Microsoft

Mac users - who ARE these people?

Jeff Caruso — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 17:06:30 -0400

Microsoft has reportedly hired Jerry Seinfeld to bring in a big gun against Apple's stream of "Mac vs. PC" ads. Seinfeld will be paid $10 million, according to the reports, as part of a $300 million campaign.

A good Google search supremacy theory

Google Subnet — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 15:58:26 -0400

Don Reisinger at CNET posted a very good theory explaining Google's current dominance in search, something that was underscored by a recent Neilsen study. He says Google counters conventional Web wisdom: Rather than trying to keep visitors around, it focuses on getting rid of them as fast as possible.

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Microsoft Live Labs opens up cool photo app to the masses. If only they could access it

Alpha Doggs — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 10:21:34 -0400

From IDG News Service:

Microsoft has made its Photosynth technology easier to use and opened it up for anyone to create their own images, the company planned to announce Thursday.

Photosynth automatically stitches together digital photos -- just a handful or a few hundred -- to create an image that a user can spin around to look at from all angles or zoom in to check out a close-up detail.

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Hey, Dell, get off of my cloud!

Mitchell Ashley — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 14:36:04 -0400

Rejected! Dell gets denied at the cloud-computing goal line by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. No "cloud computing" trademark for Dell. Dell trying to trademark "cloud computing" would be like Microsoft trying to trademark "desktop computing." Too many companies use the term cloud computing to describe online services for Dell or anyone else to attempt to swoop in and trademark the term right from under the market. It would create turmoil for what is already a generalized and widely used term. Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Yahoo, IBM, HP and others all offer what they term cloud computing or cloud services.

Why would Dell lay claim to the term cloud computing?

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Virtualization - Breaking up is hard to do

Mitchell Ashley — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 00:29:52 -0400

Desktop virtualization concepts and benefits have already been proven out, largely through old-school remote-desktop products from companies like Citrix Systems and Microsoft. We know the benefits of standardization, managing better desktop change control, remote desktop access, desktop and data storage, and business continuity. Desktop virtualization has already begun the march to take over previous remote-desktop technologies.

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Windows 7 Blog Will Not Speculate

Mitchell Ashley — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 01:26:13 -0400

The Windows 7 team announced their new blog this week, the E7 blog, where they will keep us informed about developments with Windows 7 (W7). Er... or, will they? Seems the W7 team feels Microsoft has gotten ahead of themselves in the past by over discussing and floating trial balloons about new operating system features, implicating Windows Vista of course.

From the E7 blog:

We, as a team, definitely learned some lessons about "disclosure" and how we can all too easily get ahead of ourselves in talking about features before our understanding of them is solid.

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Just how is Cisco competing with Microsoft, Google?

Cisco Subnet — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 17:09:56 -0400

Cisco CEO John Chambers never misses an opportunity to talk "collaboration" but collaboration is much more than networking - it's a lot to do with collaboration software. Om Malik, writing in GigaOm points out that with enterprises giving Google's Google Apps the thumbs-up and Microsoft pushing the collaboration elements of SharePoint, Cisco needs to think like a software company if it wants to take some of the collaboration mindshare.

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Microsoft Throwing Its Weight Around With Security

Mitchell Ashley — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 11:30:26 -0400

At Black Hat last week, Microsoft announced both and expansion and a shift in their approach to vulnerability security information. Microsoft is releasing early information about vulnerabilities addresses in upcoming security patches through a new program called Microsoft Active Protections Program (MAPP). MAPP is a different kind of security information sharing program though -- it's intended for creators of security software which helps protect Microsoft products and environments. The idea is to get vulnerability information into the hands of products like intrusion prevention systems, firewalls and others, before Microsoft releases patch.

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Google, Microsoft square off on campus

Google Subnet — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 07:33:48 -0400

At the recent Campus Technology 08 conference in Boston, both Google and Microsoft made a strong pitch for the education market. Both vendors offer free hosted e-mail and collaboration tools for K-12 and college students and faculty. Schools can use the tools while still preserving their familiar .edu domain names. Microsoft underscored its upcoming LiveMesh technologies as part of its new Live@edu suite, while Google emphasized its Google Apps technologies, including Gmail, Google Docs and Google Spreadsheets.

Both vendors hope to hook student users early with free services, and then parlay that usage into paying corporate accounts as those students graduate into the corporate workforce. To learn more about both programs, see Network World's write-up. To get additional insight into the vendors' strategies, watch the video from the show.

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Microsoft vs. Google in the education market

Microsoft Subnet — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 15:18:49 -0400

Microsoft and Google recently went head to head in the education market at the Campus 08 Technology Conference in Boston. Both companies showed off similar technologies for the education market, which includes universities and K-12 schools. Microsoft's Live@edu includes all the Microsoft Live apps, such as Hotmail, and offer education institutions 5Gb to 10Gb e-mail inboxes and allows them to keep their domains. Live@edu is free to users. Watch the video (below) to see how Microsoft's services for education match up against Google's.

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Google covers the Olympics

Google Subnet — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 13:52:57 -0400

So you're a sports nut who lives in Nigeria or Indonesia, but you've never used Google or YouTube before? Get ready to change all that. Google hatched an agreement with the International Olympic Committee (IOC), enabling its YouTube subsidiary to broadcast Olympic coverage in 77 countries starting with the opening ceremonies on Aug. 8. The move is bound to improve Google/YouTube's visibility--and usage--worldwide.

Unfortunately, those 77 countries don't include the U.S., U.K., Canada and several others. The IOC said its IOC Channel will be available on YouTube only in territories where digital video-on-demand rights have not been sold or acquired on a non-exclusive basis.

But the news isn't all about YouTube. Google has also begun showing a new 'onebox' as part of its results for Olympics-based search queries, Blogoscoped's Philipp Lenssen notes. In the onebox, which is a special result integrated into organic Google search results, users get a list of the upcoming events for the sports category, all linked to Beijing2008.cn. So even if U.S. residents can't watch on YouTube, they can quickly find the event they're interested in and tune into to NBC's exclusive Olympic coverage.

And that's another place Google is placing a bet. While the NBC Olympic site is run on Microsoft's Silverlight, Google's DoubleClick will be serving up all the ads within the Silverlight applications. The upshot? It looks like the competition for Olympics hearts and minds will be happening online, as well as in Beijing.

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UPDATE: Google has also created 3D models of the Olympic Village, available in Google Earth, to allow people to see the general location and perspectives of the venues and stadiums throughout Bejing. Take a spin.

Google to bolster Apps, not the price

Google Subnet — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 13:13:15 -0400

Google's Enterprise Unit chief, David Girouard, was coy about exactly what new features and apps to expect in its Web-hosted Apps software suite. But on one point, he didn't hedge. While Apps is slated to gain new functionality, its price will likely remain unchanged for enterprise users.

Girouard, who this IDG News story says made the remarks during a presentation at the Pacific Crest Technology Leadership Forum, emphasized that Google's intent is on adding value, not expense. Currently, Google offers a free, ad-supported Apps version for individuals and small businesses, and a Premier enterprise version that costs $50 per user per year.

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Server 2008 Hyper-V: Mouse Integration

Glenn Weadock — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 17:27:08 -0400

Now to the mouse integration issue I raised last time. I set up a VM running Server 2008. The host OS is (obviously) Server 2008. I installed the Integration Services, which according to the help system (which by the way is one of the least complete and least useful help files I have ever seen for a high-profile product) is supposed to enable mouse integration. What gives?

One blog suggested that with a Server 2008 guest, you need to install the Hyper-V upgrade (KB 950050) on the guest OS, not just the host. I guess the Integration Services work for all supported guest operating systems EXCEPT Server 2008! Ironic, huh?

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Development Costs In The Cloud

Mitchell Ashley — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 10:31:00 -0400

As more of our applications migrate into the cloud, some interesting questions for development rise up. What about development? How will developer use cloud services in the development process? How do you attract developers to develop on your cloud services? How much will cloud services cost you if you use cloud services in the software development and QA testing process?

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Meet up at Black Hat

Mitchell Ashley — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 05:49:28 -0400

This week I'll be attending Black Hat in Las Vegas, the annual security show that brings in security practitioners and n00bs alike from all over the world. Xen Hypervisor, Cisco gear, Wi-Fi, browsers, Google Gadgets, DNS and more, are all expected to come under the hacking microscope to expose the latest security vulnerabilities and hacking methods. I'm particularly interested in Web 2.0 and hypervisor-type attacks, given how rapidly these two areas are expanding but suffer the typical malady of security languishing as a secondary consideration.

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Getting Windows 2008 Hyper-V to Work on Apple Mac Pro (macpro) Server

Rand Morimoto — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 21:41:07 -0400

For those of you looking to get a super fast QuadCore server to run Windows 2008 Hyper-V, take a look at the Apple Mac Pro Server as an option. After screwing around for a week at my local Frys Electronics trying to get a clone motherboard (ASUS 2 processor with support for up to 24gb memory) to work (problem where the ASUS motherboard ONLY supports the 3ghz Xeon processor, not the 2ghz processors they sold me, they want $1200 more to upgrade me from 2ghz to 3ghz processors, no thank you!), I walked over to the Apple section of the store and bought an Apple Mac Pro Server.

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HP, Intel, Yahoo team up on cloud computing

Google Subnet — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 08:31:19 -0400

Like Google and IBM before them, HP, Intel and Yahoo are joining forces to kick-start cloud-computing research. But unlike IBM/Google, the interesting thing about the new group is that it's decidedly international in flavor, says Google Watch's Clint Boulton.

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Google-Digg deal gets buried

Google Subnet — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 09:48:04 -0400

At the last minute, Google decided against purchasing social networking site Digg for $200 million, TechCrunch reports. The agreement, which seemed like a done deal just last Wednesday, had reached the final stages of due diligence when Google decided the deal wasn't in its best interests. As TechCrunch's Michael Arrington writes:

Two sources close to the companies suggested that some issue that came up during technical due diligence was to blame. One source said that the issue was more personality driven, and that Google decided after spending more time with Digg’s top team that there just wasn’t a fit.

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Mossberg Pans MobileMe: Did Apple Screw Up?

Craig Mathias — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 10:40:13 -0400

One of my pet peeves is poor-quality products. Actually, it's way more than a pet peeve. Products with obvious flaws have been known to cause bad language here at Farpoint Group, and very bad language at that. I can't imagine why anyone would ship a product that doesn't work, or isn't at least functional to the point of meeting its published specs. Sure, wireless introduces a statistical quality to any radio-based product or service, but there's no excuse for outright bugs. Windows has just driven me right up the wall over the years because the quality of the code is so poor. I just can't deal with Microsoft anymore; I've given up. So - problems like this can get very serious indeed.

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Juniper hires Microsoft veteran as CEO

Cisco Subnet — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 12:17:53 -0400

The little blemish on his resume of failing to pull off Microsoft's bid to aquire Yahoo didn't deter Juniper from naming Microsoft veteran Kevin Johnson as CEO, replacing Scott Kriens who continues as chairman. According to an IDG News Services story, news of Johnson's departure from Microsoft comes just a week after the company released financial earnings dragged down by its online services group. Microsoft will split up the group he ran.

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