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by Peter van Ooijen.
Original Post: Vista: it's all about a nice UI
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Perhaps somebody will recognize this posts subtitle as the title of Julien Ceyssial's blog. He used to be one of the first generation of dnj bloggers but hasn't posted for very very long. But his subtitle is still in my head. On one hand I completely disagree with the statement. IT should be about correct and timely information, all the rest is distraction. On the other hand I totally agree. The information can be quite good but when it's hidden behind seven clicks in a lost corner of the presentation a lot of user will not use the software. Which makes it just as bad as highly decorated nonsense.
In Vista Windows is trying to make a big step forward in pimping the UI. There is a big Vista review on the Windows supersite; here are some of my observations. Given the right hardware (DirectX 9 graphical card) Vista will present itself with the glass interface with transparent window borders (the level is adjustable) and the Window itself projects some shade on the background. It is a delight to work with; personally I like it a lot more than my recent Mac OS X sidestep. At first sight the new Windows looks so simple without any unnecessary distractions. But it's full of nice features.
Although I'm not completely convinced yet. Some programs build on this transparent border. Take Media Player
The player-controls are in a transparent part. So is the level meter in the lower left corner. Here the transparency makes that hard to read. Occasionally Media Player displays text, like the song's title, in that corner as well. Which just blurs away.
Vista wraps all programs in the new borders, including legacy software. But some parts of the OS behave like legacy as well. Take this dialog to set a network card's properties.
It does have the new borders. But the long list of properties will (still) only display four narrow lines. No sizing, a lot of wasted space. When you compare it to the richness of WPF sizing and sliding panels there is still work to do.
An UI covers more than just the visual part. One of my favorites is the volume control. You can set (and mute) individual sound sources. So when you're listening to some nice music you not disturbed by loud announcements of new mail.
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