Programming Windows: Windows DNA (Premium)

With Windows once again at the heart of Microsoft’s strategy, the software giant assembled its developer base for another massive PDC (Professional Developers Conference) in October 1998, this time in Denver. Unlike most previous PDCs, which focused on specific platform milestones, like Win32 and Windows NT in 1992 and the Internet PDC of 1996, this show lacked a singular focus. Instead, spurred to action by antitrust accusations, Microsoft sought to present a mature face to the world, one that focused more on its cozy relationships with developers and customers, and less on its ability to embrace and extend the Internet.

The timing of this PDC was strange, since there were literally no major platform milestones on the near horizon. Windows NT 5.0 had been delayed repeatedly and now wouldn’t ship until late 1999. And Windows 98, which Microsoft originally planned as the final entry in the DOS-based Windows family, would now be followed-up by two sequels in the next few years. So, with its grand unification plan pushed back beyond those releases, Microsoft’s messaging was all about momentum.

It was a comforting story: The PC industry was experiencing a period of explosive growth, driven in no small part by the “economic engine” that was Windows. In just a few short months, Windows 98, which had no truly compelling new features, managed to sell over 2.5 million units, and was selling faster than did Windows 95 during the same time frame in its release cycle three years earlier. Internet Explorer had eclipsed the usage share of Netscape Navigator for the first time, 43 percent to 40, thanks in no small part to IE 4.0, which was favorably received and considered by reviewers to be superior. Even NT was doing great, despite a slow sales start for Windows NT 4.0: NT Workstation had sold over 18 million units since its original release and was then being preinstalled on 20 percent of new business-class PCs. And NT Server was by now outselling both Netware and all versions of Unix combined.

The PC value proposition was so successful that it was outstripping the rest of the industry. “Customers have a choice of software that is independent of their choice of hardware,” Gates said of the miracle that made the PC different from previous computing platforms. The PC, he said, was the perfect combination of “high growth, high volume, and low price.” And the future was assured with pushes towards 64-bit computing, symmetrical multiprocessing, and a coming wave of new PC form factors that would include “Tablet-like devices, TV-like devices,” and “always-connected” networking capabilities.

Naturally, Microsoft was leading the way with versions of Windows that would be specially tailored for each, a realization of Bill Gates’ “information at your fingertips” dreams. The first such branch, called Windows CE (for “consumer electronics,” despite future refutations of that moniker), had shipped in 1995 on small Ha...