PDC is around the corner and Mr. Ballmer let the cat out with an informal announcement that there will be a cloud OS, tentatively named – Windows Cloud. Live Mesh when released was trusted to be Microsoft’s backbone for something like this. The Live brand today has almost everything to offer. From a Picture Gallery, Movie Maker, Email, Online Storage & something or the small businesses to collaborate.
Mesh added a new dimension of allowing you to sync different devices and files across them, though in it’s nascent stages. I have a feeling that Live Mesh will play an important role in the so-called Windows Cloud. Here are some thing that i as a user would want the cloud OS to do for me:
- Merge the storage space of SkyDrive, Mesh & Office Live.
- SkyDrive folder should be a folder inside Mesh giving me features of SkyDrive (direct download links) and Live Mesh (syncing across devices).
- Easily move attachments from my emails on Hotmail into the Mesh folders.
- The Office Workspace should be a folder in Mesh for quick access to files.
- A Pictures folders: The current online picture management feature of Live Spaces sucks and the Media view in mesh rocks, so a pictures folder to upload images, give sharing permissions, something like the SkyDrive for images, similar to Flickr. Combining this to the Media view feature would be totally kick ass! Now, each album can be made into a folder and thereby we can have album/folder based permissions. Add the ability to create Photosynths on the fly would be simply great.
- Considering that there is now a Live Movie Maker; something to put videos online, edit them on the fly and allow people to see them. MSN Soapbox but with an overhaul that makes it a lot more usable would work wonders.
- A consistent UI throughout the individual services.
- Maybe the option to change background image like on Live.com for having my own wallpaper.
Well, that’s all i can think of for the moment.