What, specifically, can end users and organisations expect from Windows XP and Office XP? Microsoft went a long way toward answering these questions recently, showing off early versions of the software at an event in Seattle.
Make It Simpler
In short, through these two products, the company hopes to provide users with a simpler means of interacting with devices attached to PCs, with the Web, and with one another. Explains Kristian Gyorkon, product manager for Microsoft Windows clients, "We're enabling users to take advantage of scenarios that in the past would be too complex, would require too many third-party applications and too much knowledge."
With Windows XP, users will be able to give and receive help more easily; they'll be able to collect, organize, and share multimedia files, communicate via instant messaging, voice, and video, shop online, and more. When a far-away friend or colleague needs help with a software problem, for instance, the user can take control of the remote desktop over a network and fix the problem for them through Windows XP's built-in remote control client. Without supplementary software, people will be able to import an image from a digital camera, edit that image, and publish it to a Web page. "We've taken a holistic view of things," says Gyorkon.
Screen Shoot Windows XP
The OS is fronted by an entirely new, almost cartoon-like interface meant to improve navigation. "We're trying to reduce the confusion that people may have with the old Windows interface," says product manager Chandler Myrick, "to clean up the desktop, to simplify the start menu and taskbar." By way of example, Myrick points to the way the XP taskbar will display open applications. Multiple instances of the same application will be represented not by multiple icons but by a single icon, and when you click on that icon, a dialog box will pop up, describing each instance of the application in detail.
Yet, despite these improvements to Windows' outer skin, the greatest asset of the new OS may end up being the foundation it's built on. Windows XP is based on the core code of Windows 2000, and Microsoft hopes to improve on the general reliability of its existing code. "We want to make XP the most dependable version of Windows we've ever released," says Myrick, "in terms of stability, security, driver quality, and compatibility not only with applications but devices."
Rob Enderle, an analyst with Giga Information Group, feels this goal may be achieved: "People talk about all the benefits for multimedia users, but you've got to remember that this is essentially the 'one dot zero' release of Windows 2000. They've had a lot of time to patch problems discovered by the first brave group of Windows 2000 early adopters, and that generally means a more stable, less problematic product."
Windows XP is not necessarily designed solely for corporate users, however. The OS will be available in two different flavors: Windows XP Professional and Windows XP Home Edition. "This is the first time," says Gyorkon, "that we've brought the reliability you get with Windows NT and Windows 2000 to the home environment."
The Professional version is essentially a superset of the Home Edition, providing a few features that business users-and their IT managers-are more likely to need, including support for multiple processors and monitors, added security, added management controls, and a built-in Web server. Both versions will include updates to Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player, and both will lean heavily on Windows Update, an automatic means of updating the OS via the Internet.
Office XP
The new features available with Office XP parallel those of its namesake OS. Applications within the suite will generally be easier to use. They'll dovetail to a greater extent with the Web and with other software. They'll further facilitate collaboration. And they'll offer greater protection against viruses. Enderle particularly likes the collaboration tools being added but doesn't feel that the new suite is enough of an improvement on the status quo to warrant widespread adoption: "If you were thinking about going to Office 2000 and didn't, you'll go to XP, but if you just deployed Office 2000, XP probably doesn't offer enough to get you to migrate again."
Both Microsoft Windows XP and Office XP will be on sale sometime in the second half of this year. And depending on the availability of Intel's Itanium chip, they may be joined by a 64-bit XP operating system. Stay tuned to this Web site for further news on prerelease versions of the XP products.
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