New Orleans, May 8, 2003 – Let’s talk about XEEL because it got a lot of attention and a presentation at WinHEC. The name XEEL to me sounds exciting, intriguing and attractive. It is all about a whole new concept for controlling different devices in a similar way. XEEL is a case study for a new hardware design. It is unbelievable how complex the process of designing new hardware actually is. It would be great to show an entire PowerPoint deck here but I am sure that is not allowed. Let us start with the basic thought. For a long time many people have difficulties controlling PC’s and related, yet different devices. Each device operates a little different than another and often not intuitive at all. The folks at Microsoft realize this as well. XEEL is an attempt to create uniformity in controlling different devices. The preliminary results look like this:
The name XEEL is a combination of the word wheel, combined with an X to indicate the shape of the most important centre control. XEEL is a concept for navigation through information on lots of different devices. The idea is that users can navigate without thinking, not only on a PC but also on devices like televisions, audio installations, phones, PDA’s etc. The idea behind XEEL is to make navigation through information as intuitive as driving a car. It doesn’t matter what car somebody drives, elementary controls are in the same location. To finalize the current design, many meetings between software and hardware developers have been held inside Microsoft. Also a thorough test program was held with many users trying different designs. Those users were observed to find out the most efficient way of navigating through information. In different devices, XEEL could be applied like shown in the next picture.
All these devices contain a central XEEL control. Many talks at WinHEC were about ease of use of PC’s. The following may come as a shock for Windows operating system lovers, so you are warned. To make systems more intuitive in the Longhorn timeframe might mean the farewell of control-alt-delete. There are also thoughts about a whole different way of shutting down Windows. It might be that in the future an actual off switch will be implemented instead of having to select a menu entry on the Start menu. Of course all these ideas are subject to change, but honestly, it is almost crazy that we need to talk about subjects like these. My hopes are high though. Perhaps we have a nice easy to use interface for elementary tasks around 2005.
It all sounds so incredibly simple but reality is far more complex. During the presentation that covered new hardware controls it became clear that there are some challenges to overcome. Compatibility with existing operating systems must be guaranteed. In Longhorn probably new controls like the ones shown here will be supported out of the box, but users of new PC’s in combination with old operating systems must be able to use those controls as well. That means that all controls need to translate events into key combinations that are now common in all Windows operating systems.
The same subject, but than applied to audio devices, was also topic of a presentation at WinHEC. How can the user experience be simplified? For example to do something simple as controlling the volume on a PC there are 3 different ways, sometimes conflicting each other. This is another thing that is going to change in the Longhorn timeframe. Adding specific devices should be simplified as well. For instance compare the Windows XP way to set audio properties with a new way that could be part of Longhorn:
At first sight Longhorn will show much more information in a graphical way. The operating system will actually try to assist a user much better in what to achieve. Unfortunately, the picture is not all crisp, but this screen dump is so new that it was only available at WinHEC on the slide deck of the presenter. He repeated time and again that this screen shot is only an impression of what Longhorn is really going to be.
At the end of WinHEC 2003 I have to conclude that we are really in between major events. It is still too early to have lots of information about Longhorn. That will happen later this year when the PDC is held. At the same time it is almost unnecessary to get into much detail for Windows XP, after all Windows XP has been around for quite a while. Probably that is the reason why lots of the presentations at WinHEC dealt with hardware innovation in the broadest sense. It almost feels that here was an entire industry gathered together, desperately trying to find new ways to make money. In the end that will succeed, especially when the economic situation is up again. Big question remaining is when this is going to happen.
To conclude the live contributions from WinHEC I want to stick a short while with Longhorn. During one of the last presentations at WinHEC the first public live installation of Longhorn on a PC was shown. Nobody really talks about functionality yet, but Microsoft showed that it is possible to install an early alpha version of the operating system. The experience during installation is already totally different. Installing Longhorn does not take between 45 and 60 minutes, something we are used to with Windows XP. Longhorn takes about 15 minutes and developers are trying to get that installation time down. Furthermore there is no command mode part during installation. Longhorn installation is in graphics mode from the first moment on. This was the result at WinHEC:
On the outside the operating system still looks a lot like Windows XP, but that will change completely is everybody telling here. I have to say that my admiration for Microsoft has increased. It must be an unbelievable job. Working with thousands of developers on the next generation of a Windows operating system that only will be released in 2005. Daily create a new build that brings the release date a little closer. How is it possible to manage projects of this scale? Hopefully everybody things about that when booting a Windows operating system. With this the life reports from WinHEC come to an end. Three weeks from now DotNETForDevices presents another live coverage when we move to Dallas for Microsoft’s TechEd. |
