Skip to main content

Microsoft Developing Next Mobile OS: Crossbow

Successor to Windows Mobile 5.0 will feature built-in IM, strong links with Office 2007.

Microsoft, which has been carving a larger slice of the mobile device OS market, is developing a new product, code-named "Crossbow," which will incorporate features such as instant messaging, a Microsoft executive confirmed Monday.

Crossbow will have strong links with Office 2007 and Exchange 12, Microsoft's pending new office application suite and e-mail server, said Pieter Knook, senior vice president for the mobile devices and telecoms sector. Crossbow would be the successor to Windows Mobile 5.0, released in May 2005.

Crossbow will take aim at the Symbian and BlackBerry operating systems. The OS will contain a new mobile version of Office Communicator, an Office 2007 enterprise communications application, that includes instant messaging on public and private networks, Knook said.

"As the Office [2007] PC versions of those applications improve, we're tracking that on the Windows Mobile side," Knook said.

Coming Soon?

Knook said it's premature to say when Crossbow would be released, but that the company plans for an annual mobile OS release. Mobile operating systems are also complex since operators often must be tested to ensure their systems can work with a new OS, a six- to 12-month delay after a release, Knook said.

That process is nearly complete for the push e-mail capability of Windows Mobile 5.0, Microsoft's slow assault against BlackBerry e-mail that may now start to bear fruit. The company's new push e-mail capability depended on software upgrades on the telecom operators' side, as well as new versions of Exchange Server 2003 and Windows Mobile 5.0.

Those upgrades are nearly complete, Knook said. "You're getting to the point right now where this quarter is really where the whole offer comes together," he said.

Microsoft is hoping to nudge BlackBerry aside on costs and convenience for administrators. Knook estimates an enterprise deploying mobile e-mail with 20,000 users could save $1.5 million in software purchases alone, plus additional costs on licensing over BlackBerry, he said.

Microsoft is counting on strong connections with device manufacturers to strengthen its position with those enterprises already using Exchange but with a BlackBerry server. The new push e-mail feature would enable those companies to eliminate the BlackBerry middleware, which also consolidates their support structure, Knook said.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

US says world safer, despite 11,000 attacks in '05

The U.S. war on terrorism has made the world safer, the State Department's counterterrorism chief said on Friday, despite more than 11,000 terrorist attacks worldwide last year that killed 14,600 people. The U.S. State Department said the numbers, listed in its annual Country Reports on Terrorism released on Friday, were based on a broader definition of terrorism and could not be compared to the 3,129 international attacks listed the previous year. But the new 2005 figures, which showed attacks in Iraq jumped and accounted for about a third of the world's total, may fuel criticism of the Bush administration's assertion that it is winning the fight against terrorism. Asked if the world was safer than the previous year, U.S. State Department Counterterrorism Coordinator Henry Crumpton told a news conference, "I think so. But I think that (if) you look at the ups and downs of this battle, it's going to take us a long time to win this. You can't measure this month ...

Al-Qaeda number two in new video

Al-Qaeda's number two Ayman al-Zawahiri has appeared in a video saying that Iraqi insurgents have "broken the back" of the US military. He praised "martyrdom operations" carried out by al-Qaeda in Iraq in the video, posted on an Islamist website. And he called on the people and army of Pakistan to fight against President Musharraf's administration. This is the third message from prominent al-Qaeda leaders to emerge within a week. A tape from Osama Bin Laden was broadcast on 23 April, followed two days later by a message from Iraqi insurgent Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Pakistan focus Zawahiri, who wore a black turban and a white robe in the video, described the leaders of Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Iraq as traitors, and urged Muslims to "confront them". He praised Iraqi militants, saying that the US, Britain and allies had "achieved nothing but losses, disasters and misfortunes" in Iraq. "Al-Qaeda in Iraq alone has carried out 800 ma...

Does light have mass?

The short answer is "no", but it is a qualified "no" because there are odd ways of interpreting the question which could justify the answer "yes". Light is composed of photons so we could ask if the photon has mass. The answer is then definitely "no": The photon is a massless particle. According to theory it has energy and momentum but no mass and this is confirmed by experiment to within strict limits. Even before it was known that light is composed of photons it was known that light carries momentum and will exert a pressure on a surface. This is not evidence that it has mass since momentum can exist without mass. [ For details see the Physics FAQ article What is the mass of the photon? ]. Sometimes people like to say that the photon does have mass because a photon has energy E = hf where h is Planck's constant and f is the frequency of the photon. Energy, they say, is equivalent to mass according to Einstein's famous formula E = m...