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For instance - I read a PDF file, and it fills my 24 inch monitor with 1 file. I really only need it to fill about a third of my screen so I can see the pdf while I create the Word file I am working on. I also want several browser windows, a power point window, and an excel window, all in WINDOWS, not in full screen. I NEVER do anything in fullscreen since it is so limiting.
Start with something simple - like PDF reader? How do I make it NOT be full screen, since I NEVER want it to be fullscreen?
Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.
Windows 8 has a built-in MS PDF reader, which always defaults to fullscreen, and cannot be changed. The "issue" here comes from the MS implementation of the Windows 8 Tiled apps.
Download an external app, like Adobe Reader, and open the PDF with that app, and you can open the PDF in a window just fine.
I agree, the normal desktop mode is just fine as before. It makes me wonder why they even forced the apps onto a desktop when normal windows have a superior counterparts to all the apps already.
I find that the tile UI is kinda bad. I do use the apps sometime (I just realized that you can split the screen so you can have desktop on most of the screen, and App screen on a small portion--while in an app, move your mouse to the very top of the screen, then left corner, then right click).
Otherwise, I find the implementation of apps extremely jarring on PC, where everything is simply better in the desktop mode.
Why on earth would they impose such **** without choice upon us?
They haven't! Just boot into the desktop and carry on as you always did. Windows 8.1 desktop is hardly different to Windows 7's Hits galore on Google and Bing telling you how to boot 8.1 into desktop mode - never see the 'modern' interface again.
I don't believe I should have to pay extra for what has always, until now, a normal part of Windows.
It still is - don't use 'Modern UI' mode, boot to the standard Windows desktop and use Windows just like you did with Vista and Windows 7!
It has indeed lost the plot.
MS has a Plug'n play feature. It should be quite capable of detecting if the device is a mobile phone, an IPad or a laptop and if it has a touch screen or not. It should then configure itself accordingly.
Clearly 8.1 was designed for mobile devices and to exploit (for financial gain) the APPS which seem all to depend on internet access and the opportunity for targeted adverstising and more.
It is as if they then decided that the only way to cover the costs if it didn't go down as well with phones etc as they hoped was to foist it on laptop and desk top users whether they wanted it or not.
Had it been designed from the outset for all users I would have hoped they would have been smart enough to figure out the different needs.
I also get the feeling that the launch deadline came around sooner than they would have liked. WE are used to seeing software launched with some bugs and we have come to expect some. But it seems MS has decided that they can launch at any stage of development and "fix it" on the fly once its out there. In this case I would suspect its features were not properly considered and as often as not, more buggy than ever before.
Very disappointing and worse, it shows ever decreasing respect for the consumer.
