Activity Centers

Activity Centers was a Microsoft Windows feature originally intended for Windows ME, then Windows Neptune, then Windows XP, before being scrapped early on in XP's development.

Activity Centers would have been single-window applications, written in a combination of HTML and the Win32 API, that facilitate easy ways to complete common tasks. By default, Activity Centers would have opened to a "home page", which would contain links to the top priority tasks exposed by the application. Secondary Task pages would have provided the user with obvious ways to complete single tasks.

The user interface would have been divided horizontally into a "navbar" and a larger content area. The navbar would have provided a simplified navigational scheme similar to that in a Web browser, so that "back" and "forward" buttons are provided along with other common buttons.

Windows ME was originally envisioned to include several Activity Centers. The Start page, Photo Center, Music Center, Help Center, and System Restore are available but hidden by default in Windows ME build 2358 However, according to Paul Thurrott, by the release of Beta 1 in the fall of 1999, it was clear that the underlying Activity Center technology was not going to be far enough along to provide the needed HTML hooks into the more traditional Win32 interface. Therefore, only the Help Center (renamed Help and Support Center) and System Restore shipped in Windows ME RTM. AutoUpdate, intended to be an Activity Center, became a traditional application. Windows Media Player was expanded and redesigned to perform the features intended for the Music Center.

Gallery

Windows ME

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  Help Center and System Properties in build 2358 (Source: Overdoze)

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  Start page, with links to the Music and Photo Center, in build 2358 (Source: Lukas Marsik)

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  Customize Start page in build 2358 (Source: Lukas Marsik)

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  Music Center in build 2358 (Source: Lukas Marsik)

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  Photo Center in build 2358 (Source: Lukas Marsik)

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  Help and Support in Beta 1 build 2380.2

Windows Neptune

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  Build 5111 Start page, with links to the Music, Photo, Games, and Help and Support Centers

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  Build 5111 AutoUpdate

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  Build 5111 Help and Support Center - "Report a bug to the Windows Neptune Beta team."

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  Build 5111 Help and Support Center - "Section III: System Information"

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  Build 5111 Help and Support Center - "Submitting Bug Report"

Concept images shared by Paul Thurrott

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  "Microsoft conceptual design for an Activity Center "home page."" (Source: Paul Thurrott)

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  "Microsoft conceptual design for an Activity Center secondary task page." (Source: Paul Thurrott)

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  "Microsoft conceptual design for an Activity Center secondary task page." (Source: Paul Thurrott)

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  "Neptune concept shot that features several proposed Activity Centers. Image courtesy of ActiveWin." (Source: Paul Thurrott)

Thurrott credits John C. Dvorak for the images below. According to Microsoft, these images were not intended to be the final UI, but only a study to see what a task-based Windows interface might look like.

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  "Microsoft conceptual design for an "Entertainment Center", which was never part of the original Millennium spec." (Source: Paul Thurrott)

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  "Microsoft conceptual design for "Photo Center"." (Source: Paul Thurrott)

Windows XP source code

BetaArchive user TinaMeineKatze pointed out that what look like Activity Centers concept art screenshots are available in the Windows XP source code that leaked in 2020.

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  "./NT/windows/advcore/duser/resources/monthlyview.bmp" (Source: TinaMeineKatze)

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  "./NT/windows/advcore/duser/resources/dailyview.bmp" (Source: TinaMeineKatze)

See also

BetaArchive forum

• [RELEAK] Windows Me build 2358