Ever since the release of Windows 8 and the Metro UI all those years back, Microsoft has been trying to modernize Windows as a development platform. With Project Reunion it might get that bit closer.
First announced at the BUILD 2020 developer conference, this could potentially be the best attempt from the Redmond based software giant to improve the native app experience on the Windows platform by bridging the gap between its two main app development platforms.
UWP and Win32.
Project Reunion is not a new app model, nor does it offer a different set of APIs for developers to use. Instead, it is supposed to improve the current development experience in a world where the company’s two main app development platforms are night and day.
The fact that both these platforms offer different tools means choosing one platform over the other is a decision that developer are stuck with, once they choose one.
When Win32 is working for a developer, there is very little incentive to move to UWP. And when a developer starts developing a UWP app and finds that it does not meet their needs, then they more or less have to abandon the application.
It is this very conundrum that Microsoft want to fix, close the divide between Win32 and UWP.
The software titan shed more light on this during Ignite 2021, explaining that Project Reunion is about bringing the two worlds together so that the divided does not exist.
Microsoft is decoupling Win32 and UWP APIs from Windows 10 and taking the APIs that shipped in UWP and making them available to Win32 in order to bridge the gap between the two platforms. It essentially enables UWP development features for Win32.
If the idea works, both platforms will have access to all features, meaning all supported versions of Windows will gain access to modern app features and touch UI.
Fingers crossed.
