We are officially a few weeks away from Microsoft’s specialized event, wherein they plan to unveil much more about the highly anticipated Windows 10. We saw a sneak peak a couple of months back, however, that was more geared towards enterprise and to provide fundamental information about the new operating system. Since then, they’ve released Windows 10 Preview, it’s been downloaded millions of times, and it is being actively used by over 500k on a daily basis.
This will no doubt be their most ambitious release ever, and not just from a design standpoint (Windows 8 takes the cake with that one). Think of Windows 10 being the best of Windows 7 and 8 fused together in a more elegant, less jarring kind-of way. The spirit of this release is all about the unification of its varied platforms. A single operating system that can ‘magically’ (thanks Apple) drive your traditional PCs, tablets, phones and Internet of Things. It’s said that even Xbox One will run on it with a future update. The underlying goal here is to attract every possible developer to this ecosystem. I call this DODM, [D]evelop [O]nce [D]eploy [M]any, a little play on “HORM” for you embedded guys. Essentially, developers can code an entire app and with minimal modifications and deploy it across a multitude of devices. It completes the universal app approach that Microsoft introduced a while back. This is huge!
So far, the build released to the public has only showed one side of the OS. The interesting part, the part they need to nail down, is the consumer side of it. This is the part that millions will use across varied screen sizes, in a more hybridized fashion. We’ve seen bits and pieces through leaks about some of these features but nothing like what we’re going to see at this event. Microsoft calls this ‘Continuum’. Think about it as an automatic transformation of the OS which intelligently detects whether or not a mouse and keyboard is being utilized. This should work particularly well for 2-in-1 and Surface like devices. This should alleviate issues that ‘corporate’ has while simultaneously addressing the pitfalls of the worried consumer who either bought or feared moving to Windows 8. Of course, the addition of Cortana and its voice-based integration is a big deal and offers a completely new way to interact with your PC.
With offerings such as Office 365, OneDrive, Azure, and a reimagined Skype (with Star Trek-like language translations), these are exciting times if you’re a PC fan or looking for reasons why you should buy back into one. Windows 10 is rumored to be released in late 2015 and until then we have at least 3 more events and a slew of beta releases which are sure to quench our impatience.
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Thanks to our Technology Advisor, Danny Soares, for keeping us up to date about Windows 10.