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Microsoft Clips Longhorn
Gr8Apes writes "Microsoft is clipping Longhorn to get the already-delayed follow-up to Windows XP out the door by 2006. MS has decided to remove some of the most ambitious features. Blackcomb is the version to follow Longhorn, and is expected at the end of the decade. The full new file system feature has been moved to Blackcomb. Other notable parts of the story, in MS's efforts to get its DRM into play, a new version, Windows XP Premium will start shipping with new PCs, which will include a new version of the infamous Windows Media Player. This version will have the ability to shop at on-line stores like the one MS plans to launch later this year. It's their move to 'outflank Apple'."
The /. Summary says the "Full new file system feature has been moved to Blackcomb" and while true, it is misleading. The article actually says WinFS is still going to be in the next version of Windows (which is what it is talking about), it simply won't work over the network, meaning file shares won't work in the same way. This is a lot different from it being completely removed, as it is one of Longhorn's biggest features. Having this over network would be completely insane for most situations too. With many servers not upgrading to this file sharing would have to support the old version anyway so that corporate environments could function without upgrading everything. In addition, while the WinFS has the possibility of being a great help to individuals, it would be much harder to use over a clouded network environment.
NOOOOOO! CLIPPY! NOT AGAIN!
And that is "Windows Secure".
A platform that will let you browse, email, and generally enjoy the Internet without risk of viruses, trojans, worms or spam.
Ceci n'est pas une signature
Also in the long line of adjective-noun combinations for their operating systems, Microsoft will follow up on Longhorn and Blackcomb with Sweatyphone, Steelfridge, and Purpletoilet.
why did I sign up for that stupid upgrade plan? WHY???
I also reply below your current threshold.
"Blackcomb is the version to follow Longhorn, and is expected at the end of the decade."
I guess we can expect it in 2013 at the earliest.
Omnes stulti sunt.
I wonder if the patches will install without rebooting...
"Windows XP Premium will start shipping with new PCs, which will include a new version of the infamous Windows Media Player."
Not in Europe, we're going to get the "Windows XP Premium Lite" edition, hah!
The path I walk alone is endlessly long.
30 minutes by bike, 15 by bus.
Windows XP Premium will start shipping with new PCs
Buy an operating system, and a PC comes with it? Hasn't it traditionally been the other way around?
At least they can say Longhorn was released on schedule!
Well, not delayed too much, anyway.
The new thinking now says that the new Office will run on all versions of Windows, whereas it was previously going to be available only on the new XP system... This is a massive statement. It means that the 'new licencing' is so unpopular that it's forcing MS to drop its upgrade/lock-in strategy for Office. Amazing.
I think the growing popularity of Linux in the server market, and over the next 2 years or so in the desktop market too, is a big part of that decision...
Simon.
Physicists get Hadrons!
Actually, this might be a smart move by MS - not that they would realise why, but nonetheless.
There are so many 'features' of their Longwait that literally scare the you know what out of people. Features that have been around spooking before.
Now MS are hard put and have to remove (or delay) these features - and ironically, and sadly, this might actually help their acceptance.
[...]which will include a new version of the infamous Windows Media Player. This version will have the ability to shop at on-line stores like the one MS plans to launch later this year. The EU-Administration will not be very happy with this. Actually this just shows that MS doesnt give shit about the antitrust-suits. It seems like the fine from the EU wasnt nearly severe enough.
Guess they gotta keep innovating the old fashioned Microsoft way.
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You expect accurate summaries from /. stories on Microsoft? That will happen when Linux has 90% market share.
You could submit a story that Microsoft causes cancer, and they'd publish it with a bunch of spoof or dead links without batting an eye.
M$ clips Longhorn. /T
-So then it's Shorthorn!
Warning: This sig contains a small bug. ==> *
It's more than famous, it's infamous. (With apologies to The Three Amigos!).
I think it's good that they're scoping out features. This will allow the developers to concentrate on making the existing codebase actually work, rather than squandering resources to cram in a feature that works like ass and is rife with security holes.
'When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.' -HST
So, can anybody point out which features would be really worth an upgrade, because I can't see any. I don't care about Eyecandy, also there should be something else than eyecandy...
Software capable of shopping at online stores, eh? Is this kind of like your phone company giving you a speed dial to the retailers they have some vested interest in? It's product tying, and it's illegal. It's just a pity that the current administration in the U.S. really doesn't care what M$ does anymore. Here's to some anti-trust mongers taking over next February.
The changes also affect Microsoft's plan to make the next version of its Office software work only on Longhorn. The new plans call for that Office package to work on previous versions of Windows as well.
The realist in me says that this was because the new Office made extensive use of WinFS and that making it backwards compatible would just contrubite to (more) code bloat. The cynic in me says that they wanted to use some spiffy new feature in Office MMX as a lever to force users to upgrade their OS. Still, it does a heart good to think about the heads rolling at M$ over the leaking of these e-mails.
He took a duck to the face at 250 knots.
1. Does Windows XP currently allow every application full write access to the Registry, or at least access to registry components for other applications?
2. If so, does this strike anyone else as a really bad idea from the view of modularity, scalability, and security?
2. Will Longhorn keep the Windows Registry?
I think it's less "out-flank Apple" and more "out and out copy Apple". But by the time we start seeing the Microsoft Music Store, OS X 10.4 will probably be shipping, and we should also see higher clocked G5's, and maybe even G5's in the iMac line. There are some very compelling reasons to consider switching, not least of which is that when you use a Mac, you get to enjoy Microsoft's upcoming "innovations" months before Microsoft's customers do.
Yeah, I know, it's blatant Apple partisanship, but who really wants to be stuck waiting until 2006 for Longhorn to catch up to Panther, when it's likely that Apple will have released Tiger, plus Lion, Ocelot, and Tabbycat by the time the damn thing actually ships?
Blogging Weight Loss, Distance Education, and more at verlin.com
Have the previous cases not established precedent that pre-installing non-essential features into the operating system constitutes anti-competitive behavior?
Rather than putting our hope in the courts, I think it's best if everybody contributes as much as possible to the development of desktop linux. We have a two-year window. If linux can achieve mainstream acceptance by the time this goes gold, then we'll be able to avoid widespread adoption of Longhorn, Blackcomb, and everything after.
so anybody got a good project that needs testers? Or documentation-authors?
Freedom isn't free; its price is the well-being of others.
This seems like a not so sneaky move by Microsoft to shut out interoperability between linux and windows platforms. I am VERY glad therefore, that this is still 5 years off at the earliest.
Maybe we can start calling Blackcomb the Death Star.
OK I'm being a little extreme here, but if my company upgrades to Windows Blackcomb and I can't interoperate over a PPTP connection, I'll have to dump linux for my work... Which would really suck, now that I've got everything working so I CAN use linux for my job.
I really want to see where this is going. I don't know anything about the WinFS network formats, and if they will include the ability of backwards compatibility with other OS types on the network.
Although the delays are not great, most people don't realize just how big an upgrade XP SP2 is. There are major overhauls to the system, security wise. With the amount of work that's gone into it, it should be considered another O.S. release from Microsoft.
Paul Thurrott's supersite for Windows has this information about what Longhorn is all about from May 2003. I highly recommend that readers check out what MSDN has to say about it.
It is a document and content management system with synchronization capabilities built right into the desktop. And it is going to hit yet another software segment right in the pocketbook: document management and storage.
With the advances in disk drive capacity and network speed, imagine being able to sync your company's entire set of PDF files/engineering drawings/(pr0n? ;-) ) to a laptop for use on site.
Have you Meta Moderated t
This version will have the ability to shop at on-line stores like the one MS plans to launch later this year. It's their move to 'outflank Apple'.
This is seriously screwed up. If this isn't a blatant anti-trust violation, I don't know what is. Didn't the EU just assess a 1/2 billion dollar fine over this very behavior?
I can't understand how this doesn't enrage anyone who believes in capitalism. What's to stop Microsoft from integrating an Amazon.com, paypal and Ebay feature into their software and MSN stuff as well? How many markets will they be able to dominate through their desktop OS monopoly?
Can any investor look at the tech world and invest in something that isn't in danger of being killed off by a Microsoft action? It seems that entering into any online service or consumer software is a matter of picking up dimes before steamrollers.
Without proper anti-trust enforcement, innovation and investment opportunities will dwindle. Maybe some of our politicians should get their heads out of the sand. The market doesn't solve all problems, that's why we have anti-trust laws in place.
Seriously though, isn't anyone else just amazed by Microsoft's gall?
Arrogance is Confidence which lacks integrity. -- me
That would just be tit-for-tat. Forrester Research has already concluded that Linux/J2EE causes colon cancer
Just throw OpenBSD onto a box, with all incoming ports (even ssh) firewalled off, and just a web browser and email client, maybe IM as well. Make it so that those apps are the only ones that may be run by the user, don't give him a home directory, don't give him any drives except a read-only flash device, close off all outgoing ports except those needed for web and email, close off all UDP, don't allow user programs (not even Java applets), don't allow for reception of attachements beyond textual ones, weld the box shut.
While it's technically possible to break the box open and mess with it, it should be immune to viruses and trojans. Spam is another matter of course, but disallowing the posting of an email address on a form might help.
If you still want to buy it, I can get you some.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
Gimme a break. While I don't doubt that MS thinks that killing FS compatibility with other OS's is perfectly fine, I think the idea that the sole purpose of moving to a relational FS is to kill such compatibility is a little tinfoil hat-ish.
"The problem with internet quotations is that many are not genuine" -Abraham Lincoln
Ballmer: "Yes, YES! The same black comb which helps cover my baldspot! We'll simply comb over our security issues with obscurity!"
Gates: "Brilliant!"
New Guy: "But sirs, we can see Mr. Ballmer's baldspot. It blinded half the staff at the softball game."
Ballmer: "The folks from New Dehli love my full head of hair."
New Guy: "Brilliant!"
Unfortunately, entirely in Hindi.
I for one welcome the news that WinFS will be more than two years away. In the meantime, Linux/*BSD/etc. will have a chance to better refine those NTFS drivers, which combined with such long delays and feature-cuts in Longhorn, may be at least one nail in MS domination's coffin.
Or here's to hoping.
Be very, very careful what you put into that head, because you will never, ever get it out. -Thomas Cardinal Wolsey
I would not worry about it. WIN/FS is not an fs at all. It is nothing more then a meta database, system service. Its only a file system in terms of marketing speak. As far as how data is stored on the disk it is just NTFS, nothing new. There is no reason why it could not be implemented on Linux or any other operating system. The only reason it won't work on fat is you need some file system features like extended artibutes so you can flags files to facilitate sorting them with the meata database. Actually if you did someting like UMSDOS does and kept an external data file and then just hid it with the driver then you could implement on a less advanced file system. So in short WINFS is nothing more then additional bloatware that most people won't use and those who do will missuse to the point where it becomes entirely useless and only creates more overhead on the system.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
I tried to get a startup off the ground last year, and failed partly because our product had features that were going to be in Longhornn. "Longhorn will be out in 2005, how will you compete"? Sigh...
I've heard all these "ooh, media player tied to online stores=product tying=illegal." or "ooh, this shows MS doesnt care about antitrust lawsuits."
/. bias at work again.
Doesnt itunes come with every computer purchased with MacOSX? And doesnt itunes, by default, have ITMS (iTunes music store) capability?
So how is MS now including WMP any different than apple always including Itunes+ITMS? It seems like its just the
the byproduct of years of oppression by the white man
Eh, you're right... I was getting into the spirit of slashdot I suppose. You know, it kind of rubs off on you...
Short answer: it won't shut out interoperability with Linux because then it would also shut out interoperability with older versions of Windows.
I have a beta copy of Longhorn running here on a desktop. WinFS is running on the My Documents portion of the drive, and I can still share this as normal over the network without problems from both other Windows boxes and my Redhat box. Incidentally, at one point WinFS was slated to only run under My Documents, so I was actually more surprised to see that a full OS-wide implementation of it was still on the cards. Suffice to say that my experience of its current implementation has been very good - it definitely is an improvement over current filing systems, especially regarding search operations.
If you want more info on it, there's a Windows Media file here which goes into some detail about WinFS, how it works and its pros and cons.
I attempted to get a group of admins to use them to make two bickering departments happy about file locations and they basically laughed at me (^)...using shortcuts instead as "good enough".
This, btw, did not settle the arguments since neither liked shortcuts and still "couldn't find anything".
(^. I would feel insulted or take them seriously, though the same admins thought it was OK to use the default database admin account name and the default -- *blank* -- password on the primary image database server. It only processed 50,000 checks up to and beyond $100,000 USD, so maybe they were right to not bother with a password -- such trivial amounts after all. :-/ )
A firewall can not protect you from yourself. Turn off what you do not need. Do not use the firewall to do your work.
"...which will include a new version of the infamous Windows Media Player."
Shouldn't biased opinions and criticism only be present in readers comments ?
____
nico
Nico-Live
Is it only me, or that sounded like "adding Clippy in Lorghorn"?
:)
Maybe I used Office too much
"...a generation of kids has grown up thinking Trance is the shittiest music since country and western." - Paul van Dyk
So when WinFS does get on the network, will linux be able to recognize it? What will become of Samba?
/.ers reading this who I conversed with in a post a while back, I am now planning to mix Linux/*BSD boxes with my Windows boxes in our desktop environment. We'll see, if I can get Unix to sync easily with Samba and vice versa, my family's home network (used for school, work, and a whole lot more) could shift a bit more towards *nix.
Samba will continue. Not everyone will upgrade to Whistler or Blackcomb. Remember, Microsoft is STILL! trying to push users off Windows 95, 98, and NT, and it's already been several years since XP was released. Imagine the uphill battle in several years to get businesses off 2000...
This seems like a not so sneaky move by Microsoft to shut out interoperability between linux and windows platforms.
So what? Microsoft Windows Professional (2000/XP) and NT Workstation/Server, as far as I know, have generally included downgrade options. So in 2006, build your next PC with an OEM license for "Whistler" (just get the Pro edition) and use your Windows 2000 media.
Read the OEM EULA. Note that this does not apply to retail versions unless you do volume licensing with Microsoft.
Same goes for Server versions, if you're into that kind of thing. I, however, for one, have given up on Windows servers and have moved to Linux/Samba already. Reason: Microsoft may say the TCO for Windows is much lower than Linux, but they neglect all the other software you need to buy for Windows to make it actually do something (antivirus, mail server, more antivirus, defrag programs, database servers, and so forth).
The biggest mistake that can be made is to use the Home version of Windows. It not only is a crippled version of the Professional version (at least, when you define crippled as having certain features, e.g., logging in to a network), but it doesn't have any downgrade rights AT ALL.
I don't know anything about the WinFS network formats, and if they will include the ability of backwards compatibility with other OS types on the network.
If Microsoft all of a sudden turns off backwards compatibility, businesses will cry foul. If Windows isn't backward compatible, then what's the point of keeping it on a corporate network?
Either businesses will stick to their "legacy" Windows 2000 and XP or begin migrating to other platforms. I can envision the former in many small businesses without dedicated techs and the latter in larger corporations.
---
Offtopic, if there are
Oh, I see, that's a 3rd party tool, and the FS only supports symlinks for dirs (and it most probably does not go through SMB) :)
Well, there's room for improvement
Real life is overrated.
I don't see a compelling reason for the existance of this "upgrade" other than to feed the M$ coffers and lock in a steady revenue stream for them. The main features seem to be:
Actually maybe there is one new, useful feature. Or did Microsoft stop trying to catch up to the 15-20 year old idea of having multiple shared-library/DLL versions on the same system?
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Wonder if it'll just end up being a service pack for XP?
This version will have the ability to shop at on-line stores like the one MS plans to launch later this year.
What? Now I have to pay for viruses?!
A) Apple would dearly love to get back their market share. The ACG is testimony to this.
B) No matter how paltry the Apple market share, it's still several times larger than the one Linux currently 'enjoys'.
C) MS are scared shitless of Linux. Apple are a contour of the same threat.
D) Apple - and NeXT - have often set design standards. MS are watching developments here all the time.
E) The weather is currently bad in the Seattle area. MS are being sued all over the place, and more and more companies and institutions and governments are fleeing the MS camp. MS have to play it careful or lose everything.
F) The iPod might sell, but Xserve has received a lot of R&D attention. MS don't have anything like this.
Conclusion? There is a flank. There is enough of a flank for MS to be worried, just as the Halloween Docs show they were worried six years ago, long before Herr Torvalds got to Mars.
How many times does it have to be said!
Apple does not have a monopoly status!
Microsoft has a monopoly status!
When you have a monopoly the rules change! You cannot use your monopoly status to "sell"/push your other products!
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
Don't say 'can't catch win32 virii' because one day, Linux will have a similar problem. And do you know what it will be from? Root exploits and people not updating thier software. While Linux inherantly is a bit more secure than windows, and the dammage caused would probably be less severe, saying Linux is completely immune is just stupid. Right now, its just completely unaffected.
Apple OWNS i-tunes ( AFAIK ) to expand a company's market share .. You are allowed to push your own products...
The thing Microsoft is talking is locking in with OTHER vendors, to expand a monopoly...
That's a different sort of issue. One is illegal, the other isn't.
Remember too, that the rules of business change when you are CONVICTED of being a monopoly.. or at least they are supposed to.. seems nothing is being enforced..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Seriously. Back in the days of NT 3, they were talking about the searchable database/filesystem as planned for "Cairo". Cairo eventually became NT 4, which certainly didn't add anything as spiffy as a database-filesystem.
Since then, they've talked about this feature for every single release of the NT family.
It's a mirage, receding into the distance faster than you approach it.
"Genius may have its limitations, but stupidity is not thus handicapped." --Elbert Hubbard (1856-1915)
Funny, but as I recall the main information on the business systems was data, not music and videos.
I think that really depends on what business you are in.
I'll launch Windows Media Player 5-10 times a day for work.
I might launch Excel, or even the calculator, once every 6 months or so.
Some people work in industries where music and videos ARE the business, and they ARE the data. And those businesses need DRM in order to make their business viable in the digital age.
Now if people actually paid for what they use, it would be a different story. But some people are under the impression that since they borrowed a CD from a friend, and copied that CD to their computer, it is now THEIR data. Without any regard to the effort and talent that went into creating the music. So the choice is- make it harder for these people to copy the data, or hope that they have a change of heart, and start to pay up.
I don't see a long line of people waiting to pay up...
No reason to lie.
they're just doing what OSX, Gnome and KDE have had for at least a year now. (although with DirectX, great.....)
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
Very off topic, but yes, product activation is required to install XP and can get screwed up by changing your hardware. The only reason I ended up on it at work is we have a corporate license that removes all activation-nonsense. If you have that option available, then I recommend XP Pro - it's fast, the anti-aliasing is nice, and built-in WiFi and FireWire support. If you have to deal with activation, then I'd stick to Win2K Pro.
I don't know what kind of crack I was on, but I suspect it was decaf.
I bought my Apple iBook yesterday.
*twitch*
What does it take to get software written?
Software engineers.
What does it take to get software engineers?
Cash money.
What does Microsoft have more of in its bank account than any other company on Earth?
Cash money.
What does America have millions of now that India has learned to code?
Unemployed software engineers.
What did Microsoft get when Bush became President?
A big "job-creation" tax cut.
What are Microsoft not doing even though they have a desperate need and a mandate from the nation?
Creating jobs.
Is anyone else wondering just what that tax cut was really for? Is anyone else wondering just what Microsoft is really for? Is anyone ever going to vote for these guys or give Microsoft any monopolistic slack again?
"Microsoft is STILL! trying to push users off Windows 95, 98, and NT"
This is a really good point for those worried about compatibility. As far as I understand it, Longhorn(or whatever the real name will be) will require higher hardware specs than Win 9.x or even XP. A lot of people will keep upgrading their hardware like normal, but I think there are a bunch of useful machines out there that won't get tossed out. I'm not sure a 3D interface and a new file system will compel most businesses to invest in all new hardware. There are many people who just need basic word processing and email for work. I think WinXP and the 9.x's will be around for quite a bit. Longhorn probably won't be the "killer app" that gets people to upgrade like Windows 95 was.
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If they're not going to be releasing the next version of Windows until 2006 they're giving Linux a VERY BIG chance of overtaking them on the desktop. Just look how far Linux has come on in the last couple of years especially in respect to the desktop GUI and GUI configuration tools. I think MS has driven a very big nail into their coffin by giving Linux another two years to play catchup.
Conor "You're not married,you haven't got a girlfriend and you've never seen Star Trek? Good Lord!" - Patrick Stewart
> Now if people actually paid for what they use, it would be a different story
Yeah, its a shame that last year was such a banner year for the music industry. CDs sell plenty. I have difficulty seeing how the industry is being hurt when they're making more money than ever. If there was actually a drop in sales in the last few years that didn't correlate exactly with the general economic downturn there might be something to those lies.
The problem is that while trying to eliminate a "piracy" problem that doesn't really exist ("Yarrrrr!"), they're making it more difficult to legally use the music one purchases.
blog
The vitriol is due to the fact that Microsoft did their level best to bend every customer they could find over a barrel to sign them up for a maintenance plan that was going to cost said customers more money than buying Windows and Office over the counter if the upgrade cycle lasts more than 3 years. And, when this was pointed out to Microsoft, they promised (hand on heart!) that there'd be some sort of ROI for this maintenance plan.
The technology may be amazing. It may be able to make demons fly out of my nose. But they conned a LOT of CIO/CTO folks into paying them for delivering nothing while they spent 5 years building the thing.
How they did this without keeping a straight face is beyond me.
Karma: Chameleon - mostly influenced by bad '80s New Wave music
Microsoft's filesystem work sounded like it was going to finally be the first really good thing to come out of the company in decades. I know, I know, some other OSes have actually already been there, and there was no reason to believe Microsoft would get the idea "right" anyway, and that it wasn't just a strategy to block interoperability.
Those things don't matter, though. Longhorn's filesystem was going to popularize filesystem innovation, which means the Linux dudes would have to copy them in order to keep from feeling inadequate. Then desktop UIs would start to appear that take advantage of new filesystem capabilities. The upshot was that there was a hope, that I might finally get a computer that is fundamentally better than what was around in the 1980s.
Now the revolution has been postponed. Oh well.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Bzzzt, wrong.
h tml)
If you simply open a mail right now - a maliciously created one - you can have code run as your user. (http://www.us-cert.gov/cas/techalerts/TA04-099A.
No AV signature.
No patch available.
No need to click on an attachment.
Firewalls don't block it.
No need to download it with p2p.
Windows is NOT secure - the design choices they made remove the seperation between data and functional code, removes the seperation between priveldged user and non-priv, and as a result, its just a matter of WHEN the vulnerabilities are found.
You listed ways to mitigate the insecurity - doesnt change the fact that it IS insecure.
GPL'd web-based tradewars themed space game
"Later this year, it (MSFT) plans to begin a new marketing campaign, dubbed internally as Windows XP Reloaded."
Sounds appropriate... incredible special effects, which turn out to be mere bells & whistles to make up for the lack of substance. Brilliant!
"We are the first generation to influence the climate and the last generation to escape the consequences." - John McCain
"The changes also affect Microsoft's plan to make the next version of its Office software work only on Longhorn. The new plans call for that Office package to work on previous versions of Windows as well.
Windows leaders are meeting through the middle of April to make the hard decisions about which specific features to cut from the operating system."
Only Microsoft would call that a feature.
Most of these concerns were FUD. I use XP Pro at home. I've added 2 hard drives, changed the video card, added an additional firewire card and memory, all with no problems with activation.
The only person that I know that had an issue with activation was someone who changed their motherboard out. After the re-activation failed, he just called the number that it told him to, explained what he did, and in 5 minutes he had a new activation code and no problems.
Product activation was just a Red Herring that fanatics used to spread FUD. Unless, of course, you are using priated software.
Ironically Microsoft did the same thing to IBM, announcing in 92 or 93 that Windows 95 would have all the features that made OS/2 great.
Even more ironically, IBM later decided to hold off purchasing Windows 98 licenses (IIRC, it's been a while) because Windows 2000 was right around the corner (in corporate terms, 2-3 years is "Right around the corner.") and was to be based on the NT kernel so it'd be a lot more stable than '98.
I don't know who Microsoft is trying to show up now, though. Apple, maybe...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Yeah, because it's totally obvious that somebody should be paid over and over and over for something that they only did the work to create once. People should be paid for providing goods or services, not because they think they "deserve it".
Some people work in industries where music and videos ARE the business, and they ARE the data. And those businesses need DRM in order to make their business viable in the digital age.
Anyone with good sound cards and a second computer can use it to record what they play back on their first, which after a single analog step gives them a digital copy with better quality than most of the (128kbps) MP3s on the net. There is no technological way to prevent this: if it can be heard or seen, it can be recorded digitally, and once one person records it in an unencrypted digital format it's just as easy to spread around as if it had never been in an encumbered format at all.
If your business model really requires impenetrable DRM to be viable, you probably ought to find a new one before spending too much money on snake oil.
I do not see a good reason to upgrade my XP box to longhorn. To me it looks about as important upgrase as from 98 to ME would have been. I never ran ME we went to 2000 in my office.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Says the Linux guy running KDE with a taskbar, Start menu, sidepanel, similar print dialog, integrated net browser/file browser, etc.
:P
Innovating the old-fashioned Linux way--ripping things off then criticizing the company that came up with the ideas.
Thanks for the kind words.
Yes, MS is aware that the actions of 3rd party apps reflect upon them. The Designed for Windows XP logo is the carrot/stick that they use to get developers to stick to these (and other) standards.
Although I haven't read these docs in a while, I don't see Microsoft changing the Registry scheme. It has proven to be a pretty robust methodology provided it is used intelligently by the applications that leverage it.
The requirements you describe are met by providing applications their own registry space under the HKLM\Software\companyname> namespace. All other areas are generally used by the OS and more-or-less off-limits (depending on the application's need to query or modify OS functionality). If an application had data that didn't really belong in the registry (user-associated file data, for example) it should probably go into the user's profile under "C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Application Data\companyname>\Program" directory. If you run Windows you almost certainly already have some of these already.
* Replacement of Win32 with .NET, even explorer.exe is running as managed code in the leaked betas. I can't even begin to list the advantages of this. .NET is great, and with Mono making great strides in the language specification, any language will be able to compile intermediate .NET code, and code from different languages will operate together without a care.
.NET compiler.
* Avalon--presentation system that is completely hardware-accelerated and vector-based. One video showed two Notepads rotating around while still completely usable at the same time a video played in Media Player. Old apps will be compatible.
* XAML and other technologies--I've said it before, but it was just such a cool example. During an MSDN video (freely available at the site), the dev used Win32 Emacs to write a 10-15 XAML app that let him update his blog, complete with resized vector graphics and a video of moving clouds looping on the background of the window, all using the command-line
* WinFS will still exist. They're just cutting a few features that will probably be re-introduced in a service pack anyway. WinFS is incredibly exciting--one WinFS dev went to the command line and did a query for certain employees within the last week, and it came up in less than a second. No more brute-force searching. Also, no file drives. And yet, they're retaining folder and drive structures in case you want to operate that way.
* Aero--this is their top-secret interface yet to be unvieled. See, Longhorn has multiple tiers of visual operation. If you can't handle the effects, it scales back to a lesser tier, going all the way down to an unaccelerated 2D inteface like that of Windows 2000. Aero is the top tier and is supposed to be, according to them, "photorealistic" and will be a new interface for Windows taking advantage of 3D acceleration. They said they don't want to reveal any of it until release because they fear it will be ripped off by competitors (a fair judgment considering all the ripped-off Start menus and taskbars on standard Linux desktops...).
* Christ, man, there's more, but I'll get accused of being a Microsoftie even more than the trolls already do, so I'll stop.
Actually NTFS supports both hard links for files (using the fsutil utility) and symbolic links for directories (using SysInternals Junction utility).
This security stuff is still just Marketing and PR speak. It's simply a way to try to force the masses to shell out lots of cash to buy their latest bloatware, and to make suits feel like Microsoft is working to improve security.
They wanted the next version of Office to only work on Longhorn. Hmm, that sounds like just one more tactic to force people to shell out cash to buy their latest OS. They've kept incompatibility as a club for their sales staff to beat users with, and have now added security hype as another big stick.
OS X - 1 trojan every 3 years is a track record I can live with.
So, at least they'll get their answer to anti-virus protection workaround in place soon. That should start a whole new slew of lawsuits from the security companies going this year. I have the feeling that Symantec and McAfee will go after MS after they release this Springboard thing. At the very least we'll see Zone Labs going after them, I would expect, seeing as how Springboard is a virtual duplication of their software.
More AntiTrust suits around the corner.
for every product in EVERY software company. First PMs get together and throw a bunch of requirements at developers. Developers do some preliminary investigations and proof-of-concept work and estimate how long it will take them to write the damn things. Management multiplies this by 2 and that's how long it will take to test them. Then all of this is put into one big-ass schedule which usually in its first cut takes three times longer than it should. Then PMs and developers look at the schedule and remove non-critical pieces from it until the product becomes shippable in a reasonable timeframe. After all said and done this schedule will blow up 2 or 3 times in process and some more non-critical features will be cut, too. Heck, even some critical features may suffer.
The most important feature of every product is its shipping. You can have a perfect OS with all the features everyone wants, but if you haven't shipped it nobody gives a crap (and money either). You can cut back in two ways - on quality (which simply doesn't work for big projects because problems start stepping on each other's toes) and on features (which is what I believe is happening).
I have to elaborate on this...
One episode of South Park had the town trying to free a serial baby murderer. The judge asked "tell me one positive thing about killing babies." One of the kids answered "well, its easy."
Well yeah it probably is, physically, pretty easy. Babies are typically much smaller, weaker and more fragile than most adults. But that doesn't mean that everyone is going to go around killing babies. In fact almost no one does. Why not? Because its wrong. True its illegal, but even if it weren't people still wouldn't do it because its pretty cut-and-dry WRONG.
Likewise everyone has the capability to easily "steal" (as they like to say) music, whether or not there is DRM. Every DRM mechanism devised so far has been so trivially defeated that the industry looks foolish for trying. Yet the music industry thrives. Millions of people trade music on file sharing networks, but even no-talent hacks like Britney Spears and William Hung still sell massive quantities of CDs.
Its absurd. Go after the real "pirates" (whoever they are) using the existing and more than sufficient legal means. Price your products competitively so people can afford to buy them from you. But be realistic about it. Not everyone can afford to buy every CD at $15-a-pop. Friends share things. They always have, and they always will. Music and movies bring people together.
Build that into your business model and embrace it. Treat your customers right and your business will be viable way beyond the digital age.
blog
> Longhorn probably won't be the "killer app" that gets people to upgrade
> like Windows 95 was.
Windows 95 wasn't either. Most folks didn't get it until they bought a
computer that came with it. A lot of people were still using Windows 3.1
(yes, really) as late as 1998 or 1999. (Admittedly, Windows 95 wasn't
readily available until early 1996, so that's only 2-3 years. Still, Win3.1
really sucked, and almost nobody cared.) DOS continued to be used even
*longer*, because of legacy DOS-based apps that wouldn't run properly in
Windows. These have been *very gradually* dying off, and at this point
*most* of them are dead, but DR-DOS is still selling a few copies, though
admittedly most of those copies might be running on VMWare or VirtualPC.
But as late as 1998, DOS was still almost as widespread as MacOS. Win95
was at that level in 2002 or so, and Windows 98 still will be in 2005.
If Longhorn comes out in January 2006 (which seems early to me), WinXP
will still be common as late as 2010 or 2011.
This sort of thing is not unique to Microsoft. I administer four Linux
systems (two at home, two at work); one of them is still running a 2.2
series kernel (hey, it works). At work, we have five Macs. One of them
is 8.1, two are 9.0, one is 9.1, and the newest one is 10.1.5 I think.
(We don't _just_ have Macs; it's a heterogenous network; we even have
one VMS system. We've not upgraded the VMS system since we bought it in
Fall of 2000, but I think 7.2 is still the current version.)
Heck, there are (a few) people out there still using Perl version 4.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
1. You only need a 3rd party tool for command-line support. The disk management mmc snap-in lets you do the same thing: right click on a volume and select 'Change Drive Letter and Paths'. (Actually, the drive letter itself is just a symlink to the device in the object manager namespace.)
2. Yes, it most certainly does work with SMB file sharing. Try it before you expect it not to work.
My error, I typed too fast - what I have is Longhorn milestone 6 build 4053, so it's technically an Alpha release, not a beta. (Incidentally, 4053 is the build from the original NT code tree, not from the start of Longhorn development.)
The reason I have it is - as someone else rightly pointed out - because I have an MSDN subscription (I have had for C~5 years now). I signed up a while back to do pre-release testing of various MS stuff: Everett, XP SP2, Whidbey, Yukon (MS SQL 2005) and Longhorn. I must admit it's kind of a buzz to try out stuff before it's available and I'm lucky enough to have the hardware and the impetus (I freelance and advise clients of upcoming software/hardware trends) to actually do it. As far as I know, it's not publicly available for download.
Just for the record, what I've seen so far has impressed me a great deal. There are some very neat things in there - probably too much to mention here, but you can check it out at Paul Thurrott's Site if you're interested.
I would feel insulted or take them seriously, though the same admins thought it was OK to use the default database admin account name and the default -- *blank* -- password on the primary image database server. It only processed 50,000 checks up to and beyond $100,000 USD, so maybe they were right to not bother with a password -- such trivial amounts after all. :-/
What company do you work for again? I have a withdrawl to make.
Oh, it gets better.
First, a folder and a junction pointing to it are *indistinguishable*. Looking in explorer, you can't tell which is the original folder and which is the junction.
Second, it's possible to create a junction pointing to a parent folder - thus creating an infinite-depth tree. (This is why you can't hard link directories in *nix!)
Third, if you delete a junction, you also delete all of the contents of the folder the junction pointed to. The original folder remains, but it is left empty.
All these considered, I really wonder what the hell MS was thinking.
Ack. I need to clarify this. What I mean by this is if you delete it in explorer, not using "junction -d".
Tom's Hardware has a good article on what WINFS is and what its all about. I can't imagine that most people are going to use "virtual folders" to do anything other then confuse themselves.
d ex .html
http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/20040129/in
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html