Windows 8 Update: Operating system is cooked, sent to manufacturers

Also, Microsoft knows Surface is ticking off the OEMs, Windows Store is open to third-party apps

Businesses seriously considering Windows 8 can get a copy of the final version starting Aug. 15 so long as they have a subscription to TechNet, Microsoft's resource for technical information.

This means they can test and evaluate the product in order to make decisions about when and if to migrate to the new platform, which officially launches Oct. 26.

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Businesses without a TechNet subscription can get the final Windows 8 version Aug. 16 if they have a current Microsoft Software Assurance contract. The software will be accessible via the Microsoft Volume License Service Center. On the same day, the software will become available to Microsoft Partner Network members.

On Aug. 20, Windows 8 access is given to Microsoft Action Pack Providers who build services and products around Microsoft products. On Sept. 1, volume license customers that don't have Software Assurance contracts can get Windows 8 via Microsoft Volume License Resellers.

Beyond all these upcoming deadlines, Microsoft this week officially released the final Windows 8 build to manufacturers, meaning they can start installing it on Windows 8 hardware, prepping for the official launch when devices with the operating system loaded go on sale.

This is just the start of a potentially busy time for Microsoft customers. Also released to manufacturer this week were Windows Server 2012 and Internet Explorer 10, both of which are also of interest to Microsoft shops. Server 2012 launches Sept. 4 and anchors what Microsoft describes as a cloud operating system. This is a tight integration between Server 2012 and Microsoft's Azure cloud services, making it simpler to set up flexible data centers using traditional corporate infrastructure, private clouds and public clouds.

In a filing with the Security and Exchange Commission Microsoft stated the obvious -- that selling its own Surface laptop/tablets will make its OEMs very unhappy.

"Our PC hardware products face competition from computer and other hardware manufacturers, many of which are also current or potential partners," the Form 10-K says. "In addition, our Surface devices will compete with products made by our OEM partners, which may affect their commitment to our platform."

That sounds like Microsoft expects the OEMs to be less than enthusiastic about slapping Microsoft operating systems on the hardware they make -- not a good frame of mind for them to have if you're launching a new operating system that depends in large part on OEMs licensing a lot of the software.
Windows Store opens for apps

Along with the release of the final version of Windows 8, the Windows Store is now accepting Metro-style applications from developers. There is a vetting process by Microsoft to approve any app that is accepted for sale in the store with the idea that if properly written, Metro apps will work well on Windows 8 machines, won't slow them down and will be less likely to contain malware.

Note: In order to submit to the store, developers must have the release to manufacturer version of Windows 8.
iPad may be the default holiday gift

The excitement over Windows 8 on tablets may do more to confuse customers than it will do to actually sell the devices, according to an IDC report on the sale of iPads in Q2 of this year.

iPads crushed the competition, scoring 68.2% of all tablet shipments, the research firm says. With the iPad, Kindle Fire and Nook Tablet already available, and then Windows 8 and Windows RT devices going on sale in October, consumers may become confused.

"If anything, there's a real risk that people will have too many options from which to choose this holiday season," says Bob O'Donnell, IDC's program vice president for clients and displays. "Consumers baffled by the differences between Amazon and Google versions of Android, or Windows 8 and Windows RT, may well default to market leader Apple. Or they may simply choose to remain on the sideline for another cycle."

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Windows desktop destined for long slide to oblivion, says Gartner

Microsoft's biggest technology shift in two decades means traditional Windows will account for just 10% of users' time by 2020

Computerworld - Microsoft will de-emphasize the Windows desktop in future releases of its operating system as usage of traditional Windows applications falls to just 10% of users' time by 2020, analysts said this week.

A quartet of Gartner analysts, led by Michael Silver, released a report Tuesday that spelled out the market research firm's prediction for what it described as a Microsoft-initiated "technology shift," the first in nearly two decades.

"Sometimes a new version of Windows represents more than a major upgrade," said Silver in the report Windows 8 Changes Windows as We Know It. "We call these 'technology shifts.' We don't see technology shifts too often."

In fact, for Gartner's money, the only other example in Microsoft's 37-year history was the shift from DOS to Windows NT technology that kicked off in 1993 and wrapped up with the 2001 launch of Windows XP.

"Windows XP was the first Windows version based on NT technology to be targeted at businesses and consumers, and signaled the end of the DOS technology era," Gartner said.

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Likewise, the emergence of WinRT -- the name for the new runtime and programming model linked to the Metro user interface (UI) and its touch-first apps -- is a technology shift. Namely, it's a shift away from Windows NT (the core of every edition prior to Windows 8) to WinRT and Metro.

That shift will probably run much like the one from DOS to Windows NT: A long process (eight years for the first shift to run its course) that for some time features both technologies (the DOS prompt remained key to Windows for years) and a gradual diminishing of the older technology's importance.

"Microsoft is not forcing anyone to eliminate Win32 applications or preventing developers from writing them, but Gartner believes that Win32 and the Windows Desktop will become less strategic over time," said the firm.

Most enterprises that adopt Windows 8 will continue to use Win32 applications and a traditional desktop browser through 2015, said Silver and his colleagues, but by 2020, users will spend less than 10% of their time on that platform, and thus on the desktop. By then, the browser and most applications, including what Gartner called "OS-neutral" apps, will run in Metro using the WinRT runtime.

That means Microsoft will likely spend little energy from this point forward improving the Windows desktop.

"Gartner expects Microsoft to include the Windows Desktop in future releases, but improvements will be relatively minor," the research firm said, comparing future support for the desktop to the longtime inclusion of the DOS command line in Windows.

Microsoft's bet on WinRT and Metro is, of course, huge, but it was necessary.

"Gartner believes Microsoft needs to make such a change, an idea we first suggested in 2006," said Silver's report. "Our hypothesis [then] was that having to support legacy products was becoming a drag on Microsoft, slowing innovation, and that Windows had become too large for any systems designer to implement radical changes."

In 2008, Silver and Gartner analyst Neil McDonald, who also contributed to this week's report, called Microsoft's then-current position "untenable," and said Windows was "collapsing" under its own weight of legacy code and the need to support old software, both its own and that from third parties.

Microsoft, Gartner said then, had to address the problem by building a Windows system able to run on low-powered and low-priced hardware -- this was years before Apple introduced its iPad -- by crafting an operating system that was "thinner, smaller and more modular."

The result, Windows 8's and Windows RT's adoption of the WinRT runtime and the corresponding Metro UI and apps, proved Gartner prescient.

But although Microsoft had to take the plunge to avoid eventual irrelevance, it's fraught with pitfalls, some of which critics have already identified.

The attempt to shoehorn two operating systems into one package -- a knock almost everyone has leveled at Windows 8 -- is "jarring," said Gartner, which expects that Microsoft will polish the rough UI edges and deal with other issues relatively quickly, perhaps with a 2014 release.

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