Everyone was asking the same question Tuesday: What does the Windows Vista delay mean for me? Microsoft dropped a bomb late in the day, announcing it would push back widespread availability of the new operating system until January. The software company said the delay was being made for the benefit of computer makers, retailers and other partners, but many people took issue with Microsoft's assessment.
"This is not good for the whole industry," said Richard Doherty, an analyst at Envisioneering Group in Seaford, N.Y. "Not for peripherals makers, not for graphics makers, not for notebook makers and not for desktop makers. Everybody was counting on upgrades to Vista."
special coverage Piecing together Vista Click here for extensive News.com coverage of the Windows update.
Developers have an opportunity to derive revenue from developing mini-applications, called Gadgets, for Microsoft's Windows Vista OS, a company executive said at MIX 06 Tuesday.
During his keynote at the Las Vegas conference, Joe Belfiore, vice president of Microsoft's eHome division, said that developers can build Gadgets for hardware OEMs to pre-install on computers running the Vista OS once it ships later this year.
"OEMs can prepopulate machines with Gadgets," he said. Gadgets are Web-connected mini-applications that run independent of the browser and display real-time information, such as stock quotes or news headlines. They also can offer quick-view ways for users to stay connected to Web-based applications they use all the time, such as music players and e-mail.
Three years have passed since Microsoft last upgraded its widely used Office desktop applications--Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, Word, and others--and related Office server applications. The next release, Office 2007, is due in the second half of this year, and Microsoft officials have begun to talk openly about what will be new and different, including features, pricing, packaging, and licensing. Office developers will convene this week, from March 21st to the 23rd, at the Office Developers Conference in Redmond, Wash., to learn how to tune their own software for the Office 2007 environment.
The browser isn't everything when it comes to Microsoft's platform strategy for next-generation Web applications, but it remains key, Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates said Monday at MIX 06.
Microsoft made a mistake in waiting to build new innovations in its own browser technology, Internet Explorer, Gates admitted.
"In a sense we're doing a 'mea culpa' in saying we've waited too long for a new browser release," Gates said during his talk to kick off Microsoft's first show for designers and developers of high-impact Web sites. "We are very immersed in the browser as a platform." Microsoft's lackluster attention to the browser allowed competitors like Mozilla with Firefox and Opera Software ASA to challenge IE's dominance in the browser space.
Microsoft's Mix conference this week in Las Vegas will be the venue for news surrounding its Web 2.0 strategy. A key part of that strategy is "Atlas," the company's AJAX development tool, for which Microsoft will release a new preview at the show.
Microsoft will announce a March CTP of the Asynchronous JavaScript and XML tool with a Go-Live license, officials said. The Atlas March CTP with Go-Live license enables developers to begin building and deploying new Atlas applications and to extend applications that they can redistribute commercially.
Just weeks after Microsoft pulled back the curtains on its Origami project, chip design company Transmeta has slipped out a few more details about another of the software giant's secretive development projects.
Transmeta signed a series of agreements with Microsoft last May under which about 30 Transmeta engineers would provide development services to help with "a proprietary Microsoft project," Transmeta said in its annual report filed with U.S. regulators last week.
The work from those agreements has been "substantially completed" and Transmeta was, at the time of its filing, in the process of negotiating additional services for 2006, although probably not on the same scale as the previous work, it said.
Microsoft Monday unveiled a global initiative to crack down on cybercriminals who engage in phishing. The company will set in motion more than 100 legal actions against phishers in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa by the end of June, according to a release.
Phishing attacks use spam to entice Internet users to visit what appear to be legitimate e-commerce Web sites but are in fact phony sites controlled by cybercriminals. Users are encouraged to enter personal data such as passwords and bank account or credit card details, which the criminals can then exploit to commit crimes.
Microsoft this week revealed that it was at least temporarily canceling work on a tool called Expression Graphic Designer, a professional graphics application which some had labeled a "Photoshop Killer." I, however, always thought of it as "unnecessary," and that, of course, is how interesting conversations often start. Anyway, Microsoft says that there's no compelling reason for it to release the product--I statement I certainly agree with--though it is continuing work on two companion products, Expression Interactive Designer and Expression Web Designer, both of which are aimed at Web development. And, like any good horror movie, there's always the chance that Expression Graphic Designer will rear its head for the sequel, when those other two products are ready to ship. We can only hope.
At its Mix '06 designer confab next week, Microsoft will distribute a 'layout-complete' IE 7.0 test build, yet another step along the way toward the final IE 7.0 release, and talk IE futures, too.
At Mix '06, Microsoft's Web 2.0 conference in Las Vegas next week, tools for designers won't be the only hot button. Microsoft also will be showcasing Internet Explorer 7.0, distributing new browser bits and sharing ideas on the next version(s) of IE in the works. Microsoft will dole out at the show what officials are describing as a "layout-complete" version of IE 7.0.
There's a software product coming that has the potential to demote spyware from a security priority to an afterthought: Windows Vista.
Spyware has become a serious security problem for users of Microsoft's operating system over the past years, giving rise to a host of third-party tools to fight the insidious software. But perhaps the best defensive program has yet to ship, some analysts believe.
Microsoft later this year plans to release Windows Vista, the long-awaited successor to Windows XP. The operating system is being designed to shut the door on spyware. It will introduce important changes at the heart of the operating system, as well as to Internet Explorer, and include Windows Defender, an anti-spyware tool.