The rollout of Microsoft's next major version of Windows has been pushed back to late 2006 in large part by a two-punch combination of newly found security vulnerabilities and the impending disposition of sanctions expected from the European Union.
John Parkinson, chief technologist for the Americas at Cap Gemini Ernst and Young U.S. LLC, in Chicago, said Microsoft has moved a third of its Longhorn staff over to address a redesign of Windows XP, partly to address security vulnerabilities that have shown up and partly because Microsoft had concluded the EU was likely to make the company unbundle the platform in some way.
You need look no further than the swollen feature set planned for XP Service Pack 2 to see that a significant new version of Windows will be upon us within the year. The real question, then, isn't whether an intermediate Windows is on its way but how Microsoft intends to market and distribute it.
Make no mistake: We won't be seeing Longhorn for a while, and that's the way it should be. The delay may disappoint developers working to create applications for Longhorn, but a rushed release won't serve anyone's interests. With all the major subsystem changes planned for Longhorn, the operating system will require a very long testing period. Microsoft has bitten off quite a bit for this release, and the company needs plenty of time to chew it.
Microsoft will use next week's VSLive/SpeechTek/Microsoft Mobile Devcon conferences in San Francisco to emphasize its message that Visual Studio is the single, unified development platform around which developers should rally. The trio of conferences, which kick off on Wednesday with a keynote address by Microsoft chairman Bill Gates, will be a launch pad for a handful of new Microsoft products.
Microsoft announced several executive appointments Friday in its game division. Shane Kim will become general manager of Microsoft Game Studios, which produces game software for PCs, along with the company's Xbox console. He replaces Ed Fries, who left the company in January, after 18 years with Microsoft.
Peter Moore, a former Sega executive, will expand his role as vice president to oversee worldwide content and marketing for Microsoft games and game products. And Mitchell Koch, a former Disney executive, will expand his role as vice president to oversee worldwide retail sales for Microsoft consumer products.
Microsoft's MSN is planning to label its paid-search listings more clearly, a course long advised by the Federal Trade Commission. The software giant said on Friday that as of July, its Web portal will better mark out which of its MSN Search results are paid listings, making them more relevant to visitors' search terms.
In addition, MSN Search will showcase text advertisements sold by its own staff rather than promos sold by its third-party partner, Yahoo-owned Overture Services. Overture ads will appear to the right of search results rather than at the top.
A divided Nebraska Supreme Court revived a class-action lawsuit Friday alleging that Microsoft Corp. violated the state's consumer-protection laws by engaging in monopolistic behavior. The high court ruled 4-3 in favor of two Nebraskans who sued the software giant in 2001. They allege that Microsoft used its monopoly in computer operating systems to overcharge people for its widely used Windows 98 software.
Microsoft is providing its most detailed glimpse to date of features in "Avalon," the media-presentation technology component of its next-generation Longhorn operating system.
The new information arrives as Microsoft prepares to roll out an updated beta release next week of its "Whidbey" Visual Studio 2005 toolset, which will serve as the development environment for creating Avalon and Longhorn-based applications.
Microsoft chief counsel Brad Smith was questioned yesterday on how the talks with the European Union Commission broke down. An edited transcript of the interview follows:
Q. Do you plan to appeal?
A. I can say by definition this will go forward to the courts. The process will need to move forward after the commission's process is complete.
We've always said that we would prefer to work this out. Given that we haven't been able to do so, it's clear that we will all be able to benefit from the clarity that the courts can bring to these questions.
Microsoft Business Solutions wants to pump up the volume. That's the implicit--or not so implicit message--MBS and "Microsoft Classic" partners have heard in the months leading into Convergence 2004, the annual MBS customer event next week in Orlando.
Instead of focusing on futures, the Convergence spotlight will be on near-term deliverables including Great Plains Version 8, due to beta soon and to be generally available this summer, sources said. The new financial software will sport an interface mimicking that of Outlook Web Access (OWA). Microsoft executives briefly previewed the new look-and-feel at last year's show.
Microsoft plans to drop the price of its Xbox video game system by $30 to $149 next month according to a story in the Wall Street Journal on Friday. Citing people familiar with the company's plans, the Journal said Microsoft may also start selling a limited-edition Xbox packaged with its Halo shooting game, for $169. Publishers and retailers have clamored for a price cut for the Xbox and Sony's rival PlayStation 2 this year, to either $149 or $129. Reuters has cited senior industry executives saying they expected price cuts by May this year.