AddOn Studio for World of Warcraft V2 in the works
May 14, 2008
I recently posted a high-level feature specification for version 2.0 of AddOn Studio for World of Warcraft on the projects Wiki which you can check out here. **Note: **If you’re new to Warcraft programming or are interested in getting started, I highly recommend getting World of Warcraft Programming: A Guide and Reference for Creating WoW Addons (Wiley Page) my full 5/5 star review is here. Better yet, Gabor Ratky sent me some sneak peek screenshots of the new features in builds and it’s very cool stuff.…more
List of Microsoft employees mentioned in Microsoft 2.0
May 05, 2008
I just finished reading Mary Jo Foley’s new (unauthorized) book, Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft Plans to Stay Relevant in the Post Gates-Era. Amusing Part #1 came for me when I read the forward which was written by Mini-Microsoft, in Mary Jo’s words, Microsoft’s most (in)famous internal blogger. It’s an entertaining read for me personally for a couple of reasons, like the fact that friends, colleagues, and other cool projects at Microsoft are mentioned (including me which was a complete surprise), and because Mary Jo has a much broader view of all of Microsoft than so many of us have and it’s fascinating to hear Mary Jo’s balanced views on what she thinks is in store for the future of Microsoft.…more
Popfly Game Creator Alpha Launches!
May 02, 2008
Popfly Game Creator Alpha launches today and It’s amazing. Kudos to Adam Nathan as he’s really shown how Silverlight can build incredibly rich applications. I can only imagine what he’ll do when Popfly moves to Silverlight 2! Here’s the Channel 9 interview with Adam building three Popfly games from scratch * Here’s how difficult it was to make games before Popfly While Popfly Game Creator is designed for non-developers, I’m sure many developers will also want to have fun with it, so here’s my quick explanation of Popfly for .…more
Settings1.Designer.cs Bug: Multiple settings files
Apr 27, 2008
I ran into this bug today which was unfortunately closed as can’t repro. I was renaming some AppSettings variable names (right click on a Project’s Properties and go to the Settings tabs) and deleting some other settings, when I did a Search/Replace for the entire solution and somehow wound up with a duplicate Settings.Designer.cs file named Settings1.Designer.cs. This was effectively a clone of Settings.Designer.cs which meant: IntelliSense would report that any AppSettings variables were declared multiple times * The project wouldn’t compile because the variables were already declared The fix was to…more
Live Mesh Launches
Apr 23, 2008
Live Mesh is a new technology and platform that enables synchronization and storage “to the cloud.” It was officially unveiled tonight and lots of the usual suspects are providing their thoughts including Robert Scoble, Kip Kniskern from LiveSide, TechCrunch, and of course Mary Jo Foley who also provides the Live Mesh architecture diagram below. For more Live Mesh coverage: Live Mesh home Watch the application demo of the Live Mesh application on Channel 10 Watch the interview with Ray Ozzie introducing Live Mesh on Channel 9 Watch an interview with Abolade Gbadegesin on Live Mesh Architecture on Channel 9
Top 6 Pet Peeves from an MSDN Editor
Apr 10, 2008
Read the article here I don’t fully agree with the bullet point pet peeves as I think they’re very useful for listing things like properties or using numbered lists for sequential events, but it’s certainly a good list for anyone writing technical articles.
Someone should remake The A-Team for Cable TV
Apr 07, 2008
Crazy Idea #5150 Cue the background military music and authoritative announcer: Ten years ago / In 1972, a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn’t commit. These men promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Los Angeles underground. Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire… The A-Team.…more
Channel 9 Spam Video Filter Beta Launched
Apr 01, 2008
In an on-going effort to ensure that Channel 9 videos only display appropriate content, the Channel 9 Dev Team recently ported the spam feature to filter existing video content. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised by the results of our first tests using some of the more popular C9 video clips. The video filter should be complete by the time we ship Channel 9 V4. Congratulations to the dev team and to JKL consulting for creating the original video filter prototype.…more
Microsoft the Contest Machine
Mar 17, 2008
Last updated: 6/30/08 NOTE: If you’ve been forwarded a link to this blog post, it’s likely that one of your colleagues thinks you should do your due diligence before thinking a contest is the fastest road to salvation. It isn’t, here’s why… I’m starting a crusade at Microsoft to lower the number of contests we run a year. I know I’ll be successful if the number of contests a year goes down.…more
Microspotting lands an interview with Mini-Microsoft
Feb 27, 2008
Kudos to Ariel Stallings, Microsoft employee and author the Microspotting blog (one of my favorite new blogs) on landing a virtual Mini-Microsoft interview. My personal opinion of Mini is a bit mixed, and I’ve definitely disagreed with Mini in the past , but it is interesting to hear his perspective, which blogger’s he likes, and that he _thinks _he’s made some accidental slip-ups in the past. A fascinating read.