The Old New Thing

History - The Old New Thing

Why is the Microsoft Protection Service called "msmpsvc"?

April 12, 2006 Apr 12, 2006 04/12/06
Raymond Chen
(This is the first in a series of short posts on where Microsoft products got their names.) The original name for the malware protection service was "mpsvc" the "Microsoft Protection Service", but it was discovered later that that filename was already used by malware! As a result, the name of the service had to be changed by sticking an "ms...

What's the deal with the house in front of Microsoft's RedWest campus?

April 11, 2006 Apr 11, 2006 04/11/06
Raymond Chen
What's the deal with the house in front of Microsoft's RedWest campus? Here is my understanding. It may be incomplete or even flat-out wrong. The house belongs to a couple who was unwilling to sell their property when Microsoft's real estate people were buying up the land on which to build the RedWest campus. (I'm told it was originally a ...

Why are there two copies of Notepad?

March 28, 2006 Mar 28, 2006 03/28/06
Raymond Chen
You may have noticed that there's a copy of Notepad in and another in . Why two? Compatibility, of course. Windows 3.0 put Notepad in the Windows directory. Windows NT put it in the System32 directory. Notepad is perhaps the most commonly hardcoded program in Windows. many Setup programs use it to view the Readme file, and you ...

Where technology names came from: WiFi and FireWire

March 23, 2006 Mar 23, 2006 03/23/06
Raymond Chen
Phil Belanger tells the story behind the name WiFi (and it is not short for "Wireless Fidelity"). Meanwhile, Michael Johas Teener tells the story of where the name FireWire came from. (Scroll down to "Why all these names?") [9:30am - I originally had a link to a NY Times article, but it was the wrong article and I can't find the right one...

Why does the size of a combo box include the size of the drop-down?

March 10, 2006 Mar 10, 2006 03/10/06
Raymond Chen
Many people are surprised to discover that when you create a combo box (either in code via or indirectly via a dialog box template), the size you specify describes the size of the combo box including the drop-down list box, even though the drop-down list box is not visible on the screen. For example, if you say that you want the combo box to ...

Not all team integrations go smoothly

February 17, 2006 Feb 17, 2006 02/17/06
Raymond Chen
When writing the entry on Windows Integration Meetings, I was reminded of a team integration that didn't go quite so smoothly. I will not identify the teams involved because this is not an outlet for finger-pointing but rather a cautionary tale for managers and developers everywhere. Once upon a time, there were two teams developing projects...

Other things people do with beta versions of the operating system

February 14, 2006 Feb 14, 2006 02/14/06
Raymond Chen
Somewhat belatedly riffing on Larry and his discussion of time bombs in beta products, I'm reminded of one instance of a major PC manufacturer who apparently couldn't wait for Windows 95 to RTM. Tired of waiting, they shipped several thousands of machines with a late beta version of Windows 95 instead. That worked out really great...

Why does the Recycle Bin have different file system names on FAT and NTFS?

January 31, 2006 Jan 31, 2006 01/31/06
Raymond Chen
On FAT drives, the directory that stores files in the Recycle Bin is called , but on NTFS drives, its name is . Why the name change? The FAT and NTFS Recycle Bins have different internal structure because NTFS has this thing called "security" and FAT doesn't. All recycled files on FAT drives are dumped into a single directory, whereas ...