Archive for December, 2005
Monday, December 26th, 2005
Chairs safe for now
The very public spat between Microsoft and Google over the hiring of Kai-Fu Lee has ended. The increased tension between the two companies that the Lee saga emphasized remains.
Microsoft and Google revealed this week that they’ve settled the Lee hiring issue, ending the embarrassing drama before a January trial. Neither party would reveal the terms of their agreement or add anything much in the way of detail. Lawyers representing the companies said they were “pleased” and “satisfied” with the secret arrangement.
The Lee spat began in July when Google poached the executive from Microsoft to run its Chinese research and development operations. Microsoft struck back with a lawsuit and some harsh words.
Full story: Channelregister.co.uk
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Saturday, December 24th, 2005
Brico Pack Longhorn Inspirat for WindowsXP, based on the OS made by Microsoft : Vista.
This first release was made after looking at the screenshots of the beta version of their next operating system, at the time its name was LongHorn.
Warning : The use of a BricoPack installed without following the instructions can make your system down. Before installing this BricoPack, please read the instructions page “about the BricoPacks”. You must not install this pack on Windows x64
Download: Brico Pack Longhorn Inspirat
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Thursday, December 22nd, 2005
Comply or get your chequebook, says EC
The European Commission has knocked Microsoft for failing to comply with penalties set out in its antitrust ruling against the software company - and may impose a daily fine of ?2m if Microsoft does not change its ways.
Microsoft has not supplied “complete and accurate specifications” which would allow competitors’ workgroup servers to interoperate with Windows PCs and servers, according to the EC.
Competition commissioner Neelie Kroes said in a statement: “I have given Microsoft every opportunity to comply with its obligations. However, I have been left with no alternative other than to proceed via the formal route to ensure Microsoft’s compliance.”
The software company has five weeks to respond - after which the EC could impose the 2m fine on a daily basis until it complies.
Read more: silicon.com
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Thursday, December 22nd, 2005
Time Warner has chosen Google as the most suitable partner for its America Online Internet unit–but the game isn’t over for jilted suitor Microsoft.
The Redmond, Wash., software giant plans to leverage its desktop market dominance to compete with Google on search and advertising, analysts said Wednesday.
After spending much of this year wooing AOL in an attempt to get its search business, Microsoft lost out to Google. Google and AOL announced Tuesday that Google will invest $1 billion for a 5 percent stake in AOL under a broad partnership that expands their existing search engine deal to include collaboration on advertising, instant messaging and video.
Google also is offering a $300 million credit that AOL can use to buy keyword-based ads from Google, and AOL will be able to sell all types of ads on Google sites and its publisher sites that display ads powered by the search giant. In addition, Google will help AOL better expose its content to Google’s Web crawler.
But given that AOL and Google have had a search engine agreement for three years, “at the end of the day, nothing much has really changed” for Microsoft, said Michael Gartenberg, an analyst at JupiterResearch. “From Microsoft’s perspective, the ability to do a deal with AOL would have been a good thing, but it was not a critical thing.”
Read full article: ZDNet News
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Thursday, December 22nd, 2005
Under the hammer
Developers itching to test drive Microsoft’s latest instant messenger can now bid for an invitation to join the test program on eBay.
Some 70 invitations to the Windows Live Messenger 8 beta test program have been posted on eBay, with many sellers looking to make around $25.00 per invitation.
Full story: The Register
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Wednesday, December 21st, 2005
Japan is limbering up to challenge the might of Google and Yahoo by developing its own search engine.
The country’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry has organized a study group consisting of about 20 Japanese electronics companies–including Hitachi and Panasonic–and universities, which will consider the merits of creating a search tool specifically for the country’s Web users.
“The group will look into issues including whether Japan will start its own search engine,” said Fumihiro Kajikawa, a ministry official in charge of information policies. According to reports, the Japanese government is considering spending up to about $885 million on the plan, as part of its drive to become a more dominant online player.
Japan’s prime minister, Junichiro Koizumi, has previously said that the country needs to extend its influence in the IT arena.
Read more: CNET News.com
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Wednesday, December 21st, 2005
The bug affects most of Symantec’s products, including enterprise and home user software, across both the Windows and Macintosh platforms
Symantec’s antivirus software contains a vulnerability that could be exploited by a malicious hacker to take control of a system, the company admitted late on Tuesday.
According to Symantec the bug, which affects a range of the company’s security products, is a “high” risk, while the Danish security specialists Secunia have labelled it as “highly critical”.
According to an advisory issued by Secunia, the bug affects most of Symantec’s products, including enterprise and home user versions of Symantec AntiVirus, Symantec Norton AntiVirus and Symantec Norton Internet Security, across both the Windows and Macintosh platforms.
Full story: ZDNet UK
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Tuesday, December 20th, 2005
A new proposal in Congress could please Hollywood studios, which are increasingly worried about Internet piracy, by embedding anticopying technology into the next generation of digital video products.
If the legislation were enacted, one year later it would outlaw the manufacture or sale of electronic devices that convert analog video signals into digital ones–unless those encoders honor an anticopying plan designed to curb redistribution. Affected devices would include PC-based tuners and digital video recorders.
“This legislation is designed to secure analog content from theft that has been made easier as a result of the transition to digital technologies,” House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner Jr., a Wisconsin Republican, said late Friday. Criminals “obtain copyrighted content and then redistribute for profit at the copyright owner’s expense,” he added.
Full story: ZDNet News
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Tuesday, December 20th, 2005
Donzilla is a feature-packed version of Mozilla Seamonkey, customized literally to the extreme. Donzilla is intended for a user that is looking for everything he or she could possibly need in one convenient package. It is definitely not reccomended to a minimalist user.
Donzilla has been tested on all supported Windows platforms and on Fedora Core Linux version 4.
Download: Donzilla 0.9
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Tuesday, December 20th, 2005
Wait for it, wait for it…
Developers are closer to getting a full, pre-release copy of Microsoft’s next client operating system with Microsoft’s latest Windows Vista Community Technology Preview (CTP).
Microsoft on Monday re-committed itself to delivering a “feature-complete” Windows Vista CTP in “early” 2006, hinting this could be around the time of January’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.
Click Here
Shanen Boettcher, senior director for Microsoft’s Windows client group, promised Windows Vista would be “feature complete” by the end of the month.
Boettcher was speaking as he announced features tackling security, enhanced mobility and better performance in the latest CTP released to 500,000 developers on the Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN) and TechNet sites.
He was unwilling to say which features remained to be shoved into the Windows Vista code base for the next - and presumably final - CTP.
Full article: The Register
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Tuesday, December 20th, 2005
Warning over “disastrous” and “short-sighted” decision
Billionaire Time Warner shareholder Carl Icahn on Monday warned the media conglomerate’s board against making a “disastrous” and “short-sighted” decision.
If internet unit AOL agrees to an exclusive deal with search giant Google, its shareholders will hold the board responsible, Icahn warned.
Time Warner and Google have secretly reached a tentative agreement whereby Google would pay $1bn for a five per cent stake in AOL, giving AOL a valuation of $20bn, a source familiar with the negotiations who asked not to be named confirmed on Monday. Official word on the deal was expected to come on Tuesday, the source said.
The deal with Google, whose stock closed at $424.60, would nudge Microsoft out of the way. Microsoft had been wooing Time Warner to get AOL’s search business for many months and was on the verge of a deal before the surprise turn late last week, according to another person familiar with the negotiations who asked to remain anonymous.
Icahn, who directly and indirectly controls three per cent of Time Warner shares, has been organising a proxy battle for control of the company and wants to split AOL off.
Full story: silicon.com
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Tuesday, December 20th, 2005
The Microsoft RAW Image Thumbnailer and Viewer provides the ability to view, organize, and print photos captured in RAW image formats from supported Canon and Nikon digital cameras.
Often likened to a ?¢‚ǨÀúdigital negative,?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢ a RAW image is the native image format for a growing number of quality digital cameras. Because of the camera-specific nature of RAW files, they are not supported natively within Microsoft Windows. As a result, photographers shooting RAW have not been able to take advantage of the built-in features provided in Windows XP for viewing, organizing, and printing RAW photos–until now.
After installing the Microsoft RAW Image Thumbnailer and Viewer Powertoy for Windows XP you will be able to view, organize, and print photos captured in RAW image formats from supported Canon and Nikon digital cameras.
This software offers the following benefits to digital photographers:
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ High image quality. This software uses the camera vendors’ own processing libraries to provide the highest possible image fidelity for RAW images.
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ Superior color fidelity. Windows Image Color Management (ICM) is used to render images in the correct color space as determined by the photographer when the image was captured.
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ Familiar user experience. This software builds on the familiar Windows user experience and requires little or no learning curve.
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ Performance tuned for rapid previews. The software uses background processing and other techniques to ensure a good preview experience even for large images.
(This latest release contains support for new cameras such as the Canon EOS 5D, Nikon D50, D70s, and others.)
Download: Microsoft RAW Image Thumbnailer and Viewer for Windows XP 1.0 (Build 50)
Posted in IMAGE/PHOTO Editor | No Comments »
Monday, December 19th, 2005
Microsoft Research has hired Bill Buxton, a designer known for his work in human-machine interfaces.
Buxton will work as a senior researcher for the software giant and focus on product design, particularly for so-called ubiquitous computing applications.
The growing number of handheld devices and embedded processors in cars and other items poses new design challenges, Buxton said Monday. For example, in the near future a person’s watch, cell phone, car and shop window could all exchange information.
Full story: C|net
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Monday, December 19th, 2005
DIYP2P is a FREE platform for creating your own P2P program. Anyone who knows HTML can create a file sharing program connected to the popular G1/G2 networks. Since DIYP2P is using GnucDNA as the network core, your application will have all the features of a solid P2P program, already packed with files and sharing users. Basically you can think of DIYP2P as an Open Source platform where you don’t need to be a programmer to use it.
When you use DIYP2P as your platform you get:
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ FREE platform to develop your own File Sharing program
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ Access to the Gnutella1 and Gnutella2 networks - packed with users and files
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ Ability to search by artist, title, genre, or other metainformation
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ Lightning fast downloads from multiple users simultaneously
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ Connection to the network using GWebCache, a distributed connection system
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ Support for MAGNET links that allow you to click on web page links that access Gnutella
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ Elegant multiple search tabbed interface
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ Bandwidth control for the uploads and downloads
?¢‚Ǩ¬¢ NO BUNDLED SOFTWARE OF ANY KIND!
Download: DIYP2P v1.0.5
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Monday, December 19th, 2005
No more downloads after January 2006
Microsoft will formally kill the Mac version of Internet Explorer on 31 January 2006, the software giant has admitted.
The software’s been moribund since June 2003, of course, when the company said it would no longer develop the code. At the time, it said it would stop supporting the product in 2005, and indeed, the appropriate product page on its website says support will stop on 31 December.
Click Here
Actually, work on the Mac version of IE is believed to have been effectively halted back in February 2003, when Microsoft decided to can development of version 6.0 of the browser a month after Apple announced its own browser, Safari. Ironically, IE:Mac won plaudits from its earliest days for its speed relative to the rather clunky Mac implementation of Netscape. Indeed, the Mac OS 9 version of IE runs at a fair old speed, very different from the Mac OS X release.
Full story: The Register
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Monday, December 19th, 2005
Portfolio-management products purchased from UMT will be folded into Microsoft’s flagship suite
Microsoft will acquire the software and intellectual property of United Management Technologies to build into its Office software, the companies said on Friday.
Microsoft’s purchase includes UMT’s portfolio management products, which help companies identify and prioritise portfolios of projects, as well as deal with projects’ deadlines, scopes and budgets. Microsoft will fold these assets into its Office Enterprise Project Management Solutions.
Read more: ZDNet UK
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Monday, December 19th, 2005
Windows Live Messenger - Enhancer is a tool that has advertisement removing (Both Live and Downgrader), Polygamy, Boost maximum typing text, etc.
Download: Windows Live Messenger - Enhancer 1.0 [Techconnect Magazine]
Posted in instant messaging | No Comments »
Monday, December 19th, 2005
Three versions of a new worm called Dasher are exploiting a flaw that Microsoft struggled to patch
A Windows-targeted worm that drops spying software on vulnerable PCs is spreading across the Internet, security experts have warned.
The Dasher.B worm exploits a flaw in Microsoft Windows Distributed Transaction Coordinator, or MDTC, security companies said on Friday. Microsoft announced and patched the hole in the component for transaction processing in October. However, initial glitches with the update may have left some users without a properly implemented fix, Sophos said.
“The worry is that the problems with the patch may have prevented it from being successfully rolled out onto some vulnerable computers,” Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at the security company, said in a statement.
Cluley noted that computers running Windows 2000 and those that have not been updated with MS05-051 face the greatest risk.
Full article: ZDNet UK
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Sunday, December 18th, 2005
MSN Messenger is an instant messaging program that lets you send instant messages with cool emoticons, send pictures and other files to your friends, see when someone is typing a message to you, page a contact’s mobile phone, and much more.
Chat online, in real time, with friends, family, and colleagues. It’s faster than e-mail, more discreet than a phone call, and best of all — it’s free! MSN Messenger is more than just text, it’s a great way to collaborate with co-workers or touch base with family and friends. You can even send an instant message to a contact’s mobile phone. Customization features help you personalize your chats and make your connections even more meaningful.
Download: MSN Messenger 7.5.0322
Posted in Live | No Comments »
