
Previewing Windows 8 (Video) - desigooner
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2011/jun11/06-01corporatenews.aspx
======
mortenjorck
No, no, no.

The Metro UI is great. The tiles are smart, the apps are beautiful, the
solution to multitasking is promising, but this whole new approach _cannot
coexist with a Windows desktop._ I almost fell out of my seat when the
demonstrator nonchalantly switched back to the Windows 7-style desktop,
complete with start menu, taskbar, and maximized MS Office.

This the old curse of Windows backward-compatibility in a new form – not in
system-level cruft this time, but in incompatible UIs from completely
different worlds. You can't put a new tablet UI and a traditional desktop UI
next to each other on the same device and expect users to use them together.

It's as if Microsoft is attempting its own "Back to the Mac," only they never
actually left. Apple got it right, starting fresh with a new form factor and
adapting appropriate elements of it to the desktop. Microsoft is also starting
fresh with a new form factor, but then trying to shoehorn the whole thing onto
the desktop.

Of course, this is just a preview. I'm sure things will change a lot between
now and the next preview, let alone the final release. But this isn't starting
off on the right foot.

~~~
Luyt
I'd say "no, no, no" too, because prolonged use of a vertical touch surface is
ergonomically unfeasible.

~~~
mishmash
Saw that too, surely they'll make a toggle or something to switch x/y-axis,
maybe it's already in Windows?

~~~
kiiski
I think one of use misunderstood him. I assume he meant that using a touch
screen that's in front of you (vertically) is unfeasible (nothing to do with
x/y-axises).

~~~
mishmash
Oh, yeah I was talking about the millions of primarily vertical scrolling
mousewheels Microsoft helped put out there.

------
boredguy8
I'm pretty sure Julie Larson-Green came from Microsoft Office during the
overhaul of that product, which was an amazing leap forward in UI design for
Microsoft. The "ribbon" certainly had/has its detractors (and I was one at
first), but I soon realized what I didn't like about it was that it wasn't the
old, broken system I had learned to use over my lifetime. For nearly everyone
I worked with in customer service, approaching the system as an "Office
Newbie" was several times easier under the new system.

She also led the Win 7 overhaul, for which I'm forever thankful if only
because of the changes to how title bars work (being able to drag to maximize
or cover 1/2 the screen, for instance). It was so intuitive that one day I was
complaining about how Windows DIDN'T do that, but was on a Win7 box and it
worked. I know Jobs likes to use the word "magic", but that was the first time
I experienced it with a UI.

I'm wary of the changes I see outlined here, but I think that might, again, be
the consequence of having adapted myself to bad design that's been prevalent.
Past experience has me hoping I'm wrong to be wary, and I'll be delighted if I
am.

~~~
sigzero
I share those same feelings. I guess we will see in a year(?) when it comes
out.

~~~
kenjackson
My concern is did MS just Osborne itself? I was just thinking my wife's
current laptop is 3 years old -- maybe time for a new one. Now I'm thinking
I'm waiting until next year and getting a Win8 touch laptop (ideally a really
slick convertible).

~~~
zavulon
Microsoft doesn't sell computers, they sell software. To them, whenever it
comes out, it's gonna sell no matter what.

~~~
Tyrannosaurs
Yes, but they don't want Windows license sales to nose dive between now and
the release of Windows 8 do they?

~~~
adolph
Expect awesome looking Win8-ready stickers soon, I guess.

------
GrooveStomp
Wow, this looks great! For the first time that I can think of, I'm actually
excited about a new version of Windows. Even moreso, I'm actually excited
about developing for Windows as a platform. This is huge. Sure, I'm curious
how the standard mouse and keyboard interface will work, but I'm not really
worried. It looks like the standard Windows 7 interface is still there, just
working behind the scenes and collaboratively with the new UI.

~~~
graiz
Agree that it looks good at first blush however it's key that the "OS" is a
true OS and not a touch based shell on top of Windows7. HP has shipped a
number of computers with these touch-based shells and while they demo well
they aren't deep enough for day-to-day use. I do love that they are pushing
the desktop platform and creating a product that is clearly different in user
experience. I also like the idea of HTML as a rich platform but this was said
back in the days of Windows98 so I'm waiting and seeing. (Disclosure I worked
on the Windows team during 2000 and we had some similar explorations that
never saw the light of day so it's great to see)

~~~
icefox
"...it's key that the "OS" is a true OS and not a touch based shell on top of
Windows7....(Disclosure I worked on the Windows team during 2000 and we had
some similar explorations that never saw the light of day so it's great to
see)"

Do you know something that wasn't shown? It could just a full screen app that
runs on top of the existing shell not a replacement shell with a sub process
of the old shell. Or by having the quotes around OS when you say "OS" do you
just mean a new interface?

------
atacrawl
As someone who said good riddance to the Windows platform about 10 years ago
(for Mac OS _9_ , which ought to tell you how fed up I was), I have to say
that I'm genuinely excited to see Microsoft coming up with fresh UI
conventions, both with Windows Phone and now with Windows 8. They could have
gone the Google route and copied iOS, but they didn't. Likewise, they could
have gone the Apple route and rested on making modest changes to their
existing desktop OS, but again, it looks like they aren't.

~~~
9999
I followed a similar path to you (OS 8 was where I joined Apple), and I am
also intrigued by some of the ideas presented here (split keyboard for thumbs,
good job!). I am a little disappointed that I didn't see any examples of touch
interaction on what are traditionally desktop applications though. It's all
well and good to champion how tiles improve a weather application, but how
will they improve Photoshop or Visual Studio?

The premise of an HTML5 and JS based desktop is simultaneously promising and
terrifying due to bad memories of the Active Desktop days (and the exploits
that brought...).

------
jamesmcintyre
The interface is beautiful but I think it will prove to be nothing more than
eye candy veneer for an increasingly out-of-touch piece of software.

Let the desktop metaphor evolve respectively until it's no longer needed (by
most), do not sap it's identity by tearing users between two very different
modes of interaction. Once my brain is working in the desktop metaphor will it
want to "zoom-out" to yet another layer of abstraction and back and forth?
Surely this is a recipe for experience-degrading cognitive dissonance. When I
stand up from working on my mac, pick up my iPad and then read a blog on the
couch I have, subconsciously, switched to a drastically different set of
interaction-metaphors for iPad use. ("Design dissolving into behavior." -
Naoto Fukasawa)

If this interface found it's way on sub $100 20"+ smart screens (lcd or laser
projected) with kinect-like interaction than you have a compelling product.
Put it on Xbox and media center devices/tv's and you potentially have a new
interaction ecosystem.

This Windows 8 concept is fighting reality and for it's eventual users it
won't feel nearly as natural as their smartphones do today.

~~~
dangrossman
If they do it right, Windows 8 would be on the smart screen, on the Xbox, on
the netbook, on the tablet, and on the smartphones a few years in our future
when they're even faster than they are now. The UI may not be identical but
it'd be the unified "Windows Everywhere" type thing Microsoft has seemingly
always wanted to do.

~~~
jamesmcintyre
If Microsoft can retain and gain mindshare you may very well be right, going
forward I just doubt Microsoft's ability to "capture people's imaginations"
(<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvskEGWMLp4>).

~~~
lwat
If you buy a computer in 2012 it's gonna have Windows 8 on it (unless you buy
a mac). Microsoft don't need to 'capture imaginations', they have the market
share already.

~~~
jamesmcintyre
Is that you Steve Ballmer? ;)

I don't doubt Microsoft's ability to get Windows 8 into consumers homes as
much as I do not doubt their ability to shoot themselves in the foot by
pushing yet another half-baked product out the door.

Sure in 2012 millions will experience Windows 8, I would only add that 2012
may be the tipping point with OSX, iOS, Android, ChromeOS, PalmOS and others
aggressively vying to inherit their share of consumers who choose to move on.

I'm ambivalent to Microsoft's success or failure, I'm simply extrapolating
from current cultural undercurrents, the sentiment even long-time Windows
user's now hold towards conventional Windows PC's is haggard at best and
they're more open now than ever to exploring alternatives.

~~~
lwat
People have been predicting the demise of Windows for DECADES and it's still
around 90% market share so excuse me if I don't hold my breath.

~~~
jamesmcintyre
The cost structure of computing product manufacturers is changing, there is no
longer a dire need for manufacturers to sacrifice margin to Wintel.
Windows/office lock-In is dissolving. Any network-effect of being a Windows
user is dissipating. As software capability moves to the cloud, and open-
standards are adopted there simply isn't room for a bloated/expensive OS.

Decades ago I would not have bet against Windows, but today you can sense a
perfect storm of competition approaching their gates.

If in 5 years Windows is still a dominant piece of software I will be
surprised. However, I won't be surprised if Microsoft is still a main
technology player in 5 years.

~~~
pragmatic
Windows will dominate business for at least 10 years.

Office isn't the lock in. It's all those Line of Business (LOB) Apps that run
on Windows. Ironically many require internet explorer and are built in...Java,
oddly enough.

Marketing departments could switch tomorrow. Operations (depending on
industry) are locked in for years. Some are lucky enough to web based options,
some are stuck on what they have.

~~~
bgruber
But those applications locked in to Windows are frequently locked in to old
versions, so they won't move to Windows 8.

------
melvinram
It doesn't look bad. In fact, it's nice. How it will work when you're using it
to do real work will be where the rubber meets the road but I commend them for
doing more than copying Apple. OS competition might now get interesting as it
may no longer be an Apple to apples comparison (pun intended heehee.) As an
Apple guy, I'm looking forward to what innovations they can bring with W8 and
push the industry forward.

~~~
dfj225
> How it will work when you're using it to do real work will be where the
> rubber meets the road...

That's where I wonder how well received this new interface will be. I wonder
if this shell will just become something that most people skip past to get to
the familiar Windows desktop. Granted, my experience as a power user (read:
I'm a developer writing code and using the terminal--not on Windows but on OS
X or Linux) is vastly different from that of a normal consumer, but I still
think there is a common ground of using the computer to create rather than
purely for consumption.

Still, very interesting concept. I'm definitely looking forward to seeing this
released.

~~~
melvinram
Yea, it was a thought I had too. It's similar to the Front Row and Media
Center experience that most people probably don't use.

But I could see this having a different fate if it doesn't feel like a drag on
the system and it can be made useful (as I think external developers will make
it.)

~~~
dfj225
Thinking about it a little more, it really seems odd to combine two very
different modes of operation -- one touch heavy and probably best for a tablet
or some sort of mobile device and the other is the standard Windows UI
operated by keyboard and mouse. Having both modes on the same hardware seems
like an odd situation. Usually, a device naturally maps to one or the other
mode. I suppose hardware manufacturers might build tablet/laptop hybrids or
convertibles (they definitely have been trying, but I don't think any are
popular) and Windows 8 might be a huge win on these devices. However, aside
from this narrow subset of devices, I'm still guessing how this will play out.

For instance, the device used in the demo (assuming it has no other mode of
operation) seems to me that it would be a nightmare for using Excel.

edit: added the last sentence.

~~~
mturmon
Yes, a lot of the freshness involved using gestures, but that's been shown not
to work for vertical screens like on laptops and desktops
([http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/10/gorilla-arm-
multitouc...](http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/10/gorilla-arm-
multitouch/)).

This gives the video the feel of a Courier-like demo. Inspirational to look
at, but not realizable in practice.

------
krig
This looks great, but isn't this pretty much what Microsoft always does - they
decide that a particular technology or feature is THE feature, and they go
way, way too far with it. The thing I am thinking of is when they decided that
the internet and XML was it, and decided to make everything XML (ie Avalon).
Another thing was .NET and the CLR, when they decided to throw their old VS
codebase away and start over simply because now, ALL programs released HAVE to
be CLR-based. And this time it's touch.

Microsoft is like a kid with OCD. Touch! Touch is great! I love touch!
Everything is touch! Can I touch this? Then it sucks! Give me touch! More
touch!

I mean... yeah. Touch is cool, touch interfaces will probably be the main way
to use computers eventually.. but as usual, it feels like they are going at it
in the wrong way. It doesn't improve Excel to put it in a touch environment.
Apple did try that and discovered that it wasn't what people wanted.

Then again, this video focuses on the new stuff, so it's hard to tell just how
much they've moved things around.

~~~
krig
Also, another part of the video that I instinctively reacted negatively to was
the swipe to switch apps. Not even while using a touch interface do I want to
pull something in from the left side of the screen without knowing what will
pop out from there. To find the app that I want I have to flip through all of
them? That seems that the worst possible way of organizing / not organizing
different running apps.

What makes it even stranger is that they pass by a much better implementation
of the same thing in passing while demoing IE 10, where he pulls down to
reveal thumbnails of all the open tabs. Something like that in the main
interface would have been much better than having to swipe, swipe, swipe,
accidentally pausing videos, replacing views and causing all kinds of
frustration just to locate the particular app I was looking for.

~~~
Lewisham
I would be surprised if this functionality is not included at some point.
Don't get too hung up on it.

------
whackedspinach
This is great. I've been waiting for a while to see some sort of good desktop
UI that got away from the classic icons + sidebar widgets design. While this
provides the same functionality, it gives the user a lot more information at a
glance, plus it looks nicer (IMO).

I really hope that store becomes some sort of primary distribution channel.
After using Linux for so long, I've become so used to repositories that it
makes me cringe to go find some obscure nagware application when ever I need
to get something done on Windows.

~~~
fungi
> UI that got away from the classic icons + sidebar widgets design.

Have a play with kde netbook stuff, pretty funky and solid. Also there is
meego but i've never used it.

~~~
whackedspinach
Is it at all similar to the Ubuntu netbook interface? I always liked that. Now
I'm using Gnome 3, which I'm happy with.

------
amirkhella
From a UI design perspective, I think this will alienate lots of existing
Windows users, which might lead them to sticking with Win7 (XP anyone?) or
moving on to OS X Lion (to which Win8 is surprisingly similar).

Microsoft is taking their phone UI and scaling it to the desktop, which is a
big risk given how many people use that phone.

I give them credit for taking a risk, but IMO, this is the last nail in the
coffin of Windows.

~~~
giladvdn
Isn't taking a phone UI exactly what Apple is doing with Lion too? The large
icon matrix and "full screen apps" are exactly what you see on an iPhone/iPad.
Though it does feel more "optional" on the Mac relative to this video.

~~~
jamesmcintyre
If Apple didn't have large multi-touch trackpads on their macbooks with a slew
of natural gestures for navigating things like launchpad and mission control
they WOULD be mindlessly scaling the iOS UI to the desktop... but alas, they
have discernment and strong design.

------
zyb09
Meh mixed feelings. First the whole Metro UI seems to run on top of a normal
Windows as an alternative glorified launcher. He mentions that Apps are
written in some kind of new HTML/Javascript framework - now I don't know
exactly how its gonna work but a lot of people were hoping that MS was finally
settle on .NET in terms of API design. If this was a spin off of Windows, I'd
probably be a lot more happier, but as it stands, I see a lot of Window 8 PCs,
where the first thing people (and companys!) will do, is disable the new
"MetroUI" and have the usual taskbar/explorer layout with all the "legacy"
app(lication)s like .. for example .. Office2010.

~~~
RuadhanMc
If Microsoft abandons .NET... I'm done.

------
ams6110
I see opportunity here for someone to make a "Business OS." Microsoft has
forgotten who pays their bills. Business users do not want all this crap.

~~~
Flemlord
I work in financial services and there's been a mad rush to build iPad apps. I
think this will be very well received.

------
kogir
Did anyone else notice the Store icon on the start screen? I wonder if that
will be the primary distribution channel for apps using the new UI. With any
luck they'll sandbox apps like they do on Windows Phone 7. No more registry +
dll hell.

It's also interesting that they only mentioned HTML5 + JS. Right now
Silverlight is the only option for non-games on Windows Phone 7. Given how
similar the UIs look, it would be a shame to be unable to share code between
mobile and desktop versions of the same app.

~~~
watty
I'm sure there will be some kind of a store for these dashboard apps. It's
really not that different from a new skin on sidebar gadgets, is it? They're
developed using HTML+JS and distributed through an online store. This UI looks
great though and will definitely be beneficial to tablet/touchscreen
computers.

There will still be registry+dll hell because the core operating system and
applications will be running on the traditional windows environment in the
background.

~~~
darthg0d
I think there was mention of how easy it will be to install/uninstall apps in
the All Things D presentation earlier today. Registry+DLL hell might just die
with 7.

------
giladvdn
How will this work for people doing real work on their PCs? Apple (with Lion)
and now MS seem to be treating power users as an afterthought after trendier
tablet users. Don't get me wrong, I love the new stuff MS is doing on WP7, for
example. But I still need a PC (or a Mac) for most of my work.

Is it just me?

~~~
r00fus
Apple isn't ditching power users. They still sell Macs and OSX is not touch-
based (nor will it be in Lion).

Microsoft converting all of it's desktop users to a touch-first OS is going to
be... interesting.

Perhaps they will settle on multi-touch trackpads like the Apple Magic
Trackpad to resolve the gorilla-arm issue?

~~~
giladvdn
I'm a developer. A touch screen UI doesn't benefit me too much, just like I
think it won't most business users. But maybe I'm wrong. We'll have to wait
and see :)

~~~
kenjackson
For businesses its a win if you can get everyone one laptop, rather than an
iPad and a laptop.

------
crikli
The one thing that really jumped out at me was that "thumbs" keyboard. I would
LOVE to have that option on the iPad.

The rest of it looks cool enough, better than expected. For me personally I
can't imagine going back to any version of Windows. Fool me once, shame on
you, fool me...uh, you won't get fooled again.

But for those still on Windows this will be an interesting transition.

~~~
atacrawl
The thumbs keyboard was one of the few things that made me think "UX red flag"
-- since you can't really type on a touch screen without looking, the user
will have to constantly dart their eyes from one side of the screen to the
other. That would give me a headache.

~~~
statictype
After enough time I think you will be able to type on a touch screen without
looking (given a decent autocorrect which is a must for a touch screen
anyway). I've owned an iPad for about a month now and just typed this comment
without having to look at the keyboard (sans the parenthesis)

I think a spit screen keyboard is a win, overall.

~~~
aaronbrethorst
> After enough time I think you will be able to type on a touch screen without
> looking...I think a _spit_ screen keyboard is a win, overall.

Thanks for the good laugh :)

~~~
statictype
:) I swear I went over the text twice to make sure it didn't have any
embarrassing typo that disproved my point. Oh well. In my defense I make
similar mistakes on a normal physical keyboard as well.

------
sekou
If anyone remembers the Productivity Future Vision
(<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvA9lA7_5FE>) video, it looks like Microsoft
is staying true to its beliefs about the future of interfaces in computing.

~~~
anigbrowl
Well remembered.

------
Griever
I can see this being very nice for tablets, which was demonstrated, but I'm
far more curious to see what kind of innovations they throw into a standard
desktop version.

------
d2zo
I would've thought that the widget/tile implementation technology would be
Silverlight, not HTML5/Javascript. Didn't we also see a playing down of
Silverlight at MIX11? Has Silverlight fallen out of favor?

~~~
ams6110
Silverlight is dead, Jim

~~~
malnourish
Netflix still uses Silverlight, correct?

~~~
aberkowitz
Netflix uses Silverlight because it supports DRM.

------
xbryanx
I did some quick overlays, and I applaud them for apparently paying attention
to color blind users in their interface design. The colorful icons and
sidebars all seem to provide contrast to the 8% of us dudes who are color
blind.

------
thirdsun
I have to say I'm really impressed. This exactly what i was hoping for after
the introduction of the metro UI in windows mobile 7, though i didn't expect
microsoft to have the guts to do it. Glad to see they did.

One thing though: I really hope they don't keep the explorer in it's original
windows 7 style. It breaks the metro experience and i can only assume that
this was in the video because of the early developement stage.

Well, this won't make me replace my mac, but it looks very promising.

------
james4k
That is pretty awesome. Was a little worried about the integration with
traditional Windows apps, and I still am, but it looks like they just might be
able to pull it off.

------
hussam
This actually looks like a great touch UI, and it would make a great tablet UX
too given that users will never have to see the standard start menu and icons
(at least for tablets).

I know it might be fashionable to bash Microsoft, but this demo looks great.
While I'm at it, the Metro UI and Windows Phone 7 are actually good. Current
market adoption is not equivalent to "goodness". I use it personally and I'm
very satisfied .. even as a Linux user and an iPad owner.

------
losvedir
Wow, somewhat offtopic but that page is very well done. I browse in Chrome
with Javascript and Plug-Ins turned off (except for a few whitelisted sites),
and I think this is the first site that has ever had a working video for me.
Usually I have to open the page in another browser or something.

Lends a little credence to their claim of incorporating HTML 5 apps.

~~~
MatthewPhillips
Just out of curiosity, why do you browse with js turned off?

------
Jeema3000
This is pretty exciting, seeing as how it's the first major UI rethink for
Windows since Win95.

I like the idea of simplification of the UI for the average mom and pop user.
For them this will probably be a great fit with the large buttons and having
one application that fills up the whole window. It almost allows people to
think more abstractly, in terms of activities rather than apps for a lot of
things (i.e. 'what do you want to do' vs. 'how do you want to do it').

I do not like the idea of having to switch back and forth between the legacy
Windows Shell and this new shell. That, in my opinion, is what I would call as
a developer, a 'lazy implementation' - probably easier to implement for the
developers, but not the right way when it comes down to usability. I hope they
are planning some kind of tighter integration that will make that more
seamless...

------
rodh257
I reckon this UI would lend nicely to being controlled by a Kinect

~~~
rkwz
Kinect for computers, and now an UI like this?

I think they're onto something huge here.

------
kleiba
I think this is a really nice thing they're trying. Yet I'm a bit astonished
by the many comments here that say the UI looks beautiful. Because I thought
the opposite - when the tiles screen first came on I thought it was a print ad
for an insurance company or something like that. It's the kind of image my
brain was trained to ignore. I also thought the colors were too much.

Don't get me wrong - I really think it's great that they're courageous enough
to try something new. They're obviously trying to create a new style and not a
Mac OS rip-off, which I think is the right way to go, too.

But I'm curious whether the design will undergo major rework before Windows 8
comes to the stores.

------
Raphael_Amiard
I think this is looking really cool. I'm also quite happy that web standards
is the new trends at microsoft, even if it will certainly be less ideal than
one would picture it.

I also find it funny how much this looks like a tile based WM with visual
sugar. I hope they dont gloss over features on the split screen view because
ultimately that's gonna be a very important thing.

And also, they'd probably need a better way to integrate native regular apps
than what is shown in the video, provided, for some users, this might
represent 90% of the time they spend with the OS.

------
algoshift
Interesting...but I can't see using it for a desktop system. As a heavy user
of a number of engineering and software development tools I just can't imagine
how this is any good.

For example, I don't see using Solidworks or AutoCAD with my fingers. I also
don't see using any CAD/EDA packages like Altium Desiger (electronics circuit
design) with my thumbs. The same applies to firmware, software and web
development tools (Keil compilers, Altera/Xilinx development tools,
Dreamweaver, Komodo). For that matter, I can't even see using Photoshop or
Illustrator that way. I could rattle off dozens and dozens of applications
that would be seriously impaired by touch. It's cute and sexy, but it is the
slowest and most cumbersome way to interact with a computer.

I don't even see using the Office suite like this.

An on-screen keyboard might be the thing to do today...but...and there's only
one way to say it...they suck in a big way. Useless for anything non-trivial,
even on a tablet. Typing on an iPad with a bluetooth keyboard is orders of
magnitude more productive than poking at the screen.

Then there's the question of multiple screen behavior. All of our engineering
workstations have a minimum of two large (24in or more) high-resolution
monitors. A good number of them have three. There are engineering design
applications (like Altium Designer) that use multi-screen environments very
effectively to greatly enhance productivity. I need to know how this new UI
will affect these scenarios.

In my not-so-humble opinion I have always thought that MS really needed to fix
and enhance XP rather than what they've done with Vista and W7. As a power
user there's so much in Vista/W7 that makes you say "really?". They've also
just about ruined the Office suite. If you were an expert user of the prior
generation of Office and had a code base of routines and tools they pretty
much made you look like a complete newbie with the new UI and approach.
Productivity with Office definitely took a big hit for most tasks for quite
some time.

Despite criticism, Windows is a workhorse OS used across thousands of
different industries. I really hope MS is very careful about not damaging this
user base for the sake of being "trendy". Tablets are great fun, but I don't
see doing my day-to-day work on tablets any time soon. Wrong UI.

------
hristov
Great. Microsoft is going down the same rabbit hole Ubuntu and Gnome went down
in by assuming that a mouse driven desktop should have the same UI as a
touchpad. I was worried that Ubuntu made a step backward with the Unity
failure, but now Microsoft will eagerly follow them, so Ubuntu's failure will
not be that bad. In fact if the folks in Canonical overcome their egos and
realize their failure soon enough, perhaps they can get ahead of MS.

------
martingordon
Looks really nice. I really enjoy Microsoft's 2D designs. It started with
Whistler, then Windows Mobile 6 (even if I liked nothing else from it), and
continuing on to WP7 and now Windows 8.

Even if ARM consumes less power than Intel chips, I hope that the desktop
underpinnings of Windows 8 don't bog it down and destroy battery life. I also
hope there's an OEM that can build hardware that's up to snuff.

------
mmcconnell1618
This looks like the same kind of thing as "Windows Media Player." A skin on
top of the OS that hides complexity. First problem, if I'm am app developer
why am I going to build for the Win 8 UI and then rebuild again for the other
95% of Windows machines that don't support the new touch interface? I can
build for the old standard windows interface and it will work everywhere.

~~~
kenjackson
You'll do it for the same reason you build an iPad app for 20M users and not a
Windows app for 1B users.

~~~
mmcconnell1618
But that's the point. There aren't 1B Win8 users and there won't be for a very
long time. With iPad you have to build in Apple's eco system but with Win8 you
have the option to build a standard Windows app. How many people are still
running Win95 or XP? It will be a long time before Win8 reaches anywhere near
1B users.

------
thadeus_venture
I think this isn't necessarily about using a tablet or phone interface on the
desktop, it's about using either one depending on what peripherals you are
using. One configuration is a separate OS instance per device, but a more
interesting configuration is basically a phone that you can hook up to a
monitor, keyboard and mouse. So basically you get a mobile interface in one
mode, and a desktop interface in another. I'd much rather have a single small
device i can lug around everywhere I go instead of separate devices for home,
office and mobile. Given how quickly cpu speeds are progressing on mobile
devices and the prevalence of cloud hosted applications, this could be a
possibility sooner rather than later..

And regardless of that, this is about having a single application platform for
all the form factors. This video shows a tablet interface, I don't think they
will force you to use it on the desktop, at least as shown here. I think the
point was the same apps can run everywhere.

------
tiles
Pre-Windows 8 apps won't fit into the new Windows 8 model without being
rewritten for new APIs/style. If we assume Windows compatibility is then no
longer what drives Os marketshare for PCs (a big leap, but one Microsoft seems
to be making), then this would be the perfect time for Android or WebOS to
make the bid for the desktop and business users. Obviously OS X is limited by
being Apple-devices only, so where is the next big x86 compatible OS that
desktop manufacturers will sublicense?

On the interface, I absolutely think Microsoft can have Metro UI conventions
and complex applications without compromise, but it seems ill thought-out to
believe you can scale a phone interface up without greatly increasing the
density of information or ability to interact with data, of which the preview
seemed devoid.

The "wall-mount problem". What looks great on a wall-mounted monitor is not
the best interface for my actual desktop computer.

------
light3
All this functionality requires a touch screen, thats fine on mobile devices,
but what about on a desktop pc - what will be the cost of big touch-screen
monitors?

I guess a really cool idea is to have a small touchscreen you use for control,
in combination with an existing/bigger screen for the actual display.

~~~
kijinbear
I totally agree with your concerns, and I also love your small touchscreen
idea. A full touch interface gets really awkward, not to mention expensive,
once your screen gets bigger than 10-15 inches.

All these full-screen apps with touch functions are optimized for laptops and
tablets. Apple did it, Ubuntu did it, and now Microsoft is going to do it.
Maybe that's where everyone thinks the future is. But as the proud owner of a
24" widescreen monitor who is always looking for an excuse to upgrade to 30",
I am very disappointed with this inspired-by-tablets-but-also-fits-the-desktop
nonsense.

I don't want full-screen apps, dammit. I bought a big monitor because I want
several apps and all of their content to be simultaneously visible at all
times. I shudder whenever a member of my family "borrows" my PC for a few
minutes and goes on to maximize all the windows without even thinking twice.
And I certainly don't want to wave my arms all across the big screen like an
idiot. There's a very good reason why we have a small device (mouse) that can
be manipulated with the flick of a finger to control an arbitrarily larger
interface. I don't know how a small touchscreen might be used in a similar
role while retaining the intuitiveness of a touch interface, but we're
definitely going to need something like that or our arms will begin to hurt
very badly after 10 minutes.

------
huntero
This fits well with all the earlier talk about Windows 8 supporting ARM.

Microsoft isn't scaling Windows Phone 7 up to the tablet, they are scaling
Windows 8 down to the tablet. By the time Windows 8 is released, it might be
viable to run this OS on a phone. Will the mobile and desktop OS's merge?

~~~
desigooner
FWIW, Windows 8 won't support legacy apps on ARM platform.

And as far as specs go, one of the demo devices was running an Intel Atom
processor.

------
smosher
My first thought was "are you serious?" But then I remembered the Win8-on-ARM
promise. I'm not sure I'd want to use a desktop (to me 'desktop' means
'workstation') like this, but it's interesting for sure. The more I think
about it, the more the seems like a product of MS's unreleased _Courier_ UI
work.

This reminds me of a recent article about how Linux is inventing the future of
the desktop experience. I disagreed immediately, and this UI is an example of
why. I do prefer the Linux desktop experience to others, but it is a
refinement on a core of existing ideas with a few small but important
inventions. So it's more like a limo than a bus, which neither KDE nor Gnome
are driving.

------
Mithrandir
Does this mean that the majority of new PCs sold with Win8 will have
touchscreens?

~~~
kenjackson
Probably not a majority, but a lot. Think 50-100M the first year.

------
cageface
Ironic that after years of promoting their own complex software UI stacks
they're going HTML5 + Javascript for this one. One more reason why JS is
quickly becoming the most important programming language.

------
hcurtiss
Does this strike anyone else as little more than a shallow skin for Windows 7?
HTML5 and javascript? How is this different than my browser? Apps in Windows 8
. . . kind of like apps in Chrome?

~~~
riffraff
it would seem a core differentiator is that apps have means to interact with
each other? (the photo thingy in the video)

------
edanm
More and more, I realize we're nearing a big crisis in computing - touch vs.
non-touch.

I really fear seeing the world moving towards a place where you have to either
choose one platform/metaphor over the other. Or where you have to port every
single application to support all different input types. And the thing is,
touch is just so _good_ for so many things, but so impractical for certain
kinds of work.

Whoever manages to reconcile touch computing with boring old office computers,
will have a _huge_ market for them.

------
ErrantX
Ugh. No.

That looks like a decent tablet interface, and a good interface for the vast
majority of users who will be using the core apps and little else..

But for me it's a bit useless

\- file browsing looked difficult.

\- App switching looked painful (when you're switching between a lot of apps
at once I really don't want to be doing so in rotation).

I realise this is because I am a power user with specific needs... but I
really really hope they have a version with a normal desktop.

------
endlessvoid94
Holy SHIT. It blows me away that this came out of MS.

------
ThomPete
Here is the thing.

Either MS with Metro have solved it and it plays across different platforms. I
can see it work both with mouse and keyboard, touch and joypad.

Or Metro isn't versatile enough and it will mutate into a freakshow of edge
case considerations.

In any scenario, I give MS props for finally presenting a worthy alternative
to to OSx/iOS suite.

Now if only the hardware manufactures would follow suit it might be
interesting.

------
code_duck
The 'snap' feature is pretty neat. That reminds me of how you could drag
entire program fullscreen windows up and down on an Amiga. Like if you could
show parts of your different displays on X11 on the same monitor. I know MS's
system is just for different running applications here, but since they're
fullscreen it serves a similar function.

------
rooshdi
I admire Microsoft's attempt to experiment with a different Windows UI, but it
will take quite some time for users to get accustomed to this new tile format
after accumulating decades of experience with the desktop interface. These
informative tiles may be better suited for some sort of screensaver or login
screen alternative initially.

------
pseale
A nice fantasy would be that Windows 7 replaces XP as the new "business OS"
line for the next decade (XP has served in this role since ~2002). Windows
8/9/onward would then be free to deviate from backwards compatibility in favor
of a better consumer (non-business user) experience.

But it's hard to say what will happen.

------
ugh
It solves one crucial problem of all current tablet UIs (iOS, Android, WebOS):
<http://ignorethecode.net/blog/2011/03/04/multitasking/>

Please, Apple, Google and HP, blatantly copy the ability to see more than one
app at once!

------
plainOldText
Full screen apps look awesome. I can only think of how the web apps will look
on Windows 8 devices now. Hopefully there will be no need to learn a new SDK
and leveraging the Web technologies for building great apps that will work
across all devices will be enough.

------
smackfu
Corporations seem to be only adopting every other Windows version now, so it
would be interesting if Microsoft decided to alternate the targets of their
Windows versions. Windows 7 was good for enterprise, Windows 8 will be good
for consumers.

------
randomor
[http://allthingsd.com/20110601/steven-sinofsky-talks-
windows...](http://allthingsd.com/20110601/steven-sinofsky-talks-
windows-8-and-more-at-d9-video/?p=81774) another video on D9 with talk heads

------
tompickles
My first thoughts after showing the old windows desktop is... as a PC user
(non tablet) that Metro UI is gonna get really irritating with a mouse; so
you'll end up just using the Win7 looking part.... what's changed?!

------
more_original
Hm, so it looks like there won't be any windows in Windows anymore.

------
foxhill
i'm so glad they've come up with something that can be considered new, and
seemingly somewhat intuitive..

but i can't help but see that things aren't how they should be. i suppose this
is a very early preview, but ms have got to go a lot further than simply
creating an "on top of windows" application that looks pretty.

their benchmark for success has got to be the intuitiveness and the usability
of OS X, without copying any part directly.. something i feel that has always
come second place in windows.

time will tell, i suppose.

------
emehrkay
Maybe I didnt catch this, but the apps are written in html/css/js, do they
port over to win phone 7?

To me this looks like an official MS skin on top of the Windows desktop. We'll
see though

------
icandoitbetter
Oh come on. Media Center all over again. Nobody's going to use this on a
desktop computer after the first boot-up.

I do like the tiling system implementation though.

------
alinspired
Wish I had the same OS and apps for laptop, tablet, phone, especially with the
data somewhat synced.. this might be a step towards it

------
kin
i really like the UI. i wonder though what the input would be with a
traditional mouse/keyboard setup

------
tree_of_item
So is Microsoft abandoning .NET? I really don't see how HTML and Javascript
are preferable to that.

------
pama
That's one step closer to a keyboard-free future. I wonder how developer tools
will evolve.

~~~
watty
I think I'm a forward thinking fellow but I don't see developer tools moving
away from traditional keyboard (and usually mouse) environment for a long
time. This seems like a slimmed down Windows Media Center layer powered by
HTML/JS just like Windows Sidebar gadgets. It'll be great for tablets and
touchscreen PCs but I don't see it being too beneficial to business users.

------
pazimzadeh
It reminds me of Dashboard on Mac OS X, which is composed of HTML and CSS
widgets.

~~~
josephcooney
Vista and Windows 7 had sidebar widgets that were/are also HTML + CSS. Before
that (Win XP) you could put arbitrary HTML widgets anywhere on the desktop
using activedesktop.

------
niallsmart
How do you open Control Panel?

------
RuadhanMc
Dammit Microsoft. I'm rooting for you but you just don't get it, do you?
Someone that tries to please everyone, ends up pleasing no one. Touch + mouse
does not compute. It's like mating a horse with a donkey. Do you really want
your next product to be a mule?

------
nabaraj
looks killer for a tablet not so interesting for PC!

------
georgieporgie
This looks suspiciously like some sort of Media Center for Apps that's running
atop the Windows OS. Honestly, that's fine with me. All I really want them to
do is fix all the dysfunctional, inconsistent stuff in Windows 7. If they want
to put an app launcher over that, fine by me.

------
kahawe
I just love how Microsoft has started to (desperately) embrace all the "cool
stuff" that the actual "cool cats" and underdogs have come up with and been
doing for a very long time now... and how Microsoft likes to present
themselves as a hip, cool company almost like a small software shop... ever
since competitors have gotten significantly more successful and Microsoft has
been losing market shares. So transparent.

I mean, trying to start Windows 7 launch parties around the world?? Posting on
reddit to market some product and ask for "feedback"? Non-chalantly talking
about "cool stuff"? Please... do you really think people will forget how you
dealt with competitors back in the day? Will forget your FUD and zero open
standards? Will forget what a humongous multi-billion dollar corp you really
are?

------
ozataman
The video does not even have a fullscreen button. These guys really don't pay
much attention to detail.

------
philthy
I can just about guarantee most current touch and tablet devices couldn't
process heavy duty dual app/dual screen/ picture in picture/what have you.
Yeah sure a twitter feed and word let me see a HD video and adobe illustrator
with 10 or 20 apps running in the background on a tablet device...this is
ridiculous, its a silly toy. this is like that MSN keyboard for your TV back
in like 97. The puny Microsoft ship swirls in the ocean about to be gobbled by
Apple, Google, etc

