October 2003 - Posts
Oops, looks like you can get fired for blogging. The following is from Thurrott's WinInfo Update.
Sorry, guys; it wasn't Robert Scoble. A Microsoft temporary employee found himself on the receiving end of a pink slip this week when he published a photo of the Microsoft campus's shipping and receiving loading dock on his blog, a personal Web journal. Microsoft fired him because it claimed the photo was a security risk, claiming that people viewing the photo would be able to figure out the loading dock's location. The former employee later admitted that what he did was wrong, though he offered up an interesting conspiracy theory for those who are into that kind of thing: The photo he took shows a pallet of brand-new Apple Computer Power Mac G5 computers being unloaded. Was that the real reason he was fired?
FWIW, I really doubt it had anything to do with the Macs. Microsoft writes the most successful Apple software! Had they been pallets of RedHat Linux.....
No files, No problems.™
According to a Wired article, apparently Apple's latest OS update is blowing away the data on some Firewire drives. This quote is indeed troubling:
“The glitch is particularly troubling because many Mac users backed up their files to an external FireWire drive before installing the Panther upgrade. In some cases, the glitch erased files on the main machine and the external backup.”
Ouch.
Scoble
points to an
article stating that Microsoft recently approached Google regarding a partnership or acquisition. Google is more interested in an IPO. (No need to click through; the article doesn't contain any other info.)
Thurrott says Microsoft will release the PDC build of Longhorn to the public (for a small fee) in November, then distribute it to MSDN subscribers in December. Yee-haw!
A couple procrastinators have emailed me about extra PDC tickets. If anyone has an extra ticket or two you'd like to sell, please respond to this post and someone will contact you.
Connect with the vibe.™
Is anyone else staying at the Los Angeles Athletic Club? I believe I have an eight minute break one of the PDC days and may need a spotter. To help me put weight on the bar.
Seriously, though, I punched my schedule into Outlook today and it looks like I won't even have time for beers. (16 oz. curls count, right?) What's wrong with this picture? Who put the BOF sessions at night?
How are you folks managing the requisite “consumption”?
Back when Visual Basic 2/3 was all the rage I released a shareware program called WinBar. For whatever reason, it was really popular and I got a ton of downloads (this was back when the online universe consisted of CompuServe and AOL). I released a couple versions over the years, ending development sometime in the VB 4 time frame. Although I haven't had a link to it on my website in years, it still gets a few downloads a week.
The icon:
Since then, I've put a bunch of .NET stuff on my .NET site. I always like to find interesting icons to use in the utilities I put on the site. I usually check out the Mac OS X sites, grab an icon from the public domain and reuse it. I don't have any criteria, only that it's different.
A couple months ago I released Snippet Compiler, which turned out to be somewhat popular with the .NET crowd for a few days. Again, I searched for an icon to use and plugged in the first one that caught my eye.
The icon:
Note: Only today did I notice the WinBar similarity.
Now, either I'm easily amused by smiley face icons or I'm onto something here. Are those apps actually good, or do the icons make people happy enough that they use them solely for the good vibes? I don't know, but I'm betting on the latter. Can I patent smiley face icons? There's a good chance I could own the “good vibes” corner of the market and have people banging on my door, throwing money at me for permission to use smiley face icons. I'll be contacting my lawyer shortly.
 |
Some quotes:
“This code will give Microsoft the ability to change anything on your computer at anytime they wish with no notification to you.“
“Listen closely and you'll hear Microsoft mouth pieces speak of "turning software into a service" which really means they will be changing the software on your computer whenever they feel like it.“
“There are precautionary measures you can take to fend off MO3. First off, do not purchase and install Microsoft Office 2003. Also, discourage those around you from purchasing Microsoft Office as well, since one infection will quickly grow. If you need a new office suite, check out the solid and affordable StarOffice 7.0 which runs equally well on Microsoft Windows or Linux computers, and can be purchased online and immediately downloaded and installed.“
Michael's Minutes |
Hewlett-Packard's Rick Fricchione discusses the idea of architect certification, lifecycle management, and the huge services deal HP struck recently with Microsoft.
Certifying Architects [Visual Studio Magazine]
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