Windows SideShow (codenamed Auxiliary Display) was a feature by
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...
introduced in
Windows Vista
Windows Vista is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was the direct successor to Windows XP, which was released five years before, at the time being the longest time span between successive releases of ...
to supply information such as
e-mail,
instant messages
Instant messaging (IM) technology is a type of online chat allowing real-time text transmission over the Internet or another computer network. Messages are typically transmitted between two or more parties, when each user inputs text and trigge ...
, and
RSS feeds
RSS ( RDF Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication) is a web feed that allows users and applications to access updates to websites in a standardized, computer-readable format. Subscribing to RSS feeds can allow a user to keep track of many di ...
from a
personal computer
A personal computer (PC) is a multi-purpose microcomputer whose size, capabilities, and price make it feasible for individual use. Personal computers are intended to be operated directly by an end user, rather than by a computer expert or tec ...
to a local or remote peripheral device or display. SideShow was intended to enhance the Windows experience by enabling new mobility scenarios for the Windows platform and by providing power saving benefits as part of Microsoft's broader efforts regarding a mobile initiative.
SideShow was unveiled in 2003 as a feature of Windows Vista ("Longhorn") to provide peripheral awareness of information. Preliminary documentation from Microsoft focused on using it to provide online information in an internal display of a mobile device such as a
laptop
A laptop, laptop computer, or notebook computer is a small, portable personal computer (PC) with a screen and alphanumeric keyboard. Laptops typically have a clam shell form factor with the screen mounted on the inside of the upper li ...
while supporting
desktop computer
A desktop computer (often abbreviated desktop) is a personal computer designed for regular use at a single location on or near a desk due to its size and power requirements. The most common configuration has a case that houses the power supply ...
scenarios; information could also be
cached for later use when offline or when in
sleep mode
Sleep mode (or suspend to RAM) is a low power mode for electronic devices such as computers, televisions, and remote controlled devices. These modes save significantly on electrical consumption compared to leaving a device fully on and, upon resu ...
. Microsoft planned to include a
Control Panel applet and configurable
battery
Battery most often refers to:
* Electric battery, a device that provides electrical power
* Battery (crime), a crime involving unlawful physical contact
Battery may also refer to:
Energy source
*Automotive battery, a device to provide power t ...
,
calendar
A calendar is a system of organizing days. This is done by giving names to periods of time, typically days, weeks, months and years. A date is the designation of a single and specific day within such a system. A calendar is also a physi ...
, email,
wireless network
A wireless network is a computer network that uses wireless data connections between network nodes.
Wireless networking is a method by which homes, telecommunications networks and business installations avoid the costly process of introducing c ...
, and
Windows Media Player
Windows Media Player (WMP) is the first media player and media library application that was developed by Microsoft for playing audio, video and viewing images on personal computers running the Microsoft Windows operating system, as well as on ...
modules for SideShow.
SideShow was included with the release of Windows Vista in 2006, which included modules for
Windows Mail and Windows Media Player, and would ultimately encompass other aspects of the Windows platform and Microsoft ecosystem.
Microsoft Office
Microsoft Office, or simply Office, is the former name of a family of client software, server software, and services developed by Microsoft. It was first announced by Bill Gates on August 1, 1988, at COMDEX in Las Vegas. Initially a marketin ...
supported SideShow with the release of
Microsoft Office 2007. Microsoft introduced SideShow support for
Windows CE,
Windows Mobile 5.0
Windows Mobile 5.0, originally codenamed "Magneto",De Herrera, Chris pocketpcfaq.com. Retrieved September 6, 2007. was released at Microsoft's Mobile and Embedded Developers Conference 2005 in Las Vegas, May 9–12, 2005. Microsoft offered mains ...
, and
Windows Mobile 6.0
Windows Mobile 6, formerly codenamed "Crossbow",De Herrera, Chris pocketpcfaq.com. Retrieved September 6, 2007. was the version of Windows Mobile released on February 12, 2007 at the 3GSM World Congress 2007. It comes in three different versions: ...
in 2008 and released modules for applications such as
Microsoft Office 2003,
Microsoft PowerPoint
Microsoft PowerPoint is a presentation program, created by Robert Gaskins and Dennis Austin at a software company named Forethought, Inc. It was released on April 20, 1987, initially for Macintosh computers only. Microsoft acquired PowerPoi ...
,
Windows Media Center, and
Windows Sidebar. SideShow was supported with the release of
Windows 7
Windows 7 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was released to manufacturing on July 22, 2009, and became generally available on October 22, 2009. It is the successor to Windows Vista, released nearly ...
in 2009. With the release of
Windows 8.1
Windows 8.1 is a release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was released to manufacturing on August 27, 2013, and broadly released for retail sale on October 17, 2013, about a year after the retail release of its pre ...
in 2013, SideShow was discontinued.
History
Windows Vista
Auxiliary displays were listed by Microsoft among other forms of information indicators for personal computers during the
Windows Hardware Engineering Conference
The Windows Hardware Engineering Community (WinHEC) is a series of technical conferences and workshops, where Microsoft elaborates on its hardware plans for Windows devices.
The WinHEC from 1992 to 2008, which stood for Windows Hardware Engineerin ...
of 2003.
An auxiliary display feature was later presented by Microsoft during the WinHEC 2004 where it was scheduled to be included in Windows Vista, then known by its codename, "Longhorn."
It was intended for
tablet PCs and other mobile devices to provide users with up-to-date information at a glance and to increase the value of the Windows operating system in new mobile scenarios.
Auxiliary display support was included among other mobile features scheduled for the operating system, including
Windows Mobility Center
Windows Mobility Center is a component of Microsoft Windows, introduced in Windows Vista, that centralizes information and settings most relevant to mobile computing.
History
A mobility center that displayed device settings pertinent to mobile de ...
,
speech recognition
Speech recognition is an interdisciplinary subfield of computer science and computational linguistics that develops methodologies and technologies that enable the recognition and translation of spoken language into text by computers with the m ...
, and
Windows HotStart, and was listed as part of Microsoft's mobile PC strategy.
A prototype auxiliary display device was demonstrated by
Intel
Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California. It is the world's largest semiconductor chip manufacturer by revenue, and is one of the developers of the x86 seri ...
at the
Intel Developer Forum
The Intel Developer Forum (IDF) was a biannual gathering of technologists to discuss Intel products and products based on Intel products. The first IDF was held in 1997.
To emphasize the importance of China, the Spring 2007 IDF was held in Beiji ...
conference in fall of 2004.
In February 2005, Microsoft announced that the first beta version of Windows Vista, then codenamed "Longhorn," would include support for the feature; a preliminary
software development kit
A software development kit (SDK) is a collection of software development tools in one installable package. They facilitate the creation of applications by having a compiler, debugger and sometimes a software framework. They are normally specific to ...
would also be released concurrently with the operating system.
At WinHEC 2005, Microsoft released details about the SideShow development platform and discussed new scenarios enabled by the technology.
Prototypes were also produced by several
original equipment manufacturer
An original equipment manufacturer (OEM) is generally perceived as a company that produces non-aftermarket parts and equipment that may be marketed by another manufacturer. It is a common industry term recognized and used by many professional or ...
s (OEMs) and displayed at the conference.
Microsoft would release details a year later at WinHEC 2006 where additional hardware was also displayed.
Windows Vista was
released to manufacturing on November 8, 2006 and includes two SideShow gadgets, one for
Windows Mail and one for
Windows Media Player
Windows Media Player (WMP) is the first media player and media library application that was developed by Microsoft for playing audio, video and viewing images on personal computers running the Microsoft Windows operating system, as well as on ...
.
Microsoft Office 2007, released to manufacturing on the same day as Windows Vista, included an
Outlook 2007 calendar gadget for SideShow.
Windows 7
With Windows 7 Microsoft introduced multiple user support for gadgets, improved the reliability and resiliency of SideShow
API
An application programming interface (API) is a way for two or more computer programs to communicate with each other. It is a type of software Interface (computing), interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standa ...
s for gadgets on multiple devices, improved asynchronous processing
throughput, and updated the SideShow
control panel experience with changes such as a more prominent link to settings and the introduction of
tooltip descriptions for gadgets.
Overview
Windows SideShow displays can be embedded as part of a device itself or as a separate component. Examples include an
electronic visual display
An electronic visual display, informally a screen, is a display device for presentation of images, text, or video transmitted electronically, without producing a permanent record. Electronic visual displays include television sets, computer mon ...
integrated as part of a
keyboard
Keyboard may refer to:
Text input
* Keyboard, part of a typewriter
* Computer keyboard
** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping
** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware
Music
* Musi ...
, or
digital photo frames that can receive information
wireless
Wireless communication (or just wireless, when the context allows) is the transfer of information between two or more points without the use of an electrical conductor, optical fiber or other continuous guided medium for the transfer. The most ...
ly; wireless devices are connected to a
personal computer
A personal computer (PC) is a multi-purpose microcomputer whose size, capabilities, and price make it feasible for individual use. Personal computers are intended to be operated directly by an end user, rather than by a computer expert or tec ...
through wireless network technologies, including
Bluetooth
Bluetooth is a short-range wireless technology standard that is used for exchanging data between fixed and mobile devices over short distances and building personal area networks (PANs). In the most widely used mode, transmission power is limi ...
and
Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi () is a family of wireless network protocols, based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for local area networking of devices and Internet access, allowing nearby digital devices to exchange data by radio wave ...
; manufacturers may also produce detachable displays.
Sideshow devices display various types of information, such as
contacts
Contact lenses, or simply contacts, are thin lenses placed directly on the surface of the eyes. Contact lenses are ocular prosthetic devices used by over 150 million people worldwide, and they can be worn to correct vision or for cosmetic ...
,
calendar appointments, e-mail,
maps, RSS feeds, and can serve as indicators for system information such as battery life and wireless network strength.
Microsoft has published documentation which suggests additional uses for SideShow devices, such as the ability to transmit information and notifications received from a computer across
television
Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...
s and
set-top box
A set-top box (STB), also colloquially known as a cable box and historically television decoder, is an information appliance device that generally contains a TV-tuner input and displays output to a television set and an external source of sign ...
es,
and the ability to serve as a
second screen for PC games and their content (e.g., character statistics or maps) and to enable new multitasking scenarios during gameplay.
SideShow features integration with the Windows desktop gadget feature of Windows Vista and Windows 7, which enables a single gadget to operate simultaneously on a user's desktop while supplying data across devices.
SideShow uses the
Windows Portable Devices infrastructure to communicate with devices;
when viewed as a portable device in
File Explorer, users can also adjust and interact with the files included as part of auxiliary displays.
Auxiliary displays appear in
Device Manager
Device Manager is a component of the Microsoft Windows operating system. It allows users to view and control the hardware attached to the computer. When a piece of hardware is not working, the offending hardware is highlighted for the user to d ...
and integrate with Windows Vista's
Function Discovery technology.
Development platform
A gadget developed for SideShow is written by programming for the Windows SideShow Platform
application programming interface
An application programming interface (API) is a way for two or more computer programs to communicate with each other. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how t ...
—a native code
COM
Com or COM may refer to:
Computing
* COM (hardware interface), a serial port interface on IBM PC-compatible computers
* COM file, or .com file, short for "command", a file extension for an executable file in MS-DOS
* .com, an Internet top-level d ...
-based API introduced in Windows Vista.
A
managed API for
.NET Framework
The .NET Framework (pronounced as "''dot net"'') is a proprietary software framework developed by Microsoft that runs primarily on Microsoft Windows. It was the predominant implementation of the Common Language Infrastructure (CLI) until bein ...
developers was also released by Microsoft, and includes development templates for
Visual Studio 2005
Visual Studio is an integrated development environment (IDE) from Microsoft. It is used to develop computer programs including websites, web apps, web services and mobile apps. Visual Studio uses Microsoft software development platforms such a ...
and
Visual Studio 2008
Visual Studio is an integrated development environment (IDE) from Microsoft. It is used to develop computer programs including web site, websites, web apps, web services and mobile apps. Visual Studio uses Microsoft software development platfor ...
. To aid in the development of gadgets, Microsoft released a SideShow simulator that emulates the functionality of a SideShow-compatible device, thereby allowing developers to test the appearance and functionality of gadgets without requiring physical hardware.
Devices for Windows SideShow have different hardware traits than devices such as
mobile phone
A mobile phone, cellular phone, cell phone, cellphone, handphone, hand phone or pocket phone, sometimes shortened to simply mobile, cell, or just phone, is a portable telephone that can make and receive calls over a radio frequency link whil ...
s or
PDAs. The former have their own processor; they need not rely solely on a connection to a computer for processing tasks. There are online and offline abilities that allow the device to run larger components on the connected computer. The following list contains typical device display types and technologies.
Hardware-specific, native applications that provide rich-media experiences like
audio
Audio most commonly refers to sound, as it is transmitted in signal form. It may also refer to:
Sound
*Audio signal, an electrical representation of sound
*Audio frequency, a frequency in the audio spectrum
*Digital audio, representation of sound ...
and
video
Video is an electronic medium for the recording, copying, playback, broadcasting, and display of moving visual media. Video was first developed for mechanical television systems, which were quickly replaced by cathode-ray tube (CRT) syste ...
playback that can be accessed through the SideShow user interface require the SDK from the specific platform vendor. For example,
Nvidia
Nvidia CorporationOfficially written as NVIDIA and stylized in its logo as VIDIA with the lowercase "n" the same height as the uppercase "VIDIA"; formerly stylized as VIDIA with a large italicized lowercase "n" on products from the mid 1990s to ...
provides the ''Preface'' platform that includes abilities like
MP3,
AAC
AAC may refer to:
Aviation
* Advanced Aircraft, a company from Carlsbad, California
* Alaskan Air Command, a radar network
* American Aeronautical Corporation, a company from Port Washington, New York
* American Aviation, a company from Cleveland, ...
,
MPEG-4
MPEG-4 is a group of international standards for the compression of digital audio and visual data, multimedia systems, and file storage formats. It was originally introduced in late 1998 as a group of audio and video coding formats and related tec ...
encode-decode and other digital media formats.
Market acceptance
Few OEMs accepted SideShow.
In 2007, Asus announced the W5Fe, a laptop with a full-color, 2.8-inch SideShow display on the front cover.
In 2006, after being featured at
WinHEC, the 7-inch and 10-inch "Momento"
digital photo frames were released by their developer, A Living Picture, and provided Sideshow functionality over WiFi. They were subsequently marketed by
i-mate along with its Momento Live picture service, before being shut down in 2009.
In October 2007, Dell released the XPS 420, which included a Sideshow device on the top front of the machine. It was not widely promoted, found little use and was quietly dropped when the XPS 430 came out a year later.
Intoware (formerly Ikanos Consulting) provided
AccuWeather
AccuWeather Inc. is an American media company that provides commercial weather forecasting services worldwide.
AccuWeather was founded in 1962 by Joel N. Myers, then a Pennsylvania State University graduate student working on a master's degree i ...
,
Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...
,
Flickr,
iTunes
iTunes () is a software program that acts as a media player, media library, mobile device management utility, and the client app for the iTunes Store. Developed by Apple Inc., it is used to purchase, play, download, and organize digital mul ...
,
Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
, and
Windows Live Messenger
MSN Messenger (also known colloquially simply as "Messenger"), later rebranded as Windows Live Messenger, was a cross-platform instant messaging client, instant-messaging client developed by Microsoft. It connected to the Microsoft Messenger ser ...
.
On February 1, 2010, Ikanos Consulting announced Threemote, a suite of Windows SideShow-compatible products for embedded platforms including
Windows Mobile
Windows Mobile is a discontinued family of mobile operating systems developed by Microsoft for smartphones and personal digital assistants.
Its origin dated back to Windows CE in 1996, though Windows Mobile itself first appeared in 2000 as Pock ...
, Google
Android
Android may refer to:
Science and technology
* Android (robot), a humanoid robot or synthetic organism designed to imitate a human
* Android (operating system), Google's mobile operating system
** Bugdroid, a Google mascot sometimes referred to ...
, and Kopin Golden-i. Threemote appears unsupported and had been unavailable from the Android Market for some time , nor was it available for Windows Mobile. In a blog posting in April 2010, the technical director of Ikanos consulting said that Sideshow was not dead and Threemote was "bubbling along".
On February 7, 2012, Chris James released "MS Sideshow Device", an implementation of a Windows Sideshow device for
Android
Android may refer to:
Science and technology
* Android (robot), a humanoid robot or synthetic organism designed to imitate a human
* Android (operating system), Google's mobile operating system
** Bugdroid, a Google mascot sometimes referred to ...
.
Microsoft discontinued the Sideshow gallery. A duplication of the sideshow gallery content is available at Windows Sidebar Gadget Gallery.
With the introduction of Windows 8.1, Microsoft discontinued the technology and removed support for SideShow devices from the operating system.
See also
*
Smart Personal Objects Technology
The Smart Personal Objects Technology (SPOT) is a discontinued initiative by Microsoft to create intelligent and personal home appliances, consumer electronics, and other objects through new hardware capabilities and software features.
Developme ...
References
External links
Windows SideShow Managed API 1.0 SDK DownloadMSDN link for Windows SideShow
{{Windows Components
Discontinued Windows components
Microsoft initiatives
SideShow
In North America, a sideshow is an extra, secondary production associated with a circus, carnival, fair, or other such attraction.
Types
There are four main types of classic sideshow attractions:
*The Ten-in-One offers a program of ten seq ...