Onward to SP1, Windows 7 RC Dies Next Week Come June 1st, 2010

As Microsoft’s latest Windows client is evolving toward the first major upgrade, the last pre-release Build of the operating system will expire next week. Come June 1st, 2010, Windows 7 Release Candidate Build 7100 will be completely killed off. Early adopters that followed the development process of Windows Vista’s successor already know that May marked one year since Windows 7 RC was released to the public for testing. Build 7100 ended up taking the number of downloads of pre-release Windows 7 copies to over eight million.

Just a few months ahead of the May 2009 RC milestone, Microsoft had released the Beta of Windows 7. Build 7000 became available for download to testers in January 2009, and although it was initially planned as a limited testing program, Microsoft ended up delivering the bits to all interested in testing Vista’s successor.

There are a total of three stages to the expiration of Windows 7 RC, two of which have already passed. According to Microsoft, “Effective February 15, 2010, the expiration notification process begins: Windows 7 RC users receive an expiration notification in the task bar one time per day. Windows 7 RC users are presented with the Notification Wizard one time every four hours and then one time every hour. Effective March 1, 2010, Windows 7 RC enters the next phase of expiration: Expiration notifications in the task bar continue. Computers that are running Windows 7 RC restart every two hours. When the computer restarts, your work will not be saved.”

The third and final stage of Windows 7 RC’s expiration starts on June 1st. “Effective June 1, 2010, Windows 7 RC expires: Windows starts to a black desktop. Windows 7 RC users are presented with a Windows Activation screen. The screen states that the Windows that you are running is not genuine. Computers that are running Windows 7 RC restart every two hours.”

This is the most important change for Windows 7 RC as well as the fact that Build 7100 of the operating system will begin to be considered as pirated.

Service Pack 1

Windows 7 Build 7601.16556 v.172 is the latest leaked milestone of Service Pack 1. Of course, Microsoft is not confirming any details related to the development of SP1 for Windows 7, at this point in time, let alone, discussing actual Build numbers. The company did indicate that SP1 would be only a minor evolution to Windows 7, with features such as RemoteFX and Dynamic Memory representing the most consistent parts of the upgrade, both reserved for Windows Server 2008 R2. According to third-party sources Windows 7 SP1 Build 6.1.7601.16560.win7sp1_beta.100524-1800 wrapped up this week could be selected to be the official Beta. No word from Microsoft on this, though.

RTM still going strong

But the truth is that Windows 7 doesn’t need SP1 to be ready for adoption, be it by home users or business customers. The level of adoption that the platform has enjoyed so far is testimony to this fact. And remember, Windows 7 is, after all, the fastest selling operating system in history.

According to data from Internet metrics company Net Applications, Windows 7 accounted for a market share of 11.68% at the end of April 2010. Next week, Net Applications will provide statistics for May 2010, and Windows 7 is poised to jump at least 1%, to approximately 13% of the market, a figure that is roughly equivalent to over 130 million sold licenses worldwide. Meanwhile Vista will drop even further from 15.60%, while Windows XP will also continue to lose market share, down from 63.41%. By contrast, Windows Vista only hit the 13% market-share mark in October 2008, almost two years after the operating system’s general availability deadline.

This week, Forrester Research published a new report in which it indicated that Windows 7 uptake was particularly strong with business customers. According to Forrester, Windows 7 is already running on 7% of business PCs, at only half a year after launch.

“After years of stagnation due to lack of budget, IT managers are gearing up for a major desktop transformation project over the next 12 to 18 months that will introduce a new desktop operating system, productivity suite, browser, and applications on new PCs. Inevitably, Windows 7 is very much top of mind as firms start to refresh their legacy systems, but the browser wars are only starting to heat up. Forrester's analysis of more than 90,000 client PCs found that Windows 7 has quickly become the default desktop operating system for new machines and that Internet Explorer (IE) dominance is slowly eroding in favor of Firefox and Chrome,” Forrester analyst Benjamin Gray revealed.

75% of businesses continue to rely on XP, a nine-year-old operating system, while 13% are still running Windows Vista. Corporations are traditionally slow when it comes down to migrating to a new operating system, and generally attempt to tie hardware and software upgrades together. What is interesting is that Windows 7 Microsoft managed to break the mold of enterprise adoption of a new Windows OS. It still has a lot to do, but companies such as Intel were convinced to upgrade to Windows 7 well ahead of the delivery of SP1.

Introducing the Windows 3D PC

While 3D PCs are already possible, they need to be constructed by Do-It-Yourself (DIY) enthusiasts. However, Following Computex, various original equipment manufacturers and hardware manufacturers will provide customers with a new three-dimensional computing experience right out of the box. According to Brandon LeBlanc, windows communications manager on the Windows Client Communications Team, NVIDIA has partnered with Microsoft, Alienware, Asus, Dell, Toshiba, Acer, Dell, LG, ViewSonic and additional system builders in order to introduce the 3D PC, a new category of personal computers.

“So what makes a 3D PC? A 3D PC must have, by definition, the following minimum requirements: a pair of 3D active-shutter glasses. A 120Hz 3D-capable display which can be a desktop LCD monitor, a 3D projector, a 3D TV, or a laptop with an integrated 3D-capable LCD. A discrete GPU such as the latest GeForce GPU’s from NVIDIA that are designed to deliver HD content to a 3D display,” LeBlanc revealed.

Customers will be able to buy 3D PCs for prices starting approximately at $1,500 and enjoy 3D content such as games and movies as soon as they boot the machine. The 3D PC is obviously designed to keep up with the increasing trend in 3D entertainment, associated with unique experiences such as Avatar and Alice in Wonderland.

“NVIDIA has invested a lot of time working closely with game developers so that more than 425 PC games work great with NVIDIA’s 3D Vision technology. Sony and Fujifilm will be bringing 3D digital cameras to market where consumers can take 3D photos and view them in 3D on their 3D PC. A 3D PC can view the Web in 3D including live streaming of 3D video. And you can watch Blu-ray 3D movies thanks to folks like Cyberlink who will be releasing a version of their software player that will support playback of Blu-ray movies in 3D,” LeBlanc added.

As far as Microsoft is concerned, the Redmond company has labored to make Silverlight 3D-ready. The latest iteration of the technology, Silverlight 4, supports scenarios in which 3D content is streamed to NVIDIA 3D Vision-equipped PCs over the Internet.

Encrypted Google Web Search Now Available

Google has extended SSL coverage to its biggest service yet, the Web Search. The new encrypted search offers significant privacy protection at virtually no cost.

The HTTPS (Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure) is a protocol that makes use of SSL/TLS to encrypt HTTP communications. Even though HTTPS dates back to the '90s, until a few years back only a select number of websites, like online banking systems, enabled this security mechanism for entire browsing sessions.

It has always been a known fact that network administrators can snoop traffic passing through the infrastructure they control, yet people never really cared on a wide scale that their private communications could be intercepted and viewed without authorization. A more widespread need for HTTP encryption wasn't felt until the rapid proliferation of unsecured private wireless networks and hotspots, which made Man-in-the-Middle (MitM) attacks from ill-intent parties a lot more likely.

Session-wide HTTPS has been available for Gmail for years, however, the majority of users remained unaware of the option or of how to enable it. Finally, after repeated pleads from security researchers, IT experts or privacy advocates and after performing extensive testing, Google enabled it by default for all users of its email service.

Enabling encryption for Web Search might not seem as important as protecting private emails, but the move carries important privacy benefits, especially for users in countries where freedom of information and speech carry little meaning. "When you search on https://www.google.com, an encrypted connection is created between your browser and Google. This secured channel helps protect your search terms and your search results pages from being intercepted by a third party on your network," the company explains in a post on its official blog.

But protected search terms and search results are not the only benefit of the new SSL encryption. The feature also strips the referrer URL from the browser's header when visiting a URL shown in the search results. Therefore, the website in question won't see that you reached it after performing a Google Web search.

According to The Register, Google plans to enable HTTPS for Web Search by default in the future as it did for Gmail, but only after more testing is performed to make sure the change won't negatively impact large groups of users. It is also worth noting that, at the moment, SSL encryption is not yet available for all services that normally integrate with Web Search, such as Image Search or Google Maps.

Fedora 13 Released

Dear Fedora fans, we are pleased to announce that the major update of the Fedora Linux operating system is now here, available for download on mirrors worldwide (see below for download link). Dubbed Goddard, the brand-new Fedora 13 operating system is a solid release with major improvements and enhancements.

We are now looking forward for the next release, Fedora 14, codename "Laughlin," which will be released sometime in October-November 2010. Fedora 14 will include bleeding-edge packages, such as the newly released Linux kernel 2.6.34, X.Org Server 1.9, GNOME 3.0, GCC 4.5, and many more!

Highlights of Fedora 13:

· Linux Kernel 2.6.32;
· KDE SC 4.4;
· Support for webcams;
· Mozilla Firefox 3.6 web browser;
· Enhanced Init System;
· Topology Awareness;
· Improved Anaconda Installer;
· Improved software management;
· 3D Support for Nvidia Systems;
· Automatic installation of printer drivers;
· Language packs are automatically installed;
· Revamped user management interface;
· Improved NetworkManager;
· Color management;
· SystemTap static probes;
· Zarafa Groupware;
· NetBeans 6.8;
· Python 3 support;
· Btrfs snapshots integration.

Windows 7 to Get 64-bit (x64) Firefox

64-bit (x64) architectures are the future, and already well on their way to becoming mainstream and burying 32-bit (x64). Microsoft was one of the first companies to recognize the trend and adapt products such as Windows XP, and then Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Office 2010 to the general trend in the evolution of processors. In fact, the software giant is already producing x64 exclusive software with Windows Server 2008 R2 and beyond, for example. Users currently running the 64-bit flavor of Windows 7 will soon be able to install a 64-bit version of Firefox offered officially by Mozilla.

In a platform meeting on May 25th, 2010, Mozilla indicated that it had been gearing up to produce the first x64 builds of Firefox tailored to Windows 7 by the end of this week. Mozilla’s Armen Zambrano Gasparian revealed that, “Once the builds start working (I almost have them) they will show up in” the Latest Trunk download section. Early adopters will, of course, be able to download x64 Firefox releases and run them on 64-bit Windows 7.

Of course, users of Windows 7 already have a 64-bit browser at their disposal. The latest iteration of the Windows client comes with Internet Explorer 8 (64-bit) out of the box. However, as customers undoubtedly are aware, the default browser for Windows 7 is the 32-bit version of IE8, despite the fact that the operating system features the x64 flavor.

The reason for this is rather simple. 64-bit browsers don’t really enjoy support across the board for the time being. One illustrative example in this regard is that Adobe isn’t providing a x64 version of Flash to integrate with x64 Internet Explorer 8. The same is valid for Firefox. Users of x64 Firefox won’t have a release of the Adobe Flash plugin to integrate with their browser, severely impacting the user experience on websites such as YouTube, for example.

Obviously, a 64-bit (x64) version of Mozilla’s open source browser will only be delivered in the future. Firefox 4.0 is currently cooking, with the promise of a Beta development milestone available as early as the coming month. Still, ahead of the Firefox 4.0 Beta planned for June 2010, Mozilla is looking to offer early adopters at least one more Developer Preview to test-drive.

Google I/O 2010: Google TV Set to Conquer the Living Room

Android was the star of the show on the second day of the Google I/O 2010 conference. The first half of the starting keynote was dedicated to the Android mobile platform and the launch of Android 2.2 Froyo. The second half was also about Android, though, a position it hasn’t been in before. Google has, as expected, officially announced Google TV, a new platform marrying software, hardware and the web and bringing them to the living room.

The emphasis is on ‘platform,’ Google TV is not just one device, or a piece of software, or even a service. It’s all of them combined to do what many have tried, but no one succeeded so far, combine a complete web experience with the TV experience in a way that compromises neither.

With Google TV, the line between traditional programming, online video and even other online content becomes blurred. Normally, finding something to watch on TV meant flipping through the channels or looking through the TV guide. But with the number of channels always increasing, it’s hard to find what you want when you want it. Google TV solves this with a simple idea, the same one Google has been applying for more than a decade, search.

With Google TV, the line between traditional programming, online video and even other online content becomes blurred. Normally, finding something to watch on TV meant flipping through the channels or looking through the TV guide. But with the number of channels always increasing, it’s hard to find what you want when you want it. Google TV solves this with a simple idea, the same one Google has been applying for more than a decade, search.

Users will be able to bring up a search box that enables them to search specifically for the content they want. But, of course, the content they want may not be on at that particular time. It may be available online, though, so, luckily, Google TV looks to online sources as well to find what they need. In a sense, for the viewers, it won’t matter where the content is coming from, they will get the same experience.

Of course, you don’t always know what you want to watch, that’s part of the appeal of the TV. Google TV has this covered too and will enable you to browse to find something that you like, again, be it online or on TV. And it doesn’t have to be just video content. With a full browser at your disposal, you could view a Flickr slideshow or even play a Flash game on your big-screen TV.

Details about Google TV have been trickling in for a couple of months now and most have been accurate. As far as hardware is concerned, Google TV will be available on TV sets, Blu-ray players and set-top boxes. What’s more, all of these will work with your existing cable or satellite box. This flexibility is possible because Google TV comes with just a few hardware requirements, Internet connectivity, both wired and wireless, HDMI connectivity and Bluetooth connectivity for input devices.

The platform will be powered by Intel chips, specifically Atom processors in combination with a dedicated GPU and specialized hardware for video and audio. This will ensure that Google TV devices will be able to run any kind of content you can throw at it, be it HD video or Flash games. The last part is possible because of the integrated Adobe Flash player.

Which brings us to the software components. Google TV runs Android. At the Google I/O keynote, the boxes were on Android 2.1, but this will change in the future, Google says. Of course, Android was designed as a mobile operating system, but its lightweight and tight integration with the hardware make it perfect for CE devices. Interestingly, though, there aren’t that many changes between the vanilla Android and the one running on these devices.

The second big software component is the browser. The interesting part here is that Google ditched the regular Android web browser and went with Google Chrome instead. The reason for this, the company says, is that Chrome is designed for a full web experience and better suited for the large screens. Of course, most people won’t even known they’re running Chrome, since it features a completely redesigned UI.

Google TV devices are expected to hit the shelves in autumn, in time for the big holiday-season sales. For now, you should expect devices from Sony, TV sets and Blu-ray players, and a box from Logitech. Google has also partnered with Dish Network to bring the platform to the satellite TV provider’s customers.

But this is only the beginning, Google plans to continue to develop the platform and eventually open it up to everyone. Right now, developers can start optimizing their sites for Google TV. In early 2011, Google will open up the Android Marketplace to Google TV so developers can start creating apps dedicated to the platform. And, finally, in summer 2011, Google says it will open-source everything, so anyone can use the platform on any device they want.

Microsoft Wins the Best Large Workplace in Europe 2010 Three Years in a Row

Microsoft has been deemed as the Best Large Workplace in Europe 2010 by the Great Place to Work Institute for the third year running. It is quite an honor for the Redmond company’s over the pond presence, especially considering the sheer size of the “competitors.” The Great Place to Work Institute conducted an evaluation survey of in excess of 1,300 companies in no less than 17 markets across Europe. The results of the 100 Best Workplaces in Europe report as well as the awards for companies were unveiled during a gala ceremony at the Great Place to Work European Conference 2010 in Madrid on May 20, 2010.

Jean-Philippe Courtois, president, Microsoft International, welcomed news of the award. “Investing in people and creating a work environment that utilizes the latest technology has enabled staff to transform the way they work and interact with colleagues, delivering a strong work-life balance and a highly motivated and empowered team. This past year has been challenging for businesses and employees in all industries, and Microsoft is no different. That said, we continue to be optimistic especially as our industry transitions toward what we believe is the next big era in technology – cloud computing," he stated.

It is because Microsoft’s extensive investments in people that the award was given. According to the Redmond company, the award is designed to celebrate exceptional working environments, but also practices, as well as the benefits and recognition that workers receive. Palle Ellemann Knudsen, managing director for Great Place to Work Institute Europe, underlined that one of the winning points with the software giant was the way it remained consistent in the values it offered as an employer.

Linux Mint 9 (Isadora)

Linux Mint 9 (Isadora) is based on the newly released Ubuntu 10.04 LTS (Lucid Lynx) operating system, and is powered by the same Linux kernel 2.6.32.11. It now features over 30,000 software packages in the repositories, a new backup/restore tool, improvements to the Mint Menu, Windows installer, new artwork and lots of other nice improvements.

The Linux Mint 9 has a modified installer, to look just like the one in Ubuntu 10.04. It includes a new and very nice feature, one that is still missing from the popular Ubuntu OS, a very helpful and instructive welcome screen. Useful applications and desktop improvements, such as Mozilla Thunderbird 3, Pidgin or the Open in Terminal script for Nautilus are also present in this release!

Linux Mint 9 (Isadora) boots faster, it will be supported for 3 years on the desktop and 5 years on the server (LTS release), and, last but not least, it includes new and beautiful artwork, with lots of wonderful wallpapers, some nice GNOME themes and the GNOME-Wise icons.

About Linux Mint

Linux Mint is and will always be an elegant, easy-to-use, up-to-date, 100% free and comfortable Linux operating system based on the very popular Ubuntu OS. It offers paid commercial support to companies and individuals. Also, free community support is available from the forums and the IRC channel.

Google Chrome Gets Full Support for Geolocation

There is a lot of hype over location-aware services. It seems like the entire web wants to factor in your location and it’s hard to argue with the benefits this brings. Services can be catered specifically to you and knowing where you are enables plenty of them to offer more relevant results. Without browser support, everything remains just a good idea though, which is why it’s good news that Google Chrome finally supports the Geolocation API out of the box.

Preliminary support for the W3C Geolocation API was introduced in the developer builds of Google Chrome a couple of months ago. While the technology was there, it wasn’t enabled by default as more work was needed. The W3C specification is now fully implemented and enabled by default.

This means that, if you navigate to a site that requires location data, you will see a notification message asking you for access confirmation. Based on what your browser is reporting, this allows the site to determine your location.

By default, websites won’t be able to access your location without your explicit approval. If you feel you’ve got nothing to hide, you can enable all sites by default by going to Options menu > Under the Hood > Content Settings > Location where you can select the “Allow all sites to track my physical location” option.

On the other hand, if you don’t want to be bothered, you can select the “Don’t allow any site ...” option. In the Exceptions dialog, you can view the list of sites you have granted access to your location data and remove any or all of them.

If you want to check out the location feature in action, you can go to Google Maps and click on the “Show my location” icon among the left navigation controls. All of this is old news for Firefox users, as support for the Geolocation API has been built-in since Firefox 3.5, almost a year ago.