Why have they split Control Panel and Settings?


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The original split which happened in Win 8 was bad enough - fullscreen Settings app, duplicated items, nothing was obvious. What they've done now is even worse:

 

- List of installed updates is in old Control Panel, checking for updates is in the new one. How does this nonsense ever get approved?

 

- If you search for 'update' there are about 15 entries instead of 1 or 2

 

- no progress indicator, very few details

 

- WinRT version of Settings is painfully slow

 

To be honest MS has never really figured out how to organize settings, it was a mess always with bizzare obscure complicated pages like Network settings/panels spread all over the place. Look at any decent Linux distro/OSX, everything is presented in one place, it looks nice and is discoverable.

 

Are they planning on doing away with old Control Panel and rewrite everything. And in the process remove 50% of functionality, which seems to be the guiding principle in Win 10?

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They're still working on moving everything over, so... it is a beta?

Why? They clearly don't have time or resources to do this, why not just add the few modern settings (lock screen etc) into Control Panel, which is mature and tested.

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You could make that same claim and ask why they changed anything from Win98. Resources? They have plenty of resources working on UI design. They can't just flip a switch and change anything instantly. That is what beta testing is for. Unless you think that they should just make changes and release it without spending any time on a beta where they can adjust their changes and work out bugs?

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You could make that same claim and ask why they changed anything from Win98. Resources? They have plenty of resources working on UI design. They can't just flip a switch and change anything instantly. That is what beta testing is for. Unless you think that they should just make changes and release it without spending any time on a beta where they can adjust their changes and work out bugs?

Change has to be made because its better, not because they want to change stuff.

 

There's nothing better about the Metro settings app. And they don't have infinite resources - they released Win 8 and 8.1 with things split between Metro and desktop (like the file picker) which was clearly incomplete.

 

There is zero reason to suspect they'll do a better job with Settings, it seems like an afterthought, there's been no progression in the builds. Are you going to now claim the magical 'they're holding the good stuff back, these are very early builds' ??

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Control Panel was already perfect before, was no need to change.

I think the Control Panel is a mess and the grouping of the new Settings app is a welcomed change in cleaning that up. I ended up pinning the control panel and then the most often used items to it to avoid the main screen.

 

Then again, I don't care about the appearance of the icons in the Previews... maybe I'm using Windows wrong or something.

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IF they can reorganize and consolidate all the settings in one place, WITHOUT removing functionality, and can competely remove all traces of legacy CP, then I agree it's a good change.

 

But we all know this is impossible. For the simple reason that tons of legacy code and programs link to and use old control panel .cpl apps, even within Windows, and thats never going to go away.

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Control Panel was already perfect before, was no need to change.

 

Control panel worked, it was never perfect more importantly. windows needs to evolve with the computer users. and computers users are moving to touch tablets. This means windows needs to become touch capable. 

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Because they're still intent on injecting more Metro into Windows.

 

This. Whether we like it or not. They haven't moved an inch from their "one size fits all" approach. Desktop users are getting pushed aside in favor of mobile users just like with Windows 8. 

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IF they can reorganize and consolidate all the settings in one place, WITHOUT removing functionality, and can competely remove all traces of legacy CP, then I agree it's a good change.

 

But we all know this is impossible. For the simple reason that tons of legacy code and programs link to and use old control panel .cpl apps, even within Windows, and thats never going to go away.

 

Except already we've seen more and more of those windows cpl apps being replaced with every new beta release. so... obviously it IS changing.

 

yes Control Panel will stay around because of old third party programs and apps that for some reason insist on putting their settings in the control panel. but most likely they'll start removing all the other redundant stuff that has been migrated to the new settings app. 

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The opposite seems true to me.

 

indeed, Windows 10 is gimping a lot of the tablet functionality to cater to desktop users instead of splitting functionality between desktop/laptop mode and Touch/tablet mode. 

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Control Panel was already perfect before, was no need to change.

 

 

Change has to be made because its better, not because they want to change stuff.

 

There's nothing better about the Metro settings app. And they don't have infinite resources - they released Win 8 and 8.1 with things split between Metro and desktop (like the file picker) which was clearly incomplete.

 

There is more to the Control Panel and Settings app than what you as the end user sees. From a developers perspective, it's quite a different story.

 

Most likely the Control Panel is written in pure C++ with an unwieldy code base that makes it hard to maintain and develop on quickly. Each "setting" is a collection of different apps with it's own code base, making it even more difficult. Vista transformed some of this, but I believe the UI is still GDI based, maybe Direct2D.

 

Now they are rewriting it as a Modern App which means they are using either HTML or XAML for the UI which has better capabilities than GDI and a C++ or C# back-end, maybe even JavaScript. This also gives them a chance to clean up and remove a lot of hacks, make it more scalable, and easier to use across devices.

 

For example, how do you use the Control Panel across Xbox and Windows Mobile? You can't. So rather than have 2 setting apps like we have now, they move it all to one flexible settings app. XAML or HTML gives  them the ability to adapt the UI and Flow natively across devices without too much work.

 

So while you don't see the benefits, developers don't often make it for you, they do it to make their lives easier which in turn makes it better for customers by being able to deliver quicker.

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Control Panel was already perfect before

No, it really wasn't - it's a confusing mess that is barely usable. People can only find their way around it because it's been around for so many years. I'm happy to see Microsoft working to replace it, though I reserve judgement until the final version. Advanced users will adapt in no time, while new users will find it easier to use.

 

I've heard the Control Panel called a lot of things but perfect isn't one of them.

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I'm all for a new revamped version, if they actually do finish it and dont remove features.

 

e.g. Vista introduced a new Network settings which is still confusing for many. Disk properties/drivers/polices are in different places. Sleep/Power settings are mixed in with screen settings. All of this needs to be normalized and fixed in a consistent manner.

 

If they just move everything into WinRT without actually doing all this, then its not going to help users and will just confuse them. and if they don't deprecate and remove support for old APIs, devs will never stop using them either.

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It's all part of the dumbing down of windows, to attract the lowest common denominator. Some people learn from their mistakes, microsoft simply have not. Worse, for them, they thought they could pull off a sleight of hand, claiming to return to and fix the desktop, all the while sneaking even more of the metro nonsense in thru the back door. Alas, their poorly executed plan has been well exposed.

 

No, microsoft, resistance to metro will NOT go away.

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It's all part of the dumbing down of windows, to attract the lowest common denominator. Some people learn from their mistakes, microsoft simply have not. Worse, for them, they thought they could pull off a sleight of hand, claiming to return to and fix the desktop, all the while sneaking even more of the metro nonsense in thru the back door. Alas, their poorly executed plan has been well exposed.

 

No, microsoft, resistance to metro will NOT go away.

 

Do you even know what metro apps are? Once they gave it the ability to run in a window, it pretty much became a regular desktop app.

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It's all part of the dumbing down of windows, to attract the lowest common denominator. Some people learn from their mistakes, microsoft simply have not. Worse, for them, they thought they could pull off a sleight of hand, claiming to return to and fix the desktop, all the while sneaking even more of the metro nonsense in thru the back door. Alas, their poorly executed plan has been well exposed.

 

No, microsoft, resistance to metro will NOT go away.

 

Making it more accessible and universal is not dumbing down. 

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It's all part of the dumbing down of windows, to attract the lowest common denominator. Some people learn from their mistakes, microsoft simply have not. Worse, for them, they thought they could pull off a sleight of hand, claiming to return to and fix the desktop, all the while sneaking even more of the metro nonsense in thru the back door. Alas, their poorly executed plan has been well exposed.

 

No, microsoft, resistance to metro will NOT go away.

 

Agreed. It is pretty much guaranteed that several options that exist in the pre-9926 Control Panel will NOT exist ever in the Metro based version.

 

Metro has oversized icons and window controls that annoys me as a desktop user with a mouse and keyboard. Why should I have my screen real estate wasted for the sake of mobile users? 

 

And more importantly, why should I have to put up with having to edit the registry to change settings that were once changeable in the control panel? That is a problem that we are going to face ever more increasingly as Microsoft decides not to port over settings that aren't used by 95% of people to the Metro panels. 

 

 

Do you even know what metro apps are? Once they gave it the ability to run in a window, it pretty much became a regular desktop app.

 

Not really. You cannot resize Metro apps below a certain threshold. Metro apps load more slowly than well coded C++ or C or even C# .NET based apps. 

 

 

Compare the load time of the Win32 calculator to the new one. Also note how only one instance can be run.

 

I routinely run multiple control panel applets. Can't do that with Metro. 

 

Also why do all Metro apps use oversized window objects and buttons? Why can't we have small screen economic sized icons and text based items when on a desktop PC with a mouse? Its another example of desktop users having to sacrifice for the sake of mobile users.

 

 

Try to resize a Metro app to this small::

 

oj7G5UM.png

 

Try to make the Metro calculator this small:

chpybet.png

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They clearly don't have time or resources to do this

 

Cheers for the chuckle.  I am quite certain they have the resources to achieve their documented goals.

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Control Panel was already perfect before, was no need to change.

Perfect? It was/is a organizational disaster.

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Agreed. It is pretty much guaranteed that several options that exist in the pre-9926 Control Panel will NOT exist ever in the Metro based version.

 

Metro has oversized icons and window controls that annoys me as a desktop user with a mouse and keyboard. Why should I have my screen real estate wasted for the sake of mobile users? 

 

And more importantly, why should I have to put up with having to edit the registry to change settings that were once changeable in the control panel? That is a problem that we are going to face ever more increasingly as Microsoft decides not to port over settings that aren't used by 95% of people to the Metro panels. 

 

 

 

Not really. You cannot resize Metro apps below a certain threshold. Metro apps load more slowly than well coded C++ or C or even C# .NET based apps. 

 

 

Compare the load time of the Win32 calculator to the new one. Also note how only one instance can be run.

 

I routinely run multiple control panel applets. Can't do that with Metro. 

 

Also why do all Metro apps use oversized window objects and buttons? Why can't we have small screen economic sized icons and text based items when on a desktop PC with a mouse? Its another example of desktop users having to sacrifice for the sake of mobile users.

 

 

Try to resize a Metro app to this small::

 

oj7G5UM.png

 

Try to make the Metro calculator this small:

chpybet.png

 

Metro calculator does not even work, with uac turned off....

 

 

Perfect? It was/is a organizational disaster.

No, it was a powerful tool in the control of windows...

Furthermore, to say that the new one is somehow 'better', is entirely disingenuous, and makes obvious that one is not being honest in their replies, but rather just blindly just supported their chosen positions.

 

And everybody knows it.

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