&ot Information Gift: November 2006 Archives

November 29, 2006

Power Together = Free Microsoft Product Promo?

Microsoft is was apparently offering free licenses of Vista Business or Office 2007 for those who can sit still long enough to get through three 'qualifying web casts and/or virtual lab sessions within 30 days of registration'. Participants or employees of companies in the Microsoft Partner Program or Developer Network are ineligible. Offers expire on February 28, 2007, or while supplies last [all gone now, folks].

I was initially concerned that this might be a scam, because the site is suspiciously registered in the UK but the promo is available only for US users, and requires participants who qualify for both gifts to submit a W9 form once they've completed said requirements. However, the site does use MS nameservers, and I found this thread on Microsoft's Channel 9 where a Microsoftie claims ownership of the promotion, explains the tax issue, and takes some heat from the excluded Europeans. ;)

As always for such things, caveat emptor, but seems like a good deal for those of us who can take advantage of the offer.

Posted by Lewis Francis at 9:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack (0)

November 12, 2006

IE7 Faviconix

One of the changes in IE 7 is in the way favicons are handled. No longer are favicons requested and displayed only by the action of a user bookmarking your site; if a favicon is present, IE 7 will display it in the location bar.

IE 7 also displays favicons in tabs, matching the branding opportunity long enjoyed by Mozilla-based browsers like Firefox and Camino as well as the Opera family. If your clients haven't been favicon aware, they are sure to become so shortly. Be proactive and include favicons as part of your design deliverable.

The change in favicon request triggering has further implications -- some stats packages report bookmarking by correlating Internet Explorer favicon requests; as IE7 displaces IE6, these reports will become meaningless.

Addendum:
I've updated the Favicon Support Chart to include not only IE 7, but also Firefox and updated Opera info. Earlier favicon implementation and troubleshooting tips can be found in the Oct 2003 Information Gift article Faviconic.

Posted by Lewis Francis at 6:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)

November 4, 2006

IE7 vs. WMP EMBED

FYI: If your site returns the infobar/alert: This website wants to run the following add-on: 'Windows Media Player Core' from Microsoft Corporation (unverified publisher)' on IE 7, then your developer chose to present in-lined Windows Media content via the non-standard and deprecated EMBED tag rather than the fully supported OBJECT tag.

Microsoft ended official support for EMBED with the release of IE 5.5sp2 in 2001. While it still works in some situations, ymmv; safest to go with OBJECT embedding ActiveX controls for transparency and the advantage of a QA'd path.

Posted by Lewis Francis at 5:30 PM | Permalink | TrackBack (0)