Posted by: kurtsh | July 22, 2006

NEWS: Microsoft acquires AssetMetrix!

WOW.  I didn’t know about this one…
 
Would you like to know:
…how many "Retail" installations of Office 2003 you have versus "Select" versions?
…who is running SQL Server Enterprise Edition versus SQL Server Standard?
…who’s running illegally their production machines on MSDN licenses or OEM licenses?
…how many licenses you have "left" of a given product relative to a department’s license count?
…who’s got Word 2003 installed standalone versus Office 2003 installed?
…what machines have Adobe Acrobat installed as a package versus as a standalone product?
 
Most of all… would you like to be able to download an UPDATED DATABASE of all these versions and identifying rules that can be automatically used by SMS2003?
 
THAT’S WHAT ASSETMETRIX DOES. 
AssetMetrix not only provides clear, easy to interpret "inventory information" on your company’s deployed software relative to what you’ve licensed.
 
SMS2003 historically has had a bit of a problem with this because we provide "inventory data"… in other words, we tell you that you have 1824 copies of WINWORD.EXE version 11.0020.0 deployed.  What we don’t tell you is whether or not that installation of WINWORD.EXE is:
– Word 97 or Word 2000 or Word 2002/XP or Word 2003
– part of an installation of Office 2003, or if it’s a standalone install
– it’s a Select/EA installation of Word or it’s an MSDN copy
– if it’s legal or not relative to your current licensing for that department
…and it works against an consistently updated database of product that including 3rd parties – not just Microsoft products.
 
This is what Systems Management Server users have to look forward to folks.  This is gonna be incredibly valuable to Desktop Administrators the world over, and also for Server Administrators as well.
 
 

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Posted in News and politics

Posted by: kurtsh | July 20, 2006

NEWS: Microsoft licenses MSR “TouchLight” technology to EON

EON Reality Inc., in Irvine, California, is licensing Microsoft’s "TouchLight" technology, which allows users to physically interact with 3D visual content by manipulating 3D images on a screen by hand.

The company said it will use the technology as part of its commercial, automotive, aerospace and defense industry product lines. EON Reality sells applications and hardware display systems for viewing and producing 3D content.

A demonstration of TouchLight can be found at this company page.

Microsoft is licensing TouchLight through its IP Ventures program, which gives emerging companies a jump start in developing their own products by letting them license early-stage technology from Microsoft. The company launched the program in May 2005.

Other companies that have licensed technology as part of the program are Enterprise Ireland, the Finnish National Fund for Research and Development (Sitra), Inrix Inc., Skinkers, Softedge-Systems, Vimio PLC and Wallop Inc. 

 

[taken from Infoworld http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/07/19/HNmsthreed_1.html]

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Posted in News and politics

Posted by: kurtsh | July 20, 2006

NEWS: Microsoft establishes significant alliance with Nortel

Nortel and Microsoft Form Alliance to Accelerate Transformation of Business Communications
 
Microsoft CEO, Steve Ballmer and Nortel CEO, Mike Zafirovski signed a strategic partnership agreement to form the Innovative Communications Alliance.  Unified Communications Group (UCG) is at the heart of this agreement, however the investments and expected benefits will Microsoft overall.
Today with this partnership announcement, Nortel is agreeing to move their solutions on top of our UC platform.  We are committing to doing appropriately scoped R&D together so we can quickly take more complete UC solutions to our customers (e.g. advanced telephony features, call center capabilities, IVR). We have signed a broad patent cross license to facilitate the R&D interaction.  They have also agreed to develop a strong System Integrator practice to take our joint UC solution to customers.   We have also agreed to jointly go-to-market with our solutions leveraging our combined sales and marketing engines.  The overall benefit is accelerating the realization of our UC vision for our customers through:
·         Increased ability to deliver more complete UC solutions to customers, today
·         SI partner with deep voice and networking expertise to take joint solutions to market
 
UC group leadership and our top level company executive leadership, including Steve Ballmer and Jeff Raikes, are very bullish about this partnership.  Steve Ballmer has been a key sponsor of this partnership from the beginning and he has devoted significant personal time helping us close this alliance agreement.  Given our companies’ shared vision and commitment to move to software-based person-centric UC, joint strengths of our two companies in the communications space, I believe the partnership should significantly accelerate Microsoft’s momentum.
 
To learn more about what "Unified Communications" is, go to:

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Posted in News and politics

Posted by: kurtsh | July 19, 2006

NEWS: Microsoft acquires Sysinternals/Winternals

"Winternals and Sysinternals have been acquired by Microsoft. Winternals is a leading provider of systems recovery tools for Windows-based enterprises worldwide and Sysinternals is one of the leading community and enthusiast sites for people interested in information about the internals of the Windows operating system."
 
More coverage here:
 
Mark Russinovich wrote about this in his blog today. He is joining MS as a Technical Fellow in Microsoft Platform and Services.

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Posted in Uncategorized

Posted by: kurtsh | July 18, 2006

TRAINING: Secure messaging & Collaboration Hands-on-Lab, August 29th, 2006

Microsoft invites you to an exclusive training opportunity:
Secure Messaging and Collaboration Hands-On Lab
Tuesday August 29, 2006
 
On a daily basis, your success is reliant on keeping your IT systems up and running, being responsive to requests from internal clients, and helping those clients achieve their objectives through technology. At the same time you’re facing continuing threats from viruses and external and internal attacks as well. And still you’re concerned about backup and disaster recovery.
 
ISA Server 2006 and Microsoft® Antigen products can help you address these concerns and enhance the security of your messaging and collaboration infrastructure. Join us for this one day hands-on lab and you’ll learn how to:
  • Help protect Exchange Server, Instant Messaging, and SharePoint® Servers with Antigen
  • Configure and Manage Antigen Servers
  • Enable Outlook® Web Access (OWA) through ISA Server 2006
  • Help secure application publishing with ISA Server 2006
  • Provide Web Access protection with ISA 2006
  • Set up multiple layers of defense with EHS for Exchange and Antigen for SMTP gateway.
  • Optimize the infrastructures through the use of RMS and MOM

Who Should Attend:

This hands-on lab is for IT Professionals who build, support, and secure messaging and collaboration platforms, or secure remote and mobile user access points. Roles include Enterprise Messaging and Security Administrators, Exchange Administrators, and Security Managers.
 
Prerequisites:
To get the most from this lab, you should have some knowledge around Exchange, SharePoint, IM, and the threats associated with these messaging and collaboration environments.
 
Course Modules:
  • Secure Application Publishing
  • Web Access Protection
  • Protecting Exchange against Viruses and Spam
  • Protecting Instant Messaging
  • Protecting SharePoint Servers
  • Configuring and Managing Microsoft Antigen Server
RSVP:
This special, no charge training event will fill quickly and space is limited, so be sure to register as soon as possible to reserve your seat.
 
Registration:
 
Location:
Microsoft Irvine
3 Park Plaza
Suite 1800
Irvine, CA 92614
Phone: 949.263.3000
August 29, 2006
8:30 am – 4:30 pm
 

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Posted in Training

Posted by: kurtsh | July 17, 2006

OFFER: Enterprise Agreement customers get 4 additional virtualized Windows OS licenses for Virtual PC

If you have an Enterprise Agreement with Microsoft and you have the Desktop CAL licensed for your workstations, you have a new benefit!

As an Enterprise customer, you now receive the rights to four additional copies of the operating system per workstation so that you can leverage up to four virtual machines in Virtual PC. This enables you to use the product to its full potential to address application compatibility issues, run a helpdesk, run a training class, and perform software application testing. These additional operating system licensing rights are exclusive to Software Assurance customers.

 

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Posted in Offer

Posted by: kurtsh | July 17, 2006

INFO: Windows Vista to support 130+ languages

Apparently, at least count we have 130+ languages enabled in Windows Vista.  This makes Windows Vista, obviously far and away the most impactful piece of software ever created in terms of globally understandable reach, impacting hundreds of millions of people.
 
This is not everyone however.  There are many dialects and locales that differ enough from one of the 130+ languages roots that a signficantly different user interface should be used for clarity.
 
Fortunately, by giving customers the tools that we are going to be providing for free when Vista releases (Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator and Microsoft Locale Builder), we are going to make Windows linguistically accessible for >90% of the world’s literate population – that’s over 3.5 billion people. (And that’s a conservative estimate!)
 
And Windows Vista’s global linguistic reach extends not just to the operating systems interface, but also to other OS components & software applications such as:
  • Internet Explorer 7.0
  • Windows Media Player 11
  • Office 2007
  • Live.com
  • Windows Live Mail Center
  • Windows Defender
  • Windows Live Messenger

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Posted in Info

Posted by: kurtsh | July 17, 2006

INFO: “How to pimp your Xbox 360”

So you wanna pimp out your Xbox360.  Or you want to surprise your kid and get a "real player’s Xbox360"… not just one of these beige "stock units" that everyone else on the block has.
 
Some of you may know that my 3 Xbox360s are tricked out but the question everyone asks me is, "Where’d you get all that gear?"  Well, here’s where I get all my parts from.  It’s pretty much "do it yourself" and it’s really easy.
 
Faceplates:
 
Complete Cases Replacement:
 
LED-lit "Tricked out" Complete Case Replacement:
 

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Posted in Info

Posted by: kurtsh | July 17, 2006

RELEASE: Halo 2 Soundtrack Volume 2

The folks at Bungie (a division of Microsoft) released the second volume of the Soundtrack of Halo 2.  If you’re interested, Amazon’s got it for $12.95.
 

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Posted in Release

Posted by: kurtsh | July 17, 2006

BETA: Windows Defender Beta 2 Build 1.1.1347.0

Interesting.  It looks like a new version of Windows Defender came out sometime in April apparently… and I never knew about it.  Windows Defender was labeled as "Beta 2" since it was the successor to our Microsoft Antispyware Beta 1 product.  You might remember that product as being the former "Giant AntiSpyware" product that was known by it’s trademark "bullseye" logo.  (Having a bullseye for logo when you’re a security product isn’t the brightest thing in the world but I digress) 
 
Anyway, the first "Windows Defender Beta 2" was version 1.1.1051.0.   The new one appears to be Windows Defender 1.1.1347.0.  It installs over your existing installation but it requires that you shutdown both Internet Explorer as well as Outlook.
 
Download the current beta release here:

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Posted in Beta

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