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According to Gizmodo’s Jesus Diaz, Windows Vista sales aren’t helping PC manufacturers a bit. In fact, it’s business-as-usual as a result of Vista’s release, in spite of promise after promise from Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer. Business users are likely concerned with Vista’s incompatibility with existing applications; home users are just happy with the XP beast (set of problems) they know. It appears that virtually no one is running out to buy a Vista PC.

Computerworld’s Scot Finnie (a recent Mac convert) writes on the danger to Microsoft presented by Apple’s current “buzz”.

Finnie seems to think the perception that Apple’s product is hot, new and superior will drive new growth. He perceives the threat to Microsoft as being not from a market share point-of-view, but rather in terms of “mind share”. He calls the Apple story one of the “Top Ten” tech stories of the year.

He’s right. He touches on something that a lot of us in the tech industry seem to miss sometimes. It isn’t always the traditional drivers in a market that push a product towards success or extinction, but rather this intangible and not yet measurable sense of buzz. When people begin making a computer the topic of conversation at sports pubs, it’s time for us to listen up. From a business point-of-view we need to find a way to measure this “buzz”. As an IT Professional, I’m listening closely to that buzz, and plan to capitalize on it and move IT forward on newer, better technologies.

Another Windows vulnerability has been found and this time, it’s scary.

Important points on this:
(1) This is an ACTIVE exploit
(2) The solution is to avoid browsing “untrusted sites”, i.e. the INTERNET
(3) It affects Vista on down–virtually every Windows OS
(4) It exploits the animated cursor functionality and can result in arbitrary code execution on the victim’s machine

This is a serious problem. Let’s hope Microsoft has out a fix soon.

In terms of 3G AirCards, this one is our favorite. Using Sierra Wireless 3G Watcher we connected quickly and downloaded large files quickly. While connected via 3G, we downloaded files at about 1 megabit per second and uploaded at about 256k. In rural areas, EDGE was very acceptable (and actually better than the CDMA equivalent, 1xRTT) at about 150-170kbps downstream. Coverage using the AirCard 875 was absolutely better than anything we could do with the other cards we’ve tried from Cingular/AT&T.

Using 3G Watcher, we even have it working in Windows Vista! Now why we’re running Windows Vista, that is the question of the day….

Windows Vista’s “unbeatable” activation encryption has already been cracked. We knew it was only a matter of time. This is further proof that if you use complex, invasive digital rights management you only inconvenience the honest customers. The bad guys will always find a way to get past it. We reported not too long ago that the same thing happened with media DRM built-in to Vista.

Preserving digital rights means changing business models. Microsoft still doesn’t get it.

Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple, has some interesting comments on DRM and its usefulness (or lack thereof).

NetworkWorld has an interesting article about Apple’s prospects in corporate America. Recent architecture changes, virtualization, clustering, storage networks, interoperability hooks and the price of upgrading hardware for Windows Vista all put Macs under the microscope for careful consideration as replacements to existing Windows and Linux machines.

As has been the case in the past, Apple is not defining a clear course for going after corporate business (the article points this out). Apple’s rebellious, anti-corporate attitude continues in 2007. However, innovative new technologies like Parallels, which allows users to run Microsoft Windows from within Mac OS X on a Macintosh computer are likely to make corporate moves to Mac OS X more likely.

I recently upgraded to Windows Vista and found that my new operating system wasn’t compatible with my anti-virus software.  So, I jumped out onto the net to find something different that did work with Vista.  I found it in AVG Free Edition.  AVG is a free (though with a commercial product as well) anti-virus suite that works amazingly well.  It even caught some infected files on some of my backups that my previous (big name commercially available software) anti-virus software didn’t find.  Most importantly, it worked flawlessly in Windows Vista.

http://free.grisoft.com/doc/1

A lot of people are going without AV simply because they cannot afford it.  AVG is an excellent way to protect your information and assets when you’re on a budget.

I’ve been getting a lot of questions lately about backups.  I think that the average Joe is finally putting enough valuable data on his PC that backups seem important.  For more and more people, computer=brain.

Microsoft has a pretty good solution for this called SyncToy.  I use it to back up my user folder in Windows Vista. 

SyncToy for Windows XP
SyncToy for Windows Vista

The best way (though not the only way) to handle this for individuals is to acquire an inexpensive external (USB or Firewire) hard drive and setup the hard drive as a target (right) device.  Microsoft’s SyncToy includes great directions on how to setup a synchronization.  Like this, you can manually touch it off any time you want.

For more advanced users, you can set it up as a scheduled task in Windows.

For those of you (like me) stuck in the world of Windows Vista, here are some handy shortcuts on the Microsoft page that will make your experience a lot easier.

In many ways, they do make the experience a little better than XP - just different.  For instance, Ctrl-Alt-Del+K was always how I locked my XP machine when I stepped away from my desk.  Now it’s Windows-L.  Makes more sense, as I’m locking Windows.  I also like Windows-Tab, which allows me to tab through Windows applications in Windows Flip 3-D.  I prefer the Mac OS implementation of this function, but you know… the copy is never as good as the original.  Oh well.

There’s quite a bit of literature on the Internet about email etiquette.  Angry email users fill blogs, discussion boards and chat rooms with rants about poor email manners and general rudeness.  I’ve decided to do a series of blog entries on this issue from a point-of-view that is rarely used when discussing this subject: organizational politics.

Indeed, the position you and the person receiving your email are in directly relates to the mannerisms in the email.  That isn’t to say that you should be rude to anyone, but that etiquette is just different depending on who is on the other end of the tubes (that’s a political joke, for those of you who don’t get it).

Subject Lines
Remember to use a subject line every time you send an email.  Though indexing features in OS X and Vista make it easier than ever to search email content, most of us are forced to prioritize emails beforehand.  Not only should you provide a short, descriptive summary of the email in your subject line but you should also avoid using names.  For example, you might provoke entirely too much interest for wandering eyes on the other end if your HR-related email’s subject is the name of the person about whom you are communicating.  Despite warnings from IT, most managers leave their email open and computers unlocked while they get coffee, go to lunch or go to a meeting. 

If you’re in the middle of an email thread and the subject changes, change the subject as well.  Your email software can still track the thread, in most cases.

Read Receipts
The ability to send read receipts requests is one of the rudest, most annoying features in Microsoft Outlook.  Avoid them.  If you’re a manager and you can’t trust your people to read the emails you send them, find new staff.  Reading email is a basic task.  If your people can’t keep up with them, they’re probably in over their heads.

If you’re a manager sending these receipt requests, it’s rude and condescending.  If you’re sending them to your boss, it’s in extremely bad taste.  Either way, it’s a no-no.  I know there are a few exceptions, especially in help-desk situations… but in general, just think about all the ill-will you stand to create in your company.

Forwards
There are really two categories of forwards: legitimate emails and non-legitimate ones.  Non-legitimate emails make up about 30-50% of the forwards that arrive in my Inbox.  Most of them are inappropriate and could get the sender fired from their job.  It’s very rude to forward emails around.  If it requests that you forward it or promises riches for you or a dying cancer child in exchange for forwarding it to others, you should probably not forward it.  If you want to help kids with cancer, get out your wallet and make a big contribution to the children’s charity of your choice.  Volunteer.  Don’t try to take the easy way out…. mainly because the easy way doesn’t work.

The other category is legitimate emails, and this is an entirely different story.  Some people think that because it is a business email, I want to be CC’ed or forwarded every message.  This isn’t always true.  I get less email than lots of people, and I get between 30 and 60 personal emails per day (this doesn’t include auto generated messages, notifications, etc.)  A lot of folks get more than me.  Think carefully before hitting that forward button.  Not every email is important enough to demand your entire department’s time.

More later…