Microsoft came out Tuesday with seven new hosting tools that promise to help service providers significantly reduce customer support calls and response times. In some cases, beta-testers of the tools, developed for Windows-based hosting, have reduced support call volumes by 50 percent and improved support response times by 30 percent, said Microsoft.
The offerings include a centralized management and delegated administration directory, a utilities and scripts tool that automates the process of creating an operational server, an automated service provisioning tool, proactive monitoring and reporting capabilities, security and patch management capabilities, guidelines for platform design and operation and a deployment guide for Windows Media service.
Kmart, the bankrupt discount retailer, may get the red light in its bid to sell Internet unit Bluelight.com. Software giant Microsoft and others have filed objections to the proposed $8.4 million sale of Bluelight.com to United Online Inc., citing software licensing and tax issues among their concerns. The U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Chicago is slated to hear Kmart's motion on the sale on Wednesday. According to court documents, Microsoft said Kmart had not specifically identified which Microsoft software licenses it planned to transfer to United Online as part of the sale.
PDA's based on Microsoft's Pocket PC operating system now account for 30 percent of the worldwide PDA market compared to 48.6 percent for PalmSource's market leading Palm OS, according to research released Monday by Dataquest. Pocket PC-based handheld computing systems reached the 30 percent market share level in the third quarter of 2002, up from a 16.2 percent share in the third quarter last year, according to Dataquest figures. Worldwide sales of PDAs in the third quarter of 2002 reached 2.64 million, 0.9 percent up on the 2.61 million sold in the equivalent quarter last year.
The gain of the Pocket PC OS against Palm was helped by the strong impact made by Toshiba in the market. From a trickle of sales in the third quarter last year, Toshiba has sold 144,000 PDAs this year to garner a 5.5 percent share. A further challenge to Palm's leadership is expected when Dell Computer releases a Pocket PC-based PDA later this year, Dataquest said.
The impression that instant messaging will soon overtake e-mail in frequency has been percolating inside the corridors of Redmond for some time, and according to the Exchange product roadmap, has taken hold. Microsoft is preparing "Greenwich," a server platform for real-time communication, to address the enterprise IM market. Greenwich is based on the Session Initiation Protocol, or SIP, which is found in Windows XP and currently serves as the basis for Windows Messenger and Passport's directory service.
Microsoft has planned a full set of features for Greenwich that include: presence notification, server side contact lists, VoIP support, roaming settings, integrated logging via SQL database, authentication with encryption, multi-domain support, alerts and notifications, federation support, GPO based policy management, and a set of external APIs for developers. Another key aspect of Greenwich is the move toward instant messaging and collaboration via mobile devices.
Microsoft launched its Windows XP Media Center Edition operating system at an event in New York Tuesday, showing the software in PCs from Hewlett-Packard (HP). Windows XP Media Center Edition can be operated via remote control, allowing consumers to use their PCs as the nerve center of their multimedia equipment. The operating system will let users watch DVD movies, manage digital audio and video files, and play, pause and record live television.
The launch event marks the North American availability of the software in three new HP desktops. The HP Media Center PCs come with Intel's Pentium 4 processors and Nvidia's GeForce4 MX420 graphics card, and special keyboards for access to select entertainment applications. The PCs also feature five USB (universal serial bus) 2.0 ports and two IEEE 1394 ports for peripheral and video downloads, respectively.
Onyx Software Corp. joined the parade of CRM software developers to announce an extension of its relationship with Microsoft Corp. Monday. The Bellevue, Wash.-based company, a pioneer in using Microsoft's .Net technology in its CRM applications, also announced Monday an extension of its global alliance with Microsoft into three new vertical markets. The companies will jointly pursue CRM opportunities in health care, telecommunications and government, in addition to financial services.
Beta testers of Windows 2000 Service Pack 3 on Monday received invitations from Microsoft to join the Windows 2000 SP4 beta program. Nominations are being accepted through a registration survey on BetaPlace.
"Because you actively tested the Windows 2000 SP3 beta we would like to invite you to beta test the next Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 (SP4)," reads the e-mail invite. "Our goal for the Windows 2000 SP4 beta program is to have a well-targeted group of testers who can actively participate and provide feedback to our development team. Regular and consistent participation throughout the program is expected. Your feedback is critical to the success of SP4."
Testers will be able to download interim releases of SP4 via BetaPlace and request copies of Windows 2000 integrated with the new service pack, which will function for 120 days. Rewards will also be given to testers who report the most bugs each week.
Microsoft Corp. will not have to face claims it conspired with computer makers to maintain a monopoly, now that a federal appeals court has upheld a decision to throw out an antitrust lawsuit. The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., ruled yesterday that Gravity Inc. couldn't prove its claims that Microsoft conspired with Compaq Computer Corp. and Dell Computer Corp. to maintain its monopoly over operating systems by entering into anti-competitive licensing agreements.
Gravity's suit, filed in February 1999, was dismissed by a Baltimore district court in January 2001. On appeal, a decision said Gravity couldn't demonstrate that Microsoft's agreements with Compaq and Dell "are capable of causing any substantial harm to competition." Microsoft still faces lawsuits from AOL Time Warner Inc., Sun Microsystems Inc., Be Inc. and dozens of consumers.
America Online will lose a good chunk of its subscribers if it fails to develop a compelling broadband offering, a study released Monday concluded. AOL, currently the largest Internet service with 35.3 million subscribers, could see its main rivals Microsoft and Yahoo close in on that lead by luring broadband-hungry AOL users to their own high-speed services, according to Forrester Research. While still relatively new, Microsoft's MSN and Yahoo's broadband services are priced low enough to lure on-the-fence AOL users.
"Eighteen percent of dial-up users of AOL are interested in switching to broadband," said Charlene Li, analyst at Forrester Research. AOL "hasn't come out with a coherent strategy" to grow its broadband subscriber base, she said.
Microsoft is developing two new versions of its Windows CE operating system that will give smart devices greater storage capabilities and, as such, a more vital role in the enterprise as a portable data repository. The Redmond, Wash., developer is targeting a new set of smart devices, including VOIP (voice-over-IP) phones, with the next version of CE, code-named McKendric and due next year. The company plans to follow that release in 2005 with a version of CE code-named Macallan that includes greater storage capabilities and better file system technology.
Users have long wanted the moves toward greater storage, saying they will enhance accessibility. Tommer Catlin, IS director at Webcor Technologies Inc., a construction contracting company in San Mateo, Calif., said that while laptops are getting smaller, it is always easier to carry a PDA (personal digital assistant). "If you could put all your files into a device and keep track of them, it would be far easier," Catlin said.