Microsoft's SkyDrive cloud storage service is set to receive some substantial upgrades this year, according to news from both official and unofficial channels. File synchronization, secure remote access, and Windows 8 integration have been demonstrated by Microsoft, and rumored improvements include paid storage upgrades, secure storage of BitLocker keys, a new Mac client, and support for OpenDocument (ODF) files.

Pictures leaked by Brazilian site Gemind showed off the paid storage options, allowing an extra 20, 50, or 100 GB to be added to SkyDrive's base 25GB, for $10, $25, or $50 per year. The same pictures also encourage users to download a SkyDrive client for Windows or Mac OS X.

Though Microsoft may yet have some trick up its sleeve, there's a growing body of evidence from leaked screenshots that Windows 8's taskbar will omit one mainstay of the Windows user interface: the Start button. To get to the Start menu's replacement (the "Start screen") from the desktop, you can press the Windows key on your keyboard, hit the hardware Windows key if your tablet has one, swipe your touch-screen from the side, or, if you have a mouse, move it to the bottom-left corner. What you won't be able to do is actually click or tap a Start button.

The rumor may or may not turn out to be true, but if it is, we shouldn't be surprised. That's because you've entered the Metro zone, where the rules of human interaction have changed—and it's a change that will be felt not just by tablet users, but by traditional desktop denizens, too. Microsoft will need to tread carefully.

The multicolored Windows flag is no more. Windows 8 will do away with the wavy Windows logo that Microsoft has used in one form or another for the last 20 years, and replace it with a logo that's, well, a window.

Windows 8 ushers in a new, and completely different, Windows look and feel: it brings the Metro design concept to the desktop. With Metro's emphasis on clean lines and typography, Microsoft wanted a logo that reflected these ideals, and so commissioned agency Pentagram to create the new logo.

Cisco has appealed to the European Union's General Court, asking for the European Commission's approval of Microsoft's takeover of Skype to be made conditional. The network infrastructure company wants the EC to ensure "standards-based interoperability in the video calling space."

Regulatory bodies gave Microsoft's takeover of Skype the go-ahead last year, with the deal finalized in October. Cisco says that it does not want to block the merger entirely, just restrict it and require Microsoft to make Skype play nicely with other voice and video calling systems.

Yesterday, Steven Sinofsky, president of Windows and Windows Live Division, described the restrictions that Windows on ARM ("WOA") would impose on its desktop. The built-in Windows apps—including Explorer and Internet Explorer 10—and four Office apps—Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote—would run on the desktop, but nothing else would. Third-party applications would be prohibited, and there would be no provision to port existing desktop applications to run on the ARM desktop.

This led to an immediate, if somewhat surprising, reaction across the Internet. "But what about browser plugins? Will they also be forbidden?"

The answer to that is "Yes." Or perhaps even "Yes, of course they are, since it was stated in unequivocal terms that there would be no provision to run third-party code on the desktop. That means you, Flash."

And if there were any lingering doubts, Sinofsky told AllThingsD that indeed, the ARM desktop browser would have no plugins.

Plugin users will therefore have few options when Windows 8 ships. The Metro-style browser won't support plugins on any processor architecture. x86 and x64 Windows will allow sites to tell you to use the desktop browser, and if plugins are what you want, that's what you'll have to use.

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Ending months of speculation on the matter, Microsoft has revealed that Windows 8 will indeed contain a desktop—and that desktop versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote will all be pre-installed.

Microsoft insists that the desktop holds real value, and that it makes Windows less valuable to users if it was missing (a view we're sympathetic to). To that end, Windows 8 on ARM ("WOA") will have a desktop, with a taskbar, that includes Explorer, most of the current desktop utilities that ship with Windows (though not all, and Microsoft hasn't said what won't be included), and supports applications. All WOA machines will support USB and Bluetooth mice and keyboards, so users who want to will be able to use the desktop in a traditional way.

Microsoft has started to talk in detail about Windows on ARM: what it will do, what it won't do, and how it has been put together in its latest post on its Building Windows 8 blog. The focus of the lengthy post is the work Microsoft has done to bring Windows to ARM: building a common ARM platform that works the same way, whether using a processor from NVIDIA, Texas Instruments, or Qualcomm. This was a substantial undertaking: unlike desktop PCs, ARM systems are all wildly different.

Windows on ARM, or "WOA" as Microsoft is calling it, is substantially identical to Windows on x86/x64. The difference between ARM systems and x86 systems is more than just the instruction set of the processor. x86/x64 systems are almost all built in the same way. The system uses BIOS or UEFI to initialize hardware and hand over control to the operating system, they use ACPI for enumerating hardware and power management, major system devices like the video card and storage controllers are connected to PCI or PCIe with other peripherals attached to USB, and storage is either SATA or SCSI.

Microsoft today issued a brief statement promising to make "essential patents" available to competitors at fair and reasonable licensing rates, and promised not to sue companies making products that infringe these patents. The actual patents themselves weren't disclosed, but Microsoft joins both Google and Apple in making recent statements on so-called fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory (FRAND) licensing terms. Such licensing terms designate certain patents as essential to complying with industry standards, making them available for licensing at (supposedly) lower-than-usual rates.

Google, or at least someone close to the company, said earlier this week that it will continue offering Motorola Mobility patents under fair terms after completing its acquisition of the company. (Coincidentally, Microsoft sued Motorola in November 2010 for refusing to offer patent licenses under fair terms.) Apple, meanwhile, went directly to the European standards body behind 3G wireless networking, suggesting that standard licensing rates be set for the patents necessary to build mobile devices. Apple has apparently refused to pay the royalty fees demanded by Motorola and Samsung, saying they are excessive for patents covered by FRAND obligations.

Microsoft's statement today was titled "Microsoft's support for industry standards," and says the following: 

1. Microsoft will always adhere to the promises it has made to standards organizations to make its standard essential patents available on fair, reasonable, and nondiscriminatory terms.
2. This means that Microsoft will not seek an injunction or exclusion order against any firm on the basis of those essential patents.
3. This also means that Microsoft will make those essential patents available for license to other firms without requiring that those firms license their patents back to Microsoft, except for any patents they have that are essential to the same industry standard.
4. Microsoft will not transfer those standard essential patents to any other firm unless that firm agrees to adhere to the points outlined above.

Despite many of the big players pledging support for a more standardized licensing process, we imagine there will still be plenty of patents left over for legal battles to continue.

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