The DVD+RW Alliance announced this week that Microsoft has officially joined its ranks and will be the ninth company to sit on its policy-setting team. Current members include industry giants Hewlett-Packard, Dell and Sony.

The pledge of support from Redmond was expected, as Microsoft has long been a proponent of Mount Rainier, which works only with DVD+R/RW drives. Mt. Rainier allows for transparent formatting of media and full drag and drop writing support, providing for the first true floppy replacement. Last June, Microsoft issued a call to action asking hardware manufacturers to support the standard.

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Microsoft this week acquired from Connectix virtual machine technology that enables a single workstation to run multiple operating systems and application platforms. Microsoft will take over development and support of Virtual PC for both Windows and Mac, as well as Virtual Server from Connectix.

Microsoft will market the technology to businesses as a method to migrate to the latest operating systems without sacrificing existing applications. Virtual Server will enable companies to consolidate multiple NT4 servers into a single Windows Server system.

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UPDATED In a chaotic series of events Wednesday, Microsoft made available to MSDN subscribers the long awaited second beta of Office 11, leaving many beta testers bewildered, and then pulled the release shortly thereafter.

Microsoft was not expected to begin shipping Office 11 Beta 2 for at least another week, and official testers are normally given early access to such releases as a reward for their hard work. Instead, paying customers and Redmond partners were given first crack at the new Office, including OneNote and InfoPath.

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Centercode is seeking participants for an upcoming beta test of network management software designed for system administrators.

According to Centercode, "This software is a desktop administration tool that automatically examines software applications and hardware of any networked PC, mobile/remote computing device, and server. It allows network administrators to observe desktop configurations from a central location for greater control, efficiency and cost-effectiveness."

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Gaming giant Blizzard is soliciting 10,000 Warcraft III players to beta test its upcoming expansion, Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne. Applicants must have a valid Reign of Chaos CD Key and be 13 years of age or older. Because the beta will be distributed online, users must also have the capability to download 100MB of game data.

Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne adds a new chapter to the Warcraft saga. One new Hero per race will be available, along with new units, player-built shops, Natural Heroes, and new multiple game types over Battle.net. The Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne beta will be playable only over Battle.net.

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Apple on Thursday issued the fourth update to Mac OS X 10.2 since "Jaguar" was unleashed in August of last year. Version 10.2.4 includes enhancements to digital media, printing, networking and fixes bugs in the Address Book and Finder.

Mac OS X users will find new PDF workflow options when saving to PDF in 10.2.4, which allow AppleScript scripts to automatically manipulate the file. Such actions can include compressing, encrypting or sending a PDF via e-mail.

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With the second beta release of Office 11 on the horizon, Microsoft has begun to make final preparations in anticipation of the beta's widespread availability. Beta 2 kits will be offered for purchase through a customer preview program, as well as being sent to testers and Redmond partners.

This week Microsoft announced it had given the name "InfoPath" to the new Office application formerly code-named Xdocs. InfoPath is a word processor like Microsoft Word, but uses XML-based forms to streamline data collection within documents. Although it is not clear how Microsoft will ship the final product, InfoPath will be included with Beta 2.

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Microsoft is readying an update to Windows XP Media Center Edition and has invited prospective candidates to apply for the upcoming best test. "The program will introduce you to a set of technologies providing new digital media experiences on Windows consumer PCs," according to Microsoft. Interested testers must complete a survey located at BetaPlace, and those selected will be contacted next month.

Windows XP MCE was released last fall and is available on "media center" PCs available from Hewlett-Packard, Gateway and other manufacturers.

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On March 3, Sun will begin beta testing the 6.1 release of StarOffice, the company's office productivity suite based on OpenOffice.org. The 6.1 Beta program will last through May 2, 2003 and a beta refresh will follow until July 7, 2003.

"This program is designed to allow users to utilize the full functionality of StarOffice while helping to improve on usability and quality of our products," said Sun.

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After unveiling plans Monday to comply with a preliminary injunction issued by U.S. District Judge J. Frederick Motz, Microsoft has been granted a stay of the decision by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Microsoft had filed an emergency appeal in late January calling the order "extreme and unprecedented." The 4th Circuit Court has put the injunction on hold until it can hold a hearing.

The injunction came as part of a $1 billion lawsuit brought by Microsoft rival Sun Microsystems, which claims Redmond used its Windows monopoly to promote .NET over Java. In his ruling, Motz ordered Microsoft to ship Windows with Sun's Java technology within 120 days.

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UPDATED In order to comply with a preliminary injunction forcing the company to include Sun Microsystems' Java in Windows, Microsoft is preparing two updates to Windows XP Service Pack 1.

An initial update dubbed SP1a was released Monday and is identical to the currently available SP1, but stripped of Microsoft's Java. SP1b will follow in June, featuring Sun's latest Java revision and meeting the timetable imposed by the court.

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Opera Software this week released the next version of its niche Web browser focused on speed and standards compliance. Opera 7 is aimed as an alternative to Microsoft's Internet Explorer Web browser and was completely rewritten from the ground up.

The new release includes numerous features over its predecessor, including a Fast Forward button and an e-mail client dubbed M2. Version 7 also introduces Spatial Navigation, which enables users to navigate links more easily using the keyboard.

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Office 11 testers are eagerly awaiting the arrival of their Beta 2 kits, scheduled to hit doorsteps worldwide in the next month. Beta coordinators recently informed testers that Microsoft will be upgrading the Hosted SharePoint Team Services to Beta 2 bits in mid-February, indicating a release is near.

"The current plan is that the upgrade will begin at any time after February 10, 2003," the notice read. "We strongly advise you to ensure that you have copies of any data that is stored on your beta site. The EULA that was included with the beta explains that there are no guarantees for the use or reliability of this beta software. You should be aware that during the beta 1 to beta 2 upgrade process, some or all the changes you have made or information you have stored in the beta site may not be migrated properly, and could be permanently lost."

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Beta testing firm Centercode is looking for information technology professionals to take part in an upcoming network deployment software beta.

This new software is a "desktop administration tool that automatically distributes and installs software applications to any networked PCs, mobile/remote computing devices, and servers," according to Centercode.

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Internet traffic slowed to a crawl early Saturday morning as a virus-like worm exploited a known flaw in Microsoft SQL Server 2000 and flooded the world's digital backbones. The attack used a buffer overflow to execute code on a vulnerable SQL Server, causing that system to randomly seek out other computers to infect and in the process consume massive amounts of bandwidth.

Major Internet providers began to block the malicious traffic by mid-morning Saturday, although UUNet continued to report major slowdowns.

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