Microsoft and RIM have announced that RIM has licensed Redmond's exFAT patents. The press release contains a ridiculous amount of hyperbole nonsense, and if you translate it into regular people speak, it basically comes down to RIM paying Microsoft protection money for stupid nonsensical software patents. Ridiculous articles like like this make it seem as if we're talking about patents on major technological breakthroughs, but don't be fooled: this is because for some inexplicable reason, we're using crappy FAT for SD cards.
To view parent comment, click here.
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
Member since:2006-07-16
Because many people do extract their SD card from their camera or mobile phone and insert it into their laptops.
Try to do that with ext3 and you've got yourself into three problems:
- Not supported out-of-the box on Mac and Windows
- Even after installing a driver, the support is not that good. Unless you go for a commercial implementation, such as Paragon's, and that means royalties. And if you are going to pay royalties, well, wtf, pay them to Microsoft and get FAT, which does not neeed a driver!
- Some people will try the SD card on a computer where the driver is not installed, they will receive the infamous "unknown partition" message and bitch about having lost all their data
So essentially going for FAT or anything which is supported out of the box by Windows and works acceptably well is the best business decision. Props if it also works out of the box and reasonably well on Mac. Linux? No need to care about them.
Member since:2006-07-04
Member since:2006-01-03
How about one of the filing systems supported by OSX, like UFS? It is a powerful filing system, with source code available under a BSD license, and compatible out of the box with Macs. It would get along fine with the Linux and iOS kernels that make up 95% of the smartphone market, and a huge slice of the HD-Tv market, the set-top box market and the embedded market in general.
Only Microsoft would be left out, but they have already stated that the BSD license is palatable to them, and if this were official they might could keep face by adopting a "multimedia standard"
Member since:2009-05-19
Member since:2006-07-04
The third and final WWDC product I want to talk about is - of course - OS X 10.9 Mavericks. While iOS 7 was clearly the focus of this year's WWDC, its venerable desktop counterpart certainly wasn't left behind. Apple announced OS X 10.9 Mavericks, the first OS X release not to carry the name of a big cat.
We already talked about iOS 7 yesterday (after a night of sleep, it's only looking worse and worse - look at this, for Fiona's sake!), so now it's time to talk about the downright stunning and belly flutters-inducing new Mac Pro. As former owner and huge, huge, huge fan of the PowerMac G4 Cube - I haven't been this excited about an Apple product since, well, I would say the iMac G4. This is the Apple I used to love.
Apple held its big keynote event thing at WWDC earlier this evening, but since I was away with friends I've had to read up on it later in the evening. The company announced iOS 7, OS X 10.9 Mavericks, and they gave a preview of the new Mac Pro. Especially the Mac Pro impressed me, and while iOS 7's new Holo/Metro-inspired theme looks messy and garish to me, I do commend Apple for finally breaking the mold. This news item will focus on iOS 7 - I'll dive into the Mac Pro and OS X 10.9 tomorrow (it's late here now).
And yes, the PRISM scandal is far, far from over. More and more information keeps leaking out, and the more gets out, the worse it gets. The companies involved have sent out official statements - often by mouth of their CEOs - and what's interesting is that not only are these official statements eerily similar to each other, using the same terms clearly designed by lawyers, they also directly contradict new reports from The New York Times. So, who is lying?This story is getting bigger and bigger. Even though most Americans probably already knew, it is now official: the United States government, through its National Security Agency, is collecting the communications and data of all American citizens, and of non-Americans using American services, through a wide collaboration with the large companies in technology, like Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, and so on. Interestingly enough, the NSA itself, as well as the US government, have repeatedly and firmly denied this massive spying on Americans and non-Americans took place at all.Ah, patents - the never-ending scourge of the technology industry. Whether wielded by companies who don't actually make any products, or large corporations who abuse them because they can't compete in the market place or because they're simply jerks, they do the industry a huge disservice and are simply plain dangerous. According to The Wall Street Journal (circumvention link), president Obama is about to take several executive actions to address patent trolls - which may seem like a good idea, but I am very worried that all this will do is strengthen the positions of notorious patent system abusers such as Apple and Microsoft.
With version 13.05, the developers of the Genode OS Framework take measures to ensure that Genode continues to scale well with a growing number of users and the steadily broadening platform coverage. Further highlights are the improved SoC support for Exynos 5, OMAP4, Raspberry Pi, i.MX, and new components for realizing headless systems.At the D11 conference, Apple CEO Tim Cook once again took the stage to be interviewed by Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher. While most of the interview can be replicated by picking and reading 10 random Apple fanblog stories - there were still a number of very interesting things that warrant some closer scrutiny.
So, the Xbox One disaster continues. Microsoft's policy for dealing with the used games market has reportedly leaked - and it's a clear and direct attack to destroy the used games market. Prices for used games will be set at the retail value of a new game, and retailers have to hook into Microsoft's computer systems and comply with Microsoft's terms and conditions.At an event earlier today, Microsoft unveiled the next Xbox - the third model, but confusingly named Xbox One. The big focus was TV, integrated Kinect, and all the other stuff we all expected to be forced down our throats. I think it took them 25 minutes to actually come to what should be the core of the story: gaming. Nothing groundbreaking in the gaming department, except for how Microsoft intends to handle the used games market and borrowing games from friends: pay up, buddy!
Member since:
2012-01-13
Most SD-cards never get exchanged between devices. So, why doesn't RIM simply choose a good an affordable (read: free) file system? ext3, etx4, reiser, jfs....
Why choose exFAT, which is a)worse and b)more expensive?
I mean, Microsoft isn't exactly known for state of the art filesystems, or did I miss something?