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Screenshots of Old Desktop OSes

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Re: Screenshots of Old Desktop OSes

#61

Post by FergusArgyll »

hermitcrab wrote: post #58
FergusArgyll wrote: post #50

There's a lot of nostalgia in the comments here. I wonder if any reader under say 25 is willing to comment; do you think OS's today are a regression? do those look better? To me they look unwieldy, heavy and overwhelming and I can't help but think the love for them is just the love for youth or whatever

There is definitely an element of nostalgia. However, a lot of earlier desktop OS GUIs do seem to be more internally consistent and with more emphasis on usability than the current crop. I think part of the issue is that things that might make sense on a phone have bled into desktop OSes, where they make a lot less sense.

I don't mean this in a dismissive way but based on your profile I'd say you're > 25. I'm curious about the perspective of someone who didn't grow up with the those os's

Re: Screenshots of Old Desktop OSes

#62

Post by hermitcrab »

anthk wrote: post #59
hermitcrab wrote: post #54

Invisible scroll bars are a source of constant annoyance. And it sometimes takes me several attempts to move a window, because of all the various clickable things without visible boundaries. Frustrating.

On GNU/Linux run this command, it will fix it for all the GTK based desktops, such as XFCE, Gnome and Mate: gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface overlay-scrolling false Under Mac you might have a similar Cocoa setting or whatever is called (nsproperties?) with "defaults write".

I'm on Windows and Mac. Not because I love them, but because that is where my customers are. Also I try to keep my computers fairly vanilla, so that they don't look too different to the user's computer when I do videos or screenshots of my software.

Re: Screenshots of Old Desktop OSes

#63

Post by hermitcrab »

FergusArgyll wrote: post #61
hermitcrab wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is definitely an element of nostalgia. However, a lot of earlier desktop OS GUIs do seem to be more internally consistent and with more emphasis on usability than the current crop. I think part of the issue is that things that might make sense on a phone have bled into desktop OSes, where they make a lot less sense.

I don't mean this in a dismissive way but based on your profile I'd say you're > 25. I'm curious about the perspective of someone who didn't grow up with the those os's

25 is a very distant memory. ;0)

Re: Screenshots of Old Desktop OSes

#64

Post by shevy-java »

GEM Desktop 1.2 looks sooooooo like the ancient Apple operating systems. I first saw this on a friends' parents computer and was quite astonished why computers may look like that. I was very used to Windows/DOS back then.

I am also glad to have switched to Linux in 2004 already. Once you have been using Linux for a while, whenever I use windows I am annoyed at how slow it is. Just file copy operations alone and then billion excuses windows developers make, trying to copsplain why it is so slow. When I have to backup 30GB, I don't want an explanation why it is slow - I simply use what is faster. And that's just one advantage of many more Linux has. (I use the commandline most of the time though, so KDE and GNOME are IMO just pointless eyecandy these days.)

Re: Screenshots of Old Desktop OSes

#65

Post by adrianwaj »

pjc50 wrote: post #52
adrianwaj wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am starting to think the top half of the screen should be the desktop, the bottom half should be the start menu but already activated and full of programs. No conventional bottom panel-bar with a start button. A right-most column should exist that fills up with a list of opened windows. [1] When I first saw Win95 with a cleared desktop, I immediately thought - where has everything gone? Why is this empty? Decades l…

Screen real estate is precious unless on the very largest screens. Especially vertical. I'm a big fan of being able to put the app list/bar on the right, keeping the maximum vertical space available and allowing its captions to be readable horizontally. > Maybe use voice recognition that uses lip-reading through a camera to launch or modify? This feels like the result of a competition to design the worst possible use…

"are going to find it a disaster."

True, it's not a good solution and there is Subvocal Recognition (SVR) that detects electrical signals in the neck or jaw using pads. Hall effect keyboards are pretty good in terms of sensitivity I find.

Lip reading by HAL was also a disaster for Frank Poole.

Maybe a large screen that can easily be flipped vertical/horizontal would work well. People already do it with the their smartphones - why not stationary screens? Have the OS detect when it happens so it can make any predetermined layout changes. Maybe have it rotate using a small motor? Cable connections into a base unit to avoid entanglement.

In terms of screens - I think two volume dials to adjust for brightness and another one for blue-light would be ideal. It should be super easy to do at a hardware level. On 24 hour programs if really pedantic. Maybe an external "volume dial" pad that can be plugged into a USB-C would be suffice and it could have a light and movement sensor as well to take a computer out of (and into) suspend and set the desired brightness according to the environment.

There are rechargeable closet lights that already have movement and light sensors - just need to adapt it to a screen.

Re: Screenshots of Old Desktop OSes

#67

Post by whynotmaybe »

aidos wrote: post #29

Alleycat in CGA just hit me hard. For the people that didn’t live through this time, lining these images up makes it obvious why those that did speak of how visually impressive the Amiga was.

Nothing beats a 40 year nostalgia in the morning!

Except missing that sock and falling down into the dog's path and understanding the concept of fighting like cats and dogs.

I just found out that the theme song is on Wikipedia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alley_Cat_(video_game)

Re: Screenshots of Old Desktop OSes

#68

Post by DVRC »

The man behind this site is known for his skills of recoverying data from QIC tapes. Looking at the "Software Library" section makes me always wonder if it will be released at some point, since that there is some stuff that isn't on BitSavers or other sites.

Re: Screenshots of Old Desktop OSes

#69

Post by delta_p_delta_x »

I really wish Windows 11 had a Windows 2000 mode. I want a grey, boxy UI, but I also want al the modern technologies Windows has introduced since—DirectStorage, D3D12, fast SSDs, device-independent pixels and vector UIs, all written directly against a Windows API that is modernised, safe, and easy to use. No React, no ads in my weather app; the only browser on my computer will be the browser itself.

Re: Screenshots of Old Desktop OSes

#70

Post by lstodd »

somat wrote: post #48
sthuck wrote: post #39

I kinda miss that in the early 2000's kde and gnome shipped with a fuck ton of window decorations based on all those (then-not-so) old OS. Teenager me had fun switching them every day and playing with windowing behavior (focus follows mouse! hover to select and only one click needed!). I wonder what techy kids today do to explore and have fun. Speaking of the early 2000's, man, Aqua was such a good design. I apprecia…

In some ways X11 with it's focus follows mouse, don't raise on focus, select:middle click paste features provide a far more refined desktop experience then mac or windows ever could. No wait, stop laughing, sure X11 was a garbage fire when it came to consistent professional design, but because it was such a wild west of an environment there was place for real ui innovation. I know, I get grumpy fast without middle cl…

Cut-buffer (the middle click) I just can't live without. People that never experienced that still get awestruck with the ease and effortlessness.

And virtual desktops/workspaces also had that awe-effect back then. Although with multimonitor setups this faded a bit.

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