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Microsoft To Release Cloud-Oriented Windows OS
Posted by
timothy
on Wed Oct 01, 2008 01:35 PM
from the name-tba dept.
from the name-tba dept.
CWmike writes "Within a month, Microsoft will unveil what CEO Steve Ballmer called 'Windows Cloud.' The operating system, which will likely have a different name, is intended for developers writing cloud-computing applications, said Ballmer, who spoke to an auditorium of IT managers at a Microsoft-sponsored conference in London. Ballmer was short on details, saying more information would spoil the announcement. Windows Cloud is a separate project from Windows 7, the operating system that Microsoft is developing to succeed Windows Vista."
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Developers: Developers Will Get Windows 7 Alpha On Oct. 28 83 comments
CWmike writes "Microsoft confirmed today that it will hand out 'pre-beta' release copies of Windows 7 on Oct. 28, at the Professional Developers Conference (PDC). Mike Swanson, a Microsoft technology evangelist, has said attendees will receive a 160GB external USB hard drive that will presumably include the Windows 7 alpha. Mike Cherry, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft, was cautiously optimistic that today's announcement meant Microsoft was on track with Windows 7. 'If they didn't do this, you would have to wonder if they could make the schedule,' Cherry said."
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Microsoft Dark Cloud (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Microsoft Cloud (Score:5, Funny)
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
No, it has one [silverlight.net]
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Windows Cloud OS??? This is bull excrement. I want to OWN my programs (like Word 2000), not have to keep renting it "off the net" year after year after year.
Hmmm. Looks like I'll still be using XP 'til the year 2020.
I refuse to touch Vista and Cloud sounds like garbage too.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
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Don't people usually close Windows when it turns cloudy ?
Don't hold your breath (Score:5, Funny)
This sounds like vapourware to me.
Re: (Score:2)
Actually, sounds like Ulteo [ulteo.com]. I've played with Ulteo and it is pretty close, and technically MS should be able to throw enough people behind something like it.
Re:Don't hold your breath (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, sounds like Ulteo. I've played with Ulteo and it is pretty close, and technically MS should be able to throw enough people behind something like it.
Hell no. Unlike some people, Microsoft knows what "OS" means, and it's an OS: process management, drivers, the entire party.
If you want to get intot he right mindset about this project, consider it a spinoff of the Windows Server family (but will likely be a subset powered mostly or entirely by .NET).
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Re:Don't hold your breath (Score:5, Insightful)
and it's an OS: process management, drivers, the entire party.
Please click my link... Ulteo can be installed (and looks a lot like Ubuntu). I only ran in in a virtual machine, but it seemed like a pretty nice little setup. My big complaint is that they have apt-get, but you really can't use it or stuff breaks.
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Re:Don't hold your breath (Score:5, Interesting)
I suspect you're closer than you think.
Some time ago, rumour had it that Microsoft had allocated ~300 of its best engineers to work on Midori [engadget.com], a product based on its Singularity research OS.
Singularity, for those not familiar with it, is a highly impressive piece of work. It's not actually Windows at all, in fact it bears absolutely no resemblence to any existing OS architecturally and didn't even support graphics when we were last able to look at it. But it was a ground-up fresh new OS that had the following characteristics: entirely .NET based (with extensions), extremely robust and extremely high performance.
In particular, Singularity is able to go about 30% faster on I/O intensive apps than traditional server operating systems like Linux and Windows because it doesn't use hardware process isolation, but rather does everything in software. Hmmm, an OS with no graphics support, no applications, but which can run .NET applications far faster than the competition. Sounds basically ideal for a server OS or "cloud windows" if you ask me.
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Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Don't hold your breath So hazy i can't see... (Score:2, Funny)
Project/Code Name?
Candidates:
Tacoma
Wincoma
GLAUcoma
Cloudy
Misty
TearDrop
Charmin
Re:Don't hold your breath So hazy i can't see... (Score:5, Funny)
Project/Code Name?
Since this is Slashdot, how about...
"Insensitive Cloud"
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Clouds ARE insensitive, you clo .... (struck by lightening, vaporized...)
Make it the next poll! (Score:4, Funny)
I would have voted for "Windows Nimbus."
This should be the next poll.
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What it is... (Score:5, Informative)
It's not new and it's not vaporware, it's also not Windows on the cloud. It's called Microsoft Mesh. It's been in used for many months, although only the first few services are available. Right now you get PC to PC and PC to Web synchronization of data. It's pretty much the best document remote access / sharing solution right now.
MS wants to add applications too, which many people compare with Google Docs but it's not that at all. It's basically a way that people will be able to use the same app from anywhere, have multiple people use the same application thru this mesh. How it will end up working is.. as of yet unknown.
The upcoming PDC conference in October will be all about Mesh, which is what Balmer is referring to.
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Wonder if (Score:5, Funny)
they have an HTML version of the Blue Screen Of Death.
Re:Wonder if (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Wonder if (Score:4, Funny)
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
cloud = vaporware? (Score:3, Funny)
It seems so obvious now.
What is it? (Score:3, Insightful)
Is this a web-based back end for hosting apps on a server? Is it an online platform of application infrastructure? Is it a toolkit/API for writing apps like Ruby-on-Rails?
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
It's Windows Vaporware [today.com]. It's a dessert wax and a floor topping. It's any marketing spin at all that they think might put people off competitors' products.
Anyone can talk up a hand of five aces [roughlydrafted.com]. Producing it when called is a bit harder.
Perhaps it will have $DATABASE_FILESYSTEM!
Re:What is it? (Score:5, Funny)
This is the pre-announcement to announce an announcement. You'll have to wait for the actual announcement to find out what the hell it is.
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Re:What is it? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Will it function cross browser? (Score:3, Funny)
hohum (Score:5, Funny)
RMS was right! (Score:5, Informative)
http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/09/30/2146250 [slashdot.org]
Windows for cloud computing (Score:4, Funny)
I sense a disturbance in the Force ... (Score:5, Funny)
as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in labored puns about windows and clouds and nobody had the sense to silence them.
Cloud computing (Score:4, Insightful)
Which competitor has just released something? (Score:4, Insightful)
I haven't been following this stuff.
Is it safe to assume that some competitor has just released a working toolkit for developing cloud applications that works pretty well? And that Ballmer needs to get the pointy-haired boss to stop Dilbert from using that toolkit, and redesign the mission-critical project around Windows Cloud?
I see a Clippy, and a doggie, and a Bob... (Score:2)
but are those my financial records on that torrent server?
Yay for Windows Vapor! (Score:4, Insightful)
I am so excited about $NEXT_VERSION of Windows [today.com]. It will go beyond just solving all of the problems with $CURRENT_VERSION, it will be an entirely new paradigm. Forget about security problems, those are all fixed in $NEXT_VERSION. And they're finally ridding themselves of $ANCIENT_LEGACY_STUFF.
Also, there'll be $DATABASE_FILESYSTEM. It'll be awesome!
I wonder how $NEXT_VERSION will compare to $NEXT_NEXT_VERSION.
("Windows Cloud"? Good freakin' gosh, what do they have for a marketing department?)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Good freakin' gosh, what do they have for a marketing department?
The same guys who thought pairing Seinfeld and Gates could match up to the awesome juggernaut that is John Hodgman.
So, um... (Score:3, Insightful)
No Microsoft lock-in "advantage" in this field (Score:4, Insightful)
The whole point of cloud computing is to run your server apps on whatever is available to run it. These apps do not, should not, and typically CANNOT do any configuration or long-term storage on any individual instance they run on, so everything they do is compartmentalized through specialized IO and shared storage APIs, which can be reimplemented on pretty much anything.
Sure, on the desktop everybody supports Windows, because they've got the drivers, Office is popular, etc etc. But going to any from-scratch model like cloud computing, Microsoft carries absolutely zero advantage or momentum from their other market saturations.
Are you sure? (Score:2)
Cloud computing = fail (Score:3, Insightful)
Mod me down for being a little jaded against ideas like this, but I just had to say something...
Ok, so, it still requires the client to boot some sort of OS stub, right? It still needs a method to connect to the Internet...and it sure isn't going to be BOOTP or PXE. You'll still have to have a local OS, but will apps/games run on it?
How is this going to benefit anyone except the corporate coffers? Of course $mega_corps love this idea! They don't care about your experience, they care about taking your money, and remaining in control.
If cloud computing grabs hold of us, we'll have to pay per month. Even just $20/month over 5 years = $1200...heh, yeah, sounds like a superdeal for everybody! Oh, and of course they will charge more per accessible app...and don't expect to use the same app for years, you'll be pushed forward to new apps without your consent.
Do I stream my data, like movies too?
What about bandwidth caps? How about your throttle?
What happens when my Internet connection goes down?
What happens when THEIR Internet connection goes down?
What happens when their SERVER goes down? Subverted? If someone doesn't notice?
What happens when I need custom apps installed? What if they aren't "approved"?
Who do I call when an app doesn't work/crashes?
Will my printers work? How about the rest of my attached devices? Legacy devices?
What happens if I want access to my stuff while I'm not near an Internet connection?
Who gets to look at my operating log?
Are advertisements banned?
Imagine how convoluted the simple task of inserting a scanned image will be.
A modern OS needs to be local, all this will be is just an in-browser-web-app, OR some virtual desktop a la Terminal Services.
It won't happen. /rant
Good Call, Microsoft (Score:5, Insightful)
Good Call, Microsoft. With five editions of Vista competing with three editions of XP and nine editions of Server 2008 (including three that are just the regular versions without the hypervisor software), plus separate 64-bit versions of everything, the Windows product line wasn't nearly diffuse enough.
Let me guess... (Score:3, Interesting)
Windows Vista that doesn't accept being offline and can store apps in a proprietary XML like format that you can display with 'the advanced and intergrated new exiting underlining technology MS has developed and maybe patented' *cough*aka IE8 extension for offline pages*cough*.
Sounds like something even I could have made by adding and removing some stuff in Ubuntu and remaster the image...
So... (Score:2)
Of course, we already knew that Microsoft was our industry's Lex Luthor.
Is it a coincidence (Score:3, Interesting)
Windows Cloud... (Score:5, Funny)
This already exists in the wild (Score:5, Funny)
This windows cloud computing stuff is already used to send millions of emails a day and so on. The product itself really isn't news, the only news is that Ballmer is finally giving it a product name so we can talk about it more effectively in the media.
For a list of computers participating in the Windows Cloud, go here [spamhaus.org] and request an rsync feed for the XBL.
Previewed previously (Score:3, Funny)
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You mean lin-dex. Penguin(tm) brand?
Re: (Score:2)
Think it will be called the Blue Sky Of Death now.
Re:Distributed Blue Screen of Death (Score:5, Funny)
No, the Falling Blue Sky Of Death.
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