Microsoft slams XP in call for Longhorn support

IDG News Service - Microsoft Corp. yesterday bad-mouthed its own work on networking and hardware support in Windows XP in order to sell hardware makers on new technologies it has planned for Longhorn, the next version of Windows, due late next year.
Microsoft is preparing a host of technologies for Longhorn that it says will make it easier for users to set up wireless networks, connect networked devices and improve the user experience by watching available bandwidth and making it easier to troubleshoot, the software maker said yesterday.
But for Microsoft's plans to work, hardware makers have to support the software maker's new specifications in their products. So Microsoft executives at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in Seattle called for support of technologies such as Windows Connect Now, Web services for devices and so-called Qwave technologies, all of which were demonstrated.
"In the past, we really have not taken as systematic an approach as we should have. We put things together not really thinking through the end-to-end scenarios, and this is why, at times, we have failed to deliver," said Jawad Khaki, corporate vice president for Windows networking and device technologies at Microsoft, in a presentation at WinHEC.
"Longhorn ushers in the next generation of software and architecture that enables seamless connectivity," he said. To back up that statement, Microsoft has also joined the WiMedia Alliance, an industry group planning specifications for ultrawideband technology.
Khaki then called Microsoft employees on stage to demonstrate how Microsoft plans to do better in Longhorn. Younus Aftab, a program manager, demonstrated Windows Connect Now by setting up a wireless network with a wireless router and a networked camera from D-Link Corp. and a Dell Inc. laptop.
When installing the wireless access point, instead of the typical setup procedure in a Web browser, the test version of Longhorn used in the demonstration showed a wizard. "We help the user make the right choices and try to make the security automatic and the system and the process consistent," Aftab said.
Other hardware can be added to the network by connecting it directly to the router, which will pop up a similar wizard, or by using a USB key with the network settings, as Aftab showed during his demonstration.
While the network setup and connecting of devices worked well, the keyboard on the system Aftab used failed when he first started his demo.
D-Link hardware was also used in a demonstration of the Link Layer Topology Discovery (LLTD) protocol. A new Network Mapper in Longhorn will let users get an