There’s a lot going on here, but the highlights include:
• Filtering for better application management: Using the various columns available in the Processes tab—CPU, Memory, Disk, Network, and so on—you can filter and pivot the view of running processes using a visual heat map view and get a better idea of how individual applications are impacting system performance. By filtering on Memory, for example, you can see which applications are sucking up the most RAM.
Try not to micro-manage Metro-style apps. Unless one is hanging, there’s little reason to kill it from Task Manager. Windows 8 will automatically close Metro-style apps when needed.
• Metro-style apps and desktop applications managed together: As you may have noticed, Task Manager lets you manage both traditional desktop applications and new Metro-style apps. And you do so with the same interface and commands.
Metro-style apps cannot auto-start at boot time.
• Manage startup applications: Task Manager now provides an excellent new capability on its Startup tab that helps you manage which desktop applications—not Metro-style apps—auto-start when Windows boots.
• Services: Users who wished to manage system services previously needed to use the Services control panel. While this control panel is still available in Windows 8, Microsoft replicates it in the Task Manager as well. In retrospect, this is a fairly obvious place for this functionality.
Finding and Launching Applications with Search
Windows 7 includes a fantastic feature called Start Menu Search. To use it, you simply tap the Start button, type the term you’re looking for, and the search results are returned right in the Start menu. It provides an amazingly handy way to quickly find an application you want without mousing around the labyrinthine Start menu submenus.
OK, fine. But with Windows 8 doing away with the Start menu, you may be wondering how you can accomplish the same feat in the new operating system version.
Surprise: It works exactly the same way.
You can also trigger app search by pressing Winkey + Q.
That is, if you’re using the desktop environment and would like to find and then run an application, just tap the Windows key on your keyboard (or otherwise return to the Start screen) and start typing. Instead of a Start menu–based search, you’ll see the new full-screen Search experience, now called Start Search, as shown in Figure 4-43. And it’s far more powerful than the old Start Menu Search.
This new Search experience now provides a filter capability where it returns both traditional Windows applications and Metro-style apps by default. But you can use the various items in the Search pane on the right to change the search to Settings (and control panels), Files (documents and other files), and, interestingly, within Metro-style apps that support this functionality.
Keep typing to refine the search. When you see the application (or app) you want, simply click (or tap, or select) it. If it’s a desktop application, the view will switch back to the desktop and the selected application will launch immediately.
Knowing that Start Search now works for settings, files, and apps, you’ll probably use it more than ever. But even if a desktop application search is all you need, you can rest easy knowing that one of Windows 7’s best features has carried forward to Windows 8.
If you know the type of search you wish to perform, you can use different keyboard shortcuts. Winkey + F works for file searches. And Winkey + W will jump right to settings search. Check the appendix for a full list of Windows key keyboard shortcuts.
Figure 4-43: The new Windows 8 Search experience
To the Cloud: Using the SkyDrive Desktop App
While Microsoft built SkyDrive support into the Metro environment, providing File Picker-based access to the files on that cloud service, as well as integrated setting sync for those who want it, there is one crucial bit missing for desktop users: you can’t natively navigate your SkyDrive storage using File Explorer.
Fortunately, you can overcome this issue by downloading a SkyDrive desktop application that integrates your SkyDrive storage with File Explorer, providing a libraries-like interface for exploring SkyDrive, copying and moving files to and from this cloud storage service, and syncing those files with your PC.
The SkyDrive desktop application works in Windows Vista and 7 as well.
Shown in Figure 4-44, the SkyDrive application integrates with File Explorer and also lets you upload large files (up to 2 GB in size) to the service, which isn’t possible through the normal web interface. And even more exciting, it provides a unique Remote Fetch functionality that lets you access files on remote PCs through the SkyDrive web interface.
The SkyDrive application and Remote Fetch aren’t really features of Windows 8, per se, so we won’t waste too much space on them here. But you should know that this application is available, since this functionality will make your Windows 8 experiences even richer.
Figure 4-44: Access and sync your SkyDrive storage from File Explorer.
Summary
While Microsoft is very clearly heading to a future in which increasingly sophisticated and full-featured versions of the Metro user experience will eventually squeeze out the classic Windows desktop, we’re a long way from that future. And honestly, Metro and the desktop will coexist for the foreseeable future, thanks to the over one billion PCs out there still running classic Windows applications and the vast depth of experience that users have with this environment.
Fortunately, Microsoft hasn’t left desktop users in the lurch with Windows 8. This version of Microsoft’s client OS includes deep integration with new core Metro user experiences, and many desktop-related improvements like a new File Explorer, a new Task Manager, a new file copy and move experience, and more. So even if you spend most of your day in the desktop, Windows 8 will be a useful and desirable upgrade.
