Microsoft is Experimenting With a Top Menu Bar for Windows 11 (theverge.com)
- Reference: 0180699514
- News link: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/26/01/30/1355254/microsoft-is-experimenting-with-a-top-menu-bar-for-windows-11
- Source link: https://www.theverge.com/news/870663/microsoft-windows-11-top-menu-bar-powertoy-experiment
> Microsoft's PowerToys team is [1]contemplating building a top menu bar for Windows 11 , much like Linux, macOS, or older versions of Windows. The menu bar, or Command Palette Dock as Microsoft calls it, would be a new optional UI that provides quick access to tools, monitoring of system resources, and much more.
>
> Microsoft has provided concept images of what it's looking to build, and is soliciting feedback on whether Windows users would use a PowerToy like this. "The dock is designed to be highly configurable," explains Niels Laute, a senior product manager at Microsoft. "It can be positioned on the top, left, right, or bottom edge of the screen, and extensions can be pinned to three distinct regions of the dock: start, center, and end."
[1] https://www.theverge.com/news/870663/microsoft-windows-11-top-menu-bar-powertoy-experiment
Ads? (Score:2)
You won't be able to hide it and it will festooned with ads.
Re: (Score:2)
Luckily this is a powertoy so unlikely. Plus most of the powertoys are open source so easy to remove if they tried it.
Oh! The Innovation (Score:5, Insightful)
You could move the menu position in XP.
So they took it away, then offer it back and say it's innovation? or news?
honestly. So much said about so little.
Re:Oh! The Innovation (Score:5, Insightful)
You could move it around all the way from Windows 95 to Windows 7.
Heck, search youtube for those videos where they upgrade one windows version to the next all the way from 1.0 to 10 (or 11). I know I remember one where they set custom colors around Win 2.0 and those settings persisted all the way to 7.
Now your choices are "dark mode" and changing font sizes. Hooray.
Re: (Score:2)
You could still move the taskbar in Windows 8 and 8.1, too.
Re: (Score:2)
And you can still do it on Windows 10 22H2 to this day.
1984 (Score:2)
You mean a main point of the "look and feel" lawsuits after the 1984 introduction of the original Macintosh? Not "like linux." Not even like unix. X windows was just a way to bring up more VT100 terms at the time. So the real headline would be "final nail in the coffin of the look and feel era." Or "Microsoft finally admits that Apple had it right in 1984."
Not sure Apple got it right (Score:2)
I use a Mac but I still don't like the multi-mode finder bar whereby the menu for the app in focus appears in it. If you want the actual finder bar back you have to click on the desktop first then use it. Not ideal. I can understand why they'd do it in 1984 but there's little reason for it now. Just make main menus appear by default over the main app window like in every other OS.
It's going to be (Score:2)
The AI control bar. Lets them reply in text at the top of the screen.
OS/2 Warp! (Score:2)
Got the bar on the top yo
Re: (Score:2)
OS/2 had a completely different UI. In this case, we have now 30 years of people used to a Windows UI that has the taskbar at the bottom and individual menu bars for each application in each application window. People are used to this workflow, so no wonder, Microslop now has to monkey around w/ it
Maybe it's worth resurrecting OS/2. Anyone know how the osFree project is doing? (OS/2 API on an L4 microkernel)
Re: (Score:2)
OS/2 has changed names several times and now goes by Arca OS. [1]https://www.arcanoae.com/arcao... [arcanoae.com]
I used Warp 4 during the win 95 era.
[1] https://www.arcanoae.com/arcaos/
Win 10 (Score:1)
They took away Star bar placement entirely from Win 10 (I've usually kept it on the top or side) and now want to add some other shit back in? It will probably have AI garbage (poor Cortana .. although you won't be missed original psycho AI bitch), use react components and will freeze your entire desktop when you lose Internet connectivity ... because this is the world we're in now.
Nice try, but ... (Score:5, Funny)
> Microsoft is Experimenting With a Top Menu Bar for Windows 11
The Windows 11 menu bar will always be a bottom. :-)
Re: (Score:3)
That's the task bar. The menu bar is something unique to each application, and is a part of an application window. For instance, if you open Word, you have File, Home, Insert, Draw, Layout, References, Mailings, Review, View and Help. Whereas Excel has File, Home, Insert, Draw, Page Layout, Formulas, Data, Review, View and Help. It will be different for every application, even from the same company, which is why it's a ridiculous decision to anchor it to the top. That may have worked well in the past f
No Thanks (Score:2)
No thank you. Instead, fix the bugs and remove the advertising.
Re: (Score:2)
"Remove the advertising"?
Isn't advertising the whole business model of most tech companies nowadays?
Re: (Score:2)
> "Remove the advertising"?
> Isn't advertising the whole business model of most tech companies nowadays?
That or "something, something, Future AI, something, something."
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah... these days, it's probably that.
New Name (Score:2)
The name will change from Windows 11 to Windows 3.11.
Windows 3.11 (Score:2)
Windows 3.11 was a lot more usable than what this monstrosity would be. The only problem with Windows 3.11 was the lack of pre-emptive multitasking - same problem that Apple had before OS-X
Start menu (Score:2)
I used to try to use my task bar at the top of Windows, but windowed mode applications would always slowly creep up the screen as they were minimized and reopened with the top of the windowed application ending up under the task bar unable to access the minimize, maximize and close buttons. This behavior happened under multiple versions of Windows.
so there adding Norton Dedktop For Windows to 11 (Score:1)
yea this was there 30 years ago in windows 3.1 3.11 with norton desktop for windows. It was fantastic never chrashed and had norton commander for windows as its file explorer.
Let's not quibble (Score:2)
They want to put a bar at the top of the screen to show ads. You know it, I know it.
Microsoft priorities -- (Score:1)
Microsoft should stop polishing the UI and fix search. Once search works, go back to the UI work, by first, unpolishing it and making it more like Windows 2000, clean and simple with much easier control panel toggles in one place.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, one more redesign of the UI isn't something anybody asked for. Just like AI -- just because it's shiny and new (or in this case recycled) doesn't do a thing to fix the problems with Win11. Start putting out competent updates and dial back the user manipulation, and maybe then you can think about new features.
Accessing things? (Score:2)
What a concept. Telemetry included?
Multiple task bars (Score:2)
Yeah, so, on Linux you can place as many tool/task/menubars as you want, wherever you want, shaped however you'd like, with unique buttons and info on each. Meanwhile Microsoft is 'experimenting' with UI like its Xerox in 1970s, yikes.
This looks familiar... (Score:2)
Funny how much this looks like how I've had my Cinnamon desktop configured for almost a decade...system menu at the top left, widgets, clock etc on the top right, open applications top center; then at bottom center is the open application windows on each particular monitor, and bottom right is the virtual desktop switcher and system sensors widget. I've used this configuration since switching from Ubuntu 11.04's first attempt at the Unity desktop (tried it for 30 days, it just did NOT work well for me - co
Get it right (Score:5, Interesting)
Assuming this is the equivalent of the task bar... I may be crazy but to me the natural position is right. In general, because I mostly do web dev and so work with code and web pages, vertical space is far more precious to me than the relatively abundant horizontal space. So I have my task bar/dock as a vertical column on the right, with the Start button at the top, rather than a mostly empty strip along the bottom.
I think there have been desktop systems that had it this way out of the box (NextStep?).
Of course on rotated monitors and vertically-oriented tablets I stick it at the bottom.
Re: (Score:2)
> Assuming this is the equivalent of the task bar... I may be crazy but to me the natural position is right. In general, because I mostly do web dev and so work with code and web pages, vertical space is far more precious to me than the relatively abundant horizontal space. So I have my task bar/dock as a vertical column on the right, with the Start button at the top, rather than a mostly empty strip along the bottom.
> I think there have been desktop systems that had it this way out of the box (NextStep?).
> Of course on rotated monitors and vertically-oriented tablets I stick it at the bottom.
It's a personal preference. I have never liked them along the side. I tend toward top on Mac, Bottom on Linux.
Your preferences are rational and legit though for your work.
Re: (Score:2)
It also depends on the screens you have. I have 3:2 ratio. With KDE plasma I partially mimicked the MacOS way: menubar in panel on top, and fullscreen windows lose decorations.
The bottom panel is a "normal" panel.
I can't do panels on sides: 2 displays next to each other make sides a bit complex, and sides don't work for any kind of text without being ridiculously wide.
Re: (Score:2)
That's the thing: it's a matter of preference. I like that on KDE I can put the task/menu bar anywhere I want. I hated that on Windows it HAD to be at the bottom; well I don't care anymore because I don't even have a remnant of Windows anywhere. On those long narrow screens I put it on the right and it it's a VM it goes on the left, so this way if I'm in a maximized VM I know immediately.
Re: (Score:3)
You got it in one, NeXTStep provided a dock on the right side which grew from the top right corner down. This put the menu in always the same place. This only makes MORE sense in the age of wide screen displays but Apple ruined it when they made it into OSX. You can put it back where it belongs but I believe it requires plist editing, at least it did last time I did it. But that was a lot of versions ago, back when they still called it Mac OS X.
Re: (Score:2)
The NEXT menu was a floating panel that one could move anywhere on the screen, depending on one's needs. Yeah, w/ wide screens, it makes more sense, since it could be placed in those dark (unoccupied) areas if a window is maximized. If one is a Linux user, one could try using WindowMaker or AfterStep: not sure if those window managers still exist, but if they did, they'd be perfect. And yeah, I too don't like the way Apple changed it in OS-X
Re: (Score:3)
RIGHT?????
It goes on the LEFT!
But, yes, I agree with you that vertical space is much more of a premium now than horizontal space given the aspect ratios of monitors nowadays. It was different back in the 1980s when a lot of the UI conventions we still stick with were first established.
Re: (Score:3)
Until Windows 10, the task bar was something that could be moved - to the left, right or top: it didn't have to be anchored to the bottom. When Windows 11 was being done, they somehow decided that given the other changes they were doing - like centering the start button, it was too time-consuming to test whether those other 3 options would give optimal results if users dragged the taskbar to those 3 sides. As a result, the decision was made to anchor it to the bottom
If the menu bar is the list of functi
Re: (Score:2)
Some of us use large monitors. Mine is a 42" 4K TV, which I love, because there is so much real estate not blocked by dividing bars. And, a 4K TV is far cheaper than equivalent standard monitors.
Anyway, a top bar on such a large screen would be completely unusable.