The second of the two Windows Home Server development sessions from this week’s PDC has now been posted on Channel 9, with a few very cool demos which point to future enhancements to Windows Home Server’s remote access capabilities.
The session, Exposing Connected Home Services to the Internet via Windows Home Server focuses on ways in which developers can work with Windows Home Server’s remote access features.
The session includes a demo of a ”science project” from Microsoft’s Connected TV team called Florence. Think Orb/WebGuide taken to the next level. Florence is a web server which exposes and streams music stored on a PC (or home server) to any other PC on the home network or remotely using a very cool Silverlight-based user interface. The result is pretty stunning – imagine a rich Windows Media Center experience delivered remotely over the internet – enabling you to stream your Music, Videos and Photos directly to your PC (or any other internet enabled device). Let’s hope we see something like this in WHS V2.
There’s also discussion of how in the next 12-18 months, Windows Home Server will connect to Live Mesh, providing folder synchronisation between WHS’ shared folders, the cloud, and as it’s Live Mesh we’re talking about here, any other device within your Mesh. There are some restrictions today within Live Mesh which prevent as add-in being released right now, but it was announced that the team are committed to partnering Windows Home Server and Live Mesh in the future. Very cool indeed – the video’s well worth checking out if you want to see a little behind the scenes of Windows Home Server development, and a glimpse of a potential future.
Learn how to leverage the Remote Access platform in Windows Home Server to expose on-premises services running in the connected home to the Internet. See how to expose a home automation service running on Windows Home Server to the Internet, and watch a demonstration that shows how to expose services that may be hosted on other devices inside the connected home using Windows Home Server as a gateway. Finally, see a sneak preview of Home Server and Live Mesh working together to further enhance the remote experience for the connected home.
So, what Live Mesh enabled applications would you want to see for Windows Home Server?
Update: The WHS Team blog has screenshots of the Live Mesh add-in.
Video: Channel 9
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