As an IT Manager or IT Professional you probably spend a lot of time under pressure at work. So when the time comes to relax you probably want to make the most of it. So as a test, we want to find out if you are interested in getting together (virtually) every couple of weeks to interact with the...

WOW! What an amazing event . I spent most of today in the John Bassett theatre at the Metro Toronto Convention Center watching Damir and Rick deliver an excellent set of sessions on Communicating and Collaborating. For anyone out there that was unable to attend the session, and is looking into mobility...

After 5 weeks of touring across the country and delivering presentations in 10 different cities, all I can say is WOW! The Canadian IT Pro's and Developers are great. As Damir mentions in his post "It has been an amazing five weeks..." For those of you that were not able to attend every session...

Here is the third of the Launch 2005 audio recordings. This was recorded live on November 22nd as part of the Launch 2005 activities in Vancouver. If you were not able to attend the Architecting for High Availability Session, download the mp3 version to hear what my colleague Damir Bersinic had to...

Here is the second of the Launch 2005 audio recordings. This was recorded live on November 17th as part of the Launch 2005 activities in Victoria. If you were not able to attend the Managing and Monitoring SQL Server 2005 Session, download the mp3 version to hear what you missed. The session runs...

Here is the first of the Launch 2005 audio recordings. This was recorded live on November 8th as part of the Launch 2005 activities in Toronto. If you were not able to attend the Delivering Business Intelligence Session, download the mp3 version to hear what you missed. The session runs about an hour...

It's about 3:30 on a Sunday afternoon and I'm sitting in my hotel room in Vancouver overlooking a very foggy harbour. We've completed four of the ten cities on this cross Canada tour. So far, we have been to Toronto , Ottawa , Edmonton , and Victoria . This week we are in Vancouver and then Calgary...

Let the fun begin. As Mark posted earlier today , the Launch activities are underway. I have posted a few behind the scenes and setup photos to the flickr group ( rss ), and hope to post more as the day unfolds. Remember, get spotted wearing old launch gear, and you could win a prize. ...

Well, we're into the final few days before the first event on the SQL/Visual Studio Launch tour. Mark Relph has been busy blogging and has a couple of posts you should really read: Sneak Peak at the software (Yes we are giving away software) Blog about the tour and win prizes Wear your...

For those of you that have asked questions about whether we will be handing out software at the Canadian launch events, Mark Relph has just written about this on his blog: http://blogs.msdn.com/mark_relph/archive/2005/10/28/486419.aspx Enjoy, Tags: [ Microsoft ] [ SQLServer ] [ Launch2005 ]...

Are you planning on attending the SQL/VS/BizTalk Launch ? Are you planning on blogging about it? If you are, you may want to add your blog to the TechNet Event Bloggers site ( http://techneteventsbloggers.net ). As I mentioned in a previous post , you may also want to consider tagging those posts. ...

Are you blogging about the joint SQL Server / Visual Studio / BizTalk launch this November? If you are, you might want to consider tagging your blog posts to make it easy to search for anything "Launch 2005" related. Simply tag your posts with Launch2005 by adding the following somewhere in your...

Last week I had the opportunity to visit both Edmonton and Winnipeg as part of the TechNet Innovations tour and User Group Tour. I had the opportunity to meet lots of great IT Pro's and answer lots of questions. For both the Edmonton Microsoft User Group and Winnipeg IT Pro User Group we had a great...

In a previous post I mentioned that I would be presenting at the SCM '05 Symposium in Toronto. I had the good fortune of running into a couple of people that I hadn't seen in quite a while. It seemed as though the conference was well attended and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. I have...

If you're going to be in the Greater Toronto Area, and are interested in Supply Chain Management, I'll be speaking at the Third Annual Symposium on Supply Chain Management at the Wyndham Bristol Place Hotel on Thursday September 29th . The title of the session is: Enhancing Business-to-Business Integration...

The Canadian Launch Team here at Microsoft has put together a blog where we can publish all thing related to the upcoming SQL Server 2005 / Visual Studio 2005 / BizTalk Server 2006 Launch. Take a look at http://blogs.msdn.com/canadian_launch_tour_2005/ . Over the next few weeks as we get closer to...

One of my colleagues out in Calgary has already got this info posted, so I won't duplicate the information. Take a look at Dan Sellers Blog Post: http://blogs.msdn.com/dansellers/archive/2005/09/06/461448.aspx to find out when we will be in your city. Also, keep an eye on http://www.microsoft.ca...

This past Saturday one of my colleagues - Bruce Cowper - hosted a Vista Beta 1 Install Fest at the Microsoft office in Mississauga. I was there to help out as well as document the event. If you were at the event and are looking for the photos that I was taking, head over to: http://www.flickr.com...

Hot on the heels of the TechNet Spring Tour where we talked about both IT Pro and Developer topics, I will be giving a presentation and demo for the Toronto SQL Server User Group. We'll spend an hour or so talking about the x64 (Intel and AMD 64-bit) architecture in relation to both SQL Server 2005 and...

Having completed four of the five cities on this tour, I find myself sitting in a hotel room in Montreal catching up on my email. I have received some great questions and comments from attendees in the various cities so far. The most common question has been "are the slides available somewhere?" Absolutely...

The Technet and MSDN teams have teamed up for this tour to bring you a day full of SQL Server 2005 and Visual Studio 2005 presentations and demos. We will be kicking off the tour in Ottawa on June 2nd and will be heading out to 4 other cities after that. The day is going to split into two halves....

Be one of the first technology professionals to take advantage of the SQL Server 2005 readiness labs! Organizations today are facing several unique data challenges: the proliferation of data and systems across their enterprise; the need to provide employees, customers, and partners with consistent access...

Well, the first week of the tour is complete, and I'm just sitting at the airport waiting to fly out to Calgary. Bill Hilf and I have already completed 3 cities, Toronto, Montreal, and Ottawa. I'm heading out west to visit Calgary and Vancouver on this leg of the Tour. If you attended the sessions...

According to industry analyst firm Gartner, the technology industry has entered a period of high commercialization of Linux. Many acknowledge that Linux may have a place in their organizations, but many questions remain – questions about the business and technical merits of Linux, what risks will need...

Thanks to all that attended the BAM and BI session last night. Also, thanks to Scott Cairney from Cactus Commerce . For more information about BizTalk Server 2004 head over to: http://www.microsoft.com/biztalk/default.mspx For more information about SQL Server 2005 take a look at: http://www.microsoft...