On the day of Apple's digital textbooks announcement, Microsoft touts Windows-based slates for the classroom

Microsoft just outed today on its Windows Team Blog an epic post how Windows-based slates are suitable for and invading classrooms around the world.

By coincidence, in a few minutes Apple is scheduled to unveil its rumored digital textbook project, codenamed Bliss, which is expected to use tablets for interactive textbooks in the classrooms.

Apple's project is said to target the K-12 crowd, and the company's Internet software head, Eddy Cue, is expected to take centerstage. Microsoft's post touts Windows 7 tablets as very suitable for educational purposes, as they provide "familiar interface and ability to safeguard information".

The educational market is very lucrative, as the recent courting of Turkey by Apple and Google over its 15 million-strong tablet order for its schools shows, so it's only natural that Microsoft wouldn't like to be one-upped there by Apple. The post also provides testimonies from various education-related companies around the world what Windows-based tablets have brought to the school experience.

source: WindowsTeamBlog