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Tag Archives: Microsoft
GR Shared Link - Send in the Clowns
July 9, 2008 – 12:06 am
You know what they say about imitation
June 7, 2007 – 11:21 pm
(OK, I’m sure it wasn’t imitation, but…)
Recently Microsoft has started branching out and publishing various frameworks (in coordination with new releases of their development platform) that can be used to construct applications on top of their technology (similar to what has been popular for a while now in the Java world, but in this case, the .NET platform).
Interestingly, while looking into some of the more recent stuff I stumbled upon one particular implementation that looked very familiar - because it was extremely similar to the underlying framework that we’ve built for the main project I’ve been working on for a couple years. Even down to the names of the various internal components, etc. Unfortunately, I can’t go into any more detail than that about it publicly, but suffice it to say I was a bit surprised.
At the end of the day, I take it as a good validation of the design we came up with, because at the time there were some questions about it since there didn’t seem to be anything else out there like it. Sometimes in software development that means that you are either on to something good that no one else has thought of yet, but much more frequently it’s an indication that there’s probably something wrong with the way you’re thinking about doing it, and there’s a reason no one else has done it that way already. It feels good to see things emerging now that seem to indicate that it was the former rather than the latter in this case.
Royale Noir theme for XP
May 23, 2007 – 12:26 pm
Many of you may already know about this, and I’ve been running it for a long time on my system, but I just realized I haven’t blogged about it, and that several people have remarked on it when they’ve seen it on my system so…
When Windows XP first came out, one of the first things I did was switch the theme back to the “Widows Classic” look (which basically looked the same as Windows 2000), because I couldn’t stand the way the default XP theme looked. I think it was mostly the color scheme, but I heard it referred to as the “Playschool” theme several times and it really seemed like an appropriate summary - I really didn’t like it.
Anyway, some time ago I came across this Royale Noir theme and have been using it on my XP installation ever since. It’s basically an alternate color variation of the “Royale” theme distributed with Media Center Edition. A download link and very simple installation instructions are at the bottom of the link in this paragraph.
Gates on the Daily Show
February 4, 2007 – 9:57 pm
Entertaining interview with Bill on John Stewart’s show: Part 1 - Part 2
My favorite part:
Jon: What’s your password?
Bill:
Jon: You don’t have to answer that. Is it ‘Gates’?
Bill: I’ll tell you later.
Jon: Hey, do you have pets?
Bill: Well actually, we keep putting off having pets. Our kids put on a lot of pressure.
Jon: Did you ever have a pet when you were younger?
Bill: Sure I had a dog.
Jon: What was the pet’s name?
Bill: That’s not my password.
Side note: I love how Bill is still a total nerd and doesn’t seem to be too ashamed of it. I also noticed while listening to this that his voice sometimes reminds me of Ben from Lost.
The Microsoft Laptop Fiasco
December 28, 2006 – 5:14 pm
You’ve probably heard about Microsoft giving away laptops preloaded with Vista to select bloggers, with the hope (but not requirement) that they will review them. You’ve also probably heard all the backlash, up to and including many other bloggers accusing anyone who accepts the free laptops as basically losing any credibility / journalistic integrity.
I thought I’d briefly offer my take on the whole thing, and see what everyone else thinks. Basically, I think it’s a pretty wise move to motivate more talk about Vista from a lot of people who would probably otherwise not buy it. As for the implication that anyone accepting a free laptop is no longer a credible source for tech reporting, I don’t quite buy it.
Will they write a review they otherwise probably wouldn’t have? Most likely. Will that opinion and review be influenced by the fact that they received a free laptop? Depends on the integrity of the writer, not the fact that they were given a gift. There are no pre-conditions imposed on the acceptance of the laptops; they can write negative reviews or not write a review at all if they choose.
The error in logic I see with the accusation that those bloggers who accept the gift should no longer be considered honest, unbiased sources is that the gift does not make them unethical in and of itself. If you believe that the opinions of the author of the blog really are subject to this kind of bribery, then it makes no difference whether they accept the gift or not, because you’ve already decided you don’t trust their integrity, because you believe that they would allow that to influence their opinion or review. If that is the case, you have no way of knowing what other gifts/bribes they have been given that they haven’t disclosed, so you may as well stop reading them whether they accept the laptops or not, because you’ve already determined that they don’t have integrity. If, on the other hand, you believe (and think it’s important) that they do currently adhere to a high standard of honesty in their writings, then why would they not continue to do so going forward?
Basically, my take on the bashing of this so far is that it’s mostly a bunch of sour grapes from bloggers who either didn’t get the offer or are so biased themselves already against Microsoft that they will always criticize pretty much everything they do regardless of whether it’s actually “good”, “evil”, or neutral.
Microsoft speculation
August 24, 2006 – 10:28 am
Just thought I’d make a post out of part of my comment from this other thread, since it was going a bit off the original subject.
It’s in regards to a link that DaveZ posted about a Microsoft patent for a home video conferencing service.
The hardware in the current XBoxes is definitely enough to support it though, so I would’t have a hard time believing that they could roll this out fairly quickly. I’m actually kind of surprised that they haven’t done more in this regard so far. It might just be that it’s because they’re spread so thin in trying to cover so many markets.
Perhaps with the recent change in leadership they can better organize their company structure (or even split up) to allow for more rapid advances in this kind of space (home user appliance type stuff like gaming, “media center�-ish stuff, and this). Seems like its a big opportunity that they’re kind of lagging on right now, and I’m speculating that it’s because they’re so focused on all the other stuff they’ve got going on.
Either that or they’re going to “pull an Apple� and do a surprise announcement of a new product/service that’s already ready to go, which would probably be good for them PR wise.
Renepo reminder
September 11, 2005 – 1:04 pm
In this article/interview with Kiwi Mark Borrie, he reminds users that security considerations are important no matter which platform you run on, and not to be lulled into a false sense of security just because most viruses are written for Windows.
I thought that the description for the Renepo exploit was pretty interesting. Here is a synopsis:
Dubbed Renepo (alias Opener), Ducklin said the malware: “turns off system accounting, turns off the OS 10 firewall, turns off auto updates, turns file-sharing on, opens an SSH back door, downloads and installs an open source video conferencing program and opens it in ‘do not advise the user mode’.”
The article also suggests that Microsoft has surpassed Apple in terms of their approach to addressing security issues as a company. I’ve seen a lot of what MS has been doing internally to support this, in terms of making huge (schedule impacting) priority changes in the dev plans on almost all of their products. Don’t know anything about what Apple is doing, but I do seem to hear a lot of the (false) assumption that it’s automatically secure because it’s based on *nix now, and/or there aren’t as many viruses etc. written for it. This article does a pretty good job of explaining why that’s the wrong way to think about it.
Apple / MS Comparison: by an intern
August 10, 2005 – 4:19 pm
Thanks to Dan for the link to this interesting article comparing the inner workings of Apple and MS.
Here are some quotes that I thought were interesting:
** Culture ** Very similar, actually. Both companies are filled with smart, fun people who love their work…
Apple is secretive… very secretive. Unless explicitely told otherwise, nothing leaves your group. Everything is on a need-to-know basis - you can’t even tell other Apple employees. If I wanted to find out information about, say, iPod, I would check the rumors sites. Didn’t have any chance of getting information out of my iPod friends. At Microsoft, though, you’re pretty much free to say whatever you want to whoever you want… especially within the company.
Steve Jobs is god (this is a fact at Apple and doesn’t express my own feelings ;-)). You shall not disobey the Steve. Bill Gates is just some guy…
Justified Microsoft bashing
July 7, 2005 – 2:00 pm
If ever there was a reason to criticize Microsoft, this is it. This article applies to the MS blog offering, called “Spaces”.
Microsoft censors Chinese blogs
Weblog entries on some parts of Microsoft’s MSN site in China using words such as “freedom”, “democracy” and “demonstration” are being blocked. Chinese bloggers already face strict controls and must register their online journal with Chinese authorities. Microsoft said the company abided by the laws, regulations and norms of each country in which it operates. The censorship is thought to have been introduced as a concession to the Chinese government. Also being restricted on the free parts of the site are journal entries that mention “human rights” and “Taiwan independence”.
According to Reporters Without Borders, China is using a system called Night Crawler to patrol web journals and make sure that only registered blogs are published. Unregistered blogs will be shut down.
“Following Yahoo, here is a second American internet giant giving way to the Chinese authorities and agreeing to self-censorship”, said the group in a statement.
“The lack of ethics on the part of these companies is extremely worrying. Their management frequently justifies collaboration with Chinese censorship by saying that all they are doing is obeying local legislation.”
“We believe that this argument does not hold water and that these multinationals must respect certain basic ethical principles, in whatever country they are operating.”
MS Anti-Spyware problem
April 2, 2005 – 3:06 pm
Has anyone else noticed the MS Anti-spyware beta generating huge log files (like just under 1GB)? I’ll have to check my computers at home when I get there and see how big it is there.