Achievements for Minesweeper!

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012...r-minesweeper/

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"Winter Wolves" has earned the achievement [Classy Worgen]!
[Guild] [Odok]: wtf we're horde
[Guild] <GM>: doesn't matter. All worgen are classy.

Horde Bias!

The Metro interface is primarily designed for touch screen interfaces, so it doesn't feel the same on the desktop and will feel odd to those used to a start menu (which Microsoft has gone out of their way to remove).

They've also depreciated the Windows 7 interface as well, so Windows looks different. The ribbon you see in things like the newest version of Word is going to be a standard for interfaces.

I'm going to wait and see before I judge to much on the usability side.

Programmers hate it because it complicates their life to have to adapt to a completely new interface to program with, but I also know some people who are excited about it. There's also the new Windows App Store that can be seen as a direct competition to Steam depending on what gets sold there.

Seems to me they're more trying to axe "big" gaming from the PC and push it all to the XBox. "No violence" and "must load within two seconds," remember? 'Course, that's all subject to change.

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Do not buy it.

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The IT guy from my work tried out a leaked copy.

He said he thought it gave him cancer.

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Last I heard, most of the restrictions on what can be installed are with the RT version that only runs on ARM processors.

Either way, I won't be getting the upgrade until at least service pack 1. I'm also more likely to have it on my computer at work before I do at home.

Every other release of Windows is shite.

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That image isn't accurate.

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2000 - good
ME - dogshit
XP - Great
Vista - ratshit
7 - Great again

I think it's pretty accurate.

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Part of that is the great ones don't really change anything but just make fixes to the previous one. Windows 7 is Vista with the bugs and annoyances worked out. Windows 9 will likely be Windows 8 with minor fixes to improve things.

This topic is right in Bolvar's wheelhouse.

I attended TechEd 2012, where Microsoft explained its inner workings in great detail, and have been running the release candidate for months now at home on my every-day machine.

I like bullet points. Here's a few:

* It is leaner and faster than Windows 7. It boots faster, and it can run on your gimpy old hardware without issue. I cannot over-emphasize this - I saw an engineer from Microsoft boot the OS on a ten year old dell... from a USB key. If you have a machine with a system board capable of booting from a USB drive, you can run the entire OS, with all your apps, from a thumb drive. This is a really, really, cool feature.

* It's 100% compatible with Win7 apps. I haven't had any issue with my legacy Win7 programs and games. I did an in-place upgrade, and everything ran fine, and that was with a six-month old RC... the gold release should be even more stable.

* I don't like the Metro interface much at all. You're not stuck with it, though - you can immediately launch the classic desktop on boot, and I have no doubt there will be a registry hack or third-party utility that will revert the interface back entirely to Win7; there are too many IT shops that don't want to drop Metro on their end-user base.

* Metro, and the metro-enabled apps themselves, are really designed for touch screens. I think Microsoft needs to accept this, and embrace a dual-interface paradigm - Metro for phones, tablets, and desktop users that want to use it, even just short-term for only some apps - and the traditional interface for everyone else. There's just no way this interface achieves widespread acceptance right away. It's too foreign.

My suggestion? The performance enhancements are worth the upgrade. Windows 8 is faster than Windows 7. Metro isn't a selling point, but it won't suck to have the option to run Metro apps.

They should name it "the Octagon".

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Doesn't sound too bad, then, but that stuff's all moot point if Microsoft decides to jump on Apple's bandwagon and close the system.

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The "Apple Bandwagon" only applies to Metro apps. You can still write apps for windows just like you've always done - Microsoft just wants to have a more stable app marketplace for their mobile devices than the wild west Android paradigm.

Actual Release Chart:
1985 - Windows 1.01
1986 - Windows 1.02
1986 - Windows 1.03
1987 - Windows 1.04
1987 - Windows 2.03
1988 - Windows 2.10
1990 - Windows 3.0
1992 - Windows 3.1
1993 - Windows NT3.1
1994 - Windows NT3.5
1995 - Windows NT3.51
1995 - Windows 95
1995 - Microsoft Plus
1996 - Windows 97 (Never released to the public)
1996 - Windows NT4.0
1996 - CE1.0
1997 - CE2.0
1998 - Windows 98
1998 - CE2.1
1998 - CE2.11
1999 - Windows 98SE
1999 - CE2.12
2000 - Windows ME
2000 - Windows 2000 (4 Versions)
2000 - CE3.0
2001 - Windows XP 64-bit
2002 - Windows XP Media Center Edition
2003 - Windows XP Media Center Edition 03
2002 - CE4.0
2003 - CE4.1
2003 - Windows Server (2003, future base for x64 Windows XP)
2004 - CE4.2
2004 - Windows XP Media Center Edition 04
2005 - Windows XP Media Center Edition 05
2005 - CE5.0
2006 - Windows EMCE 6.0
2006 - CE6.0
2007 - Windows Vista
2007 - Windows Home Server
2008 - Windows Phone
2008 - Windows Server 08
2008 - Mobile 6.1 (CE5.2.19202)
2008 - Windows Server 08
2009 - Windows 7
2010 - Mobile 6.5

Hopefully.

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No, that's pretty much a fact.

Metro apps are "special." They're meant to be platform independent - meaning you buy an app on Microsoft's app store, and it will run within the expected performance parameters on every Windows device you own - whether it's a phone, tablet, or PC... so, in the interest of assuring this hegemony and compatibility, yes, Microsoft has strict controls over what is published on the app store. Just like Apple.

However, Microsoft is not stupid. There are thousands of commercial apps that are not, and never will be, Metro-compatible. Those applications will continue to be 100% supported in Windows PC environments.

I don't think this is a bad thing. I have an Android phone. My wife has an iPhone. Both are fantastic platforms. However, I think anyone who has spent substantial time with each will agree - Apple's app store publishes consistently solid and reliable apps, while the Android store can, quite honestly, contain a lot of crap.

There are plenty of good Android apps I use every day. There are also plenty that are battery-draining trash, or flat-out malware, and simply not worth the bandwidth it taked to download them.

I think Microsoft is striving for quality on the mobile/tablet platform so that their offering is a serious competitor to Apple.

Interesting. Good to know. Thanks.

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@Bolvar ! Nice info