Attention Windows 7 + Live Sync users!

From the official Windows Live Sync blog, regarding the Windows Live Sync mandatory update:

If your computer was already running Windows 7 before this update, you’ll have to go to the Sync website to add your computer back to all the folders you’re syncing. We know this is a hassle and we apologize for this inconvenience. You’ll also see that your computer shows up on the Sync website with a new name—you can safely go ahead and delete the old computer from the website. Rest assured that your files and folders are safe.

Source: Windows Live Sync outage and client update - Windows Live

Updated: Download update for Windows Live Sync

As we notified you a few days ago, Microsoft has released an updated version of Windows Live Sync (14.0.8089.0726 for Windows). This is a mandatory update, meaning that users must install it if they want to connect to the service.

Update (2009/10/14): There is a known issue with Windows 7.

Please read this before installing the update.

 

Click here to download Windows Live Sync

Windows Live Sync mandatory update on Thursday

A mandatory update for Windows Live Sync, that fixes a serious compatibility problem with Windows Easy Transfer will be released on Thursday, October 22nd.

Windows Live Sync users will need to go to the Sync website to install an update in order to be able to sign in to Windows Live Sync. Users will not be able to use Sync until they install the update.

Source: Windows Live Sync Official Blog

New icons for Office 2010 Beta 2?

Wzor.net has published screenshots of a private Office 2010 build (Office 2010 Beta 2 build?).

Looking through the screenshots, it is not hard to notice that there seem to be new icons for Office 2010:

 

Source: Wzor.net

Video: See What's New in Microsoft SharePoint Workspace 2010 (Formerly Microsoft Office Groove)

Watch this video, providing insight into SharePoint Workspace 2010 (new version of Office Groove):

See What's New in Microsoft SharePoint Workspace 2010 (Formerly Microsoft Office Groove)

SharePoint Workspace 2010 provides important new key features:

· SharePoint Workspace:  A new workspace type that allows you to setup a synchronization relationship with all of the supported lists and libraries from a SharePoint site.  The workspace contains site content available for you to read and edit while you are offline, and will automatically synchronize with SharePoint when you’re back online.  New lists and libraries will automatically appear in the workspace when they are created (or customized) from SharePoint.  You can take all of your favorite SharePoint sites with library/list content with you when you’re on the go.

· SharePoint Document Library Support: SharePoint Workspaces support the common SharePoint document library variants, and provide enhanced capabilities directly within the client, like: check-in and check-out, multiple content types including folders, drag and drop for document creation and organization including from Outlook or Windows Explorer, version history, and metadata/property support.  Within these libraries, Microsoft Office documents gain all sorts of new capabilities including co-authoring, automatic merging, differential sync, and more.

· SharePoint List Support: SharePoint Workspaces can contain most standard SharePoint list types, including Discussion, Announcements, Links, and custom lists.  Form previewing and editing is provided through Microsoft InfoPath 2010 technology.

· Virtual Lists through Business Connectivity Services (BCS):  Pull down and work with your content from LOB applications or other external sources.

· Views:  Both public and private views of lists and libraries are supported.

· Read & Unread, and Alert Customization: You will be notified when content changes or there are new additions to a SharePoint site that you are synchronizing through unread icons and our notification UI.  These notifications can be customized to adapt to your information needs, on a per-workspace or list/library basis.

· Content Selection: Select individual libraries or lists for synchronization.  Easy one-click setup directly from the default SharePoint browser UI.  Recommended sites are shown during workspace creation, including those published by your SharePoint administrator.

· Broad Connectivity:  Our synchronization with SharePoint supports numerous connectivity options, including Windows domain authentication, Forms-Based authentication, SSL configurations, and Alternative Access Mappings - for internal, extranet, and Internet scenarios.

· Ribbon:  Office 2007 pioneered this new way of working within your application, and we’ve adopted it as well.  It has been designed to optimize our key scenarios while ensuring consistency across cross-product scenarios.

· Office Backstage: This new feature of Office 2010 provides a new view to increase the discoverability and usability for the contextual work that happens beyond the workspace.

· Cutting-Edge Collaborative Authoring:  SharePoint Workspaces support seamless collaborative authoring sessions for Word and PowerPoint documents that are hosted in SharePoint document libraries.

· Instantly Find Documents, Lists, Attachments, and More:  Your local documents and lists are easier to find and organize than ever before.  Workspaces are automatically indexed and available through the familiar Windows Search user interface.

· Access Workspace Documents Directly from Office Applications: Offline documents can be opened or saved from Office applications through integration with the Windows Explorer.  Navigate local folders like they were part of your Windows drive.

· New Contact Card with Integrated Presence:  Office Communicator streamlines communication by allowing you to utilize its capabilities within the SharePoint Workspace application.  Communicator presence is displayed directly in the Groove workspace member pane.

· Standard Office Features:  We included numerous other features that are consistent with Office 2010 applications like:  a 64-bit native client; support for IPv6 networking; Single Sign-On authentication; new language support including full IME, mirroring, and complex scripts; native integration with standard management tools like Active Directory; continuous help publishing through Office Online; and much more.

Source: MSDN Blogs

Exchange 2010 added to WSUS

Microsoft has added a new category to WSUS (Windows Server Update Services) for the recently RTM’ed Exchange 2010.

PowerPoint Web App’s New Reading-Optimized View

The Problem

The problem is simple and every user of PowerPoint has faced it at least once:

Read a PowerPoint presentation in Normal View or watch it as a Slide Show?

If you read it in the Normal view, you will see the notes but it will be missing animation and rich media.

If you choose the Slide Show, you’ll see animation and transitions, but miss the slide notes. In addition, complex slide animations are often unintelligible unless viewed in the full screen Slide Show.

The Solution

In order to solve this, PowerPoint Web App’s default view preserves animations and allows the viewing of slide notes. So the PowerPoint Web App’s default view is a new reading-optimized view, with the following components:

• Quick access to the Edit and Slide Show views

• A resizable window – with Silverlight installed the presentation will automatically resize to fit the window dimensions

• Slide transitions, object and text animation, live in the browser. Animation timings honor their original settings, and animations set to advance on click work just as you’d expect

• Additional controls to allow faster “browsing” and locating slides within the deck

• A notes pane

 

Read more at the PowerPoint Team Blog.

Preview the New Look of MSDN

Get an early look at the new experience coming to MSDN by checking out the Visual Basic Developer Center preview. This is the new design for all MSDN sites. The Library and Forums tabs are not integrated with this preview site. As this is a preview, there are still doing some final fine-tuning of the design.

 

See more at the New Visual Basic Developer Center.

WSUS: New Product Family Name for Visual Studio

According to the WSUS blog “Very soon, the "Visual Studio" product family will be renamed to "Developer Tools, Runtimes, and Redistributables".

Microsoft plans to distribute various developer-related products through Windows Server Update Services, including Report Viewer 2005 and Report Viewer 2008.

Any updates for Visual Studio 2005, and Visual Studio 2008 will be available under this new category.

Source: TechNet Blogs

Download Windows 7 90-Day Evaluation VHD

Microsoft has released an evaluation edition of Windows 7 that anyone can use free for 90 days. According to the publisher:

This download helps you evaluate the new features of Windows 7, Windows 7 has better ways to find and manage files—like Jump Lists and improved taskbar previews—to help you speed through everyday tasks. It's designed for faster and more reliable performance, so your PC just works the way you want it to. With 64-bit support, you can take full advantage of the latest powerful PCs. And great features like HomeGroup, Windows Media Center, and Windows Touch make new things possible. For more information about Windows 7, please go to http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/.

This download is available to customers running genuine Microsoft Windows.

Source: Microsoft Downloads Center

Forefront Threat Management Gateway 2010 RC Now Available

Microsoft has released the Release Candidate (RC) version of Forefront Threat Management Gateway 2010. This is the final public release prior to our RTM (release to manufacturing) and even though no new major features were introduced in the Release Candidate, there are several important improvements about security, reliability, performance, telemetry integration and overall solution completeness.

You can install Forefront TMG 2010 RC today and upgrade to a licensed version once available without changing the configuration of your deployment.  

The download of Forefront Threat Management Gateway 2010 RC is available from here.

My personal favorite feature of Forefront TMG is the ability to combine two ADSL lines (“ISP Redundancy”, as it’s officially called).

Source: Forefront TMG (ISA Server) Product Team Blog

Windows XP Mode RTM available on TechNet, MSDN

Microsoft has released the RTM versions of Windows XP Mode and Windows Virtual PC. They are currently available on TechNet and MSDN, with public downloads available soon.

Windows XP Mode

Windows XP Mode for Windows 7 makes it easy to install and run many of your Windows XP productivity applications directly from a Windows 7-based PC. It utilizes virtualization technology such as Windows Virtual PC to provide a Virtual Windows XP environment for Windows 7.
Windows XP Mode provides a 32-bit Windows XP Professional Service Pack 3 (SP3) environment pre-loaded on a virtual hard disk.

Note:

• You can use Windows Virtual PC to run Windows XP Mode on your computer

Windows Virtual PC

Windows Virtual PC is the latest Microsoft virtualization technology that allows you to run many productivity applications on a virtual Windows environment, with a single click, directly from a Windows 7-based PC.

Note:

• Install Windows XP Mode to create a virtual Windows XP SP3 environment.
• Windows Virtual PC requires Windows 7 RTM.
• Before installing the RTM version ensure that you have uninstalled the older version of both Windows Virtual PC and Windows XP Mode and restarted the system.
• Windows Virtual PC requires processor capable of hardware virtualization, with AMD-V™ or Intel® VT turned on in the BIOS.

For more information about Windows Virtual PC, please visit the Windows Virtual PC website.

Windows Virtual PC supports the following 32 bit Guest Operating systems : Windows XP Service Pack 3 (SP3) Professional, Windows Vista Enterprise Service Pack 1 (SP1), Windows Vista Ultimate Service Pack 1 (SP1), Windows 7 Professional, Windows 7 Ultimate, Windows 7 Enterprise.

Exchange 2010 RTM’ed, General Availability in early November

Microsoft has just announced that Exchange Server 2010 has been released to manufacturing. According to the Microsoft Exchange Team Blog:

We are happy to announce that Exchange 2010 is Code Complete!  Our senior leadership team has signed off on the final code, and it has been sent to our early adopters for one final look before its public release. This Release to Manufacturing (RTM) milestone means we are on our way to general availability and the launch at Tech·Ed Europe 2009 in early November

Source: Microsoft Exchange Team Blog

Download Forefront Protection 2010 for SharePoint Beta 2

Microsoft has just released Beta 2 of “Forefront Protection 2010 for SharePoint”:

Microsoft Forefront Protection 2010 for SharePoint helps prevents users from uploading or downloading documents containing malware, out-of-policy content, or sensitive information to SharePoint libraries. Using multiple anti-malware scanning engines from industry-leading security partners combined with file and keyword filtering, Forefront Protection 2010 for SharePoint provides comprehensive protection against the latest threats. The product integrates with SharePoint technologies to provide high performance, easily customized protection optimized for SharePoint collaboration environments

The download, which is 115.9 MB in size, can be found here.

Source: Microsoft Download Center

Download Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant 6.5

If you are using Windows 7, then Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant 6.5 is a must-have for enabling Windows 7 applications to deliver great features like sharing documents, pictures, music, and video.

Through the online provider, the Sign-in Assistant helps a Windows 7 application running on one computer identify and communicate with other computers that are associated with the same Windows Live ID. Just by linking your Windows Live ID to the user account on each Windows 7 computer you own, you enable those computers to identify each other and work together more easily than has been possible in the past.

Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant 6.5 can be downloaded in 32-bit and 64-bit flavors.

Download details: Sign-in Assistant