Build 6956 was leaked to the public yesterday in the form of a virtual hard drive. Those who got it running probably didn’t take the time to dig deep, but our own Michael Frank took a look inside the build to see what he could find.

Right on par with some of the changes I mentioned would be coming to Windows 7, regional themes are now an option for different countries. It’s expected that more will be added as time goes on, but the five English-speaking countries currently stereotyped themed in build 6956+ are:

• Australia
• Canada
• South Africa
• United Kingdom
• United States

The themes are nothing more than color and wallpaper combinations for now. I’m assuming that the appropriate theme will be chosen depending on the location of the person installing Windows 7, but that has yet to be seen.

Beta 1 is currently in escrow, so any other remaining hidden features should also be visible by the time Beta 1 rolls around on January 13th at the MSDN Developer Conferences*. We should have more information for you guys regarding these themes down the road, but for now, feel free to check out screenshots of the five country-specific themes below:

*if any of you are attending the MSDN DevCon in Washington D.C., I’ll gladly meet up with you at the event! Just drop me a PM on the forums in advance to arrange a meeting place.

This posting is provided “as is” with no warranties, and confers no rights. All of the information herein could easily be right, wrong, up, down, in, out, backwards, forwards, heavily dated, or totally false. You can interpret it as you wish, or not interpret it at all. Also, in case you haven’t figured it out, all of this is non-static and heavily subject to change.

The final pillar focuses much more on the business-oriented aspects of Windows 7 rather than the consumer additions we saw in the previous four pillars. The scenarios covered by this particular pillar are designed to make deployment and maintenance of Windows 7 easier than any prior operating system. Most of the scenarios in this pillar seem to be nothing more than enhancements of features which made their debut in Windows Vista, which is good for companies looking to minimize costs while looking to deploy an improved OS since it would mean less training for both employees and IT professionals.

This is the final post in the series, so feel free to comment on any of the five pillars in this thread. The fifth pillar is across the link
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This posting is provided “as is” with no warranties, and confers no rights. All of the information herein could easily be right, wrong, up, down, in, out, backwards, forwards, heavily dated, or totally false. You can interpret it as you wish, or not interpret it at all. Also, in case you haven’t figured it out, all of this is non-static and heavily subject to change.

The third pillar in my series focused on how Windows 7 would personalize computing online, at work, and at home. The home computing additions coming to Windows 7 also include a number of home media and entertainment ideas in the fourth pillar for Windows 7, though this particular pillar focuses less on personalization and more on delivering your media to you quickly, efficiently, and vibrantly.

Most of the material in this pillar is likely covered by the eHome labs, which means most of the material covered here will be fairly vague. As with the rest of the pillars, you’ll find out more throughout the development of the operating system, though if the eHome team has control over most of this pillar, I wouldn’t be surprised to see an overwhelming amount of definition come to the scenarios in this pillar once the Beta 1 milestone is reached.

Comments? Insight? Post! Click the Read More link for the fourth pillar.
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This posting is provided “as is” with no warranties, and confers no rights. All of the information herein could easily be right, wrong, up, down, in, out, backwards, forwards, heavily dated, or totally false. You can interpret it as you wish, or not interpret it at all. Also, in case you haven’t figured it out, all of this is non-static and heavily subject to change.

So far, we’ve discussed the Specialized for Laptops and Designed for Services pillars of Windows 7. The common thread between these two focuses on connectivity and utilization of online resources. The third pillar, unsurprisingly, shares the same common link with the other two pillars.

Part Three of my series on the Five Pillars of Windows 7 will expand on some of the elements of the Designed for Services pillar with Microsoft’s plan for personalization and access. Given how susceptible the User Interface of an application or operating system is to change, this pillar could see the largest shift in scope over the coming years, so don’t be terribly surprised if the information in this pillar sees the most change out of all of them.

Comments are appreciated. You can catch pillar three after the jump.
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This posting is provided “as is” with no warranties, and confers no rights. All of the information herein could easily be right, wrong, up, down, in, out, backwards, forwards, heavily dated, or totally false. You can interpret it as you wish, or not interpret it at all. Also, in case you haven’t figured it out, all of this is non-static and heavily subject to change.

Yesterday’s pillar (Specialized for Laptops) focused on changes which, while applicable to all platforms on which Windows 7 will be found, have a slant in favor of mobile platforms. This is part two of my series on the Five Pillars of Windows 7. Most of the emphasis in today’s pillar will be focused on how Windows 7 will spread the Windows Experience away from just your hard drive.

As always, comments are appreciated. Pillar Two (Update: with screenshots!) is after the break.
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