New Microsoft Office to tap XML
The next version of the Microsoft Office family application, code-named XDocs, will streamline the process of gathering information by enabling teams to easily create and work with dynamic form. The company intends to achieve this is through extensive support for customer-defined extensible markup language, or XML. Microsoft is expected to launch the new versions of the software in the middle of next year.
XDocs will support user-defined XML schemas and will also allow documents to be integrated with XML Web services. Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, says the "vision for XDocs is to deliver on the needs of our customers by connecting XML Web services to information workers at their desktops. XDocs provides new ways to gather and re-use company data, enabling better information flow, more informed decisions and greater integration of people with business processes throughout an organisation."
Microsoft backs down on copy restrictions
Only weeks before the launch of its new Windows Media Center PCs, Microsoft has backed down on some of the copy restrictions imposed on media recorded on the device. TheRegister reports that Microsoft suddenly realised that as far as users are concerned, portable media formats are more important to them than heavily restricted ones. So instead of heavy one-device-only units, most users, it seems, would prefer to be able to playback their DVDs and such on any device from a home theatre system to a PC.
As a result, Microsoft has announced it plans to introduce some changes to Media Center, so that DVDs recorded on the device can be played elsewhere. Unfortunately it is a bit late for a complete overhaul, but the first edition is meant to be compatible with any Windows machine running the Media 9 player. Compatibility with standard DVD players is expected to happen much further down the line. [TheRegister]
Sendmail compromised with Trojan
Internet security organisation CERT warns that a cracker has managed to implant a Trojan horse into the source code for the widely used Sendmail application. The cracker appears to have compromised one of the Sendmail servers (ftp.sendmail.org) around 28 September and planted the malicious code in Sendmail 8.12.6 versions.
The code creates a backdoor when the program is compiled, allowing the cracker and others to easily access the server on which the application is installed. Sendmail is one of the most widely used mailservers available. CERT says versions downloaded using the HTTP protocol don`t appear to have been compromised but warns users to check the integrity of the version they are running.
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