According to some sources, Windows Vista took 10,000 engineers 5 years to write, costing Microsoft about $10 billion dollars. That makes it one of the biggest engineering projects in history. Chances are very good that you’ll be using Vista on a daily basis within a few years. The development process was not without its setbacks and disappointments, but has there ever been a single project in history that has directly provided a value to so many people?
By the way, the buzz in the media is that Windows Vista is the last of its kind –the market is moving too fast to spend so many resources trying to get so many features out at once. Vista is partly a demonstration of that – it dropped a number of major features because they made the product too complex, and would have delayed the release. I wouldn’t count Microsoft out yet – but I’m sure there’s exciting times up ahead.