So Aero is not dead, after all
My last post seems to have caught the attention of a few.
From what Scoble and others have said it sounds like Aero is not what we were expecting. Here's my thoughts:
- Aero is the name of the UI in Longhorn, previously presented as a UI that takes advantage of the GPU.
- Therefore Aero cannot be based on GDI, why invest a whole new windows interface on a API that will soon be obsolete?
- Aero must therefore be based on DirectX / WGF etc...
- If Aero itself isn't written as managed code, there must be at least some .NET hosting at the very least. If not then this will be seen as a lack of confidence in the .NET platform.
- If Avalon (and therefore WinFX) is just going to be 'on the same disk' as Longhorn then this still raises the question of deployment. Why not make this a mandatory install ? Who is going to write an Avalon 'smart client' if they think that it's going to come with a hefty install of the WinFX runtime.
I still remember when we were being told that all the new APIs in Longhorn were managed APIs. I wonder if this is still the case? If Aero uses WGF then what is Aero? Does it include config apps like Control Panel? I'm starting to suspect that Aero is just an interface on top of the normal Windows Manager - like Windows Media Center for the desktop.
My concern is that there is a lot of Avalon development going on out there, under the original premise that come 2006 there will be a new OS with Avalon ready installed. Since then we had the good news that this will also run on XP. But, if Avalon is only an optional component on Longhorn and a 60MB download on XP then the target user base is somewhat smaller than first promised. If there's a change in the plan then this sort of change of policy should really be made public ASAP.