El - as usual, Dvorak is completely full of crap. Let's look at a few of the most gross factual errors...
Dell and others now sell computers with the Linux operating system, which competes with Microsoft Windows. Previously, this was verboten. But since the U.S. Department of Justice brought antitrust charges against Microsoft, computer makers feel they can veer from Microsoft's often tyrannical sales agreements.
Utter hogwash. CPQ sold more SCO Unix than NT for years. Even today, MSFT products represent less than half of CPQ's volume server sales. Linux desktops are a curiosity, not a threat to MSFT. They have yet to achieve even 1 percent of shipments in the desktop space.
Kempin has since been moved into a position called ``special projects'' reporting to Chief Executive Steve Ballmer.
"Special projects" is a country club assignment for MSFT execs who want out of the rat race to get another year or two of option vesting.
Finally, we've witnessed the sudden emergence of an ``Approved'' motherboard program. Only recently has Microsoft decided to have motherboards tested for Windows reliability and the ensuring Windows logo seal of approval.
This program has been in place since 1997, and is designed to assure that hardware certified with Windows supports the OS features.
In another twist, it's now believed that the company has secretly continued developing a version of Windows NT (a.k.a. Windows 2000) for Compaq's (NYSE: CPQ - news) Alpha chip, although it supposedly had shelved the product. Apparently, a new version of the Alpha/Windows OS has found its way out of the Microsoft compound and is floating around amongst developers.
The software he is referring to was a copy of the last build of NT for Alpha. It is pretty well known that MSFT continued to develop their 64 bit code line on Alpha, since there were no Itaniums to develop on. The 64 bit code is built on the 32 bit code line, so the 32 bit builds had to be done also. MSFT said in their E2000 event in September that they had shifted development to the Itanium (with Gates, Capellas and Craig Barrett on stage) and the September date of the "last Alpha build" bears that out.
I have little respect for Dvorak - he knows better but likes to "get the ink" with silly stuff. |
