Affichage des articles dont le libellé est Operating Systems. Afficher tous les articles
Affichage des articles dont le libellé est Operating Systems. Afficher tous les articles

samedi 10 novembre 2012

Companies have a choice for devices in the workplace - employee or corporate owned

A lire sur:  http://www.atelier.net/en/trends/articles/companies-have-choice-devices-workplace-employee-or-corporate-owned?utm_source=emv&utm_medium=mail&utm_campaign=alerte_us_only

By Ivory King November 08, 2012 business people in a meeting room with mobile devices
The weaknesses of BYOD have brought another model of corporate owned, personally enabled devices. But concerns can be addressed by security and efficiency software services as well.
Corporate environments have often provided employees with dedicated devices in the past, but the strengthening of the consumer electronics movement has influenced that recently. Employee-owned laptops, smartphones or tablets may be just as powerful as the ones that the company would be providing for them. So companies began allowing workers to bring their own devices, known as the BYOD trend. Devices are consumer-purchased and supported by the enterprise IT department. But there are caveats to BYOD - due to outside devices accessing corporate data, security concerns began to develop, as well as the possibility of increased IT costs.
Corporate devices managed by employees
So a new choice is emerging for employees to use connected gadgets within the workplace, known as corporate owned, personally enabled, or COPE. In contrast to BYOD, where employees bring in their own devices to use for enterprise functions, COPE is purchased by the organization and managed by employees. COPE enables businesses to set functions and permissions on an ad hoc basis, allowing greater control over device activity. In addition to the more robust security that COPE can provide, it can save money for businesses and employees. Employees often are reimbursed for these more restricted-use devices, and companies can get better prices for the order of multiple units.
Or third party software to secure personally owned devices
BYOD continues to be supported by third-party developers, who try to answer companies’ concerns about data protection. For instance, app management platform Apperian enables brands to secure several different mobile operating systems with business app services. The platform keeps employee personal information and corporate apps and data separate, helping to assuage security and privacy concerns. Apperian incorporates app inspection, which scans for malware and data leaks. The security restricts certain higher-risk activities, such as copy and paste, as well as only lets approved apps access the corporate network.

jeudi 8 novembre 2012

COPE ou BYOD: l'entreprise a plusieurs choix pour gérer la mobilité des employés

A lire sur:  http://www.atelier.net/trends/articles/cope-byod-entreprise-plusieurs-choix-gerer-mobilite-employes?utm_source=emv&utm_medium=mail&utm_campaign=alerte_us

Par L'Atelier - San Francisco 08 novembre 2012 professionnels en salle de réunion avec des appareils mobiles
Les faiblesses du BYOD ont donné naissance à un autre modèle d'appareils achetés par l'entreprise mais activés par les employés (COPE). Dans un cas comme dans l'autre la sécurité et les logiciels de productivité peuvent également apporter une réponse à ces préoccupations.
Par le passé, les entreprises ont souvent équipé les employés avec des appareils d’entreprise, mais l’évolution des comportements des consommateurs face à la mobilité a modifié la donne. Les ordinateurs portables, smartphones ou tablettes des employés peuvent rivaliser avec ceux que l'entreprise pourrait leur donner. Voilà pourquoi les entreprises ont commencé à permettre aux employés d'apporter leurs propres appareils, une tendance connue sous le nom de BYOD, des appareils appartenant aux consommateurs mais bénéficiant du soutien du département informatique de l'entreprise. Mais le BYOD a ses limites : accès aux données de l'entreprise par des appareils externes, préoccupations apparues chez les informaticiens et risque d'une hausse des coûts informatiques.
Des appareils d'entreprise gérés par l'employé
Un nouveau choix s'est donc offert aux employés d'utiliser leurs gadgets informatiques sur leur lieu de travail, connu comme « corporate owned, personally enabled », ou COPE. Contrairement au BYOD, dans lequel les employés apportent leurs propres appareils qu'ils utilisent à des fins professionnelles, COPE est acheté par l'entreprise mais géré par les employés. COPE permet aux entreprises d'attribuer des fonctions et des permissions sur une base ad hoc, permettant ainsi un meilleur contrôle de l'utilisation de l'appareil. Outre une sécurité renforcée, COPE permet également aux entreprises et aux employés de réaliser des économies. Les employés sont souvent indemnisés pour ces appareils à usage réduit et les entreprises obtiennent de meilleurs prix grâce à des achats groupés.
Ou des logiciels externes pour contrôler les appareils personnels
Le BYOD bénéficie toujours du soutien des développeurs externes, qui s’efforcent de répondre au besoin des entreprises. La plateforme de gestion d'applications Apperian permet aux marques de sécuriser différents systèmes d'exploitation mobiles avec un service d'applications professionnelles. La plateforme maintient une séparation entre les données personnelles de l'employé et les applications de l'entreprise, contribuant à lisser les problèmes de sécurité et de confidentialité. Apperian inclut une fonction d'inspection des applications, qui les scannne contre les logiciels malveillants et les fuites de données. Certaines activités à haut risque, comme le copier-coller, sont limitées par la sécurité, qui n'autorise que les applications approuvées à accéder au réseau de l'entreprise.

mardi 25 septembre 2012

Les ventes de tablettes sont en hausse !

A lire sur:  http://www.atelier.net/trends/articles/ventes-de-tablettes-hausse

Par L'Atelier - San Francisco 25 septembre 2012 professionals working on a tablet
Les chiffres dépassent les prévisions et les tablettes prennent de l'importance comme outil de connexion. Les tablettes gagnent en popularité et leur aspect est appelé à changer, comme leur accessibilité pour des utilisateurs pleins d'attentes.
Alors que l'économie n'a pas encore repris, les ventes de tablettes devraient augmenter plus que prévu. Dans cette catégorie récente, les consommateurs continuent à acheter des tablettes, en particulier les iPads d'Apple. Selon la dernière prévision de l'nternational Data Corporation, le marché mondial des tablettes pourrait grimper à 117,1 millions d'unités au lieu des 107,4 millions précédemment annoncés. Pour 2013, la prévision d'IDC est passée de 142,8 millions d'unités à 165,9 millions, alors que la prévision pour 2016 s'établit à 261,4 millions. Mais sa jeunesse laisse augurer d'autres changements dans le marché des tablettes.
Pas de diversification du marché
Au cours des prochaines années, on s'attend à un glissement, mais non à une diversification du marché, les tablettes Windows s'attribuant une plus grande part, les Android en perdant et les autres systèmes d'exploitation disparaissant du paysage. En 2011, 57,2% des 70,9 millions de tablettes vendues à travers le monde étaient des iPads, un chiffre qui reste assez stable dans les prévisions, avec 60% en 2012 et 58% en 2016. Les appareils Android représentaient 38,9% du total de tablettes en 2011, chiffre qui devrait tomber à 30,5% en 2016. Enfin, les tablettes Windows représentaient en 2011 environ 1% mais devraient pouvoir atteindre 11% d'ici 2016.
Plus de tablettes, moins d’ eReaders
Malgré des prévisions plus optimistes pour les tablettes, IDC les a revues à la baisse concernant les eReaders. Selon leurs paramètres, ceux-ci ont connu une première moitié d'année décevante, subissant l'impact de la disponibilité de tablettes vendues, au détail, à moins de 200 $. De ce fait, les ventes d'eReaders pourraient s'effondrer d'un niveau de 27,7 millions d'unités en 2011 à 23,6 millions. Cette évolution met en lumière l'augmentation de la demande pour des appareils à usage multiple et l'existence d'un marché pour des tablettes moins coûteuses, au détriment de cette catégorie moins versatile.

jeudi 15 septembre 2011

Windows 8 developer preview: Half a million downloads and counting

Last night Microsoft made the first developer preview version of Windows 8 available for download from dev.windows.com. As of this morning, CEO Steve Ballmer says the operating system has been downloaded more than 500,000 times.

That certainly shows there’s a lot of interest in Microsoft’s new operating system. This is still an early version that’s been released for testing purposes only. Many features aren’t available yet; there’s no Windows Media Center functionality; and there’s no public support for ARM processors yet. But Windows 8 represents a dramatic change of direction for Microsoft.

The operating system has been designed to run on any device that can support Windows 7, but it also has a new Metro style user interface designed for touchscreen tablet, notebook, and desktop computers. Some elements of the Metro UI show up even if you’re using the classic Windows desktop though. The Start Menu, for instance, has been largely replaced with a start screen. And if you’re using a device with a high resolution display there’s support for full screen apps that don’t show a Windows taskbar or any toolbars until you need them (although if you ask me, that UI is even more important on devices with low resolution displays).

I was one of the half million people to download Windows 8 today, and when I took the OS for a spin on my aging Asus Eee PC 1000H netbook, I was impressed with how well it runs out of the box. But I’m still on the lookout for proper VGA drivers, since Windows 8 insists that my 1024 x 600 pixel display is an 800 x 600 pixel screen.

But just because 500,000 people downloaded the developer preview in less than a day doesn’t mean that Windows 8 will be a runaway hit… at least not right away.

First of all, the full version of the operating system may not be available until a year from now, and at that point, Apple, Google, and other software developers will likely have made major improvements to their operating systems.

Second, while Windows 8 does have a traditional desktop view, there are enough changes that the new operating system could alienate longtime Windows users. For instance the Ribbon UI that we first saw in Office 2007 is now used throughout the operating system — even in Windows Explorer. I know plenty of people that still hate the feature in Office, and who probably won’t be all that keen on using it in Windows Explorer.

Third, Microsoft announced this week that Windows 7 has been installed over 450 million times… and that there are finally more people using Windows 7 than Windows XP. But here’s the thing. Windows 7 was released almost two years ago, and it’s not until Windows 8 is on the horizon that Microsoft finally has more Windows 7 users than Windows XP users.

That’s largely because Windows XP was on the market for so long, and because Windows Vista was bad enough to basically be a non-starter for many customers.But it’s also because Windows XP was probably the first operating system from Microsoft that people really did consider to be “good enough” to use for the better part of a decade.

Windows XP had most of the features users expected, supported a wide range of third party aplications, and was stable enough to run for days, weeks, or even months at a time without crashing when treated nicely.

Windows 7 is at least as stable, and certainly offers the features most casual or business computer users need. I suspect Microsoft’s best bet at getting Windows 8 usage to surpass Windows 7 in less than two years is to emphasize its use on devices with new form factors such as tablets… but future Windows tablets will be competing against Apple’s iPad and an army of Android tablets, making Microsoft the underdog in its field for once (well, twice if you count the Zune, I suppose… or thrice if you consider Windows Phone 7).

mercredi 14 septembre 2011

Windows 8 Developer Preview available for download tonight

Windows 8 lock screen

You’ve read about the new features and seen some of the hardware prototypes. But you still want to try out Windows 8 for yourself. Not a problem. Tonight Microsoft will make the developer preview of the new operating system available for download.

Just visit dev.windows.com after 8:00PM Pacific tonight and you download Windows 8 for 32-bit or 64-bit computers with x86 processors. The preview will also include some sample applications — but these aren’t necessarily the same apps that will ship with the operating system when Microsoft releases the full operating system later this year or early next year.

The developer preview will not include the Windows Store app store or some of the other features Microsoft showed off earlier today. The software is aimed at developers that need the tools to write apps for the new Windows 8 Metro style user interface.

Unfortunately we’ll have to wait a little longer before Microsoft makes an ARM-compatible version available, so it doesn’t look like Windows will be joining webOS, Ubuntu, and Android on the HP TouchPad tablet just yet.

There’s also no way to upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 8 yet. You need to perform a clean install, so you may not want to install Windows 8 Developer Preview on your primary computer unless you’ve got all of your important data backed up.

mardi 26 juillet 2011

Don't Panic! It's only Linux 3.0

By Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols | July 22, 2011, 9:05am PDT

Summary

Linus Torvalds has released Linux 3.0 and he wants you to know that there has been no big changes. There have, however, been several small, but significant, improvements.

Blogger Info

Paula Rooney
Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

Linux 3.0 is out and the big changes are… ah… well. Not much.

Linus Torvalds, its creator and lead developer had warned us that this would be the case: “So what are the big changes?

“NOTHING. Absolutely nothing. Sure, we have the usual two thirds driver changes, and a lot of random fixes, but the point is that 3.0 is *just* about renumbering, we are very much *not* doing a KDE-4 or a Gnome-3 here. No breakage, no special scary new features, nothing at all like that. We’ve been doing time-based releases for many years now; this is in no way about features. If you want an excuse for the renumbering, you really should look at the time-based one (”20 years“) instead. So no ABI [application binary interface] changes, no API [application programming interface] changes, no magical new features - just steady plodding progress.”

In case you didn’t get the message first time, when Torvalds finally released Linux 3.0 on July 22nd, he wrote, “As already mentioned several times, there are no special landmark features or incompatibilities related to the version number change, it’s simply a way to drop an inconvenient numbering system in honor of twenty years of Linux. In fact, the 3.0 merge window was calmer than most, and apart from some excitement from RCU [Ready, Copy, Update] I’d have called it really smooth. Which is not to say that there may not be bugs, but if anything, there are hopefully fewer than usual, rather than the normal ‘.0′ problems.”

OK, but surely some things were changed right? Well, yes, there were. The not so big, but significant changes were, in no particular order:

The Xen hypervisor now can run natively with Dom0 (Domain 0) privileges. This gives it, like Linux’s Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM), the ability to work at the lowest possible level of the Linux kernel. In practical terms this means Xen virtual machines should run faster.

There have also been improvements with how the kernel works with the still experimental Btrfs (B-tree file system) and the now standard ext4 file system. This, in turn, should lead to faster and, in the case of Btrfs, more reliable, file systems.

The Linux 3.0 kernel also improves its interoperability with UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface), a replacement for PC’s BIOS. While UEFI has been slow to catch on, it’s beginning to be picked up by major PC and server companies like HP. Since UEFI lends itself well for business desktop and server deployments, you can expect to see more and more UEFI computers entering the market in the next year or two.

3.0 is also bringing in a new implementation of the Berkeley Packet Filter (BPF) The net effect of this improvement will be speed up any application that calls on network services. While this won’t matter that much if you’re just trying to get the most from your Web browser, it can save significant time for Web servers and other network service software.

So, all-in-all, there is good stuff here. Radical? No. Revolutionary? I don’t think so! But, still good, solid improvements. I don’t know about you, but that works just fine for me.

Related Stories:

Top Five Linux Contributor: Microsoft

New Name, Same Linux

Twenty Years of Linux according to Linus Torvalds


http://www.zdnet.com/blog/open-source/dont-panic-its-only-linux-30/9276?alertspromo=&tag=nl.rSINGLE

MacBook Air and OS X Lion synergy: A big hurdle for Windows 8

By James Kendrick | July 22, 2011, 5:37am PDT

Summary

The synergy between these the new MacBook Airs and OS X Lion is powerful stuff, and demonstrates the big task ahead for Microsoft’s work in progress, Windows 8.

Blogger Info

James Kendrick

Unless you have been sleeping in a cave somewhere, you know that Apple released new MacBook Air notebooks and OS X Lion together. The joint release is significant because Lion is designed from the ground up to optimize the user experience on Apple hardware. The synergy between these Apple products is powerful stuff, and demonstrates the big task ahead for Microsoft’s work in progress, Windows 8.

OS X Lion has a raft of features designed to make working with a MacBook Air, even older MacBooks, as intuitive as possible. The ability to have lots of programs running and easily get to any one of them is already changing the way I work with OS X. The handling of the small notebook screen is pure genius, as is moving between programs occupying the entire display via simple touch gestures. The hardware and software have been written from the ground up to work together.

Apple hasn’t done this overnight, it has been laying the groundwork for this synergy for a while. It started by putting large touchpads on every MacBook, and carried it over to non-notebooks with the release of the Magic Mouse and Magic TrackPad. The groundwork for a touch optimized experience was laid even before the iPad hit the scene. The company had a good plan and has executed it well.

This is the giant hurdle Microsoft faces with the next version of Windows, not so cleverly codenamed Windows 8. The sneak peeks Microsoft has given us of Windows 8 show an exciting new direction for the platform. Windows 8 attempts to do what Apple has executed, making the OS work efficiently with the system in the user’s favor. What will determine how well consumers react to Windows 8 when released will be how easy it is to use, especially on notebooks. Windows 8 must find a way to handle smaller displays intelligently like OS X Lion, and bring touch (not necessarily the screen) into the equation.

This is a daunting task for Microsoft as a software company. The legacy of Windows is that by design of Microsoft’s business plan, it must work on a wide variety of hardware made by other companies; this is not a complication faced by Apple. Microsoft decided long ago to be a software company, and this is now a competitive disadvantage. If it has to compromise the user experience offered by Windows 8 to make it work on some hardware, it will not compare well with OS X. That is a simple fact of life in this competitive environment.

Computer users have evolved the last few years to expect systems to be easy, even enjoyable to use. In the early days of Windows we all expected things to be complicated, and keeping everything going properly required access to an “expert”. Those days are gone, folks now expect their computer to just work, and be intuitive at that. This is the biggest obstacle facing adoption of Windows 8, as it means the OS must work on whatever hardware Microsoft certifies it for, and run well.

I am optimistic about the next version of Windows, more so than with any version in a long time. I hope that Microsoft’s decision to broaden the scope of hardware that Windows 8 will service doesn’t turn into a bad decision. Apple’s ecosystem is getting better due to the limited hardware focus needed due to building everything internally. Windows 8 doesn’t have that luxury, and that may be an awfully big a hurdle to jump.

Related:

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/mobile-news/macbook-air-and-os-x-lion-synergy-a-big-hurdle-for-windows-8/3403?tag=nl.e539

Are you an operating system agnostic? (Hint: I bet you are)

By Zack Whittaker | July 24, 2011, 5:12pm PDT

Summary

Only a week after buying my first ever MacBook, it hasn’t changed my opinion of Windows. It has though made me realise I am OS agnostic.

Blogger Info

Zack Whittaker

Considering I have not spent more than an hour of my life using Mac OS X, jumping about the cultural shift train when my new MacBook Air arrived on Friday should have come as a shock — considering my own personal admission to an increasingly dependent reliance on Windows.

Truthfully, the transition from Windows to Mac has been relatively easy — with only a few quirks to learn along the way.

But the one thing — only half a week later from the arrival of my new beast of a note-slash-netbook, is that I am and always have been agnostic to operating systems. I just never knew it until I forced a change of hand, and I suspect you — the reader — may be the same.


(Image via Flickr)

In reality, I have not transitioned at all. I have learned, and subconsciously compared and contrasted, but I have not actively switched from one to the other.

With Windows, one has to be aware of ‘Windows rot’, database files, caches and the build up of disk space over time, taken over by temporary files and updates that slowly wear away at the system.

Whether or not this truly exists in the Mac world, I have used up only 13% of my 128GB solid state drive, and it has remained as such since the day it arrived, and installed the junk I need to keep my productive life going.

It’s a shift I have never taken before. Being used to something old and decrepit, that works but sometimes breaks, and often needs a kick up the backside to get going again was fine, truth be known.

With my Mac, I have to leave many preconceptions and worries at the door. It seems that I do not need to clear my cache files that often, or need to wipe my Internet history or temporary files each week to remove the constant clog of files on my system.

This, as you may have guessed, is the ramblings of someone very much in the ‘honeymoon’ period; yet to work out the difficulties and set backs that Mac has yet to show, over the Windows operating system that I am so used to.

And on the subject of honesty — I have not switched on my Windows-running desktop upstairs since my MacBook Air arrived. I simply have had no need to.

Despite the closed ‘app-store only’ nature of iOS, for newcomers, Mac OS X is not. It doesn’t need jail-breaking, nor does it require hacking to get the applications you want to work on it.

For that reason alone, again despite the Windows versus Mac divide, so far all but one application is available on Mac OS X as it is on Windows. The one that isn’t, is Paint.NET — an old version of the popular image editing software, for which I use instead of the overbearing clutter that PhotoShop has to offer.

But already, I feel as though I am cheating on my new MacBook purchase by running virtualisation software, to emulate my Boot Camp partition to run Windows applications within the Mac OS X interface.

While I have my Mac OS X Lion based MacBook running multi-platform software — like Chrome, Microsoft Office, Skype and Dropbox, there is still a need to at least have the opportunity more than anything to run Windows applications directly from one’s MacBook.

Simply having the option there is enough to make me feel all-rounded more comfortable; knowing I have a fall back option ready on my MacBook wherever I am in the world. As a netbook-like solution, my MacBook Air will replace my current netbook and travel the world with me when I next travel.

And this sets me to my point. I am operating system agnostic. It doesn’t matter what I use, when it is or how I use it — whether it is a strand of Linux I have never used, Mac OS X or Windows 3.1 through to Windows 7 — I’ll use it regardless.

I suspect that actually, while most will have their own personal preference, I believe many follow this pattern too. It does not matter which browser, operating system, program or service you use — it falls down to whether the job can be done or not. If it can, then continue. If not, by all means move on.

No doubt most will agree: video editing software is better on a Mac, whereas productivity and office documents are better for Windows. The Mac vs. PC adverts on the television do highlight a point, and though jocular and with a staunch anti-PC bias, many prefer to be productive to editing videos.

At the end of the day, productivity in itself is relative. Video editing may well be someone’s job; what right do we have to disparage? We pick the devices for what we feel is best.

Perhaps I would have woken up to Mac OS X if I were able to run it alongside Windows on a PC. The fact that you can run Windows on a Mac shows more about Apple than it does about Microsoft; yet equally negates the positivity by restricting Mac OS X to a Mac computer.

It’s like a Venn diagram out of control; emulating the London 2012 Olympic logo; with jagged edges and overly highlighted spewed-up collage pieces.

Though I am now a proud Mac owner, and still a productive soldier with my desktop and office-based Windows PC sitting in the desktop — with a brand new desktop PC on its way to replace the ailing model I have — I am proud to say I am OS agnostic.

It just took a lot of fear, uncertainty and doubt — and a risky credit card payment to prove it to myself — even if it was by force.

Now, who’s up for a crack at Ubuntu?


http://www.zdnet.com/blog/igeneration/are-you-an-operating-system-agnostic-hint-i-bet-you-are/11684

dimanche 24 juillet 2011

How Microsoft plans to sell a 'couple hundred million' more Windows 7 PCs before Windows 8

By Mary Jo Foley | July 22, 2011, 7:35am PDT

Summary

Given there’s still a year (give or take) until Windows 8 launches, what is Microsoft’s game plan to keep the bottom from dropping out of the Windows PC market?

Blogger Info

Mary-Jo Foley

As Microsoft’s fourth-quarter fiscal 2011 earnings made clear, Windows 7 sales — with the glaring exception of netbooks — are good, but not as good as they used to be. Given there’s still a year (give or take) s until Windows 8 launches, what is Microsoft’s game plan to keep the bottom from dropping out of the Windows PC market?

The enterprise market will likely keep Windows 7 sales chugging, as many larger businesses are only now finally deploying Windows 7, after months of planning and testing. And, as Microsoft execs said during yesterday’s earnings call, the emerging market countries are snapping up a lot of Windows 7, though at lower prices — and with substantially higher piracy rates — than the “developed” nations.

It’s probably safe to assume Microsoft will launch another upgrade-guarantee program, as it traditionally does a few months before a new operating system launch, allowing those purchasing current Windows-model PCs to get a free upgrade to the next Windows release once it’s out.

But Microsoft needs to keep consumer demand coming in for Windows 7 if the company plans to sell “those couple of hundred million PCs between now and ‘Windows 8′” that Microsoft expects to move, according to OEM Chief Steve Guggenheimer, who spoke at Microsoft’s recent Worldwide Partner Conference. (Note: Microsoft officials said that the company has sold 400 million Windows 7 licenses since the product was introduced in 2009.)

Even though Microsoft doesn’t make Microsoft-branded PCs, increasingly it is positioning itself as selling Windows PCs (no doubt thanks to a little lot of pressure from archrival Apple). This is one of the slides Microsoft General Manager of Worldwide OEM Distribution, Terry Hagerty, showed during her session on “OEM Through Distribution” (slide deck available to registered partner show attendees only) at the Worldwide Partner conference in Los Angeles on July 11.

(click on the image above to enlarge)

Microsoft has begun making available a “Windows 7 Featured PCs” list to distributors to try to get more information out about the breadth and depth of Windows 7 PCs available to consumers and businesses, Hagerty told her Partner Conference audience. This is a “best in class” list for sales, marketing and technical teams that Microsoft is hoping they use to “create excitement and demand for Windows 7 PCs.”


There are a number of Windows PC form factors and models that many current and potential users — who don’t go to trade shows where they can see lots of different Windows PC models from different vendors side-by-side — have no idea even exist. Retail chains usually only stock a few Windows PCs, and Microsoft brick-and-mortar stores, for now, are very few and far between. (Microsoft officials have said they plan to open 75 more MIcrosoft retail stores in the next two to three years, and will expand the stores internationally.)

(click on the image above to enlarge)

Here’s a sample of the July Windows 7 Featured PC list for consumers from Hagery’s slide deck:

(click on the image to enlarge)

Here’s a sample of the Windows 7 Featured PC list for businesses:


(click on the image to enlarge)

One observation: Microsoft isn’t touting any of the available Windows 7 PCs as “tablets” in these materials. It uses the word “companion” to describe slates/tablets in its two Featured PC sample pages. And the PC matrix slide above doesn’t use the “tablet” designation at all, either. Instead, it describes Windows “slates” as “PCs with no built-in keyboard or mouse and which use touch and/or pen for input.” Maybe Microsoft is trying to distance itself from its less-than-successful tablet past (and not-so-plucky tablet present)?

In any case, it will be interesting to see what happens with Windows and Windows 7 PC demand in the coming few months, as Microsoft finally begins sharing more specifics about Windows 8….

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/microsoft/how-microsoft-plans-to-sell-a-couple-hundred-million-more-windows-7-pcs-before-windows-8/10147

jeudi 21 juillet 2011

New Mac mini loses optical drive, gains Bluetooth 4.0

By Jason D. O'Grady | July 20, 2011, 9:00am PDT

Summary

Apple today announced a new Mac mini with a Sandy Bridge processor, Thunderbolt high-speed I/O port (like the MacBook Air) and no optical drive (like the MacBook Air).

Blogger Info

Jason D. O'Grady
David Morgenstern

Apple today announced a new Mac mini alongside new MacBook Airs and Mac OS 10.7 Lion.

Like the 3G MacBook Air, the updated Mac mini ships with Intel’s Sandy Bridge processor and a Thunderbolt high-speed I/O port. According to Apple’s press release the new Mac mini delivers up to twice the processor and graphics performance of the previous generation.

The new Mac mini comes in two desktop configurations and one server configuration:

Desktop configurations

  • 2.3GHz Intel Core i5, 500GB hard drive, 2GB RAM - $599
  • 2.5GHz Intel Core i5, 500GB hard drive, 4GB RAM - $799

Server configuration

  • 2.0GHz, dual 500GB hard drives, 4GB RAM - $999

Perhaps the most interesting development is that Apple has dropped the optical drive completely from the new mini. (Something I recommended two years ago.)

…if an app you need isn’t available from the Mac App Store, you can use DVD or CD Sharing. This convenient feature of OS X lets you wirelessly “borrow” the optical drive of a nearby Mac or PC. So you can install applications from a DVD or CD and have full access to an optical drive without having to carry one around.

The other option is to purchase Apple’s external SuperDrive ($79) which works with both the Mac mini and the MacBook Air.

The new Mac mini server configuration includes a 2.0GHz quad-core Intel Core i7 processor, Lion Server, 4GB RAM and dual 500GB hard drives for $999 (US). Configure-to-order options include adding up to 8GB RAM, two 750GB hard drives, or up to two 256GB solid state drives.

Update: MacRumors notes that the new Mac mini and MacBook Air support Bluetooth 4.0 and Bluetooth low energy:

…a new specification that offers ultra low-power data transfer and has been touted as opening the door to a host of new wireless peripheral devices.

The new Mac mini is the first to support discrete graphics:

The new Mac mini also makes a transition to discrete graphics on the high-end model, utilizing the AMD Radeon HD 6630M and offering up to twice the graphics performance of the previous generation. The low-end and server Mac mini models continue to utilize integrated graphics in the form of Intel HD Graphics 3000.

What do you like/dislike about the new Mac mini?

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/apple/new-mac-mini-loses-optical-drive-gains-bluetooth-40-updated/10604?alertspromo=&tag=nl.rSINGLE

Big files, Fast Internet? Lion download speeds

By Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols | July 20, 2011, 3:17pm PDT

Summary

No one with a slow Internet connection is going to relish downloading Mac OS X Lion’s 4GBs, but if you have the pipes, the downloads seem to be working quite well.

Blogger Info

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

My buddy Jason Perlow had a bad day. When he tried to download Mac OS X Lion’s 4GBs, he ran into an hour-and-a-half of online road-block. When the download finally did start though, he was able to download it, thanks to his 100Mbps Verizon Optimum Online Ultra connection in about half-an-hour.

So, which can you expect? An hour and a half of freeze or a relatively fast download? I say “relatively” fast because in a perfect world 4GBs on a 100Mbps connection should take about five minutes. To find out what other people were seeing, I did an informal, totally unscientific survey of my high-tech friends on Google+ and Twitter to see what their experiences were like.

And, the answer, if you’re lucky enough to have a real broadband connection, is: Fast.

One friend reported that “I must have gotten lucky. My download took less than 30 minutes on FiOS. Install, likewise, was half an hour. The entire process was far less painful than anything I’d experienced before. And that, frankly, is surprising…because I was expecting more snafus since Lion’s been positioned as a major upgrade.” FiOS, a fibre optic Internet service offer from Verizon speed ranges from 15Mbps to 150Mbps. He was running at 50Mbps.

Others, running everything from AT&T Uverse a DSL Internet service at 12Mbps tocable service users in the 15 to 100Mbps range saw download times ranging from 40 minutes to the guy with the 100Mbps connection who downloaded it in five minutes.

Me? I did it in 12-minutes with my newly configured Charter Ultra60 connection.

So, what does this mean?

Well, it seems to me that Akamai, the content delivery network (CDN) behind the Mac OS X Lion roll out, is doing a good job.

Akamai did its CDN magic by hosting Lion on over a thousand servers in multiple Internet backbone and end-user ISPs. In the case of Lion, Akamai preloaded mirrored copies of Lion. Thus when you bought Lion, your data request was sent to “closest,” in terms of distance, network load, and latency, Akamai server.

So why did Jason run into trouble? He thinks it was because Akamai’s distributed, front-end IP load-balanced methodology ran out of slots. I strongly suspect though that the blame goes to Apple’s datacenters.

In the Akamai model, no stream can start until its servers have been given the OK from the authorizing site. In this case, that would have been Apple and that sounds to me like exactly what happened.

All that said, this only really matters if you’re like me and my friends who have a fast broadband connection in the first place. Many of you, most of you, don’t.

According to Akamai’s State of the Internet report for the last reported quarter of 2010 in the United States only 34% of users have “high broadband connectivity.” That includes 27% of connections between 5 Mbps to 10 Mbps and only 7% reaching above 10 Mbps. That’s lousy.

Even at a 10Mbps connection, if all goes well, you’re looking at just under an hour to download Lion.

Now, I’m a big believer in cloud computing and devices that rely on them, like the Chromebook, but then I have the bandwidth to use them. I think Apple was premature in releasing Lion as a download only upgrade. For all too many users in 2011, a DVD would have been the better option for Lion. Going online for it should have been left as an option for those who are lucky enough to have serious broadband in our homes and offices.

Related Stories:

OS X Lion Awakens: Can Akamai handle downloads for Apple’s Cloud?

Why would you want ultra-fast broadband at home?

Netflix and the Internet bandwidth dilemma

Netflix: Bigger than cable. Too big for the Internet?

Akamai: Struggling with lumpy video traffic, competition

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http://www.zdnet.com/blog/networking/big-files-fast-internet-lion-download-speeds/1270

mercredi 20 juillet 2011

‘We view a tablet as a PC’: Microsoft chooses to repeat history

By James Kendrick | July 13, 2011, 5:36am PDT

Summary

It is beginning to look like Microsoft is about to repeat the Tablet PC history with Windows 8, and that is not a good thing.

Blogger Info

James Kendrick

Microsoft is trying to excite the tech crowd with Windows 8, the next version of the platform that the company is pushing for computers of all types, including tablets to compete with Apple’s iPad. The folks from Redmond have been showing early prototypes of Windows 8 that look a lot like the Windows Phone 7 interface, with live tiles sliding around the screen. It is obvious the attempt is to keep the Windows platform as the dominant line for Microsoft, while the rest of the mobile world has realized that full-blown computers are not what tablet customers want. It is beginning to look like Microsoft is about to repeat the Tablet PC history, and that is not a good thing.

“We view a tablet as a PC”.

This statement given yesterday by Windows Phone president Andy Lees at the Worldwide Partners Conference as reported by Electronista was directed at putting to bed any ideas that outsiders have for a tablet OS based on Windows Phone.

According to Microsoft’s transcript of Lees’ talk the PC theme remained, but had a few caveats (emphasis mine).

One of the key important things here, though, is the change that’s yet to happen, but it’s about to happen, and that is the bringing together of these devices into a unified ecosystem, because at the core of the device itself it’s possible to be common across phones, PCs, and TVs, and even other things, because the price drops dramatically. Then it will be a single ecosystem. We won’t have an ecosystem for PCs, and an ecosystem for phones, one for tablets. They’ll all come together. And just look at the opportunity here.

In 2010, if you count all of these things, there’s just under 700 million units sold in that year. And yet if you look at the predictions from IDC and add them up, that will increase to over a billion units that are sold in 2012. And notice how it’s additive; it’s not that this is about replacing the PC. And that’s why our strategy is that these new form factors are within a single ecosystem and not new ecosystems themselves. Windows has always spanned different PC form factors. And with Windows 8 we’re going to take this to a whole new level including tablets.

Now, a lot of people have asked me, are we going to produce a phone that is a tablet? You know, are we going to use Windows Phone 7 to produce tablets? Well, that is in conflict with this strategy. We view a tablet as a sort of PC. We want people to be able to do the sorts of things that they expect on a PC on a tablet, things like networking to be able to connect to networks, and utilize networking tools, to get USB drives and plot them into the tablet. To be able to do things like printing, all of the things using Office, using all of the things you would expect from a PC and provide a hybrid about how you can do that with the tablet, as well.

The comments shined a light on Microsoft’s view of the tablet market that is not accurate. It keeps alive the mistaken view that drove Microsoft’s Tablet PCs, that full-blown computers are what consumers want in a tablet. That didn’t work with the original Tablet PC, and that is not going to work for today’s consumer tablets. It’s looking like Microsoft is determined to repeat history, and a failed one at that.

Apple set the consumer space on its ear with the release of the iPad, the first tablet that breached the mainstream market in numbers. The iPad defined an entire market that has companies scrambling to penetrate, and none have done so successfully to date. What caught consumer’s eyes in the iPad was the fact that it wasn’t a full PC with all of the complexities those bring. No, the iPad was a pure mobile OS that focused on bringing a touch tablet experience that was simple yet full-featured enough to let users do the things that matter. Getting on the web, playing games and consuming media were the focus of the iPad with iOS, and consumers bought into the system by the millions.

The original Tablet PC designed by Microsoft is a full PC that nobody bought in significant numbers, and it has been around for a decade. The iPad sold more tablets in the first nine months than all of the Tablet PCs bought combined over a decade. That is a significant indicator of what consumers want, a simple mobile tablet and not a full-blown PC.

Microsoft seems to be pushing the ‘tablet as a PC’ philosophy in a desperate attempt to keep the Windows line driving everything it does outside the smartphone space. The choice to repeat history will likely have the same results as the first time; nice products that nobody buys because they are too complex to operate, maintain and develop apps for. Consumers don’t want tablets that are PCs, they want them to just work.

Top Five Linux Contributor: Microsoft

By Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols | July 17, 2011, 1:45pm PDT

Summary

While you shouldn’t expect Windows to be open-sourced in your life-time, Microsoft—yes, Microsoft—is the fifth largest code contributor to Linux 3.0.

Blogger Info

Paula Rooney
Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

Cats and dogs; apples and oranges; Linux and Microsoft. Two of these three things do not go together. Would you believe that Microsoft—yes Microsoft—was the fifth largest contributor to the soon to be released Linux 3.0 kernel? Believe it.

In a Linux Weekly News story, currently only available to subscribers, an analysis of Linux 3.0 contributors reveals that Microsoft was the fifth largest corporate contributer to Linux 3.0. While only 15h overall, that still puts Microsoft behind only Red Hat, Intel, Novell, and IBM in contributing new code to this version of Linux.

To be exact, Microsoft developer K. Y Srinivasan gets the credit for helping to improve Linux. Of course, as you might guess, neither Srinivasan nor Microsoft are doing this due to any particular love tor Linux per se.

The vast bulk of Microsoft’s contributions has been to its own Hyper-V virtualization hypervisor drivers. Hyper-V is Microsoft’s 64-bit hypervisor-based virtualization system. It’s Microsoft’s answer to VMware and Linux’s own native Kernel-based Virtualization Manager (KVM).

Microsoft you see wants it to be possible for both Linux to run Server 2008 R2 instances and for Windows 2008 R2 to run Linux instances using its own virtualizaton tools. Microsoft has been working on this for some time with Novell, now SUSE.

At first, this code wasn’t open-sourced at all, but in 2009, it was discovered that some GPL code was already in Hyper-V’s Linux drivers. So it was that “In a break from the ordinary, Microsoft released 20,000 lines of device driver code to the Linux community. The code, which includes three Linux device drivers, has been submitted to the Linux kernel community for inclusion in the Linux tree. The drivers will be available to the Linux community and customers alike, and will enhance the performance of the Linux operating system when virtualized on Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V or Windows Server 2008 R2 Hyper-V.”

It also helped, of course, that Microsoft, ever so reluctantly, has been forced to work with Linux to try to keep their market share. As Matt Asay, a noted open-source executive and author said at the time, “The news reflects Microsoft’s continued interest in lobotomizing its virtualization competition through low prices, but also the recognition that it must open up if it wants to fend off insurgent virtualization strategies from Red Hat, Novell, and others in the open-source camp.

In the months after that though Microsoft did little to improve its code. Indeed Greg Kroah-Hartman, who oversees code staging to the Linux kernel, has complained at times that “The [Microsoft] developers again seem to have disappeared, this is getting old” and he threatened to remove the code from Linux.

Microsoft seems to have finally gotten the message. In the last few months they’ve worked hard to improve Hyper-V and Linux interoperability.

This may not last, and it’s really only for Microsoft’s own goals, but for now, Microsoft, yes Microsoft, is a leading contributor to Linux. Now, in these days of miracles, let me see if I can get my dogs to stop barking at my neighbors’ cats.

Related Stories:

New Name, Same Linux

Could you do Linus “Linux” Torvalds job?

The Five Best Desktop Linux Distributions

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http://www.zdnet.com/blog/open-source/top-five-linux-contributor-microsoft/9254