While Microsoft eventually hopes its Live Mesh effort will be a way for people to share data across all of their devices, the service that launches next week will be limited in several ways, CNET News.com has learned.
Next week, Microsoft will launch a pre-beta "technology preview" open to about 10,000 testers in the U.S., according to a source familiar with the company's plans.
File synchronization is an important component of Mesh, but not its only feature, the source said. Developers will be able to write their own applications for Live Mesh, with the idea that applications written for Mesh can then be accessed by a number of different devices.
Another key aspiration for Live Mesh is that it work with more than just Microsoft products. Out of the gate it will work with "multiple browsers," the source said. Initially it will be limited to XP and Vista PCs as well as Windows Mobile phones, however Microsoft wants to add Mac support as well more types of phones and even other devices, such as MP3 players.
Live Mesh is also not just a space for linking one's own devices and information. Users will be able to invite friends to share parts of their Mesh.
Ray Ozzie first talked about Mesh in a speech at last month's Mix '08 event in Las Vegas.
"Just imagine the possibilities of unified application management across the device mesh, centralized, Web-based deployment of device-based applications," he said. "Imagine an app platform that's cognizant of all of your devices. Now, as it so happens, we've had a team at Microsoft working on this specific scenario for some time, starting with the PC and focused on the question of how we might make life so much easier for individuals if we just brought together all your PCs into a seamless mesh, for users, for developers, using the Web as a hub."
The company will have more to say at Web 2.0 Expo next week, as well as at an April 24 event, both taking place in San Francisco. A Microsoft representative said the company did not have any comment ahead of its events next week.
LAS VEGAS--Mozilla Vice President Mike Schroepfer said Microsoft's decision to support a more standards-compliant mode by default should keep Web developers from having to waste so much time.
With the current set-up, he said that developers have a fairly easy time getting a site that renders properly in Opera, Safari, and Firefox, but often spend a lot of energy trying to get that same site to also render correctly in Internet Explorer.
"Web developers burn through a tremendous amount of time getting their sites to work with IE because of IE's special quirks," said Schroepfer, who I caught up with here at Mix '08.
He said that Microsoft's move toward greater embrace of standards with Internet Explorer 8 is a good thing.
"There are some encouraging things there and I hope to see more," he said.
In particular, it would be helpful if Microsoft gave a roadmap for which standards it planned to support down the road, that way Web developers could decide earlier to invest time. He said he would really like to see Microsoft support a new graphics standard known as scalable vector graphics.
"That would be a great win for the Web," he said.
Meanwhile, Schroepfer also talked up the benefits of Firefox 3, which is just hitting its fourth beta and is edging closer to a final release. In particular, he pointed to the browser's "Awesome bar" that remembers not only specific Web addresses that have been visited but also other information from the page. For example typing in "televisions" might bring up a recent TV search on Amazon, even though television wasn't in the address.
"Once you use it you actually can't use any other browser," he said. Also on tap are improved speed and antimalware features, he said.
Social Web surfing tool Me.dium is one of the first apps ready for Internet Explorer 8 beta, which Microsoft unveiled at Mix '08 in Las Vegas Wednesday.
The browser add-on enables users to chat with each other and see which Web pages they're visiting. This release takes advantage of new WebSlices and Activities features within IE 8.
With WebSlices, users can subscribe to dynamic updates of specific parts of Web pages they visit, with new content displaying within the Me.dium sidebar.
Activities capabilities enable users to bring up maps or Web searches of highlighted text on a page. The Discovery activity offers real-time content recommendations related to the pages users are browsing. The feature maps and ranks the popularity of users' ongoing activities.
Upon Microsoft's request, the Me.dium (more here) team reportedly built the tool for IE 8 within a week.
For the sake of security, Me.dium allows stealth settings so users can hide from each other, and it shuts off at bank sites.
Users testing IE 8 can download Me.dium here. Some rival social browsing tools, however, don't require installation.
The extension, also available for Firefox, added support for IE 7 in September.
Me.dium is ready for Internet Explorer 8.
(Credit: Me.dium)LAS VEGAS--Microsoft is looking to position its Silverlight Web technology as the coolest kid in school--one that is both popular and gets along with everyone.
The Hard Rock Cafe arrived at Mix 08 to show how it is using Silverlight to show its 70,000 pieces of rock and roll history online.
(Credit: Dan Farber/CNET News.com)At the Mix '08 show here, the company talked about its Mac, Linux, and mobile-phone compatibility and brought out customers like Hard Rock Cafe, NBC, and AOL to talk about how they are using the technology. It also showed Silverlight running on the newest compatible device--Nokia's smartphones.
Microsoft's Scott Guthrie also alluded to support for Apple's iPhone, saying Microsoft wants Silverlight running on "anything that has an SDK (software development kit)."
In the Hard Rock Cafe example, the restaurant and hotel chain used the technology to showcase its massive, 70,000-piece collection of rock artifacts. "This is 2 billion pixels," said a representative of the company who built the site for the Hard Rock.
AOL showed off a new version of AOL Mail, while NBC touted its plans to use Silverlight to bring more than 2,200 hours of video both live and on-demand.
The Hard Rock Cafe catalogued over 2 billion pixels' worth of images as it took its rock gear collection online with Silverlight.
(Credit: Dan Farber/CNET News.com)It's all part of Microsoft's aggressive pitch to Web developers, a clear acknowledgment that Microsoft faces a tough battle to win the hearts and minds of those who build Web sites and applications.
"I know today you have many amazing technology choices," Ray Ozzie said in his introductory comments. "But I'd like you to bet on us because I think together we can create extraordinary experiences.
... Read more
As part of NBCOlympics.com, people will be able to decide which sports to watch, either live or on-demand, as well as having the option of watching multiple video streams at once.
(Credit: Dan Farber/CNET News.com)LAS VEGAS--This summer, NBC plans to show 1,200 hours of video from the Beijing Olympics on five different channels.
But the company also knows that's not nearly enough for many people. At January's Consumer Electronics Show, Bill Gates announced a partnership with Microsoft to bring that video and another 1,000 hours to the Web, available both live and on-demand.
"It's going to be terrific and I am terrified," said Perkins Miller, a senior vice president for digital media for NBC Sports and Olympics. "One hundred fifty days from today we are going to take on the Olympics."
In one example, users can watch multiple track events at once, switching easily from among several live video streams.
(Credit: Dan Farber/CNET News.com )Now, it didn't make me cry, but the demo that Miller showed was pretty amazing. Using Silverlight as the underlying engine, NBC is allowing people to watch events live, pause them, and watch multiple video streams, share streams with friends, and see what the audience sees as the most popular highlights.
It seems like the Olympics is shaping up to be the biggest showcase--and biggest performance test--for what Web video can do.
LAS VEGAS--Microsoft offered its first public demonstration of Internet Explorer 8 on Wednesday, a prospect that had general manager Dean Hachamovitch struggling to figure out what to cover.
"I'm so excited that I had to figure out how to focus," he told the crowd. The marketing folks naturally suggested he point to three major advances, but Hatchamovitch disagreed.
"These are developers," he said he told the marketers. "They can count higher than three."
So, instead he said he would talk about eight features: CSS 2.1 support, CSS Certification, performance, start of HTML 5 support, new developer tools, activities, Web slices and one he hasn't named yet.
Microsoft also said that the first beta of the browser, intended for developers, will be available after today's keynote.
One of the new features, WebSlices, allow users to break a Web site into parts and only get updates from the part they want.
In IE 8 users can subscribe to parts of Web page," Hachamovitch said. He showed an example in IE 8 where users can use Web slices to subscribe to a single eBay auction.
Apple has its own Web-clipping subscription method that is part of Mac OS X.
Separately, Microsoft said it was making available a beta version of Silverlight 2, which will move the technology further beyond delivering video and into creating rich Internet applications.
Among the features of Silverlight 2 is what Microsoft calls adaptive streaming: the ability of the client PC to decide how large a streaming file it can handle at any given moment based on its CPU and network resources.
"If the network gets congested it can drop down to a lower bit rate," said Scott Guthrie a vice president in Microsoft's developer division.
With IE8, Hachamovitch discussed Microsoft's commitment to compatibility. He relayed a story of what his kids used to say whenever they had Internet problems.
"They'd ask 'Daddy, did you break the web?'" Hachamovitch said. "Most of the time I could honestly say 'No.'"
In a broader sense though, Hachamovitch said, that others might disagree that Microsoft, had in fact broken the Web. "Web developers might answer the question differently," he said.
Hachamovitch then went on to talk about Microsoft's commitment to interoperability and steps that it has taken. Microsoft announced earlier this week that IE 8 would use its most standards compliant mode by default. The company said it believed that move would assuage developer concerns as well as regulatory and competitive issues.
However, a top Opera executive told CNET News.com yesterday that Microsoft's move addresses only one of several concerns that the browser maker had raised with the European Commission.
Editor's note: CNET News.com's Ina Fried blogged Microsoft Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie's address live from Mix '08.
LAS VEGAS--Microsoft Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie decided he didn't want to share the stage with an elephant.
In the first minute of his speech at Mix '08, the company's Web-focused confab here, he talked about all of the things Microsoft has done in the online arena over the past year.
Ray Ozzie opens Microsoft's Mix '08 saying that Web notions like tagging will become as common as the file and edit menus on the desktop.
(Credit: Dan Farber/CNET News.com)"And then there's Yahoo," Ozzie said, adding that there isn't much he can say about Microsoft's pending bid.
"I can say it's already added some interesting twists to what promises to be a really, really exciting year," Ozzie said.
He also justified spending Yahoo-size dollars by talking about the potential of the online advertising market.
Ozzie said he hoped in his speech to connect some of the dots between Microsoft's online services, which he acknowledged can seem from the outside to be somewhat haphazard.
"It might seem to you to be just a little bit random," he said.
Update at 9:50 a.m. PST: Ozzie talked about how various experiences that today are handled differently on various devices will soon be more seamlessly connected. In music and movies, for example, connected entertainment means only having to organize and license content once and being able to use it on multiple devices.
Update at 9:55 a.m.: For productivity, he said Office Live will become a "hub" where people will be able to link tags and share documents. Ozzie said Microsoft will have more to say about this area at a separate event. He didn't say when or where this event will take place.
Update at 9:57 a.m.: Ozzie said that the attendees at Mix will be the first to be able to try out a new service for managing multiple PCs, though again he didn't say just when this service will be available.
Ozzie also announced a new database-in-the-cloud service, known as SQL Server Data Services.
In wrapping up his comments, Ozzie acknowledged that Microsoft is competing for developers' attention. "I know today you have many amazing technology choices," he said. "But I'd like you to bet on us because I think together we can create extraordinary experiences."
Microsoft's Silverlight browser plug-in will be bringing videos and other rich media to Nokia smartphones later this year.
The two companies on Tuesday at Microsoft's Mix '08 conference are scheduled to announce that Microsoft will write a version of Silverlight for Nokia's Series 60 (S60) smartphone software that runs on Symbian OS. The software, which will be available later this year, will also run on Series 40 devices and Nokia Internet tablets.
Silverlight videos are coming to Nokia's N96 smartphone.
(Credit: Nokia)For people with compatible devices, it means they will be able to see content, notably video, written for Silverlight, which Microsoft is pushing as an alternative to Adobe's Flash Player. Microsoft has been signing on content partners to use Silverlight for media streaming, including MLB.com and online Olympic games broadcasting with NBC.
For Microsoft, the deal with Nokia is a step in its pledge to make Silverlight "ubiquitous," that is, capable of running on multiple operating systems.
The software giant is trying to lure Web developers toward Silverlight--and away from Flash--to build rich Internet applications or media-oriented Web sites.
The strategy, which Microsoft detailed at last year's Mix conference, hinges on creating tools that let traditional Microsoft developers write Silverlight Web applications with familiar products like Visual Studio and ASP.Net.
Silverlight now runs on Windows and Mac OS, and it has a deal with Novell to build a distribution on Linux.
A version of Silverlight for Windows Mobile will be available later this year, said John Case, a general manager in Microsoft's developer division. "The whole Silverlight strategy is to provide one programming model and ubiquity," he said.
Microsoft chose to work with Nokia because it has the largest market share of mobile phones, but it will sign on with other handset makers to create ports of Silverlight, Case said.
All the main features of Silverlight, including video and interactive Web application development, will be included in all mobile versions.
But there will be some device-specific restraints, which means Microsoft will create editions of Silverlight for different mobile platforms, he said.
Aiming to demonstrate that its commitment to interoperability goes beyond fancy statements, Microsoft said Monday that it is shifting its plans for the next version of Internet Explorer to make the program more friendly to Web standards.
The software maker said that a planned standards compatibility mode will now be the default rendering engine when IE 8 makes its debut. Microsoft has already said that the new browser is capable of passing the Acid2 rendering test.
"We think that acting in accordance with principles is important, and IE 8's default is a demonstration of the interoperability principles in action," IE general manager Dean Hachamovitch said in a blog posting.
With IE 8, Microsoft plans to have three rendering modes: the new standards-compliant mode, the IE7 rendering engine, as well as an option for displaying older Web sites. Because of the default shift, Web sites that want IE 8 to use its IE7 engine will have to add a tag to their site's code.
Microsoft noted that there are some legal reasons for changing course. "While we do not believe there are currently any legal requirements that would dictate which rendering mode must be chosen as the default for a given browser, this step clearly removes this question as a potential legal and regulatory issue," Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith said in a statement.
At the end of last year, Opera complained to the European Commission about Microsoft's browser practices, and last week Microsoft was handed a record fine for its past noncompliance with EU dictates.
Microsoft hasn't said when the final version will be out, but a beta version of the browser is due out in the first half of the year. There also will likely be more browser news later this week, when Hachamovitch gives a keynote speech at the Mix '08 conference in Las Vegas.
Microsoft will shortly make available the test version of Internet Explorer 8, which is set for final release in the first half of this year.
The Web site ActiveWin on Monday published the contents of a beta invitation, which said Microsoft is nearing a launch date for Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1, which will be available for download and testing.
According to the Internet Explorer blog, the next version of Microsoft's Web browser is set for release in the first half of the year.
Microsoft executives are expected to reveal further details about the browser's features at the software maker's upcoming Mix conference in Las Vegas next week.
Last year at Mix, Microsoft outlined some of the features planned for IE 8, including standards compliance and tools to ease Web development.
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