If you liked the Windows 7 engineering blog, you'll love the Windows 8 one
As the Windows team did with Windows 7, the Windows team is going to be are blogging about the engineering process and decisions with Windows 8.
Microsoft kicked off the new "Building Windows 8" blog with an August 15 introductory post by Windows President Steven Sinofsky. As usual with Sinofsky posts, there are lots of words (1,250 of them) and not much a Windows watcher would consider to be "news."
In fact, Sinofsky's post stressed that the purpose of the blog isn't about generating traffic, building excitement or "causing strategic confusion among the tens of thousands" of individuals invested in the future of Windows. Instead, "this blog is here to provide a two-way dialog about the complexities and tradeoffs of product development."
Microsoft also launched a new twitter handle (@BuildWindows8) to go along with the new blog.
Sinofsky described the purpose of the blog in his inaugural post:
"We've been hard at work designing and building Windows 8, and today we want to begin an open dialog with those of you who will be trying out the pre-release version over the coming months. We intend to post regularly throughout the development of Windows 8, and to focus on the engineering of the product. Welcome to 'Building Windows 8,' or as we call it, 'B8.'"
Microsoft officials have not shared a timetable for test builds, beta release(s) or the final RTM date for Windows 8. I continue to hear attendees of the mid-September Build conference will get either a developer preview or beta build of both Windows 8 client and server. The final RTM date for Windows 8 could be anywhere from April 2012 to fall 2012, from what various company watchers have heard.
Speaking of the Build conference, Microsoft may still have yet to post any information on sessions, speakers or party dates/times for its confab, but a number of us Microsoft bloggers have taken it upon ourselves to start filling up attendees' dance cards. If you'll be in Anaheim on September 14, join us at the Build Blogger Bash. (RSVPs strongly encouraged, but no tickets required.)