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January 2007 - Posts

Links to resources about Excel Services

As part of my new role, I'm learning more about Excel Services and the ability to render spreadsheets on the server. Excel Services is available through the Microsoft Office SharePoint Services SKU. Here are links and a screenshot. Conditional Formatting Read More...
Posted Wednesday, January 31, 2007 2:10 PM by Clint Covington | 1 Comments
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Eight new query help topics available

The following eight topics are now live on Office Online: 1. Combine the results of several select queries by using a union query 2. Compare two tables and find only matching data 3. Compare two tables and find records without matches 4. Create or modify Read More...
Posted Wednesday, January 31, 2007 1:27 PM by Clint Covington | 0 Comments
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The runtime and developer extensions will be FREE!

This morning we are announcing that the developer extensions and runtime will be available for FREE ! In the past, Access developers had to purchase the Visual Studio Tools for Microsoft Office System in order to build and deploy runtime solutions. The Read More...
Posted Tuesday, January 30, 2007 8:35 AM by Clint Covington | 16 Comments
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MSDN article "Architecture Strategies for Catching the Long Tail"

It is a bit off topic for Access developers but I found this article a great read. I especially liked the discussion about long tail apps and plan to blog more on the topic in the future. Summary: This provides an overview of the software-as-a-service Read More...
Posted Monday, January 29, 2007 11:11 PM by Clint Covington | 1 Comments
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Web Directions North Conference, Feb 6 - 10 in Vancouver

This looks like a great conference if you are interested in growing your web development skills. http://north.webdirections.org/ The folks at Web Directions North have offered a $100 discount on registration fees to readers of the IE Blog . The conference Read More...
Posted Sunday, January 28, 2007 5:41 AM by Clint Covington | 1 Comments
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Principles of MicroFormats and simplicity

I have been reading a bit about MicroFormats these days. I came across these principles that were published on http://microformats.org/about . I like the clarity of the principles and the underlying statement about keeping them simple. Most of us could Read More...
Posted Friday, January 26, 2007 11:51 PM by Clint Covington | 4 Comments
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Protecting our children - a letter from Luke Chung

Some of you might know Luke Chung, the president of FMS and popular speaker at Access conferences. He sent me a letter last week that I wanted to share with my blog friends. This doesn't relate to technology or Microsoft Access but as a father, I think Read More...
Posted Friday, January 26, 2007 11:29 PM by Clint Covington | 1 Comments
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New SQL editing and versioning tool for Access

I just got an email from Andrew Wrigley, an member of the UK Access users group, about a new tool he has developed for editing SQL. You all might find this interesting--Access SQL editing tools are so lame. I haven't used it but the screen shots look Read More...
Posted Friday, January 26, 2007 10:43 AM by Clint Covington | 1 Comments
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What features do you want in Access 14?

I know, I know--most of you are still trying to get the hang of Access 2007 and now I'm talking about the next version! Last week I sat in on 8 hours of outstanding ideas about the next version of Access by the development team—lots of cool ideas in the Read More...
Posted Tuesday, January 23, 2007 9:34 PM by Clint Covington | 21 Comments
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The Excel and Access Services team is growing - we have job openings

The Excel/Access Services and Access teams have open test and PM positions for individuals who are smart and have passion for data applications. This is a great opportunity to have millions of people use your work every single day while working for one Read More...
Posted Tuesday, January 23, 2007 5:44 AM by Clint Covington | 2 Comments
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7 Rules for Productive Brainstorming

Yesterday I was kicking around campus, dropping off fliers about my wife’s resume service on bulletin boards. My 3-year-old loves to go to work with Dad and drink chocolate milk, write on the whiteboards, and play chase through the halls. Anyway, she Read More...
Posted Sunday, January 21, 2007 4:03 AM by Clint Covington | 2 Comments

MVP's Allen Browne's review and resource page on Access 2007

Allen Browne has put together a nice resource page on Access 2007. I'm not sure I completely agree with the statement about too buggy for serious use--guess that depends on your definition of serious use. As with any major release there are some bugs Read More...
Posted Saturday, January 20, 2007 4:14 AM by Clint Covington | 7 Comments
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The New York Times "Purging Bloat to Fashion Sleek Software"

NY Times has an good article about the new Office redesign. Nearly these articles are turning out really positive... Nice to see. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/18/technology/18pogue.html?ex=1169874000&en=46b182d68b8d6444&ei=5040&partner=MOREOVERNEWS Read More...
Posted Friday, January 19, 2007 10:40 PM by Clint Covington | 1 Comments
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UA articles on SharePoint integration

The end-user UA team just published three new articles on SharePoint integration. Control which forms and reports are available on a SharePoint site Create Access forms and reports from a SharePoint list Track and view version information for SharePoint Read More...
Posted Thursday, January 18, 2007 9:54 PM by Clint Covington | 1 Comments

Access 2007 Runtime information

I keep getting pinged on this topic--so let me share what information I can. There will be a Access 2007 runtime. The team is finishing up the work right now. It will support creating a runtime setup, saving a db to a template ACCDT, and SourceSafe integration. Read More...
Posted Thursday, January 18, 2007 7:22 AM by Clint Covington | 6 Comments
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You Tube video blog on data collection

Steve Zaske posted a blog on data collection a while back. Nice to see folks catching on to this useful feature. Here is the URL to his original blog post http://steve.zaske.com/?p=12 . BTW - I'm surprised nobody has responded to my post on How do you Read More...
Posted Wednesday, January 17, 2007 9:37 PM by Clint Covington | 4 Comments
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How do you use Access?

I was browsing Business Week last week and noticed a BlackBerry ad asking people to tell them what they do with their BlackBerry. I like effort to get to know their customers--something you can never understand with enough clarity. In the Access world Read More...
Posted Tuesday, January 16, 2007 10:55 PM by Clint Covington | 4 Comments
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I'm thinking about a Samsung BlackJack

I'm joining my wife's Cingular plan and need to get a new phone. The IPhone looks very cool but I have concerns about it running on the slower GSM network and the durability of the case. The Samsung BlackJack looks pretty slick and I wouldn't get harassed Read More...
Posted Tuesday, January 16, 2007 10:10 PM by Clint Covington | 0 Comments
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The 20 Most Innovative Products of the Year - Office 2007 Tops PC Worlds List!

When we started talking about the ribbon everyone knew it was a huge bet. It is nice to get some props! Here is what they have to say: "Innovation? Microsoft? Yes, we were surprised, too, but the Redmond giant's latest upgrade of the world's most popular Read More...
Posted Thursday, January 11, 2007 9:24 PM by Clint Covington | 0 Comments
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Wall Street Journal's (Walt Mossberg) take on the ribbon

Walt Mossberg an often critical voice about Microsoft products has published his review of the ribbon in the Wall Street Journal. http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB116786111022966326-mRGBGB2hIZH7SbdbE2Bg7YVHTDE_20070202.html?mod=tff_main_tff_top Read More...
Posted Thursday, January 11, 2007 8:02 AM by Clint Covington | 2 Comments
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I have a new job

In January 1998, I joined Microsoft as the ship PM for Access 97 SP1. My career has gone on to include working on Access and 2002 data access pages, SharePoint extensibility and the Web Part Framework, and most recently, Access 2007. IMHO Access 2007 Read More...
Posted Wednesday, January 10, 2007 6:36 AM by Clint Covington | 6 Comments
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History of Microsoft vocabulary tag cloud

Todd Bishop from the The Seattle PI recently put together an interesting series of cloud tags with 64 of the most commonly used words in key Microsoft-related speeches, interviews, internal e-mails and other documents from the past three decade. http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/microsoft/tags/ Read More...
Posted Tuesday, January 02, 2007 9:00 AM by Clint Covington | 0 Comments
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