Allchin Admits MSFT Violated the Law

An Anonymous Coward writes: "CNN is running what amounts to a two part article about the nine states who are continuing their case against Microsoft in which Jim Allchins admits Microsoft violated the law. The first part of the article deals with Jim Allchins assertion that there is no way for Microsoft to remove Internet Explorer from Windows without crippling the OS. However, he admits that the demonstration in court which showed this crippling was in fact rigged and that they have not done studies to se if it would be possible to produce an OS without the browser imbedded in it. The second part of the story involves Allchin admitting that Microsoft has violated the law but refused to specify the violations. 'I don't think that I can summarize those,' Allchin said. 'I'm not an attorney.'"

Comments

Ballmer says...

[xTown]

...in the article...

"Somebody could say, 'Look, I want to make Microsoft's life miserable; so I'll tell
you what, I'll pay you $10 million a year to torture Microsoft."'

I'll do it for $5 million a year!

Re:Ballmer says...

[the_rev_matt]

It would be nice to get paid to torture them instead of paying to be tortured by them...

Re:Ballmer says...

[Mike the Mac Geek]

Now we are gonna start seeing people sending Sun and Apple resumes just to torture Microsoft. I'd be willing to work below minimum wage for that honor.

Re:Ballmer says...

[Our Man In Redmond]

Hey, this is the Open Source community. We can get 100,000 people to do it for free and then share the results!

Re:Ballmer says...

[volpe]

I'll do it for $5 million a year!


Me too. I'm just not sure how I'd come up with the money.

Re:Ballmer says...

[The Milky Bar Kid]

I'd torture Microsoft for $5 million a year...

... but you'd have to give me some time to raise the $5 million.

The difference between slashdot and microsoft

[mikeage]

'I don't think that I can summarize those,' Allchin said. 'I'm not an attorney.'"

So? ;)

'Nuff said.

Re:The difference between slashdot and microsoft

[sprag]

Maybe he meant that you had to be a lawyer to produce a summary of a list of violations that long...

Re:The difference between slashdot and microsoft

[aredubya74]

Wonder why Allchin didn't use the ubiquitous "IANAL" acronym? Surprisingly, it's because his own last name is a very similar acronym!

ALLCHIN -
A Lying Lawyer? Clearly, He Is Not!

Re:The difference between slashdot and microsoft

[bobKali]

Every time I see Ballmer all I can do is picture he and Gene Wilder, in B&W, singing 'puttin on the ritz'.

Rigging as a Business Practice

[Trinity-Infinity]

How many others have rigged as a rule? Enron had an entire Energy Securities Trade Center occupying a floor of an office building in Houston. They rigged that demo for the gov't.... The gov't rigged its missle tests (and those still failed!).

No need to mod or flame. I just think its interesting/sad that companies stoop to this level. Now excuse me as I go rig my code so my boss will sign off on it before the deadline...

Re:Rigging as a Business Practice

[doconnor]

One difference with the Mircosoft case is when they rigged the demo, they where doing it in court. They where clearly commiting prejury. In the Enron case it may be just fraud. In the missle test it was probably just lying.

Re:Rigging as a Business Practice

[DCram]

Rigging for a demo is one thing but rigging for testimony in a cout of law is another.

found a couple of sites that explain the law a little more clearly. I hope
Maine Law
and Vt Law

an excerpt from the VT law.
"RULE 3.4 FAIRNESS TO OPPOSING PARTY AND COUNSEL
A lawyer shall not:

(a) unlawfully obstruct another party's access to evidence or unlawfully alter, destroy or conceal a document or other material having potential evidentiary value. A lawyer shall not counsel or assist another person to do any such act;

(b) falsify evidence, counsel or assist a witness to testify falsely, or offer an inducement to a witness that is prohibited by law;"
followed by
"Documents and other items of evidence are often essential to establish a claim or defense. Subject to evidentiary privileges, the right of an opposing party, including the government, to obtain evidence through discovery or subpoena is an important procedural right. The exercise of that right can be frustrated if relevant material is altered, concealed or destroyed. Applicable law in many jurisdictions makes it an offense to destroy material for purpose of impairing its availability in a pending proceeding or one whose commencement can be foreseen. Falsifying evidence is also generally a criminal offense. Paragraph (a) applies to evidentiary material generally, including computerized information."

to note: computerized information!!

If we were in china it would look a little diff.
China
"Article 306. During the course of criminal procedure, any defender, law agent destroys, falsifies evidence, assist parties concerned in destroying, falsifying evidence, threatening, luring witnesses to contravene facts, change their testimony or make false testimony is to be sentenced to not more than three years of fixed-term imprisonment or criminal detention; when the circumstances are severe, to not less than three years and not more than seven years of fixed-term imprisonment."

Well if it were anyone besides MS I believe the trial would start new now.
Oh well I'm not an expert on these things.

Re:Rigging as a Business Practice

[jcr]

Enron had an entire Energy Securities Trade Center occupying a floor of an office building in Houston.

That wasn't a rigged demo. The trading operation was the one real asset they had, and UBS/Warburg bought it from them.

What Enron got in trouble for was cooking their books by hiding their debts in bogus partnerships, not for making bogus trades on the futures markets.

-jcr

Re:Rigging as a Business Practice

[passion]

Now excuse me as I go rig my code so my boss will sign off on it before the deadline...

There is an entire movement that advocates Test Driven Programming. It's not such a bad idea, you just need enough tests.

Re:Rigging as a Business Practice

[sphealey]

That wasn't a rigged demo. The trading operation was the one real asset they had, and UBS/Warburg bought it from them.

Um, no. Here's one link. Enron apparently set up bogus "trading floors" full of janitors and secretaries looking intently into monitors and talking on telephones to impress potential investors.

That's not to say that they didn't have actual trading going on too, because obviously they did. But as with everything they felt the need to "cook the books".

sPh

Re:Rigging as a Business Practice

[pmz]

The gov't rigged its missle tests (and those still failed!).

I think you must be referring to the "missile shield" missle test, where there was a transponder in the drone. My interpretation of the test is that the engineers must have been focusing on a few variables, which would be more scientifically valuable if they didn't have to worry about the guidance system, too. This is perfectly legitimate testing, even if the marketeers talking to the media didn't disclose it accurately.

The problem of the "missile shield" is so incomprehensibly complex that even getting the missle and drone to collide is a feat in itself whether or not the guidance system was complete.

The "rigged" missle test really is not a good criticism of the "missile shield". What will be interesting, though, is if the engineers really overcome the remaining technical obstacles. Hitting a missle with a missle is quite ambitious and may be a tad beyond current technology.

Re:Rigging as a Business Practice

[Guppy06]

"The gov't rigged its missle tests (and those still failed!)."

Actually they've only missed once out of four or five tests.

Re:Rigging as a Business Practice

[jcr]

This doesn't add up..

I know that UBS/Warburg bought their energy-trading operation, and I know from having worked there that Swiss bankers are very careful about due diligence..

-jcr

Re:Rigging as a Business Practice

[sphealey]

As one who WORKED on the east power trading desk for enron, yes a "dummy" trading floor was set up but that was because the traders didn't want the investors distracting them and pitcking up insider info on their trades.

Enron has a lot of justifications for what it did. Whether or not those justifications will hold up in court is another question.

If I am selling my house, and I convert an empty storage room into a "bedroom" using cardboard and paint, I will undoubtedly be sued by the purchaser when he discovers the actual situation. That's called "fraud" when ordinary people do it. I guess things are different for $40 billion corporations though.

sPh

I don't get it

[mckeowbc]

How can Microsoft state that they cannot create an OS without an imbedded browser, when Solaris, BSD, and Linux are all perfectly viable, and usable operating systems, that do not have the browser imbedded in them. Someone please enlighten me.

Re:I don't get it

[Soko]

Simple. A lot of the core functionality in Windows is based on standard web protocols - like the help system. As is thier future business model - .Net is based on SOAP and XML, don't forget. No integrated browser in thier OSes, no lock on thier .Net software/services.

IOW, if IE goes, likely so would a lot of the executives, since a big chunk o' change would be thrown into the hopper. That tends to make shareholders and Boards of Directors slightly pissed off.

BTW, KDE uses Konquerer for it's help system too, does it not? So, an HTML renderer built into a desktop environment isn't (or shouldn't be) an issue. The issue is that Microsoft had criminal intent when it first bundled it's browser into Windows 95 - "cutting off the air suppy" of Netscape. They need this behaviour remedied, nothing else, IMHO.

Soko

Re:I don't get it

[gorillasoft]

How can Microsoft state that they cannot create an OS without an imbedded browser, when Solaris, BSD, and Linux are all perfectly viable, and usable operating systems, that do not have the browser imbedded in them. Someone please enlighten me.


They aren't saying that they can not create a new OS without an embedded browser - they are saying that they can not remove the already embedded browser (Internet Explorer) from their current OS's without breaking them to the point where they would no longer function. That's a big difference, and whether or not you believe them is up to you.

Re:I don't get it

[sqlrob]

They aren't saying that they can not create a new OS without an embedded browser - they are saying that they can not remove the already embedded browser (Internet Explorer) from their current OS's without breaking them to the point where they would no longer function.

But you could. Yes, it would break anything that used it. But if something else (Mozilla?) was put in supplying the same interfaces? Why (technically) does it have to be IE?

Re:I don't get it

[jd142]

Ok, how about this. You've got the html renderer and you've got IE that uses it. Distribute windows with the html renderer, but not IE, a set of code that takes advantage of the html render. The ability to make favorites, have security settings, run javascript, go forward and back, those are features of the web browser, i.e., IE. The ability to determine the correct color of a block of text in a paragraph in a table given a specific stylesheet is a feature of the html renderer. That would mean that IE for windows can take advantage of the html renderer that ships with windows. IE for the mac would need to ship with its own html renderer. IE for linux could rely on KDE's html renderer.

Does that make sense?

Re:I don't get it

[Shagg]

Simple. A lot of the core functionality in Windows is based on standard web protocols - like the help system

I don't buy that argument. Sure, it may be difficult or expensive for them to remove IE from the OS, but it's NOT impossible. What sort of effort is involved is their problem, not the courts.

Re:I don't get it

[Soko]

Yes, removing the IE executeable would go a long way to rectifying the situation - all 89K (IE6.0) of it - since the average user wouldn't see the "Web Browser", and leave the door open for others. Don't forget how Windows is built tho - iexplore.exe is just a COM containter. MSHTML.DLL is doing the real work.That's used by pervasively throughout the OS, and would mean eviscerating the whole OS in order to remove it. Not allowing IE to render HTML these days is counter-productive from the end-users point of view, anyway. They want HTML based help, since it's a simple click 'n go interface.

Your last suggestion is pretty close, I'd say. IE on the Mac uses the Quartz HTML redering engine, I think, so Microsoft is actually depandant on Apple there. Having IE use Konq's HTML rendering engine seems redundant - just use Konq. Having them port COM or COM+ (or making a CORBA bridge of some sort) to Linux/*BSD/*NIX would make a lot more sense, to me.

Soko

Re:I don't get it

[marauder404]

It's not that they can't. It's that they chose not to as an engineering approach and now they're stuck with it. Sure they can start all over again, but that's throwing away the product. That's similar to saying that *nix can create an operating system without a GUI ... why can't Microsoft? It's not that it can't, but it chose not to. And to do it now would be catastrophic.

Re:I don't get it

[tb3]

They [end-users] want HTML based help, since it's a simple click 'n go interface.

I don't buy this at all. The WinHelp system was far superior to HTMLHelp. It could do a lot of things (such as pop-up definitions) that HTMLHelp still can't do, and a lot of help developers and end-users miss it. I think HTMLHelp is another solid example of Microsoft making HTML rendering pervasive in the OS, not because it's a better solution, but because it gives them stronger control of the market.

Re:I don't get it

[metoc]

Interesting.

Assuming Microsoft is market driven, what is the market for a browserless OS? The general computer user will not be too thrilled to learn that they have to download, buy. etc. a browsers (which one???). Especially after getting used to having one included for free.

Imagine going to buy a car and find out that you have to buy a radio if you want it, and you have your choice of 5+ radio's, all with different features, prices, etc.

Bottom line is the buying public has gotten used to getting the browser for free, and we can't turn back the clock.

Re:I don't get it

[BeBoxer]

Sure, it may be difficult or expensive for them to remove IE from the OS, but it's NOT impossible. What sort of effort is involved is their problem, not the courts.

Exactly. Even if it means that have to go back to shipping NT and Win95, that's what they should have to do. Microsoft chose to intermingle the browser and the OS in what has now been determined to be a criminal act. If they knew it was illegal and did it anyway, I have no sympathy for how hard it might be to undo. If they didn't realize what they were doing was illegal, well I don't have any sympathy there either. M$ can afford the best lawyers in the world. If they didn't realize they were breaking the law, tough shit. At a minimum that should have realized that they were skirting close to the edge of what's legal given their prior antitrust difficulties.

Microsoft loves playing hardball. Time for them to shut up and accept their punishment. Sometimes hardball hurts.

Re:I don't get it

[Amazing Quantum Man]

Technically, it shouldn't. That's the whole point of COM (and IE is built as a COM app). If you match the interfaces, the client app shouldn't give a d*mn about the man behind the curtain.

Re:I don't get it

[Archie Steel]

The difference being, of course, that an OEM could include a different browser than IE, by having a deal with a different software company. Again, the problem here is one of monopoly. To keep with your car analogy, imagine if you could only get a Chrysler with a Chrysler radio and sound system with it, and that changing it is a major hassle, even though you might want to have an Alpine? I don't know about you, but I'll take choice over being stuck with factory defaults any day. I actuall did a "test drive" of Opera, Netscape/Mozilla and Galeon before settling on the last one. In the end, when given choice, the consumer is the winner.

Re:I don't get it

[flacco]

unzip;strip;touch;finger;mount;fsck;more;yes;uumou nt;sleep

Now all we need is a Unix command named "spooge" and your sig would be complete.

Re:I don't get it

[spectecjr]

That MS reasoning is crap. They can remove all the browser-related (i.e, IE) DLLs and leave just the rendering engine. All the HTML-based help works, but the browser and its FTP download engine, etc are no longer installed.

You can't remove WinInet -- I use that a lot.

Feel free to remove IExplore.exe. It's the only part I don't use in my own apps, and it's 62kb. I won't miss it.

Simon

Re:I don't get it

[Reid]

And to continue with the car analogy, since they're so much fun.... It's not like MS is analogous to Chrysler or Ford (I don't recall anyone buying a PC from MS); it's more like MS is the sole provider of engines to Chrysler, Ford, and all the other car manufacturers, and MS is providing their brand of radio with all their engines. For "free".

Re:I don't get it

[Tracy Reed]

gawk; talk; nice; date; wine; grep; touch; unzip; finger; gasp; suck; lyx;\
slurp; mount; fsck; more; yes; gasp; umount; make clean; make mrproper;\
sleep

Re:I don't get it

[tb3]

Sounds kind of like "embrace and extend" though, doesn't it? And when was the last time you heard of Microsoft adopting a standard without attempting to subvert it. Admittedly, the TCP/IP conspiracy theories are a bit of a stretch, but I wouldn't under-estimate them.

Re:I don't get it

[Teese]

IE on the Mac uses the Quartz HTML redering engine, I think, so Microsoft is actually depandant on Apple there.

Quartz is NOT an HTML rendering engine, its MacOS X's 2D rendering engine.It knows nothing of HTML at all. IE for the mac has its own html renderer thats completly microsoft develped, called Tasman. Apple does have an HTML rendering engine called the HTMLRenderLib, but it really sucks the big one. Other than Apple's HTML Help, I don't really know of anybody that makes use of it.

Re:I don't get it

[BeBoxer]

Exactly which of my claims don't you believe? Or do you simply disagree with my opinion that Microsoft should stand up and take their medicine? Of course, the fact that your post consists almost entirely of name calling and baseless suppositions about what the rest of the world believes, I don't even know why I'm bothering. Anytime you want to actually discuss facts feel free to come back. In the mean time, just crawl off into your troll hole.

Re:I don't get it

[tswinzig]

Simple. A lot of the core functionality in Windows is based on standard web protocols - like the help system. As is thier future business model - .Net is based on SOAP and XML, don't forget.

I don't have a problem with them using MSIE's rendering engine to render their help pages for the OS. All that is required is that single DLL which provides functions capable of rendering.

Same thing with SOAP and XML. Sure, load those DLL's up if you need to.

But the browser does not need to be INTEGRATED with the operating system. What do we mean when we say INTEGRATED? We are talking about Windows loading up MSIE into memory when the operating system starts! Mozilla does the same type of thing when you specify the 'quick start' method for it. The difference is you have to load Mozilla up IN ADDITION to MSIE. I'd like to choose not to load MSIE at all, and load only Mozilla.

BTW, KDE uses Konquerer for it's help system too, does it not? So, an HTML renderer built into a desktop environment isn't (or shouldn't be) an issue.

You, like many people, are confusing BUNDLING with INTEGRATION. I don't care if MSIE is installed with Windows, really. But don't require that it be loaded into memory all the time! I don't refer to the help pages in Windows. I don't use SOAP or .NET or MSIE's XML technology. Even if I did, load just the DLL's you need, not the entire MSIE system.

It really boils down to trying to make every other Windows browser look bad.

Gee, I was thinking about using browser X, but look how fast MSIE loads up!

Too bad they don't realize it's loaded during bootup... talk about rigging.

Re:I don't get it

[BeBoxer]

Yeah, you're probably right. Consider yourself dismissed, kook.

Re:I don't get it

[AME]

It could do a lot of things (such as pop-up definitions) that HTMLHelp still can't do

You can't us the ACRONYM tag in HTMLHelp? I really don't know, since I don't work in a Windows world, but it seems like a silly thing to be missing.

Re:I don't get it

[Bartmoss]

"They aren't saying that they can not create a new OS without an embedded browser - they are saying that they can not remove the already embedded browser (Internet Explorer) from their current OS's without breaking them to the point where they would no longer function. That's a big difference, and whether or not you believe them is up to you."

Who cares whether this breaks anything? Look, it's supposed to be punishment for criminal behaviour. No-one said it ought to be convenient for Microsoft. What would the point be of that?

Re:I don't get it

[mpe]

The WinHelp system was far superior to HTMLHelp. It could do a lot of things (such as pop-up definitions) that HTMLHelp still can't do, and a lot of help developers and end-users miss it.

The only complaints I have ever heard about WinHelp were related to the content (or more likely lack of...) Something which simply changing the interface does not really address.

I think HTMLHelp is another solid example of Microsoft making HTML rendering pervasive in the OS, not because it's a better solution, but because it gives them stronger control of the market.

Another way to claim that IE is part of the OS... Especially since HTMLHelp uses non standard HTML in the first place..

Re:I don't get it

[mpe]

Assuming Microsoft is market driven, what is the market for a browserless OS?

Emedded systems, single task systems, etc.

The general computer user will not be too thrilled to learn that they have to download, buy. etc. a browsers (which one???).

The vast majority of "general computer users" are using computers as part of their job if they are fiddling around trying to change settings they are typically not doing their job. In quite a few cases they may not have to worry about their job, though, because they will be fired...

Imagine going to buy a car and find out that you have to buy a radio if you want it, and you have your choice of 5+ radio's, all with different features, prices, etc.

Except that car radios are simply radios. You wouldn't find that part of the engine management system was in the radio or there are bits of radio receiver hung on the side of the engine...

Hmmm...

[dghcasp]

Ballmer complained that it would be too expensive to build a version of the Java programming language to package with Windows, as requested by the states. The states clarified that Microsoft wouldn't have to bear those costs.

Build?

Something wrong with just licensing the one that Sun already provides for free? That provides cross-platform portability (more or less) right out of the box?

Oh wait, sorry, I forgot I was talking about Microsoft.

Re:Hmmm...

[Danse]

Didn't the states say that Microsoft wouldn't have to bear the costs? Meaning that the funding for the licensing would come from elsewhere.

Re:Hmmm...

[sydb]

Please don't use the word 'hobbyist' when you're talking about programmers, especially when it's likely we're talking about Free Software programmers, who deserve a more suitable title.

Was Einstein a hobbyist? I call him an amateur, because he was not a professional scientist, and the word 'hobbyist' is demeaning. It makes one think of someone tinkering but not really understanding. Like someone who glues model planes together - a hobby, not amateur plane building.

Most pioneers are amateurs.

Sorry, just one of my hobby horses...

Re:Hmmm...

[Chris Mattern]

> Sorry, just one of my hobby horses...

That's *amateur* horses!

Chris Mattern

Headline?

[aralin]

So after a federal judge and court of appeals said that they violated a law and after half a year of haggling someone in Microsoft finally admits it. Well, what a headline. :)

Great idea...

[gfxguy]

"Sun Microsystems (can) go buy 10,000 copies, and they can have people just sit there and generate work requests to us every minute of every day," Ballmer said. "Somebody could say, 'Look, I want to make Microsoft's life miserable; so I'll tell you what, I'll pay you $10 million a year to torture Microsoft."'

Thanks for the idea, Steve!

Too damn vague...

[nahtanoj]

WTF? This guy could't say why Windows couldn't run without IE, let alone what the legal violations were. What the hell was Win95 if it wasn't Windows without IE? Do they seriously think that there is not another engine that can do what IE did for Win98, 2k, XP?

This article was a little to vague and short on content for my taste. Why the hell did they even run it?

Nahtanoj

po' wittle babies...

[nanojath]

"...Ballmer said companies like Sun Microsystems, whose relationship with Microsoft is notoriously prickly, would dedicate themselves to frustrating Microsoft engineers.

"Sun Microsystems (can) go buy 10,000 copies, and they can have people just sit there and generate work requests to us every minute of every day," Ballmer said. "Somebody could say, 'Look, I want to make Microsoft's life miserable; so I'll tell you what, I'll pay you $10 million a year to torture Microsoft.'"

I just want to say that I'm totally available to take that job.

This takes me back to every Microsoft blandishment that other software companies were just being paranoid about their tactics. The spectacle of the richest corporation in the world whining about how Sun Microsystems is out to get them is both funny and sad. O Brave New World...

Re:po' wittle babies...

[Control Group]

Not to pick nits, but MS isn't even close to being the richest company in the world. At least, not in terms of revenues...and a judgement of wealth based on stock value vs. stock outstanding is, in MS's case, grossly inaccurate due to their "stock options as salary" scam.

gee could that blurb be a little more biased?!?

[AdamBa]

"he admits that the demonstration in court which showed this crippling was in fact rigged"

Gee does he? I must have missed where in the article he actually said that.

Plus the big claim that Allchin is admitting some big thing is overblown (admittedly the linked-to article makes the same mistake). If you wade through Allchin's 250+ page deposition, the exchange is (p. 27):

Q. Well, you understand, do you not, that Microsoft was found to have done certain things that violated the law?

A. Yes.

This is just a statement of fact...Microsoft was indeed found guilty. It doesn't imply he thinks Microsoft *should* have been found guilty.

- adam

Re:gee could that blurb be a little more biased?!?

[praedor]

So? A convicted criminal doesn't GET to have a say in whether s/he should have been found guilty. S/He WAS and that is the end of that. They ARE guilty, no question, no argument. They DID violate the law, no question, no argument. The MUST be punished, no question, no argument. End of story.

In NO other sort of case does the convict get to have a say in whether or not, and to what extent, they should be punished. Of COURSE they will be punished. That is beyond their authority to say anything about. Microsoft should be held to the same reality as EVERYONE else found guilty of crime.

I don't give a damn whether Gates, Ballmer, or Allchin accept that they did wrong, THEY DID and they don't get to have a say in the matter. Found. Guilty. The end of the story. Now it is time to pay the piper for their GUILT. Sheesh.

Re:gee could that blurb be a little more biased?!?

[praedor]

Move to a new fantasy world clown. The COURTS decide innocence and guilt, NOT you, not Gates. The courts, without question, without argument, without qualification found Microsoft GUILTY. That means they are GUILTY.

This is no different than YOU trying to claim that this or that act is "unConstitutional". No, you may THINK act x is unConstitutional but YOUR interpretation of the Constitution is irrelevant. It is the Supreme Court that has the final word. In other words, it is the courts again. The courts say Microsoft is guilty, plain and simple. They are.

Re:gee could that blurb be a little more biased?!?

[GSloop]

>>"he admits that the demonstration in court which showed this crippling was in fact rigged"
>Gee does he? I must have missed where in the article he actually said that.

I can't cite a web page, but Allchin did in fact appear to be a deer in the headlights when the government questioned him about the inconsistancies of the referenced video evidence. On further questioning, he basically stated that the system must have been setup wrong. He then stated that MS would redo the test, and it would be re-submitted as evidence.

MS later completely withdrew its' video testimony completely. That may not be a blatant confession, but it does say a couple of things to me.

Either:

A) At best, MS couldn't design a decent test, using the same software engineers who designed the product.

Or

B) At worst, MS blantantly rigged the evidence and attempted to willfully mislead the court.

If you were betting $1000, which choice would you bet on? Me, I'd pick B. But silly me, I'm probably just stupid.

Any way you look at it, it's scary. It either means you can't trust any of MS's testimony, because they couldn't find their butts with both hands, or you can't trust any of MS's testimony, because they refuse to be honest.

Either way, it amazes me that anyone believes ANYTHING that MS says. Clearly, at best they simply don't know anything.

Cheers!

Re:gee could that blurb be a little more biased?!?

[praedor]

I assure you the Supreme Court will not hear this case. So many judges have already found them guilty this time there is no question that the Supremes would overrule all the judges who all acted appropriately and ruled according to law.

Appealing (again) to the Supremes will be nothing more than another delaying tactic with no ruling in Microsoft's favor. They are guilty. The End.

Re:gee could that blurb be a little more biased?!?

[GSloop]

Here's a little follow-up


ABCNEWS.com
Feb. 5 -- Microsoft admitted on Thursday that its videotaped demonstration of a browser-less Windows 98 -- a key piece of evidence in its defense against antitrust charges -- did not depict an actual test, but rather a simulation...

From Google, becaues CNet expired the article

Judge: Video discrepancy "very troubling"

By Bloomberg News
Special to CNET News.com
February 3, 1999, 3:50 PM PT

WASHINGTON--The judge in Microsoft's antitrust trial today said today that discrepancies in a video demonstration played by the software giant in court were "very troubling" and raised questions about its reliability as evidence.


Microsoft trips on video evidence

By Bloomberg News
Special to CNET News.com
February 2, 1999, 5:05 PM PT

update Microsoft's expert technical witness was tripped up at the company's antitrust trial, forced to acknowledge inaccuracies in a videotaped presentation that Microsoft's lawyers played in court.

While I can't find confirmation that MS did pull the video evidence (I am sure they did), it's clear what they presented wasn't correct, and that it was in error was KNOWN!

It may be biased, but it's factual!

Cheers!

Re:gee could that blurb be a little more biased?!?

[GSloop]

I hate to beat a dead horse...
No, actually I kind of enjoy it here...[grin]


Microsoft trial: Second bad video airs in courtroom

Re:gee could that blurb be a little more biased?!?

[scorcherer]

Either way, it amazes me that anyone believes ANYTHING that MS says.

If they are being tried in court, how can anything they say be used as evidence one way or the other? Is this just another thing of American legal system I don't comprehend?

It's like asking an axe murderer: Did you kill those people? -No, honestly not. -OK, we'll let you go then.

Re:gee could that blurb be a little more biased?!?

[The Milky Bar Kid]

I love this line...

"Do you have any expectation as to whether or not you will be putting together a similar demonstration for this part of the case?" state lawyers asked.

Translation: "Hey, going to try and obviously mislead the court again? Why not? It was such a good laugh the last time!"

More Interesting "Bundles"

[pbur]

If you want the "Scheduled Tasks" folder in My Computer, you have to install Internet Explorer...Since when has the equivilent of cron needed a web browser to work?

Pbur

Re:More Interesting "Bundles"

[Rick the Red]

Since when has the equivilent of cron needed a web browser to work?

Apparantly since 1998 or so.

Re:More Interesting "Bundles"

[the endless]

Since when has the equivilent of cron needed a web browser to work?

it doesn't, or at least not in Windows 2000.

Start > Run > Cmd.exe > "at /?" yields:

The AT command schedules commands and programs to run on a computer at a specified time and date. The Schedule service must be running to use the AT command.

AT [\\computername] [ [id] [/DELETE] | /DELETE [/YES]] AT [\\computername] time [/INTERACTIVE] [ /EVERY:date[,...] | /NEXT:date[,...]] "command"

\\computername Specifies a remote computer. Commands are scheduled on t local computer if this parameter is omitted.

id Is an identification number assigned to a scheduled command.

/delete Cancels a scheduled command. If id is omitted, all the scheduled commands on the computer are canceled.

/yes Used with cancel all jobs command when no further confirmation is desired.

time Specifies the time when command is to run.

/interactive Allows the job to interact with the desktop of the user who is logged on at the time the job runs.

/every:date[,...] Runs the command on each specified day(s) of the week or month. If date is omitted, the current day of the month is assumed.

/next:date[,...] Runs the specified command on the next occurrence of the day (for example, next Thursday). If date is omitted, t current day of the month is assumed.

"command" Is the Windows NT command, or batch program to be run.

And to be honest, no, I don't know why it's called "at".

Re:More Interesting "Bundles"

[pbur]

Yeah, I noticed that one too. My other favorite is when I debug a Javascript error with Visual Interdev, Office 2000 wants to install something...I have no idea what. And sometimes, but not always, when doing a "Find Files" in Windows 2000, Office 2000 wants to install something...again I have no idea what.

To keep the rambling going, if you install Visio 2000, it adds a stupid little toolbar to all the Visual Studio products that basically just launches Visio. And if you hide it, it only stays hidden for that session. Open Studio again and there it is staring at you. Only way to get rid of it is to hack it out of the registry.

Ok, I am done now.

Pbur

Re:More Interesting "Bundles"

[Tackhead]

> If you want the "Scheduled Tasks" folder in My Computer, you have to install Internet Explorer...Since when has the equivalent of cron needed a web browser to work?

Since someone got caught perjuring themselves in court with a rigged demo videotape. I'll bet Gates himself stormed down to the development pens and said "Build me a crond that fails without a web browser, so next time I have to do this in front of a course, I don't have to perjure myself!"

Re:More Interesting "Bundles"

[clontzman]

Apparently the reason is because Outlook uses OE for its newsreader. If you, from Outlook, try to view newsgroups, you're popped into a version of OE with the mail section stripped out.

Not that you were looking for an actual answer but there it is.

Re:More Interesting "Bundles"

[1g$man]

And to be honest, no, I don't know why it's called "at".

I'm sorry, you must not be familiar with the english language. In our language, the following statement would be analagous to the operation performed using the at command:

at a certain time, perform this task.

Hence the name, "at."

Now obviously "cron" is a much more clear descriptive verb for this function... er...

Re:More Interesting "Bundles"

[Amazing Quantum Man]

At was available waaaay back on V7 Unix. I recall using it under Zilog's ZEUS on a System 8000.

ZEUS was Zilog's V7/SysIII hybrid that ran on a Z8000 based unix box.

Re:More Interesting "Bundles"

[Prior Restraint]

That can't be the only reason, because when I tried uninstalling OE after installing Outlook 2000, I wasn't able to read simple, plain-text mail. Oh, and would you mind pointing me to the Outlook command for reading news? I can't seem to find it anywhere.

Embedded browsers

[jayhawk88]

and that they have not done studies to se if it would be possible to produce an OS without the browser imbedded in it.

Hello, Windows 3.11? Who are these people kidding?

When 9x codebase first came out, I know the idea of "integrating" Windows Explorer with Internet Explorer was some big huge revolutionary idea, but isn't it about time to admit that idea has pretty much run it course? 5 versions later, and the most Microsoft has done to get rid of Windows Explorer is hide it under the Accessories group. I don't see any of my lusers actively using this "browse your local drives through IE" feature, they all still differentiate between IE and Explorer/MyComputer.

Re:Embedded browsers

[mpe]

Except for web based applications written to rely on the active desktop. Here at my company we have at least 3 that I know of. Business critical applications through which flow millions a day in orders.

These applications actually need the active desktop or were they simply written that way because the "code monkey" was copying an example which happened to use this? Is there any actual need, from a basic software engineering principle, to use active desktop (or even a Windowing system at all). You see quite a few applications which are actually running in a DOS box or an emulation of a dumb terminal... Typically the likes of stock control systems.

Microsoft's life?

[Glytch]

When did Microsoft become a lifeform? Between his recent comments and his "monkey boy" episode, I'm beginning to wonder if Ballmer is an even bigger nutcase than Steve Jobs.

Re:Microsoft's life?

[baka_boy]

Umm...corporations have social security numbers. In a painfully literal, legal sense, they're as "alive" as you or I.

(Well, as alive as I am, anyway; no offence, but I don't know you from a grad student's AI project.)

Re:Microsoft's life?

[JabberWokky]

It wasn't an isolated incident - it's an example of a fairly common activity. And it's also very sane and beneficial. He's trying to "pump people up", and encourage pride in the company. It's the exact same thing that happens at sporting events, and many other team efforts. I'm not saying it doesn't look dumb as hell - just that if you listen to the audiance you can tell it is working.

--
Evan

Re:Microsoft's life?

[Fulcrum of Evil]

Too bad you can't kill one as easily as a person.

No, really - Corporate Personhood is one of the worst legal abuses of the 19th century. Corporations can own stock, lobby congress, and sue people, but they aren't as vulnerable as humans, they don't do jailtime, and they tend to have more money for lawyers. Nice recipe for abuse, huh?

Re:Microsoft's life?

[Chris Burke]

I didn't think the ISSD had an Elliptic-curve encryption cypher... I guess I don't remember; I've been too busy hacking the criminal database, getting people arrested for "Flagrantly Rude Public Duck Sodomy" and whotnot. I wonder what the cops thought when they went to fullfull the warrant...

Re:Microsoft's life?

[sg3000]

> corporations have social security numbers.

Companies don't have social security numbers. They have Tax ID numbers, that happen to be 9-digit numbers, but they're not the same thing. Cecil Adams can provide some enlightenment:

> Only people can get Social Security numbers, not
> corporations. When businesses file taxes they
> have to use what is variously known as a
> taxpayer or employer ID number. Like the SS
> number, it has nine digits, but it's grouped
> differently-- 00-0000000 versus 000-00-0000.

Read the whole thing at the Straight Dope.

Of course, I'm not a tax lawyer.

Re:Microsoft's life?

[mpe]

No, really - Corporate Personhood is one of the worst legal abuses of the 19th century. Corporations can own stock, lobby congress, and sue people, but they aren't as vulnerable as humans, they don't do jailtime, and they tend to have more money for lawyers.

Also even a rich person can be required to turn up to court in person, regardless of how many expensive lawyers they can hire. A corporation can get on with "business as usual" even whilst a court cases concerning it's very existance is ongoing.

Lessons learned a long time ago

[weez75]

Regardless of what Microsoft says, anyone who works in IT knows that you can essentially achieve anything you can dream if given enough time and money. They *can* remove IE from their operating system should they decide to do it. Would it cost them alot of money? Would it cost them more than they earned by driving competition from the marketplace?

Seems to me like this suit is something they foresaw so they built themselves a defense by integrating their browser into the OS just in case this argument was needed...

Who would believe Allchin ?

[jalilv]

With Products like IEradicator from 98lite which removes IE from all the Windows OS versions right up to Win2K and still keeps OS usable, would anyone in their right minds ever believe when Jim says "Forget about any business thing. Technically I just couldn't do it." ?

- Jalil

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[Sebastopol]

Interesting. Has anyone ever used this? I would be surprised if it worked on Win2000. Every file dialog on Win2k has browsing capabilities. Unless they use one clean API to talk to IE, I would have to actually see this work to believe it. Any takers?

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[Ayende Rahien]

Name one general purpose OS that comes without a browser.

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[FiringSquid]

You don't get it. Of course MS could remove IE, after rewriting the dozens of other apps in Windows that depend on it. But that wouldn't help me or others like me- small ISVs who've been building on top of IE and relying on its presence in the OS ever since it became middleware. It's simple: you use 98lite or IEradicator or whatever, you disable my app. I don't mind if you use it on your own system, but a bunch of lawyers forcing its removal from the Windows retail or OEM distribution is fucking insane.

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[schmaltz]

The poster's original question was, "Aren't there OSes now that are perfectly competitive that don't have browsers imbedded in them?"

The answer is, unequivocally, yes. "Imbedded" or embedded means that it's inextricably wired into the o/s code, kernel, whatever. Under Unix operating systems, I can definitively say there is NO browser embedded into the operating system. The browser comes as a *separate* application package, which you must install.

IE for Solaris is/was a *separate* application package which you, as a user, would install under your home directory. Absolutely *no* embedding into the O/S.

Embedding or integrating IE into the O/S is Microsoft's transparent (and so far successful) ploy to keep judges and prosecutors from doing anything constructive about their monopolistic practices. It is a separate application from the core operating system. But Microsoft chose to artificially bind it within the O/S so that it would be hard to remove, either by technician or judge.

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[truthsearch]

You definitely don't get it. You can write entire apps using MS's IE dll, embedding their browser functionality within your own app. Does that mean there has to be an IE user interface from Microsoft with an icon on your desktop, start menu, Programs menu, and "Quick Launch" bar? No. In fact, in VB you can run a wizard that creates your very own brower with their DLLs with no coding.

What you are saying is that you force your users to have IE on their desktops in order to use your software. Well that's your problem for removing the user's options. Why should they be forced to use IE when you could put your stuff in your own standalone app and still have IE functionality? This goes back to one reason people like linux: they can add and remove whatever they want from the OS. Don't force your users into using software available from one monopoly vendor. Read Roblimo's article and you may change your mind.

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[Wraithlyn]

"would anyone in their right minds ever believe when Jim says..."

Yes. Anyone who isn't familiar with IEradicator or 98lite would believe it. Which, last time I did a head count, was 99.999% of the population.

This is why we pray the prosecution team is on the ball and can educate the court.

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[tshak]

As many have pointed out, these programs don't fully remove IE from the OS. Everything from the folder browser to MSHelp uses IE. The point is though, as a browser Interface, MS could remove it. But why would I as a consumer not want an Internet browser to come with my OS? Or the audio CD player? Did MS illigally use it's monoploy to push all audio CD playing software out of the market by including a free one with Windows? No, it just made sense for MS to package their OS with tools their customers wanted.

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[rfsayre]

I use Allaire Homesite on Windows 2000. It has a preview area that uses IE.

It would be possible to make Windows 2000 without IE, but applications expect that service to be provided.

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[sheldon]

These products don't remove IE. They even admit it right here in this sentence...

"The MS HTML Engine (shdocvw.dll and mshtml.dll) is left on the machine to provide needed functionality for other applications that render HMTL (e.g. Outlook Express) or that launch a mini-browsing window (e.g. Winamp's Mini Browser, Netmeeting's Online Directory)."

But they do exactly what I say Microsoft should do. Delete iexplore.exe, and tell the court "There, we removed it... happy now?"

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[jack1323]

Win98, and Win95 aren't their current OSes. I'm fairly certain MS' latest OSes *do* have IE integrated. Those programs can't and won't work for Win2K or XP.

I really wouldn't be surprised to hear that Microsoft intentionally integrated IE with its newer OSes for legal purposes as opposed to genuine software-requirement purposes. I think it would be a lot harder to legally tell MS to de-integrate IE with their OS rather than legally telling them not to package IE with their OS.

Win98 and Win95 are slowing becoming too obselete to be used in the IE integration argument.

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[tswinzig]

I don't mind if you use it on your own system, but a bunch of lawyers forcing its removal from the Windows retail or OEM distribution is fucking insane.

Would you also think it's insane to break up a monopolist like Microsoft, since that would likely also impair your business?

If so, your basic premise is that anything that could disrupt your business is insane, even if it's justified.

If that is not your position, then you should see where Microsoft has broken the law and they will be punished. Those building their businesses on top of Microsoft's anti-competitive practices will suffer as well.

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[Reziac]

So bundle the parts of IE that your app needs WITH your app's installer (just make sure it installs the IE components without tying them to the OS), just like a shitload of apps already do.

In fact I acquired IE4 solely because Pagemill insisted on installing it, and did so with its own installer.

Or better yet, stop relying on IE (yeah, this may be a tall order from a coding/API standpoint, but IMO it'd be wiser in the long run).

I've pretty much stopped installing ANY app that relies on IE, not because of IE, but because as a rule such apps are every bit as ill-mannered as IE itself. Not exactly a good start to a product review. :)

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[Ayende Rahien]

As a matter of fact, there *is* a clearly defined API, it's the IE's COM interfaces.
You want to change it? Build an application that implements all of them correctly, and then replace the Inproc32 key for your application in IE's GUID.

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[mpe]

Would you also think it's insane to break up a monopolist like Microsoft, since that would likely also impair your business?

If someone's business was partnered with the "front" for a major drug dealer or terrorist organisation then this issue probably wouldn't have even been raised. No doubt quite a few people who do this have no idea what is behind whoever they may be doing business with.
However it's been obvious since the early 1990's that Microsoft is an entity prefectly prepared to bend and break the law. Hardly anyone can say "not fair we didn't know we were dealing with a bunch of crooks".

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[mpe]

What you are saying is that you force your users to have IE on their desktops in order to use your software. Well that's your problem for removing the user's options.

Some of the software which is braindead in this way has absolutly nothing to do with browsing the web in the first place...

Re:Who would believe Allchin ?

[snake_dad]

MS-DOS

Doesn't sound like an admission of guilt to me

[ClosedSource]

The actual exchange was:

Q: "What practices do you understand Microsoft was found guilty of?"

A: "I believe that we were found that we tried to maintain a monopoly in the PC operating system space."

Q:"And is it your understanding that Microsoft did that by engaging in certain practices that the courts have held to be unlawful?"

A: "Yes,"

This is like asking someone if they understand the charges against them, or asking them what the court verdict was. If they followed up with the question "do you believe the court's verdict was correct?" and he answered "yes", then it would be an admission.

Historical First!

[Jack Admiral]

The second part of the story involves Allchin admitting that Microsoft has violated the law but refused to specify the violations.

LOL
First time ever in history!
I thought this would never, ever happen.

I've finally read someone at Microsoft admit it did something wrong at something!

And I always thought Microsoft believed it was always correct at everything it ever ventured into. ;-)

No Study Required

[Petersko]

It's perfectly possible to know whether or not something is possible (meaning "realistic", since given unlimited time/resources anything is possible) without performing a study to find out.

Given the direction that Microsoft is gone, it probably ISN'T possible to remove IE without rewriting massive parts of the OS. With the amount of in-depth knowledge Allchin has, he can probably state that with 100% certainty - and he doesn't need to do a study to know it for certain.

The question is not whether they can provide an OS without a browser embedded - it's whether it is reasonable to modify their current OS's to that end.

Also, Allchin cannot either confirm or deny whether Microsoft broke the law. That determination is for the courts, and his statement, in either direction, does not make it so.

Re:No Study Required

[tswinzig]

The question is not whether they can provide an OS without a browser embedded - it's whether it is reasonable to modify their current OS's to that end.

Reasonable? You mean like this:

Judge: Hello. Having been found guilty of illegaly maintaining your monopoly, would you please allow us to break up your company?

MSFT: No, we feel that is unreasonable.

The broke the fucking law. Who cares what they feel is reasonable?

Re:No Study Required

[Rogerborg]

• The question is not whether they can provide an OS without a browser embedded - it's whether it is reasonable to modify their current OS's to that end.

I understand what you're saying, but that's not what Allchin's saying. The way the conversation should have gone is this:

• Court: Can you unbundle IE?
• Allchin: Yes.
• Court:: How much would it cost?
• Allchin: A million billion trillion dollars and the collapse of the free world.

Instead, it went like this:

• Court: Can you unbundle IE?
• Allchin: Absolutely not. No way. It's not possible. It can't be done. It breaks the laws of physics. It requires time travel. God Himself could not do it.

There's a small difference. In the first case, Allchin doesn't dumb down his answer for the benefit of that dumb old judge, and the necessity for him to lie is postponed.

In other words: Microsoft must not be allowed to give shortcut answers to technical questions based on what they view as being a reasonable implementation. That's for the court to decide. The mistake the court made was to even let the technicalities be an issue, they should have just asked how much it would cost, and if the answer was "too much", then appointed an expert to cost it. Which they have done, belatedly, after being stonewalled for years.

Why isn't this perjury?

[macemoneta]

Have I missed something? Hasn't MS been found guilty of lying in court (things like the rigged video)? Why isn't someone at least paying a perjury fine (or spending time in jail)? Or is that only for us regular folks?

No study is necessary.

[alizard]

There's a script at http://www.98lite.net called IEradicator which will zap MSIE from Windows 9.x / ME / 2000 using the Windows Installer. I've had an MSIE-free Windows machine for years. My experience is that Windows is stabler and faster without IE as an OS component. I wouldn't even consider installing these Windows operating systems now without removing MSIE as soon as the Windows install completes.

I use Opera and Netscape instead.

If you're running Windows 9.x-2000, I suggest you back up your machine completely and then give the MSIE install a try. You should get both satisfactory proof that Ballmer lied AND a better-running computer. Usual warning, your mileage may vary...

As for XP, while MS may have done a better job at kludging IE into the OS to make it harder to untangle this time, I'm sure a development contract to the people at 98lite plus access to the Windows API will result in a very fast and clean solution to the problem.

Re:No study is necessary.

[SuiteSisterMary]

You should get both satisfactory proof that Ballmer lied AND a better-running computer. Usual warning, your mileage may vary...

I will point out that the site is quite upfront in that they don't remove the IE engine, only the executable and various icons and other such resources. The stated reason for this is that many many other applications expect the core rendering engine to be there, so they can use it. Almost as if it were, you know, part of the operating system.....

Re:No study is necessary.

[alizard]

Depends on what you're trying to do. It rather appears that Office 9.x runs fine even with the rendering engine trashed.

quote from the manual with 98lite

98micro (Professional Edition Only)

98mirco completely eliminates the Microsoft HTML engine (SHDOCVW.DLL, and MSHTML.DLL). You can not run any program that relies on this IE Engine; e.g. Outlook Express, FrontPage, and MS Money are out. But a system with Apache, Netscape, Opera, Pegasus Mail, Gravity, Agent etc. would be just fine! Microsoft Office 97 will install and run beautifully under 98micro!

Our tests and diagnostics suggests that 98micro can be 15% to 20% faster than a stock Windows 98 installation.

See the 98lite.net Performance Page
http://www.98lite.net/perform.html for details.

If you find an application that does not work under 98micro, it's possible that:

it requires the MS HTML Engine and you'll have to abandon that application or use the ShellSwap feature of 98lite to swap to a shell containing the IE engine (SLEEK, CHUBBY, or OVERWEIGHT)

a file is simply missing; you may be able to isolate the problem to the specific file and reinstall it (this is common and most often the result of uninstalling applications)

Re:No study is necessary.

[alizard]

>As for "98lite" - I recommend AGAINST running it on Windows XP.

So does 98lite.
> If what you want is Windows 95, use Windows 95.

You have something against the idea of customizing an OS so it'll do what you want it to do? I want something that'll run the MS Office apps I'm using to communicate with the rest of the business world with a bit less overhead and more stability than 98SE out of the box.

Using 98lite, I got what I wanted. Office 97 runs fine and so do all the apps I have occasion to use. With respect to XP, while it might matter with respect to implementing an antitrust settlement, I could personally care less about 98lite being made to work with XP, while it's probably possible, my next upgrade to this box is to *nix (Lycoris looks good, but OpenBSD does, too). 98lite serves my needs pending my deciding that enough *nix apps are ready for me to make the switch.

Re:No study is necessary.

[Prior Restraint]

so I just can't uninstall Internet Explorer and have all of my applications work.

Big deal. I can't upgrade Windows and have all of my applications work. Does that mean Mircosoft can argue that Windows version x is a critical part of Windows version x+1? Put another way, since when is the ability to run every existing application a feature of Windows?

I find Netscape on Windows... slower. I clocked it - IE loads faster on my PII/350 with 128MB RAM (Windows 2000) than my Athlon 1500 with 512MB RAM loads Netscape 6.

I would suggest that part of the reason for that is the fact that by virtue of running Windows 2000, you've already loaded most of the IE DLLs into memory. Again, to look at things from another perspective, would IE load faster than Netscape on (say) a Mac? How about Solaris? (I honestly don't know.)

In closing, I'd like to point out what so many others have elsewhere: even if we grant that Windows needs an HTML renderer to function, why does it have to be IE? You mentioned that lots of other Microsoft products simply call an API. That's just begging for someone to write a wrapper for Gecko and drop it in place of shdocvw.dll and/or mshtml.dll.

Re:No study is necessary.

[SuiteSisterMary]

All of our software would run just fine for our clients if IE wasn't there at all .. almost as if, you know, IE wasn't even part of the operating system.

Well, by that logic, if your app doesn't happen to touch, say, the networking subsystem, it isn't part of the OS? What if it's a console app? Doesn't touch the GUI libs. Ooops, the GUI isn't part of the OS. What's that? App doesn't use the Parallel port bits? Well, I guess that the I/O libraries are unfarily bundled, so out they go.

MS Claims it cant remove a browser?

[Anonymous Coward]

I hate to say it, but isnt this the same company that claims they ARE smart enough to securely handle ALL of our id's and financial information (ie Hailstorm)

And now this same company tells me it can not do something as simple as modularize source code. I don't feel very safe anymore.

Re:this isn't news

[Mr_Matt]

Allchin isn't Bill Gates, and he isn't Steve Ballmer. Allchin admitting that Microsoft broke the law would be like if slashdot's janitor came out and said that moderation violates free speech.

Neither is Allchin Microsoft's janitor...he is, after all, a vice president of the company and the guy in charge of Windows. So no, it's not like he runs the company, but he does run the part that's relevant to the discussion. As such, admitting that a demonstration made for a judge was rigged is news to me. But I'm not a cynic like you, so who knows.

I won't even dive into the lame moderation analogy - if you're one of those guys who dilutes the public ability to challenge real violations of our First Amendment rights by whining endlessly over situations where the Amendment doesn't apply (say, a privately-owned website like /.), then I don't have the time of day for you.

Re:Let us look at the code..

[kelnos]

Or at least have a non-biased third party look at the code.

does such a person/organisation exist? seriously, i think one would be hard pressed to find _anyone_ who doesn't have a position regarding MS that isn't at one or the other end of the spectrum - very hard to find someone in the middle.

Maybe a break in the case?

[redelm]

One of the things that has annoyed me the most about this case has been MSFT's continued insistance that they couldn't have broken any laws. Not merely the customary statements of innocence, or the hedged "we believe we broke no laws", but an out-and-out genuine incredulity that they would even be accused. The reaction of a sociopath.

The fact that Micosoft won't even admit they were getting close to the line when everyone else was screaming they were far across it greatly disturbs me. Such an inability to distinguish right-from-wrong justifies unusually strong protective [harsh] measures.

Allchin most certainly did not say this without approval. I think this is a trail-balloon being floated. How could MSFT be expected to abid by any conduct remedy when they don't recognize offending conduct?

MSFT is selling XP embedded AS MODULAR!!!

[tz]

Ok, if I spend a lot of cash and agree not to sell it in a real consumer PC, Microsoft will sell me a version of XP where I can mix and match parts. I think I can even remove the browser. This is their embedded version of XP (does it have product activation?).

But although they say it is too technically challenging to re-engineer windows XP so OEMs can do it, in their embedded section this is a selling point.

Re:So he also admits microsoft lied under oath.

[jazman_777]

And they did it intentionally. Hopefully he can understand what is wrong with that even though he is not a lawyer.

You can blab about it in the press, confess everything, and what can anybody do about it? It makes you look "moral", but there's no immediate penalty. When it _rilly rilly_ counted (it always counts, BTW), in court, they lied like the devil, so they wouldn't pay the penalty. Here's hoping for rapid cosmic justice.

Windows without IE...

[mikeage]

is like a fish without a bicycle.

With apologies to Gloria Steinem.

At the risk of sounding pro-MS...

[Control Group]

I seriously wonder what people (the nine states included) would do if MS stripped Windows down until it was just the OS itself. Bye-bye, calc, notepad, wordpad, solitaire, ftp, telnet, minesweeper, icons, windows, menus...

This could be a classic case of "be careful what you wish for."

Re:At the risk of sounding pro-MS...

[Bonker]

I seriously wonder what people (the nine states included) would do if MS stripped Windows down until it was just the OS itself. Bye-bye, calc,

Google search lists dozens of freeware calculators, many of them promoted as 'Windows Calculator Replacements'.

notepad,

http://www.textpad.com Not freeware, but damn close to being worth the money. There are dozens of freeware 'Notetab Replacements' out there.

wordpad,

http://www.openoffice.org/

solitaire,

http://www.fdepot.com/sol.asp

ftp, telnet,

Both blatantly ripped BSD code. The original BSD code is in active use and can be ported to Win32 or compiled for use with Cygwin

minesweeper,

http://freewarejava.com/applets/games.shtml

icons, windows, menus...

It's arguable that these are part of the operating system, just like the windowing systems on Linux are part of a 'usuable' Linux Distro. That said...

There are many Windows UI and File Manager interface replacement projects, many of which are open source.

If MS distributed just a kernel, a process scheduler, IO and Memory managers, You could have a 'usuable' Windows distro made entirely of freeware or Open Source software.

Re:At the risk of sounding pro-MS...

[freeweed]

Devil's advocate here, but downloading and installing several dozen freeware programs with each Windows install would really, really suck. And considering I usually re-install it at least once a year (no, I'm not claiming it's that GOOD of an OS :)... keeping up with that many separate apps just for really basic functionality would be a complete pain.

I happen to LIKE most if not all of the bundled applications/applets in Windows. I DO NOT like the fact that they cannot easily be changed if the user so chooses.

Re:At the risk of sounding pro-MS...

[nathanh]

Good for you... now please explain to my mom how to find all this software... ok, she read your post, now explain how to install all that software... tired yet? Do that for EVERY little piece of crap that MS bundles with their OS and people want, don't forget to teach your kids your trade because you aren't going to be done in this life time, there are a lot of people out there that don't want to understand how these magic boxes work.

You wouldn't have to. The vendor who sold you the PC could have done that for you.

For example, when you buy an IBM PC you get a whole bunch of third party software. My last IBM was bundled with fax software, virus scanners, Lotus Smartsuite, etc. Dell and Compaq do the same thing but they ship different fax software products and different virus scanners.

So when Netscape was still a viable option some of the vendors wanted to ship Netscape on their PCs. Microsoft bundled their browser - which at the time was worse than Netscape - and then Microsoft threatened the vendors that were still considering Netscape instead of IE.

Bundling a browser isn't the issue here - it may or may not be "innovative", and other desktops may or may not do the same - but bundling your browser and then threatening the vendors so that your competitor's product never has the chance to compete is ILLEGAL.

It's all fun and giggles to pretend that the judges are stupid, but the findings of the court were valid and intelligent.

Re:At the risk of sounding pro-MS...

[Reziac]

I'd cheer wildly for a stripped version of Windows. FINALLY there'd be a version of WinXP that I can actually SELL to my clients, without forcing them to do an entirely-needless hardware upgrade first (but they don't need the hardware upgrade, so they don't buy XP as it stands).

And M$ would make more money because their market would expand retroactively to include older machines.

Everybody happy!!

Well, maybe not Dell. :)

Re:At the risk of sounding pro-MS...

[mpe]

Devil's advocate here, but downloading and installing several dozen freeware programs with each Windows install would really, really suck.

So your supplier/IT department would do this. Exactly as they typically do now anyway.

Re:At the risk of sounding pro-MS...

[mpe]

Why should a change in the operating system change the DATABASE ENGINE for MS Access? This seems like the worst kind of spaghetti code.

In the case of the MS Jet Database Engine DLL it isn't just used by Access... This is part of the problem. In order to ensure that things are "intergrated" Microsoft appear to have deliberatly written spaghetti code. If they had written well structured code it would have been easier for things such as IE to simply be removed. But they don't want this to be too easy.
IIRC some of the HTML rendering fuctions wound up in in obvious DLLs and the DLLs which mainly support HTML rendering also have some completly unrelated (but important) functions in.

Re:At the risk of sounding pro-MS...

[Rogerborg]

• if MS stripped Windows down until it was just the OS itself. Bye-bye, calc, notepad, wordpad, solitaire, ftp, telnet, minesweeper, icons, windows, menus

Yes, yes, very insightful. Unfortunately, if you actually read the proposal, it asks for extra versions to be made available specified middleware stripped.

Microsoft still gets to sell the full distro, they just have to provide stripped down versions to resellers who want to add their own apps.

And if stripped Windows is as unstable as they claim, then they should have no problen persuading people to keep taking the full distro, right?

Re:At the risk of sounding pro-MS...

[NeuroManson]

Ummmmmmm, that would be DOS...

you are missing my point

[AdamBa]

The headline "Allchin Admits MSFT Violated the Law" is misleading/biased/troll/whatever. He only admitted that Microsoft was found to have violated the law. For legal purposes that is an irrelevant distinction once the verdict is in, but for slashdot purposes it is being sensationalist.

- adam

Paranoia

[HisMother]

Sun Microsystems (can) go buy 10,000 copies, and they can have people just sit there and generate work requests to us every minute of every day," Ballmer said. "Somebody could say, 'Look, I want to make Microsoft's life miserable; so I'll tell you what, I'll pay you $10 million a year to torture Microsoft."'

Don't worry, Steve. Just keep that tinfoil hat on and we won't be able to control your mind.

Re:Paranoia

[Chris Johnson]

Actually, the revealing thing here is what an utterly obvious, correct move that is... to Ballmer.

The reason he is so certain other people will do that is, he does that. Why else would it seem so real to him? This is the way he thinks, reflected back in his expectations of how others will behave.

Naturally, these guys have been pre-emptively doing this sort of thing back at everybody before they could do it first. Now that it looks like they might get it back, Ballmer is freaking.

I'm a little freaked to learn this is the way Ballmer thinks... how easily that rolls off his tongue. First thing he thinks of. How many times has he said things like that?

what is this "imbedded"

[DrSkwid]

some words seem too new for my dictionary!

Here's the confusing quote

[drew_kime]

He referred to an especially embarrassing part of Microsoft's case, in which the company showed a videotape to make the argument that Windows would be damaged if a user attempted to remove the Internet Explorer (IE) Web browser. Microsoft later admitted the demonstration computer was rigged.

The timeline in question is that Microsoft, after the original presentation, admitted that it had been rigged. Allchin did not admit it in this deposition.

But that is what they have done....

[MosesJones]

Embedded XP, WinCE are modular, WindowsXP is... according to Microsoft a whole new platform that was a massive development undertaking.

And you are saying that as part of the WindowsXP development they couldn't do on a server what they can do on a PDA ?

flaw in argument

[coltrane99]

You show that if you define a market similarly for Apple computers, then they also would be shown to have a monopoly on software for that hardware, which is correct. They do.

If you lumped in all of Apple's hardware, Windows would still be on something like 95% of all computers since PC compatible hardware is so much larger a market. So I don't see what you get by redrawing the market there.

As to 'Microsoft bad', you are making the assumption that 'monopoly == bad' which is not the case legally. in the eyes of the law, monopoly == extra responsibilities. If you fail to meet those responsibilities, then yes, you are breaking the law.

That's the real problem for Microsoft in this case. Not just that they have the monopoly. But that they operate the monopoly in a predatory way. If they would tone down their 'cut off the air supply' style of doing business, they would have no legal problems from an antitrust standpoint.

We can trust the Supreme Court! NOT!

[PaxTech]

So many judges have already found them guilty this time there is no question that the Supremes would overrule all the judges who all acted appropriately and ruled according to law.

Absolutely, because we all know that the Supreme Court justices are paragons of virtue. They make their rulings strictly according to the law, and would never find in favor of one side or the other due to political or personal reasons. The very notion is ridiculous.

Hell yeah.

[Enahs]

First words of truth from MS. Yay.

The reason MS won't unbundle...

[3vi1]

Okay, okay... Any programmer in their right mind *knows* that the browser isn't an absolute, integral, part of the OS. Of course, MS is doing everything they can to 'fix' this - through actions like the change in direction of their help files from the old RTF-based nightmare. But, what has Microsoft gained? Millions and Millions of dollars in browser revenue? Put down the crack-pipe. It seems to me that all they've done is secure their position against other OS's. As I recall Netscape wasn't free when all this first started (if you were honest). I would have thought it natural that Apple or someone else would have integrated the browser with the OS and used it as a leverage point against Microsoft. Microsoft successfully countered any attack along these lines ahead of time without paying Netscape an arm and a leg to do it. I will bet my left testicle that had MS reached a licensing agreement with Netscape that right now Netscape would be swearing up and down on their mothers graves that browser integration into an OS is a 'great thing for the user'. Download a Linux distro and what do you find? A web browser is included. Users obviously *want* web browsers, and they like them to be included. Web browsers today are as integral a tool as notepad or calc... I'd hate if they weren't included because "they're not core to the OS" or "they stifle competition in the Hello World/Notepad programming arena". I like where the Windows help system is headed. I like easy access to online updates. I like the possibilities here. And, if such browser-enabled services are going to be basic parts of the OS I would expect *some* kind of browser to be included so that I don't have to install extra software just to unlock the full power of the OS. I don't just want the browser integrated in Windows. I want it integrated in *all* OS's. Okay, I'm done with my pro-MS mini-rant. *Now* you can flame me for my moronic opinion. Maybe I'm the *only* guy who likes IE. I'm a freak like that.

Re:The reason MS won't unbundle...

[praedor]

In NO linux distro is any browser so tied into the core OS that it is "impossible" to remove it. Why? Because that (web browsing, etc) is NOT a function of the core OS. Applications that run through the OS do that.

Linux, unlike Windoze, comes (usually) with a slew of selectable browsers. Take your pick. Netscape, mozilla, galleon, konqueror, links, lynx, and so on. No distro forces any one of them down your throat, makes it very difficult to install another, ties any browser in any way to the core OS.

Microsoft provides IE (a BETTER version of IE, by the way) for the Macintosh as a standalone browser. MacOS does just fine without an integrated, forced-down-your-throat browser in its os core. The fact that M$ can and does provide a fully functional IE for the Mac as a standalone means that it is NOT required to be in any OS at all (and shouldn't be). All M$ has to do is make the OS a true OS without applications tied into its inner workings. That's right, make the OS modular, exactly as the 9 states call for. Exactly like M$ has already done themselves with embedded XP. Any claim that it cannot be done is another purjoritive lie that needs to be punished by the courts.

Re:The reason MS won't unbundle...

[Chester K]

In NO linux distro is any browser so tied into the core OS that it is "impossible" to remove it. Why? Because that (web browsing, etc) is NOT a function of the core OS. Applications that run through the OS do that.

It's absolutely possible to remove IE from Windows. That's not what Microsoft was saying. Microsoft was saying that its impossible to remove IE and retain complete compatibility with everything because IE was designed to be modular, and many applications have come to take for granted the fact that pieces of it are there.

As for the Open Source equivalent of this, what exactly is the Mozilla project shaping up to be? A base of common libraries built around Internet/Web protocols....

Are you going to start throwing fits when you can't run ActiveState's Komodo IDE without having a Mozilla engine installed? How about all the other promised applications being targetted for Mozilla?

Re:I don't get it (regarding KDE)

[HeUnique]

Not exactly,

You CAN switch the HTML engine or even the browser for help - if you're talking about HTML help of course - nothing stopping you from using Gecko (select KMozilla), Mozilla, Galeon or even Opera - it's up to you..

Of course - you'll loose other features of Konqueror - all the plugins ;)

Microsoft didn't commit perjury

[maxpublic]

Microsoft didn't commit perjury. Microsoft, Inc., isn't a person and can't think, speak, or act. It's nothing more than a legal abstraction for an actual body of workers and equipment bound together in a commercial endeavor.

No, Microsoft didn't commit perjury. But folks who work for Microsoft did. Now, if *I* were to commit perjury in a court of law *I'd* go to jail. Why, then, are you protected from punishment when you commit felonies while working for a corporation?

Max

Re:Microsoft didn't commit perjury

[sheldon]

"Now, if *I* were to commit perjury in a court of law *I'd* go to jail."

No you wouldn't. This is one of those myths still remaining from the failed Clinton coup. Perjury charges are very rare in real life.

Re:Microsoft didn't commit perjury

[mpe]

Now, if *I* were to commit perjury in a court of law *I'd* go to jail.

It depends on the specifics of what you do and exactly how and when you get court. With something like happened with Microsoft it would probably have made more sense for those involved to be jailed and/or fined for contempt of court. No need to separatly try for purjury.

Re:Microsoft didn't commit perjury

[mpe]

Then why do corporations have the rights of persons, at least in America?

The have some of the rights of people (apparently a "cherry picked" set) but none of the responsibilities. There is simply no equivalent of a corporate jail, not even a remmand jail or any kind of bail system.

Re:We can trust the Supreme Court! NOT!

[praedor]

And yet THEY and ONLY they are the final arbitors of what is and what is not Constitutional. They ARE the final word still on ANY case.

Microsoft is guilty. The Supremes will not hear any silly appeal they make after Microsoft finally receives its justified punishments (there is no Constitutional question here, afterall). The courts say they are guilty so Gates' opinion, Ballmer's opinion, Allchin's opinion are totally and absolutely irrelevant. The convicted criminal doesn't have a say in whether or not they are punished. It's as simple as that.

Re:A Major OS

[Archie Steel]

..and because standardization is invevitable, we should all embrace OPEN standards, and therefore an OPEN OS so that no company would profit from its monopoly. The problem is not even with the fact that Windows achieved monopoly status with their OS, it's that they used this monopoly status to gain unfair advantages over competitors in other types of applications. Bundling is not even the problem: Linux distros bundle lots of Software together...however, this software comes from various source, and so does not profit a single company.

I don't recall Judge Penfield Jackson defining the market as Intel-based home computers only...BTW, even with Apple factored in, Microsoft still has a monopoly on home PCs (95% for MS, 5% for all the rest).

Also, I have to point out that it must have been quite a while since you've lsat tried to install Linux. The installers on modern and newbie-friendly distros are actually easier to use (not to mention less time-consuming) than for Windows. Give it a try! You'll be pleasantly surprised...

IE isn't needed for Windows 9x

[stuarth]

We can prove IE isn't really required for windows 9x. Here is a company that provides the tools to remove it - for free.

http://www.98lite.net/ieradicator.html

Though some (microsoft) software requires it to be present - such as Money 2000 - or so I've heard.

So why doesn't this discussion about if its part of the operating system go away? We discuss if this application is part of the O/S most weeks. Its an application they added to their bundle, despite it reducing the reliability of their software.

Its almost funny that MS want to own the web-browser for windows so badly! They give it away for free, it reduces the security and reliability of their operating system even though it isn't really needed, you can't remove it even from a server that doesn't even have a console attached. It's hurting their products quiet a lot... they must be desperate to take all this pain.

What "IS" is

[endoboy]

"technically I just couldn't do it" can be parsed a number of ways.... Consider, for instance, the following possible interpretations

(my PC was turned off when I tried), so "technically....."--- emphasis on "technically"

(I haven't studied the nuances of the relevant programming language), so "technically I... " ---emphasis on "I"

(I signed a contract agreeing not to), so "technically I just couldn't..." ---emphasis on couldn't

Just call me paranoid...but they may still be out to get me

MSFT should thank Berners-Lee

[volpe]

Imagine. If Tim Berners-Lee hadn't invented the World Wide Web, MSFT would have this huge component of their operating system hanging around with nothing to do, and there would be nothing they could do about it.

MS Guy #1: What's this program over here?
MS Guy #2: I call it "iexplore.exe"
#1: What's it do?
#2: Well, nothing yet. I mean, it sends requests
to servers, captures the results and
displays them, but there aren't any servers
it works with, so...
#1: So.... why is it here?
#2: Well, I'll be damned if I know why, but the
operating system just kept crapping out until
I wrote the thing. So, I guess we're stuck
with it.
#1: Sounds good to me.

Allchin deposition

[Lumpish Scholar]

Here's my favorite excerpt:

Q. Now, at the trial on liability phase of the case you sponsored into evidence a videotape demonstration, correct?

A. Yes.

Q. Do you have any expectation as to whether or not you will be putting together similar demonstration for this part of the case?

A. Not exactly like that one.

Not exactly the one that turned out to be a complete fraud? I would hope not!-)

the story as Allchin told it

[AdamBa]

This is how he described it while speaking to the Windows 2000 team at a group meeting (2-3 years ago):

1) They made the first tape (I have the impression he was in Washington at the trial and the tape was being made back in Redmond, but I could be wrong). It turned out they had switched machines in the middle, which was evident because of some difference in the desktop.

2) They made a second tape, and amazingly managed to botch that one also...once again they had switched machines. Allchin said the people involved felt terrible about it (no word on if they were out on the street the next day).

3) They did the demonstration live, in Washington, with Allchin at the keyboard, with the judge, Felten and his grad students watching like hawks, and the claim Microsoft was making *was* verified.

Now that point #3 is just from Allchin's mouth, I have no independent verification, but if it is true (and I have no reason to doubt it), then despite the botched tapes, which hurt Microsoft's credibility, the point they were trying to make was valid.

- adam

Re:the story as Allchin told it

[drig]

I don't think anyone is disputing his claims. All this thread is saying is that he faked up the test. Twice.

Use cross-platform libraries

[truthsearch]

Use cross-platform libraries and they won't have to. Qt, GTK, etc. are available on Windows and *nix. Write your stuff in that and you don't force users into anything. To be prepared, I'm going to start porting my apps at the company I work for to one of these cross-platform GUI solutions, with an independant app server middleware, also platform independant. That way any department in the world can do as they please. That helps in making everyone happy.

But of course you have a good point... where does integration end and the "pure" os begin? Well IE is an application, so definitely not needed in an os. A good example is Linux with GNU. Dropping some standard GNU apps, you've got the core needed for the OS to operate. The rest are apps. But then again that's just my judgement and anyone's answer would be opinion and not fact.

Re:Use cross-platform libraries

[mpe]

Yup, let's remove binutils from your linux environments... We should probably remove libc, too... There's nothing worse than non-essential code floating around...

If you are writing an emdeded system you might well want to do exactly that. Or you can provide your own alternatives to these programs...

OT: Another MS confession

[sheetsda]

This is a bit off-topic, but I think some people around here will find it entertaining so I'm going to post it anyway. This is a true story, I saw it happen just last night at a Microsoft sponsered .NET unavailing. One of MS's representatives was opening with a PowerPoint presentation when, suddenly and for no apparent reason, the presentation went back into PP's editor while she was speaking. She said "That's not good [pause] As you can see, some things have stayed the same." I got a chuckle out of a Microsoft employee joking about their own buggy software.

The Lazy Geek Hanbook

[sterno]

This is the oldest trick in the lazy geek handbook. If you don't want to do something, instead of saying you don't want to do it, say that it's just really hard or impossible for unspecified technical reasons. Smart managers, and judges shouldn't buy that sort of logic.

Amazing

[quantaman]

"MSFT Violated the Law"
I nearly fell out of my seat when I saw the headline! Who would of ever guessed that a company as respectable as Microsoft could EVER do something that even remotly resembles violating the law!! Boy I'm so stunned I think I'm just going to turn off my computer and go watch some pro-wrestling, now at least that's something I KNOW is for real!

Funny, it sure does to me....

[phigga]

the question, essentially, is this:

is it your understanding that Microsoft tried to maintain a monopoly by engaging in certain practices that the courts have held to be unlawful?

Now, to me, the phrase "by engaging in certain practices that the courts have held to be unlawful" is the exact same thing as "by breaking the law".

so in other words:

is it your understanding that Microsoft tried to maintain a monopoly by breaking the law?

To which he answered yes. Sounds like an admission to me...

Infinitely many Windows versions?

[jejones]

Steve Ballmer, a college friend of company founder Bill Gates and current chief executive officer, said Microsoft would be forced to offer an infinite number of Windows versions under the states' demands, all with or without extra features.

Gee...I wonder how Daimler-Chrysler offers so many versions of the PT Cruiser? Four models, nine colors, manual or automatic transmission, three choices for "security group", side airbags or not, deep tint windows or not, three choices of exterior accents, six more options one can choose or not....let's see, that comes to 165,888 possible variations on the PT Cruiser (and I'm leaving out the "woody" and gold exteriors, I think...). Mr. Ballmer, Henry "you can have a Model T in any color you want as long as it's black" Ford was a long time ago--why should computer users have fewer choices than car buyers?

Re:Infinitely many Windows versions?

[mpe]

Gee...I wonder how Daimler-Chrysler offers so many versions of the PT Cruiser? Four models, nine colors, manual or automatic transmission, three choices for "security group", side airbags or not, deep tint windows or not, three choices of exterior accents, six more options one can choose or not....let's see, that comes to 165,888 possible variations on the PT Cruiser (and I'm leaving out the "woody" and gold exteriors, I think...)

That dosn't even take into account things like possible different engine/fuel options, radios, air conditioning, etc. Some of which may only be available to the fleet buyer. The same company produces a wide range of types of car too. So even if someone just wanted to buy from this one manufacturer they have plenty of choice
Though if you want a vehicle with lots of options you go to Airbus or Boeing...

Re:Infinitely many Windows versions?

[Paul Lamere]

But this is completely different. PT Cruisers are *Hardware* and we are talking *Software*. Its got to be harder to change software*, right?

Re:IE is not integrated with the OS...

[SuiteSisterMary]

You write an application. This application has a library, called foo.dll, which is just good design. Lets you call, and expose, all sorts of wonderful things. In fact, this is so useful, that other programs start calling it, too. Suddenly you start seeing other programs list your application as a requirement, so that they can get at foo.dll, and all of it's wonderful things. So, just for fun, you take foo.dll out of your program, and put it directly into the OS. You throw your program in there, too, but it's really just an executable. The real guts are, and have always been, in foo.dll. What's wrong with that?

Browser into your OS? Old News

[dprior]

This sticking point is just so old it's unbalievable. If you aren't shipping a browser with a desktop OS, you are crazy. Have you seen what XP does with embeded IE? It's beautiful. I go from browsing files to browsing the internet seemlessley. Pick on IE for security all you want, but it's definetley a usability improvement the way they have it bundled in like that.

Anyway, yeah. My point was that arguing about building a browser into the OS is so 1997.

Re:Windows _with_ IE...

[ThatComputerGuy]

Well DUH, dummy.

Re:You missed the point

[SuiteSisterMary]

Or, put another way, Internet Explorer Three shipped with a bunch of code to do things like HTML rendering. Internet Explorer 4, however, shipped making calls to the appropriate OS libraries, and but would install them for you if your OS happened to be an older revision that didn't include them. Or is it suddenly wrong to expand OS libraries?

Too expensive to include Java?

[WasterDave]

"Ballmer complained that it would be too expensive to build a version of the Java programming language to package with Windows"

"S'OK Mate!", chirps Scott McNealy, "we've got one here you can have for nothing".

Dave :)

Re:IE is not integrated with the OS...

[SuiteSisterMary]

What, like 98lite, which explictly mentions that it's leaving in the core libraries because too many programs rely on them?

Re:platforms: bundling or competition

[spectecjr]

Windows 95 or NT comes out, and Microsoft claims to have bundled in a useful, featurific backup program. By that time, the healthy market was down to two or three brand competitors including Norton. With the release of 95 or NT, Norton completely exits the market for backup programs as they believe there is no way of competing with a useful backup program from MS.

Obviously you've not checked into Norton's product list since... oh... 1995. Norton Ghost is a rather excellent backup program. And yes, they still sell it.

Please, do more research.

the real news

[pohl]

I think the real news here is that Microsoft finally admitted that it does not follow basic, time-tested principles of good software design, such as modularity,good separation between interface & implementation, and proper separation of kernel & application responsibilities. If they practiced good software design, they would be able to remove IE from windows.

MS's greatest crime

[3seas]

Consumer Deception. Of which is so deep that even now people are being fooled by it, even here on slashdot.

What really ticks me off...

[Danse]

I am pretty pissed that the states are trying to make Microsoft muck around with Windows like this. It's not going to fix a damn thing. What they need to do is force them to publish COMPLETE documentation of all their protocols, APIs, and file formats and update them with any changes in a timely manner. Then prevent them from forming exclusionary deals with OEMs. Perhaps even some sort of mandatory licensing scheme such as that with radio and the record labels is in order so that Microsoft can't strongarm OEMs into doing things by threatening to revoke their Windows license (off the record of course). Forcing them to modularize Windows isn't really going to help. That's not where the problem lies. The problem is that nobody can be compatible with the de-facto Windows standard without Microsoft's permission and cooperation. Unless they solve that problem, they've just been wasting our time and money.

Even if they'd remove 'Start' button....

[aralin]

... I would still be using Linux.

'nuff said.

Never

[BigBir3d]

"The modified measures should deflate Microsoft's overblown rhetoric and apocalyptic predictions about the proposed remedies," Blumenthal said.

This would require a smaller ego, would it not?

At the risk of beating a dead horse.

[adamy]

Yes, the Web Browser is the killer app for desktop operating systems. Yes it makes sense for MS to include one in their system.

What they did was use Monopoly power to kill a competitor. Netscape (with all its problems) was building a user interface system. A cross platform, internet aware system for running applications. Sincer it was crossplatform, you could write an application (albeit a simple, HTML one) and run it anywhere that the system was supported. Mac, Solaris, OS/2, Linux, BSD, Amiga...this was a real threat to Microsoft. By bundling the broswer with their OS, they used their monoply to kill Netscape. The court stepped in to tell them to stop, and they lied to the court. Perjury is a felony, up their with Rape and Homicide in the legal levle. Why is it such a highly prosecuted crime? Because it is the underpinning of our legal system that is at stake.

HTML Redendering...

[Brendan Byrd]

Why doesn't somebody make a HTML rendering engine that is perfect to the W3C standard and nobody will have to use anything else? If you have a problem with the standard, use something else, instead of rewriting the standard.

Microsoft AND netscape both used Mosaic

[cybrthng]

If it wasn't for Mosaic microsoft nor netscape would have done much. Mosaic is what put the universities up on the web.. after all students never buy software :)

BTW, i could care less about netscape, i hated it when the became instant millionairs and went off starting other huge failures and then collapsed themselves. I was rather joyous in seeing them overdue themselves and go under. It wasn't MICROSOFT's fault that Netscape was a disaster, after all HUNDREDS of other companies repeated the same mistakes.

Had netscape used there IPO money for things like development, research and marketing rather then a new headquarters, fast cars and huge parties, they quite possibly could have competed.

Afterall, microsoft didn't start out but in a warehouse, netscape when from rags to ritches and didn't know how to cope and plummeted.

Re:Microsoft AND netscape both used Mosaic

[GSloop]

I don't generally complain about such things, but how about you use your "preview" button and read what you post, BEFORE YOU POST IT!

You are incoherent, use poor grammer, mix their with there (and probably would have used they're incorrectly too if you could have) and to top that all off, your spelling sucks too.


If it wasn't for Mosaic microsoft nor netscape would have done much

I think you mean neither MS or NS...

i could care less about netscape
That means you care at least a little...what I think you mean is "You couldn't care less"

Had netscape used there IPO
How about their - the personal pronoun I think.
Not there as in the money is over there...

netscape when from rags to ritches and didn't know how to cope and plummeted
Here, I'm pretty sure I know what you meant, but it sure was garbled.

Cheers!

Re:Microsoft AND netscape both used Mosaic

[os2fan]

Netscape competed in a market against free browsers. Their browser included in the browser window the ftp client, and a number of different innovations. They exposed assorted API for developers, and included SUN's JAVA virtual machine.

They sold their browser at a price of about half a game, eg $25. Despite this, they captured 80% of the market.

Microsoft saw this happening, and decided to put their finger in the pie. They sold IE v1, but this did not capture any of the market. Their attempt at IE2 failed dismally, even though they distributed it for free, and included it in Windows. But this did not discourage NS use.

It was the tieing of IE into Windows, that was one of the complaints of the trial. It really was Microsoft's fault that NS collapesd, first by preditory pricing, and when that failed, by contractual, and then technological, tieing.

Ye folk using OS/2, Linux, etc would not have a decent browser were it not for netscape.

And if ye really care about diversity, ye should care about competition, such as NS.

Re:I don't like MS, but...

[I_redwolf]

No one is debating that and yes you are a troll. People are upset with the fact that Microsoft went about the whole thing wrong. IE was integrated, so what, part of the problem is that Microsoft did all this shit illegally.. they forced Netscape outta the market UNFAIRLY. This isn't about their godforsaken product as much as it is about them being criminal and being found guilty on all charges.

Everything else is just that.. everything else. If Microsoft played fairly no one would care about them integrating whatever the hell they wanted to in their product. However because they've been found out to play unfairly; 3rd parties tend to get scared from the get go. "You saw what they did to netscape, you see how they got away with it!!"; I'm either gonna consolidate or sell to MS just based on this. Why? Because me as a 3rd party can't win. If I can't win or at least compete in the game, why play?

Again; understand that this isn't about MS incoporating their stuff. As a penalty they shouldn't be allowed to but thats what is really being debated. Comapnies, 3rd parties, programmers and some people are scared shitless because if MS gets off easy with this.. The industry will no longer be fun, no competition, no innovation, people will either assimilate or be assimilated.

So be pro-microsoft all you want, for now at least I have a right to tell you to "stop trolling".

So, what did Microsoft learn from this?

[schmaltz]

If there was a lesson to be learned from MS "embedding" IE into the O/S, and if Microsoft was open to learning it, it might be this: that their move to own the browser market ultimately cost them more than it gave them. Maybe. Maybe they earned some customer loyalty, developers who coded to the built-in IE.

Ultimately, out on the 'net, I see sites that are mostly cross-platform. Microsoft took IE's programming interface (HTML, DHTML, CSS, CSS/Javascript, DOM, etc.) in a different direction from their competition, Netscape, presumably to entice then ensnare the marketplace.

But, it didn't happen. Most sites don't use DHTML, except maybe for drop-down menus and the occasional popup. More often you're likely to encounter a Flash-based site than one based on DHTML -or one as richly designed as Flash.

Re:I don't like MS, but...

[I_redwolf]

Oh that wasn't a troll?? Then was it meant to be funny because then I wouldn't really have responded. However seeing that you were "conveying" your "feelings on the matter and being interested in people's responses".

I responded; clearly because it looked like you didn't know what you were talking about. You still don't know what you're talking about. MS wasn't found guilty for bundling their IE browser. They were found guilty for illegally crushing Netscape and sweeping the pieces out of the market.

I refute all of your "charges" and my post echo's none of them. Personally I think it's extremely logical in trying to make my point. That point being that Microsoft is criminal and they must be penalized otherwise the industry will be prone to stagnation.

Please read up on the subject before posting and as for my uid and my "+1" posting. I don't really give a shit; just like you I'm just converying my feelings on the matter and in this case I'm not too interested in your response.

Re:I don't like MS, but...

[Discoflamingo13]

Thank you for being honest. For a lot of people, Windows is the solution that will carry them over for a long time, and a lot of my people (that being the BSD/GNU/Linux guys I hang with) need to realize that as well. Personally, I don't think the issue should be about the browser - it should be about the anti-trust issues (multi-OS booting OEM rigging, locking Mac people into Word and refusing to ever update it unless Internet Explorer was the default browser, etc.).

The only thing I really take issue with in your post is file defragmentation as a feature. On virtually every other filesystem I'm aware of, setting even decent heuristics for file allocation/deallocation (not necessarily great/excellent) is enough. File fragmentation for Windows is a design problem, and selling a time/resource-wasting method to combat poorly-designed tertiary memory storage as a feature has always irked me. Every filesystem gets fragmented over time, but the issue should not be "how many days" versus "how many months."

Geez.. of course it's possible...

[kko]

We're fooling around with WindowsXP embedded (unforunately!) at the office, and it's just your standard edition of WindowsXP, and you get a bunch of tools to help you remove whatever it is you don't need, and create some policies on the machine.
Hell, the instructions tell you to start with a machine that has a "normal" version of WindowsXP Professional...
Now, the first thing to go was IE. And the system runs perfectly. So MS should cut the "IE being absolutely necessary for Windows' emotional well-being" bullcrap.

Oh, and maybe some brilliant lawyer should bring Windows 2000 Embedded or WindowsXP Embedded to the case...

Re:LIARS!

[spectecjr]

So the guy that is head of Windows (You remember Windows right? That OS that is tied so closely with Internet Explorer) doesn't know about IE on the Mac. Yeah, right!

What I find absolutely hilarious is that these guys, some of the richest guys in the world, with all their money and power, still have to lie like little children who have been caught doing something wrong. It's pathetic, really pathetic.

1. I'd love to see you in court. You have to be very careful what you say, because lawyers will twist your words and present them as fact -- and then say "no further questions" before you have the chance to explain your statement. This isn't a dress rehearsal; it's the real deal. You have to frame every answer as if they will stop you at the end of that sentence and mark it as the "Recorded Truth". (I hope I'm never in court; I'd very likely strangle the lawyer if they tried that with me).

2. Microsoft is *huge*. Over 35,000 people. And the Mac Business Unit -- who do all the Mac development -- are in California. He's in charge of Windows, in Redmond. They're two separate divisions, and unless things have changed since I've worked there, communication is probably lousy or nonexistant between the two. Heck, usually it's lousy or nonexistant between groups who have to work together unless Ballmer or Gates hits them with a big stick.

Simon

Nothing has changed...

[ASyndicate]

"Right now, the system is in a very confused state," Allchin said during the demonstration. "It's definitely not well right now."

Hmm, So what is different? Mine is never well and always confused.

Really Though, What is seperating the browser going to do? They need to publish all their APIs and Document formats. That is the only thing thats holding back. Windows isn't dominant because of windows, it's dominant because of office.

Re:Why do they even HAVE to remove IE from the OS?

[os2fan]

Why do they have to remove IE from the OS?

This is simple.

First, note that IE was included in the OS to forclose the market for NS. This is itself illegal.

Second, by creating an artificial tie between the OS and the browser, they have made it impossible for an end user or anyone else to remove IE. Yes, I know about 98lite, but 98lite only restores the system to how it ought have been.

Third, by promoting IE as "the browser of choice" and by making it available only for Windows, it makes Windows the "OS of choice" for Internet access, and therefore protect their monopoly.

Fourthly, that Windows cannot change its shell and that functionality is affected is clearly not true. Consider:

• The default shell in Win 1.x and 2.x is msdos.exe, a "file open" dialog box.

• The default shell in Win 3.x was lifted from OS/2 1.3's desktop manager and file manager, even replicatng the bugs... Lining up the icons in a vertical list is straight out of OS/2's program manager.

  The third largest market of Win3x software was programs to replace the default shell: Norton Desktop for Windows was pretty common that programs needed to be aware of it.

• Windows 95 and NT4 sported a shell that did not have any internet or web based hooks.

• The shell in Windows 2000, 98 and Me can all be replaced, but XP and SP 2 onwards can not.

• All it needs is a "new-found desire" to move the shell into "new and exciting directions" to get MS to uncouple the shell from the browser.

But even removing the icons from the desktop does not remove the code. All it does is remove the icon. Ye might as well say that there is no registry editor, since there is no icon for it.

98lite pro, really DOES remove IE code. It also patches a number of files (including wordpad and notepad), so that the dependance is gone. There's about a dozen files it patches to make Windows work without IE.

Whether or not you can use the RTF tool if you're making a competing word processor has never been tested in court, as far as I know.

Microsoft are saying "They can't remove IE", because it is the comingling of code that they're in the courts for. They have not been accused of comingling DefectX code, or notepad, into the OS. Both of these are freely installable and uninstallable. Like browsers in every other OS.

Microsoft could charge you for using DefectX right now. DefectX basically allows you to play DefectX games. Offis plugins allow you to extend Offis, and you need that virus installed for the plugin to work. I mean, Netscape charged in the order of 25$ for their browser, and people brought it.

I mean, there is nothing wrong with charging for an engine, and then charging a different amount for games to play under that.

Re:You missed the point

[Malcontent]

I think you got it backwards. When I tried to install the MS XML parser it insisted that I upgrade my browser. I was thinking to myself. What kind of an idiot builds an XML parser that requires a browser? Now I can maybe understand it going the other way (the browser needs an XML parser) but WTF?

The guys who built the XML parsers for perl, python, java, delphi etc were able to do it without requiring a browser. I guess they were more competent then the MS programmers. In the end it took something like 30 megabytes of stuff just so I can install the MS XML parser. Fucking idiots.

Apple would have integrated...

[Chris Johnson]

Apple did.

http://www.cyberdog.org/

Cyberdog was a document-centric, OpenDoc based integrated set of internet applications. It used a precursor of Sherlock indexing technology to store email messages, and could search hundreds of megs of 'em in an eyeblink. It had no visible logos, advertisements, or chrome anywhere- there were no splash screens of any sort- FTP windows acted and worked like Finder list views. Links were stored in containers like yellow-lined notebooks, which themselves could be dragged onto things like email messages. I, personally, saw a loosely-collected list of Cyberdog fanciers assemble a stunning, shockingly complete list of Cyberdog references using this technology: one person said "We should have a list of cool Cyberdog stuff, like these links" and posted an incomplete list, five people dragged that embedded document to their desktops and dragged over THEIR links, and dragged it back onto their newsgroup responses, where ten more people saw that and did the same thing, and finally a couple people organised things: result, a collective data gathering effort that would take tens of people, done in an evening with Cyberdog objects, effortlessly.

Microsoft paid Apple to kill that, and OpenDoc, and standardize on IE. Cyberdog was abandoned. I used it for a year after that, until I ended up having to do some site authoring that used Javascript, and grudgingly moved back to Netscape/Eudora/Newswatcher. I'm still on that diet- and usually I don't remember how much poorer I am, or count the number of seconds that these programs force me to sit staring at splash screens to remind me I'm using them.

But... did you even know there was anything as neat as that, out there, ever?

Microsoft is not integration- Apple had internet/OS integration absolutely nailed, far better and more seamlessly and quite humbly and undramatically. Using Cyberdog and the associated programs felt more like the future, years ago, than my Netscape/Eudora/Newswatcher/Fetch setup feels now, in 2002. It wouldn't absolutely require OpenDoc, either- it was about the self-effacing, borderless interface that didn't need to make any kind of statement of "HEY, I'M RUNNING NOW! AREN'T YOU LUCKY YOU HAVE ME??". We could still have that.

We'd have that... I'd have that, right now, if it was not for Microsoft pulling Apple off the project.

Chris Johnson

Re:You missed the point

[weston]

Or is it suddenly wrong to expand OS libraries?

Not wrong to install libraries. Just wrong to confuse those libraries with applications that call them.

Which is what Microsoft, by claiming that they can't remove IE, is doing.

Re:Windows _with_ IE...

[ThatComputerGuy]

Ok, ok, you want a reply, here's a damn reply, and gee, I apologize for not getting it to you sooner, if that makes you feel better...

Original Poster: "Windows without IE is like a fish without a bicycle."

Now, what does that mean? Well, take a bicycle away from a fish... wait a minute, you can't! Why? Because a fish would never have any use for a bicycle, and thus would never have a bicycle at all! That's ludicrous!

A _fish_ with a _bicycle_ is crazy! Whoda thunk it?!

And here you come, Captain Obvious, to take that statement and respond with "Windows _with_ IE... is like a fish with a bicycle"! Notice any similarities there...?

I'm hungry now, so I'll just leave that there. I think I've made my point.

Oh, and if you want, feel free to replace "dummy" with "fool". It sounds nicer ;)

Notes on your comment

[sydb]

1. You can't spell.
2. Find out what 'amateur' means.
3. Einstein is dead, therefore his actions can't be present tense ("Einstein has...").
4. You are wrong.

Re:hahaha

[Nastard]

No, I think he's saying that Microsoft doesn't make steel or iron, and also has nothing to do with railroads.