The Redmond Company invites users to view and generate XPS documents. For this alone, the Redmond Company is making available for download three applications: Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 - Release Candidate, Microsoft XPS Essentials Pack Version 1.0 and Microsoft Core XML Services 6.0. The three programs are designed to be integrated with Windows 2000, Windows XP Service Pack 2 and later and with Windows Server 2003. Windows Vista is missing from this list because the Microsoft XPS Document Writer and the XPS Viewer, hosted by Internet Explorer, are integrated in Vista.

"With the XPS Essentials Pack you can quickly begin reading and generating XPS Documents. It contains the XML Paper Specification Viewer to read XPS Documents and the Microsoft XPS Document Writer to output files to the XPS Document format. Additionally, the Microsoft XPS Essentials Pack download includes providers to enable the iPreview and iFilter capabilities found in many Windows applications. Windows shell handlers are also included to enable thumbnail views and file properties for XPS Documents," stated Microsoft.

As the Microsoft XML Paper Specification Essentials Pack is a pre-release version software, users can also create and view XPS documents via the Microsoft Core XML Services (MSXML) 6.0 and the Microsoft Pre-Release Software Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 - Release Candidate.

Microsoft XML Paper Specification Essentials Pack 1.0 was tested by Softpedia as being 100% Clean and is available for download here.