Touchable, portable, and compatible: Microsoft has announced Windows 8. Come along to learn about some of the key changes that are coming in this next version of Microsoft’s operating system. Ben Gracewood, Intergen's Solution Architect and Windows Phone MVP will go over the key new features inside Windows 8, and how they might affect your enterprise, your developers and your users.

1. Windows 8
Ben Gracewood
19 October 2011
ben.gracewood@intergen.co.nz

2. Windows 8
Agenda
 Situation: Windows How will
Windows 8
 Windows 8 Demonstrations impact on your
life?
 Windows 8 Design
 Software Development Story
 Migrating to Windows 8
 Q&A, Playtime

3. Windows 8
Disclaimer
 Windows 8 is pre-Beta
 Everything is subject to change
 I’m paraphrasing Microsoft, not quoting them.

4. Situation

5. Windows 8
The State of Windows
 More than 1 Billion Windows Devices
 94% of new PCs sold in 2011 will use Windows
(Gartner)

6. Windows 8
Drilling in to Windows 7
 450,000,000 copies sold in less than 3 years
 More Windows 7 consumer users than XP
 1,502 non-security code changes delivered
 May 2011: Windows 7 now accounts for one third of worldwide
OS market share.
 October 2011: Windows 7 overtakes XP with 40% market share.

7. Windows 8
Windows 7 Adoption

8. Windows 8
Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

9. Windows 8
Windows 8: A Challenger Appears
 A “bold reimagining of Windows”
 Key Themes:
 New design
 Device Choice
 Developer Choice
 Compatibility
 Performance and Memory Improvements
 Let’s take a look!

10. Windows 8 Demonstration

11. Windows 8
What did we see?
 Standard Hardware
 Full compatibility
 The new Metro-style Start Screen
 Tiles
 Charms
 Pinned Apps

12. Windows 8
Devices: Compatibility
 This device is a standard Intel i5
 Windows 8 base memory footprint is around 60% of
Windows 7.
 Windows 8 runs fine (better?) on existing hardware.

13. Windows 8
Devices: ARM
 Windows 8 can and is running on ARM devices
 Form factor will be much more like an iPad
 New applications will be fully cross-compatible
 Microsoft have not announced the entire ARM
compatibility story.
 We have seen ARM versions of Office.
 I have seen ARM devices with the full desktop enabled.

14. Windows 8 Design

15. Windows 8
Metro
 Clean, Light, Open, Fast
 Celebrate Typography
 Alive in Motion
 Content, Not Chrome
 Authentically Digital

16. Windows 8
Warning: 100% Pure Speculation
 The “legacy” desktop mode does not match the Metro
start screen.
 Touch is not a first-class citizen in legacy mode.
 Therefore: the legacy desktop mode will be redesigned
prior to final release.
 BUT: It still needs to (and will) support Windows apps.

17. Windows 8 Development

18. Windows 8
Windows 8 Development: Key Themes
 Developers can:
 develop the same way they have for Windows 7
 optionally develop using new APIs
 develop using the language they prefer
(C#/XAML, C++, HTML5/JS)
 Applications built with the new APIs will be installed via an
App Store.

19. Windows 8
Windows 8 Architecture

20. Windows 8
OR:

21. Windows 8
Metro-Style Applications
 To take advantage of Metro, we need to build new applications
(more later)
 Very similar process to Windows Phone applications:
 Submitted via Microsoft
 Apps are reviewed and vetted
 Apps are searched, rated, and downloaded via the App store.
 Apps can be side-loaded and/or distrubuted by enterprises.
 Non-Metro apps can be advertised via the App Store

22. Windows 8
WinRT Development Considerations
 Applications do not run in the background
 Apps are suspended and may be terminated under low memory
 Apps can be viewed in different layouts
 Fullscreen, pinned
 Background processing tasks are available, and very similar
to Windows Phone 7
 E.g. BackgroundTransfer

23. Windows 8
Charms and Contracts
 Charms: Items in the Metro interface that interact with Apps
 Contracts: Implementation in your app to respond to charms

24. Windows 8
Example: Share Contract
 Register for sharing
 You can do this easily using visual studio templates
 Register and respond to ShareTargetActivated
 Provide sharing UI

25. Windows 8
1. Register for Sharing

26. Windows 8
2. Respond void Event
protected override
to OnSharingTargetActivated(ShareTargetActivatedEventArgs args) {
var shareTargetPage = new HelloWorld.SharingPage1();
shareTargetPage.Activate(args);
}
public void Activate(ShareTargetActivatedEventArgs args){
// does it contains an image ?
var data = args.ShareOperation.Data;
bool containsImage = false;
data.Contains(StandardDataFormats.Uri, out containsImage);
if (!containsImage) return;
//Yes: display it !
var bitmapStream = data.GetBitmap();
BitmapImage bitmapImage = new BitmapImage();
bitmapImage.SetSource(bitmapStream);
image.Source = bitmapImage;
}

27. Migrating To Windows 8

28. Windows 8
Migrating: Users and Enterprises
 Windows 7 is your path to Windows 8
 Better than 100% device compatibility
 Smooth upgrade path
 Check your EA, Confirm with Microsoft
 Talk to Intergen about Managed Services!
(Andrew.Kosmadakis@intergen.co.nz)
 System Center!

29. Windows 8
Migrating: Developers
 Do Nothing.
OR
 Think about what your app can do in Metro.
 Consider how you can extend your app behaviours to other apps
via contracts.
 Talk to Intergen about Windows 8 Development and Developer
Education.

30. Windows 8
Summing Up:
 Situation: Windows
 Windows 8 Demonstrations
 Windows 8 Design
 Software Development Story
 Migration – get off XP today!
 Q&A, Playtime

31. Questions

32. Thank You