

Build Windows - Livestream - icey
http://www.buildwindows.com/?stream

======
blinkingled
Looking at the demo, I could not help but think Microsoft is really doing a
phenomenal job here - even to the extent that their competitors have something
to worry about Microsoft after a long time.

a) Cross platform - A sizable number of modern apps for Windows are going to
be Metro based and thus totally cross platform - ARM/x86_64. Now Android does
this already but purely from Windows standpoint - this is a great way to start
addressing real cross platform apps. The killer deal here is that people
needing legacy x86 Windows apps are not going to miss out on the fun.

b) Backwards compatibility - no explanation required. They continue to do
great in that department.

c) Very close hardware/software integration - Across vendors, SOCs and what
not - they are really taking steps toward making hardware irrelevant from a
user standpoint. If one wanted legacy apps and multiple monitors, they can
still buy the Samsung Core i5 tablet with the USB and HDMI port without
looking funny - it looks and works as sleek as your ARM tablet.

d) Real usability improvements - Like for example Refresh and Reset your PC,
Windows Update made very subtle, Task bar can just span across monitors or can
be two or more independent task bars showing only the apps on its own monitor.

The only unconvincing part of the demo was Windows Live - I wasn't sure how
much traction that would gain.

Great stuff.

~~~
dangrossman
The cool part of the Windows Live integration, to me, happens when you share
computers or tablets. When you hand off that tablet to your wife or your
guest, and they log on with their Live ID, they have _their_ e-mail, contacts,
calendar, bookmarks, app settings in front of them as if they were using their
own dedicated device. Yet when they hand it back and you log on with your own
profile, it's all your stuff again.

This is a big pain with current tablets and phones to me. When someone wants
to borrow my devices, I'm handing out my personal e-mail and photos and files,
and they're not easily able to access their things. A friend of mine wanted to
check out my Android phone and I lost all my app icons and widgets because she
wanted to try a different theme. And when I borrow my dad's tablet, I have no
easy way to access my e-mail, since I don't use gmail or something else with a
convenient webmail site.

~~~
blinkingled
Excellent point - I somehow missed that part (probably my extreme prejudice
against Hotmail set in :). That to me again falls under usability improvements
and certainly if people exercise the sharing part often (arguable as these are
personalized devices more than a PC ever was but on the other hand given the
PC roots it is possible people will like it) Windows Live might see more
traction.

------
sriramk
I really like I see so far (in the tools demo currently).

\- The Metro tile UI is fundamentally different from any other tablet UI out
there. The lock screen password gestures to unlock, the live tiles, etc are
all pretty new and different.

\- I really like the 'docking' and running multiple apps on the same screen at
the same time

\- Really like every app being able to act as a data source through a standard
API, act as a search provider, as a share provider (through those 'charms'),
etc.

\- Watching the tools demo, like the common Windows API across JS, XAML+.NET,
etc. Haven't seen anyone else do this.

This is the first conference from MSFT I'm watching from the outside for a
long time - and I really like what I see.

------
sp332
If you don't have Silverlight, this stream should work:
<http://mfile.akamai.com/125013/live/reflector:52976.asx>

~~~
sigstop
Didn't work for me (Ubuntu).

~~~
sp332
Probably requires WMV codecs?

Edit:

    
    
      sudo apt-get install gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg
    

Don't let the names scare you, they refer to the licenses not the quality of
the code. Normally these would be detected and installed automatically, but
there's a bug that prevents mms:// content from being autodetected.

edit2: fixed codecs, sorry

------
untog
I'm not really interested in live streams of events like these (I'll just read
the summaries, thanks) but the scant details I'm seeing about Windows 8 really
do look pretty good.

I've played around with Windows Phone, and I intend my next phone to be
running it- if you haven't, you owe it to yourself to try out the UI, it's
really something else. Integration with the Zune Pass is a killer feature for
me, too.

The unanswered question is fitting Windows 8 into tablet form and keeping it
running at a good speed. That remains to be seen.

~~~
MatthewPhillips
Unfortunately it's browser is unusable, in my opinion. Until someone ports
webkit or gecko to WP7, I'm staying away. And then only if it allows you to
change the browser default.

~~~
untog
IE10 really isn't a bad browser at all.

But as a web dev, I agree that there's something deep set within me that makes
me uncomfortable about using IE for day to day browsing. I'm not even sure
what MS can do about that.

~~~
MatthewPhillips
I was referring to the mobile version, which as I understand it is based on
IE8, which is archaic compared to every other mobile browser on the market.

~~~
seanx
Win Phone 7 Mango (should be released later this month, can get it now if you
know where to look) has an IE9 based browser that supports html 5 etc

------
rb2k_
> please install Microsoft Silverlight

Nah, I'll pass...

~~~
sigstop
In fact it seems that it's impossible to install by clicking on the link

"One moment, please, while the current Silverlight installation status is
determined... Microsoft Silverlight may not be supported on your computer's
hardware or operating system."

------
cpfohl
Anyone else experiencing deJobs vu here? The demo world has been forever
changed by that man. Impressive looking stuff, though.

~~~
barista
They have the same first name. Steven Sinofsky/Steve Jobs.

------
robfig
"Your Silverlight plug-in has crashed."

gg

------
sagarun
I closed the page as soon as i saw the "Sliverlight required" screen. I am on
Linux with Firefox 6.0.2. Microsoft really needs to get rid of silverlight to
cover more audience (at least people like me)

------
sravfeyn
Why the hell in every Microsoft's website, video is always automatically
loaded and played without the user intent to watch!!it's such a stupid thing

~~~
recoiledsnake
It's a live feed, not a Youtube video.

~~~
sravfeyn
This is the post "Delivering fast boot times in Windows 8" in windows blog
[http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2011/09/08/delivering-
fas...](http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2011/09/08/delivering-fast-boot-
times-in-windows-8.aspx) You can see that the video(in Silverlight) at bottom
loads without you having to click on it. It eats up bandwidth.This is the
latest Microsoft webpage that I remember in which the video gets loaded
automatically.

~~~
dangrossman
It's a plain HTML5 <video> tag with nothing saying to autostart. It'll work
however your browser is configured to handle video tags. It doesn't autostart
in any of mine.

