“My mail doesn’t work”. That’s what a colleague running Windows 8 said to me the day after he installed Windows 8 on his work laptop. “When I click my email, nothing comes up.” I took a look and realized what was going on – he was clicking the Windows 8 UI Mail app and assumed that this was somehow connected to his Outlook which was installed as a desktop app.

And so highlights a major educational challenge that Windows 8 will encounter – millions of users used to one style of interface now being introduced to a new one that runs side-by-side with their desktop. At work we had an internal tech user group meeting, and we were showing new features of VS.NET 2012 and Windows 8. When we started talking about the difference between Windows 8 UI Apps (AKA Windows Store Apps), people started asking some good questions:

- Can we share a codebase between desktop and Windows Store Apps?
- What’s the difference between WinRT and .NET?
- Why would we create a Windows Store App and not just a Desktop app?

Of course, people are looking at this from a traditional desktop point of view and not a tablet platform, which is really the market that Windows Store Apps will shine on. Still, for developers who not only need to educate themselves but also educate their clients, we’re going to need a better understanding of Windows 8 to see it get real traction within the business/enterprise market.

D