Windows Phone 'Mango' released to manufacturing

Windows Phone 7.5, code-named 'Mango', has been released to manufacturing according to a blog entry by Microsoft's Terry Myerson, Corporate Vice President, Windows Phone Engineering.

Code for new phones has been delivered to handset makers. At this point, the ball is in their court. Microsoft will now work on the code for updating existing Windows Phone 7 handsets to Mango. This code will be ready in the fall.

Mango adds many new features to Windows Phone, including app multitasking, Internet Explorer 9, and threads which coordinate messaging and chat from different sources into one conversation.

In addition to these and other social integration features, Mango will support Outlook Tasks, synch with Microsoft's Office 365 and Skydrive services and support Microsoft Lync.

"We can't wait to get Mango in your hands so you can experience all the new features for yourself and give us feedback on where to go next", Myerson writes. "As we reach additional milestones we will be back to share more but until then, thank you for your support of Windows Phone".

Yes, but when?

Larry Seltzer is a freelance writer and consultant, dealing mostly with security matters. He has written recently for Infoworld, eWEEK, Dr. Dobb's Journal, and is a Contributing Editor at PC Magazine and author of their Security Watch blog. He has also written for Symantec Authentication (formerly VeriSign) and Lumension's Intelligent Whitelisting site.