Microsoft Releases Changelist for Upcoming XP SP2

kylef writes "As we know from independent sources, Microsoft is busy readying Service Pack 2 for Windows XP. They have published on their website a changelist document (link goes to TechNet download page) detailing the nature of the security-related fixes and updates. The document is targeted towards XP admins and covers some interesting things such as the new Internet Explorer Pop-up Manager and various security policy changes. Some other juicy tidbits from the document: Internet Connection Firewall will be enabled by default, and there will be new support for something called "Execution Protection" which allows developers to make use of the NX (no execute) page guard flag on Intel's Itanium and newer AMD processors. An interesting read."

Quick, call the cops!

[ciaran_o_riordan]

> detailing the nature of the security-related fixes

DMCA violation.

lol...crashes allready

[selderrr]

I downloaded the doc file, and tried to open it with WordPad (which is supposedly compatible with MS Word (which I refuse to buy), at least up to the level of displaying the text (without tables/pics)

Guess what ? WinXPpro SP1 is very sorry for the inconvenience but decides to throw up on me (an exception that is) and bail out !

Program Error

[rehabdoll]

"wordpad.exe has generated errors and will be closed by Windows.
You need to restart the program.

An error log is being created."

nice.

*POOOF*

[MagerValp]

Was that the sound of the personal firewall market dying?

Re:Wordpad crashed

[ciaran_o_riordan]

The file is in the "OpenOffice.org MS Word doc" format. Wordpad does it's best to open this OpenOffice.org format but it' can't be expected to keep up with the regular format changes.

I could not resist...

[Savage-Rabbit]

Executio Protection

Old man Saddam could use feature that right about now.

Re:I just hope

[bobintetley]

...It's still buggering me to download the patch...

Windows is doing you from behind?

On reflection, could be accurate after all ;-)

Re:Smart.

[Daengbo]

Are they going to be upgrading to the new 2.6 kernel? I have a new chipset I was hoping would be supported.

Re:All this work

[phalse phace]

Did you RTFA?"

You must be new here.

Re:Quick, call the cops!

[Channard]

BTW, I didn*t find anything in this changelog like the "fixes to known pirate cracks and serial numbers" from SP1. Is it possible that MS gave up ?

It's there in the ROT13ed addendum that reads 'Spend six weeks locking out cracks, only to have some hax0r still in baby booties crack it in three minutes.' Not the best use of MS's time or money.

Will it run on...

[OPTiX_iNC]

a p1 133?
No?
Well, I guess I stay with linux.

Re:MSFW / MSFWE / MSFF - Request

[BenjyD]

Preferences->Homepage->exclude stories->Microsoft.

I'm sure an enterprising geek could write a script to do that for them. You could even cron job it to give MS free days/weeks.

Re:I just hope

[David McBride]

"Yeah sure! It's still buggering me to download the patch."

Well, I'm pretty sure that isn't going to work..

Re:lol...crashes allready

[BokLM]

This will be corrected in Service Pack 2, you'll have to wait ...

Re:I could not resist...

[MullerMn]

>Executio Protection

Old man Saddam could use feature that right about now.

Why? In case Harry Potter tries to kill him?

Re:All this work

[nmg196]

> So in other words IE was a pop up blocker, that html writers
> can bypass at their own will .

No. You just made that up. Read the article.

> Damn I wish I could add security features, and then poke holes in them.

I'm glad that you can't do either of these things.

Re:...where is tabbed browsing?

[Numeric]

Hey they just added Pop-Up browser blocking! I think asking for any more features is pushing it a bit. IE users will have to wait for Longhorn to get tabbed-browsing.

Re:Will it run on...

[evilquaker]

a p1 133?

Will it even run on a P3 1.33?

Re:Just another angry Linux zealot post...

[PainKilleR-CE]

Notepad opens it, at least on XP machines (where Notepad doesn't have the limit on length). Unfortunately, it doesn't look nice when you open it, and not all of it may be readable...

Re:who cares about ie blocking popups, still insec

[Anonymous Coward]

On the other, other hand (what, three hands???)

It's called the gripping hand...

Re:*POOOF*

[bmajik]

actually, the disk defragmenter is 100% MS code now. The old one was outsourced to Executive Software, a bunch of scientologists. I think we had to do the defragmenter in house to get the scientologist bits out of it for certain governments to approve XP. (or it might have been because the code wasn't fully disclosed to us, or something along those lines).

In any case, the defragger is no longer outsourced code :)

Re:bsd haiku

[Anonymous Coward]

trolling on slashdot
poor substitute for a life
yet it still goes on

Improved computer Maintenance

[aflat362]

I was interested in the Improved Computer Maintenance section. Here it is:

This section provides detailed information about the technologies included in Windows XP Service Pack 2 that help inform the user about security technologies and ensure that computers have current security updates. These technologies are either designed to help provide security or have been improved to provide more security than before.

This content is not available in this preliminary release.

Re:Wordpad crashed

[Kent Recal]

Uhm, why do I get modded flamebait for providing a link to a tool that allows to convert .doc -> .txt? Well, lick my balls Mr.Moderation...