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Paul Krill at InfoWorld:
Microsoft has re-branded its WinFX technologies as .Net Framework 3.0 to clarify the naming convention for its developer framework, company representatives said on Friday..Net Framework 3.0 is planned for inclusion in Windows Vista, due out in early 2007. The framework features the Windows Communication Foundation Web services platform; the Windows Presentation Foundation presentation layer technology; Windows Workflow, for workflow; and the newly renamed Windows CardSpace, for identity management. CardSpace had been code-named InfoCard. Current .Net Framework 2.0 technologies, such as the CLR (Common Language Runtime), also are part of .Net Framework 3.0
“The .Net Framework has always been at the core of WinFX, but the WinFX brand didn’t convey this,” said S. “Soma” Somasegar, corporate vice president of Microsoft’s Developer Division, in his blog.
The Somasegar post is here and makes it clear that it is a name change only for all the .NET Framework 2.0 pieces. There are more details by following both the links, but there’s nothing that gets techies crankier than nomenclature so I expect there will be some complaints, particularly as this is a just a mash-up under a new name of technologies that previously had a separate life of their own. In any case, as expected (per Somasegar):
The .NET Framework 3.0 will still ship with Windows Vista, and will be available down-level for Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 as planned. This change doesn’t affect in any way the ship schedules of either Windows Vista or the .NET Framework 3.0 itself.
Update 6/21: Roy Osherove provides more information and a table that’s very helpful in puzzling out the .NET Framework versioning and future plans.
At the U Connect Conference for supply-chain management, Microsoft Corp. today announced deeper investments in business process management by disclosing plans to ship Microsoft® BizTalk® Server 2006 R2. The capabilities in the new release of BizTalk Server will enable customers to extend the reach of their business processes. Scheduled to be available to customers in the first half of 2007, BizTalk Server 2006 R2 will add native support for electronic data interchange (EDI) and AS2, as well as a new set of services for developing and managing radio frequency identification (RFID) solutions. Early previews of the technology will be made available to customers and partners that can participate in the BizTalk Server 2006 R2 technology adoption program (TAP) at http://connect.microsoft.com.
BizTalk Server 2006 R2 will broaden its support for platform technologies such as the 2007 Microsoft Office system and Windows Vista™, including core WinFX® technologies such as Windows® Workflow Foundation and Windows Communication Foundation. Furthermore, BizTalk Server 2006 R2 will provide an adapter framework on top of Windows Communication Foundation to help customers build customized adapters to better support interoperability between applications. Together, these new capabilities will enable customers to increase the reach of their existing business processes to address a host of current and emerging business problems, particularly in the area of end-to-end supply chain and retail operations.
Darryl K. Taft at eWeek:
Following up on its recent release of the first preview of Sparkle, its designer tool for creating applications for Windows Vista and the Web, the company is currently at work building designers for other core infrastructure pillars of its platform.
In an interview at the VSLive conference here, S. “Soma” Somasegar, Microsoft’s corporate vice president of developer tools, said the company is following up its Expression suite of designer tools with new designer tools for both its future Web services platform—WCF (Windows Communication Foundation), also known as Indigo—and the upcoming WWF (Windows Workflow Foundation).
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“The thing people should know is these designers make their lives as developers easier. Let’s say I’m on the bleeding edge and I want to write an application today for ‘Avalon’ and Indigo and Workflow Foundation. I can do that today with Visual Studio 2005. Life may be a little bit hard because I have to write that code as opposed to the designer emitting code.”
And that’s the whole point – to make it easier to develop applications using all the slick new technology.
Yesterday’s announcement of the “Go-Live” licences for Windows Communication Foundation (WCF, formerly Indigo) and Windows Workflow Foundation (WWF) overshadowed the January Community Technical Preview (CTP) of WinFX. All the pieces of the CTP (excluding the “Go-Live” licenses) are now online for public download and nicely summarized by Ryan Storgaard here.
Worthy of special note is the optional Microsoft Visual Studio Code Name “Orcas” Community Technology Preview – Development Tools for WinFX which includes “Cider,” a visual designer for the new Windows Presentation Foundation (formerly Avalon). Orcas, of course, is the next version of Visual Studio which will only be available sometime after WinFX ships with Vista and for prior operating systems.
