It has been two years since Microsoft rallied developers at its Professional Developers Conference (PDC). But the company is promising the wait will be worth it. Redmond is due to take the wraps off its Longhorn Windows, Yukon SQL Server and Whidbey tool suite, which kicks off on Sunday. Check back here for up-to-the-minute reports from the keynotes, sessions, BOFs and meetings live from Los Angeles.

Longhorn Hot Buttons

PDC: A Guide for the Perplexed

More Buzzwords and Acronyms Deciphered

Indigo: Cutting Through the Hype

PDC Build of Longhorn Leaks

Longhorn: Can Microsoft Deliver on Its Promises This Time?

All PDC Roads Lead to WinFS

PDC Build Escapes the Longhorn Corral

Readers Weigh In on Longhorn Due Date

Seven Things to Know About Longhorn

It's Official: No Longhorn Until 2006

More Longhorn Teases from Microsoft Partner Confab

Longhorn to Get NUI Foundation Platform

Gates Foreshadows Longhorn Advances

Finally: A Confirmation of Longhorn Server

Longhorn's Gonna Have Game

Panther vs. Longhorn: The Rematch

Yukon Topics of Interest

The Yukon, Whidbey Dating Game

Yukon PDC Beta Build Is Out

All PDC Roads Lead to WinFS

Yukon Beta 1 Makes Its Debut

Mining for Yukon Nuggets

Developers Get a Peek at Yukon

Whidbey Directions

'ClickOnce' to Debut in Whidbey

Whidbey Goes Alpha

What New Features Are on Tap for Whidbey?

More Hot PDC News: From Microsoft Watch and Other Sources Around the Web

PDC Code Names You Need to Know

Longhorn: Next version of Windows; will come in both client and server flavors. Client is expected in 2006

Yukon: Next version of SQL Server database, expected to ship in latter half of 2004

Whidbey: Next version of Visual Studio tool suite; expected to ship in latter half of 2004

Aero: Longhorn 3D-rendering user interface

Avalon: Core set of Longhorn application programming interfaces (APIs) for handling graphics/presentation chores

Indigo: Next release of Microsoft's Web-services infrastructure that will underlie Longhorn ; will include .NET Remoting + MSMQ + ASMX + .NET Enterprise Services (a k a COM+)

WinFS: Windows File System data-store that Longhorn will borrow from Microsoft's SQL Server Yukon database; will be able to store XML and metadata in a single place

Palladium : Microsoft's Next Generating Secure Computing Base (NGSCB) secure-OS subsystem that will debut in Longhorn

Source: Microsoft Watch

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