Microsoft may finally be phasing out Windows XP sales, but the company is telling customers that it will offer support for the operating system through 2014.
June 30th is the last day you'll be able to pick up a retail copy of Windows XP. But you will still be able to purchase a computer running Windows Vista Business or Ultimate editions and ask the computer maker to downgrade the system to XP for you. Some PC makers may offer this option for free while others will charge a fee.
Microsoft is also making an exception to the no-sales-beyond-June 30th rule for some low-cost, low-power devices like the Asus Eee PC. So it makes sense for the company to offer a few more years of support. Add to this the fact that Windows Vista adoption has been slow in some sectors, and it honestly seems like Microsoft didn't have much choice but to offer extended support for an operating system that was first released in 2001.
This morning, the good folks over at the openSUSE project announced the official launch of the merged forums. Prior to this, English speaking openSUSE users had a bit of a confusing ride when it came to joining a support community specifically for their distro -- they had the support forums at the Novell openSUSE site, suseforums.net, and suselinuxsupport.de to choose from. The merged forums, located at forums.opensuse.org, are archived and searchable, and the new forum is open for posting (openSUSE members with an account for the wiki or bugzilla will be able to use their existing accounts on the forums, but suseforums and suselinuxsupport users will need to create new accounts).
Those who have never used openSUSE might have difficulty grasping the significance of this. It seems like a little thing, really... But the real strength of Linux (and any distro) is the knowledge and experience of the community, its experiences with different bits of hardware in different configurations. That strength is undermined when the community is divided between three sites -- even if they're three very, very good sites. If a user asks a question on one site, but the person who knows the answer is on one or two of the others (or doesn't have endless hours a day to comb forums), it is a real disadvantage to the person asking, those searching for an answer to the same problem, and ultimately the distribution in general.
The openSUSE project hopes to add more languages to the merged forums in the near future. Okay, it probably won't happen anywhere near in time for the openSUSE 11.0 release (on schedule for June 19th), but we're guessing that most people really won't mind, being much too distracted with a faster install process and a new and improved version of Zypper.
Things, the popular personal organization application from Cultured Code, is still in testing, but it already has a large userbase that is thoroughly addicted to its attractive to-do list features. It's no surprise, then, that when the clock turned to midnight in Australia and Things suddenly expired, users were up in arms. Hours later, users in the US experienced the same problem. Several people congregated on the official Things help forum, which had nearly 50 postings on the problem as of 2:30 this morning.
Cultured Code hasn't yet responded with an explanation of why Things was set to expire. The application is still free, but users have already come to rely on it, with more than one person posting that they would gladly pay the $49 pricetag Cultured Code will charge for the 1.0 release to continue using Things right now. Why the expiration, though? We expect to see either a quick fix or an update pushed out this morning -- as the app is currently at version .9.1.1, the highly anticipated 1.0 release is possible, but not likely.
If you're a Things user, visit the help forum for some unofficial ways of resolving the problem. So far, most people are either setting their computers' dates back or using a hex editor to change the expiration date. Despite all the fuss, this could end up working in favor of Cultured Code. Our take: any publicity is good publicity when people are this frantic about your product.
While most Download Squad readers who took part in our informal poll say that Windows Vista SP1 has either improved their Vista performance, or at least hasn't broken their PCs, some folks are bound to have issues with any upgrade. And over 100 of you told us that Vista SP1 has caused some problems for you. Fortunately, it looks like Microsoft is offering some help.
Mozilla, the company responsible for the Firefox web browser, recently unveiled a live chat feature on their support page. The service is staffed by a handful of volunteers, and is currently only open for a few hours a day.
We spoke with one of the volunteers, who informed us that the service is still "very much in beta." If the service is a success, Mozilla is sure to expand it in the future.
The chat is only open part of the day, so check the cute fox mascot on the right hand side of the page for hours of operation. Please bear in mind that the service is currently only for Firefox related issues.
Open source project hosting service SourceForge is launching a marketplace for users to sell their services. No, SourceForge won't be charging for access to the 160,000 projects hosted on the site. Instead, users will be able to charge for support and advertise other services they provide.
For example, say you've got an open source business application hosted on SourceForge. Users can download it and use it for free. But where do they go for tech support? They could rely on the usual tools of the open source community, turning to message boards, email, and IRC channels for support. Or they could pay you a fee and receive priority support.
Or if you're capable of developing applications, you can advertise your services. It's free to post a listing, but SoureForge will take a percentage of any resulting transactions, usually around 10%.
Right now there are only about 700 listings in the marketplace, which just emerged from beta testing. But SourceForge has 1.7 million registered users, so that number could grow very quickly.
DailyStrength is a collection of communities focused on users supporting each other in whatever hardships they are facing in life. From Lung Cancer to Depression to Parenting: there is a community for everyone. Communities are built around members with sections for posting discussions, recommendations, advice, and news. You can even send each other virtual hugs, which are like Facebook pokes but without the antagonistic feel.
There is even a community for Internet Addicts, which, clearly, is how we find the site in the first place.
Todd Haselton at Ars Technica's 1 Microsoft Way journal is reporting that the majority of Support.com's customers are confused by some of Vista's significant new changes. After opening their doors for service in June, a tally of that month's support calls revealed that a whopping 77 percent were to get help with Vista, with a surprising 30 percent of those calls simply asking for help on how to navigate Vista's controversial new Aero interface.
Considering that Support.com is a commercial service, we're going to agree with 1 Microsoft Way that their greater constituency is probably more on the newbie side than your typical Flash drive-slinging, Google-searching computer nut. That said, Support.com's report of confusion among the mainstream ranks can be taken in a number of ways, depending on whether you're a fan of the significant changes - some arguably for the sake of change alone - that Microsoft made with Vista. The findings become even more significant when you consider the fact that Windows users - people who have already been using the product for months, years or perhaps decades - are getting lost when they sit down and try to navigate through the new translucent black jungle Microsoft introduced.
Still, Support.com is but a drop in the bucket of the mainstream Vista reaction, so it would be interesting to see support request results from larger players like Dell and Best Buy's Geek Squad for a much larger gulp of the big picture.
Helperoo is a free email support system made especially for small no nonsense businesses that has just launched today. No extra features, no confusing interface, and forget about that 500 page manual needed to get started; everything a small business needs for email support is here.
Helperoo was started as a way for companies to handle simple email support without sifting through other feature rich applications that take time to learn. They stripped out all of the features that would never normally get used by smaller companies and built their simple core system. The Helperoo support system does not require any special installations or maintenance, and they look after everything by storing all information on top grade web servers. Helperoo claims that your data will be secure by using leading encryption and backup services. The system works by accepting your forwarded standard company support emails, which are then protected by industry leading spam and virus protection, to your account on Helperoo. From your Helperoo account you can then reply to, forward, close, open, hold, or create new support issues. No dedicated applications necessary, to use the support system application all you need is a browser, so you can stay in touch with issues wherever you may be.
There are two plans offered. A free 200 email per month plan that is ad supported, and a pro unlimited email plan for $12 per month.
Calling all Google Apps users, your schedule might not be spot-on this Thursday.
Users of Google Apps can expect some downtime during routine maintenance of the Google Calendar Thursday April 26th, from 8AM to 9PM. As is expected with any sort of maintenance, downtimes may and will occur and in this case Google Calendar might not be accessible for some time. Scheduled maintenance during daylight hours, what gives, Google?
This blow to users scheduling sure does make us wonder if Google Apps is worth using for our main scheduling application. It is understandable that system upgrades have to occur in order to improve services, it just sucks that we are now forced to suffer.
Drop a comment on Thursday to let us all know if you were affected by the maintenance and approx. how long your downtime lasted for.
UPDATE: More info on the scheduled maintenance from Google:
Why are we doing an upgrade? We are updating some of our servers as we continue to improve Google Calendar. This is a normal maintenance update, and as with all updates we look to minimize the impact to our end users.
How will this impact my end users? The impact to your users should be minimal. Only a subset of your users should be affected by the upgrade. These users may have trouble accessing their Google Calendars for a short period of time, generally less than 5-10 minutes each.
Will Google Calendar be down from 8AM to 9PM PDT? No. This is the window of time that the maintenance upgrade will take place. During this time some users will experience issues accessing their calendar, but only for a short period of time each.
April 24th is the last day Firefox 1.5 will be officially supported. The developers have moved to a consumer-oriented model with a short product lifespan and regular browser upgrades. While this isn't great for corporate users who are slow to implement updates, it's worked pretty well in terms of keeping Firefox on the cutting edge.
About 40% of Firefox users are still running version 1.5.0.x, so this might be a good time to upgrade.
If you are using any of the Adobe products and have the itch to upgrade to Windows Vista, you might want to check out the How Adobe Products Support Windows Vista document (pdf alert). Adobe applications are listed with their current status concerning Windows Vista support and any workarounds that might be needed until official support is available. Adobe plans to keep this document updated as product support for Vista evolves. OS upgrades are so much fun.
PC Pro is reporting that Microsoft will be extending support for Windows XP beyond 2010. It had originally intended to discontinue support for the operating system at the end of January 2009, two years after the launch of Windows Vista, but has pushed back the date in response to customer appeals. Now it says that "mainstream" support for XP will cease in April 2009 but "extended" support will continue for an additional five years, but only for Windows XP Home and Media Center editions. Extended support includes fixes for security holes but excludes warranty claims and "non-security hot-fixes or design changes." You can read more about Microsoft's lifecycle policy in the official FAQ.
As announced on Friday by David Eisenstein, the Fedora Legacy project is shutting down. As of his announcement (or maybe even earlier) Fedora Core 4 and earlier distributions are no longer being maintained or supported. He said that their current model of maintaining older distributions of Fedora Core are being examined, but right now everything is on (seemingly indefinite) hold. Jesse Keating later followed up and put it on record that the lack of contributors, and zero response to their call for help with the project, lead to the demise. I can't imagine anyone who would be absolutely dependent on Fedora Core 4, except maybe for older servers. If you're a dedicated Desktop Linux user, you're likely running Fedora Core 6, or another distribution like Ubuntu or SuSE.
The real question this leaves in my mind (an no doubtedly others) - is this just another case, in what has seemed like a recurring theme, of a concerted group of people being unable to provide support for Linux over the long term? Will Ubuntu LTS succeed where Fedora Legacy could not? With the rapid pace of Linux development, is long term support just a pipe dream, or a realistic goal?
Microsoft has officially stopped supporting Windows XP SP1 as of yesterday. That means that users who want to continue to get security updates will need to install Service Pack 2 for XP, or say goodbye to security updates and stick with SP1. It isn't a huge deal either way, and we expected this right about now, since it has been two years since the release date. Service Pack 2 isn't generally a problem for most folks, so if you haven't installed it yet, you should. I can't see why anyone would really have major qualms with Service Pack 2, except perhaps the endlessly annoying security bar in Internet Explorer 6. The solution to that problem is use Firefox, um IceWeasel I guess. This is a Public Service Announcement from your friendly neighborhood Download Squad.
Microsoft may finally be phasing out Windows XP sales, but the company is telling customers that it will offer support for the operating system through 2014. 
Todd Haselton at Ars Technica's 
Microsoft has officially stopped supporting 
