X-Nico

63 unusual facts about Microsoft Windows


4oD

The service was originally available as a Windows-only desktop program for downloading shows similar to BBC iPlayer Desktop.

ABC notation

Such software is readily available for most computer systems including Microsoft Windows, Unix/Linux, Macintosh, PalmOS, and web-based.

Active Directory Rights Management Services

Windows Rights Management Services (also called Rights Management Services, Active Directory Rights Management Services or RMS) is a form of Information Rights Management used on Microsoft Windows that uses encryption and a form of selective functionality denial for limiting access to documents such as corporate e-mail, Word documents, and web pages, and the operations authorized users can perform on them.

Adobe FreeHand

Development has been discontinued but it is still sold in versions for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X.

Altsys

It was published for many years, originally only on the Macintosh, then also for Microsoft Windows.

Analysis of molecular variance

This program, which runs on Windows is called Arlequin, and is freely available on Excoffier's website.

Apple Open Directory

Any Mac OS X Server system prior to 10.7 (Lion) configured as an Open Directory Master can act as a Windows Primary Domain Controller (PDC), providing domain authentication services to Microsoft Windows clients.

Arek Dreyer

He maintains expertise in Microsoft Windows and UNIX based environments, particularly Sun Solaris, Mac OS X has become his preferred platform, and he enjoys the challenge of heterogeneous networks like integration with Active Directory.

Arthur and the Revenge of Maltazard

To promote the film, a video game was released for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii and Microsoft Windows.

Austin M. Allran

In March 2005 Senator Allran called for the game of solitaire to be erased from the Microsoft Windows computers of state employees in his North Carolina constituency, claiming that such a move would save millions of dollars and improve productivity due to the working time lost while state employees play the game.

AVADirect

They specialize in highly customized computer systems including Microsoft Windows and Linux servers, high-end workstations and gaming systems, business PCs, and notebooks.

British and Malaysian English differences

Most computer software in Malaysia including Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office come pre-set with English (United States) as the default and these settings are seldom changed to English (United Kingdom) resulting in the proliferation of American English in many places of work, local universities and other places with heavy reliance on documents and content created by using computers.

Corel Linux

SmartMove looks for existing Microsoft Windows installations on the machine, looks a little further for individual users, and offers to transfer application settings to analogous programs under Linux.

CSharpBuilder

C#Builder, from Borland Software Corporation, is a computer program that allows programmers to create Microsoft Windows and Web applications for the Microsoft .NET Framework using the programming language C#.

Cython

Cython is written in Python and works on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X, producing source files compatible with CPython 2.4 through 3.3.

Dartmouth Time Sharing System

In 2000 a project to recreate the DTSS system on a simulator was undertaken and as a result DTSS is now available for Microsoft Windows systems and for the Apple Macintosh computer.

DATEV

In 1998 the "in-house" software was made available to its members on Microsoft Windows, as it was clear that the OS/2 operating system was going to be phased out.

DynaVox

DynaVox uses a Microsoft Windows-based configuration as a platform to run proprietary InterAACt communiciation software.

EDonkey2000

On September 16, 2000, client and server versions were available for Microsoft Windows and Linux.

Emergency Management Services

Emergency Management Services (EMS) provides an RS-232 accessible serial console interface to the bootloader menu on modern versions of Microsoft Windows.

FarSite Communications Limited

Various communications protocols are supported by the PC-based communications cards on both Linux and Windows operating systems, including

FlashCP

This is done through the use of Windows-based software that must be installed in order to use the FlashCP capability of the drive.

Guitar Pro

Until it reached version 4, the software was only available for Microsoft Windows.

It has versions for Windows, Mac OS X (Intel processors only), and Linux and is written by the French company Arobas Music.

HighGrow

The program, compatible with Windows, takes a form similar to the popular virtual pet games whereby players care for their pets by feeding, watering, and playing with them on a regular basis.

HomeRF

The group was disbanded in January 2003 after other wireless networks became accessible to home users and Microsoft began including support for them in its Windows operating systems.

IBM mainframe

There are software-based emulators for the System/370, System/390, and System z hardware, including FLEX-ES and the freely available Hercules emulator which runs under Linux, FreeBSD, Solaris, Mac OS X and Microsoft Windows.

IBM Open Class

IOC was an extensive set of C++ classes used to build CLI and GUI applications which could then be easily cross-compiled to OS/2, Microsoft Windows, and AIX.

IWARP

Networking services implemented over iWARP include those offered in the OpenFabrics Enterprise Distribution (OFED) by the OpenFabrics Alliance for Linux operating systems, and the Winsock Direct protocol for Microsoft Windows.

Ken Burns effect

On the Windows platform, 4K Slideshow Maker by 4KDownload, AVS Video Editor, Windows Movie Maker, Pinnacle Studio, Sony Vegas Studio (and Movie), Ulead VideoStudio, Adobe Premiere, PicturesToExe also have pan and zoom features built in or available through third party extensions which may be used to achieve the effect.

Lamorne Morris

Morris can be seen in commercials including ones for State Farm Insurance, Taco Bell, Twix, Miller Lite, Las Vegas, 7 Up, Edge, Sears, Microsoft Windows, Chili's, McDonald's, Ford and Hornitos Tequila.

Language Interface Pack

Unlike MUI packs which are available only to Microsoft volume license customers and for select SKUs of Windows Vista, a Language Interface Pack is available freely and can be installed on a licensed copy of Microsoft Windows or Office and a fixed base language.

Lantastic

LANtastic was a peer-to-peer local area network (LAN) operating system for DOS, Microsoft Windows, Novell NetWare and OS/2.

Lapsiporno.info

Electronic Frontier Finland (EFFI) have noticed that the blacklist includes non-pornographic websites also, including a Windows advice forum, a computer repair service and the Internet Initiative Japan server nn.iij4u.or.jp that, among others, hosts websites for a violin factory, a doll store and a hearing aid manufacturer.

Lifehacker

The blog posts cover a wide range of topics including: Microsoft Windows, Mac, Linux programs, iOS and Android, as well as general life tips and tricks.

Lotus DataLens

Lotus also released two user-oriented query builders, the DOS-based Query Builder which could interact with DataLens sources but was not built on it, and the Windows-based Data Query Assistant (DQA) which was built directly on DataLens.

M+NetMail

NetMail components are available for SUSE and Red Hat Linux, Novell NetWare v5.1 and later, Novell Open Enterprise Server (in both its OES-Linux and OES-NetWare versions), and Microsoft Windows platforms.

MagicVortex

Files can be sent either by an Internet browser or by a downloadable application for Microsoft Windows.

Mosaic notation program

Several factors can be theorized: Sibelius and Finale were the competitor notation packages; they were developed for both Macintosh and Windows platforms.

MultitrackStudio

MultitrackStudio or MTS for short is a digital audio workstation platform for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X operating systems, developed by Bremmers Audio Design.

NetBackup

It provides cross-platform backup functionality to a large variety of Windows, UNIX and Linux operating systems.

NetBIOS

A Windows computer registry may also be configured in such a way as to display "unknown" for the node type.

Norton PC Checkup

Norton PC Checkup is a program downloaded either separately or as a bundle with updates to Adobe Flash, provided to enable users to perform a system checkup of their Microsoft Windows based personal computers.

NoteWorthy Composer

NoteWorthy Composer (NWC) is a graphical score editor for Microsoft Windows computers (from Windows 95 to Windows 7), and is also reported to work on PCs under Linux with Wine.

O RLY?

In 2006, anti-virus company Sophos discovered a computer worm known as "W32/Hoots-A", which sends a graphical image of a snowy owl with the letters "O RLY?" to a print queue when it infects a Windows-based computer.

OpenCodecs

OpenCodecs is a software package for enabling HTML5 video on Microsoft Windows, particularly using the Theora and WebM codecs in Internet Explorer.

OutSPOKEN

outSPOKEN for Microsoft Windows was released in 1994 for Windows 3.1, and was widely recognized as one of the first truly effective screen readers for Windows.

P0sixspwn

p0sixspwn is a jailbreak tool for Mac OS X and Windows to jailbreak iOS 6.1.3 - 6.1.5 untethered on all devices, except Apple TV 3G.

PaPeRo

In 2006, a virtual PaPeRo was released for use in any PC running the Windows operating system and the Pocket PC, which can be used to program or monitor the use of the PaPeRo operating system.

PC Magazine

PC Magazine was a booster of early versions of the OS/2 operating system in the late 1980s, but then switched to a strong endorsement of the Microsoft Windows operating environment after the release of Windows 3.0 in May 1990.

Richard T. Russell

Richard Thomas Russell is the creator of the BBC BASIC for Windows programming language and the author of the Z80 and MS-DOS versions of BBC BASIC.

RobotWar

RoboWar is a similar game that was released later on the Macintosh, and is now available for both Mac OS and Windows.

Rua 25 de Março

A person who shops here also runs the risk of getting caught by the government, though the dangers are quite low unless it is a foreigner bringing illegal goods back into their developed country, such as illegal electronics and software like Microsoft Windows, among other things.

Segmentation fault

On Microsoft Windows, the offending process receives a STATUS ACCESS VIOLATION exception.

ServersCheck

It can perform traditional network related checks (TCP, PING, traceroute) but can also be used to monitor a wide variety of other checks such as internet related checks (url, email chain, database checks, Windows checks (diskspace, CPU, memory, process, services).

Simple DNS Plus

All options and settings are available directly from a Windows user interface.

Simple DNS Plus is based on the Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 and is 100% managed code, protecting it from common security issues such as buffer overruns, and making it run natively on both 32 bit and 64 bit CPUs and Windows versions, including Windows Vista.

Solid Edge

It runs on Microsoft Windows and provides solid modeling, assembly modelling and drafting functionality for mechanical engineers, designers and drafters.

Spam email delivery

Most of the major Windows e-mail viruses of 2003, including the Sobig and Mimail virus families, functioned as spammer viruses: viruses designed expressly to make infected computers available as spamming tools.

Standard Spanish

The result has been to identify a neutral Spanish, a version that tries to avoid regional phenomena, such as the Latin American voseo, or terms that may be identified with specific countries (for example, for “computer”, the term in Spain is ordenador, while in Spanish America the most frequent term is computadora, except in a few areas that prefer computador; as a result, Microsoft Windows uses the region-neutral term equipo).

Suicide Silence EP

The EP is released as an Enhanced CD and contains a QuickTime file for “Destruction of a Statue (Live)”, a video that is viewable on Mac and Microsoft Windows personal computers.

Survex

It is designed to be portable and can be run on a variety of platforms, including Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, and Unix.

VGX

The component of Microsoft Windows operating systems responsible for the vector graphics rendering.


Brad Silverberg

Brad Silverberg is an American computer scientist and businessman, most noted for his work at Microsoft in 1990–1999 as Senior VP and product manager for MS-DOS, Windows, Internet Explorer, and Office.

Bratz 4 Real

Bratz: 4 Real is a video game based on the Bratz franchise for the Nintendo DS and Microsoft Windows.

Cirrus Logic

Cirrus' Microsoft Windows 2D GUI accelerators (GDI) were among the fastest in the low-end market-segment, outperforming competing VGA-chips from Oak Technologies, Trident Microsystems, and Paradise (Western Digital).

Condusiv Technologies

The company was formerly known as Diskeeper Corporation, a name derived from its flagship product, Diskeeper, a file-system defragmentation software package for Microsoft Windows and OpenVMS.

Control-V

In many GUI environments, including Microsoft Windows and most desktop environments based on the X Window System, and in applications such as word processing software running in those environments, control-V can be used to paste text or other content (if supported) from the clipboard at the current cursor position.

Den Store Danske Encyklopædi

The text of the paper encyclopedia was also published, but without illustrations, on CD-ROMs for Microsoft Windows in 2004 and for Mac OS in 2005.

Dilbert's Desktop Games

Dilbert's Desktop Games is a collection of Dilbert-related games for Microsoft Windows 95, 98, 98SE, & Millennium Edition.

Final Scratch

Stanton claims that the ScratchAmp can now interact with any audio software through ASIO or WDM on Windows, and CoreAudio in Mac OS X.

GNU toolchain

Parts of the GNU toolchain are also directly used with or ported to other platforms such as Solaris, Mac OS X, Microsoft Windows (via Cygwin and MinGW/MSYS) and Sony PlayStation 3.

Go!Zilla

Zilla (not to be confused with Godzilla, a fictional Japanese monster) is a proprietary download manager originally developed by Aaron Ostler in 1995, and later purchased by Radiate in 1999, for use on Windows.

High-speed multimedia radio

This method is supported by all modern operating systems including but not limited to Windows, Mac OS X, BSD, and Linux.

Home of the Underdogs

While a majority of games available on the site were for DOS or Microsoft Windows, the site also contained a section with games for other platforms.

HP LaserJet

The HP LaserJet family, along with Aldus PageMaker and Microsoft Windows, was central to the PC-based solution and while the design was more plebeian than Apple's product, this multi-vendor solution was available to a mass audience for the first time.

JSBSim

JSBSim has been in development and use since 1996, and has been built on all of the most popular platforms in use today including those running Linux, Macintosh, and Microsoft Windows operating systems.

Karbar

Its articles, aimed at all levels of user, cover applications, programming, operating systems (Windows, Linux, etc.), graphics, animation, software, hardware, internet and games.

Magic: The Gathering video games

Magic: The Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers is a 2009 game for Xbox Live Arcade, Microsoft Windows, and PS3 developed by Stainless Games Ltd and published by Wizards of the Coast.

Microsoft Silverlight

Even though Microsoft was officially collaborating on the Moonlight project, Bruce Chizen, who was CEO of Adobe Systems at the time, which sells the competing proprietary Flash platform, questioned "the commitment of Microsoft to keep the Silverlight platform compatible with other OS besides Windows".

MicroStation

The latest versions of the software are released solely for Microsoft Windows operating systems, but historically MicroStation was available for Macintosh platforms and a number of Unix-like operating systems.

MyFax

Some of the features of MyFax include the ability to send and receive faxes by email and through the internet, as well as send faxes directly from Microsoft Office, Microsoft Outlook, and Microsoft Windows-based applications including Google Docs, OpenOffice.org, and Intuit QuickBooks.

NJStar Communicator

NJStar Communicator was a very popular Traditional Chinese Microsoft Windows add-on for Windows 95 and Windows 98 that supports Chinese, Japanese and Korean input and web pages viewing in the same windows before Windows provided those functions.

Option key

However, the Option key in a Mac operating system functions differently from the Alt key under other Unix-like systems or Microsoft Windows.

Pactos

Pactos sells a DOS-based package program called Navid 3, and also a Windows-based package program called Navid 4; both Navid programs are intended to enable blind and partially sighted people to use computers.

Pragmatic General Multicast

It is not yet a standard, but has been implemented in some networking devices and operating systems, including Windows XP and later versions of Microsoft Windows, as well as in third-party libraries for Linux, Windows and Solaris.

PRONOM

Unix magic numbers and Macintosh data forks do provide some of this functionality, but the same is not true within DOS or Microsoft Windows environments.

Sibelius Software

All of the company's software is now available for both the Windows and Macintosh platforms.

Split/Second

Split/Second, released in the UK as Split/Second: Velocity, is an arcade racing video game developed by Black Rock Studio and published by Disney Interactive Studios for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360.

Spy Fox

When running with ScummVM, these games can be played on different operating systems, including Windows, Mac and GNU/Linux.

Tersus

Both the Studio and the Server are available on a variety of platforms, including Microsoft Windows, UNIX, Linux, and Mac OS X.

Text box

Pressing Home/End keys (Microsoft's Windows OS) or Command-left arrow/Command-right arrow (Apple's Mac OS) moves the caret to the beginning/end of the line;

They Came From Hollywood

They Came From Hollywood (TCFH) was a video game under development by independent studio Octopus Motor for Microsoft Windows that involves the player smashing cities as a monster in the style of 1950s and 1960s monster films.

Turbo Sliders

It was developed by Antti Mannisto and published by Jollygood Games (now Xiha Life) for the Windows and Linux platforms in 2003.

Van Wolverton

Wolverton has written other computer books, addressing MS-DOS, IBM OS/2, Microsoft Windows, WordPerfect, Netscape FastTrack, VisiCalc, QBasic and more.

Windowing system

Operating systems such as Microsoft Windows, Mac OS (version 9 and earlier), and Palm OS, contain a windowing system which is integrated with the OS.

Xuedong Huang

From 2000 to 2004, Huang served as general manager of Microsoft's Speech Platforms Group, where he led both the business and engineering teams that shipped Microsoft Speech Server and other voice technologies used in Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Office, Windows Mobile and Microsoft Exchange Server.

Yahoo! Messenger

In addition to instant messaging features similar to those offered by ICQ, it also offers (on Microsoft Windows) features such as: IMVironments (customizing the look of Instant Message windows, some of which include authorized themes of famous cartoons such as Garfield or Dilbert), address-book integration and Custom Status Messages.