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There is the question of if the information in the article is even accurate to begin with. I searched http://support.microsoft.com/ for 3 of the KB articles that it listed, (KB950719, KB950720, & KB950721) and none of them showed up. Google only showed links back to that article...

Wanting to use VLC as my default player in Vista, UAC always prompted
me to Allow or Deny - I couldn't get around it.

I don't want to turn off UAC as this is the wife's computer.

Some research brought me to: http://www.winvistaclub.com/f6.html

With this info:

---

1) Download and install the Microsoft Application Compatibility Toolkit 5.0.
( http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=24DA89E9-B581-47B0-B45E-492DD6DA2971&displaylang=en#filelist )

2) In the Start menu, locate the new folder. Find the shortcut icon for Compatibility Administrator. Right click it and clik Run as administrator.

3) In the left hand pane, right-click on the database under Custom Databases and select Create New, and select Application Fix.

4) Enter the name and other details of the application you want to alter behavior on and then browse to it to select it. Click Next.

5) Click Next until you are in the Compatibility Fixes screen.

6) On the Compatibility Fixes screen, find the item RunAsInvoker, and check it.

7) Click Next and then Finish.

8) Select File and Save As. Save the file as a filename.SDB type file in a directory you will easily find it.

9) Copy the .sdb file to the Vista computer you want to alter the elevation prompt behavior on.

10) Click Start>All Programs>Accessories. Right click Command Prompt and click Run as administrator.

11) Run the command below:

sdbinst \.sdb

For example, if you saved the .SDB file as abc.sdb in the c:\Windows folder, the command should be like this:

sdbinst c:\windows\abc.sdb

It should prompt: Installation of complete.

---

Now VLC is my default player w/o having to annoy me.

It is new in SP3. Here is the release note: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=60807c3a-8969-4ddf-beb2-8bfac9ed416b&DisplayLang=en It is not secret and don't to be "leaked" at all.

dont hold your breath http://www.microsoft.com/windows/lifecycle/servicepacks.mspx

This information has been available since April 1st on Microsoft's website. This is not leaked... Everything in the article is in the Overview of Windows XP Service Pack 3.pdf http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=68c48dad-bc34-40be-8d85-6bb4f56f5110&displaylang=en

Yeah, it looks like it's mostly a rehash of Microsoft's own Windows XP Service Pack 3 Overview document. Nothing's leaked here.

The vulnerability being exploited is documented here and shows it was "last updated" April 23. (two days ago)

My favorite amusement is:

Currently, Microsoft is not aware of any attacks attempting to exploit the potential vulnerability. Upon completion of this investigation, Microsoft will take the appropriate action to protect our customers, which may include providing a solution through a service pack, our monthly security update release process, or an out-of-cycle security update, depending on customer needs.

Thanks for that. Now that 500k servers got owned maybe you want to move on this sort of thing a little more seriously.

At the bottom they ask, How would you rate the usefulness of this content ? But there's no option for "a little late, eh?"

Though it DOES make me wonder if the publishing of this notice gave the idea to the makers of the malware. Makes a good case for not publishing a known vulnerability until either (1) its' in the wild already, or (2) you have a fix for it. Clearly neither of these were the case on Wednesday.

I wouldn't be so sure.

The $100 target for the XO seems to be moved back a little farther each day.

In third world educational markets, Windows SE and Office Home & Student 2007 is $3 not $200. Microsoft Student Innovation Suite

The reality is most open source advocates run M$ windows OS, after all it gives you a choice of a wide range of computer games, fair enough that (P)OS ain't fit for work or school but as a toy OS it is just, almost, somewhat, nearly, fine

That PC game is blasting out 3D graphics, animation and multichannel sound. It is simultaneously manipulating dozens - perhaps hundreds - of elements within the game world. It does not run on a toy OS.

The home is a much more challenging environment for an OS than the geek is willing to admit. The geek needs to be asking why the proprietary OS and the proprietary app do so well in this space.

M$ will feel totally threatened by any GUI that threatens its monopoly windows GUI

The Windows metaphor has been extraordinarily successful across a broad range of users and markets. It is the Geek's alternative that usually dies aborning.

I know you're trying to be funny by mocking Intelligent Design, but why not Intelligent Design? Afterall, there is proof of Unintelligent Design!

I've used the Asirra Project for about a year now on my site with fantastic results. I've had absolutely 0 bot registrations, when I was getting 10-20 a week with the old CAPTCHA. Given all the press CAPTCHA's have been getting lately, it makes me wonder why more people aren't implementing something of this nature.

Microsoft is still promoting PlaysForSure. "Same Compatibility Promise - Different Name".

What part of "false advertising" did you not understand.

Microsoft will not use activation as a tool to force people to upgrade. Activation is merely an anti-piracy tool, nothing else.

Microsoft will also support the activation of Windows XP throughout its life and will likely provide an update that turns activation off at the end of the product's lifecycle so users would no longer be required to activate the product.

Microsoft will not use activation as a tool to force people to upgrade. Activation is merely an anti-piracy tool, nothing else.

Microsoft will also support the activation of Windows XP throughout its life and will likely provide an update that turns activation off at the end of the product's lifecycle so users would no longer be required to activate the product.

Microsoft will not use activation as a tool to force people to upgrade. Activation is merely an anti-piracy tool, nothing else.

Microsoft will also support the activation of Windows XP throughout its life and will likely provide an update that turns activation off at the end of the product's lifecycle so users would no longer be required to activate the product.

No, windows and Linux are both OS platforms and are, for the purposes of development, equally open (otherwise no one could write software for either windows or Linux)... Apple begs to differ...

You missed the point. I'm not talking about competition in developing applications for the operating system. I'm talking about developing a replacement operating system which can take the place of Windows. Apple has not and will never do that because they cannot develop an operating system which can run Quicken, Taxcut and Halo 3 (as long as these continue to be based on Microsoft's proprietary Win32/.NET Windows architectures), no matter how furiously their fanboys beg to differ on their behalf. Consumer choice between products in the free market assumes that they are have strengths and weaknesses but are generally interchangeable. When you have to exchange not only the product, but your spending habits,

The false assumption here is that unless you choose open source you are choosing intentional bugs.

Is this is a straw-man or simply careless reading? I didn't and wouldn't claim that all commercial software is sabotaged. A correct reading leads to "commercial open source software cannot have intentionally placed bugs," which has no relation to "commercial software must have intentionally placed bugs." I didn't even go so far as to claim Microsoft (or your precious Apple) does this, only pointing out that others allege it and the exploring dynamics of such actions.

In addition you are assuming that there is some community dedicated to nothing but scrutinizing the source code of open source software as there is in a proprietary company (like apple).

Open source does have many people providing quality control. In important places (the kernel, major applications, etc) there are people on a full-time salary doing this just like at proprietary vendors. You must be reading the Microsoft FUD. Please note how artfully fear-mongering stats are taken from reliable sources and placed at the top of the references, while security related references are almost exclusively written by Microsoft's employees and tucked in at the bottom. This has little to do with reality, and proprietary QA personnel don't find the important

point of fact, Red-hat does not risk it's reputation since they are a support provider not the OS provider per-se...

This is perhaps the strangest thing you've said, not only because it's factually wrong in several places, but because it ignores the reality of human behavior. It's also way off topic, but I'll correct you anyway because it was a poor attempt at addressing the main point.

Software vendors' customers often have a minimal understanding of what they are "buying." You suggest to be knowledgeable and yet still don't even use the right term. How well do you think some Vice President understands copyright law and those crazy EULA's? RedHat actually used to sell boxed copies for under $100, which I'm fairly certain did not include a support contract. Now that downloading ISO's is easy, perhaps it's not economic to manufacture and ship discs of plastic containing software that can be downloaded freely.

Your understanding of RedHat's role is lacking. RH certainly is not the sole (and perhaps not even a major)

What are you talking about? XP mainstream support doesn't end until April 2009. The release of what may be the last service pack doesn't "declare the death" of the platform; their support lifecycle policy does, which is clearly spelled out here.

Don't get too excited. Remember the Microsoft motto: "Our customers are our beta testers." Remember that Microsoft is the Chief of Grief -- Let someone else have the pain. Wait until the bugs are found; SP3 version 3 may be the one you want.

Windows XP was first released in 2001. Windows XP created severe problems for us until SP2 was released in 2004.

So, Windows XP gave us 3 years of misery and 3 years of relative usefulness, but with extreme vulnerability to malware. And now Microsoft has declared the death of Windows XP in June 2008.

Is it any wonder why people don't want Windows Vista?

An indication of the hassle people had with downloading 3 years of updates is this quote from Paul Thurrott, who is over-the-top pro-Microsoft, and who often apologizes for Microsoft's abusiveness in a way that tries to make abusive behavior sound less destructive: ... the 100+ updates that Microsoft has shipped since SP2 can be a nightmare to deploy.

My opinion is that Microsoft is very badly managed. Windows XP gave us 50% big hassles and 50% mild hassles. Do you want to partner with a company that has so frequently abused you in the past?

Easy solution.

1. Tell them to send you .doc or .pdf.

or

2. Install the free, simple, easy to install compat pack from MS.

Nothing you've said here translates into MS forcing you to upgrade. In fact they've given you tools that make it easy and simple to NOT upgrade, and made them free to download.

This is not to suggest that MS doesnt WANT you to upgrade, of course they do. But many, many businesses and orgs are still running quite successfully on older versions of MS Office.

http://www.microsoft.com/heroeshappenhere/

Maybe these heroes? They happen inside curly braces and protect the world from the evils of communism and linux.

tldr; ISPs are hijacking unused sub-domains.

For example if you try to go to http://linux.microsoft.com/ you get a bunch of ads for Linux products on a site that appears to be controlled by Microsoft. Obviously this is an abuse of someone else's trademark.

From the article "File formats that are supported in Works 9":

• Works 9 Word Processor
  You can open the following file formats in the Works 9 Word Processor:
  • Works Documents (*.wps)
  • Works Templates (*.wpt)
  • [snip]
  • Word (Asian Versions) 6.0/95 (*.doc, *.dot)
  • Word 2.x for Windows
  • Word 2007 Document (*.docx)
  • Word 2007 Macro-enabled Document (*.docm)
  • Word 6.0/95 for Windows & Macintosh (*.doc)
  • Word 97-2002 (*.doc)
  • Word 97-2003 Document (*.doc)
  • [snip]
  You can save files in the following formats in the Works 9 Word Processor:
  • [snip]
  • Word 2.x for Windows
  • Word 2007 Document (*.docx)
  • Word 6.0/95 (*.doc, *.dot)
  • Word 97-2002 (*.doc)
  • Word 97-2002 & 6.0/95 - RTF (*.doc)
  • Word 97-2003 Document (*.doc)
  • [snip]

  Works 9 Spreadsheet
  You can open the following file formats in the Works 9 Spreadsheet:

  • [snip]
  • Excel 97-2007 (*.xl*)
  • [snip]
  You can save files in the following formats in the Works 9 Spreadsheet:
  • [snip]
  • Excel 2007 Workbook (*.xlsx)
  • Excel 2007 Binary Workbook (*.xlsb)
  • Excel 97-2003 (*.xls)

7-zip compressing. Multimedia encoding. VC++ has an ever so awesome /MP switch. Windows threads getting previews for all your files in explorer. Heck, even Excel 2007 will thread your calculations behind the scenes.

Games may not make significant use of multi-core yet, but some other real-world things do. Quad core definitely makes an impact on my daily usage.

umm.. you are aware word supports it, right?

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word/HP011881161033.aspx

also, sun's converter tool may help.. keep in mind that you can convert anything to pdf and then from pdf to almost anything if you really need to. I read about it.. but did not bookmark it.

Is it perfect? No. Adequate for most things? Yes.

Why we all have legit full versions of XP lying about after we bought full versions of Vista to upgrade our systems.

Really.

And some of us also have liscences left on our action pack subscriptions.

Very well, consider it done!

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=95E24C87-8732-48D5-8689-AB826E7B8FDF&displaylang=en

There are viewers already

Word:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=95E24C87-8732-48D5-8689-AB826E7B8FDF&displaylang=en

Excel:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=c8378bf4-996c-4569-b547-75edbd03aaf0&displaylang=EN

Search for the rest "[MS app name] viewer".

There are viewers already

Word:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=95E24C87-8732-48D5-8689-AB826E7B8FDF&displaylang=en

Excel:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=c8378bf4-996c-4569-b547-75edbd03aaf0&displaylang=EN

Search for the rest "[MS app name] viewer".

First, KB946723 isn't the time zone patch. It's a Vista patch for hibernation blue screen errors.

Next, your problem is that the Windows Update client is broken on your system. To fix it:
1. Stop the BITS and Automatic Updates services.
2. Delete C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\. It will be recreated later.
3. Start BITS and Automatic Updates and go back to Windows Update.

If that doesn't work, then IMX following this KB article will fix it eventually:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/822798

If you're not sure what Windows Updates is doing, check the log file located at C:\Windows\WindowsUpdate.log (NOT 'Windows Update.log'). You can always search that for the error numbers the updates are throwing.

Just because it's Windows doesn't mean you don't have to know how it works.

the end of Microslop

By clicking on this link you agree to remunerate his holiness George W.Bush the sum total of 1,000,000,000 Billion Euro per annum>

Microsoft does some smarmy things, but in this case this is primarily just a name change. SFU -> SUA (and it comes standard on Vista/Server 2008)

download link for SUA

Being discontinued/desupported somewhat because the OSs that SFU runs on are being desupported. Surprising they want everyone to upgrade to Vista so they can make more money. LOL.

The default C++ new does throw an exception rather than returning NULL, but don't let your
ignorance of the language stop you from decrying it.

Neither Vista 32 bits nor XP 32 bits can use more than 3Gb of RAM !

You have to manually change the configuration to use the whole RAM: http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms791558.aspx

> This "standard" is completely irrelevant as a standard. No one, absolutely no one, is going to implement it. Not even Microsoft.

BS: Microsoft has pledged to support it in public. So assuming that the OpenOffice implementation of OOXML continues, it will support it too.

> No company is going to be allowed to implement it and become a competitive threat to Microsoft. Microsoft will shut them down with Patent Violations.

Again BS: The OSP pretty much crushes that arguement. Even the main point in the SFLC anaylsis about future versions has been addressed.

Your core arguements seem to be strictly Proof by Assertion

> This "standard" is completely irrelevant as a standard. No one, absolutely no one, is going to implement it. Not even Microsoft.

BS: Microsoft has pledged to support it in public. So assuming that the OpenOffice implementation of OOXML continues, it will support it too.

> No company is going to be allowed to implement it and become a competitive threat to Microsoft. Microsoft will shut them down with Patent Violations.

Again BS: The OSP pretty much crushes that arguement. Even the main point in the SFLC anaylsis about future versions has been addressed.

Your core arguements seem to be strictly Proof by Assertion

It's as easy to RTFE as to ask about it in a post. :)

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/sp2/proeula.mspx
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/eula.mspx

"You may also store or install a copy of the Product on a storage device, such as a network

server, used only to install or run the Product on your other Workstation Computers over an internal network;"

It's as easy to RTFE as to ask about it in a post. :)

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/sp2/proeula.mspx
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/eula.mspx

"You may also store or install a copy of the Product on a storage device, such as a network

server, used only to install or run the Product on your other Workstation Computers over an internal network;"

http://download.microsoft.com/download/0/B/E/0BE8BDD7-E5E8-422A-ABFD-4342ED7AD886/InkSerializedFormat(ISF)Specification.xps

Not really:

Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs is not a general-purpose operating system. It is designed to work with the Microsoft Remote Desktop Connection client or third-party clients, such as Citrix ICA. In addition, it allows for a limited number of workloads to be executed locally, including security software, management software, terminal emulation software, document viewers, and the .NET Framework.

It's not a full-blown OS but rather a thin client, whereas a nLite'd XP, depending on the degree of reduction, is still a fully functional XP minus the bloatware (MSN Explorer, media software, messenger, unneeded services and drivers etc.).

You're almost correct. Actually, it's called "Windows Vista Business for Embedded Systems" and "Windows Vista Ultimate for Embedded Systems".