Having watched the official Windows 8 preview video from Microsoft a few times already, and moved on to dissecting the content properly, I have to say that I find the new Windows Start Screen the core of the new NUI + GUI evolution of the Windows client.
Windows 7 comes with natural user interface capabilities, but with a graphical user interface that is still optimized for the mouse and keyboard.
The same cannot be said about Windows 8. The next version of Windows features a
seamless marriage between NUI and GUI, and the new Windows Start Screen is their brightest offspring, at least from what has been revealed about the OS so far.
The new Start Screen centralizes the programs installed on the device, and enables users to launch apps from a tile-based UI.
On next generation forma factors, such as tablets or slates, users leveraging multi-touch interaction will get the “touch-feely” Windows 8 experience via the new Start Screen, with the old Windows Start menu replaced by a customizable, scalable full-screen view of applications.
This takes me back to last year, when in one of the Redmond company’s building I was having a friendly chat with some Microsoft employees.
I remember telling them that Windows 7 was not exactly the best fit possible for Tablet PCs / slates, NUI-wise. They acted surprised at my conclusion.
However, I explained that what I meant was that for all its NUI capabilities, Windows 7 still makes customers use their finger as if it were the mouse cursor. It should be obvious that there’s more to multi-touch than just pointing your finger as something and still being required to click it, only without the mouse. Unfortunately, Windows 7 did not deliver much more.
Windows 8 does, especially when it comes down to the immersive applications available to users.
But at the same time, the old Windows UI is still available, as visible in the screenshots below, and can be accessed at any time. This of course includes the good old Windows Start Menu.
Find us on Google+
