Sql Server Compact 3.5 Design Tools

.NET Framework 4 Application Compatibility - Release Candidate announcements

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.NET Framework 4 Release Candidate – General announcements

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AshwinGK Wednesday, June 24, 2009 5:59 AM

What's New in CLR v4 (.NET Framework 4) from the CLR Team Friday July 17th 10:00AM PST

In this session the CLR development team will be focusing on the core infrastructure that makes all this possible with the new features in the Common Language Runtime. In this session the CLR development team will dive into the topics: Garbage Collection, NGEN and Performance.

Date: Friday July 17^th
Time: 10:00AM-11am PST
LiveMeeting:
https://www.livemeeting.com/cc/0000000379_103/join?id=76P755&role=attend&pw=p%2C%2Fzk2K%7CM
Conf call:
Toll Free: 866-500-6738
Toll: 203-480-8000
Participant code: #198585

.NET Framework 4 setup & deployment (Pre-Release versions) announcements

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.NET Framework 4: Windows Communication Foundation - Release Candidate announcements

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edhickey Monday, May 18, 2009 10:55 PM

Hello, and welcome to the Windows Communication Foundation Pre-Release Forum. Currently, this Forum is geared for the new Beta 1 release of Visual Studio 2010, and this will also be the place to discuss future pre-releases of Visual Studio 2010 until it is officially released. There is a Training Kit located on the MSDN Code Gallery at http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/wcfwf4 for download. Bugs found should be submitted via the Visual Studio Connect site located at https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/content/content.aspx?ContentID=12362 . All questions related to previous versions of Visual Studio should be entered in to the regular WCF and WF Forums.

Regards,

Ed

.NET Framework Networking and Communication announcements

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Is this the right forum?

This forum is a general purpose networking and communication forum. If your question pertains to NCL (System.Net), WCF, or ASP.NET, you may receive a better response posting directly to the forums for those technologies.

General Forum Tips

Here are a few suggestions (in this order of relevance) that will help you to get the best answer to your question as quickly as possible:
1. Search for your question on the forums or in Visual Studio's help system first -- it's likely someone may have already answered your question, and you won't have to waste time waiting for it to be answered again
2. Post in the correct forum (see below) -- since the experts in various subject matters tend to stick to the set of forums that focus on those topics, a question about the C# yield keyword posted in the Common Language Runtime forum will likely take a lot longer to be answered than the same question in the C# Language forum.
3. Give details about your problem -- rather than "When I call Process.Start I get an exception, please help", provide the exception type, message, and call stack. Many times it helps if you attach a snippet of the network trace/sniff of the error that shows the error. For getting network sniffs use Network Monitor and for network traces use the built in System.Net tracing according to this blog .
  If possible, provide a succinct code snippet that demonstrates the problem. This lets us reproduce the problem on our end and allows us to come up with an answer where just a general question may not have had enough details. Having this information means we can answer your question more quickly, without having to ask you for these details and wait for your response. If you have a big code sample please trim it down to the relevant parts that will help us understand the problem better.
4. Try to pinpoint the location of your error – This will help us get to the root of the issue quickly. Saying something like "My application cannot read from server" is less likely to find a quick solution as compared to "My application gets a 505 not found even though file is present since the trace shows that FtpWebRequest does not handle a 505 error for an xyz command"
5. Make sure your title summarizes the specific problem you have -- since we try to answer the maximum number of questions we can with our time, we often skim through question subjects to quickly find the ones that we know the answers to. A question with a title of "Urgent! Help needed!" is not as likely to get answered as a question with a title of "How to define a sealed class using CodeDOM". A more specific, detailed title is far more likely to get a response than a general one.
6. Once you've received a correct answer to your question, either from a Microsoft employee, an MVP, or the community in general, please mark the post as answered . You can do this with the "Mark as correct answer" button that appears on the entry containing your answer. This step is important, since it lets the Visual Studio search engine know that there is an answer in that thread for others who may also have your problem. It also lets people scanning the forums know that they can find an answer to that question by reading the thread.
7. Report bugs through Microsoft Connect, instead of on the forums -- this site allows us to see the bugs in our bug tracking database and get them assigned to the correct person. It also allows you to follow the problem through to its resolution, and is a much better way for us to handle issues you find than a bug report posted on the forums.
8. Use the report button -- as moderators we try to keep spam and inflammatory comments out of the forums. However if you do catch something that we missed, don't hesitate to use the report button so that we can keep the forums on-topic and a friendly place to go for help with your .NET questions!
Related Forums

When trying to figure out which forum is right for your question, here are some good candidates:

Network Class Library (System.Net) - for managed networking issues like HTTP, SMTP, Uri, FTP, Sockets etc.
Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) - for managed networking issues relating to WCF and SOA
.NET Framework Networking - for managed networking issues not relating to System.Net or WCF.
Common Language Runtime - for questions related to the runtime engine itself
.NET Development General - a general catchall for questions related to the BCL libraries, questions regarding the design of your code, etc.
Visual C# Language - for questions about the C# programming language, not the CLR or managed libraries
Visual Basic Language - same as above, but for VB
Visual C++ Language - same as above, but for C++ (both native and C++/CLI)
Windows Forms General - for questions about creating applications using the System.Windows.Forms libraries
ASP.NET Forums - for questions about writing web applications using ASP.NET
Development Forums - list of forums
Of course there are dozens of other forums available if your question doesn't fit into one of those categories.
You can ask here where you should post if you have not yet found the right place.

.NET Platform Architecture Development Discussions announcements

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.NET Remoting and Runtime Serialization announcements

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edhickey Friday, July 18, 2008 6:03 PM

Hi all,

We are upgrading our Forums from the 2.x platform to the 3.x platform over the next few months. This particular Forum is on the new 3.x platform, and you will see that there are some great improvements over the previous platform, including some AJAX enhancements to improve performance, especially for those that are in lower bandwidth area. Unfortunately, the platforms do not mesh yet, so if you do not see a particular subject area, have a look at the list located at http://forums.microsoft.com/msdn/default.aspx?siteid=1 for a more appropriate Forum. Thanks for your patience, and I will post an update when there is more news about further migration.

Thanks,

Ed
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edhickey Thursday, June 26, 2008 10:17 PM
While reading a reply to your question, you will notice a button with an icon that says " Mark as Answer ." Please select this button when a reply answers your question.

There are several reasons to do this:
- Our search engine weights Answered questions more highly. By marking Answers you increase the chances that others searching this forum will find the answer directly rather than re-posting the question.
- You give credit to the hard working folks who answer your questions. This is peer to peer support, so recognition is our only reward. (Check out the Top Answerers on the right side of the page to see who is currently answering questions.)
- You help Microsoft to track the health of this forum. Our forum gets 'measured' based on how many unanswered questions are in it at any time and we work hard to keep those numbers to as low a level as possible. By marking answers, others get a more accurate understanding of how well (or badly) things are going on the forum.
- Additionally, there is a new feature in these Forums. If you post a reply to the Forum, and you think you have answered the question, you can mark the "Propose as Answer" button. This will give the original poster an idea that you think you have answered the question. This does not mark the question as answered.
You can also vote "Yes" or "No" if the reply was helpful.

Thank you!

Ed Hickey

.NET StockTrader Sample Application announcements

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The updated StockTrader 5.5 sample is now available for download and setup. This replaces the 5.0 release of StockTrader. The installer can be downloaded from https://azurestocktrader.cloudapp.net or http://msdn.microsoft.com/stocktrader.

This new download includes the new Configuration Service 5.5 assemblies and ConfigWeb 5.5. Configuration Service 5.5 is backward compatible with 5.0 configuration repositories. You will want to rebuild solutions implementing Configuration Service 5.0 with the new 5.5 shared libraries.

StockTrader 5.5 What's New

The big change is support for Windows Azure SQL Database Federations. Federations allows horizontal partitioning, also called sharding, of the Azure SQL Database data tier. You will note that we have also split the previously single database into two separate physical databases: a QuoteDB and an AccountDB. By default after install, neither will be federated. You can use the new \stocktrader\builds\SQL_Loader\TradeSQLLoader.exe to create new QuoteDB/AccountDB databases, and choose the number of federation members when creating the initial databases. You can then deploy (to Azure) and then use the \stocktrader\databaseloaders\TradeSQLAzureLoader application to load data into the federated databases.

The single DAL layer works now against on-premises SQL Server (including SQL Server running in an Azure Virtual Machine); non-federated Windows Azure SQL Database, and federated Azure SQL Databases.

Configuration Service 5.5 What's New

Configuration Service 5.5 has various bug fixes, and especially enhancements to the SQL retry logic in the SQLHelper Class. Solutions using Configuration Service 5.0 should be upgraded to the new 5.5 assemblies, as well minor updates have been made to ConfigWeb.

Coming Soon: StockTrader 6.0

Within the next few weeks, a new version of StockTrader will also be available: StockTrader 6.0. StockTrader 6.0 does not replace StockTrader 5.5; but rather is a new Azure-only implementation, and it is not backward compatible with 5.5. You will be able to do side-by-side installs. Both will remain on the MSDN site. The coming Config Service 6.0 version adds support for Windows Azure Service Bus bindings, and StockTrader 6.0 can optionally be configured to use Service Bus and reliable messaging for order processing. In addition, RESTFUL web services are used in the new Business Logic layer, and the service can serve as the cloud-based backend for new StockTrader 6.0 clients that will be included in the download: Windows 8 Modern UI client; HTML5 ASP.NET/MVC client, Windows Phone client, Android client, and IPhone client.

If you have setup issues, or questions about the sample once it is installed this is the place to post them. Thank you!

-Greg

Casablanca announcements

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In order to respond to questions as quickly as possible and to centralize all discussions, the Casablanca team has retired the Casablanca DevLabs forum. You can still access existing posts, but cannot post any new questions.

Please post any new questions or discussions to the C++ REST SDK discussion board on CodePlex.

CAT.NET announcements

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degroves Friday, February 20, 2009 1:13 AM

Hello and welcome to the CAT.NET CTP forums!

The CAT.NET CTP forums provide you an opportunity to join a community of CAT.NET customers where you can share knowledge, get questions answered, and learn from others. Start by posting CAT.NET CTP related questions in the forum corresponding to your topic of interest and leverage the knowledge available in your new forum community.

If you have any suggestions or feedbacks to CAT.NET CTP, please feel free to post in our forums.

Thank you,

Dennis Groves // PM - CAT.NET CTP

Charts & Reports in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 CTP announcements

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Hi All,
Welcome to the forum.

My name is Stella Chan. I am a Lead Program Manager in the SQL Server Reporting Services Team. My team owns the Charting Controls in .NET Framework 4.0.

In this forum, we will be seeking feedback regarding the following walk through:
Walkthrough: Adding a Chart to ASP.NET Web and Windows Forms Applications

In this walkthrough, you will learn how to add a chart to an ASP.NET Web site by using the new Chart control. You will bind the chart to some data that represents hobby expenses. The resulting chart will provide a visual way to examine the expense data. You will also configure the chart to show the data in different ways.

My team will be actively monitoring this forum. Please send us any questions/comments/suggestions on programmability of the Charting controls.

Thank you and welcome to the forum.

Thanks.

Stella Chan
Lead Program Manager, SQL Server Reporting Services

CHESS – Find and Reproduce Concurrency Heisenbugs announcements

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Core Coding Experience in Visual Basic and Visual C# in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 CTP announcements

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Hi,

I'm Charlie Calvert, the C# Community PM. I'll be one of the moderators on this forum. We want you to use this forum to provide feedback on the scenarios described in the walkthroughs that are part of the Visual Studio 10 CTP. In this forum we want to stay focused on the design of those features, and not on the stability of the release as a whole. Please tell us if you think we have included the right features, and if they are correctly designed. This is your chance to give the PM's driving these your features your feedback on their designs. The October 2008, Visual Studio CTP is meant primarily to allow you to use these new features in the manner described in the walkthroughs; other parts of this pre-beta release may not be working correctly at this time. This is not the place to submit bugs; if want to report bugs, you should use connect.

Thank you

- Charlie

Core Coding Experience in Visual C++ in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 CTP announcements

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Hi,

I'm Vikas Bhatia, a Visual C++ Program Manager. I'll be one of the moderators on this forum.

We want to hear from you! We want your feedback on the features that have been provided in this Visual Studio 2010 CTP release. Please use the walkthroughs as a hand-held guide to use this release. You can use the Connect website to report bugs.

This forum has the following walkthroughs:
- What's New in Visual C++ (CTP)

- Walkthrough: Using MSBuild to Create a Visual C++ Project
- How to: Add a Build Event to an MSBuild Project
- How to: Add a Custom Build Step to an MSBuild Project
- How to: Add Custom Build Tools to an MSBuild Project
- How to: Create a Project-to-Project Reference
- Walkthrough: How to Create a Custom Platform
- Walkthrough: How to Create Custom Property Pages
- Walkthrough: How to Use the C++ MSBuild Project System
- How to: Upgrade from Earlier Versions to Visual C++ 10

- Walkthrough: Adding a Task Dialog to an Application
- How to: Add Support for the Restart Manager

- Walkthrough: Deploying a Visual C++ Application

Thank you,
Vikas Bhatia
Microsoft Corporation
http://blogs.msdn.com/vcblog/

Deep Zoom Composer announcements

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kirupa Thursday, April 3, 2008 8:52 PM

Hi everyone,
Welcome to the Deep Zoom Composer (DZC) forum. DZC is a small powertoy that allows you to create the really cool Deep Zoom images and collections that you may have heard about, and this is the place where you can talk to the DZC team, share your knowledge with others, get your questions answered, suggest ideas for improving the product, or just kick back and relax.

The following links should help you get started:

Learn how to use the Forums
If you are new to our forums, take a few minutes to familiarize yourself with at all of the things you can do here.

Download the Deep Zoom Composer Preview
It's quick. It's painless. It allows you to easily create Deep Zoom content.

User Guide
Quickly get up to speed on what DZC is and how you can use it.

Static Composition Example
See how easy it is to take your DZC output and create a working Silverlight 2 app.

Collections Example
Create Deep Zoom collections and see how to programmatically control the layout of the individual images.

Your friendly hosts are Janete and Kirupa, and we are more than happy to help answer your questions or just chat about Deep Zoom Composer in general. Please drop by. These forums are open 24/7.

Cheers!
Janete & Kirupa

Developer Documentation and Help System announcements

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Kimberley Wolk, Product Unit Manager for the Library Experience team, will be blogging regularly about Microsoft TechNet Publishing System (MTPS) and Visual Studio 2010 Help Viewer at http://blogs.msdn.com/kwolk/

MSDN TechNet Publishing System

MTPS is a publishing solution that: Hosts global sites such as msdn.microsoft.com, technet.microsoft.com, expression.microsoft.com and help.outlook.com
Provides public access to help content through web services and enables community tools like Publish This! and msdnman
Delivers connected in-product help experiences for products like Visual Studio 2008, Exchange 2010 and Windows Server 2008
Packages content that can be installed locally for offline use

MSDN & TechNet Libraries

The libraries contain reference and conceptual material that help developers and ITPro's use Microsoft technologies. You can see these sites at:
- http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/default.aspx
- http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/default.aspx
Visual Studio 2010 Help Viewer

The Help Viewer is a new offline viewer releasing as part of Visual Studio 2010. The new architecture provides a level of openness that allows customers and partners to innovate on the experience and capabilities and drive offline Help forward to meet their needs. For this release, our key tenets were:
- View online and offline content in a familiar, browser-based experience
- Ensure your local help is relevant and up-to-date
- Get fast and relevant search results using F1 and full text searches
- Benefit from a simple-standards-based architecture
Anand..

Doloto announcements

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A new version of Doloto is available as of 12/2/09. It fixes bugs that some of you have reported. Please give it a try and let us know how it went.

-Ben
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As of September 4, the forum and the Doloto page are both live.

-Ben

Dryad, DSC, and DryadLINQ CTP Release on HPC Server 2008 R2 SP1 announcements

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Pan Zhang Sunday, June 10, 2012 7:38 AM

Thank you to everyone who participated in this forum. It has been retired, but
it will remain available as read-only.
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Hello and welcome! We are delighted that you are interested in DryadLINQ, Dryad and DSC. This forum provides an opportunity to share knowledge, get questions answered, and convey feedback on these technologies. As of 1-26-2011, we have only released a CTP version, and we know the product is not yet finished. However, by trying the product and providing us with feedback, you can proudly say "DryadLINQ, Dryad and DSC were my idea!" when we hit RTM.

Sincerely,

John Dunagan

Dynamic Languages on .NET announcements

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John Boylan Saturday, December 15, 2012 1:50 AM

This forum has been retired. It is locked, but is available for review in the Archived Forums folder.
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Please only post questions relating to "dynamic programming languages"; this includes IronRuby, IronPython, the Dynamic Language Runtime, or other dynamic languages that run on .NET. And questions about VB, C#, and other non programming language specific technologies (like SQLServer) should be asked on their specific forum. Any ASP/ASP.NET related questions, regardless of programming language, should be asked on http://forums.asp.net.

Any question/post that is off-topic will be deleted.

Thanks for your cooperation ~Jimmy Schementi

DNS and Traffic Manager announcements

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Expression Community Site Feedback announcements

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Lori Dirks Wednesday, June 18, 2008 5:20 PM

Having an issue with the website? Have a suggestion to make it better? You've come to the right place. We want to hear what you have to say about the website—good and bad, ideas, suggestions, and gripes—it's all fair game.

I can't promise that we'll be able to address every issue or act on every idea, but I can assure you we're interested and listening.

Thank you for helping to shape our community and the website.

Cheers,
Lori Dirks, Community Website Manager
Patrick O'Neill, Site Manager

Feedback for Visual Basic Bug Submission Pilot announcements

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Hello everyone, first of all I want to say thank you to everyone who submitted a bug using the forums while the program was running. When the Visual Basic forums were migrated to our new platform we were unfortunately unable to keep the pilot going. We learned some valuable lessons and you should see the results of those appear in the future in our product feedback channels.

At this time the Bug Submission Pilot forum will be locked, if you have bugs to report, we encourage you to head over to the Visual Studio Connect page to provide your feedback.

Thank you again,

-Jeremy Kelley

General Troubleshooting & Support for the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 CTP announcements

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Please use this forum for general questions regarding the CTP such as Download Issues, Virtual PC configurations.... For specific walkthrough issues, please post those in the walkthrough specific thread in the appropriate forum.

please make sure to review the CTP FAQ. For more information on the CTP and to get a link to the download, please visit:

http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=129231

Thanks,
Othmane Rahmouni
Program Manager for Product Feedback
Microsoft Developer Division

General Windows MultiPoint Mouse SDK Discussion announcements

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New features in Windows Multipoint Mouse SDK 1.5.1 compared with version 1.5:
- Improved performance on low-end modern hardware, especially Atom-based netbooks.
- Improved device detection (PS/2, trackpad, and Bluetooth mouse devices are now supported).

Getting Started With Visual Studio Team System announcements

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John Boylan Monday, December 3, 2012 11:55 PM

This forum has been retired. It wilis still available for review in the Archived Forums folder.

Face Tracking – Kinect for Windows SDK announcements

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Git, Mercurial and Dropbox Deployment to Azure announcements

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Innovate on Office announcements

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Ji.Zhou Tuesday, November 9, 2010 5:52 AM

Hello forum users,

This forum was created for the Innovate on Office 2007 program in Dec. 2007. The original purpose of the program is listening to the feedbacks and suggestions about Office 2007 so that we can improve our product.

The program has ended in Nov. 2009, which Chaitanya-MSFT has announced in the following thread, http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en/innovateonoffice/thread/4fc4c293-513d-495e-907e-e3f59d02e716.

However, there are still many questions/topics raised everyday about the Office general programming in this forum. So, in order to meet this need of the community, we are creating a new forum titled "General Office Development" that will round out the Microsoft Office for Developers Category on MSDN. As part of this change, we will archive the old "Innovate on Office" forum so that it is read-only, though moderators will be able to move particularly helpful/relevant threads and any new unanswered threads from the old forum to the new.

For general Office development questions and/or questions that don't fit in the current Access, Excel, Outlook, Word, Open XML, or Visual Studio Tools for Office forums, please use this new General Office Development forum going forward.

Installing and Registering Visual Studio Express Editions announcements

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LightSwitch in Visual Studio 2012 RC announcements

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Steve Hoag Tuesday, August 7, 2012 6:22 AM

With the release of Visual Studio 2012 this forum is now retired and archived. Please use theVisual Studio LightSwitch - General Questions forum: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/lightswitch for questions or discussions targeting either version of LightSwitch.

Thank-you for your participation in this forum, and we hope you will continue to participate in the General forum.

LINQ to SQL (Pre-Release) announcements

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Performance
- Query plans are reused more often by specifically defining text parameter lengths
- Identity cache lookups for primary key with single result now includes query.Where(predicate).Single()/SingleOrDefault/First/FirstOrDefault
- Reduced query execution overhead when DataLoadOptions specified (cache lookup considers DataLoadOptions value equivalency – post beta 1)
Usability
- ITable<T> interface for additional mocking possibilities
- Contains with enums automatically casts to int or string depending on column type
- Associations can now specify non-primary-key columns on the other end of the association
- Support list initialization syntax for queries
- LinqDataSource now supports inherited entities
- LinqDataSource support for Dynamic Data query extenders added
Query stability
- Contains now detects self-referencing IQueryable and doesn't cause a stack overflow
- Skip(0) no longer prevents eager loading
- GetCommand operates within SQL Compact transactions
- Exposing Link<T> on a property/field is detected and reported correctly
- Compiled queries now correctly detect a change in mapping source and throw
- String.StartsWith, EndsWith and Contains now correctly handles ~ in the search string
- Now detects multiple active result sets (MARS) better
- Associations are properly created between entities when using eager loading with Table-Valued Functions (TVFs)
- Queries that contain sub-queries with scalar projections now work better
Update stability
- SubmitChanges no longer silently consumes transaction rollback exceptions
- SubmitChanges deals with timestamps in a change conflict scenario properly
- IsDbGenerated now honors renamed properties that don't match underlying column name
- Server-generated columns and SQL replication/triggers now work instead of throwing SQL exception
General stability
- Binary types equate correctly after deserialization
- EntitySet.ListChanged fired when adding items to an unloaded entity set
- Dispose our connections upon context disposal (ones passed in are untouched)
SQL Metal
- Foreign key property setter now checks all affected associations not just the first
- Improved error handling when primary key type not supported
- Now skips stored procedures containing table-valued parameters instead of aborting process
- Can now be used against connections that use AttachDbFilename syntax
- No longer crashes when unexpected data types are encountered
LINQ to SQL class designer
- Now handles a single anonymously named column in SQL result set
- Improved error message for associations to nullable unique columns
- No longer fails when using clauses are added to the partial user class
- VarChar(1) now correctly maps to string and not char
- Decimal precision and scale are now emitted correctly in the DbType attributes for stored procedures
- Foreign key changes will be picked up when bringing tables back into the designer without a restart
Code generation (SQL Metal + LINQ to SQL class designer)
- Stored procedures using original values now compiles when the entity and context namespaces differ
- Virtual internal now generates correct syntax
- Mapping attributes are now fully qualified to prevent conflicts with user types
- KnownTypeAttributes are now emitted for DataContractSerializer with inheritance
- Delay-loaded foreign keys now have the correct, compilable, code generated
- Using stored procedures with concurrency no longer gets confused if entities in different namespace to context
- ForeignKeyReferenceAlreadyHasValueException is now thrown if any association is loaded not just the first

LightSwitch HTML Client Preview announcements

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The LightSwitch team is proud to announce the release of the LightSwitch HTML client in Visual Studio 2012 Update 2!

Users of the previous CTP4 release should be able to upgrade with no problems. Users of the older Preview 2 please read these important upgrade instructions before installing Update 2.

The new HTML5 and JavaScript-based client is an important companion to our Silverlight-based desktop client that addresses the increasing need to build touch-oriented business applications that run well on modern mobile devices. We've also enabled support for the new SharePoint Apps model, so you can now also build SharePoint 2013 apps with LightSwitch.

Check out all the great resources to learn more:

Developer Center – We've got a refreshed website with new HTML client resource s and tutorials . The Developer Center is your one-stop-shop for the best LightSwitch team samples, videos, articles and documentation. Start with the basics or go deeper and explore the architecture and hosting options of LightSwitch apps.

How Do I Videos – We also have started a new "How Do I...?" video series that shows you step-by-step how to get started building HTML clients with LightSwitch. Keep tabs on this page as we're planning a lot more!

JavaScript Samples – We also have created some JavaScript snippets that show you how to achieve many common coding tasks on the HTML client. If you're new to JavaScript, these snippets should help!

Ask questions in the General Forum – Thanks to everyone who gave feedback on the previews! Now that we have released, we will continue our conversations in the LightSwitch General forum . The team is listening there.

Enjoy!

Managed Extensibility Framework announcements

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Welcome to the Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF) forum. This forum is the new home for all discussions related to MEF and the System.ComponentModel.Composition namespace, a set of building blocks that includes dependency injection (DI), structural matching (duck typing) and a naming and activation service for developing extensible and dynamic applications.

You can get started by downloading the CTP from CodePlex.

Regards

Managed Extensibility Framework Team

Microsoft adCenter: Development announcements

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Jeff Dillon has prepared this excellent online video that walks you through the steps for captuing SOAP messages when using the adCenter API. This is especially useful when troubleshooting or reporting issues during development.

As you'll see, Jeff is an accomplished videographer and trainer in addition to being an adCenter API expert. Let us know what you think.

http://adcentercommunity.com/blogs/api/archive/2009/01/08/soap-capture-training-video.aspx

Microsoft ESP Platform Development (Archived) announcements

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This forum and the content associated with it is being retired effective June 30^th. You can find all existing content listed in the MSDN Library for ESP.

Microsoft Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) - Threat Modeling announcements

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I have had the pleasure over the past few months to spend some time playing with an early rendition of " Elevation of Privilege: The Threat Modeling Game". According to Adam, "Elevation of Privilege is the easiest way to get started threat modeling". I couldn't agree more. If you have a team that is new to the whole process of threat modeling, you will want to check it out. If you are at RSA this week, drop by the Microsoft booth and pick the game up for free. If you aren't, you can download it here.

EoP is a card game for 3-6 players. The deck contains 74 playing cards in 6 suits: one suit for each of the STRIDE threats (Spoofing, Tampering, Repudiation, Information disclosure, Denial of Service and Elevation of Privilege). Each card has a more specific threat on it. You can see a short video on how to play and some more information about the game by checking our Adam's post here. In the end, it is a game that makes it possible to have more fun when thinking about threats. And that's a good thing.

Even more impressive is that they have released the game under Creative Commons Attribution license which gives you freedom to share, adapt and remix the game. So you if you feel you can improve up this, step up and let everyone know!!

Congratulations to the SDL team for creating an innovative way to approach the concept of threat modeling.

Microsoft Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) - Tools announcements

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SDL Team Thursday, March 3, 2011 6:17 PM

The recently released Attack Surface Analyzer tool helps developers review attack surface during the verification phase of the SDL. Additionally, Attack Surface Analyzer allows IT professionals to identify security changes as the result of installing applications on the Windows platform. By taking snapshots before and after an application is installed, Attack Surface Analyzer highlights weaknesses and security misconfigurations as issues and generates an Attack Surface report listing changes to securable objects and the computers attack surface.

This webcast will walk you through how to run Attack Surface Analyzer and how to do basic analysis of the generated report.

To register for the webcast, click here: https://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1032480502&Culture=en-US

To download Attack Surface Analyzer, click here: http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9758398
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SDL Team Tuesday, August 3, 2010 9:59 PM
Hi everyone,

We've talked with some people experiencing problems when trying to install the MSF-Agile+SDL v5.0 process template. We believe these problems are a result of an incompatibility with certain configurations of Sharepoint, and we are working to correct the issue for the next release of the MSF-Agile+SDL template. In the meantime, you should be able to work around the problem by following these instructions to disable the Sharepoint features of the template:
1. Uninstall the template if you've already installed it.
2. Reinstall the template files, and uncheck the Additional Sharepoint Components feature during the installation process.
3. Using your XML editor of choice, open the file <template install dir>\Process Template\Windows SharePoint Services\wsstasks.xml.
4. Near the bottom of the file, you will see the lines:


<feature featureId="3F6F501A-5DFF-4359-8ED8-232784DFF47E" />

5. Comment out the second line, ie:





6. Save the file and close

7. Open the Process Template Manager in Visual Studio

8. Delete the existing "MSF for Agile Software Development plus Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) v5.0" process template.

9. Upload the process template again, browse for <template install dir>\Process Template\process template.xml.

10. Close the Process Template Manager.

You should now be able to create MSF-A+SDL projects. If you're experiencing the install bug, please let us know if this helps workaround the problem (or if it doesn't).

Thanks,

Bryan

Model-Based Testing with Spec Explorer announcements

Link
Link

Xiang Li Friday, January 7, 2011 7:46 AM

Hello! We are delighted to announce the newest version of Spec Explorer 2010, Release 3.5.

Spec Explorer 2010 Release 3.5 contains new features, improved documentation, plus over 60 bug fixes. Please consult the Release Notes and our Home Page to access this release.

This release contains new / enhanced features including:

· Model change detecting : The model change detecting feature detects all model changes and decides if Spec Explorer needs to re-explore the model. For specific machines, if Spec Explorer detects any change in the model code, cord script files, or other inputs, or detects a tool version change, Spec Explorer will start a new exploration; otherwise, Spec Explorer will use existing exploration result files for current exploration viewing, test code generation, and user customized post processing. The UI has been updated to allow you to force Spec Explorer to re-explore the machines. This feature greatly improves the user experience by preventing unneeded lengthy validation and exploration events, which frequently happened in previous versions.

· Multiple machine processing : Now you can select multiple machines in Exploration Manager and explore, generate test code, or perform post processing tasks on them. For multiple machine processing, Spec Explorer generates a summary including all information of the batch-processing.

· Cord context menu : Spec Explorer adds a new context menu item "Go To Definition" in the Cord editor, which enables users to navigate to specific configurations and machines. This is part of an ongoing effort to improve the Cord editing user experience and the general integration of the tool with Visual Studio.

We hope you enjoy this release and look forward to hearing feedback from the Spec Explorer community.
Link

Hello Spec Explorers: We seek to gain a better idea of the Spec Explorer community and who is using the tool for what. We aim to bring you the best tool ever and your help will greatly appreciated if you could take a minute to fill in the Spec Explorer User Survey. With thanks, The Spec Explorer Team.

MS-Build, Multi-Targeting and WiX in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 CTP announcements

Link

kenwat Friday, October 24, 2008 10:50 PM

Hi - I'm Ken Watson, the Release Manager for Visual Studio Platform. I'll be one of the moderators on this forum.

We have provided this forum to gather your feedback on the scenarios described in the walkthroughs that shipped with Visual Studio 2010 CTP. At this stage in the release, we are interested in hearing your thoughts on the design of features presented in these walkthrough. We'll be taking more general feedback on the product when we get to the beta.

We'll be discussing the following walkthroughs in this forum:

- How to Create a Custom Platform
- How to Create an Inline Task
- How to Create Custom Property Pages
- How to Use the C++ MSBuild Project System
- How to Deploy an Application by Using WiX.
- How to Prepare a Package for Non-Registry Deployment

We look forward to hearing from you!

thanks,
Ken Watson
Release Manager
Visual Studio Platform

Multimap API Development Forum announcements

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NOTE: This was originally posted on the Multimap Blog - http://blog.multimap.com/2010/11/19/important-news-about-the-multimap-open-api/

The first post on this blog was the announcement of the Multimap Open API .

In the 3½ years that have passed, the Open API has attracted a passionate group of developers building some great apps, especially based around our Ordnance Survey and Collins Bartholomew maps.

It is therefore fitting that one of the last posts on this blog also concerns important news about the Multimap Open API.

You may have seen earlier that we announced we are about to complete the movement of users from Multimap.com to Bing Maps . A number of you have asked on the forum whether this affects the Open API. We now have the last bits in place to provide you with a full reply.

To better serve you and all of our customers, our future investments will now focus solely on Bing Maps APIs and on closing any major feature gaps between Bing and Multimap. This will enable us to accelerate delivering you more mapping and location-based services innovation through one platform, across web and mobile.

Therefore, the Multimap Open API service will be discontinued on November 18th, 2011.

To prepare for this change, we will soon discontinue the registration of new Open API keys. Existing keys will continue to operate until the switch off.

We understand that this will be disappointing news for Open API developers, but there is a silver lining to this particular cloud…

Our colleagues at Bing Maps have just released a major update to the Bing Maps AJAX control . In addition to major improvements in performance, mobile support and imagery, the Bing Maps AJAX map control now includes support for Ordnance Survey and Collins Bartholomew maps .

Our commitment: We're here to help . We have developed migration guides for both the AJAX map control and the REST web services to help get started with your planning process. The Bing Maps Developer Resources site , Bing Maps on MSDN , the Bing Community forums and the Bing Maps blog are also great resources.

From everyone at Multimap, thank you to all Open API developers for your support over the past 3½ years, and we hope to see you build some great new apps on Bing Maps.
Link

For those of you who haven't noticed, we're moving the Multimap Developer Forums over to Bing Community. This is in an effort to consolidate all Bing Developer projects into one place for all guidance, help, information, blogs, etc. For now, the threads that are here on MSDN will remain on MSDN - we'll move them over soon. For new threads on Bing Maps, please begin posting them to Bing Community. In addition to moving the forums to Bing Community, we've broken the forums up by API so if you're developing for a specific topic - AJAX, Siverlight, etc. - you can select the forum of interest as follows:

MultiMap API

Bing Maps Platform – AJAX

Bing Maps Platform – REST Services

Bing Maps Platform – Silverlight

Bing Maps Platform – SOAP Services

General Questions

Bing Map App Development

On behalf of the Bing Maps Team, we look forward to seeing your conversations moved over to Bing Community and thanks for using Bing!

CP

Chris Pendleton

Bing Maps Technical Evangelist

Microsoft Corporation
Link

MelissaMS Thursday, July 23, 2009 1:37 PM

Welcome to the Multimap API forum!

This is the place for any and all questions pertaining to the development of applications using Multimap's API and Web Service APIs. Please feel free to add any questions which we have not yet covered and we will try our best to help you.

Monitor, Alert and Auto scale in Azure announcements

Link

Network Class Library (System.Net) announcements

Link
Link
Is this the right forum?

This forum is monitored on a regular basis by the Network Class Library (NCL) team. It is dedicated to questions about the System.Net namespace and the System.Uri class. If your question falls into this category, then you have come to the right place.

To ensure a timely response, we can only actively monitor questions that fall within the category above. Non-related questions will be locked or moved to the most appropriate forum.

General Forum Tips

Here are a few suggestions (in this order of relevance) that will help you to get the best answer to your question as quickly as possible:
1. Search for your question on the forums or in Visual Studio's help system first -- it's likely someone may have already answered your question, and you won't have to waste time waiting for it to be answered again
2. Post in the correct forum (see below) -- since the experts in various subject matters tend to stick to the set of forums that focus on those topics, a question about the C# yield keyword posted in the Common Language Runtime forum will likely take a lot longer to be answered than the same question in the C# Language forum.
3. Give details about your problem -- rather than "When I call Process.Start I get an exception, please help", provide the exception type, message, and call stack. Many times it helps if you attach a snippet of the network trace/sniff of the error that shows the error. For getting network sniffs use Network Monitor and for network traces use the built in System.Net tracing according to this blog .
  If possible, provide a succinct code snippet that demonstrates the problem. This lets us reproduce the problem on our end and allows us to come up with an answer where just a general question may not have had enough details. Having this information means we can answer your question more quickly, without having to ask you for these details and wait for your response. If you have a big code sample please trim it down to the relevant parts that will help us understand the problem better.
4. Try to pinpoint the location of your error – This will help us get to the root of the issue quickly. Saying something like "My application cannot read from server" is less likely to find a quick solution as compared to "My application gets a 505 not found even though file is present since the trace shows that FtpWebRequest does not handle a 505 error for an xyz command"
5. Make sure your title summarizes the specific problem you have -- since we try to answer the maximum number of questions we can with our time, we often skim through question subjects to quickly find the ones that we know the answers to. A question with a title of "Urgent! Help needed!" is not as likely to get answered as a question with a title of "How to define a sealed class using CodeDOM". A more specific, detailed title is far more likely to get a response than a general one.
6. Once you've received a correct answer to your question, either from a Microsoft employee, an MVP, or the community in general, please mark the post as answered . You can do this with the "Mark as correct answer" button that appears on the entry containing your answer. This step is important, since it lets the Visual Studio search engine know that there is an answer in that thread for others who may also have your problem. It also lets people scanning the forums know that they can find an answer to that question by reading the thread.
7. Report bugs through Microsoft Connect, instead of on the forums -- this site allows us to see the bugs in our bug tracking database and get them assigned to the correct person. It also allows you to follow the problem through to its resolution, and is a much better way for us to handle issues you find than a bug report posted on the forums.
8. Use the report button -- as moderators we try to keep spam and inflammatory comments out of the forums. However if you do catch something that we missed, don't hesitate to use the report button so that we can keep the forums on-topic and a friendly place to go for help with your .NET questions!
Related Forums

When trying to figure out which forum is right for your question, here are some good candidates:

Network Class Library (System.Net) - for managed networking issues like HTTP, SMTP, Uri, FTP, Sockets etc.
Windows Communication Foundation (WCF) - for managed networking issues relating to WCF and SOA
.NET Framework Networking - for managed networking issues not relating to System.Net or WCF.
Common Language Runtime - for questions related to the runtime engine itself
.NET Development General - a general catchall for questions related to the BCL libraries, questions regarding the design of your code, etc.
Visual C# Language - for questions about the C# programming language, not the CLR or managed libraries
Visual Basic Language - same as above, but for VB
Visual C++ Language - same as above, but for C++ (both native and C++/CLI)
Windows Forms General - for questions about creating applications using the System.Windows.Forms libraries
ASP.NET Forums - for questions about writing web applications using ASP.NET
Development Forums - list of forums
Of course there are dozens of other forums available if your question doesn't fit into one of those categories.
You can ask here where you should post if you have not yet found the right place.

Office Development with Visual Studio 2010 CTP announcements

Link

Thank you for bravely downloading this early build of Visual Studio 2010! We are proud of all the work we've done to bring you this build. We hope you will create Office 2007 projects with Visual Studio 2010 and send us feedback, suggestions and bug reports.

In a future release of VS 2010, we will bring you many more features and the ability to create solutions for the next version of Office. For now, please use the Walkthroughs to help you get started building Office Addins, Spreadsheet solutions, and Word document solutions.

The Walkthroughs are designed to help you discover features and lead you through the areas where we need the most feedback.

Walkthrough: Creating Your First Document-Level Customization for Word

Walkthrough: Creating Your First Application-Level Add-in for Excel

Walkthrough: Creating Your First Application-Level Add-in for Outlook

Walkthrough: Creating a Custom Tab by Using the Ribbon Designer

If you are using Visual Studio 2005 or Visual Studio 2008, then please post your questions in this other forum:
http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vsto/threads/

Sincerely,

Christin Boyd, Program Manager, Microsoft Visual Studio

Office Live Small Business - Business Applications announcements

Link
JohnCh Friday, March 7, 2008 9:39 PM
If you haven't already done so, please join the Microsoft Office Live Small Business Community for Designers & Developers at dev.officelive.com. Not only will you gain access to training and technical resources, but you can get a free Developer Account!

This forum is designed to help support developers and designers who are writing applications that work with Microsoft Office Live Small Business. Please read the below Q&A's before posting questions to the forum. It may help save you some time, and also helps us focus in on the main purpose of this forum, helping developers.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q. I need help with Microsoft Office 2003, 2007, Excel, Access, Word, InfoPath, PowerPoint, VBA, etc. etc. Can you help me?

This forum is for developers working on solutions for Microsoft Office Live subscriptions, either Basics, Essentials or Premium. If your question pertains to how Office Live interacts with any of the Microsoft Office 2003 or 2007 apps, yes, please post the question here.

If your question does *not* have to do with Office Live, please do not post the question here. There are newsgroups for Microsoft Office suites . Please post your questions there, as this will be the fastest way for you to get help for your issue.

Q. I am having a problem with my Office Live subscription. Can you help me troubleshoot this problem?

A. The fastest way to get support with your subscription is to contact the Office Live support team . They have tools that allow them to see the properties of your subscription and determine if something is wrong with it. So, if you are having problems seeing your website, getting your email, billing, etc. etc. please work with support.

Q. I am trying to use the 3rd Party Design tools feature to manage my web site on Windows Vista, but the web folder doesn't work. Is there a fix for this issue?

A. There are a couple problems you may be running into:

1. You may be hitting one of several known issues with Vista and Office 2007. There is a series of patches that has been bundled together for Office Live Workspaces to address these issues. This thread contains a work around, plus a link to the patch with more explanation. Here's a direct link to the installer. NOTE: This has not yet been verified to solve the problem, so we cannot guarantee the web folder will start working. However, we don't want to keep you waiting if there is a possible solution.

2. You may have cached Windows Live ID credentials in your Windows OS, and the Web Folder is attempting to log you in with the wrong credentials and thus fails. This thread has steps for clearing those out.
Q. I'm not a developer, but I want to learn more about the cool stuff you can do on Office Live. Is there a good resource I should start with?

A. Yes! The Microsoft Office Live Community is designed to help folks who are not necessarily highly technical, but who want to learn what can be done in Office Live and see what others have done. There is a wealth of information on customizing your web site, business applications, working with your email accounts and much more. We highly recommend checking out these community bulletin boards, even for our developers to get more ideas of what is possible.

Q. I can't log into my Business Applications using SharePoint Designer 2007. It says I have the wrong version.

A. This is usually caused by having multiple Office Live subscriptions and accounts. Sometimes Windows will cache those credentials and SharePoint Designer will attempt to use them without offering you the chance to change accounts. See this discussion for additional details and a solution to the problem.

Q. Can I write a Windows App that talks to the Office Live Business Applications?

A. Yes! Using the Windows Live ID Client SDK , you can authenticate against the Live ID authority, determine which subscription(s) the user has access to and then start interacting with the Business Applications associated with that account. This could range from adding/updating/retrieving contacts, reviewing project milestones & tasks, or working with files stored in a document library . It's up to you and your imagination.

Q. Linked 'external' javascript files are not working as I expected. Are there known issues and workarounds?

A. There are two known issues with using javascript in Office Live when you use the SRC attribute of the <SCRIPT> tag to link to an 'external' javascript file.

1. JS files are cached for improved performance - Our platform caches JS files so that we can serve them up faster to your customers' browser. The downside of this is that during the development/test process, your changes are delayed. There are a few simple work-arounds. See this thread for more information .
2. If you use an external JS file inside of the web site's HTML module, it may lock up or crash IE. This is a known issue in IE, which you may work around using the "defer" attribute of the <SCRIPT> tag. For more information, see this thread .

Helpful links

Microsoft office Live Small Business Designer & Developer Community – portal with training content and resources for Web designers and developers

Microsoft Office Live

Developer Guide in the MSDN Library

MSDN Developer Center - portal of developer resources, videos, blogs, etc.

Community discussion boards - these are generally for Office Live end-user questions.

Getting started

Customer gallery - show off your Office Live site and ask for peer feedback

Web Site Design Tips

Business Applications - customizing and using the Business Applications and Workspaces

Suggestions

E-mail

Other Questions

Blogs

Office Live team blog

SharePoint Products and Technologies Blog

SharePoint Designer team blog

Chris Beiter - Office Live program manager
Link
Link

Office Live Small Business - General Topics announcements

Link
JohnCh Friday, March 7, 2008 9:45 PM
If you haven't already done so, please join the Microsoft Office Live Small Business Community for Designers & Developers at dev.officelive.com. Not only will you gain access to training and technical resources, but you can get a free Developer Account!

This forum is designed to help support developers and designers who are writing applications that work with Microsoft Office Live Small Business. Please read the below Q&A's before posting questions to the forum. It may help save you some time, and also helps us focus in on the main purpose of this forum, helping developers.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q. I need help with Microsoft Office 2003, 2007, Excel, Access, Word, InfoPath, PowerPoint, VBA, etc. etc. Can you help me?

This forum is for developers working on solutions for Microsoft Office Live subscriptions, either Basics, Essentials or Premium. If your question pertains to how Office Live interacts with any of the Microsoft Office 2003 or 2007 apps, yes, please post the question here.

If your question does *not* have to do with Office Live, please do not post the question here. There are newsgroups for Microsoft Office suites . Please post your questions there, as this will be the fastest way for you to get help for your issue.

Q. I am having a problem with my Office Live subscription. Can you help me troubleshoot this problem?

A. The fastest way to get support with your subscription is to contact the Office Live support team . They have tools that allow them to see the properties of your subscription and determine if something is wrong with it. So, if you are having problems seeing your website, getting your email, billing, etc. etc. please work with support.

Q. I am trying to use the 3rd Party Design tools feature to manage my web site on Windows Vista, but the web folder doesn't work. Is there a fix for this issue?

A. There are a couple problems you may be running into:

1. You may be hitting one of several known issues with Vista and Office 2007. There is a series of patches that has been bundled together for Office Live Workspaces to address these issues. This thread contains a work around, plus a link to the patch with more explanation. Here's a direct link to the installer. NOTE: This has not yet been verified to solve the problem, so we cannot guarantee the web folder will start working. However, we don't want to keep you waiting if there is a possible solution.

2. You may have cached Windows Live ID credentials in your Windows OS, and the Web Folder is attempting to log you in with the wrong credentials and thus fails. This thread has steps for clearing those out.
Q. I'm not a developer, but I want to learn more about the cool stuff you can do on Office Live. Is there a good resource I should start with?

A. Yes! The Microsoft Office Live Community is designed to help folks who are not necessarily highly technical, but who want to learn what can be done in Office Live and see what others have done. There is a wealth of information on customizing your web site, business applications, working with your email accounts and much more. We highly recommend checking out these community bulletin boards, even for our developers to get more ideas of what is possible.

Q. I can't log into my Business Applications using SharePoint Designer 2007. It says I have the wrong version.

A. This is usually caused by having multiple Office Live subscriptions and accounts. Sometimes Windows will cache those credentials and SharePoint Designer will attempt to use them without offering you the chance to change accounts. See this discussion for additional details and a solution to the problem.

Q. Can I write a Windows App that talks to the Office Live Business Applications?

A. Yes! Using the Windows Live ID Client SDK , you can authenticate against the Live ID authority, determine which subscription(s) the user has access to and then start interacting with the Business Applications associated with that account. This could range from adding/updating/retrieving contacts, reviewing project milestones & tasks, or working with files stored in a document library . It's up to you and your imagination.

Q. Linked 'external' javascript files are not working as I expected. Are there known issues and workarounds?

A. There are two known issues with using javascript in Office Live when you use the SRC attribute of the <SCRIPT> tag to link to an 'external' javascript file.

1. JS files are cached for improved performance - Our platform caches JS files so that we can serve them up faster to your customers' browser. The downside of this is that during the development/test process, your changes are delayed. There are a few simple work-arounds. See this thread for more information .
2. If you use an external JS file inside of the web site's HTML module, it may lock up or crash IE. This is a known issue in IE, which you may work around using the "defer" attribute of the <SCRIPT> tag. For more information, see this thread .

Helpful links

Microsoft office Live Small Business Designer & Developer Community – portal with training content and resources for Web designers and developers

Microsoft Office Live

Developer Guide in the MSDN Library

MSDN Developer Center - portal of developer resources, videos, blogs, etc.

Community discussion boards - these are generally for Office Live end-user questions.

Getting started

Customer gallery - show off your Office Live site and ask for peer feedback

Web Site Design Tips

Business Applications - customizing and using the Business Applications and Workspaces

Suggestions

E-mail

Other Questions

Blogs

Office Live team blog

SharePoint Products and Technologies Blog

SharePoint Designer team blog

Chris Beiter - Office Live program manager
Link
Link

Office Live Small Business - Web Site announcements

Link
JohnCh Friday, March 14, 2008 2:54 PM
If you haven't already done so, please join the Microsoft Office Live Small Business Community for Designers & Developers at dev.officelive.com . Not only will you gain access to training and technical resources, but you can get a free Developer Account!

This forum is designed to help support developers and designers who are writing applications that work with Microsoft Office Live Small Business. Please read the below Q&A's before posting questions to the forum. It may help save you some time, and also helps us focus in on the main purpose of this forum, helping developers.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q. I need help with Microsoft Office 2003, 2007, Excel, Access, Word, InfoPath, PowerPoint, VBA, etc. etc. Can you help me?

This forum is for developers working on solutions for Microsoft Office Live subscriptions, either Basics, Essentials or Premium. If your question pertains to how Office Live interacts with any of the Microsoft Office 2003 or 2007 apps, yes, please post the question here.

If your question does *not* have to do with Office Live, please do not post the question here. There are newsgroups for Microsoft Office suites . Please post your questions there, as this will be the fastest way for you to get help for your issue.

Q. I am having a problem with my Office Live subscription. Can you help me troubleshoot this problem?

A. The fastest way to get support with your subscription is to contact the Office Live support team . They have tools that allow them to see the properties of your subscription and determine if something is wrong with it. So, if you are having problems seeing your website, getting your email, billing, etc. etc. please work with support.

Q. I am trying to use the 3rd Party Design tools feature to manage my web site on Windows Vista, but the web folder doesn't work. Is there a fix for this issue?

A. There are a couple problems you may be running into:

1. You may be hitting one of several known issues with Vista and Office 2007. There is a series of patches that has been bundled together for Office Live Workspaces to address these issues. This thread contains a work around, plus a link to the patch with more explanation. Here's a direct link to the installer. NOTE: This has not yet been verified to solve the problem, so we cannot guarantee the web folder will start working. However, we don't want to keep you waiting if there is a possible solution.

2. You may have cached Windows Live ID credentials in your Windows OS, and the Web Folder is attempting to log you in with the wrong credentials and thus fails. This thread has steps for clearing those out.
Q. I'm not a developer, but I want to learn more about the cool stuff you can do on Office Live. Is there a good resource I should start with?

A. Yes! The Microsoft Office Live Community is designed to help folks who are not necessarily highly technical, but who want to learn what can be done in Office Live and see what others have done. There is a wealth of information on customizing your web site, business applications, working with your email accounts and much more. We highly recommend checking out these community bulletin boards, even for our developers to get more ideas of what is possible.

Q. I can't log into my Business Applications using SharePoint Designer 2007. It says I have the wrong version.

A. This is usually caused by having multiple Office Live subscriptions and accounts. Sometimes Windows will cache those credentials and SharePoint Designer will attempt to use them without offering you the chance to change accounts. See this discussion for additional details and a solution to the problem.

Q. Can I write a Windows App that talks to the Office Live Business Applications?

A. Yes! Using the Windows Live ID Client SDK , you can authenticate against the Live ID authority, determine which subscription(s) the user has access to and then start interacting with the Business Applications associated with that account. This could range from adding/updating/retrieving contacts, reviewing project milestones & tasks, or working with files stored in a document library . It's up to you and your imagination.

Q. Linked 'external' javascript files are not working as I expected. Are there known issues and workarounds?

A. There are two known issues with using javascript in Office Live when you use the SRC attribute of the <SCRIPT> tag to link to an 'external' javascript file.

1. JS files are cached for improved performance - Our platform caches JS files so that we can serve them up faster to your customers' browser. The downside of this is that during the development/test process, your changes are delayed. There are a few simple work-arounds. See this thread for more information .
2. If you use an external JS file inside of the web site's HTML module, it may lock up or crash IE. This is a known issue in IE, which you may work around using the "defer" attribute of the <SCRIPT> tag. For more information, see this thread .

Helpful links

Microsoft office Live Small Business Designer & Developer Community – portal with training content and resources for Web designers and developers

Microsoft Office Live

Developer Guide in the MSDN Library

MSDN Developer Center - portal of developer resources, videos, blogs, etc.

Community discussion boards - these are generally for Office Live end-user questions.

Getting started

Customer gallery - show off your Office Live site and ask for peer feedback

Web Site Design Tips

Business Applications - customizing and using the Business Applications and Workspaces

Suggestions

E-mail

Other Questions

Blogs

Office Live team blog

SharePoint Products and Technologies Blog

SharePoint Designer team blog

Chris Beiter - Office Live program manager
Link
Link

Parallel Computing General announcements

Link
Link

Parallel Computing Platform in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 CTP announcements

Link

Hi, all,

My name is Stephen Toub, and I'm the lead Program Manager for the Parallel Computing Platform team at Microsoft.

Visual Studio 2010 includes programming models for concisely expressing concurrency. This includes new .NET Framework libraries, such as the Task Parallel Library and Parallel LINQ, as well as the Parallel Pattern Library and the Concurrency Runtime, which enable the development of native applications with C++ that execute efficiently on parallel hardware. Visual Studio 2010 also includes parallel debugging and profiling experiences. Parallel debugging toolwindows provide the user with a view of tasks running in the application and a graphical view of parallel call stacks, while the parallel profiling views give the user an understanding of their application's core utilization, thread behavior and contention blocking, and more.

For more in-depth information on these technologies, a key resource is the Parallel Computing Developer Center on MSDN. In addition, for this CTP we've created several walkthroughs to provide a glimpse into the capabilities being provided:

- Parallel Programming with the .NET Framework 4.0
- Parallel Programming with the Parallel Pattern Library
- Parallel Debugging Toolwindows in Visual Studio 2010
- Parallel Profiling Views in Visual Studio 2010

You can download these walkthroughs and the CTP from http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=129231.

Thank you very much for your interest in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 CTP! We look forward to hearing your feedback.

Stephen Toub
Program Manager Lead
Parallel Computing Platform

Patterns & practices: Roadmap Discussion announcements

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This is THE time of the year we start giving a lot more thought to our plans for the coming 12 months. We spend this time talking to many executives around the company and are acutely listening to our customers, you, about the guidance you need most to be successful with your .NET development.

What helps us most is to understand your scenarios. Sure technology is important, but if we understand what you're trying to do, we can help apply the appropriate technology.

As we learn more about our plans, we actually have another brainstorming session today, we'll post them here to keep you in the loop. Until then, we'd like to hear from you about what you need most.

Thanks,
DonS

Pex and Moles PowerTool announcements

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Pex for fun on the web is a radically simplified version of the fully featured Pex Power Tool for Visual Studio. You do not need to install anything; all the work happens in the cloud. You can write code in C#, Visual Basic, or F#. Coding Duels are a fun way to exercise your programming skills, where Pex checks if you implement a particular algorithm correctly. Go to www.pexforfun.com, and start with the tutorial!
Link

We just released version 0.94!

After more than a year of community feedback on DevLabs, Pex and Moles have taken the next step and have become Visual Studio 2010 Power Tools. To reflect this step forward, we have increased the version number to 0.9x.

Pex and Moles come with a PowerTools license. MSDN subscribers can download Pex for commercial use. Unlike the previous DevLabs download, Pex no longer requires Visual Studio 2010 Team Suite, but will work with Visual Studio 2008 or 2010 Professional or better. The Pex installer includes Moles. Moles is also available separately for commercial use without requiring an MSDN subscription. In addition, a version of Pex is still available for academic and non-commercial use.

Get the Pex and Moles Power Tools now, and learn more about the new license terms at http://research.microsoft.com/pex. Also take a look at our completely overhauled documentation.

The MSDN forums are still there to help you with questions at http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/pex/threads/.

Thank for your support, and all the valuable feedback you gave us during our time on DevLabs. We have incorporated many of your suggestions, and we will keep listening.

Your Pex Team
Link

Regular Expressions announcements

Link

Link

OmegaMan Wednesday, February 4, 2009 5:16 PM

If you love Regex...then Regex and Linq is a match made in Heaven. Here are two scenarios where Regex and linq can be used together.

Place Key Value Pairs into a dictionary<string,string> object from regex: Regex To Linq to Dictionary in C#

Here is a quick example where this input "123abcd3" will tokenized into digits or characters and placed into an IEnumerable array with values of "123", "abcd" and "3".

The tokenization will occur and the named match Tokens will contain sub captures. Those captures will be enumerated and placed into an IEnumerable <string> array.

string input = "123abcd3" ;

string pattern = @ "(?<Tokens>\d+|[a-zA-Z]+)+" ;

var items = from Match min Regex.Matches( input, pattern )

from Capture cptin m.Groups[ "Tokens" ].Captures

select cpt.Value;

Console.WriteLine(string .Join( "," , items.ToArray() ) );

// Outputs

// 123,abcd,3

This should get you started in using Linq with Regex. GL HTH

NUI API and Programming—Kinect for Windows SDK announcements

Link

Oracle on Azure announcements

Link

POS for .NET announcements

Link
Link

Microsoft Point of Service for .NET v1.12 (POS for .NET) is a class library that enables POS developers to apply Microsoft .NET technologies in their products. It provides a simple and consistent interface for .NET Framework applications to interact with POS devices, in compliance with the UnifiedPOS standard (aka UPOS). In addition, it provides windows plug and play (PnP) support. There are thirty-six classes of POS peripherals supported including cash drawer, receipt printer, barcode scanner, magnetic strip reader (MSR), line display, RFID, Biometric, Belt, Check Scanner, Fiscal Printer, Electronic Journal, Image Scanner, Item Dispenser, Magnetic Ink Character Recognition Reader (MICR), PIN Pad, signature capture device, etc. In addition, POS for .NET supports many legacy devices where OPOS service objects are available.

POS for .NET 1.12 Download page:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=eaae202a-0fcc-406a-8fde-35713d7841ca&displaylang=en
Link

Server Core Developers announcements

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This forum can be used to ask questions around developing on Server Core.

Andrew

Sharepoint Development with Visual Studio - Archive announcements

Link

Security for Azure announcements

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Service Bus EAI & EDI Labs Release announcements

Link

Share your How to samples (archive) announcements

Link

Software Transactional Memory DevLab announcements

Link

Dana Groff Tuesday, May 11, 2010 11:33 PM

I would like to thank everyone who downloaded and participated in the MSDN DevLab and tried our .NET 4.0 Framework enabled to use Software Transactional Memory (STM.NET). The incubation is now concluded.

We appreciate all the feedback we have received since STM.NET was released; it truly helps us define our product decisions and technology investments. STM provides ease-of-use and safe, compositional synchronization. Both MSR and the parallel-programming team in Microsoft will continue to research and incubate various technologies to help the developer safely and easily scale their application; your input is important.

You can follow future efforts at the Parallel Computing Developer Center . We will continue to this blog but our STM.NET forum will be locked. Of course, you can still participate in the Parallel Extensions to .NET Forum .

While the .NET download and samples have been removed, you can still download the STM Programmer's Guide .

Thank you!
Link
This forum is to discuss the .NET Framework Enabled to Use Software Transactional Memory (STM.NET). Software transactional memory (STM) is a promising technology to help users synchronize access to shared memory. STM.NET is available from MSDN Devlabs .

Use this forum to:
- Ask questions about using STM.NET
- Report bugs and
- Report how you are using
- Give us feedback
We are looking to discover if the programming model and feature set exposed by this experimental .NET Framework help you develop applications that can take advantage of today's multi-core and many-core processors.

To set expectations, we are a very small team and we will endeavor to answer your questions and help workaround any bugs and limitations in this release. The .NET Framework we based this release on is the same as shipped with Beta1 of Visual Studio 2010.

Please feel free to look over our Programming Guide . This will give you a good introduction to STM and how to use our implantation of STM in the .NET Framework.

SyncFx - Feedback [ReadOnly] announcements

Link

One piece of feedback we receive fairly frequently is that given the number of Sync Framework forums, it is confusing, where to best find answers and ask questions relating to specific components of the Sync Framework. For that reason, we have created a new single (unified) forum for you to use for anything relating to the Microsoft Sync Framework:

SyncFx - Microsoft Sync Framework Developer Discussions

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/syncdevdiscussions/threads

As a result, as of Jan 23^rd, 2010 this forum will be locked and will only be available in read mode to allow you to search and read archived questions. Any questions that were submitted since Jan 1, 2010 in the below forums will be moved to this new location and will continue to be active in their new location. So please start tracking them in their new location.

SyncFx - General

SyncFx - Technical Discussion

SyncFx – Feedback

SyncFx - Microsoft Sync Framework Database Providers

Liam Cavanagh

SyncFx - Microsoft Sync Framework Database Providers [ReadOnly] announcements

Link

One piece of feedback we receive fairly frequently is that given the number of Sync Framework forums, it is confusing, where to best find answers and ask questions relating to specific components of the Sync Framework. For that reason, we have created a new single (unified) forum for you to use for anything relating to the Microsoft Sync Framework:

SyncFx - Microsoft Sync Framework Developer Discussions

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/syncdevdiscussions/threads

As a result, as of Jan 23^rd, 2010 this forum will be locked and will only be available in read mode to allow you to search and read archived questions. Any questions that were submitted since Jan 1, 2010 in the below forums will be moved to this new location and will continue to be active in their new location. So please start tracking them in their new location.

SyncFx - General

SyncFx - Technical Discussion

SyncFx – Feedback

SyncFx - Microsoft Sync Framework Database Providers

Liam Cavanagh

SyncFx - Technical Discussion [ReadOnly] announcements

Link

One piece of feedback we receive fairly frequently is that given the number of Sync Framework forums, it is confusing, where to best find answers and ask questions relating to specific components of the Sync Framework. For that reason, we have created a new single (unified) forum for you to use for anything relating to the Microsoft Sync Framework:

SyncFx - Microsoft Sync Framework Developer Discussions

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/syncdevdiscussions/threads

As a result, as of Jan 23^rd, 2010 this forum will be locked and will only be available in read mode to allow you to search and read archived questions. Any questions that were submitted since Jan 1, 2010 in the below forums will be moved to this new location and will continue to be active in their new location. So please start tracking them in their new location.

SyncFx - General

SyncFx - Technical Discussion

SyncFx – Feedback

SyncFx - Microsoft Sync Framework Database Providers

Liam Cavanagh
Link

This post provides error codes and descriptions for the lightweight database that is used by the Sync Framework metadata storage service. If the metadata storage service returns an error code, you can search for that code in this post and identify the cause of the error.

25001 Either the cursor is not on a row or there are no rows left.
25002 The specified buffer size is not valid.
25003 The specified length is too long for the column type.
25004 The column cannot be modified.
25005 The column cannot contain null values.
25008 The parameter is not valid.
25009 The path is not valid. Check the directory for the database.
25010 The file name is not valid. Check the file name for the database.
25011 The file that is being referenced is not a metadata store database file format.
25012 The record was not prepared for update.
25014 Access to the system column is denied.
25016 A duplicate value cannot be inserted into a unique index.
25017 The database file may be corrupted. Run the repair utility to check the database file.
25018 Failed to obtain a lock for a write operation.
25020 Failed to obtain a lock for a commit.
25022 Null values are not allowed in indexes.
25025 The primary key value cannot be deleted because references to this key still exist.
25026 A foreign key value cannot be inserted because a corresponding primary key value does not exist.
25027 The table definition or the row size exceeds the maximum row size of 8060 bytes.
25028 The specified password does not match the database password.
25030 A duplicate key value was found as a result of referential integrity action.
25033 The specified locale is not supported on this operating system.
25034 There is a file locking violation. Close any external application that uses the database file.
25035 There is a file sharing violation. A different process might be using the file.
25037 There is not enough disk space left for the database.
25038 There is not enough disk space left for the temporary database.
25039 Access to the database file is not allowed.
25044 OS Error: The OS limit of open files has been exceeded. Other applications will need to be shut down to free up available open files.
25046 The database file cannot be found. Check the path to the database.
25047 OS Error: The metadata store encountered a premature EOF for the database file. Running the repair utility might help recover some data.
25048 OS Error: The OS is reporting that no more file handles can be created. In order to proceed, try closing other applications.
25049 OS Error: The OS storage system (RAM, CF, SD, or IPSM) is not responding. Retry the operation.
25050 OS Error: The OS will not allow sharing of any more files. In order to proceed, try closing other applications.
25051 Internal error: Unable to successfully execute disk IO on the file system.
25053 Internal error: A serious error has occurred when trying to create a key.
25054 The limit of 16 columns for the multi-column index was exceeded.
25056 The size of the Unicode text column is not even.
25058 Internal error: Invalid operation without a current index.
25059 Long value data type cannot be indexed.
25060 The foreign key constraint does not exist.
25064 Only one ROWGUID, autoincrement, and version are allowed for each column in a table.
25065 The limit of 249 indexes per tables has been exceeded.
25066 The limit of 1024 columns for a table has been exceeded.
25067 Internal error: The internal transactions for the metadata store have exceeded the nesting limit.
25070 The definition of referring columns (such as number of columns or data types) in referential relationships must match the referred columns.
25072 Primary keys cannot be created on columns that support null values.
25073 Tables must contain at least one column.
25074 The expression string for the default value cannot be longer than 4000 characters.
25075 Nullable columns cannot be identity columns.
25077 The constraint cannot be removed because it is referenced by another constraint.
25078 The index cannot be removed because it is being used to enforce a constraint.
25081 The new value generated for the inserted row is outside the range for an INTEGER or BIGINT data type.
25083 The referential relationship will result in a cyclical reference that is not allowed.
25084 The data types of the columns in the relationship do not match.
25085 The table already has a primary key.
25086 The identity column contains an increment value that is not valid.
25087 Internal error: A new GUID cannot be generated for the new row.
25090 The metadata store timed out waiting for a lock. The default lock time is 2000ms. The default lock timeout can be increased in the connection string using the ssce: default lock timeout property.
25091 The lock manager has run out of space for additional locks. This can be caused by large transactions, by large sort operations, or by operations where the metadata store creates temporary tables. You cannot increase the lock space.
25092 The path specified for the temp database is not valid.
25100 Unable to create Command object because query processor is not present on the device or not located in the same directory as the storage engine.
25101 The metadata store has exceeded the buffer size. The default size is 640kb, but can be increased on initialization by modifying the ssce: max buffer size property.
25102 Another user has opened the database with different instance-level initialization properties.
25103 The metadata store could not be loaded.
25104 The database file is larger than the configured maximum database size. This setting takes effect on the first concurrent database connection only.
25105 Internal error: Invalid Security Descriptor was specified.
25106 The limit of 249 contstraints per table has been exceeded.
25107 Internal error: The specified constraint does not define the requested type of key.
25108 Another cursor on the same table has a pending operation on the same row.
25109 The database password cannot exceed 40 characters.
25110 The table and column name is part of a reserved name. Table and column names cannot begin with '__Sys'.
25111 Internal error: Compressed columns do not support the stream interface(s).
25112 Invalid use of compressed flag for non-long value column.
25113 Cannot change compression status for a database.
25114 File already exists. Try using a different database name.
25115 Wrong page (potential database corruption). Try running the repair utility.
25116 Internal error: Access to the system table is denied.
25117 Database already opened by a different user.
25118 Internal error: Cannot open the shared memory region.
25119 Cannot alter a column that is part of a key or an index.
25120 Opening a database as read-only requires a temp path to be specified.
25122 Internal error: Fatal failure of the lock susbsytem for this database.
25123 The metadata store could not be loaded.
25124 The long value was changed by another transaction.
25125 Internal error: Invalid statistics creation options.
25127 Invalid provider type.
25128 The metadata store has encountered two different versions of the product accessing the same database file. Ensure that each application accessing the same database file is using the same version of the metadata store.
25129 The string value that has been assigned to the LIKE clause in the SELECT statement exceeds the limit for the metadata store. The limit for single byte character set is 256 characters but can be smaller for double byte character set.
25130 The specified locale is not installed on this machine. Make sure you install the appropriate language pack.
25131 The metadata store could not be loaded.
25132 This version of the metadata store is not licensed for production use.
25133 Inernal error: The metadata store made an unsupported request to the host operating system.
25134 Database file had invalid encryption.
25135 Internal Error while opening share memory, cancelled the open.
25200 The column cannot have NULL values.
25201 The data was truncated. Try passing down a larger buffer.
25206 Additional records were updated as a result of referential integrity actions.
25207 Additional records were deleted as a result of referential integrity actions.
25210 This column already had a default.
27000 Too many sessions are open.
27001 The new column cannot be set as the PRIMARY KEY constraint. Create a table-level constraint instead.
27002 The new column cannot be set as a UNIQUE constraint. Create a table-level constraint instead.
27003 Column nullability cannot be changed after the column is created.
27004 The column cannot become an identity column after it is created.
27005 The column property is not valid.
27500 An overflow occurred while setting decimal data.
27501 Decimal data was truncated.
27502 The parameter is not valid.
27506 Internal Error: Unexpected value for SEPREPAREMODE.
27781 After the form '@name = value' has been used, all subsequent parameters must be passed in the form '@name = value'.
27782 The application thread has not been initialized for COM interop because COM threading model has not been set. Please check documentation for System.STAThreadAttribute or System.MTAThreadAttribute classes.
27751 The specified assembly already exists in this database.
27752 The assembly with this name is already registered. The version number does not match the expected value.
27753 SQL assembly name and .NET assembly name do not match.
27754 Circular assembly references were detected. Operation has been canceled.
27755 The ReferenceAssemblyList of the assembly being dropped is not empty.
27756 The ReferenceRoutineList of the assembly being dropped is not empty.
27757 .NET assembly with the specified name does not exist.
27758 One or more assemblies is missing in the assembly_bits specifier.
27759 Assembly specified more than once in the assembly_bits specifier.
27760 Unable to access/read the specified assembly.
27761 The specified binary literal is not a valid assembly file.
27762 Trigger with the specified name already exists in this database.
27763 The specified table does not exist.
27764 The specified trigger does not exist in this database.
27765 The calling convention of the specified method does not match the expected value. The method should be defined as public static (Shared in Visual Basic).
27766 The actual number of arguments in the specified method does not match the expected value.
27767 The argument types in the specified method do not match the expected values.
27768 The specified type was not found in this .NET assembly.
27769 The method with the specified name was not found in the class definition.
27770 The return type of the specified method does not match the expected value.
27771 A critical error occured while invoking .NET trigger.
27772 A .NET exception has been thrown during trigger execution.
27773 The action caused an INSTEAD OF trigger to fire.
27774 INSTEAD OF DELETE/UPDATE trigger cannot be defined on a table that has a foreign key with a CASCADE on DELETE/UPDATE action defined.
27775 Recursive trigger invocation exceeded the maximum allowed nesting level.
27776 The current transaction has been aborted during trigger invocation. No operation has been performed.
27777 Could not load the metadata store. Operation has been aborted.
27778 Unable to load .NET assembly with the specified name. This is because the assembly does not exist or because your trigger/stored procedure has been compiled against an assembly with different strong name.
27779 Procedure with the specified name already exists in this database.
27780 Cannot drop the procedure because it does not exist, or you do not have permission.
27992 The metadata store does not support distributed transactions. The command is currently enlisted in a transaction. You can not change the database in use until that transaction is committed or aborted.
27993 Cannot drop the database because it does not exist, or you do not have permission.
27994 Nested transactions are not supported.
27995 The command is not enlisted in a transaction.
27996 The metadata store is not responding, potentially waiting for a lock timeout. The current connection will be closed.
27997 The size of the executed script has exceeded its maximum value. Use [GO] statements to reduce the size of submitted SQL batches.
27998 There is not enough memory on the device running the metadata store to complete this operation.
27999 The metadata store is either not installed or the installation has been corrupted.
28000 Internal error: The table was unexpectedly opened.
28002 A write operation to the Internet wrote an incorrect number of bytes.
28008 Internal error: The transport failed due to incorrect message format or content.
28012 Authentication failed on the proxy server.
28015 A Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) connection is required to access this site.
28030 Internal error: Compression failed. Try again.
28031 Internal error: Decompression failed. Try again.
28032 The call to InternetOpen failed. Check the major error for more information.
28041 Internal error: Unexpected resend request.
28519 The value specified for DBDROPOPTION is not valid. Valid values are 0 and 1.
28523 Internal error: Initializing an internal object failed.
28527 Internal error: The column ordinal cannot be found.
28528 Internal error: A nickname was not generated.
28530 Internal error: The metadata store was unable to read the generated machine ID from the registry. If a network device is installed on the device, a generated machine ID will not be necessary.
28531 Internal error: The metadata store was unable to write the generated machine ID from the registry. If a network device is installed on the device, a generated machine ID will not be necessary.
28537 Internal error: The identity range was not established.
28539 Internal error: The database is already initialized.
28540 Internal error: The database is not initialized.
28546 The specified connection string is not valid.
28547 The metadata store database cannot be compacted because it is open.
28548 A specified parameter is too large.
28552 Internal error: This table does not have a ROWGUID column.
28553 Internal error: This table does not have a ROWGUID column nor an Identity range.
28554 The number of rows at the client does not match the number of rows at the server. Retry the operation.
28558 The metadata store encountered problems when creating the database.
28559 The metadata store encountered problems when opening the database.
28561 Internal error: Failed to roll back changes.
28562 Internal error: The delete message for the server was not created.
28563 The device does not have sufficient memory. The metadata store cannot allocate more space on the device. There also might not be enough contiguous memory space. Try closing other applications.
28565 The insert action failed.
28566 The update action failed.
28567 Internal error: The table cannot be opened.
28569 Internal error: The index cannot be set on the ROWGUID column.
28570 Internal error: The data row cannot be accessed.
28571 Internal error: The column data for a row cannot be accessed.
28572 Internal error: Row data cannot be set.
28573 The LocalTableName parameter is already specified.
28574 An internal error occurred.
28576 Internal error: Could not bind to column.
28578 The data type is not valid.
28580 The specified parameter is not valid.
28581 Internal error: The message cannot be built. The Make Message failed.
28582 The parameter is either not specified or not valid.
28586 The parameter is either not specified or not valid.
28599 The referenced table must have a primary or candidate key.
28601 Internal error: Stream access denied.
28602 Internal error: When trying to add a GUID tracking column, the metadata store could not create the column because the column did not contain the uniqueidentifier attribute.
28604 Internal error: This table is read-only. The internal system objects and system lock tables are not updateable.
28605 Internal error: DDL operations are not allowed on system tables.
28607 The table does not exist.
28608 Internal error: Cannot modify the column type.
28610 This operation requires the database to be opened in a single user mode and the database is currently in a multi-user mode.
28611 The file resolves to a path that is too long. The maximum length is 260 characters.
28613 Internal error: Failure converting string to GUID.
28614 Internal error: Internal error: Failed to get the minor error code.
28615 Internal error: Failed to get the index on the row GUID.
28616 Internal error: Failure checking existance of local table.
28618 Internal error: QueryInterface failed.
28619 Internal error: Failure reading from SequentialStream.
28620 Internal error: Opening of the rowset failed.
28621 Internal error: Failure setting up bindings, possibly caused by insufficient permissions.
28622 Internal error: Failure setting up a non parameterized query, possible incorrect SQL query.
28624 Internal error: Failure closing a cursor.
28625 Internal error: Failure getting column information.
28626 Internal error: Failure setting column value.
28627 Failure to open the metadata store with the given connect string.
28628 Internal error: Closing the database failed.
28629 Deleting the database failed. Ensure that other applications do not have the database open.
28630 Starting the transaction failed. Try to reduce the number of other open transactions in the application.
28633 Internal error: Failure opening the message file. This occurs when processing the message fails on the client side.
28634 Failure writing to a message file on the device. The error typically comes from running out of memory. While there might appear to be plenty of available memory on the device, there might not be enough contiguous memory. Try closing other applications or warm booting the device.
28635 Failure reading from a message file. The error typically comes from running out of memory. While there might appear to be plenty of available memory on the device, there might not be enough contiguous memory. Try closing other applications or warm booting the device.
28636 Internal error: Failure closing the transport.
28642 Internal error: Unable to create error table row because corresponding base table row has been deleted.
28644 A required property is not specified.
28645 An invalid value was supplied for a property.
29001 Internal error: An unexpected state was encountered when processing inserts or updates.
29004 The OLE DB provider for the metadata store cannot be initialized.
29007 The query cannot be tracked. There might not be a primary key, or the query might involve multiple tables.
29010 The table does not have a primary key.
29011 The table contains a timestamp or another row versioning column.
29018 No columns were found. Either the table name is missing or the permissions are not valid.
29029 Internal error: The column metadata information does not match with the OLEDB provider.
29030 The query cannot be tracked because one or more columns of the primary key are missing.
29031 The query cannot be tracked because the table includes a computed column that cannot be pulled.
29032 The query cannot be tracked because it is a multi-table query.
29050 Internal error: Failure getting a rowset.
29051 Internal error: Failure getting columns.
29062 The SQLSelectString parameter is not specified.
29500 Internal error: The transport read operation returned an incorrect data length.
29501 Internal error: The write message failed.
29503 The column cannot be found.
29504 Internal error: The names buffer is too small.
29506 Internal error: Failure getting column information. Retry the operation.
29507 Internal error: Failure getting column length. Retry the operation.
29508 Internal error: Failure getting column data. Retry the operation.
29509 Internal error: Failure setting column data. Retry the operation.
29510 BLOB data could not be completely read. Retry the operation.
29511 Internal error: The message received from the server cannot be decoded.
25500 Internal error: The execution plan cannot be generated.
25501 There was an error parsing the query.
25502 The count of column names and source expressions do not match.
25503 The column name is not valid.
25505 The constraint specified is not valid.
25506 There is not enough memory to complete the operation.
25507 There is an unclosed comment block in the SQL statement. Ensure that there are balanced '/*' and '*/' comment markers in the SQL statement.
25508 The token specified is too long. The maximum length is 128 characters.
25509 A conversion from string to float data failed.
25510 A conversion from string to numeric data failed.
25511 A quotation mark delimiter is missing from the end of the query.
25512 Conversion from string to money data failed.
25513 Null values are not valid identifiers.
25514 The identifier cannot be an empty string.
25515 In aggregate and grouping expressions, the SELECT clause can contain only aggregates and grouping expressions.
25516 Nested aggregate expressions are not allowed.
25517 In aggregate and grouping expressions, the HAVING clause can contain only aggregate functions and grouping expressions.
25518 In aggregate and grouping expressions, the ORDER BY clause can contain only aggregate functions and grouping expressions.
25519 Expressions in the GROUP BY list cannot contain aggregate functions.
25520 Expressions in the ORDER BY list cannot contain aggregate functions.
25521 The ORDER BY list cannot have duplicate expressions.
25522 The table aliases must be unique.
25523 The column aliases must be unique.
25524 A HAVING clause must have a GROUP BY clause (implicit or explicit).
25525 The WHERE clause cannot refer to aggregate expressions.
25526 Duplicate constraints cannot be specified.
25527 A function with the same signature already exists.
25530 A column with the same name has already been specified.
25531 The column name cannot be resolved to a table. Specify the table to which the column belongs.
25532 The float precision is not valid.
25533 The identifier/column name is too long. The maximum length is 128 characters.
25534 Large objects (ntext and image) cannot be used in ORDER BY clauses.
25536 Length, precision or scale cannot be specified for NTEXT or IMAGE data types. Remove these attributes from the IMAGE or NTEXT data types in the DDL statement.
25537 The columns in the subquery do not match.
25539 The escape character for the LIKE predicate is not valid.
25540 The datepart is not valid.
25541 The identifier is not valid.
25542 Data cannot be added to a system table or a schema information view.
25543 Data cannot be updated in a system table or a schema information view.
25544 Data cannot be deleted from a system table or a schema information view.
25545 A value must be provided for the INSERT statement into <table_name>.
25546 The column cannot be modified because it is an identity column or a system column.
25547 ORDER BY <column number> not supported.
25548 DISTINCT cannot be used with ntext and image data.
25549 GROUP BY cannot be used with ntext and image data.
25550 Too many identity columns are specified for the table. Only one identity column for each table is allowed.
25551 The identity column must be either an integer or big integer data type and cannot be NULL.
25552 Elements in the GROUP BY clause must reference columns in the select list.
25553 A foreign key constraint that has an UPDATE or a DELETE CASCADE rule, and self-references a column in the same table, is not allowed.
25554 Defaults cannot be created on identity columns.
25555 Subquery columns cannot be ntext or image data types.
25556 The number sign (#) is reserved and cannot be used as the first character of an identifier.
25557 Expressions combined by a UNION operator must have the same number of columns.
25558 The number of columns in the query and the table must match.
25559 Invalid index ordinal in index hint specification.
25560 Invalid index name in index hint specification.
25561 Invalid query hint specification.
25562 Percentage of rows to be sampled should be an integer between 1 and 100.
25563 There are already statistics existing on this index.
25565 Statistics on this index do not exist.
25567 Table has too few rows to build statistics.
25568 Invalid statistics creation option.
25569 Invalid set option.
25571 ORDER BY items must appear in the select list if SELECT DISTINCT is specified.
25572 The SET SHOWPLAN statements must be the only statements in the batch.
25573 Query cannot use both named and unnamed parameters at the same time.
25574 Duplicated parameter names are not allowed.
25575 Index hints are only allowed in a FROM clause.
25576 Unrecognized LOCK HINTS option.
25577 The NOLOCK lock hint is only allowed in a SELECT statement.
25578 Conflicting locking hints specified.
25579 Unrecognized SET statement.
25580 Identity seed or increment value is invalid.
25582 Alter table only allows columns to be added which can contain null values. The column cannot be added to the table because it does not allow null values.
25584 The column could not be modified because one or more objects access this column.
25585 Cannot generate a keyset cursor for the query because there is no reference to base table.
25586 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because there is a DISTINCT operator.
25587 Cursor is not updatable.
25588 Column is not updatable.
25589 Internal error: This is not a base table long value column.
25590 The combination of cursor options is not valid. For instance, updateable and insensitive is an invalid option.
25591 Internal error: The storage interface for long value is invalid or unsupported.
25592 SetColumn cannot be called during delete operation.
25593 Bookmark is not supported for this cursor.
25594 Cannot alter column of type NTEXT or IMAGE
25595 Cannot generate a keyset cursor for the query because there is a DISTINCT operator.
25596 Cannot generate a keyset cursor for the query because there is an explicit or implicit GROUP BY operator.
25597 Cannot generate a keyset cursor for the query because there is a OUTER JOIN operator.
25599 Cannot generate a keyset cursor for the query because there is a UNION operator.
25600 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because there is an explicit or implicit GROUP BY operator.
25601 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because there is an OUTER JOIN operator.
25602 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because there is a SPOOL/SORT operator.
25603 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because there is a UNION operator.
25604 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because there is a non-standard join expression.
25605 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because there is a cycle in join graph.
25606 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because a one-to-one join must compare columns in the same order as declared in unique indexes.
25607 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because there is a many-to-many relationship.
25608 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because there are one or more non-updatable relationships among base tables.
25609 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because one or more tables are not explicitly joined together.
25610 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because there is a self join.
25611 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because updatable tables are not joined on the same columns.
25612 Cannot generate an updatable cursor for the query because there is no updatable column.
25613 A conversion from float to string data failed.
25614 Procedure expects parameter, which was not supplied.
25615 The table schema has changed since the query was last compiled. Recompile the query.
25616 Statistics not supported on system tables.
25617 Invalid option specified in CREATE INDEX statement.
25618 Invalid stored procedure name.
25619 FULLSCAN option is required for CREATE/UPDATE STATISTICS.
25620 Named Constraint is not supported for this type of constraint.
25621 The specified argument value for the procedure is not valid.
25622 The table name is not valid.
25623 The global variable name is not valid.
25624 Invalid CREATE DATABASE option.
25900 The query processor encountered an error evaluating the expression.
25901 Expression evaluation caused an overflow.
25902 The data types in the IN expression do not match.
25903 There was an error in a part of the date format.
25904 There was an error in the date format.
25905 There was a syntax error in the date format.
25906 There was a syntax error while converting from one data type to another.
25907 An overflow occurred while converting the string data type to money.
25909 Default values cannot have column references.
25910 Default values cannot have aggregate functions.
25911 Aggregate value expressions cannot have ntext or image data.
25912 The original data is truncated and cannot be converted.
25913 The arithmetic operator is not supported for the data type.
25914 Modulo is not supported on real, float, money, and numeric data types.
25916 An operator on the result data type from a subquery is not valid.
25917 Bit operators (&,|,^,~) are not supported on real, float, money, and numeric data types.
25918 The data type is not valid for the arithmetic operation.
25920 The data was truncated while converting from one data type to another.
25921 The function is not recognized by the metadata store.
25922 The specified argument value for the function is not valid.
25923 The ntext and image data types cannot be used in WHERE, HAVING, GROUP BY, ON, or IN clauses, except when these data types are used with the LIKE or IS NULL predicates.
25924 An overflow might have occurred while converting binary to datetime.
25925 An overflow might have occurred while converting numeric to datetime.
25926 An overflow might have occurred while converting money to datetime.
25927 An overflow might have occurred while converting bigint to datetime.
25928 There are too many arguments specified for the procedure or function.
25929 A unary minus can be performed only on tinyint, smallint, int, bigint, money, and numeric data types.
25930 The operation cannot be performed because the precision of the numeric data types do not match.
25931 The operation cannot be performed because the scale of the numeric data types do not match.
25932 The data types cannot be converted implicitly.
25933 An overflow occurred while converting to datetime.
25935 Dividing by zero is not allowed.
25937 A time datepart must be specified to convert a string to datetime.
25938 The specified hour in the time datepart is not valid.
25939 The specified minute in the time datepart is not valid.
25940 The specified second in the time datepart is not valid.
25941 The specified millisecond in the time datepart is not valid.
25942 The specified date or time datepart is not valid.
25943 The format of the specified date or time datepart is not valid.
25944 The order of the specified date or time datepart is not valid.
25945 The escape sequence used in the LIKE predicate is not valid.
25946 The number of arguments specified for the function is not correct.
25947 The conversion is not supported.
25948 The specified argument value for the function is not valid.
25949 The expressions in UNION are not compatible.
25950 A parameter is missing.
25951 A parameter is not allowed in this location. Ensure that the '@' sign is in a valid location or that parameters are valid at all in this SQL statement.
25953 Expression evaluation caused a sign mismatch.
25954 Cannot alter column because it has a default value.
25955 The data type is not valid for the boolean operation.
26100 The table name is not valid.
26302 The specified data type is not valid.
26303 Internal error: A query processor error occurred.
26305 The DDL statement contains invalid parameters associated with the column definition.
26306 Data conversion failed.
26307 Syntax error in query.

SQL Azure Labs Support announcements

Link

SQL Server in Azure VMs announcements

Link

Team Foundation Server – Power Tools & Add-ons announcements

Link
Link

Team Foundation Server - Setup announcements

Link

Team Foundation Server - Team System Web Access announcements

Link

Team Foundation Server and Project Server Integration announcements

Link
Link
Link

We have published virtual machine showcasing the integration between Team Foundation Server (TFS) and Project Server. There are a set of walkthroughs published along with the VM that you can use as a self-paced lab to understand how the integration work.

More information and download site
Link

Team Foundation Server and Visual Studio Agile Tools in Visual Studio Vnext announcements

Link

Team Foundation Server in Visual Studio Team System 2010 CTP - Feedback Forum announcements

Link
Hello, and Welcome to the TFS 2010 CTP feedback forum!

If you haven't heard yet, the latest Community Technology Preview (CTP) is available for Visual Studio 2010 which includes the VSTS and TFS CTP features. You can get all of the details for the

CTP on the Feedback Site ( http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=129231 ).
Included with this CTP is a great list of walkthroughs designed to guide you through all of the great new features and scenarios. There are a total of 21 detailed walkthroughs that cover everything from design and planning to development, debugging, and testing. Jeff Beehler has a great post on his blog that overviews these walkthroughs (http://blogs.msdn.com/jeffbe/archive/2008/10/27/check-out-the-new-team-system-2010-ctp.aspx), which are shown below for your convenience:
- Formal 1 - Design, Planning, and Implementation.
  - Walkthrough: Designing Your Application at a Logical Level - Application Requirements
  - Walkthrough: Designing Your Application at a Logical Level - Application Behavior and Structure
  - Walkthrough: Setting Goals and Creating a Project Plan.
  - Walkthrough: Exploring Your Existing Application.
  - Walkthrough: Validating Code Changes with the Layer Design.
- Sprint 1 - Checkpoint Review.
  - Walkthrough: Reviewing the Sprint
  - Walkthrough: Finishing the Sprint
  - Walkthrough: Do Deeper Analysis of Bugs and Progress
  - Walkthrough: Holding a Great Sprint Retrospective.
- Sprint 2 - Agile Planning.
  - Walkthrough: Agile Iteration Planning.
- Sprint 2 - Agile Construction.
  - Walkthrough: Generating Interaction Sequences from Existing Code.
  - Walkthrough: Test-Driven Development
  - Walkthrough: Configuring Code Analysis Using Rule Sets
  - Walkthrough: Preventing Code Defects using Test Impact Analysis
  - Walkthrough: Creating Manual Test Cases and Adding to a Test Suite.
  - Walkthrough: Connecting Test Cases to User Stories
  - Walkthrough: Branch Visualization.
  - Walkthrough: Checking In With Build Validation.
- Sprint 2 - Agile Testing.
  - Walkthrough: Executing Manual Tests
  - Walkthrough: Using the Historical Debugger to Diagnose Test Failures
  - Walkthrough: Running Tests to Verify a Fix.
So if you're interseted in the CTP, or have already started looking at it, please let us know what you think! We'd love to get your feedback so we can make the next release even better. Thanks for the help!

Matt Mitrik
Program Manager
Team Foundation Server

Transactions Programming announcements

Link

Using Visual Round Trip Analyzer announcements

Link

Jim Pierson Friday, November 21, 2008 6:52 PM

Hello and welcome to the Visual Round Trip Analyzer (VRTA) forum.

We've created this forum so that users of the VRTA tool can share questions and answers about the tool as well as to discuss Performance Best Practices. If you haven't already, please read the MSDN Article announcing VRTA's release to the public.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/dd188562.aspx

My name is Jim Pierson. I'm one of the creators fo the VRTA tool. I'll be checking in often with the forum and will try to answer any of the tough questions that come up.

TFS Deployment to Azure announcements

Link

Visual Basic Express Edition announcements

Link

John Boylan Tuesday, January 8, 2013 11:49 PM

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. Any future posts on this topic should be put in the Visual Basic forum. Thank you for your participation in this forum.

Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) Language Specification announcements

Link

PaulYuk_MS Friday, August 7, 2009 6:04 PM

Welcome to the VBA Language Spec forum! This forum is intended to answer questions about the VBA Language Specification. Note that general technical and how to questions about VBA should be asked in the general VBA forum.

Thanks,

Paul

Visual Basic IDE announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it will still be available for review in the Archived Forums folder. Any future posts on this topic should be put in the Visual Basic General forum.
Link

Ji.Zhou Wednesday, September 29, 2010 7:34 AM

Many of you have asked if Visual Basic can be used to write Windows Phone applications.

As of today, the answer is "yes!"

Starting today, you can download Microsoft Visual Basic CTP for Windows Phone Developer Tools. This is a great milestone as it enables our Visual Basic developers to be able to build applications for Windows Phone.

Applications built using the CTP run on both the emulator and the phone. To try the CTP, you'll need the final version of Windows Phone Developer Tools and Visual Studio 2010 Professional or higher. If you don't have Visual Studio 2010 Professional, you can install the free trial of Visual Studio Professional.

The CTP includes Visual Studio 2010 project templates, item templates, designer support, emulator support, debugging, and IntelliSense for Visual Basic. After installing the CTP, Visual Studio 2010 Professional and higher users will find Windows Phone project types for Visual Basic in the New Project Dialog, as you can see below.

Post your feedback and connect with others on the Windows Phone Forums, and report issues on Microsoft Connect.

(Reffered from Soma's blog http://blogs.msdn.com/b/somasegar/archive/2010/09/23/windows-phone-vb-developers-great-mobile-apps.aspx)

Visual Basic Interop and Upgrade announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it will still be available for review in the Archived Forums folder. Any future posts on this topic should be put in the Visual Basic General forum.

Visual Basic Language announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it will still be available for review in the Archived Forums folder. Any future posts on this topic should be put in the Visual Basic General forum.
Link

Ji.Zhou Wednesday, September 29, 2010 7:33 AM

Many of you have asked if Visual Basic can be used to write Windows Phone applications.

As of today, the answer is "yes!"

Starting today, you can download Microsoft Visual Basic CTP for Windows Phone Developer Tools. This is a great milestone as it enables our Visual Basic developers to be able to build applications for Windows Phone.

Applications built using the CTP run on both the emulator and the phone. To try the CTP, you'll need the final version of Windows Phone Developer Tools and Visual Studio 2010 Professional or higher. If you don't have Visual Studio 2010 Professional, you can install the free trial of Visual Studio Professional.

The CTP includes Visual Studio 2010 project templates, item templates, designer support, emulator support, debugging, and IntelliSense for Visual Basic. After installing the CTP, Visual Studio 2010 Professional and higher users will find Windows Phone project types for Visual Basic in the New Project Dialog, as you can see below.

Post your feedback and connect with others on the Windows Phone Forums, and report issues on Microsoft Connect.

(Reffered from Soma's blog http://blogs.msdn.com/b/somasegar/archive/2010/09/23/windows-phone-vb-developers-great-mobile-apps.aspx)

Visual Basic Power Packs announcements

Link

Visual C# Express Edition announcements

Link

John Boylan Tuesday, January 8, 2013 11:47 PM

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. Any future posts on this topic should be put in the Visual C# forum. Thank you for your participation in this forum.

Visual C# IDE announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it will still be available for review in the Archived Forums folder. Any future posts on this topic should be put in the Visual C# General forum.

Visual C# Language announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it will still be available for review in the Archived Forums folder.Any future posts on this topic should be put in the Visual C# General forum.
Link

Visual C++ MFC and ATL announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it will still be available for review in the Archived Forums folder. Any future posts on this topic should be put in the Visual C++ forum.

Visual Studio Async CTP announcements

Link
Link

Visual Studio Team Services announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. The discussion for VSTS has moved! Report a problem with VSTS itself on Developer Community, provide a suggestion on UserVoice, get advice on Stack Overflow, and get support on VSTS Support.

Team Foundation Server - Setup and Administration announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. The discussion for TFS has moved! Report a problem with TFS itself on Developer Community , provide a suggestion on UserVoice , get advice on Stack Overflow , and get support on TFS Support .

Team Foundation Server - General announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. The discussion for TFS has moved! Report a problem with TFS itself on Developer Community , provide a suggestion on UserVoice , get advice on Stack Overflow , and get support on TFS Support .

Team Foundation Server - Source and Version Control announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. The discussion for TFS has moved! Report a problem with TFS itself on Developer Community , provide a suggestion on UserVoice , get advice on Stack Overflow , and get support on TFS Support .

Team Foundation Server - Build and release management announcements

Link

Varsha G Tuesday, December 5, 2017 6:52 AM

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. The discussion for TFS has moved! Report a problem with TFS itself on Developer Community, provide a suggestion on UserVoice, get advice on Stack Overflow, and get support on TFS Support.

Team Foundation Server - Reporting & Warehouse announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. The discussion for TFS has moved! Report a problem with TFS itself on Developer Community , provide a suggestion on UserVoice , get advice on Stack Overflow , and get support on TFS Support .

Team Foundation Server - Project Management & Work Item announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. The discussion for TFS has moved! Report a problem with TFS itself on Developer Community , provide a suggestion on UserVoice , get advice on Stack Overflow , and get support on TFS Support .
Link
Link
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KathrynE Thursday, January 27, 2011 11:29 PM

With the current refresh of content on MSDN (today, 1/27/2010), a number of changes were made to consolidate and streamline content that addresses customization and definition of work item types. You can learn more by reading the following blog post: Significant Changes Made to Streamline the Content for Work Item Type Schema Reference.

You might notice that some topics no longer appear in the TOC. This is by design.

Also, you may need to delete your browser's cache to see the changes.

Team Foundation Server - Process Templates announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. The discussion for TFS has moved! Report a problem with TFS itself on Developer Community , provide a suggestion on UserVoice , get advice on Stack Overflow , and get support on TFS Support .
Link
Link

The schemas (xsd) for process template and work item types are available on Code Gallery.

Team Foundation Server – Migration and Integration announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. The discussion for TFS has moved! Report a problem with TFS itself on Developer Community , provide a suggestion on UserVoice , get advice on Stack Overflow , and get support on TFS Support .
Link
Link
Link
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Welcome to the new forum for TFS Migration and Integration. For a long time, we have had no home for questions related to offerings such as the VSS Converter, ClearCase Migration Tool for TFS, as well as general questions about our tools, partners, and service offerings. This forum is intended to be the home for questions related to all of these things.

Something this forum is not intended to support are questions related to upgrading between TFS versions. For those questions, the TFS General (http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/tfsgeneral/threads) or TFS Setup (http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/tfssetup/threads) forums are your best bets.

Team Foundation Server - Eclipse and Cross Platform announcements

Link

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. The discussion for TFS has moved! Report a problem with TFS itself on Developer Community , provide a suggestion on UserVoice , get advice on Stack Overflow , and get support on TFS Support .

Visual C++ Express Edition announcements

Link

John Boylan Tuesday, January 8, 2013 11:52 PM

This forum has been locked; it is still available for review in the Archived Forums folder. Any future posts on this topic should be put in the Visual C++ forum. Thank you for your participation in this forum.

Visual Studio Class Designer announcements

Link
Link

Esther Fan Friday, October 8, 2010 9:55 PM

Jason Zander wants you to tell MS directly:

"It's been just over 6 months since we launched Visual Studio 2010 in April. I hope you've been busy digging in and taking VS out for a spin. Your feedback was invaluable to us as we were building VS - thank you! It's a great time for us to hear what you think so far. We are especially interested in hearing about your experience with regards to performance, reliability, and quality. The more details you share with us in this survey, the better we can understand your experience and apply what we learn into future versions."

- Jason Zander's blog
Link

Visual Studio Code Analysis and Code Metrics announcements

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Link
Version 10.0 of FxCop is the version that ships with Visual Studio 2010 Premium. FxCop 10.0 is part of Version 7.1 of the Microsoft Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 4.

Instructions
- Download the Microsoft Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 4 Version 7.1
- Using elevated privileges execute FxCopSetup.exe from the %ProgramFiles%\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v7.1\Bin\FXCop folder.
If you require FxCop 1.36 please download and install the Windows SDK version 7.0.
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Following is a collection of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) regarding PreFAST, FxCop, Managed Code Analysis and Code Metrics.

Visual Studio 2010 Rule Sets

Question: How do I ensure that the same code analysis rule set is used for all the projects developed by my team(s)?

Answer: See JB Browns blog post on this topic.

Rule Behavior

Question: Why does FxCop generate violations against itself?

Answer: Answered on the FxCop blog.

Question: Why do some sources recommend extending ApplicationException while FxCop does not?

Answer: Answered on the FxCop blog .

Question: Why does FxCop ignore my in-code (SuppressMessageAttribute) suppressions?

Answer: Answered on the FxCop blog.

Question: Why does DoNotExposeGenericLists recommend that I expose Collection<T> instead of List<T>?

Answer: Answered on the FxCop blog.

Question: How do I indicate to DoNotDeclareReadOnlyMutableReferenceTypes that a type is immutable?

Answer: Answered on the FxCop blog.

Custom Rule Development

Question: How do I integrate my custom FxCop rules into Visual Studio 2010?

Answer: Answered on the FxCop blog.

Question: Where is the official FxCop custom rules SDK?

Answer: There is currently no official custom rules SDK developed by Microsoft. The primary reason is that we are currently rewriting key components of the FxCop metadata reader and data flow analysis engine. This work guarantees that rules written today will need to be modified or entirely re-written in the future. Rules developers who have been working in FxCop for the past few years can attest to the fact that every release has involved some churn in the custom rules API. Each release readme contains detailed information about porting existing rules to the latest architecture.

As soon as the FxCop metadata and other relevant API stabilize sufficiently, we will develop an official FxCop custom rules SDK with samples demonstrating common patterns written in several languages. Until then, there are several resources available to custom rules developers:

· This forum. Post your rules development questions here.

· Rules samples uploaded to the MSDN Code Gallery . Search for 'FxCop'.

· Rules samples developed externally. Search the web for 'fxcop' and 'rules'

· Visit the custom rules category on the FxCop blog

Question: How do I integrate custom rules with Visual Studio?

Answer: Answered on the FxCop blog .

Question: How do I access the locals for a method?

Answer: Answered on the FxCop blog .

Visual Studio Database Development Tools (Formerly "Database Edition Forum") announcements

Link

Microsoft SQL Server Data Tools ...

...provides an integrated environment for database developers to carry out all their database design work for any SQL Server platform (both on and off premise) within Visual Studio. Database developers can use the SQL Server Object Explorer in VS to easily create or edit database objects and data, or execute queries.

Developers will also appreciate the familiar VS tools we bring to database development, specifically; code navigation, IntelliSense, language support that parallels what is available for C# and VB, platform-specific validation, debugging and declarative editing in the TSQL Editor, as well as a visual Table Designer for both database projects and online database instances.

Visual Studio Editor in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 CTP announcements

Link

Hi,

my name is Selma Ikiz and I am a PM for the New Code Editor in Visual Studio.

We have devised a set of walkthroughs for you in this Visual Studio 10 release. Please use the walkthroughs as a hand-held guide to use this release. Given that this is the first release of Code Editor in Visual Studio, we are excited to hear your feedback.

You can use the Connect website to report bugs.

This forum will cover the Code Editor Walkthroughs:

How to Use a Shell Command to Add a Comment Adornment in the Visual Studio 2010 Editor

You can implement features in the Visual Studio 2010 editor from a typical VSPackage. This walkthrough shows how to add a comment adornment to a text view in the Visual Studio 2010 editor by invoking a Visual Studio shell command.

How to Add Syntax Coloring in the Visual Studio 2010 Editor

You can add many different visual effects to the Visual Studio 2010 editor by creating Managed Extensions Framework (MEF) components. This walkthrough shows how to add syntax coloring.

How to Highlight Text in the Visual Studio 2010 Editor

You can add many different visual effects to the Visual Studio 2010 editor by creating Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF) components. This walkthrough shows how to highlight every occurrence of a string in a text file at the same time. For example, if a word occurs more than one time in a text file, and you position the cursor in one occurrence, every occurrence is highlighted.

How to Provide IntelliSense in the Visual Studio 2010 Editor

You can implement IntelliSense in the Visual Studio 2010 editor by creating a Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF) component.

This walkthrough shows how to implement two IntelliSense controllers, one for method signature descriptions and one for statement completion. IntelliSense controllers are responsible for listening to the events that trigger completion, displaying the appropriate list, and removing the display when it is committed (that is, when a selection has been made) or dismissed. This walkthrough also shows how to implement IntelliSense controller providers, which create the IntelliSense controllers for individual text views.

When you run the sample code, pressing CTRL+J or "." shows the list of methods; you can dismiss the list by pressing ESC. Pressing CTRL+SHIFT+SPACEBAR or "(" shows the list of parameters; you can dismiss the list by pressing ESC. The displayed lists of methods and parameters are static lists that are defined in the Helpers class.

How to Adapt to the Visual Studio 2010 Editor

The Visual Studio 2010 editor offers many features that you can use from your existing code components. These instructions show how to consume editor services directly from a Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF) component or a non-MEF component, for example a VSPackage. It also shows how to use adapters, or shims , to get the services of the Visual Studio 2010 editor in both managed and unmanaged code.

If you have not downloaded or would like more information about the CTP, please visit http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=129231 .

You can find the walkthroughs on the VPC disk: C:\users\Public\documents\CTPWalkthroughs\Visual Studio.

Thanks!

Selma Ikiz

Code Editor PM

Visual Studio Gallery Feedback announcements

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Visual Studio Guidance Automation Toolkit announcements

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Link

Visual Studio Lab Management announcements

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Visual Studio LightSwitch - General (Beta) announcements

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Visual Studio LightSwitch has released! Download the release version and check out our team blog post for more resources and install notes:

Visual Studio LightSwitch 2011 RTM is Here!

This BETA forum is now closed. Please ask all your LightSwitch questions in the RTM forum here:

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/lightswitch/threads

Thanks to all of you that downloaded the beta and provided feedback and help here in this forum. We appreciate all your hard work! Now please continue to support the growing LightSwitch community in our new forum.

Enjoy!
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We are extremely happy to announce the release of Microsoft® Visual Studio® LightSwitch™ Beta 2! MSDN subscribers can access LightSwitch Beta 2 today and public availability will be Thursday, March 17^th. Please see Jason Zander's post that walks through some of the new features.
- MSDN Subscribers download LightSwitch Beta 2 now!
- The general public can download Beta 2 on Thursday at 10AM PST here
Read What's New in Beta 2 for information on new capabilities in this release. We'd also like to announce that Beta 2 comes with a "Go Live" license which means you can now start using Visual Studio LightSwitch for production projects!

We've also done some major updates to the LightSwitch Developer Center with How Do I videos based on Beta 2 as well as a new and improved Learning Center and Beta 2 samples to get you up to speed fast, whether you're a beginner or advanced developer. We'll be rolling out more in-depth content and training in the coming weeks so keep checking back.

INSTALLATION NOTES: Visual Studio 2010 Express, Professional, Premium, Test Professional or Ultimate users must install Visual Studio 2010 SP1 before installing Visual Studio LightSwitch Beta 2. Visual Studio LightSwitch Beta 1 users should uninstall Beta 1 before installing Beta 2. Also see the Beta 2 readme for late breaking issues. These are known incompatible releases with Visual Studio LightSwitch Beta 2 (see links for details on compatibility and workarounds):
- Visual Studio Async CTP - known compatibility details(see *Async CTP Issues with VS2010 SP1* announcement)
- Windows SDK 7.1 - known compatibility details
- Help Viewer Power Tool – known compatibility details
PROJECT UPGRADE NOTES: Due to the many improvements in Beta 2, projects created in Beta 1 cannot be opened or upgraded. You will need to recreate your projects and copy over any user code that you have added. You can get to the user code files by switching to File View in the Solution Explorer. Please note that some APIs have changed so you may need to update some of your code appropriately. At this point we do not plan to introduce breaking changes post-Beta 2 that will cause you to need to recreate your Beta 2 projects.

We want to hear from you! Please visit the LightSwitch Forums to ask questions and interact with the team and community. Have you found a bug? Please report them on Microsoft Connect.

Have fun building business applications with Visual Studio LightSwitch!

Visual Studio Performance Tools (Profiler) announcements

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Visual Studio Source Control and SourceSafe announcements

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Visual Studio Team System - Testing announcements

Link

Visual Studio UI Automation Testing (includes Coded UI tests) announcements

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Link
Coded UI Tests help automate browser based applications built on Internet Explorer. We are now enabling cross-browser testing of such applications. Users will be able to perform functional testing of web applications across IE/Firefox/Chrome. One can use IE to record tests and validate control properties using Coded UI Test Builder. Users also have an option to hand code cross browser tests. If user needs to playback on IE, she can click on Run All in Test Explorer which plays back the recording using Coded UI inbuilt IE Plugin. On the other hand, if the user needs to playback on non-IE browser, she can setBrowserWindow.CurrentBrowser as "firefox" or "chrome" in the test depending on which browser she wants to test before running from the test explorer. In this case, Coded UI Engine communicates with Selenium Web Driver to execute the playback.

Hope you like this feature. Feel free to drop your feedback here

System Requirements:
1. Operating System: Windows 8 X86 Client/Windows 8 X64/Win7 X64/Win7 X86/Win2k8 R2 SP1
2. IE version - IE9/ classic IE10
3. Firefox version - 15+
4. Chrome version - 21+
5. Visual Studio Ultimate - VS 2012 RTM +VS 2012 Update 1 CTP
6. Selenium NET Bindings and the Selenium ChromeDriver made available to you through an installer on Visual Studio Gallery. Refer to the file attachment "CUIT Cross Browser Testing Acquisition" for more details
Features:

The following features are available across the various web browsers:
- Recording support for actions and validation on supported IE browsers
- Hand-coding scenarios support for such things as control properties, search, and playback waiters.
- Support for popups and dialog
- Ability to execute basic JavaScript with no return type
- Search resilience (via smart match) and performance improvements
Scenario Videos:

Record on IE and Playback everywhere

Author cross browser tests with Coded UI Test Builder

Author cross browser tests using plain hand coding without UI Map

Run cross browser tests sequentially on multiple browsers

Troubleshoot cross browser test failures

Known Limitations
1. No support for Safari browser
2. Browser launch needs to be part of the UITest. In case you have a browser already open and you want to run steps on the opened browser, playback will fail for non-IE browser windows. Hence, it is advisable to have launch too as part of the test case.
3. Automating browser based actions such as Maximize/minimize/restore is not supported
Troubleshooting tips

Enable HTML Logger - follow http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj159363.aspx

Feedback Survey:

Please fill in the survey to register your feedback on this feature: https://s.zoomerang.com/s/CrossBrowserTesting. Your feedback will help us plan for further enhancement to the cross browser feature.
Link

Using the Microsoft Visual Studio UI Test plugin for Silverlight, you can create Coded UI Tests or action recordings for Silverlight applications. Action recordings let you fast forward through steps in a manual test using Microsoft Test Manager. Coded UI Tests let you record actions, generate code and play back user interface tests using Microsoft Visual Studio.

This plugin supports Silverlight 4 & 5 applications hosted in Internet Explorer versions 8, 9 & 10. It requires Microsoft Visual Studio 2012 RC.

A few members of the product team got together and built this plugin as an off-hours project. It is not an official Microsoft release. We will monitor the Qand A section on the Visual Studio Galley site for feedback and queries.

For more details and to download the plugin visit VisualStudio Gallery.

Deepak Singhal, Mathew Aniyan, Siddhartha Pandey, Tapas Sahoo, Vishnupriyan Radhamanalan.
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Visual Studio Web Performance and Load Testing announcements

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Visual Studio WPF/SL Designer announcements

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DEV313 | Making the Most of the Microsoft Silverlight and WPF Designer in Microsoft Visual Studio 2010

Session Type: Breakout Session

Track: Developer Tools, Languages & Frameworks

Speaker(s): Mark Wilson-Thomas , Mark Boulter

Level: 300 - Advanced

Building Silverlight and Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) applications has become much more straightforward in Visual Studio 2010. Whether you're already a seasoned WPF/Silverlight developer or the technologies are new to you, come along to this session and see a data-driven Silverlight application built up from scratch using the new designer features – we show you tips and tricks for how to leverage the new tooling to get great results with the least sweat!
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The Visual Studio WPF and Silverlight Designer Team is delighted to inform you that Visual Studio 2010 RTM is now available! Take a look at http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudio/en-us/download

What's New for WPF and Silverlight Developers in Visual Studio 2010 ?

1. The Silverlight Designer is a fully functional drag-drop designer for Silverlight 3 RTM release out of the box, and for Silverlight 4 via an add-on (for info see http://blogs.msdn.com/wpfsldesigner/archive/2010/04/15/silverlight-4-releases-silverlight-4-tools-for-visual-studio-2010-rtm-available-now.aspx)
2. The Data Sources Window works for Silverlight 3 and 4
3. The Property Browser has been reworked to be more usable – showing a better Category view and a "Set Properties" view
4. The designer now lets you load controls that have references to static resources at app scope
5. The designer shows helpful errors when things such as controls fail to load, without the need to attach a debugger to Visual Studio.

Check out these Channel 9 videos for more info:

Designing Data Driven Forms

Styling Your Forms

Looking Forward

Feedback
We hope you enjoy the new release, and are really looking forward to hearing your feedback.

You can send both positive and negative feedback and questions to us using this Forum, and we also encourage you to raise any bugs and issues you find via Connect (see this article on how to raise bugs in Cider)

Thanks!

Mark Wilson-Thomas
Program Manager, WPF & Silverlight Designer in Visual Studio

Visual Studio Online "Monaco" announcements

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WCF Data Services (Pre-Release) announcements

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edhickey Wednesday, October 27, 2010 10:47 PM

You can download the CTP release from here

Questions about the recently released Oct 2010 CTP1 release? Ask them here!

Web Development in Visual Studio in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 CTP announcements

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Hi - I'm Bradley Millington, Lead Program Manager for the Visual Web Developer ("Web Tools") team. I'll be one of the moderators on this forum.

We have provided this forum to gather your feedback on the scenarios described in the walkthroughs that shipped with Visual Studio 2010 CTP. At this stage in the release, we are interested in hearing your thoughts on the design of features presented in these walkthroughs. We'll be taking more general feedback on the product when we get to the Beta release.

We will be discussing the following walkthroughs:

- Using HTML Code Snippets
- Packaging & Deploying a Web Application which uses IIS
- Packaging & Deploying a Web Application which uses VS Development Web Server (Cassini)
- Transforming Web.Config for Deployment
- Targeting Multiple Versions of ASP.NET

You can go to http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=129231 to download the CTP and walkthroughs.

We look forward to hearing your feedback!

Web Sandbox - General announcements

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August 11, 2010

This update focuses on a few performance issues.
- Only initialize the window once, not for each sandbox instance.
- Fix to work-around WebKit's CSS DOM performance issues (huge performance improvement).
- Fix global stylesheet clean-up.
- Fix to more accurately test that a method is natively implemented versus defined by the Host Page (reduces potential for conflict between the sandbox and outer page).
July 21, 2010

This is a fairly large update to improve support for common web frameworks and libraries. Below highlights a few of the fixes
- Fixes for input elements including <button type="..."> support and IE's document.createElement("<tag property='value'>") syntax.
- Added support for getComputedStyle(element,null).getPropertyValue.memberName .
- NamedNodeMaps can access members by member name (similar to the fix for getComputedStyle above).
- Fixed support for cancelling a hyperlinks default action by returning false to the event.
- Executing a regular expression against a regular expression type now works.
- Fixed issues with prototype inheritance. This should fix the extend pattern used by most frameworks.
- Event object fixes including relatedTarget and added custom property support to the event object.
- Support for hasOwnProperty method.
- Default value of calculated opacity is now 1 in all browsers.
- Support for getBoundingClientRect.
- Fixed a dynamic script loading timing issue to support YUI's dynamic loader.
- Support for invoking document.all() as a method in addition to the traditional [] notation.
- Fix bug in the scoping of Array.forEach.
- Support for HSL and HSLA colors (passes through to the browser so assumes browser support)
- Support for more CSS3 background properties.
- Support for textContent and getElementsByClassName on browsers that have native support.
- A number of other minor bug fixes.
June 29, 2010

This update focuses on the CSS.
- CSS2 attribute selectors are now parsed.
- RGB and RGBa values are now parsed.
- Rounded corners and box-shadows (including the webkit and mozilla proprietary equivalents) are now enabled.
- In Internet Explorer, all samples are run in the latest browser mode (Sandboxed Canvas not working in IE9 is a known issue).
June 25, 2010

We are working on improving the fidelity of the original document structure. This update includes the following changes:
- We are working on properly supporting the DOM for head elements. This update supports the TITLE, META, and SCRIPT elements. Script elements are properly represented relative to their document location.
- The scripts collection as well as attributes on individual SCRIPT elements are properly exposed. We now ignore SCRIPT elements are specified via the TYPE attribute to not contain JavaScript.
- The document anchors and lists collections are now properly supported.
- Line-breaks in TEXTAREA and PRE elements are fixed.
- For the media attribute on LINK and STYLE elements, only sheets that target the screen or all media types are supported. Print stylesheets are on our TODO list.
- Other small bug-fixes in prototype chain handling.
May 25, 2010

Today we released a refactored Sandbox script. This update has a much cleaner, more optimized policy file that uses 20K less code, signficantly less JavaScript closures, and enforces more consistency through a prescribed definition pattern. We also keep expanding support for more API's, have started on some of the HTML 5 features, and are focusing on supporting the various framework libraries.

Below are some of the highlights:
- Every method by definition exposes its corresponding property.
- Enable Firefox'es funky if (documennt.all) // return false test even though document.all is supported.
- Better support for routing keyboard events to the document.
- Fixes to support JQuery better (still a work in progress).
- Improved inner/outerHTML, regular expression, and mouse positioning support.
- Support for Canvas (requires browser support).
- Support for hyperlink javascript-based URL's in the initial HTML.
March 1, 2010 - Catching Up!
Over the past few months, we have been quietly updating the Sandbox script. Below highlights some of the more significant changes:
- Lots of bug fixes (e.g., getVarDate, NaN.toString(), regular expression issues, prototype inheritance, styling input elements, and more).
- Added better host integration events (onbeforeqos, onxmlrequest, onerror, onformsubmit, and more). We are working on the host integration documentation.
- Introduced a new isolate policy that matches the IFrame behavior providing full isolation of content from the surrounding page.
- Basic support for the IFrame element. IFrame contents are now generated and encapsulated in their own sandbox.
- Enable support for dynamically loading the sandbox library.
- Huge performance improvements for processing stylesheets and the initial HTML.
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Today, we are announcing that we are making much of the source code for the Web Sandbox project available under the Open Source Apache License 2.0.

Since the initial release of Web Sandbox we have received a great deal of feedback from the web security community. We have also been collaborating with a number of customers, partners and the standards communities that would like to adopt the technology when it is ready. Our goal is to achieve widespread adoption of Web Sandbox and to help foster interoperability with complementary technologies like script frameworks.

See the Web Sandbox site for additional licensing details. Thank you for your input to the project so far, and we are excited to continue our collaboration with you.

(Note: While we are using an Apache License, the Web Sandbox project is not sponsored or endorsed by the Apache Software Foundation and is not an ASF project.)

-Dragos
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The following items represent work in progress. Consequently until we check them off they could be regarded as current limitations. They are due to our implementation rather than the sandbox architecture.
1. The gadget's HTML must be well-formed.
2. document.write is partially implemented and not fully debugged.
3. JavaScript's with statement is unsupported.
4. The XML proxy allowing gadgets to invoke back-end services is not enabled (now supported!).
5. The Dynamic loading of script is unsupported (now supported!).
6. Silverlight and Flash objects are unsupported.
7. Depending on operations, the performance overhead varies between 1.5 and 4 times.
Should you run into other unexpected surprises we either missed something from the above list or you discovered a bug. Keep us posted.

-Dragos

Windows Developer Preview: General OS questions (Locked) announcements

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Brent Serbus Wednesday, February 29, 2012 2:57 PM

With the release of Windows 8 Consumer Preview, the Windows General OS Forum is no longer the supported destination for general questions related to Windows 8. For Developer related questions please continue to select from the list of forums under the MSDNWindows Metro app style category. IT Pros can now select from a list of dedicated TechNet forums under theWindows 8 IT Pro category. General consumers can get support from ourMicrosoft Answers community. This forum will remain as a read-only resource but we encourage you to leverage our other community support resources for new questions.

Windows Events announcements

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I am pleased to announce that the MSDN documentation for the Windows Event Log has been updated last week. The updates include an improved "Using Windows Event Log" which will be helpful for those looking to create an event provider for the first time or consuming data from the Windows Event Log.

Also check out the "What's New" for Windows 7.

Please check it out and give us feedback (via the "Send comments about this topic to Microsoft" links).

Kevin

Windows Live Search: Development announcements

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Windows MultiPoint Mouse SDK Bugs and Suggestions announcements

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We are happy to announce that Windows MultiPoint Mouse SDK v1.5 is now Live! Windows MultiPoint Mouse SDK 1.5 offers several improvements over the old Microsoft MultiPoint SDK 1.1 including:
- Now supports Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 operating systems.
- Now supports 32 bit and 64 bit applications and operating systems by leveraging AnyCPU Intermediate Language (IL).
- New cursor capabilities were added: you can specify a cursor color, assign a custom image to a cursor, or hide cursors.
- New templates for Visual Studio 2008 were added to simplify the creation of MultiPoint Mouse applications.
- The namespace changed from Microsoft.MultiPoint to Microsoft.Multipoint to comply with capitalization conventions for .NET
- The number of DLLs was reduced from five to two (Microsoft.Multipoint.Sdk.dll and Microsoft.Multipoint.Sdk.Controls.dll)
- The object model was simplified, reducing the number of exposed classes, methods, and properties.
- The sample code was simplified and made to be compliant with good coding practices, such as FxCop guidelines to help further reduce programming errors.
- The sample code for allocating mouse cursors and the number and quality of cursor icons was improved making it easier to allocate custom cursors when creating an application.
Visit our brand new website today www.microsoft.com/multipointmouse and download the new Windows MultiPoint Mouse SDK today!

Windows MultiPoint Mouse SDK Troubleshoot announcements

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We are happy to announce that Windows MultiPoint Mouse SDK v1.5 is now Live! Windows MultiPoint Mouse SDK 1.5 offers several improvements over the old Microsoft MultiPoint SDK 1.1 including:
- Now supports Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 operating systems.
- Now supports 32 bit and 64 bit applications and operating systems by leveraging AnyCPU Intermediate Language (IL).
- New cursor capabilities were added: you can specify a cursor color, assign a custom image to a cursor, or hide cursors.
- New templates for Visual Studio 2008 were added to simplify the creation of MultiPoint Mouse applications.
- The namespace changed from Microsoft.MultiPoint to Microsoft.Multipoint to comply with capitalization conventions for .NET
- The number of DLLs was reduced from five to two (Microsoft.Multipoint.Sdk.dll and Microsoft.Multipoint.Sdk.Controls.dll)
- The object model was simplified, reducing the number of exposed classes, methods, and properties.
- The sample code was simplified and made to be compliant with good coding practices, such as FxCop guidelines to help further reduce programming errors.
- The sample code for allocating mouse cursors and the number and quality of cursor icons was improved making it easier to allocate custom cursors when creating an application.
Visit our brand new website today www.microsoft.com/multipointmouse and download the new Windows MultiPoint Mouse SDK today!

Windows Presentation Foundation - Release Candidate announcements

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This forum will be retired in a few days. Please do not post new thread here.

April 22, 2011

Windows Workflow Foundation 3 announcements

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In .NET 4 the Workflow Team released an all new Workflow engine in the System.Activities namespace. With the release of .NET 4.5 Beta we are marking the types in the "WF 3" System.Workflow namespace as obsolete. The following assemblies have one or more public types that will be deprecated:
- System.Workflow.Activities.dll
- System.Workflow.ComponentModel.dll
- System.Workflow.Runtime.dll
- System.WorkflowServices.dll
- Microsoft.Workflow.DebugController.dll
- Microsoft.Workflow.Compiler.exe
- Wfc.exe
As a result, customers who are using the deprecated WF 3 APIs will encounter build warnings with a message similar to " Warning BC40000: X is obsolete: 'WF 3 types are deprecated. Please use WF 4 instead.' " We will remove the types from the .NET Framework in a future release, but we have not yet determined that timeframe (not in 4.5). This current step allows us to communicate our direction to our customers and allow them plenty of time to move to the new WF4 model. We will, of course, continue to support these WF 3 types under the Microsoft Support Lifecycle Policy.

Rules related types (e.g. System.Workflow.Activities.Rules), which do not have a replacement in WF 4.5, have not been deprecated.

Customers who want to migrate their applications to WF 4 will find help in the WF 4 Migration Guidance articles on MSDN and the WF Migration Kit on the WF CodePlex site.
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edhickey Monday, April 12, 2010 11:10 PM

Hello all,

This Forum will handle questions for all of the 3.0 and 3.5 versions of Workflow. With the release of Visual Studio 2010 and the .Net Framework 4, we have created a new Forum for the latest version of Windows Workflow Foundation here. Please do not post any questions in here that do not pertain to Windows Workflow.

Thanks,

Ed

Working with Data and XML in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 CTP announcements

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Hello, and Welcome to the Data and XML 2010 CTP feedback forum!

I am Irinel Crivat, Program Manager for the Data Programmability team in SQL Server. I'll be one of the moderators on this forum. We have provided this forum to gather your feedback on the scenarios described in the walkthroughs that shipped with Visual Studio 2010 CTP. At this stage in the release, we are interested in hearing your thoughts on the design of features presented in these walkthroughs. We'll be taking more general feedback on the product when we get to the Beta release.
T
he XSLT Profiler is a performance analysis profiler tool that assists in the development and debugging of XSLT documents. The XSLT Profiler allows developers to measure, evaluate, and target performance-related problems in XSLT code by creating detailed XSLT performance reports. The XSLT Profiler includes a wealth of useful hints for XSL and XSLT style sheet optimizations, which are essential for XSLT-based applications that demand maximum performance.
If you need to develop reliable and robust software, the XSLT Profiler is capable of detecting the performance errors and defects in coding so that they are corrected at an early stage in the development. This is essential in reducing the overall cost of developing software applications. The XSLT Profiler tool is fully integrated into Microsoft Visual Studio to provide a seamless and approachable user experience, combining several Microsoft technologies, including Microsoft XML Editor and XSLT Debugger, Visual Studio Team System, F1 (Performance Suites), and more.

If you have not downloaded or would like more information about the CTP, please visit http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=129231.

You can find the walkthroughs on the VPC disk: C:\users\Public\documents\CTPWalkthroughs\Visual Studio.

Please let us know what you think! We'd love to get your feedback so we can make the next release even better. Thanks for the help!

Irinel Crivat
Program Manager | SQL Server - Data Programmability
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My name is Tim Laverty and I'm the Program Manager for the new XSD Designer in the VS 2010 CTP. For the last five years I've worked in various groups at MS ranging from Visual Studio to Games to SQL Server.

Our team is super excited to have the new XSD Designer in the CTP. We want to hear what you think of it, what we're missing, what we got right, and what we didn't. We're ~60% done in this build and feedback you give us can and will directly affect what we eventually ship at RTM so please don't hold back.

The walkthrough included in the CTP gives a quick view into features in the designer. We essentially show four views over schema sets:

XML Schema Explorer: This shipped w/ VS 2008 SP1 and offers a hierarchal view of the schema set.
Start View: This gives stats and offers a launching point for running common queries over sets.
Graph View: This gives an overview of global elements, types, and relationships between them.
Content Model View: This gives a detailed "compiled" view of schema set node content models.

For more information about the CTP and to get the download & walkthroughs please go to:

http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=129231 .
Thanks, Tim Laverty
PM, SQL Server XML Tools

Working with Data in WPF Applications in the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 CTP announcements

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Hi!

My name is Milind Lele. I am a Program Manager for Visual Studio.

We are very pleased to announce improvements we have made to Visual Studio to enable developers to work with data in WPF applications. This CTP includes some of these improvements. We are working on improving these, but we would love to hear your feedback.

We have created a few walkthoughs to get you started. This forum is setup to discuss the following:

Walkthrough: Using the Designer to Bind WPF Controls to Data in a Dataset
Walkthrough: Using the Designer to Bind WPF Controls to Data in an Entity Data Model

To report bugs please use the Connect website.

Sincerely,

Milind Lele
PM, Visual Studio
http://blogs.msdn.com/vsdata

Building Windows Store apps with HTML5/JavaScript (Windows 8.1 Preview and RTM) announcements

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Ryan Bolz Monday, October 14, 2013 5:22 PM

After Windows 8.1 is released on October 17, this forum will be archived. The URL will stay the same in case you have it bookmarked, but it will be moved to the Archived category. It will be made read-only so you can still search for questions/answers, but not create new threads or posts. Instead, please contribute to the community by asking and answering Windows Store apps questions in the applicable forum in the Windows Store apps category. Please respond to this thread if you have any questions about this.

Thank you.
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Ryan Bolz Wednesday, June 26, 2013 4:59 PM

Hello and welcome to the Building Windows Store apps with HTML5/JavaScript (Windows 8.1 Preview) forum. Please feel free to post your questions or start discussions here.

Please remember to follow the rules outlines in our code of conduct:

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/Page/faq#faqCodeConduct

Thank you,

Microsoft Communities Team

Building Windows Store apps with C++ (Windows 8.1 Preview and RTM) announcements

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Ryan Bolz Monday, October 14, 2013 5:23 PM

After Windows 8.1 is released on October 17, this forum will be archived. The URL will stay the same in case you have it bookmarked, but it will be moved to the Archived category. It will be made read-only so you can still search for questions/answers, but not create new threads or posts. Instead, please contribute to the community by asking and answering Windows Store apps questions in the applicable forum in the Windows Store apps category. Please respond to this thread if you have any questions about this.

Thank you.
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Ryan Bolz Wednesday, June 26, 2013 5:03 PM

Hello and welcome to the Building Windows Store apps with C++ (Windows 8.1 Preview)

forum. Please feel free to post your questions or start discussions here.

Please remember to follow the rules outlines in our code of conduct:

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/Page/faq#faqCodeConduct

Thank you,

Microsoft Communities Team

Building Windows Store apps with C# or VB (Windows 8.1 Preview and RTM) announcements

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Ryan Bolz Monday, October 14, 2013 5:24 PM

After Windows 8.1 is released on October 17, this forum will be archived. The URL will stay the same in case you have it bookmarked, but it will be moved to the Archived category. It will be made read-only so you can still search for questions/answers, but not create new threads or posts. Instead, please contribute to the community by asking and answering Windows Store apps questions in the applicable forum in the Windows Store apps category. Please respond to this thread if you have any questions about this.

Thank you.
Link

Ryan Bolz Wednesday, June 26, 2013 5:04 PM

Hello and welcome to the Building Windows Store apps with C# or VB (Windows 8.1 Preview)

forum. Please feel free to post your questions or start discussions here.

Please remember to follow the rules outlines in our code of conduct:

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/Page/faq#faqCodeConduct

Thank you,

Microsoft Communities Team

Building Windows Store games with DirectX (Windows 8.1 Preview and RTM) announcements

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Ryan Bolz Monday, October 14, 2013 5:25 PM

After Windows 8.1 is released on October 17, this forum will be archived. The URL will stay the same in case you have it bookmarked, but it will be moved to the Archived category. It will be made read-only so you can still search for questions/answers, but not create new threads or posts. Instead, please contribute to the community by asking and answering Windows Store apps questions in the applicable forum in the Windows Store apps category. Please respond to this thread if you have any questions about this.

Thank you.
Link

Ryan Bolz Wednesday, June 26, 2013 5:06 PM

Hello and welcome to the Building Windows Store games with DirectX (Windows 8.1 Preview)

forum. Please feel free to post your questions or start discussions here.

Please remember to follow the rules outlines in our code of conduct:

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/Page/faq#faqCodeConduct

Thank you,

Microsoft Communities Team

Tools for Windows Store apps (Windows 8.1 Preview and RTM) announcements

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Ryan Bolz Monday, October 14, 2013 5:26 PM

After Windows 8.1 is released on October 17, this forum will be archived. The URL will stay the same in case you have it bookmarked, but it will be moved to the Archived category. It will be made read-only so you can still search for questions/answers, but not create new threads or posts. Instead, please contribute to the community by asking and answering Windows Store apps questions in the applicable forum in the Windows Store apps category. Please respond to this thread if you have any questions about this.

Thank you.
Link

Ryan Bolz Wednesday, June 26, 2013 5:07 PM

Hello and welcome to the Tools for Windows Store apps (Windows 8.1 Preview)

forum. Please feel free to post your questions or start discussions here.

Please remember to follow the rules outlines in our code of conduct:

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/Page/faq#faqCodeConduct

Thank you,

Microsoft Communities Team

Windows App Studio Beta announcements

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Hello everyone,

First we would like to apologize for the inconvenience that the failing cert has caused for any of you.

Next, We would like to let you know that the problem is now resolved. We had loaded the wrong cert into the latest site revision, which is now fixed.
Please go ahead and load the cert again, and it will now allow you to properly load it as well as your app package.

Again we are very sorry for the inconvenience.

The App Studio Team
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When attempting to sideload Windows App Studio Beta apps using the Installable Package, some devices are returning a "Can't Install Company App" error. We are investigating and will resolve the error shortly. In the meantime, you can sideload Publish Packages using the Windows Phone SDK deployment tool.
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Making the move to the Windows Phone Store?

Now that you've used App Studio to jump start building your killer app, are you ready to launch it to the world on the Windows Phone Store? Before you go, make sure you've scrubbed out any leftover template items.

If your app uses template images or titles, still has placeholder text (like [insert name here]) or uses template metadata (such as the icon, long description or keywords), it won't meet app certification requirements. Use a template to learn how to do it, then change it into your app, and you'll be off to a good start on your way to the store.

Here's a handy checklist of examples to remember.

Use:
- Your own titles
- Your own iconography (app Logo, Pin to start tile)
- Your own long description
Don't use:
- Template placeholder text ([insert name here])
- Template app content
Have fun building your app in Windows Phone App Studio, and we'll see you in the Windows Phone Store!
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To publish your app on Windows Phone Store and share it with the world, you need three things:

A) Your signed .XAP file (created for you in Windows Phone App Studio after you've generated your app by Download Publish Package)

B) Your app tile in 300x300 PNG format (same one you already created as your 'app icon' in the 'describe your app section of Windows Phone App Studio)

C) At least one screenshot in 768X1280 PNG format (this is not created automatically, so here you go. You can create this in many methods, but this is one way to do it without opening visual studio)

     1) Install your app on your device by scanning the QR code generated in Windows Phone App Studio.

     2) Launch your app and take a few screenshots of the app by pressing the Power button and the Start button.

     3) Find those screenshots in your "albums" under "screenshots" then save to your SkyDrive.

     4) Download from Skydrive and open with Paint.

     5) In Paint resize (under Home) to 768X1280 pixels if needed

     6) When you are ready publish in Dev Center and you have to "upload images", just use WXGA option and check "Automatically create lower resolution screenshots from WXGA"

You can also do this using the emulator or the snipping tool. Check it out at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsphone/develop/gg442300(v=vs.105).aspx.

Now, you are ready to publish at https://dev.windowsphone.com/publish

Community, please reply if you have a better way to do this. I'm all ears!

XML in Windows (MSXML and XmlLite) announcements

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Microsoft Translator Developer & Web Master Support announcements

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Chris Wendt Thursday, September 11, 2014 5:41 PM
For IT-type content (software, hardware...) API user can use the "TECH" domain to get better results with their translations.

To use the TECH domains, the developer needs to invoke in the API by using the category=tech parameter.

Not all the languages supported by Microsoft Translator general domain (list of the 45+ supported languages for the general domain can be found here: www.microsofttranslator.com/help). You can use the GetLangaugesForTranslate() method to query the complete language set. (also listed below for convenience). For the languages not listed the translation result will be the same between category=general and category=tech.

Here is the list of languages supported by this domain:
- cs
- da
- de
- el
- es
- fi
- fr
- he
- hi
- hu
- it
- ja
- ko
- nl
- no
- pl
- pt-br
- pt-pt
- ru
- sv
- th
- tr
- zh-hans
- zh-hant
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Chris Wendt Wednesday, September 12, 2012 11:44 PM

When you try to translate a large Word document by using Microsoft Translator, you might get 404 error. This is a known issue and we're working on this. If you need to translate a large Word document, we suggest you to split the large document into smaller documents. We will post a note at the forum when this issue gets fixed.
Thanks. Microsoft Translator Team

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Lane Rau Monday, March 23, 2009 9:40 PM

Microsoft Translator developer offerings provide developers a wide spectrum of translation and language APIs for integration into their applications and services.

AJAX Interface

The AJAX interface provides your web applications with JavaScript based access to translation services.

SOAP Interface

The SOAP interface provides a strongly typed, web service standards based programming model supporting rich development environments such as the .NET framework.

HTTP Interface

The HTTP interface provides a high degree of interoperability for any network enabled application and supports a broad range of development environments.

MSDN reference for Microsoft Translator APIs

Comprehensive reference for Microsoft Translator APIs on MSDN.

Sign up for the Microsoft Translator API

Windows Azure Marketplace gives you a convenient way to sign up for the Microsoft Translator API. The set of offers includes an option for FREE use of the API. You can try out the functionality of the Translator API without having to write any code, right there on the Windows Azure Marketplace.

News, Feedback & Support

Script Junkie Discussion announcements

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Rey Bango Monday, June 7, 2010 6:39 PM

We'd like to welcome you to the Script Junkie forum. Here you'll find a fantastic place to engage with others who have a passion for JavaScript, HTML, CSS and the emerging standards that are changing the face of web development. We urge you to share the web development experiences and techniques that have made your projects fun and exciting.

Also, please let us know your feelings about the SJ content so that authors can get the feedback they need to continuously enhance their works. We want to know what works and what topics you'd like to see in the future and this forum is a great place to share your ideas.

It's our hope that the SJ forum breeds many incredibly useful discussions and provides a hub for developers to work together to build amazing applications.

- The Script Junkie Team

Live Connect (Archived) announcements

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The Microsoft account team will need to make a chang e that will affect the way that registered applications process tickets. All you have to do is upgrade to the latest SDK and the ticket handling will automatically be updated. For more information please see this page : http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=242807 .

The change is scheduled to take place on Monday 5 ^th May, so please make sure that you update before then – users may experience problems with repeated sign-in when requesting consent for your application if you don't.
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JOshiro Thursday, June 27, 2013 9:29 PM
Live SDK v5.4 is now available for download. New additions to this version of the SDK include:
- Windows Store HTML and XAML applications. Version 5.4 of the Live SDK was updated for compatibility with Windows 8.1 Preview and Visual Studio 2013 Preview, including new behavior specific to Windows 8.1 Preview: For a user not connected with a Microsoft account, invoking WL.login in JavaScript or LiveAuthClient.LoginAsync will trigger the process to connect the user with a Microsoft account. Also specific to 8.1 Preview, for users who are not connected with a Microsoft account, calling methods on LiveConnectClient to access user data will result in a reject response.
- Windows Phone 8. This update contains several fixes for the new WP8 SDK, including a fix for a login session cache issue that could prevent a user from logging in with a different account after logging out. Additionally resolved in this update is a caching issue in LiveConnectClient.UploadAsync that could lead to additional app memory consumption and less accurate progress event data when uploading large files. As a result, larger files can be uploaded on lower-memory devices than was possible in the past.
- .NET client and ASP.NET apps. The Live SDK v5.4 Nuget package has been updated with support for .NET 4.
- Live SDK for iOS apps. Several UI issues related to login in the iOS 6 SDK have been resolved.
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Shelly Guo Thursday, December 20, 2012 6:03 AM
Live SDK v5.3 is now available for download here. New additions to this version of the SDK include:
- New .NET SDKs for client and server. Since we first introduced the Live SDK, we have seen a lot of developers ask for a .NET library that would work for classic desktop apps and ASP.NET applications. With this release you can now create applications that target traditional desktop scenarios and as well as server side scenarios. With the client .NET SDK, you can create WPF, Windows Form or console applications that let your users use their SkyDrive data. With the ASP.NET SDK, you can create websites and web server components that talk to the Live Connect API service. Using the SDK also makes it easy for you to incorporate Microsoft account into your identity system or even just use Microsoft account as your primary identity system. Be sure to check out our Build talk "Powering your apps with Microsoft accounts" below to learn more about it.
- Windows Phone 8 SDK. The WP 8 SDK takes advantage of some of the new features that Windows Phone 8 has to offer and provided you with an easy to use programming model by supporting the new Task<T> async pattern and dynamic keyword. With this you can easily move your code between your Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 application.
- Open source projects for Windows and Windows Phone SDKs. Starting from v5.3, all Live SDK client components written in C#, Objective C and Java are released as open source projects. This makes it much easier for developers to resolve problems quickly and build solutions that are tailored to their scenarios. Be sure to check out our gibhub depot for new additions of the Windows and Windows Phone SDK source code.
- New samples and starter guides. New samples for Windows and Windows Phone are added as part of the open source Windows SDK projects. We also have an updated starter guide for Windows Phone 8 and a new one for Windows 8 and Asp.Net.
SkyDrive REST API enhancements - we have added the ability to search for files in a user's SkyDrive by using a partial file name. You can do this by simply making an HTTP GET call with the search parameter 'q'. Here is an example:

GET http://apis.live.net/V5.0/me/skydrive/search?q=expenses

The response contains the list of files that have "expenses" in the file name.

Windows 8 Sign-in control deprecation - Starting with Live SDK v5.3, the sign-in control is deprecated from the Windows 8 C# and Windows 8 JavaScript SDKs. Instead, apps should follow our guidelines for implementing the sign in experience for Windows Store apps using HTML/Javascript and Windows Store apps using XAML.
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Shelly Guo Tuesday, December 11, 2012 5:40 AM

When we shipped the Live Connect API service 5.0 April last year, we included the functionality to allow an app to provision applications on behaves of other developers. This functionality is enabled if the app has permission to use the wl.application and the wl.application_create scope. Application information can be access through the https://apis.live.net/v5.0/me/applications path. After observing the usage pattern of this API for more than a year, we have concluded that this API does not fit into the user model and the design goals of the Live Connect API, whose primary objective is to provide developer access to user's data stored in Windows services, not a platform to auto provision applications. With that, we're now announcing the plan to decommission any APIs that are related to application provisioning through the Live Connect API service, which include all calls to the https://apis.live.net/v5.0/me/applications path and its sub-paths. These APIs will stop working in March 2013.
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This forum is monitored by Live Connect Support and Product Group team.

Hours of Operation: 8:00AM – 5:00PM US Pacific Time (Monday – Friday)

We do not provide any support over the weekend (Saturday-Sunday) .

Thanks!!!

Live Connect Support Team
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With the release of v5.0 of the Messenger Connect API, the previous version is now deprecated. As mentioned in thev5.0 announcement blog post, the latest version of the Messenger Connect API is the result of taking into account a lot of the input from developers about how to simplify the API and address key limitations we had in the previous version.

The v4.1 API will continue to function and will be supported for one year after the release of the v5.0 API. New applications are strongly encouraged to use the v5.0 Messenger Connect instead of the deprecated v4.1 API. It is also recommended that when you upgrade or modify existing applications avoid using and remove usage of the v4.1 APIs.

Below is a list of v4.1 features that will no longer be supported in new applications with the release of v5.0 of the Messenger Connect API
- The v4.1 API provides the ability to publish activities using activity streams to a user's Messenger Social feed. We received significant feedback from developers and end users that this functionality is not complete because it doesn't set the Messenger status field and is thus not visible in the user contact list nor in mobile or previous versions of the Messenger client. In addition, we've gotten complaints about the complexity of the data formats required to publish status updates. For this reason, we have updatedthe activity object available in v5.0 to address these shortcomings. For this reason we are not supporting any new applications using the v4.1 activity publishing APIs although this will continue to function in existing applications. Any new applications that try to use this functionality from the v4.1 APIs will receive a 1073 error.
In summary, the v4.1 Messenger Connect APIs are deprecated and ceased working on August 14, 2012.
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The final version of the Live SDK v5.2 for Windows 8 and Windows Phone is now available for download here. There are several versions of the Live SDK, depending on your target development platform:
- Live SDK for Windows and Windows Phone: use this edition if you're developing apps for Windows 8 or apps for Windows Phone 7.0 or 7.5. Download here .
- Live SDK for Android: use this edition if you're developing apps for Google Android mobile technology platform devices, like those running Froyo, Gingerbread, Honeycomb, and Ice Cream Sandwich. Download here .
- Live SDK for iOS: use this edition if you're developing apps for the iOS operating system for Apple devices, like iPad, iTouch, and iPod. Download here .
We've also added the following new features in the REST API as highlighted in this SkyDrive blog post.

1.

If you're developing apps for other platforms, you don't need to download the Live SDK; you can reference our updated Representational State Transfer (REST) API directly, as follows:
- For websites that use JavaScript, learn more .
- For Windows desktop apps, and for mobile apps for other than Windows Phone, Android, and iOS, learn more .
If you have any questions about these downloads or about the Live SDKs in general, post them in this forum. We have team members here that are ready to help you.

If you're new to Live Connect, learn how to get started ; configure your app ; work with our code examples ; do cool things with Hotmail , SkyDrive , and Messenger ; play with our APIs without writing any code ; and explore our end-to-end code samples .

SyncFx - General [ReadOnly] announcements

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One piece of feedback we receive fairly frequently is that given the number of Sync Framework forums, it is confusing, where to best find answers and ask questions relating to specific components of the Sync Framework. For that reason, we have created a new single (unified) forum for you to use for anything relating to the Microsoft Sync Framework:

SyncFx - Microsoft Sync Framework Developer Discussions

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/syncdevdiscussions/threads

As a result, as of Jan 23^rd, 2010 this forum will be locked and will only be available in read mode to allow you to search and read archived questions. Any questions that were submitted since Jan 1, 2010 in the below forums will be moved to this new location and will continue to be active in their new location. So please start tracking them in their new location.

SyncFx - General

SyncFx - Technical Discussion

SyncFx – Feedback

SyncFx - Microsoft Sync Framework Database Providers

Liam Cavanagh

Microsoft Translator User Forum (Including Bing Translator) announcements

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How to add newly released languages to your list of languages in Office?

As new languages are added to the core Microsoft Translator service, these languages will appear automatically in www.bing.com/translator, Internet Explorer, Skype Translator IM translation, etc.

However, for these to appear in Office, Word for instance, you need to first update the list. This is pretty simple and here are the detailed steps to do this. It will take less than a minute to do this
1. Open word, type a short (5 words of more) text, select the text
2. Go to the review tab, select "translation" and "translate selected text"
3. This will open the research pane and you will see a link towards the bottom of the pane that say "Get update to your services"
  - If you click on the menu "from" or "to" you will see that the new language is not in the list
4. Click on this "Get update to your services" link.,
5. Click on "Update", then "Continue" on the pop-up Windows
6. Click on "Install" (figure 3)
7. Then "OK" and "Close"
8. All done! Now the new language is available.
Questions? Comments? www.MicrosoftTranslator.com/forum
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When you try to translate a large Word document by using Microsoft Translator, you might get 404 error. This is a known issue and we're working on this. If you need to
translate a large Word document, we suggest you to split the large document into smaller documents. We will post a note at the forum when this issue gets fixed.
Thanks. Microsoft Translator Team
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Forums Redesign - Q&A / Discussions announcements

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Thank you everyone who has provided feedback into this forum so far. We appreciate the feedback and are actively prioritizing it accordingly. We are monitoring the suggestions and bugs and are currently working to make improvements based on feedback that has already been provided.

In order to help us make further improvements to this new design, please take the following action:
- If you have a suggestion for the redesigned Forums please post these to Suggestions and Feedback for the Forums. Please limit one suggestion per post and we encourage users to vote up suggestions to bring attention to the Forums team.
- If you encounter bugs please continue to post bugs in the Forums Issues forum.
- If you have additional questions or comments about the redesign, this forum is the place to post.
Again, thank you for your feedback and know that your voice is being heard.

Microsoft Translator Hub Forum announcements

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.NET Native Preview announcements

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Windows Live Messenger Web APIs: Development announcements

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Windows Phone Preview OS Issues announcements

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Windows Live Messenger Client: Development (retired) announcements

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Visual Studio Editor announcements

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To increase the chances of the right team seeing your topic, it's very helpful if you post in the forum that corresponds to your issue or discussion. This forum (Visual Studio Editor) covers questions related to the core text/code editor *only*. This includes issues related to typing, scrolling, IntelliSense, tooltips, syntax coloring, outlining, etc., as well as editor extensibility. It does NOT include questions of the form, "How do I write code to accomplish XYZ task in language Foo?".

For topics that are language-specific, database-related, or involve any type of designer surface, debugger, compiler, etc., please start with the forums listed below:

- Web Development: http://forums.asp.net
- SQL/Database Development: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vstsdb/threads
- WinForms: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en/winforms/threads (general issues) or http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en/winformsdesigner/threads (WinForms designer)
- WPF Designer: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vswpfdesigner/threads
- Debugger: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vsdebug/threads
- Test Tools: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vststest/threads

Thanks for your help in posting questions where they are most likely to be answered!

Expression Studio announcements

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Lori Dirks Thursday, January 10, 2013 11:44 PM

In conjunction with our announcement that we have discontinued development of several Expression products and are no longer selling Expression Studio, we have locked this forum to further posting.

You can read the details of our product announcement on the Expression home page, http://msdn.microsoft.com/expression.
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Lori Dirks Thursday, December 20, 2012 7:26 PM

We released important news today about the Expression family of products. Please visit the Expression Community home page for details.

Windows Live Spaces: Development announcements

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Bing Maps: Map Control and Web services Development announcements

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Since its release earlier this year, we have seen interest in, and usage of, our Bing Maps Spatial Data Services (SDS) grow rapidly.

The result is that at times of peak load the number of evaluation accounts using the service is pre-empting other requests. Today we have made a change to the SDS service that will prioritize requests from Enterprise Accounts. You can check the status of your Account to see if you have an Enterprise Account by logging into the account on the Bing Maps Account Center .

We regret that this means that you will no longer be able to submit new jobs to SDS from non-Enterprise Accounts until you request and are given access to SDS as detailed below. To be clear, data already uploaded to the SDS service can still be queried; it is only when you try to update those data sets, create new ones, or download them that you will receive an error.

If you would like to request access to SDS for a non-Enterprise Account application, you can do so by emailing MAPLIC@microsoft.com with your Account ID and (for publically accessible sites) top level domains. Be sure to send this request from the email account on record in the Bing Maps Account Center . (Replies will only be sent to these accounts so please check your SPAM filters and the usual things that might complicate communication.)

Please also note that if you are using the SDS service from an Enterprise Account, then you should not need to take any action related to production accounts. Your application should not require any changes. If you experience any issues please let us know via your enterprise support contact.

As we continue to enhance the SDS system this process will be improved and made more efficient. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

Chris Pendleton

Sr. Program Manager, Lead

Bing Maps, Microsoft Corp.
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tanoshimi Friday, May 6, 2011 9:16 AM

Released today, the Bing Maps v7 Interactive SDK demonstrates the code required to perform common tasks on the Bing Maps v7 control - how to add shapes to the map, working with tile layers, adding events to the map, together with new features such as getting the user's location and registering custom modules.

You can access the interactive SDK here: http://www.bingmapsportal.com/ISDK/AjaxV7

If you have any questions about the examples used in the iSDK, please start a new thread onthe forum
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tanoshimi Thursday, November 4, 2010 9:52 AM

On the 2nd November 2010, Microsoft announced that they have discontinued investment in the Bing Maps 3D control Active-X plug-in.

When the next update to www.bing.com/maps is launched, the option to view 3D Maps will be removed.

Current users of 3D Maps can expect the following:

1. Permalinks and the desktop shortcut to 3D Maps will be redirected to Bing Maps with the nearest match to the experience they had in 3D. In most cases this will result only in a loss of the ability to navigate in full 3D.

2. After opening collections with 3D models, the 3D models will be represented as pushpins only. The models will not be accessible from collections.

3. Permalinks to tours will now open the collection manager with a message indicating discontinued support of the feature. Unfortunately there will no longer be an option to view the tour.

The 3D API used by developers to implement 3D mode in their own Bing Maps (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb429547.aspx) will continue to be supported until December 2011.

You can view the announcement by Brian Hendricks, Bing Maps Product Manager, at: http://www.bing.com/community/site_blogs/b/maps/archive/2010/11/02/changes-to-bird-s-eye-and-3d-maps.aspx

Windows Live Writer: Development announcements

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Reporting announcements

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Please be advised that in an effort to provide a more unified Dev Center experience the ads-in-apps forums have been moved as of August 01, 2016 into the same location housing the other Dev Center forums.

If you already have links to the forums for App/Ad Unit Management, Promote Your App, and AdSDK they should continue to work. The Payout and Reporting forums have been combined and content migrated with the Dev Center Payout and Reporting Forum. All of the original posts and replies still remain and can be found in the new locations.

If you have any specific questions regarding the forum migration please contact support via the Dev Center Support Portal.

Ad Revenue, Payout & Taxes announcements

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Please be advised that in an effort to provide a more unified Dev Center experience the ads-in-apps forums have been moved as of August 01, 2016 into the same location housing the other Dev Center forums.

If you already have links to the forums for App/Ad Unit Management, Promote Your App, and AdSDK they should continue to work. The Payout and Reporting forums have been combined and content migrated with the Dev Center Payout and Reporting Forum. All of the original posts and replies still remain and can be found in the new locations.

If you have any specific questions regarding the forum migration please contact support via the Dev Center Support Portal.

SQL Server 2012 Setup and Installation (Pre-Release) announcements

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edhickey Wednesday, November 10, 2010 5:21 PM

This is the Forum for SQL Server "Denali" Setup and Installation questions

SQL Server 2012 PowerPivot for Excel (Pre-Release) announcements

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edhickey Wednesday, November 10, 2010 5:22 PM

This is the Forum for SQL Server "Denali" PowerPivot for Excel questions

SQL Server 2012 Integration Services (Pre-Release) announcements

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edhickey Wednesday, November 10, 2010 5:23 PM

This is the Forum for SQL Server "Denali" Integration Services questions.

SQL Server 2012 High Availability and Disaster Recovery (Pre-Release) announcements

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SQL Server 2012 Spatial (Pre-Release) announcements

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edhickey Wednesday, November 10, 2010 5:47 PM

This is the Forum for SQL Server "Denali" Spatial questions.

SQL Server 2012 Analysis Services (Pre-Release) announcements

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edhickey Wednesday, November 10, 2010 5:42 PM

This is the Forum for SQL Server "Denali" Analysis Services questions.

SQL Server 2012 PowerPivot for SharePoint (Pre-Release) announcements

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edhickey Wednesday, November 10, 2010 5:43 PM

This is the Forum for SQL Server "Denali" PowerPivot for SharePoint questions.

SQL Server 2012 Reporting Services (Pre-Release) announcements

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SQL Server 2012 Master Data Services (Pre-Release) announcements

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edhickey Wednesday, November 10, 2010 5:45 PM

This is the Forum for SQL Server "Denali" Master Data Services questions.

Claims based access platform (CBA), code-named Geneva announcements

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The Federated Identity "Geneva" team is happy to announce the release of Microsoft code name "Geneva", an open platform for simplified user access based on claims. This release consists of three components: Geneva Framework for .NET developers, Geneva Server for IT Pros, and Windows CardSpace "Geneva".

You can find all of our installation downloads and supporting documentation for each component of the Geneva platform on the "Geneva" Connect site.

Cognitive Services announcements

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First off: there are no changes to the API endpoints or keys you are already using from Project Oxford.

On March 30th at the //build/ conference we announced Microsoft Cognitive Services. Bringing together the services from Project Oxford along with Bing's v5 Search APIs and additional machine learning based services from across Microsoft, there are now even more capabilities available to developers to easily add intelligent features across Vision, Speech, Language, Knowledge, and Search capabilities.

Please visit our new site at: www.microsoft.com/cognitive to learn more and start using the new services today.

For more details on Cognitive Services and related announcement from //build/ please see this blog post: https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/machinelearning/2016/03/30/from-analytical-applications-to-intelligent-solutions/
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Orchard –Discussions announcements

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Orchard - Help and Support announcements

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Azure Mobile Engagement announcements

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This forum is closed as the product does no longer exist.
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ADO.NET Entity Framework and LINQ to Entities (Pre-Release) announcements

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This Entity Framework Pre-Release forum is closed.

We are seeing a lot of great Entity Framework questions (and answers) from the community on Stack Overflow. As a result, our team is going to spend more time reading and answering questions posted on Stack Overflow.

We would encourage you to post questions on Stack Overflow using the entity-framework tag. We will also continue to monitor the Entity Framework forum.

Entity Framework Team

Microsoft StreamInsight announcements

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Dear StreamInsight users,

We just officially announced our new StreamInsight V2.1 release - you can find all the relevant information including download links in the StreamInsight blog!

Regards,
Roman
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We just officially announced our new StreamInsight V1.2 release - you can find all the relevant information including download links in our latest blog posting!

Regards,
Roman
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As appeared on the blog:

Finally: The StreamInsight Development Team is now tweeting! Follow streaminsight to receive latest announcements and news. We are excited about the opportunity to use this push-channel to deliver messages to our developer and user community, that's the true spirit of an event-driven world!

Regards,

The StreamInsight Team

Microsoft Robotics - Visual Programming Language announcements

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Please see the announcement of Robotics Developer Studio 4 Beta in the Community Forum.

Visit the Microsoft Robotics Home Page for more information.

Code Contracts announcements

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This forum is now closed. Thank you all for your participation.

Regards,

MSDN Forums team
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It has taken a long time, we know, but we have finally released the contract editor extensions for VS2012 and an update to VS2010.

The new version is much more stable and less CPU consuming than previously and hopefully much more useful as a result.

For VS2012: http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/02de7066-b6ca-42b3-8b3c-2562c7fa024f

For VS2010: http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/85f0aa38-a8a8-4811-8b86-e7f0b8d8c71b

If you haven't tried it yet, then please do and let us know what you think!

To review, the extensions should show you method contracts in the following situations:
- While you are typing a call to a method: the signature helper window should show you each overload's contract in the same window as the signature and exception information.
- Hovering over an existing method call: the quick info window should show you the method's contract in addition to its summary information.
- Method override and interface implementation definitions: hover over the method name in the signature to see the tooltip of the contracts inherited (or defined in the method).
- Metadata windows: if you "go to definition" for a type/method that is defined in an external assembly then the metadata window that VS creates should be augmented with method contracts.
Enjoy.
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We have added a section to our web site listing the external projects that we know about which are using Code Contracts. If you would like your project listed, please send us a link and we'll add it to the list. This would really help us in our efforts to get the project more fully supported by the product groups.

Thanks!

Mike
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We are so happy that you are interested in Code Contracts! You are at exactly the right place for learning how to use contracts from any .NET language to:
- Specify method preconditions for expressing conditions that a caller must meet in order to call a method.
- Specify method postconditions for expressing conditions that the implementation of a method must meet before returning. Conditions can be specified for both normal termination as well as exceptional termination.
- Specify object invariants that describe the healthy states for an instance of a class.
We currently provide three tools for making use of contracts:
- A binary rewriter that operates as a post-build step to inject the contracts into the appropriate places for them to be evaluated at runtime.
- A static checker that operates as a post-build step to analyze your code without even executing it for potential contract violations.
- A documentation generator that adds information about the contracts to the XML documentation files for your project.
The installer for these tools is available for either commercial or non-commercial use.

We welcome you to use the forum to ask questions about how to use contracts and the tools, to make suggestions for how we can improve, and --- if you really must --- to report bugs and problems.

You can also check out our home page at Microsoft Research.

Azure Virtual Machines announcements

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We are currently experiencing an outage in South Central US

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/status/

You will want to monitor the Azure Status Page for further updates.

Once the issue has mitigated all Virtual Machines and data should be restored and fully functional. After the issue has been mitigated and if you are still seeing issues let us know.
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With the release of the March 2018 Security bulletin, there was a fix that addressed a CredSSP, "Remote Code Execution" vulnerability (CVE-2018-0886) which could impact RDP connections. The vulnerability was discovered to which the exploits observed were:
- Targets receive a malicious RTF Microsoft Office document
- After being opened, the malicious document causes the second stage of the exploit to be downloaded in the form of an HTML page with malicious code
- The malicious code triggers the use-after-free memory-corruption bug
- Accompanying shellcode then downloads and executes a malicious payload
For additional information regarding this update and mitigation steps see the following blog:

Unable to RDP to Virtual Machine: CredSSP Encryption Oracle Remediation

For general discussion of this topic please see:

General Discussion - Unable to RDP to Virtual Machine: CredSSP Encryption

If the mitigation steps detailed in the above links do not solve your problem please submit a new forum post to:

Azure Virtual Machines

Azure Multi-Factor Authentication announcements

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Azure MFA faced a global outage this morning. This issue is now mitigated. If you are still receiving this issue, please open a new thread and we will work with you to resolve it.

Anyone testing with the Authenticator app should use the refresh option to check for notifications.

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/status/
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Identity and access management is an anchor for security and top of mind for enterprise IT departments. It is key to extending anytime, anywhere access to employees, partners, and customers. Windows Azure Multi-Factor Authentication is now available to deliver increased access security and convenience for IT and end users.

In addition to entering a username and password during sign in, users also authenticate with the Windows Azure Multi-Factor Authentication app on their mobile device or via an automated phone call or text message. In order for an attacker to gain access to the user's account, they would need to know the user's login credentials and be in possession of the user's phone. This increases security while using mobile devices and methods that are familiar to users.

For more information, see the article: Announcing General Availability of Windows Azure Multi-Factor Authentication

Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) announcements

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SQL Server PowerPivot for SharePoint announcements

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Summary

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If PowerPivot for Excel 2010, Excel 2010, SharePoint 2010, or the Reporting Services Addin for SharePoint 2010 are beta versions, PowerPivot and its related functionality will not work with the Released versions of these components.

More Information
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The beta versions of the components listed above are not compatible with the released versions of these components. If the beta versions of the components are installed, they will not function with the released versions. For example, if you have a beta version of the PowerPivot download installed and upgrade to the released version of Excel 2010, the PowerPivot addin will not be available in Excel.
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Microsoft Robotics - Simulation announcements

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Please see the announcement of Robotics Developer Studio 4 Beta in the Community Forum.

Visit the Microsoft Robotics Home Page for more information.

Dev Center App announcements

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Window Phone is no longer supported by Microsoft and most of the questions in this forum are off topic. As a result, this forum is now closed. Thank you for your participation.
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Thank you for all the feedback regarding the new Dev Center App!

We released an update (version 1.1.1302.26 published on Feb 28, 2013) to fix these issues:

-App would fail if the background agent was turned off

- App would show an incorrect notification "update required"

- UI graphic improvements

IMPORTANT: This app requires a Windows Phone Dev Center active account and won't work without one.

Please take a minute to download the update. Please send us feedback either by email and this forum.

Application Insights (AI) announcements

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Azure Blockchain announcements

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A recent release of Azure cloud shell caused Workbench AAD setup script fail. This impacts all new deployments. While we are working on a fix, here is a workaround. Sorry for the inconvenience.
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Emergency Maintenance: We are performing emergency maintenance on the Azure Blockchain Service infrastructure due to CVE-2019-11477, CVE-2019-11478, and CVE-2019-11479 . You may experience downtime of up to 60 minutes in duration within the next 72 hours; and the nodes may be restarted. D uring this period, access to the transaction node may be lost, so new transactions submission and blockchain and smart contract state queries may fail. The access will automatically be restored, without any loss of data, and the transactions can then be resubmitted.
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Update: The issue has been resolved by the Azure networking team

Azure is experiencing intermittent VPN gateway connectivity issues when accessing your resources. This may impact your ability to successfully deploy among other things. You can find detailed updates by going to the "Service Health" page from your Azure Portal.
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A known Azure Networking Infrastructure issue may be causing Workbench deployments to fail. Please feel free to track this issue here.
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Update Jun 27th: Another issue surfaced after the fix below was applied. We have rolled out a hotfix to (keyserver pgp.mit.edu unavailable) which is now live. Your deployments should now succeed. We apologize for the inconvenience - the fix hardens our solution against similar issues in the future.

We are aware of an upstream dependency that is causing all workbench deployments to fail. We have identified the root cause as the Parity installation mechanism and have reached out to Parity team to investigate and fix. This announcement will be updated as progress is made in rolling out a fix. You can track the root cause issue here: https://github.com/paritytech/parity/issues/8978
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The Microsoft Blockchain team monitors this forum to provide support for our Azure marketplace solutions:
1. Azure Blockchain Workbench -the fastest way to get started with blockchain on Azure.
2. Ethereum on Azure - Ethereum multi-subscription cross-region multi-member solution template.
3. Hyperledger Fabric on Azure - Hyperledger Fabric solution templates.

Azure Cache announcements

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Azure Redis Cache is now Generally Available, with an availability SLA of 99.9%.

Azure Redis Cache is a distributed, in-memory, managed cache that helps you build highly scalable and responsive applications, by providing you with fast access to your data. It's based on the popular open source Redis Cache, and it gives you access to a secured, dedicated Redis cache that's managed by Microsoft.

For all new Azure deployment, Azure Redis cache is the recommended cache.

For more information browse to the Azure Redis Cache service home page.

Azure Cognitive Service announcements

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Welcome to the Azure Cognitive Services forum. This forum is for the posting of questions related to building and deploying applications using pre-built machine learning models. These pre-built models include, but are not limited to, computer vision, speech, language, knowledge and other preview services as they become available. This also includes any pre-built model that supports customization, such as custom vision or custom speech.

We look forward to hearing about the project you are working, and helping you infuse the models into your applications in the most effective manner.

Azure Data Factory announcements

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Azure Data Factory allows you to manage the production of trusted information by offering an easy way to create, orchestrate, and monitor data pipelines over the Hadoop ecosystem using structured, semi-structures and unstructured data sources.

You can connect to your on-premises SQL Server, Azure database, tables or blobs and create data pipelines that will process the data with Hive and Pig scripting, or custom C# processing. The service offers a holistic monitoring and management experience over these pipelines, including a view of their data production and data lineage down to the source systems.

The outcome of Data Factory is the transformation of raw data assets into trusted information that can be shared broadly with BI and analytics tools.

The MSDN forum will be used for general discussions for Getting Started, Development, Management, and Troubleshooting using Azure Data Factory.

Azure Disk Encryption announcements

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Heads up! If you plan on using Azure Disk Encryption, please install the latest version of PowerShell, which at this time is version 1.0.2.

Thanks!

Tom Shinder
Program Manager, Azure Security Engineering

Azure Functions announcements

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Azure Key Vault announcements

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Today we're announcing the public preview of Microsoft Azure Key Vault, a cloud-hosted HSM-backed service for managing cryptographic keys and other secrets used in your cloud applications. This forum is intended for general discussion, best practices, tips and tricks and troubleshooting. Remember, this is a public forum. Do not post confidential information here. Reach us via email to discuss your specific project or feature requests.

Azure Logic Apps announcements

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We are aware of an incident effecting any Logic Apps that were using the SQL connector. Connections will need to be recreated. Details on mitigating can be found here https://aka.ms/logicapp-sql-mitigation

We apologies for any inconvenience this may have caused and will keep you updated with details as we progress.

For questions or issues - please email logicappsemail@microsoft.com

Azure Log Integration announcements

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Hey everyone!

Welcome to the Azure Log Integration forum!

Here you can ask questions about configuration, troubleshooting, capabilities and just about anything else you want to ask!

We will monitor this forum and provide answers when we have them. We hope that community will be a powerful force to help one another though, as often you come up with solutions before we do! :-)

Looking forward to working with all of you!

Thanks!

Tom

Azure Migrate announcements

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We are pleased to announce the general availability of Azure Migrate.

Azure Migrate is offered at no additional charge and provides appliance-based, agentless discovery of your on-premises environments. It enables discovery of VMware-virtualized Windows and Linux VMs today and will enable discovery of Hyper-V environments in the future. It also provides an optional, agent-based discovery for visualizing interdependencies between machines to identify multi-tier applications. This enables you to plan your migration across three dimensions:
- Readiness: Are the machines that host my multi-tier application suitable for running in Azure?
- Rightsizing: What size will my Azure VM be, based on my machine's configuration or utilization?
- Cost: How much will my recurring Azure costs be, taking into account discounts like Azure Hybrid Benefit?
You can get started by creating a migration project in the Azure portal. In addition...
- Get and stay informed with our documentation.
- Seek help by posting a question on our forum or contacting Microsoft Support.
- Provide feedback by posting or voting for an idea in our user voice.
Happy Migrations!

Azure Mobile Apps announcements

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Azure Search announcements

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Welcome to the public preview forum for Azure Search. This is a great place to ask technical questions about Azure Search a fully-managed search-as-a-service that customers can use to integrate complete search experiences into applications and connect search results to business objectives through fine-tuned, ranking profiles. We look forward to your questions and feedback!

Azure Security Center announcements

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Welcome to the Azure Security Center Forum - we're really happy to see you here. Feel free to ask any question you like about Azure Security Center. We read all the posts and will do our best to answer your questions quickly! Here are some resources to get your started:
- Check out Sarah Fender's Azure Security Center post on the Azure Blog
- Watch Sarah's presentation at AzureCon 2015,
- Read the Azure Security Center docs
- See the Azure Security Center announcement
- Stay up to date on Azure Security by reading the Azure Security Team Blog
We're looking forward to working with you - so let's work together to make Azure Security Center the best!

Thanks! -Tom Shinder, Project Manager, Azure Security Engineering.

Azure Sphere announcements

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In September, Azure Sphere was released for public preview. Today, Microsoft released the 18.11 update to the Azure Sphere Operating System, Azure Sphere Security Service, and Visual Studio development environment. This release includes substantial investments in the security infrastructure and connectivity solutions, and it incorporates some of your feedback.

Update to 18.11 Release

Because of changes to the security infrastructure, this release will require a manual update; over-the-air (OTA) update should be available for future releases. Download and install the new SDK and follow the instructions in the Release Notes to manually update your device to 18.11 and reconnect to Wi-Fi. If you previously configured OTA application deployment, you will need to create new feeds.

Upgrade your device OS and SDK as soon as possible. Devices that run the TP 4.2.1 release will have limited functionality. Please refer to the Release Notes for more information.

New Features

18.11 release includes support for new device functionality and adds new reference solutions. Please see the Azure Sphere Blog post for more details.

If you have any questions about this update, please post them here on Azure Sphere MSDN forum.

Azure SQL Data Warehouse announcements

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We are excited to announce the general availability of Azure SQL Data Warehouse in four additional regions—North Europe, Japan East, Brazil South, and Australia Southeast. These additional locations bring the product worldwide availability count to 18 regions – more than any other major cloud provider.

Read More Here!

Cost Management - Cloudyn announcements

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Creating a support ticket
- Azure Portal > Help + Support > New Support Request > Service: Billing > Azure Cost Management
- Azure Portal > Help + Support > New Support Request > Service: Billing > Cloudyn Legacy
If you are unable to find answers using the Azure Cost Management documentation and you suspect the issue may be due to a service disruption or bug, you can open an online support ticket. You should open each support ticket for only a single problem, so that each reported issue can routed accordingly.

To open a support ticket
1. Sign in to the Azure portal ( https://portal.azure.com )
2. On the left navigation menu select Help + Support
3. From the Help + support menu, select New support request
4. On the Basics blade, for Issue type , select Billing
5. For Subscription , choose any of the listed subscriptions. The subscription chosen isn't used for routing of the issue.
6. For Service , select the Billing option, and then choose either Azure Cost Management or Cloudyn Legacy from the list
7. Under Support plan , choose your support current Azure Support Plan, and then click Next
1. On Problems , select a Severity
2. Select a Problem type , and then select a Category for that type
3. Enter a descriptive Title for the incident, and input additional information in the Details dialog
4. Choose an approximate date and time for When did the problem start , and click Next
1. On Contact information , select your preferred contact method and provide your contact information and then select Create
Once the support ticket is created, it will be added to the support queue and response time will vary based on the Support Plan and Severity (e.g. business impact) of the issue.

For more information see: Support scope and responsiveness

To check status of an Incident you have filed, see: Manage support requests
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Azure Marketplace announcements

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We are pleased to announce a new development in the display of thumbnail images with the Bing Search API. As the demand for images in Bing has increased, the need for larger thumbnails to display high quality images has grown. To meet this need, thumbnail dimensions will now be increased when the original image can support it.

How does this affect you? If you currently display images in your application, you will need to utilize existing thumbnail properties to adjust the thumbnail size to your UI specifications. We recommend that you should not have a dependency on the upper bound of the thumbnail size, as the thumbnail size will vary.

Microsoft Azure Site Recovery announcements

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We are rolling out updates for the Configuration Server (Version 8.2.2.0) and Process Server (Version 8.2.2.0). The updates bring better error handling and other quality enhancements. We strongly recommend that you get your Preview / TAP customers to install the latest updates in the following order :
1. Log onto the configuration server using the Virtual Machines page in the Azure portal and download the latest update from: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=533809 . Follow the installer instructions to install the update
2. On the server that you installed the process server, download the latest update from http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=533810 and install it using the installer instructions
3. On the server that you have installed the master target server(s), install the latest update (Version 8.2.1.0), if you haven't already
  - For Windows master target server(s), log onto the Windows master target server(s) using the Virtual Machines page in the Azure portal and download the latest update from http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=533811 . Follow the installer instructions to install the update
- For Linux master target server(s), copy the installer tar file that is available at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=533812 using a sftp client. Alternatively you can log onto the Linux master target server(s) using the Virtual Machines page in Azure use wget to download the file. Extract the files from the gzipped installer and run the command "sudo ./install" to install the update
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Machine Learning announcements

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GokhanU Monday, November 28, 2016 6:28 PM
We have released support for Azure Document DB as a data source in Azure Machine Learning. You can use the existing "Azure DocumentDB" connection option in the Import Data module to read data from Azure DocumentDB for your experiment.
For more information, please see the DocumentDB section of the Import Data module .
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New Module: Extract Key Phrases from Text

You can use this module to extract key talking points from text. As an input, the module takes a dataset that must have a text string column from which the key-phrases are extracted.

The module takes the language of the text records as input parameter. Supported languages include Dutch, English, French, German, Italian and Spanish. You can also use a language column that specifies the language of each record, as produced by Detect Languages module.

The output consists of comma-separated lists of key phrases for each record in input. The key phrases can be used to summarize a corpus of documents, or as features for a machine learning model.

Updated Module: Preprocess Text
- You can specify a language through a language column, as produced by Detect Languages module.
- Following three preprocessing options have been added: Expand verb contractions, Normalize backslashes to slashes, and Split tokens on special characters. Previously, these transformations were done automatically.
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We are pleased to announce the availability of Azure Machine Learning Workspaces and Web Service Plans for all our Azure Machine Learning users through the Azure Portal. Azure Machine Learning users can now create and manage Standard workspaces through the Azure Portal. In addition, users will also be able to create Web Service Pricing Plans. These plans are used when deploying web services and provide included quantities of operationalized compute at a single, predictable monthly cost.

Create your Standard Azure Machine Learning workspace now by going to https://portal.azure.com. Log in with the credentials that you use for accessing your Azure Subscription(s). Click on +New | Data + Analytics | Machine Learning Workspace.
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We are pleased to announce significant new capabilities for text analytics in Azure Machine Learning Studio.

The new features include following modules:
- Detect Languages
  - Identify language of each record in input file from large number of languages.
- Preprocess Text
  - Clean and simplify text to make it more easy to featurize.
- Extract N-Gram Features from Text
  - Create N-gram feature vectors from long text strings, and select only the most important features.
- Latent Dirichlet Allocation
  - Group text into categories using topic modeling.
These modules allow you to build models to solve text classification problems, such as support ticket routing or sentiment analysis. You can pre-process text in multiple languages, and then create features from your text data. Operationalization of models is fully supported.

The modules complement the existing capabilities for Feature Hashing, Vowpal Wabbit based high-dimensional models, and text analytics through R and Python scripting.

For more details, visit MSDN documentation and Cortana Intelligence Gallery.
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There is an issue impacting the "New" web service option for deploying web services from Predictive Experiments in Azure ML. We are working on resolving the issue, and a result have disabled the feature until the feature is fully functional. To access web services created the new process, please browse to https://services.azureml.net and sign in to view your web services. Sorry for any inconvenience this issue may cause.
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GokhanU Thursday, March 24, 2016 2:24 PM

We have released support for Azure SQL Data Warehouse as a data source and a destination in Azure Machine Learning. You can use the existing "Azure SQL Database" connection options in the Reader and Writer modules to read from and write to Azure SQL Data Warehouse. When using the Writer module, the destination tables must already exist in the SQL Data Warehouse.

For more information, please see How to Use Azure ML with Azure SQL Data Warehouse

Please refer to SQL Data Warehouse Reference to learn more about the product and the Transact-SQL language details.
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Visualization of tree models such as Boosted Decision Trees is now available in Azure Machine Learning Studio. To view the trees, train the model, and click Visualize on the output of Train Model module.
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Announcing the Availability of an Azure Virtual Machine Image with Popular Data Science Tools

Microsoft Data Group is happy to announce the immediate availability of a Windows Server 2012 based custom virtual machine image on the Azure marketplace containing several tools that can be used by data scientists and developers for advanced analytics. Through Azure's world-wide cloud infrastructure, customers now have on-demand access to a data science development environment they can use to derive insights from their data, build predictive models and intelligent applications. The virtual machine saves developers' time from having to discover and install the tools individually. Hosting the data science machine on Azure gains you high availability and a consistent set of tools used across your data science team.

The data science VM comes with several popular tools pre-installed like Revolution R Open, Anaconda Python distribution including Jupyter notebook server, Visual Studio Community Edition, Power BI Desktop, SQL Server Express edition and Azure SDK. Once you provision your virtual machine from this image you can get started with data exploration and modeling right away. The data on the virtual machine is stored on the cloud and highly available. You have full administrative access to the virtual machine and can install additional software as needed. There is no separate software fee to use the VM image. You only pay for actual hardware compute usage of the virtual machine depending on the size of the virtual machine you are provisioning this VM on. You can turn off the machine from Azure portal when it is not in use to avoid being billed. When you restart the virtual machine from the Azure portal you can continue your development with all your data and files intact. Further augment your analytics on your data science virtual machine by leveraging solutions in Microsoft's Cortana Analytics Suite.

The data science virtual machine helps you create an analytics environment where you can rapidly build advanced analytics solutions for deployment to the cloud, on-premises or in a hybrid environment.

You can find the data science virtual machine and the Azure hardware compute pricing at: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/marketplace/partners/microsoft-ads/standard-data-science-vm/

More information about the virtual machine can be found at: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/machine-learning-data-science-provision-vm/

If you are new to Azure, you can try the data science virtual machine for free via a 30-day Azure free trial by visiting https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/free-trial/

We encourage you to try the data science virtual machine to jumpstart your analytics project and provide us feedback on how we can better serve your analytics needs.
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Dan Manrique Wednesday, September 9, 2015 9:10 PM

We are happy to announce that we have released Azure ML in our Western Europe datacenter (Amsterdam). Now you can create workspaces in this datacenter. For more information, click here: http://aka.ms/mlwelaunch.
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Dan Manrique Wednesday, September 9, 2015 9:09 PM

We are happy to announce that we have released Azure ML in our SouthEast Asia datacenter (Singapore). Now you can create workspaces in this datacenter. For more information, click here: http://aka.ms/mlasialaunch.
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Ted Way Wednesday, September 2, 2015 6:52 PM
A free Excel add-in that you can use with web services published from Azure Machine Learning is now available. You can use this add-in for request/response predictions or batch predictions, work in Windows or the browser, share workbooks with your co-workers, and call multiple web services all within a single spreadsheet. Go to http://aka.ms/amlexcelhelp for help or ask a question here.

To try it out, open and download sample Excel worksheets that already contain web services:

http://aka.ms/amlexcel-sample-1

http://aka.ms/amlexcel-sample-2

You may use the add-in directly in the browser using Excel Online or opening the file in Excel 2013 or later on Windows. Copy the file to your own OneDrive account if you want to edit it.

Feature highlights
- Connect to multiple web services in one Excel workbook
- Choose from RRS or BES
- Supports single or no input, and single, multiple, or no outputs
For sample 1 (text sentiment analysis): http://aka.ms/amlexcel-sample-1

1.) Highlight cells A1 to A12

2.) Click the range selector button (the selection Sheet1!$A$1:$A:$12 should automatically be populated)

3.) Click OK in the Select Data dialog box

4.) Type "B1" in the output1 text box

5.) Click the Predict button

6.) This web service takes some time to process the text, so please be patient and wait for a minute. When it's done, you should see the sentiment predictions and scores in columns B and C.

For sample 2 (Titanic survivor predictor): http://aka.ms/amlexcel-sample-2

1.) Highlight cells A1 to G11

2.) Click the range selector button (the selection Sheet1!$A$1:$G:$11 should automatically be populated)

3.) Click OK in the Select Data dialog box

4.) Type "H1" in the output1 text box

5.) Click the Predict button

6.) When it's done, you should see the predictions and scores in columns H and I

To add your own web service:

1.) In the Excel add-in, go to the Web Services section (if you are in the Predict section, click the back arrow to go to the list of web services)

2.) Click Add Web Service

3.) In Azure ML Studio, click the WEB SERVICES section in the left pane, and then select the web service

4.) Copy the API key for the web service

5.) Paste the API key into the Excel add-in text box labeled API key

6.) On the DASHBOARD tab for the web service, click the REQUEST/RESPONSE link

7.) Look for the OData Endpoint Address section. Copy the URL and paste that into the text box labeled URL in the Excel add-in\

8.) Click Add
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On July 24th, 2015, Microsoft announced the Preview Availability release of Jupyter Notebooks in Azure Machine Learning Studio.

Azure Machine Learning Studio is a powerful canvas for the composition of Machine Learning Experiments and subsequent operationalization and consumption. It provides an easy to use, yet powerful, drag-drop style of creating Experiments. But sometimes you need a good old "REPL" that allows you to have a tight loop where you enter some script code and get a response. We are delighted to announce that we've now integrated this functionality into ML Studio through Jupyter Notebooks.

Jupyter enables the concept of "executable documents" with support for mixed code, markdown and inline graphics. It's one of the most important innovations in the Data Science and Technical Computing space in recent years. You now have full access to its power from any OS, from any modern browser directly from inside the Azure Machine Learning Studio.

In addition to authoring capabilities above, we are also enabling publishing AzureML web services directly from the Jupyter Notebook. We are also extending this capability to the Jupyter Notebooks running locally outside of AzureML Studio. This allows you to publish any function, including those creating ML models, to be published as a web service directly from the Jupyter Notebook running on your machine. The result is an AzureML web service API that can be called to perform functions or predictions from client applications in real time and over the internet.
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Announcing the availability of the SDK for AzureML Batch Execution Service (BES)

The AzureML BES SDK is now available for download and installation as a NuGet package on NuGet.org (http://www.nuget.org/packages/Microsoft.Azure.MachineLearning/).

The SDK wraps the BES sample code with additional functions to simplify the consumption of BES APIs.

Documentation is available after installing the SDK package in Visual Studio. The BES documentation has also been updated with sample code and guidance on using the SDK.

We are looking forward to hearing your feedback and comments on the SDK to help improve it.

Thanks,

AzureML Team
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We have posted a demo of the Retraining APIs on Codeplex.com. The demo uses the new APIs to programmatically retrain a trained model. Here is the link to the Demo.

Please take a look and let us know if you have questions or comments.

Azure Media Services announcements

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Developers and media companies trust and rely on Azure Media Services to build media applications that include encoding, content protection with DRM, video indexing , live streaming, dynamic packaging, and content delivery at scale. The API now features:
- A simplified development and management model that
- adds new capabilities across live, VOD, and Content Protection
- includes new presets to facilitate automated audio and video metadata extraction workflows in Azure
- A new l ive streaming ( Li veEvent ) entity with support for 8 -second end-to-end low-latency streaming across both HLS and DASH (when using 1s GOPs)
- R eleas e of a CLI 2.0 command line module that support s all API features (including live!)
- Be tter integration experience with key Azure services like Event Grid, Logic Apps, and Functions
- U pdated versions of the most requested client SDKs for .NET, .NET Core, Java, Go, Ruby, Python, and Node.js.
In addition, there are updates to Azure Media Player — AMP now includes a Low Latency profile to use with the new LiveEvent entity, and its accessibility support has been enhanced with the inclusion of the closed-captioning standard CEA-708.

For more information on the above, please read the announcement blog .
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As part of our impending shut-down of ACS authentication and Key support in Azure Media Services, we will be removing support for ACS key management from Powershell as of next week.

If you have not begun your migration to use AAD authentication, you should begin so IMMEDIATELY!
In June we will be shutting off ACS key authentication support for all calls to Azure Media Services API. This means that all API calls and code that has not been migrated to use Azure Active Directory (AAD) auth will no longer work.

See our previous announcements on the required updates here:
ACS deprecation Announcement

Also see the full blog post with details on migration here:

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/azure-media-service-aad-auth-and-acs-deprecation/
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Azure Media Services client SDKs for both Java and PHP now support Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) authentication.

Due to the upcoming deprecation of key authentication support for the Azure Access Control service (ACS) on June 22, 2018, all Media Services customers are required to upgrade their client SDK or REST API code to support Azure AD authentication.

To get the latest Java SDK release, see the details in our Java documentation. To download the latest PHP SDK for Media Services, look for version 0.5.7 of the Microsoft/WindowsAzure package in the Packagist repository. For critical information about the deprecation of ACS, see our blog.
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This is a CRITICAL reminder of an upcoming BREAKING CHANGE to your code if you are using Azure Media Services.

On June 1, 2018, we will be shutting down ACS authentication key support. This is currently the primary way most customers are authenticating with Azure Media Services. We are being forced off the ACS system due to that team's planned retirement of the backend ACS key services. As we have blogged before, we have moved to Azure Active Directory for Authentication (AAD). See my previous blog post here: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/azure-media-service-aad-auth-and-acs-deprecation/

Starting in November 2017, we will be turning off the ACS key blade in the Media Services section of the Azure Portal. You will no longer be able to retrieve or rotate your existing ACS keys for authentication with Media Services. We are doing this to promote the coming critical change
more,
and ask customers to move more rapidly to meet the June 1 deadline. You can still list your keys via the REST management API or through Powershell.

We are pleading directly to our customer base to IMMEDIATELY update your SDK or REST API code to use Active Directory (
AAD
) authentication. Do not delay, as this will be a breaking change to your code on June 1, 2018.
You
production code using ACS keys will begin to fail authentication on that date.

If you have any questions, reach out on this forum or email amshelp@microsoft.com to reach our team.

Thanks,
Azure Media Services team
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The Media Services team is very excited to announce some long awaited customer features, including both our new Standard Streaming Endpoints and Enhanced Azure CDN Integration .

Our new Standard Streaming Endpoints offer auto-scaling and the flexibility to deliver your content to virtually every device through dynamic packaging into HLS, MPEG-DASH, and Smooth Streaming as well as dynamic encryption for Microsoft PlayReady, Google Widevine, Apple Fairplay, and AES128 without needing to worry about Streaming Units. They also scale from very small to very large audiences with thousands of concurrent viewers through Azure CDN integration. The new Streaming endpoints only cost a very low monthly fee, with no additional costs when they scale up based on demand.

Moving forward, all new Media Services accounts will be created with Standard Streaming Endpoint by default. Addition to this all new media services accounts come with 15 days of free Standard Streaming Endpoint. This is great for developers who need to test out our MPEG-DASH and HLS advanced features without committing to spending for the month. Existing Media Services accounts with classic Streaming Endpoint will not be automatically migrated to Standard Streaming Endpoint, but will have the option to migrate manually. Standard Streaming Endpoints is our recommended option for virtually all streaming scenarios and audience sizes.

In addition to Standard Streaming Endpoints, we are also pleased to announce enhanced Azure CDN integration. With a single click you can integrate all the available Azure CDN providers (Akamai and Verizon) to your Streaming Endpoint including their Standard and Premium products and you can manage and configure all the related features through the Azure CDN portal. When Azure CDN is enabled for a Streaming Endpoint using Azure Media Services, data transfer charges between the Streaming Endpoint and CDN do not apply. Data transferred is instead charged at the CDN edge using CDN pricing .

You can start trying out new Standard Streaming Endpoint and CDN integration or migrate your existing endpoints to Standard Streaming Endpoint using Azure Portal (Please note that AMS is not accessible via Azure Classic portal and have a new home).

If you prefer writing code, you need to use REST 2.15 and upgrade to .NET SDK 3.8.0.5 .

For more information please check our blog post and Streaming endpoints overview .
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You can now monitor your usage of On-Demand Streaming for your media services accounts via the following three metrics that are now available via the Azure Media Services dashboard.

Streaming Data Out - Indicates how many Bytes of egress data has been used for On-Demand Streaming.

Streaming HTTP Errors - Indicates how many HTTP Errors have occured. This includes server errors (e.g. HTTP 500 caused by blob store or a media services component) as well as typical client errors (e.g. HTTP 404 or 403). In a future update we will provide additional granularity so that you can track these errors individually.

Streaming Requests - Indicates how many requests for data have been made for on-demand streaming.

If there are other metrics that you would like to see available for on-demand streaming, add the request to our uservoice board - https://azuremediaservices.uservoice.com/
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We have a User Voice site that we have been using for IIS Media Services on-premises for many years that we would like to direct our customers to post new feature requests and vote on features for Azure Media Services as well. We decided to mix the customer feature list, as many of the same feature requests will impact both our cloud and on-premises solutions for Media Services.

Please post your feature requests to our User Voice Media Services site here:

http://azuremediaservices.uservoice.com/

Azure Log Analytics announcements

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IMPORTANT for OpInsights users!

If you are using OpsMgr with Azure Operational Insights behind proxies with specific ACL or rules to only allow traffic to specific destination, please note the following upcoming change that would require an action in your environment.

In order to align the way that OpsMgr and direct agent send data to the service, and as we are making preparations to have a presence in more Azure regions, we have to make a ONE-TIME change to the URLs that the management packs use to post data to OpInsights: where in the past OpsMgr would be talking to ods.systemcenteradvisor.com , with an upcoming deployment (possibly mid next week, we will update this post closer to the deployment as we have a more specific date) OpsMgr will instead start reporting to <yourworkspaceid>.ods.opinsights.azure.com. We recommend you update your firewall/proxy's ACLs/rules to allow traffic to the new destination *.ods.opinsights.azure.com or your data would start either queuing up on OpsMgr and/or eventually being dropped if the new destination can't be reached.

As the new management packs will be received, the system will start reporting to the new URL, and you can later remove the previous ods.systemcenteradvisor.com entry which won't be needed any longer.

We have updated the table with the relevant URLs on our troubleshooting blog post and are updating the MSDN documentation as well. Don't hesitate to reach out to us if you need more information or help.

Read more on our blog http://blogs.technet.com/b/momteam/archive/2015/02/06/notice-upcoming-url-change-for-opsmgr-reporting-to-opinsights.aspx
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Jialin Xin Friday, November 7, 2014 7:38 PM
Log Analytics is an analysis service that enables IT administrators to gain deep insight across on-premises and cloud environments. It enables you to interact with real-time and historical machine data to rapidly develop custom insights, and provides Microsoft and community-developed patterns for analyzing data. Learn more and try it out at http://www.microsoft.com/oms

This is a forum to ask question and discuss with the community about your experience with Log Analytics!

Onboarding issues? Read this troubleshooting guide
- How do I doXYZ? Try ourdocumentation
- Customers with Premier support can log support cases viaPremier
- Customers with Azure support agreements can log support casesin the Azure portal
Note we also have another site to report Feedback, Ideas and Bugs https://feedback.azure.com/forums/267889-log-analytics (before submitting there, check what other users have already suggested and voted on). You can also reach us on twitter @OpInsights

Service Bus announcements

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zivraf Tuesday, June 25, 2013 5:13 PM
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StorSimple announcements

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Anoob Backer Wednesday, September 27, 2017 6:41 AM
In July 2017, we announced the general availability of the Microsoft Azure StorSimple 8000 series in the new Azure portal. Beginning October 2017, you need to use the new Azure portal to manage your StorSimple 8000 series devices. The Azure classic portal is no longer supported.
- Starting October 5, 2017, your classic StorSimple device managers will automatically move to the new Azure portal. This is aphased rollout, and we will update you about the move via email and portal notifications. For more information about the move, see Move your service to Azure portal.
- The new Azure portal supports devices running Update 3.0 or later. If your device is not up to date, we strongly recommend that you apply Update 5 as soon as possible. For more information, see Install Update 5 on your StorSimple device.
- The existing Azure Service Management (ASM) PowerShell cmdlets are not supported after the transition to the new portal. Update the scripts to manage your devices through the Azure Resource Manager SDK. For more information, see the script samples that use the Resource Manager SDK.
If you have any questions, see FAQ: Move to Azure portal. To familiarize yourself with the new Azure portal, please refer to the product documentation.

Source: https://azure.microsoft.com/updates/storsimple-8000-series-is-available-only-in-the-azure-portal-from-october-2017/
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StorSimple 8000 series device management is generally available in the Azure portal. This means that you can use the portal and Azure Resource Manager to unlock deep personalization and role-based access control, and have a single portal to manage all your apps.

What does this change mean for you?
- Using Resource Manager, you can now manage 8000 series devices.
- You can leverage the Resource Manager SDK for automating the 8000 series device management.
- The Azure portal supports devices running Update 3.0 or later.
What actions do you need to take?
- Your existing StorSimple Physical Device Series resources in the classic portal can be transitioned to the new Azure Portal in the coming weeks. The transition from the classic portal to the Azure portal is quick, easy, and non-disruptive.
- If your device is not up to date, we strongly recommend that you apply Update 4 as soon as possible.
For more information about the Azure portal experience, please visit the Azure Blog .
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Your existing StorSimple Virtual Device Series managers in the Azure Classic portal will be transitioned to the new Azure portal. Please note this migration is seamless and there will be no downtime to your virtual arrays. Upon completion of this migration, you may still see your StorSimple Virtual Device Series resources within the Classic portal,however you will be directed to manage them within the Azure portal.

More information is available at StorSimple Virtual Device Series transitioning to the new Azure portal.
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Anoob Backer Wednesday, November 30, 2016 7:34 PM

We're happy to announce the management of the StorSimple Virtual Device Series is now available in the new Azure portal. You can use the StorSimple extension in the new portal to create Azure Resource Manager based StorSimple managers to manage your virtual arrays.

For more information, check out Managing StorSimple virtual arrays in the new Azure portal.

Azure Storage announcements

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With general availability of Microsoft Azure Ultra Disks Storage today, we are delivering the next generation of our highly performant Azure Managed Disk, for data intensive workloads migrating to or running in the cloud. Azure Ultra Disk will help you get maximum extremely scalable performance and sub-millisecond latency for applications and databases like SAP HANA, Microsoft SQL Server, MongoDB, Cassandra, Oracle DB, Postgre SQL, NoSQL, MySQL and many more.

Azure Ultra Disks will give you access to the best in class IOPS, throughput and latency in the cloud. You can now:
- Choose from a range of different disks sizes ranging from 4 GiB up to 64 TiB with granular increments
- Scale performance up to 160K IOPS and 2 GB/s per disk with zero downtime using our flexible innovative design
- Achieve the optimal performance you need per disk even at low storage capacities
Our preview customers have benefited by achieving new levels of performance and scale on Azure for their Virtual Machine and Container workloads. Get started today with Azure Ultra Disk Storage. Please refer to our how-to- guide for a deep dive and learn more at https://aka.ms/UltraDiskBlog.
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Cloud Services (Web and Worker Roles) announcements

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With the release of the March 2018 Security bulletin, there was a fix that addressed a CredSSP, "Remote Code Execution" vulnerability (CVE-2018-0886) which could impact RDP connections. The vulnerability was discovered to which the exploits observed were:
- Targets receive a malicious RTF Microsoft Office document
- After being opened, the malicious document causes the second stage of the exploit to be downloaded in the form of an HTML page with malicious code
- The malicious code triggers the use-after-free memory-corruption bug
- Accompanying shellcode then downloads and executes a malicious payload
For additional information regarding this update and mitigation steps see the following blog:

Unable to RDP to Virtual Machine: CredSSP Encryption Oracle Remediation

For general discussion of this topic please see:

General Discussion - Unable to RDP to Virtual Machine: CredSSP Encryption

If the mitigation steps detailed in the above links do not solve your problem please submit a new forum post to:

Azure Virtual Machines
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SethM-MS Wednesday, July 25, 2012 9:56 PM

You might find this new MSDN article interesing: it compares two types of structured storage supported by Windows Azure: Windows Azure Table Storage and Windows Azure SQL Database (formerly SQL Azure). The goal of this article is to provide a comparison of the respective technologies so that you can understand the similarities and differences between them. This analysis can help you make a more informed decision about which technology best meets your specific requirements.

Check it out and please do rate the topic: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj553018.
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Jialin Xin Friday, February 18, 2011 7:20 PM

As posted on the Windows Azure Team Blog:

The Windows Azure Platform MSDN forums provide free online community support for Windows Azure and SQL Azure developers from Microsoft insiders, MVP's, and like-minded developers. The forums are a great means to get quick answers and support on all things Windows Azure without having to log a support ticket. The Windows Azure Platform forums average more than 360 new posts a month and 99% of the posted questions receive a response within one day.

To make it easier to stay on top of what's happening on the forums, you can now follow @wapforums on Twitter to keep track of new forum questions and discussions as they're posted. When you're logged into Twitter, you'll be able to see questions as they're asked, get community tips as they're posted and identify discussions that you may want to participate in.

And be sure to watch for posts from #MSTechTalk for tips and discussions from Microsoft engineering teams and #WAPSupport for posts related to top support questions.
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The SQL Azure and Windows Azure AppFabric teams have forums setup specifically for support & feedback of their products in CTP and Labs. These forums should be reserved for conversations only while the product/feature/version is not a production release. Along with community members providing answers, these forums are supported by the product groups.

You can find these forums with the descriptions of what they cover under the Windows Azure Platform - CTPs, Betas & Labs forum category.

Currently, the Windows Azure Betas & CTPs (XS instances, VM Roles & Windows Azure Connect) are supported under the primary Windows Azure Platform forums .

Thank you,

Brian Aurich - Windows Azure Community PM
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The Windows Azure Platform Training Course includes a comprehensive set of hands-on labs and videos that are designed to help you quickly learn how to use Windows Azure, SQL Azure, and the Windows Azure AppFabric.

The Windows Azure Platform Training Course is available here and includes a link to the latest offline training kit.

Wade Wegner provides information about the September update in his blog here.

Azure Backup announcements

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Announcing Security Features in Azure Backup to protect data against security threats:

https://twitter.com/AzureBackup/status/798946904809750529

Here are few highlights of the feature:
- Prevention: New authentication layer added for critical operations so only users with valid Azure credentials can perform them.
- Alerting: Email notifications sent for any critical operations that impact availability of backup data to help detect attacks as soon as they occur.
- Recovery: Backup data retained after deletion and minimum recovery points maintained to ensure recovery of data.
Learn more @ https://aka.ms/azurebackupsecurityfeature
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Premium storage VM backup GA @ https://twitter.com/AzureBackup/status/743559104421986310
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Windows Desktop Sidebar Gadget Development announcements

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This forum is now closed. Thank you for your participation.

Internet Explorer Extension Development announcements

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Ryan Bolz Wednesday, June 26, 2013 5:23 PM

Please be aware that Microsoft Internet Explorer 11 Preview is now available. Please feel free to post questions or discussions related to IE 11 Preview in this forum.

Thanks,

Microsoft Community team

Internet Explorer Web Development announcements

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Ryan Bolz Wednesday, June 26, 2013 5:24 PM

Please be aware that Microsoft Internet Explorer 11 Preview is now available. Please feel free to post questions or discussions related to IE 11 Preview in this forum.

Thanks,

Microsoft Community team

Developing Windows Desktop Applications with Power Management announcements

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Mark Aggar Wednesday, October 20, 2010 8:49 PM

Visit http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/ff944599.aspx for up to date information on how to design applications that are energy smart and work well with Windows Power Management. Post feedback on this forum if you can't find the information you are looking for via this link.
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Mark Aggar Wednesday, October 20, 2010 8:46 PM

As somewhat of a social experiment, I'm inviting those of you who've diagnosed issues with apps not working correctly with Windows power management to post your reports on this forum here. Apps not working right could mean that the PC stays awake unnecessarily, or or could mean that the app is negatively impacted by power management because it doesn't request that the system or display stay on while it is perform critical work.

The goal is to share knowledge of the issues so we aren't all "re-diagnosing the same wheel" and hopefully get the attention of the developers of the apps so they can make their applications a little more energy smart. Here's hoping...

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/powermanagement/thread/78b4122b-04cc-4fdf-b989-82e8186c5f4c
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Mark Aggar Wednesday, October 20, 2010 5:52 PM

This forum is for issues associated with developing application that work well with Windows Power Management. Please do not post general Windows development or other non-power management related questions to this forum or they will be moved to the 'off-topic' forum.

Thanks!

Application Compatibility for Windows Desktop Development announcements

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DaButler1 Friday, August 7, 2009 6:29 PM

Windows 7 Application Remediation Services are now available to assist software developers and corporate customers with application compatibility issues. Microsoft wants to ensure customers resolve application compatibility issues related to code remediation or general compatibility with Windows 7. If you are a software developer, Microsoft Partner Network (MPN) ISV, or corporate customer who is deploying software on Windows 7, you may take advantage of this program in the following ways:

1. Online support and resources at:

a. MSDN

b. TechNet

c. MPN ISV Online Technical Communities (MPN partners provided a response within 8 business hours from Microsoft)

d. https://www.isvappcompat.com/

2. Premier customers may request a Windows 7 Application Compatibility for Enterprises Workshop through their Technical Account Manager. Premier Field Engineers are also available for on-site identification and remediation of issues through Application Compatibility services. In some countries, the workshop is being made available for open enrollment events as well.

3. Use your Premier, or Professional Support agreements (or Pay Per Incident) to open paid service requests with Microsoft Support. Our support teams will assist you through shim development, debugging code or leveraging XP mode to resolve application compatibility issues. You may open a service request by using the following resources: Phone (800) 936-4900 - Premier Support , Professional or MSDN Support.

4. In addition, MPN Partners can leverage Technical Sales Assistance, Technical Advisory Services, and Break-Fix Support benefits by contacting the Global Partner Support team. To do so learn more at MPN Partner Technical Support Benefits and MPN ISV Online Technical Communities

Windows Desktop Ribbon Development announcements

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What's new for Windows 8:
- Support for PNG image resources.
- Event notifications that identify the ribbon mode, command info, event type, and location within the ribbon.
- Ability to show or hide font size buttons.
- Improvements to Quick Access Toolbar (QAT) functionality, including highlighting, undo/redo buttons, and support for gallery controls.
- Collapse ribbon and expand ribbon buttons.
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Karl Bridge Thursday, January 29, 2009 4:32 PM

Hello and welcome to the Windows Ribbon Development forum!

TheWindows Ribbon Development forum provides you an opportunity to join a community of Windows developers interested in the Windows Ribbon Framework—a rich command presentation system that provides a modern alternative to the layered menus, toolbars, and task panes of traditional Windows applications. Here you can share knowledge, get questions answered, and learn from others with development backgrounds similar to yours.

If you have any suggestions or feedback on the new Windows Ribbon Framework, please feel free to post them in this forum.

TheWindows Ribbon Development forum is based on the new Forum 3.0 platform. To learn more about Forum 3.0 features, please view the following video:

http://xpstream.winisp.net/samjarawan/msdn%20forums%20overview.wmv

Windows Desktop SDK announcements

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The RTM release of the Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 is now available for download in both ISO and Web Setup format. Web setup allows you to install a specific subset of the SDK you select without having to download the entire SDK. The DVD ISO setup allows you to download the entire SDK to install later. This release of the SDK has three ISOs to choose from. You should pick the version that matches the CPU (x86, x64, or Itanium) you are installing on. Each ISO will allow you to build applications that target all the other CPU platforms. If you install the x86 ISO (which only installs on x86 platforms), you will be able to create applications targeting x86, x64, and Itanium.

Platform Compatibility:

This release of the Windows SDK is compatible with Windows 7 , Windows Server 2008 R2 Candidate , Windows Server 2008 , . NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1 , Windows Vista, and Windows XP.

Visual Studio Compatibility:

This release of the Windows SDK is compatible with Visual Studio 2008 SP1 ; including Visual Studio Express Editions .

What's New:

Please check out the top-level Getting Started section in the SDK documentation for a full description of what's new in the SDK as well as recent posts to this blog – such as New Win32 Samples in Windows SDK for Windows 7: Windows User Interface or New Tools in Windows SDK for Windows 7.

Learn More:

Check the Windows SDK blog and the Windows SDK MSDN Developer Center over the coming weeks for more information about the Windows SDK. Please read the Release Notes for a description of known issues before you install the SDK. The Release Notes also have instructions on how to use the different components in the SDK.

Troubleshooting:

If you are having problems downloading or installing this SDK, read Troubleshooting Windows 7 SDK Download/Install.

Tell us what you think:

Send your thoughts to the Windows SDK Feedback alias . Tell us how you use the SDK and what we can do to make your life easier.

--Karin

|| Karin Meier || Windows SDK PM || Samples . Community || http://blogs.msdn.com/KarinM ||

Windows Desktop Web Services API (webservices.dll) announcements

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Please follow instructions in this post if you are intersted in using the WWSAPI runtime on Windows XP, Vista, Server 2003 and Server 2008. The version available corresponds to the one released in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2. To develop for this version of the runtime, you need to install Microsoft Windows SDK for Windows 7 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1. If you used any pre-released versions of WWSAPI, please make sure to regenerate all code using the new version of wsutil.exe tool and rebuild all source code that used any of the pre-released versions of this API. When you have technical issues of using WWSAPI, you may use this forum. All other questions about this version before you have access to it, please email them all to wwsredst@microsoft.com.
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Hello and welcome to the forum on Windows Web Services API!

Windows Web Services API forum provide you an opportunity to join a community of native C/C++ code developers who are wroking on connecting native code and web services. Here at the forum you can share knowledge, get questions answered, and learn from others similar to yours. Start by posting related questions to your topic of interest and leverage the knowledge available in your new forum community.

For more information please check out PDC 2008 talk on WWSAPI which you can find here, http://channel9.msdn.com/pdc2008/PC01/.

Thank you for your posts and we are looking forward to productive converstation on this forum.

Windows Web Services API team.

Visio General Questions and Answers for IT Professionals announcements

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Fred Diggs Sunday, October 18, 2009 6:20 PM

Welcome to the Visio 2010 Forum. This forum provides a place for you to discuss all topics related to Visio such as questions you may have about the product or tips & tricks you have learned and want to share with others.

Message Analyzer announcements

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Network Monitor announcements

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Feel free to post your questions concerning Network Monitor 3. Examples of topic areas are:

· Filtering

· Capturing

· Network Monitor API

· User interface

· NMCap (command-line capture tool)

· Writing parsers with NPL (Network Programming Language)

· Reassembly

· Conversations

Windows Desktop Perfmon and Diagnostic tools announcements

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Kukjin Lee Wednesday, July 15, 2009 4:45 PM

Please Mark Your Post "Answered" if it's Answered. Thanks.
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We have a new forum for Event Tracing for Windows (ETW), Windows Event Log, Software Tracing (WPP), and related technologies. Here you will find help for writing event providers, consuming events, and using event tools (such as logman, tracerpt, logman, and Get-WinEvent).

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/etw/threads

Database Design announcements

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Out of Scope

Some topics are out of scope for this forum.

1. Bugs, Product Decisions, and Feedback: The purpose of this forum is not to ask the product team why decisions were made and to ask them to make other changes. That feedback belongs in Connect. The purpose of this forum is to help you out with specific issues, if possible. Please post your feedback via Connect:

https://connect.microsoft.com/SQLServer

Rules of Conduct

· Relevance to Topics: We encourage you to keep your postings as close to the subject as possible.

· Respect: Please be respectful of other participants, and their contributions; avoiding insults, demeaning remarks and slurs.

· Tolerance: P lease don't assume someone's curtness was meant to insult, slur, or demean you.

· Confidentiality: Confidential information should not be posted. This is a publicly available forum.

· Appropriate Language: Please keep the conversation on a professional level, avoiding any hint of profanity in your interactions.

· Advertising/Solicitation: Advertisements should not be posted, and will be removed.

Forum Moderators may, at their discretion, edit posts for clarity, readability and inappropriate language; split post into separate threads when appropriate; and delete post that do not positively contribute to the thread. Failure to comply with these 'Rules of Conduct' may result in your posts being edited to remove the offending comments, censure, or expulsion from participating in the Forums. The bottom line is: this Forum should feel like a 'safe' place to ask hard questions that invoke passionate responses.

Marking Answers

By their very nature, many database design questions will not have a easily decernible 'answer'. You are encouraged to give folks 'credit' for helping you when appropriate. If someone's response was 'Helpful', use the 'Vote as Helpful' button. If a response answered some part of your question, or provided you one or more clues that led you to a solution, then use the 'Mark as Answer' option. Just as a thread may evolve into multiple questions, it may also have more than one 'Answer'.

Welcome to the Database Design Forum

This is a Forum for questions and discussions about database designs for Microsoft technologies, including: SQL Server, Access, SQL Azure, SQL Express, SQL Compact, etc. Often Database Designs will be generic and can be ported to any vendor's technology. Design problems that are best solved with other technologies will be welcomed and addressed to the best of our knowledge and ability.

We ask that you recognize that database design is a mixture of art and science . You may receive conflicting suggestions, for there can be multiple paths to a workable solution. You will have to use your own judgment and knowledge of your business requirements to determine the best solution for your particular problem. The 'right' design is compounded by many factors, including business, regulatory, hardware/software requirements, as well as staff expertise. We also encourage you to share your experiences with a particular design issue if it will serve to help others encountering similar problems.

In order to receive useful responses, please spend some time and properly present your scenario. Attempts to 'save time and effort' by cutting out parts of the scenario will often lead to wasted time and effort as the suggestions have to be discarded because they don't work with other parts of the unseen puzzle.

But there are limits to what you can expect from volunteers through a disconnected medium. The questions most likely to receive a good and targeted answer, are those that present a small problem, that give a very clear description of that problem within its context, and that are placed by people with a fair understanding of the subject who need help getting over a few nasty bumps. The questions that are almost impossible to answer satisfactorily are those that present a huge problem, with no clear description, and asked by someone totally new to the subject matter.

We hope that you will understand when we say that most of us that volunteer our time on this Forum do so in order to help folks learn. We will be pleased if you find the Forum to be useful. However, it is difficult or impossible for us to engage with folks privately. We don't have time to do both, and our commitment is help folks using the Forums.

Do not hesitate to read all of the threads, join in the discussions, offer your own experiences and information, and ask questions to increase your knowlege. Seek out blogs from those who write in a manner that you appreciate, and consider reviewing the Database Design Resources for additional guidance and help.

MSBuild announcements

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SQL Server Analysis Services announcements

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SQL Server Compact announcements

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ErikEJ Sunday, April 3, 2011 1:11 PM

This post on my blog should have links to all required information.

Data Mining announcements

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Raman Iyer Friday, April 29, 2011 7:37 PM

Microsoft BI Labs went live today featuring a look into the future of SQL Server Data Mining in the Cloud . The SQL Server Data Mining team presents a set of prototype web services in the cloud that mirror some of the great predictive analytics functionality available in the Table Analysis Tools for Excel add-in from the SQL Server 2008 Data Mining Add-ins for Office package. No installation required.

This blog post provides more details.

Explore these predictive services from your browser - on your own data - and give us your feedback!

SQL Server Express announcements

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Power Pivot announcements

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The PowerPivot team is pleased to report that the fix for the November CTP expiration issue has been released. We know many of you have been eagerly awaiting this fix since last week when the PowerPivot for Excel add-in expired. We do sincerely apologize for the inconvenience this may have caused you.

We have released a new version of the November CTP for the PowerPivot for Excel add-in. This new version is functionally identical to the old one except that it extends the expiration date to end of the year. You can download it from the same locations as in the past:
- http://powerpivot.com/download.aspx
- http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=48a5b47b-8c9c-450f-ab6e-178600a733ca
Please note that the new version will take some time to replicate across all servers in the Microsoft download center. If you download it from the above links and still get the expiration error message, then try again periodically. It might also help to clear any browser/download caches on your computer.
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If you are running the November 2009 CTP version of the PowerPivot for Excel 2010 add-in, your add-in expired on April 1st. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.

The SQL Server team will re-release the November 2009 CTP version of the PowerPivot for Excel 2010 add-in with an extended expiration date very soon. We will post an availability announcement with the download location and installation instructions on the PowerPivot blogs and forums as soon as possible.

Kathy MacDonald
SQL Server Analysis Services
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Summary

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If PowerPivot for Excel 2010, Excel 2010, SharePoint 2010, or the Reporting Services Addin for SharePoint 2010 are beta versions, PowerPivot and its related functionality will not work with the Released versions of these components.

More Information

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The beta versions of the components listed above are not compatible with the released versions of these components. If the beta versions of the components are installed, they will not function with the released versions. For example, if you have a beta version of the PowerPivot download installed and upgrade to the released version of Excel 2010, the PowerPivot addin will not be available in Excel.

The solution is to upgrade the beta components to their released versions when they become available.

SQL Server Master Data Services announcements

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Sherry_Li Thursday, September 3, 2015 8:21 PM

We are excited to share the new features which shipped in SQL CTP2.3 public release. You can download the product here:http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=48726, and Excel add-in here: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=47343

In this monthly release, we added a few highly asked features. Please give it try and look forward to hearing your feedback.

Manage Business Rules (MDS Add-in for Excel)

In the Master Data Services Add-in for Excel you can manage Business Rules, such as creating and editing business rules. Business rules are used to validate data. For more information, see Manage Business Rules (MDS Add-in for Excel).

Many-to-Many Relationships in Derived Hierarchies

You can now create a Derived Hierarchy that displays many-to-many relationships. A many-to-many relationship between two entities may be modeled through the use of a third entity that provides a mapping between them. The mapping entity is an entity that has two or more domain-based attributes referencing other entities.

For example, entity M has a domain-based attribute that references A and a domain-based attribute that references B. You can create a hierarchy from A to B using the mapping entity.

For more information, see Show Many-to-Many Relationships in Derived Hierarchies (Master Data Services)

Merge Conflicts

If you try to publish data that has been changed by another user, the publish will fail with a conflict error. To resolve this error, you can perform merge conflicts and republish the changes. For more information, see Merge Conflicts (Master Data Services) and Merge Conflicts (MDS Add-in for Excel).

SQL Master Data Services Team
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Sherry_Li Friday, July 31, 2015 5:02 PM

Please give it a try and let us know your feedback!

SQL Server 2016 Community Technology Preview 2.2 is publicly released and the latest bits can be found at http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/evaluate-sql-server-2016

In CTP2.2 MDS introduced following changes:

1. Custom Indexes

You can create a non-clustered index on one attribute (single index) or on a list of attributes (composite index), in an entity, to help improve the query performance. For more information, see Custom Index (Master Data Services).

2. Entity Sync Relationship

You can share entity data between different models by creating an entity sync relationship. For more information, see Entity Sync Relationship (Master Data Services).

3. Member Revision History

A member revision history is recorded when a member is changed. You can rollback a revision history, as well as view and annotate revisions. Using the Log Retention Days property, you can specify how long historical data is retained. For more information, see Member Revision History (Master Data Services).
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Sherry_Li Tuesday, January 13, 2015 9:46 PM

Hi, we are pleasured to announce the release of MDS Excel add-in. You can download it here:

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=42298

This release includes a number of performance improvements – most users will see a 4x improvement when loading data from an MDS server, without any additional server or environment changes. For an additional performance increase (2-4x), you can enable Dynamic Content Compression in IIS.

It works with both SQL12 or SQL14. The installation will be in place upgrade so the users don't need to uninstall previous installation. All the MDS connections will be preserved through the installation.

Please download the new version of Excel add-in. Your feedback is welcome!

Thanks,

SQL MDS Team
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edhickey Wednesday, June 23, 2010 8:39 PM
While reading a reply to your question, you will notice a button with an icon that says " Mark as Answer ." Please select this button when a reply answers your question.

There are several reasons to do this:
- Our search engine weights Answered questions more highly. By marking Answers you increase the chances that others searching this forum will find the answer directly rather than re-posting the question.
- You give credit to the hard working folks who answer your questions. This is peer to peer support, so recognition is our only reward. (Check out the Top Answerers in 30 Days chart at the bottom of the thread list to see who is currently answering questions.)
- You help Microsoft to track the health of this forum. Our forum gets 'measured' based on how many unanswered questions are in it at any time and we work hard to keep those numbers to as low a level as possible. By marking answers, others get a more accurate understanding of how well (or badly) things are going on the forum.
You can also vote "Yes" or "No" if the reply was helpful.

Thank you!

Ed Hickey

.NET Framework inside SQL Server announcements

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This forum covers questions regarding .NET assemblies and database objects running as part of SQL Server including user-defined types, user-defined aggregates, UDFs, triggers, and stored procedures implemented in .NET code. supported by SQL Server 2005 and later versions. Other questions regarding SQL Server database access and other related technologies should be directed to the most appropriate forum to obtain the best response.

Questions on SQL Server .NET Client (SqlClient) data access should be posted to the ADO.NET data provider forum: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/adodotnetdataproviders/threads

Questions on using SQL Server with ASP.NET should be posted to the ASP.NET forums: http://forums.asp.net/

Questions on writing Transact-SQL code, including T-SQL stored procedures, UDFs, and triggers: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/transactsql/threads

Questions on installation problems pertaining to .NET installations should be posted to the SQL Server Setup and Upgrade forum: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/sqlsetupandupgrade/threads

Questions on problems using SQL Server Data Tools: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/sqltools/threads

Questions on using other Data Access APIs (e.g. ODBC, OLE DB): http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/sqldataaccess/threads

Questions on writing code for SQL Server Compact Edition: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/sqlce/threads

Questions on SQL Server Express-specific issues: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/sqlexpress/threads

Questions that are off-topic in this forum may be moved to one of the other, more relevent, forums to ensure the best, most prompt response and facilitate forum-specific searchng for similar questions that have already been resolved.

SQL Server Notification Services announcements

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SQL Server Replication announcements

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Greg Y Thursday, December 18, 2008 5:10 AM

SQL Server 2005 SP3 is released, access it here.

Read about what's new for Replication here.

Many replication bugs were fixed in SP3, you can find your way through them here.

SQL Server Reporting Services, Power View announcements

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We have released a beta version of the Reporting Services Migration Tool. The tool is available for download at:

http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=29560

This tool essentially allows you to create a backup store of a native mode Report Server and then migrate that content to a SharePoint-integrated mode Report Server. Migrated content includes all report items (reports, shared data sources, models, shared datasets, report parts), along with associated metadata (shared schedules, subscriptions, history snapshots, etc.). Some additional details are in this blog post, along with the download link:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/jameswu/archive/2012/04/21/reporting-services-migration-tool.aspx

We are working on enabling more features in this tool, so feel free to share any feedback or report any issues. Thanks!
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Sean Boon Wednesday, April 22, 2009 4:45 AM

When posting questions in this forum, please include the version of SQL Server Reporting Services you are using. This will help us be more efficient in answering questions. If you are using the Report Viewer Control, it will helpful if you include the version of the control as well.

Thanks,
Sean
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SQL Server Migration announcements

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Need help with migration to SQL Server? Have any questions related to SQL Server Migration Assistant (SSMA) products for Oracle/Sybase/MySQL/Access? Feel free to discuss any SQL Server migration related topics or post any questions related to SSMA.

SQL Server Samples and Community Projects announcements

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Mr. Wharty Tuesday, October 2, 2012 4:49 AM
Welcome to the SQL Server Samples and Community Projects Forum.

This forum is the place to discuss all things "samplish" in the SQL Server community and samples space, whether it's an "official Microsoft sample" or a community project in CodePlex or Code Gallery. This is*not* the place to discussion specific nuances of T-SQL syntax or wage data modeling methodology wars: there are lots of other forums for those purposes. This one is for questions about samples, community projects and conversations between the collaborators that build them.

Some examples of projects that are open for discussion can be found here: http://www.codeplex.com/SqlServerSamples. It doesn't have to be listed there to be fair game, but it's a good bet that it is fair game if it's already listed there.

Below are a few guidelines to help you find your answer quickly and also to help the people who answer the questions, answer yours correctly.
- Is your question about SQL Server Samples and Community Projects . If it's not please locate the correct forum otherwise your question may be moved, closed/locked or deleted.
- Try searching the forum . Search the forum to see if your question has been asked before and answered. If you cannot find what you are looking for, please start a new thread rather than adding to an old one as some people do not see answered questions in their forum views so you may not get the assistance you're looking for.
- Don't be brief . The more information you can give in your question, the better the response will be.
- Check your alerts . You can subscribe to a question so that you can see any update on it (ReferSetting up your alerts below).
- No Spam. Spamming will have your thread deleted and may also result in your account being banned.
- Be polite. You will get better assistance if you're polite to other members so no flaming or trolling. If you persist with flaming or trolling, your accountmay get banned.
- Mark your question answered. If someone answers your question please mark their reply as the answer to your question. You can also mark multiple replies as answers if you think they answered your question. Marking replies not only assists others with similar questions, it also let's people know that you're grateful for their assistance.
Dead thread/Answer policy.

Where possible the moderators will allow sufficient time for the original poster to come back and mark the replies to their questions as answers. The amount of time is at the discretion of the individual moderator but is suggested that it will be declared dead after a week if the original poster does not respond . We will always try to be fair and mark suitable replies as answers.

Setting up your alerts

If you are having trouble receiving alerts on the threads you have created or replied to please see thisthread for troubleshooting advice.
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All of the work items for our community projects and product samples are in TFS on CodePlex. If you want to report a bug, suggest a change for an existing sample or suggest a new sample, create a work item in the appropriate project so that our community team (not just Microsoft employees) can vote on them, help us triage and prioritize them.

For example, here's the URL for the work items for AdventureWorks: http://www.codeplex.com/MSFTDBProdSamples/WorkItem/AdvancedList.aspx
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This forum is the place to discuss all things "samplish" in the SQL Server community and samples space, whether it's an "official Microsoft sample" or a community project in CodePlex or Code Gallery. This is *not* the place to discussion specific nuances of T-SQL syntax or wage data modeling methodology wars: there are lots of other forums for those purposes. This one is for questions about samples, community projects and conversations between the collaborators that build them.

Some examples of projects that are open for discussion can be found here: http://www.codeplex.com/SqlServerSamples/ It doesn't have to be listed there to be fair game, but it's a good bet that it is fair game if it's already listed there.

Also, please post your project announcements here when you create a new release or a whole new project. If you're looking for people to work on your project or looking for a project to work on, this would be a good place to do both.

Let us know what's missing, let know what could be better and let us know what we're doing right!

SQL Server Setup announcements

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C Standards, Extensions, and Interop announcements

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There are a couple new (and exciting!) extensions available in the Visual Studio gallery:
- PGO Plug-In. This tool improves the user experience for PGO in Visual Studio 2013 by providing a guided experience through the various phases of the PGO process. It also introduces the ability to perform PGO for Windows Store applications targeting x86 and x64 applications and more!
- PdbProject Extension.This extension will allow Visual Studio 2012 to open and convert pdb into a vcxproj. The converted project will load as a normal VC project and provide IDE features such as tag browsing, intelli-sense and object browsing.
While there, check out the many other extensions available for Visual Studio and be sure to leave your feedback!

Thanks!
-Eric (ebattali@microsoft.com)

Visual Studio General Questions announcements

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John Boylan Wednesday, December 19, 2012 7:07 PM

The following forums have been merged into this forum: Visual Studio WPF/SL Designer, Visual Studio Guidance Automation Toolkit, Developer Documentation and Help System, Visual Studio Report Controls, and Visual Studio Editor.

Visual Studio Diagnostics (Debugger, Profiler, IntelliTrace) announcements

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Testing with Visual Studio Test Manager (MTM) announcements

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Visual Studio 2010 Feature Pack 2 is now available to MSDN subscribers.
- Use Microsoft Test Manager to capture and playback action recordings for Silverlight 4 applications.
- Create coded UI tests for Silverlight 4 applications with Visual Studio 2010 Premium or Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate.
- Edit coded UI tests using a graphical editor with Visual Studio 2010 Premium or Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate.
- Use action recordings to fast forward through manual tests that need to support Mozilla Firefox 3.5 and 3.6.
- Run coded UI tests for web applications using Mozilla Firefox 3.5 and 3.6 with Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Premium or Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate.
For more details, see http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=192777

Visual Studio Setup and Installation announcements

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Visual Studio Integrate announcements

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Esther Fan Friday, September 24, 2010 8:07 PM

http://www.codeplex.com/site/search?query=t4&ac=8

CodePlex is Microsoft's open source project hosting web site. You can use CodePlex to create new projects to share with the world, join others who have already started their own projects, or use the applications on this site and provide feedback.
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Esther Fan Friday, September 24, 2010 7:38 PM
- This Forum - about VSX, MEF, EnvDTE, Text Templates (T4) and other non-modeling extensibility
- For questions about T4 Toolbox, please use http://t4toolbox.codeplex.com/discussions
- Visualization and Modeling Forum - for Visual Studio Ultimate architecture tools - UML, DGML, Architecture Explorer, Layer diagrams
- Visualization and Modeling Extensibility Forum - for domain-specific languages (DSLs) and extending the modeling tools
- Microsoft Connect Visual Studio - for bug reports and suggestions
- The Community Content block at the bottom of any MSDN Library page to add your own tips, corrections or feedback about the content

ClickOnce and Setup announcements

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The InstallShield 2010 Limited Edition is a free version of InstallShield for Visual Studio developers that replaces the functionality provided by the Visual Studio setup and deployment projects.

Here are some highlights of the product:

• Use Visual Studio to create installation projects for applications built with Visual Studio.

• Build your installation projects with MSBuild

• Jumpstart projects with a simple design environment and Project Assistant.

• Take advantage of Installation Prerequisites and Custom Actions.

• Digitally sign your installers.

Need a feature that is not supported in the Visual Studio deployment projects? Try the InstallShield Limited Edition. You can easily migrate your existing Visual Studio deployment projects into InstallShield Limited Edition installation projects with a few clicks. The installation projects created with the InstallShield Limited Edition are compatible with other versions of InstallShield products. This enables you to upgrade to higher version of InstallShield with a more advanced feature set.

To obtain the InstallShield 2010 Limited Edition, complete the following steps:

1. On the File menu, point to New, and then click Project.

2. Expand the Other Project Types node.

3. Expand the Setup and Deployment node.

4. Click InstallShield LE.

5. Click Enable InstallShield Limited Edition, and then click OK.

6. Click Go to InstallShield.

Note: You must register by using your email address before downloading the product.

Register and Manage Account announcements

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Starting today, no Windows Phone 8.0 device will be able to be developer unlocked. You have three options to continue testing Windows Phone 8.0 packages:

-        - updating the phone to Windows Phone 8.1 and unlocking it for developer testing

-        - submitting the apps as beta through the Windows Dev Center and testing in Windows Phone 8.0 devices, or

-        - testing your Windows Phone 8.0 apps via the Windows Phone emulator.

Any Windows Phone 8.0 device currently unlocked will continue to be unlocked and work as a test device until its certificate expires.

Note that this change has no impact on apps available in the Windows Phone Store, nor will it impact customers with Windows Phone 8.0 devices.

Windows Store team
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Over the last month, we've brought the Windows Store and the Windows Phone Store together into a single marketing and operations team to deliver a better experience for developers, end users and partners. Our focus remains to improve the way we help you reach new users and better monetize your apps, all while reducing friction and cost. Today we are making a set of changes that will simplify doing business with us.

I'm pleased to announce a unified registration experience for both Windows Store and Windows Phone developers, available at a lower cost. As a result of these changes, Windows Store developers are now also Windows Phone developers, and Windows Phone developers are also Windows Store developers. Welcome all!

Here's what you can expect:
- Registered Windows Store developers can now submit apps to the Windows Phone Store, using the same Microsoft account.
- Registered Windows Phone developers can now submit apps to the Windows Store at no additional cost, using the same Microsoft account.
- New developers can register and existing developers can renew their account using the same Microsoft account. Developers will enter registration information just once and pay a single lower price of $19 for an Individual and $99 for a Company account, providing access to publish
  apps for both Windows and Windows Phone users.
- Developers already registered with both Windows Store and Windows Phone using the same Microsoft account will receive a code via email this month, valid for a free one-year
  renewal when their existing registration is up for renewal.
- Students continue to be supported through the DreamSpark program.
You will continue to use the separate Windows Store and Windows Phone Dev Center Dashboards to submit and manage your apps. You can expect some differences in the steps you take to renew your account. The most notable for some of our Windows Phone developers is the addition of a credit card to validate all new account and renewals. You can read more about today's changes on the Windows and Windows Phone Dev Centers.

Publish your app for both Windows Store and Windows Phone and earn prizes

With the holiday selling season approaching, this is an ideal time to tune-up and publish your apps for both Windows and Windows Phone to help increase your downloads and revenue. Last year holiday sales of paid apps grew 40% over baseline, and we expect an even more robust Holiday 2013 due to an even larger base of Windows and Windows Phone users with more ways to pay for apps.

As an added incentive, we've partnered with Nokia via the DVLUP community to give you an easy way to learn more and complete challenges as you develop for both the Windows Store and Windows Phone. Along the way, you'll earn points that can then be redeemed for great prizes (for example, Nokia Lumia phones and more). DVLUP is currently open to developers in more than 20 countries. To participate, register for the DVLUP program and take advantage of the two new challenges available today:

Publish a new app for Windows Phone 8, or port an existing Windows Store app
or
Bring your Windows Phone app to Windows 8.1

I'm hopeful that the steps we've taken will encourage you to publish your apps for both Windows and Windows Phone users around the world. I'll share more in the weeks ahead, so stay tuned.

Quoted from Todd Brix on the 'Windows Phone Developer Blog'( http://blogs.windows.com/windows_phone/b/wpdev/archive/2013/11/06/unifying-developer-registration-windows-and-windows-phone.aspx)

Submitting and Publishing Apps announcements

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The price tier value updates for Windows Store are now complete. We recommend that you review the updated prices for your paid apps and in-app products. You can make any desired price changes in Dev Center.

For additional information on pricing:
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The price tier value updates for Windows Store are underway and all paid items will be updated over the course of this week. The initial maintenance was shorter than expected and app ingestion is operational again.

You can see the updated prices reflected in Windows Phone Dev Center now. We will confirm when updated prices are also available in Windows Dev Center.

For additional information on pricing:

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Further to the email sent to all developers on March 20, 2015, a reminder that next Monday (April 13) the 96 Windows Store price tiers will be updated with new values. These price tier values are updated periodically to maintain consistency across currencies, accounting for changes in foreign exchange rates, taxes, and other geographic pricing considerations. With this update, the US Dollar (USD) price in each tier will remain the same, with the prices in all other currencies adjusted relative to the USD price.

Here is an example of a price update for a paid app published in the United States and China:

Before update

After update

Product Price in US Dollars (USD)	Equivalent Product Price in Chinese Yuan (CNY)		Product Price in US Dollars (USD)	Equivalent Product Price in Chinese Yuan (CNY)
2.99 USD	18 CNY		2.99 USD	18.50 CNY

The price tier value changes will take place automatically, there is no action required on your part. After April 13, the price tier values will be updated in Dev Center, and all paid items in the Store will be updated over the course of the week. We recommend that you review the updated prices for your paid apps and in-app products in Dev Center after April 13 and make any desired changes.

To support the updates on April 13, app ingestion will be stopped from approximately 11AM to 3PM Pacific Time. During this time newly published apps and apps updates will be queued. App ingestion will resume immediately following this maintenance window.

For additional information on pricing:

Link

Jo T Smith Friday, February 1, 2013 6:20 PM

Hello all,

You can now display a badge to let your customers know that your Windows Phone app is available in the Windows Phone Store!

Use this link to get all the details and download the Windows Phone Store badge .

The Windows Phone Store badge is intended to provide a clear way to communicate the availability of your app on the Windows Phone Store. The badge can be used in your print or digital media, and is made available in a number of colors, sizes, and digital formats. The following shows some examples of the badge.

.NET Framework Class Libraries announcements

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ASP.NET Questions are off-topic in .NET Base class library, and will be moved to the Off-Topic forum when posted. Please ask questions relating to ASP.NET at the ASP.NET Forums.

Windows Communication Foundation, Serialization, and Networking announcements

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This "Windows Communication Foundation, Serialization and Networking" Forum will be migrated to a new home onMicrosoft Q&A!

We've listened to your feedback on how we can enhance the forum experience.Microsoft Q&Aallows us to add new functionality and enables easier access to all the technical resources most useful to you, like Microsoft Docs and Microsoft Learn.

Now until Aug 17, 2020:
- You can post any new questions onMicrosoft Q&A or here.
From Aug 17, 2020 until Aug 31, 2020:
- New posts - We invite you to post new questions in the "Windows Communication Foundation, Serialization and Networking" forum's new home onMicrosoft Q&A. The current forum will not allow any new questions.
Existing posts - Interact here with existing content, answer questions, provide comments, etc.

Aug 31, 2020 onward:
- This forum will be closed to all new and existing posts and all interactions will be onMicrosoft Q&A.
We are excited about moving toMicrosoft Q&A and seeing you there.

Learn More

Visual C# announcements

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This forum is for C# related question. GUI questions become very unclear if its a WPF or Winforms or ASP.Net related question.

Please post any GUI related questions to the target forum:

Windows Forms General
Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF)
ASP.Net forums

depending on what you are working on.

The C# forum is for C# related questions on the language constructs and not indirect component usage. THX

Visual Basic announcements

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ADO.NET Managed Providers announcements

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We view your organization as a key stakeholder in the process that we have to identify areas for future investments for SQL Connectivity components that address major development platforms, including ODBC, ADO.NET, JDBC and PHP. The feedback you provide is valuable and each response will be read and will be treated with utmost confidence. The survey can be found in the link below and will be available until 9th September, 2011 5:00 PM PST. http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/WEB22CS45XT9FE/.

Thanks

Raghu Ram

SQL Connectivity Group Program Manager

ADO.NET DataSet announcements

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LINQ to SQL announcements

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Welcome to the forum for discussing LINQ to SQL. A few suggestions:
- Make the subject line specific - "I'm stuck", "HELP" or "This query doesn't work" could easily mean somebody with the answer skipped it.
- Be polite when asking and responding to questions - we're all here to try and help each other
- When you have an answer please remember to mark it as such so people can filter down on who's still stuck and find answers to their problems

FSLogix announcements

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Office XML, ODF, and Binary File Formats announcements

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A number of people have inquired about the .pst file format on this forum in the past, and at that time we stated we would provide an update if the .pst file format specification becomes available. This week we announced our documentation plan for the .pst file format specification on the Interoperability @ Microsoft blog ,. If you are interested in actively participating in the review of preliminary drafts of the .pst file format specification, send an email message to pstinfo@microsoft.com and then we will contact you when a preliminary draft of the specification is ready for broader review. If you only are seeking the final version, we anticipate releasing the .pst file format specification in the first half of 2010 under our Open Specification Promise .

Exchange Server Protocols announcements

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The September 2015 release contains updates made to the Microsoft Exchange Server Protocols and Standards documents in relation to the release of Exchange Server 2016.

Exchange Server Protocol Documents links
- Landing Page: Exchange Server Protocols
- Full documentation set (ZIP) – Microsoft Exchange Server Protocols Documentation
Exchange Server and Outlook Standards links
- Landing Page: Exchange Server and Outlook Standards Support
- Full documentation set (ZIP) – Microsoft Exchange Server and Outlook Standards Documentation
The following new specifications have been added:
- [MS-OXWSOLPS]: Online Personal Search Web Service Protocol
  Note that for the Exchange Server 2016 Preview release, this document was published as "[MS-OLPS]: Online Personal Search Protocol." The title and short name published with the current release are final and should be used exclusively to refer to this document from now on.
The following protocols have been archived:
- None.
The following known issues exist in this release:
- None.
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The Microsoft Exchange RPC Extractor (RPX) is a command-line tool that can parse network captures and interpret remote procedure calls made from a client to Microsoft Exchange . RPX uses the information provided in the Microsoft Exchange protocol documentation to parse RPCs, remote operations (ROPs), and the parameters for each ROP.

Download is available at the Microsoft Download Center found here.
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Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 Protocol Documentation

The Microsoft Exchange Server protocols documentation provides detailed technical specifications for Microsoft proprietary protocols (including extensions to industry-standard or other published protocols) used by Microsoft Exchange Server to communicate with other Microsoft products.

Click here to go to the download page for the Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 protocol documentation PDF files.

Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 Standards Documentation

The Exchange Server Standards Documents describe Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 support for industry messaging standards and Requests for Comments (RFCs) related to iCalendar, IMAP4, and POP3.

Click here to go to the download page for the Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 Standards Documentation PDF files.

Windows File Sharing Protocols announcements

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This release contains updated Overview Documents in the Open Specifications library on MSDN. These documents were updated on November 5, 2018 for Windows Server and Windows 10 operating systems to reflect content updates. To see details, click the Diff link on the landing pages to view the changes associated with each document.

Technical changes have been made in the following overview:

* [MS-RDSOD]: Remote Desktop Services Protocols

The following overviews have been updated to reflect the latest products.

* [MS-ADFSOD]: Active Directory Federated Services Protocols

* [MS-ADOD]: Active Directory Protocols

* [MS-AUTHSOD]: Authentication Services Protocols

* [MS-AZOD]: Authorization Protocols

* [MS-CCROD]: Content Caching and Retrieval Protocols

* [MS-CERSOD]: Certificate Services Protocols

* [MS-DOCO]: Windows Protocols Documentation Roadmap

* [MS-FASOD]: File Access Services Protocols

* [MS-FSMOD]: File Services Management Protocols

* [MS-GPOD]: Group Policy Protocols

* [MS-MQOD]: Message Queuing Protocols

* [MS-MSSOD]: Media Streaming Services Protocols

* [MS-PRSOD]: Print Services Protocol

* [MS-RMSOD]: Rights Management Services Protocols

* [MS-STOROD]: Storage Services Protocols

* [MS-TPSOD]: Transaction Processing Services Protocols

* [MS-VSOD]: Virtual Storage Protocols

* [MS-WMOD]: Windows Management Protocols

* [MS-WPO]: Windows Protocols Overview

* [MS-WSUSOD]: Windows Server Update

The RSS functionality found on the first page of each document on MSDN is supported by Internet Explorer. You can also install an RSS Reader application to get notifications.

;
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The September 2018 release contains updated Windows protocol documents for the MSDN release on Open Specifications.

The following documents are new to Windows Protocols:

· [MS-RDPECAM]: Remote Desktop Protocol: Video Capture Virtual Channel Extension

· [MS-RDPEUDP2]: Remote Desktop Protocol: UDP Transport Extension Version 2

The following documents have been updated with new product content for this release:
- [MS-ADFSPIP]: Active Directory Federation Services and Proxy Integration Protocol
- [MS-ADTS]: Active Directory Technical Specification
- [MS-CDP]: Connected Devices Platform Protocol Version 3
- [MS-CMRP]: Failover Cluster: Management API (ClusAPI) Protocol
- [MS-CSRA]: Certificate Services Remote Administration Protocol
- [MS-FASP]: Firewall and Advanced Security Protocol
- [MS-GPFAS]: Group Policy: Firewall and Advanced Security Data Structure
- [MS-HGSA]: Host Guardian Service: Attestation Protocol
- [MS-MDE2]: Mobile Device Enrollment Protocol Version 2
- [MS-MICE]: Miracast over Infrastructure Connection Establishment Protocol
- [MS-NCNBI]: Network Controller Northbound Interface
- [MS-OAPX]: OAuth 2.0 Protocol Extensions
- [MS-OIDCE]: OpenID Connect 1.0 Protocol Extensions
- [MS-RDPBCGR]: Remote Desktop Protocol: Basic Connectivity and Graphics Remoting
- [MS-RDPEGFX]: Remote Desktop Protocol: Graphics Pipeline Extension
- [MS-RDPERP]: Remote Desktop Protocol: Remote Programs Virtual Channel Extension
- [MS-RDPEUDP]: Remote Desktop Protocol: UDP Transport Extension
The following documents contain technical updates for this release.

· [MS-CIFS]: Common Internet File System (CIFS) Protocol

· [MS-SMB2]:Server Message Block (SMB) Protocol Versions 2 and 3

· [MS-TDS]: Windows Client Certificate Enrollment Protocol

The following document contains protocols removed from Windows products.

· [MS-BDSRR]: Business Document Scanning: Scan Repository Capabilities and Status Retrieval Protocol

The RSS functionality found on the first page of each document on MSDN is supported by Internet Explorer. You can also install an RSS Reader application to get notifications.

Note that previous versions of protocol documents are available in PDF and DOCX format. Due to production processes, the release date for older documents might not exactly match the date in the document's footer.

Office Protocols announcements

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SharePoint Server Protocols announcements

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The August 24, 2015 release contains updates made to the Microsoft Office Protocols documents to include support for Office Desktop Client 2016 Preview, SharePoint 2016 Preview, and Windows 10.

SharePoint Products and Technologies Protocols Preview PDFs
- Landing Page: SharePoint Products and Technologies Protocols
Microsoft Office File Formats Preview PDFs
- Landing Page: Office File Formats
Microsoft Office Protocols Preview PDFs
- Landing Page: Office Protocols
The following new specifications have been added:
- None.
The following protocols have been archived:
- None.
The following known issues exist in this release:
- None.

Open Specifications Questions announcements

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Windows Protocols Overview Documents (ODs) support the technical specifications by illustrating how Windows protocols that are functionally related work together, with practical examples for implementers that demonstrate common usage scenarios.

The 6 ODs listed below were updated and published on DMC - docs.microsoft.com.

[MS-ADOD]: Active Directory Protocols Overview

[MS-CERSOD]: Certificate Services Protocols Overview

[MS-DOCO]: Windows Protocols Documentation Roadmap

[MS-FASOD]: File Access Services Protocols Overview

[MS-NETOD]: Microsoft .NET Framework Protocols Overview

[MS-RDSOD]: Remote Desktop Services Protocols Overview

This release also includes updated, annotated network captures - open sourced on GitHub – for MS-ADOD and MS-FASOD (in both WireShark and Microsoft Message Analyzer formats), and MS-CERSOD and MS-RDSOD (in Microsoft Message Analyzer format).
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This release contains updates made to protocol documents since the last release.

The following known issues exist in the June 2017 release:
- Underscore characters are not always visible in code in the PDF files, depending on the magnification selected by the user. Those characters are present in printed versions of the PDF.
- Information in a table row may split across two pages.
- Table borders are not always visible, depending upon the magnification selected by the user. Borders are present in printed versions of the PDF.
- Cross-protocol links are functional only when the PDF files for all the cross-referenced protocols are in the same folder.
Note: Links in the PDFs do not resolve in Adobe Reader 9 because Adobe has changed the default setting for view mode in Adobe Reader 9. To access such links, perform the following procedure:
- In Adobe Reader 9, go to the Edit menu and click Preferences.
- In the Categories list, click Documents.
- Under PDF/A View Mode, change the selection from Only for PDF/A documents to Never, and click OK.
Additional details on changing the setting are located on the Adobe help site: http://help.adobe.com/en_US/Acrobat/9.0/Standard/WS3E0E8467-B787-4020-A1D3-6BC762A42DF2.w.html
Link
Link

Windows Protocols announcements

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This release contains updated Overview Documents in the Open Specifications library on MSDN. These documents were updated on November 5, 2018 for Windows Server and Windows 10 operating systems to reflect content updates. To see details, click the Diff link on the landing pages to view the changes associated with each document.

Technical changes have been made in the following overview:

* [MS-RDSOD]: Remote Desktop Services Protocols

The following overviews have been updated to reflect the latest products.

* [MS-ADFSOD]: Active Directory Federated Services Protocols

* [MS-ADOD]: Active Directory Protocols

* [MS-AUTHSOD]: Authentication Services Protocols

* [MS-AZOD]: Authorization Protocols

* [MS-CCROD]: Content Caching and Retrieval Protocols

* [MS-CERSOD]: Certificate Services Protocols

* [MS-DOCO]: Windows Protocols Documentation Roadmap

* [MS-FASOD]: File Access Services Protocols

* [MS-FSMOD]: File Services Management Protocols

* [MS-GPOD]: Group Policy Protocols

* [MS-MQOD]: Message Queuing Protocols

* [MS-MSSOD]: Media Streaming Services Protocols

* [MS-PRSOD]: Print Services Protocol

* [MS-RMSOD]: Rights Management Services Protocols

* [MS-STOROD]: Storage Services Protocols

* [MS-TPSOD]: Transaction Processing Services Protocols

* [MS-VSOD]: Virtual Storage Protocols

* [MS-WMOD]: Windows Management Protocols

* [MS-WPO]: Windows Protocols Overview

* [MS-WSUSOD]: Windows Server Update

The RSS functionality found on the first page of each document on MSDN is supported by Internet Explorer. You can also install an RSS Reader application to get notifications.
Link
The September 2018 release contains updated Windows protocol documents for the MSDN release on Open Specifications.

The following documents are new to Windows Protocols:

· [MS-RDPECAM]: Remote Desktop Protocol: Video Capture Virtual Channel Extension

· [MS-RDPEUDP2]: Remote Desktop Protocol: UDP Transport Extension Version 2

The following documents have been updated with new product content for this release:
- [MS-ADFSPIP]: Active Directory Federation Services and Proxy Integration Protocol
- [MS-ADTS]: Active Directory Technical Specification
- [MS-CDP]: Connected Devices Platform Protocol Version 3
- [MS-CMRP]: Failover Cluster: Management API (ClusAPI) Protocol
- [MS-CSRA]: Certificate Services Remote Administration Protocol
- [MS-FASP]: Firewall and Advanced Security Protocol
- [MS-GPFAS]: Group Policy: Firewall and Advanced Security Data Structure
- [MS-HGSA]: Host Guardian Service: Attestation Protocol
- [MS-MDE2]: Mobile Device Enrollment Protocol Version 2
- [MS-MICE]: Miracast over Infrastructure Connection Establishment Protocol
- [MS-NCNBI]: Network Controller Northbound Interface
- [MS-OAPX]: OAuth 2.0 Protocol Extensions
- [MS-OIDCE]: OpenID Connect 1.0 Protocol Extensions
- [MS-RDPBCGR]: Remote Desktop Protocol: Basic Connectivity and Graphics Remoting
- [MS-RDPEGFX]: Remote Desktop Protocol: Graphics Pipeline Extension
- [MS-RDPERP]: Remote Desktop Protocol: Remote Programs Virtual Channel Extension
- [MS-RDPEUDP]: Remote Desktop Protocol: UDP Transport Extension
The following documents contain technical updates for this release.

· [MS-CIFS]: Common Internet File System (CIFS) Protocol

· [MS-SMB2]:Server Message Block (SMB) Protocol Versions 2 and 3

· [MS-TDS]: Windows Client Certificate Enrollment Protocol

The following document contains protocols removed from Windows products.

· [MS-BDSRR]: Business Document Scanning: Scan Repository Capabilities and Status Retrieval Protocol

The RSS functionality found on the first page of each document on MSDN is supported by Internet Explorer. You can also install an RSS Reader application to get notifications.

Note that previous versions of protocol documents are available in PDF and DOCX format. Due to production processes, the release date for older documents might not exactly match the date in the document's footer.

Bing Maps Web Controls announcements

Link

IoTGirl Wednesday, October 14, 2020 11:35 PM

Hello folks!

MSDN Forums are shutting down and we wanted to let you know you can still get assistance but at our newer offering Answers.Microsoft.com. We are easy to find there! Select "Bing" on the main page then "maps" in the Bing page dropdown.

See you there!

Bing Maps

Bing Maps REST, SOAP, Spatial Data Services announcements

Link

IoTGirl Wednesday, October 14, 2020 11:34 PM

Hello folks!

MSDN Forums are shutting down and we wanted to let you know you can still get assistance but at our newer offering Answers.Microsoft.com. We are easy to find there! Select "Bing" on the main page then "maps" in the Bing page dropdown.

See you there!

Bing Maps

Bing Maps WPF, WP7/8/8.1, Silverlight announcements

Link

IoTGirl Wednesday, October 14, 2020 11:42 PM

Hello folks!

MSDN Forums are shutting down and we wanted to let you know you can still get assistance but at our newer offering Microsoft Q&A. Windows and Visual Studio development support are easy to find there right on the main page! Select "Windows" or "Visual Studio" on the main page then follow the options to the support you need.

See you there!

Microsoft Maps

Bing Maps for Windows UWP apps announcements

Link

IoTGirl Wednesday, October 14, 2020 11:41 PM

Hello folks!

MSDN Forums are shutting down and we wanted to let you know you can still get assistance but at our newer offering Microsoft Q&A. Windows and Visual Studio development support are easy to find there right on the main page! Select "Windows" or "Visual Studio" on the main page then follow the options to the support you need.

See you there!

Microsoft Maps

Bing Maps General announcements

Link

IoTGirl Wednesday, October 14, 2020 11:32 PM

Hello folks!

MSDN Forums are shutting down and we wanted to let you know you can still get assistance but at our newer offering Answers.Microsoft.com. We are easy to find there! Select "Bing" on the main page then "maps" in the Bing page dropdown.

See you there!

Bing Maps

Windows Hardware Testing and Certification announcements

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Windows Hardware Certification partners can now get news, info, and updates on the new Windows Certification blog. Partners can also post comments and join in conversations with the Certification team and other community members. The blog will replace the certification newsletter. Subscribe today!
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The purpose of this forum is to help those who have questions with the Windows testing and certification processes used with the Hardware Certification Kit (HCK). Please post questions here about the tools, processes and tests used in testing, packaging, and certifying drivers.

Windows Embedded 8.1 Industry announcements

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Dave Massy Wednesday, June 26, 2013 5:37 PM

We are pleased to announce the availability of Windows Embedded 8.1 Industry Pro Release Preview

You can download and file bugs at http://connect.microsoft.com/windowsembeddedTAP/program8171

Please use this forum to discuss the preview release.

Your feedback is really important and useful to us. Thank you for participating.

Please note that for feedback on other versions of the Windows 8.1 Release Preview we recommend visiting theWindows 8.1 Preview forum

Standard 7: Embedded Enabling Features (EEFs) announcements

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Windows Embedded Compact Native Application Development announcements

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Welcome almighty native CE developers!

This new forum is dedicated to all topics related to native applications development on Windows Embedded Compact, Windows Embedded CE and Windows CE, whether you are using the latest Visual Studio 2008 or the older eVC++, this forum is all yours! If you are coming from Newsgroup, I really think you will love the forums format.

You might have noticed that 2 other forums just opened at the same time, one for CE managed applications development and another one for CE platform development, so if your question is more related to building a CE OS or a driver, go here, and if your question is about managed application development on CE, go here.

I look forward to read your first questions and to see our community jumping in.

-Olivier

Windows Embedded Compact Managed Application Development announcements

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Welcome to this new forum.

Here you will be given the opportunity to interact with a great community of developers and discuss about Managed development for devices running Windows Embedded Compact, Windows Embedded CE, Windows CE operating systems.

While the forum is new, the technologies discussed here can be as diverse as the latest and greatest version of the .Net Compact Framework, running on the latest version of Windows CE (a.k.a. Windows Embedded Compact 7) or older version of the .Net Compact framework that you might stil be using daily.

You might have noticed that 2 other forums just opened at the same time, one for CE native applications development and another one for CE platform development, so if your question is more related to building a CE OS or a driver, go here, and if your question is about native application development on CE, go here.

I am sure you will bookmark this place really rapidly.

-Olivier

Workflow Manager 1.0 announcements

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Welcome to the discussion forum for the Workflow Manager 1.0 Beta release (also referred to as Windows Azure Workflow). Workflow Manager provides hosting and management capabilities on top of the Windows Workflow Foundation. It also powers workflows in SharePoint 2013 and the next version of Office 365. You can install the Workflow Manager from the Web Platform Installer. Documentation and samples can be found on MSDN here. We look forward to your questions and feedback.

General Office Development announcements

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Many folks have been asking about the emerging "apps for Office" model, and what it means for the future of VSTO & VBA. Rest assured that VSTO & VBA continue to be alive and well. In fact, many existing automation scenarios continue to be best served by VSTO & VBA for now. At the same time, there are many exciting opportunities to look forward in apps for Office: for example, the ability to better integrate with web content and JavaScript/CSS libraries, support for host applications beyond the desktop versions of Office, and new distribution and monetization opportunities through the Office Store.

To learn more, please see the blog post: "Roadmap for Apps for Office, VSTO, and VBA".

-- Michael Zlatkovsky (MSFT)

Visual Studio Tools for Office (VSTO) announcements

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Many folks have been asking about the emerging "apps for Office" model, and what it means for the future of VSTO. Rest assured that VSTO continues to be alive and well. In fact, many existing automation scenarios continue to be best served by VSTO for now. At the same time, there are many exciting opportunities to look forward in apps for Office: for example, the ability to better integrate with web content and JavaScript/CSS libraries, support for additional programming languages and platforms, support for host applications beyond the desktop versions of Office, and new distribution, lifecycle management, and monetization opportunities through the Office Store.

To learn more, please see the blog post: "Roadmap for Apps for Office, VSTO, and VBA".
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The newest version of Visual Studio - 2015 - is now available.

The Community edition of Visual Studio also supports "Office Tools", including VSTO and "Apps for Office" templates. Both can be downloaded at
https://www.visualstudio.com/features/office-tools-vs

What was new in VS 2013 for Office:

For VSTO developers in particular, new in this release is the ability to code-sign VSTO solutions with SHA-256 certificates . The latest release also supports Office 2013 right-out-of-the-box without requiring a separate download, and the Office 2013 templates can now target the latest .NET Framework 4.5.1 .

Visual Studio 2013 also delivers a broad set of tooling for the new apps for Office and apps for SharePoint. Some highlights include the ability to create MVC SharePoint apps, enhancements around app-publishing, and a new set of tooling around Cloud Business Apps that integrate seamlessly with Office 365 services. Learn more on the apps for Office and SharePoint blog.

Tip:
Just like Visual Studio 2012, Visual Studio 2013 continues to support the Office 2010 templates. However, to reduce clutter, we have re-categorized the project templates according to the .NET Framework version that they support. So, if you're looking for the Office 2010 templates, be sure to adjust the ".NET Framework" dropdown to ".NET Framework 4.0".

We hope you enjoy Visual Studio 2013 and the many great features that this IDE has to offer!

~ Michael Zlatkovsky | Program Manager, Visual Studio Tools for Office & Apps for Office
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I know the documentation for Office 2013 is still somewhat limited, but hopefully the following link will help.

Microsoft Office Document: [MS-CustomUI2] Supporting Documentation - http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=727

From here, you should be able to download the *.txt files for Word, Excel and PowerPoint, plus the imageMso information. Once a file is downloaded, it can be opened in Excel to make it easier to look through all the controls.

Best Regards,
Nathan O.
Microsoft Online Community Support

Windows Embedded Compact Platform Development announcements

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Welcome brave CE platform developers.

You are developing a Windows Embedded Compact image, a Windows Embedded CE BSP, a Windows CE driver? then you are at the right place.

This forum will host discussions about using Platform Builder to build Windows CE images, drivers, BSPs. You might have been rerouted here from NewsGroups, and I am sure you will love the format of forums.

You might have noticed that 2 other forums just opened at the same time, one for CE native applications development and another one for CE managed applications development, so if your question is more related to developing a native application for CE, go here, and if your question is about managed application development on CE, go here.

I am sure you will bookmark this place really rapidly.

-Olivier

Windows Hardware WDK and Driver Development announcements

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Jenstepper Saturday, November 20, 2010 12:41 AM

The purpose of this forum is to helpdriver, device and kernel developers who have questions about the Windows WDK and about driver and kernel development. Please post questions here about the tools, samples, headers and libraries and documents in the Windows WDK.

Open XML Format SDK announcements

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The download page for the Open XML SDK 2.5 for Microsoft Office is now providing the RTW version of Open XML SDK 2.5. You can use this version for production. We are now updating the documentation in MSDN. Until the publication of the updated documentation, please refer to the SDK document in Productivity Tool.

The differences between the CTP and the RTW versions exist in the classes of "Office15", and those are renamed to "Office2013". Also we are preparing a set of sample code demonstrating how the classes can be used.

Regards,

Kazunori Matsuura
Open XML SDK 2.5

Exchange Server Development announcements

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Tracy Myles Wednesday, October 14, 2020 6:16 PM

Hello,

Non-developer Exchange has transitioned to Microsoft Q&A for support, please visit the "Office on Q&A" site within Microsoft Q&A to post all non-developer questions regarding Exchange.

All Exchange developer questions can continue to be asked in this MSDN forum.

Outlook for Developers announcements

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Many folks have been asking about the emerging "apps for Office" model, and what it means for the future of VSTO. Rest assured that VSTO continues to be alive and well. In fact, many existing automation scenarios continue to be best served by VSTO for now. At the same time, there are many exciting opportunities to look forward in apps for Office: for example, the ability to better integrate with web content and JavaScript/CSS libraries, support for additional programming languages and platforms, support for host applications beyond the desktop versions of Office, and new distribution, lifecycle management, and monetization opportunities through the Office Store.

To learn more, please see the blog post: "Roadmap for Apps for Office, VSTO, and VBA".
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Word for Developers announcements

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Many folks have been asking about the emerging "apps for Office" model, and what it means for the future of VBA. Rest assured that VBA continues to be alive and well. In fact, many existing automation scenarios continue to be best served by VSTO & VBA for now. At the same time, there are many exciting opportunities to look forward in apps for Office: for example, the ability to better integrate with web content and JavaScript/CSS libraries, support for host applications beyond the desktop versions of Office, and new distribution and monetization opportunities through the Office Store.

To learn more, please see the blog post: "Roadmap for Apps for Office, VSTO, and VBA".

-- Michael Zlatkovsky (MSFT)
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I know the documentation for Office 2013 is still somewhat limited, but hopefully the following link will help.

Microsoft Office Document: [MS-CustomUI2] Supporting Documentation - http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=727

From here, you should be able to download the *.txt files for Word, Excel and PowerPoint, plus the imageMso information. Once a file is downloaded, it can be opened in Excel to make it easier to look through all the controls.

Best Regards,
Nathan O.
Microsoft Online Community Support

Azure SQL Database announcements

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While it has been 3+ years since we last announced an update to SQL Data Sync service, we have been continuously deploying updates to the backend service to address top customer issues. We are listening to your feedback, and today we are happy to announce the latest update which includes both service changes and a new SQL Data Sync agent install. This update includes two main enhancements:
1. Support for synchronizing tables that have column collations:
2. Improvements to performance and resilience:
The new version of SQL Data Sync agent in the download center. Please follow the step-by-step instructions here to install a new Data Sync agent. If you have an existing agent, you can refer to this MSDN article for detailed upgrade procedures. A previous version of Data Sync agent will continue to work until it expires on 8/18/2015.
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Suggestions and Feedback for the Forums announcements

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What is the purpose of this forum?

The purpose of this forum is to give users a voice on Forums. Users can give suggestions for improvements or vote up suggestions and know that the Forums team is listening. If you have a specific question regarding Forums please post questions to Forums Redesign – Q&A / Discussions. If you are encountering a Forums bug please post this in the Forums Issues forum.

Best Practices
- Only post suggestions
- Only post one suggestion per thread, this will provide clarity to the suggestion and allow users to know what they are voting up
- We encourage you to vote! Voting allows the Forums team to know what users want the most
- Use Questions and not Discussion thread types, this will allow us to "close" suggestions once they are no longer relevant or have been addressed.
Who reads these suggestions?

As previously stated this is a place to be heard by directly by the Forums team. Although we may not respond to every post, we are actively reading through each suggestion. We will not implement every suggestion, however, we release once a month and commit to consider suggestions from the community every release.

MSDN and TechNet Profile and Recognition System Discussions announcements

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Sean Jenkin Thursday, September 1, 2011 7:35 PM

The FAQ has been updated (currently only the EN-US FAQ) to now contain details of the activities, points and achievements in the recognition system. Start here and give it a read: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/ff395928#_Recognition_System

If you have questions or feedback, please use this Forum so we can capture the conversations and update the FAQ as time goes.

Thanks!
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It's for discussions on our profile system and our new recognition system. It is not a place to ask questions about Windows or Sharepoint or Insert your product here. There are specific forums for products and technologies. Please use them. Out of context forum threads will be deleted from this forum.

Announcements for all Forums announcements

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Pam Sallee Friday, February 15, 2008 7:49 PM

This is an announcements forum, intended for the forums team to communicate important news to all Forums users. Please do not post here unless you have reason to make an announcement. While we appreciate all of the smoke-testing while these forums are new, we respectfully request that you do that in the Sandbox forums for any of the brands.

Thanks for using the new Forums!

BizTalk Server General announcements

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We have some great news to share! We've updated our Microsoft Integration Product Roadmap. See our BizTalk Team Blog, at https://aka.ms/btsblog. We are starting our new BizTalk Server vNext project. Let us know what you want and need in BizTalk Server vNext.

Paul Larsen [MS]
Microsoft BizTalk Server Team
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We have some great news to share! We've updated our Microsoft Integration Product Roadmap. See our BizTalk Team Blog, at https://aka.ms/btsblog. We are starting our new BizTalk Server vNext project. Let us know what you want and need in BizTalk Server vNext.

Paul Larsen [MS]
Microsoft BizTalk Server Team
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Available now is Microsoft BizTalk Server 2016 Feature Pack 3. This update to BizTalk Server 2016 contains new and improved capabilities for integrating BizTalk Server workloads with Office 365 Outlook Email, Calendar, and Contact resources.

Office 365 Adapters

Microsoft Office 365 is a cloud-based subscription service that brings together the best tools for the way people work today. By combining best-in-class apps like Excel and Outlook with powerful cloud services like OneDrive and Microsoft Teams, Office 365 lets anyone create and share anywhere on any device.

Microsoft BizTalk Server Adapters for Office 365 enable IT professionals and enterprise developers to integrate Outlook mail, contacts, and schedules with new solutions based on BizTalk Server 2016.

Office 365 Mail Adapter

Using the BizTalk Adapter for Office 365 Mail, you can read, mark as read or delete, Outlook e-mail messages through one-way BizTalk Server receive locations. Using the Office 365 Mail Adapter, you can write e-mail message, including setting message priority, through one-way static or dynamic BizTalk Server send ports.

Office 365 Calendar Adapter

Using the BizTalk Adapter for Office 365 Calendar, you can get future calendar events through one-way BizTalk Server receive locations. Using the Office 365 Calendar Adapter, you can create calendar events, including specifying required and optional attendees, through one-way static or dynamic BizTalk Server send ports.

Office 365 Contact Adapter

Using the BizTalk Adapter for Office 365 Contact, you can create contacts, by specifying all settings, through one-way static or dynamic BizTalk Server send ports.
Licensing
- Microsoft customers with Software Assurance or Azure Enterprise Agreements are licensed to use Feature Pack 3.
- BizTalk Server 2016 Feature Pack 3 can be installed on Enterprise and Developer editions only.
Software
- BizTalk Server 2016 Feature Pack 3 contains all the functionality of Feature Packs 1 and 2, plus all the fixes in Cumulative Update 5.
- You can install Feature Pack 3 on BizTalk Server 2016 Enterprise and Developer Edition (retail, CU1, CU2, CU3, CU4, FP1, FP2).
- Download the software now from the Microsoft Download Center.
Documentation
You can learn more about Feature Pack 3 by reading the documentation articles. Please contribute to improving our documentation, by joining our BizTalk Server community on GitHub.
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Microsoft BizTalk Server product team has released Cumulative Update 5 for BizTalk Server 2016. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledgebase Article 4132957, posted to https://support.microsoft.com/help/4132957.
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Microsoft BizTalk Server product team has released Cumulative Update 8 for BizTalk Server 2013 R2. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledgebase Article 4052527, posted to https://support.microsoft.com/help/4052527.

Microsoft BizTalk Server Product Team
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Available now is Microsoft BizTalk Server 2016 Feature Pack 2. This update to BizTalk Server 2016 contains new and improved capabilities for modernizing BizTalk Server workloads in the areas of deployment, runtime and analytics.

Deployment and Administration
- Application Lifecycle Management with VSTS
- Backup to Azure Blob Storage
Server Runtime
- Adapter for Service Bus v2
- Transport Layer Security 1.2
- API Management
- Event Hubs
Analytics and Reporting
- Event Hubs
- Application Insights
Licensing
- Microsoft customers with Software Assurance or Azure Enterprise Agreements are licensed to use Feature Pack 2.
- BizTalk Server 2016 Feature Pack 2 can be installed on Enterprise and Developer editions only.
Software
- BizTalk Server 2016 Feature Pack 2 contains all the functionality of Feature Pack 1, plus all the fixes in Cumulative Update 3.
- You can install Feature Pack 2 on BizTalk Server 2016 Enterprise and Developer Edition (retail, CU1, CU2, CU3, FP1).
- Download the software now from the Microsoft Download Center.
Documentation

You can learn more about FP2 by reading the documentation articles. Please contribute to improving our documentation, by joining our BizTalk Server community on GitHub.

Feedback

Contribute to the community by participating in our forum, reading our blog, following us on Twitter (@BizTalk_Server), as well as providing product input using our BizTalk User Voice.
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Sample based on integration with SalesForce using SOAP is available in code gallery through this link.
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This article is intended to be a knowledge base of all Errors and Warnings, Causes and Solutions documented, by community members, in all stages/components of BizTalk: different stages of development, deployment, adapters, runtime, setup and configuration… Read more here
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Through the internet you can find numerous tools that can help you for instance in automating deployment, analyze your BizTalk environment or identify performance issues. You will find these tools on Operating System, Codeplex or Microsoft Download Center. Read more here.

BizTalk Server Adapters and Adapter Pack announcements

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Available now is Microsoft BizTalk Server 2016 Feature Pack 2. This update to BizTalk Server 2016 contains new and improved capabilities for modernizing BizTalk Server workloads in the areas of deployment, runtime and analytics.

Deployment and Administration
- Application Lifecycle Management with VSTS
- Backup to Azure Blob Storage
Server Runtime
- Adapter for Service Bus v2
- Transport Layer Security 1.2
- API Management
- Event Hubs
Analytics and Reporting
- Event Hubs
- Application Insights
Licensing
- Microsoft customers with Software Assurance or Azure Enterprise Agreements are licensed to use Feature Pack 2.
- BizTalk Server 2016 Feature Pack 2 can be installed on Enterprise and Developer editions only.
Software
- BizTalk Server 2016 Feature Pack 2 contains all the functionality of Feature Pack 1, plus all the fixes in Cumulative Update 3.
- You can install Feature Pack 2 on BizTalk Server 2016 Enterprise and Developer Edition (retail, CU1, CU2, CU3, FP1).
- Download the software now from the Microsoft Download Center.
Documentation

You can learn more about FP2 by reading the documentation articles. Please contribute to improving our documentation, by joining our BizTalk Server community on GitHub.

Feedback

Contribute to the community by participating in our forum, reading our blog, following us on Twitter (@BizTalk_Server), as well as providing product input using our BizTalk User Voice.
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Sample based on WCF-WebHttp Adapter and Windows Azure Blob Storage is available in code gallery through this link.
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Sample based on WCF-BasicHttpRelay Adapter is available in code gallery through this link.
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Sample based on WCF-NetTcpRelay Adapter is available in code gallery through this link.
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Sample based on WCF-WebHttp Adapter is available in code gallery through this link.
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BizTalk Server EDI and AS2 announcements

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MSDN and TechNet Search Feedback announcements

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Hi - Welcome to our new Search Feedback forum for search on the MSDN, TechNet, and Expression websites, which are web front-ends built on top of the Live Search API to search the MSDN, TechNet, and Expression websites-- and associated technical content like the Support Knowledge Base (KB) as well as community content like Forums.

Our UI is optimized for the specific needs of technical professionals looking for technical info. Feel free to send us your suggestions, bug reports, gripes, thoughts, etc.

If you are filing a bug report with our site search, please include the following:
1. URL where the problem is happening
2. Specific search query you are using
3. Browser type and version you are using
4. If another search engine returns better results than ours, please include the URL for *that* search engine so we can compare.

This info will help us track down problems quicker.

NOTE: This forum is only for feedback about our site's search feature. If you have feedback about specfic Microsoft products or other parts of MSDN or TechNet besides search, please visit the MSDN Forums, TechNet Forums, or Expression Forums home pages to find the out the best place to send your feedback.

Thanks again for using our search and caring enough to send your feedback-- your suggestions and bug reports help us get better!

Also check out the MSDN & TechNet Search Blog at http://blogs.msdn.com/msdnsearchblog/ for the latest news and updates about our site search.

Thanks,
Justin Grant

Training and Certification announcements

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Second Shot is back and available until 31 May 2014!

Thinking about starting or upgrading your Microsoft certification? Still undecided about scheduling that exam? It's no secret that it takes time, preparation, and commitment to pass all the required exams to achieve a certification milestone, and we want to help you. That's why we're so excited to bring back Second Shot!

For those who are newer to our community: the return of Second Shot is great news for MCPs (and aspiring ones) because it means being able to retake an exam for free. Just knowing there's a chance to do-over at no cost can make a big difference on exam day.

Read the full announcement by Veronica Sopher on the BorntoLearn blog here:

http://borntolearn.mslearn.net/btl/b/weblog/archive/2013/08/29/free-retake-on-microsoft-technical-exams-through-may-2014.aspx#fbid=pcqL9ijgCLa
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vsopher Tuesday, October 2, 2012 4:45 AM
The following training and certification resources are available on Microsoft Learning's community site, affectionately known as Born to Learn.

Everyone is welcome to visit the site. To comment and participate in discussions, please register as a user with a Microsoft account (aka Live ID). If you're already an MCP, use the same Microsoft account associated with your MC ID.
- Blogs - News, announcements and offers from Microsoft Learning
- Certification Study Groups - Discussion forums and prep wikis, led by Microsoft Certified Trainers and SMEs
- MCT Central - This MCT-only area provides discussion forums and trainer prep resources available only to current MCTs.
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vsopher Thursday, January 14, 2010 9:30 PM
Welcome to the Training and Certification Forum. The main focus of this forum is Microsoft certifications, exam prep, and training products such Microsoft Press books and Microsoft Official Courseware (MOC).

The current moderators of this forum are Danny van Dam, Jeff Wharton, Mike Corkery, Michael D. Alligood, Rubel Khan and Niall Merrigan. We wish to thank them for contributing their time and expertise.

Below are a few guidelines to help everyone get the most out of this forum:
- Is your question about Microsoft Certification or Training? . If not, please search for a more applicable forum, otherwise your post may be moved, closed/locked or deleted.
- Try searching the forum . Search the forum to see if your question has been asked before and answered. Of course, if you cannot find what you are looking for, please start a new thread rather than adding to an old one.
- Don't be brief . The more pertinent information you can give in your question, the better the response will be. If you are asking about specific exams, please indicate experience level, current role, etc. We don't charge by the character or word. :)
- Check your alerts . You can subscribe to a question so that you can see any update on it. Please use this feature so you can get the answers delivered to your inbox and follow up in a timely manner.
- No Spam. Spamming will have your thread deleted and possibly your account closed.
- Be polite . It's just better to be nice :) No flaming or trolling.
- No braindumps . Asking for braindump materials, suggesting the use of or providing links to them will see your thread deleted or edited at the discretion of the moderators.
- No copyright material . Please do not ask for or share courseware, book chapters or any other copyright material.
- Mark your question answered. If someone answers your question, please mark the reply as the answer to your question. You can mark multiple replies as answers. Doing so helps other forum visitors find the best answers. It's also a great way to acknowledge and show appreciation to those who offer assistance.
- Things we cannot answer . There are certain things about exams which cannot be discussed. Please refer to Microsoft exam policies.
- Dead thread/Answer policy. Where possible the moderators will allow sufficient time for the original poster to come back and mark the replies to their questions as answers. The amount of time is at the discretion of the individual moderator but is suggested that it will be declared dead after a week if the original poster does not respond. We will always try to be fair and mark suitable replies as answers.
- Do NOT propose your own answer as the answer. This is an accepted forum etiquette across most if not all of the Microsoft forums. Of course, if you think another response is the answer, please feel free to propose it as the answer.

Windows Performance Toolkit announcements

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Please keep your posts specific to performance analysis. All unrelated posts will be moved to http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/Offtopic/threads, without warning. Repeated off-topic posts will be reported as abuse of this forum. Please use your favorite search engine to find the right forum for your question. If your question isn't about Windows performance, then you shouldn't post here.

Let's build a performance analysis community here :)

Cheers,
Michael
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Welcome to the Windows Performance Toolkit forum!

As part of Microsoft's initiative to help its partners and customers improve the performance of their Windows systems, Windows group has released in Feb'08 the Windows Performance Toolkit. Version 4.1 of this toolkit has shipped in the Windows Server 2008 SDK and subsequent v.4.1.1 update has been made available on WHDC at http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/sysperf/perftools.mspx.

This toolkit isn't for everyone - to use it effectively, you need to have a grasp of the basic OS internals such as processes, threads, DPCs (deferred procedure calls), ISRs (interrupt service routines), I/O subsystem, registry, etc. Yet one need not be a system developer to use it either. First level triage (e.g. which component is responsible for system slowdown?, is it a CPU or a disk usage issue?, etc.) can often be done with only the basic understanding of the above mentioned concepts, something people usually cover in an introductory 101 OS course. An expert in that area, can then use the same toolkit to dig deeper into the issue, root-cause it, and work on providing a fix for it. A great reference for understanding OS Internals is the Microsoft Windows Internals (4th edition) book from Mark Russinovich and David Solomon. We highly recommend you get a copy if you plan on using this toolkit routinely.

You can use this forum to ask questions about the toolkit, as well as share tips and tricks with other users on how you've used it successfully in the past. We are hoping that this forum will help build a vibrant environment of performance analyst hobbists and professionals alike, where you can find support from both the Microsoft team shipping these tools to you as well as the MVPs using it on a daily basis.

The toolkit comes with MSDN documentation available at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa139734.aspx. We recommend you consult it before asking questions on this forum. We would also like to hear feedback from you on our documentation - what are we missing, is something incorrect in the documentation, etc. You can provide it by sending email to wptkdocf@microsoft.com.

Happy tracing!
-WPT Team

Project Standard and Professional General Questions and Answers announcements

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If you want to directly tell the product team, what features, changes or enhancements you want to see in the Project family of products (Project Desktop client, Project Server or Project Online), please submit your ideas (or vote for existing ones) at the Project UserVoice channel.

Project Customization and Programming announcements

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If you want to directly tell the product team, what features, changes or enhancements you want to see in the Project family of products (Project Desktop client, Project Server or Project Online), please submit your ideas (or vote for existing ones) at the Project UserVoice channel.
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The Project 2013 SDK download is updated. The conceptual, how-to, and reference documentation in the download closely matches the Project 2013 developer documentation online content published on MSDN.

The Project2013SDK.msi download file now installs properly on Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012.

The Project 2013 SDK download contains:
- The on-premises Reporting database schema reference, ProjectServer2013_ReportingDB.chm, and the OLAP cube schema reference.
- Updated VBA Help for local use. Objects such as Chart, Report, Series, and Shape now show correct members tables, properties, and methods topics.
- Basic reference topics for the JavaScript client-side object model (JSOM), which includes REST endpoints and HTTP request syntax. You can use the JSOM for development of Project Online solutions for cross-browser web apps and for non-Windows platforms.
- Sixteen complete code solutions, including two task pane apps (with minor updates) for Project, the QuickStatus app sample for Project Server and Project Online, eight client-side object model (CSOM) solutions, two solutions for querying the ProjectData service for reporting, and three updated legacy PSI solutions.
- DLLs and a license for redistribution of the Project Server CSOM assemblies, JavaScript files for the CSOM, the Microsoft.Office.Project.Server.Library assembly, and the Microsoft.Office.Project.Server.Events.Receivers library for on-premises development.
  Notes: 1. The REDIST.zip file that is attached to the Project_Programmability blog post contains the RTM build
                  15.0.4420.1017 of the Project Server assemblies for redistribution, including the
                   Microsoft.Office.Project.Schema.dll assembly, for developing event handlers.
               2. Project CSOM solutions also require the redistributable DLLs for the SharePoint 2013 CSOM,
                   which are at SharePoint Server 2013 Client Components SDK.
- Updated Intellisense files for the PSI and CSOM, source code for creating a PSI proxy assembly, and instructions on how to update the PSI proxy files.
- XML schemas for the Project client, AppProvisioning, and the Statusing PSI.
The top-level online landing page for the Project SDK is Project for developers (http://msdn.microsoft.com/project).

For additional Project-related SDK content, see Office for developers (http://msdn.microsoft.com/office), SharePoint for developers (http://msdn.microsoft.com/sharepoint), and Build apps for Office and SharePoint (http://msdn.microsoft.com/office/apps/). The two articles on Task pane apps for Project are in the Apps for Office and SharePoint SDK, and the JavaScript API for Office reference includes information specific for Project, the ProjectDocument object with eleven methods and three events, and four enumerations for Project.

Want to try out Project 2013?
1. Sign up for Project Online and Project Pro for Office 365
2. Download Project Professional 2013 and Project Server 2013
--Jim
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It makes a big difference in answering your questions

Project Server - Setup, Upgrade, Administration and Operation announcements

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If you want to directly tell the product team, what features, changes or enhancements you want to see in the Project family of products (Project Desktop client, Project Server or Project Online), please submit your ideas (or vote for existing ones) at the Project UserVoice channel.
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Project Server General Questions and Answers announcements

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If you want to directly tell the product team, what features, changes or enhancements you want to see in the Project family of products (Project Desktop client, Project Server or Project Online), please submit your ideas (or vote for existing ones) at the Project UserVoice channel.
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We're supporting all versions of the product.
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Project Online General Questions and Answers announcements

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If you want to directly tell the product team, what features, changes or enhancements you want to see in the Project family of products (Project Desktop client, Project Server or Project Online), please submit your ideas (or vote for existing ones) at the Project UserVoice channel.
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Enterprise projects will no longer synchronize with SharePoint tasks lists by default. If you still want enterprise projects to synchronize with SharePoint tasks lists, you can turn this setting back on by going to Project Web App ‎(PWA)‎ Settings > Connected SharePoint Sites > Settings, and selecting the 'Sync Enterprise Projects tasks to Tasks List' check box.

See Blog Post
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ANAHEIM CA, 2/03/2014: At the 2014 Microsoft Project Conference Keynote, Microsoft announced a new license SKU designed for team members who need limited access to project management features of Project Online. At $7/month, what are you waiting for?
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Microsoft Machine Learning Server announcements

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Microsoft R Open 3.5.3 was released today!

Find the release info on Github.
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Just seconds ago we release Microsoft R Open 3.5.2! Get it here: https://mran.microsoft.com/download. Since there have been numerous requests for this release on these forums I wanted to share this news with you as soon as possible.
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CarlNan Tuesday, January 12, 2016 1:34 AM
On 1/12/2016, Microsoft made the announcement for the ongoing progress to deliver R to new platforms, developers and the R community. Specifically:
- Revolution R Enterprise for Hadoop, Linux and Teradata is now available as Microsoft R Server with all the benefits of Microsoft's enterprise support and purchasing options.
- The new Microsoft R Server Developer Edition with all the features of the commercial version will be available for Developers to download for free.
- The Microsoft Data Science Virtual Machine will include a pre-installed and pre-configured version of Microsoft R Server Developer Edition.
- Revolution R Open is now Microsoft R Open and is available to download for free.
- Microsoft R Server is available to all students for academic use with the Microsoft DreamSpark program
For the detail information of the announcement, please refer to the blog from Joseph Sirosh, Microsoft Corporate Vice President.

Tools for Apache Cordova announcements

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Visual Studio Tools for Applications (VSTA) announcements

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You can get the VSTA 2015 and VSTA 2015 SDK through the links below:
- VSTA 2015
- VSTA 2015 SDK
The overall summary of VSTA 2015:

Microsoft Visual Studio Tools for Applications lets you enable end users to customize your existing applications using Visual Basic and Visual C#. Since the VSTA 2012 release, several changes have been introduced to the licensing model as well as to how you integrate VSTA into your applications:
- There is no longer a licensing fee for the VSTA redistributable components. Your organization can distribute and use the VSTA redistributable components free of charge.
- VSTA no longer provides its own Visual Studio Environment for authoring macros. Instead, a supported version of Visual Studio Professional (Premium, or Ultimate) is required to develop VSTA macros and add-ins. VSTA has two primary modes of operation: with Visual Studio Professional (Premium, or Ultimate) installed and standalone. In standalone mode, VSTA provides your application with the means to load, compile, and run end user customizations. With a supported version of Visual Studio Professional (Premium, or Ultimate) installed on your user's machine, VSTA extends that functionality with the means to edit and debug those customizations.
- VSTA 2015 supports .NET Framework 4.5.1.
- VSTA 2015 presents a simplified API for integrating design-time experiences into your application using either managed (Visual C# or Visual Basic .NET) or unmanaged (Visual C++) code. It simplifies tasks such as finding the installation of Visual Studio, launching the external process, and synchronizing save state, making integration significantly easier than previous versions.
- VSTA 2015 provides the ability to upgrade VSTA projects from Visual Studio 2005 and Visual Studio 2008, compile, and run them. It also maintains compatibility with VSTA 2012 and VSTA 2013 projects.
- VSTA no longer requires your application host to provide a runtime library in order to run. This gives you the flexibility to choose the method of running user code best tailored to the host application.
System Requirement:
- Windows 7 Service Pack 1
- Windows 8
- Windows 8.1
- Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1
- Windows Server 2012
- Windows 10
Runtime requirement for VSTA 2013:
- Visual C++ Redistributable Packages for Visual Studio 2015
Requirement to enable editing and debugging for VSTA customization:
- Microsoft Visual Studio 2012 (Professional Edition or above)
- Microsoft Visual Studio 2013 (Community Edition or above)
- Microsoft Visual Studio 2015 (Community Edition or above)
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Visual Studio Visualization announcements

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- This Forum - for Visual Studio Ultimate architecture tools - UML, DGML, Architecture Explorer, Layer diagrams
- Visualization and Modeling SDK Forum - for domain-specific languages and extending the modeling tools
- Visual Studio Extensibility Forum - about VSX, MEF, EnvDTE, and other non-modeling extensions
- Microsoft Connect Visual Studio - for bug reports and suggestions
- The Community Content block at the bottom of any MSDN Library page to add your own tips, corrections or feedback about the content.
Thanks for posting your questions and feedback! We use them to help us improve the product and improve the help pages.

Visual Studio LightSwitch - General Questions announcements

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Visual Studio 2015 is the last release of Visual Studio that includes the LightSwitch tooling and we recommend users not begin new application development with LightSwitch. That said, we will continue to support users with existing LightSwitch applications, including critical bug fixes and security issues as per the Microsoft Support Lifecycle. For reference, the mainstream support phase forVisual Studio 2015 is active until 10/13/2020.

For more information see the LightSwitch Blog.
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Visual Studio LightSwitch Extensibility announcements

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We've just uploaded the updated version of the Extensibility Toolkit to the MSDN Extensions Gallery: LightSwitch Extensibility Toolkit for VS 2012

The toolkit provides project types for creating new LightSwitch Extension Libraries that target Visual Studio 11 and includes templates for creating the following LightSwitch extensions: LightSwitch Business Type, LightSwitch Control, LightSwitch Data Source, LightSwitch Screen Template, LightSwitch Shell, and LightSwitch Theme.

Updated versions of the eight extensibility samples have been uploaded to the LightSwitch Extensibility Samples for VS 2012 as well.

Enjoy
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Microsoft Visual Studio LightSwitch gives you a simpler and faster way to create high-quality business applications for the desktop and the cloud. Professional developers can extend the functionality of LightSwitch by creating extensions using Visual Studio 2010 Professional, the Visual Studio SDK, and the Visual Studio LightSwitch 2011 Extensibility Toolkit. The toolkit provides project types for creating new LightSwitch Extension Libraries and includes templates for creating your own themes, shells, business types, controls, screen templates, and data sources.

You can access the toolkit plus walkthroughs, samples and documentation here on the Developer Center. Please make sure you follow the instructions carefully for installing the toolkit and the prerequisites.

Extending Visual Studio LightSwitch

HAVE FUN!
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Parallel Computing in C and Native Code announcements

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Visual Studio Visualization & Modeling SDK (DSL Tools) announcements

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- This Forum - for domain-specific languages and extending the modeling tools
- Visualization and Modeling Forum - for Visual Studio Ultimate architecture tools - UML, DGML, Architecture Explorer, Layer diagrams
- Visual Studio Extensibility Forum - about VSX, MEF, EnvDTE, Text Templates (T4) and other non-modeling extensibility
- Microsoft Connect Visual Studio - for bug reports and suggestions
- The Community Content block at the bottom of any MSDN Library page to add your own tips, corrections or feedback about the content
Thanks for posting your questions and feedback! We use them to help us improve the product and improve the help pages.

HealthVault Developer announcements

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Ali Emami Wednesday, December 5, 2012 7:54 AM

If you are not a developer but are interested in learning more about how to manage your health information with HealthVault, please visit our HealthVault User forum.

Debugger Canvas announcements

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Kael Rowan Tuesday, January 31, 2012 6:40 PM

Hi everyone, we are pleased to announce the release of Debugger Canvas version 1.1. This version includes a number of bug fixes, new features, and improves performance. Some of the new features are:

- Easily turn Debugger Canvas on or off, even in the middle of a debug session.
- Quickly navigate up and down the call stack in the canvas using the keyboard or the mouse.
- See Multiple threads together on the canvas, each thread identified by its color.
- See recursive calls side by side.
- The option to edit code directly in the code bubbles is enabled by default.

This last "feature" is actually nothing new. You could always edit code directly in bubbles by checking the checkbox in Tools -> Options, but some users didn't know that option existed so we frequently heard the feedback that you wished you could edit code directly in the bubbles. This time we just simply enable that feature by default if you're installing Debugger Canvas for the first time.

To install this updated version of Debugger Canvas you must uninstall the previous version of Debugger Canvas first. (Or install QFE 2581019 from http://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/Downloads/DownloadDetails.aspx?DownloadID=38654 before installing the update.) This is because Visual Studio 2010 SP1 has a bug which prevents signed VSIXes from being updated. I will also post a sticky thread in the forum since I'm sure many of you will attempt to install version 1.1 on top of 1.0 without reading the instructions first. I would do the same thing! :)

You can read more about the new version and read the updated guide from the usual home page here:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/devlabs/debuggercanvas

Or you can skip straight to the download and get the VSIX directly from here:
http://download.microsoft.com/download/5/A/7/5A7FB2E7-5720-4739-BDDE-28A684C5B291/Microsoft.DebuggerCanvas.vsix

Thanks to everyone for their continued support and we sincerely hope you enjoy Debugger Canvas version 1.1!
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Hi and Welcome to the Debugger Canvas forum!

Please use the forum to share questions, comments, ideas and bugs as you use Debugger Canvas. We're eager to hear about your experiences, so that we can improve the tool and understand how this user experience works in real life situations.

So please click the Ask a question link above, and let us hear from you!

Thanks!

The Debugger Canvas team

Jens, Kael, Rob, Andrew
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Microsoft Solver Foundation announcements

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As users have pointed out, Microsoft has not been active on the Solver Foundation forums since Nate left. We have been quiet while we have gone through restructuring and planning. Some would say we have been too quiet. We know we have very loyal and enthusiastic users who want to know the future of Solver Foundation. So, here is a long overdue statement about our plans for Solver Foundation.

The current 3.1 release of MSF will be the last release as a standalone install. We are working hard on integrating Microsoft Solver Foundation into a larger analytics framework that will help users build both prescriptive and predictive analytics. We look forward to releasing this new product for your use as soon as we are able to do so. This new product will provide a migration path for current Solver Foundation users and partners.

We would like to continue to keep the current forum open to the community to discuss MSF until the release of the new product. However, Microsoft will be providing limited support of MSF in terms of monitoring the forums and providing bug fixes during this transition time.

We have been responding to email and will continue to do so. If you have feedback on issues/bugs/improvements, we welcome your feedback via msfsupport@microsoft.com. Please check back on the forum for future announcements with regards to the new analytics product.

Thanks for your support.

The Solver Foundation Team
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We are pleased to announce the availability of Microsoft Solver Foundation 3.1. You can download the Express version here, and you can read more about it by checking out the Solver Foundation team blog.

Thanks, Nathan
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We are pleased to announce an updated Solver Foundation connector to the popular MOSEK solver. The connector is available as a free download:
- 32-bit Mosek connector
- 64-bit Mosek connector
The zip file contains a dll and installation instructions. Also consult this blog post for more information. Using the connector requires the installation of the MOSEK solver - visit mosek.com for details.
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TPL Dataflow announcements

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In .NET 4.5 RC, TPL Dataflow is delivered via NuGet at https://nuget.org/packages/Microsoft.Tpl.Dataflow and is supported everywhere that .NET 4.5 runs, including desktop, server, and .NET for Metro style apps. The simplest way to install the package in Visual Studio is to highlight the target project, select Tools > Library Package Manager > Package Manager Console, and at the prompt enter:
Install-Package Microsoft.Tpl.Dataflow -Pre
The -Pre flag is needed because these are marked as prerelease versions. You can use the GUI Manage NuGet Packages dialog for this task as well, but when searching make sure to select Include Prerelease from the appropriate drop-down list. For details about this release, please refer to the blog post at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/bclteam/archive/2012/05/30/mef-and-tpl-dataflow-nuget-packages-for-net-framework-4-5-rc.aspx.
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"TPL Dataflow" is a new .NET library for building concurrent, parallel, and asynchronous applications. It enables building systems based on dataflow concepts, on in-process message passing, and on asynchronous pipelines. This library, System.Threading.Tasks.Dataflow.dll, is heavily inspired by the Visual C++ Asynchronous Agents Library, by the CCR from Microsoft Robotics, by the Axum language, and more; it's built on top of a multitude of constructs introduced in .NET 4, internally using types like Task and ConcurrentQueue<T>, in order to provide solutions for buffering and processing data, for building systems that need high-throughput and low-latency processing of data, and for building agent/actor-based systems. TPL Dataflow was also designed to integrate very well with the new language support for tasks, such that you can easily use TPL Dataflow constructs within asynchronous methods, and such that you can harness asynchronous methods within "dataflow blocks."

You can download a Community Technology Preview release from the TC Labs site on MSDN DevLabs at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/devlabs/gg585582. A previous preview release of the DLL is also available as part of the Microsoft Visual Studio Async CTP, available at http://msdn.com/vstudio/async.

Please use this forum to ask questions about TPL Dataflow, to provide feedback on the library, to let us know about your successes and to let us know about your stumbling blocks. We look forward to hearing from and conversing with you.

The Forum of Sho announcements

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Sho Team Wednesday, January 26, 2011 1:57 AM

Hello and welcome to the Forum of Sho!

This forum is meant to be a community for Sho users where you can share knowledge, get questions answered, and learn from others using Sho. Feel free to post questions about any and all aspects of Sho, and we (as well as other community members) will do our best to get you some answers. We hope that as your expertise in Sho grows, you'll also take the time to answer questions from folks who could benefit from your knowledge and experience.

For more information about Sho, including the latest installer and documentation, check out http://research.microsoft.com/sho

Reactive Extensions (Rx) announcements

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Has your interest in Rx piqued because of the recent open sourcing (http://rx.codeplex.com/)?
Do you want to want a first-person account of the history and design philosophy of Rx?
What about some pair programming with Dr Rebcabin http://rebcabin.wordpress.com/?
Or hear about using Rx in the real world from our special guest TheMechanicalBride (http://themechanicalbride.blogspot.com/2009/07/introducing-rx-linq-to-events.html, http://www.yowconference.com.au/general/details.html?speakerId=3541), the longest living Rx user on the planet?
.....

Then, sign up for the Rx tutorials at YOW!
http://www.yowconference.com.au/general/registration.html
Link

Here is your chance to learn Rx and interact with @headinthebox and@xpaulbettsx (the co-author of the gentle Category Theory-free introduction to Rx and LINQ) http://qconsf.com/sf2012/presentations/show_presentation.jsp?oid=4602. We'll make the course super hands-on and try to answer all your questions.

If you sign up using discount code "meij100", we will take you out for drinks afterwards so you can even ask more questions.

Looking forward to see many of the Rx users in person.
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Rx team Thursday, August 16, 2012 5:17 AM

Reactive Extensions (Rx) is a library available for .NET and developers, used to compose event-based programs using observable sequences and LINQ-style query operators. Visit the Rx product website to download the bits, read more details and watch in depth videos about the technology.

Feel free to post any questions regarding Rx on this forum.
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Rx team Thursday, August 16, 2012 5:16 AM
We're thrilled to announce the availability of Reactive Extensions v2.0 for the following platforms:
- .NET Framework 4
- .NET Framework 4.5
- .NET Framework 4.5 for Windows Store apps
- Silverlight 5
- Windows Phone 7.5
You can download the SDK installer from the Download Center or use NuGet to install the packages.

More information about the release can be found in this blog post.
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We're happy to announce the first official release of Reactive Extensions v1.0 Stable and the latest release of v1.1 Experimental:
- Reactive Extensions v1.0.10621 SP1 Stable Release
  - This is our official v1.0 product release, including the first Service Pack. How exciting is that?
- Reactive Extensions v1.1.11111 Experimental Release
  - This is where we continue to experiment with new ideas. Stay tuned for more...

WCF Data Services announcements

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RTW: 5.4.0

Prerelease: Coming soon
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Over the weekend the ASP.NET team released a Microsoft Security Advisory about a security vulnerability found in ASP.NET:

The WCF Data Services team looked into the issue and don't believe there is any additional exposure to the vulnerability beyond what is exposed by ASP.NET. However, if the WCF Data Service is hosted in ASP.NET, it is quite possible that the vulnerability is present. If any users use the ASP.Net encryption logic to hide sensitive information from the client and use that encrypted data to make decisions in the WCF Data Service, they can run into this issue. Below are few examples:

· If you use an encrypted cookie to make decisions to which database to connect in CreateDataSource method

· If you use an encrypted cookie to figure out whether the user is an admin rather than using RoleManager in the server

· If you use an encrypted cookie to apply business logic in change/query interceptors

For a complete description of the vulnerability, please read Scottgu's post on the subject:

http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2010/09/18/important-asp-net-security-vulnerability.aspx

Andrew Conrad

WCF Data Services Development Lead

Microsoft Corp
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New to OData? Go to http://odata.org to learn the nuts and bolts of the protocol, see who is using it today, and learn the scenarios that drove the creation of the protocol.
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The WCF Data Services team is beginning to explore improvements and new features for our next release. As part of this process, it's critical that we hear your feedback, as it helps us ensure that what we build actually meets your requirements in real-world scenarios. To enable this we've launched a new site that will allow you to interact more directly with the development team and provide input: http://dataservices.mswish.net .

The site's pretty simple and self-explanatory – you can add a new feature request or vote for feature requests that are already there. We hope you'll try it out and vote on the features you most want to see added. Finally, as features move from ideas into actual development we'll post our thoughts and ideas to the team blog at http://blogs.msdn.com/astoriateam

-Mike Flasko

Lead Program Manager, Microsoft

Microsoft Robotics - Hardware Configuration and Troubleshooting announcements

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Please see the announcement of Robotics Developer Studio 4 Beta in the Community Forum.

Visit the Microsoft Robotics Home Page for more information.

Microsoft Robotics - Decentralized Software Services (DSS) announcements

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Please see the announcement of Robotics Developer Studio 4 Beta in the Community Forum.

Visit the Microsoft Robotics Home Page for more information.

Microsoft Robotics - Concurrency and Coordination Runtime (CCR) announcements

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Please see the announcement of Robotics Developer Studio 4 Beta in the Community Forum.

Visit the Microsoft Robotics Home Page for more information.

Microsoft Robotics - Community announcements

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RDS 4 & Kinect for Windows SDK 1.5 + Windows 8 Release Preview + Visual Studio 2012

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Three new technologies that impact RDS4 have been released recently:
1. Kinect for Windows SDK version 1.5
2. Windows 8 Release Preview
3. Visual Studio 2012 RC
All of these have been tested with RDS 4 and there are a few issues to be aware of when using them with RDS 4.

Kinect for Windows SDK version 1.5

Version 1.5 is 100% compatible with RDS 4 on Windows 7 with Visual Studio 2010. The built-in services as well as the user-built samples will continue to work as they have before. The new features such as Near Mode, Seated Mode, and Facial Tracking will not automatically be exposed, but the sample code for the RDS4 Kinect service is provided and can be used as an example of how to add the new features. If someone out there in the RDS community creates an updated service that exposes new features, we invite you to share it with the RDS community by posting a link in the RDS Community Forum http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/roboticscommunity/threads.

Windows 8 Release Preview

RDS 4 has been tested on Windows 8 Release Preview and while all the services can be built and run for Windows 8, there are a couple issues to be aware of:
- When building some of the samples, you may see a the following warning: " warning MSB3270: There was a mismatch between the processor architecture of the project being built… ". This is an innocuous warning. You can eliminate the warning for any service by editing the project file and explicitly setting the target architecture.
- The setup and building of some samples may report errors indicating that Silverlight 4 Toolkit is required. The Silverlight 4 Toolkit will not install on Windows 8. The workaround is to install the Silverlight 5 Toolkit from here: http://silverlight.codeplex.com/releases/view/78435
Visual Studio 2012 Release Candidate

The Express version of Visual Studio 2012 will only open Windows 8 Metro Style app projects. You can build the RDS samples from the command-line using the DSS Command Prompt, but you will not be able to open the projects.
- The Release Candidate of Visual Studio 2012 Ultimate is a free download. It will eventually expire, but it is the best choice to try Visual Studio 2012 with RDS 4 at this time. Complete Beta Readme can be found here: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=237568
- Installing VS 2012 upgrades the .NET runtime to 4.5. The pre-built Kinect RDS4 service samples will no longer run because they specifically targeted .NET 4.0, however the source code for the Kinect samples is included and they can be built with VS 2012 RC and these user-built versions will work.
  - Samples built by the user are referred to as "User" version of the services and if they have partner requirements on other samples they will expect the "User" versions of partners as well.
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Announcing Microsoft Robotics Developer Studio 4

Today (8^th March) we're announcing the general availability of Microsoft Robotics Developer Studio 4 (RDS 4). The package can be downloaded for free. It was just over five months ago that we announced the availability of RDS 4 Beta and since then, the Microsoft Robotics team has been hard at work putting the final touches on RDS 4 to give developers access to the software they need to build robotics applications.

Since the Beta, our number one focus has been on improving the overall quality and stability of RDS 4. We've fixed a number of important issues in the product as well as made improvements to existing samples. Additionally, we updated RDS 4 to work with the release version of the Kinect for Windows SDK.

It is our goal to deliver a great product that meets the needs of the developer and hobbyist communities. We are already seeing RDS 4 being utilized to develop some interesting applications. Speaking of which, last fall, we announced the Robotics @ Home competition, and are thrilled with the submissions we've received. Today, we're excited to reveal the competition's 10 finalists. Visit the Robotics @ Home Finalists page to read more about the finalists, including how they think robotics will change the world and what they would do with the prize winnings. We look forward to announcing the grand prize winner in May of this year.

We have tested RDS 4 on Windows 8 Consumer Preview with Visual Studio 11 Beta. However, these are beta products so RDS 4 is not officially supported for use with them, but we know it works.

Also, our team has been using RDS 4 for a while now and we've come up with a few cool and unique applications. Check out the video of the Follow Me robot, created by our team.

From all of us on the Microsoft Robotics team, we'd like to thank you for your continued support and your feedback on RDS 4, which helped get us to where we are today. As always, you can use the Robotics Forums to send us any additional questions and suggestions.

NOTE: Please install Visual Studio 2010 and the Kinect for Windows SDK V1 before you install RDS 4.

SyncFx – Microsoft Sync Framework Toolkit announcements

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Nina H Saturday, September 10, 2011 7:38 AM

The Sync Framework Toolkit extends the Sync Framework capabilities for building offline applications, making it easier to expose data for synchronization to applications running on any client platform. Sync Framework 2.1 required clients to be based on Windows. This toolkit allows other Microsoft platforms to be used for offline clients such as Silverlight, Windows Phone 7, and Windows Mobile; in addition non-Microsoft platforms such as iPhone, Android, and Blackberry can be utilized as well as HTML.

The Sync Framework Toolkit provides all the features enabled by the Sync Framework 4.0 October 2010 CTP. We are releasing the toolkit as source code samples on MSDN with the source code utilizing Sync Framework 2.1. Source code provides the flexibility to customize or extend the capabilities we have provided to suit your specific requirements. The client-side source code in the package is released under the Apache 2.0 license and the server-side source code under the MS-LPL license.

The toolkit is available for download on MSDN at: http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/Sync-Framework-Toolkit-4dc10f0e.

We will keep the f orum used for Sync Framework V4 CTP available for community discussion and community support.

Thanks,
Sync Framework Team
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At PDC 2010 we announced and released Sync Framework V4 CTP. The main capability available in the CTP was greatly enhanced support for offline clients. In particular, we added the ability to easily create web services to synchronize data from SQL Server or SQL Azure databases with offline clients built on any platform - Silverlight, Windows Phone 7, iPhone or any client platform with any local client store. The final release of V4 was planned for 2011 and we were targeting the first half of this year for general availability.

This post is to inform you that we have updated our plans and postponed the V4 release for the time being. We do expect to release Sync Framework V4 in the future and will let you know the new release date when available, but it is unlikely the release will be available in 2011.

There has been a great deal of interest in our V4 release, with lots of participation in the CTP. In lieu of a formal release, we are planning to make the V4 CTP functionality available as source code samples on MSDN Code Gallery in the next few months – server code, client code and client samples. The source code samples will utilize and depend on Sync Framework V2.1 (on the server), as was the case for the CTP. UPDATE: We will make the code available by end August 2011.

This was a difficult decision for the team. We are currently focusing on the delivery of SQL Azure Data Sync which is a service providing data synchronization capabilities for SQL Azure that will be released later this year. SQL Azure Data Sync heavily utilizes Sync Framework internally.

Here are a few common questions we've received:

· Q: Will you stop supporting Sync Framework V2.1?

· A: No. Sync Framework V2.1 is a released product and will continue to be supported, both formally and via the MSDN forums.

· Q: Does this mean that the Sync Framework is being phased out?

· A: No. We expect to provide future versions of the synchronization developer platform. SQL Azure Data Sync is built on top of Sync Framework and we continue to invest in data synchronization capabilities. We believe that both end-user services and development platform are important to provide a complete stack for customers. With Sync Framework V2.1 being available we are currently focusing on the delivery of the end-user service.

· Q: When do you expect Sync Framework V4 will be released?

· A: A potential release date has not been set.

· Q: How do the offline capabilities of Sync Framework V4 relate to the recently announced "reference data caching" capabilities for OData?

· A: "Reference data caching" is being proposed as a future additional capability of the OData protocol. It specifically targets the one-way download scenario for reference data. We believe this is a common scenario and is sufficiently straightforward to integrate directly into the OData protocol. We are exploring how far to integrate sync capabilities into the OData protocol vs. potentially layering more sync capabilities on top of OData, which is the approach we took with the Sync Framework V4 CTP. We look forward to your feedback in this area as we explore together with the OData community.

Regards,

Sync Framework team

SyncFx - Microsoft Sync Framework Developer Discussions announcements

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The Sync Framework Toolkit extends the Sync Framework capabilities for building offline applications, making it easier to expose data for synchronization to applications running on any client platform. Sync Framework 2.1 required clients to be based on Windows. This toolkit allows other Microsoft platforms to be used for offline clients such as Silverlight, Windows Phone 7, and Windows Mobile; in addition non-Microsoft platforms such as iPhone, Android, and Blackberry can be utilized as well as HTML.

The Sync Framework Toolkit provides all the features enabled by the Sync Framework 4.0 October 2010 CTP. We are releasing the toolkit as source code samples on MSDN with the source code utilizing Sync Framework 2.1. Source code provides the flexibility to customize or extend the capabilities we have provided to suit your specific requirements. The client-side source code in the package is released under the Apache 2.0 license and the server-side source code under the MS-LPL license.

The toolkit is available for download on MSDN at: http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/Sync-Framework-Toolkit-4dc10f0e.

We will keep the f orum used for Sync Framework V4 CTP available for community discussion and community support.

Thanks,
Sync Framework Team
Link

Nina H Thursday, August 19, 2010 12:51 AM

Sync Framework 2.1 includes all the great functionality of our 2.0 release, enhanced by several exciting new features and improvements. The most exciting of these lets you synchronize data stored in SQL Server or SQL Server Compact with SQL Azure in the cloud. We've added top customer requests like parameter-based filtering and the ability to remove synchronization scopes and templates from a database, and of course we've made many performance enhancements to make synchronization faster and easier.

Read our blog for more detail,

Or start downloading now!
Link

The following SQL Compact hotfix addresses an issue that is commonly encountered when syncing tables with foreign key constraints:

FIX: Error message when an application inserts a value into a foreign key column in SQL Server Compact 3.5: "No key matching the described characteristics could be found within the current range"
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/974068

Sean Kelley
Senior Program Manager
Microsoft
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We are happy to announce that a hotfix for Sync Services for ADO.NET for Devices is now available which resolves some of the performance issues in the RTM version of the release. With this hotfix, the initial sync and subsequent sync for downloading INSERTs performance has been significantly improved as some performance related issues have been fixed at the client.
Please contact Microsoft Customer Support Service team to request the
HotFix if needed.
Thanks
Yunwen
Link

Hello and Welcome to this forum.

This forum has been created to provide a place where developers can discuss these APIs with members of the Sync Framework Product Group in Microsoft as well as other developers in the community. Discussions in this fourm include Microsoft Sync Framework Core Runtime, Sync Framework Database Providers, SQL Azure Data Sync and the Sync Framework File Provider

Liam Cavanagh

Program Manager,

Microsoft Sync Framework and SQL Azure
Microsoft Corporation

SyncFx - SyncToy-File Synchronization announcements

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Nina H Wednesday, November 11, 2009 7:15 PM

We are happy to announce the availability of SyncToy 2.1. SyncToy 2.1 is a free application that synchronizes files and folders between locations. SyncToy2.1 is powered by the latest synchronization engine from Microsoft Sync Framework 2.0 and provides better performance and robustness.
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Please note that there are known issues when using SyncToy 2.0 with a Home NAS. When using a NAS, there is a chance of file corruption. We have found this to be the case across the board for all NAS configurations. We highly recommend that users avoid using SyncToy 1.x and 2.0 with NAS configurations.

This issue will be fixed in an upcoming release. Unfortunately there are no known workarounds for this issue with SyncToy 2.0 and previous builds.

Liam
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We have just completed a test pass on SyncToy 2.0 running on Windows 7 and am happy to announce that we have not found any issues. Ultimately, SyncToy is provided "as is," and Microsoft does not actually provide official support services for it. However, for those of you that have started to use Windows 7, you should expect to have a similar experience to that of other platforms such as Windows XP and Vista and if issues arise please let us know on this forum.

MSDN Subscriptions Feedback announcements

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Welcome to the new MSDN Subscriptions Forum!

Feel free to post here if you have questions or comments about the MSDN Subscription, including MSDN Subscriber Downloads, DVD Media, Subscription Levels, Product keys, or anything else Subscription related!

If your post is not related to MSDN Subscriptions, or if you're not sure where to post your question, a great place to post is the Where is the Forum for...? forum at http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/whatforum.

Questions about the forums experience should be posted in the Forums Issues forum at http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/reportabug/threads

Secure Download Manager posts are off topic for the MSDN Subscriptions Feedback forum. Students having issues with the SDM should email dreamspark@kivuto.com and be sure to enter "SDM issue" on the subject line of their message. SDM Issue emails must include:
- Order #
- A detailed description of the problem, including steps taken and error message. Screenshots are highlypreferred.
DreamSpark Students having any other issue with the service need to get help from their Program Administrator. Contact the Program Administrator by clicking thehelp link at the top of the student Webstore, and then scrolling down to the bottom of the page and clicking Contact Us.

Looking forward to chatting!

Thanks,
Mike

SDK for Home Server 2011, SBS 2011 Essentials, Storage Server 2008 R2 Essentials announcements

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To get you started with developing addins, I created a Development Kit with some samples and information on how to create/build/install and addin for Windows Home Server 2011.

You can download it here.
There are also some articles on my blog.

Have fun,
Nick Asseloos
MVP Windows Home Server
http://www.asoft.be
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Standard 2009: Misc announcements

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I am very pleased to announce that Richard John Eaton, one of the most active contributors in this forum, to be our first Answerer!

With this role, Richard will help us manage the forum and other creative community activities.

I know it's a not fancy title, but it's a recognition from us for his great support in the community. We hope Richard can help us move this forum to the next level. And then he'll be moved to the next level too, to be a "Moderator". (Come on, that one is fancier :P)

Here is Richard in his own word:

40 something geek, with a severe interest in computers, Gadgets, off roading and gardening.

Lead developer at Steatite for Embedded Solutions. Having been employed there since his return from Russia in 2005.

Go Richard!

Weijuan

Standard 2009: Tools announcements

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I am very pleased to announce that Richard John Eaton , one of the most active contributors in this forum, to be our first Answerer !

With this role, Richard will help us manage the forum and other creative community activities.

I know it's a not fancy title, but it's a recognition from us for his great support in the community. We hope Richard can help us move this forum to the next level. And then he'll be moved to the next level too, to be a "

Moderator ". (Come on, that one is fancier :P)
Here is Richard in his own word:

40 something geek, with a severe interest in computers, Gadgets, off roading and gardening.

Lead developer at Steatite for Embedded Solutions. Having been employed there since his return from Russia in 2005.

Go Richard!

Weijuan

Standard 2009: Components/Run-time Issues announcements

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I am very pleased to announce that Richard John Eaton , one of the most active contributors in this forum, to be our first Answerer !

With this role, Richard will help us manage the forum and other creative community activities.

I know it's a not fancy title, but it's a recognition from us for his great support in the community. We hope Richard can help us move this forum to the next level. And then he'll be moved to the next level too, to be a "

Moderator ". (Come on, that one is fancier :P)
Here is Richard in his own word:

40 something geek, with a severe interest in computers, Gadgets, off roading and gardening.

Lead developer at Steatite for Embedded Solutions. Having been employed there since his return from Russia in 2005.

Go Richard!

Weijuan

Standard 2009: Embedded Enabling Features (EEFs) announcements

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I am very pleased to announce that Richard John Eaton , one of the most active contributors in this forum, to be our first Answerer !

With this role, Richard will help us manage the forum and other creative community activities.

I know it's a not fancy title, but it's a recognition from us for his great support in the community. We hope Richard can help us move this forum to the next level. And then he'll be moved to the next level too, to be a "

Moderator ". (Come on, that one is fancier :P)
Here is Richard in his own word:

40 something geek, with a severe interest in computers, Gadgets, off roading and gardening.

Lead developer at Steatite for Embedded Solutions. Having been employed there since his return from Russia in 2005.

Go Richard!

Weijuan

Windows Mobile Development announcements

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WebsitePanel - Development announcements

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Dear friends,

Welcome to WebsitePanel community forums! These forums provide you an opportunity to join WebsitePanel users and share knowledge, get questions answered and learn from other WebsitePanel cutomers. Start by posting WebsitePanel related questions in the forum corresponding to your topic of interest and leverage the knowledge available in your new forum community.

If you have any suggestions or feedbacks to WebsitePanel, please feel free to post in our forums.

WebsitePanel - Enterprise Modules Support announcements

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Dear friends,

Welcome to WebsitePanel community forums! These forums provide you an opportunity to join WebsitePanel users and share knowledge, get questions answered and learn from other WebsitePanel cutomers. Start by posting WebsitePanel related questions in the forum corresponding to your topic of interest and leverage the knowledge available in your new forum community.

If you have any suggestions or feedbacks to WebsitePanel, please feel free to post in our forums.

WebsitePanel - Support announcements

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WebsitePanel - Discussions announcements

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Dear friends,

Welcome to WebsitePanel community forums! These forums provide you an opportunity to join WebsitePanel users and share knowledge, get questions answered and learn from other WebsitePanel cutomers. Start by posting WebsitePanel related questions in the forum corresponding to your topic of interest and leverage the knowledge available in your new forum community.

If you have any suggestions or feedbacks to WebsitePanel, please feel free to post in our forums.

-Feodor Fitsner

Speech Service for Developers announcements

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Please take a moment to review our Bing Voice Service Forum Guidelines.

1. Forums are moderated and if you feel that a post is in violation please "Report As Abuse"

2. Suggest or mark posts as answered so that others know your issue was resolved by the feedback given

3. Create a new post and don't take over an older thread that may not be applicable.

• Link to other threads if you want to expand discussion on the topic discussed in the older thread.

4. Posts must be on-topic for the forum.

5. No personal attacks allowed. Likewise, no racial, ethnic, national, or other slurs are tolerated.

6. Constructive criticism of Bing Voice Recognition Service, API and the sample code is allowed. Wandering into criticism of Microsoft for other reasons is not. Repeated harping on the same issue is not.

7. If someone posts incorrect information, post a correction, and link to the docs that show the correct answer.

The official guidelines are found here: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/wiki/contents/articles/1034.moderating-microsoft-forums.aspx

Thank you and please continue to assist us in improving our forums and community.

Windows Desktop Development for Ink, Touch, and Tablet PC announcements

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gclassy Tuesday, February 8, 2011 5:36 PM

The following link points to the code gallery sample for the Windows Touch Photostrip sample:

http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/wintouchphotostrip

This sample demonstrates how to get past the limitation of only one window receiving WM_TOUCH messages.
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Hello and welcome to the "Ink, Multi-Touch, and Other Tablet PC Development" forum.

This is the place where you can post questions, tricks, tips, and other observations about creating applications that specifically take advantage of natural input methods of ink and touch. Whether you are setting up a development environment, integrating handwriting into an existing application, or creating a state-of-the-art multi-touch client application from the ground up, we will strive to ensure that both other members of the developer community as well as product team members from Microsoft are pointing you to the correct resources and helping out where applicable.

Some resources that you should know about immediately:
- The Windows Developer Center on MSDN (http://msdn.microsoft.com/windows) contains pages dedicated to Tablet and Touch Technology. From the home page, click Technologies, and then click Mobile PC.
- In addition, the Windows Developer Center contains resources specific to Tablet and Touch Technology in the Learn page, including How-Do-I videos and MS Learning webcasts.
- The developer center contains a number of hands-on labs dedicated to Tablet and Touch Technology. The labs--written in C++, C#, and Visual Basic .NET--range from getting started to advanced pen data manipulation.
You can find the Tablet and Touch SDK documentation in the MSDN Library:
- All conceptual topics are grouped together under the Tablet PC Development Guide. This includes native and managed conceptual information.
- All of the native reference documentation is located under the Tablet PC COM Library Reference node.
- The reference documentation for managed APIs is located in the following .NET Framework namespaces:
- In addition, the System.Windows.Controls namespace contains the InkCanvas and the InkPresenter classes.
This forum is NOT for end-user questions or hardware reviews. It is for questions about developing applications using Tablet and Touch technologies. Questions that are out of scope will be redirected to appropriate forums or newsgroups.

This forum is based on a new Forum 3.0 platform which provides many robust features. To know more about Forum 3.0 new features, view the following video:

http://xpstream.winisp.net/samjarawan/msdn%20forums%20overview.wmv

Microsoft Unified Communications Web API announcements

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Microsoft Security Development Lifecycle (SDL) announcements

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Visual Studio Report Controls announcements

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We have recently posted a number of samples that use the ASP.Net ReportViewer. These sample applications cover a wide range of topics. You'll see sample code for long standing ReportViewer concepts such as hooking up data sources to subreports and implementing a custom toolbar. There are also several samples covering areas that are new to the Visual Studio 2010 ReportViewer, such as the JavaScript API.

http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/reportviewer
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After the initial release of the ReportViewer ASP.Net control with Visual Studio 2005, we also released a separate add-on to the Visual Web Developer 2005 Express sku. But when Visual Studio 2008 was released, there was no equivalent add-in for the web developer sku. I'm happy to announce that this add-in is now available for Visual Web Developer 2008 Express Edition.

The ReportViewer control included in this download is the same one that is available with the other Visual Studio 2008 skus. This does not add new functionality to the design time or run time experience beyond making it available in a new sku.

English, French, and Japanese versions are available now. Additional languages will be available soon.

Download Details: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=b67b9445-c206-4ff7-8716-a8129370fa1d

Surface Application Design and Development announcements

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Infragistics*, a Microsoft Surface partner, has developed and released a set of controls that it has released to the Microsoft Surface community of partners and customers. These controls are optimized to run on Microsoft Surface and help create engaging multitouch applications. They include the following:
- The xamSurfaceMap control allowss users to rotate, zoom, and pan the map using contact-hand gestures. It also allows the end user to select and drag elements from the map.
- The xamSurfaceChart control is a 2-D and 3-D chart control which supports more than 50 variations of charts.
- The xamSurfaceCarouselPanel, xamSurfaceCarouselListBox, xamSurfaceDataCarousel controls include read-only grid views of data along a carousel path and carousel scrolling.
You can find these controls and more information about them on the Infragistics Web site.

*Infragistics is providing these controls at no cost to Microsoft Surface customers and is responsible for any support of these controls. Microsoft is not responsible for these controls, and is providing a link to this resource for the benefit of the Microsoft Surface community. Downloading and using these controls is at your own risk.

Expression Web and SuperPreview announcements

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Lori Dirks Thursday, December 20, 2012 7:27 PM

We released important news today about the Expression family of products. Please visit the Expression Community home page for details.
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Welcome to the Expression Web forum! This forum is frequented by users of Expression Web, many of whom are professional web designers. This forum is not a technical support forum for Expression Web. Instead, it's a user-to-user resource for Expression Web users.

While some Microsoft employees visit the forum from time to time, the forum shouldn't be used to contact Microsoft regarding Expression Web or other Microsoft products. If you need support for Expression Web, please open a support case with us via http://support.microsoft.com.

Before you post, check out the FAQ. It contains guidelines on what information is needed in order for other Expression Web users to help you.

Thank you!
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We encourage everyone to treat each other with mutual respect. Everyone should feel comfortable to ask questions and contribute to the community.

Violations of the Code of Conduct will not be tolerated. We reserve the right to remove posts that advocate or encourage violence, bigotry, racism, hatred, or profanity. We may remove postings that are inappropriate, offensive, or that violate the Code of Conduct.

We will eject or ban any user who behaves in a manner deemed inappropriate, offensive, or who violate the Code of Conduct.

Expression Encoder announcements

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Lori Dirks Thursday, December 20, 2012 7:26 PM

We released important news today about the Expression family of products. Please visit the Expression Community home page for details.
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Eric Juteau Tuesday, November 1, 2011 8:57 PM
Expression Encoder 4 SP2 is out! [11/2011]

Anew service pack is now available for Expression Encoder 4, which includes over 300 bug fixes as well as these new features:
- Intel QSV GPU encoding and improved Cuda GPU encoding (Pro only) - More information available here, (QSV and Cuda performance reports are also available).
- 1 and 2-pass VBR for offline H.264 encodes (Pro only)
- More AAC audio options (Pro only)
- SRS audio encoding
- Manage publishing points from within Expression Encoder (Pro only)
- Live crop
- Windows Media Streaming MBR
- Live H.264 VBR 1-pass (Pro only)
- No Screen Capture limit
- Follow mouse cursor
- Template improvements
- New SDK samples
More information about the new features is available here.

Expression Encoder 4 SP1 is out! [1/2011]

The English version of Expression Encoder 4 SP1 has been released and is available here . Other languages will be released shortly.

To install, simply run setup on top of a pre-existing Expression Encoder 4 installation or install it from scratch. If already installed, your license will not be affected.

Besides multiple bug fixes, here are the new features for this release:

- GPU Encoding (Pro only)

- Live Template Support (Pro only)

- Live Screen Capture

- Caption Updates (Pro only)

- Improved De-interlacing Options

- DRM Content Key (Pro only)

- HE-AAC encoding (Pro only)

- Live Push/Pull

- Windows Phone 7 Presets

More information about the new features is available here .

Expression Encoder Blog entry on SP1 release can be found here .

A couple of white papers about GPU Encoding are available here (general) and there (performance report).

Performance Assessment Tool for Live Smooth Streaming Available [9/2010]

We have created a free tool that enables Encoder 4 Pro users to roughly assess what kind of load their encoding workstation can withstand with the supplied specific sources. The tool also enables saving the files that succeeded the encode. It's available here to download .

On a separate note, Jamie Lang posted a white paper on Live Smooth Streaming here.

Screen Capture Codec Available [5/2010]

Also available is the standalone Screen Capture codec installer, available here , which can be freely redistributed. This will enable any DShow-based application, including Movie Maker, DVD Maker and Windows Media Player, to consume the XESC files that the Expression Encoder Screen Capture application outputs.

Encoder SKUs [4/2010]

There are three SKU tiers for Expression Encoder 4:

- Expression Encoder 4: the base SKU (free). This can be downloaded here .

- Expression Encoder 4 Pro without Codecs: includes all features from the base SKU, plus DRM, Live Smooth Streaming and unlimited screen capture (the free version is limited to 10 minutes). This is typically available via some Spark SKUs and MSDN.

- Expression Encoder 4 Pro: includes all features from above, plus all licensed decoders and H.264/AAC encoding. This SKU is available for purchase here . It's also available as a free upgrade from Encoder v3 with IIS Smooth Streaming (see below).

Unfortunately, the premium codecs that we shipped in the full Pro version cannot be distributed via MSDN due to codec licensing agreements.

Here is a list of the codecs in question:

- Decoders: MPEG2, MPEG/TS Splitter, Dolby Digital (AC3), MP4, H.264 and AAC

- Encoders: MP4 and H.264-based Smooth Streaming

Note: While the full-featured Pro SKU is required to get H.264 encoding functionality, 3rd party DShow decoders can be used to import the file formats above. It is also worth noting that some of those decoders may already be available on some operating systems.

More information about the SKU differences can be found here .

Upgrading [4/2010]

Whether you installed the free base SKU or got the Expression Encoder 4 without Codecs SKU and are interested in upgrading to Encoder 4 Pro, simply purchase Expression Encoder 4 Pro here and enter the new key in the application to enabled the codecs and the Pro-only feature.

If you owned either the full retail version of Encoder 3 with IIS Smooth Streaming or the retail full-featured Expression Studio SKU, you can upgrade to Encoder 4 Pro for free. Simply install the base Expression Encoder 4 from here on your PC that has the full retail version of Encoder 3 with IIS Smooth Streaming and your license will automatically be upgraded to the full-featured 4 Pro version. Please also note that both versions of Encoder 3 and 4 can coexist on the same PC, so there is no need to uninstall v3.

Unfortunately, this free upgrade is not available for Web Studio 3 users or MSDN subscriptions.

More information about the free upgrade is available here .

New Features in Expression Encoder 4 [4/2010]

Here is a non-exhaustive list of the new features available in this new version:

- New H.264 Encoder (Pro only)

- High Profile Support

- Advanced Settings

- Increased Performance dramatically

- Live

- Better device support

- Live Smooth Streaming Support (Pro only)

- Redesigned UI

- Statistics & Connections Panel

- Multi-cast support

- Screen Capture (Unlimited in Pro only)

- New SDK

- Better workflow/Capture Management

- Zoom

- Registering the Screen Capture Codec

- Remember last position

- PlayReady DRM (Pro only)

- Project Based User Experience

- Aligned the Smooth Streaming Media Element with IIS (SSME) in our templates

- Added rich DXFP Closed Caption support

More Information / Links

Expression Design announcements

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Lori Dirks Thursday, December 20, 2012 7:25 PM

We released important news today about the Expression family of products. Please visit the Expression Community home page for details.

Expression Blend SketchFlow announcements

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Lori Dirks Thursday, December 20, 2012 7:24 PM

We released important news today about the Expression family of products. Please visit the Expression Community home page for details.

Skype Web SDK announcements

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Preview update for the Skype Web SDK

Skype Web SDK Patrons,

An update is now available for Skype Web SDK preview.

What is included in this preview update:
- This preview update contains information about using the latest Skype Web SDK using new Preview API keys.
- New Skype for Business Web app plugins for Windows and Mac are also available.
- The Skype Web SDK samples have also been updated.
New capabilities and Key resolved issues
- You can now embed and use the Skype Conversation UI control for P2P chats within your application.
- We have resolved several customers reported issues related to Conversations, Chat, Audio and Video. Some key customer reported resolved issues are listed in the release notes.
Action for you

Please provide your feedback on the latest Skype Web SDK preview. Your response helps steer the direction of this SDK. Thank you!

Please respond to the email address below with feedback. SkypeDevInsiders@microsoft.com

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Skype Web SDK Version 0.2.3 Available!

A new code drop is posted to the Skype Content Delivery Network, as of Wednesday, June 10. To use the latest code in your applications follow the instructions here:

https://msdn.microsoft.com/EN-US/library/dn962162(v=office.16).aspx

Download the latest code samples of the Skype Web SDK here:

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn986863(v=office.16).aspx

Release Notes:

Known issues:

1 . The current release of Skype Web SDK is not supported in IE compatible mode.

2. 'Notified' event for selfParticipant.audio.state is not raised on an incoming

audio meeting invite.

3. When participant.video.state is equal to 'Connected', the remote participant may not

have started to stream his own video.

Fixed known issues from the last code release:

1. When a P2P video conversation is escalated to an online meeting, the video cannot be

displayed properly.

2. In a video meeting, if remote participant's video is displayed before it has started, the video might not render properly in the application

Breaking change for 0.2.3:

Version 0.2.3 introduces a change which is backward-incompatible with previous versions. The change improves the creation of 1:1 conversation s and multiparty conversations:

ConversationsManager#createConversation() now always creates a multiparty conversation (meeting). If the intention of the following code was to create a 1:1 conversation

var conv = conversationsManager.createConversation() ;

var participant = conv.createParticipant(person);

conversationsManager.conversations.add(conv);

conv.participants.add(participant);

conv.chatService.start(); // or start any other service

it should be replaced by

var conv = conversationsManager.getConversation(person) ; // this is a shortcut for the first 4 lines above

conv.chatService.start(); // or start any other service

Please see the How To MSDN documentation on Starting Conversations for full details.

Feature Requests, Bugs, and Forums

Please continue to provide feedback on the latest Skype Web SDK through the Skype Developer Preview Connect portal: Skype Web SDK Developer Preview

Skype Developer Preview Team

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Hello and welcome to the new Skype Web SDK forum!

This forum is dedicated to the new Skype Web SDK, the html5/javascript web client API for Skype for Business Server 2015. This API also has some compatibility with Lync Server 2013. This API only supports on-premise environments.

When asking a question, please specify your environment: device, OS, browser, server, and any other related information.

Kinect for Windows v1 SDK announcements

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We are pleased to announce that Kinect for Windows v1.8 is now available and released to the public. The full details of the announcement and features are available on our blog:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/kinectforwindows/archive/2013/09/16/updated-sdk-with-html5-kinect-fusion-improvements-and-more.aspx

Version 1.8 is an in-place update to the previous v1.x versions and are fully compatible. Kinect for Windows SDK 1.8 includes some key features and samples that the community has been asking for, including::
- New background removal. An API removes the background behind the active user so that it can be replaced with an artificial background. This green-screening effect was one of the top requests we're heard in recent months. It is especially useful for advertising, augmented reality gaming, training and simulation, and other immersive experiences that place the user in a different virtual environment.
- Realistic color capture with Kinect Fusion. A new Kinect Fusion API scans the color of the scene along with the depth information so that it can capture the color of the object along with its three-dimensional (3D) model. The API also produces a texture map for the mesh created from the scan. This feature provides a full fidelity 3D model of a scan, including color, which can be used for full color 3D printing or to create accurate 3D assets for games, CAD, and other applications.
- Improved tracking robustness with Kinect Fusion. This algorithm makes it easier to scan a scene. With this update, Kinect Fusion is better able to maintain its lock on the scene as the camera position moves, yielding a more reliable and consistent scanning.
  HTML interaction sample. This sample demonstrates implementing Kinect-enabled buttons, simple user engagement, and the use of a background removal stream in HTML5. It allows developers to use HTML5 and JavaScript to implement Kinect-enabled user interfaces, which was not possible previously—making it easier for developers to work in whatever programming languages they prefer and integrate Kinect for Windows into their existing solutions.
- Multiple-sensor Kinect Fusion sample. This sample shows developers how to use two sensors simultaneously to scan a person or object from both sides—making it possible to construct a 3D model without having to move the sensor or the object! It demonstrates the calibration between two Kinect for Windows sensors, and how to use Kinect Fusion APIs with multiple depth snapshots. It is ideal for retail experiences and other public kiosks that do not include having an attendant available to scan by hand.
- Adaptive UI sample. This sample demonstrates how to build an application that adapts itself depending on the distance between the user and the screen—from gesturing at a distance to touching a touchscreen. The algorithm in this sample uses the physical dimensions and positions of the screen and sensor to determine the best ergonomic position on the screen for touch controls as well as ways the UI can adapt as the user approaches the screen or moves further away from it. As a result, the touch interface and visual display adapt to the user's position and height, which enables users to interact with large touch screen displays comfortably. The display can also be adapted for more than one user.
Key links:
- What's New in version 1.8 of the SDK and the Developer Toolkit
- Download Kinect for Windows SDK 1.8
- Download Kinect for Windows Toolkit 1.8
- Download Kinect for Windows Runtime 1.8
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Hello and please take a moment to review our Kinect for Windows Forum Guidelines

Specific K4W Forum Rules of Conduct
1. Forums are moderated and if you feel that a post is in violation please "Report As Abuse"
2. Suggest or mark posts as answered so that others know your issue was resolved by the feedback given
3. Create a new post and don't pile onto an older thread that may not be applicable.
  - Link to other threads if you want to expand discussion on the topic discussed in the older thread.
4. Posts must be on-topic for the forum.
  - In the K4W forums' case, that means posting about K4W.
  - Comparisons to other Kinect libraries are tolerated, but our forums are not the place to discuss other libraries.
5. No personal attacks allowed. Likewise, no racial, ethnic, national, or other slurs are tolerated.
6. Constructive criticism of K4W and the SDK is allowed. Wandering into criticism of Microsoft for other reasons is not. Repeated harping on the same issue is not.
7. If someone posts incorrect information, post a correction, and link to the docs that show the correct answer.
8. We will ban people for trolling. Typing "M$" for "Microsoft" is always considered trolling.
The official guidelines are found here: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/wiki/contents/articles/1034.moderating-microsoft-forums.aspx

Thank you and please continue to assist us in improving our forums and community.

Chris   Wojahn

Microsoft   Kinect / Surface Solutions & Support

Escalation   Engineer, Critical Problem Resolution
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Windows Filtering Platform (WFP) announcements

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Now that you have your WFP callout developed, how can you make sure it adheres to Microsoft's recommendations? Starting with Windows 7, you can run the Windows Hardware Certification Kit (HCK) (formerly known as the Windows Logo Kit (WLK)). This kit will run tests against your callout driver to help find issues with your driver due to interoperability, non-conformant practices, and general bugs. To get started please visit:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/hardware/hh748200.aspx

Thanks,