Opinion at eWEEK: “It sounds like a small milestone, but the second release candidate of Service Pack 2 is a big deal—it’s the last rehearsal for the pack’s significant turns in security.”
Windows XP SP2: Trouble Ahead for Developers, Users
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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This is what happens when you to try to retrofit security in a service pack. all i have been hearing is bugs and problems
It broke Vmware for me. It also did not detect few programs(Outgoing) that were easily able to gain network access(and were not listed in programs allowed!) I hope these bugs get fixed before coming out
Well, you know – not everyone has the same problems.
I recently installed the latest (2149) service pack 2, and guess what NO PROBLEMS WHATSOEVER. I love the firewall, the updated Internet Explorer, and the fact that it somehow feels faster, though I can’t put my finger on what.
But yeah, it’s still a fricken RC people, wait for the official stable release before you go ballistic.
Normally I’m pretty happy with Windows, but SP2 RC2 makes my system unbearably slow. Explorer just freezes for minutes at a time when trying to display menus or the taskbar on my Pentium M laptop. I’m about to uninstall it, if I can stand the time it will take to get into the Add/Remove programs dialog.
*grr*
A recent article on Gamasutra, for game developers, about 64-bit processors AND service pack 2, and the “troubles” it can bring:
http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20040603/pournelle_01.shtml
(free registration). Worth a look.
Things are going to change – the strange part is; on one hand Microsoft get a lot of flak for not being serious about security flaws, and when they do, you still complain, because it breaks your precious apps. If you’re worth your salt as a developer, you fix those flaws in your apps.
After SP2, if your precious apps don’t work – don’t go bashing Microsoft, go bash the developers – they are the ones not following the rules, not MS. Please grow up.
Bashing Microsoft is mainstream now, what’re you gonna do about it?
I see your point, it is pretty true, not everything can be fixed at once, and it is still being designed. Maybe this is why they never really had RC’s before.
The thing is though, not everyone is a developer, and if apps start not working for a simple home user, things won’t be quite as easy for them to resolve, and this is where I see the problem.
Though, as its been said before, it’s still early, so this really isn’t the best thing to base what SP2 will really be like. It is kind of a sad twisted thing that happens with people huh? Not sure though, it just seems like it shouldn’t cause so many major problems, especially when RC1 seemed to be pretty smooth for the most part of me. My server runs it happily at least.
>Bashing Microsoft is mainstream now, what’re you gonna do >about it?
Grocers can’t sell improperly refrigerated goods.
Car mechanics are liable for the brake jobs they do.
Accountants must certify their work as accurate.
Doctors and nurses are liable for malpractice
Somehow commercial software companies and their developers are absolved of responsibility to produce quality work. That is why Microsoft gets bashed. If they stood behind their work it would be different.
From Mark Mansi’s book:
It is a fact, software products ship with known defects:
Ninety percent of reported bugs are already known at ship date
Fifteen bugs per 1000 lines of code is “normal”
Win2K will have 40,000,000 lines (Yes, that’s 600,000 bugs!)
Can you imagine this in cars? Food? Pacemakers?
Excerpt:
Mark began his program with a quote from none other than Microsoft’s Bill Gates. “The reason we come up with new versions is not to fix bugs. It’s absolutely not. It’s the stupidest reason to buy a new version that I ever heard… And so, in no sense, is stability a reason to move to a new version. It’s never a reason. You won’t get a single person to say they’d buy a new version because of bugs.”
I know, I don’t understand the software racket^W business.
Well, it could be faster because they rewrote a lot of core parts of the OS.
I’m only concerned here is that NPF 2004 will crash or no longer function when SP2 comes out. Symantec was hammered this year with this product and I think this could make it worse.
It broke my java apps(azaurus), UT2004 crashes every 15mins(but only if im playing online), and for some reason I cant use the scan function with my Epson CX3200.
Somehow commercial software companies and their developers are absolved of responsibility to produce quality work.
If you can develope a process for writing perfect software that’s as easy as keeping food refridgerated and numbers correctly added, then feel free to say that. Until then, you obviously don’t know what the heck you’re talking about because software development is a lot harder to do 100% correct than you think it is.
If they stood behind their work it would be different.
They have provided support for their products for much longer periods of time than any other software company, and probably more than any other company PERIOD.
Hey llyd,
I noticed you said IE was improved and that you like how it performs now. Have you noticed if it can display semi-transparent (alpha transparent) PNG images yet or has MS decided that they will continue to ignore what has been a W3C recommendation for years and an incredibly useful image format?
Is this all you do, troll Microsoft stories?
http://www.osnews.com/moderation.php?news_id=7362
http://www.osnews.com/comment.php?news_id=7135#239989
“If you can develope a process for writing perfect software that’s as easy as keeping food refridgerated and numbers correctly added, then feel free to say that. Until then, you obviously don’t know what the heck you’re talking about because software development is a lot harder to do 100% correct than you think it is. ”
Nobody said anything about 100%, but when you have a 90 plus percent marketshare (and thus greatest responsibility), charge the most for your OS, and it comes bundled on almost every PC at the store, then yes, customers do have the right to expect more, including that their apps will still work while you’re busy re-writing your OS. Afterall, with the vast amounts of manpower and money MS has to throw at it, Windows SHOULD undeniably be the best, securest and most structurally sound OS. The fact that it’s debatable all doesn’t say a whole lot for them. They’re hiring from the best schools, paying the most, and still having a hell of a time with their OS.
These are legitimate complaints. If the apps won’t run on it, the OS is useless…
I also have no problems with Service Pack 2. No BSOD here. It even works great with Stardock Windowblinds, Window Washer, Diskeeper Pro, Spy Sweeper and Norton Internet Security Pro. All these programs work like a jem.
You know what’s funny is that if this was Apple instead of MS people would be blaming the applications instead of Apple. They would be saying “No way can Apple make buggy products it has to be the applications for bringing their beloved Panther crashing all the time. Also these application had months to create a patch so don’t blame it on Apple.” But since it’s MS, it’s their fault for having applicatins breaking on them. It’s okay to put the blame on MS. These kinds of post get tiring to read.
I think we all can agree that we need this security. But personally even with the built in functionality, like the firewall, and prolly in longhorn an antivirus.
But I think microsoft should also consider default settings. example, re-evaluate the sucurity policies, and have “Wizards” for system Admins to setup each user for different privailages. Thats not to say they will not include this with longhorn, but we need tougher policies. I think the Login Administrator should be kept full privalige. I think the users that are setup during first boot, should be setup with not TRUE admin privalages.
I suppose this much security should be considered for D.O.D Applications but if WinXp Pro was setup like this, you would prolly have less worm, and virus spread.
Now if Anti-virus programs could have backup themselves.. Alot of virus and worms would be averted. I’m talking about basically 1 anti-virus programs have 2 different services so if a virus were to try to disable the avti-virus – the backup would remove the virus..
Kinda like the way virus copy themselves.
But as far as the way Windows runs programs with the no-execute, I would like to start to see more secure apps.
Either case, only the future and programmers hold the keys.
– iamcanadian
I made an integrated install cd with this the day it was announced, and installed it the next, after having tried a standard install of the SP on XP pro.
The slipstreamed installation so far has been flawless, while the standard network install had some issues that I couldn’t duplicate due to the mess I made of the system prior to installing the service pack.
Like everything, YMMV, but from the looks of the integrated install, once SP2 is done and released, it should be pretty solid.
This is what happens when you to try to retrofit security in a service pack. all i have been hearing is bugs and problems
You are so misguided that it’s not even funny anymore. Please get a clue so that we can have decent converstations.
Somehow commercial software companies and their developers are absolved of responsibility to produce quality work.
Very true. I’d imagine that after the first few years of actually being held accountable for their work that the quality of software would improve greatly.
Sometimes I really think that this is needed.
Does anyone know if the new version of IE will properly support .png images?
Specifically, I am interested in alpha transparecy (semi transparent or translucent image support)
Currently IE does not have this even though it has been a W3C recommendation for years and MS promised support but has yet to deliver on it.
The current release candidate of SP2 does *NOT* fix IE’s PNG support. I get the same results as I did with a fresh install of XP. Opera, of course, displays the images properly.
You know what’s funny is that if this was Apple instead of MS people would be blaming the applications instead of Apple. They would be saying “No way can Apple make buggy products it has to be the applications for bringing their beloved Panther crashing all the time. Also these application had months to create a patch so don’t blame it on Apple.” But since it’s MS, it’s their fault for having applicatins breaking on them. It’s okay to put the blame on MS. These kinds of post get tiring to read.
If apple or linux or any os did the same thing as m$ they would be treated the same. It just so happens other OS’es have not.
If you test it out on this page:
http://www.cit.gu.edu.au/~anthony/graphics/imagick5/trans_bug/
IE(6.0.2900.2096) on SP2RC2 does not support png transparency.
Give it a rest the LZW patent expired a year ago for the US, I believe it’s to expire this year for the EU. Use Gif.
Otherwise, sp2 is doing okay. Now lets see if coolwebsearch will exploit this version too!
oh and the popup stopper works pretty good too!
from this page
http://home.tephras.com/temp/PNG/index2.html
No, they simply ignored transparent/translucent PNGs. Thank you Microsoft.
And yeah, OK, another thing that ticks me off with SP2 is that Explorer gets MSN.COM as default page, EVEN if I’ve specifically asked it to do about:blank a few times already.
So there’s the crux.
Grocers can’t sell improperly refrigerated goods.
Car mechanics are liable for the brake jobs they do.
Accountants must certify their work as accurate.
Doctors and nurses are liable for malpractice
I wonder if a mechanic is liable for a brake job when you take your car home and pull the brake pads off yourself ?
Is it the fault of the accountant when you go in and screw up the books on your own ?
You think your doctor is going to be liable when you kill yourlself trying to do surgery ?
You can get reliable software and computers, thats not a problem. Just don’t expect to be able to download a damn thing or change your system settings if thats what you want.
dougsk said:
“Give it a rest the LZW patent expired a year ago for the US, I believe it’s to expire this year for the EU. Use Gif.”
You gotta fucking be joking.
Gif is no match for PNG. If you read my post, I was specifically indicating my interest in the variable opacity (alpha transparency) capabilities of PNG…something GIF does not have. GIFS are either fully transparent or fully opaque. PNG does not have such limitations…you can set it to any degree of opacity…making it still colorful but see through.
Additionally, GIF only supports 256, colors while PNG supports any. Additionally, PNG has tighter compression than GIF.
GIF is in no way a substitute for PNG.
The patent thing was never really an issue…it is the quality of the image that is important, and PNG is a standard which offers high quality whereas GIF is just crap.
http://www.w3.org/QA/Tips/png-gif
http://www.webopedia.com/DidYouKnow/Internet/2002/JPG_GIF_PNG.asp
Fixing the mess, what a massive job!
“After SP2, if your precious apps don’t work – don’t go bashing Microsoft, go bash the developers – they are the ones not following the rules, not MS. Please grow up.”
I can’t aggree. MS has established thru their many years of MS Windows an environment for developers that is full of bugs and inconsistent.
Developers have a pain to make their programs work with the “current” crop of windows.
And now you say that they are the blame?
What rules are they breaking? The non-writen and ever changing MS rules?
Please grow up!
BTW… Companies will not roll out SP2 if i know anything about company upgrade policies. You know… companies have a lot of legacy software around and part of those are no longer supported (the manufactors have folded out or the software as become “unsuported” by them).
So yes, SP2 will be usefull for the public at large… No, it won’t be that interisting to the corporate sector.
I rarely use Windows, mainly for games. However, I have to say something. The apps being broken in Xp were written BEFORE SP2. Some of the apps broken when I applied RC2 are some of the best written apps I have ever used. It is not the third party makers fault. It is something M$ should be considering. There has to be some balance there. You SHOULDN’T be willing to break existing apps, I a college student can’t afford to go out and by a new, compatible app, and have left warez alone about 2 years ago. Service Packs are important I know, but the security issues should have been implemented before the os shipped in the first place.
The environment in which software products operate is too complex and unpredictable to ever hope to enforce blanket liability of the software vendors. Leaving aside the issues of what other software products are installed, even the hardware in the machines affects the environment, by way of hardware drivers. Unless and until the hardware platforms and/or the drivers for the hardware are severely limited, no software vendor will ever be able to test against even 1% of the unique environments in which the software will operate.
Now, all that having been said, perhaps an approach based on a small number of reference platforms (*all* aspects of hardware and software environment are determined) could be used to define a setting in which software products should have no problems. Or, make vendors publish hardware and software specs of the machines they used in testing and hold them accountable if a given defect is found also to occur on machines with one of the vendor’s published configurations.
The environment in which software products operate is too complex and unpredictable to ever hope to enforce blanket liability of the software vendors
Right.
So cars, planes, space shuttles, mediacal equipment (all of which contain computers (complete with ever more complex software) in this day and age) are less complex? What a stupid argument. Making software vendors liable for their products can only be a good thing in the long run, and it’s no more impossibale than making anyone else who provides goods or services liable.
From Mark Mansi’s book:
It is a fact, software products ship with known defects:
Ninety percent of reported bugs are already known at ship date
Fifteen bugs per 1000 lines of code is “normal”
Win2K will have 40,000,000 lines (Yes, that’s 600,000 bugs!)
These stats are interesting but somewhat alarmist. There may well be that many bugs, but that doesn’t mean they are all important. E.g. suppose there was a bug that made the logon screen pink where it used to be blue, for one minute at 00:01 on September 6th 2010, if you had ATI drivers and a USB mouse. Is that an important bug? There’s little impact and most users won’t see it.
Yes, many bugs will be important but the majority are minor (frequently just cosmetic) and obscure. Personally, I wouldn’t get too wound up by those numbers.
Now, if Windows had 600,000 bugs that could cause system STOP events, that might be a problem.
So cars, planes, space shuttles, mediacal equipment (all of which contain computers (complete with ever more complex software) in this day and age) are less complex?
To a point, yes. All the things you mentioned are highly complex, but they have the fundamental advantage of having known hardware to operate on. Rigid systems (as opposed to flexible ones) are vastly easier* to produce robust code for and to test once development is complete. The big enemy of software on PCs is the sheer number of variables – what drivers are installed, what software is running, what user rights are there, is this a network or local file, etc.
Interfacing with an on-off switch is comparatively easy.
* Yes, I appreciate this is still a complex exercise.
Forgot something…
Making software vendors liable for their products can only be a good thing in the long run, and it’s no more impossibale than making anyone else who provides goods or services liable.
This is largely true (certainly more so) in the cases you listed. And, indeed, there are often penalty clauses and other legal comebacks for software vendors making bespoke, embedded systems. Not to mention the processes are more rigid in the fields of aircraft, medical equipment, etc. because they can be.
Hi Buddy
Was kinda expecting you around,
see this for an interesting discussion. read till the end
http://groups.google.com.au/groups?selm=5543dq%24qjd%40engn…
I dont think i can have a decent conversation with you at the other end. Period.
Mostly good points you have there, but I still stand by the fact that things would be better were software people liable for dammages. Hell, it might result in more uniformity on the hardware side if that’s the only thing that could keep (for example) MS or Red Hat or FreeBSD from being sued endlessly for low quality releases.
Yeah, I know that Red HAt and FreeBSD were really bad examples there. Perhaps I should have said MS, Apple, IBM, etc.
i’ve seen posts that claim SP2 makes the system faster and more responsive, and they attribute this to “core services rewritten” and other posts claim SP2 makes the system slower and more sluggish, and they attribute this to “running background security related services”
i’m curious as to what most people think
There are better browsers out there, but if your restricting yourself to vendor lock-in hey that’s fine, lots of people do it. There isn’t much shame, but if you want something fixed (eg your semitransparent images using png), your just going to have to wait for MS to tell you whats right for you. Those are the realities of being dependant on a closed-source platform.
Either further investigate your, and your users, needs (eg alpha channel png) or change platforms. There isn’t much choice so long as IE is preventing you from suceeding.
I’m running SP2rc2 on an Athlon 2600 with 1 gig 3200 DDR on a 7200 rpm drive and a gainward nv5200-128. I have noticed a bit of a slowdown whilst running RealVNC. I think IE seems to render some pages a bit faster. The only ‘bug’ was having to manually re-enter my ip/netmask/gw/dns addresses. Otherwise I haven’t noticed any significant differences.
I stopped using IE several years ago…I am now on Mozilla FireFox.
The reason why PNG is an issue is that I, being the webmaster for several NASA web sites, am forced to consider the masses/IE using sheep.
PNG is an available W3C recommended standard that IE does not support properly. If they did, I would be allowed to use them in my designs at work, but I am currently prohibited from doing so.
Just having PNG alone properly supported would also drastically improve my work flow as it would mean that I could simply use Fireworks in conjunction with Dreamweaver, without having to “export” anything (Fireworks native file format is PNG, which btw also stores layers).
On personal sites, I one the otehr hand do nothing to help IE users. They can look at gray images all they like. A link to Mozilla.org is always available with “Get a real browser” if IE is detected.
from what i understand the worst bugs are the ones that lead to memory faults, like some line of code getting passed a memory address that a earlyer line of code told the system was no longer in use. end result? program nosedives and takes whatever it can with it…
then there are code that uses bad but effective techniques to get extra speed. just read joels piece about microsoft looseing the windows api to see the problem. you either get stability or you get backwards compatiblity. that is unless you run your older software in a kind of emulator/sandbox where you allow for the old flaw they use to still work (but silently redirect it into controlled forms)…
first of all i cant understand why anyone would ‘love’ the firewall. The first thing i did was turn it off and use zonealarm instead. And yes png is a big deal-more important is the general stagnation of the web. Moz is getting css3, mathml, svg etc and the only real feature for IE is popup blocking-something you can already on 500 toolbars?
I also noticed sp2 is much slower though of course it’s still beta
“On personal sites, I one the otehr hand do nothing to help IE users. They can look at gray images all they like. A link to Mozilla.org is always available with “Get a real browser” if IE is detected.”
Well, I will enjoy looking at your sites with all gray images. Heck, I’ll just aviod them all together and go to IE friendly sites.
I’d hate to see the developers reactions. This more than substantiates Joel’s claims about Microsoft losing the API war to the web. Also it is interesting to see that Microsoft is still trying to hold web standards down by not updateing IE.
Grocers can’t sell improperly refrigerated goods.
Car mechanics are liable for the brake jobs they do.
Accountants must certify their work as accurate.
Doctors and nurses are liable for malpractice.
You are not comparing fairly. Consider:
Farmers are not liable if their products are improperly refrigerated by the grocer.
Brake component manufacturers are not liable for mechanics’ work.
Calculator manufacturer aren’t liable for accountants’ accuracy.
Pharmaceutical companies aren’t liable for doctors inappropriately prescribing their drugs.
Somehow commercial software companies and their developers are absolved of responsibility to produce quality work.
It’s not like free software developers are any different in this regard.
That is why Microsoft gets bashed. If they stood behind their work it would be different.
They do, it’s just that lots of people aren’t prepared to pay for it.
It is a fact, software products ship with known defects:
Ninety percent of reported bugs are already known at ship date
Fifteen bugs per 1000 lines of code is “normal”
Win2K will have 40,000,000 lines (Yes, that’s 600,000 bugs!)
The vast bulk of which the typical user will never see.
Again, if people were prepared to *pay* for certified, bug-free software (and also be prepared for *vastly* less functionality, or *greatly* extended release schedules) then they’d get it. Unfortunately I doubt many people are prepared to pay tens – if not hundreds – of thousands of dollars for consumer software.
Can you imagine this in cars? Food? Pacemakers?
Not a valid comparison. For starters, those things you’ve pointed out involve people dying when they break.
Modern cars have been in production for decades. The processes and methods are very well understood and honed to perfection. The technologies and processes vehicle manufacturing builds on have been around for *centuries*. They are also relatively simple pieces of equipment with limited functionality.
Pacemakers are even simpler and more limited. They hardly do anything – of course they’re easy to make reliable (reliability is inversely proportional to complexity, all else being equal).
Food preparation and handling has been perfected over thousands of years.
Software development hasn’t even made it to the point of “engineering” yet, despite what some people might try to tell you. It’s still far more art than science and the processes are still poorly understood, inefficient and constantly under heavy development. The tools are similarly immature. Software development is simply to young and immature a field to produce low cost, reliable products. Nor is it helped in the slightest by a similarly young and immature hardware industry.
To put it bluntly, it’s amazing software like Windows or Linux runs as well as it does.
Excerpt:
Mark began his program with a quote from none other than Microsoft’s Bill Gates. “The reason we come up with new versions is not to fix bugs. It’s absolutely not. It’s the stupidest reason to buy a new version that I ever heard… And so, in no sense, is stability a reason to move to a new version. It’s never a reason. You won’t get a single person to say they’d buy a new version because of bugs.”
That’s exactly right. New versions of software are to introduce *new features*, not fix bugs. Patches are to fix bugs. Service packs are to fix bugs. Point releases are to fix bugs.
This is mirrored in most industries. New cars aren’t developed to fix the “bugs” in existing models, they’re produced to introduce newer, better features.
I know, I don’t understand the software racket^W business.
That’s because you’re comparing it to mature industries. If you want to make valid comparisons, you need to look back to when the industry you want to compare to was similarly young.
So cars, planes, space shuttles, mediacal equipment (all of which contain computers (complete with ever more complex software) in this day and age) are less complex?
Hell, yes. The software in those devices are orders of magnitude less complex than a general purpose OS.
Not to mention it often costs phenomenally more and [has to] undergo much more testing.
The software in cars, the shuttle, medical equipment, etc only has to interoperate with a tiny set of extremely well known hardware and software, with well known and defined failure modes. It only has to perform a very small number of tasks. It’s relatively simple to model in an FSM. Etcetera.
The software in things like cars, microwaves, medical equipment, watches, etc is so much more reliable *because* it’s so much more simple – comparititively, it hardly does anything at all.
It’s not especially difficult to make a fairly reliable system, HOWEVER, you’ll have to sacrifice features, flexibility and money to do so. Why do you think companies like Oracle only certify their software on a handful of OSes in specific configurations ?
Making software vendors liable for their products can only be a good thing in the long run, and it’s no more impossibale than making anyone else who provides goods or services liable.
Well, it’s probably true that making software developers more liable would likely improve the overall quality of software, but:
* Who’s going to pay for it ?
* What about OSS ?
Nobody said anything about 100%, but when you have a 90 plus percent marketshare (and thus greatest responsibility), charge the most for your OS, and it comes bundled on almost every PC at the store, then yes, customers do have the right to expect more, including that their apps will still work while you’re busy re-writing your OS.
If you’re going to criticise, at least pick a valid criticism. Microsoft’s commitment to, and execution of, backwards compatibility and legacy support is pretty much unparalleled in the industry.
In any case, Microsoft aren’t rewriting their OS. They already did that back in the late 80s/early 90s (and managed to keep excellent legacy support and backwards compatibility throughout).
Shit, you can run 20 year old DOS 2.0 binaries on XP.
Afterall, with the vast amounts of manpower and money MS has to throw at it, Windows SHOULD undeniably be the best, securest and most structurally sound OS. The fact that it’s debatable all doesn’t say a whole lot for them. They’re hiring from the best schools, paying the most, and still having a hell of a time with their OS.
THey’re also working under a lot more constraints than most everyone else.
Hell, yes. The software in those devices are orders of magnitude less complex than a general purpose OS.
My point being that these things were pretty damned complex before people started putting computers in them.
Not to mention it often costs phenomenally more and [has to] undergo much more testing.
Which is more important in the long run? Costs of testing, or costs associated with people dying when something important goes really wrong because of poor coding?
Well, it’s probably true that making software developers more liable would likely improve the overall quality of software, but:
* Who’s going to pay for it ?
* What about OSS ?
The people who make the software will pay for it (if it breaks), and I’d imagine that most of the really crappy OSS projects (which weren’t going anywhere anyway) would be (rightly) abandoned. Don’t worry though, Linux will still have the OSDL and whatever corporation that has decided to play along to pay some of the bills, and OpenBSD and NetBSD at least are so well written right now that they’d likely not get sued too often either, so what’s your point here?
The whole idea about making vendors liable is to increase the quality of software in general, if a number of proprietary and OSS developers can’t handle mandatory quality (competance?) requirements, then other, more worthy people and software will take their place.
The software in things like cars, microwaves, medical equipment, watches, etc is so much more reliable *because* it’s so much more simple – comparititively, it hardly does anything at all.
Perhaps what is needed is simpler software, better architectures, etc. Microkernels and OSs based on them would look mightly nice in comparison to monolithic ones when it’s a developer’s (or his/her parent companies’) ass on the line if their product breaks things, makes others lose millions needlessly, or kills people. And don’t get started on the fact that such calamities are not yet common, as it’s only now that computers are becoming a requirement for all kinds of business everywhere, and like you implied, software is only getting more bloated and complex.
If this breaks games, people aren’t going to install it at home… that’ll actually make the virus/worm problem worse, assuming there are holes fixed in SP2 that won’t be documented until after SP2 is released.
If this breaks games, the games won’t be patched. Publishers are killing game developers off left and right, or laying off most of the staff that worked on a game just after it ships. It’s hard to get patches for current games now, let alone ones that have come out since XP was released.
So home users aren’t generally going to install this, or it’s to grow a “compatibility” feature that lets you run “old” programs without the increased security (kinda like how you can run apps in “compatibility” mode now if they’ve got Win95-specific crap in them).
– chrish
Grocers can’t sell improperly refrigerated goods.
Car mechanics are liable for the brake jobs they do.
Accountants must certify their work as accurate.
Doctors and nurses are liable for malpractice
Somehow commercial software companies and their developers are absolved of responsibility to produce quality work.
Jeb,
Are you really employed by the Food and Drug Administration, USA?
Here is newsflash for you:
A) Smoking kills people. No ifs and buts.
Still, tobacco and tobacco products are sold freely- it is easier to sue Microsoft for defects in software than tobacco company for death and sufferings of consumers of its product.
B) Flu shots make small percentage of people sick, and they actually kill a few people yearly. Yes, they do. Unexpected allergies and bad reaction to the shot.
In addition, in some cases flu shots are not for the right variant of a flu- they are inefficient, which kills even more people dying from the flu.
Who was held liable for that: doctors, nurses, pharma-companies? Nobody. It’s a fact of life- flu shots kill few people, work for most of people.
C) Cars- every car manufacturer knows their defect ratio, and it is not zero. In fact, defect ratio is 3% or more, meaning that at least one out of 30 new cars at a dealer’s lot is defective.
Go visit dealership, count number of cars- if more than 30, one of them has a defect. It was built with a defect, it was delivered to dealer by manufacturer with the knowledge that defect exists somewhere, and it will be sold defective.
Now, what that you said about car mechanics and, by association, about automotive industry? Have you seen any company found liable for industry standard defect ratio in new cars?
D) Grocers, at least in a place I live, can sell expired food given that it is properly labelled and expiration date is not altered. I bet FDA is sending stormtroopers to my county to stop that. I am so sure. Let me look to the window- well, nobody there. Not yet, I would assume. I’ll check 6 o’clock news (that was sarcasm).
Life sucks, Jeb. Every day people risk their health and lives because everything, yes, absolutely everything you can imagine is not 100% defect free.
Software is only part of it, and what I have found is that it’s usually geeks (who spend too much with computer an too little with everything else) have problems realizing that sad fact: software is the least of our every day problems.