Windows 7 Makes Pre-Release Debut

We'll learn a lot more as testers put the code through its paces. For now, we know a few things -- namely, that Microsoft has improved the taskbar and enhanced its touchscreen abilities. Microsoft is also trying to make it easier to network machines in the home.

So far, I haven't seen any show-stopping new features. Then again, that's the last thing it needs; what Window 7 really needs is stability and compatibility. And a dash of performance wouldn't hurt, either!

Posted by Doug Barney on October 29, 20080 comments

Bill Gates De-Retiring?

Those who thought the energetic Gates would retire from his day-to-day Microsoft duties to play Canasta were sadly misinformed. Besides heading The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and remaining chairman of Microsoft, Bill has a brand new gig: bgC3.

This new concern is a think-tank with goals similar to his foundation: To look at the big issues that affect our world -- and perhaps help. This is still very much in stealth mode, as you'll see when you click on www.bgc3.com.

Posted by Doug Barney on October 28, 20080 comments

Microsoft Floats Cloud Plan

Details were a bit sketchy, but here's how I understand it: Azure is an operating system of sorts because it manages and runs applications, which in this case exist in some sort of cloud. The platform, at this point, is aimed at developers who can use .NET and Visual Studio to build these apps.

VMware, with its Virtual Datacenter Operating System, announced something conceptually similar a month or two back. Here, IT uses virtualization to turn existing apps into cloud services which can run in your own datacenter or out in an external cloud -- or a mix of the two.

One key difference is that Microsoft already has massive datacenters and plans to build more. This way, Microsoft can house your apps and store your files so they're available no matter where you are or what device you're using.

I like the idea of having my data safe and always available. The only downside as an end user is: Who controls the files? I like to have ownership of the files I create, and don't want somebody controlling my access. And I would never want them taken away.

What do you make of all this, and are you going to give the preview of Azure a try? Let me know at [email protected].

Posted by Doug Barney on October 28, 20080 comments

Mailbag: What To Do About Windows 7, More

Microsoft is running out of time to GET IT RIGHT. If Win 7 doesn't hit the mark directly on the head, then no one will really care after that. I feel the new OS should be based on the Singularity core, be x64-based and use VM technology for any compatibility issue with older programs. Microsoft should not spend one more second working on x32 except for security patches. All of its OS development efforts should be focused on getting a core with legs, without messing it up with all sorts of features. Something like Win 2008 Server Core.
-Rob

Here's my list of advice for Win 7: Make it capable of virtualization as Server 2008 Hyper-V and App-V. Make it as light as possible (Google did that with Chrome and it works). Remove IE from Windows. Eliminate drivers and services from its core and keep them on the installation DVD for further installation when needed. Make it more video-efficient without the crashes caused on Vista. Make it 64-bit with 32-bit capability for legacy apps. Eliminate Windows Media Player and Windows Media Center; videos, pictures, music and folders should open and organized without any delay. Increase touch-screen use and features.
-George

You are on the wrong side of this one. The reason many of us dislike existing desktop OSes and are moving away from the them is even more compelling with super fat clients. They need even greater capacity and more expensive end user machines; they have huge patch management issues, as well as end user usability complexity and manageability issues; they're an IT support nightmare and need massive training schedules for IT staff; they're overkill (90 percent or more of users only use an Office suite, including e-mail and a browser); they add unnecessary complexity which adds risk to systems; they come at a higher cost in all IT departments that consumes funds at more stategic areas.

Long live the thin client and cloud computing. Down with fat clients and non-virtualized servers.
-Ray

A few more of you chime in on Microsoft's new patent on a tool to clean up online gaming language:

If the game owner has the choice to censor or not, then this is a great benefit. It allows parental control of online gaming. Which is as it should be done.
-Ken

We're already blurring the lines between reality and the virtual world and this just contributes to it. People are beginning to think like computers.
-Bruce

And one reader's epic rant about the evils of software authentication left Dave wondering:

I just read Dr. John's hyperbolic rant against software activation and registration. I've never had a problem with MS activation that took over five minutes to solve, but I agree that registration is quite annoying.

However, I wonder if I'm misinterpreting his point. It seems like he's saying that the pains of activation and registration are driving him to Linux, where there are no comparable apps, and therefore no activation or registration hassles. If that's the case, why not just give up the computer altogether?
-Dave

Got something to say? Say it here! Leave a comment below or send an e-mail to [email protected].

Posted by Doug Barney on October 28, 20080 comments

Surprise Patch

Hackers can exploit these RPC holes to run code remotely and, unfortunately, is the perfect platform for a worm. It just might be time to fire up Shavlik, WSUS or your patch system of choice.

Posted by Doug Barney on October 27, 20080 comments

Microsoft OK for Now

That's why it's not surprising that in this latest quarter, Microsoft had its normal stunning results. Revenue came in just north of $15 billion and profits nearly hit $6 billion, margins any self-respecting capitalist would be proud of. And for the current quarter Microsoft expects things to get even better -- maybe hitting close to $18 billion. That's a lot of Christmas Xboxes.

Windows wasn't the dollar driver. Instead, Office and SQL Server did a lot of the heavy financial lifting.

Still, Microsoft is bracing for a tougher future and will take a hard look at expenses. They can start by yanking those "I'm a PC" commercials! What are you doing to prepare for what could be a brutal economy? Advice welcome at [email protected].

Posted by Doug Barney on October 27, 20080 comments

PDC Preview

Microsoft promises improvements to the Windows kernel, but I'm still waiting to find out if there is, in fact, a new kernel altogether. I'll report back on what I learn.

At the show, developers can bring their own code and see if it'll work with Windows 7. I hope all the hardware guys bring plenty of drivers to try!

Microsoft will also promote multi-core (dual to eight cores) and many-core (lots and lots of cores) programming. This way, apps can fully exploit the amazing gains made by processors. The trick is that it takes a new approach to programming and an awful lot of effort. Basically, you have to rewrite your apps from scratch to use all of these cores. Here's what I learned about multi-core after a month of two of research.

Posted by Doug Barney on October 27, 20080 comments

VMware Numbers

This all beat expectations -- expectations that were modest due to the tough recent economy. In a brutal market yesterday, VMware only lost $1.33 a share. For a day like Wednesday, that's a major victory.

Posted by Doug Barney on October 23, 20080 comments

Win 7, I'm Confused: Can PDC Help?

I became instantly less excited about Windows 7 when Microsoft seemed to say it would be based on Vista. That means a big client using an old kernel. Recent rumors (fueled at least in part by Microsoft itself) point to a new, much smaller kernel based on something called Midori, which may or may not be based on Singularity (a new kernel coming out of Microsoft Research).

Microsoft should end this confusion. The underlying architecture of Windows 7 is critically important for IT planning. Another big issue: If Windows 7 has an all-new kernel, no matter how small, it could dramatically lengthen the wait for this OS.

Of course, the big question is: For how long will PC operating systems be a cause of excitement? Here, there are two countervailing trends. One, client OSes are getting richer. With media extensions and add-ins, we can actually spend more and more time using what comes already installed on our machines.

On the other hand, more processing is moving to the Web, the cloud, Software as a Service and all the other terms we use for big-time remote computing. Here, all we need is a browser and enough local CPU to drive our displays and networks.

Next week, Microsoft is hosting its Professional Developers Conference and will give attendees some pre-release Windows 7 code. Maybe then we'll have our answer!

Posted by Doug Barney on October 23, 20080 comments

Mailbag: Microsoft Cleans Up Gaming, Piracy Protection Rants, More

Great! Especially if they can apply it to the game characters, as well. There are actually some people out here who enjoy a good, violent game but can't stand the gratuitous profanity. We still watch our language and have found ourselves having to avoid whole game franchises because the swearing is so prevalent for absolutely no good reason.
-Steve

I like the "censors on the fly" idea for gaming. As an educator in a community college, I use gaming as an educational tool. My classroom is aimed at PG-rated content. When I do not have such confidence, I avoid using the games.
-Jack

I'm all for it. A technology used to be available for doing that based on the closed caption stuff and built into certain models of TVs. I think it's a great idea but they killed it due to altering copywritten material. If we could edit it out, then we would watch a lot more of the trash they put out and play more games, but due to the language, I don't want or let my kids play it and can't even do it myself. I'd spend more money if this were available.

Then again, they could just clean up the language in that stuff in the first place instead of making us buy a technology to do it for us.
-Ernie

The danger I could see in such a technology (and now that it has been invented, it will be deployed by someone) is not in using it to censor out objectionable words, but to insert objectionable words of a different sort. We are in the last days of a presidential election. Each election has become more contentious, more strident and more divisive. If we currently have even a few people so worked up that they are publicly threatening to kill one candidate or another, what will we have when spin masters can use software to change "on the fly" live statements by the candidate they oppose by substituting incendiary words for innocent ones? Will anyone hear or care about corrections made after the fact when they have heard with their own ears a "live" statement which confirms the fears whispered to them in earlier ads? We should be very afraid.
-Gary

A person's free speech rights allow them to say anything they want. I support that. They do not, however, have the right to force me to listen to it. I reserve the right to flip a switch and turn off what they are saying within my own domain. As I understand it, that is what the Microsoft real time censor tool provides.
-Dana

There's been a lot of buzz lately about Microsoft's Hyper-V, but Jonathan isn't wowed:

I went to an MS presentation the other day on Hyper-V and I am afraid I saw nothing which made me want to use it. One, it's not free -- it just comes with Windows 2008, which you have to pay for. Two, the VDisks are just files on the host's NTFS file system. They haven't been bothered to develop a dedicated file system. So you have defrag problems and all. Three, the management console (SCOM) is hopeless; it crashed twice during the demo I went to. Four, you can't migrate virtual machines live between hosts, which you have been able to do with Xen for years.

In short, there is no reason to use it. If you want something free, Xen performs and is reliable. There are even GUIs around if you really want one. And if you want all the features as well, there is VMware. It's expensive but if you have a lot of VMs (and we are running at around 10 per host) it does not work out as much per VM.
-Jonathan

Mike's still looking for the bright spot in the midst of Yahoo's slump:

I bought Yahoo at $26. They say buy on bad news; I did and unfortunately it's still bad news. Maybe Time Warner will offer them $14 per share?
-Mike

Earl thinks that the pricier, the better -- when it comes to Apple products, anyway.

Apple is right to only sell high-end products. Only selling their computers with top-quality hardware makes Macs more stable. Not making new operating systems backward compatible makes Macs more stable. Limiting hardware choices makes Macs more stable. Keeping market share low makes Macs less inviting to exploiters, adware, viruses and spyware.

Apple's pricing maximizes profits and limits complaints. It is a great business model.
-Earl

In the spirit of Microsoft's Anti-Piracy Day, Dennis shares his thoughts on piracy protection, including a run-in with the piracy police that did more harm than good:

I too have found that the "cure" for software piracy can be worse than the illness. I think there is a need for some sort of software police. However, I also think the folks doing the software licensing enforcement should be free of any conflict of interest that may affect their due diligence during the process. I also think whatever organization is involved should be aware of the software licensing models so they can correctly assess the information they are given. I think at the very least, it's unprofessional to not be knowledgeable about the licensing models that you are purporting to protect.

We were "turned in" to the BSA, the self-appointed software piracy police, for non-existent infractions by a former employee that was terminated. The former eployee accused us of using 16-plus copies of Autodesk and several MS Server software packages in a manner that was out of compliance -- which we were not. Over the next three months, I was in close contact with the BSA attorney regarding this matter. It was very apparent that they didn't really care whether the software we had was in compliance. They were righteous when we were out of compliance and got upset, bordering on verbally abusive, when we reported that we owned licenses that they assumed we did not. In my verbal communications, I was never offered any help from a BSA representative regarding how the licensing should be set up. I was only given the opportunity to speak with my assigned attorney. Their entire focus from beginning to end was on what they would collect.
-Dennis

And finally, in the Reader Rant of the Week, John shares his experiences navigating Microsoft's various software authentication hoops:

Piracy protection...bah! I've had it up to here with being treated like a criminal, being made to prove the legitimacy of my ownership (or should that be licenseship/rentalship/bent-over-ship?) by everyone that writes code for the Windows landscape.

You buy Windows. You install it. You jump through the hoops of activation to prove it's real and authentic, and that you actually purchased the real deal. That should be the end of it. But, no! Want to update? Prove it again. Want to download something from MS for Windows? Prove it again. Et cetera, ad infinitum. And as if that wasn't bad enough, if you want to use MS's update site but you don't like exposing your genitals to the world by using Internet Exploiter, too bad. You absolutely must use Internet Exploiter, the single greatest exploit gateway in the known universe, to utilize their update system. Want to download something from MS but don't want to use Exploiter? Prepare to jump through flaming hoops while wearing gasoline-soaked shorts with your legs tied to your shoulders, all because you have to prove, again, that the copy of Windows installed on your machine for the last couple of years, the copy that has been activated, the copy that has been authenticated as genuine countless times, is -- you got it -- genuine.

Or, another scenario: The newest game comes out in your favorite series. You rush to the store, plunk down your left one, break traffic laws getting it home, tear into the packaging and...damn! A 652-digit product installation code. So you get it installed, bang the icon and up pops the registration program. Damn, part two! I don't want to register! Close! Bang the icon...registration. AAARGH! OK. My name is...address is...phone number is...date of birth is (why do they need that?)...mother's original hair color? What the? Finally, the game's loading. Yes! No! It won't go into the game until it's checked for updates. It won't complete the check for updates until I create an account and register it on the game's update server. My name is...username already in use?! Somebody else already used "BiteMeUAnnoyingBastards"?

Microsoft, Adobe, Ahead, Roxio, Intuit and a host of others are, bit by bit, shoving me ever closer to the Linux camp. These companies made hundreds of billions of dollars by giving pirates a wink and a nudge, using them to increase their market share. Sure, some of that share was illicitly acquired, but the overall outcome was an increase in purchases and revenues. Now that they're big enough and famous enough, they think they can get along without the wink/nudge approach, resulting mainly in pissing off the hand that's fed them all along: the paying, legit customer. They haven't stopped the pirates, or made much of a dent in piracy. All they've done is piss the rest of us off. In fact, the only people who don't seem to be affected by these anti-piracy annoyances are the pirates. They hack 'em out and never think about 'em again.
-Dr. John

Need a place to vent? Do it here! Leave your comment below or send an e-mail to [email protected].

Posted by Doug Barney on October 23, 20080 comments

Microsoft To Censor on the Fly

Microsoft now has a patent that could allow online gaming dialogue to be cleaned up on the fly -- without need for an expensive Hollywood video and voice editor.

What has the free speech folks up in arms isn't so much the censorship, but the fact that the curses are replaced on the fly, and that those listening may be deceived into thinking those are the real words.

Is this invention a great move toward a more polite society, or an invasion of our rights? And how would you use such a thing in your home, office, the subway or maybe a professional football game? Keep it clean and send your answers to [email protected].

Posted by Doug Barney on October 22, 20080 comments

Microsoft Virtualization Tool Done

This rev of System Center has a familiar MO: It can manage both physical and virtual servers, something virtually every systems management vendor has told me in the last six months. The Microsoft tool can also oversee ESX VMs.

VMware should take heed. I believe the company must adopt all its tools to work across all major hypervisors -- and not just its own. If not, VMware could ultimately become a marginal player. If it goes multiplatform, the sky is still very much the only limit.

Does VMware need to support Hyper-V and Xen to survive? Business advice welcome at [email protected].

Posted by Doug Barney on October 22, 20080 comments