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Comment by heyitsnick | Hacker News Reader

My big question watching this webcast (and reading reviews of windows 8 online is), how does it all work when you step outside the ecosystem? I want to keep using chrome, not IE; dropbox not skydrive, gtalk not skype. VLC and a third-party media player, not the baked in tools.

Will these applications integrate well and can i switch off the defaults? For example, bookmarks on the homescreen, easily accessible play/pause controls etc. Or will i feel like i'm wrestling with the OS because i'm not using the Microsoft tools?

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Just like Windows always has, and then some. Chrome's already got a Metro-friendly build (though the UI is still identical to the desktop); and Dropbox et. al. can hook in via "Contracts" (similar to Android Intents) to other apps and Windows itself.

Its not quite identical, if you launch it via the desktop its the same but if you launch it via the "metro" launcher its more like a Chromebook.

Different styling, but same overall UI. No modifications I'm aware of for touch use or "Metro" restyling has been done so far (and I doubt they're concerned until x86 tablets ship in significant number or if/when Microsoft gives way on alt browsers for WinRT)

Another thing to note: For some reason, Chrome uses a different user profile between the Metro and Desktop environments.

Not any more, they've gotten rid of that ( since M23, IIRC)

I downloaded it today on W8 and it still did separate profiles. This is the release version from www.google.com/chrome.

Since I have the preview on a VM, I figured I'd look into this for you. An installation of Chrome gives you a desktop and a metro version. Chrome doesn't give you the option of pinning a page to the Start screen. You can still use the Win8's Share feature to send a link via the People hub or Mail. The People hub lets me send via Facebook or Twitter. Mail works as you'd expect. Pages that were previously pinned with IE remain pinned after you change your default browser to Chrome, but you can only have one Metro browser, it seems. The pinned pages open in Desktop IE after that change.

I won't know until tomorrow (Friday) about Skype as that is when they release it for Windows 8. Other tools likely will require some effort on the part of the developers to support the native features. You're a good a judge as me as to whether open-source apps will make that effort.

Anything else I can look into for you?

Thanks, I appreciate your and everyone else's responses; i think i'll take the plunge tomorrow.

The huge number of hooks that Windows provides to third party developers is both its blessing and its curse. I highly recommend Raymond Chen's blog for a (often hilarious) description of this world.

AFAIK, Windows 8 takes interoperability further with new features like intents, while still offering the full Win32 API (on x86 builds).

Play / pause controls are a good example. Applications have been able to integrate via global hotkeys since.. Vista? Maybe XP. Either way, I am still able to control Spotify on my Win8 laptop using the hardware controls. As I would be able to with any application that chose to implement support.

Windows continues to be the only OS to provide this kind of deep out of the box support on a broad range of hardware from multiple suppliers.

Edit: grammar

I wonder if Apple and Microsoft will get that at some point, i bet on Google not because they are superior in every way but i can trust them not locking me out when i change the ecosystem.

In fairness, if the parent was referring to online services you are absolutely correct - Google are streets ahead with their data liberation work. Microsoft and Apple are worryingly closed in that area.

I use DropBox, Chrome, GTalk, VLC and it all works fine so far.

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