Credit: ZDNet
Some hardworking Microsoft sleuths have discovered some new code names and are leading this weekend. Thanks to @ h0x0d (The Walking Cat) and Tero Alhonen (@terhoalhonen) we have some information about Microsoft’s “MeTAOS” and “Taos.” (Zac Bowden of Windows Central says that these are basically one in the same, with “Taos” is simply an abbreviation for “MeTAOS,” that sounds logical to me.)
Here’s more about what I believe these names are and how they will advance in Microsoft’s cloud and AI strategies.
Microsoft already has a “productivity cloud” in place with its Microsoft 365 / Office 365 set of offerings. Underpinning Office 365 is a layer called ‘substrate’, which is Microsoft’s customer data platform. (The idea of a substrate in Microsoft has been around for a while and was initially part of the Exchange’s data store architecture.)
Microsoft is now trying to build a large-scale distributed platform, such as a foundation, that will sit on top of SharePoint, the Office 365 substrate, Azure, Microsoft’s machine learning infrastructure and more. MeTAOS sounds to me like Microsoft’s attempt to promote the vision and messaging of the substrate by emphasizing how its AI technology will make it more useful across all platforms where Office 365 apps currently operate.
MeTAOS / Taos is not an OS in the way we currently think of Windows as Linux. It is more a layer that Microsoft wants to evolve to utilize the user data in the substrate to make user experiences and apps for users smarter and proactive.
A job description for a Principal Engineering Manager for Taos mentions the fundamental layer:
“We strive to create a platform on top of that foundation – one focused on people and the work they want to do instead of our devices, apps and technologies. This vision has the potential to define the future of Microsoft 365 and a dramatic to make an impact on the whole sector. “
A related SharePoint / MeTA job description adds some extra context:
“We are excited about transforming our customers into ‘AI natives’, with technology increasing their ability to reach more with the files, websites, news and other content that people need to do their job efficiently. by providing them with timely and actionable notifications that understand their intentions, context and adapt to their work habits. ”
In short, MeTAOS / Taos was able to take the next step along the substrate path of Office 365.
Microsoft officials have not said much publicly about the substrate, but it is actually a set of storage and other services at the heart of Office 365. Microsoft’s goal is to store all files and information (or at least a copy of this information) ) which users engage in creating, collaborating, and communicating within the substrate. As Office 365 expert Tony Redmond noted last year in a post on Petri.com, Microsoft’s vision is that the Office 365 substrate will be able to act as an ‘operating system for humans on the planet.’
Redmond reviewed a video by Jeffrey Snover, Microsoft Technical Fellow and (now former) Architect for the Intelligent Substrate Platform in Office 365. In that video, Snover compared Office 365 to Windows, noting that there were both built-in apps and a Store; write-consistent application program interfaces, and the ability to manage and protect resources, including resources in the case of Office users, documents, messages, calendars, and security services.
Until now, the Office 365 substrate has largely been a first-party thing, with several Microsoft devices such as OneDrive, SharePoint, Teams, Outlook and Bing to record / display it. Microsoft aimed to reach third-party developers across the substrate in 2019 through a Substrate Day event. But that event never happened, and this part of the substrate strategy seems to be further delayed by what happens to the COVID-19 pandemic. (Microsoft has a site with placeholder substrates for developer documentation and more, but it’s still not publicly available.)
MeTAOS is about making the “intelligence” available in Microsoft’s intelligent substrate wider through a new fundamental layer that builds on top of the substrate and other core Microsoft technologies. Microsoft’s unanimous search service is probably also an important part of this plan, considering everything stored must be able to be found and come to surface.
That is my interpretation from trying to connect the dots. Does anyone else have more info than guesses?
Update: There’s also apparently a Fluid Framework angle for all of this (Thanks) Alhonen for trying the aka.ms/metaos trick.) Fluid Framework is infrastructural technology that Microsoft has built to improve coauthoring performance and allow users to create and incorporate components into applications and documents that stay current all the time because of this rapid collaboration technology.
