US businesses warm to Vista

Uptake of Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system is starting to pick up among US businesses.

Just under half (48 percent) of US IT decision makers are using or evaluating Vista, according to a poll by IT services firm CDW.

This is CDW's third Windows Vista tracking poll since October 2006 and shows a 19 percentage-point increase in uptake since February 2007.

Vista migration is also increasing, with more than a third (35 percent) of those surveyed saying they are in the process of moving to Vista. In comparison, just 12 percent said this last February.

Thirteen percent of these migrations are complete and another third are due to be finished by May 2008.

CDW claimed this shows Microsoft's latest operating system is now seen as a more viable option in the mainstream business market.

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Of those still testing and migrating to Vista, almost half said its performance and key features are "above expectations" with the top-rated features being security, performance, productivity, search and updates.

Mark Gambill, CDW vice president, said the past year was one of "adaptations and learning for Microsoft, industry partners and adopters alike".

Gambill added that, since people have begun to understand the benefits of the operating system, there has been a "steady move towards adoption".

The CDW survey also found an increase in Microsoft Office 2007 adoption, with almost a quarter (24 percent) of businesses saying they'd made the move, compared to just six percent in the last survey.

The poll was conducted by Walker Information and covered 772 IT decision makers.

Windows Vista Service Pack 1 Beta Opens Up

Are you a Windows Vista user? If so, Microsoft has opened its beta release of Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1) up for the public to download, following several months of private beta testing. You can download it now at Microsoft’s site.

As has been true of previous Service Packs for Windows, Vista SP1 is focused on fixing bugs, improving performance, and other under-the-hood enhancements. Installing the Service Packs as they are released has become a widespread practice, and Microsoft’s Service Packs for Windows XP have been notable for fixing many security problems in the operating system. However, it is worth noting that Vista SP1 is still pre-release software, and you will want to evaluate some issues pertaining to how you install it.

Note that if you are going to download and install Vista SP1, you can choose either of two ways to do so. You can install it using an Automatic Update process (listed as Method 1 at the link above), or to install it as fast as possible you can perform a manual installation using Windows Update (listed as Method 2). If you choose the Automatic Update process, your complete installation will actually take several days, because prerequisites for the Service Pack and the components themselves will be added incrementally, not in one download and install process.

Windows Vista is available in several versions. These are the supported versions for Vista SP1: Windows Vista; Windows Vista Business 64-bit edition; Windows Vista Enterprise 64-bit edition; Windows Vista Home Basic 64-bit edition; Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit edition; and Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit edition.

If you want more enhancements for Windows Vista, you may want to download Tweak VI from TotalIdea software, which can automatically provide performance and efficiency improvements. Also, the Tweakguides Tweaking Companion for Windows Vista makes it easy to customize many aspects of the operating system.

Free Video Editing Software for Producing Movies & Vlogs

Ferrari fan, Prabhu Krishnamurthy, is on a hunt for some free movie making software. He writes:

We are coming up with a 12 minute movie for culturals. Do you know any good movie making software, that can be downloaded for free?

Our movie will be based on a news channel. So I am looking at a video editor/movie maker software that allows scrolling texts, subtitles and custom animations etc.

You want so many video editing features for free ? Well, it may be possible as here are some good options for editing that don't cost a dime.

But before you read this list, check the CDs that shipped with your handycam - most camera manufacturers like Sony, Canon and Panasonic generally provide a decent video editing software with the camera. OK, back to the list of free video editing software:

Windows Movie Maker - The best video editing tool for Windows that's absolutely free and chances are you already have it installed on your computer as part of XP SP2. Microsoft Movie Maker has all the basic video editing tools plus a good collection of transitions and video effects.

There's an in-built movie titler that lets add you styles to text titles including ticker taps, zoom and even the scroll effect. And if you are feeling lazy, just hit the AutoMovie command to have the entire video produced for you with intervention.

Avid Free DV - Avid Free DV, poor cousin of Avid Xpress Pro, has all the basic video and audio editing features and allow you to put video in two tracks simultaneously. They have an extensive collection of tutorials online to help you get started quickly.

Support both Mac OS and Windows XP platform. Infact, you can even play with keyframes for generating custom moves and transitions. Ships with the Avid Title tool.

JahShaka - An open source video editing software that is currently in Alpha stage but has features found only in expensive video editing software suites.

Works on Mac, Linux and Windows. The interface might take some time for you to get started otherwise the software is definitely the most powerful one out there. And the price is just right. $0. Also does 3D effects which you won't find in other free video editors.

Jumpcut.com - Jumpcut is a web based video editing software and now it's even part of the Yahoo! family. You upload a video or small clips just like importing inside a desktop software.

There are dozens of transitions and special effects. You can import photographs from your Flickr or Facebook account to mix them with the videos. The jumpcut editor is intuitive enough and there is good title support as well. And your movies are published online automatically. Perfect for quick vlogging and video podcasting.

Finally... While the above video editing software should satisfy the needs of most home movie makers, you can probably consider Adobe Premiere Elements or even Muvee AutoProducer for more features and better control over the final output. They have trial version to help you try out the software before actually buying it.

Install Windows XP on Mac

Here are the steps required to install Windows XP on a Mac:

Step 1: Download Mac OS X v10.4.6 (or later) and latest firmware update from Apple Download website.

Step 2: Run the Boot Camp Assistant to create a Macintosh Drivers CD or DVD.

Step 3: Create a new hard-disk partition [minimum size, 5GB] to make room for Windows XP. All the software and data on the original Mac partition stays intact.



Step 4: Insert your Windows XP CD and start the XP installation. Select Partition C: and format the partition using either NTFS or FAT file formats. Though NTFS is more secure than FAT, you won't be able to write or save files to the Windows volume from Mac OS X.

Step 5. Once XP install process is complete, Boot Camp will restart your system in Windows XP automatically. Now is the turn to install Mac Drivers from the Macintosh Drivers CD that you created in Step 2. Restart.

This is an optional step. You can change the Startup Disk preferences page to choose which OS to boot by default. The default OS can also been changed from Windows Control Panel - Performance and Maintenance - Startup Disk.Change the Operating system and Restart.

At startup, hold down the option key (alt) to choose between Mac OS X and Windows.

More Resources on Apple Website:

Apple Boot Camp Homepage | Download Boot Camp [Direct Link]

Download Apple Firmware Update | Mac OS X 10.4.6 for Intel update

Source- www.labnol.blogspot.com

Security flaw in Vista

After what seemed to be a lifetime, Windows Vista finally hit the consumer market. For many, this is the start of a new experience in Windows; but for some, is a race to find vulnerabilities in Microsoft’s new OS.

Evgeny Legerov, founder of the security firm Gleg Ltd. in Moscow has been finding security flaws in web browsers and operating systems for years. “To find a vulnerability, you have to do a lot of hard work,” said Evgeny.

He’s not doing it for a smile or renowned fame; he’s in it for the money. Evgeny claims doing the responsible thing just doesn’t pay the bills, “If you follow what they call responsible disclosure, in most cases all you receive is an ordinary thank you or sometimes nothing at all.”

Gleg Ltd. sells vulnerability research to customers around the world for a minimum of $10,000; but claims their is a huge black market for such data. One example discovered by the Japanese antivirus company, TredMicro, is a case where a hacker on a Romanian Web forum was offering a Vista vulnerability for $50,000. Evgeny says he receives offers like this all the time, and has to reject them despite the financial gain. The price is in direct proportion to the popularity of the software.

In a similar scenario this month, iDefense, a Virginia based subsidiary of the technology company VeriSign, will be offering $8,000 to the first six researchers who uncover holes in Vista, and an additional $4,000 for the code that can be used to take advantage of Vista’s ‘back doors.’

This is obviously a small percentage of what can be made on the black market; but if you want to keep things legal, $8,000 is a fair offer. iDefense, in turn, sells this information to government agencies and corporations to protect their systems.

Microsoft does not endorse such bounty programs, and would rather the research come to them first. Exploiting any Vista weakness to the public could result in hackers abusing the information before a patch can be issued to the public.

“With the underground trading of vulnerabilities, software makers are left playing catch-up to develop updates that will help protect customers,” said Mark Miller, director of the Microsoft Security Response Center.

Vista, not having an antivirus program or support for legacy antivirus software seems like a security flaw to me; but I won’t be up all night trying to hack Microsoft’s most secure operating system in history.

Windows Software

Here’s some windows software I’ve used or evaluated. Be sure to check out the sub-pages (on the right) for additional software.

FileZilla FTP Client and Server

Visit FileZilla Website
The client and server are two separate programs. I run them on my laptop.
Read about the install here.

Comments and Observations

1. I had problems connecting from my Mac (using fetch). I had configured the Windows firewall to allow the FTP port. When the connection went to passive mode the OS X firewall would reject the connection.

   I tried to limit the ports FileZilla would use but this didn’t seem to work as FileZilla didn’t seem to stay withing that port range.

   Finally I added the FileZilla server program to the Windows Firewall exclusions in addition to the FTP port and this cleared the problem.

2. I use the FTP server to synchronize directories. When doing the first synchronization (first run after files were copied to the server) the Fetch client would run through long lists of files already up to date on the server. These are simple date checks, no data copies. The Fetch client would report that the server dropped the connection. The server log would show it dropped the connection due to inactivity. I disabled the inactivity timeout. I was 2 minutes which is about how long the check would run before dropping. The server is only used by me and the laptop shuts down when not in use so I’m not worried about inactive connections using resources.

Firefox Web Browser

Visit Firefox Website
I use Firefox as my primary browser on OS X, Windows and Linux.
Installation of version 2 on Windows XP and OS X is covered here.

Internet Explorer 7

Visit Website

I write about the installation here.

The installation log is available at this link: IE7InstallLog

Clicking on "New" to create a new Doc in Google docs and then trying to change the title results in a message "This website is using a scripted window to ask you for information. If you trust this website , click here to allow scripted windows." I clicked there and my only choice was to temporarily allow, which I did. I then clicked the Title again and changed it.

In Google Docs, when clicking a star on the main page to deselect it for a document causes IE 7 to clock for about a minute until it returns a error message “Unable to connect to server, please try again”. Any other Google Docs windows/tabs also lose the connection to the server. A refresh won’t connect. Have to close the window and re-open it. Using Firefox on the same PC, with the same docs, and at the same time works fine.

When IE 7 is being shutdown and multiple tabs are open there is a prompt that asks if you want to re-open the same tabs the next time IE is opened. This prompt can be turned off.

IE 7 is not my primary browser, even on Windows. But if I’m going to run IE it might as well be the latest version which is IE 7.