Along with Windows 7 Microsoft is also cooking the software development kit for the next iteration of the Windows client. As the history of Windows 7 client and SDK development milestone releases indicate, the operating system and the developing solution will be released to manufacturing together in the second half of this month. Developers, even those that played around with the Release Candidate of Windows 7 SDK, should expect a variety of changes in the gold build compared to the latest milestone available for download, released at the start of May.

“The upcoming release of the Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 contains a comprehensive set of Win32 samples illustrating Windows 7 technologies. Over 1,200 samples were changed since the release of the Windows SDK for Windows 7 RC release. Many “new to Win 7” samples were added, simplified, or extended, and many older samples were updated to support Windows 7 as well as older operating systems,” revealed a member of the Windows SDK team.

Microsoft has already focused in great detail on the modifications or new Win32 samples added to the Windows 7 RTM SDK. Devs interested in seeing in advance what the software development kit brings to the table have available a list of New/updated Multimedia Samples in the Windows SDK for Windows 7 and one for New/updated Networking and related services samples in the Windows SDK for Windows 7.

For the multimedia samples “technologies include Animation, Audio, Direct2D, DirectWrite, GDI, Media Foundation, Windows Imaging Component (WIC), Windows Media Player (WMP), and Windows Portable Device (WPD),” the Windows SDK team representative stated, adding that for networking and related services changes impacted: “Active Directory Service Interfaces (ADSI), Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), EAP, HTTP, IPHelp, Mobile Broadband, Network Access Protection (NAP), Distributed Routing, Quality of Service (QOS), Remote Access Server (RAS), Remote Procedure Call (RPC), Universal Plug and Play (UPNP), Windows File Protection (WFP), Winsock, and Wireless LAN (WLAN).”

Microsoft Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1: RC and Microsoft Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1: RC (ISO) are available for download here.