The South Asia MVP Blog

Arijit Basu, a Dynamics AX MVP from Kolkata, India, has often seen that it becomes difficult to manage AX Configurations in an implementation. To relieve this pain in one of his implementations, he came up with an AX Configuration Launcher which can be installed on each user’s machine.

The launcher creates two local folders, one for .axc files and other for .url files. This launcher then shows all the files in groups to the user. These two folders can now be remotely updated/ synced by the admin so when new configurations are available, it is dropped into these folders and end users can access them. Also when existing configurations are no longer used, they can be remotely removed from the folders.

In version revisions, Arijit has revamped the user interface, and added the ability to sync from a centralized network share and to configure the application.

Download - AX Configuration Launcher

Jacob Sebastin, a SQL Server MVP from India, was a speaker at PASS 2009 Summit, where he spoke on Creating XML Schema Collections. Jacob’s attendee ribbons, based on attendees’ achievement, involvement and responsibilities with PASS, were a sight for sure!

As he mentions in his event summary, he was excited to be presenting at the Summit for the first time, and also enjoyed handing over signed copies oh his book - The Art Of XSD – SQL Server XML Schema Collections during his session. His session was also attended by Michael Rys, the Lead Program Manager for XML in the Microsoft SQL Server product team at Microsoft.

At the recently concluded Microsoft PDC09, Scott Guthrie announced and showcased Silverlight 4. While it earned all the wows from the attendees, for this weekend, we dig four of many awesome posts on Silverlight by the MVPs.

• Silverlight 3 DataGrid
• Bing Maps Silverlight Control
• Leverage content editor web part to render Silverlight application
• Create a custom web part to render Silverlight application

Big props to Silverlight MVP – Vikram Pendse and SharePoint MVP - Sundar Narasiman.

Vijay Raj, a Setup & Deployment MVP from Bangalore, India, authors a popular blog on Software Development & Deployment at http://www.MSIGeek.com.

To aid migration to Windows 7, Vijay has authored a 5-part series on Windows 7 Application Compatibility. AppCompat is one stop point whenever someone wants to move to a new operating system (in this case, Windows 7).

• Part 1: How do you fix the OS Version Number Issues?
• Part 2: How do you Fix Browser Compatibility Issues?
• Part 3: Demystifying the Windows 7 Virtual XP Mode
• Part 4: Session 0 Isolation and Secure Desktop
• Part 5: Libraries, UAC, WRP and other Core Changes

This series of posts covers information on how the core changes of Windows 7 will affect the Day-to-Day applications. It also covers methods to mitigate these issues from the basic viewpoint of Developers, IT Pros and End-Users. Highly recommend!

Along with Microsoft folks and industry speakers, six MVPs conducted sessions in diverse technologies, and were rated great in the audience feedback. All feedback ratings are based on a 9-point scale with 1 being the minimum and 9 being the maximum score.

Vijay K. Malhotra, a senior Windows Desktop Experience MVP, hosted a session on Indic language computing on the occasion of Hindi Diwas in September 2009. To carry the enthusiasm, we come back with another webcast talking about language computing scenarios in Indic languages.

This time he will try to cover the origin and process of development of Indic scripts and general characteristics of the Language Computing scenario across Indic languages. During his recent visit to UK during September - October 2009, he had conducted several workshops on Language Computing in Indic languages in various cities of UK including London, Bradford, and Cardiff.

The upcoming webcast delivers the same experience intended for audience from all walks of life, and not just computer enthusiasts, and speaking any of the regional Indian languages.

Register | 20 November 2009 | 1400 – 1530 IST

• On the event page, click Register Online.
• Sign in using your Windows Live ID
• Enter your Live Meeting Attendee Name and click Confirm.

P.S. The medium of this Webcast would be English.

Previously: 7 posts on Windows 7

Office 2010 beta is coming soon, as evident with the recent launch of the new beta portal this week - http://officebeta.microsoft.com, and trust MVPs for getting all excited for anything with subtext of ‘coming soon’. So, for this weekend, we pick 10 of their articles, blog posts, and interviews on the Office 2010 goodness.

Previews and Reviews:

• Preview : Microsoft Office 2010
• Office 2010: New Features
• Office 2010 Beta New Features & Changes
• What's New in Office 2010?

Office 2010 - Web Applications:

• Office 2010 Web Applications
• Welcome To Office Web Apps – First Look

Tips and Tricks:

• Capture Screenshots in Office 2010 with the new Screen Clipping Tool
• How to do Blogging with Word 2010
• Using OpenType Font Features in Word 2010

Discussion:

• Microsoft Talk: Office 2010 with Geetesh Bajaj [Podcast]
  

Big props to Windows Desktop Experience MVPs Manan Kakkar, Vinod Unny, Amit Agarwal, and Nirmal TV, and PowerPoint MVP Geetesh Bajaj.

AeroVG theme is one of the most popular themes available for Windows Vista. It provides excellent transparency in Taskbar, Start Menu, Explorer, etc. and also changes lots of visual things like Menu bar, Address bar, Progress bar, and much more. The theme was developed by Vishal Gupta, a Windows Desktop Experience MVP from India.

After a lot of reader requests for a similar theme for Windows 7, Vishal succumbed to the temptation and came up with the first beta of AeroVG Se7en theme.

You can download it using following link: Download "AeroVG Se7en" Theme for Windows 7. Also, check his tutorial which guides you to install and use custom themes on Windows 7.

Windows 7 is here, there, and everywhere. And so for the weekend, we pick seven fine posts from MVP blogs where they share tips, tricks, and how-tos for Windows 7.

• Moving To Windows 7?
• Why should I move to Windows 7?
• Master Tutorial to Make Your Windows 7 Super Fast
• How to Diagnose Memory Problems on Windows 7
• 9 Touch Gestures in Windows 7 for Multi-touch Magic
• Installing Windows 7 on Asus Eee PC Netbook 900 using Pendrive
• Complete Guide To Using VHDs, Windows Virtual PC, Windows XP Mode & ISOs On Windows 7

Big props to Windows Desktop Experience MVPs Manan Kakkar, Vishal Gupta, and Nirmal TV, Windows Live MVP Vasudev G, and Setup & Deployment MVP – Vijay Raj.

To celebrate the launch of Windows 7, and to meet other Windows enthusiasts in their cities, several MVPs in India have collaborated with popular Windows portal (also run by few MVPs in India) – MeraWindows – and hosted launch parties in ten cities across India and also Dhaka, Bangladesh for the end-user community at large.

The parties in different cities are spread over next two weeks. There is no charge to attend these community events, however, to manage logistics, free pre-registration is required. Head to http://launch.merawindows.com for specific details on individual cities, or follow the link below.

• Mumbai
• Pilani
• Delhi
• Pune
• Chennai
• Trivandrum
• Kolkata
• Mysore
• Siliguri
• Bangalore
• Dhaka
  

Windows 7 is here… and our MVPs have been pretty excited about it since we first saw the latest generation of Windows on our horizon. These MVPs have shared their excitement with the community, and also their feedback with the product teams at Microsoft.

So, here we are, with an assortment of Windows 7 bloggers amongst our rockstar MVPs. These include news, tips, tricks, tweaks, thoughts, downloads, and more!

• Ramesh  Srinivasan
• Anand C Khanse
• Vishal  Gupta
• Ramesh  Kumar
• Ajay  Pathak
• Nirmal  TV
• Ashish  Mohta
• Manan  Kakkar
• Vijay Raj
• Vasudev  Gurumurthy
  

After the stupendous success of Ultimate Windows Tweaker, The Windows Club – a popular Windows portal run by Windows Desktop Experience MVP, Anand Khanse from Pune, India - keeps releasing small, but useful utility applications for Windows.

Windows Access Panel

Access Panel for Windows 7 and Windows Vista is a freeware portable application. While you can use Control Panel to change settings which control nearly everything about how Windows looks and works, in some cases to access these very controls , or the in-built Windows programs, requires you to engage in multiple clicks or know their names.

That's where this small utility can help you. Windows Access Panel is meant to minimize your trouble in accessing such programs.

Prevent v1.0

Prevent is a freeware app which runs on all versions of Windows. If you do not want anyone deleting or renaming, or in general, messing around with your data, then Prevent might help you.

Fix IE Utility v1.0

Fix IE Utility is another freeware portable utility that re-registers all the concerned .dll and .ocx files required for the smooth operation of Internet Explorer.

The utility is useful if you face any problems while running IE, maybe after recovering from a malware attack. Fix IE Utility has been tested on IE 7 and IE 8, on Windows Vista as well as Windows 7.

UPDATE:

TWC recently also released Fix MSE Utility v 1.0. This freeware portable utility will restore all registry values and service settings of Microsoft Security Essentials to known good defaults.

We’re almost there! Windows 7 would be available worldwide on October 22. Attend live webcasts from Windows Desktop Experience MVPs and deep dive into a unique learning experience, targeted specifically for home and office users.

And that’s not all! Attend the webcasts, and you could win a Microsoft Arc Mouse every day! We’ll even help you win it ;)

23-Oct-09
2:00pm - 4:30pm
Play To: Windows 7
Abhishek Kant & Other Experts

26-Oct-09
4:00pm - 5:30pm
Performance: New dimensions
Shantanu Kaushik

27-Oct-09
4:00pm - 5:30pm
Networking: Internet and Home Networking
Allen B Tuladhar and Ramesh K

28-Oct-09
4:00pm - 5:30pm
Localization: Setting up Windows 7 to work in Hindi
Ravishankar Shrivastava

29-Oct-09
4:00pm - 5:30pm
Entertainment: Windows Media Centre
Soumitra Sengupta

30-Oct-09
4:00pm - 5:30pm
Essentials: Windows Live
Manan Kakkar

These webcasts are also available at the India Webcasts page. The listed schedule is based on India time, but ofcourse the event is on the Web and available worldwide.

Amit Bansal, a SQL Server MVP from India, is a professional consultant, trainer, speaker & writer on SQL Server (Database Platform & Business Intelligence). He speaks at major summits and conferences of Microsoft worldwide including TechED, MCT Summits, MSDN & TechNet conferences.

Amit is hosting a Webcasts series - SQL Server 2008 Business Intelligence – with three Webcasts  spread over a week. Register for the online sessions for free, and spread the word to your network.

Create a cube

November 9, 2009 | 1500 – 1630 | Add to Calendar

Whether you are a Database Developer or a Database Administrator, it is high time that you climb the ladder and know what multidimensional data is all about. In this webcast, Amit Bansal will show how to create a simple cube using SQL Server 2008 Analysis Services. You will learn the basics of Data warehousing, OLAP database and cube development.

Extract data from the cube

November 11, 2009 | 1500 – 1630 | Add to Calendar

In this webcast, you will learn how to extract multidimensional data from the cube, once the cube is ready. Amit Bansal will show you various tools and techniques to extract data from the cube using Excel 2007, SQL Server Reporting Services & MDX scripting.

Learn MDX scripting

November 13, 2009 | 1500 – 1630 | Add to Calendar

Everyone wants to learn MDX scripting. Start here !!! In this webcast, Amit Bansal will teach you the basics of MDX scripting. You shall get a very strong conceptual understanding of MDX scripting and will be able to write basic MDX queries using SQL Server 2008 Management Studio.

You can also register at the Microsoft India Webcasts page.