Two Microsoft MVPs that normally specialize in System Center Operations Manager are offering a webcast in January to let the world know why they are excited about AVIcode and its acquisition by Microsoft, as part of the larger System Center management story.

 Click here to register for the AVIcode webcast on January 12

As a personal plug, these two SMEs are some of the top-rated bloggers on SystemCenterCentral.com, as well as great speakers and experts on System Center technologies.  Check out their other great info:

Simon Skinner – SystemCenterCentral    Twitter

Pete Zerger – SystemCenterCentral   Twitter

I will be tuning in to hear what they say, will you?

YES !!!   It is here !!

And not just the bits, but also the details on how SMSE / SMSD customers can get it !

Last month, I caught up with my friend Gordon McKenna – CEO of Inframon and Microsoft MVP at TechEd 2010 Europe.   He has been bringing AVIcode technologies to his customers for years before the acquisition, so he had some great things to say about the Microsoft’s newest technology:

The official details of the 5.7 release are on the System Center Nexus blog.

Software details and licensing info are at www.microsoft.com/AVIcode .

As always, thanks for reading …

I am starting my New Years’ Resolution early by sharing some of the non-System Center geek things that make my life easier or better.

The Windows Sidebar is not new, having been first introduced with Windows Vista.  And most of us probably have the weather, a clock and Bing search tools.  But every time that I rebuild my desktop (which happens by choice more often than I care to admit), the first thing that I do is install the Outlook Upcoming Appointments gadget.  It is available for free from the Gadget Gallery. 

As I am completed managed by my calendar (and unfortunately not the other way around), this is invaluable instead of waiting for Alerts or routinely maximizing Outlook.  Instead, it puts the next few appointments up on my desktop.  

The only gotcha is that the gadget was released for Outlook 2007.  Editing one text file and changing ‘12’ to ‘14’ in two places makes it completely happy to work with Outlook 2010.  Specific instructions on which file and what to change are listed as the top community comment.

Merry Christmas, y’all !

Thanks for reading…

There is a new Partner Guide on Data Protection that was just released on Redmond Channel Partner’s online site.

There is a rumor that DPM 2010 shows heavily in the guide - - as does the EDPM appliance from i365. 

So, check it out !!!

Don’t ya love it when some of your friends connect with your other friends – and you didn’t even know until they were already connected ?!

Well – some of my friends at i365 make a very cool DPM appliance that combines DPM 2010 and i365’s EVAULT software to deliver “Best for Windows” and “Heterogeneous” backup, respectively.   And the i365 solution is delivered in pre-configured appliances that are designed for midsized businesses – and can even replicate to the cloud for DR.  Check out my last i365 blog post.

Well – the folks from i365 loaned one of their appliances to some folks at ESG.   Some of the Backup-industry analysts that I respect most (Lauren Whitehouse and David Chapa) are at ESG, so I always listen intently when ESG is looking at backup trends and technologies.

Here is part of the punchline from the ESG Lab Review of i365’s DPM appliance:

When ESG asked users to name their priorities for data protection investment in 2010, the top four responses were: improving disaster recovery capabilities, backup of virtual server environments, improving application backup, and desktop/laptop backup and recovery. EVault for DPM provides the capability to address all of these needs for small to mid-size customers.

Check out the ESG Lab Review of the i365 DPM appliance.

Today (actually yesterday) marks five years for me at Microsoft.   It’s been an amazing adventure so far and as usual for anniversaries, it seems like both yesterday and a lifetime ago that I started.

At the time, I was a Microsoft MVP in File System and Storage technologies – which is the closest category that they could find for a guy who likes to back things up and restore them.

I joined MS to be the “Technical Product Manager” – a.k.a. corporate subject matter expert (SME) and evangelist – for Data Protection Manager (DPM), whose v.1 product had released to market about a month prior.  This was the perfect job for someone who had been deploying, selling and marketing backup technologies for fifteen years.  For nearly ten of those years, I had hoped to join Microsoft in one role or another.  The DPM gig was truly perfect for me not only in its subject area (backup) but also because Microsoft was willing to allow me to be a telecommuting PM, which meant that I didn’t have to relocate to Redmond.

While DPM has usually been my primary product focus, I have also had some great opportunities to work on some other technologies in addition to DPM:

	Of note is that DPM 2006 was the first product branded “System Center” … which meant that while I was explaining why and how Microsoft was delivering a backup product, I was also able to start painting a vision of what System Center was.   :-)
	The DPM and Windows File / Storage folks were combined for a few years, which was an amazing chance to also work on: File Services     an OEM appliance     File Services
	With the DPM team re-merged back with the rest of the System Center team, I had the opportunity to work on the complete SC management story – for our midsized business customers
????	This year, it has been very exciting to be a small part of bringing in the newest technologies of the SC family – AVIcode !     … and it is an honor to now be working on the next generation of one of the most popular products in the System Center family – Operations Manager !!

And along the way, I even had a chance to write about some of my favorite video games on Xbox.com.  Where else can a server guy write about video games than Microsoft ?!?  

These days, OpsMgr and AVIcode are filling much more of my time than DPM … which certainly makes me look forward to what other cool technologies that I will have the chance to work with for the next five years!

As always, thanks for reading !!