Microsoft's Steven Sinofsky at his D9 speech showed the tablet-native interface of Windows 8 for the first time. Borrowing heavily from the tile-based interface of Windows Phone 7, it can show a user's apps as well as live widget-like tiles, contacts and other data. Everything is intended to be very easily readable and used entirely with finger touch and gestures.
Apps themselves have also changed, Microsoft said. While truly native apps will behave like they do on the desktop, Windows 8 will also have the option of webOS-like, full screen tablet apps based around a combination of HTML5 and Javascript. Internet Explorer 10 was already modified to run full-screen and had been matched by some early widget apps. Tablet-optimized apps have access to the Windows feature set and can run side-by-side with regular ones.