Best Wishes For Happy
New Year 2005
Wishing You
1 Year of Happiness
12 Months of Fun
52 Weeks of Gladness
365 Days of Success
8760 Hours of Good Health
and May You Enjoy
Every Second of it !
Sasidhar
Thursday, December 30, 2004
A NEW YEAR WISH
Best Wishes For Happy
New Year 2005
Wishing You
1 Year of Happiness
12 Months of Fun
52 Weeks of Gladness
365 Days of Success
8760 Hours of Good Health
and May You Enjoy
Every Second of it !
Sasidhar
Wednesday, December 29, 2004
Longhorn hinges on security
Previews of Microsoft’s forthcoming server-stack software reveal a company brooding over improving its security.
At the company’s Professional Developers Conference next week in Los Angeles, developers will get an in-depth technical review of the next iteration of Windows, Longhorn. Microsoft is expected to focus attention on Longhorn’s underlying graphics and Aero, the new user interface.
At the conference, Microsoft will also deliver early beta code of Yukon, its next-generation database; Whidbey, the upcoming version of Visual Studio; and a sneak peek at Indigo, a Web services development framework under construction.
Longhorn, in particular, appears to be very much a work in progress. Company officials earlier this month dropped hints that the upcoming OS -- at least the completed server version -- will not see the light of day until sometime in 2006.
But the lofty ambitions Microsoft has for its next-generation OS, database, and development tools hinge on its equally ambitious security initiative, which was outlined by a number of top company officials earlier this month.
The new security initiative, described by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer as one
of the top three or four “defining moments” in the company’s history, will weave “safety technologies” into the company’s core set of products and will simplify the company’s patching strategy, emphasizing collaboration with Windows application developers and business partners in an effort to deliver bulletproof solutions.
“Many of our customers view the security problems in Microsoft’s products as the single biggest stumbling block to adopting these technologies for their mission-critical applications. Unless these problems are solved, it will be very difficult for [Microsoft] to gain wide acceptance of their enterprise applications,” said Vijay Lal, director of product marketing at NetManage.
Many developers and corporate users agree. The severity of Windows’ security problems -- both current and future -- is enough to make them seriously contemplate other, more secure OSes.
“[Microsoft] appears pretty serious about curing the security ills they have, but I don’t know if I want to wait until we are well into 2004. We have been looking at some Linux-based things lately to see if they can give us what we need to run things more securely,” said Tom Gianetti, a systems analyst at a large financial services company in Boston.
Even as Microsoft redoubles its efforts to close Windows’ holes, just last week four new bugs were discovered in Windows Server 2003. The bugs are associated with buffer overflow, the chief technical means that hackers exploit to unlock doors to corporate networks.
Some analysts agree that the more time Microsoft takes in delivering ironclad solutions, the more incentive customers have to consider other OSes. But given the sheer mass of Microsoft’s installed base and its ongoing responsibility to deliver to this base dozens of competitive products, the company will always be constrained in its ability to build solutions quickly.
“Microsoft knows they have to fix this. To some extent they have created this issue for themselves through their own success and in the way in which they have managed their previous solutions. The only way out is to deliver on their promises,” said Chris LeTocq, an analyst at Guernsey Research.
LeTocq and other analysts have been encouraged by Microsoft’s urgency in addressing its security problems but have also expressed concern that fixing these problems will bring about others.
“To [Microsoft’s] credit, they have established this update process where they will get high-speed updates out to people who discover bugs, but it is a double-edged sword because you will get an update twice a week that you then have to implement and manage,” LeTocq said.
At the company’s partner conference in New Orleans earlier this month, Ballmer said one of the keys to making Microsoft’s security initiative successful will be working closely with its thousands of developers and partners to create seamless security solutions. Many developers are hopeful but have expressed healthy skepticism as to Microsoft’s following through with this suggestion of openness.
“Working with Microsoft collaboratively on development things, even as important as this, can be a double-edged sword. If they select you and your technology as strategically important, that’s always great news. But history suggests that what can also happen is they can buy you out or otherwise run you out of the business,” said an executive at a leading security software company who wished to remain anonymous.
But Microsoft appears eager to back up its promises. Last week, for instance, the company released its first monthly security update containing five vulnerabilities that were classified as “critical,” meaning they were “wormable.” Three of the flaws pertained to editions of Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003. The other two concerned only Widows 2000 and Exchange Server 5.5.
Going to a monthly delivery of patch releases is designed to help administrators better deal with an already heavy workload by introducing predictability into the process of fixing security holes.
Microsoft certainly has its obstacles to overcome along the road to rock-solid security. The company, in fact, has two really big problems, said Al Gillen, a system software analyst at IDC.
“First, users have this perception of Windows products and their level of security, and have given them low grades compared to other operating systems. Second, users do not have much confidence that Microsoft can get it right,” Gillen said.
At the company’s Professional Developers Conference next week in Los Angeles, developers will get an in-depth technical review of the next iteration of Windows, Longhorn. Microsoft is expected to focus attention on Longhorn’s underlying graphics and Aero, the new user interface.
At the conference, Microsoft will also deliver early beta code of Yukon, its next-generation database; Whidbey, the upcoming version of Visual Studio; and a sneak peek at Indigo, a Web services development framework under construction.
Longhorn, in particular, appears to be very much a work in progress. Company officials earlier this month dropped hints that the upcoming OS -- at least the completed server version -- will not see the light of day until sometime in 2006.
But the lofty ambitions Microsoft has for its next-generation OS, database, and development tools hinge on its equally ambitious security initiative, which was outlined by a number of top company officials earlier this month.
The new security initiative, described by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer as one
of the top three or four “defining moments” in the company’s history, will weave “safety technologies” into the company’s core set of products and will simplify the company’s patching strategy, emphasizing collaboration with Windows application developers and business partners in an effort to deliver bulletproof solutions.
“Many of our customers view the security problems in Microsoft’s products as the single biggest stumbling block to adopting these technologies for their mission-critical applications. Unless these problems are solved, it will be very difficult for [Microsoft] to gain wide acceptance of their enterprise applications,” said Vijay Lal, director of product marketing at NetManage.
Many developers and corporate users agree. The severity of Windows’ security problems -- both current and future -- is enough to make them seriously contemplate other, more secure OSes.
“[Microsoft] appears pretty serious about curing the security ills they have, but I don’t know if I want to wait until we are well into 2004. We have been looking at some Linux-based things lately to see if they can give us what we need to run things more securely,” said Tom Gianetti, a systems analyst at a large financial services company in Boston.
Even as Microsoft redoubles its efforts to close Windows’ holes, just last week four new bugs were discovered in Windows Server 2003. The bugs are associated with buffer overflow, the chief technical means that hackers exploit to unlock doors to corporate networks.
Some analysts agree that the more time Microsoft takes in delivering ironclad solutions, the more incentive customers have to consider other OSes. But given the sheer mass of Microsoft’s installed base and its ongoing responsibility to deliver to this base dozens of competitive products, the company will always be constrained in its ability to build solutions quickly.
“Microsoft knows they have to fix this. To some extent they have created this issue for themselves through their own success and in the way in which they have managed their previous solutions. The only way out is to deliver on their promises,” said Chris LeTocq, an analyst at Guernsey Research.
LeTocq and other analysts have been encouraged by Microsoft’s urgency in addressing its security problems but have also expressed concern that fixing these problems will bring about others.
“To [Microsoft’s] credit, they have established this update process where they will get high-speed updates out to people who discover bugs, but it is a double-edged sword because you will get an update twice a week that you then have to implement and manage,” LeTocq said.
At the company’s partner conference in New Orleans earlier this month, Ballmer said one of the keys to making Microsoft’s security initiative successful will be working closely with its thousands of developers and partners to create seamless security solutions. Many developers are hopeful but have expressed healthy skepticism as to Microsoft’s following through with this suggestion of openness.
“Working with Microsoft collaboratively on development things, even as important as this, can be a double-edged sword. If they select you and your technology as strategically important, that’s always great news. But history suggests that what can also happen is they can buy you out or otherwise run you out of the business,” said an executive at a leading security software company who wished to remain anonymous.
But Microsoft appears eager to back up its promises. Last week, for instance, the company released its first monthly security update containing five vulnerabilities that were classified as “critical,” meaning they were “wormable.” Three of the flaws pertained to editions of Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003. The other two concerned only Widows 2000 and Exchange Server 5.5.
Going to a monthly delivery of patch releases is designed to help administrators better deal with an already heavy workload by introducing predictability into the process of fixing security holes.
Microsoft certainly has its obstacles to overcome along the road to rock-solid security. The company, in fact, has two really big problems, said Al Gillen, a system software analyst at IDC.
“First, users have this perception of Windows products and their level of security, and have given them low grades compared to other operating systems. Second, users do not have much confidence that Microsoft can get it right,” Gillen said.
Microsoft readies Web services apps framework
Microsoft at its Professional Developers Conference 2003 event in Los Angeles in two weeks will shed light on "Indigo," which is the company's upcoming Web services applications framework. The company also will discuss the planned "Yukon" release of SQL Server and the upcoming "Whidbey" releases of ASP.Net and Visual Studio.
Indigo is described on the Microsoft PDC Web site as a programming model and framework for building connected applications and Web services. The technology is built on top of Microsoft's WS protocols, which are a suite of specifications that the company claims will power the next phase of the Internet.
Indigo is intended to enable developers to easily develop and deploy applications and services that work together and scale without limit, according to the site. A default security behavior also will be part of Indigo applications. Additionally, developers will be able to build next-generation Indigo Message Bus endpoints within ASP .Net applications.
The site said Indigo "brings together the best of .Net Remoting, MSMQ (Microsoft Message Queuing), ASMX, and .Net Enterprise Services to form a unified model and runtime for building connected applications on the Windows platform." Microsoft at the conference will present a road map for migrating existing applications to Indigo. A Microsoft representative would not comment on the planned release date for Indigo.
The "Whidbey" release of ASP .Net, which is Microsoft's Web development platform, enables developers to "dramatically reduce the number of lines of code needed to write real-world applications, provides much-improved administration and management support and dramatically improved performance," the site said.
A Personalization engine in the Whidbey version of ASP .Net enables storing of profile data about users. Also featured are Tracing, Troubleshooting, and Auditing APIs. The controls model has been unified so ASP .Net controls inherently support mobile devices without the need for separate mobile controls.
Whidbey also is the code name for the next versions of the Visual Studio developer tool and the .Net Framework development platform. Microsoft's Whidbey variants are due to ship in the second half of 2004.
The Whidbey version of Visual Studio features new deployment capabilities for offline application support. The release combines simplified Web data access, rich site layout features, dynamic Web projects, and additional features to enable rapid construction of dynamic Web applications. A new XML editor enables enhanced validation against XSD (XML Schemas language) and DTD(document type definitions) schema and XSLT (XSL Transformations) debugging.
The planned "Yukon" version of the SQL Server database features a Service Broker that incorporates asynchronous queuing and guaranteed messaging. Yukon also introduces native Web services support in the database. T-SQL, a query language in SQL Server, is updated in Yukon to incorporate ANSI SQL:99 functionality. Yukon also is targeted for release in late 2004.
Indigo is described on the Microsoft PDC Web site as a programming model and framework for building connected applications and Web services. The technology is built on top of Microsoft's WS protocols, which are a suite of specifications that the company claims will power the next phase of the Internet.
Indigo is intended to enable developers to easily develop and deploy applications and services that work together and scale without limit, according to the site. A default security behavior also will be part of Indigo applications. Additionally, developers will be able to build next-generation Indigo Message Bus endpoints within ASP .Net applications.
The site said Indigo "brings together the best of .Net Remoting, MSMQ (Microsoft Message Queuing), ASMX, and .Net Enterprise Services to form a unified model and runtime for building connected applications on the Windows platform." Microsoft at the conference will present a road map for migrating existing applications to Indigo. A Microsoft representative would not comment on the planned release date for Indigo.
The "Whidbey" release of ASP .Net, which is Microsoft's Web development platform, enables developers to "dramatically reduce the number of lines of code needed to write real-world applications, provides much-improved administration and management support and dramatically improved performance," the site said.
A Personalization engine in the Whidbey version of ASP .Net enables storing of profile data about users. Also featured are Tracing, Troubleshooting, and Auditing APIs. The controls model has been unified so ASP .Net controls inherently support mobile devices without the need for separate mobile controls.
Whidbey also is the code name for the next versions of the Visual Studio developer tool and the .Net Framework development platform. Microsoft's Whidbey variants are due to ship in the second half of 2004.
The Whidbey version of Visual Studio features new deployment capabilities for offline application support. The release combines simplified Web data access, rich site layout features, dynamic Web projects, and additional features to enable rapid construction of dynamic Web applications. A new XML editor enables enhanced validation against XSD (XML Schemas language) and DTD(document type definitions) schema and XSLT (XSL Transformations) debugging.
The planned "Yukon" version of the SQL Server database features a Service Broker that incorporates asynchronous queuing and guaranteed messaging. Yukon also introduces native Web services support in the database. T-SQL, a query language in SQL Server, is updated in Yukon to incorporate ANSI SQL:99 functionality. Yukon also is targeted for release in late 2004.
PDC sketches product road map
Microsoft will attempt to cultivate early developer mind share at its Professional Developers Conference this week by previewing its next-generation OS, development tools, database, and Web services framework.
The company will finally release early code of Longhorn, which will include an SDK (systems developer kit) that will allow developers to begin working with some of the OS's new features.
"Developers should be able to start working with the fundamental things that will be in Longhorn. I think they will like the breadth and depth of what they see. But if you were to pop this onto your home PC, you would not be super happy with the experience," said Adam Sohn, product manager of the platform strategy group at Microsoft.
Microsoft will also release early code of the next version of Visual Studio, code-named Whidbey. Although the code should offer a feel for the finished version, Sohn cautions that the development platform is still in its early days and still needs work before all the pieces are polished and put in place.
Another early version of a long-awaited program to be released is Yukon, the company's next-generation SQL Server database. Yukon will include a Services Broker that makes use of asynchronous queuing and reportedly has guaranteed messaging. The product also has built-in support for Web services.
Furthermore, Microsoft will show off Indigo, its forthcoming framework for building Web services and creating applications that can be connected inherently across environments. Company officials are expected to underscore their ongoing commitment to compatibility with existing applications and platforms relative to Indigo and will make it clear they intend to leave no existing investment behind.
"We see the value of getting folks onto the next wave, but we also know the platform rises and falls on the success of other developers. You can't leave people behind. You must have compatibility," Sohn said.
The company will finally release early code of Longhorn, which will include an SDK (systems developer kit) that will allow developers to begin working with some of the OS's new features.
"Developers should be able to start working with the fundamental things that will be in Longhorn. I think they will like the breadth and depth of what they see. But if you were to pop this onto your home PC, you would not be super happy with the experience," said Adam Sohn, product manager of the platform strategy group at Microsoft.
Microsoft will also release early code of the next version of Visual Studio, code-named Whidbey. Although the code should offer a feel for the finished version, Sohn cautions that the development platform is still in its early days and still needs work before all the pieces are polished and put in place.
Another early version of a long-awaited program to be released is Yukon, the company's next-generation SQL Server database. Yukon will include a Services Broker that makes use of asynchronous queuing and reportedly has guaranteed messaging. The product also has built-in support for Web services.
Furthermore, Microsoft will show off Indigo, its forthcoming framework for building Web services and creating applications that can be connected inherently across environments. Company officials are expected to underscore their ongoing commitment to compatibility with existing applications and platforms relative to Indigo and will make it clear they intend to leave no existing investment behind.
"We see the value of getting folks onto the next wave, but we also know the platform rises and falls on the success of other developers. You can't leave people behind. You must have compatibility," Sohn said.
Actional links Web services monitoring to Microsoft
Actional on Monday will announce bidirectional integration of its Looking Glass Web services monitoring system with the Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) systems management platform.
Through the arrangement, the Actional and Microsoft systems have access to information detected by the other product, according to Actional. The announcement is being made at Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles.
"Basically, MOM has access to all of the Web services relations that Looking Glass stores, and Looking Glass has access to all the systems and applications that MOM knows about," said Dan Foody, CTO at Actional. Looking Glass monitors SOAP messages, tracks service-level agreements, and applies policies.
"By sharing information, each operator can get their own unique viewpoint into the overall network," Foody said. With information such as overflow buffer data from MOM, corrective actions to reroute Web services can be taken in Looking Glass, he said.
"What we're doing is providing a federated management environment" through the integration, Foody said.
The peer-to-peer integration between the Actional and Microsoft platforms is beneficial, said analyst Jasmine Noel, principal at JNoel Associates.
"Most [products] will send up information to MOM, and that's it. What these guys do is if MOM sees a problem with an application or server, it sends information to Looking Glass," Noel said. "If Looking Glass sees that there is a service problem, it can send that information to MOM."
Launched in support of Microsoft's Dynamic Systems Initiative, Actional's integration software for MOM features three components: Actional Web Services Management Pack, to feed information into MOM; Looking Glass MOM Connector, to get data from MOM; and Actional Controls for Visual Studio .Net. The controls enable development of applications that understand the state of a network and can take actions based on the data.
The management pack and connector software ship later this year, while the controls are due in early-2004. The Actional-MOM capabilities are to be included as part of the core Looking Glass product. Looking Glass pricing starts at $100,000.
Actional declined to speculate on a recent suggestion by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer that Microsoft may be interested in acquiring a Web services management vendor.
Through the arrangement, the Actional and Microsoft systems have access to information detected by the other product, according to Actional. The announcement is being made at Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles.
"Basically, MOM has access to all of the Web services relations that Looking Glass stores, and Looking Glass has access to all the systems and applications that MOM knows about," said Dan Foody, CTO at Actional. Looking Glass monitors SOAP messages, tracks service-level agreements, and applies policies.
"By sharing information, each operator can get their own unique viewpoint into the overall network," Foody said. With information such as overflow buffer data from MOM, corrective actions to reroute Web services can be taken in Looking Glass, he said.
"What we're doing is providing a federated management environment" through the integration, Foody said.
The peer-to-peer integration between the Actional and Microsoft platforms is beneficial, said analyst Jasmine Noel, principal at JNoel Associates.
"Most [products] will send up information to MOM, and that's it. What these guys do is if MOM sees a problem with an application or server, it sends information to Looking Glass," Noel said. "If Looking Glass sees that there is a service problem, it can send that information to MOM."
Launched in support of Microsoft's Dynamic Systems Initiative, Actional's integration software for MOM features three components: Actional Web Services Management Pack, to feed information into MOM; Looking Glass MOM Connector, to get data from MOM; and Actional Controls for Visual Studio .Net. The controls enable development of applications that understand the state of a network and can take actions based on the data.
The management pack and connector software ship later this year, while the controls are due in early-2004. The Actional-MOM capabilities are to be included as part of the core Looking Glass product. Looking Glass pricing starts at $100,000.
Actional declined to speculate on a recent suggestion by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer that Microsoft may be interested in acquiring a Web services management vendor.
Web services, XML touted for Longhorn
LOS ANGELES -- Microsoft Senior Vice President Jim Allchin at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference here on Monday touted the upcoming Longhorn release of Windows for its XML, Web services, collaboration, and storage capabilities.
Allchin's keynote followed a Longhorn presentation by Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates, with Allchin's presentation interrupted several times for demonstrations of the technology. But developers, who are receiving early code from Longhorn at the conference, will have to wait a while for the finished Longhorn product. A first beta release is not planned until the second half of 2004, with general availability expected in 2006.
For Web services and collaboration, the Indigo technology in Longhorn enables access to multiple elements of the system, including security and trust. Peer-to-peer communications also is supported.
"What we're doing in Indigo is creating a business system you can access that does everything for you," Allchin said.
Indigo can send transacted messages reliably with security and interoperability, he said.
Indigo enables building of services and making of Web services calls, according to Microsoft officials.
"The bottom line is it simplifies the building of services in a fairly dramatic way," Allchin said.
"We have facilities for you to create services so you don't have to do much thinking," with services developed declaratively, said Allchin.
Applications can be run as a service, according to Allchin.
Synchronization also is provided in Indigo, as is collaboration, providing for unification of contact lists among systems such as real-time messaging and e-mail, he said.
"What we're trying to do in this space is create a single name space and environment for contacts" and presence, Allchin said.
Microsoft with the Avalon subsystem in Longhorn wants to unify the two worlds of development for Windows and Web applications, providing just one developer model. "What we're doing in Avalon is creating a unified persistence model for Windows applications, for Web applications, and for media-type presentations," said Allchin.
Avalon enables developers to exploit the graphics capabilities in Longhorn.
The XAML (XML Application Markup Language) functionality in Longhorn provides a markup language enabling development in a declarative programming fashion, according to Allchin. The declarative concept involves separating coding from content. "XAML allows collaboration between designers and developers," he said.
Also featured in Longhorn is "Superfetch."
"Superfetch is the idea that we can look at what's going on in a system and in a much smarter, semantic, heuristic way to determine what you're going to need in the future," Allchin said.
Secure communications are a highlight of Longhorn, said Allchin. "We will continue to ensure that those capabilities are built into the system so you as an application developer, you don't have to worry about whether your communication is secure," he said.
Also featured in Longhorn is Next Generation Secure Computing Base (NGSCB), formerly called Palladium, for secure booting in hardware and creation of shadowed memory.
"The idea is it's a curtained memory, so it would be very, very hard to penetrate that," Allchin said.
With storage, Longhorn's WinFS (Windows File System) enables extension of data to devices. "If you store your data in WinFS, you'll be able to move it around between the devices without having to do a significant amount of work," Allchin said.
Also planned by Microsoft are automated licensing services for developers. "We have continued to work on the technology. We will have a facility to enable you to license your product," Allchin said.
The Windows catalog facility also will be improved.
A developer navigation model planned for Longhorn, code-named "Aero," is intended to enrich the user experience, according to Microsoft. It will enable, for example, users to no longer have to deal with expired Web pages when going back and forth between Web pages, said Vic Gundhotra, general manager of platform evangelism at Microsoft.
Allchin's keynote followed a Longhorn presentation by Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates, with Allchin's presentation interrupted several times for demonstrations of the technology. But developers, who are receiving early code from Longhorn at the conference, will have to wait a while for the finished Longhorn product. A first beta release is not planned until the second half of 2004, with general availability expected in 2006.
For Web services and collaboration, the Indigo technology in Longhorn enables access to multiple elements of the system, including security and trust. Peer-to-peer communications also is supported.
"What we're doing in Indigo is creating a business system you can access that does everything for you," Allchin said.
Indigo can send transacted messages reliably with security and interoperability, he said.
Indigo enables building of services and making of Web services calls, according to Microsoft officials.
"The bottom line is it simplifies the building of services in a fairly dramatic way," Allchin said.
"We have facilities for you to create services so you don't have to do much thinking," with services developed declaratively, said Allchin.
Applications can be run as a service, according to Allchin.
Synchronization also is provided in Indigo, as is collaboration, providing for unification of contact lists among systems such as real-time messaging and e-mail, he said.
"What we're trying to do in this space is create a single name space and environment for contacts" and presence, Allchin said.
Microsoft with the Avalon subsystem in Longhorn wants to unify the two worlds of development for Windows and Web applications, providing just one developer model. "What we're doing in Avalon is creating a unified persistence model for Windows applications, for Web applications, and for media-type presentations," said Allchin.
Avalon enables developers to exploit the graphics capabilities in Longhorn.
The XAML (XML Application Markup Language) functionality in Longhorn provides a markup language enabling development in a declarative programming fashion, according to Allchin. The declarative concept involves separating coding from content. "XAML allows collaboration between designers and developers," he said.
Also featured in Longhorn is "Superfetch."
"Superfetch is the idea that we can look at what's going on in a system and in a much smarter, semantic, heuristic way to determine what you're going to need in the future," Allchin said.
Secure communications are a highlight of Longhorn, said Allchin. "We will continue to ensure that those capabilities are built into the system so you as an application developer, you don't have to worry about whether your communication is secure," he said.
Also featured in Longhorn is Next Generation Secure Computing Base (NGSCB), formerly called Palladium, for secure booting in hardware and creation of shadowed memory.
"The idea is it's a curtained memory, so it would be very, very hard to penetrate that," Allchin said.
With storage, Longhorn's WinFS (Windows File System) enables extension of data to devices. "If you store your data in WinFS, you'll be able to move it around between the devices without having to do a significant amount of work," Allchin said.
Also planned by Microsoft are automated licensing services for developers. "We have continued to work on the technology. We will have a facility to enable you to license your product," Allchin said.
The Windows catalog facility also will be improved.
A developer navigation model planned for Longhorn, code-named "Aero," is intended to enrich the user experience, according to Microsoft. It will enable, for example, users to no longer have to deal with expired Web pages when going back and forth between Web pages, said Vic Gundhotra, general manager of platform evangelism at Microsoft.
Longhorn details emerge
Details are emerging about Microsoft Corp.'s plans for Longhorn, its forthcoming Windows operating system upgrade.
A list of the key subsystems upon which Microsoft is said to be basing Longhorn has been posted on a Microsoft Longhorn forum. The list is based on a document – a 1,000 page "Book of Longhorn" - that is circulating internally at Microsoft.
According to the posting, the book is divided into the following seven sections:
Aero, the 3D-rendering user interface;
Avalon, the core set of application programming interfaces (APIs) for handling graphics and presentations;
Indigo, the next release of Microsoft's Web-services infrastructure that will underlie the OS; .NET Remoting + MSMQ + ASMX + .NET Enterprise Services (COM+);
WinFS, the Windows File System data-store that Longhorn will borrow from Microsoft's SQL Server "Yukon" database. It will be able to store XML and metadata in a single place;
Real-time communications and speech. The instant-messaging, P2P technology and the core speech API that will be built into the platform;
Trustworthy Computing and Security, which, in Longhorn's case, will consist largely of the Next-Generation Secure Computing Base, or "Palladium" code;
Fundamentals: Integrated workflow capabilities; rights management; perhaps even the good old .Net Framework.
The company is expected to reveal more about the OS upgrade during its Professional Developers Conference (PDC) taking place in Los Angeles from Oct. 26-30.
Aero interface details are unlikely to be previewed at the PDC event, but attendees will learn more about Avalon, the OS engine that underpins Longhorn's UI. Developers at the show will be told how to take advantage of Avalon in their applications.
The new OS is not expected to be released until 2005.
A list of the key subsystems upon which Microsoft is said to be basing Longhorn has been posted on a Microsoft Longhorn forum. The list is based on a document – a 1,000 page "Book of Longhorn" - that is circulating internally at Microsoft.
According to the posting, the book is divided into the following seven sections:
Aero, the 3D-rendering user interface;
Avalon, the core set of application programming interfaces (APIs) for handling graphics and presentations;
Indigo, the next release of Microsoft's Web-services infrastructure that will underlie the OS; .NET Remoting + MSMQ + ASMX + .NET Enterprise Services (COM+);
WinFS, the Windows File System data-store that Longhorn will borrow from Microsoft's SQL Server "Yukon" database. It will be able to store XML and metadata in a single place;
Real-time communications and speech. The instant-messaging, P2P technology and the core speech API that will be built into the platform;
Trustworthy Computing and Security, which, in Longhorn's case, will consist largely of the Next-Generation Secure Computing Base, or "Palladium" code;
Fundamentals: Integrated workflow capabilities; rights management; perhaps even the good old .Net Framework.
The company is expected to reveal more about the OS upgrade during its Professional Developers Conference (PDC) taking place in Los Angeles from Oct. 26-30.
Aero interface details are unlikely to be previewed at the PDC event, but attendees will learn more about Avalon, the OS engine that underpins Longhorn's UI. Developers at the show will be told how to take advantage of Avalon in their applications.
The new OS is not expected to be released until 2005.
Microsoft to lift lid on Longhorn OS
Microsoft Corp. will share more details on the next version of Windows, code-named Longhorn, at its Professional Developers Conference (PDC) next month. However, the company likely will keep the new user interface, dubbed Aero, under wraps.
Aero may make a cameo appearance in Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates' opening keynote, but is not finished yet and likely won't be included in the pre-beta release of Longhorn that will be handed out to PDC attendees, according to sources familiar with Microsoft's PDC plans. Also, Aero is not on the calendar of sessions at the show.
Perhaps more important to developers is that Microsoft will give PDC attendees the scoop on Avalon, the little talked about engine underlying the Longhorn user interface. Microsoft has described the technology as "a brand new client platform for building smart, connected, media rich applications in Longhorn." Developers at the show will be told how to take advantage of Avalon in their applications.
Thanks to Avalon, Longhorn will support new styles of user interfaces and user interface elements. Developers will be able to create Windows client applications that use the type of navigation features found on the Web to browse through information, according to the PDC session calendar.
Another key topic at PDC will be WinFS (Windows Future Storage), a service that sits on top of the existing Windows file system and is meant to make it simpler and more intuitive for users to find files on computers running Longhorn. WinFS uses technology from the "Yukon" release of Microsoft's SQL Server database, which is expected to ship late next year.
Microsoft's PDC documentation describes WinFS as an "entirely new user experience and model around the storage of user's data." For example, Outlook address book data today is restricted to that e-mail client. With WinFS, that data could be made available to all applications on a PC. However, applications will have to be rewritten to take advantage of such capabilities. Microsoft plans to release a slew of application upgrades at around the time Longhorn is released.
Joe Wilcox, a Washington, D.C.-based Jupiter Research senior analyst, sees WinFS as the PDC headliner because of the impact a new storage system is likely to have on developers and businesses.
"Microsoft at PDC needs to show some significant development progress on the new file system coming for Yukon and Longhorn. Developers and businesses will need some time to prepare new applications and possibly retrofit old ones to support the new file system," Wilcox said.
A lot of work remains to be done on WinFS. It works, and developers can start developing applications for it, but it is slow, fragile and many features are missing, a source familiar with the development said.
Microsoft is working hard to finish the PDC version of Longhorn. The goal is to meet "zero bug bounce," a stage where development catches up to testing and there are no active bugs, at least for the moment. The operating system will be "about half done" when the PDC rolls around, the source said. A Longhorn beta is planned for 2004.
Gates has said that Longhorn is "a big bet" for Microsoft and that this next major release of Windows is "a bit scary" because Microsoft is making some fundamental changes to its PC software. Several thousand developers at Microsoft are working on the product.
The PDC promises to offer a feast of code names. Besides Longhorn, Aero, Avalon and Yukon, other code-named products and technologies on the agenda are Indigo and Whidbey.
Indigo is Microsoft's new framework and programming model for building connected applications and Web services. Whidbey is the next version of Microsoft's developer tool Visual Studio .Net. These are what developers who work for large enterprises will be coming to PDC for, according to Chris Le Tocq, principal analyst at Guernsey Research, in Los Altos, California.
"They are looking for more advantages in Web services as opposed to changes in the client operating system," he said. In addition, these corporate software developers will be looking for timelines, Le Tocq said.
A buzz around the event is being built up by PDC attendees and Microsoft employees who discuss the event in their Web logs. Microsoft's secrecy around many of the PDC topics has helped build expectations for a show packed with new technology.
"Previews of Longhorn, Yukon version of SQL Server and the next Visual Studio .Net version make this an important developer conference for Microsoft. I expect the event to showcase tighter business strategy and technological integration between Microsoft developer tools and major, forthcoming products," Wilcox of Jupiter Research said.
PDC will also almost certainly reignite speculation about release dates of Microsoft's new products. For Longhorn specifically, sources say that Microsoft has set Aug. 15, 2005, as internal due date. However, last July Gates and Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Ballmer declined to comment on a release date.
PDC takes place in Los Angeles and runs from Oct. 26 through Oct. 30.
Aero may make a cameo appearance in Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates' opening keynote, but is not finished yet and likely won't be included in the pre-beta release of Longhorn that will be handed out to PDC attendees, according to sources familiar with Microsoft's PDC plans. Also, Aero is not on the calendar of sessions at the show.
Perhaps more important to developers is that Microsoft will give PDC attendees the scoop on Avalon, the little talked about engine underlying the Longhorn user interface. Microsoft has described the technology as "a brand new client platform for building smart, connected, media rich applications in Longhorn." Developers at the show will be told how to take advantage of Avalon in their applications.
Thanks to Avalon, Longhorn will support new styles of user interfaces and user interface elements. Developers will be able to create Windows client applications that use the type of navigation features found on the Web to browse through information, according to the PDC session calendar.
Another key topic at PDC will be WinFS (Windows Future Storage), a service that sits on top of the existing Windows file system and is meant to make it simpler and more intuitive for users to find files on computers running Longhorn. WinFS uses technology from the "Yukon" release of Microsoft's SQL Server database, which is expected to ship late next year.
Microsoft's PDC documentation describes WinFS as an "entirely new user experience and model around the storage of user's data." For example, Outlook address book data today is restricted to that e-mail client. With WinFS, that data could be made available to all applications on a PC. However, applications will have to be rewritten to take advantage of such capabilities. Microsoft plans to release a slew of application upgrades at around the time Longhorn is released.
Joe Wilcox, a Washington, D.C.-based Jupiter Research senior analyst, sees WinFS as the PDC headliner because of the impact a new storage system is likely to have on developers and businesses.
"Microsoft at PDC needs to show some significant development progress on the new file system coming for Yukon and Longhorn. Developers and businesses will need some time to prepare new applications and possibly retrofit old ones to support the new file system," Wilcox said.
A lot of work remains to be done on WinFS. It works, and developers can start developing applications for it, but it is slow, fragile and many features are missing, a source familiar with the development said.
Microsoft is working hard to finish the PDC version of Longhorn. The goal is to meet "zero bug bounce," a stage where development catches up to testing and there are no active bugs, at least for the moment. The operating system will be "about half done" when the PDC rolls around, the source said. A Longhorn beta is planned for 2004.
Gates has said that Longhorn is "a big bet" for Microsoft and that this next major release of Windows is "a bit scary" because Microsoft is making some fundamental changes to its PC software. Several thousand developers at Microsoft are working on the product.
The PDC promises to offer a feast of code names. Besides Longhorn, Aero, Avalon and Yukon, other code-named products and technologies on the agenda are Indigo and Whidbey.
Indigo is Microsoft's new framework and programming model for building connected applications and Web services. Whidbey is the next version of Microsoft's developer tool Visual Studio .Net. These are what developers who work for large enterprises will be coming to PDC for, according to Chris Le Tocq, principal analyst at Guernsey Research, in Los Altos, California.
"They are looking for more advantages in Web services as opposed to changes in the client operating system," he said. In addition, these corporate software developers will be looking for timelines, Le Tocq said.
A buzz around the event is being built up by PDC attendees and Microsoft employees who discuss the event in their Web logs. Microsoft's secrecy around many of the PDC topics has helped build expectations for a show packed with new technology.
"Previews of Longhorn, Yukon version of SQL Server and the next Visual Studio .Net version make this an important developer conference for Microsoft. I expect the event to showcase tighter business strategy and technological integration between Microsoft developer tools and major, forthcoming products," Wilcox of Jupiter Research said.
PDC will also almost certainly reignite speculation about release dates of Microsoft's new products. For Longhorn specifically, sources say that Microsoft has set Aug. 15, 2005, as internal due date. However, last July Gates and Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Ballmer declined to comment on a release date.
PDC takes place in Los Angeles and runs from Oct. 26 through Oct. 30.
It's all about Longhorn at Microsoft
Longhorn, the next major release of Windows, is "a bit scary," Microsoft Corp. Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates confided to financial analysts last week. Scary to computer users, that is, because Longhorn products will be very different from today's Microsoft software, he said. But it appears the software is also causing some shivers at Microsoft.
Microsoft last year said Longhorn would be just another Windows client. However, it is now clear that the software stable is breeding a whole herd of long-horned cattle with a dose of .Net Web services hormones. "Longhorn is the next generation, it's a big bet for us," Gates said at Microsoft's financial analyst meeting last week.
Microsoft executives, at the meeting with the financial community and in subsequent interviews at the company's Redmond, Washington, campus, were still guarded about the company's strategy, but gave a glimpse of its plans. Adoption of .Net and a drive to integration are feeding Longhorn.
The operating system will have a new file system and come out in client and server versions. Around the same time, Microsoft will release Longhorn versions of the Office System applications, Visual Studio developer tool and Microsoft Business Solutions products. Also, the results of the "Jupiter" project to unify BizTalk Server with two of Microsoft's other "E-Business Server" products, Commerce Server and Content Management Server, are set to be out at the same time.
"In the Longhorn case ... we're absolutely trying to think about not just the next generation of Windows, but the next generation of a whole series of products," Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer said at a presentation to analysts. "We believe in integrated innovation and we believe in the next generation of Windows."
Longhorn will have a "unified file system" called Windows File System, or WinFS, that will have "Web services as sort of a built-in piece," Gates said. The file system will be based on technology from the next version of Microsoft's SQL Server database, code-named Yukon, which is due out by the end of next year. WinFS as one of its advances is expected to let users view files indexed from various physical locations on a drive instead of displaying the contents of folders or directories.
Though a bit more open than before about its plan for a "big bang" release of new technology and multiple products with Longhorn, Microsoft has been mum when it comes to shipping dates. The company distanced itself from a commitment it made in May to deliver Longhorn in 2005. "We don't know the exact time frame of it. It's clearly many years of work that we're engaging in," Gates said about Longhorn last week.
With Windows XP out since October 2001, PC vendors are pushing for a quick release of Longhorn to drive sales. However, Windows Server users just got Windows Server 2003 in April and don't want another upgrade for at least three years. Microsoft is planning updates of Windows XP TabletPC Edition and Windows XP Media Center Edition to appease the PC vendors.
Longhorn appears to be a second attempt to get .Net off the ground after its initial grand launch three years ago. This time it may be for real, said Rob Helm, research director at Directions on Microsoft Inc., an independent research firm in Kirkland, Washington.
"Microsoft said .Net was a big bet, but .Net fizzled without wiping out the company. Longhorn is when .Net finally becomes a big bet," he said. "No machine on the desktop today comes with the .Net framework. That will change with Longhorn. Suddenly every machine that ships with Windows will have the .Net developer technology built in."
.Net is Microsoft's technology that uses standard technologies such as SOAP (simple object access protocol) and XML (Extensible Markup Language) to link applications over the Internet and create Web services.
Longhorn is just moving beyond the conception stage, the plans for its future are not set. The plans Microsoft laid out last week may well change again.
"With Longhorn, it seems to shift from one conference to the next," Helm said, referring to Microsoft's Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in May where the company set 2005 as the year for Longhorn and said there would not be a new file system.
Joe Wilcox, a Washington, D.C.-based Jupiter Research senior analyst, agreed that Microsoft's Longhorn plans are still in flux. "It is very clear still that there are a lot of question marks at Microsoft as to what is going to happen with Longhorn," he said.
Microsoft's Ballmer sees Longhorn as "big bang" release that will "rejuvenate the innovation cycle" at Microsoft and across the IT industry. The pressure is on for Microsoft's developers to deliver and the company does its best work when under pressure, according to Directions on Microsoft's Helm.
"Historically Microsoft has done best when it is on a massive campaign. Longhorn is the next big Windows campaign. I think it is scary, but also very motivating for the people working on it to know that the company is betting on them," he said.
Microsoft promises more details about the operating system release in October at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference to be held in Los Angeles. A preview of the software for developers will be handed out there and a beta of Longhorn is planned for next year.
Microsoft last year said Longhorn would be just another Windows client. However, it is now clear that the software stable is breeding a whole herd of long-horned cattle with a dose of .Net Web services hormones. "Longhorn is the next generation, it's a big bet for us," Gates said at Microsoft's financial analyst meeting last week.
Microsoft executives, at the meeting with the financial community and in subsequent interviews at the company's Redmond, Washington, campus, were still guarded about the company's strategy, but gave a glimpse of its plans. Adoption of .Net and a drive to integration are feeding Longhorn.
The operating system will have a new file system and come out in client and server versions. Around the same time, Microsoft will release Longhorn versions of the Office System applications, Visual Studio developer tool and Microsoft Business Solutions products. Also, the results of the "Jupiter" project to unify BizTalk Server with two of Microsoft's other "E-Business Server" products, Commerce Server and Content Management Server, are set to be out at the same time.
"In the Longhorn case ... we're absolutely trying to think about not just the next generation of Windows, but the next generation of a whole series of products," Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer said at a presentation to analysts. "We believe in integrated innovation and we believe in the next generation of Windows."
Longhorn will have a "unified file system" called Windows File System, or WinFS, that will have "Web services as sort of a built-in piece," Gates said. The file system will be based on technology from the next version of Microsoft's SQL Server database, code-named Yukon, which is due out by the end of next year. WinFS as one of its advances is expected to let users view files indexed from various physical locations on a drive instead of displaying the contents of folders or directories.
Though a bit more open than before about its plan for a "big bang" release of new technology and multiple products with Longhorn, Microsoft has been mum when it comes to shipping dates. The company distanced itself from a commitment it made in May to deliver Longhorn in 2005. "We don't know the exact time frame of it. It's clearly many years of work that we're engaging in," Gates said about Longhorn last week.
With Windows XP out since October 2001, PC vendors are pushing for a quick release of Longhorn to drive sales. However, Windows Server users just got Windows Server 2003 in April and don't want another upgrade for at least three years. Microsoft is planning updates of Windows XP TabletPC Edition and Windows XP Media Center Edition to appease the PC vendors.
Longhorn appears to be a second attempt to get .Net off the ground after its initial grand launch three years ago. This time it may be for real, said Rob Helm, research director at Directions on Microsoft Inc., an independent research firm in Kirkland, Washington.
"Microsoft said .Net was a big bet, but .Net fizzled without wiping out the company. Longhorn is when .Net finally becomes a big bet," he said. "No machine on the desktop today comes with the .Net framework. That will change with Longhorn. Suddenly every machine that ships with Windows will have the .Net developer technology built in."
.Net is Microsoft's technology that uses standard technologies such as SOAP (simple object access protocol) and XML (Extensible Markup Language) to link applications over the Internet and create Web services.
Longhorn is just moving beyond the conception stage, the plans for its future are not set. The plans Microsoft laid out last week may well change again.
"With Longhorn, it seems to shift from one conference to the next," Helm said, referring to Microsoft's Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in May where the company set 2005 as the year for Longhorn and said there would not be a new file system.
Joe Wilcox, a Washington, D.C.-based Jupiter Research senior analyst, agreed that Microsoft's Longhorn plans are still in flux. "It is very clear still that there are a lot of question marks at Microsoft as to what is going to happen with Longhorn," he said.
Microsoft's Ballmer sees Longhorn as "big bang" release that will "rejuvenate the innovation cycle" at Microsoft and across the IT industry. The pressure is on for Microsoft's developers to deliver and the company does its best work when under pressure, according to Directions on Microsoft's Helm.
"Historically Microsoft has done best when it is on a massive campaign. Longhorn is the next big Windows campaign. I think it is scary, but also very motivating for the people working on it to know that the company is betting on them," he said.
Microsoft promises more details about the operating system release in October at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference to be held in Los Angeles. A preview of the software for developers will be handed out there and a beta of Longhorn is planned for next year.
Gates: Longhorn to come with server and Office updates
REDMOND, WASH.- Microsoft is preparing Office and server products to accompany the launch of Longhorn, the successor to Windows XP, Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates said Thursday, reigniting speculation about a server version of Longhorn.
"Longhorn is not just a release of a Windows client," Gates said in a meeting with financial analysts at Microsoft's Redmond, Wash., headquarters. Longhorn is a "big bet" for Microsoft and the company at the same time will have "advances in Office and server" products, Gates said.
Microsoft Senior Vice President Eric Rudder in a slide showing the future of servers mentioned "Windows Server Longhorn." Rudder recently added Windows Server to the list of Microsoft units he heads up.
Gates' comments and Rudder's presentation renew speculation about a server version of Longhorn, which Microsoft has at several times said will be a client-only release, but has also suggested may be released in a server version. Gates did not give a timeframe for Longhorn, but Microsoft at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in May set 2005 as the year for Longhorn. Microsoft in April released Windows Server 2003 and is planning to release Office 2003 later this year. With Longhorn planned for 2005, it could mean that Windows Server 2003 and Office 2003 will be outdated in two years, an upgrade cycle that is shorter than Microsoft's typical three-year cycle.
"We have not set a rate on a next server release, but we hit about every three years. Longhorn is in the same zone as the three years," said Bob O’Brien, group product manager in Microsoft's Windows Server division in an interview ahead of the financial analyst meeting on Wednesday.
Two industry analysts attending the Thursday meeting were divided on what Gates' comments mean.
"I think Microsoft will have to at least refresh Windows Server 2003 when it releases Longhorn," said Rob Helm, research director at Directions on Microsoft Inc., an independent research firm in Kirkland, Wash.
Joe Wilcox, a Washington, D.C.-based Jupiter Research senior analyst, on his firm's Microsoft Monitor log said a server release of Longhorn is a possibility, however "I wouldn't place any bets yet. Microsoft is still early in its Longhorn plans, and roadmaps are by no means final."
Not only do the roadmaps not appear final, questions remain about the technology underlying Longhorn. "We're doing a new file system which is called next-generation Windows, or WinFS," Gates said about Longhorn. At WinHEC, however, Microsoft officials said WinFS is not a new file system, but a storage technology that is built on the existing NTFS file system.
"Longhorn is not just a release of a Windows client," Gates said in a meeting with financial analysts at Microsoft's Redmond, Wash., headquarters. Longhorn is a "big bet" for Microsoft and the company at the same time will have "advances in Office and server" products, Gates said.
Microsoft Senior Vice President Eric Rudder in a slide showing the future of servers mentioned "Windows Server Longhorn." Rudder recently added Windows Server to the list of Microsoft units he heads up.
Gates' comments and Rudder's presentation renew speculation about a server version of Longhorn, which Microsoft has at several times said will be a client-only release, but has also suggested may be released in a server version. Gates did not give a timeframe for Longhorn, but Microsoft at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in May set 2005 as the year for Longhorn. Microsoft in April released Windows Server 2003 and is planning to release Office 2003 later this year. With Longhorn planned for 2005, it could mean that Windows Server 2003 and Office 2003 will be outdated in two years, an upgrade cycle that is shorter than Microsoft's typical three-year cycle.
"We have not set a rate on a next server release, but we hit about every three years. Longhorn is in the same zone as the three years," said Bob O’Brien, group product manager in Microsoft's Windows Server division in an interview ahead of the financial analyst meeting on Wednesday.
Two industry analysts attending the Thursday meeting were divided on what Gates' comments mean.
"I think Microsoft will have to at least refresh Windows Server 2003 when it releases Longhorn," said Rob Helm, research director at Directions on Microsoft Inc., an independent research firm in Kirkland, Wash.
Joe Wilcox, a Washington, D.C.-based Jupiter Research senior analyst, on his firm's Microsoft Monitor log said a server release of Longhorn is a possibility, however "I wouldn't place any bets yet. Microsoft is still early in its Longhorn plans, and roadmaps are by no means final."
Not only do the roadmaps not appear final, questions remain about the technology underlying Longhorn. "We're doing a new file system which is called next-generation Windows, or WinFS," Gates said about Longhorn. At WinHEC, however, Microsoft officials said WinFS is not a new file system, but a storage technology that is built on the existing NTFS file system.
Gates: Longhorn is 'a bit scary'
Longhorn, the next version of Microsoft Corp.'s Windows desktop operating system, will be so different from its predecessors that users may not like it right away, Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates said Thursday.
"Longhorn is a bit scary. ... We have been willing to change things," Gates said while trying to eat a fruit salad and drink a Diet Coke during lunch at Microsoft's annual financial analyst meeting at the company's Redmond, Washington, headquarters.
"It (Longhorn) should drive a whole range of upgrades, but that could be sort of delayed," Gates said. Because of differences with the previous versions of Windows, it could be a year or two after its release before computer users really pick up Longhorn, he said.
Gates appeared to distance himself from a commitment the company made at its Windows Engineering Hardware Conference (WinHEC) in May to deliver Longhorn in 2005. At lunch Thursday, he would not comment on the release date.
"Longhorn is innovative ... there is a lot of work to be done in terms of what has to go in and what has not," Gates said. Asked if Microsoft would consider dropping some of the innovations it has planned so the product can come out sooner, Gates said no: "If you split it up, then you delay one of the really great pieces," he said.
"We need a big bang release to drive excitement," Gates said.
Microsoft has been tightlipped about specific features in Longhorn, but early versions of the product have leaked to the Internet. Major changes in Longhorn are expected to include the graphical user interface and either a new file system or a technology update to the existing file system.
Gates said on Thursday that Longhorn will have a new file system, but Microsoft officials at WinHEC said the operating system will have a new storage system that will be based on the existing NTFS.
Microsoft promises more details about the operating system release, which analysts have said will be one of the most important Windows launches for Microsoft, in October at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference to be held in Los Angeles. A beta of Longhorn is planned for next year.
"Longhorn is a bit scary. ... We have been willing to change things," Gates said while trying to eat a fruit salad and drink a Diet Coke during lunch at Microsoft's annual financial analyst meeting at the company's Redmond, Washington, headquarters.
"It (Longhorn) should drive a whole range of upgrades, but that could be sort of delayed," Gates said. Because of differences with the previous versions of Windows, it could be a year or two after its release before computer users really pick up Longhorn, he said.
Gates appeared to distance himself from a commitment the company made at its Windows Engineering Hardware Conference (WinHEC) in May to deliver Longhorn in 2005. At lunch Thursday, he would not comment on the release date.
"Longhorn is innovative ... there is a lot of work to be done in terms of what has to go in and what has not," Gates said. Asked if Microsoft would consider dropping some of the innovations it has planned so the product can come out sooner, Gates said no: "If you split it up, then you delay one of the really great pieces," he said.
"We need a big bang release to drive excitement," Gates said.
Microsoft has been tightlipped about specific features in Longhorn, but early versions of the product have leaked to the Internet. Major changes in Longhorn are expected to include the graphical user interface and either a new file system or a technology update to the existing file system.
Gates said on Thursday that Longhorn will have a new file system, but Microsoft officials at WinHEC said the operating system will have a new storage system that will be based on the existing NTFS.
Microsoft promises more details about the operating system release, which analysts have said will be one of the most important Windows launches for Microsoft, in October at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference to be held in Los Angeles. A beta of Longhorn is planned for next year.
Microsoft touts PCs, Longhorn, CE
Microsoft showed off a future model for PCs, the successor to Windows XP, and an upcoming iteration of Windows CE, all of which the company hopes will improve how users interact with computers.
One analyst sees the move as a way to boost sales.
Microsoft is "trying to spur the hardware vendors [who] will create innovations and, in turn, spur PC sales," said Matt Rosoff, analyst at Directions on Microsoft, an independent analyst firm inKirkland, Wash. "They realize IT spending is in a slump and it's unlikely to pick up any time soon."
At the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) last week in New Orleans , Microsoft officials, including chairman and chief software architect Bill Gates, showed an early version multimedia PC the company is developing with Hewlett-Packard, dubbed Athens .
"The goal here is to have a consistent user experience," said Chad Magendanz, lead program manager for Microsoft's hardware innovation group in Redmond, Wash.
Officials stressed the business uses of Athens , which runs Windows XP and features a high-DPI, flat-panel screen. For example, the PC attempts to merge voice, video and text messaging.
"The scenario is really focused on business users and specifically on communications needs," said Greg Sullivan, lead product manager for the Windows client division.
"So this is a prototype that shows what the business PC or information worker PC might look like in a couple years."
Also at the show, Microsoft stamped a 2005 shipping date on Longhorn, and foreshadowed some of the improvements, including the new WinFS (Windows Future Storage) file system, and a planned device driver program.
"Our goal for the Windows end-user is to be better able to identify problems before they see them," with Longhorn device drivers, said Jean Valentine, lead program manager for Windows hardware and driver quality at Microsoft. "The vision of the [driver development] product is to make hardware development as approachable as Windows application development."
Microsoft is looking ahead to improvements in its Windows CE .Net operating system. Version 4.2 of the product, featuring voice over IP functionality, is due to ship on June 1, said Keith White, senior director of the embedded and appliance platforms group at Microsoft.
Beyond that, version 5.0 of Windows CE .Net, code-named Macallan, is in the planning stages, White said. He would not reveal details of the release, but did say that version 5.0, like its predecessors, would operate in devices ranging from telematics systems in automobiles to smart phones and portable media players.
Improving Web services capabilities in Windows CE is also a key investment area, White said.
One analyst sees the move as a way to boost sales.
Microsoft is "trying to spur the hardware vendors [who] will create innovations and, in turn, spur PC sales," said Matt Rosoff, analyst at Directions on Microsoft, an independent analyst firm inKirkland, Wash. "They realize IT spending is in a slump and it's unlikely to pick up any time soon."
At the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) last week in New Orleans , Microsoft officials, including chairman and chief software architect Bill Gates, showed an early version multimedia PC the company is developing with Hewlett-Packard, dubbed Athens .
"The goal here is to have a consistent user experience," said Chad Magendanz, lead program manager for Microsoft's hardware innovation group in Redmond, Wash.
Officials stressed the business uses of Athens , which runs Windows XP and features a high-DPI, flat-panel screen. For example, the PC attempts to merge voice, video and text messaging.
"The scenario is really focused on business users and specifically on communications needs," said Greg Sullivan, lead product manager for the Windows client division.
"So this is a prototype that shows what the business PC or information worker PC might look like in a couple years."
Also at the show, Microsoft stamped a 2005 shipping date on Longhorn, and foreshadowed some of the improvements, including the new WinFS (Windows Future Storage) file system, and a planned device driver program.
"Our goal for the Windows end-user is to be better able to identify problems before they see them," with Longhorn device drivers, said Jean Valentine, lead program manager for Windows hardware and driver quality at Microsoft. "The vision of the [driver development] product is to make hardware development as approachable as Windows application development."
Microsoft is looking ahead to improvements in its Windows CE .Net operating system. Version 4.2 of the product, featuring voice over IP functionality, is due to ship on June 1, said Keith White, senior director of the embedded and appliance platforms group at Microsoft.
Beyond that, version 5.0 of Windows CE .Net, code-named Macallan, is in the planning stages, White said. He would not reveal details of the release, but did say that version 5.0, like its predecessors, would operate in devices ranging from telematics systems in automobiles to smart phones and portable media players.
Improving Web services capabilities in Windows CE is also a key investment area, White said.
Update: Longhorn to see light in 2005
NEW ORLEANS -- Microsoft on Wednesday for the first time publicly confirmed 2005 as the release year for Longhorn, the successor to Windows XP.
The operating system release, which analysts have said will be one of the most important Windows launches for Microsoft, will follow a pre-beta release in October, a first beta in early 2004 and a second beta in mid-2004, said Will Poole, senior vice president for Microsoft's Windows Client division, in a presentation here at the company's Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC).
"We will see Longhorn coming to market in 2005," Poole said.
The shipping year for Longhorn had been a moving target; insiders first expected it to come late 2004 or early 2005, though recently most had pegged 2005 as the year for Longhorn. The pre-beta release will coincide with Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in Los Angeles in October, the company said.
"At PDC there will be a build suitable for hardware and software developers to start creating applications for Longhorn. The build is not meant for broad customer usage, but for developer usage," said Tom Phillips, general manager of Microsoft's Windows Hardware group.
Microsoft released a developer preview of Longhorn in March, the company said. Three alpha versions of Longhorn have leaked onto the Internet, the first surfacing late last year and the most recent leak last month.
Before Longhorn comes to market, there will be some follow-on releases to existing Microsoft operating system products, Poole said. New language editions of Windows XP Media Center Edition, for example, he said. However, "the weight of the [Windows] division and the company is behind Longhorn."
A big change in Longhorn will be the new Windows Future Storage (WinFS) file system, based on SQL Server database technology and designed to give users a direct route to data, making the physical location of a file irrelevant. WinFS replaces the NTFS and FAT32 file systems used in current Windows versions.
The operating system release, which analysts have said will be one of the most important Windows launches for Microsoft, will follow a pre-beta release in October, a first beta in early 2004 and a second beta in mid-2004, said Will Poole, senior vice president for Microsoft's Windows Client division, in a presentation here at the company's Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC).
"We will see Longhorn coming to market in 2005," Poole said.
The shipping year for Longhorn had been a moving target; insiders first expected it to come late 2004 or early 2005, though recently most had pegged 2005 as the year for Longhorn. The pre-beta release will coincide with Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in Los Angeles in October, the company said.
"At PDC there will be a build suitable for hardware and software developers to start creating applications for Longhorn. The build is not meant for broad customer usage, but for developer usage," said Tom Phillips, general manager of Microsoft's Windows Hardware group.
Microsoft released a developer preview of Longhorn in March, the company said. Three alpha versions of Longhorn have leaked onto the Internet, the first surfacing late last year and the most recent leak last month.
Before Longhorn comes to market, there will be some follow-on releases to existing Microsoft operating system products, Poole said. New language editions of Windows XP Media Center Edition, for example, he said. However, "the weight of the [Windows] division and the company is behind Longhorn."
A big change in Longhorn will be the new Windows Future Storage (WinFS) file system, based on SQL Server database technology and designed to give users a direct route to data, making the physical location of a file irrelevant. WinFS replaces the NTFS and FAT32 file systems used in current Windows versions.
Longhorn steers WinHEC agenda
Extending its reach into the hardware and handheld-device realms, Microsoft this week will detail plans for the forthcoming Longhorn version of Windows, Windows CE .Net 4.2, and its Windows RTC (Real-Time Communications) Server.
Microsoft executives are also expected to demonstrate early prototypes of computers that use the company’s NGSCB (Next-Generation Secure Computing Base) technology at WinHEC (Windows Hardware Engineering Conference) 2003 in New Orleans .
Formerly known as Palladium, NGSCB is a combination of new hardware and software that Microsoft says will boost PC security. Critics, however, fear that NGSCB — which is to be included in a future version of Windows, possibly Longhorn — could be a scourge for user freedom.
NGSCB includes a software component for Windows called a “nexus” and a chip — dubbed the Security Support Component — that can perform cryptographic operations. The technology creates within a PC a second operating environment that is meant to protect the system from malicious code by providing secure connections between applications, peripheral hardware, memory, and storage.
Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates will use his keynote at the show to highlight Microsoft’s vision for the datacenter, mobile applications, and the home.
Next-generation PC prototypes will also be featured by Gates, as will innovations in machine provisioning, application deployment, and systems management, according to Microsoft.
Gates is also expected to discuss details of Microsoft’s efforts in the embedded arena. Company officials declined to offer additional details, but the news will reportedly emerge from Microsoft’s Embedded and Appliance Platforms Group, the team responsible for XP Embedded.
Executives will also detail the multimedia capabilities in Longhorn, the code name for the next version of the Windows XP OS. Longhorn, expected to ship in 2005, will enable deployment of applications with rich media types such as video.
A third internal test version of Longhorn was leaked onto the Internet in late April. Build 4015, also referred to as Milestone 5, has its own startup logo, a screen that shows a user’s settings are being loaded, and a more refined search interface, according to testers who have posted screenshots of the software on various Web sites.
Microsoft is also expanding features that will support the new WinFS (Windows Future Storage) file system. WinFS, which will be part of Longhorn, will allow users to view files indexed from various physical locations instead of displaying the contents of specific folders or directories such as My Music or My Images.
Windows CE .Net 4.2, an embedded OS, will also be under discussion. Released to manufacturing last month, Version 4.2 includes VOIP (voice over IP) and STB (set-top boxes) features for device manufacturers to build “compelling” devices with communication, data, and voice requirements, according to Microsoft.
Windows CE .Net 4.2 is reported to provide improved API compatibility across CE-based devices. Other features for the forthcoming OS will include improved security and kernel enhancements.
Windows Real-Time Communications Services is also expected to be a key topic at the show. Microsoft's upcoming RTC Server, formerly dubbed Greenwich and due to ship this fall, is described by Microsoft in a statement as an IM server that empowers companies to collaborate on new information more quickly and to take advantage of industry-standard protocols such as SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) and SIMPLE (SIP for Instant Messaging and Presence Leveraging Extensions) when deploying and structuring real-time communications tools.
Analyst Dwight Davis said he wanted to hear more about Microsoft's Dynamic Systems Initiative at the conference. "They've been closed-mouthed about some of the broader ramifications of that initiative, and they talked about it primarily in the context of the software model that they're going to be promoting, so I don't understand the ramifications for hardware vendors," Davis said.
This initiative, featured in the recently released Windows Server 2003 operating system, attempts to unify hardware, software, and service vendors around a software architecture designed to leverage industry-standard hardware and simplify IT operations.
WinHEC's primary objective is to map out the strategic direction of Windows-based technologies for hardware manufacturers in order to accommodate the long lead times their products require, explained Michael Cherry, lead analyst of operating systems at Directions on Microsoft in Kirkland, Wash.
Microsoft executives are also expected to demonstrate early prototypes of computers that use the company’s NGSCB (Next-Generation Secure Computing Base) technology at WinHEC (Windows Hardware Engineering Conference) 2003 in New Orleans .
Formerly known as Palladium, NGSCB is a combination of new hardware and software that Microsoft says will boost PC security. Critics, however, fear that NGSCB — which is to be included in a future version of Windows, possibly Longhorn — could be a scourge for user freedom.
NGSCB includes a software component for Windows called a “nexus” and a chip — dubbed the Security Support Component — that can perform cryptographic operations. The technology creates within a PC a second operating environment that is meant to protect the system from malicious code by providing secure connections between applications, peripheral hardware, memory, and storage.
Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates will use his keynote at the show to highlight Microsoft’s vision for the datacenter, mobile applications, and the home.
Next-generation PC prototypes will also be featured by Gates, as will innovations in machine provisioning, application deployment, and systems management, according to Microsoft.
Gates is also expected to discuss details of Microsoft’s efforts in the embedded arena. Company officials declined to offer additional details, but the news will reportedly emerge from Microsoft’s Embedded and Appliance Platforms Group, the team responsible for XP Embedded.
Executives will also detail the multimedia capabilities in Longhorn, the code name for the next version of the Windows XP OS. Longhorn, expected to ship in 2005, will enable deployment of applications with rich media types such as video.
A third internal test version of Longhorn was leaked onto the Internet in late April. Build 4015, also referred to as Milestone 5, has its own startup logo, a screen that shows a user’s settings are being loaded, and a more refined search interface, according to testers who have posted screenshots of the software on various Web sites.
Microsoft is also expanding features that will support the new WinFS (Windows Future Storage) file system. WinFS, which will be part of Longhorn, will allow users to view files indexed from various physical locations instead of displaying the contents of specific folders or directories such as My Music or My Images.
Windows CE .Net 4.2, an embedded OS, will also be under discussion. Released to manufacturing last month, Version 4.2 includes VOIP (voice over IP) and STB (set-top boxes) features for device manufacturers to build “compelling” devices with communication, data, and voice requirements, according to Microsoft.
Windows CE .Net 4.2 is reported to provide improved API compatibility across CE-based devices. Other features for the forthcoming OS will include improved security and kernel enhancements.
Windows Real-Time Communications Services is also expected to be a key topic at the show. Microsoft's upcoming RTC Server, formerly dubbed Greenwich and due to ship this fall, is described by Microsoft in a statement as an IM server that empowers companies to collaborate on new information more quickly and to take advantage of industry-standard protocols such as SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) and SIMPLE (SIP for Instant Messaging and Presence Leveraging Extensions) when deploying and structuring real-time communications tools.
Analyst Dwight Davis said he wanted to hear more about Microsoft's Dynamic Systems Initiative at the conference. "They've been closed-mouthed about some of the broader ramifications of that initiative, and they talked about it primarily in the context of the software model that they're going to be promoting, so I don't understand the ramifications for hardware vendors," Davis said.
This initiative, featured in the recently released Windows Server 2003 operating system, attempts to unify hardware, software, and service vendors around a software architecture designed to leverage industry-standard hardware and simplify IT operations.
WinHEC's primary objective is to map out the strategic direction of Windows-based technologies for hardware manufacturers in order to accommodate the long lead times their products require, explained Michael Cherry, lead analyst of operating systems at Directions on Microsoft in Kirkland, Wash.
Microsoft to get technical on Longhorn, 'Palladium'
Microsoft will demonstrate its much debated Next-Generation Secure Computing Base (NGSCB) security initiative for the first time next week at an event in New Orleans, and will also provide further details on its plans for managing IT systems.
At WinHEC {Windows Hardware Engineering Conference), an annual event where Microsoft tells hardware makers what it is doing with Windows, the software maker also plans to share more information on Longhorn, the next version of its operating system for desktops planned for release in 2005.
Other topics on the agenda include the recently announced Windows CE .Net 4.2 for handheld devices and embedded systems, and Windows Real-Time Communications Server, Microsoft's instant messaging server formerly called Greenwich.
New to WinHEC this year is an "innovation room" which will have about 14 products that Microsoft and its hardware partners are working on for release over the next one to three years. They include large, high-resolution displays and an "ultra mobile PC," as well as what Microsoft referred to as an "advanced communications PC," according to a statement.
With 18 hours of technical sessions devoted to NGSCB, WinHEC will be key in the development of Microsoft's hardware-based security technology, better known by its former code name Palladium. NGSCB is a combination of new hardware and software that Microsoft says will greatly improve the security of PCs, although critics have raised concerns about user privacy. NGSCB may be included in Longhorn, Microsoft has said.
"This new security product is important for Microsoft and it is important to get a demo out. This is the first time we will see what it is going to look like and we will be able to estimate what kind of an investment it is going to take to deploy Palladium," said Mike Cherry, a lead analyst at Directions on Microsoft, in Kirkland, Wash.
NGSCB includes a new software component for Windows called a "nexus" and a chip that can perform cryptographic operations called the Security Support Component. The technology creates a second operating environment within a PC that is meant to protect the system from malicious code by providing secure connections between applications, peripheral hardware, memory, and storage.
Future anti-virus applications, for example, would be able to run in a secure execution environment to guarantee that the application is not corrupted, according to Microsoft.
The technology has attracted critics, however, who have said it could be a scourge for user freedom. NGSCB would enable stricter enforcement of DRM (Digital Rights Management) technologies, for example, and the security chip carries a unique security key that could potentially be used to identify a user's PC.
Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates in his opening keynote is expected to mention advances in Microsoft's Dynamic Systems Initiative (DSI), the company's response to autonomic computing plans that IBM, Hewlett-Packard, and Sun Microsystems are promoting for self-healing, self-configuring and self-optimizing systems.
IT managers face a profusion of data, devices, applications, and personnel, and need technology that will help them integrate and run their intricate environments more efficiently, freeing up resources to invest in new initiatives, according to Microsoft.
"One of the chief concerns of most CIOs today is that there is too much complexity in the IT environment," said Eric Berg, technical product manager for the Windows Server Group at Microsoft. The first product that is part of DSI was Microsoft's Windows Server 2003 software, launched last week. Other components will be rolled out over the next several years.
WinHEC also is one of two key shows where Microsoft will provide further details about Longhorn, Directions on Microsoft lead analyst Cherry said.
"There are really two conferences that define Longhorn, the first is WinHEC and the second is Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference in October. To me it is not really interesting until October what Longhorn is going to be, until we know what is coming out of WinHEC and the Professional Developers Conference it is speculation," Cherry said.
IDC Research Analyst Alan Promisel sees WinHEC as sort of a "coming out party" for Longhorn.
"For many it will be the first opportunity to sit down and get briefed on the finer aspects of Longhorn," he said.
Other future technologies Microsoft will talk about include three-dimensional user interfaces that will boost productivity by eliminating the need for printing when working with large documents, according to Gartner Fellow Martin Reynolds. The large, high resolution displays that Microsoft will show in the new Innovation Room may be a prelude to the 3D user interface.
WinHEC is a highly technical conference aimed at hardware makers who need to make products that work with Microsoft's software. The hardware makers usually are among the first to hear about Microsoft's new plans because they need long lead times to develop products. Driver development, for example, is a topic also addressed at WinHEC.
At WinHEC {Windows Hardware Engineering Conference), an annual event where Microsoft tells hardware makers what it is doing with Windows, the software maker also plans to share more information on Longhorn, the next version of its operating system for desktops planned for release in 2005.
Other topics on the agenda include the recently announced Windows CE .Net 4.2 for handheld devices and embedded systems, and Windows Real-Time Communications Server, Microsoft's instant messaging server formerly called Greenwich.
New to WinHEC this year is an "innovation room" which will have about 14 products that Microsoft and its hardware partners are working on for release over the next one to three years. They include large, high-resolution displays and an "ultra mobile PC," as well as what Microsoft referred to as an "advanced communications PC," according to a statement.
With 18 hours of technical sessions devoted to NGSCB, WinHEC will be key in the development of Microsoft's hardware-based security technology, better known by its former code name Palladium. NGSCB is a combination of new hardware and software that Microsoft says will greatly improve the security of PCs, although critics have raised concerns about user privacy. NGSCB may be included in Longhorn, Microsoft has said.
"This new security product is important for Microsoft and it is important to get a demo out. This is the first time we will see what it is going to look like and we will be able to estimate what kind of an investment it is going to take to deploy Palladium," said Mike Cherry, a lead analyst at Directions on Microsoft, in Kirkland, Wash.
NGSCB includes a new software component for Windows called a "nexus" and a chip that can perform cryptographic operations called the Security Support Component. The technology creates a second operating environment within a PC that is meant to protect the system from malicious code by providing secure connections between applications, peripheral hardware, memory, and storage.
Future anti-virus applications, for example, would be able to run in a secure execution environment to guarantee that the application is not corrupted, according to Microsoft.
The technology has attracted critics, however, who have said it could be a scourge for user freedom. NGSCB would enable stricter enforcement of DRM (Digital Rights Management) technologies, for example, and the security chip carries a unique security key that could potentially be used to identify a user's PC.
Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates in his opening keynote is expected to mention advances in Microsoft's Dynamic Systems Initiative (DSI), the company's response to autonomic computing plans that IBM, Hewlett-Packard, and Sun Microsystems are promoting for self-healing, self-configuring and self-optimizing systems.
IT managers face a profusion of data, devices, applications, and personnel, and need technology that will help them integrate and run their intricate environments more efficiently, freeing up resources to invest in new initiatives, according to Microsoft.
"One of the chief concerns of most CIOs today is that there is too much complexity in the IT environment," said Eric Berg, technical product manager for the Windows Server Group at Microsoft. The first product that is part of DSI was Microsoft's Windows Server 2003 software, launched last week. Other components will be rolled out over the next several years.
WinHEC also is one of two key shows where Microsoft will provide further details about Longhorn, Directions on Microsoft lead analyst Cherry said.
"There are really two conferences that define Longhorn, the first is WinHEC and the second is Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference in October. To me it is not really interesting until October what Longhorn is going to be, until we know what is coming out of WinHEC and the Professional Developers Conference it is speculation," Cherry said.
IDC Research Analyst Alan Promisel sees WinHEC as sort of a "coming out party" for Longhorn.
"For many it will be the first opportunity to sit down and get briefed on the finer aspects of Longhorn," he said.
Other future technologies Microsoft will talk about include three-dimensional user interfaces that will boost productivity by eliminating the need for printing when working with large documents, according to Gartner Fellow Martin Reynolds. The large, high resolution displays that Microsoft will show in the new Innovation Room may be a prelude to the 3D user interface.
WinHEC is a highly technical conference aimed at hardware makers who need to make products that work with Microsoft's software. The hardware makers usually are among the first to hear about Microsoft's new plans because they need long lead times to develop products. Driver development, for example, is a topic also addressed at WinHEC.
Microsoft exec says Longhorn future 'fluid'
LAS VEGAS -- Despite recent claims to the contrary, there may be a Windows server operating system code-named Longhorn after all, a Microsoft executive said Tuesday.
Just last November, Microsoft officials said that the next major Windows operating system, code-named Longhorn, would be a client-only release. But Brian Valentine, senior vice president of Microsoft's Windows division, told Computerworld that that announcement was "a bit premature" based on engineering planning.
During an interview at the Microsoft Management Summit here, Valentine said that some of the new client capabilities being enabled in Longhorn, such as richer collaboration and integrated storage, will require infrastructure services on top of the server operating system. How those server operating system additions will be packaged and delivered has yet to be decided, he said.
The Longhorn client operating system is due sometime in 2005, according to Valentine. But it's too early to tell if there will be a Windows Server 2005 release, he added. "We'll do whatever makes the most sense and is easiest on our customers," Valentine said.
With Longhorn targeted for 2005, the successor to Longhorn, code-named Blackcomb, is now loosely pegged for 2007 or 2008, said Valentine. "We think that these waves can't be consumed any faster than two- to three-year cycles in the enterprise," he said.
Until yesterday, Microsoft officials had said that Longhorn wouldn't ship before mid-2004 and that Blackcomb wouldn't ship before late 2005 or early 2006. The dates that Valentine supplied yesterday clearly extend those predicted time frames.
Valentine said a new server kernel will probably be required for the Blackcomb release, so he expects there will be both client and server operating releases. But he was quick to add that no commitments have been made yet. "Just as the Longhorn stuff is still fluid, the further out you look, it even gets more fluid," he said.
With regard to the server operating system updates needed in the Longhorn time frame, Valentine said minor or simple services could be delivered as part of an optional installation of a service pack CD. But, he said, the Windows team wants to keep service packs primarily targeted at bug fixes.
Valentine said more extensive changes will likely be delivered separately. Citing one example, he pointed to the real-time communications capabilities being enabled in the next version of Office, something likely to spur the need for a real-time communications infrastructure involving the server operating system.
Any additions or changes made to the Windows server operating system in the Longhorn time frame will be done on top of the kernel for Windows Server 2003, which is due to ship next month, said Valentine. He said he views the server kernel as more than a memory manager and I/O subsystem. To him, the kernel also encompasses core services such as Active Directory and public-key infrastructure technology.
"Those things aren't going to dramatically change for the Longhorn wave," he said. "There will be some new management infrastructure that comes out in there, but that'll be overlaid on top of the server kernel."
Because the kernel won't change, customers who choose to migrate to Windows Server 2003 won't lose their investment in the event that Microsoft does decide to release a Longhorn server operating system, Valentine said.
In November, when Microsoft announced that Longhorn would be a client-only release, a Microsoft official cited the delayed shipping date for Windows .Net Server 2003 as the impetus for the change in plans. Bob O'Brien, a group product manager in Microsoft's Windows server division, called it a "common-sense decision" to scratch the server version, based on customer feedback that Longhorn would emerge too soon after Windows .Net Server 2003.
"Servers are certainly a bit of an expensive implementation for our customers, and giving them server releases that are too close together makes it difficult for them to deploy them," O'Brien said at the time. "We always have to balance our schedules against what the customers feel is the right schedule for them."
Just last November, Microsoft officials said that the next major Windows operating system, code-named Longhorn, would be a client-only release. But Brian Valentine, senior vice president of Microsoft's Windows division, told Computerworld that that announcement was "a bit premature" based on engineering planning.
During an interview at the Microsoft Management Summit here, Valentine said that some of the new client capabilities being enabled in Longhorn, such as richer collaboration and integrated storage, will require infrastructure services on top of the server operating system. How those server operating system additions will be packaged and delivered has yet to be decided, he said.
The Longhorn client operating system is due sometime in 2005, according to Valentine. But it's too early to tell if there will be a Windows Server 2005 release, he added. "We'll do whatever makes the most sense and is easiest on our customers," Valentine said.
With Longhorn targeted for 2005, the successor to Longhorn, code-named Blackcomb, is now loosely pegged for 2007 or 2008, said Valentine. "We think that these waves can't be consumed any faster than two- to three-year cycles in the enterprise," he said.
Until yesterday, Microsoft officials had said that Longhorn wouldn't ship before mid-2004 and that Blackcomb wouldn't ship before late 2005 or early 2006. The dates that Valentine supplied yesterday clearly extend those predicted time frames.
Valentine said a new server kernel will probably be required for the Blackcomb release, so he expects there will be both client and server operating releases. But he was quick to add that no commitments have been made yet. "Just as the Longhorn stuff is still fluid, the further out you look, it even gets more fluid," he said.
With regard to the server operating system updates needed in the Longhorn time frame, Valentine said minor or simple services could be delivered as part of an optional installation of a service pack CD. But, he said, the Windows team wants to keep service packs primarily targeted at bug fixes.
Valentine said more extensive changes will likely be delivered separately. Citing one example, he pointed to the real-time communications capabilities being enabled in the next version of Office, something likely to spur the need for a real-time communications infrastructure involving the server operating system.
Any additions or changes made to the Windows server operating system in the Longhorn time frame will be done on top of the kernel for Windows Server 2003, which is due to ship next month, said Valentine. He said he views the server kernel as more than a memory manager and I/O subsystem. To him, the kernel also encompasses core services such as Active Directory and public-key infrastructure technology.
"Those things aren't going to dramatically change for the Longhorn wave," he said. "There will be some new management infrastructure that comes out in there, but that'll be overlaid on top of the server kernel."
Because the kernel won't change, customers who choose to migrate to Windows Server 2003 won't lose their investment in the event that Microsoft does decide to release a Longhorn server operating system, Valentine said.
In November, when Microsoft announced that Longhorn would be a client-only release, a Microsoft official cited the delayed shipping date for Windows .Net Server 2003 as the impetus for the change in plans. Bob O'Brien, a group product manager in Microsoft's Windows server division, called it a "common-sense decision" to scratch the server version, based on customer feedback that Longhorn would emerge too soon after Windows .Net Server 2003.
"Servers are certainly a bit of an expensive implementation for our customers, and giving them server releases that are too close together makes it difficult for them to deploy them," O'Brien said at the time. "We always have to balance our schedules against what the customers feel is the right schedule for them."
Leaked Longhorn gets lukewarm reviews
A second build of the successor to Microsoft's Windows XP appeared on the Internet late last week but Windows watchers who tested the software don't see major advances to get excited about yet.
When it hits the stores at the end of 2004 or in 2005, the software, code-named Longhorn, should be one of the most important new releases of Windows that the company has ever put out. A big change will be the new Windows Future Storage (WinFS) file system, based on SQL Server technology and designed to give users a direct route to data, making the physical location of a file irrelevant.
The new file system wasn't part of Longhorn build 3683 that surfaced in November and neither is it part of the latest leaked version, build 4008. The new build shows mostly evolutionary, not revolutionary, improvements over the earlier build, according to Windows experts including testers with BetaNews (http://www.betanews.com), Paul Thurrott's SuperSite for Windows (http://www.winsupersite.com).
WinFS replaces the NTFS and FAT32 file systems used in current Windows versions. Before appearing in Longhorn, WinFS technology is expected to premiere in a new version of Microsoft's SQL Server database, code-named Yukon , due later this year.
Bits of WinFS functionality, however, are in build 4008, and can be seen for example when browsing media files. Instead of displaying the contents of specific folders or directories, such as "My Music" or "My Images," Longhorn lets users view files indexed from various physical locations, the testers report. The search feature has also been simplified.
Although all testers mentioned the emerging WinFS functionality, they are more impressed by the improved setup utility and procedure for the software. Installation is handled by the new Windows Preinstallation Environment, a small operating system that is loaded into the RAM of a PC. Longhorn installs without user interaction in about 20 minutes, a big improvement over current Windows versions, which takes about an hour to install.
Also apparent in Longhorn is Microsoft's multimedia push. The latest leaked alpha version has an incomplete "My TV" application, deeply integrated media player and support for creating photo albums, akin to Apple Computer Inc.'s iPhoto, testers reported.
The missing file system is only part of the unfinished work on Longhorn. Another part is the user interface, which is expected to be 3D and video-based.
Testers agree that the final version of Longhorn will look very different from build 4008. That is also why Microsoft, which confirmed the authenticity of the leaked Longhorn build, won't talk about the product.
"The technology at this stage in no way represents what the final version of the product will be. The release is still far away," said a spokeswoman for Microsoft, based in Redmond, Wash.
When it hits the stores at the end of 2004 or in 2005, the software, code-named Longhorn, should be one of the most important new releases of Windows that the company has ever put out. A big change will be the new Windows Future Storage (WinFS) file system, based on SQL Server technology and designed to give users a direct route to data, making the physical location of a file irrelevant.
The new file system wasn't part of Longhorn build 3683 that surfaced in November and neither is it part of the latest leaked version, build 4008. The new build shows mostly evolutionary, not revolutionary, improvements over the earlier build, according to Windows experts including testers with BetaNews (http://www.betanews.com), Paul Thurrott's SuperSite for Windows (http://www.winsupersite.com).
WinFS replaces the NTFS and FAT32 file systems used in current Windows versions. Before appearing in Longhorn, WinFS technology is expected to premiere in a new version of Microsoft's SQL Server database, code-named Yukon , due later this year.
Bits of WinFS functionality, however, are in build 4008, and can be seen for example when browsing media files. Instead of displaying the contents of specific folders or directories, such as "My Music" or "My Images," Longhorn lets users view files indexed from various physical locations, the testers report. The search feature has also been simplified.
Although all testers mentioned the emerging WinFS functionality, they are more impressed by the improved setup utility and procedure for the software. Installation is handled by the new Windows Preinstallation Environment, a small operating system that is loaded into the RAM of a PC. Longhorn installs without user interaction in about 20 minutes, a big improvement over current Windows versions, which takes about an hour to install.
Also apparent in Longhorn is Microsoft's multimedia push. The latest leaked alpha version has an incomplete "My TV" application, deeply integrated media player and support for creating photo albums, akin to Apple Computer Inc.'s iPhoto, testers reported.
The missing file system is only part of the unfinished work on Longhorn. Another part is the user interface, which is expected to be 3D and video-based.
Testers agree that the final version of Longhorn will look very different from build 4008. That is also why Microsoft, which confirmed the authenticity of the leaked Longhorn build, won't talk about the product.
"The technology at this stage in no way represents what the final version of the product will be. The release is still far away," said a spokeswoman for Microsoft, based in Redmond, Wash.
MSN to stream Times Square fete
If you can't make it to Times Square for the famed locale's 100th New Year's Eve celebration, you can watch it from start to finish online. Microsoft's MSN portal said Tuesday it will provide an online broadcast of the historic party. The Webcast starts at 3 p.m. Pacific Standard Time when event organizers plan to raise their trademark crystal ball and runs until 9:15 p.m. PST after the ball's drop. Visitors to the MSN Video site will be able to follow the action in New York City via three live streams.
The company said it arranged for the Webcast through a collaboration with the nonprofit Times Square Alliance, as well as with Countdown Entertainment and Clear Channel Entertainment TV. Celebration organizers noted that Times Square has long pushed the envelope in the broadcast-technology arena, from its signature "zipper" newswire, introduced on the New York Times Building in 1928, to huge LED displays called Jumbotrons, first seen in the 1980s.
The company said it arranged for the Webcast through a collaboration with the nonprofit Times Square Alliance, as well as with Countdown Entertainment and Clear Channel Entertainment TV. Celebration organizers noted that Times Square has long pushed the envelope in the broadcast-technology arena, from its signature "zipper" newswire, introduced on the New York Times Building in 1928, to huge LED displays called Jumbotrons, first seen in the 1980s.
Monday, December 27, 2004
Microsoft offers glimpse of the future
Microsoft will attempt to whip up enthusiasm among its nation of developers next week when it shows off many of the pieces that will serve as the foundation of its technology vision of the future for corporate users.
At its 10th annual Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles, the company hopes to stoke that enthusiasm among 7,000 developers by delivering to them early versions of its long-awaited next generation operating system, development suite of tools, database, and Web services framework.
The show figures to be the first of many come-to-Jesus gatherings as a way to entice developers to start working on development and to win early mindshare. Given that some of the finished versions of the products such as Longhorn, the Windows XP successor, will not be available until 2006, it figures to be a long religious crusade.
The company will finally release early code of Longhorn to developers, which will include a SDK, which should allow them to begin working with some of the new features of the upcoming operating system. Company officials cautioned, however, that it is merely a preview version.
"Developers should be able to start working with all the cool fundamental things that will be in Longhorn. I think they will like the breadth and depth of what they see. But if you were to pop this onto your home PC you would not be super happy with the experience," said Adam Sohn, product manager at Microsoft's Platform Strategy group.
Microsoft will show off the latest work it has done on Longhorn's graphical interface, saying that developers should walk away with a deeper understanding of what the company is trying to help developers accomplish within the new presentation layer. He said they will show off some interface prototypes and lay out their thinking on what "user interface experiences" should be.
A key ingredient in the early version of Longhorn is its new Windows Future Storage (WinFS) file system that promises to take a new approach to the way data is stored on hard drives and other physical media and make it easier to find and visualize data.
"The story [with WinFS] is, what is in there is pretty solid, and developers will be able to start programming against it," Sohn said.
Microsoft will also release early code of the next version of its Visual Studio development platform, code-named Whidbey, which should give a good feel for what will be in the finished version. Sohn cautions again that it is still early days for the product and it has a ways to go before all the pieces are polished and put in place.
"I think they will get a sense for the innovations we are trying to push into the platform technology, but it is not production-level stuff. It is for developers to get a first peek at what we are up to. We want to get their feedback and their creative juices flowing, and maybe to start some very early work," Sohn said.
Another early version of a long-awaited program to be released is Yukon, the company's next-generation version of its SQL Server database that will include a Services Broker that makes use of asynchronous queuing and reportedly has guaranteed messaging. The product also has built-in support for Web services.
"In terms of Yukon there will be a hard focus on what developers should be doing to utilize the full power of the data-driven section of the platform. You will hear more about our storage vision and how data needs to be managed at different levels inside an organization," Sohn said.
Microsoft will show off Indigo, its upcoming framework for building Web services and creating applications that can be inherently connected across environments and that can flexibly scale to meet whatever computing requirements individual corporate users have. Company officials will talk about their ongoing commitment to compatibility with existing applications and platforms relative to Indigo and will make it clear they intend to leave no existing investment behind.
"We see the value of getting folks onto the next wave, but we also know the platform rises and falls on the success of other developers. You can't leave people behind. You must have compatibility," Sohn said.
The combination of Whidbey and Indigo are intended to make it easier to build Web services.
Although Sohn said he was unaware of specific show references to accommodating Java applications in Microsoft's development scheme, he said the company does intend to keep supporting multiple programming languages.
"I think you'll hear us continue to [have] support for multiple languages inside not only the framework but more broadly in the tool set," he said. Microsoft acknowledges heterogeneity of user environments, said Sohn.
Sohn acknowledged there is a session planned on migrating Java applications to Microsoft's development framework.
There will not be much new to report on Microsoft's Office System 2003 suite of desktop applications, formally launched on Tuesday in New York, nor on its Jupiter suite of server-based applications, according to Sohn. The company, however, will address how those suites of applications have been designed so developers can build solutions on top of them and how both the applications and solutions can work together via Web services.
"We will be more focused on enabling developers to be successful, and a big chunk of that is how Office takes advantage of the different platforms. We will be talking more about underlying plumbing and what that means for developers writing enterprise applications," Sohn said.
At its 10th annual Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles, the company hopes to stoke that enthusiasm among 7,000 developers by delivering to them early versions of its long-awaited next generation operating system, development suite of tools, database, and Web services framework.
The show figures to be the first of many come-to-Jesus gatherings as a way to entice developers to start working on development and to win early mindshare. Given that some of the finished versions of the products such as Longhorn, the Windows XP successor, will not be available until 2006, it figures to be a long religious crusade.
The company will finally release early code of Longhorn to developers, which will include a SDK, which should allow them to begin working with some of the new features of the upcoming operating system. Company officials cautioned, however, that it is merely a preview version.
"Developers should be able to start working with all the cool fundamental things that will be in Longhorn. I think they will like the breadth and depth of what they see. But if you were to pop this onto your home PC you would not be super happy with the experience," said Adam Sohn, product manager at Microsoft's Platform Strategy group.
Microsoft will show off the latest work it has done on Longhorn's graphical interface, saying that developers should walk away with a deeper understanding of what the company is trying to help developers accomplish within the new presentation layer. He said they will show off some interface prototypes and lay out their thinking on what "user interface experiences" should be.
A key ingredient in the early version of Longhorn is its new Windows Future Storage (WinFS) file system that promises to take a new approach to the way data is stored on hard drives and other physical media and make it easier to find and visualize data.
"The story [with WinFS] is, what is in there is pretty solid, and developers will be able to start programming against it," Sohn said.
Microsoft will also release early code of the next version of its Visual Studio development platform, code-named Whidbey, which should give a good feel for what will be in the finished version. Sohn cautions again that it is still early days for the product and it has a ways to go before all the pieces are polished and put in place.
"I think they will get a sense for the innovations we are trying to push into the platform technology, but it is not production-level stuff. It is for developers to get a first peek at what we are up to. We want to get their feedback and their creative juices flowing, and maybe to start some very early work," Sohn said.
Another early version of a long-awaited program to be released is Yukon, the company's next-generation version of its SQL Server database that will include a Services Broker that makes use of asynchronous queuing and reportedly has guaranteed messaging. The product also has built-in support for Web services.
"In terms of Yukon there will be a hard focus on what developers should be doing to utilize the full power of the data-driven section of the platform. You will hear more about our storage vision and how data needs to be managed at different levels inside an organization," Sohn said.
Microsoft will show off Indigo, its upcoming framework for building Web services and creating applications that can be inherently connected across environments and that can flexibly scale to meet whatever computing requirements individual corporate users have. Company officials will talk about their ongoing commitment to compatibility with existing applications and platforms relative to Indigo and will make it clear they intend to leave no existing investment behind.
"We see the value of getting folks onto the next wave, but we also know the platform rises and falls on the success of other developers. You can't leave people behind. You must have compatibility," Sohn said.
The combination of Whidbey and Indigo are intended to make it easier to build Web services.
Although Sohn said he was unaware of specific show references to accommodating Java applications in Microsoft's development scheme, he said the company does intend to keep supporting multiple programming languages.
"I think you'll hear us continue to [have] support for multiple languages inside not only the framework but more broadly in the tool set," he said. Microsoft acknowledges heterogeneity of user environments, said Sohn.
Sohn acknowledged there is a session planned on migrating Java applications to Microsoft's development framework.
There will not be much new to report on Microsoft's Office System 2003 suite of desktop applications, formally launched on Tuesday in New York, nor on its Jupiter suite of server-based applications, according to Sohn. The company, however, will address how those suites of applications have been designed so developers can build solutions on top of them and how both the applications and solutions can work together via Web services.
"We will be more focused on enabling developers to be successful, and a big chunk of that is how Office takes advantage of the different platforms. We will be talking more about underlying plumbing and what that means for developers writing enterprise applications," Sohn said.
Update: Longhorn gets first showing at PDC
LOS ANGELES -- Proclaiming that the digital decade is just dawning, Microsoft Corp. Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates on Monday gave the first official peek at Longhorn, the next version of Windows expected out in 2006.
Longhorn will be "the biggest release of this decade, the biggest since Windows 95," Gates said in his opening keynote at Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in Los Angeles.
With Longhorn, Microsoft will introduce a unified storage system dubbed WinFS for Windows Future Storage. The unified file system is the "Holy Grail" for Gates. "I have been talking about it for over a decade and finally here it is," he said
Together with a new engine underlying the Longhorn user interface code-named Avalon, WinFS should make it easier for users to find and organize files on their PCs. The familiar directories and folders will be replaced with XML (extensible markup language) metadata, allowing users to easily find documents that relate to a specific project or topic, or all communications with one person, for example.
Also, Longhorn will pull data out of the "silos" that are the individual applications, Gates said. Data will reside at the platform level, instead of at the application level. E-mail address book information, for example, will be accessible from multiple applications, instead of just the e-mail client, Gates said.
WinFS will be based on technology from Yukon, the code name for the next version of Microsoft's SQL Server database due out next year. "Until we had a lot of this database technology we could not organize these things," Gates said.
Hillel Cooperman, product unit manager for the Windows user experience, demonstrated an early version of Longhorn. The user interface at first glance looked much like current Windows versions, though with transparent Windows and a transparent sidebar that includes a clock, instant messenger contacts list and other information.
Cooperman also demonstrated new features of the file system. The "My Documents" icon on the desktop no longer opens a specific folder on the hard disk drive, but displays documents located anywhere on the system tagged with XML data. He displayed documents by project and sender.
Cooperman also opened a DOS application in Longhorn, demonstrating Microsoft's "over 20 years of commitment to interoperability."
Other enhancements in Longhorn will include the hardware-based security technology called Next-Generation Secure Computing Base (NGSCB) and Indigo, the code name for a Web services technology. Indigo will connect applications on a system as well across networks, Gates said.
Software is what held back the digital decade in the past 10 years, according to Gates. "The expectations of the last decade required more time," he said. "It is simple to say where the constraint is in this era… It is software," not hardware. And Longhorn, of course, will deal with those constraints.
After Gates' presentation, Microsoft Group Vice President Jim Allchin took the stage and delved into Longhorn specifics key to software developers, the target audience for the PDC.
Allchin, who heads the Platforms group, introduced a new application programming model called WinFX, the next step from Microsoft's .Net Framework model. WinFX offers improvements in security and reliability, while also allowing a developer to work more effectively, according to Allchin. He also announced XAML, a new markup language for Avalon.
New performance-improving technologies in Longhorn include SuperFetch, which helps an application launch faster, and ClickOnce installation, which allows a user to install an application with one click and should speed up and simplify application deployment, Allchin said.
PDC attendees will get a CD containing an early version of Longhorn. However, developers have to wait to look at the new development tools. The preview handed out Monday lacks WinFX application programming interfaces, Allchin said. Microsoft has said a Longhorn first beta is planned for next year. The company has not given an official product release date.
Following the keynote, Microsoft officials said that Allchin had misspoken in his speech and that the WinFX interfaces were, in fact, included in Microsoft's preview CD.
Longhorn will be "the biggest release of this decade, the biggest since Windows 95," Gates said in his opening keynote at Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in Los Angeles.
With Longhorn, Microsoft will introduce a unified storage system dubbed WinFS for Windows Future Storage. The unified file system is the "Holy Grail" for Gates. "I have been talking about it for over a decade and finally here it is," he said
Together with a new engine underlying the Longhorn user interface code-named Avalon, WinFS should make it easier for users to find and organize files on their PCs. The familiar directories and folders will be replaced with XML (extensible markup language) metadata, allowing users to easily find documents that relate to a specific project or topic, or all communications with one person, for example.
Also, Longhorn will pull data out of the "silos" that are the individual applications, Gates said. Data will reside at the platform level, instead of at the application level. E-mail address book information, for example, will be accessible from multiple applications, instead of just the e-mail client, Gates said.
WinFS will be based on technology from Yukon, the code name for the next version of Microsoft's SQL Server database due out next year. "Until we had a lot of this database technology we could not organize these things," Gates said.
Hillel Cooperman, product unit manager for the Windows user experience, demonstrated an early version of Longhorn. The user interface at first glance looked much like current Windows versions, though with transparent Windows and a transparent sidebar that includes a clock, instant messenger contacts list and other information.
Cooperman also demonstrated new features of the file system. The "My Documents" icon on the desktop no longer opens a specific folder on the hard disk drive, but displays documents located anywhere on the system tagged with XML data. He displayed documents by project and sender.
Cooperman also opened a DOS application in Longhorn, demonstrating Microsoft's "over 20 years of commitment to interoperability."
Other enhancements in Longhorn will include the hardware-based security technology called Next-Generation Secure Computing Base (NGSCB) and Indigo, the code name for a Web services technology. Indigo will connect applications on a system as well across networks, Gates said.
Software is what held back the digital decade in the past 10 years, according to Gates. "The expectations of the last decade required more time," he said. "It is simple to say where the constraint is in this era… It is software," not hardware. And Longhorn, of course, will deal with those constraints.
After Gates' presentation, Microsoft Group Vice President Jim Allchin took the stage and delved into Longhorn specifics key to software developers, the target audience for the PDC.
Allchin, who heads the Platforms group, introduced a new application programming model called WinFX, the next step from Microsoft's .Net Framework model. WinFX offers improvements in security and reliability, while also allowing a developer to work more effectively, according to Allchin. He also announced XAML, a new markup language for Avalon.
New performance-improving technologies in Longhorn include SuperFetch, which helps an application launch faster, and ClickOnce installation, which allows a user to install an application with one click and should speed up and simplify application deployment, Allchin said.
PDC attendees will get a CD containing an early version of Longhorn. However, developers have to wait to look at the new development tools. The preview handed out Monday lacks WinFX application programming interfaces, Allchin said. Microsoft has said a Longhorn first beta is planned for next year. The company has not given an official product release date.
Following the keynote, Microsoft officials said that Allchin had misspoken in his speech and that the WinFX interfaces were, in fact, included in Microsoft's preview CD.
Security and Web integration key to Longhorn
LOS ANGELES -- Microsoft Corp. let loose early bits of Longhorn at its Professional Developer Conference (PDC) here and for the first time provided more extensive details around the key components of its next Windows operating system expected out in 2006.
Though Microsoft repeated that it would release a server version of Longhorn, the company would only discuss the client operating system. It is early days for the Longhorn client and way too early for the Longhorn server, Microsoft officials said here.
Longhorn is build up of three components on top of a layer of "fundamentals" that includes security and technology to make sure applications and drivers don't conflict. On top of those fundamentals sit Avalon, WinFS and Indigo, the codenames that with the Longhorn name itself have fed the rumor mills for the past years.
Avalon is the presentation subsystem of Longhorn, WinFS is the unified storage system built on top of Windows' existing file system NTFS, and Indigo combines all Windows communication technologies.
Microsoft officials, visibly happy that they could now talk about what they have been working on in secrecy, provided lengthy and deeply technical explanations of the technology behind the codenames. To be brief, Longhorn promises to give users a secure operating system with a new way to store files, revamped graphics and tight links to the Web.
For software developers, the operating system, though bringing a myriad of changes, should be easier to develop for and it will also run existing applications, dating all the way back to the days of DOS, the disk operating system.
Other than security and conflict prevention, the Longhorn fundamentals will also offer technology called SuperFetch that helps start an application faster, ClickOnce that makes it easy to install applications on a single PC or across a network, as well as technology that makes it easy to migrate from one machine to another, Microsoft Group Vice President Jim Allchin said in a keynote address on Monday.
"ClickOnce is the ability to just do an Xcopy, the equivalent of an Xcopy, to a machine," Allchin said.
Avalon, the Longhorn presentation system, had been little talked about until the PDC. With Avalon, Microsoft is leaving the bitmap behind it and is moving to vector-based graphics and a single graphics system. This promises better graphics and performance, said Darryn Dieken, group program manager for Windows client, speaking on Tuesday.
Today, Windows uses three different graphics APIs (application programming interfaces), to display video, two-dimensional or three-dimensional images, Dieken said. This slows down the system and requires software developers to write more code, which makes the system more error prone, he said.
Whether users will get the full benefits of Avalon will depend on the hardware, Dieken said. The new transparent windows feature, for example, will only work with hardware that is better than the average graphics card and processor in today's PCs, Dieken said.
Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates during his keynote Monday gave Microsoft's expectation of a PC in 2006. The PC is to sport a 4GHz to 6GHz processor with two cores, over 2GB of RAM, more than 1TB of disk storage, and a graphics processor three times as powerful as those found in today's PCs, he said.
Details on WinFS, the unified storage system for Longhorn, had leaked before PDC. However, some confusion about the technology Gates referred to as a "Holy Grail" was cleared up Tuesday. It is not a new file system, but the acronym nevertheless stands for Windows File System and not Windows Future Storage.
"We built WinFS on top of NTFS," said Gordon Mangione, corporate vice president for SQL Server at Microsoft , in a keynote presentation Tuesday. "We have 15 years investment in building streams on NTFS. ...There's no way we're going to throw all that out and start over again."
WinFS uses the relational engine technology that Microsoft also uses in Yukon, the next version of its SQL Server database due next year. The storage system promises to make it easier for users to find documents and e-mail messages, for example, by tagging those with XML (Extensible Markup Language) metadata.
WinFS data will no longer reside in specific folders on a hard disk drive. The "My Documents" icon on the desktop no longer opens a specific folder on the hard disk drive, but displays documents located anywhere on the system tagged with XML data. Also, certain data, such as the e-mail address book, will reside at the platform level, instead of at the application level, making it accessible from multiple applications, Microsoft said.
Existing Windows applications will work with systems running Longhorn. However, vendors will have to recode their applications if they want to take full advantage of WinFS and other Longhorn features, Microsoft officials said. The Redmond, Washington, software maker itself is planning a wave of new product releases in the Longhorn timeframe, including a new Office release.
Indigo has grown at PDC. Prior to the event, the definition was restricted to technology that enables Web services. Now Indigo stands for basically all of Windows' communications technologies, including peer-to-peer, instant messaging and Web services support, Microsoft officials said.
While Windows users will experience Avalon and WinFS first hand when Longhorn comes out, Indigo sits behind the scenes and is more interesting for developers of Windows applications.
"What we are doing is giving developers a higher level to make it less complex and more productive to write an application for Windows that communicates," said Steven Van Roekel, director of platform strategy at Microsoft. "Many of these technologies will be at a certain level an afterthought for end-users."
PDC attendees not only received a technical preview version of Longhorn, but also a Longhorn SDK (software development kit), Longhorn driver kit, and a preview of Whidbey, the next version of Microsoft's Visual Studio developer tools.
Allchin, who heads the Platforms group, also introduced a new application programming model at PDC called WinFX, the next step from Microsoft's .Net Framework model. WinFX offers improvements in security and reliability, while also allowing a developer to work more effectively, according to Allchin. He also announced XAML, a new markup language for Avalon.
Microsoft has not given a release date for Longhorn, but insiders expect the software to be out in 2006. A first beta of the product is planned for the third quarter of next year.
Though Microsoft repeated that it would release a server version of Longhorn, the company would only discuss the client operating system. It is early days for the Longhorn client and way too early for the Longhorn server, Microsoft officials said here.
Longhorn is build up of three components on top of a layer of "fundamentals" that includes security and technology to make sure applications and drivers don't conflict. On top of those fundamentals sit Avalon, WinFS and Indigo, the codenames that with the Longhorn name itself have fed the rumor mills for the past years.
Avalon is the presentation subsystem of Longhorn, WinFS is the unified storage system built on top of Windows' existing file system NTFS, and Indigo combines all Windows communication technologies.
Microsoft officials, visibly happy that they could now talk about what they have been working on in secrecy, provided lengthy and deeply technical explanations of the technology behind the codenames. To be brief, Longhorn promises to give users a secure operating system with a new way to store files, revamped graphics and tight links to the Web.
For software developers, the operating system, though bringing a myriad of changes, should be easier to develop for and it will also run existing applications, dating all the way back to the days of DOS, the disk operating system.
Other than security and conflict prevention, the Longhorn fundamentals will also offer technology called SuperFetch that helps start an application faster, ClickOnce that makes it easy to install applications on a single PC or across a network, as well as technology that makes it easy to migrate from one machine to another, Microsoft Group Vice President Jim Allchin said in a keynote address on Monday.
"ClickOnce is the ability to just do an Xcopy, the equivalent of an Xcopy, to a machine," Allchin said.
Avalon, the Longhorn presentation system, had been little talked about until the PDC. With Avalon, Microsoft is leaving the bitmap behind it and is moving to vector-based graphics and a single graphics system. This promises better graphics and performance, said Darryn Dieken, group program manager for Windows client, speaking on Tuesday.
Today, Windows uses three different graphics APIs (application programming interfaces), to display video, two-dimensional or three-dimensional images, Dieken said. This slows down the system and requires software developers to write more code, which makes the system more error prone, he said.
Whether users will get the full benefits of Avalon will depend on the hardware, Dieken said. The new transparent windows feature, for example, will only work with hardware that is better than the average graphics card and processor in today's PCs, Dieken said.
Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates during his keynote Monday gave Microsoft's expectation of a PC in 2006. The PC is to sport a 4GHz to 6GHz processor with two cores, over 2GB of RAM, more than 1TB of disk storage, and a graphics processor three times as powerful as those found in today's PCs, he said.
Details on WinFS, the unified storage system for Longhorn, had leaked before PDC. However, some confusion about the technology Gates referred to as a "Holy Grail" was cleared up Tuesday. It is not a new file system, but the acronym nevertheless stands for Windows File System and not Windows Future Storage.
"We built WinFS on top of NTFS," said Gordon Mangione, corporate vice president for SQL Server at Microsoft , in a keynote presentation Tuesday. "We have 15 years investment in building streams on NTFS. ...There's no way we're going to throw all that out and start over again."
WinFS uses the relational engine technology that Microsoft also uses in Yukon, the next version of its SQL Server database due next year. The storage system promises to make it easier for users to find documents and e-mail messages, for example, by tagging those with XML (Extensible Markup Language) metadata.
WinFS data will no longer reside in specific folders on a hard disk drive. The "My Documents" icon on the desktop no longer opens a specific folder on the hard disk drive, but displays documents located anywhere on the system tagged with XML data. Also, certain data, such as the e-mail address book, will reside at the platform level, instead of at the application level, making it accessible from multiple applications, Microsoft said.
Existing Windows applications will work with systems running Longhorn. However, vendors will have to recode their applications if they want to take full advantage of WinFS and other Longhorn features, Microsoft officials said. The Redmond, Washington, software maker itself is planning a wave of new product releases in the Longhorn timeframe, including a new Office release.
Indigo has grown at PDC. Prior to the event, the definition was restricted to technology that enables Web services. Now Indigo stands for basically all of Windows' communications technologies, including peer-to-peer, instant messaging and Web services support, Microsoft officials said.
While Windows users will experience Avalon and WinFS first hand when Longhorn comes out, Indigo sits behind the scenes and is more interesting for developers of Windows applications.
"What we are doing is giving developers a higher level to make it less complex and more productive to write an application for Windows that communicates," said Steven Van Roekel, director of platform strategy at Microsoft. "Many of these technologies will be at a certain level an afterthought for end-users."
PDC attendees not only received a technical preview version of Longhorn, but also a Longhorn SDK (software development kit), Longhorn driver kit, and a preview of Whidbey, the next version of Microsoft's Visual Studio developer tools.
Allchin, who heads the Platforms group, also introduced a new application programming model at PDC called WinFX, the next step from Microsoft's .Net Framework model. WinFX offers improvements in security and reliability, while also allowing a developer to work more effectively, according to Allchin. He also announced XAML, a new markup language for Avalon.
Microsoft has not given a release date for Longhorn, but insiders expect the software to be out in 2006. A first beta of the product is planned for the third quarter of next year.
SQL Server 'Yukon' to get XML data type
LOS ANGELES -- Microsoft at its Professional Developers Conference 2003 here on Tuesday will discuss intentions to add an XML data type to its SQL Server database, with the Yukon release of the product planned for late 2004.
Plans for integration of the database with Microsoft's Common Language Runtime (CLR) also will be featured.
XML plans involve letting developers treat XML and relational data alike, said Stan Sorensen, director of product management for SQL Server at Microsoft, in an interview on Monday.
"The way that we're going to enable that is by creating a native XML data type," Sorensen said.
Queries can be run on XML data just as they could on relational data, he said. An example of a query would be to retrieve news articles written by a specific author and attaching an XML schema to the query, enabling retrieval specifically of deeper, analytical articles.
"By creating an XML data type, we're going to enable that data to fit into that rows-and-columns format" common in relational databases, he said. Support of the XQuery language in Yukon provides for a query mechanism, said Sorensen.
Including the CLR in the database will enable developers to write database applications using a language other than the native Transact-SQL language featured in SQL Server, Sorensen said.
"It's all about developer productivity in Yukon," Sorensen said. By running the CLR engine inside Yukon, developers can write database applications in languages such as C# or Visual Basic. Third parties are expected to write drivers that enable applications to be developed in additional languages, said Sorensen, who added that he would expect such a driver for the rival Java language.
The CLR enables translation of code into a common language to be executed by the CLR engine. "What's good about that is language choice for developers," Sorensen said.
Also to be highlighted in Yukon is more integration with the Visual Studio toolset and the ability to write a Web service in Yukon. Microsoft Reporting Services enable this functionality now, but this ability will be increased in Yukon by writing a lot of the database in "managed code," Microsoft's term for code that features common and consistent object and security models as well as a common and consistent set of APIs, Sorensen said. Managed code is offered via the company’s .Net Framework.
The Service Broker planned for Yukon will enable more inter-process communications between database components, Sorensen said.
Plans for integration of the database with Microsoft's Common Language Runtime (CLR) also will be featured.
XML plans involve letting developers treat XML and relational data alike, said Stan Sorensen, director of product management for SQL Server at Microsoft, in an interview on Monday.
"The way that we're going to enable that is by creating a native XML data type," Sorensen said.
Queries can be run on XML data just as they could on relational data, he said. An example of a query would be to retrieve news articles written by a specific author and attaching an XML schema to the query, enabling retrieval specifically of deeper, analytical articles.
"By creating an XML data type, we're going to enable that data to fit into that rows-and-columns format" common in relational databases, he said. Support of the XQuery language in Yukon provides for a query mechanism, said Sorensen.
Including the CLR in the database will enable developers to write database applications using a language other than the native Transact-SQL language featured in SQL Server, Sorensen said.
"It's all about developer productivity in Yukon," Sorensen said. By running the CLR engine inside Yukon, developers can write database applications in languages such as C# or Visual Basic. Third parties are expected to write drivers that enable applications to be developed in additional languages, said Sorensen, who added that he would expect such a driver for the rival Java language.
The CLR enables translation of code into a common language to be executed by the CLR engine. "What's good about that is language choice for developers," Sorensen said.
Also to be highlighted in Yukon is more integration with the Visual Studio toolset and the ability to write a Web service in Yukon. Microsoft Reporting Services enable this functionality now, but this ability will be increased in Yukon by writing a lot of the database in "managed code," Microsoft's term for code that features common and consistent object and security models as well as a common and consistent set of APIs, Sorensen said. Managed code is offered via the company’s .Net Framework.
The Service Broker planned for Yukon will enable more inter-process communications between database components, Sorensen said.
Longhorn backs thick client model
Call it the revenge of the Windows client — or the revelation of Microsoft's three new technology pillars.
Longhorn, the forthcoming version of Windows, made its first public outing at last week's Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in Los Angeles.
Not due until 2005 or 2006, Longhorn represents Microsoft's determination to strengthen its desktop stronghold by fostering a new generation of Internet-aware applications.
Underpinning that strategy are Longhorn's three main technology pillars: Avalon, the glossy new 3D GUI; WinFS, a new, XML-based storage scheme; and Indigo, a messaging technology based on Web services. All three fall under the moniker WinFX, an upgrade of the .Net Framework and the new Longhorn application development environment.
Avalon's role can be seen as an attempt to raise the desktop ante with compelling 3D extensions to the Windows GUI so that browser apps pale even more in comparison.
For years, Microsoft has argued that browser-based apps are a step backward. The company has suggested these apps be replaced by smart, Internet-aware client applications that exploit all that excess processing power at the edge of the network — that is, desktop computers running Windows.
Greg Sullivan, lead product manager at Microsoft's Windows development group, acknowledged that "we now live in a world where the dominant application model is living in a Web page" despite the fact that the client must always be connected, that the server becomes a bottleneck, and that HTML apps are clunky to build and use. He noted that even in current desktop applications, hardware is not fully utilized, particularly the GPU (graphics processing unit) now mostly used for games.
Avalon will need all the computing power it can find. Although a subset of the new Avalon graphics subsystem will run on today's hardware, Microsoft technical evangelist Darryn Dieken said developers will need hardware not yet available if they "want a rich visual experience with all the 3D controls."
According to Sullivan, programming will actually be easier with Avalon than with current Windows GUI development thanks to XAML (XML Application Markup Language), which will simplify the creation of graphical interfaces. Moreover, XAML code can be passed from other apps.
Greg DeMichillie, lead analyst at Directions on Microsoft, explained that enterprise customers will have "the possibility of letting graphic artists more directly create the user interface either by entering the markup themselves or by using graphics tools as opposed to programmer tools."
DeMichillie added that the Avalon proposition hinges on a simple question. "Will consumers go out and buy another PC and upgrade, or will corporations buy a new PC and upgrade to get Avalon? Well, the answer to that will depend largely on whether there's some great Avalon app that's so compelling that they say, 'Yeah, I gotta have it,' " DeMichillie said.
One example of Avalon's capabilities was a shopping application developed by Amazon and demonstrated at PDC by Jim Allchin, vice president of Microsoft's platforms group. This downloadable, smart 3D client applied a Rolodex-like metaphor that illustrated the power of WinFS, the new unified storage model. When a user looks up information in a desktop calendar app, for example, it suggests a gift for mom's imminent birthday.
Microsoft revealed previously that WinFS will run on top of rather than replace its existing NTFS (NT File System). But last week the company revealed WinFS will tie into XML-based data storage, enabling developers to exploit standard XML interfaces to data previously locked up in desktop applications.
"The fact that we can start to view information in a consistent way and sort in a consistent way is important," said Ted Schandler, research director at Forrester Research. "Instead of five different storage formats on the client, you've got one. And that's a big deal."
But Schandler and several others reserved their highest praise for Indigo. According to Microsoft Director of Web Services Marketing Steven VanRoekel, Indigo is "a comprehensive implementation of messaging technology" that includes such draft Web services protocols as WS-Policy, WS-Security, WS-Trust, WS-Federation, WS-ReliableMessaging, WS-Coordination, and more.
"Indigo is the closest thing I've seen to XML-based middleware, pure Web-services-based middleware," said John Rhymer, vice president of Giga Research. "People have been talking about this for four years, and here you've got it. It looks like a really good piece of work."
VanRoekel insisted that Indigo goes beyond conventional middleware in its ability to provide standardized, message-based communications to desktop applications. As a part of the Longhorn environment, it changes the way developers view the applications they build from the bottom up, enabling them to assume secure, coordinated, message-based connectivity to other applications from the outset.
"If you're thinking about Web services, you're immediately faced with the kinds of problems that Indigo is meant to solve," Directions on Microsoft's DeMichillie said. "How do I do secure Web services? How do I do Web services that participate in business transactions? So Indigo is the piece I think most corporate developers are going to go home and … immediately start playing with it, at least in an early form."
Make that "very early." Questions as to why Indigo, WinFS, and Avalon were being unveiled years before Longhorn will ship circulated throughout the conference. The darker view was summed up by Giga's Rhymer: "Any discussion of Longhorn at this stage of the game is so, so early that it looked to me like freezing-the-market tactics. It really looked like this is part of the [anti-]Linux campaign."
According to Microsoft representatives, the company used PDC to solicit developer feedback in order to refine its plans. Microsoft also needs developers to create killer Longhorn apps to make the platform's benefits crystal clear — and to drive upgrades to yet another new generation of Windows-based computing.
Longhorn, the forthcoming version of Windows, made its first public outing at last week's Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in Los Angeles.
Not due until 2005 or 2006, Longhorn represents Microsoft's determination to strengthen its desktop stronghold by fostering a new generation of Internet-aware applications.
Underpinning that strategy are Longhorn's three main technology pillars: Avalon, the glossy new 3D GUI; WinFS, a new, XML-based storage scheme; and Indigo, a messaging technology based on Web services. All three fall under the moniker WinFX, an upgrade of the .Net Framework and the new Longhorn application development environment.
Avalon's role can be seen as an attempt to raise the desktop ante with compelling 3D extensions to the Windows GUI so that browser apps pale even more in comparison.
For years, Microsoft has argued that browser-based apps are a step backward. The company has suggested these apps be replaced by smart, Internet-aware client applications that exploit all that excess processing power at the edge of the network — that is, desktop computers running Windows.
Greg Sullivan, lead product manager at Microsoft's Windows development group, acknowledged that "we now live in a world where the dominant application model is living in a Web page" despite the fact that the client must always be connected, that the server becomes a bottleneck, and that HTML apps are clunky to build and use. He noted that even in current desktop applications, hardware is not fully utilized, particularly the GPU (graphics processing unit) now mostly used for games.
Avalon will need all the computing power it can find. Although a subset of the new Avalon graphics subsystem will run on today's hardware, Microsoft technical evangelist Darryn Dieken said developers will need hardware not yet available if they "want a rich visual experience with all the 3D controls."
According to Sullivan, programming will actually be easier with Avalon than with current Windows GUI development thanks to XAML (XML Application Markup Language), which will simplify the creation of graphical interfaces. Moreover, XAML code can be passed from other apps.
Greg DeMichillie, lead analyst at Directions on Microsoft, explained that enterprise customers will have "the possibility of letting graphic artists more directly create the user interface either by entering the markup themselves or by using graphics tools as opposed to programmer tools."
DeMichillie added that the Avalon proposition hinges on a simple question. "Will consumers go out and buy another PC and upgrade, or will corporations buy a new PC and upgrade to get Avalon? Well, the answer to that will depend largely on whether there's some great Avalon app that's so compelling that they say, 'Yeah, I gotta have it,' " DeMichillie said.
One example of Avalon's capabilities was a shopping application developed by Amazon and demonstrated at PDC by Jim Allchin, vice president of Microsoft's platforms group. This downloadable, smart 3D client applied a Rolodex-like metaphor that illustrated the power of WinFS, the new unified storage model. When a user looks up information in a desktop calendar app, for example, it suggests a gift for mom's imminent birthday.
Microsoft revealed previously that WinFS will run on top of rather than replace its existing NTFS (NT File System). But last week the company revealed WinFS will tie into XML-based data storage, enabling developers to exploit standard XML interfaces to data previously locked up in desktop applications.
"The fact that we can start to view information in a consistent way and sort in a consistent way is important," said Ted Schandler, research director at Forrester Research. "Instead of five different storage formats on the client, you've got one. And that's a big deal."
But Schandler and several others reserved their highest praise for Indigo. According to Microsoft Director of Web Services Marketing Steven VanRoekel, Indigo is "a comprehensive implementation of messaging technology" that includes such draft Web services protocols as WS-Policy, WS-Security, WS-Trust, WS-Federation, WS-ReliableMessaging, WS-Coordination, and more.
"Indigo is the closest thing I've seen to XML-based middleware, pure Web-services-based middleware," said John Rhymer, vice president of Giga Research. "People have been talking about this for four years, and here you've got it. It looks like a really good piece of work."
VanRoekel insisted that Indigo goes beyond conventional middleware in its ability to provide standardized, message-based communications to desktop applications. As a part of the Longhorn environment, it changes the way developers view the applications they build from the bottom up, enabling them to assume secure, coordinated, message-based connectivity to other applications from the outset.
"If you're thinking about Web services, you're immediately faced with the kinds of problems that Indigo is meant to solve," Directions on Microsoft's DeMichillie said. "How do I do secure Web services? How do I do Web services that participate in business transactions? So Indigo is the piece I think most corporate developers are going to go home and … immediately start playing with it, at least in an early form."
Make that "very early." Questions as to why Indigo, WinFS, and Avalon were being unveiled years before Longhorn will ship circulated throughout the conference. The darker view was summed up by Giga's Rhymer: "Any discussion of Longhorn at this stage of the game is so, so early that it looked to me like freezing-the-market tactics. It really looked like this is part of the [anti-]Linux campaign."
According to Microsoft representatives, the company used PDC to solicit developer feedback in order to refine its plans. Microsoft also needs developers to create killer Longhorn apps to make the platform's benefits crystal clear — and to drive upgrades to yet another new generation of Windows-based computing.
Microsoft eyes Web services design tool
LOS ANGELES -- Microsoft, at its Professional Developers Conference 2003 here, plans to reveal details of a Web services design tool that is intended to be similar, albeit superior, to BEA Systems' WebLogic Workshop platform, a Microsoft official said.
Generically referred to as "Visual Studio Web Services Design Tool," the product enables visual design and drag-and-drop functionality for modeling and connecting Web services systems, said Prashant Sridharan, lead product manager for Visual Studio at Microsoft. Developers will be able to model operations infrastructure such as routers and datacenter systems for use in Web services applications, according to Sridharan.
Part of the company's Indigo Web services platform, the design tool is due to ship as part of the Whidbey version of the Visual Studio developer tool in 2004.
Generically referred to as "Visual Studio Web Services Design Tool," the product enables visual design and drag-and-drop functionality for modeling and connecting Web services systems, said Prashant Sridharan, lead product manager for Visual Studio at Microsoft. Developers will be able to model operations infrastructure such as routers and datacenter systems for use in Web services applications, according to Sridharan.
Part of the company's Indigo Web services platform, the design tool is due to ship as part of the Whidbey version of the Visual Studio developer tool in 2004.
Microsoft riding Whitehorse for developers
LOS ANGELES -- Microsoft in the "Whidbey" version of the Visual Studio tool, due in 2004, will feature a set of design tools called "Whitehorse," to enable building of services-oriented systems.
Whitehorse enables visualization of relationships between services, according to Rick LaPlante, a general manager in the Microsoft developer division. He spoke during a presentation at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference 2003 here on Tuesday.
LaPlante showed a three-step demonstration in which information is communicated to an engineering team, a view of the datacenter is presented, and a service is validated to conform to policies. Web services can be incorporated or restricted via Whitehorse.
An audience member said the idea of Whitehorse, to unite network operators and developers, is a good one.
"I think that Whitehorse is kind of a great technology, to integrate those two [technology areas]," said attendee John Conger, assistant vice president and senior development analyst at Ivy Asset Management.
Microsoft Senior Vice President Eric Rudder and other Microsoft officials on Tuesday stressed ease of development features planned for Whidbey for both client and Web development.
Print management will be simplified, as will user management. "Whidbey has a feature to deal with objects to simplify printing," Rudder said.
"In Whidbey, we've also taken a dramatic step forward and built in a user management system to ASP .Net," he added.
Visual Basic development is eased in Whidbey, said Ari Bixhorn, lead product manager in the Microsoft developer division. "We really are able to take productivity to new heights, particularly for Visual Basic developers," Bixhorn said.
He gave a demonstration in which he built an insurance claims processing form, which featured guides telling where to drag and drop a particular tools window.
"In Whidbey, we can click on a field; in this case it's a service. We drag and drop it onto our form and boom -- automatically generate a data-bound UI," Bixhorn said.
Also highlighted in Whidbey is a new help system called My Help, providing better searching, a hierarchical view of data, and integrated community features. Help notes are updated as well.
The smart tag feature in Whidbey enables customization of a look and feel of an interface without writing any code, Bixhorn said. Advanced data binding enables binding of a picture to data in SQL Server, for example.
Web application development functions planned for Whidbey enable the product to be combined with ASP .Net for faster development of Web applications, said Scott Guthrie, product unit manager in the Microsoft developer division.
When building new pages on a site, master templates can be used to add content directly to the page. Web services can be accessed for information such as user IDs. Control technology also is used for functions such as providing a login screen, according to Guthrie.
Microsoft also is planning enhancements to its mobile development offerings to dramatically reduce the lines of code required for development, company officials said.
Microsoft's planned Indigo Web services framework also was touted Tuesday. Using Indigo, a Web service that initially took 50,000 lines of code to build in Visual Studio .Net and 27,000 lines of code in the company's Web services enhancements toolkit will be reduced to three lines, according to Rudder.
Additionally, Microsoft plans to release to developers its internally used Prefast tool for checking buffer overruns. The company also plans to release a Longhorn Server update to Windows Server, planned for release in 2004. Longhorn also is the name of the company's client operating system planned for release in 2006.
Whitehorse enables visualization of relationships between services, according to Rick LaPlante, a general manager in the Microsoft developer division. He spoke during a presentation at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference 2003 here on Tuesday.
LaPlante showed a three-step demonstration in which information is communicated to an engineering team, a view of the datacenter is presented, and a service is validated to conform to policies. Web services can be incorporated or restricted via Whitehorse.
An audience member said the idea of Whitehorse, to unite network operators and developers, is a good one.
"I think that Whitehorse is kind of a great technology, to integrate those two [technology areas]," said attendee John Conger, assistant vice president and senior development analyst at Ivy Asset Management.
Microsoft Senior Vice President Eric Rudder and other Microsoft officials on Tuesday stressed ease of development features planned for Whidbey for both client and Web development.
Print management will be simplified, as will user management. "Whidbey has a feature to deal with objects to simplify printing," Rudder said.
"In Whidbey, we've also taken a dramatic step forward and built in a user management system to ASP .Net," he added.
Visual Basic development is eased in Whidbey, said Ari Bixhorn, lead product manager in the Microsoft developer division. "We really are able to take productivity to new heights, particularly for Visual Basic developers," Bixhorn said.
He gave a demonstration in which he built an insurance claims processing form, which featured guides telling where to drag and drop a particular tools window.
"In Whidbey, we can click on a field; in this case it's a service. We drag and drop it onto our form and boom -- automatically generate a data-bound UI," Bixhorn said.
Also highlighted in Whidbey is a new help system called My Help, providing better searching, a hierarchical view of data, and integrated community features. Help notes are updated as well.
The smart tag feature in Whidbey enables customization of a look and feel of an interface without writing any code, Bixhorn said. Advanced data binding enables binding of a picture to data in SQL Server, for example.
Web application development functions planned for Whidbey enable the product to be combined with ASP .Net for faster development of Web applications, said Scott Guthrie, product unit manager in the Microsoft developer division.
When building new pages on a site, master templates can be used to add content directly to the page. Web services can be accessed for information such as user IDs. Control technology also is used for functions such as providing a login screen, according to Guthrie.
Microsoft also is planning enhancements to its mobile development offerings to dramatically reduce the lines of code required for development, company officials said.
Microsoft's planned Indigo Web services framework also was touted Tuesday. Using Indigo, a Web service that initially took 50,000 lines of code to build in Visual Studio .Net and 27,000 lines of code in the company's Web services enhancements toolkit will be reduced to three lines, according to Rudder.
Additionally, Microsoft plans to release to developers its internally used Prefast tool for checking buffer overruns. The company also plans to release a Longhorn Server update to Windows Server, planned for release in 2004. Longhorn also is the name of the company's client operating system planned for release in 2006.
Developers get their hands on Microsoft's NGSCB
LOS ANGELES -- In addition to showing off its next-generation Longhorn operating system this week, Microsoft Corp. for the first time handed out code that underlies its closely watched Next-Generation Secure Computing Base (NGSCB) security technology.
The company also further narrowed its focus for NGSCB, previously known by its Palladium code name, saying it is focused on putting the first version of the hardware-based security technology to work for specific business applications only, not consumer software.
Attendees at Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in Los Angeles received a developer preview of NGSCB. Developers can use this preview to get a feel of what it is like to develop an application that uses NGSCB security.
"This is the first code that we have put out there. It is very early stuff," said Mario Juarez, a product manager at Microsoft's Security Business Unit. "View it as an educational opportunity."
Developers who write code based on the preview get no guarantees that their code it will actually work when NGSCB Version 1 ships as part of Longhorn, Juarez said.
NGSCB is a combination of hardware and software that creates a second operating environment within a PC that is meant to protect the system from malicious code by providing secure connections between applications, peripheral hardware, memory and storage. NGSCB will make its debut as part of Longhorn, the code name for the next version of Windows expected in 2006.
Microsoft is working with software makers, system integrators and large customers in the financial services, healthcare and government areas to create business applications that use NGSCB, Juarez said. These applications include document signing, secure instant messaging, viewing secure data and secure e-mail, he said.
In the past, Microsoft had also pitched NGSCB as an important technology for consumers. It would be part of the cure for the seemingly endless stream of viruses, worms and security bugs that also hits consumer PCs.
"We’re not going to have a consumer story until version two of NGSCB," said Mario Juarez, a product manager at Microsoft's Security Business Unit. No schedule has been set for the release of version two.
Microsoft says the technology could be a boon for PC users, though critics have argued that it is merely a way to deliver strong digital rights management technology that will curtail users' ability to control their own PCs and could erode fair-use rights for digital music and movie files.
NGSCB includes a new software component for Windows called a "nexus," and a chip that can perform cryptographic operations called the Security Support Component (SSC). NGSCB also requires changes to a PC's processor, chipset, video and input hardware, Microsoft has said. Because of the hardware requirements, users will have to buy a new PC to take advantage of NGSCB.
The company also further narrowed its focus for NGSCB, previously known by its Palladium code name, saying it is focused on putting the first version of the hardware-based security technology to work for specific business applications only, not consumer software.
Attendees at Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in Los Angeles received a developer preview of NGSCB. Developers can use this preview to get a feel of what it is like to develop an application that uses NGSCB security.
"This is the first code that we have put out there. It is very early stuff," said Mario Juarez, a product manager at Microsoft's Security Business Unit. "View it as an educational opportunity."
Developers who write code based on the preview get no guarantees that their code it will actually work when NGSCB Version 1 ships as part of Longhorn, Juarez said.
NGSCB is a combination of hardware and software that creates a second operating environment within a PC that is meant to protect the system from malicious code by providing secure connections between applications, peripheral hardware, memory and storage. NGSCB will make its debut as part of Longhorn, the code name for the next version of Windows expected in 2006.
Microsoft is working with software makers, system integrators and large customers in the financial services, healthcare and government areas to create business applications that use NGSCB, Juarez said. These applications include document signing, secure instant messaging, viewing secure data and secure e-mail, he said.
In the past, Microsoft had also pitched NGSCB as an important technology for consumers. It would be part of the cure for the seemingly endless stream of viruses, worms and security bugs that also hits consumer PCs.
"We’re not going to have a consumer story until version two of NGSCB," said Mario Juarez, a product manager at Microsoft's Security Business Unit. No schedule has been set for the release of version two.
Microsoft says the technology could be a boon for PC users, though critics have argued that it is merely a way to deliver strong digital rights management technology that will curtail users' ability to control their own PCs and could erode fair-use rights for digital music and movie files.
NGSCB includes a new software component for Windows called a "nexus," and a chip that can perform cryptographic operations called the Security Support Component (SSC). NGSCB also requires changes to a PC's processor, chipset, video and input hardware, Microsoft has said. Because of the hardware requirements, users will have to buy a new PC to take advantage of NGSCB.
Sunday, December 26, 2004
Exploits released for new Windows flaws
A Chinese security group has released sample code to exploit two new unpatched flaws in Microsoft Windows.
The advisory comes in the week before Christmas, a time when many companies and home users are least prepared to deal with the problems. Security firm Symantec warned its clients of the vulnerabilities on Thursday, after the Chinese company that found the flaws published them to the Internet.
One vulnerability, in the operating system's Load Image Function ( http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/winui/winui/windowsuserinterface/resources/introductiontoresources/resourcereference/resourcefunctions/loadimage.asp ), could enable an attacker to compromise a victim's PC when the computer displays a specially crafted image placed on a Web site or in an e-mail. The other vulnerability, in the Windows Help program, likewise could affect any program that opens a Help file.
Because the flaws are in a library used by Windows programs, almost all browsers and e-mail clients are likely affected by the flaws, said Alfred Huger, senior director of engineering at Symantec.
"They are rather serious," Huger said. "Both can be exploited by anything that processes images or reads help files."
Because the flaws were accompanied by sample code--known as exploit code--that shows how to take advantage of the security holes, Huger expected the exploits to be quickly incorporated into the tools of malicious Internet users.
"The fact that there is an exploit out there is very concerning," he said. "I think you will see it in phishing scams and spyware in very short order."
A mass-mailing computer virus could also quickly begin using the vulnerabilities to spread.
Microsoft could not immediately be reached for comment on the issues.
The flaws came to light on Thursday, when a Chinese security forum, XFOCUS TEAM ( http://www.xfocus.org/ ), posted the issues to its Web site. The vulnerabilities were found by Chinese firm VenusTech and posted on Monday to the Internet, according to the Xfocus posts.
Software companies and corporate information technology departments are often short-staffed during the holiday season. That could mean that the response to this latest threat will be slow, Huger said.
"It is a bad time of year for this to come out," he said.
The advisory comes in the week before Christmas, a time when many companies and home users are least prepared to deal with the problems. Security firm Symantec warned its clients of the vulnerabilities on Thursday, after the Chinese company that found the flaws published them to the Internet.
One vulnerability, in the operating system's Load Image Function ( http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/winui/winui/windowsuserinterface/resources/introductiontoresources/resourcereference/resourcefunctions/loadimage.asp ), could enable an attacker to compromise a victim's PC when the computer displays a specially crafted image placed on a Web site or in an e-mail. The other vulnerability, in the Windows Help program, likewise could affect any program that opens a Help file.
Because the flaws are in a library used by Windows programs, almost all browsers and e-mail clients are likely affected by the flaws, said Alfred Huger, senior director of engineering at Symantec.
"They are rather serious," Huger said. "Both can be exploited by anything that processes images or reads help files."
Because the flaws were accompanied by sample code--known as exploit code--that shows how to take advantage of the security holes, Huger expected the exploits to be quickly incorporated into the tools of malicious Internet users.
"The fact that there is an exploit out there is very concerning," he said. "I think you will see it in phishing scams and spyware in very short order."
A mass-mailing computer virus could also quickly begin using the vulnerabilities to spread.
Microsoft could not immediately be reached for comment on the issues.
The flaws came to light on Thursday, when a Chinese security forum, XFOCUS TEAM ( http://www.xfocus.org/ ), posted the issues to its Web site. The vulnerabilities were found by Chinese firm VenusTech and posted on Monday to the Internet, according to the Xfocus posts.
Software companies and corporate information technology departments are often short-staffed during the holiday season. That could mean that the response to this latest threat will be slow, Huger said.
"It is a bad time of year for this to come out," he said.
Thursday, December 23, 2004
Microsoft readies scaled-back Windows
Less is less.
Microsoft seemed to put that message right into the name of its latest Windows version: Windows XP Reduced Media Edition.
Ordered by European regulators to sell a version of Windows without a built-in media player and denied a stay on Wednesday from an appeals court, Microsoft said it will deliver both Home and Professional versions of the scaled-back operating system to computer makers in January. The Reduced Media editions will be available only in Europe.
Microsoft group product manager Matt Pilla said the company wanted to be as clear as possible about what customers are--or aren't--getting. "As descriptive as we can be in the name, to reduce confusion, the better," Pilla said.
In addition to lacking a copy of Windows Media Player, the new version of Windows won't be able to do things like play a CD or MP3 file or transfer music to a portable device--at least not without additional software from another company. Among the limited media features that do remain are the ability to play .wav files using Sound Recorder as well as a moviemaking program that is separate from Windows Media Player.
"This is the first time we are being required to offer to consumers a version of Windows that provides them with less value rather than more," Microsoft general counsel Brad Smith said in an interview Wednesday.
Customers who opt for the media-player-free version won't be getting a bargain. The EU ordered that Microsoft couldn't charge more for the version sans player, but it didn't say that Microsoft had to charge less.
"I am anticipating that it will be offered on exactly the terms that the court's--I should say that the commission's--decision permits it to be offered, which is the same price as the version of Windows that we offer today," Smith said during a conference call with reporters.
Those who do want the version will also have to head to Europe, as Microsoft said it does not plan to offer the software elsewhere.
"We have no plans to offer this version of Windows outside of the European Economic Area at this time, and I don't expect we'll have any such plans in the future," Smith told reporters. The EEA includes the European Union countries as well as Switzerland and Norway.
Smith said Microsoft has been working on developing the stripped-down version of Windows in advance of Wednesday's ruling.
"We've had technical teams working very hard over a series of months now on all of those steps, and there will be some additional work for the final stages of testing this additional version of Windows, but I think it's fair to say that most of the technical work is behind us," Smith said. "We do have some final stages ahead."
Microsoft said that all of the things that are supposed to work do work, though it still expects support calls from customers expecting features that aren't there.
"There's things that a customer is going to expect that won't work," said Dave Fester, general manager of Microsoft's Windows consumer unit, in an interview. "Customers (using) all operating systems have come to expect certain base functionality, whether it is Windows, Mac or Linux."
Smith did not say what the exact price tag will be for complying with the EU order, but did say "It's not the kind of cost figure that one would consider to be material for a company the size of Microsoft."
Microsoft seemed to put that message right into the name of its latest Windows version: Windows XP Reduced Media Edition.
Ordered by European regulators to sell a version of Windows without a built-in media player and denied a stay on Wednesday from an appeals court, Microsoft said it will deliver both Home and Professional versions of the scaled-back operating system to computer makers in January. The Reduced Media editions will be available only in Europe.
Microsoft group product manager Matt Pilla said the company wanted to be as clear as possible about what customers are--or aren't--getting. "As descriptive as we can be in the name, to reduce confusion, the better," Pilla said.
In addition to lacking a copy of Windows Media Player, the new version of Windows won't be able to do things like play a CD or MP3 file or transfer music to a portable device--at least not without additional software from another company. Among the limited media features that do remain are the ability to play .wav files using Sound Recorder as well as a moviemaking program that is separate from Windows Media Player.
"This is the first time we are being required to offer to consumers a version of Windows that provides them with less value rather than more," Microsoft general counsel Brad Smith said in an interview Wednesday.
Customers who opt for the media-player-free version won't be getting a bargain. The EU ordered that Microsoft couldn't charge more for the version sans player, but it didn't say that Microsoft had to charge less.
"I am anticipating that it will be offered on exactly the terms that the court's--I should say that the commission's--decision permits it to be offered, which is the same price as the version of Windows that we offer today," Smith said during a conference call with reporters.
Those who do want the version will also have to head to Europe, as Microsoft said it does not plan to offer the software elsewhere.
"We have no plans to offer this version of Windows outside of the European Economic Area at this time, and I don't expect we'll have any such plans in the future," Smith told reporters. The EEA includes the European Union countries as well as Switzerland and Norway.
Smith said Microsoft has been working on developing the stripped-down version of Windows in advance of Wednesday's ruling.
"We've had technical teams working very hard over a series of months now on all of those steps, and there will be some additional work for the final stages of testing this additional version of Windows, but I think it's fair to say that most of the technical work is behind us," Smith said. "We do have some final stages ahead."
Microsoft said that all of the things that are supposed to work do work, though it still expects support calls from customers expecting features that aren't there.
"There's things that a customer is going to expect that won't work," said Dave Fester, general manager of Microsoft's Windows consumer unit, in an interview. "Customers (using) all operating systems have come to expect certain base functionality, whether it is Windows, Mac or Linux."
Smith did not say what the exact price tag will be for complying with the EU order, but did say "It's not the kind of cost figure that one would consider to be material for a company the size of Microsoft."
Tuesday, December 21, 2004
IMAGINE CUP 2005
The wait is finally over. As you must have allready seen in the announcements -
Imagine Cup 2005 Software Design India - will be launched shortly (this week).This year's SDI theme is
"Create technology that dissolves boundaries between us"
This year's Round 1 will involve you writing code to get a Mate in One for a chess game
Lots of hints have been provided to help you get started.
Log on to http://www.thespoke.net and regsiter yourselves.
Imagine Cup 2005 Software Design India - will be launched shortly (this week).This year's SDI theme is
"Create technology that dissolves boundaries between us"
This year's Round 1 will involve you writing code to get a Mate in One for a chess game
Lots of hints have been provided to help you get started.
Log on to http://www.thespoke.net and regsiter yourselves.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
