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For the "Coffeehouse Only Crowd" - A popular request, our first attempt at a weekly show on C9. http://channel9.msdn.com/showpost.aspx?postid=378886 Looking forward to feedback and a name. More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

http://blogs.timesunion.com/tablehopping/wp-content/uploads/2007/07/giants-helmet.gif More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

<img alt="" height="1" width="1"> Jason Stamper's Blog Computer Business Review, UK - 1 hour ago ... wait and see how the dust settles, but we would note that Microsoft Vista is a more secure and robust operating system than Windows XP, if that helps. ... More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

I am trying to figure out how to use SetWindowsHookEx to hook my keyboard in and use FN + the F# keys (or alternatively, Windows + F# keys?) that would carry out a certain action when pressed (such as FN + F12 ejects my CD, FN + F11 turns up my volume, etc. [maybe even with a little sound]), and to be done in the background. But I do not know where to start. More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

On Michael Dells corporate site just weeks before the Ubuntu launch Mike had a machine listed as his home machine running Ubuntu, the Dell Precision M90. Well, since the Ubuntu launch Mike has upgraded that system to a newer model the Dell Precision M6300..... Read more Link More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

<img alt="" height="1" width="1"> Jason Stamper's Blog Computer Business Review, UK - 24 minutes ago ... wait and see how the dust settles, but we would note that Microsoft Vista is a more secure and robust operating system than Windows XP, if that helps. ... More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

This is Episode #1 of , a weekly recap show of our favorite things for developers including Channel9 videos, samples, bloggers, news, and much more. This week we cover * <li class=MsoNormal>MSDN Code Gallery went Live (found on Greg Duncan's Cool Thing of the Day blog) <li class=MsoNormal>Jason Olsen's App Compat C9 Video* <li class=MsoNormal>Pavel Bansky's Tetris on the .NET Micro Framework <li class=MsoNormal>C# Future Focus: Dynamic Lookup <li class=MsoNormal>Joel Spolsky on SQL Server 2008 Reset and Phil Factor*on Microsoft doing their homework <li class=MsoNormal>Dan*interviewing*April Reagan*on MSDN Help <li class=MsoNormal>Shawn Burke's Tip on disabling optimiziations when debugging reference source code. <li class=MsoNormal>Dan with*Scott Guthrie on IIS7 hosters for Mix <li class=MsoNormal>Dan and Scott Guthrie on Windows, Web, and RIA*and talking about how*he built the control <li class=MsoNormal>Brian and Dan mock each other's hair and how he "poked" Dan's wife on Facebook. <li class=MsoNormal>Facebook releases JavaScript APIs using Nikhil Kothari's Script# Library <li class=MsoNormal>CodeProject: Eric Williams HTML Editor control article <li class=MsoNormal>Josh Holmes Code to Live Video: What Richard Hale Shaw finds exciting in C# 3.0 <li class=MsoNormal>Joel Pobar's MSDN Magazine Article: Create Your own Language Compiler, Lawrence Pit's OOK # .NET <li class=MsoNormal>Second Life replacing their scripting runtime for LSL with Mono*and future .NET languages coming. <li class=MsoNormal>Brian's Pick of the week: Nic Fillingham's Custom Rockband Drum Kit at CES <li class=MsoNormal>*Dan Pick of the week:*Greg Dolley's port of Quake 3 from C to C++/CLI <li class=MsoNormal>It Came from the internets: What*every Microsoft employee does on a conference call <li class=MsoNormal>*Recap: email us at bestshow.nospam@microsoft.com and send us your name requests Brian's Superbowl predictions * Listen to the podcast(MP3) Listen to the podcast(WMA) Download the Video Watch the Video More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

Hey folks, thanks to some herculean editing by Brian last night, Episode 1 of our weekly recap show is up for your viewing entertainment. We still don't have a name and we're looking for suggestions on what you liked or didn't like, so let us know. More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

Stallman never showers: he runs 'make clean'. This and more gems ... More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

So just getting used to VS2008, the menubars and window borders aren't that bad, I can get used to them. ....but the real show-stopper for me is that VS2008 won't let me use a non-local IIS server for ASP.NET Web Applications, yet VS2005 does. Entering a non-local URI in the Web project properties gives me this error message: --------------------------- Microsoft Visual Studio --------------------------- The IIS Web server is not installed on this computer. --------------------------- OK** --------------------------- This is VS2008 Professional btw. I'm not at home, it's at a friend's office. But if I'm going to use VS2008 for any serious dev work at home where I use a dedicated IIS/SQL box this is going to prevent me from working. What's with this descision and are there any workarounds? EDIT: wait a sec... do you get this message if the IIS Admin components aren't installed locally? You can still use a non-local IIS server as with VS2005? More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

Just once, can't I upgrade my system without everything going wrong? Apparently not. [C] I bought an new CPU, a Core 2 Duo E8500, a new motherboard to match (an Asus*P5K, not the newest board but it supports this CPU and everything based on a newer chipset was hideously expensive) and a new graphics card, a Sapphire Radion HD3850. I rebuild my system, everything's fine so far, then I boot it. I was curious to see whether Vista would still work despite the major change in plumbing, and it does. It discovers a boatload of new hardware, asks me to reboot, so far still no trouble. Then it starts to hang regularly. It just freezes solid. Sometimes it even freezes during Vista's boot sequence. Thinking this may be power related (although with a 500 watt PSU I should have enough power, I think), I tried swapping back the old X1950 Pro. Now it doesn't hang, it BSOD's instead. The STOP code is 0x00000101 which according to Google means that one of the cores didn't respond to an interrupt in time. Could this mean the CPU is faulty? I sure hope not. I am just reinstalled Vista in the hope that maybe it was a driver issue with the upgrade or something. One weird thing there is that the first few dialogs of the Vista installation (regional settings, product key) took extremely long before they displayed, a few minutes at least. But now it's reinstalled and it's immediately crashing again, no drivers installed yet. It's a shame, because when the whole thing was working (briefly) I could really tell it was faster. I'm going to try swapping out the CPU with the old one (which should also work on this mobo), if that doesn't work I can eliminate the CPU as a cause. What do you all think? Could it be the PSU? The CPU? Something else? More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

<img alt="" height="1" width="1"> Instant Viewer with Microsoft Presenter 8000 Mouse ! Geekzone, New Zealand - 1 hour ago Wonder why this isn’t present by default in Windows Vista Please note: comments that are inappropriate or promotional in nature will be deleted. ... More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

wow! :| http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22947626/ More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

You can make your PowerShell scripts fun by adding speech. Wouldn't it be cool if your script finished its task by saying "Mission Completed"? Inspired by a post on Marcelo's Weblog, I wrote a blog post about using the Speech API in PowerShell. It's just 2 lines of code:$v = New-Object -ComObject SAPI.SpVoice$v.Speak("Who let the dogs out?")Have fun! More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/02/01/microsofts-letter-to-yahoo/ January 31, 2008 Board of Directors Yahoo! Inc. 701 First Avenue Sunnyvale, CA 94089 Attention: Roy Bostock, Chairman Attention: Jerry Yang, Chief Executive Officer Dear Members of the Board: Iam writing on behalf of the Board of Directors of Microsoft to make aproposal for a business combination of Microsoft and Yahoo!. Under ourproposal, Microsoft would acquire all of the outstanding shares ofYahoo! common stock for per share consideration of $31 based onMicrosoft's closing share price on January 31, 2008, payable in theform of $31 in cash or 0.9509 of a share of Microsoft common stock.Microsoft would provide each Yahoo! shareholder with the ability tochoose whether to receive the consideration in cash or Microsoft commonstock, subject to pro-ration so that in the aggregate one-half of theYahoo! common shares will be exchanged for shares of Microsoft commonstock and one-half of the Yahoo! common shares will be converted intothe right to receive cash. Our proposal is not subject to any financingcondition. Our proposal represents a 62% premium above theclosing price of Yahoo! common stock of $19.18 on January 31, 2008. Theimplied premium for the operating assets of the company clearly isconsiderably greater when adjusted for the minority, non-controlledassets and cash. By whatever financial measure you use - EBITDA, freecash flow, operating cash flow, net income, or analyst target prices -this proposal represents a compelling value realization event for yourshareholders. We believe that Microsoft common stock representsa very attractive investment opportunity for Yahoo!'s shareholders.Microsoft has generated revenue growth of 15%, earnings growth of 26%,and a return on equity of 35% on average for the last three years.Microsoft's share price has generated shareholder returns of 8% duringthe last one year period and 28% during the last three year period,significantly outperforming the S&P 500. It is our view thatMicrosoft has significant potential upside given the continued solidgrowth in our core businesses, the recent launch of Windows Vista, andother strategic initiatives. Microsoft's consistent belief hasbeen that the combination of Microsoft and Yahoo! clearly representsthe best way to deliver maximum value to our respective shareholders,as well as create a more efficient and competitive company that wouldprovide greater value and service to our customers. In late 2006 andearly 2007, we jointly explored a broad range of ways in which our twocompanies might work together. These discussions were based on a visionthat the online businesses of Microsoft and Yahoo! should be aligned insome way to create a more effective competitor in the onlinemarketplace. We discussed a number of alternatives ranging fromcommercial partnerships to a merger proposal, which you rejected. Whilea commercial partnership may have made sense at one time, Microsoftbelieves that the only alternative now is the combination of Microsoftand Yahoo! that we are proposing. In February 2007, I received aletter from your Chairman indicating the view of the Yahoo! Board that"now is not the right time from the perspective of our shareholders toenter into discussions regarding an acquisition transaction." Accordingto that letter, the principal reason for this view was the Yahoo!Board's confidence in the "potential upside" if management successfullyexecuted on a reformulated strategy based on certain operationalinitiatives, such as Project Panama, and a significant organizationalrealignment. A year has gone by, and the competitive situation has notimproved. While online advertising growth continues, there aresignificant benefits of scale in advertising platform economics, incapital costs for search index build-out, and in research anddevelopment, making this a time of industry consolidation andconvergence. Today, the market is increasingly dominated by one playerwho is consolidating its dominance through acquisition. Together,Microsoft and Yahoo! can offer a credible alternative for consumers,advertisers, and publishers. Synergies of this combination fall intofour areas: -- Scale economics: This combination enables synergies related to scale economics of the advertising platform where today there is only one competitor at scale. This includes synergies across both search and non-search related advertising that will strengthen the value proposition to both advertisers and publishers. Additionally, the combination allows us to consolidate capital spending. -- Expanded R&D capacity: The combined talent of our engineering resources can be focused on R&D priorities such as a single search index and single advertising platform. Together we can unleash new levels of innovation, delivering enhanced user experiences, breakthroughs in search, and new advertising platform capabilities. Many of these breakthroughs are a function of an engineering scale that today neither of our companies has on its own. -- Operational efficiencies: Eliminating redundant infrastructure and duplicative operating costs will improve the financial performance of the combined entity. -- Emerging user experiences: Our combined ability to focus engineering resources that drive innovation in emerging scenarios such as video, mobile services, online commerce, social media, and social platforms is greatly enhanced. Wewould value the opportunity to further discuss with you how to optimizethe integration of our respective businesses to create a leading globaltechnology company with exceptional display and search advertisingcapabilities. You should also be aware that we intend to offersignificant retention packages to your engineers, key leaders andemployees across all disciplines. We have dedicated considerabletime and resources to an analysis of a potential transaction and areconfident that the combination will receive all necessary regulatoryapprovals. We look forward to discussing this with you, and both ourinternal legal team and outside counsel are available to meet with yourcounsel at their earliest convenience. Our proposal is subjectto the negotiation of a definitive merger agreement and our having theopportunity to conduct certain limited and confirmatory due diligence.In addition, because a portion of the aggregate merger considerationwould consist of Microsoft common stock, we would provide Yahoo! theopportunity to conduct appropriate limited due diligence with respectto Microsoft. We are prepared to deliver a draft merger agreement toyou and begin discussions immediately. In light of thesignificance of this proposal to your shareholders and ours, as well asthe potential for selective disclosures, our intention is to publiclyrelease the text of this letter tomorrow morning. Due to theimportance of these discussions and the value represented by ourproposal, we expect the Yahoo! Board to engage in a full review of ourproposal. My leadership team and I would be happy to make ourselvesavailable to meet with you and your Board at your earliest convenience.Depending on the nature of your response, Microsoft reserves the rightto pursue all necessary steps to ensure that Yahoo!'s shareholders areprovided with the opportunity to realize the value inherent in ourproposal. We believe this proposal represents a uniqueopportunity to create significant value for Yahoo!'s shareholders andemployees, and the combined company will be better positioned toprovide an enhanced value proposition to users and advertisers. We hopethat you and your Board share our enthusiasm, and we look forward to aprompt and favorable reply. Sincerely yours, /s/ Steven A. Ballmer Steven A. Ballmer Chief Executive Officer Microsoft Corporation More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

Is it wrong to love an inanimate object so much? Even one which only offers an incremental improvement over the object they replace? I got myself a set of Ultimate Ears, (the absolute bottom of their range ones, Metro Fi.) And they're a little taste of luxury, from the packaging, to the actual experience. It's hard to accurately judge, but comparing them to the bundled headphones on my Clix they're quite a big leap. It's something like the audio equivalent of SD versus HD (well, 720p anyway). I just hope this isn't the beginning of some audiophile slippery slope. More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

<img alt="" height="1" width="1"> Telligent® Partners with Microsoft® and Dell™ to Promote PRODUCT RED™ Newswire Today (press release), UK - 19 minutes ago The team at Telligent was responsible for the development, creative, and mark up of the new Windows Vista Ultimate (PRODUCT) RED blog. ... More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

Software development outsourcing services for companieNetPartner IT provides software development outsourcing services for companies whose success depends on quality software and systems. Engaging top-notch talent, we can provide qualified offshore resources for client-driven projects, or manage the entire development process. With Departments in the U.S., Europe and a state-of-the-art development center in Ukraine, NetPartner IT can provide the best combination of quality implementation and professional customer service. NetPartner IT’s procedures are built on industry’s best practices, and coupled with expert project management and clear communications, they ensure quality results and a rewarding outsourcing experience.NetPartner IT offers a comprehensive range of services centered on software development and maintenance, such as requirements, implementation, and support. Over the years, we have implemented applications for a wide range of vertical industries, including technology and software, healthcare, financial and legal, and distribution and retail. Most of our solutions utilize Microsoft technologies, and range from web to client/server to desktop applications.EXPERIENCE:NetPartner IT has the most experience in technical architecture development such as:Web-applications development, E-commerce solutions development, Client-server applications, Web, Components and program modulesNetPartner IT uses the following technology: .net\asp.net 2.0\ms ajax\mssql & php\mysql\java PRICES:Our hourly rate is USD 15-20 for an engineer. However the final price will be dependent on a number of factors such as project term, number of resources and the type of partnership model chosen.CONTACTS:Voice: +38 095 3299992, +38 063 3730000Fax: +380 642 357044email: info at netpartner-it.comicq: 217580424skype: getstar777msn: netpartner-it at hotmail.comURL: http://www.netpartner-it.com.ua/USEFUL LINKS:http://www.netpartner-it.com.ua/http://www.techno-soft.com/index.php?option=com_fireboard&Itemid=57&func=showcat&catid=2http://forum.landgraph.ru/index.php?topic=444.0http://www.offshore-development.co.uk/forum/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=62http://discuss.joelonsoftware.com/default.asp?dotnet.12.588573.0http://www.itechbridge.com/forum/index.php?showforum=706http://www.topix.com/search/article?q=netpartnerhttp://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=377081http://p2p.wrox.com/default.asphttp://www.daniweb.com/forums/forum18.html More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

<img alt="" height="1" width="1"> Telligent® Partners With Microsoft® and Dell™ To Promote (PRODUCT ... The Open Press (press release) - 1 hour ago The team at Telligent was responsible for the development, creative, and mark up of the new Windows Vista Ultimate (PRODUCT) RED blog. ... Give me Ubuntu or, well, give me something else ZDNet Blogs all 2 news articles More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

vLite condenses Windows Vista installation from the normal 15GB to 1.4GB by giving the user the option to omit features of the operating system. The creator is croatian college student Dino Nuhagic. Computerworld has an interview with him. In an excerpt:“Who can justify a 15GB operating system?” asked Dino Nuhagic, a fifth-year student from Split, [...] More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

To counter "the bloat thread", I figured we could discuss what is missing from the .Net framework. I don't consider many features to be bloat, it's more a matter of how the features are implemented and how modular they are. Are any of you missing stuff that "ought" to be in the .Net and if so, what? One can of course argue the merits of bundling to death, but still, let's just have some suggestions, if you will. It can also be change suggestions. In particular things you need as an application developer (the "plumbing"). More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

<img alt="" height="1" width="1"> Telligent® Partners With Microsoft® and Dell™ To Promote (PRODUCT ... The Open Press (press release) - 33 minutes ago The team at Telligent was responsible for the development, creative, and mark up of the new Windows Vista Ultimate (PRODUCT) RED blog. ... More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

..dont worry - its a non-political thread ;) my house had an arbourite purpley counter when we moved in. after about 5 years - we decided to change it - but instead opted for a deck and new attic*access point + floor. so we - cheaped out and painted the counter black.* it got dirty fast) especially with cats) - so i painted it... white.* bad bad mistake. looked the best its ever looked for a day... then got stained by cats, coffee, anything actually... so today i sanded it - and did a ..."FAUX FINISH!" yes - that old 90's thing.* but guess what - it worked! basically - i painted it dark gray - then sponged on black ..and..it worked.* it looks almost like black marble. *very soon we are ripping it out and getting the "wood" counter (remember that thread from years ago? "Wood"- well we are still intending on doing it.. but just thought id mention - i got another ..2 to 3 months out of doing the FAUX thing sorry - no pics yet- give me time ;) * so - concrete grey / ebony black / lufa sponge / paper towels to remove most of black..and sponge away = mablesque More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

just PRETENDING democrats win - and its either hillary or obama - do you think MS should prepare for this possible outcome? should they ready a few "innovative" ideas ( perhaps along the lines of non- wga / drm initiatives?) or should they just continue on in their - somewhat - Oil company ways (ya thats not going to go over well - or should i say oil well)* ? (armour on) pre-edit: im just saying - does everyone not think steveb has been getting away with anti-consumer murder? lock down in name of "security" stones... throw .. begin More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds

http://www.microspotting.com/2008/01/goth-in-the-office Interview with a freaky Goth chick who works at Microsoft. More... View All Our Microsoft Related Feeds