Windows 8 Guidelines for Social Media

Windows 8 Guidelines for Social Media

Microsoft had to dramatically rethink how Windows and other services, like social networks, would work out of the box. Previous versions of Windows didn't have any social network integration with non-Microsoft products. There was always Windows Live Messenger, but it wasn't included in the operating system nor did it integrate with any service other than Microsoft's own. Windows 8 completely scraps that paradigm and includes great applications that integrate with just about every major social network and service.

Take the Photos app for example. Once you log into with your Microsoft Live account, all the social networks that you've linked to it previously will show up. Photos from your Facebook, Flickr, and SkyDrive are automatically populated in the app. No more signing into each account every time you set up a new computer. This makes setting up a new computer as simple as logging in. All of your networks and settings will be synced.

Let's take a deeper look at how Microsoft has integrated social media and other services in Windows 8.

SkyDrive:

SkyDrive will be the core service that offers storage and sync between computers. If you use sync documents with SkyDrive, they will sync between machines so you have the most recent copy of every file available to you without having to manage multiple document libraries.

SkyDrive even powers sync between applications. Microsoft Office 2013 features sync for documents, settings, and templates so that your session from any computer using Office will remain the same. There will be no more headaches about not having a specific template or setting enabled at a different machine.

People

The People is a dramatic addition to Windows 8. It combines all of your contacts from your social media sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter; but also includes contacts from Exchange so you have a unified hub of all your contacts. Microsoft has done a good job of making large contact lists manageable. You can quickly search for a specific contact. Clicking on a contact will not only bring up their information but will give you their latest tweets and Facebook status updates.

Perhaps the most useful feature within the People app is the 'What's new' tab where it will present all of your contacts tweets and updates. This is a great way to catch up on what your contacts are up to without having to download an additional application from the Windows Store. Twitter lovers will be happy to know that you can favorite, retweet and reply to all within the app. Although 3rd party Twitter apps like MetroTwit might work and look better, it's nice to see Microsoft bake this into Windows 8.

Photos:

The Photos app integrates with all the services that support photo sharing like Facebook and Flickr. This is great as it will populate your new Windows 8 machine with all your photos without having to transfer photos between machines. Flickr photos loaded up quickly and flicked back and forth smoothly. Facebook photos, on the other hand, crashed the Photos app repeatedly for me. Hopefully Microsoft polishes the app before Windows 8 releases.

Sharing Application:

One of the best features of Windows 8 is its ability to share content between applications. Developers are given access to sharing menus so that they can build sharing features to their apps. If you're in the News application and see an interesting story that you want to share, pull up the Windows charms (read my Windows 8 controls guide if you don't know how to do this) and choose which application you want to share to.

After choosing a specific app, you will be able to share the story within the app or a new application will open up. Sharing with the People app allowed me to use Twitter and Facebook from within the News app without pushing me into People app to do the sharing. Apple's OS X Mountain Lion operating system attempts to make sharing easier for users but hasn't even released its Facebook sharing features that it announced months ago. Windows makes sharing much easier for developers to integrate into the operating system.

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Windows 8 RTM: First Impressions

Windows 8 RTM: First Impressions

Finally , the wait is over and super excited to get my hands on Windows 8 RTM..  And really lucky to get it before Windows 8 global release on October 26. You too can get it for free by participating in Windows 8 Utshav @ MIC or in your own college from MIC Nepal.

If you are expecting drastic changes from the release preview, you are going to be disappointed. Windows 8 is definitely improvement over Release Preview but there are not feature additions besides vastly improved Windows 8 apps, stability & bug fixes.

The set up was really quick in less than 30 minutes on my PC. And when I signed in with my Microsoft account, I was surprised that all my data, apps, IE settings and lock screen wallpaper were synced up.

 Windows 8 gives your old PC new life

When I first heard about Windows 8, I was like time to upgrade my PC. But I was actually surprised to know that with Windows 8 runs better than Windows 7 on same hardware. And what's more interesting is it boots in less than 8 seconds if it gets the right hardware.  On old PCs too, Windows 8 boots faster than Windows 7 and is responsive, fast and fluid.

New start screen patterns

 Now you can choose from 20 design patterns to make your start screen and visual. ( My Windows was not activated so I could not try them)

Windows 8 Store and apps

Till Release Preview, all apps in the Store were free. Now you also can look for paid apps.  But  I think it is only available for US (for now) since there was no way to change country in Payment options.

There are handful of beautiful apps to play or work with. And I hope by the general availability of Windows 8, there will be enough apps to compete with apple store. Also, Microsoft's apps like Mail, People, Music, Video and SkyDrive which were in app preview are now feature complete and have nice improvements over the Release Preview.

Windows 8 desktop gets metro look

No surprises here. As announced, aero is removed and replaced with simple colors and flat look. I was actually fan of aero but I am not missing it now  :) 

 Bing gets visual with Windows 8

Bing search late comer to bing apps is what makes RTM  version special..As other Windows 8 apps, Bing search provides  full and immersive experience free from chrome and tools.  I never though that searching on web could be so awesome and beautiful.  With the bing app on Windows 8, searching via browser on google and even bing.com feels outdated.  (Note: Scroll via mouse to see different Bing Wallpapers)

 Internet Explorer 10

Internet Explorer for me too was the browser I loved to hate. I even had speed and hang issues in Internet Explorer 9. But Internet Explorer 10 is just fast and fluid. Its is not different in look and feel from IE 9 but definitely better. And I prefer IE desktop to metro version on my desktop.  And One thing that surprised me was now Internet Explorer has auto correct that automatically corrects your common typing mistakes. And I am not sure if it was available in previous versions.

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Advantage and Disadvantages of Internet Explorer 9

Advantage and Disadvantages of Internet Explorer 9

Advantages

HTML5:

One of the biggest advantage of Internet Explorer 9 over other Internet Explorer version is the support for HTML5! This feature has been widely advertised by Microsoft. HTML5 lets you play video and sound without the need of another plugin or software (like Adobe Flash player). It also allow you to do other things including play cool games without the need of flash.

Speed:

Another advantage of Internet Explorer 9 (or IE9 for short) is the speed. It has been widely touted by Microsoft to be faster and slicker than other browsers. And Microsoft have come up on that promise. Its certainly faster than previous Internet Explorer 8.

Crash/hang tolerant:

With previous Internet Explorers, a hanging tab can bring down the entire browser. But with IE9, only the tag hang. You can work with any other tags.

Disadvantages

Broken websites:

Because IE9 is more standards than previous Internet Explorer, sites not written in standards complient HTML can look "broken" in Internet Explorer 9. For example, sites may look extremely narrow or plugins may fail to load. This can be solved by adding this tag immediately below the "<head>" tag:

<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=?" />

and replace the question mark (?) with the last Internet Explorer browser that works with your website. For example, if you tested your page using IE9, add If you add this to your meta tags:

<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=8" />.

Favorites:

When using ctrl+b to orginize favorites, deleting a favorite does not place it in the recycle bin to restore later. In addition, IE9 does NOT confirm whether you want to delete a favorite.

Pinned tab:

In pinned tab mode, other add-ons like WOT and Norton Safe Web does not appear.

No track filtering:

We can't import our custom list of block sites. There are even other providers that make .xml lists to import. I can't find any option to import those rules! Currently the no track does not extend to google ads.

Default features:

As mentioned in the previous blog post, Microsoft have disabled features by default that we have grown so used to with Internet Explorer 8. For example, system sounds. In IE8, when a popup is blocked, a sound would play. But IE9 is amazingly quiet. You would have to manually enable that option in the advanced tab under internet options. Furthermore, QuickTabs is disabled by default. To enable it go to internet options and click on settings next to tabs. You would find the option there.

Windows Vista/Windows 7:

Internet Explorer 9 will only work on Windows Vista and Windows 7. Those with older Windows operating system (like Windows XP) is out of luck. They would need to get other browsers like Firefox to get comparable features to IE9

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