Vista/Office Launch 2007
Today I attended the business launch of Vista, Office 2007, and Exchange Server 2007 and boy am I tired! This full day information session was overwhelming with non-stop speakers, product demos, and launch fun facts (yep that was a common theme). Did you know that this is the first time since Windows95 that both Windows and Office co-launched? Don’t worry...I didn’t care either. At least they picked good music. The Blue Man Group’s songs rocked all of the presentation and served as a central theme (mostly stuff off of Audio...Rods and Cones, Opening Mandelbrot, etc). BMG is very trade show friendly and really works for presentations!
On to the event! This was the first time that I had been at a Microsoft event with the staple MS Presentation Desk. After a light breakfast (woot!), I sat in on a keynote by a Microsoft Exec who’s name escapes me. He was a really good speaker and introduced two sales guys to hype up Vista and Office. Michael Gannotti is a firecracker of a presenter blending both Emeril and Jim Kramer together for one hell of a presentation. I was impressed! After the Keynote I sat in on a very boring presentation about deploying Vista. It looks pretty cool but I’m sure glad I don’t have to deploy that sucker to my organization. Talk about a snoozer. Then it was on to lunch (woot again!) followed by the SharePoint 2007 presentation. I walked away from that one with a lot of knowledge and understanding of the product. I may have even found a way to save my company money by using Office and SharePoint to do something we pay someone else to do right now. Kudos to the presenter on that one.
Overall it was a long and tiring presentation but it was worth it. I’ve got my free copy of Office 2007 and can’t wait to download and install it! Check out some pics from the event by clicking more.
The first Operating System I ever paid for
Well folks, I’ve gone and done it. That’s right I’ve put money down on a computer operating system for the first time in my life. Am I admitting to pirating 10 years worth of Microsoft operating systems? Hardly. See for the last 10 years I’ve been an official beta tester for the Microsoft Consumer Windows Group. This team has brought you such hits as Windows 98 and Windows 98 SE and who can forget Windows Millenium Edition and most recently Windows eXPerience and Vista. As a thank-you for beta testing their product, Microsoft used to hand out 5 license keys when all was said and done. This allowed me to install the operating system legitamitely on every PC that I owned. That was until Vista. With the latest OS, MS only gave out one key, leaving my 2 little Shuttles out in the cold.
I would have been totally happy with leaving XP on both of the Shuttles (hey it ain’t broke, why fix it) until I saw this. As my Collector’s Edidtion Twilight Princess Players Guide, Limited Edition Zelda Soundtrack, and multitude of Collector’s Edition DVDs and video games show, I’m a sucker for all things limited. Yes Billy-G, you’ve lured me in with your fancy signature edition box. It’s actually a pretty cool box but I will admit it took me about 5 minutes to figure out how to open it. That’s not a good sign for an operating system that is to take user friendliness to the next level now is it? Click MORE for a larger pic of the box.
Windows XP is not based on DOS.
An interesting article from The Inquirer points out that Microsoft may not have cut the DOS cord in Windows XP as they claimed back when it was released. If you try to create a directory folder that uses a DOS reserved word, it is renamed back to New Folder. Give it a try with CON, PRN and AUX (among others). I guess now you’ll have to think of some other way to label all of your PRN.
It’s just an operating system people!
This image gave me a chuckle today. Apparently someone shipped two pounds of inscribed chocolate to a test manager in Microsoft’s Windows group in hopes of getting invited to the Longhorn beta. I’m told he has been invited into the Longhorn beta but seeing as how Longhorn is now known as Vista, I can’t help but wonder if he will be the only one on that beta 
Oh, and new guy...I hope you brought enough for the rest of the class!
