What Windows 8 Apps Do You Use On PC?

tbh, i dont use any, rather just go to ebay website than have an app installed for it.

maybe i have just not come across anything worthwhile
 
I don't use it (because I have to sign my PC to the Microsoft account), but the Netflix app looks like it could be useful (if you have Netflix of course). Maybe also the BBC iPlayer app if one exists?
 
As said before, Windows 8 apps are mostly gash. Things like Ebay, Amazon, Mail are faster and more productive to use the full website.

Got my Windows 8 just as i want it now. Boot to desktop and Classic Shell. :D
 
EBay app is not good

Netflix
Metro tube - Youtube
Bing news
Bing weather
Email
Calendar
Xbox movies
One note
Rain alarm
Twitter
Package tracker
Here maps
Bing map preview
TV catch up
Audible


Facebook 20% app 80%web site.

So lots of media type apps that are far better than desktop/websites experiences.
 
Pinned tabs don't refresh etc. If you aren't using outlook/thunderbird/mail app. You are making life hard for yourself.

There's plenty of decent apps, as I have listed. That provide a better experience than website. Also have the benefit of pressing start button and checking 5 or so apps with inn a split second for new info, no tabbing between them, no refreshing. If there's something new then it opens near enough instantly.

Really get the imprison some haven't tried apps and just gone there rubbish.
 
It's quicker to load the BBC News website up and glance at all the headlines than it is to wait for a news tile to tick through all the options. Literally the only useful thing live tiles are good for is showing the weather at that particular moment, or an unread message count.
 
The fact you even wrote that is mind boggling stupid. that isn't what live tiles is about.
You would launch the app. The app unlike the website is very configurable. So you can display what news you want, unlike the website.

Email - shows when you have new emails - with zero interaction
Weather - you don't even need to open the app most of the time, you can just glance at live tile
Youtube the live tiles displays the most recent subscription, so again you can glance and see if there's a new video up with out doing anything.
Same with Facebook, you can see if anything new is on the wall without opening.
Package tracker you can see what's happening without opening.
Then there's things like Netflix, youtube, audible, news etc that have a better UI than the website or desktop equivalent.

And even though ebay app is crap (it's also crap on ios/android) still have it installed for notifications, so I don't forget.

Apps/websites are neither inherently good or bad, it's about using the best option, rather than instantly dismissing it. For some it's website, for some it's apps.
 
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And even though way app is crape (it's also crape on ios/android) still have it installed for notifications, so I don't forget.
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What on earth?

Live tiles / Metro apps don't work on the desktop. The start screen is something that you need to specifically look at, so in normal usage you won't see these tiles update anyway, which means you're back to notifications. Bringing up the start screen, seeing I have 5 new things on Facebook and then launching a gimped app takes just as long as clicking a bookmark for the website, with all the advantages that come with it being in a browser formatted for a PC screen.
 
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EBay*

Utter rubbish, of course they work on the desktop. I use them every day. as I keep saying so,e have advantages due to live tile, some have advantages due to notifications, dome have advantages due to a much better UI compared to desktop/website.

Just becuae some apps like eBay/Facebook, etc doesn't make all apps rubbish.

Read my list and why they are good.
 
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OK, well enjoy using your fullscreen applications formatted for touch I guess. I wish you'd put as much effort into your typing and proof-reading as you do into your Microsoft white-knighting.

Every item in your list boils down to "a thing appears telling me to open the app to find out some more stuff". That could have been achieved by badging the taskbar icons.
 
Full screen that's finny, swing as I'm sat here with several full screen apps running side by side.
And touch optimise, in no way means keyboard de optimised.

The fact you aren't using them speaks volume, as some have clear benefits, over desktop/websites.
Some websites have terrible UI, like youtube and Netflix, where the apps have great UI. Others have notification/lifetime, so no need to manually switch and refresh,

Also why are you loading apps? Once you open them once, they stay in hibernation and launch basically instantly.

At the same time, not everything is better in app form, so website/desktop is used for that. Best of both worlds with latterly zero downside.
 
Glaucus said:
Full screen that's finny, swing as I'm sat here with several full screen apps running side by side.
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So in other words, fullscreen?

Glaucus said:
And touch optimise, in no way means keyboard de optimised.
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It fundamentally does. It is impossible to have an app optimised for touch input as well as mouse and keyboard input, unless the UI can change depending on the input method.

Glaucus said:
The fact you aren't using them speaks volume
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Because the majority of them are just ways of formatting a webpage for smaller displays. The Netflix App offers nothing over the website, other than taking up the entire screen all the time instead of just when I'm actually watching a film. I have a PC with two screens, I don't want to dedicate the whole of one of them to a scaled up phone app. The fact that you even cite Netflix as an example of when the app is better than the website is pretty funny in itself, seeing as they are virtually identical - the website scrolls vertically, the app scrolls horizontally, and the backgrounds are different colours. Truly a game changer.

Glaucus said:
Also why are you loading apps? Once you open them once, they stay in hibernation and launch basically instantly.
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I said launch, i.e. "click on".
 
Oh dear, well you've dropped yourself in it now. the Netflix offers plenty over the website.
And no UI does not need to change to optimise for both. Take Netflix, both website and app work on the same principle of same size tiles to display artwork you click on.
However the app has many benefits.

The biggest three being. More films are displayed due to metro design principles, massive bonus especially in the personal recommendations. Website does not show what the film is available in, like HD/superHD etc, and series are displayed a million tomes better in the app.

So yeah no benefits :rolleyes:

Other tried th audible desktop app? Going to tell me the app isn't clearly better. Even a monkey could see the app is in a different league.

So because most apps are rubbish (and I agree), then you don't use any. So why do you browse any websites? Using that principle, most websites are useless.

You use the best one for the experience, sometimes that's apps, sometimes that's websites, sometimes that desktop software.

You said launch as in click on, well then they don't take for ever to open.

So yeah your are still talking rubbish and clearly don't have a clue what you are talking about.

I have 4 windows 8.1 devices, only one has a touch screen, I use a mixture of apps, websites and desktop software on all off them.
 
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Caged said:
Cool, find me where I said apps take forever to open.
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s long as opening up a tab and refreshing it, it takes a lot less time than that. Doing that for 5+ sites, compared to pressing windows key, and having a quick glance at live tiles for numerous things is quicker? Load times are quicker on websites is it? Ui are always better on websites are they?(already proven that one wrong, massively wrong)


Oh look ignored everything else as you were wrong.
 
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Glaucus said:
The biggest three being. More films are displayed due to metro design principles, massive bonus
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No they aren't. There's 27 films that I can see on my Netflix homepage at the moment, the same as in the app.

Glaucus said:
especially in the personal recommendations.
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The website categorizes the personal recommendations based on the title I watched which is the reason behind the recommendation. This is more useful than more titles appearing on the same viewport.

Glaucus said:
Website does not show what the film is available in, like HD/superHD etc, and series are displayed a million tomes better in the app.
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Series are displayed almost identically, with the previously mentioned horizontal scrolling instead of vertical. The website is missing the quality detail though.

Glaucus said:
So yeah no benefits :rolleyes:
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You found one benefit of the app over the website on a site that doesn't have to display a lot of information at once. The limitation of the website is not a limitation of that particular medium.

Glaucus said:
Other tried th audible desktop app? Going to tell me the app isn't clearly better. Even a monkey could see the app is in a different league.
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I haven't used the Audible website or app. I don't think a monkey would care though.

Glaucus said:
So because most apps are rubbish (and I agree), then you don't use any. So why do you browse any websites? Using that principle, most websites are useless.
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I never made any comment about whether most apps were rubbish, that's all in your head.

Glaucus said:
You use the best one for the experience, sometimes that's apps, sometimes that's websites, sometimes that desktop software.
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And for me the best experience has never been a Metro app (you know, the question asked by the thread).

Glaucus said:
You said launch as in click on, well then they don't take for ever to open.
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Never mentioned launch time.

Glaucus said:
So yeah your are still talking rubbish and clearly don't have a clue what you are talking about.
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Or you're reacting based on stuff you've made up and drawn a weird conclusion.
 
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