Bbc World “Click” with Spencer Kelly introducing the Microsoft “Vista”

Now on BBC World “What’s hot in the world of technology?” Find out in “Click”!

Spencer Kelly: Computers are getting more powerful. We’re using the web in new ways. So how is the computer industry keeping up? Um? New “Windows”?

All back those curtains! This is the week that the new “Windows” is unveiled. So, what can you expect from “Vista” and is it everything it’s cracked up to be? We’re at the launch to get the load-down on Microsoft’s new OS and we’ll talk to Bill Gates about it.

Plus – what’s new in storage? We get a “More Data” from Las Vegas. We’ll also have the latest technology use and – you’ve heard of train spotting! Well, “Case” will be trolley spotting later in “Webscape”.

Welcome to “Click”! I’m Spencer Kelly.

So, five years in the making, months behind the schedule and stripped of some of its most “wanted” features – the new version of “Windows” is finally being unleashed. Microsoft’s marketing machine is working overtime to tell us that “Vista” is the “must-have” outright. They say: “The “WOW!” starts now”. We say: “Hum… we’ll see!”

This is all where it all started: the Microsoft “Windows 1.00” in 1985 dragged from the belly of the company after two years gestation and a year late. It stands as an icon for missed opportunities – it was late, it was not fast enough, it was not clever enough, it was not good-looking enough, believe me …

Over the years “Windows” has become “neon-ubiquitous”. Around 90% of the word’s PCs run it but still the catcalls come: it’s late, not fast enough, not clever enough, not good-looking enough.

But here’s the launch of “Windows Vista” on the 30^th of January 2007. There are some, who are saying that maybe, just maybe this is enough!

It has certainly got a very flashy front end. It even animates your entire desktop background but it’s not so different as to scare people away. No longer it is elegance of line of the definiteness of design that makes technology a success. Today we need to key-in to the modern computer culture – things need to be different but still recognisable. Evolution beats revolution! Because in today’s technology world too much change is a bad thing, no matter how clever your product is.

As they say, there’s good and bad in everything.

Hamith Thompson, PC World Stores: I think the principle, pleasure, if you like, is – these things got a very, very pretty face. And beneath it is the level of functionality, which actually makes it a really, really attractive option for all sorts of users. I think one of the challenges, maybe, is that the operating system itself is … it’s new. And, you know, with newness comes a requirement to actually understand the way that it works, understand where you need to go to look for things.

Rupert Goodwins, Technology Editor, ZDNet: Well, good things about “Vista” are that it they’ve completely re-written the large chunks of it so that it should be a lot more secure. There’s much harder for bad software to get in and disrupt its working and it should keep going by itself a lot longer. And the bad side is that this comes at the cost of some compatibility. So you don’t know yet exactly what will run and what won’t run.

Spencer Kelly: For us the next six months will be full of stories about what doesn’t run properly on “Vista”, while the manufacturers desperately churn out all fixes.

Ta-da! This is the base! This is “Vista” and as you can see at the moment it’s blowing bubbles. That’s one of the screensavers… just because it can. Anyway, let’s get rid of bubbles, Chris, shall we? It’s Christine – the manual work.

So this is the blank screen: “This is Vista” and the first thing you’ll notice is down in the bottom left-hand corner – arrow friend. The “start” button is still there, so that’s still way you open up your applications in “Vista”. Here’s some we’ve prepared earlier. So your “contacts”, the “welcome centre” is there. They’re still doing “Solitaire” – goodness knows why…

And the first thing we notice, and we’ve got to talk about it because Microsoft have been bagging on about it for over a year, – look at this: your Windows are now transparent. So you can see what’s going on behind them. Is that a useful way to keep track of what you’re doing or just a way to suck up some of the graphics processing power on today’s PCs? Who is to say?

Right! If you want to flip through your applications you can now do that in “style”. Chris, can you just press the magic 3D button? There you go – your Windows flying past in the 3D styling. Or, if you want, you can do it in the more traditional manner – old tab still works in Windows “Vista”. The interesting thing here is that the icons are now live icons – you can actually see what each application is doing at this current moment and that’s also reflected down here at the bottom on the taskbar in a very murk way – you can now see again what each application is doing. And you also get up here at the top of each folder something called a “try to bread crumbs”. Basically it tells you whereabouts in your computer you are. So we are in the “public directory” and inside that we’re in the “public pictures directory”, and inside that we are in the “samples picture directory”. I’m basically very worried that you can get lost. So all of “Vista” is about helping you track where you are. On that subjects “search” is everywhere, I mean, wherever you go in “Vista”, there is a search box and it’s a live search box, so every folder has one and the “start” menu has one as well.

So, Chris, can you just click on the “start” menu? Right! Down the bottom there is a live search box.

Now, Chris we can get rid of all that because we’ve got to cut to the other big fun thing about “Vista” – it’s the side bar and you can have it either on the right or the left of screen. That’s just how powerful that technology is. So let’s start at the top. These are basically a collection of gadgets. You know why we call just they are gadgets? They are small programmes that will do whatever you want, basically. So at the top we’ve got the clock. And, Chris, if you just click on the “settings”, as well as a traditional clock, you can have whatever, your fancy including, – a daisy – the thing you get to tell the time. So let’s stick with the daisy. Having going down past that, we can see that we’ve got a mini slide show – they’re running for whatever reason and past that is an RSS feed – so you can view the latest news headlines for whatever RSS feeds you choose. Then there’s a calendar and, look how hard the processor is working! There’s a little speedometer to tell how busy things are at the moment.

You can also add any gadgets you want, as there are few that come with “Vista”. Let’s stick the picture puzzle and show you there – just in case you get bored which, of course, you never will because this is “Vista”.

And also, this is my favourite gadget – how often you have been on the phone. You just need somewhere to type in a phone number – a quick message. Now you can, you gotta post it now on your desktop and: “Hello! Chris’s mum!”

You can also go to the web and download loads of gadgets – there are already loads online. The idea is: people write new gadgets, they *outload them to an approach site and then share them with everyone else – they can download them to their Windows “Vista” desktop.

Right then! Anyone spot any similarities to operating systems that are already out there? Well, I caught up with Bill or, as he likes me to call him, Mr Gates, and asked him: “Don’t we already have all this on the Mac?”

Bill Gates, Chairman, Microsoft: Well, actually, Windows is having a lot of various: take parental controls – a very demanded feature, take peer-to-peer meetings, take the way we do grouping. A big problem, you know, is environment as we always had ten times as many applications as any other environment, because the way we reach after other software companies is the way we work on such a wide variety of hardware. And so, without gaming capability, what we call the extend, in a word, setting new standards for that – what we’re doing with RSS – nobody’s ever done that before. So, sure, everybody should love what they have. If you’ve got a horse, you should say: “Hey, you know, our thing doesn’t neigh!”. The “Windows” people like “Windows”! And, so, you know, whatever else – if you like pen and paper, go forward!

Spencer Kelly: Some of our technical viewers as well will already have some of the features of “Vista”. They’ll have the Yahoo! “Widgets”, for example, the Google desktop search. What would you say to them to encourage them to upgrade? Should they upgrade? Should they stay where they are?

Bill Gates, Chairman, Microsoft: They should compare the speed, security, richness of what it’s like now to have that desktop search built in with an API that, for example, Office calls. So, the search inside the Office is done exactly that way and there’s a thousand applications calling that API now. It’s true that people can accrete all these add-ons with different user interfaces that they download, that are popping up from time to time. You know, about 10% of users do those downloads. Then 90% wait till they get the new operating system. But even for that 10%, when you get what’s integrated in, is far better than having to think of each of these it its own way of working.

Spencer Kelly: So for both the 10% of you *downloaders and the 90% of you, who prefer to wait, here’s an important point: all the demos that you will see, including ours, are of the top of the range, all singing, all dancing “Vista Ultimate” edition, which really must get the out of line title of the year award.

There are other cheaper editions with fewer features.

For the home use there are three main versions: “Basic”, “Home” and “Ultimate”. Each one has a bit more under the bonnet than previous version. Now, if you want, you can buy the “Basic” version and then use the same disc to upgrade to “Ultimate”. All you have to do is making online payment to pay for the “Operate”.

And don’t even think about trying to hack it! “Vista” will slowly disable itself if it thinks you are trying to mess with its insides.

Oh, yes! And then, there’s the security. Everything is different about the security in “Vista”.

Rupert Goodwins: Windows “Vista” 64-bit is probably going to be as good as almost anything you can get on the planet. Actually, it’s really secure.

Spencer Kelly: “Wow!” That is some claim!

Now, not only are there three editions. You also get a 64-bit version and a 32-bit version of each. Here’s the thing: the 32-bit version will run something like 80% of all today’s software. But the more secure 64-bit version won’t. And that includes the driver programmes that control anything from your printer to your graphics card.

Rupert Goodwins: Because that is deeply imbedded into the operating system, and Microsoft want Windows to be really secure, they made Windows-64 reject all your drivers. They have to be written again to Microsoft’s new rules. In the long term, that can be fine and be much safer. In the short term, it means that you just won’t be able to use most of your existing hardware or even some of the hardware available now on the shelves until people get round to write on the new versions of the software.

Spencer Kelly: So then – “Vista” – completely re-written and really not that bad looking at all! And, yes, there are some serious echoes of the Mac.

But, hi!

And when the 64-bit version goes mainstream, everything is gonna change.

In the meantime, unless you’ve got wait-too-much time on your hands, it’s, probably, not worth upgrading right now.

Right! Where is the keyboard? Let’s see if I can crash this baby…

Great! Yes, thank you! It’s Chris, and how are you? And now we close this down. Is it still “Alt 4”? Yes, and here we go…

Now, if you are installing “Vista” in the next few weeks, why not telling us what you think of it? Give us your own personal review to click@BBC.co.uk ! And let’s assume you can work out with the e-mail programme – there’s no doubt!

BBC World, 5.02.2007,

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programme/click_online/default.stm

Assignment 7. Give Ukrainian words and expressions equivalent to the following English ones from Text 7.3. Compare your options with the keys.

comput click ; to click (on sth); Vista; Microsoft Windows; unveil; to crack up; OS (comput operating system); load down; launch; train spotting; trolley spotting; Spencer Kelly; to unleash; n must-have; outright; “Wow!”, “WOW!”; Windows 1.00 (“one point noughts”); gestation; neon-ubiquitous; PC (comput personal computer); catcall; flashy; comput front end; comput desktop; definiteness of design; v to key-in; n a key-in; user; comput software; compatibility; to churn out; sl ta-da!, tah-dah!; comput screensaver; comput application; Solitaire (computer card game – Solitaire (AmE) or Patience (BrE) is any of a family of single player card games. It has a popular computer version); goodness knows why; sl to beg on (about something); comput to flip through; tab; comput icon; comput taskbar; murk; try to bread crumbs (most probably coined from to bread crumbs); comput directory; comput search; comput search box (= comput search tab, search button); comput folder; comput menu; comput to click on; colloq to cut to something; comput side bar; comput gadget; comput settings; daisy; comput, Internet RSS feeds; comput processor; Internet web (WWW); comput to download; Internet online; comput, neol to *outload; Internet approach site; Bill Gates (William Henry Gates III, born 28 Oct., 1955 in Seattle, Washington, USA. Chairman of the Microsoft Corp., USA, since 1975. Declared net worth capital – approx. $53 billion); Mac, Mackintosh (a line of PCs designed, developed, manufactured and marketed by Apple Corp., USA, first released on 24 Jan., 1984); comput parental controls (options included in computer and video games or computer software used to access the Internet or TV, that allows a parent to monitor or limit what a child can see or do); comput, neol peer-to-peer meetings ((of a computer network) is software designed so that computers can send information directly to one another without passing through a centralised (Internet) server, abbr P2P); comput environment; to reach after; comput extend; to neigh; If you’ve got a horse, you should say “Hey, you know, our thing doesn’t neigh” – most probably pun, based upon homophonic nouns and corresponding verbs: “neigh” (a cry of an excited or frightened horse) and “nay” (“no”, to say “no”); comput hardware; comput groupings; Yahoo!; comput, Internet, neol Widget – “Yahoo! Widget Engine” (a special graphic interface in Yahoo! The word was possibly blended from “window” and “gadget”); Google; comput, n upgrade, v to upgrade; comput API – Application Programming Interface (source code interface that a computer system or program library provides in order to support requests for services to be made of it by a computer programme); comput Office (a suite of productivity programmes created by Microsoft and developed for Microsoft Windows and Apple computer’s Mac OS and Mac OS X operating systems); comput to pop up; accrete; add-on; comput, neol *downloader; comput demo; bonnet; comput, sl to hack; comput 64-bit version; comput to run a program; comput to run a software; comput driver; comput printer; comput graphics card; comput keyboard; comput to install

Assignment 8. Make your own transcript of the remaining part of Text 7.3 and find out the keywords and potential “gaps” in it. Give Ukrainian words and expressions equivalent to the English keywords from the remaining part of Text 7.3. Compile a glossary of these keywords. Here are some English keywords that you may not hear properly or don’t know their spelling:

Sony BMG; comput anti-piracy software; Federal Trade Commission; comput MP3 media slayer; jury trial; Alcatel Lucent; Flikr (Flicker); comput log-on ideas; comput dual log-on