Windows XP Mode RTMed

Microsoft recently RTM’ed Windows XP mode – virtualization technology built into the Windows 7. Windows XP Mode provides what is called the “last mile” compatibility technology for those cases when a Windows XP productivity application isn’t compatible with Windows 7. This is important to convince those that still enjoy working on Windows XP that migration to Windows 7 doesn’t mean farewell to their possibly not compatible applications. I am really convinced that XP may play important role in securing success of Windows 7.

But this isn’t what excites me about Windows XP Mode.

Windows XP mode introduces an interesting way of UI integration with the host operating system where applications running in the virtual environment look as if they were native applications running in the host OS. At the first glance there is no difference between an application running in the host and another application running in virtualized environment. This opens lots of opportunities for everyday use of beta software which is for me as VSTS MVP especially interesting these days when different VSTS 2010 versions need to be tried out and played with.

And what really excites me is the ability to try TeamCompanion in Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010 CTP side by side!



By running Outlook 2007 and 2010 side by side I get the opportunity to test drive both TeamCompanion in Outlook 2010 and with VSTS 2010 without having to explicitly use (and look after) multiple environments. Outlook 2010 accounts are configured so that they don’t remove mails from the server, so that for the time being I can still use Outlook 2007 as official mail client.

For more info about Windows XP Mode go here.