Windows Vista - here at last
Microsoft acknowledges that the latest version of its desktop operating system, Windows Vista, has taken far longer to develop than any of its previous releases. But the wait is - almost - over. Windows Vista will shortly be available to business customers and is on target for a general launch in January.
13 November 2006
It’s a launch that still won’t be without issues. Windows Vista is a substantially different beast to previous incarnations of Windows, especially on the security front – and those changes are still causing conflict between Microsoft security companies such as Symantec and McAfee. Essentially, Windows Vista is so ‘locked down’ that some security software won’t currently function properly – indeed, according to Symantec and McAfee, it can’t function properly.
It’s a tough call – Microsoft has come under huge pressure in terms of security that it’s been forced into shipping much more restrictive code – and the company is confident that this will, in itself, resolve many security issues and that denying access to the central part of Windows, the kernel, is a necessity if the company is to achieve its security goals. Microsoft has granted this access to 32-bit versions of Windows, under pressure from regulators, but the 64-bit version remains locked down because of a kernel protection feature called PatchGuard.
Both McAfee and Symantec have also claimed that Microsoft has been very late in providing the detailed API information which they need in order to make their products ready for Vista. Microsoft denies this, and, to be fair, this is one part of the operating system which is undergoing change right up until the last minute.
A good example of this is a hack demonstrated by a Polish researcher, Joanna Rutkowska, which showed that it was possible to bypass the security in the 64-bit version of Windows which was supposed to stop unsigned drivers from running. In the short time that this flaw was known about, Microsoft blocked it off – by the time release candidate 2 arrived, the exploit didn’t work any more. Microsoft’s solution shows that the company isn’t messing around when it comes to security, because it has blocked applications which need write-access to raw disk sectors – unless those applications have signed, kernel-level drivers. This will cause compatibility problems with some current disk utilities – but Microsoft is taking a longer view. Sure, there will be some initial pain, but Microsoft hopes that the security gains in the long term will be worth it.
Hacks like this don’t prove that Vista is, in itself, flawed – they simply show the nature of software security, which is: until you’ve found it (or someone has) you can’t fix it. Once it’s been found you’re vulnerable, so you’d better fix it quick!
Microsoft has also ended a seven-year anti-trust battle with the European Commission by agreeing to comply with its anti-trust rulings. Microsoft made three important changes to Vista. First, enabling users to choose their own search engine rather than imposing MSN Search. Second, it has allowed its new document format – similar to Adobe’s Acrobat – to be examined by an independent standards body. Finally, it agreed to grant access to the Vista kernel to security companies (since Microsoft has its own security offering now, this was disadvantaging them).
So there’s a lot a pre-launch friction and in all probability there will be plenty of post-launch friction too. But launch it will – and there’s no doubt that it will be successful. Sure, Windows Vista won’t be perfect. True, there will be some compatibility issues. It’s not like the switch from Windows 2000 to Windows XP –far from it. Technically it’s a bigger leap than that from Windows 3.1 to Windows 95, so expect some ‘challenges’. But Microsoft has worked hard to ship it (even pushing back Windows XP service pack 3 until a distant 2008) and has worked hard to get things right.
Once things have settled down, Vista will gain momentum. New versions of software will quickly arrive to solve compatibility issues. Home users will welcome the new interface and, despite its drawbacks, business users will benefit from the tougher security features. And, once it gains market share, software companies will learn to live with Microsoft’s new security model if they want to sell software.
