Todd's Tech Blog : Technology

todd — Mon, 08 Aug 2005 02:04:00 GMT

There is no virus for Windows Vista!!!!! This is one piece of news that really got me riled up. What happened is someone determined some commands in Monad (Microsoft's Unix-like command line console - although calling it Unix-like doesn't really give it enough credit) could create havoc and published a report about them on the web. Somehow this translated to there being a virus affecting Windows Vista beta 1 running crazy on the internet. Just to make this clear, WINDOWS VISTA WILL NOT INCLUDE MONAD. Also, Microsoft didn't pull Monad from Windows Vista because of this. Monad will be in development for quite a bit longer than Windows Vista. It may show up in Windows Longhorn R2 release scheduled for a 2009 release but it may not even be done then. So anyway, enough of my rant...:)

The downside of beta testing...

todd — Wed, 20 Jul 2005 15:30:00 GMT

Sorry for blocking out some of the text - I'm under NDA and it IS an early build, so they should get a bit of slack I guess (it's not a Microsoft product, btw). That said, it's pretty crappy to give out beta software that most of your testers cannot uninstall. Seams like that should be on the checklist of things to check before sending out beta code to thousands of testers...

Sorry for my absence!

todd — Tue, 12 Jul 2005 03:41:00 GMT

Sorry I haven't posted for a while. But in any case I'm back. One of the big reasons for my absence was because I've been focusing very hard on getting ActiveWin.com's Longhorn section finished. A number of us have put a ton of work into it, knowing that all this info will be out of date in 6 months. But oh well. Look for frequent updates... we're already planning a "refresh" to be released around beta 2... or so... :-). So without further ado, check out ActiveWin.com's very newly released Longhorn section! Also, I promise more frequent updates over here... didn't mean to neglect you guys.

Out with the old...

todd — Thu, 30 Jun 2005 22:18:00 GMT

Well, that was quick. Microsoft has cut downloads of the recently obsolete SUS and will only be offering content through it till July 2006. Those moving from SUS to WSUS might want to check out this page. This page may be helpful for people looking to get started with WSUS.

Wonder Outlook

todd — Thu, 30 Jun 2005 21:28:00 GMT

So right now I have three apps open that have almost the exact same layout and relatively same purpose - Outlook (for my email), Outlook Express (for my newsgroups), and RSS Bandit (for my feeds). I know there are plug-ins for Outlook that let it handle all of these features, but I don't see why they couldn't be supported natively (well, I understand Outlook not supporting feeds... for now). Oh, and the ability to post to blogs (a la w.bloggar) would be excellent. Mail, newsgroups, and feeds are all different, sure, but I think they're related enough that a unifying app would be just kick ass. Well, my battery is dying, so I must be off.

Scoble turning off comments?

todd — Thu, 30 Jun 2005 21:08:00 GMT

I try to stay away from blogging about blogging, but Josh Ledgard has a good reply to Scoble's recent talk of turning off comments. Before I get to my point, I should point out that Scoble has been teasing readers about some “secret new technology” that changes the way he blogs (and will so even more once it is not so secret). He says, “But, when you see this thing (probably a couple more months) you'll see that all you need to do to leave a comment on my blog is to have a blog yourself and link to it.”

Scoble has talked a lot about turning off his comments lately, and said that he's enjoyed them being down cause he's gotten a lot more done. And that's cool, I'm sure we all like having more time. However, it just strikes me odd since Scoble is all about having discussions. Even though I've come down on Scoble a time or two, I do really like him and I think he's done a lot to pioneer conversation on the web (especially when it comes to interation with Microsoft). That said, I think turning off comments is a bad idea. And this new technology that he's talking about (maybe some kind of linking technology?) sounds like it will silence a lot of people out there who don't have blogs (assuming the blogger turns off traditional comments). Anyway, go check out Josh's post that articulates this much better than I'm doing.

Block Windows Server 2003 SP1

todd — Thu, 30 Jun 2005 20:27:00 GMT

I know this is a little late, but better that never, right?

For those who are not ready to upgrade their 2003 boxes to SP1 yet, Microsoft has released a tool for blocking the upgrade.

From MS: “A blocking tool is available for organizations that have AU enabled on their servers to ensure prompt delivery of critical updates, but would like to temporarily disable delivery of the Windows Server 2003 SP1 automatic update through AU that is set to take place starting July 26, 2005.“

Get it here.

Microsoft's RSS Announcement

todd — Sat, 25 Jun 2005 02:26:00 GMT

I'm sure most of you have heard about how Microsoft is integrating RSS into IE 7 and Longhorn. They're also adding an extention to RSS - the ability to create lists. I really like RSS (and ATOM, for that matter). I think it's just one of those simple ideas that makes so much sense (it's usually the simple ones that do). And I'm excited about Microsoft embracing it and piping it into Windows. At the same time, should we be a bit apprehensive? Is Microsoft doing to RSS what it did with HTML? Well, Microsoft is pegging a lot on RSS. Looking forward, they believe, there will be browsing, search, and subscriptions when it comes to the internet. Microsoft has invested a lot fighting Google over search, so it's no surprise that they're trying to get an early (well, earlier) start on subscriptions.

This is where I'm torn. I'm just not sure how I feel about Microsoft tinkering with RSS. They may add a bunch of proprietary options to tie the RSS technology (and, as the conspiracy goes, all subscriptions... which will be a huge thing in the coming years) to Windows. At the same time, is that necessarily a bad thing? If they embrace it and extend it in ways that the community can't, are we worse off? I think it could be a great thing for the technology, especially if they keep the underpinnings open. What do you guys think?