HailStorm ramblings
There are lots of confusing messages coming from Microsoft of late, aren't there? When Hailstorm was initially announced, I was a bit dubious and later became paranoid, dubbing it JailStorm to friends (the lock in via Passport was obvious). I still think the basic direction is set, but new details pop up from time to time, like this week...
First, we have Cathleen Moore's InfoWorld piece from CTO Forum which yielded a new spin on the direction of HailStorm. And then the Hailstorm article by John Markoff.
The InfoWorld article may explain a lot about the rumored changes to the file system in future versions of Windows. If they really do see the world of HailStorm as a data centric (OpenDoc lives!) technology, with XML data at the core (as a replacement for OLE and friends, giving them more flexibility to make everything network data aware), then a unifying database like API at the file system level makes a lot of sense. The goal would likely be something akin to BeFS and the result would probably be NTFS with lots of extensions. I don't know enough about NTFS to know if this is good or bad (initial estimate, a little of each). It's an interesting view of things, even if it does seem to have lost the user view somewhere along the way. Users want files or collections of files at some point because they need to be shared. That data transition 'edge case' is going to be tricky from a user interface standpoint.
The Times article roils the waters a bit, and seems to let a lot of people off the hook but I wouldn't bet on it. Microsoft is committed to this technology. Even if their first go 'round at My Services is a dud, we all know they will not let go. While they may have jumped the gun by making it a net service before it was a ubiquitous Windows service, we can rest assured that they will continue to work on deployment within Windows, and once it is there, they'll nibble at (or gobble) important services while building a web of dependency.
The timelines may have slipped, which isn't surprising given the number of issues involved, but as far I can tell, nothing has changed about the destination.
12:37:56 AM 
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