Microsoft News Tracker

Ryan Naraine at PC Magazine:

Microsoft plans to release a pre-patch advisory with workarounds for a “highly critical” vulnerability that could put millions of Internet Explorer users at the mercy of malicious hackers.

The advisory, which will be posted here, acknowledges a code execution hole that was discovered and publicly reported by Secunia Research of Copenhagen, Denmark.
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“This can be exploited by a malicious Web site to corrupt memory in a way that allows the program flow to be redirected to the heap,” Secunia said in the alert, warning that successful exploitation allows execution of arbitrary code whenever the target visits the rigged Web site.

The advisory has now been posted here. To be completely safe, you need to turn off Active Scripting in IE6 and some betas of IE7. Microsoft is still investigating and will determine later what form a patch will take.

Update: Elinor Mills reports at ZDNet UK at that exploit code is already circulating.

Joe Wilcox at Microsoft Monitor - Office 2007 really is 2007:

Today, Microsoft said that, like Windows Vista, Office 2007 will launch in early 2007. The company reiterated commitment to finish the product before the end of year. As with Windows Vista, Microsoft plans to make Office 2007 available to businesses subscribing to volume licensing before the end of 2006.

Office 2007 was always tipped to be finished before Vista in 2006 and while there were rumors of some delays, it had been expected in 4Q2006. It’s unclear whether there were further delays and/or the idea of a joint launch with Vista was just too enticing to the marketers. Wilcox analyzes why this is likely a smart marketing move. Mary Jo Foley has more at Microsoft Watch in Can Microsoft Make the Trains Run on Time?

Update: We’re unlikely to ever know the full story, but Ina Fried at CNET has the official Microsoft spin:

“We have, however, decided to coordinate with Windows Vista to hit retail store shelves in January 2007,” a Microsoft representative said in an e-mail to CNET News.com. “We believe this will provide an easier experience for consumers and retailers alike.”

As rumored, Microsoft shook up Windows development by putting Steven Sinofsky in charge. Sort of. The full press release (see also the internal Microsoft memo) raises more questions than it answers, but one thing is clear - there is no shortage of Vice Presidents at Microsoft and they each get their own independent but overlapping pieces of the pie in the Platform and Services Division.

Let’s start with Sinofsky:

Windows and Windows Live Group

With Sinofsky in charge, the Windows and Windows Live Group will have engineering teams focused on delivering Windows and engineering teams focused on delivering the Windows Live experiences.

Sounds like he’s in charge of developing Windows and Windows Live, right? Not so fast:

Core Operating System Division (COSD)

Brian Valentine will continue to lead this group, which is focused on building the industry’s leading operating system foundation to power Microsoft’s platform products. Valentine’s mission remains focused on shipping Windows Vista.
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Windows Live Platform Group

Blake Irving will lead the newly formed Windows Live Platform Group, which unites a number of MSN teams that have been building platform services and capabilities for Microsoft’s online offerings. This group provides the back-end infrastructure services, platform capabilities and global operational support for services being created in Windows Live, Office Live, and other Microsoft and third-party applications that use the Live platform. This includes the advertising and monetization platforms that support all Live service offerings.

I’ll bet the lines of responsibility are clear there! A Microsoft spokesman denied that the Vista schedule slip had anything to do with the reorganization and looking at it, you can well believe the denial.

Of course there is more - also reporting to the PSD co-Presidents, Kevin Johnson and Jim Allchin (who will retire next year), are:

Online Business Group

The new Online Business Group includes advertising sales, business development and marketing for Live Platforms, Windows Live and MSN — including MSN.com, MSNTV and MSN Internet Access. David Cole, senior vice president, will lead this group until his successor is named before his leave of absence at the end of April.
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Market Expansion Group

Will Poole will be moving to lead a newly created group focused on emerging markets and new form factors. Establishing a Market Expansion organization with product marketing and research and development responsibilities will bring focus to this key growth area for Microsoft and its potential customers around the world through products such as Windows XP Starter Edition and the recently launched Ultra-Mobile PC devices.

Windows Client Marketing Group

Mike Sievert continues to lead Windows Client Marketing and remains responsible for product management and marketing of the Windows operating system, including Windows Vista.

Server and Tools Business Group

Bob Muglia will continue to lead Microsoft’s rapidly growing Server and Tools business, and remains focused on products and services that empower IT pros and developers.

Developer and Platform Evangelism Group

Sanjay Parthasarathy will continue to lead the developer and platform evangelism efforts for the company as Microsoft further enables developers to build applications combining software and services.

These seem fairly straightforward and it’s nice to see that Server and Tools was fortunate enough not to get “clarified.” It’s a cash cow that’s growing nicely, but never gets the buzz. Finally, besides all the divisions and groups above, the PSD co-Presidents have all the usual staff executives from finance, legal and HR reporting to them too as described in the internal Microsoft memo obtained by Microsoft Watch.

You may recall that earlier in the month, a variety of Microsoft competitors formed the OpenDocument Format (ODF) Alliance. Apparently not wishing to be outdone, Microsoft and a group of supporters have now formed the Open XML Formats Developer Group. Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols at eWeek:

Microsoft is far from done trying to convince people that its OpenXML is an “open” standard that’s every bit as good as the OpenDocument Format.

In its latest moves against ODF, Microsoft’s Bill Gates, speaking at the Microsoft Office System Developers Conference, announced that the company has joined with 39 other organizations to form the Open XML Formats Developer Group.

According to Gates, this group is for organizations that are committed to supporting the Office OpenXML format. The Microsoft-owned site is run by Doug Mahugh, a Microsoft “technical evangelist.”

Microsoft claims that Apple, Intel and numerous Microsoft partners and resellers, such as InterKnowlogy and The Computer Solution Company, have joined the OpenXML group.

The Open XML Formats Developer Group web site has more details, as does the Microsoft press release which touts a number of Office 2007 features for developers including a community technology preview of “the next generation of Visual Studio Tools for the Microsoft Office system” (VSTO) based on the next generation of Visual Studio, code-named “Orcas.”

Microsoft once again is increasing the number of internet ads served on Microsoft properties from its beta MSN adCenter program and correspondingly decreasing the ads from Yahoo. Carolyn at the adCenter Blog:

Word on the street is that when it comes to adCenter traffic, you want more, more, MORE. Well, I’m here to tell you that you’re in luck: It’s time for another traffic increase.

In fact, today we’re starting to increase the search traffic served by adCenter to 70%.

She warns that it may take several days to reach the full 70%, but I did a little testing with MSN Search and didn’t see any of the previous Yahoo/Overture ads. Recall that the adCenter team is working against a June deadline when the Yahoo advertising contract expires.