Longhorn and the Aero Interface

Longhorn is apparently going to get a socialnet infusion. Social-networking technologies, including blogs, Wikis, and RSS, are likely to play a key part in the Longhorn “Aero” interface, based on a recent reorganization at Microsoft.

In late April, Microsoft reassigned Lili Cheng, group manager of Microsoft Research’s social-computing group, to the Windows Shell interface team. “I’m moving with a bunch of people—about 10—from my research team,” confirmed Cheng, whose new title will be Director of Windows User Experience and Research.

Cheng will be charged with managing the design, user research and user assistance teams within the existing Windows user experience unit. Cheng said that she and her team will “be working on Longhorn and beyond.”

Microsoft plans to show off its next-generation Windows interface called “Aero” at the Professional Developers Conference in September.

Meanwhile, I found some early release screenshots of Longhorn’s Aero Interface at the following URL:

http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/longhorn_aero.asp

From what I can see, certainly an improvement over XP’s bubbly, “I want to be a Mac” interface, “Aero” looks more distinctive and PC-like. Microsoft is even trying to incorporate representative product images of hardware into the UI – brilliant – so that people can visually understand relationships between hardware and drivers.

Longhorn’s release is still unscheduled to my knowledge.
R

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