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Drumbeat of leaks leads to high expectations for upgrade, but pricing, form factor and apps need attention, too

Microsoft’s failure thus far to significantly spark PC and tablet sales with Windows 8 has put high expectations on an expected 2013 refresh of the OS, dubbed “Blue.”

But changes to the operating system’s feature set, tweaks to its user interface (UI) and modifications to some of its subcomponents are actually solutions to minor problems, analysts said. They point to more important issues like pricing and positioning, app shortages and enterprise reluctance as beyond the scope of an upgrade.

Microsoft has said little of Blue, the code name for the first Windows 8 upgrade, reportedly to ship this summer or fall, as well as the moniker for the company’s faster-paced development and release schedule. It’s only acknowledged the code name and touted what it’s called a new “continuous” update strategy for Windows on desktops, tablets, servers and smartphones.

For example, last week Microsoft’s CFO Peter Klein used the “Windows Blue” label, and added, “With Windows 8, we are setting a new, accelerated pace for updates and innovations.”

Several long-time Windows watchers, including Mary Jo Foley of ZDNet, Paul Thurrott of Supersite for Windows and Tom Warren of The Verge, have been tracking leaked builds of Windows Blue — which may be named Windows 8.1 — and describing its changes in detail.

The constant barrage of news, minor in each instance but cumulative over time, has many setting high expectations for Blue. “There are high expectations for Blue,” agreed J.P. Gownder, an analyst with Forrester Research. “It’s positioned as a much bigger release than a service pack, because it will augment the core products.”

Microsoft’s service packs, the historical form of its interim updates between new Windows editions, have included few feature changes, instead limiting themselves to collecting bug and security fixes released previously.

Windows 8 is not in danger of dying, analysts stressed, but many of them called the focus on UI changes and small-to-medium enhancements and additions misplaced. Microsoft has bigger fish to fry.

“I look at Windows 8, no matter how many iterations it goes through, as a transitional product,” said Michael Silver of Gartner. “Windows 8 is very transitional. It has lots of rough edges where the desktop and touch interfaces didn’t integrate. But the hardware is transitional, too. Really, 2013 is sort of a lost year for Microsoft and Windows.”

Future processors from Intel, including the Clover Trail and Bay Trail upgrades to its Atom architecture, will be necessary, said Silver, to put enough power and long-enough battery life into Windows tablets.

Others cited different problems Microsoft faces.
“First of all, price is a major issue,” said Peter King, an analyst who focuses on tablets for U.K.-based Strategic Analytics, in a Thursday interview. “Clearly the market wants cheaper tablets. Everyone’s ASPs [average selling prices] are declining, Android’s most of all. Windows tablets’ [ASPs] are too high.”

Microsoft does plan on addressing price this year. “We are working closely with OEMs on a new suite of small touch devices powered by Windows,” Klein said during an earnings call with Wall Street a week ago. “These devices will have competitive price points, partly enabled by our latest OEM offerings designed specifically for these smaller devices, and will be available in the coming months.”

Analysts heard the line “latest OEM offerings designed specifically for these smaller devices,” as confirmation that Microsoft will lower the price of Windows to computer and tablet makers, or provide rebates on their license purchases.

“When Microsoft conceived this [Windows 8 and Windows RT] project in 2010, tablet prices were high,” said King. “But the world’s changed very quickly. The trend is towards smaller, cheaper tablets.”

Fewer than half of the tablets expected to ship in 2013 will sport screens larger than 8 inches, King said, echoing other forecasts by the likes of IDC.

Microsoft, in other words, aimed at quickly-disappearing target with its demand for 10-in. screens for Windows 8 and Windows RT devices, and now must scramble to shift gears.

Michael Cherry, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft, saw an alternative reason why Windows Blue, although perhaps welcome, isn’t enough to markedly move the meter for Microsoft.

“Windows 8 sucks because Windows 8 apps suck,” said Cherry, not mincing words. “And there’s nothing in all these rumors of Windows Blue or Windows 8.1 that tells me that apps will be easier to write or that will result in better apps.”

Microsoft’s apps tally — those touch-centric programs that run in Windows RT and in Windows 8′s “Modern”-style UI — are far behind that of those for Android and iOS tablets. More important, experts have said since the October 2012 launch of Windows 8, is the lack of high-quality, must-have apps necessary to make Microsoft-powered tablets or convertible device competitive with devices relying on rival operating systems.

Cherry strongly argued that until Microsoft can solve the apps problem, nothing else it does will really matter.

“Everyone’s obsessed with the look of the thing. What do I care about a Start button in Windows 8 if I spend all my time on the desktop? It’s the lack of good applications [that's hurting Windows]. And from what I can tell, developers aren’t going to get anything from Blue. I don’t see anything about apps getting better.”

To prove his point, Cherry pointed to the apps Microsoft has created for Windows 8 and Windows RT, such as the “Mail, Calendar, People and Messaging” app.

“If that’s the best Microsoft can do, if that’s what they come up with, with their resources, it’s no surprise that there’s not a [third-party] app worth a darn,” said Cherry.

Rather than tout its new, faster release cadence, Microsoft should instead tell developers what it will do to help them make top-notch apps. Without those, Cherry questioned the entire Windows strategy. “Make a statement of intentions on development,” he urged Microsoft. “Tell developers, ‘We’re going to get you all the assistance and all the documentation you need, we will create apps that are so full-featured that they will inspire you to write great apps.’”

Microsoft may be able to solve the pricing, form factor and app problems these analysts see as critical to Windows’ transition from a desktop OS to one that works equally well on touch-enabled tablets. None are counting the company out.

Continuing coverage: Windows 8
“Never assume that the first iteration will succeed,” said King of Strategic Analytics. “For a small company, a failure could be disastrous, but for Microsoft, as large as it is, it’s just a hiccup.”

“I don’t think this is Microsoft’s last shot [at Windows 8 success],” said Forrester’s Gownder of Blue. “Microsoft has made missteps with Windows 8, but they did the same with Windows Vista. And they moved on. They have an established position in the market, and a lot to offer. They’ll get there.”

Gartner’s Silver may not have been that optimistic — “Blue isn’t going to save Windows or PCs,” he said in an interview earlier this week — but like Gownder, he conceded that Microsoft has more than one chance of making Windows 8 palatable to consumers and enterprises.

“They’d better have multiple iterations of Windows 8, because its attempt so far to blunt the affect of tablets on PC sales was pretty minimal,” Silver said. “Microsoft is right in looking toward the next release, admitting it make mistakes. At least it’s a step in the right direction.”

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Windows 8 Update: transition from Android to Windows Phone made easier
Also, iPad keyboard/cover to rival Surface, 8-inch Windows 8 tablet

UPDATE: Microsoft has delayed availability of its Switch to Windows Phone app until sometime next week.

Microsoft figures customers will be more likely to switch from Android smartphones to Windows 8 phones if it makes it easier to find the same or similar apps for their new phone as were on their old phones.

Microsoft is introducing Switch to Windows Phone, an application that finds identical or replacement applications for Windows Phone 8 in the Windows Store to replace their old Android apps.

The new application, which is being released today, is not available for iPhones.
Switch to Windows 8 inventories all the applications on the Android phone and sends that inventory to the Microsoft SkyDrive cloud. When customers log in to the same SkyDrive account from the Switch to Windows 8 app loaded on their Windows Phone 8, the app finds the same set of applications. If there are no exact replacements, the app recommends similar ones, according to Guru Gowrappan, executive vice president for products at application search firm Quixey.

Quixey supplies the apps-search engine within Switch to Windows 8. The engine uses descriptions of apps, reviews of apps, trouble reports about apps and other metadata it gathers from the Web to recommend substitute applications to users, Gowrappan says. The goal is to make them as close as possible to matching the app on the Android phone.

In the case of Switch to Windows 8, the Quixey search engine goes through the 135,000 Windows Phone 8 applications in the Windows Store seeking direct matches – such as the Windows Phone 8 Facebook app to replace the Android Facebook app – or to find applications that perform as close to the same function as possible, he says.

The search engine can also look for applications based on what customers want to do. So a customer could enter “cook Italian food” into the engine and would get a list of apps such as Tuscan Chef and Italian Video Recipes.

Sprint Zone and Sprint Digital Lounge use Quixey’s engine to find apps as does ask.com for searching Android, iOS, Windows Phone and Blackberry applications.

Keyboard for iPads mimics Surface
Logitech is selling a thin, fabric-covered keyboard/cover for iPads that give the Apple tablets similar functionality to Microsoft’s Windows 8 Surface tablet/laptops.

Called FabricSkin Keyboard Folio, the keyboards attach magnetically to iPads and flop down to convert from being a cover to being a keyboard. The device includes a prop to hold the screen at a slant for better viewing when typing. It can also fold over to allow use of the iPad as a tablet.

At $150, that puts iPads with keyboards on a price par with some models of Surface tablets with keyboards.

Some differences: Surface supports Office applications and a file system, something iPads lack. Surface draws power from the computer battery; FabricSkin Keyboard Folio has its own rechargeable battery. The Surface keyboard communicates with the tablet via direct electrical connection; FabricSkin Keyboard Folio uses Bluetooth.

8-inch Windows 8 tablet
Acer is coming out with an 8-inch tablet running Windows 8 if a leaked photo is to be believed.
Windows 8
The photo here was posted by the site minimachines.net but taken down at Acer’s request.

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QUESTION 1
You work as a senior developer at Certkingdom.com. The Certkingdom.com network consists of a single domain named Certkingdom.com.
You are running a training exercise for junior developers. You are currently discussing the use of
the Queue <T> collection type.
Which of the following is TRUE with regards to the Queue <T>collection type?

A. It represents a first in, first out (FIFO) collection of objects.
B. It represents a last in, first out (LIFO) collection of objects.
C. It represents a collection of key/value pairs that are sorted by key based on the associated
IComparer<T> implementation.
D. It represents a list of objects that can be accessed by index.

Answer: A

Explanation:

QUESTION 2
You work as a developer at Certkingdom.com. The Certkingdom.com network consists of a single domain named Certkingdom.com.
You have written the following code segment:
int[] filteredEmployeeIds = employeeIds.Distinct().Where(value => value !=
employeeIdToRemove).OrderByDescending(x => x).ToArray();
Which of the following describes reasons for writing this code? (Choose two.)

A. To sort the array in order from the highest value to the lowest value.
B. To sort the array in order from the lowest value to the highest value.
C. To remove duplicate integers from the employeeIds array.
D. To remove all integers from the employeeIds array.

Answer: A,C

Explanation:

QUESTION 3
You work as a senior developer at Certkingdom.com. The Certkingdom.com network consists of a single domain
named Certkingdom.com.
You are running a training exercise for junior developers. You are currently discussing the use of a
method that moves the SqlDataReader on to the subsequent record.
Which of the following is the SqlDataReader method that allows for this?

A. The Read method.
B. The Next method.
C. The Result method.
D. The NextResult method.

Answer: A

Explanation:

QUESTION 4
You work as a developer at Certkingdom.com. The Certkingdom.com network consists of a single domain named Certkingdom.com.
You have received instructions to create a custom collection for Certkingdom.com. Objects in the
collection must be processed via a foreach loop.
Which of the following is TRUE with regards to the required code?

A. The code should implement the ICollection interface.
B. The code should implement the IComparer interface.
C. The code should implement the IEnumerable interface.
D. The code should implement the IEnumerator interface.

Answer: C

Explanation:

QUESTION 5
You work as a senior developer at Certkingdom.com. The Certkingdom.com network consists of a single domain named Certkingdom.com.
You are running a training exercise for junior developers. You are currently discussing the use of LINQ queries.
Which of the following is NOT considered a distinct action of a LINQ query?

A. Creating the query.
B. Obtaining the data source.
C. Creating the data source.
D. Executing the query.

Answer: C

Explanation:

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Also: Windows RT gets dissed, iPads beware Windows 8

There are now more than 50,000 Windows 8-only applications available in the Windows Store, a big jump from when Windows 8 launched, but a far cry from what the company projected just before the launch.

According to the website MetroStore Scanner, the store has 50,341 apps on the shelves, finally reaching that number over the weekend after more or less growing steadily at 10% per month since last October. There was a spike in December perhaps as part of the Christmas rush.

ANALYSIS: What if Windows 8 flops?
But back in October Microsoft predicted it would have an inventory of more than 100,000 by the end of January, and now nearly two months later has just half that has materialized.

It’s bad news for Windows 8 and Microsoft because by the company’s own admission applications designed for the touch-friendly operating system are essential for attracting customers to it. Compelling apps mean more converts.

Getting apps has proven a challenge, with the latest enticement being an offer of $100 to developers for every Windows 8 app they get placed in the Windows Store up to 10. They can reap the bounty for an additional 10 Windows Phone 8 apps in the Windows Phone Store. “Offer good only to the first 10,000 qualified applications published in the Windows Store and/or Windows Phone Store, or until the end of the promotional period, whichever comes first,” Microsoft says.

That’s $1 million Microsoft is ponying up to stimulate apps development in this promotion alone. That doesn’t include the cost of developer trainings and a generous royalty agreement for the most popular applications.

While 50,000 apps is a benchmark, it’s coming too late for it to be considered a positive benchmark.

Jettison Windows RT?
Meanwhile, Microsoft is using the same Windows Store stats to defend Windows RT, the hardware/software platform based on ARM chips that runs a light version of Windows 8 and can handle only Windows Store Modern applications.

Windows RT came under fire recently from IDC, which suggested Microsoft dump the package. It is intended to compete with iPads, but hasn’t made strong inroads so far. Nevertheless, Microsoft’s corporate vice president of Windows planning told CNET that “as the number of apps grow in the store, that value promise only gets stronger.”

That value promise was based on a narrow set of circumstances. “Let’s say you drop that PC in a pool. Well, you get a new one and then you just redownload [the apps],” he told CNET. “That’s the kind of model people are used to with a phone or tablet today. I can maintain all the apps in the [Microsoft] store and reset with a single switch. So, on Windows RT, the user experience stays consistent over time.”

iPads beware
Despite the attack on Windows RT, the full Windows 8 software that supports any app that runs on Windows 7 is getting praised as an operating system for tablets.

Moor Insights and Strategy says in a whitepaper that Windows 8 tablets offer more than one advantage over Apple’s tablet. “Enterprise IT can and are deploying iPads but are doing so at an increased cost, time and complexity than PCs,” the paper says.

These tablets are PCs only without the keyboard, and so have a the manageability of a laptop with the touch centricity of Windows 8. The Intel Clover Trail processor gives the devices performance per watt that is comparable to that of the iPad, the paper says. “Through the combination of Intel Clover Trail and Windows 8, HP, Dell and Lenovo have created tablets that take the best the consumer elements of the iPad and adds to it enterprise features IT wants in their next generation tablets,” it says. “Enterprises should immediately evaluate the latest enterprise tablet offerings from HP, Dell and Lenovo and make their decisions on future deployments incorporating those additional options.”

Acer likes Windows 8
Acer President Jim Wong had some nice things to say about Windows 8 tablets recently during a financials conference call.

According to StreetInsider.com, Wong expects sales of tablets in general to pick up over the course of 2013.

According to the website, “More importantly, Wong said that momentum in Microsoft Windows 8 devices has been improving. Acer Chairman J.T. Wang echoed the sentiment during the company’s conference call, saying that Microsoft “has done some good things finally” to revitalize the Windows ecosystem.”

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IDC: Windows 8 a factor in lower 2012 PC sales
Better acceptance of Windows 8 could help a PC rebound later this year

The final numbers are in showing that PC makers shipped fewer machines last year than in 2011, and Windows 8 is among several factors being blamed by IDC for the decline, which is expected to continue this year.

Looking back IDC found that in 2012 total worldwide shipments of PCs was down 3.7%, including desktop and portable PCs.

The trend was worse in mature markets — the U.S., Canada, Western Europe and Japan — with a dip of 4%. Emerging markets — Asia/Pacific, Latin America the Middle East and Africa — were down 1.4%.

Limited interest in Windows 8 led last year to a dismal fourth quarter, IDC says in its latest Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker. Volume dropped 8.3% in Q4 2012 compared to Q4 2011, wiping out a potential bump during the normally robust holiday sales quarter, IDC says. That’s the largest drop ever recorded for a holiday season.

IDC described the reception of Windows 8, which launched in October, as “underwhelming.” Also contributing to the slow fourth quarter were tight IT budgets and a continuing poor world economy.

Hurting the potential lift that Windows 8 might have provided was the lack of components for touchscreen devices — the type of machine Windows 8 was designed to work best on. That makes the touchscreen devices that are available seem expensive compared to non-touch devices, IDC says.

Still, Windows 8 could help PC sales rebound somewhat late this year, says Rajani Singh, a research analyst at IDC. “IDC expects the second half of 2013 to regain some marginal momentum partly as a rubber band effect from 2012, and largely thanks to the outcome of industry restructuring, better channel involvement, and potentially greater acceptance of Windows 8,” he says. But it still won’t be enough to register growth; IDC projects worldwide PC sales in 2013 to drop another 1.3%.

The end of support for Windows XP should force more PC upgrades later this year as well, which could help bolster shipments later in 2013, Singh says.

The study doesn’t include tablets because they aren’t the functional equivalents of PCs, but their popularity among consumers helps siphon off dollars that otherwise might be spent on PCs, says Loren Loverde, vice president for Worldwide PC Trackers at IDC. “Growth in emerging regions has slowed considerably, and we continue to see constrained PC demand as buyers favor other devices for their mobility and convenience features,” Loverde says.

Long-term shipments of PCs shows better but still modest growth, the report says, projecting a 9% increase between 2012 and the end of 2017.

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Windows 8 Update: Supply-challenged Surface Pros to go on sale in 6 more countries
Also: Windows 8 upgrade rumored for summer, more Windows 8 ads queued, deals on Windows 8 machines

Microsoft has run out of Windows Surface Pro tablets twice in a month but is forging ahead with plans to make them available in six more countries.

According to today’s Surface blog the six countries are Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Russia, Singapore and Taiwan. The Surface Pro and Surface RT will be available there “in the coming months.”

With luck the supply of the machines will be better in these countries than it has been in the U.S. and Canada, where Microsoft has run out of Surface Pros twice. Microsoft hasn’t spelled out the reasons for the shortages.

“We are focused on meeting demand in current markets for Surface Pro and are working super hard to get new inventory into retail but recognize demand exists in other countries as well,” the blog post says. “We are committed to working with our retail partners to ensure we are delivering a great experience in the above mentioned countries for our customers.”

More promos
“Microsoft is about to embark on a second wave of Windows 8 client hardware promotions and user education,” according to a Computerworld article from the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

The story quotes Christopher Flores, director of communications for the Windows client division, who was interviewed at the show, where Microsoft is said to be keeping a low profile but meeting with partners off-site.

This new promotional wave might have something to do with the launch this week of Office 365, which has been redesigned for the touch capabilities that are such a key part of Windows 8. Demonstrating new Office features that Windows 8 supports better than Windows 7 might move some customers to accelerate their decisions to adopt the new operating system.

Windows Blue
Rumors have swirled for weeks that Microsoft is working on Windows Blue, the next iteration if its operating system. If the company follows past release patterns, this won’t be the major transformation that Windows 8 was. More likely it will represent what might be called a service pack in earlier Windows operating system releases.

There’s even a projected date for when Windows Blue (that’s just a code name) will reach the release-to-manufacturer stage: June 7, according to a post on a Chinese-language site that was discovered by Mary Jo Foley.

The site, Win8China, doesn’t attribute where it got its information, but seems to assert that Windows Blue will become the commercial version by the end of the summer. It’s hard to tell exactly from the translation of the site provided by Google Chrome.

Here’s how the translation reads, in part: “The development cycle time RTM version completed in the mid-term of 2013 (the beginning of the end of June -7), MSDN and other users will then use the priority, and then in August it will be open to all Win8 user upgrade download, as well as pre-installed into the new devices inside a PC, Tablet PC, laptop, ultra-extreme.”

Windows 8 tablet discount
Best Buy is knocking $100 off any Windows 8 touchscreen laptop, which in some cases represents an 18% discount.

Some people have linked the sale to the rumored availability of Windows Blue this summer, leading them to conclude that Best Buy is trying to unload current Windows 8 machines before the new version makes them obsolete.

Or the chain might have overstocked Windows 8 tablets and wants to clear its inventory. Or it might be getting ready to stock up on newer hardware due out later this year that blends features of tablets and laptops.

Windows 8 for dunking
Speaking of new hardware, Fujitsu is coming out with a Windows 8 tablet that can sit in a tub of water for half an hour and still work when it gets out.

It’s called Arrows Tab Q582/F and is on display at the Mobile World Congress. It costs about $1,350 to start.

Here’s how Fujitsu describes it: “With the terminal cap and slot cap tightly closed, IPX5 and IPX8 water resistance features protect the tablet from water damage. IPX5 designation indicates that the tablet can normally function after being sprayed with water from a nozzle with a diameter of 6.3 mm at a rate of 12.5 liters per minute from a distance of approximately 3 meters for a period of at least 3 minutes. The IPX8 designation indicates that the tablet will function normally after being immersed in room-temperature tap water to a depth of 1.5 meters for 30 minutes. When the terminal cap and slot caps are tightly closed IP5X dust resistance features protect the tablet from dust damage. IP5X indicates that the tablet can be left in an environment with dust particles with a diameter of 75 µm or less for 8 hours and still function and remain safe to use.”

Windows 8 Pro mobile phone
A company called i-mate says it is coming out with a mobile phone that runs the full Windows 8 Pro operating system. That’s Windows 8, not Windows Phone 8.

When it comes out later this year, it can be purchased with a docking kit that hooks the device into a desktop phone, monitor, keyboard and mouse. The kit includes a tablet driven wirelessly by the phone, which is called Intelegent.

As a standalone, Intelegent costs $750; with the kit, $1,500 and the company hopes to launch the products this summer.

All of this is according to a column in the Seattle Times.

A company spokesman says an i-mate team is at Mobile World Congress this week and couldn’t do an interview. “The i-mate Development Inc. team is busy at Mobile World Congress. We’ll reach out if they become available at a later date,” he spokesman says in an email.

The spokesman also says the Seattle Times column is accurate on details about the phone.

It will be interesting to see whether this device actually comes into being, what its battery life will be (driving an Intel Clover Trail processor) and whether the company can line up service providers that will support it.

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I recently acquired a Nokia Lumia 920 to experiment with Windows Phone 8. But a few weeks in, I’m already back to my Android-based device.

A few months ago, I forced myself to switch to Windows 8 on my desktop system (and laptop) and ended up liking the operating system very much. Once I got used to the quirks and garish look of the new Start screen and learned many of the shortcuts built into Windows 8, I found myself enjoying the operating system and was more than pleased by its myriad of enhancements and performance improvements.

I initially made the switch to Windows 8 because I wanted to fully immerse myself into the OS before formulating any strong opinions. Considering how much I ended up liking Windows 8 on my desktop, I thought I would conduct a similar experiment with my smartphone. For the last few years, I have been deeply entrenched in the Android ecosystem and have experience with a multitude of devices. I enjoy installing custom ROMs on the devices and have experimented with countless apps and utilities. At this point my smartphone is an integral part of my day-to-day computing, and I’ve grown fond of a handful of apps and the convenience of always having my inboxes and access to the web in my pocket.
I picked up a [Windows Phone 8-based Nokia Lumia 920 and was initially impressed. The hardware itself is excellent. The Lumia 920’s camera is top notch. The device is obviously well-built. The screen looks great, and navigating through Windows Phone 8 was smooth as silk. At first, my Android-based device (currently a Samsung Galaxy Note II) remained my daily driver. I kept the Lumia 920 handy until I felt I was comfortable using its email client, browsing the web. But eventually I customized the Start screen to my liking and got a good feel for what Microsoft and Nokia were trying to accomplish with the phone. I installed only a couple of apps and got comfortable with them too.

After a couple of weeks and a good initial impression, I decided to dive in head-first and make the Lumia 920 my daily device. At first, I was happy with the decision. I dug the Live Tiles and the Lumia 920 never lost its luster; it’s a great phone.

But as I started to install more and more apps and dig deeper into the Windows Phone App Store, I was regularly disappointed. There seemed to be three kinds of apps available for Windows Phone 8:

Apps specifically designed for the OS that showed signs of greatness
Quick-and-dirty ports of apps obviously designed for other platforms
Kludges that were nothing more than wrappers for mobile websites

The apps designed with Windows Phone 8 in mind were mostly great. I especially liked the IMDB app, which blows away its counterparts on other mobile platforms. The Facebook app was also very fast and responsive, but it wastes a TON of screen real estate with larger-than-necessary fonts in the navigation menu and wasted white space in the feed. There were times when I could only see a single post in my news feed because of all the wasted screen real estate. I’m not sure what the app developers were thinking with that one.

Then there were the obvious ports that just didn’t look right on Windows Phone 8. One in particular, Words with Friends, comes to mind. I know it’s an older title and games aren’t a necessity, but I enjoy playing Words with Friends; it’s a nice break in the day. Anyway, fonts (like the one used to display the score) were nearly illegible and the game is just plain broken. As of a couple of weeks ago, you couldn’t use words with the letter “Z” and the main screen wouldn’t update when it was your turn. You’d think with the amount of complaints logged in the app store someone at Microsoft would fix the game, but no such luck.

And then there’s apps like YouTube, which seem to be little more than wrappers for the YouTube mobile site. Minimal effort was put into optimizing the app for Windows Phone 8, and it shows.

As you probably guessed by now, my little experience was a failure. I’m back to my Android device and don’t plan to give Windows Phone 8 another try for a few months. If Microsoft wants people to give Windows Phone 8 serious consideration, they’ve got to get serious about offering quality apps for the platform. It’s not just about the number of available apps, it’s about the quality, and at this point in time Windows Phone 8 trails in both departments.

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Despite an unending stream of FUD being hurled at the Surface tablet, people who have bought it seem pretty enamored with their purchase, according to reviews piling up on BestBuy.com and Staples.

Microsoft launched the Surface tablet in its retail stores, all 65 of them, before expanding to Best Buy (1,900 stores total) and Staples (1,400 stores) earlier this month.

So far, sentiments for the device are fairly positive. On Best Buy’s website, the Windows RT tablet sports a 4.7 out of 5 rating, based on 28 customer reviews. Only one customer was unhappy with the device and rated it one out of five stars.

“No Outlook so not full MS Office, all other tablets have version of word, excel, and powerpoint, so very disappointing,” wrote customer gates77. He liked screen customization, but also noted “Battery life wasn’t to [sic] good and typecover isn’t as good as some logitech keyboards. Can’t load any of my windows 7 programs.”

The most popular feature about Surface RT seems to be Windows 8. “Windows 8 runs like a charm, the Windows Apps Store is growing by the day and I am able to use all my favorite apps such as iHeartRadio, NY Times, USA Today, Kayak, Netflix, Endgadget, eBay, ESPN…” wrote Cricketer from New York on Staples.com.

“The live tiles are a great innovation,” wrote Philipm785 of Atlanta. “They provide genuinely useful information without having to launch the apps and the multiple sizes and custom groupings that can be easily scrolled and zoomed are way easier to get around than the multiple screens of tiny uniform icons you get on iOS.”

The hardware is also receiving kudos. “It’s a perfect laptop replacement for those who don’t need lot of processing power. Don’t wait for the surface pro. The battery life is all day,” wrote desiboy of New York on BestBuy.com.

“I gave away my Android tablet after using this for a while,” wrote MZach of NC. “The keyboard and touchpad are unobtrusive but there when you need them and the keyboard has cursor keys!”

Even people giving 5-star reviews have complaints, include volume output, the “primitive” email app, lack of apps and x86 support, Flash support in IE10, and the price itself.

It’s encouraging to see, but I’m actually not totally surprised. Early adopters tend to be enthusiasts. As it moves beyond the early adopter stage and away from Microsoft enthusiasts into the mass market, that score will drop as more cons pile up. We’ll see what people say when the much more expensive x86 models arrive next year.

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A report claims so, but given Microsoft’s attempts to harden the OS, that seems dubious.

A new report released by the security firm Websense Security Labs claims Windows 8 will become one of the top three most-hacked platforms in 2013 because of its newness and Microsoft’s efforts to encourage development for the radical new platform.

Yeah, that didn’t make sense to me, either.

It took a chat with the folks at Websense to make, er, sense of what they were saying, but I do see their point. With a new operating system on the market that will hopefully gain significant ground and Microsoft attempting to woo developers like never before, there’s lots of potential for exploit.

“Microsoft’s efforts to produce an extremely developer friendly platform will be embraced by the cybercriminal community, and vulnerabilities will be exploited,” the company said in its 2013 Security Predictions. “If they deliver on their promise, the rate of threat growth on Microsoft mobile devices will be the highest.”

That’s a big “if.” Android, another platform Websense sees as a major target in 2013, is far more insecure. But in the case of Windows, there is, for lack of a better word, an installed base of malicious code and talent who know their way around Windows operating systems, and they are going to bring that to bear on Windows 8.

They will try to get around security systems that have been tightened up. Good luck with that. BitDefender recently ran tests on Windows 8 and found that a system with just Windows Defender, which is hardly a suitable security program, stopped 85% of the malware samples used in the tests.

The bad guys aren’t just about code; they understand how people write code and how malware works. So it’s not just malware samples, it’s accumulated and applied knowledge that they bring to Windows 8, says Websense. And given the common code between PC Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, malware could easily move across platforms.

The other two platforms that will be big targets in 2013 are also mobile operating systems: Android and iOS. According to the firm, Android will be targeted because of its open nature. Websense expects attack techniques used on the desktop platform to continue to migrate over to Google’s operating system.

iOS should be a lot more stable due to its closed nature. However, with the growing popularity of iOS devices in professional environments, IT should consider this a prime platform for targeted attacks, Websense said. And most malware that does exist for iOS targets jailbroken phones.

Websense made seven predictions for 2013, most of them centered around cybercriminals attacking mobile devices. You can find the entire report, in PDF format, here. Free registration is required to view it.

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The first time I sat in front of the Windows 8 interface, I have to admit I was not thrilled; no Start button, I couldn’t find the control panel, things just weren’t what I was used to. That was over two years ago in the early adopter program for Windows 8, and now when I use Windows XP or Windows 7, I find it very inefficient to “have to click through so many menus” to find and do basic stuff.

The focus of this article is to share with you not simply how to make Windows 8 work like Windows XP/Windows 7 “the old way” (which I will go through and give you tips on how to find stuff and configure stuff to work the old way), but instead to really focus on how to do things better and more easily, effectively helping you shortcut the learning process that makes Windows 8 actually extremely easy and efficient to use.

First of all, some basic terminology and “old way” of finding things so that I can take you through Windows 8 in a way you have learned how to use Windows. As I’m sure you are aware, Windows 8 no longer has the “Start Button” at the bottom left of the screen. Instead, Microsoft has the “Windows 8 Style Menu” (that they formally called the Metro style menu, until Microsoft was informed Metro Style was copyrighted, so they’re just calling it the Windows 8 Style menu). This is the menu that Windows comes up with.

If you are in the middle of an application (browser, Word, or any other app) and you want to get back to the menu, on a tablet, you press the “Home” button (usually a physical button on the bottom middle of the tablet device) or from a keyboard system, you press the “Windows-key.”

The “start button” for the most part (the thing that gives you access to the Control Panel, shutdown/restart, etc) is called the “Charm” and it pops up on a touchscreen tablet when you swipe your thumb from right to left on the right side of the screen (basically swiping the charm menu out from the right edge and into your screen of view). On a keyboard system, the charm menu pops up when you move the move cursor all the way to the right bottom of the screen.

From the charm menu, you can click on the top most icon (“search”) and it shows you all of your applications installed (this would be similar to doing a Start/All Programs in Windows 7). You’ll see the search bar (circled in red) and on the left you can scroll through all of your apps.

When you search/find the app you want or simply just scroll through the apps off this Charm/Search view, you can right-click the application, and at the bottom of the screen you are given options to Pin to Start, which adds the app to your Windows 8 Style Menu (THIS is a good idea as it puts a shortcut on your main menu screen so that every time you press the Home button or press the Windows-key, your apps show up on the main menu). You can also Pin to Start things like Control Panel, Command Prompt, Run, etc. I usually Pin everything I usually use/access to the Start which makes it easy for me to just go back to the main Windows 8 style menu to launch my apps!

Note: You’ll also see when you right click an app, you can also Pin to Taskbar (this pins to the old Windows 7 style taskbar at the bottom of the “Desktop” screen). I used to Pin stuff to the Taskbar, but now that more and more apps are coming out with Windows 8 menu icons (like Office 2013, SkyDrive, Box.net, Real Player, etc), I no longer find myself working from the older Win7 “taskbar.” This is one of those crutches you can continue to use, or just move into the 21st Century and start using the native Windows 8 menu.

Note: You’ll also see when you right click an app, at the bottom of the screen you can choose to run the app as an Administrator, uninstall the app, find the file/application location. These are helpful “things” we used occasionally in Win7 in the past that you now have shortcuts to run.

Another option off the Charm Menu (when you move your mouse cursor to the bottom right, or swipe your thumb right to left off the right edge of a tablet) is the Settings options (the bottom-most option on the charm) when you click on Settings…

…this is where a LOT of common things are found, such as Control Panel…

…Power (where you choose to shutdown/restart the computer/device), Network (where you select the WiFi connection you want to connect to), Change PC Settings (where you can change other things that are not in the Control Panel like desktop background, the photo you associate to your logon…

…add printers, etc).

Basically click on this Settings place and you’ll get to a lot of things you may normally access for configuration.

Okay, so with the basics under your belt, here’s where you learn to be a Windows 8 person and not a WinXP/Win7 person trying to run Windows 8. Instead of moving your cursor to pop up the charm to then click on Search to then find your application, or instead of moving your cursor to pop up the charm to then click Settings to then go to the Control Panel…you would do one of two things. If you are on a Tablet (or a keyboard-based Win8 device), ADD all of your apps, control panel, etc. to your Windows 8 style menu. It’ll take you a couple minutes to right click and “Pin to Start” all of your apps and utilities, but once they are pinned, you will almost never have to go fiddle with the charm thing. You’ll just press the Home button (on a tablet) or press the Windows key (on a keyboard-based system) and from the menu, click/tap the app and you run the app. To “switch” to another app, press the Home button or press the Windows key and click/tap the other app you want to run. All apps stay in memory; you just “toggle” between apps by simply pressing the Home button or pressing the Windows key to get to your apps.

Note: On a keyboard system, you can still Alt-Tab between apps, so toggling between apps is really easy. No more Start/Programs to get to applications. No need to Charm/Settings/Control Panel to get to the Control Panel if you simply pinned the Control Panel onto your Windows 8 style main menu!

So what happens if you want to access an app that you did not pin to your menu? On a keyboard-based system, at the Windows 8 Menu, just start typing a few letters of the app or function you want to do, and the “search” starts working immediately. For example, at the Windows 8 menu, if I start typing the letters n-o-t-e-p, the search bar will appear in the upper right and it’ll zero in on the Notepad application on the left.

Assuming the app is highlighted on the left, just press the Enter key any time and it’ll launch that app, no key clicking, nothing extra. If it pops up several apps with n-o-t-e-p, then either keep typing to zero in on “the app” you want and press Enter to launch, or you can arrow around/tap-touch/click on the app name on the left side to select “the app” you want. Fiddle with this, but effectively this is a very quick way to launch apps that may not be on your Windows 8 menu (yet).

If I start typing w-o-r-d, if I have Microsoft Word on the system, it’ll show me Word, or e-x-c-e-l will give me the option of launching Excel. Or even things like p-r-i-n-t-e-r will pop up under Settings the option for me to “Add a Printer,” or n-e-t under search settings will show me options like “Connect to a Network.”

Between Pinning things to Start and simply typing a few letters of something, I can launch apps, run utils, add printers, and do things on a Win8 system FASTER than what I thought was super efficient in WinXP or Win7. This was the trick to making Windows 8 easy to use.

Now that you have the navigation thing figured out, go to the Windows Store and download “apps” for your most common things you do, so things like there are Box.com apps, Acrobat reader apps, Picture viewers, Real Media Player app, etc.

Note: When you are in the store looking for apps, as much as you can scroll through the “Popular” apps or “Top free” apps it shows you on screen, if you wanted to “search” for an app to download, it’s not intuitive how to search for an app. The way to search for an app is when you are in the Store, pull up the “charm” thing (move mouse to the bottom right, or on a tablet, swipe your right thumb right to left to have the “charm” menu on the right side pop out and then use the “search” function in the charm). So just as you “searched” your apps earlier in this blog to find stuff on your local computer, when you are in the Store app and do a search, it’ll now search for apps in the Store (ie: searching for Acrobat, or Box, or Alarm Clock, or USA Today or the like).

When you install the app, it shows up on your Windows 8 Style menu. Simply clicking the app launches the application. However, from your Windows 8 Style menu, you might want to move your most commonly used apps to the left side of your menu so they are visible to you more frequently when you pop up the Windows 8 menu. To move the app with a mouse/keyboard, just click and hold down the mouse button down and “drag” the app to the left. On a touch tablet, you touch the app with your finger and then slide the app “down” and then to the left. This took me a while to figure out as I logically tried to push the app with my finger and immediately drag to the left which would tend to just launch the app. The trick is to touch the app with your finger, drag down a bit, then to the left to move it around! Move any non-commonly used apps from the left side over to the right side so they are out of your way.

Many times apps take up two spaces on the menu. I hate that. I’d rather have all of my apps as the small 1-square wide icon. All you do is right-click the app icon and at the bottom it’ll show you “larger” or “smaller” to make the icon a different size. Some have this option to make small icons larger. Oddly, you cannot tag multiple icons and make them all “Smaller” at the same time, you have to right click and “make smaller” one by one. It takes a few seconds to do, but buys you back more real estate on your Windows 8 menu to get more apps 1 click away to run. (Note: if you have a touch tablet, some of these first time configurations are BEST off doing with a mouse. I would usually plug a USB mouse into my tablet and run through some of these basic right-click configuration things, or drag/drop icon things as it is a LOT faster with a mouse. Everything “can” be done with your finger on a touch screen; it’s just not as efficient if you have a lot to configure/setup).

When you are in a Windows 8 app, you likely find there are no application configuration options, settings, things you can do with the app that you have in Windows XP or Windows 7 apps might have found as Tools/Options, or Options/Settings. With Windows 8, apps typically DO have configuration settings, you just have to know how to find them. Here’s the trick, app settings are in the Charm/Settings on Windows 8. Launch and sit in the Windows 8 application, and then with a touch tablet, swipe your right thumb from right to left off the left edge of the tablet screen, and press Settings; with a keyboard system, move your mouse cursor to the bottom right to pull up the Charm menu, then click Settings. With the Charm/Settings exposed, you’ll see configuration settings for that app!

Also, when you are in a Windows 8 application, there are frequently more options when you “swipe down” from the top of the tablet, or “swipe up” from the bottom of the tablet screen (or on a keyboard-based system, you position your mouse cursor at the top of the screen where a bar appears, or you move the mouse cursor at the top of the screen and right-click). As an example, when I’m in the Internet Explorer in Windows 8 and want to have the Address Bar appear, or I want to switch between IE “tabs”, things like the below pop up and give you additional application options…

For applications on your Windows 8 menu, there’s also this thing called “Live Tile,” in which the icon changes screens, like the way the CNN news live tile shows you the latest news and flips through things, or the Photos “Live Tile” flips through your pictures. You can turn Live Tile off (again, right click the icon, choose to turn Live Tile on/off). I find it annoying to have the thing flip through stuff when I don’t remember what icon is what, but it’s really your call.

To flip through running apps, you can Alt-Tab from a keyboard-based system, or from either a mouse or touch tablet, move the cursor to the upper left hand corner and little tiles of the running apps show in the left margin of the screen. You can right-click and “close” any of those running apps. I used to close apps all the time as I’m old school and after running an app and don’t need it anymore, I close it. But after a while, I just leave the apps running. They don’t take up processing power and with 4-8GB of RAM in my systems these days I have plenty of memory. Every now and then I reboot my device/tablet/system but on occasion, and I will run my finger to the upper left and choose apps to close.

And a hidden thing in the bottom left corner of the screen is a “start”-type button thing that when right clicked will show you a list of common tasks like Event Viewer, Disk Management, Command Prompt, Task Manager, Control Panel, Windows Explorer, Run, etc. It’s sometimes helpful to use that, although these days with most stuff on my Windows 8 Menu or I just type a few letters, I don’t bother with these various other menu things, but just FYI…

Logging Out of a system is done by click on your name from the Windows 8 Style menu as shown in the Figure here:

To shutdown or restart the computer, you can navigate the menus (like Charm, Settings, Shutdown), or what I did was create a Windows 8 style menu “app” that I simply click that’ll shut down my computer. You effectively create a “shortcut” on the “desktop” and then you “Pin to Start.” That’ll add the shortcut to your Windows 8 menu. Here’s what it looks like:

1) From the Windows 8 menu, click Desktop to switch to the old Windows 7 style desktop
2) Right click on the desktop and choose New | Shortcut
3) When prompted for the Location of the item, enter in c:\windows\system32\shutdown.exe /p as shown below, then click Next

4) For the name of the Shortcut, type in something like Shutdown, then click Finish
5) Right click on the shortcut that is on your desktop and choose Pin to Start

You now have an icon on your Windows 8 menu that allows you to shutdown your system with a single click.

You can change the command syntax in #3 above to restart the computer by making that c:\windows\system32\shutdown.exe /r or /h at the end (instead of /r) will hibernate a system.

Oh, and one more thing – so once I tricked out my Windows 8 menu with all of the icons I wanted, how do I transfer my icons, menu items, etc. to other systems? Microsoft came out with this thing called the User Experience Virtualization (UE-V) that is the new generation of “roaming profiles.” However, unlike roaming profiles of the past where EVERYTHING was moved from system to system whether you wanted it or not (ie: registry settings, apps, icons, junk on your desktop, etc), with UE-V profiles, you can specifically just note to “roam” your Windows 8 menu. Microsoft did a case study on my organization’s experience with UE-V [link download].

More information on UE-V is available on the Microsoft site. UE-V isn’t free; it’s part of what Microsoft calls its Desktop Optmization Pack (MDOP) that includes a bunch of other tools like RemoteApp, App-V (application virtualization), VDI, etc. Any case, you might find your organization owns MDOP as part of the Software Assurance for Windows client licensing, and if so, explore UE-V where you can roam your Win8 menu from your desktop, to your laptop, to your tablet, to your VDI guest session, to your Remote Desktop (terminal server) guest session, etc.

Hopefully, this is a place to start. I REALLY fought the whole Windows 8 menu thing for a long time, even filed several “bug reports” during the early adopter program noting that the whole Windows 8 menu was a major “bug,” although with a bunch of these tips and tricks I’ve noted in this article, I think you’ll find this whole Windows 8 menu thing to actually be a LOT easier to use and definitely faster than having to fiddle through a bunch of menus.

Several other postings I’ve done on Windows Server 2012, Exchange 2013, Intune, System Center, etc. Just click the Next Article or Previous Article buttons on this blog post to get to other articles I’ve covered, or click here to see a listing of all of the various blog posts I’ve done over the years. Hopefully this information is helpful!

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Learning curve, satisfaction with Windows 7 cited by experts

Widespread Windows 8 adoption by businesses is years away, primarily because it is so different from Windows 7 that the learning curve for end users will be a nightmare, experts say.

Gartner says in a report coming out later this week that 90% of enterprises will bypass wholesale deployment of Windows 8 at least through 2014.

A desktop consultant to businesses says he doesn’t expect to recommend Windows 8 to customers for a year or two. “There’s nothing for the task worker that Windows 8 is going to improve on,” says Pete Lee, Engagement Manger of SWC Technologies, a software development and desktop consulting firm in Oak Brook, Ill., which is a Microsoft Gold Partner.

The difficulties stem from the many small ways Windows 7 differs from Windows 8, says Georges Khairallah, a network specialist at the Chino Valley Unified School District in Chino Valley, Calif., who has been using Windows 8 for weeks to administer his network. While the differences didn’t affect him adversely, he thinks they would have a crippling effect on end users.

“It’s going to be traumatic, I think,” he says, “especially if the organization doesn’t have an excellent training program for users.”

That doesn’t mean the new operating system won’t have immediate niche applications that make it worth deploying to certain segments of employees, particularly among mobile workers and in cases where navigating by touchscreen is important, Lee says.

He thinks there are good reasons for certain types of jobs to be supported by Windows 8, and he can see Windows 8 being deployed more widely in businesses with large sales and marketing staffs that are mobile.

The operating system could prove valuable to remote and traveling workers who in addition to doing work on portable Windows 8 machines would use them for personal business and entertainment as well. The Windows 8 machine could serve the purpose of a business laptop as well as a notebook for work and a personal tablet used for messaging, music, games that would otherwise call for a separate device, he says.

He could see a business deploying Windows 8 for such workers while keeping Windows 7 on traditional desktops to avoid training as well as the costs of deploying new operating systems and the hardware upgrades that it might require.

Lee says he plans to suggest Windows 8 in work environments where many workers share the same machine, such as in laboratories where many technicians need to access data or libraries where patrons search for books. The touchscreen would be convenient for such tasks and wouldn’t eat up space that would be needed for keyboards and mice, making for a less cluttered work area, he says The touchscreen aspects of the operating system are not well suited to corporate desktops, he says. Deploying Windows 8 with full functionality would require touchscreen monitors but wouldn’t improve productivity of workers who use traditional desktops, and the monitors alone represent a heavy investment, he says.

Deploying Windows 8 without touchscreen and having users work in traditional desktop mode would be an unwarranted expense that would gain minimal new functionality, he says.

Compounding the problem is that many enterprises are still deploying Windows 7 as an upgrade from Windows XP, which Microsoft stops supporting next spring. Khairallah says his organization is in the midst of that and it hasn’t been easy. “Going from XP to Windows 7 was horrible,” he says.

He says it makes more sense to wait for Windows 8 to be sold with home computers and let workers get used to it. “Let them have the learning curve on their own time and after that start deploying it slowly,” he says. “I really don’t see it going mainstream right away,” he says.

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More than 1,000 devices certified for Windows 8 starting at less than $300.

Windows 8, Microsoft’s bold new operating system, officially debuted this morning at a coming out party in New York City highlighted by a display of the wide variety of devices on which it can run – from PCs to tablets to hybrids to laptops to notebooks.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer says Windows 8 embraces so many different devices that it redefines the PC by giving what had been considered limited or specialized devices the full functionality of traditional desktops with the addition of touchscreen support.

“Windows 8 shatters perceptions of what a PC now really is,” he says. “It pushes the limits of what a PC is.”

Steven Sinofsky, president of Microsoft’s Windows division, heralded the improved performance of Windows 8 devices over Windows 7 and touted the wide range of new hardware that will support it, starting at less than $300.

He says that vs. Windows 7, battery life is 13% longer and boot time is 36% faster – and that’s running it on a PC certified for Windows 7. With Windows 8 the improvements are even greater, he says.

While the operating system is designed for touch, Sinofsky says it works equally well on machines with keyboard and mouse, and any application that runs on a certified Windows 7 machine will also run on Windows 8.

Sinofsky also promoted so-called “modern” applications that are designed to take advantage of the touch user interface and that are available via the Windows Store, an online market that opens at the same time Windows 8 becomes available.

A separate version of Windows 8 called Windows RT runs only on ARM processors to promote battery life and to enable smaller, thinner, lighter devices, he says. These devices only support modern applications; traditional Windows 7-supported apps will not run.

The idea is that Windows RT will only run applications that have been approved by Microsoft and that are downloaded from the Windows Store. Microsoft also controls updates, with the idea that over time security and performance of the machines will remain high, he says.

While the Windows Store has thousands of modern applications ready to go, the inventory pales compared to the hundreds of thousands available for Apple iOS or Android devices. But Sinofsky claims there are more applications in the Windows Store than there were in any similar application store when it opened.

Microsoft staffers demonstrated a wide range of Windows 8 machines including desktops, all-in-ones, tablets, convertibles, hybrids, laptops and notebooks. One device from Asus that was highlighted at the press conference has a detachable keyboard that contains a separate battery that extends the life of the system to 18 hours. It’s also available with a 4G wireless service from AT&T.

MICROSOFT SURFACE
Microsoft mentioned its own Surface devices that compete with its partners’ machines, but downplayed their importance. One was pulled off a shelf holding a half dozen other devices built by Microsoft partners and demonstrated briefly in between descriptions of other portables.

Surface represents Microsoft’s foray into selling the accompanying hardware — a bold design of a thin tablet with an add-on tropical colored cover that doubles as a keyboard to turn the device into a notebook.

There are two major versions of Surface – Surface Pro and Surface RT. Surface Pro is based on x86 processors and carries the full Windows 8 operating system that can support traditional applications as well as modern applications designed specifically for Windows 8 and catering to its touch centricity.

Later during the launch press conference, demonstrations of machines made for Windows 8 showed how a touchpad on a laptop could be touched and swiped with the same gestures that would be used on a touchscreen, and Windows 8 would respond.

Windows 8 was also significant in the redesign of Office applications, the latest versions of which are optimized for touch, Sinofsky says.

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Microsoft takes income hit prior to Windows 8 launch
Microsoft experienced a rough quarter, with a 22 percent decline in net income and an 8 percent decline in revenue

Facing a sluggish PC market and deferring revenue from sales of its upcoming Windows 8 OS, Microsoft reported US$4.47 billion in net income for its first fiscal quarter of 2013, a 22 percent decline from the same period a year earlier.

The company reported revenue of $16.01 billion for the quarter that ended Sept. 30, an 8 percent decline from last year. This figure fell short of what many analysts had expected the company to generate for the period. A poll from Thomson Reuters found that analysts, on the average, expected the company to earn around $16.42 billion in revenue for the quarter.

The company had generated $1.36 billion of revenue from customers who already purchased copies of Windows 8 and the next version of Microsoft Office, but Microsoft did not include this income because these products have not been released yet. With these sales factored in, Microsoft revenue would be approximately the same as it was for the same quarter in the previous year.

In the statement that accompanied the earnings announcement, Microsoft Chief Financial Officer Peter Klein attributed the slack in revenue to a slowdown in the demand for PCs due to the pending Windows 8 launch, while noting that other sectors of Microsoft continued to perform well.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer did not address the slump in sales in the statement, but characterized the quarter as the end of an era for Microsoft, with the company focusing on building new products, such as Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8, that would address shifting market needs.

“The launch of Windows 8 is the beginning of a new era at Microsoft,” Ballmer stated. “Investments we’ve made over a number of years are now coming together to create a future of exceptional devices and services, with tremendous opportunity for our customers, developers, and partners.”

It has been a busy quarter for Microsoft. The company released the newest edition of its operating system for servers, Microsoft Server 2012, in September. In July it released a preview of the next version of its office productivity suite, Microsoft Office 2013. Most importantly, next week Microsoft will launch its next-generation operating system, Windows 8, which was designed to work on both traditional computers as well as on tablet devices, including the company’s own Surface tablet.

For the quarter, the Windows division posted revenue of $3.24 billion, a 33 percent decrease from the same period of the prior year.

The Server and Tools business generated $4.55 billion, an 8 percent increase from the same quarter in the prior year. SQL Server and System Center in particular were strong sellers. The Microsoft Business Division generated $5.50 billion in first-quarter revenue, a 2 percent decrease from the prior year period. It too was affected by pre-sales deferrals, as the company deferred reporting revenue of Microsoft Office 2013. The company noted that some products in this division, such as SharePoint and Exchange, drove double-digit revenue growth.

Online Services enjoyed a 9 percent increase in revenue, to $697 million, thanks to ad revenue in search. The Entertainment and Devices Division, which manages the company’s Xbox gaming and multimedia console, posted revenue of $1.95 billion, a decrease of 1 percent from the same period in the prior year.

Financial analysts covering Microsoft seemed to be most concerned about how the shifting PC market would affect future sales of Windows, to judge from the questions they asked during an investor teleconference call held after the release of the financial results. How will the proliferation of new form factors for computers — tablets, convertibles, all-in-ones — alter the usually predictable sales of the Windows OS?

Microsoft positioned Windows 8 as an OS that can encompass this wider market. This OS, unlike competitors such as iOS and Android, can offer a single unifying experience across different devices.

“The exciting thing about Windows 8 is that it really redefines what people think about devices, and how they think about devices,” Klein responded. “Up until now, [customers] have been forced to choose between PCs and tablets, and make trade-offs of what they get. With Windows 8, you can get whatever you want at whatever price you want.”

The adoption process of Windows should continue unabated, Klein said. Enterprise rollouts are steady, and Windows XP will reach end of life in a year-and-a-half, which will spur demand for the new OS.

The weakening demand for Windows over the past three months was due to a number of seasonal and situational factors, Klein explained. OEMs spent the past quarter letting their stock of Windows 7 machines dwindle in anticipation of new Windows 8 machines. Economic sluggishness around the globe — and in Europe in particular — slowed sales as well.

“It’s a summer quarter, I don’t know if I would read too much into one period,” added Frank Brod, Microsoft’s chief accounting officer, who also was on the investor call.

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What’s it cost to whom and for what

Last week, Microsoft and its retail partners revealed a few more details about Windows 8 pricing, clarifying what the Redmond, Wash., developer has purposefully left muddy in the months leading up to its release next week.

Windows 8 may come in fewer flavors than its predecessors, but pricing seems as confusing as ever, in large part because of Microsoft’s secrecy — this cycle it’s dribbled out information so slowly it’s driven some analysts half-crazy — with a dash also due to a record-setting discount for upgraders through the end of January.

We’ve tried to answer the most-pressing questions, filled in the blanks as best we could, and thrown up our hands when we had no more of a clue than you.

If Microsoft answers the open questions — it again declined to do so last Friday — we’ll be back with an updated FAQ.

Can I score a free copy of Windows 8? Yes, you can, but the OS is good for just 90 days.

The free trial of Windows 8 Pro RTM (release to manufacturing) can be downloaded from this Microsoft website. But when the 90 days are up, you have to replace the trial with a purchased copy or another operating system, and reinstall all applications, other software and files.

Sorry, I like OSes that stick around. What else do you have? How about $14.99? That’s the price of a Windows 8 Pro upgrade from Windows 7 for anyone who purchases a new PC between June 2, 2012, and Jan. 31, 2013.

To get the cut-rate upgrade, PC buyers must register at the Windows Upgrade Offer site.

Thanks, but that doesn’t work for me. How much for my best deal? For most Windows users, the $39.99 Windows 8 upgrade, which Microsoft will kick off Oct. 26 and offer through Jan. 31, 2013, will be the most economical.

First announced July 2, the upgrade — from XP, Vista or Windows 7 to Windows 8 Pro — will be available only as a download at that price. It’s unclear if Microsoft will open registrations or pre-orders for the download before Oct. 26, but it definitely will go live on Windows.com that Friday.

At Windows.com, look for something called “Windows 8 Upgrade Assistant,” a tool that checks your PC to ensure it will run the OS, takes your order, then kicks off the download and installation process.

I want something I can hold in my hands. How much for an upgrade on DVD? Microsoft will sell you one of those for Windows 8 Pro at the discounted price of $69.99.

From the hints on Newegg.com, one of the online retailers also selling the SKU, or “stock-keeping unit,” the price for a Windows 8 Pro upgrade on physical media will jump to $199.99 after Jan. 31, 2013.

In other words, just like the $39.99 online upgrade offer, you should strike quickly.

The $30 surcharge for a DVD may seem steep, but Microsoft has actually done a little bit better by customers than rival Apple: In 2011, Apple sold a USB drive with OS X 10.7, also known as Lion, for $39 more than the download price. Apple didn’t even bother to reprise the offer this year for Mountain Lion.

[Note: The Windows 8 Pro online upgrade lets you create a bootable installation DVD or USB drive, so unless you have a very slow Internet connection and want the media to save hours of dial-up agony, that's a less expensive way to get a DVD.]

I run Windows in a virtual machine (VM) on my Mac. What’s the damage? Looks like $99.99 for Windows 8, $139.99 for Windows 8 Pro, is the cheapest bet for now.

Those are Newegg.com’s pre-sale prices for what Microsoft is now calling “System Builder” — formerly known as “OEM” — an edition aimed at small-scale or homebrew PC makers, as well as users who want to run the OS in a virtual machine or in a dual-boot setup on a Mac or PC.

System Builder includes a license that allows for installation in a virtual environment, but offers one-time-use only. “We grant you the right to install [Windows 8] … as the operating system on a computer that you build for your personal use, or as an additional operating system running on a local virtual machine or a separate partition,” states the end-user license agreement (EULA) we’ve seen. “If you want to use the software on more than one virtual computer, you must obtain separate copies of the software and a separate license for each copy.”

I already run older Windows in several virtual machines. How much do I pay? For each VM you upgrade — up to a max of five per person — you pay $39.99 to migrate to Windows 8 Pro from XP, Vista or Windows 7 through Jan. 31, 2013.

You upgrade the VMs (or partitions, like a second boot partition on a PC, or Boot Camp on OS X) the same way someone upgrades a physical machine: by running the Windows 8 Upgrade Assistant on Windows.com.

Any chance that the System Builder SKUs will fall in price after Oct. 26? We don’t think so.

The list prices for the Windows 7 Home Premium and Windows 7 Professional System Builder equivalents are $128 and $179, respectively, according to Amazon. Not surprisingly, Amazon’s prices are less: $92 and $128, or close to the Windows 8 System Builder prices on Newegg.

In other words, unless Microsoft drastically reduces the list price of System Builder, the numbers on Newegg are probably the discounted prices.

How much to upgrade a new Windows 8 system to Windows 8 Pro? $69.99 during the discount stretch.

Microsoft’s calling this the “Windows 8 Pro Pack;” It consists of an activation code that turns Windows 8 into Windows 8 Pro. The Pro Pack is analogous to the in-place upgrades the company touted as “Anytime Upgrades” for Windows 7.

Newegg said the Pro Pack’s $69.99 price was a $30 savings over the regular price of $99.99, with the latter presumably the upgrade’s eventual list price. If so, that’s a $10 increase over the Windows 7 Home Premium Anytime Upgrade to Windows 7 Professional, which costs $89.99.

It may be cheaper to buy the new PC with Windows 8 Pro already installed, if the option’s offered. Sony, for example, charges an additional $50 to bump up a pre-ordered Windows 8 notebook to Windows 8 Pro. (Dell, on the other hand, adds the same $70 as the price for the Windows 8 Pro Pack to juice a Windows 8 machine to Windows 8 Pro.)

What about Windows 8? What will it cost to upgrade to the consumer version, rather than Windows 8 Pro We don’t know because Microsoft’s not saying.

Among the blank spots in an imaginary Windows 8 pricing chart are those for the entry-level edition. So far, Microsoft’s only talked about upgrades to Windows 8 Pro.

The company may be waiting until Oct. 26 to divulge a price for a Windows 8 upgrade, or dawdling until early next year, after the discounted $39.99 Windows 8 Pro upgrade offer expires.

Or the omission may mean more. It’s possible that Microsoft won’t even bother to sell an upgrade to Windows 8, leaving that SKU to OEMs to pre-install on their least-expensive consumer PCs, and to the System Builder line.

Clues to that include: The silence surrounding Windows 8, the Oct. 26 availability of Windows 8 Pro Pack, and the absence of a multi-license SKU for Windows 8. Microsoft sold one dubbed “Family Pack” for $150 that was able to upgrade three PCs to Windows 7 Home Premium, but Microsoft’s said nothing of something similar for Windows 8.

If the sans-Windows 8 alternative is what Microsoft chooses, it will be even more important for upgraders to move before Jan. 31, 2013, when the $39.99 Windows 8 Pro upgrade expires.

Minus a Windows 8 upgrade option, the choices would narrow to a $199.99 upgrade to Windows 8 Pro, or one of the System Builders, which don’t provide support from Microsoft. Neither sounds very attractive.

What if I hate Windows 8? How much will it cost me to get Windows 7 back? Depends.

If it’s an old PC you’ve upgraded to Windows 8 Pro, it should cost you nothing except a lot of time. You’ll need to reinstall the previous OS from your media — which is why it’s a good idea to make sure you have it before you try Windows 8 — and all your applications, as well as restore your files and other data from a backup.

But if you bought a new PC with the new OS already installed, you may need to pony up. Only Windows 8 Pro comes with “downgrade” rights, and then only to Windows 7 Professional, so you’ll need media for the latter to use the license that came with the machine.

If you don’t have that media, or have Windows 8 on the PC, you’ll have to fork over for a new Windows 7 license. Your best bet: A System Builder-like “OEM” Windows 7 license. As we said earlier, Amazon sells that for $92 for Windows 7 Home Premium, $128 for Windows 7 Professional. On Newegg, the prices are $99.99 and $139.99, respectively.

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Ad industry calls IE10′s ‘Do Not Track’ setting ‘unacceptable’
Privacy advocates hit back, call demands ‘bizarre’

Many of the country’s largest companies lashed out at Microsoft this week, claiming that its decision to turn on the “Do Not Track” privacy feature in Internet Explorer 10 would “harm consumers, hurt competition, and undermine American innovation.”

In a letter addressed to three top Microsoft executives, including CEO Steve Ballmer and the company’s top lawyer, Brad Smith, companies ranging from McDonalds and General Motors to Intel and Visa demanded a sit-down with Microsoft to discuss Internet Explorer 10 (IE10).

IE10 is slated to ship alongside the Windows 8 operating system on Oct. 26. Although Microsoft has promised to also release a version of the browser suitable for Windows 7, it has consistently refused to give a timetable.

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“ANA’s Board of Directors is very upset that the choice being made by Microsoft is one that will ultimately threaten to reduce the vast array of free content and services available to consumers,” the advertisers claimed. The Association of National Advertisers (ANA) is an industry lobbying group.

Microsoft drew the ire of online advertisers — and praise from many privacy advocates — when in late May it announced that IE10 would have the “Do Not Track” (DNT) option switched on by default. Later, it backed away slightly, saying users could turn it off when they were first told of the feature as Windows went through its setup paces.

Do Not Track is a browser feature that signals whether a user wants online advertisers and websites to track his or her movements. Four of the five major browsers — Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera and Safari — can send a DNT signal. Google has pledged that Chrome will support DNT by year’s end.

“When presented as a default ‘on,’ by design Microsoft is no longer creating a choice of whether or not data about consumers will be tracked,” the ANA’s letter continued. “Rather, Microsoft appears determined to stop the collection of Web viewing data. That is unacceptable.”

The letter was the harshest criticism yet by the advertising industry of Do Not Track in general and Microsoft’s position with IE10 specifically. The ANA used phrases like “fundamentally bad for consumers,” “undermines consumer interest” and “cheat society” in its missive.

Essentially, the ANA argued that if advertisers could not track users on the Web — and then use that information to deliver targeted online ads to them — the Internet as it’s now known would vanish. IE10′s on-by-default stance threatened that tracking.

“Microsoft’s decision to block collection and use of information by default will significantly reduce the diversity of Internet offerings and potentially cheat society of the robust offerings that are currently available,” the ANA said.

Privacy proponents hit back.

“The online advertising industry has dropped its facade of negotiating Do Not Track in good faith,” said Jonathan Mayer, one of two Stanford researchers who devised the HTTP header concept used by browsers to signal a user’s DNT decision. “This week’s letters to Microsoft and W3C leadership are part of that.”

The Worldwide Web Consortium (W3C) is a standards-setting group that is trying to finalize DNT’s implementation. The group is meeting this week in Amsterdam to continue discussions. Mayer is active in the W3C discussions.

Other privacy advocates were even tougher on the ANA and its demand that Microsoft reverse course.

“In recent days, we have suddenly seen an all-out blitz of attacks on Do Not Track, both in Washington and Silicon Valley, decrying Do Not Track as a disaster that would destroy the advertising-supported Web,” said Leslie Harris and Justin Brookman of the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) in a Wednesday blog post.

Harris is the CDT’s president and CEO, while Brookman is the advocacy group’s director of consumer privacy.

Mayer noticed the uptick in rhetoric, too. “In recent weeks industry trade groups have turned to obstructionism and vitriol within the W3C multi-stakeholder process,” Mayer said in an email reply to questions. “Outside the W3C, they’ve placed negative coverage, penned misleading op-eds and lobbied Republicans in Congress to challenge the FTC.”

The ANA’s blast against IE10 made some suspect it had been the tipping point. “It is possible that this uproar stems entirely from Microsoft’s decision in June to aggressively steer its users to turn on Do Not Track during install,” said Harris and Brookman.

Not so, countered an online ad executive.

Steve Minichini, who leads the interactive marketing group at the advertising agency TargetCast, disagreed that IE10 had been a trigger for any recent anti-DNT blitz on the part of advertisers. “We’ve been talking about this for years,” Minichini said in a Wednesday interview.

He acknowledged that the debate had heated up, but blamed Microsoft. “The main reason there’s so much conversation is the principle of it,” said Minichini, referring to IE10′s on-by-default setting. “IE10 will not have a big foothold in the market at first, but as the years roll on, year after year, it will grow. [Microsoft's move] is just a marketing strategy to grab headlines.”

Some would agree with Minichini’s point: Many Microsoft watchers and analysts have interpreted Microsoft’s decision to push users to DNT as a way for it to differentiate the browser from competitors.

Microsoft is on somewhat shaky ground with IE; the browser has lost share for years, although that decline has slowed during 2012, according to California-based Net Applications, which on Monday said all versions of IE accounted for 53.6% of those used in September. (Irish metrics firm StatCounter, however, says that IE has shrunk to just 32.7%, second behind Google’s Chrome.)

IE10 has a negligible share: Neither Net Applications nor StatCounter have begun tracking it.

It’s unclear how the W3C will, or even if it will, resolve its differences on IE10 to, for instance, either demand that websites honor its DNT signal or allow them to ignore it.

Harris and Brookman of the CDT wondered where it would end, too. But one possibility would kick off what they called a “privacy arms race” pitted with tit-for-tat responses by advertisers and Microsoft to block, unblock and re-block DNT.

“The result would be turning the online ecosystem into an ever-escalating war between privacy interests and advertisers, precisely the war that a negotiated Do Not Track setting was designed to avoid,” said Harris and Brookman.

Others have noticed a change in advertisers’ tone in the most recent DNT discussions. Last week, Federal Trade Commission chairman Jon Leibowitz told the Wall Street Journal that the industry “appears to be backing off from its commitments” made last February.

The FTC backs Do Not Track, but Leibowitz has not expressly thrown his weight behind Microsoft and IE10.

Microsoft on Wednesday declined to address the ANA’s allegations, instead repeating a previous statement that said, “Our approach to DNT in Internet Explorer 10 is part of our commitment to privacy by design and putting people first.”

In an op-ed piece in Adweek last month, however, Rik van der Kooi, Microsoft’s top ad executive, said critics were losing perspective. “Instead of debating whether DNT is ‘on’ or ‘off,’ we should redouble our efforts as an industry and educate consumers about how advertising pays for the free Web experience we all now enjoy,” van der Kooi wrote.

It may be difficult to get the two sides — the ad industry and privacy-first advocates — to agree when words like “outrage,” “bizarre” and “unacceptable” are bandied by the parties.

The ANA, which did not reply to a Computerworld request to make someone available for an interview, asked Microsoft for a face-to-face meeting between executives. “We respectfully suggest an immediate dialogue with key Microsoft executives prior to the anticipated release of Internet Explorer 10,” the trade group said in its letter.

Harris and Brookman had hope for a resolution. “At the end of the day, privacy advocates will have to settle for something less than they would like in an ideal world [and] advertisers must honor their commitment to comply with users’ Do Not Track instructions,” they said.

The debate isn’t limited to the U.S., as European regulators have also weighed in on DNT, and expressed support for Microsoft’s position on IE10.

“[The advertising industry] now stands in open defiance of policymakers on both sides of the Atlantic and, more importantly, the tens of millions of users who have enabled Do Not Track in their browser,” said Mayer. “[But] the primary effect of their efforts has been to call more attention to Do Not Track.”

“We’re going to continue to do what we do, which is to put privacy at the top of mind,” countered ad exec Minichini, who clearly would like users to run any browser but IE10. “Consumers are empowered by the browsers they choose. But Microsoft is forcing DNT on the consumer population, something we’re strongly against, and something we think consumers will be strongly against.” mcts online training and mcitp online training

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MCTS Overview

Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) certifications are designed to validate your skills on the features and functionality of Microsoft technologies. You can show your depth of knowledge in one specific technology, earn multiple MCTS certifications to show breadth across different products, or build on the MCTS to earn a Microsoft Certified IT Professional (MCITP) or Microsoft Certified Professional Developer (MCPD) certification.

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MCTS candidate profile

MCTS candidates are capable of implementing, building, troubleshooting, and debugging a particular Microsoft technology.

Why get certified?

Earning a Microsoft Certification validates your proven experience and knowledge in using Microsoft products and solutions. Designed to be relevant in today’s rapidly changing IT marketplace, Microsoft Certifications help you utilize evolving technologies, fine-tune your troubleshooting skills, and improve your job satisfaction.

Whether you are new to technology, changing jobs, or a seasoned professional, becoming certified demonstrates to customers, peers, and employers that you are committed to advancing your skills and taking on greater challenges. In addition, certification provides you with access to exclusive Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) resources and benefits, including opportunities to connect with a vast, global network of MCPs.

MCTS Network Infrastructure Certification

The Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) on Windows Server 2008 credential is intended for IT professionals who work in the complex computing environment of medium-sized to large companies.

The MCTS candidate should have at least one year of experience implementing and administering a network operating system in an environment that has the following characteristics:

250 to 5,000 or more users
Three or more physical locations
Three or more domain controllers
Network services and resources, such as messaging, a database, file and print, a proxy server, a firewall, the Internet, an intranet, remote access, and client computer management
Connectivity requirements, such as connecting branch offices and individual users in remote locations to the corporate network and connecting corporate networks to the Internet.

Job Roles for MCTS Network Infrastructure

This course is for those who work with or plan to work with IP addressing and services, names resolution, file and print services, network access and remote access, and monitoring network services. It is also for those looking to stand out for their specialised knowledge in a Windows Server 2008 environment.

Train for this Microsoft Certification and achieve MCTS status.
Which can be credited towards an MCITP.

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The Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) is a program of professional certifications awarded by Microsoft. Individual certifications are received upon passing one or more exams. The MCP program itself is designed for software developers and all kinds of IT Professionals. Microsoft also awards a variety of more targeted certifications (e.g., Microsoft Certified IT Professional).

Like Apple, Cisco, Oracle, Red Hat, Sun and Ubuntu programs, the certifications mainly focus on their respective product, as opposed to employment aptitude tests designed for programmer trainee jobs. These branches of technical series with the MC (Microsoft Certified) prefix include Microsoft Certified IT Professional (MCITP), Microsoft Certified Master (MCM), Microsoft Certified Architect (MCA), Microsoft Certified Professional Developer (MCPD), Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS).

Each exam costs depending on the region and certification track.Exams usually take between two and three hours to complete and consist of between 40 and 90 multiple-choice, drag-and-drop, and solution-building questions; and simulated content with respect to which students must perform certain common administrative tasks.

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MCTS offers different fields of specialization to IT professionals. 

The Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist – MCTS certification provide the foundation for Microsoft Certification. These certifications are designed to validate your skills on the features and functionality of key technologies. You can show your depth of knowledge in one specific technology, earn multiple MCTS certifications to show breadth across different products, or build on the MCTS to earn a Professional Series credential.

MCTS candidates are capable of implementing, building, troubleshooting, and debugging a particular Microsoft technology.

 MCTS certifications can be achieved in following technologies:

* Windows technologies

* Microsoft Visual Studio and Microsoft .NET Framework technologies

* Microsoft SQL Server technologies

* Microsoft Office System technologies (including Office SharePoint Server and Office Project Server)

* Microsoft Exchange Server technology

* Other technologies

Certification and Exam number Windows technologies

Business Desktop Deployment Exam 70-624

Connected Home Integrator Exam 70-625

Windows Embedded CE 6.0: Application Development Exam 70-571

Windows Essential Business Server 2008, Configuration Exam 70-654

Windows Mobile 5.0, Applications Exam 70-540

Windows Mobile 5.0, Implementing and Managing Exam 70-500

Windows Server 2003 Hosted Environments – Configuration and Management Exam 70-501

Windows Server 2008 Active Directory Configuration Exam 70-640

Windows Server 2008 Network Infrastructure Configuration Exam 70-642

Windows Server 2008 Applications Infrastructure Configuration Exam 70-643

Windows Server Virtualization, Configuration Exam 70-652

Windows Small Business Server 2008, Configuration Exam 70-653

Windows Vista – Configuration Exam 70-620

Microsoft Visual Studio and Microsoft .NET Framework technologies

Dot .NET Framework 2.0 Web Applications Exam 70-536 and Exam 70-528

Dot .NET Framework 2.0 Windows Applications Exam 70-536 and Exam 70-526

Dot .NET Framework 2.0 Distributed Applications Exam 70-536 and Exam 70-529

Dot .NET Framework 3.5 ADO .NET Applications Exam 70-536 and Exam 70-561

Dot .NET Framework 3.5 ASP .NET Applications Exam 70-536 and Exam 70-562

Dot .NET Framework 3.5 Windows Communication Foundation Applications Exam 70-536 and Exam 70-503

Dot .NET Framework 3.5 Windows Forms Applications Exam 70-536 and Exam 70-505

Dot .NET Framework 3.5 Windows Presentation Foundation Applications Exam 70-536 and Exam 70-502

Dot .NET Framework 3.5, Windows Workflow Foundation Applications Exam 70-536 and Exam 70-504

Microsoft SQL Server technologies

SQL Server 2005 Exam 70-431

SQL Server 2005 Business Intelligence Exam 70-445

SQL Server 2008, Business Intelligence Development and Maintenance Exam 70-448

SQL Server 2008, Database Development Exam 70-433

SQL Server 2008, Implementation and Maintenance Exam 70-432

Microsoft Office System technologies (including Office SharePoint Server and Office Project Server)

Enterprise Project Management with Microsoft Office Project Server 2007 Exam 70-633

Communications Server 2007, Configuration Exam 70-638

Groove 2007, Configuration Exam 70-555

Live Communications Server 2005 Exam 70-262

Performance Point Server 2007, Applications Exam 70-556

Projects 2007, Managing Projects Exam 70-632

Project Server 2007, Configuration Exam 70-639

SharePoint Server 2007 – Configuration Exam 70-630

SharePoint Server 2007 – Application Development Exam 70-542

Visio 2007, Application Development Exam 70-545

Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 – Application Development Exam 70-541

Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 – Configuration Exam 70-631

Microsoft Exchange Server technology

Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 – Configuration Exam 70-236

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Microsoft 70-640 Exam Quick Pass Tips ( Windows Server 2008)
As the your know that getting good job you need pass Microsoft exams and get certified to eligible for the job. Some Microsoft exams are not as simple and easy to pass; you need get the core concept of the exam this article will help you to under stand Microsoft Server 2008 for the exams of 70-640, 70-642.

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WHAT IS WINDOWS SERVER 2008
Windows Server 2008 R2, or simply R2 for short, is the second release of Windows Server 2008 . It isn’t a completely new release, but rather adds additional features and refinements to the existing release . In this book, we focus on the new features and refinements in R2 . We assume you have at least a general knowledge of Windows Server, and that you have some familiarity with Windows Server 2008, although we don’t assume you’re actively running Windows Server 2008 . Where an R2 feature is a refinement of a feature that was new in Windows Server 2008, we provide background on the Windows Server 2008 feature to provide context .

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Speed Testing Windows 8 and OS X Mountain Lion
The two latest and greatest desktop operating systems are now ready to go head-to-head against each other in performance tests.

Windows 8 has reached its “release to manufacturing” (RTM) state, and Apple’s Mac OS X Mountain Lion has been out for a few months, so now’s the time to pit the two new operating systems’ performance against each other. Even though each OS is in its final state, there are still a few caveats: the tests were run on an Apple laptop, since it’s not feasible to install Mountain Lion on anything but Apple hardware. This means that Apple gets the advantage of tuning the OS precisely to the hardware configuration. Windows, by comparison, must run on a huge array of different hardware combinations from many vendors.

I tested by installing 64-bit Windows 8 RTM on a 13-inch MacBook Pro (a 2012 2.9GHz Core i7 with 8GB RAM) using Boot Camp. The setup process was pretty smooth, though I’d imagine that not all the Windows hardware drivers were perfectly tuned for the MacBook. Nevertheless, the system was snappy and responsive running Windows 8. And as you’ll see in the results below, the emerging OS can hold its head high on several measures of performance.

Mac OS X Mountain Lion Windows 8 RTM
Startup (seconds, lower is better) 26.9 19.6
Shutdown (seconds, lower is better) 5.5 11.9
CD Ripping in iTunes (min:sec – lower is better) 3:42 3:47
Geekbench 2.2 64-bit score (higher is better) 8706 10068
Geekbench 2.2 32-bit score (higher is better) 7918 7549
SunSpider in Firefox 15 (ms, lower is better) 167 158
SunSpider in Safari/IE10 156 105
Mozilla Kraken 1.1 in Firefox 15 (ms, lower is better) 2510 2301
Mozilla Kraken 1.1 in Safari/IE10 (ms, lower is better) 2427 4352
Psychedelic Browsing in Firefox (RPM, higher is better) 1062 5709
Psychedelic Browsing in Safari/IE10 (RPM, higher is better) 3645 7224
Large file folder copy (seconds, smaller is better) 23.2 26.6
*Green cells denote the winner.

Startup and Shutdown
One of the most important gauges of speed in a computer is how long it takes to start up and be ready. This is probably one of the main reasons the iPad is so successful—it’s just there and ready to go, no need to wait for a boot process, usually. Not quite as critical, but nevertheless important is the time it takes the computer to shut down. I tested start by timing from the click of the disk boot choice to a functional home screen, with no wait spinner spinning.

For shutdown, I started the timer at the moment of hitting the Shut Down choice, and stopped it when the laptop’s fans went silent. I went through iterations for each, throwing out the high and low results and averaging the remaining five. The surprise here is that Windows 8 starts up significantly faster on a MacBook than OS X Mountain Lion does, though the latter shuts down in half the time of Windows 8. But note that hitting the power button puts Windows 8 into sleep mode, which happens pretty much instantly.

iTunes Ripping Test
A popular app used in both OSes is Apple’s iTunes, and I used this to measure how long ripping a CD (Buena Vista Social Club, to be exact) took in each OS. This test didn’t show much difference between the two OSes, with Lion coming in a scant 5 seconds quicker. It took Windows 8 3:47 to rip the 60-minute disc to 256Kbps M4A tracks, while Lion took 3:42. This one is pretty much a wash, though OS X gets a tiny advantage.

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Synthetic Benchmark: Geekbench
Geekbench 2.3, from Primate Labs, is a cross-platform benchmark that runs a series of geeky tests like prime number, Mandelbrot, blowfish encryption, text compression, image sharpen and blur, and memory stream test. The subtests comprise both single- and multithreaded applications. The results are normalized so that a score of 1,000 is the score a Power Mac G5 1.6GHz, so a higher number is better.

I ran both the 32-bit and 64-bit tests in Geekbench three times and took the average for each OS. Though it’s mostly designed to test hardware, it can at least show us whether the OS is getting in the way of accessing the hardware quickly. The result for this benchmark surprised me, with Windows 8 in 64-bit mode taking the crown, delivering a score of 10068 compared with Mountain Lion’s 8706. In the 32-bit version of the test Mac OS S Mountain Lion was actually a bit faster, with a score of 7918 compared with 7549 for Windows 8.

Web Benchmarks
To test with a few popular Web browser benchmarks, I installed Mozilla Firefox on both operating systems so that the browser engine would be less likely to determine the results. But since a case could be made for using the OS’s native browser, I ran the benchmarks in Safari on OS X Mountain Lion and Internet Explorer 10 in Windows 8, too.

The SunSpider JavaScript benchmark is a heavily used measure of a browser’s JavaScript performance, put out by the WebKit organization, which, by the way, makes the rendering engine for Apple’s Safari. Results on this test was comparable with all setups, hovering in the high 150s—with one big exception: It was significantly faster on Internet Explorer under Windows 8, which consistently delivered results closer to 100 milliseconds.

Mozilla’s Kraken 1.1 is another JavaScript benchmark, which the open-source browser maker says represents a more realistic workload. Both OSes were close when running Firefox, with a slight advantage to Windows 8. But when running the native browsers, Windows 8′s IE10 fell far behind Mountain Lion’s Safari 6.

A final browser benchmark, Psychedelic Browsing, from Microsoft’s IE Testdrive site, is designed to test graphics hardware acceleration of Web content. Microsoft has done a ton of work on this acceleration technology, and it shows in the results, using both Firefox and the native browsers.

Mac OS X Mountain Lion Windows 8 RTM
Startup (seconds, lower is better) 26.9 19.6
Shutdown (seconds, lower is better) 5.5 11.9
CD Ripping in iTunes (min:sec – lower is better) 3:42 3:47
Geekbench 2.2 64-bit score (higher is better) 8706 10068
Geekbench 2.2 32-bit score (higher is better) 7918 7549
SunSpider in Firefox 15 (ms, lower is better) 167 158
SunSpider in Safari/IE10 156 105
Mozilla Kraken 1.1 in Firefox 15 (ms, lower is better) 2510 2301
Mozilla Kraken 1.1 in Safari/IE10 (ms, lower is better) 2427 4352
Psychedelic Browsing in Firefox (RPM, higher is better) 1062 5709
Psychedelic Browsing in Safari/IE10 (RPM, higher is better) 3645 7224
Large file folder copy (seconds, smaller is better) 23.2 26.6
*Green cells denote the winner.

File Copy Test
For this one, I took a folder containing 20 files weighing in at 636MB, and simply timed how long it took to copy it from a fast USB thumb drive (a 16GB Corsair Flash Voyager GT) to the MacBook running Windows 8 and then Mountain Lion. As when I compared Windows 7 with Windows 8, the operation took a few seconds longer in Windows 8. A Microsoft representative explained to me that this is because “in Windows 8, each file transfer is scanned to ensure there is no malicious code, which takes a little longer but is a better and safer experience for users.”

Windows 8 vs. Mountain Lion
This is hardly an exhaustive comparison of every kind of performance measurement you could want to compare operating systems. And indeed with (in most cases) different software running on each, it’s hard to make direct, apples-to-apples comparisons. But the results do show that, say what you like about features and interface, Windows 8 can hold its head high next to Apple’s newest desktop operating system when it comes to performance. In particular, I was impressed with how quickly Windows 8 started up on my test MacBook, and with its remarkably faster Geekbench (64-bit) and SunSpider (in IE10) performances. And anecdotally, Windows 8 feels snappy. Speed is one thing you won’t have to worry about with Microsoft’s next big operating system.
 

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Mountain Lion, as you’d expect, doesn’t feel like any kind of slouch running on a Core i7 MacBook, either. And you could argue that you’d expect the rich environment of OS X to require more processing than the primary-color simple interface of Windows 8. This is especially true for startup, which has to load more of the rich OS’s features. Mountain Lion’s shutdown time is half that of Windows 8 running on the same machine, and on an independent JavaScript benchmark, Mozilla Kraken, its Safari browser beats Windows 8′s IE10. Finally, Mountain Lion’s faster file-transfer time will be magnified for truly large amounts of data, too.

For more Mountain Lion and Windows 8 comparisons, read Windows 8 vs. OS X Mountain Lion: Feature by Feature, and for deep dives into the operating systems’ features, read our review of Mountain Lion and hands on with Windows 8.

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We all admire and use reopen last closed tabs on our favorite modern browsers. It comes really handy when we accidentally close a running browser tab or realize immediately after closing it that you missed something.

What if it was possible to ReOpen closed explorer windows, Applications. Thanks to UndoClose, its possible on Windows.

Windows 7 application windows has totally different way of operating, even though it maintains a list of recently opened programs and items in Start Menu, it doesn’t support bringing them up again using a hotkey.

UndoClose remembers all recently closed folders and applications, and lets you restore them in the same sequence in which they were closed using two hotkeys.

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Using two hotkeys you can do pretty much all. Use Ctrl+Shift+F to open last closed folder (in Windows Explorer) and Ctrl+Shift+A, to open last closed application. You can use them multiple times to cycle through the history. You can even change the hotkeys from Settings of the application that sits silently in system tray.

Application is light weight and eats nominal RAM. No installation required, its portable across all version of Windows7.

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