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I'm probably going to sound like a shill but I'm not. I've been in the Microsoft World my entire life. They have a lot of tools (in a lot of cases free) to help people learn it's just that you have to find them.

go to http://borntolearn.mslearn.net/

To learn about not only classes and books to get certified but also free videos on what the exams use.

And the FREE tools. Some are time limited from 90 or 180 days. You can get free copies of Hyper-V ( http://blogs.technet.com/b/keithmayer/archive/2013/04/05/getting-started-with-hyper-v-server-2012-hyperv-virtualization-itpro.aspx#.UbH21efI58E ) , Free Copies of Windows 8 (90 days), Server 2012 (180 days http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/server-cloud/evaluate/trial-software.aspx ), Free copies of SQL Server 2012 ( http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/sqlserver/get-sql-server/try-it.aspx ), and so on. All you need to do is provide a machine to run them on. I have the free Hyper-V running free copies of windows 8, server 2012, and Sql server for my learning environment. Sure they are timed and you have to start over every so often but who cares it just gets easer sinc eyou know what you are doign the secord/thrid time around or you can also use the free virtual labs at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-US/virtuallabs

Other resoruces Microsoft DreamSpark if you want to go that route https://www.dreamspark.com/

Channel 9 http://channel9.msdn.com/

Microsoft Virtual Academy https://www.microsoftvirtualacademy.com/

Microsoft Springboard series that covers new topics for ITs. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-US/springboard

If you can go the Hypter-V route microsoft will soemtimes have preloaded virtual machines that have everything configured and ready to learn off of. can't find my links for the ones in the past I've used but once you keep up to date with the other resources you see.

To say that MS has a poor record of backwards compatibility is, well, ridiculous. It's only just about *the* most important thing for them, because the majority of their business is with busnesses, and if their FooBar app doesn't run, then they don't upgrade.

No other OS has near the level of compatibility that the MS sequence does.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPnehDhGa14

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2006/11/06/999999.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2003/08/28/54719.aspx

To say that MS has a poor record of backwards compatibility is, well, ridiculous. It's only just about *the* most important thing for them, because the majority of their business is with busnesses, and if their FooBar app doesn't run, then they don't upgrade.

No other OS has near the level of compatibility that the MS sequence does.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPnehDhGa14

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2006/11/06/999999.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2003/08/28/54719.aspx

And you can do the in depth planning for the plan-less agile method , right in foundation team server-ices ( New word! For all the servers and all the services on top!)
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/bharry/archive/2013/06/03/visual-studio-2013.aspx

I mean, how can you not have enterprise agile capabilities in your devops team?

No, user level programs can't generally do that. Since Vista user privileges don't give access to other app's data

I'm sorry, but you are incorrect. Programs running under the same user's security context are all on equal footing and can inspect and interact with each other. Notepad could, for example, read the entire contents of Firefox's private memory. I can create a remote thread in the Firefox process to do whatever it pleased. Vista did not change this.

There is no easy way to steal credentials out of a browser or read email or anything like that.

This is also not true. Firefox clearly stores passwords using reversible encryption (how else could it send the plaintext passwords to websites?). Both the encrypted password and the decryption key is available to any program running under the user's context.

"Reading email" is a little vague, but if absolutely nothing else, a program could capture the text being displayed in the email application using any number of Win32 API / accessibility calls.

That is why viruses often try to trick the user into granting them admin level permissions via a UAC warning prompt

UAC does nothing to prevent a program from gaining adminstrative access (elevating). This has been reliably demonstrated many times by different people, and even Microsoft has said that UAC is not a security boundary. It was created (essentially) for one thing: to force software vendors to start writing programs that did not assume or require the user to have administrator rights. It had a positive side effect of making Microsoft look more focused on security.

As for drivers even a kernel level exploit usually won't be able to install them these days. Drivers need to be signed before Windows will allow them to be installed.

I'm sorry, but this is also incorrect. Keep in mind there are multiple meanings of a "driver", but once you are executing code inside kernelspace, all bets are off. As Raymond Chen likes to say, It rather involved being on the other side of this airtight hatchway.

Windows 8 flat out refuses to install unsigned binaries as drivers

That's unfortunate for independent/small software development shops and open-source software projects. I remember when I had control over what ran on my computer; those were good days. If, however, malicious code has found its way into the kernel your machine is still fully compromised.

Windows 8 on the desktop is broken. This isn't a subjective tastes issue. It is objectively horrible.

You sound like those fox news commentators insisting that it's a "fact" that Obama is a socialist and "science" that women belong at home with the kids. Simply throwing the words "objective" and "fact" into a sentence doesn't make a statement either. The word you're looking for is "opinion".

Why would someone want to be subject to limitations like full screen apps? One reason: easier window management. When I'm on an ultrabook I don't have 10 windows open everywhere, there simply isn't enough space. Snapping Skype to one side and IE to the other is superior to me having to juggle arbitrary windows.

With arbitrary dividing spacing I would rather have dockable windows in defined panes than floating windows most of the time. Almost all of my high end applications have moved to a docked/paned windowing system. The few that haven't like 3ds max are a #()@# nightmare of overlapping dialog windows trying to get to the one I want.

I love AeroSnap in Windows 7 but I really wish I could define an arbitrary divide point and maintain that point. Instead aero snap means I have to snap and then resize new windows. Which is a hassle with a trackpad or touchscreen.

Lastly... that's so far only in the Tablet/Laptop side of the OS so I don't know why you're bitching. Regular old school anarchy windowing is still completely in tact (and enhanced) in windows 8. And for Tablet/Laptop apps it's already really nice even if needing a little more polish (see 8.1+ enhancements). I'm hoping that by 8.2 and with the addition maybe of vertical splits in the dock paneling they start offering it as an alternate windowing system for the desktop.

It's an objective, non-subjective *FACT* that the start screen shows way more icons, and places more icons within a shorter distance of the start button than the start menu. A grid gives you 2 dimensions of applications instead of 1 dimension that means you have an objective (N^2-N) more applications quickly accessible. Microsoft actually changed my mind on this subject with two graphics:
http://blogs.msdn.com/cfs-file.ashx/__key/communityserver-blogs-components-weblogfiles/00-00-01-29-43-metablogapi/3730.Page15_2D00_1_5F00_6C5DB0B3.png

http://blogs.msdn.com/cfs-file.ashx/__key/communityserver-blogs-components-weblogfiles/00-00-01-29-43-metablogapi/4300.Page15_2D00_2_5F00_7A2FF6AE.png

Also menus are idiotic. If you're using the start menu like it was designed in 1995 you're objectively slower than someone who just hits the start button and types in the first 3 letters of the application name.

Start -> All Programs -> Adobe Creative Suite -> Photoshop. (took me 10s)
vs
Start Button + "Phot" + Enter. (took me less than 3s and works in Windows 8 and 7 exactly the same.)

If you click the "All programs button" on the start screen (Just like you have to press the "All programs" button in the start menu, you'll get taken to a full organized list of applications. And with the tweaks in 8.1 it'll be even more usable than the "well organized menu" since you can sort by how frequently you use your apps. You shouldn't be wasting a second of your time curating your start menu.

And if you really were a power user you wouldn't have frequently used apps in your start menu, you would pin them to the taskbar like you've been able to do for over a decade. The fact that you're trying to use Windows 8 as if it was Windows 95 is your problem not Windows 8.

Windows 8 on the desktop is broken. This isn't a subjective tastes issue. It is objectively horrible.

You sound like those fox news commentators insisting that it's a "fact" that Obama is a socialist and "science" that women belong at home with the kids. Simply throwing the words "objective" and "fact" into a sentence doesn't make a statement either. The word you're looking for is "opinion".

Why would someone want to be subject to limitations like full screen apps? One reason: easier window management. When I'm on an ultrabook I don't have 10 windows open everywhere, there simply isn't enough space. Snapping Skype to one side and IE to the other is superior to me having to juggle arbitrary windows.

With arbitrary dividing spacing I would rather have dockable windows in defined panes than floating windows most of the time. Almost all of my high end applications have moved to a docked/paned windowing system. The few that haven't like 3ds max are a #()@# nightmare of overlapping dialog windows trying to get to the one I want.

I love AeroSnap in Windows 7 but I really wish I could define an arbitrary divide point and maintain that point. Instead aero snap means I have to snap and then resize new windows. Which is a hassle with a trackpad or touchscreen.

Lastly... that's so far only in the Tablet/Laptop side of the OS so I don't know why you're bitching. Regular old school anarchy windowing is still completely in tact (and enhanced) in windows 8. And for Tablet/Laptop apps it's already really nice even if needing a little more polish (see 8.1+ enhancements). I'm hoping that by 8.2 and with the addition maybe of vertical splits in the dock paneling they start offering it as an alternate windowing system for the desktop.

It's an objective, non-subjective *FACT* that the start screen shows way more icons, and places more icons within a shorter distance of the start button than the start menu. A grid gives you 2 dimensions of applications instead of 1 dimension that means you have an objective (N^2-N) more applications quickly accessible. Microsoft actually changed my mind on this subject with two graphics:
http://blogs.msdn.com/cfs-file.ashx/__key/communityserver-blogs-components-weblogfiles/00-00-01-29-43-metablogapi/3730.Page15_2D00_1_5F00_6C5DB0B3.png

http://blogs.msdn.com/cfs-file.ashx/__key/communityserver-blogs-components-weblogfiles/00-00-01-29-43-metablogapi/4300.Page15_2D00_2_5F00_7A2FF6AE.png

Also menus are idiotic. If you're using the start menu like it was designed in 1995 you're objectively slower than someone who just hits the start button and types in the first 3 letters of the application name.

Start -> All Programs -> Adobe Creative Suite -> Photoshop. (took me 10s)
vs
Start Button + "Phot" + Enter. (took me less than 3s and works in Windows 8 and 7 exactly the same.)

If you click the "All programs button" on the start screen (Just like you have to press the "All programs" button in the start menu, you'll get taken to a full organized list of applications. And with the tweaks in 8.1 it'll be even more usable than the "well organized menu" since you can sort by how frequently you use your apps. You shouldn't be wasting a second of your time curating your start menu.

And if you really were a power user you wouldn't have frequently used apps in your start menu, you would pin them to the taskbar like you've been able to do for over a decade. The fact that you're trying to use Windows 8 as if it was Windows 95 is your problem not Windows 8.

The real problems are quite simply Meto is useless for App Development, Your are limited to the features you can do in JavaScript. It ok for simple games and widgets... But for an App the does real work, no. They should expand the Metro UI to fully use the computer that it is running on.

You can also develop Windows 8 Metro style apps with C++ .

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2013/03/27/10405554.aspx

it takes approximately 1 second longer to resume from hibernate than from sleep

Are you sure it's actually resuming from hibernation and not hybrid suspend? Even with a fast SSD, reading a moderately sized memory dump back in could take more than 10 seconds.

I did set it to hibernate rather than suspend and I believe I turned off hybrid sleep, though it's been a while and I'm not 100% sure. It is conceivable they pulled some funny business with the naming of things. That said, they did quite a bit of work on fast boot, hibernate, and resume for Win8. Good post about it here (http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2011/09/08/delivering-fast-boot-times-in-windows-8.aspx).

All that aside, my laptop boots ridiculously quickly, faster than anything else I've worked with. I haven't timed it, but pressing the power button to the login screen is definitely less than 10 seconds and from login to desktop is nearly instantaneous. Whether the credit should go to the hardware or software, I can't say for sure because it's my only Win8 install.

No one uses WebM.

YouTube does. Wikipedia does. Wired Video does. Microsoft's Channel 9 does. Revision3 does. Et cetera and so on.

... except that you can, have been able to for years, and tons of people *have* made Xbox 360 games and published them online. They're even distributed on Xbox Live, under the completely sneaky and unexpected name of Xbox Live Indie Games. http://xbox.create.msdn.com/en-US

There are catches, of course: the online publication requires a $100/year account, and the games can only be developed using XNA (which is a quite nice framework but produces CIL assemblies, not native code). The tradeoffs are at least a modicum of curation of the store content and an architecture independence that should (don't know if this has been announced) allow running XBLIG, unmodified, on the Xbox One even though it runs on a different architecture than the 360.

These instructions are undefined; they work by taking advantage of the internal CPU architecture to execute a hybrid of other legal opcodes. A lot of other older processors have such behavior, such as the Z80. Even the 8086 had a bit of this: "pop cs" and the second encoding of "sar" come to mind. (The 8086's "pop cs" was stolen by the 286 to mean an escape to a second opcode page.)

The reason for this is simple - the instruction decoder is using a bunch of logic gates to figure out how to drive the various processing bits around, referencing a microcode ROM if necessary. The deal was that most of the opcode space was not completely used up so there are holes where no instruction is officially implemented. Using those encodings will not generate an error (most processors didn't have an illegal instruction error, nor did most microprocessors expect anything more than to crash on error). So these illegal instruction encodings merely tickled the instruction decoder in strange and wonderful ways.

A more modern processor like the Motorola 68K, however, implemented illegal instruction exceptions and thus they have no such features.

And modern processor architectures today often have plenty of gaps in the instruction space - for future instructions or whatnot, and they too generate illegal instruction exceptions. ARM actually defines an ILLEGAL opcode to cause that very exception.

Heck, Microsoft found illegal instructions were fastest for system call handling, much to Intel's bemusement

I'll just leave this here.

You forgot to use the phrase "clearly states".

Second is the pretty-good reason: compatibility and correctness. You can definitely have multiple major versions (e.g. the runtime associated with VS2008 and 2010) installed simultaneously, and I think you might be able to have multiple patch versions of the same library installed simultaneously. I think the former is true in Linux too (libfoo.so.1.0.0 vs libfoo.so.2.0.0,

Well, you're not likely to have multiple versions of the C runtime installed, because, in most if not all UN*Xes, the C runtime is part of the equivalent of kernel32.dll (libc.so, libSystem.dylib, or whatever it's called).

But, yes, you can have multiple "major" versions of libraries present. The SVR4 shared library mechanism, upon which the Linux and *BSD shared library mechanism are based, and the SunOS 4.x shared library mechanism upon which the SVR4 mechanism is based, gives libraries "major" version numbers, which change when the library ABI changes in a binary-incompatible fashion, and "minor" version numbers, which change when the library ABI changes in a way that preserves binary compatibility with older library versions but might add features (routines, flags to routines, etc.) that, if used, won't work with those older versions.

However, if your application uses libfoo version 2, but it's linked with a library that uses libfoo version 1, that's a problem. (Replace "a library" with "libpcap", and replace "libfoo" with "libnl", and you have one of the problems that makes me want to have libpcap on Linux talk directly to netlink sockets without the "help" of libnl, but I digress....)

but the latter isn't so much. It may well be that Program A installs version 1.0.0 and Program B installs version 1.0.1239, where on Linux the latter would likely be packaged to upgrade the former.

If libfoo is done correctly, any program linked with version 1.0.0 should Just Work with version 1.0.1239, and Program B should only upgrade to 1.0.1239 if there's a bug in 1.0.0 through 1.0.1238 that breaks Program B so it requires 1.0.1239 or later, and Program A should just require 1.x.x and not install 1.0.0 if 1.0.1239 is installed.

If you take the Linux approach, then programs which rely on the old behavior of the buggy code will break. This is sometimes good (e.g. bad security-related fixes), but is often not. Or it doesn't have to be a bug fix, it could just be some behavior change within the specification. By keeping multiple versions around, the Windows approach keeps the individual programs happier.

How you weight these various advantages and disadvantages is up to you. I'm not really trying to argue that the Windows approach is better, just explain why it is as it is and give a fair description of what goes on.

Yes, that's the question of the extent to which the real "specification" upon which clients depend on is the official specification or the full behavior of the implementation, and the extent to which you're willing to tell developers of code that doesn't fit the former specification but fits the latter specification to go pound sand if you "break" their code. Sometimes you end up not telling them to go pound sand, e.g. the "7090 compatibility mode" in the IBM 7094 (in which mode the index number field in instructions is interpreted not as an index register number but as a bitmask with bits corresponding to 3 of the index registers, with all the index registers specified by the bitmask being ORed together to generate the index) or the hacks in various OS X libraries in which the library detects that program XXX is using the library and falls back on the old buggy behavior (I think Raymond Chen's "The Old New Thing" has examples of similar hacks on Windows).

I didn't agree with the ribbon interface at first either. But after watching the lengths at which microsoft went in R&D it does make more sense. After watching this 1 hour 30 minute presentation I was left with the sense that this move was genuinely engineering over marketing.

However, force-feeding Metro to windows users stinks of marketing over engineering in a big way. For this Microsoft deserves lots of egg in their face.

None of the big players except Amazon's EC2 and Microsoft's Azure:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsazure/archive/2012/07/25/security-privacy-amp-compliance-update-microsoft-offers-customers-and-partners-a-hipaa-business-associate-agreement-baa-for-windows-azure.aspx

http://arstechnica.com/business/2011/09/amazon-cloud-earns-fisma-government-security-accreditation/

Thank you. I was aware that they were in technical compliance, but I was not aware that Azure had started offering the business associate agreement. The link below seems to indicate that AWS is still "looking into" the matter, but I haven't found anything conclusive that says they will offer it. Needless to say, I'm starting a project immediately to begin an Azure deployment for my organization.

https://forums.aws.amazon.com/thread.jspa?messageID=444933

None of the big players except Amazon's EC2 and Microsoft's Azure:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsazure/archive/2012/07/25/security-privacy-amp-compliance-update-microsoft-offers-customers-and-partners-a-hipaa-business-associate-agreement-baa-for-windows-azure.aspx
http://arstechnica.com/business/2011/09/amazon-cloud-earns-fisma-government-security-accreditation/

I don't & mainly because of these 2 security features Microsoft has PULLED (port filtering) &/or crippled (for efficiency in HOSTS files) shouldn't be & yet, are.

----

1.) The removal of being able to use 0 as a blocking IP address in a HOSTS file

(vs. 0.0.0.0 or 127.0.0.1, which are bigger, slower on load into the local DNS Cache (as well as slower flushes via ipconfig /flushdns) & also occupy more RAM once loaded, for NO GOOD REASON - 0 blocks as well as the other 2 do, & is smaller + faster!)

In this case, this happened on 12/09/2008 Microsoft "Patch Tuesday" updates, it wasn't LIKE that before then!

E.G.-> Here, using 0 as my blocking IP address in a FULLY normalized (meaning no repeated entries) HOSTS file with nearly 650,000 bad sites blocked in it, I get a 14++mb sized HOSTS file... using 0.0.0.0 it shoots up to 18++mb in size (& even worse using 127.0.0.1, to around the tune of 24++mb in size)... Here? This is SENSELESS bloat creation as the result!

&

2.) The removal of IP Port Filtering GUI controls for it via Local Network Connections properties "ADVANCED" section

(This is up there w/ when MS removed the GUI checkbox after NT 4.0 for IP Forwarding, only, this time, the difference is (and, it's a PAIN) is that it is NOT a single 1 line entry to hack via regedit.exe, but FAR MORE COMPLEX to do by hand)... Port Filtering is a USEFUL & POWERFUL security (& to a degree, speed also) enhancing feature!

Afaik, on THIS case (vs. #1 above)? It has always been that way in VISTA &/or Windows Server 2008... & not just the result of a Patch Tuesday modification.

----

QUESTION: Do ANY of you folks have an answer, a GOOD SOLID TECHNICAL answer, as to WHY these cripplings have been implemented in VISTA, Server 2008, & most likely their descendant, in Windows 7?

See - I posted on Microsoft/Mr. Sinofsky's (?) blog -> http://blogs.msdn.com/e7/archive/2009/02/25/feedback-and-engineering-windows-7.aspx

AND, I have YET to get a SOLID TECHNICAL ANSWER on those things going on in VISTA, Server 2008, & probably Windows 7 as well, that justify doing so...

(They're things I'd really LIKE to get an answer to, as to WHY Microsoft has done the 2 things in my list above, to the above noted versions of Windows)

APK

P.S.=> I found the (imo) rather flimsy reasoning behind WHY the PORT FILTERING gui controls were allegedly removed in Windows VISTA, Server 2008, & Windows 7, after consulting with Mr. Mitch Tulloch ( http://www.windowsnetworking.com/Mitch_Tulloch/ ) ... here tis:

From Chapter 27 of the Vista Resource Kit that explains the rationale for removing the TCP/IP Filtering UI:

----

"Windows XP Service Pack 2 actually has three different firewalling (or network traffic filtering) technologies that you can separately configure, and which have zero
interaction with each other:

Windows Firewall that was first introduced in Service Pack 2

TCP/IP Filtering, which is accessed from the Options tab of the Advanced
TCP/IP Properties sheet for the network connection

IPsec rules and filters, which you can create using the IPsec Security
Policy Management MMC snap-in

On top of this confusion, Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 had a fourth network traffic filtering technology that you could use: the Routing and Remote Access Service(RRAS), which supported basic firewall and packet filteringthe problem, of course, is that when more than one of these firewalls is configured on a computer, one firewall can block traffic that another allows"

----

Lame reasoning imo!

I say this, because it is TRIVIAL

While the latest MSVC produces fairly optimized x86 code (second to Intel's compiler), it's C++11 standard compliance is lacking.

See:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/vcblog/archive/2011/09/12/10209291.aspx
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/vstudio/hh567368.aspx

I had high expectations when Herb Sutter went to work for Microsoft but, so far, I am disappointed.

In fact, the harm caused by gcc being GPL was the very reason Clang was invented.

The political motivations behind GPL forced gcc to be developed in such a way that it was monolith and impossible to build more advanced tooling that needed data from the intermediate stages of the compile process.

See Chandler Carruth's talk "Clang: Defending C++ from Murphy's Million Monkeys". At the beginning between 2:20 and 4:00, he quotes Richard Stallman's response to their proposed changes and demonstrates that using gcc is a non-starter.

http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/GoingNative/GoingNative-2012/Clang-Defending-C-from-Murphy-s-Million-Monkeys

Visual Studio needs to allow development for all the platforms. People will love it.

Many don't. Visual Studio pulled a Windows 8-esque faux pas and they also refuse to about-face on it:

As you read this post, those of you that are fans of the Visual Studio 2010 icon collection may be asking, “what about the icons?” We currently have no plans to offer the old-style icons for Visual Studio 2012. The Visual Studio 2012 icon designs are directionally aligned with the style used across a broad range of new Microsoft products. We believe this design consistency is important, and we expect the icon styles to become familiar and comfortable over time.

...Yeah. Having said that, other than the UI in 2012, Visual Studio is a fantastic IDE.

New protocols? A low-level protocol like like a PGM or ICMP? No, the RT sockets don't let you do that (among other things, there's hardly any value: even if you made a new low--level protocol, you'd have trouble getting internet-scale adoption (heck, even useful things like PGM have trouble, and we're never getting another ICMP again).

RT Sockets are a wrapper over WinSock (aka, Windows version of BSD sockets), but with some stuff cut out and object-orient-ified.

Links: documentation is at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/apps/windows.networking.sockets.aspx/
and there's a talk: http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/Build/BUILD2011/PLAT-580T/

I think some genius decided that since 90% of people never turn off their computer that everyone else can be ignored.

You can actually read about why they made the decision at Delivering fast boot times in Windows 8. And it's not that 90% never shutdown a computer, 50% do. But the main reason why isn't to save power, some people just like starting over every day. The reason why hibernate was removed was because people are getting so much RAM that it's taking way too long to write it to disk and read it back for it to be a performance advantage. End users have a much better experience if they sleep their computer, and then the computer goes from sleep to hibernate after a few hours.

I'm a bit torn right now between two ways to go on:

a) I set up servers of my own for everything (I still have an SMTP and IMAP server for email, never trusted Gmail) like calendars, contacts, documents, notes, etc. Lots of work to set this up, a bit of money, fear of it being not secure enough if I don't put in more work and time.

b) Just throw myself at Google and accept that every odd year a service I used and love will be gone and I have to find a new home for it after exporting and converting my data (as I have to do right now with Google Reader and the >100000 starred articles in it). Hardly any work at all, Google reads all my data.

My anger says a), my lazy soul says b).

But I surely don't love Google. By the way, nice article here: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/jw_on_tech/archive/2012/03/13/why-i-left-google.aspx

Wait... has this thing any protocol or API to access this with other apps? Or is it again Google/Android/Browser or nothing?

It's incredible how they keep shuffling blame around, or hot-potato-ing it:

Laughable, if it were not so stupid.

"I'd suggest allowing one to add single addresses but the program doesn't give an end product." - by Trax3001BBS (2368736) on Thursday February 28, @01:32AM (#43031803) Homepage

When you are in the "NORMALIZE" tab, RIGHT-CLICK on the list produced (it will allow SINGLE entries on the right-click popup menu)... & it also allows FINDING ones you would like to pull out there, too (as a 'side-note' here).

So, essentially?

Use RIGHT-CLICKS popup menus in it, & they are ALL OVER it!

In fact - they mirror MOST of the normal MAIN MENU items & add some, by specific tabs you're currently in, with functions specific to those tabs on their display lists, by right-clicks on them, using the popup menus specific to them that come up on rightclicks!

---

"So I was wrong." - by Trax3001BBS (2368736) on Thursday February 28, @01:32AM (#43031803) Homepage

It happens - think I am NEVER wrong? Well, lol, I rarely am (lol)... but, it happens here too @ times!

(Mistakes HELP YOU, help yourself - you rarely forget their 'lessons' is why... ah, yes - nothing like a GOOD "PUNCH IN THE SKULL", eh? Lmao!).

---

"but at the time a tabbed HOSTS file didn't work in two separate XP systems; a spaced HOSTS file did. I quit using Hostexpert years ago as it did indeed disable my HOSTS file at the time." - by Trax3001BBS (2368736) on Thursday February 28, @01:32AM (#43031803) Homepage

I believe you - I don't KNOW if I mentioned this or not, but I will now (MS changes hosts file functionality @ times, & I got into a HUGE debate/argument & WON IT (he conceded my point in fact, regarding blocking addresses possible) with their then VP of the "Windows Client Performance Division" here about 1 of them):

I found an issue in hosts files after 12/09/2008 MS "Patch Tuesday" in VISTA onwards (Windows 7 &/or Server 2008 r2 + beyond)!

Where hosts files could no longer use the faster to load into memory 0 blocking "ip address", an analog to a DROP request in a firewall pretty much (due to smaller files resulting) & faster to parse line-by-line as well (via the tcpip.sys built-in DNS resolver loading hosts & referencing it, FIRST, before anything else by default -> http://support.microsoft.com/kb/172218 ).

Fact is - FIRST: I reported this to Microsoft during their "Engineering Windows 7" blog, here -> http://blogs.msdn.com/b/e7/archive/2009/02/25/feedback-and-engineering-windows-7.aspx?CommentPosted=true&PageIndex=3#comments

In addition to THAT?

Here on /., I literally also got their VP of the "Windows Client Performance Division" to concede my point that using 0 as a blocking "IP address" is superior

(Faster/more efficient)

Especially vs. the 6 characters-per-line larger & slower 0.0.0.0 even (worse yet, vs. the larger by 2-8 characters per line to parse loopback adapter address of 127.0.0.1) & that it would be slower, to LOAD & PARSE that larger custom hosts file result, ala his words quoted next below:

---

PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT:

"Of course, larger files take longer to load." - by Foredecker (161844) * on Wednesday December 09, @10:34PM (#30384666) Homepage

FROM -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1467692&cid=30384918

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Quite a bit faster results happens with smaller blocking addresses noted below, due to smaller filesize for looped programmatic reads by the IP stack of the hosts file, & NOTICEABLY SO!

(As it's linearly related to t

"he searched for a string in the files of his Windows system, it sent a packet to some server, which was detected by his firewall"

"Our telemetry data shows that 67% of all searches in Windows 7 are used to find and launch programs. Searching for files accounts for 22% of all Windows 7 Start menu searches, and searching for Control Panel items about 9%. Searching for email messages via Start Menu is very rare (less than 0.05%). The remaining 2% are searches executing the “Run” functionality."

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2011/10/18/designing-search-for-the-start-screen.aspx

Continuing on my last posts' premise -> http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3489093&cid=42994773 where I found an issue in hosts files after 12/09/2008 MS "Patch Tuesday" in VISTA onwards (Windows 7 &/or Server 2008 r2 + beyond) where hosts files could no longer use the faster to load into memory 0 blocking "ip address", an analog to a DROP request in a firewall pretty much (due to smaller files resulting) & faster to parse line-by-line as well (via the tcpip.sys built-in DNS resolver loading hosts & referencing it, FIRST, before anything else by default -> http://support.microsoft.com/kb/172218 ).

Fact is - I reported this to Microsoft during their "Engineering Windows 7" blog, here -> http://blogs.msdn.com/b/e7/archive/2009/02/25/feedback-and-engineering-windows-7.aspx?CommentPosted=true&PageIndex=3#comments

In addition to THAT?

Here on /., I literally also got their VP of the "Windows Client Performance Division" to concede my point that using 0 as a blocking "IP address" is superior (faster/more efficient) vs. the 6 characters-per-line larger & slower 0.0.0.0 even (worse yet, vs. the larger by 2-8 characters per line to parse loopback adapter address of 127.0.0.1) & that it would be slower, to LOAD & PARSE that larger custom hosts file result, ala his words quoted next below:

---

PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT:

"Of course, larger files take longer to load." - by Foredecker (161844) * on Wednesday December 09, @10:34PM (#30384666) Homepage

FROM -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1467692&cid=30384918

---

Quite a bit faster results happens with smaller blocking addresses noted below, due to smaller filesize for looped programmatic reads by the IP stack of the hosts file, & NOTICEABLY SO!

(As it's linearly related to the diff here between these filesizes being read in, where large size differentials result):

---

BLOCKING ADDRESSES USED & FILESIZE VARIANCE:

0 = ~ 42mb size

0.0.0.0 = ~ 53mb size

127.0.0.1 = ~ 58mb size

---

Using a custom hosts file with each above having 1,934,453++ entries largely composed of KNOWN malicious sites online to be blocked out (what I use now).

---

* See my point? It NEVER got fixed... & ought to be!

(Linux doesn't have this issue & it's 1 thing I will DEFINITELY hand it over Windows in fact - hearing that from ME, the "poster child for Windows' fanboy on /." is a rarity, mind you...)

Lastly: 0 STILL WORKS, oddly enough, on Windows 2000 SP#2 onwards, into XP, & right into Windows Server 2003 though too, oddly enough - whereas, again, by comparison, it doesn't on Windows VISTA, 7, Server 2008 r2 & beyond!

("Will wonders NEVER cease"?)

APK

P.S.=> You got lucky, & yours was DIRECTLY "security-related" + got fixed...

Needed it, since DNS has issues (worst of all being largely MOSTLY unpatched vs. the Kaminsky redirect poisoning bug for 1/2 a decade++ now mostly worldwide & worst of all, @ the ISP level):

---

5 years after major DNS flaw is discovered, few US companies have deployed long-term fix (vs. Kaminsky Bug above...):

http://www.networkworld.com/news/2013/012913-dnssec-266197.html?page=3

---

Which custom hosts files actually SECURE against it by using hardcoded favorites reverse DNS resolved vs. the in arpa addr 'tld' that houses that info

So wrong in so many ways. Any reason you wouldn't purchase a 100 year certificate and just roll with it? Too bad about 1/3 of all Azure disk space is used for endpoint backup. This reminds me of the leap-year calculating bug - Feb 29 2012, you couldn't generate a site because the default is to generate a certificate for 1 year, and well, Feb 29 2013 just doesn't exist. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsazure/archive/2012/03/09/summary-of-windows-azure-service-disruption-on-feb-29th-2012.aspx

There was also some talk about CPU rearranging things in Herb Sutter's latest presentation. If you love low-level optimization, be sure to check that out.

Well depends on what the average consumer needs from their PC. If it is not gaming (which a consumer would buy a discrete card anyway), most consumers need some graphics for web surfing and the like. With the built-in graphics of Ivy Bridge, there is enough GPU power for the average consumer. Why would this average consumer need Direct3D for YouTube?

To say that they 'need' it would be a gross overstatement; but if they are doing their casual youtubing on a relatively recent wintel, they'll be using it anyway...

That's often a case of running out of desktop heap rather than handles.

This is the article I believe you're referencing: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2012/07/25/simplifying-printing-in-windows-8.aspx

They claim printer driver storage was decreased by 60% in Windows 8, from 441MB to 184MB. This is also compared to 768MB in Vista.

I'm not sure you can do this legally.
That is, the 5 PCs in the corner should be ok. But according to this blog post (which, granted, is over 5 years old,) RDP / VNC is not:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/mssmallbiz/archive/2007/08/08/4298215.aspx

Quote: "Terminal Services does not change the number of devices accessing and using a software application, it merely provides another avenue to access the software through. So licensing Microsoft Office doesn't change at all regardless if Terminal Services is used or not. You still need one license per device accessing and using the Microsoft Office application."

I guess if you came up with some way of limiting concurrent access to 5 users at a time, then *technically* you might not violate the license since you'd only have 5 devices using it at any given time. You'd still have 100 total devices though, which I'm sure MS' lawyers would jump on..

Herb Sutter is cool, he sometimes has quite interesting stuff at Channel 9.

First of all (to GP), I like the videos and would like to see 'em in future too.

However a download link to a video file would also be a nice addition. Even the guys at Channel 9 provide it. ;)

This application sounds suspiciously similar to a New Zealand finalist in the Microsoft Imagine Cup 2012. Read about the "Transparent Communication Network" entry by "Team Connect":
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/scottwylie/archive/2012/05/03/2012-microsoft-imagine-cup-new-zealand.aspx

* Dalvik is not Java. While the Java programming language is available for Dalvik, together with a subset of the J2SE library, the runtime itself is unrelated.
* Windows 8 Metro "does not use .NET" is kinda meaningless, neither does Win32. However, you certainly can build Metro apps in .NET. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/dotnet/archive/2012/04/17/net-for-metro-style-apps.aspx
* The comment about the author of the article testing Java "by using a C# client" is bizarre and misleading. A language had to be picked, with the choice having the same impact on both tests. Chosing to test a Java server with a Java client, and then a C# server with a C# client would cause the test to be different in both situations and render the test results invalid.
* The author of the article concluded that Java was generally faster than C#, not that "it was a dog".
* Other than that, your comment is completely 100% correct. Possibly. Or maybe I didn't check.

You can't rely on consistency. Very quickly Microsoft is moving towards contextual interfaces which means the interface is going to constantly change based on what the context of execution is. Choose a different support strategy.

For yourself, poweruser than Windows-Q navigation. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/hyperyash/archive/2012/08/28/windows-8-shortcuts.aspx

They already did-ish, for Visual Studio 2012, by making an extension to use a predefined VS2010-like color scheme or custom ones.

It's neither a full reversal nor an apology for the sudden rash of Full Retard spasms from their marketing and UI departments, and oh-so-certainly not enough to get me to give my street address just to register to use a more horrible-looking VS Express, but it's slight progress. Like, 0.3% of the giant leap back they took.

And a link to Channel 9 if folks here are not familiar with it.

This is true even of Windows 7; and given the lack of differences for Win8 I would assume so there to - those from what I have seen, Windows 8 will put the Metro interface on one monitor and the Desktop interface on a second monitor by default; so you're dual-head display is now essentially a single head display for with two different environments on each monitor. Might be the only way to use Windows 8 without getting rid of Metro.

Not sure what you mean by lack of difference in Win8. There is very significantly improved multimonitor support in Windows 8: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2012/05/21/enhancing-windows-8-for-multiple-monitors.aspx

There's a significant difference in the User Interface, but a very lack of difference in kernel space (e.g. drivers).

This is true even of Windows 7; and given the lack of differences for Win8 I would assume so there to - those from what I have seen, Windows 8 will put the Metro interface on one monitor and the Desktop interface on a second monitor by default; so you're dual-head display is now essentially a single head display for with two different environments on each monitor. Might be the only way to use Windows 8 without getting rid of Metro.

Not sure what you mean by lack of difference in Win8. There is very significantly improved multimonitor support in Windows 8: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2012/05/21/enhancing-windows-8-for-multiple-monitors.aspx

Absolutely.

Also, one of the interesting points about the primary reasoning behind the creation of the CLANG compiler was not because of the GPL license.

it was because the developers wanted to make GCC more powerful, so that it could be used as a library.

Stallman refused to allow the features to be added even though they were not asking for the GPL licensing to be changed.

So the developers started CLANG. In c++. as a library.

Watch this for some very interesting history and features:

http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/GoingNative/GoingNative-2012/Clang-Defending-C-from-Murphy-s-Million-Monkeys

All languages are crap at some level and for some uses.

But watch this from Bjarne last february for some insight in C++11:

http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/GoingNative/GoingNative-2012/Keynote-Bjarne-Stroustrup-Cpp11-Style

With such poor standards as white space and curly braces, write a pretty routine to clean it up.

Even better, you should need to do less than that. Don't most IDE's and even code editors include a pretty printer these days? Did everyone forget about them?

I get having rules about naming using camelCase, underscored_names, and OtherStyles -- They can even be mixed as a handy way to provide more information -- like Hungarian notation but easy to read.

Whitespace and rules about braces don't make any sense . That's a solved problem. Pick a style for source control to reformat to on check-in and configure your editor to reformat it the way you like when you're working. At worst, you'll have a week or two of hell forcing this on an existing project but for new projects it's no problem at all.

Where do braces go?
http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WhereDoTheBracesGo
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/peterwie/archive/2008/02/04/pedantic-coder-where-do-braces-go.aspx

Flame on!

Then you go in and stop the task. Apps are only allowed certain background functionality. It's reserved for always-on stuff like VOIP, Music, and IM, or for things like notifications. You can control which apps can push notifications via a central notification control area in PC settings. For the other tasks like Music and VOIP, it's your job to end the call or stop music playback.

See the following resources for more implementation specific information:

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=27411
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsappdev/archive/2012/05/24/being-productive-in-the-background-background-tasks.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsappdev/archive/2012/05/16/being-productive-when-your-app-is-offscreen.aspx?wa=wsignin1.0
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsappdev/archive/2012/04/10/managing-app-lifecycle-so-your-apps-feel-quot-always-alive-quot.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2011/11/08/building-a-power-smart-general-purpose-windows.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2011/11/02/updating-live-tiles-without-draining-your-battery.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2012/04/17/reclaiming-memory-from-metro-style-apps.aspx

Then you go in and stop the task. Apps are only allowed certain background functionality. It's reserved for always-on stuff like VOIP, Music, and IM, or for things like notifications. You can control which apps can push notifications via a central notification control area in PC settings. For the other tasks like Music and VOIP, it's your job to end the call or stop music playback.

See the following resources for more implementation specific information:

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=27411
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsappdev/archive/2012/05/24/being-productive-in-the-background-background-tasks.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsappdev/archive/2012/05/16/being-productive-when-your-app-is-offscreen.aspx?wa=wsignin1.0
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsappdev/archive/2012/04/10/managing-app-lifecycle-so-your-apps-feel-quot-always-alive-quot.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2011/11/08/building-a-power-smart-general-purpose-windows.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2011/11/02/updating-live-tiles-without-draining-your-battery.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2012/04/17/reclaiming-memory-from-metro-style-apps.aspx