1. A computer-implemented method comprising: receiving, at a computing device, an identifier associated with a user; determining, based on the identifier, multiple applications associated with the user, the determining comprising: passing the identifier to a remote authenticator; receiving authentication of the user; passing the authentication to an entity that records application associations for users; and receiving an application association record for the user, the application association record for the user indicating the multiple applications; receiving metadata of an application of the multiple applications without executing the application, the metadata having an indicator; retrieving, based on the indicator and without executing the application, content associated with the application; presenting, on a display device of the computing device and based on the determined multiple applications, a live-tile user interface containing multiple live tiles, each of the multiple live tiles corresponding to applications of the determined multiple applications, each live tile within the live-tile user interface not occluding each other live tile within the live-tile user interface, the live-tile user interface capable of concurrently presenting content within multiple of the live tiles in the live-tile user interface; and presenting, on the display device of the computing device and without executing the application, within a live tile associated with the application, and within the live-tile user interface, the content within the live tile, the presenting enabling, through the live-tile user interface, interaction with the content presented in the live tile.