WinFS in Retrospect

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NeoSmart Technologies has an article about WinFS in retrospect. WinFS has been 15 years in the making, and here's a look at what it could have been, and possible reasons why it didn't happen.

WinFS was the last piece of the jigsaw puzzle. Anyone that is familiar with the term “Cairo” should know immediately what I’m talking about. For 15 years now, Cairo was Microsoft’s vision, almost every single decision made for the desktop operating systems came from a vision of Cairo becoming a reality, and over the years, Cairo began to take shape. Everything was in place, and only WinFS was left.

At its heart was WinFS. The culmination of Bill Gate’s vision of “Information at your fingertips.” As Robert McLaws points out, it’s all about the relational file system. It means everything. If there were mythical beasts in technology, AI would be the Phoenix, and WinFS would be the Unicorn.

Source: NeoSmart Technologies

Article: WinFS in Retrospect

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