Microsoft’s three major platforms are set for a revamp over the coming years with the Windows, Xbox One and Windows Phone systems to be significantly overhauled to allow more common features.
ZDNet reports that Threshold will be rolled out in spring 2015 and includes updates to the three operating system platforms [Xbox One, Windows, and Windows Phone] that will see them share more common elements than ever before.
Contacts cited by ZDNet writer Mary Jo Foley confirmed to the publication that Microsoft executive VP Terry Myerson mentioned Threshold in an internal email that talked of plans being devised by his unified OS engineering group.
Threshold is thought to refer to the “wave of operating systems” that will operate across phones, devices and video games consoles with the moniker not thought to refer to a single Windows OS.
Other sources added that the Threshold wave would support the same core set of “high value activities” across all three different OS platforms. This includes expression/documents, such as office; decision marking/task completion; IT management; and “serious fun.”
The implementation of more common standards across the three platforms will build on the common Windows NT core the three already share and the work it’s doing to create a single app store across all three as well as a developer tool kit that’s the same for the three platforms.
When asked to comment on the Threshold rumours a Microsoft spokesperson stated that the firm has no comment on “rumours and speculation”.
Microsoft is still in the midst of its search for a new CEO to replace the outgoing Steve Ballmer and is, at the same time, working towards the release of the long awaited Windows Phone 8.1 [Blue] update.
It’s widely expected it will be debuted at the Mobile World Congress [MWC] 2014 with details of a couple of smartphones that will run on the OS already being banded around.
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