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A modern reimagining of Windows 2000's UI - professional, simple, uncluttered, focused, no cheapening of the whole experience with adverts in a thinly-veiled at

A modern reimagining of Windows 2000's UI - professional, simple, uncluttered, focused, no cheapening of the whole experience with adverts in a thinly-veiled attempt to funnel you into Bing - with modern underpinnings and features such as WSL2 would have me running back towards Microsoft with open arms and cheque book in hand.

mixmastamyk 1y ago
Not an obligation, but ReactOS exists and needs help: https://reactos.org/donate/ https://reactos.org/donate/ Surprisingly close. I recently tried its package manager and installed a recent Python! So better than the original XP-era Windows in some respects.
- itsmartapuntocm 1y ago
  I’ve been watching ReactOS development for years and and progress is slow but steady. I’m excited for the point where it will be fully usable as a drop in replacement for old Windows software.
PaulDavisThe1st 1y ago
There are Linux distros that meet your description (no need for WSL2 either!). I am guessing you're not running towards them with open arms and cheque book in hand ... or maybe you already ran to Linux and are just nostalgic about going back to Microsoft ... ?
- p_ing 1y ago
  While DEs often emulate the look of macOS or Windows, they always get the feel wrong. You can put a global menu bar, Dock, etc into KDE, but ultimately it still acts like KDE and nothing like macOS.
  - skydhash 1y ago
    It's not like macOS or Windows is the pinnacle of UI. I'm on Fedora Silverblue, and it's so relaxing to not deal with the usual ['Yes', 'Not Now'] prompt on notifications. Or have your computer became suddenly unresponsive because of random scans you can't disable.
    - p_ing 1y ago
      The GP is talking about the Windows 2000 UI.
    - wruza 1y ago
      It's not like kde is either. In windows I have never thought about carefully moving the cursor through start menu. In kde it's one wrong move and you're in a different section, cause in 25 or how many years they didn't figure out hover activation delay.
      - hulitu 1y ago
        > In windows I have never thought about carefully moving the cursor through start menu Well, Windows 11 got rid of start menu. To get to it you have to click an obscure button. In Windows, you have to carefully think how you move the cursor at the edges of the window because Some Idiot thought is a good idea to make the window border 1 pixel wide. Even on (Q)UHD monitors.
        wruza 1y ago
        The internet says the borders are 1px since w10, but the actual resize handle area on my pc is much thicker and is adjustable, cause I remember changing it. Windows surely has its quirks in dumb places. But what linux desktop achieved in the last 10-15 years is being driven by a bunch that simply shits on its users and doesn't care for years after. I left back to windows at xfce 4.6 which broke all my effing menus and told me to gfm. Kept trying biannually and seen it getting worse and worse, at the stupidest places. Like, they have to be from really special demographics to do some of that.
- zamadatix 1y ago
  Plenty of distros/skins get it 99% of the way there for a similar looking screenshot but only 25% of the way there for the actual user interface experience. ReactOS is probably the closest (in terms of going down a holistic user interface approach) but saying it's 25% the way there to being a finished solution would be generous.
- zwaps 1y ago
  Linux UIs can’t even align fonts correctly within the elements. It is miles away from the original and you can immediately see its Linux because things don’t quite line up. Huge difference in quality, attention to detail, and the entire interface becomes unpleasant to look at. Also, Linux power management and lack of hibernation means its useless on laptops
  - Liftyee 1y ago
    Out of curiosity, when was the last time you used Linux on a laptop platform? Anecdotally, it's come a long way since 5 years ago - daily driving Ubuntu 24.04 on my Thinkpad, and I can get 8 hours of use (engineering workload) in a day. It's not ARM level of performance, but far from "useless".
    - trinix912 1y ago
      That's "It works on my machine". Especially with ThinkPads, Dell XPS, and other laptops usually used by the Linux folks. Try it on a random cheap HP and you might not even have sound working (I've gone through this a few months ago). You can sometimes easily fix it through the terminal, but then we get into the debate of whether a normal user would be able to do that.
      - guenthert 1y ago
        Well, how many "it works on my machine" does it take to make it a general statement? It works on all of my machines, from dirt-cheap lenovo EDU series ThinkPad to portable workstation Dell M6800 and Pixel Chromebook in between. It generally doesn't work for people buying computers from vendors who use hardware were the manufacturer doesn't disclose the documentation. Just don't give money to those who seek to prevent free software.
        josephg 1y ago
        I mean, yeah? But it’s far from the seamless experience of macOS or windows. On my desktop pc: - My wireless card isn’t detected - I’m using Linux mint, which means I’m still on X11. Some software doesn’t support X as well as wayland. Some only supports X I guess? - I use Davinci resolve - which has a native Linux install. But I need to use some weird tool to convert it to a dpkg to install and run it. It doesn’t have a window bar - so the only way I can change the size of the window is by right clicking in the task bar - My two monitors have different DPI - so I need to use window scaling. This confuses IntelliJ - which made all the text super tiny for some reason. I have a DPI override for that in a weird Java config file. - I want consistent copy / paste shortcuts. I can’t use ctrl+C in terminal because that’s SIGINT. So I have it set to meta+C. But I can’t bind meta+C in IntelliJ because of Java limitations. So my copy/paste shortcut is just different in different apps now. - Smooth scrolling is still an inconsistent mess between different programs. Particularly Firefox. I’ve also been running into problems where my second monitor won’t turn on after I resume the computer from sleep. But apparently that’s a bug that affects windows as well when using recent nvidia drivers, so that isn’t Linux’s fault. I’m not saying it’s bad. It mostly works great! I love my workstation, and I’m enjoying distancing myself from Apple’s increasingly buggy software stack. But it’s far from perfect. I’m happy enough to use Linux despite all its warts. But when my parents ask for a new computer, I recommend macOS or windows.
trinix912 1y ago
Windows Whistler (XP Beta) had an interesting theme that was like a bit modernized Windows 2000. Small non-rounded title bars, non-obnoxious taskbar, etc. Too bad they never finished it and offered a stable version for Windows XP users.
Gud 1y ago
Sounds like you are describing XFCE. I made the switch to a *nix OS with XFCE 20 years ago. Couldn’t be happier.
fithisux 1y ago
I agree. I also hoped Arca Noae goes down this road, but they are still 32bit.

mixmastamyk 1y ago

Not an obligation, but ReactOS exists and needs help: https://reactos.org/donate/ https://reactos.org/donate/ Surprisingly close. I recently tried its package manager and installed a recent Python! So better than the original XP-era Windows in some respects.

itsmartapuntocm 1y ago
I’ve been watching ReactOS development for years and and progress is slow but steady. I’m excited for the point where it will be fully usable as a drop in replacement for old Windows software.

PaulDavisThe1st 1y ago

There are Linux distros that meet your description (no need for WSL2 either!). I am guessing you're not running towards them with open arms and cheque book in hand ... or maybe you already ran to Linux and are just nostalgic about going back to Microsoft ... ?

p_ing 1y ago
While DEs often emulate the look of macOS or Windows, they always get the feel wrong. You can put a global menu bar, Dock, etc into KDE, but ultimately it still acts like KDE and nothing like macOS.
- skydhash 1y ago
  It's not like macOS or Windows is the pinnacle of UI. I'm on Fedora Silverblue, and it's so relaxing to not deal with the usual ['Yes', 'Not Now'] prompt on notifications. Or have your computer became suddenly unresponsive because of random scans you can't disable.
  - p_ing 1y ago
    The GP is talking about the Windows 2000 UI.
  - wruza 1y ago
    It's not like kde is either. In windows I have never thought about carefully moving the cursor through start menu. In kde it's one wrong move and you're in a different section, cause in 25 or how many years they didn't figure out hover activation delay.
    - hulitu 1y ago
      > In windows I have never thought about carefully moving the cursor through start menu Well, Windows 11 got rid of start menu. To get to it you have to click an obscure button. In Windows, you have to carefully think how you move the cursor at the edges of the window because Some Idiot thought is a good idea to make the window border 1 pixel wide. Even on (Q)UHD monitors.
      - wruza 1y ago
        The internet says the borders are 1px since w10, but the actual resize handle area on my pc is much thicker and is adjustable, cause I remember changing it. Windows surely has its quirks in dumb places. But what linux desktop achieved in the last 10-15 years is being driven by a bunch that simply shits on its users and doesn't care for years after. I left back to windows at xfce 4.6 which broke all my effing menus and told me to gfm. Kept trying biannually and seen it getting worse and worse, at the stupidest places. Like, they have to be from really special demographics to do some of that.
zamadatix 1y ago
Plenty of distros/skins get it 99% of the way there for a similar looking screenshot but only 25% of the way there for the actual user interface experience. ReactOS is probably the closest (in terms of going down a holistic user interface approach) but saying it's 25% the way there to being a finished solution would be generous.
zwaps 1y ago
Linux UIs can’t even align fonts correctly within the elements. It is miles away from the original and you can immediately see its Linux because things don’t quite line up. Huge difference in quality, attention to detail, and the entire interface becomes unpleasant to look at. Also, Linux power management and lack of hibernation means its useless on laptops
- Liftyee 1y ago
  Out of curiosity, when was the last time you used Linux on a laptop platform? Anecdotally, it's come a long way since 5 years ago - daily driving Ubuntu 24.04 on my Thinkpad, and I can get 8 hours of use (engineering workload) in a day. It's not ARM level of performance, but far from "useless".
  - trinix912 1y ago
    That's "It works on my machine". Especially with ThinkPads, Dell XPS, and other laptops usually used by the Linux folks. Try it on a random cheap HP and you might not even have sound working (I've gone through this a few months ago). You can sometimes easily fix it through the terminal, but then we get into the debate of whether a normal user would be able to do that.
    - guenthert 1y ago
      Well, how many "it works on my machine" does it take to make it a general statement? It works on all of my machines, from dirt-cheap lenovo EDU series ThinkPad to portable workstation Dell M6800 and Pixel Chromebook in between. It generally doesn't work for people buying computers from vendors who use hardware were the manufacturer doesn't disclose the documentation. Just don't give money to those who seek to prevent free software.
      - josephg 1y ago
        I mean, yeah? But it’s far from the seamless experience of macOS or windows. On my desktop pc: - My wireless card isn’t detected - I’m using Linux mint, which means I’m still on X11. Some software doesn’t support X as well as wayland. Some only supports X I guess? - I use Davinci resolve - which has a native Linux install. But I need to use some weird tool to convert it to a dpkg to install and run it. It doesn’t have a window bar - so the only way I can change the size of the window is by right clicking in the task bar - My two monitors have different DPI - so I need to use window scaling. This confuses IntelliJ - which made all the text super tiny for some reason. I have a DPI override for that in a weird Java config file. - I want consistent copy / paste shortcuts. I can’t use ctrl+C in terminal because that’s SIGINT. So I have it set to meta+C. But I can’t bind meta+C in IntelliJ because of Java limitations. So my copy/paste shortcut is just different in different apps now. - Smooth scrolling is still an inconsistent mess between different programs. Particularly Firefox. I’ve also been running into problems where my second monitor won’t turn on after I resume the computer from sleep. But apparently that’s a bug that affects windows as well when using recent nvidia drivers, so that isn’t Linux’s fault. I’m not saying it’s bad. It mostly works great! I love my workstation, and I’m enjoying distancing myself from Apple’s increasingly buggy software stack. But it’s far from perfect. I’m happy enough to use Linux despite all its warts. But when my parents ask for a new computer, I recommend macOS or windows.

trinix912 1y ago

Windows Whistler (XP Beta) had an interesting theme that was like a bit modernized Windows 2000. Small non-rounded title bars, non-obnoxious taskbar, etc. Too bad they never finished it and offered a stable version for Windows XP users.

Gud 1y ago

Sounds like you are describing XFCE. I made the switch to a *nix OS with XFCE 20 years ago. Couldn’t be happier.

fithisux 1y ago

I agree. I also hoped Arca Noae goes down this road, but they are still 32bit.