Windows 7 To Be Released Next Year?

KrispySausage writes "A recently-released roadmap for the next major Window release — Windows 7 — indicates that Microsoft is planning to release the new operating system in the second half of 2009, rather than the anticipated release date of some time in 2010. This quickly-approaching release date would seem to be at least partially verified by news of a milestone build available for review by an anonymous third party." We've previously discussed the upcoming new OS version, as well as its danger to Vista.

Microsoft roadmaps

[olman]

Two words:
Yeah. Right.

And same goes for the feature list. I haven't been arsed to check but do they have the new filesystem there once more? Someone has been working on the new Windows filesystem for about 14 years now (since chicago). Must be really rewarding to have it axed time after time.

an ME situation would be my guess

[phorm]

Perhaps MSW7 would be the equivalent to what win2k was over ME? It might actually be a decent product then (of all them, 2k was a shining star in many ways), but I'd imagine that if this is the case a *lot* of those who bought Vista (or machines with Vista) are going to be royally pissed.

Good news for Linux

[BlueParrot]

If the screenshots are anything to judge by then Microsoft are changing user interfaces AGAIN ( and as usual it is a partial clone of Apple ). Wonder what will happen when people find that switching to Linux is an easier learning curve than upgrading windows...

What new technologies can we except?

[apathy maybe]

I remember reading an article in 2001 in a computer magazine about the marvellous things that were going to be in Longhorn (now Vista). A wonderful new database-like file system, brilliant UI and other great things. I thought how wonderful this system was going to be compared to WinXP (which had just come out).

Then later I read about how the new file system (WinFS) was based on something called 'Cairo' and about how that too had been scrapped.

At that stage I was using Mandrake Linux (I switched to Ubuntu at the start of 2007), and wanted something better.

Anyway, so this chain of thought ends in, well now I am using Ubuntu, it does keep getting better all the time. I don't use MS Windows really at all now on my computers. Why do I care?

Meh, lets try and get back to where I stared. Can we expect a new file system? Can we expect radical 'new' technologies? Perhaps even voice commands? (Computer: open http colon slash slash slash dot dot org)

Why is it....

[Lumpy]

That Microsoft cant do what others can?

I just got a copy of OSX 10.5 for my really old and outdated mac. Specifically to get a working copy of dashcode as I write OSX widgets for Crestron control. I was expecting the worst as installing the latest OS on a old PC never is a good thing.

10.5 makes my machine faster. I kind of looked at it skeptically but it actually boots faster and has a more responsive feel, even NeoOffice opens faster as well as Final Cut.

Why is Apple able to deliver an OS that is faster instead of slower? It's got as much eye candy as vista.

Maybe microsoft needs to have all their programmers re-trained?

FYI: Single processor G4 with only 784 meg of ram, and a crappy laptop video card.

Re:Low memory requirements from ms...

[mchawi]

If you follow the links on the other article though, where they talk about redoing the kernel to what they are calling MinWin - it ran on 40 MB of memory and only had 100 files.

So it might be interesting where they draw the line between the kernel at 40 MB and 'the system' with 480 MB of memory. It sounds like mainly applications running that you could probably parse down.

A move in the right direction at least.

Re:if only...

[Shados]

Once MS makes an OS that can do all that, I might rejoin the dark side

I'm sure its safe to say MS -wish- they could do it :) They'd just get sued to oblivion by the europeans. MS Office bundled with Windows and forced on the user? Users seeing an MS controled repository of software with everything under the sun? Man, thats their wet dream.

Re:Low memory requirements from ms...

[_KiTA_]

From TFA:

"The system is very responsive, using barely 480MB of memory after boot."

I've obviously been in *nix land for too long, I'm still of the impression that 256 Mb is pretty much all one needs for most tasks. Even EMACS!


Bloat is relative. Compared to Vista, 480MB is freaking Calista Flockhart-level of skinny.

Re:This is fake, mod article down (*sigh*)

[tdanecker]

It really looks like the Article's Windows 7 is not the same as the "MinWin" Windows 7. MinWin is only 64-bit but the article states the OS will be shipped as 32- and 64-bit version - No chance with MinWin.

Cherry Coke

[Harold Halloway]

I'm seeing a Coca Cola parallel here. Everyone was happy with normal Coke. Then Coca Cola released the new-fangled Coke which everyone hated. In desperation, Coca Cola released 'Classic Coke' which was the old stuff which people liked.

Expect to see 'XP Classic' being released before long.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Marketing Slogan

[Fred_A]

Windows 7 - because Vista sucked

And yet everyone will be "I don't want this crappy bloated new Windows 7, I'll stick with Vista, it worked well enough for me so far"...

has anyone ever..

[frankm_slashdot]

...actually taken the time to install Windows 1 and then upgrade it all the way to Vista one version at a time? I wonder what kind of relics you'd end up finding in the registry and hard drive.. heh. almost makes me want to do it.

Re:Vista's missing features

[DanQuixote]

All in all, this sounds like a surprisingly smart move on their part.

Sorry, but as long as Microsoft is selling software which they own the power to disable at any moment, software which you have paid for yet still must call and beg for permission to run, they are NOT surprisingly smart, only surprisingly GREEDY!

I was reasonably happy with Win2K Pro. It worked well enough. What's more, when I bought it, it stayed bought.

Quit giving M$ your money. There is no longer any reason to do so. Even my kids can do system administration on Ubuntu.

Just say "NO!"

Re:windows7

[mhall119]

NT4 was alright.

So was Windows 2000.

I'd say Windows releases are more like Batman movies, each ones sucks more than the one before until it gets "re-imagined" into a new series (Win2k), which starts the process over (XP, Vista).

Or maybe like Bond movies, where they're all pretty much the same, only the plots get less believable and you're left longing for the "classic" Bond who didn't need insane gizmos to get the job done. Yes, I like that analogy better.

Re:Why is it....

[kripkenstein]

Why is Apple able to deliver an OS that is faster instead of slower? It's got as much eye candy as vista.

And Compiz on Linux offers eye candy as well, also with fewer resource requirements. But the reasons for this are fairly clear:

• Microsoft isn't competing with OS X or Linux. It has a guaranteed monopoly market share. No reason to outdo the other players on technical merit.
• Microsoft makes most of its Windows money from sales of new computers. The question is then, how do you convince them to buy a new one. It could be because the old computer is full of viruses, or because the new OS (which you must have for security reasons, or to run DirectX 10, or whatever other made up excuse) simply is too big and slow for the old hardware. This is basically the business model. Apple, on the other hand, convinces people to buy new computers for other reasons, one major one is that the new hardware is very sexy. The MacBook Air is a clear example of this - people want it just for the hardware (when did you ever hear someone say that about a Windows machine?).

Re:windows7

[Amouth]

personaly i thought w2k was perfect.. truely built on NT with jsut a few usability things added.. the fact that w2k had device management and better error reporting for hardware was a perfect improvement over NT4 - also the support for things like directX and OGL was nice too - made it more usable - while w2k still had a the small (if you wnated it to be) foot print and prety decent preformance.

i am also glad that they updated the documentation from nt4 to w2k under defragment.. i will never forget reading that in the nt4 manual.. the recomended procedure for disk defragmentation was to back up the drive to tape.. format the drive and restore from tape.. just sadly funny for a server OS..

personaly i like w2k and still use it on my laptop.. i don't need the bells and wisles that xp and vista have - and with the lesser over head it makes my old p3 laptop run perfect

Re:windows7

[I8TheWorm]

I understand the importance of getting the FP, but really... is google that difficult a tool to use?

One of the probably features of Windows 7 include MinWin, which is a much lighter kernel (25MB footprint on disk, 40MB footprint in RAM). Another is the likelyhood of MS's heirarchical filesystem that was pulled in the Vista release.

There are other features being discussed such as extensive touch interface ability, etc...

Re:windows7

[rucs_hack]

I'm interested in windows 7, simply because of this (supposedly) optimised kernel. Certainly I won't *ever* be purchasing Vista. I have one machine available that I need to use for vista builds of my software, but it doesn't get used (by me at least) for anything else, on account of being a pile of shit.

I liked windows 2k a lot, I learned Delphi programming on 2k box. These days I don't code on windows except for ports of my software, but XP is ok for games, and I still like and use MSoffice.

Unfashionable I know, but what can I say, I'm OS Neutral.

Re:windows7

[dpilot]

>recomended procedure for disk defragmentation ... just sadly funny for a server OS..

No, the sad thing is that their server OS has a filesystem where regular defragmentation is a necessity. Over time, ext3 can fragment too, but just not that fast. Further, keeping file size and lifetime (write frequency) in mind when you partition improves fragmentation resistance.

Re:Such optimism?

[JPStroud]

* UAC - annoying and not remotely secure. People will be trained to always click yes, or just disable it. Further more, it prevented me from installing legit software, and copying files in certain directories.

You know, I work in the on-site computer services industry, and I've obviously been getting more and more jobs with Vista. I hear this complaint all the damn time, from clients and from coworkers/other professionals, and I just don't bloody understand it. The really obnoxious "Cancel/Allow", "Continue?", "Are you sure?", "I really don't think you should do that..." boxes are really only a consideration if you're using the administrator account. you know, that thing that Unix/Linux advocates have ridiculed Windows users for for (at least) a decade?

I'd say one of the things I actually LIKE about Vista is that they've finally fixed the crap that made Limited User Accounts in XP completely unusable, and made the admin account so obnoxious i thought it would virtually guarantee Standard account usage..apparantly i was wrong.

As for the other half of the sentence, it's about f-ing time they started enforcing directory and file-structure policies on users! have you ever tried to recover files on a dying hdd for a windows user?

"ok, where are the files we need to recover?"
"what do you mean?"
"well, the files that are important to you. what folders are they in?"
"i don't know."
"ok, what programs do you use regularly?"
"Office and pictures"

So you grab the user folder, then it turns out that they also use quicken/quickbooks (which stores data files in the Program Files folder, for some ungodly reason), and all their pictures are in a folder called "important stuff" buried in the windows root directory...

EVERY time I set up a Vista machine for a client I create a limited user account, explain the benefits over the admin account, and install some piece of software so I can show them the dialog box that comes up when you need to elevate privs. I do the same if I'm restoring a Vista machine that's hosed..

I used to be a pretty emphatic Linux user, and I switched to macs at home for day to day use when the 2nd gen mac mini came out, but I work on Windows machines all day at work. There are some pretty annoying things about Vista (Point taken on Start Menu scrolling and performance. as dumb as it sounds, I really miss the Desktop Cleanup Wizard from XP. handy for those people who have 50k icons on their desktop that they've NEVER clicked on.. Anyone know if they just moved it in Vista?), but UAC (when Standard Accounts are being utilized) and strict file structure policies really aren't in that group, AFAIC.

Defragmentation, Windows 2000

[cbreaker]

Yea like XP has so many bells and whistles that it's a problem?

Step one: Disable Windows firewall, Themes.
Step two: Pretend it says "2000" instead of "XP"

ps. They didn't just "update the documentation" for defrag NTFS on NT4 to Windows 2000. There was no NTFS Defragment tool in NT4. The idea was that NTFS is much less susceptible to fragmentation (it is) that it would not be necessary. Unfortunately, this is untrue in the long-term - even NTFS can't avoid the fact that sometimes there will not be enough continuous blocks free for a file.

Generally speaking, you don't need to run defragmentation tools on servers anyways. It's just not a big enough problem. For a busy file server, perhaps, but back in NT4 land a file server didn't have 1TB of word documents like a medium-large sized company today does.

They added an NTFS defrag to Windows 2000.

ps. There's no built-in defrag tools for Linux ext2/3/etc or MacOS even still. Because, it's just not a huge problem with modern filesystems. But it would be nice to have these tools available for those times when heavy fragmentation has occured.

Re:Defragmentation, Windows 2000

[Anonymous Coward]

Yea like XP has so many bells and whistles that it's a problem?

Step one: Disable Windows firewall, Themes.
Step two: Pretend it says "2000" instead of "XP"


Step three: Reformat drive and install REAL Windows 2000 to avoid 'Product Activation' and all the other DRM-related stuff Microsoft put into XP and beyond to appease the media cartels.... :P

That's why I'm staying on Windows 2000: Just say no to DRM and Product Activation.... :)