So there has been a lot of chatter about the next iteration of Windows and questions about where Microsoft is going with Windows. Will there be a Windows 11? Will Windows 10 stay the same way forever? What about Windows 10X? The future of Windows as an Operating System seems to be something called Windows Core OS. To understand what Windows Core OS is, you first have to understand a little bit about what Windows 10 is and is not. From the very beginning, Microsoft said that Windows 10 would be one Operating System that would simply work on multiple form factors. The reality though was significantly different. Windows 10 for desktops, Windows 10 for HoloLens, Windows 10 for IoT devices, Windows 10 for Surface Hub, Windows 10 for Xbox, etc are all Windows 10 but they are each unique and different Operating Systems. The truth is that Microsoft had to make substantial changes to each version of Windows to make them work on the specific hardware they were marketed for. Without those modifications, Windows 10 for desktops would be horrible or downright incompatible with an Xbox. While Windows 10 is different for each version, there are some common elements across all of its versions. OneCore and OneCoreUAP are some layers of Windows 10 that you can find across all versions of Windows 10 but unfortunately, most of the OSs are unique and built from scratch. It’s real simple here. If most of the Windows 10 Operating Systems for different devices are different code, it has to be tremendously inefficient to create, test, maintain and support each version. It’s an inefficient and expensive pain in the ass. Period. In addition, it’s a pain in the ass every time Microsoft wants to build a version of Windows 10 for a new device type, such as foldable, which seemed to come out of the blue in the last couple of years. Windows Core OS (WCOS for short) is a new, modern version of Windows and is a monumental step forward in making Windows a truly universal OS. In short, WCOS is a common denominator for Windows that works cross-platform, on any device type or architecture, that can be enhanced with modular extensions that give devices features and experiences where necessary. Basically, Microsoft is building a universal base for Windows that can be used across all these different devices. Windows Core OS strips Windows down to the bare minimum. It doesn’t include any legacy components or features and sticks to UWP as a core for the operating system as it’s lighter and already universal. From there, Microsoft can build out Windows Core OS with different components and features that it can then apply to devices where necessary. But this time, those components and features can be shared across the many different devices Windows Core OS will run on. Instead of having to develop a new version of Windows 10 for every new device type that comes along, Microsoft can simply begin with Windows Core OS and pull in common features and functions that are prebuilt. This would be infinitely more efficient for Microsoft with way fewer development dollars needed to make this happen. Learn more by visiting OUR FORUM.

Propelled by average enthusiasts in their shared quest to defeat COVID-19, the Folding@Home network is now pushing out 470 PetaFLOPS of raw compute power. To put that in perspective, that's twice as fast as Summit, the world's fastest supercomputer, making the network faster than any known supercomputer. It's also faster than the top seven supercomputers in the world, combined.  It's impressive that the Folding @Home network is now more than twice as powerful as Summit's 149 PetaFLOPS of sustained output: ORNL announced two weeks ago that Summit had also joined the coronavirus fight and has already found 77 different small-molecule drug compounds that might be useful to fight the virus. Summit employs 220,800 CPU cores, 188,416,000 CUDA cores, 9.2PB of memory, and 250PB of mixed NVRAM/storage for the task. But Summit is far faster than the other supercomputers further down the Top500 list. That means the Folding @Home network is also now faster than the world's top seven supercomputers, combined. That's equivalent to the horsepower of 27,433,824 CPU/GPU cores that are being used in the most powerful systems in the world. These leading supercomputers are typically only used by nation-states for decidedly more nefarious purposes, such as nuclear research, so seeing this type of compute power unleashed for the common goal of defeating the coronavirus is certainly encouraging. Here is a view of the enemy, stunning in its complexity, and deadly in its intentions. This virus may be sweeping the globe, pushing large portions of the world into isolation at both the national and personal level, but the global community is coming together through the Folding @Home network to fight back by furthering research into possible cures or vaccines. This consists of using your computer to complete small chunks of much larger problems, thus giving researchers access to an unprecedented amount of computing horsepower. Distributed computing has always been a great hobby because of the detailed stats compilation and the dizzying number of teams involved, but Folding @Home's addition of coronavirus research to its normal pursuits, like cancer, Alzheimer's, and Parkinson's research, has led to an overwhelming amount of new users. Folding @Home reports that it has seen a 1,200% increase in contributors, with Bitcoin miners also joining the fight, and over 400,000 new volunteers have joined over the last two weeks. Unfortunately, that massive surge in demand has led to a shortage of work units (the small chunks of larger workloads sent to each user), but Folding@Home has expanded its capacity to serve units to speed production. Work units are still being issued and many more are in the pipeline. You can help, too, by simply installing the Folding@Home application and turning over some of your spare CPU or GPU horsepower to help defeat the virus. It only takes a few minutes to set up the program, and then it's effortless as the program runs in the background. Follow this thread on OUR FORUM.