Windows 9 Beta Testing

1. I have been using Windows 8 since it came out as well as beta tested it beforehand.  It has a lot of positives like faster start-ups and shut-downs, better security, etc. 
2. The main gripe always seems to center around the lack of the old start menu -
3. there are a few free third party ones that work fine (I am currently using one). 
4. I have not used it on a phone - preferring android (switched from iPhone and will never go back) but I can see the plus of using the same system on each device.

1. Vague insistence that win 8 has positives. Not that anyone disagrees with 'some' of the Win 8 (& 8.1) enhancements that are referred above as 'positives'.
2. Strawman argument that minimizes and obfuscates all of the complaints regarding Win 8 and derivatives; with a demeaning implication towards users that complain.
3. Great! Buy an Operating system and then get third party programs just to make the dang thing partially usable. Most of the quality third party utilities are not truly free. Got any other free advice that isn't worth the price?
4. Ah yes, 'the future'; suffer gladly the faults of the present so that the future will be brighter. Don't forget the fact that users pay good money for this present pain so that Microsoft can realize they goofed, big time!

Win 8 and Win 8.1 are just plain terrible in many respects, not just the 'start menu'. The whole 'app' center concept of running windows is a massive misunderstanding of the 'current' host of windows users with their trusty machines and mice.

Don't have a touch screen? Tough! Get over it and buy a touchscreen.

Your main programs don't have convenient 'apps', try searching, oh there is a 'third party' app and it only costs $5.99; download and find out it hasn't been updated to run 'the latest' release.

Not forgetting the dozen or so programs that do not have any apps.

Hunt through the disk until one finds the correct start program icon and then post it as a desktop shortcut so we don't have to find the dang thing every time. Only to discover when we click the shortcut that Win 8 does not support the old (win 7 and earlier) program configuration files. Again back through the process to post the executable's shortcut and deal with setting location and support files every time we run the program.

Then deep into using the program or any program for that matter and right in the middle of a keystroke the screen flashes back to app view. When one's eyes are focused on the material and typing it is incredibly irritating to find half of the letters went into the ether because the screen switched.

The program director who managed Win 8 and 8.1 should be canned. Or as they do in the justice service, canned 'with prejudice' meaning never again.

Every time one of Microsoft's type A manager dinosaurs oversees a project that project is destined for disaster. Every time we users are burned badly we start checking out the competition; not necessarily Apple, but Linux and Ubuntu too. What should really worry Microsoft is that those competitors are looking darned good.

Yes...I had trouble with 8, but I upgraded to 8.1 and I was able to make myself at home.  I had to watch a couple of Scott Hanselman's videos to get past an intuitive block I had though.

If you move the mouse to the lower left corner of the screen, a square Window button is displayed that lets you switch between desktop and the metro interface.  You have to run "Desktop" as an application first.  But basically, the metro part of the interface becomes a large Start menu then.  I actually liked it once I figured that out.  And also you can right click that little Start button and get access to a lot of things that were hard to find in the metro interface like control panel....and they even brought the Run dialog back!  Yes!  But the metro interface needs a little work.  The down arrow to see all programs...at first I didn't really notice it, and it is positioned oddly...maybe because the edges of the screen have functions.

I like the left edge showing running programs.  It is interesting.  I like the new task manager.  I like the speed.

The Charm bar is interesting conceptually, but it is a pain to get to with the mouse.  The features of the Charm bar are incomplete.  Also, why are options that only work with Apps shown in the charm bar when no apps are even running let alone have the focus.

After learning that stuff, the remaining problems with Windows 8 are basically that nobody tested with a mouse when designing it.  I have a laptop that came with win8 and it is NOT touch screen.  Honestly, I don't really like when things swipe to the right to get more content...like the metro interface and the new azure mgmt. portal.  I wish there could be an alternate mechanism if everything doesn't fit on one screen.

So they tried to force us into this new paradigm, but it wasn't ready and people weren't ready...and in actuality, Desktop and Device OS can be similar but there are tiny things that show which platform it was designed for.  It is like playing a game that was designed for X-Box, but not properly ported to PC.  

But overall, it isn't as bad as I thought.  At least I'm not angry any more when I use my laptop...but I too am looking forward to the Win9 beta.

On Sun, 14 Sep 2014 01:46:10 +0000, frodoboy wrote:

I told one of the beta test techs what I thought of Windows 8 and not everyone is going to have a touch screen so they better have a way to switch it back to a Windows 7 GUI. He told me how to get something similar but it wasn't even close!

Let me point out something that you perhaps don't realize: Windows 8
has two interfaces; the Modern/Metro Interface (which may be all
you've looked at) and the traditional Desktop Interface. You can use
either one or both.
That traditional  Desktop Interface is almost identical to Windows 7's
interface; the biggest difference is that there is no Start Orb to
click to bring up the Start menu. But note that you can get the Start
Orb back by using one of several third-party programs, either free or
very inexpensive (Classic Shell at
http://classicshell.sourceforge.net/ and Start8 at
http://www.stardock.com/products/start8/; my personal preference is
Start8, but they are both very good). 
And going from one interface to  the other is very easy; there are
several ways, but simply pressing the Windows key is perhaps the
easiest.
I use Windows 8, almost exclusively with the traditional desktop
interface, and with Start 8 installed. If you were to look at and use
my computer, you would have a hard time realizing that it's not
Windows 7.
I also recommend that you read "How to Make Windows 8 or 8.1 Look and
Feel Like Windows 7" at http://www.howtogeek.com/elk/298/45121/4206