What is Microsoft?
Microsoft Corporation is a software company based in Redmond, Washington. Microsoft's flagship product, the Windows operating system, is the single most popular operating system for home desktop use. Its other desktop products, namely Microsoft Office , Internet Explorer, and Windows Media Player , are either bundled directly with the Windows operating system, or are often sold together with Windows as preinstalled software on new computer systems. Additionally, the company manufactures and sells computer hardware such as keyboards and mice, and owns or possesses interest in several content-distribution channels such as MSNBC , the MSN Internet portal, and the Microsoft Encarta electronic encyclopedia.
The Microsoft Windows operating system started life as an optional addition to the MS-DOS operating system. The idea of a graphical user interface was pioneered by Apple Computer's Apple II and Macintosh . However, due to prior work with IBM , Microsoft successfully convinced the hardware giant to ship Microsoft Windows preinstalled on IBM personal computers. This monumental step had piggybacked Windows to be one of the most recognized software titles in history. The Microsoft Office suit of applications (Word , Excel , Powerpoint , and Access ) began life as Microsoft Works, an Apple Macintosh application that provided the functions of a word processor , spreadsheet , and database all in one. Microsoft's popular Internet Explorer web browser was originally a rebranded version of Spyglass Mosaic .
Microsoft products have traditionally been plagued with security problems, leading to an entire malicious software industry today. Although all major operating systems and computer programs have been subject to attack at one time or another, Microsoft's latency at resolving issues, and the simple number of them, has tarnished the company's image. Microsoft has a policy of releasing patches to its software on the second Tuesday of every month via Microsoft Update , with no more than 10 major changes to its products at those times. Thus, exploits that are discovered around mid-month are not corrected for at least four weeks, and in many cases eight or twelve weeks can go by before a patch is released for a security issue. Microsoft Corporation has promised that its new Windows Vista operating system will be more secure than previous offerings such as Windows XP , however the ten patches a month policy has not been changed.
Microsoft Software Technology Terminology Questions
Newsletter
Bookmarking:
Something New!
We see you are using Internet Explorer, which is not compatible with this website. We strongly suggest downloading Firefox. We think you'll like it better:
- Firefox displays webpages properly, while Internet Explorer displays webpages in non-standard ways.
- Firefox supports current web technologies such as PNG images, CSS and XML.
- Firefox is better for web designers and developers, who can code webpages to W3C standards. Designing for IE requires "hacks" which more than double production time.
- Firefox is better for users, as it displays webpages exactly how the designer intended.
- Firefox is more secure against viruses and spyware.
You may notice that some aspects of What-Is-What.com do not display properly in Internet Explorer. This is because Internet Explorer does not conform to web standards. Thus, website maintainers must code twice: once for standards-compatable browsers, and once again for IE. By only coding one version of this website, I have more time to add new articles and make other improvements. Coding specifically for IE was too time consuming. If you insist on using a broken browser (Internet Explorer) then you will see broken webpages.
The website code, styles, layout, and images are ©2006-2015 What-Is-What.com
This website is not compatible with MS Internet Explorer. Please upgrade to Firefox, Chrome, or Opera for optimal experience.
Комментариев нет:
Отправить комментарий