Judge Jackson decided in a ruling from the bench yesterday morning that the DoJ would have just two more days to get what information it needed from Microsoft -- and it would have to pay Microsoft for the Microsoft personnel used to conduct searches for it. Microsoft had complained at the burden of providing five people from its finance department, as well as lawyers, to help in the retrieval of data. Steve Holley, a lawyer for Microsoft from Sullivan & Cromwell, objected, saying that the 14 August request came too late. This seemed absurd, since in the more than two months since the request was made, Microsoft has refused to allow access to the sales data. Philip Malone, speaking for the DoJ, said that he wanted operating system and Internet Explorer data going back eight years, in order to get a historical perspective. Does he know when IE was "invented"? Judge Jackson has been particularly slow in making this ruling, following Microsoft's repeated refusal to supply it. Indeed, he almost seemed to be apologetic in requiring Microsoft to provide it, saying that "I have to consider that this may be information that I may need". ® Complete Register trial coverage Click for more stories