Microsoft to call Windows 7, Windows 7

Mike Nash, a vice president in the Windows Product Management Group at Microsoft, has announced Windows 7 will be called Windows 7, sparking a return to the good old days before Windows 95 showed up.

Nash revealed the software giant's intentions on the Windows Vista blog, where he wrote a rather lengthy post explaining why Microsoft had moved away from version numbers in the first place.

"We've used version numbers like Windows 3.11, or dates like Windows 98, or "aspirational" monikers like Windows XP or Windows Vista. And since we do not ship new versions of Windows every year, using a date did not make sense," explained Nash. "Likewise, coming up with an all-new "aspirational" name does not do justice to what we are trying to achieve, which is to stay firmly rooted to our aspirations for Windows Vista, while evolving and refining the substantial investments in platform technology in Windows Vista into the next generation of Windows.

"Simply put, this is the seventh release of Windows, so therefore "Windows 7" just makes sense," he continued.

We agree with Nash here – calling the next version of the OS Windows 7 does make sense and with Microsoft planning to release more regular and incremental OS updates, it's understandable. I was never a fan of the various new naming conventions Microsoft has tried since Windows 3.11 – but them I'm a bit of a sucker for version numbers.