So, Office 2013 is a desktop application with a new look (which I personally happen to like, ridiculous ‘streaming’ installation notwithstanding). Then there’s OneNote MX – the first Metro Office application. It uses a rather interesting contextual radial menu to get things done – quite fascinating. It’s in the Windows Store starting now. I’ve been playing with it for a bit, and I must say, there’s a huge chance I’ll be writing my OSNews articles in OneNote MX from now on; the ability to have multiple different text areas and pictures like in a real-world note/clipbook is very, very useful. Nice that it syncs across devices, too. Be sure to take a look – this is an indication of a possible future Metro Office.
I’ve got to say, I have to admit the dial selector is pretty sweet. The eyecandy is impressive, the interface is neat, the functionality is interesting, and it seems reasonably practical and even a little fun.
Trouble is that I don’t need OneNote for anything. Why is the only Microsoft Produced Metro app that I’ve seen done really well an app I doubt I’ll ever use again.
Seriously, if IE 10 was half as slick and wasn’t so damn buggy I might actually take an interest.
Oh well. Pleasantly surprised by Office 2013, not exactly blown away, but I’ll use it over 2010, so a marginal victory there.
In the meantime OneNote did precisely one useful thing for me – introduce me to the Microsoft Store – where everything seems to be free for the moment.
Seriously Microsoft – you should have called it ‘App Center’ or ‘Metropolis’ or something.
Haha “Metropolis” +1
I’ve seen similar dial selectors a few times for use with tablets. I think Autodesk Sketchbook Pro: ( http://images.autodesk.com/adsk/images/sketchbook_pro_image_enhance… ) was the first time I came across it several years ago. There are probably earlier examples as well.
There are two or three different radial selectors in that app. See the bottom left of this screen: http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/limage?siteID=123112&imageID=1…
Edited 2012-07-18 13:35 UTC
Yeah, other apps have had radial menus.
In Microsoft’s Office Next blog today they post a link to a wikipedia article that lists some previous radial menu apps.
Office Next: Using the new Office with touch
http://blogs.office.com/b/office-next/archive/2012/07/18/using-the-…
The “Radial Menus” section of that article has a link to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radial_menu
which lists “Notable implementations” – apps that have implemented radial (or “pie”) menus.
I designed a similar functionaloty years ago, trying to create another ui for the AmigaOS. I should have a video somewhere…
Please post some more information about this. I remember some talk on Amiga forums (years ago) about radial menus, and I’ve always thought it was a good idea.
Isn’t this taken directly from their Courier tablet?
…and came out…as I went in. Uhmm, I mean, launched the store app, found onenote mx, installed, ran, and kept getting some error messages like (I’m trying to remember exactly) the body of the received message contained a fault. That came up a few times and then the whole app went away somewhere. Good app.
I have the current 2010 version installed. I’m utterly underwhelmed, but then I sold my self to evernote a long time ago. I use evernote for EVERYTHING!
I’m willing to be educated though, so I’ll check out this new version… when I have some kind of machine that will run it. (assuming as it’s Metro, it doesn’t run on Windows 7??)
…what kind of article is this? Not all of us are / have the desire to be running Windows 8 and can just test this out on a whim. If you like it so much, where are the screenshots illustrating exactly what it is you like so much? This might as well be a press release.
A video showing a demo of the app would be useful. I just looked on Youtube but couldn’t find any.
I hope this helps a bit: http://www.winsupersite.com/article/office-2013-beta2/office-2013-p…
Aren’t circular context menus heavily patent encumbered still.