According to PC World, analyst Ben Gray of Forrest Researcher Inc., the time is drawing near at which businesses will simply have to upgrade to Vista. Businesses need the productivity associated with Microsoft’s most recent OS, and waiting until Windows 7 is released is largely out of the question.
As of June 30th, Microsoft will cease the distribution of Windows XP to retail locations and manufacturers, essentially forcing those businesses needing to upgrade to either adopt Vista or wait it out in hopes of a speedy Windows 7 release.
There is a good deal of irony here, as PC Word points out. Because of the unpredictability of previous Windows releases, the greatest of which was Vista, businesses will have to adopt Vista because no one knows anything about Windows 7, not to mention when it might be released.
On top of that, there’s absolutely no reassurance that Vista won’t end up being what XP is currently to Vista — better grounded, more established, and a smarter choice than the new OS. Many assume that Windows 7 will be what XP was after Windows ME — a sort of apology for the previous operating system that comes in the form of vast improvements and better stability. Microsoft has made no such allegations.
So even though many critics of Vista have pointed out every flaw and shortcoming in hopes of dissuading consumers from adopting it, it would seem Microsoft will end up forcing Vista upon businesses, whether those businesses like it or not.
"The platform is going to be enabled for both Windows XP and Windows Vista," said Gary Willihnganz, director of marketing at Intel's Ultra Mobility Group.
MID is the name that Intel has given to handheld devices based on Centrino Atom that are expected to be produced in a range of form factors, with many using touch screens or slide-out keyboards. The devices, which are being showcased at the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) in Shanghai, are seen as a way for users to access the Internet and play media files when they are on the move.
Intel showed off four prototype MIDs at a news conference in Tokyo Wednesday although precise details about the computers were lacking.
The machines included a Centrino Atom version of Fujitsu's previously launched Ultra Mobile PC (UMPC) and an Atom-based Panasonic Toughbook tablet PC. Also on show were two MIDs that were first unveiled at CES in Las Vegas in January: a mobile navigation device from Clarion and a keyless device from Toshiba.
In the past, Intel had said these devices would run Linux and established an effort, called Moblin.org , to develop a version of the open-source software for MIDs. The fruits of that effort include versions of Canonical's Ubuntu and Asianux that are designed for MIDs.
Support for Windows XP on MIDs is particularly noteworthy, because Microsoft plans to stop selling most Windows XP licenses on June 30 -- around the same time that many MIDs will just be hitting the market. Microsoft's stance on license availability is expected to change over the next few days, according to a source familiar with the situation, who said the company plans to announce extended of Windows XP for certain products , such as low-cost laptops.
Besides Vista and XP, Windows Mobile may also find its way onto these devices some day.
The man appointed to develop a version of Windows Mobile for MIDs is Len Kawell, formerly the CEO of Pepper Computer, who joined Microsoft last month. During the 1980s, Kawell was a founding member of Iris Associates, the company founded by Ray Ozzie, now Microsoft's chief software architect, to develop Lotus Notes. He also has experience with MIDs, as his former company, Pepper, developed a version of Linux for these devices.
eBay pulled the listing within hours of its appearance Monday, saying that it could have harmed users. "You can't sell anything that would do harm," said a spokeswoman for eBay's public relations agency.
The company removed the listing between 11 p.m. Monday and 12:30 a.m. Tuesday, Pacific Time, after eBay employees noticed the post. "It was the wording of the listing that caught the attention of the trust and safety experts who monitor the site," the spokeswoman said.
Macaulay won last week's PWN 2 OWN hacking contest at the CanSecWest conference in Vancouver. He had offered the laptop he broke into for sale, claiming that his exploit code could probably still be extracted from the machine.
"This laptop is a good case study for any forensics group/company/individual that wants to prove how cool they are, and a live example, not canned of what a typical incident responce sitchiation [sic] would look like," his listing stated.
Although the laptop was listed on eBay just before April 1, a traditional day of Internet pranks, Macaulay insisted it was legitimate.
Macaulay, a researcher with the Security Objectives consultancy, was one of two hackers to claim laptops and cash prizes for penetrating systems during last week's contest. Organizers offered Vista, Mac OS and Linux-based laptops for the taking, along with prizes that varied from US$5,000 to $20,000, depending on the difficulty of the exploit. By Friday, however, only the Linux laptop remained unbreached.
Though the laptop he hacked runs Vista, Macaulay claimed that his Adobe Flash Player exploit will affect 90 percent of computers worldwide. He won a $5,000 cash prize, courtesy of 3Com's TippingPoint division, and the Fujitsu U810 laptop he had hacked into for his work.
Had Macaulay been able to sell his laptop before Adobe patched the issue, he would have violated his contract with TippingPoint, said Terri Forslof, the company's manager of security response. "We would have disqualified him from the program," she said.
The laptop had not been hit with any other attack code during the course of the contest, she added. "He was the only person who tried," she said.