Chris Parkes: A PC is not just for Christmas...

Introducing Microsoft Office 2010

2009-07-21T22:29:51Z

There’s a great series of eleven short Silverlight videos from the Microsoft product team with regards to Microsoft Office 2010 available! The videos detail:

Access
Excel
Office Mobile
Office Web Applications
OneNote
Outlook
PowerPoint
Publisher
SharePoint Workspace
Word

Each video lasts around two minutes and looks good in full screen view. Head on over to the Office Business site for details:

Parkesy

Microsoft Office 2010 Technical Preview

2009-05-12T09:53:47Z

The Microsoft Office 2010 “limited” technical preview, due in July 2009 has a waitlist which you can sign up to as of today.

This is an invitation only program which will provide access to early, pre-release versions of Office 2010. The full list of applications:

Access 2010
Communicator 2010
Excel 2010
InfoPath 2010
OneNote 2010
Outlook 2010
PowerPoint 2010
Publisher 2010
Visio 2010
Word 2010

There is also a new, official product group IT Pro blog here.

Parkesy

ServerQuest II – A Day in a Geeks Life

2009-05-07T18:51:06Z

Here’s a neat little online game which can also be a great pointer to some valuable resources. The idea is to collect “Geek Points” as you deal with day to day problems being handed to you on a plate by your boss and your inbox!

Server Quest II is the sequel to last year’s pixellated adventure. As the resident IT professional, the scenario begins with your return from holiday when in a temporary spell of relaxed judgment, you’ve jeopardised your reputation by forwarding your personal holiday snaps to the entire organisation..!

Visit www.server-quest.com and be prepared to be ushered into a world where the IT Pro rules. Find out if you’re geek enough to play and experience “a day in a Geek’s life” with ServerQuest II—with your reputation on the line, only the server can save you!

Parkesy

Windows 7 Release Candidate Available

2009-05-06T11:17:28Z

I spent a day recently upgrading my PC’s to Windows7. That’s my home Media Center, my work laptop and my “spare” testing machine which lives in my home office. These machines were all purchased pre Vista launch and Windows7 runs on each and every one of them. So do all my devices… Impressed? I sure am!!!

The Windows7 Release Candidate can be downloaded now from here. My favourite UI enhancement so far is the new Media Center interface, I love the scrolling backdrop of album art when I’m listening to my tunes…

All the information on Windows7 can be found on the main Microsoft site.

Parkesy

2007 Microsoft Office System Service Pack 2

2009-04-21T17:30:00Z

If you feel the need to gain an understanding of what is going to be contained in Service Pack 2 for the 2007 Microsoft Office System, the Office Sustained Engineering Team have published a list on their blog. This covers both Office desktop and server products, including Microsoft Office SharePoint Server and Shared Services.

Click here for full details.

2007 Microsoft Office System SP2 is due to be released on 28th April 2009.

Ciao for now :)

Ferrari Website Built on SharePoint

2009-04-03T18:30:00Z

From Scuderia to Store, Community to News, there’s a whole host of droolable content over on the new Ferrari website, built on Microsoft Office SharePoint Server.

Head on over to http://www.ferrari.com and enjoy!

I guess I could crack some pun about SharePoint being the Ferrari of the website world but I wont!!! Ciao for now :)

SharePoint Designer 2007 Now Available as Free Download

2009-04-03T14:49:49Z

SharePoint Designer is now available as a free download from Microsoft.

SharePoint Designer can be used to customise SharePoint sites. I recorded a two minute webcast on how to use it to apply the sample themes which you can view here.

You can download the full version directly from here and more information on the product can be found here.

Please note that if you are using SharePoint Online (part of BPOS,) there are some customisation capabilities that are not supported in the current version of SharePoint Online, primarily the use of code in workflows or forms, or modifications that require deployment and configuration on the server (for example, security policies, web.config changes, etc.) or that require changes to the database schema.

Enjoy!

VS 2008 Extensions for SharePoint - March 2009 CTP Released

2009-03-20T14:51:46Z

The March 2009 CTP Visual Studio 2008 extensions for SharePoint are now available. You can download them directly from here.

Also included in this release are ten new themes for SharePoint built as VSeWSS projects. You can download them from here.

Ciao for now :)

SharePoint, Customisation and Sample Master Pages

2009-03-18T19:00:29Z

Here's another screencast I've recorded which shows how to apply the sample custom master pages available on Office Online to Windows SharePoint Services team sites.

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server - Customisation

This recording is based on the Demo Showcase virtual images, a resource readily available to Microsoft Gold and Certified partners. Total running time is just over two and a half minutes :)

Parkesy

SharePoint, People, Personalisation and MySite

2009-03-16T19:00:32Z

Here's another screencast I've recorded which shows some of the Microsoft Office SharePoint Server personalisation capabilities of MySites including profile editing and blog creation.

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server - People & Personalisation

This recording is based on the Demo Showcase virtual images, a resource readily available to Microsoft Gold and Certified partners. Total running time is just under five minutes :)

Parkesy

SharePoint, Collaboration and Workflow

2009-03-13T14:12:58Z

Here's another screencast I've recorded which shows some of the Microsoft Office SharePoint Server collaboration capabilities including the out of the box Approval workflow.

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server - Collaboration

This recording is based on the Demo Showcase virtual images, a resource readily available to Microsoft Gold and Certified partners. Total running time is ten minutes :)

Parkesy

Insight Into FAST Search and SharePoint Roadmap

2009-03-05T12:33:34Z

The roadmap for SharePoint Search and FAST enterprise search integration got an update today. In summary:

FAST Search for SharePoint is a new search server adding FAST ESP capabilities into Microsoft Office SharePoint Portal Server (SharePoint "14")
ESP for SharePoint is high-end search for Microsoft Office SharePoint Server, available today.

You can find out more from the official SharePoint Team blog...

http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepoint/archive/2009/02/10/microsoft-unveils-new-enterprise-search-road-map.aspx

Parkesy

SharePoint and 64 bit (x64) Development

2009-02-04T15:42:51Z

I've been struggling to develop anything on my 64bit Windows Server 2008 box for a while now, mainly due to lack of support for this on 64 bit. The Visual Studio 2008 Extensions for Windows SharePoint Services version 1.3 addresses my needs :)

You can download from here and more details on the content of the package can be found here.

Can be installed on x64 Server OS machines running SharePoint x64. Previously only x86 Server OS could be used
Command line build, package and retract commands are included enabling continuous integration and build servers. Previously command line build of SharePoint projects was very difficult
Refactoring support for renaming of Web Parts. Previously renaming a web part required changes in several files in the project

Enjoy!

Parkesy

SharePoint and Search

2009-01-29T18:49:31Z

Here's another screencast I've recorded which shows some of the Microsoft Office SharePoint Server search capabilities including how to search across content including the business data catalog and people.

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server - Search

This recording is based on the Demo Showcase virtual images, a resource readily available to Microsoft Gold and Certified partners. Total running time is under four minutes :)

Parkesy

Microsoft ROI Calculators (from Nucleus Research)

2009-01-28T18:39:12Z

The following tools may be useful to help build business case and justification with regards to return on investment (ROI) requirements as part of a project bid which involves any of the following Microsoft technologies:

BizTalk Server
Business Intelligence
Dynamics AX/CRM/GP/NAV/SL
Enterprise Project Management
Exchange Server
InfoPath
PerformancePoint Server
SharePoint
SQL Server
Visual Studio Team System

http://nucleusresearch.com/microsoft-roi-support-center/

Enjoy :)

Parkesy