Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Microsoft Confirms Windows 8.1 Spring Update, To Focus On Non-touch Devices

Posted by timothy on from the iteration-station dept.

SmartAboutThings writes "At a special event at the Mobile World Congress, Microsoft has announced the 'spring' update for Windows 8.1. Joe Belfiore, who is the head of platform at Microsoft for smartphones, tablets and desktop devices, said the Windows 8.1 update will come with improvements for non-touch devices. Belfiore also said the update will focus on bringing back some of the 'old' features to Windows 8.1, such as the much-hyped start button, but this won't have a negative impact on the touch experience."

6 of 172 comments (clear)

  1. 99% by Citizen+of+Earth · · Score: 5, Insightful

    said the Windows 8.1 update will come with improvements for non-touch devices

    What a fantastic strategy -- to put a few afterthoughts into 99% of their market...

    1. Re:99% by chalkyj · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It'll be nice to use server 2013 without having to battle with a "touch screen optimised" interface. I guess they over estimated how many people are running server 2013 on tablets.

    2. Re:99% by Solandri · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's really simple. The only way to install a Metro app is through Microsoft's Store. There are exceptions for developers and corporate in-house software. But for the traditional business model where Party A makes the software, Party B buys it and uses it, you can only do it by selling the software in the Store.

      If you sell through the Store, Microsoft takes a 30% cut of all revenue.

      That's what this is all about. Microsoft wants 30% of Adobe's, Intuit's, SAP's, Oracle's, etc's revenue. Their plan to make this happen is to get all users (including corporate ones) to use Metro apps. If the users accept it, then the developers will be forced to make Metro apps and sell it through the Store. And Microsoft gets a 30% cut. Of everything.

      That's why they're forcing Metro down users' throats. That's why the "Start" button isn't really a start button but dumps you straight into Metro - it's a one-button access to where the Store is. That's why your Windows Server pushes Metro apps. It's all to get you to buy and use Metro apps, so developers will start selling Metro apps.

      (And yes I realize this is Apple's walled garden model with iOS. I don't really have as much problem with it there because iOS devices are generally not productivity devices so most apps are priced $0 to $10. Not $100 to over $1000 like many Windows productivity apps. And no this is not Google's model. Yes Google takes a 30% cut of apps sold in the Play store, but they don't restrict where you get your apps from. It's easiest to get them from the Play store, but you can get them from any other store, or side-load them via microSD or USB or even directly from a website. Basically the current state of Windows software is like the Android environment where an optional store charges 30%, and Microsoft is trying to transition it to be like the iOS environment where the only store charges 30%.)

  2. Start button? by jones_supa · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The article talks about the "start button" making a comeback, but it obviously did in 8.1 already. Are they actually talking about Start Menu?

    1. Re:Start button? by _xeno_ · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Do I really need to see my open windows and part of my desktop behind the start menu when I'm just clicking to start a program? Not really.

      Actually... yes. You do. Believe it or not.

      There's a concept called "doorway amnesia" where you'll tend to "forget" what it was you're doing when your surroundings change entirely. It's why everyone has experienced walking into a room and then forgetting why they went there in the first place. By entirely replacing the desktop and changing your context, it makes it harder to remember why you opened the Start Screen in the first place.

      The rest of the complaints have to do with it being slower to use than the start menu thanks in part to the transition animations. My personal annoyance is that not everything you have installed shows up there, instead they're hidden behind the down arrow. Yes, yes, you can "pin them to start" but after installing a new app, it always initially confuses me when I go looking for it and it isn't on the Start Screen.

      Windows renders everything to an off-screen 96dpi buffer, then just scales that up 200%.

      Does Windows do the bilinear filtering thing that the Retinal MacBooks do? I saw one running in a store, and the way it handles non-DPI aware apps is bilinearly scaling it up. Made the entire thing look very blurry.

      --
      You are in a maze of twisty little relative jumps, all alike.
  3. It's simple: provide a choice by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You put a gigantic switch in the Control Panel somewhere: "Enable touchscreen UI (recommended for tablet use) / Disable touchscreen UI (recommended for desktop use)". Throw the switch to the latter option and you get something that approximates the Windows 7 UI. You could even call it "Classic" mode, like has been done for the last 2 versions of Windows. Nobody liked the default Windows XP "Playschool" theme. Many people didn't like the default Windows 7 theme. They were no big deal. Make it easy for users to choose, and people will complain a lot less about the defaults. Give them no choice and, yeah, they're going to complain bitterly (Windows 8), until third-parties step in to fix the problem (e.g., Classic Shell).

    Stick an "Advanced" button in there to allow tweaking of individual features.

    Microsoft is the last one I would have thought needed to be schooled about the value of choice, but they made the same mistake with the recent versions of Office. Experiment, but please have some respect for what users of your product have already learned.