Paul Mooney

Security by design

We had a wonderful Event yesterday at Microsoft’s NYC office, through the NYCDOTNET UG. About forty of us booked and paid on-line and Brian Noyes came to town to teach us code security, the foundation of any secure application. It was a great day, I felt as if I was back in collage as I knew just about everyone in the room. We have come a long way from dot-what and Brian went away having learned a thing or two from our engaged group.

Microsoft is sponsoring a Security Summit, coming to a city near you soon.

Mobile Blogging

We're on our way….and RSS is taking us there. This is cool, it’s exciting, and my PocketPC will never be the same! I’m using a web based aggregator that does all the surfing for me. I have Bloglines; set as my homepage, arriving at a Hot Spot I quickly learn what’s new in my world with just a tap. The best news: this is a no spam zone, no attachments, worms or viruses! You just follow the feed! What could be better?

It always gets better…..Visual Studio.NET 2005; will be loaded with Mobility enhancements; RSS is changing the way we communicate.

XNA

"Software will be the single most important force in digital entertainment over the next decade. XNA underscores Microsoft's commitment to the game industry and our desire to work with partners to take the industry to the next level."
  - Bill Gates, founder and chief software architect of Microsoft

XNA Home

Microsoft XNA is the catalyst for a new ecosystem of interchangeable, interoperable software tools and technologies from Microsoft, middleware and game development companies. By integrating software innovations across Microsoft platforms and across the industry, XNA forms a common environment that liberates developers from spending too much time writing mundane, repetitive boilerplate code. Instead, XNA frees game creators to spend their time where it matters most -on the creativity that differentiates their games.

MS RSS

RSS is approaching critical mass, it's changed my life in many ways and it can do the same for you!

New to RSS? Then read up.

The elephant in the room...

Regardless of our opinion of the Brussels decision, the headlines and sound bits are everywhere. HP is talking up Linux, IBM is delighted, Sun is beaming, and Dell will do anything to save a nickel. Where does that leave those of us committed to Microsoft Technologies? I’m running WindowsXP SP2 now, and so far so good. I love the new Office System, but the Great Moments at Work advertising campaign was useless. Yesterday at the event I attended a copy was given away as “Microsoft Office” and the winner was not jumping up and down, she didn’t even smile.

Steve Ballmer has been forthcoming, but Bill Gates is obfuscating while Jerry Kaplan the “Fat Lady” has yet to sing.

Pervasive Computing

Going Mobile

Enter the Mobile2Market Application Contest 4 Grand Prizes, 20 Finalists: Submit your applications for Windows Mobile-based Pocket PCs and Smartphones to the Mobile2Market Application Contest and you could earn US $25,000 and application distribution. In addition, five finalists in each category receive featured promotions through Mobile2Market.

Innovation - turn it on

This whirlwind of litigation, lawyers, judges, commissioners, and journalists does nothing to help my computer run better. Microsoft is a monopoly by default, no one else is stepping up to the plate, IBM, Sun, and Oracle, are up in the stands selling peanuts and Cracker Jacks. Are we waiting for Finland, while forgetting New Jersey first created software? All the time, money, and energy that have been used to boo Microsoft could have helped create a new Software company to challenge the world champ. I’m from The Bronx; we have a baseball team and the season is just beginning....   

Dear Andy

MINNEAPOLIS not BRUSSELS was the big story today.  The EU commission's 492 Euro fine was big news around the world, but as we all knew Microsoft will appeal the ruling.  Jerry Kaplan for years has claimed Microsoft ruined his business, now he has prof.

MyDevDays

Welcome!

MyDevDays, the website is fantastic! More links then 20 golf courses, videos, special offers and content, content, content!  Not much trafic...yet, but it is sure to become popular and possibly a precursor of things to come....

Fines and Stars

Antitrust Fine for Microsoft Said to Be $613 Million 

Juxtapose with:

 Chris Sells:    I've been programming for 22 years, and have seen remarkable changes in one key area: productivity. Comparing the tools, libraries, runtimes, and development environments that were available when I started, to those available now, is like night and day. The sheer amount of functionality and robustness in today's applications (as compared to the number of lines of code you have to write yourself) has to be several orders of magnitude different.

.Net Rock Stars: Chris Sells

The Blog that ate Seattle

Yesterday evening I had a look at ScottW’s blog and clicked on a link there and up popped a guy named Paul!   Granted the Scobleizer is the grandfather of all Microsoft blogs, but there’s more. A while back I asked my good friend Mr.Goggle a question, the answer I got was something I had written on DonXML’s blog!

Now I have been banging away on this Internet since before the day of the www, but I have never received as many bounces as I am with this blogging.....

Longhorn for Developers

DevDays in NJ#

I left my house at 6:30 to avoid the traffic crunch, arrived in time to sit down and enjoy breakfast. Met a few from our user group njmsdev.org and sat down for the opening keynotes (there weren’t 50 people there at 8:15).  I signed up for the Smart Client Track, where one of the presenters was James Arendt, whom I met at the 2002 Visual Studio.Net Launch in Parsippany NJ (there were over a thousand developers that day), he was a Java Developer then but quickly adapted  to .Net. We were to have a Dev Dinner after DevDays, but there weren’t any suitable places in the swamps of Jersey, so we gathered at the bar (better to network and drink then to sit in traffic). I got to meet Scott Watermasysk; two years ago I joined his NJ .Net UG with a cool website, one of the first in ASP.Net. I also met Doug Seven; three years ago I joined his community site! Circles are closing….

DevDays in NJ

DevDays in NJ this year had great content, first class presenters, but the location, location, location ensured that the attendance would be lite. I know the people at MSDN want to reach each and every Developer and aspiring Developer in NJ, but by placing the event in the Meadowlands with it's insane traffic congestion someone@microsoft had another agenda. I wrote to the DevDays Team and got back the usual “Thank-you for contacting Microsoft...”

My main concern is that someone else at Microsoft will look at the attendance in NJ and decide not to have a DevDays in NJ next year!

Invention not litigation

Sundays NYT's asks the question “is RealNetworks the next Netscape”?  I fear America is the next Netscape. Innovation not litigation is the only way out of our economic doldrums. Competition drives innovation.

Egypt, Greece, Rome and Britain each in their time declined, what can we learn from history?   

Scusa Mario, è un libero download!

One wonders if Steve Ballmer ever downloaded Realplayer? If I had a chance to talk to Mario Monti I'd show him my laptop loaded with adware and nagware courtesy of Realone. There are websites that require you to download Realplayer for content, it never occurred to me to sue Realone for all the lost productivity I have suffered as result of their adware and nagware.

This is the latest chapter of Silicon Valley vs Microsoft being fought near the fields of Flanders and the Ardenne . The BIG question from me is why can't Europe or California create an OS that I might want to buy and install?

Make Jobs not War

A few weeks ago returning form JFK to NJ I emerged from the subway at Chambers Street and looked around for the new WTC PATH station. I turned a corner and continued along a fenced corridor when suddenly I realized I was beside the hole that will forever be known as Ground Zero.  Looking down I was struck by the silence, looking around I could not see a soul.  I was alone in the tragic zone, 11PM on a Tuesday and my emotions were running high. Vengeance is so unbecoming of a democracy, how many more must die.

Where's Paul?