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Well, if you're running NTFS, you could try using NTFS junction points under 2000/XP, or NTFS symbolic links under Vista; just make the Program Files\Steam\steamapps\common\ directory a junction/symlink to elsewhere\.

Not as convenient as true put-games-elsewhere support, admittedly. :)

There's a Sysinternals utility called Desktops that is quite an excellent tool for that.

Even on Linux or OS X, I don't use the multiple desktops features much at all, so take my recommendation with a grain of salt if you like.

Software streaming is nothing new. Altiris, Citrix, and Microsft all offer solutions.

Microsoft's application streaming is the best of the three (in my opinion, from demoing each of them). They acquired it from another company, and the technology was formerly called SoftGrid.

It allows amazing flexibility, because all you really need to do is "sequence" the app, and it creates a file called Feature Block 1, which contains only the portions of the program required for initial launch. The rest of it is streamed on-demand as other parts of the app are accessed, and also in the background at all times.

You deploy apps by associating them with security or distribution groups, and as long as the client machine has the app-v client, you're set.

I've used it to sequence apps like Quake 3, Counter-Strike, and Warcraft 3 for my home network.

But Microsoft spends a huge amount of effort making sure that Java is a slow as possible on Windows machines.

Do you have links to prove it?

Do not assume (Microsoft's) malice where (Sun's) incompetence is enough to explain things.

Gee I don't know, how about the non-public APIs they use, vs the public APIs they give everybody else? Was even documented in the MFC/C++ manual, that Microsoft did not use that API for office.

You'll also notice that while they made C# an open standard, they did not make the standard API part of they.

By the way, why would Microsoft deliberately make Java run slow under Windows? It makes no marketing sense - it just means that whoever wants Java (which is a lot of people) would just use a Solaris or Linux server instead - and that isn't good for MS. They'd rather have you run Java on Windows Server and pay them for the license (bonus points if you also use MSSQL, which is my Microsoft actually provides JDBC drivers for SQL Server).

How about because they want to lock you into their product suite with C# and asp?

Microsoft does not play nicely with others, ever. Even when MS is being nice, never trust them, they're like a crack dealer giving out free samples.

Having issues with performance? Don't change your OS, change your apps.

But Microsoft spends a huge amount of effort making sure that Java is a slow as possible on Windows machines.

Do you have links to prove it?

Do not assume (Microsoft's) malice where (Sun's) incompetence is enough to explain things.

By the way, why would Microsoft deliberately make Java run slow under Windows? It makes no marketing sense - it just means that whoever wants Java (which is a lot of people) would just use a Solaris or Linux server instead - and that isn't good for MS. They'd rather have you run Java on Windows Server and pay them for the license (bonus points if you also use MSSQL, which is my Microsoft actually provides JDBC drivers for SQL Server).

What about Surface (a multi-touch platform), or their Image compositing software?

Don't worry, I run openbsd, and a few different linuxes, but seriously...microsoft does some interesting stuff! The microsoft-hate that goes on around here is kindof silly.

What about Surface (a multi-touch platform), or their Image compositing software?

Don't worry, I run openbsd, and a few different linuxes, but seriously...microsoft does some interesting stuff! The microsoft-hate that goes on around here is kindof silly.

the next obvious move?

MS to scrap the OEM tax and instead install an OS that is free for 30 days and then asks you to did into your wallet and type in a credit card number.

I think you're right. In fact, it's so obvious, they've done it already for Office 2007 - OEM preinstalls a trial version on every PC he buys, and the user can either activate it online with a credit card, or buy a serial number directly from that OEM (which is where the latter is supposed to get his cut from). I've got such a thing on a Thinkpad I've bought a few months ago.

They're in bed with MickeySoft.

Backdooring something like the Linux Kernel via traditional means (by attempting to submit malicious patches) would be much, much harder than you think. I mean just read the LKML to understand how thorough the review process is: the owner of the code scrutinizes your patch line by line, suggests improvements, even catches coding style errors, etc. Maintainers are especially cautious about code that comes from unknown developers.

Regarding your comment about hacking servers holding the source code, this would also very likely get caught really quickly, because of the very nature of version control systems whose only purpose is to track changes. As a matter of fact in 2003, a CVS mirror (not the primary repository) of the kernel source tree was successfully hacked and a backdoor was inserted in the code, but the problem got identified and fixed in less than 24 hours

With proprietary software there is only a restricted number of people who review code, typically only a very specific dev/QA team employed by the software vendor. I would even argue that because of the implicit trust between these employees, reviews tend to be shallower. Two examples to prove my point: in 2001 it was discovered that a back door password has been hidden in Borland/Inprise's popular Interbase database software for at least seven years. In June 2008 it was discovered by a security researcher that for multiple years all versions of Windows have been intentionally using a lower-quality cryptographic function for Protected Storage when the locale was set to French.

So, do you trust a development model where malicious code is caught in 24h, or a dev model where backdoors can exist for 7 years ? The answer is obvious to me :)

This is your IT support's fault, not Windows Update's.

Great, I'll let my mother's IT support know that they're idiots... oh wait, that's me!

So, how do I make my mother's WU autoupdate the patches that require agreements (or get WU to show the agreements to non-admin users)? You'd think this would be a FAQ...

Microsoft has no problem exposing Windows source code to the Royal Navy:

The United Kingdom is the latest country to join a Microsoft programme that lets governments around the world see the otherwise secret source code underlying Windows.

Microsoft unveiled the Government Security Program (GSP) two weeks ago as a way to address concerns various governments have about the security of its Windows operating system.

The programme, widely viewed as Microsoft's response to the complete openness of the open-source movement, already includes Russia and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) as members. Under Microsoft's new programme, governments may visit Microsoft's campus, see the millions of lines of source code that make up Windows, run analysis tools on the source code and build versions of Windows for themselves from the raw materials. Officials will be able to see source code for Windows 2000, XP, Server 2003 and CE. UK government gets access to Windows source code [Feb 3, 2003]

In the years since, access to the Windows source code has become rather easy for the student or the developer: Microsoft Expands Access to Windows Source Code {Jul 2004], Microsoft Shared Source Initiative

I would also humbly suggest that if that if your cyber intelligence is so limited that you haven't been able to deconstruct Win2K in eight years, you have no business building military grade submersibles.

I agree. Lego Mindstorms, the old one or the new one. Lego has an educational program to make the kits easily available to schools. It's programming, but in a graphical, orderly way that prevents too many obvious mistakes. Advanced students can then go on to use the kit with Java or C, for which there is plenty of information available. Plus, you get to build a gadget that rolls around and picks up stuff.

Otherwise, I would recommend either some flavor of Logo or Smalltalk/Squeak, both of which were designed with education in mind.

On the third hand, many of us learned programming with a simple version of BASIC, like QBASIC, or even GW-BASIC. Microsoft now has available a free thing called Simple BASIC (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/devlabs/cc950524.aspx).

There's always AppleScript for the Mac fans, which is supposed to be like English ... but isn't.

And APL was originally designed for teaching math. But you don't want to go there.

This patch only changes MSHTML.DLL

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/960714

So I think it depends if MSHTML.DLL is in use or not. I seldom use IE as I prefer Opera, and I don't really use anything much on this machine that uses MSHTML.DLL either - no Outlook or Outlook Express as I use Thunderbird and no sidebar, so presumably it could be patched.

Any application that use MSHTML.DLL will lock it against writes and force the installer to reboot to change it. I'm not sure about now but in the old days you'd try MoveFile and if that failed because the file was in use you'd use MoveFileEx(..MOVEFILE_DELAY_UNTIL_REBOOT) to queue the move after the next reboot. If you needed to call MoveFileEx you'd pop up a dialog offering to reboot the machine now, or reboot it later at the end of the installation.

Hmm, lets see

C:\Users\HP>tasklist -m mshtml.dll
INFO: No tasks are running which match the specified criteria.

No tasks using the dll means no reboot to install the patch. Now if I start the sidebar

C:\Users\HP>tasklist -m mshtml.dll
 
Image Name PID Modules
sidebar.exe 1234 mshtml.dll

If I stop the sidebar it's not in use again.

You're largely wrong. Microsoft has released some open source code, though it more often releases "shared source" stuff. To a certain extent, what Apple has released as open source has been code that was already open source that they then cleaned up or refactored to fit an internal project. Darwin, for example, is a combination of a BSD userland with a modified Mach kernel. Webkit is KHTML made usable. Worse still, in some cases Apple's release involved licensing that was more restrictive than the license the code was originally licensed under. Darwin's components were generally under BSD type licenses. Darwin, however, is licensed under the APSL, a horrible asymmetric copyleft where Apple has more rights to relicense the any code you publish under it than than you do.

MS life-support Cycle http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=fh;%5Bln%5D;lifesupsps

You can't buy it http://www.microsoft.com/windows/lifecycle/default.mspx

"No further updates planned."
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/lifecycle/servicepacks.mspx

Ok, my bad. Extended service ends 2010, so by the time they get the bugs out of it they will need to upgrade.
http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifean36

MS life-support Cycle http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=fh;%5Bln%5D;lifesupsps

You can't buy it http://www.microsoft.com/windows/lifecycle/default.mspx

"No further updates planned."
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/lifecycle/servicepacks.mspx

Ok, my bad. Extended service ends 2010, so by the time they get the bugs out of it they will need to upgrade.
http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifean36

MS life-support Cycle http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=fh;%5Bln%5D;lifesupsps

You can't buy it http://www.microsoft.com/windows/lifecycle/default.mspx

"No further updates planned."
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/lifecycle/servicepacks.mspx

Ok, my bad. Extended service ends 2010, so by the time they get the bugs out of it they will need to upgrade.
http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifean36

MS life-support Cycle http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=fh;%5Bln%5D;lifesupsps

You can't buy it http://www.microsoft.com/windows/lifecycle/default.mspx

"No further updates planned."
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/lifecycle/servicepacks.mspx

Ok, my bad. Extended service ends 2010, so by the time they get the bugs out of it they will need to upgrade.
http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifean36

Bottom line: Regardless of the existence of a backdoor, to access it - you'd have to be in a position that would enable you to get at the data without a backdoor in place. also, odd are that the UK military actually HAS the windows source code.

How could any company survive without an egotistic megalomaniac perfectionist anal retentive button hater at the helm? Well Jobs doesn't design the computers Jonathan Ive does, so designs are covered. He doesn't manage the hardware engineering, Bob Mansfield has that responsibility. Operating system is Bertrand Serlet and applications is Sina Tamaddon, with Scott Forstall managing iPhone software, so we're covered on those. Phil Schiller is the marketing brain behind Apple's recent successes, so that's okay. Retailing is covered by Ron Johnson and let's not forget that Tim Cook handles DTD operations. There's also a few 'heavy-set' bean counters around to rearrange the cash loaf they've acquired after Steve plays naked in the pile, so the money is okay, too.

So, why does Apple need ST_VE? Do they need him to run around all day screaming, "Your designs suck, Jon! Make them MORE minimal!", "Bob, your code is SHIT! Fix it!", "Ron! Sell more STUFF!", "The rest of you, if you can't make everything INSANELY GREAT, no more free Jolt Cola in the cafeteria!"? So Apple needs him, how, to survive? If they need a 'visionary', they can always find another crazy 'Steve', here. In the long run, the company is well manned to maintain it's position and 'grow the brand' even if Jobs is relegated to prowling the dark halls at 1IL in his bathrobe and Birkenstocks.

Actually, Microsoft has been providing military and government agencies with the source code of windows for quite some time now

Refer to Microsoft's 10 Immutable Laws of Security. Specifically, laws #3 and #10 (and try to ignore the obvious marketing in several sections).

MS IE Patched
Firefox 2.0 and 3.0 patched
and Opera 9.63 released earlier this week

Let browsing begin again!

I actually saw an IE8 ad earlier this week on-line (geared for enterprise computing firms) I thought it was final and out already.

Yep, MS even has a slick site already up for it:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/Internet-explorer/beta/default.aspx

When I use windows explorer to delete ie it shows the program is deleted until I close and reopen windows explorer and discover that it has not been deleted.

When you delete the iexplore.exe executable Windows File Protection will re-copy it back to where it was almost immediately. If it is popping up from sites visited in Firefox then it is able to intercept and process your network activity on a layer outside of IE (ie. Winsock) and just using IE to deliver the popups. Deleting the IE executable won't fix the overall problem.

A good idea is to download Autoruns and boot into plain Safe Mode. If the malware uses a driver to hide itself it won't be loaded in Safe Mode and you can see whatever it hides. Autoruns gives you a good look at most of the places where malware can hide itself, like Winlogon notifiers, drivers, Winsock providers etc. You can look through there and see if you can spot anything suspicous (like random name DLLs and executables).

We've deployed Firefox with Microsoft SMS.

really what choice did they have? I can see a class action from *lots* of angry people who's computers have been hosed and bank accounts hoovered would cost far more then not acting. Not to mention the loss of faith.

Not blody likely, read #17 in the XP EULA. Any other MS EULA are bound to say something similar. I would have quoted it but the filter objected to the caps usage hence the link below.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/eula/home.mspx

Excel is great for manipulating large sets of data.

Except if the data set if actually large. 1M rows barely makes for a trivial set of test data in my world.

It wouldn't be so bad if at least the answers Excel gave were right on the tiny sets it does support.

Spreadsheet addiction is a good intro to its many flaws; the issues outlined in "Poor statistics" alone are sufficient to render it worthless for the topic of discussion here.

You're confusing available system ram and the per-process virtual address space. The problem is as I originally stated; by default, a process in Windows can't allocate more than about 2GB of RAM, even if additional system RAM is available. This 2GB limit is a well known limitation, and is completely unrelated to what you're talking about.

Please google "virtual address space" to learn more. A Microsoft KB discussing the 2GB limit and how virtual video RAM was being done inside VAS can be found here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/940105

See, it seems reasonable that a 32-bit OS kernel will not handle more than a few gigabytes of RAM as efficiently as a 64-bit OS kernel. By default, 32-bit Linux puts memory over the 960MB mark into a "highmem" pool that's less efficient. It wouldn't surprise me if Windows does something similar. I'm less familiar with its VM and its limitations, although I recall hearing rumblings about XP and a 2GB limit. (Note: I haven't looked into it and could be talking out of my ass there about XP.)

I can verify that...

Windows Memory Limits

The page there says that under normal circumstances the per-process addressable memory space for a process in 32-bit Windows is limited to 2GiB - up to 3GiB (a bit more than that, actually, IIRC) if some option is set.

Of course, as you say, not a lot of stuff actually needs all that RAM... I guess it'll be a gradual transition, then - as more people upgrade to machines with the 64-bit instruction set, more programs will be built for 64-bit...

For me, just having those extra registers is worth it. GCC's a lot better at optimizing code when it has a bit of elbow room.

Mono does not seem to be just means to an end, but an end in itself.

Actually, this makes a lot of sense for an Office suite that tries to be MSOffice-compatible. See, according to Redmond, VBA is not cool today - it is being phased out and replaced by Visual Studio Tools for Office. And guess what technology are those "tools" based on, and what languages do they use...

Anyway, for Gtk# development, Mono is actually pretty good - I dare say, not any worse than Python - and quite a bit faster, too. Why shouldn't Novell use the fruits of their own labor to develop helper applications for their distro more rapidly? It certainly makes business sense for me. Similarly, RedHat invests heavily into Python, and uses it to write their own tools.

What about the Windows Credentials Management subsystem? It's been there since XP. IE and Explorer use it for the remember password option. The list of usernames/passwords in your profile can be modified via the users control panel.

However, Microsoft does seem to prefer a single (or very few) signon system with an AD domain or Passport.

GPP didn't mean startup of the system, but startup of the application. The system loads HUGE.DLL when it isn't doing anything else.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-vista/features/superfetch.aspx

Long as the PCs have a license sticker on the machine such as Vista or higher they have the right to downgrade for free.

I think downgrade rights are not available for Home Basic and Home Premium.

What do I turn off to make TCP/IP over Firewire work?

What about my favourite XP extension?

I bought a laptop that was pretty high spec with Vista installed and didn't mind the performance so much as the lack of features I use every day.

I put XP on it, but if you can tell me, I may reinstall Vista.

(OK, you got me. That was a lie.)

bitsadmin, to create jobs for the Background Intelligent Transfer Service (BITS) in Windows.

uh ... according to http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314865 you need at least 1.5GB of HD space for an XP install. I didn't check Vista requirements. I am assuming that you're not talking about "specialized" Windows installs like MicroXP or MiniXP, but how do you have a Windows install that is only 250MB?

on the flipside, have you tried puppylinux and the like that are have very small footprint -- HD space (100MB) and hardware reqs?

Do you mean 'what are calling conventions' generally --or-- what specifically are the two calling conventions?

I can't speak for Linux, but on Windows, the standard convention (of which there are many) is STDCALL.

I don't even have cable...

--another Canadian

Hulu + Bittorrent + TVersity + XBox 360 MCE = Call me when a la carte cable service hits the streets.

Wait... when did Tversity start supporting Hulu?

The Alt-Tab Replacement powertoy for XP will give you that same sort of preview of the applications when switching.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/Downloads/powertoys/Xppowertoys.mspx

I don't even have cable...

--another Canadian

Hulu + Bittorrent + TVersity + XBox 360 MCE = Call me when a la carte cable service hits the streets.

In windows 2003 R2/Windows Server 2008 they really improved DFS. It lets you set up throttling in 15 minute increments, and with Full Mesh replication, it decentralizes your replication..kind of like bit torrent. However, you have to make sure you don't accidentally use FRS, because it sucks. Where I work we have 5 branches that pull data from our data center. I have DFS replication setup so I can have all our software distribution at the local site. I need to keep the install points at all the sites the same, so I use DFS to replicate all the data, then to get to it I type \\mydomain.com\DFSSharename Active Directory determines what site I am in, then points me to the local share. If the local share is not available, it points me to the remote share, or to a secondary share in the same site...so it gives you failover for your file servers. If you don't have any windows boxes, this wont work, and this really locks you into Microsoft, but it won't cost you anything more than what you have already paid. Below is a link to Microsoft's page with more information, including how to set it up: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/technologies/storage/dfs/default.mspx

Sigh. I'm afraid that's just not true.

Each process can access the lower 2GB of the virtual memory address space. Each process does not get a seperate 4GB address space.

You'd be better of reading the following Microsoft technical article.

"Windows NT provides a page-based virtual memory management scheme that allows applications to realize a 32-bit linear address space for 4 gigabytes (GB) of memory. As a result, each application has its own private address space from which it can use the lower 2 GB--the system reserves the upper 2 GB of every process's address space for its own use."

While the article speaks of Windows NT, things haven't really changed that much behind the scenes - the basic algorithm remains the same in all the later Windows operating systems.

So if I follow your advice, I will have to keep a VGA monitor around to switch to to check to make sure I'm not being boned, as well as check the page design of every website I go to just to make sure their isn't a WMV video with DRM enabled. Wow, that is so much easier than just avoiding Vista like the clap! Thanks a lot!

But hey, if you won't believe me, maybe you will believe Microsoft and the link that gives you their full answer to Gutmann's assessment of Vista is at the top of the page. But allow me to quote one of the relevant portions. And I quote MSFT " Will Windows Vista content protection features increase CPU resource consumption? Yes. However, the use of additional CPU cycles is inevitable, as the PC provides consumers with additional functionality. Windows Vista's content protection features were developed to carefully balance the need to provide robust protection from commercial content while still enabling great new experiences such as HD-DVD or Blu-Ray playback."

So there it is, straight from the horses mouth. But believe what you will. But you can't seriously think we went from these system requirements to the incredible bloat of Vista(anything less than a dual core with 2Gb in my exp=thrashmonster) simply because of Aero and UAC, do you?

No, this is Microsoft. This is irrelevant. And I didn't need Google for either link.

DET, the source of the 'admission' that Microsoft-based laptops aren't too expensive, is also a long time customer of Microsoft Gold Certified Partner OBS, who according to this article saved $208,000 a year on an intranet. According to the report, the savings occurred as a result of certain inefficiencies such as:

"Because DET uses a range of technology platforms .. When staff needed to apply for access to network resources, they had to fill in a paper form. It could take up to 10 working days before an applicant received access"

"Information about meetings for ITD managers and various DET committees was distributed by email"

"Some staff maintained individual news archives .. on high-availability network or email servers"

"As part of the pilot project, Microsoft engaged independent business analyst BearingPoint to measure the potential impact of the Microsoft solution"

"For almost 10 years, BearingPoint and Microsoft have worked together"

I would like to have a hd-driver for vista which uses another harddisc (SSD) as a cache for other (spinning) harddiscs.

If only something like that came with the OS that would be so convenient.

Agreed Suggested reading http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc750820.aspx#XSLTsection123121120120

I said "_the_ millions" which means the infected millions. I would have left out the "the", if I meant something different. I put it there for a reason.

If I were talking about uninfected+infected users a different phrase would be more appropriate.

A user who is prone to infection is different from a user who isn't. A user prone to infection is just as likely to be infected whether they ran Windows or Ubuntu.

The number of infected windows computers may even rival the number of Desktop Linux computers worldwide :) [1].

Macs have 10% market share and they ARE getting the same shit, just not so often _yet_:

http://www.wired.com/politics/security/news/2007/11/mac_trojan
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/securityfix/2008/06/new_trojan_leverages_unpatched.html

If they hit 20-30% share, things will start to heat up for OSX, since with a 3:1 or 2:1 ratio - not targeting OSX becomes a significant missed "opportunity" - your botnets would not grow as fast if you just targeted Windows.

Lastly, you said the registry was bad because stuff could be hidden there.

But to most "windows class" users there would be little difference between "hiding stuff" in the registry or /etc. Most of them won't even know that either exist in the first place!

Whereas you'd have just as much luck hiding stuff in the registry from the experts as you would in /etc or wherever.

So I don't see this "hiding" thing as a problem.

If you suspect your system is compromised, the safe thing to do is reinstall and update from a trusted source, then restore data and documents from backups.

[1] http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=47DDCFA9-645D-4495-9EDA-92CDE33E99A9&displaylang=en
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=e0f27260-58da-40db-8785-689cf6a05c73&displaylang=en

A lot of windows machines don't run windows update and so don't run that tool. Some of them because they have an invalid license.