You know, just in case you didn't already get the point that Windows 7 is a whole lot like Vista, so you're not missing much if you wait! But don't call Windows 7 just Vista Super SP2, 'cause that make Ballmer ANGRY: “It’s not minor because it’s a lot more work than a minor release. It’s a major release.” More on this as a concession from Ballmer from Microsoft queen Mary-Jo Foley, noting that since Windows 7 really is just a year away, it's tough to genuinely sell people on Vista.

Oh, and apparently we'll get to hear a lot more about Microsoft's cloud OS in less than two weeks at the Professional Developers Conference, where we'll also be getting the first real taste of Windows 7. I wonder what it will taste like. Hopefully not ham, I don't like it very much. But peanut butter would be delicious. [ZDNet]

Says SD Times:

Midori’s design treats concurrency as a core principle, beyond what even the Microsoft Robotics Group is trying to accomplish, said Tandy Trower, general manager of the Microsoft Robotics Group.

The Midori documents foresee applications running across a multitude of topologies, ranging from client-server and multi-tier deployments to peer-to-peer at the edge, and in the cloud data center. Those topologies form a heterogeneous mesh where capabilities can exist at separate places.

In order to efficiently distribute applications across nodes, Midori will introduce a higher-level application model that abstracts the details of physical machines and processors. The model will be consistent for both the distributed and local concurrency layers, and it is internally known as Asynchronous Promise Architecture.

Sure, it's a possibility that this could just be a technology that will be integrated into a more conventional desktop-based Windows successor, or that Midori will stay in the Research wing like many Microsoft projects tend to do. But with so many industry players jumping into cloud computing (and with the Microsoft lifers involved in Midori "going back to their roots and writing code like they probably did in the old days," according to a previous rumor), the chances for something more ambitious are interesting to consider. [SD Times via The Register]

According to Microsoft 2.0:

“There’s a seemingly related (related to Singularity) project under development at Microsoft which has been hush-hush. That project, codenamed ‘Midori,’ is a new Microsoft operating-system platform that supposedly supersedes Windows. Midori is in incubation, which means it is a little closer to market than most Microsoft Research projects, but not yet close enough to be available in any kind of early preview form.

“What’s also interesting about Midori is who is running the project. One-time Gates heir-apparent Eric Rudder is heading up the effort. Midori is being incubated under Chief Research and Strategy Officer Craig Mundie’s wing. ‘Everyone under him (under Rudder on Midori) is a multi-year vet, has a super fancy title, and is going back to their roots and writing code like they probably did in the old days,’ one Microsoft tipster told me.

“When and how Microsoft will roll out Midori is still a mystery. But it sounds like the company thinks the project is serious enough to dedicate a considerable amount of time/people/resources to it.”

So it won't be in Windows 7, but from the sounds of it, Midori might be far enough along to make it to Windows 8. Will they still keep calling it Windows to hold onto the brand, or will they call it something different to illustrate how dramatically separate it is from what we're currently using? [ZDNet]