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May 22 Yet another reason to love Windows 7 – XP ModeWorried about upgrading to Windows 7 because you have legacy applications that might not run on top of Windows 7? Worry not cause Windows 7 offers another cool feature – XP Mode… What exactly is XP mode, well… in its simplest form, it is a Virtual PC running Windows XP… Yeah I know, you can do that feature in Vista… but what’s interesting here is that, you don’t need to be in the Virtual XP environment to use your application. The applications inside the Virtual XP environment can be found in your Windows 7 start menu and you actually use them as if they are installed and running on Windows 7… Cool isn’t it? So how do you start using this? First you have to be running on Windows 7… Second, you have to download Virtual PC Beta and the Windows XP SP3 image that has some magical configuration inside… You can download Virtual PC Beta – HERE Lastly, once you got those things, you launch your Virtual Windows XP, from the Virtual XP Environment, install your application and after that… you shut it down… The interesting thing happens during the shut down process… Under the Virtual XP menu on your Windows 7 start menu, shortcuts to the applications installed in your Virtual Windows XP will be available… and thus, if you need to use them, you don’t need to run the Virtual Windows XP and logon and stuffs… you just click the application shortcut and viola it runs on top of Windows 7! Windows 7 is cool!
And oh! Before I forgot! New interesting feature for the next Virtual PC… We now have USB virtualization wohooo! May 12 Oh I’m loving Windows 7 more and more – Direct AccessIn less than 24 hours, ill be participating in a production demo for direct access and oh man I can’t wait! So what is Direct Access you say… we’ll it allows you to connect to your corporate network directly without having to connect via RAS of VPN… yes… you got that right… all you need to have is an internet connection and once you are connected, you can access your corporate resources as if you are in the office! Cool isn’t it? Well of course there’s a lot of back-end configuration to ensure that this thing work securely but keeping those back-end configuration aside, isn’t this a way to make end-user lives easier? Ill post more information about Direct Access when I have a chance to play with it… but for now you can continue reading this: DirectAccess enhances mobility and manageability Help mobile users get more doneWorking outside the office is about to become a lot simpler. DirectAccess in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 enhances the productivity of mobile workers by connecting them seamlessly and more securely to their corporate network any time they have Internet access—without the need to VPN. When IT enables DirectAccess, the whole corporate network file shares, intranet Web sites, and line-of-business applications can remain accessible wherever you have an Internet connection. Manage remote machines more effectivelyWithout DirectAccess, IT administrators can only manage mobile computers when users connect to a VPN or physically enter the office. With DirectAccess, IT administrators can manage mobile computers by updating Group Policy settings and distributing software updates any time the mobile computer has Internet connectivity, even if the user is not logged on. This flexibility gives IT the opportunity to service remote machines on a regular basis and ensures that mobile users stay up-to-date with company policies. Enhance security and access controlAs well as authenticating the computer, DirectAccess can also authenticate the user and supports multifactor authentication, such as a smart card. IT administrators can configure which intranet resources specific users can access using DirectAccess. To keep data safer as it travels public networks, DirectAccess uses IPv6-over-IPsec to encrypt communications transmitted across the Internet. DirectAccess is designed to reduce unnecessary traffic on the corporate network by sending only traffic destined for the corporate network through the DirectAccess server (running Windows Server 2008 R2), or the administrator can choose to send all traffic through the corporate network. The information contained in this document relates to pre-release software product, which may be substantially modified before its first commercial release. Accordingly, the information may not accurately describe or reflect the software product when first commercially released. This document is provided for informational purposes only, and Microsoft makes no warranties, express or implied, with respect to this document or the information contained in it February 09 Windows 7 EditionsFor those eager to upgrade to Windows 7, here's an early announcement on what will be the available editions: January 29 Small things I like about Windows 7 Part 2Remember those days when you wanna present and your function key + F5 doesn’t work because you don’t have your drivers installed properly in your laptop? Well… those days are over with Windows 7… Windows 7 introduces a new key Window key + P which allows you to toggle between your screen and your projected screen: January 28 Singapore SQL User Group January 2009 MeetingSession 1:
Small things I like about Windows 7If you are someone like me who have very poor short term memory, one of the new things that you will like about Windows 7 is the built in Sticky Notes that allows you to write anything and put it on your desktop so you will remember it. Combining that with the new task bar and you get something like this: Simply hover your mouse over the Sticky Notes icon and you get an instant preview… So now… no excuse for us to forget the things that we must do! :) January 27 Another reason to love Windows 7
Focus your attention on the right side of the picture… Seen it!? Create VHD… Attach VHD… WOW! This means that if you are a geek like me who have tons of virtual machines in your computer, you can now mount these VHD drives and actually use it in Windows Explorer as if it is a real drive! Just let your imagination run wild and a lot of powerful things can be done by this feature… you can do offline servicing, you can replicate the VHD to another location, put the VHD on SAN, etc! This is just simply WOW and this is not part of the aesthetics at all! Can’t wait for the production release of Windows 7! Skype and Windows 7So far, this is the latest program that I have discovered that needs upgrade for it to work with Windows 7... Installation is already a problem as my profile is in sync to another machine... But after trying several configuration changes... It finally installed... However, when you run it... It just quits on its own without any warning or error message... Hmmm is it just me and my settings or is this common to all Windows 7 users? January 20 Virtual Clone Drive and Windows 7: Better together… NOT!If you have not installed virtual clone drive yet on your Windows 7, then don’t install it… at least while there is a known issue about it. If you have already installed it, you may have realized that, it doesnt work and when you plan to uninstall it, the driver just cant be uninstalled and it will prevent your system to shutdown properly. Whats the fix? Boot to safe mode, go to device manager and uninstall the virtual clone drive driver from there… then you are back in business… However, we are still left with the fact that at the moment, there is no tool that we can use to mount ISO image so we can use it without burning it to a disk… If you know of any tool, please let me know! I need it! :) Windows 7: Add new hardware what!?Interesting discovery that I have today while doing my routine work… I am working on a virtual machine and normally, instead of attaching the virtual lan to my physical network adapters, i’d rather attach it to a loopback adapter that is linked to my physical nic… reason behind that? its safer… you wont screw up your network with whatever things you’re playing with on your vm… In Vista, you add the loopback adapter by going to control panel – add new hardware… To my surprise… that option is moved elsewhere in Windows 7…. Where is it!?? I still don’t know! Need to spend time tying to find it and will update this post when I have it… UPDATE: January 18 Problem Solved: Huawei e169 broadband modem on Windows 7Finally found a way on how to make the broadband model with Windows 7… You need to have a modem firmware upgrade which fortunately, Huawei have provided… you can download the driver here. However, please ensure that before upgrading your firmware, note down the connection details like username, password and apn so you can configure it manually next time… Yes you have to configure it manually cause the SingTel configuration will be erased during the process HTH January 16 Initial program compatibility issues with Windows 7 found...My setup:
The setup run perfectly... driver installation runs perfectly as well... but cannot establish connection to the internet... Anyone having issues with Windows 7 and broadband modems? Anyone tried using this in x86 setup? January 15 Initial review on Windows 7I'm currently in the process of evaluating Windows 7 and I am quite amazed with the enhancements done on this new OS...
First of all, the performance is undeniably faster as compared to Vista... It install faster, it loads faster, and the UI just works very fluid...
Then comes the enhancements on the over all UI that allows you to work faster... the new task bar is amazing! It can group your similar icons, which is usual, but you will appreciate the enhancements to it if you usually open a lot of windows at the same time... when you hover your mouse to the taskbar, it displays that particular window very smoothly
Of course, built in to Windows 7 is IE 8... which boast a lot of new features that allows you to work better online.
Then finally im really impressed to how stable this built is. I also tested Vista during its beta stage and its a bit unreliable... actually to be honest, its very unstable during the development stage... But Windows 7... Its as good as an RTM! January 09 Windows 7 Available for Testing to MSDN subscribers and soon to the rest of the worldGreat news for geek guys like me who are itching to get their hands on Windows 7 :)
Downloading now... October 06 SQL Server 2008 ClusteringFor those who missed or who left earlier in our last usergroup meeting, here is a click-through copy of SQL Server 2008 clustering. Hope this can help you in your implementation. You can download the document here August 07 SQL Server 2008 has reached RTM!
Time to play with it! May 23 Skydrive now available in SEA!!!As of today, Windows Live SkyDrive is now available in Southeast Asia! We welcome new users in Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand! Quick Q&A:
What is Windows Live SkyDrive? Ever want to show pictures to friends or family when you’re not at home? Or edit a document you’re working on when you’re out of town? With Windows Live™ SkyDrive, you can store up to 5GB of files that you can access from virtually anywhere! All you need is a computer and an Internet connection. And your information is protected too – it can only be accessed using your Live ID username and password. It’s up to you who sees what, and SkyDrive is integrated with other Windows Live services. No more worrying about losing your documents or misplacing a flash drive. Click here to watch a demo of Windows Live SkyDrive · Comments. You can leave comments on any file in SkyDrive and see all of the recent comments people have left for you. · Captions. A picture's worth a thousand words, but sometimes you need a few more. Now you can add captions and descriptions to your files and photos · Browsing widget. When you click on any file, you can speed through all the files in the folder: · Larger photo previews - we've made the photo previews even bigger. How many files does 5 GB really let people store? 5GB of free storage equates to approximately 30,000 Office documents of average size, or 30,000 digital photos at a resolution of 1200x1200.
Is there a limit to the size of individual files uploaded? Yes, there is a 50MB limit on each file uploaded. May 02 SQL Server 2005 ClusteringFinally was able to come up with step-by-step procedure on how to setup SQL Server 2005 on a cluster environment.
If you are interested in this, you can download the document here. This document starts from configuring Windows Server 2003 cluster up to setting up your SQL Server 2005 cluster.
I am currently working on SQL Server 2008 clustering on Windows Server 2008 but find out that CTP 6 does not support Windows Server 2008 as a cluster host. Ill keep you guys posted on this. April 25 Heroes Community Launch 2008
April 23 .NET 3.5 Enhancements Training KitI'm happy to announce that the first version of the .NET 3.5 Enhancements Training Kit has been officially released to the public!
The .NET 3.5 Enhancements Training kit builds on the success of the Visual Studio 2008 Training Kit which resulted in 70,000 completed downloads since being released in November. These training kits provide a way for developers to grasp the breadth of the entire release, as well as dive deep into a specific technology.
The .NET 3.5 Enhancements Training Kit covers the technologies in the .NET 3.5 SP1 release and the out of band releases that are a part of the same wave, namely ASP.NET MVC and the ASP.NET Silverlight controls. Currently, the training kit contains six hands-on labs, made up of the following technologies:
1) ADO.NET Data Services 2) ADO.NET Entity Framework 3) ASP.NET AJAX History 4) ASP.NET Dynamic Data 5) ASP.NET MVC 6) ASP.NET Silverlight controls
All six labs contained within the kit have been tested and validated by customers during two .NET 3.5 SP1 training workshops held in Redmond. We will continue to receive customer and field feedback on the labs and incorporate the feedback into future iterations. There will also be new versions of the training kit with additional content, including presentations, demo scripts and screencasts.
· You can download the training kit at http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=8719735 · Please let your communities know about the training kit. You can link to Jonathan Carter’s blog post at http://lostintangent.com/2008/04/16/net-35-enhancements-training-kit/
The next iterative release of the kit will occur in sync with the beta release of .NET 3.5 SP1.
I'd like to thank everyone involved for their efforts and support thus far. We hope this training kit will be successful resource in your efforts to evangelize these technologies. April 19 Vista Service Pack 1 - Where is my SEARCH!??Finally, was able to upgrade to Windows Vista Service Pack 1 and just now, i’ve noticed one horrible change... The search command is no longer present on the start menu. Personally for me, that icon allows me to find anything (as long as the information in my laptop) in seconds and now I cannot find it.
Did a quick research and realized that because of the significant platform enhancement that Microsoft did in Search, Vista SP1 now allows you to select a 3rd party application to replace the default search engine.
Now, how do you go to that wonderful search screen in Vista Service Pack 1??
Several entry points for the search protocol: · When you press the Windows logo key+F, the default application for the search protocol starts. · When you click Start and then press F3, Windows Explorer opens the default application for the search protocol. · When you press CTRL+F in Windows Explorer, the default application for the search protocol starts. · In Windows Explorer, the Search Everywhere option appears on the toolbar as soon as a search starts. When you click this option, the default application for the search protocol starts. · You can no longer right-click the Search option on all containers.
Hope you find this useful J April 01 Heroes Happen {Here}Just got this picture from Carolyn who did the Heroes Happen {Here} Photo Book...
March 31 Tech-Ed Asia Early Bird Promo
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