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• Southern Cross have upgraded their US link from 600Gbps to 860Gbps.
• Telstra and Alcatel are landing their new 1.3Tbps cable to Hawaii
• PIPE Networks are on track with their 1.9Tbps cable to Guam.

I have to admit i've always been at a total loss as to why redhat could have the same sort of market cap as someone like Sun (at least pre-takeover rumours).

I suppose it's certainly more profitable to take other people's work and package it up, but what does that offer to a buyer?

RedHat is the leading corporate contributor to the Linux Kernel.

What they do for the buyer is make sure that their distro will work with certain software so that ISV's can certify the platform.

For example... You want to run SAP CRM. Maybe you can get it to work on Debian or Ubuntu, but SAP won't support it, and you likely need SAP support. They have certified it to run on RedHat Enterprise Linux so you can use that.

That's what most people care about. ISV support. If all you're doing is running a LAMP stack, then you probably don't care and will run CentOS, Debian, Ubuntu Server, etc. In fact, I believe a lot of hosting companies have been switching to CentOS ever since RedHat no longer provided a free version other than fedora.

They also have other products that run on RHEL.

It is a new version, they are working on it.

First, the main thrust of my post was really to comment that getting to the desktop BEFORE everything else is running is a victory simply not worth fighting for.

I.e.deferring things to startup AFTER you arrive at the desktop to give you the appearance of a faster boot time is pointless if you need those things to actually use it... or even if the fact that those things are still starting up is pegging your cpu/hard drive making it essentially unsusable even if you aren't loading something dependant on the items still loading.

That said...

The entire distribution is 50 MB and it includes network, Gui, etc... Based on your numbers above we should be able to load this entire distro into Memory within a second or two, maybe another 2-3 additional seconds if you want to add a 3d desktop like Compiz.

I think potentially, yes, this is theoretically possible. There is a laptop out there, for example, with an instant on Linux distro flashed into the BIOS, that you can use to quickly browse the web etc, without having to boot up the OS off the hard drive.

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/77281,asus-laptops-to-offer-instanton-linux.aspx

So this absolutely -can- exist. I'm not sure just how instant, instant-on is here, but it sounds like its in the 3-5 seconds range.

Other services could potentially be loaded in the background after the login screen and/or desktop are available.

I think this is a bad idea. See above, for why.

I see little reason why an OS like Ubuntu can't reduce boot times down to the sub 10 second range with a little work. It's all about scheduling.

Sure, I agree 10 seconds is quite concievable conceivable.

However much beyond that and I think coping with querying the hardware itself will take longer than that. Just querying all the buses etc to make sure nothing has changed will probably take a few seconds.

If the OS has to do a bunch of initializations every time it start up, why cant it just do a memory dump after those initializations, then only load the ones that change every time the computer starts?

Why bother reinventing the wheel? We ALREADY have "suspend to RAM" and "suspend to Disk" and that is basically already what it does. Trouble is, the device drivers have to support it for it to work properly. And it turns out that, for suspend to disk at least, that reading in the big ballooned out memory image to and from disk is usually SLOWER than just booting clean because of all the extra data involved.

And on top of that you STILL have to wait for a pile of device initialization because simply loading in your network/video/audio/etc driver to a particular ram image state doesn't do a thing towards actually putting the network/video/audio/etc device into a suitable state.

(This is in fact precisely why you need a dedicated protocol to communicate you are going into and out of suspend and device driver support for it.)

copy that:

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/68078,pipe-network-undersea-cable-to-boost-australian-broadband.aspx

I'm with you on a schedule of TV programs containing no creative content just like a list of phone numbers taken from a phone book. Ohhh wait - several years ago a company that used to scan phone numbers and names from a paper phone book got sued successfully by the national phone carrier Telstra as it being a copyright violation. They didn't copy the artisitic layout of the phonebook, it was merely a list of names and numbers in a database format. That only reached the Federal Court because the company went bankrupt before taking it to the High Court:

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/15696,fiveyear-telstra-copyright-fight-destroys-content-provider.aspx

> I still sent him (or rather his office) an email asking him if he was considering open source

You weren't alone.

http://www.fsdaily.com/Government/An_Open_Letter_to_the_New_Australian_Prime_Minister_Kevin_Rudd/related_links

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/79966,community-to-gillard-consider-open-source.aspx

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/73376,open-source-the-biggest-potential-game-changer-for-government-senator-lundy.aspx

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/76453,cebit-08-senator-lundy-lobbies-for-open-source-change.aspx

There were many calls from the Australian wider community for Rudd to consider open source.

Now, with the new (and relatively inexpensive) "netbooks" coming on to the market, many of them with Linux pre-installed, this seems more and more like the sensible way for the government to go.

The government could even be very smart here, and source the "Linux netbooks for education" from an Australian supplier:

http://www.pioneercomputers.com.au/products/products.asp?c1=3&c2=12

All of the Pioneer DreamBook Light computers can be purchased with Ubuntu pre-installed as an option. No Windows tax with Australian taxpayers money being paid un-necessarily to an American company. Local product, from a local company.

> I still sent him (or rather his office) an email asking him if he was considering open source

You weren't alone.

http://www.fsdaily.com/Government/An_Open_Letter_to_the_New_Australian_Prime_Minister_Kevin_Rudd/related_links

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/79966,community-to-gillard-consider-open-source.aspx

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/73376,open-source-the-biggest-potential-game-changer-for-government-senator-lundy.aspx

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/76453,cebit-08-senator-lundy-lobbies-for-open-source-change.aspx

There were many calls from the Australian wider community for Rudd to consider open source.

Now, with the new (and relatively inexpensive) "netbooks" coming on to the market, many of them with Linux pre-installed, this seems more and more like the sensible way for the government to go.

The government could even be very smart here, and source the "Linux netbooks for education" from an Australian supplier:

http://www.pioneercomputers.com.au/products/products.asp?c1=3&c2=12

All of the Pioneer DreamBook Light computers can be purchased with Ubuntu pre-installed as an option. No Windows tax with Australian taxpayers money being paid un-necessarily to an American company. Local product, from a local company.

> I still sent him (or rather his office) an email asking him if he was considering open source

You weren't alone.

http://www.fsdaily.com/Government/An_Open_Letter_to_the_New_Australian_Prime_Minister_Kevin_Rudd/related_links

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/79966,community-to-gillard-consider-open-source.aspx

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/73376,open-source-the-biggest-potential-game-changer-for-government-senator-lundy.aspx

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/76453,cebit-08-senator-lundy-lobbies-for-open-source-change.aspx

There were many calls from the Australian wider community for Rudd to consider open source.

Now, with the new (and relatively inexpensive) "netbooks" coming on to the market, many of them with Linux pre-installed, this seems more and more like the sensible way for the government to go.

The government could even be very smart here, and source the "Linux netbooks for education" from an Australian supplier:

http://www.pioneercomputers.com.au/products/products.asp?c1=3&c2=12

All of the Pioneer DreamBook Light computers can be purchased with Ubuntu pre-installed as an option. No Windows tax with Australian taxpayers money being paid un-necessarily to an American company. Local product, from a local company.

What's going to be more expensive: A massive NAT box or an IPv6-enabled router (as many already are)?

What's going to be more expensive: Adding NAT buster support into many apps, or using IPv6 (many apps are already IPv6-aware)?

Well, except those guys designing protocols by copying FTP, most client applications actually don't have a problem running with NAT.

Please note that many DSL and cable ISPs provide their customers with cheap "WLAN routers", who often really are plain NAT devices and so by today, you do have millions of people sitting behind NAT gateways and so NAT is a wide-spread "solution" in the industry.

NAT is in use at millions of sites, while the current worldwide amount of IPv6 traffic is merely something in the range of roughly less than a gigabit and about this well "tested" in real life. So if your router does run IPv6, it's not sure that this router will be able to run IPv6 reliably once IPv6 is widely deployed.

At the APNIC 26 conference last month, NTT presented some ballpack numbers for how many people can be comfortably put behind NAT. They're not encouraging. Basically, the common "Web 2.0"-type apps open a lot of background connections, which chews through your ephemeral port space quickly, limiting the number of people that can be NATted. Google echoed those claims loud and clear: "AJAX applications break behind excessive NAT."

Also, consider that by 2012 we'll have run out of public IPv4 addresses. But only 25% of Earth's population will be online. Do you propose to put another 3.5 billion people behind NAT? I'm pretty skeptical that NAT can handle that load.

While NAT will likely be needed in the short term to deal with IPv4 address exhaution, I'm highly skeptical of its long-term scalability.

Well, "Ajax applications will break under NAT", "tomorrow we'll run out of IPv4 addresses" and "the whole world wants to be online, so we do need more IP space" are very close to FUD.

And may I point out that a clear majority of those 3.5 billion people are much more in nead of clean, drinkable freshwater, food to eat and at least some kind of health care rather than the ability to watch sneezing pandas on youtube?

NATing between the internal LAN and the internet they can get up to ~250,000 entries (provided their hardware can support that), allowing each of their 2,000 users to be using, on average, 125 internet applications (or open connections) at once.

What's going to be more expensive: A massive NAT box or an IPv6-enabled router (as many already are)?

What's going to be more expensive: Adding NAT buster support into many apps, or using IPv6 (many apps are already IPv6-aware)?

At the APNIC 26 conference last month, NTT presented some ballpack numbers for how many people can be comfortably put behind NAT. They're not encouraging. Basically, the common "Web 2.0"-type apps open a lot of background connections, which chews through your ephemeral port space quickly, limiting the number of people that can be NATted. Google echoed those claims loud and clear: "AJAX applications break behind excessive NAT."

Also, consider that by 2012 we'll have run out of public IPv4 addresses. But only 25% of Earth's population will be online. Do you propose to put another 3.5 billion people behind NAT? I'm pretty skeptical that NAT can handle that load.

While NAT will likely be needed in the short term to deal with IPv4 address exhaution, I'm highly skeptical of its long-term scalability.

Why would anyone concerned about privacy use GMail at all???

When Google was nailed cold for driving past a No Tresspassing sign to take "Street View" photos of a family's private residence, Google responded in court by saying, "complete privacy does not exist".

Google's kow-towing to the Chinese gov't to help them censor Chinese dissidents are profusely documented.

Why would you want anything to do with such a heinous company?

Do you really think that Google Incorporated gives a rat's ass about your privacy? While Google's founding may have had some idealistic and good-hearted mindsets behind it, currently Google is just another for-profit corporation out to make as much money as possible. Your privacy matters only if it impacts the bottom line.

Given we won't have Japanese (or Swedish, for that matter) broadband speeds for another 100 years, I'd put my money towards magazines if I were you. As an added bonus - you'll exercise your imagination too!

Good luck with that "false dilemma" stuff in court. And citing Wikipedia as a credible source.

If you even make that kind of argument about basic formal logic, heh, it says a lot. It's pretty elementary logic stuff, you know. At any rate, if you need more credible sources, feel free to type "false dilemma fallacy" in google and pick your own better sources. At any rate, your ignorance of formal logic doesn't make it any less of a fallacy.

Look, I did not set out that only two shades of privacy exist. I clearly asserted that by establishing that the owners had allowed others to use that road -- for any purpose -- or that they had received direct or indirect public support for the road, that Google would weaken the owners claim to absolute privacy.

Ah, more fallacies. Why am I not surprised? The whole quote above is a string of fallacies from beginning to end.

- you "did not set out that only two shades of privacy exist"... but act as if that's the case anyway, and still harp later on the ridiculous idea of somehow needing "absolute privacy" being even relevant at all here. In fact, let's get right on to that.

- "Google would weaken the owners claim to absolute privacy" There is no requirement of "absolute privacy" to keep someone off your private property. If I want to, I can even say that everyone _except_ _you_ is allowed in my living room. It's that simple. If it's private property, I have the right to allow or disallow access to whoever I see fit, no matter how arbitrary.

- "I clearly asserted that by establishing that the owners had allowed others to use that road -- for any purpose --" is, at best, fully irrelevant. I can allow ten thousand people on my property, but disallow _you_. The fact that I allowed someone else to use it, does not weaken my ownership of it in any form or shape. Feel free to pout, but the fact that someone else got allowed, doesn't mean you're allowed too. The same applies to Google.

- "or that they had received direct or indirect public support for the road" is fully irrelevant too. E.g., houses with solar cells on the roof receive public support too, but that doesn't make them public property. The fact that that house received public support for those solar cells, does not give you the right to go right in. E.g., any farmer or rancher in the western world receives public support for their farm or ranch, but it's still private property, and they still can forbid you to trespass. Etc. The same here. Whether or not they received and subsidies (most likely not, since it's just their private driveway), does not change the fact that it's private property.

So let's move on:

In addition, a sign that reads "Private Road" clearly does not read "No Trespassing".

Heh. It was actually marked as 'Private Property', according to their lawyer. At any rate, that's clear enough for all legal and practical purposes. I don't have to put "you're forbidden to enter" on my house door too. If you or google are too stupid to understand what 'Private Property' means, well, that's not my problem. I see no need to engage in further bullshit word-meaning games on this topic.

The two phrases have different meanings and it would be left to a court to decide if members of the public should be held liable for failing to interpret "Private Road" to mean "No Trespassing".

Of course it'll get solved in a court of law, that's a truism. But don't set your hopes too high. The concept of private property isn't exactly as new and unknown to the public, as you seem to think. The concept that you're not supposed to be without permission on someone else's private property is at least as old as Roman Law, but most likely even earlier. If you think it's that open for debate whether you should have known to respec

Hahahaha! Just what the world needs, another Linux distro. Hopefully they aren't grabbing bits from Debian :) http://www.itnews.com.au/News/76080,openssl-bug-found-in-debian-linux.aspx

This has a LOT to do with the USA.

Microsoft has been indulging in clearly uncompetitive practices for decades with no more than a slap on the wrist from US regulators. The EU has achieved more real change in the past three years than the US did in that whole time.

In fact the EU is investigating the irregularites in the OOXML debacle.

"Bully for you!" - by awrowe (1110817) on Thursday March 20, @04:47PM (#22811638) No, just pointing out this is NOT "original thought" on the Linux crew's part & all that, as far as a mirroring-backing to disk system, & that it's existed on Windows NT-based OS since around 1995/Windows NT 3.51 or so...

----

"Now all you need is Chuck Norris to use it" - by awrowe (1110817) on Thursday March 20, @04:47PM (#22811638) I just wrote a complete account based on my experiences as having been part of such a solution for Windows, more than a decade ago now, that has done well FIRST starting its life as a freeware, & going commercialware & done well is all.

I was proud to have contributed to such an idea, & others like it (for both CENATEK & SuperSpeed.com), more than a decade ago, & it's nice to see others FINALLY coming around & "seeing the light"... only now, lol!

----

Heck, & about Ramdisks in general, & iirc, MAINLY SSD's (Solid-State Disks)? Even "Penguin #1" Linus Torvalds, is excited about them:

(& for the RIGHT reasons too, imo as well, which IS the same, & just common-sense I felt & have for more than a decade now on PC's of all types, home use to servers!)

====

Torvalds on where Linux is headed in 2008:

http://www.itnews.com.au/Feature/4052,torvalds-on-where-linux-is-headed-in-2008.aspx

"One of the things I personally am really interested in is the move over to SSD (solid-state drives) disks. Im a huge believer in reducing latency, and some of the better SSDs are changing the whole game when it comes to access latency, which in turn has potentially big impacts on the kernel and while they are currently expensive enough to be a pretty minor player, that is certainly looking to change in 2008 and later." - LINUS TORVALDS

Linus Torvalds, Torvalds on where Linux is headed in 2008 (article by Charles Babcock)

====

SSD's, & EVEN Software-Based Ramdisks/Ramdrives (given a system w/ enough RAM, especially ones w/ OS's that are 32-bit/4gb RAM addresseable MAX in nature, which IS the majority for more than a decade now) that has more than 4gb of RAM on it, but using a 32-bit OS?

Ramdisks (both software AND hardware ones) still so no less work great for reducing latency & seeks/access of files!

Especially for reads, on ALL types/kinds (from true SSD's, to FLASH-MEMORY based ones, to software ramdrives)...

(Reads ARE better on TRUE Solid-State disks like the CENATEK RocketDrive, or Gigabyte IRAM, OR HyperOS III series units than on FLASH-MEMORY based ones, by far, on writes especially which is slowest afaik on FLASH-MEMORY based "SSD's", which imo, for performance' sake, are not anywhere NEAR a true SSD especially on WRITES!)...

APK

"This is one area where ASP gets a nod, as keeping the versions up to date is seamless, and applications and sites designed around ASP simply don't break even with the most massive updates." Ahem... "This contrasts [Thursday's] attack in that the vast majority of those were active server pages (.ASP)," explained McAfee researcher Craig Schmugar on a company blog posting." From - http://www.itnews.com.au/News/72214,second-mass-hack-exposed.aspx

I looked at the pics in the article, and I saw that they were giving us a four-letter subliminal message.

The two URL's in the story the same ... plus might want to use the printable URL since in FF, it pegs the CPU meter (much worse than this overly busy site) ... maybe it's all that information being sent to Google?

Ad-free printer friendly version. Article text:

Klausner Technologies Inc said on Monday the company had filed a US$360 million suit against Apple and AT&T over voicemail patents that Klausner claims the Apple iPhone infringes.

New York-based Klausner said the lawsuit also names Comcast, Cablevision Systems and eBay's Skype as infringing its patent for "visual voicemail." The plaintiff seeks an additional US$300 million from the three.

Klausner said in a statement that it filed the lawsuit in U.S. Court for the Eastern District of Texas. A copy of the filing was not yet available from the court.

The suit alleges asserts that the defendants' Internet-based voicemail products and services violate a Klausner patent. It seeks damages and future royalties estimated at $300 million, according to the press release.

The complaint involves U.S. patent 5,572,576, the same one at issue in a suit Klausner filed in 2006 against voice-over-Internet telephone service provider Vonage Holdings Corp. The two sides agreed to settle that earlier case in October 2007, according a spokesman for Klausner.

Vonage is now a licensee of Klausner's voicemail technology for its Vonage Voicemail Plus service, as is Time Warner Inc's AOL for its AOL Voicemail services, Klausner said.

A company spokeswoman said Apple's pioneering Newton personal digital assistant was covered under a licensing deal between Klausner and Japan's Sharp Corp, the manufacturer of the Newton, tied to Klausner's U.S. patent 4,117,542.

The suit naming Apple as a defendant targets the sleek visual voicemail application offered by Apple in its iPhone.

The company alleged in its statement that Cablevision's Optimum Voicemail, Comcast's Digital Voice Voicemail and eBay's Skype Voicemail violate Klausner's patent by allowing users to selectively retrieve and listen to voice messages via message inbox displays.

An Apple spokeswoman said the company does not comment on pending litigation.

EBay spokesman Hani Durzy said his company has not received the suit and would not comment until its lawyers have seen it.

"We haven't seen it," echoed a Cablevision spokesman, who declined to comment further.

The suit was filed for the plaintiff by the California law firm of Dovel & Luner in Texas. "We have litigated this patent successfully on two prior occasions," Greg Dovel of Dovel & Luner, said in the statement issued by Klausner.

Why irony to describe the result? irony: incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs. Here the expectation, even if misguided, is a historical one, not a nationalistic nor skill-based one. Since irony is based on expectation, it is as much an emotional process as an intellectual one. It is not necessarily a rational response; it CAN be just a sensation one gets. Obviously no one doubts Germans are technically capable of cracking codes, so expectation is not twisted around for that reason. From an earlier article on this: "Colossus was developed at Bletchley Park to decipher German messages during World War II...Two groups of amateur code breakers will be invited to crack transmissions encrypted by one of the original Lorenz cipher machines used by the German High Command during World War II." So I do think most people might find it justifiably ironic that in a blind test a German, who otherwise knows nothing about the original German code, is able to decipher it the fastest in a contest taking place over 60 years after the fact competing with the original machine designed to decipher it in the first place. In a naive post hoc sense, one might think "the result actually makes sense because perhaps there is something 'Germanocentric' about the code." But I seriously doubt this. The historical irony remains intact. However, again only after the initial glow of the ironic sensation fades do we realize our expectation was flawed: we should have guessed that a competent German was participating, so there was a pretty good chance a German would win from the start.

http://www.itnews.com.au/News/NewsStory.aspx?story=64166/

Actually the above article states that "only 11.1 percent of phones shipped in 2006 had GPS", which is a little bit less than "most/all"...

I think you guys are confusing how the system currently works, currently MOST tracking is done via GSM triangulation, as opposed to GPS triangulation.

Also, don't forget that Enhanced 911 only applies in the US, not everywhere else, hence my response of "you're full of shit" to an article that was claiming that most/all of the word's mobiles had GPS...

Do you know of a more accurate source of the quote? The linked article definitely doesn't have an ellipsis. Copied and pasted from paragraph 9, the text is:

"I told Microsoft that it should give legal security to programmers who help to develop open source software and confine its patent disputes to commercial software distributors and end users. Microsoft will now pledge to do so."

Here's an example from August this year of why this fine is out of proportion. Copyright infringement was only a small part of the charges these guys were up against, the largest potential fines were for the charges of counterfeiting federal seals (they put the FBI anti-piracy seals on the CDs and DVDs they were producing) and dealing in counterfeit products, but I can't find the breakdown of their actual sentences.

Two men were sentenced Monday in what the government is calling the largest CD and DVD pirating scheme to be prosecuted in the United States.

Ye Teng Wen, also known as Michael Wen, 31, and Hao He, who is sometimes called Kevin He, 32, both of Union City, Calif., were each sentenced to 37 months in federal prison, three years of supervised release, a US$125,000 fine, and a US$500 mandatory special assessment.

There are lots of hints as to the answer in the URL itself:
http://www.itnews.com.au/Utils/ImageResizer.aspx?w=214&n=http%3A%2F%2Fbackoffice.ajb.com.au%2Fimages%2Fnews%2Fchallenge.jpg
It seems itnews.com.au has an aspx proggie that dynamically resizes images, in this case
http://backoffice.ajb.com.au/images/new/challenge.jpg
from the original 641x480 jpeg to a 214x160 image.
This is a generic photo meant to represent the "challenge" concept.
If you want to ogle those two chicks and their rope, the original (larger) jpeg is much better, of course. ;-)

A full transcript of the interview can be read here: Interview: Wozniak slams Apple for iPhone price drop snafu

On September 3, in this interview, Darl states clearly that he could do some "licensing deals" and sell their mobile business to raise cash. Where are the media comments on this? Are there no companies that want to own "shout postcard" and "hip check" or "Scamp"?

Laura Didio changed her mind apparently.

From http://www.itnews.com.au/News/59752,sco-could-face-cash-crunch-after-novell-trial.aspx:

One analyst says SCO's future looks bleak. The lawsuit "was a bet the company strategy, and it doesn't look like they're holding the winning hand," said Yankee Group's Laura DiDio. "Whether SCO can survive remains to be seen, but it doesn't look good," she added.

Also, watermarking pretends that people have control over their files. Millions of people whose computers that are controlled remotely in botnets don't.

There are numerous other ways files are moved around. If you take your computer in for repair, it is possible the repair person will copy any files he or she wants.

Since I don't surf infectious sites, my chances to cacth a new, yet unknown virus are minimal.

(Given that last link, expect the RIAA to become part of Homeland Security.)

The Japanese have gigabit with IPv6 to the home already, but this makes that look like dial-up in comparison.

While I agree that there is no need to cut off Nigerian IP blocks, to claim that it is a "few bad apples" is disingenuous. According to this article, 419 represents the 3rd-5th largest industry in Nigeria.

Additionally, if any country had spam as its 3rd-5th largest industrial sector, I would understand (though disagree with) suggestions of cutting it off from the internet.

Of course, If a private company blocked Nigerian IPs in house, well, that is their prerogative, for all the good it would do.

so what's to stop Microsoft from rolling out a patch to some vulnerability that coincidentally checks that the shell is anything but KDE?
It wouldn't be anything new, they have done stuff like that before.

They're also listening to you as well.

The one watching may not be human.

Go ahead and mod me down, bitches, but after this tasty tidbit you know I'm probably right.

Desktop search, video conferencing, sidebar, and Aero were Longhorn/Vista features that were announced by MS long before that impressive Tiger preview at WWDC. Those e-mails show that MS was very impressed by Apple's implementation of already-planned Vista features, not that they were copying them. Since Apple would release Tiger (with these features) before MS could release their long-delayed Vista, Vista's implementations would be directly compared (by reviewer/consumers) to Tiger's implementations.

"Longhorn" Alpha Preview (November 2002)

Except for perhaps Aqua/Aero, none of these features were "copied" from Apple the way Apple fanboys like to claim. At most, they can argue that MS changed their existing implementations of those features to resemble Apple's implementations, but they didn't copy the features themselves.

They've probably been fleshing out the feature list for Vista's successor since the first day a developer copy of OS X 10.5 reached the grubby mitts of a Microsoft employee. Don't expect the real work to start until spring, though, when it's released with its 'top secret' features.

Go ahead and mod me down, bitches, but after this tasty tidbit you know I'm probably right. And they did the same thing to Go Corp, BTW.

~Philly

one of the "research" organizations - I think it was IDC - to produce a "comparison" between Linux and Windows that was favorable to Windows, after Gartner told them they wouldn't do it.

Then they argued over whether they should ADMIT that Microsoft sponsored the study because they KNEW that admitting it would blow the game - so they argued for LYING about it.

Here's a quote from the story:

In an email dated 1 November, 2002, Kevin Johnson, now the head of Windows, wrote: "I don't like it to be public on the doc that we sponsored it because I don't think the outcome is as favourable as we had hoped. I just don't like competitors using it as ammo against us. It is easier if it doesn't mention that we sponsored it."

And another:

And the month before, Houston wrote Johnson a message that intimated pressure had been put on IDC to tweak the report so it would put Microsoft in a better light. "I hate to put it like this, but at this point, IDC is done negotiating with us. We have moved them quite a bit already, but they are now holding the line, saying that if we want the names of their 'big' analysts on the report, this is it."

AOL just cut 1400 jobs in Arizona and New Mexico. Not only that, but in another interesting story -

Internet service provider AOL's sales may shrink for the next two years as it gives away services to win more users and attract advertising, its chief executive said in an interview published on Saturday.

"Maybe another two years, you are right there," Jonathan Miller said when asked by German newspaper Die Welt whether sales would continue to fall. "But it's about profitability for us in this phase." ...

In recent weeks, AOL has sold its Internet access units in Germany, France and Britain for a total of almost US$2 billion as it reshapes itself into a free Web portal where popular email and entertainment services are supported by advertising.

The only, ONLY thing holding AOL still together are people who are less internet savvy and those who cling to AOL email addresses for their lives (certain professionals, businesspeople, et al). Creating a successful and large advertising group sounds like it'd be tricky in such a large market. Most people think of AOL the ISP or the portal than the advertising giant.

Finally, it should be noted that AOL spokesman John Buckley said "Time Warner ``is not considering a sale or demerger,'"

I tried to this story submitted but anyway... Linux phones will lock down users Mobile phone developers are scrambling to ensure that the openness of the Linux operating system does not anger telecoms regulators. Consumers who run Linux on a PC are used to having full control over the operating system, but should not expect that same level of control on a Linux powered mobile phone, warned Mike Kelley, senior vice president of engineering at PalmSource. The company is in the process of developing a Linux version for mobile phones to replace its current Palm OS. "Phones are not PCs. They tie in to a radio that is regulated," Kelley said at the LinuxWorld conference in San Francisco. "They are tied into very expensive back-end infrastructure that can be seriously disrupted by malfunctioning phones. full article

http://www.itnews.com.au/newsstory.aspx?CIaNID=346 64&src=site-marq

"Those two test accounts were actually created by one of our developers who was exploring possible opportunities, but he didn't realise it was Zango business practice not to target MySpace," said Stratz. "He should not have been doing this, and we want to tell MySpace that we didn't mean to target them." The developer, said Stratz, would soon be deleting the profiles.

*sighs*

Why didn't the submitter go with the more trollish (and lets face it, the comments will decsend to this level in a few seconds) headline the inquirer took: French committee surrenders on DRM law

Let's all remember that while we would normally blindly follow Apple's lead in this, it is a Free software issue as well as being an Apple (yay) vs France (boo) issue.

Like Microsoft (with word documents, SMB, etc), or Adobe (with encrypted PDFs), Apple should not persecute F/OSS users for attempting to interoperate with their products.

Someone mod parent down. Its pure fantasy and a troll.

Please note: the above sentance was not a quote from the parent of this post, I just happen to have used the same wording because I have the same feelings.

"Microsoft 'has become known for' providing timely patches for their software like no-one else. "

Microsoft's patches are coming quicker than they used to, which is probably why more of them seem to be causing problems.

Timely patches like no-one else? I don't think so. I know Microsoft has left critical flaws unpatched for longer than others...

"I can't say I ever noticed a patch screwing up a machine."

You and me are a pretty small percentage of the world's Windows users, so I don't think it really matters. Here are a few articles pointing to problems with Microsoft's patches:

http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2154155/users-fe el-pain-latest
http://www.crn.com/sections/breakingnews/breakingn ews.jhtml?articleId=185302749
http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jh tml?articleID=180202426
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/10/17/ms_patch_g litch/
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/09/12/ms_pulls_s ecurity_patch/
http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.j html?articleID=168600620
http://tech.monstersandcritics.com/news/article_79 92.php/Faulty_Microsoft_patches_highlight_quality_ concerns
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-5648595.html
http://www.itnews.com.au/newsstory.aspx?CIaNCID=43 &CIaNID=18362

Microsoft has been experiencing a lot of disorganization recently. With the qualification of some machines as un-Vista capable, it's delay of Vista until January 2007, popular technology experts' Opinions that "America isn't ready for Microsoft's Vista", and all kinds of project delays (Media Center, XBox, etc.) they are in need of some clear visual indication as to the direction they must take. After all, a picture is worth a thousand words.

I find this statement from an InformationWeek article to clear up what ProClarity exactly does: "ProClarity makes analysis and visualization software." Much of this software is in very popular demand now; a friend of mine just started a job at a company called SSS, which makes visualization software for modeling all kinds of information and displaying it in a manner that is very informative and interactive. Google released something similar, Google Analytics, for websites, and it has been a huge success (heck, Slashdot uses it).

Overall, I think this is a very smart move on Microsoft's part. Software for organizing information can be very useful. It's also nice to see some Microsoft articles on Slashdot for a change (even though I'm not a big fan of Microsoft), rather than the usual Googlomination.

There are two Vista concepts at play here, SuperFetch and External Memory Devices (EMDs).

"Windows Vista introduces a new concept in adding memory to a system. USB flash drives can be used as External Memory Devices (EMDs) to extend system memory and improve performance without opening the box. Your computer is able to access memory from an EMD device much more quickly than it can access data on the hard drive, boosting system performance. When combined with SuperFetch technology, this can help drive impressive improvement in system responsiveness."

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/features/for everyone/performance.mspx

SuperFetch can apparently use an EMD as additional ram and "A unique algorithm optimizes wear patterns, so that a USB device can run as an EMD for many years, even when heavily used.". I think that I'd take it with a grain of salt until I saw it working, this is still marketing fluff as the USB support won't be available until a later preview version of Vista (http://www.itnews.com.au/newsstory.aspx?CIaNID=20 100).

I am curious about the Hybrid Hard Drives mentioned in the article on the Microsoft site. Anyone know which manufacturers are developing hard drives with a large flash cache?

Windows XP Home edition anyone?

Call within the next 48 hours and you will get Outlook and Exchange bug fixes as well...

http://www.itnews.com.au/newsstory.aspx?CIaNID=217 04

... and a MSN / Butterfly one.

http://www.itnews.com.au/newsstory.aspx?CIaNID=197 48