__NOTOC__ Neptune was the

codename A code name, call sign or cryptonym is a code word or name used, sometimes clandestinely, to refer to another name, word, project, or person. Code names are often used for military purposes, or in espionage. They may also be used in industrial c ...

for a version of

Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for ...

under development in 1999. Based on

Windows 2000 Windows 2000 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft and oriented towards businesses. It was the direct successor to Windows NT 4.0, and was released to manufacturing on December 15, 1999, and was offici ...

, it was to replace the

Windows 9x Windows 9x is a generic term referring to a series of Microsoft Windows computer operating systems produced from 1995 to 2000, which were based on the Windows 95 kernel and its underlying foundation of MS-DOS, both of which were updated in sub ...

series and was scheduled to be the first home consumer-oriented version of Windows built on

Windows NT Windows NT is a proprietary graphical operating system produced by Microsoft, the first version of which was released on July 27, 1993. It is a processor-independent, multiprocessing and multi-user operating system. The first version of Win ...

code.

History

Neptune largely resembled Windows 2000, but some new features were introduced. Neptune included a logon screen similar to that later used in Windows XP. A

firewall Firewall may refer to: * Firewall (computing), a technological barrier designed to prevent unauthorized or unwanted communications between computer networks or hosts * Firewall (construction), a barrier inside a building, designed to limit the spre ...

new to Neptune was later integrated into Windows XP as the

Windows Firewall Windows Firewall (officially called Microsoft Defender Firewall in Windows 10 version 2004 and later) is a firewall component of Microsoft Windows. It was first included in Windows XP SP2 and Windows Server 2003 SP1. Before the release of Windo ...

. Neptune also experimented with a new

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and

Win32 The Windows API, informally WinAPI, is Microsoft's core set of application programming interfaces (APIs) available in the Microsoft Windows operating systems. The name Windows API collectively refers to several different platform implementations th ...

-based user interface originally intended for

Windows Me Windows Millennium Edition, or Windows Me (marketed with the pronunciation of the pronoun "me"), is an operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of Microsoft Windows operating systems. It is the successor to Windo ...

, called Activity Centers, for task-centered operations. Only one

alpha Alpha (uppercase , lowercase ; grc, ἄλφα, ''álpha'', or ell, άλφα, álfa) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of one. Alpha is derived from the Phoenician letter aleph , whi ...

build of Neptune, 5111, was released to testers under a

non-disclosure agreement A non-disclosure agreement (NDA) is a legal contract or part of a contract between at least two parties that outlines confidential material, knowledge, or information that the parties wish to share with one another for certain purposes, but wis ...

, and later made its way to various beta collectors' sites and virtual museums in 2000. Other builds of Neptune are known to exist due to information in beta builds of

and

Windows XP Windows XP is a major release of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. It was release to manufacturing, released to manufacturing on August 24, 2001, and later to retail on October 25, 2001. It is a direct upgrade to its predecessors, Wind ...

. In November 2015, a build 5111.6 disk was shown in a Microsoft Channel 9 video; version 5111 was the last build of Neptune that was sent to external testers, with the .1 or .6 after the build number stands for variant, not for compile. It is the only build of Neptune that made its way to the public. Build 5111 included Activity Centers, which could be installed by copying ACCORE.DLL from the installation disk to the hard drive and then running

regsvr32 In computing, regsvr32 (Register Server) is a command-line utility in Microsoft Windows and ReactOS for registering and unregistering DLLs and ActiveX controls in the operating system Registry. Despite the suffix "32" in the name of the file, ...

on ACCORE.DLL. The centers contained traces of

, then code-named Millennium, but were broken due to

JavaScript JavaScript (), often abbreviated as JS, is a programming language that is one of the core technologies of the World Wide Web, alongside HTML and CSS. As of 2022, 98% of websites use JavaScript on the client side for webpage behavior, of ...

errors, missing links and executables to the Game, Photo, and Music Centers. In response, some Windows enthusiasts have spent years fixing Activity Centers in build 5111 close to what Microsoft intended. In early 2000, Microsoft merged the team working on Neptune with that developing

Odyssey The ''Odyssey'' (; grc, Ὀδύσσεια, Odýsseia, ) is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences. As with the '' Iliad'', ...

, the successor to Windows 2000 for business customers. The combined team worked on a new project codenamed ''Whistler'', which was released at the end of 2001 as

. In the meantime, Microsoft released Windows Me in 2000 as their final 9x series installment. Some development builds of Whistler feature an improved version of the

logon screen In computer security, logging in (or logging on, signing in, or signing on) is the process by which an individual gains access to a computer system by identifying and authenticating themselves. The user credentials are typically some fo ...

found in Neptune build 5111. In the early roadmap for Neptune's development (shown in the 1998–2001 ''

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'' documents) there were five

service pack In computing, a service pack comprises a collection of updates, fixes, or enhancements to a computer program, software program delivered in the form of a single installable package. Companies often release a service pack when the number of individ ...

s planned. Also in these documents, it shows that Neptune was to have a successor named Triton which would be a minor update with very few user interface changes, and service packs were planned for it. Internally, the project's name was capitalized as NepTune.

References

{{History of Windows

Neptune Neptune is the eighth planet from the Sun and the farthest known planet in the Solar System. It is the fourth-largest planet in the Solar System by diameter, the third-most-massive planet, and the densest giant planet. It is 17 time ...

History

See also

References