Microsoft will re-open Windows Vista to new testers when the next phase of the operating system - dubbed Release Candidate 1, or RC1 - appears, the company said Thursday.
Six weeks after the developer turned off the Vista Beta 2 spigot, the operating system's program manager, Nick White, said that RC1 would open the testing pool to new users.
The US Department of Homeland Security has urged Windows users to install the latest patches from Microsoft as quickly as possible.
In particular it warned about one bug fixed in the latest batch of security updates that, if exploited, could put a PC under the control of an attacker.
Microsoft's recent update fixed 23 flaws found in Windows software.
Many of these bugs are known to malicious hackers and some are already actively exploited on the net.
For the third straight month, it's a busy "Patch Tuesday" for the software giant.
As part of its monthly security update cycle, Microsoft on Tuesday in the US released a dozen security bulletins. Nine of them are tagged critical, the company's highest severity rating. The alerts give details of 20 flaws in Windows and three in Office, all of which Microsoft has now fixed.
Microsoft's entry into the telecommunications industry via its increasingly aggressive VoIP initiatives will cause significant disruption to traditional market models.
Industry research and analysis company, IDC, has written a study, "The Shot Heard Round the VoIP World: Microsoft Targets the IP PBX Market via Unified Communications", which examines Microsoft's approach to unified communications, and the company's initiatives around VOIP to enhance its existing product set.
Microsoft is putting a halt to a version of its Virtual PC software for Intel-based Macs.
The move comes after start-up Parallels introduced its own virtualization software for running Windows on a Mac, and VMware said Monday it plans to provide a beta version of Mac virtualization software later this year.
Apple also has its Boot Camp software, still in a beta testing version. Boot Camp allows Intel-based Macs to run either Windows or the Mac OS, but not both simultaneously.
Microsoft's presentations on Windows Vista are not the typical Black Hat talks, but attendees are welcoming the look behind the scenes at the software giant.
Microsoft will focus on rapid acquisitions to quickly build its security capability, the company said this week.
Recent acquisitions such as Winternals and virtual private network (VPN) specialist Whale will help Microsoft build a comprehensive range of integrated services that cover every aspect of security, according to Gopal Kutwaroo, Microsoft's UK security product manager.
"Our strategy is clear. We don't do point solutions, but are trying to create integrative services, with products and solutions that work right across the computing environment," Kutwaroo said.
As the online social networking scene continues to explode, Microsoft has seen fit to give its MSN Spaces online community a makeover. The company is ditching the MSN nomenclature and is now adding Windows Live Spaces to its ever-growing "Windows Live" brand. Other services in the family include Windows Live Messenger, Live Anywhere and Windows Live Mail.
Virus writers in Austria have reportedly developed malicious code that targets Windows PowerShell, the command line interface shell and scripting language product being developed by Microsoft.
Security company McAfee warned this week that it had detected the worm, called MSH/Cibyz.
MSH/Cibyz is designed to spread using the Kazaa file-sharing network, and the worm runs in PowerShell, which is due to ship in the second half of this year. PowerShell, formerly known as Monad, will underpin future Microsoft products such as Exchange Server 2007.
Although it is a mildly critical problem that can hit a server with a denial of service attack from a local network, Microsoft has verified a workaround for a newly reported Windows vulnerability that affects XP, Server 2003, and Windows 2000 Server versions.
Restricting traffic to ports 135-139 and 445 have been confirmed by Microsoft as a workaround for a new DoS problem reported by ISS X-Force.
X-Force summarized the issue, which became public after Microsoft released its July patch updates to the public.
