During slightly more than a week after Windows 7's consumer release on Oct. 22, the new operating system's market share rose 1.68 percent to 3.67 percent in daily tracking surveys, according to Net Applications.
As of Sunday, Nov. 1, Microsoft's Windows 7 held 2.15 percent of the total operating system market worldwide, the Web analytics tracking firm said.
Meanwhile, all versions of Windows held a combined total market share of 92.51 percent. Of that, Windows XP held 70.48 percent market share and Windows Vista had 18.83 percent.
Everyone loves a killer feature: that must-have capability or technology that prompts you to plunk down your hard-earned cash in an effort to upgrade your computing experience.
In the case of Windows, there have been precious few versions that included a truly killer feature. Windows 3.1 was a killer version because it allowed PCs to finally break the dreaded 640K barrier. Windows NT was a killer version because it introduced the concepts of client/server security and true, hardware-based memory protection to the environment.
Microsoft yesterday announced the final release of its Platform Update for Windows Vista, which provides access to several key Windows 7 technologies on the previous Windows version. The Platform Update consists of runtime libraries, installed via Windows Update, that provide a common platforYesterday, Microsoft announced the final release of its Platform Update for Windows Vista, which provides access to several key Windows 7 technologies on the previous Windows version. The Platform Update consists of runtime libraries -- installed via Windows Update -- that provide a common platform for developers. It's also being made available for Windows Server 2008.
Yahoo and Microsoft have agreed to extend the time required for them to sign off on the details of their deal regarding Bing search and revenue sharing, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission Wednesday.
"On October 28, 2009, Yahoo! Inc. and Microsoft Corporation mutually agreed to extend the period to negotiate and execute a Search and Advertising Services and Sales Agreement and a License Agreement reflecting and supplementing the provisions of such agreements as set forth in annexes to their binding letter agreement dated July 29, 2009," Yahoo officials said in a form 8-K filed with the SEC.
Jive has given its enterprise social-networking software what it calls its biggest overhaul yet, giving users the ability to collaborate on Microsoft Office files and to use the product from mobile devices, including an application built specifically for the iPhone.
Jive's Social Business Software (SBS) 4.0, which the company will release on Tuesday, comes with a new "connector" that allows users to jointly author, view, annotate and edit Word, Excel and PowerPoint files.
Starting in 2012, users of certain GPS devices will no longer get traffic updates, weather reports and other data because Microsoft is discontinuing its MSN Direct service.
Microsoft has posted a notice on its MSN Direct Web site informing users that the service will be available only until Jan. 1, 2012.
MSN Direct is most often associated with Microsoft's Smart Watch program. That program was the first to use the MSN Direct service to send information like news headlines, stock quotes, weather and traffic information to special wristwatches.
Microsoft on Tuesday released the final code for a set of libraries that enables developers to write applications for Windows 7 that will also preserve the Windows 7 look and feel when the application is run on Windows Vista.
The Platform Update for Windows Vista is a free download from Windows Update, Windows Server Update Services and the Microsoft Download Center. There is also a similar package for deployment on Windows Server 2008.
The announcement of the code libraries came in a post on the Windows 7 Team Blog.
Three weeks ago, the European Commission signaled its approval of Microsoft's revised plan for a more vendor-neutral Web browser selection screen for European Windows users. But that revised plan was buffered with a big bonus: a promise to supply the general public with a wealth of interoperability information, including about proprietary formats.
Among the most sought after formats on that list has been for Outlook Personal Folders -- the much-maligned .PST file format, whose lack of comprehension has been the pet peeve of certainly every developer who's ever worked on a calendar or smartphone synchronization utility. Now the manager for Microsoft's new Office Interoperability Group announced this morning that work is under way on public documentation for the file format.
Microsoft has released a tool that lets netbook owners install Windows 7 on their machines using a USB flash drive, sidestepping the usual requirement of a DVD drive.
The utility, Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool, creates a bootable flash drive from a downloaded .iso file, or disk image, of Windows 7, and can be purchased from Microsoft's online store.
"This tool allows you to create a copy of the .iso file to a USB flash drive or a DVD," said Microsoft in the instructions accompanying the tool. "To install Windows 7 from your USB flash drive or DVD, all you need to do is insert the USB flash drive into your USB port or insert your DVD into your DVD drive and run Setup.exe from the root folder on the drive.
Users can do a "clean" installation of Windows 7 using an upgrade license to save $80 to $100 over the price of a "full" edition, a popular blog reports.
According to Paul Thurrott, who writes the Supersite for Windows blog, Microsoft's upgrade media and product keys can be used to do a full installation of Windows 7 on PCs that do not have an earlier version of the OS.
Microsoft's Windows 7 upgrades are designed to do "in-place" or "custom" installs on PCs running Windows XP, Windows Vista or one of the preview editions of Windows 7. But Thurrott said that a few simple steps lets users install upgrade editions, which are considerably cheaper than the full versions designed for fresh installations.