Re:Microsoft Introduces New "Surface" Tablet
by specialist on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @10:50AM
(#4132075)
Hmmm. So is Windows 8 a horse? Or a duck?
I like Metro quite a bit.
Alas, I can't suspend disbelief and trust that this time Microsoft will remain committed to their latest greatest new thing, not lose interest and wander off in a few years, and not screw all the developers who bought into the latest pyramid scheme.
I think a lot of other people like Metro too.
I just attended an designer graduate student thesis project gallery exhibit whatever. 2/3rds of the UIs were strongly Metro-esque. Some very cool designs. I have no doubt Metro will spawn copycats.
Re:Microsoft Introduces New "Surface" Tablet
by madoublet on Tuesday June 19, 2012 @08:47AM
(#4131482)
This. To me, Windows 8 is the first OS that actually makes sense of how people use tablets (and computers in general). Sometimes, I want to use it casually laying on the couch and sometimes I want to use it to be productive.
When you're building a piece of software you can choose to give it a metro-style UI, a classical desktop UI, or both. That way, your application works across desktops, slates, and WP8 phones. IE10 for example can be run as a full-screen metro app, or as a 'classic' desktop application.
The start menu has been replaced by a full-screen view with live tiles. And really, that's all there is to it; it's just a fancy full-screen start menu. You toggle it with the windows key, and you can quickly search for something just by typing. Live tiles are pretty handy to give you a quick overview of mail, world clocks, events, appointments, etc - much like OSX widgets.
These 'surface' slates, as well as desktops and laptops will run Windows 8 (both x86 and ARM varieties). Windows Phone 8 is just another flavor of that. I'm assuming in the near future, phones will even be able to run the desktop environment by docking to an external monitor, keyboard, and mouse.