I don’t read long blog posts very often but this week I read the latest post form the Windows 7 team from start to finish. I wasn’t even distracted as I usually am when reading long posts on the web. 

This post deals with the topic of UAC – if you reel at the sign of those three letters then you may enjoy the detail offered by Ben Fathi in the post. He goes in to the thinking behind UAC and the impact it has had – both positive and negative.

What I find more interesting than the content of the post is what the Windows 7 team is doing here. A few years back Wired ran a post an issue that was focused on radical transparency and though Steven Sinofsky has been taken to task by bloggers about translucency vs.. transparency I admire the level of exposure they’re giving to the insides of the Windows 7 engineering process. It hopefully helps people realise what a mammoth engineering task they have underway and many of the smart people involved get to put a face on an otherwise faceless process.

Sure, they’re not giving us transparent access to Windows 7 but they’re being pretty translucent about the process. I had a heated discussion about this with some Microsoft MVP’s last week at our Reading HQ. Though a few still maintained they absolutely must have the Windows 7 code before anyone else, most seemed to respect the change in process with Windows 7.

What does that change mean? It means the first time I get to play with Windows 7 is the same time as you. That is the first time that has happened with any software I know of in almost 11 years at Microsoft. Frankly I think that’s terrific. No more rumours, speculation and discussion of this build and that. We all get to play with the same thing at the same time.

Personally, I think this is a BIG step forward for Sinofsky and Co.