What is fluent design exactly?

[Chintan Gohel]

I watched the build 2017 video and saw the section on something called fluent design

i didn't get what the fuss was about nor what was really different. They had a short a video and that was it

I also read this article: Is Microsoft copying Google with its Fluent Design System? | Windows Central and it didn't make much sense either

I would have liked to see side by side comparisons of all the three systems - the current system that is used in windows 10, the soon to be fluent design and the material design which I've never seen

Any help in this?

 

[kaktus1389]

Fluent design is Project Neon (maybe you've heard of that). It's a design language that won't be limited to 2D only but will look and work better with holographic and will offer developers some more possibilities for creativity, like depth and new animations. The main changes made so far to the first party MS apps are translucent parts of apps, that can also be colored differently and have different textures, but a lot more is to come.
Microsoft officially unveils Project Neon, the 'Fluent Design System' for Windows 10 | Windows Central

 

[Drael646464]

Its basically the look of windows.

You can see here: Fluent Design System

They have some very short examples of what is all about. Basically its more animation to things, 3d parallax and depth, light as a highlight instead of just selection boxes and real life type materials like frosted glass. The last one, scale is probably the most hard to grasp. Essentially they want UI functions to cross from no visual, to 2d, up to 3d. A sort of blending. Probably the most ambitious element.

They have direct xamarin api calls for these functions, so these things will be easy for programmers to add to UWP apps. They demo'd using one of these calls to create a picture that "exploded" out, when you changed screen.

Material design is androids look they came out with a few years ago. The two are not really that similar at all. Material design focuses on drop shadows for example, whereas fluent design focuses on parallax and perspective. They both take inspiration from real life, and they are both supposed to make the OS look better, and be more engaging.