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Competitors Cry Foul At Windows XP, 2K Service Packs
caudron writes "According to an article at ZDNet, a trade group partly funded, not surprisingly, by Microsoft's competitors is claiming that WinXP SP1 and Win2k SP3 contain 6 separate violations of both the letter and spirit of the proposed DOJ Settlement. Equally unsurprising, Microsoft disagrees with them. And so the Case-That-Wouldn't-Die drags ever onward."
Service Pack 1 for Windows XP itself is not readily accessible to consumers, and thus the mechanism purportedly settling the antitrust case is, by definition, not readily accessible, ProComp wrote in the letter.
.Net Framework Common Language Runtime, an alternative to Sun's Java Virtual
.Net technology to carry them well into this decade and into the next. I'm sure MS will fire off a few of their own comments to the court in defense of .Net. Too much money and too much time has gone into this and I don't see Bill backing off.
Consumers have three choices for obtaining the service pack. The first is to use Windows XP's Automatic Update feature to retrieve and install a 30MB file. ProComp noted that the time for retrieval, as stated by Microsoft, would be 1.25 hours over a standard dial-up connection.
Honestly, if you're still using dial-up, then you should expect longer download times. And Microsoft does offer a CD ROM; granted $9.95 does seem a bit high for S&H.
The third violation, ProComp charges, is that the middleware control is not intuitive and comes with no Help file for understanding how to use it.
As a Technical Writer myself this does bother me, but honestly it isn't something with which I would walk into Federal Court.
The fourth violation alleged by ProComp shifts to Windows 2000, which, with the release of Service Pack 3, was updated with a leaner version of the middleware control.
In the letter, ProComp emphasized that the middleware controls installed with the two service packs are substantially different. The trade group contended that the Windows 2000 version is substantially less intuitive than (the one) in Windows XP.
So, the service packs are different for different Operating Systems? That seems fair. I think between this complaint and number 2, Microsoft is guilty of not putting their creative power behind the middleware control.
In the fifth alleged violation, ProComp said the updated Windows XP's My Music folder called up Internet Explorer for online shopping, even after the group had selected Netscape as the default browser and had hidden access to IE.
Now, I am beginning to understand why ProComp included the previous not-so-important violations: To show a trend. If the above is true it is bad for Microsoft. I'm sure MS will try and explain it away as some kind of oversight or better yet a "feature" of XP to improve the user's experience. Better to just release a quick "fix" and remove this "feature" quickly.
The group's allegation regarding a sixth violation rapped Microsoft for failing to include in the middleware control an option to disable Microsoft's
Machine.
I smell a fight here. Microsoft is betting on the
Honestly, the first 4 "violations" are pretty weak. However, when grouped with the 5th there is evidence of a "trend" on the part of Microsoft to not act in good faith.
What will be the outcome? I don't really believe the Justice Department wants to re-open this case, especially with all of the juicy "terrorist" cases just waiting to be tried. And let's be honest, case against Microsoft is not going to get a federal prosecutor TV time, but case against terrorists will get a federal prosecutor a lot of TV face time.
Whilst the point about non-IE browsers not being able to access the site is valid, the fact it takes 5.5 hours over a modem is not.
That is a clear violation. They have developed code that depends on IE. The fact that they provide alternate, separate code to do the same thing is irrelevent. They obviously want to play "use nice version A to do X if you have IE or use crappy version B to do X if you use something else". Version A must comply with the settlement, which means it cannot depend on IE specific functionality to install or run. It does, end of story.
So? It does what it's supposed to do.
No it doesn't. What defines what the shipped software is "supposed" to do? Nothing: there's no documentation. The user who executes documented, supported functionality cannot do anything with this software.
Call me skeptical, but this could just be an oversight.
Fine, it's an oversight. It is an oversight that results in noncompliance with the proposed settlement agreement. (See below)
It is still worth pointing out that this is a proposed settlement. Microsoft haven't actually signed anything yet.
Somebody above pointed out that one of the conditions for the DOJ to agree to support the proposed settlement was that MS agree to be compliant with it immediately. You assert that they haven't signed "anything" yet, which contradicts this. Who is correct?
MS has gone before the Court and said that they agree that the proposed settlement will remedy their anticompetitive behavior. If they then turn around and issue software that doesn't comply with THEIR OWN position, while they simultaneously and wrongly assert that it does, then doesn't that mean that A) they are acting in bad faith and B) greater enforcement oversight is needed.
Suppose that McDonald's is the only place to buy hamburgers and that there is a vital nutrient in hamburgers (let's call the vital nutrient grease). Now, you can get grease if you buy a steak...but most people can't afford steaks. You can make your own hamburgers...but most people don't know how to assemble an all-beef patty.
Suddenly, McDonald's requires that, in order to get grease, you must pay extra money. You have no choice unless you want to skip your daily grease ration. Furthermore, they are requiring you to purchase a known-addictive substance. You don't have to consume it, of course - you could pour it out and get water from the hose outside. Unfortunately, since most people are sheep, McDonald's knows that most people will drink cola, diminishing the demand for water until cola is so cheap that water is not readily available anymore (of course, you could dig a well and purify it yourself, or you could purchase Dasani (a Coke product) but I digress)
For the irony impaired...McD=MS, grease=consumer software (which the economy is now dependent upon), steak=high-end OS, hamburger=OS distro, McD hamburger=Windows, and home-made burgers=any free Unix-alike.
Your error