Microsoft unveils Windows 8 tablet effort with Samsung prototype - Page 4

Explain that to forum member majjo.

Also not seeing how "a few lines of code" magically does all the work of converting a desktop UI metaphor to a useable tablet version. Apple has spend a lot of time and effort to write iPad versions of things like the iWork suite, and I'm pretty sure there's more to it than a few lines of code.

Anyone have any idea how that works? Does it just map all those drop down menus and buttons and mouse sized targets onto bigger, touchable regions? Because that's exactly why previous versions of Windows for tablets have failed in the market place. Just making something open within a different framework is a fair ways away from making it optimal, and I call bullshit if MS is saying you can turn a desktop app into a actually useful tablet app with nothing more than a few lines of code.

Just what I need ... a tablet connected to a keyboard so I can use Notepad.

What will MS think of next?

I have a name for this ... the ZuneTab.

And just to drive the above point home, if it's that easy to convert to Metro, where were the marquee apps at the keynote? All they had were a handful of proof of concept stuff (written by students, apparently?)

Is it that apps have to be written from the ground up to be Windows 8/Metro ready? If so, how does that work as a big win for "we must have Windows compatability" folks? If not, why not show Office in Metro after writing those few lines?

Snafu is actually an acronym= Situation Normal: All Fxxked Up
Edit: replied before I saw MyopiaRocks post

Prolly talking about CSS. It's all about CSS
Microsoft has this thing called WPF that they're pushing for making desktop applications, and in theory, it separates presentation from data/logic. That might be what "a few lines of code" refers to, in this case, you slap on a different presentation layer in there and call it a tablet. But I'm skeptical.

FIGMO!

Yes. That is correct.

Its the same as most all windows programs - they look one way when running, for example, XP, but when you use Windows 7, they have the new interface.

And you can choose to use the old interface if you prefer.

So existing apps will use the Metro interface unless you want to use the classic Win7 look.

That was hilarious. I watched in real time as that guy developed carpal tunnel of the elbow. He splits the keyboard then uses one finger to type. Pulling menus and apps and whatever from the sides only worked part of the time. The interface was unresponsive and ugly. And would it be asking too much to have the demo people skilled in using the product?

Not in the past: the UI is in the OS. The app hooks into the OS and displays the app with the OS's visual paradigm.

Unless you want to use the classic view, which has always been available in the past.

When you add an external monitor to your dock. If you feel the need.

And my guess is that because Windows 8 will run on a wide variety of devices, the vendors will develop many different types of machines for many different types of users.

So, again, apps are magically rewriting themselves with "a few lines of code" to become first class tablet citizens? Because the move from mouse to finger friendly is vastly more complex than just updating UI chrome ala XP to 7-- a fact that has hindered Microsoft's tablet efforts in the past.

And if existing apps will use the Metro interface (sounds so straightforward) why didn't MS show any of them? I mean, Word just launches in Metro if I want, right?

Yes, a bewildering array of form factors has certainly served MS well in their tablet efforts so far. I particularly like the idea of having a tablet device which trades computing power for low power consumption, size and weight getting docked to act as my desktop machine. Then, I just fire up the standard Windows desktop and run Photoshop really badly. It's a win win!

Personally, I doubt it will "kill" either one. And I hope that it does not. I'm not even sure where this "killer" meme came from.

Radio did not kill live concerts. TV didn't kill movies. Movies did not kill plays. TV did not kill radio. VCRs did not kill TV. Neither did DVRs.

Usually old tech survives, with huge overlaps.

It is not as good for movies or TV because it is not widescreen. Even as an eBook reader, I'd prefer longer pages. Many Web pages are designed for widescreen as well.

For music, it needs to be plugged in, or you need headphones. The tiny speakers are crap.

I can't make a compelling use case for my personal needs, even as many other people find it perfect. I like the idea of being able to detach the screen from my desktop lair, and being able to carry it with me and use it as a touchscreen. The iPad cannot work with a mouse, and so I can't see ever using it in a dock.

Eventually, 90% plus of computers users. Just like every other version of Windows. Remember - it is not just a phone OS. It will work with many different devices.

If you just want a tablet, with a tablet OS, it will work fine for that. Just a desktop? It can do that too. Want a hybrid? It covers that use pattern as well.

IMO Windows 8 will sink or swim as a tablet OS based on the market's response to Metro. The "it's a desert topping/floor wax" schtick is more of a gimmick, and hybrid use likely to be a niche.

That's not to say that Metro won't be successful, just that it will need to succeed on its own merits as a tablet UI, not as some kind of magical "Windows to go."

The difference is that with an iPad, you need to move your whole arm up and forward to touch the screen. With Win8, your touchpad will work with just a finger motion, or your mouse will work with wrist motion.

I can't see any ergonomic advantage to using a dock for a touchscreen device.

Which is the reason M$ is optimizing every aspect of their new OS. I kinda thought that was a main point of the exercise.

I have a $99 Apple TV, so getting music to my stereo system is easy-- as will getting most video and screen content onto my flatscreen come iOS5 and air mirroring.

I can create and sequence music on my iPad, build presentations, do technical layout, paint, create and edit documents (if I tire of the soft keyboard there's nothing stopping me from using a bluetooth keyboard), edit photos, edit movies, manage my email accounts, do data base work, etc.

I often read people declaring that the iPod is "only good" for web surfing and media consumption, I find that mystifying.

And I can't see the logic of using a relatively underpowered tablet for a desktop machine.

Then they will relegate themselves to simple little applets, instead of full-featured programs. Problem solved!

No, they're optimizing the Metro interface, which runs alongside of the usual Windows. When I switch back to Windows I have a very tablet unfriendly machine, and I still haven't heard a convincing explanation as to how all those legacy Windows programs are going to rewrite themselves to take advantage of Metro.

But that's the whole point of contention-- making full-featured programs tablet friendly is a lot of work, and MS is acting like it's nothing more than a few tweaks to hop over to Metro. That seems highly unlikely to me.

It's only a facade. Depressing.
Apart from that, their facade that they're calling a new OS, isn't that horrifying. Once it works it'll be used, and business dudes are going to launch Word and Excel and get on with their lives unchanged.
I prefer iOS. It made great changes.

The world would be an easier place with all choices being either/or, black/white, good/bad, our way/the highway.

Indeed, ISTM that most people like convenience and simplicity, and are willing to give up much in order to get it.

But the rest of us are very interested in versatility and capability. We think different.

/agree

... with one caveat. The ability to use native Windows applications on the tablet will greatly increase it's appeal. Need to see a Word document? Open word and read it or sync it to your SkyDrive and use Office online (or 365). This IMO is where Apple has failed to captialize so far. If Lion would have ushered in a seamless iOS / OS X experience Microsoft would have less of an advantage.

As it stands right now there is no such things as Pages online and I can't run an iOS app on my Mac (natively).

I doubt that any lines of code will be needed for rudimentary compatibility for most applications.

Likewise, I doubt that a few lines of code will provide an optimal experience.

I have no doubt, however, that most programs will be rewritten from the ground up so as to work beautifully as both tablet and desktop interfaces, while some others will fade into obscurity. The same thing happens every time M$ radically redesigns an OS.

But of course the "rest of you" have to give up much in order to get what you want as well. Real device design is always about tradeoffs. You can make something that does everything, but it's likely to sacrifice battery life, size, ease of use, etc. to accomplish that. Even Microsofts wretched old tablets had their enthusiasts; I'm sure they felt that the "versatility and capability" were worth it, but they were few and far between.

So the question is whether or not Microsoft's willingness to give up simplicity in favor of the Windows boat anchor will give them an advantage in the marketplace. We'll see.

Agreed. It is a difficult task that M$ has undertaken. I hope that they can pull it off. Given the gaffes of the past few years, it is not at all certain that Win8 will be a good OS for either desktop/notebook use or for tablet use.

Personally, I have some huge reservations about the tile paradigm for desktop use - more than you seem to have about the ability to run desktop programs on a tablet. I hope that they don't dumb down the entire experience in order to shoehorn one OS into two form factors.

But why rewrite an app when it can run as is? Why would, say, Adobe bother with the huge outlay in capital to get anything going on Metro when any device running Metro can already run regular Windows and has out of the box Adobe compatibly?

And even in the case of apps that are rewritten, will they be any good? Metro is just a UI, after all, not a magic touch experience generator. If the current state of Windows software is any indication, I suspect we can look forward to a great many half assed ports that aren't much better than the old Windows tablets of yore.

How does MS propose to enforce Metro conventions? Do they plan to at all? How does Metro deal with something like Word? Or Excel? Big sliding boxes don't seem very optimal, but that's pretty much all we've seen.

Unless MS has some compelling solutions for this kind of thing, Metro (for all the hype) will be for all intents and purposes a widget running, social network managing, "big phone OS" that just happens to reside on the same install as Windows 8. Which is fairly cool in its own right, if nothing more than for easy access to Windows documents. But I'm not sure if it's the paradigm busting move it's being made out to be.

Again we agree. The Motorola Atrix looks pretty sweet, but I really question whether it would provide any sort of satisfying desktop experience.

But whenever I ask such questions, I remind myself that playing video on a computer once seemed impossibly complex - you couldn't even fit one movie on a standard hard drive.

Then Real Player came along, and streamed music over your modem - another seemingly impossible task. Now we stream HD video seamlessly over optic fiber with more capacity than my ISP used to have for a whole city of users on their T1 line.

So I try to hold back my predictions of "It ain't good enough, and it never will be". Someday my phone will make the quad-core laptop I'm currently using seem quaintly under powered, just like this laptop makes my old desktop seem like a weak sister.

I used to save old computers, thinking I'd one day use them as servers. The other day I came across an old motherboard I had saved, with a Pentium 4 class AMD chip in it. I laughed and threw it in the garbage. But I still remember when I upgraded to that platform - it was amazingly fast at the time. I think I had a whole Gig of RAM in it, which is almost 5 times the capacity of my first hard drive.

As I said before, some software will be rewritten from the ground up and will likely work great. Some will not be rewritten, and will work OK. Some will not be rewritten, and will work like crap, and will fade into obscurity.

It has happened lots of times before. With 3.1, with 95, with NT, XP and Win7.

There is a big difference between being able to use existing software and being able to optimally use the entire OS interface/paradigm. Legacy stuff will likely work, or most of it will mostly work, anyways. New stuff will work better. The best of the new stuff likely will work best.

True enough-- my feeling is one of the reasons that the iPad is doing so well and desktop sales are slumping is that desktop machines are now (and have been for a while) more powerful than they really need to be for most of what most people are doing with their computers. Just endlessly adding RAM and bigger HDs and faster CPUs with more cores is no longer working as a sales driver for the PC industry, because the PC people are already using emails, surfs and word processes plenty fast as it is.

So you could be right-- a tablet with next year's hardware might be plenty powerful enough for most uses, even some current edge cases like photo finishing and video editing (which can be done on tablet hardware but faster is always better when it comes to big media files).

But the tablet paradigm may also blunt enthusiasm for hybrid devices, since many people might be perfectly fine just staying on the tablet (with the exception of tossing a bluetooth keyboard into the mix). I could see a tablet OS that works seamlessly with a mouse to be of some use, but I can't see how that wouldn't break multitouch gestures. My guess that Apple's approach here would to pair a bluetooth keyboard with a trackpad, allowing a close analog of the touch experience at the keyboard hand position.

I guess, but there's a lot more work and thought and care and planning that goes into the transition from mouse to touch than from various iterations of Windows, the user facing portion of which involves little more than UI chrome.

Apple has approached this by keeping iOS a separate entity (in concept if not code), leading by example by providing best in class tablet software (iWork, Garage Band, etc.) and developing a robust and deep touch lexicon, with developer tools that strongly encourage consistency of that lexicon across apps. To achieve that level of uniformity and integration they've had to be disciplined, taking clear stands on what the iPad is and is not and how it does and does not work. The results speak for themselves.

MS appears to be suggesting that they can have their tablet cake and eat it too; that they can leave things kind of undefined and open to interpretation and still get a nice tablet ecosystem, even while providing a convenient fallback into Windows. I really question that strategy. You look at all those Windows programs with their various and eccentric ideas about UI (including a lot of Microsoft's stuff) and imagine how that works when you're talking about touch on a tablet, which is far less forgiving of random ideas that change from app to app. The iPad feels of a piece, that aren't many jarring moments when you launch an app and wonder where you are. I fear that that might not be the case with Metro apps, and that's going to impact the desirability of the device.

I'm also still really curious about how the Metro language works for anything other than things like social network feeds or browsing. Everything I've seen seems to emphasize the coolness of live tiles and sliding panels and nice typography; can't see how that serves a Metro Word, should that ever come to pass.

OK, here's a talk on building Metro apps that belies my idea that MS was just throwing this open to whatever-- they clearly have strong design tools intended to maintain consistency among apps.

And as far as that goes it looks pretty nice. However, everything that's being shown seems to center on feeds or web stuff. Early on the presenter explicitly concedes something like Photoshop must be relegated to the traditional desktop and mouse UI.

I think this is the drawback of yoking Metro to Windows 8-- it enforces a division between "real" apps and "tablet" apps. I suspect that MS has no plans to put Word, for instance, into Metro, because, again, why bother? Good old Windows is right there-- on any hardware that's running Metro.

Apple, on the other hand, has gone all in with touch, and so are motivated to create full touch versions of their bigger, more capable apps. Pages for the iPad may not be a Word rival at the moment, but it certainly gives you more word processing power on a tablet than either nothing or just getting dumped back into a Windows desktop.

Agreed. In the bad old days, you needed new hardware in order to just run the latest apps. But that has not been the case for mainstream users for many years now.



But Apple didn't do that. Instead, they just eliminated the mouse, with no good way to replace it. Their dock solution is half-assed without a mouse, and the virtual keyboard is suboptimal compared with a full sized keyboard.

I have not yet seen any tablet that I feel like buying. I'd jump at a cheap web browser/movie watching tablet, or at a tablet that would work as well as a laptop. But the iPad doesn't seem to fit either category for me. The Nook Color seems interesting - maybe I should look at it more closely.

I kind of lost interest when it was announced that the iPad would use iOS, which I found too limiting even on a smartphone, having used PalmOS for many years before I got an iPhone. I'm still waiting for something cheap and basic, or something full featured enough to spend bucks on.

So if Windows tablets are so awesome, why haven't you owned one since 1997? They've been around forever. What's stopping you?

Now that made me laugh out loud. Too bad most of the younger set on here won't get the reference, because the quote's not only funny, but it's the perfect metaphor for this MS effort.