Microsoft plans to release new technology designed to take on Adobe’s Flash, as part of a broader strategy to go head to head with Web and design tools.

Forest Key, a director of product management for Microsoft’s Server and Tools Division, Silverlight is a browser plug-in that allows Web content providers to offer rich video and interactive media experience from directly within Web sites. The technology, which leverages Vista’s new graphics framework Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), will debut at the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB ) conference, being held this week in Las Vegas.

Microsoft also will unveil Web content providers who have signed up to use the technology once it is available, including Akamai, Brightcove, Eyeblaster, Major League Baseball and Netflix.

Key said Microsoft is targeting three core audiences with Silverlight, formerly code-named WPF/E: content providers that want to distribute video and rich media over the Web; designers and developers that are building rich interactive applications; and end users that want the best possible experience when viewing Web-based media.

Plays well with others

Silverlight is compatible with a range of browsers, including Internet Explorer (IE), Safari and Firefox. Silverlight seems to delivers a similar user experience on both IE 7 running on Windows Vista and Firefox running on an Apple Macintosh computer. In fact, a big benefit of the technology for end users is that they will not have to download different video player technology to view online media based on what OS they are running, Key said.

Microsoft is highlighting the video-delivery capabilities of Silverlight at NAB, but the company plans to show how companies can use Silverlight in a similar way to Adobe’s Flash to deliver Web-based applications that use animation and other rich media, Key said.

Microsoft also plans to optimize other components of its software platform to add value to Silverlight. For example, the forthcoming Windows Server, code-named Longhorn, will include as a plug-in the IIS7 Media Pack, which adds new features to enhance and reduce the cost of delivering rich media over the Web.

Microsoft’s Expression toolset to build rich Internet applications — which Microsoft is pitting as an alternative to Adobe’s recently released Creative Suite 3 — also is key to Silverlight because designers will use it to create application to be delivered through the technology. Expression should be generally available in June.

Users skeptical

Keith Cutcliffe, IT developer and analyst for ProAssurance in Birmingham, Alabama, is skeptical that Microsoft will ever gain the faithful user base Adobe has. However, he said that enterprise customers that have developed Flash applications to run on Microsoft-based Web infrastructure eventually may use Silverlight and Expression instead because of the underlying back-end platform ties.

Scott Stanfield, CEO of application development firm Vertigo Software, seems supportive of that sentiment. He said Silverlight fills a major gap in Microsoft’s strategy to provide a mechanism to deliver and build applications that provide the stability of desktop applications with the user experience of media-rich Web applications.

“Previously Flash was the only answer,” he said. “Now Silverlight becomes a viable alternative.”

Microsoft will deliver a beta of Silverlight at its MIX 2007 conference at the end of April, and will announce plans for general availability at that time, Key said.

Windows command prompt shell window does not support use of mouse click to access its various functions. For programmers or developers or advanced users who frequently use command prompt to do their works, the following list of keyboard accelerators also known as keyboard shortcuts or hot keys will be handy to speed up their task. The shortcut keys work in command prompt window or DOS prompt, works in almost every version of Windows including Vista, XP, 2003, 2000.

Left/right arrow
Move cursor backward/forward one character.

Ctrl + left/right arrow
Move cursor backward/forward one word.

Home/End
Move cursor to beginning/end of line.

Up/down arrow
Scroll up (and back) through list of stored commands (called the Command Buffer or History). Each press of the up key recalls the previous command and displays it on the command line.

Page Up/Down
Recall oldest/most recent command in buffer.

Insert
Toggle insert/overtype mode (block cursor implies overtype mode).

Esc
Erase current line.

F1
Repeat text typed in preceding line, one character at a time.

F2 + key
Repeat text typed in preceding line, up to first character matching key.

F3
Repeat text typed in preceding line.

F5
Change the template for F1, F2, and F3 (described earlier) so that earlier commands are used as the template; press F5 repeatedly to cycle through the entire command buffer.

F6
Place an end-of-file character (^Z) at current position of command line.

F7
Show all entries in Command Buffer (History).

Alt-F7
Clear all entries in Command Buffer (History).

chars + F8
Entering one or more characters chars followed by F8 will display the most recent entry in the Command Buffer beginning with chars. Pressing F8 again will display the next most recent matching command, and so on. If no characters are specified, F8 simply cycles through existing commands in buffer.

F9 + command#
Display designated command on command line; use F7 to obtain numbers.

Ctrl-C
Interrupt the output of most Command Prompt applications.

A vulnerability in the way Windows handles animated cursors puts users at risk. Several nefarious websites are already trying to exploit the flaw, according to the SANS Internet Storm Center.

The flaw is present on virtually the entire line of Windows OSes, including Vista, which has been held up as Redmond’s poster child for safe computing. According to McAfee, Windows users browsing malicious sites using Internet Explorer versions 6 or 7 risk having arbitrary code run on their machines. Those using Firefox are not vulnerable. Microsoft said in an advisory that those using IE 7 on Vista are safe from the vulnerability because of a protected mode, which restricts where the browser can write files.

“Upon viewing a web page, previewing or reading a specially crafted message, or opening a specially crafted email attachment the attacker could cause the affected system to execute code,” Microsoft warns. Files that can exploit the vulnerability are not limited to those with the .ani extension that come with most programs that animate the cursor on Windows machines. Some exploits in the wild are reported to be embedded in jpeg files, SANS says in an advisory.