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• Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007 File Formats - "By installing the Compatibility Pack in addition to Microsoft Office 2000, Office XP, or Office 2003, you will be able to open, edit, and save files using the file formats new to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007."
• Office File Converter Pack - "This download provides file converters and image filters for Microsoft Office programs, from Office 97 to Office 2003. These additional converters and filters are for older or seldom used documents or image formats."

• Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007 File Formats - "By installing the Compatibility Pack in addition to Microsoft Office 2000, Office XP, or Office 2003, you will be able to open, edit, and save files using the file formats new to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007."
• Office File Converter Pack - "This download provides file converters and image filters for Microsoft Office programs, from Office 97 to Office 2003. These additional converters and filters are for older or seldom used documents or image formats."

My suggestion is to slap a number on your standards. e.g. PC Gaming Score: 710 for this years Ultra, and 920 for next years. Every last mouth breather out there knows that higher numbers are usually better and will assume so, even when they aren't... The goal is to provide a single number that a user can look at and say: Okay, the required number on gameX is lower, so I can play it. No worries.

It's that simple. No worrying about whether uber-awesome is greater than mega-extreme, or whether it's last years mega-extreme or this year's mega-extreme. It's, "is the number on the box of this game less than the number on my machine".

Congratulations, you just (re)invented the Windows Experience Index:

A computer with a base score of 1.0 or 2.0 usually has sufficient performance to do most general computing tasks, such as run office productivity applications and search the Internet. However, a computer with this base score is generally not powerful enough to run Windows Aero, or the advanced multimedia experiences that are available with Windows Vista.

A computer with a base score of 3.0 is able to run Windows Aero and many new features of Windows Vista at a basic level. Some of the new Windows Vista advanced features might not have all of their functionality available. For example, a machine with a base score of 3.0 can display the Windows Vista theme at a resolution of 1280 × 1024, but might struggle to run the theme on multiple monitors. Or, it can play digital TV content but might struggle to play High Definition Television (HDTV) content.

A computer with a base score of 4.0 or 5.0 is able to run all new features of Windows Vista with full functionality, and it is able to support high-end, graphics-intensive experiences, such as multiplayer and 3 D gaming and recording and playback of HDTV content. Computers with a base score of 5.0 were the highest performing computers available when Windows Vista was released.

You should look at Spec# who does really care about null pointers among other things such as contracts.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsautomotive/wa5.mspx ... the day I stopped buying cars from BMW.

Fixing weird dhcp and network stack issues
netsh int ip reset c:\resetlog.txt
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/317518 and Yes I have had to do this one on numerous occasions as re-installing just because a machine wouldn't get DHCP would have been a PITA.

How about trouble shooting the firewall? http://support.microsoft.com/kb/875357

The CLI is a good thing and it allows very powerful troubleshooting and easy ways to remotely configure things, sure the end user shouldn't have to use them all the time, but I get our end users using the CLI to help troubleshoot problems so I can tell them what is wrong with their machine. Hell even MS is touting the "NEW" command line functionality in Server 2008 and from what I have seen managed to munt things in the process.

The difference between windows and Linux now days is that Linux is a command line environment with GUI's that interface with it, meaning that anything you can do with a GUI, can be done via the command line. Where as Windows is a GUI with some CLI tools. So basically everything has to be done with the GUI or some very very crafty VB scripting (which can get real messy, real fast).

If I could convince more of my friends to use Linux, it would be far simpler for me to support them, not because I know linux better (Honestly my Windows Knowledge and Linux knowledge are about on par, probably a little stronger in the windows department... excluding vista)

Fixing weird dhcp and network stack issues
netsh int ip reset c:\resetlog.txt
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/317518 and Yes I have had to do this one on numerous occasions as re-installing just because a machine wouldn't get DHCP would have been a PITA.

How about trouble shooting the firewall? http://support.microsoft.com/kb/875357

The CLI is a good thing and it allows very powerful troubleshooting and easy ways to remotely configure things, sure the end user shouldn't have to use them all the time, but I get our end users using the CLI to help troubleshoot problems so I can tell them what is wrong with their machine. Hell even MS is touting the "NEW" command line functionality in Server 2008 and from what I have seen managed to munt things in the process.

The difference between windows and Linux now days is that Linux is a command line environment with GUI's that interface with it, meaning that anything you can do with a GUI, can be done via the command line. Where as Windows is a GUI with some CLI tools. So basically everything has to be done with the GUI or some very very crafty VB scripting (which can get real messy, real fast).

If I could convince more of my friends to use Linux, it would be far simpler for me to support them, not because I know linux better (Honestly my Windows Knowledge and Linux knowledge are about on par, probably a little stronger in the windows department... excluding vista)

Since most of the posts are not answering your question at all, here are some programs which can help.

I have been fixing Windows computers for over 10 years and can suggest the following programs from personal experience. There is no guarantee that they will find all keyloggers but they will detect the progs you find by using google.

1) Spybot Search & Destroy (free) http://www.safer-networking.org/
    This is a spyware checker, cleaner. It will also find keyloggers and screen capturing software
2) Antivir (free for personal use) http://www.free-av.com/
    This is an Antivirus / malware program which I have found to kick the shit out of Norton Antivirus (Personal + Corporate) and McAfee.
3) Norton Antivirus 2008 (not free)
    This is another antivirus program, it is not as good as Antivir but it may contain different malware signatures then Antivir.
4) Adaware (free) http://www.lavasoftusa.com/
    Like Spybot but less strict, I don't use it anymore but you should run it anyway.
5) Windows Defender (free) http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software/default.mspx
    This one is made (purchased) by Microsoft and is actually quite good, I can highly recommend it to remove crap from a computer. This one is free and includes an "active shield"

If you run suggestions 1,2,4 and 5 above you can assume that your computer is clean. To be sure format and reload.

As for the rest, follow the advice above and end the relationship....

THere are many things that OOo can do that Word cannot

Such as?

but I have yet to see anyone show anything that Word can do that OOo cannot

Thee is no so blind as those that will not see.

I suspect that any list I give you will be met with varying excuses of "yeah, but who uses that" or some such.

But here goes, off the top of my head:

Grammar Checker
Table Drawing (uses a pencil motive to draw complex tables)
Live real-time style preview (hover over a style, see the changes applied as they would look if you actually selected it)
Programmable object model and automation API (to allow other apps to use Word as as an engine)
Fast start time (seriously).

There's a lot more than that, but that's just off the top of my head.

As for multiple indexes, that's not true. Word has had multiple index support for years.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/193145

Mass renaming files? http://support.microsoft.com/kb/320167

Their disto still seems fairly popular though, so being more complicated isn't necessarily as big an impediment as you might think.

winerror.h is also shipped with the WDK. It contains all the error codes for the Win32 environment subsystem, which isn't implemented by the kernel. Win32 exists mostly in user mode: although a sizable chunk of the Win32 server process was moved from winsrv.dll into win32k.sys in NT4, which does run in kernel mode, Win32 really isn't part of the kernel. They did that to cut down on IPC overhead, not to integrate it into lower layers. Win32 services can only be used by user mode processes.

ntstatus.h is the header that contains the kernel's error codes. That file is 16272 lines in the WDK 6000 (with 8 comment lines to every code), and contains few codes not relevant to the kernel.

It's not surprising that winerror.h contains messages not related to the kernel because it's not what I'd consider part of the kernel. AFAICT, this file is included only to support win32k.sys, and possibly display drivers. I'd be interested to know how many of the kernel source files actually include winerror.h.

I think you're misunderstanding what WRK is. It's not a research kernel, its a snapshot of the 2003-x64/XP-x64 kernel, minus a bunch of hardware layer stuff (HAL, etc) and minus everything from userspace.

The information to inform you is here, which was also linked on the summary to TFA.

Working link.

Any license that uses the term "snippits" is a-okay by me!

most software was written in straight machine code, and physical limitations on memory and storage space meant that programs were smaller. So analysing a binary wasn't anything like as intractable as it is today.

Add to this the curious attitude of paranoia that's developed around the possibility of others disassembling binaries, and which is widely promoted by companies like Microsoft who are very happy to provide developers with tools to make it even harder for anyone to get your precious source code.

Microsoft Reporting Services' Report Designer Ad-Hoc report tool will allow them the access they need, without allowing them to write to the database. Also, you design the model with an Oracle back-end in visual studio, allowing you to have precise control over how they see the database.

http://www.microsoft.com/sql/technologies/reporting/default.mspx

http://visualstudiomagazine.com/features/article.aspx?editorialsid=1300

Just last night I once again visited the Top 100 Sci-Fi List of Books and checked their list for any new books that moved up and their Major Series list to decided on what I will be reading next on my month long visit in Europe. After that I hit Google to look for eBook torrents for the books and series that I am interested in and I came across this Top 100 Sci-Fi Books Torrent with most of the books from the list and many of them as complete series.

The books are in Microsoft Reader's LIT format so if you have a compatible PDA device that you use for reading then you're set or you can always convert them out to HTML with Covert Lit utility (GNU licensed and open source to boot) that runs on a number of OS's and takes care of the work. Also I would recommend the Haali Reader for Pocket PC platform if you want a good full featured reader that can read text files directly inside .zip files without uncompressing and it saves your place in many books even on phone resets in case you have a PDA type phone that you can read on like I do.

I am exactly in the same boat as you, I also read the Hyperion Cantos but I couldn't get through the first book the first three times I tried to read, because the story lines were so diluted and all-over-the-place, that if it wasn't for the single story about the village of people and the Crucifix of Resurrection I would have dropped this book like a stone and missed out on the rest of the great series. That first books almost soured me to the Top 100 Sci-Fi List because it was one of the books there that was highly recommended, and there should be a warning placed on it.

Also, I personally prefer to read books as eBooks but I also like to own the best ones as mass print paperbacks so I usually buy them en mass as complete series from Barnes & Nobel since they seem to be a less sleazy company than Amazon. Also, just as a reminder don't bother with the Amazon Kindle eBook reader since you can't put your books on it without uploading them to Amazon and anything you buy to put on the reader is only licensed to you and you do not own the books you buy.

Writing up a reply to this question makes me look at all the books on my shelf with fond memories of the adventures that I read about. If you haven't already read these then check out the Dune series for deep sci-fi, and the Dune prequel books by Herbert's son if you like lighter fiction in the same universe, Ender's Game series, Vorkosigan Saga for action packed episodic sci-fi, and the other series mentioned in the links above.

Enjoy your reading.

"Linux excels in various code structure metrics, but lags in code style. This could be attributed to the work of brilliant motivated programmers who aren't however efficiently managed to pay attention to the details of style. In contrast, the high marks of WRK in code style and low marks in code structure could be attributed to the opposite effect: programmers who are efficiently micro-managed to care about the details of style, but are not given sufficient creative freedom to structure their code in an appropriate manner. "

How ever I was left wondering how it was possible to compare fairly? He already stated:

"Excluded from the kernel code are the device drivers, and the plug-and-play, power management, and virtual DOS subsystems. The missing parts explain the large size difference between the WRK and the other three kernels."

and reading I see even more of the drivers aren't there:

"The NT Hardware Abstraction Layer, file systems, network stacks, and device drivers are implemented separately from NTOS and loaded into kernel mode as dynamic libraries. Sources for these dynamic components are not included in the WRK. "

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/sharedsource/licensing/researchkernel.mspx

So it's not like for like. Maybe you would draw different conclusions if it was, maybe the Linux style issue is because of all the drivers the WRK lacks. So even though I think his conclusion sounds probable, I don't feel I can state it as so with any confidence.

The WRK is under the Microsoft Windows Research Kernel Source Code License. I'm not sure that this license conforms with anyones definition of open source, but it's reasonably free for reasearch.

But PP addresses a crucial point, if something really is closed source there is no reviewable way to compare and present this code. So if the WRK would be total crap they could always say: yes that's only the WRK, not the real kernel.

Only statements about open source code are directly verifiable/falsifiable. One of the reasons, why the FOSS approach is superior from a scientific as well as technical point of view.

Believe it or not there are poor people who might like to have your old computer. There are third world countries that could use them in their schools. http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/hazwaste/recycle/ecycling/donate.htm
http://salvationarmy.ca/?gclid=CIyxi7-pq5MCFQGnQQodzRlNnw
http://www.microsoft.com/Education/TenTips.mspx

Actually, Vista also has UI guidelines. It's just that nobody cares.

What offer is this idiot talking about?
From TFA: "I and many of your shareholders strongly believe that a combination between Yahoo and Microsoft would form a dynamic company"

Microsoft, on the other hand, says it is no longer interested http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2008/may08/05-03letter.mspx

Actually MS has already agreed to do that. XP will be kept alive for ultraportables.

http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=4345

And I'm sure there are enough corporate customers rejecting Vista that it will be keep being sold on other machines too, at least until the next Windows release.

It's no biggie really, they just need to keep providing security updates. And they're committed to that anyway until 2014. I guess adding a few years to that doesn't cost much.

http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?LN=en-us&p1=3223&x=14&y=9#

Actually I wish they just commit to selling XP and providing security patches for 20 years or something. It wouldn't cost them much and it runs a hell of lot better than Vista on low end hardware. In fact for most machines, it's pretty much the best OS ever.

ah, but XP is not $3, it's still $199, MS is just donating $196 to charity, you see. good on the books too. everyone wins! (well, except the kids)

I have Frets On Fire with something like three hundred different songs - you can convert the guitar hero tracks to work seamlessly with FoF; and you have hammer-ons\pull-offs.

I use the XBOX 360 guitar hero controller which has a WinXP driver (32bit driver or 64bit driver)

I have Frets On Fire with something like three hundred different songs - you can convert the guitar hero tracks to work seamlessly with FoF; and you have hammer-ons\pull-offs.

I use the XBOX 360 guitar hero controller which has a WinXP driver (32bit driver or 64bit driver)

Install the BSOD screen safer. Also, compress and encrypt the data, and rename it to %SystemRoot%/Memory.dmp ('complete memory dump').

You're kidding, right? Or are we supposed to assume that Windows "core level" does not include COM?

You mean COM? http://www.microsoft.com/com/default.mspx

Then ya, I'm not kidding as COM is NOT in the NT portion of Windows. Just like KDE libraries are not in the core of Linux.

Why is this so hard for people? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_NT

Besides COM is not apparently the 'evil' you think it is either. It was a way to bag and tie several programming concepts together. Strapping OLE to ActiveX and to other communication mechanisms.

If you don't like the IE ActiveX integration, then you have a ligitimate bitch. However, if you think dropping an Excel Chart or Corel Graphic in your Word Processor is bad then you are a bit dense.

See mention of successfully porting Mono to CE here:

"How do I serve webpages from NETCF?"
http://www.danielmoth.com/Blog/2005/02/how-do-i-serve-webpages-from-netcf.html

"2. [...]
c) Port the ASP.NET MONO implementation (not aware of any *public* project that has achieved it, but there are some guys that have done it (ended up at ~1300KB) and if they want to go public with it I am sure they will - I cannot say anything else, I'm afraid)"

If your app really is that simple and cost is that much of an issue Embedded Visual C++ v3 & 4 are both 100% free. They are also very feature-free & may thus be more to your liking that Visual Studio.

Otherwise the best way to get Visual Studio cheaply is a free copy at a local user group launch event, or the "Heros Happen Here" even that's running now (though that's only Visual Studio Standard Edition): http://www.microsoft.com/heroeshappenhere

Depending on your licensing situation, the student Dream Spark program is offering the professional version for free: https://downloads.channel8.msdn.com/

Also look at the "Spark Your Imagination" program for a great deal on not only Visual Studio, but also Platform Builder & actual hardware: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/embedded/products/spark/

See mention of successfully porting Mono to CE here:

"How do I serve webpages from NETCF?"
http://www.danielmoth.com/Blog/2005/02/how-do-i-serve-webpages-from-netcf.html

"2. [...]
c) Port the ASP.NET MONO implementation (not aware of any *public* project that has achieved it, but there are some guys that have done it (ended up at ~1300KB) and if they want to go public with it I am sure they will - I cannot say anything else, I'm afraid)"

If your app really is that simple and cost is that much of an issue Embedded Visual C++ v3 & 4 are both 100% free. They are also very feature-free & may thus be more to your liking that Visual Studio.

Otherwise the best way to get Visual Studio cheaply is a free copy at a local user group launch event, or the "Heros Happen Here" even that's running now (though that's only Visual Studio Standard Edition): http://www.microsoft.com/heroeshappenhere

Depending on your licensing situation, the student Dream Spark program is offering the professional version for free: https://downloads.channel8.msdn.com/

Also look at the "Spark Your Imagination" program for a great deal on not only Visual Studio, but also Platform Builder & actual hardware: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/embedded/products/spark/

I have never had Windows fail to install for any reason..

While the plural of anecdote is not data, I think I know what the GP is talking about and have experienced it myself.

There are some known AHCI problems with a common ATI southbridge chipset which made installing Vista impossible unless you first disable AHCI (I assume this is what the GP meant by having to dumb-down BIOS settings).

So, lets try XP I thought. Too bad it has no drivers for the sata controller at all, and I have no floppy drive. I ended up having to inject the controller drivers into the XP CD and re-burn it. The XP installer then saw my disk in IDE mode, but not AHCI mode..

I gave up and left the controller in IDE mode.

For reference, Ubuntu 7.10 had no trouble on the same machine.

I can't mod, but someone, please, mod the parent with somenthing like insightful or interesting.

I already knew about the Express editions not working with PocketPC development, but this link to the Visual C# Express page saved my life.

On that page, there's a link to the Beginner Developer Learning Center. The tutorials are quite good and are serving me well.

Maybe I should get the courage and dive head first in Visual Studio.

Here's a link O'Reilly's "Head First C#."

http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/9780596514822/

Best C#/Visual Studio book from what's in my opinion the best series of teaching books around right now.

Here's the link to free download of Visual C# Express.
http://www.microsoft.com/express/vcsharp/

That's not a trial. It's a free reduced feature version of Visual Studio 2008.

"in this day and age IMHO it is kind of silly that I can't simply make a list of the two dozen or so programs that I use and have them be the only things that are allowed to run".

For Windows, what you are describing is Software Restriction Policies. This has been around for some time.

This is way off the topic of Blender, but hella interesting.

The point the parent raised about MSVC spewing those warnings is totally valid. I hadn't thought about it this way, but they are encouraging non-portable code.

Sure there are a handful of security issues you have to watch out for in a few standard C library functions (such as strcpy). Read the man pages. They explain all the issues.
(And there are some you shouldn't use at all - like gets, and sprintf, and scanf with a %s format).

But you can always work around these issues in a portable manner (usually by ensuring you allocate enough space before throwing strings at memory!) Having a "magic bullet secure version" of a function isn't going to help very much as you're always going to be able to shoot yourself in the foot in a language with arbitrary pointer access.

MS "fixes" the issue in the typical way, by adding proprietary extensions.

Just look at this list:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms235384(VS.80).aspx
They've taken it upon themselves to "deprecate" a whole bunch of POSIX functions (albeit mostly low-level things), and provided their own _-prefixed versions which seem to be no different. And added "secure" versions of a bunch of standard functions.

With regards to standardized sizes, well we have them in C99. You just need to #include <stdint.h>, and then you get access to all of the (u)int(n)_t types.

eg. int32_t, uint8_t, int16_t, etc.
See here.

Though you wanted wchar_t standardised .. I don't think they did that. My guess is if you wanted to do proper Unicode in C you might just use a uint32_t (for UTF-32) or uint16_ts (for UTF-16), and write your own unicode "is" functions - or use a proper unicode library (I haven't).

And by good, you mean several pages of vague, unsubstantiated fanboy whining, with only one paragraph about .NET that hints at, but does not name, the stupidity of InvokeRequired.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/255905 MSIs are an open format that you can take apart. Why would you be any more afraid of an .msi package than you would be an rpm or a bff or a jar for that matter?

http://research.microsoft.com/os/Singularity/

Solve security, for one.

So this is how linux is going to replace Windows on the desktop? By creating custom functionality that break RFC and common sense? Some things never change, do they?

How is this any different than what GPL did to BSD?
uh...
maybe you should have read microsoft licences...
lets see...
gpl garants that derived works are gpl. same with ms-pl.
gpl protects from patents threat both users and developers. ms-pl doesn'say anything about users. ( uh.. or does it mean that you can't sue just derived works??).
gpl says anyone can use the program. ms-pl doesn't.
gpl doesn't restict you to a specific platform. ms-lpl does, ms-pl doesn't.
i can't understand if the complete derived work must be under ms-pl (or ms-lpl)or just the copied code. with ms-rl it's just the copied-code.
no warranty _at_all_ in ms-pl. at least in gpl you can choose to give it.
gpl states that it can not be modified at all. ms-pl, lpl ecc doesn't say anything.
ecc.ecc...

so... what's the difference??
with bsd i couldn't control derived work, i couldn't control patents, anyone could take my work and do everything.
with gpl i'm sure noone fools me.
beside, ms-pl, -lpl, -rl and "Reference License" are a little too short for me...
i mean... come on... 18 lines for a fscking license, including definitions? are you joking?
how can you protect me completely in 18 lines (including definitions)??????????
or am i mistaken? aren't these the licences?
Ms-PL
Ms-LPL
Ms-RL
Ms-Reference License

Luke.

How is this any different than what GPL did to BSD?
uh...
maybe you should have read microsoft licences...
lets see...
gpl garants that derived works are gpl. same with ms-pl.
gpl protects from patents threat both users and developers. ms-pl doesn'say anything about users. ( uh.. or does it mean that you can't sue just derived works??).
gpl says anyone can use the program. ms-pl doesn't.
gpl doesn't restict you to a specific platform. ms-lpl does, ms-pl doesn't.
i can't understand if the complete derived work must be under ms-pl (or ms-lpl)or just the copied code. with ms-rl it's just the copied-code.
no warranty _at_all_ in ms-pl. at least in gpl you can choose to give it.
gpl states that it can not be modified at all. ms-pl, lpl ecc doesn't say anything.
ecc.ecc...

so... what's the difference??
with bsd i couldn't control derived work, i couldn't control patents, anyone could take my work and do everything.
with gpl i'm sure noone fools me.
beside, ms-pl, -lpl, -rl and "Reference License" are a little too short for me...
i mean... come on... 18 lines for a fscking license, including definitions? are you joking?
how can you protect me completely in 18 lines (including definitions)??????????
or am i mistaken? aren't these the licences?
Ms-PL
Ms-LPL
Ms-RL
Ms-Reference License

Luke.

How is this any different than what GPL did to BSD?
uh...
maybe you should have read microsoft licences...
lets see...
gpl garants that derived works are gpl. same with ms-pl.
gpl protects from patents threat both users and developers. ms-pl doesn'say anything about users. ( uh.. or does it mean that you can't sue just derived works??).
gpl says anyone can use the program. ms-pl doesn't.
gpl doesn't restict you to a specific platform. ms-lpl does, ms-pl doesn't.
i can't understand if the complete derived work must be under ms-pl (or ms-lpl)or just the copied code. with ms-rl it's just the copied-code.
no warranty _at_all_ in ms-pl. at least in gpl you can choose to give it.
gpl states that it can not be modified at all. ms-pl, lpl ecc doesn't say anything.
ecc.ecc...

so... what's the difference??
with bsd i couldn't control derived work, i couldn't control patents, anyone could take my work and do everything.
with gpl i'm sure noone fools me.
beside, ms-pl, -lpl, -rl and "Reference License" are a little too short for me...
i mean... come on... 18 lines for a fscking license, including definitions? are you joking?
how can you protect me completely in 18 lines (including definitions)??????????
or am i mistaken? aren't these the licences?
Ms-PL
Ms-LPL
Ms-RL
Ms-Reference License

Luke.

How is this any different than what GPL did to BSD?
uh...
maybe you should have read microsoft licences...
lets see...
gpl garants that derived works are gpl. same with ms-pl.
gpl protects from patents threat both users and developers. ms-pl doesn'say anything about users. ( uh.. or does it mean that you can't sue just derived works??).
gpl says anyone can use the program. ms-pl doesn't.
gpl doesn't restict you to a specific platform. ms-lpl does, ms-pl doesn't.
i can't understand if the complete derived work must be under ms-pl (or ms-lpl)or just the copied code. with ms-rl it's just the copied-code.
no warranty _at_all_ in ms-pl. at least in gpl you can choose to give it.
gpl states that it can not be modified at all. ms-pl, lpl ecc doesn't say anything.
ecc.ecc...

so... what's the difference??
with bsd i couldn't control derived work, i couldn't control patents, anyone could take my work and do everything.
with gpl i'm sure noone fools me.
beside, ms-pl, -lpl, -rl and "Reference License" are a little too short for me...
i mean... come on... 18 lines for a fscking license, including definitions? are you joking?
how can you protect me completely in 18 lines (including definitions)??????????
or am i mistaken? aren't these the licences?
Ms-PL
Ms-LPL
Ms-RL
Ms-Reference License

Luke.

With the ongoing issues we were facing with SP2

I thought SP3 would be a "possible solution"

Someone please suggest an option other than formatting the windows drive.

Are they desperately trying to drive their customers away?