Microsoft Update Catalog BETA August 2, 2007
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Microsoft®Update Catalog BETA FAQs:
What is Microsoft Update Catalog?
It’s a service from Microsoft that provides a listing of updates that can be distributed over a corporate network. You can use it as a one-stop location for finding Microsoft software updates, drivers, and hotfixes.
What types of software updates does Microsoft publish?
Microsoft offers important, recommended, and optional updates. Important updates provide significant benefits, such as improved security and reliability. Optional updates might include, for example, new or updated driver software for devices that you have added to your computer. The Microsoft Update Catalog now provides access to hotfixes. Hotfixes are generally provided by Microsoft Customer Service & Support. To see a list of the updates that Microsoft publishes and definitions for each type of update, refer to the Microsoft Help and Support Web site article, Description of the standard terminology that is used to describe Microsoft software updates
If I use the Microsoft Update Catalog, do I still have to use Windows Update?
The Microsoft Update Catalog provides updates, including drivers, that are for distribution across a corporate network. For non-corporate scenarios, we recommend you use automatic updating or the Microsoft Update website. In Windows Server 2003, Windows XP, and Windows 2000 with Service Pack 4, Automatic Updates is available within your Windows operating system. To check your current settings, you can right click My Computer, click Properties and then select the Automatic Updates tab. In Windows Vista, you no longer use a Web site to check for updates. Instead, you can check for updates by opening Control Panel, and opening Windows Update. If you use Microsoft Update, you can install updates for Windows and other Microsoft software products through Windows Update.
What types of updates can I import into Microsoft patch management applications?
If you are running Windows Server Update Services (WSUS) 3.0, System Center Essentials (SCE), or System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) you can import updates directly into these applications. After you’ve imported updates, you can manage them like any other updates that you obtain using WSUS, SCE or SCCM, with some exceptions:
Many updates are already available to you using the synchronizing capability in WSUS, SCE and SCCM. Security updates, critical updates, service packs, update rollups, definition updates, and critical drivers can be configured to synchronize with your server automatically. You can still import these updates into your application by using Microsoft Update Catalog, although depending on how you configure WSUS, SCE, and SCCM, you may not need to. Some updates require users to accept Microsoft Software License Terms or walk through other update specific installation steps. Microsoft Update Catalog will notify you if you are importing these updates. Occasionally, updates are for download only. These updates might not have the necessary “applicability” logic for WSUS, SCE or SCCM to identify whether the update is applicable to client computers. Updates that are available for download only cannot be imported.
How often does Microsoft Update release security updates?
Security-related updates are released once a month. However, if a security threat occurs, such as a widespread virus or worm, Microsoft will release a corresponding update as soon as possible. Other types of updates can be released whenever they are ready.
What are the legal terms for using Microsoft Update Catalog?
Your use of the Microsoft Update Catalog is subject to the Terms of Use. Software updates you receive through the Microsoft Update Catalog are governed by any license terms that come with them. If no license terms come with them, they may be governed by the original license agreement for the software to which they apply. You should check that license agreement for details.
Hello world! August 2, 2007
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Microsoft to cut price of Xbox 360 to compete with Wii game console July 13, 2007
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Microsoft plans to cut the price of its Xbox 360 game console to compete with Nintendo’s top-selling Wii.The company needs to lower the price of the Xbox, which retails from $299 to $479, to increase sales and lure customers who are not interested in traditional combat and racing video games, said Shane Kim, vice president of Microsoft Game Studios.
He declined to say when a price cut might be announced, but added that it would not happen at the annual Electronic Entertainment Expo, or E3, game conference in Santa Monica, California.
“We need to compete effectively for that customer, and part of that is getting to the mass market price point for the console,” Kim said Tuesday. “We definitely are working on that area.”
The Xbox 360 has trailed the $249 Wii in sales since Nintendo introduced the player in November.
This week, Sony lowered the price of the PlayStation 3 console, which has lagged behind both Xbox and Wii, by 17 percent to $499 from $599 in the United States. Microsoft has vowed to make its video-game business profitable by next year.
“A price cut would give the Xbox 360 an advantage over its rivals, particularly in North America where you have a choice of consoles to play the same game,” said Etsuko Tamura, an analyst at Mizuho Investors Securities in Tokyo. “There’s a lack of Xbox titles in Japan, so a price cut here would have no effect.”
In fiscal 2006, the games unit lost $1.26 billion on sales of $4.26 billion. David Hufford, a director of Xbox product management, said last month a price cut was needed to persuade parents to buy the machine for their children.
Microsoft also said that Walt Disney would offer films for rent through its Xbox Live online service. Warner Bros. and Paramount studio already sell and rent movies on Xbox Live.
Intel tells employees there’s a bigger fish to fry than AMD July 13, 2007
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While we often and talk about the good old days of the steamy AMD vs. Intel battle, the truth looms large. But those days of traditional rivalry could be changing. At least Intel itself believes that it is not only AMD the company is competing with: Sources have told us Intel is circulating a document to its employees, one which sums up that current mindset: It’s time to move on, Intel has bigger fish to fry.
Intel’s eyes have been all but looking at AMD these days, according to sources. The momentary blip seen on their radar in 2005 and 2006 regarding x86 performance has been wholly addressed. Core 2 alone (and a well-oiled marketing engine) to take back almost every inch of market share AMD had gained in the past few years.
Intel has many competitors, at least 20 that have been mentioned officially within the company strategy. And our sources have told us that the internal memo circulating today sheds light on that very fact explicitly. We’re told Intel’s true focus isn’t on little AMD. They were a blip gone by. And, according to sources, Intel’s focus needs now to be on the real threats to their core operations: Samsung and IBM.
Samsung is by far Intel’s largest competitor. In 2004 and 2005, Samsung was #2 in the world with just under half of Intel’s annual revenue. In 2006 the tables changed. Intel’s revenue decreased by 11.1% (due largely to AMD’s success with AMD64, by the way), while Samsung’s simultaneously increased by 12% due to growth and expansion. This brought the difference in revenue between Samsung and Intel from a large $17.8 billion in 2005 to a mere $11.7 billion in 2006.
IBM’s semiconductor division, on the other hand, has also made inroads. These have not been to the extent’s Samsung has. But, according to our sources, Intel has told their employees that IBM has stated goals to not to be the biggest, but rather to be the best at process technology and manufacturing. The claim of being the biggest, our sources say, belongs to Samsung.
On the same day Intel announced their upcoming 45nm hi-K dielectric solution, IBM announced their own. Both of these solutions enhance chipmaking processes notably at the 45nm node by reducing power consumption and heat generation. These will keep Moore’s Law moving forward in x86 space (and using economical manufacturing processes) for the foreseeable future. IBM has also announced an advanced 3D stacking technology.
Intel’s 2006 annual report listed an additional 17 other competitors by name. These include such diverse technology companies as Freescale (embedded), Hynix (memory), Nvidia (video), Toshiba, Broadcom (communications), AMD, VIA, and Transmeta (x86), just to name a few.
There’s no doubt that AMD is and Intel’s closest competitor in x86 space. But the reality we’re seeing today is this: By all accounts and evidence, the threat AMD posed to Intel two years ago is not apparent anymore, at least at this time. Core 2 was Intel’s turnaround vehicle and it delivered. AMD’s reclamation effort came with Barcelona. All reports raise doubts that it may not be enough – from what we can tell today.
Intel’s document shows that Intel is very confident again and isn’t shy showing it. The market situation today indicates that AMD will need to bring a big surprise to market and Intel apparently believes that there are more important issues out there than AMD today.
Is this confidence justified? Your guess is as good as ours. In about a year, once Barcelona has established itself in the market and we know what Intel’s Penryn is capable of, we all will know if Intel will be able to hold its lead or if the cycle of changing leadership positions between Intel and AMD will be going into another round.
Google To Offer Online Office Suite Free To Nonprofit Companies July 13, 2007
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The world’s largest media company is giving away something for free as Google announces it will offer its Google Apps to nonprofit organizations without charge.Google will work with companies like Mercy Hospital and NTEN to deliver applications like e-mail, spreadsheets and documents, all while delivering free tech support and supporting an unlimited number of users.
According to the company, “Google was founded with one vision – to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. And organizing the wealth of knowledge that lives inside academic institutions is critical to this mission.”
“For the academic environment, where the flow of information is important to both education and research, Google Apps Education Edition provides anywhere-anytime solutions that improve communication and collaboration among all members of the campus community,” the company said online.
“With Gmail, we revolutionized Webmail. Now we’re building on that success with Google Apps, a universally available access point for customized communication and collaboration services. Students, faculty and staff can search all of their archived mail, collaborate over IM with their contacts, and add classes and meetings to their calendars right from the Gmail interface. And we’ve only just begun. Over time, we’ll be integrating additional relevant Google products into Google Apps Education Edition, so your school can expect to stay on the cutting edge of online communication and collaboration,” Google explained.
According to a testimonial from Arizona State University (ASU) Assistant Vice President Kari Barlow, “Google Apps Education Edition is helping (ASU) become a highly flexible university that can provide extraordinary technology experiences for its students. Google’s integration of Webmail, instant messaging and calendaring is second to none.”
Microsoft’s ‘Cloud OS’ takes shape July 13, 2007
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Microsoft is in the early stages of a plan that will see virtually its entire lineup of underlying Internet services opened up to developers, the software maker made clear this week.
In addition to making available its existing services, such as mail and instant messaging, Microsoft also will create core infrastructure services, such as storage and alerts, that developers can build on top of. It’s a set of capabilities that have been referred to as a “Cloud OS,” though it’s not a term Microsoft likes to use publicly.
“Cloud-centric is probably a better way to say it because Cloud OS makes it sound like it is only running on the cloud,” said Brian Hall, general manager of Windows Live. “A lot of the data, a lot of the apps, a lot of the interesting things are on the edge. They are on the PCs. They are on the Xboxes. They are on the phones.”
But, quibbles over nomenclature aside, Microsoft made clear this week that it aims to play the same role on the Internet that it plays today on the desktop–that of providing its own applications as well as the underlying plumbing and tools that developers use to build their products.
In a speech to partners at its Worldwide Partner Conference here, Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer promised that the company would be talking to developers later this year about the first version of its developer platform, some pieces of which are currently available in beta form. Hall echoed the message that Microsoft plans to open up much of the technology that powers Windows Live as well as the underlying infrastructure.
“What’s ours is yours,” Hall told the crowd.
The ambitious promise comes more than a year and a half after Bill Gates first announced the company’s plans for Windows Live at a November 2005 event in San Francisco. Since then Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie and a team have been working on turning Microsoft’s Internet business from a series of separate services offered directly by Microsoft into a set of more unified services that can be offered either by Microsoft directly or through partners.
At this year’s Mix ‘07 show, Ozzie, who has been crafting the Live strategy, did talk about allowing programmers access to some of its higher-level services, such as Windows Live Spaces. But he was largely silent on the topic of the underlying developer platform.
“I’ve nothing to announce in that realm at this time,” Ozzie told CNET News.com in an interview then. “Yet, it’s pretty clear that we’re working on some stuff.”
Late last month, Microsoft introduced two new Windows Live Services, one for sharing photos and the other for all types of files. While those services are being offered directly by Microsoft today, they represent the kinds of things that Microsoft is now promising will be also made available to developers.
Among the other application and infrastructure components, Microsoft plans to open are its systems for alerts, contact management, communications (mail and messenger) and authentication.
“Windows Live is here as a platform for our partners,” Hall said. That’s not exactly the case–yet. Microsoft has made a couple of pieces, such as its Virtual Earth service, available commercially. Other components are available either for broad or limited testing, while still others have yet to be offered to developers. Instant messaging, for example, will be made broadly available to developers in test form in October.
‘A real computer science challenge’
One of the key challenges Microsoft faces is trying to write tools that allow developers to code in such a way that it doesn’t necessarily matter if it is a phone or a PC that is accessing the service, or whether a file is stored locally or in the cloud.
“There’s a real computer science challenge for abstracting all of that well, abstracting how do you find and manage devices, how do you access devices and do it in a way that is transparent to the developer,” Hall said.
Hall likens it to Windows in its early days.
“A lot of what Windows was doing early on was memory management, storage, all of the things today we take for granted,” Hall said. “The vast majority of developers (today), they are not thinking, ‘how am I going to store this particular piece of data in memory?’ It just happens. The same thing is going to happen in the mesh model.”
Microsoft is also trying to make sure that its business terms are attractive enough to woo the next MySpace or YouTube to bet on its technology. It has spent months talking to existing partners, but also to venture capital firms and start-ups.
For now, Microsoft is offering up many of its services free for up to 1 million users, while saying it wants to strike some kind of deal if a service exceeds that threshold.
“If this becomes a big, big commercial success we want to have a value exchange, but we’ll give you plenty of ramp room,” Hall said.
As it works to build out the underlying core services, Microsoft is also offering up applications to partners, such as Windows Live Hotmail, Windows Live Messenger and the Spaces blogging tool.
Until now, most of the deals have been one-off deals that the company has had to individually negotiate. Among Microsoft’s early deals are a few colleges and universities, such as the University of Pennsylvania, as well as some telecommunications firms. On Wednesday, Microsoft announced a deal with Qwest, which will offer its Internet subscribers the option of using a Qwest-branded version of Microsoft’s Windows Live services.
“It was a much more custom engagement model,” Hall said. “Now we are moving to a scalable come one, come all approach.”
Google expected to post double-digit profit, sales gains July 13, 2007
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Google Inc. is expected to post double-digit gains in profit and sales when it reports second-quarter results next Thursday, as the Internet company continues to build its substantial lead in online search.
Analysts polled by Thomson Financial expect Mountain View, Calif.-based Google to post a 44% gain in earnings from the period a year earlier, to $3.59 a share, while revenue is expected to grow 60% to $2.68 billion.
The strong results for the quarter ended in June are expected as the company continues to use its dominant position in the online search market to reap increasing amounts of related advertising revenue.
According to data released Wednesday by Compete Inc., Google maintained its large lead in the online search market from May to June, gaining 0.3% to a 62.7% share. That compares to a 19.6% share for second-place Yahoo Inc. and a 13.2% share for Microsoft Corp., according to the data.
Google shares have risen more than 10% in the past six months, while those of Yahoo have fallen more than 5% and those of Microsoft have remained relatively flat.
Many analysts are now anticipating further news from Google on how it plans to increase revenue from services and advertising unrelated to search.
In a significant move further into graphical display advertising, the company said in April that it plans to acquire online ad company DoubleClick Inc. for $3.1 billion. But Google has since reported receiving a second request for information about the merger from the Federal Trade Commission, indicating it may face further antitrust hurdles before closing the deal.
Meanwhile, speculation has grown about ways the company will begin to make more money via another acquisition, video sharing Web site YouTube.
Thomas Weisel Partners analyst Christa Quarles said in a note released Wednesday that while Google is “not generating much revenue from YouTube yet… traffic continues to explode on the site globally.”
Quarles said that since the acquisition of YouTube was announced in October, “the site has nearly doubled in unique visitors, reaching nearly 180 [million] in May.” If Google were to begin inserting advertisements directly inside of YouTube’s video streams, “the company could reasonably start to see $500 [million] a quarter in advertising revenue,” Quarles said.
Quarles expects Google to post revenue for the second quarter of $2.69 billion, exceeding the expectations of analysts polled by Thomson. In addition to the video aspects represented by YouTube and display ads, Quarles said other growth areas for the company should include mobile phone services.
Meanwhile, Cowen & Co. analyst Jim Friedland said in a note released Wednesday that he expects Google’s share of its traditional search market only to grow ever-higher.
“We believe Google will achieve a share of at least 90% of the search market over the next decade,” Friedland said.
Driving the company’s growth in search will be a number of factors including a larger research and development budget than that of its peers and a portfolio of free secondary applications, Friedland said.
Friedland has an outperform rating on Google shares.
Police to use helmet cams to record public order incidents July 13, 2007
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Police, camera, action! is finally to become a reality with the Home Office go-ahead today for officers in forces across England and Wales to be issued with “helmet cams”.The mini digital cameras, strapped to the helmet headbands of patrolling police officers, are to be used to film rowdy late-night scenes, underage drinkers, controversial stop and search confrontations and domestic violence incidents.
The cameras can store up to 400 hours of footage with soundtrack on their hard drive, with a battery life of eight to 12 hours. The footage can be played back on a four-inch (10cm) screen attached to the officer’s belt. Future versions may use a memory card or even live streaming technology to transmit the pictures to a nearby vehicle or communications centre.
The decision to adopt the helmet-cam technology follows small-scale trials in Plymouth by the Devon and Cornwall police, who used the head mounted video system to improve the quality of evidence provided by officers who attended domestic violence incidents.A wider trial involving 300 trained officers using 50 cameras in as many operational situations as possible followed. It found the helmet cam had significant advantages over hand-held video systems as officers did not need the support of a minder to use the equipment, both hands remained free and their peripheral vision was not hindered when they used the camera.
The police minister, Tony McNulty, said the cameras could significantly improve the quality of evidence provided by police officers and increase the proportion of offenders brought to justice: “I am delighted to be able to announce £3m for the police service which will enable forces to make this valuable technology available to frontline police officers,” he said.
The cash will initially enable each force to buy eight camera units at £1,700 each. But the police have been warned by the Home Office that they are expensive, and forces should not create the expectation that all officers will be able to have video equipment with them at all times.
Guidance published today on the use of helmet cams warns officers not to use them if a member of the public simply approaches them to ask a question, and it will be regarded as good practice to say if the camera is switched on.
Before the cameras are used in a new area, the Home Office advises police to mount a media campaign with warning posters. In Plymouth they used posters saying “Glass head”, “Police, camera, action!”, “Handcuffed” and “Video Screen”. Officers are to wear a sign and to announce: “I am video recording you.”
The guidelines tell officers they can use the cameras in situations where they would normally have made a written record. The cameras should not be used in general patrolling unless it is part of a specific operation, such as public order duties. Recordings not to be used in evidence should be deleted within 31 days.
Google’s Brin does not see Facebook up for sale July 13, 2007
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Google Inc. co-founder Sergey Brin said on Thursday his company would be happy to talk with Facebook about potential ties, but that the social network did not appear to be courting takeover bids.”If they come to us, we’d certainly be open to talking,” Brin said, answering a reporter’s question at the 25th annual Allen & Co. media deal-makers conference in Sun Valley, Idaho. “But I think they’re building a great company of their own.”
Facebook membership has exploded in recent weeks to more than 29 million active members from 24 million in late May. By comparison, rival MySpace has attracted about 60 million unique users in the United States and about 90 million globally.
Deal speculation has followed Facebook, a college-student sensation that has now turned itself into an all-ages site. Last year, Google rival Yahoo Inc. was ready to pay some $900 million for Facebook, according to sources familiar with the situation.
Palo Alto, California-based Facebook was founded in 2004 by then-undergraduate student Mark Zuckerberg as a social meeting site for fellow students at Harvard University, but it has seen its usage spike since it opened up in May to anyone.
Zuckerberg has said repeatedly he is committed to building an independent company. He reiterated this position in May when he announced the plans to open up the platform to other software developers, who can build applications on the site.
“I already thought Facebook should remain independent. This (announcement) just strengthens that,” he said.
Sources close to the company say moves to bolster its management team and put its finances on a firmer footing through experiments with advertising sales are aimed at preparing Facebook for a potential initial public offering over time, although no specific plan has been set.
Many Silicon Valley observers also consider Microsoft Corp. a potential bidder if Facebook were put up for sale. Microsoft supplies advertising services to Facebook and is hungry to expand its Web presence to compete with Google.
Max Levchin, chief executive of Slide.com, the most popular maker of mini-applications known as widgets, said Facebook has borrowed many elements of Microsoft’s decades-old strategy of serving as a platform for independent software makers.
“I would be amazed if they weren’t trying to get their hands on Facebook,” he said in an interview this week, referring to Microsoft. “The whole platform play is so obvious.”
Levchin was co-founder of online payments company PayPal, which was sold to eBay Inc. in 2002.
The attention paid to Facebook has even eclipsed MySpace. It was MySpace’s own rapid growth that helped make Rupert Murdoch a Wall Street darling. Bought by News Corp. in 2005 for $580 million, it is now considered worth about $10 billion by some Wall Street analysts.
Asked if the rise of social networks has had a negative impact on Google, Brin said, “Social networks are creating lots and lots of content … and that’s more for us to search.”
75-year-old woman hooks up to 40Gbps fiber July 13, 2007
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You know the old saying, “youth is wasted on the young”? Well I think I’ve come up with a new one. “Technology is wasted on the elderly.” While that’s not always the case, it perfectly describes this story of a 75-year-old woman with the fastest internet connection in the world.
Why on earth would 75-year-old Sigbritt Löthberg need a 40Gbps connection? Well she wouldn’t, in fact most people wouldn’t even begin to use a fraction of it. However, this woman can now watch 1,500 HDTV channels simultaneously, or download an entire HD movie in a matter of seconds.
The reason that this particular woman scored the sweet connection is that her son is Swedish internet Guru Peter Löthberg. He decided to use his mother, who has never even owned a computer, as proof that such high-speed connections over a fiber line can be both cost-effective and simple. Funny enough, he cited that the most difficult part of the process was installing Windows on her computer. I highly doubt that, as training her on how to run Windows will likely turn out to be no small task.
