14 DAY TRIAL // Bad news for hackers worldwide, it looks like it's going all downhill for them from here on end with their attempts to exploit the Windows Vista activation process. Two updates that will target and disable those back-doors will be included in the first Service Pack (SP1) for the latest version of Microsoft's Operating System. The company will also be making changes in the way it will differentiate user experience for genuine and counterfeit systems on the bias of the feedback that it will receive from customers and partners.
That being said, Monday was a glimpse of light over the subject, as Mike Sievert, Corporate Vice President, Windows Product Marketing took the time to answer some of the questions that had piled up on his doorstep. He addressed the issue of piracy as a whole, underlining the severity of it throughout most industries that have strong intellectual property components. "Software pirates are becoming more sophisticated - not just with their ability to produce high-quality fakes, but in their distribution systems and international reach. Research from the Business Software Alliance (BSA) estimates that annually, 35 percent of software in use worldwide is not paid for, and in certain countries that rate can top 80 percent."
While that's a lot, Sievert added that he was happy to say that the numbers showed that piracy was actually sliding down a slope at that moment, albeit that the angle of the incline was just small. A 5 percent increase in the revenue growth of Windows desktop OEM is quite a lot, if you ask me. And he said that even after the Service Pack would have addressed the two known issues, user feedback would still be very important to the Redmond company as it would further help with the tweaking and improving the overall experience. It "will continue to serve as the bar we measure ourselves against in evaluating our anti-piracy efforts and how these efforts evolve over time to meet the continued threat of piracy."
Tuesday saw Microsoft's Dynamics GP version 10.0 being chosen by Lakeside Behavioral Healthcare to be the technology that it would use to cure its previous accounting and reporting pain points. The previous software system used by the company was a UNIX-based one, known as CMHC/MIS and it was specific to the healthcare and behavioral healthcare industry.
What made Microsoft's Dynamics GP stand out from the rest was the accounting capabilities for general ledger and financial reporting, much better than those used before. Carla Caponi, CFO of Lakeside Behavioral: "The financial software we've been using most likely will be phased out in the next couple years. We wanted to be ahead of the curve with Microsoft Dynamics GP."
The healthcare company is a not-for-profit agency that serves people with mental illnesses and substance-use disorders in Orange Couny, Florida, and it will be working with the Microsoft Gold Certified Partner InterDyn-CFO Consulting of Orlando to implement the new solution.
Does flash based Windows XP support for low-cost hardware computing devices sound like a dream? Not any more, as on Wednesday Microsoft announced it to be the next best thing to hit the "support market." This would come as a part of the Corp's Unlimited Potential effort to bring the benefits of technology to the next five billion people, by transforming education, fostering local innovation and enabling jobs and opportunity, as the official statement said.
Formal design guidelines are to be published as early as next year and they will have the sole purpose of assisting flash-based device manufacturers with the designing of machines that will enable a high-quality Windows experience. If the limited trials that will happen in January 2008 with OLPC's XO laptop turn out well, Windows XP for that model could become available as early as the second half of 2008. There's something that will most definitely require some further covering when it will happen.
"I've been using the Motley Fool for over three years now," Krishna Yalamanchi, the one-millionth stock pick that started the MSN Money Contest said. "It takes a lot of discipline to understand the philosophy of buying and selling stocks, but thanks to Motley Fool CAPS on MSN, I was able to recognize, hold and profit using the service."
This "achievement" will have bagged her an XBox 360 as she successfully picked IMAX to outperform the market, which it did at the market close on the 5th of December. This must be the lucky Thursday for Yalamanchi, but she will not be alone in the winners list; the contest, measuring the increase in "fantasy" portfolio values between the 12th of November and the 31st of January of the next year has as its first prize 2500 dollars cash, an Xbox 360 Elite console as the second and a Zune 80 GB digital media player as its third. It's not much per se, but it's for just virtually trading what you don't really own. I'd go for that, but it's a little late to sign up, I'm afraid.
Friday was the day that foresaw the rise in interest about the coming releases of the Service Packs to whole new levels. First we have the Service Pack 1 for Windows Vista that as I mentioned earlier, among others, will plug some holes in the activation process, and coming strong from behind there's Windows XP's Service Pack 3 that is said to fly its users past most of the problems and that annoying blue screen we all get once in a while when we least expect it.
Why all the interest all of a sudden, you might ask yourselves. Because Nick White, the Vista Product Manager, confirmed the release date for SP1 for the 10th of December. And in case you didn't know, the refreshes for Vista and XP have been going hand in hand ever since July, into Beta and then into RC, so guess what, SP3 isn't that far either. All we can do is hope and pray that they're as good as advertised.
