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[triffid_hunter]

Microsoft is offering to send Windows XP Service pack 2 on a cd for free to anyone who asks for it here

be aware that sp2 breaks backwards compatibility in order to fix some security issues, and may stop some programs from working until the program vendor releases a patch.

Comments

[triffid_hunter]

i'm making a merged cd with sp2 on it so nm.. but i wanna see what else is on the cd - sp2 is only half a cd...

Microsoft hmmm...

[cryptic_tomb]

be aware that sp2 breaks backwards compatibility in order to fix some security issues, and may stop some programs from working until the program vendor releases a patch.

So let me get this straight,...

In Microsoft's all knowing wisdom. They release a patch that *ahem* fixes current bugs, and then, in doing so produces other ones?

Hmmm,
But its microsoft right?, it must be good ... right?....right?

Re: Microsoft hmmm...

[triffid_hunter]

lol no they had kludges to allow badly written but popular programs to not crash under the tighter control of later versions of windows. with xpsp2, they've taken em all out and said 'too bad - write your programs properly next time' because the kludges were opening too many security holes and maintanence nightmares. I think its a good thing, even though it can be a nightmare in the short term.

one example is that sim city for windows uses chunks of memory just after its told windows its not going to use that chunk any more. worked fine under 98, but xp would (quite rightly) crash the program with an access violation error. so ms specifically allowed sim city to do that in winxp because a lot of people like playing sim city - even though its not technically legal, and could potentially crash/corrupt the whole os and/or allow hackers/virii to take over your computer.

now all 3rd party bugs are someone else's problem.

they actually have released patches with severe bugs before :)