WithBill Gatessaying good - bye to Microsoft this workweek , we ’re realize more by the daytime how much we ’ll miss the guy cable . And when reading through the many interviews floating around this week , we come across this gem from 2003 . A leak memoranda from Microsoft , it ’s several pages of Gates just laying into his design and programming staff for - among other issues - his personal experience when trying to set up Windows Moviemaker . And it ’s a very fulfilling read if you ’ve ever been frustrated by a Microsoft product .
From : Bill Gates
broadcast : Wednesday , January 15 , 2003 10:05 AM
To : Jim Allchin
Cc : Chris Jones ( WINDOWS ) ; Bharat Shah ( NT ) ; Joe Peterson ; Will Poole ; Brian Valentine ; Anoop Gupta ( RESEARCH )
Subject : Windows Usability Systematic abasement flame
I am quite disappointed at how Windows Usability has been move backwards and the program management group do n’t drive useableness issues .
Let me give you my experience from yesterday .
I decided to download ( Moviemaker ) and buy the Digital Plus pack … so I run to Microsoft.com . They have a download position so I go there .
The first 5 times I used the site it timed out while test to bring up the download Thomas Nelson Page . Then after an 8 second delay I aim it to come up .
This internet site is so deadening it is unusable .
It was n’t in the top 5 so I enlarge the other 45 .
These 45 names are whole confusing . These gens make stuff like : light speed : Documents and SettingsbillgMy DocumentsMy Pictures seem clear .
They are not filtered by the organization … and so many of the thing are unusual .
I tried scoping to Media material . Still no moviemaker . I type in picture show . Nothing . I typed in motion-picture show maker . Nothing .
So I gave up and sent mail to Amir allege – where is this Moviemaker download ? Does it subsist ?
So they told me that using the download Thomas Nelson Page to download something was not something they anticipated .
They told me to go to the chief pageboy search button and type movie maker ( not moviemaker ! ) .
I tried that . The site was pathetically slow but after 6 second of waiting up it amount .
I thought for indisputable now I would see a button to just go do the download .
In fact it is more like a puzzle that you get to puzzle out . It tell me to go to Windows Update and do a bunch of incantations .
This struck me as all odd . Why should I have to go somewhere else and do a scan to download moviemaker ?
So I hold up to Windows update . Windows Update decides I need to download a crew of control . ( Not ) just once but multiple times where I get to see weird dialog boxes .
Does n’t Windows update know some key to talk to Windows ?
Then I did the scan . This claim quite some clock time and I was told it was vital for me to download 17megs of stuff .
This is after I was told we were doing delta patches to things but instead just to get 6 things that are labeled in the SCARIEST potential way I had to download 17meg .
So I did the download . That part was fast . Then it wanted to do an install . This take 6 mo and the machine was so dim I could n’t use it for anything else during this time .
What the heck is go bad on during those 6 mo ? That is unhinged . This is after the download was cease .
Then it told me to reboot my machine . Why should I do that ? I reboot every night — why should I bring up at that meter ?
So I did the reboot because it assert on it . Of course that mean completely getting rid of all my Outlook state .
So I got back up and running and go to Windows Updale again . I forgot why I was in Windows Update at all since all I wanted was to get Moviemaker .
So I went back to Microsoft.com and count at the pedagogy . I have to penetrate on a folder called WindowsXP . Why should I do that ? Windows Update live I am on Windows XP .
What does it mean to have to press that brochure ? So I get a bunch of confusing stuff but surely enough one of them is Moviemaker .
So I do the download . The download is libertine but the Install have many instant . Amazing how dim this affair is .
At some point I get told I need to go get Windows Media Series 9 to download .
So I determine I will go do that . This time I get dialog saying thing like “ Open ” or “ Save ” . No direction in the instructions which to do . I have no clue which to do .
The download is degraded and the install takes 7 minutes for this affair .
So now I think I am going to have Moviemaker . I go to my add / remove programme invest to verify it is there .
It is not there .
What is there ? The follow garbage is there . Microsoft Autoupdate Exclusive test package , Microsoft Autoupdate Reboot test package , Microsoft Autoupdate testpackage1 . Microsoft AUtoupdate testpackage2 , Microsoft Autoupdate Test package3 .
Someone decided to pan the one part of Windows that was usable ? The file organisation is no longer usable . The registry is not usable . This program listing was one sane place but now it is all crapped up .
But that is just the get-go of the Irish bull . Later I have heel things like Windows XP Hotfix see Q329048 for more information . What is Q329048 ? Why are these series of mend name here ? Some of the plot just things like Q810655 alternatively of saying see Q329048 for more information .
What an absolute mess .
Moviemaker is just not there at all .
So I give up on Moviemaker and resolve to download the Digital Plus Package .
I get told I need to go enter a bunch of information about myself .
I participate it all in and because it decides I have mistyped something I have to try out again . Of course it has cleared out most of what I type .
I try ( typewrite ) the right stuff in 5 meter and it just keep clearing things out for me to type them in again .
So after more than an hour of craziness and making my computer program name garbage and being scared and pick up that Microsoft.com is a dreadful website I have n’t persist Moviemaker and I have n’t got the plus package .
The deficiency of attending to useableness be by these experience blows my intellect . I conceive we had reached a first with Windows web places or the message I get when I attempt to use 802.11 . ( do n’t you just love that source credential message ? )
When I really get to use the clobber I am sure I will have more feedback .
When Seattle Pi late require Gates about the email , he replied , “ There ’s not a twenty-four hour period that I do n’t send a composition of e - mail … like that slice of e - ring armour . That ’s my job . ” There was no reference as to whether or not Gates had fourth dimension to take names . [ Seattle Pi ]
Bill GatesMicrosoftWindows
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