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If you're saying that, I'd have to conclude that you've never actually read (and understood) your MS windows EULA.

Once you buy an article you can do what you want with it. Licenses are arbitrary... That's why the EULA has the claim "you agree that you have licensed this software, not purchased it (or something to that effect).

Under general copyright there is no need to obtain a license to run a piece of software. The doctrine of fair use would allow you to install and use it to your heart's content on any one machine.
In theory a license is supposed to grant you something that you would not normally have.. MS licenses seem to do nothing other than take away rights that you would normally have. I think that that's part of the reason why EULA 'agreement' pages are designed to discourage you from actually reading them.

From the current XP-Pro SP2 eula. (find it here)

3. RESERVATION OF RIGHTS AND OWNERSHIP. Microsoft reserves all rights not expressly granted to you in this EULA. ..... The Software is licensed, not sold. (emphasis MS's)

8.Upgrades. To use the software identified as an upgrade, you must first be licensed for the software identified by microsoft as eligible for the upgrade. After upgrading, you may no longer used the software that formed the basis for your upgrade eligibility. (emphasis mine)

14 ..... The initial user of the Software may make a one-time permanent transfer of this EULA and Software to another end user, provided the initial user retains no copies of the Software. ..... The transfer may not be an indirect transfer, such as a consignment. ....

dont forget the kick ass 3000+ template collection that is up on Microsofts Office website... there is good stuff up there.

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/templates/defaul t.aspx

I did a search for linux & the top result in the googlesque ad side-bar was "Get the Facts on Windows and Linux" at http://www.microsoft.com/australia/windowsserversy stem/getthefacts/default.aspx

The Belgian government has already taken the step of including an electronic ID on its next-generation identity card. For the price 10 euros, every Belgian (for the card is mandatory, although one does not have to activate the electronic signature option) will get an officially issued card with an encryption key and an electronic signature.

For the government, of course, the benefit is in shifting as much official communication (tax forms etc.) from paper to electronic form. But financial institutions, online shops, etc. are also encouraged to use the eID.

Information on the official eID site is mostly in Belgium's three official languages (which do not include English) but there is extensive information in English on the site of Microsoft Benelux eID.

It seems like companies gravitate towards a name they like and call everything by that name regardless of its meaning.

Microsoft had (maybe still do??) "Windows powered smartcards". Well, there was no "Windows" on the card. OK, I got curious. This link says, "A Windows Powered Smart Card is a microcomputer without a graphical user interface." I couldn't have made that up!

Intel calls everything Pentium.

Sun calls everything Java.

McDonalds prefixes everything with "Mc", but I guess that is a little different.

Well, they certainly won't be moving from Linux. I went to Microsoft's official site for Vista with my firefox 1.0.7 browser under Fedora Core 4, and I can't view the site properly! Now even if I wanted to trash my Linux for Windows, I can't because they won't let me see the information. See for yourself at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/features/def ault.mspx

The problem for any corporation updating to Vista is that you rather have to replace most of your hardware along the way as well.

Really? Might want to double check that. Current mid range or higher cpu, 512MB ram (which I've been recommending for years now). You likely WON'T need a high end graphics card, because Areo doesn't come with the business versions of Vista. Actually I seem to recall people saying the exact same thing when windows XP came out. Hmm...

And upgrade your memory. Over on The Inquirer they're reporting that Vista consumes 800MB of RAM while idling.

Um, maybe because its a debug build of BETA software??? Let me give you a clue.. debug performance != release performance. The above link says that they recommend 512MB ram; I've been putting that much ram into my computers for about 4 years now.

This is absolutely insane to someone who first started using computers in the early 1970's.

Maybe you should stop living in the '70s then. People weren't exactly playing Doom3 on ANY computers in the '70s either, yet today many computers can. Who cares what requirements an OS needed in the 70s? We're in the 21st century now.

here just isn't that much stuff that an Operating System should be doing. And yes, that really is 3X XP's current requirements, the thought of which certainly is warming Intel's little heart.

Again, take a breath, and realize this is a beta version.

Seems to me if MS wants to keep IBM in the fold they should be offering to buy them all new desktops.

Ever think that MS isn't targeting older computers, they are targeting what is current today?

How to Remove Linux and Install Windows XP

1. Dont use string manipulation to build XML documents. Please. Use XML APIs to build XML, mmk? XmlTextWriter is your friend.
2. String is what String is - an immutable string. It is reasonable to expect concatenation operations on any immutable object to be a copy-on-write operation. Its nice that Java and Python optimize for this case (yet Java cannot make the component aspects of a JavaBean a first class language citizen. Properties, people! Come on!), but the docs on System.String are quite clear about the immutability of String and the appropriateness of StringBuilder. You dont even have to read that far!

I have to agree. My job involves administrating a business critical database designed in access from ground up.

I think there's a lot of denial about the problems access has - searching on the web there seems to be a lot of supporters for it. I suppose part of that is that they feel that there's no other viable 'RAD' databases available as replies to this post discuss.

Additionally, I feel a large part of this is that a lot of people who didn't previously posess programming skills work with access and are able to create a fairly sophisticated application relatively easily, and are therefore more likely to jealously defend the application that gave them such productivity (which has perhaps resulted in kudos for them in the eyes of their superiors).They gloss over the bugs and limitations and the horrible UI (especially the report designer), the crippling limitations and un-intuitive query design tool (I love that error saying something's 'too complicated' for access to understand - I don't know about you but when an application running on a system that can do 2 billion odd floating point ops a second tells you something's too complicated I begin to worry), because they know of no better, which although this isn't their fault I think results in a large degree of near-sightedness on this issue.

In my opinion, given ms's backward-compatibility obsession and general tendency to never fix even the smallest bugs they'll probably keep things the way they are, which means access ends up not being a rapid development application at all! I am of the opinion that one could achieve results far quicker in something like MySQL and perhaps a PHP front end or somesuch if only they took the time to learn it in advance. I know this is something a large part of access users are unlikely to want to dedicate business time to, but I think it'd pay big dividends in the long term, especially in terms of scalability (and sanity).

Another issue with access (I could go on all day with this) is the rather worrying corruption issues that can arise in multi-user mode. Keeping in mind ms say it can handle 255 users odd with a 2 gig db then this is rather worrying :

" Microsoft Jet, the database engine that is used in Microsoft Access, is a file sharing database system. When Microsoft Jet is used in a multi-user environment, multiple client processes are using file read, write, and locking operations on a shared database. Because multiple client processes are reading and writing to the same database and because Jet does not use a transaction log (as do the more advanced database systems, such as SQL Server), it is not possible to reliably prevent any and all database corruption"

Keeping business critical applications in an environment where even the software developer admits that you "cannot reliably prevent any and all database corruption" seems to me a rather bad idea. This coupled with the fact that multi-user access additionally results in big slowdown (let's download the whole table!!) means that access has no real uses beyond utterly trivial desktop databases. I could so easily go into vba's atrocious limitations (I'm often simply inclined to build a .dll with any non-trivial functionality in it written in lovely c++ and do the minimal amount of work possible in vba), the horrible horrible help system that just doesn't work and re-highlight the parent thread's discussion on nasty obdc sql queries but it all just adds up to the conclusion that access just isn't fit for purpose at all.

There's no way in hell spin like this would be tolerated on slashdot.

Bullshit. The only thing even possibly biased in the entire review is the one paragraph "teaser" at the beginning designed to get the reader in. And it's not even biased, it's just making an odd comparison with something completely unrelated.

Anyway, I don't mind this review .. but would like to see reviews of Microsoft products well tolerated on here in a balanced manner.

When M$ tolerates balanced reviews on their own website then maybe we can talk about "balance" on slashdot.

Slashdot is a generally open source website. Open source websites are needed to balance out blatantly biased high volume sites like microsoft, msn and Paul Thurrott.

---

Marketing talk is not just cheap, it has negative value. Free speech can be compromised just as much by too much noise as too little signal.

How was this modded as insightful... That's right its Slashdot.

BASIC uses 1-based arrays, and horror or horrors, allows you to change that behavior. I could go on, but other people will probably cover this subject adequately.

Yes TWO VERSIONS AGO! VB.NET is zero based arrays:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb; en-us;311333
 
...but VB.NET to C# translators are a bit more problematic

http://www.developerfusion.co.uk/utilities/convert vbtocsharp.aspx
http://www.soft32.com/download_26228.html
http://www.shareup.com/VB.Net_to_C_Converter-downl oad-17930.html

Just three to get you started!

For example X=A(5) could refer to a function call, an array index, or a number of other possibilities, depending on what "A" is

Well not to mention that a professional programmer wouldn't right functions as 'A' or 'X', Option explicit on would not let you compile that if both X and A are not the same data type.

Don't bother with VB 6, it's going away.

Yeah, like FIVE YEARS AGO!

But you are right VB.net and C# are basically the same. Its all syntax. For myself, I read and write English so I prefer to code in English, not code for the compilers sake.

If you are going to run on Windows at least get free tools direct from Microsoft: http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/express/default. aspx

Your argument is against the VS.NET IDE and not the VB.NET language. If you just use the always freely available SDK and avoid the VS.NET IDE, then you will have to code every letter and you will learn a lot more about .NET too.

Actually, Java and C# have nearly identical syntax. I would suggest learning Object-Oriented to start, and concentrating on what OO is, rather than all the power of a specific language. OO is definitely the future, but many people who transition from procedural or don't learn the power of objects from the beginning just use Java or C# as procedural languages.

I have found that in programming, taking a class will cut down on the time spent banging your head against the wall because there's someone to answer your questions, even if they're stupid newbie questions. Programming teachers are usually far more responsive than other teachers (systems analysis, database, e.g.) because it's more practical.

If you're just learning how to program, I wouldn't worry about pointers immediately. Visual Basic is powerful in that you can write applications quickly and learn really fast.

Visual Basic: Schneider

Java: Barker

C#: Barker

Whatever your choice, there are free IDE's for all this now from Sun and Microsoft, and part of learning will be learning how to navigate the IDE. It's a great time to learn to program.

Where I live, people can't find enough VB or C# programmers, and not enough Java programmers with a security clearance. Before you buy the hype of the next great programming language, check out the want ads on Monster or Dice and see what people need now.

And remember, the highest-paid programmers (not team leaders)still write COBOL for Mainframes, because nobody else knows how to do this, and the big companies still can't get all their systems off of them.

VisualBasic 1.0 was most certainly Windows, I belive you are thinking of QuickBasic.

No, there was such a thing as Visual Basic for DOS. I wouldn't blame you for repressing any memory you have of it :). It's mentioned in this Microsoft Knowledge Base article about preparing Visual Basic applications for Y2K. I quote:

For all versions of Visual Basic for Windows (including its predecessors such as Visual Basic for DOS and QuickBasic) prior to and including 3.0, two-digit years were always assumed to be in the 1900s.

Don't go with VB, use VB.NET. There are a lot of reasons for this:

* unlike classic VB (version 6 or prior), the current version of VB.NET is fully object-oriented, supporting generics (templates for you C++ folks), interfaces, full inheritance, abstract classes and members, overloading (including operators), etc.

* the english-like syntax of old-school VB is still present and is now applied to the object-oriented aspects of the language (e.g. which keyword makes more sense for someone learning OOP? VB.NET's "NotInheritable" or C#'s "sealed"? VB.NET's "MustImplement" or C#'s "abstract"?).

* the relevant express editions of Visual Studio are currently free and very powerful.

My warning is related to the last item: resist the urge to use all of the IDE's bells and whistles at first. In my experience, those developers who rely on Visual Studio to do everything for them never really understand what is going on behind the scenes and have trouble later on. Use the IDE just for syntax highlighting and IntelliSense at first (i.e. start with simple console applications and develop from the "Empty Project" template, even building Windows Forms applications from this starting point...THEN use the snazzy designers and wizards).

There's also MS's free Kid's Programming Language. Based on BASIC, but structured rather than linear.

If by 'beginner' you mean someone who just needs to learn a language to do simple projects for their homework or something, and who has no aspirations of becomming a software engineer or computer scientist, then yes it's probably a decent 'beginner's' language. Lots of free stuff from MS, including their free (for one year) Visual Studio Express IDE's and free (indefinitely) SQL Server 2005 Express edition.

However, if by 'beginner' you mean an aspiring computer scientist or software engineer, then by all means no, it's a terrible beginner's language. In that case, start them out with Assembly, as someone suggested in an earlier thread. Or, if you want them to learn the two fundamental language paradigms, start them with C and LISP (preferably the Scheme dialect for starters). C teaches pointers, LISP/Scheme teaches recursion.

If by 'beginner' you mean someone who just needs to learn a language to do simple projects for their homework or something, and who has no aspirations of becomming a software engineer or computer scientist, then yes it's probably a decent 'beginner's' language. Lots of free stuff from MS, including their free (for one year) Visual Studio Express IDE's and free (indefinitely) SQL Server 2005 Express edition.

However, if by 'beginner' you mean an aspiring computer scientist or software engineer, then by all means no, it's a terrible beginner's language. In that case, start them out with Assembly, as someone suggested in an earlier thread. Or, if you want them to learn the two fundamental language paradigms, start them with C and LISP (preferably the Scheme dialect for starters). C teaches pointers, LISP/Scheme teaches recursion.

That means you need some kind of document management/collaboration solution.

The company I work for uses SharePoint Portal Server
http://www.microsoft.com/office/sharepoint/prodinf o/default.mspx plus our own (closed source) sollution built on top of it http://www.urudata.com/intellikon/esp/index.aspx (and it catalogues and archives emails)

But there are several open source possibilities too, see http://www.opensourcecms.com/

On the AMD side, dual-core may become more common than single core, very shortly. The fact that dual-core chips are drop-in replacements for single core chips helps, as vendors don't have to change anything other than their CPU order.

Unless the publishers of popular proprietary programs start billing customers per core. Microsoft isn't planning on charging dual-core customers more, but Oracle treats a dual-core CPU as 1.5 billing units.

Correct. To clarify, Windows 2003 comes in Standard, Enterprise, Datacenter and Web editions. There is no Professional edition. There are Windows 2003 R2 versions of Standard, Enterprise and Datacenter.

See the feature comparison page for more info.

I'm not entirely sure why MS chose to call it R2, rather than Windows 2005, but that's marketing for you.

... and it was hell.

We have 285 mailboxes on Exchange (was 2000, now 2003) and are in the telecom business. We implemented 2003 with a cross-server migration using the mailbox move utility and we went from an unlicensed version of 2000 Enterprise to a licensed version of Standard. Who knew we had an 87 GB mailstore? After I had migrated five users, the mailstore dismounted and the event log told me there was 17 GB out of 16 in use on the mailstore. Apparantly, Standard has a 16 GB limit. I also found out about a neat registry setting (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=57029) that enables a 75 GB limit, but that was still too small for our 87 GB store. Limits was the key, as we didn't have any.

Our largest user was 1.2 GB, but we had fifteen users over 1 GB. My predecessor had tried to implement a five tiered system based on title. Non managers had 100 MB, Managers had 150 MB, Directors had 200 MB, VPs had 250 MB and Corporate Officers were unlimited. My boss (a director) wanted to half these. I pushed for something more manageable, yet reasonable and here is what we implemented:

Non-managers: 250 MB, Managers: 500 MB, VPs and above: Unlimited. We set it so that warnings were issued at 90%, Send is disabled at 100%, and Send/Recieve is disabled at 110%.

After teaching users that the 'Deleted Items' folder is not the place to store important mail, and setting up daily auto-archive set to two months, our mail store is at 50 GB. It takes four hours to backup individual mailboxes to a locally attached Ultrium LTO2 drive. So far, I haven't had to restore anyone's mailbox, but I would expect the same or faster on the restore.

Why race against the rotary engine in the Daytona 24 or the Le Mans when you can just ban it?

Why compete fairly when you can just buy, imitate, embrace and extend ???

The point is, you can play the game and it's cheating if you break the rules, but cheating is also commonly referred to in today's world as "winning". If everyone had morals, the world would be ruled by immoral assholes.

First off, if you haven't run the Exchange best practices analyzer tool, Do so. It gives out a lot of advice regarding exchange and it's settings.
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/excha nge/downloads/2003/analyzers/default.mspx

Second, as for storage limits, I would limit their exchange storage to 1GB per user, and (if you can. this only works with MSOffice Outlook) on the server side, set a autoarchive policy to archive files older than a few months to their archive folder on their PC except for the Deleted items (30 days then delete) and Junk Mail (7 Days then delete).

Third, Make sure they are made aware of any change that will affect their exchange mail store, that way, when Jim moans about how he lost all of his mail in Deleted Items after a month in there, you can point him to the memo.

Did you try using ngen.exe? This can also been run from windows installer via a custom action.

NGen Revs Up Your Performance with Powerful New Features

While this may not be a general concern for some developers, Microsoft has moved Visual Basic 6 out of "Mainstream Support" (as of 3/31/2005) and into "Extended Support". Extended support is set to end 3/31/2008. How does that affect you? If your application is working now, what's going to cause it to break? Well, it may not, but some companies (or individuals) have policies put in place as a CYA that you may not be able to develop using tools that are no longer supported by the vendor. It gives them someone to hold liable (read "blame") if something breaks.

Then again... you are using Visual Basic on a Windows platform...

(Queue the music as we wait for people to bash MS, VB, or Windows...)

Visual Basic Product Lifecycle: http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/search/?sor t=PN&alpha=Visual+Basic

Please be a bit more careful with your terminology. There's a big difference between an HTML attribute and a Javascript property, and a big difference between an HTML tag and an HTML element.

is there any good reason why Firefox can get and set the .src attribute of an imageButton (an image with a tagName of input)

I'm going to interpret that as "why Firefox can get and set the src property of an HTMLInputElement corresponding to an <input> element with a type attribute of image.

The reason that Firefox can do this is because DOM 2 HTML defines a src property for this interface, and the Gecko developers attempt to conform to this specification.

but can't read its .complete attribute?

I'm going to interpret that as "but can't read its complete property?". Firefox can't read that property because this is a proprietary Microsoft property, and the Gecko developers only reverse engineer and emulate proprietary Microsoft properties when there's significant compatibility advantages (i.e. when lots of sites use the proprietary property with degraded behaviour or errors when it isn't available).

I don't like the way it dumps CSS and program errors to the javascript console without separating them from the javascript errors.

Take the Firebug extension for a spin, you'll probably find it useful.

how many copies have been sold.

Yes. Because you can be certain that the competition will use third-class promotional tactics. Some say that they already have.
Much like fighting with an idiot, they drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience.

...is reporting stats immature or "fanboy" behavior. There are plenty of sites that report stats ad nauseum for things that other people care little about. Would you call those sorts of sites immature or "fanboy" sites? I personally think the submitter has an axe to grind... Too bad you can't mod the people who get their articles submitted when it's something as stupid as the main story here.

critical parts of a document could still be

Why talk in hypotheticals? The formats exist. They don't work in the way you describe.

It was a funny joke to start with - the idea that you would have an XML document as one huge CDATA section. It seems the joke is so funny that it has become automatic truth, without anyone bothering to check. Maybe it needs listing at snopes.com.

Here is the most dangerous site of them all.

There's always the IE Developer Toolbar from Microsoft. It's Beta 2 (but stable on my machine - YMMV) and isn't quite as wonderful as the FF extension, but it's still pretty helpful when you're trying to work out what on earth IE thinks it's playing at.

Ok, I looked up how to use BitLocker:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/windowsvista/libr ary/c61f2a12-8ae6-4957-b031-97b4d762cf31.mspx

First off, it doesn't need a TPM, it can work off a flash drive.

There's nothing in the documentation that says it has anything to do with DRM.

It's possible that the TPM can be used for DRM, but BitLocker isn't about DRM, and can't be used for DRM.

We run 2003 Active Directory, blocking executables is a snap with Group Policy.
See this Q article for more information.
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=323525
I am not a MS fan, but do Engineer a large MS site. Some things they do well. This is one of them.

They admit their mistakes and *do* fix the framework and mark the old stuff as deprecated, so anyone that thinks you have to run frameworks side-by-side is smoking something.

I guess that leads to the questions "Why are both 1.1 and 2.0 in Windows update as installable options? Why doesn't the installation of 2.0 trump the installation of 1.1? (Why does it let me install both?) And why have I seen applications that require 1.1 installed, and not 2.0?" For example, BizTalk server 2004does not run with the .Net 2.0.

I've never seen a Java app that says "This will work on Java 1.3 BUT NOT NEWER." He a microsoft KB says this is the case with BizTalk Server 2004, and the ability to install both VMs side by side shows that they expect it to be the case with other software as well.

I guess you got lucky with your Apps in that they only did things in 1.1 that can still be done exactly the same way in 2.0. Good for you.

Additionally, it appears that they have adopted a covenant not to sue:

Here are a few more specific and detailed questions and answers about Microsoft's 'Covenant Not to Sue' approach:

There is no longer really a license that people need to sign up for in any way--No one needs to sign anything or even reference anything. Anyone is free to use the formats as they wish and do not need to make any mention or reference to Microsoft. Anyone can use or implement these formats to both read and write the formats with their technology, code, solution, etc.

Patents--We eliminated the license to patents language and are instead providing an irrevocable commitment to not sue anyone based on the patents we have in the formats. If any parties prefer, we will make available the existing open and royalty free license as an alternative.

Why does Microsoft have patents in this case at all?--We pursue patents early in our development process (as required by law) to protect our innovations and protect ourselves at the same time. Having patents gives us the ability to fend off patent lawsuits that are the inevitable result of being a big company and delivering new technology. In this case we are deciding not to enforce our patents in connection with these formats.

Transferability of solutions and "GPL Compatibility"--If someone wants to build a solution that works with our formats, they are free to do so without worrying about patents or licenses associated with our formats. The concerns raised with our previous license about attribution and sub-licensing are now eliminated. Because the General Public License (GPL) is not universally interpreted the same way by everyone, we can't give anyone a legal opinion about how our language relates to the GPL or other OSS licenses, but we believe we have removed the principal objections that people found with our prior license in a very simple and clear way.

Subsets, supersets, and 'conformance'--Anyone is free to work with a subset of the specifications, and anyone is free to create extensions to the specifications. A 'conformant' use is simply one that does not modify the specification. Of course subsets and supersets may create incompatibilities with other uses of the specifications and we want to provide some guidance on this topic in the future, but this will be guidance and not a mandate. The key is that this is an assurance that no one will be sued for using intellectual property in the specifications as they are written.

Source: http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/developers /ecmafaq.mspx#EXB

Be happy, this is the IE Developer toolbar

The Firefox extension is still much better, but when you need to debug a problem with IE this toolbar it's worth its price.

• Dual-core processor
• 1G+ RAM
• DX9, 64M video card

Agreed. What good is an OS without a browser? How are you going to get another browser without a browser to begin with? Microsoft has more money than many European Union Countries, and they all want some of it. Microsoft makes Windows. They have every right to include whatever they want in the operating System. They have every right to maintain a tight grip on their proprietary API. Microsoft makes outstanding products. Linux does not compare to Microsoft products. I have yet to find a single flavor that is as easy to use, stable and secure as any Microsoft product. I am referring to ALL THREE traits combined. It is a well known fact that any Linux Distro is easily as insecure or even more so than any Microsoft product. Microsoft was forced to sell a stripped down version of their OS. They complied. Guess what? No ONE IS BUYING IT! Why? Because no one wants a stripped down OS. They want a full featured, all in one product that is affordable and simple to use. This is not about the people. This is about other companies and crooked politicians wanting more money for doing nothing. Linux is a great product, but have you ever tried to call Linux tech support? If it even exists at all, it is VERY expensive. If I have a problem with my Linux boxes, I find it easier to backup what data I can and reload as opposed to troubleshooting it. I rarely have to call Microsoft, but when I do, they have solved my issues each and every time. Where can I get Free Linux training? Whenever I google for it, I am lead to hundreds of sites that offer one page of text training. If you need to learn Microsoft products, you can get free, instructor led, on-demand training on nearly every product they make by visiting - http://www.microsoft.com/events/default.mspx or http://www.microsoft.com/learning

Agreed. What good is an OS without a browser? How are you going to get another browser without a browser to begin with? Microsoft has more money than many European Union Countries, and they all want some of it. Microsoft makes Windows. They have every right to include whatever they want in the operating System. They have every right to maintain a tight grip on their proprietary API. Microsoft makes outstanding products. Linux does not compare to Microsoft products. I have yet to find a single flavor that is as easy to use, stable and secure as any Microsoft product. I am referring to ALL THREE traits combined. It is a well known fact that any Linux Distro is easily as insecure or even more so than any Microsoft product. Microsoft was forced to sell a stripped down version of their OS. They complied. Guess what? No ONE IS BUYING IT! Why? Because no one wants a stripped down OS. They want a full featured, all in one product that is affordable and simple to use. This is not about the people. This is about other companies and crooked politicians wanting more money for doing nothing. Linux is a great product, but have you ever tried to call Linux tech support? If it even exists at all, it is VERY expensive. If I have a problem with my Linux boxes, I find it easier to backup what data I can and reload as opposed to troubleshooting it. I rarely have to call Microsoft, but when I do, they have solved my issues each and every time. Where can I get Free Linux training? Whenever I google for it, I am lead to hundreds of sites that offer one page of text training. If you need to learn Microsoft products, you can get free, instructor led, on-demand training on nearly every product they make by visiting - http://www.microsoft.com/events/default.mspx or http://www.microsoft.com/learning

And the end of Windows 98 support.

Don't bother putting any more effort into things like SenderID, which could work towards a technological solution to the problem of spam.

Keep working hard on letting us play Whack-A-Mole with our feet instead.

I guess Oracle appears to know what you are talking about:

"Oracle Database 10g Express Edition (Oracle Database XE) is an entry-level, small-footprint database based on the Oracle Database 10g Release 2 code base that's free to develop, deploy, and distribute; fast to download; and simple to administer."

And Microsoft too, kinda:

"We originally announced pricing of Visual Studio Express at US$49. We are now offering Visual Studio Express for free, as a limited-in-time promotional offer, until November 6, 2006. Note that we are also offering SQL Server 2005 Express Edition as a free download, and that this offer is not limited to the same promotional pricing period as Visual Studio Express."

I guess "Express" is some kind of magic phrase:

"With DB2 Express-C, faculty and students have direct access to an easy to learn and easy to use database for relational and XML data at no charge."

I don't think it's in these vendors' best interests to have such high bars to entry for the worker either.

I guess Oracle appears to know what you are talking about:

"Oracle Database 10g Express Edition (Oracle Database XE) is an entry-level, small-footprint database based on the Oracle Database 10g Release 2 code base that's free to develop, deploy, and distribute; fast to download; and simple to administer."

And Microsoft too, kinda:

"We originally announced pricing of Visual Studio Express at US$49. We are now offering Visual Studio Express for free, as a limited-in-time promotional offer, until November 6, 2006. Note that we are also offering SQL Server 2005 Express Edition as a free download, and that this offer is not limited to the same promotional pricing period as Visual Studio Express."

I guess "Express" is some kind of magic phrase:

"With DB2 Express-C, faculty and students have direct access to an easy to learn and easy to use database for relational and XML data at no charge."

I don't think it's in these vendors' best interests to have such high bars to entry for the worker either.

I'll give them the 95>98>98SE>ME>XP upgrade Paths but you can't excuse the lameness security that XP offered for 5 years and nothing done for 6+months on public vulnerabilities.
I'd rather give them a pass if they released XPV1 in 2000 and kept releasing a version each year touting security instead of "we're working on it and we're serious about it."

On top of that, 3rd party software is still required to keep it secure. And they can't even fix that so they have to buy the companies that add that 'layer of security'.

Microsoft is not serious about security otherwise they wouldn't sell it as an addon package. http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2005/may0 5/05-13WindowsOneCarePR.mspx

: As opposed to authorized programs, like the Sony backdoor, which used Microsoft-supplied methods to create the program to hide from the users

it's a tad worse than that: microsoft appears to directly support malware by certifying them safe under it's designed for microsoft logo program.

for example: sunncomm's mediamax rookit software carries microsoft's designed for microsoft windows xp logo, which states:

    * the product will be stable when running windows xp.
    * the related software or driver components can be installed or removed easily.
    * the basic experience with the product and the operating system will be the same or better after upgrading to future versions of windows.

each claim is pointedly debunked by reading mark russinovich in sony, rootkits and digital rights management gone too far (october 31, 2005).

even if you do trust microsoft, i would suggest caution in trusting software carrying a microsoft certified logo.

- p

Ancient? It dates back to 1997, and yes, it comes from Microsoft :)

It comes from a talk Nathan Myhrvold (CTO at Microsoft) gave at ACM: http://research.microsoft.com/acm97/nmNoVid.ppt