page 2

9/12/2006 1:44:38 PM

Quote :

"I can't WAIT until Flight Sim X ... drooool "

I'm in the beta...its badass...was 8.12gb to download but its the full game. The virtual cockpit is the only way i fly now because its just that cool. For example the cockpit glass looks very realistic with your reflection and the cockpit reflection on it. The weather and turbulance effects are also improved greatly....when you fly a 747 you can actually see parts of the wing flex under stress not just the whole playing bouncing up and down...


i beleive they still have the 'demo' available for download...its not the whole game just a select few airports and a few aircrafts....the beta is the complete version

[Edited on September 12, 2006 at 2:57 PM. Reason : fda]

9/12/2006 2:56:39 PM

http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/09/13/live-and-yahoo-bulk-up-for-local-search-brawl/

finally, a much-needed focus on the maps and local search integration.

9/14/2006 11:51:42 AM

Microsoft launching online video service
http://tinyurl.com/qr69j

Quote :

" SEATTLE (AP) -- Microsoft Corp. is hoping to tap the explosive popularity of online video sharing by joining startups and major Internet rivals with its own video service. "Soapbox on MSN Video" will let Internet users watch and post videos, rate or comment on them and share favorites by e-mailing them or linking them to their personal Web pages or blogs. ... But Microsoft believes there is "still plenty of room to innovate, and go beyond what I would say most services provide ... just sort of the basics, a very kind of primitive experience that is not that engaging," Bennett said. "It's not that fun to use. It just gets the job done." ... A beta "test" version will initially be available on an invitation-only basis to some Microsoft employees and regular MSN testers, Bennett said. He said Soapbox will be expanded to a wider audience "very quickly," but he could not say how soon."

9/19/2006 1:43:11 AM

Microsoft Soapbox is no threat to YouTube, yet
http://news.com.com/2061-12572_3-6117019.html
via Slashdot: http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/09/19/1212233&from=rss

http://soapbox.msn.com

Quote :

"Soapbox is Microsoft's user-generated video site, not to be confused with the company's professional video site, MSN Video. For its part, Soapbox is a solid video sharing service, incorporating all the Web 2.0 features a modern site should have. You can tag videos and comment on them, and you can easily find videos based on tags or popularity. You can also browse the video catalog without stopping the video you're watching, which is a nice user interface development. Uploading is easy - a neat trick lets you upload videos in the background on your PC without requiring a standalone uploader application. Videos can be of any length as long as they're under 100MB. Of course Soapbox uses Windows Media Player technology to display videos in Internet Explorer. But when run on Firefox or a Mac, it uses Flash. The soapbox page rarely scrolls, so using Soapbox feels more like using a PC application than a typical Web site. But, in the beta anyway, the browser's back button doesn?t work -- it takes you back to the last site you were on, and loses your place on the Soapbox site. I found nothing in the Soapbox product itself to propel it past other video sharing sites. It will live or die based on its content and its community. Microsoft will have to turn people on its successful blogging network, Windows Live Spaces, into Soapbox users. That could make a difference, but the site's features won't. In sum, Soapbox is disappointing. It's a slightly better sharing service than YouTube in some small technical ways, but it doesn't help users make money from their content like Revver does; it doesn't have granular privacy controls like Vox; it won't post directly into blogs for you like VideoEgg; and it won't show videos from other networks like Yahoo Video. Given Microsoft's position in the video sharing market (dead last), I expected a more aggressive product. "

9/19/2006 11:35:49 PM

IE7 released!
http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2006/10/18/internet-explorer-7-for-windows-xp-available-now.aspx
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/default.mspx

10/18/2006 9:24:21 PM

sweet

10/18/2006 9:28:42 PM

i installed it

restarted

and then had to download an update so that i could resolve http addresses

lol

10/18/2006 10:19:55 PM

LOLLL

10/18/2006 11:02:36 PM

LOL

10/18/2006 11:08:42 PM

first impressions of IE7 (i didn't try any of the betas - first time touching it tonight)

The interface..... meh
i like some things. It is sleek and clean. the buttons/icons are pretty nice, albeit inconsistent. There are 4 or 5 different button/icon "look-and-feels". First is the back/forward, figure-8 type bubbly blue buttons on the left side of the address bar. They're ok, although the bezel behind them is a bit weird. The on the right side of the address bar and the search bar uses rounded square buttons - i like them a lot.
But then down on the tab bar.... WTF. There are the 2 "favorite" icons sitting there on the left. They don't look like buttons or menus or anything, just like 2 icons sitting there in the middle of nowhere. Except when you mouse-over them you get the menu-style bezel, indicating they are menus, although menus are generally associated with words, not icons. Then on the right side of the tab bar are the new buttons, which are again menus, replacing the regular menu bar. They look fine, but again, just not consistent.

Tabs -
i'm using Firefox as the benchmark here. not to say that FF is perfect, but just as a comparison.
Again, with the inconsistent interface buttons/menus/icons. What is up with the boxy, square tabs and tab-command button thingies? Between the tab-thumbnail tab, the tab-dropdown tab, the active tab, any inactive tabs, and the new-tab tab, there are 4 or 5 different tab heights, leading to a sloppy looking tab bar. All the tabs just don't flow - they're just little boxes sitting up there in the bar. I don't feel a "connection" between the active-tab and the current page. In FF, the active tab "flows" into the current page by connecting to the 2 pixel top-border on the page. in IE7, the active tab still just looks like a box sitting up above the page, with no real connection to the current view.
What is up with the "new tab" tab? Why is it blank unless I roll over it?

Menu Bar -
removing the menu bar, or making it only accessible by customizing the view, which is done probably by only 5-10% of users, is not a good idea, i think. i think people will find it very disorienting to go into IE and not have their menu bar. But that seems to be the way MS is going - they started it with WMP10 i think (which sucked), and are doing something like that in Office 2007 (which is great, so far).

..... shit. I wrote almost all of this after using IE7 in Windows XP running in the "Windows Classic" (i.e. Windows 2000) theme. It really does look like shit in the Windows Classic theme. If you change to Luna or Windows XP theme, it looks much better. The tab bar looks good, all the tabs are rounded and smooth, etc. but even at that, that's not a good thing. It's apparently they completely optimized it for a the default Windows XP theme, completely ignoring how it would look in even the Windows Classic/2000 theme.... big oversight on their part, i think.

10/18/2006 11:32:17 PM

if you're running it in windows classic, you shouldnt care so much how it looks, since everything else looks like win98 anyways

10/18/2006 11:48:33 PM

the XP Windows Classic is a large improvement over Windows 98 and even 2000. But more importantly, it's a huge improvement over the green and blue Luna, and better than silver/green Luna too.
But my point was that Microsoft especially should be able to create an application that looks good in any Windows theme, not just their preferred one. Mozilla can....

10/18/2006 11:55:18 PM

you know, you're not limited to the standard windows visual styles. personally i use System5 http://www.deviantart.com/deviation/20568306/ ... it's clean, simple and easy on the eyes.

if you know how to change your visual style, just skip the rest of my post.

quick 'n dirty tutorial:
-- you'll need to patch your uxtheme.dll http://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=140707
-- then download "visual styles" (specifically, don't get the windowsblinds themes) http://browse.deviantart.com/customization/skins/windows/visualstyle/
-- add them to your "c:\windows\resources\themes\" directory
-- the new visual styles will show under display properties :: 'appearance' tab :: 'windows and buttons' dropdown

10/19/2006 12:09:55 AM

IE7 seems just as fast as firefox without any extensions - i like it

now if only people could develop 'add-ons' for it that could make the browsing experience like firefox while keeping the speed just as fast

10/19/2006 1:53:35 PM

^ right. namely some advanced tab control, mouse/rocker gestures, key customizations, and ad-blocking capability.....then we'd be in business

10/19/2006 5:19:28 PM

IE7 is now a critical update

11/2/2006 12:24:00 PM

Quote :

"IE7 is now will soon need a critical update "

11/2/2006 12:39:01 PM

expect that on Monday morning I'm sure

11/2/2006 12:47:44 PM

tuesday is patch day, is it not?

11/2/2006 12:51:01 PM

Quote :

"IE7 is now a critical update "

That I ignore.

11/3/2006 8:01:15 AM

MS Maps (aka Local Live) now has "Virtual Earth 3D", their answer to Google Earth, including tilt viewing and terrain viewing.

The huge difference is that it's basically browser-based - you have to download and install a large installer file, but after go through the whole install, you run it inside IE6 or IE7. That's a big selling point for me, really - i don't use Google Earth nearly as much as I could because i hate firing it up as a separate app, although it gives much more functionality.
all in all, though, very very nice for an in-browser experience

GE has also released a new GE 4 Beta - http://earth.google.com/earth4-beta6.html

[Edited on November 6, 2006 at 10:04 PM. Reason : .]

11/6/2006 10:03:06 PM

i saw a windows local beta vehicle on 440 this morning outfitted with 10-12 cameras

11/23/2006 8:34:23 PM

took me a minute to see what you were saying....
i think you mean "Windows Live Local Virtual Earth Technology Preview" van, right?
either way, it'll be cool to see the triangle in Live Local. So far they still just have Seattle and San Fran
http://preview.local.live.com/

11/23/2006 9:01:26 PM

nm

[Edited on November 23, 2006 at 10:44 PM. Reason : sr]

11/23/2006 10:43:29 PM

MSN adLab demographics for sites
http://tinyurl.com/y885yt

via SmileyCat: http://tinyurl.com/wdc8j

"Their Demographics Prediction tool will tell you — based on information culled from MSN Search users — whether your site is more popular with men or women and with what age range."

1/11/2007 2:37:31 AM

here's some evidence (from a pro-google blog) that MS Virtual Earth is as good or better than Google Earth in a lot of cases, especially in city/building rendering
http://google.blognewschannel.com/archives/2007/02/08/comparing-the-super-bowl-site-in-google-maps-and-windows-live-maps/
http://google.blognewschannel.com/archives/2007/02/15/google-earth-vs-windows-live-maps-3d-round-two/

2/15/2007 10:07:16 AM

bump per request

8/21/2007 12:31:27 PM

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070820-microsoft-aims-for-online-supremacy-opens-up-windows-live-id.html

i wish google would create a SSO

8/21/2007 1:09:24 PM

Awesome!

8/22/2007 5:24:02 PM

maybe i am late int he game, but whats with this silverlight from microsoft? does anyone know where to view and multimedia applications made by it? i just want to see how it compares to flash.

8/23/2007 8:56:39 PM

it sucks. way too little, too late. Silverlight just crashes my browser 90% of the time.

8/23/2007 9:11:51 PM

i just installed 1.0 and 1.1 alpha refresh, and nothing on the site works

http://blogs.msdn.com/tims/archive/2007/07/07/from-a-to-z-50-silverlight-applications.aspx

it just keep prompting me to install silverlight whenever i click a link to an application

8/23/2007 9:17:33 PM

you can try Tafiti, MS's new exprimental search engine built in Silverlight.....
http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2007-08-23-n64.html

Quote :

"If you’re looking for a search engine that requires a plug-in, disables your back button, won’t allow you to right-click URLs to copy them, needs pop-ups enabled, and doesn’t let you use your mouse wheel to scroll, look no further than Tafiti."

http://www.tafiti.com/

8/23/2007 10:25:41 PM

it keeps asking me to install silverlight

8/23/2007 10:44:41 PM

^^i loled when i saw that too

8/23/2007 11:05:07 PM

bump

4/12/2008 7:30:50 AM

Noen mentioned in the Google thread the MS World Wide Telescope already
http://www.worldwidetelescope.org/
here's some interviews and demos of it. skip to ~6:00 to start getting to the demos
http://www.fastcompany.tv/video/exclusive-first-look-worldwide-telescope
the WWT appears to be a much more seamless and smooth than the Google Sky efforts so far.


and some major updates to Live Maps too
http://maps.live.com/
they've added texture and color 3D models for a couple cities in 3D View
http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2008/04/new_virtual_earth_release_impressiv.html
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080411-hands-on-new-microsoft-live-maps-improvements-impressive.html

4/12/2008 8:51:39 AM

If only I could legally post to this thread

4/13/2008 4:04:34 AM

here's "the next big thing" from MS - Mesh
https://www.mesh.com/Welcome/Welcome.aspx

somekind of online desktop, synchronization platform. need to read more on it....
http://scobleizer.com/2008/04/22/ray-ozzie-delivers-with-live-mesh/
http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=1355

4/23/2008 8:03:05 AM

^^ you can't say anything at all? or you can't say anything that you want to say?

4/23/2008 12:30:54 PM

Quote :

"If only I could legally post to this thread "

lol, I know the feeling.

4/30/2008 5:15:37 AM

XNA - http://creators.xna.com/

great for learning c# and creating games

4/30/2008 11:15:32 AM

Quote :

"here's "the next big thing" from MS - Mesh https://www.mesh.com/Welcome/Welcome.aspx somekind of online desktop, synchronization platform. need to read more on it.... http://scobleizer.com/2008/04/22/ray-ozzie-delivers-with-live-mesh/ http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=1355"

If only I could legally post to this thread

It's way more than a sync platform. Fortunately I can copy and paste from the public mesh site:

Quote :

"Need a program that's only on your home PC? With Live Mesh, access to all your devices—and any programs on those devices—is at your fingertips, no matter where you are."

[Edited on April 30, 2008 at 7:10 PM. Reason : .]

4/30/2008 7:08:53 PM

All that I've read suggests they're trying to use Mesh to compete with (and offer more than) Hamachi.

This outta be interesting.

[Edited on April 30, 2008 at 10:05 PM. Reason : .]

4/30/2008 10:05:11 PM

.

[Edited on April 30, 2008 at 10:21 PM. Reason : .]

4/30/2008 10:21:29 PM

Mesh actually sounds like a hell of an idea.. I hope it works as good as it's planned to..

[insert obligatory not a chance in hell MS pulls something off that is stable, blah blah blah]

4/30/2008 10:23:54 PM

so, Noen, is it safe to assume you don't agree with Joel Splosky's take on Mesh?
More or less that it's just another Microsoft Platform providing a solution to a non-existent problem?

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/05/01.html

Quote :

"Groove had some early success selling secure networks to the military-industrial complex, but didn't make much of a ripple outside that niche. Their real success was in getting bought by Microsoft, which brought Groove's designer and chief architecture-astronaut Ray Ozzie to the role of "Chief Software Architect" at Microsoft, supposedly the technical guy that would keep inventing the future after BillG left so that Steve Ballmer would have some new territory on which to build his next illegal monopoly. And now Ray Ozzie's big achievement arrives and what is it? (drumroll...) Microsoft Live Mesh. The future of everything. Microsoft is "moving into the cloud." What's Microsoft Live Mesh? Hmm, let's see. "Imagine all your devices—PCs, and soon Macs and mobile phones—working together to give you anywhere access to the information you care about." Wait a minute. Something smells fishy here. Isn't that exactly what Hailstorm was supposed to be? I smell an architecture astronaut. ..... It's Groove, rewritten from scratch, one more time. Ray Ozzie just can't stop rewriting this damn app, again and again and again, and taking 5-7 years each time. And the fact that customers never asked for this feature and none of the earlier versions really took off as huge platforms doesn't stop him. How on earth does Microsoft continue to pour massive resources into building the same frigging synchronization platforms again and again? Damn, they just finished building something called Windows Live FolderShare and I haven't exactly noticed a stampede to that. I'll bet you've never even heard of it. The 3,398th web site that lets you upload and download files to a place on the Internet. I'm so excited I might just die."

4/30/2008 11:53:40 PM

i read that too. and while i see his point about Mesh, the whole post was overshadowed by his bitterness toward larger companies at hiring tons of young programmers

5/1/2008 12:05:56 AM

eh, let MS hold your data? why does there need to be a middleman holding the files? this would be a security nightmare for companies (the camtasia example is 'work' laptop to a desktop) ...it would be better if mesh could make my windows desktop a standalone hub for synchronization between devices. a little dyndns magic tied to my live id and i can sync from anywhere with alot more storage. also, devices are only wintel computers atm? (http://help.live.com/Help.aspx?market=en-US&project=WL_Core&querytype=topic&query=WL_Core_CONC_SystemReqs.htm)

[Edited on May 1, 2008 at 12:33 AM. Reason : link]

5/1/2008 12:30:17 AM