Ray Ozzie's first love is not public speaking. While he does just fine in front of a mic, I reckon he'd rather be talking to his developers or maybe just thinking. But as the leader of Microsoft's cloud push, Ozzie has to get out and about -- and that's how he landed at the J.P. Morgan Technology, Media and Telecom conference last week.
Much of Ozzie's talk consisted of the well-worn message of mixing standard apps with Web services. He also pitched the bean counters on Azure and then promised to integrate their PCs, phones and televisions.
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Posted by Doug Barney on 05/27/20091 comments
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (MOSS 2007) just got a service pack and now the service pack needs a service pack.
SP2 works fine, but only for six months. That's when the software is inadvertently set to expire. The good news is a fix is on the way. The better news? Microsoft has about a half a year to get the fix right!
Do you use SharePoint, and if so, for what? Shoot me the deets at [email protected].
Posted by Doug Barney on 05/27/20090 comments
Microsoft just earned a patent for technology that can lock down an operating system and only allow the manufacturer to upgrade the OS or let software to be installed.
If this sounds like Soviet-style computing, you may be right. If abused, the vendor can centrally control your machine, and paying off Politburo members with Stoli won't even help you out.
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Posted by Doug Barney on 05/27/20095 comments
Internet Information Services (IIS) has a big hole, and so far there's no fix -- just a warning. Versions 5 through 6 are vulnerable to an "elevation of privilege" attack.
So far no one has been struck, as far as we know, and there are some things you can do. Make sure your access control lists are disciplined and that those who don't need access don't have it. You can also set up fake admin accounts that don't actually have admin rights. This way an intruder may think he's cracked your system, but can't actually do anything. Pretty clever.
Posted by Doug Barney on 05/20/20091 comments
Microsoft is getting busy on unified communications, announcing that HP will be a larger and even more committed partner and that Redmond's communications wares can now be virtualized.
I thought I knew a bit about virtualization. After all, early last year I launched Virtualization Review magazine. So I just assumed that unified communications software could be virtualized just as nearly any other app. Apparently, I was wrong, and Microsoft put extra effort into ensuring that presence, instant messaging and more can all be hosted on VMs.
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Posted by Doug Barney on 05/20/20090 comments
Microsoft loves controlling file formats, but as OpenDoc and OpenOffice took hold, Redmond started to lose its grip just a bit. The answer? Office Open XML (OOXML), a new XML-based file format for Office 2007 that's close, but not a perfect match, to OpenDoc.
Keeping DOCX moving forward, Microsoft announced a host of new tools, some of them open source, to broaden the reach of OOXML. One tool lets Office 2007 files be read by Java apps, another makes the file format more Web page-friendly, and yet another eases the translation between Office files and OpenDoc.
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Posted by Doug Barney on 05/20/20090 comments
Recent rumors have Microsoft trying to buy up SAP, but a couple of readers see some problems in that match-up:
About Microsoft and SAP -- what a culture clash! Marketing into the big enterprise is sooooo different from Microsoft's current sales channel. Now, at the enterprise level, the C-level staff would probably feel better with SAP buying Microsoft.
-Andrew
Can't they do better? SAP is horrid!
-Robin
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Posted by Doug Barney on 05/20/20090 comments
Who should I trust: one PC World reviewer or nearly 50 Redmond magazine readers? I did a two-part series about Windows 7 and dozens of you told me Windows 7 was far faster than Vista. Now comes PC World with a single test -- albeit on three computers -- showing that they're roughly equivalent. I'm sure the results of that one test are accurate, but that's the problem -- it was only one test.
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Posted by Doug Barney on 05/18/20091 comments
PC World has a couple of stories worth commenting on, the first of which has Apple thumbing its nose at Vista in a new series of ads. Spending millions on clever ads is all well and good -- after all, network execs and ad agency owners have Mercedeses to pay for.
But isn't the real challenge over technology and economics? I think Apple has the technology, but it's flunking PC Economics 101. Want to take a bite out of Windows? Take the ad millions and convert them into real savings for consumers. In the economy, what dope wants to spend three times as much for a Mac? (Well, since I've bought five of them for my kids, maybe I'm not so bright, either.)
Posted by Doug Barney on 05/18/20091 comments
Microsoft issued bonds in recent days, but there wasn't a direct word about what the dough was for. Whenever there's an information vacuum, rumors are sure to fill it, and the scuttlebutt has Microsoft making a play for SAP.
Does this make sense? Well, if you care about the best technology bang for the buck, buying SAP is like spending money on 8-tracks -- they work, but modern they ain't. But from a pure business standpoint, the deal makes perfect sense. This could give Microsoft more control over corporate computing and it could eventually move SAP to the cloud. And since SAP goes to the largest enterprises, and Microsoft Dynamics to medium-size, there's little overlap. The deal, while not terribly exciting, makes far more sense than buying Yahoo.
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Posted by Doug Barney on 05/18/20090 comments
Tech-Ed is usually bursting with people and bubbling with Microsoft news. This one was a bit of a fizzle -- and you can blame the economy for that! In these days of layoffs, paycuts, and budget reductions paying for a plane, hotel and meals in Los Angeles is hard to justify. And taking the time away from work, well that ain't too cool either.
Microsoft, I think, saw the writing on the wall and played it low key. The only real news was some scheduling updates that we reported on Wednesday http://redmondmag.com/news/article.asp?editorialsid=10839. The news here was more or less a commitment to ship Windows 7 this year. While an economic recovery would be better news, Windows 7 this year isn't too shabby.
Posted by Doug Barney on 05/15/20090 comments
Earlier this week, Doug wrote about a new plan in the works among some service
providers to charge Internet users based on bandwidth use. Most (though
not all) of you think that would be pretty unfair:
"My monthly bill is getting close to $150 month, and that's bad
enough. My message to the providers is: Raise the price and I will
declare my freedom -- from them."
-- Anonymous
"I shell out about $200 a month for phone and Internet. I even dropped
my home phone to save a little. I agree, tacking on another fee would
be too much."
-- Anonymous
"Americans have had it too good for too long. Here in Australia, we've had tiered Internet plans from day dot because a large
percentage of Internet traffic goes overseas on costly undersea cables
or satellite. As the Internet originated from networks put together by U.S. universities and defense departments, a large portion of all Internet traffic went to American sites and therefore ISPs could sell
unlimited plans because only a small amount of traffic was going
overseas. Now, however, the Internet is truly global and Americans are
now surfing the world for content, not just in their back yards. This
is why your ISPs no longer wish to give you unlimited accounts; it's
costing them money when you 'travel' outside the USA.
Usage payments should be embraced and it should encourage low-bandwidth users to the Internet by giving them cheaper accounts (i.e., $10 per month for 1G of data, $30 for 25G, and $50 for 100G).
People who are clogging up the Internet by using high-bandwidth
applications will pay for the privilege, and if you just want to read e-mails from your family occasionally, you'll be able to find a
cheaper plan than your current all-you-can-eat plans."
-- John
"Interesting you had to mention shelling out extra money for Internet at your summer home. You could use some help in the sensitivity department. There are lots of people out of work right now that are lucky to even have a primary home, given the foreclosure mess and unemployment rates.
As for the rate hikes, they are ridiculous. No one can afford this nonsense in the current economic climate. I'm all for everyone earning a buck, but do it the right way and don't be greedy. Time Warner Cable continues to hike prices at every opportunity and if I had a choice where we live, we would NOT continue paying their exorbitant rates."
-- Anonymous
"The DSL/cable companies alike are making more than their fair share of the money with no significant improvement in service to justify the cost(s)."
-- Anonymous
And one reader is dismissing cloud computing until it settles some
security issues:
"Until they take security seriously out-of-the-box and forego
'backwards compatibility' for new applications that also take
security seriously, or get automatically shut down and locked out by
the operating system (sort of like network access control), this
'cloud' stuff is all vaporware. That is my belief and that of the
SMBs I work with here in Louisville, Ky."
-- Anonymous
Posted by Doug Barney on 05/15/20091 comments