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As the number of programmable device form factors proliferates, so does programming tooling and Microsoft today released the software development kit (SDK) for its entry in the small device market, the .NET Micro Framework:
Today at Embedded World 2007, Microsoft Corp. announced the availability of the software development kit (SDK) for the Microsoft® .NET Micro Framework. With its ability to work seamlessly with Visual Studio®, the .NET Micro Framework extends the power of Microsoft’s embedded offerings into the realm of smaller, less expensive and more resource-constrained devices.
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“The .NET Micro Framework was built from the ground up as a .NET solution for small embedded devices,” said Colin Miller, director of the .NET Micro Framework at Microsoft. “It brings the reliability and efficiency of the .NET environment to a new set of applications such as home automation systems, industrial sensors, retail displays and healthcare monitors. Development on this platform works seamlessly with the same tools that are used throughout the Microsoft family of platforms. This decreases the distinction between embedded application development and other application development tasks and helps reduce the cost and risks of these projects.”
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The .NET Micro Framework SDK enables developers to take full advantage of the C# development language and the rich development and debugging experience that Visual Studio provides. In addition, the SDK offers user-extensible hardware emulation and seamless, graphical debugging of emulated and real hardware to deliver robust solutions in less time than ever before.The .NET Micro Framework SDK not only works seamlessly with Visual Studio and offers an extensible emulator, but is also supported by a number of hardware platforms based on the ARM7 and ARM9 processor cores. The framework also enables device developers to connect these hardware platforms to virtually any peripheral hardware through industry-standard communication connections and custom-managed drivers.
Those interested in receiving a copy of the SDK for the .NET Micro Framework can visit http://msdn.microsoft.com/embedded/netmf.
Partner support was also announced. Conceptually, the .NET Micro Framework is for devices insufficiently powerful or expensive to warrant Windows CE and which apparently have been attracting Linux development. The licensing fee for the .NET Micro Framework is reportedly $1 to $2 per device in volume.
Windows Mobile 6.0 (codenamed Crossbow) has been available to phone manufacturers since November 2006, but will get its formal public introduction on Monday according to Ina Fried at CNET:
Microsoft plans on Monday to officially announce Windows Mobile 6, formerly code-named Crossbow, at the 3GSM trade show in Barcelona. The first devices using the software aren’t expected until spring, however, with the bulk of products using the new operating system likely to come in the second half of the year.
Among the most visible changes is the ability to type in a few letters of a song, contact or e-mail subject and have the phone automatically show only matching results. The software also supports HTML e-mail. But for Exchange messages to be viewable in that form, a company also has to have Exchange 2007, the new version of Microsoft’s e-mail server software.
Windows Mobile 6 also builds in support for Windows Live instant messaging and e-mail, which enables users to see whether a contact is online and to get their Hotmail or Windows Live Mail messages pushed down automatically.
After years of struggling to make inroads in the phone business, Microsoft is starting to find its way. Its software is now on many of Palm’s Treo devices and also on new, slim phones like Samsung’s BlackJack and T-Mobile’s Dash. The company sold 3 million licenses of Windows Mobile last quarter, up 90 percent from a year earlier.
Because it uses the same core–Windows CE 5–the new mobile operating system is expected to work with nearly all the existing Windows Mobile 5 applications.
That’s also why some have called Crossbow Windows Mobile 5 Second Edition. The next big change in Windows Mobile is coming with Photon which is about a year away.
There are more details on Crossbow in the CNET report including that support for Office 2007 file formats will not arrive until the summer. Also there has been a nomenclature change:
Pocket PC Phone Edition, for touch screens, becomes Windows Mobile Professional, while Smartphone edition, for non touch screens, becomes Windows Mobile Standard. A third version, Windows Mobile Classic, is designed for PDAs without phone capabilities, an increasingly small slice of the market.
Photon is also supposed to finally unify the Pocket PC and Smartphone editions (by whatever name) which today generally require the development of two different versions of applications.
Update: Matthew Miller at ZDNet has a nice mini review and Jay Greene at BusinessWeek.com puts it all in perspective:
For Microsoft, the mobile phone business has been marked more by defeats than victories. When it pushed into the business in 2002, handset makers and mobile phone carriers balked, worried that the software giant would try to marginalize partners, squeezing the lion’s share of profits for itself just as it has in the PC business. What’s more, its software was clunky, and a battery hog to boot, making devices running it unappealing.
The turning point came in September, 2005, when Microsoft convinced longtime rival Palm to put Windows Mobile inside its popular Treo device. Microsoft Senior Vice-President Pieter Knook calls it a “watershed moment” for Windows Mobile’s legitimacy. Over time, the company became more willing to let handset makers and carriers define the customer experience, as long as users tapped into e-mail servers running Microsoft’s Exchange software.
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Those improvements, along with the global familiarity with Microsoft’s software, helped it leapfrog BlackBerry. IDC’s estimates for 2006 worldwide market share for so-called converged devices—mobile phones that can handle e-mail and surf the Web—put Microsoft’s share at 9.8%, compared with 7.3% for BlackBerry. Still, BlackBerry held the U.S. lead through the first nine months of 2006, with a 49.4% share versus Windows Mobile’s 29% share. And worldwide, both significantly trail Nokia-backed Symbian, the mobile-operating system that’s huge in Europe and Japan.
Not every Microsoft announcement at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show made the Bill Gates keynote.
From the Microsoft Hardware group (i.e. the part of Entertainment & Devices that makes money but gets no buzz):
Microsoft Hardware’s Innovative Industry Firsts Earn Top CES Honors
This week at the 2007 International CES in Las Vegas, Microsoft Corp. will showcase its award-winning peripherals, the Wireless Entertainment Desktop 8000 and the Wireless Notebook Presenter Mouse 8000, both named CES Innovations 2007 Design and Engineering Awards Honorees on the basis of their innovative designs and advancements in peripheral engineering…
Microsoft’s Upgraded Fingerprint Reader Makes Windows Vista Features More Convenient
…Microsoft Corp. announced the availability of the Microsoft Fingerprint Reader with software updates from DigitalPersona Inc., for Windows Vista compatibility, offering users the convenience of replacing their passwords with their fingerprint…
Microsoft and Razer Launch Cutting-Edge Gaming Keyboard
HD DVD related:
Microsoft Technology Brings HD DVD to the Mainstream
Microsoft Corp. showcased the growing momentum behind HD DVD through its contribution of core technologies. Microsoft helped deliver the highest-quality video with the VC-1 codec, advanced interactivity with HDi™, and a streamlined and affordable platform for player manufacturers through the use of Microsoft Windows CE 6.0.
Microsoft Corp. and Broadcom Corp. announced a joint effort to support a hardware and software reference design for more cost-efficient HD DVD playback. The new platform uses Microsoft Windows CE 6.0 and Broadcom’s BCM7440 system-on-chip solution, allowing consumer electronics manufacturers, original design manufacturers and systems integrators to more easily and affordably deliver HD DVD playback. Several of the more innovative, high volume electronics companies that plan to use this new hardware and software platform to speed the production of HD DVD players include Lite-On IT Corp. and Zhenjiang Jiangkui Group Co. Ltd./ED Digital.
MSN Direct:
MSN Direct Goes High Def with Clear Channel
Microsoft Corp. and Clear Channel Radio today announced at the 2007 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) that they have executed a collaborative agreement to build a nationwide data delivery service using HD Radio technology, providing personalized and localized content to a variety of HD Radio receivers. This initiative will be branded MSN Direct HD, an extension of Microsoft’s existing MSN Direct service, which currently transmits a variety of information including traffic, weather, movie times, sports, and stocks to Smart Watches, weather stations, Global Positioning System navigation devices and small home appliances.
Microsoft SPOT Initiative Accelerates With Addition of MSN Direct to Navigation Devices
Microsoft Corp.’s Smart Personal Objects Technology (SPOT) Group announced the availability of MSN Direct navigation services and announced that Garmin International Inc. will be the first to offer the new MSN Direct service to Global Positioning System (GPS) devices. Customers will be able to receive dynamic local information, including weather condition and traffic updates, movies listings, and gas prices.
Microsoft SPOT also announced plans to work with future versions of Microsoft Streets & Trips and Pharos Science & Applications Inc. to offer MSN Direct Navigation Services to their devices. In addition, Microsoft SPOT is working with Centrality Communications Inc. to integrate MSN Direct with its GPS reference designs…
As promised back in September when Windows CE 6.0 was released to manufacturing (RTM), yesterday was the day for the formal launch event:
Craig Mundie, Microsoft Corp. chief research and strategy officer, announced the availability of Windows Embedded CE 6.0, the latest version of the company’s industry-leading software toolkit used to build real-time operating systems for devices such as Internet protocol (IP) set-top-boxes, Global Positioning Systems (GPS), wireless projectors, and a variety of industrial automation, consumer electronics and medical devices.
In conjunction with the 10-year anniversary of Windows Embedded, 100 percent of the Windows Embedded CE 6.0 kernel is now available through the Microsoft® Shared Source program, an overall increase of 56 percent from previous versions of Windows Embedded CE. The Shared Source program provides full source-code access for modification and redistribution by device-makers (subject to the terms of a license agreement), who are under no obligation to share their final designs with Microsoft or others. Although the Windows operating system is a general-purpose computing platform designed for creating a consistent experience, Windows Embedded CE 6.0 is a tool kit device-makers use for building customized operating system images for a variety of non-desktop devices. By providing access to certain parts of the Windows Embedded CE source code, such as the file system, device drivers and other core components, embedded developers are able to choose the code they need, compile it, and build their own, unique operating systems, quickly bringing their devices to market.
Visual Studio 2005 Professional Edition is also shipping as part of Windows Embedded CE 6.0. This marks another first for Microsoft; Platform Builder, an embedded-specific integrated development environment, will now be included as a powerful plug-in for Visual Studio 2005 Professional. This brings the entire development chain together in one, easy-to-use tool, from device to applications, shrinking time to market for device development.
Hit the link for the enhancements in CE 6.0 and as implied above, the importance of Windows CE is less for itself than as a base for device specific customizations from 3rd parties and Microsoft itself like the upcoming Windows Mobile Crossbow.
As for the complete sharing of source code with 3rd parties, that seems to have been a surprise for everyone including parts of Microsoft:
The 100% sharing campaign may actually come as a surprise to Microsoft’s own support staff, which this morning released instructions regarding how to tell whether a portion of CE 6.0 is shared or not. With today’s news, which BetaNews confirmed, there is no “not.”
However, not all of Embedded CE’s source code will be licensed for free. A significant portion of it will be free to those who have already purchased and licensed Embedded CE “in the box.” The remainder of the code will be licensed under Microsoft’s existing “Premium Shared Source Program” terms, specifically to “qualified OEMs and partners.”
As the spokesperson told us today, although the fees have not yet been disclosed, Microsoft will consider this program a legitimate source of revenue.
The fact that at least those who can afford it can see everything that Microsoft put into Windows Embedded CE 6.0, will be of interest to those who responded to the news of its impending release last May with questions about its relative interoperability, especially in the face of rising competition from Linux and embedded UNIX. Operating systems based on industry standards, some have argued, are more prone to being shared under open-source licenses, which lends greatly to their inherent interoperability.
In this space (or more correctly, collection of spaces) Microsoft has to compete with other proprietary operating systems as well as open source and in the scramble for share, Microsoft has to do what it takes to attract device vendors:
However, Hardy Poppinga, product manager for Microsoft’s mobile and embedded division in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, told ZDNet UK that the new “shared source” initiative was in itself the division’s “most significant announcement for years”.
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According to Poppinga, Microsoft is opening up the code in response to the wishes of its partners, but he conceded that a “more competitive market” had also necessitated the move.
That’s certainly a refreshing difference from other markets.
