I look at that and wonder how it, me and my systems with 50K files on them would cope.

Bob.

Besides moms and dads who don't know better....who needs this?
Who out there just needs to get work done?

Or do we all have time to spare to sort piles, move piles, throw jointed selections, pressure locking...blah-blah... around trying to find the app to open (or anything for that matter)?

How is the start menu or desktops icons you can place anywhere not meeting
anyones work needs as is?
Man this is getting ridiculous.

I've been checkin in on Vista a bit...
In a nutshell: no. Keep it...and you better keep supporting XP for quite some time.

I never liked the latest mac GUI in the first place. Do I really need an O.S. treating me like a complete moron with it's security features, "glass" panes, and many other completely useless (although maybe pretty to some) items in an O.S?

I hope many speak with their wallets, and it's a resounding - NO.
It's turning into the O.S. version of Myst.

Go design the most streamlined OS and apps you can...cut out this mind-numbing dumb-down.

Awful.

I really can't believe that someone has spent time creating something so counter-productive (virus creators excluded of course).

If you want to group files, stick 'em in a folder.

Wow looking at your reactions I just had a flashback of the DOS vs Mac OS days. Did it occur to either of you that different people have different ways of working - and if so, why shouldn't it carry over to the desktop?

The problem with folders is you can't see what's inside unless you open them. This idea of piles is to give you a different way of grouping files. Piles is a way to show more information to your brain in a way that is already familiar from real life.

If you look at my real world studio there are "folders" (drawers and bins), but a lot of the stuff I use often is not only out of the folders, but is within reach. To most people it looks like a mess, but I know where everything is. And after a while things get into concentric circles of piles based on relevance to whatever I'm working on. Some people would find it impossible to work that way, but for me it is logical and efficient. I can literally put my hand on one of dozens of tools and items without thinking.

Of course you still need the folders, but that doesn't mean it's more efficient to keep everything out of sight (for me anyway).

I have far more than 50k files to worry about, but the 3d piles seems perfect for the desktop. I'm sure a clever interface designer could integrate it with Windows Explorer's folder hierarchy too.

Yes, it did occur to most, and it's a "pile" of something alright.
Did it occur to you the unecessary processing req for this assinine desktop?
Like 90% of Vista - completely unecessary (not to mention being designed for morons IMO).

I say again: Go design the most efficient and streamlined OS (and applications) you can (I don't care who makes it...just try that once).

I don't know if I'd like that desktop or not, but it sure is interesting. I think some variation of that and the Windows Explorer might be nice.

The transition from DOS to Windows was tough for me, I liked the command line and took me a long time to get used to the Windows look and feel. I still use DOS sometimes... :)

The thing is, with real-world clutter you can see what everything is. But when those things are about 50 pixels square, you can't. So while I can look over to the side of my desk and see a pile of papers, I can easily see what's on them in the areas that stick out. On a monitor I can't see that.

Also, despite the fact that we've gotten used to cluttered desks, that doesn't mean it's idea. I WISH it was as easy to keep things organized in the real world as it is in the computer. I'd rather have someone come up with a way to mimic computer organization than mimic real-world disorganization.

Do you know anyone who has a very cluttered desk that didn't (at least to some degree) *wish* they were more organized? I sure do, even though I know where almost everything is in the piles. And remember, we tend to know where things are in the piles not because we're just smart, but because we've had to dig through them so many times trying to find something we *don't* know the location of.

It's a bit of a shame that there isn't more experimentation done with desktops. This was one of the things that was interesting about Linux, but as Gnome and KDE have gained influence, the experimentation has died down.

Regarding Vista, I just spent a few hours looking at the Beta and thought that it did everything a Linux desktop can do. Just slower. I'm happy to see that I can get rid of all the Vista do-dads and reduce the dektop back to a Windows Classic look. Unfortunately, I'm going to have to write some training on the topic later this year, so I'm going to have to use Vista.

50,000 files seems like a pretty small amount of stuff to have to deal with to me. I have to work with a lot more than that in my daily life. I've definitely wished for more desktop management:
--I'd like a set of work views on the desktop.
--I'd like to corral groups of files and collapse them into work folders.
--I'd like to treat all the files on my desktop as shortcuts, because they may appear in several groups or views.
--I want it to be easy to assemble stuff into project groups so I can stay focussed on the task at hand

There are lots of ways to do this. Apple had a spring loaded folder scheme that worked well. Kept the desk clean, which I find helpful There are also sidebars, widgets, etc.

I'd like an option to "leave shortcut" so that I can move desktop items to folders but still leave a shortcut on the desktop. I work with others over a network and they need the files too.

Rob Mack

this looks like a good idea to me. Using the 3d "space" on your monitor owuld be a HECK of a lot more efficient. Imagine, instead of a folder full of icons you have a stack. You dont need to open the folder because when you move your mouse pointer over a stack the icon you mouseover moves out for you to see.

I've got 45 quicklaunch icons that could be put in to 4 stacks this way, talking up almost no space. Great idea, i WISH I could try this.

Ironcily, an "average" programmer could make something very simular with a modern game engine liscene (or a freebee & more skill).

Would I be worried about icon's being on'y 50 or so pixels? No. Heck, right now my icons are at a size of 43 & they're pretty large. In two years monitors could be a standard of 2.5kx1.9k pixels instead of 1.6kx1.2k pixels. Worried about hourse power wasted on this? No. The calculations being used are minute & a modern game has much more physics/graphical calc's then this would.

orginization? Majority of people aren't orginazed on their PC's anyway. Modern programs make folders all over the PC, not counting the actuatl install folder.

The coolest thing would be if you want something in the recycle bin, you could toss the program in a 3d bin. :)

Just a note: When I said the the icons were only 50 pixels or so, I meant that that's not big enough to see what's written on a document, not that it's not big enough for a regular icon. In other words, the papers on my desk are easy enough to read as I look through them, but when a text document is presented as a 50 pixel image it's not even big enough to read the file name.

Also, in the real world I can rifle through the stack, which you can't do on the monitor. So unless the computer version could mimic all aspects of the real-world version and be just as easy, it wouldn't be useful to me. And it never will be able to mimic the real world completely.

I suspect that a lot of the people who see that demo and say "cool!" would use it for only a little while, as a new gimmick or toy, and then go right back to the "standard" interface.

jaydee - I think one of the factors behind Vista's gizmos and "gee whiz" stuff is the fact that a lot of users are buying more and more powerful CPUs but they are still only running word processors, email, and web browsers. What do they need so much horsepower for? So this gives Microsoft lots of headroom to bloat their apps and the OS.

For those of us who do real, CPU-intensive stuff (like digital video, audio, imaging, etc) this is BAD. We want the CPU devoted to doing our work for us, not making glitzy eye candy for the desktop. But we are not the mass consumer ($$).

And of course we know that this glitz is to compete with the "cool factor" of macs.

An empty desk indicates an empty mind.

~John F. Kennedy

(Really.)