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Vista: waiting for something

The general consensus is that Vista will be successful because firms will be forced to deploy it either due to Microsoft licensing stipulations (Software Assurance) or due to hardware upgrade cycles. But the cloud that hovers over Vista is that most firms and most users do not have a compelling reason to upgrade from XP. However, there are a lot of pundits out there who just seem to want to wish users into enthusiastically adopting Vista:

Microsoft will be omnipresent…in retrospect, this wasn’t a very aggressive prediction. I was right, but 2007 is shaping up to be the Year of Vista, whereas 2006 was the Year of Vista Delays

Why? No one knows, but something must be out there:

Something like that could start to happen in 2007. Vista is so much better than its predecessor operating systems that I think it will give the entire computer industry a pleasant kick forward. Expect everybody from Dell and HP to miscellaneous graphics card, peripheral and memory makers to benefit. And who knows what new applications will follow in Vista’s wake?

Even Office 2007 has received tepid reviews. Today’s WSJ review:

If you’d like to get more out of Office, especially in the area of how your documents look, Office 2007 is a big step forward, and worth the steep learning curve it imposes. If you’re happy with Office now, or you mostly create plain documents where formatting and design aren’t high priorities, it may not be worth the effort to buy and learn the new version.

So what’s out there?

My contribution to MOAB OS X bugs list

Security is a serious issue and as a longtime Mac user, I take all necessary precautions to ensure that my machine is not compromised. The MOAB is a useful exercise in exposing vulnerabilities that can affect OS X users. Having said that, if the minimum criteria involves listing a VLC error as an Apple vulnerability, then I have some other suggestions for their list:

This one affects OS X systems running Parallels running Windows 2000 SP4, Windows XP SP1 and SP2, Windows Server 2003 SP1, and/or Windows Vista:

According Symantec and eEye Digital Security, the bug is a memory corruption vulnerability that pops up when the MessageBox function is called; eEye pegged the threat as “medium,” while Symantec labeled it as a “privilege escalation,” a type of threat generally considered low on the security scale.

This Google bug below is allegedly fixed, but Mac OS X users accessing Gmail using Safari should be wary:

An attacker could create a malicious website that would copy all the entries in a Gmail user’s address book

OS X users accessing web-based email services using Safari 1.x/2.x and all versions of Firefox are vulnerable to phishing attacks:

US-CERT continues to receive reports of phishing scams that target online users. Most recently, users have reported receiving emails that appear to be from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The phishing email claims to offer a tax refund and requests users to click on a link to provide personal and possibly sensitive information. Identity thieves could use this information to further compromise unsuspecting victims.

Dig harder, guys. Seriously. I think you are performing a valuable service but don’t lower your standards because you have a pre-determined schedule.

David Sobatta’s take on Apple Tablet, iPod Phone etc.

A fantastic read. Key points for certain sites to consider before creating wild-ass rumors:

Apple cannot afford to chase every market a la Microsoft. They need to create products for the mass market. Tablet PCs, Virtualization, and gaming all fall under that category.

tablet computers were not a big enough market for Apple to spend its limited resources chasing. And even if the market grew, it would not reach a size to be of interest.

Apple pays far greater attention to price points now then ever before. So rumors of a $549 or $649 iPod phones make as much sense as $3,000 mac minis.

Apple executives had a theory that the route to success will not be through selling thousands of relatively expensive things, but millions of very inexpensive things like iPods

The last point is why Jobs is a visionary and Microsoft is a laggard and imitator. Some things can’t be bottled up and sold:

Steve’s ability to know where consumers and technology will intersect often creates a road paved in gold.

Thank you for sharing, David Sobotta.