Windows 8.1 may be in your near future

Beyond Windows 7 is Windows 8.1, the latest iteration in the form of a meaningful upgrade of the Windows operating system. You can do everything you are used to do (if it runs in Win 7, it'll certainly run in Win 8.1). In addition to the traditional desktop and the ability to work with all types of software you get a new taskbar, ready for touch devices, access to thousands of apps from the Windows Store, Start screen with live updates and personal settings that appear on up to five different PCs. When it comes to search you can have a single search to find things across the web, apps, and your PC; all you need to do is start typing while on the Tiles mode. See for yourself what's in store for Windows 7 users. I also understand you may not be ready to upgrade and probably don't need to. I personally always liked Windows 7, its nimbleness and the beauty of the aero effect, not to mention the amazing technology under the hood. I use and like equally both.

Now it's Windows 8 turn

"The rearticulation of the mouse cursor with the finger" (or fingers), all of them, that's succinctly the new Windows 8 multitouch interface, named Metro UI (based in the Windows Phone 7). In other words, you can use simultaneously more than one finger each one engaged on a different complementary operation on the same screen (and I don't mean just enlarging or reducing the size of a picture!) That's but one of the many features present in this new iteration of Microsoft Windows introduced officially this week, in Anaheim, California, at the BUILD conference, the first place to dive deep into the future of Windows. I missed being there, with thousands of developers, to get a free Samsung Windows 8 tablet powered by ARM mobile computing architecture (in other words, beyond the traditional Intel, and that's a big departure). I found this well documented site with a a list of 300+ Windows 8 features that Microsoft didn’t show.

And now, to top it off all, a great browser

Today Microsoft made available to IT specialists and enthusiasts the new IE 9 (Beta version), which promises to be a great contender to other great browsers as Firefox and even Google Chrome. This latest version of this resurgent browser promises to "unleash a more beautiful web" by starting to use the newest Web standards like HTML5 and hardware acceleration that takes advantage of the graphics processor power in Windows 7 and Windows Vista (sorry, I does not run in Windows XP, and why should it?). The fish tank demo will run in all browsers, as it is supposed to be, but can you, for example, get 60 frames per second? Only in IE 9.

Windows Phone 7 in the horizon... sooner than later

I had a first-hand experience with a prototype of the (it seems to be) fabulous new Windows Phone 7, slated to be released this coming holiday season. The prototypes, which are circulating in developers users groups here in New York and anywhere else in the country, are mostly intended to showcase the sort of new UI (named Metro and loosely based on the Zune interface).  And, no, this is not exactly an update to the Windows Mobile 6.5, this is a new product designed from the ground up, with a totally new OS and it will also bring, among a number of cool features, console-like gaming experience with XBox Live. Developers will receive the final Windows Phone Developer Tools on September 16th. If you want to know more go here...

Windows 7: ushering in the convergence of new media

From what I've seen of Windows 7 so far I can draw some conclusions (some obvious and some not so obvious): • First of all, for those unsuspecting users, Windows 7 is a revamped, improved, slimmed down, beautified (as if it was necessary) Windows Vista • Windows 7 is the OS that will shut up Linux and Mac zealots, simply because it has the best of those worlds plus the already mature Vista technology; whatever you found 'cool' there, you will find it here, and then some. However, don't get me wrong, I will continue to follow and appreciate all the improvements (and innovations) you may find in Linux and Mac systems. • Windows 7 is the convergence of new media into one operating system, this time consolidated, refined and ready for the masses, namely, Internet TV, Windows Media Center with Touch, and easier Home Networking, among many others. We're living in interesting times, believe or not and, as keynote speaker Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, put it at the 2009 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES), when he introduced Windows 7 Beta, "despite the economy, I hope you all agree with me, that our industry has an incredible, incredible opportunity ahead of us. I'm certainly incredibly excited to be a part of this industry." These trying times are the breeding ground for innovation and new developments. Let's embrace the challenges! See what's new in Windows 7.

Will 2009 be the year of Windows 7?

Making a quit recap, Windows Vista was released back in January 2007 and spent a troublesome year mostly because of hardware and software compatibility issues. Not because of the operating system capabilities. Then, in 2008, Service Pack 1 (SP1) came along and Vista started to show its real strength and beauty, but the damage to the image of the product was already done. However, Vista overcame successfully a nasty and biased smear campaign by the media and the competitors (read, Mac and Linux). Back to the present, 2009, and you have a big and strong multitude of followers everywhere. No doubt this will be the year of Windows Vista. But looming on the horizon is Windows 7, now getting closer and closer to the launch pad and it is just fair to ask if 2009 will be the year of Windows 7, as well. I like what Adrian Kingsley-Hughes, the PC Doctor, says of Windows 7, when he compares it to XP and Vista: if you’re looking for a solid OS then Windows 7 seems ready to deliver just that - a fast, reliable, relatively easy to use platform for your hardware and software.

So Windows 7 is coming in 2009?

It's a fact. It's here. The next incarnation of the Windows Operating Systems saga will come to a PC close to (developers perhaps just like) you reportedly in early 2009, in a pre-release, Beta, version. That is, earlier than expected. The news was officially announced in the mother of all developer's gatherings, the Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles back in November 2008, where eager developers got a copy of a pre-Beta version. But guess what? Windows 7 share the same advanced architecture of Windows Vista. So, if you are flabbergasted by how cool the newer OS is, well, that's why I love Windows Vista...!