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).

Posted by Doug Barney on 10/23/20080 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 10/23/20080 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

Posted by Doug Barney on 10/23/20080 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.

Posted by Doug Barney on 10/22/20080 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.

Posted by Doug Barney on 10/22/20080 comments

Yahoo or Yikes?

Moves like this have driven Yahoo's stock down to the point where it's almost affordable. In fact, shareholders are pining for the days when Microsoft offered almost $45 billion for the company. The offer was for $33 a share. Yahoo, last time I checked, was trading for around 12 bucks. Yikes!

Posted by Doug Barney on 10/22/20080 comments

Mailbag: OpenOffice.org Thoughts, More

I have been using OpenOffice since its inception (actually, before that with StarOffice) and I like it. I use Microsoft Office 2007 in the workplace as that is the business standard, and I use OpenOffice 3 at home as it can do everything I need and more. Your beef that it's big, complex and not exactly fun may be true, but when has an Office suite been fun? Free, useable and does 90 percent of what MS Office does sounds very, very good to me.
-Craig

I have used it for years in an effort to decrease spending in our IT department. So far, everyone has adjusted well for their needs. I would like to see more VBA or macro support. I give it two thumbs up!
-Anonymous

I've recommended OpenOffice for both home and office use with good results. My only caveat is "it's better than Office, but it ain't Office." If you require total compliance with a bit of VBA code thrown in, then pony up for Office. If you're interested in getting the job done and don't have the compatibility worries, OO is more than capable.
-Gregg

A number of years ago, when I had retired from Microsoft, I took a serious look at the desktop Linux efforts and OpenOffice. What bugged me in general about them was that they were so busy trying to emulate Windows and Office that they weren't doing anything innovative. Their value proposition is "You don't have to pay Microsoft a licensing fee," and that's about it. And note that I didn't say they were free or even cheaper, since training, compatibility and other cost of ownership issues far outweigh licensing costs. From my perspective, they just totally blew the opportunity.

So what is the opportunity? It was to create completely different and more compelling experiences than what Microsoft had done. Where was the new thinking in UI? Where was a new paradigm for information work? Basically, the open source community shows a complete lack of imagination and innovation on the desktop. The world doesn't need cheaper software -- it needs revolutionary software.
-Anonymous

With each release, OpenOffice has grown and matured and got better. OK, so it doesn't have all the features of MS Office, but the features it does have generally work as you expect. It doesn't have as many dedicated books as Office 2007 (but, hey, I don't need a book to use it). Office 2007 has thousands of features...but once I can type text, insert images, put in a table of contents and print out labels for my Christmas cards, I'm happy. If it can open my late 1980s files, it's good (newer versions of Word forgot the backward-compatibility thing). If it can do a PDF, better (and I have a utility for that, anyway). If I can open a 60-page .DOC, put comments on it, e-mail back to the sender, I'm delighted (with 3.0, commenting works more like Word 03 so that box is now ticked).

The negatives: PowerPoint import can be tempramental (for me, this is not an issue but I can see how it will affect some). ODF is not fully supported at work (so I save as PDF/DOC). Sometimes -- and far less than before -- complex DOC formatting is a bit messy. There's still an expectation in business that DOC/XLS files will be exchanged and businesses may pay for the security of knowing MSO will open/close these 100 percent of the time.
-Clarke

For me, it's a simple choice. In my company I use Microsoft OS products to run critical applications -- but we are not wed. I'm grateful to the Microsoft market for generating work for me. I run a virtual or real Windows OS (or two) to support some critical products (mostly Adobe) and run Linux and Mac OS X for everything else.

With that as context, I don't find the features offered by MS Office worth the license fee. Looking forward, I prefer the product that will do what I need and save documents in a format that conforms to an open standard. I'm really tired of the format lockdown game. My impression is that Microsoft adopts standards only after every means to thwart them are exhausted.
-Anonymous

Posted by Doug Barney on 10/22/20080 comments

Social Net-Hacking

I'm pretty savvy about computers, but there's a tiny part of me that's tempted to click on these links. I even had a boss that once clicked on an "I Love You" message...and you probably know the rest. The whole organization was infected with the "I Love You Virus."

Posted by Doug Barney on 10/21/20080 comments

Microsoft Celebrates Anti-Piracy Day

I don't agree with committing software piracy, but I find that sometimes the cure is worse than the illness. How many times have you tried to rebuild a system only to be stymied reinstalling software you already paid for?

Posted by Doug Barney on 10/21/20080 comments

Ballmer on Cloud Nine and Windows 7

More

Posted by Doug Barney on 10/21/20080 comments

Mailbag: Apple Prices, Vista Problem, More

You say that you find it an outrage, in this economy, to charge such a premium. While I respect your personal convictions, that statement is a little too broad for my liking. The Declaration of Independence cites life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness as inalienable rights, not low-cost Apple computing. What Apple charges for a laptop is Apple's business. That's the free market. If we find that we are willing to pay that premium, we can join the exclusive club. If not, then we don't. We have no right to anything at any cost other than what the market will bear and what the business will sell for.

Could Apple have greater market share in personal and enterprise computing? I firmly believe so. Do they care? I am not sure, but I would suspect that Apple, marching to the beat of its own drum for decades, has its own version of success. PC computing is definitely the more economical way to go, but it's nice to have the option to drive a Cadillac if you really want one and can afford it.
-Kurt

Your comment about Apple not being interested in matching prices with PCs got me to thinking that maybe it has something there. All of the Mac users I know are competent computer users; I can't say that of all of the PC users I know. The Mac users I talk to are usually asking for help on the PC they need to use at work, not their personal Mac. After 10 years of PC support in a public school district, I am of the opinion that most people have no business using a computer!
-Anonymous

It took a lot of convincing to get my wife to go along with getting our Macbook Pro back in February. And I am glad that we made the investment. Looking at the new models and stuff now, it would be great to get another one to take advantage of that extra video memory horsepower and overall performance.

However, the price this time around is not going to work. Apple does need to reduce the cost of its hardware by a large amount if it is going to continue to grow and prosper. Our economy now will more than likely hurt Apple if it does not do something soon. It would be a darn shame to see the current crowds at the Apple store where to be reduced to one to two window shoppers that would briefly stop in.
-Albert

Apple has no place or desire to exist in the enterprise. It uses a tailored version of Unix at the core of its OS, but that does not make it comparable to *nix clients or servers. It is a consumer-grade device provider, in that it gives you a shrink-wrapped phone, media player, laptop, 1U server, etc. with bells and whistles. It does not give you the utility that is a machine of your own. I would not start buying T-Mobile routers if they started making them.

Standard or branded PC hardware running Windows or *nix will give you far more customizability than Apple will ever offer, which is the first foot into the door of any serious enterprise. Its computers are "pretty" versions that try to do the exact same thing, but seriously fall short. Any hardware running XP, Vista or *nix will beat a Mac hands-down in every enterprise usability test you can throw at it.
-Jeremy

There are a number of companies that do not market to the low end of the market. Not sure why you are thinking that Apple needs to be all things to all people. Also, way too often reviewers do not look at all the differences in the systems (i.e., the mag attached power cord). Mac has a lot more going for it than a Windows system in a lot of ways. Most people can use a Mac and not look back to Windows. If you are doing any multimedia, then Mac rules. For those that must have Windows apps they can get them with Parallels, and it is seamless.

I think that although the laptops are a bit pricier than Windows laptops, Apple is right on for being a very profitable company. It is moving up in market share consistantly. I am seeing more and more Mac laptops in public. I know of a lot of people that are migrating to Macs also. And I know a very large number of people (like myself) that are network engineers of one sort or another that have moved to Mac for their personal systems because we are just tired of the Windows crap. Macs just work, pure and simple.
-Anonymous

Posted by Doug Barney on 10/21/20080 comments

OpenOffice.org 3 Times as Good?

Meanwhile, Office is maintaining the kind of market share that would make my local electric company proud.

OpenOffice.org gets a lot of backing from Sun, which just released OpenOffice.org 3. This new release includes better multi-page document viewing, the ability to import Office 2007 files (but not export them back) and native Mac OS X support.

Posted by Doug Barney on 10/20/20080 comments