When the Windows 8 beta arrives at the end of February, it will have some widely requested features for killing Metro apps without going to the Task Manager, for navigating using a mouse rather than touch and for doing more with gestures.
You'll also be able to change that overpowering green background. But Windows 8 director of communications Chris Flores points out to TechRadar that you wouldn't want a photograph as the background of the Metro-style Start screen.
Not only would a photo not stretch and scale as you add more tiles and groups and zoom in and out of the Start screen, it would also be covered up so much by the tiles that you'd never see it.
Instead what you can do is pick from (at the moment) eight different styles, from swirls and curlicues to lines and squares, and choose the shade you want from a scrollbar colour picker.
EIGHT STYLES: In current builds of Windows 8 you can choose eight different styles of background, and a range of colours
The background colour you pick is also used as the accent colour for selections in the Metro interface, for the settings panes and anywhere else you've been seeing the original Metro green.
MATCHED SHADES: When you pick oxblood red you don't get it everywhere; the preview shows the toning shades you'll get for panes and selections
There's good news for mouse users, as there are now a lore more ways to control the interface without touching the screen. Use your scrollwheel to swipe sideways through the Start screen to get to the tiles you want.
And if you want to zoom out so you can move or rename groups of tiles, drag a tile a long way across the screen, or just get to the far end of your tiles in a hurry, you can click in the lower right hand corner of the screen to activate the same 'semantic zoom' as pinching with your fingers on a touch screen.
SEMANTIC ZOOM: Click the icon to zoom out and see your tiles as tiny tiles in groups
You don't have to remember that because there's an icon for it at the end of the scroll bar, and there are hints for what clicking the mouse in most of the other corners does too.
PICK APPS: Use the scrollwheel of your mouse to flip through the apps you can switch to
Clicking lower left on the Windows flag swaps you back to the Windows desktop if that's open and you can now click in the top right corner to open the charm bar; that works far better because you don't have to move the mouse all the way to the left, click and then race over to the right hand side of the screen to choose the icon you want.
Move your mouse into the upper left corner when a Metro-style app is on screen – full-screen or snapped to the left side – and you'll get a thumbnail of the next app on the Windows stack. Spin the scrollwheel to step through the thumbnails and click when you get to the one you want to switch to.
That's easier than the swipe in/swipe out/swipe in dance you have to do to pick an app that's not the next one in order when you're controlling the interface with your fingers (if you drag back towards the side of the screen before the thumbnail for the next app enlarges to fill the window, Windows 8 knows you don't want it and offers the following thumbnail, but the gesture requires precise movements.
There's also a minor change to the way the charm bar appears. When you put your finger on the single pixel strip at the right side of the screen, if you don't make a clear swipe gesture then the charm bar icons appear floating transparently on screen rather than on the usual black charm bar background. That way if you didn't mean to open the charm bar, they're not as intrusive.
If you don't touch them again, they disappear quickly; if you tap an icon, the charm bar draws in fully and the pane you tapped for opens. The same thing happens when you have your mouse on the right of the screen; it's much harder to open the charm bar accidentally.
There's a new gesture for killing Metro apps without going to the Task Manager; they're not using resources unless you can see them, but you don't want an app you're done with cluttering up the stack of thumbnails and apps you have to work your way through every time you switch what's on screen.
KILLING SWIPE: Drag down from the top bezel and the current Metro app shrinks down, ready for you to throw away by swiping to the bottom
When you have a Metro app running, drag your finger down from the top bezel of the screen; as your finger gets halfway down the screen the app switches to show a thumbnail so you know you're selecting it. Drag your finger all the way from top to bottom - which you can do in one smooth swipe – and the app closes altogether. That works much the same way to kill a Metro app with the mouse. Put the changes together and Metro is a lot easier to work with, especially for mouse and keyboard users.
And if you're wondering how many apps will be available for Metro when the beta comes out. Flores isn't giving any numbers, but he did reveal that it took only a day to turn the HTML5 version of Cut The Rope into a full Metro app.
TRANSPARENT CHARM: Swipe or click hesitantly and the charms float over the Start screen, ready to disappear if you turn out not to want them
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Liked this? Then check out Windows 8 beta: new features to expect
Sign up for TechRadar's free Week in Tech newsletter
Get the top stories of the week, plus the most popular reviews delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up at http://www.techradar.com/register
Follow TechRadar on Twitter * Find us on Facebook * Add us on Google+
Your comments (7) Click to add a new comment
boots
January 30th
7. "Use your scrollwheel to swipe sideways through the Start screen to get to the tiles you want."
This happens in the Developer Preview.
"you can now click in the top right corner to open the charm bar; that works far better because you don't have to move the mouse all the way to the left, click and then race over to the right hand side of the screen to choose the icon you want."
In my copy of the Developer Preview, the Charm bar opens like a menu, in the lower left corner, over the start button. I don't have to "race" over to the right side of the screen.
"Move your mouse into the upper left corner when a Metro-style app is on screen – full-screen or snapped to the left side – and you'll get a thumbnail of the next app on the Windows stack. Spin the scrollwheel to step through the thumbnails and click when you get to the one you want to switch to."
This also happens in the Developer Preview. But from the whole left side of the screen, not just the top corner.
"When you have a Metro app running, drag your finger down from the top bezel of the screen; as your finger gets halfway down the screen the app switches to show a thumbnail so you know you're selecting it. Drag your finger all the way from top to bottom - which you can do in one smooth swipe – and the app closes altogether. That works much the same way to kill a Metro app with the mouse. Put the changes together and Metro is a lot easier to work with, especially for mouse and keyboard users."
I am glad that Microsoft has included a way to close Metro apps, but what the hell is wrong with a Close button? We have been using Close buttons for almost 30 years, we all know how they work. Adding a non-intuitive way to close Apps is not an improvment, it is a step backwards.
Alert a moderator
emi
January 27th
6. @solarscreen
Im sorry but your comment its the ridiculous one.
because how could you customize start menu(remember start screen is replacing start menu) from win95 to win7? besides 3rd party themes, and hacked dll, you never were able to.
also how cant win8 be more customizable if they even now let you choose your lockscreen picture?
still you can change wallpaper on desktop, and color taskbar and all that.
so in no way windows 8 is less customizable than prior versions of windows.
because they still let you customize start screen, only not with your custom picture which is more than what they let you do with start menu from win95 to win7
for example i still use dev preview, and i hacked it to get my custom background and yeah it looks nice when i scroll but then its nothing to die for if on RTM im not able to do it and if i have to hack it to get it like i want to. because the picture is not that visible either.
anyway, these changes sound amazing! only 1 month and we should be already using consumer preview. and be able to use store = metro style apps, also these changes make it better. i like dev preview now and it works fine, but it doesnt mean these changes would make it better.
Alert a moderator
solarscreen
January 27th
5. Ridiculous.
Microsoft defaults and a high quality experience are not even in the same category. The wallpaper finally received a bump in quality from pure cartoon only recently. The startup/login screen in Windows 7 is weak at best. Now, the ability to use your own graphics and customize your experience the way you want it is going to be removed? Bad move Microsoft. Now those of us who have enjoyed having our Windows our way will have to again resort to hacking the interface to have that again. Abusing your customers is no way to maintain product loyalty. The eight styles we will be limited to choose from are tacky at best, just like the startup screen clown. If this remains true through to release, it will be a step backwards and is very disappointing to this Windows user and MCITP-EA. Sad...
Alert a moderator
bradavon
January 26th
4. @ madjedi: You've summed up the majority of people's feelings towards Windows 8 so far, which is why I am definitely going to be giving the beta ago for myself. So I can see if what you say is actually reality when using it.
The switch from Desktop (where I see myself most of the time) and the Metro UI to access an App I don't need often enough to pin to the taskbar looks incredibly jarring.
All I can think if is Microsoft aren't stupid and now 99% of Windows 8 users for the foreseeable future will be using a desktop or laptop to access it. They also make millions/billions from the business world too.
Alert a moderator
marybranscombe
January 25th
3. @madjedi - you'll still be able to use pinned icons on the taskbar (or the desktop) without seeing Metro and the figures show they're the most popular way of launching apps in Win 7. The jury is still out on the interface (we haven't seen the final version at this stage) but there are going to be far more improvements to Win 8 than I can fit in a comment.
Alert a moderator
drmips
January 25th
2. As a windows phone 7 owner and long time windows user, I am looking forward to Win 8. The metro interface is really good.
I can see me only using the desktop for my software development, and everything else can be done in Metro. I just hope Apple provide drivers so I can put it on my MacBook Air.
Alert a moderator
madjedi
January 25th
1. These changes sound like an improvement but I still can not see any benfit to using the Metro system with a keyboard and mouse over the traditional desktop. I also think that when using Win8 in desktop mode, having to switch back to metro every time you want somthing that used to be available on the start menu will be really inconvenient. I can not yet see any reason to upgrade to this from Win7 if you are not going to be using touch.
Alert a moderator
Tell us what you think
You need to Log in or register to post comments