MSDN Student Flash : Latest Bytes

Bill Gates and the Windows Embedded Student Challenge

kevinbri — Fri, 17 Jun 2005 20:58:00 GMT

Justin Creasy is blogging about the Microsoft Windows Embedded Student Challenge (WESC 2005) event going on this week-end in Redmond. In this installment he talks about Bill Gates visiting the teams who have come from all over the world. Justin was part of the team that won this event last year. Since then he and his team have graduated and started their own company.

- Alfred Thompson (Microsoft)

Justin is also an example of the sort of people who, while in college, blog at theSpoke.

Virtual Earth

kevinbri — Mon, 23 May 2005 23:30:00 GMT

Wait until you see what is coming this summer! Chandu Thota who is on the team getting the Virtual Earth project going has some screen shots on his blog. Maps, aerial imagery, photos, directories and more. This is going to be big.

- Alfred (Microsoft)

MSN Newsbot

kevinbri — Fri, 13 May 2005 06:20:00 GMT

MSN Newsbot uses search and MSNBC to gather news from over 4,000 sources on the internet. Read all about it at the MSN Sandbox. Try the US version at http://newsbot.msnbc.msn.com But if you live some place else visit the Sandbox site for direct links to well over 20 custom bots for different languages, countries and parts of the world.

- Alfred Thompson

VS.NET 2004 Sucks, Use KDevelop

kevinbri — Tue, 19 Apr 2005 22:57:12 GMT

A friend just pointed out an article over on NewsForge, The Online Newspaper for Linux and Open Source. The article attempts to compare VS.NET and KDevelop and according to the article KDevelop is the winner:

“Given the choice between these two contenders, I'd be more likely to place my bets on the Linux-based solution. And if Visual Studio existed as a native Linux application? I'd still rather use KDevelop.”

Now there are a few flaws in the article and we do know it’s a little biased, but come on… I still have yet to see an apples to apples comparison out there from anyone on an OpenSource vs. Close Source system.

--Eric (Grand Valley State University)

The NCAA will NEVER be forgiven

kevinbri — Thu, 14 Apr 2005 01:43:57 GMT

After reading Scoble’s blog, Kevin Shofield’s post and the comment by Alfred I am completely outraged. The current ruling by the NCAA is something that I will never forgive. At the current time computer science enrollments are dropping on the average nationally and schools are trying to figure out why. Now I don’t feel that this ruling really will effect the enrollments for computer science departments, but the principle behind the matter just disgusts me.

I am going to make a stance to not contribute to any NCAA event. I will not watch anymore college sports on TV or in person.

--Eric (Grand Valley State University)

Virtual What?

kevinbri — Wed, 13 Apr 2005 06:52:27 GMT

Have you seen Virtual Server 2005 or played with Virtual PC? Well if you haven’t (and even if you have) there are two great videos on Channel 9 about these products. I would highly encourage everyone to check them out.
Virtual Server Post
Virtual PC Post

--Eric (Grand Valley State University)

Are you going to be the Last Developer Standing?

kevinbri — Mon, 11 Apr 2005 16:22:52 GMT

A friend and student ambassador pointed out a contest, The Last Developer Standing, and asked me to promote it. I began looking into the contest and it appeared to be really cool, until I read the rules and regulations and found out the contest is only open to Canadian citizens. So if you’re Canadian check out the contest.

--Eric (Grand Valley State University)

NewsGator Plug-In for Community Server

kevinbri — Sun, 10 Apr 2005 21:43:00 GMT

I have created a workspace on GotDotNet for this plug-in. The code that is up there is pretty much just a proof of concept code. While it works there is no plug-in documentation or code documentation. I do plan to update this later in the week, but for now I do not have the time and wanted to get it out into the public realm. Please feel free to download and use the plug-in as you wish or to even contribute.

Workspace: http://workspaces.gotdotnet.com/ngcsplugin

Current Release: MeetEric Community Server Plug-in v1.0

--Eric (Grand Valley State University)

Like sharing music AND seeing a cool implementation of Community Server code?

kevinbri — Wed, 23 Mar 2005 17:14:00 GMT

Then you should visit Crossfader, a new community site for “the global electronic artist”, courtesy of Microsoft. This is built on the new Community Server code from Telligent Systems – the basic version of which is open source, so download and use away! It’s roots are the .TEXT blog tool (what we’re hosted on), the ASP.NET Forums code, nGallery photo album tool, and I’m sure lots more.

-Kevin (Microsoft)

How would Slashdot percieve the MSA program?

kevinbri — Mon, 21 Mar 2005 05:14:00 GMT

Is the Microsoft Student Ambassador (MSA) program really worth it? I would have to say yes! The program is an excellent program and you can see other companies such as IBM, Apple, and Sun running similar program.

One thing that is unique about the program is the way it is structured. Once awarded the MSA you are actually not required to do ANYTHING. While it would be in your best interest to be active there are plenty of MSA's that don't take avantage of the benefits and don't do a single thing on campus, but they are still a MSA.

A friend of mine who is the Apple Campus Rep, seems to enjoy his job for the most part but what he complaines about most are the "Tight Wads at Apple". I mean he can't get anything (they did give him an iBook and told him he would get some other stuff that never showed up), he has a quota he has to meet each month, and lots of other regulated goals. He's expected to give X number of presentations year, but do they provide him with the proper marketing material? In his mind no!

While it's great to have students doing the dirty work and working on the front lines for almost nothing, if not for free. You need to equip them with the right material to do the job. One thing I do feel very strongly about is the way Microsoft equips its MSAs.

I think a real test of strength for any of these programs is to see how the public percieves them. I would be highly intersted to see what the one sided Slashdot community has to say about it. How would a Slashdot user tear apart the MSA program? Could we make it better? Sure, but the question is.. How? It's easy to hear great things about the program and what it's doing on campus from the MS community, but I am intersted in what the open soure community has to say. If anyone's listening can we make this happen?

--Eric (Grand Valley State University)

Want to become a Microsoft Student Ambassador?

kevinbri — Mon, 21 Mar 2005 04:56:00 GMT

The Microsoft Student Ambassador program is an excellent program that provides students excited about technology (Microsoft, .NET, C#, VB.NET, Apple, Linux, FreeBSD, Java, PHP, etc...) a way to interact with Microsoft. The Student Ambassador program is in it's 4th year now looking to make a big step forward into next year. The program is looking for energetic, enthusiastic, and passionate students, if you fit these categories please apply. If you need a sponsor talk to a faculty member or reply to this post. The benefits of the program are excellent and the networking opportunities are tremendous. Unfortunately I cannot disclose the benefits for next year as all of this to my knowledge has yet to be finalized.

Check out the site and fill out the nomination form.

[Official Blurb]
Are you a leader in technical clubs on campus? Are you actively involved with your department’s faculty and fellow students? The Microsoft Student Ambassador award may be within your reach!

The program is now accepting nominations for the 2005-2006 academic year. To nominate yourself, click the “Nominate” button below and follow the required steps. Student Ambassadors come from a wide range of technical majors, although the most common are Computer Science, Computer or Software Engineering, IS/MIS, and related.

You will need to meet our basic eligibility criteria, and identify a sponsor who occupies one of the following three roles:

Faculty member at your institution
Prior or current Student Ambassador award recipient
Microsoft Corporation employee

The nomination calendar
March 7th – Nominations open
May 15th – Last day for new nominations
June 7th – 2005-2006 Microsoft Student Ambassador award recipients announced
September 1st – Official start of the program

Are you eligible?
To be considered for the Student Ambassador award you must be enrolled in an accredited four-year college or university located within the United States, for the 2005-2006 academic year. Only a limited number of awards will be granted.

--Eric (Grand Valley State University)

Get the word out about the program (Scoble, Scott Water, etc...) ! I want to see lots of links and hits on this post. Not trying to make the job hard for those doing the phone screening or anything, but I want to see us have an excellent pool of candidates to pull from this year. Let's see the community and blogosphere in action.

Shared Source Projects from Microsoft

kevinbri — Sat, 19 Mar 2005 23:00:00 GMT

Josh Ledgard has a great blog entry where he talks about shared source project by Microsoft employees. He provides links to a bunch of them. Take a look. Perhaps you'll find something useful and want to join the community around one of these projects.

Alfred (Microsoft)

The places technology takes us...

kevinbri — Fri, 18 Mar 2005 17:16:00 GMT

Most of the time you never know where life's going to lead you next. It may lead you down a path you never wished to go, it may lead you to being famous, or maybe something that perked your interest will become a world wide fad. There's a great article in wired about "toothing" a fad in Europe right now that appears to be spreading across the world. What will we come up with next?

--Eric (Grand Valley State University)

[from: Chris Sells]

Mono and .NET on Linux

kevinbri — Fri, 18 Mar 2005 14:22:00 GMT

Josh Blake and a friend put together a great blogcast on using Mono and Linux to run .NET applications. They also show off GTK# and a few other features. Check out the blog cast here.

--Eric (Grand Valley State University)

What should the Student Flash cover?

kevinbri — Tue, 08 Mar 2005 19:23:00 GMT

Students – a question for you all. What would you like us to cover in this blog (or over on the e-newsletter)? Our goal so far has been to do two things:

1. Cover some of the things going on at Microsoft that are of interest to student developers – contests, Web sites, things like that. Whenever something interesting happens in Imagine Cup, on theSpoke, on MSDN Online, and so on, we try to talk about it here.
2. Provide a student’s view of things going on around the developer community online – links to interesting blogs, games, etc. This is where James and Eric have especially been posting – as students, they have a much better perspective on what’s interesting than I do from my office!

That’s what we have been doing – so what would YOU like us to do with MSDN Student Flash? Run contests or games, talk more about cool stuff going on in high schools, more full articles (rather than mainly links like now)?

Let us know in the comments below!

-Kevin (Microsoft)