November 2004 - Posts
The Microsoft IT Forum 2004 just closed its doors and so it's time to review the past week.
Bill Gates' "Magic of Software" Keynote
To create a magic atmosphere, Russ Stevens - a magician - was invited to surprise the audience with his tricks during his show. But the big hit was that all attendees got a "special" deck of cards and a DVD with instructions on some amazing tricks... I think I'll start practicing today...
The opening keynote started out with Jean-Philippe Courtois - Senior Vice President and Chief Executive Officer Microsoft Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA):
In his speech at IT-Forum 2004, Bill Gates...
- ... called 2005 "a very big year" and "the arrival of 64-bit"
- ... mentioned there will be releases of the following products in 2005:
Windows Server 2003 64-bit Edition
Windows Server 2003 R2
Visual Studio 2005
SQL Server 2005
System Center 2005
BizTalk Server
HostIntegration Server
Commerce Server
Mr. Gates: [...] "Another major issue for identity systems is, of course, the weakness of the password. Passwords have been the primary way that people identify who they are. Unfortunately, for the type of critical information on these systems and the regulations that ask that these systems be secure, whether it is health data, financial data or customer access to customer records where only certain people should have that information, we are not going to be able to simply rely on passwords. Therefore, moving to biometric identification and particularly in moving to smart cards, is a way that is coming. This is something that has been talked about for several years, but now we finally see the leading edge customers taking that step.
We have many partners that are helping to push this forward. One of the key elements for us is to have a smart card that really connects up in the best possible way to the Microsoft platform. Therefore, I am announcing today a .NET based smart card. We have a key partner here, Axalto. They have done a super job on this. In fact, Microsoft itself will be using their smart cards internally and in all of our access to our premises. Each employee will have a smart card and will use the same smart card to get in and out of the buildings as we use to connect up to our machines. Therefore, we are requiring smart card use for any remote connections to our systems. Over time, we will completely replace passwords, where even the internal access will be done through this smart card. By having the .NET capability there, we think that allows you to bring different logic and different information down onto the card itself, using the same development tools used for everything else. Hence, we have a richness and a continuity there to the platform that only exists in that .NET environment. We are very excited to see our smart cards moving into the mainstream and connecting up to our infrastructure." [...]
(Excepts from official transcript)
Security Keynote
The Keynote No 2 was held by Scott Charney - the Chief Trustworthy Computing Strategist of Microsoft. He gave an interesting speech about "The Guding Principles of Trustworthy Computing in a Dangerous World".
Panel Discussions
There were a few panels which invited to ask Microsoft experts (by either entering the questions before the event on the attendee website or directly asking during the discussions).
Partners everywhere
As usually there was a big exhibition area which also hostet the following areas:
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Microsoft Ask the Experts
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Microsoft Leaning Center & Bookshop
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Microsoft Operations Manager Partner Pavilion
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Microsoft Office System Partner Zone
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Microsoft Storage Partner Pavilion
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SMS Alliance Zone
MOM to go
Every attendee got a MOM 2005 Workgroup Edition in the original box.
Congratulations to the IT guys. My wireless LAN worked almost all the time...
IT Forum Party
I let the photos talk for themselves.
Look at the following fantastic line up:
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Roger Taylor & Spike Edney - Queen
Hits include Radio Gaga
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Midge Ure - Ultravox & Musical Director of Live Aid
Hits include Vienna, Dancing with Tears in my Eyes and from his Thin Lizzy lead guitarist days – The Boys are Back in Town
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Madeline Bell - Blue Mink
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Graham Gouldman - 10CC
Hits include Dreadlock Holiday, Also wrote & performs Bus Stop, The Hollies & For Your Love, Yardbirds
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Chris Thompson - Manfred Mann Earth Band
Hits include Davy's on the Road Again and Blinded by the Light
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Fabba Girls - Abba Tribute Band
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Outlook
You weren't at the IT Forum and ask yourself if you missed anything? You certainly did.
Make sure to check out my IT Forum gallery or Hilmar's Blog for more exciting photos.
The IT Forum 2005 will be at a much warmer place: in Barcelona, Spain!
Settlement Program Interfaces (excerpt)
[...]
As part of that settlement, Microsoft agreed to document the interfaces used by "Microsoft Middleware" (as defined in the proposed consent decree) to obtain services from the Microsoft® Windows® 2000 and Windows XP desktop client operating systems. [...]
Microsoft teams identified a few hundred undocumented Windows interfaces or parameters that were used by one or more of the Microsoft Middleware components. Microsoft's technical writers have documented these interfaces and made them available as APIs in the MSDN Online Library.
[...]
You will find all the APIs covered by that settlement here.
Did you know that you can build your custom web services that will integrate into the Research Pane of Office (2003 or above) and IE?
What are research services?
Research Library Extensibility
Common to all applications in the Microsoft Office System, a new task pane called the Research Library enables user-initiated searches across local and remote data sources, both behind a corporate firewall and on the Internet, and may include sites based on Microsoft SharePoint Products and Technologies as well. Its primary offering starts with basic resources such as Thesaurus and Dictionary in multiple languages, bilingual dictionaries, computer translation, encyclopedia, and Web searching.
The research library, which can be controlled by administrators at a corporate level, can be extended by developers and third-party information providers to make business-specific data available to users. The research library's task pane can be customized to house smart tags, hyperlinks and textual data, which also can be inserted into Office applications as structured XML data, which isn't the case with typical Web searches. One interesting note about research library extensibility is that, unlike many customization scenarios in Office, which are typically delivered at the document or application level, extending the research library allows developers to provide an intelligence solution that permeates across the Microsoft Office System.
You can find a introduction here or just look at the sample research services "Hello World" and the research service for the Google web service.
What do I need to get started?
To develop custom research services you need at least the .NET Framework 1.0 SDK respectively Visual Studio .NET 2002, Office 2003 and IIS 5.0.
Start out by downloading the SDK from here and the recently published Development Extras - that I strongly recommends since they make development a lot easier (as described in this tutorial).
Enhance your research service with graphics and fancy fonts, set custom time-out values, combine the power of your service with Office SmartTags and/or develop research services that work offline - without internet or (W)LAN access.
Who uses them anyway?
Just to name a few of them:
Where Do I get more information?
Take a look at Research Services on Office Developer Center or on my frequently updated website at www.dotnet-online.com/researchservices/.
There are just a few No-Touch Deployment experts, but Mark Levison is definetly one of them. Together with his colleague Robi Khan he will host a MSDN DevChat on "Zero Touch Deployment" next Wednesday (Nov 24th).
In October 2004, Databeacon launched the Databeacon Smart Client family of products. These products use no-touch deployment to provide web reporting and data analysis capabilities to Windows PC users enabled with the .NET Framework. Join the two chief developers responsible for this project as they outline the technical strategies, obstacles and actions taken in bringing one of the first no-touch commercial software products to market. This session will focus on no-touch deployment and integration with Microsoft Office products.
To sign up visit: http://msevents.microsoft.com/cui/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?culture=en-CA&EventID=1032259860&EventCategory=2
Do you have Microsofts OS for the living room up and running already?
No? Then maybe it's time...
What is Windows XP Media Center Edition (MCE) 2005?
See Microsoft's FAQ on MCE 2005.
Why should I try Media Center?
I don't know about you, but I was curious to see the most recent Microsoft OS - especially designed for the living room. In today's world many programmers do not take (or have) enough time to design the user interface as well as it could be. I'm always impressed of applications on mobile phones and handheld devices. Their applications offer quite a lot of functions, well organized and structured and therefore easy to use - although the displays are (very) limited. In Media Center Edition all applications can be controlled via a remote control. Sure, it will definetly not replace the keyboard, but it is a welcomed change if I can check my mails while sitting in my TV chair or beeing notified of important mails while I'm watching TV.
Where can I get Media Center?
You can buy a new computers with MCE preinstalled from these companies.
However you can also "do-it-yourself" with your computer with the following steps:
1. Check your computer!
Download the Windows XP Media Center Edition Test Kit v2.0 and complete the tests to check the compatibility of your computer's components. Additionally you should have a look at the supported components in the List of Media Center Approved Hardware Components.
2. Get the software!
MSDN subscriber are a lucky guy and can download Media Center via the subscriber downloads. If you are not one of the lucky guys you can buy the OEM version (for example from newegg).
3. Get a remote! (optional)
A MCE without a remote is not a real MCE.
You can buy remote controls separatly (e.g. from newegg: [1], [2], [3]).
4. Make it run!
Unless you have currently installed an older version of MCE, which would give you the possibility to upgrade to MCE 2005, you have only the option to do a clean install. (I found some posts about converting your windows to MCE, but that is definetly not according to the license aggreement and I strongly recommend not to try this.)
5. Stay up to date!
After a successfull installation you should install the Update Rollup 1 (includes HDTV support and more) and check out Windows Update.
6. Enhance your Media Center!
Extend your MCE experience with the following downloads:
7. Benefit and participate in the Community!
Read about other's experiences and write down your own in communities (xpmce.com, The Green Button) and/or newsgroups microsoft.public.windows.mediacenter.
Was that all?
There is far more. Make sure to check out www.dotnet-online.com/mce/, where I update frequently.
Microsoft started the MSDN Smart Client Bug Reporting Challenge
"Calling all smart client developers! Want to win a cool Visual Studio .NET branded backpack or T-shirt? Want to help the Windows Forms team ship an amazing product? If so, come enter the Bug Reporting Challenge Contest. It’s super simple—you find a bug in Windows Forms or ClickOnce, then you file the bug you found using the Microsoft Product Feedback Center. If it's a bug that the Windows Forms or ClickOnce teams fix for Whidbey, or it's a bug we'd like to fix but have to postpone for some reason, then you get 1 credit. Each month we will hand out 1 backpack and 3 T-shirts for the top 4 bug finders. Come back and enter as often as you have a bug.
Why are we doing this, you ask? When we looked at the bug stats filed by the community through the Feedback Center, we found that over 30% of code defect bugs submitted were being fixed in the product. This is a really high number when you remember that the builds the community have are not the most up-to-date ones that the team has (e.g. another 30% are not repro by our team—meaning that we already fixed it by the time that the bug came in). We wanted a way to say "thank you" to all the people who have been finding the great bugs in the product that we are fixing, so we came up with this contest."
For official contest rules and details see here.
You can get the latest beta bits in the Visual Studio 2005 Developer Center and report your bugs through the MSDN Product Feedback Center.
Good luck! |