August 2004 - apple-list - University of Manitoba Mailing Lists

INTEREST: Longhorn perspectives: Microsoft - "major improvements"; Others - "Microsoft to Gut Longhorn"
by billing 30 Aug '04

30 Aug '04

...from: http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1640211,00.asp Microsoft to Gut Longhorn to Make 2006 Delivery Date By Mary Jo Foley, Microsoft Watch and Darryl K. Taft August 27, 2004 UPDATED: After the cuts, Longhorn won't look much like the early builds that Microsoft has been distributing, but it should run existing applications. Microsoft is cutting back its Longhorn client's planned feature set so as to be able to make its current delivery targets: Beta 1 by next year and final release some time in 2006. Microsoft officially confirmed what had been leaked by developer sources late on Friday: changes to its future roadmap for the desktop version of Longhorn. And while developers and customers who expected they'd be required to rewrite their applications to take advantage of Longhorn may be happy with Microsoft's roadmap changes, others who were banking on promised Longhorn features, such as the next-generation Windows File System, will be far less so. The Windows File System (WinFS)$B!=(Btechnology that was set to simplify information storage and retrieval$B!=(Bwon't make it into the final, shipping versions of Longhorn client, company officials said. WinFS also won't be part of Longhorn server, the server complement of Longhorn that is still due out in 2007, as Microsoft announced earlier this year. The end result? Longhorn is going to be a lot more of an evolutionary than a revolutionary Windows release. "Longhorn is going to stop being a whole new thing and more of an XP with a lot of good new stuff," said one developer close to Microsoft, who requested anonymity. [...] =========== ...from: http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2004/Aug04/08 -27Target2006PR.asp Microsoft Announces 2006 Target Date for Broad Availability Of Windows "Longhorn" Client Operating System Windows WinFX Developer Technologies Will Be Made Available For Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 REDMOND, Wash. -- Aug. 27, 2004 -- Microsoft Corp. today announced it will target broad availability of the Windows(I.(B client operating system code-named "Longhorn" in 2006, and make key elements of the Windows WinFXTM developer platform in "Longhorn" available for Windows XP and Windows ServerTM 2003. "Longhorn" will deliver major improvements in user productivity, important new capabilities for software developers, and significant advancements in security, deployment and reliability. "Getting 'Longhorn' to customers in 2006 will provide important advances in performance, security and reliability, and will help accelerate the creation of exciting new applications by developers across the industry," said Bill Gates, chairman and chief software Microsoft will deliver a Windows storage subsystem, code-named "WinFS," after the "Longhorn" release. The new storage system provides advanced data organization and management capabilities and will be in beta testing when the "Longhorn" client becomes available. [...] ============ The Microsoft "LongHorn" page is at: http://msdn.microsoft.com/longhorn/

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INTEREST: video demo of Apple's MOTION, DIY bank fraud "kits" on Internet, How 8 pixels cost Microsoft $$$, IBM: SCO violating Linux GPL
by billing 22 Aug '04

22 Aug '04

..from: http://www.apple.com/motion/video/ Demonstration of Apple's new MOTION software - Apple’s high-performance motion graphic design and production application (http://www.apple.com/motion) - done at the most recent National Association of Broadcaster's (NAB) exhibition. ======================================= So you want to be a cybercrook... By James Sherwood CNET News.com August 19, 2004, 3:24 PM PT Some Web sites are now offering surfers the chance to download free "phishing kits" (definition of Phising at http://inews.webopedia.com/TERM/p/phishing.html) containing all the graphics, Web code and text required to construct the kind of bogus Web sites used in Internet phishing scams. According to security firm Sophos, the kits allow users to design sites that have the same look and feel as legitimate online banking sites that can then be used to defraud unsuspecting users by getting them to reveal the details of their financial accounts. "By putting the necessary tools in the hands of amateurs, it's likely that the number of attacks will continue to rise," said Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at Sophos. Sophos warned that many of the kits also contain spamming software that enables potential fraudsters to send out thousands of phishing e-mails with direct links to their do-it-yourself fraud sites. "The emergence of these 'build your own phish' kits means that anyone can now mimic bona fide banking Web sites and convince customers to disclose sensitive information such as passwords," Cluley said. Many online banking Web sites now carry messages urging users not to open any e-mail that they suspect may be fraudulent and to telephone their bank for further information if they do receive suspicious e-mail. Phishing has become such a problem that there are now several online antiphishing guides to educate users about the con artists' common tricks. ===================== ...complete article at: http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104_2-5316664.html? part=rss&tag=feed&subj=zdnet How eight pixels cost Microsoft millions By Jo Best Silicon.com August 19, 2004, 11:36 AM PT Microsoft's lack of multicultural savvy cost the Redmond behemoth millions of dollars, according to a company executive. The software giant has seen its products banned in some of the biggest markets on earth--and it's all because of eight wrongly colored pixels, a dodgy choice of music and a bad English-to-Spanish dictionary. Speaking at the International Geographical Union congress in Glasgow on Wednesday, Microsoft's top man in its geopolitical strategy team, Tom Edwards, revealed how one of the biggest companies in the world managed to offend one of the biggest countries in the world with a software slip-up When coloring in 800,000 pixels on a map of India, Microsoft colored eight of them a different shade of green to represent the disputed Kashmiri territory. The difference in greens meant Kashmir was shown as non-Indian, and the product was promptly banned in India. Microsoft was left to recall all 200,000 copies of the offending Windows 95 operating system software to try and heal the diplomatic wounds. "It cost millions," Edwards said. Another social blunder from Microsoft saw chanting of the Koran used as a soundtrack for a computer game and led to great offence to the Saudi Arabia government. The company later issued a new version of the game without the chanting, while keeping the previous editions in circulation because U.S. staff thought the slip wouldn't be spotted, but the Saudi government banned the game and demanded an apology. Microsoft then withdrew the game. The software giant managed to further offend the Saudis by creating another game in which Muslim warriors turned churches into mosques. That game was also withdrawn. [...] ========================== ...complete article at: http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104_2-5316507.html? part=rss&tag=feed&subj=zdnet IBM asks for Linux ban on SCO By David Becker CNET News.com August 19, 2004, 10:13 AM PT IBM asked a federal court to bar the SCO Group, a Linux adversary, from distributing any Linux software, in the latest filing in their ongoing legal battle. In a motion for partial summary judgment filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City, IBM asks the court to rule in favor of its counterclaim alleging SCO has violated the terms of one of the most common licenses under which Linux software is distributed. An IBM representative declined to comment beyond the text of the motion. An SCO representative said the company disputed IBM's allegations and would respond soon in court. The motion says that by distributing Linux software governed by the GNU General Public License (GPL) while at the same time declaring the GPL invalid, SCO has forfeited the right to distribute Linux code, particularly code to which IBM has made contributions. SCO has been a harsh critic of the GPL, declaring it a violation of the U.S. Constitution in one legal document. [...] ==================

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IMPORTANT: 15" Powerbook G4 (aluminum) battery recall
by billing 20 Aug '04

20 Aug '04

...from: https://depot.info.apple.com/batteryexchange/index.html 15-inch PowerBook G4 Battery Exchange Program In cooperation with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) and other international safety authorities, Apple is voluntarily recalling certain lithium ion rechargeable batteries that were sold worldwide from January 2004 through August 2004 for use with 15-inch PowerBook G4 (Aluminum) notebook computers. These batteries were manufactured by LG Chem, Ltd. of South Korea.

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INTEREST: Judges rule file-sharing software legal
by wbilling 20 Aug '04

20 Aug '04

...complete article at: http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104_2-5316570.html? part=rss&tag=feed&subj=zdnet By John Borland CNET News.com August 19, 2004, 1:27 PM PT A federal appeals court has upheld a controversial court decision that said file-sharing software programs such as Grokster or Morpheus are legal. Following the lead of a lower-court decision last year, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in Los Angeles said on Thursday that peer-to-peer software developers were not liable for any copyright infringement committed by people using their products, as long as they had no direct ability to stop the acts. (Download the decision.) The ruling means that companies that write and distribute peer-to-peer software can't be shut down because of the actions of their customers. It did not say file-trading itself is legal, and lower courts in the United States have said individual computer users are breaking the law when they trade copyrighted files without permission. But the ruling does lift the cloud of potential liability from defendants Grokster and StreamCast Networks, as well as from many of their rivals. "The (record labels and movie studios) urge a re-examination of the law in the light of what they believe to be proper public policy," the court wrote. "Doubtless, taking that step would satisfy the copyright owners' immediate economic aims. However, it would also alter general copyright law in profound ways with unknown ultimate consequences outside the present context." [......] ============================

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INTEREST: "If the human body did patch management the way (companies do), we'd all be dead."
by billing 17 Aug '04

17 Aug '04

...from: http://news.com.com/Study%3A+Unpatched+PCs+compromised+in+20+minutes/ 2100-7349_3-5313402.html?part=rss&tag=5313402&subj=news.7349.20 Study: Unpatched PCs compromised in 20 minutes Published: August 17, 2004, 12:22 PM PDT By Matt Loney and Robert Lemos Special to CNET News.com Don't connect that new PC to the Internet before taking security precautions, researchers at the Internet Storm Center warned Tuesday. According to the researchers, an unpatched Windows PC connected to the Internet will last for only about 20 minutes before it's compromised by malware, on average. That figure is down from around 40 minutes, the group's estimate in 2003. The Internet Storm Center, which is part of the SANS Institute, calculated the 20-minute "survival time" by listening on vacant Internet Protocol addresses and timing the frequency of reports received there. "If you are assuming that most of these reports are generated by worms that attempt to propagate, an unpatched system would be infected by such a probe," the center, which provides research and education on security issues, said in a statement. The drop from 40 minutes to 20 minutes is worrisome because it means the average "survival time" is not long enough for a user to download the very patches that would protect a PC from Internet threats. Scott Conti, network operations manager for the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, said he finds the center's data believeable. "It's a tough problem, and it's getting tougher," Conti said. One of Conti's administrators tested the center's data recently by placing two unpatched computers on the network. Both were compromised within 20 minutes, he said. The school is now checking the status of computers before letting them connect to the Internet. If a machine doesn't have the latest patches, it gets quarantined with limited network access until the PC is back up to date. "We are giving the people the ability to remediate before connecting to the network," Conti said. The center also said in its analysis that the time it takes for a computer to be compromised will vary widely from network to network. If the Internet service provider blocks the data channels commonly used by worms to spread, then a PC user will have more time to patch. "On the other hand, university networks and users of high-speed Internet services are frequently targeted with additional scans from malware like bots," the group stated. "If you are connected to such a network, your 'survival time' will be much smaller." In a guide to patching a new Windows system, the Internet Storm Center recommends that users turn off Windows file sharing and enable the Internet Connection Firewall. Microsoft's latest security update, Windows XP Service Pack 2, will set such a configuration, but users will have to go online to get the update, opening themselves up to attack. One problem, experts say, is network administrators' reliance on patching and their assumption that users will quickly patch systems. Speaking recently at the Microsoft TechEd developer conference in Amsterdam, Microsoft security consultant Fred Baumhardt said the day is likely to come when a virus or worm brings down everything. "Nobody will have time to detect it," he said. "Nobody will have time to issue patches or virus definitions and get them out there. This shows that patch management is not the be-all and end-all." Baumhardt stressed the importance of adaptability, using the human immune system as an example: "Imagine if your body said, 'Hmm, I have the flu. I've never had this before, so I'll die.' But that doesn't happen: Your body raises its temperature and so on, to buy time while other mechanisms kick in." "If the human body did patch management the way (companies do), we'd all be dead."

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FYI: FireWire 800 23GB disc burner announced, iSync 1.5 adds more devices
by billing 11 Aug '04

11 Aug '04

The First FireWire 800/1394b DVD Optical Technology Disc-for-DATA Drives Records 23GB onto a Single Sided Disc. Based on blue laser technology, the AfterBurner stores up to 23 GB of native capacity per rewritable or write-one, read-many (WORM) single sided media, delivering an advanced optical storage and archiving solution for professional data-intensive applications. The high capacity and high performance FireWire 800 External AfterBurner Series drives are designed specifically for professional storage applications, graphic design, audio/video editing/authoring and medical imaging, e-mail archival, enterprise content management and multimedia projects. ...more information and at: http://www.nitroav.com/store/customer/home.php?cat=3 =============================== ...from: http://www.apple.com/isync/ iSync makes it even easier to make — and keep — your dates. That’s because iSync, Apple’s hot synchronizing software, now works with over thirty cell phone models, as well as multiple Macs, your iPod and your PDA. =============================

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UPDATE: Final Cut, Cinema Tools, Compressor, LiveType, Soundtrack, DVD Studio
by billing 11 Aug '04

11 Aug '04

...from: http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/proapplicationsupport.html Pro Application Support 2.1 This update provides improvements for Apple's professional applications, and is strongly recommended for all users of Final Cut Pro, Cinema Tools, Compressor, LiveType, Soundtrack, and DVD Studio Pro. This update improves general user interface appearance and reliability and is required to receive future updates for these applications.

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UPDATE: important Jaguar and Panther patches
by billing 11 Aug '04

11 Aug '04

NOTE: these updates may be easily be installed by choosing "About this Mac" from the Apple menu and clicking on the "Software Update..." button. Apple Mac OS X Bulletins (APPLE-SA-2004-08-09) Yesterday, two bulletins were released by Apple. The first bulletin involved the libpng (Portable Network Graphics) vulnerability that has been in numerous patches in the Unix and Linux world in the past 2 weeks. The Mac OS X CoreGraphics and AppKit frameworks have been updated to protect against the flaws in the reference library. The software update is available for these versions of OS X: * Mac OS X v10.3.4 "Panther" * Mac OS X Server v10.3.4 "Panther" * Mac OS X v10.2.8 "Jaguar" * Mac OS X Server v10.2.8 "Jaguar" The second bulletin announced the availability of Mac OS X v 10.3.5. The new version of OS X includes the patch for libpng, and also includes security updates for the Safari Web Browser and the TCP/IP stack (the rose fragmentation attack). For more information on either of these, please see the following URLs: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=61798 http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/

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INTEREST: Logging On at 30,000 Feet,
by billing 09 Aug '04

09 Aug '04

...from: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/08/travel/08prac.html?th [NOTE: free registration required for article access] Logging On at 30,000 Feet By BOB TEDESCHI Published: August 8, 2004 IN late May, Ortwin Freyermuth readied himself for an 11-hour flight from Munich to his Los Angeles home - a journey typically preceded by a flurry of last-minute e-mail messages, in anticipation of a day's worth of traveling incommunicado. This time, though, Mr. Freyermuth eased onto his Lufthansa flight less harried than on previous trips. When his plane reached cruising altitude, he opened up his iBook, logged onto the Internet and answered messages from 30,000 feet. "It was amazing," said Mr. Freyermuth, a lawyer. "Now I don't have to stress out before every flight." The price of a stress-free flight - Lufthansa's Connexion by Boeing service costs $30 for a long-haul flight (six hours or more), or $10 for 30 minutes - is perhaps more than some are willing to pay. But Connexion is at the leading edge of a trend that analysts and executives said will gain momentum this year, and is likely to lead to lower prices, a greater selection of vendors and much more mouse clicking on flights. Connexion made its debut in May on Lufthansa, which calls its service FlyNet, and is the first full-feature, in-flight Internet service to reach travelers, after years of half-starts. The airline industry had originally planned to roll out airborne Web surfing in late 2001, but companies shelved those plans after Sept. 11 and the ensuing financial malaise. The service is only available to those with wireless Internet connections for their laptop or handheld computers. Increasingly wireless connections are built into portable devices, but those with older laptops can buy a wireless PC card for $50 to $100. What you get is a better experience than most Internet users receive at home. Wireless connection speeds are generally up to 20 times faster than those of dial-up service, and if just a few people are logged on in the plane, the speed can rival that of some workplace connections. And unlike many workplace Internet connections, Connexion's service offers unrestricted Web access. 5 Planes and Counting So far, five Lufthansa airplanes are equipped with the satellite receivers and wireless networks necessary to run the system, and the only routes served as of July were Munich-Los Angeles and Munich-Tokyo. But the company plans to equip all of its long-range aircraft with the technology, and add New York routes by the end of the year. According to Terrance Scott, a Connexion spokesman, Japan Airlines will be the next to add the service, sometime this summer or early fall, followed by Scandinavian Airlines and All Nippon Airways. Singapore Airlines, China Airlines and Korean Air will follow early next year. Mr. Scott said Connexion is in "active discussions" with several United States carriers, but none has signed on yet. [...] =======================

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INTEREST: Apple laptop sales jump 17% in Higher Ed. in 2003
by billing 05 Aug '04

05 Aug '04

...from: http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/aug2004/ tc2004085_0709_tc153.htm AUGUST 5, 2004 • Editions: N. America | Europe | Asia | Edition Preference SPECIAL REPORT: APPLE: THE NEXT GENERATION Apple Aces Academia Its college sales are surging as students flock to its well-designed laptops and the popular iPod/iTunes combo for digital music The University of California at Berkeley has some of the best and the brightest students in the Golden State's vaunted university system. When they want to arm themselves with the best tech tools, they head to the Scholar's Workstation. The on-campus computer store sells thousands of machines each year. Lately more of those models have come with an Apple (AAPL ) logo on the box. According to store administrator Mark Laws, the percentage of Apple computers sold has risen steadily. And in the fast-growing laptop category, Mac sales make up over half of the total at the Scholar's Workstation. That's a nice jump from less than 40% of total laptop sales at the store three school years ago. "People really seem to like them. We're definitely seeing more and more people come in to ask about them," says Laws. ONE-TWO LAPTOP PUNCH. Berkeley isn't the only campus where Macs are flying off the shelves. While the percentage of Macs sold at the Scholars Workstation is far higher than Apple's market share as tracked by PC market-research firms, CEO Steven P. Jobs and his troops have clearly been on a college roll. In each of the past three quarters, Apple has posted 40% increases in year-over-year sales for this segment. During the first half of its current fiscal year, Apple posted an 18% bump in year-over-year education sales. And most of that has come from higher education, since the K-12 market has remained almost flat for Apple (see BW Online, 8/3/04, "Apple's Back-to-School Blast"). Clearly the Mac is climbing the Ivory Tower. What's behind the college revival? Credit Apple's one-two laptop punch -- the lower-end iBook and the more powerful PowerBook, which are packing a wallop. "They have the right products at the right time," says Kenneth C. Green, director of the Campus Computing Project, an ongoing industry-funded study that examines how computing is used in higher education. (Apple helps to fund this study, along with rivals such as Dell (DELL ) and Hewlett-Packard (HPQ )). IT'S ALL PORTABLE. True, in higher education Apple has less ground to make up than in the broad PC market, where Jobs and his troops hold 3% or less of the total PC pie. That contrasts with Apple's 11.9% share in colleges in the first quarter of 2004. Moreover, that share could go up even more this year if Apple keeps up its torrid pace. Jobs & Co. sold 193,000 Macs into higher education in 2003, up 17.7% over the previous year. During that period, the entire higher-education market grew by only 11%. The biggest reason for Apple's expansion is the growing popularity of notebook computers on campus. According to collegiate market researcher StudentMonitor, 36% of all university students had laptops by the fall of 2003, up from 21% in 2000. During that same period, desktop ownership remained roughly flat in the high 60% range. No surprise, then, that notebook sales to universities soared by 33.8% from 2002 to 2003, according to IDC. Apple laptop sales rose by a whopping 58.5% in that same period. "When I go around and talk to colleges, I find out that well in excess of 90% of incoming freshmen have laptops," says Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice-president of worldwide marketing. "They don't bring desktops anymore. It has all gone portable. So it makes sense we'd be doing better." LURE OF MUSIC. Surprisingly, this laptop explosion for Apple came without major product introductions. Schiller says the key is that Apple's core design expertise outshines raw speed comparisons with rival offerings. "You want a lot of features, but not a lot of doors and things that can break. And we're the only ones left that actually design our own products. Other companies don't have the talent or the tech to invest in breakthrough new designs and technologies such as widescreen [LCD laptop displays,]" says Schiller. Indeed, the pricey PowerBook has become the favorite portable workstation of the campus Unix clique, which wants a nifty graphical interface and the ability to crunch serious code. Add Apple's smooth WiFi access software and its laptops are doing well in a highly competitive market. "They're well positioned in the mobile space, which is where the market is growing," says IDC analyst David Daoud (see BW Online, 8/3/04, "Apple: Sweetness Regained"). Then there's the music factor. Apple's iTunes software, which comes as a free download for either PCs or Macs, has become the de facto standard for managing digital tunes on the desktop. That, plus the runaway success of Apple's iPod music player, could be fueling a slow but steady increase in Apple customers. "My sense is that music and the iPod are influencing purchasing decisions," says analyst Charles Wolf of Needham & Co. (He owns Apple shares and has a "buy" recommendation on the stock). YOUNG CONVERTS. Will Apple's newfound success in the halls of higher learning add much needed fresh blood to the adult Mac user base? That's the million-dollar question. To date, no one has tracked the percentage of college Macs buyers who remain loyal to Apple after they receive their sheepskin. In some respects, students may be more valuable customers because they're younger and have many more computer buying years in front of them. "It's hard to get people to move to a Mac, but once they do they tend to stay," says Wolf. If Apple can stay on a roll at college, then the Mac could well become a campus fixture once again. By Alex Salkever, Technology Editor for BusinessWeek Online

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