WinFS to be available in WinXP

ScooterMcGoo writes "According to a Microsoft Watch blog, WinFS is being back ported for Windows XP. From TFA: WinFS isn't dead, Tom Rizzo, Microsoft's director of product management for SQL Server, recently told Microsoft Watch. In fact, Microsoft is planning to provide an update on the technology at this year's Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in September, he said. Rizzo said that Microsoft is busily back-porting the WinFS file-system technology to Windows XP. It's unclear if Microsoft also is porting WinFS to Windows Server 2003, but such a move would be likely, given that the Redmond software vendor is doing so with Avalon and Indigo."

Comments

Aha, that explains it ...

[ggvaidya]

I thought the Bill-Gates-as-borg icon had a slightly wider smile today ...

WinVapor

[Doc Ruby]

WinFS announcements are one of Microsoft's most popular products. Thanks for the upgrade!

Why Longhorn?

[Anonymous Coward]

And now what reason do I have to upgrade to longhorn?

Oh Wait
1. Slower Performance. Why would I acctually want free system resources?
2. DRM, Who doesn't want their rights managed by M$
3. Spending More Money. Who doesn't want to give their money to M$, really?

Re:Why Longhorn?

[theparanoidcynic]

Don't worry. I'm sure that the cracked version that gets released a week before it ships will take care of the second and third points.

Actually, by the time Longhorn actually ships Linux 3.2 will be stable. That will take care of all three.

Microsoft has hired...

[lbmouse]

Frankie Avalon and The Indigo Girls?

Re:Longhorn

[jerichohol]

It will be probably XP SP6 by the time it is released.

Re:WinFS

[XzeroR3]

My google partition works well.

Re:And I care why?

[flumps]

It stores meta data along with all your files, so ... you have to spend more money on a bigger hard drive! Yay!

Re:Longhorn

[Sheetrock]

Expect seamless integration of these features, as well as the best support options, to be available in Longhorn.

We had Internet, 32-bit color, and multitasking in Windows 3.1, but no one seemed to complain about the jump to Windows 95 (especially because they didn't have to tinker with CONFIG.SYS/AUTOEXEC.BAT to get games working.) Similarly, while new advanced technologies may be available in XP for developers and power users to preview or even use it is no substitute for the successful integration and exploitation of these features at all levels of the operating system.

Standard??

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

I think that the most important Question here is ... is microsoft going to provide an specification for the fs?, and, in case they do, will it be licensed in a GPL-compatible way?

Re:Standard??

[theparanoidcynic]

Open standards? Microsoft?

Oh wait, you were serious. Hang on while I laugh harder.

Can't wait!

[Ancient_Hacker]

ooooh, o00000h, oooooooh! Can't wait.

After seeing how completely incompetent and pants-wetting funny awful Microsoft is at file searching with the little doggie, I can't wait to experience having a few more unnecessary, superfluous, extravagant, and bloated layers HELPING me.

Re:Sure...

[wolfgang_spangler]

If Microsoft wants to make WinFS a fundamental part of their strategy, they must back port it. Forcing developers to upgrade before they can develop is foolhardy.

I think you misspelled "monopoly"

Re:What's left for Longhorn?

[loraksus]

You'll find out in 2010.

Re:WinFS

[Anonymous Coward]

As a developer, WinFS's usefulness is obvious: storing desktop application settings, configuration, temporary files, even serialized runtime objects, is a royal pain when having to worry about actual files on disk. You have to worry about asynchronous file I/O, duplicate files, making sure directories exist, making sure you clean up your temporary files, making sure the user or some other program hasn't royally screwed you configuration files, just to name a few. With a database-backed file system, the developer only has to deal with data, not the underlying file system.

Huh?

Desktop application settings, configuration => the registry
Temporary files => GetTempFileName(), CreateFile() FILE_ATTRIBUTE_TEMPORARY FILE_FLAG_DELETE_ON_CLOSE
Worry about asynchronous file I/O => mutexes, file locking (how'd WinFS help this?)
Duplicate files - ?
Making sure directories exist => CreateDirectoryEx()
Making sure you clean up your temporary files => FILE_FLAG_DELETE_ON_CLOSE
Making sure the user of some other program hasn't royally screwed your configuration files => how'd WinFS help with this? Can't they overwrite the config files if you store them there, too?

Re:What's left for Longhorn?

[indros]

It won't be susceptible to the LAND attack, perhaps?

Re:WinFS

[goofyspouse]

"So not only is it a file system, it is also a search engine."

Man: WinFS is a desert topping.
Woman: No, it's a floor wax.
Man: Desert topping!
Woman: Floor wax!
Announcer: You are both right...WinFS is both a desert topping *and* a floor wax.

Re:What's left for Longhorn?

[Proaxiom]

Parental controls on things like amount of time a user can play a particular game, use an application, or browse the web (while this may seem pointless to most geeks, as a parent I know this will be useful).

Me too. I feel it is important for my children to figure out how to circumvent protection measures like this, thus adding a little extra education to their computing experience.

Kind of like: "Of course you can play Mickey Mouse Toddler, as soon as you crack the password-based encryption I put on the executable. And what do I keep telling you about leaving your Legos on the floor?"

Re:Excuse my ignorance but...

[RoadWarriorX]

User: "Where is my Word Document?"

Hopefully, it's in his $HOME directory and not lurking about the entire filesystem like my word documents...

Re:What's left for Longhorn?

[mormop]

The name?

Re:WinFS made Outlook Express totally unusable.

[spamspamspamspam]

Now, be fair... you can't really blame WinFS for that