Microsoft makes it official - XP is coming to the XO OLPC

Microsoft’s participation in the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) initiative has been fraught with mystery and disinformation from the get-go. But on May 15, Microsoft officials finally gave the OLPC project Redmond’s official blessing.
Up to this point, OLPC Chief Nicholas Negroponte preannounced Microsoft’s every move on the OLPC front (and sometimes not quite correctly). But [...]

Why Windows 7 won’t save Microsoft

Microsoft is most likely banking on being saved by Windows 7, after its stumble with Vista. But there are early indications that Windows 7 won’t be the savior that Microsoft has been hoping for.
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At What Point Is It Cheaper to Just Buy Novell?

Microsoft no longer sees itself as simply a Windows company. One recent indication of this is their determination to buy the LAMP-centric (Linux/Apache/MySQL/PHP) Yahoo! Instead of migrating all the tried and tested Yahoo! services over to a Windows server infrastructure, wouldn’t it be simpler to establish Microsoft Linux through the acquisition of Novell? From a [...]

Will Microsoft kill Linux on ULPCs?

Obviously, Microsoft has a significant interest in making sure that users of the new breed of netbooks and MIDs hitting the market don’t get too comfortable using Linux. Many manufacturers have taken to installing various flavors of Linux on these devices to minimize footprint, improve performance, and reduce costs on low-power, low-margin hardware. Similarly, most [...]

Microsoft: June 30 Windows XP cut-off set in stone

Microsoft made it official on April 3: There will be no new reprieves for Windows XP (other than on Ultra Low-Cost PCs).
Some customers and partners had been hoping the company might extend again the deadline for all PC makers to be allowed to preload Windows XP, rather than Windows Vista, on new PCs. But today, [...]

Inside Windows 7 — what we know so far!

An interesting little bit of speculation…
You’d be forgiven for missing it, but Vista turned a year old last month. November 30, 2006, marked the official launch of Vista to the business community: the first part of an odd two-stage liftoff which was followed two months later, on January 30 2007, by the mainstream consumer launch [...]

WebFives/Vizrea aquired by Microsoft so download your content

WebFives/Vizrea aquired by Microsoft so download your content in the next 30 days. WebFives (previously known as Vizrea) has been aquired by Microsoft and the service will shut down after 31 December. It is interesting to note that the WebFives/Vizrea service was available for primarily Nokia devices, yet Microsoft purchased the company. We may see [...]

Microsoft Open Solaris? Microsoft BSD? Microsoft what?

 
I wonder what would happen if Microsoft dropped the Windows NT core, making an about face, like Apple did years ago with BSD and adopted Sun’s “Open Solaris” as the core? No, I am not talking about the movie! Granted I am sure I could write an essay and make some comparisons. What if they [...]

gOS Unboxed: Should Microsoft Worry?

Microsoft’s rivalry with Google heated up considerably this past year when rumors surfaced that Google might release its own operating system to compete with Windows. Has Google finally jumped into the fray with its own OS?
Unfortunately, no; gOS is not a “Google OS” nor is it affiliated with Google (though Desktop Linux has reported that [...]

Will GNOME split give Microsoft Open XML standards win?

Opponents of making the Microsoft Word format an ISO document standard, like OpenDocument Fellowship member Russell Ossendryver, compare GNOME’s actions to Democrats offering counters to President Bush’s 2005 plan on privatizing Social Security — any counter-proposal makes it more likely something bad will happen.
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OSX Tiger vs. Vista vs. Ubuntu Security: a 15 Point Report Card

When shopping for a new computer, your mind is probably spinning with considerations: price, reliability, speed, software capabilities, security, and other specs. Perhaps the hardest part is choosing an operating system on which everything will run. To get a good idea of what capabilities Apple’s OSX Tiger/Leopard, Windows Vista, and Ubuntu Linux have to offer, [...]

The Windows killer — The coming Google OS?

“And with most of the OS focus this week being allocated to Mac OS X Leopard, it would be nice to take our attention away from that for a moment, and take a look at what the hypothetical Google OS would look like after the company declares war on Microsoft. This OS would take [...]