Update: Fixed the registration links. I actually owe a much longer post on recent readiness (nee training) options and events for developers, architects and IT Professionals, but available time prevents me from tacking the 15 or 16 items in my "to do for blog" folder. This one event, however, warrants a more immediate shout out for two reasons. First, it's a live event as opposed to an online resource, thus timeliness matters. Second, space is limited so you'll want to register soon. The event is the Build Your Skills: Best Practices for .NET Developers Events, hosted by Jeff Brand and several of our highly talented local speakers. Since Jeff has a full blown post with all the details, I will summarize the salient points here. And remember, space is limited (and selling out fast) so register soon! Agenda
St. Louis Event – Register
March 24, 2009, 9:00am to 4:30pm at the Microsoft offices in Creve Coeur.
3 City Place Drive, Suite 1100
Creve Coeur, MO 63141 Minneapolis Event – Register
March 31, 2009, 9:00am to 4:30pm at the Microsoft offices in Bloomington.
8300 Norman Center Drive, Suite 950
Bloomington, MN 55437
I've just logged into the internet at my hotel in Minneapolis. It's the first trip I've taken with Windows 7 as the OS for my main laptop, and I just discovered something very, very useful. And especially useful for the road warrior. When I plugged in the internet and Windows 7 fetched an IP address, an information tip appeared over the network icon in the Notification Area. The tip basically said that additional steps may be required to get on the internet and suggested I open my browser. Basically the OS realized that I needed to go through the hotel's portal to authenticate access. How incredibly helpful is that? Technorati Tags: Windows 7
Capping off my mini-series on Windows 7 things I like, I was alerted to 50 seriously useful Windows 7 tips By Mike Williams over at TechRadar.com. It's a really comprehensive list organized by new applets and features, interface tweaks, useful enhancements, and performance and productivity tips. It's a really great read, so be sure to check it out. Technorati Tags: Windows 7
As I was working on various tasks today (playing with VPC images, ISO files, and a few others), I stumbled across a couple of additional features of Windows 7 that I wanted to share. These are just some quick hits, presented in no particular order. | | Right-click an ISO file and there's an option to Burn disc image; sweet! Now I have the latest MSDN Library burning to DVD and I didn't have to scramble for a ISO burning utility. | | | You can mount a VHD (virtual hard drive) in the disk management utility and treat it like a disk; handy for developers and IT Pros! | | | I will admit I find UAC to be pretty annoying in Windows Vista. For example, move a shortcut in the All Users Start Menu and you get asked not once but twice to confirm the action. I prefer to keep UAC on at all times, despite the frustration; it's come to my rescue, after all – even reputable sites will occasionally try to install bits through IE and UAC makes it quite clear what they are doing. The new, improved UAC has a slider to control the level of interaction, from off to protect-me-from-everything. I keep UAC at the default level and it is surprisingly quiet compared to Vista. It pretty much only prompts me when I really only want it to protect me. Great improvement! | | | The Sidebar – you know, the container docked on the side of the screen with the stock ticker and weather gadgets – is a really nice addition to Windows Vista. We have a couple of really handy internal gadgets that I always install, so I am a fan of this feature. Being a bit OCD about my environment, I never really liked the fact I was forced to have them all together. Moreover, I didn't like the fact that, if I had more gadgets than my screen could display, the extras spilled to a second "page" of the Sidebar. Problem solved in Windows 7! Gadgets "float" wherever you want them. I can have several placed where I need them on my desktop, and see them whenever I use the next quick hit… | | | There's a little button down in the lower right corner of the taskbar. If you click the little button, all the windows minimize. But if you hover over the little button, and you have Aero, each window goes transparent and you see the desktop – and those handy gadgets you have floating where you left them. | | | Tim Sneath's Bumper List covers the details much better than I can, but the quick summary is that you can drag windows to the top, bottom or sides of the screen and they dock there. It's great for quickly viewing folder contents or documents side-by-side. Drag them back away from the screen edge and the window restores to its former shape. Nice! | | | I am not fortunate enough to have multi-touch enabled hardware, but I got to play with a couple of computers that support single- and multi-touch and it pretty engaging, supporting touch-based clicking and dragging, multi-finger window sizing, and flicking gestures. I now know what I want to purchase for my next hardware refresh. | Technorati Tags: Windows 7
I've had a few full business days, and part of this past weekend, to work with Windows 7 some more. Along the way I've expanded my workloads some – adding applications, playing audio (I dig the new Windows Media Player), and the like – and really got into my core workloads of PowerPoint, Excel and Outlook in more depth. Hey, I'm a manager, what did you expect? (That was for you, Joe.) With more hands-on time, I've rather quickly gotten to my next set of top features. Thus I present for your reading pleasure, my next 5 top features. Number 6 – Jump Lists, Part Deux
I know, I know. I covered Jump Lists in my last post. But I focused on the MRU (most recently used files) feature of applications like Notepad and Excel. I hadn't yet installed an application that implemented its own Jump List. Since then I've played around with the latest Windows Live Essentials some more, specifically Windows Live Messenger. I was pleasantly surprised to find it implements a Jump List that showcases the possibilities of optimizing an application for Windows 7. The image to the right highlights what a developer can do when implementing a Jump Menu specific to their application. I'm intrigued about the possibilities. Rather than supporting a default MRU-style menu, like Excel or Internet Explorer, it provides quick access to Windows Live and Windows Live Messenger features. You can easily toggle your status, jump to Windows Live features like your profile or inbox, or send an instant message. I'm imaging the possibilities for some of my other favorite applications. Think of what a screen capture utility could hook to its Jump List. Or Visual Studio Team System… I really am stoked by Jump Lists. They remain my overall #2 (you can't possibly beat fast, fast, fast), but this new discovery cements Jump Lists as an unassailable #2. Number 7 – Search
I had a love-hate relationship with Windows Vista's integrated desktop search. Thanks to some tips and tricks from colleagues over the years I really developed a knack at running searches with quotes, plus signs, minus signs and the whole nine yards. And I came to rely on Windows Vista's search – though it frustrated me, usually by returning too many results in a big list of mixed content. So I became friends with the "show only" content filters, scoping my search to just documents or email. And 99 times out of 100 I found what I was looking for in the first five hits. I was even reasonably happy with the speed of the search results and eventually built searching the desktop into my habits (though I also still hold onto my old habits of folder and file organization, even for emails). Windows 7 has a great search, much improved. Initially I was nervous to find that my "show only" buttons were missing. I really didn't relish the idea of everything jumbled together in a big list. But Windows 7 continues to impress, and I'm coming around. Several very nice touches make it a genuinely pleasant searching experience. 
The search textbox is now more usable, with a nice drop-down that recalls previous searches as well as offers some additional filtering options. This example, searching for Jump Lists, shows the ability to filter by date modified and size. Date modified pops up a calendar control-style UI with a couple of quick filter options like "yesterday", "last week", or "a long time ago". Size similarly offers some quick filter options, like 0 KB, 1 – 10 KB, and other sizes. Nice, quick touches to help further filter my results. Speaking of results, you get some new display modes; the image below is content view, though you also get the traditional icon views (multiple sizes), details (my usual favorite, quickly being replaced by the new content view), and the usual others. But what I really like is the highlighting in the results list. Another very nice touch. There's also a preview mode that in my very unscientific efforts seems noticeably faster to use and more friendly. 
And did I mention search results seem to populate faster, too? Number 8 – Libraries
Initially I recoiled against Libraries. They look like folders, but they feel and taste different. And that difference made me uncomfortable. I guess I'm too old and like my insane folder organization approach too much. But I'm coming around to them. I'm realizing they are sort of like "super search" structures. By default you get four Libraries: Documents, Music, Pictures, and Videos. These libraries include, by default, the public and user-specific folders for documents, music, pictures, and videos. Makes sense, right? But they become more interesting when you create a custom library for, say, PowerPoint decks, that includes all the folders with slides in them – spanning multiple physical directories across physical drives, presenting the collection of folders as a single "Presentations" library. Now I get some much-needed sanity for my insane folder organization approach. Give Libraries a try, a really sincere try, before you go back to the folders you're comfortable with. You may just like the layer of organization they add to the mish-mash of hard drives and attached storage devices you have orbiting your computer. Number 9 – Network Connection and Management
This almost made my first top 5 (and initially was at the top of my second top 5), but it continually got beat out by other features. I finally forced myself to include it here. The entire networking experience is streamlined. When you click the network icon in the Notification Area a new new window pops up; it's basically the same as the Vista "Connect to a Network" window but it's more accessible. If a wireless connection is broadcasting in the area, you see it in the list and all you need to do is click it. Connecting to my corporate wireless network a breeze – in just two clicks (click the network icon, click the network name) I had added the corporate wireless connection to my list. Even though my home SSID isn't broadcasting, manually adding my home network was more intuitive. Easier networking is definitely worth liking. Number 10 – The Menu Bar
I know, it's almost a silly feature to tout as a top 10 feature. But it's the little things that reduce clicks and increase productivity that make me happy. The menu bar is more context aware, with a Preview button changing options based on the file type selected. In my running Jump List search example from #7, I have a JPEG selected (the Windows Live Messenger Jump List image from #6). The Preview button knows it's a JPEG and offers you quicker access to the five installed programs that understand the format, and also offers the ability to choose the default program for it. The other buttons (Save Search, Burn, View, etc.) are all carried forward from Windows Vista, with the Preview Pane button surfaced onto the menu itself (much better than being hidden on a menu cascading off the Organize menu). I toggle preview on and off a lot, leaving it off most of the time. 
Other folder types offer similar nice features surfaces to the menu bar. In Libraries and folders, you get the option to "Share With", a drop down that quickly allows you to create (or remove) a network share for the folder or Library in question. In regular folders, you can quickly access "Include in library" to add that folder to an existing Library or to create a new Library containing that folder. Plus you still get the nice context aware button to open or act on files, create new folders when nothing is selected, and so forth. Explorer is more usable now… and so is Windows. That's it… for now!
I'm five days into using Windows 7, and I find myself pretty excited (and I wasn't even one of the people standing in line for Windows 95 back in the day). Sure, I've run into – and filed – a few bugs, but overall Windows 7 is pretty polished for a beta. It's fast, hasn't really cratered to speak of, and pretty stable. And the little touches are really adding up to be something nice. I may take another run at more top features post in the coming days as I uncover more nice things that make me happy about my OS. Technorati Tags: Windows 7
Bolstered by the strong recommendations and positive experiences that my colleagues had shared with me I finally decided to dive into Windows 7 Beta. In the spirit of full transparency I should be clear I've only been running the beta on my production box for three days, but… Wow! This has truly been a _great_ experience! Now, being a manager, I will admit it took me over a week to get the environment full set up – though that had very little to do with Windows 7 and a lot do to with the amount of time I had available to get everything installed and configured. In fact, that leads to my first top 5. Number 1 – Fast, Fast, Fast
I am completely serious, this OS is all sorts _fast_. And it started with the install. After blasting the drive partitions with the nice GUI-based FDISK-like utility and rebooting to a "fresh" machine (yeah, I'm OCD like that), the installer laid down the initial OS in what couldn’t have been more than 10 or so minutes. While I have a decent little laptop here, it's no power machine. It's one of those little (PRODUCT) RED™ Dell XPS M1330 small footprint laptops (that I hosed with the heavy 9-cell battery, but I get 5 hours, so I suffer through it). It's got a decent ESATA drive running at 7200RPM, solid data transfer rate, a decent bus, and a nice 8x +R/W slot-drive, and a T7500 Intel Core Duo clocking at 2.2GHz. So, decent but not blindingly fast. And the install really completed in just about 10 minutes, give or take. And that's not the only speedy thing about Windows 7. Quite literally _everything_ is fast. Boot up time? Maybe 20 seconds. Launching and shutting down Outlook 2007? Noticeably, visibly faster. Internet Explorer 8? Much, much faster (though that's probably a combination of the improvements in IE8 over IE7 plus the Windows 7 enhancements). Launching Visual Studio 2008? Yup, quicker. Shut down? My favorite; when I'm ready to go home or grab a beer with the gang, I just do not want to wait – and Windows 7 hits a home run. Don't believe me? See Denny Boynton's post on his first 24 hours with Windows 7. Where I just have a gut feel this thing is faster (and it's only a beta; performance tuning is still around the corner), Denny actually times the differences between Vista and Windows 7. Not to speak heresy here, but I think my Windows 7 install on a "manager's laptop" outperforms the big machine running Windows XP at home. Number 2 – Jump Lists
I was there in LA and I saw the demo at PDC. I thought, "That's interesting." But I didn't really quite get them at the time. Now I've played with them and I have to say, killer feature. Jump Lists are basically MRUs (most recently used menus, like the last files opened in Word) integrated into the new taskbar. A picture of the Windows Live Writer Jump List is to the right. The Jump List is easily accessed by right-clicking the program icon on the taskbar. You see a couple of options. At the bottom of the menu is the option to close the current app. Above that is to pin the program to the taskbar, which adds the application icon permanently to the taskbar – sort of like the Quick Launch toolbar in Windows XP and Windows Vista, but with more powerful capabilities. Next up is the ability to launch a new instance of Live Writer. Finally you see the Live Writer file MRU. This is a list of the recent files you've saved (you see this post in draft). What I love about this is that I can actually manage my MRU. I can pin the files to always appear on the list, I can view the properties of the file, and I can remove the file from the list (I wish the Office MRU had that feature). Jump Lists also appear in Start Menu as a fly-out menu, exposing the file MRU and offering the same access to file properties and the ability to pin or remove the file from the list. Just click the arrow and the Jump List flies out over the right side of the Start Menu. Love this feature! 
Number 3 – Taskbar
Initially I rebelled against the taskbar. Not because the taskbar wasn't functional, useful, and powerful, but because my beloved Quick Launch Toolbar is gone (more on _that_ below). But I've come to not only respect but love the taskbar. 
These are the icons you right-click to get at the application's Jump List. You can see multiple running instances of the application with the little outlines to the right of the icon. Windows 7 give you information about the application through the icons – for example, if you're downloading a large file a green gradient progress bar-style "fill" progresses across the IE icon on the taskbar giving you a constant update on long-running tasks without you needing to swap to the window with the progress bar on it. And in a vast usability improvement over XP/Vista, if you hover over or click the icon of a running application, you get a much improved preview of each of the windows of the running application. And in the case of IE8 (and possibly other applications), you see a preview of each _tab_ in the browser: 
You can instantly close a window associated with that application with the close button. And as an added little bonus (and there are loads of them; again, see below), if you hover over one of the open windows, the OS hides everything on the desktop except the running instance that you're looking at. This feature has definitely had a positive impact on my productivity… and I don't even miss the Quick Launch Toolbar as much anymore (again, see below for a pleasant side story on the Quick Launch Toolbar). Number 4 – Location Aware Printing
This may be one of the smaller features, but it's made it to my top 5. Location aware printing simply means that the default printer changes depending on the network. When I am at home my default printer is my HP Color LaserJet 2840. When I am at work, it is the big dog HP LaserJet M9050 printing/copying/scanning/faxing behemoth. This is a really great little productivity feature; no more Ctrl+P to bring up the print dialog – just click print and the document spools to the right printer every time. w00t! Number 5 – Spiffed Up Apps
I'm a sucker for eye candy. I like the enhancements to Paint and WordPad. Both now have Office 2007-style ribbons that make features more discoverable.  |  | | Paint | WordPad | I honestly didn't realize Paint had those capabilities, and I am both surprised and impressed that WordPad supports a variety of file formats now, not just RTF or text. You can now open and save Word 2007-compatible Office Open XML files as well as the OpenDocument specification that IBM and Sun have proposed. 
More Goodies
I am sure there will be a number of "Top 5s" that I come up with as I dig into Window 7 more deeply. Despite "going over to the dark side" (management), as my friend Joe Healy often accuses (I still love ya, Joe), I still fancy myself a Windows power user. I am really looking forward digging into the internals of Windows 7 and learning all the nooks and crannies. And if you would like to learn about some of those nooks and crannies from an expert on the subject, Tim Sneath posted a stellar article, The Bumper List of Windows 7 Secrets, listing his 30 favorite hidden Windows 7 features and capabilities. It's a great article with wonderful nuggets of goodness (such as how to restore the missing-by-default Quick Launch Toolbar). Read it, get hold of a copy of Windows 7 Beta, and try it out for yourself. Technorati Tags: Windows 7
Warning: Another Ginsu moment… If you’re interested in attending MIX09, but haven’t made up your mind, perhaps a $400 discount on registration might help sway your boss to fork over the cash. Here’s the skinny on the details… Register before February 13th, use RSVP code MIX09offer, and you can save $400 off the registration cost of $1,395. So you can attend MIX09 for $995. And, as some would suggest, the best part is this is in Las Vegas (what happens in Vegas) at the Venetian (a great venue) from March 18-20 (a great time of the year to visit Nevada).
The holidays were great. I took some much needed time off to recharge the batteries and spend time with my family. Returning from the holidays I jumped right back into the thick of work with mid-year review preparation and business reporting as well as four outstanding events that saw me on the road each week in January.  Where’ve I Been?
The first week of the new year took me to Sandusky, OH by way of Cleveland, OH to attend CodeMash, a conference organized and run by several community leaders across Ohio aimed at bringing together developers, designers and technologists from a wide array of technology disciplines, from .NET to Java to Ruby and more. It was held at the Kalahari Resort in Sandusky, a resort and indoor water park, and the conference featured great activities for families and children, a really interesting addition to the traditional (and non-traditional) conference format. Following CodeMash, the team and I hosted four more MSDN Developer Conference events, in Chicago, Minneapolis, Detroit, and Dallas. I was able to attend Chicago on January 13th, Detroit on January 22nd, and Dallas on January 26th. Each event was very successful, despite some rough weather in Chicago and Minneapolis (they had –14F… before wind chill). It was great fun being able to participate in the events, meet with people, and see the team and our outstanding group of community-based presenters run several great events. All this made for one busy January, which also included mid-year business reviews, budget reviews, and planning for our (still in the works) ArcReady and MSDN Unleashed events. And knowing we’re a bit behind the planning eight ball (due to a couple of extenuating reasons), we’re getting a jump on next quarter’s event plans as well. We should be announcing our plans for this quarter in the next week or so, with those events happening in March, and next quarter’s plans (looking at early May) getting locked in a couple of weeks later. And, as a surprise added bonus, we’re working with our colleagues who cover the TechNet events engine to begin incorporating them into our quarterly event plans as well. Finally, we’re taking a good long look at how we run our quarterly events and considering some rather significant fine-tuning for our next fiscal year. If they come together well, you could see our new approach by late August or early September. (Yup, I’m really tired of being behind the eight ball, so I’m cooking up plans quite far out.) Yeah, That’s Nice, but What About this Readiness Stuff?
Okay, I went on a bit about what’s kept me away from the nine of you who follow my blog. What about that developer readiness I mentioned, eh? Well, first those fine folks in Evangelism at the mother ship have continued to publish their 10-4 schedule. They are up to Episode 6 now, and it’s some really great stuff covering Visual Studio 2010 and Team System. Warning: Ginsu alert… But Wait, There’s More!
It’s late and I’m in a silly mood. But in this case, the analogy applies. The great folks who run the Ramp Up site have posted a whole new track of content on SharePoint, complementing their earlier track of SharePoint for Developers content. The first part covered the basics of web parts, data lists, event handlers, workflow and leveraging Silverlight. The new track of SharePoint for Developers adds content covering for page navigation, page branding, web services, custom content types, and user management. Between these two tracks of Ramp Up training content, developers will definitely get a feel for developing solutions based on SharePoint.  In Closing… MVP Summit 2009
On a side note, I will be attending the MVP Summit, along with a couple of other folks from our team. If you are an MVP, drop me a note at brimoore at microsoft dot com and perhaps we can meet up at the welcome reception, Palermo’s party, or some other time during the Summit.
This will be my first Summit, and I am really looking forward to it. (Can you believe it? I’ve been at Microsoft over 8 years and this is my first Summit.) If you’re an MVP, I hope to see you there!
My colleagues in Redmond, Brian Keller and his crew, have launched a new video podcast called 10-4. This is a weekly video/screencast featuring what's new in Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework v4.0. If you're interested in what we've got in store for you when VS2010 ships, or if you're just plain curious about what we're cooking up, this new video podcast is for you. Episode 1: Downloading and Using the Visual Studio 2010 September CTP
For this first episode of 10-4, we’ll look at how to download and use the Virtual PC image of the Visual Studio 2010 September CTP. We’ll give you tips on how to download this massive (7GB+ compressed) VPC, show you how to get past some pesky expiration issues, and get you started with the CTP walkthroughs. Lastly we’ll cover where to get assistance and provide your feedback about this release.
In future episodes we’ll dive more deeply into the technical underpinnings of Visual Studio 2010 and the .NET Framework 4.0, but for this first episode we wanted to make sure everybody could get the CTP and follow along at home. Visual Studio 2010
If you'd like to learn more about Visual Studio 2010, check out our MSDN Developer Conference events (they're coming to a city near you in January), the PDC videos on Channel 9, and the Visual Studio 2010 developer center on MSDN (note: like updated) as well as the Visual Studio 2010 product feedback center.
Are you curious about Windows 7? Would you like to get your hands on the beta? On physical media? Without having to download a 1+GB image? 
MSDN Developer Conference Attendees to Receive Windows 7 Beta DVD
Register to attend the MSDN Developer Conference, and you will receive the Windows 7 Beta on DVD. Attendees at early events, especially those happening in December and possibly in early January, will have DVDs shipped to them after the event. Attendees at later events will get the DVD at the event. Agenda
There is a great set of topics planned for the MSDN Developer Conference events, plus a load of prizes. So check out the conference site and join us! Technorati Tags: MDC, Windows 7
|