Mary Jo Foley offers up part one of the complete text of an internal Microsoft memo about Windows Live/Windows 7 integration. Unfortunately, it's horribly old--from August of last year--and may thus be completely dated from a relevance standpoint. Still, internal memos are always interesting. Here are some pertinent bits regarding Windows 7 specifically:
TO: Windows Live Experience Team; Live Platform Services Team
FROM: Chris Jones, David Treadwell, Brian Arbogast
RE: Planning Windows Live Wave 3BIG BETS
While we will target a seamless experience on Windows Vista, we will make a bet on the Windows 7 platform and experience, and create the best experience when connected with Windows 7. We will work with the Windows 7 team and be a first and best developer of solutions on the Windows 7 platform.
Our experiences will be designed so when they are connected to Windows 7 they seamlessly extend the Windows experience, and we will work to follow the Windows 7 style guidelines for applications. We will work with the Internet Explorer 8 team to make sure we deliver an experience that seamlessly extends the browser with our toolbar and other offerings.
Seamless Windows Experience
For customers who are upgrading from Windows Vista to Windows 7, we will explore ways to make it easy for them to get Windows Live – particularly for photos, calendar, and movies where our applications complete the experience.
The Windows 7 platform provides new enhancements that allow us to deliver even richer experiences for customers. We will invest in differentiated features that “light up” on Windows 7, and in this theme we will identify these “signature elements” – gestures, ribbon, or other – that make our suite best on Windows 7. We will explore innovations in graphics and presentation, including window management and high-DPI support, that make our applications feel distinct and “pop” on the new platform. What experience will we provide when we “light up” Windows with Windows Live? What is better with Windows 7? What experiences or scenarios are Win7 only? How do we take advantage of or lay the foundation to take advantage of some of the hardware innovations already available or planned for Windows 7?
It should be easy to use Windows Live Messenger and our communication services with the Outlook client. It should be easy to publish from Office applications to Live Folders. This theme will involve close collaboration with the Windows 7 and Office 14 teams. Examples of features we could build to support this theme include:
* Support Windows 7 platform enhancements so Windows Live feels like a natural extension of the Windows system, including gestures, ribbon, and other elements
* What’s our next level of investment in family safety? What is the experience of parental controls and account management (with Windows 7)?
On a related note, Foley is now promoting her new book, Microsoft 2.0, which is unfortunately exactly the opposite of what I was hoping to see: Rather than a detailed history of the last decade at Microsoft (which would be fascinating), this book presents Foley's opinions about where Microsoft will go in the next decade. Given how quickly things change--I'd harken back to Bill Gates' misguided "The Road Ahead" as a wonderful example--I'm not sure what the shelf life is for a title like this. Still, I'm intrigued. No one understands the inner workings of Microsoft like Mary Jo Foley.