And we're calling it ... Windows 7!

Drumroll please!  The seventh version of Microsoft Windows, after versions 1, 2, 3, 95, XP and Vista, will be called ... Windows 7!

A blog post by Mike Nash, head of Windows Product Management at Microsoft confirmed as much yesterday: "... since we began development of the next version of the Windows client operating system we have been referring to it by a codename,'Windows 7.'  But now is a good time to announce that we've decided to officially call the next version of Windows, 'Windows 7.''

He goes on to explain their reasoning.

Up until version 3.11, Windows releases took version numbers like other software, but, then, in 1995, they started to carry the year of release.

Given that a new version of Windows only appears once every three years on average, however, both XP and Vista had specially-chosen "aspirational" names.

According to Nash, that wouldn't be appropriate this time round because it wouldn't "do justice to what we are trying to achieve, which is to stay firmly rooted in our aspirations for Windows Vista, while evolving and refining the substantial investments in platform technology in Windows Vista into the next generation of Windows."

The first pre-beta versions will be presented to programmers at Microsoft's Professional Developers' Conference at the end of this month.