Stefano Demiliani WeBlog

New Year's Resolutions for Microsoft

These are the resolutions that Directions from Microsoft has planned for the new year (as reported by Cnet).

This is a brief summary (obviously, with my personal comments ):

• Better detailed, multiyear road maps for major Microsoft products: I think Microsoft is working well on this direction, expecially this year (we've received roadmaps for products, CTP versions, Beta versions to test, documentations and support tools for free).
• Improve diffusion of its revenue-generating acquisitions (business products such as Navision, GeCad etc.): Yes, this is a big point of work for Microsoft I think. Lots of these products that Microsoft has under his brand are really interesting and powerful products (I'm thinking about Navision that I've known a little on this month) but there is not good support from the big mother (MS) and no good documentations on the net. Microsoft can work a lot for this and I hope on a major support for the (few) Microsoft Certified Partner that works with these products.
• Better Security: Obviously, big improvements are doing about security but MS can't stop his investments on this field.
• Making the PC a home entertainment hub: The big investments on Windows Media Center are on this direction I think and this could be a new world for business.
• Doing a better job of convincing customers that they can get more out of their software by using newer versions: Customers must upgrade their software versions, but I hope on big price down campaign, expecially for developers products and home OS (such as XP and XP Pro).
• Fending off open-source software: This is about server software but now increasingly also about the desktop (Linux, products such as Firefox, OpenOffice etc.). The key for me is not a war against the Open Source movement but a profitable collabouration with this world. Open Source could retrieve benefits from Microsoft and viceversa. Oh, and don't forget interoperability, a must for the future.
• Convincing developers that its upcoming Longhorn version of Windows is the way forward: there's not too much work to do for convincing developers that Longhorn is the future. I think all of us now know that we've to move on this direction a day, but we hope only that Longhorn will be a really powerful, secure and extendible platform.
• Making Xbox 2 a profitable and well-supported game console: No particular comments about this...
• Shipping a 64-bit version of Windows that encourages PC upgrades: move to 64 bits is not only an hardware upgrade, but also a software upgrade. Developers must have the right developer tools to move all existing applications to the 64 bit world.
• Playing well with others: the last proposal on this list but one of the most important for me. Microsoft must take the "others" in considerations, must work with others and must interop with others. I hope that in the future we'll be more standard compliant and all the software world (Microsoft, Apple, Sun, Open Source world etc.) could be more collabourative.

Something forgotten? Mmmm... maybe continue to improve Windows Update Service. Now is a great service, but I hoope on something better.