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Microsoft Charging Businesses $4K for DST Fix
Posted by
Zonk
on Sat Mar 03, 2007 03:22 PM
from the pricey-way-to-tell-time dept.
from the pricey-way-to-tell-time dept.
eldavojohn writes "Microsoft has slashed the price it's going to charge users on the daylight saving time fixes. As you know, the federal law that moves the date for DST goes into effect this month. Although the price of $4000 is 1/10 of the original estimate Microsoft made, it seems a bit pricey for a patch to a product you've already paid for. From the article: 'Among the titles in that extended support category are Windows 2000, Exchange Server 2000 and Outlook 2000, the e-mail and calendar client included with Office 2000. For users running that software, Microsoft charges $4,000 per product for DST fixes. For that amount, customers can apply the patches to all systems in their organizations, including branch offices and affiliate.' The only thing they can't do, said a Microsoft rep, is redistribute them."
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Linux: Linux Systems and the New DST 304 comments
An anonymous reader writes "The recent changes in the Daylight Saving Time will affect virtually all computer systems in the US one week from now. Microsoft has been busy preparing Windows users for 'Y2DST,' and all the major Linux distributions have also issued patches. How can you be sure your Linux systems are ready, and what can you do to get them ready if they're not? This how-to article at Linux-Watch answers both questions in simple language and with easy-to-follow instructions."
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Screw 'em (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Screw 'em (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Hickup? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Screw 'em (Score:5, Informative)
As an engineer who is right in the middle of helping our customers make the changes necessary for the DST fix, it is much more complicated than that.
First, you have all of the servers and clients which rely on one another. The biggest effect is on mail - Exchange/Outlook/OWA.
Second, you have to do it in the right order, at about the same time. If you update the server, then clients who schedule appointments will be off until they update.
Third, you've got software which calculates various things based on that date. Think financial transactions, etc.
I've blogged about the tool [cornetdesign.com] we have to help customers figure out what has to be done.
I wish it was as easy as just updating a script, but when you have to coordinate that change across 10s or 100s of thousands of servers, clients, etc, it's not an easy task.
And let's not forget Microsoft isn't the only one having to make changes. Lotus Notes, Groupwise, Blackberries - they all have changes that have to be made. I'll personally be glad when this is all done. Ugh.
Parent
Re:Screw 'em (Score:4, Interesting)
Why is Windows so much harder? Didnt they do it properly?
Parent
Re:Screw 'em (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:Screw 'em (Score:4, Insightful)
Umm, that's not really the problem. It doesn't matter what the hardware clock is set for, UTC or local time. In any sane installation you're only going to use the hardware clock until you sync with the NTP servers anyway. The local time is still going to change on a different date than the OS is configured for. If you have Linux or UNIX boxes and keep the hardware clock set for UTC, you're STILL going to need to fix the time zone setings for the correct DST changeover dates, otherwise all local times will be off by an hour between the new changeover date and the old one. It's not a clock thing, it a time zone thing. We're having to apply patches to every single box in our infrastructure -- that's around 15,000 systems, not including desktops. Those add another 100K or more. We've had to patch Slowaris, Linux, HPUX, AIX, and a few flavors of Windoze, and that's just the servers. Then there are patches required for Java and a host of other crap, don't ask me why they don't just use the damn system clock.
The issue here is not the DST patch, it's the fact that Micro$loth was charging $40K for the Windoze 2000 patch. They justified it because W2K is officially out of support for patches - it's EOL or EOSL, I don't remember which becuase I pay very little attention to Windoze server issues.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Updating the timezone files on a Unix OS is trivially easy and can be scripted over ssh normally.
With Windows it's a *lot* harder because it really doesn't want to use UTC.. it always tries to start from local time and convert to it, and it does in fact get it wrong for about 6 months of the year (known bug, been there since
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Nah. It's SOL.
I love Microsoft. First Vista, now this. They're making Sony look skilled at navigating the shoals of corporate error. Of course, it is important to remember who really fucked up: Congress, with this whole idiotic idea.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
non free is like that. (Score:4, Insightful)
all Linux had to do was update its zone info stuff. Why is Windows so much harder? Didnt they do it properly?
As an end user, it was even easier. All I did was apt-get update/upgrade.
The difference between the free and non free worlds is never more glaring than when you "upgrade". Because non free companies don't trust each other or their users, they can't really co-operate. When they have to co-operate, things get sticky. Mechanisms, like the Windows registry, are so bad that it's easier to wipe and reload than it is to actually update software. What's a pain for individual users is multiplied by thousands for businesses and then compounded by the number of applications updated. A whole industry exists to help banks and other businesses do trivial things like change out versions of text editors and mail clients on ordinary workstations. It's a process that's excruciatingly manual, bandwith intensive and slow, with each person able to do less than ten machines a night. Add some smoke an mirrors timing "security"* into the mix and you have something even worse.
*-there is no security on a platform with a one in four botnet ownership. The pain and expense are all for nothing.
Parent
upgrading the bank. (Score:3, Insightful)
Old troll Bungi doubts me:
"It's a process that's excruciatingly manual ... with each person able to do less than ten machines a night "
Bullshit. Do you even *believe* this crap you write? You've never had a job in a real company with more than 100 machines, so do us all a favor and just don't share your opinion on things like these. OK? Thanks.
Yes, Bungi, I've actually been on a Windoze upgrade slave gang for a fortune 100 bank and what I describe is how I remember it. They had some of the automated
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Screw 'em (Score:4, Insightful)
To add to the problems, different computers and programs have been patched at different times. What if someone with a patched computer sent out a meeting request that had the UTC time and I received it on a computer without it? My computer shows the meeting an hour off from the sender's computer. When I now patch my computer, I don't know whether to adjust the meeting time or not (assuming I didn't know the patch status of the sender's computer). There's not much you can do to avoid these issues, so people are trying to get the word out that you should confirm times for the next few weeks instead of assuming the program is displaying the intended time.
Parent
Go Linux! (Score:4, Insightful)
It's hard to say this without sounding like a zealot, but these kinds of things are nothing but good for Free Software. This patch should be nothing more than an edit to a single configuration file (and if it's not, then that's another problem), but you can't download that change freely or give it to your friends? I can understand - even if I disagree - with not giving away your applications. I cannot be made to understand, though, not giving away trivial bugfixes.
Re:Go Linux! (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Go Linux! (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Go Linux! (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
free patches are available (Score:5, Informative)
Re:free patches are available (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Really inaccurate story. (Score:4, Informative)
They also provide a variety of workarounds (registry files you can apply, and scripts to apply to a large number of machines remotely) for Windows 2000. If you don't like that, there's unofficial patches as well (http://www.intelliadmin.com/blog/2007/01/unoffic
Yay for overblown stories!
Re:Really inaccurate story. (Score:4, Insightful)
MS has free patches for all current OSes as well.
MS wins this round.
And "System Clock"? You mean the thing on the motherboard that ususally knows knows NOTHING about times zones or DST? And if it does then ALSO requires a patch to work right now? How will that help in any way?
Parent
Wow, thieves (Score:2)
innovation (Score:5, Funny)
Down with DST! (Score:5, Funny)
I've always felt that if we could harness all of the time and energy software developers and IT departments have spent over the years working on DST-related issues in software and apply it to some other purpose of good, we'd all be driving around in flying cars and taking vacations on the moon by now. It is 2007, after all. You know, the future?
That's right. I'm blaming the state of the world on DST.
Re:Down with DST! (Score:4, Interesting)
The thing I learned most from my experiment, however, is that it takes a lot of will power to get up earlier. Most people simply do not have the will power to get up and be in bed an hour earlier. And sadly, that's the reason we spend so much time, money, and effort on DST. Just to trick lazy people into getting out of bed an hour earlier. It's also the reason why a permanent year round DST (which I've seen some people advocate) is doomed to fail. People would just adjust and do everything an hour later (and then we'd need a 2 hour DST). Only the constant switching keeps them in line.
So, while I personally despise DST as a ridiculous concept, it does have its uses.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
there are free utils to patch this (Score:5, Informative)
First link under "freeware downloads".
Nothing to see here. (Score:4, Insightful)
I know in Soviet Russia that work was done for free for the betterment of ones comrades, but this isn't Soviet Russia quite yet. Companies charge you when they provide a service for you.
This is what happens when you have a monopoly (Score:3, Insightful)
TZEdit (Score:4, Informative)
Relatively Inexpesive (Score:5, Insightful)
So that includes:
Windows 2000 Server straight DST patch
Windows 2000 CRT DST patch (Never heard of that one? See here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/932955/en-us/ [microsoft.com] and here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/932590/en-us/ [microsoft.com]
Exchange running on W2K
Visual Studio 6.0 patches (I believe...)
So $4000 to cover *all* unsupported systems, and to have a human to call and say "Your patch screwed up my server" and have them fix it, is to be cliche, Priceless
..or just DIY (Score:4, Informative)
Three steps.
1. Create
2. Create
3a. Create GPO to import reg key and run VBScript on Win2k machines at Startup.
or
3b. In absence of AD, modify script to copy itself and
If you're such a small organization that you don't have an I.T. group.. then.. it's probably simple to use TZEdit to update your piddly network.
For fun, you can trick out the script to make sure it only runs once.
Not so Crazy... (Score:3, Informative)
Well, that's certainly not the first time F-22's have flown across the pacific, and they never had that problem before. It was because of the DST patch to their systems, the engineers skipped the regression tests that involved the dateline because it was just a patch for the US timezones. Look what happened.
So, while it may seem simple enough to change the DST handling in MS Windows, don't count on it.
Whenever you mess around with time, it is easy to create unexpected results. (cue time-travel jokes)
FREE Update (Score:3, Informative)
Always worth a try!
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Re:things that make you go hmmm... (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:things that make you go hmmm... (Score:5, Informative)
Talk about tinfoil hats, how paranoid do you have to be to tie a daylight savings change to the Iraq war?
The daylight savings time change is one tiny paragraph of a huge energy policy bill [loc.gov], and by the way provides for a study in 9 months to see if it actually helped, and a potential of reverting back to the 2005 schedule if it didn't help. You may not agree with the policies put forth in the bill, but it certainly wasn't prompted by a desire to avoid appropriating money --- my senators and representative (all republicans) voted against it for anti-pork reasons.
Parent
Re:things that make you go hmmm... (Score:4, Insightful)
As for the summary saying "it seems a bit pricey for a patch to a product you've already paid for." - well, no, that isn't true. Customers paid for a product and for support for it; the support for Windows 2000 is over, as per the original agreements. They got what they paid for. This is the same issue with any proprietary, closed-source software - the client is left to depend on a single vendor for patches once the official support is over, and can effectively be taken hostage (I wouldn't trust patches from anyone who doesn't have access to all the source code). Microsoft isn't doing anything 'special' here beyond typical closed-source tactics. But those are enough to show the importance of using FOSS.
Parent
Cows, Drapes and Diaries. (Score:3, Interesting)
1. Dairy cows will require milking at the "wrong time" and will suffer from overfull udders.
2. Drapes will fade quicker due to the "extra" UV light.
BTW: This DST "calamity" is not restricted to MS software, I mean how the hell does someone with a traditional diary get around the problem, I have never seen a
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Also, by the US doing this it created more time zones. How? Mexico is choosing not to go along with the DST updates, therefore anywhere in Mexico using PST effectively isn't anymore.
Re:things that make you go hmmm... (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not trying to defend MS, but there's no need to make dodgy comparisons... One can surmise that open-source users will likely have an easier time making this change, seeing as they don't have to rely on a corporation to update their binaries.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
And, please note that these products aren't even officially being supported anymore
Allow me to dance upon the grave of this particular party line here and now -- bullshit [theregister.co.uk], MS is still actively selling this operating system if you happen to be the right customer.
My gripe isn't that they want to charge for an update to a (now) 2-gen-old version of a product. My gripe is what they want to charge, even the new bargain-basement price. I could see a "nominal charge" up to the original sticker price, but I just can't swallow that a relatively simple change to the OS incurs a 40x higher cost t
Re:Bastages. (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
If you bought an extended support contract, at the time of expiration, you get this for free.
If you thought "I won't have any W2K in 6 months, so why bother" and 24 months later, the DST issue caught you - well, pay up.
Or what value did those who paid for extended support get?
Parent
Re:Exactly (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Bastages. (Score:5, Informative)
Open up regedit and go to the following location:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contr
Change DaylightStart to the following
00 00 03 00 02 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
(Simply we're changing 04 to 03 and 01 to 02)
Change StandardStart to the following
00 00 0b 00 01 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
(Simply we're changing 0a to 0b and 05 to 01)
Why those changes?
DaylightStart rules:
04 becomes 03 because we're going from "April" (04) to "March" (03). 01 becomes 02 because we're going from the 1st Sunday (in April) to the 2nd Sunday (in March).
StandardStart rules:
0a becomes 0b because we're going from "October" (0a) to "November" (0b). 05 becomes 01 because we're going from the Last Sunday (in October) to the 1st Sunday (in November).
Consider that one on the house. It works for Windows 2000 at least.
Parent
Re:Whoa (Score:5, Insightful)
No, the real, real question is: why are you so desperate to drag political bullshit into every story? Love him or hate him, GWB has absolutely nothing to do with how much Microsoft charges for a patch.
Parent