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Development of Windows Vista
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Development of Windows Vista
The development of Windows Vista (codenamed Longhorn) began in May 2001, prior to the completion of Microsoft's Windows XP operating system, and continued until November 8, 2006, when it was released to manufacturing. Windows Vista was then released generally to retail on January 30, 2007.
Microsoft originally expected to ship Vista sometime in October 2003 as a minor step between Windows XP (codenamed "Whistler") and the next planned major release of Windows, code-named "Blackcomb". Vista's original codename, "Longhorn", was an allusion to this plan: While Whistler and Blackcomb are large ski resorts in British Columbia, Longhorn is the name of a bar between the two mountains that Whistler's visitors pass to reach Blackcomb.
Gradually, Windows "Longhorn" assimilated many of the important new features and technologies slated for "Blackcomb", resulting in the release date being pushed back a few times. Many of Microsoft's developers were also re-tasked with improving the security of Windows XP. Faced with ongoing delays and concerns about feature creep, Microsoft announced on August 27, 2004, that it was making significant changes. "Longhorn" development started afresh, building on the Windows Server 2003 SP1 code-base, and re-incorporating only the features that would be intended for an actual operating system release. Some previously announced features, such as WinFS and NGSCB, were dropped or postponed.
After "Longhorn" was named Windows Vista in mid-2005, an unprecedented beta-test program was started which involved hundreds of thousands of volunteers and companies. Between September 2005 and October 2006, Microsoft released regular Community Technology Previews (CTP) to beta testers and two release candidates to the general public. Development of Windows Vista concluded with the November 8, 2006 announcement of its completion by co-president of Windows development, Jim Allchin.
The early development stages of Longhorn were generally characterized by incremental improvements and updates to Windows XP. During this period, Microsoft was fairly quiet about what was being worked on, as their marketing and public relations focus were more strongly focused on Windows XP and Windows Server 2003, the latter of which was released in April 2003. Occasional builds of Longhorn were leaked onto popular file sharing networks such as IRC, BitTorrent, eDonkey and various newsgroups, and so most of what is known about builds before the first sanctioned development release of Longhorn in May 2003, is derived from these builds.
Most builds of Longhorn and Vista were identified by a label that was always displayed in the bottom-right corner of the desktop. A typical build label would look like "Longhorn Build 3663.Lab06_N.020728-1728". Higher build numbers didn't automatically mean that the latest features from every development team at Microsoft were included. Typically, a team working on a certain feature or subsystem would generate their working builds which developers would test with, and when the code was deemed stable, all the changes would be incorporated back into the main development tree at once. At Microsoft, several "Build labs" exist where the compilation of the entirety of Windows can be performed by a team. The lab in which any given build originated is shown as part of the build label, and the date and time of the build follow that. Some builds (such as Beta 1 and Beta 2) only display the build label in the version information dialog (Winver), and the icons are from Windows XP. Most of the standard applets from Windows XP (including the Windows XP Tour applet) were retained in all pre-reset and most post-reset builds but were removed in later builds as the operating system was nearing completion. All pre-reset builds and some of the early post-reset builds still ran on the same SKUs as found on Windows XP but was changed to their final SKUs by the time the first publicly available version of the post-reset build of Longhorn was introduced.
The OOBE (the setup process) in the Milestone 2 and 3 builds is the same as Windows XP but with different music. It instead uses "No Hay Problema" by Pink Martini, which is also present in Windows Server 2003 but goes unused as the OOBE is not used in that operating system.
At the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in May 2003, Microsoft gave their first public demonstrations of the new Desktop Window Manager and Aero. These demonstrations were done on internal build 4015 (Lab06_n). Several sessions for developers and hardware engineers at the conference focused on these new features, as well as the Next-Generation Secure Computing Base (previously known as "Palladium"), which at the time was Microsoft's proposed solution for creating a secure computing environment. Also at this conference, Microsoft reiterated their roadmap for delivering Longhorn, pointing to an "early 2005" release date.
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Development of Windows Vista AI simulator
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Development of Windows Vista
The development of Windows Vista (codenamed Longhorn) began in May 2001, prior to the completion of Microsoft's Windows XP operating system, and continued until November 8, 2006, when it was released to manufacturing. Windows Vista was then released generally to retail on January 30, 2007.
Microsoft originally expected to ship Vista sometime in October 2003 as a minor step between Windows XP (codenamed "Whistler") and the next planned major release of Windows, code-named "Blackcomb". Vista's original codename, "Longhorn", was an allusion to this plan: While Whistler and Blackcomb are large ski resorts in British Columbia, Longhorn is the name of a bar between the two mountains that Whistler's visitors pass to reach Blackcomb.
Gradually, Windows "Longhorn" assimilated many of the important new features and technologies slated for "Blackcomb", resulting in the release date being pushed back a few times. Many of Microsoft's developers were also re-tasked with improving the security of Windows XP. Faced with ongoing delays and concerns about feature creep, Microsoft announced on August 27, 2004, that it was making significant changes. "Longhorn" development started afresh, building on the Windows Server 2003 SP1 code-base, and re-incorporating only the features that would be intended for an actual operating system release. Some previously announced features, such as WinFS and NGSCB, were dropped or postponed.
After "Longhorn" was named Windows Vista in mid-2005, an unprecedented beta-test program was started which involved hundreds of thousands of volunteers and companies. Between September 2005 and October 2006, Microsoft released regular Community Technology Previews (CTP) to beta testers and two release candidates to the general public. Development of Windows Vista concluded with the November 8, 2006 announcement of its completion by co-president of Windows development, Jim Allchin.
The early development stages of Longhorn were generally characterized by incremental improvements and updates to Windows XP. During this period, Microsoft was fairly quiet about what was being worked on, as their marketing and public relations focus were more strongly focused on Windows XP and Windows Server 2003, the latter of which was released in April 2003. Occasional builds of Longhorn were leaked onto popular file sharing networks such as IRC, BitTorrent, eDonkey and various newsgroups, and so most of what is known about builds before the first sanctioned development release of Longhorn in May 2003, is derived from these builds.
Most builds of Longhorn and Vista were identified by a label that was always displayed in the bottom-right corner of the desktop. A typical build label would look like "Longhorn Build 3663.Lab06_N.020728-1728". Higher build numbers didn't automatically mean that the latest features from every development team at Microsoft were included. Typically, a team working on a certain feature or subsystem would generate their working builds which developers would test with, and when the code was deemed stable, all the changes would be incorporated back into the main development tree at once. At Microsoft, several "Build labs" exist where the compilation of the entirety of Windows can be performed by a team. The lab in which any given build originated is shown as part of the build label, and the date and time of the build follow that. Some builds (such as Beta 1 and Beta 2) only display the build label in the version information dialog (Winver), and the icons are from Windows XP. Most of the standard applets from Windows XP (including the Windows XP Tour applet) were retained in all pre-reset and most post-reset builds but were removed in later builds as the operating system was nearing completion. All pre-reset builds and some of the early post-reset builds still ran on the same SKUs as found on Windows XP but was changed to their final SKUs by the time the first publicly available version of the post-reset build of Longhorn was introduced.
The OOBE (the setup process) in the Milestone 2 and 3 builds is the same as Windows XP but with different music. It instead uses "No Hay Problema" by Pink Martini, which is also present in Windows Server 2003 but goes unused as the OOBE is not used in that operating system.
At the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in May 2003, Microsoft gave their first public demonstrations of the new Desktop Window Manager and Aero. These demonstrations were done on internal build 4015 (Lab06_n). Several sessions for developers and hardware engineers at the conference focused on these new features, as well as the Next-Generation Secure Computing Base (previously known as "Palladium"), which at the time was Microsoft's proposed solution for creating a secure computing environment. Also at this conference, Microsoft reiterated their roadmap for delivering Longhorn, pointing to an "early 2005" release date.