4 ms·

To be entirely fair, the normal way of shutting the computer down now is to use the start menu. Of course, everybody is used to it, but they did have to get use

by tikhonj 14y ago

To be entirely fair, the normal way of shutting the computer down now is to use the start menu. Of course, everybody is used to it, but they did have to get used to it at some point. And they did. So it isn't entirely impossible. When I used OS X for the first time, I couldn't figure out how to do basic things either. In fact, as it stands now, I am not entirely certain how to shut off an OS X computer either. Happily I'm on Linux and everything makes sense :).

dscrd 14y ago
Shouldn't the normal way of shutting down these days be pressing the power button?
Aethaeryn 14y ago
> I am not entirely certain how to shut off an OS X computer either. Open up the terminal and type: sudo halt (NOTE: In Linux, OpenBSD, and FreeBSD, the man pages state that 'halt -p' should be used for a power off, but the OS X man page states that it's just 'halt' with no -p tag available.)
- tikhonj 14y ago
  Yes, that would work. That's actually how I sometimes shut down my Linux machine, although it doesn't even require sudo. I was talking from the UI/mouse-driven perspective. I'm not entirely sure where the shutdown option/menu on OS X is. Of course, I regularly don't use macs, so it shouldn't be a surprise--it's not like I have a computer which I just don't know how to shut down!
  - mproud 14y ago
     → Shutdown… Or, press the power button once, get a restart/sleep/cancel/shutdown dialog (shortcuts: r/s/esc/return)
freehunter 14y ago
Happily I'm on Linux and everything makes sense :) Unless you're running Gnome 3, where you have to log out then shut down, since there's no shutdown button while logged in. That's one thing Unity has over Gnome 3.
- Aethaeryn 14y ago
  You can hold down Alt and then the Suspend button magically becomes Shutdown in the GNOME 3 shell's menu. Yes, it's not a very discoverable feature. You basically have to find out about it on the Internet somewhere.
- tikhonj 14y ago
  I'm actually on KDE. Because KDE is awesome. Also, I was being a little bit facetious. The reason everything makes sense is because I've customized everything, so I'm the one who placed the shutdown button where it is. Even so, I'm lazy so I use reboot/halt from the command line instead of the buttons anyhow.
- heywire 14y ago
  Press Ctrl-Alt-Del, then choose shutdown.
- rbanffy 14y ago
  If you are running Gnome 3, it's probably because you prefer Gnome 3 over Unity, KDE, LXDE, CFDE or any other GUI option you have.
mtgx 14y ago
If they bothered to remove the Start button, why are they still keeping the same UX paradigm...especially in Metro? It makes no sense. The whole UI and UX actually looks like a mess to me, and it's very inconsistent and much more complex than it should be.
- Aethaeryn 14y ago
  Yes. They should have saved the start button and tried to keep familiar concepts that they could then later slowly phase out in future releases. One way that they could have gradually introduced Metro in a way that would keep familiarity of use to old users and almost total backwards compatibility would have been to replace the desktop with Metro (i.e. the wallpaper and desktop icons). They could have then kept the start menu and panel[1] at the bottom (and perhaps default it to have auto-hide on). They could have even allowed windows to open up over the metro tiles, and then the familiar 'Show Desktop' button on the panel would be how you get back to the full metro screen. There wouldn't be two modes and they'd still have a very similar appearance to what Windows 8 actually looks like today without having to confuse people used to the old way of doing things. The tablet and mobile version would then not have the start menu and panel, but everything else would look and feel the same. They could even have implemented it in a similar way to their ancient 'Active Desktop' technology, except fullscreen and without the traditional icons.[2] [1] I'm using the Linux term here. I really have no clue what they call the bar at the bottom because I haven't used Windows regularly for many years. [2] http://i.technet.microsoft.com/dynimg/IC193546.gif http://i.technet.microsoft.com/dynimg/IC193546.gif
  - bztzt 14y ago
    I can definitely see some benefits of keeping the taskbar/panel on screen, but I think they were primarily motivated by the belief that designing the interface around apps being fullscreen would be more attractive to developers. The bottom edge is pretty important screen real estate both for touch (appbar) and mouse (scrollbar, zoom).
  - sanjiallblue 14y ago
    The start menu had to go because Windows 8 is Microsoft's big gamble to jump into the tablet market. A start menu doesn't make much design sense on a tablet or smartphone and they're clearly trying to out-design Apple with Windows 8.
CamperBob2 14y ago
Of course, everybody is used to it, but they did have to get used to it at some point Not really. Think back to your first encounter with Windows 95. What was the first thing you noticed, the first time you opened the Start menu? The fact that the bottom-most line read "Shut down" is probably high on your list. That was all you needed to know, and you certainly didn't have to "get used to it." Interfaces need to be highly intuitive, or else highly discoverable. It doesn't sound as if Metro qualifies as either.

by tikhonj 14y ago

dscrd 14y ago

Shouldn't the normal way of shutting down these days be pressing the power button?

Aethaeryn 14y ago

> I am not entirely certain how to shut off an OS X computer either. Open up the terminal and type: sudo halt (NOTE: In Linux, OpenBSD, and FreeBSD, the man pages state that 'halt -p' should be used for a power off, but the OS X man page states that it's just 'halt' with no -p tag available.)

tikhonj 14y ago
Yes, that would work. That's actually how I sometimes shut down my Linux machine, although it doesn't even require sudo. I was talking from the UI/mouse-driven perspective. I'm not entirely sure where the shutdown option/menu on OS X is. Of course, I regularly don't use macs, so it shouldn't be a surprise--it's not like I have a computer which I just don't know how to shut down!
- mproud 14y ago
   → Shutdown… Or, press the power button once, get a restart/sleep/cancel/shutdown dialog (shortcuts: r/s/esc/return)

freehunter 14y ago

Happily I'm on Linux and everything makes sense :) Unless you're running Gnome 3, where you have to log out then shut down, since there's no shutdown button while logged in. That's one thing Unity has over Gnome 3.

Aethaeryn 14y ago
You can hold down Alt and then the Suspend button magically becomes Shutdown in the GNOME 3 shell's menu. Yes, it's not a very discoverable feature. You basically have to find out about it on the Internet somewhere.
tikhonj 14y ago
I'm actually on KDE. Because KDE is awesome. Also, I was being a little bit facetious. The reason everything makes sense is because I've customized everything, so I'm the one who placed the shutdown button where it is. Even so, I'm lazy so I use reboot/halt from the command line instead of the buttons anyhow.
heywire 14y ago
Press Ctrl-Alt-Del, then choose shutdown.
rbanffy 14y ago
If you are running Gnome 3, it's probably because you prefer Gnome 3 over Unity, KDE, LXDE, CFDE or any other GUI option you have.

mtgx 14y ago

If they bothered to remove the Start button, why are they still keeping the same UX paradigm...especially in Metro? It makes no sense. The whole UI and UX actually looks like a mess to me, and it's very inconsistent and much more complex than it should be.

Aethaeryn 14y ago
Yes. They should have saved the start button and tried to keep familiar concepts that they could then later slowly phase out in future releases. One way that they could have gradually introduced Metro in a way that would keep familiarity of use to old users and almost total backwards compatibility would have been to replace the desktop with Metro (i.e. the wallpaper and desktop icons). They could have then kept the start menu and panel[1] at the bottom (and perhaps default it to have auto-hide on). They could have even allowed windows to open up over the metro tiles, and then the familiar 'Show Desktop' button on the panel would be how you get back to the full metro screen. There wouldn't be two modes and they'd still have a very similar appearance to what Windows 8 actually looks like today without having to confuse people used to the old way of doing things. The tablet and mobile version would then not have the start menu and panel, but everything else would look and feel the same. They could even have implemented it in a similar way to their ancient 'Active Desktop' technology, except fullscreen and without the traditional icons.[2] [1] I'm using the Linux term here. I really have no clue what they call the bar at the bottom because I haven't used Windows regularly for many years. [2] http://i.technet.microsoft.com/dynimg/IC193546.gif http://i.technet.microsoft.com/dynimg/IC193546.gif
- bztzt 14y ago
  I can definitely see some benefits of keeping the taskbar/panel on screen, but I think they were primarily motivated by the belief that designing the interface around apps being fullscreen would be more attractive to developers. The bottom edge is pretty important screen real estate both for touch (appbar) and mouse (scrollbar, zoom).
- sanjiallblue 14y ago
  The start menu had to go because Windows 8 is Microsoft's big gamble to jump into the tablet market. A start menu doesn't make much design sense on a tablet or smartphone and they're clearly trying to out-design Apple with Windows 8.

CamperBob2 14y ago

Of course, everybody is used to it, but they did have to get used to it at some point Not really. Think back to your first encounter with Windows 95. What was the first thing you noticed, the first time you opened the Start menu? The fact that the bottom-most line read "Shut down" is probably high on your list. That was all you needed to know, and you certainly didn't have to "get used to it." Interfaces need to be highly intuitive, or else highly discoverable. It doesn't sound as if Metro qualifies as either.