Microsoft Corp is creating a centralized engineering division with responsibility for developing the core of the Windows operating system.
The Core Operating System Division (COSD) inside the Windows platform group will have responsibility for development, program management and testing, Microsoft said.
COSD will be headed up Microsoft senior vice president Brian Valentine and include a number of leading executives charged with heading-up development and testing activities.
Key aspects of engineering excellence customer market requirements, architecture and technology, process and tools will be unified within a single division, Microsoft said in a statement.
The company claimed COSD would help the company deliver an integrated platform, although the strategy does appear to mirror activities in the Linux community. There, the Linux kernel is developed by individuals such as Linus Torvalds and taken by vendors who build their own offerings.
Microsoft could be taking a similar approach, with key individuals really focusing on operating system features such as scalability or throughput. At the time of going to press, though, Microsoft did not specify what it defined as being the Windows’ core.
The reorganization comes as Microsoft prepares work on its next major operating system, codenamed Longhorn. The vision is that Longhorn will kick off a wave of changes around interface, data storage and web services influencing all Microsoft pre-cuts.
Company chief software architect Bill Gates has said he believes Longhorn will be as significant as Windows 95, in the ways developers build applications and users run the desktop.
This article is based on material originally produced by ComputerWire.
