Skype receives much-needed facelift in newest version

While it’s still in beta for Windows systems, the newest version of Skype has just been rolled out for Mac clients – and developer Microsoft has given the voice chat application a major facelift.

Skype 7 – as it’s being called – follows in the long-standing tradition that Microsoft has cemented in bringing big changes to the software platform. The user interface has received a complete reworking, and hopes are high that this will deliver a better overall experience for the millions who make use of the application for both business and pleasure.

One such improvement is how sending a photo in chat will generate a thumbnail of the image automatically, dramatically improving the readability of the chat and making it easier to understand when the images were sent while in the middle of a conversation. Additional improvements include shared PDF documents and Microsoft Office files will have their document icons displayed prominently.

However, the most groundbreaking design feature for the newest iteration of Skype is a split dual pane that will enable users to have a video chat pane directly alongside a chat box, no longer requiring users to switch from one to the other in the middle of a video chat as is standard operating feature in Skype 6; it’s likely that this inability to multitask is Skype 6’s most reviled feature among its wide user base.

The core design philosophy behind Microsoft’s overhaul of Skype’s desktop version is understood to provide users that are primarily familiar with the company’s mobile app with a more familiar experience. This seems to run at cross-purposes with Microsoft’s design of its next Windows version, which has sought to minimize the Metro aesthetic that so famously flopped in Windows 8, which seemed more geared towards mobile computing instead of desktop productivity. However, with Microsoft’s new “mobile first” focus this revamp of Skype’s user interface to be more reminiscent of the Skype mobile app isn’t nearly as out in left field as it appears to be.

Whatever the impetus behind the new software revision, users are unlikely to find much to fault Microsoft on when it comes to Skype 7 – except perhaps that it took so long to update the program in the first place.

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