News


Gates Shows Vista Off to the Masses at CES Las Vegas

The focus of this year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas is, as you might expect, consumer electronics. But amid the smart watches, television-ready cell phones and movie download services were a few tidbits sure to impact IT in the coming year.

Symantec To Purchase IM Vendor

Symantec is acquiring instant messaging software maker IM Logic.

Firefox Held Nearly 10 Percent Share at Year’s End

Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser slowly but surely lost significant market share to Firefox over the past year, according to the latest monthly traffic report released Wednesday by Web metrics tool vendor Net Applications.

Microsoft Ships First Python Beta

At the very end of 2005, Microsoft quietly began shipping the first beta of IronPython, a release of the open source Python scripting language that functions within the .NET common language runtime (CLR).

Semiconductor Sales Continue at Record Pace

The Semiconductor Industry Association announced Tuesday that global sales of semiconductors continued to set a record pace in November, up 7.2 percent over a year earlier.

Intel Overhauls Branding

Intel kicked off the new year by updating its brand image to focus on the company’s emerging strategy of featuring itself as a platform company rather than just a chip giant.

Microsoft Responds to WMF Zero-Day Exploit

Microsoft is nearly finished with a patch for a zero-day exploit discovered in malware last week, but the software giant doesn't plan to release the fix until next week.

Private Eyes

Microsoft leads an industry-wide struggle to balance customer privacy and business value.

I Spy

An industry alliance formally defines "spyware,"a move that should help companies combat insidious intrusions.

Open Warfare

Microsoft and Massachusetts continue sparring over file formats.

New Zero-Day Exploit Threatens XP Users

Security experts at F-Secure reported on Tuesday a zero-day exploit that exposes vulnerabilities in the Windows graphics handling engine to enable malware to take control of PCs running fully patched Windows XP SP2.

Call for Reviewers: Developer, SQL Exams

If your plans call for taking the new-generation MCP developer and SQL exams in the next few weeks, tell us how you plan to approach them and what steps you'll take to pass them.

Seagate To Buy Maxtor in $1.9 Billion Stock Deal

Twas the week before Christmas when Seagate Technology announced plans to acquire smaller rival Maxtor in an all stock deal worth an estimated $1.9 billion.

Outlook “12” To Include RSS Aggregator

Users of Microsoft’s upcoming Outlook “12” will be able to monitor Really Simply Syndication (RSS) feeds from within the e-mail client, according to a Microsoft official’s Weblog.

Kai-Fu Lee and Google Settle With Microsoft

Just as the holiday weekend was about to start, Dr. Kai-Fu Lee got a special Christmas present -- an end to his legal problems surrounding his departure from Microsoft and his simultaneous recruitment by search competitor Google.

New Year Resolution: No More Support for Mac IE

Microsoft reaffirmed this week that, with the stroke of midnight on Dec. 31, Apple Mac versions of Internet Explorer will no longer be supported.

January: Two More Developer Betas Coming

.NET-based exams 70-526 and 70-529 get their time in front of developers next month.

EC Warns Microsoft of Pending Fines on Disclosure

The European Commissioner for Competition warned Microsoft on Thursday that it is facing fines of nearly $2.4 million per day unless it immediately delivers complete documentation of its programming interfaces, particularly those for work group servers, to enable competitors to interoperate with Windows.

IDC: PC Sales Growth To Remain Robust in 2006

Research group IDC has upgraded its projections of global PC shipment growth for the fourth quarter of 2005 and calendar 2006. It seems that, even as growth slows, it’s nonetheless still continuing to grow, and more quickly than earlier estimates had predicted.

Google Gives a Cool Billion for AOL Stake

Get ready for more colorful graphics on Google pages. That may be one of the most visible outcomes of a deal between the king of search engines and America Online.