Archive for Vista
April 26, 2008 at 9:45 am ·
Filed under Releases, Vista
It’s taken ages, at least to me, since the last special updates had been pushed for Vista Ultimate. But finally and at last, they rolled out the Extras just a few days ago. If you’re running Vista Ultimate, two new Ultimate Extras should show up on Windows Update when you connect. The first one is Windows Sound Schemes, a pack of 2 new sound schemes for Windows Vista: Glass and Pearl. For more details on the Windows Sound Schemes - click here. The second one is Windows DreamScene Content Pack #3, which brings you 3 new DreamScenes for your Windows Vista desktop. For more information on Windows DreamScene - click here.
So, I’m going to download and install these babies to include them in my next demo. It’s always fun to have some new stuff to show, even if it is ‘just’ a dreamscene. Here’s a still shot of the one I’m adding right now:
Pretty pure and not too intrusive. I like it that way. If you want to stay up to date with all the goodies they push out for Ultimate users, please keep an eye on either the Windows Vista Blog, or the UltimatePC website, your home for the latest releases and updated features.
April 26, 2008 at 1:54 am ·
Filed under Releases, Vista
The Speech Components Group just announced the initial public availability of Windows Speech Recognition Macros. WSR Macros combines the ease of Windows Speech Recognition with the power of an XML-based scripting language. It makes it easy to create speech interfaces to applications and perform otherwise tedious tasks with simple spoken commands.
This tool is the brainchild of Rob Chambers and has been in development for quite a long time. Once in SCG, Rob and Onur Domanic worked on refining the functionality, fixing issues and getting the code in shape to ship. Aziz El Ouaqid ran the test effort.
Download it now
More info on the team blog
The Windows Speech Recognition Macros tool (aka WSRMacros) extends the usefulness of the speech recognition capabilities already included in Windows Vista. Users can now create powerful macros that are triggered by spoken commands. These macros can perform a single task, or a series of tasks. Macros can be as simple as inserting your mailing address to as complex as providing a completely different speech interaction utilizing a number of built in capabilities or utilizing custom JScript/VBScript actions.
XML Code samples for WSR Macro commands:
<speechMacros>
<command>
<listenFor>What are macros</listenFor>
<setTextFeedback>Macros are cool!</setTextFeedback>
<speak>W S R Macros extends the power of my voice</speak>
</command>
<!– Play Artist Command –>
<command>
<listenFor>play ?the ?artist [Artists]</listenFor>
<listenFor>play ?the band [Artists]</listenFor>
<listenFor>play ?the group [Artists]</listenFor> <disambiguate title=”Which artist do you want to play?” prompt=”Choose an Artist” timeout=”25″ propname=”Artist”/>
<wmpMediaControl command=”pause”/>
<speak>Playing Artist {[Artist]}</speak>
<wmpMediaPlay attrname=”WM/AlbumArtist” attrvalue=”{[Artist]}”/>
</command></speechMacros>
February 5, 2008 at 9:44 am ·
Filed under Uncategorized, PR, MicroLife, Releases, Vista
It’s here! It’s finally here! *small victory lap for the team* It’s been long anticipated, and for the last 3 years a team of 5000 people have been working on it, testing, retesting, double-checking and triple-checking… but yesterday they all checked off their scorecards, and Server 2008 is ready to be manufactured! Swee-heet! Windows Server 2008 has an array of new features and technologies that are too numerous to list completely, but some of the highlights are:
- Internet Information Services (IIS) 7.0 – next gen web and app platform
- Server Core – key roles, low footprint, no GUI
- Terminal Services Gateway – access your apps without a RAS client
- Network Access Protection – keep network safe from un-healthy clients
- PowerShell - powerful scripting tools for admins
- Failover Clustering – improved cluster management, security, and stability
- Next Generation Net Stack – fast and reliable
- Server Manager – setup & manage server roles and features in one place
- Read-Only Domain Controller – safe branch office DCs
- Hyper-V Beta – server virtualization. Hyper-V RTM in 180 days
And so, here we are. Fully ready for heavy duty. It’s gonna be fun! –> read more about the RTM release of Server2008 in the official press release.
SP1, Service Pack 1 for Vista is one of the most complex releases shipped by the Windows teams. This is the first time that a primary Client SP and a major Server release were jointly developed and released at the same time. Delivering a high quality SP1 has been the core focus for dedicated teams the past 15+ months. It’s been a long journey for some of them, but looking at what’s being delivered this is something we (as Microsofties) can be proud of. SP1 is a high quality release that addresses the user’s need for better key performance, reliability and compatibility issues while experiencing highly reliable setup experience. As far as I’ve tested this myself, I can only say it’s really a progress. I love working for this company, where so many people put their shoulders under a project and then come up with a good thing like this. I’m proud to be part of this family.
Key points of SP1:
- SP1 addresses many key customer frustrations including quality, infrastructure optimization, and adds support for new technologies and standards. SP1 further advances application and device compatibility, removing barriers for many customers.
- Today, customers have 10 times the number of certified for Vista Applications to choose from (from 254 at launch to over 2500 today).
- 98 out of 100 of the top selling applications of December 2007 are compatible with Windows Vista. Over 150 enterprise applications such as antivirus and VPN software have been updated to work with Windows Vista.
- 78,000 devices and components are supported by drivers on Windows Update, up from 34,000 in November 2006
As for the Belux state of deployment of Vista, it has been announced last week that we have reached the threshold of 1 million PC’s on Windows Vista in Belgium & Luxembourg. This impressive number has been fueled by exceptionally strong PC shipments (preloaded with Windows Vista) towards consumers and small businesses during the last 12 months. On top of these new PC shipments we are starting to see the first migrations towards Windows Vista in the Mid Market and Enterprise customer base (see www.microsoft.be/cases for the NMBS/SNCB reference case)
April 23, 2007 at 10:36 pm ·
Filed under MicroLife, Projects, Vista, Vaio
Jeezes. I feel like a running helpdesk trying to get things all worked out. Apparently, from what I’ve learned up until today, there’s been an error in the image IT created from my original configuration. The error might have appeared while creating the image from the ‘mother’ laptop, or it might have occured whilst putting the image on the network, or while using the network boot to load the image on the other laptops. Whatever way it is, there’s something wrong and it’s somewhat my fault, I guess.
So, what have I been up to these last ten days? I installed and formatted the test-Vaio about 9 times from scratch, using the original Windows Vista Ultimate that came with every laptop, then I installed Office again, then all the drivers and utilities from the Sony site, then the sidebar. When it was all done, I tried every known issue, until it was unreproducable.
The there’s a tiny little small issue with OneCare. I can activate it, it’s added to my Live account, but it doesn’t seem to be able to communicate with the software on the laptop, because that seems to keep on believing I’m still running the trial however the serial key has been entered and accepted. Ugh. Luckily some people are on it, trying to fix it asap, so I can get the other bloggers to enjoy the same service and normally, in the end, everything will work smoothly.
That said, if there’s anyone out there who has issues with Vista and Vaio combined, I think in the meantime I qualify as a certified problem solver… This sooo reminds me of the time when I was working at an ISP and I spent my lunches laughing with the guys over at the helpdesk… with the people who called in. Karma always comes back to haunt you. Trust me.
Other than that, the good news is I finally actually got to help out Tom Raftery, and also Hans Mestrum who’re now able to run Second Life on Windows Vista, just like I am. And on the Vaio. Yeey.
So, before I head to Vegas I’ll fire off an email to all bloggers and describe the install procedure from scratch, should they have the need to reinstall. Sorry for the inconvenience guys. I didn’t really think it would be this tricky to do a sysprep and copy the image you created afterwards.
March 22, 2007 at 12:33 pm ·
Filed under Projects, Technology, Vista, Vaio
Man… this is going to be hard :-) As part of the Vaio Influencer Program, a laptop has been sent to Ireland to reside in the loving care and attention span of Tom Raftery. Hardly unpacked, Raftery already pointed out a few bugs, one of them kept me and a few colleagues busy for quite a few hours yesterday. Reproducing the error was quite easy, but fixing it… that was something else. Eventually we managed to find out what the bug was and what it was caused by.
Tom couldn’t ’send to documents’ by right-clicking a powerpoint file on his desktop. Explorer crashed, Vista recovered. That’s not really pleasant to experience, and I must say it’s not something I tried out before shipping the laptops. So, what was going on here? We’ve done uninstalls of OneCare and Office, reinstalled it, had it updated… the entire show. Nothing seemed to help. We switched from laptop to laptop to start from zero again with the clean install, but still no results. Then my colleague Tom Mertens came up with the solution.
It appears that if you prepare a laptop in full (install all programs, gadgets etc) and then sysprep it to erase all user data, it causes the ‘documents’ folder to be un-assigned to a profile on another laptop when you then take an image of the ‘cleaned’ laptop to install it on the others. Weird, but true.
So. We’ve fixed the issue on the remaining laptops that still need to be sent out, and here’s how it works (should you accidentally end up in the same situation): You open the ‘documents’ folder and leave it open, right-click the file to be sent and it’ll work fine. In the future, you’ll no longer have to keep the documents folder open, apparently it only needs to be done once, and only if you’ve installed the laptop with an image from a sysprepped device. After that, we’ve encountered no more issues alike with files from the desktop.
Some people ask me why on Earth you’d ask a guy like Tom Raftery to bash your products around. Well, this is exactly why. The guy sniffs bugs like it was fresh air, points them out so we can solve them. There’s no use in giving a laptop for a project like this to someone who nine-to-fives by using two or three applications. You’ve got to make the best of it, explore the boundaries and have this thing tested to the max. That’s exactly what I expect from someone like Tom. I think we’ll be cursing some more when Tom has a go on it, but in the end, it’ll benefit all users, and that’s exactly why we do this. Feedback, report, improve, update. A simple cycle to make life a little less hard.
Read Tom’s experiences at TomRafteryIT.net
March 15, 2007 at 5:44 pm ·
Filed under Buzz, Projects, Vista, Vaio
Today, the Vaio project I’ve been working on kicked off when I handed over the first laptop to the first blogger in the project. The setup of the project is rather simple. There are 10 laptops, and on all of them runs a Vista Ultimate. Besides the Vista, there’s also an Office Ultimate 2007 installed (the complete edition with OneNote, Grooves, and Outlook with Business Contact Manager). Those are the basic tools. The extras I installed are Windows Live Toolbar, Windows Live OneCare (90 day trial, Microsoft points will be sent out later on to have a 12 month subscription) and Windows Live Writer beta.
Other than that I preinstalled the most common web tools like a recent Flash player, a Shockwave player, an Adobe Reader and a QuickTime standalone player without iTunes so that the laptops are really ready to use and the bloggers don’t have to start their experience with downloading all sorts of things.
As an extra, I downloaded all the original drivers and utilities that were installed on the laptop when I got them delivered with the Windows XP on, so that in case of a system problem, the orginal drivers are within reach. I also added all the released Vista compatiblity patches that Sony listed on their site. Everything is working fine, and I only had to install one XP driver, the one for the Mass Storage Controller. There wasn’t a Vista driver for that yet.
In the favorites folder of IE7, I added links to the Vaio Help Center, so the bloggers can check for theirselves if they want to update that driver, but like I said, everything is running smooth, normally there should be no need to reinstall or update the drivers. It’s just a service in the spirit of ‘precaution’.
For the sidebar, I added over 40 gadgets the bloggers can play with, going from Soapbox -, iStockPhoto - and Wikipedia search to a quick-play Media Player and Outlook alerts. The list of gadgets (gadget name + version / creator / description):
- Alarm Clock + 1.1 / link8506 / provides visual feedback when alarm rings
- BarCode Clock + 1.0.0.0 / Loke Uei / cool barcode clock
- Binsearch + 0.0.0.1 / Andrew Haigh / Find the binaries you want
- Bloglines Feeds + 1.0 / Jim Rogers / Keep track of bloglines feeds
- Bubble Wrap + 1.0.0.0 / Tim Blackshirt / Pop! Pop! Pop!
- Color Swatches + 1.0.0.0 / Tim Blackshirt / Slowly changing color combinations (copy RGB values)
- Contacts + 1.0.0.0 / Microsoft Corporation / See list of Windows contacts, search contacts etc
- CPU Meter + 1.0.0.0 / Microsoft Corporation / See current CPU and memory use
- Currency + 1.0.0.0 / Microsoft Corporation / Convert from one currency to another
- Digital World Clock + 1.5 / Sanwar / place multiple clocks, edit the description and timezones
- Empty Space + 2.0.0.0 / All in One Computer Center / make empty space between gadgets
- Feng Shui Gadget + 1.0.1 / Techie Type Guy / Improve your energy flow, Feng Shui your desktop
- FTP Access + 1.0 / Rick Robey / easy to use FTP sever access gadget
- Future Clock + 1.0.0.0 / Mark Van Beek / Modern clock of the future
- Gmail checker + 1.1.0.0 / Jack Chapple / checks your Gmail account for new email periodically
- Gmail Inbox Reader + 1.0.0.0 / Microsoft Corporation / Stay up to date on your Gmail inbox
- Gmail Quick Login + 1.0 / Justin Vaillancourt / Allows you to quickly login to Gmail
- Google Search Bar + 1.1.0.0 / Tijl Deneut / Search google for text or images
- IP Config + 1.0 / Vinod Unny / Displays your machine’s IP Address info
- iSee + 3.0 / Herman Amiune / Sidebar access to last YouTube, Google Videos and iTunes podcasts
- iStat Battery + 1.01 / iSlayer / Monitor battery usage
- iStockphoto Search + 1.0 / François Sachs / Search for stockphotos on istockphotos.com
- Live Messenger Gadget + 0.5 / Gary Zhao / Chat from the sidebar, see status of friends
- Live Search + 1.0.0.0 / Ross Dargan / Search the web using Live.com
- Live Search Maps + 1.0.0.0 / Microsoft Corporation / Monitor Traffic Flow in your area (US)
- Magic 8-Ball + 0.5 / B. Rasmussen / Can’t decide or problems prediciting the future? The Magic Ball has it all!
- Memory Meter + 1.0 / SFkilla / Show memery stats (used, total, available), has 33 skins
- Notes + 1.0.0.0 / Microsoft Corporation / Sticky notes – Post-its for the sidebar
- Outlook Info + 1.5.5 / Kelly Daamen / number of unread mail, upcoming appointments and tasks
- Outlook Tasks + 1.0.121.0 / Microsoft Corporation / See your daily tasks
- Phone Notify + 1.0.0.0 / CDYNE Corporation / Calls any phone in US + Canada and speaks the text you type
- Picture Puzzle + 1.0.0.0 / Microsoft Corporation / Basic sliding puzzle
- Polaroid + 1.6.0.0 / Jonathan Abbott / place photos on your desktop, with some basic editing functions
- Run Program + 1.0.0.1 / Dima / type the name of a program, document, folder or internet resource and open it
- Say It! + 1.0.0.0 / LiveGadgets.net / Enjoy mindless fun listening to your computer swear
- Sidebar Pong + 1.0 / SJB / Sidebar Pong
- SlideShow 1.0.0.0 / Microsoft Corporation / show a continuous slide of your pictures
- Soapbox on MSN Video Search + 1.0.0.0 / Todd Ostermeier / Search for videos on MSN Video
- Sphere Timer + 1.0.0.0 / Rogério Tomio Hirooka / Absolute TimeControl: clock-alarm-count-chrono
- Stocks + 1.0.0.0 / Microsoft Corporation / Monitor your favorite stocks
- Systran Gadget + 1.0.7 / Systran / Translator and dictionary for 14 languages
- Terror Alert + 0.0.0.1 / Benjamin F. Beideman / Displays the current Homeland Security Advisory level
- TwentyFourClock + 0.1 / Rick Martinez / Tells the current time, 24 style (from the tv series)
- Unread Live Mail + 1.0 / Lawrence James / view unread mail items in Lever Messenger account
- Voodoo Doll + 1.0.0.0 / Team Blackshirt / Don’t get mad, get evil ! Mwahahahaha…
- Weather + 1.0.0.0 / Microsoft Corporation / Weather from around the world
- Wikipedia + 1.0 / Eric Malamisura / Search Wikipedia for info
- Windows Media Player Gadget + 2.0 / David Thompson / Play files without opening WinMP
The purpose of this campaign is to collect feedback from bloggers with different social backgrounds, who also have different professional needs and different private needs when they use ‘our’ technology and software. Bloggers from all over Europe have been selected to participate, from Denmark, UK, Ireland, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, Spain… Obviously ‘we’ aimed for influential bloggers with a rather large audience in the hopes they would write about their experience with Vista, Office and the Live services. However, the bloggers are not committed to write anything. It’s not an exchange of goods for buzz or services. They are free to write what they want and if they want.
The big difference with the Ferarri campaign that ran in the US is that in this case, a personal line of communication is established between the bloggers and myself BEFORE the products are shipped, that I will ping them on a regular basis (every 2 or 3 weeks) for the coming months to help them out should anything happen or should they have questions. I will collect the feedback online through email and by following their blogs and offline as well, through meetings and phone calls, to stay in touch with them. I personally send out the laptops with my cell phone number and email address included, not some marketing agency with a call center or a ‘hold’ button, and the bloggers know exactly what ‘we’ (as Microsoft) expect when they sign up for the project. Only bloggers who have agreed to be part of this project will receive a laptop.
Starting next week on Monday, the shipping begins! I’m so excited! I really hope all goes well…
