Dave: Computers

New Blog Location!

Sat, 26 Mar 2005 15:17:40 GMT

I am moving my blog to a new URL. Please go to the following location from now on:

http://blog.davidmccarter.net

Thanks!
David McCarter

Learn VB.NET from dotNetDave

Thu, 03 Mar 2005 01:56:22 GMT

If you live in the San Diego area, dotNetDave (a.k.a. David McCarter) will be teaching a 6 week VB.NET course at the University of California, San Diego Extension beginning on Thursday March 31st from 5:30pm to 9:30pm. For more information and to enroll, please click here.

Oh, So Linux Does Have Problems :-)

Sun, 16 Jan 2005 23:15:30 GMT

Linux vendors Red Hat, Novell and Mandrakesoft on Wednesday released patches for several vulnerabilities, ranging from flaws that could allow denial-of-service attacks to buffer overflows.

For the complete article click here.

iProduct?

Thu, 13 Jan 2005 04:07:43 GMT

Netflix Gets RSS!

Sat, 11 Sep 2004 17:13:12 GMT

Netflix now has RSS feeds! Way cool. My favorite one is the "New Releases" feed. I've been using Netflix for many years and hopefully this feed will make it easier to find out what cool new movies I can add to my queue.

Great Advice from Robert Scoble on Keeping Your Computer Safe

Sun, 22 Aug 2004 15:56:11 GMT

The layers of security I use to keep criminals at bay.

Tim Anderson: SP2 debate exposes deeper problems.

ZDNet's David Berlind: SP2's new firewall: better than nothing, but not good enough.

Security is an interesting issue. How much security is good enough?

Let's get out of the computer world. Let's talk about heirloom jewelry. My wife, Maryam, has a bit of jewelry. Does she store it here in the house? No. Why not? It's not secure enough. Where does she store it? In a safe deposit box in a bank. Let's talk about a bank's security and how many layers it has.

1) The jewelry is stored in a safe deposit box with a lock.
2) There's a camera on the box area, so if something goes missing they can verify what happened later.
3) Each box is alarmed. So, if you try to break into someone else's box, an alarm will cry out.
4) The safe deposit boxes are stored inside the bank vault. Three feet of concrete and steel with a very sophisticated lock on the door.
5) Video cameras on the vault door to verify who goes in and out.
6) The vault is behind a counter and you aren't allowed to go near it unless an employee lets you in.
7) The vault is in a building that's designed to be difficult to break into. Alarms. Heavy duty doors. Lighting that makes it easy to see in.

I'm sure there's more layers too that I'm not even aware of. But, let's not dwell on this. The point is that there's multiple layers of security all to protect my wife's jewelry. Let's say any one of these layers failed. Her jewelry would still be safe. It would take multiple failures for a criminal to be able to steal her jewelry.

So, what's my point? Well, when it comes to computer security you should have multiple layers as well. If you have multiple layers of security, then any one layer -- even if it's not well designed -- will prove sufficient in keeping criminals away from the digital equivilent of your jewelry.

If you visit www.microsoft.com/protect you'll see the layers that Microsoft is recommending. For me, I go further. Here's what I'm doing now.

1) Install Windows XP Service Pack 2. This update has many protections against attacks (recompiled code, closed APIs, firewall on by default, all known patches, etc).

2) Get a good anti-virus program. Visit www.microsoft.com/protect for some suggestions, including a Computer Associates one that's free for first 12 months. Why is this important? It'll protect your system from all the known viruses, worms, and trojan horses.

3) Get a good two-way firewall on every machine. The Sygate Personal Firewall is free and is good. Zone Alarm is another popular choice. Why don't I just use the firewall that's included in XPSP2? Because it is only a one-way firewall. Sygate's watches activity going on from both inside your computer as well as out on the Internet. What if your company already has a firewall? That's not enough. You need one on every machine now because if someone takes a laptop outside of your network, gets infected, then comes back in, they'll infect you too. In fact, I use two firewalls now, even at work (one software that runs on all my machines, and one that hooks to the network before I even hook a machine to it). XPSP2's firewall is definitely better than not having a firewall at all, but for some people like me it's not enough.

4) Get a hardware-based firewall or NAT at point of network entry. Why? Because many of us attach unpatched computers while installing, or want to play networked games, or have other reasons for turning off our software firewalls (some software won't work through firewalls). Plus, even if you don't turn them off, provides one more barrier that hackers have to go through. Again, it's about layers of security and not needing to rely on any one security device.

5) Turn on automatic updating. Visit www.microsoft.com/protect so you'll always have the latest security patches. Why do that? Because software evolves. We learn about mistakes we made in our code. We find new ways to keep criminals out. If you aren't running the absolute latest software, you're vulnerable (and this is true if you're on Linux or the Macintosh too).

6) Run the latest email and Web clients. Outlook 2003 and the latest Outlook Express, for instance, has another level of security against running exe's (you can't even run them if emailed in the latest versions, but if you used earlier versions they didn't have those protections). If you are running Firefox or Netscape, they regularly fix vulnerabilities in their products too. Always run the latest. That's the safest.

7) Visit www.microsoft.com/security regularly. for the latest information on security threats. That's the official place where Microsoft will communicate about security threats and/or the latest updates.

8) Run at least one good anti-spyware program like Adaware or Webroot's Spy Sweeper or Spyware Blaster. That'll make sure that no spyware sneaks onto your system. With XPSP2 I've found that spyware is far less likely to get onto your system, but I've already found one site that has some spyware that gets past XPSP2. So, you'll need to still check, particularly if you visit "high risk" sites (sites that aren't known to you, for instance, or adult sites which are famous for putting spyware on your systems).

9) If you visit high-risk Websites, turn off ActiveX and scripting in your browser. (I turn off scripting even on Firefox when I'm visiting high-risk sites -- you all can guess what I'm talking about here. It's just too risky.) In Internet Explorer, just visit Tools/Internet Options. Click on the security tab. Then move the security slider to "high." That'll disable both ActiveX and scripting.

10) Don't run in administrator mode. I'm slowly moving my machines to not running in administrator mode. That way if something does get through all the protection it can't do as much damage. Out of all the steps here, this one is the hardest to do, though, because a lot of things don't work on Windows if you're not running as administrator.

11) Keep an install partition on each of your machines. I put a backup version of my Windows XP install CD on the second partition so that if all else fails and my machine is taken down, I can quickly repair the system and get back up with nothing more than a boot floppy that any machine can produce (since my install bits are on the second partition I don't need to do anything fancy to get back up).

Update: Chris Coulter says that an even better thing to do is to get a second hard drive and put an image of the first drive on the second (he recommends Norton Ghost). If something happens to the first drive, you can build a new image off of the second drive and be back up and running within minutes.

12) Don't allow anonymous users on your wireless network. Why not? Because if they have been infected then you'll have invited them behind several layers of your security. Plus, a criminal could use your line to send spam or infect other people. Do you really want to help those people out?

13) Use better passwords. Come on, I know some of you aren't using good passwords. For instance, I knew one person who'd just use "password" as his password. That meant his machine could be broken into very quickly (never use a single word as a password -- hackers have dictionary cracking tools that can break such passwords ). Read Robert Hensing's advice. He's a security expert here at Microsoft and works in support and explains a good way to choose passwords that are hard to break.

14) Backup your data regularly. It's amazing how few people backup their stuff. Hard drives die. Things happen. If you have backups, you'll be OK even if your machine gets wiped by something. Personally most people don't need to do it very often. I backup once a month. Why? I'm willing to lose a month's worth of stuff. (Most of my important stuff is in Outlook and that's backed up automatically by the company I work for).

Anyway, my whole thing is to treat your computers like you treat valuable jewelry. Put up multiple security barriers. This is true, by the way, whether you are on a Mac or Linux too. All the above except for loading XPSP2 apply to you too. Just because the criminals aren't attacking your systems right now doesn't mean they won't in the future. That's like saying "well, if I hide my jewelry in a box at the North Pole the criminals aren't going to take the time to go there." That might be true, but is that really a good way to approach the world?

What do you think? How many layers of security do you have? How many do you need?

You might not need all the above, by the way. At home I don't have an alarm. I don't have video cameras. I don't have a vault with three-feet of concrete between me and any potential criminal.

So, the 14 security layers I use for my computers might be overkill for you. Which layers above do you choose not to have and why?

[Scobleizer: Microsoft Geek Blogger]

Angry User: ViewSonic V37 Pocket PC

Fri, 02 Jul 2004 23:11:25 GMT

There are data syncing issues with this model and other strange behaviors. Unfortunately Viewsonic is no longer offering an upgrade to Pocket PC 2003 which should fix some of these issues. Here is the response from their technical support: "The PPC 2003 upgrade CD for the Pocket PC V37 is no longer in production.". I personally would not purchase anything that can't be upgraded! Buyer beware! The screen resolution is not that great either.

Angry User: Outlook 2003 Junk Mail Filter

Tue, 20 Apr 2004 02:53:13 GMT

Okay, it’s April 19, 2004 and I just installed the latest update to Outlook, which was an update to its junk mail filter. What I was hoping was that it would fix a major problem that I have been having… while Outlook 2003 is great at catching most junk mail from your inbox, it does not work at all if you have a “rule” setup to move incoming mail to another folder. For instance, when I started up Outlook today, I had 35 junk e-mails in one folder (3 more as I was writing this)!!! Come on Microsoft, this cannot be that hard to fix!

I have also found out that if you have a rule that moves all the incoming mail from a specified account to a folder and you have it setup that only the e-mail headers are downloaded from that account, it won't process them at all!

Update: The Update for Outlook 2003: Junk E-mail Filter (KB870765) released in July 2004 seems to have fixed the junk mail filter issue described above.

Mac OS Get a Trojan Horse!

Fri, 09 Apr 2004 22:32:59 GMT

Okay, I just can't pass up promoting that the MAC has a trojan horse. I know that Windows has many more than the MAC but I still have to bring it up :-) Trojan Horse Attacks Mac OS X. A security company warns of malicious code that targets the operating system. It could be the start of a whole new world of pain for blithe Mac users. By Leander Kahney.

Longhorn Slips

Sat, 03 Apr 2004 23:50:47 GMT

Longhorn beta likely to slip into 2005. Microsoft had planned to deliver a beta version of its next Windows release, in mid-2004. But many developers working on it have been reassigned to work on Service Pack 2 for Windows XP. So when will it really be released now? 2007?

So MAC is Perfect Huh?

Thu, 06 Nov 2003 22:02:31 GMT

Panther Bug: Is It Really Dead?. Apple says the hard-drive-eating glitch in the latest upgrade to its OS X operating system is fixed. But others say the problem lives on, affecting multiple devices that use FireWire, including camcorders. If you listen to the guys on TechTV (the Screen Savers show) and MAC heads, the OS is bug free and awesome?!?!? At least Windows never ate my hard drive ;-)

Microsoft Releases 64bit Windows To Beta

Tue, 23 Sep 2003 16:35:11 GMT

Microsoft hops on the 64-bit bus. The software giant announces the availability of a beta version of its Windows operating system for Advanced Micro Devices' new Athlon 64 chip.

Angry User: Nomad Jukebox 3

Fri, 19 Sep 2003 01:43:46 GMT

Okay, I’ve had this thing for almost a year now and I have been meaning to write this for almost that long. I did a diligent job on researching the other MP3 players out there and I picked the Nomad because it had lots of space (20 gigs), long battery life (11 hours on one or 22 on two) and excellent EQ and sound leveling… come on, what do you expect from Creative Labs! What I didn’t expect was that the firmware and software for it was so poorly written (and still is)! Okay, the headphone sucked too, but I expected that. Read on if you plan to buy one of these things…

Why The Nomad Sucks

One very important accessory they left out of the package is a straighten out paperclip! You need one handy for a few reasons. If you “accidentally” leave it plugged in to its power supply over night, it won’t turn on?!?!?! Huh? I have never had any device in my life that did this! At first I thought the Nomad was bad and I contacted the Creative labs technical support. The said they needed to replace it. They did and it kept happening until I realized what the real problem was. The only way to get the player started is to stick a straighten paperclip into the reset hole in the underside of the player.

So after I was very careful to not keep my player plugged in, it kept happening! During this time I was transferring a lot of songs over to my player while I worked on another computer. Well, after a frustrating time wondering why I kept having to use my trusty paperclip every morning. I discovered that keeping the USB cable plugged into it overnight did something, so it needed to be reset every morning! Huh?

Before I move to the crappy software, there are a few more firmware issues. One is that there is no way that you can tell if you added an Album to the Playlist. So if you added it again (because you could not remember if it was in the play list or not), the firmware is too stupid to know that you already added it and adds it again. After about six months of wondering why some songs played all the time and others hardly ever played, I finally figured it out! I also found out that the play list can not be as long as you want. I recently hit some limit and had to kill off a big play list and make lots of smaller ones. When you select to play a play list, for some reason it will play songs that are not on that play list ?!?!? Also, the random song generator simply blows. It can actually play the same song twice in a row! With over 600 songs on my player, I don’t know why I hear the same song 3 or 4 times in 8 hours??

The Software Sucks… Then Got Worse!

The Play Center software that originally came with the Nomad looked like a summer intern wrote it! It did not “play well” will other programs while transferring songs to the Nomad. Meaning it took over all the computers cycles and you could not user any other programs. Navigation around the Nomad major areas (Albums, Play lists etc.) is very poor. It’s funny how my CD player for my home stereo system can read the song names off of CD-R’s that I burn, but the Pay Center can not?

Anyway, I was hoping they would fix Play Center or come out with a better program… well they did. I just installed it and its worse! They seem to be forcing you to use this huge program Creative MediaSource Organizer. Even though it says it will work with the Nomad, it doesn’t unless you install a plug in. After going to their web site again, struggling though some error messages, deleting a device driver, installing it again and rebooting… it finally worked! But then it took me about 30 minutes just to figure out how to transfer a CD to the Nomad. The MediaSource Organizer is way to confusing to use. Most features that were in the Play Center are gone! You can’t add an entire album to the play list anymore… you have to add the tracks. The whole thing just sucks.

What Were They Thinking?

Okay Creative, good hardware but want went wrong with the software and firmware? Because of this I will NEVER purchase another Creative MP3 product. You have lost a customer forever. Actually, since we all paid for this piece of crap, I think that we all deserve the latest generation of MP3 player you have… for FREE! That’s the least you can do.

Angry User: Microsoft Outlook 2003 (beta)

Tue, 16 Sep 2003 01:18:57 GMT

Last weekend I rebuilt (hardware) my main computer at home. I was running Microsoft Office 2000. Before I shut down the old hardware for the last time, I exported all my e-mail account settings in Outlook (all 9 of them) and placed them (along with all my other backup data) on my file server. After I rebuilt my server, installed Windows XP, I installed Microsoft Office 2003 (beta 2 refresh). After I went through some hassle with making my old .pst file the main personal folder in Outlook 2003 I then attempted to setup my e-mail accounts.

At first I went to the screen where the e-mail accounts are setup because in Outlook 2000, this is where you import/export account settings. Guess what… no such option. Then I went to File/ Import and Export. I selected “Import Internet Mail Account Settings”… all I got was an error stating “No internet accounts were found to import”! What the heck! It did not let me pick a place to import them from or anything!

So I had to manually enter ALL NINE of my e-mail accounts (thank goodness I had the foresight to make screenshots of all my account settings)! It was a struggle remembering some of the passwords! This really sucked! They better get this fixed before the release in two weeks or there are going to be a lot of pissed off people.

Angry User: Microsoft ActiveSync

Fri, 15 Aug 2003 19:56:38 GMT

If you have a Compaq Pocket PC as I do, they I’m sure might be as irritated as I am… Why the heck when I cradle my Pocket PC and Microsoft ActiveSync kicks in to communicate with it, the ActiveSync windows has to pop-up and disturb me? Why can’t it just operate quietly down in the system tray and not bother me unless there is a problem? I have to purposely close the dang thing every time I dock my Pocket PC! ARRRGH! And another thing… why can’t I ever close down ActiveSync? It’s the first program I have ever encountered that does not have a way to exit out of it!?!?!?!?!?

Windows Has Another Hole... So What!

Wed, 13 Aug 2003 16:53:17 GMT

Another week, another security hole in Windows ('MSBlast' worm a piecemeal monster). Let’s face it… it’s going to happen when you have the most popular operating system on the planet! There are probably thousands of pimply faced little hackers with nothing better to do than to try to make Windows look bad. No operating system is perfect… not the Mac, not Linux… none of them. The others have holes too, but since they are in such the minority the media never publicizes them. Believe me, if we were all running Linux, there would be worms, security holes every week… so everyone settle down now!

Web Services Upgrade!

Fri, 18 Jul 2003 02:44:03 GMT

Microsoft previews upgraded Web services pack. Security to get boost [InfoWorld: Top News]

Microsoft Release Private Beta of Yukon

Fri, 18 Jul 2003 02:42:37 GMT

Microsoft releases private beta of Yukon database. Five hundred customers receive a copy [InfoWorld: Top News]

Microsoft Passport Hole!

Wed, 02 Jul 2003 22:31:55 GMT

Microsoft plugs second Passport hole. The software giant fixes a flaw in its Passport online identity system that could have allowed an attacker to take over old Hotmail accounts. [CNET News.com]

Microsoft Releases Windows XP 64-Bit Edition Version 2003 to Manufacturing

Mon, 31 Mar 2003 17:56:12 GMT

REDMOND, Wash. -- March 28, 2003 -- Microsoft Corp. today announced the release to manufacturing (RTM) of Microsoft® Windows® XP 64-Bit Edition Version 2003. Windows XP 64-Bit Edition Version 2003 is optimized to enable customers to take advantage of the performance enhancements in the Intel Itanium 2 processor.

Windows XP 64-Bit Edition Version 2003 is a high-performance desktop platform that enables the next generation of powerful Windows-based applications for Itanium 2. The platform is designed for customers solving complex scientific problems, developing high-performance design and engineering applications, creating 3-D animations, or producing videos.

"We are committed to continually enhancing 64-bit computing on the desktop for our customers," said Brian Valentine, senior vice president of the Windows Division at Microsoft Corp. "With Windows XP 64-Bit Edition Version 2003, customers can run complex technical applications and a wide range of Windows-based business productivity tools on a single platform."

The Windows 64-bit architecture gives developers the freedom to create 64-bit applications using the familiar Windows programming model, encouraging the development of a wide-ranging set of software applications for the platform.

Microsoft and Intel Corp. began collaborating on 64-bit computing in 1996. In 2001, with Windows XP 64-Bit Edition, Microsoft delivered 64-bit desktop operating system support for the first-generation Itanium processor.

"Customers have long benefited from the platform synergy between Microsoft and Intel, from desktops to workstations to servers," said Mike Fister, senior vice president and general manager of the Intel Enterprise Platform Group. "We are very excited to now be moving into the next generation of high-end workstation computing with Windows XP 64-Bit Edition Version 2003 for Itanium 2-based systems."

Today's RTM coincides with the RTM of the entire family of Windows Server 2003 products, including Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition for 64-bit Itanium 2 Systems and Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition for 64-bit Itanium 2 Systems. Microsoft will formally launch these products worldwide April 24 at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco. Windows XP 64-Bit Edition Version 2003 is available to developers now through MSDN® and is scheduled to be available to customers through PC manufacturers in the second quarter of this year.

Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Released to Manufacturing

Mon, 31 Mar 2003 17:53:34 GMT

REDMOND, Wash. -- March 28, 2003 -- Microsoft Corp. today announced it has released Windows® Server 2003 to manufacturing. The company's best-performing, highest-quality Windows server operating system released to date, Windows Server 2003 delivers an integrated server platform that enables customers to run their IT infrastructure up to 30 percent more efficiently. By completing a rigorous new testing program including a thorough line-by-line code audit, Windows Server 2003 incorporates innovative new security and reliability features that ensure the product is more secure by design. The new server platform is already receiving widespread partner support and customer interest worldwide: Microsoft has been preparing over 70,000 industry partners to market, deploy and service Windows Server 2003 when it launches April 24. More than 550,000 customers signed up for preview program betas, the highest number for any server in the history of the company.

"Our mandate was clear: build a customer-driven release that delivers a breakthrough in quality, No. 1 in performance and unprecedented value for business of all sizes," said Bill Veghte, corporate vice president of the Windows Server Division at Microsoft. "Our early-adopter customers are confirming that Windows Server 2003 is delivering by driving down overall IT costs and providing the highest level of performance and reliability. The quality of this product is a testament to our customers' and partners' invaluable contributions in the development of Windows Server 2003."

Thirty Percent More Efficient IT Infrastructure

With significant improvements to core server fundamentals, including scalability, reliability, security and manageability, as well as technological innovations, Windows Server 2003 creates opportunities for customers of all sizes to drive down costs and increase productivity. Early results from customers deploying the product include these:

Consolidation. 20 to 30 percent reduction in servers
Performance. Twice as fast across all workloads
Management. 20 percent reduction in overall costs
Productivity. 35 percent of customers redeployed IT staff to higher-value projects
Deployment. 50 percent reduction in cost over Windows NT® Server 4.0

Windows NT Server 4.0 customers migrating to Windows Server 2003 will see the biggest benefits, with systems that are 100 times more scalable at one-tenth the cost per transaction as compared to when Windows NT Server 4.0 was introduced. Further, they will see a 40 percent increase in stability due in part to a more robust driver model and system recovery capabilities designed for maximum uptime.

"We're building a more automated, robust system that is more secure, stable and manageable," said Ron Brahm, Global Infrastructure program manager at GE Medical Systems. "By upgrading to Windows Server 2003, we can administer our environment from a central location and be able to turn on a dime."

Fastest-Performing Servers Across All Workloads

Windows Server 2003 unquestionably delivers the speed and scalability that customers need across all key server roles, including database server, application server, Web server, file and print server, directory services, and terminal services. Recent industry-leading benchmarks, including Transaction Processing Performance Council (TPC) TPC-C, TPC-H and TPC-W, rank Windows Server 2003 and SQL Server (TM) 2000 as rapidly becoming No. 1 in performance.

The performance and scalability story is further enhanced by the addition of Microsoft® SQL Server 2000 Enterprise Edition (64-bit), also released today. SQL Server 2000 (64-bit) is designed to support memory-intensive and high-performance applications running on 64-bit versions of Windows Server 2003. Customers will particularly benefit from performance on Intel's largest Itanium 2-based, 64-way multiprocessing systems.

Customers of all sizes benefit from increased efficiencies that improve their bottom line in a number of ways, including reducing hardware expenditures and administrative costs while consistently delivering leading price/performance. By delivering both the best value and exceptional performance, Windows Server 2003 and SQL Server 2000 (64-bit) will fundamentally change the landscape of high-end enterprise computing.

Highest-Quality Windows Server Ever Released

Following up on its commitment to Trustworthy Computing, Microsoft spent nearly $200 million training 13,000 Windows developers on new security-focused development techniques, implementing new engineering processes, and completing a line-by-line security review of Windows Server 2003 -- delivering a product that is more secure by design, by default and by deployment.

"I've been involved in the development of every release of Windows Server, and this is by far the most secure, most reliable, highest-performing server operating system we've ever built," said Dave Thompson, corporate vice president of the Windows Server Product Group at Microsoft. "We've been proving the reliability and performance of Windows Server 2003 with the widest early adoption we've ever had. This has been a long but very productive road, and I am enormously proud of the thousands of men and women who built this product."

Throughout development, Microsoft utilized a broad community of external testers and early-adopter companies, whose active participation is the foundation for making Windows Server 2003 the highest-quality product in the company's history. Communities such as the Joint Development Program, the Customer Preview Program and the Rapid Adoption Program have been the cornerstone of ongoing dialogue between developers and customers. Microsoft introduced the Enterprise Engineering Center (EEC), an innovative new program that delivers real-world experiences replicating heterogeneous customer environments -- right down to the hardware.

"We use the EEC in the Siemens deployment of Windows Server 2003 to validate our SWAT Architecture Design Principles, test network and hardware configurations, test software applications, experience new Windows features, and submit bug and design change requests," said John Minnick, manager of technology development at Siemens Energy & Automation. "As a result of the lab experiences, we are able to bring significant value back to our own Siemens groups, regions and operating companies, not only in the area of Windows but for other IT initiatives moving forward."

Underscoring the high-quality engineering, Windows Media® 9 Series in Windows Server 2003 is powering major content Web sites and subscription services that have delivered more than 300 terabytes' worth of news, sports, music and film content using prerelease versions of the server platform (see related release).

Handing off the Windows Server 2003 gold code marks the completion of more than three years of work by 5,000 developers, incorporating more than 650 technology innovations and enhancements.

About the Windows Server 2003 Launch

Microsoft will formally introduce Windows Server 2003, Visual Studio® .NET 2003 and SQL Server 2000 Enterprise Edition (64-bit) in a worldwide launch event on April 24 at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco. Visual Studio .NET 2003 together with Windows Server 2003 provide a dependable application platform for quickly creating reliable, scalable and connected solutions. The Windows Server family includes the following:

Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition
Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition for 64-bit Itanium 2 Systems
Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition
Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition for 64-bit Itanium 2 Systems
Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition
Windows Server 2003 Web Edition
Windows Small Business Server 2003 (available in the third quarter of 2003)

About Windows Server 2003

Windows Server 2003 is a comprehensive, integrated and secure infrastructure designed to help customers reduce costs and increase the efficiency and effectiveness of IT operations. Building on Windows 2000 family strengths, the new server platform helps customers extend existing resources while laying the foundation for building a new generation of connected applications that improve business productivity.

More information is available at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/.

Internet Quietly Marks 20th Anniversary

Fri, 03 Jan 2003 17:13:13 GMT

Anniversary Called 'Major Milestone' For Computer Users

So, did you at least send a card? According to some of the folks who keep track of such things, Wednesday was the 20th anniversary of the Internet.

It was on Jan. 1, 1983, that the first 400 or so computers hooked up to what was then called ARPANET had to switch to a communications protocol called TCP/IP. It was that means of transferring data that allowed the World Wide Web to expand and thrive -- basically making the Internet what it is today.

Vint Cerf, the co-inventor of the protocol, says the anniversary is "a major milestone" for computer users to observe. However, there are others who insist that the Internet is even older than that.

They say when two computers at the UCLA swapped data across a 15-foot cable, it marked the start of the basic concept behind the Internet.