Windows 8 Start MENU

[Razanir]

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2138443/rejoice-the-start-menu-is-coming-back-to-windows.html

This is not a drill. I repeat. This is not a drill. The Start Menu in all its menu-y glory is returning to Windows 8! I might have reason to end my shunning of Windows 8, and return from my exile to Linux. (Although the bash shell will probably keep me in Linux... Or over to Mac, now that I don't hate it anymore)

[The Prince of Cats]

I have got used to not having the start menu and I must confess that I still preferred Windows 8 to Ubuntu's 'Unity' abomination, an interface so bad that I ditched it for a buggy version of Cinnamon at the first opportunity. My work increasingly needs Windows, so I just took the plunge and got Windows 8 on all four of my household's computers. Well, except the Pi...

If you're a fan of Unix Shell though, you might try CygWin (http://www.cygwin.com/‎) for a Bourne-like equivalent...

[Ailurus]

The Start Menu in all its menu-y glory is returning to Windows 8!

See, that's the part that gets me - what is so glorious about the start menu? I understand people are comfortable with it, but that's due to it having been commonplace for the last 19 years. After a day or two on Win8 I did not mourn its loss. To be perfectly frank, I'm pondering skipping over that update unless it comes with a 'turn start menu off' option, or at least an option for pressing the windows key to keep going to the start screen (I know, I know, heresy). But for all the abuse it received, the start screen allows for better visibility and much better organization than the start menu ever did, and the so-called 'jarring disruption' or whatever people are calling it these days was, to me, no worse than the disruption of having the start menu cover a good chunk of your screen.

[factotum]

But for all the abuse it received, the start screen allows for better visibility and much better organization than the start menu ever did, and the so-called 'jarring disruption' or whatever people are calling it these days was, to me, no worse than the disruption of having the start menu cover a good chunk of your screen.

Heretic! Burn the heretic! :smalltongue:

Seriously, I don't think anyone would have had the slightest issue with Happy Funtime Tile Land if it had been an *option*. Forcing everyone to use a UI designed for a touch-sensitive display with a mouse and keyboard was where Microsoft goofed majorly. While I can't see this update as anything other than a good thing, I do hope they provide the option to do what you want too, because that should be how things like this work--provide the options so that the largest possible number of people can be happy.

[supermonkeyjoe]

I initially thought this was an April fools joke that I missed :smallbiggrin:

Much as I love the new start screen on my Surface Pro, on a desktop computer using a Keyboard and mouse it was just inefficient, you bring up the start screen and then have to scroll across the whole screen to get to the option you need, with the start menu it was all there in less than a quarter of the screen.

Again it's the whole touch vs Keyboard/mouse thing that they haven't got quite right with Win8 everything is optimised for touch and works great with it, just mouse input suffers greatly.

[Flickerdart]

Honestly, I see absolutely no value in having a tiny menu when I can have an entire screen for programs and commands to occupy. I mean, there might be edge cases where what you pick will depend on information on the screen that is too vast to be stored in working memory, but I can't actually think of real situations that would happen in.

And at any rate, all I use either the Start Screen or the Start Menu for is typing in stuff I want to open. I couldn't care less about the other stuff, which is why the changes to search in 8.1 really annoyed me.


Much as I love the new start screen on my Surface Pro, on a desktop computer using a Keyboard and mouse it was just inefficient, you bring up the start screen and then have to scroll across the whole screen to get to the option you need, with the start menu it was all there in less than a quarter of the screen.
Um, what? I have 48 tiles on the Start Screen without needing to scroll, and the screenshot of the start menu there has only 29 items - the screen is 50% better for quantity of items it can display. And when you do need more items, you're going to have to navigate nested menus rather than simply scroll.

[Togath]

See, that's the part that gets me - what is so glorious about the start menu? I understand people are comfortable with it, but that's due to it having been commonplace for the last 19 years. After a day or two on Win8 I did not mourn its loss. To be perfectly frank, I'm pondering skipping over that update unless it comes with a 'turn start menu off' option, or at least an option for pressing the windows key to keep going to the start screen (I know, I know, heresy). But for all the abuse it received, the start screen allows for better visibility and much better organization than the start menu ever did, and the so-called 'jarring disruption' or whatever people are calling it these days was, to me, no worse than the disruption of having the start menu cover a good chunk of your screen.

Same with me, I personally prefer the start screen over a start menu.

[tyckspoon]

And at any rate, all I use either the Start Screen or the Start Menu for is typing in stuff I want to open. I couldn't care less about the other stuff, which is why the changes to search in 8.1 really annoyed me.

I find the Start Menu more useful for this, but that's probably because I have a long history of familiarity with the XP/Vista/Win7 way of doing this. But really it's not the Start Screen that bothers me - it's how tile-apps work in the Metro interface. I like working in multiple windows. Metro apps are not very conducive to this, with the tablet-centric paradigm of the app you have open consuming the entire workspace and being the only thing you're using at any given time. So work in Desktop, you say? I try to! But then I have to use the Start Screen for something.. and that drags you right back into Metro, and you have to force the computer to go back to Desktop. (Also, Metro Start Screen makes it harder to have a bunch of nifty wallpaper pictures >.>)

I really wouldn't have any problem with Win8 if it had a way make it use Desktop as the preferred default window, preferably with a non-Charm-bar search widget so I didn't have to touch Metro stuff unless there was something I wanted to do that really did work better in Metro. But it didn't, at least until this announcement.

[Peelee]

See, that's the part that gets me - what is so glorious about the start menu? I understand people are comfortable with it, but that's due to it having been commonplace for the last 19 years. After a day or two on Win8 I did not mourn its loss. To be perfectly frank, I'm pondering skipping over that update unless it comes with a 'turn start menu off' option, or at least an option for pressing the windows key to keep going to the start screen (I know, I know, heresy). But for all the abuse it received, the start screen allows for better visibility and much better organization than the start menu ever did, and the so-called 'jarring disruption' or whatever people are calling it these days was, to me, no worse than the disruption of having the start menu cover a good chunk of your screen.

BECAUSE I'M A CROTCHETY OLD MAN, THATS WHY.

Though I will say that with a touch screen computer, the Start Screen is pretty awesome. My wife absolutely loves the new Windows design, even if it took her a while to get used to it.

And so long as it doesn't impede my access to Kerbal too much, I don't complain THAT loudly about it.

[lesser_minion]

I find the Start Menu more useful for this, but that's probably because I have a long history of familiarity with the XP/Vista/Win7 way of doing this. But really it's not the Start Screen that bothers me - it's how tile-apps work in the Metro interface. I like working in multiple windows. Metro apps are not very conducive to this, with the tablet-centric paradigm of the app you have open consuming the entire workspace and being the only thing you're using at any given time. So work in Desktop, you say? I try to! But then I have to use the Start Screen for something.. and that drags you right back into Metro, and you have to force the computer to go back to Desktop. (Also, Metro Start Screen makes it harder to have a bunch of nifty wallpaper pictures >.>)

I really wouldn't have any problem with Win8 if it had a way make it use Desktop as the preferred default window, preferably with a non-Charm-bar search widget so I didn't have to touch Metro stuff unless there was something I wanted to do that really did work better in Metro. But it didn't, at least until this announcement.

Metro apps can already be moved around to only occupy a small portion of the screen (and an arbitrarily big or small portion of the screen in 8.1) by dragging the app from the top of the screen to the left or right (or find it in the recent apps list and drag it from there), and in 8.1, you can also tell Windows to go directly to the desktop through the navigation tab in the taskbar properties menu (right-click on the taskbar and click properties).

Note that you can also use your desktop wallpaper as a background to the start menu, although it's easier to do that through the start menu settings charm.

In general, though, Flickerdart has already made my points as far as the start screen is concerned. One thing I'll add is that the start screen also does a good job of giving you easy access to things you use frequently without having icons spewed all over the desktop.

[Flickerdart]

I find the Start Menu more useful for this, but that's probably because I have a long history of familiarity with the XP/Vista/Win7 way of doing this. But really it's not the Start Screen that bothers me - it's how tile-apps work in the Metro interface. I like working in multiple windows. Metro apps are not very conducive to this, with the tablet-centric paradigm of the app you have open consuming the entire workspace and being the only thing you're using at any given time. So work in Desktop, you say? I try to! But then I have to use the Start Screen for something.. and that drags you right back into Metro, and you have to force the computer to go back to Desktop. (Also, Metro Start Screen makes it harder to have a bunch of nifty wallpaper pictures >.>)

I really wouldn't have any problem with Win8 if it had a way make it use Desktop as the preferred default window, preferably with a non-Charm-bar search widget so I didn't have to touch Metro stuff unless there was something I wanted to do that really did work better in Metro. But it didn't, at least until this announcement.
I must say, I haven't had this experience at all. 8.1 boots to desktop. When I want a program, I hit Start, type in the name, hit Enter, and it launches to the desktop. What are you doing with the Metro screens that requires you to "force" the computer back to desktop?

[Tiiba]

I run Xubuntu in VirtualBox on Win8. So I have it both ways. I couldn't get a 64-bit version to work, so had to fetch 32-bit instead. It works just as well, though. Unlike CygWin, this really is Linux. You can even install Wine in it. Then use that to run VirtualBox, I guess.

[hajo]

I have a script, that starts up all the programs I usually need, and positions them to their place on the desktop.
And they stay there, all the time.

So, a menu/launcher/whatever is for rarely-used programs only --> I don't see the big deal here :smallamused:

[gomipile]

The start screen uses corner clicks as common shortcuts, and places important charms at the far right of the screen. I use a multi monitor setup, which means I can't quickly index on every corner of the home screen with a mouse, and the stuff at the edge of the screen gets overshot a lot unless it's near the corner where the start menu is in Windows 95 through 7.

[Elder Tsofu]

The start screen uses corner clicks as common shortcuts, and places important charms at the far right of the screen. I use a multi monitor setup, which means I can't quickly index on every corner of the home screen with a mouse, and the stuff at the edge of the screen gets overshot a lot unless it's near the corner where the start menu is in Windows 95 through 7.

Strange, I got my second monitor today and was pleasantly surprised that windows 8.1 seemed to work even better in that setup. Really simple to access all the pop-up bars on either of the screens. :smallsmile:

[gomipile]

Strange, I got my second monitor today and was pleasantly surprised that windows 8.1 seemed to work even better in that setup. Really simple to access all the pop-up bars on either of the screens. :smallsmile:

I have multiple systems with 2 or more monitors. Some are set up horizontally with the home monitor on the left, and one is set up with the monitors on top of each other with the home screen on the bottom. Basically, I want all the stuff that is traditionally in the start menu to be within a relatively small mouse distance of the lower left corner of the screen.