scooblog by josh ledgard : Scooby Snacks

A suggestion for online RSS feed readers

jledgard — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 08:13:00 GMT

Read and display the comment count so I can see how many people have an opinion about the post.

Ebay Spam

jledgard — Thu, 01 Mar 2007 20:33:08 GMT

I wonder what E-bay does to try and stop phishers from leaching off of their membership. Seems like a problem they would want to solve.

Gretchen and I recently used Ebay to sell some stuff and incurred the seller fees. Maybe we were ignorant. I just assumed that they would deduct form my paypal account automatically. Soon after our auctions we started getting phishing mails that looked like real ebay bills. The real bill also was delivered during this stretch, but we deleted it... on the assumption it was another scam mail.

So ebay lost out on payment from us for a couple of months until I signed in again and realized we owed them money. Doesn't sound like much, but if the story is common enough that's money they are losing out on.

Spam killed MyblogLog

jledgard — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 20:48:00 GMT

I removed the "My Blog Log" list of recent readers from the side of my page. That group, now at Yahoo, has some work to do in order to deal with the SPAM. For the last couple of days my recent reader list has included ads for "free online pharmacies" and "Free ipods". I love the idea of getting to know who reads my blog and creating a community of readers, but not if it can't be done without SPAM.

An easy way to bulk copy sharepoint document libraries

jledgard — Thu, 10 Aug 2006 21:36:47 GMT

Our team was migrating to a hosted TFS server environment this week so that we don't have to manage our own server anymore. One of the challenges I wasn't looking forward to was migrating our sharepoint document libraries. Thankfully I found this page that gave me an easy way to do this.

Source: Microsoft sharepoint server tutorials: bulk copying documents to a sharepoint portal server 2003 document library using my network places

The second method, which is one that I prefer, is true drag-n-drop. Using this method, you can bring over files and folders into a Sharepoint Document Library in one step. To accomplish this, you first need to setup a Network Place to the SharePoint server. This steps to do this vary slightly based on the operating system you are using. Under Windows XP Professional, follow the steps below:

1. open My Network Places.

2. From the Network Tasks pane, select 'Add a Network Place'.

3. The Add a Network Place Wizard will appear. On the opening screen, click Next.

4. Select 'Choose another network location' and click Next.

5. In the Internet or Network Address, type the URL to the SHarePoint implementation you want to connect to. This should be in for format of http://myportal.mydomain.com 6. Give the new Network Place a high-level name like 'My Portal Site'.

7. Click Finish, and if you accept the defaults on this screen, the Network Place for your portal will open in a browser window.

8. Now, navigate to the location of your document library. OPen another explorer windows to the source of your documents and simply drag-n-drop files and folders directly into the document library.

Probably something everyone knew but me, but I figured I'd pass it along.

Brad Abrams : PM Tip #21: Sanity Will Prevail

jledgard — Sun, 12 Mar 2006 19:22:58 GMT

So, next time a “stupid” decision gets made rather than sulking about it, re-examine your case honestly then if you still believe in the vision tell yourself (and others) that sanity will prevail then go work towards making sure it does.

Brad Abrams : PM Tip #21: Sanity Will Prevail.

This is a great post that every PM at Microsoft should keep in mind. It reminds me of one of the messages from “First Break all the Rules” that tells you to “be the change” if you know that the change is the right one and eventually you’ll win people over and “sanity will prevail”.

What's that blue post?

jledgard — Tue, 10 Jan 2006 22:33:00 GMT

I have RSSBandit set to flag any posts that mention my blog in blue. Today there was a blue flag from Joystiq. I didn't realize they read my blog. Good thing I put up my gamertag the other day... although my gamerscore is sort of embarrassing.

If you like games and you don't read Joystiq then you should check them out. Thanks to their blog I no longer go to ign.com or gamespot directly without following a recommended link from them.

The importance of setting good examples

jledgard — Mon, 09 Jan 2006 22:16:00 GMT

http://teamsystemrocks.com/blogs/mickey_gousset/archive/2006/01/06/590.aspx

Given that, I shot an email off to Soma expressing my appreciation, but I didn't necessarily expect to hear back right way, if at all.

And now comes the part where I say Microsoft is becoming more open. I received a response back within 5 hours of when I sent it. Now it wasn't a book or anything, but it was a personalized response, and not just a "thanks" with nothing else in the body of the message. He took the time to respond back to someone he didn't even know. I find that very refreshing. And I find it indicative of how Microsoft is striving to become more open and communicative.

There are still a lot of MSFT employees who fear that posting their e-mail address publicly is a dangerous game. I'd like to thank Soma for setting consistent good examples for employees in his organization. There are simply no good reasons to not include customers into every part of our product cycles.

Does brownie mix have more or less calories when it's cooked?

jledgard — Wed, 21 Dec 2005 21:31:00 GMT

Its slow around here this time of year and the subject of this post became the topic of a lunch conversation on our team. It's been suggested that Internet search engines can provide an answer to almost any inane question one could come up with.

We proposed that perhaps bars should install "Debate Reconciliation Machines" that offer nothing but a blank msn or google search page to solve all sorts of bar disputes. The problem with this plan occurs when your dispute reaches what some people would call "The end of the Internet" and even the all-knowing wikipedia lets you down. The machines would have to offer a refund.

Gretchen and I reached the end of the Internet in our hunt for the answer to the following question:

Does brownie mix have more or less calories when it's cooked?

Lets add on to the end of the Internet. I welcome all theories and answers to this question below.

Kicking blogging off again with some humor

jledgard — Thu, 03 Nov 2005 09:04:00 GMT

I'm a little late to the party on this one, but you have to check out the latest Microsoft innovation... WSYP

Via Church of the Customer

Microsoft's new masochism initiative
Microsoft WYSP: We feel your pain. Literally.

I've just been waiting for this video to find its way outside of our network so I could link to it. Cracks me up every time.

Enjoy - Josh

Update: Mike pointed me to a more official link: http://www.microsoft.com/uk/technet/itsshowtime/sessionh.aspx?videoid=9999

Advice on Giving Technical Presentations for Presenters

jledgard — Tue, 12 Jul 2005 00:30:00 GMT

Just blogging this for my own archives to read again in the future.

[Via Fabulous Adventures In Coding]

A few months ago an old friend had to give her first talk at a conference. Now, she used to do community theatre back when we were in school together, so she's no stranger to standing up in front of a bunch of people and acting goofy. However there are at least a few differences between Whose Line Is It Anyway? and delivering a technical talk. So I wrote up Eric's Advice For First-Time Technical Speakers.

The Two Faces of Microsoft

jledgard — Mon, 28 Mar 2005 19:30:00 GMT

Via Scoble
What Make MS Evil

I saw a company that cared about it’s employees and only getting the best people they could to create products that would empower people to do jobs. I was starting to believe Microsoft’s slogan on their company TV ads; “Your potential. Our passion.” I mean, come on this must obviously be a company that although large and seeming not very friendly to competition (Netscape vs IE) really does want to empower people to be able to get their jobs done and do things that they haven’t been able to do before. They even offer free trials of nearly all their software products.

However over the last year every time I’ve looked at something coming out of Microsoft that excited me, I would later discover several catches that made the product a waste of my time having even found out about it. A few short examples are digital music, Internet Explorer 7.0, Longhorn, and the details thus far about the upcoming 360 (XBox Next)

What’s interesting about this, from my perspective, is that it shows how customers can perceive a duality between the acts of “Microsoft” and the acts of individual employees. It also shows how, to be truly successful some of the changes we are pushing for (in the Developer world) really need to carry themselves across more of the company than our little island. Why, for example, would you use .Net to develop extensions for Windows Media player if you perceive Windows Media Player as evil?

No Shock Here: Credit Card Signatures are Useless

jledgard — Tue, 22 Mar 2005 16:21:00 GMT

<Gasp!> I wasn't surprised to read this yesterday. I have, perhaps, some of the worst handwriting known to man. I'll be forever grateful that I took the SATs before they include a cursive writing portion. Maybe it helps to explain that my father is a dentist... or maybe I've just been typing since the commodore 64.

In truth, I've never found it really comforting when the checkout staff at the local Target draws their collective intelligence together, holding my card and signed receipt up to the light, while they try and determine if I'm trying to use a stolen credit card to buy a reeses peanut butter cup and a $10 cd.

Scooby Snax: My Filming and Editing Debut

jledgard — Wed, 09 Feb 2005 00:00:00 GMT

My Filming and Editing Debut: I just finished posting Devdiv's first "self produced" channel9 videos. We go through the end to end process of testcase analysis. Blame me if you get vertigo while watching these. I gained much respect for Scobles filming abilities. Its going to take me a while to get these videos near his quality.

I really can't claim I had much to do with the editing. I pretty much used the four largest segments of video that Windows Movie Maker picked out for me. I was impressed with this product that comes for free with windows. It did everything I needed.

If you have any feedback about these videos let me know.

Scooby Snax: I don't like math

jledgard — Tue, 08 Feb 2005 23:58:00 GMT

Bad Math: I had the same thoughts Kevin did when I saw the Napster Superbowl ad telling me to do the math. "If you sign up when you are 15 years old. By the time your my age (30), you'll have spent $2,700 to not have your music collection in your physical possession." I buy singles on iTunes, but I still prefer to buy music in a physical form that allows me the ultimate portability over time. Maybe ours is the last generation that cares about really owning our digital media. If this model takes off then I'll take it as one of the first signs that I'm "just getting old and don't understand".

Scooby Snax: Powertoys, iPods, and Groundhog Day

jledgard — Wed, 02 Feb 2005 17:51:00 GMT

The History of Developer Powertoys: Raymond Chen wrote a decent post that outlined his involved in and the history of the classic "Windows Powertoys". One of my favorite parts was:

"This was all back in the day when it was easy to put up something for download. No digital signatures, no virus checking, no paperwork. Just throw it up there and watch what happens. Today, things are very different. Putting something up for download is a complicated process with forms to fill out in triplicate and dark rooms with card readers. I wouldn't be surprised if an abandoned salt mine in Montana were somehow involved."

This is something I'd like to change around here in order to make it easier for Microsoft developers to share with you their cool tools that are "cobbled together from stuff lying around". That was indeed the history of the original "Developer Powertoys". Some of them we had laying around and some of them had existed as partial macros we had been posting in the newsgroups to solve customer problems they were running into. I figured, since these MS tools were put together in the same spirit as the original windows powertoys that it made sense to borrow the name as well. Also, all of the other good names we could come up with were copyrighted by someone else and our lawyers were roughly 90% sure the Windows legal team was not going to sue us :-) ... thereby reducing the risk of trying to come up with another name.

Raymond does imply however "Even the blog name "PowerToys" has been co-opted by the Visual Studio team to promote their Powertoys for Visual Studio 2003.". In truth the blog is mostly about highlighting these hacks, tools, and utilities that non-Microsoft developers put together in their spare time. Most of the content does NOT point back to Microsoft. I created it because of the demand I was getting from developers (after they saw our VS Powertoys releases) to highlight their cool utility as well. It was then I realized I had been too inclusive by NOT highlighting these customer driven part time efforts. Why should you trust something built part time "from MS Developers" more than you trust something from part time non-MS developers.

I'm in the 80%: According to this article I'm in the 80%. I also bought Gretchen an iPod for her birthday. Though I've NEVER received an internal memo telling me to hide my iPod and I DO still use the white headphones. Anyone I know that doesn't use the white headphones replaced them for a pair that sounds better and not to "hide their shame". It did give me flashbacks to my first few weeks here when I was scared to use AIM... then I saw how prevalent it was and realized it didn't matter. I, like many other customers, will be perfectly willing to switch platforms once we are convinced that the alternatives were better. I, for example, used Netscape until roughly v4 of both browsers when I just started realizing that IE had surpassed Netscape.

Groundhog Day: Happy Groundhog Day! Not only a kooky Holiday, but also one of the best Bill Murry movies of all time. I'll probably watch it tonight.

A Social Study of Open Source: No, this article does not need my link love since it was slashdotted, but I still found several truths being told within.

A Positive look at our CTP Process: This article represents both sides of the issue, but essentially seems to be written favorably about our Whidbey CTP process. Though the catchphrases and headlines about "emulating open source" or "taking a page from open source" seem a bit on the attention grabbing side. I don't think we are anywhere close to saying those sorts of things. But, there are certainly things we could learn from more open development models.