tim ferro
ramblings of a code monkey, fanboy, and uber-geek

“Microsoft Tuesday revealed Windows 7 at its annual Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in Los Angeles. Windows 7 is designed to replace Windows Vista as the main operating system for Windows-based PC users.

With Apple’s OS X Snow Leopard also under development, we met up with Ian Moulster, Windows Live Commercial Lead for Microsoft to talk through some of Microsoft’s key ideas and discover what the next-generation of operating systems aim to offer both Mac and PC users.” - Source

“Officially, Microsoft has been saying “the first half of 2008″ whenever the company is asked to put a date for the release of Windows XP Service Pack 3 (SP3). However, various sources have been expecting the Release to Manufacturing (RTM) build to become available in the second half of April. Now, according to tech site Neowin, Microsoft’s release schedule for XP SP3 is as follows…” - Source

“No more betas, release candidates, or other test builds for Windows Vista SP1. Microsoft is pushing the final version of Windows Vista Service Pack 1 out the door. You can download standalone installers for X86 and X64 systems from Microsoft starting today.” - Source

“Microsoft has released the first public beta of Internet Explorer 8 for download by willing testers, which debuted this week at the Mix conference in Las Vegas. Intended for developers and designers only, IE8’s most intriguing new feature so far is “Web Slices,” which lets you monitor a single section of a web page, like an eBay auction (similar to Leopard’s Web Clips.) Web developers will be excited about better standards compliance.” - Source

“As a team, we’ve spent the last year heads down working hard on IE8. Last week, we achieved an important milestone that should interest web developers. IE8 now renders the “Acid2 Face” correctly in IE8 standards mode.” - Source

“As promised earlier this month, Microsoft announced today that both Visual Studio 2008 and the accompanying .NET Framework 3.5 have been released to manufacture (RTM).

Codenamed Orcas, Visual Studio 2008 (VS2008) comes two years after Visual Studio 2005. In total, there are more than 250 new features added with significant enhancements across every version ranging from Express Editions to Visual Studio Team Systems (VSTS). A key addition in VS2008 is support for the new Language Integrated Query (LINQ), which is positioned as a technology for rapid application development. LINQ is designed to let developers focus on what they need the data to do, rather than be mired in the complexities of data abstraction and casting. Also, LINQ makes it easier to tie C# or Visual Basic with SQL.” - Source

Coverage at Neowin.net
Coverage at RegDeveloper

“Then there’s the work Ubuntu computer, on which I do just about everything when I’m in the office. On Friday, I decided to update it from 7.04 to 7.10. That took a single click - no, honestly - in the system software manager, and about ten minutes downtime, most of which was me playing about. While most of the software was downloading and installing itself, I could carry on working.

And 7.10 is really rather nice; I find myself enjoying the various windows animation gimmicks more than I expected. I particularly enjoyed installing some new Firefox add-ins that needed a browser restart: as the old instance closed, the window shrank into the distance, and a second later the new instance sprang into life as if it was being thrown onto the screen from behind me. The tabs I had open were carried across the restart - stylish, fun and minimally invasive. Oh, and 7.10 found the ZDNet editorial printer on the network and installed the correct driver, without fuss. Superb.” - Source

“JavaScript has become a crucial part of Websites built on AJAX underpinnings, which makes the upcoming revision to the ECMAScript standard crucial for the future of the Web. But in today’s browser environment, no one vendor can impose an update path — which may set things up for a nasty conflict. A fight is being fought on blogs between Mozilla Chief Technology Officer (and creator of JavaScript) Brendan Eich, who wants to the new ECMAScript standard to be a radical upgrade, and Chris Wilson, architect of MS’s IE team, who would rather keep JavaScript as is and put new functionality into a brand-new language.” - Source

“Microsoft will release Windows 2008 Server as the direct successor to Windows 2003 Server in the spring of next year. The new server OS, code named Longhorn, shares the same kernel with Windows Vista and incorporates many additions compared to its predecessor.

When using the completely revamped server-management console, configuration and administration of the new server become much simpler. The new Internet Information Server 7 also sports a new user interface. With virtualization technology integrated directly into the operating system, third-party tools or solutions are no longer necessary when using virtual machines and the like. Lastly, administrators are as up-to-date as it gets, since Windows 2008 Server includes all of the components slated for inclusion in Service Pack 1 for Windows Vista.” - Source

“Microsoft has won a high-profile technology industry battle with Google and Yahoo to invest in the social networking upstart Facebook.

The two companies said on Wednesday that Microsoft would invest $240 million for a 1.6 percent stake in Facebook. The investment values the three-year-old Facebook, which will bring in about $150 million in revenue this year, at $15 billion.” - Source