by Arie Slob

Dear Windows-Help.NET subscriber, Microsoft this week showed that you can still bank on it... by delaying Windows 2000. I mean if there's one thing about Microsoft they seem to get "right" all the time, it's getting their products delayed. First it's "expected" that Beta 3 will be available in April (planned was later this month). This will obviously push everything back. Rumors are that Microsoft is "hoping" for an end of year ship date. Well` if you want my opinion, I'd say "don't hold your breath". There are also rumors about some problems Microsoft still seems to have with 64-bit support and with support for new Intel microprocessor technology, but the list is topped by Microsoft's Active Directory services and IntelliMirror technologies. Microsoft is starting to feel the crunch of the more than 30 million lines of code which make up Win2000, considered to be one of the largest software products ever. All this comes at a bad time for Microsoft, and one wonders why the government is still spending money in the courts, trying to brake-up Microsoft, when they are seemingly doing a pretty good job themselves. Customers are getting fed-up waiting for Win2000, and apparently there are many companies waiting for it, to upgrade their PC's across the board, in many cases skipping Windows 98 (and/or even 95) in the process. Well, starting next month, these customers get another choice: Compaq is going to team up with Red Hat and offer Linux preloaded on Compaq servers. Compaq is also offering 24 x 7 support for these Linux based servers. Up until now Compaq has only offered Linux on request, so this represents a a major shift in policy for them. Gateway Inc. is also rumored to have signed a deal with Red Hat, and its servers are expected to ship with Linux by year's end. These are just the kind of deals Linux needs to get acceptance in the corporate world, and get its stability and scalability known to a larger number of people. There are also moves on the software front, with some vendors starting to ship (beta) versions of their databases for Linux. Lookout Microsoft... the ground is getting hot under NT's feet. So we all thought that the AOL - Netscape deal (for more information see the Newsletter of 28 November 1998) was big. Well, that $4.2 billion deal just got reduced to another statistic when the (cable based) Internet provider @Home bought Excite for $6.7 billion (in stock). Through this acquisition, @Home becomes a major online service, directly competing with AOL and other major Internet "portals". According to Excite's CEO George Bell, the deal is all about "giving users multimedia, video, speech and audio experiences not available on the Web today". Later in the week, NBC and CNet also announced a portal for high-speed users called Cyclone, providing video, audio, television, telephony and news services among other things. Cyclone's debut is scheduled for later this quarter. The "dust" in this segment of the Internet hasn't settled yet. There is more to be expected soon. Potential partners? There's Microsoft's MSN, Lycos, AltaVista, PointCast, GeoCities, The Mining Company, HotBot and Amazon.com. Who will go with whom will have to be seen. Cookie Monster bug Netscape has recently been alerted to a bug that affects the Netscape Navigator browser software. The Cookie Monster bug affects all existing versions of Netscape Navigator (2.x through 4.x) on all platforms. Although Netscape has verified this bug, no customer incidents of lost or stolen data have been reported to Netscape. Netscape takes all potential security and privacy issues seriously and is currently working on a fix. This fix will be available in an upcoming maintenance release of Communicator. More info...

Password Tracker Deluxe
This award winning application allows you to safely and securely store and organize your passwords, usernames, and associated notes. An unlimited number of users can each store individually password-protected secure lists. The flexible notes field can store just about any type of information you need to keep secure, such as PIN numbers, credit card information, safe combinations, etc.

Win 95/98/NT

Web site | Download [1.1MB]

Apple's Attempt at Highway Robbery
According to a report in the New York Times, Apple plans to ask chip and system makers a $ 1 per port royalty for the use of the three-port physical layer 1394 interface. The 1394 is officially known as IEEE 1394, or FireWire, and is a standard to connect external devices to PC's. The 1394 standard increases the transfer rate up to 400Mbps and can connect up to 63 external devices on a single port.

Apple would take in $ 3 on each $ 5 chip if they were successful in this plan. Obviously, this proposal is making chip and system makers furious.

How to Create a Windows 98 Startup Disk from MS-DOS
This Microsoft Knowledge Base article describes how to make a Windows 98 Startup disk from MS-DOS. This may be necessary if you cannot start Windows 98 normally, but you can boot your computer to a command prompt and access your hard disk. This may also be necessary if you have a laptop computer that has a CD-ROM drive and a floppy disk drive that are interchangeable.

BrowserSpy
Ever had that creepy feeling your (Web) browser is revealing more information then you'd want it too? Well, check up on the capabilities of your browser at BrowserSpy

That's nice if you are new to Windows, but it gets annoying after a while. Here is how to turn them off.