Microsoft retains weapon to silently scrub XP

Will automatically push malware cleanup tool to Windows XP until July 2015

Microsoft will be able to silently reach into Windows XP PCs for more than a year after it stops patching the aged OS to clean malware-infected machines, sources close to the company confirmed Friday.

The Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT) will continue to be updated and deployed via Windows Update through July 14, 2015, 15 months after the Redmond, Wash. company serves its final public security patches for XP on April 8 of this year.

By extending the life of the MSRT -- and more importantly, automatically running it each month -- Microsoft will be able to clean some PCs if massive malware outbreaks hit Windows XP after it's retired from support.

MSRT is updated monthly as Microsoft targets one or more major malware families it believes are the biggest current threats. The tool is posted for manual download on Microsoft's website and distributed through the Windows Update service on "Patch Tuesday," the second Tuesday of each month when Microsoft pushes security patches to customers running still-supported editions of Windows. MSRT automatically installs on PCs with Automatic Updates enabled, and then runs a seek-and-destroy mission in the background without any action on the part of the user.

MSRT is not an antivirus program, but rather a cleaning utility designed to eradicate malware that has already snuck onto a Windows PC. The tool was first released in 2005, but was last updated Jan. 14, 2014, when Microsoft added detection and deletion capabilities for the "Bladabindi" malware family.

The extension of MSRT availability was part of the firm's decision earlier this month to offer new anti-malware signatures to XP customers who run the company's free Security Essentials antivirus (AV) software.

Previously, Microsoft said it would stop shipping Security Essentials' signature updates to XP PCs after April 8. But in a tacit nod to XP's widespread use, Microsoft postponed the cut-off until July 14, 2015.

With MSRT, Microsoft will have a weapon at the ready in case widespread malware infections strike XP machines after April 8, something the company has said is likely. If new malware pops up, or an older virus, worm or Trojan horse begins infecting large numbers of Windows XP systems -- perhaps because they exploited a vulnerability that will never be patched -- Microsoft can at least use the MSRT to try to disinfect those PCs.

Extending MSRT's life on XP will not only help customers still running the 13-year-old OS, but is also smart for Microsoft, which could face a public relations backlash if large numbers of compromised Windows XP machines are used by hackers to infect other devices running Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8.

Although Microsoft has not stopped urging customers to dump XP, it has recognized that millions of machines will continue to run the ancient OS for months and maybe even years to come.

According to metrics company Net Applications, Windows XP's user share -- the percentage of all personal computer owners who went online with that OS -- stood at 29% at the end of December 2013. Computerworld has predicted that about 20% of all personal computers will be running the operating system at the end of 2014.

Andreas Marx, CEO of AV-Test, a German company that evaluates security software, said Microsoft's decision to continue providing signatures for Security Essentials was prompted by the still-large numbers of PCs running XP.

"It's a significant move, which is likely driven by the (still) high market share for Windows XP, especially in countries like China or India, as well as the millions of users who are using Security Essentials as anti-virus protection on Windows XP," said Marx in an email reply to questions earlier this month.

Security Essentials has performed poorly in AV-Test's recent exams, and Marx cautioned users who plan to reply on it to keep their systems safe after Microsoft stops patching XP. "[Security Essentials] is baseline protection and well-suited for people who are not often using the Internet," Marx said. "But if you're online quite often and for long times, if you do financial transactions with your system and the like, I would strongly recommend switching to a commercial security suite."

Most antivirus vendors will continue to provide customers running Windows XP with up-to-date signatures for years after Microsoft pulls the patch plug in April.

Kaspersky, BitDefender and Avira -- the last is free -- were the top-scoring consumer antivirus programs for Windows XP in AV-Test's latest head-to-head comparisons. For business PCs, Kaspersky, Symantec and Trend Micro ranked 1-2-3.

Instructions for turning on XP's Automatic Updates can be found on Microsoft's support site, along with a "Fixit" tool that takes care of the chore with a single click.

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How Microsoft can save itself in the mobile world

Once upon a time, Microsoft encountered a foe in the PC market. What it did then is what it should do now in the mobile market.

Microsoft continues to pursue its fatal attraction to proprietary mobile devices, much like Michael Douglas pursued Glen Close in the 1987 movie Fatal Attraction.

Its earnings announcement last night exceeded analysts' expectations, and seem to suggest that Microsoft doesn’t need to own the endpoint to thrive. But Microsoft's odds of outflanking Apple and Google are slim.

With so many positive developments in Microsoft’s core businesses, what can possibly be gained from a small, tenuous share of the smartphone market at the risk of Nokia entering a BlackBerry-like downward spiral?

Though Nokia’s $7 billion acquisition cost is small relative to Microsoft’s wealth, competition with Apple and Google in the smartphone market confuses consumers, and likely confuses Microsoft. Microsoft should take a lesson from itself and accommodate Android and iOS in the same way it once accommodated Apple’s Mac in the PC market. It extended Office and Outlook to the Mac platform and made a great margin on every Mac that shipped to customers who needed document interoperability and email with Microsoft’s enormous base.

Nokia’s performance last quarter was dismal. Radio Free Mobile predicted smartphone revenues to grow by 12% in this last quarter. In comparison Nokia revenue declined by 2%.

Radio Free Mobile’s Richard Windsor noted four main problems described in Microsoft’s earning’s announcement.

“Android is getting better at the cheaper price points, making the Lumia 520 not such great value at $135. Low-end Lumia needs to be refreshed to re-extend the gap to Android.

“Microsoft continues to make a total mess of telling users why they should buy a Lumia device, meaning that there is very little pull for the ecosystem from the handset end.

“The app store is still woefully inadequate when compared to iOS and Android and this is a major turn off for prospective buyers of the devices.

“The change in ownership may have distracted the business from pushing the devices to the best of its ability. I am hopeful that this quarter will see this fix."

Windsor also noted the truly bright side of Microsoft’s performance:

“Microsoft reported excellent results and guidance, confounding the PC skeptics.”

Revenues and earnings exceeded analysts’ expectations thanks to Microsoft’s strong performance in enterprise, cloud and even consumer segments. Xbox and Microsoft Office shipments were both strong, for example.

Windsor expects a rebound in the PC market due to the end of life and support for Windows XP. Corporations have limited alternatives to remaining on XP. Though locked down, proprietary configurations of XP images may prevail for some time within a well-defended enterprise perimeter, without security available after April of this year, this strategy is a ticking time bomb beyond the short-term transition to Windows 7.

The Nokia business will never produce great margins. If small initial margins were the price for dominating the world’s pockets with Nokia smartphones the way Microsoft once dominated the desktop, the endeavor would be worth it for Microsoft. It is hard to imagine a scenario where that will happen, though.

However, Microsoft could create its own bright mobile future if it would just follow what it learned with the Mac and extended all of its core businesses to integrate seamlessly with iOS.

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12 Big BYOD Predictions for 2014

If you were just getting comfortable with BYOD, brace yourself for new twists and turns. CIOs can expect more devices to enter the enterprise in consumer clothing, real security threats to emerge, new MDM options and much more in 2014.

The BYOD mega trend is racing for chaos in 2014. Can you COPE? Should you call security? What now, wearables? This year is going to be sheer madness as tablets and PCs come under the BYOD umbrella, upping the stakes – and complications and confusion. It's going to force changes to BYOD policy. It's going to push CIOs to retool legacy apps and systems. And it's going to test the already-strained relationship between IT and business.

Can You COPE?
Employees don't really want to pay for their smartphones, tablets and PCs. They just want an easy-to-use device that can be used for both work and personal stuff. It's actually better, of course, if the company foots the bill. Last year, we saw the emergence of the "company-owned, personally enabled" model, called COPE. This year, we expect to see real-world implementations. COPE is a hybrid approach that sits between free-for-all BYOD and traditional company-owned computers that forbade personal use. For more, check out IT Learns to COPE with Mobile Devices.

Tablets and PCs Come to Work
BYOD had been mostly a smartphone play, but in the second half of 2013, Forrester Research analyst David Johnson saw more PCs and tablets falling under the BYOD policy. Johnson says he expects the trend to continue this year. A move toward more powerful, more critical BYOD tools brings a plethora of technical challenges. With BYOD PCs, Johnson says, "There's a lot more you have to secure in order for it to be considered acceptable, particularly in a regulated environment."

Call Security!
Hoping to derail BYOD, many CIOs played the security card -- that is, telling everyone who would listen that BYOD threatened corporate assets. But CIOs may have overplayed their hand. There hasn't been a headline-grabbing security breach, prompting one analyst to claim that BYOD security was a "non-event." But this year BYOD will expand to tablets and PCs rich with valuable corporate data, and hackers will take dead aim. That's why we're predicting a BYOD security bombshell in 2014.

Bye-Bye Stipends
Remember when your company reimbursed you for home Internet? Those were the good old days. Signs already point to BYOD going the same route, especially in areas where jobs are sparse and companies aren't under pressure to provide perks. In 2014, we might be saying goodbye to device reimbursement and monthly stipends for mobile service. Caveat: If more PCs and tablets fall under a BYOD program, however, we might see stipends increase to cover them, says Forrester's David Johnson.

IT Strikes Back
Last year, IT had to tackle BYOD head-on or risk being cut out completely. CIOs worked feverishly to change the culture from one that throws up roadblocks to one that embraces change. Tech leaders made big strides, and IT saved itself from becoming irrelevant. However, there is still a lot of work to be done with BYOD security and policy. Many companies have gaping BYOD security risks. This year, we'll see IT shoring up networks and systems to make them BYOD-proof.

Revenge of the Rogue Worker
As IT asserts control over BYOD this year, there's a chance end users will revolt. After all, BYOD was started by rogue business employees who felt IT was too rigid and slow in adopting consumer tech. The power pendulum shifted dramatically to end users and away from IT. Now IT hopes the pendulum is sliding back in its favor. This brings risk of an old danger: "If you start trying to increase control on employee-owned devices, then that's a slippery slope," says Forrester's David Johnson.

Microsoft Gets Its Tablets in the Game
Microsoft lost the BYOD smartphone to Apple and Android and was on the verge of a complete collapse in the tablet space. In a Forrester survey conducted in late 2013, Apple iPads led the vast majority of BYOD tablet deployments, with Android tablets making a serious run. Windows 8-based tablets were practically non-existent.

Then the survey asked about BYOD tablet deployment plans in the next 12 months -- and Windows 8-based tablets led the pack. What's behind the turnaround? A lot of factors are trending Microsoft's way, from refresh cycles to IT regaining some control over devices. Suffice to say, "the tablet in the enterprise is theirs to lose," says Aberdeen's Andrew Borg.

Year of the BYOD Mandate?
Two years ago, VMware made an aggressive move with BYOD by requiring all 6,000 employees in the United States to use personal smartphones for work. Last summer, a Gartner survey of CIOs showed mandatory BYOD gaining steam, prompting Gartner to predict that half of employers will require employees to supply their own device for work purposes by 2017. Then the call for mandatory BYOD quieted down in the latter part of last year.

So will we hear the mandatory BYOD chatter starting up again in 2014? As BYOD becomes the new normal, we're predicting a few more companies will put the onus on employees to buy and use their own smartphones for work as a condition of employment.

Mobile Device Management Mayhem
Last year was a good one for mobile device management (MDM) vendors, as companies began to realize the need to get a handle on BYOD. The MDM market has been flooded with newcomers and is evolving at a wickedly fast clip. Everything from expanding the portfolio to cover app management to dealing with innovations such as app wrapping and virtual work spaces to working with device makers such as Apple and Samsung, MDM vendors have their work cut out for them. Then there are giant tech companies getting into MDM, such as Dell and possibly BlackBerry. MDM mayhem is sure to be a part of 2014.

End of Legacy Apps
One of the great inhibitors to BYOD tablets is legacy applications that have browser dependencies on older versions of Internet Explorer or are locked up behind the firewall and not easily accessible. Employees are fed up with apps that chain them to the desktop. Instead, they want to use their shiny new iPads and Android tablets that they unwrapped over the holidays for work.

"In 2014, companies will begin to put practical programs in place, continue to accelerate their move to Software-as-a-Service wherever they can," says Forrester's David Johnson. "Companies will start to figure out how to modernize their core applications to be more friendly to BYOD."

Virtual Desktop, Round 2
Not every app can be modernized quickly, especially systems of record. So how will IT serve up these apps to BYOD tablets and PCs? BYOD is already starting to breathe new life into the virtual desktop. It's an infrastructure that is more resilient and tolerant of devices that are not well configured yet need to access systems of record. Virtual desktop infrastructure, in fact, is at the heart of Seattle Children's Hospital's BYOD strategy.

"We're going to see more investment in those technologies in 2014," Forrester's David Johnson says.

Wearables Wreak Havoc
Sparked by Google Glass and smartwatches, wearable gadgets have become a tour de force in the tech sector. They're not just for consumers, either. Forrester analyst J.P. Gownder predicts wearables will soon be taking the enterprise by storm, with the company-provided wearables market surpassing the consumer market within the next five years. It's quite possibly a BYOD wearables future.

Is IT ready? Hardly. "IT is just trying to catch a breath with BYOD smartphones," says Aberdeen's Andrew Borg. "I don't think they're even remotely prepared for wearables and other smart devices that are going to attempt to get on the corporate networks and access corporate files. This can loom as a big issue in 2014 and beyond."

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14 steps to a better, faster Windows laptop

After a couple of years, most laptops fall seriously behind the times. Here are several ways to upgrade your legacy laptop to meet today's standards.

Time to upgrade
I recently explained how you can clean out your laptop and increase its efficiency. However, sometimes what you really need is an upgrade.

What follows is a step-by-step rundown on how to give a legacy notebook a new lease on life by adding more RAM and a solid state drive (SSD), as well as the latest USB, HDMI and Wi-Fi hardware. As an example, I used my three-year-old HP EliteBook 2560p laptop, which is powered by a second-generation 2.6GHz Intel Core i5 processor and includes 4GB of RAM, a 320GB hard drive and Windows 7 Professional.

(I have not upgraded my operating system, although you can always switch to Windows 8 or Linux if you choose.)

Grab your tools and let's get started.


1. Grab your tools
The first step is to make sure you have the necessary tools and components. Everything is available online or at a good electronics store. These can vary depending on your needs, but should be good for upgrading most notebooks. First, let's start with the tools you'll need:

-- A small Philips screwdriver (I used a number 0)
-- A DVD-RW disc or USB drive (for creating startup media)
-- An external hard drive (for backing up data)
-- A pencil with an eraser (for pushing RAM into place)
-- A small bowl to hold screws and other easily lose-able objects
-- A marking pen for labeling

2a. Choose your components
The best strategy is to shop around to find the best -- and the most reasonably priced -- components for your particular system. The parts that I bought for revamping my EliteBook are listed below. I chose these for two reasons: Because I'm familiar with the vendors and/or products, and because they fit my system.

This list shows what I paid; prices may have changed since then (clockwise, from top):

-- Cable Matters Gold Plated DisplayPort HDMI adapter ($10)
-- Netgear A6100 WiFi USM Mini Adapter ($50)
-- Kingston 8GB SDRAM Module model DDR31333MHz (two at $90 each -- more about this on the next slide)
-- Crucial M500 480GB SSD ($370)
-- StarTech 2 Port ExpressCard SuperSpeed USB 3.0 Card Adapter ($32)

2b. Select the right memory
Adding RAM to a computer boosts performance considerably. The EliteBook's 4GB of RAM was skimpy to say the least, but rather than boosting it to 8GB or 12GB, I decided to add 16GB of RAM so I could squeeze every last bit of speed out of it.

I used Kingston Technology RAM modules, but you can get the parts from a variety of sources such as Crucial, Patriot Memory, PNY or any of the dozens of others. Most vendors offer an online ordering system, where you type in the model and details about your machine. For my EliteBook, I ordered two 8GB DDR3 SDRAM modules. At $90 each, the 8GB modules aren't cheap, but I figured the extra performance would be more than worth the price.

2c: Select your storage: Hard drive or SSD?
Instead of swapping the EliteBook's rather slow 320GB hard drive with a larger one, I decided to replace it with a 480GB solid-state drive (SSD), which is roughly five times faster at reading and writing data, can take more abuse and uses less power than rotating media does. Since much of my current work now resides in the cloud, the storage space should be quite sufficient.

On the other hand, an SSD costs roughly five to six times more than a hard drive for a lot less storage space. For instance, the 2.5-in. Crucial M500 SSD I installed cost me $370 versus about $60 for a 500GB hard drive. So it all depends on your own needs.

3. Getting inside
After turning the machine off and removing its battery, I slid the bottom panel free. Laptops differ widely in accessibility; some feature several small hatches rather than a single removeable bottom. If that's your case, look on the bottom panel for a chip icon or other label.

The first task will be to upgrade the RAM. After unscrewing and removing the panel, you should find the memory modules.

4. Replacing the RAM
Once you've found the RAM, press down on the board's edges with a pencil eraser to release the module and remove it. Then line up the contacts of each new module with those on the motherboard. Do it one at a time at a 45-degree angle and press down until the memory board snaps into place.

When you're done, replace the battery, turn the system on and make sure that the new RAM is working properly by right-clicking on the Computer entry in Windows Explorer and clicking on Properties. This brings up the Windows System page. In this case, the system recognizes the new memory, so we're ready to roll.

5a. Create a start-up drive: Windows 7
Now, it's time to upgrade the storage.

But first you need to create an external start-up drive to use after you've installed the new blank drive. Either a DVD or a USB drive will work. (I prefer a DVD, because I can put it away for future emergencies.)

Go to the Control Panel's Backup and Restore page. If you're using a blank DVD, click on "Create a system repair disc" and "Create Disc." It takes about 10 minutes to compile and burn the disc. If you're using an external USB drive, go to "Create system image" instead and, the the set-up window, select the drive to save it to.

5b. Create a start-up drive: Windows 8
For those using Windows 8, it's a little more involved. Go to the Control Panel's File History option. Then click on System Image Backup in the lower left corner. Choose whether you want the backup saved on a hard drive, DVD or a network location.

After picking the drive to back up from, confirm what you're doing and click on Start Backup to get it going. The system will then format the drive or ready the DVD, and start the process. Near the end, you'll get a Create System Image window that lets you make a startup disk to get the machine going with a blank drive in place.

Some vendors offer software tools to help create recovery media. Check your manual or with your vendor.

6. Back up your data
With the start-up media done, it's time to back up the existing hard drive using an external USB hard drive. (If you have a large-enough cloud storage account, you can back everything up online, but it will likely take much longer.)

After you attach the external drive, go to Windows' Backup and Restore page and click on "Set up backup." Highlight the external drive as the data's destination and select "Let me choose." You can then set the software to copy every file.

Next, click on the data you want copied: Local Disk (C:). Click Next to start.

7. Remove the old drive
Depending on how much data you have, it could take an hour or two to move all the data to the external hard drive (it took me about an hour and 15 minutes). When it's finished, shut the system down, flip the machine over and find the hard drive. I just left the bottom panel off during the back up; if you haven't, remove it again.

Loosen the four screws that hold the hard drive in place and put the screws into a small bowl. Finally, slide the drive out by its plastic tab.

After that, carefully loosen the screws that attach the drive to its bracket and put the drive aside. (You might want to use it as a spare.)

8. Install the new drive
It's time to install the new drive. After screwing the new hard drive or SSD onto the drive bracket, slide the drive into place and finish up by screwing the bracket into the notebook. You can also replace the bottom panel.

Now you have to fill the drive up again. Boot Windows from the start-up disc you created. My EliteBook boots from its optical drive if a disc is present; other systems may require that you change the BIOS settings to boot from its optical drive. For notebooks without an optical drive, use the same external drive you used to create the start-up disc.

9a. Reload your OS: Windows 7
It will take a few minutes to start the system, format the new drive and load Windows onto it from the DVD disc. Once it's done, boot your new drive, click on "System Recovery Options," select "System Image Recovery" and the laptop will then find the backup files on the external hard drive. Click Next to start the restoration process of moving the data to the new drive.

From here on out, it's all automatic. It should take about an hour or so. In other words, it's time for a coffee break.

9b. Reload your OS: Windows 8
To restore from a backup using Windows 8, start by rebooting the computer while holding the shift key. This will bring up the troubleshooting window.

Click on Advanced options and then on System Image Recovery to start the process. After picking the backup image you want to use (the one that was just made), click Finish and the system will begin to copy your files onto the new drive.

If you want to upgrade to Windows 8 from Windows 7, it's fairly simple: Instead of using your startup DVD, put the upgrade disc into the drive, select everything that you want to move (Windows settings, personal files and apps) to the new OS and click Next. Plan on it taking a couple of hours.

10. Add USB 3.0
When my EliteBook came out three years ago, USB 3.0 was a luxury, but now even budget machines use this faster standard. Happily, the system has an ExpressCard slot that can take a USB 3.0 adapter card. (Unfortunately, a regular PC Card slot isn't fast enough to keep up with USB 3.0.)

There are a variety of cards available from vendors like Sonnet and Sabrent; I opted for StarTech's $32 2-port ExpressCard adapter.

I loaded the software, inserted the card in the ExpressCard slot and let the hardware install itself. Once installed, the card's two USB 3.0 ports increased throughput with an external drive from 26.6Mbyte/s to 87.1Mbyte/s, more than a threefold improvement.

11. Add HDMI
Rather than having an HDMI port, the EliteBook came with a DisplayPort video connector. DisplayPort works well with my monitor in the office, but when I travel, I have to connect a projector using the system's VGA port, which doesn't handle audio. It's an easy fix with a DisplayPort-to-HDMI adapter, which averages about $10 to $20.

If you don't have a DisplayPort connector, look for a VGA-to-HDMI adapter, which should cost about $25 to $30.

12. Upgrade to 802.11ac
The current Wi-Fi standard is still 802.11n, but you may want to consider upgrading to 802.11ac. While it lacks formal IEEE approval, 802.11ac is stable and works with existing gear. The new protocol can receive data at up to 1.3Gbps of data flow, about three times that of 802.11n.

I chose Netgear's AC600 WiFi USB Mini Adapter ($50) because it sticks out only an inch from the notebook. It improved my Wi-Fi reception from 3 bars to 5 bars on the Windows Wi-Fi signal strength meter in my laptop's task tray and extended the system's range by 15 ft. More to the point, my online access speed rose from about 9Mbit/s to 12Mbit/s.

13. Update your BIOS
As long as you're updating the hardware, it's a good idea to update the system BIOS. This should be done whenever a new version comes out, but it's easy to ignore. In the case of my HP laptop, the most recent version fixes a few problems.

Start by finding and downloading the newest BIOS for your system (usually, you can find it on the manufacturer's support page) and transferring it to the desktop so it is handy. The new BIOS usually comes with a transfer utility that controls the data flow. Do the transfer with the machine plugged in -- if the transfer is interrupted, your computer may not start.

14. Check to see everything's working
Before I returned the EliteBook to service, I wanted to verify everything inside was working properly. I used HP's Support Assistant software, which came with my EliteBook. A good alternative is AVG's TuneUp Utilities 2014 ($50; free 15-day trial), which can do everything from removing duplicate files and cleaning up a hard drive to fixing Registry problems and making the system start faster.

It's also a good idea to make absolutely sure that your upgraded notebook can take the heat. I use the PassMark BurnInTest ($39; free version available), which runs a variety of tasks simultaneously while noting any faults. This is harsher treatment than you'll give it on a normal basis, but it is a good test of the system's mettle.

An overall improvement
All told, the upgrade of my HP EliteBook took about three hours. Increasing the system's RAM to 16GB meant that its PassMark PerformanceTest score of 937.1 went up to 1,241.7. After I swapped the EliteBook's hard drive for a high-speed SSD, the score rose to 1,750.7 -- nearly double the original system's performance.

Of course, all these upgrades weren't free. The bill for the various materials I used for my upgrade added up to $642 -- about the price of a new budget machine.

However, you can pick and choose which upgrades you really need and which you don't. The result will be a rejuvenated laptop that you can depend on -- or that you can confidently pass on to a friend or relative.
 

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Cool robotics could be boon for the boring kind

Google, Amazon investments in robotics have software robot firm Blue Prism pumped

After agreeing recently to meet with a U.K.-based company called Blue Prism, I started studying up by visiting the outfit’s website, which touts something called robotic automation technology. Imagine my surprise to learn, however, that this really had nothing to do computerized machines, but rather software robots designed to automate repetitive back-office processes in finance, human resources and other areas.

The term software robots is something Blue Prism CEO Alastair Bathgate hopes will become increasingly clear to people though, in part through attention Google is bringing to the topic through its swelling investments in robotics of both the hardware and software variety. He points to Google’s work in the area of software robots to help with people’s use of social media networks, such as by guiding the tone of your posts on LinkedIn vs. Twitter.

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"Google is talking about hardware robots as well as software robots, and if Google is talking about that, it gives me some confidence that we might be on the right track,” says Bathgate, a financial industry veteran who is no one-trick pony (read his wine blog here).

Bathgate adds that the buzz around Amazon’s investments in delivery drones is further bringing robotics talk to the forefront, and he figures that company is likely to invest in software robots to handle back-end processes as well.

What’s more, efforts such as the Institute for Robotic Automation hatched last month by The Outsourcing Institute’s Frank Casale could give software robotics an even higher profile. Some industry watchers, such as Horses for Sources, have dubbed a likely move by organizations to software robots as “Robotistan.”

The 30-employee Blue Prism has been around since 2001 but over the past few years has been marketing its business process outsourcing tools and methodologies using the term “robotic automation” to describe the offloading of mundane tasks from employees so that they can focus instead on customer service and other processes that benefit from a human touch. “There’s a lot of menial work being done by people that shouldn’t be,” Bathgate says. “There’s a lot of work should isn’t being done that should be done by human beings.” He differentiates the sort of tasks Blue Prism can help to automate from those handled by ERP and CRM tools that need to deal with a lot of case-by-case exceptions that are not easily automated.

The company largely sells to lines of business in retail, financial and other industries, though requires IT buy-in given that its software sits on secure virtual machines in back-end data centers or the cloud.

Blue Prism’s technology also holds promise to automate IT-related processes, such as helpdesk requests, and has one partnership in place on that front that it plans to announce next week. “I’m not sure why humans are even involved in service desks, it’s pure rules-based response,” Bathgate says.

Bathgate, who is making the rounds in the U.S. as Blue Prism seeks to grow its presence beyond its Miami office, positions the $5 million company’s technology as an alternative to physical nearshoring and offshoring of tasks and jobs.

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Hold down the right CTRL key, press the SCROLL LOCK key twice and scare the hell out of your Sysadmin

I just watched Mark Russinovich’s Technet webcasts and he demoed how to create a Blue Screen of Death on a windows PC by using the right ctrl key + scroll lock + scroll lock

This is very helpful when debugging OS issues but I thought it might cause a faint on one sysadmin or two if done without warning. EYE: Do not attempt on Production servers or face an immediate let go…

Here’s the KB article describing how to gather the memory dump and the types of memory dumps you can get with this technique. Cheers!

Windows includes a feature that you can use to cause the system to stop responding and to generate a memory dump file (Memory.dmp). When you do this, you receive a Stop error message that resembles the following:

*** STOP: 0x000000E2 (0x00000000,0x00000000,0x00000000,0x00000000)
The end-user manually generated the crashdump.
After you enable the feature, you can generate a memory dump file by holding down the right CTRL key and pressing the SCROLL LOCK key two times. The feature is available for both PS/2 and universal serial bus (USB) keyboards. PS/2 keyboards use the i8042prt.sys driver that is included with the keyboard. However, for USB keyboards that are attached to Windows Server 2003-based systems, you must install a hotfix for the Kbdhid.sys driver.For more information about this hotfix, see the resolution in the "More Information" section.

Note There is a limitation with the Kbdhid.sys driver that allows for you to generate the memory dump process by using a USB keyboard. The CTRL+SCROLL LOCK+SCROLL LOCK keyboard shortcut does not work if the computer stops responding at a high interrupt request level (IRQL). This limitation exists because the Kbdhid.sys driver operates at a lower IRQL than the i8042prt.sys driver.

 

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