Philippe's ISV Blog

Important for MOSS 2007 Delevopers, BDC Definition Editor

2007-08-23T10:21:17Z

For those of you who are tired of using Notepad or an xml editor in order to configure the BDC

The August SharePoint SDK is now available and includes the new BDC Definition Editor. Go to Brian’s blog post to read more about it - http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepoint/archive/2007/08/22/announcing-the-microsoft-business-data-catalog-definition-editor-for-microsoft-office-sharepoint-server-2007.aspx

I know a lot of customers and partners have been asking for this. You’ll also see us coming out with more prescriptive guidance around connecting SharePoint to LOB systems. We started with SAP but will be expanding to Oracle (Siebel, PeopleSoft) and others on our Interoperability site which is another great resource to point folks to - http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/bb544954.aspx

What's the BDC ? you might ask, the Business Data Catalog is a great technology in MOSS2007 allowing you to crawl and search across different data sources and applications and then do cross-content searches.

Searching on BDC ? , Enterprise Search is a good starting point, you can also find the MSDN Forum on BDC

Think about going to the MOSS portal and with one search retrieve all relevant data about a given customer, Office documents, email, order records from the erp system , extra customer info from the crm system, etc . Ever heard about "putting information at your fingertips" ?

There also is a Tool from LightningTools called BDC Meta Man, you might also give that a try .

Philippe

Tafiti Search, also using Silverlight UI enhancements

2007-08-22T11:17:31Z

Microsoft just launched Tafiti, an experimental Web site that explores the intersection of two trends: the specialization of search and richer experiences on the Web.

Tafiti, which means “do research” in Swahili, demonstrates the types of Web applications that can be brought to life with the new Silverlight technology. The site helps people use the Web for research that spans multiple queries and sessions by helping them visualize, store and share the result. Search is becoming increasingly specialized, across different user scenarios, vertical subject areas and entry points. What works well for simple destination searches doesn’t necessarily work as well for more sophisticated research projects. Tafiti uses Silverlight for richer visualizations in conjunction with Microsoft’s Live Search engine.

We encourage you to try the site .

http://www.tafiti.com

Philippe

Dynamic Languages support in .NET

2007-07-26T14:41:45Z

If you wondered what Dynamic languages are and what it means to have a DLR next to the CLR in .NET, read this blog entry from Scott Guthrie about it. The DLR supports Ruby, Python , Javascript and a new Dynamic VB most of it in pre-alpha stage however.

Philippe

Have you started pre-testing on Windows Server 2008 ?

2007-07-24T16:23:32Z

Have you started pre-testing?

Remember, pre-testing is available to help your technical team achieve efficiencies of scale by immediately incorporating requirements for Windows 2008 Server into the current dev cycle, rather than having to go back and retool apps later. That’s why we really, really want you to engage with a test vendor ASAP to find out what timing they recommend based on the current status of your apps. In addition, we are coordinating with them to provide special publicity for the first several ISVs to complete pre-testing, so it’s worth it to engage with Wipro or VeriTest .

Along those lines, one of our test vendors has indicated that a number of EAP participants have failed to return their technical questionnaires, which is essential to the test vendor’s ability to prepare for your testing. Please encourage your technical teams to complete and return test vendor forms ASAP – even if you don’t plan to pretest for several weeks!

Logo Rotation

Check out the logo rotation at www.windowsservercatalog.com currently featuring approximately 20 EAP participants.

Windows 2008 Server Application Story

We are looking for stories involving innovation on WS08, Visual Studio 08 and/or MS SQL Server 08; other technologies are a bonus. These can be stories about the customer OR about you, the developer. Those ISVs & customers who are able to create success stories that meet the requirements have a chance of very favorable and high-profile exposure during the launch. Deadline for nominations is August 31.

WPC Update

WPC was a great success. The “Logo Lounge” got amazing booth traffic. The WS08 logo program received a number of press mentions, some of which are listed below, and we have commitments for even more press coverage to come.

Case-by-Case Marketing Support

Are you planning to issue a product announcement, an event press release, or other similar news that could benefit from a Microsoft executive quote? Please keep me in the loop! I can’t make guarantees, but so far I’ve had great success helping EAP partners prepare releases to get through Microsoft’s internal process for providing supportive quotes.

WPC-related Logo Program news hits:

http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2193999/microsoft-announces-enterprise

http://www.computerweekly.com/Articles/2007/07/13/225543/server-2008-beta-to-improve-security-say-analysts.htm

http://www.wirelessdevnet.com/news/2007/jul/11/news2.html

http://www.tmcnet.com/news/2007/07/12/2779181.htm

http://www.itnews.com.au/newsstory.aspx?CIaNID=56087&src=site-marq

http://www.crn.com/software/201000436

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/11/microsoft_virtualization_roadmap_confusion/

http://www.marketwire.com/2.0/release.do?id=749805&sourceType=1

http://www.itjungle.com/two/two071107-story04.html

Philippe

Certified logo program for Windows 2008 Server

2007-07-16T13:56:52Z

Some of you have asked how to certify their apps for Windows Server 2008 , formerly known as Longhorn Server.

http://www.innovateonwindowsserver.com/LearnBuild.aspx

This link will give you access to information about certification, technical requirements and pretest tools.

Besides that, if as a Belgian or Luxemburg ISV you want to be part of the EAP program for Windows 2008 Server logo certification, drop me an email at philippb@microsoft.com

Philippe

An update on OBA Office Business Applications and underlying technologies

2007-07-12T10:52:42Z

IBF will be supported until the next version of Office comes along. LoBi is being re-designed and will come in a different form as part of the next Office System version. Today you can develop powerfull OBA's with VSTO 2005 SE, web services, etc . Sharepoing Server 2007 (MOSS) , has teh BDC the Business Data Catalog which is an excelletn way of integrating data coming from other sources. It allows cross datastore searches, etc . Example : when you search for company "ACME" on the MOSS Portal, thanks to the BDC, you would get combined results from the Office documents mentioning "ACME" but also from SAP or Siebel or Oracle or Dynamics or CRM records about "ACME" . The results allow you to view the data, if you want to transact ( update) you need to go via the business logic of each application . BDC is not a mashup or composition tool for transacting with different back-end systems.

Important annoucement for ISV developing on Windows Server 2008

2007-07-11T13:34:02Z

Windows Longhorn Server introduces major changes which have the potential to affect Server Applications produced by our ISVs:

Impact of the Windows Firewall ON by default:

As of Beta 3, LH Server has a symbiotic relationship with the Windows Firewall: LH Server Beta 3 is the very first Windows Server release to have the firewall ON by default. This represents a major change from Windows Server 2003 SP1 where the Windows Firewall was only turned ON by default on new installations while the OS was being configured and updated. To make sure that LH Server Roles and Optional Components work out of the box with the Windows Firewall ON by default, they have been updated to manage the Windows Firewall automatically. However most third-party Server applications will not be aware of this change in the firewall behavior and will break.

To mitigate the impact, we have created a Best Practices document designed to guide ISVs through the process of integrating their Server Applications with the Windows Firewall APIs (see attachment).

Impact of the new networking stack:

The Windows networking stack has been completely re-written for Vista and Longhorn and the new features that may pose potential compatibility issues include:

These features are described here:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/community/columns/cableguy/cg0905.mspx

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/community/columns/cableguy/cg1105.mspx

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/Aa480152.aspx#appcomp_topic13

If you want to receive the "Windows Firewall best practices for rule authoring and API usage" document for ISV , send me an email at

mailto:philippb@microsoft.com

Philippe

New Microsoft ISV Portal

2007-07-06T08:03:54Z

Check out microsoft.com/isv – a portal to help ISVs find the relevant Microsoft business and technical resources they need to develop solutions and grow their businesses. The ISV portal was developed for ISVs, based on feedback from ISVs. We’ll use this website to tell to tell the Microsoft ISV story to customers, press, and analysts.

Also read about a very cool ISV Showcase and a new workwide ISV Contest. Some of the great new site content and features include: RSS feeds, ISV Royalty Licensing information, Technical Resources and Benefits, links to key ISV resources, and more.

Philippe

Safari on Windows

2007-06-12T12:11:04Z

To those who are tempted to try the new browser, be warned that some serious security risks exist. Of course, its an early test version and all the usual precautions with beta software apply but still, I wonder what kind of dev tools they use on Windows not catching this

http://apple.slashdot.org/apple/07/06/12/0120230.shtml

http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/01/09/2139223&mode=nested&tid=107

While discussing the claim that Safari on Windows would be 2 x faster than IE7,I heard that early trials show some speed improvement in some cases, the js engine is probably very fast but using such rendering engine is notorious for creating problems of dropped messages/events, etc in case of heavy load , translated this means unstable and never will be stable. IE 7 on the other hand is appreciated for its stability and predictability. To end with a positive note, all ISVs developing on Windows are very welcome, more software is more choice for the users and that's always a good thing for both the users and the platform. Apple was amongst the first ISV to get a Vista certified Logo for Quicktime .

Philippe

Problems with downloading a code signing cert from Verisign ?

2007-06-01T16:44:31Z

Some problems have been reported of ISV trying to get a code signing certificate for WinQual from Verisign , "Site temporarily unavailble .." etc .

Use this url to start with and you will be fine .

http://www.verisign.com/code-signing/msft-organizational-certificates/index.html

Hope this helps

Philippe

Windows Server 2008

2007-05-23T18:21:57Z

We no longer have to twist our brains into correctly pronouncing Windows Server codename "Longhorn" because here is the official name of it and you guessed it all.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/default.mspx

I'v already seen a few very positive reviews of the current Beta 3 version, somebody even tought it is better than penguins :-) , it seems we are on the right track for another great server product and platform and applications server . More on Windows Server 2008 soon.

Philippe

Popfly

2007-05-21T17:13:38Z

We just annouced Popfly, a fun & easy way to build and share mashups, gadgets, Web pages, and applications. Popfly consists of two parts:

1. Popfly Creator is a set of online visual tools for building Web pages and mashups without coding.

2. Popfly Space is an online community of creators where you can host, share, rate, comment and even remix creations from other Popfly users.

http://blogs.msdn.com/somasegar/

And a cool tidbit: Popfly also uses Silverlight

So what is Silverlight ? If you have not yet heard about Silverlight (used to be called WPF/E ), its a browser plug-in runtime environment or cross-browser cross-platform (Macs supported) CLR supporting Ajax, VB, C#, Python, and Ruby .

It alllows the creation of rich interactive multi-media browser apps. Development environment will be Orcas , the upcoming Visual Studio release or the Expression tools family.

Where WPF is for smart client apps and requires the .NET framework , Silverlight only requires a light weight browser plug-in and is easy to deploy.

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Stewart/?p=356

Philippe

Microsoft Visual Basic 2005 Labcasts on MSDN

2007-05-09T14:09:49Z

Attend the Labcasts and you will be eligible for winning some software and books

http://www.microsoft.com/business/vb2005upgrade/default.mspx

The Visual Basic 2005 Labcasts make it easy for you to evaluate Visual Basic 2005 in a convenient and virtual environment. Get in-depth training and one-on-one real-time assistance from Visual Basic experts. Select from six informative labcasts and find out how to develop creative and modern breakthrough applications by combining the power of Visual Basic 6.0 with Visual Basic 2005.

Learn how to

· Modernize and simplify installation of Visual Basic 6.0 applications

· Add new data-bound forms to Visual Basic 6.0 applications

· Introduce simple background threading to Visual Basic 6.0 applications

· View and edit SQL Server™ data

· Create data-centric Web applications with your Visual Basic desktop development skill

· Keep Microsoft Word documents in sync with your database

Philippe

Windows Server "Longhorn" DinnerNow VHD

2007-05-08T18:00:05Z

Those of you who attended the Windows Server codename "Longhorn" Jumpstart training on april 25th got 2 DVD with the compressed VHD images of the DinnerNow.Net demo.

If you extract the base image .vhd and the differencing .vhd and run them with Virtual PC 2007 you will get errors . In order to make it work, change the security setting of each file you unpacked , double click the .vmc file and it will work.

If you want the 3rd DVD , don't forget to supply Project information on the Airframe site.

Philippe

Vista Certification testing refund deadline extended

2007-04-17T16:05:39Z

Testing Refund Deadline Extended – The testing fee reimbursement is now being extended from 4-30-07 to 6-30-07. ISVs must complete testing by 6-30-07 to earn the testing fee reimbursement benefit.

Free “Hand Held” Support – Keystone’s free support is open until 6-30-07. After 6-30-07, all ISVs will be directed to www.innovateonwindowsvista.com to go through the certification processes on their own. After 6-30-07 all ISVs must use swlogo@microsoft.com for all support related issues.

Pre-Test Funding Available – We have pre-test funding available for ISVs to help streamline the certification process. This funding is only available to ISVs who commit to certify applications by 6-30-07 and that meet the following criteria:

The ISVs application must be functionally complete and compatible with Vista and the applications must install using MSI or ClickOnce technology
ISV must be registered and engaged with Keystone
ISVs must be ready to submit their Vista compatible application/s into pre-test by 4-30-07 to be eligible for the pre-test funding.
ISVs must have completed certification by 6-30-07 to receive this funded pre-test benefit

Pre-testing will help ISVs identify any certification “bugs” they will need to fix before the ISV enters into the certification process. ISVs must engage with Keystone directly to use this pre-test funding.

Philippe