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Hi everyone,
I'd like to have my apps as tiles within a full-screen view (ideally called via pressing the Windows button on the keyboard) in Linux, pretty much the Windows Metro look as seen above. I have all the icon files and just need to link them to the apps themselves. Might you know of a way to do that?
Thanks for your help! Temperche
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The move makes some sense in context. Computer sales were declining and it was looking (if you're Cueball) as if the traditional desktop/laptop computer was about to die out. The Surface was being developed, tablets were all the rage, PC gaming wasn't that big yet, and so Microsoft thought "alright, K/B+mouse is out, touchscreens are in, we need to update our interface to cater for this new demographic, but we'll still allow people to use a keyboard and mouse if they really want to I guess". That's when they went all in with Windows-On-ARM (remember Windows RT?) as well.
Obviously a completely missed shot in retrospect. What Microsoft miserably failed to understand is that smartphones were in, but touch screen interfaces are absolutely awful for power users. Ya can't really use Excel or write a book on a touchscreen. And ya don't need to pay for a Windows license to browse Facebook, Twitter, and passively consume some news and video. So the "middle segment" of tablets never really had broad appeal in general, and Surface tablets especially were the middle segment of a middle segment (with android/chromebooks on one side and the iPad on the other) so the Metro UI never had a chance to make sense for more than a handful of very lonely Surface users. No wonder they scrapped it a few years later when sales of touchscreen windows devices failed to materialize.
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Art is a valid use-case for tablets, and actually the best one. For almost all of corporate office jobs however, tablets are a worse proposition than a regular workstation. Most people type more than they draw.
It's fine, but that means that Windows 10's "UI optimized for KB/Mouse with accessibility features for touch screens" was, in retrospect, the better choice all along. Windows 8 did the opposite and made the experience worse for everyone under the completely incorrect assumption that we were ALL going into a touchscreen-first world.
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Having a dedicated touchscreen shell is something that I believe GNOME and KDE are trying to achieve, but I don't know whether they succeeded UX-wise as I've never used them.
It's unfortunate that Windows 10 was a regression for touchscreens, but if MS did not have the resources/willingness to support both well, then focusing on KB+M was the right call IMO. When building Windows 8 they simply miscalculated how relevant touchscreens would/could become for Windows in the 2010s.
If you want privacy, Linux is definitely the only choice anymore. If you want privacy and a good UI, Linux may be a good choice depending on your tastes in UI. I think KDE does UI/UX right for your average power user while retaining most of Windows' UI paradigms (which is why SteamOS uses it for its desktop mode). Ironically Microsoft has actually been stealing a lot of design cues from KDE, especially with Windows 11. The lock screen of Windows 11 in particular is a straight ripoff of KDE Plasma, every time I walk in front of a locked Windows computer I have to do a double take. The rounded corners, slight Gaussian blur, cute-yet-serious font, it's all there.