sinofsky post made before the dev preview was released: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2011/08/29/improvements-in-windows-explorer.aspx

mas said:
it is limiting advanced users, because everything takes 2 or 3 times or more steps than it did before. noobs think it's awsome, because everything they want is all up in their face, just 1 click away in this pretty little bar with outdated bezels and other obnoxious 3d effects, while more advanced tasks that others may need to go through every day are hidden away in some mundane clickfest. then it's just a waste of space.
Click to expand...

Huh? 2 or 3 times more steps for advanced users buy only one click for noobs? And what exactly is wasted space? It's like you're saying all interaction elements must be super dense, barely readable or hidden to be useful. The ribbon can be compacted to drop down like a menu, it "wastes" ZERO space in that case and even it it's not compacted it not like the space is some how always needed or something.

Good I'm glad people around here aren't UI designers. Everything would cryptic, invisible and so compact you'd need a microscope to see anything and it would require a PhD in hieroglyphics to use.
 
Unknown-One said:
The new UI is a checkbox feature, which I imagine will only be enabled by default on devices with a touchscreen or pen-input device installed.
Click to expand...

It's much that that. It gets a whole class of applications onto desktops, games, iteractive magazines, stuff that you see on tablets that would be in some cases even nicer on a desktop. And for old farts like me, I don't have to deal with those tiny ass icons in the Start Menu any more.
 
Unknown-One said:
Guys...what's all the bitching about? Paul Thurrott already confirmed that there WILL be an option to go back to the Windows-7 style start menu and desktop.

The new UI is a checkbox feature, which I imagine will only be enabled by default on devices with a touchscreen or pen-input device installed.
Click to expand...

Haters will hate, its nothing new.
 
Where exactly were all these start menu haters before the Windows 8 developer preview?
 
Catalan said:
Where exactly were all these start menu haters before the Windows 8 developer preview?
Click to expand...

I don't hate the Start Menu. I don't think that the Start Menu is the epitome of efficiency and that the Start Screen is the efficiency killer many are proclaiming. The Start Screen is dramatically different and yet very similar to the Start Menu. It's a paradox and why I think it has a chance of becoming very popular if Microsoft can clean up a few things and a just that one spice that it is missing, which I think is a task manager.
 
Quit following Apple, you mooks! You don't even make a tablet PC! The only thing close to it is the Surface. Use your billions and LEAD! Stick with it for more than 10 nanoseconds and the market may actually follow you.
 
sfsuphysics said:
I think I threw up a bit in my mouth...

Oh well, as long as I can go back to "classic view" I'll be fine.
Click to expand...
They will kill it and force you to upgrade, like everything else. They keep taking steps back in interface design. Win8 is going down as another Vista.
 
sleepeeg3 said:
Quit following Apple, you mooks! You don't even make a tablet PC! The only thing close to it is the Surface. Use your billions and LEAD! Stick with it for more than 10 nanoseconds and the market may actually follow you.
Click to expand...

Windows 8 does in many ways incorporate the tablet ideas that Apple has made popular but doesn't at all follow Apple. Windows 8 is a far more complex undertaking that attempts to unify form factors and input methods, that's simply not what Apple is doing with the iPad, quite the opposite really.
 
I'm not surprised this is happening, but it does make some sense, at least to me.

I rarely use the start menu anymore except to shut down/reboot, as a way to launch programs I didn't bother to pin to my taskbar, occasionally to search for things (but I know where most things are... not the end of the world), and as a way to open the control panel with 2 clicks instead of 3.

For everything else I use the taskbar or keyboard shortcuts.

I am totally fine with getting rid of the start menu so long as all the functionality remains or gets moved to more useful places (e.g. Spotlight-style search).
 
ekuest said:
rabble rabble rabble get off my lawn. thats all im hearing here. i doubt microsoft is really stupid enough to hide your apps from you. there will probably be a way to enable the old start menu or something similar. but for 95% of users, having some 5-20 frequently used things right there instead of clicking through annoying menus will be considered an improvement. to think microsoft should cater their OS that will sell hundreds of millions of copies to that 5% is selfish and ignorant. i use firefox, peerblock, steam, office, and windows explorer on any given day. most other programs i have either autolaunch when i need them (vlc, utorrent, winzip, mse, etc) or else i hardly ever actually need to access them. the start menu is outdated and a general clusterfuck of unused menus.
Click to expand...

how would you call something fully configurable to be a clusterfuck, when you can organise it however you wish? that's the problem and why this type of manipulation works so well, people who don't use such features have no idea what they're missing, so they can just hack it up and make it look pretty. then wow awsome 3d bezels all over the place, with transparency! now we're having fun!

anyone who thinks vista/win7 ui is an actual improvement over classic never really used it in the first place, and now that you have certain methods of access forced on you, it seems real convenient, since what you had before was such a clusterfuck. not because it was lacking these features (indexed search has been in windows since xp), but because you didn't know how to use them.
 
Honestly I dont have a problem if the start screen works out ok. In fact I thought this would be a good idea a long time ago. Basically just using your screen real estate the best you can. You can now keep alot more just 2 clicks away.

However the implementation may not be so hot. For instance in win 8 dev build it seems like there is actually less on the screen since the icons are just so much bigger.
 
I never see my desktop after clicking the first application. Then when I load 12 more It's buried. With the start menu it's always visible, and overlays over anything on the screen. I still don't see why they are focusing on a tiny segment of the population who don't have the hardware to run multiple applications with it's GUI...over one build for desktops/laptops...:confused:
 
mas said:
anyone who thinks vista/win7 ui is an actual improvement over classic never really used it in the first place, and now that you have certain methods of access forced on you, it seems real convenient, since what you had before was such a clusterfuck. not because it was lacking these features (indexed search has been in windows since xp), but because you didn't know how to use them.
Click to expand...

Pinning applications/sites to taskbar isn't an improvement over XP silly quick launch things? Pinning windows to the sides of the screen and dragging up to maximize isn't useful? :p Use an OS with a poor GUI like OS/X and youll soon long for those.
 
DeathPrincess said:
Pinning applications/sites to taskbar isn't an improvement over XP silly quick launch things? Pinning windows to the sides of the screen and dragging up to maximize isn't useful? :p
Click to expand...
I don't know if you're being ironical. The Quick Launch toolbar is the first thing I enabled on Windows 7. Well, the second. The first were the disabling of the automatic maximize and pinning of windows to the sides and taskbar preview and aero peep and poop... ^-^
 
Chimel said:
Well, the second. The first were the disabling of the automatic maximize and pinning of windows to the sides and taskbar preview and aero peep and poop... ^-^
Click to expand...

why? :confused: Lack of it is one of the biggest things that annoys me about other OSs now.
 
I'm sure it will be fine...anything that Microsoft Fucks up I'm sure the Last team will fix like always....Looking forward to Last8. :)
 
So using an entire desktop area to accomplish what a small menu accomplishes is an improvement? That only makes even a slight shred of sense for anyone who doesn't have 30+ programs installed. For those that have a ton of stuff installed, this is a massive step backwards.

End of the day looks like MS will keep up their tradition of Good OS release, Bad OS release. They are simply trying to cram too much unnecessary crap into Win 8. Sorry but the Tiles style UI works absolutely horribly on a 23" screen. It works fine for a 10" or smaller tablet, but it garbage for anything else if you want to actually be productive. I am quickly getting to where I use my Win8 test bed machine less and less because it is incredibly irritating to use. The few minor improvements right now aren't worth the overall headache that Win8 is. Unless there is a massive overhaul between now and launch, looks like we will need to wait until Win9.

I have bought every single version of windows since 3.11. However at this point I have zero intention of paying $300 for what amounts to a Service pack level change and a new UI for Win 7 that is a huge step backwards. Also the explorer Ribbon is utterly terrible and this coming from someone who thinks the Ribbon in office is one of the best improvements to office that has happened in a decade.
 
I tried hard to get used to the auto-docking and maximize, twice, but I keep docking and maximizing when I don't want to, as I move windows around, and the left and right docking on the whole height doesn't make sense most of the time.
Same for the Taskbar preview and transparent preview, it gets in my way too often, hiding stuff I don't want to hide. Kinda annoying to me, but I'm sure I could get used to them. That is, until Microsoft changes the UI again and we have to relearn yet another behavior... ^-^
 
Chimel said:
I don't know if you're being ironical. The Quick Launch toolbar is the first thing I enabled on Windows 7. Well, the second. The first were the disabling of the automatic maximize and pinning of windows to the sides and taskbar preview and aero peep and poop... ^-^
Click to expand...

LoL you are crazy, aero snap is good it is a feature I can no longer live without. I always see some people perhaps like you who just go in and revert all the progress. That is fine M$ gives you the option but for me windows 7 is way way better than xp was.
 
rudy said:
LoL you are crazy, aero snap is good it is a feature I can no longer live without. I always see some people perhaps like you who just go in and revert all the progress. That is fine M$ gives you the option but for me windows 7 is way way better than xp was.
Click to expand...

It depends upon how many programs you want quick access to. For me, I still use StarDock's Object Dock and forget about the task bar/start button for launching of programs.

Somethings considered "progress" are a hindrance in actual use. Just because its newer doesn't mean its better.
 
Dekoth-E- said:
Sorry but the Tiles style UI works absolutely horribly on a 23" screen. It works fine for a 10" or smaller tablet, but it garbage for anything else if you want to actually be productive. I am quickly getting to where I use my Win8 test bed machine less and less because it is incredibly irritating to use.
Click to expand...

I've been running Windows 8 on a 24" 1920x1200 screen and I'm having no real issues with the Start Screen, I actually like it in a number of ways. I'm writing code with Visual Studio 2011 and I feel just as productive as I do on a Windows 7 machine. I simply don't know what is causing people of of this productivity angst, I simply can't see the problem. The biggest problem I see is the extra click involved often with getting to the stuff at was on the right of the Start Menu, that's now all in Windows Explorer, it can take an extra click to get to that stuff now, but it's not like it's a real productivity killer, I'm not going in and out of the Control Panel a hundred times a day.
 
rudy said:
LoL you are crazy, aero snap is good it is a feature I can no longer live without. I always see some people perhaps like you who just go in and revert all the progress. That is fine M$ gives you the option but for me windows 7 is way way better than xp was.
Click to expand...

i LOVE aero snap. i hate that at home i just throw shit to either side or the top when im moving files or multitasking, and then go to work (we use xp) and have to manually restructure my 2 word windows when im editing 2 documents side by side. that is the biggest productivity tool i can think of in windows 7 by far. are there xp keyboard shortcuts to do that or something? i would like to know if so.
 
As much as I don't like the Start screen on my laptop which has Windows 8 Preview installed, I can see why Microsoft is doing this.

I know comparing to OSX might be off but its interface has changed little over the years. Microsoft is trying something new whether we like it or not.

I do agree that the Start Menu has been nothing more but to launch programs. It has become a rather long list of programs as well over time when more programs are installed. Nowadays, I launch practically all my regularly used programs through pinned apps on the Taskbar I rarely use the Start Menu/All Programs list unless it's for a rarely used program like. Majority of my games are launched through Steam or Comrade (and soon-to-be Origin for Battlefield 3). I also have Rocket Dock for other items, but pinned apps is what I use most now compared to Windows XP, 2000, 98SE and 95.

The one issue I've had with the Start screen is that programs you install on Windows 8 Preview has every shortcut appear on the Start screen. That also includes the uninstall program icons and any shortcuts to websites or folders. It'll probably take the cooperation of programs to allow an option what shortcuts we want to appear in the Start screen.

However, I would like to see an option programmed into Windows 8 that automatically does that for you. For example, if Win8 detects a new program installed, it opens up the programs folder similar to how it would appear in the All Programs list. From there, you can check and uncheck items you want to appear on the Start screen.

Another thing I'd like to see is an All Programs shortcut (or tile) on the Start screen. You press the tile and a list of installed programs are listed and slides out. Again, from there, you can either launch programs or pin them to the Start screen or Taskbar.

I see this as the way forward, but can be two steps backwards if not implemented correctly.
 
octoberasian said:
Another thing I'd like to see is an All Programs shortcut (or tile) on the Start screen. You press the tile and a list of installed programs are listed and slides out. Again, from there, you can either launch programs or pin them to the Start screen or Taskbar.
Click to expand...

Windows Phone 7 already has this. You can swipe the tile homescreen to the left (or tap an arrow icon hovering to the side of the tiles) and a list of all installed apps slides in. Long-pressing on any of the apps in this list gives you the option to pin it, uninstall it, or rate and review it.

We'll probably see something similar implemented on the Windows 8 start screen.
 
Unknown-One said:
Windows Phone 7 already has this. You can swipe the tile homescreen to the left (or tap an arrow icon hovering to the side of the tiles) and a list of all installed apps slides in. Long-pressing on any of the apps in this list gives you the option to pin it, uninstall it, or rate and review it.

We'll probably see something similar implemented on the Windows 8 start screen.
Click to expand...

Hopefully.

Right now if I want to add a program to the list that wasn't automatically added, I'd have to search for it.
 
heatlesssun said:
I've been running Windows 8 on a 24" 1920x1200 screen and I'm having no real issues with the Start Screen, I actually like it in a number of ways. I'm writing code with Visual Studio 2011 and I feel just as productive as I do on a Windows 7 machine. I simply don't know what is causing people of of this productivity angst, I simply can't see the problem. The biggest problem I see is the extra click involved often with getting to the stuff at was on the right of the Start Menu, that's now all in Windows Explorer, it can take an extra click to get to that stuff now, but it's not like it's a real productivity killer, I'm not going in and out of the Control Panel a hundred times a day.
Click to expand...

Extra clicks hundreds of times a day adds up. Not to mention I utterly hate crap on my desktop. It feels cluttered and makes me irrationally angry to be stuck staring at it vs a nice clean icon free desktop.

Completely Pointless change for desktop ui and in no way an improvement.
 
DeathPrincess said:
Pinning applications/sites to taskbar isn't an improvement over XP silly quick launch things? Pinning windows to the sides of the screen and dragging up to maximize isn't useful? :p Use an OS with a poor GUI like OS/X and youll soon long for those.
Click to expand...

Chimel said:
I don't know if you're being ironical. The Quick Launch toolbar is the first thing I enabled on Windows 7. Well, the second. The first were the disabling of the automatic maximize and pinning of windows to the sides and taskbar preview and aero peep and poop... ^-^
Click to expand...

yea I can't tell either... not that I don't find some of these features useful, but again going back to my point - forced gestures/features that were always possible, just now known because it's the only way. the change in mechanics of pinning applications is purely cosmetic, saving a bit of space on a taskbar that has always had pinning and tab stacking since xp. app previews are another pointless bit of eye candy, that only works when the program is visible? what. a. joke. hey it looks pretty, but when we have transparency (also available in xp btw) why would this be useful unless we could see the previews while windows were minimised?

aero snap, terrible idea as well, vertical stretching is basically worthless for any screens below 1920x res, which are still very popular, and horizontal stretching is pointless for widescreens period. I don't need automatic resizing, what I need is windows snapping to the edges of each other, that's the most time consuming part of screen realestate management, arranging windows relative to the size of their content and each other, not occupying some arbitrary percentage of the screen.

xwindows focus, a wildly popular feature of windows they somehow managed to screw up yet again by raising z-order of the active window, I'm guessing strictly to save a single click for disabled persons navigation. luckily this can also be fixed in the registry to be made useful again. I could go on and on, the ui devs for windows must have been hired as interns, there's no other way to explain this level of incompetence.
 
Dekoth-E- said:
Completely Pointless change for desktop ui and in no way an improvement.
Click to expand...
If you don't think it's an improvement, then wait for the beta, which will have the ability to toggle the new UI on and off...

It's hardly pointless, though. They're about to have phones, tablets, a game console, and the desktop all using a unified UI. This is something huge for Microsoft and end users alike, especially since the new UI actually works very well across all of the devices that have a final implementation of it (Windows Phone, the Xbox 360), and the partial implementation in Windows 8 already shows extreme promise for tablets.

The only sticking point is the good old desktop form factor, which currently has the most incomplete implementation of Metro (The Windows Developer Preview was decidedly polished up in a hurry for the developer tablets given away at BUILD, not desktops). Expect the Windows 8 beta to have a much more comprehensive implementation of Metro that works with desktop computing just as well as tablet computing.
 
mas said:
app previews are another pointless bit of eye candy, that only works when the program is visible? what. a. joke. hey it looks pretty, but when we have transparency (also available in xp btw) why would this be useful unless we could see the previews while windows were minimised?
Click to expand...
What on Earth are you talking about? The taskbar thumbnails/previews work just fine when said application is minimized.

Are you saying that yours somehow...vanish when you minimize a window? Sounds like there's something wrong with your system, mate.
 
I wonder if it occurred to anyone in here that the reason they removed the option to switch back to the classic start menu in Win8 Dev Preview is to force everyone to give them feedback of this new start menu without switching it to classic.

Just put in your review on how to improve it and be on your merry and wait for launch. They already said they'll make it optional. There's no reason to beta test the classic start menu since it's been around before most of you guys were born.

It's no different from beta testing games where they leave out the ability to change your control. They want feedbacks of everything default to make it playable and easy for everyone. They'll put in the control option later on when they get enough feedbacks.
 
I definitely do want to adopt the new Metro interface, just not the Start screen or losing efficiency in the process. I believe there must be a way to have both objectives compatible for computers with a keyboard and no touch. It's just not there yet. I definitely do not want to switch to the classic Windows 7 Start menu and Taskbar in Windows 8, just like I never used the classic styles in Vista or Windows 7. People who do that might just as well not upgrade.

rudy said:
I always see some people perhaps like you who just go in and revert all the progress. That is fine M$ gives you the option but for me windows 7 is way way better than xp was.
Click to expand...
Windows 7 is incomparably better than XP indeed, and I have been on Microsoft operating systems since PC-DOS. I always use the latest version of Windows, usually even before they release. Hell, I even worked for the company in the OS division for a dozen years, so I am all for progress. It doesn't mean that you have to be blind or that every new feature is perfect for everybody's workflow. I never needed to pin apps to the side manually, so I don't need it automatically either. It's not just about progress, it's also about usage. I have no doubt that Aero Snap, Peek and Shake are fine and dandy for hundreds of millions of people, but there is also a minority of users who will not benefit from it. And given Windows' marketshare, a minority of users is also hundreds of millions of customers. Thanks for customization, as you said.

octoberasian said:
The one issue I've had with the Start screen is that programs you install on Windows 8 Preview has every shortcut appear on the Start screen. That also includes the uninstall program icons and any shortcuts to websites or folders. It'll probably take the cooperation of programs to allow an option what shortcuts we want to appear in the Start screen.
However, I would like to see an option programmed into Windows 8 that automatically does that for you.
Click to expand...
This^
Such a feature would work for both the new Start screen and the traditional Start menu. It would require a change in all apps, so that the main app(s) is flagged differently and can be moved to a more visible/usable location such as the main Start screen.
In the mean time, legacy apps can have this information stored in the cloud, so that when you install Office, only the word processing and spreadsheet app shortcuts are pinned to the Taskbar or Start screen.

I loved Intellisense, but it seems that it's not used as much anymore, and that most of the OS interface is now static to fit the majority of users, instead of smartly adapting the interface according to each individual's usage. Like if I use a specific app 10 times this week, I want Windows to pin a one-click shortcut automatically somewhere for me, telling me what it did and why, and asking me the first time it did if I want to cancel this action, if I want to continue pinning frequently used apps this way, if I want to be asked next time, or if I want Windows to leave me alone. It may seem a lot, but it happens only once on your machine. Once in your lifetime even if this user setting is stored in the cloud to be used on all your home and work machines and in future versions of Windows.

I have been organizing my shortcuts manually this way since Vista, I find it works well for me. I copy the main app shortcut(s) to my "Applications" group, and I move the whole app's group under my "Complements" group. I have partial automation to create these groups, merge groups from my individual settings into All Users, and move all unrecognized groups under "Complements". Without automation, it's a pain to maintain, especially with all the apps that auto-upgrade constantly and keep reinstalling shortcuts everywhere, like Adobe.
 
Dekoth-E- said:
Extra clicks hundreds of times a day adds up. Not to mention I utterly hate crap on my desktop. It feels cluttered and makes me irrationally angry to be stuck staring at it vs a nice clean icon free desktop.

Completely Pointless change for desktop ui and in no way an improvement.
Click to expand...

Hundreds of extra clicks per day? Nonsense. All commonly used apps are as easily launchable, the stuff in the right of the Start Menu is now in Windows Explorer, so I'm finding that a lot of times that stuff is right where I need it instead of having to go to the Start Menu anyway.
 
I'd be happy if Microsoft put the start menu in the Desktop context menu. Fluxbox style :D
 
heatlesssun said:
Hundreds of extra clicks per day? Nonsense. All commonly used apps are as easily launchable, the stuff in the right of the Start Menu is now in Windows Explorer, so I'm finding that a lot of times that stuff is right where I need it instead of having to go to the Start Menu anyway.
Click to expand...
I don't think he meant literally hundreds of extra clicks per day, he just reused your "a hundred times a day."
But it looks like dozens of extra clicks for an average user, unless the Desktop Taskbar can be customized the same way as in Windows 7 (which seems to be possible.)

You mean the Start menu stuff is in the Charms bar, not Windows Explorer, right?
Most people in this thread and the Microsoft usage stats don't really care about the Start menu anyway. The important thing is not to force users to switch to full screen Metro just to launch Calculator or Notepad when they are in Desktop mode. I want single-click apps, and a better integration between Metro and Desktop, so that Desktop does not look like a virtual Windows 7 machine inside a phone. It's not like, one moment, your computer has a touch screen that lies flat on your desk right under your hands, and the next instant, it has only a keyboard and mouse and the vertical monitor is 60 centimeters away from you.
 
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