Posted on 02/03/2009 7:10:52 PM PST by antiRepublicrat
Steven Sinofsky this week reaffirmed that Windows 7 would only have a single public beta releasebuild 7000, still available for download for a few more days. The current expectation is that there will be a single Release Candidate in April, with RTM around July, and Windows 7 hitting stores a few months later.
This plan marks a significant departure from Microsoft's historic Windows release strategy. Previous editions have had at least two betas and two Release Candidates; even Windows XP, a minor update to Windows 2000, received this treatment. Windows Vista went even further during its extended development period. In addition to formal betas and Release Candidates, a number of "Community Technical Preview" (CTP) releases were made available, to allow third-party developers to track the progress more closely.
How is this even possible?
This condensed release schedule is a result of a new development methodology. Underlying this is Microsoft's new commitment to what the company calls "quality." "Quality" is kind of a vague termafter all, it's not as if the company wants to ship something low-quality, even if it might not always seem that way. In this case, it means six things: device compatibility, application compatibility, performance, reliability, battery life, and security. These are not the only areas of concern for the new OSthings like the user experience and documentation quality are still important, but these six are viewed as fundamental. Windows 7 is intended to raise the bar in each of these areas and, to achieve that, Microsoft has used a new development process for this release.
(Excerpt) Read more at arstechnica.com ...
Lol i still have my Atari 800 sitting on a shelf in my computer room right now.
I’d like to see a picture of that :)
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.