Microsoft News Summary w/e 21st September 2008

There were 214 articles from the Microsoft Team Blogs and feeds last week. Here is my summary of interesting announcements and software releases:

General News

· Windows: Life without Walls and “I’m a PC”: If you wondered what was next for the Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld television ads, the next phase of the brand is here “Windows vs. Walls”. The official press announcement from Bill Veghte, Senior Vice President, Online Services & Windows Business Group explains our philosophy: “At the core, Windows is about enabling each one of us, as individuals, to live our lives without walls … I want to work when I want to work, I want to play when I want to play. I want to communicate and share with friends and family and co-workers”. If you like the campaign you can get the Life without Walls Desktop background. Read More...

· Windows Home Server (WHS) solution for consumers just gets better. The product team held the first annual Windows Home Server Platform Extensibility Day for30+ developers, Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), and hardware partners. The focus was to familiarize them about how to develop applications and services using the Software Development Kit, available publicly on MSDN. Read more...

· BlueHat Security Briefings v8 is will be held on October 15th, 16th and 17th. Day one focuses on emerging security threats and state of the art hacking tools and techniques. Day two covers Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) – a whole day’s content focused on the full lifecycle of security engineering – with a progression from design, to implementation, to verification. Read More...

· The Growing Case for Virtualization: The 14,000 IT professionals, developers and technology providers attended the VMworld 2008 virtualization conference to understand that virtualization has matured into a priority for many enterprises because it allows businesses to reduce their IT costs and be more nimble in responding to changing IT needs. Read More...

· Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) , The SDL was created back in 2004, significantly improving the security, privacy and reliability of the company’s software. Now, Microsoft is working to share what it’s learned as part of the company’s commitment to create a more trusted computing experience for everyone. The official press announcement describes the plans and find out more on the SDL Team Blog. Read more...

Software Releases

· Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack 2008 (MDOP) for Software Assurance Released. In an Optimized Desktop, a partnership is established in which IT can constructively maintain control over the desktop infrastructure, without getting in the way of the users they’re supporting. With MDOP 2008 R2 and Windows Vista, you get a solution that’s greater than the sum of its parts…a “1+1=3” scenario where IT is controlled and managed, users are empowered and productive, and the pace of business accelerates.  Read more…

· Microsoft Showcases Windows HPC Server 2008 : Thehigh performance computing offering provides enhanced productivity, performance and scalability; proves to be a valuable tool to analyze risk and provide a lever for growth in a turbulent economic environment. Read More...

· Network Monitor 3.2 Released: The team has added many of the requests we heard from our customers, while simultaneously fixing bugs and stabilizing the product. Read More...

· New Version of Windows Live Released: New beta versions of Windows Live Photo Gallery and the completely brand new Windows Live Movie Maker will be available for free at https://download.live.com! In addition to Photo Gallery and Movie Maker, this beta release includes significant updates to all of the Windows Live software applications for your Windows PC, including Messenger, Mail, Writer, Toolbar and Family Safety. Read More...

· Microsoft Pro Photo Tools 2 Released: The latest version has been released for download with some newly added features and improvements in performance. You can read about Microsoft Professional Photography Website, or more on the team blog. Read More...

· Microsoft Streets and Trips 2009 Released: Enhanced trip-planning software makes road trip planning and travel even easier for consumers. Read the Official Press Announcement of visit the website.

· Zune Version 3 Software Released: Zune, Microsoft end-to-end music and entertainment service, today released a free software update that will bring new features to every Zune portable media player. Get the download, or read more on the Official Press Announcement or Featured Story.

· Outlook Connector Beta 2 Released – an add-in that puts your Windows Live Hotmail data in Outlook. While Beta 2 does not introduce new features, it provides several improvements aimed at making synchronization with e-mail, contacts, and the free Windows Live Calendar Beta service more robust. Read more...

· Advanced Group Policy Management 3.0 Released: Available as part of the MDOP suite the latest version adds new features including Full x64 support, Windows Vistsa SP1 and Windows Server 2008, Customizable permissions, More robust change tracking, Purge historical data, group policy preferences support, UI improvements and Localization. Read More..

· Windows Essential Business Server 2008 (EBS) Released: For midsize businesses, EBS is the best way to buy this software – Windows Server, Exchange, SQL Server, System Center Essentials (SCE), Forefront Security for Exchange and Forefront Threat Management Gateway. Whether it’s the integration and pre-configuration to best practices that’s baked-in; the vastly simplified and accelerated setup and migration, with a minimum of configuration needed; the defense-in-depth security included in the box. Read More... (The essential business server team blog will be added to the directory next week)

· Two New Extensions for Windows Server 2008 Internet Information Server 7.0 Released: IIS 7.0 can be extended and customized in many different ways. URL Rewriter, a rules-based engine it allows you to rewrite your Web application URLs to be more user-friendly and search engine-friendly. Web Playlists, which allows media publishers and site managers to more directly control how media files are delivered to an end user, including limiting the ability to skip past or through specific playlist entries. Read More...