According to Martin LaMonica over at news.com the Mono group is requesting a Birds of a Feather session at PDC 05. They claim that their BOF session request for PDC 03 was swept under the rug. While the article hints at conspiracy one has to wonder what the advantage of keeping them out would be. The Microsoft vs. Linux Fanboy argument aside I can’t see the benefit of keeping them out. Of course I don’t see the big picture, or at least the picture Microsoft is looking at. I remember for...

Well, the “was going to be in Longhorn but now it’s not” WinFS has been released to Beta 1. You can download it via MSDN subscriber downloads under the Tools, SDKs, DDKs section. You can also check out the WinFS blog at http://blogs.msdn.com/winfs/ I doubt I’ll be playing with this one. While the idea is interesting and I believe has its place I’m just not in a position where it really sparks my interest at the moment. Plus, as an added bonus, MSDN Subscriber downloads...

The SDK documentation for Windows Vista Beta 1 has been released. Browse on over to what they are calling Windows SDK Beta 1 and check it out. If you’re into the bleeding edge or need to get the jump on Windows development in Vista this is where you need to be

The new beta of Google Desktop is available and it’s pretty cool. This version incorporates a “sidebar” style layout for your feeds, e-mails, to-do lists, weather, etc. While it’s not as pretty as some other sidebar programs, like DesktopSideBar (freeware), it is Google and we all like their stuff. At the very least you should check the new version out. On a side note if you sit behind an ISA Server be sure and open up POP3 Secure to your machine or else the indexer cannot...

Yep, it looks official (I’m using that very gently). Visual Studio Team Foundation Server, a key component of the new Visual Studio 2005 development tools suite to be released on November 7th 2005 will not make the RTM cut. According to this article in eWeek Visual Studio Team Foundation Server will be released as Beta 3 at the November 7th Visual Studio 2005 launch and will not reach RTM status as originally anticipated. My opinion… if you need Beta 3, take it!! It is far better in...

This is truly amazing, and long overdue. The Optimus Keyboard from Art Lebedev Studio combines the everyday keyboard with mini LEDs implanted in each key allowing for a unique computing experience. Imagine not having to remember that crazy key combo any longer… hell, imagine it in Photoshop where the keyboard shortcuts can choke a horse. Check out a few screen shots. Click for larger view. See the tiny LEDs in the pic above. Amazing. The next screen shot will sell it for you. Imagine the keys...

Normally I’m not a huge female comedian fan. Honestly it’s because I lose an hour of my life to jokes about how men are stupid and women continue to rule to world. It’s no different than the hour you lose with most male comedians who talk mostly about the hoe from last night or how their wife is stupid. Zzzzzzzz…. Usually it is a no win situation… but I just finished watching “Kathy Griffin Is … Not Nicole Kidman” on Bravo and it was hilarious. Sure,...

Ok, I just started a new beta with Microsoft and I forgot how utterly painful an open public beta can be. Here’s the setup, post your feelings. *While this is worded as though it is my own product this is in fact a Microsoft beta project* I have beta product A that I need tested on the following platforms: Windows 2003 RTM and SP1 (Not SP1 w/ R2) Windows XP Pro and Home RTM, SP1 and SP2 Ready, set…. Go test! Now, what do you think will happen? All that time you spent on the spec for...

Brian Goldfarb posted this article yesterday. Help us test the updated Upgrade Wizard features in VS 2005 “Are you interested in upgrading your web application from ASP.NET 1.x to 2.0? Well then you have come to the right place, because I have a brand new prototype of our latest and greatest upgrade wizard that we want to test to see how it converts your existing Web projects.” If you’re an ASP.NET developer then I’d suggest you go check it out. It’s always fun to squeeze...

Microsoft has posted a Self-Guided Tour of Vista Beta 1 over on TechNet. It hits the key points and goes over some the more “interesting” features of Beta 1. I have a question though. Why did you (Microsoft) write this “Self-Guided Tour” and post it with crappy 4–bit color screenshots? I am completely baffled by this especially since one of their major talking points is the new fancy graphics and screen effects. If you have a beautiful new car do you drive it around...

Many thanks to the South Central Indiana .NET Users Group (SCI-NUG) who have provided a forum for discussion of VMware and VPC installation of Windows Vista Beta 1. If you have questions or are having difficulty with your installation or wish to discuss general beta testing issues with Vista please feel free to stop in. You can visit the forum here and you do not need to register in order to post to the Windows Vista Beta 1 topic area. I apologize but the forum is no longer available...

They’ve done it again. The date on this tool is a few months ago but I just found it yesterday. VMware offers for free download a virtual machine importer that will convert your Virtual PC and Virtual Server machines into VMware machines. How cool is that? Of course the first thing I tried to convert…VSTS Beta 2 VPC from MSDN. Now, I don’t know if this is covered in the EULA for the VPC they distributed but I don’t intend on using it, I just want to see if it worked. :-)...

Any of you who follow Dilbert, and you all should, have noticed that Dogbert has taken a new job as a Police Negotiator. I’m unsure of how this fits into his plan for world domination unless killing people off brings him one step closer. At the very least I’m sure it makes him smile. Anyway, did you see what the cops were using for guns? Check out the comic here: http://www.dilbert.com/comi... Funny stuff...

Posted on behalf of Michael Bayes Mike e-mailed me a day or so ago and we started discussing the install of Vista Beta 1 on VMware ESX Server 2.5.1 build 14182. As I have discussed before I love VMware but their ESX and GSX server products always lag behind the Workstation product in both virtual hardware version and driver version. I’m sure there are reasons for this and that’s Ok… really I don’t mind that much. Anyway, Mike was kind enough to share his experience with installing...

Seen this? Many have reported this error and others have drawn the correlation between the error and the size of your virtual HD. I’m going to bring the two together. Since we are talking about Beta bits there are several “issues” to work around in order to get a good install of Vista Beta 1 up and running. In previous posts you’ve read that there are several workarounds for the “RAW” disk problem. You can basically “Choose your own adventure” by either...

I’ve been posting a series of Vista / VMware related articles on installation and configuration of Vista Beta 1 on VMware v5 build 13124. There are a few things I want to pass along after several days and a weekend of playing around with Vista, VMware and reading blog posts of other people experiences. This is beta code, specifically beta 1 code. If it all works perfectly and has no bugs or errors you should immediately go buy a lotto ticket because it is your lucky day. There is some strange...