Microsoft TechEd Africa – Day 2

What a long day – on the second day I proceeded to a few more technical sessions. To be honest, some of it went over my head a bit. On the other hand, I was once again impressed by the amount of effort MS has made in the development of Windows 7.

Windows 7 has made significant strides forward in security, even compared to Windows Vista. Anyone who does tech support will tell you malware gets on to a XP machine much, much quicker than on Vista. In my opinion this primarily comes down to User Account Control and Protected mode in modern versions of Internet Explorer (not that I typically advise that people use IE). However, a lot of people get frustrated by the constant nagging of UAC, and then just switch it off. I admit, I have done it myself. But then you deal a few times with machines that have been attacked malware, and you realize it is a very necessary evil.

Windows 7 will give users (and admins) better control in how to implement UAC. Using a sliding scale, users can define what type of actions requires a UAC prompt. Very good, but I think I will stick to maximum settings, thank you.

A few other features have also been made to secure Win7 – Applocker and Bitlocker (which has been improved). Applocker is basically a more advanced, yet easier to user version of Group Policy editor in which admin can define which appliications can be whitelisted or blacklisted. Now this sounds very big brother, but control is power right? Many modern applications (read: malware) can install without admin rights on a standard user account, and this is an ideal method to combat these problems.

Bitlocker has been improved as well, with a default bitlocker partition being installed on Windows 7 installs – this gives a much more versatile install method which can enable easy Bitlocker encryption. With Vista, Bitlocker was not exactly easy to deploy. While techies could easily go through the process of partitioning there drives (which is necessary), large corporation dont really have a lot of freedom away from this method.

Also, Microsoft had a few demo machines running multitouch version of Microsoft Virtual Earth, and it certainly is quite awesome to use. I however want to see it used in more applications, and that is where the truly creative interfaces are needed. See here:

I will post back later with my Day 3 impressions. I am off to go speak to a few Microsoft execs… would like to know a few more things…

Microsoft TechEd Africa – Day 1

Well, for the next few days I am at Tech Ed in Durban – and man its impressive. Have to say, after visiting quite a bunch of academic conferences, it is quite a change of pace to see the magnitude of this conference. But enough about the conference – I just want to mention a few things that stood out to me today.

Windows 7

As a big supporter of Windows 7, I cannot help but feel that the presenters of this product were not properly prepared. I have used Win7 since its beta days – it is one of those products that has made me believe in Microsoft again. I have never had a single problem with it, and I have updated all my machines to Win7.

The Win7 guys tried to show off its new deployment methods, and while nice, the demos failed. They were particularly excited by installing off a flashdisk, which also unfortunately failed. But to be honest, I think its great as well, and I look forward to carrying around a boot flash disk with Win7. This is off course also great for users of netbooks.

Windows 7 also runs great on lower end hardware like netbooks – Aero glass renders on these machines as well. They showed off a Mecer netbook with a multitouch, which is coming to the market at under R5000. If this indeed the case, I can see multitouch becoming a very capable interface. (but typical of Mecer, I want to see the quality of the hardware before I am convinced).

Security

In an excellent presentation by Jayesh Mowjee I was introduced to modern methods of identity theft and hacking. I have to say I was taken aback by the number of tools to enable you to steal someone’s identity without too much effort or a nominal fee. Also surprising is the list of security threats – social engineering is still the major security threat. Also, disgruntled and uninformed employees are huge security risks.

At the end of the day, the biggest security investment is still physical security and lockdown of software. Windows 7 will include Applocker which will help a lot with this types of issues, seeing as you cant really change the people, but merely steer them in the right direction. Sad, but true. (I however don’t agree with DRM, but that’s a different story.)

Tags: #tea2009

Microsoft’s new lease on life: Windows 7

While Windows 7 is constantly in the news this year, we can finally start making an educated judgement on what significance this product might have. In the last ten years just about any Windows release was plagued by the same problems time and time again. If you want an idea what I am talking about just go take a look at any Apple Get a Mac ad. While they are perhaps oversimplified, they are nonetheless true in some sense. Users are scared of new OS’s with good reason. A new OS will typically run slower, cause incompatibility issues and is normally a hassle to get used to again. Why go through all that hassle if your current OS is fine?

Well there is your first problem – Microsoft two current operating systems, XP and Vista are both perfect examples in how an OS should not be executed. Windows XP was released in 2001, which in the IT industry is a very long time ago. When it was launched it was buggy, very insecure and not a great OS, yet it became much better over time and eventually became a very quick, stable OS because in 8 years all its wrinkles are ironed out and hardware has improved so much. Windows Vista was launched in 2007, after many delays. Windows Vista was criticized for high hardware requirements and irritating User Account Control (which now, two years later is actually a very good thing in hindsight, especially if you see the increase in malware on XP machines).

Windows 7 is confirmed to be launched by the end of this year, and my, what an upgrade. Its biggest advantage over any previous version is that for the first time it runs much faster than the previous version of Windows on the same hardware. In fact, the improvement is so much that if you have a decent machine running Vista, you will be very well served by upgrading to Windows 7. Where in the past the advice might have been to only get a new OS if it is pre-installed on the machine, the same cannot be said for Windows 7. I installed it on every Windows Vista machine I use and I have to say the results are staggering. Every driver installs without a problem, the machines perform faster and in some cases battery life improves on notebooks. The overall feeling of speed and reactivity is what stands out however.
Windows 7’s beta has been available since January and was surprisingly stable and feature complete. Last week Microsoft made the release candidate version available for free download as well (bonus: the RC version will last until March 2010 before giving you notices that it will expire by June). While there has not been many changes, the RC version is very stable, in fact more stable than Vista SP1 in my findings.

The interface is very similiar to Windows Vista and is light years ahead of the XP look. Glass effects provide a lot of eye candy, but the biggest change is found in the taskbar. Instead of having large buttons for every running application, the OS groups similiar applications to a single button. At first this seams counter intuitive, but in this day and age where we multitask it starts to make sense. The glass effects are also a bit more useful – for example grouped applications all glow in their own colour and its much easier to follow the mouse with all the effects on screen as you move about. Users also “pin” often used application onto the taskbar, much in a similiar fashion to Mac OS X’s dock, but a little more intuitive. You can however change to the old type of taskbar buttons if you want.

One very noticeable part of Windows 7 is that none of the normal Microsoft applications we got used to in recent Windows versions are installed – there is no Windows Mail (or Outlook Express), no Calendar, no Photo Gallery etc. While you might see this as a stunted idea, the functionality is still available as a free download. Still, this means the OS is lean and mean, and it gives you choice to download and actually use the applications you want.

The hardware requirements are not too steep either. You need a 1GHz processor, 1 Gig RAM, Directx 9 graphics card and at least 16Gigs free disk space. I would however recommend at least a dual core processor (or hyper threading) and 2 Gig RAM. One bonus feature that is much improved in Windows 7 over Vista is the much criticized Readyboost feature. The basic idea (very simplified) is that Windows can use a flash disk to improve disk read times because of flash memory’s fast random reads. In Windows Vista the user was limited to one flash disk with a maximum of 4 Gig dedicated to Readyboost. Windows 7 removes the one flash disk limit and increases the dedication limit (hard figures are not available yet). Windows Vista did not have great boosts from Readyboost, but with these limitations removed, Windows 7 might actually make Readyboost a worthwhile endeavour. So, if you have a unused flash disk pop it in. (It has to be reasonably quick though).

Another major feature that was recently announced is “XP Mode”. This free download to higher end versions of Windows 7 will enable users (or organizations) who use very specific software that only runs on XP to run inside a virtual machine. This will enable you to run older XP specific software side by side with other windows inside the OS. But in my experience I have not had one application from a XP machine not working inside 7. So I guess this is meant for very niche software releases, which might be made by companies who are either unwilling to make their software Windows 7 compatible or do not exist anymore.

Overall I feel that Windows 7 will be a big success. Every part of the OS feels polished and stable. The development cycle is very quick up to now and is not plagued by delays like Vista, so consumers are actually looking forward to its release. If you are reasonably technical and want to try the latest and greatest, give Windows 7 RC a go. Don’t let the fact that it is not a final version yet put you off. It is every bit as stable as XP or Vista, and more. And for all you “Vista sucks, XP is perfect” users, your day has come.

PS: This is just my take on what I like about Windows 7. Of course there are many improvements that you might want to know about. If you would like an exhaustive review of Windows 7, I would recommend Paul Thurrott’s review.

Apple opens up to Microsoft!

In a surprise announcement today, Apple announced its willingness to start adapting Microsoft operating systems in its computer hardware and phones. The announcement has far reaching implications that creates oppurtunitities for both major companies.

Apple will from 1 April 2009 start giving buyers at apple.com the ability to configure their macbook, imac, mac pro or mac mini with Windows Vista instead of Mac OS X 10.5. Current interim CEO of Apple, Timothy D. Cook, states that the following:

“We have always watched Microsoft from afar, and have taken hints and ideas from their hints and ideas. Microsoft Vista is clearly a superior product from a corporate viewpoint, and we have decided to incorporate its versatility in our product line up. We are moving away from virtualization – it is clearly the type of freedom our customers do not appreciate. Apple is very excited of the prospect of years of relationship building with Steve Balmer and co. Bad artists copy. Great artists steal.“

In perhaps another surprise move, Apple is also going to start making Windows Mobile available on iPhones. The new model named iPhone Red(mond) edition, is going on sale today. The software is said to be a direct port of the interface of the Samsung Omnia, which has a interesting TouchFLO like interface similiar to the HTC smartphones.

The new iPhone Red(mond) edition will also do away with the clunky generic earphone jack and will give users a proprietary earphone jack which give users the oppurtunity a to use a new range of earphones. The new screen will also use traditional forced induction touch screen which have clearly been a much more successful method for competing companies. The new model will also go on market for a lower price of $99, of which Tim Cook notes:

“It’s time we do away with Apple Tax. We are in a recession, and this is clearly the way forward!”.

Tim Cook also announced that Paul Thurrott is now the new Chief Strategic Advisor for Apple’s mobile division.

Apple plans to make these wonderful new products available during the day.