Microsoft has revealed a general release date for its upcoming operating system Vista – 5 December, 2006. Speaking to IT professionals, parliamentarians and senior law-enforcement officers at the Parliament and Internet conference in London on Thursday, Microsoft revealed its release plans. “We will officially launch Vista, Microsoft Office 2007 and Exchange 2007 on 5 December,” said David Hipwell, a Windows client sales professional at Microsoft. On a very, very related note, the EC says that Vista will not be delayed due to regulatory issues. Also, the Shell: Revealed weblog has an item explaining why Aero Basic looks the way it looks. Update: ZDNet has removed the release date story, and since they are being rude by not offering an explanation, I have no idea what is going on.
After waiting so long I’m glad they are finally releasing it. I really want to see the final release and hear from the early adopters.
So it will be out in time for Christmas? Or it’ll take a bit longer for PC makers to start shipping with it?
Wow, if they could saddle Santa with delivering the goods in LaVista, the presents will be as delayed as the rest of Redmond’s line.
Fortunately, Santa’s transportation consultant is none other than Tux, so we’re in good shape.
We?
A friend of mine works on the vista team and recently mentioned that they are going gold within 2 weeks so dec. 5th just might be correct.
I looked at the site that explains why Aero looks like Aero or whatever and the first thing that struck me – they’re still using Notepad to show it off. In context it’s probably the best thing to do, but… there’s just something wrong with all the “next-gen hype” and still having to show the same ancient app (and I bet it still chokes on anything more than 500k in size). That feels wrong.
They’re calling the titlebar the caption now? :boggle:
Really fascinating the compromises they had to reach with Aero Basic. Fortunately, I don’t seem too many people using Aero Basic by choice. If you want the candy, go with glass, otherwise classic is just fine. Of course there will be folks with older hardware who like Aero and will have to use Basic. Then again, according to the article, any app that tries to draw its own “caption” button will revert to Aero Basic, so people will see it one way or another. I guess it didn’t come out too bad. having the two aeros look slightly different is the price MS pays for breaking with the past and moving forward I suppose.
An interesting change to see the release moved up. One wonders if the last delay announcement was real, or simply an a way to be able to “move things up” later
(note the smiley please)
> Of course there will be folks with older hardware who like Aero and will have to use Basic
And those dumb people will upgrade their hardware, so processors and mobo prices will go down!!
Come on SmallSoft, release this Vista crap! Oblige dumbs to upgrade their boxes! I would like to try SATA hard drives without spending too much money!
Cheers
Just a few years late..
Aero basic is just another one of Microsoft’s clashing themes. People bitch about consistency on the Linux desktop but Microsoft is no better, in fact they are worse in many respects. At least all Gnome apps look like they belong in Gnome. Microsoft cannot even make its own apps look like they belong.
Well, I sure hope they work on performance between now and then (as well as the graphics cards companies need to work on their drivers), because I couldn’t even get CS:S to run at a decent speed and I have a 256MB 6800GS! If people see that their high-end rigs that they paid lots of green for suddenly aren’t so hot anymore after installing the new Windows XP skin that’s coming out this December (for $99 for the stripped-as-hell version and $160 for the half-assed-somewhat-decent version), they’re going to be pissed!
Edited 2006-10-13 15:24
There’s always other OSes and Wine which wont hog your GPU.
ignore this…
Edited 2006-10-14 08:12
For the first time I don’t have the slightest need or interest in a new Windows version.
Not one of my PCs could run Vista in any but the most barebones mode, and I have no intention of buying a computer to run Windows.
It is totally irrelevant to me and that’s a great feeling!
Browser: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows 95; PalmSource; Blazer 3.0) 16;160×160
Browser: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows 95; PalmSource; Blazer 3.0) 16;160×160[/i]
cool, a fellow treo user! ;D
anyways, I have *2* pcs that *could* run vista. I tried it on them, its run ok. only because of the video cards. a fx5500 and a 6600gt …. But iwon’t be upgrading from 2k pro/xp pro ever probably. They work and I have no need for anything newer.
if I ever want some high tech graphics crap ill just run osx or xgl or something
For the first time I don’t have the slightest need or interest in a new Windows version.
I said the same thing when they came out with winXP and I was ‘happily’ using win98.
This time, I’m a bit more certain I won’t switch though.
I thought the same thing. I was happy with Win ME… (I know, happy with ME, it was a long time ago, I was young and foolish etc).
Anyway, I was happy with ME but in the end I upgraded to XP.
Now, although I have had the last 4 betas of Vista, I will not be going with the final version.
There is not enough in it for me. all the “innovations” that Microsoft have been advertising, are already in my installs of Linux.
This is not FUD, but Microsoft seriously needs to try to catch up with where Linux was, last year.
Superkaramba
Beagle
XGL/Compiz
Bonjour
All the above run perfectly on my Ubuntu, and on my Suse installs, but they are the exact same features that Microsoft is pushing.
I have been hoping that Microsofts versions of the above will be better, but unfortunatley, they are a disappointment.
And where is the program to beat Amarok ?
Just like the rapid disappearance of Vista RC2 (except at your friendly neighbourhood P2P site), the first link to the ZDNet UK story about the 5th Dec release date no longer works (the story has been removed)….
…maybe it *won’t* be released on 5th Dec after all?
This is the first version that I “do” want to try out. Okay where are my meds!!!
..that they picked my birthday for release date. Haven’t had Windows on my machine(s) for about 7 years. Maybe I should give it a spin?
..that they picked my birthday for release date. Haven’t had Windows on my machine(s) for about 7 years. Maybe I should give it a spin?
Where I live, most people like their birthdays to be something nice and memorable.
They’re going to release it just in time for Sinterklaas(http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761574698/Saint_Nicholas.html), a dutch holiday for children
This can’t be a coincidence
It is a coincidence… who pays any attention to anything the Dutch do ?
hahaha joking
It is a coincidence… who pays any attention to anything the Dutch do ?
hahaha joking
No need to be joking, since you’re right (says Dutch guy from Rotterdam).
But Microsoft might want to pay attention to the Dutch after all. Holland has the highest IE and the lowest FF marketshare. It is a very MS-loyal place, I guess. Could have something to do with relative PC-density, but as our country has been losing innovation ground for decades now, I think we just don’t care much for open source, and we love the “great” deals that Gates personally came here for to make with the PM.
Something I personally think is a very bad thing.
In any case, Vista will be a success here, I expect, more than in many other places, like the US where Linspire is actually sold preinstalled, and where Apple has always been more popular.
But Microsoft might want to pay attention to the Dutch after all. Holland has the highest IE and the lowest FF marketshare.
Proof you need to be high to use IE!
(Stereotypes are so much fun. http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=pass+the+dutch )
with Debian Etch’s release! Which I would much prefer using Debian Etch than Vista any day of the week
I’m hoping though they do release with Gnome 2.16, etc.
On the one hand it’s good that Microsoft can finally put out a new release, though on the other hand it’s kind of funny if you think about it. Everyone gives Debian a hard time because they took so long to release Sarge and have a two year release schedule more or less. But they’re a volunteer group. Microsoft basically took 5 full years for a release of a fully new update (I don’t really count MCE, 2k3 and 64bit since they’re basically just a slightly updated XP)
On the other hand, this means that people like me who refuse to even touch Vista are going to be left out in the cold as more and more games and apps start requiring DirectX 10. Meh, about time I grew up and/or programmed my own games anyhow
Etch is supposed to be released on the 4th
Etch – on the other hand – will be released once it’s stable – hopefully not earlier. Bleeding edge does not help on a server.
BTW: Etch wont ship 2.16:
http://oskuro.net/blog/freesoftware/gnome-2.16-etch-2006-10-06-21-4…
Edited 2006-10-13 18:15
I agree completely about the bleeding edge stuff. That’s why I’m waiting for Etch, because I’ll be running it on my server, I’d never run Suse or any other distribution.
Sadly, I found out about 2.16 after I wrote the post. Hopefully for those who want to use Etch as a desktop, they’ll do a backport (I’m sure it’ll come eventually.)
I loved this:
Q:
So how does Office maintain glass while also drawing over the glass, e.g. titlebar text and the round Office button? And even arbitrary buttons in their quick access toolbar?
…
A:
Office completely removes the non-client area, and renders everything in its client area, so it doesn’t have a caption (except a fake one).
Notice how the glow and the text are different, it’s because they’re not rendered by the DWM.
The ancient tradition of having a nominally standard GUI, but their own major application suite doing things its own way lives on!
It’s like an old joke that never tires me.
That’s a *good* thing.
Office does whatever it wants, and the Windows team follows.
Generally, Office implements their UI, ignoring Windows “guidelines”, then widgets based on Office UI make their way to 3rd party dev tools and Visual Studio, and eventually those become standard widgets in Windows. For example, that’s what happened with Office97’s command bars (allowed for detachable menus, “flat” toolbars, and whatnot). Office hasn’t used standard menus for years (since Office97).
There’s already 3rd pary libraries implementing the Office 2007 “Ribbon” (well, they’re *trying* to, anyway). I’m sure the Ribbon will become a standard Windows widget in the future.
As for Office 2007 removing the nonclient area and rolling their own, more power to ’em! They know more about UI than the Windows team does. Other apps can roll their own UI as well, but most don’t have the talent and/or will to do so.
We’ll see more of this with WPF; it seems to encourage “non-standard” UI; basically standards go out the window. This will lead to garish UIs at the beginning before things settle down (like what happened when VB 1.0 was released).
Office XP has the nicest menus I’ve ever seen in any app. How I wish Microsoft would just implement that style system-wide. They made them suck in 2003, with light-orange on light-blue. What was that about!?
Tom Brooks from MS stated that date would be the RTM date, not the release date for consumers.
(check the dutch tweakers.net article: http://tweakers.net/nieuws/44789/Microsoft-haalt-bakzeil:-Vista-wor… )
and i’m looking forward to it,
you may know of me as a linux user, (http://linux-noob.com) and indeed I am, but i’m also a windows user, and *shock horror* I enjoy both.
I’ll move my windows xp boxes to vista as soon as it goes RTM, and to be honest, i’m looking forward to it. The hype has gone on long enough, the 5728 release was very nice and did a great job when I tested IE against toolbars > http://osnews.com/story.php/16105/Internet-Explorer-7-in-Toolbar-Ma…
why will I move my xp boxes to vista ? because I want to be current (much like I do when I move from fedora core 4>5 via yum and finally do a clean install of 6 october 17th). Plus, I want to checkout the parental features of Vista, as I’ve three young sons and all three will be more than likely using Vista in one shape or another over the next 5 years.
just my thoughts
cheers
anyweb
Edited 2006-10-14 22:20
I’d say it’s pretty obvious what has happened… hapless sales geek tells parliamentary committee what he has been told: that it’ll be released to volume licence customers on 5th December.
Microsoft PR has a hernia: hapless sales guy was not meant to pre-empt the song and monkey-dance by Steve Ballmer announcing the official release date.
Microsoft PR calls ZDNet editor and calls in every favour possible to get story pulled. May have claimed that sales geek was misinformed… etc.
All just hypothesis of course.