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Comment by LoneWolf | Hacker News Reader

"Manual window management is awful. Windows 8 ditched windows in favor of fullscreen apps. Traditional desktop window paradigms are powerful but obsolete."

Just NO NO AND NO, I can't be the only one who hates the new Windows interface, I want to be able to place my windows where I want them not be forced to use full screen for everything, or rely on some automated way to place them, I know better than the OS how and where I want my windows.

Sorry but I had to get that out of my chest, I can't deal with the new Windows interface, it annoys me.

Microsoft please stop trying to force a tablet/touch interface into a desktop computer it just doesn't make any sense.

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> Just NO NO AND NO, I can't be the only one who hates the new Windows interface, I want to be able to place my windows where I want them not be forced to use full screen for everything, or rely on some automated way to place them

Personally I find manual window-management extremely tedious. I want a window-manager to actually manage my windows for me. So on that part, I agree with the statement. That however doesn't mean that any automatic window-management is an improvement simply by being automatic.

There are bad automatic window-managers. The one in Windows 8 can clearly be be categorized as such. That however doesn't mean that all automatic window-management is bad.

On Linux, I like tiling VMs, because that means I no longer have to manage Windows manually, yet I get to remain in control of what I do and how I position my "windows". This is good automatic Window-management.

One day I hope Windows will be able to get there and get something of equal power and usefulness. That is, without throwing all the users not power-users out the Window, because current Linux tiling-VMs are obviously aimed at and created for power-users. User-friendlyness and intuitiveness has been sacrificed in the process.

I wholeheartedly agree with you. This "reinvent the classical desktop" trend really annoys me. Traditional desktop environments like Win 95 up to 7 or Gnome 2 are imho closest to the ideal, they have many many years of evolution behind them.

Mistakes that are being made:

1) Thinking that touch is superior to mouse, that touch is the future. That's simply untrue, mouse is quicker and more productive.

2) Focusing on first-time users too much, forgetting experienced users. Example - animations - nice at first, but get annoying quickly.

3) Trying to unify the tablet and the desktop interface. The optimal interface for tablets and for desktops are different.

For me the ideal desktop environment would be:

- take the classical desktop concept

- do a design update (Gnome 2 or Win 7 aren't especially pretty, the design looks outdated)

- add some nice features without changing the whole concept, e.g. some tiling support, useful keyboard shortcuts etc.

I think tiling would greatly improve the usability. If windows had tiling and something like dmenu I would be much happier. The start screen sucks, especially if you have a lot of applications that you commonly use. It's impractical to look for a application in the tiles. I know that you can go to the start screen and start typing in the name of the program (sort of like dmenu), but why should you have to go to a pointless screen to do so.

Exactly, and another problem of the start screen is that it's fullscreen - it's distracting when the whole screen changes.

I am reminded of the Henry Ford quote "If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses."

The design idioms seen in Gnome 2 and Windows 7 are essentially highly refined versions of what existed on the Apple II OS. Personal computers and what we use them for have come a long way since then and it makes sense to redesign the UI to reflect this. Often this means getting your hands dirty and trying new things. Also - first time users are going to be around for longer than experienced users ;)

Yes, this Steve-Jobsian reasoning is exactly what leads to bad UI designs: "People don't know what they want and if they don't like our UI, it's in some way their fault."

I don't have anything against designers trying new things - unless they are trying them on me. For me, Win 8 or Gnome 3 is clearly a downgrade in terms of user experience.

Can't you just use the normal desktop interface? It's still there.

Well not really if you want to use Metro apps.

I have yet to find a single Metro app that's both superior (or even equal to) to an equivalent desktop app, and that justifies having to deal with the start screen and it's dismal multitasking.

Same here. And thus in lack people using TIFKAM apps (The Interface Formerly Known As Metro), we have a self fulfilling prophecy.

Users never arriving to the TIFKAM-scene ensures no developers will bother developing for it.

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