The company I work for has subsidized the purchase of tablet devices for employees to 'personally own'. Thus, not only are they encouraging employees to use tablet devices at work, but also to warm up to them as a device they could use and live with every day.
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Win 8 - How do I multitask?
- Thread starter TeeJayHoward
- Start date
The company I work for has subsidized the purchase of tablet devices for employees to 'personally own'. Thus, not only are they encouraging employees to use tablet devices at work, but also to warm up to them as a device they could use and live with every day.
heatlesssun
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Snap mode works better with some apps than others. It works great with the Xbox music app if you're surfing and playing tunes and wanting to jump around songs. Windows 8 is very nice on the Samsung Series 7 Slate, it's MUCH better than Windows 7 on tablets and that's really the point of Windows 8. Whatever is lost on the desktop which honestly is very little when you accept Windows 8 for what it is and not try to make it Windows 7, SO much more is gain for tablets and touch and even pens. It's an acceptable tradeoff considering the rapid growth of tablets and stagnation of the PC.
heatlesssun
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As much as people want to bitch about the desktop and keyboards and mice, that's just not where the market growth is. Microsoft had to make Windows 8 tablet and touch friendly and an option to turn those features off would only kill Windows in the long run as more and more people move to tablets and touch.
It's such and obvious thing that Microsoft had NO CHOICE but to do unless they wanted people to ignore Windows as it remained stuck in a 20 UI.
If I recall, the music app kept playing even though it wasn't up on the screen.
Thanks! That's great news...
When you get a chance, could you confirm this? (or anyone else) No rush....Thanks again.
heatlesssun
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Yes, the music app works in the background, I have the Xbox app playing in the background right now. Metro apps can play audio and download files even in the background. There are a LOT of restrictions on them doing much else in the background however. Microsoft first and foremost didn't want Metro apps to kill battery life.
Nonsense.
1. Millions of enterprise and personal users will continue to use normal non-touch pc's. No one is ever going to switch to touch only as its not a replacement.
2. Making Windows touch friendly doesn't have to be at the cost of making non-touch use worse, which is the fallacy you keep repeating, as if both can't be done.
That makes no sense at all. If I can turn touch features on/off, I'll do so based on the device I'm using, and thus get the best experience possible.
You know there is no winning with Heatlesssun.. I think its SteveB in disguise giving us a bouquet of shit and telling us it smells like roses.
I'm sure an ON/OFF Switch for Tablet mode would have killed Windows... That would be like putting a gun to SteveB head and pulling the trigger.
heatlesssun
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There should be a market for powerful keyboard and mouse driven PCs for some years to come but even iPads have keyboards and there are plenty of people that seem to say that touch is all they need even for certain productive tasks. I'm not the one saying this, there's lots of analysts and studies and surveys that seem to more and more look at tablets are real computers.
And what is that cost? The 20 year old Start Menu? Yes things have changed in Windows 8 and there is a cost in the change granted.
Being a Windows 8 keyboard and mouse desktop and touch tablet user, while I certainly understand the point of desktop mode or tablet mode that's just not what Windows 8 is trying to be, it's both a desktop and tablet simultaneously. I understand that people say that such a design weakens both but that said my Windows 8 devices run all the same software that Windows 7 did and they run touch apps with a touch UI very much like any iPad or Android device. From at least the applications perspective Windows 8 is pretty every bit the desktop OS that Windows 7 is and is capable of running the same touch apps iOS and Android can. The perspective of what truly powers an OS, which are the programs and apps, Windows 8 is a true hybrid desktop and tablet OS.
heatlesssun
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I've have acknowledged many points that Windows 8 opponents have made as having veracity. My point here again, are the trends and the markets are saying. They are not saying more and more PC please and more and more dense complex desktop software please and that's starting to take effect even in the business world. If you have problem with these things talk to the journalists and analysts that point out the not so happy and prosperous future of the traditional PC day after day after day while point out the awful time that many PC OEMs are having.
It would hurt the area that Microsoft needs a big win in quickly, i.e. tablets. There's just no where for Microsoft to go in traditional PCs. They dominate a market that's not growing. Hip, hip hurray.
I have been doing unattanded installs for ages, if I can specify certain things in xml file for OS deployments I am sure MS could have the option for it. OEM's install the OS any way. There is no rhyme or reason for the lack of this option. I strongly believe Metro has shit all to do with Tablet, Desktop, and more with the bullshit Appstore and MS cloud services.
heatlesssun
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The reason for it is clear. Windows 8 was targeted as a mobile and tablet OS but there are no touch mobile apps. Allow these apps to run on ALL Windows 8/RT machines and now tablet developers are pretty much forced to write Metro apps since from the Windows 8 perspective a Metro apps is both a desktop and tablet app simultaneously.
Again, where is there room for Windows to grow only as a desktop OS and consumers simply don't have the interest in desktops or even laptops that they do in tablets. Sure they still by them but it's just not something that excites average consumers. Desktops and laptops are just old and everyone has them now.
If Windows 8 opponents had some idea about what would spur consumer interest in traditional PCs that could provide a 5 to 10 percent growth in traditional PCs I bet Microsoft would have taken the offer.
Contrary to what you are saying, the ONLY reason MS is able to do this is they have a captive consumer and enterprise market. There is simply no choice for oems and customers, they have to buy Windows and Office. This is what allows MS to completely ignore their needs and make an OS attract new users by looking cool, and hopefully a share of tablets. If there was any competiton for the desktop at all, there is no way they would so drastically degrade the normal pc experience.
There is PLENTY of room for making Windows better, faster and easier to use. There have been basically no improvements in Win 8 as far as the app layer goes. It's not a stagnant market by any means.
And there is also room for someone integrating the desktop and tablet much much better than what we have in Win 8, which doesn't integrate them but simply runs both, and has 2 of everything - desktop, apps, settings. That's the laziest possible way of doing this.
E.g. Imagine this - I'm using IE on my pc. Then I logon to the same session from a tablet, and IE instantly becomes a touch app. That requires proper engineering and vision, instead of simply bundling both versions which share nothing and just add to the confusion.
Sorry, no one believes that Win 8 does a good job of bridging both worlds. It's a disjoint haphazard mess.
There is PLENTY of room for making Windows better, faster and easier to use. There have been basically no improvements in Win 8 as far as the app layer goes. It's not a stagnant market by any means.
And there is also room for someone integrating the desktop and tablet much much better than what we have in Win 8, which doesn't integrate them but simply runs both, and has 2 of everything - desktop, apps, settings. That's the laziest possible way of doing this.
E.g. Imagine this - I'm using IE on my pc. Then I logon to the same session from a tablet, and IE instantly becomes a touch app. That requires proper engineering and vision, instead of simply bundling both versions which share nothing and just add to the confusion.
Sorry, no one believes that Win 8 does a good job of bridging both worlds. It's a disjoint haphazard mess.
heatlesssun
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I agree that Microsoft dominance in the desktop top affords them the opportunity to take the risk to change the UI. Drastic degradation is a matter of debate especially when many people report that their desktop experience with desktop programs has not been drastically degraded.
There's always room for improvement but yes, the traditional PC market in terms of sales growth is dead in the water at the moment, which oddly enough some at least partially attribute to people waiting for Windows 8.
But the thing is that the OS shell is only part of integrating a keyboard and mouse with a tablet. The main issue there are the apps. Desktop apps would have to be totally rewritten to work with a touch UI. That's simply never going to happen. A new platform that considers all input methods, which Metro does, is a much more feasible approach.
Actually the desktop version of IE 10 is quite touch capable, the main issue with it's touch friendliness is the chrome which can be replaced, there are such IE touch UI browsers for Windows 7.
If you say so. I hear a lot of people say that but I do wonder how much they use Windows 8 across different devices and input methods. I'm not claiming that it's perfect but then what else has even attempted anything at this level?
I look at major activities that people do with both desktops and tablets. Web browsing with a keyboard and mouse on the desktop in Windows 8, no different in Windows 7. Web browsing in Windows 8 with the Metro browser. Not really any different than an Android tablet or iOS, other than it's generally much faster than a mobile OS device. We can go down the list of common activities on desktops and tablets and the experience within the applications themselves are virtually identical and very analogous to Windows 7 and mobile OS tablets. So many people have looked at the UI but they have seem to forgotten to actually USE apps and programs.
Metro most definitely doesn't consider all input methods. I can hookup a USB keyboard to a mobile phone and type, that doesn't mean it was designed for kb+m.
When you add in the confusion with switching to Metro, the new start screen, settings in 2 places, Metro elements randomly showing up in the desktp for no reason (file types, networks), then yes it has. I never said just desktop apps.
My point was having 2 versions of IE is stupid if they share no data. They are 2 completely different browsers with nothing in common. You failed to address this.
Agreed. But the future is WinRT, and it cannot be used for desktop apps, which is again stupid. There is absolutely no reason why WinRT apps with the new rich API shouldn't be allowed to produce desktop apps, and no reason why Metro apps couldn't run in windowed mode. I've bought this up before and there is no answer. Metro apps on a pc are a huge waste of screen real estate.
In theory, I agree with you - touch and non-touch should be integrated. There's none of that in Windows 8, it just has both. The desktop doesn't take advantage of touch, and Metro doesn't take advantage of kb+m. They're just stacked on top of each other.
heatlesssun
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It's up to the app how well any input method works, keyboard, mouse, touch or even pen. I use Metro apps all the time with keyboards and mice. The well written ones work perfectly with keyboards and mice, indeed a keyboard and mouse even works better in some situations when copying and pasting for instance. Some apps don't work as well with keyboards and mice but that has nothing to do with Metro, it's how the app was designed and written.
There is some overlap in places true, but even on the desktop there's multiple ways of doing some things. The Metro overlays, most people wouldn't even notice them as such. Not saying that things can't be cleaned up but once you see these things it's not exactly a big deal.
This isn't exactly true. In the RTM both the desktop and Metro versions can share Start Screen titles and browser favorites and both browsers can create both objects. The only thing is that the Metro browser cannot stores links in anything but the root Favorite folders. Also history is shared.
This is just the first version of WinRT and at this stage it wasn't meant or designed to replace the desktop. And I have addressed this, it's mostly due to the sandboxing of WinRT. It's a locked and much more secure set of APIs than the desktop. In time I imagine that things will open up but the main thing is security and power consumption in this round, along with of course creating a touch capable UI.
One can write desktop applications that work with touch and keyboards and mice. The Angry Bird games for instance on Windows currently are desktop programs and they actually work just like tablet apps on even a Windows 7 touch capable device. And again, this notion that Metro apps don't work with keyboards and mice. Then I have no idea how I use a lot of them with only keyboards and mice.
I think Windows 8 "just" having both a desktop and touch UI is not a bad start considering everything else has "just" one.
TechLarry
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Wut ?
DeathFromBelow
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Wut indeed, I'm not following heatlesssun's logic at all. I don't see why it would be less successful if they gave users the option to use the best interface for their needs. Metro is great... for tablets.
Apple integrated mobile features into their OS without making the UI less intuitive. Windows 8 feels like two different operating systems crammed together. The start screen takes up the whole screen, yet it's less functional than the start menu. Forcing desktop users to use touch features like the right-click menu popping up at the bottom of the screen in Metro is annoying. I'm also a little ticked about the situation with Media Center. Asking users to pay for a standard feature from Vista and 7 is a little much given that there are free alternatives available.
chinesepiratefood
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Non-touch hasn't been made worse.
heatlesssun
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All Windows 8/RT machines can run Metro apps and with no switch in the box to disable Metro developers have much more confidence that when they target for Metro that means the entire population of Windows 8 devices, not just tablets.
And for the Start Screen to be less functional it does seem to scale very well. I have almost 500 tiles on my desktop Start Screen and navigating through it is a breeze, much faster than going into All programs in Start Menu as there's no way to pin 500 items in the Start Menu, nor things like notifications.
DeathFromBelow
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I mean a couple of things by dysfunctional. They did dumb things like putting the shut-down option in the settings charm, it should be accessible by clicking on your user name in the start screen. Heck, why even bother with the charms menu if you're going to turn the start menu into a full screen menu? Everything should be easily accessible from one location.
I'm not currently running 8, but last I used it there didn't seem to be any way to use folders in the apps section of the start screen. You can pin folders, but they open in explorer. How is scrolling sideways through 500+ apps better than the traditional start menu?
I love my start menu:
Sleek, simple, and start search is still accessible via shift-windows key. Microsoft could have avoided all of this criticism by leaving the start menu in place and making metro accessible via a gesture like, say, dragging the taskbar up across the screen. That sort of interface would work great on tablets without affecting the desktop experience. No funky hidden buttons/charms needed.
Like I said, I think metro works great on tablets, but the current implementation makes it feel like two different operating systems stitched together.
heatlesssun
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It's actually MUCH faster than the Start Menu when dealing with that many items. Plus with Semantic zoom it's easy to go to any point in the list directly without having to scroll through everything.
My perspective is different from most Windows users probably with the Start Menu. If you think the Start Screen sucks with keyboards and mice, well the Start Menu sucks 10 times more on with touch. The Start Screen is a much better balanced UI that works well with keyboards and mice and touch.
I don't disagree with this assessment but at the same time I really have no idea what that impact of this is once you understand that this is the case and adapt to it. It is harder for me to see the impact because I'm some use to using Windows across input methods and form factors and had already adapted to the concept of this UI before it was even launched.
The start screen may be great for sorting through 500 programs, but I personaly don't use the 'all programs' section of the start menu anyway, and I doubt i'm the only one.
Anything that gets regular use is already pinned to the task bar, I only realy use the the start menu for the search box to find occasional use programs and system settings. That and shutdown/restart.
Sure the start screen has a search box but after it bounces my focus around a 24" screen I never have more than two or three results, so there's no advantage to it being full screen. If I want a system setting its not shown by default so I have an extra step to change the filter even with all this afforementioned wasted screen space. If i want additional options, I can of course right click, but instead of the menu appearing where my pointer already is, I have to go all the way to the bottom of the screen.
And if I'd not stuck a shutdown and restart shortcut to the start screen already, those options are now a couple of levels deep in a completely different place.
I've been using on my laptop* for a while now, and most things I've learned to adapt to (and in the case of the speedy start up, come to love) but the start screen's shortcomings continue to grate. If I could just have a little search widget with combined results and a shutdown/restart button i could live with the rest.
*one thing I've mentioned in the past, I acknowledge that a touchpad is a horrible way of using a computer, but with metro its even worse, MS really threw touchpad users under the bus.
Anything that gets regular use is already pinned to the task bar, I only realy use the the start menu for the search box to find occasional use programs and system settings. That and shutdown/restart.
Sure the start screen has a search box but after it bounces my focus around a 24" screen I never have more than two or three results, so there's no advantage to it being full screen. If I want a system setting its not shown by default so I have an extra step to change the filter even with all this afforementioned wasted screen space. If i want additional options, I can of course right click, but instead of the menu appearing where my pointer already is, I have to go all the way to the bottom of the screen.
And if I'd not stuck a shutdown and restart shortcut to the start screen already, those options are now a couple of levels deep in a completely different place.
I've been using on my laptop* for a while now, and most things I've learned to adapt to (and in the case of the speedy start up, come to love) but the start screen's shortcomings continue to grate. If I could just have a little search widget with combined results and a shutdown/restart button i could live with the rest.
*one thing I've mentioned in the past, I acknowledge that a touchpad is a horrible way of using a computer, but with metro its even worse, MS really threw touchpad users under the bus.
chinesepiratefood
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Shutdown/restart takes 1 extra click. That is 1 extra click once every 2 months I restart my computer. I think they should have put the power options when you click your name on the start screen, but it has such little impact I just can't care about it.
I hate the zoom. I have a lot of apps I have a hard time seeing the apps, especially since they don't have the fugly looking metro icons. I end up looking and looking until I find it. It slow compared to start menu.
I despise the search taking up my whole damn screen as well. I use it a lot to do compares its just a pain in the ass.
Why is it they could create such a hideous start menu but can't add search or run to the taskbar?
heatlesssun
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With good arrangement, grouping and naming the titles are easy to spot out zoomed in and it works great with a horizontal wheel. In any case, the Start Screen I believe is a much better way to setup hundreds of arbitrary items overall than the Start Menu.
I have no problem with the start menu arranging my icons. Its alphabetical and no giant ass icons.
ShadowVlican
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i don't know how to efficiently multitask in metro mode
at least in desktop mode, i can always see what apps are running and whether they're flashing for my attention... with metro mode, there's none of that
not to mention there's a discontinuity with desktop programs and metro apps, hard to multitask between the two
at least in desktop mode, i can always see what apps are running and whether they're flashing for my attention... with metro mode, there's none of that
not to mention there's a discontinuity with desktop programs and metro apps, hard to multitask between the two
You're not supposed to multitask in ModernUI, because according to MS's telemetry most people only run 1 app at a time, so they designed Win 8 for that case. There's a side mode as some sort of concession but it's nowhere as useful or easy to use as a simple overlapping window everyone in the world knows how to use.
It's pretty easy actually. Drag your finger in from the left to "drag in" the last app or thing you were doing (desktop included). Drag in just a little then pop it back to open a column down the left side that shows all your open apps or things whatever you call them. You'll see a thumbnail so it's easy to spot them generally. If something happens in the background that needs your attention, it should pop in a little notification at the top right. You can click the X on it or just whip it off the screen with your finger (to the right). It's actually quite fluid and fast.
In terms of continuity, the general idea is that you'll spend more time in Metro when roaming with your touch tablet device, then stay in desktop mode when you're docked or sitting for a long period of time. You don't really need to hop between the two unless you want to for some reason. To me its perfect, but then again I have a fully functional x86 tablet I use for work and leisure, and the two are generally kept seperate. Acer W500 I picked up for $280 on craigslist.
Made a short video for kicks, sorry it's bad I'm a low effort kind of guy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yrqu5T-o5j8
Why would you want to do complex multi-tasking while idling on your couch or roaming around? That's better left for when you're on the desktop sitting down for serious work.
TechLarry
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That's because Microsoft has turned your big, expensive, high powered desktop into a fucking PHONE.
Nope.
heatlesssun
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Everyone is comfortable with overlapping windows? I've read all of the Windows 8 blogs and that's not what Microsoft said on the subject. People tend to USE 1 app at a time full screen and switch between them, a workflow that Metro supports fine.
It's kind of interesting how many Windows 8 opponents are always saying that a desktop and tablet are two separate things yet want an API that was explicating targeted for tablets and mobile to work just like a desktop.
You've made multiple references about WinRT not being on the desktop and yes marketing and things of that nature involved but there are also some very deep differences in the way things work with WinRT vs desktop APIs.
I'm currently studying the title and toast notification APIs. In a traditional desktop programming model if you needed to update a tile and were attempting to do it locally, one would create a long running background process that would constantly update a tile or send out notifications. It simply doesn't work at all that way in the WinRT world. WinRT is a mobile device API, there are MANY restrictions and limitations on background processing and one does not simply create a local background process to update a tile without a good of thought.
I agree that merging the desktop and WinRT models would be nice but that's going to take time because once you start incorporating the WinRT API into dektop APIs there's a lot of other considerations that you have deal with that desktop developers have very little experience with.
heatlesssun
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Sweet, I didn't no phones could run Visual Studio, Eclipse, Office and play PC games fully maxed out.
If one thing is going hurt Windows 8 it's going to be nonsensical hype and people that don't have a clue what they are talking about.
bigdogchris
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I totally agree about the Start Menu and touch, but your prerogative is that there has to be a unified UI for both touch and KB&M devices. Apple, Google, myself and many others disagree with Microsoft on that. Apple successfully opened an App store on both desktop and tablet without having the completely redesign how OSX works and Microsoft could too.
heatlesssun
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It's not that they disagree as much as Apple and Google don't have marketing leading desktop OSes. Google has pretty much zero desktop share and OS X is now eclipsed by iOS by far. I guarantee if Apple or Google had a dominate desktop OS that it would be retrofitting it for tablets and touch.
I guess fucking phones are productive as Hell, then, because my large, desktop shaped phone gets a lot done.
In terms of what Windows 9 will be like, and I'm guessing that it'll be more Metro based, less desktop, but if that's the case, then I hope they enable multitasking for the next "desktop", because on my desktop, I use origin, steam and live messenger to chat while surfing the net and listening to music. That's 5 simultaneous programs, sorry, "apps"....I just hope they don't kill off the desktop mode in future versions.
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