Windows XP has been on the market for a year now, so naturally everyone is clamoring for details on the next version of the world's most popular operating system -- or so Microsoft Corp. hopes.
Details are dribbling out, but Microsoft won't say a word on the record, declining to comment for this story. Analysts and software developers haven't been briefed, either.
But here's what has leaked out so far.
The next version of the world's most popular desktop operating system, code-named "Longhorn," is due out in test form next year and in final form in 2004. It will have a new look and feel, very different from Windows XP's. Its guts will also be radically different from Windows XP's, because they're based on XML -- extensible markup language, the emerging lingua franca of the Internet. And it will be the first version that won't function fully without new hardware.
"With the possible exception of Windows NT, which was a change from the ground up, this could be the biggest change ever" to Windows, said Giga analyst Rob Enderle.
Observers believe that Longhorn will:
Create a new file system that replaces FAT, FAT32 (an acronym for File Allocation Table) and even the newer NTFS (the Windows NT file system), the most modern ways of storing data in Windows. To make life easier for computer users, it will simplify locating data by using the file name or content, regardless of whether data is contained in a spreadsheet, a word-processing document or an e-mail. After-market products do this now, but they impose a performance penalty.
Enderle said the new file system will also function efficiently with hard drives holding at least one terabyte of data. That's 1,000 gigabytes, or well over 1,000 compressed movies, or more than 700,000 novels the size of "War and Peace." Such drives are expected to hit the market by 2004.
Creating such a file system is an extraordinarily difficult task, one that has been attempted for years by database companies, including Microsoft, but that has never reached fruition.
The guts of the new file system are being engineered mainly in conjunction with "Yukon," Microsoft's code name for the next version of its SQL Server relational database management system.
But a beta version of Yukon isn't due out until mid-2003, which makes some onlookers wonder how the file-systems team in the Windows division can get started on adapting that technology for more general-purpose use.
"Evidence they're making some progress would be a professional developers' conference explaining it, so developers can know what they need to know to use it," said Michael Cherry, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft in Kirkland. "I don't even see a date scheduled for one."
Even if such a file system can be achieved, it would have to be thoroughly tested before use, as converting data to the new system would be necessary -- but could destroy the data.
Present a single, unified way of interacting with programs. Microsoft doesn't think computer users should have to use one program to read and write a word-processing file, another to use a spreadsheet, and a third to correspond via e-mail. Rather, the company thinks, a single program should handle it all.
Obviously this means a thorough overhaul of not just Windows but also the Office software suite, Chief Executive Steve Ballmer has confirmed in published computer-industry reports
However attractive and effective such a new interface might be, the company may be overestimating users' willingness to change their habits, some analysts say.
Once it's understood where certain tasks must be performed, many users are content to go there, even if the set-up is -- as computer geeks would say -- sub-optimal. Whether users will be willing to learn a new way of using their computers just because it's "better" is open to question.
Not to mention the expense of installing new software, says Cherry.
"There will have to be compelling reasons" to install the new operating system, because "it costs corporations a fortune to roll it out," he said.
Include enhanced security. Longhorn will be the first operating system designed for use with PCI Express, the motherboard design that will succeed the PCI standard currently in force, Enderle said. In addition to providing a performance boost of up to eight times current speeds, the new design is required to harness the increased security features of Longhorn, which Enderle said are embodied in Microsoft's "Palladium"-branded trustworthy-computing initiative.
"Neither Linux nor Unix ties the operating system to hardware," he said.
"This could bring a higher level of security than anything we've ever seen. It will almost completely prevent the platform from being compromised."
To those "facts" about Longhorn, add the hopes of other analysts. Ideally, Longhorn will "fundamentally integrate" audio, video and images in a "visually stunning" manner, much like the Mac's OS X, said Tim Bajarin, president of the Campbell, Calif., research firm Creative Strategies Inc.
It should also be able to synchronize the multiple PCs, personal digital assistants and computer-equipped cell phones -- Microsoft calls them SmartPhones -- many people will own, Bajarin said.
But getting Longhorn out the door at Microsoft could be a challenge. The company is struggling to get .Net Server -- the first server version of Windows XP -- shipped. It also has service packs for Windows 2000 and Windows XP to produce on an ongoing basis. And a new operating system takes at least 20 months, sometimes 40 months, Cherry said.
"I'd like to see Microsoft act like the operating-system leader it is, not promising scores of new features or letting rumors fly but stepping forward and saying, 'We will have X, Y and Z features and not A, B and C,' " he said.
"That would be leadership, especially when so many people are dependent on you."
In M$ we trust...
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