Windows 8 Pro, outliners and PIMs

Posted by Alexander Deliyannis
Oct 27, 2012 at 06:37 PM

Jon, thanks for the link to the NY Times article. It helped to convince me that I need to look for an alternative to Windows 8, as I have no intention to have to fight (once again) with my OS in order to be able to acceptably do tasks that I have now streamlined to a significant extent. I have done it 2-3 times in the past, from MS DOS to Windows 95 (I skipped Windows 3.1 which I found completely useless), then to Windows XP, and more recently to Windows 7. I managed to cheat my way through the last couple of transitions by maintaining the ‘classic’ Windows look and disabling all the (time- and resource-wasting) eye candy.

I intend to keep Windows 7 at least till the end of their support life (half of our office machines are still happily running Windows XP) but it seems clear to me that Microsoft development of its tools goes hand in hand with its obligating users to adapt to new GUIs—possibly quite intuitive for new users, but considerably disrupting to existing ones- within its constant pursuit of novelty. Think MS Office 2003 toolbars to 2007 ribbon etc.

It doesn’t have to be this way. The option could be there to work with a ‘classic’ look for those who want it. But then one probably wouldn’t feel the need to buy new hardware, would they?

On the occasion of the Windows 8 launch I revisited the world of Linux distributions and was very pleasantly surprised. I installed two different modern distributions (OpenSUSE and Voyager, based on XUbuntu) on two notebooks—a significantly older one and a completely new one- and both are working like charm. Installation was more streamlined than Windows, all hardware was identified including special keys, additional programs were installed with no issues etc.

The availability of different Linux distributions can be daunting, but it goes hand in hand with the versatility of the system: you can find distributions with the latest Linux kernel that can take advantage of the most recent hardware, and others than can run with the same kernel on 386s with 64 Mb RAM. And you can have a minimal desktop or the latest in animation effects if you want them.

The aim of my post isn’t so much to promote Linux (though I feel fine doing it) but rather to support Franz’s point: I’m a happy CRIMPer but, as far as the OS is concerned, I just want it to keep out of the way.