Rumors are that Microsoft might include a version of Virtual PC and a fully licensed image of a Windows XP system with Windows 7 to provide backwards compatibility.
Here’s a comment I posted on the DaniWeb IT Discussion Community about this idea:
Microsoft would do well to go one step further … and that is to ensure everyone that Windows XP will continue to be available and supported until a wide range of non-affiliated users (i.e. the blogosphere) agrees that the new operating system(s) (i.e., Windows 7, Windows 8, etc.) are better than Windows XP in terms of performance, security, features, usability, etc.
This would make it safe for everyone to either move or start exploring Windows 7.
They could even guarantee this “wide range of non-affiliated users” that they are going to do the right things with Windows 7 by including a fully functional Virtual PC image of Ubuntu … saying, in effect, we promise to do the right thing, and if we don’t we won’t blame you for switching to a better OS (obviously, I don’t expect this will happen, but it would show enormous intent to do the right thing).
You can find the DaniWeb story and read more comments at: http://tinyurl.com/d3hccz
