It's not immediately obvious but after spending half an hour trying to get my laptop to display Aero Glass instead of the opaque Aero theme I finally discovered that Glass is automatically turned off whilst using the Power Saver power plan. If you got to "Window Color and Appearance" and the "Enable Transparency" checkbox won't stay selected, check your current power plan.

Oh, and here is the Go-Live license...

http://msdn.microsoft.com/winfx/downloads/products/golive/default.aspx

Both Office 2007 and Windows Vista Beta 2 have been released. If you are an MSDN subscriber then you can pick up copies from subscriber downloads. If you are not then you can get Office from http://www.microsoft.com/uk/office/preview and Vista from the Vista Customer Preview Program (coming soon but register here).

In addition, if you want to do development for Vista you will need the following (in order of install):

1. Install the BETA 2 WinFX Runtime Components from here.
2. [ONLY REQUIRED FOR VS2005] Install the Windows SDK BETA 2 from here.
3. [ONLY REQUIRED FOR VS2005] Install the VS2005 WinFX extensions (Visual Studio ‘Orcas’ May CTP) from here.
4. Install Microsoft Expression Interactive Designer May CTP (Sparkle) from here.
5. Install Microsoft Expression Graphic Designer May CTP (Acrylic) from here.
6. Install Microsoft Expression Web Designer (Quartz) CTP1 from here.
7. Install Erain’s ZAM3D from here.
8. Check out videos on the Expression Suite here.

For Office development you'll need:

1. Install the Visual Studio Tools for Office (VSTO) June CTP from here.
2. Install the Windows SharePoint Services v3 SDK from here.
3. Install the SharePoint Server 2007 SDK from here.
4. Browse the SharePoint SDK documentation here.
5. Don't forget the new SharePoint Developer Center on MSDN.
6. Check out videos on SharePoint here (more to come later).

<edit>

1. The Groove SDK can be found here.

</edit>

Microsoft have adjusted their goals and dates for Windows Longhorn. Primarily by relegating WinFS to an add-on that will be shipped later; but also committing to ship Indigo and Avalon on XP and Windows 2003 systems. There is no mention of the user experience (Aero) though. More details can be found here:

• WinFX on Windows XP and Windows Server 2003
• What WinFX on Down-Level Windows Means for Developers
• Microsoft Announces 2006 Target Date for Windows "Longhorn" Client
• Microsoft to Gut Longhorn to Make 2006 Delivery Date
• Gates: Longhorn changed to make deadlines

[Edit: Jim Allchin, the Group Vice President for Platforms at Microsoft, is on video at Channel 9 explaining the details.]