Microsoft

Since most of the Web applications I run these days is on PHP I will fully admit that I don't know much about .Net and Mono applications.  However, I can recognize good news when I hear that it.  mojoPortal under a new version number can once again support more both the .Net and Mono platforms.  For developers and users of mojoPortal, life just got a little simpler.

Version 2.2.2.8 of mojoPortal was released this week and not only introduces the return of Mono support but additional features as well:

This may surprise regular visitors to my site, but I'm an avid reader of the Wall Street Journal.   Why is it surprising for some that I read the WSJ?  Well, probably because after all the links and excerpts to stories I have provided from CMS Report, this is the very first time I have ever mentioned an article from the WSJ in one of my blog posts.  The sad truth is that about every article found at WSJ.com can only be fully read if you are a subscriber of the online newspaper.  I have wanted to avoid frustrating readers the issues with providing a link to an article they can't access unless they're ready to hand over their cr

I usually spend my weekends writing a few drafts for articles that I'm going to post for CMS Report. The idea is that I'm not competing with the hectic pace I usually find myself in during the weekdays.  Well, I found myself distracted from the usual writing endeavor for two reasons: 1) Microsoft's Virtual PC 2007 and 2) the snow finally melting leaving a nice warm weekend to be outside.  Needless to say, not much time was spent with the computer.  However, let's talk about Microsoft and something they finally did right.

A focus lately has been on the fact that you can run Windows inside of an Apple Mac through virtualization.  What the commercials don't talk about is that you can also run the same type of software, such as Parallels, to also run the Linux OS inside your Mac.  Since Microsoft Windows and Linux are the primary operating systems I use at work, the ability to run the two operating systems together is of interest to me.  In fact that interest is so great that for the first time in a decade I've been considering to buy a Mac at home.

During the past five years I've been dual-booting between Windows and Linux on my PCs both at home and work.  However, there are inconveniences with dual-booting due to the the constant need to reboot your machine to get to the other operating system.  This better method is virtualization and something Apple has been promoting the past year or so to lure in Windows users to their computers.  Now Microsoft's free Virtual PC has arrived and I think it is about to change my world.

Steve Reynolds, Microsoft Internet Explorer Program Manager, announced on the Microsoft Internet Explorer Blog that an update for Internet Explorer 7 is available. The IE7 update "addresses an issue experienced by some users where CPU usage is high when they are navigating a page that contains multiple frames or when multiple frames are navigated simultaneously". If you have experienced any such performance issue, Microsoft is encouraging you to download and install the update.

The November 20, 2006 article "Spam surge linked to hackers" from eWeeks is a must read. Unfortunately, I can't find the actual online version of the article in print.

The article discusses the increasing complexity hackers are using botnets running on tens of thousands of hijacked Windows computers to spread spam. The article focuses on the research by SecureWorks regarding the malware trojan called Troj/SpamThru. Some scary unique features have been identified with this trojan including:

I know giving Microsoft a hard time is everyone's best pastime sport, but perhaps IE7 is an improvement over IE6. While there have been some complaints about IE7 "breaking" sites...the uproar is a lot quieter than I expected. I had anticipated a little bit more from the general public. Also, it is also nice to note that IE7 isn't included in many of the "critical"updates that the rest of the IE suite are.

From the IEBlog:

This is an interesting debate. Is Microsoft really being a monopoly when it comes to securing and patching its own operating system? Shouldn't we expect to be able to buy a computer operating system that is secure so we don't need anti-virus software in the first place? It is interesting, the marketplace for consumer products that Microsoft inadvertently created is upset at Microsoft for reducing the need to buy third-party. So what, consumers should have a less secure operating system and be required to buy a third party anti-virus software? BusinessWeek reports:

A series of posts and questions on the CMS blogs are asking whether Microsoft should help finance the costs of open source projects. I have no opinion to give that would add value to this topic. However, I'm happy to give the rundown so far of the posts that speak the loudest regarding Microsoft and open source projects.

The thread of blog posts seems to originate with a post at Dave's Tech Shop. In that post, Dave talks about the need for Microsoft to better support open source projects. Dave's reasoning:

No matter how big or small you are, does it not seems that the marketing department always lures us into these discussions?

I had mentioned a while back that we planned to call the version of IE7 in Windows Vista “Internet Explorer 7+”. Well, the feedback we got on the blog was overwhelming – many of you didn’t like it. So, as we’ve said on our website, we heard you. I’m pleased to announce that we’re switching the name back to “Internet Explorer 7”. No plus. No dot x. Just “Internet Explorer 7”.

This could be interesting for those that work with MS Word...the 2007 version will have blogging capability. It will be intesting to see how well Word will be compatible with third-party CMS applications.