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Microsoft Developers Hid a Secret Puzzle in Windows Backgrounds as They Knew Images Would Leak (betanews.com)

Posted by msmash on from the closer-look dept.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Microsoft developers working on Windows 8 created a puzzle and embedded it in the wallpapers used for internal builds of the operating system. The team knew that the images would leak out to the public -- and probably the internal builds of Windows -- so they decided to have some fun with it. Over the course of numerous builds, the puzzle was developed -- but only one person ever solved it! Over the weekend, Jensen Harris -- a former group program manager of Microsoft Office and Microsoft director leading the team working on the redesign of Windows 8 -- took to Twitter to come clean about the secret puzzle. He explained that it was common for internal test builds of Windows to have wallpapers that were not intended for public release, but said that messages tended to be included to discourage leaking: "Traditionally, these wallpapers included text embedded in them threatening to throw people in jail if they leaked the build, blah blah, substantial penalty for early withdrawal, not all coins go up in value (some go down!), etc. etc. We wanted to try a more elegant tact. So early in Windows 8, we created a wallpaper that was a combination of the text the lawyers wanted us to use with an attempt to appeal to people's better nature...thus the "shhh... let's not leak our hard work" series of wallpapers was born."

44 comments

  1. Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's a shame they went to all the trouble to do that, rather than fixing the long list of known bugs and security issues...

    1. Re: Mis-use of development resources by reanjr · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Yeah, because the team designing wallpapers is definitely the people who should be fixing the bugs the engineers haven't gotten to.

    2. Re: Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They just canâ(TM)t do anything right, can they?

    3. Re:Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You're either an idiot, a manager, or someone who never worked on a major software development project. Or possibly all three.

      Developer time isn't linear. Plowing mindlessly ahead for 12 hours at a stretch is not a productive way to work. People crave some kind of mental break from banging away, and giving it to them makes them more productive, not less.

      This is exactly the kind of playing around with something clever I'd be jazzed to see my devs doing for fun during the late stages of the project - not a huge time investment, keeps the brains working, encourages creative thinking, feels subversive enough to keep the job "fun" without creating any actual security issues.

      If you work for a company that would have discouraged this sort of thing, you work for the wrong company.

    4. Re: Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      dude its a time honored tradition to shit on micro$oft here
      get it i did the dollar sign instead of the s because they care about prophets

    5. Re: Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      i did the dollar sign instead of the s because they care about prophets

      I thought Steve Jobs was the prophet. He's not MS.

    6. Re: Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ban phone poster

    7. Re: Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      like posting a comment? You fool.

    8. Re:Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Meanwhile, your competitors released a month before you, grabbed market share, and now you're playing catch-up with a product that is full of funny easter eggs. Fast-forward a year, the product has been scrapped, your devs are laid off, and you now have the taint of a failed product launch surrounding you. Yup, sounds like a great plan.

    9. Re: Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Whoosh to you and your peer post.

    10. Re: Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      nice try. fool.

    11. Re: Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, because the team designing wallpapers is definitely the people who should be fixing the bugs the engineers haven't gotten to.

      MMm, yeah, maybe they need fewer graphic designers (with Metroflush GUI, what needs anyway?), and more programmers?

    12. Re:Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, these things are developed when the product is already in QA.

    13. Re:Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's also a violation of the no Easter Egg policy that Microsoft instated for security reasons.

    14. Re: Mis-use of development resources by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      But the idiots responsible of these wallpapers were also behind the disgusting UI. So perhaps they should have listened the user feedback instead of wasting time on the wallpapers.

    15. Re:Mis-use of development resources by godel_56 · · Score: 1

      It's also a violation of the no Easter Egg policy that Microsoft instated for security reasons.

      They're not strictly easter eggs as there is no code involved; they're simply graphic features in plain sight. They're also only in dev versions not meant for release.

  2. Should have included BSOD puzzles by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    These would be more likely to be seen and solved.

  3. I have a puzzle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    20* ***4**@10@23.03.2011

    1. Re:I have a puzzle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Watch THE VIDEO that got a 20+ year Slashdotter BANNED from Slashdot!

    2. Re:I have a puzzle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But I don't want to see APK having sex with wildlife

    3. Re: I have a puzzle by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yawn. More creimer spam.

  4. Piss off by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Frost piss off!

  5. Wow by damn_registrars · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm surprised enough people were interested enough in getting their hands on development releases of windows 8 to be able to solve the puzzle at all. It was released almost 6 years ago and it's adoption rate in the market still has been somewhat lackluster.

    --
    Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
    1. Re:Wow by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      Obviously, there was only one person interested enough...

    2. Re:Wow by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      You're kidding right? Windows development releases have been pirated since there were pirates. The only thing that put an end to it was the insiders program allowing anyone to get it for free. ...

      Wait nope, searching for Windows Insider builds returns some 400 odd torrents.

    3. Re:Wow by damn_registrars · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Pirating earlier versions of windows had a purpose, as there was generally improvement with each iteration. Windows 7 was a marginal improvement over XP (which was hardly at all an improvement over Windows 2000). But Microsoft never gave any reason to expect 8 to be an improvement over 7, and indeed it wasn't.

      Sure, some people pirated it just to pirate it. Make some sort of pointless statement or something. I can see that. I'm just really surprised it was pirated in large enough numbers - and at that with enough people pirating it repeatedly through the development cycle - that anyone noticed this.

      I guess that's a better hobby than cooking meth or clubbing baby seals, but I can imagine plenty of more productive things one could do with time.

      --
      Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
    4. Re:Wow by thegarbz · · Score: 0

      as there was generally improvement with each iteration

      Oh? You don't want to be the first person with the control to delete data from your MS account? You don't want to be the first one with ransomware protection on your files, or SE Linux style system controls?

      The problem with most people is they look at the GUI, think "Yuk" and therefore conclude that nothing under the hood is changing in Windows 10.

      The ONLY reason I am not clamouring over the latest Windows 10 releases which get better and better under the hood, is due to QC issues of late which makes the most recent beta releases fairly risky compared to say beta releases in the Windows 7 days.

      that anyone noticed this

      No one notices the pirates. What people notice is the news articles published about the pirated versions.

  6. Here is one of the Wallpapers by Saija · · Score: 4, Funny

    Here is one of those said puzzle wallpapers

    --
    Slashdot ya no es que lo era! ;)
    1. Re:Here is one of the Wallpapers by Saija · · Score: 4, Funny

      Second wallpaper

      --
      Slashdot ya no es que lo era! ;)
    2. Re:Here is one of the Wallpapers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Who taught you to link to files on Wikipedia? It's amazing that your fucked-up link actually links to something!

    3. Re:Here is one of the Wallpapers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They Work That Way(TM)

  7. find the center of the maze! by Joe_Dragon · · Score: 1

    find the center of the maze!

    1. Re:find the center of the maze! by forkfail · · Score: 2

      The enemy's gate is down.

      --
      Check your premises.
  8. Not Surprised by Dust038 · · Score: 1

    Bleeding Sarcasm xd Not Surprised that the 10 or so people still on Windows 8 took this long to solve it.

  9. M$ usurper of divine rights? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    > substantial penalty for early withdrawal

    Isn't that under the sole jurisdiction of G-d, as evidenced by the biblical teaching against shedding seed in vain? See:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onan

  10. Misuse of the word "Tact" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    But I'll show some tack and not point out the error.

  11. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  12. Last thing I need is Windows by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What a bunch of narcissists. Like I need Windows spying and crashing on my desktop.

  13. BetaArchive probably. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Those guys have a fucking fetish for specific Windows Builds.

    The sites entire primary purpose is collecting and documenting every Windows Build ever in existence, and require you to post SOMETHING NEW just to get FTP access.

  14. MS Screws it up again... by plloi · · Score: 1

    Why create a puzzle based on sudoku but double up one the characters?

  15. I knew it! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    So this proves that M$ programmers waste their time making in-house games instead of properly coding & cleaning & debugging the OS!

  16. So? The whole GUI is a frigging puzzle! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Why has ergonomics become a lost art?

  17. Awesome by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I think what they did is hilarious, but I wonder what they'll do to "one up" themselves in the future? Or maybe next time it really will be an anti-piracy feature. ;)
    The last beta I was on was Windows 10. I dropped out, though, once I read the disclaimer that whatever I do will be tracked. I expected that to be removed before Windows 10 shipped.. how wrong I was. Oh well, Mac and Linux do everything I need ever since.