Unlike other speculators, who get no spam, Robert X. Cringely offers an intriguing reason behind Apple's recent strategy of Boot Camp. From the article: 'I believe that Apple will offer Windows Vista as an option for those big customers who demand it, but I also believe that Apple will offer in OS X 10.5 the ability to run native Windows XP applications with no copy of XP installed on the machine at all. This will be accomplished not by using compatibility middleware like Wine, but rather by Apple implementing the Windows API directly in OS X 10.5.

XP is strangely compelling on Apple hardware, primarily because most users will already have XP licenses they can transfer and applications they not only own but are familiar with as well. Many people might argue, too, that OS X 10.4 (or 10.5) has many features slated to be coming in Vista, so running XP atop 10.4 could be as good or better than moving to Vista at all.

Now for the interesting part: I believe that Apple will offer Windows Vista as an option for those big customers who demand it, but I also believe that Apple will offer in OS X 10.5 the ability to run native Windows XP applications with no copy of XP installed on the machine at all. This will be accomplished not by using compatibility middleware like Wine, but rather by Apple implementing the Windows API directly in OS X 10.5.

Huh?

Wine is great, but it is also a moving target subject to Microsoft meddling. If Wine gets too good, Microsoft can "accidentally" break it at will. But Microsoft can't afford to do that with its own Windows API. The courts will no longer allow checking for a different underlying OS as Redmond did back in the days of DR-DOS. Besides, unless we are strictly talking about Microsoft apps, there isn't even much code involved here that Microsoft CAN meddle in. The wonder is, of course, that Apple could even dare to do such a thing?

Wow, Cringely obviously has a clue :) There's no way in hell Microsoft would document their API to the level necessary to allow Apple to duplicate it. Also, it's blatantly obvious he doesn't understand precisely what Wine is. Remember: Wine Is Not an Emulator. It's a built-from-scratch implementation of the Windows API...The Wine guys worked a decade on cloning the Windows API, and there are still more than enough problems. There is no way Apple can do this. Maybe for specific applications, but implementing Win32 with all the required libraries on top? Never :]