Looking for just about anything and everything related to Longhorn development, from planning all the way to Windows Vista. I need this info for a project I will be working on.
Things I'm particularly interested in:

• The planning stages
• Technologies in Longhorn (.NET, Avalon, WinFS)
• PDC events
• Longhorn's Feature Creep
• The Omega-13 reset and beyond
• Why there were so many leaks

I'd also like to get source links for anything posted here if possible. Don't think that I'm going to sit in my chair and do nothing, I'm already working on searching Google for all sorts of Longhorn info

Regarding the Longhorn development before the PDC event, I searched as much as possible for the Italian Wikipedia. I will continue the article when I have enough spare time.

Oh my god.
cassiodoroVicinetti, that's a lot of info.
(And yeah, I'm interested in all the info too)

Antitrust docs...

I have some of the PDC videos, from 2001, 2003, and 2006 i believe. 2001 has some interesting stuff because they implement a sidebar-type object into Windows XP which they said was in development, which meant they were still planning for Longhorn even at the time XP was released.

Are you still running your PDC Keynote Video Archive? I'll probably need those videos as well. Plus, according to this eWeek article, it seems like Longhorn was just starting shortly before Windows XP RTM'd: http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Windows/Pushing-Forward/

Yeah I still have that video archive! I really need to figure out a better setup and a better place to put them because my parents won't let me leave my "laptop server" on 24/7, plus it's a lot of maintenence. Maybe Andy would let me put them on the FTP server?

I also have a lot of other Longhorn Demonstrations and etc.

Could you upload that to YouTube?

Haha the videos are HOURS long and there are so many of them I can't upload them to youtube. I can give you the FTP details if you want.

want me to mirror your ftp onto my server ?

Sure if you wanna. I was hoping though Andy or MrPijey would accept some of the video materials to go on the BA FTP though.

If this helps... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Longhorn

the "Development of Windows Vista" article is missing content in my head.

How so?

EDIT: and of course I might be missing some, It's wikipedia.

This may come in handy. Grabberslasher is known for his reliability.
http://uxunleaked.blogspot.co.uk/

Recently, although I've been working quite a lot with the Windows 8 builds and my coming Windows 8 Review for BetaArchive, I'm also considering trying some of the Longhorn builds, especially the older ones.

For those of you who don't know (yet), I was actually quite interested in Longhorn back in the day. I watched as it developed, at least from 2003 (if not even 2002; not quite sure, since it has been quite a while since then), especially as I saw more and more screenshots of it. I didn't really follow its Server counterpart (later Windows Server 2008) much though, because, well, back then, I followed everything in nearly every case from the point of view of the Client counterpart, and was not really all that much interested in the Server counterparts (with a possible exception to Windows NT 3.1, Windows NT 3.5, Windows NT 3.51, and Windows NT 4.0).

I was not really all that active, though, but I did keep up on the development of Longhorn by way of reviews (both, magazine reviews in PC World and PC Magazine, and even online reviews, such as most notably those written by Paul Thurrott). I even remember, to some extent, the code reset, from seeing something written by PC World in around June 2005 (hopefully earlier, however, such as even as recently as May, but even so, it's been a few years since then).

I plan on installing and testing the Longhorn builds for myself, though, not only because they're interesting, but also to almost "relive" the days of when it was being tested.

If I find any Longhorn-related information (apart from the x64-formatted copies of some builds using the old i386 Setup routine, which is certainly true), I'll certainly post it here, but I'll have to look around to find it.

Take some time to read this: http://www.winsupersite.com/article/pro ... ghorn-2003

Also, try searches like this in Google: site:microsoft.com Longhorn filetype:ppt | filetype:doc | filetype:pdf

If you want to narrow those down to no server or Vista results, try this: site:microsoft.com Longhorn filetype:ppt | filetype:doc | filetype:pdf -server -Vista

Good places to start for a rich history of LH. =)

-Stephen

I think I remember testing Longhorn in a VM and it took i believe 30 minutes to start up. to me that's what makes Longhorn so unique, it seems that it's built off of bugs completely and it's fun to mess with it, actually scratch that, it's fun to mess with betas in general.

ReflectiaX, I can't be more grateful with you for that enormous and interesting contributions.
I just can't.
Once again, thank you a ton.

BTW, that link contains a lot of interesting info, such as deployment or even Microphone Arrays.

I wouldn't be surprised if I myself saw that particular link back in the day, but it's been so long that my memory has faded since then (about eight years or so). However, I am now not only in the process of creating a list of builds that are either available here or on The Beta Group (including possibly builds where only the screenshots are available), but I am also (in my temporary semi-retirement from working with Windows 8 until next week) downloading and testing each and every build that is available on either BetaArchive or The Beta Group.

As I go on, I'll post information regarding each and every build that I test, as long as the build itself is available here on BetaArchive, although I'm still downloading Build 3706, Build 3713, and Build 3718 respectively (remember that those earlier builds, along with Build 3683, do not stand out from their roots much, and are so close in functionality to Windows NT 5, because it literally is the same code, apart from the addition of the Avalon API, among other things, that even the Setup routine is still the same - it wasn't added until the 40xx series builds).

Working with Windows 8 nearly every day for my review got a bit overkill, so this week, I'm going to install as many Longhorn builds as possible, just to see how far I can get, then next week, I'll get "back to normal".

My Longhorn builds have many differences to my XPSP3 if I look at them using tools like dependency walker or a resource editor or REC.

Hey, I have a question here: How do you access the old Desktop Properties dialog box in Build 3706, Build 3713, and Build 3718? I believe I remember accessing it when I tested Build 3683 earlier back in early October, but I forgot where the link is located.

Anyway, that being said, if it works, I'm going to extract the files (if I have not already done so) from the Build 3706 .ISO image and access it within VirtualBox (most likely by having it recognize some of my host system's devices). The reason why I'm doing it this way is that I had to install Build 3713 first, due to having trouble mounting the .ISO, yet since it seems to be readable from within WinRAR, I'm going to extract its contents (if I haven't already done so), then reinstall to Build 3706 by running the Setup files from the current Longhorn installation from within VirtualBox itself.

Once I'm done testing Build 3706, Build 3713, and Build 3718, then I'll give my word about those earlier Longhorn builds here.

I will look forward to that. The 37xx builds of Longhorn were my favorite along with 4074 and 5058. But now we are going offtopic.

It is classic again since 3706. And if you want it back in 3683 too, just copy desk.cpl over from 3706 to 3683.

Well, that would certainly explain why I couldn't find it (if they removed it, that is, as you said). I must say, though, that these early Longhorn builds are in many ways nothing special really. I'm not saying that they're not interesting, they certainly are, but at this point, Longhorn was still extremely early - these builds were basically just an update of the Windows NT 5 (Windows 2000/XP/Server 2003) code pasted together with the updated .NET Avalon APIs (application programming interface), the Plex theme, and the sidebar.

However, since I'm still trying to see how far I can get, I'm still testing even the remaining early 3xxx series builds (I finally was able to install Build 3706 within VirtualBox, by copying the Setup files to the virtual hard drive and running Setup from there).