When Microsoft releases the first beta of its Longhorn version of Windows, it will include a nearly complete version of the product's Web services-based communication framework, code-named Indigo, a Microsoft product manager confirmed this week. A Microsoft partner familiar with Indigo's product development cycle told the IDG News Service at the recent Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC) that engineers working on Indigo, which Microsoft promises will simplify the creation of Web services, had nearly finished their work. "They're not doing a lot of work with new features at this point," said Andrew Brust, chief of new technology at Citigate Cunningham, a New York-based consulting company and Microsoft partner. This week Ari Bixhorn, director of Web services strategy for Microsoft's platform strategy group, said that the version of Indigo included in beta 1 of Longhorn will closely resemble what Microsoft will release to manufacturing with Longhorn, giving developers an opportunity to start building applications using the Indigo programming model. Longhorn is expected to ship at the end of next year.