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December 2007 - David Overton's Blog
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  • Susan B's article that just made me smile or I like to think of it as "how much money is being spent to help competition for no user benefit"

    I've been ranting a bit recently about wanting everything for nothing and then I saw Susan's article - http://msmvps.com/blogs/bradley/archive/2007/11/29/so-how-much-money-has-been-wasted.aspx - and it just goes further to say how much time is spent not moving forward, but going backwards. I thought I would add to the list with the Microsoft-EU debate about Windows Media player. As a Microsoft employee, to comment directly would be very, very bad - apparently the press might think I was expressing a Microsoft opinion and then either me or my employer could be in hot water. So I won't really comment except to state some already published facts and that a huge effort went in to build a version of Windows without Media Player. That is definitely spending money for the user to get less, but if that is what the user wants, then it should be built..... however it was announced that this version has sold well ... 1 in every 15,000 copies of Windows. That version that has cost millions and was the centre of...

  • Mobile browsers and devices that are supported in Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and in SharePoint Server 2007

    I saw this pointed out today and had to share. With SharePoint Service v3 & 2007 you can enable simple mobile access. This is covered in the Knowledge Base article Mobile browsers and devices that are supported in Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and in SharePoint Server 2007 of which the key items are: INTRODUCTION This article discusses the mobile browsers and devices that are supported in Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 and in Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. Mobile pages refer to the pages that you can access by using any of the following URLs: http://URL/m/ http://URL/_layouts/mobile/default.aspx Note To use the http://URL/m/ URL, you must enable it by using the following command: stsadm -o activatefeature -name MobilityRedirect -URL http://URL By default, the http://URL/_layouts/mobile/default.aspx URL works without any additional enabling. I saw this when David Copeland posted this to a question on an internal alias, so thanks to David for pointing it out. ttfn David Technorati Tags...

  • Windows platform news (Hyper-V pricing, Technet Edge, HPC 2008)

    The TRM blog can be found here December 2007 - Technical Rollup Mail - Platforms Microsoft outlines pricing, packaging and licensing for Windows Server 2008, Including the new Microsoft Hyper-V Server product. http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/nov07/11-12HyperVPR.mspx Microsoft announces new virtualization offerings, Windows Server 2008 details, System Center product availability at TechEd IT Forum 2007 http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/nov07/11-12ITForumPR.mspx Solution Accelerators Take the guesswork out of your deployments. Use these tested and proven automation tools and guides to assess your network and confidently roll out new services employing architectures with baked-in security and manageability. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/solutionaccelerators/default.aspx The TechNet Team have launched Technet Edge, a new community site where IT professionals can go to get the inside scoop on the latest and greatest technologies. http://edge.technet.com/Default.aspx Introducing Microsoft...

  • Service Availability and what it mean, or have a consumer broadband line and get consumer availability (10 hours downtime)

    The UKSBSGUY.com server is on my home broadband connection and this means it does not get business availability. Last night I had another 10 hours downtime and 8 hours earlier in the month. This all sounds bad, but here is where you need to understand SLAs and what availability statistics mean. If I have a 24x7 contract and I want high availability then this is how much downtime I can have through the year: Availability 365 days 31 days 1 day 99% 3.65 days 7.44 hours 14.4 minutes 99.9% 8.76 hours 44.64 minutes 1.44 minutes 99.99% 52.56 minutes 4.46 minutes 0.14 minutes 99.999% 5.26 minutes 0.45 minutes 0.01 minutes From this you can see that I am somewhere between 99% and 99.9%. If I assume 24 hours downtime this year then I am at about 99.7%, which on a consumer service is pretty amazing. Now, if someone offers you a service rebate then you need to consider the service period. For example, if someone offers 99.9% every day and you have a whole days outage, that is 1 day in 365 that they have failed, so any rebate...

  • Post Install Issues with MS07-069 (IE6 on XPSP2) - Internet Explorer 6 crashes on launch

    Just a quick one for those of you on XP SP2 with the latest security updates. There is a risk of seeing IE start crashing following this update. You have two choices: Don't install the security update - always a bad idea Install the update and deploy a registry fix to solve the problem. The IE team have documented it at Post Install Issues with MS07-069 (IE6 on XPSP2) After downloading the Internet Explorer Cumulative Security Update for December 2007, some customers using IE6 on Windows XP Service Pack 2 have experienced an unexpected crash or hang upon launching Internet Explorer. This might occur while navigating to a website hosting considerable media content (for example: http://msn.com ) resulting in Internet Explorer displaying a dialog that states “Internet Explorer has experienced a problem and needs to close”. If you experience this issue, implement the applicable workaround provided in the following knowledge base article: Microsoft Knowledge Base article 946627 For your security, we strongly recommend...

  • More on the differences between real world Vista performance and that of a benchmark

    Following up on my articles that discuss Vista performance (I still stick by my statement that it is reasonable to expect Vista to need more resources) at More on Vista vs XP performance - why doesn't everyone want a racing car, but instead do they opt for safety, comfort or even the ability to have more than one passenger? and Vista SP1 beta vs XP SP3 beta and performance - what a load of old <insert your favourite derogatory term here> I saw this and thought it was worth sharing - especially worth watching the video!! The right time to assess Windows Vista's performance Posted by Nick White on Friday, November 30, 2007 4:29 PM Measuring the performance of an operating system is a tricky thing. At the same time, it's the right and necessary thing to do, because performance is one of many criteria important to customers. Part of the trick of measuring performance is to time testing execution with the product cycle such that the results are as meaningful as possible for customers; this helps them...

  • Windows platform documentation (Windows Server System Reference Architecture, Planning VM Manager deployment, Installing and configuring VM Manager, Windows HPC Server 2008 Technical Overview, Windows Server 2008 Developer and App Compat testing)

    The TRM blog can be found here December 2007 - Technical Rollup Mail - Platforms Infrastructure Planning and Design The Infrastructure Planning and Design (IPD) guides are the next version of Windows Server System Reference Architecture. The guides in this series help clarify and streamline design processes for Microsoft infrastructure technologies, with each guide addressing a unique infrastructure technology or scenario. http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/info.aspx?na=22&p=5&SrcDisplayLang=en&SrcCategoryId=&SrcFamilyId=&u=%2fdownloads%2fdetails.aspx%3fFamilyID%3dad3921fb-8224-4681-9064-075fdf042b0c%26DisplayLang%3den Planning a Virtual Machine Manager 2007 Deployment This content provides an introduction to System Center Virtual Machine Manager (VMM) 2007 and practical guidance for planning a VMM deployment. http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/info.aspx?na=22&p=15&SrcDisplayLang=en&SrcCategoryId=&SrcFamilyId=&u=%2fdownloads%2fdetails.aspx%3fFamilyID%3d3e674bc0-bb85-47ae...

  • Microsoft Office System Developer Conference - February 10-13th 2008

    Where: San Jose Convention Center , San Jose, CA Who: 2000 developers and architects who build solutions on the Office platform (Office clients, servers, and services) ODC 2008 will bring together architects, developers, industry technical experts, Microsoft insiders and key partners in a public forum for the first time! Together, we will redefine what it means to be focused on Microsoft Office development, exchange ideas on how to continue innovating in this ever-changing space, and share best practices on how to craft the next generation of Office Business Applications . Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates will deliver a special keynote that is not to be missed (and probably one of the last ones, so be there!!). The web site http://www.odc2008.com is now live. Who is the Microsoft Office System Developer Conference for? Those involved or interested in using the Microsoft Office system (clients, servers, and services) as an application development platform. For example, people in technical roles e.g. architects, developers...

  • More on how to use / develop with Silverlight 1.0 and the fact that users are itching for Silverlight 2.0

    I love content produced in Silverlight, in fact, not enough is happening with this technology in my personal opinion inside Microsoft (or at least, inside and coming out), however I have found a few resources worth mentioning. 1st up we have information on Silverlight 1.0 development by Dan Wahlin - My Latest Silverlight Articles - Dan Wahlin's WebLog : My Latest Silverlight Articles Over the past few months I've been writing articles for the .NET Insight insight newsletter covering various ASP.NET AJAX concepts. You can read those article here . I've wrapped up that series and have started writing about Silverlight 1.0. Each week a new article will be published and I'll update them here so check back. The articles are designed to be focused and concise and get straight to the topic without a lot of fluff. Getting Started with Silverlight Using Microsoft's Silverlight Control in a Web Site Understanding Silverlight's createObject and createObjectEx Methods Silverlight XAML Primer 1: Exploring...

  • Open Office 2007 attachments to Outlook Mobile e-mail on Windows Mobile 5 or 6 - update released

    [updated on 4th December with UK English install instructions] As Steve would say, hat tip to Steve's blog . Microsoft Office Mobile 6.1 If you run Windows Mobile 5 or 6 and run Office 2007 (or get attachments from friends that do) this is a must have . You can now read Office 2007 file formats on your mobile device. More details from Jason :) [UK English Install] For those of us not in the US of A this install will complain about installing on our UK English (or other) devices. Fear not, go to the settings screen, move to region settings and change the language to US English. Ignore the prompt to reboot, run the setup on your PC. Once it is all finished it will need to reboot your device. Do so, set the language back to UK English and you now have an updated device. There is no English_UK install :-) ttfn David Technorati Tags: Windows Mobile , Office 2007

  • Internet Explorer 8 (yep, not yet released) does standards (well Acid anyway)

    Earlier this month on the IE blog there was some discussion about IE8, almost the 1st discussion about this - Internet Explorer 8 . Now they talk about the "Standards Mode" and how for those who want near 100% standards based web sites can live happily together. It is worth saying that it might end up 100% standards based, but since I don't think such a thing exists, all I will say is that is passes all the standards tests. Acid is one of these tests. I strongly recommend you read the the whole blog Internet Explorer 8 and Acid2: A Milestone As a team, we’ve spent the last year heads down working hard on IE8. Last week, we achieved an important milestone that should interest web developers. IE8 now renders the “ Acid2 Face ” correctly in IE8 standards mode. If you’re not a web developer, the details of this blog post probably aren’t all that interesting for you. I’d like you to know that we’re building IE8 for many different customers (consumers, web service providers, independent software vendors...

  • Silverlight, the UK PR company and Christmas greetings

    I'm enjoying the festive spirit at the moment - the home is well lit and I am officially off from work (officially because I still do a bit here and there). I'm off to the cinema with one of my daughters today and plan to spend some of the afternoon wrapping presents too. What more could one ask for? Well, how about Mason Zimbler writing their seasons greeting card in Silverlight? Well, if it was, then another of my Christmas wishes has been granted . It is quite nice to see a PR company taking the mickey out of themselves a bit, but they are British I suppose!! http://mason-zimbler.com/festivegreetings/ As always, enjoy the holidays David Technorati Tags: Silverlight , Christmas , Personal
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  • Happy Christmas from Microsoft UK and me (ok, so it says Seasons Greetings, but I think we all can take it to be something about having a nice break if you choose to celebrate it)

    The card itself can be found at the site http://www.seasonal-greetings.com/ , but since this is a nice little Silverlight card I thought I would try my hand at embedding it too, so below is an embedded version of the card. If this gives you problems, let me know. If you feel inclined you can click the NSPCC link and think about how to support them (I do, but so could you) [updated to change Silverlight embedded card to a link since this is now post Christmas] ttfn David Technorati Tags: Seasons Greatings , Happy Christmas , NSPCC , Microsoft

  • Happy Christmas - see the Santa Cam to see where he has been

    I Love Santa Claus!! I was thrilled to hear Jonathan Ross announce that he had entered British air space. You can see all the Santa cam videos at http://youtube.com/view_play_list?p=26B9B2ACB4AAC849 . One that caught my eye was his visit to the International Space Station: ttfn and a Merry Christmas David Technorati Tags: Christmas , Santa Cam , Santa Claus

  • Happy Christmas / Seasons Greetings - The Overton house is once again lit up for all to see

    I am lucky enough to have understanding neighbours and a family that understands that while I work hard all year, come Christmas I take time off and this includes the house being decorated in Christmas lights. To see them this year, have a look at the photo album - http://uksbsguy.com/photos/doverton/tags/Christmas/default.aspx . I will be posting some comments to the blog, but outside of that, have a GREAT holiday no matter how you celebrate it. See you in 2008. David and Family Technorati Tags: Christmas , Holiday , Personal , Christmas lights
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  • Toshiba to Make Solid-State Drives in Push for Flash

    I saw this and had to share - I want flash drives for my laptops - fast, low power... me, me, me!! Toshiba to Make Solid-State Drives in Push for Flash The memory chip maker is seeking to create new sources of demand for flash memory chips. TOKYO (Reuters)—Japanese memory chip maker Toshiba Corp. said on Monday it would make flash-based solid state drives for notebook PCs, as it seeks to create new sources of demand for flash memory chips. The world's No. 2 maker of NAND-type flash memory said its solid state drives would range in capacity from 32 gigabytes to 128 gigabytes, and that it will mass produce the 1.8-inch and 2.5 inch drives in May 2008. Much more info at Toshiba to Make Solid-State Drives in Push for Flash ttfn David Technorati Tags: Storage
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(c)David Overton 2006-23