Things are definitely different from what I expected. I sort of had planned to speak about Windows Embedded CE 6.0 during the Embedded World Conference in Nuremberg this week. Unfortunately that is not going to happen. From a personal point of view I would have liked to “entertain” the crowd at this great event and have deep technical discussions around Windows Embedded CE 6.0, but something else came up. Instead of being present at Embedded World, I am thrilled to speak at a local Dutch event, organized by Koning & Hartman. The reason to be thrilled is my speaking assignment there. My presentation on Wednesday February 14^th will not be limited to Windows Embedded CE 6.0. I can share my own thoughts about Windows Vista, Visual Studio, Windows Live and Embedded Windows. Even further, the organizers of this event asked me to share my thoughts about Microsoft’s future with the audience. Talking about things that will be important in the future, areas of technology where companies might want to invest in and so on. Of course I am only a “Microsoft Watcher”. I am not sure what direction they will take. At the same time though, if I would have to make some bets, I would put them on Windows Live, still on Windows Mobile and (after reading some reports in IT magazines here in Holland maybe after SP1 is released) on Windows Vista. Right now, Windows Vista, together with Office 2007, is for sure the biggest release within Microsoft. However, it is still my personal feeling that Windows Embedded products can even have more impact, if we would not just concentrate on Mobile Devices, but approach the entire industrial market firmly as well. After all, it is still my dream to make Windows Embedded CE 6.0 the biggest operating system Microsoft has. I should not be carried away with my dreams too much, so let’s go back to this upcoming presentation this Wednesday. I can only hope many people show up. This will not be your regular marketing presentation. I plan to talk about Windows Vista, developing software on a machine that runs Windows Vista, the impact of Windows Live and what intentions Microsoft has with releasing Zune and other devices. Hopefully though, the biggest takeaway during my presentation will be around the power of Visual Studio 2005. I’ll do my best to show you how to develop Windows applications, make use of XAML with some C# code behind to get the best out of the Presentation Foundation to create a full blown Windows Vista application, develop Windows Mobile Applications and to create a Windows Embedded CE 6.0 OS design, together with a native C++ application. I am trying my very best to run all these cool things in one single demonstration, never leaving Visual Studio. The only challenge I have …. This presentation runs for 45 minutes and I have a day’s worth of material to cover. That is really the bad part, all of my applications will probably not go beyond “Hello, World” samples. As long as you realize the potential of Visual Studio 2005, that should not be a problem though, right? Some last words then for all those folks that have the opportunity to go to Embedded World 2007. Make sure to meet Mike Hall at the Microsoft booth. Ask him those hard questions around Windows Embedded operating systems. I am sure he will give you some great answers, especially if you bring him a Starbucks Grande Vanilla Latte. If you are at the Koning & Hartman event and you want me to ask me some tough questions, please do so, but bring me a Starbucks triple espresso. The latter is a much harder task, because I know for sure there is no Starbucks in Holland so far.