Microsoft preps XP push, mulls Longhorn 'priorities'

C|Net | at | by Mike

With a long-awaited security update to Windows XP now complete, Microsoft is preparing a holiday season push for the 3-year-old operating system--and is set to revisit ambitious plans for the next major revision, News.com has learned.

That revision, code-named Longhorn, one of the most difficult and complicated in the company's history, has fallen further behind this year, as Microsoft shifted developers from the project and onto Windows XP Service Pack 2, which took longer than expected. Now the company faces the task of getting Longhorn under control and making XP seem fresh during a longer-than-usual wait between operating system updates.