It’s time again for the Architectural Openings industry’s glitterati to don their best deal-making attire and converge upon another unsuspecting American city, for what promises to be two days of excitement – door and hardware style!

It’s hard to believe that another year has gone by since the Door and Hardware Institute held its annual convention in Chicago. No one will disagree that the industry has seen some difficult times these past couple of years. Although many might consider this to be a reason to forego attending the annual event, the more astute (and optimistic) might suggest that this is exactly what is called for during challenging times. It’s specifically during times of economic uncertainty that successful businesses rely on the relationships they have cultivated and those yet to be built.

For all of us at AVAware, the DHI Convention is our one annual opportunity to meet with many of our valued clients face-to-face. Although a handshake and few minutes of small-talk may seem trivial to some, we tend to look at it a little differently. As the developer of many companies’ primary business tool, we recognize that our clients depend on us every bit as much

as we do on them. There is simply no substitute for being able to share some face time, no matter how briefly. We look forward to hearing feedback, demonstrating new products and generally sharing our respective visions of the industry, its future and our role in it.

This year’s event is being held in New York City at the Javits Convention Center, on October 26 & 27, 2011. For those that haven’t had the opportunity to spend time in Manhattan, this is just the excuse you’ve been waiting for. Convention events are scheduled for the Wednesday and Thursday, leaving the following weekend free from some much needed down-time in one of America’s most vibrant cities.

For those that are planning to attend, please drop by and visit us at the AVAware booth (# 959). In addition, AVAware will be hosting two information / demonstration / Q&A sessions during the Industry

Marketplace event, scheduled for Wednesday morning. The AVAware presentations will be held in room 1E-02 on level 1 of the convention center, and we will be publishing additional details on the website and in next month’s issue of AVAwire regarding the specifics.

In this past June’s edition of AVAwire, we invited our readers to participate in a brief survey designed to help us determine what convention attendees would be most interested in seeing covered during our Industry Marketplace sessions. It’s not too late to share your opinion. We would like to invite our readers, once again, to let us know what would interest them the most in those sessions.

To complete the short survey, please click here.

To all those who plan to be in attendance, we look forward to seeing you in New York!

It seems like only yesterday that AVAware announced support for the newly released Windows 7. In fact, that was nearly two years – a very long time in the software world. On September 13, 2011 Microsoft quietly released their first “Developer Preview” of the much anticipated Windows 8. Time for us to get to work!

Software developers face a number of unique challenges in order to keep their products competitive and vibrant. Unlike most other products, software is never truly finished. Even if a developer has decided that they’ll never add another feature (unbelievable as that is), software products are dependent on the operating systems on which they run. Invariably, enhancements made to successive versions of an operating system such as Microsoft Windows, will result in issues with existing software products. As such, developers need to stay current with operating system developments and update their products to accommodate them. In the past, Windows Vista and Windows 7 (64 bit) have necessitated significant modification to AVAproject and AVAcad in order to effectively make use of the new features of those systems.

Windows Vista brought with it Microsoft’s new “virtual store” which led to the development of the AVAware Repository and it obsoleted the traditional Microsoft Help system which caused AVAware to completely redesign the HTML help system featured in our products today. Increased demands for system memory made 64 bit Windows extremely popular when Windows 7 was released. As a result, AVAware released 64 bit support in all our products. These are just a few examples of major development work that was spawned by changes made to the underlying operating system. The unfortunate thing, from a developer’s point-of-view, is that this work is “dropped” on us and we receive no compensation from Microsoft for

AVAproject and AVAcad operate flawlessly in the Windows 8 environment

having to change our products to accommodate their revisions. By the same token, however, we have no choice but to do so. Developers that fail to keep in stride with progress will eventually have to tell their users that they can’t install their software on the new computer they just bought, or even worse – tell them to downgrade. For us at AVAware, these are simply not options!

A Dramatic New Look

In an apparent effort to unify their desktop and mobile operating systems, Windows 8 features native support for multi-touch devices. It makes use of a similar user interface as that of the other tablet-based operating systems like Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android. The major difference being, that it is actually a full-scale desktop operating system behind the scenes. Unlike devices like the iPad, Microsoft debuted their new OS on a Samsung 700t tablet built on an Intel Core i5 processor, an 11.6” screen, 4 GB of RAM and a 64GB solid state hard drive. This device is capable of running any application currently run on Windows today. In fact, this very tablet will be released shortly, preloaded with Windows 7.

The image pictured on the tablet’s screen is the new “start” screen featured in Windows 8. It bears a striking similarity to Windows Phone 7 and makes use of a similar tile-based menu system. This presentation is not completely unfamiliar to Windows users; it is virtually identical to one of the standard presentation modes offered in Windows Media Center.

Moreover, those “tiles” are not just oversized icons. They’re actually desktop “gadgets” – small applications written in HTML 5 that allow programs to display “live” information even before they’re actually running. For example, the weather application displays the current temperature on menu itself, without the users actually having to run it.

The user interface component of the operating system has changed more in this version than it has since Windows got its current familiar look with the release of Windows 95. Desktop purists can rest assured, that familiar desktop model is not gone. The new tile-based start screen (known as the “Metro” user interface) can be disabled in favor of the traditional interface.

Along with numerous new bells and whistles, it seems that Microsoft has gone back to a simpler full-screen application model. Apparently taking a cue from Apple’s lead, Microsoft has decided that a simpler screen layout is better. We can only speculate on their end-game, but the strategy appears clear – and very promising. The incredible success of smart phones and tablets in recent years has had developers scrambling to create scaled-down ‘mobile’ versions of their desktop applications to run on these devices. Microsoft apparently sees the future differently. They’ve decided to unify their software platform such that the same version of Windows that drives users’ desktop PC will also run on their mobile devices. Samsung’s 700t is only the first of many such devices we can expect to see leading up to the release of Windows 8.

For users and developers alike, the payoff is huge. Instead of incurring additional costs to develop neutered ‘mobile’ versions of popular applications, developers can focus on creating software that runs on a single unifying platform. Users will be able to run the same full-scale applications on their tablets (and hopefully soon their phones) that they do on their desktops. Imagine being able to put your desktop PC in your pocket. That will be the reality when the first Windows 8-capable smart phones begin to emerge. Tablets such as Samsung’s are clearly a huge step in that direction.

What does this all mean for Apple’s iPad and similar such devices? One would think that the future does not look bright. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer delivered a powerful message to the attendees of Microsoft’s BUILD Conference in Anaheim, California earlier this month. There has been a great deal of praise given to Apple this past year for the 35 million iPads they are    expected    to    ship.      Ballmer

AVAproject Meets Windows 8

Once we had Windows 8 up and running, the first order of business was to install the AVAproject Suite and see how it ran in the new environment. The first thing we noticed is that the .Net framework that has been pre-loaded in every release of Windows since Vista, is conspicuously absent. At this point, no conclusions can be drawn as to whether this will remain the case in the final release of Windows 8. Microsoft may simply have chosen to distribute a “light” build for the purposes of the preview.

Fortunately, the AVAware installer is designed to detect this missing component and guide the user through automatically installing it from the Microsoft web site. Once this step was completed, the installation proceeded normally. AVAproject and AVAcad installed and ran flawlessly. The only noticeable difference is that the program shortcuts normally found in the now-absent “Start” menu are now situated in “tiles” on the new Windows 8 “Start” screen.

It’s still too early to tell entirely what impact Windows 8 will have on AVAware software products, but it’s answering questions like that for which developer previews were created. For those that are anxious to play with the new operating system, be forewarned. This release is a “developer preview” only – it is NOT considered stable and definitely shouldn’t be used in a live production machine. It cannot be uninstalled and Microsoft is not providing any support for it at this point. Put simply, install at your own risk! That being said, previews such as this one allow software developers to get a “head start” on evaluating the impact that the new OS will have on their products and allow them to budget the necessary resources.

AVAware will continue to publish updates from the development team, as they continue to explore Windows 8 and enhance the product line to make use of its many exciting new features.

reminded the Windows faithful that 350 million Windows devices will be sold in the same time period and that 1.1 billion PCs are running Windows today. As he put it: "There is no phone, there is no tablet, no operating system on the planet that will ship 350 million units of anything, other than Windows!”

This would certainly lead one to believe that if given the option of a tablet running iOS with its 100,000 application library or one running Windows 8 and its millions – the choice is clear. It’s fair to assume that most of those 1.1 billion Windows users will prefer to leverage their current investment in software by purchasing a tablet that allows them to run the same applications that they do on their desktops.

The development of Windows 8 is being directed by Microsoft’s Steven Sinofsky. He is the same visionary designer that spearheaded the acclaimed Windows 7 release. He was interviewed this past June by the Wall Street Journal’s Walt Mossberg at the D9 Conference in Rancho Palos Verdes, California.

In addition to providing details of his vision for Windows 8, Sinofsky also gave the first public demonstration of the upcoming operating system. The following is a link to a streaming video of the interview and demonstration: http://allthingsd.com/20110620/windows-for-the-app-age-microsofts-steven-sinofskys-full-d9-interview-video

Ten Long Years!

This month marked the passing of an extremely important date at AVAware Technologies. In fact, this may have been one of the most important dates in the company’s history thus far.

It’s with great pride that we acknowledge Nelson Avila’s tenth year with AVAware. Nelson’s time spent with AVAware is second only to that of myself, and this is the first time we’ve had the opportunity to celebrate this milestone in the career of one of our own.

In his official capacity as Vice-President of Operations, his responsibilities include many things from dealing with our vendors to overseeing the entire customer

Paul S. Kirsch, President & CEO

support and service process. There are very few AVAware customers that haven’t had the pleasure of dealing with Nelson and experiencing his passion and dedication first-hand. I’m sure all of them would agree that his unique charm and tremendous technical and industry knowledge, make him a vital member of our team.

For myself, I can only say that I’ve been truly fortunate to have Nelson as a colleague and a friend. It’s a rare luxury to have someone at your side that you

can rely on and trust so completely and absolutely. When faced with the passing of my partner and co-founder Steven Rendulic in 2005, Nelson was instrumental in keeping AVAware alive and helping me through some very difficult days. His ongoing contributions have truly made it possible for AVAware grow into the vibrant company it has become.

Congratulations Nelson and thank you for putting up with us (me) for so long. Here’s to the next ten!

We welcome any questions, comments or suggestions about any topic mentioned in this edition of AVAwire. Please visit our website for more information, or contact us directly at (416) 239-9099.