Manufacturing Intelligence

Mobile User Interface on the Plant Floor, Part 2

By: Jim Flagg

Jan 25, 2012 | 12:44 pm

Welcome to the last part of the Mobile User Interface series! Capacitive touch has changed the way we interact with technology, but what has happened since then? Who are the major industry players now? Find out today!

Part 2:

This revolutionized the smart phone industry and Microsoft called a seven hour meeting of their top Windows Phone personnel to decide what to do about it. They decided they would have to completely rewrite their mobile operating system but this would take time.  In the meantime, Google came out with their Android operating system that started slowly but is now on more smart phones than even Apple’s iOS.  Apple also introduced their iPad with a similar user interface to the iPhone.  Microsoft had tried to nurture a tablet form factor for the Windows OS but was never successful.  With Apple’s success with the iPad, Google and Microsoft are trying to catch up. To compete with iOS, Microsoft first came out with the Windows 7 Phone with their Metro User Interface.  Although it received good reviews from the press, Microsoft’s mobile OS market share has continued to fall.  Now Microsoft is readying their Windows 8 desktop and tablet OS that will use the same Metro UI as Windows Phone 7.  But Microsoft has a long way to catch up in the mobile OS space.  Most people know at least one person with an iOS or Android OS device they can use to tryout the user interface.  It can be difficult to find someone with a Windows 7 Phone, so Microsoft has created a web site that allows you to try out the Metro UI on your iOS or Android Phone. It will be interesting to see if Microsoft’s strategy of using the same Metro UI across desktop, tablet and phone, along with their dominant position in the HMI, market can push their mobile OS onto the plant floor.  And we will be watching to see if HMI software vendors will help iOS, Android or Windows 8/Windows Phone 7 by officially supporting their software on one or more of these mobile OS.  

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