MS Vista Look and Feel To Go Cross-Platform

Robert writes "As part of the announcement of the next generation look and feel for Windows Vista, Microsoft said that it will make a subset of the new presentation layer available for other platforms. 'Windows Presentation Foundation', the look and feel which provides the rich front end for Vista, will also eventually be available in compact form for other platforms such as the Apple Macintosh, older versions of Windows, and smart devices such as phones or PDAs."

Comments

Linux

[LamboAlpha]

No linux?

ActiveX and XP?

[biryokumaru]

Are you saying I can have the security of ActiveX and the beauty of a WinXP skin with liberal use of transparency? I'm there!

D'oh! I'm on Linux... *snaps* dang.

ActiveX Plugin

[imboboage0]

When WPF/E becomes available, it will be in the form of an Active X control that can be embedded in applications or as browser plug-in.

Yep. Because we all know and love the concept of ActiveX.

And put ANOTHER way...

[blakespot]

Today's Top Headlines: "Microsoft passes around the ugly stick!"

blakespot

Separate into layers?

[daveed]

What I want to know is when they'll separate the virus, bug and backdoor bits of windows into layers, so I can use them on other platforms.

Oh, great...

[jpellino]

So now Mac users can look forward to combo boxes, tab sets that flip around as you click them, and a start menu that eats half the screen just to choose a program...

Re:No market there

[tomhudson]

KDE users already have translucent menus, translucent xterms, multiple-desktop pagers, completely configurable widgets, etc.

Porting the Vista gui to linux would be a step backwards for us.

Also, from the article:

eventually ported to ... older versions of Windows

ah, another reason NOT to upgrade. So why are they doing this? Perhaps its to try to keep people from defecting to linux, or to OSX or another of the BSDs.

Their market share has nowhere to go but down, and they know it. It's just a question of how far, how fast. With this anouncement we can say:

Microsoft Confirms: Windows is Dying.

Redmond, December 2007

4 months after the much-delayed release of Vista earlier this year, Microsoft confirms that its market share is the lowest ever.

Steve Ballmer confirms that it is all part of Microsofts' grand strategy to concentrate on the business and consumer desktop market. "We have always been devoted to giving the sheeple, I mean consumers, the best possible user experience. Our committment to this has led us to rededicate all our resources to that end."

"We are committed to maintaining our technical leadership. That is why I am announcing Windows Utopia, the next version of our OS, due sometime in 2020. It will feature, among other things, a new advanced configuration system based on 7-bit ascii files, which, with our special gui toolkits, will allow the advanced user to modify some parts of how the system functions between reboots, as well as auto-system-restore, which will reimage your system at boot time, so that you ALWAYS have that Original Microsoft Experience."

"To further show our committment to the end user, we will be spending $100,000,000 (One Hundred Million Dollars) in soft money to our partners in congress and the senate during the upcoming election year, to ensure that nothing comes between our customers and their DRM-locked-down computers." Mr. Ballmer said.

"As for the latest attempt of Apple to buy us out, we will be giving one free share of Microsoft with every copy of Vista sold. We want everyone to understand that what's good for Microsoft is good for America, and this is the best way to do that. In your face, Jobs!"

Industry analysts were too embarrassed to comment, except for Maureen (The MOGTroll) O'Gara, who was heard talking with some guy named Biff who was muttering that this latest move would send Microsoft shares "To Teh Moon!", and Laura Didio, who had 3 white papers to show that Vista had lower TCO and more functionality on a laptop than Slackware 0.9 on a PDP. Unfortunately, while her Vista laptop weighs less than a pound, the optional 40-pound battery pack (necessary if you want to run a fully-patched, DRM-enabled version for more than the 10-minute boot/call home using mandatory satellite link with traceable gps/mandatory reimage/update process) fell off the table, smashing Mr. Ballmers' foot.

In a later interview, Ms. Didio confirmed that Mr. Ballmer's chair-throwing skills have improved. "I think he really has a shot at winning the event in the 2008 Olympics, and that Microsofts' $25 Billion donation to the IOC has nothing to do with adding the event at this late date." she said.

Its nice to have Microsoft as such a deep well for comic material.

Re:Will Vista just be a UI improvement over XP?

[Anonymous Coward]

"New Sleep mode. Combining the best features of Standby and Hibernation, the new Sleep mode in Windows Vista enables and disables your PC in seconds, but stores application state to disk, allowing you to resume work as soon as it's come out of Sleep."

Wasn't this the command Picard used to deactivate the Borg on Star Trek: The Next Generation?

Re:Why contaminate?

[wo1verin3]

>> Something in the lines of quicktime or iTunes for
>> windows, start that shit up and you basically
>> lose multitasking.

You may want to add some more RAM and move up to 8 MB..... 4 MB just doesn't cut it for a lot of applications.

Re:Will Vista just be a UI improvement over XP?

[FidelCatsro]

"Windows Rights Management Client. Windows Vista will include the latest Windows RMS client."

That just me laugh my head of ..The thought of "Now connecting to www.stallman.org" rushed through my head.

Re:No market there

[daniil]

To make the transition away from Windows easier, of course.

Yeah but...

[magnus_1986]

Yeah but... does it run on linux?