I posted this to the Windows Feedback tool, but I felt like it would be a good project for the Microsoft Garage. I stated so in my feedback submission, which I am pasting here verbatim.

Standalone App Launcher with Live Tiles. Great project for Microsoft Garage! A standalone launcher app that you can open and leave visible on your screen, in which you can pin Live Tiles of installed apps. Clicking the pinned app's live tile will launch the app. Example of usage: On a multiple-monitor system, I snap the Launcher App to the right side of my right-most monitor so I can see at any time the number of unread emails from Mail, the weather forecast and radar from Accuweather, my unread count from NextGen Reader, etc. But the Launcher App can be customized and should not have to mirror the start menu layout. Tile Layouts should have the ability to be saved and loaded, should auto-resize based on window size, not be constrained to a 4-column grid, and all layouts should sync with OneDrive to be recalled on other PCs. While the start menu is useful for this, it's not "always on." It's actually reminiscent of Vista's Sidebar, if you think about it, but it's using features already built into Windows 10 apps.

I have tried your Mimicker Alarm, and other projects as well. One thing I can notice about them is the lack of killer features. Those that dare to solve our everyday issues, especially those that we accept to live with, in an innovative way.

For example, my app, Step Out Alarm Clock, is so easily adopted because it doesn't need people to do silly things to wake up. After all, they have to get out of their beds and just bring the phone with them, the alarm with dismiss automatically

Furthermore, Self-Control To Focus, wants to help millions of people to overcome cyber addiction. Because everyone must use their passwords to log in, we encourage them to change to a H4rd2R3membeR one and then forget it. It temporarily blocks the users from that kind of service, from social networks, online games to even porn!

So, you guys need to spend more time on developing your ideas before getting your hands dirty, that's the most essential element of any killer product.

Thank you

Microsoft is trying and trying to improve their desktop environment. Luna, then Aero, then Metro. Of course, those are kind of different desktop environments, but essentially they are all the same. And most of the users are tired of that. Recently I switched to Linux (Ubuntu) because I was so sick of all the same style all the time. Well, the problem was that I am an 3D artist and because of that I am software dependent. To get programs working on Linux is a huge pain because Linux has poor support regarding all the most used programs. Even though I managed to install Maya on Ubuntu it was kind of pointless because there was no proper drivers for my graphics card for Ubuntu and card was not functioning as it should. I tried AMD website and downloaded drivers that actually made Ubuntu to crash. After I restarted computer the OS failed to boot. Well actually it booted normally, but the OS could not load because drivers screwed up everything. So I had to switch back to windows again and that is really sad. I love Linux so much, especially when I found out about Elementary OS Freya. It is just simply gorgeous. Actually Freya is Ubuntu 14.04 with custom Desktop Environment which is called Pantheon (Default Ubuntu Desktop Environment is Unity). So I thought that windows should have something like that also. I found a list of custom Desktop Environments for Windows and was really disappointed. All of them looked awful. There is KDE 5 Plasma desktop environment which looks good. But latest version for windows is KDE 4 Plasma which looks awful as well. Then I found LiteStep which looked bad, but then I found out that it has a lot of themes. And some of those themes are really impressive and takes huge control over the overall looks which is one step towards a right direction, but is still not enough.

So the way I see it. Windows is stable operating system with huge support of applications that many users need and is one of the main factors that makes people to use Windows. But a huge part of users would gladly switch to Linux if not the software they are tied to. So most of the users is using Windows because they have to, not because they really enjoying it. So why not making this experience a good experience for users. Of course, many could say that you can change the themes on Windows etc. but it is not the same and actually all the themes just looks awful and makes things even worse.

Microsoft Garage team have done some impressive projects proving that they can change people lives and make everything more fun. I remember when Tetra Lockscreen was released for Windows Phone. At first I thought that it was some kind of joke, because Windows Phone was no fun at all and the functionality that Tetra Lockscreen had sounded like Sci-Fi for Windows Phone. I was amazed by that work, so I started to look for developers of that lockscreen and it turned out that it was Microsoft Garage.

I believe, that Microsoft Garage could create an awesome custom Desktop Environment for Windows. Just look at the examples of Ubuntu 14.04 and Freya OS. Freya OS is actually Ubuntu 14.04, but it has different Desktop Environment, different file manager etc. Why can not Windows have something like that? The design of Pantheon (Freya OS DE) is really simple, minimalistic and gorgeous in that way. I would die to get that kind of desktop environment on Windows. And that is not just me. There is a lot of people that wants to have something different than all the same Windows DE. And that is one of the strong sides of Linux. Let say you have Ubuntu, you don't even have to reinstall your OS to get look of the Freya OS. You can just install Pantheon DE and there you go. All the different look.

You don't need to throw this idea away directly, just see what people think. Maybe creating a kickstarted project would be a great idea. Just make a concept of some nice DE for windows, that looks way different that Windows DE. Different style, different interaction, custom file explorer instead of Windows file explorer. Just something nice, clean and minimalistic and see what people thing. I am most certain that there would be a lot of people that could back this project up and it would be win win situation. Because you would get strong proof that people actually wants it and you would get money for this project. And looking at your previous projects this could be an easy task for you.

I hope you would at least consider this idea and I would love to see an custom DE for Windows from Microsoft Garage.