Whoa – Robert Scoble said he was on the home page of Microsoft.com, so I had to go see. When I went to the home page I noticed this item:
News: Microsoft realigns for next wave of innovation and growth
I followed the link and among the subtitles see all kinds of interesting news! Better go look for yourself!!
Don’t Forget: www.acehaid.org
There is no question in my mind that LINQ is going to be very important to .NET developers.
Larry groks the plumbing much better than I do at this point. I’m focused on what it will let me do.
Don’t Forget: www.acehaid.org
At the end of PDC, I realized that I was in a bubble all week. I had stopped fretting over the Katrina disaster which is hardly behind us. Not once did I phone my parents to say hi. I didn’t even send so much as a Hollywood postcard to my friend who was in the hospital. The only non-conference related contact I had with anyone was a few phone calls each day to my husband who had had a very scary and bloody hiking accident the day before I left for Los Angeles. I had no idea there was a hurricane in the Carolinas and completely forgotten about the rising cost of gas. This is the conference bubble. The world outside the conference and its focus just doesn’t exist. I was only a few miles from the ocean and did not visit it. Nor did I see the ocean when I was at TechEd in San Diego.
Does anyone else feel this way? It makes me feel guilty to forget the world for a while.
Don’t Forget: www.acehaid.org
I use XML plenty, but I am no XML guru. I can hack out XSLT and have used XQuery a handful of times. I definitely wondered how XLINQ would impact XQuery but do not have the background to make any comparison. Therefore, I was happy to see this post by Kent Tegels who does some pros & cons on XLINQ vs. XQuery. The big con for XLINQ is that it is proprietary. The big pro for XLINQ is that it is much more powerful. Says Kent: XLINQ wins by a technical knock-out before even getting into the ring. It really wasn’t going to be a fair fight though, was it? The underlying architecture of LINQ really fortify it the point where XQuery isn’t even in the same class. It’d be like a young Mohammed Ali boxing Superman.
Don’t Forget: www.acehaid.org
Don’t Forget: www.acehaid.org
Don’t forget the VTSDA meeting today. It’s a lunch time meeting from 12-2pm at the Ethan Allen Club in downtown Burlington.
Today’s speaker is Jeffrey McMahan, a laywer from Dinse, Knapp & McAndrew, P.C., speaking on Preparing to Grow or Sell: How to Prepare for Investors or Acquirers.
This meeting will focus on the legal and business matters that companies should make sure they have reviewed and put in order before they invite the scrutiny of lenders, investors or acquirers. Specific topics will include governance and financial control practices, intellectual property ownership and protection, employment matters, contract review and corporate record-keeping.
Jeffrey McMahan is a corporate and intellectual property lawyer, advising businesses on issues related to formation, mergers and acquisitions, raising capital, technology licensing, trademarks and copyrights. Mr. McMahan’s clients range from entrepreneurial start-ups to publicly-held companies. He has particular experience working with software vendors and purchasers in system implementation, license and support agreements.
Mr. McMahan’s practice also focuses on securities and trademark matters. He has assisted both privately-held and publicly traded companies with the private placement of stock. Mr. McMahan advises clients on the selection of trademarks and assists with the registration of their trademarks with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
Meeting/Lunch is $15 for VTSDA members and $20 for non-members.
Don’t Forget: www.acehaid.org
ThinkVermont.com is the website of the Vermont Department of Economic Development. They always have a calendar of interesting events (lectures, workshops, etc) in the area.
Here are a few upcoming ones I wanted to point out
| September 29 | 5 Big Questions about the Future Details: This Aiken Lecture features Atul Dighe, a consulting futurist and co-author of the bestselling book Exploring the Future. He is often quoted for his views on the future in publications such as USA Today, MONEY Magazine, NY Times, ESPN Magazine, and Computerworld. Location: Ira Allen Chapel, UVM, Burlington Web Site: http://learn.uvm.edu/aiken |
| September 30 | Dr. Stephen Wolfram Details: Dr. Stephen Wolfram, world-renowned scientist and author who wrote Mathematica and A New Kind of Science, will speak. Location: Carpenter Auditorium/E131 Given Building, University of Vermont Campus Web Site: http://www.emba.uvm.edu/distinguished_lecture_series.php |
Don’t Forget: www.acehaid.org
Don’t Forget: www.acehaid.org
(update: added Expression graphics stuff down below)
Links that I referred to last night in my “what I saw at PDC” VTdotNET presentation
first – Code Camp 4 “Almost Agenda”
Tablet PC on Vista
Tablet PC on WPF (Avalon)
Atlas Website with Hands on Labs and Forums
Channel 9 PDC Show Off – watch for videos to get posted, including the one for the robotic ride!!
Channel 9 has videos of Raymond Chen’s session as well as demos of lots o fthe new technologies
Last but not least, there is now a webcast of the presentation we were hoping to have by Dr. Neil Roodyn on Network Awareness. I did not realize that it was broadcast live just today! (Tuesday)
Expression “family” (Acrylic Graphic Designer, Quartz Web Designer and Sparkle (“Sparkle” – sounds like something from the Barbie Family) Interactive Designer)
If I have forgotten anything, let me know.
Okay – this paragraph at the end of a review of the new Acer C200 is annoying
In summary, the C200 is a welcome breath of fresh air in a category which was supposed to be all about innovation – yet has become woefully stagnant due to the lack of software fully exploiting pen based input capabilities. Granted, it won’t run Doom IV, but at least future owners are sure to raise an eyebrow by the mention of it having 256 MB of VRAM.
The tablet pc BOF that I hosted last Tuesday night at PDC was jam packed. A large number of people from the Tablet PC Team were there as well as developers who are currently programming for tablets, developers who were “tablet-curious” and even someone from Motion – who has the best tablet out there (for non-developers).
There was a lot of discussion of the usual question – why is the tablet so slow to come to market. Developers are frustrated because we are hoping to make some money writing apps or consulting to companies that are writing apps. Manufacturers are frustrated, although I did explicitly ask the guy from Motion if they are satisfied and I think they are somewhat. They do look forward to the expansion of the market and the success of other manufacturers. The ability for manufacturers to make white box tablets can also change things dramatically.
I don’t think there was any one in the room that didn’t think that eventually a digitizer and stylus will just be part of a laptop and it won’t be a special thing – a Tablet PC – just a laptop again.
Koji Kato who is a PM on the Tablet Team brought up a really good point – maybe the real problem is that of expectations. Who set the expectation that Tablets had to explode on to the scene? (And stop comparing them to IPODs – that’s just not an, err, apple to apple (sorry couldn’t be helped) comparison.) There is a big worry that the media is drooling for it to fail – just because it will make a good story. So because it is not going fast, it’s a problem and then the blame game begins. It’s the manufacturer’s fault for not having cheap enough models. It’s Microsoft’s fault because, well just because it’s Microsoft. And it’s the developers fault because, as the journalist noted above, we aren’t writing enough apps.
Don’t Forget: www.acehaid.org