Lets all face the facts... People do not like change especially business support staff and all I.T. support staff. There are two ways to sell a new item, Make tons of changes and hope people like it or increase the reliability and allow users to pick the changes they want and add them when they want or not at their own pace. I would like a new windows installer that ask during the new install, do you want to keep the proven tried and true interface or would you like the new much changed interface. (lets say for arguments sake Proven=Windows 7 interface with all the core engine improvements of windows 10 or new=Win 10 interface with the win10 core engine). Plus and installer smart enough to know if it is being installed on a tablet, desktop, laptop with touch screen or laptop without a touch screen. Plus, Allow user to easily choose to use a local log on or online and not keep trying to switch to online. If you pick A. Win 7 interface, it will work like windows 7 but, have the win10 core and hope it works better with existing software. (Microsoft, do much, much more testing on compatibility, especially on the business side). If you pick B. Win 10 interface and core, it will have all the new newfangled changes for pads, smart phones and tin foil hats. Then go on and do the install....... I really do not think this is a bad idea but, sure someone will have thoughts as everyone has thoughts. Maybe I am venting but, it is like a new car where they move the pedals all around, gas moved to left (where the clutch used to be) brake on the right where the gas used to be. No one is going to like this. Bad idea Microsoft, look how successful Apple is and when was the last time they made a complete revamp user interface change? I know it was not every 2-3 years. Just my thoughts....
They have even done that in the past, already. When installing Windows 95 Gold you could still choose between the modern shell (Explorer.exe) or the classic Program Manager (PROGMAN.EXE) from Windows 3.x.
Is Apple that successful? I doubt that! If Apple were such successful, their Marketshare would be much higher and not just a few percent (I'm NOT talking about mobile devices iPad and iPhone)!! As I already posted in some other thread, Apple is the most expensive Computer Reseller with low cost of development for either Hardware and Software! Fact is: more than 99% of Apple products are manufactured in China (like Foxconn and others, even under Slavery conditions as well known) Apple products are build with well tested hardware but latest and/or newest all products are based on the same line of Hardware (Chipset etc. etc.) all software are bound to just that small range of hardware which lowers the development to just a fraction of what Microsoft has to invest and, and, and! What do you think Apple would be if they (just as an example) would develop Operating Systems which could be used on whole bunch of available hardware? In reality, it's impossible for to compare Microsoft OS'es and other Apps with Apple's software products! The (you tell) Success of Apple is based on mainly 2 very simple facts: Design (Eye-Candy) Community Before the first iMac reached the market, Apple were nearly bankrupt! It was that iMac with his 'special' design which brought apple back in the market! Until than Apple had just one special group of customers: the Printing Business. Reason were easy: Apple used Vector Graphics while the 'normal' PC's were using Pixel Graphics. Vector Graphics till today are used for most of the available Printing Machines and the Printing Business was able to directly use to print without the need of first needed conservation from Pixel to Vector graphic of the print products. That was getting whit the appearance of the high tech Offset Printing Machinery an huge concurrent because those machines could also use Pixel Graphics for direct print. Still there a lot very old Printing Machines in use till today and therefore even Vector Graphics are needed. The success of the iMac was shown that customers buying with eye's and Steve Jobs has realized that and seen the potential of nice layouts. The following Macbooks, iPads and iPhones were just an result of that! That Marketing Strategy of limiting Support and Warranty to limited allowance of use of Apple products, which were existing already quite some time, were published more openly, with the goal to build an community of customers who were not critical, just want to part of an limited group! And they had to pay an high price for to be part of that community. While Apple products could be used for to run native Microsoft Products, incl. Windows, Apple didn't allow to run Apples Software products on any PC! OK, there a few apps like Safari, iTune and so which are allowed run on PC's! But: Whats about OS-X? Those available 'hacked' versions are not allowed, nor supported by Apple! And while that's done by normal user, instead of Companies, Apple would not start court cases about that. If an Company would do that for profit, the past had shown already what happen than! Many companies, like UMax etc., were brought to court and closed down because of that! Microsoft on the other hand never limited the use of their Systems and Software to any special brand. As Microsoft is developing the Software for the wide varity of available hardware, those developments need a lot more to be done which much higher cost than Apple ever had! Compare both, is simply impossible! On the other hand, keeping an layout for many years didn't means that the development of new system is more easy! Many times, to develop an new system, would need also the change of an layout. From Marketing perspective, such change will also be needed. Windows 10 isn't that 'far away' from Windows 7 as you predict! No, I don't think that it would be an good idea for to keep an old layout, or even create more than one for an new system! But, all of those above is my personal thinking and other will have an different one, for sure, no problem with that!
This is the reason that I chose to be a Windows developer and not an Apple developer. Closed architecture, expensive SDKs, etc. have made Apple an "ugly baby" as far as development goes. Not to mention the approval cycle for apple software; some developers have been made to wait for months for acceptance into the Apple store. @kubato: In reality, you simply can't get everyone to like a thing. You're right when you say that changing the UI will affect the experience of some customers to the point of disgust, and that will push them away. What Microsoft has always offered is a way for third-party apps to change the look and feel of the UI, allowing it to be customized to suit the needs of pretty much everyone. And, as long as the underlying engine is strong, everyone will be happy. :MJ
Want me to use Winodws 10, take Windows 7 and add SP2 and whatever improvements in performance they made to Windows 10 and then call what you have Windows 10.
OS dev is pretty much saturated there not much to offer What is just left to do is fixing errors and compatibility If Microsoft want rediscover OS GUI or something mostly people wouldn't like it but it might catch in the long run i bless Microsoft for doing that innovation is great Open Source for GUI would be even better
Until Windows XP SP2, you actually could use Program Manager and File Manager just like you could in Windows 3.1x. SP2 disabled that functionality.
Only thing i don't like as much is the new start menu but I'm used to change etc, i feel this version of windows might be heading in the right direction compared to other OS's over the years. As for Cortana the search bar coulda been put in the notifications bit instead of on the taskbar, but its a work in progress project for them
Correct, but the Windows 95 installation actually asked you if you would like to use PROGMAN.EXE as standard shell! So they could do it if they wanted. Instead they chose to pour their tile crap on everyone.