Microsoft today released a free upgrade to Windows CE 5.0 aimed at luring media device developers away from Linux and to Redmond's vision of the digital home. The company made the announcement during the same week of LinuxWorld.
The Networked Media Device Feature Pack, free optional software aimed at OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) of IPTV set-top boxes, digital video recorders and home media gateways, helps developers focus on devices rather than licensing and integration, according to a statement.
Once a Microsoft Research project, Microsoft's forthcoming P2P-based storage engine will be targeted at the growing market for managing and delivering compliance and reference data.
Microsoft is working to commercialize "BitVault," a Microsoft Research technology designed to store large volumes of seldom-changing information ? the kind of material that overwhelms enterprises needing to house lots of compliance and reference data.
BitVault is Microsoft's code name for a "content-addressable retention platform for large volumes of reference data." BitVault incorporates P2P (peer-to-peer) technology for self-managing and self-healing and uses "massively parallel repair" to reduce the vulnerability of data loss, according to a white paper on the project. Much, if not all of the work on the BitVault strategy and working prototype seems to be coming out of Microsoft Research Asia.
Microsoft chairman and world's richest man Bill Gates has landed a role in cult BBC sci-fi drama "Doctor Who," with a special half-hour episode set to hit U.K. screens later this year.
According to reports, Gates will play himself in the episode, the plot of which revolves around the abduction of the software tycoon while he is on a fishing trip on Lake Washington.
The Doctor, played by David Tennant, is then charged by the White House with the task of tracking down Gates' abductor--reported to be a war-mongering alien, Lord Daz Fenster.
Microsoft 'CRM Live' and 'ERP Live' may not take the hosted-application shape that many company watchers, partners and customers have expected. Instead, Microsoft may lean more toward business mash ups as the crux of its software-as-a-service push.
Will Microsoft ultimately get into the CRM and ERP hosting businesses, all in the name of "CRM Live" and "ERP Live"?
Microsoft channel partners already offer hosted versions of Microsoft's CRM and ERP applications. And Microsoft announced on Monday some enhanced CRM 3.0 hosting programs for partners to its stable of offerings, including a new CRM Professional Edition for service providers.
With a nod to the increasing popularity of Linux, Microsoft announced
expanded support for the Linux OS at the LinuxWorld trade show in Boston
today.
Microsoft said it now offers virtual machine add-ins for Linux
and 24 x 7 technical support. Also, Microsoft announced its Virtual Server
2005 R2 as a free download. The software used to cost $99 for up to four
instances or $199 for an unlimited number of processors.
These latest moves beg the question, Is virtualization leader VMware in
danger of being "Netscaped" by the software giant?
Netscape saw its dominant market share virtually disappear as Microsoft
brought a free Internet Explorer and then made it part of Windows. But
VMware points to its growing customer list and developer support and doesn't see itself in the Netscape role.
Microsoft said Monday it has agreed to acquire ProClarity as a way to continue to develop its portfolio of business intelligence software.
The terms of the deal, which is expected to close in early May, are not being disclosed, said Chris Caren, a Microsoft Office general manager.
ProClarity, which has business analysis and visualization software for culling information from Microsoft SQL Server and exposing it to business users, is a privately held Microsoft partner in Boise, Idaho. The acquisition fits into Microsoft's goal to be a prominent player in the BI market against competitors such as Business Objects SA and Cognos, Caren said.
Microsoft has won an antipiracy lawsuit in which the software giant was charged with infringing on a software patent for detecting pirated software. Lawyers for an individual named Kenneth Nash said that Microsoft's Product Activation feature infringed on Nash's patent, which describes a method for detecting pirated software via unique identifiers called activation keys. Microsoft had argued that the system it used in Product Activation was "fundamentally different" from Nash's approach, presumably because Microsoft's version is so well liked that it turned into a marketing program called "Windows Genuine Advantage" that has been widely trumpeted as the most-beloved aspect of using Windows. Now that Windows Genuine Advantage has been cleared of all charges, we can look forward to using a hugely enhanced version in Windows Vista. And you thought Vista was going to be a disappointment.
Microsoft finally unveiled Microsoft Exchange Hosted Services today, giving the market a better look at the types of hosted services and prices it intends to offer going forward.
EHS is also making good on Microsoft's promise to enter the software as a service market.
A Microsoft spokesperson told internetnews.com that EHS is, "a key offering in Microsoft's software as a service strategy."
After acquiring managed messaging services company FrontBridge Technologies in August of last year, Microsoft was eager to stamp the service with its own brand and jump into what it sees as a huge market opportunity.
Even though Windows Vista won't be available until next year, Microsoft is working with hardware partners to prepare customers for its release. Starting next month, PCs with stickers saying "Windows Vista Capable" will be in stores, letting customers know what hardware can be upgraded to Vista once it is available, the company said Friday.
Microsoft and industry partners co-developed what the company calls the Windows Vista Capable PC program to identify machines currently running Windows XP that have the requirements to upgrade to Vista.
Microsoft left a two-day antitrust hearing in Brussels Friday claiming it had reached a breakthrough with European regulators in a dispute that may still result in the company being fined up to 2 million ($2.4 million) a day.
But the claim of a breakthrough was exaggerated, according to two other people involved in the closed-door hearing -- one person representing rival software companies and a person close to the European Commission, the European Union's top antitrust authority.
The Commission has accused Microsoft of failing to provide adequate technical details about its Windows operating system. The Commission ruled two years ago that by withholding this information, Microsoft was stifling competition in the software industry. Microsoft maintains that it has provided the information, which would allow competing makers of server systems to design programs that work as well with PCs running Windows as Microsoft's own server software.