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To those of you who sent me notes speculating/wondering whether Microsoft’s Midori might be a derivative of the Midori Linux effort and/or the Midori lightweight Web browser project, I’ll reiterate that I don’t believe these other Midori projects have anything to do with Microsoft’s Midori.

Microsoft’s Midori — from what little I’ve been able to glean about it — is a next-generation Microsoft operating system that is currently in “incubation” — meaning that it’s likely to be launched sooner than a typical Microsoft Research project, but not so soon as to obviate the need for Windows 7 and Windows 8. In other words, we’re looking at a new non-Windows operating system to debut some time before CEO Steve Ballmer retires (a date Ballmer has said is nine or so years away), but not before late 2009/early 2010 (the target date for Windows 7).

As I noted last week, my sources have said that Midori has something to do with “Singularity,” the Microsoft Research effort to develop a non-Windows-based operating system from scratch. Midori is the realization that Windows as it exists today isn’t the be-all/end-all. Microsoft isn’t going to continue to deliver updates to its flagship product without thinking ahead as to what might come next.

(For another view on Microsoft’s OS plans, see Ed Bott’s “Why you’ll have a long wait for Microsoft’s next OS.”]

Since I posted my initial blog entry on Midori, I’ve received a few additional (and unconfirmed) tips. One that was especially intriguing: Midori is another attempt by Microsoft to deliver on “Cairo,” Microsoft’s distributed, object-oriented operating system that never saw the light of day.