More details of the second coming surfaced yesterday when Mary Jo reported a few tips she had received about the upcoming Windows Vista Service Pack 1 beta to be released later this month, including a very basic list of functionality and performance improvements. However a day prior, a Microsoft employee silently outlined a critical flaw in Windows Vista’s ReadyBoost feature and mentioned SP1 would include the fix – a rare occasion under the new Gorbachev Sinofsky administration.

Robert Hensing, a security engineer at Microsoft, wrote on his blog (update: since been removed, Blake Handler has some quotes) about a performance flaw in ReadyBoost which severely hindered the responsiveness after resuming from standby (S3) or hibernate (S4) due to an architectural bug. The problem causes irregular and unnecessary hard-disk thrashing after resume which can take up to 8 minutes to settle down – ironically the outcome is the exact opposite of ReadyBoost‘s purpose to increase responsiveness by caching. The cause is a simple yet stupid oversight in the design of ReadyBoost’s security system which encrypts all cache-data with an AES-128 encryption key, a great idea badly implemented.

You see, Vista ‘forgets’ the key after resuming from sleep which invalidates all the ReadyBoost data already held in the memory device forcing it to flush and start over. Yes that’s right, gigabytes worth of good and otherwise usable cache-data which could actually be used to improve system responsiveness, down the drain. Mind you, this is all happening seconds after you’ve opened your lid or pressed the power button, a time when all processor cycles should be focused on getting the system back and running, not wasted to something as stupid as this.

I don’t know how such an obvious oversight can be made by the ReadyBoost team – was resuming never tested? Or was this just something they couldn’t fix in time, if so, how was this ever allowed to ship in the first place? But history aside, it’s a good thing it will be fixed in SP1 along with a batch of other anomalies. I guess now I should join the “need SP1” bandwagon since I actively use ReadyBoost.

It’s interesting to see now that after SP1 has been (informally) announced what the “only-install-Vista-after-SP1 crowd” will think. Are they going to stick to their original cause or move on to “only-install-Vista-after-SP2”. Some people have already moved on to the latter.

And to meet my monthly Sinofsky-quota, “General Secretary Sinofsky, if you seek enthusiasm, if you seek publicity for Microsoft and Windows, if you seek feedback, come here to this gate. Mr. Sinofsky, open this gate. Mr. Sinokfsy, tear down this wall!”

Editorial note: This information was originally spotted by Josh Philips of WindowsConnected.com. However due to work demands he could not write about this sooner. All credits for this extra insight into Vista SP1 should go to Josh.

Update: I’m really surprised the Sinofsky administration has yet to figure out that censorship does not work, which is why Robert Hensing has removed his original post. A summary and quote of his post can be found on Blake Handler’s blog.

Update 2: Robert Hensing’s post has reappeared and it looks like he’s offering a new explanation for the sluggishness during resume from sleep. He’s no longer blaming ReadyBoost as the cause of the problem, however I’m still having resuming problems so I’m not too sure what’s going on just yet.

Three months ago almost everyone wondered (or at least one nosy blogger did) what happens when three amazingly talented Microsoft employees leave to form their own startup company would do and could achieve. Of course I’m referring to the amazing trio – Hillel, Walter and Jenny at Jackson Fish Market. If you still think they’re selling fresh seafoods, please stop reading this blog immediately.

It wasn’t entirely clear, for me at least, what they were doing. For that cause, I’ve been straining my tiny brain cells trying to figure out exactly what they mean by “making software for consumers” – a simple concept on the surface yet unbelievably cryptic at the same time. If they wanted to make software for people, why didn’t they stay at Microsoft then? [Insert witty Steve Sinofsky joke]. Followed by more hints at “branded software experiences“. Did they just want to be a design studio? A consulting agency? It would have been hard to believe three successful Microsoft leads would do something so ‘average’.

But now their focus much clearer. Today, in fact only a few hours ago, they have launched their first Jackson Fish “Experience” – “They’re Beautiful!” – an interactive virtual flower gifting service that really lives up to the name. In fact, so real I actually thought for the first 10 minutes or so looking at the website they were selling real flowers, silly me. Don’t judge a book by it’s cover definitely applies here.

This was definitely a first-time experience for me with virtual flowers. A simple Google search for “virtual flowers” delivers an abundance of results, so I’m obviously under-educated in this field. I figured the top three results are probably the best the industry has to offer so I decided to check them out, and what horrible experiences they were.

In other words, I think I’m beginning to fall for the “branded software experiences” buzz too. Whatever magic is behind this wonderful application/service, it’s working. There’s definitely the Jenny Lam touch on the graphics here – everything is pixel perfect and drop dead gorgeous. When you ‘water’ your plants, a little angel comes and sprinkles H2O on your plants, you have to see it to believe it! Apparently plants even die if you don’t water them. They’ve even made it easy to ‘share’ your plants on your blog (right). I guess details like that puts the “experience” in software.

In terms of a business model “They’re Beautiful” fits right in with the truckloads of other Web 2.0 applications, “what money?”. Since there’s nothing more than little pixel flowers flying around it’s not so bad for them, but you have to wonder how they plan to make a buck. Nevertheless, free is good and I’m definitely going to use this service because of it. If you’re my friend, look forward to some flowers flying your way! If you’re not, then tough luck.

For what it’s worth, this is the sort of people Microsoft and Windows have lost. It’s a shame, but at the same time an exciting adventure for someone like myself, a Microsoft enthusiast. But all hope is not lost, I know the ‘new’ people who’s taking over shares similar levels of passion and enthusiasm for their work. We’ll just have to wait and see I guess. But I’m going to water my flowers for the time being. 🙂

Update: I just sent about 25 flowers to some people I know. Wow, I think I’m in love with this service. Only a few clicks, yet every single one of them was unique.

I found these two nuggets from the Live Earth Film Project archives – shining a light of funny on the gloom of global warming. I know some of you might be overloaded and frankly a little sick of the whole awareness-building phenomenon, but I swear to you these are worth every second of your time.

“Bob & Harry: The Last Two Polar Bears.”
View the high quality Quicktime version
View the YouTube segments (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3)

“A beginner’s guide to giving a damn about climate change.”

Update: The first video still has codec problems – video is a little jittery. Trying to fix.
Update 2: First video has encoding problems, unable to be fixed. I’ve provided some links to alternate versions since I cannot embed them.

A “Live” product the world should be proud of. If you don’t want to watch it for a cause, enjoy the good music anyway.

Continue reading →

When the blogs catch fire, there’s really no stopping, even when it’s burning the wrong house. I’ve made several mistakes in the past so this is not a cheap shot at other bloggers, but something like this clearly demonstrates how susceptible blogs can become to misinformation spreading like wild fire and how that problem can be compounded by the Chinese-whispers effect.

In this case, a video-on-demand software made by British developer, Skinkers, can be mislabeled as “Microsoft’s Joost-killer” when it’s not made by Microsoft at all. To be honest I was about to make the same mistake when Josh Phillips first introduced me to LiveStation, but it really doesn’t take much to investigate and find out in fact it’s made by the “Skinkers” company.

Understandably one might be easily misled by the “Live” branding, affiliation with Microsoft Research as a technology partner and the interview with Microsoft UK’s Steve Clayton as possible indication this was a Microsoft project.

The real surprise came when the streams of A-listers jumped on the story without really investigating the real story. May I be so bold as to suggest some of these bloggers fought so hard to get the story out sooner than doing any real facts-checking? I’m no blogosphere-expert but it’s not the first time this has happened. Mashable claims LiveStation is “a product from Microsoft Research”. Ars Technica states “Microsoft announces Joost killer”. HipMojo added a new product to Microsoft’s Live offering. The Indie Tribune declares war against Joost on behalf of Microsoft. Among a handful of others and it’s still spreading.

On the bright side, there’s not much harm done here. Just a whole lot of positive press on a hopeful piece of software which shows off Silverlight in a very useful manner and the capabilities of P2P networks. However, the Microsoft labeling may have signaled the ever-so-attentive Microsoft-basher to induce even more confusion. Nevertheless, the LiveStations team is doing a good job of corrections by promptly commenting on each of the top stories – a communications strategy the former Windows Ultimate team should consider.

Perhaps this should serve as a warning sign to any company who’s thinking about naming their applications with anything “Live”. Unless you’re Microsoft, in which case you should probably avoid that even more so.

It only took a dozen or so blogs and high-profile websites to force the Windows Ultimate team into communicating with its customers, so you could say we were off to a bad start. The Ultimate Team finally broke their 3-month silence today to say a whole lot about nothing. There’s a great explanation and translation of what was said by the Ultimate Team by mstefan on the Channel9 forums which I’ll quote.

That’s classic “say nothing” corpspeak. A lot of words which convey very little information.

“We would like to announce that we are announcing the announcement of these features that we have previously announced, and are intending to deliver this announcement of these new feature announcements once the announcement meets the highest quality of the announcements that we know that you have come to require of us. We strongly believe that we should only announce those announcements of features which have been throughly tested and you can be assured that our announcements will be announced at the earliest possible date. You can expect another announcement to this effect in two months. Thank you.”

Ironically this brings back memories of a joke in Steve Jobs’ and Bill Gates’ interview at the D Conference. Steve quotes the former Apple CEO of saying something along the lines of Apple after Steve had left was a sinking ship with a hole at the bottom, and his job was to only point it in the right direction.

I can’t help imagine Ultimate Extras as that sinking ship. Communicating, like what has been done today is certainly the right direction. But are we moving anywhere? We’ve got a deadline for some existing betas to be finalized together with some really long-term goals. The vibe I’m getting is that we’re not going anywhere fast, just drifting along with the flow.

But there’s more to this announcement than meets the eye. There’s a new face in town – who is Barry Goffe? And why has the original team pictures and profiles been removed?

Barry Goffe who’s now claiming the title of Director for the Windows Vista Ultimate group may have risen up through the old ranks of Product Manager, and is believed to have taken over control of the whole project. As a Microsoft veteran who’s carried numerous titles, whether or not this is a new role or purely a subset of his existing role as Director of Windows Product Management is not year clear. Barry was part of the team that defined and mapped out the SKU lineup for Windows Vista so it is not surprising he’s somehow responsible for Ultimate, one of the SKUs. Having gave numerous interviews in the past, it’s a good sign things might become more transparent with Barry than the previous leadership who failed to give any interviews as far as I can remember.

A few people have also noted another change to the Ultimate website – all traces of the previous leadership team has been removed. I must admit they did a pretty good job, unfortunately for them they can’t remove history. Archive.org’s history to be exact. A total of 14 posts including the profiles of most of the former team members have now been removed along with their profile pictures. Why? The only plausible explanation is that these people have been abducted by aliens and the aliens didn’t want anyone to notice so they hacked the website and removed all traces of their lives. A theory yet to be challenged.

Today something happened that should have happened a long time ago. If things continue to happen over the next few weeks or months, then they might deserve a second chance, although under even more scrutiny.