PHP short tag removal recommendation

Hi,
I just noticed that ak_featured_post.php file starts with short php tag “<?”.
One of my customers server in on IIS7 and there short codes are not working. I had to change that short tag to <?php and after that the plugin worked.

Php.ini-file says:
“<? and ?> tags as PHP source which should be processed as such. It’s been recommended for several years that you not use the short tag “short cut” and instead to use the full <?php and ?> tag combination. With the wide spread use of XML and use of these tags by other languages, the server can become easily confused and end up parsing the wrong code in the wrong context.”

<e />

http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/akfeatured-post-widget/