For most of us, springtime is exciting. The warm weather and the sun puts us in a better mood and makes us want to venture out into the world. But as I am so familiar with, many people out there reach a critical mass and enter an almost depressive state during springtime. Over the past few weeks, I’ve had many (over 5) close friends reach out about the tough times they are going through. Each one expressing a loss of self worth and value due to a failure in a relationship. For some it was a poor...

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As most of you know, Microsoft gives MVP awardees access to some great benefits. I’ll admit, this is the first time I’ve used it to have access to something fun and non-work related. While I only had the opportunity to play it twice (it’s just hard to find the time to play games), the new Age of Empires Online game is quite interesting. I was able to play it during it’s Alpha stage, and it’s now hit the closed Beta stage, which we’ve been encouraged to invite people to apply for. http://www.ageofempiresonli...

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http://www.microsoft.com/vi... Finally, I can blog about this interesting piece of technology from Microsoft. For beginner to intermediate developers (1-4 years), this piece of technology will WOW you. I’ll admit, how can you not be impressed by pointing to a database, saying “alakazam”, click a couple of buttons, and blammo, you have your own application! But after having been around the block a few times, I’m actually a little critical of this tool (which is rare). We’ve...

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Here’s another one of my tools in my toolset for deploying software. I’ve used their product for several years with great success. They make use of a PlugIn and web model. So if your software requires the .Net framework 3.5, the installer will check for all of the required runtimes, and then only download the files needed from your website. They also support patching your application. A great tool that’s well designed and easy to use. Plus, here’s a coupon code for 25% off! Coupon Code: MSMVP http://www.installaware.com...

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One of the most annoying things when setting up a business is paying the outrageous fees for business checks. When starting out, rather than pay the $150 for the handful of computer printable checks, I had bought software that would create the checks for me. But if you didn’t know, those little digits at the bottom of a check are magnetically encoded and requires special ink. Fortunately, my current bank has one of the best bill pay websites, so I have exclusively used it. But since I recently had...

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I’m proud to announce that two Microsoft employees, Sarika Calla and Kevin Halverson, who works on the Visual Studio Product Team will be visiting various User Groups and Companies in Arkansas and Texas! Bios: Sarika Calla – Speaking about a Woman’s perspective at Microsoft, this natively born Indian holds a Masters in Computer Science from Georgia Tech and has been with Microsoft for the past 8 years. Sarika is now a Team Lead on the IDE Team. (pic is Redmond sacalla mthumb.jpg) Kevin Halverson...

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While it’s still a full month away, I’m getting super excited about my upcoming trips. May and June are chock full of events, two of which I’ll have full announcements for within the week. In mid May I’ll be driving to Dallas to take my 2nd trip to Korea (the bulgogi part). Seeing a bunch of old friends from my first trip as well as taking a week for some deeper personal things. While in my absence, June 1st-4th, I’ve setup a tour across Arkansas and Texas for two Microsoft employees who work on...

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The catch? Attend the Ozarks .Net User Group meeting on April 1st. Here’s a list of the other prizes for the event GRAND PRIZE 1 - iPad (Wi-Fi 16GB) THIRD PARTY COMPONENTS 6 - Telerik Premium Collection 5 - Infragistics NetAdvantage for .NET 1 - Nevron Chart for .NET Lite DevExpress Xceed PRODUCTIVITY 2 - CodeRush with Refactor! Pro 2 - ReSharper CodeSmith GAMES 3 - Halo3 ODST (XBox 360) 3 - Forza Motorsport (Xbox 360) OTHER SOFTWARE 3 - Windows 7 Ultimate 2 - Microsoft Office Standard 2007 HARDWARE...

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In case you didn’t know, businesses can take advantage of the stimulus package by hiring an unemployed worker. The Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act can pay the business portion of the Social Security taxes as well as give you a $1000 general business tax credit. If you’re unemployed, make sure and mention this to a potential employee! You can find out more information from here on Intuit’s website. http://www.qbenews.com/QB_P...

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As most of you know, I serve on the INETA (International .Net Association) Board of Directors, being in charge of the Speakers Bureau and other Speaker programs. There have been several rumors floating around with a lot of misconceptions and I wanted to clarify a few things. The budget numbers have come in, and the U.S. National Speakers Bureau budget is less than half of what it was last year. I can personally guarantee that User Groups will continue to have speakers funded by INETA. However, we...

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Fair warning, I’m combining several blog posts into one. As a father, there’s nothing that makes you more proud than to see your son take his first steps, say daddy for the first time, or catch his first ball. In my professional career I’m extremely proud of the accomplishments my peers have been making. These are the people I’ve been working with and helping their professional community efforts, and while I like to think I helped them in some way, truth be told, they entirely did the work on their...

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INETA has a great gimmick. Give someone a award and then recruit them to do volunteer work! While I am completely joking, I was recently appointed to INETA’s Board of Directors. Congratulations go out to my fellow Board Members. Rob Zelt, President Mike Vincent, Vice President Scott Spradlin, Secretary Morgan Baker, Treasurer Steve Andrews, Director Lori McKinney, Director Randy Walker, Director Shawn Weisfeld, Director Chris Williams, Director Our first order of business will be a Board Meeting...

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I wanted to make sure and draw attention to the effort that Brandon King in Harrison, Arkansas has given towards promoting this event. There are some major giveaways, and we will be arranging a carpool from Springdale to drive the 1:30 to give a good showing from the NWA DNUG crew. Details: Who: CLAUDIO LASSALA What: Details at http://odnug.org When: April 2nd 5:30 PM – 8:30 PM Where: North Arkansas College (Center Campus - Durand Center - Old Regions Bank Building), Harrison, AR Grand Prize Inspiron...

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This is an open invitation to join us in helping form the Northwest Arkansas Technology Council. The discussion for the inaugural meeting will center on who and what we are and the beginning phases of our purpose. If you feel you have something to contribute to our pioneering efforts, or know of someone who can, please consider joining us, or forward the following information on. Thanks, Randy Walker You are invited to participate in the formation meeting of the Northwest Arkansas Technology Council...

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Scott Spradlin, one of most influential people I know in the world of Microsoft programming, has gone way too long without being recognized. I remember having talked with Scott on many occasions about user groups and Ineta. He’s been one of those long time influentials, mostly behind the scenes, serving in various roles with INETA and being the glue that helped connect St. Louis developers together. Scott served as the Regional Mentor for INETA for many years, helping several user groups get started....

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I was a bit shocked when I received the email announcing that I am one of ten Community Champions awarded. A huge thank you to those that nominated me. It’s always a good feeling of accomplishment when you’re recognized for your efforts. While they haven’t posted the announcement on the website yet, you can read more about the award at http://www.ineta.org/Champi... Below is the Newsletter announcement. Community Champions Winners Announced INETA Community Champion Award...

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Jan 29 – Holiday Party @ Fast Lanes, Lowell, Arkansas Northwest Arkansas .Net User Group Feb 7 – Kansas City Office Geeks (SharePoint Saturday) Daniel Larson Feb 12 – Little Rock .Net Users Group Keith Elder of Deep Fried Bytes Mar 1-4 – Microsoft MVP Summit Mar 18-20 – Mix ‘09 April 2 – Ozarks .Net User Group Claudio Lassala May 11-15 – TechEd 2009...

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Just received an e-mail that as of Nov 23, 2008 (below), Microsoft will no longer be marketing Windows Live OneCare. It’s unknown what that means, other than them closing the affiliate program (where marketers get paid if you install it). It is unreasonable that they will discontinue the product, since they have just launched Small Business Server 2008 and Windows Live OneCare Server. I’m wondering if the marketing department that was contracted, was fired. Windows Live OneCare to Close November...

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Having only told a handful of people, I applied to the OKF (Overseas Korean Foundation) for the “First Trip Home” program the week of the deadline in late October. I found out about the program late and rushed to get my application in, which included gathering documents and writing an essay. It’s been over 36 hours since I found out I was selected to participate, and I’m still a bit shell shocked. Please note that this event in my life is extremely personal and something I have not fully explored....

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I’m happy to announce that Brandon King has organized the first Harrison .Net User Group meeting for Oct 21st, 2008. The meeting will be held at Roosters BBQ, Google Map. AGENDA 5:30 PM – 6:00 PM Food and get to know each other 6:00 PM – 7:30 PM Discuss forming the DNUG, including officers, meeting times and topics of interest for guest speakers...

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Please join me in Tulsa on October 9th & 10th for the annual Tulsa TechFest event! I’ve had several people ask me about when I’ll be doing my Small Business talk again, which will be on Oct 9th at 1pm. If you are interested in starting your own software business, you won’t want to miss this! Here’s a brief synopsis: Join Randy Walker, owner of an ISV, as he leads an interactive discussion on his successes and failures of running a software business. We will discuss what’s needed to start a software...

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For those living in the Northeast Arkansas / Jonesboro and Harrison areas, there will be two new .Net User Groups. Details are still pending, but if you’re interested in helping form or attend the meetings, be sure to contact me. Helping lead user groups is a fantastic resume builder, and as anyone can attest, the social networking aspects is the number 1 reason to get involved

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For those in East Arkansas and West Tennessee, I’ll be visiting the Memphis .Net User Group on September 25th 2008. David Mohundro, the co-founder of the Fort Smith .Net User Group, will be presenting on PowerShell. You won’t want to miss this presentation, as there is some terrific tie-ins with Visual Studio. My main purpose will be to meet with the guys starting up a Northeast Arkansas .Net User Group in Jonesboro, Arkansas. If you’re interested, in helping out or attending the new NEADNUG group,...

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As I sit here watching Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel, I'm saddened to watch Indian children making soccer balls. I realize that the show is obviously over dramatized, but the reality is, there are children making soccer balls in India. So, how can any retail store, like Walmart, or the manufacturer, Mitre allow this to happen? The U.S. Dept of Labor International Affairs is specifically tasked with preventing this from happening. Walmart has rules and regulations forbidding the use of child labor....

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One of the most interesting things about being a software developer is to see the entire undercurrent and subculture of the industry. It really makes it more visible at the local geek gatherings, regional and national conferences. This year I felt extremely fortunate to have been offered an opportunity to speak and help at the Nashville / Murfreesboro devLink conference. I honestly hadn't intended on going due to the 9 hour travel required, but when my good friend John Kellar reached out, how could...

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So there's some manly competition going around the Geek community. Evidently Chris Williams challenged Darcy Lussier to do the 100 Pushup Challenge. What kind of junk is this challenge? Over the past couple of months, I've been working on both pushups, situps and squats, with NO BREAKS. I'm up to about 35 of each. But isn't having all of these breaks between sets of 10 and 15 pretty wussy? Ok ok, so each of them outweigh me by 100 pounds, and can toss me around like a rag doll, but pahleeze, 100...

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As promised, here is the link to download the Presentation from my Starting and Running your own Software Business session at devLink in Nashville / Murfreesboro Tennessee 10% off Xheo Licensing: AHCO1008 Licensing and Obfuscation RingCentral.com Virtual PBX Phone System RentACoder Where I outsource software development E-Lance Where I outsource graphic development Microsoft Partner Program You can follow me at Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn...

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For those that weren't able to attend last Tuesday's Northwest Arkansas .Net User Group meeting, 8/5/2008, Zach Young (our Vice President of the group) was able to secure Jeffrey Palermo as a speaker for a special meeting this Thursday (8/14/2008). This is a huge boon, as Jeff is one of THE most sought after speakers in North America. Jeff is most known for the Party with Palermo series of events before each of the major conferences. Jeff hails from Austin, Texas, which was recently named the hardest...

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It's never been an easy thing for me to share my faith, so a big thanks to someone special for sharing their intensity, their light with me. I've only ever allowed one person to look at my music collection in it's entirety. Had you been allowed that rare glimpse, you'd be struck at how varied and eclectic my tastes are. But since being a teenager, the one artist that has always stuck out was Steven Curtis Chapman. Being my favorite amongst artist like Styx, Default, Beastie Boys, Crystal Method,...

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For those that are unaware, Chris Williams, a fellow VB MVP does a 9 Questions series with fellow developers and influencers. I was extremely honored to be picked this week and hope you find the series as interesting as I do. Chris is also an active participant in the VB Insider's List Serv and actively gives feedback to the Visual Basic team in Redmond. You can read my answers to his 9 questions over at GeeksWithBlogs.net at http://geekswithblogs.net/c... Technorati...

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August 22-23 For those that don't know, devLink in Nashville is one of the best (if not THE best) community driven conferences out there. I'm super excited to have been invited by John Kellar to host a couple of the Open Spaces sessions. If you haven't gotten a chance to know John, he's a super guy and is helping to put on other conferences as well. So while devLink may be sold out this year, be sure to sign up early next year! At $50 this year, what a steal to get in to see the top speakers in the...

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Having recently been through a somewhat distasteful divorce (all but being called an abusive and negligent father), I came to recognize the need to establish custody records while I have my son. The need arises because I need proof of both my own and her actions. This way she cannot call my integrity into question again, and should the need arise, I can use the records to establish her own pattern. The various things I need to record are pickup and dropoff times, interaction with his mother (a very...

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Surprisingly enough, Chris Love wins the Microsoft Certification Exam Voucher. I calculated the winner by counting the total number of entries first. http://GeeksWithBlogs.net/r... comments first, then http://www.MySoftwareStartu... comments next. I then visited http://random.org and asked for the winning comment number. A screen capture of the winning randomly generated number is above...

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Over the past year, Microsoft has broadly touted their partnership with NBC and the video feeds they will provide for the Olympics. So on July 4th, I sat back and while watching their TV broadcast and went over to their website http://www.nbcolympics.com. The first thing you may notice upon visiting the website, is that their homepage is lackluster and that they are using the same drab Adobe Flash photo view. So where's the cool new Microsoft Silverlight technology? Hopefully the following will be...

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You might want to skip this first paragraph if you are just looking for the RegEx Tools portion. I still find it amazing how the web can create an online social inner-networking that bobs and weaves an amazing web of connections (confused? me too). Here's what led me to find these wonderful RegEx tools. So the Microsoft Partner Program has an initiative that gave me a bunch of certifications vouchers. I am using at least 1, possibly 2, in my giveaway. I send out an email to the VB Insider's List...

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The following is a response to the forum question posted here. I had the opportunity to meet Scott while at the Little Rock .Net User Group, and we talked briefly about my thoughts on how to take advantage of the programs available to software startups. In particular Scott owns a consulting business and he's having growing pains. Scott's problems is very typical of thousands of small business consultant shops. He's busy being the business owner, full time consultant/programmer, bookkeeper, marketing,...

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A big heartfelt thank you and congratulations to two of the developer community builders in the Northwest Arkansas area, Jay Smith and Michael Paladino with special mention to Zach Young. As a Microsoft MVP, one of our benefits this year, is the ability to award people with a special prize. This prize is an MSDN Premium account with Visual Studio Team Suite, which includes nearly all of Microsoft's business software, free of charge. Jay Smith works for Tyson Foods, Inc. where he is a PMO Architect...

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I suppose I was naive in thinking that once I received my Microsoft MVP award, I could breathe a bit. But we've had sooo much Developer Community activity, I haven't had a chance to breathe, much less blog. I still haven't had an opportunity to blog about the MVP Summit! Needless to say, the MVP Summit was a blast (other than having a digestive track illness, where I missed the last day's keynotes). The best thing about the Summit was the ability to meet and talk directly with the product teams....

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For those that want your website to render correctly on IE8, the recent newsletter gave a great example for enforcing IE7 compatibility via a Meta tag. (You can see the new IE logo above) Per Site Basis: Site owners and administrators can include the following custom HTTP header to display all pages in Internet Explorer 7 Strict mode for the site: X-UA-Compatible: IE=EmulateIE7 Per-page basis: Site owners and administrators can include the following special HTML tag after the <Head> tag on...

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I have vastly been neglecting my blogging. So as not to be outdone by Chris Koenig .... I was able to meetup with the organizers of the event, Jason Pluenneke, Curt Wolfe, Boyd Evert, & Dennis Berk several weeks ago. I am personally very excited about this new user group starting up. Partly because of my small part in helping them (one of my roles as the INETA Membership Mentor), but mostly because of my passion for databases. I'm really looking forward to what will be coming out of the group....

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Ok, so my announcement is 6 days late. I'm proud to announce that I received the coveted Microsoft MVP award for Visual Basic (currently the only MVP in Arkansas). I'd first like to thank the Academy ... oh wait wrong speech again. Actually I would like to thank the following people for their help and encouragement. My apologies in advance if I neglected to mention you. Northwest Arkansas .Net User Group - a great bunch that has been an exciting group to get to know and share with Travis Doyle -...

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I had come across an article where you can use the following line to read custom section settings from your config file (where SectionName is the name of your section) in .Net. NameValueCollection myData = (NameValueCollection)System... The advantage of this is your setting doesn't have to be in the app.config file (web.config). You can have a file named mywackyweirdfilename.config, and you use the exact same line. The beauty of it is in the...

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Excellent times ...

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A bit thank you goes out to Anthony Potts for sharing these pictures...

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I ran across an ad today that linked me to where DevExpress is giving away over 40 controls for free. I'm a big fan of two of their products (which unfortunately aren't free), CodeRush and their Excel like grid control. Their grid control is a huge hit amongst the Excel heavy business users I typically deal with. The free sets of controls you get are: The XtraEditors Library The XtraNavBar Suite ASPxMenu ASPxSiteMapControl You can register here for it: http://www.devexpress.com/P...

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Last night was the first meeting for the Fort Smith .Net User Group. It was a great turnout of 38 people and featured Raymond Lewellan talking about Behavior Driven Development. You can read more about the event from the following blogs: Michael Paladino David Mohundro Technorati Tags: Fort Smith,.Net,Northwest Arkansas...

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For those interested in hearing me speak (or avoiding me altogether ;) I will be speaking at the Tulsa SQL Server Group on March 17th, 2008 and at the Little Rock TechExpo on March 27th, 2008. Tulsa SQL Server Group March 17th, 2008 Location: Oklahoma State University( OSU - Tulsa ) 6:30 - 6:45 Announcements 6:45 - 7:30 Presentation - Peers & Special Guests! 7:30 - 7:45 Drawings and Door Prizes 8:30 - ? Club Pub Little Rock TechExpo 2008 March 27th, 2008 Location: University of Arkansas at Little...

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As of March 1st, 2008 Microsoft will force you to use the new way to access your MSDN subscription. This is terrific news! Since I have 3 people access MSDN from remote locations (out of my 5 user license), we've all had to sign into MSDN from a common Live id. Microsoft is now requiring you to setup in the Partner management website 3 different technical contacts. Once you setup those 3 different technical contacts (https://partners.microsoft... they can...

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MSN and CareerBuilder released an article titled "Where the Jobs Are: Top Jobs in 10 Industries". I found it interesting that Information Technology was the first industry listed. Below are the top 5 jobs listed for IT. I also found it interesting that the growth for "computer applications software engineers" was a whopping 45% by 2016, a mere 8 years from now. That's 5% per year. So what exactly is a computer applications software engineer? I'm guessing that it's a software developer / programmer...

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I received an e-mail (copied below) about Microsoft ending the paid referrals to new subscribers of adCenter. I find this extremely perplexing because of Google's dominance in this area, plus Microsoft's bid for Yahoo!. The number one reason for Microsoft to buy Yahoo! is so it can merge the two online advertising programs. So why kill the one program that helps encourage people to use their online advertising? At least this program encouraged me to list it and recommend it, whereas I never would...

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Social computing, while not a new phenomenon, has had a huge push in the past couple years. Gone is the day of MySpace, and the new kid on the block is Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn (Honorable mention to Plaxo, who needs to find their niche a bit better other than contact synching). Here are three different stories that have impacted me in the last week concerning social computing. Today David O'Hara brought up the subject of why he had more Twitter followers than RSS followers. My theory is Twitter...

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Great video by Will DePalo on how to securely communicate by digitally signing xml messages. Originally found on MSDN. How Do I: Add Security to Visual Basic and Visual C# Applications with Digital Signatures? Join Will DePalo as he shows you how to tighten security on your XML documents built with Visual Basic .NET and Visual C# by verifying digital signatures. Presented by Will DePalo on January 29, 2008 Length: 20 minutes 19 seconds Video Downloads: ZIP | WMV | iPod | MP4 | 3GP | Zune| PSP Audio...

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Source Code Outliner PowerToy for Visual Studio 2008 Microsoft released a free PowerToy for VS2008. The Source Outliner PowerToy is a Visual Studio 2008 extension that provides a tree view of your source code's types and members and lets you quickly navigate to them with filtering inside the editor. Technorati Tags: .Net,Visual Studio 2008...

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I am extremely particular about my credit. During my youth I ran up a bunch of debt and poorly managed my money, ruining my credit score for years. With a lot of hard work, years in the making, my credit score is near perfect. All that is to say, when I apply for credit somewhere, I do it with a purpose. I'm not a big fan of American Express, particularly because of the high rates they charge their merchants for processing (my company being one of them). However, I applied for a small business American...

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Microsoft is on their 2nd Small Business Show which features "Solutions for Entrepreneurs". You can view the show here. I thought it was interesting that up in the top left Microsoft tells you to Install Silverlight (competitor to Adobe Flash). Yet if you notice at the bottom of the popup menu, the show is displayed in Flash. Hopefully they'll rectify that soon...

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Here are some more FREE Partner Partner Training Labs: Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Virtual Training (6 parts) What's New in SQL Server 2008 for Database Administrators Implementing Change Data Capture (CDC) in SQL Server 2008 Working with the New DATE Data Type in SQL Server 2008 Administering Servers by Using Declarative Management Framework (DMF) Policies Learn How to Build Occasionally Connected Applications Authoring Reports Using Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Reporting Services Microsoft Visual Studio...

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Microsoft is offering the following free webinars for Microsoft Partners: Web Seminar 1: Web Development on the Microsoft Platform – Feb 11th at 10am PT Web Seminar 2: Architecting Web Applications – Feb 12th at 10am PT Web Seminar 3: Windows Live Services and Silverlight 2.0 – Feb 13th at 10am PT Web Seminar 4: Designer/Developer Collaboration – Feb 14th at 10am PT Web Seminar 1: Expression Suite (Overview) – Feb 18th at 9am PT Web Seminar 2: Expression Design – Feb 19th at 9am PT Web Seminar 3:...

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I've often complained at the number of initiatives and incentives Microsoft's Partner Program gives. However it looks like they are cleaning it up just a tiny bit. Microsoft is putting $10 behind their Big Easy Offer program. Essentially if you upsell or cross-sell licensing you can benefit from it. Basically Microsoft will send your customer a check, with your company's name on it. The article I read didn't explain it in great detail, but it appears that it might make things more simple by aggregating...

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I was able to meet last week and help the new group who is trying to form a .Net User Group in Fort Smith. I will post more information as I find it. If you are interested in attending, learning about, or helping form the new FSDNUG, please contact one of the following people: Michael Paladino - mpaladino (remove) @ (remove) goeagleone.com Kerry Jenkins - kerry_jenkins (remove) @ (remove) data-tronics.com Jeremy Sloan - sloan (remove) @ (remove) data-tronics.com They tentatively have the following...

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It's hard to believe that the Sysinternals group at Microsoft are on their 9.02 version. For those that didn't know, Sysinternals used to be it's own company, until Microsoft recognized how important they were and bought them out. I hadn't ever heard of the AutoRuns application until today. The jest of the application is to list every Automatically ran application during bootup. You can then disable and remove them all. It is extremely detailed and even includes the list of applications when you...

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This past weekend seems like a dream. That's probably because it was a sleep deprived coding marathon of epic proportions. Some getting more sleep than others. Of course it didn't help that I didn't get much sleep the night before we left. The We Are Microsoft event was to help non profits with their development and website needs. To hear some of the podcasts given by the GeeksWithBlogs.net crew, visit http://geekswithblogs.net/j... You can view pictures of the event at http://www.flickr.com/photo...

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Thanks to Josh Ambrose Little for pointing out that Scott Guthrie has blogged about how to debug into the .Net Framework Library in Visual Studio 2008. I think the coolest thing is the ability to step into the Forms library (since I'm a forms guy). I'm wondering how this will impact the MONO project. Now they have specific code they can reference, although I'm sure it violates several user agreements. Technorati Tags: .Net,Visual Studio 2008,MONO...

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The date & location is set! May 3rd at the Addison Conference Center in Addison (Dallas suburb) Texas. This event used to be known as the Dallas Code Camp. I'm actually really excited by this event, since befitting the DFW area's size, it will finally have a free technology event just as big. If you're familiar with the Tulsa TechFest event, it should be of similar format, but much bigger attendance. More information to follow as I hear about it. I should be seeing some of the organizers this...

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Please come join us at the Charity event "We Are Microsoft". Throughout the weekend, starting this Friday, we will be working on charity software development. Right now Mark Leon Watson and I will be working on Irving.Net web project, and I'm looking forward to working with someone whom I've only ever met online. If you live in the Northwest Arkansas area, there will be four of us going, and I'm betting we could find more room to carpool if you are interested. We will be leaving sometime Friday morning...

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Wanted to say what an awesome idea this was by fellow geek Javier Lozano. Javier started translating a C# compiler that you can write and program in Spanish. Perhaps with some community urging he could start an open source project with a full translation engine so you can select your language of choice. However I am completely bummed that it's not in VB! http://blog.lozanotek.com/a... Technorati Tags: .Net...

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http://www.codeplex.com/TFS... I came across the information from the latest MSDN Flash. The information contained is awesome. Finally you have a guide to show you how to implement TFS into an organization. I believe the MSDN Flash states it perfectly "It's a collaborative effort between patterns & practices, Team System team members, and industry experts that shows you how to incrementally adopt TFS for your organization. " There is also a related Visual Studio Team System Guidance Project...

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I wanted to thank David Silverlight for doing a wonderful service to the programming community. For my involvement in the world wide programmer community, I was awarded the 6th place prize of a "Chuck" TV show T-shirt that says "My Entire Life" on a 3.5" floppy disk. David created Community-Credit.com with the sole purpose of awarding "Stupid Prizes to Smart People". You are awarded points for helping the programmer community out, and at the end of the month whomever hast the most points are awarded...

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In my role as INETA Membership Mentor I hooked up with Jeff Julian while trying to process his Office User Group application through INETA. I had heard about GeeksWithBlogs but hadn't ever had an opportunity get familiarize myself with it. Jeff and I got to talking through e-mail and I joined as one of the members. I am now cross-posting my technical posts there and since then my readership has gone up quite a bit. Plus they've helped me automate some submittals to www.community-credit.com. Hopefully...

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Michael Klein's plane was found on Christmas Day containing the bodies of his 13 year old daughter, pilot and himself. Michael Klein was the President and CEO of eGroups, Inc. before it was sold to Yahoo! in 2000 and is now known as Yahoo! Groups. He was traveling to or from his personal eco resort in Panama when the plane went down. The survivor was a friend of his daughter. While this doesn't have any current impact on technology, I found that it was interesting, if not ironic in some sense. He...

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Just think about how much greenhouse gasses you can save if you don't fire up the fireplace, but instead turn your TV on and watch your favorite Yule Log show. Set your DVR to WGN from 1:30 to 4:30 or you can watch it all day on Christmas on MOJO in HD from 6AM to 8PM. There are a few local TV stations that also broadcast it, so check your cable or satellite provider. You can find out more about the history of the Yule log by visiting Slate and watching their video. If you didn't know, the Yule Log...

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I was very pleasantly surprised when I got this popup while looking for some Vista Power Tools. Low and behold, it does actually use it, however I didn't see anything impressive about their implementation. You can access the beta by using the following URL. http://www.microsoft.com/be...

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A big thanks goes out to Chris Koenig and the Tulsa DNUG for hosting the Tulsa InstallFest on 12/3/2007. Several of us from Northwest Arkansas .Net User Group traveled over there and participated in the fun. A big shoutout to Jay Smith for volunteering and driving us over there. Both Jay and I helped Chris register people for the event and I enjoyed getting to see some people I haven't seen in a while from the Tulsa DNUG. Whatever Chris Koenig says about his drumming skills in Rock Band, DON'T BELIEVE...

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On December 4th, the first inaugural MSDN Express event was a resounding success. We had around 17 in attendance and learned a lot about some of Microsoft's new technologies. A big thank you goes out to Zain Naboulsi, our MSDN Developer Evangelist. Zain, on his own initiative is helping put Northwest Arkansas on the roadmap for Microsoft's Evangelism team. It's been a long time coming that our region has seen some focus and the ability to draw in such high level talent. A big thanks to Jay Smith...

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The Visual Studio 2008 and .NET Framework 3.5 Training Kit includes presentations, hands-on labs, and demos. This content is designed to help you learn how to utilize the Visual Studio 2008 features and a variety of framework technologies including: LINQ, C# 3.0, Visual Basic 9, WCF, WF, WPF, ASP.NET AJAX, VSTO, CardSpace, SilverLight, Mobile and Application Lifecycle Management. http://www.microsoft.com/...

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