Summary: The coming Windows 8 beta is looking more and more like it will be called the “consumer preview.” Why the change in nomenclature?

Is Microsoft going to position the coming Windows 8 beta as a “consumer preview”? And if so, why?
Microsoft officials have repeated recently that the Windows 8 beta release is on track for late February 2012. But one public relations official with the Windows team provided a slightly different message — and one that escaped notice by most of those who read her quote — during the Consumer Electronics Show.
As reported by Pocket Lint, Windows Director of Consumer PR, Janelle Poole, stayed on message regarding Microsoft’s continued reluctance to talk about its release-to-manufacturing/ship targets for Windows 8. But, as Windows SuperSite’s Paul Thurrott noted last week, part of Poole’s message deviated from the usual script. Poole called the coming Windows 8 beta “the consumer preview.” Here’s her quote:[indent]
“We haven’t talked about the release date and we generally don’t. We are talking milestone to milestone, so for us right now we’re talking about the next milestone being the consumer preview happening in late February.”[/indent]
If you know anything about the Windows org, you know words matter. This wasn’t a random throw-away.
My first question was whether it’s just the internal Windows consumer PR team calling the beta “the consumer preview” or if the Microsoft brass plan to do the same. I’m hearing that the Windows organization is highly likely to settle on “consumer preview” as the name for the late-February beta.
The bigger question — which Thurrott and I discussed during the most recent episode of Windows Weekly — is why Microsoft may label this the consumer preview.
Thurrott’s theory was that maybe the developer preview (the September Build version) will be followed by a consumer preview (the beta) and finally the enterprise preview (the release candidate).
My theory is more cynical, but not entirely unwarranted. I believe if Microsoft changes the nomenclature, the company is doing so to signify a change that’s been coming for a while now. What used to constitute a “beta” doesn’t really exist in the new Windows world. I said the same during the Windows 7 test period: That the current Windows organization doesn’t show code publicly at all until it’s pretty much set in stone and going to be tweaked very minimally. This makes Windows more predictable, but it also implies that the product is far less likely to incorporate suggested fixes from those outside Microsoft.
During the Windows 7 test period, there were still a select group of technical beta testers on whom Microsoft seemingly leaned for real feedback and guidance regarding the product. That team, known internally as the “Test Pilots,” was disbanded after Windows 7 was released. As far as I know, there’s no equivalent to this group this time around. And Senior Program Manager for technical beta testing for Windows, Paul Donnelly, recently left Microsoft to go to Amazon with no replacement named (again, as far as I know).
There could be other reasons Microsoft may prefer the “consumer preview” name to “beta.” By claiming a product is far enough along to be used by plain old consumers — and not just techie beta testers — Microsoft officials could be hoping to convince those who think a possible Q3 Windows 8 launch will be too late for Microsoft to shoe-horn its way into the tablet space that Windows 8 is right around the corner. (”Hey, it’s basically done — it’s in consumer preview now!”)
Such a name also could help Microsoft’s PC partners who need a way to make new tablets and PCs that they’re bringing to market from now until the time that Windows 8 is shipping seem more up-to-date and palatable. (”This runs the Windows 8 Consumer Preview — so you know it’ll be able to run the final Windows 8 with no problem.”)
Microsoft officials aren’t saying anything beyond the fact that the next Windows 8 release is due out in late February and that there is no separate “consumer preview” in the works — meaning, to me, the one-and-only Windows 8 beta is highly likely to be called the “Consumer Preview” when it is released.
What’s your take as to why Microsoft is leaning toward calling the beta a “consumer preview” — and what effect (if any) this will have on Redmond, its developers, partners and customers? Thoughts?

via > http://www.zdnet.com...r-preview/11716

This sounded interesting so thought I’d share. Microsoft has announced (via a post on its Building Windows 8 blog) that Windows 8 will introduce a new file system known as Resilient File System (ReFS) which will include a next generation on-disk storage engine. I should assure you upfront that this will not cause major compatibility issues with NTFS although it is a re-plumbing of the FS not just an upgrade to NTFS. The blog says that it’s “a newly engineered file system…built on the foundations of NTFS, so it maintains crucial compatibility while at the same time it has been “architected and engineered for a new generation of storage technologies and scenarios.” Currently plans are for ReFS to make its first appearance as a storage system in Windows Server 8, after which it will evolve into a system for client storage, then ultimately for boot volumes, which is a tried and true paradigm for rolling out new file systems.
If you read the technical blog (by Surendra Verma) referenced in the Sinofsky above post you’ll see that we’re doing this to accomplish some key goals that will serve to future-proof the file system. A synopsis of the key goals are:

• Maintaining a high degree of compatibility with a subset of NTFS features that are widely adopted.
  
• Verifying and auto-correcting data.
  
• Optimizing for extreme scale
  
• Never having to take the file system offline.
  
• Providing a full end-to-end resiliency architecture when used in conjunction with theStorage Spaces feature. (I recommend my technical readers checkout this post on Storage Spaces which will give a more complete view of storage in Windows 8 not just the on-disk engine. For the less technical reader, here’s a quick overview of Storage Spaces, Three Benefits of Windows 8 Storage Spaces)
  Cheerio chkdsk .

ReFS will inherit some of the key features (and code) of NTFS (i.e. ACLs, BitLocker, symbolic links, etc) but, as mentioned above, it’s essentially a re-plumbing from an architectural point of view – specifically, there will be a new on-disk storage engine as the foundation (see graphic below). If you care, the storage engine will exclusively use something called B+ tree structure to represent stored information. I won’t even attempt a description of what that is but suffice to know that this is not a new thing and it leverages page and tables (like a database) for scalability. Verma indicated this will actually mean a simpler system. He also indicated that the file system is being designed to work for a wide range of devices "from the smallest footprint machines to the largest data centers". To give you an idea of the scalability we’re talking here, ReFS will be able to support file names and file paths with as many as 32,000 characters. It can host files as large as 2⁶⁴ bytes (an exabyte = 2⁶⁰), so this is some serious scalability – I’ve included a screenshot of the capacity specs below as well.

Oh well, this wasn’t intended to be a technical drilldown but rather just an awareness post to highlight this new technology and remind you that, in fact, we are continuing to advance our infrastructure technology to meet future needs, even on things as mundane as file systems.

via > http://blogs.technet...ile-system.aspx

In a blog post a couple of days ago on the Windows Team blog Roger Capriotti, Director, Internet Explorer Marketing
wrote on the Internet Explorer side about "The US Says Goodbye to IE6".



That’s great, good news!
Very nice work with The Internet Explorer 6 Countdown.


Here in Sweden we are down to 0.4%.

But why do 7.33% (acording to Netmarketshare) of all people on the Internet use Internet Explorer 6 in 2012?
In December 2011 the number was 7.7%, so after all we are on the right track.




Internet Explorer 6 is 10 years old!

I’m not a security freak, but I will never use Internet Explorer 6 to surf on the Internet.
It’s something like to have a antivirus program from the same time.
It was great then, but not now. Okay, I will never use IE7 either



Some of the arguments about using an old browser (IE6 and IE7) usually ends up in an business critical web application.

My questions is always:

• Why use that web application?
  
• Is It because of the vendor or the company?

In almost every case It’s possible to upgrade or switch to another vendors similar web application.



It’s more expensive to use a non standard, not updated and a non safe web browser for all of the employers on a company
rather then upgrade or switch business critical web applications.

In the case with IE6 I think that the major part of the users is not companies.
And it’s people with old operating systems too.

Read more about IE6 at the sources:
http://windowsteamblog.com/ie/b/ie/archive/2012/01/03/the-us-says-goodbye-to-ie6.aspx
http://www.netmarketshare.com/
http://www.ie6countdown.com

Today we are sharing our plan to automatically upgrade Windows customers to the latest version of Internet Explorer available for their PC. This is an important step in helping to move the Web forward. We will start in January for customers in Australia and Brazil who have turned on automatic updating via Windows Update. Similar to our release of IE9 earlier this year, we will take a measured approach, scaling up over time.
As always, when upgrading from one version of Internet Explorer to the next through Windows Update, the user’s home page, search provider, and default browser remains unchanged.

Good for Consumers, Developers and Enterprises
The Web overall is better – and safer – when more people run the most up-to-date browser. Our goal is to make sure that Windows customers have the most up-to-date and safest browsing experience possible, with the best protections against malicious software such as malware.
For consumers, the safety benefits are one of the key reasons that the industry has been moving towards automatic updates as the norm. This is increasingly important since the biggest online threat these days is socially engineered malware, which typically targets outdated software like Web browsers. The latest Microsoft Security Intelligence Report, which is based on data from over 600 million systems in over 100 countries, is good reading to give you a sense of risks that stem from outdated software.
We want to make updating to the best protection possible as fast and simple as we can for Windows customers. IE is how millions of Windows customers connect to the Web, so keeping that part of Windows updated at all times is critical to keeping them safe online. With automatic updates enabled through Windows Update, customers can receive IE9 and future versions of Internet Explorer seamlessly without any “update fatigue” issues.
Wider deployment of the most up-to-date browser benefits the Web in other ways as well. Developers and online businesses can rely on better browsers to deliver richer and more capable Web experiences. We built IE9 with a focus on modern web standards and interoperability so that developers could spend less time coding for specific browsers and spend more time building the next big thing on the Web. More of the Web running an HTML5 capable browser, vs. something built ten years ago, is a great thing for developers and the businesses they support.

Respecting Customer Choice and Control
While the benefits of upgrading are numerous, we recognize that some organizations and individuals may want to opt-out and set their own upgrade pace. One of the things we’re committed to as we move to auto updates is striking the right balance for consumers and enterprises – getting consumers the most up-to-date version of their browser while allowing enterprises to update their browsers on their schedule. The Internet Explorer 8 and Internet Explorer 9 Automatic Update Blocker toolkits prevent automatic upgrades of IE for Windows customers who do not want them. Of course, we firmly believe that IE9 is the most compelling browser for business customers, and we want them to make the decision to upgrade at their convenience. Commercial customers can learn more about how this auto upgrade affects them here.
Similarly, customers who have declined previous installations of IE8 or IE9 through Windows Update will not be automatically updated. Customers have the ability to uninstall updates and continue to receive support for the version of IE that came with their copy of Windows. And similar to organizations, consumers can block the update all together and upgrade on their own. Finally, future versions of IE will provide an option in the product for consumers to opt out of automatic upgrading.

Peter Clarke, Chief Technology Officer for the Isle of Man government, recently talked about the importance of approach in moving the Web forward, while respecting customer choice:
“Getting people to use the latest browser version has many benefits, chief among them is that newer browsers have better security features and keep users safer. The Internet Explorer team’s balanced approach to helping people move to the latest version is a good idea. Not only does it help individual users, it also takes into consideration the needs of enterprises.”

Jeremiah Grossman, Chief Technology Officer and founder of WhiteHat Securityagrees as well, saying…

"Automatic updates are a very good idea based on every piece of security research I've seen. Keeping software up to date - particularly Web browsers - is critical for online security. With that in mind, I'm pleased that Microsoft is moving toward an automatic update model, particularly since their approach balances the needs of enterprise customers who still need a mechanism to manage software updates."
We are excited to help make the Web better by upgrading Windows customers to the latest version of Internet Explorer.

Ryan Gavin

General Manager, Internet Explorer Business and Marketing

via > http://windowsteambl...-windows-7.aspx

Installing Windows is a complex operation that provides an incredibly unique capability—the ability to run a new version of Windows on a vast array of hardware configurations and combinations that were designed with no knowledge of a future Windows, even a version with substantial re-architecture of the Kernel. While most people do not experience the full code path of setup/upgrade (because they buy new PCs and choose to get a new version of Windows that way), even orchestrating the new PC “out of box experience” (OOBE) is a complex technical challenge. Our aim in improving setup is to reduce the time from start to finish so that customers can get to Windows and use the full power of Windows to further customize and ultimately enjoy their new Windows experience. This post was written by Christa St. Pierre on our Setup and Deployment team.

–Steven
(Note, we’re taking a break for the US Holiday)

Setup is something that gets a lot of attention from us in any Windows release. It needs to just work reliably across a huge number of variations of hardware and software. This is true whether you are upgrading your own laptop, or you’re an IT pro who is migrating 10,000 desktops in an enterprise using broad deployment tools. For Windows 7 our main focus was on improving successful install rates, and we did a lot of work to improve reliability and deal with many tough (but relatively rare) cases that had caused problems in setting up earlier versions of Windows. This work gave Windows 7 a more reliable setup experience than in any previous Windows release, as measured by lab testing, customer support incidents, and setup telemetry.
For Windows 8, our goal was to continue to improve reliability while also improving the installation experience and raw performance. Not only did we want it to be rock solid, but also faster and easier to use.

A big challenge

Although millions of people choose to upgrade their existing PCs, most people choose to get a new version of Windows preinstalled on a new PC. In the past that often had to do with increasing system requirements in new Windows releases, and the need to purchase new PCs with more power to run the new version. With Windows 7 however, we made a commitment to work on many more existing PCs by keeping system requirements low and maintaining compatibility. We’ve continued that commitment with Windows 8, so many of you with existing PCs can simply upgrade. Looking just at Windows 7 customers, there are currently more than 450 million PCs that will be able to run Windows 8, but we expect that many systems running Windows Vista and even Windows XP will also be eligible.
Support for these PCs running different Windows versions is a big challenge in terms of testing all possible upgrade paths, languages, service packs, architectures, and editions. When you think about it, it is a rather remarkable achievement that hardware designed for one OS can be supported on an OS that did not exist when the hardware was created, especially considering that connecting hardware to software is a fundamental role played by the OS.
There are always complexities involving hardware support. Sometimes PCs are equipped with peripherals that require updated drivers for Windows 8, and in other cases, for any number of reasons, a PC maker decides that a particular model or configuration is not supported on a new version of Windows. There are also complexities in getting software to work seamlessly upon upgrade, particularly utilities that hook into the lowest levels of Windows such as anti-virus, disk format and defrag, or virtualization. While we have a massive test and ecosystem effort, ultimately the final say on support on a new version of Windows for a PC, peripheral, or software package is determined by the maker of that product. Our commitment to keeping things running and bringing forward software is industry leading and continues with Windows 8. At one recent team meeting, a member of our team showed Windows 8 running Excel version 3.0, which is the 16-bit version of Excel from 1990!

Perceived as “difficult”

During planning for Windows 8, we wanted to hear from customers who chose not to upgrade to Windows 7 even though their PCs would run it. In 2010 we commissioned a study of how people make PC purchase decisions, and talked to customers in three global markets to find out more. While the list of reasons as to why a customer chose not to upgrade varied by market, we have received notable feedback that upgrading the PC was perceived as difficult. So even though many customers wanted to upgrade, the current setup experience might be something that just wasn’t easy enough to make them feel confident in doing so.

Different customer needs

Hearing that some customers think it is too difficult really highlights the fact that we have many different customer needs we need to fulfill with setup. Most customers who buy a Windows upgrade from a retailer just want it to be fast and easy, but a few also want to be able to do some more complex things, such as setting up in a multi-boot configuration. And of course, we also have the IT Pro customers, who need to take full control over configurations, install from network as well as media, and add customizations to the setup image. The advanced user’s needs are a lot like those of the IT Pro, both because they require more fine-tuned control and because it’s hard for us to predict exactly which controls they may want to manipulate. For this reason, we have not created a “super advanced setup” mode, but we encourage people who want to create unattended setup configurations for home or work to use our standalone deployment tools. In Windows 7, we provided a Windows Automated Installation Kit, and in Windows 8 we have enhanced that with additional tools in the Windows Assessment and Deployment Kit, which is available for download to MSDN subscribers.
For this post, I’ll talk mostly about the interactive GUI setup experiences, since that’s where we have the most changes. We sought to maintain very high backwards compatibility with existing unattended installation configurations that IT Pros or advanced users have spent time on for Windows 7, so you can expect those to work consistently for Windows 8 as well, without having to start over. So rest assured that your custom deployments continue to be fully supported as before.

Streamlining the end-to-end experience

Leaving aside automated installations and just looking at the typical GUI scenarios, we still wanted to serve two distinct customer groups in the setup user experience:

• People who want an easy way to upgrade to the new release with an absolute bare minimum of hassle
  
• People who want to do a clean install, and want more control of setup options, disk layout, and partition configuration

The way we approached these needs was based on the realization that the first group typically runs setup in the UI of their current Windows OS (i.e. they launch it like an app), while the second group typically runs setup from boot media. So, rather than trying to rationalize two fairly different experiences and customer requirements, we chose to maintain two setup user experiences: a streamlined setup that you reach by running an .exe from the DVD or via web delivery, and an advanced setup that runs when you boot off of a DVD or USB key. The streamlined setup is a new experience, optimized for ease-of-use, upgrades, and web delivery via download. Advanced setup is the home of all things familiar to the advanced user, including full support for unattended installation, partition selection, and formatting. Under the covers they share all of the same setup engine components. So both experiences benefitted from our ability to focus on a common codebase for performance and reliability enhancements.




Shifting towards web delivery methods

Before going into the detail on the user experience changes, there’s one big change that is important to call out. In the past, if you wanted to buy an upgrade for Windows, it involved purchasing a boxed product from a retail outlet, taking it home, (sometimes being infuriated while trying to open the box,) and inserting a DVD. However, buying boxed software is quickly becoming the exception rather than the rule, with more and more software being purchased online as broadband penetration increases and large-size media downloads become more common. While we will continue to offer boxed DVDs, we are also making it easier than ever to purchase and install online. This includes starting the setup experience online as well, and having one continuous integrated experience from beginning to end. There is also one big advantage that is a favorite of mine. With our web setup experience, we actually “pre-key” the setup image that is downloaded to a unique user, which means that you don’t have to type in the 25-digit product key when you install!

Streamlining - Reducing repetition and integrating experiences

More than 20 million customers downloaded and ran the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor during the first six months of availability. Many customers also ran Windows Easy Transfer during this same time period. A reasonable (and often recommended) installation experience for Windows 7 followed a flow like this:

• Download and install Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor
  
• Run Windows Upgrade Advisor
  
• Run Windows Easy Transfer to save files and settings
  
• Run Windows 7 setup and clean install
  
• Run Windows Easy Transfer to restore files and settings

This end-to-end experience included 4 different web and client experiences and required the average customer to walk through 60 screens to complete. The primary reason for the high screen count was the repetition of information. We can visualize it something like this:

A common Windows 7 installation experience: Upgrade Advisor, Windows Easy Transfer, and Setup

In Windows 8, rather than having Upgrade Advisor, Setup, and Windows Easy Transfer as separate apps or features, we’ve folded them together into one fast and fluid experience in which we first determine if your PC, apps, and devices will work in the new OS, note which things you want to keep (apps, files and/or settings), and then install the new OS.
We’ve also added the capability for setup to resume automatically after certain actions (such as resolving a blocking compatibility problem), which in the past would have required restarting setup again from the beginning.
Here’s what to expect when you launch the new setup experience from the web :

Determining compatibility
The first thing we do is scan the PC to determine compatibility, resulting in a summary report such as this one:

Windows 8 setup compatibility summary
It provides information on the apps and devices that will work in Windows 8, those that won’t work, and any other system information that is useful to know when determining whether or not to purchase and install Windows 8. A detailed compatibility report is also available if you want to print or save the information, or desire more detail about what to expect once you get to Windows 8, including which apps or devices will require updates.
The compatibility data behind the report covers hundreds of thousands of applications and devices, including retail software, OEM preinstalled software, and peripherals. If an application or device ran on Windows 7, our goals is that it should run on Windows 8 too, but in some cases it may require an update or other support from the OEM or vendor. Some applications also have custom installation logic – installing certain components or settings depending on the OS you’re upgrading from (this is particularly true of system utilities and software that is tightly connected to hardware and peripherals). You may need to uninstall and reinstall these types of apps. (This is also a reason to be careful of 3^rd party “app mover” applications, which claim to move apps from one OS to another, as the end result can be unpredictable or broken.) As a reminder, the best drivers for any system are the ones available directly from the PC manufacturer for embedded hardware and from the device manufacturer for peripherals.

Detailed compatibility report

Downloading Windows 8
Next, an integrated download manager provides time estimates, data validation, the ability to pause, resume, and re-download only parts of the file if something goes wrong. Additionally, because we have already scanned the PC to determine compatibility we know which version of Windows 8 to download – eliminating the need to ask questions such as which language or OS architecture to choose.

Downloading the Windows image from the web

Continuing with installation or creating bootable media
Once the download is complete, you are presented a choice to continue the installation, or install on another partition. The latter option takes you to advanced setup, and allows you to save an ISO or create a bootable USB drive before completing other advanced setup options. (This is the option you’ll need to choose if you want to dual boot, for example.)

Creating bootable media from web-based setup
Choosing what to keep
Next is the upgrade choice. You can choose to keep all, some, or none of your personal data depending on the OS you’re upgrading from, and your personal preferences.

Windows 8 setup options for upgrade and migration

The “Windows settings, personal files, and apps” option is akin to the existing “upgrade” option in Windows 7 and Windows Vista, where an in-place upgrade is performed over the current OS, retaining the apps that were previously installed as well as settings and user files on disk.
The “Just personal files” option is a new functionality, which allows you to get a clean install, but still keep your data without a separate tool such as Windows Easy Transfer.

read the rest here > http://blogs.msdn.co...experience.aspx