Longhorn concept

Arkmage2
3 HN recommenders · recommended in 2 months, 2009–2025
YouTube
1.2M views · 20 years ago · demo · historical

A 2003 concept video for Microsoft's Longhorn, the project that became Windows Vista. It shows an ambitious vision of the desktop, with rich visuals and new ways of organizing files and information.

HN people use it as the benchmark of what Longhorn promised, and as the reason Vista disappointed when the product was not executed to match.

“I loved the concept video, the only problem was that it wasn't executed”
GUI historyUI design craft
#longhorn#windowsvista#conceptvideo#microsoft#desktopui

6 comments from Hacker News

k
@kompakt2019 · in “Unofficial Windows XP SP4”
Longhorn concept was awesome. I remember how crazy and advanced this Longhorn promo was ▶ this video >Sadly, we all know how Vista turned out at the end. Maybe with the first versions, but after a few service packs it was really usable. Hell, Windows 7 was referred to as "Windows Vista SP3" :) But I do agree that Vista wasn't as Longhorn. I think they realized it was too demanding and too advanced so they decided to milk the concept ideas for later versions.
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d
@dgellow2019 · in “Longhorn Concept (2003) [video]”
Submitted the video to Hacker News.
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x
@xiphias2016 · in “Experience Longhorn – A look at a defining Microsoft project”
I loved the concept video, the only problem was that it wasn't executed: ▶ this video
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z
@zokier2014 · in “TagSpaces – Open-source personal data manager”
I'm too young for Cairo, but I do remember Longhorn and WinFS, and indeed the marketing and ideas of those have shaped my view of what the systems could/should be today. Didn't BeOS also have some sort of object-database-filesystem-thingy? I remember some chatter about that, but didn't actually catch any first-hand experience at the time. edit: Longhorn concept video: ▶ this video
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s
@sixothree2012 · in “Am I An Outlier, Or Are Apple Products No Longer Easy To Use?”
This is why people were disappointed with Vista. ▶ this video
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r
@rbanffy2009 · in “Courier - Microsoft's Secret Tablet?”
As a nice example, compare this (▶ this video) to what shipped as Vista. And with Courier they are not even pretending it's a real shippable product.
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