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In 1993, the Windows Taskbar actually began life as tabs across the top of the screen: https://www.businessinsider.com.au/history-of-the-windows-start-button-2

In 1993, the Windows Taskbar actually began life as tabs across the top of the screen: https://www.businessinsider.com.au/history-of-the-windows-start-button-2015-7 https://www.businessinsider.com.au/history-of-the-windows-st...

WaldoLydecker 6y ago
Ahead of their time in breaking the desktop analogy.
afterburner 6y ago
Seems a key change was to name the button "Start" instead of "System". It's a built in instruction!
- pidg 6y ago
  Reminds me of the (apocryphal?) story that the 'OK' button is only labelled that way because in user testing people read the original text - 'Do It' - as 'Dolt'.
mixmastamyk 6y ago
Funny. I never liked the taskbar at the bottom of the screen on Windows, so I always move it to the top. To this day, it still screws up new window alignment, twenty five-ish years later. After I moved to Linux and 16:9 monitors became mandatory I moved my gnome/mate taskbar to the left side, where it has stayed for about a decade. It is a bit clumsy in the vertical position, but does the job.
ajtjp 6y ago
That isn't quite the same a what this software is or what Groupy does, but that is a fascinating article. I loved this part: --- For instance, one study subject took twenty minutes of staring at a Windows 3.1 desktop before being able to open a text editing program. Finally, a programmer spoke up that this was unacceptable, to Oran’s relief. But that relief would be short lived: “Our customers are morons!” exclaimed the programmer. This was frustrating enough, Oran says. But then they talked to that user, and it turns out that he was actually a propulsion engineer for Boeing. “He was literally a rocket scientist,” Oran says. “And even he couldn’t figure out Windows.” --- IMO the #1 opportunity for open source software to gain more mainstream acceptance is focusing on making it easier for non-technical users to use. Which is hard when most of your userbase is technical users. Microsoft deserves credit for realizing they had a usability problem, and having made major improvements to that over the years.
- TeMPOraL 6y ago
  > IMO the #1 opportunity for open source software to gain more mainstream acceptance is focusing on making it easier for non-technical users to use. Which is hard when most of your userbase is technical users. Microsoft deserves credit for realizing they had a usability problem, and having made major improvements to that over the years. ... I don't know. On the one hand, I applaud the sentiment. On the other hand, general computing needs of technical users are already becoming a niche too small for the market to serve. If Open Source community gets into their heads that they should optimize for non-technical users, I fear we'll have a dearth of tools...

WaldoLydecker 6y ago

Ahead of their time in breaking the desktop analogy.

afterburner 6y ago

Seems a key change was to name the button "Start" instead of "System". It's a built in instruction!

pidg 6y ago
Reminds me of the (apocryphal?) story that the 'OK' button is only labelled that way because in user testing people read the original text - 'Do It' - as 'Dolt'.

mixmastamyk 6y ago

Funny. I never liked the taskbar at the bottom of the screen on Windows, so I always move it to the top. To this day, it still screws up new window alignment, twenty five-ish years later. After I moved to Linux and 16:9 monitors became mandatory I moved my gnome/mate taskbar to the left side, where it has stayed for about a decade. It is a bit clumsy in the vertical position, but does the job.

ajtjp 6y ago

That isn't quite the same a what this software is or what Groupy does, but that is a fascinating article. I loved this part: --- For instance, one study subject took twenty minutes of staring at a Windows 3.1 desktop before being able to open a text editing program. Finally, a programmer spoke up that this was unacceptable, to Oran’s relief. But that relief would be short lived: “Our customers are morons!” exclaimed the programmer. This was frustrating enough, Oran says. But then they talked to that user, and it turns out that he was actually a propulsion engineer for Boeing. “He was literally a rocket scientist,” Oran says. “And even he couldn’t figure out Windows.” --- IMO the #1 opportunity for open source software to gain more mainstream acceptance is focusing on making it easier for non-technical users to use. Which is hard when most of your userbase is technical users. Microsoft deserves credit for realizing they had a usability problem, and having made major improvements to that over the years.

TeMPOraL 6y ago
> IMO the #1 opportunity for open source software to gain more mainstream acceptance is focusing on making it easier for non-technical users to use. Which is hard when most of your userbase is technical users. Microsoft deserves credit for realizing they had a usability problem, and having made major improvements to that over the years. ... I don't know. On the one hand, I applaud the sentiment. On the other hand, general computing needs of technical users are already becoming a niche too small for the market to serve. If Open Source community gets into their heads that they should optimize for non-technical users, I fear we'll have a dearth of tools...