Shares of Microsoft Corp. dropped more than 6% in after-hours trading after the software giant posted a fiscal fourth-quarter profit that fell short of Wall Street’s estimates as it forecast lower-than-expected revenue for the following quarter.Net income rose 42% from year ago results to $4.3 billion, or 46 cents per share. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters were looking for a profit of 47 cents per share.

Sales rose 18% to $15.84 billion, beating analysts’ forecasts of $15.65 billion.

Looking ahead, Microsoft said fiscal-first quarter revenue would come in between $14.7 billion and $14.9 billion. Analysts were hoping for $15.06 billion.

The company’s XP operating system was upgraded in early 2007. But users have been slow to adopt the new Vista system.

“The Vista upgrade cycle is not providing the same growth that previous upgrade cycles have helped them,” said Richard Williams, senior software analyst at Cross Research.

Chris Liddell, chief financial officer of Microsoft, admitted tough economic headwinds in the months ahead. “Looking forward, despite difficult economic conditions, we will build upon the momentum exiting fiscal year 2008,” he said in a written statement.

But fears of a slowing economy are expected to pinch technology spending. “Economic weakness is hurting them,” said Williams.

Another analyst says that overall, Microsoft has actually been holding up well. “These results were really pretty solid,” said Peter Misek, global technology strategist for Canaccord Adams. “They have not seen this broad malaise that has hit Wall Street.”

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SUNNYVALE, California - Yahoo has reached a settlement with activist investor Carl Icahn to avoid a battle for control of the company.

The agreement announced Monday comes before the Aug. 1 shareholders vote.

Under the agreement, eight members of the current board will seek re-election. Icahn will be appointed to the board, and two other seats will be filled based on a list of nine candidates recommended by Icahn.

Icahn had wanted to replace Yahoo Inc.’s directors with his own hand-picked slate to negotiate a sale of all or part of Yahoo.

These days even Indiana Jones might think twice about packing his trusty trowel and theodolite for some fieldwork in southern Afghanistan. But guerrillas and foreign armies are no obstacle for archaeologists who are using Google Earth to identify hundreds of new sites. They have also drawn up plans of more than 45 known but previously unmapped sites.

Until recently, satellite images have been too expensive and variable for widespread use by archaeologists. Now Google Earth’s freely available high-resolution images are helping David Thomas and colleagues at La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia, to forge ahead with a project called Archaeological Sites of Afghanistan in Google Earth, which catalogues details of 463 potential sites in the Registan desert. These include mounds called tepes - the remains of ancient mud cities - hand-dug underground water channels and villages.

Thomas has also produced basic plans of sites such as the Qal’a-i Hauz fortress, believed to be a winter dwelling of the Ghaznavid elite of the 11th and 12th centuries. The images show evidence of structures which may have been hides used to hunt gazelle, and raised features probably used to manage water supplies.

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