Report: Early Microsoft Longhorn beta slips

“Looks like the Longhorn client code that Microsoft will likely release at its Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in very late April in Seattle will be a “preview” (a k an alpha of Longhorn client). Will Microsoft still be able to deliver Beta 1 in the first half of this year? We’re skeptical,” Mary Jo Foley reports for Microsoft Watch.

Foley predicts the release of the first beta of Longhorn around the time of the Professional Developers Conference this coming September.

Full article here.

MacDailyNews Take: Working for “Microsoft Watch” has got to be what the Devil created especially for “Apple Watchers” who fail to atone. Shudder! Lately, watching Microsoft has to seem like watching a Mack Sennett movie.

30 Comments

  1. Slip sliding away. Isn’t that a song by Paul Simon.
    Very appropriate for Microsoft and Longhorn AKA stubby now. Basicly an XP update nothing else so I don’t know why there having so much trouble.
    That’s why I’m glad I use a Mac. Tiger here we come.

  2. It slipped because they thought Apple was gonna release Tiger by now. With nothing new to copy, they have nothing new to write! Hell, they have already taken out all the “new and innovative” features, what exactly are they doing? Cant they just send all their developers a Copy of XP for the longhorn beta? Ad a couple of new background artwork and new icons and WHAM, Longhorn

  3. Does anyone have a outline/timeline of Longhorn, meaning from first announcement and features to slipping release dates and removal of features. It would make for a good laugh right about now.

  4. Wow! When I first read the headline, I thought it said “ships” instead of “slips”. Imagine my shock. Once I focused the eyes a bit, it all made sense. I thought to myself, “This is not news.”

    My magic word is “try”. That is the word MS should use. We will “try” to get Longhorn out sometime before the end of the decade.

  5. “Sennett’s films, rarely more than one or two reels long, were slapstick comedies noted for their fantastic chases and custard pie warfare.”

    Seems to me I saw Bill Gates starring in one of Mack’s custard pie warfare flicks.

  6. Glorious Longhorn will make Tiger look like a *&@!£% kitten. You are all %&* and you should be “!&*@ thankful Bill Gates and Microsoft invented the PC and innovated everything in personal computing without which there would be no 0.1% Mac market share.

  7. Buffy: No offense but I’ve heard your sort of comment a lot and… ya know I’m really sure that MS has at least ONE developer with a subscription to Apple’s dev program, considering they make Office on the Mac, etc… so they already DO have copies of Tiger, and the devs already know what’s included in it. No reason to wait til it ships to copy, they can go right on ahead right now. Unless you’re suggesting that they are still keeping new features hidden that will be added after the Betas are done? Possible buggy landmines there, better to have the devs testing all that stuff right now.

  8. Longhorn Milestone 9 (M9) and platform complete
    March 2005

    Longhorn Beta 1
    Late May 2005

    Longhorn Beta 2
    October 2005

    Longhorn Release Candidate 0 (RC0)
    Late February 2006

    Longhorn Release Candidate 1 (RC1)
    April 2006

    Longhorn release to manufacturing (RTM)
    May 24, 2006

  9. What are those last few posts about?

    Can MDN please implement a simple login validation procedure? I’ve used Expression Engine before, so I know it’s a very simple parameter to set. This would eliminate the anonymous posting as other people and make the comments section much more relevant and digestable.

    Thanks.

    (And as a side benefit it might ward off the child-trolls like NoMacForYou, Ben, lisa, ron, etc.) Where is Sputnik when you need him???

  10. BSOD – wasn’t the question from MacZac more along the lines of when did M$ FIRST ANNOUNCE that they were working on Longhorn, and officially gave it that name? (Sorta like when OS X was first announced, and then it took a few years before we even saw the beta release – our own personal hell, that – but not anymore!)

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  12. Ehm.. we already know that the actual longhorn, ie all the stuff they said would be in it.. will be LONG after 2006… they announced they were delaying a few features (how innovative) to be ‘plugged-in’ later.

    In other words, snip snip.. this cow’s getting neutered as we speak.

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