BufferOverrun: Brian Johnson

I also posted this to my work blog, but if you don’t read that you can check the link below.

Free Live Meeting on February 25. Check out the link for details and to register. Should be a good event.

CSD24CAL: Is Azure Right for my Business?

Microsoft Partners are cordially invited to attend an online Live Meeting briefing to hear new insights and points-of-views from well-known industry experts and leading edge partner companies on what the Windows Azure opportunity means for your organization. We will demonstrate how you will be able to change the face of your business and introduce new revenue streams for building solutions for our customers.

The Microsoft in the Cloud events are coming to cities in the US East Coast in February and March. Stops include Washington DC, Atlanta, New York, Charlotte, and Boston. Check out the link below for details.

Microsoft in the Cloud

...For Today, Tomorrow and Beyond.

Are you evaluating cloud technologies and wondering where Microsoft fits in? Did you know that Microsoft has over 15 years of experience delivering services like Hotmail and more recently Xbox Live through the cloud to millions of users? Do you want to know more about what Microsoft’s annual investment in the cloud – a significant portion of its $9.5B R&D budget means to you and your company?

Companies everywhere are looking to leverage cloud technology to:

• Drive greater efficiency in IT systems and cut costs out of IT infrastructure

• Increase the scalability and agility of IT infrastructure

• Reduce IT carbon footprints

• Help developers respond more quickly to business requirements

• Address lost productivity and user frustration with disconnected IT experiences

Join us to discover how Microsoft Cloud Computing enables organizations like yours:

• Have the Flexibility of choosing whether your applications will run locally, in the cloud, or a combination of the two based on your business needs

• Remain confident in the Security and availability of your data and services as you harness the efficiency, cost, and environmental benefits of the cloud

• Maintain Control while increasing end-user satisfaction and productivity via the enablement of seamless experiences across the PC, Web, and phone.

Looks like a great cause and a good opportunity to promote your web design house.  Check out the story and the links for details.

$50,000 PhizzPop Design Challenge: Agencies Called to Design New Web Site for Boys & Girls Clubs of America: Winning agency will also receive trip for two to 14th Annual Webby Awards in New York City; deadline for entries is Feb. 19, 2010.

NEW YORK — Jan. 11, 2010 — Microsoft Corp. and The Webby Awards today kicked off the Microsoft PhizzPop Boys & Girls Clubs of America Design Challenge, giving interactive design agencies of all sizes a chance to showcase their ingenuity and expertise to help Boys & Girls Clubs of America redesign its Web site for the new decade.

Microsoft and The Webby Awards selected Boys & Girls Clubs of America as the contest’s beneficiary because they believe a more powerful Web site combining the latest Microsoft tools and technologies with the latest design trends will help the 104-year-old organization better communicate its mission of helping all youth reach their full potential.

Three finalist teams will win travel and hotel accommodations to MIX10, Microsoft’s annual conference for Web designers and developers, in Las Vegas (March 15–17). At MIX, finalists will pitch their concepts live before a panel of judges from Microsoft, Boys & Girls Club of America and the International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences, which judges the Webby Awards.

I spent a really good winter vacation doing nothing. And by nothing, I mean nothing. I played games with the kids, went to some theme parks, and watched some movies, but for the most part I didn’t do any Twittering, Facebook posting, or anything in the social networking space. I did post pictures to my Flickr account, but that takes no effort and it’s stuff I want to look at in the future.

So now that I’m back this week, I’m thinking I want to get back into doing more blogging and social networking stuff.

To kick this off, I just want to list some of the stuff I’m going to blog about in the coming year.

• Startups in the East. It’s my job, but it’s also my passion. I love finding companies that are building cool products. I’m going to find as many of these this year as I can and try to let as many people as I can know about the work they’re doing.
• Web design firms in the East. That’s another work related topic, but I’m looking for WebsiteSpark companies that are building kick ass sites. If you know about some, let me know.
• Motorcycles. Yeah, I need to make myself ride sometimes, but it changes my perspective on life. Some day I want to rewrite Moby Dick as a biker book. I think this is the passage that hits me. Replace sea with “get on a bike”, and my perspective changes.

Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off- then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can.

• Photography. I just need to do more. I love to take pictures of animals and my kids. I’ll post those to Flickr.
• Gadgets. It’s been a while since I was an alpha gadget geek, but I may get back into it this year. We’ll see. I may go a little retro and just use software to resurrect some older tech for the fun of it. If I do that, I’ll write about it.
• Writing. I need to write some more. It’s time I put a new book together. 2010 sounds like a nice round year for that. As I plan it, I may blog it. We’ll see.

That’s the short list, but it’s what I want to do and I want to get it out there. I didn’t really list my family stuff, simply because that’s just a given and I don’t need a list to tell me what I need to do there.

When I don’t feel like posting anything, I just don’t post. We used to apologize for not posting, but I don’t think that’s really necessary, because, as my good friend Kent says, “Nobody cares.” :) 

Have a great 2010!

Brian

This is really something. I think it will be interesting to see how the community reacts.

Microsoft Contributes Code to the Linux Kernel | NicFill | Channel 9

Digging into this now. The download has a rich set of samples that demonstrate accessing the Windows 7 APIs from .NET applications very easily. Check out the blog entry for the details. You can get the samples and the source for the managed library here.

I’m speaking at the Space Coast .NET User Group tomorrow and I’ll be going over these samples as part of my talk. 

Windows 7 Managed Code APIs - Windows 7 for Developers - The Windows Blog

The Windows SDK team built the Windows API Code Pack to provide easy access to Windows 7 features for .NET developers , lowering the bar for developers who want to target Windows 7 Client applications. Basically, it is the closest thing a .NET developer will have to managed code APIs for Windows 7.

The Windows API Code Pack (Code Pack) is much larger in terms of offered functionality and quality than its older brother, the Windows Vista Bridge. The Code Pack contains a wide variety of APIs, including very comprehensive Windows Shell namespace objects, Windows Taskbar, Libraries, and Windows 7 Extended Linguistic Services. The following is a short list of the APIs contained in the Windows API Code Pack:

• Support for Windows Shell namespace objects, including:
  • Windows 7 libraries
  • Known Folders
  • Non-file system containers
• Windows Vista and Windows 7 Task Dialogs
• Support for Windows 7 Explorer Browser Control
• Support for Shell property system
• Windows 7 Taskbar
• Support for Windows Vista and Windows 7 common file dialogs, including custom file dialog controls
• Support for Direct3D 11.0 and DXGI 1.0/1.1 APIs
• Sensor Platform APIs
• Extended Linguistic Services APIs

I don’t know too many people who are completely confident they’ll make it through the waves of layoffs that have hit the tech industry since last year. Like everybody else, I worry about this kind of thing, but I also think about what kind of opportunity a change like this could afford me and how I could best take advantage of it.

In my job as a developer evangelist, I’ve been able to talk to a diverse set of audiences about all sorts of topics. One of the things I’ve mentioned in talks I’ve done in the last few months is that, if I lost my job tomorrow, the first thing I would do is sign up for the BizSpark program. Coincidentally, I’ve been lucky enough to have landed a new role at Microsoft where my job is to promote programs like BizSpark to startups.

With that in mind, I wanted to share with you my five step plan for starting a new software company, very inexpensively, built on the Microsoft stack. This plan is non-technical. I assume here that if you’re a dev, you have an idea of what you want to build, even if it’s a vague idea. (Picasso quote) That’s good. These are the steps that you can take to start turning that idea into a business.

What you’ll need to begin is a computer capable of running the software you need to build your product. Usually that will mean a machine capable of running Windows Vista or Windows 7. I also recommend a copy of Office 2007 so that you can create business plans, build PowerPoint presentations, and manage your e-mail, along with other office functions.

You can get almost everything else on the list below right now for free.

1. Download business templates from http://microsoft.com/office and use them to define your new business. Having a plan is important and you can learn a lot about creating a business plan just by looking at some of the templates that are available. Here are some suggested searches to find the documents you need:
   • Business Plans
   • Product Development
   • Business Stationery
     
     The Office site also has clip art, tips and tricks, and documentation that can help you get started.
2. Get a free Office Live Small Business workspace so that you can collaborate, store your documents online, and build company web site. This step is pretty straightforward, but you’ll want to spend some time learning about the collaboration site you create. An Office Live Small Business workspace lets you do some pretty interesting things like manage contacts (some simple CRM), calendar management, newsletters, document sharing and storage, and more. To create this site, you’ll need to use your Windows Live ID. You can create a new Live ID here. Once you have that, go to this Office Live page and sign up to create a new web site. Choose the name of your company and the business that you are in carefully, as an Office Live URL will be created using the business name and the business type you chose. 
   
   
   
3. Set up a new domain and build your company web site. A domain from Office Live is free for the first year and it $14.95 annually after that. Once you decide on your domain, you have a number of options for creating and managing a company home page. You can use the built-in templates and tools to build your site, or you can set advanced options to delete the template content and upload a web site built using your own tools. (I have a page at http://brianjo.us you can visit to see what a customized, template-based site looks like.)
   
   
   
4. Join the Microsoft BizSpark program to get access to professional development tools and other benefits. Check the MicrosoftStartupZone site for full details. BizSpark gives you access to an MSDN Premium Subscription, which includes Visual Studio Professional, Microsoft Expression Studio, and much more.
   
   Joining BizSpark is easy, just go to this page, and follow the directions. They can have you set up in just a few hours. Alternatively, search the Network Partner directory for a network partner near you and they can have you set up very quickly.
   
5. Find a host for your product application. You have a number of options here: You can set up your own servers, you can find a Microsoft Partner or another host for your application (many of our Network Partners are also web hosts), or you can build on Azure. There’s a full page of information about this on the MicrosoftStartupZone.

Really, that’s all there is to it (besides doing all the work and shipping a product). If you have an idea for a startup company, this is one way to pull it together. In addition to all that, you can get your company placed into the BizSparkDB directory where potential investors can review the work that you’re doing and contact you about possibly financing your company.

As I said at the beginning of this post, this is what I would do if I wanted to start a new company tomorrow. (And I’ve always got at least 3-5 ideas in my head.) If you end up starting a new company with BizSpark, or if you have questions about the program, please drop me a note at brianjo@microsoft.com. Let me know how it goes.

I also posted this to Facebook. Congrats to the team on 12K BizSpark startups! For information on the program check out Microsoftstartupzone.com. If you have questions, just drop me a note at brianjo@microsoft.com. I’m going to be doing some BizSpark events in the east soon. Stay tuned for details.

Microsoft BizSpark: 12 000 software startups served!

Six months ago, Microsoft announced the availability of a new global program for Startups called Microsoft BizSpark.  

Today, as we celebrate the program’s 6-months, we are pleased to announce that more than 12,000 Startups have already joined BizSpark.

BizSpark is available in 82 countries around the world, and, interestingly enough, we’ve seen significant uptake in countries like Brazil, Russia, China and India (4 out of the top 6 countries in terms of enrollment). BizSpark is fulfilling unmet demand for tools and technologies and we are seeing an increasing number of startups in these markets with high potential software industries.

Windows 7 RC available to all. Brandon has some good information here:

The Windows 7 Release Candidate (RC) is here! - Windows 7 Team Blog - The Windows Blog

As we previously announced, today the Windows 7 RC is now available for anyone interested in giving it a spin! Typically, a release candidate is the last development milestone before release to manufacturing (RTM), signifying that engineering and development have made significant advancements and that the code is entering the final phases of testing. Essentially, the Windows 7 RC is the result of a lot of the great feedback we received during the Windows 7 Beta. That’s why I’m so excited to use it and excited for YOU to use it!

It’s out and I’m hearing good things about it.

Download details: The 2007 Microsoft Office Suite Service Pack 2 (SP2)

Overview

The 2007 Microsoft Office Suite Service Pack 2 (SP2) provides customers with the latest updates to the 2007 Office suite (the products that are affected by this update are listed below). This download includes two types of fixes:

• Previously unreleased fixes that were made specifically for this service pack.
  • In addition to general product fixes, this includes improvements in stability, performance, and security.
  • You can find out more information in Knowledge Base Article 953195, where product-specific changes are described.
• All of the Public Updates, Security Updates, Cumulative Updates, and Hotfixes released through February 2009.
• 
  Before installing this service pack, you are strongly encouraged to read 953195, which describes some big improvements introduced by SP2, and also calls out some important information that you should be aware of before installing.