8.1 Update

Am I missing something??

I understood that a fundamental aspect of this update was to enable "Metro-App" to be run in a proper Window, alongside other "normal" Windows (instead of the previous "hog-everything" mode).

All it seems to have done is to add a proper "Close-X" & allows you to minimise it.

It adds the ability to run the "Metro-App" in a split screen, but the unused half of the screen does NOT permit other windows to be run!

Unless you totally minimise it, it still totally "hogs-everything" & blocks access to the Task-Bar!

Blame Steve "Mr. Balls-up" Ballmer.

In reply to a post by micksharpe:

Blame Steve "Mr. Balls-up" Ballmer.

Close, but not right. The one who carries the blame was sacked Steve Sinofsky

In reply to a post by johnjburness:

It adds the ability to run the 'Metro-App' in a split screen, but the unused half of the screen does NOT permit other windows to be run!

Not add! Even before the 8.1 Update and even in Win8 you could snap a Metro app to one half the screen. Also you can go back to the Start Screen and run a 2nd Metro app to run in the other half-screen. MS calls it 'snapping'.

EDIT: I've just found that if you snap a Metro app to one side of screen, the R-click on the Start button at bottom L and select Desktop, you get a compressed Desktop in other half-screen in which you can run normal Windows applications. Can't remember if you could do that prior to the Update, but don't think so.

Edited by XRaySpeX (Sat 12-Apr-14 00:43:48)

Other than the 'Close-X' & Minimise of Metro apps is there any other visible change?

I thought it was going to reintroduce the Win Start Menu or is that hidden from me as I'm still activating Classic Shell?

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

In reply to a post by johnjburness:

It adds the ability to run the 'Metro-App' in a split screen, but the unused half of the screen does NOT permit other windows to be run!

Not add! Even before the 8.1 Update and even in Win8 you could snap a Metro app to one half the screen. Also you can go back to the Start Screen and run a 2nd Metro app to run in the other half-screen. MS calls it 'snapping'.

EDIT: I've just found that if you snap a Metro app to one side of screen, the R-click on the Start button at bottom L and select Desktop, you get a compressed Desktop in other half-screen in which you can run normal Windows applications. Can't remember if you could do that prior to the Update, but don't think so.

Until the provision of the new top-bar (in Metro-Apps), where there is the new menu is that permits a split-screen, I wasn't aware that you could split previously the screen. Hence , if you could do it before this update, then it was the usual "Metro-Well-Hidden-Feature"!!

NB:- presumably by the "Start-Button", you mention above, you don't mean the Desk-Top Start Button, but that funny mini-Metro symbol that only occasionally appears when a Metro-App has "whole-hogged" the screen??

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

I thought it was going to reintroduce the Win Start Menu or is that hidden from me as I'm still activating Classic Shell?

That was the original idea but MS pulled it from the final release of this update.

I suppose it might appear in the update update

In reply to a post by idb:

That was the original idea

Source?

but MS pulled it from the final release of this update.

Source?


TY in advance...

Screenshots of the update that was inadvertently released a few weeks ago showed the intended addition (a small version of the start page IIRC) to the start button.

Post edited to add ...

Linky
Reading that I'm now not sure if it was actually intended to be released in this update.

It's not in the final release and one of the online news sources, I can't remember which, mentioned that it had been pulled.

Edited by deleted (Sat 12-Apr-14 11:21:27)

You can have Metro and non-metro apps running side by size, although its limited to 2...