Windows 8 - Two GUIS in One

So there has been much talk about the revolutionary new user interface coming soon in the form of Windows 8 metro style, but what is this metro style really, and what does this mean for the desktop that we've come to love?

Windows is the Metro Style UI

Metro Style UI (User Interface) is a tile based approach to activation of Windows applications. It was designed with touch interface in mind, and therefore has all of its mechanisms in the form of slides, taps and flicks. Upon booting of your device, Windows opens directly into the Metro Home Screen shown below.

Windows 8 Metro Style UI

The tiles shown in the alongside screenshot is used to activate applications such as Maps, Mail, Messages and the new Windows Store among others. The colour-toned tiles represent applications that run in full screen metro style, whereas the transparent tiles run in the traditional sense as a window in the desktop (yes ... the desktop is still around somewhere - but more on this later.)

As the metro style UI is meant to be an alternative to Apple's iOS and Google's Android operating systems (both smartphone and tablet operating systems), we would expect the traditional components of a touch operating system to be present, namely a home screen, an app drawer, a notifications strip, a settings menu and an app store. Windows 8 Metro has all these with the exception of a notifications strip, which leaves me wondering how notifications will work. Granted, my experience with Windows 8 Metro Style has been on a desktop PC and using the Consumer Preview. The notifications may not yet be implemented or if it has been, may not be relevant on a desktop. Either way, it would be nice to have on a desktop.

Metro UI List of PC Apps

The list of applications (the equivalent of an app drawer in android) can be found by right clicking on the home screen, and selecting "all apps". This "app drawer" is divided into two sections, namely Metro Apps on the left (with its colour-toned icons), and the traditional desktop apps on the right.

Multitasking has become essential in mobile computing, and therefore no touch device can go without a means to switch between active applications. Resembling the android app switcher (see below), windows metro has a strip of active applications which can be accessed by sliding the mouse cursor to the top left corner of the screen.

Metro UI App Switching Menu

Metro UI Settings Menu

The settings menu can be accessed by sliding the mouse cursor to the top right corner of the screen, as shown above.

Now if you were to open one of the Metro UI apps (ie one of the colour-toned tiles), it would look something like the mail app and windows store app shown in the screenshots below.

Metro UI Mail Application

Metro UI Windows Store Application

Now, the one new and unique thing found in the Metro UI, is the ability to have two applications on screen at the same time, by means of a screen split. The next screenshot shows the Metro UI Mail and Metro UI Message apps running side by side. Note the vertical black screen divider.

Metro UI screen shared between two Metro UI apps

Apps can be side arranged by grabbing an application at the very top of the app and dragging it to the left or right. While on the topic, closing apps can be done by grabbing the application at the top of the app, and sliding it to the bottom of the screen. This of course mimics a top down slide on a touchscreen device.

Lower menu for the calendar tile

The tiles on the home screen are not defined by the operating system, but can be customised to reflect each individual user's tastes and requirements. 

Lower menu for the mail tile

By right clicking on a particular tile, a list of options are displayed at the bottom of the home screen and include, amongst others, the ability to unpin a tile or change the size of some tiles. Tiles can be rearranged by dragging. The background of the home screen can also be custom set.

What about the desktop?

Okay, so at this point, you would have come to realise that Windows 8 appears to be all about the Metro UI. It looks as if the whole user interface of Windows has changed, and that everyone is in for a rude awakening. This is partially true, as the desktop still exists, as I've already hinted at above. The Metro UI makes for an interesting alternative to iOS and Android, but its counter-intuitive interface when using a keyboard and mouse, makes it difficult to say if it really should be used on a personal computer.

The thing that I find most interesting about the desktop though, is that is found in the Metro UI in the form of an application tile ..... this implies that the desktop is merely an application run from within the Metro. Is this suggestive of the future death of the desktop, having received a downgrade from the primary GUI of Windows to a mere complex application?

Accessing the Desktop from the Metro UI

Anyway, to access the desktop, clicking of the "Desktop" tile (as shown above) will open up an only too familiar Windows desktop.

Windows 8 Desktop

Now upon initial inspection of the desktop, everything will look pretty much exactly the same as that of Windows 7, but wait ...... where is the Start Button?

This is only a consumer preview, but at the moment the start button has been removed, and replaced with a slide to the bottom left corner and a click. The purpose of this click however, and therefore the purpose of your keyboard windows button, is no longer to call up a Start Menu, but instead sends the active application (in this case the desktop) to the background, and returns to the Metro UI. Further evidence that the desktop is merely a supporting act to the Metro's lead.

I haven't done too much digging around into the upgraded or downgraded functionality of the desktop, but I have noted two new and impressive features of the desktop, namely the implementation of the Ribbon into the Window Panes, and the reinvented copy function and dialog box.

Ribbon in Window Pane

New Copy Progress Window

Interaction between the Metro UI environment and the Desktop UI environment

So considering that two distinct user interfaces exist in one operating system, how convenient is this for both the touch interact user, and the keyboard/mouse interact user?

My experience is that the Metro UI is counter-intuitive when used on a desktop, but looks to be a good UI for touch tablets and smartphones where flicks, taps and drags are more intuitive. Conversely, using the desktop is as it has always been, great for desktop operation allowing for quick navigation and window switching by mouse. The desktop may be less intuitive for touch tablets and smartphones.

Because of the absence of the start menu, opening a desktop application requires returning to the Metro UI home screen each time (via Windows button on keyboard, or clicking in the bottom left corner of the desktop "application"). I found this very frustrating. 

Files are by default directed to open with Metro UI apps even when activating from within the desktop UI, which means that when I open a picture file or video file from the desktop UI, the desktop is sent to the background, and the picture / video player Metro app opens, making it harder to get back to the desktop.

(btw ... the desktop "application" cannot be closed. Even if the grab and drag down approach is used to close the desktop, it will only put the desktop in an inactive state in the background and open up the Metro UI home screen)

My opinion

If the Metro UI is more intuitive on the touch tablets / smartphones, and less so on the keyboard/mouse devices, and if the desktop is more intuitive on keyboard/mouse devices, and less so on the touch tablets/smartphones, WHY NOT JUST HAVE TWO OPERATING SYSTEMS? Have a Windows 8 for Touch Devices, and a standard Windows 8. Why the one package approach?

If the one package approach is so essential, then either give the user the option of interface upfront (with the option to change at any time ofcourse), or make the two interfaces more independent, without forcing the user into the Metro when using the desktop.

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