Microsoft to Launch Windows Mobile 6 on Monday

Thanks to an NDA breech by a French site, we can now tell you that Microsoft will launch Windows Mobile 6 on Monday at the 3GSM show in Barcelona. WM6, known to many by its "Crossbow" code name, aims to improve many of the usability aspects of the Windows Mobile platform as well as consolidate the various versions of the platform a bit more. Devices running the new platform should be available in Q2 of this year.

To start with, Microsoft has tweaked the names of the various flavors of Windows Mobile in order to better reflect the current state of the market. Windows Mobile for Pocket PC will now be called Windows Mobile Classic. Pocket PC Phone Edition will be known as Windows Mobile Professional. The Smartphone platform will become Windows Mobile Standard.

All versions of Windows Mobile will sport new versions of the Outlook and Office applications. Outlook now supports full HTML based email and all versions of Windows Mobile will have versions of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint that allow for not only the reading of documents, but the creation and editing of them as well. WM6 devices will also sport the new Windows Live for Windows Mobile application, and all WM6 devices will support Microsoft's Direct Push over the air email/PIM data synchronization system.

Some of the more memorable usability improvements include quicker access to common email options such as delete, as well the new call history function located in each contact record that enables a user to quickly see the call history for a particular person. The new Calendar ribbon UI enhancement is also a good step forward in terms of putting the right data in front of the user when they need it so that they can see their schedule and determine when they have openings for new appointments. When used with an Exchange server, the Calendar will now show which people are attending an appointment as well as allow users to forward or reply to a meeting request, something that was not possible before.

On the enterprise side of things, new features such as built-in mobile versions of the MS SQL Server and .NET framework are now included in all new Windows Mobile devices. Microsoft has also included their Information Rights Management system, which was formerly only available on PCs, in Windows Mobile 6. The new IRM system will allow administrators to restrict what can be done with specific documents, such as prohibit their printing.

One last feature that is sure to please most users is the built-in internet sharing system that will allow any WM6 device to act as a wireless modem. We expect that some devices sold by some carriers will have this feature disabled, though.

We've spent a decent amount of time with early versions of WM6 and have been quite impressed so far. A lot of much-needed refinements have been added to the system, and it shows.

 

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