Posted in GNU/Linux, Hardware, Microsoft, Servers, Windows at 4:22 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Breaking down the PR walls…
For future reference, herein we wish to demonstrate Microsoft’s inability to compete on fair grounds. This helps us substantiate and explain why Microsoft resorted to dirty tactics. Under today’s magnifying glasses: Windows Home Server.
We received some advice from a reader who wants us to cover a set of incidents which followed the recent release of what was seemingly a simple product whose primary function is — just as its tin implies — storing data.
Our reader writes:
I notice that the company famous for hiring bad programmers
(who else would fall down making a DST patch) is brushing more
critical problems under the rug:
A) Lose your shirt and lose your data:
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/0,1000000091,39365952,00.htm
So rather than passively playing our part in making bad engineering acceptable,
why not promote some good engineering:
A) Save effort, time and money while preventing the above data loss:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=202605
B) Little out of date but more graphical guidance:
http://howtoforge.com/samba_setup_ubuntu_5.10
Samba is already really good. Now that the Samba team has been handed a
final victory in the 10-year legal battle to get the server APIs out of
the Redmond cult, an already good package can get even better.
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20070919214307459
We have till June before a fix is even attempted. So until then why not
explore better options?
As further resources on this subject, consider the following references and excerpts:
Linux ‘Home Servers’
A Non-obvious Use for Debbie (a Debian 4.0 Home Server)
So far Debbie has worked in all of the relatively simple roles I’ve put her to. AVI, MOV and JPG files all work well on either the Linux or Windows clients when served by Debbie. PDFs work in either Linux or Windows. They even work when accessed by browser plug-ins, either FireFox 2 or IE6 or 7. Copying files to and from Debbie by the kids has been easy to implement.
Welcome to the Ubuntu Home Server Project
Ubuntu Home Server (UHS) will be an edition of the Ubuntu operating system which allows users to administer their home network.
Who needs Windows Home Server with Linux around?
Is this a joke? I only recently started paying attention to Windows Home Server, since I tend to focus more on desktop operating systems and enterprise server systems. So I didn’t realize until now that WHS is really just a vanilla file server.
Review: Excito Bubba home server
The Bubba is built around a 160MHz processor, which is only one tenth as fast as a notebook computer’s chip, but it uses a special version of the Linux operating system rather than Windows, which means it’s more than up to the task.
Despite Linux having a fearsome reputation as being hard to set up and use, setting up the Bubba was simple, as long as your router uses DHCP (this is switched on by default for most routers).
Multipurpose home server gains power, features
Quad Micro Works is prepping a second release of its Linux-based multipurpose home network, gateway, and server appliance. The new “Square One Personal Server” will integrate an 802.11g access point, along with a 4-port router and file, print, and Web servers.
Compelling Linux server slithers into the open
Given the compact size of the Slug (it’s smaller than most of the hard disk enclosures that plug into it), the low power consumption and the range of software available, it makes for a pretty compelling little Linux server, particularly for developers.
Hardware Review: Bubba – The Linux-Based Mini Server
Microsoft would like you to think that their new Home Server products are something new; affordable devices that sit quietly in the corner of your home, providing network backup for your most important files, and streaming your media around your home. While Home Server is definitely a new approach for Microsoft, it’s a niche that their nemesis Linux has been filling for some time. If Microsoft wanted a masterclass on how to craft their latest assault of consumers’ homes, they should look to Excito and their Bubba Mini Server.
Server device deemed “best Linux-based product”
Bubba is a compact, fanless server appliance with an internal hard drive up to 500GB, a 200MHz ARM processor, and a fully customizable Debian Linux operating system.
Compact, fanless home server runs Debian Linux
A small company in Sweden is shipping a low-power, ultra-quiet Linux file and print server based on Debian Linux. Excito’s “Bubba” is based on a 200MHz ARM processor, and comes equipped with 80GB to 500GB drives plus a customizable OS featuring a handy torrent/http/ftp download manager.
Windows Home Server
Home Servers Hold Big Promise, Limited Appeal
While Vista’s been grabbing all the headlines and hype, Microsoft’s gone and released another new operating system, and servers running it will probably be the coolest gadgets most consumers won’t rush out to buy.
Windows Home Server testing uncovers nearly 2,400 bugs
In an entry on the Home Server blog, program manager Chris Sullivan said that the group has received nearly 2,400 bug reports so far from beta testers, and still had 495, or about 21% of the total, classified as “active.”
Will Windows Home Server be Microsoft’s next flop?
If you buy-off on the theory that the world seems to be heading in the opposite direction that Microsoft wants to lead it, then you can’t help but wonder what the long term prospects for an offering like Windows Home Server are. Not good, if you ask me.
Windows Home Server fan club beats me up for asking if WHS is Microsoft’s next flop
Literally within minutes of each other (strangely coincidental), I received two e-mails — one from a colleague and the other from someone who concealed their identity — that basically told me I was out of line for questioning the chances that Microsoft’s Windows Home Server will succeed.
Will bad backups doom Windows Home Server?
Microsoft just announced it’s working on Windows Home Server, which among other features, will automatically back up files on all PCs in the home. But if the product uses the same kind of brain-dead backup built into Windows Vista, this is a product that will be dead on arrival.
The backup tool built into Windows Vista may be the worst utility every packed into an operating system. It doesn’t allow you to back up individual files, folders or even file types. Instead, you have to back up every single file and folder of broad generic types.
For example, if you want to back up a single picture, you have to back up every single graphic of every graphic file type on your entire PC, including all the graphics that Vista itself uses. This means you can be forced to back up hundreds of gigabytes of files if you only want to back up a few family photos.
Microsoft admits big delay on Home Server bug fix
Microsoft has admitted that it will not deliver a fix to a Windows Home Server data corruption bug it first discovered late last year until June at the earliest.
Stay Away from Home Server Day Care
The problem is fundamental in several ways. Data corruption or deletion occurs “when certain programs are used to edit or transfer files that are stored on a Windows Home Server-based computer that has more than one hard drive,” according to the Microsoft support document. So, the problems are with file copying and data storage—both fundamental features—and occurring in the likeliest of scenarios: Multiple hard drives. Surely Microsoft must have known that the earliest adopters would be enthusiasts?
Nine programs are associated with the data problems, seven of them from Microsoft.
Data Corruption Bug – List of Potential Applications Affected Grows
In summary, Microsoft has reproduced the bug successfully with the following applications:
* Windows Vista Photo Gallery
* Windows Live Photo Gallery
* Microsoft Office OneNote 2007
* Microsoft Office OneNote 2003
* Microsoft Office Outlook 2007
* Microsoft Money 2007
* SyncToy 2.0 Beta
* Intuit QuickBooks
* uTorrent
Home Server users have reported the issue occurring with the following list of applications:
* Photoshop Elements
* Zune Software
* Apple iTunes
* TagScanner
* Mozilla Thunderbird
* Adobe Lightroom
* Intuit QuickenMS Digital Image Library
* MP3BookHelper
* ACDSee
* WinAmp
* Windows Media Player 11
* Microsoft Office Excel
* Visual DataFlex
So, to put this in perspective, the list of potential applications affected is growing.
News Briefs: 1-17-08
Windows Home Server Anti-evangelism. Microsoft technical evangelist Volker Will is really unhappy about Windows Home Server. I’m a big fan of the product marketing, but Will’s anti-endorsement has me wondering about getting a HP MediaSmart Server as planned.
Windows Home Server bug corrupts files
Given that the point of Windows Home Server is to allow you to store your media files, a bug in the storage process that could result in corrupted files is bound to get attention.
Microsoft has issued a support document for the 13 or so (just kidding) people using Windows Home Server, the company’s latest product for those attempting to build the digital home of the future. Apparently there’s a flaw in the way Windows Home Server works with certain Microsoft applications, such as Windows Vista Photo Gallery, that could result in corrupted files if you use those applications to save files to the server. A list of the specific applications can be found in the support document.
By all means remember that Windows Home Server is a sibling of Windows Server and Windows Vista. They share the same DNA (codebase).
There are wonderful products in the market that just work. And then there’s wonderful marketing for products that just don’t work.
The emperor is naked. Share the word. █
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Posted in Novell at 3:04 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
Only days after Martin Buckley's departure, the Novell CIO, Debra Anderson, leaves the company also, unless there is something that we missed (other than confirmation from Novell itself).
Before joining UST Global, Anderson was CIO of Novell, an infrastructure software and services company. In this role she spearheaded Novell’s internal adoption of open source software from the desktop to the data center and managed the deployment of global strategic business information systems and IT services.
There have been many other departures recently, not only at the top level, but also at the bottom level (at much larger scales). █
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Posted in Deception, ECMA, Formats, ISO, Microsoft, Office Suites, Open XML, OpenDocument at 1:27 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
The Web is relentlessly criticising Microsoft’s OOXML. This whole recent debate has finally led more people to realising that documents should be capable of being viewed equally well by many different applications, devices and platforms just as the Web can be used and accessed universally. Here are some new articles of interest.
Truly Open Formats Are Key
OStatic, which is a new Web site solely focused on Open Source software, has this piece on the importance of open formats and their relationship to open source software.
Without a documented, open standard, the application becomes the only way to get data into or out of a file. If the application is a closed-source, commercial program, then the user is at the software company’s mercy, hoping that the program will continue to work, and that the format contains no serious bugs. The economics of proprietary software reward complicated and hard-to-understand file formats, because they ensure that users will continue to use the program.
With open-source sofware, the opposite is true: Programmers have an incentive to make the file format as open and readable as possible, and to encourage others to write programs that work with the same format. Format changes are documented and debated by a community of programmers and users, ensuring that the program strikes a good balance between backward compatibility and future features.
Just one word of warning about this Web site: the site is part of Om Malik’s (GigaOM) network. Om Malik accepted payments from Microsoft to advertise them in disguise, essentially by reciting their marketing slogans. There is a name for this type of thing: “viral marketing” at best and “astroturfing” at worst. There are details about this incident here. Michael Arrington (the TechCrunch network) is equally guilty.
The Microsoft-only Definition of “Open”
People are not really buying the “Open” angle in “Open XML”. It’s neither open nor XML. What’s more, it is a case of resisting what is already an international standard — properly constructed and fully-documented XML with no predatory licensing traps [1, 2, 3, 4, 5].
This document incompatibility shows it’s ugly side when you can’t open files from other people using another piece of software. This is why I do not believe taking on a large task such as creating OOXML was really worth the effort. Creating a new document format in the face of another format perfected for the job at hand, reinforced the beliefs of many that Microsoft wants to control all of the standards they use. Strangely enough, if they had chosen to use ODF, it would have helped their ailing PR by showing people that they are indeed interested in making document compatibility a true focus. That decision would most certainly be more consumer-friendly than adding in the OOXML format, or a piece rather, into Office 2007, causing confusion with consumers about whether or not others can read their documents.
‘Open’ Format the Worst ‘Feature’ of Office 2007
Consider this new article from the mainstream press in Australia [via Bob Sutor]. It slams OOXML, pretty much describing it as an anti-feature that ruins Office 2007. It also explains why Microsoft should have embraced ODF (which it still can and probably will).
ODF is also much simpler. It is functionally similar to OOXML, but comprises only 850 pages of code, compared to more than 6000 pages for OOXML.
It is not hard to believe, as many in the standards community do, that Microsoft’s whole strategy is to further entrench its global dominance and freeze out competitors.
Microsoft could, after all, have adopted the ODF standard itself and not pursued OOXML. Ask yourself why it would develop a rival standard, then bully others into adopting it. We will know in a couple of weeks which way the ISO vote goes.
Who is ISO? What parts of it have not yet been hijacked by Microsoft and its business partners, then failed to function properly?
“But, Mommy, OOXML is Broken…”
The ‘political’ side of this issue aside, consider again the sad technical state of OOXML. From a KDE developer:
Oha. So, it’s another boolean flag and describes what the application should do during editing (hint: it’s a file-format and not a guide how to implement the application itself). To be able to load+save that flag and those PII thing, I would need to know now more details what PII exactly is, where it’s stored and how I am able to load it. But at none of the 7000 pages are any details about this Sad Fine, only Microsoft knows…
Microsoft really needs OOXML. The world does not need OOXML. So which way will ISO bend? The world or Microsoft? █
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Posted in Deception, Finance, Free/Libre Software, GNU/Linux, Microsoft, OLPC, Open XML, Patents at 12:50 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
“It’s possible, you can never know, that the universe exists only for me. If so, it’s sure going well for me, I must admit.”
–Bill Gates, TIME magazine Vol. 149, No. 2 (13 January 1997)
The following short article comes from a reader, who strives to explain Microsoft’s current strategy.
Microsoft must be very scared. Their monopoly is at stake (or as Eric Raymond says, if they don’t get a monopoly lock-in their options will plummet and everything is over, so they will never behave). Their hopes to keep their monopoly remain in 2 fundamental pillars: Expect them to bury as much money as necessary to sustain these 2 pillars and get their way:
Pillar 1
Microsoft OOXML is a fundamental part of their strategy: Without the fixed revenue stream coming from governments they will suffer much, not only because they will lose one of their biggest sure captive customers (governments) but also because it would open the floodgates to competition. And they don’t stand any chances against GNU/Linux in terms of cost, scalability, security, performance and so forth.
That is why if ISO refuses Microsoft OOXML and governments start to migrate to alternatives, they are doomed.
Their other captive customer (the OEMs) are starting to fail them. As hardware prices are lowered, the ‘Microsoft tax’ is becoming more and more visible. A computer without the extra tax — and the extra requirements to run Windows — is more competitive and successful: Think about the Eee PC. That’s why they opposed so hideously to the OLPC project.
Pillar 2
The other pillar is Software Patents, which is the legal mechanism they are embracing in order to perpetuate their monopoly. Alas, software patents are illegal in Europe and we must be alert on this because they are trying to see them passed in the EU (heavy lobbying behind the scenes to our elected representatives), so this is another field where FLOSS has to fight and fight hard.
“And think about the economic crisis: It was already hard to try to prove their products were worth the ridiculous prices they ask for the licences, but it is getting harder every day.”They have extended a worldwide network of Microsoft Certified Partners, Microsoft certified developers, system administrators and satellite business that sell you anti-virus for systems they make insecure by design, and there is a huge amount of money in the whole game, much of it coming as a sure thing (the OEM tax, governments spending public funds on their products due to the lock-in, etc), and any member of this network can see its business menaced by people like you and I telling everyone that “The emperor just has no clothes”. So expect the fight.
But at the end of the day we know — as well as them — we are right and they are wrong and they know it (I always try to imagine the cognitive dissonance inside Jason Matusow’s head looking at how he bends the truth to serve his employer in his posts). Free Software has just started rolling and it is like a snowball now, but soon it will be an avalanche. Lies will be revealed sooner or later (documents coming out of legal processes show Microsoft has not changed an inch in more of 10 years).
And think about the economic crisis: It was already hard to try to prove their products were worth the ridiculous prices they ask for the licences, but it is getting harder every day.
So, let’s keep up the good fight for software freedom, which is as well our freedom, the society’s and the legacy we can fight from in our reduced field of action — we are not world leaders or powerful entrepreneurs, but into our “everyday people” possibilities we do make a difference — for the generations to come.
Remind yourself of this: Steve Ballmer keeps saying (and last said it just two weeks ago) that Linux is Microsoft’s number one competitor. Remember this. Number one threat. Not Apple. Not IBM. Microsoft is meanwhile approaching debt and it may soon be tipped over the edge only to surprise everyone who previously fell for their constant lies (otherwise known as “embellishments”). █
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Posted in Antitrust, Formats, ISO, Microsoft, Mono, Open XML, Standard at 12:27 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz
The press is far from over discussing some of the misbehavior we have witnessed over the past couple of years. Although discussions about OOXML ought to have been just technical, they ended up getting mixed in the face of endless misconduct. Which shall one criticise more and bring more attention to: the technical hoax that is OOXML or the corruptions which OOXML has revealed?
Pieter has published a good new piece which looks at both aspects of this.
To conclude, Microsoft have, with OOXML, shot themselves in both feet, then put the bloody stumps into their big mouth and chewed, hard and long. They created a fradulent process by corrupting ISO at a high level. They engaged national bodies in this process, then bought and bullied those bodies into voting “properly”. And when the committees refused to be intimidated, they went to ministers and tried to bribe them. They used their press and astroturfing budgets to sell this as a fair and necessary process. They pretended that they were the victim, of an autocratic ODF and a manipulative IBM.
This excellent summary is all very truthful, and it can be accompanied by well-documented evidence to back the claims. IT Pro has published a new article as well and it emphasises the failures of the standardisation process. Here is a portion of the text:
A toxic leech
OOXML is controversial for a number of reasons. Critics argue that OOXML is not so much a specification as a description of Microsoft’s existing proprietary data formats, complete with the replication of historic bugs, the most notorious being the treatment of 1900 as a leap year. The specification was derived internally to describe Microsoft’s current data formats, and has not benefitted from the usual wide-ranging debate and participation from competing interests, hammering out their differences to find the points they have in common, that accompany the conventional definition of a standard.
A standard is intended to facilitate multiple implementations of a protocol or data format, not to give validation to the one existing implementation of that format. There have also been complaints that, despite the fact that over 3500 comments were raised against the original specification, delegates weren’t able to suggest amendments that contradicted Microsoft’s current implementation.
[...]
In truth, the opposition has come from all quarters, and has been most vocal among those interested in open standards, which includes everybody from governments through to representatives of the free and open source software movement, and also includes many parties with an interest in maintaining open access and network neutrality for civil or commercial reasons, including the likes of IBM, Google and Oracle.
Rob Wier reminds his readers that OOXML is saturated with the same characteristics one typically finds in “Embrace, Extend and Extinguish” tactics. OOXML’s licence [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] and dynamicity, not to mention Mono dependencies in broken and lossy translation, may all be signs of things to come. They justify the need to intercept OOXML, which is falsely advertised as a case of opening up (realistically, more like broadening, as in ‘extending’ and moving goalposts).
Here begins the lesson on Embrace, Extend and Extinguish (EEE). Classically, this technique is used to perpetuate vendor lock-in by introducing small incompatibilities into a standard interface, in order to prevent effective interoperability, or (shudder) even substitutability of competing products based on that interface. This EEE strategy has worked well so far for Microsoft, with the web browser, with Java, with Kerberos, etc. It is interesting to note that this technique can work equally well with Microsoft’s own standards, like OOXML.
[...]
So, by failing to include this in their conformance clause, OOXML’s use of the term “implementation-defined” is toothless. It just means “We don’t want to tell you this information” or “We don’t want to interoperate”. Conformant applications are not required to actually document how they extend the standard. You can look at Microsoft Office 2007 as a prime example. Where is this documentation that explains how Office 2007 implements these “implementation-defined” features? How is interoperability promoted without this?
Groklaw has some good articles covering “Embrace, Extend, Extinguish”, so you are encouraged to read older stories such as this one.
You’ll hear some emails read aloud, one of Bill Gates’s, an email from 1996 about Java, where he says he was losing sleep over how great Java was, and you’ll see a strategy he suggested — “fully supporting Java and extending it in a Windows/Microsoft way”.
[...]
Well, when applets are cross-platform, it expands the number of applications that are available to you so you can go to a website. And if you have a Linux computer or a Macintosh computer or a Windows 3.1 computer, you can get an application and it will run.
You don’t have to either select a specific application or hope that the independent software vendor or the website created the application for your platform. So it would increase the number of applications available to you.
This one is good also:
“Ronald Alepin, an independent consultant and former CTO for Fujitsu, disputed the idea that Microsoft had been an innovator in the field. He said that interoperability protocols were developed by companies other than Microsoft, and that Microsoft has simply extended the protocols and then refused to disclose the extensions. In so doing, he told the court, Microsoft “has hijacked standard interoperability protocols agreed by the entire industry.”
As the previous post from an anonymised contributor insists, it is very unlikely that Microsoft has changed its ways (nor that it ever will). It’s the same old tricks, with the addition of software patents. in a disguise named “open”, or “interop”. And there is always some invasive Microsoft agent who tries to sell this to us. █
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