As the person who headed the Office user experience teams and the person who is now running the Windows experience teams in Microsoft, Julie drove the idea for the Ribbon user interface in Office 2007 and led the conceptualization and development efforts behind all of the new user interface elements in Windows 7. At PDC, I had a chance to speak with her about her efforts within the Windows and Office teams. During this interview, we discussed:

• the inspiration and need for a new interface for Office
• the circumstances which led to the superbar and the multi-touch-oriented user interface in Windows 7
• how the PDC laptops came into existence
• the decision to use various new technologies such as gaze tracking, heat maps, among others.

Highlights:

Office 2007’s Ribbon: “A lot of the things they would ask for would already be in [Office], and so we felt we could come up with a better way to expose capabilities that were in Office and help people create better, more powerful documents”

The Windows 7 superbar, jumplists, etc.: “We wanted to simplify the whole experience and take away the differences between launching applications and switching applications and making it easier to get back to documents you did the day before. That was kinda the inspiration: to put the customer more in control of everything they’re trying to do on their PC”

Multi-touch in Windows 7: “There were a lot of cool things going on both inside Microsoft and outside Microsoft with touch, things like the iPhone which has the touch interface as well as Microsoft Surface, and so we felt that your PC experience could be very much enhanced by having direct manipulation [of objects on the screen], and you’d work much more naturally with it.”

The PDC laptops and how they happened: “We worked together with Acer to spec-out a PC and we kinda had the idea that ‘what would the ultimate developer machine look like?’ and ‘what can we do to put all the things in it that would be the things we want developers to do with Windows?’ So we had location awareness, the touch screen, all of the virtualization capabilities in it, 64 bit, etc.”

The direction of the Windows 7 beta program: “We used a lot of the beta feedback from Vista to help inform the plan for what we were going to do with Windows 7, as well as things on the blogs, the customer research that we did”

How the Office 2007 UI itself was researched: “We always try to apply new technologies to learn about how people use [our software]. We even talked about trying to figure out if we could put electrodes on [people’s heads] and measuring brain waves to see how they responded to one interface over another, but we didn’t get to that point.”
(You can catch the Ribbon presentation where the gaze tracking and heat mapping bits were discussed on Jensen Harris’ blog. ~Bryant)

Catch the full video interview with full answers to these topics after the jump.

Update: I made the video public prior to posting this, but within the last ten minutes (as of 6:54 PM GMT-5), something happened to revert the video back to private again. Video has been re-established as public.

As the first of my interviews from PDC, I noticed that Loic Le Muer was quick to familiarize himself with me as a part of the interview. This fact coupled with his persistent praise for the Seesmic devs who worked on Seesmic for Windows have led me to believe that Seesmic might actually be one of the better small software companies in existence.

Loic demonstrated Seesmic for Windows at PDC 2009 during Tuesday’s keynote. The obvious difference between Seesmic for Windows and Seesmic Desktop (the AIR version) is that the Windows client is native and written on top of the .net CLR. The plus sides to this include far better performance figures, a more Windows-integrated UI, and a lower tendency to leak handles (and fill my ram). The only downside to this is that it’s Windows-only… well, until you realize that moving .net code from a Windows native environment to Silverlight is actually not nearly as bad as writing another app from scratch.

My interview with Loic takes a browse through Seesmic for Windows v. Seesmic Desktop. I also decided to run through Silverlight Seesmic with Loic during our quick block of time, and while the Silverlight version still requires some polish before going live, the Windows preview version is solid enough for everyone to take a look.

Both parts of the interview can be found below the read link. Blame YouTube for forcing me to split a 13 minute video.
My thanks goes to Andrew Lyle from neowin for manning the camera.

The interview with Dan Polivy from PDC 2008 can be found here.

For those of you visiting from AeroXperience, you guys are likely well aware of how AeroXperience was started. We began as a set of forums in March of 2004 dedicated to Windows Code Name Longhorn, which later became Windows Vista. We’ve prided ourselves with breaking news about some of the most coveted features in Vista during the Vista development process as well as with breaking the initial reports of the direction of Windows 7. AeroXperience has been one of the most accurate (and most opinionated, in some cases) sources of Windows coverage and news; amongst our bloggers, we’ve had the pleasure of having both Stephen Chapman and Rafael Rivera posting on behalf of AeroXperience during our run, and as I sit here next to them now in the PDC press room, I want to shift the attention to what winJade is and how we plan on rolling this out.

winJade is, in some senses, a new direction for us while allowing us to persist in our current mission of delivering relevant and informative Microsoft coverage. During this initial blog roll-out (planned for PDC), the purpose of the blog will still be to deliver the informative material and solid commentary on the world of Windows which you’ve come to expect. However, the purpose of the forums will shift from merely being a place to discuss Windows to becoming more of a home for novice Windows users, experienced users, and Windows experts to come together and not only talk about Windows and help each other but to also work on individual and group projects. winJade will be a home for people with ideas to implement those ideas, gather feedback, and gain an audience for the next great Windows program, tool, or concept. Stan and I have a few ideas we will be revealing on winJade when the time comes in addition to the innovative ideas which continue to find development time on the forums.

My utmost thanks go to Sam Johnson for implementing my vision for the new winJade blog, to Frank with Contrast Hosting for helping us in this transition, and to the many members on the forums who kept track of our progress and offered the many suggestions we’ve read.

From AeroXperience’s start as a home for discovery in Windows Longhorn to winJade’s mission for information and innovation, we’re looking forward to being your home not only for Microsoft news but for some of the most promising Windows-related projects.

At first, many expected the opening keynote at PDC to be about Windows 7. However, PDC’s first major keynote was dedicated to the announcement of Windows Azure, a platform which (until PDC) was completely concealed by Microsoft from the public (except through occasional, highly dramatic blurbs from Steve Ballmer). The platform’s announcement also came as a surprise to many developers, IT professionals, and pundits who saw Azure as an attempt at matching Amazon’s offerings through Amazon Web Services.

With this in mind, a number of questions regarding Windows Azure remained unanswered. Who exactly was this platform targeting? Was it after IT professionals looking to offload some of their services to Microsoft’s servers? Was it for developers looking to create interactive, deep web 2.0 applications? What would Microsoft do with the data? What about security?

Amitabh Srivastava, corporate vice president and head of Windows Azure within Microsoft, took some time to answer the most common questions about Windows Azure. You can read his responses and comment below the fold.

Who are you and what do you do with Microsoft?

Amitabh: My name is Amitabh Srivastava and I am the Corporate Vice President at Microsoft with responsibility for major components of the company’s next-generation services platform. I joined Microsoft in 1997 as a Senior Researcher and led the Advanced Development Tools group in Microsoft Research that investigated new techniques to build innovative tools and technologies to improve performance and quality of Microsoft software.

I assisted in the creation of the Programmer Productivity Research Center (PPRC), now known as the Center for Software Excellence (CSE), and I am one of a select few to be named a Distinguished Engineer, now known as Technical Fellow.

In 2003 I had the opportunity to join the Windows team as Corporate Vice President to redefine the engineering process for Windows Vista. Then in November, 2006 my focus shifted and I began working on the company’s services platform with Dave Cutler. This is when we started ‘project Red Dog’ to build the operating system for the cloud. Project Red Dog was announced as ‘Windows Azure’ on October 27 at PDC 2008.

For more information, visit http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/exec/srivastava/default.aspx
 

How would you summarize/define “Cloud Computing?”

Amitabh: Microsoft believes the cloud is fundamentally about enabling the developer eco-system to reduce complexity of delivering software. Today, as an industry, we have made some strides, but most of that innovation has come around removing the complexity of installing, maintaining and optimizing hardware. We think that there is a huge opportunity to move beyond hardware, and remove the complexity of the application platform itself; letting customers focus on their applications and end user experiences.
 

What kind of customers are you targeting with the release of Windows Azure?

Amitabh: Windows Azure was designed with developers in mind. This is about enabling developers within ISVs, System Integrators and businesses to quickly and easily create, deploy, manage, and distribute web applications and services. As an example ISVs can give their customers a range of choices in user experience over the Web or on connected PCs, servers, and mobile devices. However, the common thread among all of our audiences is their ability to choose from their existing on-premise or new virtual offerings; the opportunity to save operationally, and access to the vast scalability only offered by the internet.
 

What are some examples of corporate scenarios which the Windows Azure platform aims to resolve?

Amitabh: The Windows Azure platform will help corporate IT departments to run more efficiently and cost-effectively with Windows Azure’s scalability, reliability, and security they need to grow or enhance their productivity. Some of the advantages include:

• Availability of optional single sign-on, authentication, and identity services
• Communication services between on-premises and off, and between business partners and customers on any device via the use of the optional connectivity services
• Use of database services to share information on a global basis via the additional SQL data services

We’re providing an easy on-ramp to the cloud by providing the tools and building blocks to combine existing on-premises systems with the cloud offerings. Corporate developers have new options in writing internet-connected applications, adding new functionality to a company’s existing software solutions, and the ability to connect with partners and customers in new ways via the web or a multitude of connected devices.
 

What regulatory compliance issues might companies face, if any at all? (Also, how did Microsoft make sure that Windows Azure would not generate any regulatory compliance issues with state and national governments?)

Amitabh: Our user agreement calls out some specific issues with respect to privacy that subscribers will need to manage. Because every subscriber will have unique circumstances, we cannot provide a blanket statement that all potential uses of Windows Azure will comply with the laws of each jurisdiction that is applicable to that subscriber’s use. But we have looked at some common scenarios and believe that subscribers should be able to comply with all relevant legal requirements when making use of Windows Azure in most cases. This is a topic that we have spent a significant amount of time working on, and that work is continuing.

As we draw closer to commercial launch and obtain feedback from users during the technology preview period, we will ensure that we take all the necessary steps to help our subscribers to be compliant with various regulatory requirements.
 

What data privacy and security measures are in place to protect, for example, the trade secrets of client companies as well as the personal information of those companies’ employees and customers?

Amitabh: Microsoft has a single standard worldwide approach to privacy compliance that is based on the requirements of global privacy laws. A single high standard of privacy is more than an efficient business model; we feel it is important to treat all of our customers around the world with the same level of privacy protection. We take the security of personal information very seriously. We use a variety of security technologies and procedures to help protect personal information hosted on the Azure Services Platform from unauthorized access, use, or disclosure.

For Windows Azure, Microsoft will have a contractual relationship with its subscribers. We will only use the data stored by subscribers in Windows Azure to provide the service and will not make any use of the data beyond that which is permitted in our contractual agreement.

For detailed information of our terms of use during the CTP period please refer here
http://www.microsoft.com/azure/termswindowsazure.mspx

For detailed information on our privacy statement during the CTP period, please refer here
http://www.microsoft.com/azure/termsazureservices.mspx

On a related note, are there any content restrictions for packages published to Windows Azure? What kind of filtering is performed, if any? (e.g. malicious binaries, scripts)

Amitabh: Microsoft provides a computing infrastructure on which developers can build applications. It is the responsibility of the developer to ensure that their applications, content and services comply with applicable laws and do not engage in malicious conduct. For more information refer to http://www.microsoft.com/azure/termswindowsazure.mspx
 

Will Windows Azure have a free-of-charge or discounted counterpart for non-profit and/or home developers and if so, will there be any such premium features as extended hosting services? (Perhaps an Express version with limited hosting capabilities for hobbyist developers and students?)

Amitabh: We are still working on our pricing structure, but I can say that we are considering a variety of scenarios to address the varying needs of our customers and partners. We will announce specifics on the business model and overall commercial availability at a later date.
 

What was Windows “Strata?”

Amitabh: Microsoft often uses code names for products during their early developmental phases. Strata was the code name for “Azure™”
 

Are any Microsoft/Windows Live services already taking advantage of the Azure platform?

Amitabh: Currently Live Mesh and parts of Live Meeting are running on Windows Azure. Over time, all of our services will run on Windows Azure, and we are currently in the process of moving those over.

Randall Kennedy would be his name, and from what I saw, he tried to deceive his way into the embargoed sessions. Thankfully, such a character was not allowed access to the pre-release Windows 7 seminar, and for good reason.

I’m dedicating today’s post to the damage caused by sensationalist posts. The most recent one by Randall Kennedy (I’ll quote it directly at the end; there’s no reason to give his articles more traffic than how much he has already gotten) couldn’t possibly contain more lies and misgivings than it already does. Let’s round up the points and talk about where he’s gone wrong:

• Randall refers to the Windows 7 early 2009 beta launch as a “delay of [significant] magnitude.”
  Right. A zero-time delay is a delay of significant magnitude? Microsoft has originally intended for Windows 7 to hit public beta in early 2009, just like I was personally told by a solid number of trustworthy people (both inebriated and sober) at PDC.
• “[The beta] was generally accepted to be slated for the mid-December 2008 timeframe”
  By who? A few bloggers heard from their own internal sources that that was Microsoft’s target, but since when did that supplant official timelines? Bloggers with significant connections are good for when companies don’t talk, but when companies release official information on things such as timelines, etc., it’s a good idea to trust the official statements.
• “It’ll give the company a chance to take another pass at the kernel code base and maybe, just maybe, reconsider dropping some of that consumer-focused baggage.”
  Microsoft focuses on “consumer-focused baggage” in a client operating system because the people who will be using the operating system are consumers, either in a business environment or a home environment. Regardless, the idea with a client OS is to appeal to the user using it, thus allowing the user to get more work done faster while having more fun during free time.
• “I especially like the part where he says that Windows 7 is ‘in the can. It’s done. There are no major changes coming.’”
  That’s right. No other major features will be added. In other words, there won’t see a brand new framework being added, nor a huge change to Explorer being made. However, with this in mind, significant usability changes can be made to anything in current Windows 7 builds. There’s still lots of work to be done. Otherwise, the OS would have been released in January instead of simply entering beta.
  It’s as if the term “beta” lost all meaning. I blame Google for this travesty.
• “As an FOM (Friend of Microsoft) in good standing, Paul should know.”
  There’s no such thing as a Friend of Microsoft. This is Randall’s way of painting characters as Elitist and Out of Touch… much like politicians. Paul stated his opinions on the user interface, but Paul has a right to do that. So does everyone who used the new user interface in Windows 7 (assuming it’s the newest iteration of it). This is what the UX teams want! That’s the whole idea behind getting feedback!
• “He gets special access to all sorts of supersecret Microsoft stuff — a reward for his normally glowing coverage of all things Redmond.”
  No, he gets access because he has ridiculous readership and unbiased coverage. He voices his opinions when he has concerns about something and he voices praise when he sees praiseworthy material. Many developers within Microsoft read the WinSuperSite and listen to Windows Weekly because Paul is able to provide middle-man insight into what people think should come to a Microsoft product and what people think should stay out. His own experiences also contribute to this.
• “Maybe they can just pre-install it on the FREE LAPTOP COMPUTER I requested.”
  It’s interesting. The laptops were loaned to reviewers for evaluation purposes (so that these bloggers and journalists could use and comment on every bit within Windows 7 during the beta). They weren’t given to journalists to influence positive reviews; they were given to influence accurate reviews of all features rather than partial reviews of Windows 7 as time goes on.
  However, if Microsoft did give Randall a laptop, Randall would likely have been swayed into doing positive reviews as opposed to what seems to be his typical hit-and-run slander.
  In other words, Microsoft did the right thing by not lending him a laptop. Otherwise, they might have unfairly influenced Randall’s commentary. Sick yet effective irony, all in all.

It can safely be assumed that there’s no other relevant content worth reading in the remainder of Randall’s post. This post, as well as others by him, are made for the point of drawing traffic to InfoWorld. Frankly, I feel terrible that any respectable publication has to rely on this kind of sensationalism to keep readership.

There’s a certain type of respect which a majority of bloggers strive for: respect from genuinely interested readers. It’s what we at AeroXperience aim for with both the forums and the blog, and it’s what Paul, Mary Jo, Rafael, Neowin, WinVistaClub, WinFuture, TheVista.ru, etc. all aim for. Our objective is to provide original content to those of you who are interested in Microsoft’s latest developments, and you should feel free to call us out whenever you see a problem in our coverage. Other outlets have different objectives, but all of us aim to disperse our content and attract readership truthfully and honorably.

Based on what I read in Randall’s post today and on what I saw from him at PDC, I don’t believe this to be the case for Randall.

Then again, desperation is to be expected in an economy where publishers are dropping employees like flies.

Read Randall’s opinion post after the jump.

No Windows 7 public beta until 2009

How my scathing rebuke of Windows 7 scared Microsoft into delaying the Windows 7 public Beta until 2009.

Source: InfoWorld

TAGS: Microsoft, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP

Sometimes I don’t know my own strength. After several painful weeks of poking holes in the Windows 7 bubble (and being poked right back by the legions of Windows zealots), it seems my message about Microsoft not doing enough to satisfy IT is finally getting through: The company has now officially delayed the release of the first public Windows 7 beta until “early 2009″ — per the company’s PR firm, Waggener Edstrom.

A delay of this magnitude, hot on the heels of our scathing rebuke of the PDC pre-beta, can mean only one thing: It’s running scared. Microsoft is so concerned by the overwhelming response to our groundbreaking expose, “Windows 7 unmasked,” that it’s pulling back on the delivery reins so that it can retool the product to address the myriad performance and compatibility issues we identified.

I, for one, applaud their honesty. Microsoft knows it’s dropped the ball with Windows 7; the initial PDC build was woefully inadequate and demonstrated none of the claimed improvements in performance or resource consumption. Delaying the public beta program — which was generally accepted to be slated for the mid-December 2008 timeframe — is a smart move. It’ll give the company a chance to take another pass at the kernel code base and maybe, just maybe, reconsider dropping some of that consumer-focused baggage.

So, it’s no Windows 7 Beta for Christmas this year, kids. You’ll just have to keep playing with Vista or, if you’re lucky, the “Blue Badge” unlocked version of the PDC build (6801). In the meantime, check out Paul Thurrott’s concerns about the Windows 7 GUI and how it’s “easy” but not “simple” — or was it the other way around?

I especially like the part where he says that Windows 7 is “in the can. It’s done. There are no major changes coming.” As an FOM (Friend of Microsoft) in good standing, Paul should know. He gets special access to all sorts of supersecret Microsoft stuff — a reward for his normally glowing coverage of all things Redmond. So when even he voices his concern over an issue (the befuddling Windows 7 GUI) and follows it up by stating that the product is basically finished at this point, you know we’re in trouble.

Note: So far, I’ve focused mostly on the kernel mode aspects of Windows 7. But since it turns out there’s really nothing to see down there (it’s basically Vista + some minor tweaks), I think it may be time I turned my attention to the stuff that actually has changed — i.e., the shell glitz and other user-land components.

Anybody got a spare copy of a post-PDC build I can borrow? We asked Microsoft for a copy but the company said it “can’t accommodate us” at this time (code for: you’re blacklisted!)

Maybe they can just pre-install it on the FREE LAPTOP COMPUTER I requested. I’m still waiting to hear back from them on that one, but so far it doesn’t look good. Oh well…maybe next year!

Posted by Randall C. Kennedy on November 25, 2008 03:00 AM

During my time at PDC, I managed to speak with many people knowledgeable about various aspects of Windows 7. One of these people was Dan Polivy, a lead on the team behind the new Windows 7 sensors framework which was mentioned a number of times during the old days when Windows 7 speculation was rampant. Dan and I carried an informative interview regarding a number of functions of the Windows 7 sensors framework, including topics such as how easy it might be for a user to receive sensor data from sensors which are plugged into the framework as well as what one could do with various forms of sensor data, such as locational input from WiFi triangulation and GPS signals.

If you’re a developer, watching this video would be a wise decision; we’re doing something special for those who watch, so stay tuned.

You can catch 720p and 1080p download links as well as an embedded version (via Vimeo) after the break. All videos are x264/MP3 in AVI containers.

Update (Sunday, Nov. 8, 2008): If you have yet to see the interview, a… “reasonably good incentive” embedded within the video is now live.

If you like what you see, please donate through our subscriber portal. You can see the list of benefits, as well as how to subscribe, over here.

• 720p: Download
• 1080p: Download

Feel free to watch the Vimeo version (it would be nice to our bandwidth if you did!):

For those of you who aren’t convinced, the old taskbar actually happens to still be around, but only in the sense that the opened applications can have text next to their icons in the new taskbar. Besides that, the new taskbar functionality will all still remain intact, even though you can bring it close to looking like the old taskbar. Take a gander below; you’ll see more in our interview next week.

Mike held a small roundtable for a number of pressies. He gave a quick rundown of things you all basically already know, so I took the time to ask a few questions which kept you guys in mind. The questions I asked:

• What’s the difference between “API Complete” (build 6801) is and “Feature Complete” (Beta 1)?
• Why were lots of code samples and features being shown off for the Superbar at PDC when developers can’t develop for it? (Rafael’s extension of my API v. Feature Complete question)
• Why were the sensor demonstrations missing from the Windows 7 keynote today?

The answers to these questions can be found in the true-to-life* transcript after the break.

*Given that this is a transcript, it may be wrought with grammatical errors, but this is exactly how the chat went down.

Bryant: I had a question which I had myself but my colleague Rafael phrased it much better than I did, and it kinda ties into your note about how the build given to developers here at PDC this week is “API Complete” whereas the builds you were… whereas beta 1 is going to be “Feature Complete” or at least that’s the attempt… my own question is: what’s the difference between “API Complete” and “Feature Complete”? More specifically, Rafael’s question is, um, he noted that there are a lot of sessions at PDC talking about the superbar, and developing for the superbar, and one session that he went to had a lot of code samples being shown, but he also took note that developers can’t even develop for it because the superbar isn’t even in the build.

Mike: So the question really is, first of all, “What’s the difference between ‘API Complete’ and ‘Feature Complete’, and what is a developer to do who wants to write software that takes advantage of features that aren’t in the current ‘M3’ build.” So API complete, um, says that all the interfaces that developers are gonna code to… are in the product, and the third milestone of Windows 7 always had the goal of being API complete, which means  we’re not going to add any more APIs subsequently. Feature complete means that all the functions that are gonna be part of Windows 7 are in that build, and our beta, which will ship early next year [in time for CES], will be Feature Complete. The real – One of the hard questions we had… which we faced, is “Well, do we give everyb—do we only demo the API Complete release even though we have been working since September when we cut M3, do we demo more than the M3 build” and the answer is “aaah! We only have these developers together that often. It’d seem like kind-of a shame to not show them everything we had,” which then begged the question “Well why don’t you just give them the build that Steven used on stage?” which was the stuff from last Friday. The answer is “Well, in order to stabilize that, we woulda had to start stabilizing it back in August to be done in September (which is kinda what we did), so we couldn’t give you something from last Friday at this scale, or at the same time, it’d seem like a shame to not show you everything that we had. So what you see here is that optimization. Is it perfect? No. I think the other thing—hey well I could tell anybody anything til it’s all the way done. The problem there is, you don’t give the ecosystem the chance to get going. So, you are here a little bit watching the sausage being made in the sense that you’re watching us have this dialog with our partners to make sure that they are ready so that when we get to beta, there’s some momentum for Windows 7, and then certainly as we get towards general availability for Windows 7, there’s a healthy set of things that take advantage of Windows 7 that are out there.

Bryant: So, I guess tying back into the API Complete v. Feature Complete stuff, could a developer develop for the superbar in 6801?

Mike: Certain aspects of it, yes; certain aspects of it, no.

Bryant: Okay.

Mike: and some of that is sorta enough work to do between now and then that when the beta comes out they can get, you know, have all those features be there.

Bryant: Okay, thanks.

Mike: Great question.

Bryant: A few more questions, I guess, but… in the keynote that I saw today, there was one thing that was notably absent, and that was the sensor demos which were later discussed in the expo hall. Are you guys saving the sensor demonstrations — like the accelerometer demos, the touch demos and such… well not the touch demos so much but mostly just sensor work) — but are you saving that more for… WinHEC?

Mike: If I told you, I’d have to kill you.

Some other pressie: Cool!

Mike: Okay, here’s the challenge. Today was the first time that we talked about Windows 7 in any scale, and I’d say, again, sorta the… how advanced this thing is – this phase, we’re further along than we’ve been at least in a long time. How much do people know? We’ve held a lot more back than ever, so today was like “WOW; lot to talk about and not a lot of time,” and we had to be sorta choiceful about what we talked about.

Bryant: Yeah.

Mike: Next week we have WinHEC – things that are about sorta the core of Windows 7 by default happened here. Things that are more… developer oriented… happened here. Things that are more hardware oriented, without being specific, you could expect to be in a convention center not unlike this one in a town with the same zipcode.

[laughter]

Mike: Yeah, in about a week.

Summary:

• What is API Complete v. Feature Complete? API Complete has the developer bits ready for the developers to work with, even if some of them are dead-ends for now. Feature Complete expands on this by making all of the APIs functional.
• Why were code samples and such being shown off for the Superbar? Developers will be able to code for it anyway, but they’ll have enough to work with between now and Beta 1 that once Beta 1 hits the scene, they’ll have a good amount of code that doesn’t require functional awareness actually prepared.
• Why were the sensor bits missing from the Windows 7 keynote? Because it’s more relevant to WinHEC, but there’s a session on that which I’ll be covering today, so it’s all good.

There you have it. I’ll be covering today’s sensor demonstration at 10:30 today. I look forward to bringing you what I see.

Yesterday was packed with much news about Azure and other cloudy things. Thus, I’ll focus instead on some of the other things which took place on the 27th of October, the first day of PDC.

Today’s happenings, likely including images from the party as well as images from other goings-on, will come near the end of the night (pacific time).

Just took this shot of Tom, Rafael, and Long doing their Question/Answer session. Paul is not in this shot.