Microsoft details Windows 8 for ARM devices

Microsoft has released technical design details about the new version of Windows for devices that use ARM chips, outlining in a lengthy blog post different ways in which this OS, called WOA and still in the works, will be alike and different from existing versions of Windows.

WOA (Windows on ARM) will be based on the Windows 8 code base, itself still in development, and will replicate some familiar Windows design features, such as having a desktop interface component. In other ways, WOA will be uniquely crafted, such as requiring that devices running it use a system-on-a-chip design.

"WOA enables creativity in PC design that, in combination with newly architected features of the OS, will bring to customers new no-compromise experiences," wrote the post's author Steven Sinofsky, president of Windows and Windows Live Division.

"We created WOA to enable a new class of PC with unique capabilities and form factors, supported by a new set of partners that expand the ecosystem of which Windows is part," he wrote.

:story: Full story: Computerworld