Even though the Milestone 1 leak of Windows 8 is old doesn’t mean it can’t be useful.
I’ve been running it for a few days inside a virtual machine, tinkering with it and taking a look at what new executables it has to offer. Much of what’s on offer isn’t new, but I did find two executables that offer some interesting insight into what the release of Windows 8 might have to offer.
The first is an executable called CreateBootableUFD.exe which describes itself as a ‘Windows Disc Image Burner.’ This tool seems to be used to create bootable USB flash drives.
(http://i51.tinypic.com/2w2k6z5.jpg)
Another, more interesting tool is pwcreator.exe, the ‘Portable Workspace Creator’ tool.
(http://i56.tinypic.com/xd120.jpg)
This seems like an interesting tool. The purpose of it seems to be that you can take Windows with you on a USB flash drive. I’m going to play more with this one later.
I’ve also been deep hip-deep in looking at the strings inside files, trying to work out what some do. For example, glcnd.exe, which contains a lot of references to PDF … built-in PDF tool perhaps?
(http://i53.tinypic.com/1iwib.jpg)
There’s also a lot of new command line applications, like dpmanage.exe, an application that ‘Manages Data protection for the current user.’
(http://i55.tinypic.com/or0y38.jpg)
This leaked build is turning out to be more exciting that I’d first expected it to be!