Let s look at the Xbox One console and we ll get to know a part of the future of Windows 10

Recently, Microsoft's Windows 10 version 1905 hit the servers of Microsoft. This version is only intended for Xbox One consoles, and Microsoft is already announcing the update of 1906. What happened to the uniform development of Windows on all platforms?

While Microsoft still believed in its success in the mobile phone market, Windows was being developed to offer the same set of capabilities on all types of devices. The idea was glorious: the idea was to have the same applications running on all devices. Phone, holographic goggles, game console, PC? All you need to do is adjust the interface, because the application code itself will work. It's almost the same operating system.

Windows 10 Mobile is just about to die in torment, and Microsoft's tactic of "write all programs on a unified platform Universal Windows Platform" has changed to "write everyone you want, we will try to make it work best on our platforms". And although all varieties of Windows 10 are still available, they are likely to offer similar runtime environments - including UWP or web applications - so the universality seems to go into oblivion. It is replaced by a reasonable compromise that takes into account the specialization of individual devices.

Xbox One gets Windows 10 updates that do not go to the other variations.

Well, maybe it's too much simplification - all the latest editions of the Xbox One software come from the development branch of 19H1 Windows 10, in addition from the very beginning these systems divide a huge difference in the form of a completely different shell (shell) and some small addition , which is running in parallel on the console and virtualized Xbox OS for video games. All variations of Windows 10 were, however, updated at a similar pace.

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Meanwhile, the 1904 edition of the Xbox One has just appeared, it is being distributed in 1905, and Microsoft is already testing the 1906 version, while the current version for PC and tablets is 1903. These are quite minor updates, so small that it is a shame to spend time publishing detailed change lists. However, it is clearly visible that teams developing the PC and xbox edition of Windows 10 are less and less often looking at each other. This does not mean that they do not cooperate - see the system kernel, integration with the Microsoft Store or the runtime environment for applications - but it is increasingly clear that the development of Windows is increasingly dispersed among different categories of devices. The situation is similar when it comes to Windows for Surface Hub devices or HoloLens goggles.

Universal applications, but specialized systems.

There are many indications that the aforementioned homogeneous development strategy goes into oblivion. Similarly to the quest for a common shell of all versions of Windows. Instead, Microsoft - which we know for a long time - componentizes Windows to the Linux mode and instead of creating one system for all devices and applications, rather trying to divide it into individual building blocks, which if necessary can be combined with each other.

The question remains, what does this mean for Microsoft Lite (name given by the media), so for a completely new system that is supposed to be an alternative to Windows designed for less complicated devices like Chromebooks. How many Windows bricks will go to Lite? What does this mean in terms of compatibility with applications? And does it matter, since the importance of local operating systems in the context of application and PWA containerization is going to decrease more and more?

Of course, we do not know that yet. For now, we can only slowly draw the conclusion that just like the idea "write once, run everywhere" (code once, run everywhere) has not died in Microsoft at all. But the idea of ​​striving for a homogeneous Windows 10, in the current understanding, the most.

Let's look at the Xbox One console and we'll get to know a part of the future of Windows 10