Operating System

WHEN WE visit friends or relatives for a few days, I often find myself staring at a strange computer, trying to fix a problem or install new hardware or software. When you write a column like this one, it's an occupational hazard. On our current trip, I volunteered to set up a wireless network for my cousin so she could use her laptop on the patio (thankfully, she lives far from the Snowbelt). Her four-year-old Sony VAIO seemed to be in reasonably good shape, but as a rule, I visit Microsoft's Windows Update Web site to make sure the operating system is current before I install anything new. Wow!

Tiger Woods, Microsoft and the Tea Party are all reasserting themselves. Welcome to your post-weekend trends report for May 13, 2013. Woods won his 78th PGA event Sunday in Ponte Vedra Beach, showing further recovery from a series of injuries and marital scandals. The IRS, meanwhile, was hoping to nip its own growing scandal in the bud, as allegations that the agency engaged in political harrassment were backed up over the weekend by leaked portions of an official report. At least one office of the agency actively targeted conservative groups' applications for nonprofit status, according to the report, which put the Obama administration into message-control mode over the weekend.

When the major planets fall into alignment in the heavens, soothsayers prophesy upheaval and chaos.So beware the Ides of April. A similar portentous alignment is occurring this month in the personal computer industry as several major companies introduce new or improved operating system software.Operating system software is the foundation software upon which all other computer applications operate. It is, in an anthropomorphic sense, the soul or DNA of the machine.The most popular operating system is DOS, used by an estimated 70 million computers.

Of course, we all know who to cheer for when David challenges Goliath. But what happens when Goliath is staring down, say, a worldwide corporation that makes tens of billions of dollars a year? In other words, whom do you root for in Microsoft vs. Google? Perhaps, at this point, we should simply cheer that there's any competition at all. Through the years, it's become easy to mistrust Microsoft, a company that began as an upstart itself but now boasts a global market (an estimated 90 percent of the world's computers run on Windows)

SEATTLE - Stung by slowing personal computer sales and its ongoing antitrust challenge, Microsoft unveiled last week a new version of its Windows operating system that it hopes will help boost the company's fortunes. Calling the 18-year-old Windows operating system "the most successful software product of all time," Bill Gates, the company's co-founder and chairman, said the forthcoming Windows XP version would mark "the most important Windows release since Windows 95," a blockbuster that generated worldwide attention and made Windows nearly synonymous with personal computing.

Apple Computer Inc. last week formally introduced a substantially upgraded version of the Macintosh operating system, called System 7.0. It had been eagerly awaited and long delayed.Apple officials said they expected 1.5 million to 3 million Macintosh users to switch to System 7.0 this year, and analysts said System 7.0 was Apple's best hope for keeping the Windows operating system from Microsoft Corp. at bay.Indeed, analysts hailed the introduction of System 7.0 as one of the most significant events in Apple's flagship product line since the debut of the original Macintosh in 1984.

After years of hype, IBM Corp.'s OS/2 operating system for personal computers has arrived. OS/2 has caused quite a stir because switching to a new OS on your computer is like putting a new engine in the car. Not only does performance increase or decrease, but the car's feel, its personality, changes as well.At the moment, most non-Apple PCs use Microsoft Corp.'s Disk Operating System to run their machines, or DOS derivatives made by other manufacturers. Users can also buy Windows 3.1, which adds a graphical user interface to DOS.Big Blue wants some of that Windows action.

About 4 million of you purchased Microsoft Corp.'s Windows 98 operating system, and I'm still not sure why. That rather skimpy upgrade to Windows 95 was absurdly overpriced at $89. But lots of you paid it, so it's no surprise that Microsoft would try again, Thursday, with Windows Millennium Edition, or Windows Me. But this time it's different. There's a lower price - $59 for Windows 98 users, $89 for all others - and, this time, value for the money. Some rubbish, too. For a glimpse of Microsoft at its worst, there's the built-in Movie Maker software, Microsoft's response to Apple's marvelous iMovie video editing software, available free with all new Macintosh computers.

ask average people to name the most influential person in the computer industry, and you'll probably hear Microsoft's Bill Gates. Unless they're Apple fans, who will probably give the nod to founding father Steve Jobs. But for many of the world's top geeks, a third name looms even larger than those giants -- Linus Torvalds.Linus who?That's Torvalds, a quiet, self-effacing Finnish programmer who started what may be a revolution in the computer industry. In 1991, he was a college student studying computer science in Helsinki when he began work on an experimental operating system -- the critical software that controls computers and allows all other programs to run.His creation was based on Unix, which runs many of the world's most powerful computers and workstations.

I don't know anyone who plans to line up outside a computer store at 12:01 Tuesday morning to get a copy of Windows Vista. That's when Microsoft begins selling consumers the first major revision of its flagship operating system in five years. There's a good reason for the lack of enthusiasm. Vista is safer and slicker than its predecessor, but not a must-have upgrade. Most of its improvements are incremental, and Windows XP is a solid performer. Unless you're an uber-geek who doesn't mind gambling with his PC, installing Vista isn't worth the peril of replacing a perfectly workable operating system - certainly not the first week it's released.

Macolytes around the world were buzzing this week with news that an online hardware vendor called Psystar.com is selling a $555 PC called the "Open Computer" that runs the Macintosh OS X Leopard operating system. In fact, for about the same price, you can buy the machine with Windows or Leopard installed - or buy it for $400 with the open-source Linux operating system. For Mac lovers accustomed to paying the Apple premium, this would be a major breakthrough - at the very least, a cheap source for the second or third computer they can't afford (or justify to their spouses)

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- With all the hoopla surrounding the iPhone and the new matchbox-like iPods, it's easy to forget that Apple remains at its core a computer company. Chief executive Steven P. Jobs and company are set to remind the world about their first love in coming days with the release of Leopard, the newest version of the Macintosh operating system, which will update the current Tiger. Apple, which prefers not to announce anything in advance, has made an exception with a promise to let its latest cat loose this month.

I bought a Gateway laptop in December with a free Vista upgrade. I made sure the laptop was Vista-ready and have received the Vista pack. However, I have been hesitant to install the Vista upgrade because of the previous problems with it, and because I do not know what to expect (problemwise) once installed. The IT people are waiting before installing Vista at work, so they are no help. Would you advise to go ahead and install the upgrade or wait until more improvements are made? - Kay O'Reilly, bellsouth.

I don't know anyone who plans to line up outside a computer store at 12:01 Tuesday morning to get a copy of Windows Vista. That's when Microsoft begins selling consumers the first major revision of its flagship operating system in five years. There's a good reason for the lack of enthusiasm. Vista is safer and slicker than its predecessor, but not a must-have upgrade. Most of its improvements are incremental, and Windows XP is a solid performer. Unless you're an uber-geek who doesn't mind gambling with his PC, installing Vista isn't worth the peril of replacing a perfectly workable operating system - certainly not the first week it's released.

As 2007 rolls in, millions of Americans will have to make what looks like a momentous technical decision - should they upgrade to the latest version of Microsoft Windows, stay put, or even switch to a Mac? Meanwhile, their legislators and election boards will be pondering a far more important decision: Do we want Microsoft Windows - or any operating system - running our elections? Maryland will be Ground Zero in this debate. We made headlines by committing $106 million to a voting system based on thousands of Diebold touch-screen electronic terminals.

WHEN WE visit friends or relatives for a few days, I often find myself staring at a strange computer, trying to fix a problem or install new hardware or software. When you write a column like this one, it's an occupational hazard. On our current trip, I volunteered to set up a wireless network for my cousin so she could use her laptop on the patio (thankfully, she lives far from the Snowbelt). Her four-year-old Sony VAIO seemed to be in reasonably good shape, but as a rule, I visit Microsoft's Windows Update Web site to make sure the operating system is current before I install anything new. Wow!

MONTEREY, Calif. -- Apple Computer Inc. said yesterday that it will introduce a Macintosh operating system in 1998 that will be able to run on any microprocessor.Chairman Gilbert Amelio, in a speech to analysts and investors, said the new operating system will run some older applications, but will have a new core of software code that enables it to run on chips from Intel Corp., Sun Microsystems Inc. and others -- as well as the Motorola Inc. processor used now.Apple's machines now run only on the PowerPC chip, a limitation that has hampered acceptance in a world increasingly dominated by machines featuring Intel chips and Microsoft Corp.

In a step to help the Linux operating system gain popularity among government and corporate users, International Business Machines Corp. and SuSE Linux AG plan to announce today that they have achieved security certification for Linux from the U.S. government, a first for the free operating system. The government, under the direction of the Pentagon's Defense Information Security Agency, has revamped its certification standards process in the past year to improve the security of computer systems as part of the effort to strengthen domestic security.

I keep a museum-quality collection of PCs around my house. Motherboards, graphic cards, memory, disks and so on are frequently upgraded, swapped and replaced. Processors range from a 450 MHz Celeron to the 1.2 MHz Pentium on my laptop, and various releases of Windows. I hesitate to call my collection typical of the computing world in general, but it probably is typical of some home users. About a year and a half ago, I installed the first release of Xandros Linux on this grungy menagerie.

The first and last time Ann Fligsten took the bus from Arnold to Annapolis she couldn't find a schedule and had to trample through weeds to reach the bus stop. "If it's so hard to take a bus and you have a car, you're not going to take the bus," she said, adding that she has found others who agree with her. A group of Anne Arundel County residents seeking more public transportation options will gather Wednesday for the first meeting of what organizers believe is the county's broadest coalition ever to fight for transit.