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Microsoft & SanDisk To Provide Desktop on Thumb Drive
Jesus Christ writes "An Information Week article reports that Microsoft is teaming up with SanDisk to provide users a complete image of their desktops in their pockets, allowing them access not only to their data...but also their applications and user interface setup while on the go. 'The companies plan to add a security layer to the offering using SanDisk's TrustedFlash security and digital rights management technology. The effort will elevate "simple flash storage to a whole new level of customer benefit," said Will Poole, corporate VP for Microsoft's Market Expansion Group. Microsoft also plans to seek out third party-hardware developers to support the initiative, the company said. As part of the plan, SanDisk will phase out its U3 technology, which adds some smart features to USB devices. Independent software developers that have created U3-compatible applications will be offered help migrating their products to the new technology, which has yet to be named.'"
Funny, nowadays anything that has "trusted" in it seems to me like something I have to distrust...
I RTFA, it will support XP. I jumped the gun!
Hax-fu?
...when a program was a single executable file?
And by "file" I mean made of manila paper, and by "executable" I mean with holes punched in it.
Seriously though, why aren't most modern desktop applications portable by design?
Read my Very Short "Stories"
We've done this on Linux, including supporting checkpointing the state (very quick, its under a second ignoring writeback time, which is a function of the device one wants to use) so one can migrate to a different machine where one can restart it.
a c2006_fordist.pdf
http://www.ncl.cs.columbia.edu/publications/comps
It looks to me like MS finally caught on to Portable Applications and BartPE bootable CDs or USB sticks.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
Windows on a stick? Yes, sounds familiar.... oh, sorry, that was 'shit on a stick'
Seriously though, I wonder what nick names will be found for this product?
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
I don't know whether to cheer that the U3 flash drives are going away, or to tremble in fear of what these new ones will do.
I manage college computer labs, and those damn U3 drives have been a recurring hassle. They try to auto-install software on every Windows machine they come into contact with, and require two drive letters (which doesn't work so well in an environment where several key letters are already in use). When used on a Mac, they mount an extra pseudo CD on the desktop, loaded with software that's obviously (but not to many students) utterly useless. If this is in any way an extension or "improvement" upon that, then my job is about to get even harder.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Microsoft has also announced they will start producing a revolutionary new device, enabling for much more efficient transport of goods. They are calling it the Microsoft Wheel.
I had visions of hitting a button on my thumb drive and getting a huge desktop folded out that I can rest things on. You know, my notebook, my feet, that 5th cup of coffee...
More Twoson than Cupertino
digital rights management technology
Ooooh, so close to not being crap!
It will only run on Vista.
I didn't realize that there was an 80G thumb drive
It'll be interesting to see how application licensing works for something like this...
Everyone is doing this already. Ok... everyone except Microsoft. You've been able to run a complete version of Linux or OSX off of a USB drive for a while now.
Hey, is that a desktop in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
I read Usenet for the articles.
So, they're pretty much trying to create a copy of MojoPac (wikipedia entry) and call it their own? MojoPac does the same thing for Windows, but it's not tied to a single physical device. The good part about this is that when I upgraded from an iPod to an external HD, I was able to take the entire setup with me without a problem. Unfortunately for MS, they are teaming up with a flash disk manufacturer rather than an HD maker. I found that trying to run any real app such as Office off a flash drive was impossibly slow. The reason I upgraded from my iPod to an custom external 7200rpm drive was for the sake of speed. The iPod was faster than running off a flash disk, but was still too slow for most things. Now, I can run all the important applications (e.g. GIMP, and WoW) without any noticeable performance hit off my external drive via MojoPac. It will be interesting to see how MS/Sandisk compare in terms of performance speed to MojoPac. Given how bad U3 was, I would be surprised if they can get it fast enough to run any games off of the device. Unless they can get enough performance off the flash disk to run Office, I don't see them as being a real competitor to MojoPac.
Just let me have "My Briefcase" so I can synchronize my files with my floppy disk. There's no way this would be more successful a feature than that!
64GB should be close enough
Yes, it's largely a BIOS problem. BIOS is a freaking travesty of junk 20-year-old code zealously protected by a evil, backward-looking cabal of motherboard and BIOS vendors. It's slow and nonstandardized and often buggy, and it needlessly initializes lots of hardware that's going to be reinitialized by the operating system anyway. Of course, it would be great if we were all running LinuxBIOS, like the OLPC is. It can go from power-on to kernel load in about 1 second, and is completely modular and customizable. Oh, and it can boot Windows and xBSD and probably OSX too. But unfortunately, the chipset and motherboard vendors mostly don't release their docs, so the odds that your desktop mobo is supported by LinuxBIOS are sadly very small.
/dev/sdg1 or /dev/hda1). This goes a long way to making it easy to install Linux distros on portable drives.
/dev/whatever, so it won't get confused when you move it from computer to computer. Unfortunately you will still have to figure out how to make each computer boot from USB in the first place, because BIOS IS SO FREAKING GHETTO!
All that being said... with modern Linux kernels (2.6.1+ I believe) you can mount partitions based on the UUIDs stored in the partition table (e.g. 8F3B6029A471238F), rather than by what particular interface BIOS sez they're connected to (e.g.
With Ubuntu Edgy or Feisty, you *can* simply install Linux to a USB hard disk (I've done it without a hitch). It will look for the hard disk partitions based on UUID rather than
My bicyles
Since they plan on doing something from scratch (from what I understand), how about defining open standards that could be used on any platform?
.xml files and keep it simple.
I know some things can't be cross-platforms (executables, etc), others can (wallpaper, keyboard, mouse, language, international, email and IM settings, etc).
Put everything in pure (i.e., non-"Microsoft-enhanced")
Seeing as Microsoft is part of this initiative, however, I predict that "cross-platform" will mean "Windows Vista and future versions of Windows".
It will not be a portable run-anywhere-on-x86-liveUSB like Knoppix or DSL. It will be another useless piece of shit.
'Once scientists, even the dim-witted social scientists, get muzzled, the Western Civilization is finished.' - oldhack
Both...
But we all know the only thing that can shrink Windows that much would be a black hole.
09F911029D74E35BD84156C5635688C0
+2 Troll is Slashdot's way of saying groupthink is confused
I had to blitz a memory stick for my father-in-law. As I recall, this program hung while reformatting the stick. Scary, but it did work.
Just use PortableApps.com today. It has better compatibility, working with most Windows OSes (95, 98, Me, 2000, XP, 2003, Vista) as well as Wine under *nix. It's open so you can add any software that's already portable to it. And it's much more popular than U3 ever was, with over 20,000,000 apps downloaded. Plus it works from any drive you'd like: USB flash drive, iPod, portable hard drive, network share, etc... so you're never tied down.
Portable versions of Firefox, GIMP, LibreOffice, etc
You put it on the retractable cup holder labeled CDRW same as everybody else !
I've been doing this for years, going clear back to toting a Zip disk around with me that had Eudora on it, executing the program from the disk along with carrying the files I'm working with at the time.
I'm doing this now with my sandisk titanium Cruzer 2 Gig. I've got my email client, Eudora, that runs just fine executing from the flash drive. My FTP client, leapftp is similar. Effectively, my "My Documents" resides on the flash drive, too. Then there's the suite of portable applications from http://portableapps.com/ I use portable Firefox, OO and Putty and have lots of room left over on the 2 Gig drive.
Since all that good stuff is on that little flash drive, I back it up automatically every night so if I lose it, it's no biggie. Encryption is a good idea..
I'm with the other comments about being nervous if MS is running the show. It's going to be more about restrictions than enabling.
"Do the Right Thing. It will gratify some people and astound the rest." - Mark Twain
And after you have dropped a large stack of punch cards, you will realize that the good old days SUCKed. In addition, the card reader was monster. ppl like to remenese about the GOOD OLD DAYS, with out realizing that it is all relative. I like today. Just because MS and other companies are issues, does not mean that things are that bad.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
"As part of the plan, SanDisk will phase out its U3 technology, which adds some smart features to USB devices."
Translation.
'Our U3 technology was crap, especially when compared to what was already out there' (see the other posts on this topic).
"Independent software developers that have created U3-compatible applications will be offered help migrating their products to the new technology, which has yet to be named..."
Translation.
'We're getting into bed with MS, who have a solid history of fucking-over third-party sw developers, and end-users, (the Zune episode springs to mind). So, eh, kiss your investment goodbye, suckers!
Meanwhile, go download the stand-alone versions of Firefox and Thunderbird if you want portability.
But if you're serious about your data, DO NOT mix the OS & application environment with user data on that key. My main PC has a separate partition for data on the disk. If the OS, (any one of them), gets screwed, no problem - reinstall. Data not affected...
and all of the other IT guys out there trying to secure workstations and networks...
Thanks SanDisk and Microsoft!
"Just Smile and Nod." --Huck
I did not know what U3 was when I got my 512 MB SanDisk, which I got simply because it was the cheapest per MB available at the time. When I plugged it in I noticed that it wanted to install a bunch of garbage. So I unplugged it, held shift down, plugged it back in, and watched it install itself as a normal flash drive. I deleted all the pre-existing crap on the drive, and never had another problem with it.
Brackets contain world's first nanosig, highly magnified:[.]
Needless to say, if anyone really used it, that would be a meaningful statement. Now, Joe User will think MS/SD is the ideal solution.
If Linux users want to be relevant, they need to court Joe User and not try to alienate him. They need to provide stuff he wants, like a huge ready to go software base he can get on his next trip to Costco/Best Buy/WalMart. Careful now, you scoff, and you'll be engaging in the exact behavior that turns Joe User off.
You want to take on MS, then take Joe User away from him. Apple was successful in pulling Artsy Fartsy Franky from MS, Linux needs Joe User.
But, if all this doesn't matter to you, then don't complain when MS does something and people like me let you know you had your chance. Win the war, adopt a strategy that will beat MS.
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
"The companies plan to add a security layer to the offering using SanDisk's TrustedFlash security and digital rights management technology. The effort will elevate "simple flash storage to a whole new level of customer benefit"
The first thing Microsoft cares about in this endeaver is DRM?
And this is going to provide "a whole new level of customer benefit"?
I don't think so.
If Microsoft wants to make USB useful, let Windows XP and Vista be booted off it...(Yes, I know somebody has finally made this possible but success seems to be limited.)
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
I'll be sure to ask my employer to open up the firewall to I can "sftp" into my home box. That sounds a lot easier than an automated ~/ mount from a four-inch thumbdrive I can carry around in my pocket.
You can run sftp on any port you want, so you don't have to ask anyone for anything.
If your boss shares the extreme ignorance and paranoia expressed in the first sentence, nothing you want will work. Your employer epoxied the USB ports years ago and will never purchase or turn on whatever will allow your marvelous automounting security hole.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
I'm not sure how much the DSL takes up when used with a USB drive, except that they will gladly sell you a 128MB USB drive with its 50MB image on it. I've currently got the 50MB DSL image running in VMWare on a work computer (keeps from having to bug the boss who's not totally convinced on OSS, but gives me, as QA, the leeway to use whatever I need.) Anyway, if you haven't guessed, DSL's image, fully running, is 50MB.
Problem: USB drives are widespread, standardized, and allow users of many competing platforms such as Mac and Linux to exchange data freely with Windows boxes.
Solution: this thing.
Viper is the preferred editor of the Emacs operating system.