Katrien's MSDN Blog

Congratulations to new and re-awarded Belgian MVPs

katriend — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 11:37:46 GMT

At Microsoft we like to drive special attention to people that do great work in the developer community, as you might know the MVP title is a recognition of this effort.

Since yesterday we have two new MVPs in Belgium, of which one in the developer space.

Therefore, I would like to congratulate Maarten Balliauw for being awarded MVP in the ASP/ASP.NET category.
Maarten has been working a lot around ASP.NET MVC lately, of which he also released the first book on the subject (as far as I know it was the first one at the time): ASP.NET MVC 1.0 Quickly.
Next to that, Maarten’s blog is a fantastic resource. He does depth posts around ASP.NET MVC, Azure, VSTS, PHP, OpenXML and much more. Congratulations Maarten!

Renewed MVPs

We would also like to congratulate the MVPs that have been re-awarded. You have been doing great work!

Hans Le Roy - Internet Explorer - http://hlrnet.com/technoblog/?tag=ie8
Loïc Bar - Client App Dev - http://blogs.codes-sources.com/loicbar/default.aspx
Ludovic Lefort - SharePoint Services - http://lefortludovic.blogspot.com/
Riemer Grootjans - XNA/DirectX - http://www.riemers.net/
Jan Tielens - SharePoint Server - http://weblogs.asp.net/jan/
Wilfried Mestdagh - Windows Live Platform
Bruno van Dooren - Visual C++

Congratulations to all of you!

Tooling and integration with Visual Studio to kickstart WPF development (by a Belgian firm) – an interview

katriend — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 20:45:53 GMT

Last week I invited David Sleeckx, the technical architect behind Vidyano, to give us a demonstration on what he has been working on. Vidyano is a tool that is tightly integrated with Visual Studio 2008 to help with the (rapid) development and architecturing of windows applications using Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) in the presentation layer and LINQ to SQL, Entity Framework or even something custom data access layer for the model.

Ever since I got to see the first demo of this tool, I was impressed with the capabilities and decided it was time to get a demo on video. David joined me last week to explain the concepts of the tool as well as give a demo from the ground up.

We decided to create two videos, one in Dutch and one in English. Here are the links to the videos:


Interview in Dutch	Interview in English

As you will see in the video(s), David builds a new application from the ground up to show how the Vidyano tool works. One very important point to note is that by the fact that the tool uses XAML for the presentation layer and these views are in a complete separate project, they can be passed on to a designer to edit the look and feel through Expression Blend.

Check out the video in your preferred language, knowing that the Dutch version is longer and contains more demos. David also shows two projects they did using the Vidyano tool for their own clients, both are for the medical industry and what surprised me most was the amount of time it took to develop them.

In case you would like to try the tool, download the free trial and check out the step by step tutorial to create a project. The tutorial explains the process of creating a LINQ to SQL model, creating the Vidyano module, adding pages with a chosen layout structure, and running the project.

Vidyano is created by Rhea (a member of the Visual Studio Industry Partner Program) and you can find the product on the Visual Studio Gallery.

MSDN Chopsticks: recently added videos (ALM Roadshow, SharePoint, VISUG, SQLUG)

katriend — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 20:25:06 GMT

It’s been a while since I’ve done an update on what new videos have been added to MSDN Chopsticks, so here is a list with the most recent additions.

MSDN ALM Roadshow
The MSD ALM Roadshow took place in May 2009 at different locations. Presented by Pieter Gheysens in Dutch and Vincent Fievez in French, all Dutch recorded sessions are now online.

Sessions in Dutch
ALM Roadshow - Het werk van uw team plannen met Visual Studio Team System (deel 1)

ALM Roadshow - Broncontrole op de juiste manier met Team Foundation Server (deel 2)

ALM Roadshow - Uw code op verschillende manieren testen en de kwaliteit ervan verbeteren (deel 3)

Community:
Serge Luca has created a set of screencasts on SharePoint

	Generic Framework for Association and Initiation Forms in SharePoint Workflows
	Quickstart with Ajax on SharePoint
	Overview of Visual Studio Extensions for SharePoint 1.3 CTP
	Workflow for SharePoint: fixing the AspxCollectFeedback sample
	Workflows for WSS3 Demystifying ASPX forms association

MSDN Webcasts
These are recordings from live webcasts we did in the past weeks.


	Dutch: WPF Demystified (Nederlands) French: WPF démystifié (Français)
	Dutch: Windows 7 voor .NET ontwikkelaars French: Windows 7 pour développeurs .NET

VISUG sessions (Visual Studio User Group)

	VISUG session: Mocking
	VISUG Back2Basics: ASP.NET Caching - Part 1 VISUG Back2Basics: ASP.NET Caching - Part 2

SQLUG (SQL Server User Group)

	SQLUG: Overview of Visual StudioTeam System 2008 Database Edition
	SQLUG: The Azure Services Platform and SQL Services

Happy viewing!

All TechDays 2009 sessions recordings are online

katriend — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 19:19:18 GMT

Yes, you are reading the title correctly! We have put all video recordings of the TechDays 2009 sessions online and free for you to watch. With more than 70 developer and IT-Pro oriented sessions, you can now watch everything at your own pace.

Check out sessions like “The Daily Scrum” “The Future of C#”, “Pex – Automated White Box Testing for .NET”, “.NET Common Language Runtim 4”, from speakers like Ingo Rammer, Bart De Smet, Christian Weyer, Stephen Forte and many many more. The pre-conference sessions focusing on SharePoint 2007 with .NET Framework 3.5 (WCF, WF, LINQ, Silverlight) are also available.

During the event we also did some interviews with the speakers and the user groups present at the Community booths:

http://www.microsoft.com/belux/techdays/2009/track.aspx?tid=msdn_interviews&engine=MSDN

An extra feature this time is that we are also giving you a link to download the session videos for offline viewing.

Enjoy!

Slides for Windows 7 for .NET developers webcast, and update on Windows API Code Pack

katriend — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 19:20:00 GMT

Last week we had the Windows 7 for .NET developers webcast, where we showed .NET wrappers that are available to access Windows 7 features otherwise only available to managed code developers.
> For the slides download see at the bottom of this post.

Update: recordings of the webcasts are now online on the Chopsticks site:
- Dutch: Windows 7 voor .NET ontwikkelaars
- French: Windows 7 pour développeurs .NET

While addressing many of the Windows 7 features will be possible in .NET 4.0, where for example WPF will surface the touch features, taskbar integration and more, none of this is available today. However, there are already today some options for .NET developers.

Windows API Code Pack (now v0.90)

The Windows API Code Pack is a managed code library giving access to a bunch of Windows 7 features. Just two days after the webcast the API code pack was updated, version v0.90 is now available with quite some new APIs exposes, updated samples and bugfixes.

Current version exposes these APIs:

Windows 7 Taskbar
Known Folders, Windows 7 Libraries, non-file system containers, and a hierarchy of Shell Namespace entities.
Windows 7 Explorer Browser Control.
Shell property system.
Windows Vista and Windows 7 Common File Dialogs, including custom controls.
Windows Vista and Windows 7 Task Dialogs.
Direct3D 11.0, Direct3D 10.1/10.0, DXGI 1.0/1.1, Direct2D 1.0, DirectWrite, Windows
Imaging Component (WIC) APIs. (DirectWrite and WIC have partial support)
Sensor Platform APIs
Extended Linguistic Services APIs
Power Management APIs
Application Restart and Recovery APIs
Network List Manager APIs
Command Link control and System defined Shell icons.

The library also contains all source code for the wrappers as well as sample projects.

Download the API Code Pack on MSDN Code Gallery

Other managed code libraries

Some functionality does not yet today make part of the Windows API code pack. Two other libraries are “Windows 7 Multitouch .NET Interop Sample Library” and “Windows 7 Taskbar and Libraries .NET Interop Sample Library ”.

Check out these videos on Channel9 around these libraries:

Download webcast slides

User Experience @ Vitra (UX@Vitra) events write-up

katriend — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 18:03:00 GMT

During the last two weeks Microsoft Belgium organized four events at different Vitra locations. Vitra is a well-known furniture brand, which seemed like the perfect location for these informal events. The title was User Experience @ Vitra.

In this post I’m writing my experiences with the event, if you are looking for resources that I mentioned during the demos you might want to skip to the second part of the post.

The events

The goal of the events was to bring together people in the web & marketing world and get them in touch with what Microsoft is doing in this space. Since we wanted an informal event setup we had different product/technology corners. With subjects such as Microsoft Surface (demoing the table), IE8, Windows 7 (touch), Silverlight, SharePoint, and more.

The events were the work of a lot of people and departments at Microsoft, but driven by my colleagues at the Partner group.

In the period of June 2nd to June 11th we held the event at these locations, every time at a Vitra store location in the city: Antwerp, Diegem (Brussels), Gent and Liège.

The atmosphere

See for yourself, take a look at the pictures:

Antwerp event pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/pietel/sets/72157619149643882/
Diegem (Brussels) event pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/pietel/sets/72157619163825755/
All pictures taken by Pieter Baert (@pietel).

What was shown

We had several corners in which there was a chance for people to come around, watch a short demo, ask some questions, exchange ideas and see something new. While some corners were actual technology demos others were simply a chance to get talking about a certain technology.

The start of each event was given by Luc Van de Velde (Director Developer & Platform Evangelism) and/or Tom Crombez. Tom is THE contact person for agencies at the Partner group. We kicked off each event with the showing on the Microsoft Future vision video, and how many of the future technologies shown here are already present and possible today, be it in a different form. Go watch the video, it’s really worth it!

After the introduction the different corners started their demos, with a chance for every attendee to do the tour and spend some time at the chosen corners. Not the typical conference type of presentations but I think this went really well with the type of event.

People could watch, touch and play on the Surface table, go for a demo of some cool Silverlight applications delivered by folks from the Silverlight user group, get some more info on IE8 light-up features, touch some Windows 7 devices, see some SharePoint, have a look at some great cases by the Microsoft Advertising team, talk to Microsoft folks about the web platform, and of course get in touch with the Partner team. Not to forget, drop by the Mojito bar which was very much visited corner ;-)

Folks from the community were also there at the Expert bar, where all questions around the technologies were answered: Gill Cleeren, Kris Van der Mast and Kevin Dockx.
I would like to thank the members of the Silverlight user group for their presence as well: Frederik Duchi and Kevin DeRudder.

Resources on Expression Blend, SketchFlow and Silverlight

My corner was around creating a unique User Experience, focused specifically on showing some new Expression Blend 3 capabilities. While 15 minutes is really short to show a lot around this, I chose to show some of the highlights: SketchFlow, importing from Photoshop, new sample data capabilities and styling.

Demos were centered around Silverlight but the goal of my corner was also to talk to people about the XAML + .NET technology stack. By using XAML (which I call the UI language) together with .NET you get to implement to different media:

Reaching the web, on multiple platforms and browsers: Silverlight
More richness and full access to the client windows machine: Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF)
Other devices: beginning with the Surface table. Surface development can be done by using WPF and the Surface SDK. Note: XNA can also be used to develop for Surface.

I think it’s important to highlight the fact that XAML is really used as the glue between all of these technologies, and that even if each of the technologies offers different advantages, from a learning perspective you don’t have to completely start over. It’s always going to be learning the XAML and .NET (no real need to learn .NET if you a are a designer using Blend 3).

Following are some links that give you lots more information around what I presented.

The technologies:

Silverlight 3 community site
Silverlight team blog
Windows Presentation Foundation (community site)

The products:

Expression community homepage
Expression Blend 3 Preview – download
SketchFlow article and video, worth the read: “SketchFlow: Rapid prototyping that works”

Not to miss is also the site of the MIX09 conference, where all of the sessions are online and free to watch. Specifically for Expression Blend, check out “Sketch Flow: From Concept to Production” and “Creating Interactivity with Microsoft Expression Blend”.

The UX@Vitra thank you page also contains resources around the other technologies presented during the event.

What others wrote about the events

I found a few different posts about the events, also worth a read if you are looking for an attendee’s view on the whole thing. There might be more, let me know if you have one to add here.

And to finish off, these folks from Microsoft Belgium are on Twitter:

Tom Crombez (@artymoony)
Hans Verbeeck (@hansver)
Miel Van Opstal (@coolz0r)
Koen Van Tolhuyzen (@koenvant)
And me :) @katriendg

And for those who asked, I was using a Twitter client written in WPF before the sessions started: the Twitter client is bDule. Still in Alpha but I love how you can split up your interface in several ways, follow several tags at the same time and even several Twitter accounts. By the way, another cool WPF Twitter client is blu.

The NewCloudApp() contest now international

katriend — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 15:01:20 GMT

Do you have an application or cool ideas for an application using the Azure Services Platform? You might give the NewCloudApp contest a try. Use Windows Azure as hosting for your .NET or PHP applications, and use the other services such as .NET Services to interact with the cloud. It’s encouraged that you also spend some focus on the user interface by taking advantage of a rich UI in Silverlight for example.

The contest previously only open to the U.S. has now got an international part to it, so go for it!

Submission deadline for your application is July 9th 2009, so that gives you about a month to complete it. Check out all the details of the contest on http://www.newcloudapp.com/

Windows 7 RC and support for VHD (including booting from VHD)

katriend — Sun, 17 May 2009 12:48:25 GMT

I’m loving the new Windows version, I’ve been using it on my work and my demo computers since the release of the Beta version in January. I’m not going back!
Now with the release of Windows 7 RC we are coming closer to a scheduled release by holiday season 2009 (as announced during TechEd US keynote).

Expiration of Beta and RC versions
If you are using the beta version yourself it’s recommended to upgrade (actually do a clean install) for RC. The beta version will be expiring in July 2009.
Windows 7 RC install will expire in February 2010.

Note that the RC version is available for download until the end of June 2009, from the MSDN site.

VHD support

One of the interesting features in Windows 7 is support for VHD. There’s support in two ways: first is being able to create and mount a VHD file as a disk in the OS.

This is done through the Disk management settings under Computer Management.

The second feature is booting from a VHD file. As my colleague Arlindo explained to me, this is not running on vritualization technology. It’s done through the boot loader which will unpack the VHD and then boot from there. So it’s not the same as running your VHD with Virtual PC.

Creating a bootable VHD

To create my bootable VHD I used a few sites with to gather the information and guide me through the process. These were:

Because an existing VPC is not supported to be used as a bootable VHD, you are obliged to follow one or other procedure in order to get a new Windows 7 installed on the VHD. Basic steps are, as I followed from Cesar’s post:

After the base Windows 7 OS is installed, restart the computer and run from Windows 7 DVD. Note: it
Choose Windows Repair (or press Shift+F10 to load the command line at the first install screen)
Start the Command prompt.
Type Diskpart
Diskpart utility will load. Type create vdisk file=c:\Windows7Build7000.vhd maximum=40000 (where “c:\Windows7Build7000.vhd” can of course be another location and name). The 40000 refers to the disk size. Adapt as required.
Enter the command to select the newly created disk: select vdisk file=c:\Windows7Build7000.vhd
Type: attach vdisk
Type: exit (you exit Windows Repair, but Do Not Reboot), or close the command line
Click “Install now” back in the installation wizard.
Accept license and then make sure you choose “Custom (advanced")” in the installation type screen.
Choose the newly created disk as a destination (by checking the size of your newly created VHD you should be able to recognize which one it is.
If you get a warning saying that your computer hardware might not support this drive just ignore it.
Continue installation wizard, Windows 7 gets installed and will reboot the system a few times. That’s it.

After following this procedure I ended up with two Windows 7 entries in my boot sequence so this is something that needs to be addressed. I found out the last install (on VHD) is put at the top.

The only change needed here is adapting the entries in the boot loader so that I know exactly which one is which. To do this we can use the bcdedit.exe command line tool.

The bcdedit tool is pretty straightforward (see TechNet document on command line options). What I need to do is rename the VHD Windows 7 entry to something that is more logic, and secondly I would like my base OS to appear as the first in the dual boot option. To do this I opened up command line in admin prompt, and used these commands.

bcdedit /v
This command will list the boot loader entries. Copy the GUID for the VHD entry onto clipboard.

bcdedit /set {GUID} description “Windows 7 – VHD”
Setting the entry description, you can of couse choose whatever description fits you.

bcdedit /displayorder {guid} /addlast
Here we set the display order of the VHD entry to be displayed last. Since the entry already exists it’s simply moved to the end of the list.

Now since I also want to make sure the first entry gets selected by default when booting, I copy the base OS GUID to clipboard and then use the /default option:

bcdedit /default {GUID}

With that I’m all set: my main install I’m using for my main (released) version demos and keeping the VHD for trying out all beta versions of technologies. And my boot entries show as I have set:

Sleep mode also continues to work perfectly, indifferent from the fact that it’s been booted on the VHD or the base OS.

To finish off, another interesting advantage of having a bootable disk on a VHD: you can use BitLocker to encrypt the whole disk where the VHD sits: if by any your laptop gets lost or stolen there’s no way to get the VHD’s content.

Microsoft Web Platform Installer: what is it and how to install it?

katriend — Sun, 10 May 2009 18:39:37 GMT

The Microsoft Web Platform Installer was officially announced at MIX09. The Web PI as it’s abbreviated is your best tool get access to Microsoft’s web platform runtimes, tools and database. It only installs free products, beginning with the platform tools but it also allows you to easily install ASP.NET community tools like DotNetNuke, Umbraco and others, but also PHP open source projects like Acquia Drupal, Wordpress, and more.

In this post I’m focusing on the platform and not using the gallery, which will be for a later post.

Just this weekend I re-installed my old laptop at home with the Windows 7 RC, so having a new clean install is really a good moment to try out the Web Platform Installer. No need to get several tools from several download sites, search for the latest version and so forth.

Before getting started: supported platforms

Web PI is supported on the following platforms: Windows Vista, Windows Vista SP1, Windows XP SP2+, Windows Server 2003 SP1+, Windows Server 2008

Note:
Here I’m doing the installation on a new Windows 7 RC version, which itself is not really a supported platform. Logical as Windows 7 is not released but I had no issues except a warning about SQL Server 2008 Express, for which I made sure to add SP1 after completing the Web PI installation.

Installing the web platform with the Web Platform Installer

microsoft.com/web

Download, choose either Web PI 1.0 (released) or 2.0 which is still in beta. Here I’m going to install version 2.0 since I want access to some beta stuff and also because at a later stage I would like access to the gallery.

Go to http://www.microsoft.com/web/downloads/platform.aspx and click Download and run. This will launch the installer.

The first screen you’re presented with shows you the latest additions.
Note: this is exactly the same screen that is presented to you when you re-run the Web Platform Installer later on to add technologies.

Choosing which items to install is straightforward, and you get detail information about each of the detail options. For example, on the web platform section I’m installing the Web Server, Frameworks and Runtimes, Database and Tools. Under each of these there are extra options, that you can customize to your needs. By default, the most used and logical ones are selected but you may choose to add other features as well.

Let’s drill further on the Web Server section.

I surely want to run ASP.NET as well as have support for the latest Media services on Internet Information Server. To add those I choose to “Customize” the Web Server element.

In case I’m not sure what a specific feature means I can click the (i) icon. This gives you extra information and a link to even more details about the selected feature. In the screenshot below you can see I selected to know more about IIS Media Services 3.0 Beta:

Since this is the Web PI 2.0 beta I do have a choice of some technologies still in beta like the Application Request Routing 2.0 Beta or the IIS Media Services 3.0 Beta.

Framework and Runtimes

In the framework and runtimes section you have the option to install ASP.NET MVC 1.0 (which I’m doing), .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 and PHP 5.2.9.-2.

Database

The proposed database is SQL Server 2008 Express, as well as the SQL Server 2008 Management Studio Express and SQL Server 2008 Management Objects.

Tools

In the tools section the free Visual Web Developer 2008Express with SP1 (the latest service pack already applied), and the Silverlight 2 Tools for Visual Studio. Since this is the beta one the option to install Silverlight 3 Tools for Visual Studio. I know the two sets of tools (Silverlight 2 and Silverlight 3 Beta) cannot be installed on the same machine. And yes, the Web PI correctly checks for this and warns you. I had to try it out and was glad the check is built in :-)

Now that I have chosen all items I wish to install I can either go ahead and get my machine setup, or also choose to install applications from the gallery. I’m skipping this part for now and go ahead and click on “Install”. The Web PI shows the items selected along with any specific license terms, which in order to install, well of course I do need to accept. Let’s do that.

Once installation starts, depending on the items you have chosen there might be some extra configuration screens appearing. In my case I selected the SQL Server 2008 Express, for which I now get the chance to configure security settings.

Only after this does the installer start downloading the items I have chosen. Depending on the number of items this might take a few moments to complete.

That’s it, all the chosen items have been installed.

Re-running the installer

Running the installer again is very easy, just launch the Web Platform Installer from the Start menu. At this stage the installer will connect and download information on any new items added or updated in the installer.

Uninstalling chosen items

One thing I noticed was that when re-running the Web PI I had no choice to unselect already installed items. At this stage the Web PI does not support this feature (at least that what seemed the obvious to me). The best solution now is to go through Control Panel > Uninstall a program. All the individual programs installed through the Web PI can be found there and uninstalled separately if needed.

So now I’m all set to start my development and testing on the newly installed machine. All without having to go through several downloads of framework, tools, IIS extensions, and so forth.

I’ll be blogging about the Gallery at a later stage as well, including the support for PHP applications delivered with the gallery.

And now to end this post you might want to sit back and watch this funny video: Cannon P.I., and see which Microsoft execs you might recognize ;-)

Multi-mania 09 and a Meet & Greet with Laurent Bugnion

katriend — Sat, 09 May 2009 11:40:19 GMT

Multi-mania is a great multimedia event taking place on 18th and 19th May in XPO Kortrijk. It’s organized by the PIH school and welcomes some great speakers and a lot of visitors every year. Lots of sessions around motion graphics, RIA technologies, media, gaming, etc.
This year there’s also a special event around gaming and entrepreneurship: the Microsoft Enterpreneurship Forum.

Silverlight 3 and Expression Blend 3 sessions

For Multi-mania we have asked Laurent Bugnion, MVP Silverlight, book author and all-round WPF and Silverlight master, to come back to Belgium and do one session. Luckily for us Laurent didn’t hesitate and agreed to come by. After a visit in March for TechDays, he’s back to do a session on Expression Blend 3 and SketchFlow. I tell you, if you to do any prototyping SketchFlow is a must see session!

And let’s not forget, there is also a session by our own Belgian Gill Cleeren on Silverlight 3. Silverlight 3 Beta came out in March during MIX09. You’ll see what is new with this version including pixel shaders, perspective 3D, out of browser support, media improvements and more.

Meet & Greet, together with the Belgian Silverlight User Group

{ THE DOCTOR IS HERE, TELL ME WHERE IT HURTS... } - under this motto the BESUG is organizing a get together with Laurent Bugnion. Got any questions, issues with Silverlight 2 and 3 or Expression Blend? This is the perfect time to join the group and get your answers.

You can Laurent and the BESUG in Kortrijk on the 18th of May at 18h30. Get-together takes place at the PIH school, registration and location info on the MS Community site.

Community Day 09 coming on 25th June

katriend — Sat, 09 May 2009 09:35:09 GMT

Belgian user groups are doing it again: for the 3rd year they are organizing the Community Day. This year the event takes place on the 25th of June, in Utopolis Mechelen. The choice for a new venue was needed since last year’s location just became too small. Talking about a successful event!

The Belgin user groups behind the event are BESUG, BIWUG, IT-Talks, MVUG, Pro-Exchange, SCUG, SQLUG, VBIB, Visug, WinSec and XNA-BUG.

Checkout the agenda with developer sessions such as Silverlight 3, XNA 3.1, jQuery, Composite Application Guidance (aka Prism), SharePoint, and the more IT-pro oriented sessinos on OCS, Exchange 2010 and more. I’m even doing a session myself on Windows 7 for managed code developers.

Hope to see you there in big numbers. Well, as big the the venue allows that is :)

Register in time!

ALM Roadshow: Team Foundation Server and Visual Studio Team System

katriend — Wed, 06 May 2009 15:49:00 GMT

In the week of 11th of May 2009, MSDN is organizing a roadshow around Application Lifecycle Management, focusing on the use of Visual Studio Team System and Team Foundation Server tools.
In the current economic climate, IT companies are often forced to deliver more in less time and with smaller budgets. To help you make your application development lifecycle more efficient, consistent and with a better time-to-market tools like Team Foundation Server come to the rescue. Join this roadshow to learn how exactly TFS can assist your team. Read all the details in Dutch or French on the event website. This is a free event.

There are five events planned during the week, giving the choice of language and location:

11 May in Mons – Microsoft Innovation Center, in French
12 May in Gent – Zebrastraat, in Dutch
13 May in Antwerpen – ALM, in Dutch (Yes, ALM is really the name of the location)
14 May online through Live Meeting – in Dutch
15 May online through Live Meeting – in French

All events take place in the afternoon, from 14h00 to 17h30.

Speakers

For the events in Dutch we have Pieter Gheysens, MVP for VSTS speaking. Check out his blog http://intovsts.net

French events are presented by Vincent Fievez, Microsoft-platform specialist for over 15 years and currently working for ICT7, a company that he helped found.

Express Yourself newsletter: issue 5 is available

katriend — Wed, 06 May 2009 15:26:00 GMT

Express Yourself is a Belgian newsletter focusing on web development and web design topics. Issue 5 has been sent to subscribers, focusing on the latest around the MIX09 announcements. Here’s an extract.

UX Prototyping with Blend 3 and SketchFlow
As part of Blend 3, we announced SketchFlow, a new capability that allows designers to quickly prototype the flow and composition of applications.

SuperPreview part of Expression Web 3
Learn more about SuperPreview – a feature of Expression Web 3 that allow developers to visualize a preview of a page rendered by IE6, IE7, IE8, Safari and Firefox. You can download the free standalone version of SuperPreview, which supports Internet Explorer.

What's new in Silverlight 3
With lots of new features like Out of Browser support, Perspective 3D, GPU acceleration, enhanced databinding, to name a few. Get started now!

Internet Explorer 8
IE8 was released at MIX09: new possibilities for richer user engagement. Be sure to check out MIX09 Day 2 Keynote, with Dean Hachamovitch and Deborah Adler.

Flash Designer top questions
Expression MVP Don Burnett covers frequently asked questions from Flash Designers.

Local events, don’t miss these:

UX@Vitra, 4 dates in June 2009 – register and come find us in June
Multi-mania, May 18th-19th 2009, including some sessions on Silverlight and the new SketchFlow feature in Expression Blend 3.

Subscribe and receive the newsletter into your inbox.

User Experience at VITRA – join us at 4 different locations

katriend — Wed, 06 May 2009 07:14:00 GMT

Are you a web developer, web designer/integrator, project manager, account manager or own a web agency? Well, we have an event for you.
In June, in four different locations you’ll get served a ‘cocktail’ of a unique location, a nice atmosphere, cool demo’s, loads of useful information, food and drinks for people involved into web design and development.

The unique locations are the Vitra showrooms. If you don’t know Vitra, check out their site and get an idea on the type of furniture they offer.

Several people from Microsoft will be there to meet you, show you demos around the MS web and UX technologies, talk to you and answer your questions.

It’s also a great chance to mingle amongst your peers in an informal atmosphere and do some networking.

The dates and places are the following:

2nd of June – Vitra Antwerp
4th of June – Vitra Diegem (close to Brussels)
10th of June – Vitra Gent
11th of June – Vitra Liège

Check out the site for a few more details (it’s worth it), and register in Dutch or French:

If you are a Twitter user, we are using the tag #uxv.

See you there!

PHP on Windows Training Kit available (April 2009 update)

katriend — Mon, 04 May 2009 18:12:39 GMT

As you might know running PHP applications on Windows Server 2008 (and Vista SP1) and Internet Information Services 7 (IIS7) is supported through the FastCGI module. If you need to learn more there is good news: a full training kit has been released. Besides addressing configuration of PHP on IIS 7 it also contains demos and labs on how to take advantage of SQL Server from PHP applications.

Contents:

PHP & SQL Server Demos

Integrating SQL Server Geo-Spatial with PHP
SQL Server Reporting Services and PHP

PHP & SQL Server Hands On Labs

Introduction to Using SQL Server with PHP
Using Full Text Search over Office Documents in PHP

PHP on Windows Hands On Labs

IIS Access Control Features for PHP
Using IIS 7.0 Media Features in a PHP Application
Troubleshooting PHP
Migrating PHP Applications to IIS 7.0

Download “PHP on Windows Training Kit (April 2009 update)”