With the unveiling of Windows 8 earlier this week at the Build conference, Microsoft officially introduced the Metro-style interface. As well as being a new way to navigate Windows, it’s also Microsoft’s way on to tablet devices by providing a solution to touch-friendly input sitting on top of the underlying Windows OS implementation.
That Metro-style interface is arguably the biggest change Microsoft has ever implemented for a new version of Windows. It does not rely on any legacy libraries Windows has used before, instead being built with a new API called Windows Runtime (WinRT).
What does that mean for Windows users? Well, the existing Windows 7-style interface is still available in Windows 8, but Microsoft hasn’t made it easily accessible. But in the final version of the OS, use of applications will be split between the old and new interfaces. It looks likely that Microsoft is going to prefer the Metro-style interface for all consumer-oriented software, even if mouse and keyboard are the input methods. The only exceptions to this rule will be developer and business software such as Visual Studio, Photoshop, Maya etc. This will cause issues for some users who prefer the old style of Start Menu interface, and even Microsoft is having to split applications in two to cope with this change. With that in mind, Internet Explorer 10 will have two modes.
Internet Explorer 10 will still exist as your typical Windows application, just like IE9, but hopefully with improved standards support, as well as retaining access to plug-ins and extensions. But there is also a second version or mode of IE10 specifically for use with the Metro-style interface. IE10 Metro as I call it will not support any plug-ins and is a HTML5-only experience.
Remember how Apple decided to not support Flash on the iPad and iPhone? Well, this looks to be Microsoft’s equivalent play. If you use the standard version of IE10 then you retain access to such functionality, but as IE10 Metro is going to be used across mobile and touchscreen devices, Microsoft has gone for a much cleaner, less resource intensive version of its browser. That means no Flash, no Silverlight, no plug-ins at all. It’s HTML5 all the way.
For consumers and owners of Windows 8 tablets, this should come as good news. You won’t be subjected to regular plug-in updates and the need to install battery-crippling software like Flash. But for developers it causes an extra headache. They will now either have to switch to HTML5-only app development, or support two versions for IE10 Metro and non-Metro versions. As HTML5 will work on both versions of IE10, to me this looks like just another push to leave Flash and Silverlight behind. Why support two versions when you can create a single HTML5 version that works everywhere? Of course, that assumes HTML5 has the functionality in place to recreate that Flash or Silverlight app a developer maintains.
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