Cairo (operating system)
Encyclopedia
Cairo was the code name for a project at Microsoft
from 1991 to 1996. Its charter was to build technologies for a next generation operating system
that would fulfill Bill Gates
' vision of "information at your fingertips." Cairo never shipped, although portions of its technologies have since appeared in other products.
Professional Developers Conference
by Jim Allchin. It was demonstrated publicly (including a demo system for all attendees to use) at the 1993 Cairo/Win95 PDC. Microsoft changed stance on Cairo several times, sometimes calling it a product, other times referring to it as a collection of technologies. Bill Gates even attempted on one occasion to describe it as a collection of abstract design goals, strictly denying it had ever been a real operating system project.
At its peak, Cairo was one of the largest groups at Microsoft
and employed a majority of the company's senior engineering and design talent.
concepts to make information available quickly and seamlessly across a worldwide network of computers.
The Windows 95
user interface was based on the initial design work that was done on the Cairo user interface. DCE/RPC
shipped in Windows NT 3.1. Content Indexing is now a part of Internet Information Server and Windows Desktop Search.
The remaining component is the object file system
. It was once planned to be implemented in the form of WinFS
as part of Windows Vista
but development was cancelled in June 2006, with some of its technologies merged into other Microsoft products such as Microsoft SQL Server 2008
, also known under the codename "Katmai". It was subsequently confirmed in an interview with Bill Gates
that Microsoft plans to migrate applications like Windows Media Player
, Windows Photo Gallery
, Microsoft Office Outlook etc. to use WinFS as the data storage back-end.
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
from 1991 to 1996. Its charter was to build technologies for a next generation operating system
Operating system
An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...
that would fulfill Bill Gates
Bill Gates
William Henry "Bill" Gates III is an American business magnate, investor, philanthropist, and author. Gates is the former CEO and current chairman of Microsoft, the software company he founded with Paul Allen...
' vision of "information at your fingertips." Cairo never shipped, although portions of its technologies have since appeared in other products.
Overview
Cairo was announced at the 1991 MicrosoftMicrosoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
Professional Developers Conference
Professional Developers Conference
Microsoft's Professional Developers Conference is a conference for software developers, normally Windows developers.It covers new and upcoming technology from Microsoft, and so only occurs in the years when there is something new to talk about...
by Jim Allchin. It was demonstrated publicly (including a demo system for all attendees to use) at the 1993 Cairo/Win95 PDC. Microsoft changed stance on Cairo several times, sometimes calling it a product, other times referring to it as a collection of technologies. Bill Gates even attempted on one occasion to describe it as a collection of abstract design goals, strictly denying it had ever been a real operating system project.
At its peak, Cairo was one of the largest groups at Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
and employed a majority of the company's senior engineering and design talent.
Features
Cairo used distributed computingDistributed computing
Distributed computing is a field of computer science that studies distributed systems. A distributed system consists of multiple autonomous computers that communicate through a computer network. The computers interact with each other in order to achieve a common goal...
concepts to make information available quickly and seamlessly across a worldwide network of computers.
The Windows 95
Windows 95
Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented graphical user interface-based operating system. It was released on August 24, 1995 by Microsoft, and was a significant progression from the company's previous Windows products...
user interface was based on the initial design work that was done on the Cairo user interface. DCE/RPC
DCE/RPC
DCE/RPC, short for "Distributed Computing Environment / Remote Procedure Calls", is the remote procedure call system developed for the Distributed Computing Environment...
shipped in Windows NT 3.1. Content Indexing is now a part of Internet Information Server and Windows Desktop Search.
The remaining component is the object file system
Object-based file system
In computing, the term object-based file system refers to an architectural blueprint for distributed file systems. An object-based file system splits file metadata from file data and stores them on different servers...
. It was once planned to be implemented in the form of WinFS
WinFS
WinFS is the code name for a cancelled data storage and management system project based on relational databases, developed by Microsoft and first demonstrated in 2003 as an advanced storage subsystem for the Microsoft Windows operating system, designed for persistence and management of...
as part of Windows Vista
Windows Vista
Windows Vista is an operating system released in several variations developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, tablet PCs, and media center PCs...
but development was cancelled in June 2006, with some of its technologies merged into other Microsoft products such as Microsoft SQL Server 2008
Microsoft SQL Server
Microsoft SQL Server is a relational database server, developed by Microsoft: It is a software product whose primary function is to store and retrieve data as requested by other software applications, be it those on the same computer or those running on another computer across a network...
, also known under the codename "Katmai". It was subsequently confirmed in an interview with Bill Gates
Bill Gates
William Henry "Bill" Gates III is an American business magnate, investor, philanthropist, and author. Gates is the former CEO and current chairman of Microsoft, the software company he founded with Paul Allen...
that Microsoft plans to migrate applications like Windows Media Player
Windows Media Player
Windows Media Player is a media player and media library application developed by Microsoft that is used for playing audio, video and viewing images on personal computers running the Microsoft Windows operating system, as well as on Pocket PC and Windows Mobile-based devices...
, Windows Photo Gallery
Windows Photo Gallery
Windows Photo Gallery is a photo management, tagging, and editing tool developed by Microsoft, and is included with all editions of Windows Vista...
, Microsoft Office Outlook etc. to use WinFS as the data storage back-end.