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Office 2003 Bug Locks Owners Out
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "A Microsoft Office 2003 bug is locking people out of their own files, specifically those protected with Microsoft's Rights Management Service. Microsoft has a TechNet bulletin on the issue with a fix. It looks like they screwed up and let a certificate expire. There's no information on when the replacement certificate will expire, though, or what will happen when it does."
Actually, it's not really a bug, just the usual friendly reminder from Microsoft that there's a new version out and it's time to ante up again.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
I know a LOT of people still using MS Office 2003. Some people dislike the Ribbon System with '07's version. Some people are too cheap to upgrade when the old copy still "works". Now, Microsoft isn't making any money from all those old copies of 2003, so what's stop them from "Programming Obsolescence" into their software?
It sounds a bit sinister, yes; but it's not technically illegal. It might even be in the oft-skimmed EULA. Or maybe it's just similar to the way HP printers always fail a week after the warranty expires.
If our elected representatives no longer represent us, do we still live in a Democracy?
God I hate microsoft. I really do.
I was about to type out a long post extolling the virtues of... erm... something... and then I blinked back to my screen and realised I had just envisaged what a mistake like this from an upstream supplier (in this case Microsoft) would have on my work day.
I am in IT and I would have had hundreds of phonecalls for this by now, and it is only 09:24... sheesh to apply a hotfix like this to all my clients...
woops there I went again imagining what this would mean for my workday... I can't actually say that any of our clients use the RMS service on their office documents.
Wowee, dodged a bullet there.
Good luck to all the IT grunts out there in the trenches trying to get this fixed right now...
Seven Days with Ubuntu Unity
Why wouldn't Microsoft allow the end user to setup and manage their own certificates upon installation?
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Putting that amount of trust in a third party that has the power to lock you out of your own files... It boggles the mind as to why that is acceptable in anything of importance.
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
MS Office has a rights management service??? Everywhere I've ever been has relied on NTFS/SMB permissions on a network or encryption to protect their documents. Has anyone ever used this feature? Can Open Office rescue these files? If it's all about an expired cert, does turning back the system date allow you to open the file and re-save it unprotected? I'm a big fan of silly system date cracks/rescues. :-)
It's just something they over looked. They're not forcing anyone to upgrade and they've even fixed the problem.
Microsoft IS a software development company. They make money on your purchasing their new offerings and eventually they quit supporting the old crap. It's 2009, 2003 was 6 years ago. What do you expect them to do?
Did anyone else find it funny that they call it Microsoft RMS (rights management system)?
If you have Office 2003 and no web access, are you hosed?
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
So, it's gone from I can haz cheezeburger to I can haz stdio to I can haz accez to meh filez or I can haz certificate ?
Really this would be solved by one simple request:
I can haz openoffice?
It's late, I blame the time...
that I warned Y'all about this long ago.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
From the article...
"Office 2003 users receive the error, "Unexpected error occurred. Please try again later or contact your system administrator,""
WTF? Is there anyone out there that can point me to an expected error? Can these wannabe programmer motherfuckers ever pass on real information on an error to the end user? Their error messages might as well say, "Our program fucked up, we're dipshits, we don't know what the fuck is going on. In fact, we couldn't have put together a crappier piece of software if we were drunk, or high."
Steve's Computer Service, Hobbs, NM
Microsoft gets people to update by giving their product to the CEOs and "bigwigs". When everybody _else_ in the organization cannot read or use the new format for the documents, they have to keep bouncing transfered documents back to the aforementioned bigwigs. Eventually the bigwigs get tired of the fact that they cannot understand how to use save-as-older-format, and they dislike having their underlings telling them to do things, and they cannot bear to find all the files they saved and re-save them before they downgrade back to the old version... So the entire company naturally has to pay to upgrade everyone.
Repeat that at the border of the company. Every iteration of Little Company that works with and is dependent on Big Company, cannot allow themselves to be seen as unhelpful nor out of date, and they cannot bounce the documents they receive via email etc. without giving that exact impression...
Letting certificates expire is _not_ a Microsoft "strategy", it's an artifact of their adoption of "We don't care. We don't have to. We're The Phone Company" where there is no longer just one phone company, but Microsoft wants to be "The Software Company".
This _is_ egg on their face, but the only ones who will not yell "brilliant omelet" are the people who can connect the "Trusted Computing" dots. Letting the world _again_ see what it means to leave the keys to your property in the hands of any entity that doesn't _have_ to care is just another Microwhoops...
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
in that case [omgubuntu.co.uk],
WARNING!
Ridiculous FUD site (OMGubuntu) in parent comment.
Please put aside any credibility before reading or you may suffer significant loss..
There's been a boatload of warnings about depending on this kind of technology.
The problem is, there's been plenty of opportunities for "I told you so", and people still buy software with time bombs built into it.
Now that I know that this won't affect the Isolated Basement Department, I can now safely install Office 2003...
Receipt, check. Shrinkwrap off, check. Must keep original box...
WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
Obviously, someone at Microsoft has a sense of humour.
it's a feature not a bug :)
Explosions! MWA HA HA HA HA!
Can I mod something +1 Scary if it's true but I wish it weren't?
"I blame this kind of error messages on programmers .."
...
I blame the people who designed a system where an expired certificate throws up such an error msg
davecb5620@gmail.com
The reality of the situation is much simpler.
When you buy a new PC or laptop for your company - guess which version of office comes on it - the latest.
Guess if it is cheaper or more expensive to purchase one with the old version - more expensive. And whi is going to approve to pay more for something older?
So, as new machines come into *ANY* company, no matter *WHO gets them, they have the newest versions of Windows and Office, and this is what makes the problems. In many companies, I imagine it is the CEOs and marketing who get the newest machines first - which then leads to your flawed theory. (In the company I work for, engineering gets the newest machines first, as we actually need the horsepower).
Compatability pack worse than OO.o for compatibility.
Save a wodge and get OO.o instead.
1)Remove MS Office
2)Download OO Office
3)Install OO Office
4)Enjoy an excellent free office suite that's just as powerful and if say so on my own opinion more user friendly!
People who call themselves "I don't believe in intellectual property" and make that text link to the EFF obviously misunderstand the purpose of the EFF.
My lord, take one of thy mighty infinite mod points and mod parent -1 smote! Amen!
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
There's still a problem of terminology. The programmer knew that there could be errors that his code wouldn't explain to the user. He even put a default message box in there to notify the user.
So it becomes a philosophical question: If you know that something can happen that you didn't plan for, is it really unexpected?
Maybe the programmer should have given unhandled errors a fancy name. Then users would see the error and contact a system administrator or just chalk it up to their own ignorance and try something else. Maybe a name like: GURU MEDITATION ERROR.
And:
That's the problem. The correct code should be:
We're using C++. We wanted to use the fopen-related set of functions, because they provide better error information than the C++ iostreams library does.
But as you mentioned, it can drive you nuts writing all kinds of error handling code for each call to fopen, fwrite, etc.
So for each of those functions, we wrapped them with a function that tests the error codes, and throws a very descriptive exception if/when a problem occurs.
This seems to be working well for us.
div by zero is an error that could be expected any time you are doing division with external inputs.
You aren't the world. You aren't the people. you aren't the one to make a brighter world, so please stop living.
Look, just because YOU have a boner for hating Open Office doesn't make Open Office more compatible with Office97 files than Office2007 with the compatability pack.
Er... Java is optional, and only required if you use the database engine (nobody does, because almost nobody knows when _not_ to use a spreadsheet, IMHO of course 8-) or some of accessibility and wizard thingies.
One of the ACs gives the actual quote and reference.
Plus OpenOffice.org (and I think core open office as well) dumped the larger desktop interface a long, long time ago.
Try something recent, and try reading the documentation, before you rail against any product.
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
SymbolNOBODY:
You said what's quoted below from you, here -> http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1476008&cid=30428430
"It's tolerated (perhaps encouraged) in part because these annoying actors are otherwised engaged in improving Linux. Major Debian and BSD contributors, for example, use slashdot as a workspace for their human-machine interaction side experiments, of which APK is probably one. In addition many of these trolls post links which, if you follow them, will completely hose a Windows machine. This is part of the game. - by symbolset (646467) on Monday December 14, @01:15AM (#30428430) Journal
I took offense to the BOLDED part... so, my reply in the URL below was simple (and logical):
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1476008&threshold=-1&commentsort=0&mode=thread&pid=30428430#30430244
Additionally, "symbolNOBODY"? Well - the day you can make something like this (& that got you PAID for it, & that has done as well for others online):
http://www.tcmagazine.com/forums/index.php?s=b861a743aa23c4568b7d73e07ef7ecec&showtopic=2662
That's also gone over 250.000 views worldwide in 1++ yrs.' time online, & across 15 forums where that guide for Windows Security has been made either an:
1.) "Sticky/Pinned" thread
2.) An "Essential Guide"
3.) Rates 5/5 stars (etc.)
AND, gets "feedback" like this from users that have applied it:
----
http://www.xtremepccentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=28430
PERTINENT QUOTE/EXCERPT:
"...recently, months ago when you finally got this guide done, had authorization to try this on simple work station for kids. My client, who paid me an ungodly amount of money to do this, has been PROBLEM FREE FOR MONTHS! I haven't even had a follow up call which is unusual. Now I don't recommend this for the average joe, but it if can work for a kids PC it can work for anything! Now, i substituted OpenDNS and activated the Adult Content filter with them for this kids computer. I know its not perfect, but will catch over 99.5% of said sites."
and
http://www.xtremepccentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=10f9ba9ad5ff990aaae1e7ec91f593a2&t=28430&page=3
"Its 2009 - still trouble free! I was told last week by a co worker who does active directory administration, and he said I was doing overkill. I told him yes, but I just eliminated the half life in windows that you usually get. He said good point. So from 2008 till 2009. No speed decreases, its been to a lan party, moved around in a move, and it still NEVER has had the OS reinstalled besides the fact I imaged the drive over in 2008. Great stuff! My client STILL Hasn't called me back in regards to that one machine to get it locked down for the kid. I am glad it worked and I am sure her wallet is appreciated too now that it works. Speaking of which, I need to call her to see if I can get some leads. APK - I will say it again, the guide is FANTASTIC! Its made my PC experience much easier. Sandboxing was great. Getting my host file updated, setting services to system service, rather than system local. (except AVG updater, needed system local)"
Thronka - forums member @ xtremepccentral.com
----
THEN, when you have done so, on THAT account? THEN, you can talk!
Also?
When you have done all of this as I have over time in this Art & Science of computing:
"My Name is Ozymandias: King of Kings - Look upon my works, ye mighty
This is the kind of error messages you see from programmers who use exceptions _poorly_. I use exceptions well, and in doing so I don't just use the pointlessly empty exception classes. I have a tidy little toolbox with a slelect few exception classes that are normally instanced in a way that includes file and line numbers (for me) and useful text (for the user) at a minimum. Heck, when I compile with a debug macro defined (q.v. -DDEBUG) on a GCC/GlibC based system, my exception constructor saves a whole stack trace created at construction using backtrace().
Oddly enough, such exceptions are typically thrown in response to "doing error checking within the routine".
They are also damn handy inside of libraries where, for instance, you want to have a function that returns int and there is no "invalid" value to return (such as -1) because the whole domain of int is a valid value. (as in doing checksums or hash tables and so on).
The fact of the matter is, many people should not be trusted with power tools, and many people should not be trusted with manual tools, but nobody who thinks either kind of tool should not exist for whatever reason should be trusted with any tools at all.
You hate exceptions because either (a) you don't know how to use them properly or (b) you have been forced to use the code of someone who doesn't know how to use them properly, and perhaps (c) both of the above.
The real predicate is whether the condition can be properly handled locally or not. Passing an error return code (q.v. minus-one etc) back through ten layers of function calls is just as information poor a thing to do as throw an empty class as an exception. In fact its _worse_ in most cases as you need to make a tangle of logic to turn a callee's -1+errno for out-of-bounds into your local -1+errno for could-not-allocate, into the callers -1 pool-is-full-use-a-malloc-instead. This just multiplies for the full Cartesian Product of all possible error paths including those paths that also then fail.
Tell me true (presuming you use C/C++ on a posix-like os)...
Do you always check the return value from snprintf() to make sure that you didn't run out of buffer during conversion? Let me guess, you just choose to use really big buffers...
Do you wrap every write() in a pointer-increment loop to naturally catch when a write of ten bytes actually only writes 5. Let me guess, you only check for -1, and only on file descriptors that you think are "likely" to error out...
IMHO people who discard features whole-scale, and cite "hate" as a reason are generally guilty of practicing outside their ability.
There are plenty of things I "don't do", like I never use pure virtual functions in C++. I feel they serve no useful purpose except to annoy the programmer that comes along after me. (Having had a thread safety problem in a code block where one thread called a virtual function on a object that was being destroyed by another thread, and having the resultant call become a call to that NULL kinda irked me. But I learned my lesson. I put asserts or exceptions in the functions and document them, and document the class as having no useful default implementation. Also I've seen fat interfaces where the first thing a user has to do is stub-out the interface in order to make a single test call; where that lead to an important function ending up containing just "return 0;" all the way to production; which cost us time and money. But I don't "hate" pure virtual functions for finding them pointless and unhelpful.)
Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
--"Code Complete" Microsoft Press