Say what you will about the Micro Soft Corp.It is the Elite, Predominant,Number One Gun in the WORLD for one reason and one reason only.*THEY ARE THE BEST*.They have flaws as we all do *BUT* they are quick to respond to these minor details and quick to fix the problems.If it were not for *MICROSOFT* we would not even be close to the standards of Internet Capabilities and or PC Capabilities we have today.Whatever the others have in mind USUALLY came from MS...or Microsoft makde it better........LIVE WITH IT..Microsoft is the *BEST*.......................Stetson.

If you wanna rant about MS why not do it and have the chance to win something while you are at it! Novell is holding a contest. They make no bones about being pisses at Microsoft and now they are going to give away a Compaq handheld just for ranting about Microsoft!
http://www.novell.com/pr...re/whytheylie/rant.html
you should go here and read up on why Novell is so pissed too:
http://www.novell.com/products/netware/whytheylie/

That is a rather funny campaign. Too bad ther web slingers can't code javascript!

Even their own website states is plainly - it's all about marketing. Message to Novell - If you don't stick your weenie out, no one will ever see it... even if it is bigger and better.

Everyone talks of the great evil that microsoft is. How crappy an OS Windows (and ME is got to be the worse of the 9x genre), but i mean, come on whats the alt?

No piece of software is perfect, god knows microsoft is proof of that. But windows XP by far is the best os i have ever run on my computer. I have no complaints about it. The only reason microsoft finds so much problems with thier software is because make it a point to find errors. Its the old mentallity of fighting back at the machine. Well good luck, you'll loose. I know. I mean, i know people get confused when i upgrade thier copy of windows... everything is "changed around"... hell if upgrading from ME to XP is that confusing to the average joe, whats the chances of them buying into a whole new OS...

And as for real player... if it wasn't for that damn tracking software, i might actually like it...

RealOne freaken sucks, it keeps changing my associations even though I tell it not to...

I wonder if they licensed that technology from apple! LOL!!!

When you take a step back and see what Microsoft is doing it is incredible. They are making an OS that runs great on millions of different computers with different types of users and who knows how many millions of hardware configurations.

It is truly amazing that they can pull it off as well as they do. Mad props to Microsoft!

Runs great huh, then why can't I install the latest Windows updates without "An error has occured, and this application must close"? Why can't I resume from hybernation? It worked before I went to Windows Update last week.. Why can't I play DIVX on WinXP using the 4.xx CODEC when that same CODEC worked GREAT on my Linux drive? Why does Windows still lose my mouse? Why did I have to reboot last night because Windows conveniently misplaced it's ability to play sound? They do have GREAT ideas alright! If they would just implement them right..

Hate to say it, but that sounds like a problem with the user. I've never heard of XP screwing up that much.

I've used the newest 4.whateveritis DivX codec and it works fine in XP.

Hibernation doesn't work on my computer anymore either. Its a driver problem, and I think its my NIC because when I come out of hibernation I can't get on the network :/

It's definately not a problem with the user, I deal with Windows systems for a living. It not a driver problem, my system worked fine until I installed all of the Windows updates. It is not a problem with my system either, as I have NONE of these issues with any other O/S. It is a Windows problem, it has been an inherent Windows problem since Windows released it's first 32Bit O/S. The hybernation problem is a Windows flaw, as I let XP manage it. It restores windows from disk, and then it locks up solid. Just because *YOU* haven't seen the same problems, that doesn't mean they do not exist.

;-)

I agree. The whole Real media is badly implemented.
Editing Real files is a nightmare, particularly video files. Not being able to change bitrates, and only saving as Real files top the list of evil.

hibernation issues are 99% of the time caused by driver issues (as with all other power management problems). if u didnt specificly update a driver, then i suspect windows updated a windows file (which works fine for millions of other users) that broke your driver - sorry but that again is a driver issue as far as im concerned if it hasnt broken everyones pc.

you (like far too many other people) mistake driver problems to be microsofts fault. the mouse issue.... never happened to me so i suspect its a driver issue (or even bios issue?!), the sound problem, never happened to me... again most likely to be a driver issue.

linux doesnt have so many driver issues because half the drivers arent written by the manufacturers. take creative for example..... famous for their incredibly poor drivers. the linux creative drivers arent so famous for problems mainly because creative didnt write most of them. manufacturers never put enough time into the drivers in my experience, they just get the hardware working and then release it - their reputation (unfortionately) doesnt depend on their drivers but more about the hardware they have made - if the driver is dodgy "oh its microsofts fault". lol well no most of the time it isnt.

Ok, but if the drivers are certified by Microsoft, then when they break who do you blame? After all, the manufacturers pay Microsoft to certify the drivers! I have not installed any driver updates, there have been none other than my Display driver which was updated a month ago. ;-) Yes, Linux kernel drivers tend to be better than manufacturer drivers (which itself is a bit odd), unless we are talking about XFree Video drivers (which tend to SUCK heh). Point is that not everyone is having a completely wonderful experience with XP. ;-) I'm actually switching back, I gave it a fair shot and I still think Windows sucks. It's ok for my mother-in-law, but I need more control over my system. :-)

I agree with fewt I'll deal windows for a living and I've a 50% increase in me work time because well I upgraded to XP but know I has this I used to be a big MS supporter but after all of the issue ME and 2k give me I looked into other OS I found Linux (which I said I would never use) to be a much more reliable OS sure there is no multi billion dollar company behind it but Linus did good and the guy doing it now are great I replaced my 2k ad ser with Mandrake after testing a few of the more corporate targeted Linux distro's and hey Nvida linux drivers work better then the new high power XP one they released.

I have XP Pro on my Gateway 700s and I'm not having any problems here.

Hit the space bar to take it out of Hiberation.

Two things Microsoft certainly isn't doing: (a) Listening to what their customers want, (b) Innovating.

Microsoft don't innovate because there is risk involved. There is no guaranteed proffit in innovating.

What they are instead doing is (a) Looking at what most prominent features their competitors have and incorportaing those and calling them new, (b) buying it if they don't have it.

Take Remote Desktop Assistance. This is nothing more than the "desktop sharing" technology which was buried in Netmeeting combined with the ideas of "Terminal Services Client", which was based on Citrix Winframe, which in turn was based on concepts that have existed for at least 10 years in Unix "X" Windows systems for donkeys years. Microsoft staunchly refused to do anything like this until companies like Citrix started making money by selling a product for Windows that did exactly that.

Most of the recent GUI changes to Windows originate from other operating systems, and are typically corner-stone technologies from those operating systems (such as the "start" menu with the "task bar"; variations of these were featured in GUIs since the very earliest GUIs).

You could even look at all the recent voice-technologies that Microsoft is integrating into Windows. Microsoft hates pirates, and yet it is the very pirates they are catering to. The people who *don't* want to have to buy voice-recognition software from X and voice-comms software from Y and etc. Windows is supposed to be an operating system, but in fact, Microsoft increasingly leave little room for anyone to write software to operate *under* their system.

If you look at how these technologies arrive within Windows, you can see that I'm not just Microsoft bashing. In Windows XP Plus and Office XP they've started to graft in L&Hs speech engine properly. They've been working on this for some time, we've seen the "Speech" options in Windows 98 and ME...

But integrating voice recognition into an operating system isn't as simple as making it hear your voice. The GUI has to change too, because the GUI has been optimized and designed for years around mouse operation. Driving a Windows PC with your voice isn't easy. You have to try and speak like you're using a vocal mouse. Bleah!

It will probably be 2004 before we see versions of Windows where the GUI has been redesigned to accomodate the bought-in-and-poorly-understood-by-MS Voice technologies.

You can see proof of this very easily. Install OfficeXP and the Plus Pack! XP voice systems, and see if they work with IE. Nope. Because what they bought didn't include IE integration. Surely if this was software Microsoft had developed, at all, it would have included IE support?

To draw an unfortunate Trekie analogy, Microsoft are the Borg of software vendors. They aren't interested in the culture and personality of products, they are only interested in their technology. They buy them out and insert them forcefully into Windows. They then attempt to bury the previous existance of any such technologies with Marketing that announces their newly integrated buyin technology is an innovation. Once the technology is integrated, it can be years before Microsoft understand it well enough to actually make it a real part of the operating system rather than just a freebie addon that comes with it.

Remember when they tried to claim Defrag and DriveSpace (the compression tool) were innovations that Microsoft had created? When infact both of them were products they had bought (and in the case of DriveSpace stolen) from other companies?

As for alternatives. There is MacOS / OS/X, and modern incarnations of Linux. RedHat has pretty much caught up with the GUI interface. It's a doddle to install, update and run. We have RedHat to thank for Windows Update, which Microsoft added in competition to operating systems like Linux and the BSD tree having built in OS-update systems.

But they have a difficult struggle ahead of them. When Microsoft feels the field isn't in its favour, it can buy in a whole new category of technology (like voice recognition) and throw that into the mix. Its competitors, whos operating systems probably had VoiceRecognition facilities and integration way before Microsoft did are left looking second-rate because voice-recognition or remote-desktop sharing or media playing is an add-on feature in their system.

Lindows should be an interesting product ( http://www.lindows.com/ )

*-- "They are advertising bug fixes as new features and glitzing it up with so much hype and cash as to attempt to woo more people away from competing technologies," one developer told BetaNews. --*

Who said this? Fewt? Some other person from these boards? Sounds like some innocuos way of saying, "We needed some adversarial comment in this story... just to err.. not piss anyone off."

just to avoid silly spelling arguments from people with nothing better to do, that word was supposed to be innocuous.

Nope, wasn't me, I'm not a MS developer. They couldn't pay me enough to go work for them. ;-) (Yes, I do mean that too)

"They couldn't pay me enough to go work for them."
Everyone has a price...

No, some of us still have morals. ;-)

I'd be interested to see those morals put to the test... just to see how much it would take =) (Yes I do believe that you can do just about anything with money)

I have read this thing several times and do not see the reference claiming the developer quoted was an MS employee or affiliated with MS. For all we know, it could be a quote from a 12 year old Jr. High student in a computer class.
And where in this article does it say that Coronna uses TCP to dynamically buffer? Is that why Shoutcast pushes 5.1?

I think this article should have been passed through the editor.

Why not? Maybe you could go in and fix all of the problems with their code that you are so quick to point out.

I have little interest in fixing their problems. They (Microsoft) have more than just "software" problems. :-P haha

Try eliminating greed and selfishness with money.

ehhehe, you got me there, that's one thing I think would be very difficult (if at all possible) to do with money.

Isn't this an Oxymoron?
"Microsoft", and "advance"?

Suggestion?

"Suggestion?"

Grow up!

yeah, it's "Microsoft" and "Security" :-P haha

or.. "Microsoft" and "Innovation"

(heh, had to get a bit of MS bashing out of my system this morning )

I've given up on you growing up any time soon =)

me too LOL!!

From Merriam-Webster:

Innovate - To introduce as or as if new

Sounds like Microsoft to me.

Dude.. First of all I was serious regardinmy post.
Second of all I am only a teen.
Third of all, what the hell are you doing posting stuff everyday here? Don't you have a job or something? Or is this just a hobby for you eh? If so, you must be a heck of a boring person.

a) The I've given up...etc comment was to fewt not you, if it had been to you it would have been as a reply to one of your messages.

b) What am I doing posting stuff? Same thing you are, bit of a hobby bit of fun and a bit of boredom. Yes I work and yes I also visit the same dozen or so news sites everyday including cnn, bbc, /. and yes BetaNews.

c) Being a teen doesn't excuse you from anything. DO you think people (grow-up's we'll call them since we'll assume they've grown up) think you or anyone else for that matter is cool if you spell Microsoft with a $ or some other dodgy way? What if you saw some journalist spell Microsoft that way...would you still believe what they are writing given they've already shown you how immature and biast they are?

I mean if you want to bash Microsoft go and do it for the right reasons not everytime there's an opportunity to do so. Defaming the same company over and over and over again is what's getting old and boring.

Now incase you get the wrong idea, I get the s***s with Microsoft over some of their products etc just as much as the next guy but posting "M$ sux0rs" type messages doesn't help out anyone.

stop making idiotic comments...
dude you are 18 already (or is it 19 now?), seriously, grow up!

don't even try to defend yourself, i know where you live too

don't even try to defend yourself, i know where you live too

hmmm sounds like someone's engaging in the style of "drunken programing"

Brings a whole new meaning to sloppy programming, eh?

Which would make it preferable to the Real product.

Haha 0wnage

But not to WMP 6.4.

Here is a link to an article written recently about
Oracle's "UNBREAKABLE" web site and a nasty MS bashing.
I don't know anything @ all about Oracle. Do they provide home users with the quality media software MS does?
Do they provide Suzy Home Maker a cool home experience?
hummm scratching head here.
The guy even references MS as being one of the groups
from around the world with nothing else to do but try break into their site. ummm DUH???

DUH me too? LOL

here is the link
http://www.zdnet.com/zdn.../0,4586,2831288,00.html

This is too funny :)
Oracle even charges 40 bucks for their 30 day trial software

No, but Oracle does make powerful database software which is both robust and blazing fast. The closest Microsoft has to that is Microsoft SQL, which is a far cry from Oracle's software.

I'm not sure exactly what you're ranting about though. There are lots of software companies that make software you don't use. Doesn't mean other people don't use them. Oracle's database systems are widely deployed, and it's very likely that many of the businesses that provide services and products for you have an Oracle database for something.

What your post has to do with MS's "Corona" project is truly beyond me.

Actually, Oracle's database is the slowest of the big three (MSSQL, DB2, and Oracle)

Actually it depends on what you are doing and wether or not you're looking at the results funded by Oracle or Microsoft.

Each of the database's you mentioned has it pluses and minuses, from a developer's point of view Oracle is by far the 'best', from a DBA point of view (as far as I have been told at least as I am no DBA) then you cannot go past DB2. That said SQL Server is very good in it's own right.

Borland charges for their trial software too. What's your point?

"Actually it depends on what you are doing and wether or not you're looking at the results funded by Oracle or Microsoft. "

You couldn't be more right, I have Oracle and SQL boxen here, and I must say that SQL is definately more limited by the fact that it only runs on Intel hardware than anything else. My 6 Way Xeon 500 boxes running SQL just can't compete with my 6 way PARISC 550 boxes running oracle. Now if SQL ran on the 6 way PARISC boxes then I'm sure the result would be nearly the same regardless of which DB I had running on it.

I've been working with Oracle, as a developer primarily, but I have done some DBA with it, and I gotta say that it is NOT as great as some people make it out to be. And their support is a joke. MS Sql Server 2000 is, in my opinion, the best RDMS today. It's fast, easy to admin, and easy to develop for.

-Sheppe

"The closest Microsoft has to that is Microsoft SQL, which is a far cry from Oracle's software."

Designating the LONG datatype as large text makes sure no other developer in the world is able to use Oracle! My god, what are those guys at Oracle thinking?!?

Also, making textual searches case-sensitive makes sure you never find "oRacle" or "Oracle" or "ORACLE" when the search string is SELECT * FROM Table WHERE Field LIKE 'orac%'.

Sigh...

really ??? they give delphi& kylix for FREE

Try SELECT * FROM Table WHERE lower(Field) LIKE 'orac%'

Case sensitivity is a sensible default. A great deal of other databases default to case sensitivity (PostgreSQL, Ingres, MySQL, etc).

Oracle's target audience isn't Joe Desktop.

I use PostgreSQL and MySQL by preference for my own projects, but now that I've had chance to work with Oracle on a number of serious projects (including an ISP and a digital TV service) I actually appreciate oracle a lot more. If you want something that can provide an incredibly robust and powerful service at high-loads, Oracle is your ticket. If you want a database back end for your candy store in the mall, then one of the free servers (Post or My) or SQL-Server is your ticket.

As a note - I've worked with SQL-Server on some very large scale projects. People working on systems in the financial sector will fall about laughing at you if you suggest SQL-Server. SQL-Server is far too generalised (buggy and insecure) and scales far too poorly (I've experienced this first hand at a number of sites).

Meanwhile, Oracle has volumes of tunables, that most of us ignore when we first encounter Oracle, as being pointless nonsense that our favoured SQL server does automatically. What you forget is that having your SQL server performance tune on the fly means nothing is ever tuned, and your server is wasting a lot of important cycles doing tuning. Quite often at the expense of other server threads. Read: major performance hit.