If there's a flaw in your car tire, then you know your car tire may blow out and hurt you. Increased distribution of the information lowers the risk (people may change the tires, stop driving it long distances etc).
If there's a security hole in your OS, increased distribution of the information will do MORE damage (unless you believe that everyone that hears the information will immediately patch or repair their servers themselves - since if the info is distributed before a patch is available, then the vendor can't help you yet).
Microsoft doesn't sell the hardware to do these things, the PC manufacturers do. Yet Microsoft is bundling the software programs into its OS in order to put its rivals out of business. That *is* evil.
Rivals? Do you think that the companies that make CD recorder software are Microsoft's rivals? Do you really think Microsoft included CD burning capability in XP to put the guys that make Nero out of business?
Adaptec is probably the most successful maker of CD burning software for Windows (ie, the people with the most to lose). Guess what? The CD burning software in XP is written by Adaptec.
What's abusive about adding limited CD burning capabity to the operating system? An Operating System's job is to provide access to the hardware. A CD burner is obviously a piece of hardware, and one that, up until now, a clean OS install has been unable to let you use.
Or should Windows also not include video, sound, IDE, scanner, printer or mouse drivers?
I agree Microsoft shouldn't force their preferences on anyone (and OEMs should be free to install different CD burning capability if they so choose) but I don't agree with making it illegal for them to supply it.
As for whether or not the OEMs should have to pay for it if they're going to replace it, that's a more difficult question. Should the OEMs have to pay for the development of the bundled ATI video driver if they shipping a machine with an nVidia graphics card?
I can't wait to see the microsoft docs for their protocols...
Take a look at MSDN, most of them are there already. Microsoft has a million documented hooks in the OS for customizing and adding things, and very few people ever use them.
Windows Media Player's ability to burn CD's, for example, is provided through the Image Mastering API, which other apps can use, and which is documented well enough that a competitor could replace it.
Also, the bundled ability is so lame that it's going to be replaced by most people - you can't burn an ISO with it, for example, only CD audio discs or discs with files on them (and then, you have very little control).
Apple has CD burning in the Mac OS (look at their ads - they're making a big deal out of it) yet Microsoft adding it to Windows is evil. *shrug*
I called Rogers in Canada (Ontario) for help with a connection problem from a machine with Windows XP on it, and even though the problem had nothing to do with Windows XP, they refused to help me because I was using an unsupported operating system.
Funny thing is, I called back a few days later, and the guy helped me. I mentioned the earlier call and he told me that they weren't going to support XP, but then Future Shop (a big PC retail chain in Canada) started shipping PCs bundled with the Rogers service and Windows XP.. and they had to start supporting it.
He said they got a few sheets of paper with some screenshots and that was it - limited support, but still, better than being told to go away.
Funny thing is, XP's TCP/IP support is fairly well set up to help the tech support guys - if you go into the properties for the network connection there's a tab that's got a summary of all the connection's settings and a "Repair" button that resets the interface and renews the DHCP lease..
Multiple simultaneous logins works really well in a house type environment where you've got a few people sharing the computer.. Mom's Solitaire that she was playing when she went off to do something else stays open while someone else uses the computer for a few hours.. when Mom switches back to her desktop, her stuff is still there.
Sure, someone else could have used the same desktop and left the game running, but then they have Mom's bookmarks and stuff, not their own. Better to have the fast user switching.
And switching desktops is one keystroke.. Windows-L takes you to the list of users.
Microsoft's Pocket Streets and Trips is pretty darn cool.. I have a full street map for the cities I travel in loaded into my iPaq and I can enter an address and have it show me exactly where it is on the map.
Microsoft has done almost nothing to eliminate the threat of viruses?
The last two big worms had patches available before they started spreading... It's the folks who put freshly installed boxes on the Internet without applying the latest patches who are guilty. (Are they terrorists? Does buying Windows and installing it at home make you a terrorist? Or maybe you become a terrorist without even realizing it when someone exploits your box!)
The only thing Microsoft has done here is make it easy for unqualified people to set up and run boxes with open, exploitable ports...
If a particular Linux distro was as widespread as Windows is, and the default install left things exposed (which has happened on numerous occasions) then the virus authors would be exploiting holes in that distro the same way these worms are exploited.
The thing saving Linux from worm attacks right now is low marketshare among novice users.
The ECMA standards body rules section 1.4 say that if a company shows up with a patent and doesn't license it with "reasonable, non-discriminatory" license practices, then the standard will be cancelled.
If I spend $10 going to see a movie whose production company has been shut down, is my $10 wasted? Not unless the movie sucks.. and from what I've heard, Tribes 2 doesn't suck...
I'm not sure - the screen is supposed to be sealed, but I some flaw allows dust to get in.
The iPaq screen is reflective, which means you need light on the front of it (not the back) to see it. This makes it (as far as I know) the only color PDA that you can use outdoors in direct sunlight - the more light the better.
But because the screen is lit from the front (actually by lights at the side of the screen), this makes the little specs of dust GLOW.
It's annoying. But I'd rather put up with it than go through the trouble of sending mine back.
It has it's problems, but the iPaq is one of those devices that seems to inspire a little bit of fanaticism in it's owners.. Check out Brighthand or PDA Buzz and look in the forums - you'll see lots of complaints about the iPaq, but nobody seems to want to give theirs up.
Some common complaints:
You can't press more than one button at a time. This makes gaming nearly impossible.
The speaker "clicks" as the little amplifier turns on whenever it needs to make a sound; This is probably a WinCE thing, so hopefully the linux driver folks will make it configurable.
Dust inside the screen. Seems to happen to everyone - it happened to me, I'm just living with it.
Weird expansion capabilities. You can add a Smart Media or Compact Flash slot, but the sleeve you need to get to do so makes the iPaq quite a bit bigger, and you can only have one sleeve at a time.
I'd recommend it.. but maybe it's safer to buy it from somewhere like Radio Shack that will let you return it if you decide you really don't like it.
- Steve
Do you realize it's not Microsoft who picks where you go, it's configurable? Do you realize that your stating that it's Microsoft who picks where you go shows that you don't know what you're talking about?
You don't need to have the original CD around to apply service packs, etc. Copy the source CD to your hard drive and install from that, or update the registry afterwards to point to wherever you've put the original files.
Have you ever looked at their developer materials? They are very good at documenting and encouraging you to use their extensions. Asking him if they plan to open up their proprietary extensions is kind of silly.
The third party cookie distinction is back in IE6 again (at least it is in the latest WinXP beta, and they share the same codebase). You can say Accept, Block, or Prompt separately for first and third party cookies, as well as accepting or rejecting all session (not persistent) cookies.
So you can accept all first party cookies, and be prompted about any third party ones.
It's not about leaving the application "out there" and using it from home. It's about your IT department running the application on big machines they control, in your building, on your high speed network, and letting you use them over your network. It makes a lot more sense that way - somewhat centralized administration, but without the risks involved in using apps over the Internet.
In Windows Media Player 7, they took out the ability to Save the streaming video file you're watching. Watching the same stream in Media Player 6, you can save it no problem.
According to Q273006, this is "by design". Thanks, guys.
>NET based apps (services) will be totally
>dependent on your connection to the network
>(internet). You think your company is effected
>now when you can't get email or surf the web?
>Imagine all the sales, accounting, etc, depts.
>sitting around without any apps because the
>DSL/FRAME/etc is down.
That's BS. You might want to actually look at the technology before writing about it. You can easily write.NET apps that don't need a network connection (and download and run them just like any other Windows app). That's probably what most use of the.NET technology will look like.
It's like Java - when you critize Java, what are you critizing? The bytecode? The language? The virtual machine?
.NET is a lot of things. It's a bytecode interpreter as well, and a a language, and a class library, and a bunch of other stuff. It's a replacement for Win32 (Microsoft makes that statement in one of their MSDN articles - that.NET is basically the sequel to Win32).
It's not about renting software online - it makes renting software easier, but hey so does Java. I wish they'd given each piece a name and not chosen to wrap the whole bundle with the.NET name.
DirectX is an example of where a bunch of technologies are living under one name fairly happily... but ActiveX is another Microsoft example of a name that, well, nobody really knows what it means (COM? OCX? OLE? JavaScript? They're all part of ActiveX).
I thought Open Source was about having source code available. How does this apply to networking? You're going to require that the bandwidth be distributed with source?
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If there's a flaw in your car tire, then you know your car tire may blow out and hurt you. Increased distribution of the information lowers the risk (people may change the tires, stop driving it long distances etc).
If there's a security hole in your OS, increased distribution of the information will do MORE damage (unless you believe that everyone that hears the information will immediately patch or repair their servers themselves - since if the info is distributed before a patch is available, then the vendor can't help you yet).
Big difference - bad analogy.
- Steve
Microsoft doesn't sell the hardware to do these things, the PC manufacturers do. Yet Microsoft is bundling the software programs into its OS in order to put its rivals out of business. That *is* evil.
Rivals? Do you think that the companies that make CD recorder software are Microsoft's rivals? Do you really think Microsoft included CD burning capability in XP to put the guys that make Nero out of business?
Adaptec is probably the most successful maker of CD burning software for Windows (ie, the people with the most to lose). Guess what? The CD burning software in XP is written by Adaptec.
What's abusive about adding limited CD burning capabity to the operating system? An Operating System's job is to provide access to the hardware. A CD burner is obviously a piece of hardware, and one that, up until now, a clean OS install has been unable to let you use.
Or should Windows also not include video, sound, IDE, scanner, printer or mouse drivers?
I agree Microsoft shouldn't force their preferences on anyone (and OEMs should be free to install different CD burning capability if they so choose) but I don't agree with making it illegal for them to supply it.
As for whether or not the OEMs should have to pay for it if they're going to replace it, that's a more difficult question. Should the OEMs have to pay for the development of the bundled ATI video driver if they shipping a machine with an nVidia graphics card?
- Steve
I can't wait to see the microsoft docs for their protocols ...
Take a look at MSDN, most of them are there already. Microsoft has a million documented hooks in the OS for customizing and adding things, and very few people ever use them.
Windows Media Player's ability to burn CD's, for example, is provided through the Image Mastering API, which other apps can use, and which is documented well enough that a competitor could replace it.
Also, the bundled ability is so lame that it's going to be replaced by most people - you can't burn an ISO with it, for example, only CD audio discs or discs with files on them (and then, you have very little control).
Apple has CD burning in the Mac OS (look at their ads - they're making a big deal out of it) yet Microsoft adding it to Windows is evil. *shrug*
I called Rogers in Canada (Ontario) for help with a connection problem from a machine with Windows XP on it, and even though the problem had nothing to do with Windows XP, they refused to help me because I was using an unsupported operating system.
Funny thing is, I called back a few days later, and the guy helped me. I mentioned the earlier call and he told me that they weren't going to support XP, but then Future Shop (a big PC retail chain in Canada) started shipping PCs bundled with the Rogers service and Windows XP.. and they had to start supporting it.
He said they got a few sheets of paper with some screenshots and that was it - limited support, but still, better than being told to go away.
Funny thing is, XP's TCP/IP support is fairly well set up to help the tech support guys - if you go into the properties for the network connection there's a tab that's got a summary of all the connection's settings and a "Repair" button that resets the interface and renews the DHCP lease..
- Steve
Multiple simultaneous logins works really well in a house type environment where you've got a few people sharing the computer.. Mom's Solitaire that she was playing when she went off to do something else stays open while someone else uses the computer for a few hours.. when Mom switches back to her desktop, her stuff is still there.
Sure, someone else could have used the same desktop and left the game running, but then they have Mom's bookmarks and stuff, not their own. Better to have the fast user switching.
And switching desktops is one keystroke.. Windows-L takes you to the list of users.
You can't format your drive and install Windows XP. That would require deleting Linux, and Linux doesn't support that, does it?
Microsoft's Pocket Streets and Trips is pretty darn cool.. I have a full street map for the cities I travel in loaded into my iPaq and I can enter an address and have it show me exactly where it is on the map.
Microsoft has done almost nothing to eliminate the threat of viruses?
The last two big worms had patches available before they started spreading... It's the folks who put freshly installed boxes on the Internet without applying the latest patches who are guilty. (Are they terrorists? Does buying Windows and installing it at home make you a terrorist? Or maybe you become a terrorist without even realizing it when someone exploits your box!)
The only thing Microsoft has done here is make it easy for unqualified people to set up and run boxes with open, exploitable ports...
If a particular Linux distro was as widespread as Windows is, and the default install left things exposed (which has happened on numerous occasions) then the virus authors would be exploiting holes in that distro the same way these worms are exploited.
The thing saving Linux from worm attacks right now is low marketshare among novice users.
- Steve
The ECMA standards body rules section 1.4 say that if a company shows up with a patent and doesn't license it with "reasonable, non-discriminatory" license practices, then the standard will be cancelled.
If I spend $10 going to see a movie whose production company has been shut down, is my $10 wasted? Not unless the movie sucks.. and from what I've heard, Tribes 2 doesn't suck...
A game is entertainment, not an investment...
I'm not sure - the screen is supposed to be sealed, but I some flaw allows dust to get in.
The iPaq screen is reflective, which means you need light on the front of it (not the back) to see it. This makes it (as far as I know) the only color PDA that you can use outdoors in direct sunlight - the more light the better.
But because the screen is lit from the front (actually by lights at the side of the screen), this makes the little specs of dust GLOW.
It's annoying. But I'd rather put up with it than go through the trouble of sending mine back.
- You can't press more than one button at a time. This makes gaming nearly impossible.
- The speaker "clicks" as the little amplifier turns on whenever it needs to make a sound; This is probably a WinCE thing, so hopefully the linux driver folks will make it configurable.
- Dust inside the screen. Seems to happen to everyone - it happened to me, I'm just living with it.
- Weird expansion capabilities. You can add a Smart Media or Compact Flash slot, but the sleeve you need to get to do so makes the iPaq quite a bit bigger, and you can only have one sleeve at a time.
I'd recommend it.. but maybe it's safer to buy it from somewhere like Radio Shack that will let you return it if you decide you really don't like it. - SteveDo you realize it's not Microsoft who picks where you go, it's configurable? Do you realize that your stating that it's Microsoft who picks where you go shows that you don't know what you're talking about?
You don't need to have the original CD around to apply service packs, etc. Copy the source CD to your hard drive and install from that, or update the registry afterwards to point to wherever you've put the original files.
Have you ever looked at their developer materials? They are very good at documenting and encouraging you to use their extensions. Asking him if they plan to open up their proprietary extensions is kind of silly.
The third party cookie distinction is back in IE6 again (at least it is in the latest WinXP beta, and they share the same codebase). You can say Accept, Block, or Prompt separately for first and third party cookies, as well as accepting or rejecting all session (not persistent) cookies.
So you can accept all first party cookies, and be prompted about any third party ones.
- Steve
It's back in the current 6 betas.
It's not about leaving the application "out there" and using it from home. It's about your IT department running the application on big machines they control, in your building, on your high speed network, and letting you use them over your network. It makes a lot more sense that way - somewhat centralized administration, but without the risks involved in using apps over the Internet.
- Steve
According to Q273006, this is "by design". Thanks, guys.
Was the Contacts button on the WinCE device broken? The iPaq and the Jornada both have one, I'm not sure about the Casio.
Anyone else find it strange that Microsoft is on the working group, and Netscape is not? Where was Netscape on this one?
>NET based apps (services) will be totally
.NET apps that don't need a network connection (and download and run them just like any other Windows app). That's probably what most use of the .NET technology will look like.
>dependent on your connection to the network
>(internet). You think your company is effected
>now when you can't get email or surf the web?
>Imagine all the sales, accounting, etc, depts.
>sitting around without any apps because the
>DSL/FRAME/etc is down.
That's BS. You might want to actually look at the technology before writing about it. You can easily write
- Steve
It's like Java - when you critize Java, what are you critizing? The bytecode? The language? The virtual machine?
.NET is basically the sequel to Win32).
.NET name.
.NET is a lot of things. It's a bytecode interpreter as well, and a a language, and a class library, and a bunch of other stuff. It's a replacement for Win32 (Microsoft makes that statement in one of their MSDN articles - that
It's not about renting software online - it makes renting software easier, but hey so does Java. I wish they'd given each piece a name and not chosen to wrap the whole bundle with the
DirectX is an example of where a bunch of technologies are living under one name fairly happily... but ActiveX is another Microsoft example of a name that, well, nobody really knows what it means (COM? OCX? OLE? JavaScript? They're all part of ActiveX).
- Steve
I thought Open Source was about having source code available. How does this apply to networking? You're going to require that the bandwidth be distributed with source?
http://www.opensource.org/osd.html