If the MS crew wants to add something to the next version of Windows, couldn't they try to get it working in the current version to learn what they need to do to the current version to accept the new feature/s? Once the current version is modified the work with the new feature/s, it becomes the next version. What's your ideas? - you didn't say they had to be good ideas...
Nah, it's a good idea, but the catch is, why the lab build? Hope arseny92 would come and explain how new features are done.
since they showed that pic in spring with a watermarked screen, I don't believe it was mocked up/ photo-shopped but showing the real thing already working
I was thinking the MS people have access to all the builds, so does it really matter which one they use, within reason, to try something out. I'd guess the build and features are developed step by step, don't think you can build a feature w/o an os, and you can't build an os w/o knowing how the features are going to work with it. It is either a lot simpler, or more complicated, than this I'm sure.
If I can remember properly the next version of Windows might not be branded Windows 9 by Microsoft. I heard from a friend it is geared toward attempt to win Windows 7 users.
Lol... That is a fair description, looking at the intention behind it. Much have been said about it(Windows threshold) in some online forums that it would work differently based on hardware type. I hope it is not going to render old computer system useless.
I suspect MS wants to distance itself from 8 ASAP. 8 should have been called Love Child of ME & Vista
There are different development branches in the development of Windows. (introduced after the Longhorn development reset because the source code became a complete mess since everyone was working together on 1 build) There are the Feature Build Labs ("FBLxx" in build tags), they develop new features like the start menu and the windowed apps, separate from each other. Once they think a feature is stable enough for proper testing it gets merged into the main development branch (WINMAIN). What might have happened with the start menu demo you posted: a FBL made the start screen feature, it got merged in the 8.1 Update 2 winmain branch (9600.xxxxx)(it was probably scheduled for Update 2) but now it got pulled from winmain (maybe it wasn't ready for Update 2) and is being merged into the winmain branch for Threshold (97xx). As far as I know, that's how it worked in Windows 7 and 8, I don't know if whether has changed or not. I'm sure arseny92 could do better job of explaining how it works