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Windows 8.1 Preview
- counterpointer 13y agoLive video of the keynote at BUILD http://channel9.msdn.com/ http://channel9.msdn.com/ Live blog http://live.theverge.com/live-microsoft-build-2013/ http://live.theverge.com/live-microsoft-build-2013/ Ballmer being his usual trademark excitable self. http://d35lb3dl296zwu.cloudfront.net/uploads/photo/image/13084/20130626-09220688--IMG_0087.JPG http://d35lb3dl296zwu.cloudfront.net/uploads/photo/image/130...
- agilebyte 13y agoThanks, always a pleasure to see the monkey man.
- lawnchair_larry 13y agoAll I see is Metro demos, which I want nothing to do with. Anyone have a list of the actual features?
- untog 13y agoThe Verge has a rundown: http://www.theverge.com/2013/6/26/4465888/windows-8-1-preview-video http://www.theverge.com/2013/6/26/4465888/windows-8-1-previe... spoiler: it involves a lot of Metro, what with it being the Windows UI now, and all.
- FreezerburnV 13y ago> and website owners can create separate Live Tiles that can be pinned to the Start Screen to access RSS feeds. That little tidbit really stood out as interesting to me. I seriously hope that MS does this well, and I can have live tiles for all my favorite sites that actually update with their new content.
- lurkinggrue 13y agoYeah, I would like less metro please and no more horizontal scrolling. Oh yes and less full screen shit. Would be nice.
- dm8 13y agoIt still feels like an OS designed purely for tablet computing.
- xradionut 13y agoI wanted to shout "Get your touch screen shit out of my server rack." Then I realize that I can run Server 2012 without a GUI or not. (evil smile) The one good thing about Windows 8 in my world is that it's forcing people to make decisions they have been putting off for years.
- revscat 13y ago> The one good thing about Windows 8 in my world is that it's forcing people to make decisions they have been putting off for years. What do you mean?
- jbigelow76 13y agoI think he means admin'ing your servers from CLI. Using the metro UI in Windows Server 2012 will make you want to hurl yourself out a window to avoid having to do it again.
- xradionut 13y agoCLI/PowerShell. Also there's the meta-decision that comes from questioning Redmond's judgment and actually looking at alternatives.
- abhinavk 13y agoThat, someday humanity will have to adapt NUI.
- xradionut 13y agoIf I think dirty thoughts will my file system become corrupted? :)
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- godgod 13y agoWill 8.1 still come with the NSA backdoor. If so, I do not want. Try Linux.
- counterpointer 13y agoHonest question, isn't there NSA written code in Linux via the SELinux patches that were integrated?
- ChikkaChiChi 13y agoWorse...they were the original developers of it.
- druiid 13y agoYes, but given that it's open-source I imagine if there was a back-door in it, someone would have found it by now. That said, they could purposefully have excluded security triggers for vulnerable kernel exploits which haven't been found yet... but as far as being some direct back-door in it by now I highly doubt that.
- kryten 13y agoLook at the OpenBSD IPsec fiasco and ask yourself that again.
- nivla 13y agoYes and No. I honestly don't believe there are backdoors in SELinux but it still follows the same path of Truecrypt. A lot of privacy advocates are wary of Truecrypt despite being open source because: 1. No one has yet thoroughly audited the source codes. Its too large and complex that it warrants a good amount of time and money. 2. The identity of the founders/maintainers are unknown. 3. The binary offered for download cannot be efficiently verified to the source. One of the things I have learned is that just because something is closed source, doesn't mean it has a backdoor and just because something is open source it doesn't mean it is secure. Always assume what you din't write is insecure and proceed accordingly.
- RyanZAG 13y agoI clicked through to the live feed on http://channel9.msdn.com/ http://channel9.msdn.com/ from the link there. I was right in time for the presenter to click on the new windows button which makes an incredibly jarring animation of tons of randomly colored tiles pop up over the screen. The presenter then says "not at all jarring ... not at all jarring". Sure, right, I think you need to get out of that reality distortion field - it's not working.
- counterpointer 13y agoHave you actually used Windows Phone or Windows 8 for any length of time? The animations are very subtle on actual devices and work very well with the flat look. Can't speak for the animations being screencasted across the internet via streaming video though which can introduce lag, jitter, FPS drops and artifacts, especially for fast moving scenes like animations. I'll reserve my judgment till I install the preview.
- RyanZAG 13y agoThe full screen, multi-colored tile metro screen is subtle and not jarring? The one that pops up whenever you want to launch a new program, completely removing any context of what you are currently working on? Is that what you're actually saying? The strange rotating 'subtle' animation you are trying to say makes up for this just makes it all the worse by putting completely unnecessary 'bling' all over a workstation.
- untog 13y agoSo you haven't used it, then?
- skrebbel 13y agoClearly he hasn't.
- counterpointer 13y agoI figured from your post that you were complaining about some new thing you noticed in Windows 8.1 from the live stream. Looks like I was mistaken and you were actually complaining about how Windows 8 has been since a couple of years which has been rehashed thousands of times on HN. You're right, however MS thinks it needs tablet apps to get on the tablet train and one way to increase exposure is to make desktop users look at live tiles, however misguided that it maybe. There is a setting in Windows 8.1 to boot straight to desktop to make it better on boot. http://microsoft-news.com/new-start-button-screenshot-disbable-hot-corners-boot-to-desktop-shutdown-from-start-button-in-windows-8-1/# http://microsoft-news.com/new-start-button-screenshot-disbab...
- philliphaydon 13y agoREALLY hope I can turn off the start button.
- mariusmg 13y agoSame here. That thing is useless.
- jpreiland 13y agoIs its function the exact same as pressing the Windows key (bringing up all the app tiles/metro UI thing)? I already do that whenever I want to start something. I tend to navigate using only my keyboard when possible, so when I open stuff up I just hit Windows key and start typing what I want ("chr" and then Enter would start Chrome, for example). The only downside to the technique I use is that they separate Apps from Settings/Utilities (whatever word they use), so if I want control panel type stuff, I have to arrow down to that filter to see the search results that I want. I hope 8.1 consolidates that (or that there's an option to make it work that way) Before today I was under the impression that the start button they were bringing back would be like the Windows 7 start button.
- lurkinggrue 13y agoPeople wanted a start menu that didn't take up the whole screen. They just put in a button. I just want less full screen shit.
- luchs 13y agoYou can also use Windows + W to search in Settings.
- lurkinggrue 13y agoSo brave.
- overgryphon 13y agoIt's nice in remote desktop. When you aren't in full screen mode it was annoyingly difficult to get the mouse exactly on the single-pixel-or-two hot corner.
- ChikkaChiChi 13y agoBing integrated all over the place? Does Microsoft honestly think they'd lost enough market share that they are no longer viable candidates for antitrust lawsuits?
- revscat 13y agoObivously, and I'd argue rightfully. Microsoft HAS lost market share, especially if you include tablet/smartphone OSs in the mix. I cannot seem to find it now, but not too long ago I ran across a survey which included portable devices into their calculations of OS marketshare percentages, and determined that Microsoft now has a minority share of the global OS market when those numbers are included. Microsoft still dominates on the desktop, but the desktop doesn't matter like it once did. I doubt that the government will express much interest here, and rightfully so.
- jbigelow76 13y agoMicrosoft never had enough market share in search to warrant antitrust lawsuits[1]. [1]That doesn't mean the EU won't use totally unrelated market share stats from 5 years ago to continue treating Microsoft like a money pinata.
- soundgecko 13y agoI doubt even the EU will act against the only meager competition to Google's absolute dominance. Not to mention that devices with Google as default are the majority these days because of iOS, Android on phones and tablets with declining PC sales. Bing is only default in IE which in nullified in EU because of the browser ballot, Google pays off Mozilla and some OEMs to have it as the default.
- russellsprouts 13y agoYou can turn all of the integration off, if you choose. Europe may still go after them.
- ChikkaChiChi 13y agoI guess I'm a little shocked at how willingly everyone just thinks this is ok. Bundling like this is not in the best interest of the consumer. Why would interested in artificially inflating a company's market share in an unrelated space because you forget to disable it? Are you going to be ok if Microsoft introduces ad tiles in Metro?
- ladzoppelin 13y agoI actually really enjoy Windows 8 and will probably just wait for 8.1 to be released. Its cool their listening to their customers but I hope they don't force the start menu back on everyone. At least boot to desktop will be awesome considering my "D" key is broken and clicking the "Desktop" tile takes an eternity.
- MWil 13y agothe video doesn't show a single desktop improvement. as a purely desktop user (never once having used a metro app), is there anything for me in 8.1?
- pmarsh 13y agoYup, tweaks to what they're calling the "Power user menu" Start+x and Display Scaling and of course now you can boot right to the desktop. http://winsupersite.com/windows-8/hands-windows-81 http://winsupersite.com/windows-8/hands-windows-81
- kvb 13y agoI'm sure there are several, though I don't know if there's a comprehensive list. For instance, DPI scaling can now be set per-monitor.
- kryptiskt 13y agoYou can boot to desktop, turn of the hot corners, and there's a start button with a nifty right-click menu. So there's something.
- davidcollantes 13y agoOh dear. I have used Windows 8 (work on IT, I am forced to). Windows 8.1 seems to look, and behave just the same as Windows 8. Adoption not happening here.
- iaskwhy 13y agoThat's curious. If it looks and behaves exactly the same then adoption (as in updating) shouldn't be a problem.
- skrebbel 13y agoI like it. Nearly all the features shown off in that video make me go "want!". The additional start screen organizing features are precisely what i'm looking for. Now all I want is more and better fullscreen apps. Not the "your favourite news source" apps. They're bullshit on phones and they're even more bullshit on PCs or big tablets. Real, useful apps. Like a barebones spreadsheet that fits in a sidebar. Zen-writing text editor. Extensions for IE-in-fullscreen-mode. Music player that doesn't suck and doesn't want to be all "cloud". They're getting real close here. I really hope app vendors follow suit. (p.s. if you try Win8 without a touchscreen, you didn't really try it at all)
- lurkinggrue 13y agoI can't get past the fact that I hate full screen at all.
- untog 13y agoWell, Windows 8 probably has the best handling for screen sharing out of any tablet OSes- the whole "snap" functionality is very clever. Not so for desktops, of course.
- acturbo 13y agopersonally, i don't care about Windows on a tablet ... i develop software and create graphics using a 24" monitor ... i don't like seeing full screen anything. Windows 8 is a disaster for serious content creators and productivity professionals like me.
- Freaky 13y agoWhat, all because of a fullscreen start menu? Start8 lets you configure it to open in a smaller popup overlay if you'd prefer. Or indeed have an old Windows 7 style menu instead.
- kryptiskt 13y agoProject Spark looks like a fun toy.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- kryten 13y agoAvailable on MSDN subscriber downloads in x64 ISO form now. Downloading at a pitiful 600k/sec :(
- moheeb 13y agoMaybe this shows a generational gap...but I don't think I could ever consider downloading at 600k/sec pitiful.
- DanBC 13y agoWe need some nice speed simulators so people can see what it's like downloading text over 300 baud; 1200 / 75 bps; 9,600 bps and 14,400 bps. You can read the text as it downloads. You use interlaced jpegs so that people can see something while the rest of the image downloads.
- MrDOS 13y agoSloppy[1] is a really old tool that does this. For iOS development specifically, I've been told of Network Link Conditioner[2], and supposedly, Fiddler[3] and Charles[4] both includes some of this functionality. 1. http://www.dallaway.com/sloppy/ http://www.dallaway.com/sloppy/ 2. http://mattgemmell.com/2011/07/25/network-link-conditioner-in-lion/ http://mattgemmell.com/2011/07/25/network-link-conditioner-i... 3. http://fiddler2.com/ http://fiddler2.com/ 4. http://www.charlesproxy.com/ http://www.charlesproxy.com/
- kryten 13y agowell to be honest this line usually gets 1200-1500k/sec but it just rained which knackers it for a day at average. The joys of ADSL. Agree in a way though. I still remember being utterly jaw droppingly surprised when I got a 128k ISDN instead of my lowly 28.8k Hayes+POTS setup.
- kryten 13y agoInstalled. Don't like it at all. The apps screen is a disaster and it's clunkier than Windows 8 was originally. Not impressed and rather annoyed that I wasted another evening.
- Freaky 13y agoCan anyone confirm whether or not this includes ReFS support? That's probably more important to me than any other feature 8.1 could possibly offer, having encountered silent data corruption just a few months ago (thanks, WD).
- ayi 13y agoReFS is includes since Windows 8's initial release but only on Server editions.
- Freaky 13y agoYes, hence wanting to know if it's included in 8.1 preview as it has been in the leaked prerelease. http://www.winbeta.org/news/leaked-windows-blue-build-9369-hints-refs-client-support-windows-81 http://www.winbeta.org/news/leaked-windows-blue-build-9369-h...