Kurt Shintaku's Blog

The folks at Graphic.ly are working on a Windows 7/WPF based application that allows you to purchase and view comic books and graphic novels on your computer whether it’s a convention Windows PC or a Tablet or a Touch-based computer. 

Purchases are said to be going for $1.99 each which puts the costs in the same realm as traditional comics.  Whether this will resonate with people, one can only wonder.  Comics have historically always been a physical collectible with half the pleasure arising from owning a physical object, the ability to trade that object, and evaluate the value of that object in comparison with other’s interest.  There’s not much thrill in owning Green Lantern #1 when it’s just bits, right?  Personally, I get a high every time I open my mailbox to find a physical magazine in there for me to open up and discover what new PC got evaluated by Maximum PC’s editors… or what up and coming games is being hyped by the reviewers at Official Xbox Magazine.

But then again, if you’re always on the road, and tend to chew up content faster than they can produce it, maybe a ‘purchase & download online’ model makes sense.  With a large store with content, it’s wholly possible to never run out of stuff to read ever again.

Anyway, the application is in beta and requires one to submit an application to be accepted into the private beta.  Invitations are handed out on an as needed basis so if you’re interested, try applying.

• BETA:  Graphic.ly Beta Application for Windows 7
  http://graphic.ly/about.html

(Can’t wait? @graphicly is apparently publishing line jump codes over Twitter.  You’ll figure out what this means if you apply for the private beta.)

For the first time, I’m allowed to talk about it.  And yes.  It’s good.  Very very good.

I’m officially allowed to have friends & relatives come over and game as guests on the MP beta now on my personal Xbox 360.  For those of you still waiting, the beta will of course be going live for the rest of the world on May 3rd – and in order to participate, you MUST own a copy of the Halo: ODST campaign disc.  It’s a requirement to initialize and play the downloadable Multiplayer Beta.

One thing?  ‘Invasion’ is SICK.  Just sayin’.

Share your pain and win!
Tell us your tales of IT fails and you could win:

• Star prize of a Sony Vaio X laptop
• One weekly winner gets their story made into a cartoon and recieves a framed version
• One weekly winner gets 100 pounds to spend in the Microsoft Store
• Three weekly runners up receive 30 pounds to spend in the Microsoft Store.

If you win, you’ll have your tale ‘cartoonized’. as the tale below is:

• LINK:  Where’s the ‘any’ Key
  http://www.wherestheanykey.co.uk/

Wheee!  3 new free apps for my Zune HD!

If you know me, you know I don’t go anywhere without my ZuneHD.  If I’m driving to work, I’m listening to my ZuneHD.  If I’m going to customers, I’ve got my ZuneHD on.  If I’m blogging… yes, right now… I have my ZuneHD on.  So it’s uber-cool to have a few new little timewasters available on it… totally free.

• STOPWATCH – Simple ,easy to use stopwatch with lap splits and a countdown timer mode
• SOLITAIRE – Play the quintessential single player card game anywhere you go.
• LABYRINTH – Lead your marble through a world filled with a variety of challenges.

To get them, just run the Zune Client and click on MARKETPLACE – APPS and you’ll see them available for download.

The Get On the Bus Tour is back and we’re taking our 10-city road tour to the East Coast toward New Orleans and Tech-Ed 2010. Register for a tour stop near you, where we’ll dive deep into both Windows 7 and Office 2010, and present specific learning paths for the latest Microsoft Certifications. All at no cost to you.

• Charlotte, NC
  Thursday, June 3, 2010
  Hilton Charlotte City Center
  222 East Third Street
  Charlotte, NC
  (704) 377-1500

FREE SOFTWARE!
We are giving away 50 copies of Windows 7 Ultimate for the first 50 Get On the Bus event attendees through the door at EVERY STOP! Don’t miss your chance to win a copy of Microsoft’s newest software offering – register today at www.thebustour.com.

LINK: http://MicrosoftBusTour.com

ChangeBASE and App-DNA are Microsoft partners that have tools to assist you in detecting and resolving application incompatibilities. Both partners provide free testing for application compatibility—simply upload the app, it runs the test and sends a report back that tells whether it’s compatible or not, and if not, where the problems are. This is a simple, quick service that can be used to get an almost immediate snapshot of how compatible an application is with Windows 7.

App-DNA
App-DNA has enterprise class software that can help:

• Save months in application testing costs alone
• Automate application virtualization for App-V and XenApp
• Quickly help consolidate and optimize infrastructure and server farms helping to significantly reduce your data-center power consumption

http://www.app-dna.com/

ChangeBASE
ChangeBASE AOK is a software company that has developed a suite of automated, highly innovative applications that hugely improve the time, quality, consistency, and cost of the test, remediation, and ongoing management challenges that companies face as they begin the process of migrating their applications from one operating system or deployment environment to another.
http://www.changebase.com/

[Shamelessly stolen from Major Nelson’s blog]

Halo: Reach will be available in standard, Limited and Legendary editions when the game launches this fall. Full details on the contents of the Limited and Legendary editions are below:

Halo: Reach Limited Edition – $79.99 (USD)
In addition to the game disc and manual, the Limited edition includes:

• Game disc housed in recovered ONI ”black box”
• An exclusive Elite armor set for use in multiplayer modes
• Artifact bag containing Dr. Halsey’s personal journal and other classified documents and effects that unravel long held secrets from the “Halo” universe

Halo: Reach Legendary Edition – $149.99 (USD)
The complete “Halo: Reach” collection. In addition to the game disc, manual, and the complete contents of the Limited edition, the Legendary edition includes:

• Noble Team statue expertly crafted by the artisans at McFarlane Toys. Individually molded, hand-painted and individually numbered, this statue is a must-have for any serious “Halo” fan
• UNSC-themed custom packaging
• An exclusive multiplayer Spartan armor effect

The standard edition of Halo: Reach will have an estimated price of $59.99 USD.  The two special editions will be available only while supplies last . Until then, I’ve posted some high rez pictures of some of the items mentioned above.

In other Halo news, Bungie’s latest Halo: Reach ViDoc, titled Carnàge Carnivàle was also released today. We’re only a few short days away from the Halo : Reach multiplayer beta which starts May 3rd. As a reminder, you will need your Halo 3: ODST game disc to participate in the beta.

Please visit http://www.microsoft.com/security/about/sir.aspx to view the latest Microsoft Security Intelligence Report (SIR), volume 8, and previous volumes. SIR Volume 8 covers July 2009 to December 2009. SIR provides in-depth perspective on changing threat landscape including:

• Software vulnerability disclosures and exploits in both Microsoft and third-party software
• Malicious software and potentially unwanted software
• Mitigation Strategies for Protecting Networks, Systems, and People

SIR v8 offers insight and guidance on cyber defense and highlights are captured in the blog.

Threat Assessment for United States – SIR V8

We released Silverlight 4 Tools for Visual Studio 2010!

• DOWNLOAD:  Silverlight Runtime & Development Tools
  http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=177508. 

The tools will install:

1. Silverlight 4 RTM Developer Runtime
2. Silverlight 4 Tools RC for VS 2010
3. Silverlight 4 SDK RTM
4. Silverlight 4 Tools RC Package
5. WCF RIA Services RC

Note that this is the RC release of the Silverlight 4 tools. With these tools you can start developing Silverlight 4 applications using Visual Studio 2010.  If you are not familiar with what’s new in SL 4 check out Tim’s blog here: http://timheuer.com/blog/archive/2009/11/18/whats-new-in-silverlight-4-complete-guide-new-features.aspx

If you haven’t already downloaded VS 2010, you can get the free Express version from here:

• DOWNLOAD:  Visual Studio 2010 Express Edition
  http://www.microsoft.com/web/gallery/install.aspx?appid=VWD2010.

If you are a MSDN subscriber you can get the full version here: http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudio/en-us/download

Expression Blend 4 enables you to create websites and applications based on Silverlight 3 and Silverlight 4, and desktop applications based on Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) 3.5 with Service Pack 1 (SP1) and WPF 4.

The final versions of both Silverlight 4 and .NET 4 have been released! To coincide with this, we are releasing a release candidate version of Expression Blend 4 that you can use to target them.  Download everything you need below:

• .NET Framework 4
• Expression Blend 4 Release Candidate

Expression Blend provides support for prototyping, interactivity through behaviors, special Silverlight functionality, and on-the-fly sample data generation.  Expression Blend includes new behaviors that are quickly and easily configured. To support the development of line-of-business (LOB) applications, Expression Blend introduces support for Views and ViewModels.

Find out more about what’s new in Expression Blend 4 RC.

There are two things that you really need to know about this release.

• First, if you are doing Windows Phone development, you should not use the Expression Blend 4 RC. We will have an update for you soon with updated components, but in the meantime, please use Expression Blend 4 Beta.
• Second, this release of Expression Blend 4 targets the final versions of Silverlight 4 and .NET 4, you can share your creations with the rest of the world. You no longer are limited to only sharing your creations in source code form or for private testing.

As always, we love to hear from you. Please feel free to comment below or use our forums here.

– The Expression Blend Team

[parts of this post stolen from the Expression Team blog]