A Windows 8 rebuild plan for Microsoft

[Night Hawk]

Alright everyone you knew was going to come sooner or later! Some common sense approaches that is!

A Windows 8 rebuild plan for Microsoft

Summary: There's been much angst and consternation surrounding Windows 8, the big Blue update and the missing Start button. Fear not, Windows faithful, Ken Hess is here to help with suggestions for a Windows 8 rebuild.

By Ken Hess for Consumerization: BYOD

April 24, 2013 -- 17:47 GMT (10:47 PDT)

It's not often that I get all up in a company's "biness" with suggestions for rewriting a piece of software or an entire operating system but I'm taking this opportunity to do so. Microsoft needs my help on this and so do millions of lost users. I might be premature with this but, "You're welcome."

I do expect to hear whining from the usual suspects but I think the new interface, which I'm calling Fahrenheit 351, will entice you to love Windows again. Please enjoy my proposed enhancements.
I have decided to supply illustrations along the way to help guide Microsoft's developers and you, the future user, in how my enhancements and design changes work.

First, I want to get rid of that silly Metro interface with those ridiculous-looking, giant tiles. I want simplified pictures to use, let's call them icons that more accurately represent the underlying program. Here's an example of what Windows 8 currently offers and what I propose as a replacement.

see full report

(and have a laugh while you are at it! :sarc: )

 

[jimbo45]

Hi there
Looks like Windows 3.1 / Windows 3.11 !! Still runs fine in a VM as well even in 2014.
The Icons though are definitely more sensible than the stupid tiles.

However the whole Metro interface itself looks a bit Old in any case

Remember a decade or so back the Kiddy Menu from AOL.

Screenshots of both systems enc.

Cheers
jimbo

 

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Still several steps backwards.

 

[alphanumeric]

Anybody else having problems with Links to ZDNet articles on this site? That link and a couple of others here are crashing IE. I get a "Internet explorer has stopped working" twice and then a page cannot be found. If I Google it and go there that way the page loads fine?

 

[z3r010]

I cant see why there is nothing out of the ordinary with the link, I've just fired up IE to test and all seems fine to me.

 

[alphanumeric]

I was afraid you were going to say that. It's been happening over the last couple of days and always seems to be a link to ZDNET. CNet and PCWorld links are fine though. The page starts to load but fails. Going to the same article though Google works fine. I just reset IE and it didn't fix it. I'll have a look at the addins and maybe disable some of all of them as a test. Anyway, if it keeps up I'll start a new thread on it. Thanks for the reply.

 

[King Arthur]

Went in expecting something serious, came out laughing my behind off. ( ﾟ∀ﾟ)ｱﾊﾊ八八ﾉヽﾉヽﾉヽﾉ ＼ / ＼/ ＼

Thanks for the laugh, my good sir!

 

[Solarstarshines]

So is this Windows 8 /3.1 revised ?

Couldn't they just make it look like 7 but with better features this whole thing is a mess

 

[Night Hawk]

The sad part here is no longer being able to keep IE as the default browser while IE10 is at least one step forward while 8 took a major backwards! Yet I never cared for FireFox much either while the 64bit flavor has been doing quite well despite a few update notices. Never have any problem opening any good links to ZDNet or elsewhere with either browser.

Besides this was the better of the two articles on PCs they offered wednesday. The other was comparison of several brands and which was found to be the more reliable compared to which was seeing the most frequent crashes? Want the most reliable Windows PC? Buy a Mac (or maybe a Dell) | ZDNet

See all that 3.x stuff certainly brings back memories! Too bad the first of six 3 1/2" floppies can;t read from anymore when trying to a VM going for a look at that oldie! When seeing the comparisons to how things looked to what 8 brought with it you have to watch out you don't crack any ribs from laughing too hard! :roflmao:

 

[Solarstarshines]

Hi there
Looks like Windows 3.1 / Windows 3.11 !! Still runs fine in a VM as well even in 2014.
The Icons though are definitely more sensible than the stupid tiles.

However the whole Metro interface itself looks a bit Old in any case

Remember a decade or so back the Kiddy Menu from AOL.

Screenshots of both systems enc.

Cheers
jimbo

I have had aol since 2.1 was that the Prodigy version I really don't remember that screen call me forgetful
Also I think Us and Europe had different versions because I remember 3.0 had AOL logo the Earth and a Key symbol for getting connected

 

[jimbo45]

The sad part here is no longer being able to keep IE as the default browser while IE10 is at least one step forward while 8 took a major backwards! Yet I never cared for FireFox much either while the 64bit flavor has been doing quite well despite a few update notices. Never have any problem opening any good links to ZDNet or elsewhere with either browser.

Besides this was the better of the two articles on PCs they offered wednesday. The other was comparison of several brands and which was found to be the more reliable compared to which was seeing the most frequent crashes? Want the most reliable Windows PC? Buy a Mac (or maybe a Dell) | ZDNet

See all that 3.x stuff certainly brings back memories! Too bad the first of six 3 1/2" floppies can;t read from anymore when trying to a VM going for a look at that oldie! When seeing the comparisons to how things looked to what 8 brought with it you have to watch out you don't crack any ribs from laughing too hard! :roflmao:

Hi there
If you want the floppy images I can put them on to my Drop box account as floppy image files which can be read by a Virtual Machine.

Doing a spring House clean the other day I actually found a USB floppy drive adaptor -- not sure if I have the old Windows 3.11 floppies any more though.

Cheers
jimbo

 

[jimbo45]

Hi there
Looks like Windows 3.1 / Windows 3.11 !! Still runs fine in a VM as well even in 2014.
The Icons though are definitely more sensible than the stupid tiles.

However the whole Metro interface itself looks a bit Old in any case

Remember a decade or so back the Kiddy Menu from AOL.

Screenshots of both systems enc.

Cheers
jimbo

I have had aol since 2.1 was that the Prodigy version I really don't remember that screen call me forgetful
Also I think Us and Europe had different versions because I remember 3.0 had AOL logo the Earth and a Key symbol for getting connected

Remember this was the "Kiddies only" section part of the menu.

Cheers
jimbo

 

[prospero]

Yeah. Definitely a touch of Windows 3.1 but still better than Metro, which probably works fine on smartphones and tablets but has no place on a PC. (I'm showing my age).

 

[Faladu]

Have you run Windows 3.1 on a PC made in the past 12 years? It's amazingly fast on a Pentium-90....
Say no to bloat.... pretty please. :devil:

Ooops too late Bloat 8 is here.

 

[robinb9]

Yeah. Definitely a touch of Windows 3.1 but still better than Metro, which probably works fine on smartphones and tablets but has no place on a PC. (I'm showing my age).

lol no you are not, I feel the same way, I do not like it on a PC even though I have it. Without touch which now ups the price of a laptop, desktop, scrolling from right to left or visa versa with the mouse zooms the screen so fast your eyes go nuts, it is hard to adjust it and I have thought it was just my machines but I went into BestBuy and on their machines, laptops and desktops that they have on display, the same thing happens.
Windows 8, in my opinion should only be on a touch screen, ie TABLET or PHONE, I do not like it on a PC-Period! I even played with the touchscreen laptops and desktops and I did not like the way they behaved

 

[smarteyeball]

So is this Windows 8 /3.1 revised ?

Couldn't they just make it look like 7 but with better features this whole thing is a mess

It's a joke tommy.

 

[Night Hawk]

The sad part here is no longer being able to keep IE as the default browser while IE10 is at least one step forward while 8 took a major backwards! Yet I never cared for FireFox much either while the 64bit flavor has been doing quite well despite a few update notices. Never have any problem opening any good links to ZDNet or elsewhere with either browser.

Besides this was the better of the two articles on PCs they offered wednesday. The other was comparison of several brands and which was found to be the more reliable compared to which was seeing the most frequent crashes? Want the most reliable Windows PC? Buy a Mac (or maybe a Dell) | ZDNet

See all that 3.x stuff certainly brings back memories! Too bad the first of six 3 1/2" floppies can;t read from anymore when trying to a VM going for a look at that oldie! When seeing the comparisons to how things looked to what 8 brought with it you have to watch out you don't crack any ribs from laughing too hard! :roflmao:

Hi there
If you want the floppy images I can put them on to my Drop box account as floppy image files which can be read by a Virtual Machine.

Doing a spring House clean the other day I actually found a USB floppy drive adaptor -- not sure if I have the old Windows 3.11 floppies any more though.

Cheers
jimbo

I was trying to figure if I ever did get the first replace how to combine the 6 floppies into one iso since I did have a floppy drive in a 5 1/4" bay adapter on the old case but wasn't going to move that in on this one at anytime. Back in 2009 when the XP Mode beta release was first out I was trying out the old stuff like 98SE on VM while 3.1 and 95 didn't make it back them to VBox. VBox simply couldn't boot the first floppy image or floppy image made from it when transferring the platter over to a blank floppy.

Even with 98SE there were a few twists to get that oldies to even install once I had the VHD ready! I first had to copy a few files from the 98cd into a folder on the vhd and then run the 98 installer for it to even see the vhd! I was thinking that Bochs might be the better option for the oldies there since that also allows ME and 2000 without fuss and you know they had floppies as well.

Yeah. Definitely a touch of Windows 3.1 but still better than Metro, which probably works fine on smartphones and tablets but has no place on a PC. (I'm showing my age).

I am full agreement that MS trashed 8 as far as the gui is concerned! The Window RT gui for their ARM and then Surface Tablet series was implemented on 8 for pushing 8 out on the new tablets and Windows Phone. But why they released it on the desktop releases was simply a marketing decision which is obviously seen with the new Win 8 tv spots showing tablets only! Make everything look the same while 8 sales plummeted immediately when compared to Vista's initial struggles!