WinInsider

A lot of people are speculating that Windows XP Media Center Edition (XP MCE) 2005 is based on XP Home Edition, not on XP Professional Edition, as earlier releases were. Their reasoning is that XP MCE 2005 drops a few key XP Pro features, such as the ability to log on to a domain, Group Policy Editor (GPE), and Encrypting File System (EFS) support. But XP MCE 2005 does include many key XP Pro features, such as Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) 5.1. So what's the truth? Honestly, people are asking the wrong question because all XP versions are based on the same code base. The key question is why XP MCE has changed at all.

In a meeting of programming heavyweights dubbed a shootout of competing platforms, participants exhibited criticism and sarcasm, but also a grudging respect for their opposing peers. At a session entitled "The Great J2EE vs. Microsoft .Net Shootout" at the OOPSLA conference here this week, software development superstars debated the relative strengths and weaknesses of Microsoft's .Net and Sun's Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition.

Regarding the object-relational mapping issue, Hejlsberg said, "This is one of my pet peeves - the enormous impedance mismatch between databases and enterprise programming languages. I'm amazed at how much progress we can make by integrating the two worlds and O/R [object-relational] mappings are the first stop along that path. I'm spending a large portion of my time trying to figure out how to solve these problems."

Microsoft is at work on an object-relational mapping technology effort known as ObjectSpaces that was slated to be delivered with the upcoming Longhorn operating system.

Microsoft and Time Warner may think their control of DRM technology vendor ContentGuard is a done deal, but the EU may try to block a final acquisition. Reuters reported on Friday that unnamed sources said the European Commission on Competition, the entity charged with regulating antitrust matters, would say no to the buy. Microsoft and Time Warner all but own the company already. Four-year-old ContentGuard was a spin-off company set up to commercialize DRM technology developed at Xerox's PARC research center. Microsoft became a strategic investor, along with Xerox, when the company launched in 2000.

Microsoft C++ architect extols the virtues of melding major languages with virtual platforms. What will be the dominant programming languages a decade from now?

Microsoft developer division architect Herb Sutter told attendees of the OOPSLA 2004 conference here that he couldn't predict the names of the most prominent programming languages of 2014, but he had a good idea of the characteristics of those languages.

Sutter said the top future programming languages will blend existing "concrete" languages with virtual platforms. They will likely include garbage collection, (even if only as an optional feature); security and verifiability; the ability to be optimized; and an easy and scalable way to manipulate large quantities of external data.

When it launched its "Windows Genuine Advantage" pilot program in September, Microsoft was hoping 20,000 customers would opt into the voluntary program, via which Microsoft checks whether customers are running counterfeit copies of Windows.

But by a little over a month later, 828,000 customers had opted in, Microsoft officials said Wednesday. And they did so with no real incentives, admitted David Lazar, director of Microsoft's Windows client product management group.

Microsoft Windows users need to watch out for several flaws in non-Microsoft media players, security experts said.

Apple Computer and RealNetworks have both issued fixes for their Windows software to patch serious security vulnerabilities. Apple released Quicktime 6.5.2 on Wednesday to plug two holes in its Windows media player. On Tuesday RealNetworks advised users of its RealPlayer 10, RealPlayer 10.5 and RealOne Player software to use the "Check for Updates" feature to download the latest patch.

One of the flaws in Apple's Quicktime player affects Mac OS X users as well, but the company patched the problems at the end of September.

As part of its growing effort to thwart piracy, Microsoft is offering free photo slideshow software to customers who verify that they have a genuine copy of Windows.

Microsoft on Wednesday released Photo Story 3, the latest version of its software for creating photo slideshows set to music or narration. The previous incarnation was sold as part of a $20 digital media bundle known as Microsoft Plus Digital Media Edition.

This time around, Microsoft is making the software available free of charge, but it is requiring customers to take part in the Windows Genuine Advantage pilot program. In the program, people use an online tool to check whether their PCs are using a properly licensed copy of the operating system.

In a speech at the Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages and Applications-or OOPSLA-conference here, Microsoft's head researcher announced a new framework and tools for building domain-specific languages and the precursor to the company's software factories strategy.

Rick Rashid, senior vice president of Microsoft Research, described the strategy during his keynote at the conference, saying software factories represent "a change in what we actually want to do with software. Now we have to think about programming with large components."

In the four page memo, Ballmer said the hefty premiums that Linux vendors Novell, Red Hat and IBM charge for must have items such as technical service and support, product warranties and licensing indemnification outweigh the cost advantages of free, open-source software.

"There is no question that customers are benefiting today from a healthy, competitive IT industry Customers have a clearer opportunity than ever before to evaluate choices," Ballmer stated. "It's pretty clear the facts show that Windows provides a lower total cost of ownership than Linux. The number of security vulnerabilities is lower on Windows, and Windows' responsiveness on security is better than Linux. And Microsoft provided uncapped [intellectual property] indemnification of their products."

On Wednesday, Microsoft will ship Photo Story 3 for Windows, the latest version of its amazing digital photo slideshow utility. However, this version of Photo Story differs from previous versions in many ways, adding a wide range of new functionality. Best of all, it will be made available free to all users of Windows XP.

Originally scheduled to be integrated with Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005, Photo Story 3 builds on the successes of Plus! Photo Story and Plus! Photo Story 2, which were included in successive versions of Plus! Digital Media Edition, a digital media-oriented add-on pack for Windows XP that sold millions of copies over two years.