Microsoft gave a rare public demonstration of its eagerly awaited, security-enhanced Windows XP Service Pack 2 at the XChange Solution Provider conference in Nashville, Tenn.
In an XChange world premiere event before several hundred solution providers, Microsoft Technology Specialist Bill Tomlinson touted the security features of the Windows XP Service Pack 2, which features an array of robust new security capabilities and an improved firewall.
Amid mounting pressure from competition regulators, Microsoft will scrap a clause in its licensing contracts with PC manufacturers that prevents them from enforcing any hardware patents they have that may have implications for software.
The so-called non-assert clause will be removed from all licensing agreement renewals for the Windows operating system from August of this year, Microsoft spokesman Tom Brookes said Monday.
"We recently reviewed this provision again after receiving comments on it from some of our OEM (original equipment manufacturer) customers and have decided to delete the provision in its entirety from the next round of OEM contracts," Brookes said.
Microsoft has given U.S. antitrust authorities a sworn statement that could help the government block Oracle's bid to buy PeopleSoft, attorneys familiar with the case said. Microsoft's statement to the Justice Department undercuts one of Oracle's central arguments in defense of the $9.4 billion deal -- that the two companies will soon face competition from Microsoft for a crucial part of their business.
In the statement given to investigators, a representative of Microsoft says the company has no plans during the next two years to move into the market at issue -- software sold to large business customers to manage things like finances, human resources and sales forces, the sources said.
Microsoft is expected to formally debut and demonstrate the beta version of Software Update Services 2.0 at the Microsoft Management Summit 2004 next week, sources said. The beta is expected to be announced at the company's annual management software show in Las Vegas next week but the actual release of the code into the hands of select testers may slip until April, sources said.
The long awaited patch management server code for Windows Server 2003, expected to ship in mid-2004, has been significantly enhanced and will include support for the first time for Office, SQL Server and Exchange patches, as well as new hooks for ISVs, sources said.
InternetNews
Chalk up another technology innovation for the folks in Redmond: Microsoft has patented a scroll mouse. The software giant was awarded U.S. patent 6,700,564 on March 2 for an "Input device including a wheel assembly for scrolling an image in multiple directions." The new twist in the invention appears to be the addition of horizontal scrolling alongside the traditional vertical scrolling capabilities that are common in scrolling devices.
"Certainly as a practical matter, given how fast Microsoft and the market for technology move, it's very hard for the law and regulatory bodies to keep up," said Mike McGuire, an analyst with Gartner G2, a division of the Gartner research firm.
PC technologies are rapidly converging with traditional consumer electronics devices, promising to wipe out boundaries between computers, televisions, radios and even the telephone. The winners in this transformation have yet to be determined, and competitors are lining up to duke it out. For example, Microsoft faces a suddenly reinvigorated rival in digital music: Apple Computer, whose iTunes Music Store accounted for about 75 percent of all legal digital song downloads in its first year of operation.
SeattlePI
A security program to debut later this year for Microsoft Windows-based computers won't come under the name McAfee, Norton, or any other brand often linked with firewalls and virus protection.
It will come from Microsoft itself.
Dubbed the Windows Security Center, it will monitor the status of a computer's defenses against viruses and other attacks. Although it won't actually scan for viruses, it's the latest example of the way Microsoft is edging into the field of security software by adding new capabilities to the Windows operating system.
Microsoft has agreed to pay AT&T an undisclosed sum as part of an agreement to settle most of the claims in a patent infringement dispute between the companies, AT&T announced late Friday.
The dispute goes back to May 2001, when AT&T sued Microsoft for infringing on a patent related to a compression technology used to reduce the size of digital speech files. AT&T employees were granted the patent in 1984, according to a copy of AT&T's complaint.
Microsoft's bCentral Web site for small businesses more than doubled its audience last week to become the fastest growing site used by U.S. office workers, Internet audience measurement service Nielsen//NetRatings said Friday. Traffic to bCentral rose 110 percent to 1.2 million different visitors in the week ending Feb. 29, NetRatings said. The site's most-viewed page was an article on the "Best and Worst States for Taxes," which drew 40 percent of bCentral's audience, it said.
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has invalidated a claim to Web browser technology central to a case against Microsoft, a move that could spare the software giant from paying more than half a billion dollars in damages, according to documents obtained on Friday.
The patent agency's preliminary decision, if upheld, also means that Microsoft will not be required to make changes to its Internet Explorer Web browser that would have crippled the program's ability to work with mini-programs that work over the Internet, such as the Quicktime and Flash media players