Loose Your Data, the Microsoft Way

May 1, 2008 (Computerworld) Microsoft Corp. confirmed on Wednesday that it delayed the rollout of Windows XP Service Pack 3 (SP3) because changes to the operating system can corrupt data in the company’s retail point-of-sale and store management software.

I hate to laugh, but I have to.  If it was some bizarre interaction with a third party software package, I might be able to forgive it as an oversight.  But to create two different service packs, for two different OS’s that both corrupt data in one of Microsoft’s own, rather expensive, software packages?  How pathetic can you get?

Certainly it is within the best interest of every systems administrator out there, to test all service packs and updates with the software they run, to ensure that their mission critical applications don’t explode on them.  It falls on their shoulders, ultimately.  However, you would hope that Microsoft, as large as they are, would test their own software against their own OS roll outs.

I know that Microsoft is the 800 pound gorilla in the software cage, which makes them a natural target, but with their recent mistakes in judgment and poor software offerings (Vista simply sucks, the Windows Genuine Advantage is anything but and has screwed up several times now telling valid customers that they’re software thieves, Windows Home Server still corrupts any data you save directly to it across the network, and the last two service packs weren’t released to paying Microsoft Developer Network customers, etc.) I have to wonder if they’re not starting to collapse under their own weight.