Microsoft Weblog

May 8th, 2008

Microsoft On the Rebound Into the Arms of Facebook?

Could Microsoft be pursuing Facebook now since Yahoo! wouldn’t let them take them to the Senior Prom? It appears that way from Andy Beal’s perspective and his sources.

Facebook is already wearing Microsoft’s ring–the company recently invested $240 million in the social network–but the timing is just too strange. Ten minutes ago, Yahoo was the company that was going to solve all Microsoft’s problems. Now it’s Facebook?

Sadly I think this is horrible news. I’m fine that Microsoft has invested a ton of money into the company, after all, there can’t be much wrong with spreading around the wealth to some companies that are doing some great things right?

As much as I think Microsoft is moving towards a better, brighter and more open future, I think for them to purchase Microsoft outright would probably destroy Facebook. I don’t think they’d do anything from a technological perspective to destroy it, I just think most people would start jumping off the network in masses because of the way they feel about Microsoft in general.

I think Facebook has some great things going for it, it’s surely a valuable community of users and content now. That community is still expanding in its scope and influence as well.

What do you think? Good idea or bad idea?

Source: Andy Beal on MarketingPilgrim

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By Jason Bean -- 1 comment

May 8th, 2008

Productivity Tracking Built into the Microsoft OS

I just published a post over at Uncover the Internet about an application called RescueTime that allows you to track what applications and websites you spend all your time on during the day.

My initial thought was that this would be an interesting feature to get built into the operating system itself. What better application to track your application and website usage than the operating system itself.

My next though though was to begin wondering if it would be possible to get this information already from some kind of log file in the system.

Does anyone know if there’s some way that can be accomplished? What interesting log file options are there available for users to comb through and get some interesting stats?

Let us know in the comments.

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By Jason Bean -- 0 comments

May 7th, 2008

Here’s a New Feature Request in Visual Web Developer Express 2008

I made the “professional” switch over to ASP.NET development awhile back and began using Visual Web Developer Express (VWDE) for all my business clients with the day job. I’ve still kept Dreamweaver 8 installed though because I have a few clients that still use it so it’s nice to be able to open and view exactly what they’ve done in the default editor as well.

There are a number of things I still really like about Dreamweaver that I wish VWDE would incorporate into their product.

One is built in FTP support, but the other is some of the controls that are available when you right-click on a tag in the tag bar along the bottom of your page.

For example here’s the feature as it appears in Visual Web Developer Express 2008

As you can see, the only options when you right-click on a tag is to select it or the content within it. Helpful, but not AS helpful as Dreamweaver is with the same option in the same space.

With Dreamweaver, I can remove the tag completely, which is very handy for cleaning up stray styles and formatting you don’t want in the code anymore. But the other options are also valuable as well like:

• Quick tag editing
• assign a CSS class to a tag
• setting the tag’s ID
• or managing the code by collapsing unneeded items

If anyone from the VWDE team is reading this. Hopefully you’ll add it to your list of upcoming features along with the FTP support.

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By Jason Bean -- 0 comments

May 6th, 2008

See DRASTIC Speed Improvements in Vista

One of the biggest complaints I’ve both heard and personally seen with Windows Vista is that sometimes navigating through a file directory structure is agonizingly slow.

Here’s a fix we’ve stumbled across that makes a DRASTIC speed increase for this process. The solution was found on Microsoft TechNet and is amazing in the comparative results that are noticed.

Please perform the following actions to check the result:

1. Turn off Auto Tuning on the Windows Vista machine:
   • Click Start, and type cmd in the Start Search box.
   • Right-click the cmd icon, and select Run as Administrator.
   • In the Command Prompt, type the following command:
     netsh interface tcp set global autotuninglevel=disabled
   • After that, please check the result.
     Note: Please re-enable Auto Tuning by typing the following command if the above steps cannot fix the issue:
     netsh interface tcp set global autotuninglevel=normal
     
2. Install the updates KB938194 and KB938979 on the Windows Vista machine.
   http://support.microsoft.com/kb/938194
   http://support.microsoft.com/kb/938979

On the one laptop we’ve tested this on the results of changing this setting were absolutely amazing. It felt like an upgrade of tripling the RAM on a machine that was only running 128MB.

Vista is still fast when you change it back as well

One thing we changed that wasn’t mentioned above is that after we tried it, we changed the setting back on the autotuninglevel = normal. The speed improvements were still noticed. It’s almost like the system had to flush a file or something.

Regardless, if you find yourself waiting seconds for directory files to open and display folders, try this fix and let us know what you think.

I should also say something like it may not work for you and I’m not responsible if it blows up your computer. I’m still shocked at the difference I just saw though, and it wasn’t my laptop.

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By Jason Bean -- 1 comment

May 6th, 2008

Use a Laptop As a KVM Switch

I’ve thought of another feature I wish existed for a laptop. I frequently work on people’s computers for them. If I have them bring me their desktop machine I tell them to unplug everything and don’t worry about bringing me the monitor, keyboard, mouse, speakers, etc. I’ve got all of these things at my house that I can hook up if I need.

Map Laptop Keyboard, Mouse, Monitor to Desktop Machine

The problem is that I’d like to be able to sit the CPU down next to me on the couch and then sit on the couch with my laptop and review their system. I’d like to somehow be able to plug-in the desktop to my laptop and be able to map my laptop’s keyboard, mouse and monitor to the desktop.

I know you could kind of accomplish this with Microsoft Remote Terminal Services client, but that’s kind of hard to initially setup at your first boot-up of the machine. But even then there’s challenges if it’s not on your network or is having Ethernet problems.

Does this type of functionality exist somehow? Let me know!

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By Jason Bean -- 1 comment

May 6th, 2008

Grand Theft Auto IV - Did you buy it?

I’ve finally heard back from Microsoft and they let me know that they’ve been able to fix the “known issue” I was experiencing that was keeping me from connecting to the Xbox LIVE service with my Xbox 360.

The only thing I’ve really done online at this point is to play a few games of Halo 3. Just doing some basic training and team skirmishes so far. I’m really enjoying myself, I just wish I had an entire weekend to waste without feeling completely guilty for not getting anything else done.

All that aside, here’s the big question. Did you purchase Grand Theft Auto IV? I’ve never been a big fan of that type of game, but I realize it’s popular.

What’s your currently top ranked Xbox 360 game? I need to try some new titles and don’t have much time to really play as much as I would like, so I’ve got to choose my titles and invest my time wisely.

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By Jason Bean -- 1 comment

May 5th, 2008

Is It Really Over? Microsoft Pulls Yahoo Offer

This is one that I really thought would happen. I didn’t think it would happen easily or exactly quickly, but I thought it would eventually get approved and move forward.

Part of me thinks this could still be in the overall strategy though. The YHOO stock price has already dropped to $24 from it’s 52-week high of $34.

What do you think? Could it be that Microsoft will come back in a few weeks or a couple of months and offer a little less than their original offer, getting Yahoo! for an even greater deal through an official hostile takeover? Steve Ballmer has said no, but people change their minds frequently. Saying no strongly could help generate the drop in stock price they’re really looking for in the deal.

Here’s some other current news coverage of the deal from ZDNet:

• Why Yahoo’s ad inventory is so important to Microsoft
• Microsoft takes its ball and leaves Yahoo on the Web 2.0 playground
• Microsoft walks: Five reasons why it’s a good move

Photo Source: flickr wes4ua’s photos

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By Jason Bean -- 0 comments

May 5th, 2008

Xobni Goes Public and New Design

I’ve been using Xobni for awhile now ever since I found it and downloaded it initially. I wrote about my experiences with the application. I’ve found that it’s really helpful in a variety of instances when looking for information in e-mail that’s in context with the task you’re trying to accomplish at the moment.

The service is now out of private beta and anyone can download and install it to see for themselves.

I’ve heard some people say that Outlook slowed down tremendously after they installed it, but I haven’t noticed anything like that up until this point during my usage of the application.

With the new public release they’ve also made just some slight appearance modifications to the Xobni information pane.

I don’t think the search function needed to be made quite so prominent in the new, updated user-interface design. Maybe that’s because I’ve not been a big user of the general search features. I more regularly use the network, conversations and files information.

Xobni had some news coverage in the New York Times as well if you’re interested in what some other people besides myself think about the product.

In the article, Jeff Bonforte, expressed interest and goals in expanding the reach of Xobni into other e-mail and communication clients:

Xobni now has ambitions that extend well beyond Microsoft Outlook. Jeff Bonforte, a 35-year-old former Yahoo vice president, joined Xobni as chief executive in February. He plans to expand Xobni’s reach to various e-mail programs, like the popular Web-based services Yahoo Mail, Google’s Gmail and Microsoft’s Hotmail as well as social networks like Facebook and Linkedin.

That would be pretty slick to be able to type in a name in Xobni and it be able to read my e-mail for that contact’s information regardless of which one of my e-mail accounts I had been communicating with the individual.

The only problem I can see is I don’t keep my e-mail around for very long in other e-mail clients. So, not sure if Xobni would keep a history of messages that I’ve already deleted from my system. Not sure how they would.

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By Jason Bean -- 0 comments

April 30th, 2008

Try Microsoft’s Surface Computing for Yourself at AT&T Stores

Interestingly enough, after just posting my previous post about what Microsoft’s next big thing could be, one of the things I mentioned, Microsoft Surface, is now on display in a few select AT&T locations around the United States.

Put Your Hands on Microsoft Surface and Experience It for Yourself

I was really hoping I might get lucky and there would be more than there are and one of them would be here in Indianapolis. No such luck. Here are the locations where you can see it for yourself at your local AT*T store:

• New York City
  381 Madison Avenue
  New York, NY 10017
• New York City
  350 Park Avenue
  New York, NY 10022
• Atlanta
  3429 Lenox Road NE
  Atlanta, GA 30326
• San Antonio
  13127 San Pedro Avenue
  San Antonio, TX 78216
• San Francisco
  1206 El Camino Real
  San Bruno, CA 94066

If you’re in one of these locations, I’d love to hear a real-world user’s feedback on what they think about the possibilities. Will it be the next big thing?

UPDATE: Here’s coverage of the AT&T store launches from the Surface team blog

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By Jason Bean -- 0 comments

April 30th, 2008

Why Can’t Microsoft Twitter

I’ve been spending more and more time in the Web 2.0 world and immersing myself in more social networking applications. One of the most popular right now is twitter.

I got to thinking recently though about why it is Microsoft couldn’t develop an application like twitter?

I don’t think it’s because Microsoft doesn’t have any really outside of the box or creative thinkers. Would they have the possibility of it being more likely if they promoted and/or fostered the Google idea of having employees work on their own personal projects?

What if it were just because they’re Microsoft?

Is Microsoft Incapable of Producing the Next Big Thing?

Could it be that even if Microsoft developed an amazing application that totally changed the world of computing and technology, because it came from Microsoft it would never get the credit it deserved? Almost an idea that “no good can come from Microsoft”, not because Microsoft doesn’t deliver good stuff, but because the world would never admit it was a great thing.

A quick thought of potential items:

• Silverlight
• Surface Computing
• Windows Home Server

Let us know what you think in our current online poll below or in the sidebar.

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By Jason Bean -- 1 comment