Something that I seem to be akin with the moment is lack of time to do the things I want.  I’m glad that even the likes of Microsoft have the same problem!

Windows Vista.  Something which you will probably hear a lot of in the next few months as Microsoft attempts to push its shiny new operating system.  At a hefty five years plus, Vista has had one of the longest development cycles in over twenty years of Windows releases by Microsoft, and also the most resource intensive in their history.  Personally I can’t help but feel a little disappointed at the release overall, in comparison to what I was expecting a few years ago Vista is not touted as more evolutionary than revolutionary, but I can understand why such a tame release.    

A little history is needed here….Pre Service Pack 2 for Windows XP when Vista was called Longhorn, there had been a growing problem of Malware, Browser Exploits, Buffer Overflows penetrating the XP operating system security.  Microsoft had originally intended to release SP2 with a new firewall turned on by default, and a rollup of all the hotfixes for the previous year.    Whilst they could have done this, the problems arising were beginning to be too big to ignore.  Signalling their intent Microsoft shifted between 80-90% of the Windows Client Team off Longhorn development and onto Windows XP SP2, a huge time investment!

Longhorn development originally started with the Windows XP SP1 codebase along with all the exploits that they just fixed for SP2.   They could have ported all these fixes back into the codebase, but at what cost?  Microsoft announced on 27th of August, 2004 that it was making significant changes. "Longhorn" development by basically started afresh, building on the Windows Server 2003 codebase, that’s almost one and a half years of lost development!

Blow is an example of where Longhorn was just before it was canned (one mins or so in)


So that’s where all the time has gone?  No, not quite.   Many would still argue that Microsoft have just been sitting on their hands since XP and milking the money, whilst the likes of Apple have released five versions of OSX since 2001.    With all the resources of a company like Microsoft you’d expect them to pick up the slack, maybe, maybe not. I think there is only so much money you can throw at a problem (too many cooks anyone?).   The Windows Client Team has been busy bunnies themselves in this time releasing multiple versions (whilst developing Longhorn/Vista):

Windows XP Professional x64 Edition
Windows XP Media Center Edition
Windows XP Media Center Edition 2004
Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005
Windows XP Tablet PC Edition
Windows XP Tablet PC Edition 2004
Windows XP Home and Professional N Editions
Windows XP with Service Pack 2
Windows XP Embedded
Windows XP Starter Edition
Windows 2003 Server
Windows 2003 Server SP1
Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs

In all there's been a five year break between true Windows versions, but many of these releases Media Center, and Tablet PC have included huge and innovative functional changes.

Next time round I’ll give it a shot on talking up Vista……If I have time! :)

Scott