Kurt Shintaku's Blog

Is Microsoft disappearing?  
Is .NET a dying platform? 
Are companies looking for nothing but “Web 2.0” knowledgeable workers? 

If you live in California, you might think so with the reality distortion field that surrounds & clouds the thoughts of high-risk dot-coms, impractical startups, and marketing hype machines that populate this state.

Answer:  An emphatic, “I don’t think so”.  Take it from this Business Insider article:

…As of October 1, Dice had more than 10,000 listings looking for skill with Microsoft’s developer platform .NET (up 29% from last year), more than 8,000 with the Microsoft programming language C# (up 26%), and more than 6,000 (up 24%) referencing the ASP.NET Web development technology. Anecdotally, Dice’s teams are hearing from a lot of employers that there’s a real crunch for qualified .NET developers.

Microsoft’s collaboration product SharePoint is also hot, with more than 4,000 listings, up 42% from last year. Dice explains that companies in the Midwest are particularly hot for SharePoint developers.

Other technologies may have more listings or faster growth, but few combine both — for instance J2EE/Java tops the list with more than 18,000 job postings but was up only 19% from last year, and Ruby on Rails was up 67% but is found in only 1,800 listings.

The only non-Microsoft technology that is clearly a better bet is JavaScript, with more than 10,000 listings and 53% growth from last year.

…

And guess what’s already one of the very best tools for planning, developing, debugging, & most of all ‘engineering’ Javascript code?

Microsoft Visual Web Developer 2010 Express.  And it’s completely FREE.

• DOWNLOAD: Visual Studio – Visual Web Developer 2010 Express
  http://www.microsoft.com/web/platform/tools-developer.aspx

The Windows PowerShell Command Builder enables IT professionals and power users to visually assemble commands related to SharePoint 2010 Products and Office 365 on a Design Surface in a browser and take those commands to their respective products.

The Windows PowerShell Command Builder provides an intelligent user experience. After you drag a verb or noun object on the Design Surface, the interface will hide either the verbs or nouns that are not associated with the verb or noun placed on the Design Surface. After you construct a command, you can copy the command to Windows PowerShell script, the SharePoint 2010 Management Shell, or other desired location to be saved or executed.

• DOWNLOAD:  Windows PowerShell Command Builder Getting Started Guide (155k, 8 pages)
  http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=27588

There’s been a ton of news recently about Microsoft Dynamics CRM/xRM as a result of the release of the 2011 product as well as the ONLINE/cloud version.

Check these items out:

CONFERENCE: CRM360 Virtual Summit
CRM360 virtual summit focuses on how Microsoft Dynamics CRM and industry-specific CRM solutions from Microsoft partners are improving customer retention and ROI for businesses worldwide. Learn how the right CRM solution empowers you to nurture your existing customer relationships by improving internal processes, reducing administrative tasks, and freeing up employees to spend more time with your customers.
Meet with Microsoft and Microsoft Partners, and network with peers and Microsoft Dynamics CRM solution providers from the worlds of Distribution and Services, Financial Services, Manufacturing and Resources, the Public Sector, Microsoft Services, and Communications Sector – all online. All compliments of Microsoft.
http://www.crm360summit.com/

WHITEPAPER: Optimizing and Maintaining the Performance of a Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 Server Infrastructure
I am pleased to announce the release of the white paper, Optimizing and Maintaining the Performance of a Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2011 Server Infrastructure, which is currently available for download from the Microsoft Download Center. The paper is also available at the MSDN and the TechNet libraries.
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/crm/archive/2011/09/20/white-paper-optimizing-and-maintaining-the-performance-of-a-microsoft-dynamics-crm-2011-server-infrastructure.aspx

CONFERENCE:  Microsoft Convergence 2012 for Dynamics CRM – March 18 – 21, Houston, TX
The buzz is starting: We’re excited to announce that Convergence is moving to Houston in 2012! Bookmark this site and return often to see new information on the next premier gathering of the Microsoft Dynamics community, set for March 18 – 21 at the George R Brown Convention Center in Houston, Texas. And be sure to sign up for Email Alerts, so that you can be one of the first to know when registration opens for our next event.
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/crm/archive/2011/09/29/convergence-2012-a-world-of-opportunity.aspx

BOOK:  Microsoft Dynamics CRM and Silverlight
The new book, Silverlight + CRM is a great resource for CRM developers who need to get up to speed on Silverlight and how to make it work well with Dynamics CRM 2011. This is a need I have seen over and over again. This comes up with clients, friends, user groups. We hope to fill a gap and get other professionals up to speed and making some great software. This book covers where others have not yet. Go to Amazon and search for Silverlight CRM and the results are few!
We’ve got code samples/library and you’ve got direct access to the author/editor/publisher like you wouldn’t have from one of the big guys.
The book retails for $69.99 print and $29.99 for electronic. Head over and use these discount codes directly on our site.
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/crm/archive/2011/09/14/it-s-official-new-microsoft-dynamics-crm-and-silverlight-book-is-out.aspx

CONFERENCE:  CRMUG Summit – Nov 7 – Nov 11th, 2011, Caesars Palace, Las Vegas
CRMUG Summit is designed with one thing in mind: to connect you, the Dynamics CRM User, with the right resources to address your specific CRM challenges, issues and priorities. We create ample networking opportunities, both formal and informal, to make it easy for you to connect with other Users, partners, or Microsoft staff members who have the experiences and answers you need. Those opportunities include structured networking sessions, Microsoft Town Hall meetings, exclusive expo times, interactive discussions, Microsoft Conduits, role/industry/location-based roundtables, Ask the Experts sessions, meetings-on-the-fly, networking receptions and more. And, of course, there will be plenty of opportunities to keep the conversations and the fun going even after the day’s planned agenda is complete (after all, we will be in Vegas)!
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/crm/archive/2011/09/07/top-reasons-to-attend-the-summit.aspx

Read about this and more at:

• Microsoft Dynamics CRM Team Blog
  http://blogs.msdn.com/b/crm/default.aspx

I thought some of you might be interested in this article “What’s Behind Windows 8” from Maximum PC magazine.

• DOWNLOAD: Oct 2011 – Maximum PC Magazine, “What’s Behind Windows 8” (12MB)
  http://dl.maximumpc.com/Archives/MPC_2011_10-web.pdf

——————–

This is pre-“BUILD CONFERENCE” so there have been things announced/confirmed since this magazine went to print, however there’s a long list of capabilities that have been purported to have been uncovered in leaked builds of Windows 8.  I honestly don’t know if any of the unconfirmed features are in Windows 8 however a few were in fact confirmed at BUILD and in the Windows Developer Preview that was released to the public.

The article is broken down into two categories:

• “What we know for sure”
• “What we predict” (based on leaked builds)

The “What we predict” section talks about a lonnnnng list of features & their projected probability of it remaining in the product, such as:

• ISO Mounting (since confirmed on Building Windows blog)
• Pattern login (since confirmed in Dev Preview called “Picture Login”)
• Hybrid Boot (since confirmed in Dev Preview)
• Portable Workspaces
• History Vault
• WinFS
• Cloud Storage
• Push Notifications
• Facial Recognition
• System Reset (since confirmed)
• App Store
• Native PDF support
• …

[as taken from the Visio site]

SharePoint Network Topology Diagram Add-in leverages Visio services to deliver a near real time intuitive rendering of the status of Sharepoint farm’s infrastructure and associated services. Visio Graphics services – A key part of Sharepoint 2010, enables customers to share their dynamic data driven Visio diagrams and dashboards within Sharepoint. This helps extend the reach of valuable information and insights across relevant teams within the enterprise for capacity planning and general IT maintenance.

The timer job fetches all the key technical metrics about the Sharepoint farm infrastructure using Sharepoint object model and WMI (Windows Management Instrumentation). It’s frequency can be adjusted based on specific administrative needs. The timer job creates a Sharepoint list that is linked to a Visio diagram. A client add-in helps you generate, customize and link the output of the timer job to a Visio diagram by using a wizard driven interface.

Upon publishing the Visio diagram within Sharepoint, Visio services enable users to refresh their diagram from within Sharepoint.

Pre-requisites

• English version or Localized English version of Windows OS. Windows 7 is preferred.
• .Net Framework 3.5
• Visio 2010 Licensed Professional or Premium version. Visio 2010 standard version and trial versions (any SKU) are not supported.

MORE INFO
http://visiospfarmaddin.codeplex.com/

Download

• SharePoint Network Topology Diagram Add-In (X86)
  application, 1668K, uploaded Oct 5 – 613 downloads
• SharePoint Network Topology Diagram Add-In (X64)
  application, 1669K, uploaded Oct 5 – 133 downloads

The following is provided by Forefront UAG Update 1:

• Lync web services publishing—Forefront UAG now supports publishing Lync web services
• Dynamics CRM 2011 publishing—Forefront UAG now supports publishing Dynamics CRM 2011
• SharePoint 2010 with Office Web Apps—Forefront UAG now supports publishing SharePoint 2010 with Office Web Apps
• Improved browser support—Forefront UAG now supports more web browsers than in previous releases

Installation instructions are located at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh490311.aspx. 

For more information about Unified Access Gateway 2010 in general, visit:
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/server-cloud/forefront/unified-access-gateway.aspx

• DOWNLOAD:  Forefront Unified Access Gateway (UAG) Service Pack 1 (SP1) Update 1
  http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=27604

Legal-Compliance Solutions Using SharePoint Enterprise Content Management

Discover how centralizing your content in SharePoint 2010 drives legal compliance, business process automation, increased user adoption, rapid ROI, while leveraging your investment in your SharePoint Platform.

SharePoint is arguably to most powerful information worker productivity platform ever developed. However the business value and user adoption of SharePoint projects rely heavily on the ability to easily and efficiently capture, locate and manage information coming from multiple sources; including paper, fax, e-mail, Office applications, file shares and legacy systems.

Join us at the Microsoft Technology Center for a fast-paced presentation and hands on session focused on Maximizing ROI in the following key areas:

• Leveraging SharePoint as a Document Imaging platform
  • Role-based demonstrations focused on onboarding content efficiently and accurately to SharePoint:
  • Information worker electronic capture (e.g., email and other desktop applications)
  • Line-of-business capture and integration
  • Centralized high volume paper capture
  • Remote and ad hoc paper capture
  • Shared network paper capture

• Leveraging SharePoint as a Records Management and Legal Compliance Platform:
  • Records Management and Compliance
  • Legal compliance rules-based approval and electronic routing (Workflows)
  • Case Management
  • Digital Rights Management
  • Information Architecture/Managed Metadata
  • Enterprise Search
  • Security
  • Architectural considerations for Legal compliance

Date/Time:
November 3rd, 2011
8:30am – 11:15am

Location:
Microsoft Office
3 Park Plaza, Suite 1600
Irvine, CA, 92614
Cost: Complimentary

Presented By:

Registration:
Please contact me for registration information if you are a managed customer of mine in the legal industry.

Microsoft, Celestix and CSS present:
Implementing Windows 7 DirectAccess with Unified Access Gateway

Join us at the Irvine MTC for this free training course.  Attendees will be introduced to the technical aspects of Microsoft Forefront Unified Access Gateway 2010 (UAG) and Windows 7 DirectAccess. The course will provide the knowledge and skills to design, and deploy remote access solutions with UAG and Windows DirectAccess technologies. Students will gain hands on experience implementing UAG and DirectAccess solutions.

AGENDA:
•    Microsoft Forefront UAG 2010 overview
•    Application publishing basics for UAG
•    Forefront UAG 2010 restricted network access
•    Forefront UAG 2010 full network access and DirectAccess
•    Windows 7 DirectAccess testing and troubleshooting

LOCATION:
3 Park Plaza, Suite 1600
Irvine, CA 92614

For times, dates, and registration information:  If you are a customer of mine, please contact me and I will get you the appropriate information.

For those of you paying attention, Microsoft, in cooperation with government authorities & Kaspersky, took down the Kelihos Botnet which was capable of sending out 3.8B spam messages per day. 

This brings the total botnet shutdowns to 3:

• Sept 2010: Waledac – 80,000 computers, 1.5 billion spam emails a day
• Mar 2011: Rustock – 150,000 computers, 30 billion spam e-mails a day
• Sept 2011: Kelihos – 41,000 computers, 3.8 billion spam e-mails per day

What does this mean to you?
This saves everyone money & time.

• Diminished congestion on inbound mail pipes.
• Diminished mailbox sizes & storage utilization.
• Less administration & labor of enterprise mail filters.
• Increased end user productivity.
• Reduced risk of spam-originated malware infection.

Simply put, through the systematic dismantling of these botnets, overall spam has dropped worldwide by 64 billion messages, or roughly 71%.  Here’s is a the timeline progression of diminished spam as a result of these botnet shutdowns.

• 90 billion – July 2010
• 60 billion – Dec 2010
• 22 billion – May 2011

22 billion to go.  As the world pushes forward against botnets, we can all hope for a spam-free future.

<taken from US Govt Configuration Baseline Technet blog>

IEZoneAnalyzer is a utility for viewing and comparing Internet Explorer security zone settings – that is, the configuration settings that grant web sites in the Intranet zone more capabilities in the browser than web sites in the Internet zone. Earlier today, I wrote about the surprisingly complex rules that determine whether and when explicit mappings of websites to security zones take effect or are ignored. IEZoneAnalyzer version 3.5 adds a Zone Map Viewer that shows which web sites have been specifically assigned to security zones and whether the assignment is effective. Click on the “Zone Map Viewer” button in the main dialog’s toolbar to display the Zone Map Viewer. You can toggle the Zone Map Viewer between an “Effective Settings” view and a “Raw Settings” view with labeled toolbar buttons.

“Effective Settings” lists the configured web sites and the zones to which they are mapped. The Comments column calls out settings that are applicable only to 32-bit processes or only to 64-bit processes, or that are completely overridden and never take effect. For example, the first screenshot below shows a number of site assignments to Trusted Sites that are overridden because they are defined in User Preferences, but overridden both because the “use only machine settings” group policy is in effect and because a Computer Configuration Site-To-Zone Assignment policy is in effect. The screenshot also shows two overridden settings that are in effect only when Enhanced Security Configuration (ESC) is enabled, which is not the case as shown by the informational lines at the top of the listing. A given site is listed only once in the Effective Settings view. If a site is mapped the exact same way in a registry location that is in effect and in another that is not in use, the “overridden” one is not shown. That is, a setting is shown as “overridden” only if is defined somewhere differently from what is actually in effect.

To download the tool and read more about it’s use, visit:

• DOWNLOAD:  IEZoneAnalyzer v3.5 with Zone Map Viewer
  http://blogs.technet.com/b/fdcc/archive/2011/09/22/iezoneanalyzer-v3-5-with-zone-map-viewer.aspx