General Discussions

**ForrestCroce** · 03-12-2008, 09:00 PM

This has been a tremendous irritation lately ... I'm wondering how other people deal with it? I've lost count of how many times over the last week Microsoft has pushed down a Windows update that requires a restart ... and they more or less assume permission when they want to reboot.

Yesterday I had almost half a dozen web pages open in my favorite text editor. They were in a halfway state - not really in the old format anymore, but not quite in the new formate yet, either - so saving them every time I walk away from the pc isn't an option. Unfortunately Notepad++ doesn't have the auto recover feature in SQL Server's client tools. I leave the computer powered on and schedule a defrag for the wee hours of the morning; I get home and all my work is gone, and Windows is freshly booted.

As far as I can tell, there isn't an option for 'never hijack my machine.' The closest choices seem to be 'download updates but let me choose when to install them' and 'check for updates but let me choose whether to download and install them.' The security risk is pretty boring. I run NAT and DHCP; I'm selective in my travels around the web, and I don't have plenty of other gaping holes. On the other hand, I don't want to put important updates off indefinitely, or miss them because the O/S was nagging me.

I've lost count of the updates that demanded a reboot in the past two weeks. A popup window gives you ten minutes to click a button and cancel it from restarting. This is by far the most painful thing about Vista; if anybody has advice on how to avoid throwing my laptop out the window I'll be grateful!

**serandfae** · 03-12-2008, 09:49 PM

Crash feature....how appropriate.

That says it all: It ain't a bug, it's a FEATURE!

I don't have Vista, but in XP I have my updates set to check for updates, but don't download or install them until I tell it to. I can't stand an OS that tries to be helpful; I want it to stay the f*** out of the way unless I ask for its help. Microsoft just does not understand that. But that setting is the closest to my desires without the thing constantly kvetsching at me.

Yeah, I'm having one of those days, can you tell?

tim

**cbwm** · 03-13-2008, 08:30 AM

This message brought to you from a workstation running windows 2000. Old reliable I call it. Microsoft wont even support it anymore. They specifically made their most recent IE product(the one that gives you tabbed browsing) uninstallable on it. Fortunately, practically every other product runs perfectly on it. Thankfully, I've been running Firefox on it, the creators of tabbed browsing, since long before Microsoft even came up with a version of IE that had it.

On topic, there has to be a way of turning off automatic updates in Vista. Many parts of the world still operate on dialup, and auto-update would destroy the connection.

Back to my hijack, did y'all realize that with the recent tanking of Microsoft stock Billy Gates is no longer the richest guy in the world? Number three apparently is his new found position. The whole Docx document format for Office2007 (Vista Only) is another great example of a Microsoft strong arm boondoggle, and another reason why they're stock isn't climbing like it used to. I might just install OpenOffice this weekend. What could it hurt.

**Learning Newbie** · 03-13-2008, 01:16 PM

Bill Gates hasn't been the richest guy in the world for some time now. That honor belongs to a Mexican.

Office 2007 runs on XP. I've been doing that since a few months after it came out.

I'd soil my pants if you can't turn off the automatic updates in Vista. I think our friend Frosty just needs to get off his but and do that.

No offense, man, but "fool me twice, shame on me". If it's been causing you lots of problems, turn it off. Or you'll keep dealing with the same issue over and over again.

Internet Exploder is really only an acceptable web browser for people who've never heard of FireFox. Luckily for Microsoft they get to install their browser by default and home page it to MSN. A lot of people don't know any better - they have a captive audience. If web browser's weren't free I'm sure it would be illegal.

**tripy** · 03-13-2008, 01:34 PM

I've used windizupdate last time I ran a windows desktop. [ http://windowsupdate.62nds.com/thanks.php ]

The biggest advantage for me was that it could work from firefox, and it seemed to follow windows update rate well.

**cbwm** · 03-13-2008, 02:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

Bill Gates hasn't been the richest guy in the world for some time now. That honor belongs to a Mexican.

Only if you consider the beginning of February of this year "some time". Warren Buffet now holds the crown with a Mexican in #2 and Gates in third.

http://www.forbes.com/2008/03/05/ric...llie_land.html

The article sites the bid for Yahoo as the reason Gates is no longer the richest, but truth be told, it is the dip in Microsoft stock which they attribute to the Yahoo bid. If that were the only cause, I think you'd have seen the stock bounce once the bid fell through.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

Office 2007 runs on XP. I've been doing that since a few months after it came out.

Now that I didn't know. Doesn't help my Win2K install much, but at least I can load it without loading Vista. I still think the document format conversion is a crock.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

Internet Exploder is really only an acceptable web browser for people who've never heard of FireFox. Luckily for Microsoft they get to install their browser by default and home page it to MSN. A lot of people don't know any better - they have a captive audience. If web browser's weren't free I'm sure it would be illegal.

Truer words were never written. The real comedy is that the giant is getting beat by a competitor with way less money, developing a product which is free because Microsoft gives it away (Echos of Walmart). How bad does your development crew have to suck to loose in a race so stacked in your favor.

**Learning Newbie** · 03-13-2008, 02:54 PM

The thing about OpenDocument and WordXML is, well, there are a lot of things. Microsoft is playing really clever hardball on that one, but I'll have to concede your earlier point that it's really bad for the market as a whole. Consider

A bunch of 3rd Party software companies (ISVs) have built tools that are compatible with Office to extend it for disabled people. Those 3rd Party companies did a good job apparently. And that means nearly blind people (and others) prefer Word and Excel, not because the programs themselves are inherently better, but because nobody's gotten around to making similar plug ins for Open Office, because it's not as widely used. Liberalchussettes wants to dump Microsoft completely and go with Open Office, and to make it law that all public documents should be in Open Document format so the citizens can read them. Open government, sunshine, all that - it's a good idea. But disabled people sued to prevent it because until the Open Office versions are made, it would leave them out in the cold. I don't think discriminating against the blind is what we want to be doing, but on the other hand, discriminating against people who don't spend $400 on Office (or pirate it) isn't cool, either. You cna get Word and Excel and Power Point viewers, but honestly, who wants to?

They should make a .NET implementation of Open Office. I don't run OOo myself. I don't have J2RE installed on my machine, and don't want to change that. It's a resource hog, basically it's a virtual machien and operating system with its own threading and whatnot. .NET is attractive to programmers, but also to end users because it's almost native to the operating system and it has a very good security model. I'd switch to OOo myself in a heartbeat and just convert to Word format when I have to.

It's funny how Office is the reverse situation as IE and FF. Microsoft is loosing the browser war. Slowly. Last year FireFox was pushing what, 8 %? Now by some accounts it's almost 20 %? My parents in law are in their 70s, and when they use a computer, it's FireFox. They don't know anything about browsers, except that FireFox is better. They know it's safe, and they know it's made by volunteers "who know computers really well" and care about technology. All the same applies to Open Office, it just isn't penetrating.

While I'm ranting, XML is supposed to be human readable, not just a memory dump.

**cbwm** · 03-13-2008, 05:32 PM

I imagine the OOo folks are having the same problem with market penetration as the competing operating systems. Too much legacy and legacy integration. Firefox only had to be compatible. Unless I can operate OOo and do business seamlessly with my business associates who have yet to convert, it will be a very difficult battle to win. No document conversions, no format or data losses with a document save.

In the meantime, Microsoft will continue to do things to entrench itself(back to my example of the first employee you need to fire). They have done many things, but changing document formats is a good example that screws over those who had completely decrypted the .doc format, including OOo, and were then able to play nicely with others players in the market. I know OOo still doesn't have reader that works.

I also like your story about Mass.. Obviously, if I were a resident of Mass. and you asked me whether we should blow 400$ of taxpayer money per copy of MS Office, or save the cash on something that does essentially the same thing, you know what my answer would be. Buy the few near 'Blind' state employees a copy of MS Office, and save the money on the rest.

I would agree with your .Net solution, but lets not forget that anytime you build on a MS platform, you stand the risk of them ripping the rug out from underneath you to unfairly compete. Its sad the Java JVM is such a poor performer but again, Microsoft was clever enough to see Java as a threat to their uneven playing field and immediately refused to comply with the standard. I doubt the Sun JVM will ever run efficiently.

On thinking about it for 30 seconds, the only real fair answer is to spin the OS branch of Microsoft into its own new company. You would see a fairly rapid emergence of real competitors to many of our known workplace "standards".

**Learning Newbie** · 03-13-2008, 06:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cbwm

I also like your story about Mass.. Obviously, if I were a resident of Mass. and you asked me whether we should blow 400$ of taxpayer money per copy of MS Office, or save the cash on something that does essentially the same thing, you know what my answer would be. Buy the few near 'Blind' state employees a copy of MS Office, and save the money on the rest.

Now, chicken and egg theory and all that, but don't you think that would increase demand for Open Office plugins? I mean, I see an infinite loop here. OOo doesn't have 3rd party developer support because it doesn't have penetration, but it doesn't have penetration because it doesn't have plug ins.

Quote:

Originally Posted by cbwm

On thinking about it for 30 seconds, the only real fair answer is to spin the OS branch of Microsoft into its own new company. You would see a fairly rapid emergence of real competitors to many of our known workplace "standards".

I'm not sure whether that would be politically or socially justifiable. But it would have a major impact, either horribly bad, or very good. Office and all the Microsoft apps run potentially better than their competitors because they have access to the Windows codebase, and do things to cooperate with the system under the covers. SQL Server puts a lot of emphasis on taking over as much memory as it can get, but staying behind the line where the operating system begins to swap, which would defeat the whole purpose. If they did get split off into apps vs oses, there would be a lot less to gain from keeping all the details a secret, and it might start being in their interest to publish that data to software vendors, who would be able to make software that runs better against the Windows platform, and have it look better in the process.

**cbwm** · 03-13-2008, 07:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

I'm not sure whether that would be politically or socially justifiable. But it would have a major impact, either horribly bad, or very good. Office and all the Microsoft apps run potentially better than their competitors because they have access to the Windows codebase, and do things to cooperate with the system under the covers. SQL Server puts a lot of emphasis on taking over as much memory as it can get, but staying behind the line where the operating system begins to swap, which would defeat the whole purpose. If they did get split off into apps vs oses, there would be a lot less to gain from keeping all the details a secret, and it might start being in their interest to publish that data to software vendors, who would be able to make software that runs better against the Windows platform, and have it look better in the process.

If I recall correctly, the breakup of MS was the original order of the court when MS lost the anti-trust case. I suppose I need to go back and find out why that never happened. As far as justifiable on any scale, I think it is justifiable on every scale. It would force all Microsoft products to compete fairly with the rest of the products in the marketplace. The OS, and their thousands of other products would have to compete on their own merits instead of the unfair advantage of insider information. In my opinion, that type of struggle would only cause those products to truly become better, or die the death they so richly deserve.

If I read your "negative" to breaking up Microsoft correctly, it was that Microsoft's products perform better right now because of their tight integration and inside knowledge. While "better" may be true in comparison to other products on the same platform, we truly don't know what "best" is because none of Microsoft's competition have access to the same information.

**ADAM Web Design** · 03-14-2008, 12:35 AM

GETTING BACK ON TOPIC FOR A MINUTE (primarily because I have no interest in getting into a debate with someone who doesn't know what a fact actually is)...

Forrest, if you go to Start-->All Programs-->Windows Update, you'll see an option there that says "Change Settings" on the left side. It's not very visible, but it's there. Click there, and then click any setting other than the one you have. Once you go through the whole Vista confirmation thing, you're good to go.

**choskins102** · 03-14-2008, 03:40 AM

The solution is simple: get a Mac

**Learning Newbie** · 03-14-2008, 01:10 PM

I'm not sure how a Mac solves the problem? Our hero is trying to use a computer to run software, if I'm reading correctly. It doesn't sound like he wants to own a computer to make him feel cool.

**ADAM Web Design** · 03-14-2008, 04:02 PM

They can run software. They're great with Microsoft products.

**** those Mac users and their Microsoft-lovin' ways.

**Learning Newbie** · 03-14-2008, 04:10 PM

Wow, you're right! Plus if you use Word for Mac instead of Word for Windows you're "take artistic control". And Forrest is artistic, so he needs a Mac.

**CSS4Life** · 03-14-2008, 04:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ADAM Web Design

They can run software. They're great with Microsoft products.

**** those Mac users and their Microsoft-lovin' ways.

Oi I'm a Mac user I'll have you know *wags finger*.

I haven't tried Word 08 for Mac - it better not be like Office 07 for Windows is *shakes fist*

There's a lot of body movement going on in this post *nods head*