This piece is written a little... enthusiastically. That said, I would completely agree that the "Ah-ha!" moment for me with Windows 8 was when I tried it out on a touch-screen enabled laptop (something from Acer at Costco).<p>Suddenly the horrible "tiles" dashboard brought up by the Windows key made much more sense to me, was more fluid than I anticipated and after about 10 mins playing on the laptop I walked away feeling "Yep, this is exactly how a laptop should be."<p>I was really surprised. Found it instantly intuitive and a faster way to navigate my way around the computer.<p>There are also a slew of more advanced keyboard shortcuts in Win8 as well that make me happy that Microsoft hasn't forgotten about keyboard-driven folks.<p>I know there is a lot of Win8 hate going around, but so far, I think it was a good move. Very curious how Blue Sky (8.next codename?) turns out though.
Things hold me back from "loving" windows (I say this as a continuing daily user of Windows for 18+ years) as my primary system instead of my MacBook Air.<p><pre><code> o Add a half decent gcc/bash/posix tool chain (something built in, not cygwin)
o Include a decent terminal/ssh client.
o License apple's touch pad
</code></pre>
They've got a lot of things going for them:<p><pre><code> o Better Games
o The new tablet/wacom SurfacePro blows away anything apple
offers for stylus digitization on the iPad.
</code></pre>
Microsoft has a chance here - they just have to keep pushing.
I had high hopes for Windows 8 and honestly believed the hybrid experience of desktop and tiles wouldn't be all that bad. What I fool am I. Since spending more time with it I can't believe just how frustrating the experience of constantly needing to switch between the two is.<p>To add insult to this injury is how badly thought out so many of the little details of Windows 8 seem to be. From creating your user account (forced to choose a password hint?) to using the system search everything feels clunky and always involved an unnecessary extra step.<p>I will agree that the only thing that does feel decent and well thought out is the touch experience. After trying it out on a surface if you simply use the tiles and IE10 the experience is actually quite fluid and nice. However the problem remains, Windows 8 is still meant to be the next major version of Windows and not just some tablet OS. On a desktop (even a touch desktop) and in the hands of a power user it's an abject failure.
So I got a Surface RT recently, and as someone who hasn't used Windows since XP came out, I came away pretty impressed. I think the weakest aspect of the Windows experience has always been the hardware that it runs on, and Surface gives us glimpses of what Microsoft can do when it keeps the OEM's at arms-length.<p>It's a deeply flawed product in a lot of ways. I don't know why Google can make a $300 Nexus 4 with Quad-Core Snapdragon + Adreno 320 graphics and 320 ppi display, while Surface RT at $500 comes with an aging Tegra 3 and 150 ppi display. And contrary to what all the apologists on the internet were saying, you miss that extra measure of power when you see simple animations drop frames or when you realize you just don't have enough horizontal pixels to comfortably view a pdf while holding the device in portrait mode (the Surface Pro's screen is a huge step up in that regard). Windows 8 isn't fully baked yet. It doesn't have the reassuring visual solidity of iOS, which comes from a painstaking attention to avoiding redraw flicker. The apps in the Microsoft Store, with the exception of some great ones like the Netflix app or Fotor, are of almost uniformly shitty quality. The gestures are well-implemented, but so undiscoverable I'd never give a Win 8 machine to my mother... There are instances of the "old Microsoft" peeking through--things that make you go "did anyone even use this?" For example, the background level of the headphone amp is very noisy. It's not a problem for music, but if you're listening for the keypress feedback, you hear the background hiss come on and off as Windows turns off the sound-card between bouts of typing.<p>All that out of the way, it's the first non-Apple devices that I've actually found charming. From the magnesium case to the felt of the type/touch covers, it feels like a device that's worth $500. It looks nothing like an iPad but it manages to look great. It's something you want to touch and turn around in your hands and the PC OEM's have never been able to bring that to the Windows ecosystem. Once you figure out how the gestures work, they are efficient and fluid to use. At least as long as you stay in Metro (and ignore the desktop bolted onto the side like some weird monstrosity), the UI looks coherent. It looks like someone actually designed it, instead of having a bunch of engineers do whatever the hell they wanted.<p>I'm not surprised it's not selling well--I wouldn't recommend one to anyone unless they have very specific needs, but at the same time I'm actually excited to see what the next iteration looks like. I haven't been able to say that for a non-Apple product in years.
This whole article was gushing over how <i>beautiful</i> and <i>modern</i> his experience was, but the one and only actual example he uses of it actually doing something for him was that it found printer drivers. This was written like a fashion article.
I just bought a Lumia 620 and the tiles system is just that good. I do miss the possibility of Android (widgets and number of apps) but I really really dig where Microsoft is going lately. Metro looks great, their last products (Bing, Office, Internet Explorer, Surface...) do too. I'm waiting for their new Xbox announcement but I really feel like they're getting back into the game.<p>I'll still be a bit skeptical on the Windows 8 until I try it myself. But as we always say, better skip a version every two windows.<p>EDIT: I almost forgot what they did with the kinnect those past years.
I've had a Surface RT for a few months now and the experience has been disappointing. The tablet feels slower and much less polished than the three year old, cheaper, Windows Phone 7 device I have lying around.<p>Maybe Windows 8 works great on the Pro, but I feel like Microsoft did a bait and switch by promoting RT like they did.
I will not love Windows anymore unless they show file extensions by default, allow scrolling areas without click to give it focus first, allow changing the volume by using the scrollwheel over the speaker tray icon, don't have such a small limit for amount of characters in the command line, have incremental history in the command line, and other things like that.<p>I'm not their target user.
Microsoft may be bringing innovative UI to the market. They may even have a technically mature infrastructure. But how are they going to regain the trust they lost by breaking API and promises time after time in the last twenty years ?
I have been using windows 8 on my MacBook and frankly, I hate the work flow. I can, however, see how a tablet form factor would suit the os nicely. For most things I use windows for(visual studio, ssms, file manipulation and some occasional web dev) the context switch DRIVES ME BANANAS! I often start new processes with cmd + r and it seems win 8 doesn't like my timing because half the time I get a run dialog and the other half I get the metro screen of reduced productivity.<p>Some other complaints about win 8- the metro apps all seem to take FOREVER to launch. You get this giant c64esque splash screen for 10-15 seconds. Feels confining to me. The task switching needs improvement. Wish I could see a screen of all my running apps and click the one I need. Anyone that can provide advice would be owed a beer.
Yeah, with the users point of view, 8 is stunning!!!<p>But what about the developers and power users? Think about those AAA game development studios, Large budget software houses? Will they develop high end software by touch?<p>This will sound a little off-topic, but I would like to bring this to notice, anyway... -- GNOME 3 --<p>Yes, the open source community made a similar move like metro some days ago... And to be honest, I will not like to use a touch based UI for development until someone forces me with iron fists!!!
The article was pretty good, but this bothered me: "For most of February". A time frame too short for me to make any conclusions about an OS.<p>A few weeks is usually how long I will use a "gee-wiz" feature of an OS/app/software until I turn off the unnecessary glitz (that's probably now choking my hardware) and get down to business.
It reads like a testimonial for a questionable health product.<p>I have difficulty believing that anyone can wax so rhapsodic about Windows 8's UI. It's so clunky and frustrating that the best you can expect to be is "resigned to your fate".<p>Me, I couldn't wait to scrap that shit off and load me some Slackware.
Although it is nice to see people are using Windows 8 and like it, these articles do not bring anything to the table.<p>I remember the first time I figured out Windows xp, Windows 7, fedora , ubuntu , mac OS 10 , yes I was very excited for each occasion. But it was not worth an article . Every OS is useful for some needs so let's move on.
Coming from a site that has an atrocious mobile web interface, not even worth the read.<p>People come back to love their abusive spouses too. Doesn't make it right :)
well there are Windows 8 users!!!!..the main feature as a web developer i like in Windows8 is its native support to JavaScript...wen i get free the next task is to make some JS apps for Windows8..also i got to know that UbuntuOS and FireFoxOS does give JS as native support...and hopefully in future they together improve HTML5 support than their own API in JS..
dude.. go to ubuntu or mountain lion and then write another article...<p>I don't like windows because:<p>1. I don't have terminal
2. I can't configure it easily
3. I don't like to have lots of things in taskbar
4. I want multi-workspace and easy to switch between them
5. I want more fullscreen stuff..
6. filesystem built not ok! viruses in windows are a big threat! I don't want antivirus
What I notice is, although the author compares the gloriousness of Win8 to various other products, he takes very special care to not mention iOS or a single Apple product. Not once.