Wow, this looks great! For the first time that I can think of, I'm actually excited about a new version of Windows. Even moreso, I'm actually excited about developing for Windows as a platform. This is huge.
Sure, I'm curious how the standard mouse and keyboard interface will work, but I'm not really worried. It looks like the standard Windows 7 interface is still there, just working behind the scenes and collaboratively with the new UI.
Agree that it looks good at first blush however it's key that the "OS" is a true OS and not a touch based shell on top of Windows7. HP has shipped a number of computers with these touch-based shells and while they demo well they aren't deep enough for day-to-day use. I do love that they are pushing the desktop platform and creating a product that is clearly different in user experience. I also like the idea of HTML as a rich platform but this was said back in the days of Windows98 so I'm waiting and seeing. (Disclosure I worked on the Windows team during 2000 and we had some similar explorations that never saw the light of day so it's great to see)
"...it's key that the "OS" is a true OS and not a touch based shell on top of Windows7....(Disclosure I worked on the Windows team during 2000 and we had some similar explorations that never saw the light of day so it's great to see)"
Do you know something that wasn't shown? It could just a full screen app that runs on top of the existing shell not a replacement shell with a sub process of the old shell. Or by having the quotes around OS when you say "OS" do you just mean a new interface?
What they showed was primarily the UX though. Nothing about the capabilities of the new "windows 8 apps". Though given that it has a powerful OS underneath it should have all the capabilities that windows provides.
It would be exciting to develop for this. Glad I familiarized with the metro look and feel developing for the Windows Phone. I can reuse it.
