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Microsoft Proposes RSS Extension
An anonymous reader writes "Microsoft Chief Technical Officer Ray Ozzie said this week that his company is working on a new extension to RSS that would help users with different contact and calendar software and services synchronize each other's information." From the article: "If this sounds familiar to those using IBM's Lotus Notes, it should. SSE was conceived after Microsoft's recently recruited chief technology officer Ray Ozzie brainstormed with members of the Exchange, Outlook, MSN, Windows Mobile and Messenger Communicator product teams shortly after he joined."
Because they've already done so much for SPF.
Embrace and Extend!!
Microsoft's motto is embrace and extend.
It embraces like a boa constrictor, and then extends like a medieval torture rack.
Microsoft, sit down, and let's hear from someone else.
What are you eating? isItVeg?.
Why must they add their own custom extension to everything? It seems their behaviour (almost) always ends up leaving security holes in people's machines.
Personally I think this is an example of a good technology (RSS) that Microsoft is trying to co-opt by coming out with something marginally "better" -- mostly just more complex -- so they can attain some elements of control over it.
Oh and one other thing - they're basing it on the ideas underlying Exchange and Lotus Notes? I can't wait to see this one.
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Someone else Found it on the digg_
...would help users with different contact and calendar software and services synchronize each other's information.
...would help users with different Miscrosoft contact and calendar software and services synchronize each other's information.
Here, let me help you with that. I think what you really meant was this:
--- witty signature
I hope they do as good a job with RSS as they did with HTML! Actually, to be fair, Netscape was just as bad with that. But I did like the scrolling better than the blinking.
Religion for nerds. Stuff that really matters
If this software/service follows the same trends as the rest of their products, Microsoft will once again be punted by somebody who takes the same concept one step further. Futher more, Microsoft will some how find a way to make this peice of software so insecure that sombody from India will be able to edit your RSS files. Then Microsoft will claim blasphemy and be yelled at by screaming Linux geeks.
Erego; pointless.
google.slashdot
MS will make this better the same way they make everything else better, by adding stuff on top.
I think their moto should be "if its broke, pour some paint on it so you don't see that part!"
Bloat...? Whats that?
May I point out that when IE extended the abilities of the WWW, we ended up with worms and exploits up the wazoo. Is RSS relatively safe as it is now, and if so, why muck with it? Just what we'd need is a worm that can exploit a technology designed to deliver new information to everyone at once.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
Any bets this extension to RSS will be like what they did to Kerberos? It will be incompatible will existing RSS implementations. Any details will have to be reverse engineered or require immense community pressure to have disclosed.
And sombody better cross reference this to Microsoft's patent filings.
Bill: "Basically, RSS is a technology we have little marketshare in and we'd like to alter to give us a chance to catch up. Eventually, of course, we will monopolise the technology bastardizing it until only our RSS reader, Internet Extreme Explorer, is the only tool that will correctly read it. What? Not a good idea? I thought it was fresh!"
Microsoft's "new" RSS format will be XML based, it will turn out in six months that they have filed a patent on it, they will offer a RAND license, they'll submit it as an ECMA standard, and they'll proclaim that it's open. Microsoft will recruit Apple and Oracle to sign up for "free" licenses of their "standard" and proudly announce their adoption of it.
And then Microsoft will try to create FUD (through strategically placed speakers) within the open source community whether it is really possible for open source software to implement their "open" standard. They'll do this in an effort to scare away commercial users from adopting open source software based on the "open standard".
That way, they'll try to achieve the appearance and widespread adoption of an "open" standard while still interfering with its open source implementation.
Why use RSS for that when vCard and iCalendar specs already cover that and are implemented by many groupware suites out there. The RFCs cover from HTTP transport of calendar and contact data as well as other MIME enclosures... And it's a simple and elegant format, it's not XML based but it works! Why reinvent the well this time? more info on vCard and iCalendar at http://www.imc.org/pdi/
-- Por mais que eu ande no vale das trevas e da morte, meu PowerMac G4 Não Travará!!!
now ill have super slashdot feeds...powered by supreme M$ technology! fantastic
1. Extend RSS
...
2.
3. profit??
to proprietary, close, non-standards based bastardizations.
Who will guard the guards?
"But didn't Lotus Notes suck?"
:)
Yeah..but....look where they are now.
RSS is a form of RDF, and so this idea of an "extension" is a little both misleading and confusing.
Part of the point of RDF is that you can embed lots of vocabularies in a single document. You can say, for example, that a RSS publisher has an attribute FoaF document, or even arbitrary FoaF properies. Or you could use an RDF version of vCard, or RDF iCal...
That's all been part of the Semantic Web for a long time.
It seems that instead of the standards, the proposal is for yet another complete extension from Microsoft.
I think RDF needs help getting the full adoption it needs, but based on what Microsoft has done to other standards (Kerberos, SPF, HTML, etc.) I don't think that this will end up being the right approach to fix any problems RSS has.
So let me guess: they'll stick binary data in RSS.
Then we have remote execution via RSS, system automation via RSS, a rootkit you never realized was there via RSS. FFS, use the tool for what it was intended, not a hacked-up stealth technology for taking over blogs and putting pretty pictures all over it.
insecurity asks the wrong question irritation gives the wrong answer
Any takers on whether or not they'll attempt to patent these extensions, and make sure that they cannot be licensed in a manner compatible with the GPL?
Dear Microsoft,
No.
Signed,
Everyone On The Internet
Just like a rapist.
Didn't they work on an open JEDEC standard, only to turn around and patent it before finalization? Perhaps Microsoft will have an RSS patent ere long?
Why use RSS for that when vCard and iCalendar specs already cover that and are implemented by many groupware suites out there. The RFCs cover from HTTP transport of calendar and contact data as well as other MIME enclosures...
You may not be that familiar with MS' tactics in the past. If you want to get your name in everything you have to act like you "contributed" to it. For them to add to an open standard they want to make it look like they proposed new features directly as opposed to a behind-the-scenes addition (open source itself isn't in it for the glory, though it comes naturally) that wouldn't help them out in publicity. I propose Microsoft does an upgrade to Internet Explorer (either 7 and/or more version 6 fixes) in light of the many recent exploits instead of trying to get their hands into more technologies...or perhaps IE 7 will be based on their implementation of RSS? Oh wait maybe I saw this on MSDN recently...
I am down to about 60/35 (Safari for the other 5%) usage with IE barely being used more than FF . Looking forward to seeing integrated RSS in IE7 (I'm sure this will be just one of many features) Quote
Or perhaps, The aggregator allows users to subscribe to feeds in both RSS and Atom formats; suggests and organizes popular feeds; and connects directly to MSN Search, saving a user's search history. No word yet on how or when MSN plans to commercialize the aggregator. The MSN RSS Aggregator .
It seems so much clearer now that the rain is gone! Definitely makes me think MS has something up that they aren't telling people
Why not join in and support the effort?
Based on upvotes, Ageism is the only "-ism" Slashdotters care about and think isn't SJW
It seems to me that MS could just come up with some useful XML schema(s) that RSS carries, just like it carries HTML markup right now. Why do they have to extend the RSS (family of) standard(s)?
IF they extend it, we won't come.
"It's open for everyone, except those whom have repeatedly shown their distain for standards and for those whom have repeatedly and purposefully corrupted the standards process with the expressed intent of extinguishing said standards."
C#
Sounds like Microsoft is trying to re-invent GroupDAV, which is an open standard developed for precisely this purpose. Microsoft just has to be a childish brat and do things its own way.
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Microsoft is releasing this spec under a Creative Commons license. So perhaps it's not evil, or at least they're doing a better job of hiding the evil part!
I can't wait for somebody to find out how to exploit this (and you know somebody will), prompting MS to issue a security patch (but only on the second tuesday of the month) that disables it.
I smell IPX.
Let the fox in the hen house because to keep them out would be "discrimination"? Get real.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
>I can't wait to see this one.
You don't have to wait, it is already published. Instead of just spouting off, go read the spec and judge it on its technical merits, instead of adding another needless me too "MS sucks so this must suck" post.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/xml/rss/sse/
Then come back and give a reasoned opinion about the flaws in the proposed extension.
Some people (people make nasty hurtful decisions, not companies, folks, people) take great joy in fscking nice people in the ear through deceit, and then apologising to them again and again until they forgive them so that they can fsck them in the ear again.
Some nasty people get a huge kick out of this and laugh until they cry if they can get the nice person to bend their heads over three or more times because they can't help forgiving and trusting. It really really annoys me, because I like to give people a second (and third) chance and I get a sore head sometimes.
http://pcblues.com - Digits and Wood
Isn't there RSS stuff that already does this? Like RSSCalendar for the last while or so? (Mind you, I don't see any links to technical information or protocols, so if they were hoping to keep people locked into their own little "capture eyeballs" business model .. oh well.)
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
That's no extension. IT'S A TRAP!
How about we just stop excepting their ideas, much like they do to us (or take it as their own). Stop having Linux just play "catch up" with them.
May I point out that when IE extended the abilities of the WWW, we ended up with worms and exploits up the wazoo.
XMLHttpRequest was one of those extensions and it's given us Gmail and other "AJAX" interfaces. Not all extension is bad; if it was how the heck would the industry progress?
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
"Any takers on whether or not they'll attempt to patent these extensions, and make sure that they cannot be licensed in a manner compatible with the GPL?"
You mean like GPL code is licensed to be compatible with everyone else?
In 2030, as mankind pulls itself out of the ashes caused by the great net meltdown of 2006, observers will point to Microsoft's extension of RSS as the straw that broke the camel's back.
Hey! I've got a great new extension for our Microsoft friends. I call it "TTF", or "The Third Finger." And it's so efficient it only requires one-fifth the bandwidth of that needed for an entire spanking.
Please guys. Stop breaking things.
The WONDERFUL extensions to LDAP, DNS, DHCP, and many more? UGH
while true ; do echo this is my sig; done
*sigh* No, Microsoft, you may not add the evil bit to RSS!
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
"Microsoft just has to be a childish brat and do things its own way."
As opposed to Linux and it's three different incompatible windowing environments, and two* different sound servers.
*Three if you include Gstreamer.
..they change the acronym to RCS.
No, Notes is a stable secure environment that allows extreamly rapid development, with very simple yet powerful administration. It's biggest problem was that while MS added eye candy to Exchange, Lotus worked on security and features.
MS was also allowed to pervert the term "Groupware" into meaning email and calandering. Back around '87 or '88 MS was out touring Exchange and promising that it would be a Notes killer, but every time they were asked if it could do tasks that was simple in Notes, the answer was "Not, yet but it's planned for the next version." Well it didn't take long before MS just gave up and started telling people that "Groupware" was email and calandering. Now you see dozens of applications that claim to be groupware. Most would have been laughed at for that claim in the '80s.
Being a Notes/Domino fan, let me tell you what IS wrong with Notes.
1) Poor control of the front end classes. It is problimatic to dynamically create objects in the client.
2) No native Linux client. They do have a native Linux server. (as well as many other OSs) 3) The JVM is built in, and is often a version behind what is in broad use. 4) Printing is a bit weak. That's about it.
Dear Everyone On The Internet,
What an odd word.
Signed,
Microsoft
-- This void intentionally left null.
Well that post took a while to appear.
-- The Heineken Uncertainty Principle: You can never be sure how many bears you had last night.
Don't say that about Microsoft, that's just ignorance, you're being ignorant.
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
...we mobile users have been able to synchronize PIM data for years using this great, free (as in beer) service
You need to go talk to Netscape and the WC3. Then you will realize that Microsoft comes by their reputation honestly. Dude, these are people you really don't want showing up at your party and your all for sending out invitations. You must be young.
Because supporting a standard is nothing you can brag to potential customers about. Extending $BUZZWORD so that it does things that are extremely necessary ever since We Said So gives the company the image of someone who gets the things done that other people couldn't.
I say it's at least 70% marketing.
USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)
I fail to see how Microsoft can take an open, XML-based, plain text format that is ratified in numerous RFCs, and somehow "corrupt it" amd make it unuseable by adding some extra extentions.
Hell, these extentions would not even break existing clients, the parser would just not do anything with the new nodes and attributes!
But on the other hand, you are Evolution and want to sync with Outlook, this would be *great*.
Honestly, with you guys Microsoft is damned if they to (try to create an open standard for synching datebooks via RSS) and damned if they don't (keep their systems proprietary and incompatable).
Microsoft's RSS Checklist:
1) Embrace
2) Extend
3) Extinguish
RSS 2.0 has one simple rule for extensions: put it in its own damn namespace; any RSS 2.0 tag remains in the default namespace and no new attributes or tags can be used that are in the default namespace unless specified by the standard. OPML (also written by Winer) is the same way.
As such, this spec does not break RSS 2.0 or require any RSS 2.0 feed reader to change if it simply wants to ignore the extension (the way most RSS readers just ignore extensions). Winer wrote the spec that way specifically so extensions are just that, extensions, not ways to break the file.
My only gripe is that it looks as though it has introduced yet another date format to parse. Dates are different for RSS 0.91/2.0 and 1.0 and it's really obnoxious to deal with.
"But remember, most lynch mobs aren't this nice." (H.Simpson)
-- Joe
Are you sure that they haven't joined in? Since they are major players in WebDAV (even if their implementation can be squirrelly), I'd be surprised if they didn't have someone involved in a big way. (I tried to find a membership list to check, but first must have coffeeee...)
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
How about they start by implementing current standards first?
http://tinyurl.com/72rs5 I think it's good, and the extension is necessary, but the standard should be well-designed.
A collegue of mine posted some ASP.NET code on SourceForge back in July for providing Exchange mailbox data (Not just Calendar items -- Inbox, Calendar, Tasks, everything) via RSS feed:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/exrss/
*** Quantum Mechanics: The Dreams of Which Stuff is Made ***
The second form is not only smaller, but easier to process, because a ASCII sort of the 'when' values is sufficient to determine which represents an earlier moment in time.
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
I know this is slightly off-topic, but I'm not sure why anyone would want to use Lotus Notes. Outlook, for all its problems, is certainly better than anything IBM/Lotus has come out with. We use Notes 5 at work, which means we're behind by about 8 years or so. Anyway, the folks in my group here at work use a connector so we can use Outlook. I think the better solution for the problem that Microsoft is trying to solve is to buy out Lotus Notes and destroy it. Forget RSS extensions.
Download the connector here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?Fa milyID=8EBBBA59-5F17-4E52-8980-C4F0DFA92D65&displa ylang=en
Grammar Lesson: you're is a contraction of "you are"; your means you possess something; yore means days gone by.
okay, now how can i find a anti-RSSvirus engine?? would norton work??!! someone has to let clamAV know about this...
Why does everyone have to keep reinventing the wheel. Or is it just another case of NIH?
/ syncml/syncmlindex.html
SyncML has been a standard syncronisation protocol now for several years, and it is even XML based. But MS has consistantly ignored it from what I can see.
http://www.openmobilealliance.org/tech/affiliates
Finally we can get VoIP and such other nice things on our RSS !!!
Thanks Microsoft!
Fabio Aquotte
The list is long, but here are some.
* An simple yet complete Access Control List. It starts at the connection to the server and works it way all the way down to the specific fields you want to give access to.
* A simply yet complete Execution Control List.
* Replication. No one does it better or easier
* Extreamly simple to set up and maintain load balancing.
* Simple clustering.
* Multiplatform. Many for the server, fewer for the client.
* Write once run anywhere development.
* The ability to have multiple people that are not currently connected to each other to work in the same database at the same time. Notes understands the difference between a 'copy' and a 'replica'. If you and I are running from the same copy with different replicas, we can make changes at different unconnected places, and it will not break the application.
* A simple API that gives access almost all aspects of the environment. Depending on where the code is going, you have the choice between 'Simple Actions' (Simple wizard), @Formula (like original 1-2-3 or excel macros), LotusScript (Basic), Java, or Javascript.
* HTML rendering inside of the client
* Runtime on the fly native application auto-conversion to HTML/Javascript. Not 100%, but it gets you 80% of the way there. This allows mixed client/browser applications.
* Secure
* No rip and replace. Notes v1 apps still run in v6.5, and I have no reason to believe they won't run in v7 to be released in January.
* A commitment to interop with standards. Many features in Notes were not standardized, or even existant when Notes was created, but as standards have emerged, Lotus has interface to them. i.e. SMTP, POP3, IMAP, LDAP, SQL, Java, XML, HTML, URLs...
* Stable.
* Simple administration. I have seen receptionists trained to be administrators in a week, and successfully perform the job. I'm not talking about shining stars that just never got the chance, but people that were topping out on skill sets as receptionists.
* The ability to keep using your HTML based applications even disconnected from the server. i.e. on an airplane.
* I could keep going on...
One of the reasons Notes has such a bad reputation is that the barier to entry is so low that companies will often assign whoever is the first person to use it as the adminstrators and developers. If you are going to just use Notes as an email server, that might be ok, but the people soon end up out of their scope when asked to develop applications that require an actual developer to do the work.
As for what I do with it, here are some of the applications I have developed:
* Multiple help desk systems
* Injury tracking
* Root Cause Analysis
* Repair assignemnt and tracking
* Various simple calendering apps link vacation tracking and such...
* Medical testing scheduling
* Time card applications
* Resource tracking
* Training compliance and tracking
* Applicant tracking
* Intern tracking
* Sales Management
* Various discussion applications
* Employee Appraisal
* Order Inquiry
* Various web based questionairs
* Photo Hosting
* Recipie book
Anything else I can't think of off the top of my head.
These were not slapped together, just make it work applications, but full end user apps that notify users (nag when it warrents) via email, escalate when necessary, and implement the various business logic that is necessary to keep data in a consistant state. Some use a browser as a client, some use Notes as the client, and many use both, determined by the task and user.
So, yes, if you work at a company that has Notes/Domino, and your only using it for email, your company is missing out on a very good application platform.
The company that I do the bulk of my work for has one employee that works with me. She was an admin type that fell into the position. She is now a very low end developer. She handles testing, form/view design, and can edit some code to fix some errors. Between her and I, we crank out 3 to 4 full end user application a year, while she also supports all existing applications that are in production.
If you'll notice the licensing on the specification, it's the Creative Commons Share-alike license. For a corporation that hates the GPL, this seems odd.