Bill Gates spoke about his new Windows family and some of the development work going on at Microsoft Corp, when he announced that he would be working with ICL Plc (CI No 2,034). NT will be used initially on high-end Intel Corp workstations, RISC workstations and servers – no word of a version for ICL’s Sparc, and on symmetric multiprocessing servers, as it requires 8Mb of memory. Software developers already have access to it and some 200 new applications will be on view at the Comdex show, November 16 to 20. Hermes, the joint systems management project between Microsoft and ICL, will run under NT. Hermes will enable data to be distributed over local and wide area networks. It will also manage systems from a remote point, enabling users to access files held in any personal computer on the network as well as to locate faults within it. Windows for Workgroups is shipping in the US now, and will predominantly be sold pre-installed on network-ready personal computers. It will run on laptop and desktop personal computers and pen-driven systems, when they arrive. In addition, FoxPro and Microsoft Access will be available in the next six months. Cairo, the object-oriented and embedded operating system will not be shipping in the foreseeable future, although others estimate that it should be released by mid-1994.
