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Andy Wilson, one of the guys at Microsoft Research who seems to have done a lot of the research work that let to this table product, got his PhD at MIT, so it's not unreasonable to think that Andy Wilson was probably involved on similar multitouch interfaces at MIT. At any rate, this is taking a research prototype and bringing a product based on it to market. I'm guessing the work at MIT was not ready to be commercialized yet, so it's unfair to complete discount what Microsoft has done here.

Check out the demonstrations of TouchLight and PlayAnywhere on Andy Wilson's blog: http://research.microsoft.com/~awilson/default.htm l - he's been working on this for quite some time. As I understand it, the surface itself is not a touch screen like in a PDA - the images from the camera are processed to perceive depth and detect a touch when all captured images reach a certain point of intersection. Instead of only detecting a physical touch, the screen can also detect as your hand (or whatever) moves closer or further away from the screen.

You can see some pretty cool demos at http://www.microsoft.com/surface/

I find this very interesting from a marketing perspective. They are promoting this as if it was a product, and yet it isn't on sale - and even the implementations they are talking about (T-Mobile, Sheraton Hotels) are really trials with partners that won't be happening until the end of next year.

So what is this all about? The Vista and Office '07 launches haven't gone well from a marketing perspective - there has been a lot of press basically saying that Microsoft is losing its competitive edge. Couple that with the iPhone, and the fact that Apple is almost certainly going to be launching new products with multi-touch capabilities over the next year or so, and I think it is clear what is going on. Microsoft really want to improve their image in relation to Apple - they don't want Apple to be seen as the innovator and them as the company that's lost it.

Notice on the website that they have a section called "origins" giving the history of the technology within Microsoft - I think they are trying to reverse the image that they copy Apple. Now when the touch-screen iMac is launched (or whatever) Microsoft will have done a fairly good job at taking some of the shine off the launch, even though they don't have a consumer product in the area, nor will they have for some years.

Note, I am not saying that Microsoft are not serious about this as a product -- just that this news launch (about a product that doesn't exist) is all about addressing people's perceptions of the company, and trying to piss on Apple's fire a bit.

PDC is not Microsoft's preeminent developer conference. Tech Ed 200X is. My understanding is that TE is Microsoft's biggest developer conference, and it's running next week, June 4-8 (or 3-8 if you registered for the pre-conference sessions.) Picture 10,0000+ geeks trying hard to make dinner conversation, cavernous convention halls, and (literally) dawn-to-dusk classes and sessions for six days. Quite an experience.

Conferences get cancelled all the time for all kinds of reasons: I was scheduled to go to Lynda.com's DX3 in Boston, and it got nixed a few weeks out, probably because of competition from FlashForward, MIX, and TechEd. Conferences can get nuked for any of a number of reasons: attendence, competing events, a sense of quiet. I'd rather they schedule developer conferences for when they're warranted, rather than trying to hype up whatever's finished according to a timetable.

In this case, we're in something of a quiet period: SQL Server 2005 and VS.NET 2005 have been released, ASP.NET 2.0 has been out for awhile, and everyone's waiting for the next big shoes to fall: the growth (or failure) of Silverlight, an ORM-ish technology called LINQ, and the next version of VS.NET, which will fold a lot of web dev/expression stuff into VS.NET. My guess is that "Orcas" will be an extremely significant release for MSFT, in that it will finally turn a wo rld class programming/DB interaction environment into a tool that advanced designers and Dreamweaver users will want to use.

All of that's a bit off, and so for now, a quiet conference schedule may represent some honesty from Redmond. Personally, among Microsft technologies, I'm currently most excited about some of the third-party stuff coming out. Check out the controls offered by Telerik, or even more gee-whiz cool, the just-released EntitySpaces 2007 ORM framework. Awesome tools. I think Mike & Co. just released this to production yesterday.

BTW, I will be at Tech Ed if anyone wants to meet over junk food and ice cream. As I have a bit of a background programming Actionscript, I'm interested particularly in seeing what Expression/Silverlight can do.

Pardon me if this point has already been made.

What's the most important thing in high-performance computing nowadays; is it super-optimized low-level parallel programming or is it just plain parallel programming? I'm talking about any high-level framework which allows for easy multi-threading in applications which need it. A framework that will not only heighten developer productivity, but also utilize the additional cores in a computer system with a minimal effort. Wouldn't that be better than not doing it at all? The C-omega language http://research.microsoft.com/Comega/ by Microsoft Research Labs does exactly this.

I have to agree, though, that the problem here is us - the programmers. The implementation of the language can only as smart as it is, and potential side-effects in terms of data dependencies etc. will definately occour. I'm not aware of any languages which implement a degree of Data Flow Analysis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_flow_analysis, which allows the compiler to alert of such "stupidities" propagated by us--or perhaps even optimize them for the better.

As several of you pointed out, matrix calculations can easily be distributed onto n number of cores, computers, or whatnot without any problems. I can't mention any real-life application where fast matrix calculations could save lives, but hey..

Orca.exe is the tool for creating/editing .MSI packages. It can be used to extract package contents.

MSI packages are databases that store more than files. More about the MSI file format.

<fanboi mode on>

When you use the word "platform" I'm assuming we're talking about the OS itself, i.e. excluding the applications. I'm not very familiar with MS Windows but I think Linux is doing excellent qua performance and stability, witness that it can be used for embedded applications (thanks a lot to FSF's gcc and binutils, methinks), can be used for real-time (with modifications, but I thought they are going to be folded into the mainline kernel), is quite secure (selinux) and most of all is usable for serious computing: how many of the top-500 supercomputers run a kind of Linux (on at least some of the nodes)? At first glance I'd say about 70%. How many run *any* special edition of MS Windows, or other non-unix-like OS? At first glance I'd say 0%. Can you imagine what a boost this is for e.g. HIV and cancer research (paragraph 3 on the page)? Now imagine the real-life effects on society, if research centers were forced to use Microsoft software. To how many CPUs does that scale? Let's not even get started on "Windows for Warships" (for brits and maybe argentinos: listen to their sci-fi radio show -- but I digress).

<fanboi mode off/>

Of course that doesn't imply Linux is also a good desktop platform but I can't at the moment think of any OS feature that is specific for desktop use and that Linux can't provide. I may be a fanboi but yes, I'd say "Linux is better than MS Windows" (njaa njaa njaa etc.; penile length etc.).

Now how this translates to "has the best applications" is a completely different matter, for which technical excellence is much less important than inertia, portability of existing software, existing market share, and marketing (Microsoft marketing budget for Windows XP was $ 1 000 000 000 BTW; I'd say that compensates a lot).

You may have read that in some wishful-thinking blog somewhere. MS has killed IE and WMP for Mac but I don't remember them ever saying they would kill Office for Mac. There is also no mention of killing it on their official Mac Office website (updated May 2007) -- where announcements about the death of other products are usually placed.

"The next version of Office for Mac - named Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac - is under development and scheduled to be available in the second half of 2007."

http://www.microsoft.com/mac/default.aspx?pid=macI ntelQA

Microsoft already has an open packaging format for installers, it's called Windows Installer (formerly Microsoft Installer), or MSI for short. MSI 3.1 supports Windows 2000+. http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa372866. aspx

Why re-invent the wheel? This is open to everyone and well documented on MSDN and countless forums all over the web.

Don't worry it's not you, it's the "real world".

One of the reasons is that real-world is often full of state and the state is easier to represent when it's explicit and not hidden in the function parameters/the stack. Of course there are different problems and my "real-world" is not your "real-world" but I think in general not everything is a function/a list/ a predicate/ and yes, an object. There is no holy grail. Some problems can be expressed easier if you think in terms of functions, some if you think in terms of predicates (i.e. logic programming a la Prolog), and of course the all too popular objects.

The trick is to recognize the most efficient and clear representation and if there isn't one, it's time to roll your own language. Google did it , Microsoft did it for the Office. That's sort of the next level of development -- making your own language to fit your problem/solution domain best

"Besides, its not hard to write cross-platform C++ code."

There are many little differences between Microsoft's STL and everyone else's. These make porting C++ programs difficult. When you do it you will find lots of little bugs appearing in your code later on that are hard to prepare for. C++ is (in)famous for not being portable.

For one quick example of this:
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa985896( VS.80).aspx

Quoting Steve Yegge:

"C++ is much less adaptable than C. It's large, nonstandard, ungainly, and nonportable, and it has horrible linking problems, regrettable name-mangling, a template system that's too complex for what you can do with it, and so on, and on."

http://steve.yegge.googlepages.com/scheming-is-bel ieving

WinForms is a part of the .Net Framework according to Microsoft that is a framework that the C# and Visual BASIC.net language use.

Next time, read the whole article before you quote things out of context. Mono does not even use the Microsoft source code for Winforms, but instead "Mono's Windows.Forms implementation translates the native system events such as X11 into Win32 WM_ messages and dispatches them using the WndProc mechanism. This allows applications that depend on overriding WndProc to get some features not exposed by the APIs to still run." So they did not really clone Winforms, but wrote a library that translates X11 messages into Win32 messages, so it is more of a translation library than a cloned library. Sort of like translating Latin into Greek, or X86 code into PowerPC code, or analog into digital.

"So, when you talk about how much you gained going from MSSQL to Oracle, I'm pretty sure most of that's because of your preference for Oracle,"

*sigh* Then re-read the comment. I said I was more experienced with MSSQL and had to move. You cannot justly prefer what you do not know so well. I had been working with Oracle for a long time, querying remote databases etc, but that's a far cry from actually designing an application's database on an Oracle server. Then you have to know the nuances. Now I know both Oracle and MSSQL well, and I prefer Oracle.

Indexing is totally different in MSSQL and Oracle. For example, the clustered index in MSSQL is the most important index there is. In Oracle, there is no such thing (there are cluster indexes, but cluster has a different meaning in Oracle). So this means that you have to think totally different about indexing an Oracle DB. Honestly, I am not sure of what exactly behind the scenes makes Oracle indexes more efficient (or seem more efficient). But my experience is that querying Oracle is very fast, much faster than MSSQL.

MSSQL feels like a toy when you are used to Oracle. Not to say it's a bad database. I like MSSQL. But for high volume, high availability, high traffic websites, in the corporate environment, I'd choose Oracle. At home, I'd choose MySQL. Because it's better than MSSQL? Not so much. It's about the same, to me. But the difference is the price. MSSQL ain't free, unless you want a junior version. So MS has priced what is a very competent database out of the market. It's not as good as Oracle, not as free as MySQL. That's a tough spot to be in.

The downside with this and other approaches mentioned is that they do not seem to provide a way to easily visualize, associate, correlate, cross-reference, etc.

I have a friend who is an attorney and who performs extensive research against a wide array of source material...including the web...and he swears by Microsoft OneNote:

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/onenote/default. aspx

Yes, a Microsoft product...let the flames begin.

Microsoft has the answer to this one. One Note. It's absolutely magnificent for stuff like that. There are some other programs which take similar stabs at the same problem, Treepad, Infomagic, and, of course, Google Notebook. But One Note wins this one walking away.

You are experiencing a bug with Microsoft Update, not WGA. It's been driving us crazy here at work for months now.

Thankfully, Microsoft finally released a hotfix for it.

Try this: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/getstarted/FX101 938921033.aspx

"What you and other posters have mentioned about port control (the port filtering control panel, ipsec rules, application level firewalls, ACLs on transport devices), plus the "Routing and Remote Access" service in server versions, cover everything I can think of." - by Foolhardy (664051) on Wednesday May 23, @07:29PM (#19246287)

Excellent, because imo, you DO know what you are about in this field (based on your replies and work in SDEdit in fact)... I find it good to know the methods I extolled can be used to control ports via GUI methods (which is what TheRaven64 was asking about, in addition to RESERVED PORTS in Windows 2000-2003-VISTA).

They're all good stuff, & work concurrently/simultaneously w/ one another, which is good (even with hardware NAT firewalls etc.), no hassles, & provide layered security & PORTS ACCESS CONTROL (to some extent, but not really @ an ACL level though). Still, the results are there & do work, & I am glad to see you "2nd my motions" on this account.

(Also - Perhaps I missed it, but, I didn't see anybody else mention the material on port filters, or IPSec (the "poor man's firewalls"), & this is why I did that 'big writeup' on them & how to use them (as well as download of the AnalogX prebuilt IP Security Policy - which is VERY good, strong, and flexible (but, does cause hassles with tools for filesharing (emule, etc.)))).

That is one case where (filesharing programs) where IP Port Filtering is actually superior for port access control, vs. IP Security Policies in fact.

Now, I did note your comments on ACL's on the TDI interfaces & one other persons (while speaking of managing this IN SOURCECODE for an application), & it was "kick ass", informative, & possibly useful to me at some point (developer here too).

The points you & the other fellow brought up are not ones I was NOT aware of, but it is good to know!

"This is a white paper on TCP implementation notes and parameters you might find interesting." - by Foolhardy (664051) on Wednesday May 23, @07:29PM (#19246287)

Yes, I have read up on that one when it issued (big fan of the MS daily downloads pages here is why -> http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/Results.aspx?Di splayLang=en&nr=50&sortCriteria=date )

They made even MORE alterations, for the good mind you, in the SERVICE PACK #2 release (see the material on it regarding TcpChimney settings, which iirc, allow offloading of various tasks from the System CPU to the processors on NICS that support it).

Well, since your tool is excellent, I can only offer up a "tit-for-tat" trade/return to you, with an application I wrote years ago that still survives in the Shareware/Freeware circuit (and runs unmodified all the way thru ALL Win32 OS, even 9x-VISTA & all iterations in between):

APK Registry Cleaning Engine 2002++ SR-7:

http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/389/foowhatev ermakesgooglehappy.html

Enjoy it, it IS the safest & most thorough registry cleaner there is, bar-none!

APK

Ask your computer using (non-techie) Mother/sister/brother what's important:
1) No hassle
2) Use **exactly** the same apps as everyone else, pre-installed
3) Cost - under $200 every 3 years
4) Quicken!!!! (the current version, not a 5 yro version)
5) Ms-Office (Open Office doesn't support all the XLS macros)
6) All the apps I want aren't pre-installed.

Seriously, users don't want to be bothered with loading apps and hunting for an app that is the same as what everyone else uses. I guess wine is a good step, but even I with 20+ years C/C++, networking, and architecture - find having Windows is just **easier**. My laptop is windows. My desktops are not.

Notice that security wasn't in the list? Virus, spyware, firewalls aren't mentioned. Picture their face - "why does it have to be so hard?" they ask.

My list of apps mandatory apps: Quicken http://quicken.intuit.com/, Visio http://office.microsoft.com/visio, XLS http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/excel/FX10048762 1033.aspx, and Toolkit 5.x http://www.iclub.com/products/tk5.asp

Besides firefox, thunderbird, VLC http://www.videolan.org/vlc/, videoredo http://www.videoredo.com/, MovieManager http://freshmeat.net/projects/xmm/, Putty http://freshmeat.net/projects/putty/

Ask your computer using (non-techie) Mother/sister/brother what's important:
1) No hassle
2) Use **exactly** the same apps as everyone else, pre-installed
3) Cost - under $200 every 3 years
4) Quicken!!!! (the current version, not a 5 yro version)
5) Ms-Office (Open Office doesn't support all the XLS macros)
6) All the apps I want aren't pre-installed.

Seriously, users don't want to be bothered with loading apps and hunting for an app that is the same as what everyone else uses. I guess wine is a good step, but even I with 20+ years C/C++, networking, and architecture - find having Windows is just **easier**. My laptop is windows. My desktops are not.

Notice that security wasn't in the list? Virus, spyware, firewalls aren't mentioned. Picture their face - "why does it have to be so hard?" they ask.

My list of apps mandatory apps: Quicken http://quicken.intuit.com/, Visio http://office.microsoft.com/visio, XLS http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/excel/FX10048762 1033.aspx, and Toolkit 5.x http://www.iclub.com/products/tk5.asp

Besides firefox, thunderbird, VLC http://www.videolan.org/vlc/, videoredo http://www.videoredo.com/, MovieManager http://freshmeat.net/projects/xmm/, Putty http://freshmeat.net/projects/putty/

(Is this your handiwork/did you create it? If so, I am very impressed!)

Your thoughts on my approach here are appreciated (as regards TheRaven64's questions about how to control access to ports & reserved ports (Tcp Parameters controls this latter part via its RESERVEDPORTS value (ephemeral ports on udp only, iirc))

GTA IV is coming to the 360 the same day as the PS3. http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2006/may0 6/05-09GrandTheftAutoPR.mspx

FFXIII is not coming to the US until the end of 2008 at the earliest in which time the PS3 will be at least $100-200 cheaper than today. A game that may be out in 18 months is hardly an incentive to invest $600 today. http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3159809

I imagine it is so that Microsoft can better protect you from yourself.

You don't want the ability to put yourself in a compromising position do you? Microsoft want to offer you Genuine Protection(tm).

I imagine it is so that Microsoft can better protect you from yourself.

You don't want the ability to put yourself in a compromising position do you? Microsoft want to offer you Genuine Protection(tm).

"The notion of reserved ports doesn't exist on Windows" - by Ravnen (823845) on Tuesday May 22, @06:44AM (#19218927)

Check this then:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\Tcpip\Parameters

And, there? Check the "RESERVED PORTS" parameter... here is documentation (scant) on it from MS:

How to reserve a range of ephemeral ports on a computer that is running Windows Server 2003 or Windows 2000 ServerL

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/812873

Apparently, this does exist, albeit apparently ONLY for "ephemeral ports" (short-lived ones).

(AND, iirc, UDP based ones only are used for this value afaik - the reason I make that statement, is when I have attempted to perform UDP filtering, it NEVER works out right & I have connection problems, when I attempted to use that on UDP!)

Port filtering stuff that I outlined here (and this is WHY I mention I let everything in on UDP, instead of limiting it as I did on TCP to ports 80/8080/443 only).

http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=235621&thre shold=-1&commentsort=0&mode=thread&cid=19221131

IP PortFiltering is done here/HOW TO, STEP-by-STEP:

Start Button -> Control Panel -> Network Connections -> Local Area Connection (or whatever you called yours) -> Properties Button -> (Next Popup dialog screen) -> Highlite "Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) -> Click the PROPERTIES button -> Click the ADVANCED button @ the bottom of this screen -> Go to the OPTIONS tab & highlite TcpIP Filtering & click the PROPERTIES button -> Check off "ENABLE TCP/IP Filtering on ALL Adapters" -> Permit only (add ports as you need to here)

E.G./I.E. -> In the tcp list section, I leave 80/8080/443, for my personal home use @ least. In the UDP list I let all pass thru, & in the IP stack list, I only allow 16 (tcp) & 7 (udp).

(Any feedback on this note is appreciated. I can learn from you all, like anyone else is why.)

APK

Also, the object manager namespace can be browsed with winobj or winobjex.

Actually, the IO system has always been able to cancel IO operations, including by terminating the thread owning the operation. However, IO can only be canceled when the drivers owning the operation allow it to be, and Vista got rid of many of the places IO could block but couldn't be canceled in the standard drivers. MUP (which does UNC network host lookups) in particular.

I had the same idea about reaching the ACLs of objects without a convenient interface to them, so I wrote SD Edit. It even uses native functions when possible and supports case sensitivity. The ACLs on \Device\Tcp can be edited via sdedit t file tc ntapi n \Device\Tcp

15 petabytes per year.

According to Gordon Bell and Jim Gray, recording one person's life as DVD video generates about 7 TB per year, so this is the same as generating life records for 2,000 people.

BTW, according to one trend line I've seen, the cost of a PB of raw storage will drop below $1,000 around 2020. This means that while it may cost ~$5,000,000 to store the first year's data, by 2020 you could store 13 years worth of the data (i.e. all of the data produced up to that date) for around $250,000. Double that if you want it mirrored.

"Windows makes no distinction between privileged and unprivileged ports, so any application that can open sockets can listen on port 80. That said, every port number (and every other object in the NT kernel) has an associated ACL, so it is possible to limit them on an individual basis." - by TheRaven64 (641858) on Tuesday May 22, @06:27AM (#19218865)

Programmatically, on a "per-application basis", the other respondents outlined (@ a kernel level, using NtAPI/ZwAPI calls) a method for you to explore here:

http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=235621&cid= 19221887

Now, on this material next below?

Well, I think this might help you some as well, as to limiting ports accesses on various ports WHOLESALE (Ip stack filtering) &/or on a user-defined basis (via IP Security Policies), below after this quote of yours, next:

"I've never seen this exposed to the UI though, so I've no idea how you'd go about doing it" - by TheRaven64 (641858) on Tuesday May 22, @06:27AM (#19218865)

You have this on ports, via a GUI method as mentioned above!

There are 2 ways:

1.) Port filtering

& alternately

2.) IP Security Policies (ontop of software firewalls (which also have some control here & at the application level no less) & hardware 'firewalls').

You may find this useful (or, others may, as YOU in particular may be aware of this stuff already, one never knows, but I am mentioning it here in detail anyhow for your reference, or for that of others who use Windows NT-based OS that have these features (Windows 2000/XP/Server 2003/VISTA):

FIRST - Read this article, for background. Mainly because it shows you how to limit/unleash various ports and what drivers act on them as filters, & @ what levels in the network stack for Windows:

TCP/IP Packet Processing Paths:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/community/columns /cableguy/cg0605.mspx [microsoft.com]

IpNat.sys, IpFltDrv.sys, IpSec.sys, & TcpIp.sys in Windows 2000/XP/Server 2003/VISTA each has abilities for port restrictions!

This sounds like what you guys are looking for!

The steps below are basically how to use it (implement it) for limiting access to various ports, via GUI interfaces no less, in Windows versions noted above.

All of this & the tools noted can be used for LAYERED SECURITY in this manner (port filtering, IP Security Policies, software firewalls, & hardware NAT routers (true packet stateful inspection ones, & 'ordinary' NAT units as well)!

They ALL can be used simultaneously/concurrently, in layers, per the article from MS above entitled "TCP/IP Packet Processing Paths"

IPSecurity Policies are implemented in secpol.msc (this is the most complex of the lot, and I recommend "AnalogX's" model, as it works (but, can be troublesome with filesharing tools like EMule mind you), & can be downloaded here:

ANALOGX IP SECURITY POLICY OVERVIEW/HOW TO EXPLANATION:

http://www.analogx.com/contents/articles/ipsec.htm [analogx.com]

ANALOGX IP SECURITY POLICY TEMPLATE DIRECT DOWNLOAD:

http://www.analogx.com/files/aps-ipsec.zip [analogx.com]

(You can tune AnalogX's template model as you like above & beyond its original form for apps YOU use in particular)

AnalogX's IP Security Policy provides a good template to start with!

IP PortFiltering is done here/HOW TO, STEP-by-STEP:

Start Button -> Control Panel -> Network Connections -> Local Area Connection (or whatever you called yours) -> Properties Button -> (Next Popup dialog screen) -> Highlite "Internet Pro

Microsoft further reserves the right to terminate this pledge and revoke this pledge to You upon the expiration or termination of that certain patent agreement entered into by and between Microsoft and Novell Inc., dated as of November 2, 2006.

"I think he meant getting to "port object permissions" on a programmatic level... with an API. What you are describing are filesystem Access Control Lists. He's talking about using ACLs on ports. Everything being an object in NT, and being able to have ACLs applied to "everything," is a good idea. As the grandparent said, the application developers at MS just have to use them." - by flydpnkrtn (114575) on Tuesday May 22, @09:03AM (#19219899)

Maybe using the native "port filtering" is a method (one way, prefereably used in conjunction with the 'other way', using IP Security Policies, in combination with it).

Read the article(s) below from Microsoft (regarding how IP Packet processing occurs in Windows OS) & AnalogX (regarding IPSec), first, & some of the steps you need to implement this AT A PORTS LEVEL!

"Basically the "Security tab" you see for files could be applied to individual ports." - by flydpnkrtn (114575) on Tuesday May 22, @09:03AM (#19219899)

You have this on ports, as mentioned above, in two ways: Port filtering, & alternately, IP Security Policies (ontop of software firewalls (which also have some control here & at the application level no less) & hardware 'firewalls').

You may find this useful (or, others may, as YOU in particular may be aware of this stuff already, one never knows, but I am mentioning it here in detail anyhow for your reference, or for that of others who use Windows NT-based OS that have these features (Windows 2000/XP/Server 2003/VISTA):

Read this article, because it shows you how to limit/unleash various ports and what drivers act on them as filters, & @ what levels in the network stack for Windows:

TCP/IP Packet Processing Paths:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/community/columns /cableguy/cg0605.mspx

IpNat.sys, IpFltDrv.sys, IpSec.sys, & TcpIp.sys in Windows 2000/XP/Server 2003/VISTA each has abilities for port restrictions!

This sounds like what you guys are looking for!

The steps below are basically how to use it (implement it) for limiting access to various ports, via GUI interfaces no less, in Windows versions noted above.

All of this & the tools noted can be used for LAYERED SECURITY in this manner (port filtering, IP Security Policies, software firewalls, & hardware NAT routers (true packet stateful inspection ones, & 'ordinary' NAT units as well)!

They ALL can be used simultaneously/concurrently, in layers, per the article from MS above entitled "TCP/IP Packet Processing Paths"

IPSecurity Policies are implemented in secpol.msc (this is the most complex of the lot, and I recommend "AnalogX's" model, as it works (but, can be troublesome with filesharing tools like EMule mind you), & can be downloaded here:

ANALOGX IP SECURITY POLICY OVERVIEW/HOW TO EXPLANATION:

http://www.analogx.com/contents/articles/ipsec.htm

ANALOGX IP SECURITY POLICY TEMPLATE DIRECT DOWNLOAD:

http://www.analogx.com/files/aps-ipsec.zip

(You can tune AnalogX's template model as you like above & beyond its original form for apps YOU use in particular)

AnalogX's IP Security Policy provides a good template to start with!

IP PortFiltering is done here:

Start Button -> Control Panel -> Network Connections -> Local Area Connection (or whatever you called yours) -> Properties Button -> (Next Popup dialog screen) -> Highlite "Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) -> Click the PROPERTIES button -> Click the ADVANCED button @ the bottom of this screen -> Go to the OPTIONS tab & highlite TcpIP Filtering & click the PROPERTIES button -> Check off "ENABLE TCP/IP Filtering on ALL Adapters" -> Permit only (a

If english is not your first language, I think the mistake could be natural.

However, I am real curious as to what makes you state with such assurance that WMP DRM and MCE DRM are unrelated; I think you are, in effect, saying that there are 2 completely unrelated DRM subsystems on a Win MCE computer, correct? I can find no documentation to support this point of view, and would very much appreciate it if you could provide a link. I have no problem being proved wrong.

However, there is a strong evidence supporting my being right; if you look at http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/play er/11/readme.aspx there is a strong implication.
I'm fairly certain that Media Center ignores DRM when recording video, paying attention to only the broadcaster's copy protection flag (CGMS-A). When it writes it to the local drive, I'm fairly positive it then uses the DRM subsystem to "protect" that file, and it is through the process of trying to fairly use this DRM "protected" file that the majority of usage issues come from.

My Motorola Q is 320x240 landscape, Windows Mobile (Smartphone) 5.0.

Plus, if that made any sense, there wouldn't be an Emulator Image for Windows Mobile 5.0 Smartphone with 320x240 (Landscape) Screen available for download for Visual Studio.

They are public record. MS has over 5000 patents. Would you like to do the reading?
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2006/mar0 6/03-065000PatentPR.mspx

Here's one:
http://www.google.com/patents?id=MlwmAAAAEBAJ&dq=m icrosoft

Does any open source software violate it?

http://research.microsoft.com/~pablo/avalanche.asp x

For that matter, 2000 is also NT 5.0, and XP is NT 5.1. And I didn't make that up, though I can't remember where it came from -- that is how Microsoft versions them.

Windows OS versioning.

- T

I have a G-15 from logitech. I dont' sit at it typing all day, but it's backlit keys and LCD screen are great for what I do at home. It also has 15 programable keys that can be assigned to one of 3 custom definitions (M1,M2,M3) for a total of 45 key definitions. If your looking for a typing board, I prefer the MS Natural Pro. It has a great feel to the keys and is very comfortable.

http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/products/details /US/EN,CRID=2166,CONTENTID=10717 There is a new version the G11 wich is about $25 less, and looks like it removes the LCD screen.
OR
http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/mouseandkeyboard /ProductDetails.aspx?pid=022&active_tab=overview
Heh, I gues its the MS Natural "ELITE" now...

The classmate site posted before states that it has 256Mb of RAM and 1GB/2GB NAND Flash storage device plues an 800x480 screen.

XP system reqs:
128 megabytes (MB) of RAM or higher recommended (64 MB minimum supported; may limit performance and some features)
1.5 gigabytes (GB) of available hard disk space*
Super VGA (800 x 600) or higher-resolution video adapter and monitor

Office system reqs: The basic version:
Memory 256 megabyte (MB) RAM or higher1
Hard disk 1.5 gigabyte (GB); a portion of this disk space will be freed after installation if the original download package is removed from the hard drive.
Display 1024x768 or higher resolution monitor

So, even with very stripped down versions of XP and Office with interfaces re designed for this screen there will be no room for a single user document!

Sounds more like a Windows Mobile Device spec for me.

The classmate site posted before states that it has 256Mb of RAM and 1GB/2GB NAND Flash storage device plues an 800x480 screen.

XP system reqs:
128 megabytes (MB) of RAM or higher recommended (64 MB minimum supported; may limit performance and some features)
1.5 gigabytes (GB) of available hard disk space*
Super VGA (800 x 600) or higher-resolution video adapter and monitor

Office system reqs: The basic version:
Memory 256 megabyte (MB) RAM or higher1
Hard disk 1.5 gigabyte (GB); a portion of this disk space will be freed after installation if the original download package is removed from the hard drive.
Display 1024x768 or higher resolution monitor

So, even with very stripped down versions of XP and Office with interfaces re designed for this screen there will be no room for a single user document!

Sounds more like a Windows Mobile Device spec for me.

in its early years before Windows even existed Microsoft indeed said "A PC on every desk and in every home" At later points in time they added bit about windows, and even later said they wanted a server in every home.

I remember when this quote and a related Comdex video came out ("OS/2 will be the operating system of the 90s"), and I still have a copy of the video somewhere. People always laughed at this one and say that Bill was a turn-coat to OS/2, but, you know, he was right.

I was a die-hard OS/2 fan, and still have a copy of it running on a virtual machine. I don't give a nod to Bill easily. However, MS worked with IBM on OS/2 version 1, before abandoning it to go with the monster Windows was becoming. MS took their work and used it to shape Windows NT, and everything derived from NT still has an OS/2 heart.

For evidence of this, just check out:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/archive/ntwrkstn/ reskit/os2comp.mspx

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/913800

Cockup rather than conspiracy?

Stored procedures can also improve performance. Many tasks are implemented as a series of SQL statements. Conditional logic applied to the results of the first SQL statements determines which subsequent SQL statements are executed. If these SQL statements and conditional logic are written into a stored procedure, they become part of a single execution plan on the server

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa174792( SQL.80).aspx

At Microsoft, the Program Manager position is not a management position. Instead, it is the role of an engineer responsible for defining the features of a product. You can read more here, if you're interested: http://members.microsoft.com/careers/careerpath/te chnical/programmanagement.mspx

Of that list, the Group program manager, product unit manager, and engineering manager are people managers, while the rest are most likely individual contributors.

The whole parameterized query thing vs stored procs argument has been argued from the day the internet was born.
Here's the arguments I would make for stored procs.

Most database engines also apply the exact same techniques to plain text queries. If the plain text queries are parameterized, then it works even better

Database engines more often than not will generate a whole new execution plan for plain text queries, it can also cause the execution plan cache to fill up more quickly, plus it opens you up to sql injection. Using plain text dynamic sql is just plain unforgiveable, if you really want to write your sql in your source code then you should use parametertized queries.

Microsoft's Transact-SQL is an absolutely horrible language that is very difficult to debug and had very poor error handling.

Debugging stored procs in Visual Studio is easy. This of course is impossible to do with dynamic sql.

here

The screencast shows live object/entity linking through a bloated RIA interface that probably needs a 3 GHz CPU and a 400$ GFX card to render properly. Let alone an MS operating system and their bloated, insecure, barely beta and closed-source proprietary silverthingie stuff.
The rotating entitiy cubes are pointless, anoying and distracting and are probably just there to hide the fact that we are basically looking at a RIA case tool with a restricted featureset. Everybody knows that things are going this way, but I doubt MS will get all things right to capture a larger audience and developer base.
Meanwhile I'm sticking with Laszlo for true cross-plattform RIA developement. After all even Adobe Flex is scrambling to catch up with them. And Laszlo went completely open source way before anybody else.

It is common practice with database development tools to update stored procs from sql scripts which are checked into source control systems. Microsoft has a whole verion of Visual Studio for this purpose.

Not using stored procs at all in your application is typically done by novice developers, it is not how an experienced professional works with a database.

That's nine managers and six developers. No wonder the team "hustles for resources." They're probably going broke paying management wages to sixty percent of the staff. It says three more people aren't pictured -- we can bet that two of them are more managers.

You're obviously not familiar with Microsoft position nomenclature. Of the names listed, there are three real managers -- the GPM, the PUM, and the Engineering Manager. You're confusing "Program Manager" and "Product Manager" as actual managers. They aren't.

Program managers "manage the program", not people -- they write specs, interface with customers, etc.

Product managers "manage the product", and are purely marketing. Again, they don't necessarily manage people.

Program managers and product managers are roughly on par with developers and test developers. They don't make the same big bucks as GPMs or PUMS.