Microsoft is busy preparing its next-generation Windows client, shortly after shipping Windows 8 in October. Microsoft is planning to standardize on an approach, codenamed Blue, across Windows and Windows Phone in an effort to provide more regular updates to consumers.

Originally unveiled by ZDNet, the update on the Windows side, due in mid-2013, will include UI changes and alterations to the entire platform and pricing. We’re told that Microsoft is aiming to make Windows Blue the next OS that everyone installs. The approach is simple, Microsoft will price its next Windows release at a low cost or even free to ensure users upgrade. Once Windows Blue is released, the Windows SDK will be updated to support the new release and Microsoft will stop accepting apps that are built specifically for Windows 8, pushing developers to create apps for Blue. Windows 8 apps will continue to run on Blue despite the planned SDK changes.

YEARLY UPGRADES WILL BE THE NORM FOR WINDOWS SOON

We understand that you will need a genuine copy of Windows to upgrade to Windows Blue. Built-in apps and the Windows Store will cease functioning if a copy is upgraded that is pirated. Sources tell us that Microsoft will likely keep the Windows 8 name for the foreseeable future, despite the Windows Blue update. A big part of Windows Blue is the push towards yearly updates for Microsoft’s OS. Microsoft will kick off an annual upgrade cycle for Windows that is designed to make it more competitive against rival platforms from Apple and Google.

Amid all the attention lavished on the new iPad, a Bloomberg report notes that work on Windows 8 is likely to wrap up this summer, setting the stage for a debut in PCs and tablets this October.

The first wave of devices are likely to run both Intel and ARM processors, with the overwhelming majority carrying Intel, Bloomberg said.

Although Microsoft is developing its offerings with ARM technology — that’s what’s running Apple’s iPad — there will be “fewer than five” WOA (Windows on ARM) devices, compared to more than 40 Intel machines, according to the report. Sources also told Bloomberg that three of those Windows 8 ARM devices will be tablets.

The company’s release of a Consumer Preview in late February suggested they were on track for a fall release. Windows 7 was released to developers in July 2009 and in devices that October as the holiday shopping season was just gearing up.

The consumer beta offerings were met with overwhelming interest — over a million downloads in the first 24 hours.

At this point in the tablet revolution, however, Apple is in its third iteration of its incredibly popular iPad and there are numerous Android-based offerings. So the pressure is on for Microsoft to get a viable tablet to market.

“Microsoft isn’t fighting the battle it’s used to fighting,” said Michael Gartenberg, a tech industry analyst for Gartner, Inc. “This is a universe that has changed.”

With well-established tablets on the market and the ecosystems that have developed around them, Microsoft will have to deliver more than just a tablet and an OS. “Ecosystems are driving purchases these days.” Gartenberg said.

“Consumers aren’t buying the new iPad because it has a Retina display — it’s because of what they can do with the apps that use the Retina display.”

With a huge gap between tablet market leader Apple and the Android tablet developers, Microsoft may have an opportunity to insert itself as a competitor for the No. 2 spot, he said. A lot is riding on the success of a Microsoft Windows 8 tablet, especially as Apple pulls away from the pack with its third-generation iPad, which promises to sell well in the holiday season.

“Certainly Microsoft needs to have a device on the market…but they also need to make sure it’s compelling.”

Of course, it could be worse — if the operating system isn’t ready for prime time, compelling tablet or not.

Each round has an optional map tutorial at its start and an interactive cutscene to end, wherein the top player from the winning team will have the option to beat the losing team to death or to free them. Domination mode seems to be a lesson in classic capture-point format, while Firestorm offers a more creative multiplayer approach, with the offensive team attempting to light two ignition points in the enemy’s camp that will be doused with gasoline when the opposing team calls in air support — unless the enemy secures its radio first.

There aren’t too many details on Ghost Recon Commander just yet, but gamers should expect it to have high production values as seen in console quality games. It will support asynchronous play with friends and will include a few “twists” that will make it a new style of social gaming where you’ll really need your friends to play, said Ubisoft’s Chris Early to Pocket Gamer.

Early also revealed that the game will be tied to other titles in the Ghost Recon series in a way that would encourage more gameplay overall. For instance, playing Ghost Recon Future Soldier on the console would help you unlock characters, experience points, and currency that can be used for Ghost Recon Commander on Facebook and vice versa.

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In a blog post on the Facebook Engineering page today, Facebook’s Karan Mangla describes how it took some serious big data and architectural handiwork to add broad geo-tagging capabilities. It was actually relatively easy to find locations for Facebook Places when geo-location was only possible with updates done via mobile devices broadcasting GPS signals, but letting users add such data to any updates — even to do so retroactively — meant opening up the range of possible places beyond a user’s current physical location.

Dealing with a larger data set for every update meant Facebook had to change its infrastructure in order to make each update as efficient as possible, lest it risk a slow user experience. Here’s how Mangla said it accomplished this at the database layer:

Depending on the use case, results can be biased toward places closer to the user or provide completely global search. Since the candidate set of places increases significantly in this new system, ranking each of these places to find those that are most relevant to the current user becomes very important. With each place in the index, we store a large set of features to improve ranking, including check-ins and likes received by the place and our best estimate for the opening/closing time for the place. Then we run models generated by machine learning to select the most relevant places based on these features.

With any complex platform such as Facebook, though, there’s always a catch. Mangla noted that while displaying chronological information only requires a server to grab the last few dozen pieces of a user’s activity, displaying geospatial information requires  grabbing all the activity associated with any given place on the user’s map. Facebook had a fix:

To manage this data load, we created infrastructure to farm out data fetching to multiple servers. On every page load, a single server fetches the IDs of all pieces of content that can be displayed for the current user. This server then breaks up this data into smaller chunks, and each chunk is sent in a request to another server to actually fetch the data and do privacy checks. The responses from these servers is then combined to create the timeline map display.

The rest of Mangla’s post provides some deeper insights into how Facebook went about predicting locations for previously uploaded photos, as well as its plan for launching APIs that will let third-party apps update users’ timeline maps or feed users relevant information based on where they are at any given time. It’s well worth reading.

The bigger picture, though, is the further confirmation of how much work goes into making a web platform as sticky as possible to ensure maximum user and developer engagement. That means not only adding new features, but also making them perform as well as possible. It takes a lot of time and money to get this stuff right, and Facebook plans to spend whatever it takes to keep itself relevant over the long haul.

Of course, assuming all this location data eventually makes its way to advertisers who’ll be better able to target users with relevants ads, Facebook should still bring in enough money to keep everyone happy.

Lord of the Rings Online is a game that’s not gotten an extremely large amount of press from non-gaming-centric sites thus far, but with the ability to play such a game with minimal effort like this, there’s no knowing what games might gain traction. It’s surprising that LOTR hasn’t come across even our radar here at SlashGear more than a few times, with a group such as Gaikai having to be the ones to bring it all on to the main terminal – that said, it’s all very exciting! There’s an astounding amount of MMORPGS out there now here in our very accepting of gaming as more than a hobby world, and allowing play with as simple a sequence as we’ve got here can only mean great things for such titles as Dungeons & Dragons and LOTR.

You’ll be able to play online SOON straight through each game’s own webpage: Lord of the Rings Online and Dungeons & Dragons Online.

As Robert Stevenson, EVP at Gaikai notes on the subject:

“MMOs have always been one of the key genres that we’ve wanted to deliver via the cloud – never before has it been possible to play MMOs in this way. And we couldn’t be more pleased to showcase Gaikai’s technology by streaming Dungeons & Dragons Online and The Lord of the Rings Online, which are both fantastic multiplayer gaming experiences with legions of loyal fans.” – Stevenson

For those of you who have never been there, Gaikai also has a wide range of games which you can both play and preview right from your web browser. No need for installations of any kind, and minimal wait time allows you to get gaming quick as a flash. It’s a must try for any and all lovers of games with minimal time on their hands to get down to business!

According to Bloomberg terminal headlines:

• It will have a sharper screen and a faster quad core chip.
• Production will be at full volume by February with the gadget going on sale in March.

Jeremy Horwitz at iLounge reported earlier this week that the iPad 3 will be slightly thicker than the iPad 2 – by about 1 milimeter.

Horwitz says he saw the case of the next iPad, and it seems to have come from someone that makes iPad cases.