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How has Bill Gates' thinking evolved over the years? Internal Microsoft memos and e-mails provide a glimpse inside his mind, showing how he has approached the struggles and opportunities facing the company, from BASIC to Windows Vista. Microsoft has made some of these messages public as part of its historical record, but many were disclosed in lawsuits against the company. Click the links to read the source documents.

February 1976: "An open letter to hobbyists": In this seminal message, a young Bill Gates rails against software piracy among early computer hobbyists and displays the blunt approach for which he will become known: "As the majority of hobbyists must be aware," he writes, "most of you steal your software."

April 1987: "Microsoft is #1": In a message to his top executives, Gates marks the moment that the company passes Lotus as the largest software company: "Of course their sales may go past ours again and it's not really our goal to be #1, but I do get a real kick out of the fight that their big distraction of being the largest is being taken away BEFORE WE HAVE EVEN BEGUN TO REALLY COMPETE WITH THEM," he writes.

October 1988: "Australian Trip Report" (PDF): This diary of an overseas trip provides insights into Gates' focus and concerns as Microsoft expands internationally. The memo also demonstrates the growing public interest in Gates: "I gave the same one hour speech four times this day and five times the next day," he writes.

April 1993: "Chicago schedule" (PDF): Gates sounds the alarm over a delay in the schedule for "Chicago," the code name for what would become the Windows 95 operating system. "This is a major disaster as far as I am concerned," he writes. "All of my efforts to get the applications groups to synchronize to Chicago will be wiped out by this kind of schedule slip."

January 1994: "12 month progress report" (PDF): In a memo to Microsoft employees, Gates outlines the company's growing set of competitors, including IBM, Sun, Novell, Apple, WordPerfect, Oracle and Lotus -- warning, among other things, that Microsoft has been too slow to counter Lotus Notes. He exhorts the troops: "Anticipating and responding to our competitors is critical to our future success. This is a fast moving, intensely competitive industry."

January 1995: "RE: Barksdale joins Netscape" (PDF): Gates reacts to Netscape's hiring of veteran Jim Barksdale as its chief executive -- foreshadowing the Web browser wars, in which Microsoft's tactics would form the center of the U.S. government's antitrust case against the company. "I am really surprised," Gates writes, adding that Barksdale "is a very good manager and very experienced." He concludes, "Netscape is getting to be more and more important (for) us to watch!"

May 1995: "Internet Tidal Wave" (PDF): Later than many would have expected, Gates assigns the Internet "the highest level of importance" for the company, saying that it "will set the course of our industry for a long time to come."

June 1997: "RE: Moving forward with Mac Office 97" (PDF): Gates encourages an executive who urges the company to complete the next version of its Office software for Macintosh computers, desipite an uncertain relationship with Apple: "I appreciate your mail," he writes. "It shows the kind of passion about great products that has made Microsoft successful. I admit we have neglected the Mac business." At the same time, he asks, "Can we avoid Apple knowing how far along we are for the next 30 days?"

October 1997: "RE: IBM" (PDF): In an e-mail to future CEO Steve Ballmer and other top Microsoft executives, Gates outlines the company's uneasy relationship with IBM, compared with other PC vendors: "Overall, we will never have the same relationship with IBM that we have with Compaq, Dell and even HP because of their software ambitions. I could deal with this just fine if they weren't such rabid JAVA backers," he said, referring to a rival Sun Microsystems technology.

June 1998: "Our smartphone strategy -- responding to Symbian" (PDF): Gates recounts a conversation with the CEO of cell phone maker Nokia and outlines the company's strategy in the key market for mobile phone software: "I said our main concern was getting a group with critical mass together and if they had come to us with Ericsson/Motorola we would have loved to do a Symbian type deal," he writes. "I said the notion we weren't willing to tailor the software was wrong and that the term 'OS' is just part of what we were talking about doing together."

January 2002: "Trustworthy Computing": Responding to mounting criticism, Gates declares security the company's top priority: "In the past, we've made our software and services more compelling for users by adding new features and functionality, and by making our platform richly extensible. We've done a terrific job at that, but all those great features won't matter unless customers trust our software. So now, when we face a choice between adding features and resolving security issues, we need to choose security."

March 2002: "Windows/Office Roadmap" (PDF): Gates sets a mid-2004 completion date for Longhorn, the internal code name for the operating system that would come to be known as Windows Vista. "There is a lot of great progress being made despite the size of the challenge," he writes. In reality, after a series of delays, it isn't released until early 2007 -- to mixed reviews and with only some of the ambitious features that Gates once envisioned.

May 2002: "Windows royalty for school projects" (PDF): In a message to top Microsoft executives, Gates underscores the threat posed to Windows by the open-source Linux operating system, telling a story about Microsoft losing out on school contracts on the basis of price: "I am not saying this is easy to figure out but if we are going to avoid just rotting away to Linux we need to find boundaries like this and do something," he writes.

April 2003: "Apple's Jobs again ..." (PDF): Gates marvels at the deals struck by Apple CEO Steve Jobs for the iTunes Music Store, and tells executives that Microsoft needs to come up with a viable alternative of its own. Jobs' "ability to focus in on a few things that count, get people who get user interface right and market things as revolutionary are amazing things," Gates writes. "This time somehow he has applied his talents in getting a better licensing deal than anyone else has gotten for music."

October 2005: "Internet Software Services": In this message, Gates laid out Microsoft's new strategy of incorporating online services into its software, and broadening its business to pursue more advertising revenue. The memo is also notable for recognizing the expanded strategic role of Microsoft executive Ray Ozzie, who was still relatively new to the company. Less than a year later, Gates announced plans to step down from day-to-day duties and named Ozzie to take his place as chief software architect.