Greg's Cool [Insert Clever Name] of the Day: 02/05/2012

Saturday, February 11, 2012

Using the Windows System State Analyzer utility to compare before/after system snapshots (pre/post install/config/uninstall etc)

Ask the Performance Team - An Introduction to the Windows System State Analyzer

There often arises a need to figure out what may have changed on a system, either due to a specific issue or even to compare the difference between two systems. Today I would like to introduce you to the Windows System State Analyzer utility. Unless you are a developer or tester, you probably have never heard of this tool, as it is part of the Windows 2008 R2 Logo Software Certification and Windows 2008 R2 Logo Program Software Certification toolkits.

The basic functionality of the System State Analyzer tool is to allow you to compare two snapshots taken at different points in time. This allows you to compare the state of a machine both before and after an application install for instance. Today I will give you a run-through of what the tool looks like while doing a compare of a system both before and after installing a software package, in this case Virtual PC 2007. The initial UI will look something like this:

· Server Logo Program Software Certification Tool x86: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=140110

· Server Logo Program Software Certification Tool x64: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=140109

Note: You must have the .NET Framework 2.0 installed for Windows System State Analyzer to work correctly.

...

..."

This is a utility I know I'm going to enjoy using... Why? Because I think it might finally help me see what's all (keyword) being done to my systems via Group Policy. Oh and snapshots pre/post install are cool too... And pre/post uninstall comparisons too. Oh and... and...

(via Blue Onion Software - Friday Links #189)

[Humor] Tech Support...

WinExtra - The truth behind the mystique of tech support

LOL.... So true...

Friday, February 10, 2012

Walking through learning how to use Microsoft Translator via a console app

Visual Studio Gallery - Walkthrough: Microsoft Translator in a C# Console Application

"This sample explains how to use the Microsoft Translator API through the Windows Azure Marketplace by creating a sample application which takes an input string and translates it from the detected source language to a random output language.

...

Having seen some of the cool projects people have been doing with the Microsoft Translator API I decided to write a small app and learn how the APIs work. Since this is a learning exercise, I wanted something that’s very simple and yet powerful enough to exercise all of the key features in the API. The Console application I came up with takes a string as a command-line argument. It firsts asks the service what language the string was written in. Next, it asks for the list of all supported languages and chooses one at random. Finally, it gets the string translated from the source language to the randomly selected target language. You put a string in and get a random translation of that string out. The design is simple, so let’s look at the implementation!

1. Getting Ready to Code

2. Preparing the Development Environment

3. Determine the Language of the Input String

4. Get a List of All Supported Languages

5. Translate the String to the Randomly Selected Languages

6. Result

..."

I thought this a great walkthrough for using the Microsoft Translator service, where being in a console app lets you focus on the lesson at hand (and not the plumbing)

[Humor] Did you notice...

xkcd - Kerning

I hate when that happens... When someone says, "Can you hear/see/smell that?" and until that moment you didn't but now you can't not... :P LOL

Wayback gaming today... Warzone 2100 (free, cross platform and OSS too)

The Next Bench Blog - Freeware Friday: Warzone 2100

I love freeware games – especially once store-bought titles gone public domain. That is, you once had to shell out money for ‘em. Now, gratis. Well, if you’re any kind of fan of strategy, I have a pretty good pick for this week – Warzone 2100. Rebuild civilization and design your own weapons of mass destruction along the way. ...

Real-time strategy games have been kicking around for well over a while now and this lesser known title had some unique stuff going for it back in the day. This game was kind of a builder’s paradise – with a focus on finding ancient relics, researching them and using the design pieces to mix-and-match and create a mobile machine gun turret tank….or whatever else you can dream up. With over 400 technologies you can develop and the unit design system, there’s a surprisingly vast choice of units and tactics you can try.

I actually remember playing the original game when it came out in 1999 – yep, I feel old. ANYhow, the game went public domain around 2004 and since then, it’s been an on again, off again labor of love to update the open code.

One of the nice benefits of how it worked out: You get a full retail game – granted, it’s over 12 years old – but that just means you can play it on just about any computer out there, without a problem. ...

Warzone 2100

In Warzone 2100, you command the forces of The Project in a battle to rebuild the world after mankind has almost been destroyed by nuclear missiles.

The game offers campaign, multi-player, and single-player skirmish modes. An extensive tech tree with over 400 different technologies, combined with the unit design system, allows for a wide variety of possible units and tactics.

Not something I expected to see in a HP blog post, but still cool none-the-less. And the best is that the game isn't just free, but it's open source too (active open source too... the latest beta was release on February 8th, 2012! :)

Helping Office Moodle... Free Office Addin that lets you Open From and Save To your Moodle with Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint

Education - The Office Add-in for Moodle - free software for teachers in February

"If you use Moodle, you may be familiar with grumbles from staff about the number of steps involved in creating documents and getting them onto your Moodle site. Teachers often create their teaching materials, and student materials, in Word, Excel and PowerPoint. And then they have to save it somewhere, then log into Moodle, find where they want to put it onto Moodle and then upload it. So why shouldn’t it be as easy as saving the file to your desktop, or your SharePoint?

That’s exactly what the Office Add-In for Moodle does - adds a “Save to Moodle” and “Open from Moodle'” button to all of your Office applications.

Uploading files to Moodle has never been easier. The Office Add-in for Moodle is an add-in for Office 2003, 2007 and 2010, that allows teachers to open and save Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents to a Moodle website. Today, teachers who use Office and Moodle have to switch back and forth between their web browser and Office applications. With the Add-In, teachers can create, open, edit, and save Moodle documents from within the Office applications. You no longer need to use your web browser when working with Office documents stored in Moodle.

It doesn’t require anything to be installed on the Moodle server. Anyone who is the teacher or owner of a Moodle course can install the Add-in and access their documents. Once installed, there are two menu items ‘Open from Moodle’ and ‘Save to Moodle’ (see right) under:

the File menu in Office 2003

the Office Button in Office 2007

the File tab in Office 2010

...

Where can I find out how to use it?

Step-by-step instructions to help setup the system, as well as how users will use it, are on the Moodle.org website.

Where do I get Office Add-In for Moodle from?

Either go to the Office Add-In for Moodle page on Education Labs, or download directly from this link

..."

I've not blogged about Moodle yet, but I've been watching it and you're likely to see more from me soon on it. (For example these are in my "blog about these someday" queue, Project of the Month July 2011: Moodle, Hosting your Moodle on Windows Azure, Why Moodle is better on SharePoint, Installing Moodle on SharePoint).

No need to cheat with these HTML5 Cheat Sheets (Tags, Event Handler Attributes)

InMotion Hosting - HTML Cheat sheets

These might be dated (The Browser Support Sheet, not shown, lists Chrome 9, IE 8... :/ ) but the other sheets still looked okay and a possible good starting point at least if you're just starting the HTML5 journey...
(Via Dr. Doris Chen's Blog - HTML5 Cheat Sheets -> Adventures of a Technical Evangelist in Southern California - HTML5 made easy with HTML5 Cheat Sheets for tags, event handler attributes, and browser support

Need a SQL Server 2012 RC0 Hyper-V VM? Here are all 42 parts.

Microsoft Downloads - Date Published:2/10/2012
Language:English

The Base ImageX Server is a virtual machine that can be hosted in Hyper-V that allows a user to test out

System requirements

Supported Operating Systems: Windows 7

Windows Server 2008 SP2 with Hyper-V Role installed
8GB ram allocated to the BI ImageX VM
Minimum 80GB hard drive space – 250GB recommended
Minimum 1 Virtual Processor allocated to the BI ImageX VM – 2-4 Processors Recommended

..."I believe this is a normal/standard Hyper-V image but the the whole "ImageX" thing
That said, we really have to have a better way for distributing and getting these VM's from Microsoft.
Update 3/31/2012: The password is pass@word1 as mentioned here, Thinking "Introducing A early look SQL The SQL Server Playing SQL SQL SQL Server "Introducing Want SQL Server SQL Time to start Denali SQL Server A couple SQL d/en/details.aspx?id=28802" target="_blank">BI Image X: SQL 2012 RC0
Intelligence features of SQL Server 2012 – RC0; including PowerView reports and PowerPivot Excel Documents.

Version: 1
the latest Business Intelligence features of SQL Server 2012 – RC0. The virtual machine has been configured to support the use of PowerView reports, PowerPivot Excel documents and various content packs allowing the user to explore the capabilities of SQL Server 2012. Working with the demos that can be installed on the ImageX server the user will have a clear picture of how the SQL Server 2012, Office and SharePoint tools support and enhance the self-service business intelligence environment.
and references are making me question that a little...
42 parts? And then the setup, config, etc, to just eval and play with an image that's going to expire soon? In a perfect, cloud world, it would be nice if we never had to download them at all... Think "Azure VM Eval" service, where the standard image is the shared and everyone gets their own Diff's. So storage isn't wasted and thereby cheaper.
om/download/en/details.aspx?id=27417">2010 Information Worker Demonstration and Evaluation Virtual Machine (SP1). Thanks Charles!

about presenting SQL Server 2012 to others? Then you have to check out the "SQL Server 2012 Update for Developers Training Workshop"
SQL Server 2012" second draft of free eBook now available (6 of the 10 final chapters)
at the "SQL Server 2012 Early Adoption Cook Book" (Think "Work in progress")
Server 2012 launches March 7th... with a free virtual launch event
officially easiest way to play with SQL Server 2012... The SQL Server Virtual Labs
2012 RC0 is now available. Here's a download link round-up.
with SQL Server 2012 the easy way, via a Microsoft and Amazon partnership for SQL Server 2012 on AWS/EC2 (Think "5 Minutes to Denali")
Server 2012 Edition and Licensing Revamp Round-up
Server 2012 Data Quality Services Slide Demo
2012 (fka Denali) Developer Training Kit Web Installer Preview (Updated)
Microsoft SQL Server Code Name 'Denali'" Free (draft two chapter preview) eBook
Denali CTP3 (aka next version of SQL Server)? Here's a Hyper-V VHD just for you (in 36 parts, but I've also provided direct download URL's for use in your DM of choice...)
Denali Sequence Object Overview
Server Denali Feature Watch - FORMAT(), as in, "OMG we finally get .Net like Number/Date/Time formatting in our TSQL" Or "Saying goodbye to my old friend, Convert(103)..."
thinking about, and providing feedback on, what you’ll need to upgrade to Denali (aka next version of SQL Server)
CTP3 introduces LocalDB - Think SQL Server Express crossed with SQL CE (or SQL CE grown up or SQL Express made as almost as easy CE)
Denali FileTables Feature - The fruits of WinFS? (Think "A FileStream enabled table that you can access as a network file share and other standard File IO API's" or "SQL Server File System in a Table")
Server ColumnStore references...

Thursday, February 09, 2012

A simple Visual Studio add-in that helps keep in you in your TFS context

Visual Studio Gallery - TFS Solution Info

"Displays context-based TFS information about the currently loaded Solution/Projects including Branch and Workspace Supports Visual Studio 2010...

For those TFS users who frequently open multiple branches of the same code and need a visual indicator of which Branch and Workspace you are currently in, TFS Solution Info Tool Window will show you what you need at a glance.

..."

Simple add-in but if you're in a bunch of different branches this will help you keep your context straight... I also like that he's going to release the source in a bit too. :)

NLP is Hard... But with AboditNLP it's not as...

Elegant Code - NuGet Project Uncovered: AboditNLP

"If you are coming to this series of posts for the first time you might check out my introductory post for a little context.

AboditNLP is a Natural Language Processor library. This kind of stuff in interesting, but not something I have chosen to spend my time on.

It has a demo http://nlp.abodit.com/home/demo which gives you sample things to type to the library. ..."

AboditNLP

Natural Language Conversations

A conversational natural language engine allows humans and computers to converse in a natural way using typed messages. These messages may be exchanged using SMS, XMPP chat, email, or web-based chat.

Conversational interfaces are an improvement over form-filling interfaces for many applications. One of the best known examples of this is the input box on Google calendar where you can type something like '10:20 meeting at Larry's' and it will create a meeting starting at 10:20 and will set the location to 'Larry's'. This particulare example is a hybrid interface where a conversational element has been integrated into a traditional form-based interface. A pure conversation interface is often called a 'chatbot'.

Conversational interfaces are particularly well suited to mobile applications where the small screen, tiny keyboard and lack of a mouse makes traditional form-filling a tedious and error prone experience.

Consider for example the simple request what orders did we receive last month on a friday after 4pm. What would the dialog look like to specify a query like that? What if, instead, your users could simply enter what they are looking for? That's what a conversational natural language engine can do for your business.

NLP is hard

General purpose NLP is a really hard problem but for a specific application domain (like CRM integration, product support, home automation, ...) it's possible to define a sufficiently large recognition base that you can provide a good experience to your users. This library is focused on providing you the tools you need to create such domain specific chatbots or to add natural language capable input boxes to your traditional forms-based applications. ...

...

Software and Licensing

This Natural Language engine will soon be available for download and integration in your .NET projects. For personal, non-commercial projects there is no charge. For use in commercial applications and for any consulting requirements please ..."

AboditNLP - Natural Language Interface to Home Automation

"Rather than hunting through a multi-layer web-page-by-web-page interface all aspects of a home can be controlled and/or queried directly using single line commands issued from a smartphone or computer using SMS or a chat client like Google Talk.

Examples of things you can do when you connect a home automation system to this natural language engine can be seen in this actual dialog with my own home automation system:-

..."

Interesting... I can see the applications for this already. Image speech to text and then mix this in? hum... (of course that could lead to some pretty funny results too...lol)

Free "Introduction to Reactive Extensions" on-demand video training available, with 8 sessions and growing

Mr. Bool - Introduction to Reactive Extensions for .net (not finished yet)

"As MSDN defines it “The Reactive Extensions (Rx) is a library for composing asynchronous and event-based programs using observable sequences and LINQ-style query operators. Using Rx, developers represent asynchronous data streams with Observables, query asynchronous data streams using LINQ operators, and parameterize the concurrency in the asynchronous data streams using Schedulers. Simply put, Rx = Observables + LINQ + Schedulers.” We will look at every piece in details in the upcoming videos.

..."

Mr. Bool (aka Ayad Boudiab) is doing it again, providing a cool set of free on-demand training videos. All he asks is that you, optionally, +1 it the first time you hit the site...

(via .Net reddit - Introduction to Reactive Extensions for .net - online course with a lot of free videos)

Welcome to the Golden State... "The Complete Guide To Southern California Accelerators and Incubators"

socalTECH.com - The Complete Guide To Southern California Accelerators and Incubators, Part I

"In recent months, a dozen accelerators and incubators have emerged in the Southern California area, looking to help take the new generation of technology startups to funding and beyond. However, with the proliferation of incubators, the difficulty in figuring out which programs are--and aren't--worth looking at has become very difficult, if not impossible, for startup entrepreneurs. In an attempt to help people navigate the landscape of accelerators and incubators, we've put together a (hopefully) comprehensive list of Southern California's various startup accelerators and incubators. We've split this into three lists, depending on how the programs are structured.

Part I: The Accelerator Programs

What is an accelerator program? We've defined an accelerator program as a class-based, limited-time program which ties mentors, educational events, and often, seed funding, to help ideas become startups, and to help get startups to the point where they are fund-able. Most accelerators, but not all, offer up physical space, but they're more geared around mentoring and a formal program for helping companies to define their business, prototype and develop the first version of their service, and create a pitch and get funding. Most are modeled after the YCombinator and TechStars accelerator programs. We've deliberately left out in-house incubators, and programs which don't follow the class-based format (we'll cover those next). Listed in no particular order:

...

..."

Not something I usually blog about, yet I thought this a cool list/series and it's LA baby! Go SoCal! :)

Thinking about presenting SQL Server 2012 to others? Then you have to check out the "SQL Server 2012 Update for Developers Training Workshop"

SQL Server 2012 Update for Developers Training Workshop

"Deliver Your Own SQL Server 2012 Workshop!

Do you need to drive adoption of SQL Server 2012 in your company, region or country? Looking for some great technical training content to use to get it done? Well look no further, you have found it! We invite members of the SQL Server Community far and wide to host their own SQL Server 2012 Update for Developers Training Workshop (SQL11UPD) using the SQL Server 2012 Developer Training Kit Content.
Important: Microsoft is making big investments to build and publish this content and make it available free of charge to whoever can benefit from using it. If you deliver a training workshop using some or all of this content please take the time to fill out our survey here:
http://svy.mk/sql11upd

Workshop Overview and Benefits

SQL Server 2012 offers an impressive array of capabilities for developers and IT Professionals alike that build upon key innovations introduced in previous releases. The SQL Server 2012 Update for Developers Training Workshop (SQL11UPD) will help you understand how to build enterprise grade solutions which exploit key improvements in SQL Server 2012.
Participation in this training course offers the following benefits:

Learn all the essential elements of SQL Server 2012 development in an interactive instructor-led format

Learn how to exploit the unique features of SQL Server 2012 in your solutions Intermediate 200 level technical training designed for developers and IT Professionals Content developed by technical experts from Microsoft, solidq.com, sqlskills.com and southworks.net.

Get hands-on experience with SQL Server 2012 improvements

Audience
The training course is designed for the following technical roles:

Primary Audience

Solution developers responsible for application source code development

Database developers responsible for database programming

Secondary Audience

Architects and IT Professionals who are familiar with solution development and want to understand how developers will exploit new features and capabilities in SQL Server 2012.

The training course is not designed for sales, marketing and management professionals. Developers with the following expectations may not benefit from participating in a the training course.

..."

SQL Server 2012 Developer Training Kit BOM

This wiki provides a comprehensive list of all of the SQL Server 2012 Developer Training Kit Content. Check back here regularly for new and/or updated content. All content has been tested to work with the following technology releases:

SQL Server 2012 RC0

Visual Studio 2010 SP1

Office 2010 SP1

SharePoint 2010 SP1

The content is organized into a sample agenda to help you plan your own SQL Server 2012 Update for Developers Training Workshop.

Day 1: Introduction and Database Engine Topics

Module 1: Introduction to SQL Server 2012

Module 2: Introduction to SQL Server 2012 AlwaysOn

Module 3: Exploring and Managing SQL Server 2012 Database Engine Improvements

Module 4: SQL Server 2012 Database Server Programmability

Day 2: Visual Studio, .NET and Business Intelligence Topics

Module 5: SQL Server 2012 Application Development

Module 6: SQL Server 2012 Enterprise Information Management

Module 7: SQL Server 2012 Business Intelligence

Hands-On Labs

Topic: SQL Server 2012 Database Engine

Topic: Visual Studio 2010 and .NET 4.0

Topic: SQL Server 2012 Enterprise Information Management

Topic: SQL Server 2012 Business Intelligence

Topic: Windows Azure and SQL Azure

...

And what's kind of cool is that the BOM uses the new/beta "Content Installer" Azure service. So when you click on the deck you want, it's supplied via the Content Installer service. Think the goodness that is WebPI for content...

Content Installer

A simple utility for downloading and installing hands-on labs, samples, presentations, and more.Download now!

The Content Installer is a simple application that is designed to make it easier to download and install technical learning content such as hands-on labs, samples, and more.

The Content Installer enables you to simply select, download, and install the individual pieces of content that you want.

It also integrates with the Web Platform Installer to seamlessly identify and install any prerequisites that you might need on your machine

The Content installer site even has an OData feed! :) http://www.contentinstaller.net/api/v1.1/odata/. And it's also nice to see, the Content Installer is a Click-Once app. :)

So we've got some great training content now and coming soon for SQL Server 2012, and a new and pretty cool way to get it...

(via Mr Wharty's Ramblings - SQL Server 2012 Developer Training Kit BOM)

SQL Server 2012 launches March 7th... with a free virtual launch event

The officially easiest way to play with SQL Server 2012... The SQL Server Virtual Labs
SQL Server 2012 RC0 is now available. Here's a download link round-up.
Playing with SQL Server 2012 the easy way, via a Microsoft and Amazon partnership for SQL Server 2012 on AWS/EC2 (Think "5 Minutes to Denali")
SQL Server 2012 Edition and Licensing Revamp Round-up
SQL Server 2012 Data Quality Services Slide Demo
SQL Server 2012 (fka Denali) Developer Training Kit Web Installer Preview (Updated)
"Introducing Microsoft SQL Server Code Name 'Denali'" Free (draft two chapter preview) eBook
Want Denali CTP3 (aka next version of SQL Server)? Here's a Hyper-V VHD just for you (in 36 parts, but I've also provided direct download URL's for use in your DM of choice...)
SQL Server Denali Sequence Object Overview
SQL Server Denali Feature Watch - FORMAT(), as in, "OMG we finally get .Net like Number/Date/Time formatting in our TSQL" Or "Saying goodbye to my old friend, Convert(103)..."
Time to start thinking about, and providing feedback on, what you’ll need to upgrade to Denali (aka next version of SQL Server)
Denali CTP3 introduces LocalDB - Think SQL Server Express crossed with SQL CE (or SQL CE grown up or SQL Express made as almost as easy CE)
SQL Server Denali FileTables Feature - The fruits of WinFS? (Think "A FileStream enabled table that you can access as a network file share and other standard File IO API's" or "SQL Server File System in a Table")
A couple SQL Server ColumnStore references...

Wednesday, February 08, 2012

The boy in me chuckles at this post's title... "Mango Sample: Give your app the Finger!"

Jerry Nixon @work - Mango Sample: Give your app the Finger!

"...

My colleague Developer Evangelist, Sam Stokes, in California has written a compelling article on dragging items in Windows Phone.

But I have a problem with Sam’s approach

Maybe it’s because I have a problem with Sam – but probably not; he’s actually one of my top 90,000 people @ Microsoft. So, let’s talk about moving things in XAML!

Sam moves objects around by incrementing and decrementing an item’s top/left dependency property inside a Canvas.

...

Is there an alternative?

Yes. It’s TranslateTransform – a Silverlight class specifically designed to accommodate the task of moving objects from one position to another. (TranslateTransform is also part of WPF). And get this, even in the documentation dips into this discussion:

MSDN: The local 0,0 for an object can be offset on a Canvas using Canvas.Left and Canvas.Top, but this does not count as a transform; the object retains its own local 0,0 in this case for transform purposes.

A TranslateTransform is easy to use. A TranslateTransform has an X and Y property which correlate to the relative position to the element’s original layout location. As you would expect, negative numbers move it in a reverse direction

...

In the code above, I handle the ManipulationDelta event to track the touch gestures by the user. In the handler, I increment and decrement the X and Y values of the TranslateTransform – just like Sam. And just like Sam, my object tracks (or moves) with the user’s finger. But unlike Sam, my approach is hardware accelerated and a common, repeatable pattern.

Conclusion

Admittedly, I am sort of picking on my colleague to make a point. The reality is, Sam’s approach works. In fact, it is a very common approach to moving elements in a XAML environment, but there are downsides – do those downsides really matter? Maybe not enough for you to rewrite your application, but then again maybe so.

You’re the developer, you need to make the final call. Now you have a little more information. Informed decisions are usually better decisions. But I can’t tell you what is right for your application. What I can tell you is that TranslateTransform is easy to use, powerful, high performing, and a consistent approach. Other than that, it’s up to you.

Special acknowledgement to Sam Stokes for starting a great discussion

..."

Not only was the title attention getting, but the content was interesting too! (Gosh, imagine that! lol)

Checking on CheckDB - How to check CheckDB's progress

Alkampfer's Place - Check progress of DBCC CHECKDB

"If you issue a DBCC CHECKDB on a big database to verify for consistency errors, it will take a long time to complete, but the Management Studio windows usually does not give you any hint about how long does it take, or a percentage progress. Luckily enough sql server has a Dynamic Management View that can solve your problem.

This is the SQL code to visualize progress of the operation

...

..."

So much I don't know... sigh. Have to remember this the next time I do a DBCC CheckDB.

Add a little mischief to your next PowerPoint Presentation with Mouse Mischief (Think one computer, one presentation, many mice and an engaged audience)

Mouse Mischief Home

"Try a little Mischief.

Mouse Mischief integrates into Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 and Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007, letting you insert questions, polls, and drawing activity slides into your lessons.

Students can actively participate in these lessons by using their own mice to click, circle, cross out, or draw answers on the screen

..."

Mouse Mischief can transform teaching and learning in the classroom. Mouse Mischief integrates into Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 and Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007, allowing teachers to create interactive presentations that engage and excite every student in the classroom. Approximately 525 students, each with his or her own mouse, can answer multiple choice questions and draw on a shared screen. You can download Mouse Mischief free of charge.

Three compelling reasons to use Mouse Mischief in your classroom

Actively engages students and supports collaborative learning

With Mouse Mischief you can spark student curiosity by incorporating interactive technology into the curriculum. Students have fun learning while seeing visual representations of their answers on a shared screen while using colorful mouse pointers (like a robot, snowflake, guitar, and many more shapes). You can enable collaborative learning when using Mouse Mischief in Team mode; in Team mode, all members of a team need to work together to agree on an answer before it can be selected.
Improves classroom management and overall student participation

With Mouse Mischief you no longer need to wait for raised hands; you can immediately see your students' answers on the screen. Mouse Mischief helps make it easy for all students,even those who are often quiet in class, to participate regularly without the fear of saying the wrong answer. This can allow you to have better visibility into the progress and comprehension of your entire class so you can adjust your lessons on the spot.
Is familiar to use and easy on the classroom budget

Because Mouse Mischief integrates into familiar PowerPoint technology, you do not have to spend time learning new skills to use it. Additionally, you can set up your classrooms to play Mouse Mischief lessons without purchasing expensive hardware; many schools already have mice, and both mice and USB hubs are available at many stores where computer accessories are sold.

Mouse Mischief Home - Get Lessons

Check out the featured lessons below, and discover firsthand how Mouse Mischief can bring PowerPoint lessons to life. For more lessons, visit Office.com and Microsoft Partners in Learning Network to download, upload, and search for lessons created by Mouse Mischief users around the world.

Mouse Mischief Home - Download

Oh and this add-in is free. All you need is to add mice, just normal USB mice...

Forget the classroom (well don't but) imagine this at your next presentation at work or user group! Turn your boring presentation into an interactive and engaged session, all without having to leave PowerPoint or buy expensive hardware...

(via MicrosoftFeed - Download Microsoft Mouse Mischief and Enter the New Generation of Learning Solutions)

The different paths to Becoming... a Technical Evangelist

Secret Microsoft Communications - How to become a technical evangelist

"This is an important job for many companies and Alice has written a great blog on how to become one, make sure see it at:

Becoming a technical evangelist

That is how Alice Pang became a technical evangelist. My road was completely different, as yours will be.

Many companies need people to explain how their technology works, and not have a sales metric. Sales people are the respected soldiers of the corporate world, focused, with a good work ethic, but once the sales is made, the relationship changes. With Evangelism, you don’t aren’t attached to commission, or a salary and commission.

What I like about evangelist is that I can build relationships and community.

..."

Adventures of a Technical Evangelist in Southern California - Becoming a technical evangelist

"Note: This was my first Toastmasters (icebreaker) speech, because I was asked to give my job title prior to delivering the speech and decided to give a 5-minute answer to the inevitable question.

The first question most people ask me when I tell them what I do at Microsoft is, “What is a Developer Evangelist?” Often I get, “Is it a religious position?” (The answer is no.) To be honest, I had no clue such a position even existed before I started looking for my first job out of school. I didn’t grow up telling myself I wanted to become a Developer Evangelist; but when I think back to what I wanted to be when I grew up, I realized that perhaps I did want to be a technical evangelist all along.

...

But really, I am all of these things. I’m a performer, because I often stand in front of large audiences (sometimes on a stage) and deliver presentations. I’m a reporter, because I bring the news of the most exciting technology to people via various forms of media (videos, live stream, Twitter, articles, etc.). I’m a teacher, because I show people how to develop on our platforms at 1st party, 3rd party, and community events. I’m a networker, because I travel around and connect with influential people in order to spread excitement for our technology. And, of course, I’m an engineer, because I write code for my demos and build things (that thankfully work better than my robot did!).

I can’t say that I went out looking for a role that fit exactly everything I wanted to be; I guess I just got lucky after completing a number of software internships that gave me good experience in preparing for this role. (For example, as an intern at Microsoft, I learned about all the cool technology built by various product teams. And while interning at Nokia Research Center in Beijing, I began the summer fixing bugs in phone apps but got the opportunity to present the apps to executives from around the world during the 2008 Olympics, because I could speak fluent English and Mandarin Chinese.) After finding the Developer Evangelist role, I’m optimistic that there really is the perfect job out there for everyone; you may just find it under a different name.

..."

I'm thinking that when I grow up I might want to be technical/dev evangelist of some kind... maybe... or a space pioneer... or in FBI... or a specialty (science Fiction/Fantasy of course) bookstore owner... or... or... :P

Jump!!! FlightGear lets you get out of the cockpit, literally!

FlightGear - Sky Diving Visualization

"The Challenge

As a skydiver adds more gear such as front packs and items strapped to legs or arms, the jumper’s basic stability in free-fall is reduced. It becomes easier to tumble out of control and there is less margin for error. Similarly, the aerodynamic wake of the jumper may interfere with pilot chute opening (known as “hesitation”). Investigating different gear configurations generally involves vertical wind tunnel testing, or actual tests with jumpers. To avoid some of the cost, and mitigating safety concerns, a tool to computationally analyze these jumpers and their gear is highly desired. Creare, Inc., an R+D research firm in Hanover, NH, under funding from the US Army, developed a Computation Fluid Dynamics toolkit for analyzing jumpers and their equipment, and model the resulting configurations in FlightGear.

Note: a flyable parachutist model is available to download and test at the end of this article.

...

Where is the Parachute?

This exercise is setup as a free-fall simulation, not a parachute simulation so there is no chute modeled. Instead the simulation is mercifully paused when the altitude reaches 100′ above the surface.

Download and Fly

Follow these instructions to download, install, and fly the Creare Parachutist model:

Note: the parachutist model is not compatible with FlightGear v2.4, you must fly this model with one of the v2.6 release candidates, or the official v2.6 release scheduled for February 17.

Download the Creare_Parachutist-v1.0.zip file.

Unzip it into your FlightGear “Aircraft” folder.

Start FlightGear and select either –aircraft=Parachutist-Scenario1 or –aircraft=Parachutist-Scenario2

Make sure you specify an initial altitude (such as –altitude=10000), otherwise you will just be sitting at the end of the runway working on your tan.

Press F1 and F2 to toggle the two available dialog boxes on/off.

You can manipulate the joint poses individually or select from a set of pre-defined poses, or select “Joystick” control and fly with a joystick (or keyboard or mouse) similar to flying a helicopter or airplane.

..."

That's awesome and you know it!

Goodbye Windows Workflow (v3)...

Winson's Technical Multiverse - WF3 Deprecation

"Note: From Microsoft

In .NET 4 the Workflow Team released an all new Workflow engine in the System.Activities namespace. With the release of .NET 4.5 Beta we are marking the types in the “WF 3” System.Workflow namespace as obsolete. The following assemblies have one or more public types that will be deprecated:
• System.Workflow.Activities.dll
• System.Workflow.ComponentModel.dll
• System.Workflow.Runtime.dll
• System.WorkflowServices.dll
• Microsoft.Workflow.DebugController.dll
• Microsoft.Workflow.Compiler.exe
• Wfc.exe

As a result, customers who are using the deprecated WF 3 APIs will encounter build warnings with a message similar to “ Warning BC40000: X is obsolete: ‘WF 3 types are deprecated. Please use WF 4 instead.’ ” We will remove the types from the .NET Framework in a future release, but we have not yet determined that timeframe (not in 4.5). This current step allows us to communicate our direction to our customers and allow them plenty of time to move to the new WF4 model. ...

..."

Given the complete re-write that was WF 4, and the break from v3 that it was, this isn't too surprising. This should give any existing WF v3 users a few years to move off (as, given this move, I'd bet WF v3 will be nuked in .Net v5). So if you're using WF v3, now's the time to at least start planning for you move to v4+

"In Tune with InTune for Legal Firms" free webcast, February 21, 9:00AM PST

Kurt Shintaku's Blog - WEBCAST: “In Tune with Microsoft Intune” for Legal Firms – February 21, 9:00AM PST

In Tune with Microsoft Intune
Desktop/laptop client management using the cloud.

Join us for this free webinar on Tuesday, February 21, 2012 at
12:00 p.m. Eastern / 11:00 a.m. Central /
10:00 a.m. Mountain / 9:00 a.m. Pacific.

Description:
Come hear about the features and benefits of the Windows Intune service.

Speakers:
Missy Mazur, the Windows Intune Business Development Manager, is responsible for marketing to the Midwest’s strategic enterprise accounts based in Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana. A certified Project Management Professional (PMP), Missy has successfully implemented process-driven improvements that have positively impacted the bottom line, and she is an expert at driving collaboration between stakeholders to increase market and product awareness. Missy is also a Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) with a project management specialization.

Richard Ruiz is an author and Cloud Architect at Microsoft with a focus on building strong cloud, management and Windows partnerships that enable customers to offer flexibility, security and cost savings as part of their desktop strategy. Richard is an industry expert in technologies such as VDI, SCCM, Windows, Windows Azure, Windows Intune and Application Virtualization. Richard’s latest publication is the Sybex book "Mastering Microsoft Virtualization."

You may or may not know but in my day life I work in the legal industry and so when I saw this I thought it interesting. I've heard of InTune but thought it would be interesting hearing about it with the slant...

Sunday, February 05, 2012

Stop copy-n-pasting your pages... OneNote page templates are click-click easy...

Tim Murphy's .NET Software Architecture Blog - Organizing Your Work With OneNote Page Templates

"If you have seen the Windows Phone commercial where the father is in the grocery store with the shopping list in OneNote you have gotten you first taste of the flexibility that can be had with OneNote. I like most consultants have a lot of fires going and once and I am finding that the templates in OneNote are helping me to get a handle on the different projects and tasks I need to track.

I started using OneNote to do simply what its name suggests: take and organize notes. Lately though I am finding ways that it can help to centralize things that I had been using multiple applications to accomplish. Having them all in one place, as with most things makes it easier to not miss something.

You may find using the tasks feature of Outlook works well for you, but I found that I was in and out of my email so fast that I ignored the tasks. As simple To Do List template in OneNote seems to be the solution for me since I spend so much time documenting projects. As an alternative you can use the Prioritized To Do List shown below or the Project To Do List which gives you a list per project.

...

..."

I've become a pretty heavy OneNote user in the last year, but being a dev dude, I just started using it, figuring it out as I went along. And while this journey of discovery can be fun, it does lead to some holes, to missing some important features.

For example, Page Templates.

Until reading this post, OneNote Page Templates isn't something I thought about at all. Sure I use templates all the time in Word, PowerPoint, etc, but I always considered template to be a document level thing. So I knew there were OneNote Notebook templates (which you'd use once), but didn't even think there might be Page templates (which you can use over and over)... sigh

Using Page Templates isn't hard once you know the trick (which took me a little bit to find).

Funny enough, creating a new page based on a template or saving the current page as a template is done via New Page.

Select a template and pow, done.

To save the current page as a template, it's just as easy. Have the page open that you want to save and then;

You'll name the template and again, pow, you're done. Your new template will now be available in your "My Templates"

Are there more OneNote Page templates available online? You, bet.

OneNote 2010 Page Templates

Yes, these are all OneNote Page templates (I know, I thought, "Charts? Letters? Invites?" But, yep, these are all OneNote Page Templates...)

Let's look at one, the Home Lists;

In short, if you're a OneNoter and you're not using Page Templates, you're missing out...

From C# to C++, the short guide that isn't (all that short)

Bob Taco Industries - C# to C++ – A Somewhat Short Guide

"This is a big post – over 12200 words – and so I’ve decided to make it available as a PDF download, which you can get here:

http://www.bobtacoindustries.com/Content/Devs/CsToCpp-ASomewhatShortGuide.pdf

It has bookmarks for easier navigation along with a Table of Contents and page numbers.

I expect that I will revise this from time to time and welcome any suggestions, feedback, and (especially) corrections. If so I will update the Last updated field at the top and will create a revised PDF as well. I hope this proves useful.

For those interested, the sessions from the GoingNative 2012 conference will be streaming live today (Feb 2) and tomorrow on Channel 9: http://channel9.msdn.com/posts/Announcing-the-GoingNative-2012-Full-Schedule . Sessions will also be available for download shortly after the show ends (I’d guess within 24-48 hours, but that’s just a guess). It looks fascinating so definitely check it out! (I know I will be watching it.)

Introduction

This is a somewhat short guide to the important things to know if you are a C# programmer and find yourself needing or wanting to work in C++, for example to create Metro style games for Windows 8 using C++ and DirectX. In fact, this guide is written with that goal in mind so it's not necessarily a universal guide for all platforms and purposes.

This guide is also going to be fairly utilitarian and pithy, with code standing in place of elaborate commentary. I'm expecting that you know how to program already and have a good understanding of C# (or of some sort of imperative, object-oriented language at any rate).

I'm also assuming you are fairly handy with navigating the MSDN library. Its Bing search box is really awesome; if you haven't used it before, do give it a try. I like how the search is tailored to not just MSDN but also other great programmer sites like the Stack Exchange sites, CodeProject, CodePlex, etc.

I'm sprinkling a fair bit of code throughout as I said above. This is both to show you a (pseudo) real example of something and also to help illustrate words with code so that each will hopefully help to clarify the other.

..."

When he said "Somewhat short" he wasn't kidding. The PDF is 38 pages.

Basic Assembly Language Programming (yes, that Assembly Language)

SecurityXploded Blog - Assembly Programming Basics Presentation & Updates

"Here comes the update from our last local security meet (sx/null/g4h/owasp) where Amit Malik & Swapnil delivered spectacular session on ‘Assembly Programming Basics’. This is part of our ongoing FREE ‘Reversing & Malware Analysis Training’ which has been started since our last meet.

Duo delivered superb one hour session to jam packed 40+ folks who listened keenly even though it was mid lunch hour. This Session started with talking about assembly basics, registers, flags, instructions, calling conventions, stack basics, MASM programming etc along with live demonstration.

Presentation of the session is already online on our Security Presentations page. For those who could not attend this offline session, it also includes demonstration video (http://vimeo.com/36198403). Video is not visible on live presentation (issues with slideshare). So you need to download it offline to view the embedded video in presentation.

In addition to this, we also recommend reading our ‘Assembly Programming: A Beginners Guide’ which will help you to quickly started with ASM Programming.

..."