The World - As I see it.

E3: Microsoft reveals Kinect Fun Labs

2011-06-06T12:02:00.001-04:00

via winrumors.com

Cost of Google - SEO article - Allan Pollett SEO

2011-02-24T00:04:00.001-05:00

SEO Blog / Web Marketing Articles:
How much does Google cost? Is it really free?
Have you ever wondered how much it costs us to have Google? Confused by the question…you probably thought Google was free. This is a misconception. The truth is Google is not free because like every other search engine it crawls the web and indexes what it finds. Google is by far the largest and now with its release of the Caffeine update the fastest crawler. It has about 25 billion pages in its index and it crawls pages as frequently as daily to once every 2 weeks. So you are probably still wondering…where is the cost? Well when Google crawls a site it uses that site’s bandwidth. Web site hosting companies charge $2 to $5 for 1 gigabyte of file transfer or bandwidth. So if Google is using bandwidth then someone is paying for it.
Now let’s do some math…hmm…takes me back to my school days…
25 billion pages x 130k (average page size) x 5 (average times pages get indexed over a month) = (calculator time) = 16 million gigabytes per month
Cost = 16 million x $3.5 (average hosting cost for bandwidth) = $56 million per month or $672 million per year. This is just an approximate number and doesn’t include video indexing which would bring the number up a lot more.

So Google isn’t so free after all. However, on the bright side majority of sites rely on Google for their visitors so it is basically a cost associated with doing business on the web.

*Note a recent study by Charzinsk in 2010 states that the average web page size is 507k.
So based on that, the amount of bandwidth Google uses would be about $218.4 million per month or 2.6 billion dollars per year.

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I'll be working on a video version of this article which I hope to post soon. Any questions about the web marketing, please feel free to contact me at
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via allanpollett.com

Microsoft Hides Your Email Address via Hotmail Aliases | News & Opinion

2011-02-04T12:00:00.001-05:00

February 3, 2011 07.43pm EST

Microsoft Hides Your Email Address via Hotmail Aliases

By Mark Hachman

0 Comments

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Microsoft said Thursday that it has enabled aliases on Hotmail accounts, allowing people to create temporary email addresses.

Users who create an alias can route emails to that alias to a separate folder, which can then be managed separately. For example, email sent to "markthereporter@hotmail.com" will be sent to a private folder that will be accessible from my main Hotmail account.

Beginning today, users can add up to five email aliases per year to each account, up to a maximum of fifteen.

So far, the alias feature is exclusive to Microsoft; Google hasn't added it to its Gmail mail system.

Microsoft positioned the alias feature as the email equivalent of a one-time credit card number that can be used on a dodgy shopping site. "Let's say you're in the market for a new car," Dharmesh Mehta wrote in a blog post. "There are a bunch of websites that will email you price quotes, sales alerts, etc. During your car search, these messages are helpful, but once you're done, they become clutter that can be difficult to stop. By using an alias on these websites instead of your main email address, you can avoid this. And when you're done, just turn the alias off, ensuring future unwanted messages that are sent to that alias don't land in your inbox."

Gmail does allow users to add a " " to their email addresses to create a sort of alias; addressing emails to "johnqpublic101 home@gmail.com" will route the email to the johnqpublic101 inbox, add indicative stars to them, or route them to the trash. But Mehta also argued that such methods are detectable, including by humans.

Hotmail also allows a user to access email stored in a non-Microsoft account, pulling the information via POP, rather than IMAP.

In December, Hotmail added sandboxing to its email accounts, which can protect the system from malicious scripts. The "Active Views" technology isolates JavaScript. Microsoft also added additional security verification technology, using cell phones and a trusted PC. All are followons to a revamped Hotmail client that Microsoft began rolling out last summer.

via pcmag.com

Researchers turn USB cable into attack tool | InSecurity Complex - CNET News

2011-01-20T21:44:00.001-05:00

George Mason researchers demonstrate how to take control of a laptop via a USB-connected smartphone at the Black Hat DC conference.
(Credit: Angelos Stavrou)

Two researchers have figured out a way to attack laptops and smartphones through an innocent-looking USB cable.

Angelos Stavrou, an assistant professor of computer science at George Mason University, and student Zhaohui Wang wrote software that changes the functionality of the USB driver so that they could launch a surreptitious attack while someone is charging a smartphone or syncing data between a smartphone and a computer.

Basically, the exploit works by adding keyboard or mouse functionality to the connection so an attacker can then start typing commands or click the mouse in order to steal files, download additional malware, or do other things to take control of the computer, Stavrou told CNET in an interview. The exploit is enabled because the USB protocol can be used to connect any device to a computing platform without authentication, he said.

He and his partner were scheduled to demonstrate an attack at the Black Hat DC conference today.

The exploit software they wrote identifies what operating sysetm is running on the device the USB cable is connected to. On Macintosh and Windows machines, a message pops up saying the system has detected a new human interface device, but there is no easily recognizable way to halt the process, Stavrou said. The Mac pop-up can be quickly removed by an attacker with a command sent via the smartphone so the laptop owner may not even see it, while the Windows pop-up lasts only one or two seconds in the lower left corner, making that an ineffective warning too, he said.

Linux machines offer no warning, so users will have no idea that something out of the ordinary is happening, particularly since the regular keyboard and mouse continue to function normally during an attack, Stavrou said.

"The operating system should present a pop-up and ask if the user really wants to connect the device" and specify what type of device is being identified to the system, he said.

The researchers wrote the exploit for Android devices only at this point. "It can be done for iPhone, but we didn't do it yet," Stavrou said. "It can work on any computing device that uses USB," and it can work between two smartphones by connecting a USB cable between then, he said.

"Say your computer at home is compromised and you compromise your Android phone by connecting them," he said. "Then, whenever you connect the smartphone to another laptop or computing device I can take over that computer also, and then compromise other computers off that Android. It's a viral type of compromise using the USB cable."

The original compromise can happen by downloading the exploit from the Web or running an app that is compromised. The researchers have created exploit software to run on a computer, and an exploit to run on Android that is a modification of the Android operating system kernel. Scripts can then be written for the actual attack.

Antivirus software wouldn't necessarily stop this because it can't tell that the activities of the exploit are not controlled or sanctioned by the user, Stavrou said. "It's hard to separate good behavior from bad behavior when it comes from the keyboard," he said.

There's not much a person can do to protect against this at this time, according to Stavrou. The operating systems should have the capability for devices to inspect USB traffic and alert users about what exactly is happening over the connection and give them the option of refusing an action, he said.

via news.cnet.com

zenm's posterous

2011-01-06T22:06:00.001-05:00

via zenm.posterous.com

Hi Everyone, this is my friends son. Please read his story and help out if you can!
Thank you!

The Joy of a Salesman

2011-01-06T20:58:00.001-05:00

Ahh, this video never ceases to amuse me... just a classic. If you're in sales, you must see this!!!

DEMO!!!

2011-01-04T21:31:00.001-05:00

Hey!!! Just showing my friend how to use Posterous!!!

Microsoft

2010-12-20T19:06:00.001-05:00

Some products to think about this holiday season. I like the Dell - that thing looks amazing!!!

How to use the FM radio on the HTC Surround - HTC Surround User Guides - Know Your Cell

2010-11-23T21:18:00.001-05:00

How to use the FM radio on the HTC Surround

We show you how to use the FM radio on the HTC Surround

Published on Oct 25, 2010

The HTC Surround features a slide-out speaker with Dolby Mobile for punchy sound.

We show you how to use the FM radio on the HTC Surround and make the most out of that speaker.

Note: You'll have to plug in the wired earphones before you can use the radio on the HTC Surround, because this holds the FM antenna.

How to find radio stations on the HTC Surround

Once you've plugged the headset in, select Music + Video from the Start screen.

Flick to Zune and select Radio.

Choose a radio station you want to listen to by swiping left and right to go up and down, or flick to jump to the stations with a stronger signal.

Press favorites to show your favorite radio stations.

Press play or pause to stop or resume playback.

How to add a favorite radio station

When you've navigated to a favorite radio station, select the star icon to add it to your favorites.

To remove a favorite radio station, tap the star icon again.

How to switch radio playback to speaker mode

While playing a radio station, press and hold the station number.

You'll now be able to choose between headset or speaker mode.

Switch back by again pressing and holding the radio station number and switch back.

via knowyourcell.com

Was trying to figure this out - and found this really cool link. Even shows you how to use the built-in speaker for playback instead of the headphones (since they are required to be plugged in).

Technolog - The first Windows Phone 7 apps you should grab

2010-11-08T22:27:00.001-05:00

The most popular Windows Phone 7 downloads of the moment, including both apps and games.

By Wilson Rothman

Today is when the first Windows Phone 7 models go on sale — the Samsung Focus at AT&T and the HTC HD7 at T-Mobile. As we've discussed, they're powerhouse phones with gorgeous screens and Microsoft's surprisingly nice "glance and go" operating system designed in the age of Facebook. But what matters once you get the phone is what apps to download. There are currently about 1,600 apps in the Marketplace, most of them free or dirt cheap.

There's already a lot of cr'apps in there, the standard lineup of flashlights, tip calcs, stopwatches, unit converters, and of course fart emulators. And because you can read what system resources each app needs to access, you can spot some shady ones too. A "simple and fun finger drawing tool" that needs access to "owner identity" and "phone calls"? I'm sure there's a plausible explanation, but I am gonna pass!

There are also a lot of things still missing. There's no Pandora. There's no Kindle, Nook or Kobo e-book readers. (Update: Amazon stated about a week ago that it would be first to WP7, available "later this year.") There's just one instant messaging app, and it's for Windows Live Messenger. The cooking and wine categories are barren — no Epicurious or BigOven, and no wine reference databases. Kid entertainment — that is, edutainment — is totally missing. And I don't see Bank of America or any other leading American banks with apps, nor do I see Mint.com. (USAA and Geico have apps though.)

There are a ton of games, and we've reviewed many here: Windows Phone 7 games: The good, the bad and the weird

What I did was sift through most of the non-game apps, and put together a list of the ones you definitely need, plus a few premium ones that you may want to buy. (Msnbc.com is a joint venture of Microsoft and NBC Universal, but that has nothing to do with our surprise enjoyment of Windows Phone 7.)

Yelp - The most popular crowd-sourced restaurant review network is necessary, even if many of its reviewers are just a little too high-strung for this Earth.

Foursquare - Check-in and become mayor, at least until Facebook puts it out of business with its Places (which is not yet available on Windows Phone 7).

Facebook - Microsoft built a client for FB, even though the service is integrated through much of the Windows Phone 7 OS. It's nice but not as full-featured as the iPhone and Android versions. That is, again, no Places or Deals.

Twitter - The homespun app makes up a little for the fact that Twitter isn't part of the People section of Windows Phone 7. But I'd still like to see that.

YouTube - Unlike Android and iPhone, the YouTube app doesn't come pre-installed. But other than that, there's really no difference — you'll still get your Auto-tune the News.

Shazam - The bot that wins "name that tune" more than you or I ever could is here, with a smooth, simple interface.

Breaking News - It's the fastest source of up-to-the-minute news on the Web. And I'm not just saying that because it's part of msnbc.com.

Slacker Radio - Some prefer this streaming music service over Pandora, and anyone who's buying the T-Mobile HTC HD7 gets it pre-loaded on their phones. Well worth trying.

iheartradio - A social network with 750+ U.S. radio stations, it's one of the best ways to access radio streams online, with decent customization tools.

Where - The same free point-of-interest search app that appeared on the iPhone in the early days is ready on Windows Phone 7 at launch. It's a good supplement to Bing Maps.

Public Transit - A basic app that searches Google's public transportation data, it's not much more than a customized search, but since the gorgeous Bing Maps app doesn't give bus or train info (yet?), it's useful.

Realtor.com - The realty mafia's home base, it's a good resource for house hunters, and it's geographically linked. Now if there was only a Zillow app to pair with it.

Graphic.ly - There may not be a Kindle or Nook app yet, but there's a very nice hub for those more interested in graphic novels than text-heavy prose. Membership is required, and the books cost money, but the app itself is free.

ICanHasCheezburger - This is the "official" app of kittens being ridden by baby chickens ("I is not a horsy"), and it's mercifully free.

gReadie - It's one thing to access Google Reader on a phone, and it's another thing to enjoy it. Here's an attractive way to get at your RSS feeds.

Seesmic - For someone more in need of managing their social networking feeds, this app lets you gaze into both Twitter and Facebook (though irksomely not at the same time).

TED - Get smarter by listening to smart people talk, or just look smarter by keeping the icon prominent on your phone's home screen. Either way, this free collection of TED talks will help you.

Pictures Lab - $1.99 - In these early days, there aren't many really good photo editors to choose from, but this one has enough filters, tools and multi-touch controls to keep most people happy. (See comment below for special pricing.)

History Here - $2.99 - Who needs crusty old park rangers when there are smart phone apps? This one lets you scout out nearby historical landmarks. And it comes from the A&E TV people, so you know it'll be entertaining and informative.

GoVoice - $2.99 - A third-party client for Google Voice, this one looks great with its Windows Phone 7 motif but all of the necessary functionality, from calling to visual voicemail.

Zagat To Go - $9.99 - Yes, it's $10. Which in app terms might as well be a million smackeroos. But really, if you live in a dense enough area and like Zagat, it's still cheaper than buying their books, and it's always on your person. Think of it as an antidote when the Yelpers get too crazy.

WinFart Pro - $0.99 - "The only no-nonsense fart application featuring over 20 high-quality fart sounds." I mean, if you're gonna download a fart app, might as well get the "pro" one, right? This one even has a motion trigger, for startling friends when they touch your phone. Good news is, you can try it first: The demo is fully functional, just "limited to two fart types."

Since app catalogs are constantly growing, some of the stuff that I said isn't there may turn up — if you spot Pandora or Kindle or anything like that, please let it be known in comments, and/or send me a tweet at @wjrothman.

Related must-see stories:

• Windows Phone 7 games: The good, the bad and the weird

• Windows Phone 7 video walkthrough and mini review

via technolog.msnbc.msn.com

#

2010-11-08T22:24:00.001-05:00

via technolog.msnbc.msn.com

a simple review of the new Windows Phone 7 powered Samsung...

10 Tools To Speed Windows 7

2010-08-25T09:26:00.001-04:00

Time To Get Serious

Data suggests that, finally, enterprises are doing serious work to plan for migration to Windows 7 platforms after 10 years of using mostly Windows XP machines. Key benefits to Windows 7 include better performance and better security compared to XP, but there are always ways to boost the performance, functionality and security even further.

Microsoft provides many of the following tools itself, including some thrown in for free with Windows 7 versions. Others are available for download. There are some good, straightforward pieces of hardware that can also complete the puzzle of a well-honed Windows 7 desktop or laptop -- including new disk drive technology. We've taken a look at all of these in the CRN Test Center lab, and find these tools and products offer simple, straightforward avenues to either boost performance, security or functionality of your Windows 7 PCs.

Next Slide >

via crn.com

An interesting read to get some more juice out of your Win 7 Install...

#!

2010-08-11T15:28:00.001-04:00

New Capabilities Help Microsoft's Bing Maps Gain Respectability

2010-08-11T10:43:00.001-04:00

Related: White Papers |-->Videos | Slide Shows | ChannelCasts | Comments
Microsoft (NSDQ:MSFT) continues to improve the capabilities of its Bing Maps, a part of the Bing search engine site that’s been attracting more attention lately – even applause – in its competition with Google (NSDQ:GOOG).
Microsoft has been rolling out a number of new features for Bing Maps this week, most notably the ability to help users calculate cab fares between two addresses.

Some of the new features, including the taxi fare calculator, were submitted by users as part of Microsoft’s “King of Bing Maps” competition. The winner of that competition will be announced Aug. 20 and will win a $1,000 travel gift card.

The contest appears to be helping Bing gain some ground in respectability against Google. Google does not offer a taxi fare calculator, for example.

Other entrants in the contest can be seen at the Bing community blog. Another entrant overlays a map that displays sales taxes around the country, for example, while another simply generates a random set of map coordinates and takes the user there on Bing Maps – the modern-day equivalent of throwing a dart at a map on the wall.

Outside of the contest, Microsoft this week said that Bing Maps is now tied into the OpenStreetMap (OSM) community, the online map with free geographic data that’s edited by volunteers Wikipedia-style. OSM community members contribute data to the OSM central database – everything from street names to GPS readings – to create maps.

In a posted blog, Chris Pendleton, Microsoft’s “Bing Maps evangelist,” said Microsoft Bing has linked the OSM database to its Windows Azure Content Delivery Network. Through a new application in the Bing Map App gallery, Bing users can load OSM maps as a new map style option.

While Google remains far and away the online search engine leader, it’s share of the overall search market has been slipping in recent months, according to recent numbers compiled by digital marketing intelligence firm comScore. Competitors, meanwhile, have gained some ground, including Bing, which improved its market share to 12.7 percent in June.

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Microsoft Partners Dance On Google Wave's Grave

2010-08-11T10:06:00.001-04:00

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Google (NSDQ:GOOG)'s decision to kill off Google Wave is being hailed by Microsoft partners as proof that the communication and collaboration market is tougher to break into than it may seem.
Google Wave, a melange of e-mail, instant messaging and social networking, was seen as a dipping of toes into a space dominated by products like Microsoft Exchange and Sharepoint and IBM Lotus Notes. After launching it last May, Google this week halted development of Google Wave as a standalone product, due to weak adoption.

Microsoft (NSDQ:MSFT) partners believe the collaboration parallels between Google Wave and Sharepoint were overblown, but they're nonetheless feeling a frisson of schadenfreude at the demise of the product.

"Google Wave was an interesting lesson," said Ken Winell, CEO of ExpertCollab, a Microsoft solution provider in Florham Park, N.J. "I think Google had hoped that a basic platform like Google Wave would attract people at the consumer level, but they basically built a shared inbox."

Ric Opal, vice president of Peters & Associates, an Oakbrook Terrace, Ill.-based solution provider, says some of his customers are looking at Google Docs and Gmail but none has asked about Google Wave. He cites the ubiquity of Sharepoint as the big reason why. "It would have been hard for Wave to penetrate the collaboration space given the strength of SharePoint," he said.

Winell agrees: "Sharepoint offers much more than Google Wave, including workflow, security and audience management and Web parts to customize."

Google often highlights the cost advantages companies can reap by switching from Microsoft Office to Google Apps. Had Google Wave caught on, we probably would have been hearing similar claims about Sharepoint.

But Office and Sharepoint are very different animals, and Microsoft has the advantage of a user base that's accustomed to the features and functionality it offers. Companies often discover that the time involved in learning a new platform outweighs the cost advantages Google offers, notes Kevin Baylor, managing partner at Suncoast Business Technologies, a solution provider in Bradenton, Fla.

"We know companies that have moved their corporate collaboration and communication to Google and are enjoying the cost savings, but many still miss the Microsoft feature set. It's not always about the bottom line," Baylor said.

Google says it's making inroads in the enterprise, but Microsoft often points out its rival's lack of experience in this market. The demise of Google Wave is, in the opinion of some Microsoft partners, a telling example of Google underestimating the rigorous nature of the challenges companies face in the enterprise.

"Enterprise software means 36 language versions and thousands of people involved in the marketing, sales, and support of these application ecosystems," said Tim Huckaby, CEO at InterKnowlogy, a Microsoft Gold partner in Carlsbad, Calif.

"Right or wrong, throwing a product up on a Website in English only, and assuming that the viral effect will grow the business just isn’t going to cut it when you're going up against the Microsofts of the world," Huckaby added.

Andrew Brust, chief of new technology for twentysix New York, a Microsoft partner in New York City, describe Google's product success ratio as "incredibly low" given how much praise and how little scrutiny the company often gets.

"I don't blame Google for taking risks and losing. In fact, I would praise them for it. But their failures need to be covered fairly so that they can be compared accurately with other tech companies' successes," said Brust.

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1 message - Last message on Aug 9, 2010 at 5:01:39 PM by MIRMatt

MIRMatt

Aug 9, 2010 5:01 PM
in response to: Fourthrail
Re: Microsoft Partners Dance On Google Wave's Grave

When first announced in May, 2009 at the Google I/O conference in San Francisco, many technology analysts saw Wave as a potential competitor to SharePoint and its web-based sibling, SharePoint Online. But unlike SharePoint (which is the fastest selling product in Microsoft�s history), Wave has had a hard time gaining acceptance from both personal users and the business community.

It will be interesting to see what impact the loss of this offering has on Google's ability to drive their other business productivity tools into the corporate market.

Further insight: www.contentmanagement.typepad.com

Reply

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Can't win 'em all I guess...

New Microsoft Web Site Seeks Support For Windows Phone 7 Mobile Apps - Software - IT Channel News by CRN

2010-08-10T14:12:00.001-04:00

-->
-->--> --> -->Microsoft (NSDQ:MSFT) has launched an online showroom called Mobile App Match in an effort to spur development of third-party applications for the upcoming Windows Phone 7 mobile operating system.
The site also offers a discussion venue where mobile phone users can suggest ideas for Windows Phone 7 applications and provide feedback on application prototypes.

The site is separate from the online marketplace where Microsoft sells applications for its mobile operating system.

Microsoft debuted the public beta of Windows Phone 7 at the company’s Worldwide Partner Conference last month and plans to make the mobile software generally available in about two months. The company’s stated goal is to have smartphones running the operating system hit the market in time for the holiday shopping season. And having lots of third-party applications when the new product ships will go a long way toward giving it a competitive boost in the market.

But Microsoft has a long way to go to catch up with rivals Apple and Google. Apple’s App Store has more than 225,000 applications for its popular iPhone while Google’s Android mobile operating system, which runs on smartphones from Motorola, HTC and other manufacturers, is estimated to have some 65,000 third-party applications.

The new Microsoft Mobile App Match site allows developers to post their Windows Phone 7 application prototypes or videos demonstrating how they would work. Users can comment and vote on the applications, post their own application ideas, and start conversations on Windows Phone 7 topics.

The site also provides Windows Phone news and blog posts, links to developer tools, development tips and Windows Phone 7 commercials.

Microsoft, which has struggled to gain a significant foothold in the mobile computing market, is pulling out all the stops to make Windows Phone 7 a winner. At the partner conference Microsoft chief operating officer Kevin Turner said mobile computing was one of the few key technology areas where Microsoft is not a market-share leader – a situation he vowed to change.

And Microsoft has been beating the drums to get ISVs to develop applications for Windows Phone 7. At Microsoft’s MIX10 developers’ conference in Las Vegas in March the company gave developers an in-depth look at the tools they’ll be using to build Windows Phone 7 applications.

via crn.com

Death of Windows XP SP2 Support a Security Risk - CIO.com - Business Technology Leadership

2010-06-23T23:55:00.001-04:00

CIO — If your business is still running Service Pack 2 of Windows XP, security problems are lurking around the corner, according to new research from IT services vendor Softchoice stating that almost 80 percent of organizations surveyed risk a security breach if the do not upgrade to SP3.

Why should SP2 users fear the reaper? Because Microsoft is ending support for SP2 on July 13, a date that was established when Windows XP SP3 was released on April 21, 2008. Paid support and security updates for SP2 will no longer be available, although Microsoft has stated that Windows XP SP2 users will still be allowed to access Microsoft online Knowledge Base articles, FAQs and troubleshooting tools.

All free technical support, warranty claims and design changes for Windows XP ended in April 2009 when the OS moved from Mainstream Support to the Extended Support phase. Extended Support includes paid support (charged on an hourly basis or per incident), security update support at no additional cost, and paid hotfix support.

Similar to this Article

Windows 7 Tips: Best Security Features

Windows XP SP3: The Perfect Reason to Avoid Upgrading to Windows Vista

Pros and Cons of Windows 7 Security

Companies who choose not to update their SP2 systems to SP3 could, "create unnecessary security risks as hackers continue to look for vulnerabilities knowing that software updates will no longer be forthcoming from Microsoft," according to a release about the research report.

Windows XP SP2 users can download the SP3 software package from Microsoft's support site if they want to continue receiving security updates. Microsoft will also terminate support for Windows Vista RTM and Windows Server 2000 on July 13.

The Softchoice report is based on an analysis of 278,498 corporate and public sector PCs across 117 organizations from industries such as financial, healthcare, manufacturing and education.

Softchoice's data shows that 46 percent of these PCs are still running Microsoft Windows XP SP2. In addition, it is estimated that 77 percent of these organizations have enough SP2 in their environments to warrant immediate updates.

What happens for companies that don't update? Well, an unsupported service pack means no security updates, hotfixes or assisted support from Microsoft customer service. Essentially, you will no longer receive software updates from Windows Update to protect PCs from viruses, spyware and other malware, or that improve Windows reliability, including new drives for hardware.

Slideshow: Windows 7 Hardware in Pictures: The Latest and Greatest Laptops
Slideshow: In Pictures: Pro Sports Teeming with Tech Partnerships
Slideshow: Fighting the Dark Side: Tech's Heroes and Villains

While Windows XP SP2, released in 2004, was a major overhaul and therefore was delayed by many businesses, SP3 is more of an incremental upgrade, says Dean Williams, Services Development Manager for Softchoice.

Continue Reading

via cio.com

How to Enable Windows 7 GodMode

2010-06-22T11:07:00.001-04:00

Here’s a neat Windows 7 trick that’s been doing the rounds on the Internet. It enables “GodMode,” a term devised by the Microsoft development team, which provides a single place to access all Windows settings without needing to browse options and folders in the Control Panel.

To use it:

Create a new folder.

Rename the folder to
GodMode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}

(note that you can change the “GodMode” text, but the following period and code number are essential).

The folder icon will change — double click it to show the GodMode window:

The window shows nearly 50 sections with quick links to configuration options. Strictly speaking, it’s not a God Mode since all the options are available elsewhere. It’s more akin to an “all tasks” list — but you may find it easier than stumbling through Windows numerous screens and panels.

Big Red Warning!

The trick appears to work on both the 32 and 64-bit versions of Windows 7. Vista 32-bit and Windows Server 2008 32-bit should also work. However, it is known to crash 64-bit versions of Vista — and you may need to boot in safe mode or to the command line to delete the folder.

New Year, New Windows

Since it’s the new year, you may be considering an upgrade to Windows 7. I’ve been watching the prices closely since Microsoft’s Windows “E” fiasco and they should have risen on January 1, 2010. However, that does not appear to have occurred just yet … perhaps it won’t be long? movie downloads

US Amazon.com:

Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade — $110

Windows 7 Home Premium (full version) — $180

Windows 7 Professional Upgrade — $175

Windows 7 Professional (full version) — $255 (down $5)

Windows 7 Ultimate Upgrade — $200

Windows 7 Ultimate (full version) — $292

UK Amazon.co.uk:

Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade — £65

Windows 7 Home Premium (full version) — £90 (down £20)

Windows 7 Professional Upgrade — £133 (down £6)

Windows 7 Professional (full version) — £160 (up £10)

Windows 7 Ultimate Upgrade — £150

Windows 7 Ultimate (full version) — £170 (up £4)

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Posted on January 5, 2010 in News & Trends. The views and opinions in this blog post are those of its author.

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Simplifying your control panel! Found this to be quite useful. Nothing new from a functionality standpoint, just ease of access to the features.

Seven Features in Windows 7 You Probably Don't Know About - CIO.com - Business Technology Leadership

2010-06-16T19:40:00.001-04:00

Seven Features in Windows 7 You Probably Don't Know About

From streaming Netflix movies in Windows Media Center to eye candy desktop Themes to a calculator that does a lot more than arithmetic, here's a slideshow of cool but unappreciated Windows 7 features.

By Shane O'Neill

By this point if you're using Windows 7 you've Aero Snapped, Peeked and Shaken, you've jumped to Jump Lists and taskbar thumbnails, and shared photos and music using HomeGroup. But there's a plethora of hidden gems in Windows 7 that don't get nearly enough attention.

Here's our photo collection of seven underrated Windows 7 features and instructions on how to use them.

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Sticky Notes

If yellow notes stuck to desks and computer monitors rule your life, it's time to go digital with Sticky Notes in Windows 7. The Sticky Notes app can be found by clicking the start button in Windows 7, typing in "sticky" and pressing enter. A new note appears on the desktop. Let the digital "to do" lists begin. With Sticky Notes in Windows 7, you can format a note's text, change colors, collapse, resize and flip through notes. Sticky Notes is available in Windows 7 Home Premium, Professional and Ultimate.

[ For complete coverage on Microsoft's new Windows 7 operating system -- including hands-on reviews, video tutorials and advice on enterprise rollouts-- see CIO.com's Windows 7 Bible. ]

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Some interesting findings...

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2010-05-11T18:38:00.001-04:00

Microsoft: Datacenter Growth Defies Moore's Law - PCWorld

2010-04-12T10:23:00.001-04:00

Fast, cheap and all over the place. That's how technology experts behind Microsoft's fast-growing Live offerings envision the future of the enterprise data center in a Web 2.0 driven world.

Faced with a shortage of datacenter space and demand for datacenter space that is more than doubling every 24 months, Microsoft is eyeing alternatives to traditional datacenter design, including the use of mobile shipping-containers spread all over the globe to facilitate growth and deal with user demand, according to James Hamilton, architect of Microsoft's Windows Live, during a presentation Tuesday on datacenter design at the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco.

Just as Web 2.0 app developers pursue innovative means for achieving explosive growth, those in charge of the Web 2.0 server room are looking for cutting-edge methods for processing and facilitating that growth, Hamilton said.

"The glut of 2000 datacenter space is over," he said, referring to the fallout of the dotcom market collapse, which left a glut of excess datacenter and bandwidth capacity. "We are out of space industry-wide. We have taken all the most desirable space and everyone is in a mass buildup."

Google alone has 450,000 systems running across 20 datacenters, and Microsoft's Windows Live team is doubling the number of servers it uses every 14 months, which is faster than Moore's Law , Hamilton said, referring to the famous observation by Gordon Moore that the number of transistors on an integrated circuit doubles every 24 months.

Companies like Microsoft and Google have been expanding their datacenter facilities at a breathtaking pace in recent years. Most recently, Google said it would build a $600 million datacenter near Charleston, South Carolina , where tax breaks and ample electricity were available. Microsoft has announced similar plans for rural Washington State .

Microsoft, IBM, HP, Sun and others have also formed a consortium called the Green Grid to tackle an impending energy crisis that threatens data center growth.

Hamilton discussed a datacenter design strategy that used the storage container as a core building block and stressed the importance of a paradigm shift in server farm architecture in light of the data deluge brought on by the expansive growth of Web 2.0.

To meet the growing need for datacenter space, Hamilton advocates what he called a services rather than an enterprise model for the Web 2.0 datacenter: housing operations in dispersed, tightly packed storage-container datacenters, not unlike Sun Microsystems Project Blackbox.

The air-tight containers would be constructed to achieve close proximity between server boxes and CRACs (computer room air-conditioning units), with variable fans controlling airflow. The power-efficiency benefits of this construction would be further enhanced by the near total elimination of ingress and egress for human access, thereby eliminating the space-waste issues faced by traditional datacenters, Hamilton said.

The containers -- the datacenter equivalents of flash drives -- would be dispersed strategically about the globe in an effort to move capacity to the edge, closer to customers, thereby diminishing dependency on and costs associated with CDNs (content distribution networks, he said.

"We're not close enough to customers, so we have to work with content distribution networks as well," Hamilton said.

Web 2.0 enterprises also need to adopt a radically different approach to hardware maintenance in a world of small, cheap, mobile datacenters, he said.

Noting that 40 percent of the cost of datacenter operations goes toward staff, Hamilton said that companies need to eliminate headcount in datacenters as much as possible, by switching to a "detect/reboot/replace" approach to server failure, rather than costly maintenance and servicing of malfunctioning hardware. Such an approach could improve servers-per-administrator ratios from 100-to-1 to upwards of 1,000-to-1, Hamilton said.

"Spending 20 percent of your datacenter budget on service? Well, then, don't service it," Hamilton added. "It seems ironic to build systems that run well on unreliable components and then house those unreliable components in a super-reliable datacenter."

The payoffs of such an approach go beyond mere cost savings. Forgoing the solitary central facility in favor of a distributed-microcenter approach will also increase reliability and be more flexible in the face of large, oftentimes seasonal fluctuations of customer loads, or regional disputes like war or national disaster, he said.

Not that the distributed model doesn't come with risks and challenges. A shift to smaller, trailer based data centers has implications in the software programming model. Also, savings on datacenter administrators will likely be diverted to pay for more application developers.

Judging from the looks of the app-dev crowd that makes up the audience of Web 2.0 Expo, however, that would be just fine.

via pcworld.com

Wow, this is from 3 years ago - I wonder where they're at today...

Windows Phone 7 Interface: Microsoft Has Out-Appled Apple - Microsoft windows phone 7 - Gizmodo

2010-02-15T16:45:00.001-05:00

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Windows Phone 7 Interface: Microsoft Has Out-Appled Apple

I'm sorry, Cupertino, but Microsoft has nailed it. Windows Phone 7 feels like an iPhone from the future. The UI has the simplicity and elegance of Apple's industrial design, while the iPhone's UI still feels like a colorized Palm Pilot.

That doesn't mean that the Windows Phone 7's user experience would be better than Apple's. The two user interface concepts—data-centric vs function-centric—are very different, and the former is quite a radical departure from what people are used to.

With the iPhone, Apple put together an extremely simple modal interface that works, one that people of all ages and backgrounds understand right away: "This is a device that adopts different functions and gives me access to different kinds of information depending on the icon I click on."

It's pretty simple idea, which made it a raging success. In fact, that success is the reason why this model is Apple's bet not only for mobile phones, but for the future of computing. It is also the reason why the Androids, Palms, and Blackberries of this world are following them.

Clean slate

Microsoft's approach is completely different. Instead of becoming another me-too cellphone, like Android and the rest, the Windows Phone 7 team came up their own vision of what the cellphone should be. In the process, they have created a beautiful user interface in which the data is at the center of user interaction. Not the apps—specific functions—but the information itself. At some points, in fact, it feels like the information is the interface itself.

Out of the box, this information is organized into areas called hubs, which follow the user's areas of interest. Accessible through live tiles in the home screen, the Me (the user), people, pictures and video, music, and games—plus the omnipresent search—hubs give views into several data sources, connecting and presenting them into an interweaved panoramic stream. These hubs dig heavily into many databases, both locally and into the cloud.

Rather than accessing an app to get contact information and make a call to a person, open another app to get her Twitter updates, and then another app to get her Facebook updates, and another for her latest mails to you, and yet another one to watch her photos, the Windows Phone's people hub offers a seamless view into all of it, presented in a very simple and logical way. On a function-centric model like the iPhone, when the user thinks "I want to make a call", he puts the device in "calling mode" by clicking on an app, selects a contact, and calls. When the user thinks "What's up with John Smith?" he puts the device in Facebook or Twitter or Mail mode, and so on.

Microsoft has organized the hubs into panoramas, by stitching groups of information as columns of a single landscape screen—bigger than the phone's display—that can be scrolled with your finger. The solution—tied together with minimalist interface aesthetics and animations that are inviting, elegant, and never superfluous—works great.

What about other applications?

Instinctively, I like Microsoft's approach to organizing the core of our digital lives—people social multimedia communication all merged into the hubs. I like it better than the "it's a phone, it's a mail program, it's a browser, it's an iPod" Apple approach. It's less rigid than the iPhone or Android's model, offering a richer experience, inviting to explore, and offering data from many points of view in a quick, clearly organized way. It also seems more human, and that's certainly something Apple—or their followers—have to worry about.

Does that mean that function-centric models are worse? Like I said before, not necessarily. Especially because the information-centric panoramas don't fit every single task people expect their iPhones to perform now. And when I say every single task, I really mean the two gazillion apps populating the Apple store. Microsoft could dress the hub experience in any way they want, but if their devices don't offer a rich application market, they will fail the same way the current competition is failing against Apple.

Fortunately for Microsoft, the Windows Phone model is not only information-centric, but also function-centric. According to Joe Belfiore, gran jefe of the Microsoft's Windows Phone Program, applications are not required to plug into the hub metaphor or the panorama user interface. When the development toolkit comes out in a month, they would encouraging applications just like the ones you have in the iPhone today. In other words, Microsoft understands that one approach is as important as the other.

They are just hoping that their hubs would be a better, funner, more intuitive way to access and cultivate our digital lives, which is mainly what most consumers want to do nowadays. Looking at what they have shown today, I think they are definitely in the right track. But like the Zune HD, it just may be too late.

Send an email to Jesus Diaz, the author of this post, at jesus@gizmodo.com.

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Metkis 04:37 PM

I think the conclusion people had came to was: if Microsoft could bring a Zune HD-esque experience to a phone, it would be enjoyable and excellent. Why not? The Zune HD is actually one of Microsoft's greater hardware and software creations. As it comes across, it seems like they've done exactly that.
To be frank, a lot of the "gasping" going on is from astonishment that Microsoft has created a compelling product after beating what is now, really, a dead horse.

I wouldn't ride side-by-side with Diaz on this one, but I do agree it is a compelling product, and I'd be a liar if I said I wasn't excited about its announcement considering the quality of the Zune and 360 infrastructure and Microsoft's powerful developer and industry connections. Reply

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Die Fledermaus 04:29 PM

Okay my soap box my two cents worth. I have tried the Zune HD UI without any manuals, or help of any kind and I found it to be difficult to get around in. Now this phone has a similar design set to it so I am going to figure that it will follow similarly. Partially cut off text as menu headers while creative visually is not clear functionally. How is scrolling down page after page better then screen after screen on say the iPhone? To this same end if your data is bigger then the screen maybe that is okay but it would frustrate me that I have only this slice like a small window on a larger world. I want to see it all and then drill down to the details.
How is this UI much different then the other Android UI with there flippy bits and 3D shifting, which was so the WOW when they first came out? How is this phones pseudo running multi app capabilities any different then the iPhone? It certainly isn't the cards like the Palm which is much truer multi app functionality. The reviewer mention a more data centric model with live data being fed to the screen squares in real time, doesn't the android OS have this? One other issue I have watched the videos, where is the system tools/Prefs. They certainly not obvious which says something about the interface.
What I really want to see is this phone next to an equivalent android next to an equivalent iPhone and get a really good point for point of why this or that makes this or that phone the tech to own. Reply

Edited by Die Fledermaus at 02/15/10 4:32 PM

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Xenoman 04:28 PM

the is only one way to do a real test, to give both phones to a 3 year old and see wich is more easy to use ! Reply

Jesus Diaz promoted this comment

Jesus Diaz 04:35 PM

@Xenoman: Yeah, that's why I watch the fucking Teletubbies instead of Californication.
Thanks for pointing out to that benchmark. Reply

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aeast 04:21 PM

To be honest, Microsoft [to me] has never done anything very out of the box or innovative. It is their ability to sit back, watch the market, figure out what the consumer wants, and come in and knock all of the above out of the park that makes them so successful. Don't get me wrong, innovation is still in their playbook, but why take huge risks? Natal is a perfect example. Is it innovative? Yes. Is the concept of motion control new? No. They play off of and add to what succeeds, and in return, they succeed. Reply

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Poop Cooper 04:20 PM

"Rather than accessing an app to get contact information and make a call to a person, open another app to get her Twitter updates, and then another app to get her Facebook updates, and another for her latest mails to you, and yet another one to watch her photos..."
We aren't talking about WP7 anymore, are we Reply

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sonac36 04:17 PM

I feel that I am the only true skeptic of these devices. NO ONE IS GOING TO BUY THESE THINGS. People need windows on their computers, but not on their phones too. People don't want to use windows media player, or other music and video sources. If microsoft had introduced this a year or two ago, hell, they would own the smartphone market right now, but they are two late. If I were buying a smartphone right now I would get a droid, nexus one, or wait for iphone 4. Reply

jon.athan promoted this comment

jon.athan 04:22 PM

@sonac36: "People don't want to use windows media player, or other music and video sources."
Perfect, because this runs Zune software, which works very similarly to iPod, except cooler looking wireless syncing and a 15$ "all the must you want" subscription option.

You say people don't want it and never say why. It's fine to hate what you see, but this is a fun, cool, and fresh OS. People will want this the same way people want Android. People like different things, and people like good things. Reply

Mihos 04:25 PM

@sonac36: I am buying it. Reply

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DustyButt 04:16 PM

I just finished watching the video for the WP7 UI, and some here are saying that compared to the iPhone the UI looks bland. But, if I'm not mistaken, all of that is customizable by the user to be as "colorful" or as "basic" as they'd like. I think a peripheral target of this UI is user a customizable experience, and that to me is always exciting.
This is product is really really interesting. Reply

Edited by DustyButt at 02/15/10 4:18 PM

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szrimaging 04:14 PM

Well, if it is more stable than my iPhone, I'll take one in December. The only problem is the crap load of iPod/iPhone accessories I have. Mind you, I own other iPods, and plan on buying one more. Reply

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Sir Gibler 04:13 PM

So far, there's only one thing I don't like about the new interface. The alphabetical, single column view of apps not on the start screen. Reply

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jurrasix 04:10 PM

Or perhaps, like the xbox, they were late for a reason and stand to turn this OS into a great success story like the xbox/360/XBL.
The Zune HD was too late because it was an MP3 player. The market had moved on and all of the Zune's core functions were standard features on smartphones.

Let's also not forget the total of active XBL users out there...MS has a chance to make smartphones actual gaming platforms like their console counterparts. Much like the rest of the iPhone experience, every iPhone game is separate, stand alone, and only has the value of the game itself. XBL on a phone changes everything. Reply

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Edited by jurrasix at 02/15/10 4:11 PM

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PurpleMonkeyDishwasher: 04:10 PM

"Windows Phone 7 Interface: Microsoft Has Out-Appled Apple"
Jesus, are you sure you want to say this on Gizmodo. 90% of your readers will never forgive you. Reply

University of Pi 04:16 PM

@PurpleMonkeyDishwasher:: but the other 10% will praise you Reply

PurpleMonkeyDishwasher: promoted this comment

PurpleMonkeyDishwasher: 04:22 PM

@University of Pi: I agree, it's great. I mean, Apple really knows what they are doing, but they do get a lot of attention here. It's nice that Microsoft's hard work has been recognized this time. Reply

Ioncloud9 04:30 PM

@PurpleMonkeyDishwasher:: No he is safe. He said his 'it might be too late' qualifier at the end. Reply

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otko 04:09 PM

I'm not grasping the hub panorama scroll function. I'm sure I will once I see it in action. It sounds interesting. Reply

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Monty 04:08 PM

Microsoft's new mobile operating system really feels like what we expected the iPad to be. We were hoping the iPad would be a device that was not just a large iPod Touch / iPhone, but instead an extension of our digital lives. Microsoft, almost anticipating what they expected Apple would do next, created what we all hoped the good folks in Cupertino were about to release. Now we have a complete roll reversal where it is Microsoft that has innovated into a new level of human-computer interaction. This new operating system appears to be (yes, I am typing about something I have only read about) not only a brilliant design for phones, but a brilliant design for tablets, a brilliant design for a Netbook - heck, it could be the future of computing. Yes, that is an exaggeration of something so basic that Redmond has done, but it was something simple that Apple had done when it released the Macintosh, too - and look what has happened.
What is perhaps even more interesting than this amazing new product is how Microsoft has instantly made so many people change their mind that the Borg was "too late" in the phone game. In fact, they may be arriving at the perfect moment. How many people will now hold on to their old device just a bit longer until this "phone" is on the shelf at their carrier of choice? For all the bitching I, and others, have done over the years about Microsoft just stealing other people's work - they appear to have truly innovated far beyond the competition this time.

Way to go, Microsoft. Now don't screw it up, okay? Reply

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Snes 04:07 PM

Jesus supporting Microsoft, weather is fucked up, and a black man is president (nothing wrong with that, I helped vote him in). Yup the world is about to end. Reply

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PurpleMonkeyDishwasher: 04:11 PM

@Snes: You forgot, people watch Jersey Shore and Sarah Palin might run for president. Reply

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OCEntertainment 04:06 PM

Ahhhh. After all these arguments with fanboys, I finally figured out what it was that makes them go ga-ga for Apple design. It has nothing to do with how good something looks or how well it functions. It has everything to do with how completely batshit insane it is.
No offense Jesus, but you're saying Microsoft has out-Apple'd Apple because their interface is so completely different from what we're used to. And it doesn't appear to be in a good way. I reserve judgment until I've held the thing in my hand, but from all the pictures and videos I've seen so far, it is not readily apparent how certain functions work. And the ever-important App Store, you openly acknowledge needs to be affixed to this design after the fact.

It's a lot easier to integrate an information-centric design into an overall function-centric UI than the reverse. Taking Android 2.0 and the Palm Pre as examples. For most tasks, there are individual applications which is what allows the device to literally become anything (could you imagine if the App Store had been an after thought instead of the forefront?), but the contact lists can contain information streams for individual people. This is the most logical way to present that information. Rather than having a steady stream on your home page for individual people.

Frankly, I was a little indignant at first that you claimed everyone else was copying Apple (seriously, that's getting old), but if the argument is information- versus function-centric, fine. Most platforms decided to go with function-centric (which is an idea that Apple also did, prior to Android and the Palm Pre). However, I refuse to accept that simply being ridiculously different is the heart of innovation and interface design. In fact, interface design is supposed to be simple to understand. Not difficult. I could probably poke around this WinMo 7 interface and figure stuff out, but I'd likely be going to the manual a lot more than I would with other phones.

I'm excited to see what WinMo 7 does. It looks like an interesting platform, and I'm sure between now and the launch there will be significant improvements. Not only that, but the integration with all of Microsoft's other products is coming together nicely, so there's that, too. However, if the claim is that Microsoft out-Apple'd Apple because their interface is a ballsy risk with a different model, rather than a more usable model....sorry, but I think Apple's better than simply doing crazy stuff because it's crazy.

Usually their crazy stuff actually works. Reply

Prostate of Grace 04:19 PM

@OCEntertainment: I think the benefit to becoming information-centric as opposed to app-centric is that the way we use the services from them will be much more unified - providing a welcome standard in an increasingly fragmented mobile internet. Reply

Edited by Prostate of Grace at 02/15/10 4:32 PM

TonyWonder 04:36 PM

@OCEntertainment: Streamlining information is the equivalent of freebasing heroin. At a certain point it just needs to be done; the old way isn’t good enough anymore. The way we consume information needs to be changed. This in-app-out-app shuffle is wasting valuable time. It all needs to be there. Reply

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Blub10 04:05 PM

An interesting switch-a-roo. I know nothing about phones of any kind but the underlying change of themes are interesting. Years ago, when trying to help people understand the difference between PCs and Macs, I would mention that with a Mac you choose something (object) and then do something to it (function), with PCs it was the opposite, you chose to do something (function) and then select the object. The PC seemed odd.
What’s interesting here is it seems Apple has slipped into the function/object mode while Microsoft, of all companies, has seen the light with the Mac and is now going to use the information(object)/function mode. It’s a flip flop, how odd. Reply

Prostate of Grace 04:20 PM

@Blub10: Epic observation! Reply

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beelover9481 04:05 PM

I guess 7 is their lucky number. :D Reply

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MacAttack7388 04:00 PM

Out Apple'd Apple?
I think not. The interface looks tedious. Many presses to get to a function that takes an iPhone just one.
Look deeper than the shininess. Reply

tande04 promoted this comment

tande04 04:05 PM

@MacAttack7388: What? To get that same information you'd need to open 5 different "apps."
Its one of the biggest problems facing apple right now in my opinion. Reply

PurpleMonkeyDishwasher: 04:07 PM

@MacAttack7388: With a name like MacAttack, no one is ever going to believe your comment is not biased. Reply

Rexian 04:10 PM

@tande04: "What? To get that same information you'd need to open 5 different "apps"."
Even if there was ONE app, searching that in 5 iPhone home screens filled with 100 look-a-like icons takes way longer than I'd like to admit.

Grouping is always a better but let's see how intelligently they group non-social non-multimedia apps. Posted via web from T.J. Walia's posterous

Windows Phone 7 Series Hands-On Pics and Video - Windows phone 7 - Gizmodo

2010-02-15T16:42:00.001-05:00

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Windows Phone 7 Series Hands-On Pics and Video

Windows Phone 7 snuck up on the world today, but having played with it, I'll tell you Microsoft is putting all it's muscle behind this. No matter who you root for, to be anything short of impressed is stupid.

How does it feel? Nothing like an iPhone, for starters. The slippery, rotate-y screens may take a little getting used to, but they feel right. Microsoft deliberately wanted to get away from icons and this notion that all behaviors get the same size button on the home screen, and you definitely get more of a sense of priorities here: Entertainment, social networking, photo sharing—those matter, and oh yeah, here's a phone if you need a call, and here's a browser if you need that too.

It's hard to tell from looking at this stuff, but much of it is customizable, including almost everything on that home screen. Don't let the uniformity of design language fool you, there will be a lot you can do to differentiate from other people.

As you can see, the fluidity of the "panorama" navigation is here—when you enter a hub, you get those little teasers to the right, showing you want you'll get if you flip one screen over.

Though details are scarce in these early days, the device here is built "to spec," so probably running 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor. I can tell you that everything ran smoothly. This is obviously too early to make any technical statements, but it really was impressive, and where there are a few hiccups, it's hard to say whether it was human error or a glitch, but we'll leave it be for now. This is just demo software.

On to the screenshots—click here if thumbs haven't loaded, or if you just hate gallery format:

As you can see from the screenshots above, most hubs are fleshed out, though we couldn't have a look at Marketplace. Some of the shots here are "in between" shots, that moment between tapping a start screen element and the whole hub springing in behind it. There is also one shot of the slide transition from sleep screen—which has a lot of great heads-up information—to the start screen.

There aren't a ton of answers yet, but what we do know you can find above or in Matt's piece: Windows Phone 7: Everything Is Different Now

[Windows Phone 7 on Gizmodo]

Send an email to Wilson Rothman, the author of this post, at wilson@gizmodo.com.

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yoshi 03:40 PM

I think I am going to have see this in person. For some weird reason, I am not impressed. In fact, I found myself getting a little irritated at Microsoft because it doesn't seem that good?
What am I missing here? Reply

andysdavidson005 03:54 PM

@yoshi: as nice looking as it is etc, it seems to be more like a media center, than a proper platform OS, very limited like the zune, just big fonts and pictures. Reply

yoshi promoted this comment

budice4ever 04:13 PM

@yoshi: I'm wondering the same thing, all the articles seem to be amazed by this but I don't really see what this gives you that other OS' don't. Sure its way better than the old Windows Mobile (which I currently have I'm sad to say) but I don't see why I would want this over an Android or something else especially if it doesn't multitask. I guess for Windows making a phone that doesn't crash is "magical". If it has 4G then we can talk turkey Reply

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PhyrePhox 03:18 PM

Wait, did you just say that it would be stupid to be unimpressed? Well, I'm not impressed, and I'm decidedly not stupid.
The breathless tone in the several articles I have read today on Giz regarding this phone is disconcerting. I have watched the videos; I see lots of eye candy, and a device that won't be available to buy until this fall. In other words, a UI that only exists in the land of make-believe.
I'll reserve judgement until I can actually test usability. Until then, it's only cool "looking" and nothing more. Reply

LaraPandion I promoted this comment

Edited by PhyrePhox at 02/15/10 3:18 PM

LaraPandion I 03:19 PM

@PhyrePhox: The UI will be available before fall. Microsoft has yet to release a mobile platform that wasn't available months before launch as long as you have compatible hardware. I suppose this will be the same. Reply

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MacJedi 03:13 PM

"No matter who you root for, to be anything short of impressed is stupid."
I'm not really rooting for anyone - but I'm not impressed by the UI - therefore, by your proclamation, I am stupid. Thanks for the judgment. Reply

LaraPandion I promoted this comment

LaraPandion I 03:15 PM

@MacJedi: With a name like MacJedi you aren't rooting for anyone? Clearly you are rooting for the Jedi. Reply

Mihos 03:20 PM

@LaraPandion I: Maybe he is more of a Jedi that works for McDonalds...... Reply

LaraPandion I promoted this comment

LaraPandion I 03:29 PM

@Mihos: Although being a proud McDonald's employee does not rule out being biased, it does have a high correlation with being stupid (at least if you are out of High-school and/or basing your screen name on it). Reply

MacJedi 03:29 PM

@LaraPandion I: I am rooting for the Jedi - you're right.
But just because I'm a Mac fan don't assume I have an iPhone or can't appreciate anything non-Apple. I don't have an iPhone, I have an Env2. And my next phone will probably be Android-based. Reply

Mihos 03:47 PM

@LaraPandion I: I honestly did not mean that as a dig. I learned long ago to never make fun of someone's job.... unless they are in politics. Screw those guys. Reply

Edited by Mihos at 02/15/10 3:47 PM

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Decadence 03:12 PM

I don't know, something doesn't seem all that "magical" about it. Reply

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Graverobber 03:07 PM

Does the browser do HTML5? Reply

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PurpleMonkeyDishwasher: 03:05 PM

I know it's still way too early but does anyone have any speculation which carrier this phone will be on in the US? Reply

cmaceachen 03:08 PM

@PurpleMonkeyDishwasher:: This isn't a phone, it's a phone OS, so while their premium partner was said to be ATT, I'd say all of them, just like you can find WinMo phones on all carriers now. Reply

PurpleMonkeyDishwasher: promoted this comment

PurpleMonkeyDishwasher: 03:10 PM

@cmaceachen: Yah that's a good point. For some reason i thought there was custom hardware involved as well. I'm getting ahead of myself. Reply

cmaceachen 03:23 PM

@PurpleMonkeyDishwasher:: MS has set minimum hardware requirements for the phones they'll allow the OS to be licensed for, so they'll all meet a minimum standard and the OS will perform as intended. Could very well end up being a specific phone showing up on ATT at some point... a zune phone even? who knows... Reply

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Raptr569 03:03 PM

I'm curious, is there no accelerometer on this phone? Cuase that would seem an obvious feature even my cheap and nasty C903 has that! Reply

LaraPandion I promoted this comment

LaraPandion I 03:16 PM

@Raptr569: The long video showed auto-rotation, thus accelerometer. Reply

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TonyWonder 03:01 PM

I like the look of it a lot. But I have a feeling when I'm in a hurry that stupid graphic back and forth from the home screen is going to get annoying. Lag via the UI visualization is still lag none the less. Reply

Edited by TonyWonder at 02/15/10 3:02 PM

Donatom3 03:09 PM

@TonyWonder: The Zune HD has the same interface and I see no lag, on the slower older Tegra 1 chipset. Reply

Kerfudle: 3.1.3 its slightly better! 03:40 PM

@Donatom3:
Hes not talking graphics lag, he is talking about time wasted waiting for the visualizations to complete. Reply

TonyWonder promoted this comment

TonyWonder 04:26 PM

@Kerfudle: 3.1.3 its slightly better!: yes thank you, my shit way of saying things Reply

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ThisCharmingMan 03:01 PM

It does look impressive, minus the few hiccups. I'm not sure if I'm sold on the interface quite yet. Not sure if those swipe tabs are the most intuitive way to sort through information, but I'll wait to pass judgment until I know more about the UI. It's a little reminiscent of the new Xbox live interface, where they assume that you want to swipe through more tabs to get information you used to be able to see on one page of the old dashboard. On a slightly more positive note, aesthetically, I think the design is pretty sexy. Reply

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Russ Savage 02:57 PM

Are there really that many people that play video games, let alone want some kind of phone that can interact with said games?
I just don't know what the benefits are, I'm honestly asking. Reply

FriarNurgle promoted this comment

FriarNurgle 03:03 PM

@Russ Savage: Considering games dominate Apple's App store, MS is on the right track. Only problem is that Apple has been on that track for a really long time already. Time will tell. Reply

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Golf_Nut 02:43 PM

Does it use the standard ActiveSync for Exchange integration?
#WP7 Reply

WWSJD 03:19 PM

@Golf_Nut: according to the 22 minute video in the other post, yes. Reply

Golf_Nut promoted this comment

Golf_Nut 03:32 PM

@WWSJD: k, thanks. I haven't had time to listen to the 22 vid yet. Reply

See 2 replies Hide 2 replies

smegz 02:41 PM

If they can keep a tight control on the hardware specs, this will be a phone to reckon with. This may actually change my feelings about WinMo phones. By the time my iPhone contract expires, these may be mature enough to consider. Reply

Don Nguyen promoted this comment

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sqlfanatic 02:40 PM

This is definitely a game changer. Impressive no doubt about that. I am curious, like other commenters here, regarding the degree of customization. Probably there could be something for the font and the animation. This is a good direction for Windows Phone 7. Reply

Don Nguyen promoted this comment

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MacPro66 02:32 PM

I wonder if you'll be able to stream from your homegroup etc. And the through the Xlive marketplace such as music and video from Netflix etc. very impressive so far. Reply

GhostAmongMen 02:44 PM

@MacPro66: I would be surprised if they didn't include, at minimum, the ability to stream music with the Zune Pass. Doing Netflix and Zune video as well would be a big win. Reply

MacPro66 promoted this comment

Edited by GhostAmongMen at 02/15/10 2:45 PM

MacPro66 03:14 PM

@GhostAmongMen: yeah, thats what I was thinking/hoping..THX!! :-) Reply

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Beat the Traffic Information and Road Conditions

2010-02-12T00:00:00.001-05:00

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Great site if you're trying to avoid traffic jams...

Google's experiment: leapfrogging ISPs to deliver ultra-high-speed Web | Between the Lines

2010-02-10T23:01:00.001-05:00

February 10th, 2010

Google's experiment: leapfrogging ISPs to deliver ultra-high-speed Web

Posted by Sam Diaz @ 8:53 am

Categories: Google, ISPs, Web Technology

Tags: Google Inc., Web, Network, Internet Service Providers (ISPs), Networking..., Internet, Sam Diaz

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Google, eager to take the Internet to the next level, isn’t waiting around for the telecoms or wireless providers to kick those connections into ultra-high-speed mode. In a blog post this morning, the company said it planning to build and test ultra-high speed networks in a small number of regions across the U.S.

The experimental fiber network will deliver speeds more than 100 times faster than most consumer connections today - a 1-gigabit-per-second fiber-to-the-home connection. The company said it plans to provide competitively-priced services to at least 50,000 and potentially up to 500,000 people.

So why does Google think we need faster connections to the cloud? Here’s its list of some examples of what a faster connection could bring:

Next generation apps: We want to see what developers and users can do with ultra high-speeds, whether it’s creating new bandwidth-intensive “killer apps” and services, or other uses we can’t yet imagine.

New deployment techniques: We’ll test new ways to build fiber networks, and to help inform and support deployments elsewhere, we’ll share key lessons learned with the world.

Openness and choice: We’ll operate an “open access” network, giving users the choice of multiple service providers. And consistent with our past advocacy, we’ll manage our network in an open, non-discriminatory and transparent way.

With any other post, I might argue that Google is taking things too far by putting its paws into too many baskets. I already commented this week on how I thought it was a bad idea for Google to act as retailer of the new Nexus One mobile phones. Now, I’d be inclined to ask why they want to be an ISP.

But Google has been very clear that this is an experimental project. From the post:

Like our WiFi network in Mountain View, the purpose of this project is to experiment and learn. Network providers are making real progress to expand and improve high-speed Internet access, but there’s still more to be done. We don’t think we have all the answers – but through our trial, we hope to make a meaningful contribution to the shared goal of delivering faster and better Internet for everyone.

The first step is to reach out to cities that might be interested in being test locations for Google’s ISP efforts. The company is issuing an open Request for Information to identify communities that are interested. To help bring it all together, Google has put information on this page. And, of course, there’s a YouTube explainer video, too.

Sam Diaz is a senior editor at ZDNet. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.

Email Sam Diaz

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via blogs.zdnet.com

January auto sales: Many automakers up, Toyota down

2010-02-09T21:48:00.001-05:00

After a rough 2009, automakers are counting on sales in 2010 to recover. Now the results are in for the first full month of the year. Some automakers are rallying, while the numbers dash the hopes of others.

Toyota’s sales were adversely affected by a Stop-Sale order on the eight models which account for more than 60 percent of its sales. It ended the month down 8.7 percent over the previous year.

On the other hand, Ford, Hyundai, and Subaru all started 2010 with over 20 percent sales increases over January 2009. Here are the details:

Ford continued its sales surge with a 24 percent increase over last January and an increase in overall market share. Ford’s car models were the big sellers with the Focus, Fusion, and Taurus posting strong increases over last January.

via blogs.consumerreports.org

CBC News - Politics - Breakthrough made on 'Buy American'

2010-02-04T15:44:00.001-05:00

Canadian companies will get access to funding from U.S. economic stimulus projects in 37 U.S. states under a deal to circumvent the protectionist "Buy American" clause, CBC News has learned.

The breakthrough in negotiations between Washington and Ottawa might not be announced until tomorrow, the CBC's Chris Hall said.

During an afternoon press conference, Industry Minister Tony Clement would not confirm details of the deal but said Trade Minister Peter Van Loan and Prime Minister Stephen Harper were working hard on the file.

"There is nothing to be announced now," Clement told reporters at Parliament.

The agreement applies only to U.S. funding delivered under the current stimulus program, not future legislation that might include "Buy American"-type provisions.

The U.S. money is allocated for roads, public housing and other infrastructure projects, the drawback being that most of the money has already been spent.

Hall said the Canadian government is arguing the deal sets a precedent for future stimulus spending in the U.S.

In return, Canadian provinces are to sign on to a World Trade Organization general procurement agreement, which will give the U.S. and other countries access to projects underway in Canada with federal stimulus spending.

The "Buy American" provision gives priority to U.S. iron, steel and other manufactured goods for use in state-level and municipal public works and building projects funded with stimulus tax revenue.

The provision was put into the $787-billion US American Recovery and Reinvestment Act — the U.S. government's economic stimulus package — by the U.S. Congress.

Canada has been trying to get an exemption from the provisions since last fall.

In October, reports of progress between the U.S and Canada over the controversial provision prompted the Federation of Canadian Municipalities to withdraw a resolution to block U.S. companies from bidding on city contracts in this country.

via cbc.ca

Wow...

Apple's mac os x is less secure than windows - The Inquirer

2010-02-04T11:23:00.001-05:00

IF YOU BELIEVE Apple's marketing then you would think that the expensive fruity machines are more secure than PCs.

After all, most of the viruses out there are designed for the PC and Apple users hardly suffer from the problem. But this line of reasoning does not influence corporate IT managers who, were it true, would be trying to stave off hackers by installing shedloads of Apple gear.

However that's not the case. Most tell us that even if Apple gear was half the price it's just security by obscurity. A determined hacker who wanted to get into corporate systems would be though it like a knife through butter.

Tyler Reguly, a senior security research engineer with Ncircle told the newnewinternet that if you take a look at the two platforms, and the mindsets of the companies behind them, then the Windows PC wins hands down. He said that the Mac ships with more exploitable vulnerabilities already on a system when it is delivered. Further, Eric Johanson, a security researcher pointed out that the Mac OS X has far more published vulnerabilities per user than Windows.

However Apple is also actually more insecure because of the attitude of its customers. A computer's security, if it exists, is only as good as the user. Unfortunately in the case of the Mac the user is a smug, technologically illiterate person who believes they are invulnerable because they use a Mac. Such people randomly press buttons, visit sites that sensible people don't and download things carelessly because Apple's marketing tells them they are safe.

A recent Eset survey last year showed that when Apple users fell for phishing crime they tended to lose a lot more cash than a Windows PC user. The cynic in me thinks that if you spend a third more than you need to for your PC and think that the Ipad is a pretty neat idea then you are exactly the sort of mark that a phishing campaign is designed to reach.

The Eset survey said that the only safer Mac user was one who used both a Windows PC and an Apple Mac because they tended to be a bit more clever than your average fanboy.

Another reason why Apple PCs are so insecure is that it is incredibly slow at responding to news that flaws exist in its software. Microsoft has long ago realised that sitting on vulnerabilities without patching them is dead stupid. Most patches from Microsoft arrive comparatively quickly.

The cappuccino company's mindset, however, while reinforcing the myth of indestructibility of OS X, means that Apple users will be exposed much longer than Microsoft. A hacker can go to the web and find a list of vulnerabilities which are months old and be secure in the knowledge that they are less likely to be patched.

Unfortunately for Apple this philosophy is fast coming unstuck following the success of the Iphone. The gizmo is popular enough to become a target of hackers and malware distributors. It also can be used to store data worth stealing.

Alas for most Apple users, Jobs Mob is more keen on working out ways to stop people jailbreaking its Iphone than it is on protecting them from malware on the gear. However the Iphone is a toy computer and has all the vulnerabilities of a computer.

So what will it take for Apple to pull its socks up? One enterprising malware writer to pen an interesting bit of code that installs itself on a Mac, sniffs address books for friends with other Macs and works out the way to distribute itself to them too. It is not a huge technology challenge and when it is designed then Macs will fall over all over the world.

Only when this happens will Apple reach the same epiphany that Microsoft did over security and follow the Vole into more secure computing. µ

via theinquirer.net

Windows 7 Running on the Apple iPad via Citrix - citrix - Gizmodo

2010-02-02T13:40:00.001-05:00

This content is restricted.

Windows 7 Running on the Apple iPad via Citrix

Trumpets playing, bloody moons, seas of fire, cats cohabiting with dogs, and Windows 7 running on the Apple iPad right on the day it launches. That's how the Universe ends, my dearly beloved, and you can blame Citrix for it:

It turns out the 9.7 inch display on the iPad with a 1024x768 screen resolution works great for a full VDI XenDesktop. Windows applications run unmodified and securely in the data center, and even multiple applications at once.

The iPhone restrictions of screen size and small keyboards are overcome with the iPad. The iPad looks to be an ideal end-point device that can empower users to be productive wherever they are and IT will be able to safely deliver company-hosted virtual desktops and apps without worry.

Those are the wet words of Chris Fleck, the vicepresident of virtualization and remote software company Citrix. And what you are seeing above is Windows 7 running on the iPad SDK simulator, thanks to Citrix Receiver and XenDesktop 4—running meaning that it's executed on a server and remotely displayed on the iPad at full resolution.

Fleck sounds excited on his blog, and points out that the software will be ready for the launch of Apple's JesusTablet. Personally, I can't wait for other remote desktop applications to be adapted for the iPad full resolution. [Citrix via PC World]

Send an email to Jesus Diaz, the author of this post, at jesus@gizmodo.com.

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TonyWonder 12:38 PM

Hey Jesus, I feel your pain but no matter how many mockups you make with a small bezzel, the real iPad will always have one big enough you can rest your coffee on it. Keep the dream alive my small bezzel loving friend Reply

Edited by TonyWonder at 02/02/10 12:39 PM

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Don Is 12:32 PM

Jesus,
Just curious. What is with Gizmodo's novel use of the word "wet" lately? From Joel, we get "It's taken me a couple of days for me to understand the wet sickness I felt" and yours, above.

I checked with UD, to see if it is some new kind of slang, but no luck. I am genuinely curious.

Is it from a movie? Reply

Decadence 12:33 PM

@Don Is: Its in reference to female stimulation in response to the announcement of the iPad that is currently felt by most of the Gizmodo editorial staff. I think. Reply

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A Pimp Named DaveR 10:23 AM

Jesus, I hate to complain, but this is misleading. Citrix sends out, basically, a video signal to a client display. The client isn't "running" anything other than the Citrix client software.
Saying Windows 7 is "running" on the iPad here is no more accurate than saying that I currently have Windows 7 running on my Dell monitor. I don't. The software is running on the computer; the monitor is a display. Windows 7 is NOT running on this device. The fact that the iPad can effectively run a Citrix client is definitely newsworthy on its own, and there's no need to mislead by claiming something that isn't true. Reply

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AmishJohn 10:10 AM

I was honestly looking at the JesusTablet, but I can't wait three days for it to restart every time it dies... Reply

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Astigmatism 09:58 AM

This is non-news for consumer users, but for all of us lawyers out there, this could be the difference between lugging our crappy Dell office laptops with us on vacations and weekend trips and tossing an iPad into a carryon. I had no intention of buying one until I heard about this on Sunday; now I think it's 60/40 that I will. Reply

Xeno 11:55 AM

@Astigmatism: Or just getting any of those many tablets that can do this naively since they are running Win 7 on the actual device. Just one less hoop to jump through that way. Reply

Astigmatism 12:24 PM

@Xeno: There's no "native" here, though - it's always just a presentation screen on your computer, with the actual apps running remotely on the (Windows-based) server. I use Citrix from home both on my iMac and my Vaio, and the experience is pretty much identical. The only thing that really puts me off this device, honestly, is the Flash thing, as Xeraphim notes. Reply

Nathan Obbards 12:31 PM

@Astigmatism: You can do the same thing on an iPhone, a Touch, and a netbook. Reply

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pupaboy3 09:44 AM

Windows 7 on the iPad? Now you are taking. I would be interested in an iPad only if it had Win 7 on it. Reply

Xeno promoted this comment

Xeno 11:56 AM

@pupaboy3: It's called the HP slate. Reply

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LeopoldNestor 09:30 AM

There is a VNC client for iPhone; sure there will be one for iPad. No need for Citrix.
Reply

Nathan Obbards promoted this comment

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Killjoy 08:33 AM

Remote access of full-fledged computers via terminals? Input and output on a basic shell, with a sort of... of... main frame doing the heavy lifting? Why, it's so crazy it'll never work! I mean, for starters you'd have to have some kind of completely wireless persistent network available all over the world. Reply

Philip Barnett 09:24 AM

@Killjoy: Actually, I use it every day and it works quite well. As for the persistent network, WiFi is preferred but any connection will do. Reply

Killjoy promoted this comment

Killjoy 10:49 AM

@Philip Barnett: Aw, hell. I forgot the sarcasm tag, didn't I? Reply

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Emulsifide 08:24 AM

"running meaning that it's executed on a server and remotely displayed on the iPad at full resolution."
It will be interesting to see if Citrix codes their client software for the iPad to allow HDX, which takes advantage of client-side hardware for graphics and computing power. Seeing a demo of this working with 3D Studio MAX is a sight to behold.

For those who are concerned about the cost of such a system, yes, this is a business oriented total virtualization solution that Citrix offers which means the overall cost is out of reach of an individual. From what I gathered at a Citrix sales pitch last week, the lowest buy in price of the software is roughly $225 per seat (individual client license). At my company, we're looking to buy 170 of theses licenses, which is rather cheap for a company, but crazy for an individual.

However, given the fact that Apple's iPad has the attention of Citrix, who's to say they won't come out with a consumer version of the solution to provide individuals full computing power on their Jesus tablet? Reply

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seanpat12 08:23 AM

Jesus pad? Are you serious? Reply

AmishJohn promoted this comment

AmishJohn 09:51 AM

@seanpat12: It's only good for three days. Reply

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UnderLoK 08:09 AM

I've been in shock since the 90's that Citrix still exists. They basically sold their best technology to MS in the 90's and have been using the cash to try and come up with something profitable ever since.
Am I completely wrong? Do they actually have a decent product that stands on its own or are you still better off just running a plain Jane 2Kx box running TS? Last I knew their main product is nothing more than Hummingbird (Virtual Apps). Reply

Greg Lloyd 08:20 AM

@UnderLoK: The difference, at least that I see, is that you can't push an application on TS, so someone could have Word, and only Word, on demand, without having to have a new desktop. Reply

UnderLoK promoted this comment

UnderLoK 08:25 AM

@Greg Lloyd: That's all I know of which was a failure long before Citrix did it (Hummingbird would allow you to send specific X apps as well back in the 90's). I can see it working well for POS, but beyond that I don't really see the point.
This coming from a guy who uses Fusion on a daily basis... ;) Reply

Edited by UnderLoK at 02/02/10 8:27 AM

cprincipe 09:26 AM

@UnderLoK: Citrix makes tons of money in the corporate space, allowing virtual sessions when you don't trust people to access your network (think offshoring). Reply

UnderLoK promoted this comment

UnderLoK 09:31 AM

@cprincipe: But you can do that with TS as it is. Sure there is a little less load, but I don't see it as being all that significant. Then again, the largest TS house I've worked in only did 40 at a time. Reply

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armendni 07:08 AM

I'm a little confused. So Citrix is essentially running a custom Virtual Machine over a desktop onto an Ipad? Seems kinda silly but hell if I hear Windows 7 is running on an Ipad... That's pretty cool. Reply

acidrain69 07:37 AM

@armendni: Windows 7 isn't running on the iPad. The iPad is connecting via terminal services to a VM running on a server off in the cloud somewhere. You could do this for MacOS, Linux, anything that has a VNC or RDP server. The iPad is only running a little program that connects to a VNC/RDP server and displays it's screen, and passes keyboard/mouse events back. You can already do this, today, on the iPhone. Reply

armendni promoted this comment

armendni 08:16 AM

@acidrain69: oh ok that's what I was thinking... thanks for clearing it up for me. Reply

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Serpentor X 06:04 AM

Reply

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SewerShark 05:22 AM

His Steveness will not like this. Reply

xeleion - Works at Best Buy 05:25 AM

@SewerShark: No he won't, but this would be the only way I'd buy one of the damn things. Reply

SewerShark promoted this comment

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Cy Cyril 03:05 AM

I already do this on my iphone via RDP, it's ok and lets me listen to music over flash from my server thatsits in a FAST data center but it isn't a real solution. The UI is no suited to the device and its really hard to navigate. Either the ipad will support flash, via jailbreak or other mean, or I'm not buying one.
Hey adobe! release a flash client via cydia and make everyone happy.

Give a nice 1 finger salut to apple at the same time. Reply

Benguin approved this comment

Benguin 04:00 AM

@Cy Cyril: You actually raise a pretty interesting point. I wonder what would happen if Adobe did release a flash plugin via Cydia. Their stance of "Apple maintains a closed ecosystem and won't allow open development" always read to me more as "Why bother fixing anything when we have a perfectly good scapegoat right here."
If they were to undermine Apple like that, I see one of two things happening:
1) They prove that Apple are just being giant dicks and flash isn't as horrid as they make it out to be
2) They prove Apple right and everyone on the internet can stop whining.

We as consumers could not lose. Reply

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pixelsnader 02:40 AM

Did the author just name a product he doesn't own after himself? Reply

Covertghost promoted this comment

Covertghost 07:31 AM

@pixelsnader: Hey, Apple named a product a name they don't own for themselves.
Why can't we? Reply

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SmallShark 02:21 AM

is it possible to hack the iPad then install a free new OS on it? Apple sais iPhone OS is a stripped down Leopard Reply

UnderLoK promoted this comment

UnderLoK 08:14 AM

@SmallShark: It has an ARM based processor so your options are extremely limited. Reply

Mr_Bishop 08:31 AM

@UnderLoK: Not reallty, there are loads of Linux based OS's, the problem is drivers for the OS's. Reply

UnderLoK promoted this comment

UnderLoK 08:42 AM

@Mr_Bishop: Linux dists you mean... Linux is the OS, Debian, Suse, RH, Slack, and the rest are dists.
So as I said you are extremely limited. You can run Linux or FreeBSD or? That leaves a pretty big gap as far as usability goes. You know, since most people need OSX or Windows. Reply

Edited by UnderLoK at 02/02/10 8:43 AM

Mr_Bishop 09:01 AM

@UnderLoK: Yeah I guess if your hell bent on running a closed source OS. Personally i like Ubuntu,Debian,Android and the rest. If only they would combine Android and chrome OS... Reply

UnderLoK 09:17 AM

@Mr_Bishop: Ubuntu has done one thing right, get the masses to see Linux and try it for themselves. Problem is that Linux IMO is still only good as a server and still fails on the desktop like it always has.
The draw used to be a fancy desktop which brought people in the droves to Linux. Enlightenment alone was responsible for most of the influx of users in the late 90's. Now Gnome and KDE are bloated, XFCE isn't bad, but E it is not. Hell they don't even look as good! OSX's dock that people go on and on and on about? Looks just like E's did, that brushed aluminum look? Again a default E theme... The list goes on.

I would just like to add that if you are hardcore OSS you should be running Fedora. Ubuntu supports more hardware for a reason. Reply

Edited by UnderLoK at 02/02/10 9:19 AM

Mr_Bishop 09:51 AM

@UnderLoK: Im not hard core by any means, i mean sure i use Ubuntu Almost exclusively instead of windows but im learning. Excluding available software and one issue with my old nvidia GPU ive yet to have any issues compared to XP. I also like Gnome more then Explorer (im assuming thats what you meant by E?) Ubuntu runs smoother, longer, and cooler on my PC then XP did. Reply

Posted via web from T.J. Walia's posterous

Microsoft reveals 60 million Windows 7 sales - Pocket-lint

2010-02-02T08:58:00.001-05:00

Microsoft reveals 60 million Windows 7 sales

Fastest selling OS ever

View more images

29 January 2010 9:30 GMT / By Amy-Mae Elliott

Microsoft's second quarter financial results have revealed just how many copies of Windows 7 the software giant has shifted since it went on sale in October 2009.

While announcing record revenue, sales figures of 60 million Windows 7 licenses from Microsoft make it the fastest selling operating system ever.

With revenue up 14% compared to the same period the year before, the success is being credited to the launch of the new OS: "Exceptional demand for Windows 7 led to the positive top-line growth for the company", Peter Klein, chief financial officer at Microsoft said.

"This is a record quarter for Windows units", added Kevin Turner, chief operating officer at Microsoft. "We are thrilled by the consumer reception to Windows 7 and by business enthusiasm to adopt Windows 7".

The $27,000 suitcase - CNN.com

2010-01-31T14:10:00.001-05:00

(CNN) -- Talk about a hefty baggage fee:

For months now I have not been able to get the $27,100 suitcase out of my mind.

The economy is rocky. People are out of work. Yet the $27,100 suitcase exists. It's not a joke.

At first I thought it was. Last fall I was traveling through Naples, Florida, and a cover line on a glossy local magazine caught my eye.

The magazine was called Gulfshore Life, and the cover line said:

"The $58,000 brooch... The $27,100 suitcase... Check Out Our Luxury File."

Perhaps, I thought, this was a teaser to a satirical story using literary exaggeration to whistle past the graveyard of America's fiscal hard times.

But when I flipped open the magazine, the feature seemed to be serious.

The $27,100 suitcase, the story said, was sold by Hermès, the luxury retailer, which has a store in Naples. The suitcase was called the Hector, and was "constructed of Officier canvas with Evercalf calfskin."

I closed the magazine, but could not stop thinking about the suitcase. A suitcase is something that gets banged around. It sits out in the rain and snow on airport runways. Baggage handlers toss it roughly onto conveyer belts. Sometimes it gets lost on flights.

Why would anyone pay $27,100 for a suitcase?

Weighty and important matters dominated the news. But there it was, always in the back of my mind: the suitcase, and the parallel world of wealth it represented.

Over the holidays, I was in New York City. One morning I walked to the Hermès store at the corner of 62nd Street and Madison Avenue. I took a deep breath and walked in.

"May I help you?" a clerk asked.

"I'd like to see the $27,000 suitcase," I said. (I shaved $100 off the price; the phrase sounded smoother that way.)

"Which bag specifically?" she said.

"You have more than one that costs that much?" I said.

"There was one that cost $200,000," she said. "It featured diamonds."

"Why would someone spend that kind of money on a suitcase?" I said.

"Hand-stitching," she said. "Sometimes exotic material."

She looked around, as if to be certain no one was listening, then half-whispered:

"I use my Samsonite."

She said that the $27,100 suitcase was not, on that day, on floor display. I left New York, still mulling: How could a person take such a suitcase on a trip? It would be like putting a baggage tag on $27,100 in cash.

At Midway Airport in Chicago, I went in the slush and slop to Southwest Airlines' curbside baggage-check area to commiserate with my baggage-handler friends there. I told them the story.

I would like to report their response, but it was so cold outside, and they were so bundled up head to toe, that all I could discern was their muffled laughter.

In recent days I was in southwest Florida again. This time I went to the Hermès store there, in the elegant Waterside Shops outdoor mall.

"I'm interested in the $27,000 suitcase," I said to the first clerk I saw.

She absolutely beamed, and I immediately realized she had mistaken my intentions.

"No," I said. "No. I don't want to buy it."

The wattage of her smiled dimmed a bit. She said I would have to give her more information about the product; she said some specially made Hermès bags sold for $40,000 or $50,000. "The people who pay that much for a bag usually fly on jets," she said.

"Most people fly on jets," I said.

She gave me a don't-be-dense look.

"Oh," I said, surmising that, in these circles, "jets" was a synonym for "private jets."

Back in my hotel room, I called Hermès' U.S. corporate headquarters.

There, a spokeswoman, Bernice Kwok-Gabel, said that for many customers, only the best that money can buy will do. "They want the finest," she said. "No compromises." She said that for people who might spend $27,000 on a work of art, $27,000 for a suitcase is not excessive. "If they want it, the price is not a big concern."

She said that the $27,100 Hector suitcase is actually a twinned piece of luggage: two compartments carried by a single handle. For a customer on a tight budget, a single Hector compartment can be bought by itself.

For $14,000.

I ended my quest where it began: at Gulfshore Life magazine, where I had seen the original mention. I called the editor-in-chief, David Sendler, to ask if he thought his readers had greeted the item about the suitcase with a shake of the head.

"Some probably did," he said. "But I'm sure there were others who saw it and thought: 'I'd like to have that bag.' We have a very high-demographic readership."

I will leave you with this thought. At that Hermès store in New York, I asked the clerk why someone would pay so much for a suitcase that would inevitably get scuffed and scratched in transit.

"Some people buy metal cases in which to enclose their suitcases," she said.

She saw the disbelief in my eyes, smiled, and said:

"They buy suitcases for their suitcases."

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Bob Greene.

via cnn.com

GM alongside other automakers were struggling to sell vehicles priced under $30,000 yet there are suitcases going for $27,000. If I'm EVER going to spend that much on a suitcase, it better have a genie or something in it...

Despite being Indian, why I don’t fly Air India…

2009-10-05T11:12:00.001-04:00

NEW DELHI: The Maharaja witnessed his first in-flight Mughal-e-Azam at 30,000 feet above sea level on Saturday, as two members of the cabin
crew—one male and one female—slugged it out with the pilot and co-pilot. (

Watch Video )
Endangering the lives of 106 passengers and grossly violating safety norms, the airline staffers came to blows in the cockpit and galley of the Indian Airlines Airbus A-320 as the aircraft cruised over Pakistan en route to Delhi via Lucknow from Sharjah.
The cabin-vs-cockpit tiff originated on the ground in Sharjah itself and then turned into a full-blown fight once IC 884 took off soon after midnight.
The cabin crew alleged that pilots harassed a 24-year-old female colleague who later filed a molestation complaint against them with the cops after the flight landed in Delhi.
The pilots, on the other hand, accused a male flight purser of misconduct that seriously compromised flight safety, and said the accusation of molestation aimed to protect the complainant's purser friend—who has a commercial pilot licence (CPL)—from facing action.
No party denied that blows and abuses were exchanged as bewildered passengers looked on. Sources said that the female cabin crew member and the co-pilot sustained bruises.
Confirming the in-flight fight, Air India said it had ordered an inquiry and had grounded the staff members involved. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation has also ordered a probe.
There were unconfirmed reports that at one stage the cockpit was unmanned, as the crew was busy fighting outside. Things allegedly degenerated to the point where the captain threatened to divert the plane to Karachi, likening the situation, sources said, to a "hijack".
In Sharjah, the cabin crew went to meet Captain Ranbir Arora and co-pilot Aditya Chopra for the pre-flight briefing. Both sides give different versions of what happened after this.
The cabin crew lobby said that after the initial tension on the ground in Sharjah, when the woman crew member went into the cockpit, one of the pilots held her hand and then pushed her out of the cockpit.
"She hit the cockpit door with such force that she started bleeding. When Amit Khanna, the purser, saw her in this condition, he went to the cockpit to ask what was happening. At this point, the pilots got abusive and started a fight with him," said a representative of the IA cabin crew, who added that the actual fight took place on the Lucknow-Delhi segment.
Pilot sources claimed that despite his CPL, Khanna could not get a pilot's job due to the downturn.
"The airhostess had announced flying time from Sharjah to Lucknow as per the schedule, and not the actual one that the commander gives. After taking off, the pilot scolded the airhostess and then called Amit to the cockpit," said a source.
Khanna, the source added, entered the cockpit angrily and that's when the fight started. "He became abusive, and tempers ran high in the cockpit. Given the highly unsafe situation there, the commander said he would divert to Karachi, to which Amit retorted, 'Jahan le jaana hai, le jaao, is aircraft ko main bhi uda loonga (take it wherever you want to, I can also fly)'," a pilot representative said, adding that the fight occurred over Pakistan, while the plan was flying from Sharjah to Lucknow. The woman crew member, the source explained, got bruised when she entered the cockpit in the melee.
The cockpit was cleared, with pilots pushing out Amit and then locking the door. After that, the plane landed in Lucknow at around 4.30 am. "Amit then apologized to the pilots, and they took off for Delhi so that the flight wasn't delayed. He later got the woman crew member to level charges of molestation to avoid action for making a hostile entry into the cockpit," said a source speaking on behalf of the pilots.
The police are investigating the woman's complaint and have registered a case against the pilot and co-pilot. "There are several eyewitnesses and we are recording their statements," said joint CP (operations) Satyendra Garg. The police had the victim examined at Safdarjung Hospital, where her bruises were confirmed. A case was registered, among others, under Section 354 for outraging the modesty of a woman.
The DGCA is fuming at the gross violation of safety norms on IC 884. "The airline didn't even inform us of this incident in time. We're going to summon the crew members on Monday. This incident is shocking and we may need to take exemplary action," said a senior official.

via timesofindia.indiatimes.com

It’s stupid things like this that make me stay away from Air India. I flew with them once, back in 1993. One of the worst flight experiences I had and I’ve never gone back.

Air India pilots, crew slug it out at 30,000 ft-News-VIDEOS-The Times of India

2009-10-05T10:46:00.001-04:00

via timesofindia.indiatimes.com

50 Things Everyone Should Know How To Do | Marc and Angel Hack Life

2009-09-29T22:46:00.001-04:00

Self-reliance is a vital key to living a healthy, productive life. To be self-reliant one must master a basic set of skills, more or less making them a jack of all trades. Contrary to what you may have learned in school, a jack of all trades is far more equipped to deal with life than a specialized master of only one.

While not totally comprehensive, here is a list of 50 things everyone should know how to do.

1. Build a Fire – Fire produces heat and light, two basic necessities for living. At some point in your life this knowledge may be vital.

How to Build a Fire

Wilderness Survival Firecraft

Build a Fire Without Matches or a Lighter (video)

2.  Operate a Computer – Fundamental computer knowledge is essential these days. Please, help those in need.

How To Help Someone Use a Computer

The BBC’s Guide to Using a Computer

Mac Basics

Windows Basics

3.  Use Google Effectively – Google knows everything. If you’re having trouble finding something with Google, it’s you that needs help.

Google Guide

Google Advanced Search Operators

Google Web Search Features

20 Tips for More Efficient Google Searches

4. Perform CPR and the Heimlich Maneuver – Someday it may be your wife, husband, son or daughter that needs help.

Learn CPR

How To Perform Adult CPR (video)

How CPR Works

How to Perform the Heimlich Maneuver (video)

5. Drive a Manual Transmission Vehicle – There will come a time when you’ll be stuck without this knowledge.

How To Drive a Stick Shift Instructional Movie (video)

Learn to Drive a Stick Shift

Learn to Drive a Car with Manual Transmission

6. Do Basic Cooking – If you can’t cook your own steak and eggs, you probably aren’t going to make it.

Cooking Basics and Tips

Cooking and Baking How To Information

Basics of Cooking Series

7. Tell a Story that Captivates People’s Attention – If you can’t captivate their attention, you should probably just save your breath.

How To Tell a Great Story

How To Give a Great Speech

Presentation Tips for Public Speaking

8. Win or Avoid a Fistfight – Either way, you win.

How To Actually Win a Fistfight

How To Win a Fistfight (video)

How To Win a Street Fight

How To Avoid Confrontations Like a Samurai Warrior

9. Deliver Bad News – Somebody has got to do it. Unfortunately, someday that person will be you.

How To Deliver Bad News in Writing

How to Deliver Bad News to a Customer

Good Ways to Deliver Bad News

10. Change a Tire – Because tires have air in them, and things with air in them eventually pop.

How To Change a Flat Tire (video)

How To Change a Tire (video)

Saturday Mechanic: Changing a Tire

11. Handle a Job Interview – I promise, sweating yourself into a nervous panic won’t land you the job.

The 25 Most Difficult Questions in a Job Interview

Job Interview Questions and Answers

How to Handle Your Job Interviews Successfully

10 Sticky Job Interview Situations and How to Handle Them

12. Manage Time – Not doing so is called wasting time, which is okay sometimes, but not all the time.

How To Manage Time and Maximize Effectiveness

Managing Your Time

10 tips for time management in a multitasking world

Time Management Tips and Exercises

13. Speed Read – Sometimes you just need the basic gist, and you needed it 5 minutes ago.

Learn Speed Reading

How To Speed Read the Net

Speed Reading Techniques

14. Remember Names – Do you like when someone tries to get your attention by screaming “hey you”?

How To Remember People’s Names

Tricks for Remembering Names

7 Hacks to Remember Any Name

15. Relocate Living Spaces – Relocating is always a little tougher than you originally imagined.

Moving Tips and Guidelines

Moving and Relocation Guides

Moving Tips

16.  Travel Light – Bring only the necessities. It’s the cheaper, easier, smarter thing to do.

Travel Light with One Bag

Pack Light and Travel Happy

Packing Light and Right

17. Handle the Police – Because jail isn’t fun… and neither is Bubba.

What to Do If You’re Stopped by the Police

How To Handle the Cops if They Knock on Your Door

How To Handle the Police

18. Give Driving Directions – Nobody likes driving around in circles. Get this one right the first time.

How To Give a Complete Stranger Driving Directions

How To Give Directions

Giving Good Driving Directions

19. Perform Basic First Aid – You don’t have to be a doctor, or genius, to properly dress a wound.

First Aid Guide

Understanding First Aid

Common First Aid Topics

20. Swim – 71% of the Earth’s surface is covered by water.  Learning to swim might be a good idea.

How To Teach a Child to Swim

Swimming Breathing Basics

Find Swimming Lessons Near You

21. Parallel Park – Parallel parking is a requirement on most standard driver’s license driving tests, yet so many people have no clue how to do it. How could this be?

How To Parallel Park a Car (video)

How To Parallel Park (video)

How To Parallel Park

22. Recognize Personal Alcohol Limits – Otherwise you may wind up like this charming fellow.

Alcohol: Know Your Limits

Know Your Limits

Alcohol Consumption Info

23. Select Good Produce – Rotten fruits and vegetables can be an evil tease and an awful surprise.

Produce Primer: Selecting the Best

Tips on Choosing Produce and Keeping it Fresh

Buying Fresh Vegetables

24. Handle a Hammer, Axe or Handsaw – Carpenters are not the only ones who need tools. Everyone should have a basic understanding of basic hand tools.

How To Safely Use a Hammer

How To Safely Use an Axe (video)

How To Choose and Use a Handsaw

25.  Make a Simple Budget – Being in debt is not fun. A simple budget is the key.

Money 101 - Making a Budget

How To Make a Budget and Stick To It

How To Make a Budget That Works

26. Speak at Least Two Common Languages – Only about 25% of the world’s population speaks English. It would be nice if you could communicate with at least some of the remaining 75%.

Free Online Language Courses

Learn a Foreign Language Online Free

Language Learning with Rosetta Stone

27. Do Push-Ups and Sit-Ups Properly – Improper push-ups and sit-ups do nothing but hurt your body and waste your time.

How To Do a Proper Push-Up

Chris Comfort’s Push-Up Workout (video)

19 Variations for a Push-Up (video)

How To Do Sit-Ups (video)

How To Do an Abdominal Crunch (video)

28. Give a Compliment – It’s one of the greatest gifts you can give someone, and it’s free.

How To Give a Good Compliment

5 Kick-Ass Reasons to Give a Genuine Compliment

How To Give a Killer Compliment

10 Best Compliments a Man Can Give a Woman

29. Negotiate – The better deal is only a question or two away.

How To Negotiate Like an Indian

Salary Negotiation Tips

Win-Win Negotiation

30. Listen Carefully to Others – The more you listen and the less you talk, the more you will learn and the less you will miss.

Tips on Effective Listening

Listening Tips for the Classroom Environment

Techniques for Active Listening

31. Recite Basic Geography – If you don’t know where anything is outside of your own little bubble, most people will assume (and they are probably correct) that you don’t know too much at all.

Maps and Geography of the World

USA Geography Map Games

Test Your Geography Knowledge

32. Paint a Room – The true cost of painting is 90% labor. For simple painting jobs it makes no sense to pay someone 9 times what it would cost you to do it yourself.

Painting Tips (video)

House Painting Guide

DIY Painting Tips and Tools

33. Make a Short, Informative Public Speech – At the next company meeting if your boss asks you to explain what you’ve been working on over the last month, a short, clear, informative response is surely your best bet. “Duhhh…” will not cut it.

How To Conquer the Public Speaking Fear

Better Public Speaking and Presentation

How To Write an Informative Speech

34. Smile for the Camera – People that absolutely refuse to smile for the camera suck!

How To Smile for the Camera

How To Be Photogenic

How To Smile with Your Eyes

35. Flirt Without Looking Ridiculous – There is a fine line between successful flirting and utter disaster. If you try too hard, you lose. If you don’t try hard enough, you lose.

Guide to Flirting

Flirt Without Frightening

The Rules of Flirtation

The Science of Romance: Why We Flirt

36. Take Useful Notes – Because useless notes are useless, and not taking notes is a recipe for failure.

Various Note Taking Systems

Note Taking Skills and Guidelines

Take Study-worthy Lecture Notes

37. Be a Respectful House Guest – Otherwise you will be staying in a lot of hotels over the years.

10 Ways to Be and Excellent House Guest

How To Be a Good House Guest

Have A Pleasant Visit By Following A Few House Rules

38. Make a Good First Impression – Aristotle once said, “well begun is half done.”

How To Make those First Impressions Count

Making a Great First Impression

Tips for Making a Good First Impression

39. Navigate with a Map and Compass – What happens when the GPS craps out and you’re in the middle of nowhere?

How To Use a Compass Alone

Using a Compass Alongside a Map

Navigate with a Map and Compass

40. Sew a Button onto Clothing – It sure is cheaper than buying a new shirt.

How To Sew a Button

How To Sew a Button On (video)

41. Hook Up a Basic Home Theater System – This isn’t rocket science. Paying someone to do this shows sheer laziness.

How the Home Theater Works

Home Theater Hookup

Home Theater Installation Tips

42. Type – Learning to type could save you days worth of time over the course of your lifetime.

Online Typing Lessons for Everyone

Free Typing Lessons for the Standard QWERTY Keyboard

Free Touch Typing Program

43. Protect Personal Identity Information – Personal identity theft is not fun unless you are the thief. Don’t be careless.

FTC’s Identity Theft Site

Identity Theft Info (video)

How Identity Theft Works

44. Implement Basic Computer Security Best Practices – You don’t have to be a computer science major to understand the fundamentals of creating complex passwords and using firewalls. Doing so will surely save you a lot of grief someday.

4 Steps to Protect Your Computer

Security Basics for Home Computers

SANS Basic Computer Security Whitepapers

45. Detect a Lie – People will lie to you. It’s a sad fact of life.

How To Detect Bullshit

Identify a Lie with 6 Simple Questions

How To Detect Lies

46. End a Date Politely Without Making Promises – There is no excuse for making promises you do not intend to keep. There is also no reason why you should have to make a decision on the spot about someone you hardly know.

Tips for The End of a Date

Tips for Ending a Bad Date

How To End a Date Gracefully

47. Remove a Stain – Once again, it’s far cheaper than buying a new one.

Effective Ways to Remove Laundry Stains

DIY Cleaning and Stain Removal

Stain Removal Articles

48.  Keep a Clean House – A clean house is the foundation for a clean, organized lifestyle.

The Keep-It-Clean Plan

Keeping a Stress-Free, Clean House

How To Keep Your House Clean in 20 Minutes a Day

49. Hold a Baby – Trust me, injuring a baby is not what you want to do.

How To Hold a Baby (video)

How To Hold a Baby

50. Jump Start a Car – It sure beats walking or paying for a tow truck.

Edmunds Jump-Start How To

How To Jump Start Your Car (video)

DIY: Jump Start a Car

Check out these books for more ideas on pertinent life skills:

3,684 Things You Should Have Learned but Probably Didn’t

The New York Times Guide to Essential Knowledge

The Experts’ Guide to 100 Things Everyone Should Know How to Do

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Possibly Related Posts:

10 Reasons You Are Rich

3 Easy Steps: The Only Life Hack You Will Ever Need

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132 Comments

Filed under Hacks, Life, Productivity

via marcandangel.com

Some great info here...

Photoshopping Illegal? France Set to Regulate Airbrushed Pics

2009-09-24T23:09:00.001-04:00

File this squarely under “would never happen in the U.S.” but French lawmakers have a fascinating new idea to combat body image issues: require disclaimers on Photoshopped or otherwise “enhanced” images of people.

The required warning would be needed in newspaper and magazine advertising, press photos, product packaging, political campaigns and art photography, according to the Telegraph. The language will reportedly be: “Retouched photograph aimed at changing a person’s physical appearance.”

The proposed law comes from French MP Valerie Boyer and is inspired by a recent report she authored on anorexia and bulemia. She points to the deterimental effect that unrealistic body images can have on adolescents: “Many young people, particularly girls, do not know the difference between the virtual and reality, and can develop complexes from a very young age. In some cases this leads to anorexia or bulimia and very serious health problems.”

More than 50 French politicians have voiced support for the law. If passed, advertisers who break it would be subject to a fine of £30,000 (about $48,200 USD), or 50 percent of the campaign cost.

What do you think: should this law pass? Is Photoshopped body imagery a public health issue?

[via Ars Technica]

via mashable.com

Project Natal - A step in the right direction

2009-09-23T13:30:00.001-04:00

This is just amazing. This is a huge leap forward for the gaming industry, and will only be a stepping stone for the things to come. Well done Microsoft!!!

Microsoft's Project Natal: What does it mean for game industry?

2009-09-02T10:21:00.001-04:00

via news.cnet.com

This is why I love #Microsoft. They take an idea, and improve it to the nth degree... Can't wait to have this for my Xbox.

Is VMware scared of something? #Microsoft and #Citrix don't get a big booth? #virtualization

2009-08-28T16:27:00.001-04:00

-->
--> --> --> --> Among the hundreds of exhibitors that will be pitching and demoing their virtualization technology at next week's VMware-sponsored VMworld conference, two of them -- Citrix (NSDQ:CTXS) and Microsoft (NSDQ:MSFT) -- will be unusually quiet.
Citrix and Microsoft, archrivals of VMware in the fast-growing virtualization market, are complaining that VMware changed the rules for competitors that wish to participate in the VMworld 2009 conference, to be held in San Francisco.
As a result of those changes, the two have found themselves limited to small 10 x 10-foot booths and shut out of the kind of promotional opportunities offered to exhibitors, which would normally pay extra for larger booths and especially for sponsorship activities.
Things were different at VMworld 2008, held last September in Las Vegas.
At that conference, both Microsoft and Citrix were Gold sponsors, according to the VMworld 2008 Web site.
That is not the case this year, said Kim Woodward, vice president of corporate marketing at Citrix.
"It's a proprietary event," Woodward said. "They get to set the rules. That's fine. We're the kind of company that follows the rules.'...'It's interesting that VMware didn't want to take more of our money for a bigger booth and more participation."
VMware declined to respond to questions about Citrix's and Microsoft's appearances at VMworld 2009.
Woodward said Citrix first learned of the change in April after receiving the VMworld prospectus and then sending a completed contract to event management requesting the same level of participation as in 2008, including being a Gold-level sponsor and exhibiting in what she remembers being a 400-square-foot booth.
The event management responded that, because of new guidelines, Citrix could not participate as a sponsor and could only exhibit in a 100-square-foot booth, Woodward said.
Those guidelines are spelled out on page 2 of the prospectus, a copy of which was examined by Channelweb.com, in a paragraph that reads, "To sponsor or exhibit at VMworld, your company must be a VMware partner in good standing in our TAP, Strategic Global Partner or VIP Partner programs. Sponsors or exhibitors that are not VMware partners may be allowed under exception."
VMware's approach to VMworld is different than Citrix's approach to its primary annual conference, Citrix Synergy, Woodward said.
Citrix Synergy, held in May 2009 and scheduled to be held in May 2010, was already very open, and will be even more so next year, Woodward said. For instance, the judges of papers presented at the conference, who have all been Citrix personnel in the past, will include industry and press participants in the future.
Woodward said Citrix plans no retaliation against VMware at Citrix Synergy 2010.
Next: Microsoft "To Make The Best Of It"

via crn.com

C'mon VMware. Sure in 2008 you were far ahead of Microsoft when it came to virtualization. With the release of Hyper-V R2, not so much. But let's face it, when it comes to the future of Virtualization my take is that there will be a mixed environment. I don't see an entire Hyper-V environment or an entire VMware environment.

New PS3 Ads - job well done Sony!!!

2009-08-28T14:02:00.001-04:00

via gizmodo.com

Save Thousands Moving to Microsoft #Virtualization @virtualization

2009-08-27T14:20:00.001-04:00

REDMOND, Wash., Aug. 27 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Microsoft Corp. today announced that some business customers are saving on average $170,000 (U.S.) when they switch to Microsoft virtualization software from VMware Inc. software. Customers are turning to Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V and Microsoft System Center management tools to help reduce energy consumption, hardware costs and recurring licensing costs, and improve their overall management of virtual and nonvirtual applications, servers and computers.

(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20000822/MSFTLOGO)

Customers that have switched to Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V, System Center and other Microsoft virtualization solutions include Avanade; Brick Township Board of Education, New Jersey (U.S.); Convergent Computing; Crutchfield Corp.; INA (Croatia); Ingersoll Rand plc; Jackson Energy Authority; Mamut ASA (Norway); the National Concert Hall of Ireland; NetBenefits (U.K.); PoundHost Internet Ltd. (U.K.); Siemens Standard Drives (U.K.); T2 Systems Inc.; Voith IT (Germany); and University of Miami.

Strong customer adoption of server and application virtualization software helped drive growth of the Microsoft System Center suite of management tools. Microsoft recently reported that the company's management division revenues grew more than 30 percent from 2008 to 2009 and is now at approximately $1 billion in annual sales.

Industry consulting firm Information Technology Intelligence Corp. recently published its "2009 Global Virtualization Deployment Trends Survey" of more than 700 IT professionals. The results showed that Microsoft made big year-over-year market share gains across small and midsize businesses and enterprise organizations. The survey showed current use of Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V is 32 percent. The survey also showed that 59 percent of the respondents plan to adopt Windows Server 2008 R2 Hyper-V in the next 12 to 18 months.

"The light switch has gone on for customers, and they realize they no longer have to pay a virtualization tax with VMware that creates an isolated, virtual island within their IT departments," said David Greschler, director of virtualization and management marketing in the Server and Tools Business at Microsoft. "The System Center management suite and Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V provide a cost-effective, interoperable and scalable enterprise-class virtualization solution. As a result, more and more customers are switching to the Microsoft solution, and some are saving on average $170,000 when they switch."

Customers Switch to Microsoft Virtualization

PoundHost is a fast-growing hosting service provider in Maidenhead, England, that embraced server virtualization as a way to curb hardware costs and lower hosting prices. However, the high cost of VMware software and lack of physical management tools hurt PoundHost's competitiveness and ability to manage its entire infrastructure. PoundHost turned to Windows Server 2008 R2 Hyper-V technology to help reduce licensing costs by 80 percent and add new services. With the addition of Microsoft System Center management tools, automated server provisioning has reduced IT costs by more than $50,000 annually. The dramatic increase in virtual machine sales and reduced licensing costs has enabled PoundHost to increase profitability by 55 percent.

"We could use VMware tools to manage the virtual machines, but we wanted to offer server monitoring, backup and software-update services to increase our services and revenue," said Matthew Munson, group technical director, PoundHost Internet Ltd. and BlueSquare Data Group Services Ltd. "VMware didn't have a suite of tools to do these things. The Microsoft System Center products work with Hyper-V, so we could manage and provision servers much more easily than we could with VMware."

Crutchfield, based in Charlottesville, Va., is a leading consumer electronics retailer with a mail-order catalog and e-commerce Web site. The company's IT staff turned to virtualization to cut datacenter costs, improve IT staff productivity, and promote business agility. However, its VMware-based solution limited its server consolidation ratios, and a software upgrade would have cost $44,000. Instead, Crutchfield deployed a cost-effective solution using Windows Server 2008 with Hyper-V technology and the Microsoft System Center management suite. Today, Crutchfield has cut datacenter heating output by 50 percent and reduced physical servers by 30 percent. The IT staff uses Microsoft System Center to manage both physical and virtual servers, boosting IT staff productivity by 40 percent.

"We had so many reasons for building out our virtualization solution, but with the VMware-based platform we couldn't make any headway," said Craig Vanhuss, system administrator, Enterprise System Group at Crutchfield. "Since deploying Hyper-V, IT has shown a new level of agility and responsiveness. Thanks to our Microsoft virtualization solution, we are meeting the needs of the business while minimizing costs."

More information about how to begin cutting costs, including case studies on PoundHost and Crutchfield, can be found at http://www.microsoft.com/virtualization . Microsoft product and solution experts at VMworld 2009 can be followed via Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/virtualization or by monitoring the hash tag #MS_Virt.

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

SOURCE Microsoft Corp.

via money.cnn.com

Virtualization has never been easier. Hyper-V is just another role in Windows Server 2008 (including R2). Once the role is installed, it's just point and click to setup, configure and get a Virtual Machine (VM) running. On top of that is the cost savings in comparison to other vendor products. Microsoft not only offers features that are directly comparable to VMware in their R2 release, they also go one step further and offer the ability to manage your physical and virtual infrastructure - this includes managing VMware virtual machines. This is done by the use of System Center Virtual Machine Manager. Free downloads are available from Hyper-V Server, or Windows Server 2008/R2 which includes Hyper-v.