There's a lot of "This is typical of M$", "Antitrust... etc.", and "This just goes to show they have too much power," going around.
BS. Plain and simple.
This is STANDARD industry practice. Do some research before you start going off on a big rant about how evil MS is. (Which may be true, but not because of this. lol)
Sony has sued or threatened to sue just about EVERY SINGLE mod-chip maker and retailer during the last year. They have threatened and/or sued installers and resellers of mod chips, as well as sued the mod chip makers into the ground multiple times.
Nintendo isn't much better. But Sony has been hyper-aggresive about this. I have friends in Germany who run a console modding business, yet refuse to do anything related to the PS2 due to Sony's legal threats to them.
This is not a Microsoft thing. It is a console thing. That's all there is to it.
My most recent example...at home, my Dell monitor gave out--flicking and being all blurry on me. I had my wife (who's not really a super-technical person) call up the next day when I was at work...
Basically, they said the monitor line was defective, I was still under warrenty (bought the computer 2 1/2 years ago with a 3 year warrenty), and they would send a new one within 2-3 business days. (This was on a Thursday, by the way.)
Great! I totally didn't expect them to do jack, especially not replace my monitor that quickly.
So...what do they do? Monitor on my doorstep via Airborne Express at 11am THE NEXT MORNING.
Yes, they overnighted me a new monitor when I was in year 2 1/2 of the most basic warrenty--all when they made no promises to me any sooner than 2-3 business days. (Meaning Tuesday or Wednesday the next week. Obvously, I wasn't thrilled about having no monitor for 5 days.)
So, in my experience, Dell's service is outstanding. They get a big thumbs up from me.
Only if the human really doesn't talk about anything in particular, and expects a meaningful response. ALICE cannot give meaningful responces.
ALICE would probably make a good CEO, rather than a conversation tool.
CEOBot: What would you like to know? Interviewer: What were your profits this year? CEOBot: What would you like to know about our profits this year? Interviewer: How much were they? CEOBot: How much do you think they were? Interviewer: Well, you claimed 22billion. CEOBot: I'm afraid I really don't know anything about that. Would you like me to sing you a song?
This guy is obviously smart, but this whole interview just seemed to be a lot fo whining and rhetoric.
Honestly, he ignored some of the questions as an opportunity to ramble on about one thing or another. It's just a bit much.
He bashes politics in the text, yet answers with highly political answers.
I respect his work, but I'm not so impressed with his views on intelligence...nor am I interested to hear about all his troubles with the AI community.
I just wish he would have shut up and answered the questions some of the times...this is an interview, after all--not a soapbox.
I'm seeing quite a few comments along to line of "What's the point of E3 any more? It's just hype."
Well, as a member of the gaming media (I'm an editor for RPGFan.com), I can tell you that E3 is and will continute to be a valuable assest for everyone in the business.
Really, "Best of Show" awards are just fluff. The real nitty-gritty of the show happens on the floor, when thousands of industry folks get to play and see every upcoming game for the next year (or three--depending on the publisher.)
Sure, people give awards as a way to highlight certain events, but that's NOT what E3 is about. I can assure you that people play more than the highlight titles, and it helps the gaming media--and industry as a whole--get better aquainted with upcoming product lineups and emerging publishers/developers.
As long as E3 continutes to be a place for the gaming trade to go and look at a pltehora of upcoming products, it serves its purpose well.
This is still nothing more than speculative. Sony's always bragging about how they're working on "x technology" to make their current or upcoming platform better.
The reason Sony did it was because it was leaked on the internet that Microsoft was doing a price drop. (I looked into it, and I guess it was a leaked Wal-Mart ad, actually.)
Of course everyone knew a PS2 price drop was coming *eventually*. Heck, the system is almost *2 years old* and hasn't had a price drop yet. Really, it was a matter of *when*, and Sony had no intention of reducing their price this soon.
Sony's had no trouble selling units at $299, and was in absolutely no rush to reduce their profit margin. They only did it this soon to be competitive with Microsoft, who cut prices much sooner than anyone anticipated they would.
I'd have to track down our PR person to get ahold of the actual releases, and she's not online at the moment... HOWEVER...you can use this for some slight reference.
"The price cut had been in the works for several weeks, according to David Hufford, Xbox product manager at Microsoft. Microsoft has been working with US retailers over the last several weeks to orchestrate the price reduction and put it into effect as smoothly as possible. Following Sony's announcement of a price cut for its PlayStation 2 console, Microsoft decided to follow suit rather than wait to announce the cut next week at E3."
Basically, Microsoft was gonna annouce a price cut at E3, Sony got wind of it and decided to beat them to the punch, so to speak.
However, it was something MS was already going to do at E3 anyway, so Sony's annoucement did not pressure MS into the position. It was actually the other way around.
I'm in the gaming biz and I can tell you that this is not the case.
Microsoft annouced a few weeks back that they were planning a price drop the first day of E3. Sony then decided to follow suit "in May." (Without a specific date set.)
Really, the first time IE 6.0 pops up its media window, it gives you a "Do you want to use the Media Bar to play all audio files?" prompt. I chose "No", and IE never bothered me with file associations again.
On the other hand, I installed RealOne a few weeks back and desipte unckeck a huge list of files it wanted to take over, I still grabbed quite a few. I attempted to reassociate them with Media Player and other programs, and guess what happened...
Next time I opened RealOne player, it popped up some "File Associations Agent" which said: "Another program or programs have attempted to associate RealOne Player-assoicated files with themselves. RealOne Player has re-associated all files."
WTF???
Nowhere did I choose to have these files associated with RealOne Player, nor did I choose any "maintain file associations" button. Not to mention, you can't even get rid of the resident aspects of RealOne Player. Just about every time I boot my computer (which, admittedly, is very rarely) I get some "RealOne Player Critical Notification" box that pops up. As far as I can tell, the best you can do is make it only show up "A few times a month"--there is no "GO AWAY YOU FSCKING ANNOYING POP-UP WINDOW!!!" option that I could find.
So, yeah. As evil as MS may possibly be, I don't feel bad for RealPlayer on this one. =P
The auto-preview/run exploit is a PRE IE 5.5 SP2 issue.
That's right. The auto-launching EXE exploit only affects people: a) Running Outlook Express b) Running a version of IE before 5.5 SP2.
Considering that IE 5.5 SP2 is VERY old as it is, people who are still using 5.1 or 5.5 initial release haven't bothered updating their software in years--let alone worrying about security patches.
Microsoft can make as many patches as they want, but if people don't install them even given the opportunity of two years, what can you do?
(BTW, I'm not saying that later versions are immune. Just that they won't be auto-infected. All it will do it pop up an Open/Save dialog box at worst...of course, someoen can still run the EXE if they're stupid and get infected.)
"Forget about upgrading like they are currently doing and do a re-write.. making sure everything is secure and works right!"
Umm...you haven't used Windows 2k/XP much, have you? XP, despite all the anti-MS/. rhetoric works like a charm, never crashes, supports just about every piece of hardware known to man, and, especially in the Home version which isn't IIS-capable at all, is very secure.
Fact is, most of Microsoft's notable "mistakes" regarding security are not with the OS, but with products like Outlook and IIS. Those are not the same as the OS, and 2k/XP's user-based security model is perfectly fine. There have been very few OS-level exploits of 2k/XP.
"Sure they say windows 2000 isn't on MS-DOS but really? So we see: Starting Windows ||||||||||||| Instead of: Staring MS-DOS......"
Are you for real? Text = MS-DOS now? Gee...give the user something to look at while it loads the graphics/display layer and it's suddenly MS-DOS. Wow.
2k/XP are not built on DOS at all. DOS does not exist in either system. There is DOS-emulation, and a lookalike command prompt, but DOS is officialy dead.
"There's no difference.. and while the stabilility has gotten better... it's not good or near linux."
Whatever. My computer hasn't crashed with 2k/XP (I upgraded to XP after using 2k since release) more than 10 times in the last 2-3 years. Almost all of them were due to the Norton Antivirus issues with XP. (Which was Norton's fault, and they admitted it and later released a patch.) The only time I ever reboot is when installing software that requires me to reboot. The Win2K Servers I admin at work haven't crashed since install well over a year ago.
"Active Directories.. don't even talk to me about that! They are confusing and complex! Novell is so much easier to use."
Ooookay. Novell is easy to use. That's a good one.
" Goodness Bill! Just startover.. don't try to release a new O/S every year! Take 2 or 3 and let's make this thing good. We don't need to upgrade and for goodnessgracious Bill, dump the XP 'simplification'"
What you descibe sounds like XP without you "getting it." Don't like the simplification? Go back to "classic mode" skin. Yay.
I'm not gonna say my opinion on the matter for fear of getting this corrective post modden into oblivion...but your post is so obviously flawed it was is desperate need of correction.
At least three of the patches recently have been "Security Rollup Patches." One for Win2K as an OS, one for IE, and one for COM+. (There may have been a few more...I'm just remembering these off the top of my head.)
Who knows how many fixes were included in those rollup patches. Probably more than you would think.
Last time I checked, the site really wasn't touting IIS for web hosting, but using Windows servers for enterprise solutions. That's a pretty different situation.
It's also quite possible that since this really isn't an "in-house" Microsoft deal, they didn't have their web developers working on it...they probably farmed it out to some starving web-heads from SF for an absurdly low price. That said, most web developers don't develop for MS boxes simply because hosting companies charge twice as much for Windows space as a general rule.
Sure, it may seem like some mass hypocricy or something...but if the website isn't about "Use IIS for hosting two-page, temp web pages!" there really isn't much of an issue.
Office 2K, running on a 500 megahertz P2 box with 256 megs of RAM. (Although it was running with 128 for quite some time.)
Idle at startup: 7.5 megs of RAM With 8 documents open, all of which are many pages in length, half of which have embedded images, tables, and various other heavy formatting options: 17.5 megs of RAM.
Now, that's not exactly what I'd call terrible. If it was linear, and it was 7.5 per document yeah, that would SUCK. But it's not.
Because the "application" that renders the "protected" audio data playable on a computer is a Win32 app.
This likely has less to do with Microsoft leveraging than it does that the makers of "Cactus Data Shield" not only suck as making a protection method, but they can't code their way out of a paper bag either.
Uh oh, posting this on/. will probably get me modded down faster than just about anything as a Troll or something...but given that the original "Article" was doing the trolling, I'm willing to give it a go.
Aside from the various issues with the review itself--which has been commented upon by quite a few posters already--this opening line just baffles me:
"Warcraft III runs on Windows 95/98/2000/NT and Mac OS. My setup was easy as pie, which was surprising since I run WinXP."
Oh please. Enough with the lame-ass cheapshots, OK? I can't think of any reason why installation of ANYTHING would be surprising on WinXP. It's got to be one of the most installation-friendly OSes ever created. Aside from the fact that I have been able to plug in EVERY piece of hardware (everything from ancient value USB scanners to brand-new stuff) either myself or any of my coworks have without having to install a SINGLE driver manually, I have yet to find anyone who has had trouble installing a program.
If you're gonna bitch and moan about something, do it with valid points. Is that so hard to understand?
Personally, I don't mind having a tower. I like throwing in odds-and-ends in my PCI slots, so something like this would never really be my primary rig. However, for the "average" user (or even a secondary living room computer or something) this thing looks great!
It's got everything the one could ask for, with a few more conviniences than even your average desktop. (That being readily-available mic, headphone, USB, and firewire on the front of the box. Nice stuff.) The fact that it's so tiny is also great, as it could be shown off as a table-top piece, or stowed away where nobody could see it. Pair this with a flat-panel and you've got a PC box with (almost) as much appeal as the G4 Cube. (Which, I'll admin, does look a bit cooler...but I'll take what I can get.)
The only handicap I see is the lack of an AGP slot and, thus, very weak gfx performance. *sigh* Oh well. Can't have everything, I guess.
(William Henry Gates 3d), 1955-, American business executive, b. Seattle, Wash. At the age of 19, Gates founded (1974) the Microsoft Company, a computer software firm, with Paul Allen. They began by purchasing the rights to convert an existing software package. In 1980 they agreed to produce the operating system for the personal computer being developed by International Business Machines (IBM). That system, MS-DOS (Microsoft Disk Operating System), and subsequent programs (including the Windows operating systems) made Microsoft the world's largest producer of software for microcomputers. In 1997 the U.S. Justice Dept. accused Microsoft of violating a 1995 antitrust agreement, because the Windows 95 operating system required consumers to load Microsoft's Internet browser-thus giving Microsoft a monopolistic advantage over other browser manufacturers. In late 1999 the trial judge decided that Microsoft was a monopoly that had stifled competition.
Gates, who is chairman of Microsoft, is the wealthiest person in the world. He founded (1994) the William H. Gates Foundation (focusing on health issues in developing countries) and the Gates Learning Foundation (1997), renamed the Gates Library Foundation (providing education assistance). In 1999, he merged the foundations into the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, a philanthropy that was worth $17.1 billion, after Gates's donation of $5 billion that year.
Gates has written The Road Ahead (1995, with N. Myhrvold and P. Rinearson) and Business @ the Speed of Thought (1999).
From Encarta.com Gates, William Henry, III (1955- ), American business executive, who serves as chairman and chief software architect of Microsoft Corporation, the leading computer software company in the United States. Gates cofounded Microsoft in 1975 with high school friend Paul Allen. The company's success made Gates one of the most influential figures in the computer industry and, eventually, one of the richest people in the world.
Born in Seattle, Washington, Gates attended public school through the sixth grade. In the seventh grade he entered Seattle's exclusive Lakeside School, where he met Paul Allen. Gates was first introduced to computers and programming languages in 1968, when he was in the eighth grade. That year Lakeside bought a teletype machine that connected to a mainframe computer over phone lines. At the time, the school was one of the few that provided students with access to a computer.
Soon afterward, Gates, Allen, and other students convinced a local computer company to give them free access to its PDP-10, a new minicomputer made by Digital Equipment Corporation.
In exchange for the computer time, the students tried to find flaws in the system. Gates spent much of his free time on the PDP-10 learning programming languages such as BASIC, Fortran, and LISP. In 1972 Gates and Allen founded Traf-O-Data, a company that designed and built computerized car-counting machines for traffic analysis. The project introduced them to the programmable 8008 microprocessor from Intel Corporation.
While attending Harvard University in 1975, Gates teamed with Allen to develop a version of the BASIC programming language for the Altair 8800, the first personal computer. They licensed the software to the manufacturer of the Altair, Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS), and formed Microsoft (originally Micro-soft) to develop versions of BASIC for other computer companies. Gates decided to drop out of Harvard in his junior year to devote his time to Microsoft. In 1980 Microsoft closed a pivotal deal with International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) to provide the operating system for the IBM PC personal computer. As part of the deal, Microsoft retained the right to license the operating system to other companies. The success of the IBM PC made the operating system, MS-DOS, an industry standard. Microsoft's revenues skyrocketed as other computer makers licensed MS-DOS and demand for personal computers surged. In 1986 Microsoft offered its stock to the public; by 1987 rapid appreciation of the stock had made Gates, 31, the youngest ever self-made billionaire. In the 1990s, as Microsoft's Windows operating system and Office application software achieved worldwide market dominance, Gates amassed a fortune worth tens of billions of dollars. Alongside his successes, however, Gates was accused of using his company's power to stifle competition. In 2000 a federal judge found Microsoft guilty of violating antitrust laws and ordered it split into two companies. An appeals court overturned the breakup order but upheld the judge's ruling that Microsoft had abused its power to protect its Windows monopoly. (For more information on the history of Microsoft, see Microsoft Corporation.)
Gates has made personal investments in other high-technology companies. In 1989 he founded Corbis Corporation, which now owns the largest collection of digital images in the world. In 1995 Corbis purchased the Bettmann Archive of 16 million photographic images and announced plans to digitize part of the collection. In 1994 Gates and Craig McCaw, a pioneer in the cellular telecommunications industry, became primary investors in Teledesic Corporation. Teledesic planned to launch several hundred low-orbiting artificial satellites to create a global, high-speed telecommunications network.
In the late 1990s Gates became more involved in philanthropy. With his wife he established the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which, ranked by assets, quickly became one of the largest foundations in the world. Gates has also authored two books: The Road Ahead (1995; revised, 1996), which details his vision of technology's role in society, and Business @ the Speed of Thought (1999), which discusses the role technology can play in running a business.
In 1998 Gates appointed an executive vice president of Microsoft, Steve Ballmer, to the position of president, but Gates continued to serve as Microsoft's chairman and chief executive officer (CEO). In 2000 Gates transferred the title of CEO to Ballmer. Gates, in turn, took on the title of chief software architect to focus on the development of new products and technologies.
Science as opposed to pratical application
on
Jef Raskin Talks Skins
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· Score: 2, Interesting
See, this demonstrates the fundumental problem with "scientists" who view their science as foolproof. The problem with discarding human opinion is that a human will eventually have to use and adjust to whatever you construct. If you have crafted a "perfect" GUI by some magical formula, there is still no way to assure that everyone will a) like it b) fine it "perfect" or c) think it useful at all.
Now, I'm not a big Steve Jobs fan...but let's set that aside for a moment. Sure, it's nice that this guy's a "real UI expert" and Jobs was mearly relying on "guruism"...but, in the end, Jobs liked it as a human, did he not? (At least, that's the way the article put it.) And, given that computers and GUI's are operated by humans, shouldn't that account for something?
Most of the GUI process is dominated by the actual look & feel of the interface. Is there a formula for that? Really? I would be interested to see if his formula included stark and boring design elements, or curved and shiny ones. I would then be interested to watch a wealth of people throw their arms up in disagreement. THAT'S the point. That's why customization is important.
Some people love the default look of WinXP. Some people like the "Sliver" color scheme instead of the "Blue" one. Some people hate the skinned look and revert to the "Classic" interface. The list goes on...
Certainly, a little bit of context switching in certain situations is better than having some scientist dictate what the Ultimate GUI (tm) should be? Generally speaking, if the basic layout and whatnot is basically the same, the human brain is pretty quick at readjusting itself. When I switch skins from "Classic" to some crazy skin I grabbed from the web, it doesn't take me THAT long to adjust myself.
I'll take the risk of losing 20 seconds of productivity to staring at an interface I think is absurdly ugly and can't stand to look at for the better part of my waking hours.
Slashdot Mirror
Even better... According to my sources, if you grab an NES and plug the ORIGINAL Metroid game into it, you can even play it as well!
;-)
No word if this works with Metroid II or Super Metroid... Hopefully those stealthy code-crackers will figure that one out soon.
-Jayde
There's a lot of "This is typical of M$", "Antitrust ... etc.", and "This just goes to show they have too much power," going around.
BS. Plain and simple.
This is STANDARD industry practice. Do some research before you start going off on a big rant about how evil MS is. (Which may be true, but not because of this. lol)
Sony has sued or threatened to sue just about EVERY SINGLE mod-chip maker and retailer during the last year. They have threatened and/or sued installers and resellers of mod chips, as well as sued the mod chip makers into the ground multiple times.
Nintendo isn't much better. But Sony has been hyper-aggresive about this. I have friends in Germany who run a console modding business, yet refuse to do anything related to the PS2 due to Sony's legal threats to them.
This is not a Microsoft thing. It is a console thing. That's all there is to it.
-Jayde
My most recent example...at home, my Dell monitor gave out--flicking and being all blurry on me. I had my wife (who's not really a super-technical person) call up the next day when I was at work...
Basically, they said the monitor line was defective, I was still under warrenty (bought the computer 2 1/2 years ago with a 3 year warrenty), and they would send a new one within 2-3 business days. (This was on a Thursday, by the way.)
Great! I totally didn't expect them to do jack, especially not replace my monitor that quickly.
So...what do they do? Monitor on my doorstep via Airborne Express at 11am THE NEXT MORNING.
Yes, they overnighted me a new monitor when I was in year 2 1/2 of the most basic warrenty--all when they made no promises to me any sooner than 2-3 business days. (Meaning Tuesday or Wednesday the next week. Obvously, I wasn't thrilled about having no monitor for 5 days.)
So, in my experience, Dell's service is outstanding. They get a big thumbs up from me.
-Jayde
Only if the human really doesn't talk about anything in particular, and expects a meaningful response. ALICE cannot give meaningful responces.
ALICE would probably make a good CEO, rather than a conversation tool.
CEOBot: What would you like to know?
Interviewer: What were your profits this year?
CEOBot: What would you like to know about our profits this year?
Interviewer: How much were they?
CEOBot: How much do you think they were?
Interviewer: Well, you claimed 22billion.
CEOBot: I'm afraid I really don't know anything about that. Would you like me to sing you a song?
-Jayde
This guy is obviously smart, but this whole interview just seemed to be a lot fo whining and rhetoric.
Honestly, he ignored some of the questions as an opportunity to ramble on about one thing or another. It's just a bit much.
He bashes politics in the text, yet answers with highly political answers.
I respect his work, but I'm not so impressed with his views on intelligence...nor am I interested to hear about all his troubles with the AI community.
I just wish he would have shut up and answered the questions some of the times...this is an interview, after all--not a soapbox.
-Jayde
I'm seeing quite a few comments along to line of "What's the point of E3 any more? It's just hype."
Well, as a member of the gaming media (I'm an editor for RPGFan.com), I can tell you that E3 is and will continute to be a valuable assest for everyone in the business.
Really, "Best of Show" awards are just fluff. The real nitty-gritty of the show happens on the floor, when thousands of industry folks get to play and see every upcoming game for the next year (or three--depending on the publisher.)
Sure, people give awards as a way to highlight certain events, but that's NOT what E3 is about. I can assure you that people play more than the highlight titles, and it helps the gaming media--and industry as a whole--get better aquainted with upcoming product lineups and emerging publishers/developers.
As long as E3 continutes to be a place for the gaming trade to go and look at a pltehora of upcoming products, it serves its purpose well.
Just my 2 cents...
-Jayde
Actually Windows XP (and now Windows Update is distributing a 9x/2K version of the plugin) auto-updates in its spare time.
Check your facts.
-Jayde
This is still nothing more than speculative. Sony's always bragging about how they're working on "x technology" to make their current or upcoming platform better.
The reason Sony did it was because it was leaked on the internet that Microsoft was doing a price drop. (I looked into it, and I guess it was a leaked Wal-Mart ad, actually.)
Of course everyone knew a PS2 price drop was coming *eventually*. Heck, the system is almost *2 years old* and hasn't had a price drop yet. Really, it was a matter of *when*, and Sony had no intention of reducing their price this soon.
Sony's had no trouble selling units at $299, and was in absolutely no rush to reduce their profit margin. They only did it this soon to be competitive with Microsoft, who cut prices much sooner than anyone anticipated they would.
-Jayde
I'd have to track down our PR person to get ahold of the actual releases, and she's not online at the moment... HOWEVER...you can use this for some slight reference.
7 0, 2865558,00.html
http://gamespot.com/gamespot/stories/news/0,108
"The price cut had been in the works for several weeks, according to David Hufford, Xbox product manager at Microsoft. Microsoft has been working with US retailers over the last several weeks to orchestrate the price reduction and put it into effect as smoothly as possible. Following Sony's announcement of a price cut for its PlayStation 2 console, Microsoft decided to follow suit rather than wait to announce the cut next week at E3."
Basically, Microsoft was gonna annouce a price cut at E3, Sony got wind of it and decided to beat them to the punch, so to speak.
However, it was something MS was already going to do at E3 anyway, so Sony's annoucement did not pressure MS into the position. It was actually the other way around.
-Jayde
I'm in the gaming biz and I can tell you that this is not the case.
Microsoft annouced a few weeks back that they were planning a price drop the first day of E3. Sony then decided to follow suit "in May." (Without a specific date set.)
-Jayde
Really, the first time IE 6.0 pops up its media window, it gives you a "Do you want to use the Media Bar to play all audio files?" prompt. I chose "No", and IE never bothered me with file associations again.
On the other hand, I installed RealOne a few weeks back and desipte unckeck a huge list of files it wanted to take over, I still grabbed quite a few. I attempted to reassociate them with Media Player and other programs, and guess what happened...
Next time I opened RealOne player, it popped up some "File Associations Agent" which said: "Another program or programs have attempted to associate RealOne Player-assoicated files with themselves. RealOne Player has re-associated all files."
WTF???
Nowhere did I choose to have these files associated with RealOne Player, nor did I choose any "maintain file associations" button. Not to mention, you can't even get rid of the resident aspects of RealOne Player. Just about every time I boot my computer (which, admittedly, is very rarely) I get some "RealOne Player Critical Notification" box that pops up. As far as I can tell, the best you can do is make it only show up "A few times a month"--there is no "GO AWAY YOU FSCKING ANNOYING POP-UP WINDOW!!!" option that I could find.
So, yeah. As evil as MS may possibly be, I don't feel bad for RealPlayer on this one. =P
-Jayde
The auto-preview/run exploit is a PRE IE 5.5 SP2 issue.
That's right. The auto-launching EXE exploit only affects people:
a) Running Outlook Express
b) Running a version of IE before 5.5 SP2.
Considering that IE 5.5 SP2 is VERY old as it is, people who are still using 5.1 or 5.5 initial release haven't bothered updating their software in years--let alone worrying about security patches.
Microsoft can make as many patches as they want, but if people don't install them even given the opportunity of two years, what can you do?
(BTW, I'm not saying that later versions are immune. Just that they won't be auto-infected. All it will do it pop up an Open/Save dialog box at worst...of course, someoen can still run the EXE if they're stupid and get infected.)
-Jayde
Sure you can. It's called: CD Quality vs. MP3 Quality =P
-Jayde
"Forget about upgrading like they are currently doing and do a re-write.. making sure everything is secure and works right!"
/. rhetoric works like a charm, never crashes, supports just about every piece of hardware known to man, and, especially in the Home version which isn't IIS-capable at all, is very secure.
Umm...you haven't used Windows 2k/XP much, have you? XP, despite all the anti-MS
Fact is, most of Microsoft's notable "mistakes" regarding security are not with the OS, but with products like Outlook and IIS. Those are not the same as the OS, and 2k/XP's user-based security model is perfectly fine. There have been very few OS-level exploits of 2k/XP.
"Sure they say windows 2000 isn't on MS-DOS but really?
So we see:
Starting Windows |||||||||||||
Instead of:
Staring MS-DOS......"
Are you for real? Text = MS-DOS now? Gee...give the user something to look at while it loads the graphics/display layer and it's suddenly MS-DOS. Wow.
2k/XP are not built on DOS at all. DOS does not exist in either system. There is DOS-emulation, and a lookalike command prompt, but DOS is officialy dead.
"There's no difference.. and while the stabilility has gotten better... it's not good or near linux."
Whatever. My computer hasn't crashed with 2k/XP (I upgraded to XP after using 2k since release) more than 10 times in the last 2-3 years. Almost all of them were due to the Norton Antivirus issues with XP. (Which was Norton's fault, and they admitted it and later released a patch.) The only time I ever reboot is when installing software that requires me to reboot. The Win2K Servers I admin at work haven't crashed since install well over a year ago.
"Active Directories.. don't even talk to me about that! They are confusing and complex! Novell is so much easier to use."
Ooookay. Novell is easy to use. That's a good one.
" Goodness Bill! Just startover.. don't try to release a new O/S every year! Take 2 or 3 and let's make this thing good. We don't need to upgrade and for goodnessgracious Bill, dump the XP 'simplification'"
What you descibe sounds like XP without you "getting it." Don't like the simplification? Go back to "classic mode" skin. Yay.
I'm not gonna say my opinion on the matter for fear of getting this corrective post modden into oblivion...but your post is so obviously flawed it was is desperate need of correction.
-Jayde
WinXP, IE 6.0. Does not have any effect whatsoever. Just pauses ona blank screen.
-Jayde
Is it possible that the Kazaa/Fasttrack folk slipped it in via Morpheus before they made it incompatible?
Because, now that you mention it, I have it on my box too...and I've only used Morpheus.
-Jayde
At least three of the patches recently have been "Security Rollup Patches." One for Win2K as an OS, one for IE, and one for COM+. (There may have been a few more...I'm just remembering these off the top of my head.)
Who knows how many fixes were included in those rollup patches. Probably more than you would think.
-Jayde
Last time I checked, the site really wasn't touting IIS for web hosting, but using Windows servers for enterprise solutions. That's a pretty different situation.
It's also quite possible that since this really isn't an "in-house" Microsoft deal, they didn't have their web developers working on it...they probably farmed it out to some starving web-heads from SF for an absurdly low price. That said, most web developers don't develop for MS boxes simply because hosting companies charge twice as much for Windows space as a general rule.
Sure, it may seem like some mass hypocricy or something...but if the website isn't about "Use IIS for hosting two-page, temp web pages!" there really isn't much of an issue.
Also, notice the page has at the bottom:
"©1994-2002 Unisys Corporation. All rights reserved."
NOT
"©1994-2002 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved."
-Jayde
Office 2K, running on a 500 megahertz P2 box with 256 megs of RAM. (Although it was running with 128 for quite some time.)
Idle at startup: 7.5 megs of RAM
With 8 documents open, all of which are many pages in length, half of which have embedded images, tables, and various other heavy formatting options: 17.5 megs of RAM.
Now, that's not exactly what I'd call terrible. If it was linear, and it was 7.5 per document yeah, that would SUCK. But it's not.
-Jayde
Because the "application" that renders the "protected" audio data playable on a computer is a Win32 app.
This likely has less to do with Microsoft leveraging than it does that the makers of "Cactus Data Shield" not only suck as making a protection method, but they can't code their way out of a paper bag either.
-Jayde
WindowsXP already has built-in remote desktop capabilities.
Perhaps this is a bit simplistic of a suggestion compared to a few others, but it's probably something worth looking in to as an option.
-Jayde
Uh oh, posting this on /. will probably get me modded down faster than just about anything as a Troll or something...but given that the original "Article" was doing the trolling, I'm willing to give it a go.
Aside from the various issues with the review itself--which has been commented upon by quite a few posters already--this opening line just baffles me:
"Warcraft III runs on Windows 95/98/2000/NT and Mac OS. My setup was easy as pie, which was surprising since I run WinXP."
Oh please. Enough with the lame-ass cheapshots, OK? I can't think of any reason why installation of ANYTHING would be surprising on WinXP. It's got to be one of the most installation-friendly OSes ever created. Aside from the fact that I have been able to plug in EVERY piece of hardware (everything from ancient value USB scanners to brand-new stuff) either myself or any of my coworks have without having to install a SINGLE driver manually, I have yet to find anyone who has had trouble installing a program.
If you're gonna bitch and moan about something, do it with valid points. Is that so hard to understand?
-Jayde
Personally, I don't mind having a tower. I like throwing in odds-and-ends in my PCI slots, so something like this would never really be my primary rig. However, for the "average" user (or even a secondary living room computer or something) this thing looks great!
It's got everything the one could ask for, with a few more conviniences than even your average desktop. (That being readily-available mic, headphone, USB, and firewire on the front of the box. Nice stuff.) The fact that it's so tiny is also great, as it could be shown off as a table-top piece, or stowed away where nobody could see it. Pair this with a flat-panel and you've got a PC box with (almost) as much appeal as the G4 Cube. (Which, I'll admin, does look a bit cooler...but I'll take what I can get.)
The only handicap I see is the lack of an AGP slot and, thus, very weak gfx performance. *sigh* Oh well. Can't have everything, I guess.
-Jayde
From Encyclopedia.com
(William Henry Gates 3d), 1955-, American business executive, b. Seattle, Wash. At the age of 19, Gates founded (1974) the Microsoft Company, a computer software firm, with Paul Allen. They began by purchasing the rights to convert an existing software package. In 1980 they agreed to produce the operating system for the personal computer being developed by International Business Machines (IBM). That system, MS-DOS (Microsoft Disk Operating System), and subsequent programs (including the Windows operating systems) made Microsoft the world's largest producer of software for microcomputers.
In 1997 the U.S. Justice Dept. accused Microsoft of violating a 1995 antitrust agreement, because the Windows 95 operating system required consumers to load Microsoft's Internet browser-thus giving Microsoft a monopolistic advantage over other browser manufacturers. In late 1999 the trial judge decided that Microsoft was a monopoly that had stifled competition.
Gates, who is chairman of Microsoft, is the wealthiest person in the world. He founded (1994) the William H. Gates Foundation (focusing on health issues in developing countries) and the Gates Learning Foundation (1997), renamed the Gates Library Foundation (providing education assistance). In 1999, he merged the foundations into the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, a philanthropy that was worth $17.1 billion, after Gates's donation of $5 billion that year.
Gates has written The Road Ahead (1995, with N. Myhrvold and P. Rinearson) and Business @ the Speed of Thought (1999).
From Encarta.com
Gates, William Henry, III (1955- ), American business executive, who serves as chairman and chief software architect of Microsoft Corporation, the leading computer software company in the United States. Gates cofounded Microsoft in 1975 with high school friend Paul Allen. The company's success made Gates one of the most influential figures in the computer industry and, eventually, one of the richest people in the world.
Born in Seattle, Washington, Gates attended public school through the sixth grade. In the seventh grade he entered Seattle's exclusive Lakeside School, where he met Paul Allen. Gates was first introduced to computers and programming languages in 1968, when he was in the eighth grade. That year Lakeside bought a teletype machine that connected to a mainframe computer over phone lines. At the time, the school was one of the few that provided students with access to a computer.
Soon afterward, Gates, Allen, and other students convinced a local computer company to give them free access to its PDP-10, a new minicomputer made by Digital Equipment Corporation.
In exchange for the computer time, the students tried to find flaws in the system. Gates spent much of his free time on the PDP-10 learning programming languages such as BASIC, Fortran, and LISP. In 1972 Gates and Allen founded Traf-O-Data, a company that designed and built computerized car-counting machines for traffic analysis. The project introduced them to the programmable 8008 microprocessor from Intel Corporation.
While attending Harvard University in 1975, Gates teamed with Allen to develop a version of the BASIC programming language for the Altair 8800, the first personal computer. They licensed the software to the manufacturer of the Altair, Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS), and formed Microsoft (originally Micro-soft) to develop versions of BASIC for other computer companies. Gates decided to drop out of Harvard in his junior year to devote his time to Microsoft. In 1980 Microsoft closed a pivotal deal with International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) to provide the operating system for the IBM PC personal computer. As part of the deal, Microsoft retained the right to license the operating system to other companies. The success of the IBM PC made the operating system, MS-DOS, an industry standard. Microsoft's revenues skyrocketed as other computer makers licensed MS-DOS and demand for personal computers surged. In 1986 Microsoft offered its stock to the public; by 1987 rapid appreciation of the stock had made Gates, 31, the youngest ever self-made billionaire. In the 1990s, as Microsoft's Windows operating system and Office application software achieved worldwide market dominance, Gates amassed a fortune worth tens of billions of dollars. Alongside his successes, however, Gates was accused of using his company's power to stifle competition. In 2000 a federal judge found Microsoft guilty of violating antitrust laws and ordered it split into two companies. An appeals court overturned the breakup order but upheld the judge's ruling that Microsoft had abused its power to protect its Windows monopoly. (For more information on the history of Microsoft, see Microsoft Corporation.)
Gates has made personal investments in other high-technology companies. In 1989 he founded Corbis Corporation, which now owns the largest collection of digital images in the world. In 1995 Corbis purchased the Bettmann Archive of 16 million photographic images and announced plans to digitize part of the collection. In 1994 Gates and Craig McCaw, a pioneer in the cellular telecommunications industry, became primary investors in Teledesic Corporation. Teledesic planned to launch several hundred low-orbiting artificial satellites to create a global, high-speed telecommunications network.
In the late 1990s Gates became more involved in philanthropy. With his wife he established the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which, ranked by assets, quickly became one of the largest foundations in the world. Gates has also authored two books: The Road Ahead (1995; revised, 1996), which details his vision of technology's role in society, and Business @ the Speed of Thought (1999), which discusses the role technology can play in running a business.
In 1998 Gates appointed an executive vice president of Microsoft, Steve Ballmer, to the position of president, but Gates continued to serve as Microsoft's chairman and chief executive officer (CEO). In 2000 Gates transferred the title of CEO to Ballmer. Gates, in turn, took on the title of chief software architect to focus on the development of new products and technologies.
See, this demonstrates the fundumental problem with "scientists" who view their science as foolproof. The problem with discarding human opinion is that a human will eventually have to use and adjust to whatever you construct. If you have crafted a "perfect" GUI by some magical formula, there is still no way to assure that everyone will a) like it b) fine it "perfect" or c) think it useful at all.
Now, I'm not a big Steve Jobs fan...but let's set that aside for a moment. Sure, it's nice that this guy's a "real UI expert" and Jobs was mearly relying on "guruism"...but, in the end, Jobs liked it as a human, did he not? (At least, that's the way the article put it.) And, given that computers and GUI's are operated by humans, shouldn't that account for something?
Most of the GUI process is dominated by the actual look & feel of the interface. Is there a formula for that? Really? I would be interested to see if his formula included stark and boring design elements, or curved and shiny ones. I would then be interested to watch a wealth of people throw their arms up in disagreement. THAT'S the point. That's why customization is important.
Some people love the default look of WinXP. Some people like the "Sliver" color scheme instead of the "Blue" one. Some people hate the skinned look and revert to the "Classic" interface. The list goes on...
Certainly, a little bit of context switching in certain situations is better than having some scientist dictate what the Ultimate GUI (tm) should be? Generally speaking, if the basic layout and whatnot is basically the same, the human brain is pretty quick at readjusting itself. When I switch skins from "Classic" to some crazy skin I grabbed from the web, it doesn't take me THAT long to adjust myself.
I'll take the risk of losing 20 seconds of productivity to staring at an interface I think is absurdly ugly and can't stand to look at for the better part of my waking hours.
-Jayde