You may have had problems …

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installing Windows 7 if you got through a promotion.

College students who took advantage of a “deal too sweet to pass up” have run into a bit of trouble.

The $29 electronic version of Windows 7 Home Edition sold for Microsoft (MFST) through Digital River (DRIV) doesn’t seem to install properly on some 32-bit Vista machines.

Apparently the download files weren’t properly packaged and when some users tried to “unload the box” they got an error that read:

“We are unable to create or save new files in the folder in which this application was downloaded“

If you were one of the unlucky ones there is a fix available that can be found here.

Kudos to Microsoft for acknowledging there was an issue.  Kudos as well for a fix being provided, though some would claim the fix is difficult.

Microsoft acknowledged the problem Thursday evening and by Friday was reportedly offering refunds. Meanwhile, however, Microsoft technicians are pointing users to a five-step Download Squad workaround (pasted below the fold) that might be enough to send students screaming to the nearest Apple Store. (Source: Windows 7 student upgrade hell – Fortune Brainstorm Tech)

But in all seriousness making an ISO really isn’t that hard.  Unless you’re Microsoft apparently.

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Messaging innovation from Mozilla Labs

Recently Mozilla Labs introduced an exploration known as Raindrop.

Today we’re introducing Raindrop, an exploration in messaging innovation being led by the team responsible for Thunderbird, to explore new ways to use Open Web technologies to create useful, compelling messaging experiences.

We hope to lead and spur the development of extensible applications that help users easily and enjoyably manage their conversations, notifications, and messages across a variety of online services. A central principle behind Raindrop is that messaging should be personal — we want Raindrop to be people-centric both in how we process messages, and in how we can help give people control over their personal data and experiences.

When a friend’s link from YouTube or flickr arrives, your messaging client should be able to show the video or photos near or as part of the message, rather than rudely kicking you over to a separate browser tab. Notifications from computers and mailing lists should be organized for you, not clutter your Inbox or require tedious manual filter setup. It should be easy to smoothly integrate new web services into your conversation viewer entirely using open web technologies. (Source: Introducing Raindrop – Mozilla Labs)

The mission of Raindrop and how it works:

Raindrop’s mission: make it enjoyable to participate in conversations from people you care about, whether the conversations are in email, on twitter, a friend’s blog or as part of a social networking site.

Raindrop uses a mini web server to fetch your conversations from different sources (mail, twitter, RSS feeds), intelligently pulls out the important parts, and allows you to interact with them using your favorite modern web browser (Firefox, Safari or Chrome).

Raindrop comes with a built-in experience that bubbles up what conversations are important to you. You can participate in the experience by writing extensions that use standard open Web technologies like HTML, JavaScript and CSS. Or, use the lower level APIs to make your own experience. You have control over your conversations and how you want to play with them.

Sounds interesting.  Perhaps it’s time to head over to Mozilla Labs to check it out.

As with all explorations hosted by Labs, Raindrop is an open source project and everyone is welcome to participate in its design, development and testing. (Source: Raindrop – Mozilla Labs)

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The top blogging platform …

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when the choice is WordPress or Typepad:

On Monday we asked all of you to vote between WordPress and Typepad in order to figure out which blogging platform should reign supreme. The fight wasn’t even close, though.

3,102 votes were cast, and with 87% of vote, WordPress destroyed Typepad. WordPress garnered 2,714 votes compared to Typepad’s mere 267 ballots (9%). 121 of you decided to call it a tie. (Source: Poll: WordPress overwhelms Typead in Reader Vote – Mashable, Social Media Guide)

I’d be curious if the results would be similar in a poll involving WordPress and Blogger.

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Security starts with infrastructure assessment

Interesting article on cloud computing security.

Security professionals are facing the difficult challenge of extending security requirements to take advantage of cloud computing and software-as-a-service applications.

Particularly difficult is finding ways to secure the new boundaries between the enterprise, the cloud service and the end user while managing dependencies on off-premise infrastructure and privileged operators. And they have to do all this without inhibiting flexibility and agility.

It’s a challenge that security professionals have to overcome when considering this.

Research firm IDC predicts that 76% of U.S. organizations will use at least one SaaS-delivered application for business use by the close of 2009. Cloud-based services adoption is being driven by the business performance benefits and realized cost efficiencies. This isn’t new for those of us in IT. Mission critical information already is handled in the cloud for companies that outsource email services or maintain customer information in CRM systems such as Salesforce.com. The challenge for security teams is to safely integrate extended cloud capabilities into corporate policies and procedures.

The best approach?

Forrester recommends the usual checklist of cloud security requirements that any enterprise would have for internally hosted applications. Authenticate users and control access to applications, tightly log and audit privileged operations, protect sensitive data to prevent loss and meet compliance mandates, and reduce risk with rigorous vulnerability management, according to Forrester. Take into account differences in the SaaS vendor’s infrastructure and business practices when evaluating the sensitivity to security. For instance, expect the cloud vendor to be replicating data between data centers for performance and business continuity and expect to have a degree of shared resources with virtualized application environments. (Source: Cloud security begins with infrastructure assessment – Search Security.com)

Click the source to read the whole thing.

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Useful blogging tools

Image via CrunchBase

If you utilize the WordPress platform, there are tons of tools to utilize that make things run smoother.  Here are some that were highlighted by Six Revisions.  (H/T – E1evationllc on Twitter)

1. ScribeFire

ScribeFire is a Firefox plugin that gives you an array of useful features and options for writing posts. You can drag and drop content from a variety of sources (which the WordPress Visual Editor currently doesn’t fully support), manage and leave notes on your posts, upload files via the built-in FTP, create timestamps, and manage uploaded images. ScribeFire is the tool of choice for bloggers that need moar cowbell than what the WordPress built-in editor affords them.

2. WordPress Helper

Whether you’re new to WordPress or an experienced veteran blogger, you’ll find WordPress Helper to be a much-welcomed addition to your blogging arsenal. WordPress Helper notifies you of new WordPress versions, gives you the ability to set custom keyboard shortcuts, and places useful help files, accessible by right-clicking on the page on a PC, at your finger tips.

3. Screen grab to WordPress!

If you include a lot of screenshots in your posts, you should check out the free Firefox add-on, Screen grab to WordPress!. You can save a web page as an image, and then use the tool to automatically upload it to your WordPress site with a click of a button.

4. WordPress scanner

With WordPress Scanner, you can sleep easier at night knowing that your blog is safe from known and potential security vulnerabilities. WordPress Scanner is available as a web-based application, or as a WordPress plugin.

5. Broken Link Checker

Broken Link Checker is a WordPress plugin that essentially checks your hyperlinks to see if they’re still active. It scans your posts and pages to check for broken links and then notifies you via the WordPress Dashboard if there are any broken links found. You can set specific times for when the link-scanning occurs and it’s recommended you pick a low-traffic time of the day to do so.

6. Google Syntax Highlighter

If you’ve ever tried including code snipplets in your WordPress posts through the WordPress Visual Editor, only to find out how it mangles your prettily-formatted code, you’ll love Google Syntax Highlighter, a WordPress plugin that handles preformatted code in your WordPress posts and pages. Google Syntax Highlighter makes it much easier to display code on your posts and colors (“highlights”) the syntax for better readability. If Google Syntax Highlighter isn’t for you, check out WP-Syntax, WP-Chili, or SyntaxHighlighter Plus.

7. Insights

Insights is a WordPress plugin that assists you in finding and gathering information and media for your blog posts. Insights gives you the ability to search existing blog posts for specific information and an intuitive interface for searching external websites and services such as Flickr, Youtube, Wikipedia, and Google Blog search – all from within the WordPress interface.

8. Windows Live Writer

There are but a handful of notable Microsoft applications – Windows Live Writer is one of them. Windows Live Writer is a free desktop application that’s compatible with WordPress (along with other popular publishing platforms like Blogger and Typepad). You can write posts offline and upload them whenever you’re ready to publish.

If you’re a Mac user, check out ecto or Thingamablog (a cross-platform desktop app for Linux, Mac, and Windows users).

(Source: 15 Useful Tools for WordPress Bloggers – Six Revisions)

Go check out the rest of the tools highlighted.  Just keep in mind that if you use the free .com platform offered by WordPress some tools may not be useable.

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Shakespeare literay works …

William Shakespeare via last.fm

given the Facebook-syle news feed treatment.

About a year or so ago there was an amusing bit of writing circulating on the Web that deconstructed Shakepeare’s “Hamlet” into a series of Facebook-styled newsfeeds.

Written by Sarah Schmelling, the piece imagined humorous status updates and activities “Hamlet” characters might have posted on Facebook, had there been such a thing in 14th-century Denmark.

Some of the more cheeky zingers included, “Hamlet wonders if he should continue to exist. Or not”; “Ophelia removed ‘moody princes’ from her interests”; and “Ophelia joined the group Maidens Who Don’t Float.”

That last activity from Ophelia is now the title of a book by Schmelling, published by Penguin Books, that gives this Facebook news-update treatment to other literary works. And, in a fine bit of technology synergy, that book just so happens to be available for Amazon’s e-reader, the Kindle.

So goes the state of the book industry in this, the golden age of technology — clever memes are reducing fine literature into Facebook news-feed updates and Kindle e-readers are replacing our beloved, dog-eared paperbacks.

These technology-influenced changes to what we read and how we read have book experts and sociologists raising an alarm about whether all of this technology is really a good thing. A panel at the 2009 Brooklyn Book Festival in New York City that included Schmelling recently tackled this topic.

To be fair, there have been and likely always will be humorous or gimmick-oriented books on the market to appeal to the demographic that doesn’t have the time or inclination to sit down and devote itself to a more weighty tome — or to inspire those folks to take themselves a bit less seriously. And Kindles have been available for nearly two years now and people are still, so far, buying paper-based books.

…

Perhaps a lesson of how literature and technology can find a happy medium is ultimately found back where we started, with Schmelling’s humorous “Hamlet” piece. The item appeared on the Web site of McSweeneys, a literary journal spun off from a nonprofit organization started in San Francisco by award-winning author and memoirist Dave Eggers.

That organization — 826 National — is devoted to setting up free tutoring and writing instruction for kids aged six to 18 and to encouraging them to appreciate literature and write creatively. 826 National also works with local schools and teachers in its seven locations to help get students excited about writing, and produces student writing, film and other creative projects.

If an organization devoted to getting kids to appreciate literature and create it themselves sees fit to poke fun at Hamlet using the world’s largest online social network as its theater, perhaps there is a place where even the most stubborn, bespectacled literary purist as well as the most rabid, Kindle-wielding techno-enthusiast can find some common ground. (Source: To Kindle or Not to Kindle – CIO.com)

Go read the whole thing.  Very interesting.

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Underground hacker forum gets hacked!

Interesting.

Here’s one to make you smile. An underground malware and hacking forum got a taste of its own medicine when it was itself hacked by a digital vigilante.

A post from F-Secure says the underground pakbugs.com forum drew malicious hackers who bought and sold malware, stolen credit card numbers and the like. That is, until someone going by “Catch Them” broke into the site and gathered the full list of registered users, including their forum passwords and e-mail addresses, which the vigilante then posted to the Full Disclosure security mailing list. The F-Secure post includes screen shots of the pakbugs site and the users list.

F-Secure says the site has been going up and down since the event, and it’s not responding when I check it (from a Linux test machine, probably not a good idea to visit underground hacking sites using your Windows desktop). Let’s hope the site stays down. (Source: Tables turned on hacker site – CIO.com)

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Formal Net neutrality rules …

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coming down the pipe from the FCC.

The U.S. Federal Communications Commission is planning to create formal rules against Internet providers selectively blocking or slowing traffic, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski will announce net neutrality rulemaking during a speech Monday, the Journal reported. Net neutrality rules would prohibit Internet providers from blocking or slowing their customers’ access to Web sites or Web applications. A FCC spokeswoman did not immediately return a message seeking confirmation of the Journal story.

Since mid-2005, the FCC has said it will enforce four broadband policy principles, saying consumers have a right to access the legal Internet content of their choice, and they are entitled to run Web applications and services of their choice.

Welcome news to some.

“The Internet was created and grew up under strict nondiscrimination rules,” said Gigi Sohn, president of Public Knowledge, a digital rights advocacy group. “Those same ideas are as valuable today as they were 10 years ago. Having rules in place will bring a degree of certainty that will help both carriers and consumers alike. Carriers will know what is allowed and what is not; consumers will be relieved to know they will be able to have access to any content and service on a nondiscriminatory basis. “

Some critics have suggested net neutrality rules would hamper investment in new broadband pipes, because the broadband providers could not control what runs over their networks.

Sohn disagreed. “Rather, as in the past, they will encourage investment in the kinds of innovation and technology that will help move our economy forward,” she said.

Free Press, a media reform group, called the rulemaking a “big win for consumers.”

While others think it’s not a good move.

But Randolph May, president of conservative think tank the Free State Foundation, said it is “discouraging” that the FCC is considering new broadband regulations.

“In light of the way competition is continuing to develop in the broadband marketplace, and with only a few isolated instances of complaints alleging net neutrality-like abuses ever having been filed, it is a mistake for the chairman to propose common carrier-type regulation in the broadband world,” he said.

The mobile-phone and Internet industry would be concerned “about the unintended consequences that net neutrality regulation would have on investments from the very industry that’s helping to drive the U.S. economy,” added Chris Guttman-McCabe, vice president of regulatory affairs for CTIA, a mobile trade group. “We believe that this kind of regulation is unnecessary in the competitive wireless space as it would prevent carriers from managing their networks — such as curtailing viruses and other harmful content — to the benefit of their consumers.” (Source: Report: FCC Will Formalize Net Neutrality Rule – CIO.com)

What do you think?

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PC demand strong …

in advance of Windows 7 release.

People are snapping up new desktop and laptop PCs long before the launch of Windows 7, a sign of strong demand in the market, analysts say.

Demand for PCs improved in July and August, which is “something special, because the expectation was that many people would delay purchases until after Windows 7 came out in October,” said Manish Nigam, head of technology research in Asia for Credit Suisse, at a technology conference in Taipei.

Microsoft marketing in advance of the release may have played a role.

Consumers often wait until after the launch of a major new operating system to buy a new PC for fear of having to pay for the upgrade and to avoid the hassle of loading the new software themselves. This time, strong marketing for free or discounted Windows 7 upgrades for new PC buyers ahead of the official launch of the OS on Oct. 22 appears to have worked.

The advertising blitz for Windows 7 “will be a major positive for the PC industry,” iSuppli said.

Hype for the new OS, which won solid reviews from many people who tested it, and lower prices for PCs are already drawing buyers.

The big question – when will corporations get back into the game?

The big question mark for the PC industry is when corporations, which account for nearly 60 percent of PC shipments, will start replacing aging fleets of computers.

Executives in charge of replacing PCs are more finicky about major OS upgrades than consumers. Decisions they make about new software will affect thousands of computers that they have to maintain. Many are also mindful of how unpopular Microsoft’s last OS, Windows Vista, was. The OS launched in early 2007 to great fanfare that quickly turned to disappointment. Customers complained about a number of issues, from clunky performance to missing hardware drivers. Some people even opted to downgrade back to Windows XP.

The problems Vista faced make the transition to Windows 7 potentially slower among corporate users. Analysts expect them to wait until Windows 7 has been on the market for at least several months and Service Pack 1 has been published before adopting the new OS.

That means PC purchases by corporations probably won’t begin until the middle of next year.

Which could mean of all things a possible PC shortage and/or higher prices.

Credit Suisse’s Nigam believes U.S. corporations may lead the rebound in PC buying next year, noting capital spending hit its lowest level in years at the depths of the financial crisis, even worse than after the dotcom bust.

The investment bank forecasts a 12 percent increase in corporate PC purchases next year based on surveys with corporate IT managers. Such an increase would likely make PC vendors happy, but it could hurt consumers through potentially higher PC prices, considering the shortages already hitting some PC parts. (Source: PC demand takes off ahead of Windows 7 – The Industry Standard)

Either way this is positive news for the IT market.

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Virtualization skills a must have

Interesting article.

IT departments today may be looking to hire virtualization specialists, but as the technology becomes mainstream for servers, desktops, storage and networks, industry watchers and high-tech hiring managers say virtual know-how will become a standard requirement for many IT job candidates.

“We see virtualization as having a significant impact on operations and infrastructure organizations in IT. Most will start dealing with the technology in a stovepipe fashion: server, desktop, network and storage,” says Ed Holub, research vice president at Gartner. “But organizations are beginning to treat virtualization more horizontally than vertically and pulling teams together to share that virtual know-how.”

With the most recent rash of virtualization projects, the technology area has become a subset of the server team in many IT organizations, analysts say. But as companies look to broaden their adoption, subject-area expertise in desktops, networks and storage will require those IT staffers to also become virtualization experts. (Source: No Virtualization Skills? Better Get Started – CIO.com)

Go to the source and read the whole thing.

And remember to gain an understanding of the security issues raised by virtualization as well.  Including how to resolve them.

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