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Having written a little about VDI and RHSD the other day, I see that Register has an item about RemoteFX and playing games.  This uses the technology of RDS as well as either VDI or RSHD. While you can play games, Windows 7 renders in all it’s glory too.  One word of warning from a licensing front.  If you are using RemoteFX then you will need an RDS CAL when you are buying the licenses as RemoteFX is licensed by the RDS CAL and remote admin tasks that you can do on a server without needing a RDS CAL does not include playing games (IMHO).  You also need to check that you have a client device that can handle RemoteFX.  While platforms like Citrix, Quest and VMware will enable various remote access technologies that do not use RemoteFX (Citrix and Quest will even allow the use of their own technology or RemoteFX) the device chosen still requires the capabilities to display the high quality applications and games, even if not enough to process it all in the first place! For example, for Citrix to use the GPU on the client to redirect Aero, it requires a Windows Client, even if it is not Windows 7.  Look at http://support.citrix.com/proddocs/topic/xendesktop-als/hd-aero-redirection.html for an example: Hardware Windows Aero capable DirectX 9-class GPU that supports: Pixel Shader 2.0 32 bits per pixel 128MB memory 2 GHz non-mobile central processing unit (CPU). Citrix recommends 3 GHz for optimal performance. Note: Dual monitor sessions are supported for user devices with a single GPU. A single GPU is defined as a single entry under Display adapters in Device Manager and not as the number of PCI cards plugged in the device. A single PCI card can have multiple GPUs on it. Software DirectX 9.0c runtime (Windows 7, Windows Vista, or Windows XP) What this all means is that you still need a good graphics card somewhere – the desktop or the server and some reasonable network bandwidth if you want good graphics!   ttfn David

I was keen to play with the Hyper-V R2 Service Pack 1 features, so I decided to download and install it, however I could not find anything that was not for Windows 7 or Windows Server (as opposed to Hyper-V Server).  After asking internally I was pointed to what I needed.  The process was fairly simple:   Download the SP1 beta from the Microsoft site and ensure you answer the questions correctly as an IT Pro to ensure you get the opportunity to download.  You will need to update both your Windows 7 / Windows Server client to manage the system as well as the Hyper-V Server, so you might need to download both the x86 and x64 versions as Hyper-V Server is x64 only. Remove the language packs that are not supported by the beta from the Hyper-V Server. To do this you will need to log into the console and run the LPKSETUP.exe program and remove anything that is not as part of the download package (English, French, German, Japanese, and Spanish) Run the SP1 update on the Hyper-V Server Run the SP1 update on the Windows 7 Client Open the properties page in your Hyper-V Manager on Windows 7 SP1 and you can now edit the new properties Remember that Remote FX requires a Windows 7 SP1 (beta 1) guest and that Dynamic Memory requires (for the beta only) a Windows Enterprise or Datacenter guest with Standard and Web being supported when it is out of beta. See http://blogs.msdn.com/b/virtual_pc_guy/archive/2010/07/12/dynamic-memory-beta-supported-guest-operating-systems.aspx for some more details on dynamic memory support in the beta.   thanks David Technorati Tags: Hyper-V , Hyper-V R2 , SP1 , Service Pack 1 , Dynamic Memory

I will be at iForum again this year representing Microsoft (with others). We will be presenting the joint VDI and Terminal Server solutions from Microsoft and Citrix, which includes Access Essentials for customers of less than 75 users. if you would like to attend, snap up the early bird discount. Here is the “blurb” Reducing costs, improving efficiencies and increasing performance is a challenge for any business…but Microsoft and Citrix can help. Citrix and Microsoft have decades of experience working together to provide customers a range of solutions which deliver choice, flexibility and cost savings. Our joint solutions to dynamically deliver desktop service and applications to uses wherever they are is based on tight integration of Citrix solutions with Window Server 2008, Hyper-V server virtualisation and terminal services / presentation virtualisation, and with the System Center management tools especially Virtual Machine Manager. Microsoft is proud to be a platinum sponsor at this year’s Citrix iForum 2009 event taking place in Edinburgh 15 th – 17 th June at the International Conference Centre – so register your place today and take advantage of the early bird discount that has been extended until the 30 th April http://www.citrixiforumedinburgh.com/?VOUCHER_CODE=MSFT1 Thanks David Technorati Tags: Citrix , Microsoft , VDI , Terminal Services , Access Essentials

Someone posted this question on a discussion group at work and it got me thinking. If you bought a nice new system over the last 2 or so years in preparation for SBS 2008 (Cougar as was or even SBS v.Next) and had it installed with SBS 2003 you've probably heard that SBS 2003 to SBS 2008 is a 2 box migration and needs the Swing technique to do an on box migration. I've come up with a much simpler solution, but your hardware might need some additions to make it work. So here is what you need: Box with 6GB of RAM minimum (4GB for SBS 2008, 1GB for SBS 2003 and 1GB for Hyper-V server). 1 new disk for SBS 2008 system disk and 1 disk to hold Hyper-V (which could be small if desired or temporary) System that meets the minimum system requirements of Hyper-V ( http://www.microsoft.com/servers/hyper-v-server/system-requirements.mspx ) You need to ensure your hardware is really up to spec and is fit enough that you want your new SBS 2008 system to run on it for the next 2+ years, otherwise this may well be a false economy. The process in outline is below. If you need more detailed information, let me know and I'll knock something up (as well as this may possibly end up in the book) Take a full system backup before starting Take existing system and add RAM and 2 disks Install Hyper-V Server onto 1 disk Install Hyper-V manager onto a client PC ( see here for details ) Configure the network to all nodes can connect to a real physical network that has your internet router and firewall on it Configure a virtual machine with pass-through disks that point to each of your SBS 2003 disks. To make a disk visible in Hyper-V console as a pass-through see here . Only configure approx 1GB of memory as you only need it to run well enough to perform a migration. Start and boot the SBS 2003 VM. Check that all services start (or can be started if there is a timing issue) and that all data is available. Install the integration Services Setup disk, run the setup and reboot when asked Create another virtual machine with 4GB of RAM that...

In my last post on installing Hyper-V for my home setup I said I had a number of issues.  One was that the Hyper-V Manager kept on showing the error "Cannot connect to the RPC service, make sure your RPC service is running".  This turned out to be several issues. To start with my Hyper-V box is in a workgroup, so security is manually configured.  Then there is the connection ID security - by hand and finally there is the client setup too.  I spent a long time with John Howard's blog which got me the following commands for the Hyper-V server: netsh advfirewall set currentprofile settings remotemanagement enable netsh advfirewall firewall set rule group="Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI)" new enable=yes netsh advfirewall firewall set rule  name="Remote Administration (RPC-EPMAP)" new enable=yes profile=domain netsh advfirewall firewall set rule name="Remote Administration (NP-In)" new enable=yes profile=domain netsh advfirewall firewall set rule name="Remote Administration (RPC)" new enable=yes profile=domain netsh advfirewall firewall set rule name="remote desktop (tcp-in)" new enable=Yes profile=domain net localgroup “Distributed COM Users” /add David There was then a few things to do on the client PC where it would not connect.  Again the postings at http://blogs.technet.com/jhoward/archive/2008/03/28/part-2-hyper-v-remote-management-you-do-not-have-the-requested-permission-to-complete-this-task-contact-the-administrator-of-the-authorization-policy-for-the-computer-computername.aspx helped me solve the problems. I've put all this here as a reference really, because John has been a busy boy and now has a tool that does this for you called HVRemote . So, learn from my pain and use John's tool.  You should be able to add a user and set the permissions very quickly.   One thing I will say is that I use OneCare on my OC client and I had to add some rules in the OneCare firewall:   - Port 135 for...

A Quick note - there has been lots of comments recently on who's virtualisation has what share of the market. I've just installed Microsoft Hyper-V server up and running with 3 VMs inside it (HomeServer, SBS 2008 and Windows Server 2003) and I expect a couple of small desktops too before long. Anyway, rather than just guessing, why not fill in Virtualization.info's survey? It took me about 45 seconds to complete at virtualization.info's Virtualization Adoption Surveys . I'll post on how I got everything working after I've got the next chapter of the book done. Should be 4 chapters done by the end of this weekend, although I'm behind a few pictures :-) ttfn David Technorati Tags: Hyper-V , Virtualisation , Virtualization , SBS 2008 , Survey , virtualization.info

I know the table above is really, really simple, but I wanted to start the ball rolling – I have been thinking about this for ages!! Let me explain the diagram. The horizontal axis signifies how much of a solution is hosted. An example of this might be Office Live or Hotmail, where almost all of the solution is hosted. We then have the “on premise” or on-site IT going vertically. For most people, this is solutions like SBS 2003. A typical S+S solution might be MS CRM Online which has online components, but also enables you to go off-web and use Outlook or one of the mobile clients when on the road. While many thought on-line would be the next best thing even the king of on-line, Google, have recently admitted that it would not always be the answer in the posting they made on April 1st. Steve Clayton did the leg work and checked this was not form of April fool too!! Even the NY Times is talking about it, which to me says it really is going mainstream - http://www.nytimes.com/idg/IDG_002570DE00740E180025742400363509.html . Ok, so that is the picture out the way, now lets talk about the question. Which question you ask… well, this one: Will any of your customers be running in the “S+S or hosted” marketplace in 5+ years time? Now while that is a good question, I expect most of you will say … some, definitely not all, but some. How many customers can you afford to lose to a S+S provider? Now this leads to an even bigger question …. What will you have done to ensure they are still your customers, as opposed to someone who is skilled in S+S? Personally I find this question much more concerning as many people can’t articulate any plans they have to capture these customers!! So what do I suggest … If you are a services partner I recommend you start to look at SaaS services like Office Live that are slowly moving towards S+S or S+S services like CRM online and start to plan how you could add value to them and make money in the future. If you are an ISV, then now is the time to start to look at services like the Sync Framework...

I saw this in the Technet newsletter and thought I would pass it on: The launch of Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008 is drawing near and we are pleased to announce the three main launch activities to help you learn more: 1) The main launch event on 19 March at the ICC Birmingham - register now 2) The TechNet and MSDN Roadshows in April and May - pre-register now 3) The Virtual Launch Experience also on 19 March - pre register now ttfn David Technorati Tags: Events , Windows Server 2008 , SQL Server 2008 , Visual Studio 2008 , Launch

If you don't know about the Heroes Happen Here :: Home campaign then you are very much behind the times. The Launch events for SQL Server 2008 (errrm), Visual Studio 2008 and Windows Server 2008 are fast approaching and so is your customers ability to buy and use them - do you understand what, why and when? If not, go to the website and see how your customers can benefit and why you should learn more about the product and what you can do to improve your business with these products. ttfn David Technorati Tags: Heroes happen here , Heroes happen {here} , Heroes , Windows Server 2008 , SQL Server 2008 , Visual Studio 2008

I saw these and they just made me laugh while sharing a few things about WS2008 vs 2003. Unlike some "new and improved" washing powders, Windows Server 2003 is a good product, but some key areas have been improved to meet people's new and different needs, such as more security, sharing of information, web based applications, minimal systems and virtualisation. The blog entry (which was obviously written before RC1 appeared, but posted afterwards) can be found at Windows Server Division WebLog : About Lone Server . If you want some fun, skip the soapbox video and look at the long video from the blog / link below. About The Lone Server Once I was almost famous. For years, my friends and I were on the front lines: we were the Windows Server 2003 servers that powered Microsoft.com, one of the hottest Web sites in the world. Then, early last summer, everything changed. Quietly, without warning, the new kids took over. Windows Server 2008. Yes, I know, the product’s not even done yet. These were Beta 3 servers, for Pete’s sake. Long way from prime time. But there they were, humming away. No problems. All of ‘em on Windows Server 2008. Except me. The last Windows Server 2003 left at Microsoft.com. Here’s a video (1:58) of my life today: And here’s a longer version (3:14), in case you have as much time to kill as I do: How can this be? If you’re like me (and I know I am), you probably wonder how a product that’s eight months away from shipping can be handed the responsibility of running something as big and important as the Microsoft corporate portal. Fact is, Windows Server 2008 was lurking around MS.com since back when they still called it Longhorn. Those early bits first took live traffic back in ’05. And since then, WS08 has been everybody’s favourite kid. They called it part of the development team. Said it was a prodigy. Given all the cool little jobs. But then, suddenly, to be given the whole enchilada? All of MS.com? While still in Beta friggin’ 3? Unimaginable, but there it was. My only hope is that...

Sorry to sound so vague, but I have to start by saying that Windows Server 2008 is a server platform, not a cure for cancer, so lets put it in perspective and set our expectations high, but not stupidly high expecting it to be revolution. Server 2008 is a quality evolution of Windows Server 2003 and extends and enhanced the Server 2003 offerings. However, if you plan on building applications for the future then Server 2008 will be the place to be. Microsoft have released a document called the "Windows Server 2008 Developer Story" that has a wealth of information on Server 2008 developer directions and how they combine to offer something greater than the sum of the parts. The download site describes itself as: Windows Server 2008 Developer Story An executable containing the Windows Server 2008 Developer Story The Windows Server 2008 Developer Story introduces users to new features of the Windows Server 2008 operating system by providing a cohesive story about how the features fit together to make a compelling platform for developers. The Developer Story topics explain how to take advantage of a new feature or solve a problem using the new Windows technologies. The topics include conceptual information for context and technical specifications for practical application of each scenario. This download contains the Windows Server 2008 Developer Story (ServerDevStory.chm). Download details: Windows Server 2008 Developer Story If you look inside the help file it loads then you get this list of the top 7 ways to take advantage of Windows Server 2008. Top 7 Ways to Light Up Your Apps on Windows Server 2008 Whether you are building Web applications or writing core server-based system services, Windows Server® 2008 provides many new features that you can leverage to build more secure, flexible, and innovative applications. Build More Flexible Web Applications on Internet Information Server 7.0 (IIS7) Extend IIS7 through modules New unified configuration model Administration capabilities using Microsoft.Web.Administration...

The TRM blog can be found here December 2007 - Technical Rollup Mail - Platforms Microsoft outlines pricing, packaging and licensing for Windows Server 2008, Including the new Microsoft Hyper-V Server product. http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/nov07/11-12HyperVPR.mspx Microsoft announces new virtualization offerings, Windows Server 2008 details, System Center product availability at TechEd IT Forum 2007 http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/nov07/11-12ITForumPR.mspx Solution Accelerators Take the guesswork out of your deployments. Use these tested and proven automation tools and guides to assess your network and confidently roll out new services employing architectures with baked-in security and manageability. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/solutionaccelerators/default.aspx The TechNet Team have launched Technet Edge, a new community site where IT professionals can go to get the inside scoop on the latest and greatest technologies. http://edge.technet.com/Default.aspx Introducing Microsoft Search Server 2008 http://www.microsoft.com/enterprisesearch/serverproducts/searchserver/default.aspx A successful enterprise search solution gives users efficient access to unstructured data, structured information, and expertise. It helps keep sensitive information secure; is easy to set up, administer, and manage; leaves room for scalability; and allows you to customize and extend your search experience. Search doesn’t have to be complicated. You can deliver it to your organization quickly and easily with Microsoft Search Server 2008 A successful enterprise search solution gives users efficient access to unstructured data, structured information, and expertise. It helps keep sensitive information secure; is easy to set up, administer, and manage; leaves room for scalability; and allows you to customize and extend your search experience. Search doesn’t have to be complicated. You can deliver it to your organization quickly and easily with Microsoft Search Server 2008 Download the Express Edition Free: http...

I saw this and thought I would pass it on since I was talking to one of my customers about this yesterday. To get to the two calculators go to Windows Server Virtualization Calculators Windows Server Virtualization Calculators The Windows Server Virtualization Calculators provide two ways to estimate the number and cost of Windows Server Standard Edition, Enterprise Edition and Datacenter Edition licenses needed for your virtualization scenarios to help you determine the most cost-effective edition of Windows Server. Calculator 1 is designed to estimate the licenses and cost of Windows Server by editions and numerous Microsoft server products on a single, physical server. Calculator 2 is designed to estimate the licenses and cost of only Windows Server by edition for one or multiple physical servers. The calculators are pre-populated with the US dollar Open agreement Estimated Retail Prices that you can update with your organization's prices for more accurate estimates. Calculator 1 lets you interactively build virtual machines running multiple Microsoft server products to estimate the licenses and costs for Windows Server by edition (Standard, Enterprise and Datacenter) and many Microsoft server products. It starts with configuring your server based on virtualization technology, sockets and clustering requirements, and then builds the virtual machines. Calculator 2 provides two ways to estimate the number and cost of Windows Server Standard Edition, Enterprise Edition and Datacenter Edition licenses needed for your virtualization scenarios to help you determine the most cost-effective edition of Windows Server. ttfn David Technorati Tags: Virtualisation , Calculators , Licensing

Having been on holiday, I did not look too far before posting my blog post on Vista SP1. Then while reading other peoples blog I discovered that there was some more excellent information out there. As always Susanne has published her communication which I am sure will be updated as more relevant information for small business partners becomes apparent. Kevin has a link to the TechNet site for SP1 on his blog . Finally a HUGE amount of information is shared on the Vista Blog and this Vista Blog entry . Some are a little upset that the GPMC is disappearing, but I've never used it on Vista, so let me know if you care one way or the other. Finally, I got my invite on Connect to sign-up for SP1, so I will let you know more as I load it and am able to share. ttfn David Technorati Tags: Vista , SP1 , Service Pack 1

This information is from the last 2 Technet Newsletters ( http://www.microsoft.com/technet ). Webcasts that have occurred in the past are available for download by clicking on the URLs. Blogs Exchange Team Blog http://msexchangeteam.com/default.aspx Outlook Team Blog http://blogs.msdn.com/outlook/default.aspx Awards Exchange Server wins CRN award The 2007 CRN Channel Champions Awards have been recently announced! http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2007/05/11/438675.aspx Evaluation Quickly Evaluate Microsoft and Partner Solutions Through a Series of Pre-Configured Virtual Hard Disks Microsoft Exchange on virtual hard disk (VHD) lets you try out the key features of Exchange Server 2007. With the VHD Test Drive program, you can download VHDs and evaluate them for free in your own environment, without the need for dedicated servers or complex installations. http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=692a6e3c-81c9-4d8a-93fa-266d651735dc&DisplayLang=en Educating Information Workers About Exchange Server 2007 The information and procedures in this document focus on the information worker features that can be accessed on a computer that is running Exchange Server 2007 that has the Client Access or Unified Messaging server role installed. This document provides overviews of these features and the tasks you must perform to manage and configure them. http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/info.aspx?na=22&p=19&SrcDisplayLang=en&SrcCategoryId=&SrcFamilyId=&u=%2fdownloads%2fdetails.aspx%3fFamilyID%3d31f73783-0517-4b02-84bc-1fd957eb2f3c%26DisplayLang%3den 1 June 2007 : TechNet Webcast: Exchange Server 2007 Client Access and Web Services (Level 200) In this webcast, we focus on Client Access Services in Microsoft Exchange Server 2007. The overall goal of Client Access Services is to add value to the data in your inbox by enabling you to access that data from any location. We explain how to access inbox data using Microsoft Office Outlook, Microsoft Office Outlook Web Access (OWA), and mobile devices...

There are a couple of recent announcements with regard to the current range of products that I thought I would cover off. One is about licensing and has been written up by Matt McSpirit at http://blogs.technet.com/mattmcspirit/archive/2007/06/22/microsoft-virtualisation-licensing-client-and-server.aspx and covers how many licenses you get when. The other is Virtual Server SP1: Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1 Is Now Available Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1 is the server virtualization technology engineered for the Windows Server operating system to increase hardware utilization and enable IT staff to rapidly configure and deploy new servers. Register to download the free software and you will receive relevant resources that are strategically assembled to address the challenges you will face as you discover, assess, and deploy the software. http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=7042993 The What is New page shows (plus more on the page) - note the x64 support for more memory. http://www.microsoft.com/technet/virtualserver/evaluation/vsoverview.mspx What's New in This Release Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1 includes the following new capabilities: Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1 Enterprise Edition can be installed on servers with up to 32 physical processors. • Virtual Server host clustering. Support for host-to-host connectivity lets you cluster all virtual machines running on a host. • iSCSI support. iSCSI clustering enables guest-to-guest connectivity across physical machines. • x64 support. Virtual Server runs natively within a 64-bit Windows host operating system, providing increased performance and memory headroom. • Enhanced PXE booting. PXE boot support has been added to the virtual machine network adapter. This means that when the appropriate network infrastructure is in place, you can perform a network installation of a guest operating system in the same way as physical servers. • Other improvements. Virtual Server now includes improved hyperthreading, support for F6 Disk (SCSI driver), Active Directory integration using service...

A nice man named Zack dropped me a mail asking about the Business Desktop Deployment (BDD) tools and "real" documentation, which led to Matt in the PTS team writing about all the great tools (see below). I then installed SP2 for Windows Server 2003 and realised that my SBS 2003 system now has the capabilities of BDD to deploy Vista desktops (in my case, pre-configured with Office 2007 too). Wow. I went and checked and the Windows Deployment Services admin controls are there on my SBS SP2 system, so you can use this information to enable PXE deployments of Windows if you want. These can include other programs such as Office and anti-virus products and also be pre-configures to join the domain etc. Business Desktop Deployment 2007 - Resources Posted Wednesday, March 14, 2007 11:43 AM by mattmcspirit For those of you out there who have an interest in the different ways that you can deploy Windows Vista, Office 2007 and your other applications, you may be interested in the Business Desktop Deployment Workbench, or BDD for short. So, what is it? Well, the BDD is essentially, your one-stop-shop for deployment when it comes to our new wave of technology. Want to customise your Vista install? Want to inject drivers for hardware into images? Want to customise WinPE 2.0? Want to easily create Unattend.xml files? Want next week's winning lottery numbers? OK, BDD can't help you with that last one, but it can allow you to do all the others! Source: Peering through Windows... ttfn David Technorati tags: BDD , Business Desktop Deployment , SBS 2003 , Service Pack 2 , SP2 , SBS 2003 SP2

With support for Vista and Office 2007 being key for people inside and outside of Microsoft we have had two updates recently to support this. This entry relates to Virtual PC 2007 and another will relate to SQL 2005 SP2. You can find out about Virtual PC 2007 at http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/virtualpc/default.mspx , however the key features over and above the 2004 product are: · Support for Windows Vista as a host · Support for Windows Vista as a guest · Support for Windows Vista 64-bit as a host · Improved performance compared to Virtual PC 2004 Ttfn David Technorati tags: Virtualisation , Virtual PC , Vista , Windows Vista , x64

FYI - I use this for all my testing, including my WSS v3 on SBS 2003!! Virtual PC 2007 Beta now available! Good news - the Virtual PC 2007 Beta is now available. You can sign up for it here: https://connect.microsoft.com/programdetails.aspx?ProgramDetailsID=874 . Major changes include: Support for hardware virtualization (Intel and AMD) Support for Windows Vista as a host operating system Support for Windows Vista as a guest operating system Note: No support for Aero Glass though - just Aero Basic Support for 64-bit host operating systems Note: Virtual machines are 32-bit only Improved performance There are also a plethora of bug fixes. Some notable ones include: Lots of work to allow Virtual PC to play better with laptop power management Fix for IntelPPM issue ( http://blogs.msdn.com/virtual_pc_guy/archive/2005/10/24/484461.aspx ) Virtual PC now supports greater than 2.2GB ISO images Source: Virtual PC Guy's WebLog : Virtual PC 2007 Beta now available!

Howdy folks, Just saw this over at the Xensource web site . It basically says that Microsoft and Xensource – organization leading the Xen Linux based virtualization tools – have extended their working agreements. A few months ago Xensource licensed Microsoft's VHD (virtual hard disk) format and now this has been further enhanced so that Xen will work with the Hypervisor that will ship for Longhorn Server. This means that if you need to run Windows and Linux, the virtualization technology underneath will actually work for you as opposed to against you. Another step towards MS and Linux interop. We already now support Linux guests on Virtual Server!! A bit more about Virtualization and Xen can be found at http://h0bbel.p0ggel.org/2006/07/18/microsoft-and-xen-sitting-in-a-tree/ Ttfn David

Hi guys, here at Partner Conference and one of the snippets I picked up is that Virtual PC is now a free download, following the lead Virtual Server. There are restrictions I believe, in the number of hosts, but how great is this. The product can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtualpc/downloads/sp1.mspx ttfn David

Today we had a bit of a kick of for FY07 (Financial Year 07 in Microsoft) and a review of FY 06. We had a healthy year with excellent growth (this is no way a prediction of the MS Company results) and we also did a bit of sweeping a few things out. It has been speculated for a little while that Alistair Baker would be moving on and today we had it confirmed. As of 31st July, the new MD of MS UK will be Gordon Frazer from the South African Sub. He did seem like a very positive and fired up person, so I think this will be nothing but goodness, as will having another Brit in the power halls at MS in the States. For the press release, have a look at http://www.microsoft.com/uk/press/content/presscentre/releases/2006/07/PR03662.mspx ttfn David

People have asked for my tools I use to produce my site statistics, so I have released a draft cut. It should all work. To get the best out of it you need a $20 subscription to http://www.maxmind.com/app/web_services_guide#city and MapPoint , but otherwise it works - without both these it is fully functional, but no maps. The source can be found at http://uksbsguy.com/files/11/files/entry735.aspx and the exes at http://uksbsguy.com/files/11/files/entry736.aspx . ttfn David

As some of you may know, I am a true Star Wars Geek. I love all 6 films - yes, even Jar Jar. I had heard about the 2nd game - me & Molly are loving the 1st game and then I saw this on MSN Video - amazing! Cool features - all the characters, the ability to go off piste with any vehicle and the ability to take characters apart and create new ones - just like you would with Lego Pieces :-) ttfn David

I found some amazing site themes at http://japan.communityserver.info/ and have updated the default site with this. If you wish to change it back, click http://uksbsguy.com/user/EditProfile.aspx and select the site theme of "default for CS2.0". You might also notice the Posts on this site Zoom Cloud showing you a cloud of the keywords mentioned on the site. See the site in it's full glory at http://uksbsguy.com ttfn David

Hello everyone, just a quick note to say that today Lizzy May was born into this world at 2:24am GMT. She is happy and health, as is her mum and the rest of us. She weighs 6lbs 15 1/2 ounces and was 54cms long. If you want to see some lovely pictures, go to http://uksbsguy.com/photos/doverton/category1018.aspx obviously this will slow down some of the posts over the next few days or weeks. ttfn David