When Software Leaks (and What Really Goes Down)

Bryant writes "The Windows community is somewhat notorious for leaks from upcoming versions of Windows (obligatory link to this guy since that's most of what he does), and while the official PR word from Microsoft and many other companies with regards to leaks is a simple 'no comment,' no one has really gotten a candid, inside look at the various things that go down when word, screenshots, or builds of upcoming software leak. I managed to get some time with a senior Microsoft employee for the sake of discussing leaks, and the conclusions reached (leaks heavily affect communication, not so much the product schedule) as well as what these guys actually have to deal with whenever someone leaks a build, breaks an embargo, etc. may actually be a surprise given what most companies try to instill in the public mind."

Comments

I always had the impression

[Presto Vivace]

the Microsoft leaks were a calculated way to build public interest in new products. But what do I know.

Re:I always had the impression

[Anonymous Coward]

I think they still are, this guy was talking about unplanned leaks, which would mean that there are also planned leaks.

Re:I always had the impression

[Foredecker]

I'm a relatively senior development manager in Windows and no, they are not calculated or deliberate. There is no super secrete leak committee. Leaks are a big hassle.

Re:I always had the impression

[SEWilco]

secrete leak

Heh.

Re:I always had the impression

[Nefarious Wheel]

Never show a child or a fool a thing half-finished.

Re:I always had the impression

[lukas84]

That's above your paygrade.

Re:I always had the impression

[Sir_Lewk]

There is no super secrete leak committee.

See, this statement is logically flawed.

If you knew about it, and told us it existed, then it would not in fact be "secrete" and thus not exist. Your absense of knowledge of this "super secrete" committee is similarly in no way prove of it's nonexistance. Furthermore, if the the committee does in fact exist and you are aware of it, then you denying its existance would be expected.

Re:I always had the impression

[larkost]

Never show a child or a fool a thing half-finished.

Then how exactly are we supposed to show management that we are actually getting something done?

Re:I always had the impression

[JohnnyBGod]

You must really like people talking trash about the work you do, to hang around here.

Re:I always had the impression

[Sir_Sri]

Leaks have a lot of different causes. They can be someone trying to get their 15 minutes of fame for the leak, or a disgruntled employee trying to make things look bad. They can be communication from the devs to management that things are not in a good state and the leak forces the issue. They can, as you describe, be intentionally done by marketting types (though it's unlikely MS would need or want to do this, since anyone really interested in MS products can get in on various builds that actually work). They can be from hackers trying to find a new malware vector, or just some hacker showing off where they got into. They can also, like closed beta's or the like (or any 'secret' information that say, everyone in the Army knows) be something sufficiently widely distributed it isn't public - but you know it's not perfectly final either.

Re:I always had the impression

[Anonymous Coward]

That's what PowerPoint is for. You have to speak to them in their own language (i.e. pictures and text so simple as to be inaccurate) ;)

Re:I always had the impression

[6ULDV8]

That's exactly what I'd expect the Secret Leak Committee to say.

Re:I always had the impression

[hairyfeet]

Or to bullshit the press and the competition when your product doesn't cut the mustard, see The yellow road to Cairo as an example. No matter what you think of MSFT you really have to give them credit, because their early 90s products compared to the competition (NextSTEP, OS2, even System 7) were really pretty shitty, but by throwing enough BS and a few well placed leaks with the press they made everyone think they had a super OS waiting in the wings just getting the finishing touches put on it.

To be able to kick the competitor's asses without actually having a product is pretty damned impressive in my book, and proves that in the right hands with careful planning leaks can be a powerful tool. What was it old Jack Trammell said? Business is war? Well it is pretty impressive to me to kick your competition off the battlefield by just the illusion of having the bigger gun.

Re:I always had the impression

[Presto Vivace]

They can also be bogus, as in where a reporter just makes stuff up, but not in the case of the article cited above.

Re:I always had the impression

[shutdown -p now]

You must really like people talking trash about the work you do, to hang around here.

Imagine the sheer joy of writing /. post that exalts the virtues of Win7, lambasts Apple, pokes fun at Google, and has a well-hidden pun on Linux, and getting it modded to "+5, Insightful" - because it really is that well-written.

It's as rare as you think it is, but it does happen.

~

Re:I always had the impression

[shentino]

Yes, planned leaks.

Also known as beta versions.

Re:I always had the impression

[Anonymous Coward]

That's actually pretty shallow and closed-minded. I used to be on the "other side" and always wondered what the big deal with powerpoint was.

It's like this - unlike COMPUTERS, people need to be engaged. When you're role in the business is to be face to face with people almost 110% of the time, you WILL be busy. It's not like say, creating an automated install with your company's logo that installs MS OFFICE off the SMB server afterwards giving you 20 minutes to fuck around with.

Sometimes you really only have 10 minutes to digest everything.

Other times though, your comment is completely warranted: 10 minute powerpoint and 50 minute social / cinnamon roll

Re:I always had the impression

[Nefarious Wheel]

That's what PowerPoint is for. You have to speak to them in their own language (i.e. pictures and text so simple as to be inaccurate) ;)p>

That's what PowerPoint is used badly for.

The best use is as a sort of wallpaper you use to give people a fixed visual link for the things you are saying. Think of it as an index to the stuff you want them to remember, a key phrase that your audience can use as an association for the stuff you want them to remember - you do the actual talking, the communicating. Use pictures a lot.

And if you really want people to remember, have popcorn popping or some other good smell happening, because the olfactory sense seems to be hardwired into wetware memory logic. (People buy more when they're hungry, too).

The worst use of PowerPoint is to use it as a way to present detailed information. Crowd the slides and you lose. A PP slide is something to talk about. It's no good trying to make it carry the whole message.

Oh, and use whitespace. Short messages are easier to read.

Re:I always had the impression

[Sir_Sri]

true enough

Re:I always had the impression

[Philip_the_physicist]

There is no Cabal^HSecret Leak Committee

Best Regards,
The Cabal

Re:I always had the impression

[dbIII]

It's not just the early 1990s - remember all the things that Longhorn was supposed to do and how it was going to be an OS X killer? What we actually got was Vista with it's main redeeming feature being eyecandy no better than we saw in the Enlightenment window manager back before Slashdot even existed, let alone what OS X was by the time Vista came out.

Re:I always had the impression

[0ld_d0g]

That's why I cant eat out anymore and have started wearing a tin foil hat. They're watching me, dammit ! They can read my thoughts ! Every week I send them letters to call off the watch but they keep denying it.. aaargh !~

Re:I always had the impression

[cerberusss]

To be able to kick the competitor's asses without actually having a product is pretty damned impressive in my book

In my book, this is cold and calculated, and doing business in the cut-throat way. I hate it, because it can kill fledgling entrepreneurs with good ideas but no steady cashflow.

I think it's totally unethical. But then again, I probably won't get rich.

Re:I always had the impression

[commodore64_love]

Darn. I thought this article would be about memory leaks, which make programs like Firefox inexplicable grow from 50,000 to 500,000 bytes of RAM, even after I close all the tabs. I never understood that behavior.

Re:I always had the impression

[KnownIssues]

[...]they are not calculated or deliberate. There is no super secrete leak committee.

That's exactly what a super secret leak committee would want people to think!

Re:I always had the impression

[Bob-taro]

Your absense of knowledge of this "super secrete" committee

"Absense"? People who don't spell check shouldn't throw stones.

Re:I always had the impression

[hairyfeet]

But that is the way the game has been played since the beginning. Look up "The History of Commodore" and see what old Jack did to gain advantages. Not paying contractors, screwing over his own programmers, pretty much that old guy would have stolen candy from a baby if it would have given one of his companies a leg up, and it made him a buttload of cash.

And don't forget this little gem (sorry I don't remember who gave this quote) that sociopath behavior is frowned upon unless you are a CEO, where it is rewarded. Business has always been filled by back stabbing assholes. Look up the history of any major CEO in computing history and I'm sure you'll find plenty of true asshat behavior, from Jobs lying to Woz about how much they were getting for their first sales, to Gates screwing Spyglass out of IE. You may not like it, but in business being the bigger prick usually makes you the richer prick.

Re:I always had the impression

[RobertM1968]

Apparently, what you know is the truth, that this guy is trying to obsfucate. Otherwise people like the examples listed would have been fined/sued/jailed (or some combination of 2 or more of the above) quite some time ago.

Re:I always had the impression

[oscartheduck]

I'm responding to this because earlier posts from you have seemed to be on the level.

Firefox stores the history of each tab in RAM. So if you reopen a tab with ctrl-alt-T (presumably, it's command-alt-T in Mac OS) then to maintain this behaviour the tab has to reopen with its history intact. Because that history is stored in RAM, this means that merely closing a Firefox tab does little to minimise its memory usage. There's an about::config flag to alter this behaviour, but I don't know it offhand.

Re:I always had the impression

[Nefarious Wheel]

ga;ty

Calling jcr. How was this handled at Apple?

[Anonymous Coward]

John C. Randolph, how were leaks handled at Apple?

Does their method of handling leaks reflect the vastly different culture at Apple versus, say, Microsoft, Oracle and IBM?

They are effective even if they aren't quality

[psnINsplPL]

Microsoft is very effective at marketing in a fashion that gets many people interested in their products.

It also gets people that would normally dislike their products curious about what's going on and trying them.

I've watched it happen for so many years now that I know it to be a fact!

Re:They are effective even if they aren't quality

[Stupendoussteve]

It has nothing to do with marketing "in a fashion", that is the definition of marketing period.

Apple could be viewed the same way.

Re:They are effective even if they aren't quality

[Jesus_666]

However, Apple didn't hold a monopoly while having an abysmal track record in things like security or doing what the software is supposed to do (I'm looking at you, IE). I mean, Microsoft held their monopolies for years while Windows and IE were the butt of jokes made even by rather nontechnical users.

'Surprise'

[fridaynightsmoke]

Was the surprise the lack of surprises?

I would summarise that interview as "When builds leak they might be incomplete or old, and people may get a wrong impression of what the product will be like. This causes my phone to ring which is a pain in the ass"

No real surprises there.

Re:'Surprise'

[SilverHatHacker]

This causes my phone to ring which is a pain in the ass

I suggest you don't sit on it when it's set on "Power-vibrate".

Re:'Surprise'

[NoYob]

This causes my phone to ring which is a pain in the ass

Well, he shouldn't sit on his phone.It wouldn't be a pain in the ass then, would it?

Geeze!

Unless, he's kinky and well I won't go there.

Re:'Surprise'

[RAMMS EIN]

``I would summarise that interview as "When builds leak they might be incomplete or old, and people may get a wrong impression of what the product will be like. This causes my phone to ring which is a pain in the ass"''

Also, if the issue is that leaked builds give people wrong impressions about your product, why don't you release builds that give the right impression? I can see the argument for wanting to keep things under wraps, but if reality is that builds get out there, you might as well ensure that they are the builds you sanction. You know, "release early, release often", and people won't get the wrong impression about what is really going on.

Re:'Surprise'

[tehniobium]

Yeh, I was hoping for the MIA (MS Internal Affairs) who are a CSI type outfit to come in and kick the hell out of everybody ;)

Or at least something more surprising and "insiderish" than this BS.

Then again I should know not to RTFA ;)

Re:'Surprise'

[Killotron]

Microsoft had a huge beta program for Windows 7, and those are the versions that Microsoft wants people to test and run. The biggest problem is that internal builds, which were never meant to go public, sometimes make it out, because a lot of people aren't making the correct distinction between released builds and questionable leaked builds. They could include alternate approaches that alter APIs, scaring the hell out of partners, new (possibly major) bugs that haven't been caught by QA, or simply be incomplete or old. When people see these, and think that this reflective of the quality or direction of the software, that's a big problem for a guy in marketing that tries to communicate the quality and direction of the software.

Let's be honest here - if you want to play around with NeatOpenSourceProject, are you going to go to sourceforge and download the newest daily build, or are you going to go download the latest release, regardless of how much older it may be?

You know

[Turzyx]

It's suprising how many times one person can, you know, say "you know" in one interview. For the record, it was 22 times, don't you know...

Re:You know

[fridaynightsmoke]

It's suprising how many times one person can, you know, say "you know" in one interview. For the record, it was 22 times, don't you know...

Well, you know, it can, erm, you know, act as a very effective, er, space-filler, you know, when you're, erm, trying to think of what to say next, if you know what I mean.

Re:You know

[poofmeisterp]

It's suprising how many times one person can, you know, say "you know" in one interview.

For the record, it was 22 times, don't you know...

Don't you know is from Minnesota, don't you know? :>

Re:You know

[selven]

Try listening to people in casual unprepared (speech, not text) conversation. You'll be surprised how many nonsense syllables people use because their thought can't keep up with their speaking.

Re:You know

[poofmeisterp]

Try listening to people in casual unprepared (speech, not text) conversation. You'll be surprised how many nonsense syllables people use because their thought can't keep up with their speaking.

You know, sometimes things just make sense. You know? I mean, there are some things that I don't, you know, think a lot about, until, you know, I see a good comment on, you know, the issue I, well, you know, missed.

Good one, selven! :)

I have the opposite issue. Mind races, mouth tries to keep up. Words get dropped from the middle of sentences. ;)

Re:You know

[psnINsplPL]

I have the opposite issue. Mind races, mouth tries to keep up. Words get dropped from the middle of sentences. ;)

I hear ya on that one! I've been made fun of constantly because of the dropped words. Jumping from thought to thought requires too much vocal time for that kind of communication.

Re:You know

[sopssa]

Another thing was the constant "Right." answer from the interviewee.

Re:You know

[dubbayu_d_40]

As someone who often speaks publicly, I have trained myself to replace "ummm" with "you know." It works very well in verbal communication because it buys the speaker time and doesn't make either party uncomfortable or appear dumb. I guess it doesn't translate well to print, I'll have to remember that should I be interviewed.

Re:You know

[dj_tla]

It's common practice for a journalist to strip those nonsense syllables from an audio interview transcribed to text. Just sayin'.

Re:You know

[sixteenbitsamurai]

Minnesotans will vehemently disagree and tell you Canadians speak like that, then Canadians will turn around and cuss you out in French. Really though, nobody talks like that except old folks of Scandinavian descent and no one else in Minnesota does unless you are an asshole tourist looking to get your ass kicked. As a matter of fact, the actual "accent" or "dialect" we possess, or rather the lack of an accent or dialect, is often emulated by television and movie actors because the quality of our spoken English is the most clear and easily understood in the United States.

If you really want to make fun of Minnesotan speech, try slurring like a drunk. The town I grew up in, population not exceeding 2,000, has about a dozen bars. The town I live in now has about twenty, with over a dozen of those on main street, as well as three liquor stores on main as well, with a population of about 8,500 people. Drinking and driving isn't an issue around here, it's a competitive sport. So basically if you talk like you've had about a case of beer in one sitting, you'll sound like a Minnesotan, or rather, an Iron Ranger. Beyond that, we really don't have any obvious speech deficiencies, permanent effects of prolonged alcohol abuse notwithstanding.

Either way, I'm not so much proud of where I live (I'm really not) as much as I can't stand the ridiculous idea that everyone in Minnesota "speak like dat stupid woman from dat Fargo movie, oh ya doncha know. Uff da!"

Re:You know

[inode_buddha]

Like, totally....

Re:You know

[turing_m]

As a matter of fact, the actual "accent" or "dialect" we possess, or rather the lack of an accent or dialect

Yes, after all those thousands of years English has been evolving and mutating, it finally finds perfect expression without accent or dialect in, of all places, Minnesota, USA. Coincidentally, where you were born and raised. What are the chances? How lucky you are!

p.s. when your bridge gets fixed, consider a road trip.

Re:You know

[ceoyoyo]

Also the "right" every other paragraph where the blogger felt he had to insert something he said so he could remind the reader that it was actually an interview and not a guest blogger.

Re:You know

[oldhack]

You betcha!

Re:You know

[kaizokuace]

Yea "don't you know" is like part of their syntax for the midwest markup language MML. It's the same as in HTML.

Re:You know

[nametaken]

As someone who grew up in a different region and travels to Minnesota on occasion, I'm quite comfortable confirming that you folks do speak that way. Of course us Chicago natives apparently sound like Coach Ditka in the SNL skits. ;)

It's more pronounced in da U.P. though, eh. We haav a place dare too, eh.

Re:You know

[fridaynightsmoke]

Right

Re:You know

[skiman1979]

"you know" can still be distracting in public speaking, especially if you say it a lot. Are you suggesting that I already know the things you are telling me in your speech? If so, then why are you telling me these things? Is your speech insignificant? :)

People tend to say 'umm' and the like a lot less in 1 on 1 conversations than they do when speaking to an audience. If you can pick different audience members to make eye contact with during different parts of your speech, like you are talking directly to that person, you may notice you use less of these verbal crutches.

Silence can also be a nice tool. Silence gives the audience a moment to let your message 'sink in' while you moving to the next point. It also gives you a moment to gather your thoughts if you lose your place while the audience thinks about what you've said... as long as you don't pause too often.

Re:You know

[poofmeisterp]

My father grew up there, so he and my grandfather have mentioned several times when we discussed Kansas, Iowa, and Minnesota, that MN was the one with the accent. That's where I get my info from.

I'll add yours onto the stack, as well. That's how people learn; listening to others. It's a shame that so many people are hard-set on themselves being 100% right all of the time.

...and no, I'm not referring to you. I'm talking about everyone. I was actually glad to see your message. Me likey the learning. :)

Re:You know

[poofmeisterp]

Yea "don't you know" is like part of their syntax for the midwest markup language MML. It's the same as in HTML.

See, SOME people get humor ;)

Re:You know

[Jesus_666]

But, you know, it could've been, like, totally worse.

Re:You know

[Jesus_666]

There are places like that. For instance, standard High German is virtually identical to the Hannover dialect. Being from Lower Saxony* I find it very slightly sad that my area doesn't have much of an accent. We're 100 km north of Hannover so our language is colored ever so slightly but if I want to get any noticeable local color I have to mix in Low German, which is a different language altogether. Which I don't really speak.


* For all non-German readers: Hannover is the capital of Lower Saxony.

Re:You know

[toddestan]

You know, that's not a bad idea, you know. Though it may get old after a while, you know. So I would try and use it sparingly, you know.

Oh, THOSE leaks

[domulys]

It took me a few minutes to realize that we were't talking about memory leaks.

I've been spending too much time with Valgrind lately...

Re:Oh, THOSE leaks

[Culture20]

It took me a few minutes to realize that we were't talking about memory leaks.

You're not alone. I blame the editor. Software can *be* leaked (dispersed before official release), but software doesn't leak by itself except as memory leaks (and maybe software that controls hydroelectric dams or sprinkler systems). The title should be "When Software is Leaked", but it's not as "actiony" sounding.

Re:Oh, THOSE leaks

[cliath]

Took you a few minutes to read the summary?

...with whenever someone leaks a build...

I don't believe the article.

[tjstork]

I think the "anonymous softie", the over use of colloquial communication's - "you know", shows that this interview was entirely made up.

Re:I don't believe the article.

[Foredecker]

I'm a relatively senior development manager in Windows. Your right, this sounds made up. If the anonymous person is a real MSFT employee, then it doesn't sound like someone from the core product group (COSD or WEX).

Re:I don't believe the article.

[GigsVT]

I'm a relatively senior development manager in Windows.

Not any more!

Re:I don't believe the article.

[Sir_Lewk]

I think that the misuse of "your" shows that this post was entirely made up. If this slashdotter is a real MSFT employee, then it doesn't sound like someone from client performance team of the core product group.

Sorry, I just fail to see how overuse of the phrase "you know" signifies much of anything. You know?

Re:I don't believe the article.

[tjstork]

I think that the misuse of "your" shows that this post was entirely made up. If this slashdotter is a real MSFT employee, then it doesn't sound like someone from client performance team of the core product group.

Uh, check his posting history. I think he's the real deal.

Re:I don't believe the article.

[Sir_Lewk]

I don't doubt it, I was simply pointing out the absurdity in his reasoning.

Re:I was so confused...

[NoYob]

What kind of fucking retarded dickwipe are you, then? Your parents must hang their heads in shame that you ever sprung from their ill-fated loins. Fuckwit.

You tell him!

I gotta tell you this though. It was the shittiest article on leaks in boat hulls I've ever read! I mean, WTF does Microsoft have to do with it?!

Leak concern?

[cpattersonv1]

It's odd that they would be concerned with the perception of quality in leaked software... Microsoft customers have come to expect the final release to be buggy anyhow. The only people who are going to install the leaked software probably wouldn't buy the final build anyhow.

Re:Leak concern?

[lukas84]

You're assuming that the guy the interviewer talked with actually wants to ship buggy software. He doesn't.

Management does. Because they're interested in the shareholders, not the customers.

Re:Leak concern?

[cpattersonv1]

Not really.

I'm assuming the person the interviewer spoke with isn't a developer at all. Developers know their work is in progress and don't care if people get copies of the code before it's released... unless it's a private developer... then it's their personal code. All the developer wants is the paycheck.

The interviewed is more than likely a PR person. The developer's phone wouldn't ring off the hook because the company would secretly investigate his terminal for proof of leak.

Since it's a PR person I'm assuming, then the "they" in my statement refers to the company. Not the interviewed.

Management is worried about the leak. They're worried about the bugs that pose a risk to the project and someone releasing an RC version. They will also try to minimize risk of failure for a release candidate so the software will not fail when it's sold.

The shareholders aren't worried about anything because they know they're still going to have a monopoly on software anyhow.

Re:Leak concern?

[shutdown -p now]

I'm assuming the person the interviewer spoke with isn't a developer at all. Developers know their work is in progress and don't care if people get copies of the code before it's released.

What makes you think the developers don't care at all about perception of their work?

A leaked build can be one of the daily builds. As such, it can have some pretty major bugs in it, if the last few commits didn't play well together, or one was just fscked up - in fact, such a build might as well just crash on startup. When it gets leaked with that stuff, you can be sure that someone, somewhere, writes a witty blog post along the lines of, "Microsoft is nearing RC, and yet the product is full of major bugs; apparently, the release is totally rushed by management. Remember Vista?". Next day, it ends up on Slashdot front page as a story titled "New Microsoft software released with major flaws".

And then you get IM'd by a friend who sends you a link to that, and have to explain what actually happened.

So, yeah, I do care.

Re:Leak concern?

[Sulphur]

New software released without major flaws.

--

Whom the Mods wish to destroy, they first drive mad.

weird tag line

[cliffiecee]

The header says "Aeroexperience Blog: The forums are over there."

That's not very catchy, it seems like some sort of advisory note, as if Windows enthusiasts were so clueless that-

<smug>Ah, I get it now.</smug>

Windows 7’s biggest threat: journalists

[David Gerard]

As Microsoft's launch of Windows 7 continues to attract small amounts of attention, it today issued a plea through its network of objective opinion-shapers: Don’t let the journalists near it.

“We understand that many journalists use Macs,” said CNet marketing marketer Don Reisinger. “This means they necessarily suckle at the Satanic rear passage of Steve Jobs. We cannot countenance their bias and 'reality' leaks. Journalists are responsible for all those signs outside computer shops offering to replace Vista with XP. When was the last time you saw the entire technology field stop and wait for an announcement from any other company besides Apple? It’s so unfair!”

Smears and slanders also come from obsessive overweight nerdy Mac-using Linux geek troublemakers who run “benchmarks” and “tests.” “It’s horrifying leaks and bias from the ‘reality’-based community,” said ZDNet marketing marketer Mary Jo Enderle. “We understand that, just because Vista was 40% slower than XP and Windows 7 is the same speed as Vista, the nattering nabobs of negativism are already writing press releases condemning it as ‘not enough of an improvement’ - based entirely on unauthorised leaks of the official beta and RC. It’s so unfair!”

“Mactards are like concentration camp guards,” said Guardian marketing marketer Jack Schofield, “brutalising ‘I’m A PC’ users and” [This comment has been removed by a Guardian moderator. Replies may also be deleted.]

“The only reason Vista failed was because Microsoft planned for it to fail,” said Reisinger in an earlier ad-banner troll post. “It was a fantastically subtle double-bluff! They did the honorable thing in the face of the vile calumnies spread by Apple. It’s so unfair!”

Microsoft debuted Windows 7 on a new 17 Asus Eee Ultra-Portable Mini-Netbook with 8GB memory and a 2GHz quad-core processor. Battery life is up to twenty minutes in preliminary tests.

Re:Windows 7’s biggest threat: journalists

[johnsd]

Ultimately operating systems will succeed if they are good regardless of the marketing. Why to apparently intelligent people have to make such emotionally loaded silly statements as in the quotations above? - Who has ever seen a "Mac using Linux geek"?? - Whatever Steve Jobs is, he probably is not satanic!! - Who has seen these Mac using journalists putting signs outside shops offering copies of XP to install on people's PCs?? What will be next?? On the other hand MS has been responsible for a lot of FUD - are they now saying they can't handle a bit themselves?

Re:Windows 7’s biggest threat: journalists

[BOFHelsinki]

*whoosh*

Real security slows things down too much.

[Kenja]

Real security slows things down too much, so companies get by with "good enough" and then get litigious if things go wrong.

Toby Zeigler on leaks

[Presto Vivace]

leaks are about showing off.

Re:Toby Zeigler on leaks

[Presto Vivace]

There is a larger point here about leaks. First of all the HP reaction to the leak was all out of proportion to what happened. Their reaction was about control, not about protecting the company. Secondly, leaks are about showing off and are corrosive to building trust. When you leak you are working for the reporter and their publication, not your company or your company's customers. That is what my blog post was about.

Re:Toby Zeigler on leaks

[postbigbang]

No, leaks are spin control, pimping products, and controling the 'conversation'.

They're like the proverbial flags run up the pole to see who salutes. If they were serious, like Apple, they'd jump right down the throat of the leak and drop a grenade.

Leaks done by a few are designed to make them look good somehow, as though they're kewl or trying to assert some 'creds'. Mostly it's random BS.

Otherwise, it's a marketing department decision, and they know exactly what they're doing. It's calulcated and it works. Disinformation can also be useful to see who and what gets more traction. It's a game. Some play it for keeps, some play it like it's a game.

Side note

[93 Escort Wagon]

Speaking as a web developer (and admittedly a Mac user, FWIW) - shouldn't a website named "AeroXperience" work a bit harder at having a halfway decent web site design? While I personally think the graphics are ugly, what really stands out is how the page doesn't scale - and it's not like there's some overarching design that requires the amount of page width the styles seem to be enforcing.

Aero is all about the visuals, right?

Old news - leaking Windows since 1983

[linebackn]

It's not like Microsoft's "leaks" are anything new. I have even found references on old archived newsgroups to people discussing pre-release Windows 1.0 as early as late 1983 (although perhaps not "leaked" if they were meant to have it). Late 1983 was when Microsoft was promoting this vapor-ware product in magazines such as Byte in order to upstage the now forgotten VisiCorp Visi On and this little product about to be announced from Apple called the Macintosh. Of course it was not officially release until 1985. There is even a late 1984 pre-release still floating around.

Microsoft wants people to get their hands on their software. They make it available to developers, testers, and reviewers. And if they wave their hand to others and say "ah-ah-ah you aren't allowed to have that" then people start drooling over this tempting forbidden software rather than seeing it as just another pile of bits. It is an inexpensive way to produce publicity.

Re:Old news - leaking Windows since 1983

[Anne Honime]

I completely agree. Before the widespread use of Internet, in a time when torrents were still a dream, I was using daily an early build of Windows 98 dubbed Win'96 by the press. It was massively copied the old fashioned way and spread. Tough beast to use, but pretty stable compared to a legit Win95 if you absolutely barred yourself to put a picture in the background of the explorer.

Re:Old news - leaking Windows since 1983

[IntlHarvester]

Right. I used to get Windows 95 betas directly from Microsoft's sales/consulting people.

However, there's sites that post screenshots of early Windows alpha releases handed out to driver devs. The general internet reaction tends negative because it isn't visually any different than the current version. I can't imagine those sorts of leaks do much for PR.

Re:Old news - leaking Windows since 1983

[cyclomedia]

I remember them days.... Win 96 was essentially win 95b, IMO the best of the 95 branch, it went something like

1995 - Win 95 (No IE integration)
1996 - 95B (essentially SP1)
1997 - 95C (Introduced IE4 integration, evil!)
1998 - 98
1999 - 98SE - with IE5 built in
2000 - ME

So there was a flavour of the 95 family for each of those years, up until 2007 i was using a bizzare mix of 95B and 98SE courtesy of 98lite. I suspect your "Win96" was 95C, being the first attempt to lock-in IE before 98 proper came along

So what do we take away vis a vis open source?

[PCM2]

Compare to Linux, for example, where "leaking an unfinished build" is a total non-issue. Even expected, in fact. So whether the leaks are intentional or not, if they are a problem, then it sounds like they're a problem of Microsoft's own making.

Re:So what do we take away vis a vis open source?

[im_thatoneguy]

Yeah Open Source doesn't have any sort of image problem with being "Half baked" or "constantly in beta". I'm sure Microsoft wishes it had Linux's desktop market share.

I'm not surprised

[woolio]

I would summarise that interview as "When builds leak they might be incomplete or old, and people may get a wrong impression of what the product will be like. This causes my phone to ring which is a pain in the ass"

No real surprises there.

Well I'm not surprised at all. He must actually like leaks, otherwise he wouldn't keep his phone shoved up his ass.

My software doesn't leak

[noidentity]

I use Java, so my software doesn't have memory leaks.

Re:My software doesn't leak

[vivek7006]

"I use Java, so my software doesn't have memory leaks"

But its slow as a donkey :)

Re:My software doesn't leak

[noidentity]

I admit it; I lied. I don't use Java and don't like it. Its lack of destructors (as C++ has) is a big shortcoming, since destructors aren't just about freeing resources. Witness Java code with lots of finally clauses, where in C++ you can package that cleanup with creation, eliminating the possibility creating without deleting. Also in Java you often want to call close() on a file/stream to ensure it's closed now, not whenever the collector feels like it.

Re:My software doesn't leak

[vivek7006]

  <--------- Whooosh

     /"""""
    |  (')')
    C     _)
     \   _|
      \__/

      Mods

gcc 2.96 - Re:So what do we take away vis a vis...

[sowth]

Sometimes it is a problem for Open Source. gcc "2.96" for example. A distro took an experimental version of gcc, called it "2.96" (the previous version was 2.95.x) and released it in their distribution. This version of gcc had a number of serious problems and incompatibilities with other versions of gcc.

This caused quite a few headaches. If you ever see a version of gcc marked 2.96, DO NOT use it. It is screwed up.

This is partly why I don't like to use distros who modify projects. Yeah, they may improve the crap script kiddie ones, or the ones written by universities where they are based on sound concepts, but were programmed by non-programmers--scientists and the like.

But, many of the very popular core projects are written by programming experts who are the best in their field. For example OpenSSL and Debian: did the maintainer really think he was more of a cryptography programming expert than the OpenBSD guys? No frakking way!

Re:There's an exception.

[sowth]

I for one think it is idiotic to edit what the interviewee said. Even with grammar corrections, who is to say you won't accidentally change the subtle meaning of what they said?

I say you did it the right way, and should not listen to grammar Nazi trolls. Grammar and spelling only really matter when it would cause someone to misunderstand something.

They don't need leaks

[DavMz]

I can't imagine what their job looked like the day they released the (in)famous build5048: Longhorn Developer Preview

Re:There's an exception.

[Zontar The Mindless]

I say you did it the right way, and should not listen to grammar Nazi trolls. Grammar and spelling only really matter when it would cause someone to misunderstand something.

Translation: "Clear communication doesn't matter. It is perfectly acceptable to expect your audience to burn up cycles performing your error-checking for you. If they get it wrong, what the hell, it's not your problem."

reasonable comments

[Slashed Dot]

you know, i really found this article to be educational also, because i've seen it before where someone will post a leak of some sort, a leaked build, or leaked screen shots, something leaked, and they will say 'wow look it's so rough man this will be the worst most horrible experience ever' or 'look they cut this essential feature out it will be horrible' or 'look how sloppy everything is!'. from what i read of this dev's statements, he sounds like me when i'm working on anything, from my car to my computer. if an outsider peeked in and looked at it all while i'm in the middle it may look really sloppy. dirt all over, parts strew right and left, half of it doesn't even work, and i myself am just sloppy and dirty. dust on my nose, smudges on my glasses, grease on my hands. it really presents the idea that i am just a slob and also that the finished product will be horribly broken.

of course, that is the not the case. i just need to get dirty and make a mess to get anywhere sometimes. i may wind up taking whole sections of my computer or car out and botching something together just to test something. it doesn't look good at all, but it's just part of the process. when i'm done, it will be functional. it will work. it will in fact even look nice, but i have my process to work in and if you step into that while i'm busy and you don't know what is going on in my head, you won't be impressed.

so please, save the hating on this dev for someone else. i'm glad he said something. it helps put these negative reviews of various Windows leaked builds (or WIP builds of anything really) in perspective. important things to realise i figure.

thanks, anonymous dev.

No they are not 8for you)

[aepervius]

if you are a dev manager , then you do not care a SHIT on leak. As the ncie article pointed out, only MARKETING manager and associated cre for a leak.

Re:There's an exception.

[BOFHelsinki]

In some cases, it's perfectly fine to keep some verbal mannerisms intact in an interview. It's usually done to preserve a human component which would otherwise be lost.

"Human component"? You usually interview robots, then? ;-)

I did clean it up to an extent, but I only removed bits which would have otherwise compromised the meaning of a particular statement.

In light of the difficulty you mentioned, preserving all the content of a casually speaking interviewee, how did you know which bits to remove?

Re:There's an exception.

[BOFHelsinki]

The problem is that it's nearly impossible to properly translate a relaxed interview into a transcript. Removing any element has the potential to compromise the meaning the author was trying to convey, and this is something which I couldn't afford to have happen. I'd prefer a relaxed transcript to a properly formatted transcript which may have had its meaning lost in translation. Bear in mind that some of this person's statements aren't even complete sentences; I couldn't reasonably infer what this person intended with enough certainty to fill in the blanks, so I had to leave it as is.

It was an interview, right? The professional thing to do would be to ask follow-up questions to clarify what this person meant. The follow-up is a rather basic interview technique. But agreed, doing nothing is better than infering (guessing, really) to fill in the blanks. Thanks for the effort anyway, it was interesting as such.

MS Leaks Disambiguation

[speardane]

I misunderstood....

I thought you were talking about "leaks" in products like Word (and other non-MS products) and XP "going down" - I find even with Word 2003 it was still safer to reboot every other weekend. Has this been fixed yet?

for the me the rest is all variations in marketing technique...

Windows '96

[Anne Honime]

It was not an official build. I digged a bit and found a ref :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Nashville

From snapshots you can't really see the differences between it and 95 or 98, but it was really a mix bag of both and had some very nifty tricks that did not make it in 98. For instance, you could get rid of mouse double-clicks, and use 1 click action throughout the UI, weblike. Options would turn blue when hovered by the mouse pointer. There was a good Personal Information Manager that wasn't kept later on. Etc.

Crashes were funny because they were hardwired to an external debugging machine ; so blue screens went like 'can't find //E/debug/dump' or something like that.

Re:Windows '96

[bigstrat2003]

From snapshots you can't really see the differences between it and 95 or 98, but it was really a mix bag of both and had some very nifty tricks that did not make it in 98. For instance, you could get rid of mouse double-clicks, and use 1 click action throughout the UI, weblike. Options would turn blue when hovered by the mouse pointer.

Dude, that was actually in 98. It confused the hell out of most users (who were accustomed by then to the double-click), but it was there.

Re:Windows '96

[Anne Honime]

It did not worked the same way. There are '96 disk images ready for vmware and other such emulators. Try it out by yourself. Win '96 was in my opinion way less confusing and much more consistent than 98 in that respect. Just my opinion, though.

leak of a leak of a leak

[lie2me]

... of a super secret leaks marketing depeartment

Re:gcc 2.96 - Re:So what do we take away vis a vis

[evilviper]

did the maintainer really think he was more of a cryptography programming expert than the OpenBSD guys?

The OpenBSD guys wrote and maintain OpenSSH, which uses OpenSSL. The OpenBSD guys don't have anything to do with OpenSSL.

Re:gcc 2.96 - Re:So what do we take away vis a vis

[sowth]

You are correct. From openssl.org:

OpenSSL is based on the excellent SSLeay library developed by Eric A. Young and Tim J. Hudson.

Sorry for the misinformation.