Leaked Windows 9 screenshots show a work still in progress

Internet Explorer 12 is claimed to feature a new Chrome-like look.

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[Marcos2247]

I like the general design philosophy behind Metro.

Microsoft just needs to finally implement it consistently in the desktop environment. The easiest and biggest example of what I mean currently is the folder icons in Windows Explorer. Still those ugly yellow icons that I hated in Vista.

There's tons of other inconsistencies. Windows Explorer looks pretty bad altogether. Calculator is a joke.
Also, while I think the ribbon interface in Office is actually good, I HATE it in Windows Explorer.

But when done right, Metro-inspired Windows can look surprisingly good. Like SublimeText with the Metro theme (if only we could finally get rid of the non-functional title bars).

 

[Marcos2247]

SomeRandomGuy[/url]":wdmoxj0e]Metro really oughtn't throw tech people for such a loop.

A lot of really vocal people in IT are extremely conservative when it comes to their computers. This is more true for Windows-users than for OSX-users, who tend to be more open to change. It's much more worse for Linux-users. And the extreme end are the BSD folks, who for the most part seem to think the mid nineties were the epitome of UI design.

I'm primarily a Mac guy, who has and will continue to use Windows a lot. I consider myself open, even eager to change. I like iOS 7 and can't wait for Yosemite, I am even more excited for Android L and Material Design. And I like the general idea behind Metro.

But the Start Screen is something I will never accept. I know it works like an over-sized Start Menu. But for me, who uses the Start Menu about 800 times per hour, it is too distracting .... intrusive .... attention catching. I don't know.
When 8 hit it was really brutal, 8.1 improved the situation somewhat by allowing the desktop wallpaper to be used, so entering the Start Screen didn't just punch you in the face.

I believe the Start Screen is nice for casual use(rs).
Having Live Tiles for E-Mail, Twitter, Facebook Feed, Weather and other useful stuff right there when you turn the machine on.

Microsoft blew it big time by being so incredibly ham-fisted about the introduction of Metro. And I maintain they did it to leverage their desktop monopoly and push Metro familiarity on the people, so Windows phones stand a better chance in the store.

Had they made the Start Screen optional and enabled a Start Menu (without a 3rd party app) and had they - from the beginning - consistently applied Metro asthetics to the desktop environment, the backlash would have been a lot more moderate. There would have still been enough Status Quo fans to cause a ruckus.

 

[Marcos2247]

rdamiani[/url]":2zc8thtj]Funny you should mention Apple as being more open to change.

Funny how I didn't, really.

I said Mac-users are more accepting of change. Apple is pretty merciless at dropping features, hardware and software, and their customers are usually pretty accepting of that.

iOS7 got blasted left and right for alleged design failures, 10.7 Lion got lots of insults for its various shortcomings - yet both were quickly adopted. Mac users complain and adopt. Windows users are much more likely to outright boycott.
See the 25% market share of Windows XP. And that's not just China, I know three people personally, two of them very tech savvy, who are still using it because Vista once looked at them funny.

Linux users seem even more resistant, when you look at the shit Canonical gets basically for every single Ubuntu release that does anything different from before. Or look at the holy war over Gnome and how it dares to try out UI ideas from after the 90s.

And then there's BSD, where the people go who think Linux is just a flashy consumer OS...

 

[Marcos2247]

solendil[/url]":22xmkzae]It looks like that last users of Windows will be productive users (think music, graphism, computing, programming, designing, etc...)

Isn't that nearly half of the people already? And even more by 2020.

A lot of non-tech savy people are using computers productively, because computers are everywhere. My mother too has no conception of files and folders, doesn't grasp that her browser is not "the internet", that e-mails don't get delivered to her computer (she thought I was "hacking" when I configured her iPad to retrieve her e-mail).
But at work she uses it productively as a tax attorney's secretary. She's using highly complex and very expensive tax software eight hours of every day.

I don't see this divide between productive users and casual users. It's all situational.
And as such, desktop OSes can't go away. They are currently not very interesting, because the market is saturated - and dominated by the Windows monopoly. Publicly traded corporations (or those that aspire to be) are addicted to growth. Mobile computing is still a growth market, hence it gets all the love (from MS, Google, Apple, Intel, AMD, nVidia, ...)
But give it 3 years and that market is saturated as well. Companies will then have to come back to the boring markets and start refocussing their efforts. Windows/OSX will be sexy again then.