Microsoft will soon unveil the latest version of Windows and it will be called Windows 10.
What happened to Windows 9? Don't ask me because making sense of the Windows naming sequence is like solving one of those Mensa "What’s the pattern?" puzzles. So far, we have this: Windows 1, 2, 3, 95, 98, 2000, ME, XP, Vista, 7, 8, 10. OK, whatever.
Windows 8, as the world now knows, was a superimposed mishmash of two operating systems. There was the touchscreen-friendly Modern or Metro interface (TileWorld), but it was officially retired and replaced with nothing. The other one is the regular desktop, both are shown above.
They are quite separate, these two environments. Each has its own Help system, its own Web browser, its own email program, its own control panel, its own conventions and gestures. Worse, each runs its own kind of programs. Regular Windows programs open at the desktop, as always — but TileWorld apps open in TileWorld, with no menus overlapping windows. Like iPad apps.
Microsoft believed at the time (2012) that the world was going touchscreen crazy. That, sooner or later, every PC would have a touchscreen. And guess what? They could not have been more wrong.
Most computers still don’t have touchscreens. Windows 8 was a massive flop with critics. "Windows 8 is a failure — an awkward mishmash that pulls the user in two directions at once," wrote Woody Leonhard in InfoWorld. "A horribly awkward mash-up of two fundamentally incompatible approaches that worked poorly on both PCs and tablets," wrote Galen Gruman.
Windows 8 was a massive flop with consumers, too. Today, 51 percent of desktop PCs still run Windows 7; only 13 percent have "upgraded" to Windows 8 or 8.1, according to Net Applications.
The answer has always been screamingly obvious: Split up the two halves of Windows 8 and Windows 10 has done just that.
If you use Windows 10 with a mouse and keyboard, the Start menu is back. Not just the Start button, not just the secret Windows key+X utility menu of Windows 8.1 — the real Start menu.
And TileWorld is gone. No more screen of big flat tiles taking over your monitor. Tiles aren’t gone completely; they still pop out of the regular Start menu, a little weirdly.
But at least mouse-and-keyboard folks won’t sacrifice productivity in the name of the touchscreen revolution that never came, and tablet fans won’t have to work (much) with tiny window controls.
What happened to Windows 9? Don't ask me because making sense of the Windows naming sequence is like solving one of those Mensa "What’s the pattern?" puzzles. So far, we have this: Windows 1, 2, 3, 95, 98, 2000, ME, XP, Vista, 7, 8, 10. OK, whatever.
Windows 8, as the world now knows, was a superimposed mishmash of two operating systems. There was the touchscreen-friendly Modern or Metro interface (TileWorld), but it was officially retired and replaced with nothing. The other one is the regular desktop, both are shown above.
They are quite separate, these two environments. Each has its own Help system, its own Web browser, its own email program, its own control panel, its own conventions and gestures. Worse, each runs its own kind of programs. Regular Windows programs open at the desktop, as always — but TileWorld apps open in TileWorld, with no menus overlapping windows. Like iPad apps.
Microsoft believed at the time (2012) that the world was going touchscreen crazy. That, sooner or later, every PC would have a touchscreen. And guess what? They could not have been more wrong.
Most computers still don’t have touchscreens. Windows 8 was a massive flop with critics. "Windows 8 is a failure — an awkward mishmash that pulls the user in two directions at once," wrote Woody Leonhard in InfoWorld. "A horribly awkward mash-up of two fundamentally incompatible approaches that worked poorly on both PCs and tablets," wrote Galen Gruman.
Windows 8 was a massive flop with consumers, too. Today, 51 percent of desktop PCs still run Windows 7; only 13 percent have "upgraded" to Windows 8 or 8.1, according to Net Applications.
The answer has always been screamingly obvious: Split up the two halves of Windows 8 and Windows 10 has done just that.
If you use Windows 10 with a mouse and keyboard, the Start menu is back. Not just the Start button, not just the secret Windows key+X utility menu of Windows 8.1 — the real Start menu.
And TileWorld is gone. No more screen of big flat tiles taking over your monitor. Tiles aren’t gone completely; they still pop out of the regular Start menu, a little weirdly.
But at least mouse-and-keyboard folks won’t sacrifice productivity in the name of the touchscreen revolution that never came, and tablet fans won’t have to work (much) with tiny window controls.
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