Microsoft's Mixed Motifs

Microsoft has a big user interface problem. There are simply too many mixed motifs and metaphors, which are inconsistent and confusing even among the same product families.

In his speech last week, Ballmer used term "user interface" 21 different times.

"The shorthand I like to use when we're talking about this evolution in computation and user interface model is software plus services," Ballmer said.

He's got to be freaking kidding. Software plus services is the revolutionary new user interface? Microsoft's existing UIs reveal why Ballmer's vision may be too ambitious.

Office 2007's revamped UI is a wellspring of controversy. Some people praise Microsoft for taking a truly innovative task-oriented approach, while others fault the company for offering no classic mode. The new UI is a one-way street.

Office 'Ribbon'

My problem with Office 2007's UI: Fluent is a good concept, but it doesn't mix well with other new Microsoft UI motif approaches. While Microsoft executives incessantly harp on the benefits of integration, they can't seem to deliver a consistent look and feel across so-called integrated products. If anything, the company's motif approaches are contradictory.

For starters, Microsoft only brings the new Office 2007 UI to four applications: Access, Excel, PowerPoint and Word. Outlook, perhaps the most used Office application, gets a modest makeover while InfoPath and OneNote pretty much stick to the old file menu approach.

Office 2007's Fluent does away with the old-style file menu structure, replacing it with task-based visual cues. For consistency's sake and for the benefit of user productivity, Microsoft should have brought the new motif to all Office products.

Moreover, Microsoft should have brought Outlook's search motif to other Office applications. The biggest improvement to Outlook's UI is a fast and accurate search.

Microsoft expects business workers to spend more time in SharePoint—perhaps as much time as they do in Outlook—but the software introduces yet another motif, albeit one that is file menu based.

Like Office 2007, Windows Vista does away with the traditional file menu structure for one that is more task-centric. The problem is that this approach is quite unlike Office 2007.

When Microsoft last simultaneously released Office and Windows, in 1995, they shared a fairly similar file menu motif. Simultaneous releases of Office 2007 and Windows Vista should have been Microsoft's opportunity to leverage one product off the other. But the basic look and feel of the individual products makes them seem more like estranged friends than like siblings.

Vista Folder Menu

Office Live, Popfly, Silverlight, Visual Studio, Windows Live and Windows Mobile are all examples of Microsoft products that use somewhat different (or even hugely different) UIs. The number of different Microsoft motifs has multiplied with the 2007 product release cycle.

From one perspective, mixed motifs are a way of life. The UI for a television differs from that of the front door or the alarm clock. However, UIs tend to be consistent and familiar across product categories. For example, there may be hundreds of calendars for sale at the local bookstore come the new year, but each one follows a basic monthly motif.

By taking a more task-oriented approach with some of its newer UIs, Microsoft is on the right track. A more common, pervasive, unifying approach is necessary, however, if businesses or consumers are going to "grok" the benefits of what Microsoft refers to as "better together." Office 2007 isn't that much better with Windows Vista. But it should be. The one barrier is the mixed motif approach.

Related Posts:

• Questioning Office 2007 Priorities, Microsoft Watch, July 17, 2007
• Tell Me about Dial Tone 2.0, Microsoft Watch, May 15, 2007
• Google and Long Tail Computing, Microsoft Watch, February 22, 2007
• How 'Fluent' Are You in Office 2007?, Microsoft Watch, January 23, 2007
• Users Praise, Raze Windows Vista, Microsoft Watch, December 21, 2006
• How Microsoft Wrapped the 'Ribbon' in a Bow, Microsoft Watch, December 3, 2006
• Microsoft Cuts the Ribbon on Office 2007 UI Licensing, Microsoft Watch, November 21, 2006