Microsoft enlists developers in security push

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Things that make you go "Hmmm..."

From the article, "The tools service packs will help developers determine whether existing applications need changes to run on the update to Windows XP."

Sounds like a more than an implied admission that the SP2 changes can, and most likely will create a "Catch 22" for Windows application vendors/developers and users alike. That is, if the SP2 changes require updates to the vendor software, said software will be inoperable until whatever necessary changes are made. Therefore any system that has been upgraded to SP2 may lose the ability to run certain applications until they have been "certified" for SP2. However, if these applications are multi-platform (i.e., other OS's as well as Windows and possibly even Windows "pre-XP" versions) they may not function properly on the non-XP systems once they have been changed. In effect, vendors may be required to maintain both SP2 and non-SP2 versions of their products. Users may have to inventory their applications and not upgrade to a hopefully more secure version of their OS until they have assurance of compatibility with SP2 from their non-MS vendors.

It was only one sentence in the article but it caught my attention and I have to wonder what all of the implications of that one statement will be. Hopefully, I am reading more into this than there is but, for now, I have a very uncomfortable feeling about this upgrade.

And no, I didn't miss the implications of locking people into MS solutions at the expense of other vendors, I just didn't want to get into that until I have some clarification of the ramifications of these "potentially necessary" changes.

-nk

Posted by: Netizen Kane   Posted on: 03/01/04 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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