Really Shocking Snatch???????

The news doing rounds over the web is that Microsoft has applied for patent over RSS protocol and file format. I you have your jaws hitting the ground with a thud! mind you are not the first one. I searched over the Internet for the contribution of Microsoft for the creation or development of RSS format, but to put it simple, their contribution has been almost ZERO, except for a trivial Channel Definition Format, part of Internet Explorer 4.0, which never saw light. Apart from that in 2005 nov, they have proposed Simple Sharing Extensions for RSS feeds. Ironically SSE was put under Creative Commons License.

Anyway the news will rather be a shock to the Bloggers all around the world and the millions of the websites using RSS feeds. Think if you have to fill Microsoft's pocket everytime you read my blog! Now that's not all, though unconfirmed I heard that the US Patent and Trademark Office, has already granted Microsoft the patent. Though the USPTO website database does not show any such thing. This could create further issues as the equally populer Atom protocol (blogger.com also supports Atom) and the RSS have many in common. So the patent will Atom infringing Microsoft patent.But Atom has the option to patent their own protocol, which would make both the protocols mutually infriging, so the only option I see is to keep RSS copywright open. There is so much prior art in this issue and I don't think USPTO could ever find it easy to allow this to be patented.

I found Tim Bray who was deeply involved in Atom, quoting in somewhere in the Internet,

"It will be interesting to see if the USPTO shows any evidence of having overcome the problems that resulted in their track record of obliviousness to prior art"

For now, once again Microsoft is stepping up the gear and getting into the forbidden zone, hope they don't find themselves in trouble, or rather put millions of websites and blogosphere into a fix either.
In the meanwhile I will give you a one final shock
Check this link out
codevalley

AMD stages a fightback!

July 14th, 2006, was an important date for the two big processor companies. The processor giant Intel and the green counterpart AMD, duel turned to a new high as Intel released Core2Duo. AMD which had the market dominance for the past 3 years, at last lost it to Intel, and the rest is history.
Now after two Quarters, AMD is bringing a string of new releases, starting with the Quad FX range of processors released in November.

Quad FX
The strength that AMD had till last year was it's 90nm SOI technology which was much better than Intel's 90nm technology. But once Core2Duo was releases with a new 65nm technology, the strength turned into weakness in no time. The Quad FX range of processors, aka, FX70, FX72, FX74, clocked at 2.6Ghz, .8Ghz, 3.0Ghz is a great achievement as the engineers are concerned. To crunch millions of transistors and get a clock of 3.0Ghz at a 90nm SOI die, is no mean achievement. The whole idea was to get some vendor release a motherboard which dual socket which could host two Quad FX processors and provide some kind of direct memory connectivity, thanks to Hypertransport, and this could be branded as a Quad core. Intel had tried a similar trick by fusing two Core2Duo and calling it a quad core offing, Quadro.
Now the engineers might be amused but I am not sure if the enthusiasts and users were, as this bulky system sucked around 600Watts of power at peak load (mind that C2D sucks less than 100Watt). Also the benchmark did not show anything amazing, it lost even against the older FX 62, from the same school. But some argue that there in no Operating System at persent that could identify multiple cores and hence the benchmarks are not valid. But still no one could find a cork to fix the heating hole.
Now, thinking what AMD should do?? Goto 65nm fabrication?? Bingo!! that is what they exactly did...read on.
The Trimmed AMD
December 5, 2006, marked another important day for AMD, as they released their first 65nm SOI processor, the Brisbane -core, The Athlon 64 X2 processors are based on 65nm technology, with 4000+, 4800+ , 5000+ range of processors operating at around 2.1-2.6Ghz. These are only the entry level processors, but already some analysts claim they are more efficient than the Intel counterpart as it would consume only around one fourth power compared to Core2Duo. It has a TDP rating of 65watts(wow!!). The new processor works on socket AM2, and also has a reasonable pricing.
The entry level processors will be soon supplimented with, Lima, Kuma, Agena cores (stands for single, dual and quad core). The new processor has not yet been benchmarked though.
So wait and watch the drama as it unfolds...
codevalley