ST Report: 17-Apr-98 #1415
From: Bruce D. Nelson (aa789@cleveland.Freenet.Edu)
Date: 04/25/98-11:21:30 AM Z
From: aa789@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Bruce D. Nelson)
Subject: ST Report: 17-Apr-98 #1415
Date: Sat Apr 25 11:21:30 1998
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April 17, 1998 No.1415
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CPU Industry Report Apple Denies Imatec Claim Windows 98 Features
11 States Pursue Microsoft Is WIRED TIRED? Good NEWS for Apple
Plus 98 Features Digital Isn't Forever! Linux Advocate
SONY PS MLB '99 People Talking Classics & Gaming
GTE PLANS BIG ADSL ROLLOUT
MS Sets Price of Windows 98 Upgrade
Justice, Microsoft Officials Meet
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Florida Lotto - LottoMan v1.35
Results: 04/11/98: five of six numbers with three 3# matches
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>From the Editor's Desk...
Guess whos a Grandpa again. <grin> My son Ralph and his wife
Pattie presented me with a 7lb 7oz beautiful baby boy at around
noon Monday. Mom and Baby are both doing just fine. Oh! Daddy is
doing fine too.
The DOJ is still very busy handing out hankies to the crybabies is
the computing community that cant seem to "best" Microsoft. What
a pity. In the beginning, everyone started off on a level playing
field. Some scoffed at Windows v1.0 saying itll never take hold
and went off in their own directions. Others ("the Johnnie come
latelys") came to be as a result of Windows with all its MS
inspired and generated accessory programs. Netscape comes to mind.
Barksdales Netscape would have no reason to be here had it not
been for windows in the first place. Yet Barksdale wants MS to get
off a piece of the action. Nobody forced Barksdale to come out
with a Web Browser that supports Windows. Why must MS now "give"
away its hard earned position of superiority? If I were Gates/MS
Id be rather arrogant if not downright nasty about the whole
affair.
One must concede the fact that Microsoft did make it ALL happen
from the early days of MS-DOS till today. If none of MSs efforts
had borne fruits where would we all be today? Slogging around in
CP/M and Cobal? Struggling with Digitals rubber band GUI? I know
its a bad joke but it kinda rings true. The sore losers in the
industry are trying everything in their power to force MS to give
up ground and/or to sort of "start over" whilst allowing the
criers more leeway to eat MSs lunch so to speak. What about the
MS stockholders? Theyve all of them invested their hard earned
money know the gamble they faced. They WON why should they be
forced, directly or indirectly, to give up their earnings because
Barksdale and friends are crying the blues? Hey.. Jim, this is the
FREE ENTERPRISE System. "You run what you brung". Trying crying
your way to the winners circle at any NHRA AA Fuel event like at
Gainesville FL. The judges will laugh you right into the Glades.
Netscape is on the slide. So now you wish that MS should use its
resources and surrender market position to bolster poor leadership
and slipshod marketing on Netscapes and others part?
You dont see King Kahn crying the blues or The good Doc at Corel
for that matter. They are real, true grit players in the Free
Enterprise marketplace. Corel has taken a few serious hits in the
market as has Phillippes efforts yet they come back fighting just
as hard as before and I might add, winning a few rounds too. But
they do it the right way by EARNING their winnings!! Not crying to
the DOJ and having a "bone thrown" to them.
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STReport Headline News
LATE BREAKING INDUSTRY-WIDE NEWS
Weekly Happenings in the Computer World
Compiled by: Dana P. Jacobson
Justice, Microsoft Officials Meet
Top Justice Department trustbusters met Microsoft lawyers
and executives as the government pondered whether to bring
new, broader charges against the software giant. "It's not
unusual to meet with parties during the course of a
negotiation," a Justice Department spokesman said after the
3-1/2-hour meeting ended. He had no comment on the
meeting's substance. Microsoft general counsel William
Neukom entered and left the Department of Justice by car
through an auto entrance, avoiding reporters and camera
crews who were waiting outside.
We felt it was an extremely useful exchange of information
on both sides," said Mark Murray from Microsoft's
headquarters in Redmond, Wash. "I just don't think it's
appropriate to comment on the specific details of the
meeting." Microsoft, which had sought the meeting, met with
Assistant Attorney General Joel Klein and other top
antitrust officials to open a high-level dialogue when the
company is under increasing scrutiny by state and federal
law enforcement for alleged anti-competitive practices.
Some Justice Department staff lawyers say they believe the
federal government now has enough evidence to file charges
against Microsoft. In an interview this week in Washington
state, Microsoft Chief Operating Officer Bob Herbold said
the company was in daily contact with federal antitrust
authorities and was providing information to state
investigators. Eleven states are preparing to file
antitrust charges against Microsoft, sources close to the
investigation have said. They said the states would accuse
Microsoft of using its dominance over computer operating
systems to extend its control to related areas, such as the
Internet. California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Iowa,
Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, South Carolina, Texas
and Wisconsin are involved in the case and others may join,
a source said.
In the past, Microsoft has reached agreements with
authorities when it faced a serious court challenge. For
example in January the company faced what legal experts
said was the certainty of a contempt citation from U.S.
District Court Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson. On the
morning of the hearing, Microsoft and the government
however announced they had reached an agreement that
averted the potential contempt citation. Jackson is hearing
government allegations that Microsoft violated a 1995
consent decree that was supposed to help ease the way for
increased software competition.
The Justice Department has argued Microsoft defied the
decree and competed unfairly against Netscape
Communications in the market for browsers, software needed
to look at the Internet's Web. Microsoft has asked an
appellate court to throw out the government's charges,
arguing that it was exercising a right under the decree to
integrate a Web browser into its operating system. The
expedited appeal will be argued before a three-judge panel
of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of
Columbia Circuit on April 21. On Thursday, a day before the
talks with the Justice Department, Microsoft announced it
had revised contracts with about two dozen media and
entertainment companies to eliminate exclusivity
provisions.
Under the contracts, content providers featured on the
"Channel Bar" of Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser were
required to promote the Microsoft browser exclusively on
their main Internet pages. The contract provisions drew the
attention of Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah last month
at a hearing where he grilled Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates
on the issue. At the time, the company said that it would
get rid of the problem.
MS Appeals to Public With Newspaper Ads
A day before Microsoft Corp. is set to meet with government
antitrust watchdogs to discuss its legal woes, the software
behemoth took its case to the public with ads in five major
U.S. newspapers.
"We believe the marketplace should determine what
innovations consumers want. At Microsoft, the freedom to
innovate for our customers is more than a goal; it is a
principle worth standing up for," the company states in
quarter-page ads in The Washington Post, The Washington
Times, The New York Times, The Seattle Times and The
Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Lawyers for Microsoft and the
Department of Justice are set to meet Friday to discuss an
upcoming federal appeals court hearing on the government's
antitrust case against the company. Although the meeting is
expected to address the DOJ's October suit over Microsoft's
Internet Explorer browser bundling with its Windows 95
operating system, also looming on the horizon is a possible
legal challenge involving the Windows 95 successor, Windows
98, which is set for a June 25 release.
Meanwhile, a dozen state attorneys general are also probing
the software giant's business practices.
11 States Readying Action Against Microsoft
Eleven states were preparing Thursday to file antitrust
charges against Microsoft Corp. this month, increasing
pressure on the federal government to take action against
the software giant. Sources close to the investigations
said the states would bring the kind of broad, new charges
against the Redmond, Wash., company that the Justice
Department has been investigating for months. The sources
said the states would accuse Microsoft of using its
dominance over computer operating systems to extend its
control to related areas, such as the Internet.
Bugs in Netscape Communicator Code Slow New Products
CMP Techweb reported that new offerings based on the newly
available Netscape Communicator 5.0 source code are getting
held up in production as developers struggle to make sense
of the half-baked freeware. Netscape had new business in
mind when it decided to ship Communicator code for free,
said Netscape CEO Jim Barksdale. But Bigfoot CEO Jim
Hoffman said his company, which had planned a new product
around the code, was in for some surprises. Bigfoot is
creating an Internet front end using the Netscape
Communicator source code the company released free last
week, but the job is tougher than the New York-based
company thought it would be. Reaction from other developers
to the free release of the Communicator source code has
been mixed, with many complaints that the code isn't ready
for prime time.
Windows Terminals About To Catch Fire
The Spring Comdex computer show, which is to be held in
Chicago starting April 20, will be the unofficial
coming-out party for technology from software giant
Microsoft Corp. that enables underpowered personal
computers to control Windows-based applications running on
a sever.
In addition to providing a venue for a demonstration of
Microsoft's forthcoming Windows Terminal Server, which
enables the Windows NT operating system to distribute
server-based applications to multiple users, some analysts
and industry insiders said the event will also serve as an
occasion to crown Microsoft's victory over the Java-based
network computer (NC) movement.
"Our position is that Microsoft will win this game," said
Michael Kantrowitz, executive vice president of Neoware
Systems Inc., which makes a computing device, a so-called
Windows-based terminal, designed to run Windows
applications stored on a server. "Companies don't want to
replace their Windows applications and rewrite them in
Java. They want to use what they already have." Microsoft
first proposed its server-centric approach to personal
computing last year, largely as a defensive move to protect
the dominance of the Windows operating system in corporate
environments. Feeling threatened by the growing support
behind the network computer, an inexpensive computing
device that runs Java applications downloaded from powerful
servers, Microsoft announced it would build a multiuser
version of Windows NT that would distribute Windows
applications to scaled-down PCs.
Microsoft usurped much of the NC's momentum by providing
corporations with the means to reduce the cost and
complexity of routine maintenance by placing the bulk of
processing power on centralized servers. The key to the
projected success of Windows terminals, however, said
Eileen O'Brien, an analyst at International Data Corp., is
that it enables enterprises to reap the rewards of the
network computing model without giving up access to their
Windows applications. The sale of hardware designed to run
distributed Windows applications is expected to start
slowly, with only 302,000 terminals sold to corporations in
1998, according to O'Brien. By the middle of the year,
however, when Microsoft is expected to release the
commercial version of its Windows Terminal Server product,
O'Brien said the sale of Windows terminals should pick up,
reaching more than 5 million units in the year 2002.
Although O'Brien said she believes the Windows terminal
market will account for only about 10 percent of personal
computers sold to enterprises, others think penetration
percentages could be twice that. Chad Gibbons, product
manager at Windows terminal maker Boundless Technologies
Inc., said that in addition to being a replacement device
for mainframe terminals, Windows terminals will be deployed
as substitutes for full-blown personal computers that are
primarily used for productivity applications, such as a
word processor or a spreadsheet program.
Boundless, much like Neoware, Wyse Technologies Inc. and
other terminal makers, has diverted plans to build
Java-only devices to concentrate on Windows terminals,
which start at about $250 and should be unveiled at the
Spring Comdex show. Despite the apparent momentum around
the Windows terminal market, O'Brien said several questions
have to be answered before enterprises are likely to adopt
the technology. John Frederiksen, group product manager for
Windows Terminal Server, said pricing has yet to be set but
that it will not cost customers more to run Windows
applications from a terminal than it does from a standard
PC.
Firm Sues Digital Over Alta Vista Trademark
Alta Vista, a British media concern, said on Wednesday that
it filed a trademark infringement lawsuit against computer
giant Digital Equipment over Digital's use of "Alta Vista"
for its Internet search engine. In the case filed in U.S.
District Court in Washington, the suit alleges that
Digital's use of Alta Vista for an increasing array of
software infringes on Alta Vista Corp.'s trademark in the
United States. The suit seeks an injunction barring
Digital's use of the mark and a court order canceling
Digital's federal trademark registrations, the company said
in a statement. A Digital spokesman said the company had
not yet received the lawsuit and will respond accordingly
after it gets the complaint.
Microsoft to Modify 'PalmPC' Name, Bowing to 3Com
Microsoft Corp. said it agreed to resolve a brand-name
dispute with 3Com Corp. and will modify its use of the word
"Palm" in marketing its handheld computers. In a rare
retreat, Microsoft will no longer refer to its class of
tiny computers as "PalmPCs." Instead, its worldwide
marketing will use "Palm-size PCs." In return, 3Com, which
sells the popular PalmPilot handheld computer, agreed not
to pursue any lawsuits. Microsoft, the world's biggest
personal computer software company, rarely backs down from
lawsuits or marketing disputes. The Redmond, Wash., company
said it agreed to resolve the issue because of its "strong,
long standing business relationship" with 3Com, the world's
second-biggest computer networking equipment vendor.
Apple Denies Imatec Patent Claim
Apple Computer has denied the allegations of the lawsuit
filed against it by Iamtec and said it intends to
vigorously defend itself. The lawsuit, filed February 13 in
the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New
York, contends that Apple's ColorSync products infringe on
Imatec's patents related to color calibration of computer
equipment. In response, Apple denied the infringement
claims and has counterclaimed to invalidate the Imatec
patents. Apple said that products which used the color
calibration in question were on the market in the U.S. in
1985. Apple said that using these techniques, as well as
other techniques which were publicly available before the
filing of the Imatec patents, it developed ColorSync in
1993.
Judge's Ruling Could Bring Domain Refunds
Registrants of Internet domain names soon could get part of
their money back, thanks to a federal court ruling this
week. Federal District Court Judge Thomas Hogan ruled that
the $50 million collected for the so-called "Intellectual
Infrastructure" fund -- which is designed to go toward Web
improvements -- is an illegal tax because the government
never approved it. Network Solutions Inc. (NSOL), the
company that collects funds and registers domain names
including .org and .com, already had stopped collecting the
fees after a judge issued a preliminary injunction in
prohibiting the company from charging any more fees. That
brought the cost of registering domain names down to $35
from $50 per year. Bill Bode, a lawyer representing domain
name registrants who sued NSI in October, said he was
pleased with the outcome.
"It was a very positive ruling," said Bode, adding that
he's been getting lots of calls from domain name
registrants. "They want to know when they'll get their
money," he said. "I tell them 'soon.' "
Lawyers for the plaintiffs are still seeking class action
status, which would mean that all domain name registrants
would automatically receive refunds. The judge has yet to
rule on that issue and what will actually become of the
money in the fund. NSI's positive spin Judge Hogan threw
out claims that all fees collected by NSI were excessive
because they exceeded the company's actual costs. NSI
officials put a positive spin on that ruling.
"This decision amounts to business as usual for Network
Solutions by affirming that our position as the exclusive
registrar of domain names in .com, .net, .org and .edu is
legally constituted and that NSI can charge a market rate
for providing its services," said NSI CEO Gabe Battista in
a statement. The judge also rejected claims that NSI
amounted to an illegal monopoly.
FCC Report Keeps Internet Mostly Free of Charges
An FCC report issued Friday on who should subsidize
telephone service for the poor and remote areas has largely
spared the Internet from charges. The FCC said services
that allowed customers to make callsover the Internet using
a regular telephone handset appeared to fall under the
definition of telecommunications services that should
contribute to universal service charges. But the agency
stopped short of decision saying it wanted to see more
information on individual Internet telephone offerings. If
charges are eventually levied, it would be a blow to firms
like Qwest Communications International Inc. and IDT Corp.,
which want to offer Internet long-distance service at rates
as low as 5 cents per minute. AT&T Corp. has also announced
plans to offer a similar service.
Hackers Improve Vintage High-tech Sound Toys
You know you've tapped a nerve when your best innovations
come from enthusiastic fans hacking your product. What
began as a small project by the team of musician-engineers
at Swedish company Propellerheads (
http://www.propellerheads.se to faithfully resurrect two
early '80s electronic instruments using software emulation
has blossomed into creative subculture on the Web.
Every new program feature on ReBirth 2.0, to be released in
June, reflects on its users in such a way that it becomes
hard to tell which came first: the software or the
community. "I've been working with synths since 1979," says
Ernst Nathorst-Boos, one of ReBirth's five creators. Among
the other engineers, he says, "Peter Jubel has been
building his own hardware designs and Marcus Zetterquist
has a nice little collection of his own. This is a program
we all wanted and needed for ourselves."
ReBirth, when installed on a computer, emulates the robust
Roland TR-808 drum machine running in tandem with two
rubbery TB-303 bass machines. The new release throws
another drum simulation, of the Roland TR-909, into the
mix. Introduced in 1981, the plastic Roland boxes that
ReBirth software emulates were directly responsible for the
wildfire growth of techno and rap music during the '80s.
Because Roland wanted to make machines that sounded like
conventional pop-music rhythm sections -- and were probably
not very concerned with catering to musical undergrounds --
the less-than-realistic-sounding line of drum machines was
killed off. Though the original machines retailed for a
couple hundred dollars apiece, they now fetch more than
$2000 per box from collectors.
Today, users are attracted by the "squidgy acid noise" of
ReBirth, and use the low-cost software in conjunction with
other cheap gear to produce high-quality dance tracks. (A
careful ear will catch ReBirth's rattlingon recent CDs by
Daft Punk, Nine Inch Nails, and Motley Crue.)
Nathorst-Boos says ReBirth was designed with the Internet
in mind, and points to countless Web and FTP sites, chats,
and at least one mailing list. ReBirthers like Germany's DJ
Mouse and England's Stuart C-Nation, saythey got their
start in the enthusiastic Web-based Amiga/PC tracker
culture, and they now use ReBirth to swap 50K song files
with a global pool of collaborators. Cherry Coke and
Texas-based record label Bionic Teknologies have fueled the
fire by sponsoring ReBirth song design contests.
Online users also seem inspired to hack ReBirth, by
changing its sound resources and creating slick new visual
interfaces. Baltimore-based musician scaNNer primarily
creates Jungle or Drum & Bassmusic, but didn't really like
the 808 sounds ReBirth makes. So he added some familiar
Jungle sounds as well as his own musical samples to the
ReBirth engine, and released the project as "Wobble." "I
think the driving force behind Wobble was just the ability
to do it," scaNNer says.
Propellerheads, for its part, is co-opting hackers like
scaNNer by making ReBirth easy to alter, and including
several of the most impressive "Mods," or modifications, on
its Web site and the ReBirth 2.0 CD-ROM. Besides Wobble,
the impressive amateur overhauls now distributed on the
official Web site include Pitch Black Edition, the
Metallicon, and Alien Birth. "This great subculture lives
its life regardless of what we do here in the office," says
Nathorst-Boos.
Even before ReBirth uttered its first squawk, there were
other software synthesizers inspired by early machines like
the 303, such as Rubber Duck, created by a group of
university students called D-Lusion
(http://www.d-lusion.com), and seq-303, by Techno Toys
http://www.technotoys.com . Boris Diebold, R&D manager for
D-Lusion, insists its work hasn't been affected by ReBirth:
"Where they tried, and succeeded, in emulating the real 303
sound to the best, we focused on new, innovative sounds."
Now, not only synth fans are writing 303 shareware, but
Roland itself is simulating 808/303 sounds with its
retro-friendly hardware Groove Box. The knob has turned
full circle, and the Propellerheads couldn't be happier.
"It turned out we did something that first of all many
people thought was impossible," says Nathorst-Boos, "and
secondly attracted a huge range of people, from pros to
those with only a casual interest in music."
Seiko Instruments Says to Sell First Wristwatch PC
Seiko Instruments Inc. said Wednesday it would begin
selling wristwatch personal computers in Japan on June 10 -
the world's first wearable PC.A company statement said the
new watch, called the Ruputer, can download data that
includes text and pictures from other personal computers.
The wristwatch PCs will be sold with three software
applications that run on Microsoft Corp.'s Windows 95
operating system, it said. Watches come equipped with a
16-bit central processing unit and 128 kilobytes of main
memory, it said.
GTE To Offer Faster Internet Access (ADSL)
GTE today said it will offer high-speed Internet access up
to 50 times faster than conventional modems to consumers
and businesses beginning in June. The company said its
unit, GTE Network Services, will offer network-based
asymmetric digital subscriber line service in about 300
central offices in 16 states. The plan is subject to
regulatory approval, the company noted in a statement. The
company said it plans to expand this service to no less
than 30 additional markets in the second half of 1998.
This campaign "helps enable GTE to offer end-to-end
Internet solutions on a broader scale, and is in keeping
with the company's overall goal to become a national
provider of integrated telecommunications services," the
company said. The new service will provide continuous
Internet access in place of traditional dial-up modem
connections, the release said. "Consumers can
simultaneously surf the World Wide Web and place telephone
calls over the same line," the company said. GTE said it
will offer customers monthly and multi-year plans as well
as volume discounts. The monthly target price range is $30
to $250, excluding certain charges, such as an installation
fee, Internet service charges, and modem leases, the
company noted.
Intel to Demo PII Possibilities
Intel Corp.'s latest Pentium II processors are expected to
usher in an era of improved business application
performance. At this week's launch in San Francisco of the
350MHz and 400MHz Pentium II chips, formerly code-named
Deschutes, Intel will demonstrate systems running CPU- and
I/O-intensive applications such as communications, file
compression and decompression, and virus scanning and
filtering.
At the heart of the performance boost is Intel's first
100MHz bus, which speeds connections to such components as
graphics, memory and I/O. While automatic file compression,
for example, is possible today through software such as
Nico Mak Computing Inc.'s WinZip 6.3, Intel claims existing
hardware has not been robust enough to support those
capabilities. "There are still sizable delays in just
sending e-mail across the network, but [the performance] of
this architecture lets you leave the file compression
switch always turned on so every file is automatically
compressed and decompressed," said Will Swope, vice
president of marketing at Intel, in Santa Clara, Calif.
Intel officials declined to discuss systems costs or
relative performance, but independent channel sources said
the price/performance of the new computers will be worth
the upgrade. Still, in an era of dirt-cheap PCs, one of
Intel's biggest challenges will be to justify the need for
more processing power on the corporate desktop.
Intel to Launch New Chips
In one of its biggest product launches this year, Intel
Corp. Wednesday will launch its belated entry to the
booming sub-$1,000 PC market, and its fastest yet Pentium
II chips for the high end of the market. Intel said
hundreds of computer makers worldwide are developing PCs
around its new chips. But analysts said Intel's entry to
the low-cost market, the first in its Celeron line, will
not have the typical sweeping PC maker support and rivals
are already attacking the chip and reports on its
performance. To counter Intel, competitor National
Semiconductor Corp. will launch a new 300-megahertz version
of its Intel-compatible chip family, called the M II 300,
priced at about $180 in volume quantities of 1,000,
available in May.
Adobe, Netscape, IBM Push New Web Imaging Format
Adobe, Netscape, and IBM say they have the format to
popularize vector graphics on the Web the Precision
Graphics Markup Language, or PGML. The companies have
pitched the language to the World Wide Web Consortium as an
open specification for vector graphics. Rather than the
pixel-by-pixel definition of today's Web graphics standards
-- the GIF and JPEG formats -- vector graphics use concise
mathematical expressions to describe shapes, lines, and
even animated positions. Vector formats are typically more
efficient than bitmapped formats at handling special
graphics tricks on a Web page, such as animated letters
dropping into place in a sentence.
The current front-runner among vector formats is Flash,
Macromedia's proprietary technology for rendering graphics
in browsers. But the trio of companies say PGML better
satisfies the Web's scalable, lightweight vector demands
while giving graphic designers better precision over fonts,
color, layout, and compositing. It describes a graphic as a
collection of graphical objects -- path objects, shape
objects, image objects, and text objects.
In addition to using an imaging model similar to Adobe's
PostScript language and Portable Document Format, PGML is
built around the vaunted extensible markup language (XML).
Comparing it to Flash, Adobe's director of Web authoring
products emphasized this XML basis for the language. "Flash
is more of a binary kind of format, and not as easily
readable," said Ted Simonides. "PGML is controllable
through XML -- a future direction we expect to be more
widely supported."
Macromedia Unveils New Flash Animation Products
Macromedia Inc., expanding its strategy to make more money
from Internet-related software products, will unveil new
versions of its Flash animation design program Tuesday and
announce plans to make Flash an Internet animation
standard. Macromedia, a maker of software for graphic
artists and Web page designers, also said it would make the
file format behind its Flash animation software open to
other software companies, to encourage them to base new
products on its technology. The moves could make the San
Francisco software company more influential in setting
Internet standards and could generate a significant amount
of new revenue, the company and analysts said.
New Software Will Be Able to Grade Essay Papers
Bleary-eyed professors may soon find a way to cut down on
the time devoted to test papers with the introduction of a
computer program that can grade essays as well as people
do. "It's not for (grading) grammar or style, but it can be
used for exams in anatomy, history or psychology," said
Professor Thomas Landauer, one of the software developers
who has worked at Bell Laboratories and began working on
Intelligent Essay Assessor 10 years ago. The software uses
mathematical analysis to measure the quality of knowledge
expressed in essays.
Microsoft Sets Price of Windows 98 Upgrade
Microsoft's Windows 98 operating system upgrade will be
released June 25 in retail outlets for sale at a suggested
price of $109, an executive of the software giant said.
Microsoft officially will announce the release date and
price today, although the June 25 date has been circulating
for weeks and at least one Internet-based retailer began
taking orders last month at about $95 a copy.
After discounting, the upgrade probably will be sold in
most stores for $89 to $100, Rob Bennett, group product
manager, said. Federal and state regulators examining the
company's business practices still could try to block
release of the product, but time is running out. Completed
software code is scheduled to be shipped to computer
manufacturers by mid-May, in time to allow them to get at
least some new machines with Windows 98 preloaded onto
store shelves by the June 25 release date.
Last week, Microsoft executives met with antitrust
regulators at the Justice Department in Washington to
discuss the continuing federal investigation, which in part
has focused on Windows 98 and its integration of the
company's Internet browsing technology. The Justice
Department contends Microsoft's use of its effective
monopoly in the computer operating system market to boost
its share of the browser market over rival Netscape
Communications is a violation of Microsoft's 1995 agreement
settling antitrust charges.
In January, Microsoft agreed to comply with a court order
by giving computer manufacturers the right to install
Windows 95 without the Internet Explorer browser icon on
the computer desktop. While Microsoft is cranking up its
impressive marketing machine to tout the benefits of
Windows 98, publicity surrounding the launch is unlikely to
approach the near-frenzy that accompanied the release of
Windows 95 three years ago.
"It's a different product, and it's also a different market
we're introducing it into," Bennett said. "It's not going
to be Windows 95." Windows 98 likely will quickly become
the standard operating system for new personal computers,
but company executives have tried to limit expectations for
how many of the nearly 120 million Windows 95 users will be
willing to invest the time and money needed to upgrade. In
addition to tighter integration of the Internet browser
with the operating system, Windows 98 adds support for some
of the latest hardware, including DVD disks, television and
the universal serial bus for peripheral devices. The new
system also offers "a lot of fixes and improvements" over
Windows 95, including faster application startup and
computer shutdown.
Windows 98 requires a minimum of a 486-class computer with
16 megabytes of random access memory and 195 megabytes of
free hard disk space for the typical installation, compared
with 120 megabytes for Windows 95, Bennett said. The system
is in the final stages of testing by 100,000 end users,
including 70,000 ordinary consumers who paid about $30 each
to get a preview of the product.
Internet's 'Spam King' Recants But Some Doubt Him
"The Spam King," one of the most notorious junk e-mailers
on the Internet, says he has abdicated his throne and
promises never to sin again. But not everyone believes him.
Sanford Wallace, 29-year-old president of Cyber Promotions
Inc., abruptly announced his decision to a legion of
long-time adversaries who frequent a news group dedicated
to fighting bulk e-mail promotions. The term "spamming" was
derived from a "Monty Python" sketch in which a waitress
offers diners a choice of "spam, spam, spam, spam and
spam." Wallace once boasted his Philadelphia-based firm was
sending out 25 million promotional e-mails daily on behalf
of himself and his clients.
U.S. Commerce Secretary Says Encryption Policy Failing
The Clinton administration's internal battle over
regulating data scrambling technology burst into the open
Wednesday as a top official conceded the current policy on
computer encryption was failing. Commerce Secretary William
Daley noted the administration has been unable to put in
place even a modest easing, approved by President Clinton
in 1996, of tight export limits on encryption. Encryption
products, which scramble computerized information and
render it unreadable without a password, have become an
increasingly critical means of securing global
communications and Internet commerce.
Microsoft Announces Windows 98 Is Scheduled to Be Available
on June 25
Excitement for Windows 98 Building Among PC Enthusiasts
04/14/98
REDMOND, Wash. - Microsoft Corp. today announced that
customer anticipation is high for the upcoming release of
the Microsoft+ Windows+ 98 operating system, scheduled to
be available worldwide on June 25, 1998. In addition, a
recent consumer-event survey revealed that 95 percent of
those surveyed plan to upgrade. Windows 98 will be
available simultaneously to customers in stores and on new
PCs from leading manufacturers.
"Windows 98 is catching fire among the PC enthusiasts,"
said Yusuf Mehdi, director of marketing, personal business
systems group at Microsoft. "The beauty of Windows 98 is
that it runs applications faster and easier than Windows
95, while unlocking a whole new range of hardware devices
and entertainment capabilities for consumers."
Customer Excitement Builds
As the launch of Windows 98 approaches, consumer
anticipation continues to grow - as evidenced by the
response to recent programs such as the quarterly Microsoft
eXtreme live satellite broadcast. The event, which
showcased Windows 98 in 45 theaters across the United
States and Canada, was sold out with approximately 40,000
enthusiasts pre-registering to attend. Survey results from
the event showed overwhelming support for the forthcoming
product, with over 95 percent of attendees announcing their
plans to upgrade to Windows 98. In addition, 97 percent of
attendees reported they would recommend Windows 98 to their
friends and family.
Over 150,000 eager consumers worldwide are participating in
Microsoft's Consumer Beta Preview Program, which offers
customers an opportunity to "test drive" the Beta 3 version
of the product before the final release.
A recent independent survey by Windows Magazine found that
62 percent of users of Windows who plan to upgrade to
Windows 98 will do so within the first six months after the
launch of the product, while 87 percent said they will do
so within the first year. This compares to 68 percent of
users who said they would upgrade to Windows 95 in the
first year. Users cited the product's increased
functionality and improved performance as key criteria for
their decision.
Windows 98 Works Better, Plays Better
Windows 98 builds on the breakthrough features of Windows
95 by improving performance, reliability and ease of use,
as well as unlocking an exciting new range of PC hardware
and entertainment capabilities.
In particular, Windows 98 offers the following key consumer
benefits:
Improved performance and reliability. With Windows 98,
Microsoft has focused on improving the key areas that keep
users waiting on their PCs today, including opening
applications, which averages 36 percent faster, accessing
the Internet, viewing graphics and shutting down the PC,
which is up to two to five times quicker than with Windows
95. Windows 98 dramatically improves performance in these
areas so users can spend more time enjoying their PC and
the Internet. In addition, Windows provides users an
average of 28 percent more disk space through more
efficient storage of data on the hard drive.
Simplified navigation, help and Internet access. Windows 98
improves the key areas where PCs typically present users
with difficulties: navigating and locating information,
finding help when encountering a problem, and accessing the
Internet. The enhanced user interface of Windows 98 makes
use of key Internet Explorer technologies to unify and
simplify the desktop, making it quick and easy for users to
navigate information, whether it resides on their PC or the
Internet. Accessing help also becomes easier with the new
Web-based online help system that provides easy-to-access
information when encountering problems, enabling simplified
searching for information. Additionally, Windows Update, a
centralized Web-based resource site, allows registered
users to keep their PCs running optimally by providing the
latest drivers and system updates, ensuring their PCs are
always tuned and updated. (Web-based online help and
Windows Update require Internet access, which may require a
separate fee through a service provider).
A new range of PC hardware and entertainment capabilities.
Just as Windows 95 enabled a range of new 32-bit software
applications, Windows 98 ushers in a whole new range of
hardware and entertainment functionality. Now, not only do
games run better on Windows 98-based PCs than on
traditional game console devices, but Windows 98 includes
native support for universal serial bus (USB), which makes
using additional hardware devices as easy as plugging in a
toaster. In addition, Windows 98 provides DVD and
television broadcast capabilities, allowing a PC with a TV
tuner card to seamlessly receive and display television and
other data distributed over broadcast networks (reception
depends on the availability of broadcast sources in a given
area).
Estimated retail pricing for the upgrade version for users
of Windows 95 and Windows 3.1 is $109 (U.S.).
Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide
leader in software for personal computers. The company
offers a wide range of products and services for business
and personal use, each designed with the mission of making
it easier and more enjoyable for people to take advantage
of the full power of personal computing every day.
Source: National Software Testing Laboratory (NSTL),
December 1997. Results based on differences in application
load times on identical hardware systems running Windows 98
vs. Windows 95. Systems with Windows 98 used the FAT32 file
system and were optimized with the Windows 98 Maintenance
Wizard. These results are averages obtained from launching
multiple applications on a variety of PCs, with processors
ranging from 486/66MHz to Pentium 200 MMX, with 32 MB of
RAM. Your own results will vary depending on your system
configuration. Best results are obtained with faster
processors and more RAM.
Results based on a test of 200 users' hard drives. This
test calculated the space to be gained by converting from
FAT16 to FAT32. To convert to FAT32 you need a 512MB or
larger hard drive partition. Actual experience will vary
depending on hard drive partition size and number of files
on your system. Hard drive partitions in excess of 1 GB
and/or a large number of files yield best results.
Microsoft and Windows are either registered trademarks or
trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or
other countries. Other product and company names herein may
be trademarks of their respective owners.
Windows 98 Beta 3 Release - Feature Overview
New Feature Description
Complete
Internet
Integration
Integrated With the Integrated Internet Shell
Internet Shell included with Windows 98 Beta 3,
Internet access becomes a seamless part
of the user interface. Users will no
longer have to learn multiple
applicationsone to look at their local
information, perhaps another to look at
their network, and unquestionably
another to use the Internet or
intranet. With the Integrated Internet
Shell, Windows 98 Beta 3 unifies this
process into one utility to universally
view local, network, intranet, and
Internet data, so you can get to the
information you need faster and easier.
Advanced Windows 98 Beta 3 provides the easiest,
Internet fastest, and most entertaining way to
Browsing browse the Web. This is done via:
Functionality
* Advanced browsing capabilities
such as AutoComplete, enhanced Web
searching, improved favorites,
navigation history on the
Forward/Back buttons, and improved
printing.
* Support for all major Internet
standards including HTML, Java,
ActiveX, JavaScript, Visual
Basic. Scripting, and major
security standards.
* Improved performance with Dynamic
HTML, a just-in-time Java
compiler, and basic code "tuning."
Personalized When users are asked the biggest
Internet problem they have with the World Wide
Information Web, the number one response is getting
Delivery the information they need. Windows 98
Beta 3 addresses this problem by
providing a mechanism to automatically
select and schedule downloads of the
information you care about. This
enables you to see what has changed on
a Web site without physically visiting
the site and even allows you to view
the site when you are not connected to
the Web.
Suite of Tools Windows 98 Beta 3 also contains rich
for Internet tools for online communication
Communication including:
* Outlook Express, a full featured
e-mail and news reading client.
* Microsoft NetMeeting, a complete
Internet conferencing solution
providing standards-based audio,
data, and video conferencing
functionality.
* Personal Web Server (and the Web
Publishing Wizard), which provides
an easy way to publish Web pages
on intranets or the Internet.
* Microsoft FrontPad is a WYSIWYG
(what-you-see-is-what-you-get)
HTML editor based on the editing
tools in Microsoft FrontPage. 97,
the award-winning, full-featured
Web authoring and management tool.
* Microsoft NetShow is a platform
for streaming multimedia over
networks that range from low
bandwidth dial-up Internet
connections to high bandwidth
switched local area networks. From
simple audio to sophisticated
interactive Web-based
applications, companies use
NetShow to offer new streaming
content for applications such as
training, corporate
communications, entertainment, and
advertising to users all over the
world. The NetShow player is
installed with Windows 98.
Windows The Windows Update Web Site is an
UpdateIncludes extension to Windows 98. It is a new,
the Update centralized Web-based resource site
Manager that allows registered Windows 98 users
to get more out of their PC. Windows
Update keeps users systems tuned and
up-to-date by providing easy access to
the latest drivers and operating system
files on an on-going basis. Windows
Update also makes computing easier by
providing product assistance with
up-to-date information and answers to
users "how-do-I-do" and "how-do-I-fix"
questions.
Dial-Up The Dial-Up Networking included with
Networking Windows 98 Beta 3 has been updated to
Improvements support: Dial-up scripting (which can
(Including automate the process of connecting to
Multilink bulletin boards and online services);
Channel Dial-Up Networking user interface
Aggregation) enhancements to simplify setting up and
using dial-up connections; and support
for Multilink Channel Aggregation which
enables users to combine all available
dial-up lines to achieve higher
transfer speeds. For example, you can
combine two or more ISDN lines to
achieve speeds of up to 128K, or
combine two or more standard modem
lines. This can provide dramatic
performance improvements when dialing
into the Internet or corporate network.
Client Support Virtual Private Networking is a new
for Virtual networking support for remote users to
Private access their corporate network via a
Networking (VPN) secure connection. Virtual Private
Networking utilizes the Point-to-Point
Tunneling Protocol (PPTP). Support for
this service is natively built-in to
the operating system.
Online Services The Windows 98 Beta 3 desktop contains
Folder an Online Services Folder with links to
America Online (AOL), AT&T WorldNet,
CompuServe 3.0, and Prodigy clients.
When you click the link to the client,
a setup program starts that
automatically registers you with that
Internet Service Provider.
Internet The Internet Connection Wizard is
Connection designed to make a first time
Wizard connection to the Internet simple. The
Internet Connection Wizard gives the
user a list of National ISPs to choose
from, then the Wizard will then do all
of the software configuration for the
user.
HTML-Based To assist users in finding "help"
Online Help information, Windows 98 includes an
HTML-based Online Help system. This
help system is extensible and enables
simplified help searching.
15 These Troubleshooting Wizards can help
Troubleshooting you quickly diagnose and solve
Wizards technical problems with Windows 98.
Troubleshooters are scenario-based
walkthroughs that the user can
customize to their situation by
choosing the answer that fits their
situation. The Troubleshooting Wizards
included in Windows 98 address the
following areas: Network, Modem,
Startup Shutdown, Print, DriveSpace 3,
Memory, MS-DOS Programs, Display,
DirectX, Sound, The Microsoft Network,
Hardware Conflict, Dial-Up Networking,
Direct Cable Connection, and PC Card.
Higher Quality
Setup Several enhancements have been made to
Enhancements the Windows 98 Beta 3 setup program in
an effort to decrease setup time while
increasing setup reliability. In
addition, the setup interface shows you
how far along you are with the setup
process.
Faster Shutdown The time it takes to shutdown the
system has been dramatically reduced in
Windows 98.
FAT32 FAT32 is an improved version of the FAT
file system that allows disks over two
gigabytes to be formatted as a single
drive. FAT32 also uses smaller clusters
than FAT drives, resulting in a more
efficient use of space on large disks.
On average users will get as much as 28
percent more hard drive space using
FAT32.
Need more space on your drive? Find out
how much space you can gain with FAT32
FAT32 Conversion For added flexibility, Windows 98 Beta
Utility 3 includes a graphical FAT32 conversion
utility, which can quickly and safely
convert a hard drive from the original
version of FAT to FAT32.
Power Management Windows 98 Beta 3 includes built-in
Improvements support for Advanced Configuration and
Power Interface (ACPI). This allows you
to switch on or off your PC like you
would your TV set. ACPI is an open
industry specification proposed by
Intel, Microsoft, and Toshiba which
defines hardware interfaces that allow
for standard power management
functionality throughout a PC system.
In addition to ACPI support, Windows 98
Beta 3 includes support for the
Advanced Power Management (APM) 1.2
extensions including: Disk spindown,
PCMCIA modem power down, and resume on
ring.
Windows Windows 98 Beta 3 supports direct
Scripting Host script execution from the user
interface or the command line (a script
is simply a series of commands that can
be automatically executed). This
support is provided via the Windows
Scripting Host (WSH) and allows
administrators and/or users to save
time by automating many user interface
actions such as creating a shortcut,
connecting to a network server,
disconnecting from a network server,
etc. The WSH is extremely flexible with
built-in support for Visual Basic
scripts, Java scripts, and a language
independent architecture which will
allow other software companies to build
ActiveX scripting engines for languages
such as Perl, TCL, REXX, and Python.
New Windows 98 includes two new
Accessibility accessibility tools including - the
Tools Accessibility Configuration Wizard
which helps people adapt Windows'
options to their needs and preferences,
and a low-end screen magnifier which
helps people with moderate vision
impairments and those working on
unfamiliar machines.
Win32. Driver The Win32 Driver Model (WDM) is an all
Model (WDM) new, unified driver model for Windows
95 and
Windows NT. . WDM will enable new
devices to have a single driver for
both operating systems. The WDM has
been implemented by adding selected NT
Kernel services into Windows 98 Beta 3
via a special virtual device driver
(NTKERN.VXD). This allows Windows 98
Beta 3 to maintain full legacy device
driver support while adding support for
new WDM drivers.
Windows The Windows Maintenance Wizard was
Maintenance designed to make the PC more
Wizard self-maintainable. The Wizard schedules
tune-up jobs to be run automatically on
a regular basis. Windows Maintenance
Wizard will help you by:
* Deleting unnecessary files.
* Making sure your hard disk is
optimized and properly
functioning.
* Launching applications up to 36
percent faster (in average).
You can launch the Windows Maintenance
Wizard from the System Tool group off
of the Start Menu. Features of Windows
Maintenance Wizard include:
Disk Defragmenter
The new Disk Defragmenter uses the
process of disk defragmentation to
increase the speed with which your most
frequently used applications run. To
accomplish, this Disk Defragmenter
creates a log file which identifies
your most commonly used programs. Once
this log file has been created, it can
be used by Disk Defragmenter to store
the files associated with most commonly
run programs (the files will be stored
contiguously on the hard disk). Placing
all of the files associated with a
given application in the same location
on your hard disk will optimize the
speed with which your application runs.
ScanDisk
Windows 98 Beta 3 has been enhanced to
run ScanDisk automatically in the event
the operating system is shut down
improperly or your hard disk suffers a
hard error. This feature will
significantly help people ensure that
their hard drives are in proper working
order, free of lost clusters,
cross-linked files, etc.
Disk Cleanup
Disk Cleanup is a tool in Windows 98
Beta 3 that automates the task of
cleaning unwanted file off of the hard
disk, increasing free space. This tool
is a especially useful to help users
clean out Internet cache files that can
accumulate after browsing the Web.
Additionally, this tool is customizable
by the user to designate files to
remove.
Microsoft System Windows 98 now contains a centralized
Information system information utility that gathers
Utility 4.1 system configuration information for
technical support. This tool is
comprised of a collection of ActiveX
controls, each responsible for
collecting and displaying a certain
category of system information in the
right frame of Microsoft System
Information Utility. A Support Engineer
can guide the user experiencing an
issue to Microsoft System Information
Utility to facilitate the information
gathering process.
System File System File Checker keeps track of
Checker Utility critical files that make your computer
run. If these files are moved or
changed, System File Checker provides
an easy way to restore these files.
Once file changes are detected, System
File Checker offers the user several
courses of action.
Registry Checker Registry Checker is a proactive support
program that finds and resolves
Registry problems, and regularly backs
up the Registry. Windows 98 Beta 3
provides both an MS-DOS- and a
Windows-based program for scanning the
Registry, backing up and restoring the
Registry and system configuration
files.
Automatic Skip Automatic Skip Driver Agent (ASD)
Driver Agent identifies potentially dangerous
(ASD) failures that are known to have caused
Windows 98 Beta 3 systems to stop
responding and marks them so they are
bypassed on subsequent startups.
Automatic Skip Driver:
* Identifies hardware devices that
fail to respond when tested by
Windows 98 Beta 3.
* Displays a dialog box indicating
that it has detected a failure
that may cause the system to stop
responding.
* Prompts you with the option to
bypass this action on subsequent
startups.
New Dr. Watson Windows 98 Beta 3 includes an enhanced
Utility version of the Dr. Watson utility. With
Dr. Watson enabled, when a software
fault occurs (general protection fault,
hang, etc.), Dr. Watson will intercept
it and indicate what software faulted
and why. In addition, Dr. Watson
collects detailed information about the
state of your system at the time the
fault occurred. It logs this
information to disk, and can display it
on screen to assist administrative and
product support personnel in
determining the cause of the fault.
System System Configuration Utility is the
Configuration graphical replacement for Sysedit. This
Utility tool allows the user to troubleshoot
through a process of elimination with
check boxes. System Configuration
Utility allows the user to create and
restore back ups of configuration
files.
Version Conflict Version Conflict Manager detects file
Manager version conflicts with installed
programs. Windows 98 Beta 3 will then
install the Windows version of the
driver. By doing this, Windows 98 Beta
3 puts the system in an optimal
compatibility stage. Version Conflict
Manager also stores all files and has
an easy user interface that enables the
user to change the driver if needed.
New Backup This new backup applet supports SCSI
Utility tape devices and makes backing up your
data easier and faster.
Remote Access Windows 98 Beta 3 includes all of the
Server components necessary to enable your
desktop to act as a dial-up server.
This allows dial-up clients to remotely
connect to a Windows 98 Beta 3 machine
for local resource access or connecting
to an IPX/SPX and/or NetBEUI network.
Display Setting Display Setting Enhancements provide
Enhancements support for dynamically changing screen
resolution and color depth. Adapter
refresh rate can also be set with most
newer display driver chipsets. Windows
98 Beta 3 also includes the display
enhancements previously available in
Microsoft Plus!. (Microsoft Plus! is an
add-on pack for Windows 95 which
provided several minor operating system
enhancements.) The enhancements with
Windows 98 Beta 3 include: full window
drag, font smoothing, wallpaper
stretching, large icons, and hi-color
icons.
New Generation
of Entertainment
Functionality
Broadcast With a TV tuner board installed,
Architecture Windows 98 allows a PC to receive and
display television and other data
distributed over the broadcast
networks. Windows 98s Program Guide,
which is updated continuously, lists
television shows on now and in the
future and allows for instant tuning
into shows for viewing on the PC.
Windows 98 can also receive Enhanced
Television programs, which combine
standard television with HTML
information related to the programs, as
they become available. Additionally,
Windows 98 users will be able to
receive Internet content or other data
services via the broadcast networks,
without tying up their existing phone
lines.
ActiveMovie ActiveMovie is a new media-streaming
architecture for Windows that delivers
high-quality video playback while
exposing an extensible set of
interfaces upon which multimedia
applications and tools can be built.
ActiveMovie enables playback of popular
media types including MPEG audio, .WAV
audio, MPEG video, AVI video, and Apple
QuickTime video.
Support for Provides support for third parties to
Intel MMX build software that exploits the Intel
Processors Pentium Multimedia Extensions (MMX) for
fast audio and video support on the
next generation of Intel Pentium
processor.
Enables the
Latest
Accessories
Multiple Display Multiple Display Support allows you to
Support use multiple monitors and/or multiple
graphics adapters on a single PC. The
ability to have your work environment
displayed on multiple monitors can be
extremely beneficial in many areas
including: desktop publishing, Web
development, video editing, and gaming
environments.
Support for New One of the major goals of Windows 98
Generation of Beta 3 is to provide complete support
Hardware for users to take advantage of the
array of innovations which have
occurred in computer hardware over the
last few years. Some of the major
hardware standards supported by Windows
98 Beta 3 include: Universal Serial Bus
(USB), IEEE 1394, Accelerated Graphics
Port (AGP), Advanced Configuration and
Power Interface (ACPI), and Digital
Video Disc (DVD).
PCMCIA There have been several enhancements to
Enhancements Windows 98 Beta 3 with respect to
PCMCIA technology including:
* Support for PC Card32 (Cardbus):
Cardbus brings 32-bit performance
to the small PC Card form factor.
It enables notebooks to implement
high-bandwidth applications like
video capture and 100Mbps
networking.
* Support for PC Cards that operate
at 3.3 Volts: This enables
hardware manufacturers to lower
the power consumption of their
devices by using 3.3V rather than
5V.
* Support for Multifunction PC
Cards: Allows two or more
functions (such as LAN and Modem,
or SCSI and sound) on a single
physical PC Card. Supporting
Multifunction Cards helps decrease
the cost-per-function of PC Cards,
and makes better use of the
precious number of slots on most
PCs permitting more functions per
PC.
Built-In Support Windows 98 Beta 3 includes support for
for Infrared IrDA, the Infrared Data Association
Data Association standard for wireless connectivity.
(IrDA) IrDA support enables Windows 98 Beta 3
users to easily connect to peripheral
devices or other PCs without using
connecting cables. This driver set
provides infrared-equipped laptop or
desktop computers with the capability
of networking, transferring files, and
printing wirelessly with other
IrDA-compatible infrared devices.
Distributed The Component Object Model (COM) allows
Component Object software developers to create component
Model (DCOM) applications. Now, Distributed COM
(DCOM) in Windows 98 Beta 3 (and
Windows NT 4.0) provides the
infrastructure that allows DCOM
applications (the technology formally
known as Network OLE) to communicate
across networks without needing to
redevelop applications.
Client Support Windows 98 Beta 3 includes Client
for NetWare Services for NetWare that support
Directory Novell NetWare Directory Services
Services (NDS) (NDS). This enables Windows 98 Beta 3
users to log on to Novell NetWare 4.x
servers running NDS to access files and
print resources. This service provides
the key features that Novell users
need, such as: NDS authentication,
ability to browse NDS resources,
ability to print to NDS print queues,
and full support for processing NetWare
login scripts, NDS property pages, and
NDS passwords.
32-bit Data Link The Data Link Control (DLC) protocol is
Control (DLC) used primarily to access IBM mainframe
and IBM AS/400 computers. The 32-bit
DLC protocol software built-in to
Windows 98 Beta 3 enables a network
administrator to add support for 32-bit
and 16-bit DLC programs.
Microsoft Plus! 98
The Ideal Companion for Windows 98
Microsoft. Plus! 98 complements Windows. 98 with enhancements that let you work and play with
your computer like never before. You can get the latest virus fixes, optimize your hard disk,
choose new desktop themes, and challenge your game skills.
Powerful System Utilities:
McAfee VirusScan
File Cleaner
Start Menu Cleaner
Compressed Folders
More Fun and Better Looking:
Desktop Themes
Deluxe CD Player
Picture It!. Express
Spider Solitaire
McAfee VirusScan
* Defend your computer against viruses with this top-selling anti-virus program. If VirusScan
3.1.6 discovers a virus, you can quickly and easily use VirusScan to remove it before other
files are infected. You can run VirusScan to diagnose a file you've shared or downloaded
from the Internet.
* Receive six months of free updates. As new viruses are identified, you can download
VirusScan updates free of charge.
* Integrated with Windows 98 Maintenance Wizard to schedule virus scanning automatically.
File Cleaner
* Get the most out of your hard drive by clearing unnecessary files. The File Cleaner
integrates with the Windows 98 Disk Cleanup feature to optimize free space on your hard
drive. When you need more disk space to run a program or store needed files, the File
Cleaner has easy-to-use color codes to help you determine how often you use files. The
Advice tab gives you detailed information about file types and whether they are critical to
your system.
Start Menu Cleaner
* Check your Start Menu for invalid shortcuts and empty folders. If a folder contains only one
program or file, it is moved up a level so you can more quickly locate and open it. The
Start Menu Cleaner also helps you quickly fix broken links.
* Schedule regular maintenance of your Start Menu. Start Menu Cleaner integrates with the
Windows 98 Maintenance Wizard, so you can organize your Start Menu regularly.
Compressed Folders
* Create compressed folders with just a few clicks, and then drag and drop files and programs
into them to reduce their size by up to 90 percent. Compressed folders act and look like any
other folder on your system, so you can view file properties, determine and set password
protection, and see the compression percentage of each file.
* Use Compression Folders to archive files, share files over the Internet, or copy files onto
a floppy disk. To save disk space, you can run programs and view documents in the compressed
folder without extracting them.
* Increase your security by using password protection for individual files in compressed
folders. Users can view your compressed folders with any compression program only if you
give them the password.
Desktop Themes
* Add new colors, pictures, and humor to your desktop by choosing one of the new series of
desktop themes. You can choose from Fashion, Science Fiction, World Travel, Falling Leaves,
and more. Or surround yourself with the humor of Cathy, Doonesbury, FoxTrot, and Garfield
cartoons. Perhaps you prefer the beauty of Corbis Photography, or the chill of the Universal
Studios Horror Theme.
* Customize your wallpaper, window colors, screen saver, sounds, mouse pointers, and more!
Some of the themes have animated 3D screen savers.
* Can't decide? Then rotate desktop themes automatically every month! You can always go back
to a favorite theme later.
* Interact with dialog boxes, icons, and sounds that are customized according to the theme you
select for a more enhanced computing experience.
Deluxe CD Player
* Play your favorite CD and, with an Internet connection, instantly identify the artist, CD
and track titles. This happens automatically, and the information is stored on your hard
drive for the next time you play that CD.
* Learn more about the music you enjoy. Visit linked Internet sites such as Music Boulevard,
Billboards, and Tunes Network to help you search for information about the artist, read
about music-related issues, and purchase CDs.
Picture It! Express
* Manipulate and convert images with Picture It! Express, a basic version of Microsoft Picture
It! Use a scanner or digital image to acquire images. With Picture It! Express, you can
crop, rotate, and flip images, soften edges, adjust contrast, and even get rid of "red eye"
from your favorite photographs.
* With a compatible scanner, Picture It! Express can automatically locate your image, crop it,
and correct brightness and contrast.
* To print your image, you can choose from a variety of standard photographic print sizes or
customize your print size.
Lose Your Marbles
* Play Lose Your Marbles, SegaSoft's top-rated game, and see why it was awarded four and a
half stars by Computer Gaming World. To win, remove the marbles from your board while adding
more marbles to your opponent's board. You can move the rows up and down, and you can rotate
marbles within a row. This is a fast-paced, challenging puzzle that keeps you on your toes.
Spider Solitaire
* Deal a hand to play the most challenging game of solitaire yet. Spider Solitaire uses two
decks of cards. To win, you must use all of the cards to create eight rows of cards in
ascending order from aces to kings. It is possible to win this game-can you do it? Here's a
hint: try to empty as many slots on the board as possible within the first three deals.
A T T E N T I O N ** A T T E N T I O N ** A T T E N T I O N
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A T T E N T I O N ** A T T E N T I O N ** A T T E N T I O N
EDUPAGE STR Focus Keeping the users informed
[Image] Edupage
Contents
Microsoft Buys Firefly For Its Judge Declares NSF Domain Fund Banks Form Group To Address Year
Privacy Technology Illegal 2000 Concerns
Dell Shuns Discount Label Digital Talking Heads Michigan Introduces $30 Million
Education/Technology Plan
Is Wired Tired? Pomposity In-Pomposity Out Qwest Announces Internet2 Grant
AT&T Network Problem Security Flaw U.S. Leads On Year 2000 Readiness
Chatterbots Could Cut "Hold" Time SGI Bases Turnaround Strategy On The State Of Journalism At The
To Zero Intel Agreement Turn Of The Century
GTE Plans Big ADSLl Rollout Web Users Want To Be Left AT&T Network Failure Takes A Toll
Anonymous On Commerce
IBM's Not Selling Computers-It's Commerce Secretary Calls U.S. Digital Isn't Forever
Selling "E-Business Tools" Encryption Policy A Failure
Intel Unveils "Basic PC" Chips Intel To Cut 3000 Jobs Good News For Apple
Internet Growth
MICROSOFT BUYS FIREFLY FOR ITS PRIVACY TECHNOLOGY
Microsoft has acquired Firefly Network Inc., a spinoff of the MIT
Media Lab in Cambridge, Mass., and plans to move Firefly's 70
employees to Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, Washington. Using
artificial intelligence techniques, Firefly developed technologies
for both data filtering and privacy. Its filtering technology
provides a method for comparing a computer user's observed tastes,
preferences and behavior to that of other users on whom similar
data have been collected -- and then, based on those comparisons,
making recommendations on such things as books and movies that the
user would probably like. Its privacy technology is intended to
give
computer users control over the personal information collected by
Web sites, and to support the new privacy standard called P3P
(Platform for Privacy Preferences Project) now being developed by
the World Wide Web Consortium, an Internet standards group.
Microsoft says it is interested mainly in Firefly's privacy
technology rather than its filtering technology, but acknowledges
that "our plans are a little squishy now." Privacy advocates are
expressing concern that integration of Firefly technology into
Microsoft's Internet Explorer software for browsing the Web would
significantly expand the scope of personal information that can be
tracked on individuals using the Internet. (New York Times 10 Apr
98)
JUDGE DECLARES NSF DOMAIN FUND ILLEGAL
A U.S. district court judge said Wednesday that the $30
Intellectual Infrastructure Fee charged as part of the Internet
domain name registration process has been illegally collected,
because it was never approved by Congress. "Congress may have
intended to grant NSF the authority to collect the assessment, but
it has not yet done so," wrote the judge. "Congress must pass
legislation that more explicitly conveys its intentions." More
than $45 million had been collected in the fund before it was
phased out at the beginning of this month. The judge's ruling came
in response to a lawsuit filed on behalf of the American Internet
Registrants Association. Twenty-three million dollars of the fund
was slated to go to the Next Generation Internet project, which
funds universities' and research institutions' connections to a
super high-speed backbone network. The plaintiffs in the case plan
to petition the court for class-action status, which would allow
them to ask that the entire fund be returned to all domain name
holders. (Net Insider 9 Apr 98)
BANKS FORM GROUP TO ADDRESS YEAR 2000 CONCERNS
An international group of major banking institutions, including
Citicorp, Barclay's Bank, Deutsche Bank, Bank of Tokyo and Hong
Kong Bank, has banded together to develop a set of guidelines for
addressing the Year 2000 problem. The Global 2000 Coordinating
Group's guidelines will be distributed throughout the banking
industry by managers and regulators. The group plans to look at
financial issues, such as cash-payment systems, securities
clearance and custody systems, stocks, bond futures, commodity
exchanges, foreign currency exchanges, and derivative trading. It
will also attempt to gauge the readiness of industries linked to
the economic infrastructure, such as utilities and transportation
groups. (Information Week 9 Apr 98)
DELL SHUNS DISCOUNT LABEL
Dell Computer doesn't just want to be known as a discount computer
company any more. "We have value to offer that is not
price-based," says the company's vice chairman. Dell has built its
reputation on its direct sales approach, which allows it to sell
computers for 10% to 20% less than comparable models in stores.
With competitors like Compaq and IBM trying to emulate their
business model, Dell now wants to emphasize that there are other
good reasons to buy its machines. Meanwhile, Dell is hoping to
transact 50% of its sales over the Internet by the end of 2000,
which will enable it to maintain an attractive price differential
with regard to rival companies. (Wall Street Journal 10 Apr 98)
DIGITAL TALKING HEADS
A newly launched employee leasing firm is taking a decidedly
virtual approach to filling jobs. Using technology developed at
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Digital Personnel Inc. offers
businesses a stable of virtual employees -- photo-realistic,
computerized talking heads to use for fielding complaints or
taking product orders through the Internet. "We offer
ready-to-talk talking heads to companies," says DPI's owner. "I
see it as a natural evolutionary next step for the Internet. If
you think about how every time you go to look up the Web page of a
company, you'd much rather talk with someone than read a bunch of
text. It's the difference between reading the telephone book and
asking someone what the number is... I can't imagine any company
not wanting their Web site to have a human interface, whether it's
the IRS or Home Shopping Network." The talking heads can be
pre-programmed with canned responses to frequently asked
questions, or operate as a facade for an artificial intelligent
agent, or even serve as photogenic masks for human customer reps.
(Tampa Bay Business Journal 6 Apr 98)
MICHIGAN INTRODUCES $30 MILLION EDUCATION/TECHNOLOGY PLAN
Michigan Governor John Engler has proposed a plan to give 100
grants of $10,000 each to schools, libraries and community centers
to fund computer equipment, Internet access, and teacher training
on the use of computers, as well as 200 grants of up to $10,000 to
teachers who have creative plans for integrating technology into
the classroom. The plan also calls for the creation of a state
virtual university. (Government Technology Apr 98)
IS WIRED TIRED?
Trying to explain why Wired magazine and parent company Wired
Ventures have been unable to find new investors to take over the
magazine, media analysts are suggesting that it's simply a case of
Wired having become old news. Fortune magazine quotes one media
executive saying: "Wired made the nerd hip. But now that
everyone's online, what's its cachet?" (Forbes 20 Apr 98)
POMPOSITY IN, POMPOSITY OUT
Reviewing a new book by the literary critic George Steiner,
Anthony Gottlieb writes: "He is scathingly skeptical about
computer translation: it will never, he thinks, be able to emulate
our linguistic gifts. To see how bad these programs really are, I
fed some of Steiner's sentences into an English-German translation
program, then fed them back into a German-English one. The results
were not impressive: 'After the axiomatic moment ontological of
the confidence, attack comes,' was one. On the other hand, since
Steiner's original was, 'After the axiomatic moment of ontological
trust, comes aggression,' I'm not sure it's entirely the machine's
fault." (New York Times Book Review 12 Apr 98)
QWEST ANNOUNCES INTERNET2 GRANT
Qwest Communications International of Denver, Col., is donating
$500 million worth of transmission services to a consortium of
research universities working on the Internet2 project. The
project is linked to the Clinton administration's Next Generation
Internet initiative. The Qwest network initially will have a
transmission speed of 10 gigabits per second. Cisco Systems and
Nortel will also provide an indeterminate amount of hardware for
the project. Meanwhile, the Defense Advanced Research Projects
Agency says it will provide $50 million in grants to universities
and federal research facilities to develop technologies designed
to support the high-speed network. (Washington Post 14 Apr 98)
AT&T NETWORK PROBLEM
"Serious interruptions" on AT&T's high-speed fiber optic data
network began Monday afternoon and caused problems for hundreds of
multinational banks, travel agencies, insurance and credit card
companies. The problem appeared to be the result of software
errors. (USA Today 14 Apr 98)
SECURITY FLAW
A software developer and two UC-Berkeley graduate students have
found a flaw in GSM digital cellular phone technology that could
be used to obtain free phone service by a hacker in possession of
the credit card-like device used with the phones. However, since
the security code can not be extracted unless a thief has physical
possession of that device (the SIM card, standing for Subscriber
Identification Module), experts say the problem will have
negligible impact. It is currently of interest mainly because the
new digital systems, unlike the older analog ones, were believed
to be virtually tamperproof. (Wall Street Journal 13 Apr 98)
U.S. LEADS ON YEAR 2000 READINESS
While industry observers decry the lack of initiative on the part
of U.S. companies to prepare computerized systems for the
transition to the next millennium, the rest of the world is in
much worse shape. For instance, only 8% of German companies have a
formal program to deal with the problem, as opposed to 80% of
large U.S. firms. And one in five French companies hasn't begun to
overhaul its information systems, according to a 1997 Ernst &
Young study. Meanwhile, the former Eastern Bloc countries are
suffering a dearth of programmers because many have been lured to
high-wage nations such as the U.S., and some Asian nations may be
laboring under a false sense of security because they believe
their systems, which are programmed to recognize traditional
cultural calendars, are immune. "Their understanding of the
problem is, 'It's not such a big deal, we'll cope with it at the
end.' Now they've got no options." (USA Today 13 Apr 98)
CHATTERBOTS COULD CUT "HOLD" TIME TO ZERO
Artificial intelligence software programmed to provide a
human-like interface could soon be put to work on the Web,
answering product questions or completing order forms. Gateway
2000 wants to add these "chatterbots" to its Web site to answer
technical questions: "It could be a great way to automate support
so people don't have to wait on hold," says a Gateway technology
manager. "It's one of our top priorities." Chatterbot software
works by first analyzing questions and then placing them into
categories. An answer is then formulated from a repository of
software code, called a script. (Investor's Business Daily 13 Apr
98)
SGI BASES TURNAROUND STRATEGY ON INTEL AGREEMENT
Silicon Graphics Inc. is putting the finishing touches on a broad
cross-licensing agreement with Intel that will allow the
struggling computer maker to develop custom chips inside its
Intel-based machines to enable faster performance and better
graphics than competing models. In return, Intel will be able to
design its own graphics technology into future chips without fear
of lawsuits from SGI. Meanwhile, SGI plans to concentrate its
efforts on producing new computers called Visual PCs and spinning
off its MIPS microprocessor unit into a subsidiary that might
eventually be a separate company. (Wall Street Journal 13 Apr 98)
THE STATE OF JOURNALISM AT THE TURN OF THE CENTURY
A vice president of the Tribune Company, which owns the Chicago
Tribune and other newspapers, has issued a memo warning the
company's reporters and other staff: "The company reserves the
right to access, review and monitor your electronic mail
communications and computer usage for any business purpose. Be
aware that the company has the capability to retrieve computer
information, including messages employees send or receive and
Internet sites accessed through the company's computer system."
(Washington Post 13 Apr 98)
GTE PLANS BIG ADSL ROLLOUT
GTE says it will begin a large-scale deployment of asymmetric
digital subscriber line (ADSL) service beginning in June. "This is
the largest announcement on ADSL deployment to date," says the
president of GTE Network Services, who adds that the market for
data services is expected to balloon to $400 billion in the next
decade, up from $100 billion in 1995. The high-speed service is
expected to cost $30 a month, not including Internet-access fees,
installation fees and monthly equipment charges of $12. (Wall
Street Journal 13 Apr 98)
WEB USERS WANT TO BE LEFT ANONYMOUS
Vanderbilt University researchers Donna Hoffman, Tom Novak, and
Marcos Peralta ( http://www2000.ogsm.vanderbilt.edu / ) say that
94% of Web users surveyed have refused to provide information to a
Web site, and 40% have given fake information. (New York Times 13
Apr 98)
AT&T NETWORK FAILURE TAKES A TOLL ON COMMERCE
The failure earlier this week of AT&T's national high-speed
network didn't affect conventional or cellular telephone service,
but did manage to disrupt the portion of the network that carries
data for transactions involving credit cards, bank accounts,
travel reservations and the like. "This sort of thing is going to
happen infrequently, but more and more in the future," says the
managing director of the Yankee Group. "And it makes you realize
how vital to the lifeblood of the economy these complex computer
networks have become." There is no way to gauge how many
transactions were forfeited as a result of the blackout, but
analysts are saying the losses are likelyhuge, with thousands of
businesses affected. (New York Times 15 Apr 98)
IBM'S NOT SELLING COMPUTERS, IT'S SELLING "E-BUSINESS TOOLS"
IBM has been telling customers that their future lies in
electronic business, but up until now, it's been unclear how Big
Blue plans to capitalize on that trend. Now it's announced a
$100-million yearlong global advertising campaign based on the
slogan, "The Work Matters. The People Matter. The Tools Matter."
IBM plans to repackage its laptops, PCs and other computers as
"e-business tools," on the theory that the strategy will
differentiate it from competitors who focus on price and features.
"By positioning every IBM product as part of e-business, they
strengthen their ability to compete against other hardware and
software companies," says a senior analyst at Zona Research. (Wall
Street Journal 15 Apr 98)
COMMERCE SECRETARY CALLS U.S. ENCRYPTION POLICY A FAILURE
Distancing the Commerce Department from the position held by the
Federal Bureau of Investigation, Commerce Secretary William M.
Daley says that the Clinton Administration's controls on
encryption technology are hurting America's ability to compete
with other countries. "There are solutions out there. Solutions
that would meet some of law enforcement's needs without
compromising the concerns of the privacy and business communities.
But I fear our search has thus far been more symbolic than
sincere... The cost of our failure will be high. The ultimate
result will be foreign dominance of the market. This means a loss
of jobs here, and products that do not meet either our law
enforcement or national security needs." (New York Times 16 Apr
98)
DIGITAL ISN'T FOREVER
"Digital information lasts forever, or five years -- whichever
comes first," says a senior computer scientist at RAND Corp. The
problem is that computer experts are finding out that under
less-than-optimal conditions, digital tapes and disks, including
CD-ROMs, can deteriorate in as little as five to 10 years. And the
decay, although it happens gradually, isn't evident until it's too
late, says the founder of Voyager Co., which makes commercial
CD-ROM books and games. "CDs have a tendency to degrade much
faster than anybody, at least in the companies that make them, is
willing to predict." At the same time, as data is ported from an
antiquated platform to a newer system, often there are bits that
fail to make the transition. Sometimes it's just a matter of
footnotes disappearing, but sometimes whole categories of data are
lost. "It's like playing the child's game of Telephone. It doesn't
take many translations from one media to another before you
havelost significant aspects of the original data." (Business Week
20 Apr 98)
INTEL UNVEILS "BASIC PC" CHIPS
Intel is moving aggressively into the "basic PC" chip market with
the introduction of its new Celeron chips. The move is seen as an
attempt by the chipmaker to protect itself in the low-end market
that up until now it has largely ignored, focusing instead on
high-speed microprocessors that power PCs in the $2,000 and up
range. Competitors Advanced Micro Devices and National
Semiconductor together already claim a 25% market share in the
basic PC chip segment. Analysts say the Celeron chips, which are
based on the same design as Intel's best-selling Pentium II chips
but lack a memory device that feeds data more quickly to the
microprocessor, are slower than competing models. Intel plans to
introduce new versions of the Celeron later in the year that will
include the memory device and have significantly higher
performance. (Financial Times 15 Apr 98)
INTEL TO CUT 3000 JOBS
Intel Corp. says it plans to cut 3,000 jobs as part of its
strategy to maintain dominance in an industry that is experiencing
a drop in prices at the same time that the rate of growth is
slowing. Intel also says it will reduce R&D and capital spending
by about 5%. The company plans to achieve its staff reduction over
the next six months, primarily through attrition. Chairman and CEO
Andy Grove says he believes the recent downturn is part of a
cyclical trend that will see revenues rising again in the next few
years. (Washington Post 15 Apr 98)
GOOD NEWS FOR APPLE
Apple Computer has surprised Wall Street by reporting quarterly
earnings that are more than double what most analysts had
expected. Lou Mazzuchelli of Gerard Klauer Mattison & Co. says:
"The company has proven they know how to clean up the house
internally and make good products," but added that "this quarter
doesn't answer completely yet when they can regain growth." (Wall
Street Journal 16 Apr 98)
INTERNET GROWTH
A study by the U.S. Commerce Department ( http://ecommerce.gov/ )
says that traffic on the Internet is doubling every hundred days
and predicts that electronic commerce will grow to $300 billion a
year by 2002. (USA Today 16 Apr 96)
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[Image]
"It doesnt get any better"
Adobe ImageReady Makes It Easy and Quick for Creative People to Optimize
Their Work for the Web
Beta Version is Now Available
San Jose, Calif., (April 13, 1998) (Nasdaq:ADBE) - Adobe believes the Web
should unleash people's creativity, not hamper it. Adobe ImageReady 1.0,
introduced today by Adobe Systems Incorporated, is a software program
certain to make the Web a more colorful and accessible place. As a powerful
and flexible image- processing tool, ImageReady streamlines the Web design
and editing process, providing designers an easy and quick way to prepare
images for the Web.
Until now, Web designers had little choice but to spend endless hours
trying to figure out how a graphic would look on their Web site when seen
with a different browser or computer. They needed to use several software
programs to cobble together their site. Typically, they did not learn until
after they completed a graphic, how long it would take for the image to
download. The technical burden took the fun and excitement out of designing
visually interesting Web graphics. ImageReady software, along with Adobe's
award winning graphics applications like Adobe PhotoshopR and Adobe
Illustrator, changes that.
Adobe ImageReady enables Web designers to make smart and quick decisions as
to how they want their artwork to appear on the Web. ImageReady empowers
designers to balance the tradeoffs between file size and image quality. "In
the past it was all trial and error," says Bart Dority, creative director
of DynaMind, a new media company in Manhattan. "As you work with ImageReady
you can see a preview of how the file will look on the Web, how large the
file size is and how long it will take to download. It saves an amazing
amount of
time."
Adobe's latest image-editing software is about to perk up online commerce.
Potential e-commerce customers who log onto commercial Web sites often lose
patience or jump to another site when all they see are little boxes that
say GIF or JPEG. ImageReady's LiveView window lets a business minimize this
wait time for customers. "Now we can give a business a better estimate of
exactly how long it will take a potential e-commerce customer to download
any image on their Web site," says Dority. "That's another service we can
now provide our clients."
Adobe ImageReady works seamlessly with Adobe Photoshop and Adobe
Illustrator software. That is a big plus for Kazia Sealy, who works on an
employee intranet site at Time Inc. "As a graphic designer and
illustrator," says Sealy, "I want to concentrate on the art, not the
technical stuff." With Adobe's award-winning software, designers can create
original artwork in Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator and then work with
Adobe ImageReady to prepare the highest-quality, best looking Web sites.
Adobe ImageReady helps creative people focus on what they do best-designing
great graphics, not mastering complicated computer programs. "At DynaMind,
our staff is made up of designers, not computer specialists," says Dority.
"It's great being able to give them a new tool that looks and operates like
Photoshop," which, he says, all of his designers already know how to use.
For firms like DynaMind whose Web clients include several Fortune 500
firms, ImageReady software's features can save days of repetitive work.
"Creating a Web site for a large client can involve designing hundreds of
graphics," says Dority. But once he finds the right compression setting for
a single image, he is able to use ImageReady's automation capability to
apply that same setting to every other graphic on his site. Of the Droplets
feature, Dority says: "It literally lets me do a day's worth of work in
seconds."
Among ImageReady software's other timesaving and creative features are its
ability to:
remove the guess work from choosing between image quality and
file size
add more impact to a Web site with animated GIFs by using the
built-in animation palette
save time optimizing graphics by previewing them using the
browser dither capability
Pricing and Availability
Adobe ImageReady is priced at $299 and is expected to ship second quarter
1998. A public preview version of the product is available through July at
http://www.adobe.com
About Adobe Systems Incorporated
Based in San Jose, Calif., Adobe Systems Incorporated develops and supports
products to help people express and use information in more imaginative and
meaningful ways, across all print and electronic media. Founded in 1982,
Adobe helped launch the desktop publishing revolution. Today, the company
offers a market-leading line of application software and type products for
creating and distributing visually rich communication materials; licenses
its industry-standard technologies to major hardware manufacturers,
software developers, and service providers; and offers integrated software
solutions to businesses of all sizes. For more information, see Adobe's
home page at http://www.adobe.com on the World Wide Web.
Adobe, the Adobe logo, Acrobat, Caflisch Script, Giddyup, Image Club, Mezz,
Minion, Myriad, PageMill, Penumbra, WebMorsels and WebType are trademarks
of Adobe Systems Incorporated. Apple, Macintosh, Macintosh Quadra and Power
Macintosh are trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc. registered in the United
States and other countries. Microsoft and Windows are either registered
trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. All other trademarks are
the property of their respective owners.
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Kids Computing Corner
Frank Sereno, Editor
fsereno@streport.com
We're working on one....
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Jasons Jive
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Jason Sereno, STR Staff
jsereno@streport.com
See ya next week!
April 15, 1998
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Jerry Tardif
888/624-6429
jrt@thewebtools.com
New Search Sleuth Unveiled for Internet 'Power Users'
VERMILLION, SD -- The WebTools Company (TWTC) announced the commercial
release of Mata Hari, a desktop search tool for knowledge workers,
professionals and others researching information on the Internet. The
software extends features found in current metasearcher, offline browser,
filter and document management products. TWTC states Mata Hari is a unique,
next-generation search solution for the growing document overload of the
Internet.
"We designed what became Mata Hari to solve our own Internet search
frustrations," said Michael Bergman, chairman of TWTC and its parent,
VisualMetrics Corporation. "The enthusiastic response of early users told
us we had stumbled on a real market need." VisualMetrics established TWTC
as a wholly-owned subsidiary in late summer 1997 for the sole purpose of
commercializing Internet tools.
Users submit queries through Mata Hari to Internet search engines such as
Yahoo, Hotbot, Alta Vista or Excite. Mata Hari retrieves the actual
documents identified by the engines, removes duplicates, and then filters,
scores, indexes and stores results in a desktop database. Searches can be
immediate, work in the background, or run during off hours when Internet
connections may be faster.
According to the company, "Mata Hari translates all dialects of search
engine, cutting through the hundreds of millions of documents on the
Internet to find the exact results desired." Users can further search and
manipulate the results databases using all of Mata Haris features.
Users can pose multiple queries at the same time, in simple sentences or
using structured (AND, OR) syntax. Queries can include phrases ("my oh my")
and wildcards.
Users can search from one to all of the 100 supported engines, which may
return potentially thousands of Web link references. Mata Hari evaluates
these against the queries and flexible site and document filtering settings
chosen by the user. Final, accepted results can be as large as 1,000
complete Web documents and 65,000 unique terms.
Mata Hari can download up to 120 engine listings or documents
simultaneously, leading to rapid search times and an end to the
search-click-wait-download-review delays of conventional searching. Users
can also submit existing Web pages with links such as bookmark listings
or the results from previous Mata Hari searches as the source for
Internet retrievals.
The software automatically scores documents using multiple methods. Users
may rerank all documents based on those identified as matching desired
results. They can select and fine-hone results by single or multiple terms,
documents, queries or the source search engines using Mata Haris advanced
set capabilities.
Users may view documents in their Internet browser during download or later
from the database, or via a quick view local viewer. They can send
partial or complete results listings as a Web page to the browser for
printing, e-mailing to others, or archiving.
Users may annotate, delete and sort documents, or search the databases with
different queries. Mata Hari provides robust download progress messages,
document status icons, user messages and error-trapping. TWTC distributes a
comprehensive help system with the software.
"Don't be fooled by the small size of Mata Hari," said Jerry Tardif, TWTC's
president, "software performance is extremely fast and powerful." He added,
"We believe our advanced technology has raised the competitive bar many
notches." Tardif cited a potential Internet search tool market of $350
million to $450 million by the year 2000, the exponential growth and
increasing fragmentation of the Web, and established vendors as fueling
this competition. "But, to a person, our early users tell us they can now
find information they were never able to find before," he said.
Mata Hari is a Windows NT or Win95 application. It is being distributed and
supported solely via the Internet. Its price is $79.95. The complete
version 1.01 software may be downloaded for a free 30-day evaluation at:
http://thewebtools.com
The WebTools Company is devoted exclusively to providing user-intelligent
tools for the Internet. Mata Hari is its first product. TWTCs Web site
policy is to keep all consumer information confidential, to not issue
cookies, and to support Internet anti-spamming and privacy efforts.
VisualMetrics is a closely-held software company founded in January 1995
with strengths in data management, analysis and decision support tools,
software language translation, software portation, and platform-independent
designs.
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rmariano@streport.com
STReport International Online Magazine
The Linux Advocate
Column #10 - April 16th, 1998
by Scott Dowdle
dowdle@icstech.com
http://www.icstech.com/~dowdle
LOGIN:
First of all, I'd like to appologize for the lack of columns the last couple of
weeks. I did deliver a column to Ralph for last week, but he forgot to put it
in... so I've updated the news section and resubmitted. The whole Linux Weekly
News site reproduction in STR deal fell apart. The LWN folks have the goal of
going banner ad someday to help pay for the site... and they felt reproducing
it in STR on a weekly basis would diminish the value of the site... and I can
certainly understand that. Any any event, they did mention to me that they
don't have any exclusivity rights to the material/content they present there
and suggested that I could use their content as a template for my own. That
sounds like a great idea. :)
What follows is a list of the three best Linux related news and info sites that
I've found.
http://slashdot.org is the "News for Nerds. Stuff that counts" site. It is
updated several times daily and is basically a user contributed site, but oddly
enough, slashdot.org is THE BEST computer industry news site I've found to
date... and if you don't check it out every day, you can quickly fall behind.
http://www.freshmeat.net is the best site I've found for Linux software news.
Freshmeat provides information on new and updated software for Linux. It is
updated at least once a day so check there often.
http://www.eklektix.com/lwn/ is the Linux Weekly News site and a new edition is
published every Thursday. LWN is a digest of information from various sites
including the two previously mentioned and more.
Linux News
Item #1 - Linux Devel Kernel - Hmm, let's see... the 2.1.9x development Linux
kernel has been updated about 3 or 4 times since my last column... and at the
time of writing was at 2.1.96. As it reaches 2.1.99 the push to turn it into
the new production kernel (2.2.0) will be stronger... so 2.2.0 shouldn't be
that far away... maybe a few weeks or a couple of months... you never know.
Item #2 - GIMP updates - The GIMP has been updated several times as it
approaches 1.0. The release version at the time of writing is 0.99.26. GTK (the
GUI API library which GIMP is written with) was released as 1.0 so how far away
can GIMP 1.0 be? I'm guessing a week or two.
Item #3 - MS Gets Busted - Microsoft has been in the news a lot lately. I'm not
sure if the following report is mentioned elsewhere in this issue of STR or
not, as it hasn't gotten very much press coverage since the initial story.
Anyway, the L.A. Times broke the story last Friday about Microsoft and a "just
business" PR plan that has many in the industry irritated. I'll not going to
offer an editorial on the issue because I think it speaks for itself...
although I do term this as Microsoft's latest "scandal." :) Check out the
following URL:
http://www.latimes.com/HOME/NEWS/BUSINESS/UPDATES/lat_microsoft0410.htm
Item #4 - Dvorak comments - John C. Dvorak is the only industry columnist that
I've seen mention the L.A. times article and he makes some rather interesting
comments on the matter. Mr. Dvorak's column entitled,"CAUGHT IN THE ACT," may
be found at the following URL:
http://www.zdnet.com/pcmag/insites/dvorak/jd.htm
Item #5 - PERL Creator Interview - There is an online interview with Larry Wall
(creator and primary author of PERL) at the following URL: