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Dave Calkins wrote: to switch between categories (apps/settings)
This one I don't get. When I search, I get all results in a single list, as formerly in the start menu.
Dave Calkins wrote: Why force me to occupy my entire screen just to pick a program?
That is a matter of taste. Why speaks again full screen ?
Dave Calkins wrote: Also, the start screen doesn't let you setup a multi-level folder hierarchy to organize things
Indeed, you have the groups structure. And the search makes the "folderizing" obsolete, IMO.
I think it is all a matter of taste, but not of functionality.
~RaGE();
I think words like 'destiny' are a way of trying to find order where none exists. - Christian Graus
Do not feed the troll ! - Common proverb
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Having only groups and no folder hierarchy is definitely lost functionality not simply different taste.
Same thing for forcing full screen. You lose the context of whatever it was you were doing on the rest of the screen as you're thrown into a full screen environment to do something that doesn't at all require full screen. Its a functionality thing because its completely changing your environment just to do 1 task which in no way would require that.
And yes, the search when you type thing filters it by the category selected on the right. So unlike Win7 where you could just type a partial name of anything, now you have to now and select the category first. This is lost functionality imo.
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Dave Calkins wrote: And yes, the search when you type thing filters it by the category selected on the right. So unlike Win7 where you could just type a partial name of anything, now you have to now and select the category first. This is lost functionality imo.
That's no longer the case in Win8.1. You will however probably want to uncheck the box that says to combine local system searches with Bing searches.
Did you ever see history portrayed as an old man with a wise brow and pulseless heart, waging all things in the balance of reason?
Is not rather the genius of history like an eternal, imploring maiden, full of fire, with a burning heart and flaming soul, humanly warm and humanly beautiful?
--Zachris Topelius
Training a telescope on one’s own belly button will only reveal lint. You like that? You go right on staring at it. I prefer looking at galaxies.
-- Sarah Hoyt
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Interesting; I just recently installed Win 8.1 but hadn't noticed that change.
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Also note that there's a company with an addon for Win8 which re-adds the Win7 start button (not the 8.1 start button but the real 7 start button). They have another addon which lets you run windows store apps in desktop windows.
So if you want, you can get the full start button back in Win8 and if you like the apps, you can run them in desktop windows and essentially not need to use the start screen at all then.
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See, that happens when you have good marketing. There is no "return of the start button." Their merely implemented a toggle button but they sell it as a start button.
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Also, I'm concerned that Windows 7 may be the last installment of a proper Windows operating system. I think most people agree it was a good release. Just where Metro fits into the working day of a typical Windows user I have no idea. Windows 8 is looking more and more like a car crash and they need to return to delivering proper desktop functionality to those that want it.
I don't need or want nobby Windows Apps on my work PC.
Regards,
Rob Philpott.
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Microsoft is/was confused. Someone in a suit saw the iPad selling millions of units and said, "Hey, hey, hey, it's a new world out there. It's a pad, pad, pad world. The new OS must be a pad. Besides, I've never used a desktop and all I ever do is read stories in the Financial Times and run Excel so if you can do that then it is everything. No need for desktop existence any more."
Then they changed everything to be a pad. They changed the entire OS to be a pad OS, but the problem is there are still millions of people and millions of developers who actually use desktops.
"No matter," says the suit with an idea. "We'll change all the UI so it looks like a pad. It's genius!"
Meanwhile millions of us desktop users -- especially software developers -- eschew the pad (flat, lifeless, colorless, bloodless, contrastless) UI but now they are sticking it on our desktops. Even if you're running Windows 7 you get it via IE 10.x with the flat scroll bars and in Visual Studio 2012 and up. Terrible.
It's a fail because users are trying to tell them, but Microsoft is like, "I can't hear you over the sound of the stamping feet" (users running away).  And of course the suits are like, "What problem? I can read my news stories and my Excel spreadsheets perfectly."
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Regrettably, listening to people outside the company (be they users, developers, or testers) has never been a Microsoft "thang". They do act in a very arrogant way, and have done since the DOS days... 
The only instant messaging I do involves my middle finger.
English doesn't borrow from other languages.
English follows other languages down dark alleys, knocks them over and goes through their pockets for loose grammar.
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newton.saber wrote: Then they changed everything to be a pad. They changed the entire OS to be a pad OS, but the problem is there are still millions of people and millions of developers who actually use desktops.
Not really. I've been using Win8 for awhile now and the above is not true. Once you find your way to the desktop and pin your applications to the task bar, you can (mostly) use it just like Win7. You can almost entirely avoid the start screen, never use any of the apps, and be fine, and use it just like Win7. The new RT/metro UI doesn't really replace anything because it doesn't address desktop apps. It instead provides a completely separate layer which can largely be ignored anyway.
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Agreed. I've been using it on a laptop for the last year, and the only contact I make with the Metro bits is the control panel; and after almost 20 years of developer centric cruft accumulating on its dialogs it's well past the point where it should've been redesigned from scratch to present things from a user perspective.
ex the "Adjust visual effects for crappiest appearance"[^] checkbox.
Did you ever see history portrayed as an old man with a wise brow and pulseless heart, waging all things in the balance of reason?
Is not rather the genius of history like an eternal, imploring maiden, full of fire, with a burning heart and flaming soul, humanly warm and humanly beautiful?
--Zachris Topelius
Training a telescope on one’s own belly button will only reveal lint. You like that? You go right on staring at it. I prefer looking at galaxies.
-- Sarah Hoyt
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Rob Philpott wrote: I'm concerned that Windows 7 may be the last installment of a proper Windows operating system.
Welcome in the club. You are member no. 1 865 274 918!
Anything that is unrelated to elephants is irrelephant
Anonymous
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Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience
Greg King
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I always wanted to be somebody, but now I realize I should have been more specific.
Lily Tomlin, Actress
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Have you tried the best upgrade windows can have? It is called linux.... 
Common sense is not so common... Voltaire
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I've heard people complain about Ubuntu Unity just as loud as they complain about W8...
In the end, you get used to anything.
JM2B,
Pablo.
"Accident: An inevitable occurrence due to the action of immutable natural laws." (Ambrose Bierce, circa 1899).
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Jokes apart,
Yes, there truly are problems on any operating system. I believe the most important is if it delivers what promises and if it is worth the cost(or the lack of it). 
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Worked flawlessly for me on my Surface RT and my desktop (Win8 Pro). The Surface took quite a while but it worked great. Loving the new version even more than the original.
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No issues here. I always wait until others have helped debug new operating systems before I do any optional upgrades.
Besides, I've gotten used to Win8 and didn't see anything interesting to upgrade for.
CQ de W5ALT
Walt Fair, Jr., P. E.
Comport Computing
Specializing in Technical Engineering Software
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I usually never use an MS product before the first service pack. This time it looks like I will wait for the service pack of the service pack.
modified 20-Oct-19 21:02pm.
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The obamacare website debacle is NOT the fault of the programmers. It is the fault of MANAGEMENT! Bringing in the "best and brightest" won't help unless they're qualified project managers. Bringing in the best and brightest will not work unless they follow proper SDLC practices. More importantly, bringing in the "best and brightest" won't help unless they start over (using the fore-mentioned SDLC practices).
Going with the cheapest bid is NOT what you want to do with a project of this scope. You want the contractor with the best pool of talent working on it, not a contractor that undercuts everyone else's bid under the assumption that they can gather a reasonable talent pool after they win the bidding war.
Until the government realizes this, they will continue to get piss poor software delivered late and way over budget, and then wonder what the f*ck happened.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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 you can bid for government contracts on renta coder?
Every day, thousands of innocent plants are killed by vegetarians.
Help end the violence EAT BACON
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I wish our management had the insight to see this at our office. We are always in trouble, even when it's management / the testing department's fault 
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We go through complete SDLC processes for point releases, as well as major revisions. Everybody associated with the project sits in on all the design meetings, including testers. We have three levels of test (dev, SIT, and UAT), and everybody has to sign off on each progression through the cycle. Even with all the processes in place, employee vacations, holidays, and small delays), we manage to release on time with maybe one or two obscure bugs after release to manufacturing.
We're currently in the SIT phase of the latest three-week sprint for a point release, and the next sprint is already mostly through the functional spec/test case development phase. By the time we go to UAT, we'll be writing code for the next sprint.
Yes, the work is hard, but we rarely have to revisit old code unless a new feature demands it.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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That sounds very well organized
We are lucky to get anything more than a verbal spec. Even the boss jokes about it when he actually scribbles something down on paper or the whiteboard.
There's no proper SDLC and it shows. We often have to redo stuff as the 'spec' changes and then get blamed for taking too long and it costs the company more development time.
We (developers) are trying hard to make management see this and change things...
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I'm afraid this is the way things are done at far too many, perhaps most, places. And, of course, it is never the fault of management if the product is late and/or buggy.
Just because the code works, it doesn't mean that it is good code.
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Yup.
We try our best, but without a spec it's almost impossible to get all the business rules right...
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