OT: But will Longhorn be able to do this?

  • Thread starter Thread starter William Stacey
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William Stacey

What I really long for is something like the interface in "Minority
Report" where you can move the elements around, throw them around, resize,
etc, etc.
Click to expand...

I was thinking the same thing :-) Even then, he mostly interacted with 2D
menus at any one time. 3D sounds cool, but I have enough trouble managing
multiple 2D windows. Talk about desktop overload with multiple transparent
windows behind windows - this can only go so far to be usable I would think.
Currently, I would love a pair of glasses that shows a sizable virtual
screen and some gloves to interact with it - even 2D. Plastic sheet screens
would be cool too, like in Red Planet.
 
Jeremy,

This is actually pretty cool looking, like Aqua (OS X) on steroids. I'm
curious to see how this will be implemented.

What I really long for is something like the interface in "Minority
Report" where you can move the elements around, throw them around, resize,
etc, etc.
 
::snickers::

I wonder how long it took the java vm to render all that... 10 minutes? ;-)
 
To answer your subject question, as best as possible at this time anyway,
Longhorn has some sort of 3d UI features that have not been disclosed. The
current longhorn SDK doesn't provide any interfaces, etc. One way or the
other, I doubt MS is going to let Sun overtake it totally. If they consider
this project as a real threat they will compete, and considering the
apparent quiet nature of Longhorn 3d support, they may have something up
their sleeve that they don't want copied, we will have to wait for betas to
start rolling out to find out.

In reality however, the question of is "is it usable?". It looks nice, but
looking nice and working nice are very different things. This isn't the
first project I've seen like this(although it is the first by a major
company) and none have been really all that great usability wise.Immediate
problems I see...who really looks at apps that way? When I'm working on
something I'm working on it, not a half dozen other things in the back
ground. Also the window icons sitting in the shelf at the bottom...the
height, if not collapsable, would be a detriment to working area and what
you can actually see. I'd hate to be tryign to read something and have those
sticking up infront of it. So I wonder how it actually works vs. how it
looks, this picure just doesn't show enough to begin to judge(and since the
demo is in real format, I won't be watching that anytime soon).

Another thing I wonder about is if this desktop will start to provide Java
lockin. I doubt any of the OSS\Sun folks will mention it, but if the UI is
designed with java, how will you access it otherwise, CORBA(not windows
friendly), COM(not unix friendly), Webservices(that'd be funny...UI running
off webservices)? I have no interest in a desktop environment that forces me
to use java and only java(or even java and C++). Even with the "existing 2d
application support", will advanced features be available outside of java?
There are similar questions about Avalon. If it is only accessible from
..NET, is it right? I just don't know, I like .NET and it provides a small
number of features that makes things more open ended than java does(AFAIK
anyway...can you export C functions from a java lib?), but not many. And
that still isn't an excuse, its only somewhat more bearable.

Ah well, just some thoughts. You may want to ask in the avalon[1] group and
not here, there is a better chance you will get a clean answer, although I
wouldn't expect much from MS directly.


1. microsoft.public.windows.developer.winfx.avalon
 
Daniel,

Thanks for you comments, I've been following Longhorn closely and I have
to admit my subject line was at least in part an attempt to provoke a
response :). Just as you I suspect Microsoft has "something up their
sleeve", but as you point out we'll have to wait and see. From XAML
demos I've seen I believe this new technology has all the building
blocks for what we're seeing in this demo. That is you can rotate forms,
scale them, ect... I don't know what the 3D capabilities of XAML are
(can anyone comment?), if you can rotate forms on their Z-Axis then I
think that answer gets us closer to an answer of the big question, and
that is very close to a "yes... Longhorn will be able to do that".

I have put a lot of thought into how best the 3D capabilities of todays
graphic cards could be leveraged for everday apps and Suns design is
very close to what I had envisioned with the windows that can be rotated
and shelfed like books. You ask "is it useable" and that same question
was ask of Windows, which as you may remember wasn't all that useable at
first due to lack of processing power. I think we may see a similar
trend, but I think the ability to push windows back on the z-axis and
rotate them and such, to be able to add depth to the user environment is
a huge advantage that we can leverage. I imagine some sort of new user
interface device will be justified (3D mouse).
 
Jeremy Deats said:
Daniel,

Thanks for you comments, I've been following Longhorn closely and I have
to admit my subject line was at least in part an attempt to provoke a
response :). Just as you I suspect Microsoft has "something up their
sleeve", but as you point out we'll have to wait and see. From XAML
demos I've seen I believe this new technology has all the building
blocks for what we're seeing in this demo. That is you can rotate forms,
scale them, ect... I don't know what the 3D capabilities of XAML are
(can anyone comment?), if you can rotate forms on their Z-Axis then I
think that answer gets us closer to an answer of the big question, and
that is very close to a "yes... Longhorn will be able to do that".
Click to expand...
I've heard something about being able to rotate on the Z-Axis long ago, but
it may have been speculation, I don't recall. As for any comments that you
can get...everything I've seen on Avalon and 3d API's has been answered
basically as "Yes, there will be 3d support" and virtually nothing else,
whatever MS has in the works it isn't being completely open about it. Which
isn't a surprise considering everyone seems to want another windows 95
revolution to come out of Longhorn.
I have put a lot of thought into how best the 3D capabilities of todays
graphic cards could be leveraged for everday apps and Suns design is
very close to what I had envisioned with the windows that can be rotated
and shelfed like books. You ask "is it useable" and that same question
was ask of Windows, which as you may remember wasn't all that useable at
first due to lack of processing power. I think we may see a similar
trend, but I think the ability to push windows back on the z-axis and
rotate them and such, to be able to add depth to the user environment is
a huge advantage that we can leverage. I imagine some sort of new user
interface device will be justified (3D mouse).
Click to expand...

A change in interface devices is a very bad thing, mice are complex enough
for most people(ever try to teach an adult computer education course?) New
UI prompts, etc would probably be better, or perhaps an extension of the 4
way scroll wheel mice. Ideally for turning on the z-axis I'd rather have a
button that is easy to hit instead of a new mouse. When it comes down to it,
flashy graphics and neat 3d metaphors are fine, but my PC isn't a game and I
don't want to have to ever really explore for anything. Overcomplexity is
still a very real thing, and with 3D the potential for blowing over teh
complexity limit is higher than it was in the 2d realm...We must rely on
developers to be responsible with the technology.

Anyway, I was coming back with a bit more information that I ran across.

From Paul Thurotts Internet Nexus (www.internet-nexus.com) in regard to
Project Looking Glass:
"...Looks like someone didn't make it to this year's PDC: Nothing in this
demo is "better" that what we've seen of Longhorn, and much of it looks
suspiciously similar to Longhorn, as I noted."

I didn't make the pdc, so I'm curious what was seen there. But Thurrotts
comments suggest that to an attendee this wasn't as big of a surprise as it
was to those of us who didn't make it. Again, you may want to ask this in
the avalon or areo groups where more people that are dedicated to and
familiar with those technologies will be.

Btw, I'm not so concerned with processing power. I firmly believe that
modern systems have the processing power to do better than XP or MacOS X, I
am more concerned with the designs and how it all works. Windows wouldn't be
pleasent (although I know some argue that it isn't as is) if the design
wasn't well thought out, no matter what the horsepower of the machine. Even
consoles that are badly designed(weird commands, strange dir seperators,
etc) are not nice to work with, even though they don't use a whole lot of
power to run. Like I mentioned, I worry about fluff in the UI getting in the
way of functionality, like those tiles on the shelf there...they take up a
good inch of the screen and I know its just going to make me mad when
something gets caught behind them. Lining up windows like books may be
useful, I just worry I won't be able to find anything(I often have 30-40
windows open at a given time), so I wonder how well it'll scale to that
level. Will it be as easy to navigate as XP's grouped taskbar? We'll have to
wait and see on that as well, ;). I am confident that MS atleast won't
release a product that is harder to use than XP, I can't say I have
confidence in Sun about much these days, maybe this will be the product that
makes me want to believe them again?

Anyway, I finally broke down and installed that accursed realplayer
software, so I'm going to watch this demo.
 
Just watched the video and I am beginning to think Sun is turning into
Apple: when real innovation stops, just start claiming innovation.

While impressive to an extent, this is far from new, IMHO. Many people have
discussed it over the years, I'm pretty sure I've even seen a few examples
of it(MS Researches Gallery springs to mind, not quite the same but still),
as well as a few third party windows shells and Longhorn to boot.
Interesting, not overly amazing, but interesting.

It also feels like another shot in the Sun\Microsoft war. In which case, it
raises the question of does it matter or not.
I also wonder how exactly the community fits in. There is a considerable
community around .NET, but thats rarely touted as a reason MS can do
anything.

ah well...
 
It certainly looks good. But I don't like how Sun is implying that
Microsoft is somehow "holding us back" in interface innovation. The fact
that they're going to basically depricate the Win32 API for GUI in favor of
Avalon shows that they're working on moving forward.

And I saw pictures of a 3d GUI environment written by Microsoft Research
years ago (wish I had a link....I'm having trouble finding it now). This
certainly is no new idea, and it's not Sun's idea either.

Some of the other things that they are pushing as innovative simply aren't.
Translucent windows? PUHLEASE! I have that now.

Also, I've never been a fan of the "feel" of any of Java's GUI libraries.
The look of some are decent, but the functionality is off. Windows, MacOSX,
KDE, etc. all function a certain way, and I can almost always instantly spot
a Java GUI app because of how it operates. You would think that with the
"open community of Java programmers" someone would have come up with
something better before now. Eye candy does not equal innovation....just
look at the Game industry for that. At least MacOSX's GUI enhancements
provide some substance.

Not that I'm against Sun implementing a 3D desktop. I hope it works, and it
certainly would be interesting to use. I just hope they do a LOT of
user-testing on it---years worth. Microsoft tweaked Chicago's (Win95's) UI
for a long time before settling on it, and they were happy to throw it out
the "window" on XP. It seems now that in Longhorn that look and feel of a
GUI app will be more abstracted. From what I have seen, Avalon allows
Microsoft to take GUI in several directions. I've already heard that there
will be motion-blurring window movement. If they can do that, then they
could certainly render a window on a box and rotate it. That's no big deal.
Render to a texture instead of the frame buffer, draw 12 triangles, and
you've got it.

Technically, I can buy a program to add 3D accelerated effects to Windows
NOW... I certainly can't rotate them in space, but I'm still undecided on
how useful that is. The only reason I don't use these 3-D effects is
because they're sitting on top of the OS and it's as slow as heck. I'm
hoping that Longhorn will fix that (and I have faith in Microsoft in this
case).

On a side note, I personally believe that flying cars haven't been
widespread because many people cannot navigate in three dimensions very well
(much less two, in some cases). Why would a user interface be any
different?

One useful thing to come out of this might be the ability to slightly adjust
the angle of view in order to see what is under a window. But I personally
don't need to be able to drag a Window on it's Z-Axis.

I'm still in the "Let's Wait and See" camp. Good for Java if it
works....but I will never buy into it if they are acting like Microsoft held
us back from having this today, and never plans on adding anything like it
to Windows.

Anyway, I DON'T need that right now!

Good topic for discussion, by the way.

--Matthew W. Jackson
 
Matthew,

You're right, Jonathan Schwartz takes many unwarented stabs at Microsoft
through out his presentation. In the big picture it's no secret that Sun
is hurting and that they desperately need to expand into new markets in
order to survive, obviously their is bitter blood with Microsoft because
Microsoft built C# and then provided innovations with ASP.NET, Visual
Studio.NET and the .NET CLR virtual machine.

The truth is Microsoft spends more on R&D than any other software
company on the planet, they have one of the largest R&D labs in the US.
They have learned to not just through something togeather and out there,
also Microsoft has hired a number of former Sun employees in the last
five years. It wouldn't be of huge surpise if I leanred this "new"
Looking Glass technology was stolen from Microsoft though inside spys.

I know any new UI has to go through a lot of testing, the working demo
Jonathan shown was an "early preview", I think it has to be molded into
a usable product through user feedback. I can look at it and imagine how
useful that type of environment could potentially be. I understanding
getting there takes time.

I don't understand people who are so opposed to change, I mean I was a
Windows hater for a long time, namely because it was slow, but also
because at that time I could do work faster at a command prompt, that's
what I was familure with I had built up batch files to help with task,
it was a comfort zone. Windows took a few iterations to become really
usable, but eventually it was and now it isn't practicle to not have
some form of graphical UI on the desktop. Same goes with the mouse, it's
a great design for 2D environments, but a new albeit similar device
could probably be designed that would greatly improve the usablity of a
3D environment.

I don't understand why so many .NET programmers are opposed to change.
Not everything has to be proven to an absolute postive in order to be
effective, with somethings you just have to have a vision of what it
will become and then take a risk by putting it out there and letting it
evolve (e.g. Microsoft Windows)
 
Good points, but I didn't say I was opposed to change. I just want to make
sure this is turely what we need before we drop the 2-D desktop. There are
things that would work better in 3-D, but there are many that would be
worse.

Then there are things nobody has thought about. Imagine thousands of popup
windows with annoying 3-D advertisements.

I do want change. I just said that the resistance to change in this case
ISN'T coming from Microsoft. We aren't being held back while Sun is trying
to push us forward. Microsoft has toyed with the idea of a 3-D GUI, but
that dosn't mean they believe the world is ready for such a thing.

However, they are setting up their core APIs, especially Avalon, where
adding such a feature would be very easy to do. If a 3-D GUI isn't in
Longhorn, it certainly could be added to Longhorn fairly easily. If it's
not in Windows 6.0, I expect it to be in Windows 6.1 or in Windows Longhorn
Plus!

But there are a few things that have to happen first: such as full hardware
acceleration for GDI+. I wonder how Sun is handling hardware acceleration.
Are they using some libarary on top of OpenGL?

Truth be known, I've been advocating a 3-D operating system for years. But
it shouldn't be done JUST so that everything can look nice and people can
OOOOH and AAAAH over it. There needs to be a compelling usability reason
for it.

And if I was resistant to change, I wouldn't be using C# and .NET in the
first place. I'd still be using a mixture of C++ and VB4. I honestly
jumped on the C# bandwagon during beta, and never looked back. I'll
probably be one of the first to buy a 3-D GUI, no matter what platform it is
on. It still doesn't mean that I want it right now.

--Matthew W. Jackson
 
I found this link and wanted to share it.

http://research.microsoft.com/adapt/TaskGallery/pages/technology.htm

Sometimes we answer our own questions. With this one, I think the
answer is two fold.

A. Microsoft developed a 3D GUI technology and made public their
research in September of 2002. Microsoft research report details the
most relivant features presented in Suns demo. In light of this, it's
a false claim to call Suns technology innovative, it is at best a
glorified demo of a Java user environment based on Microsofts
research. Yes, they have sunken that level of low unfortunately.

B. Through Microsoft's R&D its a safe bet that if Longhorn can't do
that its for good reason, otherwise it will do that and more (who
knows what remains unpublished).


Nicholas Paldino said:
Jeremy,

This is actually pretty cool looking, like Aqua (OS X) on steroids. I'm
curious to see how this will be implemented.

What I really long for is something like the interface in "Minority
Report" where you can move the elements around, throw them around, resize,
etc, etc.


--
- Nicholas Paldino [.NET/C# MVP]
- (e-mail address removed)

JDeats said:
Suns "Project Looking Glass":
http://wwws.sun.com/software/looking_glass/

A true 3D desktop just as I had envisioned. This is awesome and truely
the next level of user interface design. It's one of those few
inventions that you see and you think "I need that right now!".

-Jeremy
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
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