The Internet Explorer 8 team has announced that a release candidate (RC) will be available to the public in the first quarter of calendar year 2009.
The announcements were made on the IEBlog posting, IE8: What's After Beta 2. Dean Hachamovitch writes, "We have combed through instrumentation of over 20 million IE sessions and hundreds of hours of usability lab sessions. ... We will be very selective about what changes we make between the next update and final release."
You can download beta 2 (if you haven’t already) and let us know about your experience.
The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has published the Office Open XML (OOXML). OOXML is a file format for representing spreadsheets, charts, presentations and word processing documents. An Office Open XML document file contains mainly XML based files compressed within a zip package. The announcement was made on the ISO news release, Publication of ISO/IEC 29500:2008, Information technology - Document description and processing languages - Office Open XML file formats.
The documentation for Office Open XML (OOXML) runs 7,228 pages and can be ordered on CD from the ISO for 342 Swiss francs ($285). The specification is named ISO/IEC DIS 29500:2008.
The specification was approved as an international standard this past April.
Microsoft uses a version of OOXML in its 2007 Office System. Future software products would adhere to the ISO-approved OOXML specification.
You can learn more about how your software can support the Open Office XML standard at OpenXML Developer. You'll find the lastest community technology preview that supports the Office Open XML standard at Open XML Format SDK 2.0.
Check out Doug Mahugh's blog for the latest in interoperability of Office System.
Here's some great info on Microsoft’s patents and patent applications in the area of Cloud Computing.
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/result.html?p=1&edit_alert=&srch=xprtsrch&query_txt=AN%2Fmicrosoft+AND+cloud+AND+search&uspat=on&usapp=on&date_range=last20&stemming=on&sort=chron&search=Search.
It is not necessary to read an entire patent to understand the main concepts. Instead, you can read the ABSTRACTS, which appear at the top of each document.
These patents provide insights into Microsoft’s thinking about Cloud Computing.
You can also check out direct information on Microsoft’s Cloud initiatives at http://www.azure.com, http://office.live.com, http://www.microsoft.com/online and http://www.mesh.com.
Thanks for checking out this post!
Microsoft Robotics Developer Studio 2008 (RDS) was released this week at the RoboDevelopment Conference. It is a Windows-based environment for hobbyist, academic and commercial developers to create robotics applications for a variety of hardware platforms. RDS includes a lightweight REST-style, service-oriented runtime, a set of visual authoring and simulation tools, as well as tutorials and sample code to help get started.
Non-programmers can create robot applications using a visual programming environment. You can simulate your robot in three dimensional physics-based environments.
RDS includes a .NET-based REST-style, services-oriented runtime consisting of two components: Concurrency and Coordination Runtime (CCR) and Decentralized Software Services (DSS).
With RDS, robotics applications can be developed using a selection of programming languages, including those in Microsoft Visual Studio® and Microsoft Visual Studio Express® (C# and VB.NET), as well as scripting languages such as Microsoft Iron Python®. Third-party languages that support the RDS services-based architecture are also supported.
This is the third major release of Microsoft RDS and builds upon its previous versions, which have received support throughout the robotics community, including students, researchers and commercial developers.
Microsoft said the latest release of Microsoft RDS also offers improved licensing options by replacing its noncommercial and commercial licenses with three editions: a Standard Edition for professional developers, an Academic Edition for students and educational researchers, and an Express Edition for hobbyists and casual users. Each license of the new Standard and Academic editions permits the user to distribute an unlimited number of copies of the CCR and DSS run-times
For more information see Microsoft Robotics. For developer documentation, see Microsoft Robotics Developer Studio on MSDN.
RoboChamps competition
Microsoft recently announced the launch of the RoboChamps Urban Challenge, sponsored by KIA Motors. Similar to the real-world DARPA Urban Challenge, participants will be tasked with programming a robotic car to navigate to a series of checkpoints in an urban environment. The vehicles must obey traffic lights, avoid other cars and stay on the road. The cars must drive autonomously using only the available sensors, i.e. no human intervention is allowed. The first prize is a real car - a KIA Soul! Second prize is $10,000 and third prize is $5,000.
For more information about the RoboChamps Urban Challenge, see RoboChamps.
Description
Are you excited about the WPF but concerned about the learning curve? Have you seen Silverlight but don’t know where to get started? Or are you curious about how tools like Visual Studio and Expression Blend help designers and developers work together to deliver great user experiences? If so, join us at XamlFest!
XamlFest is a two day interactive event where you’ll learn about the platforms the tools and processes used to deliver differentiated user experiences. It’s a chance for you to mingle with UX minded Microsoft folks as well as industry leading design integrators. It’s also an opportunity to pick up a free copy of Visual Studio 2008 and Expression Studio 2 for you attendance.
Each XamlFest day will start with interactive sessions by Microsoft and our design partners, followed by a free lunch and a chance to network, have some fun and win prizes. Each afternoon will be geared toward assisted development with instructor-led walkthroughs, or, better yet, come with your own project in mind and we’ll help kick start your very own proof of concept!
Please note that each attendee will need a laptop to take part in the assisted development sessions.
Agenda
|
Date |
Time |
Topic |
|
Wednesday, December 17th |
9:00 AM - 10:30 AM |
Introduction to WPF, Xaml, Expression Blend |
|
|
10:30 AM – 10:45 AM |
Break |
|
|
10:45 AM – 12:00 PM |
Building Visually Rich Applications: The role of the Integrator in building designable applications |
|
|
12:00 PM – 1:00 PM |
Lunch, Mingle, Prizes |
|
|
1:00 PM – 3:00 PM |
Instructor-led WPF walkthrough and assisted development |
|
|
3:00 PM – 5:00 PM |
Assisted development |
|
Thursday, December 18th |
9:00 AM - 10:30 AM |
Introduction to Silverlight, Data Binding, LINQ |
|
|
10:30 AM – 10:45 AM |
Break |
|
|
10:45 AM – 12:00 PM |
Platform Centric Design Best Practices:
Creating WPF and Silverlight XAML for Web and Local Client Solutions |
|
|
12:00 PM – 1:00 PM |
Lunch, Mingle, Prizes |
|
|
1:00 PM – 3:00 PM |
Instructor-led Silverlight walkthrough and assisted development |
|
|
3:00 PM – 5:00 PM |
Assisted development |
Frequently Asked Questions
Q. What if I don’t have Visual Studio?
A. No problem, every attendee leaves with Visual Studio 2008 Pro!
Q. What if I don’t have Expression Blend?
A. Again, no problem! Everyone leaves with Expression Studio 2.
Q. What if I don’t have an idea for a starter project?
A. We’d like you to leave with something personal, but if nothing comes to mind that’s OK too. It’s the main reason we’re planning a few guided sessions where you can fallow along with us. These sessions should take no more than two hours, so if something sparks your interest you’ll still have time left for assisted development.
Q. What if I don’t have a laptop?
A. You can still participate in the training in the mornings and lunch, but assisted development in the afternoon is a harder problem to solve. We have no problem with people pairing up, so you might want to check with friends or co-workers to see if they’re interested.
Q. Can I just come for the training and skip assisted development?
A. XamlFest is about empowering designers and developers to deliver great user experiences and we believe a key component is hands-on assisted development. If you are unable to participate in the afternoon sessions please wait until the day before the event to register. This will give others the opportunity to sign up first, and if there’s still space available you’re welcome to join us.
XamlFest -- Come as you are, leave Xamlized.
Dates
Wednesday & Thursday December 17th and 18th
Attendees
We’re only allowing 50 attendees to this event. First come, first served.
Venue
Microsoft Technology Center: Silicon Valley
1065 La Avenida—Building One
Mountain View, CA 94043
(650) 693-1001
Registration
We’re asking that each company send no more than 3 people to this event so that we accommodate as many as possible. We’re allowing only 50 attendees to ensure we deliver a good experience during the assisted development sessions.
To register, please send an e-mail with the names and e-mail addresses of your attendees to xamlfest-siliconvalley@live.com.
Developers are discovering the new capabilities of Internet Explorer's 8 developer tools. The new tools let you to review the internal representation of a Web page from the browser's perspective.
You can use the Developer Tools to:
- Viewing individual attributes
- Determining why a particular CSS rule is applied to an individual element
- Previewing different document compatibility modes
- Debug and profile your JavaScript
Developer Tools are available from a menu item inside Internet Explorer.
Javascript Debugging and Profiling. The broswer it now supports console.log, just-in-time debugging, and has better usability through changes like an improved file chooser. You can use the built-in JScript profiler to find your profiling hot spots. For more information, see Script Debugging and Script Profiling.
CSS Live Editing. With live editing of cascading style sheets, you can click a property name, value, or selector, and then type in a new value.
Modes Testing. ou can test your web pages in different modes. When the Developer Tools are open for the first time, they detect a Web page's mode settings and treat them as the default modes of that page. You can then test the Web page using the Browser Mode and the Document Mode menus.
Outline Your HTML. The Outline submenu of the Developer Tools menu highlights sets of objects on a Web page. This helps you understand where elements appear on the Web page, as well as the types of elements used to create specific effects.
Save Your HTML. You can save your HTML into a text file directly from Internet Explorer, eliminating the possible changes in pasting your results into a text file.
Learn more about Developer Tools in Internet Explorer 8 at Discovering the Internet Explorer 8 Developer Tools.
Windows HPC Server 2008 broke into the Top 10 among supercomputer list of the Top 500 super computers as judged by Top500.org
Windows HPC Server 2008, a 64-bit system that shipped Nov. 1, came in at No. 10, achieving 180.6 teraflops with 77.5% efficiency at the Shanghai Supercomputer Center and Dawning Information Industry Co.
Windows HPC Server 2008 makes supercomputing more accessible to end users by allowing you to harness computing power through a familiar Windows desktop environment. It also reduces the complexity of Top500 runs and increases efficiency. The Top500 Excellence Kit includes a Top500 guide containing best practices and internal knowledge from Microsoft developers on how to achieve the highest-efficiency LINPACK runs. As a part of the kit, you can get several management and performance tools used in its 180.6-teraflop run, a High-Performance LINPACK (HPL) Wizard that automatically tunes HPL for your cluster environment. Get the code at Windows HPC Community Resources.
Parallelizing code is not easy given that programming languages, frameworks, developer tools, and even the majority of developers have grown up in a largely serial age. So the software development industry is taking strides to make parallelism more accessible to developers, and Microsoft is leading that charge. With Visual Studio 2010, Microsoft is delivering the first wave of powerful developer tools such as Task Parallel Library, Parallel LINQ and Coordination Data Structures for managed code to ease the transition to parallel code. These technologies, along with MPI, MPI.Net and Cluster-SOA, extend parallelism to clusters of thousands of nodes using Windows HPC Server 2008. More information on taking parallelism mainstream is available at Parallel Computing Development Center on MSDN.
ISVs are discovering the compute and cost advantage of Windows HPC Server. For more information, see Demos and Videos or try out the Trial Version.
You may have read the blog I posted earlier this week, Discounts Offered in Visual Studio 2008 Price Promotions, that explains serveral programs that offer ISVs discounts on tools.
If a you're looking for a reseller, we would recommend the following:
- If you have five PCs or more, you should consider one of Microsoft’s Volume Licensing Programs because significant discounts are available. A licensing wizard is available on this site to help you choose the right program for their business.
- If you are not purchasing in Volume Licensing you can buy from any of our resellers.
Here are some of our primary resellers and the volume licensing programs they offer:
Amazon
Retail only (no Volume Licensing Programs)
Softchoice
1-800-268-7638
Retail and the following Volume Licensing Programs: Open, Select, Enterprise Agreement, Gov-Ed
PC Connection
1-800-800-0014
Retail and the following Volume Licensing Programs: Open, Select, Enterprise Agreement, Gov-Ed
Softmart
888.SOFTMART
Retail and the following Volume Licensing Programs: Open, Select, Enterprise Agreement, Gov-Ed
SoftwareONE
800-444-9890
Retail and the following Volume Licensing Programs: Open, Select, Enterprise Agreement, Gov-Ed
Programmers Paradise
1-800-445-7899
Retail and the following Volume Licensing Programs: Open
There Visual Studio Promotions are for:
- First time purchasers
- Current customers without MSDN subscriptions
- Current customers with MSDN subscriptions
- Current customers with Software Assurance
- Visual Studio Team System customers
For more information, see Visual Studio Promotions.
If are a Microsoft Partner with the ISV Competency, see Deep Visual Studio Team System Discounts for Partners with ISV Competency.
The Windows Essential Server Solutions products, specifically designed for for small and midsize businesses shipped this week. The servers included Essential Business Server (EBS) 2008, Microsoft's first-ever bundle for midsized businesses and Windows Small Business Server (SBS) 2008.
The two bundles help serve the needs of businesses that have up to 300 PCs.
Windows Essential Servers combine Windows Server 2008, Exchange 2007, Windows SharePoint Services, Microsoft Forefront, Windows Live OneCare, and more. Some versions include SQL Server 2008. You can compare version at Editions Overview. You can try out Windows Essential Servers at Try It.
Special Offer to Streamline your development process.
ISV partner contributions are a critical factor in the overall success of Microsoft in the marketplace and we want to help you get the most from your application development process. Between October 1, 2008 and December 31, 2008, ISV competency partners may purchase Visual Studio Team System 2008 Team Suite with MSDN Premium subscription at a 66% discount off retail price! Give your team members the tools they need to drive software quality, project visibility, and team collaboration. Learn more about this limited time offer now.
SharePoint interest is growing with leaps and bounds, but there are still many scenarios that make more sense to leave in rich client applications. The question I've been asked a lot lately is how to bring these two worlds closer together.
Say, for example, you've got a web page that displays some basic information about a customer. How can you create a hyperlink that launches a smart client and takes you to that same customer inside the application? The solution is probably easier than you suspect, and in this post I'll walk you through the steps:
Launching a Smart Client from the Web - With Context!
Support for the empowering innovative user experiences in applications, such as Windows 7 multi-touch, ribbon controls, and taskbar extensibility features are being added to .NET Framework 4 accroding to S. Somasegar, Senior Vice President Developer Division in his blog posting .NET FX 4.
The Surface 2.0 SDK will also be built on Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) 4 and share a common multi-touch infrastructure and programming model.
The DataGrid control will significantly improve your experience when building data centric applications. Soma said, "We are also addressing some of the fundamentals with even better deployment, continuing improvements in performance and scalability, visual improvements such as text clarity and layout pixel snapping, and improved localization and interoperability."
Visual Studio 2010 is undergoing a transformation as well. Some of the editors are being written in WPF. Soma said, "This work has driven some improvements in WPF and the new WPF controls will strengthen your ability to re-skin your application with WPF while leaving the business logic intact."
N-tier development will get easier. "We are providing Visual Studio support for a single solution that spans both the web server and the client tiers with end-to-end solutions around sorting, paging, filtering of data on the client, as well as end-to-end solutions for data validation from declarative data on the database tier all the way through to the client UI."
With connected systems (Windows Communications Foundation (WCF) and Windows Workflow Foundation(WF)) you will express applications in a way that makes sense to the team and business.
- In WF includes a composable set of workflow styles, a unification of rules and activities as well as improved data binding, scoping, and expression support.
- WCF simplifies implementing complex communication patterns with content-based message correlation and support for long-running durable communications.
- Adding XAML support for declarative service authoring and improved support for REST service authoring.
- New flowchart designer that makes it easier to rehost the designers outside of Visual Studio.
In addition, new tools make it easier to build WPF applications.
For more information, see .NET FX 4.
We are pleased to announce Microsoft Dynamics CRM Incubation Week.
Microsoft Dynamics CRM Incubation Week is designed to offer following assistance to entrepreneurs.
- Learning and building next generation business solution on Microsoft Dynamics CRM Platform (a rapid application development platform to reduce the cost and Go-To-Market time) with help of on-site advisors (Microsoft Dynamics CRM experts).
- Getting entrepreneurs coaching from a panel of industry experts (academic and angel investors)
- Generating marketing buzz for their ideas
The 1st CRM Incubation Week is being held at Microsoft Technology Center, Reston, VA from Mon 12/15/2008 to Fri 12/19/2008. This event consists of ½ day of training, 3 ½ days of active prototype/development time, and a final day for packaging/finishing and reporting out to a panel of judges for various prizes.
For details on leveraging this opportunity click here.
Sanjay Jain
ISV Architect Evangelist
Microsoft Corporation
http://blogs.msdn.com/SanjayJain
A Live Search team has released a community preview of the next version of its interface for application programmers. The project named Project Silkoad, lets you build applications without restrictions around presentation. The beta version of V2 is now available.
Getting started is simple:
- Decide what search content you want to display on your site.
- Choose from JSON, SOAP, or XML output,
- Customize the output according to the needs of your own search application.
You can get started at the Live Search Developer Center. The site provides you with links to create the AppID, which is needed to access Live Search, documentation, the software developer kit (SDK), and forums.
Several changes were announced improving the Live Search SDK for developers. There are no limits to the amount of queries your sites can make. And you can rank the content how they want. Developers also can syndicate Microsoft's image search, news search, and phone-book search and have complete control within your site. And you don't have to run Microsoft Live Search ads on your sites,
That said, if you are in the United States, you can join the pilot program for putting ads on your site. For more information, see Monetize your search application.
At Tech-Ed EMEA 2008 we introduced new programs and tools modeled after the our internal Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) process that enables software developers to create more secure and privacy-enhanced applications.
Three elements were introduced to SDL:
- SDL Optimization Model. Free model for facilitating gradual, consistent and cost-effective implementation of the SDL
- SDL Pro Network. Network of professionals who can help guide and support software developers in implementing SDL in their environments
- Microsoft SDL Threat Modeling Tool. Guidance in drawing threat diagrams, guided analysis of threats and mitigations, integration with bug tracking systems and reporting capabilities
SDL is a methodology for developing and programming that Microsoft created in-house and refined over the lifecycle of several major product releases and over a multi-year period. It's a series of best practices for developers and designers to evaluate and consider security issues from the moment they design a product, instead of tacking on security as an afterthought, or not doing it at all.
The result has been to make Microsoft products more secure. Although the process is not perfect given its complexity, the number of critical bugs has dropped in half for major product releases.
For more information, see Software Development Lifecycle. For more information abou tthe neew programs, see SDL Programs.
