Windows Factor

No one is mistaking the current IT jobs market for the one that sizzled during the dot-com days and inflated salaries to astronomical rates. But as the U.S. economy wrestles with a weak housing market and record oil prices, demand for IT workers is on the rise.

"There is a distinct shortage of certain IT [skills], and that shortage seems to be growing," says Neill Hopkins, vice president of skills development at The Computing Technology Industry Association Inc. (CompTIA) in Oakbrook Terrace, Ill.

View Full Article: Computerworld

Ed Bott: [...] As it turns out, Dell has published a large database of information about its current inventory for anyone to see, and I was able to sift through it to form some surprising conclusions about the current relationship between XP and Vista in the PC marketplace. The short version: Consumers have embraced Vista overwhelmingly, whereas small business is much more reluctant, preferring XP by a better than 2-to-1 margin.

View Full Article: Ed Bott's Microsoft Report

WORM_RBOT.HBZ is the latest threat spotted in the wild that targets the Windows systems and attempts to drop its files on most versions of the Microsoft operating system including 98, ME, NT, 2000, XP and Server 2003. The worm was discovered by security company Trend Micro, which wrote that it could easily reach your system because it might be deployed by other malware, or directly, when a user visits a malicious website. Just like other similar worms, WORM_RBOT.HBZ attempts to create new registry entries to be sure its files are executed every time the operating system is fully loaded.

But what's more important is that it automatically scans the network shares to drop its files and spread itself on the network. "It searches the network for certain shares, into which it attempts to drop copies of itself", Trend Micro wrote in the advisory.

View Full Article: Softpedia

Didn't get the digital camera you wanted for Christmas? Then maybe you should consider buying yourself one of these, an UltraCamX Large Format Digital Aerial Camera. Producing images with a 216 megapixel resolution, these cameras are used to take the high-resolution imagery used within VirtualEarth/Live Maps. A word of warning though, Microsoft's press release in Nov 2007 shows that only 3 UltraCamX systems have been purchased in North America since they went on sale in May 2006. Better start saving for next Christmas then.

View Full Article: LiveSide

A few months ago, at the fall Intel Developer’s Forum, we got some hands-on time with an Intel Skulltrail system and were able to snap a handful pictures and document a few benchmark scores. At the time, Skulltrail was still in it the pre-production phase as Intel had a few changes in store for the platform, but it was mature enough for the company to show off what Skulltrail had in store.

As we mentioned in our initial look at Skulltrail, the platform is built around an Intel server-class motherboard tweaked for the enthusiast market. It also features dual 45nm quad-core processors for a total of eight cores, and because the Skulltrail mobo is outfitted with a pair of NVIDIA-built chips, it would support SLI as well. In our article from IDF we had a couple of pictures of a Skulltrail system, but because it was fully assembled and featured dual graphics cards, it was tough to see the foundation of the system – the motherboard – in all its glory.



What we have for you here, however, is an up close and personal look at the Skulltrail platform's D5400XS Intel ATX motherboard from a couple of different angles. As you can see, the Southbridge and dual NVIDIA nForce 100 MCP chips are actively cooled by a large fan-sink cooler. Our pics of Skulltrail from IDF showed a trio of small heatsinks, so things have changed a bit. The motherboard has four PCI Express x16 slots and dual standard PCI slots. Aluminum heatsinks cover the Northbridge and some of the components around both LGA771 Xeon CPU sockets.

Source

Joe Wilcox: Once again, rather than make predictions, I will offer Microsoft some advice for the year ahead. Not that anyone listened to my recommendations for 2007. The best advice is unexpected, and I have plenty of it to give.

Next year, I've got to remember to do this in June, because Microsoft's 2008 fiscal year is about half over already. But it's never too late to change (wink, wink, nudge, nudge).

The list is in reverse order from least to most important...

View Full Article: Microsoft Watch

Long Zheng: If you?ve been wondering where all the advertising for Windows Vista has disappeared to, look no further YouTube. Starting from last week, Microsoft has begun uploading a series of original short videos showcasing a combination of Windows Vista, Windows Live and Office 2007 experiences.

Unlike the $500 million heart-warming ?Wow? campaign at the start of the year, this campaign focuses much more on functionality with realistic end-user scenarios and clear benefits on how using Windows Vista, Windows Live and Office can help get the job done. Perhaps this marks the beginning of the $300 million more Microsoft?s throwing into the Vista advertising pool.

View Full Article: Long Zheng's Blog

Just as Microsoft's past year was characterized by launches, the next will be defined by a departure.

But even as Bill Gates leaves his full-time executive role, the company will be grappling with some of the biggest competitive challenges in its history, particularly on the Internet.

Here's our annual look at what to watch at the company in 2008.

View Full Article: Seattle Post-Intelligencer

At a time where everyone is anxiously awaiting the upcoming service pack for Windows Vista (and while others flock back to Windows XP in droves), yet another flaw in the Windows Vista operating system has been discovered that can bring the Windows shell ("Windows Explorer") to its knees within 20 seconds. Even worse, this issue occurs under every day usage of the operating system if you use the Search function regularly with boolean search operators.

1. Click on Start, and then click on Documents.

2. In the Search entry box, type "NOT Shortcut" (without the quotes).

3. Click on the "Save Search" button and save the search query as "Search Test".

This has been confirmed as a flaw in Windows Vista (all editions) and Windows Vista 64-bit (all editions), and even worse, the issue still occurs on the latest release candidate for Service Pack 1. The bigger question is, will Microsoft step up to the plate and fix this issue or will they let it pass on by while they work heavily on Windows "7", ignoring the fact that Windows Vista still has flaws and inconsistancies that are seeing larger companies hold back deployment until 2009 or even skip Vista?

News Source: ActiveWin

Windows Live Messenger 9 and Google Talk are now cooperating

It seems all of the IM programs are finally realizing what users have known all along: There?s just too many of them.

Apparently Microsoft has succeeded in getting Live Messenger 9 (currently in private testing) to communicate with Google Talk, and they are working on integration with AIM and ICQ also. Seeing as how Live Messenger 8 already talks with Yahoo Messenger, we could be getting very close to a polished, officially released, messenger hub.

Source: Mashable