This time around, however, Microsoft has dropped Outlook from the Home and Student version. The email client was available in the comparable version in 2003. In dropping Outlook, Microsoft is apparently giving consumers a reason to upgrade to the Standard edition. "It's a matter of time before we see if that actually works," Swenson said.
It is a matter of time before Microsoft loses the inbox to the likes of Google. I don't quite get the logic of not giving away Outlook the way they give away IE. Winning mindshare of a "function" everyone needs and that is available for free in rather mature forms would seem a no-brainer to me. But then again I am not a marketing genius.
After reading this I went to donate $25 because I use this service a lot and it is an ubiquitous part of the information appliance aspect of the net for me. I had to click around and then reach for my glasses to find the little "your continued donations keep Wikipedia running" link in like 6 point type. Come one folks - ASK FOR WHAT YOU NEED!
Before turning this over to advertisers make an appeal. Put it at the top of every article that comes up on search. You can't just say donations don't work when you don't really make an effort to us know you need them.
Setting up a security system once and then not reinforcing it periodically so that users take it seriously is the probelm.
Absolutely agreed. When you login BofA it displays in small type "If you don't recognize your personalized SiteKey,
don't enter your Passcode." No one is every going to read this and yes they were told about it when they picked the image but the whole thing probably seemed kind of silly and they soon forget the plot. BofA needs to think about clever ways to get peoples attention.
Have strong messages that point to the picture with animations, themes, clever phrases - something like a little mini-movie entitled "don't to get phished" that would be amusing and still get peoples attention.
Make it clear to people that they have to bear some responsiblity for security and if they don't want to do so, give them a non-transacting account so they can at least see their balances and get info. While the current rules don't usually hold the client liable, it is still going to be a miserable experience that will take time to get sorted out. Constantly talking about phishing is not good for business in the short run but if banks don't solve this problem it will be much worse in the long run.
Add phishing awareness to advertising. Notice how a) drug companies tell you all the terrible things that will happen if you take their drugs b) Tobacco companies tell you to quit smoking. It is time that banks tell you to be aware of phishing and that is why they have that little site key. The site key is for your protection because they love you.
There's something wrong with Linux, and it's not just one thing. It's the whole philosophy that software is just its features and nothing more.
The iPod was not about its features, or its interface, or its design, or its marketing, it was ALL of those things understood and executed simultaneously by a company and a person who Just Got It.
This is the best articulated description of both the problem and the solution. There is no doubt that feature-for-feature, Linux rocks. Yet as a first impression and certainly as a total philosophy it does not measure up to Windows. Another *nix that the iPod folks have "tarted up" both rocks and makes a fantastic first impression and prides itself on a total philosophy. So the question is when will a visionary with deep pockets, on the level of Steve Jobs, devote the attention needed to Linux to make it into something as refined and single-minded as OS X?
I don't know the answer to this but I think it lies in the fact that operating systems are not sold retail, but rather included with a PC. As PC prices falls, the portion of their cost attributable to software rises and this creates the ideal entrepreneurial opportunity for a competitor to Microsoft to pull together something based on Linux and open source add-ons.
So what is the problem? The problem is that there is nothing in it for such a visionary because of the licensing terms of the base software itself. Apple gets away with whacking BSD into shape because of the liberal BSD license whereas Linux has the real-deal in the form of GPL licenses which says that all refinements are to be publicly available. Witness CentOS and Oracle who sell (or threaten to sell) the refinements to Linux contributed by Redhat to see the effect of this policy. Granted Redhat is far from being visionary but you still see what happens to those who try and make incremental improvements and build an enterprise around it.
I am not a licensing expert but I think that the honest truth is that for Linux to come together and compete with Microsoft (e.g. being bundled with new P.Cs, making a great first impression, having loads of mainstream software available for it) it will take a commercial enterprise that sees that there is gold in the difference between what Microsoft charges PC manufacturers vs. what can be done with open source solutions. Right now I don't see how that formula works.
I would love to hear what those who are better informed on licensing matters have to say about this.
Now, they found that people were assuming these funny responses were somehow endorsed by Google.
You bet they did. I can't tell you how many bright, thoughtful and technology savvy folks I showed the 'failure' search to who just assumed it was some sort of joke that those crazy kids in Mountain View were foisting on us. I think Google's reasoning for taking this step is legitimate and I respect the fact that they were honest about it.
Ajax is an odd addition to our vernacular. Those who stick to the strict definition of Ajax associate it with the HTTPRequest but really Ajax is about the transition from page->post->page (actually pretty much circa 70's CICS) to applications coded in JS that need services from a host (via HTTPRequest, iFrames or more recently JSON). I hope that 5 years from now we will drop the Ajax term and simply call it 'browser-centric applications'.
The "average joe" will never switch to Linux. Instead he will eventually buy a computer from Wal-Mart for $169 and he won't know or care about the fact that the OS is *nix. What will drive the mass defection to Linux will be the shrinking cost of PCs which increases the portion of the cost paid by the manufacturer for the OS making it more attractive to pass on the conventional OEM arrangement with Microsoft. Hardware manufacturers drive the adoption of the desktop operating systems more than evangelists.
Client side Java holds more promise for creating a true desktop user experience. It has some disadvantages in that it is not installed by default on all browsers and has not yet gained the penetration of Flash. Also to do anything interesting you pretty much need a signed applet (as is the case with ThinkFree) which is a problem for many corporate "locked down" desktops. Sure they could figure out how to deal with that but pure Ajax just runs anywhere and is as secure as any other web site (e.g. it introduces no new issues). My own view as someone who has done development in both is that Ajax is no where near maturity yet and that it will improve a lot in the very near future. Just look how far it has come in the last two years.
Cringley's tone always has a sinister tinge but that is just his style. I think you could equally interpret the article on the face of the facts as Google being poised to save the world from bandwidth addiction.
My personal view - purely speculation - is that Google sees a future world where more of the essential computing infrastructure that is currently on our desktop will be part of a better controlled network of servers. This could actually be a good thing and maybe 25 years from now we will look back and say, "what were we thinking, putting all that hardware in an uncontrolled environment where it became subject to the vagaries of botnets, viruses, and blue screens from running buggy software.". They are the only entity with the capital and vision to get us there.
I second the thanks for that. The whole./ discussion has thus far been about the merits of HTML mail. You can love it or hate it - that is fine. But if if HTML mail is to be supported at all it needs to be supported in some sort of standards based way that won't screw people over. I realize that there is no standard for HTML mail and there is no obvious path to get there from here. The state we are in now is where each email client has a different set of quirks and those who produce HTML email content have to just deal with it. In the web page word things have gotten better. IE7 is closer to standards compliance and it is getting much easier to make a web page that will display the same everywhere.
So why would Microsoft make a move that puts us years behind on the goal of having standards for HTML mail. I just don't understand their thinking on this.
Personally I think it would be nuts to allow applications to run under any mobile phone OS? It would be a support/virus nightmare - "Er why is there an explosive device displayed on my screen where the pretty pixmaps used be?". Applications should run in a sand box such as Java (like most phones today) or even better in the browser. The fact that phones will be running powerful browsers like webkit and Opera (announced for Samsung phones) opens up a whole new world for mobile applications.
You are right they don't have to be mutually exclusive. You might be perfectly objective and be able walk and chew at the same time. But not knowing you personally and knowing that you "loathe Microsoft" and "actively work to oppose them" would I not be prudent to question your advice?
I have been in the business for a long time and I can understand having strong feelings about Microsoft and after all this is Slashdot where it is the norm to express strong feelings. Still I have the sense that referring to Microsoft as the "enemy" is not helpful in promoting alternative solutions.
I am not talking about the adoption of free software in general. The adoption of free sofware was not the main point of the article. It was talking mainly about Linux. Linux has been adopted in the server space because it is better and not because it is free or because the alternative would be to do business with the "enemy". In fact many companies pay for their Linux distros even though they could get the identical distro for free (e.g. CentOS).
I am not suggesting that the world is rosy or that Microsoft is not trying to protect their monopoly. I am just saying that most people don't really care and are looking for objective information on the best solution for their needs and will adopt something because it is better and not because they want to further the Free Software movement or because they hate Microsoft.
Only there to promote Microsoft/Novell and Oracle. It's making a campaign in favour of our enemies disguised as a positive article.
I believe that attitudes such as this are actually holding back the adoption of Linux. It creates a sense that the proponents of Linux are all driven by their hatred of Microsoft rather than a cool-headed and objective choice of which operating system is better for a given situation.
I now direct everything through GMail, forward a copy to a Linux mailbox and pop it periodically to my desktop in case Google gets hit by a bus. This is a simple solution that let's me access mail from anywhere. Even on a GPRS cell phone connected to my laptop while chilling under a palm tree, the whole thing works smoothly and quickly. I don't like complicated solutions when it comes to email as this is the one thing that is absolutely critical to me.
The only real hard part is getting your old mail up to GMail so you can search on it. There are some solutions available but they are far from perfect.
You are not alone. A serious online desktop solution must address each and every one of your concerns...
(1) I don't want my personal data on another person or groups computer, especially without an option of having my own backup of all my data. Even with the latter, I'd be leary, but the latter hasn't even happened yet in many cases, so I'm not expecting it to happen soon.
Having an offline store of data is essential. Having lived through 911 in New York when communications were down for some time I know I cannot rely 100% on online access. Online storage needs to automatically replicate to your PC so it is available with or without an internet connection.
(2) An online storehouse like that would be a hackers dream. I'm not likely to have anything majorly secure on my system, but nonethelless, I'd rather remain a small unimportant target (my PC), than a large glowing beacon of temptation (remote server housing a lot of people's data).
I think this can work both ways. With all of the best minds trying to protect this glowing beacon you could argue that it would be better protected than your PC where we have to depend on you to have all of your settings spot on to get protection. Still some things should be able to be encrypted to make sure they don't go into the wrong hands.
(3) Occasionally ISPs have trouble. I've not seen this with my ISP yet, but I've known a lot of people who have had 4-24 hour downtimes. I don't want to loose access to my documents/data if that ever happens with my ISP.
I believe that same solution for point 1 applies.
(4) I don't have to deal with slower (compared to hard drive access) network connections and stressed servers making things slow when I'm using my computer.
I used to carry around my outlook PST file so that when I travel to places where I can only connect via my GSM cell phone connection I would not incur absurd data charges for checking my mail. I recently switched to GMail and was thrilled to find that it did not waste a shred of bandwidth. Given that I did not have to download mails or attachments I did not want to look at I found it actually beat the standard POP email in terms of lowering my bill. So well written web applications need not be painful on slow connections. When you consider that your searching is done on the server at amazing speed it starts to actually be faster than having things on your desktop.
(5) If I'm travelling around, and using my notebook, I don't want to have to worry about my documents not being available when I go somewhere that may not have internet access. Kein danke.
Again a storage replication feature as for point 1 would solve this.
The bottom line is that offline storage, encryption and the ability to use private (company servers) for storage of certain critical data will have to part of any online desktop solution.
What I don't understand is why GPRS/EDGE is so much slower here in the U.S. at least on the Cingular network. When I travel almost anywhere outside of the U.S. with the same laptop, phone and the same Cingular account my speed is much faster and would almost be usable for surfing were it not for the huge data bill I get upon return home.
The answers to those questions will determine how effective the whole thing ends up being.
The definition of non-obvious is supposed be "non-obvious to those skilled in the art". While a patent examiner may specialize in a specific area (e.g. software, medicine), they still are not likely to be "skilled in the art" enough to make a reasonable judgment on obviousness. I have heard it suggested that a better way to use outside experts is to explain to them what needs to be solved and see if they come up with the same solution. While a very slippery slope, something along these lines is needed.
Finding better prior art is a big step but I concede that the review process is far from a complete solution.
As I said, it's just too easy, there's no checks and balances and there's too much money (i.e. incentive) and anonymity/ambiguity (i.e. no risk) involved.
Thanks for citing the examples and references. There may well be corruption but I just hate to make the assumption that because there is so much money and anonymity/ambiguity that corruption automatically exists. I guess you can call me naive.
No, the best we can do is to get our congressional representatives to fix the law so that it actually implements the objectives laid out in the constitution, to also make sure this massive interference in the citizen's business has a scientific basis and maybe send some of the bribed examiners at the USPTO to jail (with the amount of anonymity, ambiguity and money involved it's a certainty there's a lot of corruption going on). These are all unlikely but not impossible.
Bribed examiners?
Give me a break.
Good luck writing to your representative. In the mean time I think the review process is a major step forward.
To fairly grant a patent, the patent office must be able to understand a) what has already been done b) what is just plain obvious.
To achieve either you have to be skilled in the art of the subject at hand and that is just not something one could reasonably expect of a patent examiner who must be a generalist. A community skilled in the art must get involved and I really think this a good thing and could turn the patent system around. No matter how evil you think patents are, they are not going away anytime soon. The best we can do is to better the current situation by supporting efforts such as this.
I also switch a similar box to Ubuntu (a 800MGZ 196Meg Net Vista). I was impressed at how far things had come in terms of ease of use. I am used Linux on a server but made it a point to pretend I know nothing about the command line. Installing applications was very logical and easy and it really felt like newbie-friendly environment.
Performance was another matter and quite disappointing. The machine was much slower and openoffice was just too slow to use at all (60 seconds to launch the spreadsheet?). I think it is a myth that Linux (with GUI and apps) is more performant than Windows on underpowered machines. Then again it was the only Linux box on which I run a GUI so maybe it was a one-off problem with that machine.
That quote was just too funny. In any huge huge huge project the state of play a month before is usually going through the thousands of trouble reports, deciding which features you will turn off so you can ge the release out, figuring out work arounds for the rest of them, discovering that the analysis was flawed on some functions and of course by now you ditched many other features because the analysis was not done at all. And yes you change a few icon colors to keep key users happy and get your sign-off.
This is for a successful 1.0 implementation.
Slashdot Mirror
After reading this I went to donate $25 because I use this service a lot and it is an ubiquitous part of the information appliance aspect of the net for me. I had to click around and then reach for my glasses to find the little "your continued donations keep Wikipedia running" link in like 6 point type. Come one folks - ASK FOR WHAT YOU NEED!
Before turning this over to advertisers make an appeal. Put it at the top of every article that comes up on search. You can't just say donations don't work when you don't really make an effort to us know you need them.
This is the best articulated description of both the problem and the solution. There is no doubt that feature-for-feature, Linux rocks. Yet as a first impression and certainly as a total philosophy it does not measure up to Windows. Another *nix that the iPod folks have "tarted up" both rocks and makes a fantastic first impression and prides itself on a total philosophy. So the question is when will a visionary with deep pockets, on the level of Steve Jobs, devote the attention needed to Linux to make it into something as refined and single-minded as OS X?
I don't know the answer to this but I think it lies in the fact that operating systems are not sold retail, but rather included with a PC. As PC prices falls, the portion of their cost attributable to software rises and this creates the ideal entrepreneurial opportunity for a competitor to Microsoft to pull together something based on Linux and open source add-ons.
So what is the problem? The problem is that there is nothing in it for such a visionary because of the licensing terms of the base software itself. Apple gets away with whacking BSD into shape because of the liberal BSD license whereas Linux has the real-deal in the form of GPL licenses which says that all refinements are to be publicly available. Witness CentOS and Oracle who sell (or threaten to sell) the refinements to Linux contributed by Redhat to see the effect of this policy. Granted Redhat is far from being visionary but you still see what happens to those who try and make incremental improvements and build an enterprise around it.
I am not a licensing expert but I think that the honest truth is that for Linux to come together and compete with Microsoft (e.g. being bundled with new P.Cs, making a great first impression, having loads of mainstream software available for it) it will take a commercial enterprise that sees that there is gold in the difference between what Microsoft charges PC manufacturers vs. what can be done with open source solutions. Right now I don't see how that formula works.
I would love to hear what those who are better informed on licensing matters have to say about this.
Ajax is an odd addition to our vernacular. Those who stick to the strict definition of Ajax associate it with the HTTPRequest but really Ajax is about the transition from page->post->page (actually pretty much circa 70's CICS) to applications coded in JS that need services from a host (via HTTPRequest, iFrames or more recently JSON). I hope that 5 years from now we will drop the Ajax term and simply call it 'browser-centric applications'.
The "average joe" will never switch to Linux. Instead he will eventually buy a computer from Wal-Mart for $169 and he won't know or care about the fact that the OS is *nix. What will drive the mass defection to Linux will be the shrinking cost of PCs which increases the portion of the cost paid by the manufacturer for the OS making it more attractive to pass on the conventional OEM arrangement with Microsoft. Hardware manufacturers drive the adoption of the desktop operating systems more than evangelists.
Client side Java holds more promise for creating a true desktop user experience. It has some disadvantages in that it is not installed by default on all browsers and has not yet gained the penetration of Flash. Also to do anything interesting you pretty much need a signed applet (as is the case with ThinkFree) which is a problem for many corporate "locked down" desktops. Sure they could figure out how to deal with that but pure Ajax just runs anywhere and is as secure as any other web site (e.g. it introduces no new issues). My own view as someone who has done development in both is that Ajax is no where near maturity yet and that it will improve a lot in the very near future. Just look how far it has come in the last two years.
Cringley's tone always has a sinister tinge but that is just his style. I think you could equally interpret the article on the face of the facts as Google being poised to save the world from bandwidth addiction. My personal view - purely speculation - is that Google sees a future world where more of the essential computing infrastructure that is currently on our desktop will be part of a better controlled network of servers. This could actually be a good thing and maybe 25 years from now we will look back and say, "what were we thinking, putting all that hardware in an uncontrolled environment where it became subject to the vagaries of botnets, viruses, and blue screens from running buggy software.". They are the only entity with the capital and vision to get us there.
I second the thanks for that. The whole ./ discussion has thus far been about the merits of HTML mail. You can love it or hate it - that is fine. But if if HTML mail is to be supported at all it needs to be supported in some sort of standards based way that won't screw people over. I realize that there is no standard for HTML mail and there is no obvious path to get there from here. The state we are in now is where each email client has a different set of quirks and those who produce HTML email content have to just deal with it. In the web page word things have gotten better. IE7 is closer to standards compliance and it is getting much easier to make a web page that will display the same everywhere.
So why would Microsoft make a move that puts us years behind on the goal of having standards for HTML mail. I just don't understand their thinking on this.
Personally I think it would be nuts to allow applications to run under any mobile phone OS? It would be a support/virus nightmare - "Er why is there an explosive device displayed on my screen where the pretty pixmaps used be?". Applications should run in a sand box such as Java (like most phones today) or even better in the browser. The fact that phones will be running powerful browsers like webkit and Opera (announced for Samsung phones) opens up a whole new world for mobile applications.
You are right they don't have to be mutually exclusive. You might be perfectly objective and be able walk and chew at the same time. But not knowing you personally and knowing that you "loathe Microsoft" and "actively work to oppose them" would I not be prudent to question your advice?
I have been in the business for a long time and I can understand having strong feelings about Microsoft and after all this is Slashdot where it is the norm to express strong feelings. Still I have the sense that referring to Microsoft as the "enemy" is not helpful in promoting alternative solutions.
I am not talking about the adoption of free software in general. The adoption of free sofware was not the main point of the article. It was talking mainly about Linux. Linux has been adopted in the server space because it is better and not because it is free or because the alternative would be to do business with the "enemy". In fact many companies pay for their Linux distros even though they could get the identical distro for free (e.g. CentOS).
I am not suggesting that the world is rosy or that Microsoft is not trying to protect their monopoly. I am just saying that most people don't really care and are looking for objective information on the best solution for their needs and will adopt something because it is better and not because they want to further the Free Software movement or because they hate Microsoft.
I believe that attitudes such as this are actually holding back the adoption of Linux. It creates a sense that the proponents of Linux are all driven by their hatred of Microsoft rather than a cool-headed and objective choice of which operating system is better for a given situation.
I now direct everything through GMail, forward a copy to a Linux mailbox and pop it periodically to my desktop in case Google gets hit by a bus. This is a simple solution that let's me access mail from anywhere. Even on a GPRS cell phone connected to my laptop while chilling under a palm tree, the whole thing works smoothly and quickly. I don't like complicated solutions when it comes to email as this is the one thing that is absolutely critical to me. The only real hard part is getting your old mail up to GMail so you can search on it. There are some solutions available but they are far from perfect.
You are not alone. A serious online desktop solution must address each and every one of your concerns...
(1) I don't want my personal data on another person or groups computer, especially without an option of having my own backup of all my data. Even with the latter, I'd be leary, but the latter hasn't even happened yet in many cases, so I'm not expecting it to happen soon.
Having an offline store of data is essential. Having lived through 911 in New York when communications were down for some time I know I cannot rely 100% on online access. Online storage needs to automatically replicate to your PC so it is available with or without an internet connection.
(2) An online storehouse like that would be a hackers dream. I'm not likely to have anything majorly secure on my system, but nonethelless, I'd rather remain a small unimportant target (my PC), than a large glowing beacon of temptation (remote server housing a lot of people's data).
I think this can work both ways. With all of the best minds trying to protect this glowing beacon you could argue that it would be better protected than your PC where we have to depend on you to have all of your settings spot on to get protection. Still some things should be able to be encrypted to make sure they don't go into the wrong hands.
(3) Occasionally ISPs have trouble. I've not seen this with my ISP yet, but I've known a lot of people who have had 4-24 hour downtimes. I don't want to loose access to my documents/data if that ever happens with my ISP.
I believe that same solution for point 1 applies.
(4) I don't have to deal with slower (compared to hard drive access) network connections and stressed servers making things slow when I'm using my computer.
I used to carry around my outlook PST file so that when I travel to places where I can only connect via my GSM cell phone connection I would not incur absurd data charges for checking my mail. I recently switched to GMail and was thrilled to find that it did not waste a shred of bandwidth. Given that I did not have to download mails or attachments I did not want to look at I found it actually beat the standard POP email in terms of lowering my bill. So well written web applications need not be painful on slow connections. When you consider that your searching is done on the server at amazing speed it starts to actually be faster than having things on your desktop.
(5) If I'm travelling around, and using my notebook, I don't want to have to worry about my documents not being available when I go somewhere that may not have internet access. Kein danke.
Again a storage replication feature as for point 1 would solve this.
The bottom line is that offline storage, encryption and the ability to use private (company servers) for storage of certain critical data will have to part of any online desktop solution.
Google filed 31 patents in their lifetime. Granted they are younger and smaller than MS but does this represent a different thinking about IP?
What I don't understand is why GPRS/EDGE is so much slower here in the U.S. at least on the Cingular network. When I travel almost anywhere outside of the U.S. with the same laptop, phone and the same Cingular account my speed is much faster and would almost be usable for surfing were it not for the huge data bill I get upon return home.
The answers to those questions will determine how effective the whole thing ends up being.
The definition of non-obvious is supposed be "non-obvious to those skilled in the art". While a patent examiner may specialize in a specific area (e.g. software, medicine), they still are not likely to be "skilled in the art" enough to make a reasonable judgment on obviousness. I have heard it suggested that a better way to use outside experts is to explain to them what needs to be solved and see if they come up with the same solution. While a very slippery slope, something along these lines is needed.
Finding better prior art is a big step but I concede that the review process is far from a complete solution.
As I said, it's just too easy, there's no checks and balances and there's too much money (i.e. incentive) and anonymity/ambiguity (i.e. no risk) involved.
Thanks for citing the examples and references. There may well be corruption but I just hate to make the assumption that because there is so much money and anonymity/ambiguity that corruption automatically exists. I guess you can call me naive.
No, the best we can do is to get our congressional representatives to fix the law so that it actually implements the objectives laid out in the constitution, to also make sure this massive interference in the citizen's business has a scientific basis and maybe send some of the bribed examiners at the USPTO to jail (with the amount of anonymity, ambiguity and money involved it's a certainty there's a lot of corruption going on). These are all unlikely but not impossible.
Bribed examiners?
Give me a break.
Good luck writing to your representative. In the mean time I think the review process is a major step forward.
To fairly grant a patent, the patent office must be able to understand a) what has already been done b) what is just plain obvious.
To achieve either you have to be skilled in the art of the subject at hand and that is just not something one could reasonably expect of a patent examiner who must be a generalist. A community skilled in the art must get involved and I really think this a good thing and could turn the patent system around. No matter how evil you think patents are, they are not going away anytime soon. The best we can do is to better the current situation by supporting efforts such as this.
I also switch a similar box to Ubuntu (a 800MGZ 196Meg Net Vista). I was impressed at how far things had come in terms of ease of use. I am used Linux on a server but made it a point to pretend I know nothing about the command line. Installing applications was very logical and easy and it really felt like newbie-friendly environment.
Performance was another matter and quite disappointing. The machine was much slower and openoffice was just too slow to use at all (60 seconds to launch the spreadsheet?). I think it is a myth that Linux (with GUI and apps) is more performant than Windows on underpowered machines. Then again it was the only Linux box on which I run a GUI so maybe it was a one-off problem with that machine.
I will send you the .mpp file :-)
That quote was just too funny. In any huge huge huge project the state of play a month before is usually going through the thousands of trouble reports, deciding which features you will turn off so you can ge the release out, figuring out work arounds for the rest of them, discovering that the analysis was flawed on some functions and of course by now you ditched many other features because the analysis was not done at all. And yes you change a few icon colors to keep key users happy and get your sign-off. This is for a successful 1.0 implementation.