Blogging
Blogging Related
Just annoucing that I will have some blog downtime over the next few days. I am having some housework done that will require electricty be shut down and computers moved around. Should be all good by Monday.
Cheers!
I am delivering a webcast later this morning entitled – Microsoft Solutions to Windows Update Management. The Webcast starts at 9am Pacific Time and I expect all 23 of you to show up! :)
Cheers!
Straight from John Carmack…..
Xbox 360: 'A really sweet develoment system'
"The Xbox 360 will probably will be id's primary development platform. As it is right now, we would get the game up on the 360. When I would do major hack-and-slash architectural changes it was back on the PC, but it’s looking like the Xbox 360 will be our target. All of our tools are on the PC, and we’re maintaining the game running on the PC, but probably all of our gameplay development and testing will be done on the Xbox 360. It’s a really sweet development system."
Cheers!
I recently received an email asking – “How can I populate Internet Explorer Zones using Group Policy?”. I receive this email pretty frequently so I thought I would just blog it….
First, get into the Group Policy Object Editor then locate the Internet Explorer Security Page objects. You are looking for the Site to Zone Assignment List object.
Open that object and can enter site names you wish to push to the clients. You select the zone using a numerical value (1-4) for the zone it should go in:
1= Intranet Zone
2= Trusted Sites Zone
3= Internet Zone
4= Restricted Sites Zone
In my example, I have added my blog site to the Trusted Sites Zone –
Once the policy is created and linked to an OU (or domain or site), and the clients have refreshed, the client will have the list you set in group policy.
Downside - with the control we give the admin, we sacrifice control at the user level. This group policy will overwrite any existing settings in place at the client. In addition, the user loses the ability to add sites to the zones theselves. The user can get into the interface and add sites to zones but the will not stick. As an admin you may wish to lock out access to the page completely.
You can find more detailed information on this and other settings in this document.
Cheers!
Whew! I came home from Seattle for the weekend only to now be in Palm Beach, Florida. I am covering some Technet events for a co-worker who is working on a project. I am delivering in Palm Beach tomorrow and Tampa on Thursday. Looks like there are still spots open for registration. If you happen to be in either area this week, stop in and say hello! We will also be piloting a new customer registration system that should speed things up when you come in for the events. I would love to hear your feedback on the registration process.
I will be hopping on a plane Thursday evening to come back to SoCal.
Cheers!
Check out Stephen Toulouse information about the WMF/SetAbortProc vulnerability. I hope this puts to rest rumors about it being an intentional backdoor…
Cheers!
Robert Scoble comments on how he doesn’t care for the title of “evangelist”. He believes there is a religious connotation applied to it (and he is right about that). He goes on to explain why he doesn’t want religious customers. He details this along with a link to Guy Kawasaki’s blog entry on the Art of Evangelism which I think is a very good analogy for what we do. I think Scoble is too caught up in the religious meaning of the word which gets reinforced by Guy’s analogy.
I am also an evangelist. I am an ITPro Evangelist and I also have that on my business card. However, I started out not liking the title. I have since changed my mind to embrace it. When my title changed from “Technet Presenter” to “ITPro Evangelist” I didn’t care for it for the exact reason of its religious meaning. But as time has passed, I have realized that what I do as an ITPro Evangelist is exactly what a religious evangelist does – I speak the good word about Microsoft products and technologies to the masses in hope of educating the masses about what we have to offer. Maybe I will convert a few along the way; maybe I will turn some away. But I believe in my company and our products and think they can help a lot of people with their technical problems.
I decided to go check out Webster’s to see how they define evangelist –
Evangelist – 1) Any one of the four authors of the New Testament gospel books – Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John; 2) One who practices evangelism, especially a protestant preacher or missionary.
That led me to look up –
Evangelism – 1) Zealous preaching and dissemination of the gospel, as through missionary work; 2) Militant zeal for a cause
I also looked up the synonyms to see if maybe there was a better word for what we do –
Evangelist - advocate, champion, companion, converter, herald, messenger, missionary, pioneer, propagandist, proponent, proselytizer
I am all of those things for the company. However, none of those synonyms work as a job title as none of them truly convey the depth of what we do. Evangelist is a rather broad word that allows me combine all of those words to champion our products, convert the undecided and be a messenger both for the product team to the customer and for the customer back to the product teams. I think the word is perfectly appropriate in spite of the religious connection. If someone wants to spend all their time debating with me the religiousness of my job title, maybe they have some other non-technical issues I can’t likely help them with anyway.
Scoble doesn’t want “religious customers”. He wants “skeptical, educated, pragmatic” customers. I believe my role is to address the skepticism customers may have about our products, educate them about our products and give them the facts and practical information that allows them to use our products to solve their problems. I choose to do this by talking mainly about our own products where Scoble chooses to talk a lot about competitors.
I agree with Scoble that people should make educated choices about purchasing and implementing based upon a comparison of different products. I don’t think it is my job to educate people on 3rd party products though. The competition has their own evangelists. They don’t need Microsoft employees doing it for them. With so many products out there, it is very difficult for the average consumer and even the hard-core ITPro to know everything there it to know about all products. That is where I come in to make sure that MS products are being evangelized to the masses such that the features and capabilities are known. If we don’t then we become obscure. Without someone letting people know what Microsoft has to offer, we will cease to be relevant. Let the competition figure out how to be heard above the crowd while we focus on making sure we are.
Regardless, we are both evangelists and I believe the word appropriately describes what we should be doing for the company and for our customers.
So…..Hello, I am Chris Avis. I am an ITPro Evangelist for the Microsoft Corporation. What can I tell you about OUR products?
Cheers!
Normally I avoid blogging when I have had a few beers, shots, ???????.....but I made a promise to two young ladies this evening, and I intend to keep it. I just made it back to my hotel room after an evening of beers, shots and karaoke. The karaoke was to be had at Ozzie’s Bar in downtown Seattle. Unfortunately, they don’t appear to have a site of their own (come on……it is 2006.....how does ANY business NOT have a web site these days?!?!!??!?.....Ozzie owner’s….contact me, and I will set up a web site for you at no charge)
Anyway, so I went to karaoke tonight and I met Cari (Happy Birthday!) and Becky. These were two wonderfully engaging young woman who carried on with us (some co-workers went with me) until closing time (which I must say…..karaoke that shuts down at 1:15am is pretty weak….).
So to Cari (Happy Birthday!) and Becky….thank you for the wonderful evening and best wishes!! Se3nd me blog links and I will link back to you!
Cheers!
I made a few posts this morning from my hotel room using my Samsung i730 as a Bluetooth connected modem. I am super jazzed at the speed and stability of the setup. I decided to head down for breakfast and take my laptop and phone with me so I could read some blogs and news. I never bothered to disconnect the phone or the BT connection. I clipped the phone to my belt, grabbed the laptop, took the elevator down 10 floors, setup in the restaurant and, much to my surprise, everything was still connected. I popped right onto the Internet with no prompts for reconnection or credentials at all. I thought it was a fluke.
Well I just did the same thing coming back up to my room after breakfast and it was no fluke. I popped right back on, read a couple of articles and decided to make this post.
Why is this so amazing to me? Because I remember my first 300 baud AppleCat Modem which, while being a super cool device (at the time and still today), would disconnect if you sneezed within 50 feet of it – and that was a hardwire connection. My trip up and down was completely wireless and it never dropped.
Sweetness….
Cheers!
I would like some feedback from those who read (or at least glance at) my blog. I have been struggling with direction since starting up my blog and have finally come to a crossroads where I need to make a change. A couple of things have brought me to this decision – 1) There is a new version of Community Server that I want to migrate to and I am going to improve my hardware for my network. I like rebuilding my home network now and then just to get my hands dirty. 2) I have a tendency to blog about things that are interesting to me that I think others might find interesting as well. I also NEED to blog more about Microsoft products and technologies as I am an IT Pro Evangelist for the company. The problem is, blogging for work and blogging for interest seem to be muddling up the blog (IMO).
I am not trying to increase hits and readership so much as organize and structure what does get posted. I am even considering splitting my blog into two separate blogs – one for work and one for personal. The downside there is maintaining two blogs. The upside is organization and clarity.
Now….I work mostly with our “BackOffice” server products. I tend to gravitate towards Windows 2003, ISA, and Exchange (and all of their predecessors). I even supported the Small Business Server product as a whole from it’s inception through SBS 2000. I also have a passion around the Media Center and other consumer products (am I not a consumer?). Of course there are blogs-a-plenty on all of those items so I want to offer something they don’t, if I can.
So I would like some feedback from you. Do you like it the way it is? Would you like to see it split? And from a Microsoft perspective, is there something missing from other MS Product and Technology blogs that you want filled in? For that matter, is there an MS Product or Technology that isn’t getting enough or the proper “air-time”? What about podcasts and webcasts? What is valuable to you?
What it really comes down to is this – I don’t want to push a corporate agenda, I want to give you what you want. So…..What do YOU want?
Send me an email – chris.avis@microsoft.com or comment on this post about it. You can even, give me a call if you want – 760-695-7838 – if I don’t answer, leave me a message with a number and I will give you a ring back.
Cheers!
Now this puts in formal form something I have done off and on for years now (though with much less frequency due to the wonderful Do Not Call List registries in the US) .When you get a call from a telemarketer, run through this counter-script designed to beffudle the telemarketer and give YOU the upper-hand. Best thing is it is short enough to print out and keep by a phone for use when needed.
Cheers!
I have a lock pick set that came from my grandfather’s tools many, many years ago. Why he had it, I don’t know. I found it many, many years ago, tested my skills and have managed to open a few simple locks. Ifeel pretty comfy that I could open most standard house door locks given enough time and more importantly….patience.
So this tidbit caught my eye this morning. It is a hack to convert a vibrtaing toothbrush into a vibrating lock pick. Now, I don’t and never have used an electric toothbrush, but I may pick one up just to test this little project out. If nothing else it might save me a call to the locksmith if i lose my keys.
Cheers!
I know this isn’t exactly new product but I just have to say how cool it is. Orb allows you to connect to a home based Windows XP or XP Media Center machine and listen to/watch/view stored content. I just finished watching the season premiere of Battlestar Galactica via Orb.
But it gets even cooler….
I used my Samsung i730 with the Bluetooth hack to connect through the Verizon EVDO network to Orb and then to my Media Center which is connected via Wireless to my home network. Wireless to Wireless to watch a TV show just seems flippin’ cool to me.
Oh yeah…..in the episode…..they all die…. J
Cheers!
I will be delivering some Technet sessions in Florida next week. Jan 17th in Royal Palm Beach and Jan 19th in Tampa. We are going to be covering a rather large set of topics including – New Features of Windows 2003 R2 such as Active Directory Federation Services, better Distributed File System capabilities, and benefits provided for Branch Office deployments. We will also be discussing some new features in Exchange 2003 SP2, and some great information on how to locate resources that every ITPro should know about to help make their day go a lot smoother.
I am looking forward to heading out to Florida next week and hope some of you make it as well.
Cheers!
Ps… I am delivering these same events in SoCal in late February. No registration links have been made available yet.
Presentations and WebCasts –
New Video & Audio based information for developers is located at these links:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdntv/archive.aspx
http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowForum.aspx?ForumID=14
http://msdn.microsoft.com/theshow/
http://msdn.microsoft.com/dotnetrocks/
Extending Visual Studio 2005 Team System – Discussion on how Microsoft IT extended Visual Studio 2005 Team System to incorporate software development lifecycle methodology process by modifying the default process template. By modifying the process template developer compliance increased and external tools were eliminated.
Getting Started – Visual Basic Fusion with Visual Basic 6 and Visual Basic .NET – This presentation walks you through the Visual Basic Fusion articles and shows how Microsoft Visual Basic 6 applications can be extended with the Microsoft .NET framework. This video is the second of a two-part presentation by Scott Swigart of Swigart Consulting.
Beta’s, RC’s and CTP’s…Oh My! –
Windows Workflow Foundation Beta 1.2 – Compatible with Office “12” (Beta 1) – Windows Workflow Foundation is the programming model, engine and tools for quickly building workflow-enabled applications on Windows. It consists of a Microsoft® WinFX® name space (System.Workflow), an in-process workflow engine, and designers for Microsoft Visual Studio 2005. Windows Workflow Foundation is available (currently as Beta) for both client and server versions of Windows. Windows Workflow Foundation supports a wide range of scenarios including workflow within line-of-business applications, user interface page flow, document-centric workflow, human workflow, composite workflow for service-oriented applications, business rule-driven workflow and workflow for systems management.
Microsoft Pre-Release Software WinFX Language Packs – December Community Technology Preview (CTP) – The WinFX language packs contain translated text, such as error messages, for languages other than English. Installation of a language pack is not required to run WinFX resources on a non-English operating system; however, it is recommended.
Note: An English WinFX language pack is not available because all text is in English by default. To download a specific language pack, select the target language from the change language drop-down.
Pre-released WinFX Runtime Components Tool – For best results, install on a computer that has not had pre-release versions of WinFX runtime Components 3.0 installed on it. If your computer has a pre-release version on it, follow the Uninstall Instructions below to uninstall these pre-release bits before installing the November CTP. You must remove them in the correct order to ensure a clean uninstall.
If you have a pre-release version of SQL Server 2005, MSDN, Visual Studio 2005, or the .NET Framework, you must uninstall them by following VS pre-RTM Uninstall Instructions.
Microsoft Pre-Release Software WinFX Runtime Components – December Community Technology Preview (CTP) – "Windows Presentation Foundation", "Windows Communication Foundation", and "Windows Workflow Foundation" are the names for three strategic developer technologies that Microsoft plans to ship in 2006 as part of the Windows Vista operating system. In addition, Microsoft is making these technologies available on Windows XP and Windows Server 2003. The WinFX Runtime Components December CTP enables developers to continue experimenting with early builds of these technologies, get acquainted with the development experience, and provide Microsoft with feedback.
Hotfixes, Patches, Updates, Service Packs —
Help for Subsystem for UNIX-based Applications SDK – This help file documents all the POSIX style APIs provided by Subsystem for UNIX-based Applications.
Australian Daylight Savings changes in Microsoft Products for the year 2006 – The Commonwealth Games are scheduled to be held during March 2006 in Melbourne Australia. Several Australian states including New South Wales, Victoria, Australian Capital Territory, South Australia and Tasmania, have changed the Daylight Savings transition end dates to the first Sunday of April 2006.
DirectX End-User Runtimes (December 2005) Full Download – This download provides the DirectX end-user multi-languaged redistributable that developers can include with their product. The redistributable license agreement covers the terms under which developers may use the Redistributable. For full details please review the DirectX SDK EULA.txt and DirectX Redist.txt files located in the license directory.
This package is localized into Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Czech, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Russian, Spanish, Swedish, and English.
DirectX End-User Runtime (December 2005) Web Installer – Microsoft DirectX is a group of technologies designed to make Windows-based computers an ideal platform for running and displaying applications rich in multimedia elements such as full-color graphics, video, 3D animation, and rich audio. DirectX includes security and performance updates, along with many new features across all technologies, which can be accessed by applications using the DirectX APIs.
Windows CE 5.0 Platform Builder Update – KB911711 – Fixes made in this update:
Component: Datasync
Description: ActiveSync connection may fail if a user attempts to re-connect to a device after failing to enter a password.
Tools and Apps –
PlaysForSure Portable Device Test Kit – Microsoft has established the PlaysForSure program to establish compatibility between music or video device and online stores that sell digital music and video using Windows Media technologies. If you are designing or manufacturing a portable media player device, you can use the PlaysForSure Portable Device Test Kit to verify that your device is compliant with the requirements of the PlaysForSure logo program. Please note that you must have a fully executed PlaysForSure Logo License Agreement in place with Microsoft prior to using the logo on your products or marketing materials.
Microsoft Domain-Specific Language (DSL) Tools – Using the Microsoft DSL tools you can create your own designer, integrated into Visual Studio, for a visual domain-specific language. The tools help you define the domain-specific language and generate the code of a graphical designer for you. The resulting designer uses the same underlying modeling technology that is used by the Class Designer and Distributed System Designers in Visual Studio 2005.
The Microsoft Tools for Domain-Specific Languages is part of the Visual Studio 2005 SDK.
SQL Server 2005 System View Map – The Microsoft SQL Server 2005 System View Map shows the key system views included in SQL Server 2005, and the relationships between them.
BizTalk Server 2004 Load Generation Tool – This tool is intended for developers and IT professionals to simulate load on a BizTalk Server. Using this tool, you can simulate load to instrument performance and stress against a BizTalk deployment. In addition, this tool may also be extended by developers to simulate load for custom transports. This tool should be used in a test environment only, and should not be used in a production environment. This tool is provided "as-is" and is not supported.
Visual Studio 2005 Tools for Office Sample: Deploying Visual Studio 2005 Tools for Office Solutions using Windows Installer – This download targets developers who want to deploy a Visual Studio 2005 Tools for Office solution using a Visual Studio 2005 Setup project to create a Windows Installer package.
The accompanying article provides the following discussions of Visual Studio 2005 Tools for Office deployment:
- An overview of the main steps required to deploy a Visual Studio 2005 Tools for Office solution.
- An overview of how to deploy a Visual Studio 2005 Tools for Office solution using the Visual Studio Setup project including how you can add the Visual Studio 2005 Tools for Office runtime and the Microsoft Office 2003 primary interop assemblies prerequisites to your setup packages.
- The steps for granting security trust to a solution.
Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 – Update to the Web Project Conversion Wizard – The Web Project Conversion Wizard in Visual Studio 2005 has been updated to handle newly discovered conversion issues. This update will improve the success rate of the wizard and make it easier for developers to convert their Visual Studio .NET 2003 Web projects to the new Visual Studio 2005 Web Site project model.
Case Studies, Guides and Whitepapers –
Moving to SQL Server 2005 at Microsoft – Discussion on how Microsoft IT moved its line-of-business applications to SQL Server 2005. Additionally, this paper also discusses a number of details and best practices that Microsoft adopted to move its applications on SQL Server 2005 that may help other organizations successfully plan and roll out SQL Server 2005.
Upgrading Visual Basic 6.0 to Visual Basic .NET and Visual Basic 2005 – This guide is intended for software technical decision makers, solution architects, and software developers who are involved in Visual Basic 6.0 application or component development. It helps you understand the issues and risks that go along with upgrading to Visual Basic .NET. It also provides steps for preparing your applications for a successful and cost-effective upgrade. Finally, it gives ideas and pointers about how advance your application after you successfully upgrade it to Visual Basic .NET.
SQL Server 2005business Intelligence Metadata Whitepaper – This white paper covers several interesting and unique methods for managing metadata in SQL Server Integration Services, Analysis Services and Reporting Services using built-in features including data lineage, business and technical metadata and impact analysis.
Related Download: The SQL Server 2005 Metadata Samples Toolkit can be downloaded from:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=11DAA4D1-196D-4F2A-B18F-891579C364F4&displaylang=en
Cheers!
Presentations and WebCasts –
Deploying SharePoint Products and Technologies for Enterprise Collaboration – Detailed discussion about the design and deployment of the Microsoft IT hosted collaboration platform. The platform supports personal storage, team Web sites, group and division portals, and enterprise services. With server farms centralized in three regional data centers, Microsoft saves both hardware and support costs.
Moving to SQL Server 2005 at Microsoft – Discussion on how Microsoft IT moved its line-of-business applications to SQL Server 2005. Additionally, this paper also discusses a number of details and best practices that Microsoft adopted to move its applications on SQL Server 2005 that may help other organizations successfully plan and roll out SQL Server 2005.
Hotfixes, Patches, Updates, Service Packs —
Update for Windows XP x64 Edition – KB903651 – See Below
Update for Windows Server 2003 – KB903651 – See Below
Update for Windows 2003 for Itanium-based Systems – KB903651– See Below
Update for Windows Server x64 Edition – KB903651 – Install this update to allow more than one domain-based DFS namespace to be created on a computer that is running Windows Server 2003, Standard Edition. After you install this item, you may have to restart your computer.
Australian Daylight Savings changes for Microsoft products for the Year 2006 – The Commonwealth Games are scheduled to be held during March 2006 in Melbourne Australia. Several Australian states including New South Wales, Victoria, Australian Capital Territory, South Australia and Tasmania, have changed the Daylight Savings transition end dates to the first Sunday of April 2006.
Update for Software Update Services – Run this script and follow the instructions in KB912307 to resolve an issue in Software Update Services (SUS) 1.0 Service Pack 1 (SP1) in which all previously approved updates may revert to an unapproved state and the status appears as "updated". This script will reset your approval settings to their previous state. SUS 1.0 SP1 servers that were deployed on or after December 13, 2005 will not encounter this issue.
Tools and Apps –
SQL Server 2005 System View Map – The Microsoft SQL Server 2005 System View Map shows the key system views included in SQL Server 2005, and the relationships between them.
Active Directory Migration Tool v2.0 – The Active Directory Migration Tool (ADMT) version 2.0 provides an easy, secure, and fast way to either upgrade from Windows NT Server 4.0 to Windows Server Active Directory service or restructure Windows Server Active Directory domains between forests or within a forest. The tool migrates users, groups, and computers between domains in a way that allows users to have access to their resources and applications at all times. Version 2.0 includes new features, such as password migration, a scripting interface, and a command line interface, that make migrations easier.
Also available is the Active Directory Migration Tool v3.0, which provides an integrated toolset to facilitate migration and restructuring tasks in an Active Directory infrastructure.
BizTalk Server 2004 Load Generation Tool – This tool is intended for developers and IT professionals to simulate load on a BizTalk Server. Using this tool, you can simulate load to instrument performance and stress against a BizTalk deployment. In addition, this tool may also be extended by developers to simulate load for custom transports. This tool should be used in a test environment only, and should not be used in a production environment. This tool is provided "as-is" and is not supported.
Case Studies, Guides and Whitepapers –
Microsoft CRM 3.0 Implementation Guide – This Implementation Guide provides the information required for a successful Microsoft CRM implementation into your business. This guide addresses the planning, installing (both hardware and software), pre-deployment testing, and operating tasks for the maintenance of the Microsoft CRM system.
This guide is written for the computer system administrator. This guide also assumes that any organization implementing Microsoft CRM software will have the services of an independent software vendor (ISV) or value-added reseller who is partnered with Microsoft and will help you with the entire process of implementing and maintaining your Microsoft CRM installation. Because of this assumption, there are references in this guide to these "partners" who are expected to provide various services to you.
Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 Virtual PC Demonstration – Microsoft Dynamics CRM 3.0 release Virtual PC Demonstration. This demo is a one computer setup with Microsoft CRM 3.0 server and Microsoft CRM 3.0 client for Outlook. This demonstartion also contains Microsoft Exchange Server 2003, Microsoft SQL Server 2005, and Microsoft Visual Studio 2005.
Microsoft File Server Resource Manager – The Microsoft Corporation Information Technology group uses Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 File Server Resource Manager as a centralized tool for managing file servers located in branch offices around the world. File Server Resource Manager is a suite of tools that allows administrators to understand, control, and manage the quantity and types of data stored on their servers.
Live Communications Server 2005 Document: Configuring Certificates – This document explains how Live Communications Server 2005 uses certificates and how to configure certificates for each server role using your existing certificate infrastructure.
Terminal Services Scaling and Performance on X64-based versions of Windows Server 2003 – Microsoft Windows Server™ 2003 Terminal Server lets users run Microsoft Windows®-based applications on a remote computer that is running one of the Windows Server 2003 family of operating systems. This white paper contains results, analyses, and sizing guidelines for Terminal Services on x64-based versions of Windows Server 2003. Hewlett Packard worked in cooperation with Microsoft to perform the initial sizing tests and data collection in the Microsoft Enterprise Engineering Center in Redmond, Washington. The tests were performed using Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Enterprise x64 Edition and Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition with Service Pack 1 (SP1).
DirectX End-User Runtime – Microsoft DirectX is a group of technologies designed to make Windows-based computers an ideal platform for running and displaying applications rich in multimedia elements such as full-color graphics, video, 3D animation, and rich audio. DirectX includes security and performance updates, along with many new features across all technologies, which can be accessed by applications using the DirectX APIs.
DFS Operations Guide: Using the DFSRAdmin Command-line Tool – The Dfsradmin.exe command line tool is new for the Distributed File System (DFS) in Microsoft® Windows Server™ 2003 R2. Use this tool to administer DFS replication, including creation of replication groups and replicated folders, adding members to replication groups, and managing the location of staging folders. This guide offers step-by-step instructions for performing these common tasks by using DFSRAdmin.
SQL Server 2005 Business Intelligence Metadata Whitepaper – This white paper covers several interesting and unique methods for managing metadata in SQL Server Integration Services, Analysis Services and Reporting Services using built-in features including data lineage, business and technical metadata and impact analysis.
Related Download: The SQL Server 2005 Metadata Samples Toolkit can be downloaded from:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=11DAA4D1-196D-4F2A-B18F-891579C364F4&displaylang=en
Security –
Improving Security at Microsoft through Deployment of Windows XP SP2 – Overview of why and how Microsoft IT proactively deployed Windows XP Service Pack 2. Windows XP Service Pack 2 is a critical security release that addresses Internet-based security threats.
Windows Server 2003 PKI Operations Guide – How to configure and operate a Windows certificate authority, with operational scenarios, custom configuration information, sample commands, and best practices.
MBSA 2.0 Scripting Examples – Sample scripts that illustrate how to extend MBSA 2.0 for greater scalability during scanning and report rollup.
Cheers!
Every now and then, I feed my ego by finding out who links back to my own blog. Since I don’t command a Scobelesque size audience, I don’t get a phenomenal amount of hits (yet) so I have to come up with ways to keep me interested in blogging. The best way is to pump myself up by checking my logs to see who links back to any post I have made.
Remarkably, the most active post I have made in the past few days has nothing to do with Microsoft (and you just might get a post later this week on why this is a good thing and yet another post on why it sucks).
Nathan Wienberg over at BlogNewsChannel …. Linked back to me and called me out by name. Angry or not, as far as I know, outside of my co-workers, that is the first time someone has taken the time to type my name in as a part of a blog post and it jazzed me to no end. There is a certain amount of head swelling that comes with that, but I am not going to let it get to me. All I am going to say is say……thank you, Nathan. It made my evening to see my name on someone else’s posting.
Cheers!
I picked this up from WFMU’s Beware of the Blog…….
It would appear that the Fins have stopped time somewhere in the late 70’s and this video proves it. The music is bad, the hair is bad, the clothing is worse.
I think it is time to activate one of the many bazillion dollar ideas that I came up with in the late 70’s and early 80’s while hanging out at the clubhouse with the guys and a certain green friend of ours. One day we were contemplating the current (and sad) state of pop music and how much we hated disco. I popped of with something like (details are extremely fuzzy)…..“Dudes……<exhale>……in the year 2000, I am gonna make some T-shirts that, like, say ‘Disco Still Sucks’……”
I think it is time to put that plan into action…..at least in Finland…..
Cheers!
I don’t use IM as much as I did say 5 years ago. So I don’t get too excited when new IM products come out. But I know other people do so i wanted to make sure everyone knows about the Windows Live Messenger Beta.
I just loaded it up on my machine simply enough and had access to all of my existing contacts immediately. I still get toasts notifying me of email on my Hotmail account and I can IM people. So the things *I* need are there.
I encourage you to play around with the other advanced features if you want to know more….
Cheers!
I am in Seattle and heard news from the Technet subscription team that a special beta release of Exchange “12” would be available in the March mailings. I wish I could say I was the first to get this news to you but my buddy Kevin,blogged about it from the meeting.
Cheers!
Scoble is still at CES and ran across a really cool sounding device that allows you to look through it at the sky, it can, through GPS and magnetic positioning determine where you are in relation to the objects in the sky and provide narratives about the objects…. Future…..here we are….
I do live presentations and often with my own equipment. I may have to add one of these to my travel bag…
AutoBlog has some pics up of what I think looks like a super-rugged golf cart but is more suited for off-road use. It is CES worthy because of the Bluetooth setup.
ChipChick is posting about some other interesting items at CES. I have 3 daughters so the pink hard drive seems to have some meaning here for me….
Yahoo! Has a cool CES blog if (like me) you aren’t there and want to stay up on some of the cool stuff….
Cheers!
Scoble is at CES and linking to gobs of cool stuff. My fave is the 102” Plasma…..drool!
Anandtech has an article on the new ATI OCUR (Open Cable Uni-Directional Reciever) one of the first of I hope several cable and satellite card tuners that will pump HD content to MCE without needing an OTA antenna. I didn’t exactly have fun putting mine up!
ATI’s Press Release for the OCUR.
Windows MCE + DirectTV partnership announced by BillG at CES (Fast Forward to 56:00). Yahoo picked this up as well along with other notes from CES. And finally, DirectTV’s Press Release on this (no mention of MCE though)
Press Release on HD-DVD Support for XBox 360. More on this from GameSpot
Gary Krakow talks about Slingbox gets even better by delivering movie content to mobile devices.
Cheers!
Happy New Year!
Moving on…to the important stuff…..
Go right now and grab a calendar or open Outlook. Start filling in people’s birthdays with a reminder pop-up for two-four weeks BEFORE the birthday. This has been an annual ritual for me now for a while. I still miss someone’s every year. Damn Snooze button…. Everyone knows someone with a birthday in January so I just reminded you. Now put it in Outlook.
Guys…..only 44 days till Valentines Day. Only 6 shopping weekends most of which are football weekends. Make a commitment to get the gift figured out the weekend BEFORE the Super Bowl (it’s a bye week…..just do it!) so you can have a puking good time on Super Bowl Sunday without any guilt. Oh yeah, Valentines Day is on a crap Tuesday night this year. That means you are going to have to leave the house and take her out to dinner on a (gasp!)…… weeknight. Get reservations NOW or you have to cook dinner yourself. If that happens…..here is an easy one.
Lemon Thyme Chicken
3 tbl Flour 1 Medium Onion (chopped)
½ tsp Salt 1 tbl Margarine
¼ tsp Pepper 1 can Chicken Broth
3 tbl Lemon Juice (fresh) 4 Skinless Chicken Breasts
2 tbl Olive Oil
1 tsp Thyme
Combine flour, salt, pepper in large zip-lock bag and shake thoroughly. Add chicken and coat well. Save excess flour mix. Remove chicken to pan heated at medium heat with 1 tbl of Olive oil. Brown chicken on each side adding 1 tbl of Olive Oil when flipping to other side. Do NOT cook all the way through! Just brown the outside. We want to sear it and lock in some of the juices. Remove chicken to plate and cover to keep warm.
Add Margarine and Onion to skillet cooking till Onion is softened. Stir in excess flour mix (make some extra if you want a thicker sauce) and cook for approx 1 minute or until sauce thickens. Add chicken broth, 2 tbl of lemon juice and Thyme. Bring to boil stirring constantly.
Return Chicken to skillet covering chicken with mixture and reduce heat. Simmer 10-15 minutes or until Chicken is cooked to liking. (Test for doneness, should NOT be any pink). When chicken is done, add remaining lemon Juice to taste, Mix, serve over cooked white rice
Suggested Side Dishes: Roasted Red Potatoes, Asparagus, Steamed Vegetables
Suggested Wine: I just had to add that because it sounded good. I don’t know anything about wine. I use the white meat/white wine/red meat/red wine formula. But I like this meal with a Zin.
Some of you will STILL drag your feet so I have assembled some handy sites to have in case you just don’t get it together in time –
FTD.Com (they can’t help you if you logon on the 14th)
Hallmark.com (do not attempt to get away with an electronic card and flowers alone)
Victoria’s Secret (who is the gift really for?)
Godiva.com (an old stand by…..better have some backup though)
Exotic Car Rental (okie….really for the guys but she won’t complain)
Sky Diving (Do NOT tell her about this BEFORE you get her to the diving facility)
Red Envelope (great, inexpensive items with some higher end items now and then)
Las Vegas (only works once…….and usually only if she has never been before)
The Trip (sweetness…..may have to promise this one and write an IOU)
The Rock (when you need some serious juice or doing damage control)
Everyone….SXSW Music Festival in Austin, Tx – March 10-19. St. Patrick’s falls in here on the 17th. What could be better than green beer on 6th street, awesome music, great people? Just go.
Everyone….Taxes are due April 15th. ‘Nuff Said…
Cheers!
Our presentation team had a meeting a few months ago where they brought out a professional photographer to take what were essentially publicity stills of our presenters to use on web and print materials. We had a little fun with it and each of us presented the corporate image as well as an alter-ego. You can view these secondary personalities for our Technet team here. Just mouse over the presnter picture for a glimpse into our other selves…..
You can see our MSDN counterparts here….
Cheers!
First….the Bad…
In all my years of working with computers, I have never had a RAM chip go bad, in a machine, DURING normal operations. I have killed them off when swapping them. I have zapped them when laying out in the open. But never had one go bad, in the case, while performing it’s duties. But that is exactly what happened to my firewall server yesterday. Of course everything else is behind that server so when it died, my virtual world ceased to exist.
The Good…
I will have some additional downtime today. I am supposed to recieve two Buffalo Technologies 1.6 TB NAS boxes today.
That’s right……3.2 Terabytes of storage to ease my storage woes. I already have two terabytes scattered amongst the many machines that are on the network, but it has been quite cumbersome for a while now to remember what drives are where and more importantly, where I am putting things.
So that means some downtime later today as I move some things around and get a little better organized. Will post again when I have had a chance to play with the boxes and let you all know a mini-review of the Buffalo products.
Cheers!
Here are the slides for the Webcast we did this morning. I have added a couple extra decks that add some additional information for your use. If you are interested in seeing this session LIVE, check out www.technetevents.com for a live “Best Of SQL” event near you.
Cheers!
…via the Anti-Malware Engineering Team.
…and some information on disabling the ActiveX control that was later delivered by Sony that allows you to block this control.
Cheers!
If you have never had the pleasure of reading Rory’s blog, clear 3–5 minutes of your day and read this post……it will make you smile……
Breakthrough
Cheers!
I was recently notified I won a contest (that I didn’t know existed!) for most blog post hits for the month of October. Dean Andrew, a manager in our Technet Webcasts group, posted about my winnings.
The great thing about that particular post is that it was a post to help advertise a webcast for another team member.
Everybody Wins!
Cheers!
My co-worker and friend Michael Murphy is debuting the first of his Internet Radio series today with an interview with Bill Zack, co-author of Programming SQL 2005 (due out from MSPress early 2006).
From MJ’s site — “In keeping with that theme here is a 20 minute interview with Bill Zack, one of the co-authors of Programming SQL 2005 due out from MS Press early 2006. We spend the first five minutes discussing Bill's many other projects including his software architects User Group in Manhattan and get into a discussion of SQL 2005 at about the 4:45 mark.”
Chek it out!
Cheers!
I am back and catching up. I just posted a BUNCH of link posts to a variety of new downloads that have been made available over the past 3 weeks. Sorry to flood your feeds with all fo that but there was just so much good stuff to make people aware of.
My hands are actually cramping a little so I am going to take wrist saving “anti-carpal-tunnel” break, get some other work done and then post about what I have decided to to about my blog in the next few weeks.
Back in a bit!
Cheers!
I have been traveling….I have had countless con-calls….I have been in meetings….and when I have not been doing work related stuff I have been trying NOT to think about work. Thus, the inactivity on my blog.
I needed a little off time from blogging to decompress and set some priorities. We had a team meeting this past week which allowed me to vent a few frustrations, get some direction from my management and team members, and let off a little steam. It was good for me and I hope good for our team.
I have three things I am focusing on the next 1–2 months:
The next iteration of the Technet Resource DVD
The upcoming “Best of…. SQL!” events
The SQL 2005 Launch on December 6th
Technet Resource DVD – This is a DVD that gets handed out at our live events across the country. It is also available at trade shows and will be available at your local SQL Launch events. The DVD has a large number of resources to help the ITPro with everyday activities. It includes, whitepapers, technical specifications, webcasts, slides and demo shorts of the delivered presentations and much more.
Best Of….SQL! Events – Leading up to the SQL Launch we are delivering free technical sessions that were developed from some of the best SQL sessions we have run in the previous few months. You can check for where the events are in your part of the US here.
SQL 2005 Launch – For the SoCal area, we are on for December 6th at the Anaheim Convention Center. Don’t forget to Register online and show up at the event to get your free software!!!
Let me add a 4th area of focus as well….blogging….I am brainstorming with friends, acquaintances, co-workers on how to make our team blogs the #1 source of information for ITPros across the world. While this will be a learn as I go process, I want to assure you that I am doing everything I can to make this a valuable resource for you.
Any suggestions you have please send to me at chrisavi@microsoft.com !!
Cheers!
Whew! I am still travelling for another week and then I get some much needed downtime where I will be back in the swing and more active with my blogging again. Look for a few changes at the site in about two weeks!
Cheers!
…I am everywhere…..
I like to travel. Be it personal or work related I normally enjoy it. But I am burning out. I have done quite a bit of cross time zone travel the past month or two and it has worn me down. I am in Anchorage this week. Home on Friday. A week later I hit the East coast with my fiance to attend her mother’s wedding. On the way back I stop in Dallas for a week for a team meeting. Then I get a break…..no more cross time zone travel for about 6 weeks. It will be a working vacation of sorts where I get to spend some much needed home time with my bride to be, catch up on housework, and start blogging regularly again.
I have also given additional thought to how I blog and what I blog about. It isn’t like I want to be Scoble but I would like to increae readership with something valuable. I have been tossing around some media casting ideas with a couple of other co-workers which may come to fruition here in a couple weeks when my travel dies off. I am also going to do some regular posting around Group Policy and ISA. I will likely narrow my categories a little so if you have subscribed to any of the category feeds, please watch them over the next two weeks to see what if any changes I make.
More later…..
Cheers!
I have a problem.
I have a customer facing job and the distinct ability to forget someone’s name immediately after they say the final syllable. It is uncanny. Anything I can read or learn to help overcome this trait I try. Robert Scoble found this posting on “Listening to Customers” through Memeorandum. So I gave it a read. I was hoping it was an article on listening in the now and being able to retain information. Turns out the article was really about filtering who and what to listen to. Not what I hoped for but an excellent read.
The first thing I picked up was how similar the first section is to concepts in Malcom Gladwell’s “The Tipping Point”. The concept of early adopters and mavens is identified very early on in the book. I think these people should be listened to very carefully, but like Ken Norton notes, “…companies have been lured to their doom by a very small, well-meaning and vocal group of power users who fooled the company…”. The early adopters don’t have all the answers. Ken goes on to talk about Middle and Late adopters and identifies some of their traits. I think he is right on the mark.
After reading the post a second time, it jolted me because I sometimes think *I* have all the answers. *I* know what people want. *I* know this isn’t true, but I let myself believe it anyway. I need to spread myself out and talk to a wider audience. I need to listen to what they say and throw out some of the perceptions I have. Clean slate time.
I had an opportunity to do that this past weekend. Microsoft held an informal gathering of MS Developer Evangelists from all over the world (already in L.A. for the PDC) and local college students to brainstorm on “digital lifestyle”. I piggybacked on this from the ITPro side as I have a passion around getting our technologies in the hands of students. I wanted to know – straight from students – what they thought of Microsoft and the products we have.
Let’s jump back to the clean slate thing real quick.
I grew up in the old days of real “chalkboards” that used super-dusty chalk. None of this fancy, low dust stuff. Dry erase boards were a still a pipedream. The chalkboards we had were a dark, heavy black and the chalk was a blinding, dusty white. Anything written on the boards was NOT easy to remove. It took some effort to really get the chalk off. Forget about it if the eraser was choked up with chalk dust. To really get it clean you had to use a damp cloth.
I thought I had a clean slate when I sat in on this meeting. Turns out I used an eraser instead of a damp cloth so I still had remnants lurking around my brain. Perceptions of students that just weren’t accurate.
As Ken Norton and Malcom Gladwell note, there are early adopters. In the computer world these are the uber-geeks that must have the beta before anyone else. They will gladly take an alpha as well. Thankfully, we did not have a room of uber-geeks. We had a room with some geeks, some developer students and then……miracle of miracles……history majors, pre-law, language majors and others. My first blown perception was that ONLY CompSci students would want to attend. Thankfully, we had an excellent mix.
My second blown perception was this: I thought the students would have heard about all of the products we have released and already made a choice on using the product or learning more about them. I was shocked and amazed when I spoke to three students together (2 – CompSci, 1 – Political Science) and none of them had heard of Media Center. I was even more shocked when they reacted to it as a very cool product they would use regularly (had they heard about it before now). Isn’t this part of our target market – students who need a PC and a digital media device when they leave home for school?
With that I whipped out the damp cloth and wiped away anything I thought I knew about the students and what they knew about our products. The only thing I was dead on about was the “hip and cool” factor. It does play a big part in product perception. From the students –
iPods are hip and cool (and very much associated with Apple) and….they just work (till they break). Windows is not cool. Office is cool, but only because you can’t survive as a student without it. Linux users are perceived as hip and cool (and knowledgeable) because they know more than just Windows and Office. Linux is cool because it is new and different (though none of the 6 students I talked to had ever used it). Microsoft is perceived as the “grandma company” and Windows as “grandma’s operating system”. Ouch. “If your friends think it is cool, you probably will too.” (peer-to-peer marketing). Apple makes “cool” products and students know what those products are. Microsoft makes Windows and Office. Beyond that the association of Product Name to Microsoft trails off very quickly. (Wouldn’t it be great if we (MS) were more identifiable as one of the companies that made some of their cell phones work!?!?!). Oh yeah. Microsoft is Evil. But I never got a clear answer as to why. (Peer-to-peer perception spreading).
It was quite refreshing to hear all of this from a group other than the ITPros I speak to most every other day. The “I work in the field” ITPros know what MS products are and how they are used. Some think MS is evil but for different reasons than “my friend says so, so it must be” (though I would argue that this form of peer-to-peer perception spreading is a lot more prevalent than we realize). But I build my own perceptions about how the industry perceives Microsoft around the ITPros I am primarily connected to. The fact is, we have a 90%+ share of the home user/desktop market and they have a lot of spending dollars. We need to listen to them (and all the sub-groups) as well.
BTW…..There was a lot more valuable stuff in this brainstorming session besides the cool factor, but this post is already longer than I wanted.
What all of this boils down to is making sure when I decide to wipe slates clean that I use a damp cloth instead of a chalk laden eraser. There exist groups other than the ITPros I speak to that can give some excellent feedback on our products. I am going to keep my eyes and ears open.
Cheers!
I was fixing the color on my iPaq Camera this morning while I was connected to it with SOTI and snapped this picture. I have alwas liked the redundant, infinite, self creating, whatever you want to call it pictures like this so I would share.
Along the same lines is a site I stumbled on sometime ago called the The Infinite Cat Project.
Finally, while I was cruising around the web trying to find a picture to help represent database mirroring in SQL 2005, I stumbled across the Mirror Project.
Cheers!
PDC starts up Monday in LA. I have other commitments though so I won’t be there. Many of our MSDN presenters will though so look for them. BillG will be keynoting and it will be broacast live on the web. It is supposed to be accessible though this link but It doesn’t appear to be active yet.
Tuesday I am delivering Rock Solid SQL for a HUGE crowd in Irvine, Ca.
Wednesday I go to the doctor to have him say: “Chris, your cholesterol is to high, you don’t exercise enough, and you need to wear sunscreen when you are outside. Oh yeah, your are going to be 40 next visit so we get to start the fun tests……”
ugh….
Thursday I do Rock Solid SQL in San Diego, Ca.
Friday I have a webcast – Part 2 of Understanding Group Policy
I will post as I get to come up for air…..
Cheers!
I woke up this morning, made coffee, showered, shaved, started reading some blog news, and unltimately got smacked in the face with an awesome wake-up call.
I was reading Rory’s latest posting about a blog called Mini-Microsoft. Rory says it is the most important Microsoft blog there is. I am not going to follow that line until I have read a bunch more MS related blogs. Mini-MS *is* the most interesting and thought provoking read so far though.
Mini-Microsoft stirs up some emotional issues regarding employee morale, review compensation and broken processes. All things a bunch (not all ,unfortunately…) of us at Microsoft think about but rarely voice.
I am not going to go on and on and on singing the praises of the 6 or 7 most recent posts I read. I want you to read and make your own decision on how good they are and how important they are. I will only say one thing about it because this is a hot-spot for me…..
The posts are anonymous. I understand why. Being opinionated and being a blogger doesn’t always mix very well. We all need the freedom to be critical (not malicious), and honest (though tempered) about our work places. Most of us choose to work somewhere for a reason. For those of us that have chosen to work somewhere because of the mission of the company, we should be allowed to provide input and direction if we think the company is beginning to stray from that mission. We should not be afraid being smacked down for offering up honest opinions and thoughful resolutions to problems we see. We should be able to do this whether we are a shipping clerk or a public figure without fear of unemployment.
Someday….
Cheers!
We now have registration cities and dates available for the Big Launch……
Here is a challenge to my faithful blog readers (now up to 7!)……
I want the largest attendance of any of the nationwide events. For the SoCal area it will be in Anaheim, CA on Dec. 6th. I wish I could offer some sort of prize to everyone if Anaheim has the largest attendance but sadly, my budget is about $1 dollar……and that has to cover my T&E for the next 10 months.
Fortunately, EVERYONE that attends will recieve a copy of SQL Server 2005 AND a copy of Visual Studio 2005. I think that is a darn good incentive to go……considering the event is FREE. Of course there is some legal mumbo jumbo that applies to this so let’s break away from our regularly scheduled program to get that over with…..
*Offer only good to registered launch event attendees. Must be present at event to receive software packages or vouchers for software redemption. Limit: one offer per person, while supplies last. The software may not be resold and is not redeemable for cash. Taxes, if any, are the sole responsibility of the recipient*
(I read that as – register, show up, get it, don’t try to sell it afterwards…..but I am not a lawyer)
So……for my SoCal SQL people (and you Dev types and Biztalkers)….tell your boss know you need a paid day off to learn cool stuff. Tell your friends, tell your User Groups, tell your grandma and grandpa, put in for a day of vacation if your boss won’t pay ya to learn. Link to my blog, post to your blogs, chat about it, get a tattoo with the regostration link……well……a temporary tattoo. Make the Anaheim event the largest of the events in the states. Get your free stuff, meet the SQL/VS/Biztalk Gurus and yes…..I will even be there.
I just had a fabulous idea……(”The Nun” won’t like it……but she isn’t home to stop me…..)
If, after the counting is all done (sometime after the January 11th event), Anaheim has the largest attendance in the states, I will let one of my attendees shave my head at one of my Live Technet briefings in SoCal……I will even let my hair grow out till then for a more dramatic shave if it happens….
I better post this……she is pulling into the driveway…..
Cheers!
*update* - I just realized the Anaheim event could be the most attended event without this post. We do have a pretty darn good marketing machine at MS. Since there is no easy way to know for sure and I am committed, I am just gonna run with it. I would like to see how much impact this challenge generates though. My request to you is to post your comments here if you will be attending, and make an effort to come see me at the event. When I have the details, I will post what I will be doing at the launch event and where I will be. My goal is to meet you, get you the information you want, and take your feedback into the product groups. So post your comments (Thank you Sylvia!), email me, come see me at the event!
I took a break from blogging over the long weekend and gave some thought to how I have been posting so far and the direction I want to take in the future.
I don’t want to be a geek all the time. I think the geek blogs that are “all geek and nothing but the geek, so help me Bill” are boring. I also know that posting about my exploits at a Karaoke bar, or the history of how I started working at Microsoft (yet to be posted) only succeed in complimenting my own narcissistic view of…..me.
I want to offer some quality “how to” advice for my community while also being a human. I think a good mix of both is the way to go. I don’t want to make assumptions about what the ITPro community needs to know about though. I want your feedback on what you need.
If you haven’t noticed yet, I allow comments to my posts.
I want you to use them.
I want to know what your thoughts are about something I have posted. I also want to know what you would like to get information about. If you don’t want to post a comment for all the world to see (and provide their own comments about) then email me – chrisavi@microsoft.com – I don’t get paid enough (nor am I important enough) to have my own admin or secretary so I answer all my email myself.
Tell me what you need and I will do my best to fulfill your request.
Cheers!
Okay….I am hooked on this thing already.
In the 10 years I have been working on the web, I have only had 3 different home pages for any substantial length of time. In order…..Yahoo!, MSNBC, Google, back to MSNBC. I have always liked reading Internet based news and so MSNBC so far holds the record at close to 5 of the 10 years as my home page. I read other sites but I liked the format of MSNBC so I kept it and branched out from there.
Start is my new home page.
Start accepts RSS feeds so now I am able to add and organize a bunch of feeds the way I like them on a web page that I can access from anywhere. I can also add weather, stock quotes, and a few other goodies from a canned menu provided by Start. I have just spent the last hour or so adding feeds and organizing it the way I like it.
huh? an hour?
Yeah…..I have never been much of a blogger and as a result, not much of a blog reader. So I decided I needed to expand my horizons at the same time I was configuring my Start site. As I searched for some blogs I wanted to add I ended up reading some of them and it took me longer than expected to get my page set up.
I have no idea how long it would takle some one who has a bazillion feeds they read to get setup. I just figured after an hour I needed a break from reading and I wanted to post about what I had stumbled on so far.
I like the Start site. Simple, clean, easy to set up, drag and drop enabled for organizing and a couple of themes so I have some control over look. The coolerest (yeah….coolerest!) thing is being able to shrink down the sumary of the feeds, close the page, re-open and they are still shrunk. I can cram a BUNCH of feeds on the page and expand/collapse as needed.
It does have a few quirks though…..
I had to delete my cookies to get the page to reset after I hosed it all up while playing around. No big deal really as I needed to get the crumbs out of my system anyway.
I can add stock quotes and weather sites but I can’t find a way to remove any I don’t want any longer.
It seems a little plain after having MSNBC for such a long time and seeing pictures on a home page. Yeah….I am all about the pictures (now that I typed that, does Playboy have an RSS feed?……well, yes….they do…..). Maybe let me lick to a URL based pick so i can decorate my site some (no….not Playboy)
Check out Start when you get a chance. I think you will like it.
Cheers!
While bouncing around the web today (or tomorrow or the next day or…..) Drop in on start.com. You can add feeds, news links, localized weather and other web information through a very easy to use interface. It will require (bummer!) a Passport account but I am overlooking that for now because of the usefulness of the Start site.
The site can be themed and you can even change the columns that are presented to you. Fascinating to me the amount of control I have over it.
I have not had a chance to make use of all of the features yet to give a proper review so I have set aside some time to accomplish that tonight. So far, very, very promising….check it out and let me know here what you think.
The group that is working on start.com also has a blog where they allow feedback on site features and post updates to what is happening with the site. Check them out….
Cheers!
Jesper Johansson recently started blogging. He is a Sr. Program Manager in the MS Security Business Unit. If you want to know the straight dope on security, he knows it.
Steve Riley is also a Sr. PM in the SBU. I have seen Steve present and I have to admit to borrowing some of his analogies for my own sessions. Great stuff….
Cheers!
....and as a naturalized Texan I should never have had any pre-conceived notions about how the evening would turn out.
Southern California has made me soft which is something I thought only happened north of Bakersfield.
My sincerest apologies to my southern brethren....
(btw....waiting on my Colorado Omellete, hashbrowns and grits at IHOP)
Jett, the owner of Hawaiian Don's is a kick as KJ and the owner of the place. In spite of being a mile from OSU, he has nice little place that defies the sterotypes that anyone may wish to apply. Sure, plenty of country music gets played and mimiced by the above average crowd. But they seem to be regulars and very comfortable with Jett and each other.
Jason and Will are the only two names the Jaegermeister will let me remember right now (I may need to read this in the morning to remember them further) and they sang very well. Will's rendition of some Snoop Dogg track more than impressed me after hearing him pump out several country tracks.
Fushizzle to the hizzy bizzle my bruthizzles.
I managed to get in the following -
Chris Isaak - Wicked Game (last minute change from 'Drive')
Journey - Faithfullly
Jet - Are You Gonna Be My Girl
Hoobastank - The Reason
If you happen to be on OK City any time soom, ignore the fact that OSU is spittin' distance away (go Longhorns!) and look the place up.
Good unfiltered wheat beer, lotsa tracks, good people and......jaeger.
Rock On....
Cheers!
....I just found the menu - the list of tracks they have - and they have a kick ass selection.....
'Hollaback Girl' playing on the jukebox...
Opening with....Incubus - 'Drive'
Rest of the set list in the morning...
Cheers again!
Here I am in a bar callled "Hawaiian Don's" about 1 mile away from OSU waiting for the KJ to show up.
There are roughly 30 college students drinking a wide and varied assortment of drinks that serve no other purpose than to lessen inhibitions and relieve the stress of college life.
It is 9:39pm, the karaoke starts at 10:00pm, and I am tapping this out with one hand while I nurse a Shiner Bock wiith the other.
I am one shot of jaeger into the evening and dipping into the sordid conversations around me...
The crowd is about 40% men, 60% girls on cell phones.
I found this place by way of the very, very southern front desk attendant at the hotel I am staying at. I should have known I was in trouble right after I asked, "Do you know of a GOOD karaoke bar around here?" and the reply after the extended perplexed look (i am 6'4"...wearing a tye dye t-shirt and flip-flops) then the reply...."Well, there is this place over by OSU...."
I probably should have called it a night......but here I am.
I adriving the only car in the parking lot.....trucks being the only known form of transport in these here parts.....and I have yet to hear anything but country from the jukebox.....
I suppose I will have to bust out my Lonestar, Vince Gill and Garth Brooks....
Gonna throw in my rendition of Baby Got Back just to see what happens.....
6'4....
Tye dye....
Flip flops.....
Here comes the KJ....Should be a fun night.... :)
Cheers!
6:20am – UA Flight # 77 – Seat 11c
Destination: Dallas by way of Denver
Note One – I have discovered I can’t write a short blog entry. I am the Stephen King of bloggers - in length only, not style, creativity or quality.
Note Two – I started this blog on the said flight, I finished it 1 day later in the airport waiting for a flight to Oklahoma City.
Connecting through Denver made me thing back to when I used to live here. I actually lived out in the burbs in Littleton, Co - the home of Columbine High School. I went to school there in 1979 and that is where I really discovered computers.
A friend of mine (okay….let me confess….a guy I played Dungeons and Dragons with) had some computer stuff at home. I think it was actually his fathers but *I* got to touch it so it didn’t matter. If I remember correctly, he used to make D&D player sheets on the computer and print them out. They were (in retrospect) horribly formatted, dot matrix print-outs that weren’t the nice 8.5 x 11 sheets we have today. These were the giant daisy-wheel print outs that had the perforated edges and tops that always seemed to rip into the part of the paper that was important when you tried to separate them.
At the time they were the best player sheets on the planet.
This same guy also introduced me to the computer lab (more like a computer closet) at Columbine. A magical place where there existed an old Hazeltine machine with it’s glowing, yellow-green phosphorous screen, and a couple of other machines that I don’t remember the names of. He got me in that computer lab, my eyes glazed over, and here I am today – blogging at 35,000 feet (and wrapping up in Terminal B at DFW).
The Hazeltine, while more “advanced”, was not my favorite machine in the lab closet. There were two other, much less modern machines as well. They were teletype machines that had large paper rolls in them – no screens. Everything you typed on the extremely loud keyboards was echoed to paper in typewriter fashion. They also had modems attached to them. Not the single board, internal, mini–modems of today. These were monstrous, external, acoustic coupler modems. There were two of these behemoths – one for each teletype – and each also had their own rotary dial telephone sitting next to it. It seemed like it took a full minute to dial a 7 digit number on these things. A decade if the number had a couple of 9’s in it. My friend showed me how to start the teletype, dial the mainframe phone number, listen for the other end to screech back (I always thought of it as a phone chicken), and then place the phone into the giant rubber cups. A few minutes later the teletype would spit out a bunch of stuff that indicated it was ready to accept commands, and then……joy of joys…..I had access to Star Trek and Wumpus.
I was hooked.
I loved playing Star Trek and Wumpus on those old machines. There was certain level of excitement in waiting for the slow teletype to spit out the new x/y graph of where you had moved your ship to. The anticipation of waiting to see if a Klingon ship, denoted by the letter “K” in our version, would get printed out on the paper and give me something to attack. Or, I would make a move and then have to wait another 30 seconds for that move to be printed out. Another move, another 30 seconds. Another move, another 30 seconds……damn……warped into a star.
Same thing with Wumpus. Type “N” to move north, wait 30 seconds for the machine to print out that I had exits to the S and W. Move West, wait 30 seconds to be told I had exits to the E, W, and N.
Uh oh……I hear a Wumpus.
Shoot an arrow W, wait 30 seconds, find out the arrow bounced back and killed me.
Good Times…….Good Times.
These machines were old. Not just 1979 old, but early 70’s old. Possibly even the 60’s old. There were much more modern machines I had access to in that day. The TRS-80 at the local Radio Shack (more on that later). If the family made a day trip to the mall I had access to Space Invaders, a cycle jump game where the motorcycle criss-crossed the screen top to bottom until on the last pass you had to jump over barrels or cars and attempt to land on the opposite ramp (I never did well at that game) and of course…..PONG. There were other cool games too but I can’t remember all of them. Compared to the teletypes I played Wumpus on, Space invaders was Star Wars like futuristic. I was pretty darn good at Space invaders…..figured out to shoot X number of times, wait, shoot the ship, get the big bonus, shoot a few invaders, wait, shoot the ship, get the big bonus, repeat, repeat, repeat. As fun as it was pumping quarters (and a single quarter per game, mind you!) into the arcade games, the teletypes had an appeal the arcade games lacked…..
Programmability.
Not only could I access the mainframe to play games, but the teletypes also had a means of accessing a programming environment which, as far as I can remember, was BASIC. I was able to write simple programs to make the teletype print what I wanted it to on the screen. I wrote a very simple program that let you ask questions and it would offer replies. It only had maybe 5 replies and everything you typed in, it considered a question…..
User – HELLO?
Computer – HELLO!
User – WHO ARE YOU?
Computer – HOW ARE YOU TODAY?
User – I AM FINE. WHO ARE YOU?
Computer – HELLO!
User – I ASKED WHO YOU ARE. ARE YOU STUPID?
Computer – HOW IS THE WEATHER?
User – YOU SUCK!
Computer – HELLO!
I never was a good programmer…….
I did write a nice little practical joke version of it though. There were different people that would check the lab in the mornings. If I knew who that person was I program a little “good morning program” and leave it “running” on the machine over night. When the victim arrived in the morning and pressed any key on the teletype….
Computer - “GOOD MORNING! YOU LOOK WELL TODAY, MRS. JOHNSON! I LIKE THE OUTFIT YOU PICKED TODAY!”.
I would try to get there early to see the response and most of the time it was a look of amazement and then a tinge of what might be construed as unease. Back in those days, human computer interaction was still associated with HAL from the movie “2001”. It creeped some people out. There would be a quick realization it was a prank of sorts which ended when the victim lifted the phone from the coupler. In one case, much to my delight, it resulted in a look of true ear and the machine getting unplugged from the wall.
Good Times……
Even with all that fun to be had, my absolute favorite thing about the old teletypes was the paper tape puncher/reader they had. Whatever you programmed on the mainframe you could have sent to the puncher/reader and it would punch holes in the one inch wide, yellow tape to represent the code. I liked it as much for all the confetti dots it created which were devilishly difficult to remove from heavily sprayed hair…..or so I heard (whistle…) (I was in 9th grade……gimme a break!). I think my most creative version of my human/computer interaction program required a couple hundred feet of paper tape to store. It took what seemed like eons for it to create the tape. It took the same amount of time to read it back in and transmit back to the mainframe. But it was a record of what I created.
Good Times…..
A few months later, my family moved to Edgewood, MD and I lost access to a computer of any kind (except for playing Asteroids, Pac Man, Space Invaders et al, and of course…..my Atari 2600) until my 11th grade year. By this time it was 1981, Disco was (thankfully!) dying, AC/DC, Pink Floyd, and the Cars were my fave music, and the Rubik’s Cube Craze was in full swing. My school (Edgewood HS) had a computer lab and I managed to get into a Computer Math class. They had a gigantic machine – I have no idea what it was – but it was the old switch and button type with the punch cards.
I never played with it. Why?
Because my first day in the lab I saw someone playing “Adventure” on an Apple ][. I was a Dungeons and Dragons player and this was like heaven for me. Best of all, it was a computer that could be purchased for use at home AND it had <drum roll please> a color screen! And not just a color screen but <drum roll please> 16 colors! (I didn’t know until after I started working at Microsoft some 13 years later that it was a Microsoft game…..thank you Uncle Bill).
I begged my father for an Apple ][. But with myself and 3 brothers, it just wasn’t happening. So I spent as much time as I could during and after school playing Adventure, learning DOS and BASIC. I wrote a dating program (didn’t work for me), a more advanced computer/human interaction program, and my crowning achievement, an application that simulated working a Rubik’s Cube. That simulator was slower than a TSA security checkpoint at LAX, but it worked (in color!) and gave me a reason to be in the lab……
All good things have to come to an end though. My family moved again, this time to Arlington, TX. I had copied all of my programs to floppy and convinced my teacher to let me take them with me. Those 5¼ floppies were expensive back in 1982 so it was awesome cool of him to let me take them.
Upon arriving to my senior year at James Bowie High School, Arlington, Tx, graduating class of nineteen hundred and eighty-three, I discovered there were more than just Hazeltines, teletypes and monstrous punchcard spewing COBOL machines in the world. I knew this already, but really didn’t have much interest in the TRS-80 (it just didn’t look cool) or the Commodore PET (a PET computer?!?!?!). But that is exactly what we ended up with. The new school had the Commodores, which were actually an annoying step backward in my opinion. My Apple floppies were worthless in them not just because they weren’t compatible, but because they didn’t have floppies. These things had cassette tapes for data storage. Ugh. But I adapted for the one year I was at the school. BASIC was still basic with a few changes, and I started doing some machine language programming and playing with PEEKs and POKEs. I learned that machine language was much faster than BASIC and could be more powerful if you could figure things out.
This great about the middle of my senior year because I managed to get my hands on an Apple //+. The processor was similar (6502) and I started doing some machine language programming on it and subscribed to some Apple related computer mags. They had some cool machine language entry programs that check-summed your line entries so you could see if you made a mistake. That made things simpler but I didn’t learn a lot form them because they didn’t explain what I was typing. I stagnated a little until….
I discovered it had a modem in it. And not just any modem, but an Apple Cat. For the first time in almost 4 years that I could dial into another machine again. Only now, I could dial into a BBS. One that was run on an Apple. One that other Apple Users also dialed into and shared information with each other. The world opened up for me……
Good Times……
<to be continued>
Pseudo Epilogue – The guys I played Dungeons and Dragons with in Littleton, Co – Eric Geisking, Greg “Gonzo” Gonzalez and a non-player, Eric Watts – drop me a line sometime if you stumble upon this. It would be great to hear from you. (I will update the other names when I get home and have a chance to look at my yearbook…..many moons have passed and I have had a few beers since 1979…)
As promised on my webcast from this morning, here are some resources on the Security enhancements to SP1 as well as some specific docs around Quarantine Services.
These documents are VERY high level. Overviews really. No meat, just gravy. Oh yeah, we can do Quarantine Control on the LAN as well.
What is Remote Access Quarantine Control?
Planning for Network Access Quarantine Control
Configuring Network Access Quarantine Control
This Document adds some potatoes to the Quarantine meal…..
Implementing Quarantine Services with VPN Guide
Now the Meat!!!!
Step-By-Step Guide for setting up Quarantine services in a LAB
Step-Bt-Step Guide for deploy Remote Access Policies with RRAS
VPN Quarantine Sample Scripts I used in the demo
VPN Quarantine and ISA 2004
I believe Paul (or was it Raul?) asked about using RSA SecureID and VPN – Here ya go!
Cheers!
I am getting into this blogging thing....
In fact, consider this my replacement for all the FPS games I gave up a couple years back because they were just too addictive for me. (I did jump back into the fray for Halo 2 but I avoided XBox live with it.....I would have fallen in and never returned...)
I am one of those people you know that has some goofball idea or lopsided opinion about something almost ALL of the time. I am also one of those people that has an idea or a thought, I expend a lot of mental energy fleshing it out, I make a feeble effort to remember what it all is, and then I promptly forget it (I grew up in the 70's.....what can I say...) My Pocket PC has been a god-send because it allows me to jot a quick note or type up the details and now I get to forget about it only to stumble on it later.
I have been taking some of those notes and converting them to blogs for the past couple weeks.
But have you ever had one of those moments where an idea or thought hits you that is so amazing (to you)....so astounding (to you)....so utterly stupendous (to you) that you felt you had to tell someone, right then, that moment, or else the thought would be lost in time and lose it's impact if even a single minute were to pass?
That is me all of the time....
My Pocket PC is nice enough to have WiFi and GPRS as well as Bluetooth. In short, I can be connected to the Internet (and my blog) all the time if I want. In my hands I have the perfect outlet for my ravings.
But, as anyone with a Pocket PC will tell you, browsing the web, even with the decent sized screen on an iPaq, leaves something to be desired if the site is not mobile device aware.
My Pocket PC has a browser.....can I blog with it? Sure..... as long as I don't mind spending half my time scrolling all over the screen to check formating and trying to find the damn "submit" button. It reminds me of the early web days when many people still had small monitors with a max (readable) resolution of 800x600 and you would hit a site formatted for 1024x768.
Beyond !@#*ing annoying.
So I set out on a hunt this afternoon to find a PPC based blogging app that I could actually use. The search literally took about 1 second. I went to http://search.msn.com, used "Pocket PC Blogging" as my query and 1 second later, hit number 1 was for the tool I am using right now to write this post.
Kevin Daly is the coder and has written a nice PPC blogging application called "Diarist". What caught my eye, and the reason I downloaded the first tool I hit, is the tool supports Community Server Web Posting as well as it's MetaBlog API which is what I use on my site.
The tool comes in two versions (I am using 1.1) and each version has an .MSI install version and a .CAB install (I grabbed the .MSI). It installed perfectly to my iPaq 6315 to the default directory. I am going to play around later with installing it to my storage card.
It has a very simple interface (nice!) and an easy to use lay out. It supports
hyperlinking,
basic text markup and assigning multiple categories to a single posting which *I* find invaluable. It even allows you to link to a picture.....I just didn't have one handy. If I had one suggestion to offer it would be to allow the categories windows to be static once opened so I could pick multiple categories without having to re-open the window. Hardly a show stopper.
Make that two suggestions - I was going to take a break from writing this post but couldn't find an obvious method of saving what I have written so far just in case something flakes out. Cut and paste to a text doc kept me from worrying but it would be nice to be able to save it through the app for later editing.
I think one of the best features of the app is the support for a fairly wide range of blog site providers. I intentionally ignored blogging matters for years. Over time I picked up the names of the popular providers and many are listed in the configuration setup. If *I* have heard of them then the TRUE bloggers certainly have heard of them.
The number one best feature of the app - it just works. Very little config, not a lot of setup involved, and seemingly little footprint on my PPC.
I should mention that on Kevin's site he states very plainly to read the README.TXT file that comes with the app. I second that motion. I am your typical "just get in the car, screw the map" kind of guy. I was initially stumped when comparing the Diarist setup to my BlogJet configuration and that didn't get me connected to my server. A quick glance at the README took care of that and I was up and running within 15 minutes of download (1 minute of reading the README...)
To be fair, this is the ONLY PPC based blogging app I have downloaded so far. No doubt there are others. I will probably spend some time this weekend looking for a few others to test. But this one hit the mark out of the gate and set a pretty high bar.
Rockin...
Cheers!
<clicking Post.....NOW!>
<first…….go grab yourself a 6 pack….this is a long one>
<beer 1>
I admit it…..I am a SQL n00b…..So I am taking a SQL 2072 course next week in Oklahoma City.
Go ahead…..I know you want to…..have your chuckle about how Oklahoma sucks and you know it does cuz that is the only thing that keeps Texas from falling into the Gulf of Mexico.
I like that joke btw…..BUT!
The fact is, I will be learning more about SQL in one week…..in Oklahoma…...than I have in the past 10 years.
<beer 2…..you know you chugged the first one right after you saw “Oklahoma” and “Texas”>
On a personal level, I have had zero use for SQL. For that matter I have had zero use for databases of any kind for the last 10 years or so. I used to have an Access (95) DB years ago. The only reason I had that one was to make an attempt at moving my fantasy football league over from AppleWorks and my Apple //gs to my brand spanking new AMD 486–120 (I still have that machine and I still use it now and then….it posts and boots to a Win95 OSR2 desktop faster than most of my gHz boxes get to WinXP) ((I also have my Apple //gs still which comes in handy for playing Wizardry!))
Wow…..I feel like I just jumped into the way-back machine with my pet boy, Sherman…..but I digress….
I tried to port my fantasy football league over from AppleWorks (which I loved) to Access (which I hated). I didn’t know I hated it until after trying to figure it out. I never did get comfortable with Access but I blame the simplicity of using AppleWorks on that.
Now I find myself in the position of having to learn SQL for my job….which isn’t a bad thing. It’s not like I haven’t been in a similar position about every two weeks for the last 8 years with the monstrous number of products and technologies we churn out. I believe anyone at Microsoft will tell you “If you don’t like learning new stuff, you work at the wrong company”.
I have just never had a use for or had to learn SQL…..till now.
In 1994, I never imagined that a database application – one that could essentially run on a home PC – would be capable of storing and querying the massive amounts of data that SQL can today. Of course, in 1994 I never imagined that I would need more than 200 megs of hard drive space or that my 5 1/4 floppy would be useless in just a couple of years. Back then, it would take my Apple //gs (which had an Applied Engineering TransWarp GS Accelerator) 30 minutes to parse the AppleWorks database and create the scoring report for my 10 team fantasy football league. It took well over an hour if I turned the TransWarp “off”. That database only held a few hundred players with weekly – not cumulative – stats in it. Today www.fanball.com supports hundreds of individual leagues, each determining their own scoring method, players rosters, play off schedules and ALL with the ability to provide immediate scoring information.
And that is just the football portion of their site. They also do baseball.
All that accessibility……all of those stats…….all of that FOOTBALL!!!!!….because of a database….
<beer 3…..come on…..we have a football related topic here>
*Note* – I don’t know what database Fanball uses…..for all I know they have linked a couple thousand TransWarped Apple //gs machines together and have Wozniak on the payroll….The point I am trying to make it how far we have come……
Now…..I was semi–advanced back then. On my Apple //gs I actually had two 5 1/4 floppies AND two 3.5 floppies. I even had two SCSI hard drives but I used most of the hard drive space for my BBS. The fantasy football stuff was pretty small and I wanted to make use of the 5 1/4’s as long as I could so I ran AppleWorks from the 3.5’s and stored the football stats on the 5 1/4’s. I learned a few tricks in those days…..you could notch the floppy disks with a $5 disk notcher (or a pocket knife if you were lazy) and use both sides. This allowed me to use both sides of the floppy – doubling storage capacity – AND it saved me money which I desperately needed for beer. But it always seemed to reduce the reliability of the floppy disks. It certainly shortened their life spans. But even on an un-notched disk, sneeze the wrong way and those old floppies would scramble data faster than a Waffle House cook does eggs. That meant manually backing up data to another floppy. I usually made yet another copy just in case (I almost always sneeze in pairs…) THAT was how I backed up my data and guaranteed it was accessible when I needed it.
Now, with SQL 2005, we have things like log shipping and peer-to-peer replication. Magical, wondrous, computer voodoo to someone who manually made 3 copies of their data just in case it was allergy season.
But my favorite way to guarantee that SQL 2005 guarantees data is protected (and ALWAYS available!) is - mirroring with automatic failover.
If, like me, you are new to SQL/Databases (or just haven’t been exposed to SQL 2005 yet), let me offer a very simplified explanation of what is involved.
For database mirroring with automatic failover to work, you need….take a deep breathe…..relax……<grab your beer so you don’t commit alcohol abuse>…….three (3) SQL Servers……
<finish beer 4, grab beer 5 but don’t open yet…..>
….I know you winced. You may have blown beer out your nose. Some of you may have even decided to quit your job as a SQL DBA and (gasp!) become a SQL Developer…..
Let me finish and then I will tell you a little secret that may save you some beer money…..
….breathe……relax…..
<bathroom break>
<beer 5……nurse it>
Server 1 is the “primary” or “principal” database server. It is the machine you want up 24/7. It is the “all the eggs in one basket” machine. It is online and active and is the DB server that all of your applications are writing to and reading from. The apps have no concept of any additional servers in the mix.
Server 2 is the “backup” or “mirror” database server. It *must* start off with an exact copy of the primary database data. Simplest thing is to just restore a backup of the primary to this machine. There is some planning involved here to make sure this DB has the exact same data as the primary….but I only had you grab a 6 pack. For the 12 pack version come to a Live Technet briefing or find a local SQL 2005 Roadshow or SQL Launch Event or read this.
As our applications are reading and writing data on Server 1, we will commit the transactions at both servers at the same time (technically we don’t commit to the primary until we can commit to both at the same time). This can introduce some latency so monitor your network especially if you have bandwidth concerns. The trade off is availability and redundancy.
Server 3 is called a “witness” server. The witness server is essentially the innocent by-stander at the scene of the server failure crime. It’s purpose is to just keep an eye on both servers and determine if one or the other goes offline. if one goes off line it notifies the other that it is now the primary. If the original primary comes back it notifies the servers and we can switch roles again after data is back in sync.
So you decide to implement this solution. You go purchase a SQL 2005 Enterprise license. Cough of the same amount for the Backup server license, Then you grab SQL 2005 Express edition as a witness server.
<waitadamnminute….. beer muffs must have distorted my hearing>
Did I just say you could use SQL 2005 Express Edition as the witness server to a SQL 2005 Enterprise mirror?
Yes I did.
No need to have an Enterprise class server twiddling it’s thumbs and keeping an eye on two other servers. Use it’s little brother to do that job…..you can even fudge things a little and have a second instance on the primary or backup server act as a witness but if that dual-role server goes offline you won’t be failing over automagically. Just so ya know….ANY version of SQL 2005 can act as a witness.
How far have we come in just 10 years…..
<beer 6>
Enjoy at your leisure……
Cheers!
I have been wondering about our (humans) dependence on technology a lot lately. Particularly electronic technology. Since these devices all rely on electricity, and solar power just isn’t up to snuff, what is going to happen when we do finally run out of petroleum and coal to generate electricity to power all of the electronics we have so blindly come to rely on? (I am sure we will come up with other power solutions…..but what if?)
While pondering this one day, it made me think back to the 1983 movie Wargames where the scientist that created the WOPR computer had gone into isolation and shunned technology (except for his radio controlled pterodactyl…) Personally, I think it is almost completely impossible (as an American) to eliminate all use of electronic gadgets and doo-dads. Even the simplest of items our lives have some electronic component…..I even have a pen with an LCD clock in it that I picked up at some trade show. I call that a waste of technology.
So I decided to do an experiment. This past weekend I made a promise to myself —
Don’t use ANY computers and avoid electronics whenever possible.
Here is some minor detail about what I had to work around…..
My kitchen stove has a computer that senses temperature – I used the grill. (I grilled BBQ Beef Ribs for the first time ever on Sunday night…...I used a Raspberry Chipotle BBQ sauce……phenomenal!)
My Jeep has computers that sense fuel consumption, cruise control, anti-lock brakes, etc – I drove my 1972 Citroen 2cv all weekend. (it has electrical components but there isn’t a circuit board to be found in the car) Problem is, the 2cv is in the garage – which has an opener and a remote – so I unplugged the opener and used the manual garage release….
My primary phone is an old Microsoft MP-900. It is connected to a Windows 98 box — So I let the fiancé answer/make all the calls over the weekend I just yelled at a distance…..(btw…..my cell phone has ZERO signal at the house….so that part was easy!)
My alarm clock……I just didn’t set it. I am a morning person….up at 6am Sat, 6:30a Sun and 4:50a Mon, and 4:30a today….can you say…..in-som-ni-ac?
I am a coffee drinker but the coffee maker has electronics. I think the coffee grinder probably does too. Jeanne made the coffee for me. But I would have cracked on that one anyway.
Even my ceiling fans are electronically controlled – but it was already on so I just didn’t touch it.
I didn’t blog over the weekend. For those of you that MUST BLOG EVERY 3 MINUTES……I survived without any withdrawal symptoms. BUT, I have only been blogging for a coupla weeks. I am hardly addicted……yet.
I live in Southern California, and I don’t regularly use the A/C anyway. Just open the doors and windows. 84 in the living room. It’s a dry heat.
I usually do most of the cooking, but that would have involved opening the electronically controlled fridge or the freezer…so, with the exception of the ribs, I got out of cooking over the weekend…..
The hot water heater is electronically controlled……checked that AFTER taking a shower…..decided I continue to indulge myself on that one.
Nose Hair trimmer…..electronic. Deal with it……..
I must admit one blatant computer usage – I have Windows Media Center that I use for ALL of my media storage. I ordered “The 4400: Season 1” from Netflix a week ago and spent Sunday night with a strong pitcher of margaritas (and the ribs!) catching up. That meant using the TV and the remote….all electronic….
I think you get the picture. It was interesting for a weekend. I would hardly want to go for a month or more unless it was part of a reality show and they allowed NORMAL looking people on.
Yeah…..that will happen.
Cheers!
Anytime you wait for technology to refine itself and THEN jump in to the fray, you run the risk of not knowing what everyone else takes for granted. I have been learning this first hand with becoming a blogger. I am roughly 2 years behind the blog-rush and I am just now learning what RSS feeds are, how to properly categorize posts, what blogging software to use, etc…. I still don’t know exactly what “aggregated views” are and there are all sorts of other peculiar acronyms and terms that I am just plain ignorant of. It has been a learning experience that will continue for quite a while.
I never really wanted to blog. My definition of a blog was a personal diary…. a la LiveJournal…. where some acquaintances of mine have been “blogging” the events of their daily lives for some time now. These same acquaintances also live in an iRC chat channel I have frequented for many years so I heard little tidbits from time to time about what they were posting.
“I posted in my LiveJournal today about how Sally slept with Juan and broke up Sally’s marriage to Fred!”
“I just posted to my LJ about how my dog died….”
“I just LJ’d my pics from the kegger this past weekend! Wait till you see the pics I got of that drunk chick/dude/whatever!”
Based upon those kinds of comments, I NEVER wanted to become a blogger. What goes on in my daily life is pretty damn dull. I work from home, pasted to a PC most of the day. While that may sound like a dream job to some of you, consider that I live in Southern California where, as they say, the weather kicks ass just about all of the time. The beach is 30 minutes away, snowboarding/skiing is a couple hours the other direction. Working from home isn’t nearly as easy when there are the temptations of SoCal within minutes in every direction.
Even if I thought my life were particularly fascinating, I just don’t get why anyone other than my immediate family and maybe some close friends, would care to read about it online. That is what phones are for. In this day and age of free long distance for just about anyone, I still prefer to call to tell family and friends about my exploits on the phone vs posting them into the online void only for them to be Googled for all eternity. (I don’t like phones too much either….but that is for another time…)
I have sinced figured out that blogging is much more than personal diaries. And the Livejournals of the world have their place. While I will and have posted some personal stuff, my goal is more to connect with my ITPro Audience. Of course, to do this, you have to let people into your life a little. If it is “all geek and nothing but the geek!” then it gets a a little old. I bet what happens with my blogging over time is that it become more and more personal while still maintaining some tech stuff. I think that is just the way it works for some people.
From the other side, I don’t read very many blogs at all. The ones I do read, I read on a rather infrequent basis. There is only one blog that has managed to keep my attention. The blog is for a co-worker of mine and he has a rather expansive following. And…. of all things, he posts quite a bit of personal information which is EXACTLY the kind of blog I would seem to want to avoid. But it isn’t so much the content of the blog that keeps me coming back as much as his posting style. I would be doing a disservice to him if I tried to explain how he posts. Just go check it out.
Okay……If you decided to come back from Rory’s blog….I thank you. I think his is MUCH more interesting than mine.
Rory…..your welcome for the 4 additional people I have pushed toward your blog.
Anyway……so I played the waiting game, had to sort through all kinds of information on blogging, screwed up my categories so that I blog-spammed some feeds (sorry MS!). It only took me 13 days to figure that much out.
If I had to blog with a lawnmower, you would all be in the hospital hospital by now…..
Cheers!
Okay. I admit it. I like Karaoke. I have been going to Karaoke bars/clubs/places for 12 years now. I started gong with some acquaintances from a BBS I used to run in the Dallas area. For 5 years I only sang one song ever – Wicked Game by Chris Isaak. One drunken evening I decided to sing a different song….I think it was a country song…..and botched it terribly.
Or so I was told the next day. I, of course, thought it sounded perfectly awesome with my beer muffs on.
It didn’t matter to me. I enjoy singing and always have. I became a regular. I even went so far as to set up and host the web site for my favorite KJ and friend Glenn Lukin at On Stage Entertainment (site is now run by MJK Media). If you are ever in Dallas, Tx and have a free night, go by and see him. He is one of the nicest people you will ever meet. Not to mention one of the best song selections I have seen anywhere.
All this brings me to The Challenge. When I first started doing live presentations, I challenged my audience to a Karaoke Duel. I would be willing to go the night AFTER a presentation to a karaoke bar in the local area where I would sing a song and the challenger would sing a song. If the audience liked the challengers song better I would get them a copy of some piece of software from Microsoft.
In 2 years no one ever took me up on it.
Well….. I am re-instating the Challenge. Same “rules”. Just get a hold of me before I come into town for a presentation and we will make arrangements.
And I will up the ante….. challenger gets a copy of Windows 2003 Standard – Full Retail (no time bomb crap) *if* the audience likes their song better. No stacking the audience. But feel free to buy drinks if you think that might help.
To give you a heads up…..here was my set list from last night…
- Chris Isaak – Wicked Game
- Journey – Send Her My Love
- Billy Joel – She’s Got a Way
- Simon and Garfunkel – Bridge over Troubled Water
I also sang as part a quadrunket (a name I made up for a duet that is sung by 4 intoxicated people…) that was utterly abysmal. I wish I could blame the other parties involved but to be honest….we all sucked. In all fairness the KJ told us the version of “Cruisin’” we were to be singing was the Huey Lewis/Gwenyth Paltrow version from the movie “Duets”. Turned out to be the Smokey Robinson version which I have never even heard before…..
I had a blast…
Karaoke Challenge………….Activated!!
Cheers!
I happened to be on vacation in London when the bomb scares were going on. In fact, we arrived in London on the 21st, the day of the failed attempts.
We didn’t want to let the recent events deter us so we rode the tubes while we were there….
And one more…..
Cheers!
Being new to the blog-o-verse, I am learning the tools of the trade.
I spent the better part of today fumbling with a combination of BlogJet, Community Server, MetaBlog API’s, Windows 2003 NTFS Permissions, IIS Configurations, and finally, ISA 2004. Why????
Well, I purchased BlogJet on the advice of two co-workers of mine (Kevin and Keith) as a means of managing my blogs posts more easily. Installing it was easy enough, but configuring it to work with Community Server 1.1 was another matter. First you have to download the MetaBlog API 1.1 which is not easy to find. Then you can actually choose the MetaBlog API in the BlogJet config or the .Text if you have FTP access to your blog directory. Once I was able to connect with the MetaBlog API, I decided I wanted to be able to use FTP to upload pictures via BlogJet. So I started fumbling with the FTP side of things…..
Let me go tangent for a moment….
If you read back to my first blog post, you will note I mentioned being freakish about control of my machines. I want to control every aspect myself that I can. I run my own firewall servers, DNS servers, web servers, the whole thing. Which means when configuring something new I am used to bouncing around to different machines, changing settings to accomodate access, blah, blah, blah….. What it comes down to is this – by demanding the control I am also forced into knowing or learning what has to be configured and how. I like it that way. It keeps me on my toes.
But sometimes things fall out of my head now and then……(grew up in the 70’s)
Back on track now……I set up my FTP server with a new virtual directory pointing to a newly created folder on the blog site for storing pictures that will be uploaded. I then proceeded to grant myself appropriate NTFS permissions to the directory and limit everyone else. I then verified the FTP site was set to WRITE access. Dropped to a command prompt, opened up the FTP site and….voila!….I can READ the site. Decided to test in IE 6.0 as well and I am all good.
Fire up BlogJet and configure a new account for .TEXT posting and hit a wall right here…..
Just so ya know…..I don’t get past this screen for another 3 hours…….
When clicking “Test this configuration” I recieved a pretty standard Access Denied message. Problem is – I shouldn’t be! I spend the next 2 hours or so poking around in IIS, NTFS permissions, searching the web, cruising the knowledge base, and of course, getting sidetracked by a variety of interesting articles or newsbytes I run into in my search for an answer. I make a few changes here and there but the result is always the same – Access Denied.
I went so far as to whip out Network Monitor to see what was up…..and this is where I started to catch on. Ya see……I tested logging into the FTP site at the command prompt and thru IE, but I never tested uploading a file which is exactly what happens when you click the “Test this Configuration” link in BlogJet. The BlogJet app attempts to drop a “test.gif” file in the assigned directory and then attempts to retrieve it. I saw this happening in NetMon and also saw it was giving up an access denied. I repeated the test at the CMD prompt and within IE with the same results.
This is when I remembered a very inconspicuous setting in ISA 2004.
I am publishing my FTP site from behind ISA. ISA uses a built in FTP Filter to manage the additional control channels used by FTP client apps to send/recieve files after the initial connection is made. By default, this FTP Filter has a setting of READ ONLY for file uploads. Until this is unchecked, nothing gets uploaded – doesn’t matter how correct all the rest of your settings are…..
I think you can put two and two together now…….So…….this is my first post using BlogJet to edit and upload a picture……
Cheers!
I am clicking “Post and Publish"…..now!
For the last few months I have bitching to myself about how when I mow the yard, my mulching mower doesn't seem to be mulching anything. So I make the call to get a new mower blade because when I bought the mower it did a very good job.
Now this isn't the first time I have contemplated getting a new blade. About 6 months ago, I flipped the mower over, pulled the blade off, took it to a few hardware stores and could not find the correct blade. So I whipped out a file, sharpened it up and put it back on.
I was never thrilled with the results of that little exercise.
Fast forward to yesterday. I flip the mower over, measure the blade and head to the hardware store, and settle for a "Universal Mulching Blade". Head back to the house, proceed to remove the old blade and notice.......<light bulb flickering>......it is still pretty darn sharp. Not exactly what I would have expected given the mower seems to be just knocking the grass over. I decide to pull the blade anyway and drop the new on on. The new blade is clearly marked with "bottom" on one side of the blade so the installer knows which end faces toward the earth when it gets installed. Following this sagely advice, I install the new blade.
Only something is amiss...... it appears the cutting edge is pointing in a different direction from the blade I remo......<light bulb shining brightly now>. Turns out that 6 months ago, after sharpening my old blade, I re-installed it upside down. So in fact, the mower was knocking the grass over with the back side of the blade.
So.....Mr. Billy Bob Thornton....if you decide to make a sequel to "Sling Blade".....I have a prop for you.....
I finally have a blog....
....and it has been an experience getting here.
I have spent the last year asking myself - Do I even want to do a blog?
Well, I am actually going to leave that discussion for another day. I have reasons for blogging. I have reasons for not blogging. Someday I will blog about them...
After I decided to have a REAL blog, my next decision was - Do I host my blog at work (I am a Microsoft employee) or do I host it on my own servers?
The upside to hosting it on work servers - I don't have to do much except....post. The downside being I don't have the control that I am freakish about having when it comes to my online life and computers. I suppose it only took me one post on the work hosted server to realize I wanted that control. Thus the reason for 3 posts in 8 months.
My final choice was - What will my blogging solution be?
I haven't done any REAL coding since 1993 when I shut down my Apple //gs BBS (they have my last name wrong). So writing my own solution was not going to happen. So that left searching for a packaged solution. To be honest, I didn't spend a lot of time mulling it over. Microsoft runs their blogging solution on Telligent Systems - Community Server. I figured, if it scales well enough for MS it can scale for little old me.
And it is free.
So I pulled down the CS1.1 package, cannibalized one of my idle machines (Dual 1Ghz, 2 gigs RAM) slapped Windows 2003 + SP1 and SQL 2000 + SP4 on it and fought with CS for a couple of days. I had some pretty darn simple issues with the install which the people on the CS Forums helped me resolve. The Install docs for CS leave a little to be desired, but they are online in WiKi format so I may just go fix them myself.....
So here I am....a part of the blog-o-verse.
Now what....
Well....I am a technology presenter for Microsoft so I will be using this forum to let the world know where I will be and what technologies I will be talking about. I also do a lot of webcasts so look for that information here as well. One of the reasons I am blogging is to help develop some relationships with the ITPro community. So if you happen to have attended one of my live presentations, or even just a webcast, I would enjoy hearing your comments about those sessions.
Tell me what you liked.
Tell me what sucked.
But most importantly - Tell me what you need from me and Microsoft. I am here to serve.
I will also just be babbling from time to time......about stuff.
Cheers....