Blogs

If you are using Vista and ISA, you will be used to getting a compatibility warning when the client loads. Well, this KB and download gives you a time when that is no longer the truth :-) From the joys of Susan B's blog View article... .. How to obtain the version of Firewall Client for ISA Server (December 2006) that includes Windows Vista support: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929556 Finally the ISA firewall client that will support Vista is out today and there's a new WSUS category to boot! As always, be careful when playing with your systems ttfn David

People often wonder what happens to the feedback provided through the blog and the Regional Support Centers, so I thought I would give you a quick update. Below are some things that you have asked for and the current status of them. I know not all the answers are what you want to hear, but at least you know we are working on things Things we have solved Problem Answer Business Contact Manager was not included in Action Pack Product will be included (probably from July) Lack of 64-bit Windows Server Shipped as a special shipment and will be standard from July pack Damaged Actions Packs and missing CDs We apologise for this and ask you to contact the regional support center for replacements. At the moment we are not getting too many complaints about this, but will monitor Can I have 64-bit Vista Hopefully this will be shipped in the next kit Things still in progress (the light is closer for these items than the 2 items in the last section) Problem Answer Downloads for AP subscribers – when will this be generally...

I blogged about this a week or so ago, but the new site is now up and running and looks pretty fabulous. Click the Image to get to the new site. You can see that it is split into two sections, for those starting a business and those growing a business. Have an explore to find out what is there that you or your customers can use. Remember that bCentral was able to draw over 1/4 million UNIQUE visitors in a month, so your customers might well be on the list. The new blog can be found at http://blogs.technet.com/smallbusiness/default.aspx - it already has some excellent entries which I will be referring to soon. ttfn David Technorati Tags: bCentral , Microsoft , Small Business

If you will be in the Reading area on the night before the SBSC Symposium, then come along to Reading and have a drink and catch up with the community. You'll have the opportunity to mix and chat to different members of the regional groups as well as exchange ideas about business (or anything you like!). No agenda has been set for the evening (as yet); think of it as a regional SBS group meeting on steroids! The VIP area has been booked out for our meeting so there’ll be plenty of space to spread out and relax. Members of the community, Microsoft, and other vendors will be available to chat to and this will hopefully be a great start to the Microsoft Small Business Specialist Symposium. And just a reminder, while some drinks will be bought, more food and drink is available, but sorry guys, you've gotta pay for yourselves!

If you like the look of Microsoft Office Live for Small Business and Office Live Workspaces, then you might also like this from BT. It looks even more like understanding how to build a business on the back of Windows SharePoint Services is going to be vital in the small business space! BT launches free business tools U.K. telecom company offers BT Business Builder, which bundles free management applications for small businesses. By David Meyer Special to CNET News.com Published: September 11, 2007, 8:34 AM PDT U.K. telecom company BT Group has added a set of business-management tools to its portfolio of free hosted applications for small businesses. BT Business Builder incorporates bookkeeping, invoicing, sales, planning, payroll, human resources, and health and safety tools, together with a news-alert service covering new business legislation. <snipped - go to site to see more >BT, which is gradually shifting its image from telecommunications incumbent to global IT services giant , has already launched...

I saw these and they just made me laugh while sharing a few things about WS2008 vs 2003. Unlike some "new and improved" washing powders, Windows Server 2003 is a good product, but some key areas have been improved to meet people's new and different needs, such as more security, sharing of information, web based applications, minimal systems and virtualisation. The blog entry (which was obviously written before RC1 appeared, but posted afterwards) can be found at Windows Server Division WebLog : About Lone Server . If you want some fun, skip the soapbox video and look at the long video from the blog / link below. About The Lone Server Once I was almost famous. For years, my friends and I were on the front lines: we were the Windows Server 2003 servers that powered Microsoft.com, one of the hottest Web sites in the world. Then, early last summer, everything changed. Quietly, without warning, the new kids took over. Windows Server 2008. Yes, I know, the product’s not even done yet. These were Beta 3...

This is an extract from the TRM blog which can be found here http://blogs.technet.com/trm/ . I have removed the KB article list and some items which I don't think are relevant to small business / ISV partners, however the full info can be found on the blog page too Documents SQL Server 2008 Product Overview For organizations to be successful and thrive in today’s world of data, they need a vision that addresses key data trends. The data platform vision of Microsoft helps organizations meet these data explosion needs and the next generation of data-driven applications. Microsoft will continue to invest in and evolve the following key areas to support their data platform vision: mission-critical enterprise data platform, dynamic development, relational data, and business intelligence. Read this paper to learn about the Microsoft Data Platform Vision and how SQL Server 2008 meets the needs of the next generation of data-driven applications. http://www.microsoft.com/sql/techinfo/whitepapers/sql2008Overview.mspx...

Another User interface trick that I am now using from Vishal's blog - it just adds minor touches to Vistas UI. 3D Rotating User Pic in Windows Vista Start Menu Ave’s 3D UserPic In the old longhorn 4xxx days, the startmenu user picture was more animated as it was today. Today, we get a cheap alpha-fading effect when you hover over an item: the user picture simply blends with the icon for a while. Back in the days, the user picture was actually rotating when you had the start menu opened. This application tries to achieve that effect. Screenshot ttfn David Technorati Tags: Vista Tweaks , Windows Vista , Vista

Office Live is an amazingly flexible web design and business application tool, but understanding how to build customisation services around Office Live can be a bit of a hard one, especially when it includes things like Live ID from a client application. The presentation video from Mix07 goes through the process by initially doing a couple of site design. Then they build a reservation mini application that shares information between custom sharepoint lists internal to the site and present input/output information on the public site. Then workflow is added to make the reservations move from requests to processes when the status is changed and update a calendar. Remember that Office Live is built on a Windows SharePoint Services V3, so a platform that is already hotting up. A simple mashup is built using the customer information and a Local.Live.com map. Finally a client based application is created to log into the web service and then access the lists to update information. While this is nothing revolutionary,...

Did you make it to the 1st Vista Squad event? Well, if you did you will know how well it was appreciated, and if you did not, then time to get down here. The details are: The next Vista Squad meeting is confirmed :) All your favourite superheroes will be in attendance. In addition we have two guest heroes sharing their superpowers on WPF and Vista's BitLocker feature. Date: 24th May 2007 Time: 5.30pm onwards Location: Microsoft UK HQ, TVP, Reading, Building 3 Room: Memphis Agenda: 6.15pm - 6.30pm "Introduction" 6.30pm - 7.20pm "BitLocker presented by Stephen Lamb" 7.20pm - 7.30pm "BitLocker Q&A" 7.30pm - 8.30pm "Food and Networking" 8.30pm - 9.20pm "Introduction to WPF presented by Ray Booysen" 9.20pm - 9.30pm "WPF Q&A" Link: http://vistasquad.co.uk/blogs/announcements/archive/2007/05/02/vista-squad-2-0.aspx Come along!! ttfn David

I like Vijay - he never lets me get away with cutting corners and has an honest perspective on many things. His personal review of what Exchange, Vista and Office will bring to the world is refreshing because he can say he has been there!! Vista vs Linux October 13, 2006 on 6:51 pm | In Linux , Vista | As Vista nears the business launch date of November 2006 the articles doing a comparison are appearing thick and fast. Firstly, let me say I’m an advocate of Open Source and what it has brought to the world. It’s given us some great solutions and powers the heart of the internet as we know it and companies like Google have built their business on it. That’s not a bad achievement! However, Microsoft has a formidable offering to both consumers and businesses alike. This offering is only getting stronger through EVO (Exchange Server 2007, Vista and Office 2007) and issues such as the WGA debacle and delays in Vista aren’t going to make the impact of these new technologies any less dramatic. Source: iQubed Blog » Vista...

I saw this and thought I would pass it on. If you are interested in SharePoint, Silverlight, SQL 2008, Visual Studio 2008 and .Net 3.5 then you should look at these: MSDN Southern Events Developing on the Windows Live Platform Date: 6 November 2007 Location: Reading An Introduction to the Microsoft Web Platform (and how to do it for zip, nyada, zero cost to you) Date: 27 November 2007 Location: Reading What's New in Smart Client Development Date: 29 November 2007 Location: Bristol SQL Server 2008 Date: 4 December 2007 Location: Reading Find out about all MSDN events MSDN London Events Building Dynamic Web Applications with Microsoft Silverlight Date: 8 November 2007 Location: London What's New in Visual Studio 2008 and .NET Fx 3.5 for the Web Developer Date: 6 December 2007 Location: London Find out about all MSDN events MSDN Northern Events Building Dynamic Web Applications with Microsoft Silverlight Date: 15 November 2007 Location: Manchester SQL Server 2008 Date: 22 November 2007 Location: Bradford...

I read with interest the previosu stories about large oganisations banning Vista deployments, wondering if this was anything but normal policy. Then this story broke where NIST in the US "were irked" at suggestions that the ban was in anyway but normal practice until they finish testing Explaining a Vista ban The National Institute of Standards and Technology has put a moratorium on using Windows Vista, but that's business as usual, says agency's CIO. newsmaker The prestigious National Institute of Standards and Technology has put a ban on Windows Vista, but that's standard procedure, according to NIST's chief information officer. NIST, which does research and sets standards for things like cryptography for government use , is among several federal agencies that have put a moratorium on the use of Vista . The agencies are taking some time to make sure that the new Microsoft operating system meets their needs. It is not unusual that large organizations aren't rushing to install major software updates. These organizations...