Apple's Mac and Microsoft's Windows 8 are out in the real world.  And at this time more than ever, the two companies are taking the competition into two distinct directions. 

With the release of Windows 8, Microsoft has been far from subtle in its vision for the future of operating systems. Opting to radically change the default desktop to the same style as Windows, Microsoft have changed up some of the fundamental aspects of Windows, as well as adopting new features like an App Store. 

When Mac OS X first arrived on the scene in 2001, it was a huge change from Mac OS 9. The Dock, the various graphical changes, and window animations were a big shift from what Mac users knew; Windows 2000 stuck to a tried and true aesthetic and workflow that users understood. Contrast that with 2012, where Microsoft is blazing its own trail, fundamentally changing how people interact with a computer. 

The most notable change in Windows 8 is the most visual: the introduction of the UI formerly known as Metro, now dubbed Windows 8-style Modern UI. Replacing the old-style desktop and Start Menu as default, Windows 8 opts for a dashboard of tiles more skin to that of the Xbox 360 and miles away from both OS X and previous iterations of Windows. 

On the other hand, Mountain Lion continued the tradition of Apple not changing the fundamental setup of OS X. We, of course, still have our dock, our Applications Folder and the fairly new Launchpad, the full-screen, iOS-style home screen of apps on Macs. In fact, the basic idea of the Windows 8 Dashboard is very similar to Launchpad, but the latter is certainly more tucked away in OS X. 

Of course, soon after the announcement of OS X Lion, Apple launched the Mac App Store, its digital distribution platform for Mac apps. It's been significantly adopted in its near-to-two years of life and is already the most prolific storefront for OS X apps. 

In Windows 8, Microsoft brings their own native storefront for apps to the table. In a way that's very similar to the way iOS handles app downloads, users browse the Windows Store for software, buy and download it and then see it appear on their dashboard as a tile. The store is in its mere infancy at launch, with few apps available, however. This feels much more like buying apps on an iOS device than on a Mac, thanks to the full-screen-only view, and many of the apps feel much more like the lite mobile apps than the apps we're buying from the Mac App Store. 

Apple doesn't have to be scared of; it's Google who should be watching their backs on the tablet front. If anything, they should be proud of how their rivals are finally creating products and building ecosystems that start to match the quality and finesse that only Apple has possessed. Congratulations, Microsoft.