Microsoft Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie touched off more than a month
of speculation, debate, hand-wringing and questioning when he took the stage at
the company’s MIX 08 conference March 5 and talked briefly about Microsoft’s
vision of a “mesh” though which all devices can be connected.
In the weeks since, company officials have fed the debate with hints here
and there about what the mesh is all about and what will be involved. However,
they’ve given very little detail, further fueling the speculation in the
blogosphere, with writers guessing what
it all means and how it will impact Microsoft’s traditional operating system-based
culture.
At
the Web 2.0 conference in San Francisco
April 23, Amit Mital, general manager of Live Mesh for Microsoft, will
unveil the first Technology Preview of Microsoft’s Live Mesh, one of several
events planned by the company to kick off its latest software-plus-services
initiative.
The limited preview will include the introduction of several applications
designed to help users, businesses and developers essentially synchronize their
multiple devices—from PCs and laptops to cell phones, game consoles and media
players—over the Internet via Microsoft’s Live Mesh, Abhay Parasnis, product
unit manager for Live Mesh, said in an interview before the conference.
“The number of [Web-enabled] devices is increasing by the day,” Parasnis
said.
Individually, each one works well, he said. However, it’s when users try to
go across devices—for example, sitting at a laptop trying to access a photo
that is on the cell phone—that is when things begin to fall apart, he
said.
Mital echoes that sentiment in a memo that he is issuing April 23.
“[A]s we discover, adopt and use more of these digital devices, it becomes
increasingly difficult to keep the people, information and applications we
depend on in sync,” Mitel writes.
“I don’t know about you, but I’ve got two work laptops, a home PC, a
SmartPhone, a Media Center,
and a growing list of new devices. Unfortunately, at least initially, every new
device I add makes my life a little harder, not easier.”
Architecture 
