A couple of days ago, I received a mail from Microsoft Connect which confirmed me as a private tester for Microsoft SQL Server Data Services. While I am still exploring this new service, I just thought of guiding all those interested in this service in order to help you get started with SQL Server Data Services a.k.a SSDS but first up, what is SSDS?

At this years MIX, Microsoft unveiled SQL Server Data Services as a direct competitor to Amazon SimpleDB. SQL Server Data Services  is a web-facing utility-based service designed for businesses and developers that need scalable, highly available, secure and easily programmable on-demand data storage with robust database query capabilities. The platform is built upon existing Microsoft SQL Server relational database technologies. So basically it’s a cloud-based repository service that will offer APIs that enable storage in the cloud.

More on SSDS from Microsoft’s FAQ:

Will SSDS support everything in SQL Server?
SSDS will initially only expose a small subset of what is in SQL Server. Microsoft says it plans to extend the capabilities of SSDS over time with such features as binary large object columns, full text search, and richer data types.

How will developers and customers use SSDS?
It is designed to let developers rapidly run on-demand applications, while end users will be able to query and modify any amount data. SSDS will support REST and SOAP interfaces, which are designed to work with any Internet-development toolkit. XML is the primary interface.

What might SSDS be used for?
Data archival, reference data such as catalogs, business functions such as HR services (ie. healthcare records management), and Web facing applications including social networking and picture sharing.

So how do you get started? The SSDS program as of now is only open to a small group of private testers but the number of testers are increasing rapidly on daily basis as the service approaches a public beta soon.

To use SQL Server Data Services (SSDS), you first need to sign up for the service and acquire a user name and password. For this private beta release, you go to http://www.microsoft.com/sql/dataservices/default.mspx and register your request for the free beta. Invitations are sent via e-mail. Each invitee receives an invitation id. Once you have received your invitation, you go to https://beta.mssds.com/public/Default.aspx, provide your invitation id, and then obtain the necessary credentials to access the data service. After you obtain credentials, you can programmatically create and query flexible entities.

SSDS is a Web 2.0 friendly data service. It supports both SOAP and REST interfaces. As a result, developers can use almost any language or development environment that supports these interfaces. Queries are made using a LINQ syntax from C#. To develop applications with Visual Studio, you will need version 2005 or later. Visual Studio 2008 is the preferred development environment for use with SQL Server Data Services.

Several samples are provided in various languages including C#, Java and Ruby. The C# samples are authored in the Microsoft Visual Studio integrated development environment. One of the samples which I am using to learn program this service is this one posted in MSDN forums by Mike Amundsen. The demo has two parts: a SSDS Proxy server built in C# and a web client done in Ajax. I’ll highly recommend to try out this app to those interested!

I will follow up with my example using SOAP or REST interfaces to develop applications with SQL Server Data Services in C# here at my blog very soon. Might come up with a Webcast too if I get a good response. So do let me know that whether you guys prefer a step by step tutorial or a Webcast session? Last but not the least, dont forget to sign up to get your hands on this service as soon as possible!

Taimur Asad (Via Startup Meme)

Silverlight 2 Beta2 was released today.  You can download both Silverlight 2 Beta2 and the Visual Studio and Expression Blend tools support to target it here.

Beta2 adds a lot of new features (more details below), but is still a 4.6 MB download that takes less than 10 seconds to install on a machine.  It does not require the .NET Framework or any other software to be installed for it to work, and all features work cross-browser on both Mac and Windows machines.  These features will also be supported on Linux via the Moonlight 2 release.

Silverlight 2 Beta2 supports a go-live license that allows you to start using and deploying Silverlight 2 for commercial applications. There will be some API changes between Beta2 and the final release, so you should expect that applications you write with Beta2 will need to make some updates when the final release comes out.  But we think that these changes will be straight-forward and relatively easy, and that you can begin planning and starting commercial projects now.

You can build Silverlight Beta2 applications using the VS 2008 Tools for Silverlight and Expression Blend 2.5 June Preview downloads.  You can download both of them here.  The VS 2008 Tools for Silverlight download works with both VS 2008 and the recent VS 2008 SP1 beta release. 

UI and Control Improvements

Silverlight 2 Beta2 includes a bunch of work in the UI and Control space:

More Built-in Controls

In Beta 1 only a few controls were included with the core Silverlight setup.  Most common controls (including Button, ListBox, Slider, etc) were shipped within separate assemblies that you had to bundle with your applications (which increased the app download size).  Beta 2 now installs 30+ of the most common controls as part of the core Silverlight 2 download.  This means that you can now build Silverlight 2 applications that use core controls that are as small as 3kb in size - making Silverlight application downloads small and startup time fast.

In addition to the core controls included with the base Silverlight 2 setup, we are also this week shipping additional higher-level controls that are implemented in separate assemblies that you can then reference and include with your applications.  This includes controls like DataGrid (more details on its new Beta2 features below), Calendar (now with multi-day selection and blackout date support in Beta2), and a ...

Continue at ScottGu's Blog

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Microsoft is making available to testers a first beta release of Service Pack (SP) 1 for Visual Studio 2008 and the accompanying .Net Framework 3.5.

On May 12, Microsoft made available to any/all interested parties the first beta bits for both VS 2008 SP1 and .Net Framework 3.5 SP1. These can be downloaded from Microsoft’s Microsoft Developer Network site. Microsoft is warning testers that there are some compatibility issues involving the VS 2008/.Net Framework 3.5 SP1 betas and Expression Blend, the Silverlight 2 Beta 1 software development kit (SDK) and Silverlight Tools Beta 1 for VS 2008.

New to VS 2008 SP1, according to Microsoft, are “new features for targeting Windows, Office, and the Web. Developers building .NET-basedapplications will enjoy improved performance in the WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation) designer, new components for Visual Basic and Visual C++, as well as an MFC-based Office 2007 Ribbon. Web developers will see continued improvement in the client-side script tooling including JavaScript IntelliSense.”

And new to the .Net Framework 3.5 SP 1 are “more controls, a streamlined setup, improved start-up performance, and powerful new graphics features for client development and rich data scaffolding, improved AJAX support, and other improvements for Web development.”

The .Net Framework 3.5 SP1 and VS 2008 SP1 also both add support for the ADO.Net Entity Framework. The framework service pack also adds support for ADO.Net Data Services, and the VS 2008 one adds support for the still-in-beta SQL Server 2008 release.

Microsoft has been building an entity data model framework around its ADO.Net technology that is designed to raise the level of abraction for database programmers. Originally, the ADO.Net Entity Framework was slated to be part of Visual Studio 2008.

ADO.Net Services, the technology codenamed “Astoria,” is a RESTful interface for data. Astoria is designed to enable applications to expose data as a data service that can be consumed by Web clients within a corporate network and across the Internet. Microsoft released a first test build of Astoria in December 2007, with officials saying the final release should be ready around mid-2008.

Microsoft officials declined to provide a target date for delivery of the final SP1s for Visual Studio 2008 and .Net Framework 3.5.

Source: Mary Jo Foley

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Today, we are delivering the first Community Technical Preview (CTP) of XNA Game Studio 3.0, giving you the ability to build games for the entire family of Zune media devices.  This feature gives you access to the majority of the XNA framework APIs while retaining a seamless sense of integration with the Zune media experience.  In addition, this release now requires either Visual Studio 2008 Standard Edition and higher (C# language support must be installed), or Visual C# 2008 Express Edition.

Keeping with Zune media experience, the XNA Game Studio 3.0 integration includes discoverability/access to user’s non-DRM music –  allowing you to customize background soundtracks or create real-time visualizations.  In addition, we’ve announced the ability to have multiple nearby Zunes wirelessly engage in an ad-hoc social gaming experience. 

A preview release of XNA Game Studio 3.0 is now available through the XNA Creators Club Online site (http://creators.xna.com), with a final release scheduled for the holiday 2008 season.  For those of you that prefer the shortest path to happiness, the direct link to the XNA Game Studio 3.0 CTP is here.

There’s three other important things we want you to know before you dig in:

• Either Visual Studio 2008 Standard Edition and higher (C# language support must be installed), or Visual C# 2008 Express Edition are required to install and run the XNA Game Studio 3.0 CTP.  Visual Studio 2005 SKUs are not supported with XNA Game Studio 3.0 and beyond.  However, you do not need to uninstall Visual Studio 2005 or XNA Game Studio 2.0, as those products will work side-by-side with Visual Studio 2008 and XNA Game Studio 3.0 CTP.
• This current CTP does not enable Xbox 360 game development.  Only Windows and Zune are supported in this CTP.  If you want to build and deploy games for the Xbox 360, you must continue using XNA Game Studio 2.0 for now.
• This CTP doesn't work in 64 bit yet.  We plan to support it before RTM.

We hope you have fun with this CTP, and we look forward to your feedback on this product!

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Microsoft Corp. today delivered on its commitment to rapid innovation for the newest Microsoft platforms and latest Web technologies by announcing the release of Expression Studio 2.

The suite of professional design tools includes Expression Web 2, Expression Blend 2, Expression Design 2, Expression Media 2 and Expression Encoder 2 and works seamlessly with Visual Studio 2005 and Visual Studio 2008, solving the age-old designer and developer workflow challenge. The innovations in Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML), used by both Expression Studio and Visual Studio, allow for unprecedented designer-developer collaboration for the creation of both standards-based and Microsoft Silverlight-enhanced Web experiences as well as Windows Vista and .NET Framework 3.5 client applications.

Geotagging with Virtual Earth: Take advantage of geotagged images with Virtual Earth integration.

View more high-res screen shots.

In line with the team’s commitment to short release cycles, Expression Studio 2 is coming to market one year after the last release with major updates to each product. The products together contain more than 100 new features and introduce new Microsoft Silverlight functionality for creating stunning cross-browser, cross-platform Web experiences. Key features include the following:

• Expression Web 2 adds support for PHP and Adobe Photoshop import based on customer feedback.

• Expression Blend 2, in addition to Silverlight support, adds vertex animation and an improved user interface with a new split design/XAML view.

• Expression Design 2 adds improved exporting functionality including the ability to export slices.

• Expression Media 2 is a robust digital asset management solution for photographers and other creative professionals. It adds support for the latest file formats including RAW, provides geotagging functionality, and is supported by Microsoft Office 2007 and Microsoft Office for Mac 2008.

• Expression Encoder 2 is now a core offering of the suite. It allows creative and Web professionals to optimize almost any type of video content quickly for publishing on the Web, either in streaming video, rich-media advertising or other Web 2.0 projects.

This groundbreaking release brings creative professionals fully into the application development process, accelerating time to market, minimizing resource use and improving return on investment for new projects. A full overview of features is available at http://www.microsoft.com/expression/features.

“The release of Expression Studio 2 flies in formation with the latest platform releases such as Silverlight and Windows Presentation Foundation and is a very exciting milestone for the industry,” said Eric Zocher, general manager for Expression Studio at Microsoft. “Great user experience is at the heart and soul of our Expression family of tools and is fundamental to enabling developers and designers to collaborate on building and delivering dynamic, connected applications that help customers achieve results.”

Millions of customers and partners such as Conchango PLC, 2ndFACTORY Co. Ltd, Design To Business (d2B), Infusion Development, and Pink and Yellow Media are beginning to experience the newfound power of Expression Studio and delivering rich, connected client and Web applications based on Windows Presentation Foundation, Microsoft Silverlight and Microsoft ASP.NET AJAX.

“The release of Expression Studio 2 signifies some major advancements in the way that designers and developers work together, which is enabling us to realize much more of our vision, and to do it more efficiently,” said Paul Dawson, head of experience at Conchango. “In addition, the increased connectedness between Visual Studio 2008 and Expression Studio is really beneficial. XAML is now where we live out that collaboration, which is giving us efficiencies in the design and development process of somewhere in the region of 20 percent to 30 percent, meaning our customers get much better branded user experiences, more reliable and robust code, in a shorter time frame and for a better cost.”

Pricing and Availability

Microsoft also unveiled final product pricing and availability for the complete Expression 2 product family. Interested customers can purchase the entire studio from leading retailers such as Amazon.com and Best Buy starting in mid-May for $699 estimated retail price (ERP) (U.S.). In addition, all of the tools except Expression Design 2 are available as stand-alone products: Expression Blend 2 is available for $499 ERP (U.S.), Expression Web 2 is available for $299 ERP (U.S.), Expression Media 2 for $199 ERP (U.S), and Expression Encoder 2 for $199 ERP (U.S.). Microsoft also offers several upgrade options for existing Expression users and companion upgrades to Expression Web and Expression Media from a range of software titles by other vendors, including Adobe Systems Inc. All Expression products for English-speaking markets will include a getting-started video training courtesy of Total Training Inc. Comprehensive video training will be available for purchase separately at http://www.totaltraining.com/expression2.

As announced at MIX08, Microsoft also is introducing the Microsoft Expression Professional Subscription in June 2008, which includes the full suite along with a number of other Microsoft programs* such as Visual Studio, Windows Vista and Microsoft Office to help users get started at an exceptional value of $999 ERP (U.S). More information about the subscription is available at http://www.microsoft.com/expression/subscription.

Full product pricing and availability information is available at http://www.microsoft.com/expression.

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Don't look now, but Microsoft is finally working to tune up its Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN) site. The effort promises to resolve long-running frustrations developers have encountered working with the online library and resource.

Redmond Developer News has learned that Microsoft has assembled a task force to determine how it can improve MSDN, a site that aggregates much of Microsoft's technical content for developers. The task force, which spent much of this week in New York interviewing developers, made a stop last night at the monthly meeting of the NYC .NET Developer's Group held in Microsoft's New York offices. The task force revealed its effort to a group of more than 100 people attending the meeting.

"There's great content there. It's very thorough, but from a practical standpoint, it doesn't really meet people's needs," said Brian Hsi, a product manager involved in the effort, who made his pitch at the meeting. "It's kind of static. It's really a library at the end of the day."

Hsi underscored that Microsoft was only at the information-gathering stage and offered no timetable for when changes will be implemented and how extensive the MSDN revamp may be. But he did say that his team intends to interview developers throughout the United States to determine what they like and dislike about the site.

One thing Hsi did indicate is that MSDN will evolve from the more "static" resource that it now is to a more community-focused effort.

"Historically, we've been pretty much a content-driven site," Hsi said. "We're really talking about moving toward broader involvement from community members. It's not so much that there's people that offer content, it's [that] everyone's in it together."

Search and Complain
Indeed, Hsi was rather blunt in his critique of MSDN. "It's often tough to find out if something is accurate or relevant," he told the group. "People just want answers."

The biggest criticism of MSDN is the difficulty of finding content spread across the various Microsoft services, including CodePlex, CodeGallery, Channel 9 and the various forums, libraries and blogs. It's a situation that motivated several developers at the meeting to express frustration with the challenge of finding information on MSDN.

"It is kind of ironic that the internal search never finds anything so I have to go to Google to find things," said James Curran, a senior programmer for barnesandnoble.com, in an interview following the meeting. "I am really looking forward to an improvement because there's a lot of good information that's tough to find."

But even those using Google and other search engines can't find terms that use, say, the "#" sign or a URL.

Another attendee lamented that when Microsoft launched MSDN in 1994, the site promised that if a developer didn't receive an answer to a question posted on a newsgroup or forum within three days, Microsoft would guarantee an answer. "We can't get that anymore," the attendee said.

Hsi acknowledged that search has been a key bugaboo with MSDN, saying the company has conducted some pilots using its own Live Search interface to MSDN by having editors tie together content from CodePlex and other sites within MSDN.

"There's definitely improvements along the way," Hsi said. "I know it's not perfect, I am not here to tell you that it is, but we're making some progress."

The moves come about a year after Microsoft introduced improvements to navigation on MSDN's TechNet. Among the key improvements was the implementation of tabbed, contextual navigation. By clicking on a tab, a user is directed to a site focused on a specific technology or product, a process that was designed to minimize the amount of clicking and result in fewer redundant links.

MSDN also has more consistent navigation, such as "download" tabs in the same location, according to MSDN.

Via: ENTNEWS

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Microsoft has been working like gangbusters to create the perception that its cross-platform multimedia runtime Silverlight is a viable alternative to Adobe's Flash, and the vendor will soon put updated tools in the hands of Silverlight developers.

In a Thursday blog post, Microsoft developer Ashish Thapliyal said Microsoft is "targeting late Summer" for its release of Silverlight 2.0, which is currently in its first beta release.

Silverlight 2.0 supports VC-1, WMV, MP3 and WMA content, but Microsoft has no plans to support the Flash video (.flv), used by Youtube and many other Websites, said Thapliyal. Microsoft's rationale here is to avoid paying licensing fees and to keep the Silverlight download file size as small as possible, he added.

"Silverlight isn't designed with an extensible codec model in mind, so there is no date/version announced for this," wrote Thapliyal.

A second Silverlight 2.0 beta is due in May, and this version will be very similar to the final release, according to Thapliyal. He said no details are available about the roadmap for Silverlight for mobile, or Silverlight v.Next, also known as Silverlight 3.

Silverlight 1.0, which Microsoft launched last September, was designed to facilitate rich media scenarios in a browser, and supported a JavaScript/AJAX programming model. Silverlight 2.0 will focus on enabling development of Rich Internet Applications and will go up against Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR), a multimedia runtime that lets application designers blend online and client-side functionality.

Scott Stanfield, CEO of Vertigo Software, Richmond, Calif., whose firm designed the corporate Website for the Hard Rock Cafe using Silverlight 2 Beta 1, says the project proceeded smoothly and without downtime.

"Beta 1 is solid, so we're hoping that Microsoft adds some more cool features in the coming months before releasing 2.0," Stanfield said.

According to Thapliyal, Silverlight is currently being downloaded 1.5 million times per day, and more than 60 organizations have joined Microsoft's Silverlight Partner Initiative since Silverlight 1.0 was launched last September. Thapliyal also took a swipe at Adobe's oft-repeated claims that Flash is installed on 90 percent of the world's Internet-connected PCs, noting that percentage based claims are "hard to verify".

Microsoft last August quietly launched an experimental visual search service called Tafiti.com, which highlights the graphical capabilities of Silverlight in the context of Live Search and makes searching the Web a more visual experience.

Source: Channel Web

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Silverlight is about 7 month old kid but it is already making such a big buzz. One of my colleague Rahul did excellent job in terms of putting up a FAQ regarding the roadmap

1. When exactly will Silverlight support all the codecs that a standard Windows Media Player support? How about supporting .flv since most of the video on internet currently is using this format?

Silverlight isn’t designed with an extensible codec model in mind, so there is no date/version announced for this.

Silverlight supports playing VC-1, WMV, MP3 and WMA content.  It doesn't support arbitrary codecs since those get complicated from a licensing perspective (Microsoft needs to pay the owners of those formats royalties), and they also dramatically increase the size of the download (which we want to keep small to enable really easy deployment).

Currently the alternative to this is Expression Media Encoder. It will have support for taking different formats like flv and converting them into Silverlight supported formats.

2. Which streaming server protocols does Silverlight support currently and which will be supported in near future?

MMS now and future.
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc189080(VS.95).aspx#anchor_mediaformats_streaming

3.  Why the support for displaying a .gif image is is missing? When it will be added?
We don’t want to take the hit for another codec. It may only be a little bit of download time—but our mandate is small and fast and every little bit counts. We are also hesitant to support .gif because it implies support for animated .gif, which we decided would have to be integrated into our animation scheme somehow—and that will be a lot of work.

Looking from Flash perspective, Flash does not support .gif either. However, as of present, this is something being evaluated, but no date has been announced

4. Is the size of Silverlight 2 Beta plug-in expected to increase by the time of final release? Which namespaces Microsoft is planning to add in final release.

It may increase a little, but the size is not known at this time. Beta 2 will contain the full set of namespaces. To see the list of namespaces in Beta2 you will have to wait.

5. What would be the full and final set of controls that are expected to be included with Silverlight 2 - final release?

The controls in Beta 2 will be the full set in the final release. You will be able to see that once Beta 2 comes out.

6. When is Silverlight 2 - final version expected to be released?
We are targeting late Summer

Here is a rough timeline:
Silverlight 2.0 Beta 1 (Q1CY08 with limited (non commercial) Go-Live)
Silverlight 2.0 Beta 2 (Q2CY08 with Go-Live)
Silverlight 2.0 RTM (Summer 2008) – Exact timing TBD

Silverlight v.next – We are working on a v.Next plan and have nothing to announce at this time

Silverlight for mobile – No date available

7. Is there going to be a big difference in terms of features/component model etc. in Silverlight 2 beta and final release (just like it is the case with 1.1 Alpha and 2.0 Beta)?
There will be breaking changes between Beta 1 and Beta2 of Silverlight 2 but the changes will not be drastic between Beta2 and Final Release. You can expect almost similar feature set as with Beta2 which is expected to come out in the Month of May 2008.
Also, if you develop your websites using 1.0 it will be compatible when 2.0 comes out. Then you simply have to update your skill set capabilities.
Silverlight 1.0 is shipping separately so we can provide key customers the stability and support they need to begin delivering fast, cost-effective delivery of high-quality media experiences to all major browsers running on Mac OS or Windows and soon Linux. There is only one Silverlight so all the capabilities of 1.0 will be unified in the 2.0 release.

8. Will Silverlight 2 final release offer some local Caching API (with automatic expiration, notifications etc.) just like System.Web.Cache API in ASP.Net 2.0/3.5?
It’s already in the Beta and called ‘Isolated Storage’

Isolated storage can solve some of the requirements of caching APIs (but without the notification), the browser cache can handle others (again, without notification).

9. In order to call a WCF Service from Silverlight 2 Beta, you have to use “basicHttpBinding” currently. Will Silverlight support additional bindings in near future like MSMQBinding and others?

We have not planned for this feature as of yet. So I would personally say ‘probably not’. However this is an interesting feedback 

10. Does Microsoft have any authentic estimates of Silverlight usage by the end users? Adobe claims 90% coverage of Flash, We know Silverlight is new but would like to know the current coverage, estimated coverage in next 1 year and Microsoft’s plans to increase its coverage, to move forward with our development efforts with even more confidence J

We’ve announced that we’re at about 1.5 million downloads per day at the moment. The problem with putting out some % values like Adobe do is that it is hard to be accurate and hard to verify.

Since the launch of Silverlight 1.0, the number of partners participating in the Microsoft Silverlight Partner Initiative has already grown to more than 60 organizations, and new customers have delivered Silverlight applications. Most recently UVNTV.com and NBA.com have committed to going live on Silverlight. We are very excited about success of Silverlight 1.0, download numbers continue to be in line with expectations to date.

You can get an idea about the future of Silverlight with the amount of efforts that are being put on this technology. Have a look at the partner initiatives that would attract hardware/software developers, solution providers etc.
http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight/partners/default.aspx

I would recommend you to visit the news and announcements section frequently to remain updated about technology.
http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight/news/default.aspx
http://silverlight.net/Community

Source: MSDN Blogs

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

LAS VEGAS--While Internet Explorer 8 demos, Silverlight progress and a Monkey Boy reprise from Steve Ballmer captured much of the attention at Mix 08--it was a database announcement that could be the sleeper announcement of the show.

What Microsoft announced was a database-in-the-cloud service where Web developers can store their data. Those attending the Mix show here were able to sign up for a beta test that is set to begin in three or four weeks, with a final version aimed to be launched by the end of the year, according to Dave Campbell, a technical fellow in Microsoft's SQL Server division.

"We're taking SQL Server we're pulling pieces of it apart and we're putting it back together," Campbell said in an interview. One of the challenges is taking software designed to run highly reliable servers and storage and turning it into a commodity service.

But, Campbell said, that's also where the opportunity lies. "In this world, dumb and fast rules."

"If you give up a tiny bit in terms of the degree of consistency in the architecture, you can get tremendous resiliency and scale, but you want to retain enterprise-class quality around data service," he explained. Factoring data into classes of data or tiers is one way to improve the class of service using commodity gear, he said.

What Microsoft is doing in this case with its database is also the kind of thing it makes sense to imagine the company doing with a variety of "building block" services.

"SQL Data Services is a building block for Microsoft's longer term vision of a services fabric for developing and deploying applications," Campbell said. "Imagine at some point a version of Visual Studio with a services palette in the toolbox and wiring up and composing services."

Illuminata analyst Gordon Haff said that it's important for Microsoft to be a player in this area.

"A lot of computing and storage is going to be moving online," he said. "For them not to get into this game would be suicidal at some level."

Campbell downplayed the notion that Microsoft was competing with Amazon.com's S3 service.

Haff said that there are some differences, since Amazon targets largely unstructured data and Microsoft is aimed more at structured and semi-structured data, but said it's not like the two don't overlap.

"They are targeting a somewhat different market, but everyone competes at some level," he said.

Campbell wouldn't get into how Microsoft would price the service, but said it some type of usage model that takes into account both the amount of data stored in the cloud as well as the bandwidth used in transferring information.

Source: C|NET NEWS

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Whether creating standards-based Web user interfaces by using Microsoft ASP.NET, building cross-platform rich interactive applications with Silverlight, or creating ultimate Windows Vista experiences with Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), Expression tools enable designers to fully apply their creativity while collaborating with developers using Microsoft Visual Studio. Expression Studio includes the following products:

• Expression Web for building standards-based Web sites.
• Expression Design for professional illustration and graphic design.
• Expression Blend for creating engaging Web-connected experiences for Microsoft Windows. This special preview version is compatible with creating content for Silverlight 1.0 Release Candidate and Silverlight 1.1 Alpha.
• Expression Blend 2.5 March 2008 Preview
  Build content that targets Silverlight 2 Beta 1 with the Expression Blend 2.5 March 2008 Preview.
• Expression Media for assets management as well as media encoding. This version also includes the Expression Encoder tool for transcoding video content.

Download Expression Studio 2 Beta 

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Last September we shipped Silverlight 1.0 for Mac and Windows, and announced our plans to deliver Silverlight on Linux.  Silverlight 1.0 focused on enabling rich media scenarios in a browser, and supports a JavaScript/AJAX programming model.

We are shortly going to release the first public beta of Silverlight 2, which will be a major update of Silverlight that focuses on enabling Rich Internet Application (RIA) development.  This is the first of several blog posts I'll be doing over the weeks and months ahead that talk in more depth about it.

Cross Platform / Cross Browser .NET Development

Silverlight 2 includes a cross-platform, cross-browser version of the .NET Framework, and enables a rich .NET development platform that runs in the browser.  Developers can write Silverlight applications using any .NET language (including VB, C#, JavaScript, IronPython and IronRuby).  We will ship Visual Studio 2008 and Expression Studio tool support that enables great developer / designer workflow and integration when building Silverlight applications.

This upcoming Beta1 release of Silverlight 2 provides a rich set of features for RIA application development.  These include:

• WPF UI Framework: Silverlight 2 includes a rich WPF-based UI framework that makes building rich Web applications much easier.  In includes a powerful graphics and animation engine, as well as rich support for higher-level UI capabilities like controls, layout management, data-binding, styles, and template skinning.  The WPF UI Framework in Silverlight is a compatible subset of the WPF UI Framework features in the full .NET Framework, and enables developers to re-use skills, controls, code and content to build both rich cross browser web applications, as well as rich desktop Windows applications.

• Rich Controls: Silverlight 2 includes a rich set of built-in controls that developers and designers can use to quickly build applications.  This upcoming Beta1 release includes core form controls (TextBox, CheckBox, RadioButton, etc), built-in layout management panels (StackPanel, Grid, Panel, etc), common functionality controls (Slider, ScrollViewer, Calendar, DatePicker, etc), and data manipulation controls (DataGrid, ListBox, etc).  The built-in controls support a rich control templating model, which enables developers and designers to collaborate together to build highly polished solutions.

• Rich Networking Support: Silverlight 2 includes rich networking support.  It includes out of the box support for calling REST, WS*/SOAP, POX, RSS, and standard HTTP services.  It supports cross domain network access (enabling Silverlight clients to directly access resources and data from resources on the web).  Beta1 also includes built-in sockets networking support.

• Rich Base Class Library: Silverlight 2 includes a rich .NET base class library of functionality (collections, IO, generics, threading, globalization, XML, local storage, etc).  It includes rich APIs that enable HTML DOM/JavaScript integration with .NET code.  It also includes LINQ and LINQ to XML library support (enabling easy transformation and querying of data), as well as local data caching and storage support.  The .NET APIs in Silverlight are a compatible subset of the full .NET Framework.

Silverlight 2 does not require the .NET Framework to be installed on a computer in order to run.  The Silverlight setup download includes everything necessary to enable all the above features (and more we'll be talking about shortly) on a vanilla Mac OSX or Windows machine. 

The Beta1 release of Silverlight 2 is 4.3MB in size, and takes 4-10 seconds to install on a machine that doesn't already have it.  Once Silverlight 2 is installed you can browse the Web and automatically run rich Silverlight applications within your browser of choice (IE, FireFox, Safari, etc).

Silverlight 2 Tutorials: Building A Simple Digg Client

To help people come up to speed with Silverlight 2, I wrote a Silverlight application and put together a series of step by step tutorials that drill into and explain the different programming concepts behind it (controls, layout management, networking, data-binding, styles, user controls, templates, etc). I also added a tutorial post that demonstrates how to migrate the application outside of the browser and make it a desktop application using WPF and the full .NET Framework. 

Below are the pointers to the 8 tutorials I've put together:

• Part 1: Creating "Hello World" with Silverlight 2 and VS 2008
• Part 2: Using Layout Management
• Part 3: Using Networking to Retrieve Data and Populate a DataGrid
• Part 4: Using Style Elements to Better Encapsulate Look and Feel
• Part 5: Using the ListBox and DataBinding to Display List Data
• Part 6: Using User Controls to Implement Master/Details Scenarios
• Part 7: Using Templates to Customize Control Look and Feel
• Part 8: Creating a Digg Desktop Version of our Application using WPF

The application I've built the tutorials around is a simple search front end to the popular Digg.com site, and allows users to type in search topics and browse Digg stories that match them.

All of the UI in the application is built using Silverlight's WPF framework.  The application uses the Silverlight networking stack and cross-domain access support to query the Digg REST API directly, and uses LINQ and LINQ to XML to query/transform the returned data into DiggStory objects that I databind the UI against:

The application supports a master/details data interaction model that allows users to select stories from the search list and quickly drill into more details about them.  A user can jump to the Digg article directly from the details form, or close it and pick another story to drill into:

The entire application is implemented in about 35 lines of C# code and 75 lines of XAML page/user-control markup.  It only uses controls and libraries built-into Silverlight.

If you have used WPF before the UI concepts I discuss in the tutorial series will all be very familiar.  If you haven't used WPF before, the tutorials should provide a good overview of the fundamental programming concepts in it, and hopefully provide you with the basic knowledge necessary to start building Silverlight 2 applications with VS 2008 when Beta1 comes out.

I'll post details on my blog once Beta1 is available for download.  I'll also upload the final Digg application to my site (along with the code + project file to open and edit it in VS 2008) once Beta1 has shipped.

Source: ScottGu's Blog

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates today will unveil a software giveaway that will ultimately provide millions of college and high school students around the world with access to the latest Microsoft developer and designer tools at no charge to unlock their creative potential and set them on the path to academic and career success.

View a Webcast of Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates talking to students at Stanford University about DreamSpark, Feb. 19, 2008.

The Microsoft DreamSpark student program (http://channel8.msdn.com) makes available, at no charge, a broad range of development and design software for download. The program is now available to more than 35 million college students in Belgium, China, Finland, France, Germany, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the U.K. and the U.S. Broad global coverage, as well as an expansion of the program to high school students around the world, potentially reaching up to 1 billion students worldwide, will continue throughout the next year. Gates will share details with students and faculty at Stanford University as part of a U.S. and Canada college tour that kicks off today.

“We want to do everything we can to equip a new generation of technology leaders with the knowledge and tools they need to harness the magic of software to improve lives, solve problems and catalyze economic growth,” Gates said. “Microsoft DreamSpark provides professional-level tools that we hope will inspire students to explore the power of software and encourage them to forge the next wave of software-driven breakthroughs.”

Priming the Talent Pipeline

Microsoft DreamSpark is available to all students whose studies touch on technology, design, math, science and engineering. Students of today are more technical in their everyday lives than ever — representing both their personal interests and what is expected of them when they arrive in the workplace for the first time. The following cutting-edge software will be available to empower students to unlock their ingenuity by building critical skills:

1. Microsoft developer tools. Visual Studio is the Swiss Army knife of computer programming. These professional-grade products provide a security-enhanced and reliable environment, enabling students to program everything from a cell phone to a robot or to create their own Web page. Students will also be able to invent compelling new gaming content and make their dream game a reality by porting their creations to their Xbox 360 console.

2. Visual Studio 2005 Professional Edition

3. Visual Studio 2008 Professional Edition

4. XNA Game Studio 2.0

5. 12-month free Academic membership in the XNA Creators Club

6. Microsoft designer tools. This ultra-versatile suite of tools will enable students to vividly bring their creative visions to life in vibrant new Web site designs and more effective digital content, including animation, imagery and photography.

7. Expression Studio, including

•Expression Web

•Expression Blend

•Expression Design

•Expression Media

8. Microsoft platform resources. The foundation for development and design platforms, these products deliver a security-enhanced, reliable and manageable environment for students to more quickly turn ideas into reality.

9. SQL Server 2005 Developer Edition

10. Windows Server, Standard Edition

“The opportunity, as a student, to use the same professional tools that I can expect to use after I graduate gives me a real head start in my career,” said Nathan Murith, a computer science student at the University of Geneva in Switzerland, who tested the service in a pilot before today’s launch. “I’m already getting more out of my studies, applying my learning to try out new ideas, and gaining new insights into careers in software design and development.”

Demand for Software Expertise in All Marketplaces and Economies

Technological innovation is a critical economic growth engine and is expected to generate 7.1 million new jobs in the global economy over the next four years, according to a study of the economic impact of IT across 82 countries and regions carried out in 2007 by IDC and commissioned by Microsoft. The same study found that the IT employment base will grow to 42.5 million people, with the sharpest growth occurring in developing nations.

“Technology is the ignition key for job growth, economic development and creating sustainable solutions to global problems,” said John Gantz, chief research officer at IDC. “The emerging economies are forecast to drive over 25 percent of the new IT jobs over the next four years. These jobs will be driven by an evolving, highly skilled labor force. Tech skills are key to employability.”

Availability

In the next six months, the company expects to expand Microsoft DreamSpark to college students in Australia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Japan, Lithuania, Latvia, Slovakia and many more countries in the Americas, Asia and Europe, as well as to high school students by the third quarter of 2008. Students should check http://channel8.msdn.com for regularly posted updates to see when Microsoft DreamSpark will be available to them.

Microsoft is working with academic institutions, governments and student organizations around the world, such as the International Student Identity Card (ISIC) Association, to ensure the necessary local student identity-verification technology infrastructure exists to bring Microsoft DreamSpark to all students in markets around the world. The program will be expanded as fast as this community-based effort with government and organizations can be connected at a local level in new countries.

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT”) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

Note to editors: If you are interested in viewing additional information on Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft Web page at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass on Microsoft’s corporate information pages. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but may since have changed. For additional assistance, journalists and analysts may contact Microsoft’s Rapid Response Team or other appropriate contacts listed at http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/contactpr.mspx.

An updated version of Popfly has been released with feature addition as: 

• Data sources, a.k.a. yellow blocks.  For everyone who has ever wanted to bring their own data into the mashup creator, we present the data source editor: comma separated values are converted into yellow data source blocks for use in the mashup designer.

• Improved search interface.  Search for projects and users through the search bar located at the top of most pages. We’ve improved searching in Popfly Explorer as well.

• Build a better block.  For the block creators out there, you now have the ability to upload images or any other supporting files to your block.

• Comments on profile pages.  Reach out to other community members through profile page messages.

• Better ways to invite friends.  We’ve improved the intelligence of the contact list import feature – find your friends who already have Popfly accounts, and invite others to play around with Popfly.

• New blocks. MovingSlideshow (smooth panning and zooming transitions) and RSSList (would look great in a blog sidebar).

• Help Wiki.  Find more tutorials and getting started information at a new location: www.popflywiki.com. Help being relocated to the wiki – for now the team will be updating the wiki, but we’re looking into opening this up to the entire community.

• Silverlight support in Popfly Explorer. You can now add Silverlight to your Popfly Web Site.

Source: Popfly Team Site

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Interested in improving your IT Service Management?  Optimize your IT Processes with Hana (MOF v4)

Hana guidance provides a structured approach for IT process optimization.  Hana integrates MSF and MOF, plus extends the guidance to include planning and governance. Hana enables you align IT with your business goals, deliver IT as a service, and leverage compliance activities to optimize your people’s effectiveness.  

HANA Life Cycle Model

  Guides Available in this Release

This beta includes the following documents:

· Hana Beta Reviewers Guide 3

· Business/IT Alignment SMF

· Change and Configuration SMF

· Customer Service SMF

· Financial Management SMF

· Problem Management SMF

· MOF Overview

· Mapping Spreadsheet (earlier versions of MOF to version 4.0)

· Design and Deliver Phase Overview

· Operate and Support Phase Overview

· Plan and Optimize Phase Overview

· Manage and Adapt Integration Layer Overview

· Build SMF

· Deploy SMF

· Envision SMF

· Governance, Risk, and Compliance SMF

· Operations Management SMF

· Policy Management SMF

· Project Plan SMF

· Reliability Management SMF

· Service Monitoring and Control SMF

· Stabilize SMF

  Where to Find the Beta Program

Our goal for this beta is to receive feedback from a broad group of IT experts regarding Hana’s content structure and high-level concepts across the entire set of SMFs.  Your feedback will be addressed in our March and April beta releases, but we’ll need your input soon to make Hana the best it can be.

Before you start reading the content, please take a look at the Reviewer’s Guide, which lists some of the specific feedback we’re seeking. We’ve intentionally presented content in different ways in certain SMFs, and how you respond to these differences will guide our final choices. The Hana beta is available on the Connect website via invitation only.

To join the Beta, please visit our Connect site.

Please send your comments and feedback to MOFPM@microsoft.com

Source: D' Technology Weblog

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Microsoft has launched Microsoft Student Experience beta, a site for the Students. It has various links to sections like Academics, Careers, Socialize. It provides links to various discounted software and offers. Hope such offers are offered to Students Worldwide.
And lots of cool 'How -to' and I hope lot more will be kept added to the list. And also a download section with lots of good ones. Check out!

Source: meraTechPort

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

The new SQL Server 2008 Learning Portal contains the latest trainings including eBooks and e-Learnings, Instructor-lead Trainings and Certification Exams on SQL Server 2008. Go to this site to be ready for SQL Server 2008 today!

Go to the Microsoft Learning Portal for SQL Server 2008

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

The source code for www.tafiti.com is available!

What is Tafiti? It is a search visualization website which brings a new user experience to researching (searching and storing results). It was originally created by Microsoft to demonstrate Silverlight and the Windows Live Search APIs.

Today the Windows Live Platform team announced the release of the Tafiti Search Visualization source code to CodePlex which means any developer can download, modify, and resell the code (see MS-PL License for all the details).

Tafiti has been released as a Windows Live Quick Application via CodePlex, which is a set of demos developers can download and use as reference implementations or starter kits for the Windows Live Platform.

You can see Tafiti running at http://tafiti.mslivelabs.com (or see the original with the Halo3 skin) and to understand how to use it read the walkthrough or watch the video (4.5 minutes).

For more information see the announcement on dev.live.com or on Angus Logan's blog.

Source: MSDN Blogs

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Microsoft Corp. today marked the next step in its initiative to democratize game development and unleash the creativity of the community with the release of the XNA Game Studio 2.0, the next generation of the popular game development platform for Xbox 360 and Windows. The new version builds upon XNA Game Studio Express, released one year ago, and includes the ability to create online, cross-platform multiplayer games for Xbox 360 and Windows using Xbox LIVE and Games for Windows — LIVE, respectively. XNA Game Studio 2.0 adds more than 15 new features and is available for download from http://creators.xna.com.

“When building XNA Game Studio 2.0, we wanted to offer everyone the opportunity to utilize the rich gaming environment of LIVE used by AAA developers for titles such as ‘Halo 3’ and ‘Gears of War,’” said Chris Satchell, general manager of the XNA organization at Microsoft. “We accomplished our goal with this new toolset, and, best of all, it remains highly accessible to students, hobbyists and pros alike.”

Many of LIVE’s best features are supported by XNA Game Studio 2.0 with minimal to no coding necessary to activate them — features such as matchmaking, which uses LIVE to find the best games for gamers to play based on their location and Internet connection. In addition, XNA Game Studio 2.0 fully supports game development with all versions of the Microsoft Visual Studio product line.

XNA Creators Club Academic Trial Memberships Now Free to Qualified Students and Faculty

Since its release last December, XNA Game Studio has been an incredible success, with 750,000 downloads, adoption by more than 300 universities worldwide and at least nine textbooks on the tools in development. In subjects from computer science to fine arts, introductory courses to graduate and research projects, XNA Game Studio is helping faculty members and students explore the boundaries of applied gaming technology in education. Along with XNA Game Studio 2.0, Microsoft will also provide a free academic trial membership in the XNA Creators Club beginning in January, allowing faculty members and students to use XNA Game Studio 2.0 and Xbox 360 for instructional purposes.

Time to Dream-Build-Play Again

From more than 4,500 entrants from around the world, four community games were awarded Xbox LIVE Arcade publishing contracts in this year’s Dream-Build-Play game development competition. Microsoft will once again challenge aspiring game developers to create their dream games for a chance to win more coveted publishing contracts. This week Microsoft kicks off registration for Dream-Build-Play 2008 with the Silicon Minds Warm-Up Challenge. Registration begins on Dec. 14 and winners will be announced at the Game Developers Conference, where details of the main challenge will be announced. Run in partnership with Microsoft Research’s Machine Learning Group in Cambridge, England; Rare Ltd.; and Lionhead Studios, prizes for the Warm-Up Challenge will include the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to interview for an internship with one of those organizations.

“Artificial intelligence is so important to the games we make at Lionhead Studios, and we are very excited to see what the community can come up with in this Warm-Up Challenge to Dream-Build-Play 2008,” said Peter Molyneux, managing director at Lionhead Studios. “We are always on the lookout for the best talent and believe that XNA Game Studio 2.0 will be a great platform for contestants to showcase their skills on.” More information about Dream-Build-Play 2008 is available at http://www.dreambuildplay.com.

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

Microsoft's .Net software development platform is more popular than Java in the enterprise, according to one industry analyst firm's report detailed on Wednesday

Info-Tech Research Group said its research found .Net the choice over Java among enterprises of all sizes and industries. Entitled, "It's Official: .Net Roasts Java's Beans," the study explored the relative prevalence of Java and .Net across different types of enterprises and found .Net has gained considerable market share and become the favorite of many enterprises.

In conducting its study, Info-Tech said it recently surveyed more than 1,850 organizations of different sizes. Info-Tech's research is not sponsored, a company representative said.

Almost half of all enterprises responding to the survey focus primarily on .Net with an additional 12 percent focused exclusively on .Net, the research found. This compares with just 20 percent of enterprises focusing primarily on Java and only 3 percent standardizing solely on it, Info-Tech said.

Java is not out of the game yet, the company said. But in offering hope for Java devotees, Info-Tech likens Java to legacy code. The company said .Net may emerge as a means of stitching together diverse applications but the immense amount of Java code will remain in the tradition of other legacy systems such as Cobol. Java also has "incredibly strong allies" in Sun Microsystems, IBM and Oracle, Info-Tech said.

Sun, which developed Java, declined to comment on the Info-Tech report. Sun recently decided to change its identification on the Nasdaq stock exchange from SUNW to JAVA, in recognition of its bread-and-butter brand.

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)

What, now Symbian phones can run Windows Mobile software?
In reality Net60 in fact makes it possible to run .NET Compact Framework applications on Symbian phones but compatibility is very low - only .NET Compact Framework 1.0 while nowadays all Windows Mobile phones already have .NET Compact Framework 2.0 in ROM pre-installed and recently released Visual Studio 2008 offers already .NET Compact Framework 3.5 !
The release is not public but the software vendor is handpicking those who can get it or not:
Red Five Labs announces a beta release version of Net60 - the .NET Compact Framework for S60.
Beta testers please need to complete our sign up process and wait for the account to be approved by our team. We expect to have to provide support to a large user community and tightly coupling our website to our support ticketing system allows us to provide great support to users of our site. You will efficiently be able to submit queries to us, whether bug reports or sales related questions.
This beta version supports S60 3rd edition devices.
To learn more, click HERE.
It is worth mentioning that several Windows Mobile applications are not written in .NET (i.e. managed code) at all, but are native applications (i.e. binary machine code, without bytecodes and virtual machines), and will not be running on Symbian - never ever.

Source: msmobiles.com

Taimur Asad (The Microsoft "Wow" Blog!)