OT: Windows 8

[Andy Burns]

Windows 8.1 boots on this Celeron netbook in 7 seconds flat.

[Huge]

My wife, who was a secretary for 40 years prefers WordPerfect.

A large part of my job is writing software standards and I'm afraid I have to use Word, 'cos that's my employer's standard. (Sometimes I secretly edit them in LibreOffice, and no-one's noticed so far. Indeed on one occasion the only way I managed to sort out a formatting cockup that Word introduced was to fix it in LibreOffice.)

[Huge]

I think if I were doing that kind of work on Linux, I'd consider using LyX and/or TeX.

[dennis]

If people don't like the ribbon they can close it (well hide it) or change it to something they like better.

The only problem is they never bother to RTFM.

[dennis]

On mine I open control panel, networking and select make a new connection. Select VPN, enter the credentials in the desktop window and away you go. I dont see any charms bar doing it.

[dennis]

It uses less resources so it runs better on machines with less RAM. It gets to a usable state faster. Its less easy to hack. Its hard to find stuff it doesn't do better.

[John Rumm]

When you think back, the whole "start" button menu thing has been largely unchanged since win 95... the addition of the embedded search box in win 7 improved it, but it sill has a few shortcomings.

It certainly needs a fair amount of manual organisation to keep it functional and ordered the way that makes sense to you. Otherwise it quickly grows into a long list of stuff you mostly never use. (how many times do you see machines with a start button "programs" list several columns wide?). It seems that relatively few people realise you can drag the folders about and create hierarchies, or for that matter, even sort the thing into alphabetical order.

Observe the way that most people still leave out a pile of icons on the desktop for stuff they use frequently. The ability to pin icons to the task bar is ok - but wastes space there. It would probably benefit from an additional launcher or carousel gadget for keeping your most used programs accessible as a single click - perhaps something similar to the Mac's. Being asked the question on installation whether you want the apps main icon added to that would be useful.

[Bob Eager]

I was referring to PCs, of course....!

For actual document preparation, it would have been 'roff' on UNIX V6. Not even 'nroff' or 'troff'. In fact, befoe that I think I used RUNOFF on TOPS-10.

[John Rumm]

I've been using word for ages, and I prefer.... Word Perfect ;-)

[John Rumm]

Nice in theory, if the option to revert to the old menu controls was actually available (without buying third party add ons)

Last time I looked it did not come with a manual.

[dennis]

Of course it does, its one Brian can use if he wants to.

[John Rumm]

That lets you specify the destination address and the name of the connection - it does not let you fill in the password or user name - it asks for those the first time you try to connect (on mine anyway).

[Tim Streater]

I keep the things I use most in the Dock. Even things I rarely use, such as PacketPeeper. So the desktop is usually pretty empty except for local and remote disks I've mounted, and perhaps a file or two I'm working on or a usenet post I've dragged out of Thoth and onto the desktop.

[John Rumm]

So could you highlight where it explains how to go back to menus rather than the ribbon?

[Bob Eager]

As usual, dennis gives half the information. It only works in Office 2013.

As for the manual, the help system doesn't provide a good one. Google is always better. Office Help is possibly the worst documentation I have seen in a major product.

[dennis]

No, you need to DIY so you remember.

[dennis]

I don't have anything other than office 2013 and 2007 so I will take your word that it doesn't work on 2010.

That's frequently true for most manuals.

[Simon263]

But Win7 radically changed things with the way the taskbar is done so that I almost never use the start button menu at all except for stuff that I use very rarely.

I don?t bother, because I do that organisation stuff in the taskbar.

Otherwise it

I don?t bother because if it isn't in the taskbar for the stuff I use all the time, its better to use the text box when you can remember the name. I do very occasionally want to do something I do very rarely and can't remember its name so it would be useful to be able to just go to the appropriate category and recognise the app there, but I do that so rarely that it doesn?t warrant the effort to organise the start button menu properly.

That?s why I have it auto hide, so it doesn?t waste space.

It would probably benefit from

Autohide does that fine IMO.

- perhaps something similar to the

That is there with the taskbar with many installs.

[John Rumm]

So tell us how to enable menus in place of the ribbon in 2007 and 2013 then.

[Huge]

"Of course"??? :o)

I still have the documentation I wrote for the "Crisp Weight Control System" in December 1977, using RUNOFF for RSX11/M and printed on a DECwriter of some kind, LA120, perhaps?

(I wrote some of the software, too. It controlled crisp bagging machines at KP.)