Windows 8 Appears to Reek Badly
August 22, 2012
Windows 8 changes everything. That’s the paradigm Microsoft is pushing and that’s how it seems they want it. But is it what you want? Is it what businesses will want? Personally, I think NOT. Here’s one person’s take on why they will not run it anymore: “Why I’m uninstalling Windows 8” by Tim Edwards on PCGamesN http://www.pcgamesn.com/article/why-i-m-uninstalling-windows-8. By the way, read the comments too; many people seem to think the article is totally bogus. But I think it is pretty representative of the normal reactions of a typical end user—someone who is not an expert.
OK, so I downloaded and installed Windows 8 in a VirtualBox VM. The desktop is literally one click away, but it lacks a start menu so you better hope your program installer puts an icon on the desktop by default. I created a very complete Ninite file with all of my normal free software which downloaded and ran just fine. Win 8 added icons for EVERY program installed on the home screen, including all of the piddly little programs included with PuTTY–which I deleted. I enabled the Quick Launch toolbar on the desktop and dragged all of the desktop icons onto it. This is “too hard” for your average end user so if 8 has a prayer in the enterprise there will have to be a lot more work by sysadmins with deployment.