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Microsoft Research Turns 10
Alec Muzzy writes: "Did you know that Microsoft Research, the first research laboratory started by a software company, just turned 10 years old? Their website is currently featuring some highlights of their research in the past 10 years and how it is applying to the new products Microsoft is making today - for instance their work in Real-Time Fur will be used in some XBox games, and Speech Recognition may be in future Pocket PC's. Reading these pages gives you a real insight into what new technologies Microsoft is working on."
I thought Apple was much older than 10 years...
;)
--T
http://www.theMediaBunker.com
I think too often people assume that just because the higher-ups in Microsoft display an infinite amount of stupidity, everyone that works for Microsoft is an idiot. Get real.
I'm far from a M$ lover, but you gotta give a research department like this the credit it's due.
...but deadly underneath...
Notice that no mention is made of Microsoft's "Black Ops" division (often referred to as "R&D"), whose current research documents include "Mind Control using pre-packaged Windows Sound Schemes" and "The Manchurian Candidate and You: What it All Means."
In the late 1990s the college of engineering at my university would have reps and engineers from Apple's ATG (Advanced Technology Group) visit to judge projects, talk about the industry, and share stories over a BBQ. From what I understand, the ATG was a research group that had free reign to experiment with software and hardware projects, some of which were eventually wrapped into shipping Apple products. In about 1994 I remember a demo/presentation that included some neat webserver CGIs for "intelligent" searching and document organzation (cool for that time period). We were also shown a cool speech recognition + text-to-speech utility that utilized facial recognition as well as displaying a spooky relaistic animated talking face. I also recall a semi-working mockup of a 3D version of the Macintosh Finder (Apple's Macintosh desktop / file manager). One of the coolest things I remember was that not all of their projects were on Apple Macintosh hardware. Most were, but a few were on IBM RS/6000 (AIX) and SGI Indigo (IRIX) workstations.
Cool stuff.
Anyone else notice the amount of people dedicated to researching security for M$? Interesting to see that they still have major security holes in all of their releases. Yet again I am convinced that they leave their software buggy on purpose, so that upgrades are easier to sell.
Celebrate Steak and a Blowjob Day!
Perhaps by "software company" they mean "software only company." DEC also makes hardware... MS didn't get into the hardware game (if you count mice and keyboards) until fairly recently.
-Andy
Let us not forgive or forget that. :-)
The sad thing is Microsoft has spent a pretty penny on research, but because of Microsoft's internal structure and development philosophy, the research doesn't get to do more than provide a gimick or two. E.g., Microsoft research spent a lot of time and money to develop a technique using Baysean probability to analyze what a user was doing and figure out what they were trying to do. The end result of that was the mother-#$! Office Paperclip that popped up whenever you typed the words, "Dear John".
Microsoft Research should be figuring out how to improve the performance of NT's Microkernel architecture, improve virtual memory management on multi-media machines and a host of other useful technologies. But they don't. Go figure.
The bitter lessons of a veteran coder: http://bitterprogrammer.blogspot.com
doesn't Xerox PARC count? they have been doing pure research (least I think so) for a long time now
"I would say that 99 per cent of what my father has written about his own life is false." - L. Ron Hubbard Jr.
Wasn't Digital a hardware company primarily (like Sun, HP and Apple)?
Fear: When you see B8 00 4C CD 21 and know what it means
Digital is not a software company. They produce some software, but so does HP, IBM, etc, they're a hardware company as well. Microsoft is a company completely dedicated to software, and I don't believe they made any hardware at all in '91. Now they make a few periphials, but nothing to speak of.
Some choices - I have a few other suggestions:
Is M$ monopolistic or just greedy?
Does M$ software suck by design or is it coincidence?
Will XP allow the NSA to spy on home users or just allow Microsoft to spy on home users?
When will Microsoft give up the legal battle with DOJ - when Hell freezes over or when pigs fly?
WTF? Real Time Fur?? How about Real Time Stability?
Now as much as everybody would like to deny that Microsoft has come up with anything new and original, you have to give them this:
All of their research on the blue screen of death has paid off. And they obviously know how to allocate their resources, devoting the most effort to the feature that gets seen most often.
I didn't know about this site. But it looks really very interesting, and something that is even more interesting is that they have special licensees for universities and other non profit research institutes to have access to the source code for NT and CE. This is some of the most interesting things I've seen.
Here is a link.
Will work for bandwidth
Xerox had a Palo Alto research center, commonly known as Xerox PARC. Many cool things came out of there, including various forms of modern LAN networking, the laser printer, primitive forms of Graphical User Interfaces, and much more.
IBM, HP, DEC (Digital Equipment Corp), Sperry-Rand/Remmington-Rand/Unysis, Bell Labs, and many others had similar research long ago as well. Heck.... where do you think UNIX came from?!?!
Wasn't Linux developed just over 10 years ago?
The earliest datestamp in kernel 0.0 is 15 Jun 1991 at 1:54 pm (memory.h).
No wonder Microsoft decided they needed a research department.
Give me my freedom, and I'll take care of my own security, thank you.
Careful about lumping MS and MSR together. The MSR department really is a separate entity from the rest of MS. I know many people who've been part of it in some fashion, and the impression one gets is that, in practice, they seem to be more about prestige and providing legitimacy to MS than providing actual innovation for future products.
made me type 0.0 instead of 0.01 -- argh!
Give me my freedom, and I'll take care of my own security, thank you.
On balance, so far, I'm pretty disappointed with the output from Microsoft's research lab. Most of the interesting stuff that has come out of it seems to be things people were doing before they came to Microsoft. I think it remains to be seen whether Microsoft Research will manage to develop a decent research culture, comparable to IBM and Bell Labs. One thing that is clear: Microsoft Research seems to be struggling as much with trying to get their research results into products as any of their predecessors.
Judging by the sheer numbers of Microsoft mice & keyboards I've seen in offices and homes, it looks to me like Microsoft is in the hardware business as well. I suppose MSFT reps would say they make keys&mice as a "service" to help the computing world, but it looks to me as if Logitech, Kensington, and others make plenty to keep the computing world stocked.
XBox also seems to be hardware in nature.
Microsoft's research into hydroponics. It's the only explanation for this.
mp3's are only for those with bad memories
Can't you people read the titles anymore even? SOFTWARE COMPANY IBM, DEC, HP, Apple, Xerox, AT&T are companies that have produced some software, but none of these companies, now or at the time they launched their research labs, depended on software.
MS is a software company.
Speech recognition has been part of Windows CE for a long while. Here is a press release from Lernout & Hauspie for the technology that was licensed to Microsoft in 1998. [I recall using a very poor speech recognition software on Windows CE even earlier.]
Never play leapfrog with a unicorn. Or a juggernaut.
"Hey, look what those guys are doing!"
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
As usual, MS takes credit for the work of others. I was particularly incensed by the article on fur textures. The algorithms for fur were first developed by Rhythm 'n Hues, an award-winning Hollywood effects shop (and an SGI shop). Their first applications of this algorithm should be familiar to all: the furry Coca-cola polar bear commercials.
But of course, giving credit to other pioneers means nothing to Microsoft. They steal the work of the people that make the REAL innovations, and proclaim it was their own invention.
between researching security and implementing it. Microsoft has lots of smart people working for it, at least some of whom I'm sure understand completely the security implications of what they do. They just purposely decide not to do anything about it.
Which brings up the next point in that there is often a difference between doing what's "Right" and doing what's profitable. Easy is what sells to most folks. Secure is not. (talking generalities here...) And making things secure often makes them dramatically less easy. Since the primary purpose of Microsoft is to make money, easy will always win out over secure in their world. Good, bad, or indifferrent, that's the way it is. Follow the money trail and you'll understand why MS acts the way they do.
Limux has the opposite approach. Generally in the *nix world, performance (including stability, speed and options) usually wins out over outright ease of use. That's what the users of it demand. Certainly some things are very easy, but in many cases it's a different kind of easy for a different kind of audience. Whether that is good or not is an excercise left to the reader. (i.e. you)
The Macintosh is Xerox technology at its best.
--
E2 IN2 IE?
I alsowy thought DEC was a services company that sold hardware and software so their consultants could charge you large fees to support it.
Its not just Microsoft, the whole of computer science has hit a point where everything is now pretty evolutionary with no big major breakthroughs.
Well, Microsoft might have the first research center "started by a software company", but it's dwarfed by the depth and breadth of activities at IBM's Thomas J. Watson Research Center. Established in 1961, the Watson Center is headquarters for the largest industrial research organization in the world. They've been doing software research four times as long as Microsoft.
And it shows.
The really interesting and innovative aspect of Microsoft's research dept. is that it is staffed entirely by attorneys expert in contract law. The fields of contract law and license agreements have advanced so much by Ms' innovations in these areas. People don't give them enough credit here I think.
Digital was not, strictly speaking, a "software company" but had a major research lab a long time ago.
Same for IBM.
CCA (Computer Corporation of America), creator of the venerable Model 204 database system, had an excellent research group. The did some of the classical database research in the 70s and 80s. (In fact, Phil Bernstein, who did this work while at Harvard U. and CCA, is now at Microsoft although not in research, I believe).
In 2006 or so, someone is going to submit to Slashdot about the 10th anniversary of Microsoft inventing the browser.
Now they just have to find a cure for the Slashdot Effect. :)
/*drunk.. fix later*/
No, actually they were building CP/M cards for the Apple II at least 20 years ago, maybe longer.
www.lucernesys.comHorizon: Calendar-based personal finance
This is so obviously false, that it's hard to imagine someone would dare to post it to, of all places, Slashdot. It's harder to imagine that Slashdot passed it along.
Of course there were research centers before 1991. In particular there was the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, which pioneered the windows-based interface expanded upon by Apple and MicroSoft.
But let's think back even further. IBM has been putting up research labs all over the world, and decades earlier:
Next thing you know, some Microsoft shill will be claiming that MS invented the Internet, 5 years ago.
Actually, didn't M$FT invent "thunking" (switching between 16-bit and 32-bit mode)?
Microsoft Research Turns 10
Military Intelligence, Honest Politicians, Professional Wrestling, and Sexy Geek are also celebrating birthdays later this month.
I think despite what most people here on /. think about Microsoft as a company, :) you have to admit a lot of their research has created some very good ideas.
For example, the Microsoft Natural Keyboard and the improvements in the design of the Microsoft Mouse came out of this group. And MS Research has done a lot to dramatically improve the look and feel of Windows, especially the placement of menus, icons, etc.
I believe that the Linux supporters and developers should seriously look at creating an Open Source equivalent of Microsoft Research (companies like Dell and IBM could provide the initial seed money for such a lab). Imagine tightly-controlled research that could result in dramatic improvements in the usability of Linux on both the graphical and command line level, and developing keyboards and mouse pointers geared towards the needs of Linux users.
Hi -
I know Ashton-Tate (the long defunct makers of dBASE) may be viewed by some as kind of a joke in microcomputer history, but I worked there for several years and we had a small but very professional research group with its own VP in Torrance, CA by at least 1988.
I'm tired of reading that Microsoft is/was the first software company to have a research group. Also, to pick nits further, Microsoft is not a software only company, since they have designed and sold peripherals such as mice and keyboards over the years.
Tom Rombouts, Torrance, CA
I read a long time ago that MSR was trying to hire as many Computer Science faculty as would take the offer (usually much better salary than colleges could pay). The goal was two-fold: try to garner some prestige by having notable names within MS, and secondly work as an "intellectual roach motel", where research talent could be prevented from creating breakthroughs outside of Microsoft's control. This latter seems to have worked well, when one considers how many bodies are working for MSR and how little has come out of it. Just having researchers on the payroll, and therefore unable to contribute to IBM, etc. is probably worth it to Microsoft. A cushy, high-paying, do-nothing job at MSR is probably what they had in mind when they tried to hire Alan Cox a couple years ago.
Yes, but I think the point is that MS is trying to give the *impression* that they were the first TECH company do have a pure research lab, and using the term 'software company' they technically aren't lying, just giving a false overall impression to the people who don't knitpick the details =P
"I would say that 99 per cent of what my father has written about his own life is false." - L. Ron Hubbard Jr.
Jim and Janet Baker founded Dragon Systems in 1982. (Course they did eventually sell to Lernout and Hauspie.) Stephen Wolfram founded Wolfram Research in 1987. Stephen Wolfram is about to introduce his new book to the world that will revolutionize all of science. In essence, by founding his company he funded his own research and created the tools he needed to complete it. And these are examples just off the top of my head, I'm not saying they're anywhere near the best.
Most people who have worked on both research and real world development can tell you that there are always trade-offs to make between what works under limited conditions in a lab and what works in a production system with dozens of variables. Hypothetically, what if the Paperclip algorithm developed by the researchers actually were pretty smart at learning and predicting the user's behavior but would either eat up too much RAM take up too much time do perform their predictions?
What would you do if you were a PM for Office? Scrap the research opr pare it down to where it works in a reasonable amount of time and uses a reasonable amount of resources but isn't as clever asd you'd like? Real managers and real developers make decisions like this everyday.
Microsoft Research should be figuring out how to improve the performance of NT's Microkernel architecture, improve virtual memory management on multi-media machines and a host of other useful technologies. But they don't. Go figure.
I just looked at the MS Research page which lists the current research areas and noticed the following
- Research into Systems and Networking
- Research into Systems and Performance
- Research into Advanced Compiler Technology
- Research into Collaborative and Multimedia Technologies
- Research into Security
These are just the ones that address your immediate questions. There are several dozen more cool and worthwhile research areas at MS Research. Of course, being a typical slashdotter it is easier for you to bash them unthinkingly than do an ounce of research.PS: For those who think Microsoft isn't interested in the work done by MSR, when I was at a presentation at BillG's house this summer he kept on going on and on about the interesting projects being worked on at MSR and about how of all of MSFT that is probably one place where he is familiar with all the projects being worked on.
You read more at http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/info/defrag.sht
P.S. Does anyone know why
They made people rediculous offers to lure them away from their universities and other companies.
One example recruitment I heard went like this.
ring ring
Hello?
Hello, this is Microsoft Research, we'd like you to come work with us
Why should I? I'd never work for the great Satan. [thinking that this would make the caller hang up. But, what would Satan say? You got it...]
Well, what are your terms?
Ummm [trying to think of something completely unreasonable] How about $XXX.XXX [twice what he was getting then.]
Fine.
Ok, I want to work three months, then take a month off, work three months, take a month off...
We can't do that. How about this, you work for four years, then you get four years off at that same rate.
uhhhhhhh, well, ok.
When they set up the CG research group, they promised to have half the papers in Siggraph (the premier forum for computer graphics research) in a few years. This was a little scary, but not as scary as what really happened. What really happened is that these people pretty much stopped publishing at all; and stopped interacting with the rest of the graphics community.
I asked a few of the people there about it, and they seemed happy as clams, they weren't worried about it. To me, it appears that their world had shrunk to be just Microsoft. It's more than a pity, it's almost criminal.
thad
I love Mondays. On a Monday, anything is possible.
That keyboard sucks IMO. I hit the 'y' half the time with my left hand, which makes the whole thing a pain in the neck. and its just uncomfortable for me.
Yes, it does take some getting used to, but after using the MS Natural Keyboard for a while going back to a regular keyboard is not a fun experience given that it feels like going back to something narrow and uncomfortable.
And i believe that a few companies(HP,IBM, and a few others) have already started an Open Source Lab in Western US.
That's good, but they need to have a single unified research lab for Open Source software so we don't end up with a duplication of efforts (and all the hassles that implies).
More to the point, being 'uncannily perceptive' doesn't solve the core problem with Clippy, which was that no one likes forcible context switches away from their work. There is a great deal of needed research and implementation on how people interact with their computers, how they maintain continuity through an application, and how to present easy access to information. The idea that you can end-run around those problems by having an application interrupt you at odd times is hogwash, no matter how intelligent the application.
Their research department actually exists?! I thought it was just an alias for their acquisitions department.
Most computer companies did research and development
at the beginning, not after 15 years.
For most of its history MicroSoft just emulated
what others had already did, and sell it
"more effectively".
At least MS now has some respectable brainpower,
but I dont see much of it in their products yet.
> I thought Apple was much older than 10 years...
I think he meant that internally Microsoft used to refer to Apple as Research and Development South.
Insert simplistic political, ideological, or personal proselytization here.
I'm not saying that Linux is research. The point my comment was trying to make was that all of a sudden, there's an OS that, because of its licensing, has the power to remove market share from Microsoft. Therefore, Microsoft must become more innovative and advance the science of desktop operating systems in their favor.
Granted, I don't think Linux was GPL'd for *quite* a while after its release (when was it, anyway?), and it's unknown how soon Microsoft really saw it as a "threat", but I think the timing is interesting.
P.S.-- the most useful technology (IMHO) that's come out of Microsoft is DHCP.
Give me my freedom, and I'll take care of my own security, thank you.
You cite the Natural Keyboard and Intellimouse as examples of their innovation?
Microsoft Natural Keyboard was an extension on other ergonomic keyboards that had been available for some time. Even Apple had an ergonomic keyboard back in 1992 -- except theirs was adjustable and sported an astonishing $250 price tag. I'm sure that others had them as well, but MS didn't put theirs out until years later.
And Microsoft licensed the Intellimouse from HP, so I'm not sure how much research went into that from MS's resources.
So I agree with the previous posts; Microsoft's research group seems to have contributed little to actual MS products.
Insert simplistic political, ideological, or personal proselytization here.
I suspect that, in ten years, people will be as impressed by the work that was done at MS Research as people today are with the work done at PARC.
PARC invented: Ethernet networks, windowed GUI's and laser printing! The ABSOLUTE basis for everyone's current networked computer environment (at least at most companies).
To say that Microsoft will come up with anything anywhere even close to as innovative as any one of those things (let alone 3) is totally laughable.
Bullshit couched in intellectualism is still bullshit.
- "Eller was in ACT, the advanced consumer technology group, which [Nathan] Myhrvold had recently set up. Gates had decided to make Microsoft the first software company with an internal division fully dedicated to advanced research. It would serve two purposes: to develop add-on products for Windows, and, as analysts have often speculated,
- to absorb some of the company's outrageously high profits, and thereby, ideally, lower the potential for further government scrutiny. Since 1988, prosecutors had kept Microsoft staked out as if they were the Gambino family, a trend that would only intensify as time went on." (rest of chapter one here)
(This is a mildly fun book, if awkwardly written and often too swaggeringly slandering. Can't really recommend it, though.)Well, actually, natural keyboards came out way before MS got interested in them, and I don't see anything good with MS mice. The Taiwanese had wheel mice about 7yrs before MS made theirs.
Optical mice had been popular about 20yrs ago, the only new thing MS added was the ability to work on most surfaces instead of special mousepads. I have always found MS mice to be too big for my hands, and the MS optical, whose shape is much more comfortable than previous mice, got its shape by copying Logitech's MouseMan+ range (including placement of extra buttons and ribbed wheel).
but in reality, it's only to line their pockets.
"The Most Fun Possible on 4 wheels" is at SunBuggy in Las Vegas
Microsoft invented the ballless mouse? What? Suns have had optical mice for a decade, haven't they? I doubt Sun even invented it, I bet.. I bet Xerox PARC actually invented it. I know it was primarily used for graphics early on.
Yes, the original optical mice required a special mousepad for the mouse to track on. But it was only a matter of time before it could track on any surface. I'm willing to bet logitech's optical trackball sensors would work as mouse sensors on any surface. Again, not to say logitech came out with their optical system before MS, who knows. But I'm POSITIVE the optical mouse has been around far longer than MSR.
Even Apple had an ergonomic keyboard back in 1992 -- except theirs was adjustable and sported an astonishing $250 price tag.
But at US$250 in 1992 dollars, nobody was going to buy that keyboard on a large scale.
When the Natural Keyboard came out in late 1995, I believe the cost was around US$80. You can get the Natural Keyboard Elite for around US$40 nowadays.
I remember using a Mouse Systems optical mouse that did require a reflective mousepad way back in 1988. That was not the most convenient thing to be sure.
The Intellimouse Explorer was one of the earliest mouse pointers that had an optical sensor that works on most surfaces--Logitech didn't come out with theirs until at least one year later.
I never saw a Taiwanese mouse pointer that had a scroll wheel on it until after Microsoft introduced them on the Intellimouse around 1995.
Yes, I am aware of optical mouse pointers (and indeed used a Mouse Systems mouse that required a special reflective surface mouse pad way back in 1988), but the arrival of Intellimouse Explorer a few years ago was a big breakthrough, especially you can use most surfaces for the mouse pointer.
By the way, it was actually Microsoft that kicked off the revolution in more ergonomic mouse pointer designs. Remember the famous Dove bar Microsoft Mouse from the late 1980's? That mouse forced Logitech to completely redesign their mouse pointers from a squarish box to the much more ergonomic Mouseman designs that better fit your hand. What's interesting is that Logitech's current First Mouse+, First Mouse+ Optical and iFeel Mouse are probably among the most comfortable mouse pointers to use (Logitech's current Mouseman-series mice are quite large and a bit unwieldy).
Of course Apple is. And they weren't the first either. However, the claim as written, is in the best MS tradition - it's not quite lying, though it's deceptive as hell.
You see, Apple had an actual material product to sell. So did all the other pioneers. Microsoft was pretty much unique (there may be an exception but I can't think of it) in that they ran (this is not true anymore, and hasn't been for years) a profitable company with no tangible product. A "software company" as the blurb said.
Of course, Apple and lots of other companies were "software companies" in that they were companies that made software, but they weren't reliant on software for their entire revenue - apple made and sold hardware and developed their software as a compliment to that, just like Sun, DEC, IBM, etc. So there's some wiggle room to claim the statement is true.
I don't buy it for a minute, of course. Just another clever lie.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Friends don't let friends enable ecmascript.
In 2006 or so, someone is going to submit to Slashdot about the 10th anniversary of Microsoft inventing the browser.
Today would be a good time for someone to submit a story about the 10th anniversary of AOL inventing the Internet.
I hope to god this is modded up. Anyway.
"For example, the Microsoft Natural Keyboard and the improvements in the design of the Microsoft Mouse came out of this group"
This is great because I work at a department at my university where a guy downstairs is suing microsoft. You wanna know why?
Way back when he was typing on his keyboard and noticed his wrists were starting to hurt. He then created the first natural keyboard. Upon trying to sell it to several companies and failing, he tried microsoft (Software only, at the time.) Unfortunately they declined, but strangely enough they started making hardware later. One of their first creations... The natural keyboard.
I really wish I knew the guy's name right now. But he works one floor below me. I'll post on it if I find out any more info.
1. MS DOS (CP/M)
2. MS Windows (X/MacOS)
3. Dblspace (Stacker)
4. NTFS (HPFS)
5. Recycle Bin (Trashcan)
Run help under Win2k and see how man *nix commands there are. It's kinda funny to see MS "finaly" implement PUSHD, POPD, AT, FIND with Win2k. I just showed a coworker that you could telnet to a Win2k computer and start stop programs. He was amazed.
$HOME is where the
-- silver_p
Other people have said that other companies made ergonomic split keyboards. Of course they did, but the ability to produce one this inexpensively, and to simplify the mechanism to the minimum necessary is pretty innovative.
And as far as I know, the pad-less optical mouse really was invented by MicroSoft. I never heard of such a thing beforehand, everybody else was trying to use accelerometers.