Matthew Lim

Congratulations to Koh Zi Han, you have won the Xbox Kinect bundle. We will also contact the rest of you who have won the GV movie tickets through email shortly. Last but not least, we would like to take this opportunity to Thank You all for participating in the Windows Azure X’mas giveaways and your support in the past year. Here’s wishing you a prosperous year ahead! (= How to win the Xbox Kinect bundle? Step 1: Go to http://www.microsoft.com/windowsazure/offers/ Step 2: Scroll down to ‘Standard Offers’ Step 3: Click on ‘Introductory Special’ and sign up. Step 4: Send us your purchase confirmation email, full name, address, contact details to v-kilaum@microsoft.com Terms & Conditions: ...

You’re invited to a very special event on December 2nd, 2010 Learn about the future of Silverlight from Corporate Vice President, Scott Guthrie and other experts, direct from Microsoft’s HQ. Hear about our plans for the next version of Silverlight, the latest developments as well as in-depth sessions on building applications with Silverlight. Registration is free – take part in-person or online. Find out more and Register online

The Future of SQL Server I believe that there are many of you are busy migrating. Moving and upgrading from previous version to SQL Server 2008, and some of you already using SQL Server 2008 R2. There are tons of R2 features we can count on, especially on BI part. We already have countless meeting in the past talking about those BI enhancements, its benefit, and how does it improve and impact our development. Now it’s time for reflection. What we have done in the past. What we have achieved, and what are our expectation for the future. Are there any features you want to include in the next release? Do you have any idea on how to make this platform better in the future? Come and join us with 2 executives from SQL Server product team in our next meeting. This is the right time to hear about strategic direction of SQL Server directly from people who made the product. You may have some concerns, wish list and feedback. Nobody knows better other than us on how SQL Server performs in daily production. Our feedback will be very valuable for the product team to make necessary improvements. Bring your boss too; he/she may have strategic idea that will be valuable for our meeting. We will discuss the following topics: ...

The Post PDC10 Viewing Party, 8th November at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, co-hosted by Hammad Rajjoub from was a smashing success as we had a good time watching PDC10 keynotes from Steve Ballmer and Bob Muglia and talking about some of the technologies mentioned in PDC10. There was awesome freebies, insightful content and engaging conversations going around the room. It all ended with a scrumptious dinner that everyone enjoyed immensely and of course the grand lucky draw prize of an Xbox 360 + Guitar Hero package was given out to Veerasivanantham Paramasivam of Bank Of America Merrill Lynch. Here are some snapshots of the event: During the event, Ziriad’s (Microsoft Singapore DPE Director) keynote covered some of the key technologies such as Cloud, IE9, Silverlight, Windows Phone 7 etc. which was followed by two break-out sessions. You can check out Ziriad’s slides here: [slideshare id=5774621&doc=pdc2010update-101114035258-phpapp01] First break-out session is from Mingfei (Microsoft Developer Evangelist) on Windows Azure AppFabric. Slides below: [slideshare id=5774665&doc=boacloudcomputing-101114040211-phpapp02] Second break-out session is from Hammad (Microsoft MVP, Lead of ) on Windows Server AppFabric. Slides below: [slideshare id=5741540&doc=windowsserverappfabric-pdc2010-101111065307-phpapp01]

So here is how the story goes… we have a winner for our “Guess what she is smiling about” contest and here are the top 3 entries that we think are the most creative! In 3rd place… “I guess the lady is saying about having an application that knows whether the guy she adores likes her based on his heartbeat rate.” -Lin Liyi In 2nd place… “She wants an app that lets her share what her boyfriend sings to her.” -Anuj Bheda and the winner of our KINECT… “She needs an app that can detect the peak frequency of laser emissions coming out from someone so she can plan her counter attack accordingly..” -Jocelyn Villaraza Big ‘Thank You’ to all who have participated, Re-Tweeted, shared this contest and congratulations to Jocelyn for giving us such an entertaining and creative answer. Jocelyn’s app would really come in handy in the future, when all of us carry around our laser guns and light sabres ready for a showdown anytime, its like the wild wild west 2.0! By the way, did I mention that the 2 runner ups gets super awesome limited edition WP7 stickers? Yes… WP7 stickers, you will get, hmmm. ...

We are excited to announce our first ever Startup Weekend Singapore! Click here for full details. What is Startup Weekend? [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8AG8SNyuTU[/youtube] Marc Nager, Director of Startup Weekend Global Operations will be coming out for the weekend to help facilitate the weekend and share his experience after being to dozens of successful Startup Weekends around the world. A big thank you to Dennis Phua and Jeffrey Paine who have really been leading the efforts and all the wonderful sponsors and supporters SGEntrepreneurs and IDA Where? Microsoft SG, 1 Marina Boulevard, NTUC Building. When? 29 - 31 October 2010 Click here to register now!

We conducted our 1st Application LifeCycle Management (ALM) Solution Briefing on the new Visual Studio 2010 on 22nd Sep in Microsoft Auditorium. A total of 110 attendees across various disciplines such as architects, application programmer, developers, tester & project manager attended the talk. We invited 3 speakers to deliver the ALM message. The general poll from the evaluation feedback form indicated that we have delivered a well balance content which has helped to elevate the use of ALM as a tool to help improve productivity in the daily work of a developer. As the opening keynote, Mr Steven Sim who is the Microsoft Regional Developer Tools Sales Lead shared on “VS2010 Your ALM Solution”. Steven shared the definition of a well-managed Application LifeCycle and how VS2010 can be leverage to address some of the common challenges encountered during development cycle. Did you know that - “Based on time, budget, and delivering specified functionality 68% of projects never made it into production or were canceled”. Check out Steven’s slide to find out more on Microsoft ALM Solution. ...

Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 is an interoperable family of products that help make it easier to create, test and deliver custom software solutions. A rich set of integrated tools and server infrastructure coupled with flexible and agile process’s that represent a breakthrough for development tools, help you manage and optimize your entire software development process. Learn how you can be more productive in developing application using Visual Studio 2010 with effective communication and collaboration, achieve holistic Application Lifecycle Management using Team Foundation Server 2010. Discover the various features of Visual Studio 2010, such as architecting tools, advanced debugging techniques, and testing tools in this workshop. Register NOW to avoid disappointment. Please click here to register. Who Should Attend TDM, IT Manager, Project Manager, Application Manager, Architect,Development Team Leader, Developer, Programmer Date 11 - 13 October 2010 (Monday – Wednesday) Time 9:00am – 5:00pm Venue Avantus Training Pte Ltd 79 Robinson Road #15-04 CPF Building Singapore 068897 Program Overview ...

September Meet Up Agenda Date: 29th Sept 2010 Time: 7:00 PM - 10:00PM Venue: Microsoft Singapore (Conference Room SINOMB 22CF-12) 7:00 PM to 7:15PM - Registration 7:20 PM to 8:30PM – Third Party Archive Integration in Exchange 2010 by Shaji Firoz 8:30 PM to 8:45PM - Toilet/Stretching Break 8:45PM to 10PM – Synergy in Microsoft Productivity Solutions by David Lim Abstract for Third Party Archive Integration in Exchange 2010: With release of SP1 in Exchange 2010, archiving is in-built now. However, this session will be focusing on third party archiving solution, namely, SourceOne from EMC.We will be going through high level framework of SourceOne architecture, its integration with Exchange 2010, general features and lastly, how to manage it. Session will emphasis mostly on used case basis, where users moved from Notes mail system to Exchange Server, manage their huge NSF file in SourceOne Archiving Server. Also, the session will discuss about features such as Journaling, Shortcuting and PST ingestion. So join us in this month’s meet up and get to know more about this beta release. Abstract for Synergy in Microsoft Productivity Solutions: Demo how the IW (informationWorker) can leverage Microsoft Unified Communication on daily work. In this session, will demo how OCS 2007 a simple phone call can become a conference call or a video conference on the fly. Voice-mail and faxes move over the network like email and will arrive in the Microsoft Office Outlook inbox where users can sort, prioritize, and forward them, just like any piece of email. Users on the road can dial in over any telephone to hear their emails and appointments. About Shaji Firoz: Shaji Firoz is a Senior Consultant working for IT Outsourcing company in Singapore. Shaji works mostly on Microsoft Technologies - with keen on messaging environment. He leads the development & implementation efforts in Exchange & Active Directory environments. He authors MS Exchange based technical articles in this site and spends time on blogging about Hosted Exchange in msexchange.org blog section. In recognition of his knowledge of Windows & Exchange Servers and his willingness to share the information and help to community, Microsoft recognized him with MVP in Exchange Server. About David Lim: David Lim works as a Solution Manager that focuses on Microsoft Infrastructure Solution and Microsoft Unified Communication in Local System Integration Company; a Microsoft Gold Partner and Microsoft Voice Specialized Partner. His expertise in Microsoft Unified Communication, based on Microsoft Exchange and Communication Server Solutions. I also experienced in Microsoft Virtualization Technology and System Center. Registration For registration, please email to tristonwan@gmail.com with the following: ...

 Application Life-Cycle Management (ALM) Solution Briefing Innovative applications can catapult your business forward providing you with a competitive advantage. Microsoft’s Visual Studio Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) solution allows you to realize the strategic value of your custom software investments. Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 is an interoperable family of products that help make it easier to create, test and deliver custom software solutions. A rich set of integrated tools and server infrastructure coupled with flexible and agile processes that represent a breakthrough for development tools, help you manage and optimize your entire software development process. This event gives you a valuable opportunity to learn more about how Microsoft’s Visual Studio Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) solution can help you reduce cost, reduce development time, increase quality, and improve project visibility and manageability. To Register : Email Sandy at MSmarketing@swap.com.sg with the following info: Name, Job Title, Phone, Mobile, Email Address, Company Name, Company Address For more information please call us up at +65 6227 7445. Who Should Attend: TDM, IT Manager, Project Manager, Application Manager, Architect, Development Team Leader, Developer, Programmer Date: 22nd September 2010 (Wednesday) Time: 1:00pm – 5:15pm (Registration starts at 1.00pm) Venue: Level 21 Auditorium, NTUC Centre, One Marina Boulevard, Microsoft Singapore Program Overview: ...