Windows 11 Promising but still a Mess

Greetings,

I was a Apple only user for 29 years. I joined Android and Windows at the release date of Windows 10. Switching to Android was awesome and a one way ticket. Windows 10? A mixed bag.

My #1 complaint about Windows was how messy and dated even said 'new' OS was. To me Windows has always been a decade behind and proudly so. I'm not talking about Macs only. If Zorin OS ran every app Windows did I'd be using Zorin.

So you think I'd be the happiest clam in the bay with the imminent release of Windows 11. I mean just LOOK --



WHAT'S RIGHT

1. I've been using an app to force my taskbar to center. And another app to make it transparent. I don't know if 11 will offer the latter but I'll be very pleased to have the former built into the OS.

2. That hazy Windows default desktop background is the first thing I get rid of helping someone setup their new PC. This is a background I'd be in no hurry to remove. What's also smart about it is --

3. -- when considering Freud let's just say... it's a feminine friendly image. Steve Jobs realized half of the population was being snubbed by PC manufacturers and he/Apple have/do brilliantly exploit that to this day. So this desktop pic is a win.

4. At first glance that new Start Menu looks like a good idea. I personally like the current Start Menu with tiles because it offers such flexibility. But I understand that most users are terrified of it because it isn't even remotely easy to manage. To this day if I accidentally create a folder of items I nearly lose my mind trying to 'un-folder' the items. Very poor design.

WHAT'S WRONG

Where to begin?

1. It seems to me most users have rejected RECENTS and TIMELINE. Yet here it is back again as 'recommend'. Hopefully this can be turned off.

2. Why have an all apps button? If designed properly you'd simply continue scrolling thru apps. Adds a step and window that is unnecessary.

3. Win11 replicates Win10's issue of having important information/settings EVERYWHERE instead of organized. Let's for a moment consider the areas we need to see now and again --

a. Start Menu
b. Apps (Preferred as well as All Apps)
c. Taskbar
d. The righthand side of the taskbar (always forget what this is called that includes) time, date, volume control icon, hidden icons etcetera
e. Notifications (hidden until you click that button which also reveals --)
f. Shortcuts to Wifi and Bluetooth and such controls which, in turn, lead to --
g. Even more settings within the settings app
h. Widgets plus news and such

I have a radical idea. It may blow minds to bits but I just can't take it any longer: how about the Start Menu incorporating almost all of that?

IMO the major design flaw of this new Start Menu is top secret. Do you see how it's a narrow box? I believe it's this way because it's designed to work in 'tablet' mode. That you can't have a big tall and wide 'start menu' because it simply won't work if you're in tablet mode. Right?

But Earth to Microsoft: most PC users don't use tablet mode as their going concern.

What's being presented to us as a solution... isn't. It's actually more half-baked thinking from Redmond.

Imagine if when you hit the Windows button -- a larger version of that interface greeted you. Taking up at least 3/4s of your screen? With the push of one button you'd see -- the weather, more apps, the quick settings, notifications, other widgets you want. You'd have next to everything available with one click. You wouldn't have to remember where Windows hid the Wifi settings because you already know the Windows button would deliver the solution somehow.

Apple has something kinda like this called 'Control Center'. But it's different. And that's okay. I believe I've added even more stuff into that window. The writer in me would ask Windows to stop calling it the start menu and simply call it... wait for it... the window. That is: brag that next to everything can be done IN 'The Window'.

Now, to be clear, I didn't stick everything in 'The Window'.



I believe having some of that always available is smart. Mac does it, Linux does it -- don't rock that boat.

There is a problem with it though. If you're going to have a centered taskbar you can only add so many apps before that area bumps into the apps. That is why Mac OS separate these items from each other.

The solution is fairly obvious. Allow the apps taskbar to be moved to the left side of the screen. This is something you 'can' do in Windows 10 but it looks like garbage. Because it widens the taskbar to accommodate the date and time. This --



-- only makes matters worse. Now if Redmond is afraid of Apple lawsuits they can say, no, our date and time are not in the top right but the bottom right. Which seems to be okay in modern patent law. The fact this mistake is STILL sitting in the wrong place reveals that half-baked is STILL a thing.

I think Panos or somebody said "And this is just the beginning..." And I believe that. Because this asinine company never finishes a build. They just introduce something new and half-baked... and barely fix it... year in and out.

There are annoyances in Mac OS. Just like any OS. But when the likes of Zorin ships ten times more polished than the world's leading operating system -- that's just the stuff of WOW.

I enjoyed your view on this matter and I am in complete agreement about how the Windows OS is a decade behind in certain aspects, if not all of them..........of course for the right reasons we all know to be true.

You're spot on about the delivery of the Windows OS not being polished upon release or official debut; but I hope that at the very minimal it will at least boot.

@The Pool Man

Windows 11 Forum

The Pool Man said:

I'll have you know I'm seated and patiently waiting at the Windows 12 Forum.