Tag: Microsoft

  • Windows Phone 7 ‘Mango’ Has Officially Been RTM’d

    Windows Phone “Mango” has officially been RTM’d. What’s RTM? It means that Microsoft has given the new build its stamp of approval and released it to the manufacturers. Once it’s in the hands of companies like Samsung, HTC, LG and others, the finished software will go through rigorous testing and configurations to make things run…

  • SharePoint: Resolving Access Denied errors for Site Owners

    Recently, I experienced a very strange problem while working on a client’s SharePoint 2007 install. SharePoint’s permission management isn’t always the easiest or most intuitive, but for the most part it works pretty well. And then there are the head-scratchers, which make absolutely no sense until the cause of the problem is discovered. The Problem…

  • How to Restore Aero Effects if the Windows Desktop Window Manager Crashes

    “Aero” is the graphical user interface that Microsoft introduced with Windows Vista and Windows 7. It includes many productivity features for managing your windowed desktop environment, but one of the most noticeable features is the glass-like transparency effect that is typically present on the borders of windows. At times, the Desktop Window Manager (DWM) service…

  • Windows Phone 7: A Guided Tour

    Windows Phone 7 is the most refreshing take on a smartphone OS to date. I find iOS to be awkwardly simple, with little innovation or interest generated by the operating system itself. Instead, Apple relies on its App Store and solid hardware to keep the customer’s attention. Android has its established fan base that appreciate…

  • Dealing with Workflow Failed On Start (retrying) errors in Microsoft SharePoint

    I don’t know why I expect SharePoint to work without problems. In almost every project I’ve done, some unforeseeable problem pops up that seems to make little sense. Maybe, after beating my head against the wall so many times, I’ve developed SharePoint amnesia, but I always expect the project to be a pleasant experience. I…

  • Review: Kinect for Xbox 360

    [ad name=”Xbox Kinect”] Remember when the PlayStation EyeToy came out? How about the Wii with its ground-breaking motion sensing controls? You can throw those gimmicks out the window, Microsoft’s Kinect for Xbox 360 is the new way to play! The Kinect gained huge popularity over the holiday season. Microsoft has finally done motion controls right…

  • Fix: Advanced Search Fields in Microsoft Outlook are Disabled or “Grayed Out”

    Group policy is a feature in the Microsoft Windows operating system that allows administrators to set rules and privileges for users on a network. One of its abilities is to disable indexing of files on your hard drive, which can be done for security or performance purposes. A common problem that can occur when indexing gets disabled…

  • Microsoft Unveils a Slimmer, Smarter Surface 2.0

    How’s that for alliteration? When Microsoft first unveiled their Surface technology in 2007, I was impressed with the possibilities that could be had when combining advanced displays with accurate, multi-touch optical recognition. Their original product combined a 30” display with a series of cameras to establish the position of inputs (like your hands), which produced…

  • SharePoint Solution Deployment Horror

    A couple of weeks ago, I had the worst professional SharePoint moment of my life, thanks to SharePoint 2007, Visual Studio 2008, and WSPBuilder. Deploying custom solutions to SharePoint is something I have done many times, but I’ve learned to expect nothing but the worst, especially when the task at hand seems like it should…

  • A Developer’s Guide to Troubleshooting Microsoft SharePoint Errors

    Anybody that has worked with Microsoft SharePoint as a developer knows that it can be an exercise in frustration for the strangest of reasons. One only has to see a handful of helpful error messages such as “An unexpected error has occurred” to understand exactly what I mean. Yes, one may look through the logs…