Rumour - Kinect for Windows SDK to launch on Thursday

Rumour has it Microsoft will release a software development kit for Kinect for Windows this week.

WinRumors reports Microsoft will announce the SDK during a live-streamed Channel 9 event on Thursday.

Microsoft's Spanish president María Garaña mentioned the SDK would see the light of day this week, speaking at the La Red Innova conference in Madrid.

The SDK is said to be a limited release beta, with the following features:

• Robust Skeletal Tracking for high-performance capabilities that track the skeleton image of one or two persons moving within the Kinect field of view
• Advanced Audio Capabilities, including four-element microphone array with sophisticated acoustic noise and echo cancellation for great audio; beam formation to identify the current sound source and integration with the Windows speech recognition API also included
• XYZ depth camera for standard color camera stream access and depth data that indicates the distance of the object from the Kinect camera

Microsoft has indicated it wants to see Kinect as an independent platform, not just an Xbox 360 peripheral. It has maintained an open attitude to homebrew development for the device.

Thanks, Joystiq.