Win9 - will MS understand what is needed?

Back in the day I tested some OS stuff for Apple.
The criteria was:
1) speed of use (same as ease of use)
2) learning curve
3) robustness (how often you made mistakes)
4) completeness (can you do what you want)
and some other stuff that did not matter so much.

Microsoft wants to replace XP once and for all with 9.
Will it be faster, easier to learn, have a clearer UI and let us do more than ever? Ever since the ribbon interface I have come to the conclusion MS does not rate their UI by what used to be the holy grail points listed above.

Am I alone or do you all think like I do that there will be a lot of window dressing (pun intended) and precious little improvement?

 

Windows 8.1 Update 1 is pretty close to acceptable.

There have actually been many improvements since XP.

 

I will argue, with everyone, that 7 is the next XP and 8 is the worst update since gd vista.

Anything that makes a pc like a tablet needs to die. If i wanted a tablet id buy one.

If i wanted a console, id buy another.

I want to build a pc and have an OS that i can understand, doesnt kill resources, and makes sense.

As of now, thats XP or 7. Im sure 9 will be another cluster F . we MIGHT get something better at 10, since thats MS track record. heh

a great build, 2 builds that make you want to tear your hair out and kill ppl, then a good one or a great one.....then something to tear your hair out over.

lol

 

I am with you Laura, I like new. I have learned every OS I can all the way back to NEXT and GEOS.

But day in and day out for my work I know any time spent learning and using the OS is a waste, I have to be using programs make money. I want my workers to make money.

MS used to argue against a GUI because it was "slower and less productive". At the time they had a point but computers got faster and mouse/keyboard was proven better. I use 7, but there are some things that are not as good as XP and I hope Microsoft listens to logic and makes 9 the best ever. 8 has a fun user interface, but I am MUCH slower with it even after a long time learning its ins and outs.

 

What things in 7 are a downgrade from XP?

 

I just dont support an os "upgrade" every few years because someone thinks its what the public wants, when in reality, the majority wants most things to stay the same, esp if it costs you more.


and really, most upgrades have been a money grab and justifying why they have jobs.

the majority of the public LIKE what they had because it was intuitive and worked. ( win xp and 7 over **** like ME or VISTA and if you liked them, then you really just go with the flow i guess)


change for changes sake is bs.

 

I'd take Vista with the latest patches over anything I've seen on Win8.

 

Curb the language a bit please

That said, most upgrades for any OS have been that way. Heck, computer hardware for years has been too. It is not a Microsoft disease.

OS X Tiger was back in 2005, and Mavericks isn't a huge departure from it in 2013-14.

 

will do! must have been off last night, i try not to be "that guy" usually lol

 

I did not have the funds for XP, and so I installed and used Linux for many years. Due to economics, I went to the world of Win7 2 years ago. I liked it and enjoyed the stability. Some few weeks ago, I suffered a HD failure. I cannot find my Win 7 disk.... so I tried Linux again. What a disaster of a touchscreen on desktop Unity is. Video driver failure brought me to a dead stop, and none of the commands I remember work anymore. The worst issue is that the help forums did not respond to requests for help.

It is not all about users being inflexible. Some change is difficult to embrace.

The first $100 I earn extra will to NewEgg for Win 7 or 8.

(this was not intended to be the start of a flamewar either!)

 

Laura is right, touch is where we are headed. So sad we have to crawl along this path.
I will change when and if they get it figured out. But remember keyboard and mouse are touch and have decades of development.
Progress could be made in voice but it seems all we get are voice commands to do touch commands. How about tracking my retina for screen position to find a file and let me think "open with Excel". Have Excel understand "add function to A5 to B7 relative equals sum of cell above it plus 5%" (or some phase like that)" when I speak.
Gestures may be the way to go, but I don't see that answer in any way shape or form except in gaming.
The lack of imagination and progress with touch annoys me. We have had a lot of iterations with touch. Time to move on, but as I asked in OP - Will MS get it?

As for XP, which I still use on occasion, it was the last OS IMHO to not blame the user. UAC makes the user choose many things the average person has no knowledge of or interest in. Searching Google all I see is pro-Win7 sites. How soon we forget the things that were better in XP.

 

The Vista debacle would have been okay, if the OEM people would have got their drivers set. Vista introduced a new driver capability, and most ignored this. So, it got bad reviews.

Ram issues also, they (OEM) didn't expect the usage of ram, so they just based it on an average of what XP used.

Fun part is that they (OEM) were given this info before us. But alas, old news.

I'm expecting the same with windows 9. It will be similar to 8 (Vista). Will 9 be the new 7?

On a side note.....Come on....Windows 8 doesn't use COM ports for GPS devices anymore?!?!?!

 

I was thinking I would not reply to the "what is better in XP" but why not?
The main argument is that for many people Win7 does so many things they don't want and they have to pay for the downgrade in performance.

http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/going-back-to-xp-still-faster-than-win7-lol.181850/
is still true, and most cannot tell DX9 from DX11 rendering - XP win

http://www.zdnet.com/dont-kill-my-windows-xp-7000005788/
Mainly he says:
There is no compelling reason to upgrade.
Security would push you to a Mac or Linux solution if you were really worried.
I did like the quote "an older PC needs Win8 like a fish needs a bicycle". LOL - XP win

http://hackadelic.com/is-windows-xp-better-than-windows-7-a-user’s-perspective
This is what I often run into. Download TinyXP (legal for study?), study the services and hit up Black Viper. Not too bad setting up a minimal system that adds a ton of speed to XP. Win7 is no where near as easy to pare down to essentials. - XP win

http://www.quepublishing.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1411503
is supposed to be a list of why 7 is better. Notice not one of these improve program performance and many slow down the user while in the OS. - Tie, depends on what you want.

I run and recommend Win7, but mostly for support reasons. XP seems simpler and more user friendly. XP has less icon/picture, and more actual information.

Now more than ever I want to know 100% what my PC is doing. Win7 made that harder, Win8 makes knowing 100% almost impossible. Hidden processes, processes with arcane names and tying the OS to the BIOS? No thanks. Hit Ctrl-Alt-Del now and look at your processes. I could go down the list in XP and know each one. Years of Win7 and I still see things I am not sure of.

My prediction is that MS will not get it with 9. Win9 will be harder to understand, slower to use (at least at first) and do nothing more useful than XP did for most people.

BTW, I did beta test 7 and of my many suggestions to make it simpler and with more information none were implemented.

 

A little OT, but wasn't MS talking about gloom and doom for XP users when they stopped supporting it? Did my weekly virus scans and spyware scans, nothing...

Also, what is the fascination with touch screens for a PC? I totally get it for a tablet or phone. The way my PC is set up, I would have to lean forward to touch the screen. Small touch screens on laptops are nice, if you don't have room for a mouse. But I will take a mouse over a touchpad any time.

Say in a program like PhotoShop, I don't see how touch would work editing a picture. I know a lot of people use stuff like the WAACOM pen instead of a mouse, but that is still not touch screen.

I am in no way against the touch technology, just don't see the point or improvement on a PC.

 

"I am in no way against the touch technology"
I guess I officially am. I am already tired of cleaning my iPhone screen and no way I want to clean 30" of monitor daily. Why pay for 4K resolution then put finger prints all over it?
XP support may be gone for most users, it remains to be seen how much trouble that will be. China just decided to do their own updates....

 

I don't think anyone was expecting an overnight meltdown Its coming though.



As for the comments of XP being better than future OSes, I can tell who the tech savvy ones are not now That is a home user/ joe user observation.

 

No way dude. Win XP is waayy more better than Windows 12.:-D:-D

 

Tech savvy ones know when new is better and when new is just different.

LOL, if you refer me to as home user view. When you plug into the outlet for power my old tech hardware and software will always be there for you. Longevity and stability is what I want here. Hence we have almost 30 years of QNX with a few upgrades along the way. No change in UI unless you consider machinery changes. Our software is more stable than our hardware and quite likely will never have a worm or virus. Unfortunately we are slowly losing to the Windows onslaught and will be more vulnerable for it. Our installs require a local dongle to be inserted for ANY software changes. We can run a program off the USB or network, but it is not allowed to change anything locally, not even write to the HDD. It does require me to personally attend each station for changes, but there are very few changes so it works fine. No anti-virus needed, updates of the OS are quarterly, and all the works gets done. Maybe this is tech savvy where the OS does not intrude on user productivity?

 

Here we go again with security by obscurity rolleyes

 

We are on opposite sides by definition.
I want security by all means, you want ease of administration.
Each has its place.

 

Ease of administration is irrelevant. I want real security, not security by obscurity. Not being under constant attack doesn't mean you are secure. Apple learned that the hard way not long ago, and will again. So has the OSS world, and ech time they were MAJOR flaws that went undetected for years.. Microsoft is a grizzled veteran when it comes to security, because they were tried by fire.

Its funny that you say I want ease of administration, when you act like Windows 8 is hard to use

 

Your security is an illusion. Windows is a remotely administered system and therefor vulnerable. Simple and true.
Your reference about Win8 eludes me. I mean you want to be able to update 50,000 computers in a day. The only way to do that is remotely. I want to update one computer a week and want it will be difficult. Which will be more secure?

Wait, the Win 8 comment - I don't think Win 8 is hard to use, just slower.

 

Your security is a delusion. Security by obscurity is the true illusion.

PS--I can't have an illusion of security when I never claimed Microsoft to be more secure. I am just saying, quite factually, that neither are other OSes. Lets see them survive a true Microsoft-sized onslaught. There would be much crying and gnashing of teeth.

 

LOL, get outside the box.
My systems are secure because they have almost no access. This will not work for what you do. They are not obscure they are hidden and locked down. They will never see a Microsoft-sized onslaught. Consider the ship weathering a mighty storm and the submarine under it that does not even know the storm is there. They are more secure because they need not fend off the attacks, although they would probably do MUCH better than Microsoft products.

http://www.qnx.com/developers/qnx4/qnx4kb/solution.html?code=834

read it carefully, no anti-virus has ever been written for QNX because none has ever been needed nor will the need arise. This situation is not yours.

 

Bro, you don't even know what my situation is, so why do you claim that you do? Its funny though, a lot of what you say about QNX was said about OS X. Too bad it was proven wrong.

If QNX ever sees true popularity like Windows (it won't), then we can revisit this conversation.

PS--A Windows machine that has no access to it is just as secure as a QNX machine with no access to it.

 

Hmm, your situation is defined by your opinions? And those you post here.
Agreed on the no-access; limited access however is required or the hardware useless. That is where QNX shines, no amount of abuse by the user will hurt the system. There simply is no way in to make changes. This has been tried as naseum and never achieved.

QNX is far to expensive to be popular.

I think we agree security has many facets and no reasonable way to achieve 100%.

Back on topic, I hope Win9 has well defined, easy to understand processes with no way to hide files. Yeah, I know, keep dreaming.

 

Replying to an old thread rather than starting new..

http://www.guru3d.com/news_story/windows_threshold_microsofts_plan_to_win_over_windows_7_users.html

From what I see Microsoft is still trying to lead in a vacuum and hope others will follow. Win8 was someone's bright idea, but it was not fully tested for popularity before it was released. At least they are listening with 8.1.
I will bet Win 9 has the same problems Win 7 has like folders popping open in the explorer side panel when you don't expect it, poor scrolling in explorer. They need to review their XP code.

 

I've NEVER had any of those problems in 7, and nobody I know has either.

8 doesn't have that issue, so why would 9?

 

8.1 Update 1 is pretty dang decent. Each iteration has improved on a new UI. Now there is talk of 9? turning off Metro by default for desktops. However, you can still enable it.

This is precisely what Apple did over the years. They slowly introduced iOS components into their desktop OS.

Microsoft doesn't have the luxury of doing it slowly over the years. If they did, they would be left behind and irrelevant as the computing landscape changes.

 

I also agree 8.1 is pretty nice.

To see what I am talking about with the sidebar folder popping open:
1) open any folder in explorer
2) drag a file from the main window to the side bar
3) hesitate to double check where you are dropping the file and the folder will open to a sub folder and the folder you want moves to the top of the screen in the sidebar

Pro users will never see this as they will drop the file quickly. I work with engineers, they are cautious and work with computers maybe an hour a day. They often lose files this way. They drag from the main window to the side bar where they want to drop a file and the folder pops open so they drop it in the wrong place. Why the side bar moves the folder you are hovering over to the top is beyond me.

http://www.sevenforums.com/
Is where I suggested this was a problem. They had a Microsoft monitored input thread and I put my 2 cents in there. Setting the time to expand would be best, but at the very least let me turn it off.

 

Microsoft rarely monitors third party forums for stuff like that. It was probably one employee that wasn't in a position to do anything about it anyway.

You should have sent it directly to MS.

I couldn't reproduce your issue, in 7 or 8.

I opened a folder. Clicked and held on a file (or folder, though you specified file). I then moved it to the sidebar and held it there for a while. Nothing happened. I moved it to different places. Nothing happened, other than being offered to move it or create a link in <insert favorite>. I tried dropping it in invalid areas, I tried sloppily dragging it into yonder and letting go.

Nothing happened like what you described.

 

Not sure why you could not reproduce the effect.
http://merill.net/2009/04/show-folder-tree-in-windows-7-explorer/
is an old comment showing that I am not alone.

You are probably right the guy soliciting suggestions did not have the horsepower to make any changes. But at the time this was a pretty well known issue.

http://social.technet.microsoft.com...s-going-to-the-wrong-location?forum=w7itproui

I don't have an 8.1 install handy, could someone check its behavior?
BTW this behavior is from Vista on, XP did not do this.

 

I'm not following. Am I supposed to enable that option to reproduce your bug?

All I see is that subfolders will expand in the tree. That makes sense to me and doesn't sound like a bug. That is the whole purpose of a tree structure.

 

Yes, folders expand in the tree.
And when they expand the folder you are hovering over moves to the top so you are hovering over a different folder. Therein lies the problem. The folder you hover over should expand down, not move to the top.
Folder options do not matter.

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/5x5ovcv9pzj02a0/hm.avi

I guess we have differing opinions on how it should work. This makes sense to me.

It opened down for me fine with the exception of the very first item, because it was a library, not a folder.

 

Thanks for the video link, well done!
In the middle of the video you saw the problem, but the folder did not move much because there were not many sub folders. I think you will agree when you are dealing with a LOT of sub folders. Having the intended folder move to the top is not expected.
I have yet to find anyone that uses windows explorer this way that thinks the folder to the top is the right response. But I have found many that have never encountered it or just intuitively work around it.

 

I was actually just moving it around really fast during the middle. I didn't actually find the problem. If you want, I can do a longer, more deliberate one.

 

Your video shows the problem clearly, notice when you hover over documents the folder opens and moves out from under the file you want to drop. If you dropped at that time you have mis placed your file.
The file you hover over should not move. It should expand down.

 

But its not a bug, its how MS designed it. From a developer standpoint, I understand why. They chose the lesser of two evils.

Small trees open top down, as you would expect. Extremely large trees open from the middle and expand up and down. As you get closer to the bottom, the bias towards opening up increases. The reason for this makes sense; it is less of a problem to open from the middle and need to slightly adjust than it is to open a huge tree downwards requiring multiple user actions to use it: hovering, click+hold, scrolling, then releasing. This is bad. Opening from the middle is bad too, but not as bad: click+ hold, hover, adjust to the right folder that is on the screen.

It makes sense to me. As an end user, your mileage may vary as to whether you like it or not. I would accept this as a bug if the hover tooltip pointed to the wrong folder upon opening, but it does not. MS is not fixing this because this is how they envisioned it.

 

Glad you explained the programming aspect.
This is considered a bug by many because it causes mistakes by the user.

IMHO dropping the file in the wrong place is really bad, scrolling on folders with many sub folders is only occasionally troublesome. I would choose occasionally troublesome over really bad regardless of programming philosophy.

Why not give us a choice?

 

I honestly feel that scrolling would increase the margin of error.

They should offer a choice. Heck, Apple should give us many choices I don't have.

Thats the price we pay for using someone else's software: we are at their mercy.

Remember, too many choices lowers user friendliness.

 

"I honestly feel that scrolling would increase the margin of error."
NP with that opinion, but before Vista this never came up. Hovering over a folder does not move the folder when it pops open in any other OS.

LOL, good thing I am sorting files this morning and have tons of time while they transfer.

 

I know, this is an old thread. But this morning's comments in DailyTech has a pretty good list of what Win8 broke. Win9 is coming, hopefully faster and easier to understand than Win 8 or 7 but I fear it will go like Office and be yet another downgrade from the usability standpoint. I will be testing it soon, but MS knows I am not a fanboy-yesman so they tend to ignore my suggestions.

http://www.dailytech.com/Report+Windows+9+Threshold+Tech+Preview+Coming+Next+Month/article36404.htm

 

Admittedly, I ended up skimming because a lot of it was petty fighting, but can you highlight what they "broke"?

 

How broken these are is subject to opinion, and many can be changed with tweaks. But that is not the idea, a new OS should improve the user experience out of the box. Many of these are trivial but a host of trivial decisions can sway the experience and productivity.
I am speaking from the viewpoint of supporting a pool of standard users who have to do most upgrades on their own. I am the closest to IT we get and I have other things to do.
1) Aero, things are flat in Win8 making what you need or want not stand out. The clock has equal status to your most used program. Much of the theme customization is gone. The most common comment I hear is "looks like my desktop was run over by a steam roller".
2) Login, using your Microsoft ID to log in is asking to have it taken and it fails if you don't have your internet connected. It's not that frequent, but it can fail if your cached credentials get wiped (an update can do this). Worst case is your computer updates the network drivers as part of an update which wipes the cache, and it needs you to login to complete updating the drivers. You can't login without the network working again. You can't get the network working again without logging in. Catch-22. Sneakernet to the rescue to install the new drivers! But only if you have made a local account.
3) Safe Mode, F8 is disabled by default
4) Task Manager in 8 is a little better, but XP had the right idea, plenty of power and did not fill the screen on start up.
5) Call "Computer" anything, but MS needs to stop changing (This Computer, My Computer, This PC, etc).
6) Control Panel options have moved - again
7) Apps, Charms, Gadgets and whatever else they want to call programs leads to an endless discussion in symantecs. To the common user they are all the same.
8) More clicking. Count the clicks to reboot and shut down as examples.

I will stop here, but a quick Google search will reveal many more problems that Win 8 should never have had. Such a great base OS destroyed by its UI.