Stop Microsoft

All Things Microsoft => Microsoft Software => Topic started by: Laukev7 on 12 July 2003, 21:48

Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 12 July 2003, 21:48: I was bored, and having tried out all the major x86 OSes, I installed an alpha version of Microsoft Longhorn, just to see what it looks like. Well, I must say, I am astonished.

Astonished by how Microsoft would make such a ridiculously huge, bloated and complicated system in the apparent goal to make it EASIER TO USE.

It's so bloated and full of useless baubles and oversized icons that everything feels cramped. Picture this: a huge bar on the right (copied from QNX) with superfluous applets, that takes a quarter of the screen, an enormous start menu which takes nearly half the screen, with needless entries. Not to mention that everything is virtually undistinguishable, because everything is the same colour! The Plex theme is even worse than Luna!

Microsoft is hyping about how users will be able to find stuff more easily with Longhorn. Yet, everything is very badly organised. Why do you need a control panel entry AND a Hardware entry AND a Printer entry in the menu? Shouldn't 'My documents, My music, My videos' belong in 'My computer'?? And what's with 'Game Libraries'??? Why do you need a search entry in the menu AND the sidebar AND the control panel AND the Explorer toolbar AND 'My computer'? And WTF is 'Download manager' in the control panel???

The search system is laughable. 'Filter by file system, floppy, harddrive or CD drive'?. What use is that? Why not just search on the medium after clicking on its icon? And you may also have noticed that the round shape of the search fields is blatantly copied on iTunes.

Of course, all the configuration panels are STILL full of useless options and features. Nothing whatsoever has been simplified, only rearranged in flashy, different ways. It's like adding yet another layer of makeup to a wrinkled woman's face.

I know this is an alpha, but... we're talking common sense here!

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Laukev7 ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: cahult on 12 July 2003, 19:35: Do you have a screenshot so we all can feel like puking?
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: jasonlane on 12 July 2003, 20:16: Laukev7 man, I expected more from you! ;)

Oh never mind, go here then:

You sinner (http://www.absolution-online.com/)

then here

feel better? (http://www.apple.com/macosx/panther/)

Screen shots would good for a laugh (http://tongue.gif)

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Zardoz ]

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Zardoz ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Fett101 on 12 July 2003, 22:28: Have you considered changing the theme and turning off the big ass sidebar?
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: mobrien_12 on 13 July 2003, 00:20: quote:
Originally posted by Laukev7:
The search system is laughable. 'Filter by file system, floppy, harddrive or CD drive'?. What use is that? Why not just search on the medium after clicking on its icon?

July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Laukev7 ]

This is, I believe, because MS wants to get rid of the traditional file system concept and replace it with a relational database....

More stupid stuff.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 00:25: Screenshots pending. Please stand by...

(Oh, did I mention that Longhorn is crawling on my 1 GHz Pentium 3 PC?)
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Stryker on 13 July 2003, 00:33: Where did u download it from? I hear all this talk but have seen it nowhere.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 00:59: eMule. By the way, the screenshots are coming soon. I am having problems sending the screenshots to my Geocities webhost (which is no wonder, given the system I'm using!)

Edit: OK, here goes.

http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/desktop.png (http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/desktop.png)

This is the default 800x600 appearance of Windows Longhorn, right before I threw up on the screen.

http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/startmenu.png (http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/startmenu.png)

I think this menu's even larger than the XP one.

http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/wmplayer.png (http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/wmplayer.png)

Windoze Media Player, as clunky as ever. Notice that there are TWO huge top bars and TWO sets of resize/minimise/close buttons. Of course, with the usual intelligent content of MSN.

http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/expanded-sm.png (http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/expanded-sm.png)

Things can get quite messy at 'low' resolutions. And that shot was taken on a 17" screen...

http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/my-comp.png (http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/my-comp.png)

'My Computer'. Should be relabeled 'All your computers are belong to us'.

http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/wmplayer1024.png (http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/wmplayer1024.png)

This is a screenshot taken at 1024x768. Even at that resolution, thing can get very cluttered. Microsoft should copy on Apple (again); they really could use the Expos
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: skyman8081 on 13 July 2003, 02:23: :D amn your our of bandwidth, I can't see the last
:image. :(
:
:but from the first se7en images longhorn looks ugly-ass.
:MS has stooled to new lows in the shit-heap to make
:this trowl.

Edit: I am going to set up a mirror for those. (i've got the first seven from my cache and I'm trying to find the html page

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: [root@localhost /]$ ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 02:34: quote:
Originally posted by M. O'Brien:

This is, I believe, because MS wants to get rid of the traditional file system concept and replace it with a relational database....

More stupid stuff.

Exactly, and this looks like a very unsuccessful attempt. I was actually afraid that they surpass the Mac OS with such a technology. But all they've done so far was copy on Apple!
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: skyman8081 on 13 July 2003, 02:56: pictures mirror (http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn)
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 03:10: Thank you very much, root. (http://smile.gif)

But there appears to be a problem. I can't access your mirror.
:(

Edit: OK, it's fixed now.

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Laukev7 ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: skyman8081 on 13 July 2003, 03:19: my hon't allow dir access. so I had to put an index page in linking them all.

so it is up now.

with the exception of number 8.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: xyle_one on 13 July 2003, 03:19: ehh. longhorn is rediculous. The windows are huge and waste too much space. windows media player is poorly thought out. jesus. 2 sets of close and minimize buttons? why? dumb. eveything is definitely muddied up by being blue. way too much blue. everywhere. it is distracting.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 03:21: No problem, root. I can send the last one to you, if you want. Unless you would rather wait another hour...

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Laukev7 ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: skyman8081 on 13 July 2003, 03:25: I have it.

and longhorn has succeded in making windows classic look UGLIER than the default.

it is a de-facto force of the plex down our throats.

sonofabitch!
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 03:34: Oh, another screenshot. I would really like to know who in the world would bother going all the way to the control panel just to install a program from CD, when you can simply use autorun, or even click on the installer (but now I think of it, just accessing the CD became a bit of a trek with Longhorn.

http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/cp.png (http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/cp.png)

Edit: Replaced the link.

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Laukev7 ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: TheKnifeThrower on 13 July 2003, 03:41: I wonder what it looks like on a 1288x1024 display? Because thats the minimum resolution a monitor will need to prevent the programs menu from eating up their screen.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 03:50: At that resolution, everything looks VERY small on a 17" screen. Unlike Mac OS X which, it seems, adapts rather well to smaller monitors.

Looks like lightweight 12" portable computers are out of question. Just the interface of Longhorn seems to weigh a ton, let alone the hardware required to handle such a beast.

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Laukev7 ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: skyman8081 on 13 July 2003, 03:54: what I thought. you would need about a 21" monitor for LH to look right.

btw laukev7, check your PM's. your host is down.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: jasonlane on 13 July 2003, 04:05: That is truly appaling.

What the fuck is the "slide show"?????? What a waste of resources, they probaly spent most of their time producing the bloat ware for that!

Also I thought that there was a design principle about NOT having too much blue on the screen, look like I'm underwater whenever I look at it, expecting to see fish.

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Zardoz ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: M51DPS on 13 July 2003, 04:48: (http://www.dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/desktop_diversions/images/wallpaper_comic.gif)
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 05:22: Apparently Microsoft removed the 'ActiveX display as a web page feature', as I've seen it nowhere. So much for web browser integration.

Yet another screenie. Root, you know what to do. ;)

http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/progacess.png (http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/progacess.png)

I added some more applets to show them:

1. An interesting feature which seems to have been implemented since Windows XP. Looks like Microsoft had to answer some settlement obligations.

2. A good example of redundancy.

3. Most people just love to watch videos in a sidebar. You may be interested to know that the applet is still not drag & drop, as one would expect from such an advanced OS.

4. Change users.

5. iSync. There's so much blue, M$ should call it 'I sink'.

6. No idea what that's supposed to be.

Edit: Replaced dead link.

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Laukev7 ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: skyman8081 on 13 July 2003, 05:38: your link is broken.
Mirror Link (http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/progacess.png)

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: [root@localhost /]$ ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 05:40: Yes, this is why I sent you the picture by e-mail. I guess Geocities is no good for image hosting.

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Laukev7 ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: skyman8081 on 13 July 2003, 05:41: heh. hit quote instead of edit.

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: [root@localhost /]$ ]

might as well make a useful post.

it least they allow it now. although I think that the changes might requre restart and revert on restart.

but WHY do you need 2 clocks?!

eh. just ranting

correct picture link is at:
http://ca.geocities.com/laukev7/untitled10.PNG (http://ca.geocities.com/laukev7/untitled10.PNG)

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: [root@localhost /]$ ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 05:48: Heh, two clocks. And one of them doesn't even have numbers. And I HATE clocks with handles.

quote:
it least they allow it now. although I think that the changes might requre restart and revert on restart.

I don't understand. What are you referring to?

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Laukev7 ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: skyman8081 on 13 July 2003, 05:57: quote:
Originally posted by Laukev7:
Heh, two clocks. And one of them doesn't even have numbers. And I HATE clocks with handles.

I don't understand. What are you referring to?

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Laukev7 ]

if you try to set a non IE browser as default it will inform you that they need resart to take place. but it reverts to default upon restart. locking it in.

MS is just evil enough to do it. too.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Stilly on 13 July 2003, 06:18: how much ram does that beast take to work?

and how much space does it take?
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 06:23: Well, I have 328 megs RAM on my 1 GHz P3, and it's quite slow when it comes to multi-tasking. Admitedly the installer used FAT32 instead of NTFS, for some reason, when I asked for a clean install, but that only affects file searches (I'm not sure about that). Web browsing is VERY slow, though. The rest is OK if you do one task at a time, but the computer crawls if you have anything else open, like WMP (and that's without playing music or video).

And just the Windows folder takes 1.8 gigs.

And Root, I tried to set Mozilla and Quicktime as default, and I wasn't asked to reboot. And I tried rebooting, and Moz and QT stayed default.

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: Laukev7 ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: xyle_one on 13 July 2003, 06:36: 1.8 gigs to install just windows? goddam. it will never end. xp pro was like 1.2 gigs, 2000 was like 800mb. fucking rediculous.

at least when i install 1.8 gigs of a linux distro, i get a shit load of applications to use.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 06:54: God, that Plex interface is so ugly, I got a headache from looking at it to take screenshots. Even Luna is a relief compared to that wretched Longscorn GUI (I installed XP as well just before installing Longhorn).
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Canadian Lover on 13 July 2003, 07:36: (http://www.members.shaw.ca/spamforthomasrocks1/foghorn3.jpg)

[ July 12, 2003: Message edited by: The all X11 hater ]

[ July 13, 2003: Message edited by: The all X11 hater ]
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Fett101 on 13 July 2003, 08:48: quote:
Originally posted by Laukev7:
http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/classic.png (http://members.cox.net/skyman/pics/mirror/longhorn/classic.png)

Does this answer your question, fett?

Yes it does, although I doubt it will do that when it's released.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Fett101 on 13 July 2003, 08:59: quote:
Originally posted by ecsyle:951:
1.8 gigs to install just windows? goddam. it will never end. xp pro was like 1.2 gigs, 2000 was like 800mb. fucking rediculous.

at least when i install 1.8 gigs of a linux distro, i get a shit load of applications to use.

*ahem*

OSX (http://www.apple.com/macosx/upgrade/requirements.html)
2.Verify you have enough hard drive space. While the amount of disk space required depends on your computer and the way you are installing Mac OS X, you are recommended to have at least 3.0 GB of available space on your hard drive.

Redhat (https://www.redhat.com/software/linux/technical/)
Hard Disk Space:
Custom installation (minimum): 475 MB
Personal Desktop: 1.7 GB
Workstation: 2.1 GB
Custom installation (everything): 5.0 GB

Though, the desktop install includes office and multimedia and other assorted apps, I wonder, though do not care enough to find out, what a basic install, with GUI and basic apps similar to a windows install, would be.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 21:10: Sure. You could disable all that crap, but what's the point? Longhorn offers nothing else significant but DRM protection schemes
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Fett101 on 13 July 2003, 21:32: Well Apple's site isn't kind enough to be more helpful (I had to google to find requirements) and I haven't the cash to pay thier high prices and find out how small they can make it. Are those Linux distributions comparable to the GUI, configuration utilities, and miscellaneous apps on a windows install.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 21:44: Such a Linux OS can fit on a CD, with multimedia applications, games, word processors and browsers. Knoppix, SuSE Linux (the evaluation version) and others I don't know about. Whether you like them or not, they clearly prove that you can get a decent interface without wasting space with useless rubbish. And Mac OS X may be quite big, but it provides much more useful and innovative features than that bloated Longhorn crap.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: suselinux on 13 July 2003, 11:08: I'm likin` KDE more and more

and Longhorn looks an awful lot like it!

That task bar pisses me off.

I went through and matched my kde task bar to it

I've got everything except for that stupid bloody slide show, but I guess you need a 64 bit system to use such an industry changing inovation such as that!

I don't know why they used an analog clock I don't think many of MS's customers could read it!

and by the time they've figured out the time, the hands moved five minutes, and they have to start all over again!
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 11:23: Watch it. I'm no Microsoftie, and I HATE analogue clocks... especially with no numbers... *shudders*

I find Longhorn looks much more like QNX. The sidebar is a direct rip-off of the Photon shelf. Except, of course, for the revolting colour, and the shelf is much more useful in QNX.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Refalm on 13 July 2003, 17:40: I don't think the Plex theme will stay there. They pay some design company to do it for them, just like they did with Windows XP.

The Windows XP beta, called Whistler, looked very differently from what it is now. Click here (http://www.winsupersite.com/images/reviews/2410per_0002.gif) for an example. I guess they'll change the design of this beta too.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: xyle_one on 13 July 2003, 17:49: quote:
Originally posted by Fett101:

*ahem*

OSX (http://www.apple.com/macosx/upgrade/requirements.html)
2.Verify you have enough hard drive space. While the amount of disk space required depends on your computer and the way you are installing Mac OS X, you are recommended to have at least 3.0 GB of available space on your hard drive.

Redhat (https://www.redhat.com/software/linux/technical/)
Hard Disk Space:
Custom installation (minimum): 475 MB
Personal Desktop: 1.7 GB
Workstation: 2.1 GB
Custom installation (everything): 5.0 GB

Though, the desktop install includes office and multimedia and other assorted apps, I wonder, though do not care enough to find out, what a basic install, with GUI and basic apps similar to a windows install, would be.

curious. when i installed jaguar, it only wanted about 1.5 gigs, and that was mostly for localized language files & printers. my redhat install was about a gig... but, the apps i get for both installs make up for any space taken. windows offers me nothing. oh wow. movie maker and ms paint. kwal-e-tee..
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: Laukev7 on 13 July 2003, 20:03: quote:
The Windows XP beta, called Whistler, looked very differently from what it is now. Click here for an example. I guess they'll change the design of this beta too.

You may have noticed that they changed the theme just after Apple released screenshots of Mac OS X. And at the same time, they renamed Whistler 'Windows XP'. Coincidence? I think not.

Therefore, since Apple has not drastically changed the appearance of Mac OS yet, we should not expect any change from Microsoft yet. After all, the whole point of Plex seems to be show-off and 'me too'.
Title: Forgive me, for I have sinned.
Post by: M51DPS on 13 July 2003, 21:27: quote:
And don't forget that OS X doesn't use a separate swap partition.

Actually, you can speed up OS X if you put the swap on a different partition or disk (http://www.resexcellence.com/hack_html_01/06-01-01.shtml).