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Today Steve Ballmer, Microsoft’s CEO was ordered to testify in court regarding the publicized case regarding the “Vista Capable” advertising campaign that Microsoft set up for computer manufactures. The issue with the case is that the requirements for being Vista Capable were too low and could only run the most basic version of Vista which is Basic. That was while they were also advertising all the new features of Vista that for the most part aren’t in Vista Basic like Aero. I knew about it some when I bought my laptop a few years ago and I can say that from my experience that most machines sold then would barely run Vista much less any reasonable distribution. I was in on the beta testing and I can say that Vista was a very heavy OS when in development requiring a lot of hardware. Some issues for example were the requirements allowing 1GB of ram. That on Vista is dreadfully slow compared to XP. Then “Vista Capable” machines were allowed to ship with graphics that couldn’t even run the Aero effect which was widely publicized and advertised. To get a Machine to run Vista decent at that time was about $1000 or a little more but they bent the rules in hopes of selling more units thus more copies of Windows. I know my laptop which is a HP DV5178 would do ok but it ran $1200 and I knew exactly what I was getting unlike most consumers that when you say video card they say “What?”. My laptop had at that point 1GB of ram a 1.66 Core Duo processor, Nvidia go7400 graphics and a 100GB SATA hard drive. I still think that the 1GB of ram would be iffy but I easily upgraded to 2GB for $20.

My views are kind of neutral but what I didn’t like were the uneducated salesmen that tried to sell anything without making the customer aware of such issues during that time. I find that even though what a customer really wants may not be in there budget but at least I feel they got the best solution and understand why it is the best for them. That doesn’t have to be real detailed but enough for them to feel good and to know what they are getting into. I find that they came back to me as well. Also eventually the sales people started coming up or asking me to come over and give better advice. I made a point though while at the computer store even though I was a customer I would chime in and help people out since half the time the salesman was clueless. There was nothing better than the feeling you got from knowing you helped someone get the right product and when you know that they will be happy for a longer period of time.

Well tonight I thought about something I saw on a guest speakers computer this week and it really interested me. So I decided to check into it. Windows docks really have come a ways since a few years ago when I last tried them.

I found that there are 2 major docks that are in use and are active. Rocket dock and Object dock. I tried out the free version of Object Dock though and Rocket Dock is free.

They both have some key advantages from what I have noticed in a couple minutes of use. Rocket Dock to me is simpler and it gives you the option to re open an applications window based off of the apps icon vs having minimized images for each window in Object Dock. However, Object Dock is good for when you maximize windows as it disappears automatically like the desktop I guess, where on Rocket Dock you can have auto hide like the windows task bar but that is not the same having to mouse around down there to get it back up. I think it is just personal preference as to the one you choose but personally I like Rocket Dock more.

Rocket Dock

Object Dock

The Rocket Dock site is a little slow so here is a link to it. It is 6.2MB.
It works on 2000/XP/Vista and they say that they don’t support XP 64bit or Vista 64. However, it is running on my Vista HP 64bit just fine.

Well, Yesterday google apparently maid an agreement with Viacom to protect everyones privacy. Google will now turn over info that blanks out the user names as well as the IP addresses which Viacom was actually seeking. However, Google employees that violated copyrights may be opened up to them. So it won’t be as bad as originally thought for now. Plus I feel it looks good for Google since they are respecting peoples rights of privacy.

Links:

http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/08/07/15/149202.shtml

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/212226/google-wins-agreement-to-anonymise-youtube-logs.html

Well many may already know that at age 52, Bill Gates retired on friday. But there is a lot of talk going around about the future of Microsoft. Well one new thing I saw recenly was Microsoft’s PBX sitter video. I think it might be showing Microsofts new vision which I think is right on target. Not only adding features but coding the software better. Making it more optimized to run faster and having fewer errors. One thing still stands today though after Microsoft quit shipping out copies of windows XP today. While the only other microsoft option is Vista which is notorious for having more than its fair share of problems is the only other OS available. But there is already a trend that is currently taking place that I and probably most other people weren’t aware about. Google was able to entice some software developers away from Microsoft a while back but they are now returning back to Microsoft citing that they value software reliability and readiness for consumers more than google. So it basically means people who used to work on the well liked XP are now returning to microsoft. So to me in the last few days I think I am really seeing a positive change happening over at microsoft. Plus I have seen a little bit of chatter about microsoft recognizing the open source community and linux.