One of the best things virtually the Surface Pro three is its pen. Information technology's inverse the mode I take notes, brainstorm and review PDFs. As useful as the pen is, withal, I tin't help simply call back its implementation in Windows is a half-mensurate.

Currently, the pen's behavior is different depending on where you use information technology. In the operating system parts of Windows and in programs like Word, the pen is a mouse replacement. So in certain apps like OneNote, it acts like a pen that you can draw with. Yous can mark upwards on PDF files, but not with JPG or DOC files.

This specificity is fine for knowledgeable users, only for coincidental users it'southward confusing to remember what the pen can be used for or where. If there'south no clear sense how a tool will be used, chances are it won't be.

For the pen to ever have mainstream adoption, information technology should exist used consistently no matter where you lot are, like the mouse or keyboard. Ideally, you should be able to write, draw and marking-up with the pen everywhere. The pen doesn't ever need to be a mouse replacement.

It made sense in a pre-touch world, where the pen was needed to be a navigation device. If the pen couldn't be used to navigate, asking users to switch from pen to mouse and back again would have been an unbearable hassle. In that pre-bear upon world, a pen is more stylus than actual pen.

That'southward changed with Windows 8, especially on the Mod side, where using a pen to draw and then using a finger to navigate is non merely piece of cake, it'southward intuitive. The just unintuitive part is that the canvas is limited to certain places. There's a huge opportunity for Microsoft to fix this and make the pen great.

For example:

You're probably asking why this is necessary. Two reasons: 1) To demonstrate the pen can be used anywhere. 2) A quick way to take notes. In addition to the standard screen cap, these notes can too be saved, archived and searched, simply like if it was drawn on OneNote.

The notes shouldn't be stock-still to the screen but to the content displayed. For example, if I roll to the right, my scribbling should too scroll to the right.

Needless to say, the scribblings tin besides be deleted; with the button on N-Trig pens, and the "eraser" nub on Wacom pens.

I'd like to see something similar with Microsoft Office. I should be able to type with a keyboard and then reach up with a pen and mark up the certificate.

When I return to the document the next twenty-four hour period, my scribblings should be saved. I should exist able to search for them afterward too. Options to hide or print them all would be dandy.

How nigh a non-productivity related employ example -- beingness able to write or sketch on photos.

Calculation a handwritten note to a photo can add a personal touch that you might treasure as much as the photo itself. In the current implementation, I have to import the photo into a plan similar OneNote just to write on it. How peachy would it be if I can only marking up an epitome from anywhere?

These are simply three examples, but y'all become the idea. I should be able to use the pen everywhere, I should be able to relieve anything I write and have it all searchable subsequently. In short, the entire Windows environs should exist like one giant OneNote canvas.

I'm certain that the technical implementation won't be easy, and it'll probably have to be done in stages, but the end goal is worth it. Moreover, information technology's a unique competitive advantage that other platforms similar Bone X, iOS or Chromebooks cannot hands replicate.

Steve Jobs once famously said that if you need a stylus, you've failed. I completely agree. A stylus is half-pen, half-mouse, with a confused nature that simply the nigh committed volition understand.

But this isn't nigh a stylus, this is most making the pen great.