Hotmail Gets Interactive, Runs JavaScript Within E-mails

Windows Live has just announced something new for Hotmail: Interactive e-mail.

The e-mail giant is allowing developers to embed and run JavaScript from within e-mails; this is the natural next step in e-mail’s evolution from plain text to HTML and beyond.

What this means for the average e-mail recipient is that more of the messages they receive will be increasingly up-to-date, and content will be interactive. If the developer sending the e-mail is hip to Hotmail’s changes, you’ll be able to take actions from within the e-mail itself without having to navigate to a slew of other web pages. Basically, the new Hotmail e-mails will look, feel and behave like a web page running within an e-mail.

It’s a cool update, and it also has the potential to keep Hotmail more competitive with Google’s Gmail, which offers users previews of content from Flickr and YouTube within e-mails.

The problem with running JavaScript in e-mails, of course, is security: How can Hotmail protect users from malicious code? Windows Live Active Views is a product aimed at answering this question.

While we’d love to know more about what exactly Active Views is and how it does what it does, all Microsoft has told us so far is that Active Views uses “technology that allows senders to run code securely in their email messages.” That’s a pretty vague statement about a pretty cool feature; we’ll let you know when we learn more.

Orbitz and Monster.com will be the first two companies to use the new interactive e-mail platform from Hotmail, with LinkedIn and Netflix jumping on the bandwagon soon. Here’s a quick demo of the product:

A bridge to the cloud: Google Cloud Connect for Microsoft Office now available to early testers

Tens of millions of people have moved to Google Docs because it’s 100% web: it provides real-time collaboration in the browser, with no software to install, manage or upgrade. Of course, we know that many more of you still use Microsoft Office, because until recently, there weren’t many tools to help you collaborate and share with others. Now there’s more choice.

To help smooth the transition from Office to the cloud, my teammates and I founded a company called DocVerse, which was acquired by Google earlier this year. Over the last 9 months, we’ve been hard at work moving the DocVerse product to Google’s infrastructure. We’ve also renamed it Google Cloud Connect for Microsoft Office. Today, we’re pleased to take the next step towards a public launch and make it available to early testers.

For those of you who have not made the full move to Google Docs and are still using Microsoft Office, Google has something great to offer. With Cloud Connect, people can continue to use the familiar Office interface, while reaping many of the benefits of web-based collaboration that Google Docs users already enjoy.

Users of Office 2003, 2007 and 2010 can sync their Office documents to the Google cloud, without ever leaving Office. Once synced, documents are backed-up, given a unique URL, and can be accessed from anywhere (including mobile devices) at any time through Google Docs. And because the files are stored in the cloud, people always have access to the current version.

Once in the Google cloud, documents can be easily shared and even simultaneously edited by multiple people, from right within Office. A full revision history is kept as the files are edited, and users can revert to earlier versions in one click. These are all features that Google Docs users already enjoy today, and now we’re bringing them to Microsoft Office.

All you need is a Google account, and you’re ready to go. That’s it!

If you’re a Google Apps for Business customer interested in joining our preview program, please sign up here. If you’re not, don’t worry- at launch, Google Cloud Connect will be available free to everyone, including consumers.

Posted by Shan Sinha, Group Product Manager on Google Docs Blog

Happy 25th Anniversary, Microsoft Windows

It was 25 years ago today that Microsoft released Windows 1.0. The world’s most popular operating system has gone through a number of versions since then, and the next iteration, Windows 8, is expected within 2 years.

At the time it launched, Windows actually wasn’t a full operating system. Rather, it was a graphical user interface (GUI) that ran on top of DOS. Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates said at launch that Windows 1.0, which carried a suggested retail price of $99 in 1985, was “unique software” that would provide “unprecedented power to users today and a foundation for hardware and software advancements of the next few years.” (You can read the full, 32-page Windows 1.0 press kit at this link.)

While that uniqueness has long been up for debate, it is certainly easy to argue that Gates was right about Windows laying a foundation for the future of the personal computer. Windows has been the dominant operating system for the past two decades. Its future as such, however, is in doubt. Computing seems to be undergoing a fundamental shift away from the PC paradigm and toward mobile and tablet-based interfaces.

The graphic below, from ZDNet UK, illustrates the progression of Windows from November 20, 1985 to today.

The following image is a screenshot of Windows 1.0, which sat on top of Microsoft’s command-line operating system, MS-DOS.

Source: http://on.mash.to/bixJN1

Moonlight

want to browse sites that work with MS Silverlight while you are in linux and u don't know how
Moonlight is the Linux version for Microsoft Silverlight

Microsoft to Launch Browser-based Game Store

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On November 15 Microsoft will launch Games for Windows Marketplace, an online store that will let users buy digital copies of games directly from the browser.
Besides online access from any computer, key features of the store are “ultra-fast” downloads, search by titles or by genres, clean navigation as well as deals and discounts, including “Deal of the Week” and other recurring and seasonal offers.
Users will be able to purchase games with their Microsoft Points or a credit card.
The Games for Windows Marketplace is, in a way, a browser-based version of Microsoft’s Windows Games on Demand store, which is a part of its Games for Windows Live online service. By placing the store in a browser, Microsoft eliminates a couple of steps needed to purchase a game.
“With Games for Windows Marketplace, we set out to create a digital store built for PC gamers end-to-end. And by integrating with our existing Xbox LIVE and Windows Live services, we’ve made it easier than ever for millions of gamers to see for themselves how easy buying PC games can be”, said Kevin Unangst, senior global director of PC and Mobile Gaming at Microsoft.
At launch, there will be about 100 games available at the store, including Grand Theft Auto III, Dead Rising 2, Lost Planet 2, Max Payne, Deus Ex: Game of the Year Edition, Flight Simulator, Gears of War, Halo, Zoo Tycoon, Fable III, Age of Empires Online and Microsoft Flight.
Source: http://on.mash.to/9qAQCl

“The Sims 3″ and Other EA Games Headed for Windows Phone 7

“The Sims 3″ and Other EA Games Headed for Windows Phone 7: "

EA, one of the biggest video game publishers in the world, will support Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 mobile phone platform with Xbox Live-enabled games starting this year.
The first titles EA Mobile has announced include The Sims 3, Tetris, Monopoly and Need for Speed Undercover.
All of these franchises appear on existing mobile platforms so the content isn’t exclusive, but Windows Phone 7 owners will have the advantage of the Xbox Live online gaming network. Though Apple has begun offering something similar with Game Center, it’s arguably the most unique feature about Windows Phone 7 and it will make the platform more appealing to game developers and gamers.
All of EA’s games will support Xbox Live Achievements — special badges and goals awarded for accomplishing in-game tasks. The Achievements will add to your gamerscore, which is shared between Windows Phone 7, Games for Windows and Xbox 360 games.
Windows Phone 7 is a slick mobile operating system, but even as it was launched today, the perceived wild card was developer support. To compete with the iPhone and Android, Windows Phone 7 will need a strong library of third-party apps and games.
This weekend, Microsoft was caught using graphics from Rovio’s Angry Birds to promote Windows phones. Angry Birds is one of the most popular mobile games in the world right now, but Rovio was quick to tweet that it has not committed to supporting the platform — a potential blow to developer perceptions.
Rovio went on to say that it will support “all relevant platforms” moving forward, so if Microsoft plays its cards right, Rovio games on Windows Phone 7 aren’t of the question.

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Msp 2010

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Msp 2010

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Life After Microsoft: 15 Startups Founded By Ex-Employees

Not only did Microsoft practically invent the industry-standard interview technique, but it’s grown by about 88,593 employees since the company started in 1975.

The software giant knows how to pick tech candidates with potential by now. And it turns out that much of what makes a good tech employee is also what makes a good tech entrepreneur.

Inevitably, some Microsofties decided they’d rather try to be Bill Gates than work for him. In 35 years, ex-employees have created a bevy of impressive new companies.

We’ve rounded up 15 of the most interesting ones below.

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1. Cupidtino

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Yes, Cupidtino, the dating site for Apple fans, was co-founded by ex-Microsoft program manager Mel Sampat (oh, burn). According to the site, “Diehard Mac & Apple fans often have a lot in common — personalities, creative professions, a similar sense of style and aesthetics, taste, and a love for technology.”

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2. Picnik

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Picnik is an easy photo editing website that was recently acquired by Google. The co-founders, Darrin Massena and Mike Harrington, both worked as development managers at Microsoft, where they “took turns managing each other.” CEO Jonathan Sposato also worked at Microsoft as a senior manager in the consumer division. Before joining Picnik, he started a desktop application app company called Phatbits, which was also purchased by Google.

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3. DocVerse

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DocVerse is a company that was created by ex-Microsoft employees to share documents created on Microsoft software. But it was recently purchased, as so many startups are these days, by Google.

The service allows real-time sharing and editing of Microsoft Office documents. The plan after the acquisition was to “combine DocVerse with Google Apps to create a bridge between Microsoft Office and Google Apps.”

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4. Cranium

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Whit Alexander and Richard Tait, the founders of the popular board game Cranium, met at Microsoft. In an unusual move for ex-Microsoft employees, they took their startup business offline. The idea was to develop a board game that offered so many activities that everybody would be good at some portion of it. Their success allowed them to put a hefty $77.5 million price tag on the company when they sold it to Hasbro Inc. in 2008.

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5. Stack Overflow

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Joel Spolsky, a former member of Microsoft’s Excel team, is the co-creator of this popular Q&A site for programmers. He is also the co-founder and CEO of Fog Creek Software, the author a blog that has been translated into more than 30 languages, and has written four books on software development. Technically that’s at least two more startups for the ex-Microsoft team, but we figured he could only be on the list once.

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6. Glassdoor

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Glassdoor is a database of anonymously posted information about salaries, interviews, and jobs. You can search by region, position, or even by a specific company (there are, for instance, currently 441 Microsoft interview posts, with questions, on the site). Since the only way to get full access to salaries and reviews is to post one of your own, the content is constantly growing.

Robert Hohman, the co-founder and CEO, started his career at Microsoft. Rich Barton, the other co-founder, is also an ex-Microsoft employee. But he co-founded Zillow.com which we’ll cover later in this post.

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7. RealNetworks

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In 1995, RealNetworks created the Internet’s first audio streaming program, RealAudio. RealAudio led to RealVideo, which is today known as RealPlayer. Founder Rob Glaser worked at Microsoft for about 10 years prior to starting RealNetworks.

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8. Symform

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Praerit Garg and Bassam Tabbara are another co-founder pair that left Microsoft together. Their company, Symform, provides online storage for small businesses at a low cost by allowing them to trade inexpensive local storage for cloud storage. Data is divided into fragments, encrypted and sent to random nodes in the system. It’s more affordable than traditional online storage companies because there is no data center infrastructure.

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9. Hawthorne Labs

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Co-founder Shubham Mittal worked for both Microsoft and Google before starting Hawthorne Labs, which earned his company coveted spots on both ex-employee startup lists. Hawthorne Labs’ first product, Apollo, is a newspaper for the iPad that learns what articles and sources you enjoy and helps you discover new content based on your personal preferences and viewing history.

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10. Zillow.com

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Zillow.com provides a “zillion” data points about real estate, the market for the place you rest your head at night (zillion + pillow = zillow). Users can look up information on 93 million homes as well as search homes for sale, homes for rent, recently sold homes, and mortgage solutions. Co-founder Rich Barton founded Expedia.com within Microsoft in 1994. The other co-founder, Lloyd Frink, also worked at Expedia before it spun off of Microsoft.

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11. Valve

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Valve is the creator of Steam, the world’s largest online gaming platform. The company also creates its own games. The first one, Half-Life, has been named the “Best PC Game Ever” by PC Gamer on three separate occasions, and has won more than 50 “game of the year” titles. Founder Gabe Newell spent 13 years at Microsoft before founding Valve in 1996. According to his profile on the Valve site, his greatest contribution to Half-Life was his statement, “Cmon, people, you can’t show the player a really big bomb and not let them blow it up.”

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12. Corbis

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Bill Gates isn’t exactly an ex-employee of Microsoft, but he’s not really an “employee” now either. Therefore Corbis, the image resource site he founded more than 20 years ago, qualified for this list. While Corbis will likely never live up to its older sibling, having offices in North America, Europe, Asia and Australia and customers in more than 50 countries worldwide is nothing to scoff at.

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13. iLike

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Co-founder Ali Partovi joined Microsoft by way of acquisition when he sold LinkExchange for $265 million in 1998. He founded iLike, a social music discovery site, with his twin brother Hadi, who had also been on the founding team of the company Tellme Networks (also acquired by Microsoft). Nat Brown, a third co-founder, worked for Microsoft but never sold anything to them.

iLike was acquired by MySpace in 2009.

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14. Swipely

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Swipely, which launched publically just last month, aims to be “an online service that turns purchases into conversations.” In other words, it automatically shares your credit card purchases across your social networks. Founder Angus Davis was acquired by Microsoft along with his first startup, Tellme Networks, in 2007. He left to start Swipely in 2009.

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15. Kashless, Inc.

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Companies often give discounts to big groups. With Kashless’s Tiprr, you can get the group discount without necessarily knowing the members of your group. Like Groupon, users receive a daily e-mail with local deals. Unlike Groupon, the deal gets better as more people opt in. The company also runs Kashless, the website, which facilitates recycling by hosting posts for free stuff. The ex-Microsoft founder of the company, Martin Tobias, previously founded a digital media services company called Loudeye Technologies.

Source: Mashable "http://bit.ly/9oQ6tP"

Internet Explorer 9 Has Arrived

Microsoft is pulling out all the stops to mark the launch of the open beta for Internet Explorer 9, a web browser the company promises will “beautify the web.”

The IE9 beta launches today here at the Design Concourse Center in San Francisco with a major gala that includes hundreds of developers, journalists and Microsoft employees, as well as a live band playing on pedestals in the lobby.

“The browser is a stage. It is the backdrop of the web,” said Corporate Vice President of Internet Explorer Dean Hachamovitch.

Microsoft says that IE9 is a reinvention of the browser. It not only includes greater HTML5 and web standard compliance, but also the ability to turn any website into an application on the Windows taskbar. Thee websites are pinned to the taskbar, providing users with a one-click option to a their favorite websites. It also includes Windows 7’s jump lists; any website that supports them will provide a quick menu to its most popular webpages.

The focus of IE9 is on the “regular consumer,” which may irk those of us who generally have more than 10 or 20 tabs open at any given time. Tabs appear on the right side of the address bar, decreasing the amount of real-estate for tabs. To help decrease tab overload, they are grouped based on different websites within the taskbar.

Perhaps IE9’s biggest selling point is hardware acceleration. The company has used four developer previews to show off the speed of IE9 compared to its competitors. IE9 harnesses the PC’s hardware to accelerate graphics, videos and text. The result is that IE9 is able to render heavy graphic interfaces far better than even Chrome or Firefox.

The IE9 beta is available for download today on the Beautify the Web site Microsoft has launched as part of its promotional campaign. We have had access to the IE9 beta for a while now and will be posting our thoughts and reviews soon. In the meantime, let us know whether you believe Microsoft can get back into the browser game with IE9.

Screenshot Tour: Microsoft Security Essentials 2.0 Beta

Screenshot Tour: Microsoft Security Essentials 2.0 Beta: "
The new beta version of Microsoft Security Essentials was launched yesterday to a limited amount of users. Here we’ll take a look at what you expect from the new version of How-To Geek’s favorite PC security application.

We have already given Microsoft Security Essentials our stamp of approval. Now there is a new beta version that we’ll take a look at today. It was released through Microsoft Connect and is available on a first come – first serve basis. it’s not available in all countries either, so depending on your location you might not have access to it. It is available in both 32 & 64-bit versions.

Installation and Setup

You will need to log into your Microsoft Connect account, or sign up if you don’t have one yet. Then you can download the version which is right for your OS.



Apparently there were problems downloading the file from MS Connect yesterday and they recommended a work around is to use the Microsoft File Transfer Manager (link below).



Installation is quite easy following the install wizard. If you already have version 1.0 of Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) installed, you’ll be able to Upgrade.



Decide of you want to join the Customer Experience Improvement Program or not…



It will offer to turn on Windows Firewall for you. It you use another firewall application or just don’t want it turned on you can uncheck it.



Now wait while the upgrade takes place. The amount of time it takes will vary. We installed the 32-bit version on a Windows 7 Home Premium Core2 Duo system and took around three minutes.



To finish the upgrade a reboot is required.



After getting back from the Restart you can begin setting it up. The user interface has a bit of a new look, but using it is essentially the same as the current version.



If you don’t have the current version of MSE installed, there is no Restart required, it will offer to get the latest definition updates and scan your system right away.



64-bit Version

We did experience a bit of a problem getting the 64-bit version upgraded on our Windows 7 Ultimate machine. We ended up uninstalling the current version with Revo Uninstaller Pro and when the following error came up, we restarted the machine and it installed successfully and is working great.



New Features

It still has the features you’re already used to such as scheduling scans and real-time protection, and offers new features as well. One of the new interesting features for Windows 7 & Vista (not available in XP or 2003) is you can enable network protection. This will inspect your network traffic and block any suspicious connections. A very nice feature for those with a home or small business network.



Also it includes the Firewall integration that we looked at during the installation.



It integrates with Internet Explorer to protect against web-based threats such as malicious scripts.



It also includes a new updated protection engine that offers better detection, easier cleanup, and better performance. We ran some fake test virus files and the detection was as good as the current version and cleanup was a breeze.



Running on Windows Home Server

If you’re running Windows Home Server on your home or small office network, you’ll love the fact that the MSE Beta works on WHS version 1 and also on Vail! Just put the executable in a shared folder, then Remote Desktop into your server. Alternately, if you’re using the Advanced Admin Console for WHS you can access your server desktop through the Console. Then just install it as shown above.

Windows Home Server version 1 runs on Server 2003 so the new Network Protection feature isn’t available. However, it should be available in WHS Vail beta as it’s built on Server 2008.



It will run in the taskbar even after a reboot or if you’re not logged in so you won’t need to install it as a service.



Conclusion

Remember that this is still in beta and you might experience some bugs…though we haven’t experienced any in our limited testing other than the x64-bit install. It will run on XP, Server 2003 and above, but the advanced network protection is not available in on those two operating systems. If you’re an early adopter you might want to get it while downloads are still available.

Get MSE 2.0 Beta from Microsoft Connect



Source : How To Geek

Apple to Microsoft: "Eat My Dust!"

Yesterday Apple passed Microsoft to become, for the first time, the 'world's most valuable technology company,' according to the New York Times. Apple gained a stock-based valuation of $222.12 billion while Microsoft's was $219.18 billion.

Does this make Steve Jobs the Bill Gates of technology?

Although Microsoft is still a powerful and important company, it has been skating on its Windows operating system and Office productivity suite for a long time. In an op-ed, a former Microsoft vice president called it 'a clumsy, uncompetitive innovator' with a monolithic culture, characterized more by politics than technology.

Apple, on the other hand, has made its way back in the last decade from the brink of a final fall to become a much-celebrated innovator, focusing on user experience and design. The resurgence began with the introduction of 1998's candy-colored iMacthat was followed in turn by the iPod, the iPhone and most recently the iPad.

Carl Howe, an analyst at the Yankee Group, pointed out early this month that the iPad looks to be 'the fastest consumer product growth to the $1 billion revenue mark in history,' taking under 80 days.

It didn't hurt that, as Gartner pointed out, worldwide mobile phone sales for Q1 this year have been tremendous, favoring Apple.

'Worldwide mobile phone sales to end users totaled 314.7 million units in the first quarter of 2010, a 17 per cent increase from the same period in 2009... Smarpthone sales to end users reached 54.3 million units, an increase of 48.7 per cent from the first quarter of 2009. Among the most successful vendors were those that controlled an integrated set of operating system (OS), hardware and services.'

It's been a long time since Microsoft created that type of market-influencing drama.

As of Wednesday, Wall Street valued Apple at $222.12 billion and Microsoft at $219.18 billion. The only American company valued higher is Exxon Mobil, with a market capitalization of $278.64 billion.

At $58.4 billion, Microsoft's revenue still exceeds Apple's, $42.9 billion, according to the Times.

'But Microsoft is sitting on far more cash, $35.7 billion to Apple's $23 billion, which makes the value assigned by the market to Apple -- essentially a bet on its future prospects -- all the more remarkable.'

Now, who's that coming up from behind, trying to pass Apple on the outside? Oh, probably nobody.

Source: http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/apple_to_microsoft_eat_my_dust.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+readwriteweb+(ReadWriteWeb)

The New Hotmail Challenges Gmail

Hotmail, Microsoft's webmail service, has improved a lot in the past two years. Hotmail is now a modern web application that no longer traps users's data and focuses on important things like speed, usability, fighting spam and integrating with other communication services.

The latest Hotmail update, that will be released as part of Windows Live Wave 4, tries to show that Microsoft finally managed to develop a better email service than Gmail and, in many ways, succeeds.

Hotmail improved its spam detection algorithms and it's now able to tweak some parameters based on your actions. Hotmail can now flag messages as spam even after you've received them.

Another interesting improvement is that Hotmail categorizes messages, so you can quickly find the messages from your contacts, messages from mailing lists or notifications from social networks.

Hotmail no longer has limitations for email storage and the main reason is that large attachments can be stored in Windows Live SkyDrive. 'With Hotmail, we've combined the simplicity of sending photos through email with the power of Windows Live SkyDrive so that you can send up to 200 photos, each up to 50 MB in size, all in a single email. You can send all your vacation photos at once without worrying about attachment limits,' explains Microsoft. This is an important feature that's missing from Gmail and it's surprising that you can't upload photos to Picasa Web Albums or upload documents to Google Docs directly from Gmail.

Microsoft also integrated Hotmail with Office Web Apps, so that documents can be previewed and edited online, without having to install an office suite. Now that attachments are stored in a single place, the total attachment limit for a message is 10 GB, while Gmail offers about 7 GB of storage for all your messages.

Hotmail added many of the features that used to be available only in Gmail: conversation view, full session SSL, watching YouTube videos inline, but Microsoft managed to make some improvements. The active view feature doesn't work only for YouTube, it's enabled for many other sites (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn), so you can accept invitations or reply to a Twitter message directly from Hotmail. There's also a feature that lets you create a single-use password for signing in on public computers.

Google has a lot to do to catch up with the new Hotmail, but that's a good thing. Competition is what makes products better.

Source: http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2010/05/new-hotmail-challenges-gmail.html

Week in Microsoft: Windows Phone 7 Series arrives

Windows Phone 7 Series arrives:

This week at Mobile World Congress, Microsoft showed off its new phone platform for the first time. Everything that we knew and loathed about Windows Mobile is gone. Even the name is different. It's now 'Windows Phone 7 Series.'

One of the many unanswered questions about Windows Phone 7 Series is what the application development situation will be like. A few details have started to emerge; through both official and unofficial channels and the big news is that application development will use managed code more or less exclusively.

Windows 7 growing faster than Vista, overtakes Mac OS X

Windows 7 sold well during the 2009 holiday season, and the results are showing up, not only in sheer revenue, but in the OS market share numbers as well. Nevertheless, in December 2009, Linux was the only operating system to show positive percentage growth in market share.

Between November and December 2009, Windows market share dropped 0.31 percentage points (from 92.52 percent to 92.21 percent), Mac OS dipped 0.01 percentage points (from 5.12 percent to 5.11 percent), and Linux edged forward 0.02 percentage points (from 1.00 percent to 1.02 percent).

Strong sales from Windows 7 and Snow Leopard were not enough to stop both Windows overall and Mac OS overall from dropping. When putting this into perspective across the whole year, though, we see that Windows was actually sliding steadily throughout 2009 (93.66 percent in January 2009), while both Mac OS (4.71 percent in January 2009) and Linux (0.90 percent in January 2009) have been gaining.



You can see the market share pie for December 2009, according to Net Applications, at the top of this post. The graph directly above this paragraph shows how things at Ars are different from those elsewhere, but the differences aren't as significant when it comes to the browser market: our Mac OS share is more than five times greater than the rest of the world, while Linux is six times more. Nevertheless, more than half of our users are on Windows.



Even if Windows is slowly losing share, Windows 7 is doing phenomenally well. Above, you can see how quickly the OS has been gaining share in its first few months compared to Windows Vista's first few months.

While Vista was at 0.93 percent after a month, Windows 7 was at 4.00 percent; when Vista jumped to 2.04 percent after two months, Windows 7 hit 5.71 percent.

There are many reasons for this, including the fact that Vista had to compete with XP, which was on the market for an abnormally long time. Furthermore, Windows 7 arrived in time for holiday sales, while Vista did not. In addition, Windows 7 had a very successful beta program, both private and public. Most importantly though, Microsoft managed to generate the kind of hype around Windows 7 that it hasn't generated around any of its operating systems in years.



In terms of OS versions, Windows saw the following changes between November and December: Windows XP dropped 1.28 percentage points (from 69.05 percent to 67.77 percent), Windows Vista dropped 0.68 percentage points (from 18.55 percent to 17.87 percent), and Windows 7 gained 1.71 percentage points (from 4.00 percent to 5.71 percent), meaning it has passed all versions of Mac OS. Speaking of which, Mac OS saw the following progress: version 10.4 dipped 0.04 percentage points (from 0.84 percent to 0.80 percent), version 10.5 dipped 0.14 percentage points (from 2.61 percent to 2.47 percent), and version 10.6 moved up 0.22 percentage points (from 1.38 percent to 1.60 percent).

Taking the historical perspective, we can see that Windows Vista and Windows 7 together have just over a third of Windows XP's market share, while Mac OS 10.5 and 10.6 together have more than five times the market share of Mac OS 10.4.

Before the end of 2010, we're expecting to see Windows 7 pass Windows Vista, Windows XP to drop below the 50 percent mark, and Mac OS X 10.6 to pass 10.5 and 10.4 combined.

Document Source : arstechnica.com