Windows 8 on a laptop: first look | Hacker News Reader

Windows 8 on a laptop: first look

pcpro.co.uk

35 pointsrevorad16 comments

First comment on this story is "'press the Windows key and start typing the name' Who on earth does that? I don’t want to TYPE anything. I want to point and click as much as possible! Even on a PC"

Which I think precisely differentiates the user model here on HN and the general public.

I remain a mouse user except where I absolutely have to type things. I do recognize that this differentiates me from many if not most HN users :P.

I get the impression he's talking from a power user perspective.

Sometimes I can't think of the name of an app I use infrequently and I scan the start menu looking for a name that jogs my memory.

So will I now have to Google what the app does in order to find the name so I can start the program?

Or you're on someone elses machine and you want to see what apps are installed?

If you activate the Search Charm from the new Start page you are presented with an alphabetical listing of all installed application (Metro and Desktop).

I think search is very different from browsing. Browsing is appropriate at different times than search. Some people (independently of whether they are power users or not) like browsing more than search or search more than browsing.

There are many cases in which it makes sense to support those two modes†.

I launch all my apps using Spotlight but I hardly ever search for music in iTunes. In my music library I rely (nearly) solely on browsing, using search doesn’t do anything for me. (Maybe that’s because I have a very limited number of apps and I know all their names but I have so many more songs and I often don’t even know the title I want to play, just the general direction I want to go?)

—

† And some in which it doesn’t really, e.g. web search.

Having used Windows 8 for the past day or so, I'm definitely warming up to the Start menu being replaced by the Start Metro screen. It feels very similar to Ubuntu's Unity launcher. That said, for the times that I know I'm only going to be quickly launching an app by typing the first few letters of its name, I wish they had an optional "mini" panel for it, possibly with its own keybind. Dock it onto the left side of the screen, or make it a front-and-center popup like Alfred/Gnome-Do/Quicksilver/Launchy.

can I add Synapse (for Ubuntu) to the list ? Written in Vala, faster than Gnome-do and primarily developed for the ElementaryOS project.

If MS continues with their ideas for Windows 8, then Windows 7 will be the last OS I own from them. I really do not understand the rational for wanting to make desktop PCs look and act like tablets. I really don't want full screen apps on my 24" monitor. And that start screen looks like it was written for 5 year olds.

It's funny that you say that because as a programmer I feel the same way.

On the other hand, my girlfriend is not as tech savvy and, for the first time, has been stolen away from the clutches of her Apple products to play with Windows 8.

The simplicity and intuitiveness have really opened the doors for the real consumer market on this one (remember, we aren't the target market).

> And that start screen looks like it was written for 5 year olds.

That's how the average user IS. That's what Apple has shown us with the phenomenal success of their iPhone, iPad products. It's the "Don't make me think" philosophy taken to an extreme.

I'm guessing that you are probably like me, a command line aficionado. They call it "simplification" of the user interface, but we feel that there's an element of idioticization there, too! :-) I mean, how do they get things done when there's no place to TYPE?! It's scary to have no place to type. :-)

This first Windows 8 development release is really to get people working on Metro apps. It's tablet-centric and desktop and laptop use (without a touch screen) is a very clear afterthought. There will be major changes to the way this all works over the coming months. There have to be for Windows 8 to be a viable desktop OS.

That review jives with my own experience. I sincerely hope that they make the metro "Start" optional before the final build.

Also, you can move past the lock screen by hitting enter or by hitting control (in case you habitually use ctrl-alt-del).

Space bar also works.

Here's a Registry hack to get it back: http://www.geek.com/articles/geek-pick/how-to-get-a-windows-...

UI looks inconsistent, but I see a lot there to be excited about. If they are taking cues from the phone OS, then that's a very good thing IMO. I've always felt that was one of the nicer mobile UI's.

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