Category Microsoft

Those of you who have already entered into This is the spirit of giving! Get your Vista on-! Free Giveaways! that is great! If you haven’t entered yet, go post your comment, tweet, digg or whatever for your chance to win those two books and a copy of Vista Ultimate!

The holidays are not over yet! There will be some more prizes for the winning over the next week or so, including: Another copy of Vista (32bit only), a Zune and who knows what else I have in store (Seriously, I don’t even know yet!) (Oh, and a copy of Norton 360) and whatnot!

So, go get your prize on! Comment (Here, there or everywhere) and lets make the running for these prizes a decent one! I’ll stop giving away if I don’t get any interest?!

Oh, who wants some Windows Server 2003 Enterprise 25user Cal! (I still have a bunch of those! :)) (And may have some Microsoft Exam vouchers to give away soon!)

Happy Holidays!

@cxi

Totally hijacked from Dave Bost @ The Mind of a Developer Evangelist

On December 12th, the Microsoft Evangelist team on the West Coast is hosting a (virtual) Windows FireStarter event. This is a great chance for developers to learn “straight from the horses mouth” (so to speak) guidance, best practices and tips&tricks for building applications on top of the Windows platform.

They are holding this FireStarter event *LIVE!* in Redmond, but they are also streaming it live online to the rest of the world.

This would be a great opportunity to secure a conference room for the day, post the agenda around your office, and join us live on December 12th. I’ll see if we can also open up an IRC channel or something to carry the communication online during the sessions.

Be sure to register for online participation or if you can happen to be in Redmond on the 12th, you can participate in-person. Seats are limited!

Agenda: (all times are PST)

8:30 – 8:45, Kick off, Mithun Dhar

8:45 – 9:30, Keynote/Why Vista!, Chris Henley

9:30 – 10:45, The Case of the Unexplained, Mark Russinovich

11:00 – 12:15, Building Differentiated UI Applications Using Composite WPF, Glenn Block, Bob Brumfield & David Hill

1:00 – 2:00, Best Practices for Developing for Windows for Windows Standard User, Crispin Cowan

2:00 – 3:00, Windows Security and Bitlocker, Byron Hynes

3:15 – 4:00, (Windows 7 + Windows Server 2008 R2) Teaser Session, Byron Hynes

4:00 – 5:00, Windows for everyone!

I highly encourage you check this out if any of this applies to you, especially Windows 7, Server 2008, Mark Russinovich, AppDev, Security.. any of it!

Also, be sure to check out Dave’s Blog and the Thirsty Developer, by far one of the most consumable podcasts (which just happens to be about development and architecture!)

This question gets asked by a lot of people “ooh! Windows7 or Vista! What should I do?!?”

I won’t be the one to make that decision for you.  Infact, I’ll make it harder for you :)

In the season and the spirit of giving, and finally getting around to doing this (I’ve planned to do this for awhile) I’m giving away to a random and wanting participant one or more of the following!

I’ve had these sitting on my bookshelf for some time, and have been meaning to give them away! Will you get them? Do you want them? If you’re located in Chicago-land I could definitely drop them off, but if you’re in Egypt, Italy, Russia or Mumbai I’ll gladly ship them to you.

		Retail	Amazon
	Windows Vista Resource Kit Windows Vista Administrator’s Pocket Consultant Windows Vista Ultimate	$59.99 $29.99 $399.95	$36.55 $18.27 $224.99
		$485.93	$279.81
	Your Cost:		$0.00!

What’s the catch?

I encourage you in the spirit of giving to tell your friends and your friends-friends.  I get my hands on stuff like this all the time and when I don’t give it away at events while talking to people about Technology, It ends up back on my shelf ready for me to give away!

Please do comment on this, comment on here, retweet this on Twitter as well! :)

The more people who are interested and involved, the happily I’ll be that this is going to a good home(s).  (I only have one of each of these at the moment, but if the interest is there, I have a whole closet of other goods, software included!)

Please comment! Please retweet, Digg, Stumblr, etc. Add me @cxi on Twitter too! (Only comments on the blog count though! :))

Every comment, link back, blog post, twitter follow, retweet, digg, etc will give you an entry into the drawing!

Thanks and a happy thanksgiving and other festiveness to all!

(All those certification bound, be sure to check out the Free Testing Archive for free Certs!)

Please see the Free Testing Archive for tests like this and more!

Register for Beta Exam 71-505: TS: Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5, Windows Forms Application Development

Registration Begins 11/21/2008

You are invited to take beta exam 71-505: TS: Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5, Windows Forms Application Development. If you pass the beta exam, the exam credit will be added to your transcript and you will not need to take the exam in its released form. The results willnot appear on your transcript until several weeks after the final form of the exam is released. The 71-xxx identifier is used for registering for beta versions of MCP exams, when the exam is released in its final form the 70-xxx identifier is used for registration.

71-505: TS: Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5, Windows Forms Application Development counts as credit towards the following certification(s).

· Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist: .NET Framework 3.5, Windows Forms Applications

· Microsoft Certified Professional Developer: Windows Developer 3.5

· Microsoft Certified Professional Developer: Enterprise Application Developer 3.5

Availability

Registration begins: November 21, 2008

Beta exam period runs: November 25, 2008– December 15, 2008

Receiving this invitation does not guarantee you a seat in the beta; we recommend that you register immediately. Beta exams have limited availability and are operated under a first-come-first-served basis. Once all beta slots are filled, no additional seats will be offered.

Testing is held at Prometric testing centers worldwide, although this exam may not be available in all countries (see Regional Restrictions). All testing centers will have the capability to offer this exam in its live version.

Regional Restrictions: India, Pakistan, China

Registration Information

Please use the following promotional code when registering for the exam: X356Y
You must register at least 24 hours prior to taking the exam.

To register in North America, please call:

· Prometric: (800) 755-EXAM (800-755-3926)

Outside the U.S./Canada, please contact:

· Prometric: http://www.register.prometric.com/ClientInformation.asp

Test Information and Support

You are invited to take this beta exam at no charge.
You will be given four hours to complete the beta exam. Please plan accordingly.
Find exam preparation information: http://www.microsoft.com/learning/en/us/exams/70-505.aspx

Raise your hands up and praise Joanne Lin of the MSLCommunity for bringing us these little gems! (Gem1 and Gem2 ! :)) [Time for some verbatim copying!…kind of!]

Help celebrate our 25^th anniversary with a free e-book offer.  The November offers is valid from November 19 to November 26, 2008, so download the e-books soon.  You can also sign up for Microsoft Press Connection newsletter to get monthly update.

For November:

Windows Embedded CE 6.0 Fundamentals by Stanslav Pavlov and Pavel Belevsky:   This book examines the architecture, built-in programming tools, drivers, and build process, and shows how to take advantage of the Windows Embedded CE 6.0 Software Development Kit (SDK).

Download this e-book!

Windows Server 2008 Networking and Network Access Protection (NAP) by Joseph Davies and Tony Northrup with the Microsoft Networking Team:   Get the official resource for deploying, administering, and troubleshooting Windows Server 2008 networking and Network Access Protection (NAP) technologies.

Download this e-book!

Going for a SQL Class? Get a copy of SQL Server 2008 Standard Edition!

Microsoft Learning is teaming up with the SQL Server team to give away free copies of SQL Server 2008 Standard Edition to people who attend select instructor-led classroom training at a Microsoft Certified Partner for Learning Solutions (CPLS). Here’s the deal: The Deal!

So, if you’re looking for an early gift for yourself, or your friends.. Get them the Ebook that keeps on giving! :)

Happy Holiday-Season-Time! And spend that good money in this economy of free!