Microsoft is expected to reveal its Windows 8 app store plans this week, detailing how it will challenge Apple thriving third-party download ecosystem with its new breed of notebooks, desktops and tablets. The unveil will come at an event on Tuesday, Fox News reports, and is expected to offer free and paid apps along with trial versions and in-app payment systems, just as on Microsoft Windows Phone platform.
However, legacy apps for the traditional Windows desktop will not be supported: instead, the store will offer Metro-style software. Legacy software will show up as a landing page within the store, linked to developers sites, while brick mortar sales of boxed apps as well as third-party download sites will still be supported.
The Windows 8 Store was confirmed in the pipeline several months ago, indeed the icon though not the functionality was present on the Windows 8 tablet we previewed back in September. Microsoft has refused to comment on its exact setup until this week.
Microsoft is considering dropping support for regular software on Windows 8 on ARM tablets, according to the latest leaks, leaving owners of the slates with only Metro-style apps to play with. Contrary to original suggestions from Microsoft, that developers although having to rewrite their x86 software to suit ARM chipsets would be able to release regular, desktop versions of their apps for Windows 8 tablets, that decision now looks like it will be reversed, ZDNet reports. It is suggested the turnaround could be part of Microsoft strategy to better challenge Apple iPad with consumer-centric devices.
Microsoft has said that Windows 8 ARM tablet owners would have a choice when it came to software. The new OS brings the Metro UI to PCs from Windows Phone, with a more finger-friendly, Live Tile based interface for touch use and general multitasking, and the regular desktop underneath if needed. Microsoft may limit ARM Windows 8 tablets only to that Metro UI, and apps that support it.
Microsoft Windows 8 will be out on fall 2012, but security researchers has already found a way to exploit the platform. They created a Windows 8 bootkit that can bypass the User Account Control using just 14KB of exploit code. It is said to be the first proof-of-concept to find a vulnerability in Windows 8 by a simple code that will force restarting your PC, Demo Video Below!
The exploit works on the current Windows 8 developer preview version, allowing a hacker to run command prompts under the SYSTEM account once exploited. It bypasses the User Account Control completely and does not prompt the end user. This small .exe file can exploit Windows XP, Vista, and 7 and Windows Server 2003.
Video Below!
The Windows installation process either frustrates people because they know it will take a lot of time or intimidates them with the complexity of the procedure. Microsoft are redesigning the process for their upcoming Windows 8 OS to deal with both problems.
You can still do an advanced setup, which will let give you the most control over how the OS is installed, or you can do a streamlined setup, which is started by simply running an .EXE file or via web delivery.
As far as web delivery goes, that would be the simplest method you do not need to go out and buy a box with DVDs, you just start the installation process at home and everything needed will be fetched over the Internet. That includes the license key too, so you do not have to manually type it in.
The Update install procedure for Windows 7 took you through 4 different tools to check if your computer and installed apps will continue working plus making sure your personal files make it through the install. With Windows 8, a single tool will do all the work including downloading the Windows 8 files. After the download you can just let the tool install the new OS update or create an installation DVD or thumb drive.
| You can transfer these… | When upgrading from… | ||
| Windows 7 | Windows Vista | Windows XP | |
| Applications | x | ||
| Windows settings | x | x | |
| User accounts and files | x | x | x |
In Windows 7, the files and settings to be preserved across the upgrade were calculated while the previous OS was still running. The registry values and data collected by our upgrade logic were also gathered while running on the old OS. The content of the files was then gathered offline during the Windows Pre-Installation Environment phase in order to avoid file-in-use issues.
Most of this work has been removed in Windows 8. The gather rules no longer run during upgrade. instead, we just move the following folders into Windows.old when the PC is offline:
- Windows
- Program files
- Program files (x86)
- Users
- Program data
NVIDIA president Jen-Hsun Huang has warned Microsoft not to position Windows 8 on ARM as PCs, arguing that tablets should be the company first focus. The outspoken CEO described his argument as coming from "a finesse perspective" in an interview with AllThingsD, and a hope that Microsoft puts its software emphasis on bringing full Office support to the ARM-based version of the platform. "That would be the killer app" Huang reckons.
Everything else is on the web. As we have already seen, in our preview of Windows 8 on tablets, the platform does a solid job of integrating the browser into the normal workflow, as well as allowing multiple pages to be juggled and simultaneously viewed on a touchscreen-only device.
Huang obviously has a vested interest in Windows 8 being tablet-centric from the start. NVIDIA chips are currently inside around 70-percent of the non-iPad tablet market, and he said he would definitely be open to powering future Apple iPads too.
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