Windows 7 is slated for a 2010 release, although we could see it as late as 2009. Much like the reports coming out on Snow Leopard, Windows 7 is slated not to come with a variety of new features but rather on buttoning up the existing features and in some cases Microsoft will be reducing the number of features in the OS. Well, maybe not removing features, but rather moving them into Windows Live and making them as easily accessible as possible using the newly revamped Windows Live toolbar. Applications moved to the Windows Live-style a la carte menu:
- Windows Live Family Safety (replaces the former parental controls options)
- Windows Live Movie Maker (video editing made easy, replaces Movie Maker)
- Windows Live Writer (allows for blog publishing)
- Windows Live Mail (replaces Microsoft Outlook Express and Microsoft Mail)
- Windows Live Messenger (same old program, different location)
- Windows Live Photo Gallery (now looks more like a certain Google app)
Expect to see more of the same style of windows as we saw in Vista, but now they should all work a little better and a little snappier. Heard that before? Yes you have. In Windows Vista Service Pack 2 Microsoft reported hella fast performance compared to that of SP1. But not-so-much in reality. I hope to see drastically better performance out of the OS at release time. However, it’s currently in Alpha (what MS calls Pre-Beta) and so not much can be inferred from the current performance of Windows 7.
According to the MS Engineering blog other items we can expect to see that aren’t currently in the OS include better search, better account control APIs (via powershell and WMI), better internationalization, more energy efficiency, better performance, integrated multi-touch and less annoying help balloons.
As for the Server version of Windows, it appears (according to the internal MS blogosphere) that we’re likely only to see Windows Server 2008 R2. However, I have been unable to ascertain whether or not this will be an upgrade that you’ll have to pay for (like 2003 R2 was).