Microsoft researchers are unveiling a prototype that uses an internal projection and vision system to bring a spherical computer display to life. People can touch the surface with multiple fingers and hands to manipulate photos, play games, spin a virtual globe, or watch 360-degree videos. Sphere was to be shown publicly for the first time at Microsoft's Faculty Summit in Redmond according to an article in the Seattle PI, Here comes Sphere: Microsoft debuts computing in round . The idea that...

Visual Studio Team Foundation Server (TFS) offers source control, data collection, reporting, and project tracking, and is intended for collaborative software development projects. It sits on a server in your organization as a project repository. It works great with the standard, professional, and Team System versions of Visual Studio. You create projects, check in code, build your projects, all because you connect to TFS. And you can customize it to work the way your team works. But as Somasegar...

The latest community technology preview of Visual Studio Team System 2008 Database Edition is now available on our download site . In addition to providing support for SQL Server 2008 database projects, this release incorporates many previously released Power Tools as well as several new features. The new features include distinct Build and Deploy phases, Static Code Analysis and improved integration with SQL CLR projects. Database Edition no longer requires a Design Database. Therefore, it...

Sam Ramji, senior director of platform strategy, made three announcements at the O'Reilly Open Source Convention in Portland, Oregon that support open source initiatives. Microsoft has become a Platinum sponsor of the Apache Software Foundation . Microsoft has put many of its protocols and formats into a perpetually royalty-free license including all the Office binary specifications. The royalty-free license is called the OSP ( Open Specification Promise ). For the first time Microsoft...

Do you ever have a need to create really awesome 3D models?  Well a while back Microsoft acquired Galigari ( http://www.microsoft.com/virtualearth/resources/news-feb-08.aspx ) for their truly awesome 3D toolset. They’ve just released Caligari 7.6, and it’s absolutely FREE.  All you have to do is register and download the app.  You can also download a complete PDF manual and instructional tutorial videos.   One of the cool uses of the 3D models you make is to upload them into...

The Windows Home Server 2008 Power Pack 1 has been released to manufacturing (RTM). Windows Home Server Power Pack 1 will be automatically downloaded to Windows Home Servers through Windows Update if Automatic Updates is enabled on your home server. The announcement was posted on the team site at Power Pack 1 - come and get it . Power Pack 1 provides a range of new enhancements, including support for home computers running Windows Vista x64 editions, backup of home server Shared Folders, improvements...

You can sell video games for the Xbox 360 console — and keep most of the profits — beginning this holiday season. As a Premium member in the XNA Creators Club , you’ll be able to submit any complete Xbox 360 game you’ve created in XNA Game Studio to the Creators Club community for peer review. Other Premium Creators will check to make sure your game is safe to play. If it is, you’ll set a price point – between 200 and 800 Points – that people will pay to download your game. Once the game is...

Windows Search 4.0 will begin automatic updates using Windows Update within the next week or so to Windows Vista, but will be an optional update for Windows XP users. The new version will update the indexes, Search will release most of the requested resources and slow down the indexing process as soon as it detects mouse or keyboard activity, or when another application requires computer resources. Details of the update are posted on TechNet at Reminder - Windows Search 4 coming to WU soon...

Scott Gurthrie announced the fourth community technology preview for ASP.NET Framework's MVC , the Model View Controller that will come with .NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1. ASP.NET MVC provides a framework that enables you to easily implement the model-view-controller (MVC) pattern for Web applications. This pattern lets you separate applications into loosely coupled, pluggable components for application design, processing logic, and display. The release adds higher level features to the...

BizTalk Services provides a way to connect multiple service-enabled applications in the cloud. The latest community technology preview (CTP), R12, adds workflow enabled service orchestration. A hosted Windows Workflow Foundation runtime and Web services messaging are featured in R12. You could, for example, set up an automated process that uses Web services to provide pricing information to a partner. BizTalk Services acts as a hosted service bus for connecting applications across the Internet...

The Windows Live Mesh preview was broadened this week so you can get an early peek at the device and data synchronization services. All participation requirements were dropped, except for having a Windows Live ID. The announcement was made on the Live Mesh community forum in a posting, Service update: new build, new features coming today . The posting says, "The team has also been hard at work on our developer platform . We are on track to share that work with the world at PDC ’08 (Oct 27-30...

The redesigned and streamlined ISV Resource Center Web site is the place to start for advice and resources relevant to your marketing and development needs. New navigation helps you find what you need faster—and regular content updates help keep you informed. Why not take full advantage of the technical, marketing, and business-building resources that are available to you as a Microsoft ISV? It's easy and you can start right now. Follow these steps to begin: Sign up for the ISV Newsletter...

IE8 is set for broad release in the third calendar quarter, which means real soon now. There are several features for you. Most important is standards compatibility. You may see misaligned Web pages, overlapping text or images, JavaScript functionality and errors. The default mode for displaying pages in Internet Explorer 8 is "Standards mode." To fix this issue, Web site owners and administrators can add a meta-tag that tells Internet Explorer 8 to display an entire site or a specific page like...

eWeek.com provides an insight into the Oslo and how the initiative relates to cloud computing. You can read the article at Oslo: Road to Microsoft's Cloud . But I'll summarize key points of interest to ISVs here. Oslo is built around service oriented architecture (SOA) and adds core modeling technology. The products involved in Oslo are BizTalk Server 5, BizTalk Services 1, Visual Studio 10, Microsoft System Center 5, and .NET Framework 4. The future of development is with software modeling...

I was asked by a partner this week what new features are in store for business intelligence. Here are some of the new features for BI. The links take you to a page to find datasheets, white papers, blogs, and webcasts. SQL Server 2008 Analysis Services Top New Features Develop solutions quickly with the new, streamlined Cube Designer . Take advantage of enhanced Dimension and Aggregation Designers . Create attribute relationships easily by using the new Attribute Relationship...

Bob Kelly, corporate vice president of the Microsoft Server and Tools business, announced at Worldwide Partner Conference that Microsoft SQL Server 2008 would be on the price list in August. Several features are of interest specific to developers. LINQ Provider : SQL Server 2008 enhances LINQ by providing a new LINQ to SQL provider that allows developers to issue LINQ commands directly against SQL Server tables and columns. This will reduce the amount of time it takes to create new data...

The Microsoft virtualization products that includes Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V , System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM) 2008 , and Microsoft Application Virtualization (formerly SoftGrid) starts with a press briefing September 8. The September event is the U.S. kickoff event to a 6-month worldwide event series highlighting Microsoft virtualization products and partner solutions from the datacenter to desktops with a focus on partners and customer deployments. VMM and Application Virtualization...

An extension to .NET Framework 3.5, Code-named Zermatt , helps you more easily build applications that incorporate a claims-based identity model for authentication and authorization. Claims are a set of statements that identify a user and provide specific information such as title or purchasing authority. Zermatt uses standard protocols such as WS-Federation, WS-Trust, and Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML). Data contained in the claims can come from Active Directory , LDAPv3-based directories...

We are pleased to announce Microsoft Certified Master -- a new certification series for individuals deeply focused on designing, building, and troubleshooting solutions based on a single product. The Microsoft Certified Master program incorporates advanced, experience-based training and testing on Microsoft technologies that go beyond any product training offered outside of Microsoft today. The first three specialization areas will be: Microsoft Certified Master: Microsoft Exchange Server 2007...

Small Business Assurance program announced at Worldwide Partner Conference provides you and your customers with confidence in moving to Windows Vista. When you and your customers buy a new PC with genuine Windows Vista Business or Windows Vista Ultimate, you'll receive free coaching and support from Microsoft to help you get more out of Windows. We've heard from small businesses that they are three times more likely to favor Windows Vista once they start using it. With the Small Business Assurance...

Microsoft Pinpoint is Microsoft’s premier online business marketplace for small and medium-sized business customers and partners. It is a benefit of the Microsoft Partner Program. Through Pinpoint partners can connect with prospective customers that best match their competencies and capabilities, and win new business by activating positive trust and reputation with online scale. The first beta is now live. PinPoint was announced at Worldwide Partner Conference. Microsoft Pinpoint is especially...

Windows Small Business Server 2008 and Windows Essential Business Server 2008 will ship in mid-November. Early trial releases are available now on MultiplyYourPower.com . Both servers are part of the Windows Essential Server Solutions that help small businesses with a cost effective platform for your software applications. Windows Small Business Server 2008 standard edition comes with Microsoft Exchange Server 2007, Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, Windows Live OneCare for Server, and other utilities...

The Worldwide Partner Conference is in full swing in Houston, Texas. More than 7,000 partners representing 145 countries have gathered at Houston’s George R. Brown Convention Center to learn more about business growth opportunities and product innovation from Microsoft executives. You can attend the events and experience the partner-related announcements yourself. Watch keynotes liive or on demand. See demos and see demos in the sponsor expo hall. are available online at the Digital Worldwide...

In my last post , I mentioned that I'd be building a demo of how to add SQL 2008 spatial data to a WPF layer over VE.  I've made some good progress on that front, and will post the demo soon (hopefully by this week's end.) Building off the great work Adam Eversole, Jared Bienz, and Marc Schweigert, I set off to build a VE control that wasn't just WPF enabled, but rather, I wanted it to be WPF friendly.  In other words, I wanted the experience of adding a WPF mapping layer over VE to feel...

You can build Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) applications easier across multiple development teams with Composite Application Guidance for WPF . This guidance is intended for software architects and developers who are building enterprise WPF client applications. The guidance uses a number of design patterns . The guidance includes the following assets: Stock Trader Reference Implementation. A sample composite application based on a real-world scenario. Composite Application Library...