A recent visit to Microsoft by PC Week editors made it clear that the company's top priority is addressing the NC-Java problem. Of course, Microsoft officials don't express it quite that way. They use such terms as "simplifying the desktop and centralizing administration." But it's clear that the agenda is being set by Sun and friends, and to keep desktops and ubiquitous computing appliances in the Microsoft fold, Gates and company must do something.

They are doing something, and the NetPC isn't it. Because of its hardware requirements, the NetPC is not a thin client; it's merely a more centrally controllable and secure client than the classical desktop PC. It doesn't fill a niche at the low end of the PC line, which now consists of Windows CE, NetPC and, residually, Windows 3.1. While Windows CE and Windows 3.1 might fit the broad category of thin client, Windows CE doesn't yet run Java applications, and Windows 3.1 runs them way too slowly.

Something else is needed. After hastily pushing the NetPC spec out last fall, Microsoft has regrouped. At last week's Windows Hardware Engineering Conference in San Francisco, CEO Bill Gates sketched his concept of a Windows Terminal.

As Microsoft officials explained to us the week before, it's a concept loosely derivative of the Citrix WinFrame software product, which lets PCs or other computing devices act as clients to a Windows NT Server, running applications remotely--much as if they were terminals. Microsoft officials were vague as to whether the company could offer something identical to the Citrix scheme or quite different--the door seems open for Microsoft to license the Citrix technology or create its own.

Microsoft has yet to come up with a hardware reference model for the Windows Terminal. It's not clear whether the device would use a hard disk or flash ROM. And Gates said in his speech that if it had an operating system or browser, it would not be a true thin client. That would seem to rule out the ability to run a Java Virtual Machine locally, but that's not clear either at this point.

What's important, however, is that Microsoft seems to have grasped that there is a gap in its lineup of "Windows Everywhere" clients, which start at Windows CE for handheld devices and progress upward to clusters of NT servers. Microsoft must now work very quickly to catch up and bring out a product, along with the required industry partners. In order to stem NC momentum, Microsoft will have to get a working product out the door this year.

Customers that have all-Windows shops are likely to be hesitant to import such seemingly alien architectures as NCs. Many of those customers will look longingly at a hypothetical $500 device with a Windows affinity that promises far fewer support headaches than conventional Windows desktops.

Because it's likely to be a simple device, it could run at its host a componentized version of Microsoft Office that would allow the loading of components on demand. Also, it would seem to be a prime candidate for Outlook Express, the slimmed-down version of the full-fledged Outlook E-mail client that's part of Office 97.

According to Jeff Raikes, Microsoft group vice president of sales and marketing, the top concern of Microsoft's enterprise customers is total cost of ownership and its corollaries, network computers and thin clients. A Windows Terminal has all those concerns right in the cross hairs.

Would a Windows Terminal ease your TCO troubles? Let me know at stan_gibson@zd.com.

Source: PC Week