Spambot Busted

Microsoft has just helped eliminate a spambot that could send some 1.5 billion spams every day. The Botnet Task Force, which Microsoft runs, got an injunction against the still unidentified botnet "herders," and the botnet domains are now shut down.

While the folks behind the botnet are still unknown, the botnet itself, W32.Waldedac, is fairly well-understood and hopefully will be gone for good.

Posted by Doug Barney on 03/03/20101 comments

VBScript Hit by Strange Exploit

If an e-mail directs you to a Web site, and that Web site asks you to push the F1 key -- don't! This is a new attack that takes advantage of a flaw in VBScript running on IE and Windows 2000, 2003 or XP, and if successful, can run malicious code on the attacked computer.

I can't remember ever being asked to hit the F1 key by a Web site, and I doubt you IT pros would fall for this either. But tricks like this fool novices all the time. In fact, I had a boss at an IT publication who thought someone was in love with him...and he unleashed the I Love You virus on his entire operation.

Posted by Doug Barney on 03/03/20103 comments

.PST Format Now Mostly Open

Microsoft has been on an interoperability kick of late, and its most recent move involves Outlook's .PST format for storing e-mail. Microsoft recently published all the how-to's and wherefores for .PST so other vendors can tie more directly into the mail store.

There are limits, however: You can only access .PST files running on Outlook, and you can't implement the format in your own products.

Posted by Doug Barney on 03/01/20100 comments

Windows XP, Server 2003 Winding Down

All good or even mediocre things must come to an end, and so it is with XP SP2 and Windows Server 2000 and 2003, for which extended support will end this summer.

Microsoft is pushing customers to upgrade before July 31 or suffer the no-support consequences. If you don't upgrade but still want a failsafe, you'll have to buy a custom support plan. XP users have another, simpler option: Just upgrade to SP3! That will be supported for three more years.

Posted by Doug Barney on 03/01/20101 comments

Back in the Saddle

The recession had a lot of victims; jobs, mortgages and IT projects were all killed. While there's not a lot of good job and foreclosures news, IT projects may be on their way back. Cancelled projects as well and new ones are starting to get funding -- a development that could make IT fun again!

Top tech areas? Virtualization, Web design, collaboration, cloud computing and social media.

Posted by Doug Barney on 03/01/20102 comments

Doug's Mailbag: Microsoft Anti-Piracy, More

Last week, Doug asked readers how they feel about Microsoft anti-piracy tools. Here are some of your thoughts:

So who's afraid of the big, bad wolf? Let Microsoft check my PC; I'm not hiding anything. With a world full of honest people, costs would reflect a lower pricing in products, and the Internet would remain an invaluable tool for business, knowledge and assistance.
-Alan

I really don't object to WGA and its related anti-piracy tools, but this is because I have never had a problem with them that wasn't easily (if not entirely conveniently) solved. The problem, as I see it, is that these tools do, from time to time, generate false positives for honest, law-abiding users. What's worse is that these tools don't really thwart the "pirates for profit." The people caught in the middle of even properly functioning anti-piracy tools are not the pirates themselves but rather those that have been duped into buying forgeries or previously activated licenses.

It just is not clear to me that it serves Microsoft well to alienate generally honest users who buy one license and use it on multiple systems (at home or at work) when these tools do little to thwart the losses Microsoft experiences in the Third World by the REAL PIRATES! If Microsoft loosened their EULAs to permit the same license to be on a notebook and a desktop simultaneously, or if they offered aggressive pricing for multiple license packaging (up to three upgrade licenses, say, for the price of one full license), I would think Microsoft could sell the idea of strict enforcement of licensing a lot easier.
-Marc

Whether you are in favor of anti-piracy measures or against them seems to depend upon whether you sell software or are trying to install one license on three machines! But I do agree that some anti-piracy procedures are a very large pain, even for licensed users.
-Mike

Posted by Doug Barney on 03/01/20100 comments

Doug's Mailbag: More Thoughts on the Ribbon

Absolutely hate the ribbon. Takes up too much space. For the life of me, I do not understand why Microsoft would make such a major change without allowing users the option to have their old setup. Are they so afraid of rejection that they force it down the users' throats?

About 50 percent of the users at the firms I am a consultant for like the new setup; 50 percent hate it. But I will tell you that the ribbon has slowed acceptance at most firms. With a user support base of over 100, only about 20 computers are running Office 2007. The rest are mostly Office 2003 with a scattering of XP and 2000.
-Thomas

I like (not love) the ribbon. I was willing to give it a try before I condemned MS for an unasked-for new set of features. At first I really hated it, but decided there had to be a rhyme to the unreason. So I looked at it from a "what's the paradigm" standpoint. Once I did that, the organizational structure seemed more cohesive and I think I can find more features more easily with it than with the previous interface.

Most users don't have my background, though, and I know lots of them who LOATHE (not dislike, LOATHE) it.
-Mike

Personally, I think the ribbon bites. For me, though, it's about navigation through the interface. Much of it just doesn't seem intuitive, particularly when creating form fields in Word, for instance. Menu path Developer > Design Mode > Protect...etc. I had to Google "forms in Word 2007" to learn that!
-Marquis

I don't like the ribbon, but more importantly, I don't like that Microsoft moved things around so much. I could live with a ribbon organized around the old menus, but why is the PivotTable in the Insert menu instead of the Data menu? If you are deleting rows (important to get rid of 'space' in simply cleared-out cells), being able to access the Edit menu for Delete would be helpful. You can right-click the rows but you can't unless you have the entire row already selected, which you can't do by hitting Ctrl+Shift+End.

I have a million other examples that are beyond annoying. I keep two laptops active, one with the old version and one with the new version of Office. I've figured out everything that I need to do in Office 2007 but everything takes about 25 percent longer.
-Michael

One good thing about the ribbon: It keeps entry-level positions available in IT as scores of curmudgeonly users need assistance figuring out how to do Office tasks they've done for years. Old dogs and new tricks.

One bad thing about the ribbon: Even experts like me are unnecessarily less efficient as we Google to figure out where old functions have found a new home. Unfortunately, MSFT forced a change to feign the appearance of evolution in the suite.
-Erik

I thought you might like to hear from a typical user who also teaches students and teachers how to use this software. Of course, having to teach others how to use something is the fastest way to learn it yourself, so I picked the ribbon up pretty quickly. But even when explaining it to others, I find the system works really well, for the most part. I definitely love the Quick Access Toolbar, which eliminates the need to deal with the tabs most of the time.

There are some things that seem less intuitive, such as the increased difficulty in inserting slides from a file in PowerPoint. But mainly, I really like the ribbon.
-Judy

I love the Office ribbon. I teach college-level classes in office applications, and of course MS Office 2007 has been the staple for a number of years. Students switching from the old pull-down interface to the ribbon usually are less than excited at first. No one seems to like change. The Office button hiding the old File commands hides some of the most used commands. But normally, after students use the ribbon and find the logic and elegance of context-sensitive tools, they quickly become advocates.

I hope the ribbon survives and becomes the model for future interfaces.
-Randy

I just finished doing battle with the ribbon. Actually, not with the ribbon itself, but with the content of the ribbon. A customer of mine had a simple request: He'd like to be able to insert a name and address from his Outlook contacts into a Word 2007 document. Back in the day, there used to be an Insert Address button that you could customize on the icon bar quite easily. It would make sense to have that simple feature part of the "insert" ribbon. Well, even though several Microsoft 'help' documents reference the Insert Address button in 2007, it was nowhere to be found (or I haven't looked under the correct rock).

I did finally find the Address Book under All Commands. I'm only able to add it to the Quick Access Toolbar. Why can't you add it to the ribbon? Also, in order to add the company to the pasted address, you need to dig up an obscure document which has you write a formatting script and insert it using the Building Block feature.
-Dan

I still prefer the old interface. It is much more difficult to find the seldom-used menu options.
-Anonymous

But frankly, Andrew's tired of hearing about ribbon this, ribbon that:

OK, Doug, is it a slow day at the office? Enough with the ribbon!
-Andrew

Check in on Monday for more reader letters, including thoughts on Microsoft's anti-piracy efforts. Meanwhile, write a comment below or send an e-mail to [email protected].

Posted by Doug Barney on 02/26/20100 comments

Sharing Synchronization Secrets

Most of us have several machines, and most of us are pretty mobile. So how do you keep a common set of files accessible from different PCs and locations? Are your files in the cloud or on a server? Do you use remote control software and have one PC as the master? Any cool third-party apps help you out in this regard?

I' m looking to explore the best options in a future feature story for Redmond magazine. Share your solution with the world be writing me at [email protected].

Posted by Doug Barney on 02/26/20107 comments

Google Apps Appeal

When most think people of Google, they picture free apps and services supported by ads. But a lot of Google wares have real price tags, including the enterprise version of Google Apps. And with paid products often come dealers -- and Google Apps can now claim nearly a thousand resellers. A big chunk of those are service providers who sell the apps as part of their overall service.

Posted by Doug Barney on 02/26/20102 comments

Beta Blocker

Recently, I asked Redmond Report readers about your experiences with the beta version of Office 2010. Over a dozen of you agreed to be interviewed, giving deep insight into this new tool.

But due to space limitations in the magazine, I wasn't able to report on some of the problems you've run into. Take Redmond Report reader Bernie M. Bernie was interested in the new rev of Visio -- particularly because it sports the new ribbon interface -- and was told by Microsoft that Visio 2010 would coexist with his earlier version.

Posted by Doug Barney on 02/26/20104 comments

Doug's Mailbag: Ripping the Ribbon, More

Redmond Report readers have always been vocal about the Office ribbon, whether they love it, hate it or have just resigned themselves to it. This week is no exception:

I've been using the ribbon for a few months. Didn't like it when I started. Don't like it now. Finding things is just too difficult. Remembering where they are hidden is irritating. I realize this is supposed to be progress, but intuitive it's NOT.
-Franco

Although the ribbon took awhile to get used to, especially for someone like me who was/is used to using the keyboard shortcuts, overall I do like it. I don't think it's the design of it so much as the fact that Microsoft rethought where everything was placed. In the old pull-down menu system, it seemed like it started logical and then some things ended up wherever there was room when Microsoft remembered it at the end of design. The ribbon system is much more logical overall so it's much easier to teach people who aren't power users but still need to get around the programs efficiently.

The only thing I miss is the ability to get to even the most hidden features with keyboard shortcuts. Sure, in 2007, we can still use the ones from 2000 and earlier, but how long will that last? For someone who uses these programs day in and day out for hours on end, it would be nice to give us an alternative to mousing to the expansion arrows in a block or remembering an old bygone era in Office. Maybe in Office 2010.
-Heidi

I love Office 2007's ribbon. We used it in a desktop project we did. I had to really push for it, but our clients have never said they didn't like it, and we were rewarded with a product that still looks current, years later. I have asked other vendors when their software is switching to the ribbon. It is superior. People just don't like change.
-Jason

I've got Mac Office 2004 (or whatever) at home, Windows Office 2007 with the ribbon at work. I've been struggling with the ribbon for months. In some instances, it's OK. Other times, it just gets in the way -- with locating capabilities as well as execution. Some ribbon operations take more key strokes/mouse movement to achieve the same result. And I still don't know why Microsoft insists on childish icons.
-Kevin

It was a tough transition, but I can't go back to not using the ribbon. I don't even know if I know how to (or even want to) use PowerPoint 2003 anymore. Long live the ribbon.
-Eric

I've gotten more or less used to it, but I see no gain over the old menu system. In fact, it has the negative of using more space.

Icons by themselves do NOT make anything easier. You still need to learn what each icon means. Personally, I find words easier to comprehend. I believe icons were used on street signs to avoid the need for listing multiple words in different languages. Is this Microsoft's intent -- to save money on language versioning at customers' expense? Or was the ribbon interface simply a me-too idea in search of a use?
-Anonymous

I, too, have gotten used to the MS Office ribbon and I find it just as easy to use as the old menu system. However, what I hate about it is the amount of room it takes up, and the inability to move it the way you used to be able to move the button bars (if there is a way, someone please let me know how). With wide-screen monitors having becoming standard, I find there just isn't enough vertical space on the screen these days, and the ribbon just takes up so much more.
-Mark

It is my humble opinion that the much-touted ribbon is the biggest waste of time since the cavemen discovered that they need to come in out of the rain. Has anyone at MS ever contacted the worldwide software development community to find out if the effort to provide this useless piece of junk is worth the development effort? I'll bet that any software development company that has created deliverable items of software has had many non-complimentary comments on the subject. This piece of unnecessary software has caused us many hours of development time to try to hide, and only eats up valuable desktop and/or screen real estate.
-Hans

Posted by Doug Barney on 02/24/20100 comments

Windows 7 Up, IE Down

In news less shocking than a Lindsay Lohan relapse, a research report finds that Windows 7 is taking off while IE is steadily losing market share.

The gloom-and-doomers love to criticize IE, calling it bloated and insecure and predicting its demise. But despite the retreat, IE still has 64.8 percent share, according to Janco Associates. In presidential politics, that's a landslide!

Posted by Doug Barney on 02/24/20107 comments