Windows 8 - Next Wave of Growth and New Challenges for Microsoft Chrome OS among them

Moving onward after the successful delivery of Windows 7, Microsoft is concerned not only with putting together the lines of code that will finish up as Windows 8, but also with the evolution of the Windows brand. While the company continues to be largely sister on Windows 7’s successor, and for lovely reason since Windows 7 GA was three months ago, various inside sources have confirmed, albeit unofficially, that Windows 8 planning is already in full swing. However, beyond, future capabilities, features and default components, the application giant is also tending to the evolution of its branding strategy that has Windows at the core.

Earlier this month, Microsoft was looking for the Senior Director of Windows Brand Strategy, a “role [that] will focus on the ‘trifecta’ of Windows brands for the consumer audience (i.e. Windows 7, Windows Live and Windows phone) - providing thought leadership on the query of how the company can evolve and optimize the Windows brand experience in the years to come with Windows 8 and beyond. However, this role will also partner closely with leaders and colleagues on the commercial audience pivot to refine and evolve the holistic brand strategy for Windows Client, Windows Server, Windows Azure and Windows Embedded,” according to Microsoft.

The Windows brand strategy will move forward along with the operating technique itself, and it will fall onto Microsoft to make sure that marketing is tailored to consumers, that public relations are strengthened, and to manage events, web presence and relationships in a manner that will benefit the product.

“The Brand Strategy team (Central Marketing Group) works closely with the company’s business group leaders, marketers and engineers to set and manage Microsoft’s brand portfolio strategy, identity, and architecture. The group also tracks and measures brand health of the Microsoft master brand and key sub brands,” the company noted.

As Windows 8 will start to take contour and Microsoft will enter what the company is thinking about the next wave of growth, it will be CMG’s efforts that will be responsible for attracting new customers, and making marketing campaigns increasingly efficient. According to the application giant, the Senior Director, Windows Brand Strategy will work on Windows brand architecture, strategy, naming, identity, and brand health measurement.

“The Windows brand is the flagship of Microsoft’s brand portfolio. Synonymous with Microsoft for much of its history, the Windows brand has amazingly strong global brand equity. Over 1 billion people use Windows application on their PC every day, and 500 million people use Windows Live services on the world wide web or mobile phone. While the equity is strong, the Windows brand is facing new challenges from the changing marketplace and competitive pressures. Google, with its Android and Chrome operating systems, poses a whole new set of challenges in addition to the traditional competition from Apple,” the company said.

What is interesting is that Microsoft mentions Apple and Google Chrome OS, but ignores Linux. And fact is that even ahead of Windows 7’s GA, Windows XP managed to win the netbook war against Linux, and grab the vast majority of the market. Meanwhile, Mac sales continue to push up the market share of Mac OS X, although Apple’s OS did trip a tiny after Windows 7 was launched.

Linux continues to hold approximately 1% of the OS market, according to Net Applications, but apparently Microsoft is more concerned with newcomer Google Chrome OS, which will only be available to customers preinstalled on new netbooks at the finish of 2010. Still, Chrome OS will have not only the Google financial power behind it, but and a brand that consumers largely applaud and are quick to embrace because of the search engine that has become virtually synonymous with the Net.

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Windows 8 and Windows 7 SP1 Preparations alongside Windows 7 Development

“Efforts lead to an unprecedented state of servicing readiness for Windows. Windows 7 Service Pack technologies, processes & builds were ready over a year before release compared to Vista & previous OSes which did not reach that state of servicing readiness & quality for months after release. Planning servicing quality goals, metrics, processes, & tools & technologies for Windows 8,” reads an excerpt from Badruddin’s CV.

Unlike the work done for Vista & earlier releases of Windows. Microsoft started preparing for the next releases of the Windows client as the latest iteration of the operating method was still in development. The Redmond-based company already debuted work to ensure the servicing readiness for Windows 7 Service Pack 1 & started planning for Windows 8, the successor of Windows 7. The information comes from the profile of Ahmed Badruddin, a Microsoft Program Design Engineer in Check II since September 2008 until present day. Badruddin was four of the people that labored to define & execute the testing strategy associated with improving Windows 7 Service Pack experience quality. (by MSFTKitchen)

Users that were walking Windows Vista RTM at the start of 2008 surely recall the glitches that Microsoft hit with the deployment of Service Pack 1. The Redmond-based company ended up postponing the delivery of Vista SP1 until it managed to release updates designed to get Vista RTM operating systems ready for the implementation of SP1. It appears that the program giant is looking to keep away from similar hassles with the release of Windows 7 SP1 & beyond, with Windows 8.

This is why Badruddin, along with additional Microsoft employees “spearheaded initiatives & projects to drive up the quality of Windows 7 (Microsoft’s next operating method) Service Pack experience. Collaborated with teams across Windows organization to mitigate risks to Windows 7 Service Pack 1.”

Back in the first half of June 2009, Windows 7 Build 7227 was leaked in the wild. Build 7227 was unlike any other pre-release Windows 7 development milestone, as a version check revealed that it already featured SP1. I speculated at the time that Windows 7 Build 7227 with SP1 was nothing over the result of Microsoft testing serviceability for the first major upgrade of the OS, & it looks like I was right.

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Microsoft eyeing Google, Apple with Windows 8 development

As it develops Windows 8, Microsoft has come to acknowledge both Apple and Google as competitors for the hearts and minds of current and would-be Windows users.
It's been months since Windows 7's successor has entered the planning and early development stages, and already Microsoft is taking aim at its competition deep inside its headquarters. At least two of them, Apple and Google, are being scrutinized closely, according to sources within the company. Despite the strong start Windows 7 has had, and Windows' large installed base, the company realizes that there's new challenges in the changing marketplace that must be met head-on if the Windows brand is to continue to flourish.

Specifically, Microsoft is taking note of competitive pressures from Google, with its Android and Chrome operating systems, saying that the search giant "poses a whole new set of challenges." As for Apple, Microsoft noted that the company could not be forgotten, because there would still be the "the traditional competition" from Cupertino. Linux was not explicitly mentioned, though this is likely because Microsoft believes it poses a bigger threat in the business space, and sources say this particular discussion looked at the consumer-facing aspects of the Windows brand.

Microsoft is planning to switch internal focus from Windows 7 to Windows 8 at the start of its next fiscal year in July 2010, and according to a Microsoft roadmap, Windows 7's and Windows Server 2008 R2's successors are slated for release in 2012. Tidbits for Windows 8 will continue to come in till then, including more on where the branding of the operating technique will be heading.

Microsoft will focus on evolving and optimizing "the Windows brand experience," specifically the "trifecta" of Windows brands for the consumer audience (Windows 7, Windows Live, and Windows phone) in the years to come with Windows 8 and beyond, sources said. More broadly, Microsoft leaders and colleagues will be trying to refine "the holistic brand strategy" for Windows Client, Windows Server, Windows Azure, and Windows Embedded.

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Stick with Windows 7/Windows 8, No Chrome OS for You

 
Holding your breath for the Windows killer from Google? Perhaps it will be a lovely idea to exhale, if you haven’t completed so sooner this year, when the Mountain View-based search giant unveiled Chromium OS. As increasingly Google Chrome OS details are released to the public, it is becoming increasingly clear that Google’s own breed of a Linux open source operating method is incapable of replacing Windows, and that it wasn’t designed as a substitute for Microsoft’s proprietary operating method. Approximately a year ahead of Chrome OS’ general availability date, the platform is destined to at best coexist alongside Windows; however, Windows 7 and Windows 8 after it will continue to be the operating systems of choice for consumers.

“Google Chrome OS is not a conventional operating method that you can download or buy on a disc and install. As a consumer, the way you will get Google Chrome OS is by buying a netbook that has Google Chrome OS installed by the OEM. Google Chrome OS is being developed to run on new machines that are specially optimized for increased security and performance. They are working with manufacturers to create reference hardware for Google Chrome OS. These netbooks will be available in the fourth quarter of 2010,” reads an excerpt from the Chromium Developer FAQ.

“Google Chrome OS will seamlessly auto-update so that users have the latest and greatest features and fixes. Google Chrome OS will be supported by Google and our partners, whereas Chromium OS is supported by the open source community, but they fundamentally share the same code base. Google Chrome OS also has some chilled firmware features, verified boot and easy recovery, which need corresponding hardware changes and thus also don't work in Chromium OS builds,” Google stated.

Ultimately, what separates a non-conventional OS from a fully-fledged platform is the lack of customer choice. As mentioned in the quote above, restrictions start with the actual hardware. Customers basically won’t be able to buy a new machine off the shelve, or build their own computer from scratch and slap Chrome OS on top expecting it to work seamlessly. While Chrome OS binaries can be obtained from the Chromium OS project, they won’t be coming from Google, but from third-parties, they won’t feature update functionality, and it won’t be officially supported by the Mountain View company.

But this will be the Google Chrome OS that will only start being available with new notebooks at the finish of 2010. And by the finish of 2010, Microsoft would have already delivered the first service pack for Windows 7, and be neck deep in to the development method of Windows 8, the next iteration of Windows. And while Google Chrome OS binaries are already up for grabs in the wild, including a version from Dell, Google is telling finish users that the platform is not ready for “public consumption.”

“If you are the kind of developer who likes to build an open source operating method from scratch, you can check out Chromium OS, build it and experiment with it. A quantity of sites have also posted pre-built binaries of Chromium OS. However, these downloads are not verified by Google, therefore ensure you trust the site you are downloading these from. Keep in mind that Chrome OS is not yet ready for general consumer use,” the search giant added.

However, Google clarified some issues related to hardware support. Although initially it appeared that Chrome OS and Chromium OS won’t be playing nice with traditional hard disks, this is not true. Google noted that it preferred solid state drives (SSDs) to hard disk drives (HDDs), for performance and reliability reasons, and that OEM partners would equip Chrome OS notebooks with the first. However, Chromium OS does work with conventional HDDs, but users will suffer a depreciation of performance. Moreover, additional hardware products and devices with existing open source/Linux drivers can be tailored to work with Chrome OS/Chromium OS.

But perhaps the largest downside of Chrome OS is related to program. “Google Chrome OS is a web-centric method, so all applications are web applications; this provides powerful and simple manageability and security. To write applications that will benefit from native code execution they recommend using NativeClient, an open source project that allows web apps to run native code securely within a browser. Of coursework Chromium OS is open source, and it is Linux. This means that as a developer you can do much anything you require, including installing any Linux application,” Google stated. Yes, if you’re a Linux developer. But are you? I know I’m not.

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Windows 8 Coming into Focus in 2010,The company mentions Win 8 in a multitude of job posts

Windows 7 was released to manufacturing on July 22nd, 2009, along with Windows Server 2008 R2, & both platforms made it to customers by October 22nd, 2009, with the client flavor of the OS being the last to reach the general availability stage. Undoubtedly, for the latest iterations of the client & server operating systems, the Redmond company will produce the first service pack come next year. There might even be a third service pack for Windows Vista, although Microsoft is keeping all details under a hermetically shut lid. But one thing is sure, as 2010 rolls in, Microsoft will shift its focus to Windows 8, the next generation of Windows.

Users are bound not to come across publicly shared details on Windows 8 from Microsoft for some time. Going out on a limb, I would say that the application giant will start unveiling the first Win8 information through official channels no sooner than the finish of 2010, or even in 2011. After all, Jon DeVaan, senior vice president, Windows Core Operating Technique Division, & Steven Sinofsky, president, Windows & Windows Live Division, kicked off the Windows 7 engineering conversation with the public in August 2008, a year & a half after Vista’s GA in January 2007.

In some way, the application giant is already offering Windows 8 tidbits to the public, albeit, all details available are insufficient to contour the company’s designs & strategy for the next iteration of Windows. As Windows 7’s successor starts coming in to focus, Microsoft is looking for additional people to join the planning & development efforts behind the Windows project. In this regard, the company has published a variety of Windows 8 related job posts, which have been “harvested” by a variety of Microsoft watchers, including MSFTKitchen.

Make no mistake about it, Sinofsky continues to helm the Windows project, & Windows 8 is bound to follow in the footsteps of its predecessor, Windows 7. Certainly, Sinofsky won't need to change what proved to be a winning strategy, thinking about the indications of Windows 7’s early commercial success, with strong sales, outpacing Vista’s by over double.

Microsoft has the Windows 8 job for you

One of the most interesting Windows 8 roles Microsoft is looking to fill is that of Sr. Manager, Partner Skills Development – Launch Lead, in the Worldwide Partner Group (WPG), Small Medium Solutions & Partners (SMS&P) Division for Microsoft Business.

Then there’s the Application Engineering: Program Management job for the Windows Division.

“Do you need to help ready the entire partner ecosystem on all the new Microsoft products & solutions? The Partner Skills Development Team is looking for a senior thought leader & skilled project/product manager to ensure the health of the partner ecosystem through the strategic evolution skills development framework (& its execution) for upcoming Microsoft product launches. For example, in Fy10, the focus will be on Windows Server R2, SQL Server R2, & Wave 14 (Office 2010, SharePoint 2010, & Exchange 2010) &, as they head in to Fy11, the focus will quickly switch to Windows 8. In this role you will lead the execution of partner skills development BOMs – by partner type for the entire partner ecosystem – on a WW basis. This role with interact with & influence individuals from across Microsoft, including individuals within the Worldwide Partner Group, Microsoft Learning, SMSGR, the product groups (BGs), Operations, & partner segment teams with SMSG,” Microsoft reveals.

“Are you ready to get closer to Microsoft’s best customers & biggest partners while staying in a highly technical role? The new Ecosystem Fundamentals team in Windows is hiring a Senior PM to work closely with OEMs driving continued increases in performance & reliability while providing tools, testing, training & telemetry. The successful candidate for this critical role will ride the Windows 7 wave of success to enabling continued improvements in to the ecosystem. This work includes Windows 8 planning, OEM gizmo & kit ownership, performance testing & analysis focused on improving the hardware/software ecosystem while working closely with OEMs, ODMs, ISVs, & IHVs in order to strengthen Windows partnerships. Now is the time to move in to a great role centered in the Windows group & focused on customer satisfaction improvements based on solid engineering,” according to the company.


“The Windows Fundamentals Reliability, Security & Privacy (ReSP) team will improve the quality of Windows 8 by driving the trustworthy computing pillars of reliability, security & privacy in the Windows operating technique. They analyze reliability information from hundreds of millions of machines, making data-driven decisions to improve the ecosystem-meaning Windows itself, other Microsoft products, & our partners such as the OEMs, ODMs, chip makers, ISVs & IHVs. They will extend this to measuring the security & privacy of the ecosystem as well. They believe Windows will transparently recover from failures & will drive scenarios to enable this. They broadly own implementing the SDL method inside Windows, & will extend the SDL concepts to reliability, & possibly other Fundamentals. They have strong technology ownership in support of this mission, including advanced detection, control & reporting components such as the client-side portions of Windows Error Reporting (WER), Application Quality Metrics (SQM), Reliability Analysis Component (RAC), & prevention & recovery technologies such as the WinRE, restart manager, fault-tolerant heap, method reflection, RADAR leak detection, & network hang recovery. They will continue to build on our world-class auto-analysis & expert debugging infrastructure which processes millions of user & kernel mode failures, as well as expanding on tools & check infrastructures such as Longhaul testing, & a Fuzz testing lab infrastructure & expertise for testing protocols across Windows,” Microsoft notes in a job post for the position of Application Engineering: Check in the Windows Division.

“The Application Experience Bug Inquiry Team, AEBit, is looking for passionate SDETs that need to make an impact on Windows 8. On the AEBit team you will get the unique opportunity to challenge & grow your debugging skills on issues that span the entire OS. You will have the opportunity to engage with application vendors, OEMs, as well as internal component teams. You will also be applying & enhancing your knowledge of technique internals. As part of the AEBit team you will be responsible for driving & ensuring compatibility in Windows by engaging with component teams, root causing application bugs, & authoring mitigations. If you are a strong SDET looking for a challenge they would like to listen to from you,” an excerpt from a Application Engineering: Check job with the Windows Division reads.

A job in Application Engineering: Development for Server & Tools Business deals with Windows 8 Server: “Windows Server is the top-selling server operating technique & is growing share in a growing market. Central to the success of Windows Server is the experience of IT Professionals managing Windows Server. For our next release, they are taking that experience to the next level by helping to make IT Professionals more effective & more productive by shipping a product they will love to use.We work closely with UX & a passionate PM & Check team to deliver world-beating user experiences for managing Windows Servers. For Windows 8 Server, they are planning, architecting & building a new UX framework around themes that are key to the success of the entire Server product line.”

Of work, Windows 8 & Windows Live will continue to be joined at the hip, as Microsoft brings the Windows client closer to the Cloud. “The Windows Live Mail team is looking for a seasoned Lead Program Manager to drive our next generation Mail client, & manage one stellar PMs. Our client has over 40M users world-wide, & serves as a key component of our Windows Live 'light up Windows' strategy. Our current release is centered on hot new consumer features & better synergies with Hotmail & Windows 7, & our future releases will likely be tightly designed to work best with new Windows 8 platform technologies. They will also work closely with the Outlook team on ways to bring Windows Live to Outlook. Mail is part of the WL Desktop Communications team, which also includes Messenger. Our team values user-centered design, technical & engineering excellence, & attention to detail.”

Microsoft is also looking to create new IIS features for Windows 8. From the job post for a Program Management position with the Server & Tools Business: “IIS team is looking for an experienced PM to join our core platform team. Your role will span across driving key features in to Windows 8 as well as owning several out-of-band modules, including web analytics that will bring business intelligence for the customers that host applications & contents on IIS. Your work will help differentiate IIS & Smooth Streaming from Apache & Flash. You ought to also be ready to work in a fast-paced environment & have a strong desire for quality, security, & performance. Your feature will be used by millions of customers.”

“The TAG team provides the foundation services & infrastructure to support a unified check & dev workflow. This team’s charter includes – developing & jogging a unified check submission & execution technique for Windows 8, Automating Check pass scheduling & execution, results analysis & automated triage, Windows code coverage services, Developing & jogging the eBVT quality gate, supporting WinSE’s Windows 7 sustained engineering check needs. This is an exciting time to join the Check Automation & Gates team & lead the next wave of foundation services & infrastructure to ensure delivery of a high quality product. With openings across the team, there’s sure to be the perfect opportunity suited to your specific passion & enthusiasm,” Microsoft mentions in a job for the Windows TAG team.

The Redmond company is additionally looking for a application engineer to influence & contribute to Windows 8 serviceability. “The WinSE UX check team needs a strong SDET to create new check automation, write robust check designs, designing check cases, debug reported issues across Windows Shell & related UX, help establish sound check engineering processes, & influence & contribute to the serviceability of Windows 8. As an SDET on this team, you’ll design, implement, & execute various types of check automation, including functional, integration & release tests. You will also have several opportunities to write check tools, & work on security bugs, & will be interacting with PM & Dev counterparts in a dev/test/pm trio, & various partner teams. In this team, you will have an opportunity to ship important updates for Windows to solve critical reliability, performance & security issues by the Windows Update mechanism. This position requires strong communication & collaboration skills, & a drive for results. Overall, this position is best suited for a strong SDET looking for an opportunity to showcase your skills & innovate.”

There’s one aspect that is already set in stone, so to speak, when it comes down to Windows 8, one that not even Microsoft can, or will dispute, for that matter. Windows 8 Server will be a major release of the Windows Server operating technique, as opposed to Windows 7 Server, which ended up as a Release 2, namely Windows Server 2008 R2. Microsoft has argued that Windows 7 is indeed a major version of the Windows client, despite having Vista at its foundation, & 6.1 versioning specific of the evolutionary, than revolutionary development model selected.

Windows 8 in the making

The intimate connection between Windows client & server releases, following Vista SP1 & Windows Server 2008 RTM/SP1, continued with Windows 7 & Windows Server 2008 R2, & is bound to survive with the building of Windows 8 & Windows 8 Server. But, in this context, it remains to be seen whether Windows 8 Server will drag Windows 8 along with it, & make it a new, undisputable, major version of the client, one that Microsoft won’t must defend.

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Windows 8: Microsoft Shifting Focus To Next OS In July 2010

 
Various job listings posted online this November have hinted at when Microsoft designs to shift its focus to Windows 8.

Most early adopters of Microsoft's latest offering, Windows 7, are still getting settled in to the month-old OS, and discovering what the highly favored current version of Windows can do. However, it seems the guys up in Redmond are not hanging around, as this past month alone Microsoft has posted five job openings in the hopes of finding folks to work on Windows 8.

So what tidbits of Windows 8 knowledge can they glean from the vacancies listed? They already know from a recent product roadmap that Microsoft's next OS is expected to hit retail some time in 2012, and according to rumors it could pack in 128-bit support (though some have cast doubt on that possibility).

Technology site Ars Technica discovered the job listings over on Microsoft's official careers page. A number of the listings have since been edited or removed, but Ars Technica still has the original listings obtainable in full on their site.

But these fresh vacancies,



which include an assortment of positions such as testers, project management personnel, and launch leads, hint that Microsoft is planning to shift its internal focus to Windows 8 as they "head in to Fy11". The fiscal year for 2011 begins in July of 2010, which gives Microsoft two years to perfect Windows 8 before it is expected 2012 debut.

Follow GeekTech and Chris Brandrick on Twitter.

What would you like to see in Windows 8? Let us know in the comments!

This story was updated on Dec. 3 to clarify what was mentioned in the Windows product roadmap .

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Windows 8 in development, Google’s Translation of Windows 8 Mention on Microsoft China

Google’s Translation of Windows 8 Mention on Microsoft China

To support a large number of program & hardware is a feature of Windows, but also with other operating systems is two major difference. In the solution of problems of cross-age sense of Windows7 hardware ecosystem compatibility issue, Microsoft China R & D Group's hardware innovation center stage in the beginning of the project suffered an embarrassing.

With these questions in that they found the country's largest IT equipment, the computer stores the Pacific Ocean, through the co-operation with them to analyze sales information stores inside the peripheral, has made the authority of the hardware market information. By looking at sales information, they found that the market with Windows-related hardware products was over 28,000 species, only the access to this two, in the Chinese market on over 640 kinds. However, on further analysis, they found that although hundreds of thousands of products in each section, but occupy 80% of pre-sales Ranking the number of products is limited. For example, there is a Although there's 253 kinds of the scanner, but the sales of the top 28 kinds of products has already covered 80% of the market. Therefore, only check the 28 kinds of products, they can cover the user's Bacheng scanner.

As China's wide variety of hardware products. Therefore, received the mandate, the team on how to select products tested produced a confused, they tentatively put forward two hundred mainstream peripheral pre-test program. At this time, Windows vice president, a series of questions put to them ---- these first 200 peripheral mean? 20% of the market, 60%? Or 80%? Importance there? For these problems, they can not answer, only Momobizai, embarrassed to go home.

Completed these words, he also added in the hope of the Chinese team to check range to cover the Jiucheng market. Of work, through a complete hardware sales information, hardware innovation center engineers quickly calculated to cover the scope of this new check.

After that, they started a list of the equipment of targeted testing. When the team has revised the plan & the preliminary check results with the vice president in charge of re-sharing, he became very happy, & told the Chinese team, he's thought about this issue for years, & our measures for this problem provides the most nice solution simultaneously, he praised that "you have the best peripherals on the planet list!"

Thanks to "the list of the best peripheral", Windows 7 have a high degree of compatibility of the hardware ecosystem. In Windows the occasion of the upcoming next-generation process, Windows 8 planning meeting is also Microsoft's headquarters. At the meeting, their peripheral testing strategy is also over 3,000 people demonstrated in full before the Windows team. Now, they start to deepen the market information analysis to quarterly changes, & testing to identify major trends & changes, & with headquarters in real-time sharing. Through this approach will soon become the world's largest PC market in China's hardware & ecological information, it will further affect the evolution of the next generation of Windows, but also affected the whole world.

Source: Microsoft China

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Microsoft to switch internal focus to Windows 8 in July 2010

 
The first job posting is from November 3, 2009 & is looking for somebody to fill the Application Engineering: Check job section by working on critical updates that will be delivered through Windows Update for Windows 8:

Seven more job postings were posted last month that mention Windows 8. From them, they can glean a few small tidibits about Windows 7's successor.
With another month gone (boy that two flew by), it is time to take a look at what Microsoft Careers, a great source for scraps on future Microsoft products, had to say about Windows 8 over the last 30 days or so. This month they saw two job postings regarding the successor to both Windows 7 & Windows Server 2008 R2, each two offering a small glimpse in to what Microsoft is thinking about. Before they go through them in chronological order, they ought to note that a quantity of them have already been removed & others have been slightly reworded, so what you see below is the original unedited versions Microsoft first posted & which they saved until now.

 The WinSE UX check team needs an strong SDET to create new check automation, write robust check designs, designing check cases, debug reported issues across Windows Shell & related UX, help establish sound check engineering processes, & influence & contribute to the serviceability of Win8. As an SDET on this team, you'll design, implement, & execute various types of check automation, including functional, integration & release tests. You will also have several opportunities to write check tools, & work on security bugs, & will be interacting with PM & Dev counterparts in a dev/test/pm trio, & various partner teams. In this team, you will have an opportunity to ship important updates for Windows to solve critical reliability, performance & security issues by the Windows Update mechanism. This position requires strong communication & collaboration skills, as well as a drive for results. Overall, this position is best suited for a strong SDET looking for an opportunity to showcase your skills & innovate.

 The WinSE UX Check team is two of the most fun teams in Windows Sustaining Engineering to work with! They release hot-fixes, security patches & Service packs for all Windows platforms on a regular basis. They help keep our customer install base humming through a significant portion of the lifecycle of the product. If the experience of shipping deliverables to millions of people on a regular basis energizes you, if you enjoy working on issues that impact those millions of our customers all the time, if you enjoy being in the glare of publicity, & if you enjoy the thrill of solving critical problems, you have come to the right place!!!

The second job posting arrived soon after, on November 4, 2009, asking for another Application Engineering: Check employee who will be doing various forms of testing internationally:

 The Windows International Check OOB (Out of Band) team is handling a variety of International check projects including Windows Small Business Server (SBS), Home Server, stand-alone out of band releases for Windows 7/Windows 8, & down-level support packages requested by different business divisions by utilizing a state-of-the art seller outsourcing model.

The third job posting arrived a week later on November 11, 2009, looking for a Application Engineering: Development employee who would help the Windows Update team prepare for Windows 8. It's since been removed, but we have saved the text:

 As a team member in this position, you will write check designs for World-Readiness- (Globalization & Localizability) as well as Localization Testing, & create & manage check tools & guidelines. You will also perform globalization code reviews as part of the OOB method using tools & globalization guidelines. In addition, you will must engage with Program Managers, Developers, International Project Managers & partner SDETs to collaborate on specification reviews, scheduling as well as budgeting & planning. Check execution will be done by seller check resources in Beijing, China, so management of remote seller resource will also be necessary.

 As part of this team, you will help shape Windows 8. Components of our code include a core agent that runs as an NT service, an API layer as well as a UI application. They talk to the update servers using web services & they have special protocols in place to deal with the gigantic scale of the process.

 This is a great time to join us. Our team owns the Windows Update Client & our code delivers application & updates to over 600 million computers. They done up work on Windows 7, & are pushing forth on Windows 8 planning & preparation. There's opportunities to work on a quantity of hard problems, including third-party application updating, updating virtual machines while they are turned off (turns out this is hard!), & delivering full applications, among others. To help us charge full steam on these fronts, they are looking for skilled & passionate application engineers.

 Windows Server is the top-selling server operating process & is growing share in a growing market. Central to the success of Windows Server is the experience of IT Professionals managing Windows Server. For our next release, they are taking that experience to the next level by helping to make IT Professionals more effective & more productive by shipping a product they will love to use.

The fourth job posting made its appearance on November 17, 2009 asking for somebody for the Application Engineering: Development job section. It specifically talked about Windows 8 Server as well as a new UX framework before being significantly reworded:

 They are looking for a Application Development Engineer experienced in UI Design to help lead, architect, write code, & deliver the next generation of Server Management experiences. In this role, you will document directly to the Development Manager, oversee & help architect the new design, & work closely with lots of other teams delivering in Windows Server. You will take on the challenge of bridging the existing with the new & have an understanding & appreciation of both user interaction design & systems application. You will also have a record of technical leadership, nice planning, & shipping world-class application.

 They work closely with UX as well as a passionate PM & Check team to deliver world-beating user experiences for managing Windows Servers. For Windows 8 Server, they are planning, architecting & building a new UX framework around themes that are key to the success of the entire Server product line.

 Are you ready to get closer to Microsoft's best customers & biggest partners while staying in a highly technical role? The new Ecosystem Fundamentals team in Windows is hiring a Senior PM to work closely with OEMs driving continued increases in performance & reliability while providing tools, testing, training & telemetry. The successful candidate for this critical role will ride the Windows 7 wave of success to enabling continued improvements in to the ecosystem. This work includes Windows 8 planning, OEM gizmo & kit ownership, performance testing & analysis focused on improving the hardware/software ecosystem while working closely with OEMs, ODMs, ISVs, & IHVs in order to strengthen Windows partnerships. Now is the time to move in to a great role centered in the Windows group & focused on customer satisfaction improvements based on solid engineering.

The fifth job posting is from a day later, on November 18, 2009, & is looking for somebody in the Application Engineering: Program Management job section who would make sure to work closely with Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), Original Design Manufacturers (ODMs), Independent Application Vendors (ISVs), & Independent Hardware Vendors (IHVs) for Windows 8:

 Do you need to work in a group that you know is strategic to Microsoft's growth designs? Do you need to have impact on a global scale? Come join the Worldwide Partner Group. Partners generate over 90% of Microsoft's $40 billion in annual revenue, & at over 650,000 partners strong, Microsoft has the largest, & best, channel in the industry. Be a part of the team that is driving significant business impact by evolving the Microsoft Partner Program (MSPP) to maximize the leverage of this strategic asset.

The sixth job posting arrived on November 20, 2009, requesting a Sr. Manager, Partner Skills Development - Launch Lead who is to change business focus from Windows 7 to Windows 8 in fiscal year 2011. Microsoft's fiscal year starts in July, which is only four months away. According to Microsoft's roadmaps, the release of Windows 8 is scheduled for release in 2012. Here's the body of the job posting:

Finally, the last job posting of the month arrived on November 24, 2009, requesting somebody for the Application Engineering: Check job section who wants to work on improving reliability, security, & privacy in Windows 8:

 Job Purpose/Overview: Do you need to help ready the entire partner ecosystem on all the new Microsoft products & solutions? The Partner Skills Development Team is looking for a senior thought leader & skilled project/product manager to ensure the health of the partner ecosystem through the strategic evolution skills development framework (& its execution) for upcoming Microsoft product launches. For example, in Fy10, the focus will be on Windows Server R2, SQL Server R2, & Wave 14 (Office 2010, SharePoint 2010, & Exchange 2010) &, as they head in to Fy11, the focus will quickly switch to Windows 8. In this role you will lead the execution of partner skills development BOMs - by partner type for the entire partner ecosystem - on a WW basis. This role with interact with & influence individuals from across Microsoft, including individuals within the Worldwide Partner Group, Microsoft Learning, SMSGR, the product groups (BGs), Operations, & partner segment teams with SMSG.

 Do you need to be on the cutting edge of detecting the latest security threats in the wild? Are you passionate about improving customers' perception of Windows reliability & performance? Do you need to help our ISVs better understand how they can make their application more secure & reliable? If so, the Detection, Control, & Measurement (DCM) team is for you! The DCM team is dedicated to improving the reliability, security, performance & privacy of Windows by helping to "Detect" inbox issues, "Control" failures, & "Measure" issues & relaying that information back to Microsoft so action can be taken. A quantity of the core technologies in this team include Windows Error Reporting clients (WER aka Watson/Kernel Crash), Reliability Analysis Component (RAC), Perftrack, & SQM.

 The Windows Fundamentals Reliability, Security & Privacy (ReSP) team will improve the quality of Windows 8 by driving the trustworthy computing pillars of reliability, security & privacy in the Windows operating process. They analyze reliability information from hundreds of millions of machines, making data-driven decisions to improve the ecosystem-meaning Windows itself, other Microsoft products, & our partners such as the OEMs, ODMs, chip makers, ISVs & IHVs. They will extend this to measuring the security & privacy of the ecosystem as well. They believe Windows will transparently recover from failures & will drive scenarios to enable this. They broadly own implementing the SDL method inside Windows, & will extend the SDL concepts to reliability, & possibly other Fundamentals. They have strong technology ownership in support of this mission, including advanced detection, control & reporting components such as the client-side portions of Windows Error Reporting (WER), Application Quality Metrics (SQM), Reliability Analysis Component (RAC), & prevention & recovery technologies such as the WinRE, restart manager, fault-tolerant heap, method reflection, RADAR leak detection, & network hang recovery. They will continue to build on our world-class auto-analysis & expert debugging infrastructure which processes millions of user & kernel mode failures, as well as expanding on tools & check infrastructures such as Longhaul testing, as well as a Fuzz testing lab infrastructure & expertise for testing protocols across Windows.

In the first week of October 2009, they rounded up every minor detail that bloggers had posted on Windows 8, & then at the finish of October 2009, they posted about the remaining job postings related to Windows 8 that Microsoft made. Now we are caught up again with the job postings made in November 2009, & we'll be keeping an eye on anything that gets posted in December 2009.

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Windows 8 2012 ,Windows 8: More Roadmaps

Well, on this day of PDC 2009, since I won’t listen to anything about Windows 8, I took it on myself to see what I could scrounge up. It looks like a bit more is being announced to partners where Windows 8 Server is concerned… well, in the context of a roadmap, at least. The information all says the same thing I’ve been reporting by other roadmaps: Windows 8 being released around a timeframe of 2012. Perhaps the whole, “end-of-the-world” thing in 2012 has something to do with Windows 8. Or not. lol. Either way, here are the additions to my ginormous
 roadmap collection
Windows 8

 

 

Although that second roadmap doesn’t have anything listed for a name, it’s two times again the same elderly song: Windows 8 ~2012.:

 

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Windows 8, and So It Begins Revolutionary vs. evolutionary

 
Back in early 2007, after Windows Vista shipped to customers worldwide, Microsoft shifted its focus on what was at the time referred to as Windows codename Vienna, & which ended up as Windows 7. The company delivered a taste of early designs, noting that it was aiming for a release ahead of 2009, but nothing more after that. In fact, it wasn’t until August 2008 that Sinofsky started sharing crumbs from the development method of Windows 7, at a time when the operating method was between the Milestone 2 & Milestone 3 development stages.

Windows 7 was released to manufacturing on July 22, & hit the shelves on October 22, generating obvious questions about what’s next for Microsoft’s proprietary operating method. & the answer is simple: Windows 8. This time around, the Redmond-based company made small efforts to hide the moniker associated with the next generation of the Windows client. Not that it could, given that the codename aspect of Windows development efforts is the only transparent aspect of the otherwise translucent communication strategy set in place by Steven Sinofsky, President, Windows & Windows Live Division.

With Windows 7 wrapped up, Sinofsky was upgraded to the President position from senior vice president of the Windows & Windows Live engineering group, but as it was the case for Windows 7, Windows 8 will be developed in accordance with his vision. With Sinofsky at the helm of the Windows 8 project, Osterman could even expect the same development experience as for Windows 7.

In this regard, it is interesting to understand how early Microsoft actually started building the successor of Windows Vista. According to Larry Osterman, Microsoft Principal SDE, the Windows team was hard at work coding for Windows 7 within 4-5 months after the general availability of Vista. “In June of 2007, they started working on actual feature planning – the planning team had come up with a set of tentative features for Win7 & they started the actual design for the features – figuring out the user experience for the features, the internal implementation details, etc.,” Osterman noted.

Revolutionary vs. evolutionary

“The remarkable thing about Win7 development was that it was friction free. During the Vista development method (& in every other product I’ve worked on) development was marked by a constant stream of new issues which were a constant drain on time an energy. It felt like they moved from two crisis to another crisis,” Osterman recalled. “For Win7 it was different. I think it was some time during the second milestone that I realized that Win7 was ‘special’. The newer development method that was deployed for Win7 was clearly paying off & my life was far less stressed. In fact I don’t think I worked late or came in on weekends two times during the entire 3 years that Win7 was under development – this was a HUGE modify. Every other product I’ve ever worked on has necessary late nights & weekends (sometime it necessary all-nighters). But for Win7 it didn’t happen. In lieu they set a set of goals that were reasonable with achievable schedules & they executed on those goals & delivered the features they promised.”

When it moved forward from Windows Vista (version 6.0) & Longhorn (Windows Server 2008) to Windows 7 (v6.1) & Windows Server 2008 R2, Microsoft chose the path of evolution than build a revolutionary OS. Another legitimate query about Windows 8 is whether the platform will continue to evolve, or whether Microsoft is ready for a revolution in Windows, even though the memory of what revolutionary meant for Vista is still fresh for customers. While only time will tell whichever way Microsoft will take Windows 8, two thing is clear, the Redmond-based company started planning for the next generation of Windows long before Windows 7 was finalized.

In addition, the application giant is also hiring people to start coding for Windows 8. If the development method described by Osterman still applies, Microsoft will start building Windows 8 early in 2010, if not even earlier. However, as is the case with all Windows platforms, the successor of Windows 7 will must go through a planning phase, where coding is left in the background, & the priority is putting together the actual feature set for the operating method. Still, don’t expect Microsoft to start talking Windows 8 until well in to 2010, if not even 2011. After all, it took over a year since the Windows 7 coding had started for Sinofsky to share the first details on the engineering method of the project.

 in October, Microsoft mentioned Windows 8 in a number of job posts:

- “IIS team is looking for an experienced PM to join our core platform team. Your role will span across driving key features in to Windows 8 as well as owning several out-of-band modules, including web analytics that will bring business intelligence for the customers that host applications & contents on IIS. Your work will help differentiate IIS & Smooth Streaming from Apache & Flash. You ought to also be ready to work in a fast-paced environment & have a strong desire for quality, security, & performance. Your feature will be used by millions of customers,” for the position of Senior Program Manager.

- “The Windows Live Mail team is looking for a seasoned Lead Program Manager to drive our next generation Mail client, & manage five stellar PMs. Our client has over 40M users world-wide, & serves as a key component of our Windows Live “light up Windows” strategy. Our current release is centered on hot new consumer features & better synergies with Hotmail & Windows 7, & our future releases will likely be tightly designed to work best with new Windows 8 platform technologies. They will also work closely with the Outlook team on ways to bring Windows Live to Outlook,” for the position of Principal Lead Program Manager.

- “The TAG team provides the foundation services & infrastructure to support a unified check & dev workflow. This team’s charter includes - developing & jogging a unified check submission & execution method for Windows 8, Automating Check pass scheduling & execution, results analysis & automated triage, Windows code coverage services, Developing & jogging the eBVT quality gate, supporting WinSE’s Windows 7 sustained engineering check needs,” for the position of Check Lead 2.

What would you prefer Windows 8 to be? Revolutionary or evolutionary?

- “The Application Experience Bug Inquiry Team, AEBit, is looking for passionate SDETs that require to make an impact on Windows 8. On the AEBit team you will get the matchless opportunity to challenge & grow your debugging skills on issues that span the entire OS. You will have the opportunity to engage with application vendors, OEMs, as well as internal component teams. You will also be applying & enhancing your knowledge of method internals. As part of the AEBit team you will be responsible for driving & ensuring compatibility in Windows by engaging with component teams, root causing application bugs, & authoring mitigations,” for the position of Application Development Engineer in Check.

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Windows 8 GUI/NUI, the Evolution Continues

 
Undoubtedly, a key aspect of the evolution from Windows Vista to Windows 7 is the new
graphical user interface of the operating technique. At least equally important, if not even more so, is the way in which, with Windows 7 Microsoft is bringing natural user interfaces to the mainstream. & the Redmond company will continue to push onward with the evolution of the GUI & explore new boundaries for NUI beyond multitouch. Obviously, the best candidate for the next generation of NUI/GUI to come to life is the upcoming iteration of the Windows client, Windows 8.

According to Microsoft, Windows 8 planning is already underway, & this is also valid for the user experience aspect of the operating technique. Moreover, it appears that the application giant’s efforts are multifaceted, & not only internal, as the company has tapped UX & UI guns for hire.

“We are the Seattle based Human Computer Interaction Specialists. Give us a try & you will see why Microsoft has selected us to be involved with Windows 8 planning,” reads the description of an NUI & UX Designer, Ron George who left Microsoft to start his own design outfit. (by MSFTKitchen)

Windows 7, under the lead of Julie Larson-Green, corporate vice president, Windows Experience, has reached a new apex in terms of the Windows Aero graphical user interface with a complete overhaul of the Taskbar, & essentially a revamping of the way finish users launch, switch, & revisit Windows applications. Simultaneously, Windows 7 brings to the table native multitouch support & the necessary application programming interfaces (API) to permit all application to take advantage of the NUI.

Microsoft is not yet ready to talk Windows 8, no matter how scarce the details would be. Actually, despite the fact that employees refer to the Windows 8 project constantly, the company has yet to even confirm the validity of the codename.

Still, it is clear that the application giant has started preparing for Windows 8, & it is also clear that GUI & NUI efforts are integral part of the planning technique. In addition, it’s worth mentioning that NUI goes beyond multitouch, & that the company has officially expressed the position that voice/speech might be the new touch.

“I have never worked on the core Windows Team. I did lend a hand in Windows 7 with the Touch Pack while I was at Surface. I am also currently involved in Windows 8 (I know that answer perks your ears up, haha). When I think back about 15 years to when I started doing this, Windows is where I wanted to land,” George added for MSFTKitchen.

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128-Bit Kernel Support in Windows 8 and Windows 9: A Big, Fat Lie

Caveat: I’ve been sitting on the information contained in this post for a while now, bu
t it's finally perturbed me to put it out there for all of you (and myself, for that matter). If you would be so kind as to help spread the word, that would be great as the lie has spread like wildfire and taken on various forms, such as sites now reporting that Windows 8 will be 128-bit (ridiculous). Not only that, but the perpetrator that started this mess needs to be called out with fair warning given to all. What you select to believe by the finish of this post will be up to you, but my intentions here are to help sift out the garbage in a community full of journalists who – like me – truly bust their butts to bring you solid, distinctive, and honest content.





Most of you may recall the “exclusive” I posted on this 2 months ago now. As most of you may also recall, I’m no stranger to the LinkedIn profile browsing. Well, when I found Mr. Robert Morgan’s profile, I got WAY excited for my own lovely. I whipped up that post as soon as I could, then took a step back to see if someone else had found it. Well, as it had turned out, sometime like a week earlier, it had been, “found” by blog.eightforums.com (I’ve linked the Google cached page for that link in case they try to delete it and play none-the-wiser, as you can already compare it to the post on their page today to see that they deleted my comments calling them out on the issue). I say “found” because – as it turns out – it wasn’t found at all. It was fabricated. Everything on that profile was garbage, and when you read back at what his job description said, it does indeed look like something a “journalist” would write so as to generate one hell of a scoop. Check it out again:



 Experience
 Senior Research & Development Microsoft
 Public Company; MSFT; Computer Program industry



 January 2002 – Present (7 years 10 months)

 Working in high security department for research and development involving strategic planning for medium and longterm projects. Research & Development projects including 128bit architecture compatibility with the Windows 8 kernel and Windows 9 project plan. Forming relationships with major partners: Intel, AMD, HP and IBM.



Let’s critique this, shall they? First off, “working in a high-security department for research and development” is something that no employee working in those conditions would -in their right mind – write in their profile. I’ve seen some brilliant things pop up in people’s job profiles, but nothing so blatant. Second, Research and Development isn’t the Windows team. Each is its own department with its own funding and its own projects. At BEST, Windows 9 MIGHT be accurate here (as in, Research and Development is working on technologies that may make it in to Windows much later), but it’s not. If someone is going to be working on a 128-bit kernel for Windows, it’s going to be the architecture side of the Windows core team (David Cutler’s crew, etc.); not MSR.





I don’t think 128-bit is in the scope of someone for the next 7-10 years. After all, 64-bit is never properly utilized these days – nevermind dropping 128-bit in to the laps of devs and consumers! And that brings up another point… at best, 128-bit would exist only for select industries that could truly use it right now. AMD’s Bulldozer project is real, but it's absolutely nothing to do with Windows 8 or, I would imagine, Windows 9, either.



Alright, so… let’s assume that profile was indeed real. blog.eightforums.com was certainly enjoying the traffic off of their initial “find.” As a matter of fact, they somehow managed to land an exclusive interview with the guy afterwards! One time again, I’ve linked to the Google cached page for the same reason I did a few paragraphs ago. So… whatever happened with that interview, anyway? What happened with it is that it was one great massive elderly pile of BS, that’s what happened with it! It was a massive, fat lie (along with the cake, of work).

Yes, your supposedly down-right and honest Windows 8 market-cornering buddies over at eightforums managed to pull the wool over the eyes of every major news site out there. Unfortunately, minor details lined up for those like me to jump the gun and post what they did, when they did and without ever verifying if this guy was even an employee in the first place. This stuff happens sometimes and, well, I don’t take kindly to it. thinking about how much time and hard work I know I put in to bringing you all the content that I do – nevermind how much time and hard work the limitless other real journalists around the community put in! Not only that, but stuff like this makes a mockery of the credibility of the sites you know and trust. We’re as human as you are, though, so I’m one who is fully willing to say, “hey, this guy fooled me and I’m sorry they ended up fooling you, , vicariously through my post.”



Now, a couple of days or so after all of this stuff went global, I noticed a couple of my respected peers make some comments on this story that started to make me take a second look at it all. First, Paul Thurrott said the following:



 Windows 8 To Be 128-bit Only? LOL





 Wow. I must admit, the most brilliant thing about this rumor is that someone believed it. I won’t single someone out, but spare me. It’s and utterly bogus. Obviously.

The fact that this all got around to him in the form that Windows 8 was going to be *ONLY* was baffling for me, nevermind seeing the next hit being doled out by one Steven Bink of bink.nu:



 Bink says: Sorry but this is BS so to say. They are still in the transition to 64bit, That Morgan guy does not exits at MS



By that time, I immediately thought back to the shite I had already called out the eightforums people on and then… it all made much sense that they would be the ones to fabricate garbage like this. At this point, I have now also verified (thanks to one kind Microsoft folks for checking for me) that Robert Morgan is/was nowhere to be found in the employee database. It was all a load of shite created by a site desperate for traffic and attention. They throw up frivolous posts to somehow meander Windows 8 in to the text to boost their rank in search engines for the keyword. Not only that, but their forum is littered with garbage posts that – one time again – only exist so as to skyrocket their keyword density.



So, now we’re at this juncture ONCE AGAIN with eightforums. First, it was stealing content from my site (which, I hope I’ve made clear won't be tolerated any longer) and now, one massive lie heard ’round the net. And to top it off, dishonest means obviously get you somewhere since this guy was apparently at PDC 2009 as press! How they got in, I have no idea but at this point, I wouldn’t doubt it if they wasn’t there and his PDC coverage was and a massive, fat lie. Everything they wrote could have been discerned from watching the keynotes streaming online. Not to mention, out of all his blabber about, “I wonder if they will listen to about Windows 8,” they produced a whole lot of NOTHING! My favorite line of his from PDC comes from his PDC Day 1 blog entry:



 What can they dig up about Windows 8? I see tons of wannabe journalists and some actually gifted bloggers, how will they be different then all the others? We’ll bring you the dirt!!, we’ll interview the top minds at the conference in the next few days to get all the best information. Like always, members of the Windows 8 forums will get the stuff they can’t post here, all that leaked information, they try to get all our members to say things off record and sneak them in to the underground circles of Windows 8 Forums, only members can see!





“Wannabe journalists,” huh? LOL! Oh, the irony. Lot of top minds they interviewed there, huh? Lot of Windows 8 information they could dig up, huh? And leave it to this guy to not only pull the wool over everyone’s eyes a couple of times, but his loyal followers by generating a paid membership for his web-site as well! He’s actually going to charge people for his lies. Man, if you’re a glutton for being ripped off, by all means, whip out that Paypal account… but if you’re AT ALL wise – even if you’re a member on that forum and see me as the bad guy because I’m taking shots at your “leader” – you’ll take a lovely look at the massive picture here and see that this guy has provided absolutely NOTHING of substance for his readers or for this community. Nothing. a bunch of empty promises and cliffhangers. Where’s the PDC 2009 Windows 8 info you were going to dig up? Where are the interviews with the “top minds” about Windows 8? Where’s that Robert Morgan interview exclusive you supposedly had? I mean, to see how bad it is, take a look at his latest ENLIGHTENING post:



Seriously? You’re *that* desperate to throw Windows 8 (and italicize it, none-the-less) in to a story? lol. Oh, the humanity…

So, at this point, I can’t spell it out much clearer for everyone. For some reason, though, I can’t help but wonder who you’re going to believe: Some nobody site trying to corner the Windows 8 market by littering their site with pointless references to Windows 8, or tried-and-true individuals who have been in this community for limitless years reporting the lovely with the bad and truly busting their butts to bring you content with REAL substance? I certainly hope the latter, as people like me calling out sites like eightforums serves me no purpose other than wasting my time and generating drama that I would not must deal with. In cases like this, though, it’s worth it.





Update: Be sure to go to his site to catch him poking fun at the frequency of road maps I post. Even I laughed at it; nothing like a lovely bit of roasting every one time in a while. ;)



Update 2: I’ve decided to remove the antagonizing comment about awaiting negative comments from eightforums and disable comments for this post. Finish of discussion. If you have something to say, feel free to email me. Thanks to those of you who left supportive comments initially. I do appreciate it.

.

 

Let’s critique this, shall we? First off, “working in a high-security department for research and development” is something that no employee working in those conditions would -in their right mind – write in their profile. I’ve seen some pretty amazing things pop up in people’s job profiles, but nothing so blatant. Second, Research and Development isn’t the Windows team. Each is its own department with its own funding and its own projects. At BEST, Windows 9 MIGHT be accurate here (as in, Research and Development is working on technologies that may make it into Windows much later), but it’s not. If anyone is going to be working on a 128-bit kernel for Windows, it’s going to be the architecture side of the Windows core team (David Cutler’s crew, etc.); not MSR.

Windows 8 To Be 128-bit Only? LOL

 

Wow. I have to admit, the most amazing thing about this rumor is that anyone believed it. I won’t single anyone out, but spare me. It’s completely and utterly bogus. Obviously.

 

The fact that this all got around to him in the form that Windows 8 was going to be

Bink says: Sorry but this is BS so to say. We are still in the transition to 64bit, That Morgan guy does not exits at MS

 

By that time, I immediately thought back to and then… it all just made too much sense that they would be the ones to fabricate garbage like this. At this point, I have now also verified (thanks to two kind Microsoft folks for checking for me) that Robert Morgan is/was nowhere to be found in the employee database. It was all just a load of crap created by a site desperate for traffic and attention. They throw up frivolous posts just to somehow meander Windows 8 into the text to boost their rank in search engines for the keyword. Not only that, but their forum is littered with garbage posts that – once again – only exist so as to skyrocket their keyword density.

 

So, now we’re at this juncture with eightforums. First, it was stealing content from my site (which, I hope I’ve made clear will not be tolerated any longer) and now, one big lie heard ’round the net. And to top it off, dishonest means obviously get you somewhere since this guy was apparently at PDC 2009 as press! How he got in, I have no idea but at this point, I wouldn’t doubt it if he really wasn’t there and his PDC coverage was also a big, fat lie. Everything he wrote could have been discerned from watching the keynotes streaming online. Not to mention, out of all his blabber about, “I wonder if we will hear about Windows 8,” he produced a whole lot of NOTHING! My favorite line of his from PDC comes from his PDC Day 1 blog entry:

 

What can we dig up about Windows 8? I see tons of wannabe journalists and some actually talented bloggers, how will we be different then all the others? We’ll bring you the dirt!!, we’ll interview the top minds at the conference in the next few days to get all the best information. Like always, members of the Windows 8 forums will get the stuff we just can’t post here, all that leaked information, we try to get all our members to say things off record and sneak them into the underground circles of Windows 8 Forums, only members can see!

 

“Wannabe journalists,” huh? LOL! Oh, the irony. Lot of top minds he interviewed there, huh? Lot of Windows 8 information they were able to dig up, huh? And leave it to this guy to not only pull the wool over everyone’s eyes a couple of times, but his loyal followers by creating a paid membership for his website as well! He’s actually going to charge people for his lies. Man, if you’re a glutton for being ripped off, by all means, whip out that Paypal account… but if you’re AT ALL wise – even if you’re a member on that forum and see me as the bad guy because I’m taking shots at your “leader” – you’ll take a good look at the big picture here and see that this guy has provided absolutely NOTHING of substance for his readers or for this community. Nothing. Just a bunch of empty promises and cliffhangers. Where’s the PDC 2009 Windows 8 info you were going to dig up? Where are the interviews with the “top minds” about Windows 8? Where’s that Robert Morgan interview exclusive you supposedly had? I mean, to see just how bad it is, take a look at his latest ENLIGHTENING post:

 

 

Seriously? You’re *that* desperate to throw Windows 8 (and italicize it, none-the-less) into a story? lol. Oh, the humanity…

 

So, at this point, I can’t spell it out much clearer for everyone. For some reason, though, I can’t help but wonder who you’re going to believe: Some nobody site trying to corner the Windows 8 market by littering their site with pointless references to Windows 8, or tried-and-true individuals who have been in this community for countless years reporting the good with the bad and truly busting their butts to bring you content with REAL substance? I certainly hope the latter, as people like me calling out sites like eightforums serves me no purpose other than wasting my time and creating drama that I would rather not have to deal with. In cases like this, though, it’s totally worth it.
: I’ve decided to remove the antagonizing comment about awaiting negative comments from eightforums and disable comments for this post. End of discussion. If you have something to say, feel free to email me. Thanks to those of you who left supportive comments initially. I really do appreciate it.

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Windows 8: More early clues start to emerge

Windows 7 and its server complement, Windows Server 2008 R2, were released to manufacturing in late July. By late August, Microsoft’s Windows client unit already was turning the crank on Windows 8 client and server.

As soon as Microsoft releases the final bits of a new Windows release to manufacturing — and often before — plenty of users’ thoughts turn to what’s next.

Stephen Chapman, a tech enthusiast who runs the UX Evangelist site, has been beating the bushes for a few months now for Windows 8 information. They recently unearthed some of job profiles of folks who have worked on and are working on various elements which may or may not make it in to the final Windows 8 release.

Anders Vindberg, a Microsoft Technical Fellow in Microsoft’s Management and Services division — a “Big Brains” interview with whom I’ll be posting soon — acknowledged that planning sessions were well underway for Windows 8. And of the 12 working groups created, “eight or nine revolve around management.” (Back in April of this year, Microsoft was seeking developers interested in working on some of these management features and enhancements to Distributed File System Replication for Windows 8.)

They also found a reference to more tweaks that Microsoft is making around kernel patch protection, by PatchGuard. Chapman blogged that, based on what they unearthed, “PatchGuard is apparently going to make life even a small more difficult for hackers (and anti-virus companies as well, perhaps).”

Chapman found listings regarding tweaks being made to the Hibernate/Resume/Integration programming interface “that can integrate and utilize the new TLZ file compression engine.” (I’m not sure what TLZ means here. I found a reference to TLZ as a file extension for Tar (.TAR) file compressed with LZMA (.LZMA) file compression “most commonly used on Unix systems.”)

I’ve seen a few Windows 8 references out there focused around the server version that mention new functionality Microsoft is working on to make Windows 8 Server an even stronger datacenter operating system. That dovetails with Microsoft’s slow but steady push toward offering customers not a public-cloud hosting capability, but and a private two. For Microsoft, a private cloud will revolve around Windows Server. Some of the features/functionality developed by the Windows Azure operating system (Red Dog) team will undoubtedly find their way back in to future iterations of Windows Server.

Things are happening on the Windows 8 Server front, . It seems that the Dublin application server that Microsoft has been readying might find its way in to Windows 8 Server, based on another online resume Chapman found. (Microsoft officials said last year that the grand plan for Dublin was to integrate it in to Windows Server, but seldom said when.)

It’s still early. Windows 8 is unlikely to debut until 2011, at the earliest, given the way Microsoft is delivering Windows releases these days. I’ll be interested as to how Microsoft execs characterize Windows 8, given they decided to deem Windows 7 a “major” release and Windows Server 2008 R2 a “minor” two.

Somebody else hearing any scuttlebutt yet on Windows 8? What are you hoping gets included in the next Windows client and server releases?

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Roadmap reveals possible Windows 8 launch date

windows8roadmapAlthough the roadmap is titled Windows Server release, it is still appropriate for our guessing purposes :)
Windows Server 2008 was a major release and took place in 2008, which is five years before 2012. The next major release for a client operating method will occur five year after. In which case, Microsoft is expecting to release Windows 8 some time in 2013.

A roadmap slide from an French Windows Server presentation spotted by UXEvangelist shows that the next major Windows Server release for Microsoft is set for 2012, which is approximately five years from the release of Windows 7.

Note the ~ (tilda) which means approximate. As they have seen with the development of Windows 7, Microsoft did not mention anything specific regarding release dates until RTM was near. Original estimates of Windows 7 RTMing in April and October were also off from the July 22 date.

The current poll they have walking on the sidebar shows most of our visitors think Q4 2011 will be the Windows 8 release date. What do you think now? Let us know in the comments.

Note: Although Code Name “Windows 8″ may suggest that Windows 8 won't be the final name, “Windows 7″ was and a Code Name before it was declared the official name of the operating method.
2012. The next major release for a client operating system will occur one year after. In whi
Note the ~ (tilda) which means approximate. As we have seen with the development of Windows 7, Microsoft did not mention anything specific regarding release dates until RTM was very near. Original estimates of Windows 7 RTMing in April and October were also off from the July 22 date.
The current poll we have running on the sidebar shows most of our visitors think Q4 2011 will be the Windows 8 release date. What do you think now? Let us know in the comments.
Note: Although Code Name “Windows 8″ may suggest that Windows 8 will not be the final name, “Windows 7″ was also a Code Name before it was declared the official name of the operating system.

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Windows 8 planning and preparation underway

According to a job posting on Microsoft's career site, Windows 8 planning & preparation is currently taking place.

The job posting, spotted by enthusiast site CodenameWindows, hints at third-party application updating, updating virtual machines while they are turned off & delivering full applications, among others. Microsoft admits in the posting that updating virtual machines whilst they are off "turns out this is hard!." The job is for a role on the Windows Update Client team, responsible for delivering program updates to over 600 million machines.

With Windows 7 out of the door, work is now beginning on Windows 7 SP1 & Windows 8. Expect to see increasingly hints at what is to come over the coming months.

"As part of this team, you will help shape Windows 8. Components of our code include a core agent that runs as an NT service, an API layer & a UI application. They talk to the update servers using web services & they have special protocols in place to deal with the huge scale of the system" notes the job listing.

Thanks to Shayla for the news tip

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Microsoft readying test systems for Windows 8 development

After they hit a roadblock with the Windows 7 engineers though, they returned to what plenty of have found to be a nice source for scraps on future Microsoft products before they are announced, confirmed, or even in early development: Microsoft Careers. They did a simple search and found that, since our last post, three job postings related to Windows 8 have been made on the site.

Four more job postings were posted this month that mention Windows 8. From them, they can glean a few tiny tidibits about Windows 7's successor.
Although Microsoft gave us some great numbers regarding the Windows 7 beta, the company (unsurprisingly) refused to give us any details about what changes the planning and development team was going to make for Windows 8. Earlier this month they rounded up every minor detail that bloggers had posted on the operating technique.

 The Web Information Services (IIS) team is redefining how the net technology stack is delivered to the customers. They are simplifying how developers, IT pros, and hosters consume our technology by managing the end-to-end experience from development to deployment. They build both technologies and solutions—whatever it takes to do the right thing for customers and Win The Web. Customer empathy is a deep core value at IIS. They are also an agile team that frequently ships projects out-of-band to change to ever changing Web environment.

The first job posting (we'll be going in chronological order) is from October 8, 2009 and is looking for a Senior Program Manager. Its mention of Windows 8 is not hugely exciting, but IIS users should be happy to know that Redmond is still thinking about them, both in terms of the next Windows client and server releases:

The second job posting, for a Principal Lead Program Manager, should be interesting to all the Windows Live fanatics out there. It looks like Microsoft is going to be tying Windows Live Mail much closer to Windows 7 and Windows 8. The posting is from October 9, 2009, and here's the part that matters:

 IIS team is looking for an experienced PM to join our core platform team. Your role will span across driving key features in to Windows 8 as well as owning several out-of-band modules, including web analytics that will bring business intelligence for the customers that host applications and contents on IIS. Your work will help differentiate IIS and Smooth Streaming from Apache and Flash. You ought to also be ready to work in a fast-paced environment and have a strong desire for quality, security, and performance. Your feature will be used by millions of customers.

 The Windows Live Mail team is looking for a seasoned Lead Program Manager to drive our next generation Mail client, and manage two stellar PMs. Our client has over 40M users world-wide, and serves as a key component of our Windows Live "light up Windows" strategy. Our current release is centered on hot new consumer features & better synergies with Hotmail & Windows 7, and our future releases will likely be tightly designed to work best with new Windows 8 platform technologies. They will also work closely with the Outlook team on ways to bring Windows Live to Outlook. Mail is part of the WL Desktop Communications team, which also includes Messenger. Our team values user-centered design, technical and engineering excellence, and attention to detail. The successful candidate should have several years [of] experience as PM lead. In addition to being deeply technical, you will need to enjoy being part of a fast moving, energetic team.

Microsoft said in January 2009 that there were 500 million Windows Live users on Hotmail and Messenger, but they cannot recall a time when they disclosed any numbers for Windows Live beyond that. Forty million Windows Live Mail users is not bad for a new application, and we'd expect that number to grow rapidly over the next few months given that Windows 7 has arrived, and it doesn't include an e-mail client.

The third and fourth job postings were made on October 18, 2009 and October 19, 2009, respectively. The first is for a Program Engineering: Check and the second is also for a Program Engineering: Check, but they are for different teams. As we have already said, Microsoft won't give any official word on where they are with Windows 8, but it is clear the company is still planning and brainstorming. They are also getting the testing systems ready for Windows 7's successor, according to the third job posting:

 The TAG team provides the foundation services and infrastructure to support a unified check and dev workflow. This team's charter includes—developing and jogging a unified check submission and execution technique for Windows 8, Automating Check pass scheduling & execution, results analysis & automated triage, Windows code coverage services, Developing and jogging the eBVT quality gate, supporting WinSE's Windows 7 sustained engineering check needs.

 You'll lead a team of highly gifted SDETs and partner closely with members of both the development and program management teams to design and check new features, create tools & automation, and enhance the overall check infrastructure. Your team will be responsible for writing check designs & check cases, performing ad hoc, manual, and automated testing, filing bug reports, and interacting with internal partners.

 This is an exciting time to join the Check Automation and Gates team and lead the next wave of foundation services and infrastructure to ensure delivery of a high quality product. With openings across the team, there is sure to be the perfect opportunity suited to your specific passion and enthusiasm.

 The Application Experience Bug Inquiry Team, AEBit, is looking for passionate SDETs that need to make an impact on Windows 8. On the AEBit team you will get the matchless opportunity to challenge and grow your debugging skills on issues that span the entire OS. You will have the opportunity to engage with program vendors, OEMs, as well as internal component teams. You will also be applying and enhancing your knowledge of technique internals. As part of the AEBit team you will be responsible for driving and ensuring compatibility in Windows by engaging with component teams, root causing application bugs, and authoring mitigations. If you are a strong SDET looking for a challenge they would like to listen to from you.

This unified check submission and execution technique for Windows 8 will of work only be used internally at Microsoft, but don't worry, you'll see the benefit of it in the development builds you get your hands. The fourth job posting talks more specifically about bug hunting:

If you see anything else Windows 8-related over the coming months, feel free to drop us a line.

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Windows 8 will mark 30 years since the home computer revolution

ZX81 was remarkable for its time. It was the first home computer to be widely available on the high street, & the first computer that households could actually afford, with an Apple II or IBM PC costing around £2,500.
I had initially wanted a colouring book but my parents had seen the ‘educational value’ of the Sinclair machine & were determined I was getting five. I recall vividly the trip to WH Smith that resulted in a very bemused few days for me while I tried to come to terms with what this thing was. Five time I had it though I was hooked!


I recall fondly getting my first ZX81 & I think about myself privileged to have been born when I was, & to have been growing up through the most exciting part of the home computer revolution.


I was firmly in the Sinclair camp.  After my ZX81 I owned a Speccy, a Speccy+2 and a Sinclair QL.  I am one of a great many people who consider the ZX Spectrum to be one of the finest computers ever created.  It brought about the home computer revolution pretty much on its own and, consequently, was copied right around the globe.
It wasn’t until Amstrad came in with more of a business focus did things begin to change.  The Spectrum and Commodore 64 had given birth to the first generation of dedicated games consoles and that left the market open for something more serious.  Back then everybody was still talking about the paperless office, a concept we’d never really trust these days, and Amstrad brought to market products to help small businesses and individuals become more productive at home and at work.  They lit the way and showed the likes of Dell and Compaq how to produce mass-market PCs for under £500.  It was at this time that Compaq created a compatible clone BIOS for the IBM PC.  From that moment on the home computer revolution was over!
It had lasted only five short years but they were a truly exciting time.
So just how the hell does my personal nostalgia trip fit in with Windows 8 I hear you ask?  It’s actually Windows XP that started the ball rolling with this but Windows Vista and Windows 7 have both grasped the bull by both horns and Windows 8 will, I think, complete the picture.
This is the excitement we feel about how it works and operates and how we interact with the next version of Windows.  After the first PC clones began to appear we became bogged down with performance.  The important thing was the next development in technology and not the operating system itself.  Windows 95 got tongues wagging, but all too quickly the excitement died down to be replaced again by talk of the next big hardware revolution.  Finally we have OS interfaces that excite and engage people on a daily basis and that can actually maintain that level of enthusiasm.  The fact that modern hardware has for a few years now provided all that we need has obviously helped this conversation to flourish.
This revolution really started, nay exploded, in 1982 with the ZX Spectrum, BBC Micro and Commodore 64 changing the face of childhood forever.  The clones came flooding in, everyone with their own ideas.  Innovation and excitement were the order of the day and you couldn’t go anywhere or speak to anyone without the home computing revolution coming into the conversation.
It makes me remember spending Saturday mornings in my local high street electronics shops.  There were always large crowds of kids gathered around the computers.  We’d compare the different interfaces and the way the machines operated.  Each one brought something exciting to the mix but it was never the hardware that excited us.  Okay so the keyboard had a thing or two to contribute.  You either loved or hated the squidgy keys of the Speccy and most people hated the blister’inducing keyboard of the Oric 1, even though the machine itself really impressed.  Generally though it was how we interacted with the machines that made them successful or reduced their developers to tears when the receivers were called in.

Back then this was essential because, in order to own one of these machines, you had to program it yourself.  The user interface as everything.  This is where the ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64 and BBC Micro excelled.  All three had interfaces that people could actually use.
You have to have been born during a few short years in the late 1960s and early 1970s to appreciate the magic of that time.  It was truly, the most exciting period of my childhood, and something that no child born before or since will ever be able to share.
This is something we take for granted now on modern PCs.  But it’s still not always that way.  Windows 7 may offer great leaps forward in how we interact with our PCs, but any trained eye will be able to point out all the places it fails.
I can only hope, and look forward, to the way we interact with Windows 8, whatever it is, causing enough excitement to commemorate this 30th anniversary appropriately.

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Microsoft mulling 128-bit versions of Windows 8, Windows 9

 
Working in high security department for research and development involving strategic planning
for medium and longterm projects. Research & Development projects including 128bit architecture compatibility with the Windows 8 kernel and Windows 9 project plan. Forming relationships with major partners: Intel, AMD, HP, and IBM.

Believe it or not, Windows 7's successor(s) have been in the planning and early development stages for a while now. They haven't posted anything about any of them yet, but we have been watching closely to see if anything interesting turned up. Exactly one weeks ago, it did. A LinkedIn profile, which has already been taken down, for a Robert Morgan, Senior Research & Development at Microsoft, has shone a sliver of light on the possibility of 128-bit support coming to Windows 8. According to the LinkedIn page, which has been removed since, Morgan has been with the application giant since January 2002, but we are more intrigued with what his profile (first paragraph) and his status (second paragraph) before they disappeared:

Windows 8 News found Morgan's profile first and immediately started trying to get in contact with him over LinkedIn. When they saw this, they leaned back and waited to see if they could receive a response from him. They did. The site claims it's managed to get an exclusive interview with Morgan and is letting its readers to ask questions. The deadline is October 11, 2009 so head on over and post your queries.

 Robert Morgan is working to get IA-128 working backwards with full binary compatibility on the existing IA-64 instructions in the hardware simulation to work for Windows 8 and definitely Windows 9.

While this small tidbit is news on its own, they feel it is necessary to look at what we have heard about Windows 8 so far. In April 2009, Codename Windows spotted a Microsoft job posting for a Lead Application Development Engineer in Check with this interesting description:

This news is interesting because they always thought Windows 7 would be the last release that had 32-bit and 64-bit versions. This was brought on by the fact that Windows Server 2008 R2, the server version of Windows 7, was the first Windows Server release to be 64-bit only. The next client version of Windows should therefore do likewise, but apparently Microsoft is going to prepare it for 128-bit as well. We are not saying Windows 8 will definitely come in 64-bit and 128-bit flavors, but Microsoft is moving down that path, and at the least, Windows 9 might.

 DFSR is Microsoft's premier file replication engine and is an integral part of our branch office strategy and File Server role. It can scale to thousands of servers and replicate hundreds of terabytes of information. They have shipped the technology that powers file sharing in Windows Live Messenger, Windows Meeting Spaces (Vista) and Branch Office replication in Windows Server 2008 which has strong customer deployment. DFSR technology saves MS-IT and our customers over 80% WAN bandwidth by using advanced On-The-Wire differential compression.

 For the upcoming version of Windows, new critical features are being worked on including cluster support and support for two way replication. The core engine is also being reworked to provide dramatic performance improvements. They will also soon be beginning major improvements for Windows 8 where they will be including innovative features which will revolutionize file access in branch offices.

 In Windows Server 2008 R2 release, the Server UX Check team (under the File Server Management organization) is finalizing the MMC [Microsoft Management Console] based User eXperience (UX)/Interfaces for the File Server Role. Currently the team owns DFS [Distributed File System] Management, Share and Storage Management, FSRM [File Server Resource Manager] & Classification UI, Disk Management, SMFS. For Windows 8, the SSD organization is working on the next version of the file server.

That same month, ZDNet found another job posting that also described some interesting details:

 As the team moved to Windows 8, you will have 2 main responsibilities - (i) put on the customer/design critique hat as they plan our next version file server management experience (i) participating in the architectural design, and development and driving automated testing for managing the next generation file server. Our current automation does not meet the multi-machine paradigm requirement and so you will contribute significantly in the development of check automation to validate setup/configuration of the new server, managing configuration changes, performing diagnostics and reporting using Power Shell, Command line, Object Model, UI.

In September 2009, msftkitchen found a couple of résumés for Microsoft employees that reference possible features for Windows 8.

 Researched new algorithms and programming methods to build Hibernate/Resume Integration API that can integrate and utilize the new TLZ file compression engine for the Hibernate/Resume component of new Windows 8 Operating Technique.

Bo Qin:

 Using C and C++ programming languages in SourceInsight, developed a 100% functional C wrapper for C++ functions and the Hibernate/Resume Integration API, which will be used in Windows 8 replacing Windows Vista's Xpress compression engine.

Maryrita Steinhour:

Ramaswamy Ranganathan

 Led working group to make a recommendation on a PatchGuard follow-on. Wrote a summary white paper and presented the results of the working group to the executive team. Recommendation of tabling the function until Windows 8 was accepted and it is now a Windows 8 feature candidate.

 Working on feature development, enhancements and bug fixing activities for Win7 and Win8's Remote Desktop client. Involved in bug fixes and improvements for Remote Application and Server Tools as well.

The following descriptions on LinkedIn pages were also found by msftkitchen but have since been removed:

 Authored DA setup guide, a complete guide for setting up DA that was used by several customers and other teams internal to Microsoft for configuring their DA environments. This guide was also the foundation for the DA check automation that will be created for Windows 8, and provided the foundation for the publicly available DA setup guide.

 Hold multiple patents related to SAN infrastructure, hard drive technology, and security aspects within the datacenter space two which two of which is already generating royalties and another is slated for inclusion in Windows8. Integrate well in to standards organizations such as the FCIA, T10, T10, SNIA, and T13.

 Working Group - For Win 8 download experience, researched security user mental models to tell design.

 Managing and Improving application usability for over 10 years, designing, researching, and developing multi-tier distributed applications for Windows 8 focusing on customers using e commerce, general consumers, and banking companies.

Recall that all this talk is early in the game. They won't see Windows 8 released until 2011 at the earliest, and 2012 is more likely. What do you need to see in Windows 7's and Windows Server 2008 R2's successors?

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