Microsoft Announces Windows Unit Shake-Up

Whatever they do, they need to get all their developers talking and on the same page. Not having WinFS in Vista will be a real disappointment. Frankly, without winfs, i see no reason to migrate away from Server2003 when they ship the next server edition.

WinFS is currently planned for inclusion into Longhorn Server, and should be available on Vista consumer edition via Windows Update.

WinFS Beta 1 was released around about PDC 2005, if I recall accurately.

Analyst Ted Schadler with Forrester Research said Thursday's changes signal that Microsoft intends to give more power to those who market and sell products, decreasing the sway of engineers who develop the software.

That's a smart move, he said, because the company is facing both an increasingly saturated market for Windows and ever-more-sophisticated competitors.

I'm not sure I'd call that a smart move, since it was giving more power to the marketing side that
led to many of the later performance and security problems their products have had in the past.

Vista will be the first new version of Windows since XP was released in late 2001.

Aside from Windows 2003, released on the server side. And the Tablet PC and Media Center editions.
I suppose SP2 doesn't count, since its additional features were mostly to address security and
performance issues.

Once again a more compelling argument to get a Mac and a far more secure operating system! Especially since they have been doing what Windows Vista is claiming it will do since 2001-2002! Check out macTV Show #102,#103,#104 - The 'Real' Windows Vista (Pt. 1)(Pt. 2)(Pt. 3) on iTunes.

I don't see a compelling reason to simply throw away an existing investment in hardware
and applications. For Windows users who are unfamilar with or uninterested in the changes that
Vista offers, there's a more compelling arguement to stay with Windows 2000/XP for now.
And perhaps look at Linux as an alternative that can work with their existing hardware.

For others, there are still reasons to be interested in what Vista will have to offer, more than
just changes to the interface and internal security.

Who cares just give us the core no one needs the stupid vista GUI we got Mac's for that.

You will be able to get the core, and have a choice of GUIs to put on it.

But there will be a lot of people who think they need the "stupid vista GUI" because
Microsoft will attempt to improve it in areas that appeal to ease of use, as well as trying
to make it shiny and pretty eye candy.