How did the Win 95 user interface code get brought to the Windows NT code base? • Hacker News Board

Re: How did the Win 95 user interface code get brought to the Windows NT code base?

#111

Post by dang » Wed, Nov 26, 2025, 2:49 AM UTC

throwaway2037 wrote: post #68

@dang: It would be nice if we can add an exception to these URLs. Currently, the domain hint only says: "microsoft.com". It would be better if it said: "devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing" or "microsoft.com/oldnewthing". I think we did something similar with forbes.com to illuminate when it was a blog (which are frequently low quality), instead of the official media website.

Ok, that should be done now. I'm not happy about how much screen space "devblogs.microsoft.com/oldnewthing" takes up, so I might look into rewriting these to "microsoft.com/oldnewthing". On the other hand, that's arguably a bit misleading too.

Re: How did the Win 95 user interface code get brought to the Windows NT code base?

#112

Post by user_7832 » Wed, Nov 26, 2025, 6:31 AM UTC

jasonvorhe wrote: post #108

psunavy03 wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That works for technical folks, but it's also a barrier to Linux adoption when too many things require dropping to a Bash terminal and dorking around. Try getting Grandma or Katie from HR to be able to do that . . .

Grandma gets her computer setup by family, Katie probably has tech support or a managed device. I've been setting up Linux for friends and relatives and apart from 1-2 niche issues I didn't even have to do any support because stuff just works.

You’re probably right for grandma or Katie, but CLIs are definitely an issue. I know it because they are an issue even for someone like me. And I’m someone who is fairly techy (heck, we’re on HN) and can read the docs/rtfm. I’m more comfortable flashing a kernel I’ve never heard the name of for the first time, than editing some arcane wayland settings.

Simple example, I wanted to customize my gestures in gnome. I installed another app for it on the recommendation of multiple stack overflow and Reddit threads.

I ended up losing the default gnome gestures, and even disabling the app didn’t help.

I only use my windows (10) ltsc installation now. (Where, fwiw, I do have an absolute *ton* of customization/“ricing” apps for everything from custom ux themes to taskbar tweaks. Amazingly, pretty much everything is stable.)

Re: How did the Win 95 user interface code get brought to the Windows NT code base?

#113

Post by ale42 » Wed, Nov 26, 2025, 1:24 PM UTC

fredoralive wrote: post #73

ale42 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, it's not that the latest Office is that much different in this sense... just open Word, add a tab stop, double-click on it and you get a dialog box that probably was almost identical in Word 6 on Windows 3.1. Not that it looks bad or anything, it's perfectly appropriate IMHO. I still dream of getting back menus in Office, now some functions are so hidden that if you don't use them often enough you always lose a…

Clicking the "100%" next to the zoom slider gets another Word 6.0 refugee, complete with nice pixel art 4:3 CRT. In Windows 10, Wordpad and Paint can both bring up the classic Windows 3.x colour picker Window, complete with the inscrutable Custom Colours bit. Although Wordpad is gone in Windows 11 and I don't think the Windows 11 Paint has the classic picker. It still (IIRC) has a colour arrangement in its new picker…

Great, didn't know this one, thanks!

Re: How did the Win 95 user interface code get brought to the Windows NT code base?

#114

Post by iso1631 » Thu, Nov 27, 2025, 11:01 AM UTC

grujicd wrote: post #51

iso1631 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder what percentage of people on HN have ever used subversion or cvs, let alone older systems.

I'm still using subversion as it servers solo developer needs perfectly.

If you're just doing an edit on main and push changes, git can do that fine just as well as svn, but no need to run a specific server on your laptop either, and in a client/server basis back to your home pi you just use standard ssh rather than running a special server.