Windows 8 has been a commercial and critical flop. The improvements made in 8.1 brought it more in line with the expectations of long-time Windows users. Overall though, Microsoft did a poor job of transitioning its customers away from an interface that had gone unchanged for 17 years—and a terrible job communicating why they should want to. With the Windows 10 Technical Preview, it looks like Microsoft will be addressing those problems and bringing to the table new functionality that users will actually welcome.