Windows Weekly 521: CShell by the Seashore!

Comin up on Windows Weekly, Mary Jo

explains CShell to those of us, me

included, who don't know what it is, yet.

Plus Apple is trying to become more like Microsoft

while Microsoft is trying to become more like

Apple. We talk about squiggles and stickers

in Skype and a whole lot more Windows news.

Stay tuned.

Netcasts you love, from people you trust.

This is TWiT. Bandwidth for Windows Weekly

is provided by CacheFly. At C-A-C-H-E-F-L-Y.com.

[music]

This is Windows Weekly, episode 521, recorded

Wednesday June 7, 2017.

CShell by the Seashore

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Welcome to Windows Weekly, this is the show

where we talk all things Windows.

Leo Laport is on vacation this week, so you've

got me. But of course you've got your regulars

Mary Jo Foley and Paul Thorot. Thank you

so much for coming and sharing your

Windows wisdom, Mary Jo and Paul.

--Wow. Wit and wisdom.
--Windows, wisdom! That's W,w,w,w.

Yes, wit and wisdom and Mary Jo, you just

got back from Japan
-- I did.

-- you posted some lovely pictures, how was

it?

It was really good. I had a great time.

I barely worked which was unusual

for me on a vacation.So that was good.

--What devices did you bring?

I brought the HP laptop that I've been

using. And my Android phone, my Nexus 6P

and that's it. No other devices.

And those both worked ok?

-- Yep.

Awesome.

-- Yeah I was using - Paul had talked up

GoogleFi which is a network service

you can use overseas and not pay exorbitant

charges for, and so I used that with

Google Translate and it was really great.

Both made the trip way easier.

And Paul held down the fort for you.
-- He did.

--Yep.
Did you have a lot of jealousy at all

of the Instagram pictures, Paul?

Well, yeah, I actually - I think I said this

to Mary Jo last week but you know the big

difference for me, because she went to

Japan before and she's been to what, like

Thailand or Vietnam, sorry
--Cambodia.

Yeah. You know because she can get online

now she can post photos, so when she

goes to these awesome places that I want

to see it's like, well "take some pictures"

And it's just great that she was able to

post them. So I had to live vicariously

but...
--They were perfect.

And there wasn't the kind of annoying

#LoveMyLife, hashtag [laughs]

--Yeah not like she totally does.

-- Yeah I do that a lot, super annoying

Alright, we should get into the Windows

news. Let's start with Windows 10 and
CShell, Mary Jo, you wanted to talk about

CShell and I'm sure everyone watching this except me

knows what CShell is so in case there's other people

who don't know what CShell is, maybe you can

tell us first what it is.

--Well I'm not sure everybody does know

because it's kind of a new concept

There's been a lot of back and forth
about it on the Web

over the past few months, I guess.

I think it was Windows Central who wrote
the first story about it

but CShell stands for Composable Shell.

At first some of us thought that it was
Cloud Shell, but no.

It's Composable Shell and it's basically

an evolution of the Windows shell.

So, the Windows Shell as probably
everybody listening

to this podcast knows is the part of Windows

that handles a lot of the systems
management parts of the

operating system, so things like
the Start, Activity Center, Settings

so that's what Shell is. So composable
shell is this new version of

the shell that Microsoft's been building
that is going to make it easier

for them to have a consistent shell across
all the different flavors of Windows 10.

You know, we know that Windows 10
has the common core right now

across all the different versions, like
the Xbox version, the HoloLens version

Windows Phone version but what it
doesn't have is the common shell

across all of those. And this is what

this CShell effort is all about

The reason it's interesting - there's a

couple reasons it's interesting.

One is Continuum as Microsoft's described

it with Windows Phone doesn't really work

that well right now. But based on some

of the recent leaks from Leaked Builds,

it looks like Continuum is going to get

a lot better because of CShell

CShell's gonna let you have more consistent

things like context menus across all the

difference versions of Windows now

which I guess you don't have right now

if you have Windows phone.

Fast App Switching, so a lot of
the things that Windows Phone

has been missing, are going to be
coming to it thanks to CShell.

And if you've been following along
with all the rumors about what

Surface Phone, or whatever the
next Microsoft mobile platform

is going to be - CShell is one of the
pieces of this that's going to make

it possible. So we don't really know what
the operating system flavor is going to

be in whatever's next for Microsoft.
My speculation is Windows 10 on

arm, with CShell on top of it,

but whatever it is, CShell is going to

make--kind of give Microsoft a way to

try to come back in some form

in the mobile space.

So, that's why you should care about

CShell and know what CShell is.

[Paul laughs] Microsoft sells CShell down

by the sea shore, that kind of thing.

I was going to try to say that, but I knew

it wasn't really going to work out.

And I can't even speak normal sentences.

This kind of reminds me of two things.

You know, there's the componentization

work that Microsoft did in Windows back

in the Longhorn days, and then has

improved over subsequent versions of

Windows, and then there's also

this notion of the fluent design system,

this new user experience they're

working on for Windows currently,

that has been inspired by 3-D or mixed

reality experiences. Where instead of

simple mouse-over effects, you get light

bleeding through. It's kind of inspired

by real-world objects, I guess is

the way to put it.

And it seems like this is

like that--like both of those things--

but for the Shell. You know, that this

is a way to componentize Windows

in a new way that will help it on

different device types,

different form factors, and hopefully

even on PCs it will result in

a more modern look and feel as well.

I mean, this is the one part of Windows

kind of like the Mac where it really

hasn't changed much in...I mean, forever.

Twenty years? Twenty-five years?

[Mary Jo, off-screen]: Right. Yeah.

It's been a long time.

And so I always joke--fluent,

so this Fluent design language,

I seem to be inept at actually

understanding it.

[Paul laughs}

And seeing it, like when people put up

a picture, they'll be like,

"Look at Fluent, doesn't that look great?"

And I'm like, "Does it look different?

I don't know."

I'm just not a design person.

[Paul, off-screen]: It's certainly subtle.

Subtle changes, yeah.

So as long as you brought up

Surface Mobile, is it time to talk about

the rumors of a Surface phone,

but "Surface Mobile" is what it might

be called?

Mary Jo: Yeah. Here we go again.

Another rumor. This is another rumor

That came up this week thanks to our buddy

the Watching Cat, also known as

H0X0D on Twitter.

He found a Chinese website

that had supposedly captured something

that Microsoft in China displayed

very briefly that said,

"This is Microsoft Surface Mobile."

Which is a horrible name, by the way.

And hopefully just not real at all.

[Laughs] But he and some others

who were translating the text

of one of the leakers who found this

and it mentioned Continuum,

it mentioned Snap Dragon as being

the processor.

It mentioned two things

that look like new code names:

Surface Payking and Surface Lavonia,

and it also mentioned something called

Onto Table. Which people are interpreting

to be projecting from a phone

onto a table

instead of onto a large screen monitor

or a TV.

[Paul, off-screen]: Right.

So the question is, is any of this real,

and even the most enthusiastic sites

are kind of doubting it.

They're saying, "Eh, I don't know

if this is real, it looks kind of fake.

Looks made-up. Looks Photoshopped."

There isn't a picture of the device,

but even the wording and the logo

don't really match up correctly, so

they're like, "Is it real? I don't know."

I've been trying to track down is it real,

is any part of this real, and my answer is

so far I can't find anybody who knows

or who thinks it is real.

[Paul, off-screen]: This seems to have

come right out of the conversation

that you and I had. [Laughs]

You know, some months ago on the podcast,

and it was you who said,

"You know, we keep thinking of this thing

as Surface phone, but you felt that,

and I don't remember if this is an opinion

or based on some information you had

from sources, but this thing would be

a different kind of mobile device,

and yet I think you literally coined

the term "Surface Mobile" as maybe

a more accurate way to describe it.

Mary Jo [off-screen]: Hey, don't blame me!

[Mary-Jo laughs]

So Mary-Jo's e-mail address is, uh,

M-J-M at...

[Mary-Jo laughs] Oh, man.

You know, I think whatever Microsoft

does do in mobile next is going to be

probably a device that can be more

than one thing, like we keep hearing

maybe it's a phone--well, maybe it's

a tablet, right, that has

telephony capabilities,

but what's interesting about this rumor

from this week is it never mentions

telephony at all, and it makes it look

more like it's a phone that can transform

into a tablet, and then use Continuum

to transform into

another kind of experience.

So, I don't know. When I saw the rumor,

the first thing I did was go back and look

at one of those envisioning videos

that Microsoft used to do.

I think the last one they did was 2015,

when they showed a glimpse of the future,

and there are a whole bunch

of pictures in there of people

holding something that looks like a phone

and kind of making a gesture

like they're sending it to something

and then it shows up on the wall,

or it shows up on a mirror.

Paul [off-screen]: Yes. Is this the one

where it looks like a really flat thing,

where the phone is almost just the screen?

Yeah.

So I don't know if the rumor

is kind of reflecting an evolved version

of that idea.

Paul [off-screen]: By the way,

that's a very visual version

of this notion of ambient computing.

If you think about a home as a Google home

in each room, or something, you could

walk around the house and talk to it,

you could extend that out into the world,

but of course you often need something

to look at, a screen of some kind.