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Quote: Microsoft's Chaitanya Sareen explains that the company has witnessed a "trend" towards using the new taskbar as a way to simply launch applications rather than navigating to links within the Start menu
You mean Microsoft is seeing the behavioural changes from users as more and more people move to a Mac and get used to the Docking Bar?
Well, I guess this will be a self-fulfilling prophesy then.
cheers,
Chris Maunder
The Code Project | Co-founder
Microsoft C++ MVP
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OK but that still makes very little sense. People are using the taskbar with pinned items more? Ok nice. But you're not going to put all your programs there, or pretty soon you'll have to upgrade your monitor because "your computer is full".
So ok they "give" us a menu (nevermind that we already had it) to solve that problem, but then they hide it. Why? The start orb wasn't taking up so much screen real estate that is was a problem.
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Hmm. I'm "still" on WinXP and I suspect it may be the last operating system I ever use; once this machine dies I guess my IT life will go with it.
It's been a while since I actually clicked the start button (why click when Ctrl-Esc does the job and your hands are on the keyboard anyway? Is it stupid of me to assume that they have't got rid of the keyboard shortcut too?) My Start menu currently has over 200 shortcuts on it, but in an organised, structured system, nothing more than 4 levels deep (even that's too much, really). But it's quick and easy to navigate and I know what's where. I can navigate it using the keyboard (once I changed all the MS Office menu names back to Access, Word, Excel from the stupid "Microsoft Access", "Microsoft Word", "Microsoft Excel" etc introduced in Office2003 which rendered keyboard shortcuts useless...) Are MS really suggesting I pin over 200 shortcuts to my task bar (including the ones I only use once a year but know where they are when I need them)??
And what precisely is a "charm"? Is it some sort of carry-over from computer gaming where, if I use it in the right way, I might unlock some vital bit of functionality?? FFS, I'm an IT professional, I need to control and manage my system, not cross my fingers and hope for good luck to achieve what I'm being paid to do. I've said it before, but the rot set in when they replaced File MANAGER (where the user MANAGED his system) with Windows EXPLORER (where the user was left to wander about in the hope of finding his/her way through a jungle of impenetrable folders that may or may not be where they say they are...)
Windows (did) work. WTF are they doing mucking about with it just so that it's "cool" for the next couple of weeks? Does nobody LEARN from the past any more?    
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I think that it was unnecessary to remove the Start button, but i aggre that removing the Start Menu and replacing it with the Start Page was a good choice, althought i believe they must have implemented it as a more direct replacement of the Start Menu (yep, with folders or categories and all), because, sometimes, not everything i install ends in that page (for example configuration files, or help files), and not everything i install is needed in that page, a lot of unnecessary and disorganized apps lie at the end of it and i need to organize it to make them useful.
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Right-click on an empty area of the start screen, and click the "All Items" button that appears at the bottom. I discovered that on accident when I was looking for the same thing.
Which is a major part of the problem I've had with Win8. In their quest for "simplifying" the screen, they've eliminated so many visual cues as to where things are, that I've found many of them "by accident". There's an excellent video floating around on YouTube where a guy showed his father Windows 8 (Customer Preview), and he spent 20 minutes looking for the "Start Button". There's nothing on the screen that tells you that you need to move your mouse to the lower left to bring up the start menu. There's nothing telling you that you need to right-click on an empty area of a web page to bring up the Metro version of Internet Explorer's tab menu, address bar, etc. There's nothing showing you that you *can* snap windows side-by-side, let alone *how*.
Besides that, I may be comfortable experimenting with the system to see what it can do and how it works, but (1) I'd rather spend my time *doing* instead of trying to figure out *how* to do, and (2) my mother certainly won't be, and will be very confused as to how to do things (even if they have a "tutorial" when the OS first starts, do you think anyone is going to remember everything it has to teach?).
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Thanks, for the hint, my only gripe with the Start page right now is that it automatically puts there every program i install without order or logic there. 
Regarding the video, i've seen it and it remarks very well that changes like that without proper training (or tutorials) can be disorienting at first, my own experience: i found pretty frustating in the Developer Preview the way the "Start button" worked and i wasn't able to hit it properly in the first week, after that i accostumbred to it.
Also there is another video, i believe is in one of the Windows blogs, but i don't remember exactly where, that shows a user testing Windows 95, and is pretty much the same history.
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Reading the Steve Jobs biography, I was impressed with an anecdote about an illiterate boy who was able to pick up and start using an iPad without any instruction. I've also noticed my own kids use my Windows Phone and my wife's Android tablet. While I'm sure a large part of it is how little kids have no fear of trying new things to figure it out, what struck me was how truly intuitive these devices are, how they are usable without any instruction.
Windows 8 is going in the wrong direction. For all they talk up how "intuitive" it is, the fact that they are having to put in a tutorial for the most basic functionality is completely backwards.
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I have really mixed feelings about it...
I really like Win 7, even with the changes that made a few things more difficult (security). I have a Windows phone and love it, so I was really looking forward to Win 8.
I have a home built Media Machine for my auto. It uses a 7" touch screen 1024x768 resolution. My media machine currently uses XP and will probably be using XP until it dies of old age. Here's why...
I installed a fresh drive and Win 8 Release Preview. After some playing I was able to get the touch screen drivers to work, kind of. I realize this is the fault of the screen and/or driver, but gestures don't work. The screen is so small that trying to do anything with your finger other than launching an app on the metro screen is impossible: the scroll bar at the bottom of the metro screen is very difficult and getting the cursor into either hot-spot cannot be done.
So I tried using it with a stylus, which won't work well in a vehicle by the way (think bumpy road). The scroll bar can be used, but I still can't get to the left-hotspot.
For this application, Win 8 will not work at all, unless I 'hide windows' with an all encompassing user application. Then it doesn't matter what the OS is.
Before removing the Win 8 drive and replacing it with the original XP drive, I tested it with a desktop monitor, keyboard and trackball. It took a little getting used to, which I expected. The extra clicks to do some things when using the desktop is annoying. other than that I liked the desktop experience.
I have no opinion on using it on a tablet because i haven't tried it.
My 2 cents.
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If you can’t get to a conference, let the conference come to you! There are a ton of free recorded conference presentations online... Coming soon to a cubicle near you.
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There are a lot of good webcasts from Microsoft.
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What about free beer and useless toys? It's not a conference if I haven't won yet another USB-powered rocket launcher in a Gran Turismo contest.
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Second 
Sincerely Yours,
Brian Hart
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As if the level of social interaction we get wasn't bad enough already.
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Historically, the lengths of text messages were usually limited due to technical reasons. For example, the data packets holding SMS messages only had room for 160 characters (see below). Now that those technical reasons matter less, people are recognizing that limits have other advantages. I would have written a shorter letter, but I did not have the time.
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Definately on phones don't want long messages, and I do like short emails on some topics.
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This post describes the relatively undocumented API for debuggers (or other low level programs) that can be used to enumerate the existing threads in a process and receive asynchronous notifications when threads are created or destroyed. This API also provides asynchronous notifications of other interesting thread-related events and feels very similar to the interface exposed by libdl for notifying debuggers when libraries are loaded dynamically at run time. Understanding this might also help unravel the plot in Primer.
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The difference between a bad developer and an average developer is small, but the difference between an average developer and a great developer is enormous. It’s an ocean of difference. A great developer is 20x more valuable than an average developer, easily, and so it’s critical to hire one great developer, instead of 20 average developers. Help us Rockstar Ninja Developer. You're our only hope!
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So I posted a comment on his website and he didn't like it so now he's blocked me from ever posting on his blog. I wasn't even that rude. I only asked where he got the 20x number from and suggested he made it up. He doesn't, apparently, have the courage of his convictions and felt it better to delete my post and ban me rather than try and answer my questions.
"If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." Red Adair.
nils illegitimus carborundum
me, me, me
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Rockstars sometimes have huge, but fragile, egos.
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I take it these are your posts:
"•Mark
What a pile of festering crap. 20x? Really? Where did you get that number from? Thin air is my guess. There is no objective way to decide who is a great and not so great developer. It can change with time and project and by the people you are judged against in the team you happen to be in at any given time. And you might be awful at distinguishing great developers because you’re a self-obsessed and talent-less twat but some of us have gotten reasonable enough at it not to keep hiring morons. Keep your mouth shut and let people think you’re a fool; open it and let them know you are a fool.
•John
Seriously? You think by deleting my post that makes you right? You’re not right: you can’t just pluck a number out of thin air and not expect to be lambasted for it. Still, I suppose you’ll delete this as well – your ego must be terribly fragile if it can’t take any criticism."
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Your point?
"If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." Red Adair.
nils illegitimus carborundum
me, me, me
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No. I'm assuming they are your point, not mine. I found his article too poor to even summon up the energy to be apathetic about it.
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They are indeed. Normally I don't bother but I am 86.7% against people who make up random numbers or statistics to make a point.
"If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." Red Adair.
nils illegitimus carborundum
me, me, me
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I'm 15.2x more likely to agree with that point than with a poke in the nose with a wire brush.
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