We've been examining and dissecting beta
versions of Windows 8 for almost a year in that time, a few traits
have become eminently clear. First and foremost, no matter what you think about
Windows 8's design, it's a towering engineering achievement: Microsoft managed
to bolt a very capable, modern, touch-friendly interface (I'll stick with calling it metro for now) onto
a stalwart (some would say stodgy) workhorse, coming up with a product that's
familiar to more than a billion users, and forward-looking at the same time.
That's quite an accomplishment.
But sometimes engineering achievements are
appreciated only by the engineers. From the user's standpoint, Windows 8 is a
failure -- an awkward mishmash that pulls the user in two directions at once.
Users attracted to the new touch-friendly Metro GUI will dislike the old
touch-hostile desktop underneath. By the same token, users who rely on the
traditional Windows desktop will dislike having to navigate Metro to find
settings and apps they intuitively locate in Windows 7.
