official Windows 8 Consumer Preview Discussion

[Wyn6]

I think you need 1366x1024 minimum to do the snap to screen. I run at 1920x1200 on my desktop, so it works well :) I'll try on my laptop at home and see how it behaves, don't remember the native resolution there.

Fyi, it's 1366x768.

[techguy77]

People should just stop talking about stuff that they have no idea about.

FTR, you will get a popup on metro. But please continue trolling.

Nothing popped out for me. I am not trolling. Popup only showed up on Desktop unless i missed some sort of notification.

Let me add this. This was developed by some of the top developers/programmers in the world at the top software company in the world. I guarantee they do more work-related multitasking in a single day on their machines than many of us do in a week. If there was a problem with productivity, wouldn't you think this would highly affect Microsoft, their employees AND their bottom line?

If it was undoable, I guarantee that in the years since they conceptualized this, they would have rethought it. Because, guaranteed the majority of their employees will be using this once the product is finalized. Does it make sense for them to create something that's going to severely hamper their own company? So, I somehow doubt that most of you complaining about multitasking will be THAT hampered.

It was developed from Windows 7 environment, therefore developers really never played with Windows 8 in a way they do things with Windows 7.

So i suspect you can't use anything else but live or hotmail account for those Metro Apps. What about people who have google or other accounts and refuse to have live/hotmail account?

[bandit_liberty_rumble]

What I'm saying makes perfect sense. Two apps open at once, on a screen of any size, is sufficient when multitasking in Windows 8,

And I suppose, with a screen resolution of 1280x800, one app open at once is sufficient (since Metro Snap doesn't work) ?! :rolleyes:

[Wyn6]

Nothing popped out for me. I am not trolling. Popup only showed up on Desktop unless i missed some sort of notification.

It was developed from Windows 7 environment, therefore developers really never played with Windows 8 in a way they do things with Windows 7.

So i suspect you can't use anything else but live or hotmail account for those Metro Apps. What about people who have google or other accounts and refuse to have live/hotmail account?

I think you misunderstood my post. It was in the context of what will come not really what has been. Although, I will guarantee you that many people have been testing the hell outta this, devs included. But, what I was getting at is that eventually MS will be using this in-house as a main OS. If it was crippling multitasking, they would've rethought how that works.

[techguy77]

You wouldn't switch to Metro to use it, you would check it in the preview pane to the left. You still have to open it if you're in desktop mode. Unless, you have it snapped, or you have multiple windows open at once on the desktop. Most people tend to work in one app at a time. They may have two up simultaneously while running many. You can't physically work more than one app simultaneously anyway. For example, I can't do something in Excel while composing an email or writing this reply at the same time. I have to do one, switch to the other, do that, switch back and so on.

If I wanna check Twitter either thru the web or via an app, I have to go somewhere else and click somewhere else. Or... I can have an app snapped to the side be that in Win 7 desktop OR in Win 8 Start Screen.

About apps to be written. Traditional desktop apps can be written in WinRT and work on x86/x64, and ARM with the same functionality. This enables Metro is the design language and philosophy. A dev can opt in to use that design language if they choose. Or, they can opt out and use their own design. Targeting WinRT does not in anyway handicap an app. Using the Metro design language, likewise, does not handicap an app.

I would further explain this but... I don't wanna. ;) Seriously, I hope that clears some stuff up. Probably not. But, one can hope.

Preview pane is quite useless because in order to use it you have to act with your mouse in very unnatural way. It doesn't flow smooth. Snapping app to the side seems ok idea but it is taking too much space. For some reason everything Metro related is enlarged like you would zoom in things on Desktop. Metro doesn't have concept of multitasking and also everything runs maximized taking whole screen space. There are no navigations so either you are force to use keyboard shortcuts which wont work for 98% of people out there or use mouse to move cursos into really weird corners. Metro Apps looks flat to me, very plain, there is nothing rich about them and content is pretty boring. Afterall why would you use Metro Mail App when Windows Live Mail for Desktop is 100 times better. Somehow when i switch to Metro Mail (example) i get feeling i am on my Windows Phone. It is so disconnected. :).

WinRT has no value over Win32 in my mind. At least is not ready. Also HTML5 is not important at all and it wont be for quite few years in the future, it is not even standardized.

I think you misunderstood my post. It was in the context of what will come not really what has been. Although, I will guarantee you that many people have been testing the hell outta this, devs included. But, what I was getting at is that eventually MS will be using this in-house as a main OS. If it was crippling multitasking, they would've rethought how that works.

I understand but do we really know what are they going to use? :)

From what i found out playing with Windows 8 CP for about 24 hours, i pretty much end up being on Desktop for the most part after getting all desktop shortcuts in place and pinning applications to taskbar. My start menu has only Desktop Pin on it and that's it. Everything else i uninstalled and unpinned. I believe 'in case MS doesn't provide option to disable Metro' this will be setup for most power users. I really don't under lock screen in Windows 8 and its value except that i have to drag up mouse every time. Also i had to create shortcuts for Panel, Shutdown and other processes on my desktop since even i know how to get there seems unnatural and can't bother wasting my time.

Don't take me wrong but this is how i see Windows 8 fit my needs if i was forced to be on it. Bottom line, I have to setup Desktop so i can avoid Metro annoyance as much as possible.

[~Johnny]

Nothing popped out for me. I am not trolling. Popup only showed up on Desktop unless i missed some sort of notification.

It was developed from Windows 7 environment, therefore developers really never played with Windows 8 in a way they do things with Windows 7.

So i suspect you can't use anything else but live or hotmail account for those Metro Apps. What about people who have google or other accounts and refuse to have live/hotmail account?

Microsoft have actually said they've deployed Windows 8 internally, and they do develop Windows 8 on Windows 8. Metro apps can use whatever accounts you want (and the mail, people & calendar apps support google for example), but if you want Skydrive sync then you need a live account obviously (which does not require a Hotmail email address).

[bandit_liberty_rumble]

Metro apps can use whatever accounts you want (and the mail, people & calendar apps support google for example), but if you want Skydrive sync then you need a live account obviously (which does not require a Hotmail email address).

As far as I can see, unless you sign up for an MS account, Mail, Calendar, People, Messenger etc. can't be used?!

[Wyn6]

I'm asking average users I work with to do basic things that they do every day here on their desktops or laptops, it's taking forever to do the basics. It's not just the location, but the separation of some things, and they don't know the difference between how one IE acts, vs how the other acts. If I say, well just use the one on the desktop, they want to know why the other one is there. I left an average number of installed programs extra tiles in Metro exactly as if they installed them themselves, the start window is another three pages long with those installs, because Metro does not know one from another, and when they find the first one with that name, that's the one they click on, even if it's further on the Metro screen. Our users barely remember how to zoom their screen, so telling them about shortcuts only works for a few. I'm trying to find more time to learn more about it myself (looking for the "load a program at startup" at the moment).

Here's the thing. When you've been doing something a certain way for 10, 20, 30 years, a dramatic change in that is going to come with a learning curve.

Example, you've been driving the same car for the last 3-6 years. You decide to head out and buy a different car. Let's say you even buy it from the same maker. Guess what? It's going to take you some time to learn things about the car. The main function, driving... doesn't change. But, how you do other things may be different like, operating the radio, Bluetooth setup, wipers, information console, where the trunk button is (glove or driver's side), adjusting the seats, are they electric? how do you set the memory controls? etc.

You don't learn that stuff in 1 minute or an hour. It takes days, and weeks to learn. Man, I recall discovering something on my car after having it like 3 years. Same goes for many other things. Let them sit and play with the OS for a week, they'll get it. You can even be their friendly salesman and go over the features of the new car... er, new OS with them.

[Quillz]

Hey guys. pressing WinKey+PrntScrn takes a PNG screenshot that is auto saved to your Pictures folder! No need to 'paste' into third party software.

I really like this (long overdue) feature, but I wish it would following a naming convention like in Mac OS X, where it's "Screenshot on <DATE>.<TIME>." The way it does it now is it just keeps calling the pics "Screenshot (#)," which normally isn't a big deal, but if you want to move all your pics into one folder, you'll have to do a lot of file name merging.

[~Johnny]

As far as I can see, unless you sign up for an MS account, Mail, Calendar, People, Messenger etc. can't be used?!

Those specific Microsoft apps require it right now, but it's not a Metro specific requirement, and once you've signed in you can also add your other accounts.

[bandit_liberty_rumble]

they don't know the difference between how one IE acts, vs how the other acts. If I say, well just use the one on the desktop, they want to know why the other one is there.

you've been driving the same car for the last 3-6 years. You decide to head out and buy a different car. Let's say you even buy it from the same maker. Guess what? It's going to take you some time to learn things about the car.

Especially if it comes with two different steering wheels. :)

Those specific Microsoft apps require it right now

That's what I meant. I dont'get the reason for this requirement though. Not even Apple asks you to sign up for an account with them just to get access to their Mail app.

[techguy77]

As far as I can see, unless you sign up for an MS account, Mail, Calendar, People, Messenger etc. can't be used?!

Yeah that's what i meant.

Microsoft have actually said they've deployed Windows 8 internally, and they do develop Windows 8 on Windows 8. Metro apps can use whatever accounts you want (and the mail, people & calendar apps support google for example), but if you want Skydrive sync then you need a live account obviously (which does not require a Hotmail email address).

That is interesting part that they do develop Windows 8 on Windows 8.

[ESC@PE]

I think some people are missing an important fact here. Many people seem to be confusing 'familiarity' with 'ease.' Just because someone is 'familiar' with doing something their own way, does not necessarilly mean that what they are doing is the 'easy' way to go about it. In fact, there will most likely be many ways we can make the 'familiar' things in our lives 'easier' to do, and even so, the way many people are used to doing their 'familiar' tasks may already be quite inefficient. My point being, when trying new things try and stay open minded and understandable with what is happening.

In the case here, because of a slightly new GUI people seem to be quick to flame it as 'broken' or 'unintuitive.' I'm not saying all of the changes will work and be efficient for all but just give a little bit of extra thought about what's going on.

[Eins.MY]

As far as I can see, unless you sign up for an MS account, Mail, Calendar, People, Messenger etc. can't be used?!

You can create free Microsoft Live account here : https://account.live.com/

Take less than 1 minute. I created my live accounts using my gmail and now I can access Store, Skydrive etc. How convenient.

[techguy77]

I think some people are missing an important fact here. Many people seem to be confusing 'familiarity' with 'ease.' Just because someone is 'familiar' with doing something their own way, does not necessarilly mean that what they are doing is the 'easy' way to go about it. In fact, there will most likely be many ways we can make the 'familiar' things in our lives 'easier' to do, and even so, the way many people are used to doing their 'familiar' tasks may already be quite inefficient. My point being, when trying new things try and stay open minded and understandable with what is happening.

In the case here, because of a slightly new GUI people seem to be quick to flame it as 'broken' or 'unintuitive.' I'm not saying all of the changes will work and be efficient for all but just give a little bit of extra thought about what's going on.

I agree, it took me 10 minutes to figure out everything (where is what with Windows 8). In my opinion learning curve is not a problem, at least not for power users. I found that easiest and quickest way to do anything in Windows 8 are simply keyboard shortcuts. That wont work for 98% of Windows User Base. Everything can be done with mouse tried that too.

As I said learning curve is not a problem but something else, broken flow, incosistency, duplications, conflicts, visually not appealing, purpose, obstacles, being intrusive, lack of choice. I am a developer myself for over 25 years. Right now i build desktop and web applications in .NET Environment and i can point out lot of UI issues with Windows 8.

[briangw]

Ughh ! Useless OS - I don't get it. ME part 2.

Lol, no, it's far from ME.

[techguy77]

Lol, no, it's far from ME.

Windows 8 will have good performance. This whole discussion is about UI :) which is kind of funny otherwise Windows 8 as far as performance goes will rock.

[bandit_liberty_rumble]

You can create free Microsoft Live account here : https://account.live.com/

Take less than 1 minute. I created my live accounts using my gmail and now I can access Store, Skydrive etc. How convenient.

That's great, and totally makes sense if you want to use the Store, Skydrive or whatever. How does it make sense though to force the user to log in with an MS ID before being allowed to use an app with a completely different account?!

[Elliott]

What I'm saying makes perfect sense. Two apps open at once, on a screen of any size, is sufficient when multitasking in Windows 8, due to how easy it is to switch to another app/window, and if someone cannot be as productive when multitasking that way as they are when using Windows 7, they have a problem. Too many people don't understand that this will simply be a case of them adapting to how multitasking works in the Metro experience of Windows 8. It's very easy and quick to switch to other apps/windows by either using keyboard shortcuts or a quick move of the mouse; thus, productivity is not hindered at all.

It's concerning that an incredible amount of people aren't prepared to give this new multitasking concept a try, when it will likely benefit them. Using it for a few hours or days is not enough time; you should all use it for a couple of months before judging. That's what I'm doing. What I have said in the above paragraph isn't stated with certainty, as I'm waiting to find out for sure if that is the case; it's merely me being rational, considering I (unlike many) "get" the new multitasking concept.

I'm sorry, but my workflow could never work with only an app-and-a-quarter open at a time and a broken multitasking paradigm that requires a lot of mouse movement and some guessing as to which app thumbnail is the one I want. Obviously Microsoft's devs can't really deal with it either because Visual Studio isn't an Immersive app.

[+Warwagon MVC]

Has anyone been successful in getting the iso onto a usb thumb drive using the Windows 7 USB DVD download tool? I get nothing but "the file is not a valid iso" error. And, I have tried this 3 times, downloading the x86 iso directly off MS website.

worked first try. Took a while but it worked.

[ady199]

Does anyone know when us users in the UK will be able to log into:-

Music

Video

Xbox Live Games

Thanks in advance

[hougtimo]

Does anyone know when us users in the UK will be able to log into:-

Music

Video

Xbox Live Games

Thanks in advance

I'd also like to know this! I'd like to listen to my ZunePass music!

[lalalawawawa]

Does anyone know when us users in the UK will be able to log into:-

Music

Video

Xbox Live Games

Thanks in advance

Nope. Logging in is possible from USA, Japan, France and Germany.

[ArialBlue]

Damn 25GB space to every user?

[+Neyht Subscriber²]

The thing that bugs me (the most) about the Metro interface is that it doesn't seem to support extended desktops....at all.

Correct me if I'm wrong but metro apps will only work on one monitor, correct?