August 13, 2007 (Computerworld) -- Microsoft Corp. last week released a pair of Windows Vista updates that had leaked onto the Internet at the end of July, but the company didn’t say when it will begin pushing them to users via Windows Update.
One of the updates is pegged as a performance booster for the new operating system, while the other addresses reliability issues. They include a long list of nonsecurity bug fixes, including one to improve the speed of Vista’s wake-from-hibernation function and another that’s designed to more quickly calculate the time needed to copy or move large directories.
In addition, several fixes are intended to resolve compatibility glitches between the operating system and third-party video drivers.
A Microsoft spokeswoman said the updates will become available through Windows Update, the software vendor’s automated patching service, “at a later date.”
When the previews of the updates found their way onto the Internet, there was speculation that they were related to the upcoming Vista Service Pack 1 and that they might even be harbingers of SP1’s release.
That doesn’t appear to be the case, but Microsoft confirmed that it has released early code for both Vista SP1 and the long-delayed Windows XP Service Pack 3 to small, invitation-only groups of testers.
So far, Microsoft has committed only to providing a beta release of Vista SP1 sometime this year while consistently downplaying the service pack’s importance. However, many companies appear to be waiting for SP1 before deploying the new operating system.
Samir Bhavnani, an analyst at NPD Group Inc.’s Current Analysis West unit in San Diego, said that many of Microsoft’s large corporate customers likely won’t shift to Vista for years. But SP1 is an important step in the process of spurring users to upgrade, Bhavnani added. “SP1 will get a lot more businesses to adopt Vista than the version that exists today,” he predicted.
Windows XP SP3 already has a tortured history. Last October, Microsoft delayed SP3’s release until the first half of 2008 — which would be more than a year after Vista’s launch and about three and a half years after XP SP2 became available. And last week, the software vendor described even the 2008 release date for SP3 as “preliminary.”
-- Gregg Keizer, with Elizabeth Montalbano of the IDG News Service.
Monday, August 13, 2007
DirectX SDK bug means bad news for IE users
August 13, 2007 (Computerworld) -- The DirectX software development kit Microsoft issued in 2002 contains a critical vulnerability, a Polish researcher claimed as he released attack code that can hijack Windows PCs by tempting Internet Explorer users to malicious sites.
According to Krystian Kloskowski, who posted exploit code on the milw0rm.com site, the FlashPix ActiveX control included with DirectX Media 6.0 SDK contains a buffer overflow bug that can be exploited. More importantly, according to an advisory issued by US-CERT on Sunday, "because the FlashPix ActiveX control is marked 'Safe for Scripting,' Internet Explorer can be used as an attack vector for this vulnerability."
Internet Explorer 6 (IE 6) can be leveraged to exploit the flaw, noted Kloskowski, but he did not say if the newer IE 7 is also a workable attack vector. For its part, Microsoft acknowledged it is investigating Kloskowski's claim but it did not answer a query about whether IE 7 users are at risk. A company spokeswoman, however, said Microsoft would provide a patch if necessary and added: "We're currently unaware of any attacks trying to use the claimed vulnerability or of customer impact."
The likely attack scenario, said US-CERT, would be a malicious site that includes the exploit, and spam that tries to dupe users into clicking on a link to that site. Alternately, an HTML e-mail message -- with the exploit buried in the HTML -- could also be used. In that case, infection would occur as soon as the recipient viewed the message.
Danish bug tracker Secunia rated the vulnerability as "highly critical," its second-highest threat ranking in its five-step scoring system. US-CERT, meanwhile, recommended taking the somewhat-extreme steps of either disabling all ActiveX controls or setting what's called a "kill bit" using the registry to disarm only the FlashPix control. US-CERT's warning included the string to add to the Windows registry to set the FlashPix kill bit.
Although Microsoft has added additional security features to both IE 6 and IE 7 over the years to clamp down on threats posed by buggy ActiveX controls, they remain a problem. Late last month, for example, Yahoo Widgets, a platform that runs small, Web-based gadgets on a Windows machine's desktop, was tagged with a critical vulnerability in an associated ActiveX control.
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I personally Use FireFox because IMO its safer to use, and faster. This helps me keep everything organized and it even has its own spell checker!
According to Krystian Kloskowski, who posted exploit code on the milw0rm.com site, the FlashPix ActiveX control included with DirectX Media 6.0 SDK contains a buffer overflow bug that can be exploited. More importantly, according to an advisory issued by US-CERT on Sunday, "because the FlashPix ActiveX control is marked 'Safe for Scripting,' Internet Explorer can be used as an attack vector for this vulnerability."
Internet Explorer 6 (IE 6) can be leveraged to exploit the flaw, noted Kloskowski, but he did not say if the newer IE 7 is also a workable attack vector. For its part, Microsoft acknowledged it is investigating Kloskowski's claim but it did not answer a query about whether IE 7 users are at risk. A company spokeswoman, however, said Microsoft would provide a patch if necessary and added: "We're currently unaware of any attacks trying to use the claimed vulnerability or of customer impact."
The likely attack scenario, said US-CERT, would be a malicious site that includes the exploit, and spam that tries to dupe users into clicking on a link to that site. Alternately, an HTML e-mail message -- with the exploit buried in the HTML -- could also be used. In that case, infection would occur as soon as the recipient viewed the message.
Danish bug tracker Secunia rated the vulnerability as "highly critical," its second-highest threat ranking in its five-step scoring system. US-CERT, meanwhile, recommended taking the somewhat-extreme steps of either disabling all ActiveX controls or setting what's called a "kill bit" using the registry to disarm only the FlashPix control. US-CERT's warning included the string to add to the Windows registry to set the FlashPix kill bit.
Although Microsoft has added additional security features to both IE 6 and IE 7 over the years to clamp down on threats posed by buggy ActiveX controls, they remain a problem. Late last month, for example, Yahoo Widgets, a platform that runs small, Web-based gadgets on a Windows machine's desktop, was tagged with a critical vulnerability in an associated ActiveX control.
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I personally Use FireFox because IMO its safer to use, and faster. This helps me keep everything organized and it even has its own spell checker!
Saturday, August 11, 2007
Inactivity
Sorry for my inactivity. I have been to a few places and haven't had the time to post a couple things. I will be back again Monday. This will be only last a few more days and shouldn't take too long. Keep a eye on the blog for some special offers about free sites and some new tools and news coming out in the tech world. Wont be too long till we are back at full strength.
Get Free Cash
Skeptical Much?
It might sound like a get rich scheme, but it really isn't (unless you're super devoted into it). I've been a member of CashCrate for a long time (since August 2006, which makes it officially one year). And now, I've realized that I have made about $223. Ok, ok, i know it doesn't sound like much, but I haven't really been "dedicated" to this. Let me explain.
I started really small, maybe only $5 dollars a month. But slowly (and surely), I started to accumulate many referrals. This ever so slightly boosted my income by a few bucks. But now it has been a year, and I have 9 Active referrals, 53 First Level referrals, and 52 Second Level referrals. This is something I've never thought of accomplishing!
Only recently, I've make a lot of money (especially for a teen who doesn't work :D), which was a one time amount of $130. I was extremely happy and was ecstatic. This was probably the point I started raking in the referrals. All you have to do is show someone that it actually works! You try to persuade people into joining, but they're always skeptical. They're always thinking "what if this is a scam, what if this doesn't work for me?" Well, what they have to lose? All you're doing is completing small surveys and joining sites with your spam email accounts. Maybe the maximum time you're going to spend per offer is around 2 minutes. The offers average around $.40. Lets say you take 1 hour a day. Simple eh? So 60 / 2 = 30. So 30 offers a hour. 30 x .4 = 12 dollars. Not bad! So every day for one month.... 30 x 12 = 360 dollars. Wow, one hour a day for a month yields 360 dollars? Nice!
Lets apply the referrals part of the equation.
Hold up, don't stop there. Now you have 360 dollars, you can tell others, "hey, this thing works, and you should try it!". Now slide in your referral link (By the way, you make 20% of what they earn). So they do the same thing, one hour a day for a month, and they get around 360 a month. Guess what, in addition to your 360 dollars a month, you get an extra $72. So your monthly total would be $432. So more referrals, is equal to more money. Now, your referral will get another referral and lets say they also make the same $360 a month. You get 10% of that Second level/degree of referral. Monthly total would come out to be $468.
In conclusion.
Wow, not bad for investing a little of your time a day. Some people report of making thousands a month since they have over hundreds of first level "active" referrals. If they can do it, why can't you?
Sign up now!
http://www.cashcrate.com/310528
Do me a favor and click my link! <(^.^)> Thanks :D
It might sound like a get rich scheme, but it really isn't (unless you're super devoted into it). I've been a member of CashCrate for a long time (since August 2006, which makes it officially one year). And now, I've realized that I have made about $223. Ok, ok, i know it doesn't sound like much, but I haven't really been "dedicated" to this. Let me explain.
I started really small, maybe only $5 dollars a month. But slowly (and surely), I started to accumulate many referrals. This ever so slightly boosted my income by a few bucks. But now it has been a year, and I have 9 Active referrals, 53 First Level referrals, and 52 Second Level referrals. This is something I've never thought of accomplishing!
Only recently, I've make a lot of money (especially for a teen who doesn't work :D), which was a one time amount of $130. I was extremely happy and was ecstatic. This was probably the point I started raking in the referrals. All you have to do is show someone that it actually works! You try to persuade people into joining, but they're always skeptical. They're always thinking "what if this is a scam, what if this doesn't work for me?" Well, what they have to lose? All you're doing is completing small surveys and joining sites with your spam email accounts. Maybe the maximum time you're going to spend per offer is around 2 minutes. The offers average around $.40. Lets say you take 1 hour a day. Simple eh? So 60 / 2 = 30. So 30 offers a hour. 30 x .4 = 12 dollars. Not bad! So every day for one month.... 30 x 12 = 360 dollars. Wow, one hour a day for a month yields 360 dollars? Nice!
Lets apply the referrals part of the equation.
Hold up, don't stop there. Now you have 360 dollars, you can tell others, "hey, this thing works, and you should try it!". Now slide in your referral link (By the way, you make 20% of what they earn). So they do the same thing, one hour a day for a month, and they get around 360 a month. Guess what, in addition to your 360 dollars a month, you get an extra $72. So your monthly total would be $432. So more referrals, is equal to more money. Now, your referral will get another referral and lets say they also make the same $360 a month. You get 10% of that Second level/degree of referral. Monthly total would come out to be $468.
In conclusion.
Wow, not bad for investing a little of your time a day. Some people report of making thousands a month since they have over hundreds of first level "active" referrals. If they can do it, why can't you?
Sign up now!
http://www.cashcrate.com/310528
Do me a favor and click my link! <(^.^)> Thanks :D
Windows XP: The OS that won't die?
(Computerworld) -- Microsoft Corp. has had to create a new build of Windows XP Professional for computer makers because the six-year-old operating system's continued popularity has nearly exhausted the supply of product activation keys.
The new build, dubbed SP2c, includes no fixes or feature changes, but was created simply to address the shrinking pool of product keys. XP Pro SP2c, which has been released to manufacturing, will be made available to resellers and system builders next month, said Microsoft.
"Due to the longevity of Windows XP Professional, it has become necessary to produce more product keys for system builders in order to support the continued availability of Windows XP Professional through the scheduled system builder channel end-of-life date," wrote the Microsoft system builder team on its blog yesterday.
Previously, Microsoft has set Windows XP's EOL for retailers and resellers as Jan. 31, 2008, and for small-scale systems builders a year after that.
"SP2c will be released into the System Builder channel in September to provide system builders with a new, extended range of product keys," the system builder team said. The updated build applies only to Windows XP Professional; XP Home, for instance, is not affected.
The move shouldn't come as a surprise; even Microsoft has predicted continuing strong sales of Windows XP. Last month, the company's chief financial officer said that he tweaked the fiscal year 2008 forecast to account for XP's longevity. Rather than count on an 85/15 split in sales between Vista and XP, said Chris Liddell, Microsoft now expects a 78/22 split, an increase of nearly 50% in anticipated XP sales.
Other signs of the not-dead-yet operating system's vigor have included retreats by manufacturers like Dell Inc. from earlier Vista-only policies. In April, for example, Dell again began offering Windows XP as an option to consumers. It had already done the same thing for small business customers.
The new build, dubbed SP2c, includes no fixes or feature changes, but was created simply to address the shrinking pool of product keys. XP Pro SP2c, which has been released to manufacturing, will be made available to resellers and system builders next month, said Microsoft.
"Due to the longevity of Windows XP Professional, it has become necessary to produce more product keys for system builders in order to support the continued availability of Windows XP Professional through the scheduled system builder channel end-of-life date," wrote the Microsoft system builder team on its blog yesterday.
Previously, Microsoft has set Windows XP's EOL for retailers and resellers as Jan. 31, 2008, and for small-scale systems builders a year after that.
"SP2c will be released into the System Builder channel in September to provide system builders with a new, extended range of product keys," the system builder team said. The updated build applies only to Windows XP Professional; XP Home, for instance, is not affected.
The move shouldn't come as a surprise; even Microsoft has predicted continuing strong sales of Windows XP. Last month, the company's chief financial officer said that he tweaked the fiscal year 2008 forecast to account for XP's longevity. Rather than count on an 85/15 split in sales between Vista and XP, said Chris Liddell, Microsoft now expects a 78/22 split, an increase of nearly 50% in anticipated XP sales.
Other signs of the not-dead-yet operating system's vigor have included retreats by manufacturers like Dell Inc. from earlier Vista-only policies. In April, for example, Dell again began offering Windows XP as an option to consumers. It had already done the same thing for small business customers.
'Vista Capable' suit against Microsoft allowed to proceed
August 10, 2007 (IDG News Service) --
A judge in Washington state has denied Microsoft Corp.'s request to dismiss all claims in a suit alleging that the "Windows Vista Capable" stickers the company put on PCs violated consumer protection laws and were an example of deceptive business practices, allowing the case to move ahead toward a jury trial.
In the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington in Seattle, Judge Marsha J. Pechman dismissed one of four claims by plaintiff Dianne L. Kelley in a lawsuit against Microsoft over the stickers, which Microsoft -- in conjunction with PC makers -- affixed to PCs that were sold before Windows Vista itself was available to give consumers an idea about which machines could run the operating system.
The suit also calls into question the fairness of Microsoft's "Express Upgrade" coupon program that allowed users to upgrade to Vista from XP machines for little or no cost after buying a "Windows Vista Capable" computer.
According to court papers, Pechman is allowing two of the plaintiff's claims to move into the trial phase of the case. One alleges that Microsoft violated the Consumer Protection Act by engaging in unfair or deceptive business practices by affixing the labels to PCs without telling consumers that they might have to spend more money for a machine to run a premium edition of the operating system. Another alleges that Microsoft unjustly received payment for Windows XP licenses and upgrades from Vista Basic to Vista Premium because of their practices.
Pechman dismissed one claim, which called Microsoft's placement of "Windows Vista Capable" stickers on PCs that could not run all versions of Windows Vista a "breach of contract." Another claim -- that a "Windows Vista Capable" sticker represents a written warranty under federal law -- has been taken under advisement by the judge, which means she will decide later how to proceed on that claim, Microsoft said.
The case is scheduled to go to trial on Oct. 8.
Microsoft's hardware partners began shipping PCs with the "Windows Vista Capable" logo in April 2006 as a way for people to know that if they purchased a new Windows XP PC before the new operating system was available, their machines would be ready to run Vista. However, the designation was potentially confusing, because a PC with the label was guaranteed to run only the least expensive, most basic version of Vista, Windows Home Basic.
A month later, Microsoft launched a Web site to explain the hardware requirements for different versions of Vista, as well as a new PC designation called "Windows Vista Premium Ready," which the company used to label PCs that could run other editions -- such as Vista Home Premium and Vista Ultimate -- with more features than Vista Basic. Microsoft also provided coupons for people who purchased these PCs to upgrade to the appropriate version of Vista either for free or for little cost once the operating system was available.
Kelley filed her suit against Microsoft in March as a class-action case, but whether the suit applies to an entire class of people with similar complaints has not yet been determined.
Kelley, a resident of Camano Island, Wash., purchased a PC with a "Windows Vista Capable" sticker affixed to it last November. In her complaint, she said that Microsoft was "deceptive" in its failure to indicate that the PC lacked the "Premium Ready" designation. Kelley also claimed that the upgrade she received for her PC only allowed her to upgrade to Vista Home Basic, which offered "few ... advantages over the existing XP operating system." Therefore, consumers were duped into thinking they would receive coupons for a "dramatically new" operating system when they could not, according to her complaint.
Microsoft spokesman Guy Esnouf said the company is pleased that one of the claims in Kelley's complaint has been dismissed and looks forward to proving its case in court.
Reprinted with permission from
A judge in Washington state has denied Microsoft Corp.'s request to dismiss all claims in a suit alleging that the "Windows Vista Capable" stickers the company put on PCs violated consumer protection laws and were an example of deceptive business practices, allowing the case to move ahead toward a jury trial.
In the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington in Seattle, Judge Marsha J. Pechman dismissed one of four claims by plaintiff Dianne L. Kelley in a lawsuit against Microsoft over the stickers, which Microsoft -- in conjunction with PC makers -- affixed to PCs that were sold before Windows Vista itself was available to give consumers an idea about which machines could run the operating system.
The suit also calls into question the fairness of Microsoft's "Express Upgrade" coupon program that allowed users to upgrade to Vista from XP machines for little or no cost after buying a "Windows Vista Capable" computer.
According to court papers, Pechman is allowing two of the plaintiff's claims to move into the trial phase of the case. One alleges that Microsoft violated the Consumer Protection Act by engaging in unfair or deceptive business practices by affixing the labels to PCs without telling consumers that they might have to spend more money for a machine to run a premium edition of the operating system. Another alleges that Microsoft unjustly received payment for Windows XP licenses and upgrades from Vista Basic to Vista Premium because of their practices.
Pechman dismissed one claim, which called Microsoft's placement of "Windows Vista Capable" stickers on PCs that could not run all versions of Windows Vista a "breach of contract." Another claim -- that a "Windows Vista Capable" sticker represents a written warranty under federal law -- has been taken under advisement by the judge, which means she will decide later how to proceed on that claim, Microsoft said.
The case is scheduled to go to trial on Oct. 8.
Microsoft's hardware partners began shipping PCs with the "Windows Vista Capable" logo in April 2006 as a way for people to know that if they purchased a new Windows XP PC before the new operating system was available, their machines would be ready to run Vista. However, the designation was potentially confusing, because a PC with the label was guaranteed to run only the least expensive, most basic version of Vista, Windows Home Basic.
A month later, Microsoft launched a Web site to explain the hardware requirements for different versions of Vista, as well as a new PC designation called "Windows Vista Premium Ready," which the company used to label PCs that could run other editions -- such as Vista Home Premium and Vista Ultimate -- with more features than Vista Basic. Microsoft also provided coupons for people who purchased these PCs to upgrade to the appropriate version of Vista either for free or for little cost once the operating system was available.
Kelley filed her suit against Microsoft in March as a class-action case, but whether the suit applies to an entire class of people with similar complaints has not yet been determined.
Kelley, a resident of Camano Island, Wash., purchased a PC with a "Windows Vista Capable" sticker affixed to it last November. In her complaint, she said that Microsoft was "deceptive" in its failure to indicate that the PC lacked the "Premium Ready" designation. Kelley also claimed that the upgrade she received for her PC only allowed her to upgrade to Vista Home Basic, which offered "few ... advantages over the existing XP operating system." Therefore, consumers were duped into thinking they would receive coupons for a "dramatically new" operating system when they could not, according to her complaint.
Microsoft spokesman Guy Esnouf said the company is pleased that one of the claims in Kelley's complaint has been dismissed and looks forward to proving its case in court.
Reprinted with permission from
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