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March 2005 - Posts

Thursday, March 31, 2005 11:04 PM

Podcast: Windows Mobile - Interview with Erick Eidus.

Working in MED is always interesting, especially when you get the chance to chat with someone that’s been around Windows Mobile devices since the first handheld PC – Meet Erick Eidus, a Product Manager in the Mobile group at Microsoft –
posted by mikehall | 3 Comments
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Thursday, March 31, 2005 9:43 PM

Star Trek Survey - Results are in...

No big surprises for this weeks survey… 42% Next Generation. Which was the best Star Trek Series ? Prompt Count Pct Star Trek (original series) 13 20.31% Next Generation 27 42.19% Deep Space Nine 12 18.75%
posted by mikehall | 5 Comments
Thursday, March 31, 2005 6:56 PM

An Apple a day...

Keeps John Kennedy up waaaay too late editing videos for the web. Find out how we recorded the new tutorial videos and what John learned from the experience. – Mike  
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Thursday, March 31, 2005 6:07 PM

Tutorial - Adding files to Windows CE 5.0

You’ve built your Windows CE 5.0 operating system, and you now need to add some files, perhaps this is an application you’ve written in Visual Studio .NET 2003, or an MFC application written in eMbedded Visual C++ 4.0 SP4, or some resource
posted by mikehall | 5 Comments
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Thursday, March 31, 2005 2:05 PM

CodeProject Survey - Laptop or Desktop

From this weeks CodeProject survey, 0.4% of responses came from developers that don't have a laptop or desktop - so I wonder how they replied to the survey?OptionVotes%Laptop only18611.1Laptop and Desktop86852.0Desktop only60836.4Neither7.4Responses1669  -
posted by mikehall | 4 Comments
Thursday, March 31, 2005 1:57 PM

Inside Windows CE

A few years ago a book titled Inside Windows CE was launched, this was 1998 and was about the time that the first public release of Windows CE "Embedded" operating system and tools made it out of Redmond. This was Windows CE version 2.0 (codenamed
posted by mikehall | 7 Comments
Thursday, March 31, 2005 1:39 PM

OpenNETCF - GPS Library.

Those darn clever OpenNETCF guys have been at it again, this time they've been working on a GPS library in Managed Code! - they've called this GPS Library Reloaded - how very cool is that!It's now time to provide feedback on the library - go here to
posted by mikehall | 3 Comments
Thursday, March 31, 2005 1:00 PM

Native App Development - SDK ?

Windows CE supports two application development stories, 'managed' and 'native' - managed application development is handled by Visual Studio .NET 2003 through C# and Visual Basic application development against the .NET Compact Framework, but what's
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
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Thursday, March 31, 2005 9:43 AM

Picasa - Better Image Management

I was trying to find an image on one of my office PC's a couple of days ago to show one of the guys from MS-Studios, after a few minutes of trawling through folders Pete suggested I install Picasa from Google (does anyone click on the More>> link
posted by mikehall | 2 Comments
Tuesday, March 29, 2005 10:33 PM

Orb is now FREE - watch video, see photo's, listen to music over the network.

Orb networks have announced that their service is now free – this looks like an interesting product, if I get some time over the next couple of weeks (very slim chance) then I will have to install and have a play… – Mike
posted by mikehall | 5 Comments
Tuesday, March 29, 2005 10:13 PM

Bloggers at MEDC

We ran a special discount for bloggers at MEDC – it would appear that people are reading the mobile and embedded blogs (or should I say Embedded and Mobile blogs – which reminds me, why isn’t the conference called the Embedded
posted by mikehall | 4 Comments
Sunday, March 27, 2005 10:08 AM

This weeks Survey...

You're a developer, right ? - that means that you watch Star Trek, right ? - ok, take this weeks Survey - it's time to find out which was the best series… – Mike
posted by mikehall | 1 Comments
Friday, March 25, 2005 10:12 PM

Transparent Monitor Screens

This is pretty wild - fancy a Transparent Monitor ? – Mike
posted by mikehall | 15 Comments
Friday, March 25, 2005 5:25 PM

It's Podcast time again - Meet Cathy Kerr, Technical Documentation Writer and Djembé (Bongo) Player !

It’s Friday afternoon, so that must mean it’s time for a Podcast  – Today I met with Cathy Kerr from the Embedded Documentation team, if you think the documentation role is just about writing documentation then you should listen to this Podcast
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
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Friday, March 25, 2005 3:12 PM

MED UA Videos.

I spent about an hour today being filmed by the Embedded UA (User Assistance) team, we recorded three videos, I’m expecting the videos to be edited and available early next week – I’m not going to tell you what we recorded, I will leave
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Friday, March 25, 2005 1:24 PM

My first play with a Sony PSP

I took some photo’s (below) to compare the size of the PSP with an HP iPaq Pocket PC – the PSP feels good in the hand, has a fantastic display, and the controls ‘feel right’ – I can certainly see why someone would want to play games on here, I’m not sold
posted by mikehall | 6 Comments
Friday, March 25, 2005 12:47 PM

Beverage Survey Results are in...

We had a total of 75 completed surveys, 113 surveys started… What coffee providers to you use on a regular basis? Prompt Count Pct Starbucks 44 58.67% Jitters 2 2.67% Seattles Best Coffee 2 2.67% Home Brew 20 26.67% Java (huh?)
posted by mikehall | 6 Comments
Thursday, March 24, 2005 2:46 PM

CEFileWiz Updated.

It would appear that some developers PC’s have HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Platform Builder\5.0\Directories\OS Install Dir that doesn’t include a final backslash, this casues problems when launching the CEFileWiz application – I’ve
posted by mikehall | 20 Comments
Thursday, March 24, 2005 1:51 PM

Speech Enabling your Windows CE Device.

There seems to be some confusion around Speech Enabling a Windows CE embedded device - Windows CE 5.0 exposes a set of Speech API's known as SAPI (or Speech API), this doesn't include a speech engine, which is a required component - you will need to license
posted by mikehall | 4 Comments
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Thursday, March 24, 2005 10:07 AM

JavaLobby talks about the Microsoft Technical Summit

Last week I presented a session covering Windows Embedded technologies to a group of about 40 Java, Linux, and Flash developers, this wasn't a typical presentation, no slides, and open discussion about the Microsoft products, tools, technologies, and
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
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Wednesday, March 23, 2005 9:45 PM

Windows CE - BIB, DAT, REG, DB, and CEC Files.

One of the questions that’s come up in the Windows Embedded Student Challenge is what REG, DAT, BIB, and DB files are, and how CEC files are contstructed.   CEC Files and how to include files into your O/S image with Windows CE 4.2 or Windows
posted by mikehall | 9 Comments
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Tuesday, March 22, 2005 8:51 PM

Windows Embedded Haiku.

I received my first e-mail about the Windows Embedded Jingles and Adverts - this isn't quite a jingle, but is pretty cool... It's a Haiku – read on… Component of thought, operating so smoothly: Device of the mind. Thanks Ruth !
posted by mikehall | 2 Comments
Tuesday, March 22, 2005 8:48 PM

Windows XP Embedded - Horm

Are you interested in Hibernate Once Resume Many (HORM) - this is a new feature in Windows XP Embedded SP2 - there's a great article on MSDN that discusses HORM. – Mike
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
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Tuesday, March 22, 2005 11:43 AM

What is a Smart Client ?

I met with Craig Neable yesterday – I’ve worked with Craig at a number of events including TechEd Europe, Mobile and Embedded Developers Conferences, and the list goes on… Craig now works in the Smart Client developer group at Microsoft so I wanted to
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Tuesday, March 22, 2005 11:17 AM

Feeling Creative ?

You probably know that I have a podcast feed running (and you're signed up to receive the feed through iPodder or Doppler, right ?) - but there's something missing... The podcast needs some adverts or jingles, this is where you come in... if you're feeling
posted by mikehall | 1 Comments
Tuesday, March 22, 2005 9:26 AM

Symbian Licenses ActiveSync Software from Microsoft

Who would have thought that Nokia and Symbian would be licensing ActiveSync from Microsoft - the following Reuters article talks about the competition from RIM, and how corporate users now expect to be able to get their e-mail on a mobile device.-
posted by mikehall | 1 Comments
Tuesday, March 22, 2005 7:40 AM

Replacing the NK.BIN image...

Assuming that you’ve built a Windows CE image that supports H/D (or compact IDE Flash on the eBox) and have downloaded the image to RAM from Platform Builder there are a number of ways to get an image onto the underlying media of the device. When
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
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Tuesday, March 22, 2005 7:14 AM

ZDNet interview with Microsoft's Identity Architect.

Microsoft's Chief Identity Architect, Kim Cameron is interviewed by ZDNet's David Berlind, downloadable an as MP3. – Mike  
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Monday, March 21, 2005 8:29 PM

Listening to Podcasts on the go...

I’m really getting the hang of this Podcasting thing, not only recording Podcasts but also listening to a bunch of Podcasts, DotNetRocks, G’Day World, Daily Source, and a number of others – Syncing the content to a Windows Mobile device
posted by mikehall | 8 Comments
Monday, March 21, 2005 3:42 PM

ICOP (or CEPC) H/D Instructions updated...

The ICOP tutorial for adding H/D support to your eBox II board was missing a step, you need to add some platform.reg content - I've updated my previous post to include the instructions.Here's how the Windows Explorer looks on the device with the ATAPI,
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Monday, March 21, 2005 6:48 AM

[UPDATED] Windows Embedded Student Challenge - Adding H/D support to your image.

This question has come up a number of times recently – how do you add support for a hard drive (or access to the internal flash) in your Windows CE 5.0 operating system image – those nice chaps at ICOP have a tutorial here that explains the steps.
posted by mikehall | 11 Comments
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Sunday, March 20, 2005 1:45 PM

Microsoft Embedded operating systems and the minivan

First read this blog post from Seth Godin – did everyone somewhere along the line believe that Windows CE and Windows XP Embedded were unreliable, not real-time, big footprint, hard to develop against ? – if so, where and when did this happen
posted by mikehall | 8 Comments
Saturday, March 19, 2005 1:48 PM

GPL Violations - more information.

Following on from my previous post (Companies accused of violating the GPL) there’s a very interesting article on Forbes that talks about Linux’s Hit Men, the Free Software Foundation has been persuing a number of companies for infringement of the GPL.
posted by mikehall | 7 Comments
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Saturday, March 19, 2005 9:33 AM

Podcast - XBOX Test and Music

I recently had the pleasure to chat with Arif Gursel a Software Test Engineer in the XBOX team, the podcast interview we recorded determines what an XBOX software test engineer does all day (and it’s not playing Halo 2 ! [we’re both trying
posted by mikehall | 1 Comments
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Friday, March 18, 2005 3:58 PM

Linux/Java Camp - Comments.

I presented a session on Windows Embedded operating systems at today’s Linux/Java Camp – I didn’t want to present slides so only had one slide which had my name, job title, e-mail address and blog/podcast address. The session started
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Friday, March 18, 2005 1:59 PM

It's survey time, what are your beverage habits ?

so, I have access to a survey tool </evil chuckle> – and thought I would kick off some developer type surveys – the first asks what your coffee habits are – Click HERE to start the survey – results will be published this
posted by mikehall | 7 Comments
Friday, March 18, 2005 9:03 AM

Linux/Java Camp presentation.

Scoble blogged about the Linux/Java camp that’s currently running at Micrsosoft Campus – I’m presenting at 9:15 this morning on Windows Embedded technologies – I’m hoping to make this a conversation about our technologies
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Thursday, March 17, 2005 9:37 AM

Podcasting on your Pocket PC

I have to admit that I’m totally hooked on Podcasting, both creating podcasts (exposed from my blog) and syncing and listening to Podcasts, every morning I sync a number of podcast feeds to my laptop and listen to the content in the office –
posted by mikehall | 6 Comments
Wednesday, March 16, 2005 10:54 PM

Better than CLR ?

Couldn’t resist this one – I’ve just watched a TV advert that “claimed” that Lime Away is better than CLR – I don’t see how a limescale remover could be better than the Common Language Runtime – Mike
posted by mikehall | 3 Comments
Wednesday, March 16, 2005 10:14 PM

Companies accused of violating the GPL

From ZDNet Thirteen companies, including Motorola and Acer, have been handed letters claiming they have failed to comply with the GNU General Public License. I guess it was only a matter of time before this happened – it will be extremely interesting
posted by mikehall | 3 Comments
Wednesday, March 16, 2005 9:42 PM

The BEST Halo 2 Game Movie...

ok, so what happens when one of the players in an XBOX Live Halo2 games falls asleep ? – check out the video here to find out. (Note: some “interesting” language used in the video – you have been warned). – Mike
posted by mikehall | 1 Comments
Wednesday, March 16, 2005 9:27 AM

Windows Mobile devices - Music Videos.

Are you looking for great music videos to download and watch on your Pocket PC, Smartphone, or Portable Media Center ? – Take a look at the following services that launched yesterday. CinemaNow is launching Watch Music Here (www.watchmusichere.com)
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Wednesday, March 16, 2005 9:15 AM

Tablet PC .NET Application Development Webcasts

Join us for the first webcast in the series entitled "Tablet and Mobile PC Applications Development", designed for .NET Developers. This session focuses on the InfiNotes Note Taking Framework built by Agilix Labs Inc. as an extension to the Tablet PC
posted by mikehall | 2 Comments
Tuesday, March 15, 2005 10:26 PM

Windows XP Embedded Supplemental Toolkit.

From Windowsfordevices.com – SJJ Embedded Micro Solutions has released the Windows XP Embedded Supplemental Toolkit. Described as "more than just a book," the toolkit offers new tools to help developers with creating components, finding
posted by mikehall | 2 Comments
Tuesday, March 15, 2005 9:25 PM

MED Podcast March 15th - Job Shadowing at Microsoft.

One of my colleagues in the Mobile and Embedded group had his son, Brad Butler in the office today on a Job Shadow with one of the Mobile and Embedded Product managers, Eric Engineer (I really think Eric should change his last name to Marketing!) –
posted by mikehall | 2 Comments
Tuesday, March 15, 2005 12:24 PM

It's all about timing - Windows XP Embedded team is blogging.

I'm not entirely sure which came first, my posting on the difference between Windows XP and Windows XP Embedded or the fact that the Windows XP Embedded Team is now blogging - but you now have another RSS feed to sign up to. The first post if from
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Tuesday, March 15, 2005 11:31 AM

And now... Windows XP vs Windows XP Embedded...

Just to round out the story, I should also compare Windows XP with Windows XP Embedded... How does the story begin... oh, yes, that's right... </clears throat> A long time ago, in... Windows XP Embedded can be traced back to the days of Windows
posted by mikehall | 5 Comments
Tuesday, March 15, 2005 9:16 AM

Windows Mobile vs. Windows CE

You’ve probably heard of the Windows Mobile platform, or the Windows Mobile operating system, what is this, and is there any relationship between this and Windows CE ? – This is a question that comes up all the time, so here’s my attempt
posted by mikehall | 3 Comments
Monday, March 14, 2005 8:00 PM

Windows Embedded - Training, Academia, and Cricket.

Today I had the pleasure to talk with Ivan Joseph, a Product Manager in the Mobile and Embedded Devices group at Microsoft – Ivan runs training and academic programs, and is also responsible for the Windows Embedded Student ChallengE (note the extremely
posted by mikehall | 12 Comments
Monday, March 14, 2005 10:05 AM

Windows CE 5.0 - CEPC Debug Serial on COM1

You may have noticed that if you are building and debugging Windows CE 5.0 images on a CEPC that COM1 has been stolen by the debugger to send debug output to a listening terminal (or terminal application). You *should* be able to stop the serial debug
posted by mikehall | 2 Comments
Sunday, March 13, 2005 1:10 PM

ESC West - Top Questions and OS Changer.

ESC West seemed quiet this year, the last day especially, it seems like ESC West is moving back to San Jose next year, I wonder if this is due to the apparent shrinking size of the conference and the perception of less attendees coming through the
posted by mikehall | 3 Comments
Saturday, March 12, 2005 3:12 PM

Microsoft Shared Source Blog

Jason Matusow director of shared source at Microsoft is now blogging – The whole discussion around shared vs open source is pretty interesting, I listened to a discussion of open vs shared source given by Jason on a flight to SFO
posted by mikehall | 1 Comments
Saturday, March 12, 2005 2:50 PM

Your added value in an embedded system is...

There’s been a major shift away from home grown operating systems in the last 10 years, approximately 50% of embedded devices were built from home grown operating systems, now the figure is closer to 10% – the reason is obvious, developers don’t want
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Saturday, March 12, 2005 11:55 AM

Aaron has updated the DUAScriptGen tool.

Aaron Stebner has been working hard on an update to the DUAScriptGen tool, he's added support for importing INF files for a Windows hotfix package - I think this is a really cool feature - Aaron is looking for volunteers to test out the feature - are
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Friday, March 11, 2005 10:22 AM

Pssst... Read Blogs ? - get a discount for MEDC

The Microsoft MEDC team have extended a special offer to blog readers. The first sixty people to sign up for MEDC 2005 using the RSVP Code CAATTAT get an extra 10% off our Super Early Bird price of $795. A total savings of $480!Register immediately to
posted by mikehall | 2 Comments
Thursday, March 10, 2005 11:29 AM

OS News - Editorial: OSS Software, Deaf Developers & Unsatisfied Users

Makes for an interesting read OS News - Editorial: OSS Software, Deaf Developers & Unsatisfied Users – Mike  
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Thursday, March 10, 2005 9:01 AM

[Updated] XBOX v-next - some details from the Game Developers Conference (GDC)

Not only is ESC West running in SFO, but just across the street is theGDC (Game Developers Conference) – some details about the next version of XBOX have been released at the event – even more impressive is the fact that 1000 attendees get to go home
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Thursday, March 10, 2005 8:42 AM

ESC West - What's up with the Win Driver booth ?

Right next to the Microsoft booth at ESC West is a company called Win Driver or something like that (I think they write drivers for Windows or something ) – anyhow, they’ve got these large letters running down the side of their booth
posted by mikehall | 5 Comments
Wednesday, March 09, 2005 3:57 PM

Doug Boling interview at ESC West

I managed to catch up with Doug Boling down at ESC West, and recorded a 20 minute interview, sync the Podcast to get the file… – Mike  
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Wednesday, March 09, 2005 7:32 AM

ESC West - Seems Quiet

Yesterday was the first day of the ESC West event, for me it was a busy day which started with presenting a session on building Embedded GUI’s for Consumer Electronics Devices, and then moved swiftly into press meetings and booth duty from 4pm –
posted by mikehall | 3 Comments
Wednesday, March 09, 2005 12:05 AM

Meet MED UA Video

ok, so I promised you the MED UA (that’s the Mobile and Embedded Devices group User Assistance) team video, this is your chance to meet some of the team working on the documentation for Windows CE. Note that the video is a WHOPPING 18MB! There
posted by mikehall | 2 Comments
Tuesday, March 08, 2005 11:01 AM

What's wrong with this ?

Just spotted this on the Microsoft Windows Mobile page – anyone see what’s wrong with this ? Personalize Your Device Make your device unique - just like you. Change the home screen with a theme, add a ringtone that matches your best
posted by mikehall | 14 Comments
Monday, March 07, 2005 9:29 PM

Getting Podcasts onto your Smartphone (or Pocket PC)

Now that I’m a Podcaster (if there is such a thing) I thought it would be interesting to sync my podcast files down to a Smartphone device running Windows Mobile 2003 – it’s so easy, even someone with an MBA should be able to do this… (anyone remember
posted by mikehall | 12 Comments
Monday, March 07, 2005 3:06 PM

Trip to SFO - Podcasts are the best...

The flight to SFO from SEA took about two hours, flight conditions were perfect, and there were a number of empty seats, which meant I had a row to myself ! So, what to do for two hours? – listen to some podcasts of course ! – I listened
posted by mikehall | 3 Comments
Monday, March 07, 2005 10:08 AM

Voice Command 1.5 now available !

Voice Command 1.5 is now available (duh, I've already said that in the title of the post!!!)New! Additional features to assist people with impaired vision.   For consumers who have difficulty reading a small screen or using a key pad, Voice
posted by mikehall | 4 Comments
Monday, March 07, 2005 6:58 AM

Dan's Windows CE Project - Follow along...

Dan McCarty has started a blog that tracks a Windows CE project – the initial posts are leading up to why Dan chose Windows CE for the project… it’s an interesting read, can’t wait to get to the point where Dan is doing something
posted by mikehall | 2 Comments
Saturday, March 05, 2005 3:09 PM

MED Podcasts VoIP and Docs.

Hey, the first two MED (Mobile and Embedded Devices Group) Podcasts are ready for you to listen to… There are two options, either get to the files directly from the links below… #1 Balz Wyss talking about VoIP #2 Jenny Kays talking about
posted by mikehall | 4 Comments
Friday, March 04, 2005 12:16 PM

Bod on the Pod.

Now that my Podcast hardware is setup and running it's time to get down to some recording, today I plan on recording a couple of interviews, one with our VoIP guy, and with one of the Windows CE documentation team - if all goes well I will have both live
posted by mikehall | 2 Comments
Thursday, March 03, 2005 7:57 PM

Windows CE 5.0 - "Core" or "Pro"

So, you’ve just built a Windows CE 5.0 based operating system image and are not sure whether the operating system components are in the “Core SKU” or the “Pro SKU” – how can you find out ? – there’s a downloadable
posted by mikehall | 1 Comments
Thursday, March 03, 2005 2:12 PM

MEDC - Reasons to go...

The Mobile and Embedded Developers Conference 2005 is coming to Las Vegas in May (9-12, Mandalay Bay Hotel) - why should you go ?Here's just some of the reasons...Hear from Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates about long-term Microsoft
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments
Wednesday, March 02, 2005 3:10 PM

Bill Gates KBE

Bill Gates was knighted today by Queen Elizabeth, so Bill can be known as Bill Gates KBE, which stands for Knight of the British Empire – What else do you think KBE might stand for (keep it clean!). – Mike
posted by mikehall | 8 Comments
Wednesday, March 02, 2005 2:45 PM

Interesting Podcasts ?

I see that JK on the Run now has a mobility/gadgets podcast up and running, the RSS feed for the podcast is here – and the web site is here – I had a listen to the podcast this morning, it sounds like it could be interesting, so
posted by mikehall | 7 Comments
Tuesday, March 01, 2005 11:07 AM

Arise Sir Bill...

From Yahoo news – Microsoft co-founder and chairman Bill Gates will be awarded an honorary knighthood by Britain's Queen Elizabeth Wednesday for his outstanding contribution to enterprise. He will become a Knight Commander of the Most Excellent
posted by mikehall | 11 Comments
Tuesday, March 01, 2005 10:44 AM

Windows Mobile or Ultra Portable PC ?

I have an OQO to play around with for a while, this is a fully functional PC in a palm sized (depending on the size of your hand) form factor. The device runs on a Transmeta processor which seems to scale from 300MHz to 1GHz depending on processor load
posted by mikehall | 10 Comments
Tuesday, March 01, 2005 10:05 AM

MED Podcast

Hey, my podcast hardware has finally arrived (I will get a photo shortly), so I decided to record and test the intro podcast file, here’s a link  – I’m recording using Sony Sound Forge, merging the music file using Audacity and
posted by mikehall | 0 Comments