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Gary Edwards

Microsoft Hit By U.S. DOT Ban On Windows Vista, Explorer 7, and Office 2007 - Technolog... - 0 views

  • »  E-Mail »  Print »  Discuss »  Write To Editor late last year -- can be resolved. "We have more confidence in Microsoft than we would have 10 years ago," says Schmidt. "But it always makes sense to look at the security implications, the value back to the customer, and those kind of issues." The DOT's ban on Vista, Internet Explorer 7, and Office 2007 applies to 15,000 computer users at DOT proper who are currently running the Windows XP Professional operating system. The memo indicates that a similar ban is in effect at the Federal Aviation Administration, which has 45,000 desktop users. Compatibility with existing applications appears to be the Transportation Department's major concern. According to a separate memo, a number of key software applications and utilities in use in various branches of the department aren't Vista compatible. Among them are Aspen 2.8.1, ISS 2.11, ProVu 3.1.1, and Capri 6.5, according to a memo issued by staffers at the DOT's Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration. Any prolonged ban on new Microsoft technologies by the federal government could have a significant impact on the software maker's bottom line, as Microsoft sells millions of dollars in software to the feds annually. http://as.cmpnet.com/event.ng/Type=count&ClientType=2&AdID=125682&FlightID=75634&TargetID=2625&SiteID=222&AffiliateID=283&EntityDefResetFlag=0&Segments=1411,3108,3448,11291,12119&Targets=2625,2878,7904,8579&Values=34,46,51,63,77,87,91,102,140,222,227,283,442,646,656,1184,1255,1311,1405,1431,1716,1767,1785,1798,1925,1945,1970,2217,2299,2310,2326,2352,2678,2727,2767,2862,2942,3140,3347,3632,3636,3638,3890,3904,4080,448
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    Whoa, those government desktops add up quickly.  This Vista ban will immediately effect over 50,000 desktops, with tens of thousands more possibly impacted by the IE 7.0 ban.  The MS Exchange/SharePoint Hub juggernaut is based on IE 7.0, which is not available for Windows 2000 - MSOffice 2000 desktops.

    Lack of Vista Stack compatibility with non Microsoft application is given as the reason for the ban.  But notice the "alternatives" to Vista mentioned; Novel SuSE and Apple Mac.  What kind of interop - compatibility do they offer?  My guess is ZERO!

    The reality is that the DOT is trapped.  My advice would be stay exactly where they are, keeping the current MSOffice desktop installs running.  Then, install the Foundation's daVinci ODF plugin for MSOffice. 

    This will insure that Windows OS and  MSOffice bound business processes can continue to function without disruption.  Win32 APi based applications like those mentioned in the article can continue.  Critical day to day business processes, workgroup and workflow related activities can continue without disruption or costly re engineering demanded by a cross platform port.

    What daVinci doe sdo is move the iron triangle that binds Windows-MSOffice applications to business processes and documents, to an ODF footing.  Once on a ODF footing, the government can push forward with the same kind of workgroup - workflow - intelligent docuemnt - collaborative computing advnaces that the Vista Stack was designed to deliver.  Only this push will involve the highly competitive "the customer is sovereign" environment of ODF ready desktop, server, device and Web 2.0 systems.  End of Redmond lock-in.  End of the costly iron triangle and the force march upgrade treadmill that so enriches Microsoft.

    So what's not to like?  We can do this.
    ~ge~

    http://docs.google.com/View?docID=dghfk5w9_20d2x6rf&revi
Gary Edwards

Yahoo Adds Flash, HTML to Widgets Platform - Flock - 1 views

  • Yahoo Widgets Version 4.5, which delivers an updated widget platform for developers and a new Widget Gallery for consumers, said Scott Derringer, director of product management at Yahoo. Widgets are mini-applications that live on a desktop and deliver personalized, up-to-date information to help users.
Gary Edwards

Flow Document Overview - 0 views

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    Uh OH! Look what Microsoft has put into the new .NET 3.0 SDK! Flow Documents is a Microsoft specific version of HTML that is part of the Windows Presentation Foundation Browser Developers Framework. XAML - XPS-XABL. It also looks as though Microsoft has reserved MS-OOXML MSOffice level integration for themselves. Another thought is that MSOffice is being positioned as a developers framework for Web 2.0 development. This docuemnt is goign to take some serious study. Bad news for IBM and Adobe for sure. PDF, Flash and AJAX are all going to be in the fight of their lives. The conversion tools are going to become of critical importance. Some initial thoughts are that we could convert MSOffice documents to CDF+; convert OpenOffice documents to CDF+; and convert Flow Documents to CDF+, using the same XHTML 2.0 - CSS desktop profile (WICD Full). Converting MS-OOXML to Flow Documents however appears to be next to impossible by design. The easy approach would be to let the da Vinci plug-in perfect an internal conversion to either CDF+ or Flow. It will be interesting to see if Microsoft provides a Flow plug-in for MSOffice. I doubt it, but perhaps there will be a demand from Flow developers. da Vinci could of course be configured to produce Flow Documents. At first glance, my assumption would be that the ability to convert native MSOffice documents and allication genrated Flow Documents to CDF+ would be the most important course to take. We''ll see. This is no doubt explosive stuff. Microsoft is truly challenging the W3C for the Web.
Gary Edwards

Is HTML in a Race to the Bottom? A Large-Scale Survey of Open Web Formats - 0 views

  • The "race to the bottom" is a familiar phenomenon that occurs when multiple standards compete for acceptance. In this environment, the most lenient standard usually attracts the greatest support (acceptance, usage, and so on), leading to a competition among standards to be less stringent. This also tends to drive competing standards toward the minimum possible level of quality. One key prerequisite for a race to the bottom is an unregulated market because regulators mandate a minimum acceptable quality for standards and sanction those who don't comply.1,2 In examining current HTML standards, we've come to suspect that a race to the bottom could, in fact, be occurring because so many competing versions of HTML exist. At this time, some nine different versions of HTML (including its successor, XHTML) are supported as W3C standards, with the most up-to-date being XHTML 1.1. Although some versions are very old and lack some of the newer versions' capabilities, others are reasonably contemporaneous. In particular, HTML 4.01 and XHTML 1.0 both have "transitional" and "strict" versions. Clearly, the W3C's intent is to provide a pathway to move from HTML 4.01 to XHTML 1.1, and the transitional versions are steps on that path. It also aims to develop XHTML standards that support device independence (everything from desktops to cell phones), accessibility, and internationalization. As part of this effort, HTML 4.01's presentational elements (used to adjust the appearance of a page for older browsers that don't support style sheets) are eliminated in XHTML 1.1. Our concern is that Web site designers might decline to follow the newer versions' more stringent formatting requirements and will instead keep using transitional versions. To determine if this is likely, we surveyed the top 100,000 most popular Web sites to discover what versions of HTML are in widespread use.
    • Gary Edwards
       
      The summary statement glosses over the value of a highly structured portable XML document. A value that goes far beyond the strict separation of content and presentation. The portable document model is the essential means by which information is exchanged over the Web. It is the key to Web interop. Up till now, Web docuemnts have been very limited. With the advent of XHTML-2, CSS-3, SVG, XForms and CDF (Compound Document Framework for putting these pieces together), the W3C has provisioned the Web with the means of publishing and exchanging highly interactive but very complex docuemnts. The Web documents of the future will be every bit as complex as the publishing industry needs. The transition of complex and data rich desktop office suite documents to the Web has been non existent up till now. With ISO approval of MSOffice-OOXML, Microsoft is now ready to transition billions of business process rich "office" documents to the Web. This transition is accomplished by a very clever conversion component included in the MSOffice SDK. MS Developers can easily convert OOXML documents to Web ready XAML documents, adn back again, without loss of presentation fidelity, or data. No matter what the complexity! The problem here is that while MSOffice-OOXML is now an ISO/IEC International Standard, XAML "fixed/flow" is a proprietary format useful only to the IE-8 browser, the MS Web Stack (Exchange, SharePoint, MS SQL, and Windows Server), and the emerging MS Cloud. Apache, J2EE, Mozilla Firefox, Adobe and Open Source Servers in general will not be able to render these complex, business process rich, office suite documents. MSOffice-OOXML itself is far to complicated and filled with MS application-platform-vendor specific dependencies to be usefully converted to Open Web XHTML-CSS, ePUB or CDF. XAML itself is only the tip of the iceberg. The Microsoft Web Stack also implements Silverlight, Smart Tags and other WPF - .NET
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    What makes the Internet so extraordinary is the interoperability of web ready data, content, media and the incredible sprawl of web applications servicing the volumes of information. The network of networks has become the information system connecting and converging all information systems. The Web is the universal platform of access, exchange and now, collaborative computing. This survey exammines the key issue of future interoperability; Web Document Formats.
Gary Edwards

XML-Empowered Documents Extend SOA's Connection to People and Processes | BriefingsDire... - 0 views

  • We're going to talk about dynamic documents. That is to say, documents that have form and structure and that are things end-users are very familiar with and have been using for generations, but with a twist. That's the ability to bring content and data, on a dynamic lifecycle basis, in and out of these documents in a managed way. That’s one area.The second area is service-oriented architecture (SOA), the means to automate and reuse assets across multiple application sets and data sets in a large complex organization.We're seeing these two areas come together. Structured documents and the lifecycle around structured authoring tools come together to provide an end-point for the assets and resources managed through an SOA, but also providing a two-way street, where the information and data that comes in through end-users can be reused back in the SOA to combine with other assets for business process benefits.
  • Thus far we’ve been talking about the notion of unstructured content as a target source to SOA-based applications, but you can also think about this from the perspective of the end application itself -- the document as the endpoint, providing a framework for bringing together structured data, transactional data, relational data, as well as unstructured content, into a single document that comes to life.Let me back up and give you a little context on this. You mentioned the various documents that line workers, for example, need to utilize and consume as the basis for their jobs. Documents have unique value. Documents are portable. You can download a document locally, attach it to an email, associate it with a workflow, and share it into a team room. Documents are persistent. They exist over a period of time, and they provide very rich context. They're how you bring together disparate pieces of information into a cohesive context that people can understand.
    • Gary Edwards
       
      "various line of business applications and composite applications" is exactly where ODF failed in Massachusetts! Think of client/server, with many business processes bound to MSOffice on the client side. The big ODF vendors tried to convince Massachusetts to "rip out and replace" MSOffice. Which proved to be terribly disruptive and costly. These bound "client side" processes would have to be rewritten, and none of the ODF applications were the equivalent of MSOffice as a developers platform (even if the cost was something MASS was willing to pay for - which they were not!). MASS came up with an alternative idea to save ODF, the idea of cloning the OOXML plug-in for MSOffice to create an ODF plug-in. The problem was that MASS did not have an IT budget thanks to Microsoft's political mucking. So MASS CIO Louis Gutierrez turned to the big vendors askign them to support something they seriously opposed. An ODF plug-in would leave MSOffice in place.
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    • Gary Edwards
       
      This paragraph says it all. The portable document is an essential frame for moving information thoughout the emerging client/ Web Stack /server information infrastructure model. The key is that the portable docuemnts are interactive and "live". The data and media streams bound to objects within the documents are attached to their original sources using XML connecting streams like XMLHTTPRequest or P2P Jabber XML routers. In 2003 we used Jabber to hot wire Comcast documents (docs, spreadsheet cells and presentations) to backend transactional blackboxes and web service rich data resources. The productivity gain from this approach is that end users are no longer required to verify and manage data. The "system" manages the data, freeing the end user to concentrate on the task of presentation, analysis and explanation.
    • Gary Edwards
       
      What? The key to client/ Web Stack /server design (advanced SOA) is to have a desktop "editor" that writes highly strucutred XML docuemnts that are universally portable across a wide range of Web Stacks. The W3C provides CDF as a very advanced docuemnt container for the purpose of porting complex documents across a wide range of "editors", servers, and devices. (X)HTML 2.0 - CSS3, SVG, XForms and RDF are the core components of the open web future where complex documents and business processes will move to client/ Web Stack /server models. The problem is that there are NO desktop "editors" capable of producing CDF. ISO approval of MS-OOXML stamps MSOffice as a standards compliant "editor". The problem is that it is very difficult to convert MS-OOXML documents to CDF - XHTML-CDF-SVG-RDF!!! The MSOffice SDK does provide an easy to implement MS-OOXML <> XAML conversion component. XAML itself is part of the proprietary WPF set of technologies, joining Silverlight, Smart Tags, and WinForms as a complete MS-Web ready alternative to advanced W3C technolgoies: XHTML, CSS, SVG, XForms, and RDF. XAML "fixed/flow" replaces XHTML-CSS. Silverlight replaces SVG and SWF (Flash). Smart Tags is a porprietary alternative to RDF-RDFa. And WinForms is of course an alternative to XForms. The MS Web STack core s comprised of Exchange, SharePoint and MS SQL Server. The core is joined by Windows Server, MS Dynamics, and MS Live (among so many). ISO approval of MS-OOXML provides the MS Cloud with a standards compliant "editor" that currently ownes OVER 95% of the desktop marketshare when it comes to bound business processes. With ISO approval, an entire generation of client/server processes can now transition to client/ Web Stack /server models, where they can take full advantage of the advanced SOA model where portable XML documents move structured data and media through a highly distributed but end user controlled web model.
    • Gary Edwards
       
      OK. Nice summary!
    • Gary Edwards
       
      Uh oh. Does Mr. Sorofman understand the importance of MSOffice-OOXML-XAML-Smart Tags as an alternative to W3C RDF? This split in the Web will result in a nightmare for Google. Think of it as though Google owns the consumer side of the web, and Microsoft owns the business process side. Such is the importance of ISO approval of MS-OOXML! Google will be unable to match the search advantages of either RDF or Smart Tags. With Smart Tagged docuemnts though, Google won't even get the chance to compete. They will be locked out of the document processing chain that begins with MSOffice-OOXML and extends through a proprietary MS Web STack rich with XAML, Silverlight, WinForms and Smart Tag semantics! Although hindsight is 20-20, we can look back at 2006 in Massachusetts and see that the failure of ODF there is going to result in huge losses to Google and Oracle. Google will find themselves locked into a consumer web box, unable to branch out to business. Oracle will find themselves on the wrong side of a Microsoft dominated client/ Web Stack /server based transition of legacy client/server systems.
    • Gary Edwards
       
      Great idea Mr. Sorofman, but Microsoft owns the "editor" in this equation.
    • Gary Edwards
       
      Another good summary statement. Convergence however is very much tied to interoperability across the emerging client/ Web-Stack /server model that represents advanced SOA, SaaS, Web 2.0 and emerging Cloud Computing models.
    • Gary Edwards
       
      What we found at Comcast in 2002-2003 was many spreadsheet "templates" that the sales staff used to keep track of inventory, pricing, and client accounts. By P2P enabling the cells in these templates, we were able to connect in transactional database information in real time ( or web connect time :). Every template, whether it was a writer document,-form, spreadsheet template, or presentation deck was P2P Jabber wired at the object level wherever an external information source was invloved. Which seemed to be everywhere! The hard work is getting the XML connectors in place, setting up an information stream between the Web Stack (Apache Tomcat - MySQL-XUL Server), and the backend transational black boxes. With Comcast this was done through a 24 hour dump cycle with each black box dumping and uploading from the Web Stack. For sales, marketing and management, the Web Stack did the heavy business of serving up Jabber data and resolving order conflicts. The "system" took over the management and verification of data, releasing the sales force to concentrate on their primary task.
    • Gary Edwards
       
      In Massachusetts, they were using eMail to shuttle spreadsheet templates around. This is about as brittle and unproductive a method as there is, but it was all they had. Rather than focusing on keeping their client side business processes operating, MASS might have been better off focusing on building a client/ Web-Stack /server model they could gradually transition these desktop bound processes to. Establish an open Web-Stack design, and work back towards the desktop client. Instead, MASS fell into the trap of trying to replace MSOffice on the desktop with ODF OpenOffice based alternatives, while simultaneously purchasing Exchange-SharePoint Web-Stack components! The MS Web-Stack is designed for MSOffice-OOXML business processes, not ODF!!!!!
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    Dana Gardner transcript of podcast interview with JustSystems and Phil Wainwright. Covers the convergence of the portable XML document model with SOA. It's about time someone out there got it. You know the portable XML document has arrived when analyst finally get it.
Gary Edwards

IE aims to embrace the web again | Technology | The Guardian - 0 views

  • I asked Hachamovitch, who has led the Explorer team since 2003, why it has taken Microsoft so long to address these deficiencies. "It comes down to what we were doing with our time," he said. "Between 2001 and 2003 we were building what you experience now as Windows Presentation Foundation and Silverlight."These technologies display not HTML, the language of web pages, but XAML, Microsoft's proprietary code for creating rich visual content.
  • It sounds good, but Hachamovitch's warmth begins to fade when I broach the vexed subject of browser scripting. The context is important. Hachamovitch had already stated that Microsoft spent three years neglecting IE for the sake of a more proprietary technology, which is now appearing on the web as a browser plug-in called Silverlight. This is similar in some ways to Adobe's Flash, and supports rich multimedia effects within web pages, as well as the ability to run applications written in Microsoft's .NET Framework.
  • Is it possible that Microsoft is stifling the advancement of JavaScript in order to promote programming within Silverlight instead?
Gary Edwards

ODF versus OOXML: Don't forget about HTML! - O'Reilly XML Blog - 1 views

  • But Lie is right, I think, to be alarmed by the prospect that if OOXMLfails MS will revert away from open formats. I don’t see them adopting ODF as the default format for general sale. for a start, current ODF simply does not have matching capabilities. This issue of fit is strong enough that we don’t even need to get to the issue of control. We have this nice little window now where MS is inclined to open up its formats, something that the document processing community has been pleading for for years. The ODF sideshow runs the risk of screwing this up; I’ve said it before, but I say it again: being pro-ODF does not mean you have have to be anti-OOXML. ODF has not been designed to be a satisfactory dump format for MS Office; OOXMLhas not been designed to be a suitable format for Sun’s Star Office or Open Office or IBM’s products. HTML is the format of choice for interchange of simple documents; ODF will evolve to be the format of choice for more complicated documents; OOXML is the format of choice for full-fidelity dumps from MS Office; PDF is the format of choice for non-editable page-faithful documents; all of them are good candidates for standardization, all have overlap but are worthwhile to have as cards in the deck of standards. But systems for custom markup trumps all.
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    Famed Microsoft WikiPedia editor Rick Jellife takes on the HTML-CSS proposal put forth by Opera Browser CTO Håkon Wium Lie's in his recent CNET column.

    Rick claims that the Opera proposal is "solid in its ultimate premise .... that inspite of .. all the talk about ODF and OOXML, it is important not to lose track of HTML's potential and actual suitability for much document interchange.

    Good discussion except that MS Rick can't help himself when it comes to the tired moral equivocation argument that the world can and should accept and use two ISO/IEC desktop productivity environment file format standards, ODF and OOXML.  Once again he puts forward the claim that ODF is OPenOffice specific and OOXML is MSOffice specific - each having it's place and value as an international standard.

    Are we standardizing applications here?  I thought it was about creating a universal XML file format that all application can use::  One file format  for OpenOffice, MSOffice, KOffice, Writer, WordPerfect Office, Novell Office, GNOME Office, and even the Flash-Apollo based " Virtual Ubiquity " from Rick Treitman.

    ODF does need to provide the marketplace with at least three profiles; desktop productivity environments, server side portal publication-content-archive management systems, and devices.  This would greatly improve interoperability as ODF documents transition across desktops, servers, devices and Internet information domains.  It would also help the implementation of ODF by SOA, SaaS and Web 2.0 systems.

    But having two file formats that irreconcilably incompatible servicing the exact same market categories?  Doesn't make sense.  And can only end in massive end user confusion where the application with dominant marketshare end up crushing any and all competitive alternative
Gary Edwards

Joshua : Web is THE Platform? SRSLY? : MIX Online - Flock - 0 views

  • The web is the platform upon which many different and incompatible data gardens will do battle.&nbsp; There WILL be fights, winners and losers, and this will happen BECAUSE the web is the platform.&nbsp; If anyone is really serious about reducing the bloodshed and adhering to the spirit of the web, they should put their money where their mouths are and let loose some of the control from their own walled gardens and incompatible schemas.
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    The W3C is the keeper of the Open Web Platform, and they are coming under assault from a number of initiatives.  Of course there is Microsoft and the emerging MS Stack that runs on proprietary alternatives and bastardized eXtensions of W3C Open Web technoloigies.  MS-OOXML is perhaps the most serious challenge to the W3C and HTML yet.  Adobe has weighed in with Flash, Flex, and AIR.  But Google as a threat? 

    Joshua focuses in on the Google Web 2.0 Presentation and finds that Google Gadgets are not W3C technologies available to all.  Then he has this great line summarizing that the war against the Open Web is really about different data gardens doing battle on the platform used by all and owned by none.

    I hope Joshua and the other Open Web defenders are paying close attention to MS-OOXML and the emerging MS Stack.  Certainly Microsoft is building a walled garden of applications, services and data.  The question is, will the MS Stack garner enough critical mass to break the Open Web?

caren chio

Best PC Technical Support Provider - 1 views

I work as an information officer and my task is to flash all upcoming activities our company will have. Because I am using my PC more often, it heats up, and sometimes, it gets too hot, I was think...

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