Microsoft Office currency updates. Office 95 and Office 97 support the euro character, a symbol for the new Eurodollar European Union common currency. But according to Microsoft, application support is not enough for the euro character to function. NT must support the euro character in order for applications to also support it. In addition, printers might require font updates to print the character. SP4 includes a euro currency symbol; supporting keyboard drivers; and new core fonts such as Arial, Courier New, and Times New Roman. For more information about the euro symbol and Microsoft support, go to http://www.microsoft.com/ officefreestuff/000/office/documents/euro.htm.
NT 4.0 Option Pack updates. Microsoft no longer includes new add-on service software in service packs. The company now distributes add-on services in Option Packs. Microsoft has released one NT 4.0 Option Pack. SP4 introduces fixes for some services in this Option Pack. Microsoft has updated Certificate Server to include fixes for Teletex encoding, X.509-compliant serial-number generation, and backup functions for elements such as keys and certificates.
Internet Information Server (IIS) 4.0 fixes include support of long filenames for security restrictions on files and directories, and improved logging and caching of performance information.
SP4 updates Microsoft Message Queue Server (MSMQ) with 15 problem fixes, including disk-space recovery features, improved transaction recovery, and support for sending MS PowerPoint and MS Word documents that use ActiveX and other components. SP4 also provides updates to the MSMQ Windows 95 client.
The updated Microsoft Transaction Server (MTS) includes a new Java context class that lets developers use Visual J++ to eliminate the IObjectContext interface. The new context class lets you report that an object's work is done, temporarily or permanently prevent the system from processing a transaction, determine whether security is enabled, create a new instance of other MTS objects and include their work in the current object's transaction, and determine whether the object is executing within a transaction.
Option Pack updates include enhancements for Simple Mail Transport Protocol (SMTP) and Network News Transport Protocol (NNTP). SMTP now supports multiple virtual servers and the ETRN command for dequeueing mail over dial-up links. No information about NNTP enhancements was available at press time.
Security updates. Microsoft's Active Directory (AD) has several group policy updates. SP4 introduces group policies for directories, letting administrators define and control the state of computers and users via groups that are associated at various directory levels, including domains, sites, and organizational units (OUs). The system maintains group policies after you establish them.
SP4 includes the new proquota.exe utility. Proquota.exe monitors the sizes of user profiles and ensures that you don't exceed a predetermined file size limit. Users whose files are too large cannot log off until they reduce the file size.
SP4 has a new Security Configuration Editor (SCE). The new component is a Microsoft Management Console (MMC) snap-in that helps consolidate NT's security interfaces. (For more information about SCE, see Mark Joseph Edwards, "Service Pack 4's New Security Configuration Editor," October 1998.) To download Microsoft's SCE white papers, go to http://www.microsoft.com/
windows/downloads/bin/nts/SECURCONFIG.exe.
Miscellaneous updates. SP4 includes Year 2000 (Y2K)-compliance updates for several NT components. MS Word will support four-digit dates and will recognize the years 1900 and 2000 as centuries. In addition, User Manager, the Find Files feature, the Date/Time applet in Control Panel, and the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) administrator program are updated for Y2K compliance. (For information about troubleshooting Y2K problems, see Paula Sharick, "Y2K and Microsoft," page 155.)
SP4 includes IE 4.01 and support for Compaq's Fiber Storage Devices and PCI and EISA bus Fibre Channel Host Controllers. SP4 includes printing enhancements to provide better Z-ordering and dithering for printing text and graphics. Finally, SP4 includes an updated version of ntfs.sys that can access NT 5.0 file systems, with some limitations.
Recommendations
SP4's release seems imminent. However, Microsoft's track record might spur you to install SP3's hotfixes while you wait. Before you load a new service pack on your NT system, update your Emergency Repair Disk (ERD) with the Rdisk utility. To ensure you have a current copy of the account and security databases, run this utility from a command prompt with /s.
Always read a new service pack's readme.txt file. This file contains important notices, warnings, and instructions.