Kurt Shintaku's Blog

Microsoft Business Intelligence account on YouTube is bursting with new content from the Gartner Business Intelligence Summit this past week.
http://www.youtube.com/user/MicrosoftBI

If you’re interested in checking it out, start at the Day 1 video where Bruno Aziza gives a quick recap of the first day of the 2012 Gartner BI Summit. There are many exciting conversations going on right now centered around Big Data, Cloud and Mobile BI. Head to Microsoft.com/BI and read about our customer stories and download the latest bits and demos. If you are at the Summit in person, make sure to check out our booth. Microsoft is the only booth with a theater and 12+ sessions for you to view. Visit Booth #6 to experience the power of BI first hand!

There’s a lot more on the channel but here’s the wrap up for the summit:

Visit Microsoft’s Business Intelligence site at http://www.microsoft.com/bi

Here we go.  The Microsoft Exchange Conference 2012 registration just went live!  Registration is $1800 for a limited time.  When those registrations are taken, the remainder go for $2000.

From the Exchange Blog:

I hope those of you who signed up for more information already saw the email about Microsoft Exchange Conference 2012 (MEC) registration. The lost conference is back, taking place September 24-26 in Orlando, Florida at the Gaylord Palms Resort & Convention Center. Kudos to Dan Bobke for narrowing the coordinates down to the lake in Kissimmee in the comments to my last post (see MEC is Back!). I think he may have gotten the closest.

This is the Exchange event you will not want to miss! This will be your best opportunity to go deep on the next major release of Exchange. Going into beta later this summer, Exchange 15 will bring a ton of new capability and value to the table and we’re pumped up to spend the week giving you the end-to-end story of this next release in the family.

At MEC 2012, you will:

• Get exclusive Exchange 15 content directly from the engineering team
• Get hands-on experience with Exchange 15
• Enjoy unparalleled access to Exchange team members, Masters and MVPs
• Preview amazing new products from select vendors
• Build personal relationships throughout the Exchange community

Visit MECisback.com and reserve your spot at MEC 2012 before the opportunity disappears. It is going to be epic!

Taken from: http://blogs.technet.com/b/exchange/archive/2012/04/03/mec-2012-registration-is-open.aspx

Wanna see some magic using Microsoft’s Kinect?

TED Talks Marco Tempest spins a beautiful story of what magic is, how it entertains us and how it highlights our humanity — all while working extraordinary illusions with his hands and an augmented reality machine.

• VIDEO: Marco Tempest: A magical tale (w/ augmented reality)
  http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/marco_tempest_
  a_magical_tale_with_augmented_reality.html

• DOCUMENTARY OF “THE MAKING OF”
  If you’re interested in the “making of” of this performance, check out the documentary posted here. 
  https://vimeo.com/39346593

Check this out:  Totally free, Kindle users can download the Introducing Microsoft SQL Server 2012 eBook at no cost over Whispernet!

Introducing Microsoft® SQL Server® 2012 explores the exciting enhancements and new capabilities engineered into SQL Server, ranging from improvements in operation to those in reporting and management. This book is for anyone who has an interest in SQL Server 2012 and wants to understand its capabilities, including database administrators, application developers, and technical decision makers.

So go get it!

http://www.amazon.com/Introducing-Microsoft%C2%AE-Server%C2%AE-2012-ebook/dp/B007PJ6DSW

Folks – I’m noticing that a lot of people seem to think WiDi is available on all Intel Core Series Processors.  I’m quite certain that this is not so.  You need to also have an Intel Centrino Wireless Network Adapter for the WiDi software to work. 

Here’s the system requirements for Intel Wireless Display:

System Component Requirements for WiDi:

• Processor:  ONE of the following:
  Intel® Core™ i7: 640M; 660LM; 640LM; 620LM; 620M; 610E; 690UM; 680UM; 660UM; 640UM; 620UM; 660UE; 2710QE; 2820QM; 2720QM; 2635QM; 2630QM; 2657M; 2649M; 2629M; 2620M; 2617M; 2540M; 2520M; 2510E; 2640LM; 2620LM; 2630UM; 2610UM; 2530UM; 2920XM
  Intel® Core™ i5: 580M; 560M; 540M; 520M; 480M; 460M; 450M; 430M; 580UM; 560UM; 540UM; 520UM; 470UM; 430UM; 2540M; 2520M; 2410M; 2537M
  Intel® Core™ i3: 390M; 380M; 370M; 350M; 330M; 330E; 2310M
• Graphics:
  Intel® HD Graphics
• Wireless: ONE of the following:
  Intel® Centrino® Wireless-N 1000, 1030
  Intel® Centrino® Advanced-N 6200, 6205, or 6230
  Intel® Centrino® Wireless-N + WiMAX 6150
  Intel® Centrino® Advanced-N + WiMAX 6250
  Intel® Centrino® Ultimate-N 6300
• Software
  Intel® My WiFi Technology (Intel® MWT)² and Intel® Wireless Display¹ must be pre-installed and enabled.
• OS
  Windows 7 64-bit*, Home Premium, Ultimate or Professional
  Windows 7 32-bit*, Home Premium, Ultimate, Professional or Basic

INTEL LINK: System Component Requirements for WiDi
http://www.intel.com/support/wireless/wtech/iwd/sb/CS-031059.htm

——————-

FOLLOW UP:
The reason I wrote this post was that there’s a lot of chatter on the Internet about people not being able to get WiDi working but near as I can tell, everyone seems to think that just because you have an Intel processor in your laptop – that entitles you to have a computer that will work with WiDi and that’s just not so. WiDi has specific requirements and one of those requirements are an Intel Centrino WiFi adapter. Many laptops have both Intel processors but very commonly also have BROADCOM WiFi Mini-PCI-Express adapters in them, which are great… but will not allow WiDi to work.  (Note: Broadcom was a former client of mine and I have a great deal of respect for Broadcom technology… hi Dave… but in the case of WiDi, you need an Intel component.  Sorry!)

I myself had to open one of my laptops and swap out the Broadcom PCI-E adapter out for an Intel Centrino WiFi adapter… and lo and behold, WiDi lit up like a Christmas tree once I’d gotten the new WiFi adapter working.

Music to my ears.

At NAB in Las Vegas in the past couple weeks, we relaunched the Microsoft Media Platform, which bought together all of Microsoft’s media tools, technology, and offerings under a single framework and umbrella.

Built on the powerful foundations of Windows Media Server, IIS, Expression Encoder, and PlayReady, the Microsoft Media Platform provides functions for every stage of digital media processes and can be easily integrated into existing workflows and third-party services. The Microsoft Media Platform can be used to deliver content to a variety of client technologies including HTML5, Silverlight and native devices.

• WEB: Microsoft Media Platform
  http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/mediaplatform

More about NAB’s announcements here:
http://blogs.technet.com/b/mediablog/archive/2011/04/22/nab-2011-recap.aspx

We’ve just released v2.6 of two customer-ready documents known as our Product Portfolio One-pager.

The one-page shows all of Microsoft products in a single scalable view.  I have them available in .PDF as well as a Visio document for managed customers of mine that are interested.

The documents are viewable from ZOOM.IT, leveraging Microsoft Deep Zoom technology.  Enjoy!

• Microsoft Product Portfolio – Enterprise View
  http://zoom.it/7EQf
• Microsoft Product Portfolio – All Up View
  http://zoom.it/CuHw

EVOLVING FROM PRINCIPLES TO PRACTICES

Industry and government decision makers are increasingly aware that operational security protections and regulatory compliance are insufficient in protecting global applications and infrastructures. Organizations are realizing the value of secure development practices and seek to accelerate adoption and articulate this value to management.

The inaugural Security Development Conference 2012 (SDC 2012) will bring together industry professionals to network and learn from security experts about secure development practices. SDC 2012 will include information for leaders in software engineering, process and business management who are responsible for implementing or accelerating the adoption and effectiveness of secure development practices in their organizations.

Visit https://www.securitydevelopmentconference.com for more information & registration details.

DATE:
May 15-16, 2012

LOCATION:
The Fairmont – Washington D.C.
2401 M Street, NW
Washington, District of Columbia, 20037
United States

AGENDA:
https://www.securitydevelopmentconference.com/Agenda.aspx

REGISTRATION: ($100 off until April 13th!)
https://www.securitydevelopmentconference.com/registrationselect.aspx

I keep hearing people refer to the the Samsung Series 7 Tablet PC as being the same hardware as the device that was handed out at our developer event “BUILD”.

This is not true.  The Series 7 Slates are technically different devices in comparison to the devices handed out at BUILD.  Here’s a chart that goes over what the different technical specifications between each:

(Taken from http://www.samsung.com/global/windowspreview/)

Friends, the final and complete version of Introducing Microsoft SQL Server 2012, by Ross Mistry (@RossMistry) and Stacia Misner (@StaciaMisner), is now ready as a free download! You can download the PDF version of this title here (288 pages; 10.8 MB).

We will update this post soon with links to EPUB and MOBI files. We expect these files to be available by March 23.

UPDATE: The EPUB is here, and the MOBI is here.

If you prefer a hard copy of the book, you can order it here for $14.99.

Introducing Microsoft SQL Server 2012 includes 10 chapters:

PART I DATABASE ADMINISTRATION (by Ross Mistry)
1. SQL Server 2012 Editions and Engine Enhancements
2. High-Availability and Disaster-Recovery Enhancements
3. Performance and Scalability
4. Security Enhancements
5. Programmability and Beyond-Relational Enhancements

PART II BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE DEVELOPMENT (by Stacia Misner)
6. Integration Services
7. Data Quality Services
8. Master Data Services
9. Analysis Services and PowerPivot
10. Reporting Services

We are releasing this title to help you learn about the new features and capabilities in SQL Server 2012, which Microsoft released to manufacturing (RTM) on March 6, 2012. You can expect general availability of the product to begin on April 1, 2012.

Please help us share the news about this ebook. And enjoy!

<original post at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/microsoft_press/archive/2012/03/15/free-ebook-introducing-microsoft-sql-server-2012.aspx>