Microsoft Prototype FCC Device Broken

Microsoft Corp. on Monday gave a simple reason why its prototype for beaming high-speed Internet service over unused television airways failed a government test: the device was broken. 08/13/2007

Microsoft Closes $6B Buyout of AQuantive

In closing a $6 billion buyout of digital marketing company aQuantive on Monday, Microsoft is taking a first step in its quest to leapfrog Yahoo and challenge Google in the online advertising business. 08/13/2007

Mailbag: Crossing Over to Linux

Java Gains SOA Ground on .NET

The Monday Before Patch Tuesday

A Blogger Got It Wrong, Big Surprise

Ford Announces Pricing for Microsoft Sync System

Ford Motor Co. said Thursday that Sync, its in-car communication and entertainment system developed with Microsoft Corp., will cost $395 as an option when it debuts this fall on the Ford Focus, Ford Edge and Lincoln MKX. 08/10/2007

Microsoft's iPhone?

With Windows Home Server, Microsoft finally appears to be following Apple's marketing lead -- and it just might work. 08/10/2007

Illinois To Get Fastest Supercomputer

By 2011, the University of Illinois should be the home of the world's fastest supercomputer. 08/09/2007

New Republic Blogger Questioned

A magazine gets a hot story straight from a soldier in Iraq and publishes his writing, complete with gory details, under a pseudonym. The stories are chilling: An Iraqi boy befriends American troops and later has his tongue cut out by insurgents. Soldiers mock a disfigured woman sitting near them in a dining hall. As a diversion, soldiers run over dogs with armored personnel carriers. Compelling stuff, and, according to the Army, not true. 08/09/2007

AQuantive Approves Microsoft Buyout

Shareholders of online advertising company aQuantive Inc. approved a buyout offer from Microsoft Corp. at a meeting in downtown Seattle Thursday. 08/09/2007

IBM Launches System To Track Medications

To help the pharmaceutical industry combat drug counterfeiting, IBM is launching an electronic pedigree system Thursday that tracks medications through the supply chain until they reach consumers. 08/09/2007

'Green' Tech Shops Have a Way To Go

The extremely air-conditioned computer farms known as data centers are the gas-guzzling jalopies of the technology world. Some require 40 or 50 times more power than comparably sized office space. 08/09/2007

Microsoft To Release Six 'Critical' Patches Tuesday

Microsoft will be releasing a host of patches next week, including six "Critical" and three "Important" updates, in its monthly Patch Tuesday releases. 08/09/2007

Java and .NET Camps Split Over SOA

Developers are showing a trend toward favoring the use of Java vs. .NET when it comes to implementing service-oriented architectures (SOAs), according to analysis from Evans Data Corp. 08/09/2007

Microsoft Makes Vista Fixes Public

Meanwhile, readers add their views on usability issues, and other matters. 08/09/2007

Like Action Packs? Better Start Studying

Microsoft decides to rein in partner perk, requiring tests on Nov. 30. 08/09/2007

Redmond Points to Cactus for Commerce Server

Partner inks key deal with Microsoft, based on vertical industry know-how. 08/09/2007

Online Boom Boosts Cisco Profit, Shares

Cisco Systems Inc. shares jumped nearly 6 percent after the network equipment maker reported fiscal fourth-quarter results that beat Wall Street's expectations and boosted its financial forecast. 08/08/2007

A Prickly Commerce Server Solution

Microsoft on Wednesday tried to clear up nagging questions about its Commerce Server roadmap and did. Kind of. 08/08/2007

VS Beta 2: Bug Fixes, Final Features, Polish and Shine

The folks in Microsoft's Developer Division probably didn't mind the damp and drizzle of summer in Seattle as much this year, as they worked feverishly to polish the next iteration of the mothership. So far, it looks like the long hours paid off. Beta 2 of Microsoft's Visual Studio (VS) 2008 IDE and .NET 3.5 landed, fully loaded, the last week in July. 08/08/2007

Microsoft Wins 'Other' Patent Battle

Judge overturns jury decision in Alcatel-Lucent MP3 court filing. 08/08/2007

Ten Years Later, Steve Has Some Loot, Too

Apple makes some inroads, years after being bailed out by Redmond. 08/08/2007

Blogger Outed: Forbes Editor Is 'Fake Steve'

At long last, someone has cracked one of the technology world's biggest mysteries -- the identity of Fake Steve, a sharp-tongued blogger who had tech aficionados in stitches with a satiric diary purporting to be from Apple CEO Steve Jobs. 08/07/2007

Sun Microsystems To Reduce Work Force

Server and software maker Sun Microsystems Inc. plans to cut an unspecified number of jobs as part of a new restructuring plan, according to a regulatory filing Tuesday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. 08/07/2007

IBM and Novell Team on Open Source App Server

IBM and Novell have formed a partnership around one of IBM's open source application server products. Under the agreement, Novell plans to offer worldwide product support for the IBM WebSphere Application Server Community Edition (WAS CE). 08/07/2007

Microsoft Releases Vista Updates to Public

Microsoft on Tuesday officially released several updates for Windows Vista -- fixes that were initially released to the public last week, before being pulled down. 08/07/2007

Apple Debuts New iMacs

Apple Inc. updated its iMac computers Tuesday with a slimmer design, faster chips and glossy screens, hoping to further propel sales that already outpace the rest of the PC industry. 08/07/2007

Microsoft Slices and Dices Open Source Community

Exec sees Linux patent deals as a Redmond divide-and-conquer tactic. 08/07/2007

Redmond Drops Price of Vista in China

At $66, Vista is almost a steal, maybe. 08/07/2007

French President Crashes at Former Microsoft Exec's Pad

Presidential junket appears to have oblique Microsoft connection. 08/07/2007

Fake Steve Jobs Is the Real Dan Lyons

Blogger turns out to be...a journalist. 08/07/2007

Microsoft Web Server Threatens Open Source Leader

Microsoft's Web server, Internet Information Server (IIS), continues to gain against longtime leader Apache, and could end up surpassing it if current trends continue. 08/06/2007

'Rosario' CTP Surfaces

Microsoft has released the first CTP of Visual Studio Team System "Rosario." 08/06/2007

Researcher: Flaw Exposes Hack Threat

Terrorists and other criminals could exploit a newly discovered software flaw to hijack massive computer systems used to control critical infrastructure like oil refineries, power plants and factories, a researcher said Saturday. 08/06/2007

VMware Releases Virtualization Software for Mac

VMware has the latest entry in the growing market for software that allows Windows to be run on a Mac. 08/06/2007

Build AJAX Security With JSON

AJAX-era security requires tossing out a lot of what you thought you knew about security, starting with Same Origin Policy. 08/06/2007

Lenovo To Sell $199 PC in Rural China

Lenovo Group Ltd. said Friday it will sell a basic personal computer aimed at China's vast but poor rural market and priced as low as $199. 08/03/2007

Policy Management Tweak Misses Cut in 2nd SQL Server 2008 CTP

Anticipated improvements to the way polices are set up and managed in one or more instances did not make it into the second CTP of SQL Server 2008. 08/03/2007

Microsoft Works Goes Free, Ad-Supported

Microsoft Corp. will test a free, advertising-supported version of Works, an already inexpensive package of word processing, spreadsheet and other programs, but would not say whether it is exploring a similar Web-based suite. 08/03/2007

Computer Security Problems Found at IRS

IRS employees ignored security rules and turned over sensitive computer information to a caller posing as a technical support person, according to a government study. 08/03/2007

Mexican Billionaire Donates Laptops

Billionaire Carlos Slim said he doesn't care if he is the world's richest man and promised to donate hundreds of thousands of laptop computers to Mexican children. 08/03/2007

Delays Hit Next Version of Office for Macs

The next version of Microsoft Office for the Mac platform has been delayed until next year. 08/02/2007

SourceLabs Unveils Enterprise Java OSS

SourceLabs is offering the latest version of its open source Java stack for enterprises. The company's SASH 2 software suite lets companies escape being locked into proprietary solutions by combining the popular Spring, Axis, Struts and Hibernate open source solutions. The stack works with Apache Tomcat, IBM WebSphere and BEA WebLogic servers. 08/02/2007

SOA Bangers and Mashups

It's a service-oriented architecture (SOA) world -- well, not quite for everyone yet. However, what happens when IT departments increasingly use SOA to expose data and applications as services? The next step might be to begin collecting and using those services to create something useful. 08/02/2007

Mass. Approves Microsoft Office Document Format

In a victory for Microsoft's open source efforts, Massachusetts has decided to accept Microsoft's Office file format as sufficiently open to allow it to compete with other office productivity suites. 08/02/2007

Apple Releases Security Patch for IPhone

Apple Inc. has issued a software patch to fix some security holes that independent security researchers recently discovered for the company's vaunted iPhone. 08/02/2007

Vista Fixes: Sealing Off the Leaks

Something like Service Pack 1 came down the pipe. 08/02/2007

A Scheme Too Grand

Despite all the talk surrounding SOA, will the technology crash and burn like many others before? 08/01/2007

Peek in on Your Processes

Get to know the ins and outs of your system's processes with ProcPeek. 08/01/2007