Windows 7 Becomes Windows 7

Windows Vista may have been released to consumers last January, but the “Windows 7” moniker for the follow-up OS was coined long before that. Every few months since then, we’d hear more about the OS, and Microsoft is doing a great job in making sure everyone knows what’s going on with the Vista-replacement – they’ve even gone as far as to release a very in-depth development blog a few months ago.

Well, we’ve been calling it “Windows 7” for a while, so let’s stick with it, ok? Microsoft agrees, and sure enough, the next version of Windows is going to be called just that. It may seem lazy, but “Windows 7” actually has a nice ring to it, and hey, it does seem to work for Apple, right?

Wondering why Windows 7 is actually considered the seventh version? In the earliest days, the OS names were simple, with Windows 1.0 in 1985, 2.0 in 1987 and 30 in 1990. Things changed when Windows NT was released in 1993, which was essentially the fourth version. Windows 95/98/ME also shared the “4” version number, while 2000 and XP officially became the fifth. Vista of course is version six, which makes Windows 7 appropriately named.

“For me, one of the most exciting times in the release of a new product is right before we show it to the world for the first time,” Nash wrote. “In a few weeks we are going to be talking about the details of this release at the PDC and at WinHEC. We will be sharing a pre-beta ‘developer only release’ with attendees of both shows and giving them the first broad in-depth look at what we’ve been up to.”