Microsoft is taking tough measures to find out who leaked a CTP of Windows Home Server to The Hotfix.net blog after the software preview was posted on the site by a user named "Richard" soon after it was released to a small group of
testers.
In a e-mail to testers obtained by the IDG News Service, Kevin Beares, the Windows Home Server community lead at Microsoft,
wrote to MVPs whose name contain "Richard" that they will not have access to the beta until
he finds out who leaked the software to The Hotfix.net site. MVP is a title Microsoft gives people who are active and helpful
in communities for Microsoft's different product groups, and many MVPs end up being early testers of products.
Microsoft will force PC makers to stop selling machines running XP by the end of this year, despite ongoing compatibility problems and demand for XP from users. Demand for XP is particularly strong among small and medium-sized businesses, according to Dell, which announced it will continue offering some machines with XP pre-installed.
Users complained that Vista's start-up, shut-down and application load times are far too long compared with Windows XP. Users on Microsoft's Performance & Maintenance forum, who sound pro-Vista for the most part, have vented about a variety of speed issues.
Microsoft has pushed back the release of the first public beta for Windows Server virtualization, code-named Viridian, from the first half of 2007 until the second half of the year so that it can meet its internal goals for performance and scalability.
Viridian is Microsoft's Windows hypervisor technology that will run beneath the operating system and manage resources for multiple virtual machines.
But Microsoft is way behind its Linux competitors on this front, as Red Hat and Novell's SUSE have both already integrated the Xen hypervisor technology into their server products.
In response to widespread chatter on blogs and forums, Microsoft has acknowledged the presence of hacks that may allow pirates to bypass the product activation security feature in its Windows Vista operating system.
According to a post by Microsoft Senior Product Manager Alex Kochis on the Windows Genuine Advantage developers' blog, Microsoft has identified two ways in which hackers have broken the product activation security feature on original equipment manufacturer PCs that come bundled with Vista. But the Redmond, Wash.-based tech giant does not yet have plans to snuff out this threat.
To hear Google tell it, the person doing a search on a home PC is "the same guy" who uses search in the enterprise. Microsoft says that may be true, but that doesn't mean they have the same needs.
In a panel discussion here at the Gilbane content management conference, officials from Google and Microsoft had a cordial debate over how the two companies address the enterprise search market. Jared Spatraro, group product manager for enterprise search at Microsoft, said there were three main areas of search: commodity, high end specialized services and mid-market "true enterprise" services. He said Microsoft plays in and continues to invest in all three areas.
Microsoft says a preliminary investigation into reports of vulnerabilities in its Office 2007 suite has produced no evidence of a threat to users. Reports of new security holes in MS Office have been made public on known exploit sites, including information about four bugs posted on one site. Microsoft has not released specific information about the vulnerabilities, citing potential risk to users.
"Microsoft's initial investigation has found that none of these claims demonstrate any vulnerability in Word 2007 or any Office 2007 products," a company spokesperson said April 11. "Our investigation into the possible impact of these claims on other versions of Microsoft Office is continuing."
Oracle next week plans to release fixes for 37 security flaws across all its products, the company said Tuesday. The fixes will be delivered April 17 as part of Oracle's quarterly patch cycle. Seven of the bugs are serious and could allow a system running the vulnerable Oracle software to be compromised remotely, the company said in a note on its Web site.
This is the second time Oracle is giving a heads-up on patches. The first such advance notice was in January. Microsoft has been giving customers a similar early warning since late 2004. Both companies have put their patches on a schedule so customers know when to expect them. The early warning is meant to allow for extra preparedness.
Security at the Forefront
The company has engaged in a competitive campaign with partners, such as McAfee, Symantec and Trend Micro, with products like Forefront and Windows Live OneCare.
"I don't think that Microsoft's security competitors are going to panic over the Forefront ad campaign," said Andrew Jaquith, Yankee Group's program manager for Security Research.
A Symantec spokesman said the company doesn't comment on others' advertising campaigns. Oh? Symantec sure had lots to say about Windows Vista.
Microsoft, with its hands full integrating its Dynamics ERP (enterprise resource planning) line, does not plan to acquire any of the smaller vendors competing with the software giant
in the midmarket area, a senior executive said.
Acquisitions are "not in our plan right now," said Klaus Holse Andersen, the newly appointed corporate vice president for
Microsoft Business Solutions Worldwide Sales and Operations, on Tuesday. "We think we have the technology we need."
Microsoft sees double-digit growth from medium-size businesses for ERP applications, which can manage anything from payroll
to inventory to the supply chain.
One thing never seems to change: Microsoft is always enduring some antitrust challenge--even when it is working with other industry players to create better products. Take, for example, Microsoft's recent agreement with Novell to make Windows server software interoperate better with the Linux server products of Novell.
Last month, oblivious to this agreement, the European Commission issued another statement of objections alleging that Microsoft engaged in bad faith to thwart interoperability in the server market. The Commission's proposed remedy would require Microsoft to make its valuable intellectual property available to its competitors--for free.