First Boot Camp from CBEUG

Hello Everyone !
 I am happy that i was a part of the MSP Boot Camp held at Coimbatore. I would like to say a few of my delightful experience as a MSP among the group. I was really excited to be a party of it. Well Here goes my post.

It was morning 9.30 and got a call from Indhuja stating that she was near the venue and she asked me to be there to the venue soon. Well I was still in the bathtub taking a peaceful bath and said her that i will be there in 2 min. After a 20 min of time gap, I was flinging with my bike near central theater and found a fine number of MSPs standing and waiting for all to gather around the venue.....

The Agenda for the day was
Introduction

9 30 AM - 10 00 AM
Ice Breaking Session 10 00 AM - 11 00 PM
MSP Program 11 00 PM - 12 00 PM
Lunch 12 00 PM - 1 30 PM (The saddest part, the seniors left us off the PizzaHut)
CBEUG Structure 1 30 PM - 2 30 PM
Exclusive Session for New
MSPs on how to achieve targets 2 30 PM - 3 30 PM
Feedback and Interaction 3 30 PM - 4 00 PM

There came our Lead Mr.Abhishek with a huge smile in his face and introduced himself to the crowd. After some chat, we were redirected into the ZOOM Consultancy where the BootCamp was to be organized. The first thing I was to  learn  there was the way of interaction one should have in the Official & Unoffical Environment.  We had an ICE-BREAKING Session, where the criteria was to interact with each other. Everyone should come onto the diece and say 10 points about them-self of which 5 should be wrong and 5 should be the right one. It was a gud fun there even though  time consuming.

Mr.Abhishek & Mr.Armugham said us a few lot more points the MSP Program, they were really adorable that they spoke in such a friendly manner. While the presentations were on the go, we had an un-expected Shutdown of power. Errrrrrrr. I wished it continued.He gave us some of their experience as a MSP and left us for the LUNCH !
Now i am here for Lunch @ home and gotta be there by 1.30 ! 
Be Right Back ! 
I went there in for the After-lunch session, and the damn current was to be schedule at 14.00 Hrs and it came only by 15.00 Hrs. It was frustrating, to sit there. But we managed ourselves to get back on the session. He was talking all about the hierarchy of the MSPs & ADEs and such stuffs... He told more about MANY MSPs from various parts of India. 

They showed us a bunch of Pics of their MSP life which really inspired us a lot. After all those kinda stuffs There was a light among the swindle, the eye garbing Windows 7 Launch Party... It was really fun giving pose for it. The ever funniest part of all he gave us all some exciting goodies, never the less it was the Windows 7 printed Tissue Paper. I will never forget those... Then he gave Indhuja a Windows 7 Bag for being the only and only female stuff down the Camp and gave me a Windows 7 Bag for being the top scorer among the new MSPs.... 
Then we had a sharing of resources session followed by a waving & everyone left with a huge smile in their faces... 

Thanks a lot to all these senior, who were instrumental in conducting this CBEUG-BootCamp. That was really fun & lovable....... I loved it the professional way.         
Let me tell you all something even more... To know the difference between senior MSPs and new MSPs just have a look at the professionalism at Abhishek`s Blog & my blog. I will tell myself to be a good MSP only when i start blogging like him., Hats off to him

Windows 7 Launch Party Features Drool-Worthy Technology

Hello friends,
The Windows 7 has been launched and its a great victory and a cloud 9 for the Microsoft. Yes, Steve Ballmer's keynote was enthusiastic and optimistic. Yes, the little girl featured in the Windows 7 commercials, who was brought on stage, was adorable.
But the real show-shopper was the technology Microsoft  rolled out to present Windows 7 features.
The party really got started when the software giant showed off how device-savvy Windows 7 is, with a demo connecting a Nikon D5000 DLSR to Windows 7. Device Stage -- Windows 7's visual interface that is used to recognize devices and peripherals -- automatically recognized the well-acclaimed camera, which lists for about $625, by placing an actual image of the camera on the Task Bar. It was the ultimate in Plug and Play. The demo showed how easy it was to import pictures once the camera was connected.
Next, was an impressive demo of the new capabilities of Windows Media Center integrated with the multi-touch features of Windows 7. Using a PC all-in-one TV tuner, or a USB tuner (which is available for less than $100), Microsoft demonstrated how a user could touch their way through an interactive TV guide to access TV listings. Media center also supports High Definition streaming.
A little more about the touch-screen eye candy: The demo displayed the impressive collaboration among Windows 7 developers and hardware vendors. The demonstration included Toshiba's capacitive glass with optical sensors and Acer's resistance touch technology with G sensors.
The audience also got a look at the new Home Networking feature. Printers, multimedia files and documents can be effortlessly shared within a home network. An added plus -- laptops that users may regularly connect to a work domain or network can intelligently shift between connecting to work and a Home Group network.
The highlight of the demo was streaming multimedia files to 16 screens from a single laptop -- a Dell  Studio XPS 16. Microsoft even showed the CPU utilization while streaming -- it held pretty steady at 54 percent.
DirectX 11's 3-D capabilities also got a platform. Using Nvidia's 3-D technology, a breathtaking 3-D image was projected on a large screen. Microsoft is working with both Nvidia and ATI to deliver some fancy 3-D graphics for gamers -- audience members had the chance to don a pair of 3-D glasses and ogle an impressive game featuring a 3-D Batman.
Loaded up with Windows 7 for the audience to admire was the super-ultra-thin Dell Adamo XPS -- a 9.9-mm laptop that is still not available as of yet, but the preview certainly whets the geek appetite for what promises to be an impressive ultra portable.
There were no glitches, blue screens or any other technology embarrassments during the demos. Microsoft and its partner vendors were really on top of the game with the technology featured today.

---

SathyaNarayanan,
Microsoft Student Partner,
Sri Krishna Arts & Science College,
Coimbatore,
TamilNadu, IND-641 001.
E-Mail: sathyathemobileking@student-partners.com
IM: sathyathemobileking@gmail.com
Ph:+(91)-9442290294

Poland Imagine Cup 2010

Registration for Poland Imagine Cup 2010 is OPEN ! 
 
Thanks for attending registering yourself for participating in the Poland Imagine Cup 2010. Below is the registration link which has to be filled mandatory. Please note that ONLY after filling this registration for you will be entitled to participate in the competition.  Once you register you will get a verification and conformation mail. Participate and bring Laurence for your school and our country INDIA. For more details mail me back for any query.

here is the Link
                                       Have a Healthy Competition
                                                                                       Yours potential,
                                                                                   Microsoft Student Partner. 
Related Useful Links:
For F.A.Qs Click here.
For Competition Overview Click here.

--
With Regards.,
SathyaNarayanan
Microsoft Student Partner.,
Department of Computer Application.,
Sri krishna Arts & Science College.,
Coimbatore.,TamilNadu., IND.
Mail : sathyathemobileking@student-partners,com
Ph: 9442290294

CBEUG - BootCamp

Hi folks,

First of all congrats to all the new MSPs for joining our family. After request from many of you, we have finally decided to conduct CBEUG Boot-camp in Coimbatore on 24^th Oct 2009(Saturday).

·         We plan to start the event by 9 30 AM and finish it by 4 30 PM

·         This event will give you the opportunity to learn more about the MSP program & critical activities, interact with Senior and other new   MSPs & share best practices. And, of course, you will have loads of fun in the process.

Dont Forget to bring your laptop and pen drives to collect the resources.

Please reply us back assuring your availability on the above mentioned date ASAP.

Agenda

1. Introduction                                 9 30 AM - 11 00 AM
   
2. Ice Breaking Session                   11 00 AM - 12 00 PM
   
3. MSP Program                             12 00 PM - 1 00 PM
   
4. Lunch                                          1 00 PM - 1 30 PM
   
5. CBEUG Structure                        1 30 PM - 2 30 PM
   
6. Exclusive Session for New MSP  2 30 PM - 3 30 PM
   

     on how to achieve targets
    7. Feedback and Interaction             3 30 PM - 4 00 PM

·         The Venue is              
                        ZOOM CONSULTANCY
                   Venkateshwara Towers
                   659, Mettupalayam Road.
                   Near Central Theatre. 
                    Coimbatore - 641002.
                   

·         Contacts:
                        Abhishek Suresh - 99941 46127  
                        Arumugham - 99948 50728
                        SathyaNarayanan - 9442290294
                        

      NOTE:

      (For the New MSPs)

This event is conducted exclusively based on your request.We expect your presence.This event will really help you to meet the Targets.

Coimbatore User Group Supported By Microsoft and Ineta

Firefox Locks Out Microsoft's App Dev Tech

Developers who use Firefox found themselves without some Microsoft add-ons after Mozilla blocked them due to security concerns. Browser access to one of the tools, .Net Framework Assistant, has been restored. The companies are working together to come up with a way to safely reopen access to Windows Presentation Foundation.

Microsoft technology used to program applications that can be accessed through a browser continued to be blocked for Firefox users Monday.

Mozilla had been blocking two Microsoft plug-ins after the discovery that Microsoft's .Net 3.5 SP1 install silently adds a plug-in to Firefox allowing the surreptitious launch of a malicious XAML browser application that could take over infected machines.
One add-on, the Windows Presentation Foundation, aids programmers in developing applications using Microsoft technologies, including Silverlight, that can be accessed via a browser. It remains blocked, but Mozilla Vice President of Engineering Mike Shaver wrote in a blog posting on Sunday that the Firefox team is working to find an alternative.

Restoration Timing Uncertain

Mozilla initially blocked Microsoft's .Net Framework Assistant as well, but reversed that policy after speaking with Microsoft engineers over the weekend and learning that it does not provide access to the same vulnerability.
The current blockade is redundant for users who have already applied Microsoft's patch for the vulnerability, which rolled out Oct. 12 as part of what Microsoft described as its largest vulnerability patch of 2009.
Although Microsoft has patched against the vulnerability, it's unclear when the Windows Presentation Foundation access will be restored.
Mozilla's press office did not return an email message seeking comment by deadline for this article.

Microsoft's Misbehavior

Most home users likely didn't notice anything more than an odd security warning when they fired up their browsers, but some may have encountered malfunctioning Web apps. Also, some enterprise users and designers may have faced trouble accessing custom applications and design capabilities through Firefox with the technologies blocked, said Wolfgang Kandek, CTO of Qualys, a vulnerability management company.
This is the second time this year Microsoft has been called out for silently installing plug-ins into Firefox. The first time was when the company included the Framework Assistant add-on in a service pack for the .Net application framework without alerting users.
"That normally is not considered to be good behavior," Kandek told the press.
Microsoft didn't respond to requests for comment by deadline.

Cooperation Between Competitors

While it appears that Mozilla initially overreacted in blocking the .Net Framework assistant, which is necessary for many third-party applications to run, it restored access to the plug-in quickly.
Mozilla and Microsoft appear to be working well together to address the issue for the benefit of users, Kandek said.
"I thought it was a great example of cooperation between two companies that are competing a lot," he said.

­Cloud­ Comp­uting­ Tech­nolog­y

Description
So now most of you people are quite pissed up in technology. So you might be thorough with some concepts of Software Engineering. Different types of process models and everything. Lets get down to some serious technology of tomorrow pushing today's technology somewhat back. 

Cloud computing joins in ranks of terms including grid computing, utility computing, virtualization, clustering, etc. In last year, Cloud computing term got famous and started ahead of grid computing, ultility computing and distributed computing. Huge companies like MIcrosoft, IBM and Google put a their hands on this technology. Most of the companies still making researches in field of cloud computing.

Further a cloud computing can be stated as a combination of:

1.      SaaS – Software As A Service

2.      PaaS – Platfom As A Service

3.      IaaS – Infrasturture As A Service

Believeing that you has some knowledge about these concepts. If you want to read about this concepts I am mentioning links to these things below in the references section. This will clear your concepts at basic level.

Cloud computing is a technology which provides Software as well as a service to that software. It also provides a particular platform as a service. While you can user the infrastructure as a service from a cloud computing technology provider.

Clod computing can be of two types public or private. Public cloud computing is available publically on Internet. Amazon Web Services is the largest public cloud computing provider. While private cloud conputing provides services to limited number of people. It may be proprietary networks or a data center.

Software as service is a  front-end interaction with service provider to use its hardware infrastructure. These services can be anything from web-mail to data processing

Platform as a service is a cloud a set of software as well as services which is defined on the server of a service provider.   Applications can be created by developers on the service providers platform over an internet.

In Infrastructure as a service a provider provides with a virtual server instances with unique IP address and an blocks of storage on demand, while customers can use its API (Application Programming Interface) to start, stop or manage these storage.

Some of the key characteristics of cloud computing are :

1.       Cost are reduced upto great extent.

2.       User can enjoy device and location independence

3.       Technology could be quite reliable for business purposes

4.       Improves scalability

5.       Technology can be secured to used due to increased security focused resources and centralisation of data

Still lots of research is going on in cloud computing. For further references you can go through links I stated below:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_computing

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_as_a_Service

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platform_as_a_service

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrastructure_as_a_service

http://www.microsoft.com/azure/default.mspx

http://www.microsoft.com/virtualization/en/us/cloud-computing.aspx

http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/labs/ccf/default.aspx

http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/news/features/ccf-022409.aspx

http://mesh.com

Microsoft`s own free Anti-Virus Released (Full Version)

Microsoft Security Essentials 

Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE) (previously codenamed Morro) is an antivirus software created by Microsoft that provides protection against viruses, spyware, rootkits, and trojans for Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7, free of charge. MSE replaces Windows Live OneCare, a commercial subscription-based antivirus service and Windows Defender, which only protects users from adware and spyware. It is geared for home use, unlike Microsoft's upcoming enterprise-oriented product Microsoft Forefront.

Symantec and McAfee, two competing antivirus vendors, responded by claiming that MSE is not comparable with their own offerings. AVG Technologies viewed MSE positively, stating it reinforced the company's ideal of free antivirus software. Reviews were mostly positive, citing its organized interface, low resource usage, and the fact that it is free.

Download this free software @ http://www.microsoft.com/Security_Essentials/

OOPS ! I forgot about the release, It was released this September 29th, 2009. (19 days old baby)

The Trick part of this software is that its not OpenSource and its ClosedSource... Puzzzled ??? I will explain about Closed Source in my next post. As of Now... Bubye... ;)

Microsoft Products free of Cost for Students ????

Can anyone believe that Microsoft Products are available free of cost for the Students in India ? Sit back and ready this post leisurely to believe the fact. This time Microsoft opens the "Gates" to become "BillGates"..


Getting mircrosoft's genuine software free of cost?
Yes friends its possible only through Microsoft's Dreamspark Program. Microsoft extended their helping hand to the enthusiastic and interested students by providing them the copies of their Development( VS2008, Win Server, Robotic developer etc..) and Designing ( Expression Studio) software absolutely FREE of cost. Not only software's u can also get some resources and tutorials ("IT academy Pass") to improve your knowledge and learn technologies.
Do u feel exited as i felt .
So to get your free softwares pls visit www.dreamspark.com
If u are in INDIA pls visit www.dreamsparkindia.com
for other details
The only criteria is that u have to be a "STUDENT"
So kindly utilize this opportunity and get your dream achieved
Thank u Microsoft.
thank gokoulane for his post 

Session on Windows LIve & Live@Edu

Hi flocks,
  Good to see you all back after a three day gap. Today was a fascinating day for me. I had to attend a online conference of the MSPs in India and has to hurry up will all by job schedule. Today was the last class to be attend in this semester which reminded me that i have my semester exams to be studied... Let it be my part...

 For these two days I conducted two sessions one was on Windows Live & Live@Edu and other was on Windows 7 vs Windows Vista.

Session Details:-
Windows Live& Live@Edu(13-10-2009):-
This is my first session as a MSP. I had conducted more than 100 sessions like this and this was something news which made me feel the pride as a Microsoft Student Partner. The session was planned actually in the morning session and eventually conducted in the afternoon session. The session was attended by the Final Year students from the Department of Computer Applications and Software Systems., Sri Krishna Arts and Science College. The session lasted for some 2 hrs in an interactive way. I loved the way everyone asked me questions in a technical way.

           
             I as an MSP proved them how the usage of the Windows Live & Live@Edu in our college would be profitable and effective... They accepted their defeat that this feature would be helpful after a long debate which nearly took Half an Hour... But i was taken away by the point that "No Online Activity can replace the effectiveness of a teacher teaching in the class". The session concluded in a peaceful way.

Some how the day will never end without a problem...... I Lost the Remote of My Laptop.... After a 20 min hunt..  I found it in a senior`s pocket.. All he said was,"oh! I thought it was chocolate".


Windows Vista -vs- Windows 7(14-10-2009)

No one can accept that Windows Vista is a Operating System until it was branded under Microsoft. This was what i was to talk all the 2 Hrs about. This session was attended by the 2nd Year student of B.C.A Department., Sri Krishna Arts and Science College.

               The  hardest thing i was to handle was my class students.. They made a damn hell of noise till i stated my session.. So, I had to put some movie songs for them... Could not help, thank god.. they kept quite like a baby eating the food. I some told all the blunders which Microsoft made in Vista & its corrections in the simultaneous slides.....
                   It was a comparative session. The session was about to end and I was to know that there was a clash between the students..... Reason:-"One guy was unable to listen to my speech bcz another was talking", so he disturbed all together. 
                     The sessions ended had i had to answer a billion dollar question, "When will you leave us ?". I just swung the mic off and told. Here is the conclusion and summarized the sessions`s activity.

Live@Edu ~Deployment Procedure

Hello Friends, 

 Good to have you all back. I found many of them puzzled about Live@Edu Program by Microsoft. So here I give a clear picture of what it is and what are the procedures of deploying it in your campus. 

 

Live@Edu Criteria:

• Colleges should be offering graduate degree and/or post graduate degree courses e.g. B.Sc, BCA, BBA, B.Tech, B.E, M.Sc., MCA, MBA, M.Tech, M.E. etc.

• Currently Live@Edu is not applicable to high-schools having only 10+2 classes (I too don't know the reasons. )

• There should be more than 550 students in the college/department.
  

Live@Edu Deployment Prerequisites:

• You should be able to at least understand the terms like IP Address, Domain, URL, Control Panel, DNS Record, E-Mail Server, MX Records, Web Space etc.

• The college should have its own website. We require only the domain name (later during configuration), no web-space is required.

• If the college has no web site, or if the management is hesitating to provide you the access to the control panel or even worse, if the college already has an email solution for its students, you can still approach and try to convince the college management to buy a new domain name for the deployment of Live@Edu which would mere cost less than Rs. 500/-. This new domain should be approved by your college authority for its genuineness through  a valid letter (which you need to submit as proof).

• You should have access to the website control panel or at least to the college server/network administrator who has access to the website control panel.

Live@Edu Configuration Prerequisites:
After you are done with all these and ready to start, follow the steps below:
1. Log on to Windows Live Admin Centre
2. Sign-In with your Student Partners ID.
3. After you have logged in, click on the Add Domain button
4. Enter the domain name in the textbox provided e.g. mycollege.ac.in and choose Set up Windows Live Hotmail for my domain
5.  Then accept the agreement and proceed to the configuration settings page.
6.  You shall see something like this, this is just an example, your information may vary:

You need to prove ownership of this domain by creating an MX record or a CNAME record. Use the settings below.

Mail setup (required)

To set up mail and prove ownership of this domain, you must create an MX record through your domain registrar. Use the following settings:

• DNS record type: MX
• Host: mycollege.ac.in
• MX server: 609640938.pamx1.hotmail.com
• TTL: 3600 or 1 hour
• Priority: 10 (or High priority)

 7. Then, log on to to your college domain control panel, and create a new MX record according to the details. If you don't know what all these mean, dont panic, just relax, take a print out of this info and ask your server/network administrator to do this for you.
8. After you have completed Step 7, wait for 12-16 hours (or maybe 1 day), for the DNS server to reflect the recent changes.
9.  Then again logon to Windows Live Admin Centre and if everything is alright, you shall see some thing like this:

Your domains

Click on the name of the domain you want to manage. Click the Add domain button to sign up another domain.

Domain name	Accounts	Membership	Status
mycollege.ac.in	0	open	Active

 10. Voila, now everything is perfectly fine. Now check if the membership column of your domain is Open or Closed. We have to make it closed. So to do that, click on your domain mycollege.ac.in. On the left hand side vertical menu, click on Open Membership then click on Settings. And finally click on the button saying Turn open membership off
11. Then lets move on to Co-Branding of Live@Edu and your College. Click in the link saying Co-Branding then click on the link saying Sign-in Page. And then upload a logo of your college with the following specifications:

File type: JPG
Max. height (pixels): 225
Max. width (pixels): 130

There are other co-branding options available, take your own time to play with them and know what they have to offer.
12. Finally its the time to add accounts to the domain.  For this you can take up attendance sheets of all your college

Ning with a Bing !

Hello Friends.,
       After being selected as a Microsoft Student Partner many things have changed from my routine life. I feel more confident & entertaining as an MSP. But the  work schedule makes me go mad. Let it be my part. Here i am going to post about Ning ! .... its a site which provides you a facility to create your own social networking site like Orkut.,FaceBook.,Hi5 etc...  Its really a gud one.

         Ning is an online platform for people to create their own social networks. Ning is Andreessen's third company (after Netscape and Opsware). Ning competes with large social sites like MySpace and Facebook by appealing to people who want to create their own social networks around specific interests with their own visual design, choice of features and member data.
                      The unique feature of Ning is that anyone can create their own social network for a particular topic or need, catering to specific membership bases. At its launch, Ning offered several simple base websites developed internally and by members of a closed beta. In late September 2006, Ning narrowed its focus to offering a group website, a photos website, and a videos website for people to copy and use for any purpose. These three templates were later superseded by a single customizable application aimed at enabling anyone to easily create their own social network.

                            However, Ning does allow developers to have some source level control of their social networks, enabling them to change features and underlying logic.

Microsoft Live@Edu

Since the time I've become an MSP(Microsoft Student Partner) there's a lot of fuss about what Live@Edu is and how is it better and more feasible then Google Apps. So here's the content straight from a horse's mouth.....

Regarding Live@Edu and convincing features of Live@Edu over GMail/Google Apps:
1] Live@Edu is a collaboration platform which also helps students and teachers interact dynamically, share notes, spectate presentations/lectures etc.
For this purpose Windows Live Meeting 2007 can be used. The students need to have only Windows Live Meeting 2007 client (which is free) and teachers for broadcasting the presentations will need Windows Communications Server 2007 (which actually costs a bomb if you have steep pockets).

2] Secondly, the unique selling point of Live@Edu is students are given mail addresses @ their own college domain. For Example, if a Harvard's student's name is "abc" then he can get abc@harvard.com. Now that's fantastic!!!
Imagine lacs of bucks saved by the college management in case they plan to give every student a mail ID w.r.t. their college domain.

3] Data warehouse geeks like me should look out for this feature coz it's the most sought after!!
5 GB of storage space for every ID registered over Windows SKY Drive with mailing facilities over HOTMAIL.
Now I can say I don't have to worry about as to where I can save my movies and other stuff coz I have a big repository.

3] Besides if college have labs which don't have Internet connectivity then too all is not lost. Students can still communicate with their local contacts over Windows Live Messenger. Just add the contacts as LAN contacts in the messenger, though I'm yet to try it personally.

4] Besides there's SMS to all facility which unfortunately doesn't work in India currently. I hope they (Microsoft Live team) address the problem at the earliest since I'm sure all are waiting for it eagerly.

5] If you look closely at the second feature which I've mentioned above, students can actually benefit from it once they finish their college because it'll help them build life-long relationship with their college and friends.

6] And the best of them the deployment of Live@Edu is free for MSP's like us whereas in other case it would have cost us atleast 50,000/- INR.

7] For more features and videos on Live@Edu goto:

http://get.liveatedu.com