Businesses having second thoughts about Vista
Click title for source at ComputerWorld.com…
Gregg Keizer
July 30, 2007
Fewer businesses are now planning to move to Windows Vista than seven months ago, according to a survey by patch management vendor PatchLink Corp., while more said they will either stick with the Windows they have, or turn to Linux or Mac OS X.
In a just-released poll of more than 250 of its clients, PatchLink noted that only 2% said they are already running Vista, while another 9% said they planned to roll out Vista in the next three months. A landslide majority, 87%, said they would stay with their existing version(s) of Windows.
Those numbers contrasted with a similar survey the Scottsdale, Ariz.-based vendor published in December 2006. At the time, 43% said they had plans to move to Vista while just 53% planned to keep what Windows they had.
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July 31, 2007
Business: Windows Vista Starts To Meet Business Realities
July 30, 2007
Business: Microsoft Conquers China… Or so it would seem; No Mention of Linux Stats
How Microsoft beat Linux in China and what it means for freedom, justice, and the price of software
Click title for source at TechRepublic.com…
Jason Hiner
July 27th, 2007
Who remembers Red Flag Linux? Born during the dot-com boom and officially financed and adopted by the Chinese government, Red Flag Linux was supposed to be China’s answer for avoiding the double-team of Windows and Microsoft Office that dominates the rest of the world’s PCs. In some circles, the potential spread of Red Flag Linux in the world’s most populated nation was even hailed as a critical sign that Microsoft was not going to be able to spread its domination of the software market to the rest of the world.
However, Red Flag Linux has turned out to be little more than a key bargaining chip in a high stakes game of commerce between the Chinese government and the world’s largest software maker. Thanks to some major concessions on source code and a precipitous price drop, the Chinese government has now thoroughly embraced Windows and Office. And thanks to a major about-face in the way that it deals with piracy, Microsoft has also won over the Chinese people.
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July 27, 2007
CodeProject; Tools & Code: JavaScript Reflection… An interesting approach…
JavaScript Reflection
Click title for source at CodeProject.com…
Introduction
I was writing an application for creating a manifest for JavaScript. I was unable to do it using DOM; instead I wrote my own application for parsing JavaScript files. It is little tough to peek into JavaScript objects, initial I could only get the members and fields using for-in. but that was not enough, what if someone stored a file locally and I have to write code to execute it, I would be able to get only the members, just executing members without passing the required input parameter if any will not work. The code below will parse the file and give me the options as to what input is required and if something is returned what it could possibly be returning except primitive types. Knowing these things in advance makes it easier to execute the code. Well it worked for me; let’s see how it works for you. I know many people are looking for something like this.
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Business: “Open source Thunderbird email client looks for new nest”
Open source Thunderbird email client looks for new nest
Click title for source at DesktopLinux.com…
Steven J. Vaughan Nichols
Jul. 27, 2007
It’s no secret that Mozilla Corp., the company behind Firefox, Thunderbird, Sunbird, and other open-source Internet programs, has made Firefox its No. 1 priority.
Mozilla CEO Mitchell Baker is now admitting that the popular email client Thunderbird has taken second place, and she’s now looking beyond Mozilla to find another way to advance the program.
In a recent blog, Baker starts with a mea culpa.”Mozilla has been supporting Thunderbird as a product since the beginning of the [Mozilla] Foundation. The result is a good, solid product that provides an open alternative for desktop mail. However, the Thunderbird effort is dwarfed by the enormous energy and community focused on the Web, Firefox and the ecosystem around it. As a result, Mozilla doesn’t focus on Thunderbird as much as we do browsing and Firefox and we don’t expect this to change in the foreseeable future.”
The solution? “We have concluded that we should find a new, separate organizational setting for Thunderbird; one that allows the Thunderbird community to determine its own destiny,” said Baker.
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Windows: XP-SP3 is Coming!!!
Microsoft Confirms Windows XP SP3
Click title for source at RedDevNews.com…
by Keith Ward
26 July 2007
The second service pack (SP 2) for Windows XP was a watershed release. Dropped in August 2004, it addressed a number of issues on the security side: turning Windows Firewall on, rather than off, by default, and including a pop-up blocker in Internet Explorer were two of the major changes. Those upgrades made a big difference in the public perception of XP, and sales, which had been steady, took off.
As analyst Matt Rosoff of independent research company Directions on Microsoft said for a recent story, “People came on board with XP SP2. It’s efficient; all the drivers are there; it works as it’s supposed to work. It’s been out five years now.”
Indeed, it works so well that it’s cutting into Windows Vista business. Given XP’s continued strength, it makes sense that Microsoft continues to support it, and it appears it will do so with SP3, which is scheduled to make an appearance in the first half of next year.
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July 25, 2007
Linux: Canonical (Ubuntu) Releases “Landscape”; Web-Based Management Tool
New “Landscape” Ideal for Large Deployments
Click title to go to Ubuntu site…
UBUNTU LIVE, Portland, OR, July 22, 2007 – Canonical announced today the availability of Landscape, its web-based systems management tool for Ubuntu servers and desktops.
Available to Canonical’s support subscribers, Landscape provides a key tool for the growing number of businesses that want to take advantage of the ease of use of Ubuntu and have previously seen system administration or support as a hurdle.
“For our support customers this is a huge value-add,” said Steve George, director of Support and Services at Canonical. “Landscape is an enterprise-ready systems management tool that is as easy to use as everything else built with the Ubuntu philosophy. Any business deploying Ubuntu on multiple servers or desktops can instantly benefit from increased productivity and reduced costs of management.”
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Linux, Business: HP To Offer Linux Machines
Next major PC company to go Linux will be HP
Click title for source at DesktopLinux.com…
Steven J. Vaughan Nichols
Jul. 24, 2007
People used to think the very idea that a major PC vendor would offer desktop Linux was beyond a joke. It was, as Vizzini from The Princess Bride would have said, “Inconceivable!”
But, as events turned out, to quote Inigo Montoya from the same movie, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
HP will soon be joining Dell in offering at least one Linux desktop line in its SKU sales listing. Here’s why I believe this.
First, Dell successfully broke the Windows-only wall when it added Ubuntu Linux 7.04 to three systems in its consumer line in May. While Dell hasn’t released any sales numbers, its Linux sales must be doing well. You don’t start offering Ubuntu on another brand-new laptop line and announce that you’ll soon be selling Ubuntu to SMBs (small to midsize businesses) and internationally unless you’re making money from it.
Offering Linux once could have just been a good PR move. Expanding the Linux offering means Dell must actually be selling units.
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.NET: Visual Studio 2008-Beta2 About To Be Released… Keep tabs on it at the MS-Site below…
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Visual Studio 2008 (formerly known as Visual Studio code name “Orcas”) delivers on Microsoft’s vision of enabling developers and development teams to rapidly create connected applications with compelling user experiences for Windows Vista, the 2007 Microsoft Office system, mobile devices and the Web. Watch this space for news of Beta 2, which will release later this summer. Read More… |
July 24, 2007
CodeProject: “Rich OutlookBar in XP and Vista style”
Rich OutlookBar in XP and Vista style
Click title for source at CodeProject.com…
By Jan Geerinck
Introduction
I’ve always enjoyed using a control that behaves like the OutlookBar in Outlook. After testing and creating this, I knew that if I wanted other people to work intuitively with my programs, the OutlookBar control must look and work like the one in Outlook.
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