My team is the evangelism team for DirectX, so I’d say we work extremely close with the DirectX team since we are a part of it. And as far as the IHVs, one of my primary responsibilities is managing the relationships between Microsoft and the various graphics companies. We do have direct and indirect influence on the product - my team is also responsible for working with all of the Windows game developers on a global basis. We look to them to use our technology in their games and give us feedback and suggestions on how to make DirectX a better and more useable product.

Does the battle of the IHVs affect your work with ISVs in anyway? How often have the words "NVIDIA" and "ATI" cropped up in your conversations with ISVs and what are they usually about?

In some ways, yes - we need to make sure our API works on all hardware and also make sure the games that are shipping are using the latest version of DirectX and all the new features. And I don’t think I’ve ever had a conversation with a game developer when both ATI and Nvidia didn’t come up during the meeting… graphics and graphics chip companies are a huge component of game development these days, so it’s only natural the market leaders would be a common topic!

You mentioned that your line of work entails working with the IHVs. What sort of work would that be, and what aspects of this relationship with various IHVs are the most important?

As I mentioned earlier, I am responsible for managing the relationship between the graphics IHVs and Microsoft. That entails doing everything from facilitating meetings to tracking their roadmaps and technology implementation. I also deal with some of the marketing and event and a load of other things… essentially what ever comes up!

It's been a vicious one-year battle between NVIDIA and ATI. How do you see the IHV landscape and industry shaping up in the next year or so? What sort of specific role does DirectX play in the determination of who wins and who loses in the IHV war?

That’s a tough question and one I don’t think I should extrapolate on - the good news is that the ultimate winner here is the consumer - competition makes both companies (as well as the other companies in this segment) build better faster and more cost effective products. I don’t think DirectX plays a role on who wins or who loses - I think that is a matter of which company executes the best and is able to leverage the technology across their entire product line.

The next Microsoft OS, codenamed "Longhorn", will take much more advantage of the capabilities of video cards, from the desktop to gaming. In your view and from what you can tell us now, what aspects of the next Windows are you most excited about that will benefit the ISVs and the gaming community?

In October, we held PDC (Professional Developers Conference) in Los Angeles. We had over 7000 developers there to learn about the functionality and features of Longhorn. Most of those attending were not game developers; it’s geared toward the rest of the software development community. One exciting thing to me is that we are giving these developers a new set of tools that will enable capabilities and features we haven’t even thought of yet - and related to that I can’t wait to get these same tools into the hands of the game development community, game developers historically take these things and use them in new and innovative ways. I don’t think I can even begin to guess what sort of things these guys will do with these tools, but I’m really excited to see what happens!

It has also been said that Longhorn will come with the next full version of DirectX, tentatively called DirectX Next (DXNext), of which this site has written an early preview. The DirectX Meltdown 2003 slides indicate a number of innovative features. Have you been discussing DXNext with the ISVs and IHVs, or are you concentrating solely on DX9 for now? If you have been working with ISVs and IHVs on DXNext, could you let us know which of the many DXNext features indicated in the Meltdown 2003 presentation have generated the most enthusiasm/optimism from the ISVs and IHVs?

We don’t comment on unannounced products but I can reiterate that we work very closely with the Game ISV community to get their feedback on any technology we are going to build for their use. We have several advisory boards that are made up of industry leaders in graphics, networking, audio and all of the other disciplines we build technology for - these advisors are intimately involved in directing us on next generation products and technologies. That’s about as much as I can comment at this point, sorry!

Is there a Microsoft webpage that we can visit to learn more about what your department is doing?

Yes there is, its http://www.microsoft.com/windows/directx/default.aspx

*You might also wish to have a look at this page - Beyond3D

Finally, is Mr Bill Gates Neo or Morpheus in the upcoming Microsoft promotional video? Is he any good at kung fu?

I’m not sure what video to which you are referring. And as far as Kung Fu, I would guess he would be good at anything he set his mind to; he’s a pretty smart guy.

This interviewer had recently read that Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer would be in a Microsoft advertisement that uses The Matrix theme - Beyond3D

We would like to express our thanks to Chris and to Stacey Tsurusaki (Microsoft) for their time. As Windows as an operating system continues to grow and improve as the platform for tools and game development, not many realize just how much work and effort are involved behind the scenes at Microsoft's various departments. We're sure many developers appreciate the work and support offered by Chris and his team.

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