David Overton's Blog

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• Improved searching of Windows Servers (2003, 2008, SBS, Windows Home Server) and Windows desktops (Vista and XP) through the Windows Search 4.0 Preview which improves local and network searching

  There is a feature that I 1st found of Windows Home Server that can be applied to SBS, Windows Server, Windows Vista / XP and any other Windows system with Windows Search 3 or 4 on it. This feature is the ability to search the other machine’s index rather than the files, meaning that you can go to a file share and search 100s of GBs of files in a couple of seconds simply by using the Vista search box. The Search V4 Preview extends this ability to more versions of Windows. That is not all it does – see the note... Posted Apr 03 2008, 12:28 PM by David Overton with | with no comments Filed under: Windows Vista and XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Home Server, beta, Windows Client, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Search

• If you liked the Deep Zoom (aka Sea Dragon) tool, then you will be blown away by the preview of the Deep Zoom Composer

  I created my Star Wars Deep Zoom preview and really liked it, but then contacted the author of the site to see how I could add more pictures and control the layout &/or host it myself. Normally when I ask these sorts of questions I get a response about "later" and "out of beta", but instead I got pointed to these 3 articles and I have to say Wow!! You can see what someone can do with this technology at The Hard Rock Cafe - http://memorabilia.hardrock.com/ Download the Preview of the Deep... Posted Mar 13 2008, 09:55 PM by David Overton with | with no comments Filed under: Developer, Community, beta, Microsoft, Documentation, Demo, Internet and Web, Expression, Partner, Silverlight

• PhotoZoom using Silverlight and DeepZoom (aka SeaDragon) technology - mine is on Star Wars, but we could create a SBSC one

  The above technology is built using Silverlight 2.0 beta that was announced at MIX08. You can upload photos or import via an RSS feed. I did the later, bit it occurred to me that we should start something like this for SBSC and ISV partners. To see the effect, go to http://photozoom.mslivelabs.com/Album.aspx?alias=Doverton&album=1 and then zoom in and out using the +/- in the top left corner or the scroll wheel on your mouse. It is quite amazing! Hat tip to Steve for this one ttfn David Technorati Tags:... Posted Mar 11 2008, 02:13 PM by David Overton with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: Developer, Live, Fun, beta, Microsoft, Silverlight, ISV

• How to Report a Problem Page in IE8 with the Report a Problem Webpage for Internet Explorer 8.0 Beta Add-On

  I've spent the day using IE8 and while it is faster, some pages have problems. If your seeing this, download this add-on to submit to Microsoft. Report a Webpage Problem Internet Explorer 8.0 Beta Add-On The Microsoft Report a Webpage Problem Internet Explorer Add-on allows the user to submit a report to Microsoft for webpages they believe are having rendering problems, scripting errors, or various other types of problems Download details: Report a Webpage Problem Internet Explorer 8.0 Beta Add-On To use... Posted Mar 07 2008, 09:53 PM by David Overton with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: Support and Tools, Developer, Community, Internet Explorer, beta, Microsoft, Internet and Web

• Internet Explorer (IE8) beta 1 now available ... Wow

  We all new that the super standards mode was coming, but look at all the announcements today, including the downloads : IE8 and CSS 2.1 Testing Since I joined the IE team at the beginning of 2007, it has become clear to me how important it is for web developers to predict how a given browser will work. I’ve certainly heard and read how very important it is to web developers to minimize the cost IE8 and JScript As Dean mentioned yesterday in his post announcing the availability of the Internet Explorer 8 Beta... Posted Mar 06 2008, 10:56 PM by David Overton with | with no comments Filed under: Internet Explorer, beta, Microsoft, Internet and Web

• Latest news, events and downloads in the Security world from Microsoft - Windows Server 2008, Mobile, employee habits, Antigen, IPSEC, ForeFront, NAP, XP Firewall, System Center

  Each month the TRM blog product this great summary of the Microsoft world in various product areas. The blog can be found here http://blogs.technet.com/trm/ News Help your customers securely deploy Windows Server 2008 with the Windows Server 2008 Security Guide! http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=92550 Every day, adversaries attempt to invade your customers’ networks and access their servers—to bring them down, infect them with viruses, or steal information about customers or employees. Your customers are... Posted Mar 06 2008, 05:55 AM by David Overton with | with no comments Filed under: Windows Vista and XP, Office System, Support and Tools, Windows Longhorn, Security, Community, Windows Server 2003, beta, Event, SBSC, Windows Client, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Office 2007, Documentation, Malware, Tips, ISA Server, Partner, Service Pack, SharePoint, Windows Server 2008, Office Communication Server

• Internet Explorer goes for standards 1st - Microsoft's Interoperability Principles and IE8

  IE8 is cooking along nicely. IE is one of those products that is highly impacted by standards and given the announcements Microsoft made about standards and interoperability last week, the IE team have made some announcements ( IEBlog : Microsoft's Interoperability Principles and IE8 ) Microsoft's Interoperability Principles and IE8 We’ve decided that IE8 will, by default, interpret web content in the most standards compliant way it can. This decision is a change from what we’ve posted previously. Why... Posted Mar 05 2008, 08:08 AM by David Overton with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: Internet Explorer, beta, Open Standards

• Office Live Workspace is now available (in beta) for all - aka Windows SharePoint Services for all small businesses

  According to the site Workspaces (WSS for Office Live users) is now not quite out of beta, but still has a lot to offer: Anywhere Access Save 1000+ Microsoft Office documents in one place Access them from almost any computer with a Web browser No more flash drives or sending yourself documents via e-mail Learn more Share with Others Invite people to your workspace You control who can view, comment, and edit your documents Stop manually merging versions from multiple people Learn more Extend the Microsoft Office... Posted Mar 04 2008, 10:42 PM by David Overton with | with no comments Filed under: Office System, Windows SharePoint Services, Hosted, Software as a Service, beta, SBSC, Microsoft, Office 2007, Office Live, Small business, Internet and Web, Partner, Software plus Service, SharePoint

• Microsoft Online Services - beta in US, international .. not for a while yet, but you get to see where Microsoft is going!

  What is it? I know Vlad is not going to like this, but even he will admit that this has been on the cards for a while. Software plus services is coming to town in a bigger and bigger way. At the moment there is a limited beta in the US and (just like Google), it has the beta tag on it . So what have we seen today, well we have seen Microsoft stand up and be counted in it's commitment to the software-plus-services strategy. We have seen existing "on premise" solutions of Exchange and SharePoint... Posted Mar 03 2008, 09:01 PM by David Overton with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: Business, Community, Exchange, Hosted, Software as a Service, beta, Event, Microsoft, Office Live, Internet and Web, Partner, Licensing, Software plus Service, SharePoint, OWA, Outlook Web Access, If you only read one post today

• Technical RollUp : March 2008 - Technical Rollup Mail - Platforms (Windows, virtualisation, Active Directory, Core, Debugging, Terminal Services, Vista SP1 changes / new / implementation guides)

  As always, from the Technical RollUp : March 2008 - Technical Rollup Mail - Platforms blog posting. I've removed all the KB article stuff and it is worth pointing out that towards the end of the list are all the docs associated with what has changed with Windows Vista SP1: Blogs and information Windows Virtualization Team Blog http://blogs.technet.com/virtualization/ The World Simplified is a Virtual World http://blogs.technet.com/virtualworld/ Ask the Directory Services Team http://blogs.technet.com/askds... Posted Mar 03 2008, 09:37 AM by David Overton with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: Windows Vista and XP, Support and Tools, Windows Longhorn, Virtualisation, Developer, Windows Server 2003, beta, Microsoft, Windows Client, Windows XP, Vista, Windows Vista, Documentation, Demo, x64, Partner, Virtual PC, Virtual Server, Terminal Server, Windows Server 2008

• All change - Windows Vista SP1 here now for technical customers - it was delayed. It is still a little way away for non-technical people

  Last week Microsoft announced SP1 for Vista to the world , but then said some device drivers were causing problems so there would be a delay to enabled those to be resolved. That is the device drivers, not SP1. Well, as you can imagine, there was a fair amount of noise around this, so the rollout has been changed to enable technical people who were on the beta and MSDN & Technet Plus people to get it much earlier. Someone once asked me why we could not get things on the web quicker - well, if you have a... Posted Feb 12 2008, 07:04 AM by David Overton with | with 5 comment(s) Filed under: Windows Vista and XP, Community, beta, Microsoft, Windows Client, Windows Vista, Service Pack, System Update

• New way to see information on Windows Mobile - regular updates and good detail

  I got the heads up on this on Friday, installed it today and already love it. Go to the MSN Direct site to learn more about what it is and how it works What is it MSN Direct for Windows Mobile is ready for a Technology Preview. It is a Windows Mobile Standard Smartphone application that connects to our information service and delivers the information that you care about – and it updates automatically – and you never have to enter an URL, or wait for a web page to load. What type of info can I get? Weather, Stocks... Posted Feb 12 2008, 12:07 AM by David Overton with | with no comments Filed under: Windows Mobile, Software as a Service, beta, Microsoft, mobile, Software plus Service

• New build of Vista SP1 RC Preview to load and rumour that Vista SP1 Confirmed for February 15

  I've been running Vista SP1 builds for a while and I like them. I don't like the process of changing builds which is "simply" a case of uninstalling the old build, letting it reboot twice, updating the registry, doing find updates in windows update, reboot, do it again, reboot, do it again, wait 15 mins, do it again, then let it install for a chunk of time, reboot twice more. Now, you won't have this fun when the "real" update comes out, but us testers simply enjoy this process... Posted Jan 27 2008, 06:49 PM by David Overton with | with no comments Filed under: Windows Vista and XP, Support and Tools, beta, Windows Client, Vista, Windows Vista, Service Pack, System Update

• Internet Explorer 8 (yep, not yet released) does standards (well Acid anyway)

  Earlier this month on the IE blog there was some discussion about IE8, almost the 1st discussion about this - Internet Explorer 8 . Now they talk about the "Standards Mode" and how for those who want near 100% standards based web sites can live happily together. It is worth saying that it might end up 100% standards based, but since I don't think such a thing exists, all I will say is that is passes all the standards tests. Acid is one of these tests. I strongly recommend you read the the whole... Posted Dec 19 2007, 10:44 PM by David Overton with | with 1 comment(s) Filed under: Internet Explorer, beta, Open Standards

• WSS v3 Search and Search Server - how to mix the two and fix the error "The search request was unable to connect to the Search Service"

  I got this e-mail the other day: Hi David,From your posting "How to install Microsoft Search Server 2008 Express - including how to install on Windows Home Server" it seems that you had some similar problems that I am experiencing regarding running wss3 and ssx on the same server. In my case it effectively broke the "search this site" option and I'm trying to find a solution to this do you by any chance now what is my problem? I keep getting the error message: The search request was unable... Posted Dec 18 2007, 10:03 AM by David Overton with | with no comments Filed under: Office System, Windows SharePoint Services, beta, Tips, SharePoint, Search