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Longhorn Preview
itraor writes "PC World has previewed Longhorn, not the first one out I guess. Among the few noted features is that Windows now offers translucent UI, finally catching up with Apple. "
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The newest versions of the next Windows add graphics sizzle and more search features but lack visible productivity enhancements.
Scott Spanbauer From the August 2005 issue of PC World magazine Posted Wednesday, June 22, 2005
The most recent build of Longhorn--Microsoft's next Windows--has some impressive visual touches, including the kinds of translucent objects found now in Apple's OS X, and more powerful ways of finding files. But it doesn't yet exhibit any breakthroughs in productivity, or promised features such as security improvements and smarter connections to handheld devices.
We tested the 64-bit version of the latest code released to developers (Longhorn build 5048) and have also viewed demonstrations of a subsequent build. The first beta version of the operating system is due for release this summer.
Over the last several years, Microsoft has touted Longhorn's trio of significant innovations: a graphics engine dubbed Avalon; a technology called Indigo that enables programs on different computers or devices to communicate; and an indexed, searchable data storage layer called WinFS. But when faced with a self-imposed release deadline of late 2006, Microsoft decided last year to pull WinFS out of Longhorn, promising to release that component as an add-on at a later date.
So what of the two remaining Longhorn design pillars? A new desktop theme called Aero is about the only sign of Avalon graphics in our pre-beta. Turning mundane buttons, window frames, title bars, and icons into animated, 3D-rendered, and sometimes transparent objects, Aero brings the Windows interface to life. Indigo, which supports enhanced Web services, won't be visible to end users.
But even though WinFS is now out of the mix, Microsoft has taken advantage of file attributes in the NTFS file system already available in Windows XP to make Explorer better at ferreting out documents according to author, camera model (for photographs), or genre or album title (for music files). The operating system lets you create virtual lists based on these attributes so that, for example, you can see every photo on your system or all Microsoft Word files, regardless of where they are stored and without having to explicitly search for them.
Longhorn will also do a better job of connecting to smart phones (Microsoft wouldn't indicate whether the phones would have to run the company's Windows Mobile operating system), cameras, and audio players, improving their integration into Explorer and making file transfers and synchronization more consistent across device types. Still notably absent from the Longhorn builds we've looked at are new versions of the Internet Explorer browser (even though Microsoft has said it is close to releasing a beta of IE 7) or any other bundled utilities. Gone, for the time being anyway, is the desktop sidebar that lurked in previous preliminary versions of Longhorn.
And in spite of announced planned enhancements such as monitoring of outbound data (Windows XP's firewall watches inbound traffic only), protection against malware, a new type of restricted user account, and a secure startup scheme to ensure that a PC hasn't been tampered with, Longhorn so far has the same minimal security toolbox as Windows XP with Service Pack 2.
Though security remains an unresolved issue, build 5048 brings Longhorn's graphical user interface into sharper focus.
Catch-Up Eye Candy
The new Avalon graphics engine includes a programming interface that permits Microsoft and third-party software makers alike to write applications that put the latest and greatest graphics cards to work rotating, texturing, and fading windows, as well as making menus, title bars, and other elements translucent--finally enabling Windows to catch up to Apple's OS X, several years after the fact.
We managed to activate a subset of these features in our copy of Longhorn build 5048, and they're certainly welcome refinements (see top screen). Nevertheles
Don't anthropomorphize computers: they hate that.
No, Windows doesn't support per pixel alpha levels. Just per window alpha. And when you do set per window alpha, weird things happen if you drag a non-transparent window over a transparent one (sometimes the image of the non-transparent one will be "embedded" in the transparent one).
Expect a lot of eyecandy-disabling apps to come out very quickly.
You mean like the disabling apps in the Control Panel? Like System -> Advanced -> Performance (Visual effects, processor scheduling, memory usage, and virtual memory)?
wtf... alpha blending has been around natively in windows since W2K. It wasn't used but it was there and many mods allowed context menu to set windows transparency.
o x-composite is still slow like hell...
o e17 will us software blending...
*sigh*
\u262D = \u5350
http://udu.wiki.ubuntu.com/XEyeCandy?highlight=(Di stroSpec)
Article Summary:
- Windows is catch up to Apple's OS X.
- All the features that would sell an OS upgrade have been pulled to meet the release date.
- Same as XP with a kewler user interface.
- Only advantage over Apple's OS X is the hardware support.
My Sig indicates the end of the comment I posted.
If you want eye candy on windows, use stardock's stuff. (No, I don't work for them.) They have had their stuff out for several years.
Windowblinds allows you to skin your apps. FX allows you to do transparency and 3-D effects for min/max. And you can use their icon program to change all the icons.
It is a lot of fun, although I still use windows classic most of the time.
Build 5048 was 'released' at WinHEC so that the hardware manufacturers could begin writing drivers under LH's updated driver architecture. This build was not intended to showcase any particular feature of Longhorn, in fact many were removed from the build (including the new 3d interface). The purpose was to provide a shell platform where they could verify their drivers, that is all.
I wouldn't give creedence to any LH review until the upcoming Beta in late August.
...because there is a good chance that the upcoming beta releases will look completely different. And the final release will then look completely different than the betas.
For comparison, here are some links that illustrate the evolution of the Windows XP UI:
Whistler preview
Another Whistler preview
Yet another Whistler preview
Whistler beta 1
Beta 1, another build
XP Beta 2
XP RC1
For me, it's Longhorn's vector-based approach to the UI. While everybody's busy giggling and snorting at the 'eye-candy' at Longhorn, the reality is you'll be able to use it on monitors with > 3,000 pixels in width without having to use a microscope to read the text. You'll be able to resize windows etc to suit your needs. I also really enjoy the idea of using the system's GPU to offload the graphical stuff.... ...Certainly Linux is going to have its own implementation of this feature set.
Vector based graphics, offloading work to the GPU? Linux has its own implementation of this featureset now. It is called Cairo, and it works right now. GTK+ is going to be using it very soon, and SWT already makes use of it for their "advanced graphics" system. If you want Cairo rendering of GTK+ right now, use the cairo-gtk theme engine and associated themes.
Is Cairo fully integrated in yet? No, development is still in the works to port things over to Cairo (but work on both Mozilla and OpenOffice is already underway as well). In a sense then while the backend has been hammered out (Cairo) the full end to end functionality is till in the works. Then again Longhorn is still a ways from release as well.
This does mark an interesting point though: Linux is not playing catchup with Windows on this one, they are running pretty much in parallel. Similarly Beagle is in parallel or ahead of WinFS. I know all the Mac people will complain that their both playing catchup with OS X, but let's take this one hurdle at a time. In terms of new features Linux is playing head to head with Windows these days, and considering how far behind they were when they started (or how far behind they were even a year or two ago) I would take that to mean that Linux will be running ahead of Windows and only a little behind OS X in another few years.
Jedidiah.
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
They don't need to run IE in "low rights" mode, they need to change the design of the HTML control and IE so they display pages in "no rights" mode all the time, unless the application they're embedded in explicitly extends the capabilities. That is, the HTML control by itself should have no mechanism for running ActiveX or VBscript or any "local access" features in JScript. All these would need to be added by the app (such as Windows Update), and there would be NO TIME that the IE shell would add these capabilities, no matter what "zone" it's in.
Give us a strong sandbox in the browser, and you won't need to run the browser in a weak one.
- Refactor your code to do without quirks of Mac programming like interrupt handlers, most memory manager routines, cooperative threading, or assumptions about the underlying file system.
- Rearchitect your code so that it separates function from interface and doesn't make any assumptions about the look or feel of the GUI. Pump all interface interaction through an abstraction layer.
- Drop any custom hacks and re-implement things like inits as independent applications, servers, or shared libraries that don't rely on specifics about the OS.
- Rewrite apps that use older Apple technologies like Powertalk with OpenTransport, Standard File dialogs with Navigation Services, and Postscript drawing with Quickdraw GX. Users won't notice a difference, but these are the new "officially blessed" technologies in System 8.
The big difference I see between Apple and Microsoft in these difficult development days is that Microsoft is firmly still "on message" and telling their developers to continue using old Microsoft technology. "There's no need to abstract your code to NOT rely on Microsoft intellectual property. Keep this leash on even though no one's holding it right now."Copland was insane precisely because it wasn't a technical goal but a marketing attempt to say "We'll address every visible fault in our product all at once." Apple did actually salvage some ideas (like a color GUI, CHRP, and ATSUI) but those small changes were almost unnoticable when coupled with the big changes Apple was promising:
- A kernel rewritten for speed and stability
- Erasing application boundaries via OpenDoc.
- Eliminating all init and "shared memory" problems
- Backwards compatability.
Clearly Microsoft isn't in as much danger as Apple was by their slow delays because their changes don't encourage independence from their technology, but it might illustrate where some good Linux evangelists could take advantage of the delays.- Talk about the benefits of reworking your code to a good M-V-C paradigm.
- Talk up things like Cygwin and APR and the ways shared libraries and background processes developed on these will be more forwards, backwards, and cross-platform compatible.
- Talk about the security advantages of not relying on Microsoft IP for the data model of your app.
- If the developer seems amenable to it, mention ways of abstracting a GUI to make things run on GnuStep or X/11.
- Maybe even talk about Mono and Samba and the other Microsoft imitative tools out there.
Microsoft was crazy to tout specific technologies (like a database driven file system) rather than simple, visible functional changes (like better searching). It seems that right now they're getting back on track (probably with Chris Jones' return). They're fulfilling their cosmetic promises since that's the only thing that end users will notice. And developers will stick around even on the stinkiest of development platforms solely because of the presence of end-users.