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gp: "First, MS is doing tons of interesting stuff. You have no idea."
parent: Like what? I haven't heard anything vaguely interesting (other than cool FUD) coming from Redmond in years.

There's a huge amount of stuff, poke around on http://research.microsoft.com/

three links from the front page I found this [I clicked on redmond, interactive visual media, then photo tourism]
http://research.microsoft.com/vision/InteractiveVi sualMediaGroup/PhotoTours/

gp: "First, MS is doing tons of interesting stuff. You have no idea."
parent: Like what? I haven't heard anything vaguely interesting (other than cool FUD) coming from Redmond in years.

There's a huge amount of stuff, poke around on http://research.microsoft.com/

three links from the front page I found this [I clicked on redmond, interactive visual media, then photo tourism]
http://research.microsoft.com/vision/InteractiveVi sualMediaGroup/PhotoTours/

...and the other user is considering returning it as he can't even get on the net with it, despite have drivers for all of his hardware.

did this person try turning off ipv6? on the only vista release machine I've seen that fixed our networking problems.
[see http://www.microsoft.com/technet/community/columns /cableguy/cg0506.mspx#ENKAC for the registry hacking involved]

[damn "old" routers]

Add Search Providers to Internet Explorer 7

XP Media Center includes a desktop dancer program.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/deskt op/dancers.mspx

One of the characters is wearing a ghost outfit. Occasionally the white sheet slips, revealing the thin curve of steel underneath.

10 reasons

1. Don't forget that the vast majority of people working for Microsoft don't code.

2. Also, that their corporate culture has been known to be sucky for almost 2 decades (hint: nobody likes being shuted at).

3. And that you can make as much or more money elsewhere (Microsoft stock options are no longer a real incentive)

4. You can enjoy more autonomy at almost any other company

5. People want to have a life outside of work (follow-up to #2)

6. Its more fun being a larger part of a small project than a faceless cog in a large project (follow-up to #4)

7. A lot of the interesting stuff just isn't being done by Microsoft

8. Clueless VPs spouting bullshit:

   Corporate Vice President of Development Ben Fathi is already discussing features for the next OS: "We're going to look at a fundamental piece of enabling technology. Maybe its hypervisors, I don't know what it is ... Maybe it's a new user interface paradigm for consumers. It's too early for me to talk about it ... But over the next few months I think you're going to start hearing more and more."

   A perfect example of someone who should be kept locked away from the media until they have something concrete to say.

9. Windows and Microsoft aren't seen as being cool any more, and haven't been for a decade.

10. Who wants to be associated with crap products that are responsible for most of the zombies/worms/viruses?

I mean, really ... Ben Fathi is supposed to be the guy overseeing everything, and he says "I don't know what it is" about what's next, and this is news????

Ben Fathi serves as corporate vice president of development for the Windows Core Operating System Division (COSD) at Microsoft Corp. He oversees the development of core components of Microsoft Windows, including the kernel, and technologies associated with security, networking, virtualization, setup and deployment.

Fathi previously served as corporate vice president of the Security Technology Unit (STU), where he was responsible for delivery of all core security technologies, including the authentication, authorization and audit capabilities (AAA) of Microsoft products; Windows Rights Management Services (RMS); BitLocker drive encryption; and anti-virus, anti-spyware and network security protocols. Fathi also managed the Security Engineering and Communications team, the Security Response Center and the Security Outreach team, all of which focus on helping protect customers from online security threats.

So, he says he doesn't know what the next big thing in Windows is going to be ... here's a suggestion - new graphics and artwork to make it look more like OSX, a new startup sound that cost a billion instead of a few measly million to "enhance the user experience some more", a Duke Nukem Forever interactive screen-saver, and ribbons with dropdowns with flyouts with popups with menus, so that the user has at least 10 different ways to get to any particular option. And not one, not 2, but FOUR new programming languages - D minus (to replace C sharp), DOT NOT (a .net replacement that is ultra secure by refusing to do ANYTHING), J-Script/XML+J-Script/CSS for those who want to continue to build non-standard web sites, as well as Internet Explorer 9 - will only allow you to visit microsoft-signed sites, and a revamped cmd.exe and windows kernel that will only allow access to 640k of ram per process so that no application can ever be a resource hog. This last spec will be known as "Microsoft Dynacode Operating System 1", or MS-DOS 1.0. Plans call for an optional text interface sometime by 2012, and the removal of mouse support by 2015, because they can sell ms keyboards for more than mice.

Oh, and their engineering slogan will be "Windows ain't done until Wine won't run."

Want an MP3 player for your Mac or Linux box ? Don't look at the Zune ...

Want to view that webpage that requires IE (talking about those things that no matter what you do, will not work on another OS. For example, Quicken online)

Want to use your xbox has a media viewer ? Don't look at anything except Windows Media Center ...

MS has way more vendor lockin then Apple does.

Besides the recent trouble with Vista, I can get iTunes and Quicktime on a Windows box.

Try to get WMP or what not to work on your Mac ... AND be a current version from the past year or 2.

Best thing to do these days, is buy a Mac

... then you can run Linux, OS X or Windows ... legally and at the same time if you want.

Microsoft invested $150 million in Apple in mid 1997, at a time when Apple's market cap was 2.2 billion. The stock consisted of non voting shares

Just a note, MSN doesn't have any meteorologists on staff. The weather forecasts at weather.msn.com are provided by The Weather Channel.

A real CLI that I can use (let's face it, the windows shell is ancient and pales compared to Bash. Maybe when Monad comes out).

"Yeah, but I like Yahoo Messenger, or MSN, or whatever". There's Adium. "Ummm..."

Actually monad is now out and is called PowerShell, try it you might like it!

For Vista:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?fa milyid=C6EF4735-C7DE-46A2-997A-EA58FDFCBA63&displa ylang=en

Other Windows versions:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/technol ogies/management/powershell/download.mspx

Actually monad is now out and is called PowerShell, try it you might like it!

For Vista:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?fa milyid=C6EF4735-C7DE-46A2-997A-EA58FDFCBA63&displa ylang=en

Other Windows versions:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/technol ogies/management/powershell/download.mspx

What maintenance? Windows Update is automatic.

• Two Windows SP1 workstations were rendered useless by a Windows Update patch to the point that they couldn't even boot into safe mode. SP2 machines were unaffected. The reason that these PCs were still at SP1 was because SP2 broke a terminal client needed for 80% of this business's data processing needs (we found this out the hard way). Solution: wipe and reinstall, turn wupdate off.
• A year ago, WU 908531 (which installed verclsid.exe, a program for validating COM objects) broke Explorer, Internet Explorer, and Word on any computer with an HP DeskJet or scanner installed. Documents would not open or save in Word. The My Documents folder would not open. Immediate workaround was to rename or delete verclsid.exe. Now with all the Windows PCs out there with HP peripherals, you'd think MS would catch this in QA, right? Nope.
• Windows Genuine Advantage...'nuff said. No, wait. I spent too much time on the phone with Microsoft's Bangalore phone bank resolving this one. Even my own office PC got bit when I added a DVD burner; I had to reactivate over the phone.
• Pushing Internet Explorer 7 as a critical patch. Stupid. Broke a lot of applications that depend on the underlying DLLs for their user interface, most notably recent versions of Quickbooks. Easy fix, uninstall IE7. But time is money for our clients. I will admit that it seems like MS took IE7 off the critical list, since the HP workstation I bought (probably the last to ship with XP) did not have IE7 among the 69 Windows Update critical patches I installed after bringing it up for the first time.

it is a pain for me trying to install the new Office on all my customers' computers,

Right here. ;)

"the bottom line is that Apple has had two years (at least) to get their [stuff] together with widely available documentation and SDKs from Microsoft that many other software companies have happily used so far."

Yes, you could say that, or you could also take note that several other companies are in a similar position. For instance, Cisco barely has a beta VPN client for 32 bit Vista http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929490# and they aren't alone. Perhaps part of the issue is that Vista is "so secure" that everyone is having to re-write their code from the ground up to fix all the sloppy hacked-together stuff they put out for XP. Or maybe there's a bit more to porting an app to Vista, or more to porting an app to run natively in 64 bit mode...

"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 So, why the complaining about iTunes when Vista just came out? This seems a bit more important, as well as ::ahem:: late.

widely available documentation and SDKs from Microsoft that many other software companies have happily used so far

I challenge you to find a SINGLE Windows "Logo" certified application that does not run on Vista. Just one. (Not counting things like anti-virus, which use file system filters that were dramatically overhauled in Vista.)

The fact of the matter is that the vast majority of backwards compatibility issues with Vista are due to the fact those applications are poorly written.

Microsoft publishes some fairly simple rules that developers should follow to make sure their software is compatible with future (and current) versions of Windows. Rules like "Don't store your freaking user settings in Program Files". Not exactly hard to follow.

Yet most apps that don't follow these rules STILL work on Vista. Microsoft actually wrote code that detects when crappy applications do stupid stuff that violates their Logo rules, and will automatically redirect their output to temp folders under the user's profile.

But there is only so much they can do.

Apple has had more than a year to get their software ready for Vista. In my opinion, the only explanation for them not doing so is because they want to try and influence users to not upgrade to Vista.

I still find it incredible that software that is over 20 years old still runs on Vista.

http://download.microsoft.com/documents/useterms/W indows%20Vista_Home%20Basic_English_2cd69850-7680- 4987-8b1e-59a3d405c074.pdf

MICROSOFT WINDOWS VISTA HOME BASIC

4. USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may not use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system.

MICROSOFT WINDOWS VISTA HOME PREMIUM

4. USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may not use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system.

MICROSOFT WINDOWS VISTA ULTIMATE

6. USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system on the licensed device. If
you do so, you may not play or access content or use applications protected by any Microsoft digital,
information or enterprise rights management technology or other Microsoft rights management
services or use BitLocker. We advise against playing or accessing content or using applications
protected by other digital, information or enterprise rights management technology or other rights
management services or using full volume disk drive encryption.

WINDOWS VISTA BUSINESS

f. Use with Virtualization Technologies. You may use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system. If you do so,
you may not play or access content or use applications protected by any Microsoft digital,
information or enterprise rights management technology or other Microsoft rights
management services or use BitLocker. We advise against playing or accessing content
or using applications protected by other digital, information or enterprise rights
management technology or other rights management services or using full volume disk
drive encryption.

MICROSOFT WINDOWS VISTA HOME BASIC

4. USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may not use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system.

MICROSOFT WINDOWS VISTA HOME PREMIUM

4. USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may not use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system.

MICROSOFT WINDOWS VISTA ULTIMATE

6. USE WITH VIRTUALIZATION TECHNOLOGIES. You may use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system on the licensed device. If
you do so, you may not play or access content or use applications protected by any Microsoft digital,
information or enterprise rights management technology or other Microsoft rights management
services or use BitLocker. We advise against playing or accessing content or using applications
protected by other digital, information or enterprise rights management technology or other rights
management services or using full volume disk drive encryption.

WINDOWS VISTA BUSINESS

f. Use with Virtualization Technologies. You may use the software installed on the
licensed device within a virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system. If you do so,
you may not play or access content or use applications protected by any Microsoft digital,
information or enterprise rights management technology or other Microsoft rights
management services or use BitLocker. We advise against playing or accessing content
or using applications protected by other digital, information or enterprise rights
management technology or other rights management services or using full volume disk
drive encryption.

It's the sandboxing. A program run by a given user doesn't automatically get the user's full permissions -- it only gets a small subset. For example, it can't open files from the user's home directory other than by calling a trusted system File Open dialog, which allows the user to select the file and returns an open file handle to the application (or in OLPC's case hardlinks the file into the chroot jail).

In terms of research projects, see the secure scripting language E and the proof of concept CapDesk.

Interestingly, in the commercial world it only seems to turn up in safe bytecode runtimes -- there's very little out there for native code. For an example of something similar in concept look at JNLP or ClickOnce deployers.

See Microsoft ClickOnce deployment for .NET for just what you're describing. The default security is *just like* a Java sand-boxed applet, and applications need to define any greater access to other resources.
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/aa700952. aspx

Personally I don't like it -- to hard for the developer, and end users will just click OK anyway. Look into their scheme for certificates to secure this, from both the developer and the "publisher", to see a real mess that no end user will understand. The article is from the .NET 2.0 doc's, so I wonder if they're downplaying this feature?

It's hard to know where to begin and others have commented on many of the problems with this so-called analysis, but I want to take issue with one of the core statements in the article:

A system call is an opportunity to address memory. A hacker investigates each memory access to see if it is vulnerable to a buffer overflow attack. The developer must do QA on each of these entry points. The more system calls, the greater potential for vulnerability, the more effort needed to create secure applications.

Huh? This is perhaps the most oversimplified and outright incorrect statement about what it takes to create secure applications that I have ever seen.

Let's take one very simple counterexample. Let's imagine that in the Apache* scenario, all string operations use the legacy C APIs (strcpy, strcat, sprintf, etc.) and the developers were too lazy to even add the manual error-prone bounds checks, whereas in IIS6, all string operations use Microsoft's strsafe.h replacement APIs (StringCchCopy, StringCchCat, StringCchPrintf, etc.) with extra diligence to make sure they are correct and even protect against integer overflows. Now which application is more secure, regardless of whether one has more lines on a graph?

I'm guessing the author's intent was to talk about attack surface area and how it relates to securing applications, but this is an extremely poor way to do it.

* - For the pedants, I'm not saying this is really the case with Apache.

Windows does clean it... well, sort of.

When you're running low of disk space a warning appears, offering to run the Disk Cleanup tool, which tries to remove unused temporary files (among other things).

But I wonder why it doesn't erase those pesky thumbs.db files (by checking their last access date).

"They'll probably stop supporting XP any day now."

It's a troll because Microsoft actually has a GOOD record of supporting their OS's for a few years after they've moved to new versions.

When did they end Windows 98 support? Wasn't it in 2006?

According to links from this page mainstream support for XP will end in 2009, and extended support in 2014.

So the original post made a completely false claim that cast FUD. Isn't that a troll by definition?

But those same companies are at the mercy of consumers, just like anybody else. If there is enough bad press due to the poor security of the product, the company will be forced to fix things. This is especially true for companies that sell software to large corporations.

Microsoft really is a case in point. They did a lot of what you described, got nailed for it by the press, by consumers, and by corporations, and they really did change their ways. Their Secure Development Lifecycle has turned out some pretty high quality releases. For instance, IIS 6 has far fewer vulnerabilities than Apache. One certainly couldn't say that for IIS 5.

Are there any public-use computers left in the world that aren't locked down to prohibit this?

Yes and No.

It's done by reading a local Game Definition File which will - in Microsoft's vision of the future - be created by the developer and included in the game install.

However for games without such a file - presumably including all legacy games - Vista will dial the mothership and request the data using "Windows Metadata Services".

See http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb173447. aspx

The problem with OSS is that there are just too many choices.

You're entirely right. Thank god that with closed source, there's only one media player to choose from. And only one web browser. I'm so happy that there's only one closed source mail client too!

I would make my point further, but my comment would be rejected as spam...

The problem with OSS is that there are just too many choices.

You're entirely right. Thank god that with closed source, there's only one media player to choose from. And only one web browser. I'm so happy that there's only one closed source mail client too!

I would make my point further, but my comment would be rejected as spam...

The problem with OSS is that there are just too many choices.

You're entirely right. Thank god that with closed source, there's only one media player to choose from. And only one web browser. I'm so happy that there's only one closed source mail client too!

I would make my point further, but my comment would be rejected as spam...

A Ghz+ processor, 1G of RAM and a US$30 video card is all you need to comfortably run Vista.

I'm not sure what you mean by "comforatbly." Perhaps with all the bells and whistles stripped down to Windows 2000 era functionality you might be able to run Vista by itself on such a rig, but not much else and if it is anything like previous versions of windows running on such a reduced rig (far less than Microsoft recommends) must surely affect performance. Quite apart from the fact that Microsoft has routinely given far lower system requirements than are really required to actually run the system with applications without constant thrashing from paging, etc, Microsoft recommends a 3d card with 128MB of memory just to hold the textures for the GUI. One shudders to think what you need to actually play a 3d game on such a system. It is true that they are claiming you can run on the reduced rig you describe, but again that is without any of the new interface features running.

Given that they are saying 1GB is required, it is likely that the reports that 2GB is really the requirement to run smoothly are not out of line. Historically Windows memory requirements have included the requirement of a paging file of 2x memory which is constantly thrashing just to run the OS at the amount of memory Microsoft claims to require, which really leads one swiftly to the conclusion that 2-3x the claimed requirement is necessary to prevent excessive paging (which really slows things down) and give at least some breathing room for an application or two. This is especially important when one considers how much memory the MS Office suite will tend to require and the fact there is a new version involved there as well.

I seriously doubt the 40GB HD is realistic here, either since they say at least a hefty 15GB is required for the most stripped down install of Vista itself. The only saving grace here is that you basically can't buy drives that small these days; even laptop drives are getting more respectable in size. BUt you are talking about the upgrade case, and an old XP system with a hoary 40GB drive is likely not to make it through an upgrade.

As cheap as video cards are these days and as cheap as memory is we are still talking a few hundred dollars to upgrade a lot of computers that ran XP pretty comfortably. Much much cheaper than a new Mac, even than a Mac Mini. But it's silly to suggest that moving from a system that runs XP very well to barely running Vista without any of the new interface features is an "upgrade." Why would you deliberately make your computer run slower? If you want to upgrade to the new OS it only makes sense if you have the beef in your system to really run the full monte. None of this "Basic" business. Ultimate or nothing. If you can settle for less, you may as well stick with XP or 2000.

If you're into encryption and the challenges of meeting various design constraints, here's a paper from Microsoft describing the algorithm and their attack model. Of particular interest is the requirement that it must take fewer cycles to decrypt data than to read it from disk (otherwise the CPU becomes the bottleneck for disk operations).

Essentially algorithms that are known to be stronger may be too slow for full disk encryption. If turning on BitLocker was a significant performance issue, most users would turn it off. If you are worried about specific files, it might be wise to use a stronger, but slower, algorithm just for those files so that the rest of the disk operates at a reasonable speed.

As to your specific point, they do mention the weaknesses of AES-CBC. This was their motivation for the diffuser component (while its quality is unproven, they do show that it can't be any worse than simply using AES-CBC; the point of this document is to expose it to public scrutiny). It looks like the diffuser makes it difficult to determine the plaintext that was supplied to AES. In particular, you don't know which bits to modify to produce changes in any particular block of the AES chain. Similarly, modifiying the ciphertext will cause the change to be randomly propogated across the plaintext (Ciphertext -> AES-CBC -> Diffuser -> Plaintext).

Bitlocker uses AES-CBC with some tweakage to deter the usual attacks against full-disk encryption with CBC. The Microsoft paper about encryption options for full-disk encryption is really not bad.

All beside the point, because that's not what the Register article was about, nor was it what the forensics types were talking about. The big point here is *crypto does not solve problems*. Crypto moves problems around. It turns the problem of protecting data into the problem of protecting keys. You hope it's an easier problem, but if you don't protect keys (keep the nerdstick on a chain around your neck, don't have a recovery key, etc.) then it's the same as not protecting your data. Same issue as with PGP: the easy way into PGP-encrypted files is to brute-force the idiotic passphrase that's almost certainly being used to conceal the private key.

Mostly under the hood where I can't see them? Yeah in excessive DRM technology that was not built for MS's customers.

And those benefits you keep hinting about are so deep inside that even this Microsoft Shill can't come up with 7 great reasons why Vista is better than XP: http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/en-US/hel p/639a0593-b990-4f53-82be-857fcea5a5061033.mspx

(article "spotlighted" today in front page of: http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/en-US/def ault.mspx )

Starts with IE7 as number 1 reason(!?[1]) and goes downhill from then on. I mean Mahjong Titans is one of the reasons listed...

[1] IE7 is available for XP, and you can still optionally stick with IE6 for those broken IE6-only typically built using MS's old technology.

And about search. I've always found Win2K's file search easier to use than WinXP's (which has all sorts of crap that gets in the way), so now Vista improves search? Forgive me if I'm not impressed.

Sure, per app sound control is nice, but it would have been cheaper to implement without all that DRM stuff getting in the way. Again who pays?

And you say: Office 2007. Office 2007 is not Vista. Are you claiming it doesn't work on XP? That'll be interesting.

Or are you claiming MS is adding hidden features to its OS to make Office 2007 better? Didn't MS get in trouble for something like that before?

You said: "No DRM means no digital HD media. Can't do it. Not legally, anyway."

Sure you need HDCP support. But which law says you need to put "tilt bits" and all the other DRM stuff into Vista that will _increase_ customer costs AND reduce function?

You think those Made in China HD players are going to have "tilt bits" and other crap in their hardware? You really think that millions of those HD players will get "revoked" just because some guy in Norway reuses their keys? So MS has less influence over media companies than than those pesky bunch in China?

All that looks like increased value to you? Of course it does, Microsoft gives you money. Money from boiling frogs.

Lastly: I've got many more good reasons why you're wrong and that Vista sucks and is not innovative.

BUT they're under the hood where you can't see them. ;)

Mostly under the hood where I can't see them? Yeah in excessive DRM technology that was not built for MS's customers.

And those benefits you keep hinting about are so deep inside that even this Microsoft Shill can't come up with 7 great reasons why Vista is better than XP: http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/en-US/hel p/639a0593-b990-4f53-82be-857fcea5a5061033.mspx

(article "spotlighted" today in front page of: http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/en-US/def ault.mspx )

Starts with IE7 as number 1 reason(!?[1]) and goes downhill from then on. I mean Mahjong Titans is one of the reasons listed...

[1] IE7 is available for XP, and you can still optionally stick with IE6 for those broken IE6-only typically built using MS's old technology.

And about search. I've always found Win2K's file search easier to use than WinXP's (which has all sorts of crap that gets in the way), so now Vista improves search? Forgive me if I'm not impressed.

Sure, per app sound control is nice, but it would have been cheaper to implement without all that DRM stuff getting in the way. Again who pays?

And you say: Office 2007. Office 2007 is not Vista. Are you claiming it doesn't work on XP? That'll be interesting.

Or are you claiming MS is adding hidden features to its OS to make Office 2007 better? Didn't MS get in trouble for something like that before?

You said: "No DRM means no digital HD media. Can't do it. Not legally, anyway."

Sure you need HDCP support. But which law says you need to put "tilt bits" and all the other DRM stuff into Vista that will _increase_ customer costs AND reduce function?

You think those Made in China HD players are going to have "tilt bits" and other crap in their hardware? You really think that millions of those HD players will get "revoked" just because some guy in Norway reuses their keys? So MS has less influence over media companies than than those pesky bunch in China?

All that looks like increased value to you? Of course it does, Microsoft gives you money. Money from boiling frogs.

Lastly: I've got many more good reasons why you're wrong and that Vista sucks and is not innovative.

BUT they're under the hood where you can't see them. ;)

The fact that this does not affect Office 2007 suggests that Microsoft is learning from their mistakes.

This is further supported by other software they have released that went throught their "secure development lifecycle" initiative, including IIS 6.0, IIS 7.0, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003, etc.

Of course, IIS 7 and Vista have only been out there for a few months now... so, obviously, the jury is still out on them.

meet the lovely darling microsoftie, Carmen

In this url, http://www.microsoft.com/mscorp/java// , it is stated,
The MSJVM will reach its end of life on December 31, 2007. Customers are encouraged to take
proactive measures to stay informed about obsolete software and move away from the MSJVM
in a timely fashion. The MSJVM is no longer available for distribution from Microsoft and
there will be no enhancements to the MSJVM. Microsoft products and SKUs currently
including the MSJVM will continue to be retired or replaced by versions not containing
the MSJVM on a schedule to be announced.

what doest it mean?

ozgur uksal

4) Microsoft wants gamers to abandon the PC as a gaming platform and go to the 360. Then they can focus on making the Home version of Windows a purely media-centered OS and the business version essentially a backend for Office-type apps without having to worry about making a 3D rendering library or any of that crap.

Hmmm, maybe you need to floss a little yourself.

Not disputing the games comment but WPF aka Net 3.0 is intrinsically a 3d rendering library. So much so, my ATI tools that draw an FPS counter in the top r.h. corner of any 3d screen (only ever seen in games before) now does so on any WPF window, dialog or menu.

"After 17 years with the company, Jim Allchin retired from Microsoft as of Jan. 30, 2007 - the day on which Microsoft officially released the Windows Vista operating system to consumers." Here's his bio.

It's sort of silly to say that the fact that the guy is PM makes him sort of super authority. . . . hell, there are PM interns

It's sort of silly to say that the fact that the guy is PM makes him sort of super authority. . . . hell, there are PM interns

It's sort of silly to say that the fact that the guy is PM makes him sort of super authority. . . . hell, there are PM interns

It's sort of silly to say that the fact that the guy is PM makes him sort of super authority. . . . hell, there are PM interns