14 DAY TRIAL // Back in October 2012, when Microsoft officially introduced the new Windows 8, many users bashed the software giant for dropping the Aero Glass effects and going for a flatter look, explaining that older Windows versions looked much more eye-candy than the modern successor did.
As time passed by, everyone got used to the new design approach, and after many companies actually switched to a flat look for their products (see Apple and its latest iOS releases), people stopped complaining about what Windows 8 looked like.
Now it turns out that users actually love the way Windows 8 looks and want to keep the flat look in Windows 10 as well, so one of the most voted requests submitted by Technical Preview testers refers to the UI of the desktop.
Users point out that flat icons look much better on the modern desktop and ask Microsoft to replace all icons and graphics in Windows 10 with flatter designs.
“Completely flat look for the desktop”
Believe it or not, but some of those who submitted feedback to Microsoft want the desktop to switch to a completely flat design, including icons and other elements that would make it even more different from Windows 7.
Setting it apart from Windows 7 is one of the things that users want to see happening in Windows 10, the feedback reads, even though many have until now asked Microsoft to make the new operating system look more like its predecessor.
“I would love to see a completely Modern UI/flat design for everything on the desktop. I extremely love the new File Explorer and Computer icons, they do match the Modern UI theme, but a lot them remain unchanged,” the feature request adds, adding that a “redesigned theme from the ground up that doesn’t make you feel like you’re using Windows 7” would the best addition.
Microsoft wanted Windows 10 to look like Windows 7
One of the things that Microsoft tried with Windows 10 was to restore the full functionality of the Windows 7 desktop, so it’s not such a big surprise that the company wanted to make its modern OS version look like its predecessor.
This is how the Start menu returned on the desktop, even though with a modern touch, but at the same time, Microsoft also implemented a number of subtle changes to icons and other visual things.
At this point, it’s not yet clear whether Microsoft will introduce more changes to the Windows desktop in the final version of the OS, but there's more to come in the coming months, as we get closer to the public launch of the OS