Mattias Lindberg : News

Ytterligare lite SharePoint Server 2010 Sneak Peak

mattlind — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 14:19:14 GMT

Arphan Shan (Director i SharePoint-teamet) har lagt upp ytterligare en Sneak Peak på funktionerna i SharePoint Server 2010. Det är en inspelning av hans presentation på WPC (Worldwide Partner Conference) förra månaden. Hela titeln är Building Solutions on SharePoint: The Value Delivered Today, and a Sneak Peek at Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010. Se den nedan eller kolla på http://www.microsoft.com/video/en/us/details/efc1bbbf-123a-45bc-8145-c08545e29f2c.

SharePoint Designer är nu GRATIS!

mattlind — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 08:25:00 GMT

Vi har meddelat att SharePoint Designer från och med nu övergår till att bli en produkt som får laddas ner och användas utan kostnad, den är alltså GRATIS från och med idag! Du kan ladda ner den via produktsidan för Microsoft Office SharePoint Designer.

SharePoint Designer används för att på ett enkelt sätt anpassa av SharePoint utan att behöva skriva kod, exempelvis kan man modifera rapporter, arbetsflöden och olika vyer. Målgruppen för SharePoint Designer är IT-proffs som vill kunna göra ändringar i sin miljö utan att behöva skriva kod i Visual Studio och skapa features och WSP-paket.

Detta är såklart bra för många att SharePoint Designer blir mer tillgängligt och det kommer göra det lättare för icke-utvecklare att modifera sina SharePoint siter så att de passar dem bättre. Men det är även värt att påpeka att ändringar av en site layout som görs direkt i SharePoint Designer inte är en kontrollerad IT-process, det jag menar är att du inte kommer kunna dra nytta av ändringarna på andra siter eller i andra miljöer utan att manuellt göra om dem.

Ett sätt att använda SharePoint Designer i ett större projekt är att prototypa och skapa en basdesign med hjälp av SharePoint Designer. Men när man ska göra leverans till andra delar av projektet (systemtest, acceptanstest, produktion) så skapar man mer strukturerade packeteringar.

Microsoft Recite – Ljudinspelning med röstsökning!

mattlind — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 11:38:00 GMT

Använder du ljudinspelningsfunktionen i din Windows-telefon? Har du svårt att hitta bland dina inspelningar? Då är (kanske) svaret Microsoft Recite!

Microsoft Recite är en add-on applikation till Windows Mobile 6 som låter dig spela in meddelanden och sedan söka på dem med hjälp av röstigenkänning.

Efter att ha testat detta lite måste jag säga att sökningen funkar väldigt bra!

Steg 1 – Spela in	Steg 2 – Spela upp dina inspelningar	Steg 3 – Sök efter inspelning
Klicka på Remember så börjar inspelningen. Skärmen animerar så vackert under inspelningen :-)	En lista med alla inspelningar visas, med datum och längd.	Klicka på Search, säg en eller ett par nyckelord och klicka på Finish. Microsoft Recite söker efter ljud i dina inspelningarna som liknar nyckelorden och visar en resultatlista.

På deras blog finns två demos: Demo (2 min) och Demo (6 min). Den korta visar är en snabb översikt medan den längre är lite mer komplett, men de visar samma funktioner!

Jag har tidigare varit en ganska flitig användare av inspelningsfunktionen på min telefon men eftersom allt bara heter Inspelning1, Inspelning2, …, Inspelning 123 (och Inspelning123 visas mellan Inspelning1 och Inspelning2 i listan :-) så slutade jag använda det. Med Microsoft Recite får man i alla fall datum, tid och längd

Den största bristen jag hittills har hittat är att jag inte kan använda touch-gränssnittet när listan över alla inspelningar visas, dvs. jag kan inte byta vald inspelning, klicka på Play eller Delete på skärmen utan måste använda knapparna på telefonen för detta. Förhoppningsvis är detta något som de skulle kunna fixa, för det är väldigt irriterande när man ALDRIG annars använder knapparna utan bara klickar på skärmen.

Jag tycker att Du ska testa detta, om inte annat så är det lite cool teknologi.

/Mattias

Files, folder and disks on the web: Live Mesh, SkyDrive or Groove?

mattlind — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 01:20:48 GMT

I admit it, I'm not at the front of the technology curve. Why? I just recently learned about Live Mesh and I got really impressed (have I been hiding under a rock?, no I've been on paternal leave for six months :-). When SkyDrive (part of the Live offering) was launched I tried it with a few files but didn't really see what I would use it for. It was storage on the web without a simple interface; to edit a file I needed to download it, edit it and upload it.

The experience with Live Mesh is completely different from SkyDrive, at least when you install the software client on your device. Live Mesh folders appear on my Desktop as normal folders and files in them can be edited just like any other file on my disk. And when a change is made to a file that change is synchronized across all connected devices as well as being available through the web client. In the future I will even be able to synchronize files with my smartphone running Windows Mobile, cool!

Tonight my wife and I spent an hour trying to figure out how we should use Live Mesh to collaborate. We installed the client on her laptop and I gave her access to one of my mesh folders and then we tried creating and updating a few files to see how the changes were synchronized. Our test document was a shopping list, as good as any test...

In the near future I see us using Live Mesh when we create an application for a building permit, we want to extend our house some. As the application for this building permit is completely web based (e-government you know) we need to collect drawings and other documents before submitting the application, and what better place than Live Mesh to do this? We will both have access to the same files and we can both contribute to the application.

If I like Live Mesh so much why have I mentioned Groove in the title? Groove is also a network-based disk drive used to share folders and files, which it has in common with Live Mesh. However, Groove differs from Live Mesh in that its purpose being much more focused on collaboration between a number of people within the same company. To me the two biggest advantages of using Groove over Live Mesh are: automatic synchronization of updates in Office documents if several people have updated the same document and ability to synchronize the content of SharePoint document libraries.

I see Live Mesh an an important part of Microsoft’s vision for cloud computing; data stored on a local device is (almost) simultaneous accessible on other device and in the cloud. To me this represents a case where the vision of "software plus services" shows its strength. The service are the folders and files in the mesh and the software is the application on the device. The service can be accessed through a web interface but the software part enhances the experience beyond the simple collaboration scenarios of SkyDrive and enables much better and cooler scenarios. So the software is not a requirement for accessing the service, but it provides a richer experience.

Currently Live Mesh is only supported in a selected number of countries and it has the status of being a Tech Preview.

AutoCollage: Automatically arrage photos in a collage

mattlind — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 11:10:50 GMT

Microsoft Research has released a tool that analyze all the pictures in a folder, picks the "most interesting" ones and makes a blended collage. You can download a trial version at http://research.microsoft.com/AutoCollage/ that runs for 30 days, then you have to buy a license from the online store.

I have tried this tool for an hour and I think AutoCollage does a great job of creating a collage which can be used to share highlights from an event; wedding, vacation, weekend in Stockholm, etc. I don't primarily see these collages as something you print and put in an album (but perhaps it could be used as a cover page to an album), more probably it will be useful for digitally sharing your experience with friends and family. But perhaps printing them big and use as banners is one possible usage.

AutoCollage is a first release and may not have every feature you wish for but it does a good enough job for me.

Below is an example of a collage created using some images from my hobby (bird photography), an MS event and some private pictures. Note that AutoCollage takes into consideration the shapes of flower and makes an irregular crop. It also blends the lighter parts of the boys head and the wedding ring.

News about BizTalk Server 2009 and alignment with Oslo

mattlind — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 23:13:06 GMT

The roadmap for BizTalk Server has been updated with details about BizTalk Server 2009 (previously known as BizTalk Server 2006 R3). Some highlight are:

Support for the latest and greatest development platform; Windows Server 2008, Visual Studio 2008 SP1, SQL Server 2008 and the .NET Framework 3.5 SP1. It also adds support form virtualization through Hyper-V.
Extends the developer experience by adding support for Team Foundation Server (TFS).
Enhanced support for SOA and Web Services; UDDI 3.0 registry, ESB Guidance 2.0, WCF support for WebSphere MQ
New LOB adapters for Oracle E-Business Suites and SQL Server and updates for existing adapters.
EDI and AS2 support will be enhanced along with updates to the SWIF. RFID support will also be extended.

Even though future versions of BizTalk (after the 2009 version) will add support for Windows Workflow Foundation (WF) it is clearly stated that Microsoft is "committed to continued support for BizTalk Server’s XLANG orchestration technology".

Follow this link to go directly to news about the future releases: http://www.microsoft.com/biztalk/en/us/roadmap.aspx#WhereWereGoing

SharePoint SP1 Planning och Deploying Guidelines

mattlind — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 16:04:00 GMT

A whitepaper which gives all the details how you should plan and deploy Service Pack 1 for SharePoint has just been released. Download and read the document at Planning and Deploying Service Pack 1 for Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 in a Multi-server Environment.

Download Links for Office System SP1 and SharePoint SDK Refresh

mattlind — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 08:50:00 GMT

Here you'll find direct links to downloads and KBs explaining the WSS and SharePoint Server 2007 SP1, the WSS and SharePoint Server SDK Refresh and also the Office Client Suite 2007 SP1. Enjoy!

WSS and SharePoint Server SP1

WSS 3.0 SP1
MOSS/SharePoint 2007 SP1
KB936984: Description of the 2007 Microsoft Office Servers Service Pack 1
KB942390: MOSS SP 1 Fixlist KB
KB936984: MOSS SP 1 Description KB
KB942388: WSS SP 1 Fixlist KB
KB936988: WSS SP 1 Description KB
KB945013: How to Deploy SP 1 KB

More information about the SharePoint SP1 can be found at Announcing the Release of WSS 3.0 SP1 and Office SharePoint Server 2007 SP1 (the SharePoint team blog).

WSS and SharePoint Server SDK Refresh

Read more about the details of the update at SharePoint SDKs (and Other Documentation Resources) Now Updated for SP1.

Office System Client SP1

Microsoft and Phase One Form Strategic Alliance to Improve Digital Photography Solutions

mattlind — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 22:13:30 GMT

Today it was announced that Microsoft and danish company Phase One will work together to improve the experience of Windows users. Phase One is known both for their superb digital backs for medium format camera (up to 39 MP sensors) as well as their very popular RAW converter program Capture One (C1). To me this is great news, a high profile RAW converter company will team up with MS to enhance the experience!

Even though this is great news to improve the out-of-the-box Windows experience I don't see myself replacing Adobe Lightroom in the near future...

Windows Server 2003 SP2 Released

mattlind — Tue, 13 Mar 2007 23:24:00 GMT

Have you noticed that Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 was made available yesterday?! I was told to look at this link which shows new downloads, and there they are with release date 3/12/2007. At the time of this writing the x86 version has a popularity rating of #13528, which I assume is going to change soon :-)

Click the links to directly download the x86 version or the x64 version. There is also a KB article called List of updates in Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 which lists a HUGE number of updates!

MS announces HD Photo

mattlind — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 19:29:19 GMT

Microsoft has announced HD Photo, formerly known as Windows Media Photo. Bill Crow has much more information about this and you can also read a news article.

HD Photo seems to be aimed at competing with JPEG as a format for the future. The best feature (when compared to JPEG) seems to be higher compression ratio while maintaining more information (less destructive), and it also includes a lossless option. There may have been other formats that have been better than JPEG, but the influence of Microsoft in the computer industry may increase the chances for this format to gain momentum (especially if the standardization effort is successful). However, it's a big task to replace JPEG...

RTM Versions of MOSS SDK and WSS SDK

mattlind — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 11:43:00 GMT

Randall Isenhour has announced that the RTM versions of the MOSS SDK and WSS SDK are available, you can read more here.

Here are the links to download MOSS SDK and WSS SDK from MSDN.

SysInternals@TechNet

mattlind — Mon, 13 Nov 2006 15:45:00 GMT

As I noted in a previous post SysInternals is now part of Microsoft, and the tools have finally been made available at TechNet. You can download them at http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/default.mspx. My favorite tool is DebugView, I use it all the time and so should you!

BizTalk Server 2004 SP2

mattlind — Fri, 27 Oct 2006 09:50:00 GMT

Service Pack 2 for BizTalk Server 2004 has just been released!

Read about List of bugs that are fixed in BizTalk Server 2004 Service Pack 2 and download Microsoft BizTalk Server 2004 Service Pack 2. Download, test, deploy and enjoy!

Windows Live Writer Beta Announced (incl. Mini-Review)

mattlind — Sun, 13 Aug 2006 23:43:00 GMT

Finally the public Beta of Windows Live Writer has been announced, this tools has been available in pre-Beta builds for a few weeks internally to I'm going to give a few impressions from my personal usage. You can download Windows Live Writer at http://download.microsoft.com/download/f/9/a/f9a19f2d-cec4-4a25-9b0b-eb9655ea7561/Writer.msi, the team has a blog at http://windowslivewriter.spaces.live.com.

Easy configuration: When I asked it to connect to my blog on MSDN (running Community Server) it was a simple "click Next"-wizard and then it was done. It even downloaded my Categories and allows me to set the locally. More info on supported blog software is available at the Writer Zone.
Spellchecking: Previously I was writing my texts in Word (Office 2003) so I had spellchecking, but then you create the post on the web and make some changes and then spellchecking is gone. With Windows Live Writer I get WYSIWYG authoring AND spellchecking of last minute changes. Also note that it you have checked part of the document it doesn't recheck that again unless you make changes, so you don't have to Ignore all those errors on URLs etc. more than once.
Multiple editing views: You can edit in both WYSIWYG (Normal View) and HTML View. There are other views as well, but I haven't used them.
Draft publishing: It's easy to post a Draft, which is what I normally do. I prefer to upload my posts as Draft and then edit publishing date manually (unless something needs to be published ASAP, as this post).
Windows Live Writer SDK: There is an SDK for those of you who wish to create plug-ins.

What's missing if I look at my blogging workflow?

No table support: I have not found any support for creating tables in my posts while editing them in Normal View. To create a table I have to go to HTML View and add the <table>-tags myself. Hopefully this is something that will be addressed in later versions.
Control publish date/time: As I mentioned before I usually upload my posts before they are published. If I have a way of controlling the publishing date/time from within Windows Live Writer it would eliminate the step where I go to the blog admin console and change this property.

As I'm a blogger with only two month experience I haven't tried other tools, so I cannot compare Windows Live Writer to other tools. But after using the tool for several week I can say that it's easy to use and has improved my blogging experience.