InfoWorld: Application development reports “Judge questions impact of Microsoft settlement. WASHINGTON – A U.S. district court judge on Wednesday praised Microsoft for efforts to improve technical documentation for its communications protocols, but questioned the effect in the marketplace of her final judgment in the U.S. government’s antitrust case against the software giant.”
Archive | February, 2005
Microsoft kills another word: interoperable joins innovation
Computerworld News reports “Microsoft’s Gates vows ‘interoperable’ software. In a lengthy letter to customers yesterday, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates spelled out a new mission for his company’s software: better interoperability. ”
That’s just silly. Microsoft got into the market interoperating with IBM LAN Manager, then Novell networking. Until Microsoft actually shows they are acting differently, this is just a rehash of “Embrace, Enhance, Extend, Extinguish.” Microsoft is using their marketing machine to kill the meaning of another word, just as they distorted the “right to innovate” to mean “using monopolistic practices to dominate a marketplace and crush competition,” they are trying to redefine “interoperate” to mean “Microsoft can access everything but no one can access them.”
Recently, Microsoft was embroiled in a controversy over the “openness” of their Office XML. (HINT: Don’t bother, go with OpenOffice.org’s soon-to-be-OASIS-standard format. Tools are out there.) The resolution was for Microsoft to issue a new license for their XML that effectively limits others to read and not write the format, and also a poison-pill requirement that software contain a clause specifying the technologies are licensed from Microsoft, a requirement which prevents the formats from being used in GPL software.
It is interesting to note that Microsoft is trying this tactic. Let’s see what happens next.
Fat Tuesday followed by Patch Wednesday
Computerworld News reports Thirteen patches planned in next Microsoft security update. “Microsoft has telegraphed its plans to release 13 security patches as part of its regular monthly security update next Tuesday.”
Details on MS05-04 through -015 include critical patches to prevent remote code execution in Internet Explorer, OLE, COM, the DHTML editing control, the License Logging system, PNG processing, the Windows Shell, Sharepoint, ASP.NET and Microsoft Office. Microsoft Bob appears to be unaffected. It is the seventh week of 2005.
Novell PSA
Novell published this Public Service Announcement [FLASH]
Learn something new every day…
Ed Lawson did a great presentation on CUPS, the Common UNIX Printing System, last night at CentraLUG. Christopher Schmidt did a great job of taking meeting notes when he wasn’t showing us how he programs his cell phone in Python via Bluetooth from his PowerBook. Really. Cool.
The Python SIG also held a session in the hour before the main meeting, and we’ve tentatively agreed on the 3rd Wednesday of the month as the time for the SIG to get together. Location still TBD – we may use the NHTI in Concord, but are also looking at Manchester as a more central location.
Thursday night the Peterborough LUG, also known as MonadLUG, will be holding its first session in a while, coming back from a period of somnolence thanks to their new coordinator, Guy Pardoe. Looking forward to the meeting!
Podcasting De-Mythologized
Dan Gillmor on Grassroots Journalism, Etc. posts “Podcasting De-Mythologized. Lisa Williams has done a smart, 4-minute video explainer about podcasting… Now, if we could only give the genre a more accurate name. It’s about sending MP3s to devices of various kinds, not solely the iPod. Watch Williams’ piece anyway. ”
I’m a big fan of The Gillmor Gang, which is a weekly talking heads program featuring some sharp IT analysts. The last show, with guest Dan Bricklin, was excellent. I fear it may be their last, though, as IT Conversations host Doug Kaye is off on vacation for two weeks, and Doc Searls points out that Steve Gillmor left this rather vague “be back later” message. Hope they return soon.
While they call it “POD-casting,” it’s just audio; non-iPodders like myself can listen on their Macs and PCs, their MP3 Players, or do like I do and burn the MP3 to CD and listen in the car. Someone on a recent Gillmor Gang made fun of the idea of making a CD, but it’s actually pretty easy, simple and pretty cheap. I get CDs at five cents a piece on sale in bulk spindles from Staples or the big box electronics stores and I can listen pretty much anywhere. No batteries to buy or recharge, no FM transmitters or earbuds to fumble with. Dan Gillmor is right that the name is misleading. It might be better to talk about them as “talk shows” or “internet radio shows” or something. Optionally using RSS as a distribution mechanism, podcasting is like TIVO®-for-audio: it records all by itself in the background and just shows up. A great idea.
Slashdot: EU Software Patents Dead Again
Good news Slashdot: reports EU Software Patents Dead Again.
Good. Patents are for physical inventions. Copyright is for code. You should be able to protect, with a copyright, your expression of an idea in code. You should not be able to lock up, with a patent, an idea for your exclusive use.
DLSLUG tonight: Hacking the Linksys WRT54G with Sveasoft firmware
I’ll be presenting "Hacking the LinkSys WRT54G with Sveasoft firmware" tonight to the Dartmouth-Lake Sunapee Linux User Group, a reprise of my November presentation to the Central NH Linux User Group, both chapters of the Greater New Hampshire Linux User Group
The presentation was edited with the Taco HTML Editor,
http://www.tacosw.com on the Mac and with
SciTE, http://www.scintilla.org/; on Windows and Linux. Interoperability is Good.
The templates for the document and instructions on their use are from the Simple Standards-based Slide Show System, S5 developed by Eric Meyer and available at http://www.meyerweb.com/eric/tools/s5/ under a Creative Commons license. Thanks, Eric!
Is resistance futile?
Hide Your IPod, Here Comes Bill. Apple’s music player apparently is wildly popular on Microsoft’s campus. Thousands of Microsofties own the devices, to the great irritation of management. By Leander Kahney. [Wired News]