News
        
        Windows 7 Gets a Blog
        
        
        
        Microsoft's team developing the Windows 7 operating system has  come out with a new blog called "
Engineering  Windows 7." The blog will be a place where the company plans to  release information about its still-in-development operating system. A 
post by Ed Bott was one of the  first to spot it. 
Windows 7 is being built on the kernel of Microsoft's  current operating system, Windows Vista. The new OS has been estimated as  appearing around January 2010, but Microsoft has been very quiet about the  details.
The Engineering Windows 7 blog maintains that tradition by providing  few details about the new OS. However, it has a long explanation for why  Microsoft has said so little thus far. One of the problems is keeping Microsoft's  partners clear on exactly what will go into Windows 7. 
"Our intent  with Windows 7 and the pre-release communication is to make sure that we have a  reasonable degree of confidence in what we talk about when we do talk,"  the Engineering Windows 7 blog states. "Again, top of mind for us is the  responsibility we feel to make sure we are not stressing priorities, churning  resource allocations, or causing strategic confusion among the tens of  thousands of partners and customers who care deeply and have much invested in  the evolution of Windows."
  The blog is being hosted by Jon DeVaan, senior vice president of the Windows  Core Operating System Division and Steven Sinofsky, senior vice president of  Windows and the Windows Live Engineering Group.
  Sinofsky is the Microsoft senior leader who spilled some of the details, in  a vague way, about Windows 7 to CNet blogger Ina Fried in a May interview.
  Microsoft plans to disclose further details about Windows 7 on its new blog  leading up to two of its high-profile tech events this year: the Professional Developers  Conference (Oct. 27 in Los Angeles) and the Windows Hardware Engineering  Conference (Nov. 5 in Los Angeles). 
  Some of the hard technical details about Windows 7 will be disclosed at  those two events, according to Microsoft's blog.   
        
        
        
        
        
        
        
        
        
        
        
        
            
        
        
                
                    About the Author
                    
                
                    
                    Kurt Mackie is senior news producer for 1105 Media's Converge360 group.