markharrison.co.uk/blog

A new Live Mesh update (0.9.3103.9) has been made available along with news of expanded availability: you can sign up directly, with no waiting list, if your country/region is the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, or New Zealand.

www.mesh.com

From Tom Schultz ...

The Microsoft Commerce Server Product Team is very excited to inform you about our upcoming release of a new multi-channel retail accelerator to Commerce Server 2007, code-named 'Mojave', which is being designed specifically to meet the e-commerce needs of enterprise & midsize businesses.

Mojave address these following core themes -

Multi-channel is here now :

• Out of the box integrated consumer centric multi-channel capabilities over multiple mediums, brands, and locales.
• 3 out of the box channels ready to go: Web, Mobile, Live Services
• New channels require configuration and not customization.

Out-of-the-box shopping experiences :

• Out of the box ASP.NET 2.0+ web part shopping features.
• Web 2.0 social networking paradigms via SharePoint and Live integration.
• E-commerce web features easily added by business users, skin-able by designers (Expression), extendable by developers (Visual Studio).

Tools to empower Merchandisers and Marketers :

• Centralize day to day marketing and merchandizing tasks in a single portal.
• WYSIWYG content editing with preview.
• Content management capabilities: workflow, approval, auditing and publishing.
• Leverage familiar Office tools to minimize the learning curve

More plus information on Technology Adoption Program

Wireless networks are not supported with Hyper-V.

John Paul Cook explains how to implement a workaround by bridging network connections.

Virtual PC Guy clarifies how the Hyper-V networking works.

Three new important updates have been released that affect SharePoint Server 2007, Windows SharePoint Services 3.0, Project Server 2007, Search Server 2008, Search Server 2008 Express and Project Professional 2007.

The Infrastructure Update contains the new Enterprise Search features that were shipped in Search Server 2008 and Search Server 2008 Express that were are not already in SharePoint Server 2007; this includes Federated Search capability, a unified administration dashboard and several Search core platform performance updates.

Also includes Content Deployment updates and significant platform performance improvements.

The updates can be downloaded from the links below:

• Infrastructure Update for Microsoft Office Servers (KB951297) - x86
• Infrastructure Update for Microsoft Office Servers (KB951297) - x64
• Infrastructure Update for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 (KB951695) - x86
• Infrastructure Update for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 (KB951695) - x64
• Infrastructure Update for Microsoft Office Project 2007 (KB951547) - x86

Installation instructions

Lots of new announcements at the 2008 Electronic Entertainment Expo

Keep up with the news at XBOX @ E3 2008

Spent this morning rebuilding my laptop with Windows Server 2008 so I can run Hyper-V

Michael O'Donovan has demonstrated that SharePoint performance on Hyper-V is greatly improved over that achieved with Virtual Server 2005. Generally 100% faster - and search queries 200% faster under Hyper-V.

• SharePoint under Hyper-V versus Virtual Server 2005 R2

I also learnt today that my US colleagues are using solid state disk drives and getting a further 2 to 3 times performance improvement.

Useful article on how to turn a Windows Server machine to have workstation characteristics

• How to convert your Windows Server 2008... to a Workstation!
• update: Windows Server 2008 Workstation Converter

And Spence solved my problem of unknown Bluetooth devices on Windows Server 2008.

• Enabling Bluetooth on Windows Server 2008

ReMix UK 08 takes you to the frontier of today's web. With boundaries continuing to blur between developers and designers, consumers and producers, and TVs, PCs and mobile devices, ReMix UK 08 asks 'where next for the web?'

Over 30 top flight speakers from around the world will be talking about the latest in technology, creative trends, and the new web.

Come and join the conversation

Downloadable TechNet white papers:

Delivering Accessible Solutions using Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007

Mark Harrison - Microsoft Corporation
Henny Swan - Royal National Institute of Blind People

Abstract

This white paper provides information and guidelines about the issues that organizations face when delivering Web solutions, including those built by using Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 that are accessible to people with disabilities.


Best practices for developing accessible Web sites with Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007

Abstract

Waldek Mastykarz

This white paper provides information about designing and developing accessible Web sites in Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. This document is intended for users who are familiar with Office SharePoint Server 2007, Microsoft ASP.NET, and Microsoft .NET development.

From the Live Search team ...

We're excited to announce that we've reached an agreement to acquire Powerset, a San Francisco-based search and natural language company.

Powerset will join our core Search Relevance team, remaining intact in San Francisco. Powerset brings with it natural language technology that nicely complements other natural language processing technologies we have in Microsoft Research. More importantly, Powerset brings to Live Search a set of talented engineers and computational linguists.

More

Powerset blog

Congratulations to Chris O'Brien and Vincent Rothwell from the UK SharePoint Architects community that won MVP awards today - very well deserved !