Microsoft Agrees to Alter Vista Desktop Search
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Bowing to pressure from Google and antitrust regulators, Microsoft will alter Windows Vista so users can pick a non-Microsoft program to search their hard drives.
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Within its recent response to the U.S. Department of Justice that stated it would modify Windows Vista to enable end users and OEMs to change the default desktop search it uses, Microsoft for the first time discussed Service Pack 1 for the OS, saying a beta will come this year.
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Microsoft will offer improved capacity to search copyrighted books on the Internet.
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Microsoft Corp. will make changes to its desktop search program following a complaint to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) by Google Inc., a news report said late Tuesday.
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U.S. antitrust authorities confirmed on Tuesday they reached an accord with Microsoft Corp. requiring the company to modify its Vista operating system in response to complaints its desktop search function puts Google Inc.  and other potential competitors at a disadvantage.
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Google still hopes to influence changes that Microsoft plans to make in Vista's desktop search function.
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California Attorney General Jerry Brown said Wednesday that Microsoft Corp. has agreed to make "significant changes" in its new Vista operating system to stay in compliance with a U.S. court agreement in Microsoft's antitrust case.
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(InfoWorld) - Google has complained to federal antitrust officials that the search tool in Microsoft'sÂ Windows VistaÂ Â discourages customers from using its own search utility, the company confirmed Sunday. Stories posted to the Web sites of The New York Times (registration required)Â and theÂ Seattle Post-IntelligencerÂ SaturdayÂ first revealedÂ that Google's complaint centered on Vista's built-in desktop search software, dubbed Instant Search. According to both newspapers, Google accused Microsoft of designing Vista to discourage users from running its indexing and search software. On Sunday, Google spokesman Ricardo Reyes confirmed the charge. "Microsoft's current approach with Vista desktop search violates its agreement with the government and hurts consumers." he said in an e-mail to Computerworld. "The search boxes built throughout Vista are hard-wired to Microsoft's own desktop search product, with no way for users to choose an alternate provider from these visible search access points. Likewise, Vista makes it impractical to turn off Microsoft's search index." According to postings on Microsoft's support forums, the only way to completely disable Vista's search is to stop the Windows Search service in the Microsoft Management Console. Microsoft disputed Google's charges. "We've been working with state and federal antitrust officials for the past two years to ensure that there are no problems with any of the features in Windows Vista," said company spokesman Jack Evans. "These desktop search issues were reviewed at length with regulators prior to the release of Windows Vista and resulted in more than a dozen changes at their request." Even so, Microsoft will consider more changes to Vista, Evans added. "While we donât believe there are any compliance concerns with desktop search, we are committed to going the extra mile to resolve this issue, so long as the changes Google is requesting do nothing to undermine the privacy and security of computer users." During aÂ March 2007 hearingÂ conducted by Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, the federal judge who oversees the 2002 Microsoft consent decree, the government's status report noted that a complaint had been filed, but did not identify the company. "At the last status conference, plaintiffs reported that they had just received a middleware-related complaint," theÂ status reportÂ read. "Since then, plaintiffs have been investigating this complaint, including obtaining significant additional information from Microsoft and the complainant." Google had previously raised concerns about search in Microsoft'sÂ Internet Explorer 7Â browser with federal officials. In May 2006, however,Â federal officials rebuffed Google, saying that IE 7 users could easily switch search providers and that computer makers could set the default search engine in IE 7 before shipping systems. Google has also filed similar complaints over search in both IE 7 and Vista with the European Union's antitrust commission. Those complaints have not been settled. According to The New York Times, the U.S. Department of Justice refused to pursue the Google complaint, andÂ Thomas Barnett,Â the assistant U.S. attorney general for antitrust, sent a memo to numerous state attorneys general in May asking them to also reject the complaint. Prosecutors in several of those states, however, have reportedly decided to investigate the Google concerns whether the federal government goes along or not, a decision that has Barnett reconsidering the agency's position. E-mails and phone calls asking several of the states involved with the 2004 Microsoft settlement to comment were not returned Sunday. Barnett's division will present its next report on Microsoft's progress in meeting the 2002 settlement to Kollar-Kotelly in a hearing scheduled for June 26. Â
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Microsoft Corp. on Monday joined the battle for supremacy in so-called desktop search, introducing software for quickly locating files on personal computers that challenges Google&#39;s two-month-old rival product.
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Microsoft and Google look set to clash over their rival ways of searching desktop computers.
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MicrosoftÂ has joined the desktop search fray with its release Monday of the beta test version of a suite of tools designed to let users find information stored in their PCs.
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Start++, an unofficial add-on to Vista's desktop search that lets users type single-letter shortcuts to speed up Web searches or even launch applications, has been posted online by a Microsoft engineer.
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Microsoft revise a program that allows Windows Vista customers to upgrade from a basic version of its OS to one of the premium editions.
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Microsoft&#39;s MSN division is expected to announce a test version of its long-awaited desktop-search software this morning in a conference call with reporters.
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Microsoft Corp launched the beta version of its new MSN Toolbar Suite on Monday, with what it calls is &#39;breakthrough desktop search functionality&#39; that will help users quickly find virtually any type of document, media file or e-mail message on their
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Search engine giant Yahoo has tapped Pasadena-based X1 Technologies to add the ability to search desktop files and folders on Microsoft Windows platforms.
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Microsoft MSN Desktop Search Is Out In Beta  As expected, Microsoft has finally released a beta of their Desktop Search software. It is integrated with their Browser Toolbar set and is now labeled MSN Toolbar Suite Beta.  The download size is huge compared to Google Desktop Search at 4.8megs and you would ...