Microsoft drops 'risky' Windows 8 preview on World
Microsoft has released to the World near-final code for Windows 8 - its riskiest bet yet. Officially called a Consumer Preview, but actually a beta, the next Windows 8 milestone will be the release candidate followed by release to manufacturing, Windows Division president Steven Sinofsky said Wednesday. Microsoft chose the …
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No Iberian languages?
I mean who speaks German but not English?
</not-exactly-crucial-I-realise>
Re: I mean who speaks German but not English?
Ummm, quite a few Germans, Austrians and Swiss?
Re: Re: I mean who speaks German but not English?
<scouse>Exactly!<scouse>
Re: No Iberian languages?
Well you have to consider the Windows 8 target demographic. They aren't exactly aiming at people with good education, that's a market long lost to Linux.
@Christian
Ok so: German and English speakers are all stupid, or is it that all Linux users are super intelligent?
Either way, it must be great to be able to congratulate yourself on your own intelligence, based on your choice of OS. That is an OS, which I'm constantly reading on The Register can be used with no special knowledge. In fact I'm constantly assured that people's grandparents are using, never having seen a computer before with no training whatsoever.
Re: @Christian
" In fact I'm constantly assured that people's grandparents are using, never having seen a computer before with no training whatsoever."
They can stand on it to reach the sherry.
Re: Re: No Iberian languages?
Well you have to consider the Windows 8 target demographic. They want people with actual money to spend, not bankrupt Southern Europeans.
There FTFY.
Re: No Iberian languages?
They want people with actual money to spend, not bankrupt Southern Europeans.
What about countries outside southern Europe that speak those languages?
How's Brazil's economy doing?
Re: Re: No Iberian languages?
"How's Brazil's economy doing?"
I dunno, why don't you ask a favela inhabitant?
Re: Re: No Iberian languages?
Ah, I see, you've managed to confuse "education" with "all-consuming smugness".
Easy mistake to make.
Well you have to consider the Windows 8 target demographic.
Metrosexuals
Downloading now. Looks interesting...as with others, I'm really not sure about removing the Start button, but at least they're trying. I'm actually kinda warming to Metro, but not on the desktop. The whiplash I get from moving to and from it is just too much.
I'm really not sure about removing the Start button
I think it's a great start (if you'll pardon the pun), now all that needs to be done is to get rid of the rest of windows.....
Metro - no thanks.
I won't be putting Metro on anything. It's fucking ugly, it's too simplistic to be useful.
Re: Metro - no thanks.
Completely, utterly, totally, whole-heartedly; 100% disagree.
Re: Metro - no thanks.
And the constant context switching between Metro and the Desktop when launching multiple non-Metro apps (what most of us will be doing, at least at the outset) is distracting.
Re: Re: Metro - no thanks.
For a mobile device, maybe, but not a workstation.
Re: Metro - no thanks.
So fine - you can use W8 in desktop mode on your PC. Nobody forces you to use Metro.
Re: Metro - no thanks.
Wow. Computing for da future. Set up ur new computer to dual boot to both Windows 8 with Metro and Ubuntu 12.04 with Hud. Your computing experience will be enhanced
Re: Re: Metro - no thanks.
Not that easily - it starts in Metro mode, and every time you click the new Start button from the desktop you get transported back to Metro land. And, at least so far as I've seen, there is no way to configure W8 for "classic" mode so that you get something resembling the W7 or previous start menu, etc. So you would have to find/build your own, or litter the desktop with shortcuts to launch apps. And lather/rinse/repeat for every program you want to run, new software installs, etc. Trying to maintain that is going to be a right royal pain. You say nobody forces you to use Metro, but MS is doing everything they can short of actually removing the desktop to do exactly that.
Re: Re: Metro - no thanks.
For that matter, nobody is forcing you to use W8. I just recently upgraded from XP Pro to W7. I think I'll wait until W9.
Let's all remember, the OS is not an application. It's a way to run applications.
Go figure
......yet "Leapfrog/Fisher Price" iOS is lapped up. Talk about f cking UGLY! People have told me they wanted an iPhone because it's simplistic. Thats one of the reasons I believe iOS users need 'special' assistance. (They're a bit thick.)
@Obviously
How incredibly self-righteous of you to assume that unless your O/S comes with a 1990's style flight-sim keyboard overly and requires 2 years of training it's utter shit!
I personally have no interest in the iOS gadgets, happy with what I have but here's a small smidgen of a clue about interface design. How about people want to use technology to ( well bugger me! ) GET STUFF DONE!
Your average techno-gadget punter, if you're still listening Mr Smug-Chops, just wants to buy a gadget and get stuff done. Well paint me blue and call me Susan! People want to buy things and get stuff done, not spend hours dicking about to make it sing and dance? Yep, that's right, they want to buy it and use it! Even if that gadget and it's interface falls a little short at the moment, if it's capable of getting 90% of the user's tasks done, it will do for the time being.
So when you design something that a million people will stamp over their own Granny to get hold of, then you can stand tall and proud in your ivory tower shitting on everyone else, until then STFU!
Re: Go figure
I simpler is always worse, then let's all use mainframes and machine code.
Re: Re: Go figure
simpler is always worse, then let's all use mainframes and machine code.
Simpler!!!!!! FFS you've never had to work with a badly written/Telon generated CICS program...
Re: @Obviously
"Well paint me blue and call me Susan!" -- You sir owe me a new Red Dwarf themed keyboard and a fresh cup of coffee. I also quite agree that some folk like to actually work on their computers and get stuff done.
Re: Metro - no thanks.
The thing is, the whole experience is ANYTHING BUT simplistic.
Two internet explorers, two control panels, two ways of doing a handful of things.
The whole thing is a complete abomination, designed simply to try to sell you crap through the Microsoft Store so they can grab a cut.
A real shame, since there are a handful of technical advances buried under there somewhere. Buried under a mountain of baby-poop green and colourful squares.
ITYM - Not Android? Not by Sony? - no thanks. *hatehatehate*
I fixed that title for Barry because he forgot to declare an interest.
I'm interested at the difference in attitudes between the Reg and the Tech blogs.
The commentards here are pretty much 90% along the lines of "hate fail lol Vista Fisher-Price lol we're so superior etc".
The commentards on Engadget or the Verge - known Apple cultist haunts, interestingly, are 90% "wow, love it, downloading, this is amazing etc"
I think the difference is that people read the gadget blogs because they actively want new things. The commentards on the Reg, it appears, absolutely do not.
Sorry El Reg. Your readership are turning into the demographic that buys the Telegraph
Re: @Obviously
Don't beat around the bush - tell him(her) what you really think
Am I the only one who finds this entire "tile" interface fugly?
Looks like
It looks like something Fischer-Price would make. They make toys for very young children.
No of course not.
There's you and the fella who threw himself in front of a train at Didsbury this afternoon.
Enjoy tomorrow.
@Fishman
That's what everybody said about XP, many of the same people are saying that about Win8/Metro despite never having seen anything except a screenshot of it.
Hate it - I have a 24" monitor not a 10" tablet!
Can the tile rubbish be disabled? Just give me the Windows 7 desktop and start menu, plus the hidden technology improvements of 8. That's all.
The server version better not have this stupid interface otherwise Microsoft have shot themselves in the nuts.
Re: @Fishman
I've seen it and used it since the developer preview was released, and I still don't like it. At all.
Re: Hate it - I have a 24" monitor not a 10" tablet!
How about you read a single article about W8, and get back to us on that?
No, I think 99% of the world do as well.
It's Microsoft's very own Unity disaster...
Re: Hate it - I have a 24" monitor not a 10" tablet!
"The server version better not have this stupid interface otherwise Microsoft have shot themselves in the nuts."
You're right, it probably won't. From what I've heard, you'll be saying goodbye to a GUI!
Re: Hate it - I have a 24" monitor not a 10" tablet!
Well, I have both. I'm downloading the preview as I write, and will be throwing that onto a VM (displayed on the big monitor), but I would also be interested in trying W8 on my 10" tablet (currently running Froyo) - only I don't see an ARM download.
@ anon 19:19
I've used it
It's fugly
It's not for desktop usage
But marketing will love it.
Re: Hate it - I have a 24" monitor not a 10" tablet!
Actually the server version has no interface, to my knowledge it's going CLI :)
@Busted
I wonder how Barry Shitpeas will object to the server being CLI only?
You know he will find a way.
@ Steve Foster
ARM devices usually require some device-specific code or variables outside the purview of the OS in order boot, as they don't have anything like a bios that's needed to discover the hardware config. And that's not to mention the various processor family differences etc
It's pretty likely (IMHO) that Windows for ARM will only ever be available pre-configured on devices.
Re: @Fishman
That's actually nonsense. I'd hope on a reputable meeting place such as El Reg, that those commenting have tried the Dev Preview and Consumer Preview. I certainly have. It's not good, it is a complete mess, by any standard.
The reason why people said XP looked stupid is because they had a bright blue theme with a green start button. If you were sensible, you chose the silver theme and had a decent enough looking desktop.
If you loved the old stuff, you chose classic, job done, couple of clicks. Nothing was radically different to 2000 to the point of being unusable, by any means.
The dubious changes in Windows 8 are far more than "click here to change classic theme if you hate new themes, job done".
Re: Re: @Fishman
XP looked good with the Royale theme, which gave the title/taskbars a metallic style sheen.
Metro is like win3.x program manager, and the "hot corners" will be a shambles on a multiple monitor setup.
So... slim to none?
“We paid just as much attention to using Windows 8 with a mouse and keyboard as with touch”
Re: So... slim to none?
t seems strange that their internal reviews didn't catch that before they made the last public release.
Re: So... slim to none?
Ah I see Steve, so when he said:
“We paid just as much attention to using Windows 8 with a mouse and keyboard as with touch”
He was LYING. That's right - HE IS A LIAR.
Fool.
@Phoenix50: Re: Re: So... slim to none?
Frankly, dear boy, yes.
That's what I've learnt as a dev and user in the past 20 years of dealing with MS & their products. What they say is, as far as possible, indifferent to the actuality yet still remain legal.
So, yes.
Re: @Phoenix50: Re: Re: So... slim to none?
Bzzzt. Disagree.
So I guess it's a tie, dear boy.
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