Microsoft to announce more details of Windows 10

MICROSOFT is set to announce more details of Windows 10 at a ‘consumer experience’ event.

MICROSOFT is set to announce more details of Windows 10 at a “consumer experience” event at its Redmond, Washington, headquarters on Thursday.

Windows 10 is set to unify rather than merge the two parallel universes of the desktop and the modern interface — previously named metro interface — that drew confusion with Windows 8, especially on desktops.

Forrester analyst Frank Gillett said that in the enterprise space Windows 8 drove less than 10 per cent of devices. One factor was the stark difference of Windows 8 from Windows 7, which greatly increased time needed for staff training.

Windows 10 attempts to unify the Windows experience in several ways. The resurrected Start button not only returns functionality similar to Windows 7, it offers access both to traditional programs and store apps — from one screen.

Store apps run in the same desktop environment as do traditional apps, and app windows can be resized as you would a traditional window. You can search from Start as you would in Windows 7, rather than relying on accessing Search through the Charms. Four rather than two apps can be snapped together on a single screen.

The Task View button offers an overview of what’s running, similar to that in Apple’s OS X, and you can create multiple desktops for different work environments as you can in Linux. Windows 10 also promises to react more intuitively to whether it is running on a touch or non-touch device.

But it’s Windows 10s greatly enhanced data security, authentication and encryption that may endear it to enterprise.

The event is expected also to showcase new features of Windows on smartphones, more Xbox gaming and there’s rumours Microsoft will reveal a second, lightweight browser.

Mr Gillett said Microsoft needed to persuade companies that Windows 10 was an attractive enough option.