9 ms·

Microsoft backs off on Metro

100 points by tanglesome 13y ago

vectorsys 13y ago
Steven J. Vaughan-Anna-Nichols-Smith told us so alright. Now if he can stop telling us that it's the year of the Linux desktop like he's been doing for the last decade and a half.
sz4kerto 13y ago
Metro is a fantastic design language. What they screwed up is the combined Metro+classic desktop in Win8. A Surface 2's UI is great (the problem is the lack of apps), same for WP.
- thirsteh 13y ago
  It sounds like you're suggesting that Windows 8 would've been fine if they had just forced Metro, but people dislike Windows 8 because its default view is so obviously designed for tablets and touch, not because they're able to turn it back into something close to Windows 7.
- joe_the_user 13y ago
  As far as I know design, Metro could well be a fantastic way to make design-oriented apps. The problem is that full, complete, design orientation doesn't give you enough clues to accomplish tasks. Maybe no one ever cares to accomplish anything on a tablet but if they do, it doesn't seem like Metro will be helpful. I mean, the problem with the Metro start button isn't that it's touch oriented - you can click the tiles with a mouse just as easily. The problem is you look at the start button and say "beautiful - WTF is it?" If you just feel like experiencing an endless beautiful demo, it's great but if you have a goal, it's opaque how you'd achieve it.
  - jkrems 13y ago
    Design != good looking. If you look at something and it seems beautiful but not functional, it's maybe good art but it's likely to be shitty design.
  - usaphp 13y ago
    > design orientation doesn't give you enough clues to accomplish tasks Design is a specification of an object, manifested by an agent, intended to accomplish goals, in a particular environment, using a set of primitive components, satisfying a set of requirements, subject to constraints;
- jpalomaki 13y ago
  I wonder if they actually thought they would eventually port the major applications to Metro? Somehow hard to believe that the master plan was to have this mess between Metro and traditional desktop going on forever. On the other hand porting apps like Office to Metro would have been quite a job. The whole concept would probably have to be resigned. For my usage it would be been quite fine if the old desktop apps could run as Metro apps. I really liked how the splitting of the screen between multiple Metro apps worked in Windows 8.1. It was easier to use the screen efficiently than with traditional desktop windows.
  - dublinben 13y ago
    >It was easier to use the screen efficiently than with traditional desktop windows Did you never take advantage of Aero Snap in Windows 7? It's far more useful and versatile than the limit multitasking of Metro in Windows 8.
    - contextfree 13y ago
      The problem with Windows 7 snap is it's still tied to the overlapping window model, so when you snap a window it just goes on top of whatever was on screen and doesn't automatically manage the remaining space.
  - contextfree 13y ago
    I don't understand the use of the "would have been" tense. It's not a hypothetical thing, they are in the process of doing exactly that right now.
- eCa 13y ago
  It might be great for touch, but I don't have a touch screen. On my new Win8 machine the first program I installed was Classic Shell [1]. Now I have a (functioning) start button and it boots straight to the desktop so I never have to see the touch interface. [1] http://www.classicshell.net/ http://www.classicshell.net/
  - shitlord 13y ago
    Another good alternative is Start8: http://www.stardock.com/products/start8/ http://www.stardock.com/products/start8/
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
    - jamesaguilar 13y ago
      Well, it's not really necessary for the start screen to context-switch the entire screen. That's my main complaint. The W7 start menu was more than sufficient in terms of screen real-estate to get its job done.
- adamwong246 13y ago
  for touch. For the average, non-touch mouse and keyboard windows users (aka all windows users), metro sucks. But I agree, on a tablet, Metro is great.
- lurkinggrue 13y ago
  Is it fantastic? It's just fonts on whitespace with stock photos while scrolling horizontally. While paging from the side or a slide in is cool they decided to go with an infinite side scrolling paper thing. Real bitch to read like that. The newsapp is a perfect example of that annoying hard to track with your eyes side scrolling that would be a 1000 times better if it either scrolled vertically or just paged.
deleted 13y ago
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gum_ina_package 13y ago
If you think MS is going to back down on touch, you're dead wrong. Moving forward, what the author refers to as "Metro" (actually known as the "Modern Interface") will be the default interface users interact with on WP and XBox. And yes, it might be true that they'll allow users to boot into the desktop, it's not confirmed that will be the default option for users. The whole point of the Modern design language is to provide a unified experience for all of the Windows ecosystem. Honestly, it's really good - except on their most used product, Windows. I think when they allow Modern apps to run inside the desktop, allow desktop apps to work with the charms bar, and build their own laptop you'll see customers flock in droves to the Windows ecosystem.
- corresation 13y ago
  No one expects Microsoft to retrench from touch, nor does anyone misunderstand what they were trying to do: They wanted to leverage their desktop dominance into some mobile/tablet marketshare. Many words can be spilled justifying this (unifying being one), but the stark reality is that it degraded the experience on the mouse and keyboard desktop, where the design simply followed the desire to get into what Apple was having success at.
  - leoc 13y ago
    And ofc Apple, in turn, spent much of its 30-years-of-Macintosh celebration making indirect slams on the Metroisation of Windows and the whole desktop/touch-unification idea http://www.macworld.com/article/2090829/apple-executives-on-the-mac-at-30-the-mac-keeps-going-forever.html http://www.macworld.com/article/2090829/apple-executives-on-... "You don’t want to say the Mac became less good at being a Mac because someone tried to turn it into iOS." etc.
- Touche 13y ago
  Please don't call something "unified" when it shares none of the same code, doesn't work the same, and was created by teams who don't talk to each other. Superficially similar looking != unified.
  - 13y ago
andrewfong 13y ago
Jay Machalani's concept for fixing the Metro+desktop are the way to go IMHO. http://jaymachalani.com/blog/2013/12/12/fixing-windows-8 http://jaymachalani.com/blog/2013/12/12/fixing-windows-8 Basically the concept is to include both the Metro + desktop UIs and let the user explicitly choose. When you're in tablet mode, all desktop apps run full-screen (or using the Metro-style split screen) and when you're in desktop mode, Metro apps run windowed like Desktop apps.
- andrewfong 13y ago
  Also, ModernMix gets you part way there on the latter. One interesting side effect I noticed while using it is that Metro / Modern apps tend to use larger fonts and layouts (which doesn't really work that well when you shrink the apps down to a smaller window). Possible solutions include auto-scaling and letting the app present a different interface when Windowed.
- amaks 13y ago
  unfortunately Microsoft in all its infinite wisdom will likely tone down the metro concept instead of fixing it.
UK-AL 13y ago
People won't be happy unless its the start menu from windows xp forever.
- sirmarksalot 13y ago
  Is there any reason it shouldn't be? Yes, I understand how it's not useful for touch interfaces, but why does it have to be? Why do desktops need touch? Why can't tablets have their own, completely separate OS -- or at least their own shell? What advantage does convergence bring?
  - gtirloni 13y ago
    If they need or not, I think it's not for the OS manufacturer to decide. Desktops ARE coming with touch and so are laptops. Soon enough, all new laptops and desktops WILL have touch. I just went to Walmart tech area and almost all laptops had touch. The ones without touch were in the obscure corner where no one went. Microsoft can adapt or be eaten. I think they have decided the later. Now regarding "completely separate OS", impossible to maintain. And "at least their own shell", goes back to desktops/laptops having touch and the old shell not being good for that. I don't see a problem with their hybrid approach. I enjoy the touch stuff where it fits. I don't see how a SAP or heavy data entry (where a keyboard will make all the difference) will benefit from Metro, so why no keep the desktop there as usual (like they did)?
    - NickNameNick 13y ago
      Desktops with touch are stupid. My monitor is up in front of my face, and a good distance back on my desk, not down on the front of my desk where my hands are. I'm not sitting at my computer to give my shoulders a workout. Besides which, any idiot who gets fingerprints all over my nice monitor deserves a slapping, even if its me. Having touch sized buttons on the screen makes the mouse and keyboard experience worse - everything has to be bigger, with giant borders and separation because your finger is ~100px or more across, and my mouse pointer has a single-pixel click area. Te problem with the hybrid approach is simply that I, or any anyone like me, can't or won't use touch for our desktop use, so why should a touch oriented UI forcibly impinge upon our experience? They didn't keep the desktop as it was - they removed the start button and a bunch of context menus and hid them in those ridiculous 'charms' pop-outs. The start screen is an enormous waste of time. If they were optional, or the defaults changed based on whether a touch screen was present it might be different, but they are not optional, or even configurable without third party software. I'm not saying they can't or shouldn't change things. I think the start menu could have been re-drawn as something visually like a charm menu, fading in from the left edge of the screen, so long as it doesn't take you away from what you are doing it would have been fine.
drcoopster 13y ago
Isn't Windows 8.1 already out? It seems like this article is a little bit behind the times.
- csacc 13y ago
  Opened comments to find whether this was said. Seriously, Windows 8.1 has been out for months. I checked the published date on this article three times.
- wozer 13y ago
  I think this is about the update TO Windows 8.1 I.e. basically the first SP for 8.1.
- ptx 13y ago
  If you dereference the source links you'll find that "the forthcoming Windows 8.1 update" in the article refers to Windows 8.1 Update 1 (which updates 8.1), not to 8.1 being an update of 8.0: http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/30/5362156/windows-8-1-update-1-boot-to-desktop-by-default http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/30/5362156/windows-8-1-update...
- taspeotis 13y ago
  > Isn't Windows 8.1 already out? Yes. > It seems like this article is a little bit behind the times. No.
esw 13y ago
I hope Stardock Software (makers of Start8) enjoyed the wild ride while it lasted.
- kitsune_ 13y ago
  I'd rather have them concentrate on Galactiv Civilizations 3 anyways.
  - thearn4 13y ago
    I was a pretty huge fan of Sins of a Solar Empire for a long while too.
mirsimiki 13y ago
The problem with Windows 8 is the fact that it has two different desktops experiences. I quickly realized I felt much more comfortable using my keyboard and mouse on the desktop mode. I tried to ignore metro mode and use only the desktop but the whole metro thing is so ingrained with it's sensible corners and start menu. After some time of tweaking I could disable most of the things and ended up with something resembling a crippled Windows 7 at best. They really had something going on with Windows 7 and they blew it. Maybe metro is ok for light usage like checking emails, browsing, multimedia, which is certainly what a lot of people do, but for a developer like me it just feels handicapped. This is what Microsoft should do, offer different versions of Windows, one with metro the other with the desktop. I really don't think they are that stupid to just mess with the momentum Windows 7 had. If they don't then they are finished in the desktop front, at least for people who make things with their OS and not just consume media.
JeremyMorgan 13y ago
I can't really complain about it much, it's awesome on my Surface of course, and not so great on my laptop. But really all I do is go back to desktop and it's really out of the way. I too am missing the start menu, I think it's one of those things that just worked so well they shouldn't have changed it. The extra few seconds added to go in and find something on the metro desktop and pin it to my desktop or taskbar is a waste. I see what they tried to do, but it's didn't really work out.
- Amezarak 13y ago
  I'm confused. Why does it take you longer to find something on the Metro desktop? At least in my usage, it functions exactly like the old start menu did: I either start typing to find a program (most of the time) or I hit all programs and look around for it. What slows you down? The main things I dislike about 8/8.1 are hot corners and the Metro apps being default on desktops. (Seriously Microsoft, I'm glad you finally implemented a native PDF reader but come on.) I don't understand complaints about the start screen. That being said, Windows 8 did one really great thing for the desktop: multi-monitor support finally works the way it should have all along. The upgrade is worth it just for that, for someone like me with three montors.
  - taspeotis 13y ago
    > I'm confused. Why does it take you longer to find something on the Metro desktop? At least in my usage, it functions exactly like the old start menu did: I either start typing to find a program (most of the time) or I hit all programs and look around for it. What slows you down? Yeah I never got why people complained about this. We're running Windows 8 and now 8.1 at work on our development machines (not for "now I can develop Metro apps!"). It's good because we get the latest RDS protocol improvements so remote access works just that little bit better and Windows 8 comes with other technical improvements. My workflow for launching applications never changed: if it's not pinned to my taskbar then it's WinKey + Type "Fi" (say for Firefox) + Enter. All that said, I did install ClassicShell a fortnight ago just to try it out (after using the Start Screen since Windows 8 RC) and not having to leave my desktop for the Metro interface just works that leeeeeeeeetle bit better in unquantifiable ways. Now it's on my home + work PCs.
leobelle 13y ago
This is the right thing to do. I'm glad they've realized it. Windows 7 is miles more usable than even 8.1.
mattkevan 13y ago
I have no idea how easy this would be, I imagine rock hard, but couldn't they do a responsive interface, like Canonical is trying to do with Ubuntu? Apps come packaged with both a mobile and desktop UI, and depending on which input devices are available it shows the relevant one. For example, a Surface by itself would show the metro UI, but connect a type cover or a keyboard and mouse and it'd flip to the desktop interface. Same apps, same data. Obviously it would take a lot of work to ensure consistency and maintain spacial awareness between modes, but they do still employ some bright people, right?
- contextfree 13y ago
  Conceptually that was more or less what they were trying to do with Windows 8 - provide affordances optimized for each input method. For example, with touch you use swipe/flick gestures to pan back and forth, with mouse a scrollbar appears and you use that. With mouse some commands have small controls that appear when you hover over an item, with touch those controls are on a bar at the bottom of the screen. And so on. What made it different from what Ubuntu is doing (as I understand it) is a couple of additional problems they were trying to solve: First, you're probably thinking about "hybrid" devices in terms of having a tablet that you use with touch exclusively for X hours, and then attaching a mouse and keyboard, having it become a "PC" and using it with those inputs exclusively for X hours. In this usage model it's OK to have pretty stark changes between modes because you don't mode switch very often. However, they really wanted to enable a usage model where "touch plus mouse plus keyboard" became more like "mouse plus keyboard" in that you can constantly switch between inputs without really thinking about it, or even use them simultaneously. For this model to work whatever optimizations are done for different inputs need to be less intrusive and more localized - generally more about hiding/showing certain controls than completely changing the layout. Second, there was a feeling that even for large displays and mouse/keyboard the desktop windowing model felt too heavy and required too much manual window management, at least for some (more casual) use cases. So they were hoping the model developed for tablets could double as a solution to the "Windows feels like too much work" problem on the desktop, especially for home PCs used for entertainment and communication. To me the recent rumors sound like they're continuing the same general philosophy (of having a common UI with optimizations for each input method), but maybe deprioritizing the above two goals somewhat, which would leave them freer to make more drastic per-input-method optimizations.
DennisP 13y ago
The worst problem with Microsoft's touch interface on a non-touch machine: ordinary mouse movements get interpreted as gestures sometimes. You can lift your finger off the display, but you can't lift your mouse pointer, so you end up issuing commands that bring up various screens when all you were trying to do was move your mouse around. I was pretty surprised that got through Microsoft's QA. I decided they had left behind anyone who wanted to get actual work done, and bought a System76.
Negitivefrags 13y ago
As a PC game developer I was angry when I installed Windows 8 for the first time. It's just so bad it makes me angry. My immediate reaction was "Why are you killing Windows, Microsoft?". From that moment I installed the beta I could see the destruction of PC gaming and everything that came along with it following in it's wake as clear as day. A lot of people misinterpreted Gabe Newell's dislike of Windows 8. People seemed to think that he disliked it simply because of the windows app store. Just because it might compete with Steam. The problem is much more fundamental than being competed with. He disliked it because it's a terrible release of Windows that destroys the very platform Steam is on. It's no wonder Gabe decided to go all in on Linux. It may be a slim hope getting that to stick, but at least it's a chance. If the platform you rely on is going to self destruct out from under you, you need to jump to whatever has a chance of keeping you afloat.
- yuhong 13y ago
  Why would it destroy PC gaming?
  - rictic 13y ago
    People leaving Windows is potentially an existential threat for Steam if the platforms that they go to don't support Steam well. Consoles and iOS are flat out due to non-negotiable platform policies. Android is possible, but tough. Mac OS X is doable, though word is that Apple has historically been tepid to game developers on the platform. I believe that these are the forces that lead Valve to choose instead to invest into linux, and build an OS of their own on top of it.
- lawnchair_larry 13y ago
  I know some people on the Windows team. My immediate reaction when I tried the beta was, "Oh shit, I have to let them know what someone has done to their work before it's too late! The public is about to see this!". Obviously, after half a second of thought, I realized they already know and use what I was seeing for the first time. But it was so shockingly bad that I instinctively thought it was some kind of mistake that they must not have seen yet. When I did talk to them next, it was more along the lines of expressing condolences. I thought since it was objectively bad, it goes without saying that they also think it is bad, and some internal politics led to what was released, ruining their hard work. To my surprise, they defended it and claimed to really like it. I found this so baffling that I've since been struggling with several theories; "either they are crazy or I am crazy, I'm not sure which anymore", some kind of Stockholm Syndrome, or something contaminating the water around Redmond. I ruled out the possibility that it's me who is crazy after a few rounds of a game where I hand my laptop to a coworker, who uses windows exclusively (and one even develops drivers for it), and told them to try and close Internet Explorer and shut down the computer. Invariably the result was trying for 5 or 10 minutes before walking away in frustration, sometimes with colorful language.
ryan-allen 13y ago
I think Microsoft jumped the gun by a few years, the Surface 2 Pro is the computing concept I think they believed was the future. I run Windows 8 exclusively and I use a Start Menu replacement called Start Is Back, and it's great. It was only $3. I never use Metro on my 27" screen. HOWEVER, I'm really keen to get something like the Lenovo Helix [1], as I think that's where things are going to go (like an iPad that has an i5 and runs both iOS and OS X). Sensible friends of mine who have the original Surface say metro is great as a tablet UI, the only annoyance being that the Store is lacking in many apps. Either way, I think Metro is OK, they just screwed up the roll out. As we see more devices like the Surface 2 Pro, the Dell Venue 11 and the Lenovo Thinkpad Helix, it'll start to make more sense. [1] http://shopap.lenovo.com/au/en/tablets/thinkpad/thinkpad-helix/ http://shopap.lenovo.com/au/en/tablets/thinkpad/thinkpad-hel...
- Mister_Snuggles 13y ago
  That reminds me a lot of the Compaq tablet computers, such as the TC1100[1]. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP_Compaq_TC1100 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP_Compaq_TC1100
seanalltogether 13y ago
Does anyone know what this means for the windows 8 app store? Is it still going to be restricted to metro only apps? I know you can link to desktop apps but you can't sell them through the app store yet. Will they lift this restriction?
ii 13y ago
Flat is inevitable. Flat is practical. But, yeah, you can not make money on it yet, because you know people love what they used to look at. They don't like change. Kazimir Malevich 100 years ago tried to tell the world about it but the world is slow.
- chenster 13y ago
  Metro is just too flat, too radical UI change. It seems refreshing at first, then gets boring quickly. iOS 7 is also flat, but not completely. It incorporates subtle gradient and shade, and kept the around corners mixing best of both worlds. The bottom line, it's not a completely new UI. It's a incremental update. Users are somewhat still familiar with the new UI. OS X pretty much evolves the same way. Incremental changes seems to be much a safer bet.
- DonGateley 13y ago
  Flat is nothing more than a cost cutting measure to "benefit" developers. They don't have to pay for or do design any more so they can be more productive in churning out more of the trivial things Steven Sinofsy and Jony Ive think really sell licenses and machines. I feel really sorry for all the graphics design people whose work I loved and who now have to use pastel crayons with large blunt tips which of course anyone can do so puts the designers pretty much out of work. I hope this too shall pass and eye pleasing detail shall return. I just hope all the designers weren't pushed into becoming higher paid programmers never to return to esthetics.
MichaelGG 13y ago
What does booting to the desktop have to do with anything? Out of all my Win8 annoyances, having to click the desktop tile is probably at the end of the list. Without a start menu, doing full-screen context shifts to launch programs is just annoying. The dumb metro-style things for, say, WiFi connector (a whole huge side of the screen, instead of a tiny popup, with less functionality than before) -- all that stuff is what's annoying. Booting direct to desktop seems as pointless as adding a start button that launches the full-screen thing. No one was asking for that. So either MS is incredibly obtuse, or they think they're going to fool people by pretending to have changed something.
- lurkinggrue 13y ago
  What they did to the Network slide in thing was so annoying. I hate the trend of wasting tons of screen space for features.
keeptrying 13y ago
I think it proves a very important entrepreneurial point - i.e. if you have distribution your product will do well however bad it is ...
chenster 13y ago
I haven't heard much positive things about Windows since version 7. Is it dying?
transfire 13y ago
By going back they are just going to hurt themselves even more! HAHAHAHA! This is the end of Windows. Buh Bye.
smegel 13y ago
> Dumping Metro is a great step toward making Windows 8 more attractive, but the Windows 8 desktop mode still doesn't have a real Start menu. Because they aren't actually dumping metro? The problem with metro wasn't that it was the default UI, but that it replaced the start menu. I really hate all these disingenuous tech reporters who lauded the "return of the start button", when they knew true well that the problem wasn't that the button disappeared, but that the menu was gone. Now we have another shill reporter claiming victory because of a default change, when metro is still just a click away. The problem with metro is that it exists at all (on non touch screen devices).
InclinedPlane 13y ago
I think it's obvious that mobile & desktop OSes need to essentially merge to a substantial degree. But the idea that you should use one and only one control scheme / UI in every use case is just dumb. There's not going to be one universal way for humans to interact with a computer, period. Sometimes touch will be used, sometimes keyboards & mice, sometimes voice, sometimes other methods of control. It's vastly more valuable to figure out how to seamlessly transition between different modes of use/control and to maximize the utility of each mode than to try to engineer some grand compromise design that can be used in all modes but takes advantage of none of them very well. Moreover, Microsoft needs to learn a very hard lesson here. If you want to change things you need to transition. UI reboots are like system rewrites, they carry a lot of the same risks, if you commit to the new system before it's mature without giving people the option of using the old system you'll often times end up with rejection instead of acceptance. Microsoft has developed a bad habit lately of ramming new ways of doing things down users throats without any time to get used to the changes. The only people who can get away with bullshit like that are Apple, and Microsoft is very definitely not Apple.
deleted 13y ago
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JTenerife 13y ago
I've hardly ever read a non-opiniated review or discussion about windows 8. All these discussions go direct to our fanboy hearts. It's like the programming languages or favorite IDE discussions ... :-) Anyway, there's a huge potential for having one device that can be used with different UI concept based on the peripherals: A tablet docked into a docking station should be operated by mouse and keyboard (desktop mode), otherwise it should be operated by touch (metro mode). Windows 8 should recognize what default to use. While Metro as default for a PC doesn't make sense, it's not really a big problem. The issue is mainly amplified by our emotions. It took me much longer to get used to OS X, but as I liked the device to much, it didn't bother me at all. I kind of enjoyed exploring how to use it.
sdegutis 13y ago
Wow. What's with all the Metro hate? (Besides the term Metro, which definitely deserves it.) Yes, it's different. But is it really news when an average user has a negative bias against change and unfamiliarity?
- sdegutis 13y ago
  Oh wait, I think I know why. About 5 years ago, when Mac OS X 10.4 was the latest, I started considering switching from Windows (Vista at the time) to Mac. But all my friends and colleagues were telling me about how awful Macs were. They were remembering the Macs from the 90s, and that image stuck with them long after those Macs died. They had no idea what innovation and improvements Apple had done with Mac OS X and the iMac. They were just blindly biased and either okay with it or unaware of it. I wonder if that's the same thing happening today with Windows 8. I bet people here are so biased against it because previous versions of Windows or previous Microsoft products or practices left a bad taste. To be fair, I don't know any modern news about Microsoft. So maybe they still are shady business people. But I don't expect to be able to find any unbiased sources who can confirm or deny this credibly.
alkonaut 13y ago
There is nothing fundamentally wrong with the design language of "modern", and no one ever has needed several resizable draggable windows for their desktop. That UI paradigm should be easy to replace by a nice tiling manager. What I do need however is a UI that lets me run my legacy apps side by side with new ones, in any configuration and number. I don't mind the look of metro and I never liked the start menu. If my start menu is a start screen, fine. The biggest problems are a) the divide between old and new. The mistake was making a completely separate UI rather than making a single UI that could adapt to both touch and mouse interaction. b) the API debacle: what IS microsofts strategy for the future of heavy desktop apps? What happened to wpf/xaml? Developers don't like constant surprises.
alkonaut 13y ago
Hopefully when win9 comes out we can all look back and laugh at this. It somehow magically fixes the dual UI issue. At least if it doesn't we don't have do worry about Win10 at all.

100 points by tanglesome 13y ago

Steven J. Vaughan-Anna-Nichols-Smith told us so alright. Now if he can stop telling us that it's the year of the Linux desktop like he's been doing for the last decade and a half.

sz4kerto 13y ago

Metro is a fantastic design language. What they screwed up is the combined Metro+classic desktop in Win8. A Surface 2's UI is great (the problem is the lack of apps), same for WP.

thirsteh 13y ago
It sounds like you're suggesting that Windows 8 would've been fine if they had just forced Metro, but people dislike Windows 8 because its default view is so obviously designed for tablets and touch, not because they're able to turn it back into something close to Windows 7.
joe_the_user 13y ago
As far as I know design, Metro could well be a fantastic way to make design-oriented apps. The problem is that full, complete, design orientation doesn't give you enough clues to accomplish tasks. Maybe no one ever cares to accomplish anything on a tablet but if they do, it doesn't seem like Metro will be helpful. I mean, the problem with the Metro start button isn't that it's touch oriented - you can click the tiles with a mouse just as easily. The problem is you look at the start button and say "beautiful - WTF is it?" If you just feel like experiencing an endless beautiful demo, it's great but if you have a goal, it's opaque how you'd achieve it.
- jkrems 13y ago
  Design != good looking. If you look at something and it seems beautiful but not functional, it's maybe good art but it's likely to be shitty design.
- usaphp 13y ago
  > design orientation doesn't give you enough clues to accomplish tasks Design is a specification of an object, manifested by an agent, intended to accomplish goals, in a particular environment, using a set of primitive components, satisfying a set of requirements, subject to constraints;
jpalomaki 13y ago
I wonder if they actually thought they would eventually port the major applications to Metro? Somehow hard to believe that the master plan was to have this mess between Metro and traditional desktop going on forever. On the other hand porting apps like Office to Metro would have been quite a job. The whole concept would probably have to be resigned. For my usage it would be been quite fine if the old desktop apps could run as Metro apps. I really liked how the splitting of the screen between multiple Metro apps worked in Windows 8.1. It was easier to use the screen efficiently than with traditional desktop windows.
- dublinben 13y ago
  >It was easier to use the screen efficiently than with traditional desktop windows Did you never take advantage of Aero Snap in Windows 7? It's far more useful and versatile than the limit multitasking of Metro in Windows 8.
  - contextfree 13y ago
    The problem with Windows 7 snap is it's still tied to the overlapping window model, so when you snap a window it just goes on top of whatever was on screen and doesn't automatically manage the remaining space.
- contextfree 13y ago
  I don't understand the use of the "would have been" tense. It's not a hypothetical thing, they are in the process of doing exactly that right now.
eCa 13y ago
It might be great for touch, but I don't have a touch screen. On my new Win8 machine the first program I installed was Classic Shell [1]. Now I have a (functioning) start button and it boots straight to the desktop so I never have to see the touch interface. [1] http://www.classicshell.net/ http://www.classicshell.net/
- shitlord 13y ago
  Another good alternative is Start8: http://www.stardock.com/products/start8/ http://www.stardock.com/products/start8/
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
  - jamesaguilar 13y ago
    Well, it's not really necessary for the start screen to context-switch the entire screen. That's my main complaint. The W7 start menu was more than sufficient in terms of screen real-estate to get its job done.
adamwong246 13y ago
for touch. For the average, non-touch mouse and keyboard windows users (aka all windows users), metro sucks. But I agree, on a tablet, Metro is great.
lurkinggrue 13y ago
Is it fantastic? It's just fonts on whitespace with stock photos while scrolling horizontally. While paging from the side or a slide in is cool they decided to go with an infinite side scrolling paper thing. Real bitch to read like that. The newsapp is a perfect example of that annoying hard to track with your eyes side scrolling that would be a 1000 times better if it either scrolled vertically or just paged.

deleted 13y ago

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gum_ina_package 13y ago

If you think MS is going to back down on touch, you're dead wrong. Moving forward, what the author refers to as "Metro" (actually known as the "Modern Interface") will be the default interface users interact with on WP and XBox. And yes, it might be true that they'll allow users to boot into the desktop, it's not confirmed that will be the default option for users. The whole point of the Modern design language is to provide a unified experience for all of the Windows ecosystem. Honestly, it's really good - except on their most used product, Windows. I think when they allow Modern apps to run inside the desktop, allow desktop apps to work with the charms bar, and build their own laptop you'll see customers flock in droves to the Windows ecosystem.

corresation 13y ago
No one expects Microsoft to retrench from touch, nor does anyone misunderstand what they were trying to do: They wanted to leverage their desktop dominance into some mobile/tablet marketshare. Many words can be spilled justifying this (unifying being one), but the stark reality is that it degraded the experience on the mouse and keyboard desktop, where the design simply followed the desire to get into what Apple was having success at.
- leoc 13y ago
  And ofc Apple, in turn, spent much of its 30-years-of-Macintosh celebration making indirect slams on the Metroisation of Windows and the whole desktop/touch-unification idea http://www.macworld.com/article/2090829/apple-executives-on-the-mac-at-30-the-mac-keeps-going-forever.html http://www.macworld.com/article/2090829/apple-executives-on-... "You don’t want to say the Mac became less good at being a Mac because someone tried to turn it into iOS." etc.
Touche 13y ago
Please don't call something "unified" when it shares none of the same code, doesn't work the same, and was created by teams who don't talk to each other. Superficially similar looking != unified.
- 13y ago

andrewfong 13y ago

Jay Machalani's concept for fixing the Metro+desktop are the way to go IMHO. http://jaymachalani.com/blog/2013/12/12/fixing-windows-8 http://jaymachalani.com/blog/2013/12/12/fixing-windows-8 Basically the concept is to include both the Metro + desktop UIs and let the user explicitly choose. When you're in tablet mode, all desktop apps run full-screen (or using the Metro-style split screen) and when you're in desktop mode, Metro apps run windowed like Desktop apps.

andrewfong 13y ago
Also, ModernMix gets you part way there on the latter. One interesting side effect I noticed while using it is that Metro / Modern apps tend to use larger fonts and layouts (which doesn't really work that well when you shrink the apps down to a smaller window). Possible solutions include auto-scaling and letting the app present a different interface when Windowed.
amaks 13y ago
unfortunately Microsoft in all its infinite wisdom will likely tone down the metro concept instead of fixing it.

UK-AL 13y ago

People won't be happy unless its the start menu from windows xp forever.

sirmarksalot 13y ago
Is there any reason it shouldn't be? Yes, I understand how it's not useful for touch interfaces, but why does it have to be? Why do desktops need touch? Why can't tablets have their own, completely separate OS -- or at least their own shell? What advantage does convergence bring?
- gtirloni 13y ago
  If they need or not, I think it's not for the OS manufacturer to decide. Desktops ARE coming with touch and so are laptops. Soon enough, all new laptops and desktops WILL have touch. I just went to Walmart tech area and almost all laptops had touch. The ones without touch were in the obscure corner where no one went. Microsoft can adapt or be eaten. I think they have decided the later. Now regarding "completely separate OS", impossible to maintain. And "at least their own shell", goes back to desktops/laptops having touch and the old shell not being good for that. I don't see a problem with their hybrid approach. I enjoy the touch stuff where it fits. I don't see how a SAP or heavy data entry (where a keyboard will make all the difference) will benefit from Metro, so why no keep the desktop there as usual (like they did)?
  - NickNameNick 13y ago
    Desktops with touch are stupid. My monitor is up in front of my face, and a good distance back on my desk, not down on the front of my desk where my hands are. I'm not sitting at my computer to give my shoulders a workout. Besides which, any idiot who gets fingerprints all over my nice monitor deserves a slapping, even if its me. Having touch sized buttons on the screen makes the mouse and keyboard experience worse - everything has to be bigger, with giant borders and separation because your finger is ~100px or more across, and my mouse pointer has a single-pixel click area. Te problem with the hybrid approach is simply that I, or any anyone like me, can't or won't use touch for our desktop use, so why should a touch oriented UI forcibly impinge upon our experience? They didn't keep the desktop as it was - they removed the start button and a bunch of context menus and hid them in those ridiculous 'charms' pop-outs. The start screen is an enormous waste of time. If they were optional, or the defaults changed based on whether a touch screen was present it might be different, but they are not optional, or even configurable without third party software. I'm not saying they can't or shouldn't change things. I think the start menu could have been re-drawn as something visually like a charm menu, fading in from the left edge of the screen, so long as it doesn't take you away from what you are doing it would have been fine.

drcoopster 13y ago

Isn't Windows 8.1 already out? It seems like this article is a little bit behind the times.

csacc 13y ago
Opened comments to find whether this was said. Seriously, Windows 8.1 has been out for months. I checked the published date on this article three times.
wozer 13y ago
I think this is about the update TO Windows 8.1 I.e. basically the first SP for 8.1.
ptx 13y ago
If you dereference the source links you'll find that "the forthcoming Windows 8.1 update" in the article refers to Windows 8.1 Update 1 (which updates 8.1), not to 8.1 being an update of 8.0: http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/30/5362156/windows-8-1-update-1-boot-to-desktop-by-default http://www.theverge.com/2014/1/30/5362156/windows-8-1-update...
taspeotis 13y ago
> Isn't Windows 8.1 already out? Yes. > It seems like this article is a little bit behind the times. No.

esw 13y ago

I hope Stardock Software (makers of Start8) enjoyed the wild ride while it lasted.

kitsune_ 13y ago
I'd rather have them concentrate on Galactiv Civilizations 3 anyways.
- thearn4 13y ago
  I was a pretty huge fan of Sins of a Solar Empire for a long while too.

mirsimiki 13y ago

The problem with Windows 8 is the fact that it has two different desktops experiences. I quickly realized I felt much more comfortable using my keyboard and mouse on the desktop mode. I tried to ignore metro mode and use only the desktop but the whole metro thing is so ingrained with it's sensible corners and start menu. After some time of tweaking I could disable most of the things and ended up with something resembling a crippled Windows 7 at best. They really had something going on with Windows 7 and they blew it. Maybe metro is ok for light usage like checking emails, browsing, multimedia, which is certainly what a lot of people do, but for a developer like me it just feels handicapped. This is what Microsoft should do, offer different versions of Windows, one with metro the other with the desktop. I really don't think they are that stupid to just mess with the momentum Windows 7 had. If they don't then they are finished in the desktop front, at least for people who make things with their OS and not just consume media.

JeremyMorgan 13y ago

I can't really complain about it much, it's awesome on my Surface of course, and not so great on my laptop. But really all I do is go back to desktop and it's really out of the way. I too am missing the start menu, I think it's one of those things that just worked so well they shouldn't have changed it. The extra few seconds added to go in and find something on the metro desktop and pin it to my desktop or taskbar is a waste. I see what they tried to do, but it's didn't really work out.

Amezarak 13y ago
I'm confused. Why does it take you longer to find something on the Metro desktop? At least in my usage, it functions exactly like the old start menu did: I either start typing to find a program (most of the time) or I hit all programs and look around for it. What slows you down? The main things I dislike about 8/8.1 are hot corners and the Metro apps being default on desktops. (Seriously Microsoft, I'm glad you finally implemented a native PDF reader but come on.) I don't understand complaints about the start screen. That being said, Windows 8 did one really great thing for the desktop: multi-monitor support finally works the way it should have all along. The upgrade is worth it just for that, for someone like me with three montors.
- taspeotis 13y ago
  > I'm confused. Why does it take you longer to find something on the Metro desktop? At least in my usage, it functions exactly like the old start menu did: I either start typing to find a program (most of the time) or I hit all programs and look around for it. What slows you down? Yeah I never got why people complained about this. We're running Windows 8 and now 8.1 at work on our development machines (not for "now I can develop Metro apps!"). It's good because we get the latest RDS protocol improvements so remote access works just that little bit better and Windows 8 comes with other technical improvements. My workflow for launching applications never changed: if it's not pinned to my taskbar then it's WinKey + Type "Fi" (say for Firefox) + Enter. All that said, I did install ClassicShell a fortnight ago just to try it out (after using the Start Screen since Windows 8 RC) and not having to leave my desktop for the Metro interface just works that leeeeeeeeetle bit better in unquantifiable ways. Now it's on my home + work PCs.

leobelle 13y ago

This is the right thing to do. I'm glad they've realized it. Windows 7 is miles more usable than even 8.1.

mattkevan 13y ago

I have no idea how easy this would be, I imagine rock hard, but couldn't they do a responsive interface, like Canonical is trying to do with Ubuntu? Apps come packaged with both a mobile and desktop UI, and depending on which input devices are available it shows the relevant one. For example, a Surface by itself would show the metro UI, but connect a type cover or a keyboard and mouse and it'd flip to the desktop interface. Same apps, same data. Obviously it would take a lot of work to ensure consistency and maintain spacial awareness between modes, but they do still employ some bright people, right?

contextfree 13y ago
Conceptually that was more or less what they were trying to do with Windows 8 - provide affordances optimized for each input method. For example, with touch you use swipe/flick gestures to pan back and forth, with mouse a scrollbar appears and you use that. With mouse some commands have small controls that appear when you hover over an item, with touch those controls are on a bar at the bottom of the screen. And so on. What made it different from what Ubuntu is doing (as I understand it) is a couple of additional problems they were trying to solve: First, you're probably thinking about "hybrid" devices in terms of having a tablet that you use with touch exclusively for X hours, and then attaching a mouse and keyboard, having it become a "PC" and using it with those inputs exclusively for X hours. In this usage model it's OK to have pretty stark changes between modes because you don't mode switch very often. However, they really wanted to enable a usage model where "touch plus mouse plus keyboard" became more like "mouse plus keyboard" in that you can constantly switch between inputs without really thinking about it, or even use them simultaneously. For this model to work whatever optimizations are done for different inputs need to be less intrusive and more localized - generally more about hiding/showing certain controls than completely changing the layout. Second, there was a feeling that even for large displays and mouse/keyboard the desktop windowing model felt too heavy and required too much manual window management, at least for some (more casual) use cases. So they were hoping the model developed for tablets could double as a solution to the "Windows feels like too much work" problem on the desktop, especially for home PCs used for entertainment and communication. To me the recent rumors sound like they're continuing the same general philosophy (of having a common UI with optimizations for each input method), but maybe deprioritizing the above two goals somewhat, which would leave them freer to make more drastic per-input-method optimizations.

DennisP 13y ago

The worst problem with Microsoft's touch interface on a non-touch machine: ordinary mouse movements get interpreted as gestures sometimes. You can lift your finger off the display, but you can't lift your mouse pointer, so you end up issuing commands that bring up various screens when all you were trying to do was move your mouse around. I was pretty surprised that got through Microsoft's QA. I decided they had left behind anyone who wanted to get actual work done, and bought a System76.

Negitivefrags 13y ago

As a PC game developer I was angry when I installed Windows 8 for the first time. It's just so bad it makes me angry. My immediate reaction was "Why are you killing Windows, Microsoft?". From that moment I installed the beta I could see the destruction of PC gaming and everything that came along with it following in it's wake as clear as day. A lot of people misinterpreted Gabe Newell's dislike of Windows 8. People seemed to think that he disliked it simply because of the windows app store. Just because it might compete with Steam. The problem is much more fundamental than being competed with. He disliked it because it's a terrible release of Windows that destroys the very platform Steam is on. It's no wonder Gabe decided to go all in on Linux. It may be a slim hope getting that to stick, but at least it's a chance. If the platform you rely on is going to self destruct out from under you, you need to jump to whatever has a chance of keeping you afloat.

yuhong 13y ago
Why would it destroy PC gaming?
- rictic 13y ago
  People leaving Windows is potentially an existential threat for Steam if the platforms that they go to don't support Steam well. Consoles and iOS are flat out due to non-negotiable platform policies. Android is possible, but tough. Mac OS X is doable, though word is that Apple has historically been tepid to game developers on the platform. I believe that these are the forces that lead Valve to choose instead to invest into linux, and build an OS of their own on top of it.
lawnchair_larry 13y ago
I know some people on the Windows team. My immediate reaction when I tried the beta was, "Oh shit, I have to let them know what someone has done to their work before it's too late! The public is about to see this!". Obviously, after half a second of thought, I realized they already know and use what I was seeing for the first time. But it was so shockingly bad that I instinctively thought it was some kind of mistake that they must not have seen yet. When I did talk to them next, it was more along the lines of expressing condolences. I thought since it was objectively bad, it goes without saying that they also think it is bad, and some internal politics led to what was released, ruining their hard work. To my surprise, they defended it and claimed to really like it. I found this so baffling that I've since been struggling with several theories; "either they are crazy or I am crazy, I'm not sure which anymore", some kind of Stockholm Syndrome, or something contaminating the water around Redmond. I ruled out the possibility that it's me who is crazy after a few rounds of a game where I hand my laptop to a coworker, who uses windows exclusively (and one even develops drivers for it), and told them to try and close Internet Explorer and shut down the computer. Invariably the result was trying for 5 or 10 minutes before walking away in frustration, sometimes with colorful language.

ryan-allen 13y ago

I think Microsoft jumped the gun by a few years, the Surface 2 Pro is the computing concept I think they believed was the future. I run Windows 8 exclusively and I use a Start Menu replacement called Start Is Back, and it's great. It was only $3. I never use Metro on my 27" screen. HOWEVER, I'm really keen to get something like the Lenovo Helix [1], as I think that's where things are going to go (like an iPad that has an i5 and runs both iOS and OS X). Sensible friends of mine who have the original Surface say metro is great as a tablet UI, the only annoyance being that the Store is lacking in many apps. Either way, I think Metro is OK, they just screwed up the roll out. As we see more devices like the Surface 2 Pro, the Dell Venue 11 and the Lenovo Thinkpad Helix, it'll start to make more sense. [1] http://shopap.lenovo.com/au/en/tablets/thinkpad/thinkpad-helix/ http://shopap.lenovo.com/au/en/tablets/thinkpad/thinkpad-hel...

Mister_Snuggles 13y ago
That reminds me a lot of the Compaq tablet computers, such as the TC1100[1]. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP_Compaq_TC1100 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP_Compaq_TC1100

seanalltogether 13y ago

Does anyone know what this means for the windows 8 app store? Is it still going to be restricted to metro only apps? I know you can link to desktop apps but you can't sell them through the app store yet. Will they lift this restriction?

ii 13y ago

Flat is inevitable. Flat is practical. But, yeah, you can not make money on it yet, because you know people love what they used to look at. They don't like change. Kazimir Malevich 100 years ago tried to tell the world about it but the world is slow.

chenster 13y ago
Metro is just too flat, too radical UI change. It seems refreshing at first, then gets boring quickly. iOS 7 is also flat, but not completely. It incorporates subtle gradient and shade, and kept the around corners mixing best of both worlds. The bottom line, it's not a completely new UI. It's a incremental update. Users are somewhat still familiar with the new UI. OS X pretty much evolves the same way. Incremental changes seems to be much a safer bet.
DonGateley 13y ago
Flat is nothing more than a cost cutting measure to "benefit" developers. They don't have to pay for or do design any more so they can be more productive in churning out more of the trivial things Steven Sinofsy and Jony Ive think really sell licenses and machines. I feel really sorry for all the graphics design people whose work I loved and who now have to use pastel crayons with large blunt tips which of course anyone can do so puts the designers pretty much out of work. I hope this too shall pass and eye pleasing detail shall return. I just hope all the designers weren't pushed into becoming higher paid programmers never to return to esthetics.

MichaelGG 13y ago

What does booting to the desktop have to do with anything? Out of all my Win8 annoyances, having to click the desktop tile is probably at the end of the list. Without a start menu, doing full-screen context shifts to launch programs is just annoying. The dumb metro-style things for, say, WiFi connector (a whole huge side of the screen, instead of a tiny popup, with less functionality than before) -- all that stuff is what's annoying. Booting direct to desktop seems as pointless as adding a start button that launches the full-screen thing. No one was asking for that. So either MS is incredibly obtuse, or they think they're going to fool people by pretending to have changed something.

lurkinggrue 13y ago
What they did to the Network slide in thing was so annoying. I hate the trend of wasting tons of screen space for features.

keeptrying 13y ago

I think it proves a very important entrepreneurial point - i.e. if you have distribution your product will do well however bad it is ...

chenster 13y ago

I haven't heard much positive things about Windows since version 7. Is it dying?

transfire 13y ago

By going back they are just going to hurt themselves even more! HAHAHAHA! This is the end of Windows. Buh Bye.

smegel 13y ago

> Dumping Metro is a great step toward making Windows 8 more attractive, but the Windows 8 desktop mode still doesn't have a real Start menu. Because they aren't actually dumping metro? The problem with metro wasn't that it was the default UI, but that it replaced the start menu. I really hate all these disingenuous tech reporters who lauded the "return of the start button", when they knew true well that the problem wasn't that the button disappeared, but that the menu was gone. Now we have another shill reporter claiming victory because of a default change, when metro is still just a click away. The problem with metro is that it exists at all (on non touch screen devices).

InclinedPlane 13y ago

I think it's obvious that mobile & desktop OSes need to essentially merge to a substantial degree. But the idea that you should use one and only one control scheme / UI in every use case is just dumb. There's not going to be one universal way for humans to interact with a computer, period. Sometimes touch will be used, sometimes keyboards & mice, sometimes voice, sometimes other methods of control. It's vastly more valuable to figure out how to seamlessly transition between different modes of use/control and to maximize the utility of each mode than to try to engineer some grand compromise design that can be used in all modes but takes advantage of none of them very well. Moreover, Microsoft needs to learn a very hard lesson here. If you want to change things you need to transition. UI reboots are like system rewrites, they carry a lot of the same risks, if you commit to the new system before it's mature without giving people the option of using the old system you'll often times end up with rejection instead of acceptance. Microsoft has developed a bad habit lately of ramming new ways of doing things down users throats without any time to get used to the changes. The only people who can get away with bullshit like that are Apple, and Microsoft is very definitely not Apple.

deleted 13y ago

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JTenerife 13y ago

I've hardly ever read a non-opiniated review or discussion about windows 8. All these discussions go direct to our fanboy hearts. It's like the programming languages or favorite IDE discussions ... :-) Anyway, there's a huge potential for having one device that can be used with different UI concept based on the peripherals: A tablet docked into a docking station should be operated by mouse and keyboard (desktop mode), otherwise it should be operated by touch (metro mode). Windows 8 should recognize what default to use. While Metro as default for a PC doesn't make sense, it's not really a big problem. The issue is mainly amplified by our emotions. It took me much longer to get used to OS X, but as I liked the device to much, it didn't bother me at all. I kind of enjoyed exploring how to use it.

sdegutis 13y ago

Wow. What's with all the Metro hate? (Besides the term Metro, which definitely deserves it.) Yes, it's different. But is it really news when an average user has a negative bias against change and unfamiliarity?

sdegutis 13y ago
Oh wait, I think I know why. About 5 years ago, when Mac OS X 10.4 was the latest, I started considering switching from Windows (Vista at the time) to Mac. But all my friends and colleagues were telling me about how awful Macs were. They were remembering the Macs from the 90s, and that image stuck with them long after those Macs died. They had no idea what innovation and improvements Apple had done with Mac OS X and the iMac. They were just blindly biased and either okay with it or unaware of it. I wonder if that's the same thing happening today with Windows 8. I bet people here are so biased against it because previous versions of Windows or previous Microsoft products or practices left a bad taste. To be fair, I don't know any modern news about Microsoft. So maybe they still are shady business people. But I don't expect to be able to find any unbiased sources who can confirm or deny this credibly.

alkonaut 13y ago

There is nothing fundamentally wrong with the design language of "modern", and no one ever has needed several resizable draggable windows for their desktop. That UI paradigm should be easy to replace by a nice tiling manager. What I do need however is a UI that lets me run my legacy apps side by side with new ones, in any configuration and number. I don't mind the look of metro and I never liked the start menu. If my start menu is a start screen, fine. The biggest problems are a) the divide between old and new. The mistake was making a completely separate UI rather than making a single UI that could adapt to both touch and mouse interaction. b) the API debacle: what IS microsofts strategy for the future of heavy desktop apps? What happened to wpf/xaml? Developers don't like constant surprises.

alkonaut 13y ago

Hopefully when win9 comes out we can all look back and laugh at this. It somehow magically fixes the dual UI issue. At least if it doesn't we don't have do worry about Win10 at all.