[theGeatZhopa]

I think it's the slice technique to introduce the "new" task bar in much broader context. In each installation, even when I have to help friends, I switch the taskbar from the centered to the left positioned (as it has been for decades) temporarily/permanently.

This is because the centered is reduced in informational real estate. There's is simply not enough space to show more, as it is the case with a full screen wide, left positioned.

And the people don't like it or miss something (like me). So, if I were Microsoft and I plan to have only the centered one in a distant future, I need to find a way .. and that's this way. A way people are used to already from a lot of UI in their daily life..

I think it's the motivation behind this. :)

But you're right. You just have to learn to structure your thinking in 255 characters long sentences, then long file paths won't even appear hahhah I hate it too. Have you tried the UNC path \\.\fullfilepath\filename.ext

I used this for access files with very long paths and names..