Microsoft Support & Discussions

Microsoft is close to debuting a build of its “Project Vancouver” social-analytics services built on SQL Azure. Source: All About Microsoft

Severity Rating: Critical Revision Note: V1.1 (October 12, 2011): Added a link to Microsoft Knowledge Base Article 2586448 under Known Issues in the Executive Summary. Summary: This security update resolves eight privately reported vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer. The most severe vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if a user views a specially crafted Web page using Internet Explorer. An attacker who successfully exploited any of these vulnerabilities could gain the same user rights as the local user. Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users who operate with administrative user rights…

The promise of HTML5 is a Web that works for everyone. Media accessibility through captioning is an important part of that promise and an area that is still emerging through standards work. Using the proposed HTML5 track element, developers can add captioning to HTML5 video by pointing to a caption file that contains a written representation of the dialog or actions in the video. Once the standards for captioning converge, there will be less need for external add-ons to publish accessible video content. The following HTML fragment shows how the track element works: The W3C HTML5 specification …

Microsoft is making its Internet Explorer 9.0.3 release, a cumulative security update, available via Windows Update starting on October 12. Source: All About Microsoft

By Paul Thurrott It couldn’t come at a worse time for beleaguered RIM: Its proprietary wireless network for Blackberry smart phones experienced service outages in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa on Monday and Tuesday, and now they’ve spread to North America too. As a result, Blackberry users are experiencing email delivery delays of up to three hours as well as sporadic access to the web and Blackberry Messenger. Source: Win Super Site

By Paul Thurrott This week, Microsoft updated its guidance and porting tool, which are aimed at helping iPhone and Android developers port from those platforms to Windows Phone. And in a related move, Nokia discussed how the Windows Phone porting tool has been updated to include migrating from Nokia Symbian Qt. Source: Win Super Site

The October 2011 Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer is now available via Windows Update. This security update resolves eight privately reported vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer. The most severe vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if a user views a specially crafted Web page using Internet Explorer. An attacker who successfully exploited any of these vulnerabilities could gain the same user rights as the local user. Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less affected than users who operate with administrative user rights. This security update is rated Critical for Internet Explorer on Windows cl…

The Microsoft Surface 2.0, known as the Samsung SUR40, isn’t going to be out in 2011, after all. Samsung has pushed back availability to January 2012. Source: All About Microsoft

Microsoft is stepping up its support of Hadoop with new Windows Azure and Windows Server distributions in order to better support users’ big data and unstructured data needs. Source: All About Microsoft

Microsoft isn’t sharing its public-cloud roadmaps like it used to. Last year, the Windows Azure team outlined its delivery plans in detail. Here’s a look at what’s there and what’s still missing. Source: All About Microsoft

Microsoft is making some Windows 8 UI concessions but isn’t going so far as to allow users to circumvent the tiled Metro screen altogether. Source: All About Microsoft

Severity Rating: Critical Revision Note: V1.1 (October 11, 2011): Added an update FAQ to announce a detection change for KB2518870 and KB2518864 that corrects an installation issue. This is a detection change only. There were no changes to the security update files. Customers who have already successfully updated their systems do not need to take any action. Summary: This security update resolves a publicly disclosed vulnerability in Microsoft .NET Framework. The vulnerability could allow remote code execution on a client system if a user views a specially crafted Web page using a Web browser that can run XAML Browser Applications (XBAPs). Users whose accounts are confi…

By Paul Thurrott IT is finally embracing the consumerization of IT, and your ability to embrace the widening of end-user technology will determine whether you’re necessary in the future. Source: Win Super Site

Microsoft and Oracle are on opposite sides when it comes to the importance of multitenancy support to their respective public-cloud platforms. Source: All About Microsoft

Severity Rating: Important Revision Note: V1.0 (October 11, 2011): Bulletin published. Summary: This security update resolves four privately reported vulnerabilities in Microsoft Windows. The most severe of these vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if a user opens a specially crafted font file (such as a .fon file) in a network share, a UNC or WebDAV location, or an e-mail attachment. For a remote attack to be successful, a user must visit an untrusted remote file system location or WebDAV share and open the specially crafted font file, or open the file as an e-mail attachment. Read Bulletin

Severity Rating: Important Revision Note: V1.0 (October 11, 2011): Bulletin published. Summary: This security update resolves a publicly disclosed vulnerability in Windows Media Center. The vulnerability could allow remote code execution if an attacker convinces a user to open a legitimate file that is located in the same network directory as a specially crafted dynamic link library (DLL) file. Then, while opening the legitimate file, Windows Media Center could attempt to load the DLL file and execute any code it contained. For an attack to be successful, a user must visit an untrusted remote file system location or WebDAV share and open a legitimate file. Read Bulle…

Severity Rating: Important Revision Note: V1.0 (October 11, 2011): Bulletin published. Summary: This security update resolves a privately reported vulnerability in the Microsoft Active Accessibility component. The vulnerability could allow remote code execution if an attacker convinces a user to open a legitimate file that is located in the same network directory as a specially crafted dynamic link library (DLL) file. Then, while opening the legitimate file, the Microsoft Active Accessibility component could attempt to load the DLL file and execute any code it contained. For an attack to be successful, a user must visit an untrusted remote file system location or WebDAV…