There are large panels in a smooth-scrolling grid. The finger-friendliness is exemplified by the new start screen. No longer will phone users have to use small, fiddly, desktop-oriented scroll bars smooth finger scrolling with inertia is the order of the day. Touch is mandatory for all 7 Series devices, and the user interface reflects that it's touch-driven through and through. Most obviously, the user interface is new. Microsoft really has changed nearly everything. There have been rumours-especially of a Zune Phone-but nothing concrete. That this successor was intended to be the platform that got Redmond back in the game was equally well-known.

That Microsoft has been working on a successor to Windows Mobile 6, due for release some time this year, is no secret. Everything that we knew and loathed about Windows Mobile is gone. Today at Mobile World Congress, Microsoft showed off its new phone platform for the first time. Windows Mobile is slow, unstable, clunky, and fundamentally not designed for use with fingers. The recent 6.5 release has done little to redress the balance. Though a long-time player in the smartphone OS market, Windows Mobile is outclassed by its competition. The one company missing from that list is, of course, Microsoft.

Apple's iPhone OS, Google's Android, Palm's webOS, and Nokia's Maemo all offer rich, touch-driven platforms for a new generation of fast, Internet-capable, high-end telephonic pocket-sized computers.

The last three years has seen an explosion in new smartphone operating systems.

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