The Microsoft Management Summit (MMS) brings together the brightest IT professionals from around the world to increase their technical expertise through an intensive week of training led by experts in desktop, device management, datacenter, and cloud technologies.
Checkout the ASKCORE listing of selected sessions at http://blogs.technet.com/b/askcore/archive/2013/04/23/sessions-from-mms-2013-now-available.aspx.
Want to learn more about the Microsoft Azure service and all of the capabilities? Scott Guthrie is broadcasting live right now (April 23, 2013 from 9am - 10:30am PST) so head on over the http://channel9.msdn.com/ for the live stream.
It’s here. It’s here. It’s here. Yep, the 2013 Windows PowerShell Scripting Games are finally here, and today is the official kickoff. Launched this morning at the first community organized International PowerShell Summit taking place in Redmond, Washington this week, the 2013 Scripting Games launched amid great fanfare!
See the rest of this post at http://blogs.technet.com/b/heyscriptingguy/archive/2013/04/22/2013-powershell-scripting-games-official-kickoff.aspx.
Let's say you want to create a sticky note app that lets you add a sticky note on your Windows 8 desktop computer. Then this sticky note is sent to a live tile on your Windows 8 phone and your Windows Surface, so you simply can't forget or ignore it! Windows Azure Mobile Services helps you easily put together Windows Store and Windows 8 phone apps that can do this.
See how at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/silverlining/archive/2013/04/17/access-roaming-data-in-the-cloud.aspx.
Over the next couple days we will roll out a major upgrade to Microsoft account, including optional two-step verification to help keep your account more secure.
Microsoft has increasingly focused on delivering connected devices and services that are currently used by more than 700 million people around the world. A Microsoft account is the key that unlocks your experience across these products—from your Windows PC to your Windows Phone, from Xbox to Outlook.com, from SkyDrive and Skype to Office and much more.
For the complete post and more information on this subject, see http://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoft_blog/archive/2013/04/17/microsoft-account-gets-more-secure.aspx.
This morning we announced the general availability release of our Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) support for Windows Azure – including our new Virtual Machine and Virtual Network capabilities. This release is now live in production, backed by an enterprise SLA, supported by Microsoft Support, and is ready to use for production apps. If you don’t already have a Windows Azure account, you can sign-up for a free trial and start using it today.
See the rest of the information in the deep dive at http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2013/04/16/windows-azure-general-availability-of-infrastructure-as-a-service-iaas.aspx.
See the announcement on the Azure blog at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsazure/archive/2013/04/16/the-power-of-and.aspx.
On April 27, 2013 something very cool is happening. A bunch of Windows Azure MVP's and community activists are organizing a Global Windows Azure Bootcamp. This is a completely free, one-day training event for Windows Azure, all organized by the community, and presented in person all over the World.
See the rest of Scott’s post at http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2013/04/12/windows-azure-global-bootcamp-on-april-27th-sign-up-now.aspx.
People are continually surrounded by devices that are connected to a network. Even the latest refrigerators and washing machines can connect to the internet and home networks. So it’s no surprise that end-users expect their apps to be connected as well. These “connected apps” consume the latest content from the web—social media, digital media, blogs, and other types of content. Developing connected apps has become the norm, but it can still be a challenge to handle common issues like loss of network connectivity, metered network costs, or performance issues. Windows 8 makes it easier than ever before to write a connected app.
See all of the details at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsappdev/archive/2013/04/10/creating-connected-windows-store-apps.aspx.
For the latest and greatest on business intelligence and business analytics, look no further than the PASS Business Analytics Conference, which kicks off today in Chicago. At a time when data is increasingly at the forefront of the industry conversation, this event offers an opportunity to go deep and take a look at how business intelligence and data professionals are using analytics to further their business goals. Are they able to share their insights and tell stories in new ways?
See http://blogs.technet.com/b/dataplatforminsider/archive/2013/04/10/day-1-pass-business-analytics-conference-the-art-of-analytics.aspx for more information.
Missed the live broadcast of Microsoft Certified Career Day 2013? Want to revisit the sessions? You're in luck! You can now watch the following recorded webcasts on your own time at aka.ms/mccd2013.
See http://borntolearn.mslearn.net/btl/b/weblog/archive/2013/03/18/catch-highlights-from-certified-career-day-2013.aspx#fbid=p101Vk5hNK2 for more information.
Today we released some great enhancements to Windows Azure. These new capabilities include:
All of these improvements are now available to start using immediately (note: some services are still in preview).
See Microsoft Corporate Vice President Scott Guthrie’s blog at http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2013/04/08/windows-azure-active-directory-general-availability-new-backup-service-web-site-monitoring-and-diagnostic-improvements.aspx for more information.
We finished the RTM release of Visual Studio 2012 in August 2012 and launched it in September. At that time, we committed to releasing new value into Visual Studio via a regular cadence of Visual Studio Updates, and in November 2012 we released our first, Visual Studio 2012 Update 1 (VS2012.1), which contained not only bug fixes and performance improvements, but also new functionality spanning four primary areas of investment: Windows development, SharePoint development, agile teams, and continuous quality.
See the rest of Soma’s blog post on this release at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/somasegar/archive/2013/04/04/visual-studio-2012-update-2-now-available.aspx or go directly to the download at http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=38188.
In February 2013 Microsoft received the Common Criteria (CC) certificate for SQL Server 2012 SP1 Enterprise Edition (English) x64 (Version 11.0.3000.0) at EAL4+ and compliant with U.S. Government Protection Profile for Database Management Systems, Version 1.3, 24 December 2010. This is the 7th CC certification for SQL Server, starting with SQL Server 2005 SP1 in 2007.
See the remainder of the blog post at http://blogs.technet.com/b/dataplatforminsider/archive/2013/04/04/sql-server-2012-common-criteria-certification.aspx for more information.
Congratulations SQL Server Team!
Microsoft is looking for great student research on the future of cybersecurity policy. If you have conducted or plan to conduct such research, read on for information on how you can win a $5,000 cash prize for your research in our Cybersecurity 2020 essay contest.
Get the full details at http://blogs.technet.com/b/security/archive/2013/03/21/cybersecurity-2020-student-essay-contest.aspx.
See the official rules and information at http://www.microsoft.com/security/gssd/contest.aspx.
Join us for live discussion and Q&A as we are joined by well-known technology analyst, author and blogger, Paul Thurrott and other special guests including early adopters and top Office engineers. Don’t miss the fun as our adventurous hosts reveal lesser known deployment secrets and much more.
More information at http://blogs.technet.com/b/office_resource_kit/archive/2013/03/22/garage-series-live-new-office-real-world-adoption-tips-tricks-and-secrets-shared.aspx.
Microsoft’s 2013 Spring CIO Summit takes place April 9-10 and will host more than 200 CIOs from companies across the US. Registration for the in-person CIO Summit is at capacity, but that doesn’t mean any of Microsoft’s customers have to miss out. This year the virtual CIO Summit is a complete hybrid experience, with live streaming of day one of the in-person Summit on Tuesday, April 9, covering every keynote session plus originally produced content available only to the virtual audience.
Register for this webcast at http://bit.ly/16k6PyF. See the agenda at http://bit.ly/VCIOAgenda.
System Center Global Service Monitor helps achieve a 360-degree view of the health of web applications. It uses Windows Azure points of presence across the globe, monitored alongside existing data found within the familiar System Center 2012 Operations Manager console. Global Service Monitor reports on availability, performance, and function of web applications by scheduling and executing synthetic transactions against the application from Windows Azure.
Today, we’re pleased to announce commercial availability of this Windows Azure-based service to our customers with active Microsoft Software Assurance coverage for their System Center 2012 server management licenses.
See the full post and details at http://blogs.technet.com/b/server-cloud/archive/2013/03/28/announcing-availability-of-global-service-monitor-and-system-center-advisor-support-for-windows-server-2012.aspx.
Working with data to gain new insights not only involves dealing with the data that you already have but also being able to find additional data to complement your analysis. In many cases, this additional data is publicly available to everyone but it has been traditionally difficult to find and to leverage in your analysis.
Because Public Data is essential in a variety of Self-Service BI scenarios, we added an “Online Search” feature in Data Explorer. This button is your first step to find data and import it right into your spreadsheet, without having to switch context.
See the full post on the new Data Explorer blog at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/dataexplorer/archive/2013/03/27/data-explorer-online-search-overview.aspx.
We are pleased to announce and personally invite you to our next developer conference, Build 2013, which is taking place June 26-28, 2013 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. It’s been a while since our last developer event in the Bay Area, and we’re looking forward to a fantastic gathering.
See the full blog post at http://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoft_blog/archive/2013/03/26/announcing-build-2013.aspx.
No two enterprise IT departments are the same – but one thing they all have in common is this: They want the components of their IT infrastructure (hardware, software, cloud, apps, etc.) to JUST WORK.
One of the things I really love about my job is the opportunities I have to meet with so many of our customers and partners around the world. Despite the diverse conversations we have on their specific needs, there is a common issue I hear over and over: The first and foremost concern for companies is the performance and reliability of their infrastructure.
See the rest of Brad Anderson’s blog post at http://blogs.technet.com/b/in_the_cloud/archive/2013/03/25/transforming-the-data-center-and-hybrid-it.aspx.
System Center is a comprehensive management platform that enables you to more easily and efficiently manage your IT environments, including your server infrastructure and client devices. With System Center 2012 SP1, you get the most cost effective and flexible platform for managing your traditional datacenters, private and public clouds, and client computers and devices. System Center 2012 is the only unified management platform where you can manage multiple hypervisors, physical resources, and applications in a single offering.
See http://www.microsoftvirtualacademy.com/training-courses/System-Center-2012-Service-Pack-1-Updates for the complete listing of courses.
Over the last few years I’ve had, in one meeting or another, countless discussions with my teams and colleagues about the size, shape, and impact of the Cloud. If you’ve been to a Microsoft event like TechEd or MMS, you’ve heard us talk about the Cloud OS and the promises we feel the Cloud OS delivers. What can get lost in so much of the discussion, however, is a simple question: What is the Cloud OS?
See the remainder of Brad Anderson’s blog post at http://blogs.technet.com/b/in_the_cloud/archive/2013/03/21/a-real-cloud-os-for-the-enterprise-cloud-era.aspx. This is a good read. Well worth you time. Join in the conversation.
With the recent announcement about Azure HDInsight, now is a good time to look at how one might use Data Explorer to connect to data sitting in Windows Azure HDInsight.
As you might be aware, HDInsight is Microsoft’s own offering of Hadoop as a service. In this example, we are going to look at how data can be consumed from HDInsight. We will be using a dataset in HDInsight that contains historical stock prices for all stocks traded on the NYSE between 1970 and 2010.
See the remainder of the blog post at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/dataexplorer/archive/2013/03/18/mashups-and-visualizations-over-big-data-and-azure-hdinsight-using-data-explorer.aspx.
Yesterday, Microsoft announced that Windows Azure HDInsight Service – the company’s cloud-based distribution of Hadoop – is now available as a standard preview service through the Windows Azure Portal. Windows Azure HDInsight Service builds on top of the Hortonworks Data Platform to ensure full compatibility with Apache Hadoop while providing customers with the low cost and elasticity of cloud computing.
See the rest of the blog post at http://blogs.technet.com/b/stbnewsbytes/archive/2013/03/18/microsoft-brings-big-data-to-windows-azure.aspx for more information and links to key resources.
As developers build on the full capabilities of HTML5, touch, and hardware accelerated graphics, the web today is more engaging for consumers than many imagined. The experiences developers are building today simply were not possible just a few years ago. Saturday marked the third anniversary of the IE Test Drive site. What started as a few examples of hardware-accelerated HTML5 to help developers imagine the potential of the web, has grown to a collection of over 140 feature-packed demos.
See the entire blog post from the IE Team at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ie/archive/2013/03/18/imagining-a-more-engaging-web-3rd-anniversary-of-ie-test-drive.aspx.