Cloudy Days Ahead

Midori, Midori, Midori what the hell is Midori?

Let's get the basics down first:
1. Smoothly scalable, concurrent use of any "available" processing hardware.
2. Near-instantaneous data synchronization platform.
3. Built-in application virtualization, by fully abstracting hardware resources.
4. Seamless storage pooling between "the cloud", on-premise servers, desktop & mobile clients.
5. Cross-site & cross-device identity & authentication services.

You can see how far-reaching these core tenets are. So, you'll understand why Midori is still in its "infant" phase. However, the low-level stuff is slowly being pushed out through major Microsoft platforms silently. That way, Microsoft will really be able to "flip the switch on" one day, and boom! Skynet! :-)

The full scope of the project is known to very, very few people within Microsoft. Other teams at the company may today be building components of it into their products without even knowing or grasping the role these components may one day play. And no, Microsoft will not talk about it until things are fully in place, which may not happen for at least another five years. This project is meant to be a long-term platform building investment, and the company will not play the marketing game with its competitors where this thing is concerned.

So, while we may not find out anything substantial about Midori for another few years, we can still attempt to see the components that are being pushed out today.

One of these is called the Microsoft Sync Framework. It now powers Windows Sync in Windows 7. It is integrated into Sharepoint 2010. It has influenced enhancements to ActiveSync in Exchange 2010, but Exchange will not incorporate it fully until the next version. It will form the data-sync pillar of Midori.

A second pillar is a little bit behind in terms of capability and reach. Expect that to change after PDC this year. I'm talking about Identity Services. This is much more far reaching than Windows Live ID especially in terms of programmability. It is not a single "product" per se, but encompasses a variety of techniques such as tokens, password auth, SIDs etc.

The third pillar for storage pooling & processing concurrency is currently surfaced in Windows Azure, specifically through the fabric controller. Midori in its full form will be able to access storage & processors on any device that has a minimum set of .NET framework components available. Expect these components to be pushed through with .NET 4 on the Windows PC, in more limited fashion with Silverlight 4 on other operating systems and to devices based on Windows Embedded CE 6.0 R3, such as Windows Mobile 7 powered devices, the next and final generation of Zune hardware, and the next iterations of Xbox and Microsoft Auto.

The fourth pillar of app virtualization and seamless transition from web-app to RIA to desktop app can be seen in the Live Operating Environment. This will make its way (with limited capabilities) through to consumers via the next release of Windows Live Essentials. App-V & XP-Mode in Windows 7 & Server 2008 R2 gives us a glimpse into the ongoing virtualization work. This will play a bigger role in Windows 8 & 9 as the primary way to support legacy apps and keep backward compatibility. Eventually, all non-Midori applications will be run in a seamless way in virtualized spaces.

I will leave you with two more things. These are a bit fuzzier right now, but hopefully their role will become clearer in future.

The first is the PlayReady DRM system. Currently built into Silverlight, Zune and Media Center, this system is very quietly being integrated into consumer electronic devices. Right now, that means some IPTV systems that use MediaRoom, some Nokia S60 devices, some Blackberry devices, some Blu-ray players and so on. It will probably be never allowed into the Apple or Google ecosystems however. This seems to be its biggest pitfall. PlayReady enables managed copies and media-state synchronization, but how it will succeed without iTunes support is beyond me.

The second is "Who will pay for Midori and how will they do it?" My guess is Midori is meant to allow Microsoft to finally turn its desktop OS and applications into subscription services. Everyone knows that the holy grail of income in the industry is subscriptions. They ensure a steady, guaranteed flow of income unlike one-time sales. Whether customers will like the idea is an open question. And it also remains to be seen how hardware partners will react when Midori intends to make their products even less important in the customers' minds.

A final note, Jonathan Shapiro recently joined the Midori project. Wonder who'll join next?

I'm out.

I wrote this in a hurry to push it out ahead of PDC, so I may not have linked to all the right places. Please comment/tweet to let me know where I should link to your respective stuff.

HP Touchsmart tx2 Troubles

So, the Midori/LOE/MSF post is still being cooked, in the meanwhile, please bear with me as I post this stuff below for record-keeping and to make it accessible to folks with "tx2"s everywhere.

First the issues:


Touchsmart/Mediasmart 2.0 worked when installed in Vista compatibility mode in Windows 7. Touchsmart 3.0 is simply not working. This problem is fairly widespread among customers. Only DVD 3.0 works. Essentially, anyone who bought a tx2-13xx series after Windows 7 launch has preloaded working Touchsmart 3.0 and tx2-10xx series bought during upgrade option period prior to launch have the new software not working in Windows 7. The software installs silently, but no shortcuts are added to the start menu, and any attempt at launching the apps/suite from \Program Files\ folders results in the .exe running for 2-3 seconds and dieing automatically showing no UI. This can be seen in Task Manager. HP support claims that the "customized Win 7 upgrade discs by HP include essential files that are currently unavailable in the broken web-release, but that this is being worked on and should be updated soon".

HP Support also said that "[they] have an refresher training going on for all the departments related to TouchSmart" and that tx2 has finally been elevated to the same level of attention as Touchsmart desktops at HP. So, from now on tx2 customers should be automatically directed to Premier support as HP has been claiming since a year but was not doing yet.

Support also said, "You could try recalibrating the touch feature since from the update what we have received is that for Windows 7, 4 point touch is enabled" when I said we only have 2 points with the RTM drivers down from 4 points with the 2.59 RC drivers. Support said this will be reported to engineering, but gave no info on WinTab support. Interestingly, I was told "We do not have an update as of now that TouchPack is going to be an OEM [release]" when I asked for info on the Touch Pack (since Microsoft Surface Rebound game requires 4 points of touch.) It seems Microsoft decided very late that Touch Pack would be an OEM supported & distributed release and not direct download. So, HP is having a hard time working on TouchSmart and Touch Pack at the same time and obviously, TouchSmart takes priority.

So about the fan noise. the F21 BIOS update reduced it, but it still is too active. I found out that Microsoft has made a hotfix available that is slated for inclusion in Windows 7 SP1 and Vista SP3. It allows AMD processors to be put in enchanced sleep C1E state instead of just C0 sleep state. This increases power savings when idle by at least 10% and reduces heat when idle as well. The KB is 974090 but for some reason it does not currently install in Windows 7 while it does install in Server 2008 R2 and Vista SP2. Support acknowledged the existence of this update and said, "You could try it after installing all the available OS updates as even we have the same document provided by Microsoft for heating issues with AMD PCs". This may therefore make it to version 3.0 of "Essential System Updates for Windows 7" by HP, but there is no word on inclusion in BIOS or possibility of any BIOS updates.

OK, now for my suggestions:

You guys should market the tx2 heavily to university students *after fixing the problems*. Everyone who has seen me use my tx2 for notes etc. asks for a detailed demo and wants to get one. I got a stacked coupon so i could buy it for $800, which people think is a good price, but otherwise it costs $1000+ for the same specs I have. So, maybe pricing it specially for students and marketing it directly (in the field) to them would help. The one other suggestion i got from people is that you should include a s-video or hdmi port. And perhaps make an Intel-powered version w. Intel graphics and thinner/lesser weight available. Say leave out optical drive etc. but keep screen size at 11 or 12 inches and make the screen level with the bezel. People who want to use tablets do not much care for good graphics like HD3200. Most people use consoles for gaming these days. So, unless ATI/nVidia creates a low heat, low power integrated graphics solution, Intel will do. Intel processors are also much more power-efficient right now.

And HP folks, please read touchsmartdevzone and support forums more often and post responses.

Support acknowledged everything I said at this point and suggested that I should consider posting this to the forums and said that they will read stuff moving forward.

Thanks, nice person at support who actually listened, said the facts without embellishment and turned around actual results. Let this be an example to all of HP support staff and the company as a whole. FYI, also copying this same thing to my blog for safe-keeping (read eternal storage in the Bing cache :-)

"Connectify" your Windows 7 PC for free

Update: Check out Virtual Router at Codeplex for a free and simple solution.

So, I like where these guys are going, and the fact that they seem to have made the process dead simple, but being the true tinkerer/lifehacker that I am, I decided to investigate a little and found out how to do it myself. If you don't want to go through all this trouble, just pay them whatever they will charge and buy their stuff.

What am I talking about, you say? Why, Connectify of course. It is an application that allows Windows 7 PCs  to behave like wireless hot-spots [via Engadget]. The app leverages the built-in Virtual WiFi technology in Windows 7 that enables a single hardware wireless card to behave like two virtual wireless cards. However, the front-end for enabling this technology is command-line and tinkering based, and requires the driver for your wireless card to allow it. That means any PC sold with Windows 7 and most "upgrade-option" PCs. So, here is how you can do it yourself. I'll have a small script/program available soon, unless someone decides to code it themselves. Please share if you do.

1. Open Network & Sharing Center in the Control Panel.
2. Click Change Adapter Settings. See if you have a "Wireless Connection 2" listed. If not, then don't bother reading further until you get the latest driver.
3. Right-click "Wireless Connection" and click Properties. Click the Sharing tab and check the "Allow others to share Internet connection" option. Click OK.
4. Type "cmd" in the Start menu, right click and click "Run as administrator"
5. Type "netsh wlan start hostednetwork"
6. You should now see a new network pop up in Connect To and other places.
7. However, this may be named randomly, so you can use "netsh wlan set
" with various parameters to encrypt that network, change the SSID, set a passphrase etc."
8. Type "netsh wlan stop hostednetwork" to turn it off again. The config info is persistent.

You can see how this can easily be done as a Powershell or VB script etc. Best part is, the netsh subshell allows you to export configuration data as XML files, so even a web interface is a possibility.

Enjoy.