Microsoft’s goals for Windows 8 revealed

Windows 8 is on its way. And the first documents pertaining to its development path have already hit the Web.

Make no mistakes about it, Windows 8 is in the works at Microsoft. Proof, if proof was needed, is the leaking of a set of slides showing the company’s hopes and aims for its next big operating system. Although I have to say, despite a few key innovations, the plans for Windows 8 aren’t particularly exciting, suggesting an evolution rather than a revolution from the current Windows 7.

Windows 7 is, in effect, everything Vista was meant to be. Because Vista was meant to be the big step-up from XP. So Windows 8 is due to be the next big step-up, moving things on from Vista and Windows 7.

Work is only at an early stage at the moment, but there has already clearly been some serious road-mapping for what Microsoft wants Windows 8 to be. At least according to a set of slides first revealed on the Italian site Windowsette. Microsoft Kitchen then expanded on the slides, and took a close look at each in turn.

What immediately jumps out are the references to Apple and the way Microsoft’s most obvious rival does business. Microsoft wants its products to have the same “it just works” status and potential for brand loyalty. Following on from this is the Windows 8 prototype hardware, which looks strikingly like an angular version of an Apple Mac.

Microsoft wants Windows 8 to have multiple options for users to log in with, including facial recognition. There could even be some crossover with Kinect on the Xbox 360.

A focus for Windows 8 will be faster boot ups and shutdowns. And this could vastly improve user satisfaction alongside a proposed ‘Reset’ button that could provide an easy way to put your PC back to factory fresh while still retaining setting and software.

This would utilize the Windows Store which, as the name suggests, would be an application store built specially for Windows operating systems. This looks to be a major improvement on the Windows Marketplace Microsoft currently has in place.

If these slides are to be believed, and the development doesn’t stall too badly, then Windows 8 is set for release in 2012.

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