According to the source, Microsoft wants to make the taskbar appear to float above the desktop by separating it from the desktop and rounding off the corners.
Whenever Explorer.exe crashes, it takes down the desktop including the taskbar. They are probably trying to separate the taskbar from the desktop.
It’s a new style and people expect to see a unique style with every Windows version change. Of course, if you really want to you can make Windows 11 look like Windows 98 with a few button presses afaik.
3 a) It potentially looks like they might start auto-hiding the taskbar by default which could be interesting. If they are and they allow applications to maximize to the full borders of your monitor, that could potentially be awesome.
3 b) auto-hiding the taskbar frees up real estate and if you put on a tin foil hat you can say that Microsoft is going to use that newfound real estate to show ads to users and will justify it because they only take up less space than you were missing before, it’s no big deal, right? (This is highly unlikely and Windows as an OS hasn’t really shown people ads yet. The most it’s done is shipped with minor bloatware apps.)
Windows as an OS has absolutely been showing ads for a long time. Ads for their own stuff for the most part, but those are still ads. They pop stuff up all over the place advocating for paid OneDrive plans or Office 365 or whatever.
They are necessitating 8GB of RAM. for what?! Like, it would be a struggle to find a machine with less than 8GB still being sold new, sure, but why does the OS need that RAM?
To be honest, I think 8 GB is a more realistic requirement for light tasks nowadays, but not because of Windows - even Windows 10 would struggle with Chrome, Word, Excel, etc on just 4 GB, and I can’t imagine that W11 is any better. Increasing the requirements would ensure that OEMs won’t put Windows 12 on shitbox PCs with 4 GB and call them usable, just because they meet the bare-minimum standards.
Yeah, I guess. It seems wasteful to need 8GB just to run an OS and browser especially after Microsoft was pushing server core specifically to go the opposite route with resource utilization on servers.
I’m no “normie” but Linux is so damned ass backwards my brain just can’t cope, some of the times I was unsure if I was asking the OS to change directory or summon Moloch to bring a thousand years of darkness to the world.
Linux always had the problem of highly technical people building wonderful things with a GUI that looks like it was designed by a third grader. Mainly because the majority of Linux contributors think the GUI is some fad that will blow over soon. I’m exaggerating of course, the last 10 years has seen some massive improvements. But the GUI being an afterthought still has a bit of truth to it.
I get how you feel. A lot of your existing Windows knowledge is not applicable to Linux so you feel like an old fart that doesn’t understand computers when you first start using it.
That being said. Now that I’m over that hump, I get why all the linux nerds are so militant about it. It is an objectively better experience if you compare it to Windows from a power user level. It’s a lot like gaming on a PC. Yes, you have to build it. Yes, you have to tinker with games to get them to run “just right”. But it is a better experience once you get there.
How is Linux with flight sticks? With Steam now available in Linux, lots of game compatibility is taken care of, but I would love my peripherals to work as well.
Well, we had Windows 10 for over 5 years before Windows 11. 10 was supposedly the last version they were doing, so it’s a little surprising they’re back to regular major releases now.
Too many people turned off telemetry data. They couldn’t get enough of it to just upgrade under the 10 banner. They’re forcing more and more online bits and slowly not letting you turn the other stuff off.
Nah, this is pure speculation. The only source is Microsoft saying they are working on some next gen stuff, could just as well be a major upgrade to W11.
I’m not usually a “Windows is terrible” kind of peron, but dramatically changing the main UI every 2 years is the fastest way to get me to change to Linux on my daily driver.
The Windows 10 taskbar is just better. The Windows 11 taskbar moves things to the middle by default for some reason, violating Fitt’s law, and removes several features of the Windows 10 taskbar without improving anything as far as I can tell. The new taskbar in the screenshot makes it even harder to click things by making them farther from the bottom of the screen, and makes the right side of the taskbar take up more space.
The new system tray is laughable. The icons cannot be that size. Imagine 16 icons of that size, but half of them are 24x24 or smaller icons scaled up.
One possible improvement with the new taskbar is that even though they have useless search and task switch buttons and the date+time takes up an unnecessary amount of horizontal space, they don’t have any of the other visual clutter like news and weather tickers.
The only reason I could possibly think a middle aligned taskbar is better would be for ultra wide setups. But even then, just make it a non default drop-down in settings and only a default if an ultra wide resolution is used.
In fairness I’ve been a Mac user since 2007, but even with my occasional flirtations with Windows, I’ve not used anything higher than 10.
My wife’s machine is running 10. I heard her trying to install 11 via a VM the other day to see how she got on with it, and I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone swear at a computer quite so much in quite so short a period of time.
You are not logged in. However you can subscribe from another Fediverse account, for example Lemmy or Mastodon. To do this, paste the following into the search field of your instance: !technology@beehaw.org
A nice place to discuss rumors, happenings, innovations, and challenges in the technology sphere. We also welcome discussions on the intersections of technology and society. If it’s technological news or discussion of technology, it probably belongs here.
Remember the overriding ethos on Beehaw: Be(e) Nice. Each user you encounter here is a person, and should be treated with kindness (even if they’re wrong, or use a Linux distro you don’t like). Personal attacks will not be tolerated.
Holy Shit Windows 11 just got Vista’d
Every time I hear about more modern versions of windows I’m more and more glad I switched to Linux
…why?
I can see a few reasons for this.
Whenever Explorer.exe crashes, it takes down the desktop including the taskbar. They are probably trying to separate the taskbar from the desktop.
It’s a new style and people expect to see a unique style with every Windows version change. Of course, if you really want to you can make Windows 11 look like Windows 98 with a few button presses afaik.
3 a) It potentially looks like they might start auto-hiding the taskbar by default which could be interesting. If they are and they allow applications to maximize to the full borders of your monitor, that could potentially be awesome.
3 b) auto-hiding the taskbar frees up real estate and if you put on a tin foil hat you can say that Microsoft is going to use that newfound real estate to show ads to users and will justify it because they only take up less space than you were missing before, it’s no big deal, right? (This is highly unlikely and Windows as an OS hasn’t really shown people ads yet. The most it’s done is shipped with minor bloatware apps.)
Windows as an OS has absolutely been showing ads for a long time. Ads for their own stuff for the most part, but those are still ads. They pop stuff up all over the place advocating for paid OneDrive plans or Office 365 or whatever.
They are necessitating 8GB of RAM. for what?! Like, it would be a struggle to find a machine with less than 8GB still being sold new, sure, but why does the OS need that RAM?
To be honest, I think 8 GB is a more realistic requirement for light tasks nowadays, but not because of Windows - even Windows 10 would struggle with Chrome, Word, Excel, etc on just 4 GB, and I can’t imagine that W11 is any better. Increasing the requirements would ensure that OEMs won’t put Windows 12 on shitbox PCs with 4 GB and call them usable, just because they meet the bare-minimum standards.
Yeah, I guess. It seems wasteful to need 8GB just to run an OS and browser especially after Microsoft was pushing server core specifically to go the opposite route with resource utilization on servers.
Microsoft: “Gotta keep all of the telemetries and AI running 24/7 of course!”
Every day I’m closer to trying Linux again.
Please do? What is stopping you anyway?
As someone who has moved from Windows to Linux and has been using it as primary OS for everything and gaming; it’s not ready.
I love Linux. But it’s not there. It’s for tech savvy people. It’s simply not user friendly enough for the “normies”. I hope it’ll happen one day.
I’m no “normie” but Linux is so damned ass backwards my brain just can’t cope, some of the times I was unsure if I was asking the OS to change directory or summon Moloch to bring a thousand years of darkness to the world.
Linux always had the problem of highly technical people building wonderful things with a GUI that looks like it was designed by a third grader. Mainly because the majority of Linux contributors think the GUI is some fad that will blow over soon. I’m exaggerating of course, the last 10 years has seen some massive improvements. But the GUI being an afterthought still has a bit of truth to it.
You exaggerate but only slightly.
I get how you feel. A lot of your existing Windows knowledge is not applicable to Linux so you feel like an old fart that doesn’t understand computers when you first start using it.
That being said. Now that I’m over that hump, I get why all the linux nerds are so militant about it. It is an objectively better experience if you compare it to Windows from a power user level. It’s a lot like gaming on a PC. Yes, you have to build it. Yes, you have to tinker with games to get them to run “just right”. But it is a better experience once you get there.
How is Linux with flight sticks? With Steam now available in Linux, lots of game compatibility is taken care of, but I would love my peripherals to work as well.
Already??? Windows 11 just came out
2 years ago? That’s seems like a normal cadence for OS releases.
Well, we had Windows 10 for over 5 years before Windows 11. 10 was supposedly the last version they were doing, so it’s a little surprising they’re back to regular major releases now.
Too many people turned off telemetry data. They couldn’t get enough of it to just upgrade under the 10 banner. They’re forcing more and more online bits and slowly not letting you turn the other stuff off.
Nah, this is pure speculation. The only source is Microsoft saying they are working on some next gen stuff, could just as well be a major upgrade to W11.
Who gets excited about that!?
Plus, all the (always online, storing everything we say, type and look at) AI features should be looked at critically and not with high anticipation.
wow this is the best thing to happen to linux in awhile
Maybe 2024 will finally be the year of Linux on the desktop.
Every time someone writes these words on a forum the year of the Linux desktop is pushed back another month
Gnome is so freaking good right now it’s a legit contender.
if Red Hat could just not shit the bed for like a minute that would be great.
I’m not usually a “Windows is terrible” kind of peron, but dramatically changing the main UI every 2 years is the fastest way to get me to change to Linux on my daily driver.
I’m already using Linux as mine. I pretty much only use windows for gaming at this point
Why do they insist on dicking around with the taskbar?
The Windows 10 taskbar is just better. The Windows 11 taskbar moves things to the middle by default for some reason, violating Fitt’s law, and removes several features of the Windows 10 taskbar without improving anything as far as I can tell. The new taskbar in the screenshot makes it even harder to click things by making them farther from the bottom of the screen, and makes the right side of the taskbar take up more space.
The new system tray is laughable. The icons cannot be that size. Imagine 16 icons of that size, but half of them are 24x24 or smaller icons scaled up.
One possible improvement with the new taskbar is that even though they have useless search and task switch buttons and the date+time takes up an unnecessary amount of horizontal space, they don’t have any of the other visual clutter like news and weather tickers.
The only reason I could possibly think a middle aligned taskbar is better would be for ultra wide setups. But even then, just make it a non default drop-down in settings and only a default if an ultra wide resolution is used.
Personally on a 1440p monitor or better I think middle aligned is better 🤷
That would make sense. Ive always played at 1080P or 4K (upscaled). So realistically…i have no baseline.
Just that 1080p is fine to have it left aligned.
I probably don’t need to ask, at this point, but will there be an agenda flyout back again?
Huh, and I’ve never even used Windows 11…
I used it for about 6 months, and I just couldn’t take it. I wiped it and installed Windows 10.
I didn’t even know it had released yet. And at my job they’re still using 10.
In fairness I’ve been a Mac user since 2007, but even with my occasional flirtations with Windows, I’ve not used anything higher than 10.
My wife’s machine is running 10. I heard her trying to install 11 via a VM the other day to see how she got on with it, and I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone swear at a computer quite so much in quite so short a period of time.
Her machine is still running 10.
11 is almost just a reskin of 10
Except with a lot of features removed.
At my job there are many computers with Windows 7 still. I guess it doesn’t really matter as long as the software we need keeps working.
Are those computers connected to the internet? Security updates for windows 7 were stopped in 2020.
It really doesn’t to businesses. Many places I’ve worked didn’t upgrade the OS until they did a hardware refresh.
Apparently they’re going to move the system files to their own protected partition in 12, first good Microsoft change?
But I loved having Windows deciding it owns my boot partition and formatting over my bootloader
God this is the fucking worst. Why would they ever make this decision?
aside from annoying dualbootersMicrosoft cares about dual-booters about as much as Meta/Facebook care about people running anything other than FB on their phone.
They’re like a vampire: once you invite them in you are rendered powerless to them. Source: “The Lost Boys”
Lots of ai integrations? Yeah, no thanks