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World's worst web comic? I thought it was Heroes Happen Here

What about Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs? http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/sa/benefits/fundamentals.mspx http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Fundamentals_for_Legacy_PCs

Microsoft has offered a product called Windows XP Embedded for a long time. It lets hardware vendors basically roll their own version of XP to suit the requirements of their device. They can take out this or that, assume a smaller screen resolution, or what-have-you. A tool that ships with the product cooks up an install image to their specifications, et voila!

I don't see anything particularly revolutionary about Microsoft helping Asus out with a customized version of Windows for the Eee PC when they routinely do the same for ATM manufacturers, for example.

There's a seemingly perfect version of Windows nestled between CE and XP: XP Embedded. Why is this not perfect for the Eee PC? It runs on even slower hardware with a tiny amount of RAM, and consumes minimal "HD" space (usually on a CF card). Its development interface does exactly the kind of component customization (don't want Notepad? gone.) that you might need on such a device, so it doesn't seem to make sense that MS would need to supply an even more stripped-down version. Actually, even if MS came up with someone smaller than XPe, they'd have a hard time getting it to run normal applications.

To further comment on this, the OS the parent is referring to is Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PC's which is based off Windows XP Embedded, to be a replacement for the 9x/2000 machines that volume license customers with SA contracts may be using. It runs on less memory and processor and is up to date on patching (as up to date as XP can be). While this wasnt intended to be a full featured os (I believe its more for remote desktop and holding over old hardware until companies can upgrade), I have used it in vmware and have not had any major issues with it. http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/sa/benefits/fundamentals.mspx

Both notebooks are somewhat expensive and so different that comparing "value" depends almost entirely on what unique features the buyer values more. At this price level, I'd probably choose an MPC TransPort T2500 (comes with Office Basic and 3 years warranty/support by default).

What a dumb arrogant statement. Microsoft has their own fucking products that don't run correctly under regular user accounts. Dynamics GP is one example. We run Dynamics for our ERP system, and we have to change NTFS permissions on various folders, and permissions on a handful of registry keys to get it to run correctly.

And you don't think they should have done that BEFORE they even asked MSOOXML to become an ISO standard?

It went something like this. First, Microsoft introduced OOXML in Office 2007. Then they've submitted it to ECMA for standardization. The resulting spec had a few tweaks in it. That, in turn, got submitted to ISO, and they've made quite a few (albeit mostly minor) changes to it there. What got approved by ISO is the spec with all those changes, which Microsoft obviously couldn't have anticipated. Now, though, there's no excuse for them not to catch up - and I'm sure they will do it, otherwise the whole ISO push is moot for them.

It does not seem to bother you that this so called standard has no implementation whatsoever let alone two independantly developed and interoperable implementations.

Can you cite some reference here? Link to a website from Microsoft where I can order the specs?

If only somebody would produce some reliable collaboration software and some reliable conferencing software, Billionaire corporatists could benefit from global wage competition without any need for immigration. Based on the stated need for immigrants, their own software isn't good enough for production use.

If only somebody would produce some reliable collaboration software and some reliable conferencing software, Billionaire corporatists could benefit from global wage competition without any need for immigration. Based on the stated need for immigrants, their own software isn't good enough for production use.

"... we are committed to supporting the Open XML specification that is approved by ISO/IEC in our products"

It makes sense too, if you think of it. What Microsoft expects to get from this is access to markets where a standardized document format is required (such as some governments). Unless they actually implement the OOXML as approved by ISO, they won't get it (they would still be able to claim that OOXML is an ISO standard without clarifying that it's not the same OOXML as in Office 2007, but they wouldn't pass any actual checks or certifications needed).

Microsoft Corp. has announced that it is expanding its presence in Canada by opening a new software development centre in the Greater Vancouver Area, in British Columbia. The Microsoft Canada Development Centre will open in the fall of 2007 and will be home to software developers from around the world.

The Microsoft Canada Development Centre will operate as one of a handful of development centres outside the company's Redmond, Wash., headquarters. The other development centres are located in North Carolina, Ireland, Denmark and Israel. In addition, the company houses full research and development centres in the United Kingdom, India, China and the Silicon Valley. The Microsoft Canada Development Centre builds on recently announced expansions to Boston, Mass., and Bellevue, Washington. The Vancouver area is a global gateway with a diverse population and is close to Microsoftâ(TM)s corporate offices in Redmond and the Centre will also allow the company to continue to recruit and retain highly-skilled people affected by the immigration issues in the U.S.

Here's the link: http://www.microsoft.com/Presspass/exec/billg/speeches/2007/03-07Senate.mspx

If you want video, google for Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor homepage and go to March 07, 2008 archive (sorry, they don't have static links to their realplayer videos).

Check out the "$5 billion in personal taxes" part in the video, spoken off the record so not part of the transcript... Bill sure shut that Congresscritter up though.

Don't even bother. The majority of Slashdotters would claim that going to a college is a waste, and would wear their badge of illiteracy with honor, stating that they've learnt everything that there is to learn without setting foot in college. And then they'll tell you how their experience and wonderful geekiness sets them apart from the rest.

And you're right about the need for intelligent people with good academic credentials. I know several companies that are looking for people in EE/ECE related fields with graduate degrees - it is almost impossible to find good candidates, and almost 80% of the folks tend to be Indian or Chinese. I remember a graduate class in Quantum Computing - out of a class of 18, there were all of 2 Americans* in there.

I wonder how many of these people working at Microsoft are Americans? Perhaps, people like this guy should definitely be sent back, rather than let them stay back and use their talents, right?

*Never mind the fact that a lot of people who go to school here eventually identify themselves with an American cultural identity, and call themselves Americans anyway -- what's the point of discrimination then, I wonder?

that is the default behavior for users with admin privileges. When the user that's being prompted isnt an admin, then UAC prompts for admin privileges. its actully RunAs 2.0. WithGPO you can turn off UAC, set it to silently elevate for admins, Allow/Deny, or require credentials. But then again, I've just been labbing all this before i certify vista on my network. you can try this you self with an standard user, or read the docs http://technet2.microsoft.com/WindowsVista/en/library/00d04415-2b2f-422c-b70e-b18ff918c2811033.mspx?mfr=true

While you can blame Microsoft for training issues, Microsoft's own products work just fine as Limited Users.

While you can blame Microsoft for training issues, Microsoft's own products work just fine as Limited Users.

And have companies who sell operating system take some financial responsibility for future security.

Absolutely ridiculous. I've heard this before, and I think it makes as much sense as holding the door manufacturer responsible for home break ins.

Microsoft has never claimed to be completely secure and they haven't made any contracts specifying that they should be.

You are correct in that these features do not appear in any commercial version of OS/2. I did not claim that; only that Windows NT was based on the original OS/2 version 3.0 specification (more on that below!).
Regardless: I may be incorrect, but ... ... IRPS was introduced in NT 3.51 as part of the new device driver model. Windows NT 3.1 (the original Windows NT) did NOT contain that feature). ...

Yes it did. And so did VMS.

http://windowsitpro.com/Windows/Articles/ArticleID/4494/pg/2/2.html

One of Microsoft's goals from the start I think was to get a 32 bit version of the 16 bit Windows API running on a 32 bit kernel with a VMS like IO system tweaked a bit to be SMP friendly and processor independent. Dos took over from CPM when the market moved from the Z80 to the x86 and CPM-86 was late and bad. I think Bill Gates was paranoid that Microsoft would be destroyed by a analagous move to Risc SMP.

The original main architecture was the i860 ( codenamed N Ten ). Apparently the internal codename was Windows NT.

Later the main architecture was x86 with secondary support for a bunch of Risc architectures. One of them, Alpha was kept alive internally to allow them to port to 64 bit.

Deferred Procedure Calls (DPCs) is part if Windows Driver Model (WDM) which was fully implemented only in Windows 2000 (see http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc264476.aspx).

No DPCs are another VMSism. They are a way to avoid spending too much time at a raised IRQL (another VMSism that is implemented in Vax hardware and emulated on x86 until the APIC supported it natively)

However, these are tiny details of the bigger picture. The main feature set: Threads, pre-emptive multitasking, priority-based scheduling, support for SMP, layered architecture, pluggable file systems, application level insulation (i.e. one application can't take everything down), paged memory management (page swapping instead of segment swapping) all originate from the original OS/2 v3.0 specification*).

Yeah, and that was based on the NT kernel. The difference was that the main userland API would use 32 bit version of OS/2 APIs to please IBM rather than Windows ones. If you read Showstopper by G Pascal Zachary there's a funny account of a meeting where an obnoxious Microsoft employee presented the new 32 bit main API for "OS/2 3.0" to IBM. To IBM's horror every single function was almost identical to Win16 with all the pointers extended to 32 bits, and totally different to OS/2. None of OS/2's function had equivalents. At that point the OS was still called OS/2 3.0. Somewhat latter it was renamed Windows NT, the same as the internal Microsoft codename. All of which is funny, it reminds me of a bad sci fi series where a shadowy bad guy turns out to be the main bad guy (who you thought was dead) in disguise.

NB! This is different from the actual commercial product "OS/2 version 3.0" , which is derived from the OS/2 2.x code base! Confusing, I know!
The history behind this is as follows: IBM and Microsoft co-developed OS/2 1.x [16-bit operating system]. When it became time to migrate to 32-bit Microsoft claimed that it was difficult for them to travel between Seattle and Bocca Raton, Florida, where IBM labs resided. They convinced IBM to take upon themselves the implementation of the first, Intel-only, 32-bit version [which became OS/2 2.0 and base for later versions of OS/2], and to leave Microsoft to work on the next-gen portable OS/2 [which was to be some future 3.x version of OS/2]. However, Microsoft soon abandoned OS/2 and used the know-how and specifications for developing Windows NT.

You may be too young to remember, and possibly mis-informed. (The winne

Interestingly enough, Visual Studio 2005 and 2008 under Vista can't access a project stored in a local IIS website unless running as admin. You're explicitly prompted to run the entire session under Administrator account. The alternative is to change your project storage to disk instead of IIS -- maybe not a bad idea, but contradicting their new HTTP based projects of 2002/2003 (as Web services were promoted then too, now web services are actively discouraged for security and scalability reasons. Lessons learned, I guess.)

Clicking "Run as administrator" is easier and just reinforces the "click through all these dialogs" mentality. I think MS went too far in some of the dialogs; their new push to give detailed explanations is counterproductive, as I don't want to read an essay at that particular time.

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa964620(VS.80).aspx

Still, I agree -- running as admin is dangerous; Linux and Unix had a great approach from their beginnings. Windows needs to catch up to that, and it'll involve a massive effort on the part of the users and developers. Having Ubuntu Linux prompt similar to UAC helps reinforce the principle of running with lowered privileges, and shows that Windows isn't any more evil now that it has UAC, it's just that things were so non-secure before that it's hard as hell to conform to the new guidelines.

Otherwise, there are very few makes of onboard 802.11x currently in circulation that don't have at least one open-source driver available. See http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Jean_Tourrilhes/Linux/ for a list of supported makes and models. I think you might be pleasantly surprised.

A final note: there's no need to be unpleasant to those who disagree with you. For the record, I'm an OS agnostic, as I have one of each major OS represented in my home, and I can't say that I've suffered any massive problems, wireless or otherwise, with any of them. I and the other posters you've replied to were simply pointing out exceptions to your blanket statement that no wireless cards work under Linux. I don't think I or anyone else ever claimed that anyone who has or has had difficulties with wireless under Linux must be lying. Moreover, the cards that tend to give trouble under Linux also tend to give similar trouble under Windows and other operating systems - the problems lie with poorly written drivers, not Vista, Linux or any other OS.

Thank you for your consideration.

If you are setting up public computers (schools/libraries/what ever other public place) there is this public computer install from believe it or not microsoft. I think it was called shared computer toolkit. IT required a special install. You needed to partition the hard drive keeping 25-30% of the drive unused. You set up the machine you are done. If someone even an admin installed/made changed without telling the computer to keep those changes, a reboot would undo all of those changes or installed software. Needed to log in with a local admin user to get access to the shared computer menu to keep changes. It did like windows update so those went in. It also liked auto update with SAV which surprised me. It did not block people from making changes/installing software, reboot the machine just took all those things away.

figures microsoft changed it they now call it steady state. if you want this: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/cc160970.aspx It did work with our public computers. The decisions was made to kill all the public computers since we do have wireless here and most people that come here do have their own laptops.

format c:\ [Enter]

Was that ever funny?

Short of a firewall, you can use something like TCPView to look for unexplained network activity:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb897437.aspx

A rootkit can hide its activity, so this isn't as good as a firewall, but it is easier, and you'll at least be able to figure out if you have a non-rootkit infection.

You do not need to buy a license for their software to view Office 2007 (or any earlier) docs.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=3657ce88-7cfa-457a-9aec-f4f827f20cac&displaylang=en to download the freely available viewer.

- it helps if you know your enemy before trying to criticise them, otherwise its egg+face for all the world to see

I can think of an entire website, which is linked from Microsoft's open source website open source page link.

Whether they contribute much (if anything) is another question entirely.

Microsoft does keep a FUD campaign about OSS being hard to use, a toy, lacking support, worse than equivalent commercial software, etc., some of which is true and some just plain smear.

I can smear Vista as well:
Vista wipes hard drives and drags your machine to a crawl. The first is a fact, at least for me - Vista automatic update left my machine in an unbootable state during the pre-SR1 patch and I had to erase my drive with an image to get it to work again. The second is smear - running OpenGL on Vista in a window is incredibly slow, but I'm applying it to the entire OS just like they do in some of their comparisons.

Keep in mind here that I don't hate MS, I hate MS's business practices (heck, I hate most business practices, but they're rich and I'm a peon, so who am I to talk?).

If ClearType causes color fringing on your Gateway LCD, have you tried using ClearType Tuner, part of Windows XP PowerToys, to configure ClearType? I know that out of the box, Windows ClearType assumes an RGB LCD panel, but a few LCD panels are BGR, or they have really weird gamma.

I know (hope) you were trying to be funny, but you can read MS Office documents without owning Office, and have been able to for at least 8 years or so:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=3657ce88-7cfa-457a-9aec-f4f827f20cac&displaylang=en

"No. I play HL:2 on a system with 1GB of RAM and a 256MB video card. Runs fine. Vista runs fine of my laptop with integrated graphics from 2005. No Aero glass, but I have it dropped even further down to W2000 style. Vista runs WELL on slow machines with a simple theme."

My Compaq 2580US Laptop had 1G of RAM and ran Vista like a dog. My new laptop has 386M of video RAM, 2G (1.6G free for the system RAM) and runs Civilization IV: Beyond the Sword slow, but not fast enough for my tastes. It slows down when I try to go to negotiations with other Civilizations and I wait for it to load the animated AI character I have to deal with. When I added an extra 1G memory stick, it ran a lot faster. HL2 is an older game, maybe that is why it works with less RAM?

"This may be true, but I will suggest that 2GB is not really needed for Vista. I have a gaming computer with 1GB and it is FAST. I think the main reason people computers are slow is the anti-virus or anti-spyware software they have running all the time, 2, or 3, or even 4 programs at a time. All those programs scanning every file that is accessed--is it any wonder they are slow?"

Vista and OSX are fully multitasking systems. Yes I really need programs running in the background and doing things. So do most other people. I got my email client loaded, my web browser, my programming tool, a game I am playing, and anti-virus and anti-spyware programs as well as a firewall running. Some people also run P2P files sharing programs, IM clients, and MP3 music players at the same time as well. 1G can't cut it for all of that. I may get an idea for my program, pause the video game, open the programming tool, write code, write a word document, write an email, and then go back to playing the game at home. I cannot just run one program at a time, I need several open at once. Maybe you don't multitask, but I do and so do a lot of people.

"I'm not sure what you are babbling about VPC for...please name the software that won't run in Vista. There are VERY few incompatible mainstream programs. Also, there is no XP virtual machine in Vista. Lots of the APIs are backwards compatible so that all the calls programs need are still there."

Not according to Microsoft not everything is backwards compatible with Vista Microsoft says to check your legacy software before trying to run it on Vista. Microsoft claims to have rewritten code in Vista that changes how APIs work, some things that were integers are now longs, and other data types used in API calls have changed as well. Many people are complaining about Vista not being backward compatible. But you seem to act as if Microsoft and these other people are somehow lying about that and Vista is 100% backwards compatible?

that they support opensource. Majority of their sales will be of "customized, supported, superior" versions which "need IP protection from patent trolls and so is not freely redistributable and modifiable. We regret that this has to be done this way, but you always have that (third rate) open source code...."

Or, they are buying time to sufficiently stuff more pockets, so that a few years down the line, the IP-protection agreement mentioned on http://microsoft.com/link=12345 (whatever that may contain at that point in time) becomes so important that "we have to take the painful but necessary step of closing certain parts of code under IP agreements with certain (read SCO-like proxies) IP companies that supply us some innovative improvements".

And without those innovative improvements, basically things won't work.
Finally, the next version of the OS or the Office Suite or the whatever SaaS-tool will be so compelling that these opened source codes are really of no use to the latest and most advanced "microsoft product and platform ecosystem"

To be taken with a fistful of salt.

Wasn't the JPEG vulnerability discovered after the source code leak?

Article was missing the download link - here:
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc203350.aspx

(captcha was "Empire" - ha!)

From parent's link:
"Microsoft today announced a set of broad-reaching changes to its technology and business practices to increase the openness of its products and drive greater interoperability, opportunity and choice. These changes are codified into four new interoperability principles and corresponding actions: 1) ensuring open connections; 2) promoting data portability; 3) enhancing support for industry standards; and 4) fostering more open engagement with customers and the industry, including open source communities."

The article links to:
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/presskits/interoperability/default.mspx
where several documents in non-standard formats are describing how well ms are complies with standards.
Not to mention you have to buy a licence of M$ Office too read it.

M$ laughs EU in the face with this one.

Unexpected, as in they told us very loudly that they were going to do it?

unfortunately that's a problem too - Microsoft still leads in the server space too (though not by nearly as nuch as the desktop). Now I see Linux making big inroads to this market, but MS makes a ton of money off their server offerings - not just all the Windows Server flavours, but also all the server-based frameworks and 'servers'. Ever seen the cost of crappy old Biztalk server? even crappier Sharepoint? (especially as you also need Office Pro to get Infopath that makes it halfway worthwhile). Application Server? Exchange! It'd make your wallet cry to just look at the numbers that businesses regularly pay!.

Also, the server space is where MS get to say they are 'enterprise' and 'TCO' and 'competant'. They like marketing and they like money, so they wouldn't want to see this area be given up to Linux without a fight.

Here's a link to 2006 year-end figures, take a look at the bottom and see how the client profits have gone compared to server. (client take s a $700m hit, server rises $500m over the 6 months. The full year figures were skewed by Vista, but they show a trend towards server growth and client decline)

What little is left of them?? A world without them? Are you kidding? If you're expecting this deal to cripple them AND you're arguing that this would be a Good Thing, you're wrong on both counts.

A quick perusal of their investor relations site ( e.g. http://www.microsoft.com/msft/earnings/FY08/earn_rel_q1_08.mspx ) would tell you that they're experiencing phenomenal growth and that they have a profit margin enjoyed by very few large companies. To argue that MS is somehow on it's last legs is ridiculous. They can tank this deal and still be more or less fine. They could literally burn the $40bn in cash and still be more or less fine (of course, their investors might get a little jittery if they started doing that...).

And to argue that the complete meltdown of a company that employs 80,000 people worldwide - most of whom are IT workers - would somehow be good for the rest of us is equally ludicrous.

You might as well have said "Spending $40bn on a risky deal is totally going to kill MS because there's no way one of the fastest growing modern companies can spend one year of income on an acquisition. And this is great because I want to get paid less."

The solution for best legibility is not just color. See the MSR paper at: http://research.microsoft.com/~jplatt/clearType/

I like http://search.msn.com/ better.

Microsoft's Live technology far exceeds Google's offerings. I'm selling my GOOG for MSFT stock and BRK.A.

Sincerely,
Warren Buffet
God is Back

That is *completely* incorrect. In Exchange 2003 prior to SP2, the limit for the mailbox store was 16 GB. In SP2 they upped that limit to 75 GB, which really is probably enough for most of the small organizations that probably just have a single server running Exchange Standard.

Here is a document about it, scroll down to the part where it says Licensed Database Size Limit. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa998066.aspx

In Exchange 2007, Standard Edition can have up to five mailbox stores in each of five storage groups. And there is no limit on size. http://www.msexchange.org/tutorials/Exchange-2007-Store-Related-Changes-Improvements.html

Its also mentioned on the Microsoft Exchange page on wikipedia.

I'm not saying that Exchange is a perfect mailserver for (or worth the cost in) every situation, or denying that Microsoft does some really annoying things, but please try to get your facts straight before you complain about a piece of software.

Of course Xp Home doesn't offer that as XP Pro does but instead of domain policies and domain logins you could have used child safe controls like Norton Internet Security offers for XP Home.

If your son is a hacker, then he knows that he can login via the local account instead of a domain to bypass the domain policies and domain logins. One other way is to log into safe mode with networking support by pressing F8 on bootup which still gives Internet access but without domain policies or domain logins. But there are other ways to bypass domain policies as well if one knows what to do.

But I admit you found a way to use XP Pro and domains to try and control what your family does. You are an exception because you know how to get a server working and how to administer security on it and workstations, but most families just use XP Home and peer to peer workgroup networking without domains. Mostly because they don't know enough to set up a domain and domain policies.