Testing Microsoft Vista

Optimized testing schedules for MS Vista

Microsoft is planning to change and optimize its testing schedules for the long awaited Windows update codenamed "Longhorn" now officially named as "Microsoft Vista". Microsoft has already released a preview version of the OS. The company plans to release more and more preview versions instead of "Beta" and "Release Candidate" versions. In order to improve the quality of the final version the company plans to release a series of test versions this year. Each version of the release is intended to get feedback from specific audience.

A Community Technology Preview (CTP) program is all set to release early this year (around Feb) the company wants the corporations to test it. In the next quarter another Customer Preview Program (CPP) is expected to roll out this release will consumers to get a hands on Vista. Sources from Microsoft say that it has got almost all that is necessary and no major capabilities have been cut from the recent release; though these where not test for final release.

Vista has been a long wait for the consumers; perhaps this is the first time that MS plans to more frequent previews program. The company had planned for more frequent CTPs in order to get higher feedback but then later decided to go slow on releases. The company wants to delay the final release so that it can include as many new features as possible and come up with a more stable version, reducing the number of Service Packs. What I personally feel is that MS is trying to use these preview for its marketing, it might want more people to use the preview release and then buy the final release. Well what ever it is intended for it is a good move by Microsoft.

But the final big question is that: Is it worth the entire wait? Or is it a dream concept that Microsoft plans to achieve?

Privacy vs. Security

US Government trying to steel right to privacy

A fact that was disclosed in court documents last week confirmed that the US Department of Justice has complied many major search engines in US to hand over the details of all queries that where made; in order to revive the anti-pornography law. Definitely search engine giants such as Google, Microsoft Yahoo, AOL have heaps of information about the user, which has to be maintained; I don’t think government should be allowed to mine these data. We all hate child porn but that doesn’t mean we compromise with our right to privacy. Do We? The fact that we don’t know what the US government will be doing with the information.

I term this as illegal because there is not any kind of agreement or disclaimer with such a clause. I was surprised to hear that most of the major companies had agreed to comply. Thanks to Google it is trying to defend its customers. The data that the US Government has asked for contains information of many people who reside outside US territory. US govt can in no way justify such an act, it has no right to gather information or in a way steel the right to privacy of people outside its boundaries. Can a society maintain its freedom when a government is permitted to conduct searches without reasonable proof of any wrong doings?

“The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing” - Edmund Burke

I don’t understand how the US govt can even imagine of such a decision, even if its applicable on its own citizens or other citizens; it is against a persons private interest. What about our democratic freedom, I mean how can we leave it to an other country's law. Any data generated will come under jurisdiction of the court of law from where the data or information is generated.

Does this mean that I should think thrice before I use a service that an US based company provides. Please post your comments or feedback on this and how you would react to this kind of actions...

in my room

My New pictures

Intel inside VoIP

VoIP refers to Voice over Internet Protocol, which basically takes a voice signal and puts it into packets much the same way that data gets packetized before it is sent over the network. But it's done in a way that the network recognizes that it's a voice session, which affects how the call is set up and managed through the network.

Intel is working to improve the conference calling capabilities of VoIP solutions. In a multi-tasking world, you might be hosting a conference call as well as sharing data or doing another application, and the performance demands on your platform begin to get fairly high.

A key barrier to widespread VoIP deployment has been lack of standards and interoperability. Intel is working with the industry to drive standards and rich interoperability to accelerate VoIP adoption.

Fire caught FireFox 1.5

I really like firefox, the fact is that since I got FF I actually never used IE in-fact, I don’t even remember that I ever had IE on my sys. However, version 1.5 has been blowing out, at least twice a day; FF 1.5 is not worth upgrade; certainly little has changed since 1.07, other than a few extensions. I observe that I often crash when I lock my broadband connection using firewall. Maybe some kind of ad server delay/crash is to blame… If any others experiencing similar problem or find the reason worth sharing please post a comment

Is .NET ready for Web 2.0???

Big Question: Is .NET ready for Web 2.0?

I was surprised to hear that some of the popular web 2.0 applications are developed using Microsoft .NET Framework. But this is true… “Best of 2005” list of .NET apps according to Nolan Zak include:

1. Press Display – Online viewing for all kinds of newspapers from all over the world using an AJAX-y interface. Allows viewing and printing of individual articles.
2. NASA Worldwind – View and pan over the entire world. Similar to MSN Virtual Earth and Google Earth but allows you to “replay” various events in the history of the world, like the 2004 Tsunami or some massive arctic icebergs breaking apart.
3. Grouper – Create your own peer-to-peer network to chat and share pictures, videos, and files with only the people you invite.
4. Writely – Share and collaborate on html documents in real time. That’s right, two or more people editing the same file at the same time!
5. Phanfare – The best of the .NET versions of online photo galleries. Flickr and YouTube are also better <gasp!>
6. Squeet - Online RSS feed management. This one is developed with .NET 2.0. See an overview and review by Scott Cate

Disclaimer If you find any other Web 2.0 applications please post in comments…

Feeding with .NET

I found libraries to generate and parse all the three major kinds of syndication formats.

1. Atom
2. RSS
3. OPML

These libraries can be used to generate feeds that visitors can subscribe in order to get the updated content on your site or blog. These libraries come with complete documentation that helps user to start developing web applications or web services using the .NET Framework.

I have not yet tried these libraries, let me try them first and I’ll share my experience creating a feed soon. J

You can find these libraries at: http://www.howdev.com/technologies/

Related Feeds: http://www.howdev.com/news/howelldevelopments-rss.opml

Powered By Qumana

A validation method better than what MS provides!

Change the border color of the controls whose validation fails

This is a wonderful blog that I came through I felt it very interesting… This (great) guy has done a wonderful job… Ever wondered how you can change the border color settings of the control whose client side validation fails, the solution is simple just modify the WebUIValidation.js file provided with asp.net