Why the Windows 7 Start Menu is Going Out of Fashion
It's the start of the end of Start.
Remember what Windows 95 was all about? Besides a whole new platform, it also brought us the Start menu, which was big enough to get its own Rolling Stones theme song.
The Start menu was where all the action was at, making it easier to access programs now without having to dig through directories to find executables (back when we called them those things instead of folders and apps).
Even with the most useful of technologies, however, time evolves usage models and eventually we find a better way. That appears to be the story of the Start menu.
In a new B8 blog post written by Chaitanya Sareen, program manager lead for Microsoft's Core Experience Evolved team, we find out that a new feature of Windows 7 dramatically reduced Start menu usage since Windows Vista.
"It is striking to see how dramatically different the use of the Start menu is in Windows Vista vs. Windows 7. Some of the Special Folders (what we call those items on the right side of the menu) dropped in use by over 50%. Likewise, people accessed pinned items on the Start menu half as often in Windows 7 than they did in Vista. People also access All Programs and the MFU [Most Frequently Used] far less often," wrote Sareen. "Finally, we see an 11% drop in how often people are opening the Start menu at all. While 11% may seem like a small number at first, across our hundreds of millions of customers it is eye opening to see such a drop for a universally recognizable element of the Windows interface. We’re not talking about some hidden setting that is tweaked by a minority of people—we’re talking about a fundamental piece of Windows that people are using less and less."
That new feature was the ability to pin programs to the taskbar.
"To really bring this all home, let’s take a look at where people are pinning their apps. Figure 4 [above] reveals that 85% of people have three or more items pinned to the taskbar compared to a mere 23% who have the same number pinned to the Start menu," Sareen noted. "Although the taskbar and Start menu have different pinned defaults, many people do customize both of them when they want to. The message is clear that the majority of people want most of their apps on the taskbar rather than having to dig into Start."
So what's wrong with the Start menu? This is what Microsoft thinks are issues with the one in Windows 7:
- The menu feels cramped relative to available screen real estate when you try to see and navigate the full catalog of your programs.
- Search doesn’t have the space it deserves to quickly show you rich results across all sources of information, especially on larger screens.
- It’s hard to customize the menu to make it feel like it’s really yours.
- Icons and shortcuts are static and don’t leverage more of the pixels we see in modern graphical interfaces to surface connected scenarios.
With these lessons learned, Microsoft is transforming a Start menu into a Start screen – and that will be in Windows 8. Microsoft promised to share details on the Start screen soon.
Of course, those who won't be using the Metro UI will still get the Start menu, but it'll look quite a bit different: The First Glimpse of the Windows 8 Start Menu
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There's not an app for that.
i still keep little used programs on the start menu to keep my screen from being cluttered with icons
Shortcuts is where it's all at!
I really loved Windows XP style Start Menu, please bring that back! The reason Start Menu is not popular in Windows 7 is because you always have to go through "All Program" to get to your stuff - an unnecessary and frustrating step...
pinned to the taskbar? huh? do they mean the quickstart icons? or do they mean making a folder with link shortcuts in it and making a new toolbar pointing to that folder (which I'm still doing with windows XP)?
yeah it's more convenient to use taskbar and desktop icons for frequently accessed programs, but the start menu is still useful for infrequently used programs.
I'm worried all this focus on "apps" will have huge icons all over the place instead of allowing a clean look.
Out of curiosity, how could they possibly get accurate statistics on these things without invasively tracking what you do on your computer?
I've always liked to have a clean barren desktop(some say a waste of screen real estate). Auto hide the task bar and make the recycle bin disappear. So the start menu and windows+E button always get a lot of use. So I would miss the start menu, but if it was replaced by an app drawer like in Android or OSX I could learn to live with it.
i still keep little used programs on the start menu to keep my screen from being cluttered with icons
Right. You'll still be able to do that with the "Start screen", though. In fact realistically in a lot of cases (especially touchscreen mobile devices) you could drop explorer and just use Metro - put your most common apps up front, and the rest are tucked away but still very easy to get to. It's not for everyone, though, and that's why Win8 has both interfaces.
Yet what they fail to see is that the first graph shows that more than half of users pin items to the Start Menu...
Removing the Start Menu will guarantee that I will not buy.
I like my desktop clean, and only my 2 or 3 most used programs pinned to taskbar. Don't clutter it up by removing the start menu.
I have a feeling the decrease in using the "Documents," "Pictures," etc links on the start menu was at least partly due to them sending you to the "Libraries" instead of your actual "Documents" and "Pictures" folders. Don't get me wrong, libraries are useful, but when I see my user tile followed by my user folder I expect that the "Documents" and "Pictures" will also take me to the real folders, not "Libraries."
I love my clean desktop... Everything I use is on the start menu and quick launch. I hate cluttered desktops.
pinned to the taskbar? huh? do they mean the quickstart icons? or do they mean making a folder with link shortcuts in it and making a new toolbar pointing to that folder (which I'm still doing with windows XP)?yeah it's more convenient to use taskbar and desktop icons for frequently accessed programs, but the start menu is still useful for infrequently used programs.I'm worried all this focus on "apps" will have huge icons all over the place instead of allowing a clean look.
No, they mean Pinned to the Taskbar - which is exceptionally easy with Win7 and a step beyond what was in XP's Quick Launch icons.
With a Pinned app, I can pin quite a bit more than just the application; I can pin its status so if it's an RDP window, I can pin that server and have a stack of servers so when I right-click on that Pinned App, I get a choice of 7 (that I have pinned). Granted, you can do that with XP, but it's far more laborious and you can't stack them. . .
That's just one example - honestly, it's really nice.
On the other hand, if we could go back to XP's side-expanding Start Menu, I'd be happier! The reason I don't go with Win7's menu (which MS doesn't seem to get) is because it expands vertically which is not very conducive to work. . . it's clunky. . .
Win7 start button usage is down, because it's not as usable as XP's.
I'd rather do a MacOS/iOS combo type of interface:
1. Have Buttons/Widgets/Shortcuts, etc... scattered/arranged on the desktop for instant access.
2. Have a horizontal scroll bar along the bottom with less-used features like the control panels, settings, configurations, etc...
3. Along the top, have browser-like tabs for each open program "window" that you can jump around to.
That's waht I want to see in Windows 8.
Tree-style menus are pretty much obsolete. I don't like the TILE stuff Windows 8 seems to be pushing though - seems like a big messy collage.
Although a big fan of the desktop I think we need to remember that windows was based on a "work" environment (thus "desktop" and “folders”). Now that computers are moving more to the "home" environment (and more importantly developers are realizing this). I don't think anyone wants a system they use at "home" to work like their "work" system (task oriented) instead, visual cues that are emotional, social and fun oriented. So instead of “desktops”, “folders” and “project” we will see things like “home”, “family and friends” and “stuff to do”.
Microsoft is following Apple's tendency of favoring looks over using ease. For me XP's start menu is the best way to keep your stuff organized, much better than Win7's quick launch. If Windows takes the start menu out I'll reverse back to XP.
I hope they don't remove the "press windows key/type a few letters/press enter" shortcut! I also hope they do something with kinect and maybe some software to make motion tracking out of a few cheap webcams. I don't like fingerprints.
If they're going the apple direction I'll keep a windows box for gaming and use Debian for everything else, I should probably just do that anyway
@torque79
i find for the infrequent used items smart search is awesome, between pinned to taskbar and smart search i have never found the need to hunt into the start menu
i hope they will replicate some functionality of pinned to taskbar in the metro tiles, pinned item quicklist has been a god send
smart search is still present in win8 albeit it slightly more laborious (winkey + W or Q key depending which context your searching)
The menu feels cramped relative to available screen real estate when you try to see and navigate the full catalog of your programs.
Make Icons Smaller and Use Quick Launch Problem Solved Next...
Search doesn’t have the space it deserves to quickly show you rich results across all sources of information, especially on larger screens.
Press F3 Next...
Icons and shortcuts are static and don’t leverage more of the pixels we see in modern graphical interfaces to surface connected scenarios.
Create better icons not 256 x 256 again Problem Solved.
Anyone else get the feeling that Microsoft's PR team has a hand in a lot of these stories about the new Windows 8 interface changes? I've liked/been neutral towards Microsoft for ages, but this stuff has raised my doubts.
If I remember correctly MS sought to use "It's The End Of The World As We Know It" as a way to refer to win 95 as a whole but REM rejected. MS got "start me up" instead and had it be all about the start menu.
This is nothing else than Microsoft wanting the same UI to start things on a desktop, a tablet and a mobile phone.
OK, the icon mosaic is nice on a phone, on which there are only a "few" heavily used apps, and it's not a pain to slide the mosaic with your fingers on the screen. That's definitelu not the same story when a larger display is being used, I don't want to have a big mosaic of big icons, or even worse a huge mosaic of small icons.
So to me, this article seems to be a brain washing tactic from Microsoft ....
I keep my START menu, on "fashion" or not.
With win7, the only thing I use the start menu for is the search since its usually two keys and I have what I need.
What about the 89% of us who regularly use the start menu? Do we seriously need to start regularly clicking on the start menu to drive up the usage numbers?
I really can't stand the Windows 8 start screen. It takes up way too much space and obscures what I'm working on. It also requires a lot of mouse travel. I really don't see why a dozen or so tiles should take up the whole screen when twice as many buttons can fit in a compact start menu like what is used in Windows 7. My preferred setup is to pin my most frequently used apps to my task bar and use the start menu for infrequently used apps. I do not want Microsoft creating an app dumping ground like how OS X and Gnome 3 organize things.
A good user-interface is one that allows a high degree of customisability rather than enforcing a particular style on the user. If Microsoft make their UI as flexible as possible, the use their usage data to tweak the default settings to suit the majority of users and less technically adept users then they can have their cake and eat it.
I've never been satisfied with a Windows GUI on a fresh install, but always been able to customise it to my liking. At present I have nothing pinned to my Taskbar, fourteen of my most used programs pinned to the Start Menu, disabled most of the default user directories like "Documents", ""Pictures", "Games" etc., and have everything in the Notification Area hidden besides the volume control and network status. "Show desktop icons" is disabled. It's a very clean layout and simple/quick to work with, but probably not all like the typical Windows user UI.
I've always liked to have a clean barren desktop(some say a waste of screen real estate). Auto hide the task bar and make the recycle bin disappear. So the start menu and windows+E button always get a lot of use. So I would miss the start menu, but if it was replaced by an app drawer like in Android or OSX I could learn to live with it.
ever read those EULA you "agree" to prior to installing windows. next time look for a check-mark box that says something like "I agree to send statistical information to microsoft," or something like that. not 100% sure that is what that refers to although it makes sense to me and is no more invasive than google tracking android phones everywhere, Lol.. i'm not a hater wither, i use both windows and android and enjoy them, just observations.
The article seems to overlook something:
Default Windows 7 Installs have (3) items pinned to the taskbar! Windows Media Player, Windows Explorer, & Internet Explorer! So yes, most people will have 3 pinned.
Since win98 you could create custom tool bars with icon shortcuts to your most often used apps, docs, or web favorites. You can make it free floating always on top or dock it to any side of the screen making it auto hide. Very similar in functionality to the dock in OSX. I've used it for years and am still amazed at the folks who try to navigate through hundreds of items and pop up sub menu's from the goofy start menu.
Personally I use an XP style start menu on 7, thanks to "classic shell". It's still transparent and nice, but expand the old fashioned way, without having to scroll through my hundreds of programs. In fact it's a win95 style start menu, as the XP default was already not to my taste. Not that I use the start menu much, I have dozens of shortcuts on a side launch bar, that I had to buy since microsoft stupidly removed that feature.