Windows Insiders Questionnaire

Today, I filled out a rather lengthy questionnaire about my membership in the Microsoft Windows Insiders, a group of volunteers who test unreleased versions of Windows. It was a bit on the long side, and some of it didn't apply to me very well. 

When asked if I mention it anywhere else, I mentioned this blog. I didn't think to add that to see most of that, one would have to go back to about 2014, and work forward from there. I've said a lot about Windows on here, but not so much lately as in the beginning of the Windows 10 testing, during those heady days when we were discovering the usual teething problems characteristic of any new operating system.

While Windows 10 is built on the same basic chassis (kernel) as Windows 7, it does have a lot of background items running busily behind the scenes, to make the stuff we see work more smoothly or more comprehensively, and those also use quite a lot of resources, so you should have a computer with some respectable 'horsepower' under the hood, so to speak. At the same time, and for those unfamiliar with it, Windows 10 does run older programs much more readily than some previous operating systems. That's very useful if you tend to cling to favorite older graphics editing programs, or perhaps something from the corporate environment you'd rather not replace just yet. You may get a notice that it isn't compatible, but if you select "run anyway", it likely will run OK.

And Windows 10 is improving. All of us Insiders sending in our Feedback and suggestions is helping to encourage useful changes. Two heads really are better than one. As I said in a rant to Microsoft in 2009, maybe us unwashed masses can't do code like you do, but we do know what we like, and what we'd like to have, and what's bugging us about what we've got now, and that information should be useful in designing a better Windows. And it was. I was right. And if little Sally is still there, and still reading this stuff, a warm hug to you!