The Lounge - CodeProject

If after 10 years in the business it takes you a long time to get oriented on a new system you need to examine if you are in the right endeavor. Perhaps accounting or sales may suit you better?

Having seen very large changes in the industry over the past 41 years I don't see what the big deal was about Windows 8.

It wasn't perfect and a few tweaks in Windows 8.1 have made it even more usable, but the basic functionality didn't change.

I was able, within a few days of needing a cheat sheet, to do everything using Windows 8 as I was using Windows 7. What a lot of people don't realize is that you can do anything you did under Windows 7, albeit the way you did it is a little different.

Some things like the administrative menu (right button in lower left corner of screen) were an improvement.

Having gone from coding sheets that you submitted to a key punch operator and all the iterations culminating in the modern UI I don't find it a problem when someone moves my cheese.

In fact I like learning new ways of doing things. That is why I chose this industry. It keeps my mind working in old age.

Once you lose your pride the rest is easy.

I would agree with you but then we both would be wrong.

The report of my death was an exaggeration - Mark Twain
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs

I'm on-line therefore I am.
JimmyRopes

JimmyRopes wrote:
If after 10 years in the business it takes you a long time to get oriented on a new system you need to examine if you are in the right endeavor.

First that has nothing to do with what I said.
Second I have been doing in for more than 40.
Third I was emphasizing that in the last 10 years I have spent a lot of time interfacing with what other people think/claim are 'good' ways to do something so I have some experience in actually differentiating between those that are in fact good from those that are just average and those that are horrifically bad (even in some cases to be unusable from a business perspective.)

JimmyRopes wrote:
I was able, within a few days of needing a cheat sheet, to do everything using Windows 8 as I was using Windows 7.

I once started and completed the certification process for a proprietary credit card interface in two weeks, actually slightly less than 10 working days. That of course drove revenue to the company. (That of course was one of the 100 external API that I needed to interface with.)

Spending a week or a even a couple days in a week learning a new version of windows doesn't drive revenue and because I am not in fact producing anything during that time period it is a loss.

JimmyRopes wrote:
What a lot of people don't realize is that you can do anything you did under Windows 7, albeit the way you did it is a little different.

Which of course I knew. And it doesn't change anything I said. I have in fact drove nails with a wrench and removed nails with a pliers, but that doesn't alter the fact that I would still rather use a hammer for both.

JimmyRopes wrote:
I don't find it a problem when someone moves my cheese.

Nor do I but I can also understand that other people would find it difficult and I also understand that claims of actual 'improvement' are very likely nothing but market hype. And if there is not in fact an improvement then the time spent learning by itself will drive the 'improvement' into the negative.

JimmyRopes wrote:
In fact I like learning new ways of doing things

Myself I like delivering products that sell and even, hopefully, work. Some of that of course is because I like getting paid so I can pay my bills. And learning something that, at best, is just some new paint on the same old car doesn't do it. 32 bits from 16 bits that was a worthwhile trick. 64 bits from 32 was a good trick too. Moving buttons around and adding shading does absolutely nothing but look good in a demo when one has nothing better to show.

Once you lose your pride the rest is easy.

I would agree with you but then we both would be wrong.

The report of my death was an exaggeration - Mark Twain
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs

I'm on-line therefore I am.
JimmyRopes

To be fair, I work with people who regularly save files on their computer and who minutes later are completely unable to find those files. This is after using PCs for more than 20 years.

A new OS would be more confusing than switching genders for these people.

MehGerbil wrote:
I work with people who regularly save files on their computer and who minutes later are completely unable to find those files.

Hopefully they are not developers. Big Grin | :-D

Once you lose your pride the rest is easy.

I would agree with you but then we both would be wrong.

The report of my death was an exaggeration - Mark Twain
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs

I'm on-line therefore I am.
JimmyRopes

The "All Apps" display in Windows 8 was a poor substitute.

Software Zen: delete this;

I never go to all apps unless I want to pin an app to the start page. Big Grin | :-D

Once you lose your pride the rest is easy.

I would agree with you but then we both would be wrong.

The report of my death was an exaggeration - Mark Twain
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs

I'm on-line therefore I am.
JimmyRopes

JimmyRopes wrote:
I never could understand the concern about the start button. Once I got used to using the start page I never thought about the missing start button. Apparently, it was a big deal to people who are stuck in a rut.

My big deal with the lack of a Start button in the original Windows 8.0 release is that you had to hover the mouse over a tiny 4x4 pixel area in the bottom-left corner to get the popup that would bring up the Start page. Which is fine if you only have a single monitor or your primary monitor is your left-most one, or you don't use Remote Desktop in a window to connect to other Win8 machines.

If you have a monitor to the left of your primary one, or have Win8 in an RDP window, then it's just too damned easy to overshoot that tiny bottom-left area, so getting the mouse in juuuuust the right 4x4 pixel space means you have to slow down to do some pixel-perfect clicking. This is no fun on a high-res monitor. I can't imagine it at 4K.

Using the Windows key on its own as a shortcut to bring up the Start screen isn't an option either for machines being accessed through Remote Desktop, as it's the local machine that intercepts it, not the remote one. While I'm aware it's an option on mstsc.exe's Local Resources tab, that's about half a dozen clicks away...assuming I actually remember to do that each time I want to connect to a new machine (and then I never do, so I have to disconnect/reconnect to just set the option).

The return of the Start button fixed all that. I use 8.1 on multiple machines every day, and at this point I don't see it as any different than 7. Every time I go back to an 8.0 machine however, I get bitten again by these idiosyncrasies right away--and after this much time, I can't blame this on anything being "new" to me.

Try the Windows Logo Key. Big Grin | :-D

Once you lose your pride the rest is easy.

I would agree with you but then we both would be wrong.

The report of my death was an exaggeration - Mark Twain
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs

I'm on-line therefore I am.
JimmyRopes

As much as I think the start button crowd has over blown this thing I'd have to maintain that one shouldn't have to know a key combination to get started using programs.

Try using the Windows Logo icon on the left end of the task bar in Windows 8.1. Big Grin | :-D

Once you lose your pride the rest is easy.

I would agree with you but then we both would be wrong.

The report of my death was an exaggeration - Mark Twain
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs

I'm on-line therefore I am.
JimmyRopes

I brought it up in my third paragraph.

Try Windows 8.1. Big Grin | :-D

There is a windows logo icon on the far left on the task bar.

Once you lose your pride the rest is easy.

I would agree with you but then we both would be wrong.

The report of my death was an exaggeration - Mark Twain
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs

I'm on-line therefore I am.
JimmyRopes

I've brought that up as well. And I mentioned that's all that was needed to fix all of the issues I've had with 8.0.

The only point I was trying to make is that without a big fat button onscreen to click to bring up the Start screen, there was an actual usability issue with the original Win8 release...and unlike a lot of people, I otherwise really didn't have any other problem with it.

dandy72 wrote:
unlike a lot of people, I otherwise really didn't have any other problem with it.

Strange that you would bring up Windows 8 deficiencies when Windows 8.1 has already fixed the problem you were having.

Once you lose your pride the rest is easy.

I would agree with you but then we both would be wrong.

The report of my death was an exaggeration - Mark Twain
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs

I'm on-line therefore I am.
JimmyRopes

JimmyRopes wrote:
Strange that you would bring up Windows 8 deficiencies when Windows 8.1 has already fixed the problem you were having.

What I was responding to, specifically, was this:

> I never could understand the concern about the start button.

So all I was saying is that the button's absence was a legitimate concern with 8.0, which as we've both pointed out, has been addressed with 8.1.

I see nothing strange about pointing out what was broken in 8.0 and is now ok again with 8.1.

dandy72 wrote:
So all I was saying is that the button's absence was a legitimate concern with 8.0, which as we've both pointed out, has been addressed with 8.1.

I see nothing strange about pointing out what was broken in 8.0 and is now ok again with 8.1.

I never had a problem with pointing at the corner in Windows 8 so in my opinion it was never broken.

People like you did have a problem which was addressed in Windows 8.1, but that doesn't make it a problem for all of us and I still don't understand what the problem was as I didn't have a problem.

As I have stated I don't understand what the problem was. Having said that I don't have a problem the way it is in Windows 8.1 either.

Once you lose your pride the rest is easy.

I would agree with you but then we both would be wrong.

The report of my death was an exaggeration - Mark Twain
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs

I'm on-line therefore I am.
JimmyRopes

Just try it. RDP into a Windows 8.0 machine, and have the RDP session running in a window. Don't have it remap the Win-key to the remote machine. Now try to quickly get exactly on the corner for the popup to show up.

It's an exercise in frustration.

That being said, and I think it's worth repeating, I have no complaint whatsoever with Windows 8.1, and those who to this day still bitch about it are simply part of the group that's already going to be unhappy with any type of change.

I'll have to take your comment about RDP without trying it as I don't have a Windows 8 machine to remote into. That would be a legitimate problem, or should say the only legitimate problem anyone has raised that I am aware of. Most of the time it is a case of things being different rather than things being broken.

I agree about Windows 8.1 and that some people are going to be unhappy with any type of change.

I am sorry to have taken you as one of them. I was mistaken. Sigh | :sigh:

Once you lose your pride the rest is easy.

I would agree with you but then we both would be wrong.

The report of my death was an exaggeration - Mark Twain
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs

I'm on-line therefore I am.
JimmyRopes

JimmyRopes wrote:
That would be a legitimate problem, or should say the only legitimate problem anyone has raised that I am aware of

Thanks for acknowledging that. It *was* my only real complaint about 8.0. I'm still not a fan of Metro (or whatever they call it these days), but I'm certainly not complaining about it the way it seems the rest of the world does. I actually want it to succeed, because if the world's going touch-screen, then the desktop is really not well-suited for it.

It seems there's people who look at the Metro stuff, decide they hate it, and then decide they're gonna hate the whole OS because of it. I keep telling people, Metro's not the OS, if you just ignore those parts you've never used and don't actually need, 95% of what you do every day doesn't change one bit with 8.1. It's a fine OS.

Sorry for not reading and comprehending your original post. I have been distracted by personal business lately, but should have taken the time to understand what you were saying. Sigh | :sigh:

Once you lose your pride the rest is easy.

I would agree with you but then we both would be wrong.

The report of my death was an exaggeration - Mark Twain
Simply Elegant Designs JimmyRopes Designs

I'm on-line therefore I am.
JimmyRopes

I'll elaborate on #3. Microsoft has said all Lumia's running Windows 8+ will get Windows 10 for the phone.

Source: Windows Central[^]

That is very good to know.
I may hold off my purchase until Windows 10 is released.

I'm not following the logic. They're saying they'll all be upgraded, so you'll get Windows 10?!?

I want to buy a book on the new OS.
I don't care to learn 8.1 and then turn around and learn 10.

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