Six years after the landmark antitrust settlement between the United States and Microsoft, the Department of Justice said Aug. 30 that the deal has benefited consumers by promoting competition in the middleware market.

In a filing in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, the Department of Justice stated that the agreement has accomplished the goal of removing "anticompetitive exclusionary obstacles" erected by Microsoft prior to the settlement.

Seven states are pushing back against the Department of Justice’s assessment that the landmark antitrust settlement between the United States and Microsoft has removed the anticompetitive obstacles created by the software maker and resulted in more competition in the middleware market.

In fact, according to attorneys for California, Connecticut, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, the commonwealth of Massachusetts and the District of Columbia, known as the "California Group" of plaintiffs, "Microsoft’s market power remains undiminished and… key provisions of the final judgment–those relating to middleware–have had little or no competitively significant impact."

Microsoft requested that AutoPatcher, a free update distribution tool, cease to be offered for downloads, despite its four-year existence with no prior problems.

AutoPatcher was developed by a group of technologists including its project manager Antonis Kaladis, an IT security professional in Greece. It allows users to update their Windows systems, tweak their registry settings and update other software, such as Sun Microsystems Inc.’s Java programs, without remaining connected to the Internet.

Java versus .NET for service-oriented architecture development is something less than the war of the worlds, but as an industry debate analysts offer contrasting views.

The Java side got something of a boost when an Evans Data Corp. survey of 400 developers and IT managers actively working on Web services found an uptick in Java usage and a decrease in Microsoft .NET. Java was up slightly and .NET was down 20 percent from previous Evans surveys. But the net result was that the two technologies were "virtually tied" in overall usage, with one in five respondents planning to use both, according to Evans. Support for both is common say two analysts who offered contrasting views.

Microsoft and Eolas Technologies have settled their long-running legal battle, according to a letter sent to Eolas shareholders. The letter, posted on the Seattle Post-Intelligencer Web site, says that the companies settled on Aug. 24, but will not disclose terms of the settlement. On Sept. 4, Eolas plans a shareholder meeting and will discuss information from the settlement that it is allowed to disclose as well as future business plans for the company.

CNET Networks has acquired the TechTracker family of Web sites, including VersionTracker, MacFixIt, and iPhone Atlas. Separate notes confirming the acquisition were posted to all three sites late last Wednesday.

Writing in his blog, VersionTracker.com founder Kurt Christensen said that CNEt’s acquisition of the TechTracker sites "gives CNET a stronger presence in the Mac market than ever before."

Data integration software vendor JuxtaComm Technologies has filed suit in a Texas court alleging patent infringement. The case names a number of high-profile software companies, including Microsoft and IBM.

JuxtaComm is alleging that the companies in question–which include a number of prominent business intelligence and application integration companies–have infringed its patent for a system that transforms and exchanges data between distributed heterogeneous computer systems.

Microsoft said Wednesday it will acquire a Chicago-based provider of enterprise group chat software to bolster the messaging capabilities of its Office Communications Server and Office Communicator products.

Microsoft’s plan to acquire privately held Parlano is expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of this year. The company did not disclose the financial terms of the deal. Parlano has about 50 employees, which Microsoft eventually plans to relocate to its headquarters in Redmond, Washington.

It appears that PDF spam has had its 15 minutes of fame. Having reached its peak volume on Aug. 7 at nearly 30 percent of all spam messages sent, PDF spam today is hardly registering on email security vendors’ spamometers.

The unwanted emails with PDF files attached–usually pushing the recipient to purchase a penny stock that the spammer then dumps once the trading price goes up–comprise less than 1 percent of spam today, according to security vendor Sophos.

Amid mounting criticism of the deal, the chairman and CEO of Acer has vowed to step down if the company’s bid to join with Gateway does not succeed.

"The merger will definitely succeed. If it doesn’t… I will resign," the Chinese-language newspaper, Economic Daily News, quoted Acer Chairman and CEO J.T. Wang as saying in an interview published Wednesday. Acer spokesman Henry Wang confirmed the statement.