Windows Server and System Centre are the building blocks for our Private Cloud solution – on their own they are great products, together they are fantastic. I want you all to have a play with them, to evaluate them to see if you can find room for them inside your organisations. So, as an incentive to get you to do just that, I’m going to put the names of everyone (in Ireland) who downloads the evaluation software into a hat and pull out a load of winners after the summer.
I have done this before and I asked you to send me proof of your download. That wasn’t too smart of me - my inbox filled up! Turns out I can request a report of everyone who downloads from Ireland – as long as I respect your privacy:
Whilst you’re registering for the evaluation make sure you opt-in to communications from Microsoft so I can contact you. Obviously if you already receive emails from Microsoft you won’t need to do this.
Now, if I do pull your name out of the hat, I will send you an email to inform you of the good news.
Download the two evaluations today!
Download Windows Server 2012 Release Candidate (RC)
Download Microsoft Private Cloud Evaluation Software
At the end of the Summer I’ll be pulling names out of a hat. The first one out will get a Nokia Lumia 800. The next fifty will receive a 8GB memory stick.
Enjoy your evaluations.
Windows Server 2012 will Release To manufacturing (RTM) in the first week of August – that’s when you’ll be able to download and install it. Combined with Windows Azure, is the cornerstone of Microsoft’s truly differentiated Cloud OS vision.
Based on your feedback, we are making Windows Server 2012 licensing simple, economical, and better aligned with how you use it, including aligning the model with System Centre 2012. There are now four editions based on the size of your organisation, as well as their virtualisation and cloud computing needs.
From a technical standpoint, these editions are the same. All features that are available in the Datacenter edition are also available in the Standard edition. The only difference between the two editions is virtualisation rights. Windows Server Standard Edition includes two instances of Windows Server while Windows Server Datacenter Edition includes unlimited instances of Windows Server.
With Windows Server 2012, there’s ONE QUESTION you have to ask: Are you licensing Windows Server 2012 to run:
A. a workload on the bare metal, or
B. as a virtualization host?
If the answer is A, then you should purchase Windows Server 2012 Standard. If the answer is B, then you should purchase Windows Server 2012 Datacenter.
In announcing that Windows Server 2012 will be available in four versions, Microsoft also said that development of the Windows Home Server and Small Business Server platforms will be discontinued,
This is great! At the Worldwide Partner Conference, we announced a new offering that provides Windows Azure services (Web Sites and Virtual Machines) for Windows Server using System Center 2012 SP1
Details on how to get started on this are here: http://www.microsoft.com/hosting/en/us/services.aspx
We have two (I know we have many more than 2 really) gurus on Windows Server 2012 in Ireland, both Aidan Finn and Damian Flynn are Microsoft MVPs.
Aidan Finn has a load of short videos up on YouTube covering a lot of the neat features in Windows Server 2012.
Damian Flynn was speaking at TechEd Europe – two of his four sessions were recorded:
Deploying Private Clouds: Lessons Learned from the Windows Server 2012 TAP
Windows Server 2012 IP Address Management
And they have both just published a book! Microsoft Private Cloud Computing is available is both in Paperback and for the Kindle.
Irish Apps Update
At the Windows Phone Summit recently, Microsoft announced that the Windows Phone Marketplace officially hit 100,000 apps and games—a milestone we reached faster than Android, and a testament to the thousands of talented developers around the world who’ve supported us since launch. Together they deliver more than 200 new titles, on average, each day. Great apps such as Paypal and Audible and games such as Words With Friends, Draw Something and NOVA 3 are coming very soon with Window Phone 8, to learn more about Windows Phone 8 you can watch the announcement video.
At the same time Irish developers have embraced Windows Phone building over 600 Windows Phone apps in the past 6 months.. Microsoft Ireland is now working with developers to build more apps for Windows Phone 8 and of course Windows 8. Every one of those apps will work on the upcoming Windows Phone 8 devices.
Here are a small selection of the apps and games from Irish and international developers.
If you open this mail on your phone the links will take you direct to the app marketplace to install the app so you can showcase and share with your friends and family
Irish Times – Free
Features include the weather forecast, most popular stories, share tools and more to make this your daily "must read" news app.
Bus Nearby – Free
Find bus stops around you in Dublin, see when the next buses are due, then save your favourites stops.
Parking Tag - Free
This is a simple app to allow you to park your car in Dublin in 4 button presses
Irish Tides - Free
Tidal predictions for 130 ports around the Irish coast. Gives the estimated tidal heights and times of HW and LW for the next 7 days
iSpeak – 99c (free trial available) iSpeak is an award winning speech and text translator, say your phrase in your native language, choose output language and iSpeak will read in a native accent.
1st4 Live Manchester United Scores - Free Live scores, commentary, news, fixtures, results and opinion for Manchester United. Winner of International Sports app of the year and with 25 5* reviews this is an example of how to design for Windows Phone.
Wizard Wars - €1.29 (free trial)
Battle hordes of rampaging enemies, use items like bombs and shrink spells to hinder their advance. Earn gold to fund your war efforts & upgrade your towers.
Solar Sprint – 99c
Solar Sprint is an endless runner in the infinite playing field of space. Create a vortex in order to, shepherding a planet from one solar system to another avoiding Asteroids
Doodle Bomber 7 - free
You are a Bombardier in a WW1 era airship flying back and forth over a canyon filled with targets. Your job, release the bomb at the right time to hit as many targets as possible.
Skype -Free
Talk to friends, family, and colleagues anywhere in the world and see them as if they're in the same room.
LinkedIn – Free
Find and connect with more than 161M members worldwide, read the latest news, keep up-to-date with your groups. This app beats any iOS or Android equivalent
rowi –Free
An easy-to-use Twitter app with a clean, simple design.
Netflix – Free (subscription required)
Watch TV episodes and movies on your phone with this must-have subscription service.
WhatsApp - Free
WhatsApp uses your 3G or WiFi to message with friends and family. Switch from SMS to WhatsApp to send and receive messages, pictures, audio and video messages
Weave - €2.99 (free trial)
A fresh take on RSS readers, built exclusively for Windows Phone.
Viber - Free
Viber lets you connect with your friends for free. It synchs with your mobile phone number and contact list to instantly show who uses Viber.
Tune In Radio - Free TuneIn is a new way to listen to live local and global radio from wherever you are. TuneIn offers over 50,000 stations and 1.2 million on-demand streams.
Xbox Companion - Free Search for your favorite movies, TV shows, music, and games, and play them on your Xbox from your phone.
Finn Krewer a student in NUI Galway built the most popular Irish developed app of 2011 watch his story
Did you know that Microsoft & Nokia are funding a student or startup that has a killer idea for a Window Phone app? If they submit their idea to AppCampus they can receive funding and help to build their app.
That’s it for the update.
Oh, and if you happen to be building a Windows 8 App, please let me know (I might be able to help you get it into the Windows Store before we launch).
Rory Monaghan is a Galwegian who has been working in application virtualization and the desktop space for over 5 years.
He has put together this series of short video tutorials guiding you through what it is and how to set it up through to troubleshooting it when it’s not working (which is hopefully infrequently).
Microsoft Application Virtualisation (App-V) enables enterprises to meet the needs of users and IT by empowering anywhere productivity and accelerated application deployment. It provides anywhere user access to applications that available on any authorized device without application installs.
The first video in this series in just a presentation to introduce you all to APP-V. I discuss the requirements for APP-V, the different components, the capabilities of APP-V and the different types of setups.
This video is a walk through demonstration of the setting up the APP-V Full Streaming environment.
This video is an end to end of APP-V sequencing and a how to for streaming the application from the APP-V server.
This video is a demonstration of the APP-V Management console with an explanation of the different options available.
Troubleshooting in APP-V explained
Thanks Rory
Windows 8 represents an unprecedented opportunity for designers and creative agencies as leading brands, businesses and app publishers around the world are beginning to re-imagine their experiences and differentiate themselves on Windows 8. The fastest way to get ready for Windows 8 is to learn about User Experience and Design from the team that built the platform. The Windows team would like to extend an exclusive invitation to this online training session on June 14th 2012.
The goal of the training is to give designers a solid understanding of how to design great Windows 8 apps that leverage the full capabilities of the platform and follow the UX guidelines. After this training, you’ll understand the tenants of a great app, how to think about information architecture as well as best practice for designing flexible layouts, touch and how to leverage contracts and much, much more.
Logistics
Dates & Times
June 14th / 8.50am – 5.45pm PST
Location
Online Training
Registration Link
https://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1032515356&Culture=en-US
Enjoy
On Thursday 7th June Scott Guthrie presented the Meet Windows Azure session To say that what he announced was amazing would be an understatement!
I personally find this part of the announcement awesome – who’d of thought that Microsoft would ever be selling you a Linux virtual machine?
If you have the time I strongly suggest you watch Scott’s presentation: http://www.meetwindowsazure.com/Conversations#ScottGuthrieMeet
On Friday 8th June, I held an online meeting to discuss Windows Azure for IT Professionals. It was timed to be the day after Microsoft launched a plethora of new features onto the Azure platform. Vikas Sahni & I had been planning this event for quite a while, but were not “allowed” to tell you what we would be talking about.
We had a few technical “issues” but got there in the end. We did record the session, but even had issues with that! I’d say that the Friday afternoon gremlins were at play (we didn’t get to record it all).
The idea was to introduce Windows Azure to IT Professionals – Azure has been positioned/sold to Developers up until now. As of last week, it’s very much targeted to everyone. IT Professionals will LOVE Windows Azure.
The slides we used are here: http://sdrv.ms/LtbhBg
I’ve broken the recording down into these pieces:
And that was where the gremlins took over!
Vikas continued to create a Wordpress blog site. Then I went on to explain the new networking features (VPN directly between your infrastructure and Azure – virtualised networking).
Read up about the new Windows Azure here: http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/
The Windows Upgrade Offer went live on Saturday 2nd June. Here’s how it works:
More details and FAQ available from www.windowsupgradeoffer.com.
Mary-Jo is on holidays and recruits Aidan Finn to replace her?
"I’ve asked a few illustrious members of the worldwide Microsoft community to share their insights via guest posts on a variety of topics — from Windows Phone, to Hyper-V. Today’s entry is all about Hyper-V Replica and is authored by Aidan Finn”
Aidan Finn is a Microsoft Valuable Professional (MVP) with an expertise in Virtual Machine. He works for MicroWarehouse Ltd, an Irish Value Added Distributor, as a Technical Sales Lead, working closely with Microsoft and VARs in Ireland. He blogs on aidanfinn.com, tweets as @joe_elway, and has written or contributed to books such as Mastering Hyper-V Deployment (Sybex, 2010) and Microsoft Private Cloud Computing (Sybex, 2012).
This guest post by Aidan explains Hyper-V Replica, a new feature in Windows Server 2012. The up and coming new version of Windows Server includes loads of new features that will see Microsoft leapfrogging VMware for all your virtualisation requirements. Hyper-V replica is just one of them.
Well done Aidan for being considered one of a few illustrious members of the worldwide Microsoft community
Here’s his post: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/microsoft/one-of-windows-server-2012s-secret-weapons-hyper-v-replica/12707?tag=mantle_skin;content
Let me open with a big congratulations to last week’s winners (Damian Niezgoda, Michael Maher and Anthony McCarville) all of whom are getting a 32GB USB drive as their prize for completing my Microsoft Virtual Academy challenge - to pass the Office 365 for the IT Pro - Lync Online, SharePoint Online & Deployment exam.
I started this little initiative back in February as a way to get you excited about learning (again?) and to give you an extra incentive and some guidance. I’ve been kicked off of my top spot on the Top Ten list for Ireland and have given away loads of TechNet Subscriptions and weekly prizes. I did promise to keep this going until the Summer, which officially was the 1st May. I still had a few prizes left and it’s been colder in the last few weeks than it was at Christmas! Summer is finally here (it was 23 degrees in Belfast yesterday) and the forecast is looking good. This will be your last MVA Challenge
So, get your version of this screenshot into my inbox by the end of May (by close of play on Thursday May 31st). Your challenge is to pass the Understanding Microsoft’s High-Availability Solutions test.
I hope I have been successful, that you’ve enjoyed playing along and that you’ll continue learning without my little incentives.
Unfortunately I can’t open this up to the world – you’ll have to give me an Irish address to claim your prize (North or South).
This week’s winners were Brian O’Hanlon, Jonathan Flack and Joe Glynn. They each won their choice of either an Umbrella, a Rain Jacket, a Mini-Toolkit or a 32GB USB memory stick – and all they had to do was learn!
This week’s Microsoft Virtual Academy challenge is to pass the Office 365 for the IT Pro - Lync Online, SharePoint Online & Deployment exam.
Send me your version of this screenshot before 09:00 on Monday 21st May to be in with a chance of winning a prize.