Category: Microsoft

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SDN Cast 52, live from Madrid, news for week 22

In this week’s SDN Cast (week 22) we connected live to Madrid – Spain, where I attended the MVP Community Event. Between sessions and eating at a restaurant in the Real Madrid Stadium I quickly escaped the group for a moment to give you our weekly report and to sit with Marcel Meijer and Fanie Reynders to present you with the latest news and upcoming events. A show with a sunny Spanish touch.

One of the interesting events for this week is the Computex 2017 event where Microsoft not only announced new products but also presented their vision on “Always Connected Devices”.

The “Always Connected” topic wasn’t their first time, Bill Gates mentioned that years earlier, but this time in a way where devices have integrated their SIMs, so called eSIMs. These are provider independent chips/SIMs installed in your machine and enables you to connect to one or more supported mobile providers. There won’t be a vendor lock with this and allows you to switch providers as you like.

With this you will turn all your devices into phone. This means that your small tablet form factor can act like a phone, but also with larger devices you can turn your device in a phone (note: not like Skype is doing using the internet, but using the 4G/LTE services from your mobile provider).

It’s an interesting development and we might see in this what Microsoft has in mind for mobile phones. Up to now we were kept into the dark on any plans or roadmap for Windows Mobile.

Where can you find our 52nd episode of our Dutch SDN Cast?

https://youtu.be/4rqg8pI21pM

Did you subscribe our Dutch SDN Cast channel already?

Subscribe your YouTube channel if you don’t want to miss a single broadcast. Usually we will broadcast on Thursday evenings at 8 PM but there can be a change of plans where we need to move to another time or day. So to be sure Subscribe to our channel on YouTube or go to http://www.sdncast.nl to see when the next episode is due.

News from the show:

Reactive Extensions v4 Preview 1

https://github.com/Reactive-Extensions/Rx.NET/releases/tag/v4.0.0-preview1

Announcing the preview of Azure’s Largest Disk sizes
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/announcing-the-preview-of-azure-s-largest-disk-sizes/

Getting started with the Video Indexer API
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/gettingstartedwiththevideoindexerapi/

.NET Framework May 2017 Cumulative Quality Update for Windows 10
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2017/05/26/net-framework-may-2017-cumulative-quality-update-for-windows-10/

Evolving TFS/Team Services build automation capabilities
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/bharry/2017/05/30/evolving-tfsteam-services-build-automation-capabilities/

Microsoft highlights ecosystem growth and innovation at Computex 2017 with Windows 10 devices

https://news.microsoft.com/2017/05/31/microsoft-highlights-ecosystem-growth-and-innovation-at-computex-2017-with-windows-10-devices

https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2017/05/31/microsoft-shows-partner-innovation-always-connected-pcs-mr-iot-computex-2017

Events

Last week’s events

Techorama – May 22-24 2017 – Antwerpen, Belgium
http://techorama.be/

Scott Guthrie’s Azure Red Shirt Dev Tour ’17
https://www.microsoftevents.com/profile/form/index.cfm?PKformID=0x1796299223a

This week’s events

WWDC 2017 – June 5-9, 2017 – San José
https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=02152017a

Upcoming events

Global Devops Bootcamp June 17
http://globaldevopsbootcamp.com

DevSum 17 – June 8-9, 2017 – Stockholm

http://www.devsum.se/

Goto Amsterdam – June 12-15
https://gotoams.nl/2017

Microsoft Data Insights Summit – June 12-13, 2017 – Seattle
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/datainsightssummit

NDC Oslo – June 12-16, 2017 – Oslo
http://ndcoslo.com

E3 – June 13-15, 2017 – Los Angeles Convention Center
https://www.e3expo.com/show-info/2895/about-e3/

Office365 Engage – June 19-22 – Haarlem
https://office365engage.com/

Google Cloud Next – June 21 – Kromhouthal – Amsterdam
https://cloudplatformonline.com/Next-Amsterdam-2017.html

SDN Event 2 – Zeist – June 23, 2017
www.sdn.nl

Inspire July 9-13 – Washington D.C.

https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/inspire/

Ignite 2017 – September 25-29 – Orlando
https://ignite.microsoft.com

SDN Event 3 – Zeist, NL – October 6, 2017

www.sdn.nl

TechDays – October 12-13, 2017 RAI Amsterdam

http://www.techdays.nl/

Call for speakers/writers

As usual we are always looking for presenters for our own events and Meetup’s so if you want to share something about hot technologies or just about something you implemented at work or in an App that could be interesting to our audience let us know so we can schedule you for one or our next SDN events or Dutch .NET Group Meetups.

This off course also goes for if you want to write a great article for us to publish in our SDN Magazines or at our SDN Website. The downside of publishing a magazine article is that there can be some time between writing the article and publishing the magazine. So, if it is time critical sometimes the best option is to publish it on the www.sdn.nl website to get more speedy attention to the article.

As you see, options enough to address your audience with top notch information. You can even, if you like, be our guest in our SDN Cast shows to discuss the projects you are working on or other topics you master. We will instruct you how to connect with us and what it is you need to join the show.

Subscribe

Hopefully we will see you at our weekly web cast, for the schedule go to www.sdncast.nl for next week’s announcement to find out the day and time of our next broadcast or go to www.sdncast.nl/youtube to watch old episodes and videos that we recorded at our events. Don’t forget to subscribe our YouTube channel www.sdncast.nl/subscribe or go directly to YouTube not to miss any of our shows!

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Week 9 – SDN Cast News, looking for the answer with André Obelink

SDNCast 42

With the twentieth anniversary of Visual Studio and the forty-second broadcast of our Dutch SDN Cast we speak with André Obelink on the subject of VB (Visual Basic) and the future of it. Forty-two is also the answer to life, the universe and all according to the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. Enough reasons to check out the recording on YouTube for this week.

André Obelink is Microsoft MVP and author of six books, five covering Visual Basic and the sixth written with co-author Sander Gerz on C#.

You can find André Obelink at several places such as
Twitter: @obelink
Website: http://www.obelink.com/

A returning question by many developers is will Visual Basic be around in the near future and if so where will it be positioned by Microsoft. A valid question, as it often appears that also with Microsoft Visual Basic seems to be the ‘forgotten’ language. APIs, sample code and documentation is released for C# at first and following a bit later the VB submission (sometimes we are still waiting for VB equivalents to arrive). We discuss all of this in depth, so if you are Dutch speaking look at this week’s Dutch SDN Cast.

Next to Visual Basic several other subjects get by, from the light-hearted topics such as Xbox Gaming to the very extensive exercise to write books and again – is there a future in book writing.

All in all enough topics making it well worth to jump to YouTube and watch the recording of the 42nd Dutch SDN Cast if you haven’t already watched it live last week.

Where can you find SDN Cast 42?
https://youtu.be/M8818TDd1ys

Subscribe to our YouTube channel so you won’t miss a single episode. Usually we are broadcasting live on Thursday evening 8PM GMT+1 in the winter but it might change depending on how things go that week. If you want to be sure you better subscribe to our channel on YouTube or go to http://www.sdncast.nl to discover when our next show will be planned. It will show you when the next show is starting.

News of the week

Azure Command Line 2.0 now generally available
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/announcing-general-availability-of-vm-storage-and-network-azure-cli-2-0/

TFS 2017 Management Pack
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/bharry/2017/02/27/tfs-2017-management-pack/

Microsoft System Center Management Pack for Visual Studio Team Foundation Server 2017
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=54791

Announcing the Xbox Live Creators Program
https://blogs.windows.com/buildingapps/2017/03/01/announcing-xbox-live-creators-program

Windows 10 SDK Preview Build 15042 Released
https://blogs.windows.com/buildingapps/2017/02/28/windows-10-sdk-preview-build-15042-released

Getting Started with a Mixed Reality Platformer Using Microsoft HoloLens
https://blogs.windows.com/buildingapps/2017/02/27/getting-started-mixed-reality-platformer-using-microsoft-hololens
Node v7.7.1 (Current)
Node.js 7.7.0 contains a bug that will prevent all native modules from building, this patch should fix the issue.

https://nodejs.org/en/blog/release/v7.7.1/

To relax a bit … Nintendo Switch
http://www.intertoys.nl/games/nintendo-switch/nintendo-switch-met-blauwe-en-rode-joy-con-controllers

Events

Events This Week

Game Developers Conference – February 27 – March 3rd – San Francisco
http://www.gdconf.com/

Events Next Week

Visual Studio 2017 Launch, March 7-8 – Online
https://launch.visualstudio.com/

Visual Studio 2017 Local Events, March 7 – April 30th

https://launch.visualstudio.com/local-events/

XABLU
https://www.xablu.com/event/visual-studio-2017-launch/
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/visual-studio-2017-launch-party-amsterdam-tickets-32184912941
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/visual-studio-2017-launch-party-eindhoven-tickets-32184874827
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/visual-studio-2017-launch-party-hengelo-tickets-32184379345

Delta-N
https://www.delta-n.nl/visual-studio-2017-launch-event

Info Support
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/visual-studio-2017-launch-party-tickets-32321070191

Upcoming events

REST-full APIs with ASP.NET Core – March 14, 2017 – Gouda
https://www.isense.nl/evenementen/restfulAPI

AKKA.NET & Docker Deployments – March 16, 2017 – Eindhoven
http://www.dotnetzuid.nl/Meeting/15/akkanet-docker-deployments

SDN Event 1 – Zeist – March 17, 2017
https://www.sdn.nl/EVENTS/17-maart-2017

You can already register, so put it in your scheduler and register!

Serverless Compute, March 23, 2017 – Quintor, Amersfoort
http://www.dotned.nl/dotned-bijeenkomst/23-maart-serverless-compute-bij-quintor/?id=123

Microsoft Tech Summit – Amsterdam, March 23-24, 2017
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/techsummit
https://www.microsoft.com/nl-nl/techsummit/amsterdam.aspx

Build – May 10-12, 2017 – Seattle
http://build.microsoft.com

Techorama – May 22-24, 2017 – Antwerpen, Belgium
http://techorama.be/

WWDC 2017 – June 5-9, 2017 – San José
https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=02152017a

DevSum 17 – June 8-9, 2017 – Stockholm
http://www.devsum.se/

Microsoft Data Insights Summit – June 12-13, 2017 – Seattle
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/datainsightssummit

NDC Oslo – June 12-16 2017 – Oslo
http://ndcoslo.com

E3 – June 13-1, 2017 – Los Angeles Convention Center
https://www.e3expo.com/show-info/2895/about-e3/

SDN Event 2 – Zeist – June 23, 2017
www.sdn.nl

Ignite 2017 – September 25-29 – Orlando
https://ignite.microsoft.com

SDN Event 3 – Zeist – October 6
www.sdn.nl

We hope you like to watch our SDN Casts. We try to keep up with the news in about an hour a week. You hear what is new and get fun demos on technology and Software Development that you can use in your daily job.

Don’t forget to Subscribe to our channel as we can get a better URL to remember our channel if we reach the number of subscribers needed to add this and make your and our lives a bit easier! And if you haven’t heard if you are the number 100 Subscriber you get something in return! Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3oE_YPB4AJVQSInC-yy3pw?sub_confirmation=1

Go to the website and check when our next broadcast will be!
http://www.sdncast.nl.

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Week 3 SDN Cast news with Brady Gaster from Microsoft

SDNCast 36

SDN Cast 36 is, to break a pattern, completely hosted in English. Not for no reason, but because we asked Brady Gaster to join us this week on our web cast. And, as we learned from our parents excluding someone from the discussion is ill-mannered by talking in a different language without translation we did not want to do the show half Dutch, half English and went for the English all the way option.

Already said it, we had a special guest this week, Brady Gaster in a live connection with Microsoft Campus in Redmond. Brady is working on some great tooling such as Downr, Azure Tools for Visual Studio Code, also DMC – docs.Microsoft.com is part of he daily playground, so we asked him to tell us all about it and even better to join us at one of our upcoming SDN Events.

Obviously we started with some news and events but the interesting part of this show is the part where Brady explained in a waterfall of information what they built (and deployed). We collected all the links from his presentation and added them to the list of links below.

Take some time to look at his presentation and see where you can use it in your daily job to be more productive, and think of it as a teaser or introduction of what you will see at our upcoming SDN Events later on this year!

Where can you find the 36th edition of our SDN Cast?
https://youtu.be/NsISi73TdBU

Subscribe to our YouTube channel so you won’t miss a single episode. Usually we are broadcasting live on Thursday evening 8PM GMT+1 in the winter but it might change depending on how things go that week. If you want to be sure you better subscribe to our channel on YouTube or go to http://www.sdncast.nl to discover when our next show will be planned. It will show you when the next show is starting.

News of the week

Introducing Electron to the Windows Runtime
https://slack.engineering/introducing-electron-to-the-windows-runtime-4fa789b93d90
https://www.npmjs.com/package/electron-windows-store

Announcing “UWPDesktop” NuGet Package Version 14393
https://blogs.windows.com/buildingapps/2017/01/17/announcing-uwpdesktop-nuget-package-version-14393

New Year, New Dev: Developing your idea into a UWP app
https://blogs.windows.com/buildingapps/2017/01/18/new-year-new-dev-developing-idea-uwp-app

VS Code in store?
https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/issues/15820#issuecomment-273688385

Exploring Intermediate Language (IL) with ReSharper and dotPeek
https://blog.jetbrains.com/dotnet/2017/01/19/exploring-intermediate-language-il-with-resharper-and-dotpeek/

Announcing Windows 10 Insider Preview Build 15007 for PC and Mobile
https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2017/01/12/announcing-windows-10-insider-preview-build-15007-pc-mobile

.NET Core Image Processing
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2017/01/19/net-core-image-processing/

Essential .NET – Essential MSBuild: A Build Engine Overview for .NET Tooling
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/mt791801

What Xamarin Developers Ought to Know to Start 2017
http://motzcod.es/post/155770642197/what-xamarin-developers-ought-to-know-to-start-2017

Visual Studio Shortcuts Desktop
http://wndw.ms/FkkoWL

Brady Gaster Links

http://twitter.com/bradygaster
http://docs.microsoft.com/
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/

http://dotnet.github.io/docfx

http://bradygaster.com
https://github.com/bradygaster/downr

https://www.twitter.com/avodovnik
https://twitter.com/tripdubroot
https://cmatskas.com/
https://twitter.com/stuartleeks

http://aka.ms/vscodeazuretools

Events

Events this week

NDC London – January 16-20 – London, UK
http://ndc-london.com/

Events Next Week

Microsoft Dynamics 365 First Look: Amsterdam – January 24 – Amsterdam
https://www.microsoftevents.com/profile/form/index.cfm?PKformID=0x9417743c7a

Fanie Reynders – iSense – January 26
https://www.isense.nl/evenementen/restfulAPI

dotNed Saturday – January 28 – Veenendaal
https://dotnedsaturday.nl/

Upcoming events

Code & Comedy – February 8 – Nieuwegein
http://CodeAndComedy.nl

SDN Event 1 – Zeist – March 17 2017
https://www.sdn.nl/EVENTS/17-maart-2017

Microsoft Tech Summit – Amsterdam, March 23-24 2017
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/techsummit
https://www.microsoft.com/nl-nl/techsummit/amsterdam.aspx

Build – May 10-12 2017 – Seattle
http://build.microsoft.com

SDN Event 2 – Zeist – June 23 2017
www.sdn.nl

Ignite 2017 – September 25-29 – Orlando
https://ignite.microsoft.com

SDN Event 3 – Zeist – October 6
www.sdn.nl

We hope you like to watch our special SDN Casts this week with Brady. We try to keep up with the news in about an hour a week. You hear what is new and get fun demos on technology and Software Development that you can use in your daily job.

Don’t forget to Subscribe to our channel as we can get a better URL to remember our channel if we reach the number of subscribers needed to add this and make your and our lives a bit easier! And if you haven’t heard if you are the number 100 Subscriber you get something in return! Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3oE_YPB4AJVQSInC-yy3pw?sub_confirmation=1

Go to the website and check when our next broadcast will be!
http://www.sdncast.nl

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Microsoft to acquire Linkedin

MS-Linkedin-2016-06-12-1-c

Microsoft announced they have bought LinkedIn for the measly amount of $26.2 billion. Here is the new text from Microsoft:

Microsoft Corporation and Linkedin Corporation announced Monday June 13th to have entered into a definitive agreement under which Microsoft will acquire LinkeIn for $196 per share in an all cash transaction valued at $26.2 billion, inclusive of LinkedIn’s net cash. LinkedIn will retain its distinct brand, culture and independence. Jeff Weiner will remain CEO of LinkedIn, reporting to Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft. Reid Hoffman, chairman of the board, co-founder and controlling shareholder of LinkedIn, and Weiner both fully support this transaction. The transaction is expected to close this calendar year.

It is not sure what the reasoning behind the takeover is, other than that captain Satya Nadella from Microsoft said it will complement their businesses. We’ll see what the future will bring with this acquisition.

For the complete news flash to read goto:
http://news.microsoft.com/2016/06/13/microsoft-to-acquire-linkedin/#sm.000oq6vhph25eta11hp208qakzjta

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VSTO Runtime Update (10.0.50325)

The Visual Studio Developer Division just announced a new version of the VSTO (Visual Studio Tools for the Office System) Runtime (10.0.50325).

One of the issues, the one when using WPF controls caused a massive delay in closing Office applications, I worked close with the team to test and get this solved. The issue also reported on Connect was a hard one to fix as it depended on many factors such as Touch Screen interfaces and appeared on previous versions of the Runtime.

The second issue addressed by this update covers the publisher’s name and verification status to show properly when using SHA256 code-signing certificates where the Trust Prompt at first displayed “Unknown Publisher” even when the publisher was fully trusted.

Read more about the Runtime Update at the blog from the VSTOTeam located at:
VSTO Runtime Update to Address Slow Shutdown and “Unknown Publisher” for SHA256 Certificates 

You can download the latest version of the VSTO Runtime at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=140384 and will be distributed as part of Windows Update.

I for one am very happy to see this solved and released to the public. Our enterprise firm encountered the WPF issue on a large scale just after deploying our top of the bill new laptops to all of our users and would like to thank the VSTO Team for working with us to get this out of the way! We really spent a huge amount of hours in this to cover all the scenarios we could think of in both new and older (existing) add-ins.

Showtime: The Book Thief

The Book Thief

The “Showtime” section on my blog is a reminder, mostly for my own reference but maybe helpful for other film enthusiasts as well, to remember what movies I’ve seen lately, what it was about and how I rated it in general.

The Book Thief is about a little girl, unable to read and write at her early years to be abandoned by her mother in times of war in the 1930’s. While living at her foster parents home she learns to read and write and especially gets the affection to read books. To be able to read books she steals (or borrows) the books and was called “The Book Thief” by one of her neighbor boys.

the perspective of a German family in war time isn’t used in many films. Especially a family giving shelter to a Jewish refugee in a city of Germany is a less common thing to project.

The movie is highly (maybe over-)dramatized, displaying some intense situations people had to go through when the world was at war. Although the level of dramatization could be a bit less overall it is a touching story. The girl playing Liesel Meminger (Sophie Nélisse) is a rising star and I think we haven’t seen the last of her yet.

I expected the movie, given the amount of nominations, to be somewhat better and rate it a high six out of ten.

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Satya Nadella is the new CEO of Microsoft

Today Microsoft announced that Satya Nadella will be the new CEO of Microsoft following Steve Ballmer who announced last year to retire in 2014. With that, Satya asked Bill Gates to step back in, but with a different hat on -no not that hat– but as “Technical Advisor focusing on products and technologies”.

Instead of me telling all of this to you, it is probably better to let the board speak for itself and show you the official announcements as available on YouTube.

Steve Ballmer welcomes Satya Nadella as Microsoft CEO

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jy8Qhcf_moA]

Microsoft Chairman John Thompson on CEO Satya Nadella

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3K5lloQTT8]

Bill Gates welcomes Satya Nadella as Microsoft CEO

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M5BhQVuRcTk]

All great, these kind words and praise for the man, but what did he have to say for himself? Well, here is his first (short) interview as CEO of Microsoft:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8JwNZBJ_wI]

In fact, I have met him (at a distance Glimlach ) earlier last year and the year before when he did his Keynote for the //Build conferences for the years of 2012 and 2013 in the role of President, Server and Tools Business.

Who would have expected that today he would be CEO of this huge worldwide company? Let’s see how he will do in the near future and how it will affect the current policies at Microsoft.

Showtime: La Grande Bellezza

La Grande Bellezza

The “Showtime” section on my blog is a reminder, mostly for my own reference but maybe helpful for other film enthusiasts as well, to remember what movies I’ve seen lately, what it was about and how I rated it in general.

La Grande Bellezza (“The Great Beauty”) is a piece of art, the sceneries, panoramas or just the way it was filmed as a whole is just great. The story is about Jep Gambardella turned sixty-five and is overlooking his life trying to decide if his life had the quality level he wanted out of it, would he be able to write a new book worth reading meeting the quality bar. He once wrote a book and was successful with that one but lived his life after that as a highly respected journalist.

The images of Rome, the nightlife of nightclubs and parties and all of the extravaganza around it all is a joy to look at. The category of the film may be Film Art (and Art it is!) but is not the kind of movies stamped to be dull and boring. In fact I gladly surprised and even though the movie is not for ‘everyone’ on my list it proved to be a Great Beauty and allow it to get Nine out of Ten at least for being something completely different.

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Visual Studio 2012 Update 1 Now Available!

VisualStudio2012Logo

Earlier the Visual Studio team in Redmond announced that as of Visual Studio 2012 their update frequency would go up and planned to release an update with bug fixes but also with new features. By doing so the development team is able to respond in a more dynamic manner to changes in direction and respond to feedback on a shorter notice.

This is how they expressed it:

“Microsoft is planning to update Visual Studio 2012 periodically to provide new and improved tools and capabilities. These improvements will be aligned with the latest software development trends so that you will always have access to the best solutions for building modern apps. The updates will also contain bug fixes and other enhancements.”

Today their first update was released to the Web and you can install it today from the download page (see “Visual Studio 2012 Update 1” under the “Additional software” section.

You can read more about it on Somasegar’s blog:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/somasegar/archive/2012/11/26/visual-studio-2012-update-1-now-available.aspx

or at The Visual Studio Blog:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/visualstudio/archive/2012/11/26/visual-studio-2012-update-1-is-here.aspx

Download it here:

http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudio/eng/downloads#d-visual-studio-2012-update

Have Fun!

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An update rollup is available for Visual Studio 2010 Tools for Office Runtime 4.0

Today a rollup update for Visual Studio 2010 for Office Runtime 4.0 that was auto-magically released November 13th has been deployed to (at least one of) my machines.

This rollup fixes about four issues with the Visual Studio 2010 Tools for Office Runtime and one fix in particular of a bug that I found and posted on Connect:

http://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/705610/cached-data-storage-fails-in-protected-documents

We worked close with the VSTO development team to identify and isolate the issue and they were able to solve it for us to allow us to continue working with the runtime.

The issue isn’t touched a lot beside our organization (it is a specific user scenario not used by many others) so distribution of the fix was ‘delayed’ until deployment of yesterdays rollup (a hotfix could be requested for in case you ran into it).

So as of yesterday the fix became available for everyone along with a couple of other fixes. Again, probably not many of you will notice any differences but I’m sure the users using one or more of the fixed features will be pleased to see it released in the main branch of the product.

If you want to download the VSTO Runtime on your own, not waiting for Microsoft Update or WSUS you can download it at the Microsoft Download Center.

On a side note, also Office 2013 tooling was released this week to enable you to build VSTO solutions targeting Office 2013 but I will spend some time on that in a separate blog post.

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Download all Build 2012 videos

Earlier I created a custom downloader to download videos from //Build (2011) and was thinking about creating another one for //Build 2012.

I did however remember there was a batch download tool for Channel 9, where the //Build and other events are hosting their videos and searched for it and found it:

Select your //Build 2012 videos and download them here:
http://dayngo.com/channel9/Events/2a7a1747-b3e7-4e55-96f5-a0f9002298dd/Build_2012

It creates either a PowerShell script or a WGET script for you to use and download the videos in one batch. Saves me some work to create another downloader.

The number of sessions this year was a lot lower than last year. Compared to last year //Build 2012 had only 60% of the number of sessions at //Build 2011 (275 last year against 164 this year). This is probably related to the fact that the venue in Anaheim in 2011 was much bigger and Microsoft Campus has only limited space to host their sessions.

Enjoy downloading and watching the //Build 2012 sessions!

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Build 2012

Build2012

Last year I attended Build 2011. It was highly secretive and more or less Apple-ified kind of conference held by Microsoft however this time. No one knew what to expect other than that Microsoft planned to make a big shift in their plans for the upcoming years. As I blogged about it last time, it seemed that Microsoft decided to align all products with the same type of User Interface and able to run on most devices from phones to data servers.

One of the big announcements was that Windows would be able to run on ARM processor based devices and would be prepared as touch enabled Operating System.

Tomorrow, Eight-Eight-Eight (8-8-8, August 8th at 8AM) it will happen again. Microsoft is opening their doors this time on Microsoft Campus in Redmond, not in a fancy location with Disneyland or Vegas setting but ‘just’ at Microsoft’s home base.

Again, no-one knows what to expect and what to arrange for traveling and lodging but I’m pretty sure it will provide a lot of interesting information and options to build your network for the next year or so. Build 2011 provided insights in completely new areas and was definitely worth attending. In general I am an autodidact, the reason often is that I am learning the things that I ‘predict’ to be big in the -next- couple of years and a lot of it is simply not available soon enough. Living on the bleeding edge. Events like Build are different, mainly because the speakers on the conference -are the developers- working on the new technologies. Not some consulting guys but the ones who designed it.

So, it won’t take more that 24 hours until we know what it’s all about. Or maybe not … maybe you only know how to register and where to stay. That was what happened last year. No information at all.

For me I’ll try to register and see if I can get a ticket to learn what to focus on the next couple of years. Maybe my boss is willing to sponsor me, maybe not -in that case I’ll break my piggybank and will it be my early Christmas vacation- but the ones who get in will be the ones with the Golden ticket ….

Let me know, are you trying to get registered, to get the Golden Ticket …?

To be continued …