Last night's inaugural (don't ask me to spell that again!) Vista Squad User Group meeting was very sucessful. Around twenty technical enthusiasts gathered at the Microsoft Campus in Reading. I was particularly interested that the membership (approximately...

Thanks to James Senior for posting about the location of the recently released WAIK documentation . There's a wealth of free (no additional charge once you have a Windows license) tools in there including the Guided Help authoring tool ACWStudio2.exe...

Thanks to David Overton and James Senior for sharing the following... If you want to see what people are doing out there to make our OS look even better, look at these: (without modifying the OS) 3d cube based virtual desktop Rotation based Flip 3D Alternative...

Thanks to Rodney Buike for sharing his interview with Jeff Jones (Director of Trustworthy Computing @ MSFT) who discussed his extensive research of publically available vulnerability statistics. Here's the mp3 recording . Rodney contributes to the very...

I'm now responsible for the Data technology area of evangelism at Microsoft (in the UK) in addition to Information Security and Integration. If you'd like a local point of contact then please feel free to email me . Note: Thanks to Brent Edwards for the...

A good place to start is by joining Peter Blackburn for his session titled Introduction to SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services in the evening of 24th April in Manchester. The session is described as follows: What We Will Cover Introduction to SQL...

It's not long until the NxtGenUG Fest '07 event - it's taking place on 23rd May at the Microsoft Campus in Reading. Rafal is one of a number of top rated speakers including Oliver Sturm and Lorna Brown who'll be talking about Vista Security, Dynamic languages...

Microsoft has a wonderful "self help" culture whereby employees are easily able to directly access services online. Sadly there is a brand new system that isn't any where near as easy to use as it should be. The reason for writing this post is to encourage...

The Vista Squad's first meeting will take place on Wednesday 28th March starting at 18:15 @ Microsoft Campus in Reading, UK. If you'd like to share thoughts about .net and Vista then The Vista Squad may be just what you're looking for. If you'd like to...

Following on from my Effective Security Means Doing More with Less Risk post we need to consider how to deal with risk. The options are quite simple. Ignore it and hope the bad thing won't happen. Accept it as being manageable. Take steps to mitigate...

Information security is going through a major change. There are those who are ahead of the curve of mainstream adoption and of course there are those who have unique highly regulated environments who may struggle to adapt. Developers and IT Professionals...

Just before going on tour for our Technical (TechNet) Roadshow I received a shiney new laptop and promptly trashed the incumbunt O/S (XP) and replaced it with 64 bit Vista. All was good. I was in a hurry and therefore simply booted from the network and...

TechNet Webcast: Information About Microsoft April Security Bulletins (Level 200) Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM Pacific Time Christopher Budd, CCE, CISA, CISM, CISSP, ISSMP Security Program Manager, Microsoft Corporation Mike Reavey...

If you're new to Windows Vista's BitLocker featureset then I recommend reading " all you ever wanted to know about windows Vista's Bitlocker drive encryption and secure start up technologies " & " why won't bitlocker read my usb token on boot how...

During the Technical (TechNet) Roadshow and whilst meeting IT Professionals both online and offline many people have asked questions about Windows Vista's Bitlocker featureset. My earlier post titled all you ever wanted to know about Windows Vista's BitLocker...

I spent the weekend in the Yorkshire Dales just twenty miles from the venue and came across the following sign - it's for real: Grassington is a wonderful (very) small market town right in the heart of the Yorkshire Dales - great food, beer, views...

I loved the wonderful shape of Glasgow's IMAX theatre as you can see below - almost an organic shape formed of steel. It was a great venue. During the session I referred to a very informative Channel9 video covering the details of Windows Vista's User...

Following my post about Tech-Ed: IT Forum 2007 it's only appropriate for me to share the dates of Tech-Ed: Developers 2007 too. There will be more information available between now and the event. Rest assured that we'll have the same high standard...

I know it seems a long way away but I'm aware that many of you have to start justifying budgets very soon for activities later in the year. We're back in Barcelona for Tech-Ed:IT Forum - as before we'll have leading technical experts from around the...

If you live in the UK and would like to be interviewed by the BBC as part of an "Online Safety Panel" then browse here , complete the web form, sit back and wait to see if you're selected as one of the ten people to be filmed on 20th March.

I've changed the colour scheme and formatting of this blog to make it easier to read on devices with small screens. Any suggestions to improve it further are greatly appreciated. Thanks Steve

Thanks to James for writing about the upcoming Live Writer Gadget - I can't wait until it's finished. I like Live Writer as it's really useful for writing blog posts both offline and online

Thanks to David Weeks for sharing the following extensive list of Windows Vista product features corresponding to each edition running from Home Basic to Ultimate. Windows Vista Editions Feature Table Home Basic Home Premium Business Enterprise Ultimate...

The Port25 blog is the outlet of Microsoft's Open Source Software lab. It often includes interesting articles on topics I'd never expect to read about. Their remit is simple. Make it as easy as possible for other operating systems to integrate with Microsoft...

Thank you to everyone who joined us at the recent TechNet Roadshow venues of Nottingham and Bristol. A popular topic of discussion was Windows Vista's Guided Help feature. It's a great way of helping your users to learn how to make the most of the available...