Microsoft Shows Off Radical New UI, Could Be Used In Windows 8 403
autospa writes "In a three and a half minute video, Microsoft may have shown the world what it has in store for the eagerly awaited Windows 8. In the video Microsoft showed a radically different interface from past versions of Windows — even Windows 7. Running on Surface 2, the touch-screen successor to the original Microsoft Surface, the device accepts input from a Windows Phone 7 handset (HTC HD7). Gone are the icons that drive Windows, OS X, and Linux operating systems of past and present. In their place are 'bubbles' that interact with files and post streaming information off the internet."
The UI was not interesting. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:And I thought Office 2010 was hard to use (Score:5, Informative)
No, he's not below average. The problem is mostly likely not that he finds the new interface simply difficult to use, but that he probably has a decade or two of experience using the old interface. He's had all that time to learn where each feature was. When each new version came out, the old features were almost always exactly like before, and just a few new menu items and buttons were added each time. Each time he had to learn a few new things, but all of his old knowledge was still relevant. Now suddenly in one version, everything he's spent many years learning has been pulled out from under him, and he's instinctively looking in the wrong places for everything. Habits that are that well ingrained can be incredibly difficult to break.
I've been using the new interface for about 3 years now, and I still instinctively want to look in the wrong (ie: old) locations. What makes it even more difficult is that there are items in the new interface the mislead people accustomed to the old interface. For example, in the old interface of Excel, if you wanted to insert a new row into your spreadsheet, you went to the menu bar and picked Insert -> Rows. With the new interface, you go up to the top, you see a tab on the ribbon named "Insert" and you automatically think "that's where I'm gonna find the option to insert a row". So you click on it and, I'll be damned....you can insert just about everything EXCEPT a row or column.
Re:That is the greatest advantage of Microsoft (Score:4, Informative)
There, now you can config your NIC
No...it ruined itself (Score:5, Informative)
If I wanted to interact with bubbles... (Score:2, Informative)
...I'd eat taco bell and sit in the bathtub.
Re:Research stuff (Score:4, Informative)
Sure. Here are a few that are not obvious - or officially published - like Kenect.
II think some slashdotters assume that if its not some big earth shattering high PR value block buster thing, then it must not happen. My point is that this happens all the time. The benefits Microsoft Research brings to our products are many, but not necessarily highly visible.
Remember, we are a company. Our goal is to make money - great heaping gobs of it. MSR is a key part of this. MSR does exists to benefit our products. This often takes time and not everything MSR does gets into a product. But we learn a lot even from the things that dont help a product directly.
But, you are missing my other - and most important - point: Diegcog - very likey just made that statment up. Its called lying. Ill be interested to read his respsonse, if any.
-Foredecker [wordpress.com]
whoosh: the dissection of a joke. (Score:4, Informative)
andrea noted that the interface was: .... nice to watch but utterly useless.
which inspired maird to assert:
There is the proof....
You see, maird was saying that the demonstration of something pretty but useless stands as proof that its in the new Windows. The implication is that Windows releases have been dominated by attractive, but worthless items.
By responding to andreas comment with this statement, maird successfully introduced a discontinuity, which the reader may perceive as a delightful surprise, sometimes reacting with laughter. In the traditional world, where this discourse may have occurred around a fire, Mairds companions may have slapped him affectionately on the back, making cooing sounds about wittiness and "bons mots". In this disconnected world "+5 funny" is the depressing equivalent.
Some interpret the delightful surprise as a confusing consternation; often spurning an irrepressible desire to resolve the ambiguity. While this activity in itself is also quite funny, it is more the sad kind of funny.