About every 4/5 months we start asking again but get no confirmations/denials... So... we wait.
Well, it's now been eight (8) months since this topic started and still no sign of the improved XPE.

And all the time, I'm looking at the new version of Picasa and I'm thinking, "Hmmm... nice thumbnails. Superb printing. Nice basic photo retouching. In fact, even the advanced retouching is pretty good. The cropping and rotating are excellent. Multiple undo levels. Original picture reversion. The one thing that it doesn't have is complete integration with Xara. Hmmm..."

And, as I continue to get familiar with Picasa, I have to ask myself how much that integration really matters to me.