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Follow Us"As we developed Windows 8, we thought deeply about how these services can take an even more active role in completing the experience–offering a cloud service for each and every Windows 8 customer and all their PCs (and phones), should you choose to use it," write Mike Torres and Omar Shahine, Group Program Managers for SkyDrive, on an update on how to deliver their vision for Windows 8, in the blog.
The integration will include SkyDrive files integrated into Windows Explorer on the desktop, the ability to fetch remote files through SkyDrive.com and SkyDrive as a Metro style app for Windows 8.
"We think what people want in personal cloud storage is a single drive that’s available across all of their devices, tailored to the experiences they’re using, providing instant, secure, and private access to their files, and sharing files and folders with people they choose. To bring this to billions of people, our approach is to seamlessly connect the files (and behaviors) that people have today on the PC with the app and device experiences that they will use in the future," they add.
SkyDrive as a Metro style app for Windows 8
"With Windows 8, we wanted to make sure that your files would be instantly available and up-to-date as you move between PCs — without configuring add-ons or using a USB drive."
"Enter the new SkyDrive app. With the SkyDrive app, an early version of which will be available at Consumer Preview, we focused on two things: 1) designing a fast, fluid, touch-first version of SkyDrive that makes it quick, easy, and even fun to browse and access your files, and 2) making your SkyDrive available for use from any Metro style app via the file picker (open/save) and the new Share charm in Windows 8," they add.
Together, this will bring a file cloud to every Metro style app, allowing users to open files in SkyDrive and save them right back to your SkyDrive.
"The best part about building this on the Windows 8 platform is that any Metro style app that enables its users to open and save files will get SkyDrive integration for free. Without adding a single line of code, users of the app will be able to access and store files on SkyDrive. So essentially, SkyDrive is one touch away from any Windows 8 app," the duo adds.
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SkyDrive app in Windows 8 desktop
"We’re also bringing the power of SkyDrive to every Windows 8 desktop through Windows Explorer and to desktop apps like Office as well," the post goes.
The SkyDrive on the desktop app will also run on Windows Vista and Windows 7.
"SkyDrive for the desktop will also provide the ability to sync up to your available quota of storage (and the ability to unlock more), along with unmatched performance on your PC. Oh, and we will also have support for uploading large files (up to 2GB) through Explorer, another big request from SkyDrive.com users over the years," the pair adds.
Fetching files through SkyDrive.com
Microsoft is also bringing a new feature wherein, with SkyDrive in Windows 8, users can turn their PC into a 'private cloud', and use it to store, access, browse, and stream 'files from anywhere by simply fetching them from SkyDrive.com'.
"We built a new feature that allows you to “reach across” the Internet to access any file, stream videos, or view photo albums from a remote PC that is running SkyDrive on the desktop," write the pair.
And the company has added 'another layer of protection for remote PCs' to ensure that the SkyDrive files do not end up on wrong hands.
"In order to access a remote PC, you will have to provide a second factor of authentication. This requires that you type a code that we send to your mobile phone or alternate email address in addition to having access to your account (if you’re already on a trusted PC, you won’t have to do this every time)," the post says.
Microsoft SkyDrive today has about 17 million customers and currently stores approximately 10 petabytes of user data (one petabyte is a million gigabytes, or a million billion bytes).
"Growing our infrastructure is one of many things we have been busy working on, but most important of these are our investments in sync and cloud scenarios for Windows 8, which will finally bring the DNA of SkyDrive and Mesh together into one service. Given our goal to be the world’s hard drive, we will need to continue to build out the service, and you can expect our pace of improvements to continue through 2012," they add.