All posts in Uncategorized

Microsoft is set to begin a pilot of a new Genuine Advantage anti-piracy mechanism for Office that will add a “nag-like” feature, akin to what is now part of Windows Vista, to Office.

Office already currently includes an Office Genuine Advantage (OGA) validation mechanism (for Office XP and Office 2007), but Microsoft doesn’t do a whole lot to “punish” those it deems to be running non-Genuine versions of Office. However, as part of a new OGA notifications pilot program — which Microsoft is launching in Chile, Italy, Spain and Turkey, according to an April 8 announcement buried in a Q&A on Microsoft’s Web site — Microsoft is set to turn up the unpleasantness a notch.

I asked Microsoft to explain what will happen in the new pilot. According to Cori Hartje, Director Genuine Software Initiative:

Full Article – http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=1322

Microsoft is set to begin a pilot of a new Genuine Advantage anti-piracy mechanism for Office that will add a “nag-like” feature, akin to what is now part of Windows Vista, to Office.

Office already currently includes an Office Genuine Advantage (OGA) validation mechanism (for Office XP and Office 2007), but Microsoft doesn’t do a whole lot to “punish” those it deems to be running non-Genuine versions of Office. However, as part of a new OGA notifications pilot program — which Microsoft is launching in Chile, Italy, Spain and Turkey, according to an April 8 announcement buried in a Q&A on Microsoft’s Web site — Microsoft is set to turn up the unpleasantness a notch.

I asked Microsoft to explain what will happen in the new pilot. According to Cori Hartje, Director Genuine Software Initiative:

Full Article – http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=1322

Maintaining harmony between security and privacy concerns is a difficult balancing act for many companies, and the continued convergence of the two disciplines is creating a whole new set of challenges.

In a Tuesday keynote speech at RSA 2008, Craig Mundie, Microsoft (NSDQ:MSFT)’s chief research and strategy officer, said the software giant has met the initial challenges of trust and security and is now shifting its focus to building a ‘trusted stack’ of software that encompasses not just the OS, but also devices, applications, identity, and data integrity.

“Today we are in a transitional situation at Microsoft. We moving beyond the first generation of trust and security and moving into the trusted stack,” said Mundie.

Full Article – http://www.crn.com/software/207100422?cid=CRNFeed

It’s not uncommon to come across a patch for a software problem you’ve never heard of or thought was possible. In most cases they’re caused by an unconventional use-case or a bad combination of hardware/software configurations. Sometimes the symptoms are so exceptional it makes you ponder about who in the world would be affected by it in the first place. I wouldn’t be surprised if in this case it was just one person. The Microsoft KB article speaks for itself.

Full Article – http://www.istartedsomething.com/20080408/cant-resume-windows-32-processor/

It’s not uncommon to come across a patch for a software problem you’ve never heard of or thought was possible. In most cases they’re caused by an unconventional use-case or a bad combination of hardware/software configurations. Sometimes the symptoms are so exceptional it makes you ponder about who in the world would be affected by it in the first place. I wouldn’t be surprised if in this case it was just one person. The Microsoft KB article speaks for itself.

Full Article – http://www.istartedsomething.com/20080408/cant-resume-windows-32-processor/

The WSPP technical documentation set provides detailed technical specifications for Microsoft proprietary protocols (including extensions to industry-standard or other published protocols) that are implemented in Microsoft Windows Server work group server software and that are used to deliver file & print and user & group administration services to Windows work group networks. The documentation set includes a set of companion overview and reference documents that supplement the technical specifications with conceptual background, overviews of inter-protocol relationships and interactions, and technical reference information, such as common data types and error codes.

The scope of communications covered by this technical documentation set includes all protocols implemented and used in Windows Work Group Server Operating Systems (namely Windows NT Server 4.0, Windows 2000 Server Standard Edition, Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition, and Windows Server 2008) to provide file & print and user & group administration services to Windows client operating systems (namely Windows 98 and successors up to and including Windows Vista) and other Windows Work Group Server Operating Systems.

Download Link – http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=7708dd71-8c01-420f-aae3-044d1691566d&DisplayLang=en

Intel plans to release an anti-theft technology for laptops during the fourth quarter of this year, but the company isn’t offering many details yet.

Called Intel Anti-Theft Technology, the new capability will be added to Intel’s Active Management Technology, which is part of Centrino vPro and allows IT managers to remotely access and configure computers.

In the event of theft, the technology will “basically lock the system, lock the disk, so people cannot be maliciously using and getting the data,” said Dadi Perlmutter, executive vice president and general manager of Intel’s Mobility Group, according to a transcript of his presentation at the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) in Shanghai.

Full Article – http://news.yahoo.com/s/macworld/20080406/tc_macworld/inteltoreleaseantithefttechnologyforlaptops;_ylt=AqGSaoaX_SvfkuEMrr0GP8wxVrIF

After dangling some vague promises about its plans to create seamless social and device “meshes,” Microsoft is set to deliver more details about its mesh-syncrhonization strategy — and deliver its first Live Mesh beta to external testers — later this month.

In a Web 2.0 Expo keynote on April 23 entitled “Get Mesh!,” Amit Mital, who is identified as “General Manager of Live Mesh product at Microsoft,” is set to unveil more of Microsoft’s vision. There are no further details on the Web 2.0 site about Mital’s slated 10-minute appearance, other than the fact that Mital was previously General Manager of Microsoft’s Live Meeting Web conferencing service, as well as BizTalk Server, Microsoft’s integration server.

Full Article – http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=1318

Windows 7 could be arriving much sooner than anticipated, according to none other than Bill Gates.

When asked about the progress of Windows Vista during a speech at the Inter-American Development Bank, Gates told the audience: “Sometime in the next year or so we will have a new version,” according to a report on CNet.com.

Full Article – http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/184932/gates-windows-7-coming-next-year.html

Windows 7 could be arriving much sooner than anticipated, according to none other than Bill Gates.

When asked about the progress of Windows Vista during a speech at the Inter-American Development Bank, Gates told the audience: “Sometime in the next year or so we will have a new version,” according to a report on CNet.com.

Full Article – http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/184932/gates-windows-7-coming-next-year.html

As we worked towards the recent release of Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1, the IE team focused hard on performance. As part of our effort to improve IE, our investigations have revealed several add-on performance problems. In this post, I want to share some of the common themes that we have discovered.

First, I would like to thank those of you who have provided feedback on this blog, in the IE Beta NewsGroup, and around the web. The Internet Explorer team has been working hard on performance in IE8 and it is great to see the results of some of our early investments. We still have room (and plans) to improve, but for now you can find out more about the performance improvements in IE8 Beta1 from our developer whitepapers.

If you are new to the world of developing IE add-ons and want some background material, here are a few great links to get you started:

• Building Browser Helper Objects with Visual Studio 2005
• Building Stable Browser Extensions
• Add-on Development

Full Article – http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2008/04/04/designing-for-add-on-performance.aspx

Windows Live OneCare 2.0 was released back in mid-November and, ever since, we haven’t heard much from the Windows Live OneCare team. That should change soon, as LiveSide has noticed a 2.5 English-only public beta signup page. Hopefully the official blog entry will appear soon, since at press time a changelog was nowhere to be found. When it becomes available, though, you can expect this post to be updated accordingly.

Full Article – http://arstechnica.com/journals/microsoft.ars/2008/04/03/windows-live-onecare-2-5-public-beta-begins

Microsoft on Thursday issued five critical security bulletins and three important ones for all flavors of Windows, Internet Explorer and Office. Vista and Windows Server 2008 are affected by four of the five critical bulletins.

In its patch day advance notification for its Tuesday update, Microsoft issued five critical bulletins to address remote code execution vulnerabilities. Microsoft said it will patch critical flaws in Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2003 (SPs 1 and 2), IE 6 and 7 and Office XP SP3, 2003 and 2007 Microsoft Office System among others.

Details of these vulnerabilities will be disclosed on Tuesday.

Among the three important vulnerabilities, the affected software includes Windows Server 2003 and 2008, Vista and Vista SP1 and Visio 2002, 2003 and 2007.

Microsoft has issued 25 security bulletins so far this year.

Adobe Systems has shared the first scrap of information about its next version of Photoshop, CS4, and it’s a doozy: there will be a 64-bit version of the photo-editing software, but only for Windows and not for Mac OS X.

Adobe generally keeps features in the Windows and Mac versions at a level of parity, but that wasn’t possible this time around because of a change Apple made last year to the Mac’s programming underpinnings, John Nack, Adobe’s product manager for Photoshop, said in an interview.

Full Article – http://www.news.com/8301-13580_3-9909725-39.html?tag=nefd.lede

Q&A: Michael Dix, General Manager of Windows Client Product Management, discusses Microsoft’s commitment to deliver Windows to customers for a new category of devices known as ultra low-cost personal computers (ULCPCs).

REDMOND, Wash., –April 3, 2008 – Today Microsoft announced the worldwide extension of the availability of Windows XP Home for an emerging, new class of mobile personal computers commonly known as ultra-low-cost PCs, or ULCPCs. Windows XP Home for ULCPCs will be available until the later of June 30, 2010, or one year after general availability of the next version of Windows.

Full Article – http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2008/apr08/04-03xpeos.mspx