Microsoft's Windows operating system, which long ago won the war over desktop computers, didn't even show up in the fight to be the dominant tablet OS.
Windows 8, the software behemoth hopes, will change that.
At the company's Build conference Tuesday in Anaheim, Steven Sinofsky, president of Microsoft's Windows team, offered an in-depth look at the next version of the omnipresent software.
Windows 8 is important not only because Microsoft hopes to use it to extend Windows' desktop dominance over Apple's Mac OS X, but also because Windows 8 will be the company's weapon to finally get into the tablet fight and take on Apple's iPad.
The Build conference is about getting developers on board as much as a year early to get familiar with Windows 8 and to start writing apps for the new OS now. The idea is that when Windows 8 finally launches, its app store won't look empty, as was the case for tablet-app offerings from Hewlett-Packard and Research In Motion. Even Google's Android Market, which has hundreds of tablet-optimized apps, pales in comparison to Apple's thousands of tablet apps.
In a closed-door presentation to reporters Monday, a day before Build officially opened, Sinofsky and other Microsoft executives detailed the elements of Windows 8...
Your personalized lock screen shows you unread emails and other app notifications. The image shown here is a photo of the road leading to Mt. Cook National Park in New Zealand.
Ew. I just say ew. Considering ME was a flop, XP a hit, Vista a flop, W7 a hit -> W8 will also flop. It looks like they are forcing the desktop PC to become a tablet/smartphone/desktop all in one! One should get both 3 and then you can sync all your **** and whenever someone hacks your pw they hack EVERYTHING. I'll skip this.
Just give me the better boot times, improved file copying/moving, etc, but not this ****ing Metro and smartphone ********.
I agree Peep. This looks too unorganized. If I can't change the look etcs, I won't use it. I'll defenitely try it out though, if I like it I'll keep it. Winows 7 would **** so hard with a more modern look.
