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Get set for yet another Windows update

By Anand Parthasarathy

BANGALORE AUG. 29. Less than a year after its global launch, Windows XP, the latest version of the PC operating system, is due for its first major update. While Microsoft has not formally announced this, the New York Times yesterday quoted the company as saying, it plans to release SP1 or Service Pack no. 1 for XP, `within the next ten days.' This is said to be part of its compliance measures, in a deal worked out with the U.S. Justices Department, during a protracted court case.

Indian users of the operating system can expect to find free downloadable versions of the update pack — but don't try unless you have a legally bought version of XP and had registered the product's identification code earlier through Microsoft's Windows Product Activation Service (WPA). Otherwise, suggest some experts, attempting to download the update could "bomb'' your computer — at the very least, freezing the software at its current stage and foiling attempts to upgrade by any means. However, many users here might feel that the update is no big deal anyway: Essentially it will allow one to remove Microsoft's proprietary tools like the browser "Internet Explorer,'' the audio-video CD player "Windows Media Player'' and the MSN Messenger programmes, from the desktop menu. One of the crucial points raised by opponents during the U.S. antitrust court cases was that Microsoft unfairly tied down users to its own versions of such popular utilities, by making them work better, under Windows, than competing products.

As part of the `loosening' process, the Microsoft's Developer Network (MSDN) website has posted a software development kit (SDK) containing some 250-plus programming interfaces which will help PC vendors in future to offer Windows XP-based machines with popular third party alternatives to the Microsoft tools: for example, with RealPlayer rather than Windows Media Player.

A `teen machine' Windows XP users can also expect an even bigger upgrade by year end — the introduction of a software tool called `Windows XP Media Centre' which will allow PCs to record and playback TV programmes using a `remote'.

By combining CD and DVD player functions with the ability to switch over seamlessly to TV, Microsoft hopes to unleash a `lean, mean, teen machine' which the young, worldwide, will appreciate. It will also go some way towards bridging the PC-TV divide, merging the two functions and holding out the hope that in the near future, one machine can do the job of both.

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