Microsoft News Tracker

Nancy Weil in InfoWorld - IDC, Gartner find Q3 PC shipment increases:

Spurred by low-priced computers, global shipments of PCs increased more than 17 percent in the third quarter, according to analyst companies IDC and Gartner Inc., which independently released figures from that period on Monday.

Low-cost and portable systems drove the increase, which occurred in spite of higher interest rates and surging oil prices, IDC said. PC market growth for the quarter was “remarkable” and maintained “relative independence from broader economic trends,” Loren Loverde, director of IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker, said in a statement Monday.

Loverde’s counterpart at Gartner highlighted home demand for mobile computers as particularly strong in the quarter. Overall market growth was better than expected, said Charles Smulders, vice president of Gartner’s Computing Platforms Worldwide Group.

More details by following the link, but the net seems to be that inexpensive desktops and notebooks lead the parade with some of those desktops presumably being the inexpensive Media Center systems without TV tuners we’ve been hearing about.

Joe Wilcox makes the case for the thesis that Microsoft Vista has missed an important hardware upgrade cycle and as a result, more Vista technologies will have to be supported on Windows XP. I think he’s right, but the prolonged senescence of Windows systems is a continuing problem that will continue to afflict Microsoft and ISV’s too.

Harold Wong has the news (lightly edited):

Exchange Server 2003 SP2 has Released to Web as of today! To get your hands on this Service Pack, here’s the link for the download. To learn more about Service Pack 2, please visit the SP2 site.

In addition, Service Pack 2 offers a vastly improved experience in both managing and using mobile email. This comes with the tight integration with the Messaging and Security Feature Pack for Windows Mobile 5.0. The Mobile Operators will be releasing these new devices into the market over the next several months. More information about Windows Mobile based devices can be found here.

Details on the Windows Mobile 5.0 Messaging and Security Feature Pack are here.

Press release:

Microsoft Corp. today announced the retail availability of its first cross-platform game controller and the latest addition to the Microsoft® Game Precision Series. The Xbox 360™ Controller for Windows® delivers the precision and control that will set the standard for next-generation game controllers.

“This controller is a great example of one of the many areas where the Xbox 360 and Windows platforms complement each other,” said J Allard, Microsoft corporate vice president and chief XNA officer. “The Xbox 360 Controller for Windows is an important step in making it easier for consumers to enjoy gaming on both platforms.”

The Xbox 360 Controller for Windows works with Windows XP-based PCs and the Xbox 360 system, with a comfortable, enhanced ergonomic design, force feedback vibration support and a familiar button layout across both platforms.

“For the first time, gamers can simply unplug their controller from their Xbox 360 system and plug it into their Windows XP-based PC,” said Chris Donahue, director of the Windows gaming and graphics team at Microsoft. “This is a great breakthrough for the gaming industry as we make it easier for developers to create multiplatform titles.”

The Xbox 360 Controller for Windows retail product will include a driver for Windows XP-based PCs. The wired Xbox 360 Controller, which comes with the core Xbox 360 system, will also work on Windows XP-based computers after users download the available driver from Microsoft. The Controller has a 9-foot breakaway controller cable that plugs into a standard USB port.

MSRP is $39.99. Yet another aspect of Microsoft’s cross platform game development push (cf. XNA).

Martin LaMonica at CNET:

On the company’s Shared Source Initiative Web site, Microsoft on Tuesday posted details of three new licenses. Each license is short and designed to be easy to understand and use, the software giant said.

Microsoft’s Shared Source Initiative is a program to allow third parties, such as other software companies and large customers, to see portions of Microsoft source code. Viewing the code enables other companies to create closer integration with Microsoft products, such as Windows CE, or build new products based on that code.

Until now, Microsoft had more than 10 licenses, many of which are specific to products or to the type of audience, such as academics, systems integrators, software developers or government customers.
…
Although Microsoft does allow third-parties to view portions of its code, none of the company’s shared-source licenses is considered open-source by the Open Source Initiative. Microsoft does not intend to submit its new licenses to OSI for approval as open source, though two of them would meet OSI’s criteria, a Microsoft representative said.

In a nutshell, the three licenses are:

• Microsoft Permissive License (Ms-PL) — The Ms-PL is the least restrictive of the Microsoft source code licenses. It allows you to view, modify, and redistribute the source code for either commercial or non-commercial purposes. Under the Ms-PL, you may change the source code and share it with others. You may also charge a licensing fee for your modified work if you wish. This license is most commonly used for developer tools, applications, and components.

• Microsoft Community License (Ms-CL) — The Ms-CL is a license that is best used for collaborative development projects. This type of license is commonly referred to as a reciprocal source code license and carries specific requirements if you choose to combine Ms-CL code with your own code. The Ms-CL allows for both non-commercial and commercial modification and redistribution of licensed software and carries a per-file reciprocal term.

• Microsoft Reference License (Ms-RL) — The Ms-RL is a reference-only license that allows licensees to view source code in order to gain a deeper understanding of the inner workings of a Microsoft technology. It does not allow for modification or redistribution. This license is used primarily for technologies such as development libraries.

More by following the link and Jason Matusow provides some background on the change as well. Also today, Microsoft made available under the Permissive License a variety of Visual Studio 2005 Starter Kits for both Web and standalone applications. Download them here.

Update: (Via Alex Barnett) Tim O’Reilly has more including:

Based on a quick read, the non-limited versions of these licenses look like they might well be able to meet with OSI approval as open source licenses. I’d urge Microsoft to go ahead and to go ahead and submit them to License-Discuss for OSI Approval, and become a full-fledged member of the open source community. They are clearly getting closer and closer to a tipping point. Let’s encourage them to go all the way! Be nice.