Just my own humble opinion, but after having had a run with the trial version of Windows 8, all I can say is that Apple's share of the desktop space can do nothing but increase. This thing will set Windows users all over screaming in all directions.
Having upgraded my copy of Parallels to version 7 through one of the recent MacUpdate bundles, I thought I'd see what all the excitement was about and took advantage of the easy Windows 8 download/installation option offered on the Parallels start screen. All it has cost me so far has been 3 Gb of hard drive space, and time I'll never get back. Where to begin? Windows 8 is startling, to say the least. As illogical as it was, at least the Start Button was an identifiable object at the bottom left of the screen, where you knew could go to launch programs, call up Control Panels, gain access to the hard drive's contents, and even log out or shut down. Even if it was illogically named, at least most people were able to work out its many uses fairly quickly. Now, in Window 8's Metro Interface - it's gone! Now I can see that for Microsoft Windows, the only thing more illogical than the Start Button is NOT having a start button. It took me a good ten minutes of careful mousing around to discover how to shut down: you have to park your mouse in the very bottom right-hand corner of the screen, whereupon a transparent menu containing five icons pops out from the right-hand side of the screen. You then have to move mouse over this menu, at which point it turns black and the icons now have labels: Search, Share, Start (ah! there it is...), Devices and Settings. Perhaps the Shutdown command is under the "Start" icon (well, it's been like that for the last seventeen years!)? Nope. All that does is take you back to the Metro Interface. Oh, and by the way...if you object to Launchpad in Lion and soon Mountain Lion, you're going to HATE Metro in Windows 8. They've taken Launchpad and made it look ugly but hey! It does respond to gestures on the Mousepad! OK, so how do we shut down? Turns out that's in the Settings Icon! Of course. Everyone has been telling Microsoft for years that the Start Button was a silly place to go to shut down, so obviously, it's now a SETTING. Wow. Well let's try actually doing something. Let's try a few programs (which are all presented as icons displayed against garishly coloured panels). Let's try "Maps". Nothing happens. OK, it is a trial, perhaps it's not ready yet. Let's try Calendar. Nope, I need a Microsoft account to do that. How about Weather? Yes, that works. Only trouble is that the temperatures are all in Fahrenheit. There is no obvious way to change this within Weather itself, so let's quit and try to find the Regions Control Panel. Hang on...THERE'S NO QUIT COMMAND. There's no window to close because the program takes up the entire screen. There is no window and there is no menu. There's an inactive Back Button and that's all. The only way out is to drag the mouse down to bottom right of the screen, rollup to the popout menu and click the Start Icon, which takes me back to the Metro Interface. Maybe I'm starting to get the hang of this. There's still no Control Panel though. What happens if I right-click on the background? Suddenly, a large green Dockish-lookng area pops up at the bottom of the screen, containing a single icon labelled "All apps". I click this and I get as screen entitled "Apps". That's right - APPS! How iOS of them, but now things are looking a little more hopeful. By now, Parallels has populated this screen with all of my Mac applications as well, so I can use Windows 8 as an Application launcher for the Mac if I really want to, but that's by the by. The important thing is I've now found the Control Panel. Click. I've now left the Metro Interface and I'm looking at a more familiar Windows 7-like screen. But not quite. There's still no Start Button, but perhaps even worse, there's absolutely no indication anywhere that the Weather "app" is still running! I would at least expect to see some sign of it in the Task Bar; but I'm trying sort this measurements problem, so I go to the Region" settings, but there's no allowance for temperature measurements. There is a setting for "Measurements" which is set to "Metric", but it has had no effect on the Weather program. There's more believe me, but it's all in the same vein. Much of the included software won't work without a Microsoft account. When in the new Metro Interface there are no menus, no windows (funny - it IS called Windows 8...), no clear or intuitive pathways to get back from wherever it is you end up. It is certainly possible to work it out, but it requires considerable patience, a bit of lateral thinking, and lots of poking into dark corners with the mouse cursor. Even right-clicking has completely unexpected results depending on where you are. You can get back to a Windows 7-like Desktop environment that does have windows and menus, but you can't do much without inevitably returning to the Metro disaster. Enough. I've wasted enough time with all this. At least now I know how to shut down gracefully. Goodbye. I have been privately congratulating Microsoft for finally finding the resources to strike out their own and come up with something different instead of just copying or buying whatever else is out there. Now I'm glad I've kept it mostly private. Windows 8 just shows that Microsoft should not be let on their own. I can only hope that there enough complaints from early adopters that some important changes can be made before this thing is released to an unsuspecting public. Vista was bad enough, but they were able to recover to a large extent with Windows 7. I don't know how they will recover from this. From what I can see there will be no escape from the Metro Interface with this system. All common workflows will be thrown to the four winds. Just working out what to do is a major challenge. It's going to be an IT Manager's worst nightmare. On the other hand, it must bode well for OS X 8. Anyone fearful of Mountain Lion will quickly see they have nothing to worry about. Bring on Mountain Lion! Please!! As I said at the beginning, it's jut my humble opinion... Peter Hinchliffe Apwin Computer Services FileMaker Pro Solutions Developer Perth, Western Australia Phone (618) 9332 6482 Mob 0403 046 948 -------------------------------------------------------------------- Mac because I prefer it -- Windows because I have to. -- The WA Macintosh User Group Mailing List -- Archives - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/archives.shtml> Guidelines - <http://www.wamug.org.au/mailinglist/guidelines.shtml> Settings & Unsubscribe - <http://lists.wamug.org.au/listinfo/wamug.org.au-wamug>
